Running a hand down the line, he dropped back upon the mast.

The stranger regarded him with a curious stare, and at last found his voice.
"You seem powerfully set on saving me." His teeth chattered as he spoke, and his face was pinched and hollow-eyed from cold and exposure.

But he was handsome, for all that-- a fellow not much older than Zeb, lean and strongly made.

His voice had a cultivated ring.
"Yes," answered Zeb, as, with one hand on the line that now connected the wreck with the shore, he sat down astride the mast facing him; "I reckon I'll do't." "Unlucky, isn't it ?" "What ?" "To save a man from drowning." "Maybe.

Untie these corks from my chest, and let me slip 'em round yourn.