The Mountains

cean's wide expanse a hulk wallowed sluggishly, the forgotten relict of a once brave and sightly ship, possibly the Sphinx of some untold ocean tragedy, she lay black

e and sky no other thing was visible. For this was one of the desert parts of the Pacific, three hundred miles north of the steamship route fr

icers lined the starboard rail. Their

r lieutenants. "These floaters that lie with deck alm

d Billy Edwards, the ensign, a wistful expression on his bi

's money," observed Carter, the officer of the deck. "It t

Ives. "He's no economist when it come

whirling arms a hundred feet abranch, shivered, and dissolved into a widespread cataract. The water below was lashed into fury, in the midst of which a mighty death agony beat back the troubled waves of the trade wind. Only then did the muffled

ed where the unintended victims of the explosion, the gay-hued open-sea fish of the warm waters, had succumbed to the

charge of the destruction, returned

rnett. She was a to

she?" as

ree-masted schooner. A

nd brief-spoken veteran, who had at his finger's tips al

tion bureau of the Sev

he Aleutians. Some of the crew froze. Others got ashore. Part of survivors

ards. "Great Cats! What a drift! How

derelict has wandered in h

Huronian, which, ten years later, on the same day and date, and hailing from the same port as the Naronic, went out into the void, leaving no trace; of Newfoundland captains who sailed, roaring with drink, under the arches of cathedral bergs, only to be prisoned, buried, and embalmed in the one icy embrace; of craft assailed by the terrible one-stroke lightning clouds of the Indian Ocean, found days after, stone blind, with their crews madly hauling at useless sheets, while the officers clawed the compass and shrieked; of burnin

was the Lau

to hit on her?" as

of the world, wasn't she?" After a moment's hesitation he added: "From something I heard as

uire, the paymaster, a New Englander, who

Laughing Lass mystery and the dis

riments to identify telepathy with the Marconi

of physics and chemistry, besides most of the natural sciences," said Barnett. "The gover

ost with the

d a ragamuffin crew. A newspaper man named Slade, who dropped out of the world about the same time, is supposed to have gone along, too. Thei

lph Slade?"

free-lance writ

campaign, on the North Dakota. War correspondent then. It's strange t

ject of the voya

o be after buried tre

scientific expedition," said Edwards. "I knew the old boy, and he wasn

shing to all the world just what her business is, all the wo

d be much more in the Schermerhorn line of traffic. Not unlikely th

wift twilight into the darkness which had been hastened by a high-spreading canopy of storm-clouds. Abruptl

voice to it. It was plainl

g. Presently Ives and Edwards, who were the keenest-sighted, made out a faint

eck,

d Carter, the off

re I can't make any

's it

queer gen

Forsythe, among the group aft. "T

e it better than t

'Tain't any regular and proper l

cers discussed it interes

ve a city, seen from a distance,"

lighted city is some eight hund

ybe," sugge

o cover that distance" said Iv

Look at that!"

strom of varied radiance, pale with distance, but marvellously beautiful. Forsythe

orts the compass behav

at ship had swung, and they were speeding direct for the p

id Billy Edwards. "Did anyone ever see a sho

e veteran. "New to