In its present
condition it was absolutely useless.
While the captain had been thinking and considering the matter, Cheditafa
had been wandering about the coast exploring. Presently Captain Horn saw
him running toward him, accompanied by the two other negroes.
"'Nother boat over there," cried Cheditafa, as the captain approached
him,--"'nother boat, but badder than this. No good. Cook with it,
that's all."
The captain followed Cheditafa across the little stream, and a hundred
yards or so along the shore, and over out of reach of the tide, piled
against a low sand mound, he saw a quantity of wood, all broken into
small pieces, and apparently prepared, as Cheditafa had suggested, for
cooking-fires. It was also easy to see that these pieces of wood had
once been part of a boat, perhaps of a wreck thrown up on shore. The
captain approached the pile of wood and picked up some of the pieces. As
he held in his hand a bit of gunwale, not much more than a foot in
length, his eyes began to glisten and his breath came quickly. Hastily
pulling out several pieces from the mass of debris, he examined them
thoroughly. Then he stepped back, and let the piece of rudder he was
holding drop to the sand.
"Cheditafa," said he, speaking huskily, "this is one of the Castor's
boats. This is a piece of the boat in which Rynders and the men set out."
The negro looked at the captain and seemed frightened by the expression
on his face.
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