the sight of it the blood lust in his breast had been

supplanted by another.

At sight of the emblem of peace Virginia ceased firing.

She saw the tall Malay issue a few commands, the

oarsmen bent to their work, the prahu came about,

making off toward the harbor's entrance. At the same

moment there was a shot from the shore followed by loud

yelling, and the girl turned to see her father and von

Horn pulling rapidly toward the Ithaca.

2

THE HEAVY CHEST

Virginia and Sing were compelled to narrate the

adventure of the afternoon a dozen times. The Chinaman

was at a loss to understand what had deterred the

pirates at the very threshold of victory. Von Horn

thought that they had seen the reinforcements embarking

from the shore, but Sing explained that that was

impossible since the Ithaca had been directly between

them and the point at which the returning crew had

entered the boats.

Virginia was positive that her fusillade had frightened

them into a hasty retreat, but again Sing discouraged

any such idea when he pointed to the fact that another

instant would have carried the prahu close to the Ithaca's

side and out of the machine gun's radius of action.

The old Chinaman was positive that the pirates had some

ulterior motive for simulating defeat, and his long

years of experience upon pirate infested waters gave

weight to his opinion. The weak spot in his argument

was his inability to suggest a reasonable motive. And

so it was that for a long time they were left to futile

conjecture as to the action that had saved them from a

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