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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Cappy Ricks Retires, by Peter B. Kyne
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Cappy Ricks Retires
+       But that doesn't keep him from coming back stronger than ever
+
+Author: Peter B. Kyne
+
+
+Release Date: July, 2004 [EBook #6020]
+This file was first posted on October 19, 2002
+Last Updated: March 12, 2018
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CAPPY RICKS RETIRES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Charles Franks and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CAPPY RICKS RETIRES
+
+_But that doesn't keep him from coming back stronger than ever_
+
+By Peter B. Kyne
+
+
+[Illustration: But, in time, Cappy would find her a rich husband]
+
+
+
+THE ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+But, in time, Cappy would find her a rich husband
+
+_(Excerpt from the log of Capt. Matt Peasley:)_ “I am alone on the
+ship--all the rest are now dead--”
+
+He always shouted when telephoning
+
+“Two million dollars!” cried J. Augustus Redell
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CAPPY RICKS RETIRES
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+If you have read previous tales of the Blue Star Navigation Company and
+the various brisk individuals connected therewith, you will recall one
+Michael J. Murphy, who first came to the attention of Cappy Ricks at the
+time he, the said Murphy, was chief kicker of the barkentine _Retriever_
+under Captain Matt Peasley. Subsequently, when Matt Peasley presented
+in his person indubitable evidence of the wisdom of the old saw that
+you cannot keep a good man down, Michael J. became skipper of the
+_Retriever_. This berth he continued to occupy with pleasure and profit
+to all concerned, until a small financial tidal wave, which began with
+Matt Peasley's purchase, at a ridiculously low figure, of the Oriental
+Steamship Company's huge freighter, _Narcissus_, swept the cunning
+Matthew into the presidency of the Blue Star Navigation Company;
+whereupon Matt designed to take Murphy out of the _Retriever_ and have
+him try his hand in steam as master of the _Narcissus_.
+
+The same financial tidal wave had swept Cappy Ricks out of the
+presidency of the Blue Star Navigation Company--presumably far up the
+beach to a place in the sun, where he was to bask for the remainder
+of his old age as president emeritus of all his companies. However, if
+there was one thing about Cappy you could depend upon absolutely it
+was the consistency of his inconsistency. For, having announced his
+retirement, his very next move was to bewail his inability to retire.
+He insisted upon clinging to the business like a barnacle to a ship,
+and was always very much in evidence whenever any deal of the slightest
+importance was about to be consummated. Indeed, he was never so
+thoroughly in command as when, his first burst of enthusiasm anent the
+acquisition of the _Narcissus_ at fifty per cent. of her value having
+passed, he discovered that his son-in-law planned to order Mike
+Murphy off the quarter-deck of the _Retriever_ onto the bridge of the
+_Narcissus_, while an unknown answering to the name of Terence Reardon
+had been selected for her chief engineer.
+
+Cappy listened to Matt Peasley's announcement; then with a propitiatory
+“Ahem! Hum! Harump-h-h-h!” he hitched himself forward in his chair and
+gazed at Matt over the rims of his spectacles.
+
+“Tell me, Matt,” he demanded presently, “who is this man Reardon? I do
+not recall such an engineer in our employ--and I thought I knew them
+all.”
+
+“He is not in our employ, sir. He has been chief engineer of the
+_Arab_ for the past eight years, and prior to that he was chief of the
+_Narcissus_. It was Reardon who told me what ailed her. She's a hog on
+coal, and the Oriental steamship people used to nag him about the fuel
+bills. Their port engineer didn't agree with Reardon as to what was
+wrong with her, so he left. He assures me that if her condensers are
+retubed she'll burn from seven to ten tons of coal less per day.”
+
+“Hum! So you're going to give him the job for telling you something our
+own port engineer would have told us after an examination.”
+
+“No, sir, I'm going to give him the job because he has earned it. He
+gave me some very valuable information about the wretched condition of
+her electric-light plant and a crack, cunningly concealed, in the after
+web of her crank shaft--”
+
+“Oh, by thunder,” piped Cappy, “that's worth knowing! Ship a new crank
+shaft, Matt, and save the Blue Star a salvage bill sooner or later.”
+
+“All that inside information will not only save us money in the future,”
+ Matt continued, “but it enabled me to drive a closer bargain
+when dealing with MacCandless, of the Oriental Steamship Company.
+Consequently Terence Reardon gets the job. He's only making a hundred
+and fifty dollars a month in the _Arab_, and as he is a rattling
+good man--I've looked him up, sir--I've promised him a hundred and
+seventy-five a month in the _Narcissus_.”
+
+“Oh, you've already promised him the job, eh? Mistake, Matt, serious
+mistake. You say you looked him up, but I'll bet you a new hat there is
+one thing about him that you failed to investigate, and that is: What
+kind of Irish is he?”
+
+“Why, regular Irish, of course--mighty good Irish, I should say. Keen,
+observing, not too talkative, a hard worker, temperate in his habits and
+a crackajack engineer to boot.”
+
+Cappy settled back wearily in his chair and favored his youthful partner
+with a glance of tolerant amusement.
+
+“Matt,” he announced, “those are the qualifications we look for in an
+engineer, and it's been my experience that the Irish and the Scotch
+make the best marine engineers in the world. But when you've been in the
+shipping game as long as I have, young man, you'll know better than
+to pick two Irishmen as departmental chiefs in the same ship! I did
+it--once. There was a red-headed scoundrel named Dennis O'Leary who went
+from A.B. to master in the _Florence Ricks_. That fellow was a bulldog.
+He made up his mind he was going to be master of the _Florence_ and
+I couldn't stop him. Good man--damned good! And there was a black
+Irishman, John Rooney, in the _Amelia Ricks_. Had ambitions just like
+O'Leary. He went from oiler to first assistant in the _Amelia_.
+Fine man--damned fine! So fine, in fact, that when the chief of the
+_Florence_ died I shifted Rooney to her immediately. And what was the
+result? Why, riot, of course. Matt, the Irish will fight anybody and
+anything, but they'll fight quicker, with less excuse and greater
+delight, among themselves, than any other nationality! The _Florence
+Ricks_ carried a million feet of lumber, but she wasn't big enough for
+Rooney and O'Leary, so I fired them both, not being desirous of playing
+favorites. Naturally, each blamed the other for the loss of his job, and
+without a word having been spoken they went out on the dock and fought
+the bloodiest draw I have ever seen on the San Francisco waterfront.
+After they had been patched up at the Harbor Hospital, both came and
+cussed me and told me I was an ingrate, so I hired them both back again,
+put them in different ships, slipped each of them a good, cheerful
+Russian Finn, and saved funeral expenses. That's what I got, Matt, for
+not asking those two what kind of Irish they were. Now, then, sonny,
+once more. What kind of Irish is Terence Rearden?”
+
+“Why, I don't know, I tell you. He's just Irish.”
+
+Cappy lifted his eyes to the ceiling as if praying for the great gift of
+patience.
+
+“Listen to the boy,” he demanded of an imaginary bystander. “He doesn't
+know! Well, stick your head down over his engine-room grating some day,
+sing The Boyne Wather--and find out! Now, then, do you happen to know
+what kind of Irish Mike Murphy is? You ought to. You were shipmates with
+him in the _Retriever_ long enough.”
+
+“Oh, Mike's from Galway. He goes to mass on Sunday when he can.”
+
+“Hum! If he's from Galway, where did he leave his brogue? He runs to the
+broad _a_ like an Englishman.”
+
+“That's easily explained. Mike left his brogue in Galway. He came to
+this country when he was six years old and was raised in Boston. That's
+where he picked up his broad _a_.”
+
+“That doesn't help a bit, Matt. He's Irish just the same, and what a
+Yankee like you don't know about the Irish would fill a book. You
+know, Matt, there are a few rare white men that can handle Chinamen
+successfully; now and then you'll run across one that can handle
+niggers; but I have never yet met anybody who could figure the mental
+angles of the Irish except an Irishman. There's something in an Irishman
+that drives him into the bandwagon. He's got to be the boss, and if he
+can't be the boss he'll sit round and criticize. But if I want a man to
+handle Chinamen, or niggers, or Japs, or Bulgarians I'll advertise for
+an Irishman and take the first one that shows up. A young man like you,
+Matt, shouldn't monkey with these people. They're a wonderful race and
+very much misunderstood, and if you don't start 'em right on the job
+you'll always be in trouble. Now, Matt, I've always done the hiring and
+firing for the Blue Star Navigation Company, and as a result I've
+had blamed little of it to do, considering the size of our fleet;
+consequently I'll just give these two Harps the Double-O. Have Murphy
+and Reardon at the office at nine o'clock to-morrow morning and I'll
+read them the riot act before turning them to.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+Cappy Ricks was at his office at eight-fifty the following morning.
+At eight-fifty-two Mr. Terence Reardon, plainly uncomfortable in a
+ready-made blue-serge Sunday suit purchased on the Embarcadero for
+twenty-five dollars, came into the office. He was wearing a celluloid
+collar, and a quite noticeable rattle as he shook hands with Cappy
+Ricks betrayed the fact that he also was wearing celluloid cuffs; for,
+notwithstanding the fact that he bathed twice a day, Mr. Reardon's
+Hibernian hide contained much of perspiration, coal dust, metal grit and
+lubricating oil, and such substances can always be washed off celluloid
+collars and cuffs. To his credit be it known that Terence Reardon knew
+his haberdashery was not _au fait_, for his wife never failed to remind
+him of it; but unfortunately he was the possessor of a pair of grimy
+hands that nothing on earth could ever make clean, and even when he
+washed them in benzine they always left black thumb prints on a linen
+collar during the process of adjustment. He had long since surrendered
+to his fate.
+
+At eight-fifty-four Mike Murphy arrived. Murphy was edging up into the
+forties, but still he was young enough at heart to take a keen interest
+in his personal appearance, and a tailor who belonged to Michael's
+council of the Knights of Columbus had decked him out in a suit of
+English tweeds of the latest cut and in most excellent taste.
+
+“Good morning, captain,” Cappy Ricks greeted him. “Ahead of time as
+usual. Meet Mr. Terence Reardon, late chief of the _Arab_. He is to be a
+shipmate of yours--chief of the _Narcissus_, you know.
+
+“Mr. Reardon, shake hands with Captain Mike Murphy. Captain Murphy has
+been in our employ a number of years as master of sail. The _Narcissus_
+will be his first command in steam.”
+
+“Terence Reardon, eh?” echoed Mike Murphy pleasantly. “That sounds like
+a good name. Glad to meet you, chief. What part of the old country are
+you from? The West?”
+
+The wish was father to the thought, since Mike was from the West
+himself.
+
+“I'm from the Nort'--from Belfast,” Mr. Reardon replied in a deep Kerry
+brogue, and extended a grimy paw upon the finger of which Mike Murphy
+observed a gold ring that proclaimed Mr. Terence Reardon--an Irishman,
+presumably a Catholic--one who had risen to the third degree in
+Freemasonry.
+
+Cappy Ricks saw that ring also, and started visibly. A Knight Templar
+himself, Terence Reardon was the last person on earth in whom he
+expected to find a brother Mason. He glanced at Mike Murphy and saw that
+the skipper was looking, not at Mr. Reardon, but at the Masonic emblem.
+
+“Sit down, chief,” Cappy hastened to interrupt. “Have a chair, captain.
+Mr. Reardon, my son-in-law, Captain Peasley here, tells me you were
+chief of the _Narcissus_ when she was on the China run for the Oriental
+Steamship Company.”
+
+Mr. Reardon sat down heavily, set his derby hat on the floor beside him
+and replied briefly: “I was.”
+
+Captain Murphy excused himself and drew Matt Peasley out of the room.
+“God knows,” he whispered hoarsely, “religion should never enter into
+the working of a ship, and I suppose I'll have to get along with that
+fellow; but did you mark the Masonic ring on the paw of the Far-Down?
+And on the right hand, too! The jackass don't know enough to wear it on
+his left hand.”
+
+“Why, what's wrong about being a Mason?” Matt protested. “Cappy's a
+Mason and so am I.”
+
+“Nothing wrong about it--with you and Cappy Ricks. That's your
+privilege. You're Protestants.”
+
+“Well, maybe the chief's a Protestant, too,” Matt suggested, but Mike
+Murphy silenced him with a sardonic smile.
+
+“With that name?” he queried, and laughed the brief, mirthless laugh of
+the man who knows. “And he says he's from Belfast! Man, I could cut that
+Kerry brogue with a belaying pin.”
+
+“Why, Mike,” Matt interrupted, “I never before suspected you were
+intolerant of a shipmate's private convictions. I must say this attitude
+of yours is disturbing.”
+
+“Why, I'm not a bigot,” Murphy protested virtuously. “Who told you
+that?”
+
+“Why, you're a Catholic, and you resent Reardon because he's a
+Protestant.”
+
+“Not a bit of it. You're a Protestant, and don't I love you like a
+brother?”
+
+Matt thought he saw the light. “Oh, I see,” he replied. “It's because
+Reardon is an Irish Protestant.”
+
+“Almost--but not quite. God knows I hate the Orangemen for what they did
+to me and mine, but at least they've been Protestant since the time of
+Henry VIII. But the lad inside there has no business to be a Protestant.
+The Lord intended him for a Catholic--and he knows it. He's a renegade.
+I don't blame you for being a Protestant, Matt. It's none of my
+business.”
+
+Matt Peasley had plumbed the mystery at last. He had been reading a
+good deal in the daily papers about Home Rule for Ireland, the Irish
+Nationalists, the Ulster Volunteers, the Unionists, and so on, and in
+a vague way he had always understood that religious differences were at
+the bottom of it all. He realized now that it was something deeper than
+that--a relic of injustice and oppression; a hostility that had come to
+Mike Murphy as a heritage from his forbears--something he had imbibed at
+his mother's breast and was, for purposes of battle, a more vital issue
+than the interminable argument about the only safe road to heaven.
+
+“I see,” Matt murmured. “Reardon, being Irish, has violated the national
+code of the Irish--”
+
+“You've said it, Matt. They're Tories at heart, every mother's son of
+them.”
+
+“What do you mean--Tories?”
+
+“That they're for England, of course.”
+
+“Well, I don't blame them. So am I. Aren't you, Mike?”
+
+“May God forgive you,” Mike Murphy answered piously. “I am not. I'm for
+their enemies. I'm for anything that's against England. Ireland is not a
+colony. She's a nation. Man, man, you don't understand. Only an Irishman
+can, and he gets it at his mother's or his grandmother's knee--the
+word-of-mouth history of his people, the history that isn't in the
+books! Do you think I can forget? Do you think I want to forget?”
+
+“No,” Matt Peasley replied quietly; “I think you'll have to forget--in
+so far as Terence Reardon is concerned. This is the land of the free and
+the home of the brave, and even when you're outside the three-mile limit
+I want you to remember, Mike, that the good ship _Narcissus_ is under
+the American flag. The _Narcissus_ needs all her space for cargo, Mike.
+There is no room aboard her for a feud. Don't ever poke your nose
+into Terence Reardon's engine-room except on his invitation or for the
+purpose of locating a leak. Treat him with courtesy and do not discuss
+politics or religion when you meet him at table, which will be about the
+only opportunity you two will have to discuss anything; and if Reardon
+wants to talk religion or politics you change your feeding time and
+avoid meeting him. I've taken you out of the old _Retriever,_ Mike,
+where you've been earning a hundred and twenty-five dollars a month, to
+put you in the _Narcissus_ at two hundred and fifty. That is conclusive
+evidence that I'm for you. But Terence Reardon is a crackajack chief
+engineer, and I want you to remember that the Blue Star Navigation
+Company needs him in its business quite as much as it needs Michael J.
+Murphy, and if you two get scrapping I'm not going to take the trouble
+to investigate and place the blame. I'll just call you both up on the
+carpet and make you draw straws to see who quits.”
+
+“Fair enough,” replied the honest Murphy. “If I can't be good I'll be as
+good as I can.”
+
+At that very instant Cappy Ricks was just discovering what kind of Irish
+Mr. Terence Reardon was.
+
+The most innocent remark brought him the information he sought.
+
+“Captain Murphy, whom you have just met, is to be master of the
+_Narcissus,_ chief,” he explained. “He's a splendid fellow personally
+and a most capable navigator, and like you he's Irish. I'm sure you'll
+get along famously together.”
+
+Cappy tried to smile away his apprehension, for a still small voice
+whispered to him and questioned the right of Terence Reardon to call him
+brother.
+
+Mr. Reardon's sole reply to this optimistic prophecy was a noncommittal
+grunt, accompanied by a slight outthrust and uplift of the chin, a
+pursing of the lips and the ghost of a sardonic little smile. Only
+an Irishman can get the right tempo to that grunt--and the tempo is
+everything. In the case of Terence Reardon it said distinctly: “I
+hope you're right, sir, but privately I have my doubts.” However, not
+satisfied with pantomime, Mr. Reardon went a trifle farther--for reasons
+best known to himself. He laved the corner of his mouth with the tip
+of a tobacco-stained tongue and said presently: “I can't say, Misther
+Ricks, that I quite like the cut av that fella's jib.”
+
+That was the Irish of it. A representative of any other race on earth
+would have employed the third person singular when referring to the
+absent Murphy; only an Irishman would have said “that fella,” and only
+a certain kind of Irishman could have managed to inject into such simple
+words such a note of scorn supernal. Cappy Ricks got the message--just
+like that.
+
+“Then stay off his bridge, Reardon,” he warned the chief. “Your job is
+in the engine-room, so even if you and Captain Murphy do not like each
+other, there will be no excuse for friction. The only communication you
+need have with him is through the engine-room telegraph.”
+
+“Then, sor,” Terence Reardon replied respectfully, “I'll take it kindly
+av you to tell him to keep out av me engine-room. I'll have no skipper
+buttin' in on me, tellin' me how to run me engines an' askin' me why
+in this an' that I don't go aisy on the coal. Faith, I've had thim do
+it--the wanst--an' the wanst only. Begorra, I'd have brained thim wit' a
+monkey wrench if they tried it a second time.”
+
+“On the other hand,” Cappy remarked, “I've had to fire more than one
+chief engineer who couldn't cure himself of a habit of coming up on the
+bridge when the vessel got to port--to tell the skipper how to berth
+his ship against a strong flood tide. I suppose that while we have
+steamships the skippers will always wonder how the vessel can possibly
+make steerage way, considering the chief engineers, while the chiefs
+will never cease marvelling that such fine ships should be entrusted to
+a lot of Johnny Know-Nothings. However, Reardon, I might as well tell
+you that the Blue Star Navigation Company plays no favorites. When the
+chief and the skipper begin to interfere with the dividends, they look
+overside some bright day and see Alden P. Ricks waiting for them on the
+cap of the wharf. And when the ship is alongside, the said Ricks comes
+aboard with five bones in his pocket, and the said skipper and the said
+chief are invited into the dining saloon to roll the said bones--one
+flop and high man out. Yes, sir. Out! Out of the ship and out of the
+Blue Star employ--for ever.”
+
+“I hear you, sor. I hearrd you the first time,” Terence Reardon replied
+complacently and reached for his pipe. “All I ask from you is a square
+deal. I'll have it from the captain wit'out the askin'.”
+
+Thus the Reardon breathing his defiance.
+
+“I'm glad we understand each other, chief. Just avoid arguments,
+political or religious, and treat the skipper with courtesy. Then you'll
+get along all right. Now with reference to your salary. The union scale
+is one hundred and fifty dollars a month--”
+
+“Beggin' yer pardon for the intherruption, sor, but the young man
+promised me a hundhred an' siventy-five.”
+
+“That was before the Blue Star Navigation Company took over the young
+man and his ship _Narcissus._ Hereafter you'll deal with the old man in
+such matters. I'm going to give you two hundred a month, Reardon, and
+you are to keep the _Narcissus_ out of the shop. Hear me, chief--out of
+the shop.”
+
+“No man can ordher me to do me djooty,” said Terence Reardon simply.
+“Tell the fine gintleman on the bridge to keep her out av the kelp, an'
+faith, she'll shtay out av the shop. Thank you kindly, sor. When do I go
+to wurrk?”
+
+“Your pay started this morning. The _Narcissus_ goes on Christy's ways
+in Oakland Harbor at the tip of the flood this afternoon. Get on the
+ship and stay on her. It's a day-and-night rush job to get her in
+commission, and you'll be paid time and a half while she's repairing.
+Good-day and good luck to you, chief. Come in and see me whenever you
+get to port.” And Cappy Ricks, most democratic of men, extended his hand
+to his newest employee. Terence Reardon took it in his huge paw that
+would never be clean any more, and held it for a moment, the while he
+looked fearlessly into Cappy's eyes.
+
+“'Tis a proud man I am to wurrk for you, sor,” he said simply. “Tip-top
+serrvice for tip-top pay, an' by the Great Gun av Athlone, you'll get it
+from me, sor. If ever the ship is lost 'twill be no fault of mine.”
+
+Mr. Reardon's manner, as he thus calmly exculpated himself from the
+penalty for future disaster, indicated quite clearly that Cappy Ricks,
+in such a contingency, might look to the man higher up--on the bridge,
+for instance.
+
+When Terence Reardon had departed Cappy Ricks called Mike Murphy into
+the room.
+
+“Now, captain,” he began, “there are a few things I want to tell you.
+This man Reardon is a fine, loyal fellow, but he's touchy--”
+
+“I know all about him,” Murphy interrupted with a slight emphasis on the
+pronoun. Unlike Mr. Reardon he employed the third person singular and
+did not say “that fella,” for he had been raised in the United States of
+America.
+
+“I have already given the captain his instructions,” Matt Peasley
+announced. “He understands the situation perfectly and will conduct
+himself accordingly.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+A small army of men swarmed over, under and through the huge _Narcissus_
+for the next three weeks, and the hearts of Cappy Ricks and Matt Peasley
+were like to burst with pride as they stood on the bridge with Captain
+Mike Murphy, while he ran the vessel over the measured course to test
+her speed, and swung her in the bay while adjusting her compass. She
+was as beautiful as money and paint could make her, and when Terence
+Reardon, in calm disregard of orders, came up on the bridge to announce
+his unbounded faith in the rejuvenated condensers and to predict a
+modest coal bill for the future, Mike Murphy so far forgot himself as
+to order the steward to bring up a bottle of something and begged
+Mr. Reardon to join him in three fingers of nepenthe to celebrate the
+occasion.
+
+“T'ank you, sor, but I never dhrink--on djooty,” Mr. Reardon retorted
+with chill politeness, “nor,” he added, “wit' me immejiate superiors.”
+
+A superficial analysis of this remark will convince the most sceptical
+that Mr. Reardon, with true Hibernian adroitness, had managed to convey
+an insult without seeming to convey it.
+
+“Isn't that a pity!” the skipper replied. “We'll excuse you to attend
+to your duty, Mr. Reardon;” and he bowed the chief toward the companion
+leading to the boat deck. The latter departed, furious, with an
+uncomfortable feeling of having been out-generaled; and once a good
+Irishman and true has undergone that humiliation it is a safe bet that
+the Dove of Peace has lost her tail feathers.
+
+“That's an unmannerly chief engineer,” Mike Murphy announced blandly,
+“but for all that he's not without his good points. He'll not waste
+money in his department.”
+
+“A virtue which I trust you will imitate in yours, captain,” Cappy Ricks
+snapped dryly. “Is Reardon working short-handed?”
+
+“Only while we're loading, when he'll need just enough men to keep steam
+up in the winches. When we go to sea, however, he'll have a full crew,
+but the fun of it is they'll be non-union men with the exception of
+the engineers and officers. The engineers will all belong to the Marine
+Engineers' Association and the mates to Harbor 15, Masters' and Pilots'
+Association.”
+
+“He'll do nothing of the sort,” Matt Peasley declared quietly. “We have
+union crews in all our other steamers, and the unions will declare a
+strike on us if we put non-union men in the _Narcissus_.”
+
+“Of course--if they find out. But they'll not. Besides, we're going to
+the Atlantic Coast, so why should we bring a high-priced crew into a
+low-priced market, Mr. Ricks? Leave it to me, sir. I'll load the ship
+with longshoremen entirely, and we'll sail with the crew of that German
+liner that came a few days ago to intern in Richardson's Bay until the
+European war is over.”
+
+“I'm not partial to the German cause,” Matt Peasley announced. “So I'll
+just veto that plan right now, Mike.”
+
+“Matt, we're neutral,” Cappy declared.
+
+“And it pays to ship those Germans, Matt,” Murphy continued. “I confess
+I'm for the Germans, although not to such an extent that I'd go round
+offering them jobs just because they _are_ Germans. But the minute I
+heard about that interned boat I said to myself: 'Now, here's a chance
+to save the _Narcissus_ some money. The crew of that liner will all be
+discharged now that she is interned. However, the local unions will not
+admit them to membership and they cannot work on any Pacific Coast
+boat unless they hold union cards. Consequently they must seek other
+occupations, and as the chances are these fellows do not speak English,
+they're up against it. Also, they are foreigners who have paid no head
+tax when coming into the country, because they are seamen. They have
+the right to land and stay ashore three months, if they state that it is
+their intention to ship out again within that period; but if they do not
+so ship, then the immigration authorities may deport them as paupers
+or for failure to pay the head tax; and in that event they will all be
+returned to the vessel that brought them here, and the owners of the
+vessel will be forced to intern them and care for them.' Under the
+circumstances, therefore, I concluded they would jump at a job in an
+American vessel, for the reason that under the American flag they would
+be reasonably safe; and even if the _Narcissus_ should be searched by
+a British cruiser, she would not dare take these Germans off her.
+Remember, we had a war with England once for boarding our ships and
+removing seamen!”
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet,” said Cappy Ricks, “there's something in
+that, Matt.”
+
+“There's a splendid saving in the pay roll, let me tell you,” the proud
+Murphy continued. “I took the matter up at once with the German skipper
+and he fixed it for me, and mighty glad he was to get his countrymen off
+his hands. We get all that liner's coal passers, oilers, firemen, six
+deckhands and four quartermasters at the scale of wages prevailing in
+Hamburg. I know what it is in marks, but I haven't figured it out in
+dollars and cents, although whatever it is it's a scandal! It almost
+cuts our pay roll in half.”
+
+“Do you speak German, captain?” Cappy queried excitedly.
+
+“I do not, sir--more's the pity. But the four quartermasters speak fair
+English, and I have engaged two good German-American mates who speak
+German. Reardon has shipped German-American engineers and some of his
+coal passers and firemen speak fair English. I've got two Native Son
+Chinamen in the galley and a Cockney steward. We'll get along.”
+
+“And a rattling fine idea, too,” Cappy Ricks declared warmly. “Mike, my
+boy, you're a wonder. That's the spirit. Always keep down the overhead,
+Matt. That's what eats up the dividends.”
+
+“Well, I wouldn't agree to it if the _Narcissus_ wasn't going to be
+engaged in neutral trade, or if she was carrying munitions of war to the
+Allies,” Matt declared. “I'd be afraid some of Mike's Germans might blow
+up the ship.”
+
+“Believe me,” quoth Michael J. Murphy, “if she was engaged in freighting
+munitions to England, it'd be a smart German that would get a chance to
+blow her up. I think I'd scuttle her myself first.”
+
+“Well, Mike, if your courage failed you,” Cappy Ricks replied
+laughingly, “I think we could safely leave the job to Terence Reardon.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+On that first voyage the _Narcissus_ carried general cargo to northern
+ports on the West Coast. Then she dropped down to a nitrate port and
+loaded nitrate for New York, and about the time she passed through the
+Panama Canal the Blue Star Navigation Company wired its New York agent
+to provide some neutral business for her next voyage. Freights were
+soaring by this time, due to the scarcity of the foreign bottoms which
+formerly had carried Uncle Sam's goods to market, and Cappy Ricks and
+Matt Peasley knew the rates would increase from day to day, and that
+in consequence their New York agents would experience not the slightest
+difficulty in placing her--hence they delayed as long as they could
+placing her on the market.
+
+On the other hand, the New York agents, realizing that higher freight
+rates meant a correspondingly higher commission for them on the charter,
+held off until the _Narcissus_ had almost finished discharging at
+Hoboken before they closed with a fine old New York importing and
+exporting house for a cargo of soft coal from Norfolk, Virginia, to
+Manila, or Batavia. The charterers were undecided which of these two
+cities would be the port of discharge, and stipulated that the vessel
+was to call at Pernambuco, Brazil, for orders. The New York agents
+marvelled at this for--to them--very obvious reasons; but inasmuch as
+the charterers had offered a whopping freight rate and declined to do
+business on any other basis, and since further the agent concluded it
+was no part of his office to question the motives of a house that never
+before had been subjected to suspicion, he concluded to protect himself
+by leaving the decision to the owners of the _Narcissus_. Accordingly he
+wired them as follows:
+
+“Blue Star Navigation Company,
+
+“258 California St., San Francisco, Cal.
+
+“Have offer _Narcissus_, coal Norfolk Batavia or Manila, charterers
+undecided, Pernambuco for orders, ten dollars per ton. Shall we close?
+Answer.
+
+“SEABORN”
+
+2 boards, 1” x 8” and up, and too great a percentage of 4” x 6”-20' No.
+1 clear. And there were mighty few clear twenty-foot logs coming into
+the boom these days.
+
+“Well, will a cat eat liver?” declared Cappy Ricks. “I should say we do
+accept. Why, man, she'll make forty thousand dollars on the voyage,
+and whether she goes to Batavia or Manila, we're certain to get a cargo
+back.”
+
+“All right, I'll wire acceptance,” Skinner replied, and paused long
+enough to make a notation on the message: “O.K.--Ricks.” Mr. Skinner
+meant nothing in particular by that. He was a model of efficiency, and
+that was his little way of placing the responsibility for the decision
+in the event that the wisdom of said decision should, at some future
+time, be questioned. Mr. Skinner never took unnecessary chances. He
+always played a safe game.
+
+It is necessary to state here also that Matt Peasley was not in the
+office when that telegram arrived from Seaborn & Company. If he had been
+this story would never have been written. He was down at Hunter's Point
+drydock, superintending the repairs to the steam schooner Amelia Ricks,
+which recently on a voyage to Seattle had essayed the overland route via
+Duxbury Reef. When Matt reached home that night he found his ingenious
+father-in-law fairly purring with contentment.
+
+“Well, Matt, old horse,” Cappy piped, “I've chartered the Narcissus.
+Norfolk to Batavia or Manila with coal. Got a glorious price--ten
+dollars a ton. That's what we get for holding off until the last
+minute.”
+
+“That's encouraging,” Matt answered pleasantly, and asked no further
+questions. He was obsessed with the engines of the _Amelia Ricks_. It
+was going to cost a lot of money to put them in condition again, and
+he remarked as much to Cappy. Thus it happened that they entered into
+a discussion of other matters, and the good ship _Narcissus_, having
+finished discharging her cargo of nitrate, dropped down to Norfolk,
+where Captain Michael J. Murphy proceeded to let a stream of coal into
+her at a rate that promised to load her fully in less than four days.
+
+It is worthy of remark, at this juncture, that Mike Murphy and
+Terence Reardon had, by this time, cast aside all appearance of
+even shirt-sleeve diplomacy. Diplomatic relations had, in fact, been
+completely severed. Crossing the Gulf Stream, Murphy had called the
+engine-room on the speaking-tube and politely queried if Mr. Reardon
+didn't think he could get a few more revolutions out of her. To this Mr.
+Reardon had replied passionately that if such a thing were possible he
+would have done it long ago without waiting to be told. He desired to
+inform Captain Murphy that he knew his business; whereupon Murphy
+had replied that he never would have guessed Mr. Reardon was that
+intelligent, judging by the face of him. In disgust Mr. Reardon had
+replied: “Aw, go to--” and then tried to close the speaking-tube before
+the captain would have the opportunity to retort. However, Michael J.
+knew his own mind, and, like all the Irish, was a marvel at repartee.
+Quick as was Terence Reardon, therefore, Michael J. Murphy was quicker.
+Perhaps all of his message had not been delivered before Reardon closed
+the tube, but the chief got enough of it for all practical purposes.
+
+He caught one word--“Renegade”; a word so terrible that it left the
+chief engineer speechless with fury, and before he could call the
+skipper a baboon, the golden opportunity was gone. He closed the tube
+with a sigh.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+While the _Narcissus_ was loading, the Fates were keeping in reserve for
+Cappy Ricks, Matt Peasley and Mr. Skinner a blow that was to stun them
+when it fell. About the time the _Narcissus_, fully loaded, was snoring
+out to sea past Old Point Comfort, Matt Peasley came across Seaborn &
+Company's telegram in the unanswered-correspondence tray on his desk.
+Five times he read it; and then, in the language of the poet, hell began
+to pop!
+
+Cappy Ricks came out of a gentle doze to find his big son-in-law waving
+the telegram under his nose.
+
+“Why didn't you tell me?” Matt Peasley bawled, for all the world as if
+Cappy was a very stupid mate and all the canvas had just been blown out
+of the bolt-ropes.
+
+“Why didn't you ask me, you big stiff?” shrilled Cappy. He didn't know
+what was coming, but instinct told him it was awful, so he resolved
+instantly to meet it with a brave front. “Don't you yell at me, young
+feller. Now then, what do you want to find out?”
+
+“Why didn't you tell me the _Narcissus_ was to drop in at Pernambuco for
+orders?” roared Matt wrathfully.
+
+Cappy pursed his lips and calmly rang for Mr. Skinner. He eyed the
+general manager over the rims of his spectacles for fully thirty
+seconds. Then:
+
+“Skinner, what the devil's wrong with you of late? It's getting so I
+can't trust you to do anything any more. Tut, tut! Not a peep out of
+you, sir. Now then, answer me: Why didn't you tell me, Skinner, that the
+_Narcissus_ was to call in at Pernambuco for orders?”
+
+“I read you the telegram, sir,” Mr. Skinner replied coldly, and pointed
+to the notation: “O.K.--Ricks,” the badge of his infernal efficiency. “I
+read that telegram to you, sir,” he repeated, “and asked you if I should
+close. You said to close. I closed. That's all I know about it. You and
+Matt are in charge of the shipping and I decline to be dragged into any
+disputes originating in your department. All I have to say is that if
+you two can't run the shipping end and run it right, just turn it over
+to me and I'll run it--right!”
+
+Completely vindicated, Mr. Skinner struck a distinctly defiant attitude
+and awaited the next move on the part of Cappy. The latter,
+thoroughly crushed--for he knew the devilish Skinner never made any
+mistakes--looked up at his son-in-law.
+
+“Well,” he demanded, “what's your grouch against Pernambuco?”
+
+“Forgive me for bawling you out that way,” Matt replied, “but I guess
+you'd bawl, too, if somebody who should have known better had placed a
+fine ship in jeopardy for you. It just breaks me all up to think you
+may have lost my steamer _Narcissus_--the first steamer I ever owned
+too--and to be lost on her second voyage under the Blue Star flag--”
+
+“Our _Narcissus_, if you please,” Cappy shrilled. “You gibbering
+jackdaw! Out with it! Where do you get that stuff--lose your steamer on
+her second voyage! Why, she's snug in Norfolk this minute.”
+
+“If she only is,” Matt almost wailed, “she'll never be permitted to
+clear with that German crew aboard. Pernambuco for orders! Suffering
+sailor! And you, of all men, to put over a charter like that!
+Pernambuco! Pernambuco! Pernambuco--for--orders! Do you get it?”
+
+“No, I don't. It's over my head and into the bleachers.”
+
+“I must say, my dear Matt,” Mr. Skinner struck in blandly, “that I also
+fail to apprehend.”
+
+“Didn't you two ever go to school?” Matt raved. “Didn't you ever study
+geography? Why under the canopy should we waste our time and burn up our
+good coal steaming to Pernambuco, Brazil, South America, for orders?
+Let me put it to you two in words of one syllable: The _Narcissus_ is
+chartered to carry a cargo of coal from Norfolk, Virginia, to Batavia
+or Manila. At the time of charter--and sailing--the charterers are
+undecided which port she is to discharge at, so they ask us to step
+over to Pernambuco and find out. Now, whether the vessel discharges at
+Batavia or Manila, her course in the Atlantic Ocean while en route to
+either port is identical! She passes round the Cape of Good Hope, which
+is at the extreme south end of Africa. If her course, on the contrary,
+was round Cape Horn or through the Straits of Magellan there might be
+some sense in sending her over to the east coast of South America
+for orders. But whether she is ordered to Manila or Batavia, the fact
+remains that she must put in to Durban, South Africa, for fuel to
+continue her voyage; so why in the name of the Flying Dutchman
+couldn't the charterers cable the orders to Mike Murphy at Durban?
+The _Narcissus_ is worth a thousand dollars a day, so you waste a few
+thousand dollars worth of her time, at the very least, sending her to
+Pernambuco when a ten-dollar cablegram to Durban would have done the
+business! I suppose all you two brilliant shipping men could see was a
+ten-dollar-a-ton freight rate. Eh? You--landlubbers! A-a-g-r-r-h! I was
+never so angry since the day I was born.”
+
+While Matt ranted on, Mr. Skinner's classic features had been slowly
+taking on the general color tones of a ripe old Edam cheese, while at
+the conclusion of Matt's oration Cappy Ricks' eyes were sticking out
+like twin semaphores. He clasped his hands.
+
+“By the Twelve Ragged Apostles!” he murmured in an awed voice. “There's
+a nigger in the woodpile.”
+
+“I very greatly fear,” Mr. Skinner chattered, “that you are mistaken,
+Mr. Ricks. Something tells me it's a German!”
+
+“Well, well, well!” Matt Peasley sneered. “Skinner, take the head of the
+class. Really, I believe I begin to pick up signs of human intelligence
+in this sea of maritime ignorance.”
+
+“Oh, Matt, quit your jawing and break the news to me quickly,” Cappy
+pleaded.
+
+“Haven't you been reading the papers, sir? Australian and Japanese
+warships have been hunting for the German Pacific fleet for the past few
+weeks, and the Germans have been on the dodge. Therefore, they've
+been burning coal. They are only allowed to remain in a neutral port
+twenty-four hours, and can only take on sufficient coal and stores to
+enable them to reach the nearest German port. Consequently, since they
+have been afraid to enter a neutral port, for fear of giving away their
+position, it follows that they've had to stay at sea--and naturally they
+have run short of coal. A few steamers have cleared from San Francisco
+with coal, ostensibly for discharge at Chilean or Mexican ports, but in
+reality for delivery to the German fleet at sea, but even with these few
+deliveries, there is a coal famine. And now that the Pacific is getting
+too hot for it, the general impression is that the German fleet will try
+to get through the Straits of Magellan, for, once in the Atlantic, coal
+will be easier to get. More ships, you know; more ship-owners willing
+to take a chance for wartime profits--and they say Brazil is rather
+friendly to the German cause. We will assume, therefore, that the German
+secret agents in this country realize it is inevitable that Von Spee's
+fleet must be forced into the Atlantic; hence, in anticipation of that
+extremity, they are arranging for the delivery of coal to those harassed
+cruisers. The agent in Pernambuco is probably in constant communication
+with the fleet by wireless; the fleet will probably come ranging up
+the coast of South America, destroying British commerce, or some of the
+ships may cross over to the Indian Ocean and join the _Emden_,
+raiding in those waters. So the German secret agents charter our huge
+_Narcissus_, load her with ten thousand tons of coal--”
+
+Matt Peasley paused and bent a beetling glance, first at Cappy Ricks and
+then at Skinner.
+
+“Was she to carry soft coal or anthracite?” he demanded.
+
+“I don't know,” Mr. Skinner quavered.
+
+“Search me!” Cappy Ricks piped up sourly.
+
+“I thought so. For the sake of argument we'll assume it's soft coal,
+because anthracite has not as yet become popular as steamship fuel.
+Well, we will assume our vessel gets to Pernambuco. If, in the meantime,
+the German admiral wirelesses his Pernambuco agent, 'Send a jag of coal
+into the Indian Ocean,' to the Indian Ocean goes the _Narcissus_, and
+presently she finds a German warship or two or three ranging along in
+her course. They pick her up, help themselves to her coal, give Mike
+Murphy a certificate of confiscation for her cargo, to be handed to the
+owners, who in this case will be good, loyal sons of the Fatherland and
+offer no objection--”
+
+“I see,” Cappy Ricks interrupted. “And if, on the other hand, the German
+admiral says, 'Send a jag of coal to meet us in a certain latitude and
+longitude off the River Plate,' and Mike Murphy objects, that German
+crew on our _Narcissus_ will just naturally lock Mike Murphy up in his
+cabin and take the vessel away from him! When they're through with her
+they'll give her back--”
+
+“I'm not so certain they'll have to lock him up in his cabin in order
+to get the ship,” Mr. Skinner struck in, a note of alarm in his voice.
+“Mike Murphy is so pro-German--”
+
+“Ow! Wow! That hurts,” Cappy wailed. “So he is! I never thought of that.
+And now that you speak of it, I recall it was his idea, getting that
+crew of Germans aboard! He said it would cut down expenses. Holy
+mackerel, Matt; do you think it was a frameup?”
+
+“Certainly I do, but--Mike Murphy wasn't in on it. You can bank on that.
+No piratical foreigner will ever climb up on Mike Murphy's deck except
+over Mike Murphy's dead body. According to the president emeritus there
+is more than one kind of Irish, but I'll guarantee Mike Murphy isn't the
+double-crossing kind.”
+
+A boy entered with a telegram. It was a day letter filed by Mike Murphy
+in Norfolk that morning, and Matt Peasley read it aloud:
+
+“Sailing at noon. Regret your failure take me into your confidence when
+deciding withdraw vessel from neutral trade. If orders send me to either
+of ports named in charter party and I am overhauled _en route_, that is
+your funeral. If orders conflict with charter party, as I suspect they
+may, that may be my funeral. Regretfully I shall resign at Pernambuco.
+You know your own business, and I cannot believe you would go it blind;
+if you change your mind before arrival Pernambuco, cable care American
+Consul and will do my best for you.
+
+“M. J. M.”
+
+Gappy Ricks sprang into the air and tried to crack his aged ankles
+together.
+
+“Saved!” he croaked. “By the Holy Pink-toed Prophet! Saved! Bully for
+Mike Murphy! Say, when that fellow gets back, if I don't do something
+handsome for him--”
+
+Matt Peasley's scowls had been replaced by smiles.
+
+“God bless his old Mickedonian heart!” he said fervently. “He thinks
+the coal is for that British fleet reported to be _en route_ across
+the Atlantic to give battle to the German Pacific fleet; or for Admiral
+Craddock's Pacific fleet in case the Germans chase it back into the
+Atlantic. He knows that we know he is pro-German and for anything that's
+against England--and if he makes up his mind the coal is for the British
+fleet he'll resign before delivering it! By Judas, this would be funny
+if it wasn't so blamed serious.”
+
+“To be forewarned is to be forearmed,” Mr. Skinner quoted sagely. “It is
+most fortunate for us that Murphy's suspicions do us a grave injustice.
+We know now that he will call on the American consul at Pernambuco and
+ask for a cablegram.”
+
+“Yes, and by thunder! we'll send it,” Cappy declared joyously. “Cable
+him, Skinner, to fire that German crew so fast one might play checkers
+on their coat tails as they go overside.”
+
+“I wish to heaven I could wireless him to put back to New York and ship
+a new crew,” Matt Peasley mourned. “There's just a possibility that
+German crew of his may take over the ship on the high seas and not put
+into Pernambuco at all!”
+
+“We can only wait and pray,” said Mr. Skinner piously.
+
+Cappy Ricks slid out to the edge of his chair and, pop-eyed with horror,
+gazed at his son-in-law over the rims of his spectacles.
+
+“Matt,” he declared, “you're as cheerful as a funeral. Here we have this
+thing all settled, and you have to go to work and rip the silver lining
+out of our cloud of contentment. And the worst of it is, by golly, I
+think there's something in that theory of yours after all.”
+
+“We should always be prepared to meet the worst, Mr. Ricks,” Mr.
+Skinner admonished the president emeritus. “While piracy as a practice
+practically perished prior to the--”
+
+“Skinner! In the fiend's name, spare us this alliteration and humbug,”
+ Cappy fairly shrieked. “You're driving me crazy. If it isn't platitude,
+it's your dog-gone habit of initialing things!” He placed his old elbows
+on his knees and bowed his head in his hands. “If I'm not the original
+Mr. Tight Wad!” he lamented. “But you must forgive me, Matt. I got in
+the habit of thinking of expense when I was young, and I've never gotten
+over it. You know how a habit gets a grip on a man, don't you, Matt? Oh,
+if you had only overruled me when I decided to save money by cutting
+out the wireless on the _Narcissus!_ I remember now you wanted it, and
+I said: 'Well, what's the use? The _Narcissus_ hasn't any passenger
+license and she doesn't have to have wireless--so why do something we
+don't have to do?' Skinner, you should have known enough--”
+
+“I am managing the lumber end of the business, Mr. Ricks,” Skinner
+retorted icily.
+
+“Never mind what you're managing. You're my balance wheel. I've raised
+you for that very purpose. I've been twenty-five years breaking you in
+to your job of relieving me of my business worries--and you don't do it.
+No, you don't, Skinner. Don't deny it, now. You don't. I pay you to
+boss me, but do you do it? No, sir. You let me have my own way--when
+I'm round you're afraid to say your soul's your own. You two boys know
+blamed well I'm an old man and that an old man will make mistakes. It
+is your duty to watch me. I pay the money, but I don't get the service.
+When Matt argued with me about the wireless you sided in with me,
+Skinner. You've got that infernal saving habit, too--drat you! Don't
+deny it, Skinner. I can see by the look in your eye you're fixing to
+contradict me. You're as miserable a miser as I am--afraid to spend five
+cents and play safe--you penurious--er--er--fellow! Skinner, if you ever
+forget yourself long enough to give three hoots in hell you'll want one
+of them back. See now what your niggardly policy has done for us? At a
+time when we'd hock our immortal souls for a wireless to talk to Mike
+Murphy and tell him things, where are we?” Cappy snapped his fingers.
+“Up Salt Creek--without a paddle!”
+
+“Come, come,” Matt said soothingly, “As Skinner says, we can only wait
+and pray--”
+
+“All right. You two do the praying. I'm going to sit here and cuss.”
+
+“Well, we'll hope for the best, Mr. Ricks. No more crying over spilled
+milk now. I'll figure out when the _Narcissus_ is due at Pernambuco and
+cable Mike to let his crew go. And you know, sir, even if he should
+not receive our cablegram, we have still one hope left. True, it is a
+forlorn one, but it's worth a small bet. The crew of the _Narcissus_ is
+not all German. There are--”
+
+“Two pro-German Irishmen, two disinterested Native Son Chinamen and a
+little runt of a Cockney steward,” Cappy sneered. “And she carries a
+crew of forty, all told. Matt, those odds are too long for any bet
+of mine. Besides, Reardon and Murphy hate each other. A house divided
+against itself, you know--”
+
+“They might bang each other all over the main deck,” Matt replied
+musingly, “but I'll bet they'll fight side by side for the ship. Of
+course we haven't known Terence Reardon very long; he may be a bad one
+after all; but Mike Murphy will go far. He's as cunning as a pet fox,
+and he may make up in strategy what he lacks in numbers.”
+
+“The Irish are so filled with blarney--” Skinner began, but Cappy cut
+him short with a terrible look.
+
+“There goes some more of our silver lining,” he rasped. “Skinner, what
+are you? A kill-joy? Now, just for that, I'm going to agree with Matt. A
+man has got to believe something in this world or go crazy, and I prefer
+to believe that the ship is safe with those two Hibernians aboard--win,
+lose or draw. And I want you two to quit picking on me; I don't want the
+word '_Narcissus_' mentioned in my presence until the ship is reported
+confiscated by the British, if her coal is for the Germans, or by the
+Germans, if her coal is for the British--which it isn't--or until Mike
+Murphy reports at Manila or Batavia and cables us for orders.”
+
+“I'm with you there, sir,” Matt Peasley declared. “I'm going to bank
+on the Irish, and refuse to believe it possible for the _Nar_--for a
+certain vessel flying our house-flag to be caught by the wrong warship,
+a couple of thousand miles off her course and with coal, or evidences of
+coal, in her cargo space. Buck up, Skinner. A little Christian Science
+here, boy. Just make up your mind no man in authority is going to come
+over the rail of the--of a certain vessel--and ask Mike Murphy or his
+successor _pro tem._, for a look at his papers!”
+
+“If she ever is confiscated on an illegal errand,” Skinner mourned, “and
+Mike Murphy has nothing more tangible than a dime-novel tale of coercion
+as an excuse for being in that latitude and longitude--well, we'll never
+get our bully big ship back again!”
+
+And for the first time in his life the efficient Mr. Skinner so far
+forgot himself as to swear in the office!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+Throughout the long, lazy days that the _Narcissus_ rolled into the
+South, Captain Michael J. Murphy's alert brain was busy every spare
+moment, striving to discover, in the incomprehensible charter his owners
+had made for him, what the French call _la raison d'etre._ Not having
+any wireless, he was unable to keep in touch with the stirring events
+being enacted in Europe and on the high seas, as news of the said events
+filtered by him through space. While on the West Coast, where all the
+newspapers are printed in Spanish, he had been equally barred from
+keeping in touch with the war, although _en route_ through the Panama
+Canal he did his best to buy up all the old newspapers on the Zone.
+
+Upon arrival in New York with his cargo of nitrate, his anxiety to make
+a record in his first command in steam caused him to stay on the job
+every moment the _Narcissus_ was discharging, for Cappy Ricks had
+impressed upon him, as he impressed upon every skipper in the Blue
+Star employ, the fact that a slow boat is slow paying dividends.
+Consequently, the worthy captain had had no time to acquaint himself
+with the movements of the various fleets, and when he sent his day
+letter to his owners on the morning of the day he sailed from Norfolk
+for Pernambuco, his action was predicated, not on what he knew, but on
+what he felt. The sixth sense that all real sailors possess warned him
+that his cargo of coal was not destined for Batavia nor yet Manila, but
+for delivery at sea to the warships of some foreign nation. Devoutly
+Michael J. hoped it wasn't for the British fleet, since in such
+a contingency he would be cruelly torn between his love and duty.
+Consequently he resolved that, should the choice of alternatives be
+forced upon him, he would steer a middle course and resign his command.
+
+On the other hand, Mike Murphy knew Matt Peasley and Cappy Ricks to
+be intensely pro-Ally in their sympathies, despite the President's
+proclamation of neutrality and the polite requests of the motion-picture
+houses for their audiences to remain perfectly quiet while Field-Marshal
+von Hindenburg, Sir John French and General Joffre came on the screen
+and bowed. Under the circumstances, therefore, Murphy found it very
+difficult to suspect his owners of conspiring to deliver a cargo of coal
+to the German fleet at sea. No, indeed! Matt Peasley and Cappy Ricks
+were too intensely American for that; indeed, Cappy was always saying he
+hoped to see an American mercantile marine established before he should
+be gathered to the bosom of Abraham.
+
+From whatever angle the doughty skipper viewed it, therefore, the tangle
+became more and more incomprehensible. Cappy and Matt knew full well
+the rules of the game as promulgated by their Uncle Samuel, and the dire
+penalties for infraction. However, granted that they knew they could
+scheme successfully to evade punishment at the hands of their own
+government, Mike Murphy knew full well that no man could guarantee
+immunity from the right of a belligerent warship to visit and search, or
+from confiscation or months of demurrage in a prize court in the event
+that his ship's papers and the course the vessel was travelling failed
+to justify her presence in that particular longitude and latitude.
+And with the huge profits to be made in neutral trade, it seemed
+incomprehensible that a sound business man like Cappy Ricks should
+assume all these risks for the sake of a little extra money. Surely
+he must realize that if he sent her on an illegal errand her war-risk
+insurance would not hold.
+
+On the other hand, it appeared to Murphy that the charter must have
+been consummated with the full knowledge and consent of the Blue Star
+Navigation Company, for the veriest tyro in the shipping business could
+not have failed to be suspicious of that clause in the charter party,
+stipulating a call at Pernambuco for orders. Of course there was the
+possibility that this acquiescence had been due to misrepresentation
+on the part of the New York agents or rank stupidity on the part of the
+Blue Star Navigation Company. But Seaborn & Company were above a shady
+deal. In putting through the charter for the Blue Star Navigation
+Company it might have occurred to them that all was not as it should
+be, but that was none of their business. If they spread their hand and
+permitted Cappy Ricks an unobstructed view, it was up to Cappy to decide
+and order them to close or reject the charter. As for stupidity on the
+part of the Blue Star Navigation Company, Murphy knew full well that
+stupidity was the crime Cappy Ricks found it hardest to forgive. Even
+had Cappy overlooked that suspicious clause in the charter, because of
+his age, Matt Peasley's youth and practical maritime knowledge should
+have offset Cappy's error; and even if both had erred, there still
+remained the matchless Skinner, as suspicious as a burglar, as keen as a
+razor, as infallible as a chronometer.
+
+No, it just didn't seem possible that the Blue Star Navigation Company
+had gone into the deal with eyes wide open; on the contrary, it seemed
+equally impossible that they had gone into it with their eyes shut.
+Consequently Michael J. decided to wake them up--provided they slept on
+the job--and to give them an opportunity to repent before it should be
+too late.
+
+He felt very much better after sending that telegram, but as the
+_Narcissus_ ploughed steadily south at the rate of two hundred and
+thirty miles a day, he began to grieve because he had no wireless to
+bring him a prompt reply; he berated himself for not waiting at the dock
+in Norfolk until his owners should have had an opportunity to answer;
+he abused himself for his timidity in questioning the judgment of his
+owners, for indeed he had been content to hint when more decisive action
+was demanded.
+
+How Michael J. Murphy yearned to discuss his problem with some one as
+loyal and devoted to the Blue Star Navigation Company as himself! His
+dignity as master of the _Narcissus_, however, bade him refrain from
+discussing the integrity of his owners with his mates--particularly
+with new mates, to whom the house-flag stood for naught but a symbol of
+monthly revenue. In fact, of the forty-one men under him, there was but
+one with whom he could, with entire dignity, discuss the matter. That
+man was Terence Reardon. But even here he was barred, for since he had
+called the chief engineer a renegade, the only possible discussion
+that could obtain between them now must be anything but academic;
+in consequence of which Michael J. Murphy was forced to hug his
+apprehensions to himself until the _Narcissus_ steamed slowly into the
+outer harbor of Pernambuco. Ten minutes after she dropped her big hook
+the skipper's suspicions were crystallized into certainty.
+
+Just as she came to anchor the steward appeared on deck, vociferously
+beating his triangle to announce supper--for at sea dinner is always
+supper.
+
+“Mr. Schultz,” the captain called from the bridge, “as soon as your men
+have had their supper clear away the working boat. I'm going ashore.”
+
+“Very vell, sir,” Mr. Schultz replied heartily, and the captain went
+below to supper. He was scarcely seated before Mr. Schultz stuck his
+head in the dining saloon window and announced that a gentleman who
+claimed to represent the charterers was alongside in a launch and
+desired to come aboard and speak with him.
+
+“Let down the accommodation ladder, Mr. Schultz, and when the gentleman
+comes aboard, show him round to my state-room,” the skipper answered.
+“I'll meet him there in a pig's whisper. It is probable he has come
+aboard with our orders, Mr. Schultz, so never mind clearing away the
+boat until I speak to you further about it. Steward, set an extra cover
+at my right. We may have a guest for supper.”
+
+He hurried round to his state-room and donned a uniform coat to receive
+his visitor. Mr. Schultz came presently, bearing a visiting-card upon
+which was engraved the name: Mr. August Carl von Staden. Behind the mate
+a sailor with a bulging suitcase stood at attention; two more sailors
+stood behind the first, a steamer trunk between them, and as Captain
+Murphy stepped out on deck to greet his visitor he observed a tall,
+athletic, splendid-looking fellow coming leisurely toward him along the
+deck. The stranger carried a large Gladstone bag.
+
+The captain bowed. “I am the skipper of this big box,” he announced
+pleasantly. “Murphy is my name.”
+
+Herr von Staden shook hands and in most excellent English, without
+the slightest trace of a German accent, expressed his pleasure in the
+meeting. The captain cast a glance of frank curiosity at the bag von
+Staden carried and at the baggage the sailors had in tow. Von Staden
+interpreted the glance and smiled.
+
+“I have brought you your orders, Captain Murphy. They are contained in
+this envelope;” and he handed a blank envelope to the captain. “However,
+I happened to know that one of the orders is to provide a berth for me.
+I'm to go with you as supercargo.”
+
+“I hadn't heard anything about such a possibility,” Mike Murphy replied,
+with just a shade of formality in his tones. He turned to the first
+mate: “Mr. Schultz, will you be good enough to see to it that Mr. von
+Staden's baggage is stowed in the owners' suite. Then tell the steward
+to see that our guest's quarters are put in order. Mr. von Staden, will
+you kindly step into my stateroom here while I read these orders?”
+
+Von Staden nodded. Entering the captain's room he sat down on the
+settee and lighted a gold-tipped cigarette, while Murphy tore open the
+envelope. It contained a cablegram reading as follows:
+
+“Von Staden & Ulrich,--Pernambuco, Brazil,--Ornillo Montevideo.
+
+“BLUESTAR.”
+
+The captain reached for his telegraphic-code book. When decoded the
+message read:
+
+“Instruct captain to proceed to Montevideo and there await further
+orders.
+
+“BLUE STAR NAVIGATION COMPANY.”
+
+The cablegram had been filed at San Francisco two days before. Murphy
+looked keenly at his guest, who smoked tranquilly and returned the look
+without interest.
+
+“Mr. von Staden,” the captain announced, “these are strange orders, in
+view of the fact that I cleared from New York for Manila or Batavia,
+via the Cape of Good Hope. It would be a sure sign of bad luck to the
+steamer _Narcissus_ if a British cruiser should pick her up off the
+coast of Uruguay.”
+
+Von Staden smiled. “You are very direct, captain--very blunt indeed.
+This is a characteristic more Teutonic than Celtic, I believe, so I
+shall experience no embarrassment in being equally frank with you. Your
+cargo of coal is designed for our German Pacific fleet.”
+
+“I guessed as much, sir. Nevertheless, my owners did not see fit to take
+me into their confidence in this illegal undertaking, Mr. von Staden--”
+
+“They did not think it necessary,” von Staden interrupted smilingly.
+“In fact, Captain Peasley assured our people in New York that your
+sympathies are so overwhelming in favor of our cause we need anticipate
+no worry as to the course you would pursue. Moreover, in the event of a
+judicial inquiry it would be an advantage if you could say that you had
+had no voice in the matter, but had been instructed to obey the orders
+of the charterers--of whom we are the agents in Pernambuco. Perhaps this
+cablegram will allay your fears,” and he drew an unopened cablegram from
+his pocket and handed it to Murphy. It was a code cablegram, signed by
+the Blue Star Navigation Company and addressed to Murphy in care of von
+Staden & Ulrich. When decoded it read:
+
+“Execute the orders of supercargo if possible. It may lead to further
+business. Charterers must take the risk. We do not think there is any
+risk. Please remain.”
+
+This cablegram was signed “Matt.”
+
+“Well, captain?” von Staden queried politely.
+
+“I don't like this business at all,” the captain replied. “My owners may
+think there is no risk, but I'm afraid. England controls the seas--”
+
+“We are in possession of the secret code of the British Navy, Captain
+Murphy. We know the approximate location of every British warship in the
+Atlantic and Pacific--and I assure you there is no risk.”
+
+“Well, my boss informs me the charterers assume the risk, so I suppose
+I shouldn't worry over the Blue Star Navigation Company's end of the
+gamble. They know their own business, I dare say. Evidently they feared
+I might want to resign, so I have been asked to remain; and when Captain
+Peasley says 'please' to me, Mr. von Staden, I find it very, very hard
+to refuse.”
+
+“I am glad, for the sake of our selfish interests, my dear captain, to
+find you so loyal to your owners' financial interests,” the supercargo
+replied heartily. “Now that you have decided to remain, I need not point
+out to you the danger of a resignation at this time. It might lead
+to some unlooked-for developments which might prejudice your owners,
+although I think they have covered their tracks very effectually.
+Nevertheless, it is not well to take the slightest risk--”
+
+“Without being well paid for it,” Murphy interrupted sneeringly. “My
+owners have been well paid for their risk, but where do I come in? I
+haven't been promised double my usual salary, or a split on the profits
+of the voyage; and I know if I were to command a vessel loaded with
+munitions of war I would not be asked to take her into the North Sea at
+the customary skipper's wages. I'd be offered a large bonus.”
+
+“You forget, my dear captain, that your charterers assume all the risks.
+One of them was the risk that you might resign unless you received
+adequate compensation. I came aboard prepared to insure that risk,” and
+he touched with his toe the Gladstone bag. “What do you say to $5,000?”
+
+Michael J. Murphy smiled. “It is pleasant, sir,” he said, “to be paid
+$5,000 for doing something one yearns to do for nothing. I am not a hog.
+Five thousand dollars is sufficient. How do I get it--and when?”
+
+“In gold coin of the United States, or gold certificates of the same
+interesting country, my dear captain, and you may have it immediately.”
+ Again Herr von Staden kicked the Gladstone bag.
+
+“I'll take it in gold certificates. And in order that my dear old
+father and mother may have the benefit of my rascality in case anything
+unforeseen should arise to prevent my return, I suggest you hand over
+the boodle this minute, and I'll go ashore and express it home.”
+
+“Captain Murphy, you are a man after my own heart--”
+
+“I am not a born fool, sir,” Murphy interrupted. “I'm accepting this
+money to be a fool, well knowing it is foolish to do it, for still I
+am taking a risk. I am thirty-eight years old, Mr. von Staden, and a
+skipper as young as that has his future all before him. Set him down on
+the beach, however, with his ticket revoked for all time--and his future
+is behind him.”
+
+“In that event,” the supercargo replied, “you might accept my assurance,
+without questioning my authority for such assurance, that you would have
+no difficulty in procuring a remunerative position ashore. The firm of
+von Staden & Ulrich could use you very handily.”
+
+“Thank you, sir. Consider the matter settled. Will you come ashore with
+me, sir, and dine, or would you prefer to have supper aboard?”
+
+“I beg of you to be excused from going ashore, captain. I have much to
+do to-night. The launch which brought me alongside has a knocked-down
+wireless plant aboard, and I am anxious to have it set up on your good
+ship _Narcissus_--a task I shall have to oversee personally. I shall
+probably work all night.”
+
+“Praise be!” Michael J. Murphy answered heartily. “We'll have some
+interest in life now. We can get all the war news, going and coming,
+can't we? Have you brought along an operator?”
+
+“I am an operator,” the supercargo answered. “By the by, can you fix me
+up with a wireless room?”
+
+“There are two staterooms and a bath in the owners' suite which you will
+occupy. You can take your choice.”
+
+“Good. I shall want to sleep close to my instrument.”
+
+He opened the bag, counted out five one-thousand-dollar gold
+certificates of the United States of America and handed them to the
+captain.
+
+“The grand old rag,” Michael J. murmured. “How many rascals fight under
+the flag of old King Spondulics!”
+
+“I believe you have an Irish chief engineer,” von Staden continued.
+“While I understand his sympathies are with us, still it seems only
+right to compensate--”
+
+“Suit yourself, Mr. von Staden.”
+
+“What kind of a man is he, captain?”
+
+“I'd hate to tell you. I've had little to do with him, but that little
+was enough. We avoid each other as much as possible and never speak
+except in the line of duty. I make no bones of the fact that I think
+he's a scrub.”
+
+Mr. von Staden nodded sagely. “Perhaps I'd better wait and get
+acquainted with him,” he suggested, and closed his bag. Murphy
+showed him to his quarters, which the steward, under the first mate's
+supervision, was already setting in order; and, having decided to set
+up the wireless in the sleeping-room, von Staden accompanied the skipper
+round to superintend the taking on board of the wireless plant from
+the gasoline launch bobbing alongside. When the equipment was finally
+hoisted to the deck of the _Narcissus_, Michael J, Murphy boarded the
+launch and was whisked ashore for the avowed purpose of sending to his
+aged parents the fruits of his elastic conscience.
+
+Herr August Carl von Staden stood at the head of the accommodation
+ladder and smiled as the launch disappeared into the tropic twilight.
+Then he said something in German to Mr. Schultz, who laughed. Evidently
+it was very good news, for even the quartermaster at the companion
+ladder smiled covertly. It is possible they would not have felt so
+cheerful had they known that Michael J. Murphy's “dear old father and
+mother” had been sleeping in a Boston cemetery some fifteen years, and
+that their last words to Michael had been an exhortation to remember
+that manliness and honor must be his only heritage. And as the launch
+bore him shoreward, he looked back and grinned at the dim, duck-clad
+figure of von Staden.
+
+“Your agents looked me up, my hearty,” he soliloquized, “and if they did
+their work half well, they told you I was an honest man. Only a crook
+comes with a bag of gold to talk illegitimate business with an honest
+man. I'm banking you're as crooked as a bed spring, and that there's
+something fishy about this enterprise. Cappy Ricks isn't fully informed,
+otherwise he wouldn't be doing business with a crook!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+Arrived ashore, Captain Murphy hurried to the cable office, registered
+his cable address, borrowed a code book and sent a code telegram to
+his owner. Then, having subsidized the operator liberally to rush it,
+Michael J. Murphy set out for a stroll among the limited attractions
+of Pernambuco. His cablegram would get through in two hours at the very
+most, and though the captain figured the Blue Star offices would
+be closed when the message reached San Francisco, still he was not
+discouraged. He knew the cable company always telephoned to Mr. Skinner,
+at his home, all Blue Star and Ricks Lumber & Logging messages arriving
+after office hours and before midnight. Naturally Skinner could be
+depended upon to have a copy of the code at home, and if he didn't
+Murphy knew he would rush down to the office, no matter what the hour,
+and decode it there. Of course he would cable his reply immediately, in
+which event it might be that the captain would have an answer shortly
+after midnight or by breakfast at the latest.
+
+He decided, therefore, to return to the cable office about midnight and
+await the reply to his cablegram. He had proceeded but a few blocks from
+the cable office, however, before a disturbing thought struck him with
+such force as to bring him to an abrupt pause.
+
+_His owners had cabled him in care of von Staden & Ulrich, when in the
+telegram sent just before sailing from Norfolk he had instructed them
+to cable him in care of the American consul._ Murphy's native shrewdness
+had made him suspicious of von Staden the instant the latter had so
+nonchalantly offered him a bribe of five thousand dollars, for
+the proffer of a bribe of that magnitude, without any preliminary
+bargaining, did not co-ordinate with Michael's idea of business.
+Certainly if the charterers had his owners “fixed,” five thousand
+dollars was too much money to give their captain, particularly since
+there were available any number of capable rascals eager to do the job
+for twenty-five hundred, and the devil take the consequences.
+
+At the time von Staden had handed him the two cablegrams from the Blue
+Star Navigation Company, no suspicion that they were forgeries had
+entered the captain's mind; indeed, Matt Peasley's cablegram to him
+appeared at first blush to be an answer to the telegram which Murphy had
+sent his owners from Norfolk. In that telegram Murphy had mentioned his
+suspicions and hinted at unwarranted risks and the possibility of
+the circumstances attending the delivery of his cargo forcing his
+resignation. Matt's cablegram handed him by von Staden urged him to
+remain in the ship and assured him there were no risks; that if there
+were, the charterers assumed them. For the nonce, therefore, the
+master's mind did not dwell on any doubts as to the genuineness of
+the orders he had received, even though he decided instantly as a
+precautionary measure to confirm them before proceeding to carry them
+out. This, however, was merely because he was suspicious of von
+Staden and desired to obviate the possibility of that individual's
+double-crossing the Blue Star Navigation Company.
+
+Under the circumstances, therefore, he had considered it good policy to
+appear to fall readily in line, and, the better to disarm von Staden's
+watchfulness, he had demanded extra compensation. The ease with which
+the bribe had been secured having crystallized his suspicions, instantly
+he had cast about in his ingenious brain for a good sound excuse for
+going ashore and cabling his owners. To demand his bribe in advance and
+then announce that he would go ashore and express it to those dependent
+upon him, in case he failed to return and enjoy it himself, seemed to
+present a reason that would not be questioned and accordingly he had
+done so.
+
+Michael J. Murphy removed his uniform cap and thoughtfully scratched his
+head. “Now why,” he demanded of the scented night, “did Matt cable me
+in care of that German firm when he must have known I would call on the
+American consul in the expectation of finding a cablegram there?” He
+shook his head. “They've got us winging, Michael,” he soliloquized, “so
+I suppose the only thing to do is to play safe, call upon the American
+consul immediately if not sooner, and ask if he has a cablegram for us.”
+
+And without further ado the worthy fellow sprang into a cab and was
+whirled away to the residence of the American consul. Yes, the consul
+had a cablegram for him, but it was at his office. Could Captain Murphy
+not wait until morning?
+
+Most emphatically Captain Murphy could not. That cablegram was
+important; it meant a great deal of money and possibly life or death--
+
+Regretfully the consul entered the cab with the captain, drove to the
+consulate and delivered the cable-gram to the eager mariner, who swore
+when he discovered it was in cipher and not code, for this necessitated
+immediate return to the _Narcissus_ in order to obtain the key to the
+cipher. He thanked the consul and sent the latter home in the cab, while
+he hurried for the harbor front and the nearest boat landing. He was
+filled with apprehension, for indeed there was something radically
+wrong when his owners cabled him in the secret cipher of the Blue Star
+Navigation Company--something the company had, doubtless, never found
+occasion to do before. For while each vessel of the Blue Star fleet
+had a copy of the A.L. code aboard, with the cipher key typewritten and
+pasted on the second fly-leaf, not a single Blue Star skipper knew why
+it had been pasted there or why the company should have gone to the
+trouble of getting up any one of the hundreds of secret ciphers possible
+to be developed from the A. L. Telegraphic Code. This was a secret that
+lay locked in the breast of Mr. Skinner. It is probable, however, that
+it had occurred to him in an idle moment that a secret cipher might
+come in handy some day, and Mr. Skinner believed in being prepared for
+emergencies.
+
+The captain bade the launch wait for him at the accommodation ladder,
+while he hurried round to his state-room and promptly fell to work on
+Mr. Skinner's cipher cablegram. When he had laboriously deciphered it
+this is what he read:
+
+“Unaccountably failed note suspicious clause charter. Something rotten.
+We are playing square game. Think plot deliver coal German fleet South
+Atlantic. Discharge your German crew immediately, first notifying
+Brazilian authorities and American consul. Have help when you notify
+them game is off, otherwise may take vessel away from you. They will
+stop at nothing; fleet desperate for coal. Cable acknowledgment these
+orders; also cable when orders fulfilled. Very anxious. 'BLUE STAR
+NAVIGATION COMPANY.'”
+
+“Ah-h-h!” breathed Michael J. Murphy softly, but very distinctly. “So
+that's the game, eh?” His big square chin set viciously; subconsciously
+he clenched his hard fist and shook it at his enemies. “The cunning
+Dutch devils!” he murmured very audibly, and at that precise instant
+Herr August Carl von Staden stood in the open doorway. He coughed, and
+Murphy glanced up from the translation of the cipher message just in
+time to note a swift shadow pass over the supercargo's face, a shadow
+composed of equal parts of suspicion, embarrassment and desperation.
+
+“You have returned very promptly, captain,” he remarked smoothly, and
+then his restless glance fell on the cablegram and beside it the scratch
+pad and the two parallel columns of words scrawled on it. A man of far
+less intelligence than von Staden possessed would, have realized as
+quickly that the first column was composed of cipher words, while the
+second column was the translation. From this tell-tale evidence his
+suspicious glance lifted to the skipper's face, and he read in Michael
+J. Murphy's black eyes the wild rage which no Irishman could have
+concealed--which the majority of his race would not even have taken the
+trouble to endeavor to conceal.
+
+In that glance each learned the other's secret; each realized that the
+success of his plans depended on the silence of the other; each resolved
+instantly to procure that silence at any cost. Von Staden reached for
+his hip pocket, but before he could draw his automatic pistol and cover
+the skipper, Michael J. Murphy had hurled ten pounds of code book into
+the geometric centre of the supercargo's face. It was the first weapon
+his hand closed over, and he did not disdain it. The instant it landed
+and von Staden reeled before the blow, Murphy came out of his state-room
+with a scuttering rush and von Staden fired as he came. The captain felt
+the sting of the bullet as it creased the top of his left shoulder;
+then his right fist came up in a blow that started at his hip and landed
+fairly under the supercargo's heart. Von Staden grunted once, the pistol
+dropped clattering to the deck and he folded up like an accordion. For
+him the battle was over.
+
+Not so, however, with Mike Murphy. Gone to the winds now was the caution
+he would have exercised had the attack been delayed two seconds longer;
+forgotten was the shrewd advice of his owners to have help standing by
+when the ship cleaning should commence. Michael J. Murphy thought of
+nothing but blood, for the fight had started now and he was loath to
+have it cease.
+
+“You bloody murderer!” he growled. “You'd kill me and steal my ship,
+would you?” And with the reckless abandon of a sailor he planted the
+broad toe of a number nine boot in Herr von Staden's short ribs, hoping
+to break a few, for in the process of working his way up from the bottom
+Michael had fought under deep-sea rules too often to be squeamish now.
+So he kicked Herr von Staden again, after which a glimmer of reason
+penetrated his hot head and he walked to pick up the supercargo's
+automatic pistol. Then something landed on him from above and he went
+down backward. His head struck the deck with a resounding thump,
+and Michael J. Murphy had a through ticket to the Land of Nod and no
+stop-over privileges.
+
+The something which had thus inopportunely dropped on Michael was Mr.
+Henckel, the second mate. He had gone up on the bridge to see if
+the canvas jacket had been dropped over the brightly polished brass
+engine-room telegraph apparatus at each end of the bridge, in order to
+protect it from the tropical dew. While thus engaged he had heard the
+shot which von Staden fired at the captain, and forthwith had run across
+the top of the house and peered over to discover what was happening
+on the deck below. Discovering the captain in the act of kicking a
+distinguished son of the Fatherland in that fragile section of the human
+anatomy frequently referred to as the “slats,” the second mate had stood
+a moment, immobile with horror, the while he gazed upon the fearful
+scene. Then the captain walked to a spot on the deck directly beneath
+the position occupied by his subordinate, and stooped to pick something
+up.
+
+Even their enemies are proud of the dash and gallantry, the utter
+contempt for consequences, which animate the German going into battle,
+and Mr. Henckel, second mate of the S.S. _Narcissus_, was as fine a
+German as one could find in a day's travel. The instant Michael J.
+Murphy stooped to recover von Staden's automatic pistol, therefore, Mr.
+Henckel saw his duty and, in the language of the elect, “he went an'
+done it”--the which was absurdly simple. He merely leaped down off
+the house on top of the captain, and forthwith deep peace and profound
+silence brooded over the good ship _Narcissus_, of San Francisco.
+
+It is worthy of remark here that Mr. Terence Reardon who, had he been
+present, might have had something to say--not that his action would
+indicate that he despised Mike Murphy the less, but that he loved his
+owners more--was unfortunately down in the engine-room. Consequently he
+failed to hear the shot, and when he came up on deck the victims of
+the affray had been collected and taken thence, a seaman with a mop
+had removed the profuse evidence which Mike Murphy's rich red blood had
+furnished and Mr. Schultz, the first mate, was on the bridge, while Mr.
+Henckel was up on the forecastle head with his gang, waiting for the
+order to break out the anchor.
+
+Presently a seaman came up on the bridge and reported that the light in
+Mr. Reardon's state-room had been out fifteen minutes. So Mr. Schultz
+waited an hour longer to make certain the chief engineer would be
+asleep; whereupon commenced a harsh, discordant tune--the music of
+the anchor chain paying in through the hawse pipe. When it ceased Mr.
+Schultz stepped to the marine telegraph; a bell jingled in the bowels of
+the _Narcissus_; an instant later all the lights aboard her went out as
+the first assistant engineer threw off the switch, and silently in the
+heavy velvet gloom the great vessel slipped out of Pernambuco harbor and
+headed south.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+Just about the time the _Narcissus_ was kicking ahead at nine knots, in
+distant San Francisco the cable company was getting Mr. Skinner out
+of bed to dictate to him over the telephone a message which had just
+arrived from Pernambuco.
+
+“Ah!” murmured the incomparable Skinner as he donned a dressing gown and
+slippers and descended to his library to decode the cablegram. “The
+luck of the Blue Star flag still holds. That belligerent and highly
+intelligent fellow Murphy has received our cablegram, sent him in care
+of the American consul, and in accordance with my instructions he is
+acknowledging its receipt. Hum-m-m! The first word is 'oriana.' Let
+me turn to 'oriana.' Hum-m! 'I have an order presumably emanating from
+blank.' Ah, yes, the next word is 'Buestar,' the cable address of the
+Blue Star Navigation Company. Well, well, well, the foxy fellow! After
+wiring us to cable him, he gets our cable and then cables us to confirm
+it! Caution is a virtue, but this brand is too high-priced. The next
+word is 'osculo'.”
+
+Mr. Skinner turned to “osculo” and discovered that it meant “I am
+ordered to--” The next word in the cablegram was “Montevideo.”
+
+“Good heavens!” Mr. Skinner gasped. “He has received orders, presumably
+emanating from us, ordering him to Montevideo! Can it be possible that
+Mr. Ricks or Matt Peasley has sent him a cablegram without my knowledge?
+I must read further.”
+
+He did, and having done so he discovered that, in addition to being
+ordered to Montevideo, Mike Murphy wanted to know if it was all right
+and if von Staden and Ulrich--presumably German--were to be trusted;
+that he would remain in command at the company's request, although
+he considered such request unreasonable, even if it could be granted
+without risk. Also, he wanted these instructions confirmed and was
+anxiously awaiting an answer.
+
+“Well, I'm certain of one thing,” Mr. Skinner soliloquized after
+reading this extraordinary message: “Murphy has not been to the American
+consul's office for the cablegram I sent him several days ago. Evidently
+there is mischief afoot. However, there is nothing to be gained by
+cabling him again in care of the American consul, so I'll just assume
+that he has registered his cable address with the cable company; hence,
+if I cable him to his cable address the message will be delivered to him
+aboard the _Narcissus_. And since he says he is anxiously awaiting an
+answer, I'll relieve his anxiety with all possible speed and send him an
+answer immediately.”
+
+Whereupon Mr. Skinner wasted several dollars cabling Mike Murphy that
+the Blue Star Navigation had not, to his knowledge, cabled him any
+instructions save those sent in care of the American consul; that von
+Staden and Ulrich were unknown to him, and to be very careful not to
+lose the ship. This message Mr. Skinner dictated over the telephone to
+the telegraph office and asked them to rush it. Evidently they did so,
+for just as Cappy Ricks arrived in the office the following morning,
+word was received from the telegraph company that owing to the departure
+of the _Narcissus_ from Pernambuco the night before, the Blue Star
+Navigation Company's cablegram had not been delivered.
+
+“Well, Skinner,” Cappy chirped as he sat in at his desk and lighted a
+cigar, “what's the news around the shop this fine morning? Any word from
+Murphy?”
+
+“Yes--and no,” Mr. Skinner replied, and laid his information before
+Cappy for perusal. Cappy read it all twice, then slid out to the edge of
+his chair, placed his hands on his knees and looked at Mr. Skinner over
+the rims of his spectacles.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he said solemnly, “this is certainly hell! Cable
+the American consul in Pernambuco and ask him if Murphy received the
+cablegram we sent in care of the consulate. And, in the meantime, don't
+whisper a word of this disquieting information to Matt Peasley. Time
+enough to cross a bridge, Skinner, when you come to it.”
+
+Mr. Skinner promptly filed a cablegram to the American consul, and just
+before the office closed they got about forty dollars' worth of reply,
+informing them that Captain Murphy had appeared at the consulate greatly
+excited the night previous; that he had declared the cablegram awaiting
+him might mean life or death--certainly a large sum of money; that he
+had been given the cablegram and had gone aboard ship to look up his
+cipher key. He had not returned and the ship was not in the harbor.
+
+“Let me see the carbon copy of the cablegram you sent Murphy in care of
+the American consul,” Cappy demanded. Mr. Skinner with a sinking heart
+obeyed.
+
+“Skinner,” said Cappy, “do I understand you sent this message in cipher,
+which necessitated on the part of our captain a trip back to his ship
+before he could decipher it? Why didn't you send him the message in
+regular code? He would then have decoded it right in the consulate, or
+at best he could have gone to the cable office and borrowed a code book
+from them.”
+
+“I sent it in our secret cipher,” Mr. Skinner faltered. “It was delicate
+business--quite--er--an international complication, as it were, and in
+the event of unpleasant developments--Well, how did I know but that some
+German might be on the key at the cable office when the message arrived
+there for Murphy--”
+
+“Quite right, Skinner, my boy, quite right,” Cappy interrupted
+sadly. “The only trouble with you, Skinner, is that you're too danged
+efficient. You look so far into the future you're always gumming up the
+present.” He sighed.
+
+“Why, what do you think--” Skinner began, but Cappy silenced him with an
+autocratic finger.
+
+“I do not think, Skinner, I know. Had it not been for your damnable
+cipher message, Murphy would have got your warning ashore instead of
+being forced to go back to the ship for it. Having got it ashore he
+would have taken care to warn the Brazilian authorities and they would
+have been on watch and prevented the ship from leaving. As I view the
+situation, Mike went aboard, deciphered your message and got ripping
+mad. Von Staden and Ulrich were probably aboard, and hot-headed Mike
+probably undertook to throw them overboard single-handed--and failed.
+His body is doubtless feeding the fishes in Pernambuco harbor this
+minute, and our lovely--big--_Narcissus_--the pride of--the Blue Star
+fleet--”
+
+“Shall I tell Captain Peasley?” Mr. Skinner faltered.
+
+“Yes, tell him. He's bound to find out sooner or later. Skinner, I could
+stand the loss of the ship, but what breaks me all up is the thought
+that after forty years of honorable business my friends and my enemies
+might suspect me of being a filibuster. I, Alden P. Ricks, whose
+great-grandfather died at Yorktown, whose grandfather was killed at
+Lundy's Lane, whose father won a medal of honor at Chapultepec--I,
+Alden P. Ricks, who had to belong to the Home Guard because I was such
+a little runt they wouldn't take me in the Civil War--to think that I
+should attain to seventy years and even be suspected of staining the
+flag of my country for the sake of a few dirty dollars--after all the
+Ricks blood that has been shed for that flag! Horrible!”
+
+Mr. Skinner turned away for, man and boy, he had spent twenty-five years
+under Cappy Ricks, and he loved him. He could not bear to see the old
+man suffer.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+When Michael J. Murphy returned to consciousness he found himself in his
+berth, although for all the effort he made to verify this fact it might
+have been Mr. Reardon's. For fully half an hour he lay there, gradually
+straightening out the tangle in his intellect, and presently he was
+aware that the back of his head was very sore and ached, so he put up
+his hand to rub it and found a lump as large as a walnut. His right
+shoulder was numb and he was unable to move it, although this would not
+have surprised him had he been aware that a hundred and eighty pounds
+of Teutonic masculinity had landed on that shoulder with both feet and
+dislocated it. As it was, the skipper wondered vaguely if the ship's
+funnel had fallen over on him. His right side ached externally, and when
+he sighed it ached internally. That was a broken rib tickling his lung,
+for, while he was in blissful ignorance of the reason therefor, the
+chronicler of this tale can serve no good purpose by concealing the true
+facts in the case. Immediately upon regaining consciousness, Herr August
+Carl von Staden had insisted upon returning Michael J. Murphy's kicks
+with compound interest.
+
+“Holy mackerel!” the skipper murmured. “I feel like I've been fed into
+a concrete mixer. The only injury I can account for is my left shoulder,
+where that supercargo shot me.”
+
+After spending another half hour in mild speculation on these phenomena
+he was aware of an added impediment in breathing, so he put his hand
+up to his nose and found it clogged with blood. His luxuriant black
+mustache prevented an extended examination of his upper lip, but
+nevertheless, something told him it was split. A hard foreign substance
+lying between his right cheek and the inferior maxillary he concluded
+must be the pit of an olive left over from dinner. Subsequently,
+however, he discovered it was one of his own teeth. So he swore a mighty
+oath and felt considerably better.
+
+“This is certainly mutiny on the high seas and punishable by hanging,”
+ he soliloquized. “I wonder if Cappy Ricks would know me now;” and he
+reached up to turn the switch of the electric light over his berth.
+He turned the switch, but the light did not come on, and while he lay
+considering this state of affairs, he was aware that something that was
+not his head was throbbing in the ship. He decided presently that it was
+her engines. From the steady rhythmic pulsations he realized the vessel
+was being driven full speed ahead; and since he could not recall having
+given any orders to that effect, he was not long in arriving at the
+correct answer to the riddle--whereupon Michael J. Murphy did what
+every shipmaster does when he loses the ship he loves and finds himself
+ravished of his reputation as a sane and careful skipper. He wept!
+
+Those who know the breed will bid you beware the Irish when they weep
+from any cause save grief or sympathy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+Cappy Ricks, who claimed to know Mike Murphy's kind of Irish, doubtless
+would have been extremely gratified had he been granted a peep at the
+battered, bleeding, weeping wreck of his faithful Michael as the pride
+of the Blue Star fleet rolled south to meet the grey sea rovers of the
+Fatherland and deliver the cargo of coal that meant so much to them. The
+sight might have aroused some hope in Cappy's heavy heart, he being by
+nature inconsistent and always seeing a profit where others found naught
+but a deficit. However, though Cappy was variously gifted he was not
+a clairvoyant, in consequence of which he spent a very sleepless night
+following the receipt of that windy cablegram from the American consul.
+He dined at his club, and when it was time for him to leave and his
+daughter sent her car for him, he lacked the courage to go home and face
+his son-in-law. So he spent the night at the club and came down to the
+office about noon, hoping Matt Peasley would have recovered from the
+shock by that time. The latter was waiting for him, and came into
+Cappy's sanctum immediately to hold a post-mortem.
+
+“Matthew, my dear boy,” said Cappy miserably, “this is terrible.”
+
+“I think we should take the matter up immediately with the State
+Department,” Matt replied. “There may be a United States warship in
+those waters, and she could be instructed by wireless to endeavor to
+intercept the _Narcissus._ We can prove a clean bill of health with
+those cablegrams, and get back our ship.”
+
+“Yes--from our own Government, of course. But, oh, Matt, if old Johnny
+Bull ever gets his horns into her we can kiss her good-bye. We can't
+bring forward any evidence to alibi that German crew on a ship so far
+off her course and loaded with contraband.”
+
+“Well, I know if I were skippering a British warship and picked up the
+_Narcissus,_ her owners would find I was born and bred in Missouri,” the
+honest Matt admitted. “By the way, have you read this morning's papers?”
+
+“No, Matt. I've felt too blamed miserable about this _Narcissus_
+affair.”
+
+“Well, the _Scharnhorst_, the _Gneisenau_, the _Leipzig,_, the _Dresden_
+and the _Nurnberg_ met a British fleet under Admiral Craddock, away down
+off Coronel, Chile. The British were cleaned for fair.”
+
+“You don't tell me!”
+
+“I do tell you. And I'll bet my immortal soul that German fleet is
+heading for the entrance to Magellan this minute. If I were a religious
+man I'd be praying for clear weather so they'll find the entrance
+without any trouble.”
+
+“I hope they run ashore and drown every man Jack!” cried Cappy fiercely.
+
+“I do not. You will note that our charterers tried to induce Mike to go
+to Montevideo for orders. That was because they expected to lie snug at
+Montevideo and be within striking distance of a designated meeting place
+in the South Atlantic when the German fleet should pass through Magellan
+from the Pacific. Remember that for several weeks the German fleet has
+managed to lose itself in the Pacific, but now that the British fleet
+has stumbled onto it and forced an engagement, the Australian and
+Japanese cruisers will all be headed for the south coast of Chile to
+make reprisal. We know the Germans are short of coal; doubtless some of
+the fleet have suffered in the engagement with Admiral Craddock's
+ships, so it's a safe bet they'll run into the Atlantic now and raid the
+Falkland Islands--by the way, a British possession. They will hope to
+find coal and stores there, which, with the cargo of the _Narcissus,_
+will enable them to continue raiding.
+
+“Of course they will try to accomplish this before England sends a fleet
+to avenge Craddock--and I'm hoping the Germans will succeed, for, if
+they do, they will surely be decent enough to run our _Narcissus_ into
+some South American port and give us an opportunity to get her back
+again. On the other hand, if the Germans delay their departure from the
+Pacific, the British will surely get wind of the _Narcissus_ waiting at
+Montevideo; and when she comes out they'll just naturally grab her.”
+
+“I guess you're right,” Cappy replied gloomily; “so for the present
+we're pro-German. Still, I find that a hard dose to swallow, in view of
+the fact that our German crew in the _Narcissus_ has evidently taken the
+vessel away from Mike Murphy.”
+
+“I am sure they have done just that, sir; otherwise Mike would have
+obeyed our orders. We know he received the orders; hence the only reason
+he did not carry them out was because he wasn't permitted to do so. My
+only hope is that they haven't killed him, for if he is alive and free,
+he and Reardon, with the assistance of the cockney steward and the two
+Chinese cooks, might--”
+
+“Might what?”
+
+“Might steal her back again.”
+
+“Matt! It isn't possible, is it?”
+
+“I'll bet Mike Murphy and I could steal her back if we had half a
+chance. The odds would be forty to two against our succeeding, but a
+little strategy is sometimes to be preferred to great horsepower. I
+think I could do it, and I think Murphy will do it--if he only thinks of
+it.”
+
+“How? Tell me how you'd steal her back.”
+
+“What's the use?” Matt replied wearily. “I'd have to have help. So will
+Mike--and I've just remembered Mike Murphy and Terence Reardon are the
+wrong kind of Irish to have together in the same ship. We did our best
+to prevent it, but the odds are too long for us; the coal is for the
+Germans and we hate England, so why worry? I know Mike Murphy will not
+take that view of it; for my sake he'll fight to the last gasp, but he
+must have help, and Reardon owes me no such allegiance as Murphy.”
+
+“Well, he owes me something,” Cappy spoke up. “You promised him a
+hundred and seventy-five dollars a month and I raised the ante to two
+hundred. It was an investment, pure and simple. I was buying loyalty,
+and by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, I think I'll get it. Come to think
+of it, there was a look in Reardon's eyes that I liked, when he took my
+hand in those greasy paws of his and said he was a proud man to work for
+me. Matt, that fellow is full of bellicose veins. He may not fight
+for me, but he'll fight for Mrs. Reardon and the children and that
+two-hundred-dollar-a-month job, for it's the first he's ever had and
+if he loses out it'll be the last he'll ever get. He was telling me all
+about his family and how much the job meant to him, that day we had the
+_Narcissus_ out on her trial trip.”
+
+Matt Peasley's face brightened. “By Jupiter, that puts a different face
+on the situation. If Reardon is alive they might get together for mutual
+protection.”
+
+“Well,” Cappy piped up, greatly relieved to discover Matt was facing the
+tragedy so optimistically, “we might do worse than hope. Wire the State
+Department, Matt; and in the meanwhile, cheer up, sonny, and trust in
+the luck of Alden P. Ricks. I remember Captain Noah Kendall--peace to
+his ashes--used to say to me: 'Mr. Ricks, if you ever fell into Channel
+Creek at low tide you'd come up with a pearl necklace wrapped round your
+ankle, and you'd be smelling like a spray of lemon verbena.' Cheer up,
+Matt! What though the cause be lost, the _Narcissus_ is not lost--yet.
+The Celtic troops remain, and from now on my war cry is going to be--”
+
+“Ireland uber Alles,” Matt Peasley suggested.
+
+“You're blamed whistlin'!” said Cappy Ricks.
+
+So Mr. Skinner was called into consultation, and he and Matt Peasley and
+Cappy drew up a heart-rending telegram to the Secretary of State,
+who consulted with the Secretary of the Navy, who wired the Blue Star
+Navigation Company that he was sorry but he didn't have as much as a
+rowboat in the South Atlantic to save their steamer _Narcissus,_ and
+would they please keep still about it, since a noise like that, unless
+absolutely based on facts--and he understood their wail to be based on
+suspicion--would tend to create additional friction in an international
+complication already strained to the breaking point. Whereupon Cappy
+Ricks flew into a rage and immediately dictated a long letter to his
+congressman and his senator, urging them to battle to the last trench in
+the campaign for a two-power navy.
+
+Time passed. Then suddenly the world rocked with the news of the
+annihilation of the German Pacific fleet off the Falkland Islands. Cappy
+Ricks and Matt Peasley read the horrid tale in the morning papers as
+they sat at breakfast, and immediately both lost all interest in food.
+Like two mourners about to set out for the morgue to identify the corpse
+of a loved one recently killed by a taxicab, they drove down to the Blue
+Star offices, where immediately upon arrival something terrible in Mr.
+Skinner's face brought on palpitation of Cappy Ricks' heart.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he chattered, “Have you any news?”
+
+“Not yet, sir,” murmured Mr. Skinner brokenly, “but soon! The British
+consul wants you to ring him up. He says he's had a wireless from
+H.M.S. _Panther,_ off the Falkland Islands, and he thinks it will be of
+interest to you.”
+
+“Is my _Narcissus_ confiscated?” Cappy and Matt cried in chorus.
+
+“I--I don't know,” Skinner faltered. “I just didn't have the courage to
+pursue the matter further. The British consul said she was captured but
+as for con--”
+
+“Idiot! Bonehead!” rasped Cappy. “My _Narcissus_ is gone--gone! Oh,
+Lord! Matt, you ring up the British consul--I'm an old man--Skinner, my
+dear chap, forgive my harsh language. Have you a little drop of whisky
+in the office?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+Capt. Michael J. Murphy's futile tears of rage having dried almost as
+quickly as they came, he crawled painfully out of his berth and lighted
+a match, to discover he was a prisoner in his own state-room. He turned
+another electric switch, but still the room remained in darkness.
+
+“Sneaking out of Pernambuco with the lights doused,” he soliloquized.
+Then he remembered a little stump of candle he kept in his desk for use
+when heating sealing wax, so he lighted the candle and by its meager
+rays took inventory of his features in the little mirror over his
+washstand.
+
+“By the Toe Nails of Moses,” he soliloquized, “somebody's sea-boots did
+that, and if I ever find out who was wearing them at the time there'll
+be a fight or a footrace. I'm a total wreck and no insurance--yes, thank
+God! here's the ship's medicine chest.”
+
+Having spent the greater portion of an adventurous career far
+from medical aid in time of bodily stress, Michael J. was, as most
+shipmasters are, rather adept in rough-and-tumble surgery. His compact
+little library contained a common-sense treatise on the care of burns,
+scalds, cuts, fractures and the few minor physical diseases that sailors
+are heir to, and in accordance with immemorial custom he, as master of
+the ship, was the custodian of the medicine chest. So he washed the gore
+from his face, disinfected his split lip and patched himself up after
+a fashion. The bullet wound in his left shoulder proved to be a flesh
+wound, high up, so he cleaned that and decided his left wing would be
+in fair fighting order within a few days. Then he undressed and said his
+prayers, with a special invocation for help from his patron saint,
+holy Saint Michael, the archangel. Evidently Saint Michael inclined a
+friendly ear, for it is a curious fact that no sooner had his namesake
+risen from his marrow bones than a curious sense of peace and comfort
+stole over him. As in a vision he saw Herr August Carl von Staden
+standing on the bridge, bound at ankle, knee and hand and with a rope
+round his neck. From the supercargo's neck the rope led aloft through a
+small snatch-block fastened to the end of a cargo derrick and thence to
+the drum of the forward winch--a device which had been known to hoist
+with a jerk objects several tons heavier than Herr August Carl von
+Staden! This picture thus conjured in Murphy's imagination was so real
+he was almost tempted to recite the litany for the dying!
+
+“'Twould have been better for them had they killed me dead and hove my
+carcass overboard,” he decided. “The fact that they didn't, but took the
+trouble to carry me to my own bed and lock me in, is proof that they'll
+not murder me now--so I'll not worry. I'll have every beer-drinking,
+sausage-making son of a seacook begging me for mercy before the week is
+out. I'll just lie low and rest up a bit, and by the time we're off Rio
+I'll drop on them like a top-mast in a typhoon. Then with the help of
+the two Chinamen, the steward and Reardon 'twill not be hard to run her
+into Rio. I wonder if that pirate frisked me of my five thousand.” He
+searched through his clothing and was amazed to discover that the bills
+were still in his possession.
+
+“I'll give them back in the morning,” he concluded. “I had a pistol in
+the drawer of my desk and a rifle in that locker;” and in the wild hope
+that his luck still held, he searched eagerly for both. They were gone.
+
+Nevertheless, Michael J. Murphy smiled as he wrapped a wet towel round
+his throbbing head, for he had already decided upon his plan of campaign
+for regaining command of his ship, a _coup_ for which he required no
+weapon more formidable than his native intelligence. As he sank groaning
+into the arms of Morpheus, however, even a Digger Indian would have
+realized that for the next two weeks the master of the _Narcissus_ would
+be unable to defend himself against an old lady armed with a slipper.
+Nevertheless, the indomitable fellow, with the amazing optimism of
+his race, had already decided to attack and subdue, within four
+days, thirty-six husky male enemies; which lends some color to the
+oft-repeated declaration that an Irishman fights best when he is on his
+back with his opponent feeling for his windpipe.
+
+When Michael J. Murphy awoke it was broad daylight and Herr August
+Carl von Staden was standing over him. The supercargo was clad in an
+immaculate suit of white flannels and was looking as fresh as new paint.
+
+“Can it be possible?” Murphy queried in amazement. “Upon my word, friend
+pirate, I had flattered myself I'd tucked you away for a couple of days
+at least.”
+
+“The excellent Mr. Henckel tells me I was out for ten minutes from
+that solar-plexus blow you landed,” Mr. von Staden replied in tones of
+mingled admiration and friendliness. “And of course you cannot see how
+sore my ribs feel. I take it rather ill of you to have kicked me.”
+
+“Kicked you! I wish I'd killed you! And, speaking of kicks, somebody
+certainly kicked me. Who was it?”
+
+“Upon recovering consciousness,” the supercargo replied with some
+embarrassment, “I was overcome with fury. You were lying on the floor of
+your stateroom, where Mr. Schultz and Mr. Henckel had hurriedly tossed
+you--so I came in and kicked you.”
+
+“I never kicked you in the face,” Murphy complained.
+
+“No, but you flattened my nose with your code book.”
+
+“Well, I'll admit a good smack on the nose does make a man mad. But
+you shot me in the shoulder. By the way, do your lungs hurt when you
+breathe, Dutchy?”
+
+“No. Do yours?”
+
+“A slight tickle. I think you caved in my super-structure. Who jumped on
+me from the top of the house?”
+
+“The second mate.”
+
+“He dislocated my shoulder. I can wiggle my fingers, so I know it isn't
+a fracture. Suppose you take off your shoe, sit at the foot of my bed,
+put your foot under my right armpit and press, and at the same time pull
+on my right arm.”
+
+“Delighted, I'm sure,” declared Herr von Staden in his charming Oxford
+accent, and forthwith snapped Michael J. Murphy's shoulder into place
+with great dexterity.
+
+“Thank you,” the skipper answered, and wiped the beads of agony from his
+white face. “If you'll frisk my trousers over there on the settee you'll
+find the five thousand dollars you gave me to sell out my owners. I
+don't want it. I never intended to keep it. I was suspicious of you and
+your confounded cablegrams, and I had to have a reasonable excuse to go
+ashore and cable my owners for confirmation. The bribe furnished that
+excuse. I suppose you thought I'd fallen for your game.”
+
+“I must confess your attitude completely deceived me.”
+
+“Thanks for the compliment. And now, if you don't mind, suppose you
+tell me something: Was it a German agent who put the bug in my ear about
+hiring the crew of that interned German liner in San Francisco?”
+
+“I greatly fear it was,” von Staden answered smilingly. “There is an
+old man who presides over the destinies of the Blue Star Navigation
+Company--”
+
+“You mean Cappy Ricks?”
+
+“I believe that is the name. He has a reputation for being at once the
+most reckless spendthrift and the most painstaking money saver in the
+world. He is always preaching economy--”
+
+“And well I know it. If he hadn't preached it, Captain Peasley would
+never have stood for this rabble your friends wished on me.”
+
+The supercargo chuckled. “We wanted the largest vessel we could find,”
+ he explained; “and when it was reported to us that the Blue Star
+Navigation Company's _Narcissus_ was going from San Francisco to the
+West Coast and thence to New York with nitrate, we decided to get her.
+We investigated you. Your name is Michael J. Murphy; naturally we knew
+you were Irish; and the Irish--your kind of Irish--are not sympathetic
+toward the cause of Merry England. The same held true of your chief
+engineer, Mr. Reardon. We knew of the passion of this interesting
+person, Cappy Ricks, for cutting down expenses. We knew you and Reardon
+were new to your jobs and would be likely to consider any reasonable
+plan for eliminating expense in your respective departments, in the hope
+of pleasing your employer. So the suggestion that you ship our people
+was made to you and Reardon, and you accepted it with alacrity. The rest
+was very easy. We got in touch with your New York agents through some
+friends of ours in very good standing there, and they were enabled to
+charter the ship merely by offering an extraordinary freight rate. They
+purchased the cargo of coal and sold it to us at a nice profit, and we
+depended on your national animosity and racial sympathy, seasoned with a
+liberal cash subsidy, to enable us to deliver it. We preferred to do
+the decent thing, but in the event that you proved unreasonable, we
+concluded it would be wise to have our own people aboard and take the
+vessel away from you. I admit we tried to trick you with the cablegrams.
+Why attempt to conceal the fact now? That was unsportsmanlike. However,
+if the fat is in the fire, as you Americans would say, you have put it
+there by forcing my hand.”
+
+“Very cleverly done,” quoth Michael J. Murphy. “I always admire brains
+wherever I find them.”
+
+“Men in my line of endeavor are trained to provide for all conceivable
+emergencies, captain. I think I provided for all of them in the case
+under discussion. Who, for instance, would conceive that you would
+have taken the trouble to call upon the American consul for the
+cipher message that has caused all this unpleasant row and facial
+disfigurement?”
+
+“You have read the translation, of course?”
+
+“Naturally.”
+
+“It is self-explanatory. You intend delivering my cargo somewhere
+off the south coast of Uruguay. May I be pardoned for expressing some
+curiosity as to your plans thereafter, my piratical friend?”
+
+“Please do not call me your piratical friend.”
+
+“Well, you're a pirate, aren't you?”
+
+“Legally--yes. Morally--no. In times of national necessity one's
+patriotism--one's duty to one's country--excuses, in the minds of all
+fair men, the commission of acts which ordinarily would bring about the
+deepest condemnation. I assure you that if we had had the faintest hope
+of doing business in a businesslike way with your owners, we should have
+been happy to pay almost any price for their ship, for she carries ten
+thousand tons of coal; and you surely must realize, Captain Murphy,
+how limited is the number of ships suitable for our purpose under the
+American flag. We were desperate--”
+
+“I believe Bethmann-Hollweg said something of the same nature with
+regard to Belgium,” Murphy replied blandly. “A nation fighting for its
+life is a law unto itself, eh?”
+
+“Self-preservation is the first law of human nature,” the supercargo
+replied.
+
+“All right. Then we understand each other. While I decline to terminate
+the war between August Carl von Staden and Michael Joseph Murphy,
+nevertheless under the law you have just cited I believe I'm entitled
+to breakfast. I'm starved. I figured on having supper ashore last night,
+but after I received that cablegram from my owners I forgot all about
+food. Now I'm remembering. I wish you'd send the steward in with about
+forty dollars' worth of spoon victuals. My grinders are very loose.”
+
+“Captain Murphy,” his jailer declared, “do you know you are a very
+wonderful man?”
+
+“All the Murphys are. It runs in the blood, like a wooden leg.”
+
+“I really regret that you are such a wonderful man. If you were not
+I'd give you the liberty of the ship. As it is, I crave your pardon for
+keeping you a prisoner in your state-room. The exigencies of war, you
+know.”
+
+“Don't mention it, Dutchy. For the second time I ask you: When you have
+delivered this cargo of coal, what do you intend to do with my ship?”
+
+“We will, in all probability, give you a new crew, and the present crew
+of the _Narcissus_ will go aboard one of our warships and thus remove
+themselves from the reach of a possible indictment for piracy and mutiny
+on the high seas.”
+
+“Where will you get a new crew for me?”
+
+“Our fleet has sunk a few British tramps in mid-ocean during the past
+sixty days. Naturally they removed the crews first. These prisoners are
+in our way, and the admiral will welcome an opportunity to load them all
+aboard the empty _Narcissus_, for even prisoners of war must eat,
+and the stores aboard our fleet are more valuable than these captured
+seamen. In obedience to that first law of human nature they will not
+object to working the _Narcissus_ into the nearest South American port.”
+
+“Well, that's comforting; but for heaven's sake don't be too much of a
+hog with my cargo. Leave me enough of it to carry my ship to the
+nearest port. She burns about thirty-five tons a day--you might get the
+statistics from Reardon.”
+
+“By all means, captain. Our capture of the _Narcissus_ is merely
+a deplorable national necessity. We would not lose her for you for
+anything.”
+
+“How about a British cruiser picking her up before we make connections
+with your fleet?”
+
+Herr von Staden shrugged. “That,” he replied, “would be the fortune of
+war.”
+
+“It would look like the picture of misfortune to me. And how about the
+freight on this cargo you've stolen? Don't my owners get something out
+of this deal to help pay expenses? You're going to play as fair as you
+can with me, aren't you, Dutchy?”
+
+“By all means. However, you are evidently in doubt as to the real
+situation. Your charterers are responsible to your owners for the
+freight money. If they do not pay it Mr. Cappy Ricks can sue them. As
+for the cargo, we have not stolen it, since one cannot steal that which
+one owns. We paid cash for this cargo before you cleared from Norfolk,
+for our go-between would take no risks whatsoever.”
+
+“I see. Well, I suppose I'll have to grin and bear it. By the way, don't
+forget to take back your blood money. It's in my trousers pocket.”
+
+Von Staden was genuinely distressed. “Are you quite certain you want
+me to do that?” he queried. “Five thousand dollars is quite a sum for a
+poor sea captain to toss aside so contemptuously. Why not accept it as
+compensation for that broken rib, and that bullet I put through your
+left shoulder, the dislocated right shoulder, the loose teeth and the
+split lip? In fact, I am so certain five thousand dollars will not cover
+your personal injuries I am willing to be a sport and add something to
+the sum.”
+
+Michael J. Murphy grinned--rather a horrible grin it was, owing to his
+swollen lip and jaw.
+
+“Dutchy,” he said, “listen to me: All the money in the world couldn't
+make me be untrue to my salt. And if you have any lingering notion that
+I'm not going to collect a million dollars' worth of satisfaction
+for the way you've acted aboard my ship, I can only say that as a
+fortune-teller you'll never earn enough money to keep yourself in
+cigarettes. You say you have been trained to provide for all conceivable
+emergencies, so I'm advising you, as a friend, to brace yourself for the
+surprise of your life before you're a week older. Have you pondered the
+possibility of sudden death aboard the S.S. _Narcissus?_”
+
+“Certainly. Should we be overhauled by a British cruiser I should take
+a short cut to eternity. One naturally dislikes the thought of being
+hanged for a pirate. It would be a reflection on one's family. As for
+sudden death by violence at the hands of any member of the crew of this
+steamship, I should be willing to risk quite a sum of money that no such
+tragedy will be enacted.”
+
+“Just why?”
+
+“Well, you'll be safe in this stateroom until I am ready to turn your
+command back to you, and a man with two shoulders in the condition
+of yours is hardly likely to try battering down this stout state-room
+door.”
+
+“Correct. And I'm a trifle too thick in the middle to think of crawling
+through the state-room window.”
+
+“And if,” the supercargo continued, “you have any idea of calling the
+engine-room on that speaking tube and soliciting aid from Mr. Reardon,
+please be advised that for the present Mr. Reardon has been relieved
+from duty in the engine-room.”
+
+“So you've got Reardon locked up, too?” Murphy queried. “Well! Well! I'd
+hate to think of being locked up and that man Reardon free. However, you
+need not have worried. I'd die before I'd ask that fellow for help--and
+he'd die before he'd give it.”
+
+“So I understand from the first mate. However, I thought it prudent
+to guard against a temporary truce and an alliance for the common
+interest.”
+
+“Dutchy,” said the skipper, “you're pretty smart.”
+
+Von Staden smiled most companionably. “I also took the precaution to
+remove some weapons from your apartment.”
+
+“Take anything from me, Dutchy, except my honor, my pipe and tobacco,
+and my ship. Take any one of those four, however, and may the Lord
+have mercy on your soul. Please hand me that book entitled _Backwood's
+Surgery_ till I see what's good for a broken rib; then send the steward
+for my breakfast order. After that--well, after that you might make your
+will, Dutchy.”
+
+“I did that in Pernambuco,” the delightful Herr von Staden replied, “so
+your advice is wasted.”
+
+He handed the skipper the book on surgery and went out, carefully
+locking the door behind him. He returned presently and stood beside the
+steward, who thrust his head through the state-room window and desired
+to know the captain's choice of breakfast.
+
+“A bowl of mush and milk, three soft-boiled eggs and a pot of coffee. No
+toast. Hurry!”
+
+When the steward returned with the order he was accompanied by Mr.
+Schultz, the first mate. The sight of the traitor threw Mike into a
+furious rage.
+
+“Mr. Schultz,” he said ominously, “the things I'm going to do to you
+would make the devil blush.”
+
+“So?” Mr. Schultz replied soothingly.
+
+“I'm going to hang von Staden. He's a pirate, and the rule of the Seven
+Seas is that a skipper hangs a pirate whenever he can lay hands on him.
+And you know me, Mr. Schultz. I'm a devil for etiquette aboard ship.
+As for you, you're only guilty of mutiny, so I'll content myself with
+tricing you up to the shrouds and flogging you with a cat soaked in
+brine.”
+
+And so on, _ad libitum, ad infinitum_.
+
+Mr. Schultz was frankly mystified. Being a German, he did not understand
+the Irish, although in view of the fact that during the war he had room
+in his head for but one thing--the Fatherland--perhaps the skipper might
+have pardoned his mate the glance of contempt and utter disgust which
+the latter now bent upon him. Here was a man, Mr. Schultz told himself,
+who, having stipulated his price and struck a bargain, had demonstrated
+beyond cavil that he was not a gentleman, for he had refused to stay
+bought. More, he had basely attacked his benefactor.
+
+“So?” he repeated.
+
+“Out, you blackguard, and leave me alone!” Murphy yelled.
+
+“It iss an order dot I stay und see dot der steward shall mayg no
+conversations vatsoefer,” Mr. Schultz declared firmly.
+
+“Verboten, eh?” sneered the skipper. He had once been to Hamburg, and
+naturally he had acquired the word most commonly used in the German
+language.
+
+“_Ja_,” Mr. Schultz replied placidly, but with an air of finality that
+left no room for further argument.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+In the course of the afternoon, having chewed the bitter cud of
+reflection and reviewed his situation from every possible angle, Mike
+Murphy came to the conclusion that, for all Terence Reardon's religious
+backsliding, he might be fairly honest in money matters and possessed
+of a sense of loyalty where his owners' interests were concerned. Also,
+having found Herr von Staden bluffing in one instance it occurred to the
+captain he might be discovered bluffing in another--so he resolved to
+investigate. Accordingly at an hour when he knew Terence should be in
+the engine room he took up the speaking-tube at the head of his bed and
+blew into it. But no shrill whistle signalled his desire in the engine
+room, and though Michael blew until he was red in the face and his lips
+hurt him cruelly, reluctantly he came to the conclusion that Herr August
+Carl von Staden had the situation very well in hand and Terence Reardon
+in the latter's state-room under lock and key.
+
+He was right in one particular: von Staden had the situation very well
+in hand, but he did not have Terence Reardon under lock and key. Murphy
+had been balked in making connections with the unsuspecting Terence for
+the reason that a little ball of cotton waste had very carefully been
+tucked into the engine-room howler a few inches at the back of the
+whistle at the chief's end of the tube. Hence, in the event that one
+sought to whistle up the other, he merely wasted his breath. Having
+learned, on the very excellent authority of both men in the case, that
+they despised each other and were not on speaking terms, von Staden
+decided that the chance of Terence Reardon's listening to Michael
+J. Murphy's tale of piracy and mutiny was so vague as to be almost
+negligible. However, he was painstaking and careful in all things and
+never ran any unnecessary risks; consequently, just to be on the safe
+side, he had instructed the first assistant to plug the speaking-tube
+leading to the skipper's room. And in order to discourage the captain
+from, seeking an interview with the chief, von Staden had told the
+former that the chief was a prisoner.
+
+Mr. Reardon was too important a personage to be deprived of his liberty
+when nothing was to be gained by such action. If he could be kept in
+ignorance of the state of affairs aboard the _Narcissus_, he would
+continue to attend to business; if the worst came to the worst
+his friendship would be a better asset than his hatred. If he grew
+suspicious and demanded a showdown, Herr von Staden would give it to him
+without reservation and stuff his mouth with gold; then, if the chief
+declined to listen to reason, it would be time enough to lock him up.
+While the supercargo would not hesitate to sacrifice his life, his
+liberty, or his honor for his country, he was nevertheless desirous of
+being a gentleman if accorded the opportuniby. And it must be admitted
+he had found Mr. Reardon amusing and vastly entertaining, for the very
+first night aboard, after Mr. Schultz had introduced him to the chief
+and he had presented the latter with a good cigar, Mr. Reardon, under
+the spell of the witchery cast by the sea and the night, had sat on
+deck and told the German wonderful tales of the fairies in Ireland--this
+while the skipper was ashore. In particular he told von Staden the tale
+of the fairy queen with the iron hand.
+
+“Her hand,” said Terence, “was as beautiful as ye'd find in a day's
+thravel, an' 'twas herself that'd dhrive men crazy afther wan look at
+her. An' she was good to the poor, but divii a bit av love did she have
+for a redcoat. Whin she'd take human form an' a bowld buck av a British
+dragoon would come making love to her, 'tis herself would say to him:
+'Captain, alannah, would ye oblige me wit' a dhrink av wather?' An'
+whin he turrned to dhraw the wather, she'd breathe on her hand--like
+that--an' immejiately 'twould turn to iron an' wit' wan blow she'd knock
+his brains out. Sure they found the bodies all over Ireland, but divil
+a man, woman, or child could they ever convict av the murrder. For why?
+Why, sure, the minute she'd killed a redcoat she'd breathe on her hand
+ag'in, an' immejiately 'twas flesh an' blood ag'in!”
+
+No, decidedly it would not do to imprison this excellent fellow. Von
+Staden had read fairy tales as a boy, but never had he met a man who
+could tell them like Terence Reardon. A hard-headed, highly intelligent
+chief engineer of a big tramp steamer telling tales of the fairies! Von
+Staden couldn't understand it. It was so childish--and yet there was
+nothing childish about Terence Reardon. The German wondered if Terence
+Reardon believed in the fairies and finally he asked him point-blank if
+he did; whereupon Terence turned a solemn eye upon him and replied:
+
+“Why, av course I do not. Do you think I'm a blubber-jack av a bhoy? But
+isn't it pleasant to talk about thim whilst wan has nothing betther to
+do? Sure, whin I'm lonely at night I think up new fairy tales to tell to
+the childhren whin I come home from a v'yage.”
+
+So that was the Irish of it! Strangely enough it did not occur to the
+practical German that an individual with an imagination like that,
+on such an expedition as the present, was the most dangerous person
+imaginable to be given the freedom of the ship.
+
+So passed twelve days and nights. Mr. Schultz kept in his pocket the key
+to the captain's state-room, and consequently was always present when
+the little cockney steward brought the prisoner his meals, tidied up the
+state-room and made up the captain's bed. The captain spent most of
+his time lying on his uninjured side and remained very quiet, for the
+fractured rib, which had received no attention, was causing him a great
+deal of suffering. Neither did the bullet wound in his shoulder heal
+cleanly, for the reason, unknown to the captain, that the bullet had
+carried with it into the muscle a fragment of Michael J.'s undershirt.
+
+However, his physical sufferings were as nothing compared with those
+he experienced mentally. He had hoped to be in fair fighting condition
+within a week at the latest. Wrapped in paper and tucked away in the
+back of the ship's safe he had a silver-hilted stiletto he had taken
+away from a cutthroat who had tried to rob him once in Valparaiso--and
+with this weapon he had planned to cut away the lock on the state-room
+door. And once outside--
+
+What Michael J. Murphy did not know was that when one has dislocated
+one's shoulder one will do very little wood-carving during the three
+subsequent weeks. It almost broke the skipper's heart to think he had
+made a threat in good faith, and was balked from making it good.
+
+During this entire period Mr. Reardon was going about his duties as
+usual, in absolute ignorance of the state of affairs about the ship, for
+he was an innocent, trustful sort of fellow, and to a born romanticist
+like Terence the fairy tale which Mr. Schultz had spun at breakfast
+the morning after leaving Pernambuco was not at all difficult of
+assimilation. It appeared--according to Mr. Schultz--that the skipper
+had gone ashore for a night of roystering, and upon returning to
+the ship about midnight, in a wild state of intoxication, had become
+involved in an altercation with the launchman over the fare. In the
+resultant battle the skipper, in his helpless condition, was being
+terribly beaten by the vicious Pernambucan; hence one could scarcely
+blame him for drawing a pistol and shooting the launchman--fatally,
+according to Mr. Schultz. Of course, after that, to have lingered longer
+inside the three-mile limit would have been sheer insanity, so Mr.
+Schultz, taking matters into his own hands, had uphooked and skipped
+with doused lights from the jurisdiction of the Pernambuco police.
+
+“And how did the skipper come out of all this?” Mr. Reardon had inquired
+anxiously.
+
+“He iss in rodden shape,” Mr. Schultz had declared. “Von of hiss angles
+vos brogen, und he vos cut mid a knive--preddy deeb, but noddings to
+worry aboud. Der only drouble iss der dooty of navigading der shib falls
+double on der segond mate und me.”
+
+“Make him pay ye over-time out av his own wages, the wurthless
+vagabone!” Mr. Reardon had urged. “May he walk wit' a limp for the
+rest av his days--bad cess to him! I've a notion, Misther Schultz, that
+lad'll never comb his hair grey.”
+
+Mr. Schultz nodded lugubriously; then he glanced up and caught the
+little cockney steward staring at him so balefully, that he realized he
+must have speech in private with the steward. Consequently he lingered
+at table until Mr. Reardon finished his breakfast and went below;
+whereupon Mr. Schultz intimated to the steward, in his direct blunt
+fashion, that for the remainder of the voyage, Riggins--for that was
+the steward's name--was to consider himself deaf, dumb and blind; the
+penalty for reconsideration within the hearing of Mr. Reardon being a
+swift and immediate excursion, personally conducted by Mr. Schultz, to
+Davy Jones's locker! Following this earnest exhortation, Riggins, never
+a robust person mentally or physically, came abruptly to the conclusion
+that this was one of those occasions where silence, if not exactly
+golden, was at least to be preferred to great riches.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+IT may appear strange that during the days and nights Michael J. Murphy
+lay on his bed of pain Terence Reardon did not once pass the little
+open window of the skipper's state-room. Not, however, that the latter
+watched for him, for he did not. He believed that Reardon, like himself,
+was a prisoner; although, had the chief passed the window and had the
+captain observed his passing, the complacence of Herr von Staden and his
+patriotic company would have received a jar much earlier in the voyage.
+
+Unfortunately, however, for Murphy's plans, the chief's stateroom was
+located in the after part of the house and on the side opposite the
+skipper's, and following their brief spat through the speaking-tube,
+Terence Reardon had confined himself exclusively to his engine-room
+and that portion of the ship along which he must of necessity pass when
+going to and from his state-room. He told himself it was the part of
+wisdom for one of his ferocious temper to avoid the occasions of sin.
+Certainly it would be hard to pass the skipper's state-room without
+looking in, particularly since in these warm latitudes the door would
+probably be open; for should the skipper be within at the time, they
+would peradventure scowl at each other, and he is a fool indeed who
+cannot foretell the future when a thousand generations of natural
+enemies exchange “the black look.” Terence remembered his boy Johnny, a
+youth who, according to Mrs. Reardon, should never be a marine engineer,
+but the finest lawyer that ever pouched a fat fee. And there was Mary
+Agnes and Catherine Bertram. Next year they would begin taking piano
+lessons, and in the fullness of time, no matter how hard the pull, both
+should go to the state university and acquire the education made to fit
+their father's head, but by force of circumstances denied him. And
+at the thought Terence looked at his hard black hands and set himself
+resolutely to face a life sentence of rattling ash hoists, roaring
+furnaces and the soft sucking sounds of the pistons. Two hundred dollars
+a month--and the union scale was a hundred and fifty! Ah, no, he dared
+not trifle with that job. He must, at all hazard, avoid friction with
+the skipper, for what would Mrs. Reardon say if Cappy Ricks forced
+him to roll the bones with Mike Murphy--one flop and high man out? Mr.
+Reardon could close his eyes and see Mike Murphy roll out a “stiff,”
+ while with trembling hand the Reardon rolled five sixes!
+
+The _Narcissus_ had been out of Pernambuco harbor four days before
+Mr. Reardon, upon comparing the sun--which all are agreed rises in
+the east--with the direction in which the ship was headed, and then
+extracting the cube root of the resultant product, and subtracting it
+from the longtitude and latitude of the Cape of Good Hope, decided that
+there must be something wrong with Mr. Schultz's navigation. So he spoke
+to Mr. Schultz about it, and was laughingly informed that they were
+traveling on a great circle. Thereupon Mr. Reardon remembered that at
+sea a ship traveling on the arc of a great circle, for some mysterious
+reason repudiates the old geometrical theorem that a straight line
+is the shortest distance between two points. He recalled that vessels
+plying between San Francisco and Yokohama describe a great circle which
+brings them well up toward the Aleutian Islands, So he was satisfied
+with the explanation, this being his first voyage into the South
+Atlantic anyhow; but he continued to observe the sun each morning, and
+still the vessel's head held far to the south. A suspicion that all was
+not as it should be slowly settled in Mr. Reardon's head, and though
+he said nothing, he used his ejes and ears. A dozen times a day, as the
+ship rolled steadily south, he was tempted to take down the speaking
+tube and confide his suspicions to the master, confined in his
+state-room by reason of deep--but not serious-knife wounds. Each time
+he was on the point of yielding, however, he remembered that Mike Murphy
+had called him a renegade--so he refrained.
+
+The installation of the wireless plant and the presence aboard the ship
+of Herr von Staden had failed to arouse his suspicions the first day
+out. True, the wireless could not have been connected with the electric
+light plant below without Mr. Reardon's knowledge and consent, but when
+he asked Mr. Schultz about it the latter replied that Cappy Ricks must
+have changed his mind about installing wireless on the _Narcissus_, for
+he had cabled to the agents of the charterers in Pernambuco to have
+a wireless plant and a competent operator waiting for the vessel upon
+arrival. It was Mr. Schultz's opinion that the owners had evidently
+arrived at the conclusion that it was wise to have a wireless aboard
+during war times. Personally, Mr. Schultz approved of the innovation.
+
+So did Terence Reardon, for that matter. He found the new wireless
+operator a charming fellow, possessed of talents far superior to those
+of the young men who ordinarily pound the brass at sea. Indeed, after
+the second day out, Mr. Reardon would have been heartbroken had anything
+happened to that wireless. For Herr August Carl von Staden sat at the
+key almost continuously, eavesdropping on the war news, and Mr. Reardon
+never came to the wireless room that the operator did not have some news
+of an overwhelming British defeat!
+
+As the voyage proceeded, however, and Mr. Reardon's mind grew a trifle
+uneasy, reluctantly he began to view Herr von Staden and the wireless
+with apprehension. He asked the affable operator how much the Marconi
+company charged the _Narcissus_ for his services and the rental of the
+wireless plant, and von Staden, momentarily stumped, replied that the
+tariff was two hundred dollars a month; whereupon Reardon knew he lied,
+for the charge is one hundred and forty. The German, realizing instantly
+that he was not on the target, added: “That is, for a first-grade
+operator and a plant like this. Of course we furnish cheaper operators
+and less powerful plants, Mr. Reardon.”
+
+“Oh! So that's the way av it?” the chief replied, and immediately went
+to his state-room for the purpose of thinking it over. Eventually he
+came to the conclusion that all was not as it should be, but that,
+nevertheless, it was no affair of his. He was paid to obey signals given
+him from the bridge.
+
+“'Tis no business av mine, afther all,” he soliloquized. “For why should
+I be puttin' dogs in windows? He's paid to navigate the ship, an' didn't
+Cappy Ricks tell me to mind me own business? And yet, there's something
+wrong in this ship. I feel it in me bones.”
+
+He felt it with a force that was almost violent when Mr. Schultz called
+down through the speaking-tube late one afternoon and told him to put
+her under a dead-slow bell. That meant they were practically heaving to,
+and steamers only heave to at sea in fine weather when they have reached
+a certain longitude and latitude and plan to keep an appointment. On the
+instant there was a strong odor of rat in Terence Reardon's engine
+room, but his “Very well, sir,” contained no hint of his surprise and
+suspicion. He gave his orders to the firemen to bank the fires, and when
+this had been done he informed his engine-room crew that they might
+all go on deck for five minutes and get a breath of fresh air. Nothing
+loath, they scrambled up the steel stairway--and the instant the last
+man was out of earshot Terence Reardon sprang to the speaking-tube to
+whistle up the skipper in his room.
+
+Now, undoubtedly the cool and calculating Herr August Carl von Staden
+had been carefully trained to take into consideration, when planning his
+strategy, every conceivable contingency that might possibly arise. It is
+probable that the German secret service never turned out a more finished
+graduate than Herr von Staden; but the fact remains, nevertheless, that
+there are certain contingencies over which no human being has control.
+One of these is Newton's law of gravitation; another, an equally
+immutable law to the effect that water will seek its own level; a third,
+the vindictiveness of an outraged Irishman; and a fourth, the very
+natural tendency of any man, not excepting Mr. Terence Reardon, to be
+profoundly surprised and intensely curious when certain phenomena, which
+we shall now proceed to explain, take place in the engine room where he
+is chief.
+
+Michael J. Murphy, having only the day before again essayed the task
+of whistling up the engine room, and having, by reason of the ball of
+cotton waste with which the tube had been plugged by the first assistant
+engineer, again failed to receive the courtesy of a reply from any one,
+had, to put it mildly, been annoyed.
+
+“Very well, my bullies,” he soliloquized as he hung up the tube, “you
+wouldn't speak to me when I wanted to speak to you; so now the first
+time one of you wants to speak to me I'll hand you a surprise, and
+I'll hand it to you right in the mouth.” And forthwith Michael J. had
+carefully poured down the speaking tube the contents of the basin in
+which he had just made his morning ablutions! He longed to do something
+nasty, and he succeeded admirably.
+
+As we have already remarked, water seeks its own level. It ran down the
+speaking-tube until it encountered the cotton waste plug; whereupon, due
+to the hydrostatic pressure, the plug gave way and was forced down to
+the tightly closed mouth of the tube, and the suds backed up behind
+it. It was pretty warm in the engine room, and most of the water had
+evaporated by the time Terence Reardon took down the looped tube and
+opened it for the purpose of putting his lips to the mouthpiece and
+blowing heartily through it. However, there was about a gill of water
+left in the tube.
+
+Now, as everybody knows, water running down a slope of seventy-five or
+eighty degrees comes rather fast. Consequently Mr. Reardon had no time
+to dodge.
+
+Why be squeamish? He got a mouthful and was very nauseated for half a
+minute. Also he cursed, we regret to record, and was very, very angry.
+Carefully he drained the devilish tube, wiped it clean with some fresh
+waste, and racked his brain for the right thing to say to Michael J.
+Murphy. Finally he hit upon something he concluded would about fill the
+bill, so he put his lips to the mouthpiece once more and whistled up
+the skipper. To his surprise, however, his breath didn't seem to get
+anywhere: in fact, it was directed back in his face rather forcefully;
+so he investigated and discovered the mouthpiece was only half open.
+Upon endeavoring to open it fully he sensed an obstruction in the back
+of it, so he unscrewed the mouthpiece and drew forth a ball of dirty,
+sour-smelling cotton waste.
+
+He gazed a moment in speechless wonder. Then: “I'll whistle that dirrty
+Tomfool, until he answers me in self-defense,” he announced'to the main
+motor, and forthwith blew a mighty blast. Almost instantly Michael J.
+Murphy yelled: “Hullo!”
+
+“Murphy,” Terence Reardon announced calmly and very distinctly, “you're
+a contimptible dhrunken ape!”
+
+“Holy Moses! Reardon, is that you?” the astounded Murphy demanded.
+
+“It is-as you'll discover whin you're able to come on deck an' give me
+the satisfaction I'll demand for the dirrty dab av wather an' cotton
+waste you put in the tube, knowin' that the firrst time I took it down
+to spheak to you, ye blackguard, in the line av djooty--which is the
+only reason I would spheak to you--I'd get it full in the mouth. Ye
+dirrty, lyin', schamin', dhrunken murrderer!”
+
+He paused to let that stream of adjectival opprobrium sink in. Silence.
+Then:
+
+“I poured the contents of my washbasin in the tube, I'll admit, but
+I did not plug it with cotton waste. One of your assistants did that,
+chief, and as for the water, as God is my judge, I didn't intend it for
+you--”
+
+“Who else would ye be afther insultin' if it wasn't me? Are ye not
+friendly wit' me assistants?”
+
+“Forgive me, Reardon, and listen to what I'm going to tell you.”
+
+And then the tale was told. When it was done Terence Reardon grunted.
+
+“I knew it!” he said. “I knew it! I felt in me bones there was something
+wrong aboard this ship. An' so ye were not dhrunk an' disordherly at
+Pernambuco?”
+
+“The liars! Did they tell you that? Reardon, it's only the mercy of
+heaven they didn't murder me. I'm lying here, helpless and crippled in
+my state-room, with the key turned in the lock. They've stolen my ship
+from me, and I can tell by the roll of her she's practically hove to
+under a dead-slow bell this minute. We've reached the rendezvous--we're
+waiting for the German fleet to deliver the coal; and oh, man, man,
+if we're caught by a British cruiser we'll lose the ship! They'll
+confiscate her, chief. Wirra! Wirra!” he cried, breaking into the
+forgotten wail of his childhood. “How can I ever face Matt Peasley and
+Cappy Ricks after this? Reardon, man, they'll think we stood in with
+the Germans and let them do it. We're both Irish--they know we're both
+pro-German--”
+
+“What's that you said?” Terence demanded sharply. “Me pro-German. Me? I
+_was_ pro-German--yis--wanst!”
+
+Fell a silence.
+
+Now, for the benefit of the uninitiated, be it known that there is
+a certain curse employed by the Irish and by no other race on earth.
+Whenever you hear an Irishman employ it, you know instantly--provided,
+of course, you are Irish yourself--just what kind of Irish that Irishman
+is. You cannot mistake it. There is no possible chance. It is only
+brought forth with the dust of the centuries on it, so to speak, to
+grace a fitting occasion. Terence Reardon felt that such an occasion
+was now at hand. As naturally, as inevitably, therefore, as the suds ran
+down the speaking-tube, that curse climbed up it--softly, distinctly,
+and with a wealth of feeling in the back of it:
+
+“God put the curse av Crummle on thim!”
+
+Mr. Reardon, of course, referred to the late Oliver Cromwell. Any one
+who has ever read the sorry history of Erin knows what the amiable
+Oliver did to the Irish. Consequently such an one will have no
+difficulty in estimating the precise proportions of bad luck Terence
+Reardon prayed might be the immediate heritage of the crew of the S.S.
+_Narcissus_.
+
+Michael J. Murphy blinked rapidly, for all the world as if Mr. Schultz
+had entered at that moment and struck him a terrific blow on top of
+the head. A more dazed Irishman than he never threw an ancient egg or
+a defunct cat at an alleged Celtic comedian with green whiskers. He
+was absolutely staggered--but not for long. The Irish come back very
+quickly.
+
+“Shame on you, Terence Reardon!” he declared. “And you with a Masonic
+ring on your finger.”
+
+“Glory be!” cried the delighted Terence. “Sure are you wan av us?”
+
+“One of you!” Mike Murphy fairly shrieked. “The minute I'm out of this
+room you'll apologize or fight for thinking I'm a renegade.”
+
+“_Naboclish!_” laughed Terence Reardon, slipping into the Gaelic and out
+again. “The divil a Mason am I! Sure that ring ye saw on me finger that
+day in the office av the owners belonged to me second assistant in the
+_Arab_. He'd lost it in the engine room, an' a mont' afther he'd left
+I found it. Not knowin' what ship he was in, 'twas me intintion to take
+the ring over to the Marine Engineers' Association an' lave it for him
+wit' the secreth'ry; and to make sure I wouldn't forget it I put it on
+me finger--”
+
+“Well, you knew, Terence, that with the likes of me round you'd not be
+liable to forget it,” Mike Murphy laughed.
+
+“As for you, ye divil,” Terence continued, “faith, what wit' yer English
+tweeds an' the fancy cut av thim, an' yer lack av the brogue an' the
+broad _a_ av ye, I thought, begorra, ye were a dirrty Far Down! God love
+ye, Michael, but 'tis the likes av you I'm proud to be ship-mates wit'.”
+
+“But you said you were from Belfast, Terence.”
+
+“So I am. I was borrn there, but me parents--the Lord 'a' merrcy on
+their sowls--moved back to Kerry.”
+
+“Terence!”
+
+“What is it, Michael, me poor lad?”
+
+“Do you ever drink on duty? I don't mean with your superiors--”
+
+The chief chuckled. He knew what Murphy was alluding to.
+
+“I do,” he replied, “wit' me equals.”
+
+“'Tis a pity, Terence, that man Schultz has the key to my state-room
+in his pocket. Now if you could manage to tap that Dutchman on the head
+with something hard and heavy, take the key out of his pocket and throw
+him overheard, you could let me out of this purgatory I'm in. Then I
+wouldn't be surprised if the sight of me and the absence of Mr. Schultz
+would put a bit of heart in that little cockney steward--and maybe he'd
+bring a drink to hearten you for what's ahead of you this night.”
+
+“An' what might that be, avic?” Terence demanded.
+
+“I want you to steal the ship back from them, Terence.”
+
+“Very well, Michael. 'Tis not a small thing ye ask me to do, but the
+divil a more willin' man could ye find to ask. Have ye figured out the
+plan av campaign? Sure what wit' the suddenness av it all I'm all in a
+shweat wit' excitement.”
+
+“You may be cold enough before morning, Terry, my boy.”
+
+“Bad luck to you, Michael! Dyin' is wan thing I cannot afford to do,
+although be the same token they tell me ould Ricks has a kind shpot in
+the heart av him for the widow an' the orphan--particularly av thim that
+dies in his service! As I say, I cannot afford to get kilt, but in
+back av that ag'in I cannot afford to lose the best job I ever had.
+An' afther all, 'tis a poor man that won't fight for a fine, kind
+gentleman--”
+
+“Damn the fine, kind gentleman! It serves him right for letting us
+get into this fix. He can afford the loss of the ship, but you and I,
+Terence Reardon, cannot afford the loss of our honor and self-respect.
+For the sake of the blood that's in us we can't afford to let a lot of
+Dutchmen steal our ship and cargo.”
+
+“Whist!” Reardon warned. “Hurry up. Me crew is comin' below ag'in.”
+
+“Make it a point to pass by my state-room window after dark. You'll find
+a scrap of paper on the sill. Help yourself to it.”
+
+“Faith, I will,” Mr. Reardon promised fervently, and the tube closed
+with a click.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+TERENCE Reardon's preparations for the night's work began the instant
+he hung up the speaking-tube. The _Narcissus_ carried three assistant
+engineers, in consequence of which Mr. Reardon was not required to stand
+a watch unless he so elected; although from force of habit acquired
+in the days when he had been chief of the _Arab_--a little
+three-thousand-ton tramp--and perforce had to stand a regular watch,
+he found it very difficult not to spend at least eight hours in
+every twenty-four in the engine room. When, eventually, he came to a
+realization that his job was not to make the engines behave, but to see
+that they behaved properly, he spent more of his time on deck, and
+put in only a few hours below during the watch of the third assistant
+engineer--the third assistant being a young man in whom the chief
+reposed exactly that degree of confidence a chief engineer should always
+repose in a third assistant. Mr. Reardon, therefore, was at liberty to
+leave the engine-room whenever he felt so disposed; and following his
+illuminating conversation with the captain he felt very much disposed to
+leave immediately.
+
+He went first to his state-room, where he bathed, changed into new
+under-clothes and socks, donned a freshly laundered suit of faded
+dungarees--old, faded, well-washed dungarees, by the way, always
+appearing neater and cleaner than new ones--and shaved; for if
+Providence willed it that lie should die to-night. Mr. Reardon was
+resolved to be in such a highly sanitary condition that “those upon whom
+should devolve the melancholy duty of laying him out”--which phrase, in
+the Hibernian sense, means those who should dispose his limbs, close his
+eyes, tie up his black jowls with a towel and fold his hands--alas,
+so white in death, at last! across his still breast--might be moved to
+remark that, notwithstanding the nature of the deceased's vocation, they
+could not recall ever having seen a cleaner corpse.
+
+Having attended to his pre-dissolution toilet, Mr. Reardon next sat
+in at his littered desk, swept a space clear of tobacco crumbs, ashes,
+pipes and some old copies of the _Cork Eagle_, and sat down to write a
+farewell letter to his wife, hoping that, even though his enemies should
+slay him, yet would they have sufficient respect for the dead to mail
+that letter to Mrs. Reardon. And, in order that he might not anger his
+posthumous benefactors, he mentioned nothing of the state of affairs
+aboard the ship. He merely stated that she might never see him again, in
+which event she was to call upon the owners and ask them to invest for
+her the proceeds of his life insurance policy, since they could and
+would invest it to better advantage than she. Then he spoke of his grief
+at the thought of the children being forced to forego their college
+education and suggested that she ask Cappy Ricks to give Johnny a place
+in his office; also, should the owners offer anything as compensation
+for the loss of her husband, she was to accept it, for, as God was
+his judge, she would be entitled to it! This last sentence Terence
+underscored for emphasis; that was as close as he came to saying that
+if he died it would be in defense of his owner's interest. Then he
+commended her to the comfort of her religion and subscribed himself:
+“Your loving and devoted husband, Terence P. Reardon, Chief Engineer
+S.S. _Narcissus_.”
+
+Having set his small affairs in order against a hasty exit from this
+vale of hatreds, Mr. Reardon, in unconscious imitation of all the
+condemned men who had preceded him on the voyage across the Styx,
+repaired to the dining saloon and partook of a hearty meal. He realized
+he had undertaken a contract that would require the employment of
+weapons more formidable than his hard fists, and devoutly he
+wished that, like the fairy queen, he had but to breathe on them to
+metamorphose them into pig iron. He pictured the slaughter aboard the
+_Narcissus_ when he should wade into the conflict. Finally he made up
+his mind that, in lieu of an iron hand or two, he would use his favorite
+monkey wrench, for he had no firearms whatsoever; although, had somebody
+presented him with a one-man machine gun with full directions for using,
+Mr Reardon would have recoiled in horror from it. Firearms were highly
+dangerous. They killed so many people!
+
+He left the table long before the others had finished. There was no one
+on deck as he emerged from the dining saloon, so he walked leisurely
+round past the captain's cabin, whistling the “Cruiskeen Lawn” to let
+Mike Murphy know who was coming. Evidently Michael assimilated the hint,
+for there was an envelope on the little window sill as Terence hove
+abreast of it. He snatched it swiftly away and continued round to his
+own state-room.
+
+The envelope contained Michael J. Murphy's plan for campaign worked out
+to the most minute detail, by reason of his absolute knowledge of the
+customs aboard the ship. Mr. Reardon read the remarkable document and
+sat lost in admiration; a twinkle leaped to his eyes and a cunning,
+rather deadly little smile came sneaking round the corners of his broad
+chin.
+
+“Arrah, but 'tis a beautiful schame,” he soliloquized. “Who but that
+lad could have t'ought av it? An' here I've been shpendin' the past two
+hours borrowin' trouble.”
+
+He read and reread the plan of attack, in order to familiarize himself
+with the details; then he held a match to the document and destroyed
+it. He considered a moment, and then performed a similar service to
+his farewell letter to Mrs. Reardon, for the chief engineer of the
+S.S. _Narcissus_, of San Francisco, had made up his mind not to
+die--to-night!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+Mr. Schultz, the first assistant, and Mr. von Staden were engaged in
+coffee and repartee when Terence Reardon thrust his head in at the
+dining saloon window. He was mildly excited.
+
+“Be the Great Gun av Athlone!” he declared. “I've just been bit be a
+bedbug--an' I t'ought there wasn't a bedbug in the ship!”
+
+Mr. Schultz looked up, horrified. “Chieve,” he said, “dot is rodden
+news. Bedbugs! _Ach!_”
+
+“An' well you may '_Ach_,' Misther Schultz. Let a colony av bedbugs move
+into the _Narcissus_ an' Terence P. Reardon will move out. There's
+only wan thing to do, Misther Schultz, an' that is to tackle the divils
+before we're overwhelmed be the weight av numbers. Have ye a bit av
+sulphur in yer shtore-room, Misther Schultz--the kind that comes in
+balls an' is used to burrn in shtate-rooms to kill bedbugs?”
+
+When Terence Reardon put that innocent query to the first mate he knew
+very well Mr. Schultz would reply in the negative--which he did--for the
+reason that Michael J. Murphy had privately informed Mr. Reardon
+that the little cockney steward, Riggins, had charge of the bedbug
+ammunition. Riggins, who had been standing with his back against the
+wall, eyeing Mr. Schultz sourly, now spoke up and said he had some
+sulphur.
+
+“More power to ye, Riggins!” Mr. Reardon declared heartily. “Then do ye,
+like the good lad, give me two or three balls av it. I'll burn them
+in me shtate-room to-night, wit' the door an' window locked, an' be
+morrnin' sorra bedbug will be left alive.”
+
+“Very well, sir,” Riggins replied. “Might Hi arsk, Mr. Reardon, where
+you hintend passin' the night?”
+
+“I'll shleep in me auld aisy-chair abaft the house an' next the funnel,
+where I'll be snug an' warrm,” Mr. Reardon replied, for he desired an
+excuse to be on deck all night without arousing the suspicions of Mr.
+Schultz or von Staden.
+
+The steward, having finished serving those who ate in the dining saloon,
+stepped out on deck and started for his own room. Mr. Reardon remained
+by the window a minute, discoursing on the curse of bedbugs aboard a
+ship, and then with a sigh followed the steward leisurely. Mr. Schultz
+appeared undecided whether or not to accompany him in the capacity of
+censor, but finally concluded to remain and finish his coffee, for if
+Riggins had decided to enlighten the chief as to the real reason for the
+skipper's indisposition he had had frequent opportunity to do so during
+the past ten days. It did not seem likely, therefore, that he would run
+any risks at this late date. To Mr. Schultz, Riggins appeared to be
+a man who could be depended upon to remember which side his bread was
+buttered on and who supplied the butter.
+
+Arrived at the steward's state-room, Mr. Reardon helped himself to the
+entire box of bedbug exterminator and addressed Riggins very briefly:
+
+“Riggins, ye're a child av Johnny Bull, are ye not?”
+
+Riggins, without the slightest trace of embarrassment, admitted his
+disgrace.
+
+“An' bein' what ye are,” Mr. Reardon continued, “would ye do somethin'
+av great binifit to England?”
+
+Riggins replied that inasmuch as he had lost two brothers at the Battle
+of the Marne, that ought to indicate bally well where the Riggins tribe
+stood on the subject of defense of the realm.
+
+“Good!” Mr. Reardon murmured. “Even if misguided in their pathriotic
+motives, shtill yer brothers were brave min, an' for that I respect
+thim. Now, thin, Riggins, ye rabbit, listen to me: In a momint av
+surpassin' innocince Captain Murphy an' mesilf swallowed a cute
+suggestion from a lad whose back I'll break in two halves whin the
+_Narcissus_ gets back to San Francisco. 'Why not save expinse,' says
+he, 'an' ship the crew av this German liner that's interned over in
+Richardson's Bay?' Riggins, to make a long shtory short, we have thim
+this minute, an' the dear God knows that even if shipped at the
+German scale av wages that gang'll prove a dear crew to the Blue Star
+Navigation Company if you an' I, Riggins, fail to do our djooty. They've
+half murdered the captain, shtolen the ship an' cargo from him, an' run
+her t'ousands av miles off her course to deliver the coal to the German
+fleet.”
+
+“Oh, my bloody ol' Aunt Maria!” gasped the horrified Riggins.
+
+“What I want to know from you, Riggins, is this: Will ye help me
+shteal the ship back to-night? We're runnin' almost due south, an' that
+good-for-nothin' von Staden has been in communication wit' the fleet all
+day long. I feel it in me bones. If we get the ship back we'll head due
+west for the coast av South America an' hug the three-mile limit-an' the
+devil scoort them thin. Riggins, ye gossoon, what for the cause av Merry
+England? They wouldn't take ye for a gift in the British Arrmy, for I
+doubt if ye'd weigh ninety pounds soakin' wet an' a rock in yer hand,
+but for all that, here's an iligant opporchunity for ye to serrve yer
+counthry, an' should worrd av yer brave action reach the king--bad cess
+to him--he may call ye Sir Thomas Riggins an' make ye consul-general av
+the Cannibal Islands.
+
+“Out wit' it, Riggins. Yer king an' counthry calls ye, an' be the same
+token so do Michael J. Murphy an' Terence P. Reardon. What'll ye give,
+Riggins, to preserve the seas to Britain?”
+
+“Me 'eart's blood, that's wot!” Riggins replied quietly.
+
+“I accept the sacrifice in the name av His Majesty, King Jarge! Be on
+deck at ten o'clock sharp, waitin' close undher the shtarboard companion
+leadin' to the bridge. Whin I come out on the shtarboard ind av the
+bridge an' whistle 'O'Donnell Abu,' do ye--”
+
+“S'help me, chief, I never 'eard of the blighter before,” Riggins
+interrupted.
+
+“God forgive me!” Mr. Reardon murmured _sotto voce_. “I'll have to do
+it. Well, thin, Riggins, whin I come out on the shtarboard ind av the
+bridge an' whistle 'God Save the King'--troth, I'll gamble that's one
+blighter ye've hearrd tell av--do ye run up into the pilot-house an'
+take the wheel. I'll not whistle until we have the deck to ourselves,
+wit'out fear av intherruption, an' ye must come quick an' take the
+wheel, else the vessel'll fall off into the trough av the sea an'
+commince to wallow--which same'll wake up the second mate an' bring him
+an' von Staden on deck to see what's wrong wit' her. An' until I'm ready
+to call on those lads I'm not wishful to have them call on me! Remimber,
+Riggins: Wan jump an' ye're into the pilot-house; then howld her head
+up to the sea--an' lave the rest to me. Gwan wit' ye now, or that skut,
+Schultz, will be gettin' suspicious av us.”
+
+When Mr. Schultz came along ten minutes later he found Mr. Reardon very
+busy calking with oakum the cracks round the door and window of his
+state-room, through which little wisps of yellow smoke were curling.
+Mr. Schultz was so completely deceived that he hurried round to his own
+quarters and pawed over his own mattress and bedding in a vain search
+for bedbugs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+At eight o'clock Mr. Schultz relieved the second mate on the bridge,
+and five minutes later Terence Reardon, for the first time invaded that
+forbidden territory. “Bad cess to me!” he complained plaintively. “I'm
+the picthur av bad luck. I've a leaky connection below an' divil a bit
+av red lead. Could ye lind me a dab av red lead from yer shtore-room,
+Misther Schultz?”
+
+Mr. Schultz marvelled that any man could force his mind to dwell on red
+lead, leaky pipe connections, sulphur and bedbugs in a ship like the
+_Narcissus_ at a time like this. He had met a few innocents in his day,
+but this Irish engineer was most innocent of all.
+
+“Sure, Mike!” he replied, and grinned at his feeble play on words.
+“_Und_ as I gannot leave der bridge yet, here iss der key to der
+store-room. Helb yourself, mine _Freund, und_ den gif me der key back.”
+
+“Ye addie-pated son of sin!” Mr. Reardon soliloquized as he took the key
+and departed. “Faith, a booby birrd has more sinse nor you! D'ye suppose
+I didn't wait until ye were on djooty before axin' ye, well knowin' ye'd
+lind me the key an' I'd be alone in yer shtore-room!”
+
+Mr. Reardon was in the store-room less than two minutes. When he emerged
+he carried a daub of red lead on an old spoon, as Mr. Schultz, looking
+down on the dimly lighted main deck, observed. What he did not observe,
+however, was the chief's action in tossing the spoon overboard the
+instant he passed beyond the range of Mr. Schultz's vision. It is
+probable, also, that the mate would have been disturbed could he have
+seen Mr. Reardon in his state-room, with the door locked, removing from
+beneath his dungaree jumper several fathoms of light, strong, cotton
+signal halyard, two five-foot lengths of half-inch steel chain, and a
+strip of canvas. His pockets also gave up two padlocks, with keys to
+fit. This loot Mr. Reardon very carefully hid in the space under
+his settee, after which, with due thanks, he returned the key to Mr.
+Schultz.
+
+The remainder of the evening until nine-thirty Terence spent in the
+wireless room with Herr von Staden. Then he retired, very low in
+spirits, to his state-room, to make his preparations for wholesale
+assault with a deadly weapon--possibly wholesale murder! He cut the
+signal halyard into short lengths; then he cut the piece of canvas into
+strips about two inches wide and secreted the halyard and canvas strips
+here and there about his person. Then he descended to the engine room
+and selected his monkey wrench from the tool rack on the wall, helped
+himself to a handful of cotton waste, and returned to his state-room
+mournfully keening “The Sorrowful Lamentation of Callaghan, Greally and
+Mullen, killed at the Fair of Turloughmore.”
+
+“Wirra,” he murmured presently, “but 'tis a terrible thing to hit an
+unsuspectin' man wit' a monkey wrench! An' that divil von Staden,
+for all his faults, is not a bad lad at all at all. An' I'd give five
+dollars--yes, seven an' a half--if he were bald an' shiny on any other
+shpot save an' exceptin' the shpot I have to hit him. Ochone!
+
+
+   “'Come tell me, dearest mother, what makes me father shtay
+    Or what can be th' reason that he's so long away?'
+   'Oh, howld yer tongue, me darlin' son, yer tears do grieve me sore,
+    I fear he has been murdhered in the fair av Turloughmore!'
+
+
+“Sure, I haven't got the heart to dhrive the head av this monkey wrench
+into that bald shpot. If he'd hair there I wouldn't mind.” Mr. Reardon
+sighed dismally. “I'll have to wrap a waddin' av waste around me weapon,
+so I'll neither kill nor mangle but lay thim out wit' wan good crack--
+
+
+   “'It is on the firrst av August, the truth I will declare,
+    Those people they assimbled that day all at the fair,
+    But little was their notion that evil was in shtore,
+    All by the bloody Peelers at the fair av Turloughmore.'
+
+
+“I must practice crackin' the divils! Sure, 'twould be an awful thing
+to have the sin av murrder on me sowl--not that 'tis murrder to kill a
+Dutchman that's a self-confessed pirate into the bargain. Shtill, 'tis a
+terrible t'ought to carry to the grave--”
+
+Wham! Mr. Reardon brought his padded wrench down on his defenseless bed.
+“Too harrd,” he told himself. “Sure a blow like that on top av the
+head would knock out the teeth av the divil himself! Less horse-power,
+Terence!”
+
+Wham! He tried it again, this time with better results. For five minutes
+he beat the bedclothes; then his spirits rose and, like the mercurial
+Celt that he was, he chanted blithely a verse from “The Night Before
+Larry Was Stretched”:
+
+
+   “'Though, sure 'tis the best way to die,
+        Oh, the divil a betther a-livin'!
+    For sure whin the gallows is high,
+        Your journey is shorter to heaven;
+    But what harasses Larry the most,
+        An' makes his poor sowl melancholy,
+    Is to think av the time whin his ghost
+        Will come in a sheet to sweet Molly!
+            Oh, sure, 'twill kill her alive!'”
+
+
+He slipped the short, heavy monkey wrench up his right sleeve, walked
+out on deck and stood at the corner of the house, smoking placidly and
+gazing down on the main deck forward. The look-out on the forecastle
+head was not visible in the darkness, but Mr. Reardon was not worried
+about that. “For why,” he argued to himself, “should I go lookin' for
+the skut whin if I wait a bit he'll come fluttherin' into me hand?”
+
+He did. At five minutes after ten Mr. Schultz hailed the look-out in
+German, and although Mr. Reardon spoke no German, yet did he understand
+that order. Mr. Schultz, a victim of habit, desired the look-out to go
+to the galley and bring up some hot coffee for him and the helmsman. It
+was the custom aboard the _Narcissus_, as it is in most Pacific Coast
+boats, for the cook, just before retiring, to brew a pot of coffee,
+drain off the grounds and leave it to simmer on the galley range where,
+at intervals of two hours during the night, the watch could come and
+help itself.
+
+Terence Reardon knew that the look-out, after heating the coffee and
+bringing a few cups up on the bridge, would return to the galley and
+partake of a cup and a bite himself.
+
+The man came down off the forecastle head, crossed the main deck and
+disappeared in the galley. In about ten minutes Mr. Reardon saw him
+climb up the port companion to the bridge; a minute later he came down.
+Mr. Reardon waited until he was certain the fellow was sipping his
+coffee in the galley; then with the utmost nonchalance he went up on the
+bridge and hailed Mr. Schultz, who was standing amidships blowing on a
+cup of coffee.
+
+“Begorra,” he complained, “Divil a wink can I shleep to-night. I've been
+sittin' wit' the wireless operator all evenin', an' now, thinks I,
+he's weary listenin' to me nonsinse, so I'll go up on the bridge an'
+interview Misther Schultz. If I--be the Rock av Cashel! What was that?”
+
+“Vot? Vere?” Mr. Schultz exclaimed, and set down his cup of coffee.
+He was all excitement, for he had been looking for the flash of a
+searchlight for the past hour and he wondered now if the unsuspecting
+Reardon had seen it first.
+
+“Over that way.” Mr. Reardon pointed off the port bow. “Did ye not see
+that light?”
+
+“A light. _Gott im Himmel!_”
+
+“Ye can't see it now,” Mr. Reardon replied soothingly. He stepped round
+to the back of the mate and permitted his trusty monkey wrench to slip
+down into his hand. “But if ye continue to look in that direction,
+Misther Schultz, ye'll see not wan light but several.”
+
+“_Donnerwetter!_ I gannot see dem,” Mr. Schultz protested, wondering if
+there might not be some defect in his eyesight.
+
+“Have no fear. Keep lookin' that way an' ye'll see thim,” Mr. Reardon
+reassured him. “Ha-ha, ye divil!” he crooned--and struck.
+
+“I'll gamble ye saw the lights I promised ye,” he breathed into the ear
+of the unconscious mate as he deftly caught the falling body and
+eased it noiselessly to the deck to avoid calling the attention of the
+helmsman to the interesting tableau going on behind him. Quickly he
+gagged Mr. Schultz with a strip of canvas; then he tied his hands behind
+him and bound him at ankle and knee with the short lengths of signal
+halyard. As a final attention he “frisked” the mate and removed his keys
+and a heavy automatic pistol.
+
+“Lie there now, me jewel,” he said, and trotted out to the starboard
+end of the bridge, whistling shrilly “God Save the King.” When the swift
+patter of feet along the deck warned him that the steward was coming, he
+walked back amidships and opened the little sliding trap in the roof of
+the pilot-house, which on the _Narcissus_ was set just below the bridge.
+The quartermaster's head was directly beneath the trap. “Oh-ho, me
+laddybuck!” Mr. Reardon murmured, and dropped his padded monkey wrench
+on that defenseless head. Instantly the quartermaster staggered and hung
+limply to the wheel.
+
+“Bad luck to me, I'll have to hit ye agin,” Mr. Reardon complained--and
+did it. Then he slid through the trap into the pilot-house, steadied the
+wheel with one hand and unlocked the pilot-house door with the other to
+admit the steward.
+
+“Strike me pink!” that astounded functionary exclaimed as he gazed at
+the quartermaster lying beside the wheel.
+
+“I will--if ye don't take howld av this wheel an' do less talkln',” Mr.
+Reardon replied evenly. “Bring her round very slowly, me lad, an' in the
+intherval I'll wrap up me little Baby Bunting on the floor forninst ye.”
+
+When the quartermaster had been duly wrapped _a la_ Mr. Schultz and
+dragged clear of the wheel, Mr. Reardon returned to the bridge and with
+brazen impudence set the handle of the marine telegraph over to full
+speed ahead. He hummed “Colleen Dhas Cruthin Amoe” as with a light heart
+he skipped down to the galley and found the look-out eating bread soaked
+in coffee. Mr. Reardon nodded and said “Good nicht, _amigo_” for his
+voyages had taken him to many ports and he was naturally quick at
+picking up foreign languages. The fellow, concluding Mr. Reardon desired
+a cup of coffee also, turned to the rack to get him a cup.
+
+“How dare ye ate up the owners' groceries in this shameful manner?” Mr.
+Reardon demanded. “Do ye not get enough at mess that ye must be atin'
+between meals? Shame on you--”
+
+One tap did the trick. “'Tis a black way to repay a kind t'ought,” Mr.
+Reardon observed to his victim as he bound and gagged him; “but war is
+war, an' a faint heart an' a weak stomach never shtole a ship back from
+forty German pirates!”
+
+He closed the galley door on the unfortunate look-out and climbed up
+on the boat deck to get Michael J. Murphy out of prison. Cautiously he
+unlocked the state-room door with the key taken from Mr. Schultz, and
+the skipper came forth. Mr. Reardon led him under an electric light and
+gazed upon him wonderingly.
+
+“Begorra, Michael, me poor lad,” he whispered, “be the look av the white
+face of you I'm thinkin' ye ought to be in bed instid av out raisin'
+ructions.”
+
+“I'm weak; I have a fever,” Murphy replied. “Still, half that fever may
+be plain lunatic rage. Did you find a gun on the mate?”
+
+“I did. Take it, Michael, I'll have nothin' to do wit' it.”
+
+The skipper grasped the weapon eagerly. “The ship is headed due west
+undher full speed,” Terence explained, “an' the mate, the quarter-master
+an' the look-out have all received evidence av me affectionate regard.
+Next!”
+
+“Von Staden. He kicked me and broke my ribs, Terence.”
+
+“Wit' the greatest joy in life, Michael. The skut's busy in the wireless
+room.”
+
+So they went to the wireless room. Von Staden was taking a message as
+they entered; at sound of their footsteps he turned carelessly and found
+himself looking down the muzzle of the captain's automatic.
+
+“Will ye take it peaceably, ye gossoon, or must I brain ye wit' this
+monkey wrench?” Mr. Reardon queried fiercely.
+
+“And take your hand off that key, you blackguard. No S O S,” Murphy
+ordered.
+
+The supercargo stared at them impudently. “This,” he said presently, “is
+one of those inconceivable contingencies.”
+
+“Your early education was neglected, Dutchy. However, don't complain and
+say I didn't give you warning. Terence!”
+
+“What is it, Michael?”
+
+“All well-regulated ships carry a few sets of handcuffs and leg irons.
+If you will put your hand in my right hip pocket, Terence, lad,
+you'll find a pair for present emergencies. They were in my desk and I
+concluded to bring them along.”
+
+“An' a pious t'ought it was, Michael.”
+
+So they handcuffed Herr August Carl von Staden and gagged him, after
+which Mr. Reardon, leaving the skipper to guard his prisoner, ran round
+to his own room and got the two lengths of chain and the padlocks. When
+he returned, Michael J. Murphy kicked his unwelcome supercargo to the
+mate's store-room and Mr. Reardon locked him in among the paint pots,
+pipe, old iron and other odds and ends which accumulate in a mate's
+store-room.
+
+They went next to the door of the forecastle. It was open--and, what was
+better, it opened inward. Also, it was of steel with a stout brass ring
+on the lock, this ring taking the place of what on a landsman's door
+would have been a knob.
+
+Terence Reardon and Michael J. Murphy listened. From within came a
+medley of gentle sighs, snores and the slow, regular breathing of
+sleeping men. Softly Mr. Reardon closed the door, turned the ring until
+the latch caught, drew a section of chain through the ring in such a
+manner as to prevent the latch from being released, passed the ends of
+his chain round the steel handrail along the front of the forecastle and
+padlocked them there.
+
+“Now, thin,” Mr. Reardon announced, “that takes care av the carpenter,
+the bos'n, four seamen, two waiters an' the mess bhoy. Do ye wait here
+a minute, Michael, lad, whilst I run up on the bridge and give that
+unmintionable Schultz the wanst over.”
+
+The weak, half-dead Murphy sat down on the hatch coaming and waited.
+The chief was away about ten minutes and the captain was on the point of
+investigating when Mr. Reardon appeared.
+
+“That unfortunate divil had come to, an' was lookin' an' feelin' cowld
+whin I wint up on the bridge,” he explained, “so I wint to me room an'
+got a pair av blankets to wrap round him where he lay. It's wan thing
+to tap a man on the head, but 'tis another to let him catch his death av
+cowld.”
+
+Captain Murphy smiled. Ordinarily he would have laughed at the whimsical
+Terence, but he didn't have a good laugh left in him. His lung was
+hurting, so he suspected an abscess.
+
+They returned to the boat deck, and with his rule Mr. Reardon carefully
+measured the exact distance between the ship's rail and the center
+of the doors of the state-rooms occupied by the mates and assistant
+engineers. This detail attended to, they went to the carpenter's
+little shop and cut two scantlings of a length to correspond to the
+measurements taken, and in addition Mr. Reardon prepared some thin
+cleats with countersunk holes for the insertion of screws. He worked
+very leisurely, and it was eleven o'clock when he had everything in
+readiness.
+
+“There's nothin' to do now until midnight, whin the watch in the ingine
+room is changed,” Mr. Reardon suggested, “so lave us go to the galley.
+Wan av me brave lads is in there, an' if he's not dead intirely, faith,
+I'm thinkin' I might injoy a cup av coffee!”
+
+So they went to the galley and found the look-out glaring at them. He
+made inarticulate noises behind his gag, so Mr. Reardon, much relieved,
+found seats for each of them and poured coffee. Then he filled his pipe,
+crossed his right leg over his left knee and puffed away. He was the
+speaking likeness of Contentment. And well he might be.
+
+The first assistant engineer had been driving the _Narcissus_ for an
+hour at full speed at right angles to the course he believed she was
+pursuing. He would, being totally ignorant of the change of masters,
+continue to drive her at full speed until midnight, when he would come
+off watch, tired and sleepy, and go straight to his state-room. The
+second assistant would go direct from his state-room to duty in the
+engine-room and continue to drive the _Narcissus_ at full speed until
+four o'clock, and inasmuch as it would be quite dark still when the
+third assistant came on at four o'clock to relieve the engineer on
+watch, there was not the slightest doubt in the minds of Murphy and the
+chief but that the deception could go on until breakfast. However, that
+would interfere with their plans. Long before that hour the men locked
+in the forecastle would have discovered their plight, and the noise of
+the discovery might reach below decks and bring up, to investigate,
+just a few more husky firemen and coal passers than even the redoubtable
+Terence Reardon could hope to cope with successfully.
+
+“By four o'clock we'll be more than fifty miles off the course Schultz
+was holding her on,” the captain suggested. “In all likelihood the
+German admiral wirelessed his last position and the course he was
+steering, and von Staden gave Schultz his course accordingly.”
+
+“Faith, we're not a moment too soon at that,” Mr. Reardon replied.
+“Schultz was lookin' for searchlights whin I tapped him. Be the Toe
+Nails av Moses ye're right, Michael. We'll be so far off that course be
+daylight they won't even see our shmoke. D'ye think that little handful
+av bones, Riggins, can manage the wheel until we've claned up the
+ingine-room gang? We can relieve him wit' wan av the Chinamen then.”
+
+“Tell him he'll have to stick it out. And by the way, Terence, come to
+think of it, you had better run forward and remove the sidelights; then
+unscrew all of the incandescent lamps on deck until the contact is lost.
+You can screw them in again just before the watch is changed, so they
+won't suspect anything, and unscrew them again after we have the watch
+under lock and key. The fleet may be too far away to see our smoke by
+daylight, but they may be close enough to see our lights to-night! Tell
+Riggins to darken the pilot-house. The binnacle light is enough to keep
+him company.”
+
+“Thrue for ye,” Terence replied, and hurried away to carry out Murphy's
+instructions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+At twelve o'clock the second assistant engineer, hurrying along the deck
+to relieve the first assistant on watch, found Mr. Reardon leaning
+over the rail meditatively puffing his old briar pipe. In answer to the
+former's query as to what kept the chief up so late, the latter replied
+that he was burning sulphur in his room to kill bedbugs.
+
+“The good Lord forgive me the lie,” he prayed when a few minutes later
+he was called upon by the first assistant, hurrying off watch, to repeat
+the same tale.
+
+The first assistant and his watch had a shower-bath and turned in. They
+were not interested in the workings of the deck department in the dark;
+they could not know that the vessel's course had been changed; they
+thought only of getting to sleep. Mr. Reardon waited until one-thirty
+A. M. to provide against possible sleepless ones, and then crept aft on
+velvet feet. The _Narcissus_ had very commodious quarters in her stern,
+where her coolie crew had been housed in the days when she ran in the
+China trade; and when the Blue Star Navigation Company took her over
+these quarters had been fitted up to accommodate the engine room crew.
+In the same manner, therefore, that he had imprisoned the men of the
+deck department in the forecastle, Mr. Reardon now proceeded to imprison
+the men of the engine department in the sterncastle. This delicate
+mission accomplished, he went up top-side and measured the diameter
+of the ventilators, in order to make certain that the thinnest of his
+German canaries could not fly the cage via that difficult route. Having
+satisfied himself that he had no need to worry on this score, he made
+his way forward again.
+
+“Well, Michael, me poor lad,” he announced as he rejoined the skipper,
+“I'll tell you wan thing--an' it isn't two. The crew av the _Narcissus_
+off watch at this minute will never come on watch ag'in--in the
+_Narcissus_.”
+
+The skipper smiled wanly. “I'm sorry you must take all the risks and do
+all the work, Terence,” he replied.
+
+“Gwan wit' ye, Michael. Sure if I had a head on me like you, an' a
+college edication in back av that ag'in, I'd be out playin' golf this
+minute wit' Andhrew Carnegie an' Jawn D. Rockefeller--ayther that, or
+I'd have been hung for walkin' away wit' the Treasury Buildin'.”
+
+They discussed the remaining details of that portion of the ship
+cleaning still before them. “Remember, Terence,” Mike Murphy warned the
+chief, “when the blow-off comes at four o'clock and the uproar commences
+fore and aft, we have the means to keep them quiet. I'll go forward
+and you go aft. When we threaten to throw burning sulphur down the
+ventilators and suffocate them, they'll sing soft and low!”
+
+Mr. Reardon chuckled. “An' Schultz t'ought I was afther bedbugs whin
+I asked the shteward for the sulphur,” he replied. “Shtill an' all,
+Michael,” he added, a trifle wistfully, “I could wish for a bit more
+excitement, considerin' the size av the job.”
+
+“Don't worry, Terry, you may get it yet. I'm dizzy and weak, chief; I'm
+fearful I'll not be able to last out the night--and these Germans are
+desperate. Suppose we go forward now, while I'm able, and awaken Mr.
+Henckel. It's high time he relieved Mr. Schultz, and he'll be waking
+naturally if we let him oversleep much longer.”
+
+The subjugation of Mr. Henckel was accomplished without the slightest
+excitement or bloodshed. Mr. Reardon rapped at his door and Mr. Henckel
+replied sleepily in German. The skipper and the chief merely lurked,
+one on each side of his state-room door, until he stepped briskly out;
+whereupon the captain jabbed him with the gun while Mr. Reardon shook
+the monkey wrench under his nose. Indeed, Mr. Reardon had the gag in the
+second mate's mouth even while it hung open in surprise. They bound him
+hand and foot, and Mr. Reardon picked him up and tucked him gently in
+his berth, for, as the chief remarked to him, he was as safe there as
+anywhere and far more comfortable, although Mike Murphy objected and was
+for putting him in the mate's store-room with von Staden, whom they had
+put in the dirtiest and most unwholesome spot aboard the _Narcissus_,
+for two reasons: In the first place, he had kicked Michael J. Murphy
+and shot him through the shoulder; and in the second place, he was the
+cleanest German and the most wholesome pirate they had ever seen,
+and they figured the contrast would annoy him. Mr. Reardon, however,
+objected to this plan. He argued that von Staden would be glad of Mr.
+Henckel's company, and was it not their original intention to keep that
+laddybuck von Staden in solitary confinement? It was. They closed the
+state-room door on Mr. Henckel, and left him to meditate on his sins
+while they repaired to the carpenter's little shop, to return to the
+boat deck presently with the scantlings and cleats Mr. Reardon had
+prepared.
+
+With the scantling the chief shored up the doors to the state-room
+occupied respectively at the time by the first and third assistant
+engineers; then he screwed the cleats into place at top and bottom, so
+the scantling could not slip. Not for worlds would he have used a hammer
+to nail them into place, for that would have spoiled the surprise for
+the objects of his attentions. Throughout the entire operation he was
+as silent as a burglar, although by way of additional precaution the
+captain stood by with drawn pistol.
+
+“Now thin, Michael,” Mr. Reardon whispered as they pussy-footed away,
+“there are six fine Germans below in the ingine room, an' two Irishmen
+an' half an Englishman on deck. The Chinee cooks don't count, for sure
+the poor heathens would only get excited and turrn somebody loose if
+we asked them to do anything desperate. And, as ye know, wan good
+Irishman--and bad luck to the man that says I am not that--can keep a
+hundhred Germans from comin' up out av that ingine room. Go to yer bed,
+Michael, an' lie down until I call ye.”
+
+“Better take this automatic,” Murphy suggested, and showed him how to
+use it.
+
+But Mr. Reardon resolutely refused to abandon his monkey wrench,
+although he consented to carry the automatic to Riggins in the
+pilot-house. The estimable Riggins had been steering a somewhat erratic
+course, for he found it impossible to keep his eye on the lubber's mark
+while the bound quartermaster glared balefully at him from the floor.
+Indeed Riggins had been pondering his fate should that husky Teuton ever
+get the upper hand again; hence, when he found himself in a state of
+preparedness and was informed that he must stick by the wheel until
+relieved, the prospect did not awe him in the least. The present odds
+were counterbalanced by the strategic position held by the minority, and
+Riggins was content.
+
+On his way back to his state-room, there to rest until the final call
+to arms, Michael J. Murphy concluded it would be well to search the
+quarters of the second mate and Herr von Staden for contraband of war.
+So he did, with the result that he unearthed in von Staden's room the
+rifle and revolver which belonged to the _Narcissus_, and under the
+second mate's pillow he found another automatic pistol. He confiscated
+all three weapons by right of discovery, and hid the rifle in the
+galley, the last place anybody would think of looking for it.
+
+In the meantime Mr. Reardon proceeded further to strengthen his position
+by closing the port entrance to the engine room and shoring up the door
+with a stout scantling, cleated at top and bottom to hold it securely in
+place. Then he donned Mr. Schultz's heavy watchcoat, dragged round
+from the lee of the house the upholstered easy-chair Mrs. Reardon had
+insisted upon his taking to sea with him for use in his leisure moments,
+placed this chair on deck just outside the starboard entrance to the
+engine room, loaded his pipe, laid his trusty monkey wrench across his
+knee and gave himself up to the contemplation of this riot we call life.
+He resembled a cat watching beside a gopher hole. By half-past three
+o'clock he had finished figuring out approximately the amount of
+money Mrs. Reardon would have in the Hibernia Bank at the end of five
+years--figuring on a monthly saving of fifty dollars and interest
+compounded at the rate of four per cent. So, having satisfied himself
+that Johnny would yet be a lawyer and the girls learn to play the piano,
+Mr. Reardon heaved a sigh and reluctantly went to call Michael J. Murphy
+for the final accounting.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+At ten minutes to four Mr. Uhl, the second assistant, a man of some
+thirty years and ordinarily possessed of a disposition as placid as that
+of a little Jersey heifer, ordered one of his firemen to go and call the
+watch to relieve them. Mr. Reardon, his monkey wrench firmly grasped in
+his right hand, knew that at exactly ten minutes to four Mr. Uhl would
+issue that order--so he was on the spot to receive the fireman as
+the latter came leisurely up the greasy steel stairway. As the fellow
+emerged on deck he paused to wipe his heated brow with a sweat rag
+and draw in a welcome breath of cool fresh air. He did not succeed in
+getting his lungs quite full, however, for Michael J. Murphy, lurking
+beside the door, thrust the barrel of his gun in the fireman's ribs,
+effectually curtailing the process of respiration practically at once.
+From the other side of the door the chief engineer stepped out and
+wagged his bludgeon under the fireman's nose.
+
+“_Ach!_” Mr. Reardon coughed, and grimaced pleasantly. “_Schmierkase und
+Sauerkraut_, ye big shtiff! _Vat wilse du haben_, eh? _Zwei bier?_ Damn
+the weather, as Misther Schultz would say.”
+
+He laid his finger on his lips, enjoining silence; then with the same
+finger he pointed sternly onward, and the fireman took the hint. In the
+clear space aft the house and next to the funnel Mr. Reardon bound and
+gagged him and laid him tenderly on his back to await developments.
+
+“Now thin, Michael,” he said to the skipper, “lave us go back an' see
+can we catch another. At four o'clock, whin this lad fails to return,
+Misther Uhl, the omadhaun, will sind up another man to see what the
+divil ails the firrst man.”
+
+And it was even so. This time it was the oiler.
+
+At five minutes after four a coal passer came up the stairs, and he was
+swearing at the delay in being relieved. Something told Mr. Reardon this
+fellow would make trouble, so without warning he hit the coal passer a
+light rap “to take the conceit out av him.” Two minutes later the coal
+passer had joined his fellows beside the funnel.
+
+At a quarter after four Mr. Uhl scratched his head and said something
+very explosive in German. He started up the stairs, got halfway up--and
+came down. It had occurred to him very suddenly that three men had
+already gone up the stairs and had failed to return. He called a fireman
+and gave him some very explicit orders in German; whereupon the man
+disappeared in the shaft alley. Five minutes later he returned, pop-eyed
+with excitement and the bearer of a tale that caused Mr. Uhl to arch his
+blond eyebrows and murmur dazedly “_So?_”
+
+Ten minutes passed. Mr. Reardon glanced interrogatively at Michael J.
+Murphy. “I think the divils are suspicious,” he whispered. “We should
+have had another be now. Have a care now, Michael. Whin they come they
+come wit' a rush an'--”
+
+A pistol shot echoed through the ship. It came up from forward. Three
+more followed in rapid succession--a scream--a shout!
+
+“May the divil damn me!” Terence Reardon cried in a horrified voice. “I
+clane forgot the little companion hatch at the ind av the shaft alley.
+They've crawled down the shaft alley an' up on deck at the very sterrn
+av the ship!”
+
+He dashed aft towards the spot where his prisoners were laid out close
+to the funnel. As he turned the corner of the house he observed that the
+electric lamp which he had so carefully screwed out of its socket had
+been screwed in again, and by its light Terence beheld no less a person
+than Mr. Uhl cutting the halyards that bound the oiler. The fireman had
+already been cut loose, but the potent effects of Terence Reardon's blow
+with the wrench still remained; though conscious, the man was unfit for
+combat. The coal passer, evidently the first man to be rescued by Mr.
+Uhl, was standing by.
+
+“Gower that, ye divils!” Mr. Reardon shrieked, and charged, swinging his
+monkey wrench with all his horsepower. He missed his first stroke at
+Mr. Uhl, who very deftly stabbed him high up on the hip for his
+carelessness; then the chief swung again, and Mr. Uhl was out of the
+fight.
+
+Not so the big coal passer, however. He planted in Terence Reardon's
+face as pretty a left and right--hay-makers both--as one could hope to
+see anywhere outside a prize-ring; whereupon the chief took the count
+with great abruptness. The fireman reached for the monkey wrench--and at
+that instant the weak, pale-faced skipper lurched around the corner of
+the house and his automatic commenced to bark.
+
+It was not a time for sentiment. Michael J. Murphy glanced once at
+Terence Reardon's bloody, upturned face, and the glazed eyes thrilled
+him with horror. The chief engineer was dead! That meant that Michael J.
+Murphy would soon be dead, too. Well, they had fought a good fight and
+lost, so nothing now remained for him to do save slaughter as many of
+the enemy as possible and go to his accounting like a gentleman.
+
+He turned his back on the heap of bloody, prostrate men, stepped over a
+little rivulet of gore that ran rapidly toward the scupper as the
+ship heeled to port, then hesitated and started back as she heeled
+to starboard. He was vaguely conscious that Mr. Uhl had shut down his
+engines before coming on deck and that in consequence the ship had lost
+headway and was beginning to wallow. In his weak state her plunging
+caused him to stagger like a drunken man. As he crossed to the port side
+of the ship and gazed down the deck he noticed that the incandescent
+lamps had all been screwed back in their sockets, and by their brilliant
+light he beheld one of the firemen in the act of removing the scantling
+from before the first assistant's door. Just as the door swung open the
+captain fired, but evidently missed, for the man sprang nimbly into the
+state-room for safety.
+
+If the great European War has proved nothing else to date, it has
+demonstrated one comforting thing about the German people: one does not
+grow impatient waiting for them to carry the fight to him. The fireman
+had no sooner entered the first assistant's state-room than the first
+assistant came out. He was wearing his pajamas and a piece of young
+artillery, and without the slightest embarrassment he commenced shooting
+at Michael J. Murphy, who, not to be outdone in politeness while he
+could stand and see, promptly returned the compliment.
+
+The first assistant's first shot nipped a neat little crescent out of
+Mike Murphy's large red right ear; his second ripped clean through the
+inside of the skipper's left leg.
+
+“High and then low,” was the thought that capered through Mike Murphy's
+brain. “God grant he don't get me through the middle! That's what comes
+of fast shooting--so I guess I'll go slow.”
+
+The electric lamp over his head was shattered and the fragments
+scattered round him as he leaned against the corner of the house and
+took careful aim at the first assistant, who missed his next shot by a
+whisker and died in his tracks with two cartridges still in his gun.
+
+Dazedly Michael J. Murphy advanced along the deck, stepped over the body
+and entered the state-room. In the corner the fireman crouched, hands
+uplifted in token of surrender, so the skipper closed the door and
+shored it up again with the scantling. Mechanically he picked up the
+first assistant's huge revolver, broke it, removed the cartridges and
+threw them overboard. Then he slipped a clip of seven cartridges into
+his automatic and staggered round to Mr. Henckel's state room.
+
+The door was open. The bird had flown.
+
+Michael J. Murphy went in and sat down on Mr. Henckel's settee, for
+he was very weak and dizzy; and at least nobody could shoot at him in
+there. “Come, come, Michael,” he croaked, “no going out this voyage. You
+have work ahead of you. Pull yourself together and let us count noses.
+Now then, there were two firemen, two coal passers, one oiler and Mr.
+Uhl on watch. Terence killed Mr. Uhl with the monkey wrench, I killed
+the big coal passer, I think I killed the oiler, and one fireman was out
+of the scrap from the beginning. Then I killed the first assistant and
+locked the other fireman in his room. That leaves Mr. Henckel and a coal
+passer to be reckoned with. Now there was some shooting up forward and
+somebody was hit. That means Riggins shot somebody or somebody shot
+Riggins. The second mate probably went forward to let the men out of the
+forecastle, while the fireman went aft to let the engine-room gang out
+of the sterncastle. They haven't had time to do it yet; they'll have to
+pry those rings out of the door with a crowbar. I'll go aft and drive
+the fireman forward; when I have them bunched I'll argue with them.”
+
+He arrived at the break of the house and looked down on the deck aft.
+The lights had been turned on and a man was just raising a short crowbar
+to attack the door, from behind which came shouts and cries of anger and
+consternation.
+
+Mike Murphy rested his automatic on the deck rail and fired twice at the
+man in front of the sterncastle door. The fellow fled at once dashing
+along the deck, zigzag fashion, to distract the skipper's aim, and
+disappeared in the dark entrance to the starboard alleyway. So Michael
+J. Murphy slid down the companion and followed into the alleyway, firing
+two shots for luck as he came.
+
+Scarcely had he disappeared into the murk amidships when Terence Reardon
+rolled groggily down the companion after him. Terence had no means of
+ascertaining which alleyway the skipper had charged into--and he did not
+care. Blind with fury he lurched into the port alleyway; in consequence
+of which the fugitive, fleeing ahead of the captain down the starboard
+alleyway and thinking to turn down the port alleyway and double back to
+complete his labors at the sterncastle door, bumped squarely into the
+chief engineer.
+
+Mr. Reardon said no word, but wrapped his arms round the man and held
+the latter close to his breast.
+
+Thus for a moment they stood, gripping each other, each wondering
+whether the other was friend or foe.
+
+Then Mr. Reardon decided that even if his nose was bloody he could not
+possibly be mistaken in the odor of a fireman just come off watch. He
+had lost his monkey wrench in the _melee_ on the upper deck--the defunct
+Mr. Uhl having fallen upon it, thereby obscuring it from Mr. Reardon's
+very much befogged vision, but his soul was still undaunted, for Mr.
+Reardon, in common with most chief engineers still in their prime,
+firmly believed that he could trounce any fireman he saw fit to employ.
+He bit suddenly into the fireman's cheek just where the flesh droops
+in a fold over the lower jaw, and was fortunate enough to secure a
+grip that bade fair to hold; then he crooked his leg at the back of his
+opponent's and slowly shoved the fellow's head backward. They came
+down together, Mr. Reardon on top, content for once to hold his man
+helpless--and rest--while his enemy's shrieks of pain and rage resounded
+through the ink-black alleyway.
+
+Michael J. Murphy heard that uproar and halted. After listening a few
+seconds he came to the conclusion that a German was in deep distress,
+and that hence it was no part of his business to interfere. Besides, he
+had business of his own to attend to. He could hear a chain rattling
+up forward, and while it was too dark to see who or what was doing the
+rattling, he found Mr. Henckel guilty on mere suspicion, and fired
+at the sound; whereupon somebody said “_Ach, Gott!_” in tones of deep
+disgust, two little flashes of fire cut the dark, and two bullets
+whispered of death as they flew harmlessly down the alleyway.
+
+Instantly Mike Murphy returned the salute, firing at the other's
+flashes; then he fell to the deck and rolled over into the scupper to
+escape the return fire, which was not slow in coming.
+
+“I wonder where the devil he got that gun,” was Murphy's comment. “Mr.
+Uhl must have had it in his pocket and lent it to him.”
+
+There was profound silence within the forecastle, and pending the
+destruction of his attacker Mr. Henckel judged it imprudent to make any
+further attempts at a delivery. He required time to formulate a plan
+of attack, and in the interim he desired shelter. Mike Murphy heard the
+patter of feet, the patter ceasing almost as soon as it commenced--and
+he smiled grimly.
+
+“He's hiding,” the captain soliloquized. “Now, where would I take
+shelter if I were in his fix? Why, back of the hatch-coaming, of
+course--or the winch.” He had a sudden inspiration and called aloud:
+
+“Riggins! Riggins! Answer me, Riggins. This is Captain Murphy calling
+you.”
+
+“'Ere, sir,” came the voice of Riggins from the pilot-house above. The
+voice was very weak.
+
+“Climb out of the pilot-house, Riggins, to the bridge, turn on the
+searchlight and bend it down here on the deck till I get a shot at this
+scoundrel. Don't be afraid of him, Riggins. It's Henckel and he can't
+shoot for beans. Get the light fair on him and keep it on him; it'll
+blind him and he won't be able to shoot you.”
+
+“The dirty dawg!” snarled Riggins wearily. “'E come up on the bridge
+a while--ago--an' I drove 'im off--but 'e plugged me, sir--through the
+guts, sir--an' me a married man! Wot in 'ell'll my ol' woman--say--”
+
+And that was the last word Riggins ever spoke. True, he managed to crawl
+out of the pilot-house and up the short companion to the bridge; he
+reached the searchlight, and while Mr. Henckel and Mike Murphy swapped
+shots below him he turned on the switch.
+
+“Bend it on the deck, Riggins. On the deck, my bully, on the deck,”
+ Mike Murphy pleaded as the great beam of white light shot skyward and
+remained there; nor could all of Murphy's pleading induce Riggins to
+bend it on the deck, for Riggins was lying dead beside the searchlight,
+while ten miles away an officer on the flying bridge of H.M.S. Panther
+watched that finger of light pointing and beckoning with each roll of
+the ship.
+
+“Something awf'lly queer, what?” he commented when reporting it to his
+superior.
+
+“Rather,” the superior replied laconically. “It can't be the Dresden
+and neither is it one of ours. We'll skip over and have a look at her,
+Reggie, my son.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+Michael J. Murphy had two shots left in his automatic, and he was saving
+those for daylight and Mr. Henckel's rush, when a searchlight came
+nickering and feeling its way across the dark waters. Slowly, slowly
+it lifted and rested on the big blunt bows of the _Narcissus_, hovered
+there a few seconds and came slowly aft, and as it lighted up the main
+deck Mr. Henckel rose from behind the hatch-coaming.
+
+“_Deutschland uber Alles!_” he yelled joyously--and rushed.
+
+Terence Reardon, having pounded his firemen into insensibility, had
+crept down the port alleyway, and, unknown to Captain Murphy and Mr.
+Henckel, he had, from the opposite side of the deck, watched the flashes
+of their pistols as they fired at each other.
+
+“I'll have to flank that fella an' put a shtop to this nonsense,” Mr.
+Reardon decided presently, and forthwith crept across the deck on his
+hands and knees until he reached the hatch-coaming. Mr. Henckel lurked
+just round the other corner of the coaming, so close Mr. Reardon could
+hear him breathing. And there the crafty chief had waited until Mr.
+Henckel rose for his charge--whereupon Mr. Reardon rose also.
+
+“Ireland upper always, ye vagabone!” he yelled, and launched himself at
+Mr. Henckel's knees. It was a perfect tackle and the second mate went
+down heavily.
+
+In an emergency such as the present all Terence Reardon asked was good
+fighting light. Fighting in the dark distressed him, he discovered, for
+while polishing off the fireman in the black alleyway he had missed one
+punch at the fellow's head, and had been reminded to his sorrow and the
+ruin of his knuckles, that the deck of the Narcissus was of good Norway
+pine. However, H.M.S. Panther was scarcely three cable lengths distant
+now, and the officer on her flying bridge could see that some sort of a
+jolly row was in progress on the deck of the Narcissus; so he kept the
+searchlight on the combatants while Mr. Reardon bent Mr. Henckel's back
+over the hatch-coaming, took his automatic away from him, and proceeded
+to take a cast of the mate's features in the vulcanite butt of the
+weapon. And vulcanite is far from soft!
+
+When Terence Reardon had completed his self-appointed task he stood up,
+hitched his dungarees, spat blood on the deck, and stood waving from
+side to side like a dancing bear. His face was unrecognizable; his
+dungarees, so neat and clean when he donned them the night before, were
+now one vast smear of red, and he grinned horribly, for he was war mad!
+
+“Next!” he croaked, and turned to the master for orders.
+
+But Michael Joseph Murphy was out of the fight. He lay prone on the
+deck, conscious but helpless, and because his broken rib was tickling
+his lung the froth on his lips bore a little tinge of pink. Only his
+eyes moved--and they smiled at Terence Reardon as the triumphant exiles
+of Erin faced each other.
+
+Terence Reardon turned and shook his battered fists full into the rays
+of the searchlight. He was magnificent for one brief instant; then
+the war-madness left him, and again he was plain, faithful, whimsical,
+capable, honest Terence P. Reardon, chief engineer of the S.S.
+Narcissus, who considered it a pleasure to discourse on the fairies when
+he had nothing more important to do. Now that the fight was over and the
+German fleet had overhauled them at last, he had time to think of Mrs.
+Reardon and the children and his best job gone for ever--tossed into the
+discard with his honor as a faithful servant.
+
+He sat down very suddenly on the hatch-coaming and covered his terrible
+face with his terrible hands.
+
+“Ah, Norah! Norah!” he cried--and sobbed as if his heart must break.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+
+When Captain the Hon. Desmond O'Hara, of H.M.S. Panther, boarded the
+steamer Narcissus via the Jacob's ladder Mr. Reardon hove overside
+at his command, he paused a moment, balanced on the ship's rail, and
+stared.
+
+“My word!” he said, and leaped to the deck, to make room for a
+pink-and-white middy. The pink-and-white one stared and said “My aunt!”
+ Then he, too, leaped to the deck, and a stocky cockney blue-jacket poked
+his nose over the rail.
+
+“Damn my eyes!” said this individual. “'Ere's a bloomin' mess!”
+
+“Who is that person?” Captain Desmond O'Hara demanded, pointing to the
+semiconscious Mr. Henckel, who was moaning and saying things in his
+mother tongue.
+
+“That,” said Mr. Reardon with a familiar wink, “was a fine, decent
+German until I operated on him!”
+
+“So I observed. And who might you be?”
+
+“Me name is Terence P. Reardon, an' I'm the chief engineer av the United
+Shtates steamer _Narcissus_, av San Francisco.”
+
+“Ah! An Irish-American, eh?”
+
+Mr. Reardon looked down at the deck, smiled a cunning little smile and
+looked up at Captain O'Hara. “Well, sor,” he declared, “I had me hyphen
+wit' me whin I shipped; as late as yestherd'y afthernoon 'twas in good
+worrkin' ordher; but what wit' the exertion av chasin' our Gerrman
+crew round the decks, faith I've lost me hyphen, an' I'm thinkin' the
+skipper's lost his too. That's him forninst ye. For the prisent he's in
+dhrydock awaitin' repairs, which leaves me in command av the ship.
+And since he's in no condition to go to his shtate-room an' unlock the
+ship's safe, an' sorra wan av me knows the combination, the divil a look
+will ye have at our papers. I'll save time an' throuble for us all be
+tellin' ye now that we've ten t'ousand tons av soft coal undher
+deck, that we cleared from Norfolk, Virginia, for Manila or Batavia,
+Pernambuco for ordhers, an' that we're a couple av t'ousand miles off
+our course. So confiscate the ship an' be damned to ye! Only I'm hopin'
+ye'll not be above takin' a bit av advice from wan who knows. There's a
+Gerrman fleet not far off, an' if ye shtop to monkey wit' us, faith ye
+may live to regret it--an' ye may not.”
+
+Captain the Hon. Desmond O'Hara smiled sweetly. “Divil a fear,” he said,
+in no way cast down. “We met the beggars off the Falklands yesterday
+and sunk them all but the Dresden. She slipped away from us in the dark,
+making for the mainland, and we were looking for her when we saw your
+searchlight cutting up such queer didos, so the Panther dropped behind
+to investigate. Had it not been for your searchlight we would have
+missed you.”
+
+“An' be the same token a little dead Englishman signalled ye.” Mr.
+Reardon gave another hitch to his dungarees. “Sor,” he said doggedly,
+“I never t'ought I'd live to see the day I'd want to cheer a British
+victh'ry--but I do.” He glanced down at his right hand and shook his
+head. “Englishmen that ye are,” he continued, “I'll not offer ye a hand
+like that--much as I want to shake hands wit' ye.”
+
+“Faith, don't let that worry you, Mr. Reardon. I'm not an Englishman.”
+
+“In the divil's name, you're not an--an--”
+
+“I'm an Irishman! My name is Desmond O'Hara.”
+
+Mr. Reardon was fully aware that here was a grand specimen of the kind
+of Irish he had been taught to despise--the Irish that take the king's
+shilling, the gentlemen Irish that lead the king's cockneys into battle.
+And yet, strange to say, no thought of that entered his head now. He
+stepped up to Captain O'Hara, looked round cautiously as if expecting to
+be overheard, winked knowingly and whispered, as he jerked a significant
+thumb toward the unhappy Mr. Henckel: “Sure 'tis the likes av us that
+can take the measure av the likes av thim.”
+
+“It is,” replied Captain O'Hara, and reached for Terry Reardon's awful
+hand. “It is!”
+
+Together they lifted Michael J. Murphy into a boson's chair, the jackies
+unslung a cargo derrick, Mr. Reardon went to the winch, and the skipper
+was hoisted overside into the _Panther's_ boat and taken aboard the
+warship for medical attention. Just before Mr. Reardon hoisted him he
+drew the chief's ear down to his lips.
+
+“About von Staden,” he whispered. “I thought I wanted to see him hung.
+Legally he's a pirate; but, Terence, he was raised wrong; you know,
+Terence--_Deutschland ueber Alles_. These Dutch devils thought it was
+all right to steal our ship--national necessity, you know. Let von
+Staden out of the mate's store-room and tell him the English have
+us--that his fleet is gone. Then turn your back on him, Terence.”
+
+Mr. Reardon followed orders. “Captain Murphy ordhered me to let ye out,”
+ he explained to the supercargo, “an' towld me to turrn me back on ye.”
+
+“Please thank him for me,” von Staden replied gently. “I scarcely
+expected such kindness at his hands. You may turn your back now, Mr.
+Reardon.”
+
+So Mr. Reardon turned his back, and, despite the rush of the British
+jackies to stop him, Herr August Carl von Staden reached the rail.
+“_Deutschland ueber Alles!_” he shouted defiantly--and jumped. He did
+not come up.
+
+Captain the Hon. Desmond O'Hara removed his cap. “They die so infernally
+well,” he said presently, “one hates to fight them--individually.
+Yesterday the _Nuernberg_ fell to us. We outranged her, and when she was
+out of action and sinking, with her men swimming and drowning all round
+her, the _Panther_ was stripped of life preservers in two minutes. Some
+of my lads went overboard to help the Boche.”
+
+Mr. Reardon remembered he had wrapped waste round the head of his monkey
+wrench and curtailed his indicated horse-power when tapping individuals;
+yet, when he fought them in bulk, with what savage joy had he struck
+down Mr. Uhl, a poor, inoffensive devil and the victim of a false ideal
+of national honor! Mr. Reardon was quite sure he despised Englishmen;
+yet the tears came to his eyes when the jackies carried poor little
+Riggins away from the searchlight, and he prayed for eternal rest for
+the soul of his late assistants, for he had learned in a night, as he
+fought with tooth and fist and monkey wrench, what those who fight
+with tongue and typewriter will never learn--that racial and religious
+animosities are just a pitiful human bugaboo--in bulk. Only that valiant
+minority that sheds its blood for the heartless majority can ever know
+this great truth--and the pity of it--that warriors never hate each
+other.
+
+They are too generous for that.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+
+Capt. Matt Peasley, with his heart in his throat, called up the British
+consul at San Francisco. Cappy Ricks, looking very pale and unhappy,
+sagged in his chair, while Mr. Skinner stood by, gnawing his nails and
+looking as if he would relish being kicked from one end of California
+Street to the other.
+
+“Hullo!” Matt Peasley began. Cappy Ricks shuddered and closed his eyes.
+“Is this the British consul's office?... This is Captain Peasley, of the
+Blue Star Navigation Company... Yes... About our steamer _Narcissus_...
+You say the consul is on his way down to our office... Thank you...
+Goodbye.”
+
+Cappy Ricks sighed like an old air-compressor. “I hope I live till he
+gets here,” he declared feebly. “Deliberate race, the British. No pep.
+Never get anywhere in a hurry.”
+
+As if to give the lie to Cappy's criticisms, the British consul was
+admitted at that moment.
+
+“Gentlemen,” he announced as the heart-broken trio gathered round him,
+“I have some very grave news for you.” His voice was vaguely reminiscent
+of that of the foreman in a quarry who calls upon a lady to inform her
+that her husband has just been caught in a premature blast and that the
+boys will be up with the pieces directly. “Your steamer _Narcissus_,
+loaded with ten thousand tons of coal, has been captured a hundred miles
+north-east of the Falkland Islands by His Majesty's cruiser _Panther_.
+In view of your vessel's clearance--”
+
+A low moan broke from Cappy Ricks.
+
+“Tightwad!” he reviled. “Old Alden P. Tightwad, the prince of misers!
+He thought he'd add a couple of ten-dollar bills to his roll, so he
+encouraged his skipper to hire a lot of interned Germans to work his
+ships in neutral trade! He was penny-wise and pound-foolish, so he cut
+out the wireless to save a miserable hundred and forty dollars a
+month. Bids are invited for the privilege of killing the damned old
+fool--Skinner! What are you looking at?”
+
+“N-n-nothing!” stammered Mr. Skinner.
+
+“I won't be looked at that way, Skinner. I have my faults, I know--”
+
+“Ssshh!” Matt Peasley interrupted.
+
+“And I won't be 'sshh-ed' at either. I lost the ship. I admit it. I
+O.K.'d the charter, and Murphy did his best to save her for us and
+couldn't. I'm the goat, but if it busts me I'll reimburse you two boys
+for every cent you have lost through my carelessness--”
+
+“I beg your pardon, Mr. Ricks,” the consul interrupted. “Pray permit me
+to proceed. The circumstances attending this case are so very unusual--”
+
+“My dear Mister British Consul, I shall not argue the matter with you.
+You're too bally deliberate, and, besides, what's the use? The ship is
+gone. Let her go. We'll build another twice as big. Of course I could
+give you an excuse, but if I did you'd think I was old Nick Carter come
+to life. We'll just have to take it up through our State Department,
+present our alibi, and try to win her back in the prize court.”
+
+“She will never be sent to a prize court, Mr. Ricks. It doesn't require
+a prize court to decide the case of the steamer _Narcissus_. The
+evidence is too overwhelming. There could not possibly be a reversal of
+the decision of our admiral.”
+
+Mr. Skinner sat down suddenly to keep from falling down. The consul
+continued: “The commander of the _Panther_, Captain Desmond O'Hara--by
+the way, an old schoolmate of mine--has sent me a long private report
+on the affair; by wireless, of course, and in code. It appears that in
+Pernambuco harbor your German crew overpowered the captain--”
+
+“What?” cried Cappy, Matt and Skinner in chorus. “You admit that?”
+
+“We do, Mr. Ricks. And last night your chief engineer, Mr. Terence
+Reardon, with the aid of the steward, one Riggins--a British subject and
+unfortunately killed in the affray--and Captain Murphy overpowered the
+German crew--”
+
+“Oh, Mr. Ricks!” gasped Skinner.
+
+“Oh, Matt!” shrilled Cappy Ricks.
+
+“Oh, Cappy!” yelled Matt Peasley.
+
+“Oh, nonsense,” laughed the British consul. “They stole her back,
+gentlemen, and when Captain O'Hara found her rolling helplessly and
+boarded her, she was a shambles. Dead men tell no tales, Mr. Ricks--yet
+it was impossible for any fair-minded man to doubt the testimony of
+the dead men aboard your _Narcissus_! Her killed, wounded and prisoners
+formed a perfect alibi. In the meantime, Mr. Reardon and Captain
+Murphy are aboard the Panther, receiving medical attention, and will be
+returned to duty in a few weeks; the _Narcissus_ is proceeding to meet
+the other ships of our fleet. She will coal them at sea.”
+
+“Then you've confiscated her cargo?” Matt Peasley demanded.
+
+“We should worry about the cargo if they give us back our vessel,”
+ Cappy Ricks declared happily. “We haven't received our freight money,
+of course, but by the time I get through with the charterers they'll pay
+the freight and ask no questions about the coal.”
+
+“We confiscated it, Mr. Ricks,” the British consul continued, “for the
+reason that it was German coal. The supercargo who boarded the vessel
+at Pernambuco told your captain his people had paid cash for it to the
+charterers. But we're going to give you back your vessel because we
+haven't any moral right to keep her, since her owners have committed
+no breach of international law. The supercargo left fifteen thousand
+dollars behind him when he jumped overboard, but Captain O'Hara declined
+to confiscate that. At Captain Murphy's suggestion it will be forwarded
+to the widow of the man Riggins. Captain O'Hara especially requested
+that I call upon you and inform you that you have two of the finest
+Irishmen in the world to thank for your ship.”
+
+“Thank you, Mister Consul. By the way, can you reach Captain O'Hara by
+wireless? If you can, I should be glad to pay for a message if you will
+send it.”
+
+“I shall be delighted indeed.”
+
+“Then tell him the Blue Star Navigation Company thanks him for the
+courtesy of his message, but that it does not agree with his statement
+that we have two Irishmen to thank for our ship. We think we have
+three! I know the Irish. The scoundrels never go back on each other in a
+fight.”
+
+The consul laughed.
+
+“By the way,” he said, as he took up his hat preparatory to leaving,
+“your ship is now equipped with wireless--a fine, powerful plant such
+as they use in the German Navy. The supercargo brought it aboard at
+Pernambuco.”
+
+Matt Peasley, the Yankee, came to life at that. “Has that been
+confiscated, too?” he queried.
+
+“No, captain. However, we have confiscated that German crew of yours--”
+
+“Hallelujah!” yelled Cappy Ricks.
+
+“--and loaned you a crew of British seamen from the tramp _Surrey Maid_.
+The _Scharnhorst_ torpedoed her off the coast of Chile, and we found her
+crew on board one of the German transports when we captured them after
+the fleet was destroyed. You're all fixed up, from skipper to cabin
+boy--”
+
+“Wireless operator, too?” Matt Peasley cried.
+
+The consul nodded. “He's got a steady job,” the youthful president
+declared, and turned to Cappy Ricks for confirmation of this edict. But
+Cappy, the pious old codger, had bowed his head on his breast and they
+heard him mutter:
+
+“O Lord, I thank Thee! All unworthy as I am, Lord, thou loadest me with
+favors--including a wireless plant, free gratis!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+
+Long after the British consul had departed Cappy Ricks sat alone in his
+office, dozing. Presently he roused and rang for Mr. Skinner.
+
+“Skinner,” he said, “Matt reports that the late Riggins made an
+allotment of his wages to his wife when he shipped aboard the
+_Narcissus_?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Riggins's wages hereafter shall constitute a charge against the
+_Narcissus_ while Mrs. Riggins lives and while the Blue Star Navigation
+Company can afford to give up seventy dollars every month. Attend to it,
+Skinner. Another thing, Skinner.”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“We ought to do something for Murphy and Reardon. Now then, Skinner,
+you've never had a chance to be a sport heretofore, but you're a
+stockholder in the Blue Star Navigation Company now, and as such I feel
+that I should not use my position, as owner of a controlling interest in
+the stock of the company, to give away the property of the company in
+an arbitrary fashion. So I'm going to leave it up to you, Skinner, to
+suggest what we shall do for them. I believe you will agree with me that
+we should do something very handsome by those two boys.”
+
+“Quite so, sir, quite so. Well, to start off with, Mr. Ricks, I think we
+ought to pay their hospital bills, if any. Then I think we ought to give
+each of them a handsome gold watch, suitably engraved and with a small
+blue star--sapphires, you know--set in the front of the case.”
+
+“You feel that would about fill the bill, eh, Skinner?”
+
+“Well, next Christmas I think we ought to give them each a month's
+salary.”
+
+“Hum! You do?”
+
+“Yes, sir. I think that would be a very delicate thing to do.”
+
+Cappy sighed. Poor Skinner! Victim of the saving habit! Decent
+devil--didn't mean to be small, but just couldn't help it. A
+bush-leaguer--Skinner. Never meant for big company--
+
+“In addition--” Skinner began.
+
+“Yes, Skinner, my boy. Go on, go on, old horse. Now then, in addition--”
+
+“It seems like the wildest extravagance, Mr. Ricks, but those men
+have fought for their ship and I--remember, Mr. Ricks, this is only
+a suggestion--I think it would be a very--er--tactful thing to do
+to--er--”
+
+“It'll choke him before he gets it out,” Cappy soliloquized. Aloud he
+said: “Go on, Skinner, my dear boy. Don't be afraid.”
+
+“At a time like this, when freights are so good and vessel property
+pays so well, it seems to me--that is, if you and Matt have no
+objection--that we ought to give Mike and Terence a--er--a little
+piece of the _Narcissus_--the ship--er--they
+love--say--er--a--ten-thousand-dollar interest--each--”
+
+“God bless you, Skinner! You came through at last, didn't you? The
+president emeritus agrees with you, Skinner, and it is so ordered.
+
+“Now skip along and wireless the glad news to Mike and Terence. Tell
+them when they have the coal out to proceed to Rio and load manganese
+ore.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+
+In due course Captain Michael J. Murphy and Mr. Terence Reardon came off
+the dry dock, the sole visible evidence of that unrecorded second naval
+engagement off the Falkland Islands being a slight list to starboard
+on the part of the Reardon nose, and a notch in Murphy's right ear. Mr.
+Skinner had had a local jeweler prepare the presentation watches against
+the day of the home-coming of the warriors of the Blue Star, and on
+a Saturday night Cappy gave a banquet to Mike and Terence, and every
+employee of the Ricks' interests who could possibly attend, was present
+to do the doughty pair honor and cheer when the awards for valor were
+duly made by Cappy and congratulatory speeches made by Mr. Skinner
+and Matt Peasley. It was such a gala occasion that Cappy drank three
+cocktails, battened down by a glass or two of champagne, and as a result
+was ill for two days thereafter. When he recovered, he announced sadly
+and solemnly that he was about to retire--forever; that nothing of
+a business nature should ever be permitted to drag him back into the
+harness again. Then he bade all of his employees a touching farewell,
+packed his golf clubs, and disappeared in the general direction of
+Southern California. He was away so long that eventually even the
+skeptical Mr. Skinner commenced to wonder if, perchance, the age of
+miracles had not yet passed and Cappy had really retired.
+
+Alas! On the morning of December 24th, Cappy suddenly appeared at the
+office, his kindly old countenance aglow like a sunrise on the Alps.
+Immediately he cited Mr. Skinner to appear with the payrolls of all of
+the Ricks enterprises and show what cause, if any, existed, why there
+should not be a general whooping up of salaries to the deserving all
+along the line. The Ricks Lumber & Logging Company had already declared
+a Christmas dividend; the accounts of every ship in the Blue Star fleet
+had been made up to date and a special Christmas dividend declared, and,
+in accordance with ancient custom, Cappy had appeared to devote one
+day in the year to actual labor. Christmas dividend checks and checks
+covering Christmas presents to his employees were always signed by him;
+it was his way of letting the recipients know that, although retired, he
+still kept a wary eye on his affairs.
+
+He had writer's cramp by the time he finished, but while the spending
+frenzy was on him he would take no rest; so he seized a pencil and,
+while Mr. Skinner called off the names of the deserving and the length
+of time each had spent in the Ricks service, Cappy scrawled a five, a
+ten or a twenty beside each name. Thus, in time, they came to the first
+name on the Blue Star pay roll.
+
+“Matthew Peasley, president; salary, ten thousand dollars a year; length
+of service, four months,” Mr. Skinner intoned. “How about a raise for
+Captain Matt?”
+
+Cappy laid down his pencil and looked at Skinner over the rims of his
+spectacles.
+
+“Skinner,” he said gravely, “you're only drawing twelve thousand a year,
+and you've been with me twenty-five years! And here I'm giving this boy
+Matt ten thousand a year and he's been on the pay roll only four months.
+Why, it isn't fair!”
+
+“Remember, he was three years in the Blue Star ships that--”
+
+“Can't consider that at all when raising salaries. The salaries of
+ship's officers are fixed and immutable anyhow, and when considering
+raises for my employees. I can take into consideration only the length
+of time they've been directly under my eye. Cut Matt's salary to five
+thousand a year and let him grow up with the business. His dividends
+from his Ricks L. & L. and Blue Star stock will keep him going, and he
+hasn't any household bills to keep up. He and Florry live with me, and
+I'm the goat.”
+
+“I fear Matt will not take kindly to that program, Mr.
+Ricks--particularly at this time, when every ship in the offshore fleet
+is paying for herself every voyage.”
+
+“Why?” Cappy demanded.
+
+“Well,” Mr. Skinner replied hesitatingly, “perhaps I have no business to
+tell you this, because the knowledge came to me quite by accident; but
+the fact of the matter is, Matt is going to build himself an auxiliary
+schooner--”
+
+“Good news!” Cappy piped. “That's the ticket for soup! An auxiliary
+schooner with semi-Diesel engines, four masts and about a million-foot
+lumber capacity would be a mighty good investment right now. Every yard
+in the country that builds steel vessels is filled up with orders, but
+our coast shipyards can turn out wooden vessels in a hurry; and, with
+auxiliary power, they'll pay five hundred per cent on their cost
+before this flurry in shipping, due to the war, is over. I don't care,
+Skinner--provided he builds a ship that's big enough to go foreign--”
+
+“But this isn't that kind,” Mr. Skinner interrupted.
+
+“No other kind will do, Skinner.”
+
+“This is to be a schooner yacht--”
+
+“A what!” Cappy shrilled.
+
+“A yacht--eighty-five feet over all--”
+
+“Eighty-five grandmothers! Why, what the devil does that boy want of a
+yacht? How much money does he intend to put into her?”
+
+“I do not know, Mr. Ricks; but we can be reasonably certain of one
+thing; Matt Peasley will not build a cheap boat. She'll have a lot of
+gewgaws and gadgets, teak rail, mahogany joiner-work--at the very least,
+she'll cost him thirty thousand dollars.”
+
+“Skinner,” Cappy declared solemnly, “he might as well put the money in
+a sack, go down to Clay Street Wharf and throw the money overboard!
+The other night I saw a couple of soldiers having a pleasant time in
+a shooting gallery, but what the president of the Blue Star Navigation
+Company wants with a thirty-thousand-dollar yacht beats my time. Why,
+he has more than thirty good vessels to play with all week, and yet he
+wants a yacht for Sunday! Skinner, my dear boy, that is wild, wanton
+extravagance.”
+
+“Well, I dare say Matt thinks he can afford the extravagance.”
+
+“Skinner, no man can afford it. Extravagance may reach a point where it
+becomes sinful. And I say it's a crime to put thirty thousand dollars
+into a yacht when the same thirty thousand, invested in a good vessel,
+will yield such tremendous returns. Skinner, my boy, how did you find
+out about this yacht nonsense?”
+
+“I was looking through Matt's desk for a letter I had given him to read,
+and I ran across the plans. Thinking they were Blue Star plans, I looked
+them over; there was a letter from the naval architect attached--”
+
+Cappy threw down his pencil.
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet,” he cried in deep disgust, “I thought
+I was going to have a Merry Christmas--and now it's spoiled! Good Lord,
+Skinner! To think of a man throwing away thirty thousand dollars, not to
+mention the upkeep and interest after he's thrown it away--”
+
+“You've just this very day thrown away about thirty thousand dollars you
+didn't have to,” Mr. Skinner reminded him.
+
+“I do have to. I've got to keep all my boys happy and satisfied and up
+on their toes, or what the devil would happen to us? They're my partners
+when all is said and done, and how am I going to face my Maker if I
+don't give my partners a square deal? There's a vast difference between
+justice and extravagance. Skinner, you don't suppose Matt's like every
+other shellback of a skipper? Why, he's only twenty-five years old; and
+if he's got the blue-water fever again, after a year ashore, there'll be
+no standing him at thirty.”
+
+“Well, he's got it, sir,” Mr. Skinner opined firmly. “Did you ever see
+an old sailing skipper that didn't get it? You remember Burns, who had
+the _Sweet Alferetta_? His father died and left him a million dollars,
+and five years later he came sneaking in here one day, told you he was
+tired clipping coupons and that if you wanted to save his life you'd
+give him back the _Sweet Alferetta_ and a hundred dollars a month to
+skipper her! He sold his interest to his successor for two thousand
+dollars when he fell into the fortune--and five years later he bought it
+back for three thousand, just so he could have a job again.”
+
+“Yes,” Cappy admitted; “they all get the blue-water fever--after
+they've left blue water. I never knew a sailor yet who wouldn't tell
+you sailoring was a dog's life; but I never knew one who quit and quite
+recovered from the hankering to go back. I think you're right, Skinner.
+This yacht is just a symptom of Matt's disease. He realizes his business
+interests tie him to the beach; but if he has a sailing yacht that he
+can fuss round with on week-ends in the bay, and once in a while make a
+little cruise to Puget Sound or the Gulf of Lower California, he figures
+he'll manage to survive.”
+
+Mr. Skinner nodded.
+
+“Speaking of yachts,” Cappy continued, “the case of old Cap'n Cliff
+Ashley suggests a cure for this boy Matt. Cap'n Cliff was a Gloucester
+fisherman, with the smartest little schooner that ever came home from
+the Grand Banks with halibut up to her hatches. He couldn't read or
+write and he'd never learned navigation; but he'd been born with the
+instincts of a homing pigeon, and somehow whenever he pointed his
+schooner toward Gloucester he managed to arrive on schedule; and any
+time he got a good fair breeze from the west, like as not he'd run over
+to England and sell his catch there.
+
+“Like most of his breed, Cap'n Cliff had to have a fast boat; he had to
+keep her as immaculate as a yacht in order to be happy, and he was never
+so happy as when he'd meet a squadron of the New York Yacht Club out
+on a cruise and sail circles round the flagship with his little old
+knockabout fish schooner. On such occasions old Cap'n Cliff would break
+out a long red burgee with M.O.B.Y.C. in white letters on it. On one of
+his trips to England he hooked up with a big schooner wearing the ensign
+of the Royal Yacht Club and dassed 'em to race with him.
+
+“Well, sir, it happened that the late King Edward was aboard his yacht
+that day, and you know what a sport he was in his palmy days. Cap'n
+Cliff cracked on everything he had in the way of plain sail and, after
+holding the King even for a couple of hours, he put his packet under
+gaff topsails and fisherman's staysail and broke out the balloon jib,
+bade Edward good-bye in the International Code--and flew! About six
+hours after Cap'n Cliff came to anchor, the King loafed up in his yacht,
+dropped anchor, cleared away his launch, and came over to visit Cap'n
+Cliff and shake hands with him.
+
+“'My dear sir,' says Edward, pointing aloft to the red burgee with
+M.O.B.Y.C. on it, 'pray to what yacht club do you belong?'
+
+“'My own bloomin' yacht club, your majesty,' says Cap'n Cliff; and if he
+hadn't been a Yankee fisherman the King would have knighted him on the
+spot!
+
+“And that remark, Skinner, my dear boy, clears the atmosphere in the
+case of our own dear Matthew. He shall have his own blooming yacht club,
+only his yacht shall carry cargo and pay her way.”
+
+“You mean--”
+
+“I mean I'm going to send him to sea for one voyage, once a year,
+which will break up that blue-water fever and save Matt thirty thousand
+dollars as an initial investment, and about ten thousand a year upkeep
+and interest. All that boy needs to cure him, Skinner, is the old
+_Retriever_, totally surrounded by horizon and smelling of a combination
+of tarred rope, turpentine, wet canvas, fresh paint, green lumber and
+the stink of the bilge water. Lordy me, Skinner, it puts them to sleep
+and they wake up feeling perfectly bully! Where's the _Retriever_ now,
+Skinner, and who is in charge of her destinies?”
+
+“She's due on Puget Sound from the West Coast. Captain Lib Curtis has
+her.”
+
+“Good news! Well, now, Skinner, you listen to me: The minute he reports
+his arrival you wire Lib to put the old harridan on dry dock and slick
+her up until she looks like four aces and a king, with everybody in the
+game standing pat. Can't have any whiskers on her bottom when Matt takes
+her out, Skinner, because if the boy's to enjoy himself she's got to
+be able to show a clean pair of heels. Then write Lib to wire his
+resignation and give any old reason for it. Have him resign just before
+the vessel is loaded and ready for sea, and tell him to insist on being
+relieved immediately. Of course, Skinner, Matt will get busy right away,
+looking for the right skipper to relieve Captain Curtis--and about that
+time the president emeritus will shove in his oar and ball things up.
+Every doggoned skipper Matt recommends for the job is going to have his
+application vetoed by Alden P. Ricks, and--er--ahem! Harumph-h-h!”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“And you stick by me, Skinner. Follow all my leads and don't trump any
+of my aces; and just about the time Matt begins to get good and mad
+at my doggoned interference--you know, Skinner, my boy, I'm only a
+figurehead--you cut in and say: 'Well, for heaven's sake! You two still
+squabbling over a skipper for the _Retriever?_ Matt, why don't you
+save the demurrage and take her out yourself--eh?'” And Cappy winked
+knowingly and prodded his general manager in the ribs.
+
+“I guess that plan's kind of poor--eh, Skinner? I guess it won't
+work--eh? Particularly when I come right back and say: 'Well, he might
+as well, for all the use he is round this office. Here I go to work and
+appoint him president of the Blue Star and he won't stay in the office
+and'tend to the president's business. Yes, sir! Leaves all that to you
+and me, Skinner, while he degrades himself doing the work of a port
+captain.'”
+
+“All of which is quite true, Mr. Ricks,” Mr. Skinner affirmed. “He will
+not stay in the office--and he's getting worse. Two-thirds of his time
+is spent round the docks.”
+
+“Well, two-thirds of his time in 1915 will not be spent round the docks,
+Skinner. Play that bet to win! We're going to have a busy old year
+in the shipping game in 1915, and a busier one in 1916 if that war in
+Europe isn't over by then. A voyage in the _Retriever_ will fix the boy
+up, Skinner, and he'll stick round the office and put over some real
+business. Yachts! Hah! What does a business man want of a yacht?”
+
+“You overlooked one very important detail, Mr. Ricks,” Skinner ventured.
+
+“I overlook nothing, Skinner--nothing. His wife shall accompany him on
+the voyage. I shall implant the idea in her head, beginning this very
+night as soon as I get home. I'll just tell her she isn't and never will
+be a true sailor's true love until she takes a voyage with her husband.
+Romantic girl, Florry! She'll about eat that suggestion, feathers and
+all, Skinner. She'll do the real work for us. Always remember, my boy,
+that an ounce of promotion is worth enough perspiration to float the
+_Narcissus_.”
+
+“But what shall we do for a port captain?”
+
+“I've ordered Mike Murphy--via Matt, of course--to take a vacation
+under full salary and recover from the wounds he received walloping
+that German crew on the _Narcissus_. About the time Matt leaves in the
+_Retriever_, Mike will be ready to go to work again or commit murder if
+we don't give it to him; so we'll slip him a temporary appointment as
+port captain. I'm going to make it permanent some day, anyhow. I suppose
+you've noticed that Mike Murphy has a crush on your stenographer; and I
+don't see how he's going to put anything over if he never gets a chance
+to see the girl!”
+
+“I really hadn't noticed it, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“If it was a ten-cent piece you'd notice it,” Cappy retorted. “And now
+that matter is settled, how about this port steward? Is he a grafter? If
+not, raise him five dollars a month. He's been with us only a year.”
+
+Late that afternoon, after Cappy had made the rounds of his office,
+distributing his checks and wishing all hands the merriest of
+Christmases, he paused at last at Mr. Skinner's desk and laid a
+thousand-dollar check thereon.
+
+“Not a peep out of you, Skinner--not a peep!” he cautioned his general
+manager. “No thanks due me. You've earned it a thousand times over--and
+then some. Hum-m! Ahem! Harumph-h-h! By the way, Skinner, my dear boy,
+I forgot to mention to you another little idea that's in the back of my
+head.”
+
+“You mean about sending Matt to sea for a voyage?”
+
+“Exactly. The sea is a wonderful institution, Skinner--wonderful! It
+promotes health and strength; and--er--damn it, Skinner, my dear boy,
+have you ever observed that there isn't a married skipper in our employ
+that hasn't been lucky? Many well-known authorities prescribe a sea
+voyage--”
+
+“What for, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+Cappy thrust his thumb into Skinner's ribs, winked, bent low, and
+whispered:
+
+“Too slow, Skinner; too slow. I'm getting old, you know--I can't wait
+for ever. And if the experiment succeeds--Skinner, my dear boy, you're
+next! You've been married more than a year now--”
+
+“I fail to comprehend--”
+
+“Grandson!” Cappy whispered. “Grandson!”
+
+“Oh!” said Mr. Skinner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+
+One of the remarks most frequently heard on California Street was to
+the effect that whenever Cappy Ricks girded up his loins and went after
+something he generally got it. His scheme to get Matt Peasley to sea for
+one voyage, accompanied by Florry, worked as smoothly as a piston; and
+on the fifteenth of January the Peasleys went aboard the _Retriever_ at
+Bellingham and towed out, bound for Manila with a cargo of fir lumber.
+Matt made the run down in sixty-six days, a smart passage, waited a week
+in Manila Bay before he could secure a berth and commence discharging,
+discharged in a week, loaded a cargo of hemp, with a deckload of
+hardwood logs, and was ready for the return trip to San Francisco on
+April twenty-fourth, on which day he towed out past Corregidor.
+
+His wife, however, was not with him on the return voyage. Following a
+family conference, it was decided that Florry should return home on the
+mail steamer--which action Cappy Ricks considered most significant when
+Matt apprised him of it by cable, but failed to state a reason. The
+president emeritus, immediately upon receipt of this information,
+trotted into Mr. Skinner's office and laid Matt Peasley's cablegram on
+the latter's desk.
+
+“Well, Skinner, my dear boy,” he piped, rubbing his hands together the
+while, “what do you know about that?”
+
+“Do you--er--suspect--er--something, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“Suspect? Not a bit of it. I know! Neither Florry nor Matt would dream
+of permitting the other to come home alone if there wasn't a third party
+to be considered. Paste that in your hat, Skinner. It isn't done.”
+
+Cappy was right, for the same steamer that bore his daughter home
+carried also a brief letter from his son-in-law conveying the tidings
+of great joy. The old man was so happy he went into Mr. Skinner's office
+and struck his general manager a terrible blow between the shoulders,
+after which he declared it was a shame that his years and reputation for
+respectability denied him the privilege of chartering a seagoing hack
+and painting the town red!
+
+The _Retriever_ crept slowly up the China Sea on the first of the
+southwest monsoon. At that period of the year, however, the monsoon
+is weak and unsteady; and after clearing the northern end of Luzon the
+_Retriever_ kicked round in a belt of light and baffling airs for a
+week. Then the monsoon freshened somewhat and the _Retriever_ once
+more rolled lazily away on her course, with young Matt Peasley humming
+chanteys on her quarter-deck and pondering the mystery that confronts
+all mankind in their first adventure in fatherhood. Would it be a boy or
+a girl? He was expressing to himself for perhaps the thousandth time the
+hope that it would be a boy, when from the poop he saw something he did
+not relish.
+
+It was the ship's cat coming across the deckload toward him, in
+his yellow eyes a singularly pleased expression and in his mouth a
+singularly large rat.
+
+Matt Peasley stepped below, found an old glove and drew it over his
+right hand, after which he returned to the quarter-deck.
+
+“Come, Tommy!” he called; and pussy came, to be seized by the tail and,
+still holding fast to his prey, cast overboard.
+
+“It's bad luck to do that to a black cat, sir,” the mate informed him.
+
+Matt Peasley's eyes were blazing.
+
+“And it's worse luck still for any mate aboard my ship who neglects to
+put the rat-guards on the lines when the vessel is lying at the dock,”
+ he growled. “You lubberly idiot!”
+
+“But I did put the rat-guards on the lines,” the mate protested.
+
+“Yes, I know you did; but I had to remind you of it,” Matt replied. “You
+didn't get them on in time--and now the Lord only knows how many rats
+we have aboard. Ordinarily I don't mind rats, but an Oriental rat is
+something to be afraid of.”
+
+“Why, sir?”
+
+“Because they carry the germs of bubonic plague, you farmer!” And Matt
+very carefully removed his glove and cast it overboard after the cat.
+“And it's a cold day when you can't find an occasional case of plague
+in the Orient. The cat caught the rat and mauled it round; hence the
+cat had to go, because I never permit in my cabin a cat that has been on
+intimate terms with an Oriental rat. And now I bet I know what's wrong
+with that fo'castle hand that went into the sick bay the day before
+yesterday. He complained of swelling in the glands of his neck and
+groins.”
+
+The cook left the forward deckhouse and came aft over the deckload. At
+the break of the poop he paused.
+
+“Captain Peasley,” he announced, “Lindstrom is dead.”
+
+“Tell everybody to keep away from him,” Matt ordered. He turned to the
+mate. “Mr. Matson,” he announced, “the first duty of a murderer is to
+get rid of the body. Go forward and throw Lindstrom's body overboard;
+then stay forward. If you come aft until I send for you I'll blow your
+brains out!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+
+When the _Retriever_ was out from Manila seventy days Cappy Ricks
+remarked to Mr. Skinner that Matt would be breezing in most any day now.
+On the eightieth day he remarked to Mr. Skinner that Matt was coming
+home a deal slower than he had gone out. The efficient Skinner, however,
+cited so many instances of longer passages from Manila to San Francisco
+that Cappy was comforted, although he was not convinced. “You make me a
+type-written list of all those vessels and their passages, Skinner,” he
+cautioned; “and when you can't think of any more authentic cases fake up
+a few. Florry's beginning to worry. She knows now what it means to be
+a sailor's wife, and if that doggoned Matt doesn't report soon 111 know
+what it means to be a sailor's father-in-law. I wish to Jimminy I hadn't
+sent Matt out with the _Retriever._”
+
+Ninety days passed. Cappy commenced to fidget. A hundred days passed,
+and Cappy visited the hydrographic office and spent a long time poring
+over charts of the air currents in the China Sea, along the coast of
+Asia and in the North Pacific.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he quavered when he returned to the office; “I'm
+a most unhappy old man.”
+
+Mr. Skinner forgot for an instant that he was a business man and, with a
+sudden, impulsive movement, he put his long, thin arm round the old man
+and squeezed him.
+
+“If you didn't think so much of him, sir,” he comforted Cappy, “you'd
+worry less. She really will not be overdue until she's out a hundred and
+twenty days.”
+
+“Skinner,” Cappy piped wearily, “don't try to deceive me. I've been
+in the shipping game for forty-odd years, boy. I know it's about six
+thousand miles from San Francisco to Manila, and if a vessel averages
+ninety miles a day she's making a smart passage. Matt made it down in
+sixty-six days, and he ought to come back in sixty, because he has fair
+winds all the way. Skinner, the boy's a month overdue; and if he never
+shows up--if he stays out much longer--Florry'll break her heart; and
+my grandson--think of it, Skinner!--think of the prenatal effect on the
+child! Oh, Skinner, my dear, dear boy, I want him big and light-hearted
+and sunny-souled like Matt--and to think this is all my doing--my own
+daughter! Oh! Oh, Skinner, my heart is breaking!”
+
+Mr. Skinner fled to his own office and did something most
+un-Skinner-like. He blinked away several large bright tears; and while
+he was blinking them the telephone bell rang. Mechanically Mr. Skinner
+answered. It was Jerry Dooley, in charge of the Merchants' Exchange.
+
+“Mr. Skinner,” said Jerry, “I've got some bad news for you.”
+
+“The-the-_Retriever_--” Skinner almost whispered.
+
+“Yes, sir. I thought I'd tell you first, so you could break it to the
+old man gently. The Grace liner _Ecudorian_ arrived at Victoria this
+morning and reports speaking the _Retriever_ eight hundred miles off the
+coast of Formosa. The vessel was under jib, lower topsail, foretopmast
+staysail, mainsail and spanker. She was flying two flags--an inverted
+ensign and the yellow quarantine flag. The _Ecudorian_ steamed close
+alongside of her, to windward. Captain Peasley was at the wheel--”
+
+“Thank God!” Mr. Skinner almost sobbed. “What was wrong with her, Jerry?
+Hurry up, man! Hurry up! Tell me!”
+
+“He was alone on the ship, Mr. Skinner. Bubonic plague! Killed the
+entire crew! Matt was the only man immune, and he's sailing the
+_Retriever_ home alone!”
+
+Mr. Skinner groaned.
+
+“Good gracious Providence! Why didn't the _Ecudorian_ take him off?”
+
+“Credit them with offering it,” Jerry replied. “He wouldn't come. He
+declined to jeopardize the people aboard the steamer and he wouldn't
+abandon the _Retriever_ with her full cargo; so what could they do? They
+had to sail away without him.”
+
+Gently Mr. Skinner broke the news to Cappy Ricks; for, of course, the
+United Press dispatches had carried it to the later afternoon editions
+and it would be useless for Mr. Skinner to attempt to lie kindly. Cappy,
+with bowed head, heard him through; when finally he looked up at Skinner
+his eyes were dead.
+
+“Quite what I expected of him, Skinner,” he said dully. “And I'd rather
+have him die than dog it! This report from the _Ecudorian_ helps some,
+Skinner. It will do to keep hope alive in my Florry--and every two weeks
+until the boy is born we'll--we'll--Oh, Skinner--”
+
+“Yes, sir; I'll attend to it. Leave everything to me, Mr. Ricks. I'll
+have wireless reports and telegrams and cablegrams from every port on
+earth telling of ships having spoken the _Retriever_, with the skipper
+well and hearty, and sending messages of good cheer to his wife.”
+
+“You--you won't be--er--stingy, Skinner? You'll send out the
+_Tillicum_ to find him and tow him in, won't you? And you'll have real
+telegrams--spend money, Skinner! I'll have to bring those messages home
+to Florry--”
+
+“Everything, Mr. Ricks. And I'll start right in by slipping fifty
+dollars to each of the waterfront reporters on all the papers. They're
+good boys, Mr. Ricks. I'll tell them why I have to have the service.
+Mrs. Peasley must have our fake reports confirmed in the papers--”
+
+“For work like that the marine reporters should have more money,” Cappy
+suggested wearily. His old hand reached out gropingly, closed over Mr.
+Skinner's and held it a moment childishly. “You're a very great
+comfort to me, Skinner--very great indeed! And you'll come home with me
+to-night, won't you, Skinner? I'm a little afraid--I want you near me,
+Skinner--in case I can't get away with it to Florry.”
+
+His dry, dead eyes studied the pattern in the office carpet.
+
+“Two mates, a cook and ten A. B.'s!” he murmured presently. “One man,
+even a Matt Peasley, cannot do the work of thirteen men. No, Skinner; it
+isn't done. One man simply cannot sail a barkentine.”
+
+But Mr. Skinner was not listening. He was on the long-distance phone
+calling the master of the _Tillicum_, just about finishing discharge of
+a cargo of nitrate at San Pedro. And presently Cappy heard him speaking:
+
+“Mr. Ricks, listen! Grant, of the _Tillicum_, says Matt would go up the
+China Sea on the southwest monsoon... Yes, captain. You say--ah, yes;
+quite so... Grant says he'd edge over until he got into the Japan
+Stream, and that would add a knot or two an hour to his speed... Yes,
+Grant. Speak up! ... Grant says, Mr. Ricks, that about the middle of
+September or the first of October Matt would run out of the southwest
+monsoon into the northeast monsoon--that's it, Grant, isn't it? He'd
+get them about off Formosa, eh?... Yes, Grant. Then he'd run into the
+prevailing westerly winds and run north on a great circle about five
+hundred miles below the Aleutian Islands--I see, Grant. All right! Fill
+your oil tanks and take an extra supply on deck, head into the North
+Pacific... Yes; use your own judgment, of course. Mine's no good... Yes;
+and bring a lot of disinfectants and a doctor, so it'll be safe to put
+a few men aboard when you find her and put your hawser on her ... Yes,
+Grant. If you find her you'll not have reason to regret it. Good-bye!
+Good luck!”
+
+“While the _Tillicum_ is on this wild-goose chase, Skinner,” Cappy said
+wearily, “she is chartered by the Blue Star Navigation Company to Alden
+P. Ricks personally, at the prevailing rates. The stockholders mustn't
+pay for my fancies, Skinner. You'll see to that, won't you?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+
+_Excerpt from the log of Captain Matt Peasley relief skipper of the
+American barkentine Retriever; Manila to San Francisco._
+
+May Third.--Seaman Olaf Lindstrom died to-day, following an illness of
+thirty-six hours. He was taken with chills and fever on the morning
+of the second, complained of a severe headache and vomited repeatedly.
+Removed him from the forecastle to a spare room in the forward house,
+which on the _Retriever_ has always been used as a sick bay. While being
+supported along the deck he collapsed, and when the mate undressed him
+and put him to bed he complained of soreness in his groins. I examined
+them and found them slightly swollen. Treated him for ague--calomel,
+salts, quinine and whisky, and one-fortieth-grain strychnine hypodermic
+solution to keep up his heart action when the fever registered one
+hundred and four and higher. He grew steadily worse. Could not find
+anything in my Home Book of Medicine that exactly described his
+symptoms, and was at a loss to diagnose Lindstrom's case until I
+discovered the ship's cat with a rat it had just killed.
+
+There were no rats aboard the _Retriever_ when she left San Francisco.
+I recalled that the first night we tied up to the dock in Manila a dirty
+little China Coast tramp lay just ahead of us; and as I passed her on my
+way uptown I saw a rat run down her gangplank. She had rat-guards on
+her mooring lines. We had just tied up to the dock and I returned
+immediately and instructed the mate to be sure to put the rat-guards on
+our mooring lines, and not to use any sort of gangplank. When I returned
+to the vessel later that night I found that the mate had neglected to
+put on the rat-guards and logged him for it. Before we left the dock a
+Chinaman died of bubonic plague aboard that tramp, and the port health
+authorities put the vessel in quarantine immediately and prevented
+further spread of the disease.
+
+When I saw the ship's cat with a rat, therefore, I knew we had some of
+that rotten China Coaster's plague rats aboard. Accordingly threw cat
+and rat overboard just as the cook announced Lindstrom's death. Upon
+looking up the information on plague, I am now convinced we have it
+aboard--that Linstrom died of it. First Mate Olaf Matson wrapped
+himself in my old bathrobe, gloved his hands and threw Lindstrom's body
+overboard, following it with the gloves and bathrobe.
+
+I am, in a measure, prepared for plague. When I learned we had lain
+close to a vessel with a case of plague aboard I laid in some plague
+medicine, on general principles and just to have an anchor out to
+windward. At the English drug store on the Escolta I bought a tiny
+bottle of Yersin's Antipest Serum and another of Haffkine's Prophylactic
+Fluid. It was all they had on hand and it wasn't much; but--it is enough
+to save me--and I intend to be saved if possible. I cannot afford to die
+now. I do not know how old the Haffkine's Fluid is; and the older it is,
+the longer it takes to render one immune. The antipest serum will render
+me immune immediately, but the duration of the immunity thus granted
+lasts, at the most, only fifteen days. I must, therefore, first take a
+hypodermic injection of antipest serum to render me immune immediately
+and the next day follow with an injection of Haffkine's Fluid, which
+gives permanent immunity, but not for a week or longer when used alone.
+
+There is this devilish thing about it to be considered, however: I may
+at this moment be inoculated with plague, for the period of incubation
+is from three to seven days--and I've fondled that cat every day since
+we left Manila. If I am already infected and do not know it, and while
+in that condition take an injection of the antipest serum, the book says
+the serum will immediately bring on a fatal and virulent attack of the
+plague! On the other hand, if I am not inoculated and take the antipest
+serum I am safe.
+
+The question before the house, therefore, is: Shall I take it or shall
+I not? And if I do take it shall I be saving my life or committing
+suicide? I am like the fellow in the story who was forced to drink from
+one of two glasses of wine. He knew one of them contained poison, but
+he didn't know which one it was! I shall make my will and flip a coin to
+decide the issue.
+
+May Fourth.--Two a.m. Mate reports another sick man in the forecastle.
+Wish I had some formaldehyde gas. Have told mate to sprinkle chloride
+of lime in Lindstrom's bunk and to dust the walls and floors of the
+forecastle and sick bay with it. That is the only disinfectant I have
+aboard in quantity.
+
+At midnight I flipped the coin--heads I'd take it; tails I wouldn't. The
+coin fell heads--and I took it.
+
+Four a.m.--Mustered the crew and gave them a lecture on bubonic plague.
+I have sufficient antipest serum for four men. After explaining that it
+was Hobson's choice, I asked the men to draw matches, held in the hand
+of the first mate, to see who should be the lucky ones. They all decided
+to take a chance and go without it, with the exception of two seamen and
+the mates, who, learning that I had taken it, decided to follow suit.
+Accordingly I inoculated them with the antipest serum.
+
+Five p.m.--Inoculated myself with Haffkine's Fluid.
+
+Seven-thirty.--Seaman Ross died. Mr. Matson threw the body overboard. No
+services.
+
+Midnight.--Mr. Matson is down with it.
+
+May Fifth.--Mr. Matson very ill and delirious. Cook moping round like
+a drunken man; complains of severe headache. Wind blowing lightly from
+south-west. Everything set. Inoculated second mate and the two seamen
+with Haffkine's.
+
+May Sixth.--Mr. Matson died at noon today. Cook down with it; also
+another seaman, and Mr. Eccles, the second mate. Have altered ship's
+course and am running for Hongkong. Winds light and baffling. Have not
+made thirty miles today. Calm at midnight. Mr. Eccles died just as the
+watches were being changed. I now feel that I have escaped; so examined
+Mr. Eccles' body. He went so fast I am curious. No swelling of the
+glands at all. Am inclined to think his was pneumonic or septicaemic.
+Threw him overboard myself.
+
+May Seventh.--Light and baffling airs all day; monsoon blowing in weak
+puffs. Another seaman ill. So ends this day.
+
+May Eighth.--Cook died at noon. No buboes on him either. He turned
+kind of black. I was chief undertaker. No airs to speak of. Ship barely
+making steerage way. So ends this day.
+
+May Ninth.--Seaman Peterson died early this morning. Do not know exact
+hour. Found him dead in his berth. Another funeral; no services. Monsoon
+freshening. Made forty-eight miles today. Two more seamen on sick
+report; and, to add to my worries, they are the very two I inoculated
+with the antipest serum and Haffkine's. Is this stuff worthless?
+
+May Tenth.--Seamen Halloran and Kaiser died within an hour of each other
+this evening--Halloran at nine-thirty and Kaiser at ten-eighteen. Put
+both bodies overboard immediately.
+
+I have four seamen left, and am doing the cooking, navigating, nursing
+and undertaking. Wind freshening hourly. Made seventy-two miles today.
+Glad Florry and Cappy Ricks cannot see me now, although, for some fool
+reason, I have a notion I shall see them again. If I were going to get
+plague it would have developed before now. I feel quite safe, but most
+unhappy and worried.
+
+Midnight.--Seaman Anderson down with it. Jumped overboard to save me the
+bother of throwing him overboard about the day after to-morrow, which
+is a courtesy I did not expect of Anderson. I am obliged to him. I am
+exhausted and so are my three remaining seamen. We cannot handle the
+canvas now, so have taken in the foresail, royals, and topgallant sails,
+hauled down the flying jib and got the gaff topsail off her, leaving
+her under the jib, fore-topmast staysail, upper and lower fore-topsails,
+main-topmast staysail, mainsail and spanker. Hove her to and turned in.
+
+May Eleventh.--After a horrible breakfast, which I cooked, got under way
+again. Monsoon blowing nicely, but under the small amount of canvas I
+am forced to carry cannot make more than six miles an hour. Have decided
+not to run to Hongkong. If I am to lose my three remaining seamen I
+shall have lost them long before I sight land, and the tug or steamer
+that hooks on to me off Hongkong will stick me with a terrific salvage
+bill. If I'm going to be stuck I prefer to be stuck closer to home, and
+if I manage to keep these three men the four of us can sail her home.
+I'll take a chance and run up the coast of Asia with the Japan Stream
+until I reach the northeast monsoon. I'm certain to be spoken and can
+send word to Florry. In a pinch, at this season of the year, I can sail
+her home alone.
+
+May Fifteenth.--I am alone on the ship. Into the Japan Stream, monsoon
+blowing the sweetest it ever blew. Lucky thing for me I had the
+forethought to trim her down; otherwise I should have had to cut away a
+lot of canvas. And how Cappy Ricks would scream at the sail bill later
+on! We were hove to overnight when Borden and Jacobsen died, on the
+thirteenth. McBain complained of a headache and vertigo on the morning
+of the fourteenth; so I laid to until he died, last night. I was not
+with him when he passed. What good would it have done? I had breakfast;
+and after breakfast I found him in his berth, dead. I tossed him
+overboard, and every last rag of clothing, dunnage and blankets aboard,
+with the exception of those in my own cabin. Then I burned sulphur in
+the fore-castle, the galley, the cook's room and the stateroom formerly
+occupied by the mates, closed the doors, and hoped for the best. Slept a
+lot that day and night; and at eight this morning slacked off my spanker
+and main sheets, checked in my foreyard and topsail by taking the the
+braces to the donkey engine, and was off for home.
+
+Have established my commissary in the lee of the wheel box. Set up a
+small kerosene stove I found in the storeroom, and get along nicely. It
+is quite an art to fry eggs with one hand and steady the wheel with the
+other, but I managed it three times today. To-morrow I will cook enough
+at breakfast to last me for luncheon and supper; hence will only have to
+heat some coffee.
+
+Logged fifty-one miles by eight o'clock; then lashed the wheel and let
+her take care of herself while I got steam up in the donkey and hauled
+in my spanker and mainsail; then I slacked off my foreyard and topsail
+yards, hove her to on the port tack, hung three red lights on the
+forestay to show she wasn't under command, set my alarm clock and turned
+in. I have to smile at the ease with which one man--provided he is a
+sizable man and able to stand strain--can sail a barkentine before the
+wind in fair weather. I am not worried. I am not going to have bubonic
+plague. It is horribly lonely, but I am due for fair winds--and I should
+worry.
+
+Even if I should get a blow and have to take the lower topsail off her,
+I can lower the yard by the topsail halyards until it rests on the cap;
+then I'll skip aloft and run a knife along the head of the topsail and
+let it whip to glory. After that it may blow and be damned! All the
+clothes the old girl is wearing now will never take the sticks out of
+her. I've trimmed her down to jib, lower topsail, fore-topmast staysail,
+mainsail and spanker. Wish I dared carry the foresail. However, I
+must play safe. It is awful, though, to be in a ship as fast as the
+_Retriever_ and have to crawl the way I'm crawling. Crawl all day and
+sleep all night! Well, sometimes I can crawl all day and night and sleep
+half a day. We shall see. I used to be able to stand considerable before
+I hit the beach and got soft. The necessity for firing the donkey every
+night would soon exhaust my fuel supply; but I have a deck-load of
+hardwood logs! [Illustration: (_Excerpt from the log of Cap't Matt
+Peasley_) “I am alone on the ship--all the rest are now dead”--]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+
+Four months had passed since the _Ecudorian_ had spoken Matt Peasley
+off the coast of Formosa; during that period no further news had been
+received in Cappy Ricks' office, although the diligent Skinner, aided
+and abetted by the waterfront reporters, managed to have a piece of
+cheering information for Florry about every two weeks. And, in order
+to forestall any possibility of some garrulous girl friend, with a
+male relative in the shipping business, “spilling the beans,” as Cappy
+expressed it, the old man had taken a house in the country, and came
+to the office only twice a week to mourn for his lost Matthew and glean
+what little comfort he could from the empty words of hope Mr. Skinner
+dispensed so lavishly.
+
+“If we can only keep Florry buoyed up with hope until the baby comes!”
+ Cappy would groan. “She's worried; but, strange to say, Skinner, she
+hasn't the slightest idea he's in any danger. Those fake cablegrams and
+reports of ships speaking Matt--each time closer to home--have done
+the trick, Skinner. Of course the boy's dead, and I killed him; but
+Florry--well, she took a trip on the _Retriever_ and knows how safe she
+is, and I've had a lot of old sailing skippers down to visit me,
+and primed them to tell her just how they would get away with such a
+proposition as Matt's--and how easy it would be. Besides, she knows Matt
+had some plague prophylactic aboard--”
+
+“Yes; and I've told her she mustn't show the white feather--for your
+sake,” Mr. Skinner interrupted; “and I think she's sensible enough to
+know she mustn't permit herself to show it--for the baby's sake.”
+
+Cappy bowed his head and shook like a hooked fish.
+
+“When the baby's two weeks old I'll tell her,” he moaned. “Oh, Skinner,
+Skinner, my dear boy, this is going to kill me! I won't last long now,
+Skinner. All my fault! I had to go butting in. That girl's heart is
+breaking with anxiety. When she comes down to breakfast, Skinner, I can
+see she's been crying all night.”
+
+“Horrible!” Mr. Skinner murmured. “Horrible! We can only hope.”
+
+On the twelfth of September Florry's baby was born. It was a boy, and
+a bouncing boy at that; and Cappy Ricks forgot for the moment he had
+rendered that baby fatherless, and came up to the city to report the
+news to Skinner.
+
+“Well, Skinner, my dear boy,” he announced with just a touch of his
+old-time jauntiness, “little Matthew just arrived! Everything lovely.”
+
+Mr. Skinner was about to formulate suitable phrases of congratulation
+when the telephone bell rang. It was Jerry Dooley up at the Merchants'
+Exchange; and he was all excitement.
+
+“Hey, Skinner,” he cried. “The _Retriever_ is passing in!”
+
+“No!” Mr. Skinner shrieked. “It isn't possible!”
+
+“It is! She's coming in the Gate now--she's right under the lookout's
+telescope; and there's only one man on deck--”
+
+Mr. Skinner turned to Cappy Ricks, put his arms round him and jerked the
+old man from one end of the office to the other.
+
+“He's safe, he's safe, he's safe, he's safe!” he howled indecorously.
+“Matt's sailing her in. He's sailing her in--”
+
+“You scoundrel!” Cappy shrilled. “Be quiet! Is she sailing in or
+towing--”
+
+“She's sailing in.”
+
+Cappy Ricks slumped down in his chair, his arms hanging weakly at his
+sides.
+
+“Yes, Skinner,” he barely whispered, “Matt's alive, after all. Nobody
+else would have the consummate crust to sail her in but him. Any other
+skipper under heaven would have hove to off the lightship and sent in
+word by the pilot boat to send out a tug. Oh, Lord, I thank Thee! I'm a
+wicked, foolish, bone-headed old man; but Lord, I do thank Thee--I do,
+indeed!”
+
+Half an hour later Cappy Ricks and Mr. Skinner, in a fast motorboat,
+came flying up the bay and caught sight of the _Retriever_ loafing
+lazily past Fort Mason. On she came, with a tiny bone in her teeth; and
+suddenly, as Cappy peered ahead through the spray that flew in over
+the bows of the launch and drenched him to the skin, the _Retriever's_
+mainsail was lowered rapidly. The vessel was falling off by the time the
+mainsail was down and Cappy and Mr. Skinner saw Matt run aft, steady
+the wheel and bring the vessel up on the wind again. She was now under
+spanker and the headsails. Matt lashed the wheel and again ran forward,
+pausing at the main-topmast-staysail halyards to cast them off and
+permit the sail to come down by the run.
+
+On to the topgallant forecastle Matt Peasley leaped, praising his Maker
+for patent anchors on the _Retriever_. With a hammer he knocked out the
+stopper; the starboard anchor dropped and the red rust flew from her
+hawsepipe as the anchor chain screamed through it. With his hand on
+the compressor of the windlass, Matt Peasley snubbed her gently to the
+forty-five fathom shackle, cast off his jib halyards to let the jib
+slide down the stay by its own weight, raced aft, and gently lowered
+the spanker as the American barkentine _Retriever_, with the yellow flag
+flying at the fore, swung gently to anchor on the quarantine grounds,
+two hundred and twenty-one days from Manila.
+
+Cappy Ricks turned to his general manager.
+
+“Pretty work, Skinner!” he said huskily. “I guess there's nothing wrong
+with that boy's health. Damn! The quarantine boat will beat us to it!
+Matt's throwing the Jacob's ladder over the side for them.”
+
+“We can't board her until she passes quarantine--” Mr. Skinner began;
+but Cappy silenced him with a terrible look.
+
+“The word can't, Skinner, was eliminated from my vocabulary some fifty
+years ago. We can--and I will! You needn't; but I've simply got to! Hey,
+you!”--to the launchman--“kick her wide open and show some speed.”
+
+Despite the warning cries from the quarantine officers in the health
+boat, the launch ran in along the _Retriever's_ side; Cappy Ricks
+grasped the Jacob's ladder as the launch rasped by and climbed up with
+an agility that caused Mr. Skinner to marvel. As his silk hat appeared
+over the _Retriever's_ rail a wind-bitten, bewhiskered, gaunt,
+hungry-looking semi-savage reached down, grasped him under the arms,
+snaked him inboard and hugged him to his heart.
+
+Silence for a minute, while Cappy Ricks' thin old shoulders shook and
+heaved as from some internal spasm, and Matt Peasley's big brown hand
+patted Cappy's back. Presently he said:
+
+“Well, father-in-law--”
+
+From somewhere in Matt Peasley's whiskers Cappy's voice came
+plaintively:
+
+“Not father-in-law, sonny. New title--this morning--six
+o'clock--nine--pounds--grandfather! Eh? Yes; grandfather! Grandpa
+Ricks!”
+
+“Boy or girl?” Matt Peasley roared, and shook the newly-elected
+grandfather.
+
+“Boy! Florry--fine--never lost hope!”
+
+A port health officer came over the rail. He shook an admonitory finger
+at Cappy Ricks.
+
+“Hey, you! Old man, you're under arrest--that is, you're in quarantine,
+and you'll have to stay aboard this ship until she's fumigated. Yes; and
+we'll fumigate you, too. Whadje mean by coming aboard ahead of us?”
+
+“Cappy,” Matt Peasley said, “tell that person to go chase himself! Why,
+there hasn't been any plague aboard the ship in nearly five months!”
+
+Cappy looked up and wiped the tears of joy out of his whiskers.
+
+“Scoundrel!” he cackled. “Infernal young scoundrel! What do you mean by
+risking my _Retriever_, sailing her through the Gate with a crew of one
+man?”
+
+“Take a look at me!” Matt laughed. “I'm all hands! And didn't I prove
+I'm enough men to handle her? The pilots wouldn't board me, and by
+sailing her in myself I saved pilotage and salvage claims. I lost the
+lower topsail and the consignees are going to find a shortage in those
+hardwood logs; but that's all--except that I haven't had a decent meal
+in God knows when. Say, Cappy, what does he look like? A Peasley or a
+Ricks?”
+
+“Both,” Cappy chirped diplomatically. “Matt, are you all over the
+blue-water fever?”
+
+“You bet!” he declared. “No more relief jobs for me. I've had plenty,
+although it might have been worse. It was lonely and sometimes I thought
+I was going crazy. Used to talk out loud to myself! I had some awful
+weather; but I just tucked her head under her wing and let her roll,
+and after I ran into the northeast monsoon, and later into the westerly
+winds, I had it easier and got more rest. You know, Cappy, when a
+ship is sailing on the wind, if you lash her helm a little bit below
+amidships she'll steer herself. Slow work, but--I got here; and, now
+that I'm here, I'm going to stay here.
+
+“Of course, Cappy,” he added, “I've just got to have something with
+sails to play with; but no more offshore sailing in mine--that is--well,
+I'm going to stay home for a long time--after a while, maybe--and
+meantime I'm going to build a little schooner yacht--”
+
+“For the love of Mike, do!” Cappy pleaded. “I'll be stuck in quarantine
+with you for a couple of days and we'll kill time drawing up a rough
+set of plans. And when that schooner yacht is ready, Matt, I'll tell you
+what I want you to do.”
+
+“What, Cappy?”
+
+“Send the bill to grandpa, Matthew!”
+
+“If I hadn't been a case-hardened old fool I'd have cheered you on when
+you wanted to build that schooner yacht last year. I'd have saved myself
+a world of grief.”
+
+He placed his hand gently on Matt's shoulder and his face was ineffably
+sad as he continued: “Of course, with you away and your fate undecided,
+as it were, Matt, that infernal Skinner wasn't worth two hoots in a
+hollow. Why, the boy flopped around the office like a rooster with its
+head off, and as a result I've had to come out of my retirement and keep
+an eye on things. Thank God, I can let go now. Really, Matt, you have
+no idea how I long to separate myself from the hurly-burly of California
+street. What I want is peace and seclusion--”
+
+“You can have my share of that commodity for the remainder of my natural
+life,” Matt laughed happily, “I want noise and people. I want screaming
+and yelling and fighting and risks and profits and losses and liars and
+scoundrels and honest men all inextricably mixed.” He tossed his great
+sun-tanned arms above his head. “Lord, I want Life,” he half shouted.
+
+Cappy sighed. These young pups! When they grow to see life as old dogs--
+
+“Well, Matt, all I've got to say is that the first man that butts into
+my private office and starts unloading a cargo of grief on me, is going
+to get busted between the eyes with a paper weight. I'm through with
+grief and woe. I don't give a hoot what happens to the world or anybody
+in it. I want peace and a rest. I can afford it and wouldn't I be a
+first-class idiot not to take it while the taking is good, Matt?”
+
+“No more mixing in the shipping end, eh?” Matt asked hopefully.
+
+Cappy raised his right hand solemnly. “Never again, Matt. I'm through
+with ships and sailors and cargoes and the whole cussed Blue Star fleet
+can sink and be damned to it, but I'll not lift a hand to save it. I'm
+THROUGH.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+
+ALAS! Man proposes, but God disposes. Cappy had smoked his post-prandial
+cigar next day and was in the midst of his mid-afternoon siesta, when
+the buzzer on his desk waked him with its insistent buzzing. He reached
+for the telephone.
+
+“My dear,” he reproved his private exchange operator, “how often have I
+told you not to disturb me between two and three o'clock?”
+
+“I knew you wouldn't mind being disturbed this afternoon, Mr. Ricks.
+Your old friend Mr. Gurney, of New York, is calling.”
+
+“Old Joe Gurney? By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet! Show him in.” Cappy
+was at the door to meet his visitor when the latter entered. Mr Joseph
+Gurney, senior partner of the firm of Gurney & Harlan, was, like Cappy
+Ricks, a shiping man and a Down-Easter. He and Cappy Ricks had been a
+boyhood friends in Thomaston, Main, and Gurney & Harlan were the agents
+and controlling owners of the Red Funnel line plying between New York
+and ports on the West Coast.
+
+“Well, Joe, you doddering old pirate?” cried Cappy Ricks affectionately.
+“Come in and rest your hands and feet. I'm tremendously glad to see you.
+When did you drift into down?”
+
+He shook hands with Gurney and steered him toward a chair.
+
+“Ten minutes ago, Alden, my boy. Delighted to see you again, and
+particularly pleased to see how carelessly you carry your years. I'm
+three months younger than you--and I feel like the last rose of summer.”
+
+“You look it, Joe. Take a leaf out of my book and let the young fellows
+'tend to business for you. Don't let worry ride over you in the shank
+of your old age, my boy. I never do. Haven't paid a bit of attention to
+business in the last ten years, and that's why at my age I'm looking so
+fit.”
+
+“You'll live to be a hundred, Alden.”
+
+Cappy smiled.
+
+“Well,” he declared, “I'm going to live while I have the time. I never
+expect to be a walking corpse just stalling round in an effort to defer
+settlement with the undertaker, and I won't be a dead one until the
+neighbors hear a quartet singing Lead Kindly Light out at my house--Joe
+you look worried. Anything gone wrong with you, old friend? Need some
+money? Have you married a young wife?”
+
+“It's Joey,” Gurney confessed miserably.
+
+“What? My godson, little Joey Gurney?”
+
+“He's big Joey Gurney now.”
+
+“Yes, and a fine boy, Joe--no thanks to you. His mother's influence
+was strong enough to counteract any impulses for crime he might have
+inherited from his father.”
+
+Gurney smiled sadly at Cappy Ricks' badinage.
+
+“He is a fine boy, Alden, but--he's only a boy, and I'm afraid he's
+going to make hash of his young life before it's fairly started.”
+
+“Booze?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“Well, then where did he first meet this woman?”
+
+Joe Gurney, Senior, hitched his chair close to his friend's and laid an
+impressive hand on Cappy's knee.
+
+“Alden,” he said feelingly, “you and I have been friends, man and boy,
+for about sixty-five years. I believe we were five years old when we
+robbed Deacon Follansbee's beehive and got stung to death.”
+
+“Yes, and we've both been getting stung more or less ever since,
+only somehow we still manage to recover and be none the worse for the
+experience. At least, Joe, we learned about bees. When it comes to boys,
+however, I've still got my experience coming. My little chap died when
+he was twelve, you know. I've never quite gotten over his loss; in fact,
+Joe, I was dreaming of him a minute ago when you called.”
+
+“You had him long enough, Alden, to realize how I feel about Joey.”
+
+Cappy nodded. “Let's see,” he answered, reflectively pulling his
+whiskers, “Joey must be about twenty-four years old now, isn't he?”
+
+“Twenty-four last Tuesday; and at twenty-five he comes into his mother's
+fortune. I've managed his little nest egg pretty well, Alden; invested
+it all in the vessel property of Gurney & Harlan, and since the war
+started I've swelled what originally was a quarter of a million to
+about a million and a half. His stock in the Red Funnel Line is worth a
+million at the very least, and the remaining half million is represented
+by cold cash in bank and bonds that can be converted into cash
+overnight.
+
+“Hum-m-m! Harumph-h-h! Quite a fortune for a youth of a twenty-five to
+be intrusted with. I'll bet somebody will take it away from him before
+he's thirty.”
+
+“That's a safe bet, Alden. He has a candidate for his money on his trail
+right now.”
+
+“And he doesn't realize it?”
+
+“Alden, he's only twenty-four years old. What does a boy know at
+twenty-four?”
+
+“Well, Joe, you and I had accumulated a heap of experience and hard
+knocks at that age, and I seem to remember we each had a little money
+we'd managed to save here and there. I don't agree with you at all
+on this twenty-four-year-old excuse. My son-in-law, Matt Peasley--you
+remember the Peasleys of Thomaston; Matt's a nephew of Ethan, who was
+lost off the main yard of the _Martha Peasley_--was holding a master's
+ticket for sail, any ocean and any tonnage, before he was twenty-one.
+He's not much older than your Joey right now, but, nevertheless, he's
+president of the Blue Star Navigation Company and worth a million and a
+half, every dollar of which he has made by his own energy and ability.”
+
+“Well, of course, Alden, there are exceptions to every rule.”
+
+“Not if you raise 'em right and you've got the right kind of stock to
+work on and the boy is healthy and normal. Now I know your Joey comes
+from the right stock; I know his mother raised him right until he was
+sixteen when the good Lord took her away from you both; and I know he is
+healthy and normal. Hasn't he proved that by falling in love? The only
+conclusion I can draw, therefore, is that you've made a monkey out of
+him, Joe Gurney.”
+
+“Perhaps I have, Alden; perhaps I have,” Gurney replied sadly.
+
+“No 'perhaps' about it. I know you have. You sent him to college and
+gave him ten thousand dollars a year to spend. If you wanted to give
+him a fine education and turn out a man and a gentleman you might have
+gotten him into the Naval Academy at Annapolis, where he would have
+learned something of ships and graduated with a master's ticket; after
+serving a few years and getting the corners knocked off him he could
+have resigned and you would have had a sane, dependable man to sit in at
+your desk when you're gone. By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, Joe Gurney,
+you make me sick! You're like every other damphool American father who
+accumulates a few million dollars in excess of his legitimate needs and
+then gets all puffed up with the notion he's got to give his son all the
+so-called advantages his own parents were too poor to afford him--or too
+sensible. The result is you turn out an undeveloped or over-developed
+boob, too proud to work and not able to take a real man's place in the
+world because he hasn't been taught how. And in the course of time he
+marries a female boob who has been raised according to the same general
+specifications, and nine times out of ten she's too refined to be
+bothered with a family. And presently there's a trip out to Reno and the
+little squib in the paper and--er--ahem! Drat your picture, Joe, you're
+the responsible party. You created a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year parasite
+on the body politic while your boy was still in his teens, and now you
+want to know what the devil to do about it, don't you?”
+
+“That's exactly what I want to know, Alden,” Gurney confessed miserably,
+“and I've crossed the continent to get your advice. I haven't very many
+real friends--the kind I can open my heart to--”
+
+“Tut, tut, Joe. Enough of vain repining. Now then, old friend, let's get
+to the bottom of this thing and see if we can't buy this wreck in from
+the underwriters, salvage it and put it in commission again. Never
+say die, Joe! Where there's a will there's a lawsuit or a
+heartache--particularly if the estate makes it worth while. Now then,
+Joe, you must realize that it's the fashion nowadays, when a fellow has
+to consult a specialist, to give his personal and family history
+for three generations back before receiving treatment. So if I am to
+diagnose Joey's case I'll have to have a history of Joey. Now then! He
+graduated from college at the age of twenty-two did he not?”
+
+“He didn't graduate, Alden. He was requested to leave.”
+
+“Hum-m-m! I didn't know that. What for?”
+
+“General uselessness and animal spirits, I suppose. It wasn't anything
+dishonorable. The main contributory cause was an alleged poem lampooning
+some individual they called Prexy.”
+
+“Hum-m-m! And since leaving college what has he done?”
+
+“I've had him in my office.”
+
+“Joe, answer my question. I know you've had him in your office. But what
+has he done? Has he earned his salary?”
+
+“I'm afraid he hasn't, Alden. Somehow golf and tennis and week-end
+parties and yachting and big-game hunting in Alaska and tarpon fishing
+in Florida sort of interfere with business.”
+
+“Well, that isn't much of a crime, Joe. I never had time to do those
+highly enjoyable things and I couldn't afford them. When I could afford
+them and had time to do them I was too old. You say the boy is fond of
+yachting?”
+
+“It's his greatest hobby. In his taste for salt water he at least
+resembles his ancestors. The Gurneys were all sailors and shipping men.”
+
+“Is he a good yachtsman, Joe?”
+
+“He has a schooner that's a hundred and six feet over all and he seems
+to win pretty regularly with her. I never knew him to get worse than
+second place in all the races he has entered.”
+
+“Too bad,” Cappy Ricks murmured sadly. “A noble ambition absolutely
+misdirected. He would have been a skipper and, lastly, a good shipping
+man if you had only managed him like a sensible father should. Now about
+this girl he's in love with?”
+
+“That happened about three months ago. He met her at one of those
+roof-garden, midnight cabaret, turkey-trot palaces in New York--”
+
+“Yes, I know. I always take in the sights when I go to New York, but
+the last time I was at that one up near Fifty-fourth Street the noise
+bothered me. And the show was very poor; in fact, after seeing it I made
+up my mind I was off cabaret stuff for keeps.”
+
+“You ancient scalawag! What were you doing in a place like that?”
+
+“Seeing life as it ought not to be, of course. Your boy Joey took me up
+there, by the way. In-fer-nal young scoundrel! He showed me the town and
+we had quite a time together.”
+
+Joe Gurney's old eyes popped with amazement.
+
+“You went batting round with my Joey--an old ruin like you?”
+
+“Why not? We behaved ourselves, and besides I always trot a heat with
+the young fellows whenever I get a chance. It keeps me young. I
+enjoyed Joey a heap, although I could see he was a jolly young jackass.
+Moreover, I'm his godfather, and I guess it was all right for me to tag
+along and see to it that my godson didn't get into deep water close to
+the shore, wasn't it? Don't you ever step out with Joey and get your
+nose wet?”
+
+“Certainly not!”
+
+Cappy Ricks smiled wistfully.
+
+“If I had a son I'd pal up with him,” he declared. “I'd want to get out
+with him and raise a little dignified hell once in a while, just to be a
+human being and keep him from being a mollycoddle. Ahem! Harumph. So he
+flagged this damsel in the leg show, eh?”
+
+Joe Gurney nodded miserably.
+
+“Have you given her the once over?” Cappy demanded.
+
+“Yes, I went up there one night. I was afraid somebody would see me, so
+I took along Joey's aunt, Matilda. We saw the young woman. She does a
+dance specialty--an alleged Hawaiian hula-hula. It's fake from start to
+finish.”
+
+“You show a guilty technical knowledge of the hula, Joe,” Cappy reminded
+him. “But passing that, what's the latest report on the situation?”
+
+“Horrible, Alden, horrible!” replied Joe Gurney.
+
+“Careful, Joe, careful! Many a wheat-straw skirt and sharks'-teeth
+necklace may conceal a pure and honest heart.”
+
+“Well, she's been married twice and divorced once, to begin with, and--”
+
+“That's a-plenty, Joe.”
+
+“And she has just completed her contract in the show and gone out to
+Reno to acquire a six months' residence in order to get rid of husband
+number two so she can take on Joey.”
+
+“Who told you all this?”
+
+“I found it out--by asking.”
+
+“Have you told Joey?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“Does he know it?”
+
+Gurney nodded.
+
+“I had one of his young friends, whom I can trust, tip him off in
+confidence. The news didn't make any difference to Joey. He asked her
+about it, and she explained it all away to his entire satisfaction.”
+
+“I dare say. And you haven't given any indication to your son that
+you're on to him and his love affair?”
+
+“I thought best to pretend ignorance, pending my arrival at a solution
+of the difficulty.”
+
+“Therein you showed a gleam of real intelligence. Having humored your
+boy all his life you could not expect to cross him in his first love
+affair and get away with it. No, sir-ree! The thing to do is to put the
+skids under Joey and his lady love before they know you know it. Tell me
+more about her, however, before I begin making skids and skid grease.”
+
+“She is thirty-one years old--”
+
+Cappy Ricks threw up both hands.
+
+“Farewell, O my countrymen!” he murmured.
+
+“She has two children--one by her first husband and one by her second.
+They're living with her mother. She supports them from the proceeds of
+her hula dancing.”
+
+“Score a white mark for her, Joe. Is she a good looker?”
+
+“A brunette, Alden, and Joey's Aunt Matilda admitted against her will
+that she was a beauty. My lawyer tells me, however, that she hasn't an
+ounce of brains, and proclaims the fact by laughing loudly when there is
+nothing particularly worth laughing at.”
+
+“I imagine you've had a detective agency investigating her.”
+
+“I have. She has little education and no refinement; her people are very
+ordinary. Her father is a whitewing in Philadelphia and is separated
+from her mother, who keeps a boarding house in Muncie, Indiana.”
+
+“I'm afraid, Joe, she won't do for your daughter-in-law,” Cappy Ricks
+opined slowly. “But don't worry, my boy. You've come all the way from
+New York to confide in me and get my advice, and somehow I have a
+sneaking notion you've come to the right shop. If there's anybody
+calculated to put a crimp in love's young dream, I'm that individual.”
+
+“I knew Joey and you were good friends, and besides, you're his
+godfather. He thinks a lot of you, Alden, and I kind of thought maybe
+you might come East with me, see the boy, get him to confide in you
+and--er--sort of advise him in the way he should go. I'm--er--well,
+Alden, I'm afraid I feel too badly about this to talk to Joey. I might
+lose my temper, and besides--besides, he's all I have and he reminds me
+so much of his mother that I--”
+
+“Yes, yes, I understand, Joe. Leave it to me and I'll advise with him.
+Yes, I will--with an ax handle! And I'll go East with you and tie knots
+in his tail--only he won't know anything about it. It may cost you a
+little money, but I assume expense is no object.”
+
+“It would be cheap at a million.”
+
+“Where that boy and your money are concerned you're such an ass, Joe,
+I'm almost tempted to charge you a million extra for the operation.
+However, considering Deacon Follansbee's beehive, and Joey's mother and
+my godson--”
+
+Old Joe Gurney took Cappy Ricks' hand in both of his, that trembled so
+with age and anxiety.
+
+“Dear old Alden,” he declared. “I knew you wouldn't fail me.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+
+For a long time after old Joe Gurney had terminated his visit Cappy
+Ricks sat in the position which with him always denoted intense mental
+concentration. He had sunk low in his swivel chair and swung his old
+legs to the top of his desk; his head was bowed on his breast and his
+eyes were closed.
+
+Suddenly he started as if snake-bitten, sat up at his desk and reached
+for the telephone.
+
+“Get me the West Coast Trading Company,” he ordered the private exchange
+operator, “and tell Mr. J. Augustus Redell I want to speak to him.”
+
+Redell answered presently.
+
+“Gus, my dear young friend,” Cappy began briskly, “I want you to do me a
+favor, and in so doing I think you'll find you are going to perform one
+for yourself also.”
+
+“Good news, Cappy. Consider it done.”
+
+“Thank you, my boy, but this particular favor isn't done quite so
+quickly. I want you to tell that Peruvian partner of yours, Live
+Wire Luiz Almeida to dig up a specification for a cargo of fir to be
+discharged on lighters at some open roadstead on the West Coast, and the
+more open the port and the more difficult it is to discharge there;
+and the harder it is to get any sane shipowner to charter a vessel to
+deliver a cargo there, the better I'll be pleased. Surely, Gus, you must
+have a customer down on the West Coast in some such port as I describe,
+who is actually watering at the mouth for a cargo of lumber and is
+unable to place it with a mill that will guarantee delivery? Look into
+the matter, Augustus, and see what you can do for me.”
+
+“Do you want to furnish such a cargo from one of the Ricks Lumber &
+Logging Company's northern mills and freight it in one of your Blue Star
+Navigation Company vessels?”
+
+“No, I don't want to do it,” Cappy replied; “but in this particular case
+the acceptance of such a cargo and the freighting of it via a Blue Star
+windjammer, even though the usual demurrage at such discharging ports
+will cause the vessel a loss, is a consummation devoutly to be wished.
+Ordinarily, if you made such a proposition to me I'd call in the boys
+from the general office and tell them to throw you out, but--well, in
+this case I'm willing to stand the loss, Augustus.”
+
+“Yes, you are--not. Somebody else will recompense you for any loss, Cappy
+Ricks, never fear. Do you want the West Coast Trading Company to give
+you a bonus for accepting our order?”
+
+“No, my boy. I'll make Skinner sell you the lumber at the regular base
+price at the mill, plus insurance and freight to point of discharge. And
+I won't stick you too deep on the freight, even in wartime.”
+
+“There's something wrong with you this morning, Cappy,” Redell declared,
+highly mystified. “You're too obliging. However, I'm not to be outgamed.
+I have a specification for a cargo of half a million feet for delivery
+at Sobre Vista, Peru; I've been trying for a month to place the order
+and nobody will accept it because nobody wants to guarantee delivery. On
+the other hand, the purchasers have been unable to get any ship owner
+to charter them a vessel to go to Sobre Vista without a guaranty of a
+perfectly prohibitive rate of demurrage per diem; consequently I had
+just about abandoned my efforts to place the order.”
+
+“Fine business, Gus. And is Sobre Vista a rotten port at which to
+discharge?”
+
+“It's vile, Cappy. It's an open roadstead and the vessel lies off-shore
+and discharges into lighters. About four days a week the surf is so high
+the lighters cannot lie alongside the ship or be run up on the beach
+without being ruined, and to complicate the situation they only have
+two or three lighters at the port. Labor is scarce, too, and the few
+_cargadores_ a skipper can hire have a habit of working two days and
+staying drunk for the remainder of the week on the proceeds of those two
+days of labor. So you can see for yourself that discharge in Sobre Vista
+is very hard on the skipper's nerves, and that if he can work two days
+a week he's in luck. And when we deduct from those two days all the
+national holidays and holy days and saints' feast days that have to be
+duly celebrated, not to mention the three hundred and sixty-five days in
+the year the populace doesn't feel like exerting itself--well, Cappy,
+I couldn't give you anything worse than Sobre Vista if you paid me for
+it.”
+
+“May the good Lord bless you, Augustus! Come down and do business with
+Skinner on the cargo. Get him to quote you a price f.o.b. ship's tackles
+at the mill dock and tell him you'll furnish the tonnage when the cargo
+is ready for delivery. There's no sense in worrying poor Skinner until
+his worries are due, and when I send a Blue Star schooner to load your
+cargo for Sobre Vista I'm going to have to fight him and my son-in-law,
+Matt Peasley. But leave it to me, Gus. I'll guarantee the tonnage.”
+
+“This is certainly wonderful,” the grateful Redell observed. “Thank you,
+Cappy. What I'll do to those Peruvian customers of mine on price will be
+a shame and a disgrace. Are you going to stick me for any demurrage on
+the vessel, Cappy? Because if you are, I'll have to stick my customers
+in order to get out clean.”
+
+“No demurrage, Gus, not a penny.”
+
+“Bully! Then I'll stick my customers anyhow. It makes the profit all the
+greater, and since they expect to pay a reasonable demurrage I see no
+reason why I should disappoint them.”
+
+When Redell had hung up Cappy summoned into his presence Captain Matt
+Peasley.
+
+“Matt,” he queried, “what schooners have you got due at any one of our
+northern mills within the next thirty days?”
+
+Matt Peasley pondered and counted on his big fingers. “The _Tyee_ will
+be in from Valparaiso about that time,” he answered.
+
+“Have you got her chartered?”
+
+“Oh, no. We're using her in our own trade. Skinner will have a cargo
+ready for her by the time she gets back, although we don't know yet
+where we will send her.”
+
+“Well, Matt, you tell Skinner he can't have her and to look around for
+some other vessel to take her place. I may give her to him at the last
+minute, but then again I may not. When she arrives at the mill, Matthew,
+my boy, tie her up to the mill dock to await my pleasure.”
+
+“Why, what the devil are you going to do with the _Tyee?_” Matt
+demanded, astounded beyond measure.
+
+“I might want to take a cruise for my health and use the _Tyee_ as a
+pleasure boat,” Cappy answered enigmatically. “They tell me she's as
+fast as a yacht in a breeze of wind.”
+
+“The longer I'm acquainted with you, father-in-law,” Matt Peasley
+declared, “the less I know you. You can have your _Tyee_, but for every
+day she is held awaiting your pleasure your personal account will be
+charged with something in three figures. I'll figure out her average
+profit per day for the last five voyages and soak you accordingly.”
+
+“Fair enough,” quoth Cappy Ricks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+
+Three weeks later Alden P. Ricks arrived in New York. After he had been
+driven to his hotel and had removed the stains of travel he telephoned
+the office of Gurney & Harlan and got Gurney, Senior, on the line.
+
+“Well, I'm here, Joe,” he announced. “Have you followed my instructions
+and cut Joey off at the pockets?”
+
+“I have, Alden. He's rather desperate as a result, and has been
+trying to borrow money by hypothecating the inheritance due him on his
+twenty-fifth birthday. You see, I didn't give him a second's notice;
+just told him he was spending too much time in play and too much money
+for pleasure, and that until he came into his private fortune he would
+have to earn any money he desired to spend. I have been very firm.”
+
+“That's the stuff, Joe. And is he trying to earn it?”
+
+“Yes, I think so. He's sticking round the office at any rate.”
+
+“Hum-m-m! That's because it costs money to go anywhere else. Has
+he succeeded in raising a loan by assigning an interest in his
+inheritance?”
+
+“No, not yet. I blocked him at all the banks and with my old friends,
+and I do not think he can borrow as much as he needs from any of his
+friends. They, like him of course, are dependent on their fathers'
+generosity.”
+
+“Fine way to raise a boy! Bully. Well, I'll be down to your office in
+about an hour and take you and Joey to luncheon at India House. You
+haven't forgotten what I wrote you, Joe? You know your part, don't you?
+. . . Well, see that you play your hand well and we'll save that boy
+yet.”
+
+Two hours later the Gurneys were lunching with Cappy Ricks at the one
+New York club to which Cappy belonged--quaint old India House in
+Hanover Square, haunt of shipping men and shippers, perhaps the best and
+least-known club in New York City. Joey had been unaffectedly glad to
+see his godfather; so much so, indeed, that Cappy rightly guessed Joey
+had designs on the Ricks pocketbook; for after all, as Cappy admitted
+to himself, he is a curmudgeon of a godfather indeed who will refuse to
+loan his godson a much needed twenty-five thousand dollars on gilt-edged
+security. In expectation of an application for a loan before the day
+should be done, however, Cappy was careful not to be alone with Joey
+for an instant, for something told him that only the presence of Gurney,
+Senior, kept Gurney Junior from promptly putting his fortune to the
+touch.
+
+“Well, Joey, you young cut-up,” Cappy began as the trio settled in the
+smoking room and the waiter brought the coffee and cigars, “I see you're
+getting to be quite an amateur sailor. Your Dad tells me you won your
+last race with that schooner yacht of yours in rather pretty fashion.”
+
+“It was a bully race, Mr. Ricks. I wish you could have been aboard with
+me,” Joey declared enthusiastically.
+
+“Hum-m-m! Catch me on a yacht!” Cappy's tones were indicative of
+profound disgust.
+
+“Ricks, you're a kill-joy,” old Gurney struck in. “All you think of
+is making money, and you've made so much of it I should think the game
+would have palled on you long ago. I tell Joey to go it while he's
+young--while he has the capacity for enjoyment.”
+
+“Joe, I tell you now, as I've told you before, you're spoiling this boy.
+When he's twenty-five years old he comes into a fortune and you're
+not even preparing him for the task of handling that money wisely. You
+bought Joey that schooner yacht, didn't you?”
+
+“I bought her cheap,” old Joe Gurney protested lamely.
+
+“They cost a fortune to maintain, Joe. Now if Joey wanted some
+salt-water experience you should have sent him to sea as quartermaster
+on one of your own Red Funnel liners; presently he would have worked up
+to second mate; then first mate, and finally skipper. By that time he
+would have known the salt-water end of his father's business, after
+which he could sit in at a desk and learn the business end. Somehow,
+Joe, when I see a shipping man's son fooling away his time on a pleasure
+yacht instead of learning the shipping business, I feel as if I'd just
+taken a dose of ipecac.”
+
+“Godfather is out of sorts,” Joey soliloquized sagely, and resolved to
+wait a day or two before broaching the subject of a loan. Cappy Ricks
+surveyed the young fellow severely.
+
+“Joey,” he began, “I've no doubt you're quite a sailor on your handsome
+yacht, in your yachting uniform, with all the real head work to be done
+by your sailing master--”
+
+“Not a bit of it,” Joey protested. “I'm not that kind of a yachtsman.
+I'm the captain tight and the midshipmite, and the crew take orders from
+me, because I don't employ a sailing master.”
+
+“Do you mean to tell me that when you go on a cruise to the West Indies
+you navigate the yacht yourself--lay out your own courses and work out
+your own position?”
+
+Joey smiled patronizingly.
+
+“Certainly,” he replied. “That's easy.”
+
+“Sure. Play is always easy. But let me tell you, young man, if you had
+command of a big three-legged windjammer, with a deckload of heavy green
+lumber fresh from the saws, and ran into a stiff sou'-easter such as we
+have out on the Pacific coast, you'd know what real sailoring is like.”
+
+“Joey could handle her like that,” old Gurney declared with pride, and
+snapped his fingers.
+
+“Could you, Joey?” Cappy Ricks demanded. “I have my doubts.”
+
+“Why, I think so, Mr. Ricks. I might be a little cautious at first--”
+
+“Well, I don't think you could,” Cappy interrupted.
+
+“Well, I do,” old Gurney declared with some warmth. “I've been out with
+Joey on his yacht and I know what the boy can do.”
+
+“Bah! You're a doddering old softy, Joe. Yachting is one thing and
+sailoring is another. I have an old lumber hooker on Gray's Harbor now,
+loading for a port in Peru, and I'd certainly love to see Joey with her
+on his hands. I'll bet fifty thousand dollars he couldn't sail her down
+to Sobre Vista, discharge her and sail back inside of six months.” The
+old schemer chuckled. “Lordy me,” he continued, “I'd like to see Joey
+trying to make her point up into the wind! She'd break his heart.”
+
+“Look here, Alden,” Old Joe Gurney commenced to bristle. “Are you
+serious about that or are you just making conversation bets? Because if
+you're serious I'm just shipping man enough to call you for the sheer
+sporting joy of it.”
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, you're on!” Cappy Ricks almost yelled.
+“Put up or shut up--that is, provided Joey is as big a sport as his
+father and will undertake to sail my schooner _Tyee_ to Sobre Vista and
+back.”
+
+“Oh, she's a schooner!” There was relief in Joey's voice. “Why, I'll
+sail any vessel with a fore-and-aft rig. I thought perhaps you were
+trying to ring in a square-rigger on me, and I'm not familiar with them.
+But a schooner--pooh! Pie for little Joey!”
+
+“She's got three legs, and with a deck-load of lumber she's cranky and
+topheavy. I'm warning you, Joey. Remember he is a poor ship owner who
+doesn't know his own ship.”
+
+Joey got up and went to a map laid out on a table, with a piece of plate
+glass over it, to compute the sailing distance from Gray's Harbor to
+Sobre Vista. He could not find Sobre Vista on the map.
+
+“Figure the distance to Mollendo and you'll be close enough for all
+practical purposes,” Cappy called to him, and winked at the boy's
+father. “A little pep, here, boy,” he whispered to Gurney, “and we'll
+snare him yet.”
+
+Joey came back from his study of the map.
+
+“I'd have the nor'west trades clear to the Line,” he remarked to his
+father. “After that I'd be liable to bang round for a couple of weeks in
+the doldrums, but in spite of that--did you say I couldn't do it in six
+months, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“That's what I said, Joey.”
+
+“Take the bet, dad,” said Joey quietly, “and I'll take half of it
+off your hands. I'll give you my note, secured by an assignment of a
+twenty-five-thousand-dollar interest in mother's estate to secure you in
+case Mr. Ricks should win and call you for his winnings--but he hasn't a
+chance in the world.”
+
+“Money talks,” Cappy Ricks warned him and got out his check book. “Joe,
+I'll make a check in your favor for fifty thousand dollars and you make
+one in my favor for the same amount. We will then deposit both checks
+with the secretary of the club, who will act as stakeholder--”
+
+“'Nuff said, Alden P. Ricks. I accept the dare. Sonny, if you're a worse
+sailor-man than you appear to be, you're liable to cost your father a
+sizable wad. However, I can't resist this opportunity to put a nick in
+the Ricks bank roll.” Gurney snickered. “Alden,” he declared, “you'll
+bleed for a month of Sundays. Really, this is too easy! For old sake's
+sake, I'll give you a chance to withdraw before it is too late.”
+
+“Let the tail go with the hide, Joe. I don't often bet, but when I
+do I'm no piker. Joey, there's just one little condition I'm going to
+exact, however. I'm going to send one of my own skippers along with
+you on the _Tyee_, because your license as master only permits you to
+skipper pleasure boats up to a hundred tons net register; so in order to
+comply with the law I'll have to have a sure-enough skipper aboard the
+_Tyee_. But he shall have orders from me to be nothing but a companion
+to you, Joey. Once the tugboat casts you off, you are to be in supreme
+command until you voluntarily relinquish your authority, when of course
+he will take the ship off your hands. Any relinquishment of authority,
+however, will be tantamount to failure, and you will, of course, lose
+your twenty-five thousand.”
+
+“That's a reasonable stipulation, godfather. I accept if father
+does--that is, provided dad lets me in on half the bet.”
+
+“Better let the young feller in, Joe,” Cappy suggested. “If you don't he
+might throw the race.”
+
+“Well, I don't like to encourage the habit of betting, least of all with
+my own son, but in view of the fact that this is a friendly little bet
+and--er--well, you can have half, Joey.”
+
+“Thank you, sir,” said Joey. “Mr. Ricks, when do I start?”
+
+Cappy Ricks glanced at his watch.
+
+“The sooner the better,” he replied. “The _Tyee_ is loading now, but
+I'll wire them you're coming and to hold her for you. You have time to
+arrange your affairs, pack a trunk and catch the Lake Shore Limited for
+Chicago at five o'clock. From Chicago you take the--”
+
+“Never mind. I know the quickest route. Dad, I'll need some money before
+I go.”
+
+“How much, son?”
+
+“Oh, a couple of thousand, just to play safe. And I'll have to leave you
+a batch of bills to settle for me.”
+
+“All right, son, I'll settle them. Here's your two thousand. You can pay
+me back out of your winnings on the voyage. And never mind about your
+note or the assignment of an interest in your inheritance. If I cannot
+take my own son's word of honor I don't deserve a son. Just take care
+of yourself, Joey, because if anything should happen to you it would go
+rather hard with your old man.”
+
+He wrote Joey a check for two thousand dollars and took an affectionate
+farewell of his son.
+
+“Now listen to me, my dear young Hotspur,” Cappy Ricks commanded him
+as he shook Joey's hand in farewell. “The schooner's name is _Tyee_ and
+you'll find her at the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company's mill dock in
+Aberdeen, on Gray's Harbor, Washington. And don't be afraid of her. She
+was built to weather anything. The skipper's name is Mike Murphy, and if
+you can't get along with Mike and learn to love him before you're in the
+ship a week, there's something wrong with you, Joey. Just don't start
+anything with Mike though, because he always finishes strong, and
+whatever he does is always right--with me. When you get out there he'll
+show you the orders I will have telegraphed him and you have my word
+of honor, boy, that there'll be no double-crossing and no interference
+unless you request it.”
+
+“Right-o!” cried Joey, and was off to earn twenty-five thousand dollars
+of the easiest money he had ever heard of.
+
+“Like spearing a fish in a bathtub,” murmured Cappy Ricks dreamily, and
+tore up the fifty-thousand-dollar check he had just written. “Joe, if
+your boy is such easy game for a pair of old duffers like us, just think
+what soft picking he must have been for that nimble-footed lady with the
+raven hair, the pearly teeth and the eyes that won't behave!”
+
+“But she's coarse and brainless, Alden. I can't imagine a boy like my
+Joey falling in love with a woman like that. He ought to know better.
+Just remember how he was raised.”
+
+“Fooey! Joey isn't in love. He only thinks he is, and the reason he
+thinks it is because she has told him so a hundred times. Can't you just
+see her looking up at Joey with her startled-fawn eyes and saying: 'Oh,
+you do love me, don't you, Joey?' As if the fact that Joey loved her
+constituted the eighth wonder of the world! And she's probably told Joey
+she'll die if he ever ceases to love her; and he's kind and obliging and
+wouldn't hurt a fly if he could avoid it. Why, Joe, you old idiot, you
+mustn't feel that Joey has disgraced himself. Isn't he planning to marry
+the woman? Only a decent man--a born idealist--could hold that designing
+woman in such reverence. Blamed if it isn't kind of sweet of the boy,
+although I _would_ love to give him a kick that would jar all his
+relations--including his father!”
+
+Old Joe Gurney gazed at Cappy in admiration.
+
+“Alden,” he declared, “you have a singularly acute knowledge of women.”
+
+“I employ about fifteen of 'em round my office; I had several narrow
+escapes in my youth; I have had a sweet and wonderful wife--and I have a
+replica of her in my daughter. And I do know young men, for I have been
+young myself; and I know old fools like you, Joe, because I've never had
+a son to make an old fool of myself over.”
+
+“Well, now that you've hooked Joey for a six months' voyage, what's next
+on the program?” Gurney asked after a brief silence.
+
+Cappy smiled--a prescient little smile.
+
+“Why, I'm going to pull off a wedding,” he declared. “I'm going to marry
+Joey to the sweetest, nicest, healthiest, prettiest, brainiest
+little lady of twenty summers that ever threatened to put the Ricks
+organization on the toboggan. She's my private secretary and I've got
+to get rid of her or some of the young fellows in our office will be
+killing each other.”
+
+“Here, here, Alden, my boy, go slow! I ought to be consulted in this
+matter. Who is this young lady and what are her antecedents?”
+
+“Say, who's running this layout?” Cappy demanded. “Didn't you come to me
+squealing for help? Joe, take a back seat and let me try my hand without
+any advice from you. The girl's name is Doris Kenyon and she's an
+orphan. Her father used to be the general manager of my redwood mill on
+Humboldt Bay, and her mother was a girlhood friend of my late wife's; so
+naturally I've established a sort of protectorate over her. She has
+to work for a living, and any time there's a potentially fine,
+two-million-dollar husband like Joey lying round loose I like to see
+some deserving working girl land the cuss. As a matter of fact, it's
+almost a crime to steer her against Joey in his present state. But,”
+ Cappy added, “I have a notion that before Joey gets rid of that
+hula-hula girl he's going to be a sadder, wiser and poorer young man
+than he is at present.”
+
+“Your plan, then, is to give Joey six months away from his captor in
+order that he may forget her?”
+
+“Exactly. Absence makes the heart grow colder in cases like the one
+under discussion, and the sea is a great place for a fellow to do some
+quiet, sane, uninterrupted thinking. The sea, at night particularly, is
+productive of much introspection and speculation on the various aspects
+of life, and in order to make Joey forget this vampire in a hurry all
+that is necessary is to have a real woman round him for a while. The
+first thing he knows he'll be making comparisons and the contrast will
+appall him.”
+
+“You don't mean--”
+
+“You bet I do. Joey's future wife accompanies him on the voyage, and
+my bully port captain, Mike Murphy, and his amiable sister go along to
+chaperone the party and make up a foursome at bridge. I've had a naval
+architect at work on the old cabin of the _Tyee_, putting in some extra
+staterooms, bathrooms, and so on, and in order to make a space for the
+passengers I subsidized the two squarehead mates into berthing with the
+crew in the fo'-castle. Doris always did want to take a voyage in one of
+the Blue Star windjammers, and I had promised to send her at the first
+convenient opportunity.”
+
+“You deep-dyed, nefarious old villain!”
+
+“Old Cupid Ricks, eh? Well, it's lots of fun, Joe, this butting in on
+love's young dream. And I'm just so constituted I've got to run other
+people's affairs for them or I wouldn't be happy. I do think, however,
+that this house party on the old _Tyee_ is about the slickest deal I
+have ever put over. Joe, they're going to be right comfortable. I've
+shipped a maid for the girls, and the cook this time is several degrees
+superior to the average maritime specimen, for there's nothing like
+a couple of days of bum cooking to upset tempers--and I'm taking no
+chances. Also, just before I left I gave your future daughter-in-law her
+quarterly dividend--you see, when her father died I had to sort of look
+after the family, and I ran a bluff that Kenyon had some Ricks Lumber &
+Logging Company stock--you know, Joe. Proud stuff! I had to hornswoggle
+them. Well, as I say, I gave her the money, and my girl Florry went
+shopping with her. Sports clothes? Wow! Wow! White skirts, blue jersey,
+little sailor hat--man--oh, man, the stage is set to the last detail!
+I even had them ship a piano. Doris plays the guitar and has a pleasing
+voice, and just for good measure I threw in a crackajack cabinet
+phonograph and a hundred records with enough sentimental drip to sink
+the schooner.”
+
+Joe Gurney stared at his old friend rather helplessly and shook his
+head. Such finesse was beyond his comprehension.
+
+“You see, now,” Cappy continued, “the wisdom of my course? I insisted
+that you cut off Joey's allowance and get him hungry for money. You
+did--and he got hungry. He would have been posted at his clubs in thirty
+days; it is probable he owed a few bets here and there; his tailor may
+have needed money. Consequently, by the time I arrived on the scene
+he was ripe for any legitimate enterprise that would bring him in the
+needful funds; we arranged the enterprise and he promptly smothered
+it. Right off, Joe, your son said to himself: 'It will be almost a year
+before I come into my inheritance, and in the interim I'm going to get
+married, and a married man who lives on the scale my wife will expect
+me to assume is going to need a lot more money than a clerkship in his
+father's shipping office will bring him. Now, there's Tootsy-Wootsy
+out in Reno with a five months' sentence staring her in the eye before
+she'll be free to marry me, and I can't very well go out to Reno to
+visit her without running the risk of incurring my father's displeasure
+or the tongue of gossip. Consequently, I have five months' time to kill,
+also, and how better can I kill it than by a jolly sea voyage in a bally
+old lumber hooker? I can easily win twenty-five thousand dollars from my
+godfather, and that twenty-five thousand will carry us along until dad
+turns over my mother's estate to me. Fine business! I'll go to it.' And,
+Joe, he's done gone! Of course I'm going to win his twenty-five thousand
+bet because he doesn't know what it means to discharge a vessel in Sobre
+Vista, and Mike Murphy has orders from me to hire all the available
+stevedores there to do something else while Joey is trying to hire them
+to discharge the _Tyee_. Don't worry, Joe! The country is safe in the
+capable hands of Mike Murphy.”
+
+“I see. And the twenty-five thousand dollars you will win from Joey--”
+
+“Will reimburse me for the extraordinary expense I've been to in saving
+your son. If Joey's end of the bet doesn't cover I'll nick you, Joseph,
+although I figure Joey's end of it will pay the fiddler. He won't
+miss it out of his two millions. Besides, I've noticed that the only
+experience worth while is the kind you pay real money for--and Joey has
+to buy his experience the same as the rest of us.”
+
+Five days later Cappy Ricks dropped into the Red Funnel Line and laid a
+telegram on old Joe Gurney's desk.
+
+“Read that,” he commanded, “and see if you can't work up a couple of
+cheers.”
+
+Gurney read:
+
+“Aberdeen, Wash., June 3, 1916
+
+“Alden P. Ricks
+
+“Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, New York
+
+“Joey arrived bung up and bilge free. Had loaded and hauled into stream,
+waiting for him. Came out in launch, climbed Jacob's ladder and stood
+on rail, sizing up ship. Saw Doris and almost fell face down on deck. He
+says Doris is a dream, she says Joey is a dear. Take it from me, boss,
+it is all over but the wedding bells.
+
+“M. CUPID MURPHY.”
+
+Old Joe Gurney took Cappy Ricks' hand in both of his and shook it
+heartily.
+
+“My worries are over, Alden,” he declared. “You have, indeed, been my
+friend in need.”
+
+“My troubles and Joey's are just commencing, however,” Cappy retorted
+blithely. “However--'never trouble trouble until trouble troubles
+you' is my motto. Where's that hundred-and-six-foot schooner yacht of
+Joey's?”
+
+“She's at her moorings in Greenpoint Basin. Why?”
+
+“I want to borrow her for a cruise to San Francisco, via the Panama
+Canal. Joey and his bride can sail her back. May I have her, to do what
+I please with, Joe?”
+
+“Alden, don't ask foolish questions. Take her and God bless you! Joey
+owns her, but I pay the bills; so her skipper takes orders from me.”
+
+Two days later Joey's schooner _Seafarer_ was standing out to sea past
+Sandy Hook, but Cappy Ricks was not aboard her, for that ingenious
+schemer had boarded a train and gone back to San Francisco and his
+lumber and ships.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+
+Cappy Ricks' meditations were interrupted by a knock at the door of his
+private office.
+
+“Come in,” he piped, and his son-in-law, Captain Matt Peasley, stuck his
+head in.
+
+“The _Tyee_ is sailing in, Cappy,” he announced. “The Merchants'
+Exchange has just telephoned.”
+
+“It's an infernal lie,” Cappy shrilled excitedly. “It can't be the
+_Tyee_. If it is, she's two months ahead of her schedule, and by the
+Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, I fixed up that schedule myself.”
+
+Matt Peasley grinned.
+
+“Perhaps Joey didn't like your schedule and re-arranged it to suit
+himself,” he suggested.
+
+“Impossible! That infernal young scoundrel put it over me? Preposterous!
+Why, Mike Murphy was on the job. Get out, Matt, and don't come in here
+again today throwing scares into the old man.”
+
+Nevertheless, Cappy's confidence in human nature was badly jarred when
+Captain Michael J. Murphy was announced two hours later. Indeed Cappy
+could scarcely credit his sense of sight when the redoubtable Michael
+entered the room. He glared at the worthy fellow over the rims of his
+spectacles for fully a minute while Murphy stood fidgeting just inside
+the doorway.
+
+“Well,” said the Blue Star despot presently, “all I've got to say to
+you, Mike Murphy, is that you're certainly a hell of a seaman to stand
+idly by and see that young Joey do me up like this. Give an account of
+yourself!”
+
+“They're engaged,” Murphy protested valiantly.
+
+“That's my work, Mike, not yours. Don't take any credit that isn't
+coming to you. I want a report on your end of this deal. How does it
+happen that this boy harpoons me for twenty-five thousand dollars?
+Have the _cargadores_ at Sobre Vista gone on the water wagon? Did Joey
+out-bid you for their services? Have they added a lot more lighters to
+their lighterage fleet? Has the surf quit rolling in on the beach? Have
+the inhabitants of Sobre Vista been converted to the Mohammedan faith
+and declined to celebrate saints' days and holy days? Is there smallpox
+in the town, that the quietus has been put on fiestas and fandangoes,
+and has Peru been annexed by Chile and the celebration of the national
+holidays forbidden?”
+
+“No, Mr. Ricks. It's the same old _manana_ burg. The trouble was that
+Joey is a better sailorman than he appeared to be. He cracked on all the
+way down and made a smashing voyage, and, of course, as soon as we got
+there he went ashore. Two other schooners were there ahead of us. One
+was loading general cargo and the other was discharging it, and when
+Joey heard they had been there a month he investigated conditions and
+saw where you had him. Mr. Ricks, he came back as mad as a hatter. Of
+course I saw he would have to wait until the other schooners were out of
+the way before he could begin discharging, because they had first call
+on the lighters; so in view of the situation and the fact that Miss
+Murphy and Doris were a bit tired of the ship and wanted to go ashore
+and see the back country, I organized a trip for them.”
+
+“You left Joey aboard the Tyee, of course.”
+
+“Yes, sir. And there's where I made my fatal break. The minute my back
+was turned the son of a pirate got busy. It appears there was a six-inch
+waste pipe leading from the crew's lavatory out under the stern of the
+ship, and this pipe had rusted away and broken off at the flange just
+inside the skin of the ship sometime during the vessel's previous
+voyage. Of course it happened while she was homeward bound in ballast,
+and was standing so high out of the water that this vent where the pipe
+was broken was above the waterline; consequently not enough of a leak
+developed to be noticeable. At the mill dock, however, after we got
+her under-deck cargo aboard, the vessel had settled until this vent was
+under water, and immediately she developed a mysterious leak. In fact,
+due to the enormous pressure, the water came in faster than the pumps
+could handle it. Fortunately, however, we discovered where the leak was,
+though it was then too late to mend it. To do so we would have had to
+take out the under-deck cargo again. So I just whittled out a six-inch
+wooden plug, fastened it to the end of the boat hook, ran it down the
+narrow space through which the broken pipe led, found the vent, hammered
+the plug home, stopped the leak, pumped out the well, finished taking on
+cargo and sailed for Sobre Vista.”
+
+“A small leak will sink a great ship,” Cappy Ricks murmured. “I think I
+anticipate the blow-off, Mike; but proceed.”
+
+“Unfortunately for us that cargo of lumber we had was for the Peruvian
+government. They were going to use it in the construction of barracks
+or a new customhouse or something--and Joey knew this. And he knew about
+that plug. So the minute my back was turned he pulled out the plug
+and the water came in and trickled all through the cargo and the ship
+commenced to settle. But Joey didn't care. He knew a little salt water
+couldn't hurt the lumber. When the top of the _Tyee's_ rail was flush
+with the water he plugged the hole again, got his crew busy with the
+pumps, and by judiciously plugging and unplugging that leak he kept the
+crew pumping all day and all night without raising the vessel an inch,
+and the people ashore could see the streams of water cascading overside
+and the crew pumping like mad. And presently Joey gave up, went ashore,
+sought the captain of the port and put up a hard luck story about a leak
+in his ship--a leak he couldn't find anywhere--a leak that was getting
+away from him, because his men were too exhausted to do any more
+pumping. And he said his ship would get water-logged and settle until
+the surf began to break over her. And presently the deck lashings would
+part under the battering of the surf and the deck load would go by the
+board. Half of it would drift out to sea, and the other half would pound
+on the beach and get filled with sand, which would dull the saws and
+planes of the carpenters when they came to cut it up. Also, the ship's
+cabin would be sure to go, and unless he had help he would have to
+abandon the vessel and she would lie there, submerged, at anchor, a
+menace to the navigation of the port.”
+
+“The scoundrel! The in-fer-nal young scoundrel!” cried Cappy Ricks.
+
+“Well, he got away with it, sir. Remember our cargo was for the Peruvian
+government and they'd had the devil's own time getting it; consequently
+they couldn't afford to lose any part of it and have their anchorage
+ground menaced by a derelict. So the captain of the port took it up
+with the commandant of the local garrison, and the commandant, as Joey
+expressed it, heard the Macedonian cry and got busy. He commandeered all
+the lighters the other schooners were using; the soldiers rounded up the
+_cargadores_ at the point of the bayonet, and they started discharging
+the American schooner _Tyee_, with the spiggoty soldiers swelling
+Joey's crew at the pumps and Joey doing business with that wooden plug
+according to the requirements. Fortunately there weren't any surf days
+that week, and the way the cargo poured out of the _Tyee_ was a shame
+and a disgrace. And when it was all out Joey plugged the leak again,
+pumped out the ship, and wired me at Mollendo to hurry back with the
+ladies or he'd sail without me. So you can see for yourself, Mr. Ricks,
+it was a hard hand to beat. And his luck held. He cracked on all the way
+home and, as you know, sir, the _Tyee_ is fast in a breeze of wind, and
+you told me not to interfere unless he asked me to.”
+
+Despite his disappointment Cappy Ricks lay back in his chair and laughed
+until he wept.
+
+“Oh, Mike,” he declared, “it's worth twenty-five thousand dollars
+to know a boy who can pull one like that. What do you think of him,
+anyhow?”
+
+“He'll do. His father has spoiled him, but not altogether. I think a
+heap of him, sir. Remember I've been shipmates with him a trifle over
+four months, and that's a pretty good test.”
+
+“Very well, Mike. I forgive you, my boy. I hope Miss Murphy enjoyed the
+trip. Tell her--”
+
+The door opened and Joey Gurney, accompanied by Miss Doris Kenyon
+entered unannounced.
+
+“Hello, godfather,” yelled Joey joyously. He jerked the old man out of
+his chair and hugged him. “I'm back with your schooner, sir. She was
+easy to navigate, but that was a cold deck you handed me in Sobre
+Vista--”
+
+“Glad to see you, Joey, glad to see you,” Cappy interrupted. “Ah, and
+here's my little secretary again. Miss Kenyon, this is a pleasure--”
+
+“Mr. Ricks,” Joey interrupted him, “the lady's name is no longer Miss
+Kenyon. She is now Mrs. Joseph K. Gurney, Junior. The minute we got
+ashore at Meiggs' wharf and could shake the Murphys, who stood out till
+the last for a church wedding, we chartered a taxicab, went up to the
+City Hall, procured a license, rounded up a preacher--and got married.
+What do you know about that?”
+
+“You're as fast as a second-story worker, Joey. I shall kiss the bride.”
+ And Cappy did. Then he sat down and stared at the fruit of his cunning
+labors.
+
+“Well, well, well!” cried Joey. “Kick in, godfather, kick in. You owe
+me twenty-five thousand dollars, and if I'm going to support a wife I'll
+need it.”
+
+Cappy summoned Mr. Skinner, who felicitated the happy pair and departed
+pursuant to Cappy's order, to make out a check for Joey.
+
+“And now,” said Cappy, as he handed the groom his winnings, “you get
+out of here with your bride, Joey, and I'll telephone Florry and we'll
+organize a wedding supper. And to-morrow morning, Joey, I'd like to see
+you at ten o'clock, if you can manage to be here.”
+
+Joey promised, and hastened away with his bride.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+
+True to his word he presented himself in Cappy's lair promptly at ten
+next morning. The old gentleman was sitting rigidly erect on the extreme
+edge of his chair; in his hand he held a typewritten statement with a
+column of figures on it, and he eyed Joey very appraisingly over the
+rims of his spectacles.
+
+“My boy,” he said solemnly, “sit down. I'm awfully glad you cabled that
+hula-hula girl of yours in Reno that the stuff was all off.”
+
+Joey's mouth flew open.
+
+“Why--why, how did you know?” he gasped.
+
+“I know everything, Joey. I'm that kind of an old man.”
+
+Joey paled.
+
+“Oh, Mr. Ricks,” he pleaded, “for heaven's sake don't let a whisper of
+that affair reach my wife.” He wrung his hands. “I told her she was the
+only girl I had ever loved--that I'd never been engaged before--that
+I--oh, godfather, if she ever discovers I've lied to her--”
+
+“She'll not discover it. Compose yourself, Joey. I've seen to all that.
+I knew you'd give Doris the same old song and dance; everybody's doing
+it, you know, so I took pains to see to it that you'll never have to eat
+your words.”
+
+“I must have been crazy to engage myself to that woman,” Joey wailed.
+“I don't know why I did it--I don't know how it happened--Oh, Mr. Ricks,
+please believe me!”
+
+“I do, Joey, I do. I understand perfectly, because at the tender age of
+twenty-four I proposed marriage to a snake-charmer lady in the old Eden
+Musee. She was forty years old if she was a day, but she carried her
+years well and hid the wrinkles with putty, or something. Barring a
+slight hare-lip, she was a fairly handsome woman--in the dark.” He
+reached into a compartment of his desk and drew forth a package of
+letters tied with red ribbon. “You can have these, Joey,” he announced;
+“only I shouldn't advise keeping them where your wife may find them.
+They are your letters to your Honolulu lady.”
+
+Joey let out a bleat of pure ecstacy and seized them.
+
+“You haven't read them, sir, have you?” he queried, blushing
+desperately.
+
+“Oh, yes, my boy. I had to, you know, because I was buying something and
+I wanted to make certain I got value received. Pretty gooey stuff, Joey!
+Read aloud, they sound like a cow's hoof settling into a wet meadow!”
+
+“I'm so glad she took it sensibly,” Joey announced, for he was anxious
+to change the topic of conversation. “I suppose she saw it was the only
+way.”
+
+“No, she didn't, my son. Don't flatter yourself. On your way out West to
+join the _Tyee_ you wrote her every day on the train. You told her about
+your bet with me, and who I was and all about me. Lucky for you that you
+did, and doubly lucky for you that you cabled her the jilt from Sobre
+Vista, or she would not have come to me with her troubles. Joey, that
+must have taken courage on your part. It's mighty hard for a gentleman
+to cable a lady and break an engagement. That's the lady's privilege,
+Joey.”
+
+“I--I was desperate, Mr. Ricks. I had to. I had to have her out of the
+way by the time I got back, or Doris might have found it out. You see, I
+wanted to clear the atmosphere.”
+
+“Well, you clouded it for fair! You see, Joey, in all those letters it
+appears that you never once mentioned the words marriage or engagement.
+But your cablegram was an admission that an engagement existed, and the
+lady was smart enough to realize that. It appears also that about a week
+after you cleared for Sobre Vista her annoying husband was killed by a
+taxicab in New York, so that saved her any divorce proceedings; and
+when your cablegram reached her she was a single lady who had been
+heartlessly jilted. The first thing she did was to hire a lawyer, and
+the first person that lawyer called on was Alden P. Ricks, the old
+family friend. It appears a suit for breach of promise was to be
+instituted unless a fairly satisfactory financial settlement could be
+arrived at.”
+
+“How much did she want?” Joey barely whispered the words.
+
+“Only a million.”
+
+“How much did you settle for? I'll pay it out of my inheritance, Mr.
+Ricks. Don't worry! I won't see you stuck, for you've stood by me
+through thick and thin.”
+
+“Why, I didn't give her anything, Joey. I just had her lawyer bring her
+on to San Francisco for a conference. Of course when lunch time came
+round and I hadn't heard any proposition I felt I could submit to your
+father, I invited Miss Fontaine and her lawyer to luncheon with me in
+the Palace Hotel Grill, and while we were lunching, who should come
+up and greet me but my old friend, the Duke of Killiekrankie, formerly
+Duncan MacGregor, first mate of our barkentine _Retriever_. Mac is an
+excellent fellow and for some time I had felt he merited promotion. So I
+made him a duke.
+
+“Well, the duke was awfully glad to see me, and being a gentleman I
+couldn't do less than introduce him to the lady and her lawyer. He only
+stayed at our table a minute and then rejoined his friends, but
+all during the meal I could see Betsy Jane's mind wasn't on her
+breach-of-promise suit. She asked me several questions about the duke,
+and I told her I didn't know much about him except that he was sinfully
+rich and a globe-trotter, and that we'd met in Paris. Lies, Joey, but
+pardonable, I hope, under the circumstances.
+
+“Well, Joey, it seems that she and the duke were registered at the same
+hotel and I'll be shot if his lordship didn't meet her--by accident, of
+course--in the lobby that afternoon. He lifted his hat and she smiled
+and they had a chat. The next day she cut an engagement with her lawyer
+and me to go motoring with the duke in my French car, and Florry's
+chauffeur driving, for, of course, the duke was an expensive luxury and
+I was trying to save a dollar wherever possible. That night the duke
+gave a dinner party in honor of the lady--and he gave it aboard his
+yacht, the _Doris_, formerly the _Seafarer_, right out here in San
+Francisco harbor--”
+
+Joey went up and put his arm round Cappy's shoulders.
+
+“Oh, Cappy Ricks, Cappy Ricks!” he cried, and then his voice broke and
+his eyes filled with tears.
+
+“Yes,” Cappy continued, “I had sort o' suspected she might pull that
+breach-of-promise stuff on you, Joey--”
+
+“What made you suspect it?”
+
+“Why, I sort of suspected you were going to marry Doris Kenyon--”
+
+“You planned to get us together on the same ship--!”
+
+“Only place I could think of where you were safe from the Honolulu lady
+and couldn't run away from Doris, Joey. Well, as I say, I had sort of
+suspected she might sue you and disgrace you and break the heart of that
+little girl I'd picked out for you long before you ever met her--so I
+started to get there first and with the heaviest guns, I borrowed your
+yacht for the duke and had him sail her round himself, so he'd have her
+here to give the dinner party on. Then I got a Burke's peerage and told
+MacGregor who he was and had him study up on his family history and
+get acquainted with his sister, Lady Mary, and his younger brother, the
+Honorable Cecil Something-or-other--in particular he was not to forget
+to rave about the grouse shooting in Scotland.”
+
+Cappy paused and puffed his cigar meditatively for half a minute.
+
+“Joey,” he continued, “any time you run a bluff, run a good one.
+If you're starring a globe-trotting duke, have his ancestry all
+straightened out in advance, because he's bound to break into the
+newspapers and the motto of the newspaper editor is 'Show me.' And the
+yacht--just one of the props of the comedy, Joey; and with a little
+cockney steward in livery to say 'Your ludship'; and the name of the
+yacht changed in case she'd ever heard you speak about the _Seafarer;_
+and the cabin done over in white enamel with mahogany trim; and a new
+set of dishes with your family crest and the name of the yacht on
+every piece in case you had ever had her aboard; and a private
+secretary--borrowed him from my general manager, Skinner, by the way--we
+were certainly there when it came to throwing the ducal front. And we
+got away with it, for MacGregor's accent is just Scotchy enough, and he
+comes of good family and has excellent manners. Yes, I must say Mac made
+a very comfortable duke. Skinner's young man tells me it would bring
+tears of joy to your eyes to see him kiss the lady's hand.
+
+“Well, Joey, the upshot of it was that after paying violent court to the
+lady for two weeks--Mac said he could have pulled the stunt the night of
+the dinner, for she fell for the title right way, but I told him to make
+haste slowly--the duke received a cablegram calling him home from his
+furlough. Oh, yes, Joey, I had him in the army. Any young unattached
+duke that doesn't join the British army these days doesn't get by in
+good society, and I had my duke on a six months' furlough to recover
+from his wounds. Fortunately a bunch of cedar shingles had fallen on
+Mac's foot recently and he was dog lame, which strengthened the play.
+
+“Of course the duke was up in the air right away. In a passionate scene
+he confessed his love for that damsel of yours, Joey, and laid his
+dukedom at her feet. Would she marry him P. D. Q. and help him sail the
+yacht home? Would she? 'Oh, darling, this is so sudden!' she cried, and
+almost swooned in his arms. From a cabaret to a dukedom. Some jump!
+Sail the yacht home to England through the mine fields and submarines?
+Perfectly ripping, by Jove! I give you my word, Joey, she tacked on one
+of those New York British accents for the duke's special benefit. There
+was a lot of beam to her _a_'s, Mac told me, but blamed little molded
+depth to her mentality. So they were married in haste, and after the
+duke had seen his bride in the elevator bound for their rooms at the
+hotel, he excused himself to get a highball. And I guess he got the
+highball, because I find it in this expense account he turned in to me.”
+
+“It sounds like a fairy tale,” Joey murmured in an awed voice. “What did
+the duke do next?”
+
+“Came right down to this office and informed me he was, plumb weary of
+the life of a bon vivant and was anxious to get to sea again. So I made
+him master of a new steamer we acquired recently, and he's gone out to
+Vladivostok with munitions for the Russians.”
+
+“But didn't you give him some money, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“No. Why should I? Didn't I give him command of a steamer? You can slip
+him a fat check if you feel that way about it, but I never coddle my
+skippers, Joey, until I'm sure they're worth while. I think, however,
+that Mac will make good. He's very thorough.”
+
+“Wha--what became of Ernestine?”
+
+“Oh, by Godfrey, that's a sad story, Joey. It seems she waited at the
+hotel for the duke to come back and he didn't come, so the following
+morning she went down to the water front looking for the yacht--and the
+yacht was gone. During the night I'd had it towed over to Sausalito;
+consequently the launchman she hired couldn't find it down in Mission
+Bay, and back to the beach she came. After a couple of days had passed,
+however, she commenced to smell a rat, so she came down to my office and
+asked me if I'd seen anything of the duke.
+
+“'Why, yes, I have,' I told her. 'The old duke came in here yesterday
+afternoon, soused to the guards, and complaining he'd been cruelly
+deceived into marrying a two-time loser with a couple of youngsters,
+and inasmuch as he was certain the family wouldn't receive her he was
+leaving the United States immediately, never to return.
+
+“'And this morning the justice of the peace who performed the ceremony
+mailed him the license, which has been duly recorded in the office
+of the Secretary of State in accordance with law; and inasmuch as the
+license was sent to him in my care I am holding it in our safe until he
+calls for it.'
+
+“Well, Joey, she looked at me and she knew the stuff was all off. She'd
+married the duke; I had the license to prove it, and of course she
+realized her breach of promise suit and claim for a million dollars'
+worth of heart balm would be laughed out of court if she had the crust
+to present it. So she did the next best thing. She abused me like a
+pickpocket and ended up by getting hysterical when I told her how I'd
+swindled her. When she got through crying I lectured her on the error of
+her ways and suggested that inasmuch as she had had one divorce already,
+another wouldn't be much of a strain on her, and I'd foot the bill for
+separating her legally from John Doe, alias the duke, on a charge of
+desertion. Then I offered her a thousand dollars and a ticket back to
+New York for the surrender of all your letters to her and that infernal
+cablegram and a release of all claims against you. I guess she was broke
+for she grabbed it in a hurry, Joey. The atmosphere is now clear, my
+son, and nothing further remains to be done in the premises, save settle
+the bill of expense. Fortunately the _Tyee_ made money on that fast
+voyage under your command, but the cost of bringing the yacht round from
+New York, doing over the cabin, buying the new dishes with the crest,
+and settling with the lady should rightfully be borne by you. As I
+say, the duke was expensive, for the rascal certainly rolled 'em high.
+Skinner has made me up a statement of the total cost, with interest at
+six per cent to date, and it appears, Joey, that you owe your godfather
+$12,143.18. On the day you come into your inheritance, add six per cent
+to that sum and send me a check.”
+
+“But the twenty-five thousand dollars I won from you--” Joey began, but
+Cappy held up a rigid finger, enjoining silence.
+
+“I am going to stick your dub of a father for that, as a penance for his
+sins of omission, Joey; for by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, if ever a
+boy won a bet and was entitled to it, you're that young man. In-fer-nal
+young scoundrel! Keep it and split fifty-fifty with your wife. You won
+a straight bet from a crooked gambler, and if I haven't had a million
+dollars' worth of fun out of this transaction I hope I may marry a
+hula-hula woman--and I've passed my three score and ten and ought to
+know better!”
+
+“But about this man MacGregor--”
+
+“Don't worry about him. The Scotch are a hardy race and Mac is a sailor.
+Joey, I know sailors. The scoundrels have a wife in every port!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+
+During the period when Joey Gurney was busy doing all that Cappy
+Ricks desired him to do and some things that were slightly off Cappy's
+program, the president emeritus of the Blue Star Navigation Company and
+allied interests was discovering that it is one thing to declare for the
+simple life and quite another to live it. The Great War challenged
+so much of the Ricks interest that he could not bear to live far
+from morning and evening editions--and he wanted them red hot off the
+presses. Things were doing in the shipping world. The most inconceivable
+trades were being consummated daily, freights were soaring, lumber
+prices had reached an unprecedentedly high level and promised to go
+higher; there was something doing every minute and not enough minutes
+in a working day to accommodate half of these somethings. What more
+natural, therefore, than that Cappy presently should find himself caught
+in the maelstrom, even though he told himself daily that, come what
+might _he_ would keep out of it.
+
+The first indefinite evidence that he was about to be engulfed came in
+the form of a newspaper story, ex the steamer _Timaru_, from Sydney, via
+Tahiti. There it was, as big as a church--a paragraph of it, tucked away
+in a column-and-a-half story of the bombardment of Papeete by the German
+Pacific fleet early in September of 1914:
+
+“An incident of the bombardment was the sinking of the German freight
+steamer _Valkyrie_ by shells from the German fleet. The vessel had been
+captured by the French gunboat _Zeile_ some weeks previous and was at
+anchor in the harbor, under the guns of the _Zeile_, when the German
+squadron appeared off the entrance. The gunboat immediately was made the
+target for the German guns, and sunk. During the attack, however, a wild
+shell missed the _Zeile_ and struck the _Valkyrie_, tearing a great hole
+in her hull and causing her to sink in ten fathoms at her anchorage.”
+
+Ten fathoms! Sixty feet! Why, at that depth Cappy should have known that
+her masts and funnel would be above water; that in all probability
+she carried war-risk insurance; that she was so far from anywhere the
+underwriters would have abandoned her, even had she not been a prize of
+war, since there are no appliances in Papeete for salving a vessel of
+her size; that she could be raised if one cared to spend a little money
+on doing it; that one projectile probably had not ruined her beyond
+repair; that she was a menace to navigation in Papeete Harbor and hence
+would have to be gotten out of the way, either by dynamite or auction;
+that--well, any number of thats should have occurred to Cappy Ricks
+to suggest the advisability of keeping track of the wreck of the
+_Valkyrie_. However, for some mysterious reasons--his resentment against
+the German cause, probably--the golden prospect never appealed to him,
+for when he had finished reading the article he merely said:
+
+“Well, what do you know about that? Skinner, it's a mighty lucky thing
+for that German admiral that I'm not the Kaiser, for I'd certainly make
+him hard to catch. The idea of sinking that fine steamer--and a German
+steamer at that! Here was the little old French gunboat, about as
+invulnerable as a red-cedar shingle; and instead of moving into proper
+position and raking her with their light guns--instead of calling on her
+to surrender--these Germans had to go to work in a hurry and inaugurate
+a campaign of frightfulness. The minute they were off the harbor--Zowie!
+Blooey! Bam! It was all over but the cheering, and they'd chucked an
+eight-inch projectile through a ship that was worth four of the gunboat.
+
+“Skinner, that's what I call spilling the beans. Why they didn't take
+their time, recapture that freighter and give her skipper a chance to
+hustle across to San Francisco or Honolulu and intern, is a mystery to
+me. The idea! Why, for that German fleet to waste ammunition on that
+Jim-Crow town and a hand-me-down gunboat was equivalent to John L.
+Sullivan whittling out a handle on a piece of two-by-four common fir in
+order to attack a cockroach!”
+
+Cappy was so incensed that he growled about the Germans for an hour.
+Then he forgot the _Valkyrie_, notwithstanding the fact that the press
+jogged his memory again when the German fleet, deciding that prudence
+was the better part of valor, fled from the Pacific to escape the
+Japanese, only to be destroyed in the South Atlantic by the British
+fleet. A resume of the operations of the German squadron in the
+Pacific brought forth mention of the destruction of the _Zeile_ and the
+_Valkyrie_. However, Cappy's mind was not in Tahiti now, but off the
+Falkland Islands, for he was very much pro-Ally and devoted more thought
+to military and naval strategy than he did to the lumber and shipping
+business.
+
+However, the climax of Cappy's indignation over the disaster to
+the _Valkyrie_ was not attained until a few months later when, in
+conversation on the floor of the Merchants' Exchange with the skipper
+of the schooner _Tarus_, who happened to have been in Papeete at
+the bombardment, he learned he had done the German admiral a grave
+injustice. He came back to his office, boiling, declaring the French
+were a crazy nation, and that, after all, he could recall meeting one or
+two fine Germans during the course of a fairly busy career. He summoned
+Mr. Skinner and Matt Peasley to hear the sordid tale.
+
+“Remember that steamer _Valkyrie_ the Germans were supposed to have sunk
+by accident in the harbor of Papeete during the bombardment in September
+of 1914?” he queried.
+
+“I believe I read something about it in the papers at the time,” Mr.
+Skinner replied.
+
+“What about her?” Matt Peasley demanded.
+
+“Why, the Germans didn't sink her at all, Matt! The Frenchmen did it,”
+ Cappy shrilled. “The crazy, frog-eating jumping-jacks of Frenchmen! The
+tramp wasn't flying the German flag--naturally the Frenchmen had hauled
+it down; so the Germans didn't investigate her. Besides, they were in a
+hurry--you'll remember the Japs were on their trail at the time; so they
+just devoted forty minutes to shooting up the town, and beat it. I don't
+suppose they ever knew they hit the _Valkyrie_; perhaps they figured
+that, having sunk the gunboat, the _Valkyrie_ could up hook and away at
+her leisure, since there was nothing left to prevent her.
+
+“Huh! Makes me sick to talk about it; but the skipper of the _Taurus_
+was there at the time and he tells me that, though the _Valkyrie_
+was pretty well down by the stern, her bulkheads were holding and she
+wouldn't have sunk if those blamed Frenchmen, fearful that the German
+fleet was coming back after her, hadn't gone aboard and opened her sea
+cocks! Yes, sir. Rather than risk having her recaptured, they opened her
+sea cocks and sunk her! And, at that, they didn't have sense enough to
+run her out to deep water. No! They had to do the trick as she lay at
+anchor; and there she lies still, a menace to navigation and a perennial
+reminder to those Papeete Frenchmen that he who acts in haste will
+repent at leisure.”
+
+To this outburst Mr. Skinner made some perfunctory remark, attributing
+the situation to a lack of efficiency, while Matt Peasley went back to
+his office and grieved as he reflected on the corrosive action of salt
+water on those fine, seven-year-old engines.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+
+Time passed. Mr. Skinner developed a pallor and irritability that
+bespoke all too truly an attack of nerves, from overwork, and sore
+against his will was hustled off to Honolulu for a rest while Cappy
+Ricks had the audacity to take charge of the lumber business. Whereupon
+Mr. J. Augustus Redell, of the West Coast Trading Company, discovered
+the unprotected condition of the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company and
+promptly, in sheer wanton deviltry, proceeded to sew Cappy Ricks up on
+an order for a million grape stakes.
+
+A word here regarding the said J. Augustus Redell. He was a blithe,
+joyous creature, still in the sunny thirties, and what he didn't
+know about the lumber business--particularly the marketing of lumber
+products--could be tucked into anybody's eyes without impairing their
+eyesight. Mr. Redell had fought his way up from office boy with the
+Black Butte Lumber Company to lumber broker with offices of his own. He
+had owned a retail yard in which business he had gone “bust” for more
+money than the world appeared to contain. But he had fought his way back
+and paid a hundred cents on the dollar, including some hundred and
+forty thousand dollars he had owed the Ricks mills at the time of his
+collapse. Because he was young and fine and good-natured and brave and
+brilliant, Cappy had always admired J. Augustus Redell, but after
+the latter had so splendidly re-established his credit and formed a
+partnership with a Peruvian gentleman, one Senor Luiz Almeida, known
+locally as Live Wire Luiz, Cappy found that he had for the genial
+J. Augustus an admiration that amounted to affection. The West Coast
+Trading Company, under which title Live Wire Luiz and J. Augustus Redell
+did a lumber brokerage business with Mexico, Central American and South
+American countries principally, had Cappy Ricks' entire confidence,
+although he would have died rather than admit this. Live Wire Luiz he
+ignored and always dismissed as a factor in the affairs of that company,
+but whenever Redell had a deal on that was too heavy for his financial
+sinews, Cappy could always be depended upon to lend a helping hand. On
+his part, Redell revered Cappy Ricks as only an idealistic and naturally
+lovable rascal of a boy can revere an idealistic and lovable old man.
+To J. Augustus Redell little, old, naive, whimsical, gentle, terrible,
+brilliant, cunning, generous, altruistic, prudent, youthful old Cappy
+Ricks was a joy forever. With the impishness of his tender years, Mr.
+Redell could conceive of no greater joy than picking on Cappy Ricks just
+to see the latter fight back.
+
+Quite early in their friendship, the astute Redell discovered a rift in
+Cappy's armor--two rifts, in fact. The first was that Cappy feared and
+loathed old age and fiercely resented even the most shadowy intimation
+that with age he was, to employ a sporting phrase, “losing his punch.”
+ The second weakness that lay exposed to Redell was Cappy's passion for
+wringing a profit, by ingenious means, from apparently barren soil where
+no profit had ever hitherto burgeoned. At heart Cappy was a speculator;
+only the fact that he was a prudent and careful speculator had conduced
+to enrich him rather than impoverish him.
+
+Now, Cappy was fully convinced, from optical evidence, that J. Augustus
+Redell was a gambler. He admired Redell's genius for business, the
+soundness of his decisions, the alertness of his mind and the brilliance
+of his financial _coups_, but--he deprecated the younger man's daring.
+Cappy called it recklessness. By degrees the old gentleman had come to
+assume a proprietary interest in Gus Redell and the latter's affairs,
+for the younger man frequently sought counsel from Cappy and not
+infrequently, a loan! Cappy knew his young friend to be the soul of
+manly honor, but--he was young! Ah, yes! He was young. Ergo, he was
+foolish. True, his foolishness had not as yet been discovered, but Cappy
+was certain it would come to the surface sooner or later. The boy
+was reckless--a gambler. Cappy abhorred gambling. He never gambled.
+Occasionally he speculated! What more natural, therefore, than that
+little Cappy should presently arrogate to himself the privilege of
+stabbing young J. Augustus to the vitals from time to time, just to
+impress upon the boy the knowledge that this is a hard, cold, cruel
+world with a great many bad men in it!
+
+Nothing could possibly have delighted Redell more. Whenever Cappy
+stabbed him, forthwith he set about to stab Cappy in return, and thus
+had developed a joyous business feud. These best of friends spent an
+hour and a half daily, at luncheon, “picking” on each other, telling
+tales on each other, eternally “joshing” for the edification of a
+coterie of their lumber and shipping friends who always lunched in a
+private dining room at the Commercial Club and who were known within
+that organization as the Bilgewater Club.
+
+Early in 1915 Redell had seen an opportunity for inducing Cappy Ricks to
+speculate in grape stakes--to his financial hurt and humiliation. There
+was to be an election that fall--a special election to see whether
+California should “go dry” or “stay wet,” and for some reason not quite
+apparent to Mr. Redell, a great many people believed the state would
+“go dry.” Among the people who so believed, Redell discovered, were the
+woodsmen who, during the winter of 1914, would, under normal conditions,
+have split from redwood trees sufficient grape stakes to support such
+new vineyards as would come into bearing in the fall of 1915. Fearing
+that there would be no market for their grape stakes when the making of
+wine should be prohibited by law, these woodsmen had made no effort
+to supply the demand; wherefore the Machiavellian J. Augustus Redell,
+taking advantage of Mr. Skinner's absence from the office of the Ricks
+mills, cleverly managed to inculcate in Cappy Ricks the idea that it
+would be a splendid and profitable venture if he, the said Cappy, should
+wade into the grape stake market and corner it. The idea appealed to the
+speculative part of the old gentleman's nature and he had gone to work
+in a hurry, only to discover, after he had accepted orders from the
+West Coast Trading Company for a great many carloads of grape stakes for
+future delivery, that, when the day of reckoning should come, he would
+not be enabled to pick up enough grape stakes to fill his orders, for
+the very sufficient reason that nobody had manufactured grape stakes for
+that year's market, and they were not available at any price!
+
+It had been a cruel blow and Cappy's weakness had been exposed
+without mercy to the members of the Bilgewater Club by Mr. Redell, who
+thereafter kept both eyes wide open, knowing that sooner or later Cappy
+would retaliate.
+
+Retaliation was, of course, inevitable. Cappy realized this. For the
+first time in his career as a lumber and shipping king the sly old dog
+realized he had been out-thought, out-played, out-gamed and man-handled
+by a mere pup. And, though he had taken his beating like the rare old
+sport that he was, nevertheless the leaves of memory had a horrible
+habit of making a most melancholy rustling; and for two weeks, following
+his ignominious rout at the hands of J. Augustus Redell, Cappy's
+days and nights were entirely devoted to scheming ways and means of
+vengeance. Curiously enough, it was the West Coast Trading Company that
+accorded him the opportunity he craved.
+
+Having massacred Cappy in the grape-stake deal and established an
+unlimited credit thereby, the West Coast Lumber Company, per Senor
+Felipe Luiz Almeida, alias Live Wire Luiz, decided to purchase a little
+jag of spruce from the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company. Cappy Ricks
+looked at the proffered order, saw that it called for number one clear
+spruce, and promptly accepted it at a dollar under the market. He was
+to bring the spruce in to San Francisco on one of his own schooners,
+lay her alongside the _City of Panama_ and discharge it into her, for
+delivery at Salina Cruz, Mexico.
+
+Cappy knew, of course, that Live Wire Luiz handled exclusively the West
+Coast Trading Company's Mexican, Central and South American business. He
+knew, also, that there were many points about the lumber business that
+the explosive little Peruvian had still to learn; so he decided to stab
+the West Coast Trading Company, through the innocent and trusting Senor
+Almeida, with a weapon he would not have dreamed of employing had J.
+Augustus Redell placed the order. Live Wire Luiz knew the Ricks Lumber
+& Logging Company always sold its output on mill tally and inspection;
+that Cappy Ricks' grading rules were much fairer to his customers than
+those of his competitors; that when he contracted to deliver number one
+clear spruce he would deliver exactly that and challenge anybody to pick
+a number two board out of the lot. But what Live Wire Luiz did not know
+was that there are two kinds of number one spruce on the Pacific Coast.
+One grows in California and the other in Oregon and Washington--and
+Cappy Ricks had both kinds for sale.
+
+“Aha!” Cappy murmured as he glanced over Live Wire Luiz's order after
+the latter had gone. “Number one clear spruce, eh? All right, sir! Away
+down in my wicked heart I know you want some nice number one stock from
+our Washington mill, at Port Hadlock; but unfortunately you have failed
+to stipulate it--so we'll slip you a little of the California product
+and teach you something you ought to know.”
+
+Whereupon Cappy sent the order to his mill on Humboldt Bay, California.
+Though this plant manufactured redwood lumber almost exclusively,
+whenever the woods boss came across a nice spruce or bull-pine tree
+among the redwood he was wont to send it down to the mill, where it was
+sawed and set aside for trusting individuals like Live Wire Luiz.
+When seasoned this spruce was very good stock. Unfortunately, however,
+experts differ in their diagnosis of California spruce. There are those
+who will tell you it is not spruce, but a bastard fir; while others
+will tell you it is not fir, but a bastard spruce. Cappy Ricks had no
+definite ideas on the subject, for he didn't own enough of that kind of
+stumpage to grieve him. All he knew or cared was that when such outlawed
+stock was billed as spruce no judge or jury in the land could say it was
+fir; also, that in its green state it possessed an abominable odor!
+
+The lumber was delivered to the _City of Panama_ in due course and, as
+Cappy had suspected, Live Wire Luiz failed to come down to her dock
+and take a smell. This was a privilege left intact for the consignee at
+Salina Cruz; and he, according to Mexican custom, which only demands
+a ghost of an excuse to seek a rebate, promptly wired a protest and
+declared himself swindled to the extent of five dollars a thousand feet,
+gold.
+
+Also, having been similarly outraged once before, he demanded to know
+why he had been sent California spruce; whereupon Live Wire Luiz called
+up Cappy Ricks, abused him roundly and sent him a bill for six dollars
+a thousand, rebate! Unfortunately for the West Coast Trading Company,
+however, it had already discounted Cappy's invoice; so the latter could
+afford to stand pat--which he did.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXV
+
+
+Shortly after noon on the day of his small triumph over the West Coast
+Trading Company, Cappy Ricks bustled up California Street, bound for
+luncheon with the Bilgewater Club.
+
+On this day, of all days, Cappy would not have missed luncheon with the
+Bilgewater Club for a farm. As he breezed along there was a smile on his
+ruddy old face and a lilt in his kind old heart, for he was rehearsing
+his announcement to his youthful friends of how he had but recently
+tanned the hide of a brother! He almost laughed aloud as he pictured
+himself solemnly relating, in the presence of J. Augustus Redell and
+Live Wire Luiz, the tale of the ill-favored spruce, excusing his own
+mendacity the while on the ground that he wasn't a mind reader; that if
+the West Coast Lumber Company desired northern spruce they should have
+stipulated northern spruce; that, as alleged business men, it was high
+time they were made aware of the ancient principle of _caveat emptor_,
+which means, as every schoolboy knows, that the buyer must protect
+himself in the clinches and breakaways. And lastly, he planned to claim
+it the solemn duty of the aged to instruct the young and ignorant in the
+hard school of experience.
+
+Judge, therefore, of his disappointment when, on entering the lobby of
+the Merchants' Exchange Building, on the two top floors of which the
+Commercial Club is situated, he encountered Redell and Live Wire Luiz
+leaving the elevator.
+
+The West Coast Trading Company had offices in the same building and, as
+Redell carried a plethoric suit case, while Live Wire Luiz followed with
+a small hand bag, Cappy realized they were bound for parts unknown.
+In consequence of which he realized he had rehearsed to no purpose his
+expose of the pair before the Bilgewater Club. He halted the partners
+and secured a firm grip on the lapel of each.
+
+“Cowards!” he sneered. “Running out on me, eh? By Judas Priest, I
+just knew you didn't dast to stay and hear me tell the boys about that
+spruce. Drat you! The next time you'll know the difference between attar
+of roses and California spruce!”
+
+Redell put down his suit case, pulled out his watch, glanced at it and
+then at his partner.
+
+“Shall I tell him, Luiz?” he queried.
+
+Live Wire Luiz thereupon consulted his watch, scratched his ear and
+said:
+
+“Friend of my heart, do you theenk eet ees safe?”
+
+“Oh, yes. He isn't a bit dangerous, Luiz. He's lost all his teeth and
+all he can do now is sit and bay at the moon.”
+
+Live Wire Luiz shrugged.
+
+“I theenk maybe so you are right, _amigo mio_. The steamer she will
+go to depart in half an hour, an' that ees not time for thees ol'
+high-binder to do somet'ing. Eet ees what you call one stiff li'l'
+order. I admit thees spruce bandit ees pretty smart, but--” again Live
+Wire Luiz shrugged his expressive shoulders--“he ees pretty ol', no? I
+theenk to myself he have lose--what you call heem? ah, yes, he have lose
+hees punch!”
+
+“I fear he has, Luiz; so I'll tell him. At least the knowledge will
+gravel him and take all the joy out of that stinking little spruce
+swindle of his.”
+
+“'Twon't neither!” Gappy challenged. “I stung you there--drat your
+picture!--and I'm glad I did it. I rejoice in my wickedness. Cost you
+five hundred dollars for making a monkey out of the old man in that
+grape-stake deal, Gus.”
+
+“Why,” said Redell wonderingly, “I thought you'd forgiven me that,
+Cappy.”
+
+“So I have; but I haven't forgotten. Expect me to lose my self-respect
+and forget about it? No, sir! When I go into a deal and emerge in the
+red, I take a look at my loss-and-gain account and forget it; but when
+I'm ravished of my self--respect-wow! Look out below and get out from
+under! In-fer-nal young scoundrel! If I don't show you two before I die
+that I haven't lost my punch I'll come back from the grave to ha'nt you.
+Go on and spin your little tale, Augus-tus. You can't tell me anything
+that'll make me mad. What you got on your mind besides your hair, Gus?
+Out with it, boy; out with it! I'm listening.”
+
+And Cappy came close to Redell and inclined his head close to the young
+fellow's breast; whereupon Redell put his lips close to Cappy's ear and
+answered hoarsely:
+
+“I'm going to Papeete to bid in that sunken German steamer, _Valkyrie_.”
+
+Cappy nodded.
+
+“Huh!” he said. “Is that all? Well, when you return from Papeete you're
+going to take another journey right away.”
+
+“Where?”
+
+“Into the bankruptcy court first, and then up to the Home for the
+Feeble-Minded. On the level, boy, you're overdue at the foolish farm.”
+
+“I'll take a chance, Cappy. All you old graybeards can do is sit on the
+fence and decry the efforts of the rising generation. You just croak and
+knock. Of course I admit that once on a time an opportunity couldn't fly
+by you so fast you wouldn't get some of the tail feathers; but that was
+a long time ago.”
+
+He paused and glanced at his partner. Sorrowfully Live Wire Luiz tapped
+his forehead with his brown, cigarette-stained forefinger.
+
+“Senile decay!” Redell murmured.
+
+“Sure; I bet you, Mike!” Live Wire Luiz answered.
+
+He wagged his head lugubriously, turned aside and affected to wipe away
+a vagrant tear with his salmon-colored silk handkerchief.
+
+“Look here!” Cappy rasped. “This thing is getting personal. Never mind
+about my years, you pup. If my back is bent a trifle it's from carrying
+a load of experience and other people's mistakes. And never mind about
+my noodle! It may have a few knots and shakes in it, but they're tight
+and sound, and it's free of pitch pockets, wane and rotten streaks; so
+this old head grades as merchantable timber still.
+
+“As for your head, Gus, and that of this human firecracker with you,
+both have streaks of sap round the edges, and I'll prove it to you yet.
+No; on second thought I don't have to prove it. You've already done that
+yourself! You're going to Papeete to try to bid in the _Valkyrie_, and
+she's junk!”
+
+“Partly.” Redell admitted. “She's been under water about two years and I
+suppose the teredo have digested her upper works by now; but they can be
+rebuilt quickly and without a great deal of expense.”
+
+“How about her boilers? You'll have to retube them.”
+
+“I don't think so. I was talking with Captain Hippard, of the
+Morrison-Hippard Line. They had the steamer _Chinook_ under water a year
+in Norton Sound, but they raised her and brought her to San Francisco
+under her own steam. You know, Cappy, it's the combination of water and
+air that makes iron and steel rust. It seems that when a boiler is under
+water and not exposed to the air it rusts very slowly; also, the rust
+is like a soft film--it doesn't pit and scale off in great flakes. And
+a couple of years under water will not do any appreciable damage to the
+_Valkyrie's_ boilers. The _Chinook_ is running yet, notwithstanding the
+fact that fifteen years ago she was submerged for a year.”
+
+“Huh!” Cappy grunted.
+
+“The same condition, of course, holds true with regard to her hull, only
+more so,” Redell continued. “The paint will protect the hull perfectly.
+Of course if, after getting her up, she is permitted to lie exposed to
+the air, the soft film of rust will promptly harden and scale off and
+she'll go to glory in a few months. However, nothing like that will
+happen, because the minute she's up she'll be thoroughly cleaned and
+scrubbed and painted. Of course the asbestos cover will have peeled off
+her boilers, but even at that I'll bring her to San Francisco under her
+own steam. She'll just be ungodly hot below decks and a hog for coal
+until the boilers are re-covered.”
+
+Cappy sighed. He was not prepared to combat this argument, for he had a
+sneaking impression Redell was right. However, he returned undaunted to
+the attack.
+
+“She's shot full of holes,” he declared.
+
+“She has one hole through her, and when she's loaded light that hole is
+above water line. The wrecking vessel that goes down to salve her will
+have steel plates, tools and mechanics aboard, and new plates can be put
+in temporarily. And if that cannot be done those holes can be patched
+with planking and cemented over.”
+
+“Well, all right. Grant that. But think of her engines, Gus. Think of
+those fine, smooth bearings and polished steel rods all corroded and
+pitted by salt water. The water may not have a disastrous effect on the
+boilers and hull, but an engine can't stand any rust at all and still
+remain one hundred per cent efficient. I tell you I know, Gus. I had my
+_Amelia Ricks_ submerged on Duxbury Reef for a week; then I hauled her
+off and she lay on the tide flats in Mission Bay another three weeks
+until I could patch her up and float her into the dry dock. Do you
+know what it cost me to make her engines over again? Thirteen thousand
+dollars, young man--and, at that, they're nothing to brag of now.”
+
+“Quite right; but that's because you didn't employ a German engineer and
+tell him you were going to put the _Amelia Ricks_ on Duxbury Reef. Are
+you familiar with the characteristics of German engineers, Cappy?”
+
+Cappy threw up both hands.
+
+“I'm neutral, Gus. Between them and the French it's a case of heads I
+win, tails you lose.”
+
+“No, no, Cappy. You're wrong. The Germans are a careful, thrifty,
+painstaking, systematic race, and the chief of the _Valkyrie_ was the
+flower of the flock. When that little French gunboat captured her this
+chief engineer looked into the future and saw himself and the _Valkyrie_
+interned indefinitely--and he didn't like it. It just broke his heart to
+think of a stranger messing round among his engines; so the instant he
+got into Papeete and blew down his boilers he did a wise thing. He knew
+the war risk insurance would probably cover the _Valkyrie's_ loss as a
+war prize, but there was a chance that her German owners might send one
+of their hyphenated brethren down to Papeete to buy her in the prize
+court; and if that happened the chief wanted them to have a good ship.
+Perhaps, also, he figured on getting his old job back after the war. At
+any rate he got out a barrel of fine heavy grease and slobbered up his
+engines for fair.”
+
+It was too much. Cappy Ricks was too fine a sport not to acknowledge a
+beating; he was too generous not to rejoice in a competitor's gain.
+
+“You lucky, lucky scoundrel!” he murmured in an awed voice. “Not enough
+salt water will get through that grease to hurt those engines. Gus, how
+did you find this all out?”
+
+“Well, you can bet your whiskers, Cappy, I didn't depend on hearsay
+evidence and water-front reporters to dig it up for me. The minute I
+heard her sea cocks had been opened and that her funnels and masts were
+sticking up out of the harbor I concluded I was interested; so I sent
+Bill Jinks, of our office, down to Papeete to get me some first-hand
+information. The chief of the _Valkyrie_ is interned there, of course.”
+
+“May mad dogs bite me! Why in the name of all that's sweet and holy
+didn't I have sense enough to do that?” Cappy mourned.
+
+“You have lose the punch!” chirped Live Wire Luiz, and Cappy glared at
+him.
+
+“She's an honest vessel, Cappy.”
+
+“An' what you s'pose she have in her?” Live Wire Luiz demanded. “Oh,
+notheeng very much, Senor Ricks. Just two t'ousand tons of phosphate.”
+
+“Worth ten or twelve dollars a ton, Cappy.”
+
+“An' t'irteen hundred tons of the good coal to bring her to San
+Francisco, _Ai_, Santa Maria!” Live Wire Luiz blew a kiss airily into
+space and added: “I die weeth dee-light!”
+
+“You haven't got her yet,” Cappy snapped viciously.
+
+“No; but we'll get her all right,” Redell declared confidently.
+
+“How'll you get her?”
+
+“We've only one real competitor to buck--an Australian steamship
+company. They're crazy to get her; and as there are no French bidders on
+this side of the world, naturally and in view of the present condition
+of world politics the French authorities in Papeete are pulling for the
+Britisher. Jinks is now in Papeete and I'm about to start for there at
+one o'clock. Two bids, Cappy; I'll be the dark horse and file my bid at
+the last minute, after I've sized up the lay of the land. But, before I
+do so, I'm going to take the representative of that Australian steamship
+company into my confidence and find out what he's going to bid. For
+instance, now, Cappy, if you were bidding against me, how high would you
+go?”
+
+“She's a long way from nowhere,” Cappy replied thoughtfully. “It means
+sending a wrecking steamer down there with a lot of expert wreckers,
+divers, mechanics and carpenters; it means lumber for cofferdam and
+pontoons; it means donkey engines, cables, pumps, the stress of wind and
+wave--”
+
+“She lies in a protected cove, Cappy; the mean rise and fall of the
+tide, so close to the equator, is about eighteen inches, and the water
+is so clear you can always see what the divers are doing. Forget the
+stress of wind and wave.”
+
+“Forty thousand dollars would be my top figure if I were the Australian
+bidder,” Cappy declared, and added to himself: “But, as Alden P. Ricks,
+seventy-five might not stagger me in view of the present freight rates.”
+
+“Just what I figured,” Redell answered. “She'll cost us two hundred
+thousand dollars before we get her in commission again. I figure the
+Australian people will not go over forty thousand dollars. They won't
+figure Jinks as a heavyweight. I told him to create the impression that
+he was a professional wrecker--a sort of fly-by-night junk dealer, who
+would buy the vessel if he could get her at a great bargain. Then I'll
+drop quietly into Papeete, and at the eleventh hour fifty-ninth minute
+I'll slip in a bid that will top the Australian's. If by any chance
+Jinks' bid should also top the Australian's I'll just forfeit the
+certified check for ten per cent of my bid, run out and leave the ship
+to Jinks, the next highest bidder. The chances are I'll make a few
+thousand dollars at that.”
+
+“How do you purpose raising her--provided you are the successful
+bidder?”
+
+“Well, she has four hatches and she lies on an even keel. I'll build a
+coffer dam on her deck round these four hatches and pump her out. If we
+have enough pumps we can pump her out faster than the water can leak
+in under the coffer dam. When I've lightened her somewhat I'll kick her
+into the shore, little by little, until she lies in shallow water with
+her bulwarks above the surface. Then I'll patch the holes in her, pump
+her out--and up she'll come, of course.”
+
+“You say that so glibly,” Gappy growled, “one would almost think you
+could whistle it.”
+
+“Don't feel sore, Cappy. Do you know what a vessel of her age and class
+is worth nowadays? Well, I'll tell you. About sixty dollars a ton,
+dead weight capacity--and the _Valkyrie_ can carry seven thousand tons;
+that's four hundred and twenty thousand dollars--”
+
+“If you can get her up,” Cappy interrupted.
+
+“If I bid her in I'll get her up. Don't worry.”
+
+'“It'll clean you of your bank roll to do it.”
+
+“Of course. Luiz and I aren't millionaires like you; so we'll just form
+a corporation and call it the S. S. Valkyrie Company and sell stock
+in our venture. I have you down right now for a ten-thousand-dollar
+subscription at the very least, though you can have more if you want
+it.”
+
+“Gus,” Cappy pleaded, “if you bid that boat in for forty thousand
+dollars I'll give you ten thousand dollars for your bargain and
+reimburse you for all the expense you've been put to.”
+
+“Nothing doing, Cappy.”
+
+“I'll make it--let me see--I'll make it twenty thousand.”
+
+“You waste your breath. She'll pay for herself the first year she's in
+commission.”
+
+“I'll furnish the sinews of war, Gus, for a half interest in her. Let me
+add her to the Blue Star Fleet and you'll never regret it.”
+
+“Sorry, Cappy; but Luiz and I are ambitious. We want to get into the
+steamship business ourselves.”
+
+“Well, then, I've offered to do the fair thing by you two lunatics,”
+ Cappy declared with a great air of finality. “So now I'll deliver my
+ultimatum: I'm going to keep the _Valkyrie_ and not give you two as much
+as one little piece of her. Yes, sir! I'm going to send a representative
+to Papeete and match you and that Australian chap for your shoe-strings.
+Gus, you know me! If I ever go after a thing and don't get it, the man
+that takes it away from me will know he's been in a fight.”
+
+“Indeed, I know it, Cappy--which is why I kept this information
+carefully to myself. However, I guess you'll not get in on this good
+thing.”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“You're too late for the banquet.”
+
+“Not one leetle hope ees left for you, Cappy Reeks,” Senor Almeida
+asserted. “The _Moana_, on which my good partner have engaged passage
+to-day, ees the last steamer which shall arrive to Papeete before the
+bids shall be open. The next steamer, Capitan Reeks ees arrive too
+late.”
+
+“Yes; and the _Moana_ sails in just twenty-five minutes, Cappy. If
+you're thinking of sending a man down to bid against me you'll have to
+step lively.”
+
+Cappy Ricks was now beside himself; this gentle, good-natured heckling
+had made of him a venerable Fury.
+
+“I'll cable my bid!” he shrilled.
+
+“No you won't Cappy, for the reason that there is no cable to Tahiti.”
+
+“Then I'll wireless it!”
+
+“Well, you can try that, Cappy. Unfortunately, however, the only
+wireless station in Tahiti is a little, old, one-cat-power set. It can
+receive your message, but it can't send one that will reach the nearest
+wireless station--and that's at Honolulu. And until the bank in Tahiti
+can confirm drafts by wireless I imagine it will not pay them on
+presentation.”
+
+Cappy surrendered. He couldn't stand any more.
+
+“Good-bye, Gus,” he said. “Good luck to you! If you get that vessel
+you'll deserve her, and when you're forming the S.S. Valkyrie Company
+I'll head the list of stock subscribers with a healthy little chunk. You
+know me, Gus! I'm the old bell mare in shipping circles; a lot of others
+will follow where I lead.”
+
+“I forgive you the spruce deal, Cappy. You're an awful pirate; but, for
+all that, you're a grand piece of work. God bless you!” And Redell put
+his arm round the old man affectionately. “Good-bye.”
+
+And, followed by Live Wire Luiz, who was going to the dock to see his
+partner aboard the _Moana_, Redell disappeared into California Street.
+
+“Dammit!” Cappy soliloquized bitterly. “I can't eat lunch now. One bite
+would choke me.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVI
+
+
+And he turned toward the entrance to the Merchants' Exchange, being
+minded to enter a telephone booth and notify the Bilgewater Club he
+would not be present that day. As he walked through the gate into the
+Exchange, however, he was accosted by a heavy, florid-faced man carrying
+a thick woolen watch coat over his arm. This individual was Captain
+Aaron Porter, one of the San Francisco bar pilots, and he greeted Cappy
+with a respectful query after the old gentleman's health.
+
+“I don't feel very well,” Cappy replied wearily. “I'm getting old,
+captain--getting old.”
+
+Then he noted the watch coat the pilot was carrying and decided
+subconsciously that there could be no connection between it and the
+sultry August weather prevailing at that moment; consequently it
+informed the observant Cappy, as plainly as if it had a tongue and had
+spoken, that Captain Aaron Porter expected shortly to be exposed to
+the chill northwest winds outside as he piloted a vessel to sea. In the
+manufacture of sheer inane conversation, therefore, Cappy tugged the
+coat and said:
+
+“Going to take a ship out this afternoon, captain?”
+
+“Yes, sir. I'll be responsible for the _Moana_ until we cross the Potato
+Patch--”
+
+“The _Moana!_” Cappy cried, and pulled out his watch. “You'd better be
+stepping lively, then. She sails at one, and you have twenty minutes to
+get to Greenwich Street Pier.”
+
+“Oh, there's no hurry, Mr. Ricks. She'll be delayed from half to
+three-quarters of an hour waiting for the Australian mail. The mail
+train from the East is late, and of course the _Moana_ cannot sail
+till--”
+
+“You will pardon me, captain,” Cappy Ricks interrupted politely, “but
+I've just thought of a very important matter. I must run and telephone.”
+
+As J. Augustus Redell had just pointed out, twenty minutes was scarcely
+ample time in which to decide on the right emissary to send to Papeete,
+get into communication with the said individual and induce him to go. In
+addition, such a person would have to have time to pack some clothing;
+also, to procure a letter of credit at the bank and purchase a ticket,
+not to mention the time requisite to receive his instructions and get to
+the steamer's dock. But with almost an hour--well, a wide-awake man
+can accomplish much in an hour, and Cappy Ricks was a natural leader of
+forlorn hopes. In the brief interval required to accomplish the journey
+from the door of the Merchants' Exchange to a telephone booth a flock of
+bright ideas capered through Cappy's ingenious head like goats on a tin
+roof.
+
+“Main 2000!” he barked, and in five seconds he had the connection. “Put
+Skinner on the line!”
+
+Cappy's own private exchange operator had the temerity to inform him
+that Mr. Skinner was out at luncheon.
+
+“The in-fer-nal scoundrel--just when I need him! Put Captain Matt
+Peasley on the line, and be quick about it. Matt! Matt, listen! This is
+the old man speaking. Get an earful of what I'm going to tell you now,
+and don't ask any questions--just obey! Do you remember that big German
+freighter--the Valkyrie--sunk in Papeete Harbor?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“She's a prize, Matt. I've just been given a low-down on her condition.
+Gus Redell is leaving on the _Moana_ to bid her in at the government
+sale--the young scoundrel told me all about it and twitted me because
+we were asleep on the job and let the good thing get away from us.
+The _Moana's_ supposed to sail at one o'clock, but the Eastern mail is
+late--she won't get away from the dock until about one-thirty; but when
+she does--”
+
+“When she does we'll have a man aboard her to beat Redell to the German
+steamer,” Matt Peasley interrupted. “I've got the message. Where are
+you, father-in-law?”
+
+“At the Merchants' Exchange.”
+
+“You attend to the funds and I'll do the rest.”
+
+“Confound you!” rasped Cappy Ricks. “You're so headstrong, you'll jam
+things up yet if you don't listen to me.”
+
+“But you'll have to send somebody Redell doesn't know.”
+
+“That doesn't matter at all. Now, son, will you listen to me? I'll
+attend to the money and I'll also frame this entire deal. Is Miss Keenan
+in the office--you know--Skinner's stenographer?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“She's been wanting to go on a vacation. When I heard about it I asked
+her how she'd like a cruise to Alaska--remember we have the _Tillicum_
+leaving at six to-night for St. Michael's. She said that would be fine;
+so I gave her a pass and the owner's suite on the _Tillicum_.”
+
+“So I hear. Her trunk was sent to the _Tillicum's_ dock this morning and
+she has her suit case in the office. She planned to work today and go
+aboard the _Tillicum_ after office hours.”
+
+“Good! Then she's all ready lor a voyage to Tahiti. Have the private
+exchange operator phone our wharf office instantly and tell them to load
+Miss Keenan's trunk on the first wagon handy and rush it over to the
+_Moana_. Give Miss Keenan fifteen hundred dollars and tell her she's
+to go to Papeete. If she kicks about clothes tell her to get along with
+what she has and buy what she needs on arrival.”
+
+He waited while Matt Peasley gave the necessary instructions to the
+exchange operator. Then:
+
+“It's all right, sir. Miss Keenan will go. She'll be on her way in five
+minutes. I've told her to go aboard and buy her ticket from the purser
+or from the ticket agent at the gang plank.”
+
+“Fine business! Now who else have we in our employ that I can send? I
+want a man--and a rattling smart one.”
+
+“Mike Murphy, the skipper of the _Narcissus_,” Matt suggested.
+
+“The very man! He's discharging at Union Street Wharf. Phone the
+wharfinger's office and tell him he'll not regret taking a message down
+to the dock to Captain Murphy. Murphy will probably be at lunch aboard.
+Tell the wharfinger to tell him to throw a few clothes into a suit
+case--that he's to go to Papeete on mighty important business--and to
+meet me at the head of Greenwich Street Dock at one-twenty, without
+fail, for his orders and his money. Having phoned these orders, Matt,
+take the office automobile and scorch to the water front to see that
+they're carried out. Take Miss Keenan with you. Good-bye.”
+
+And Cappy Ricks dashed out of the Merchants' Exchange as though the
+devil was at his heels walloping him at every jump. It was four blocks
+to the Marine National Bank, but the California Street cable car took
+him there in four minutes. Gasping and perspiring Cappy trotted into the
+cashier's office, where for ten precious seconds he stood, open-mouthed,
+unable to say a word.
+
+“Well, Mr. Ricks,” the cashier greeted him, “if you can't talk make
+signs.”
+
+Cappy flapped his hands and made three rapid strokes with his index
+finger, like a motion-picture actor writing a twelve-line letter; then
+the words came in a veritable cascade.
+
+“Letters of credit,” he croaked-“two.” The cashier picked up a pencil
+and a scratch pad. “One, twenty-five thousand, favor Michael J. Murphy;
+one, favor--oh, what in blue blazes is that girl's first name? Oh, dear!
+Oh, dear! I never heard her first name--she's just Miss Keenan. Oh,
+the devil! Call her Matilda--that's it--Matilda Keenan--fifty thousand
+dollars for her; and--”
+
+“You appear to be in a terrific hurry for them, Mr. Ricks, so I'll
+get them started immediately,” the cashier interrupted, and turned his
+memorandum over to an underling, with instructions to give Mr. Ricks'
+letters of credit precedence over all other business.
+
+“Now write--check--your favor--seventy thousand. I'll sign it--hope
+Skinner has enough cash on deposit; if he hasn't--my personal note, you
+know.”
+
+“A mere trifle, Mr. Ricks. We will not worry over that.” The cashier
+filled in the check and Cappy signed it with a trembling hand. “And
+now,” the cashier continued, “we will have to have Miss Keenan and Mr.
+Murphy come to the bank to register their respective signatures--”
+
+“Nothing doing!” Cappy piped. “Give me the cards and I'll have 'em write
+their signatures on them aboard the steamer and send them ashore by
+the pilot. None o' your efficiency monkey business, my son! I guarantee
+everything.”
+
+He dashed to the telephone and yelled into the receiver: “Taxicab!
+Taxicab!”
+
+“One of the cars belonging to the bank is at the curb, Mr. Ricks.
+The chauffeur will take you wherever you desire to go,” the cashier
+suggested.
+
+“Bully for you!” Again Cappy commenced to flap his hands.
+“Stenographer--where's the stenographer? Oh, Judas Priest, nobody helps
+me! Bless your sweet heart, my dear, here you are, aren't you? Yes,
+and I'll not forget you for it either. No, no, no! No notes. Just stick
+piece of paper in the typewriter--now then! Ready! Dictation direct to
+machine. Er--ah! Harumph-h-h! Oh, suffering sailor! What's the name
+of the French bank in Papeete? I don't know. I'm a director and vice
+president of this infernal bank--and I don't know I'm alive! Man, man,
+I want it--a thing--a what-you-may-call-'em--a--Oh, the devil! Why do I
+deposit in this dratted bank? Eureka! I have it! I want a notice.”
+
+“You mean an advice, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“Bully boy! An advice. That's it. Holy mackerel, how I love a man that's
+fast on his feet! A notice to the bank in Papeete, Island of Tahiti,
+that you've given Captain Michael J. Murphy a letter of credit for
+twenty-five thousand dollars--only one notice for one letter of
+credit. I'm up to skullduggery. Man, man, why don't you dictate? Usual
+courtesies--good customer of your bank--you know; usual flubdub. No
+advice regarding Miss Keenan's letter of credit--just Murphy's.”
+
+The cashier good-naturedly shouldered Cappy Ricks aside and dictated to
+the bank's correspondent in Papeete a brief note to the effect that
+the Marine National had that day issued to Captain Michael J. Murphy
+a letter of credit in the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars; that it
+understood Captain Murphy was proceeding to Papeete on some matter of
+business and took this occasion to commend him to their kindly offices.
+
+“Stick that in an envelope--address envelope, seal it, and write
+outside: 'Kindness purser S.S. _Moana._' The mail to Papeete is closed,
+but I'll see that the _Moana's_ purser delivers it to the bank,” Cappy
+ordered.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVII
+
+
+Ten minutes later Cappy dashed up to the entrance of Greenwich Street
+Pier and found Matt Peasley waiting for him, with Captain Murphy. Miss
+Keenan had already gone aboard the _Moana_, the huge funnel of which,
+as Cappy noted with a thrill, was still sticking up over the roof of
+the dock. He crooked his finger and Michael J. Murphy leaped up on the
+running board of his car.
+
+“Mike,” said Cappy solemnly, “listen to me! Here's a letter of credit in
+your name for twenty-five thousand dollars, and an advice to the bank
+in Papeete from our bank here stating that the letter of credit has been
+issued. Give this letter to the purser, together with a good-sized bill,
+and ask him to deliver it to the Papeete bank when the _Moana_ arrives
+there. Here, also, is a letter of credit for Miss Keenan in the sum of
+fifty thousand--and the bank in Papeete has no notice of it! Remember
+that! It's important. Keep it to yourself. Miss Keenan has the expense
+money for both of you; tell her to split the roll with you. Tell her,
+also, that her name from now until she gets back is Matilda Keenan, and
+to sign her drafts that way.
+
+“Here are the signature cards. You sign yours and have her sign hers;
+then you give both to Captain Porter, the pilot, when he leaves the
+ship, and ask him to deliver them to me. I, in turn, will deliver them
+to the bank. Tell Miss Keenan she is absolutely under your orders; that
+she's to forget she ever heard of the lumber and shipping business. Both
+of you are to keep away from a man by the name of J. Augustus Redell.
+He's aboard and he's our enemy, captain. He's going to bid forty
+thousand dollars on the German steamer _Valkyrie_; so you bid forty
+thousand and five dollars--and take her away from him. At the very last
+minute have Miss Keenan put in a bid for thirty thousand--in case--you
+know, Mike--we might catch it going and coming. It might pay to have you
+fall down on your bid--you know, Mike! She's the dark horse--the reserve
+capital. Papeete--one-horse town, Mike. Everybody knows the other
+fellow's business--principal competitor for the steamer is an Australian
+steamship company. Considering condition world politics today, and no
+French bidders, naturally Frenchmen will pull for the Britisher.
+Expect bank will leak and tell 'em you only arrived with twenty-five
+thousand--you know, Mike! Can't be too careful. Trust nobody--and
+remember this man Redell is the smartest young man in the world and
+the trickiest scoundrel under heaven. Don't hold him cheap. He's a holy
+terror! He'd pinch the gold out of your wisdom teeth while you'd be
+laughing at him.”
+
+“How high am I to go--if it becomes necessary to bid more than--”
+
+“Shoot the piece!” Cappy ordered. It is to be regretted that the
+Bilgewater Club, cut off from the house rules in a private dining room,
+had a habit of shooting craps occasionally after luncheon, and Cappy
+Ricks had picked up the patois of the game. “Seventy-five thousand is
+the limit; but satisfy yourself she's worth the limit before you go to
+it.”
+
+“And Redell is going to bid forty thousand, sir?”
+
+“That's his limit. He told me so in confidence when he felt certain I
+couldn't possibly be a competitor--told it to me, and kidded me for a
+dead one at twenty minutes of one, when he knew I couldn't possibly have
+time to act. But he forgot the mail--it was delayed--”
+
+“I get you, sir. There's more to this job than merely acquiring the
+ship,” retorted the astute Murphy.
+
+“There's a million dollars' worth of satisfaction in it for me if I can
+beat Gus Redell to that steamer. He says I've lost my punch.”
+
+But Captain Murphy was off down the dock, suit case in hand, while Cappy
+dismissed his borrowed car and climbed into the office car with Matt
+Peasley. Five minutes they waited at the head of the dock--and then
+four huge motor trucks, laden with mail, lumbered through the dock gate.
+Cappy beamed into Captain Matt Peasley's face.
+
+“I guess this is a rotten day's work for the president emeritus, eh?”
+ he chuckled. “President emeritus! By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, if I
+waited for you and Skinner to get wise to all the good things that are
+lying round loose, the Blue Star Navigation Company would be in the
+hands of a receiver within the year. Matt, if you expect to manage
+the Blue Star you'll have to wake up. You're slow, boy--s-l-o-w-w! For
+heaven's sake, don't force me back into the harness! You know I've been
+wanting to retire for years.”
+
+“Well, our messengers are aboard, so let's get out of here. I'm hungry;
+I haven't had any lunch,” Matt replied.
+
+“Come to think of it,” Cappy answered cheerfully, “I believe I could
+eat a little something myself. However, I still have one small duty to
+perform, Matthew. I've got to send a wireless.”
+
+“To whom?”
+
+“That scoundrel Redell, of course. Think I'm going to swat him and leave
+him in ignorance of the fact?”
+
+Immediately upon arrival at the Commercial Club, Cappy sent the
+following message:
+
+“J. Augustus Redell,
+
+“Aboard S. S. _Moana_.
+
+“Augustus, my dear young friend, I have known men who grew rich by
+keeping their mouths closed!
+
+“CAPPY.”
+
+“There!” said Cappy, as he dispatched this simple declarative sentence.
+“I'll wager one small five-cent bag of smoking tobacco our friend Gus
+Redell will not sleep to-night. He'll just lie awake wondering what in
+Sam Hill I meant by that.”
+
+When he got back to his office he found an aerogram, which read as
+follows:
+
+“Alden P. Ricks
+
+“258 California Street
+
+“San Francisco
+
+“Everything lovely. After getting aboard decided to bluff; went to
+Redell, told him I was your representative. He went green clear back of
+the ears; said he had observed delay in sailing. Told him he'd better
+quit and go ashore with pilot; that I had bank roll choke hippopotamus.
+Your wireless handed him that moment! Would hesitate repeat his
+language. Have agreed pay him for his first-class ticket. All
+first-class cabins sold out; had to have it for Matilda. Steerage an
+awful place for a skipper, but will have to make the best of it.
+
+“MUHPHY.”
+
+Mr. Skinner, alarmed at the shrill screams emanating from Cappy Ricks'
+office, rushed in and found the president emeritus rolling round in his
+swivel chair, beating the air and stamping on the floor.
+
+“Good gracious, Mr. Ricks!” Skinner cried. “What's the matter? Are you
+hurt?”
+
+“Hurt!” Cappy shrilled. “Hurt? Well, I should say so! Skinner, my boy,
+if you ever lose your punch you'll know just how much I'm suffering. As
+Live Wire Luiz would say: 'I die weeth dee-light!'”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXVIII
+
+
+Three months later Cappy Ricks sat alone in his office, his feet on
+his desk, his old head bowed on his breast. Apparently he was having
+a gentle snooze. Suddenly he sat up with the suddenness of a
+jack-in-the-box and stepped to the door leading to Mr. Skinner's office.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he said, “do you remember that stinking Humboldt
+spruce I sawed off on Live Wire Luiz one day when you were out to
+lunch?”
+
+Mr. Skinner nodded.
+
+“They claimed a rebate of six dollars a thousand on it,” he declared;
+“and we declined to allow the claim. Well, I've decided to allow it,
+Skinner. Tell Hankins to draw a check for the rebate in full and bring
+it in to me. Send in a stenographer.”
+
+Cappy clawed his whiskers as the stenographer took her seat at his desk.
+
+“Ahem! Hum! Harumph-h-h!” he began. “Take letter.”
+
+“Mr. J. Augustus Redell
+
+“President West Coast Trading Co.
+
+“Merchants' Exchange Building, City.
+
+“My dear Gus: Having waited for several weeks in the hope of meeting
+you at the Bilgewater Club, to which, due to some mysterious reason,
+you appear to have been excessively disloyal of late, I despair of the
+delight of a personal interview and am accordingly writing you.
+
+“You will recall that jag of odoriferous spruce your excitable partner
+was chump enough to buy from the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company. On
+the receipt this morning of a communication from my exceedingly capable
+representative in Papeete I came to the conclusion that I could afford
+to allow the rebate claimed by the excessively sour-balled Senor
+Almeida, and accordingly I am inclosing herewith, to the order of your
+company, the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company's check for $536.12.
+
+“I also beg to tender you my assurance that if I have seemed in the
+past to cherish an unchristian resentment of that little deal in grape
+stakes, the memory of the outrage no longer rankles in my bosom. For
+you, my dear young friend, I entertain the kindliest, the most paternal
+of feelings. I have not only forgiven, but I have also forgotten; for my
+honor is clear again and I figure I can pretty blamed well afford myself
+the luxury.
+
+“Regarding that steamer _Valkyrie_, please be advised that the next
+steamer to Australia, via Papeete and Raratonga, will carry a Blue Star
+flag and my instructions to our representative to have it tacked to the
+main truck of the _Valkyrie_ as she dies submerged in the harbor.
+Since I assume you will be interested in learning the details of our
+acquisition of the steamer in question, and since, further, I cannot
+see that I have anything to lose by withholding this interesting
+information, please be advised that we bought her in for twenty-two
+thousand five hundred dollars.
+
+“I fear you will be inclined to doubt this and accuse me of romancing
+for the purpose of dropping more salt in a wound still fresh and
+bleeding; but I assure you such a suspicion would be a grave injustice
+to an old man whose portion from you should be pity, not opprobrium.
+
+“To begin, it was very easy--after we had you out of the way. Like a
+sensible man, you knew you were licked and threw up the sponge to save
+yourself unnecessary punishment. It has been my experience that only a
+very wise man has sense enough to do that; consequently, despite your
+youth and impetuosity, I seem to see the glimmer of a very brilliant
+commercial future for the West Coast Trading Company.
+
+“However, to the story: When Mike Murphy got down to Papeete he found
+a couple of broken-down junk dealers hanging round--the kind of fellows
+who would have been glad to bid in the vessel at a couple of thousand
+dollars for the privilege of breaking her up for junk and gutting her
+of her cargo. A little reflection convinced Captain Murphy that he could
+eliminate these small fry and centre his attention on the Australian
+steamship company; and he was aided in arriving at this conclusion by
+your Mr. Jinks, whom he found glooming at the dock on the arrival of
+the _Moana_ minus your handsome self. By the way, Mr. Jinks' action in
+aiding and abetting Murphy, after discovering that his own company was
+out of the running, was so sportsmanlike that, if you will kindly advise
+me of the expense to which you were put in sending him to Papeete, we
+will gladly send you our check to cover.
+
+“It took the capable Murphy about an hour and a half to get the lay of
+the land--and then he started to play his little game. In the rather
+restricted society of Papeete Murphy played the fool. Every little while
+he would apparently acquire a small jag and get very confidential. He
+told everybody his business--in confidence--and everybody in Papeete
+knew just how much he was going to bid on the wreck. Finally, the day
+before the bids were to be opened--Murphy was waiting till the last
+minute before filing his--the captain of the port got a wireless from
+some adventurer down in Noumea, asking him to withhold the opening of
+the bids till he could get up to Papeete and make a bid. Murphy had
+already fooled away three weeks in Papeete and if the captain of the
+port hearkened to the request from the man from Noumea it would mean a
+wait of another three weeks. Consequently he awaited the next move with
+interest.
+
+“Well, Augustus, the captain of the port had the temerity to delay the
+opening of the bids, and Murphy noticed that his competitor hired
+an attorney and made a bitter and formal protest against the delay.
+However, it looked to Murphy like they had made just a little bit too
+much noise--so he hired an attorney and made a lot of noise himself.
+The captain of the port overruled both protests, however; and about that
+time Murphy decided to put over a dirty Irish trick. He announced
+he could see very clearly there was a move on to double-cross the
+legitimate bidders and that he wasn't going to hang round any longer.
+The _Timaru_ was due the next day, so he and Jinks engaged passage to
+San Francisco on her; and, just before he left, Murphy went up to the
+bank and drew eighteen thousand dollars on his letter of credit.
+
+“He got a certificate of deposit in his own name, and that same
+afternoon his attorney filed a sealed bid with the captain of the port.
+
+“Now I had suspected there might be a leak from that French bank in
+favor of the Australian; so I had taken care to have it advised by the
+Marine National here that the latter bank had issued a letter of credit
+for twenty-five thousand dollars to Captain Murphy. Therefore, the
+Papeete bank very naturally concluded that twenty-five thousand dollars
+was all the money Murphy had with him! And when he drew eighteen
+thousand dollars on it they thought they knew the exact amount of his
+bid; they thought, also, he had made a bid, in view of the fact that his
+attorney filed one the same afternoon. At any rate, the news reached the
+Australian and he withdrew his bid and substituted another. Since he
+was the possessor of straight inside information as to the amount of his
+single competitor's bid, he saw no reason why he should waste money;
+so he bid four thousand pounds, or approximately nineteen thousand five
+hundred dollars. They say he felt pretty sore when the bids were opened
+and the _Valkyrie_ went to Miss Matilda Keenan for twenty-two thousand
+five hundred dollars.
+
+“Miss Keenan, by the way, is Skinner's stenographer. Murphy was only the
+decoy. She carried the real bank roll and nobody suspected her; in fact,
+Murphy was so certain of his prey he didn't even bid! He tells me the
+_Valkyrie_ is really a gift, and that, at the widest possible estimate
+of salvage cost, the Blue Star Navigation Company has purchased, for
+two hundred thousand dollars, a four-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar
+ship--thanks to you!
+
+“With kindest regards, and again assuring you of the pleasure I have
+always taken in our friendship--a friendship which, I trust, nothing
+will ever disrupt--I am
+
+“Cordially and sincerely--”
+
+Cappy paused and gazed at the stenographer appraisingly.
+
+“Read that over again, my dear young lady,” he commanded.
+
+The girl complied and Cappy nodded his satisfaction.
+
+“You and Mr. Skinner get along all right?” he queried.
+
+“Oh, yes, sir.”
+
+“I'm very glad to hear that. You've been substituting for Miss Keenan,
+haven't you?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Well, you can have the job for keeps if you want it. You suit me. Take
+letter: 'Miss M. Keenan--' I called her Matilda, but her name's Mary; so
+let it go at that.
+
+“My dear Miss Keenan: Captain Murphy arrived on the _Timaru_, with the
+information that he had taken a chance and left our affairs in the laps
+of the gods and the capable hands of his understudy. It has been pretty
+tough sledding waiting for the next Australian steamer, but, thank God!
+she made port yesterday and your report of the success of your mission
+is before me. I thank you. Yen're a good girl, and I am very happy to
+learn of your engagement to Captain Murphy. He is a splendid fellow and
+I am sending him back to Papeete in command of our _Amelia Ricks_, which
+has been fitted up as a wrecker, to raise the _Valkyrie_. You had better
+wait in Papeete and marry him there, as I am opposed to long engagements
+among my employees; and Michael will do better and faster work if he
+settles all his personal worries before tackling those of the Blue Star
+Navigation Company.
+
+“On his return with the _Valkyrie_ I shall make him port captain of the
+Blue Star Fleet, which job will keep him home nights. And since, by
+his ingenuity, he succeeded in purchasing for twenty-two thousand five
+hundred dollars a piece of property for which I was prepared to pay as
+high as seventy-five thousand dollars, for your wedding present I
+shall allot you and Captain Murphy a ten-thousand-dollar piece of the
+_Valkyrie_. It should earn you thirty per cent and make you independent
+in your old age.
+
+“Very sincerely--”
+
+Cappy Ricks ceased dictating and clawed his whiskers reflectively.
+
+“Yes,” he murmured irrelevantly; “I guess that's considerable of a
+knock-out from an old fogy who's lost his punch!”
+
+Then, to the stenographer:
+
+“That will be all, my dear. As you pass through the general office
+tell those fellows out there that I've gone into executive session with
+myself and am not to be disturbed unless it's something very important.
+I've got to decide which one of our skippers to promote into the
+_Valkyrie_ when we get her up and I must think up a new name for her.
+I think I'll call her the J. H. Skinner. Skinner's a little slow on his
+feet, but he means well and he's old enough to have a ship named after
+him.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIX
+
+
+The practical theft from the West Coast Trading Company of the German
+steamer _Valkyrie_, had, to Cappy's mind, atoned for the loss and
+humiliation he had suffered in that grape stake deal. His honor
+was clean again and for weeks he taunted Redell with the latter's
+inefficiency, insufficiency and general business debility, until, having
+extracted the last shred of triumph from the affair, a vague sympathy
+for Redell commenced to surge up in Cappy's kindly heart and he
+commenced casting about for an opportunity to do the former a favor.
+
+Redell had enjoyed his beating, for he was, indeed, a rare sport.
+However, he would have to retaliate. The feud must go on. Unless he
+could mix a modicum of fun with his profits, J. Augustus would not have
+regarded the fight worth while, so accordingly he kept his eyes and his
+ears open for a handy weapon with which to jab Cappy through that same
+old rift in his armor--his passion for a large profit through an adroit
+and ingenious deal in a commodity where even a very modest profit was
+not discernible to ordinary mortals.
+
+Finally Redell found the opportunity he sought. He was so proud of his
+formula that he could not forbear remarking casually to Live Wire Luiz
+one bright day that, granted good health and the approval of Providence
+for one week, he would knock Cappy Ricks for a goal. And he narrated his
+scheme.
+
+“Friend of my heart!” the little Peruvian cried excitedly, and held out
+his arms to Redell, inviting a fraternal embrace. “I love you! Damn eet!
+I say eet! You are one wezard weeth the money-making schemes!”
+
+Mr. Redell cautiously compromised on a hearty handshake; to avoid a kiss
+he was careful to keep the table between himself and Live Wire Luiz.
+
+“Shall we empty the corporate sock and climb aboard for every cent we
+can beg, borrow or steal?” he demanded.
+
+“Sure, I bet you!” Live Wire Luiz cried; for, though a featherweight
+physically, he was possessed of the courage of an Alexander.
+
+J. Augustus Redell put on his hat, took from a pigeonhole in his desk
+the last trial balance of the West Coast Trading Company's books
+and departed for a conference with his banker. Half an hour later he
+returned, and the expectant Luiz promptly noted a cloud on Mr. Redell's
+sunny countenance.
+
+“I can't arrange for a loan,” he reported disgustedly. “The limit, in
+view of our present obligations, has been reached.”
+
+“On the margin of ten cents,” suggested Live Wire Luiz, “take a chance,
+_amigo_. Thees is not speculation. It ees what you call the ceench weeth
+the copper reevets.”
+
+“I figure it that way; nevertheless, copper-riveted cinches sometimes
+aren't properly cinched and Fortune backs out of the packsaddle. I dare
+not take a long chance on this, Luiz. If something went wrong we'd be
+sadly embarrassed. We dare not take a chance up to the limit of what
+money we have on hand, because we need those funds for other things.”
+
+Live Wire Luiz swore mournfully in Spanish. Redell nodded and retired
+to his own office, where for an hour he sat with his head in his hands,
+searching his agile brain for a bright idea that would lead him out
+of his dilemma. Suddenly he leaped to his feet, tossed his hat to the
+ceiling and caught it again as it came down.
+
+“Cappy Ricks is my meat,” he declared aloud. “Besides, I owe Cappy one
+for making a monkey out of me on that last deal. He hoisted me on my own
+petard. Now I'll hoist him, and incidentally annex a profit for the West
+Coast Trading Company.”
+
+He rushed out into California Street and for the major portion of the
+day was very busy among various shipping offices. When he returned, late
+in the afternoon, to the offices of the West Coast Trading Company,
+his alert young face wore a pleased and confident smile. Live Wire Luiz
+noted this and took heart of hope.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XL
+
+
+Cappy Ricks was, for the thousandth time since his voluntary retirement
+from active business some ten years previous, overwhelmed with his
+ancient responsibilities. Mr. Skinner had, under the insistent prodding
+of his wife, consented grudgingly to a vacation and had gone up into the
+Sierras to loaf and fish.
+
+Scarcely had Skinner departed when one of the Blue Star steamers ran
+ashore on the Southern California coast, and Captain Matt Peasley left
+immediately for the scene of the disaster to superintend the work
+of floating the stranded vessel. This left Cappy riding herd on
+the destinies of the Blue Star ships, with Mr. Hankins, Skinner's
+understudy, looking after the lumber.
+
+Prior to boarding the train, Matt Peasley had ventured the suggestion
+that Mr. Skinner be ordered by wire to return to town at once; but this
+veiled hint that the Blue Star ships could not be managed by the man
+who had built up the Blue Star Navigation Company had been received very
+coldly by the president emeritus of the Ricks interests.
+
+“Young feller,” Cappy informed his son-in-law testily, “I'll have you
+know I was managing the Blue Star Navigation Company quite some years
+before you quit wearing pinafores; so I guess, while you and Skinner are
+away from the office, we can manage to stagger along after a fashion.”
+
+“But I don't like to have you worried with business after you've
+retired--”
+
+“Retired!” Cappy hooted. “Swell chance I've got to retire! I'll die in
+the harness whether I want to or not. Tut, tut, my boy! Don't be afraid
+to put me in as a pinch hitter for this organization. The worst I can do
+is to single--and I might clout a home run.”
+
+“But Skinner has been away two weeks--”
+
+“Enough! It would be a bad thing to obsess Skinner with the notion that
+we can't get along without him. Then he never would take a rest; and
+I don't want any martyrs or neurasthenics round my office. You got
+anything on the fire that's liable to burn or boil over, before you get
+back?”
+
+“Nothing to worry about, Cappy,” Matt answered. “Our five-masted
+schooner _Mindoro_ is the only vessel requiring immediate attention. She
+arrived at Sydney yesterday with lumber from Gray's Harbor, and as yet I
+haven't been able to get a satisfactory return cargo for her.”
+
+“What have you been holding out for?”
+
+“I want to get a cargo for delivery in San Francisco if possible. The
+vessel will be ready to go on dry dock by the time she gets back here;
+and besides, I'm planning to put a semi-Diesel-type engine in her.”
+
+'“Not by a jugful! She wasn't built with a shaft log, and I won't have
+you weakening my _Mindoro_ by cutting away her deadwood--”
+
+“Tish! Tush! You're a back number, Cappy. They don't cut through the
+deadwood any more. They run the shaft out over her quarter and hang it
+on struts.”
+
+“She'll carry a helm--”
+
+“She'll not; but if she does, let her. It'll give the helmsman something
+to do.”
+
+Cappy subsided, fearful that if he persisted he might be given new
+evidence of the fact that times had changed a trifle, here and there,
+since he had--ostensibly--gone on the retired list.
+
+“Well, I'll take care of the _Mindoro_,” he assured his son-in-law.
+“Early in life I adopted the woodpecker as my patron saint. Ever since,
+whenever I want anything I keep pecking away, and pretty soon I bust
+through somewhere.”
+
+The following morning, bursting with a sense of responsibility, Cappy
+came bustling down to the office and got on the job at eight-thirty.
+After looking through the mail he called up all the freight brokers in
+town and urged them to make a special effort to line up a San Francisco
+cargo for the _Mindoro_; then he summoned Mr. Skinner's stenographer and
+was busy dictating when Mr. J. Augustus Redell was announced by a youth
+from the general office. Cappy went to the door to welcome his beloved
+young friend and business enemy.
+
+“Come in, Gus, my dear boy,” he chirped, “and rest your face and hands.”
+ He turned to the stenographer. “That will be all, my dear, for
+the present. I can't dictate business secrets in the presence of
+this--ahem--harumph-h-h!--er--”
+
+His desk telephone rang. Cappy took down the receiver and grunted.
+
+“J. O. Heyfuss & Co. are calling you, Mr. Ricks,” his private exchange
+operator announced.
+
+Cappy smiled and nodded. J. O. Heyfuss & Co. were ship, freight and
+marine insurance brokers.
+
+“Something doing for my _Mindoro_,” he soliloquized aloud.
+
+“Mr. Ricks?” a voice came over the wire.
+
+“Hello there!” Cappy replied at the top of his voice. For some reason
+he always shouted when telephoning. “Ricks on the job! Whatja got for
+my _Mindoro_, Heyfuss?... Zinc ore? Never carried any before. Don't know
+what it looks like.... Yes; that freight rate is acceptable. We should
+have more, but God forbid that we should be considered human hogs...
+Yes.... Sure it's for discharge in San Francisco? ... All right. Close
+for it.... Good-bye!... Hey there, Heyfuss! Don't close in a hurry. See
+if you can't get the charterers to pay the towage over to her loading
+port. If they won't pay all, strike 'em for half.”
+
+He hung up without saying good-bye.
+
+“Well, that's out of the way,” he declared with satisfaction. “Just
+closed for a cargo of zinc ore from Australia to San Francisco ex our
+schooner _Mindoro_. Matt Peasley's been hunting wild-eyed for a cargo
+for her--scouring the market, Gus--and nothing doing! And here the
+old master comes along and digs up a cargo while you'd be saying Jack
+Robinson. By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, if you can show me how the
+rising generation is going to get by--”
+
+He paused suddenly, leaned forward, and pointed an accusing finger at
+his visitor.
+
+“Gus,” he charged, “you're up to something. I can see it in your eyes.
+You look guilty.”
+
+Mr. Redell hitched his chair close to Cappy and with his index finger
+tapped the old gentleman three times on the right knee-three impressive
+taps.
+
+“Alden P. Ricks,” he began with equal impressiveness, “I have a
+scheme--”
+
+Cappy chuckled and slapped his thin old thigh.
+
+“I knew it! By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet! Gus, if you ever come into my
+office and fail to unload a scheme on me I'll think you aren't enjoying
+your usual robust health. What are you going to start now? A skunk farm
+for cornering the market on Russian sable?”
+
+“Cut out the hilarity. This is serious business, Cappy. I can show
+you where you and I can waltz into the Chicago Pit, make a killing on
+December wheat, and escape with a sizable wad before our identity is
+discovered.”
+
+Cappy, caught off his guard, blinked at the enormity of the prospect;
+but, remembering his dignity as a business man, he shook his head sadly
+and replied:
+
+“Wheat! Wheat, eh? A lumber and shipping man monkeying with wheat? Not
+for little old Alden P. Ricks! No, sir! When I go speculating I stick
+to my specialties--lumber and ships. Did you ever hear of a gambler,
+winning a fortune at faro, who didn't drop his winnings on the ponies?”
+
+“But this is a beautiful layout.”
+
+“I don't know anything about wheat and I'm too old to learn. Besides, I
+don't trust you, Gus. You're an infernal scoundrel; and experience has
+taught me that any time I take your tip and go in on a deal I have to
+step lively to keep from being walked on.”
+
+“But this time I'm free from guile. I won't stab you, Cappy.”
+
+“No use! The last boat just left, Augustus.”
+
+[Illustration with caption: He always shouted when telephoning.]
+
+Mr. Redell, however, was made of rather stern stuff. He was a young man
+who never took “No” for an answer. Persistence was his most striking
+characteristic.
+
+“Now listen,” he implored. “Let the dead past bury itself. I give you
+my word of honor, Cappy, that this deal is on the level. Just let me put
+all my cards on the table while you take a look; then, if you don't want
+to come in, all I ask is your word of honor that you'll stay out while I
+round up a partner with red blood in his veins.”
+
+Cappy pricked up his ears at that. He saw that Redell was serious; he
+knew that once the latter passed his word of honor he never broke it.
+Still, Cappy did not wish to appear precipitate in his surrender; so he
+said weakly:
+
+“I am against speculation.”
+
+“You mean you're against foolish speculation,” Redell corrected him. “I
+take it, however, that you have no objection to playing a sure thing.”
+
+“Well,” Gappy admitted, “in that event I might be persuaded.
+Nevertheless, I'm afraid of you. There's a fly in the ointment, even if
+I cannot see it. You owe me a poke, and you'll never rest until you've
+squared the account between us.”
+
+Mr. Redell held up his hands in abject distress.
+
+“Cappy,” he pleaded, “don't say that. You wrong me cruelly. It is in
+my power to stand idly by and let you assimilate a poke right now; but,
+just to show you I haven't any hard feelings, I'll do something nice for
+you instead.”
+
+“What do you mean--nice?”
+
+“I'll save you money--not only today but for years to come; and I'll
+save your self-respect.”
+
+“Shoot!”
+
+“Call up J. O. Heyfuss & Co. and tell them to take their cargo of zinc
+ore in bulk for your schooner _Mindoro_ and go to the devil with it!”
+
+“But, good gracious, boy, I have to get something for her homeward
+trip!”
+
+“In this case nothing is better than something. Do you know anything
+about zinc ore?”
+
+“Yes; as much as an Eskimo knows about the doctrine of
+transubstantiation.”
+
+“I thought so. Well, I'll enlighten you. Zinc ore is blamed near as
+heavy as lead, and it's as fine as cement. Load it in a ship in bulk
+and, what with the pitching and rolling of a vessel on a long voyage,
+she opens up every seam and crack in her interior; then this powdered
+ore sifts into the skin of the ship and down into her bilge, and you'll
+never be able to get it out without tearing the ship apart. Why, after
+a vessel has freighted a cargo of zinc ore there may be as much as fifty
+tons left in her after she's supposed to be discharged; and, of course,
+thereafter she'll carry that much less cargo than she did before.
+Besides, the consignees are liable to send you a bill for the shortage;
+you can gamble your head they'll deduct it from the freight bill.”
+
+“Holy sailor!” Cappy was appalled.
+
+“Why,” Redell continued, “I'm surprised at your ignorance, Cappy!”
+
+“And I'm amazed at your intelligence! Where did you get all this
+zinc-ore dope?” Cappy challenged. “How do you know it's true?”
+
+“I got it from Captain Matt Peasley. I heard him give it to J. O.
+Heyfuss on the floor of the Merchants' Exchange two weeks ago, when
+Heyfuss tried to sneak up on his blind side and hang that cargo of zinc
+ore on him. I guess they weren't importing much zinc ore when you were
+active in business, Cappy, or you'd have known all about it. You see
+the plot, don't you? As soon as Heyfuss learned that Matt Peasley and
+Skinner had gone away, leaving a defenseless old man on the job, he
+organized himself to spear you.”
+
+“The shameless son of a sea cook! By gravy, Gus, you're my friend!”
+
+“Need any more proof?”
+
+“Not a speck.”
+
+“Then I'll give you some. Call up Heyfuss and declare that ore cargo
+off; after you've done that I'll tell you where you can get something
+better. Moreover, you can close the deal yourself and save the
+brokerage.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLI
+
+
+Cappy Ricks called up J. O. Heyfuss and in a few terse sentences told
+that individual where to head in.
+
+“Now, then--” he began, facing round on Redell once more.
+
+Again Redell's index finger tapped Cappy's knee. Dramatically he
+pronounced a single word:
+
+“Wheat!”
+
+“Wheat?”
+
+“Wheat!”
+
+“What kind of wheat?” In his amazement Cappy was rather helpless.
+
+“Number One white Australian wheat.”
+
+“You jibbering jackdaw! Wheat? Don't you know blamed well that wheat is
+one of the commodities Australia never exports to these United States?
+Why? Because we don't need her doggoned wheat! We grow all the wheat we
+need and a lot more we don't need; we export that, and it's just as fine
+wheat as you'll find anywhere. Moreover, any time our crop is a failure,
+our next-door neighbor, Canada, is Johnny-on-the-spot, ready to make
+prompt delivery. So what in thunder are you talking about?”
+
+For answer J. Augustus Redell drew from his pocket that morning's paper
+and pointed to the headline of a front-page story. Cappy adjusted his
+spectacles and read: Bakers Announce Six-Cent Loaf!
+
+“Hum-m-m!” said Cappy.
+
+“You bet! And it's a smaller loaf, by the way. Doesn't that argue that
+there is something doing in wheat, when the price of bread goes to six
+cents for a half portion?”
+
+“Well, there might be something in that, Gus. Crack along and tell me
+some more.”
+
+“Until the identity of the real culprits is fixed, Cappy, we must blame
+the war in Europe for the six-cent loaf; likewise for the fifteen-dollar
+shoe that formerly cost our wives six or seven; for the eleven pounds of
+sugar for a dollar, when twenty to twenty-two pounds was the standard in
+the good old days. Europe is too busy fighting to pay much attention to
+farming; the wheat farmers of Canada are somewhere in France instead of
+being at home 'tending to business; and it has been up to Uncle Sam
+and the Argentine Republic to feed the world, you might say. Naturally
+speculators have seized upon this condition to shoot the price of wheat
+to the skies, and in desperation the millers have been casting about to
+buy cheaper wheat. Investigation discloses the fact that Australia has
+an enormous quantity of wheat on hand; some of it is the surplus of the
+1915 crop. Of course she has exported all she could to England; but, at
+that, she has been handicapped.”
+
+“How?”
+
+“Because when a ship sails from Liverpool with goods for Australia, it
+is a rare case when that same ship promptly loads with Australian
+goods and puts back to Liverpool. She takes a cargo of coal, say, from
+Newcastle up to Manila; a general cargo from Manila to Seattle or San
+Francisco; thence to a West Coast port with a general cargo; thence to
+New York with nitrate; thence to Europe with foodstuffs or munitions.
+Australia hasn't had the tonnage to export her wheat and it's been
+piling up on her. Now they've simply got to sell something to get some
+ready money.”
+
+“This is perfectly re-markable!”
+
+Redell took a document from his pocket and gravely handed it to
+Cappy, who examined it and discovered the same to be a charter party,
+consummated the day before between the West Coast Trading Company,
+owners of the barkentine _Mazeppa_, and Messrs. Ford & Carter, a well
+known export and import firm whose principal business was done in grain.
+Cappy read the charter party carefully and even verified the signatures,
+with which he was familiar. The vessel was to carry a cargo of wheat
+from Melbourne to San Francisco at a freight rate that fairly shrieked
+the word “Dividend.”
+
+“Re-markable!” Cappy declared. “Preposterous!”
+
+“Seeing is believing. Call up Ford & Carter, and they'll jump over
+themselves to give you a cargo of wheat for your _Mindoro_.”
+
+“Im-possible!”
+
+“Well, I'm telling you. Why, it stands to reason, Cappy! Canada and the
+United States are so much nearer Europe than is Australia that it has
+been cheaper to use our wheat, and the result is we've been cleaned out;
+and the newspapers are filled with dismal stories of the sufferings of
+the poor due to the increased price of bread.”
+
+“Come to think of it, Gus, there _has_ been a lot of that stuff in the
+papers lately. But, of course, when a fellow's stomach is full and he
+isn't in danger of being attached for debt, he never thinks of the less
+fortunate brother. Yes, Gus, I dare say the demand for our wheat now
+exceeds the visible supply.”
+
+“Is it any wonder, then, that this condition of affairs should come to
+the attention of the Australian exporters? Just because Australian
+wheat has never been shipped into the United States is no reason why
+it shouldn't be shipped--particularly when the price of flour goes up
+daily. Why, we pay two and a half dollars for the fifty-pound sack
+of flour that formerly cost us a dollar and a quarter! Eggs are up to
+seventy cents a dozen--by jingo, Cappy, what's going to become of us?”
+
+“God knows!” Cappy answered dismally.
+
+Redell had him hypnotized. Already Cappy could see the gates of the
+poorhouse opening to receive them all. Redell's voice brought him back
+to a realization of his peril.
+
+“You'll find, Cappy Ricks, that for months to come every sailing vessel
+that carries lumber to Australia from the Pacific Coast will come back
+with a cargo of wheat while these war prices are maintained.”
+
+“Great Jumping Jehoshaphat! How'd you get next to all this, Gus?”
+
+“The early bird gets the worm, and success comes to the man who creates
+his own opportunities. I thought it all up out of my own head, Cappy,
+and then tried it out on Ford & Carter. It knocked 'em cold for a
+minute; but that was only because the proposition was so unusual. When
+I explained the situation to them, however, and gave them time to digest
+it, both offered to take me out to luncheon. You can see for yourself
+they've chartered our Mazeppa at a fancy freight rate.”
+
+Cappy licked his lips.
+
+“The _Mindoro_ is sound, tight and seaworthy,” he murmured. “She could
+carry wheat.”
+
+“Come on in, Cappy. The water's fine!”
+
+“I'll do it! Gus, you're a mighty good fellow, if I do say it that
+shouldn't. I have five windjammers en route to Australia this minute,
+and, by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, if I can get wheat charters for
+all of them on the return trip I'll accept, if it costs me money. Gus,
+something has got to be done about this high cost of living or we'll all
+go to hell together. There comes a time in a man's life when he must put
+aside the sordid question of 'How much is there in it for me?' and ask
+himself: 'How much can I put in it for the other fellow?' Gus, it's our
+Christian duty to furnish tonnage to import this wheat. We should, as
+patriotic citizens, make it our business to boom Australian wheat in
+the United States and give these doggoned pirates that gamble in the
+foodstuffs of the country a run for their money. Food prices should be
+regulated by this Government. The Chicago Pit should be abolished by
+legislative enactment--”
+
+“Well, they won't do it this year, Cappy,” Redell interrupted dryly.
+“Still, it occurred to me that I saw an opening where two high-minded
+philanthropists--to wit, Alden P. Ricks and J. Augustus Redell--might
+strike a blow for freedom and at the same time give these wheat
+speculators a kick where it will do them the most good. When one cannot
+annihilate his enemy the next best thing is to take some money away
+from him; and you and I, Cappy Ricks, can take a young fortune away from
+these fellows, while at the same time depressing the price of wheat and
+doing our fellow countrymen a favor. Are you prepared to volunteer under
+my banner? If so, hold up your right hand.”
+
+Cappy held up his right hand.
+
+“Out with it, Gus,” he ordered; “out with it! This is most interesting.”
+
+“Ah! You're interested now, are you? Well, bearing in mind the fact that
+your specialty is lumber and ships, I will give you an opportunity to
+withdraw before it is too late. Besides, it occurs to me that I have
+already done enough for you today.”
+
+“Don't be greedy, Gus. Remember there is an exception to every rule.
+Besides, I'm getting old and--er--ahem!--hell's bells, boy, I've got
+to have my fling every once in a while. Come now, Gus! Out with it! I
+believe your proposition embodied the coupling of both our names in the
+betting, did it not?”
+
+“It did, Cappy. Still, come to think of it, I really ought not to come
+in here and tempt you into speculating--”
+
+“How much money do you want?” Cappy shrilled impatiently. “Cut out this
+infernal drivel and get down to business. Unfold your proposition; and
+if it looks to me like a winner I'll take a flyer with you if it's the
+last act of my sinful life.”
+
+“On your own head be it, Cappy. Here goes! However, before laying my
+plan before you, perfect frankness compels me to state that my visit to
+you was not born of an overweening desire to do you a kindness or make
+money for you. Philanthropy is not my long suit--in business hours; and
+my interest in you today is purely a selfish one.”
+
+“Go on; go on, boy! Am I a child in arms?”
+
+“I have made a ball, Cappy,” Redell continued, “and I want you to
+fire it. I have a splendid prescription to make a clean-up in December
+wheat--”
+
+“Give me your prescription.”
+
+“Well, sir, my prescription lacks one small ingredient to make it a
+standard household remedy. You can supply that ingredient--to wit, cash
+of the present standard of weight and fineness. Every spare dollar that
+Live Wire Luiz and I can get our hands on is working overtime in the
+legitimate business of the West Coast Trading Company; every loose asset
+with a hockable value has been hocked, and we dare not strain our credit
+with our banker by borrowing money with which to speculate. If I apply
+for a sizable loan, without putting up collateral, he'll ask me what I
+want to do with the money--and if I answer truthfully he'll throw
+Luiz and me and our account out of his bank. And I never was a very
+successful liar. Therefore, in consideration of the valuable information
+I can furnish, I suggest that you carry me for a quarter of a million
+bushels of December wheat.”
+
+“How much will that cost me?” Cappy queried warily.
+
+“We'll operate on margin. I think a margin of ten cents a bushel will do
+the trick; of course, if wheat should go up a point you'll be asked to
+come through with more money. However, I have a sneaking notion that
+a well-known heavyweight like you can place his order with any of the
+local brokers without having to put up a single cent; at the most they
+might ask you for five thousand or ten thousand dollars. But they know
+you're good for any engagement you may make; they'd be tickled to death
+to have your promissory note. I suggest that you get in touch with a
+sound brokerage house in this city--one that is a member of the New York
+Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade--and sell, for my account, two
+hundred and fifty thousand bushels of December wheat at the market.”
+
+“What'll I do for myself?”
+
+“Go as far as you like. You know your own limitations. I'm desirous
+of selling a quarter of a million bushels at the market; and, as I am
+furnishing the plans and specifications for this raid, I suggest that
+you sell at least a quarter of a million yourself.”
+
+“Funny business!” Cappy murmured. “Selling a quarter of a million
+bushels of wheat you do not own and never will! Hum-m-m! Ahem!
+Harumph-h-h! Then what?”
+
+He bent his head and gazed very severely at Mr. Redell over the rims
+of his spectacles. For reply Mr. Redell took from his pocket thirteen
+sheaves of paper and handed them to Cappy, who investigated and
+discovered them to be thirteen forty-eight-hour options on thirteen
+sailing vessels bound to Australian ports with lumber, and not as yet
+provided with a return cargo to the United States.
+
+“By to-morrow morning I shall have exercised those options and closed
+for thirteen cargoes of wheat,” Redell explained. “You have five vessels
+bound to Australia also. Give me an option on them for their return
+cargo and that will make eighteen.”
+
+“Yes, yes. Then what?”
+
+“I will charter all of the eighteen to Ford grain of it, in order to
+protect themselves against a falling market.”
+
+“Naturally. And the market is--”
+
+“December wheat closed in the Chicago Pit yesterday at $1.89 1/2, and
+the market has been very stiff for quite a while. The bulls are right on
+the job.”
+
+“Will not the advent of all this Australian wheat depress the market?”
+ Cappy shrilled excitedly.
+
+“Not unless the bears happen to find it out, Cappy,” Redell retorted
+gently. “It is our job to bring the matter to their attention, for it
+so happens that Alden P. Ricks and J. Augustus Redell are the only two
+people in the United States who happen to know about it. Ford bulls
+will get panicky; the bears will take heart of hope, and with Number One
+white Australian wheat they'll beat the brains out of the market and in
+all probability kick it down to $1.85, at which figure we promptly buy
+as much wheat as we have previously sold. Thus we cover our shorts,
+and the difference between $1.89 1/2 and $1.85, less brokerage and
+interest--if any--will be, roughly speaking, four cents. Four cents on a
+quarter of a million bushels is ten thousand dollars--not a great deal,
+truly, in these days of swollen fortunes, but, nevertheless, a nice
+piece of velvet--eh, Cappy, you sporty boy?”
+
+“It isn't so much the money we make,” Cappy replied sagely. “It's the
+fun we have making it, my boy; the joy of putting over a winner. The
+instant a man begins to love money for money's sake he's a knave and
+a fool. Kill him! But--er--ahem--as you say, my dear young friend, ten
+thousand each is not to be--er--sneezed at.”
+
+“Then you're coming in on the deal?”
+
+“I should tell a man!”
+
+After the fashion of the West they shook hands on it and went to
+luncheon at the Commercial Club.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLII
+
+
+Directly luncheon was over and Cappy Ricks had returned to his office,
+J. Augustus Redell moved into action. He called on Messrs. Ford &
+Carter, talked the situation over with them, and showed them where they,
+having the necessary tonnage in hand with which to guarantee delivery,
+could bring a couple of million bushels of fine Number One white
+Australian wheat to the Pacific Coast, cut the price a cent, and
+doubtless unload every kernel of it at a fair profit. There was
+every probability that wheat would go to two dollars. For his part in
+producing this profit Mr. Redell desired a commission of five per cent
+on all sales of wheat imported in the bottoms he had under option and
+which he stood ready to turn over to Ford & Carter without profit,
+since the owners of the vessels would pay him the customary broker's
+commission on the freight money earned on the voyage. Ford & Carter
+said they would think the matter over; so Mr. Redell tactfully withdrew,
+stating that he would call up the following day for an answer.
+
+He knew Ford & Carter would promptly dispatch a long cablegram to their
+agent in Australia, instructing him to get a forty-eight-hour option on
+the wheat, with a guaranty of delivery to the vessels as they arrived
+from time to time. Meantime, Ford & Carter would quote every milling
+company in the West, subject to prior acceptance and their ability
+to deliver Number One Australian wheat at a price that would be of
+interest. If the milling companies accepted this rather nebulous
+quotation and telegraphed orders, and Ford & Carter's Australian agent
+could purchase at a satisfactory price the wheat to fill these orders,
+then Ford & Carter would make formal acceptance and purchase the wheat.
+If, on the other hand, their agent in Australia failed to get the wheat,
+then Ford & Carter had an “out” with the milling companies who desired
+to buy the wheat from them, and the entire matter would be off, with
+Ford & Carter merely out a couple of hundred dollars in telegraph bills.
+That was the bet they had to make to put their fortune to the touch; and
+right cheerfully did they make it.
+
+J. Augustus Redell gave them all the time he could. His forty-eight-hour
+options on the vessels then en route to Australia had cost him nothing;
+that was a courtesy which one shipowner always extends to another, free
+of charge, unless the vessel happens to be on demurrage at the time the
+option is given. When his options were within two hours of expiring he
+called on Ford & Carter.
+
+“We'll take 'em all,” Carter almost shouted at him. “They'll be arriving
+with sufficient time elapsing between arrivals to guarantee us immunity
+from any undue delay or embarrassment in loading them. We've bought the
+wheat and sold it; now give us the tonnage to freight it, Redell, and
+we'll all be happy, and a little richer than we were the day before
+yesterday.”
+
+Redell took up the telephone and called each shipowner, in turn, to
+inform him that he would exercise his option on the latter's ship, and
+for the owner to prepare charter parties and send them up to his office
+for signature.
+
+“I will have no difficulty in getting the owners to agree to an
+assignment of these charters to you,” he advised Carter. “You and Ford
+are brothers in good standing, I take it. However, if they insist on
+doing business through me, in order that they may hold me responsible,
+I'll simply recharter to you at the same rate.”
+
+“Lovely!” cried Messrs. Ford & Carter in unison.
+
+Ten minutes later J. Augustus Redell burst into Cappy Ricks' sanctum and
+wakened the old gentleman from his afternoon siesta.
+
+“The trap is set,” he announced. “Come on, Cappy! We're going up to the
+broker's office now and give the order to sell our December wheat. I
+can't go alone, you know. There wouldn't be an odor of sanctity about
+the transaction if I did.”
+
+“We'll have Gregg & Company attend to it for us,” Cappy announced. “You
+remember Harry Gregg, don't you? Used to be in the steamship business
+years ago. Gosh, that boy knows me! He'll take a stiff finger bet from
+Alden P. Ricks.”
+
+Together they motored uptown to the office of Gregg & Co., where Cappy's
+card gained him instant admittance to the broker's private office.
+Redell remained in the anteroom on pretense of speaking to an
+acquaintance, and the instant Cappy disappeared into Gregg's office
+Redell stepped out into the hall, where he waited until Cappy had booked
+his order and came hunting for him.
+
+“Well, I've sold my two hundred and fifty thousand bushels at a
+dollar-ninety,” Cappy announced.
+
+“How much margin?” Redell demanded.
+
+“Oh, Gregg didn't sting me very hard. Ten cents a bushel. It seemed like
+a good bet to him. He looks for a drop in December wheat.”
+
+“Met a pest out here and couldn't seem to get away from him,” Redell
+explained. “Take me in and introduce me to Gregg, and I'll give him an
+order to sell a jag of wheat for me.”
+
+Cappy complied and Redell gave the broker his order.
+
+“It will take about twenty-five thousand dollars to margin this trade,
+Mr. Redell,” the latter remarked easily as he wrote out the order and
+handed a copy to Redell.
+
+“Nonsense!” Cappy struck in. “Mr. Redell is one of our most delightful,
+trustworthy and popular young men, and to ask him for twenty-five
+thousand dollars today would prejudice his standing with his banker. I
+guarantee him, Harry. Treat him as you'd treat me. I guarantee him up to
+a hundred thousand dollars.”
+
+“Your guaranty goes with me, Mr. Ricks,” Gregg answered promptly, and
+shoved the copy of the order he had just booked over to Cappy, together
+with the fountain pen. Cappy wrote: “O. K. Alden P. Ricks.” Redell gave
+his check for ten thousand dollars margin and the deal was closed. When
+the scheming pair returned to Cappy's office the latter gave Redell his
+check for ten thousand to reimburse Redell for margining the trade, in
+accordance with Cappy's verbal agreement to provide the sinews of war.
+
+“Now then, Cappy,” Redell announced as he stuffed Cappy's check into his
+pocket, “the next move is to return to my office, close those charters
+with the owners and turn the ships over to Ford & Carter. That matter
+attended to, I shall, with eighteen charter parties in my pocket, drift
+casually over to the Merchants' Exchange. There I shall find the market
+reporters for both of our sunrise sheets; if they are not there I shall
+wait until they arrive. These gifted young men I shall draw to one side;
+to them I shall, with great gusto, relate a tale of Number One white
+Australian wheat, shortly to descend upon the United States of America
+in no less than eighteen vessels, now chartered for that purpose, with
+more to follow. In proof of this statement I shall exhibit the charter
+parties; and then--”
+
+“Front-page story!” Cappy declared, interrupting.
+
+“Not yet--but soon. To get on the front page a story must be rather
+unusual. A perusal of our daily rags will convince the most skeptical
+that the sensational, the unusual, the bizarre are what appeal most to
+the men who make the newspapers. The unusual thing about our deal lies
+in the fact that this is the first time in the history of Australia or
+the United States that the former country has exported wheat into the
+latter--the first time the latter has ever had to call on an outsider
+for help. Then, Cappy, it will be a front-page story--and how those boys
+will hop to it! Why, we'll get a column about Australian wheat invading
+the land of the free whose rapacity threatens the very food that goes
+into the mouths of little children! Little children and their mouths is
+good stuff! I'll use that line when slipping the story to the boys. They
+might overlook it if I didn't. I'll remind them of the six-cent loaf
+of bread, the sufferings of the poor, and how far the importation of
+Australian wheat will go to knock the Chicago wheat barons for a goal.”
+
+“Here, here! You're too precipitate,” Cappy cautioned. “Don't tip this
+story off to both reporters. That's coarse work. Tell it to one only.
+Put him under obligations to you by seeming to give him a scoop. Tell
+him you won't say a word to his competitor, and he'll tell his city
+editor the story is exclusive; then they'll be certain to play it up
+big.”
+
+“Cappy, you're the shadow of a rock in a weary land! Who'll tip off the
+other reporter?”
+
+“I will, of course. Leave it to me. A man doesn't go through the mill
+of Big Business without knowing the way of that singularly useful
+individual, the newspaper man.”
+
+Redell sat down and laughed until the tears ran down his merry
+countenance. Cappy thought the outlook sufficiently cheerful to warrant
+that laugh, and suspected nothing. He even joined in the laugh.
+
+“And to-morrow morning, when that story appears, the local brokerage
+firms will be calling up Ford friend and gave him a paternal hug. He
+winked wickedly.
+
+“My dear boy,” he suggested, “suppose you and I go out and pin one on?
+Hey? How about you, boy? A pint of '98, in order that we may properly
+drink confusion to the wolf of want and damnation to dull care!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIII
+
+
+Late that afternoon Cappy Ricks graciously summoned the Chronicle
+reporter to his office and told him in detail all he knew about the
+Australian wheat invasion.
+
+“Of course,” he added, “this may be mere street gossip; but I think
+there's something in it, my boy. At any rate, I thought you might care
+to be tipped off to the situation. It looks like a corking story to me.
+I suggest that you call up Ford & Carter and see what they have to say
+about it.”
+
+“I wonder whether the Examiner reporter has a tip on this?” the
+Chronicle man queried hopefully.
+
+“Not from me. This story is for you, young man. That's why I called you
+down to my office.”
+
+About the same hour J. Augustus Redell might have been seen at the press
+table on 'Change, unfolding a similar story to the market reporter
+of the Examiner, who thought it was a humdinger of a story, and so
+declared.
+
+“All right. Glad you think so,” Mr. Redell replied, beaming upon him.
+“And just to show you I'm right, I'll not breathe a word of it to the
+Chronicle man.”
+
+Having planted his journalistic bomb, Mr. Redell glanced at his watch.
+It was exactly eleven o'clock. “I still have time,” he murmured, and
+departed immediately to the office of Gregg of December wheat, but to
+cease selling the instant the market hesitated to absorb it or the price
+broke a point. At the same moment, in another brokerage office, Cappy
+Ricks was issuing a similar order. Before the market closed, Cappy had
+succeeded in selling a hundred and eighty thousand bushels, while Redell
+had disposed of a hundred and thirty. Evidently the bears took it as it
+came, for the market closed strong at $1.89.
+
+Neither Cappy nor Redell reported at his office the following day. At
+the hour when the market opened in Chicago both schemers appeared on
+the floor of the Merchants' Exchange and bent their gaze upon the
+only blackboard on 'Change they had not heretofore honored with
+their scrutiny--the board in back of the Grain Pit, which carried the
+quotations on the Chicago Board of Trade, already beginning to come in
+by wire.
+
+For an hour the trading was inactive. Then suddenly the price broke
+half a point as somebody tossed a lot of fifty thousand bushels on
+the market. Cappy and Redell each wondered whether he might not be the
+responsible party; and while they pondered somebody unloaded a hundred
+thousand bushels at $1.88. Cappy gasped as the quotations appeared on
+the blackboard.
+
+“Something doing, Gus!” he whispered; Redell nodded.
+
+And now commenced a period of wild trading. The price crept back to
+$1.89, only to be assaulted and beaten back to $1.87; then, fraction
+by fraction and point by point, the price fell; and J. Augustus Redell
+wagged his head approvingly.
+
+“They have received our message,” he said. “The riot is on!”
+
+When the price had been beaten down to $1.83 Cappy turned to his
+associate.
+
+“I'm through!” he said. “Time to cover my shorts.” And he trotted away
+to a telephone booth.
+
+As for Redell, he would not intrust his fortune to a telephonic order,
+but sprang into 'his runabout, parked at the curb outside the Exchange,
+and scorched uptown to Gregg & Co.'s offices, where he learned that he
+had sold four hundred and ten thousand bushels of December wheat. One
+hundred thousand had been sold at $1.90, two hundred and eighty thousand
+at prices varying from $1.89 to $1.88 1/8, and the remainder at 1.88.
+
+“Buy me four hundred and ten thousand bushels at the market,” he
+ordered.
+
+Before he left the office the sale had been confirmed and Mr. Redell's
+shorts had been covered at a price ranging from $1.83 to $1.83 5/8,
+whereupon he closed out his trade and received a check for his margin
+and his profits. An hour later he met Cappy Ricks again on 'Change.
+
+“Well, Cappy?” he queried.
+
+“I cleaned up, thank you,” the old gentleman informed him. “Sold,
+bought, and got the money. This is one time it rained duck soup and I
+was there with a bucket.”
+
+He prodded Mr. Redell playfully in the short ribs and the incident was
+closed. They had made a profit of more than twenty thousand dollars
+each; and when each returned to his office he forgot all about December
+wheat until half past five that evening, when both met on the deserted
+floor of the exchange to scan the blackboard. December wheat had closed
+that day at $1.83! Two days later J. Augustus Redell called Cappy Ricks
+on the telephone.
+
+“That you, Cappy?”
+
+“Yep!”
+
+“Redell speaking. Read the story on the front page of the Chronicle this
+morning?”
+
+“No; what was it?”
+
+“The British Government has placed an embargo on the exportation of
+wheat from Australia; so all those eighteen charters I negotiated with
+Ford were placed with Ford & Carter subject to Ford & Carter's ability
+to make delivery and to prior sale. Before Ford & Carter could make
+them firm orders and get in over their heads, I tipped them off to the
+possibility of this government embargo.”
+
+“You tipped them off! How did you know the British Government was going
+to clap an embargo on Australian wheat?”
+
+“Why, I didn't know,” Redell confessed. “I just guessed it would; so
+I advised Ford than I did--and I made a trifle more than twenty-four
+thousand dollars.”
+
+“Is that so? Well, listen to me tell it; When you and I cashed in that
+day our deal was closed wasn't it?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“And I'd played fair with you?”
+
+“You certainly did, Gus.”
+
+“Then I was freed from any further obligations to take you into
+partnership with me, was I not?”
+
+“That's how I figure it, my boy.”
+
+“That's how I figured it also, Cappy. Consequently, being morally
+certain that the British Government would place an embargo on the
+exportation of Australian wheat--Cappy, you must admit that the British
+Government would have been absolutely crazy if it hadn't--I just called
+on Gregg & Co. and bought another half million bushels of December wheat
+at $1.83 to $1.84 a bushel. Then I sat tight and waited for that embargo
+story to break. Cappy, do you know that story just raised hell on the
+Chicago Pit today? The bears were caught napping; and the bulls got busy
+and kicked the price up to $1.90 again, at which figure I unloaded and
+took my profit.”
+
+“You amazing rascal! Why didn't you tip your partner off to that deal?”
+
+“We were no longer partners. You admitted that a moment ago. When I
+first outlined this scheme I didn't have a dollar to spare with which I
+could speculate. Every last cent was tied up in the business of the
+West Coast Trading Company. So I schemed to take you in as a partner on
+one-half of the deal; and you not only financed me but guaranteed me to
+the broker! Your introduction was all I wanted. After that my credit
+was as good as December wheat; in consequence of which, without a cent
+invested, I was actually enabled to carry a trade for half a million
+bushels! Much obliged to you, Cappy. You're a fine old sport, and I
+like you--I wouldn't be surprised if you laid off on me after this--eh,
+Cappy?”
+
+“Gus,” said Cappy Ricks, “one of these days the Democratic party is
+going to wake up and discover that America isn't where they left it the
+night before! And when that happens they're going to ask you about it,
+you--you--infer-nal--”
+
+The phone clicked. J. Augustus Redell had hung up.
+
+“Drat it!--God bless him!” murmured Cappy Ricks--and hung up, too.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIV
+
+
+Whenever Cappy Ricks made up his mind that his Blue Star Navigation
+Company ought to add another vessel to its rapidly growing fleet, he
+preferred to build her; for a few bitter experiences early in life
+had convinced him that the man who buys the other fellow's ship
+quite frequently is given a bonus in the shape of the other fellow's
+troubles--troubles which have the unhappy faculty of tilting the
+profit-and-loss account over into the red-ink figures. In order to avoid
+these troubles, therefore, Cappy would summon his naval architect, whom
+he would practically drive to distraction by fussing over the plans
+submitted before giving a final grudging acceptance. The blue prints
+approved, Cappy would spend a week picking holes in the specifications,
+and when there was no more fault to find Mr. Skinner, his general
+manager and the president of the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company, would
+send a list of the timbers, planking, and so on required, to one of
+Cappy's sawmills in Washington; for Cappy had a theory--the good
+Lord knows why or where acquired--that Douglas fir from the state of
+Washington was better for shipbuilding purposes than Douglas fir grown
+in Oregon. Perhaps he figured that the Columbia River, which separates
+the two states, made a difference in grade.
+
+The woods boss would then be adjured to select his trees with great
+care. No tree would do that sprouted a limb within eighty feet of the
+butt, and the butt had to be at least six feet in diameter, in order
+that it might produce fine, clear, long-length planks that would not
+contain “heart” timber--the heart of a log having a tendency to check
+or split when seasoned. When the material was sawed a Blue Star steam
+schooner would transport it to San Francisco Bay, and it would be stored
+in Cappy's retail lumber yard in Oakland, to be seasoned and air-dried;
+following which Cappy Ricks would let the contract for the building of
+the vessel to a shipyard on Oakland Estuary, and sell the builder this
+seasoned stock at the price of rough green material, even though it was
+worth two dollars a thousand extra--not to mention the additional value
+for the extra-long lengths furnished specially. Cappy's ancestors, back
+in Maine, had built too many ships to have failed to impress upon
+him the wisdom of this course; for, on this point at least, initial
+extravagance inevitably develops into ultimate economy.
+
+Following the laying of the keel, Cappy would come out of retirement and
+become an extremely busy man. He had the vessel's engines to consider;
+and for two weeks his private office would resound with the arguments
+and recriminations of Cappy and his port engineer. There would be
+much talk of pistons, displacement of cylinders, stroke, reciprocating
+engines, steeple compound and triple-expansion engines, Scotch boilers,
+winches, compressors, dynamos, composition and iron propellers and the
+latest developments in crude-oil burners. And on the day when the port
+engineer, grown desperate because of the old man's opposition to some
+detail, would fly into a rage and resign, Cappy would know that, at
+last, everything was all right; whereupon he would scornfully reject
+the resignation and take his port engineer to luncheon at the Commercial
+Club, just to show he wasn't harboring a grudge.
+
+In the meantime the port captain would be making daily visits to the
+shipyard to make certain that the builder was holding rigidly to the
+specifications and not trying to skimp here and there; and on Saturdays
+Cappy would accompany him and satisfy himself that the port captain
+wasn't being imposed upon. Finally the ship would be launched; and as
+she slid down the ways Cappy Ricks would be standing on her forecastle
+head, his old heart fluttering in his thirty-six-inch chest and his
+coat-tails fluttering in the breeze, one arm round the port captain and
+the other round the port engineer. As the hull slipped into the drink he
+would say:
+
+“Boys, this is the life! I love it! By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet,
+there's more romance in ships than you'll find in most married lives!”
+ Then he would wave an arm up Oakland Estuary, which prior to the great
+war was the graveyard of Pacific Coast shipping, and say with great
+pride: “Well, we've done a good job on this craft, boys; she'll never
+end in Rotten Row! Every sliver in her is air-dried and seasoned. That's
+the stuff! Build 'em of unseasoned material and dry rot develops the
+first year; in five years they're punk inside, and then--some fine day
+they're posted as missing at Lloyd's. Did you ever see a Blue Star ship
+lying in Rotten Row? No; you bet you didn't--and you never will! I never
+built a cheap boat and I never ran 'em cheap. By gravy, the Blue Star
+ships are like the Blue Nose that owns 'em! They'll be found dead on the
+job!”
+
+Quite early in 1915 the Blue Star Navigation Company had found ample
+opportunity, due to a world scarcity of tonnage, to dispose of several
+of their oldest and smallest steam schooners at unbelievably fine
+prices.
+
+“Get rid of them, Matt,” Cappy advised his son-in-law, Captain Matt
+Peasley, whom he had made president of the company. “You have the
+permission of the president emeritus to go as far as you like. Big boats
+for us from now on, boy. Slip the little ones while the slipping is
+good. These high prices will not prevail very long--only while the
+war continues; and at the rate they're slaughtering each other over
+in France the war will be over in six months; then prices will fall
+kerflump! Then we'll build a couple of real steamers.”
+
+So Matt Peasley promptly sold five steam schooners, following which he
+made up his mind that the world still had two years of war ahead of
+it. Accordingly he urged the letting of contracts for two
+seven-thousand-five-hundred-ton steel freighters immediately.
+
+“Nothing doing!” Cappy declared. “Why, it's rank nonsense to think of
+building now at wartime prices. If our recent sales have pinched us for
+tonnage we'll have to charter from our neighbors and worry along as best
+we can until the war is over.”
+
+“You're making a mistake, Cappy Ricks,” his son-in-law warned him.
+
+“Ask Skinner if I am. Skinner, let's have your opinion.”
+
+Mr. Skinner, always cautious and ultra-conservative promptly advised
+against Matt Peasley's course; but Matt would not be downed without a
+fight.
+
+“I know prices for ship construction are fearfully high just now,” he
+admitted; “but--mark my words!--they're going to double; and if we
+place our contracts now, while we have an opportunity to do so, we'll
+be getting in on the ground floor. I tell you that war hasn't really
+started yet; and the longer it continues the higher will prices on all
+commodities soar--but principally on ship construction. Father-in-law, I
+beg of you to let me get busy and build. Suppose the boats do cost us a
+quarter of a million dollars more each than we could have built them
+for in 1914. What of it? We have the money--and if we didn't have it we
+could borrow it. I don't care what a ship costs me when freight rates
+are soaring to meet the advance in construction costs.”
+
+Nevertheless, Cappy and Mr. Skinner hooted him down. Three months later,
+however, when Cappy Ricks had changed his mind, and Mr. Skinner was too
+heartbroken to curse himself for a purblind idiot, it was too late to
+place the contracts. Every shipyard in the United States and abroad was
+loaded up with building orders for three years in advance, and the Blue
+Star Navigation Company was left to twiddle its corporate thumbs. Matt
+Peasley was so angry that he almost speculated on the delight of being
+at sea again, in command of a square rigger, with Cappy Ricks and Mr.
+Skinner signed on as A.B.'s; in which condition of servitude he might
+dare to call them aft and knock their heads together. However, he
+managed to have his revenge. Every time nitrate freights went up a
+dollar a ton he told them about it with great gusto, and the day he
+chartered the _Tillicum_ for Vladivostok, with steel for the Russian
+Government at seventy-five dollars a ton, he had poor Cappy moaning in
+his wretchedness.
+
+“Just think how nice it would be,” he taunted his aged relative, “if
+we had only placed contracts for two big boats when I urged it. By the
+middle of summer I'd have them both on the Vladivostok run--perhaps at a
+hundred dollars a ton; and long before the war is over you could do what
+you've been trying to do for the past ten years.”
+
+“Do what?” Cappy queried.
+
+“Retire!” Matt retorted meaningly.
+
+“In-fernal young scoundrel!” Cappy was angry enough to commit murder.
+“Out of my office!” he shrilled, and pointed to the door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLV
+
+
+For once in his busy life it was, figuratively speaking, raining duck
+soup, and poor Cappy was there with a fork! When he had recovered his
+composure he sent for Matt Peasley.
+
+“Matt, my dear boy,” he confessed miserably, “this is certainly one
+occasion upon which father appears to have overlooked his hand. However,
+none of us is perfect; and if we're caught out without an umbrella, so
+to speak--”
+
+“We?” Matt reminded him witheringly. “Cappy, it's all right to use
+that 'we' stuff when you're talking to Skinner, but trot out the
+perpendicular pronoun when you're talking to me. I hate to say 'I told
+you so'; but--”
+
+“Lay off me!” Cappy pleaded. “I'm an old man, Matt; so be easy on me.
+Besides, I don't make a mistake very often, and you know it.”
+
+“I do know it. But when you blocked me on that building scheme you
+certainly made up for lost time. Really, Cappy, you mustn't make me play
+so close to my vest in these brisk times. If I'm to manage the Blue Star
+Navigation Company I mustn't have my ideas pooh-poohed as if I were a
+hare-brained child.”
+
+“I know, Matt; I know. But I built up the Blue Star Navigation Company
+and the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company by playing 'em close, and it's a
+hard habit to break.
+
+“However, let us forget the past and look forward with confidence to
+the future. Matt, my dear boy, since we cannot get a shipyard to build
+a steamer for us, I'm going to break a rule of forty years' standing
+and buy one in the open market. I guess that'll prove to you I'm not so
+hide-bound with conservatism as you think. Go forth into the highways
+and the byways, Matt, and see what they have for sale.”
+
+“How high do you want me to go?”
+
+“As high as they hung Haman--if you find it necessary.”
+
+“That's certainly a free hand; but I'm afraid it comes too late. I
+doubt if there is an owner with the kind of steamer we want who is crazy
+enough to sell her.”
+
+“Tish! Tush! All things are for sale all the time. Scour the market,
+Matt, and you'll find Cappy Ricks isn't the only damned fool left in the
+shipping business. My boy, you'd be surprised at the number of so-called
+business men who are entirely devoid of imagination. Dozens of them
+still think the war will end this fall, but I'm willing to make a
+healthy bet that the fall of 1917 still finds them going to it to beat
+four of a kind.”
+
+“You said something that time, father-in-law,” Matt replied laughingly.
+
+Then he roughed the old man affectionately and went forth into
+California Street, where he wore out much shoe leather before he
+located what he considered a bargain and reported back to the president
+emeritus.
+
+“You're right, Cappy!” he declared. “You aren't the only boob in the
+shipping business. I've located another.”
+
+“That's what you get by taking father's advice,” Gappy retorted proudly.
+“Have you bought a steamer?”
+
+“No; but I'm going to buy one this afternoon. She's going to cost us
+half a million dollars, cash on the nail, and I have an option on her at
+that figure until noon today. Skinner has a lot of lumber money he isn't
+using, and I'm going to borrow a quarter of a million from his company
+on the Blue Star note at six per cent. Don't want to run our own
+treasury too low.”
+
+“Dog-gone that Skinner! That's some more of his efficiency. I own both
+companies, and it's just like taking money out of one pocket and putting
+it into the other; but Skinner's a bug on system. Just think of making
+me pay myself six per cent interest! However, I suppose we must have
+some kind of order. What's the name of the steamer?”
+
+“The _Penelope_.”
+
+Cappy Ricks slid out to the edge of his chair, placed one hand on each
+knee, and appraisingly eyed his son-in-law over the rims of his glasses.
+
+“Say that again, Matt--and say it slow,” he ordered.
+
+“I said _Penelope--P-e-n-e-l-o-p-e_. Maybe you call her the
+_Pen-elope!_”
+
+“Are you buying her as is?” Matt nodded. “To hear you tell it, Matt, one
+might gather the impression that half a million dollars is about what
+we give the janitor at Christmas. Boy, half a million dollars is real
+money.”
+
+“Not in the shipping business these days, Cappy. Why, you have to wave
+that much under an owner's nose before he'll look up and show interest
+enough to ask you who you are and who let you in.”
+
+“Well, the man who would, in cold blood, consider paying half a million
+dollars for the _Penelope_ is certainly ripe for a padded cell,” Cappy
+jeered. “That fellow Hudner, of the Black Butte Lumber Company, owns
+her, does he not?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Then you know exactly the condition she's in. I'll bet a cooky her
+bottom plates are rusted so thin from lack of an occasional coat of red
+paint that if you were to stand on her bridge and toss a tack
+hammer down her main hatch you'd punch a hole in her. She's a long,
+narrow-gutted, cranky coffin--that's what she is; and the worst-found
+ship in Pacific waters. Why, let me tell you something, young man: she
+can't get by the inspectors this minute.”
+
+“She has just gotten by them,” Matt contradicted. “Passed yesterday.”
+
+“What does that signify? When her skipper has her up for inspection he
+scours the water front like a hungry dog, borrowing a boathook here, a
+sound life-boat there, some fire buckets elsewhere, a hose from the fire
+tug, and a lot of engine-room tools wherever he can get them. As for
+life preservers, he rents them for ten cents each from a marine junk
+dealer. So, when the inspectors arrive, the _Penelope_ is a well-found
+ship; as soon as they pass her the skipper returns the equipment, with
+thanks. As for paint--why, the only painting she ever gets is when
+Hudner lays her alongside some British ship to discharge a foreign cargo
+of lumber into the lime-juicer; then her mate steals all the paint
+in the Britisher's lazaret. The poor, unfortunate devil! He has to do
+something to make a showing with the _Penelope's_ owner! I tell you,
+Matt, I know this man Hudner! He's as thrifty as an Armenian and as
+slippery as a skating rink. He's laying to stab you, boy. Mind your
+step!”
+
+“Even so, Cappy, she's a bargain. I expect to spend fifty thousand
+dollars putting her in first-class condition after we get her.”
+
+“You expect to spend it! Why, how you talk! Hudner is the one that
+should spend that money. For the love of trade, what is he selling you?
+A ship or a hulk?”
+
+“I don't care what she is; we can make her pay for herself and earn half
+a million or a million extra before this war ends. And she won't be such
+a bad vessel after she's shipped a couple of new plates. She has a dead
+weight capacity for six thousand tons and was built at Sunderland in
+1902. When she went ashore off Point Sur, in 1909, Hudner bought her
+from the underwriters for five thousand dollars and spent more than half
+her original cost repairing her. That, of course, made her tantamount to
+a ship built in the United States, and under American registry she can
+run between American ports. And that's what we want. She'll be just the
+thing to carry lumber to New York, via the Canal, when the war ends and
+the nitrate harvest is over.”
+
+Cappy Ricks threw up his hands.
+
+“You see before you, my boy,” he said mournfully, “a dollar-burdened,
+world-weary old man, who for ten years has been trying to retire from
+active business, and cannot. The reason is he dassent; if he dassed,
+this shebang would be in the hands of the sheriff within a year. Now,
+listen, young feller! I know all about the _Penelope_. Before the war
+she had repaid Hudner, with interest, every cent she cost him, and since
+the war I suppose she's made half a million dollars. Now when Hudner
+finds he has to spend a lot of money fixing her up, he figures it's best
+to get rid of her and saddle somebody else with the bill. Her intrinsic
+value is just about one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, and
+when Hudner asks half a million for her he expects to get four hundred
+and fifty thousand. In order to play safe, go back and offer him four
+hundred thousand dollars; presently he'll come down fifty thousand and
+you'll come up fifty thousand, and the trade will be closed on that
+basis. Meantime I'll sit here and weep as I reflect on the cost of
+putting that ruin in fit shape to receive a Blue Star house flag. I tell
+you, Matt, I wouldn't send Pancho Villa to sea in her as she is now.”
+
+Matt Peasley, like Cappy Ricks, was a Yankee; when he did business he
+liked to chaffer; and, after all--he thought--there was a certain shrewd
+philosophy in what his foxy father-in-law had said. At least Cappy had
+supplied him with ammunition for argument; so he went back to Hudner's
+office and argued and pleaded and ridiculed, but all to no avail. He
+returned to Cappy Ricks' office.
+
+“I fought him all over his office,” he complained, “but he wouldn't
+come down a cent. I think we'd better take a chance and give him half a
+million.”
+
+“Fiddlesticks! Stay with him, Matt. I know Hudner. He acts like he's
+full of bellicose veins, but anybody can outgame him. Let your option
+expire; then to-morrow meet him accidentally on 'Change and talk with
+him half an hour about everything on earth except the S. S. _Penelope_.
+Just before you leave him he'll grab you by the lapel of your coat and
+ask if you're still interested in the _Penelope_. Then you say: 'Why,
+yes--moderately; but not at half a million.' Then you make him a firm
+offer--for the last time--of four hundred and fifty thousand dollars;
+and he'll say: 'I'll split the difference with you'--and before he can
+crawfish you accept. You're bound to make at least twenty-five thousand
+by following my advice, Matt.”
+
+Matt Peasley ran his big hand through his thick black locks.
+
+“By jingo,” he declared, “we'd make twenty-five thousand dollars while
+we're dickering with Hudner!”
+
+“I know, my boy; but then I don't like Hudner, and it's awful to do
+business with a son of a horsethief you don't like and let him put one
+over on you. That's the thrill of doing business, Matt. Though I'd hate
+to have anybody think I'm in business for fun, still, if I thought
+I couldn't get some fun out of business I'd go right down to Mission
+Street Wharf and end all.”
+
+“Nitrate freights are up to thirty dollars a ton,” said Matt later that
+day. “They were twelve a year and a half ago. Cappy, we can't risk the
+delay; and I'm sorry I took your advice and let my option expire. I
+insist on buying.” He reached for Cappy's desk 'phone. “I'm going to
+tell Hudner to prepare the bill of sale--that I'll be up in fifteen
+minutes with the check. He who hesitates is lost, and--”
+
+The door opened and a youth stood in the entrance.
+
+“Mr. J. O. Heyfuss is calling,” he announced.
+
+“Show him in immediately,” Cappy ordered, glad of the opportunity to
+delay Matt's telephonic acceptance of the vessel at Hudner's price.
+“Hold on a minute, Matt,” he continued, turning to his son-in-law.
+“Heyfuss is a ship broker; maybe he has a ship to sell us; she might
+prove to be a better buy than the _Penelope_... Howdy, Heyfuss? Come in
+and sit down.”
+
+Mr. Heyfuss entered smilingly, saluted both satellites of the Blue Star
+and sat down.
+
+“Well, gentlemen,” he announced, “wonders will never cease. Every day
+I'm seeing, hearing and doing wonderful things in the shipping business.
+Day before yesterday I bought the old barkentine _Mayfair_. She'd been
+laid up in Rotten Row for seven years, and for at least four years the
+tide has been rising and falling inside her. She cost me seven hundred
+and fifty dollars, and I sold her the same afternoon to Al Hanify for
+a thousand. Not very much of a profit; but then it was Saturday and
+everybody closes up shop at noon, you know. So I felt the day wasn't a
+blank, anyhow.
+
+“And what do you suppose Al did? You'll laugh. He called up Crowley her
+out on Hanlon's Marine Way, putting a new bottom in her. They're going
+to spend twenty thousand dollars on her; and when she's ready for sea
+Redell has a cargo of fir for Sydney waiting for her.
+
+“She'll come back with coal and make her owners at least fifty thousand
+dollars.”
+
+“That's all very interesting to outsiders, but commonplace stuff to us,”
+ Cappy reminded his visitor. “Have you got a commission to sell a ship
+for somebody?”
+
+“Want one?”
+
+“Surest thing you know!”
+
+“All right. I'll sell you the _Alden Besse_. She's an old tea clipper,
+built in the forties; but she's sound and tight. Been a motion picture
+ship for the past five years. I can deliver her to you for forty
+thousand dollars.”
+
+“No, you'll not. I sold her to the motion picture people for fifteen
+hundred,” Cappy countered, “and I don't want her back at any price.
+I send my boys to sea to earn a safe living, not to visit Davy Jones'
+locker.”
+
+“Well, I think I might get you the old Australian prison ship,
+_Success_. She was built at Rangoon in 1790, of teak, and will last
+forever. Perhaps you saw her when she was exhibited at the Exposition
+last year. Might get her for you kind of cheap.”
+
+“Nothing doing. Heyfuss, we want a steamer.”
+
+“Sorry, but I haven't a thing in steamers. Just sold the last one I had
+ten minutes ago--the _Penelope_.”
+
+“The what!” Matt Peasley and Cappy cried in chorus.
+
+“The _Penelope_. Sold her to a big Eastern powder company. She goes into
+the nitrate trade, of course. These munition manufacturers must have
+powder, and to get powder they must have nitrate, and to get nitrate
+they must have ships, and to get ships they must pay the price. I got
+Hudner a million dollars for that ruin of a _Penelope._”
+
+Matt Peasley gently seized J. O. Heyfuss by the ear and led him to the
+door.
+
+“Out, thief!” he cried. “You can't sell us anything; so we don't want
+you hanging round this office. You might steal the safe or a roll-top
+desk, or something.”
+
+Heyfuss departed, laughing good-naturedly, and Matt Peasley turned to
+confront Cappy Ricks. The latter had shrunk up in his chair and was
+looking as chopfallen and guilty as a dog caught sucking eggs. He
+favored his big son-in-law with a quick, shifty glance, and then looked
+down at the carpet.
+
+Matt folded his arms and stared at him until he looked up.
+
+“Don't you go to pick on me!” he warned Matt furiously. “I'll not be
+picked on in my own office, even by a relative.”
+
+Matt threw back his head and chanted,
+
+
+   _“There was I, waiting at the church,
+    Waiting at the church--“_
+
+“I was right!” Cappy shrilled. “My mode of procedure was without a
+flaw.”
+
+“Absolutely! The operation was a success, but the patient died.”
+
+“But a feller just has to haggle!” Cappy wailed. He was almost on the
+verge of tears. “It's the basic principle of all trading. Why, I've made
+my everlasting fortune by haggling. Drat your picture, don't you
+know that the very pillars of financial success rest on
+counter-propositions?”
+
+“Listen, relative, listen: I haven't said a word to you, have I?” Matt
+replied.
+
+“No; but you looked it, and I'll not be looked at.”
+
+“All right, Cappy, I'll not look. But I can't help thinking.”
+
+“Thinking what?”
+
+“That it's about time you quit talking about retiring--and retired!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVI
+
+
+With this Parthian shot Matt himself retired, leaving Cappy to shiver
+and bow his head on his breast; in which position he remained motionless
+for fully an hour.
+
+“I guess the boy's right,” he soliloquized finally. “I think I'd better
+retire, after pulling that kind of a deal twice in the same place. The
+pace is getting too swift for me, I think; I can't keep up... Well, I
+guess they've got the goods on me this time. Matt was certainly on the
+job twice, and I blocked him both times ... Oh, Lord! I'll never hear
+the last of this... By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, I've lost my punch!
+Matt didn't say so; but he thinks it. And I don't blame him a bit.”
+
+The door of Cappy's office opened and again the youth stood in the
+entrance. “Mr. Redell is calling; there's a gentleman with him,” he
+announced.
+
+“Tell 'em I'm busier'n a cranberry merchant,” Cappy snarled. “And unless
+you're figuring on hunting a new job, my son, don't you come in here
+again today.”
+
+The youth retired. However, he knew from experience that Cappy Ricks
+never discharged anybody save for insubordination or rank incompetence;
+hence, he did not hesitate to disobey the old gentleman's edict.
+
+“Mr. Redell says his business is very important,” he announced,
+presenting himself once more at the door.
+
+“All right! No rest for the weary. Show them in.”
+
+J. Augustus Redell entered, accompanied by no less a personage than the
+British Consul. Cappy greeted them without enthusiasm and bade them be
+seated.
+
+“Well,” J. Augustus Redell announced cheerily, “It's plain to be seen
+that Little Sunshine hasn't been round this office recently.”
+
+Cappy grunted.
+
+“What's gone wrong, Cappy?”
+
+“Everything! Been going wrong for years and I never realized it until
+this afternoon. Ah, Gus, my dear young friend, how I envy you your
+youth, your capacity to think, your golden dreams, your boundless
+energy, your ability to make two-dollar bills grow where one-dollar
+bills grew before, thus making an apparently barren prospect as verdant
+as a meadow in spring. But make the most of your opportunity, young
+feller! The day will come to you, as it has come to me, when everything
+you do will be done twenty minutes too late; when every dollar you make
+will be subject to a cash discount of one hundred per cent; when every
+competitor you held cheap will suddenly develop the luck of the devil,
+the brains of a Demosthenes, and the courage of a hog going to war.”
+
+“I should judge that you have recently suffered a great bereavement.”
+
+“I have, Augustus, I have. Through my indecision I have just lost a
+bank roll a greyhound couldn't have jumped over. Suppose it was a paper
+profit? I grieve just the same.”
+
+“Forget it, Cappy! Life is real, life is earnest, and you have a bank
+roll of real profits a giraffe couldn't reach the top of.”
+
+“Oh, it isn't the money, Gus. Money is only a vulgar symbol of my
+bereavement. The trouble is--I've lost my punch! I can't think, Gus; I
+can't act promptly. I'm out of touch with my times. I remind myself of
+nothing so much as the old rooster that suddenly discovered he had been
+elected to furnish the dinner the following Sunday. His hens cackled and
+called to him that they had found some worms, but he wouldn't pay
+any attention to them; just leaned up against the wire netting in the
+poultry yard and said to himself: 'Oh, hell! What's the use? Today an
+egg--tomorrow a feather duster!'”
+
+“Don't be pessimistic, Cappy. Don't! It doesn't become you, and I don't
+believe a word you're telling me. You're still the old he-fox of the
+world; and I've come to you for help on a deal that's going to mean a
+whole lot of money to both of us if we can only put it through.”
+
+“I'm sorry, Gus, but I'm not interested. As a matter of fact, I've
+retired.”
+
+“Nonsense! Nonsense! I know where there's a beautiful ten-thousand-ton,
+net register, steel steamer to be bought for three hundred thousand
+dollars--”
+
+Cappy Ricks threw out an arm and pressed his hand against Redell's
+mouth.
+
+“Sh-h-h!” he warned. “Sh-h-h! Hush!”
+
+With the agility of a man half his age Cappy ran to the door, bolted it
+on the inside and returned to his desk. He was rubbing his hands and his
+eyes were aglow with interest.
+
+“What are you sh-h-h-ing about?” Redell demanded.
+
+“Matt Peasley and that cowardly Skinner. Not a word of this to them,
+Gus! Not--a--whisper!” And he winked one eye and twisted up the corner
+of his mouth knowingly. Mr. Redell nodded his promise and Cappy went on:
+“Now Gus, my dear young friend, start in at the beginning and tell me
+everything. I assume, of course, that this is real business and not
+another of your jokes on the old man. Word of honor, Gus?”
+
+“Word of honor, Cappy.”
+
+“All right; blaze away! Come, come! What have you got to offer?”
+
+“I have a condition and I offer you a half interest in it if you can
+suggest a plan to circumvent His Royal Highness, Kaiser Wilhelm--”
+
+“Hum-m-m! Enough!” Cappy interrupted, and turned to the British
+Consul: “This is an international affair, eh? See if I don't state
+the proposition in a nutshell--if I may be pardoned the bromide.
+This steamer is a German, and the proposition is to get her under the
+American flag so firmly that she'll stay there; then, I suppose,
+we're to charter her to the British Government, or one of Britain's
+allies--Russia, for instance.”
+
+J. Augustus Redell and the British Consul exchanged admiring winks.
+
+“What did I tell you, Mister Consul?” Redell declared triumphantly. “Mr.
+Ricks knows the story before we have told it. And yet he's complaining
+about the loss of his punch!”
+
+Cappy looked slightly self-conscious; it was plain the compliment
+pleased him.
+
+“Well, Gus, my boy,” he answered, “I have lost my punch, though at that
+I'm not exactly a pork-and-beaner. Hum-m-m! Ahem! Harumph-h-h! This must
+be a hard order to fill. Mister Consul, when Gus Redell has to come
+to me for help. That son of a gun can move faster and go through more
+obstacles than quicksilver. Gus, what's gone wrong with you? Have you
+lost your punch too? And at your age?”
+
+“Looks like it, Cappy. I've thought and thought until I'm desperate, and
+not an idea worth while has presented itself. That's why I've come to
+you.”
+
+“Well, I don't guarantee a cure, my boy. But I'll say this much: If you
+and I can't put this thing over, then it just isn't put-overable. Fire
+away, Gus!”
+
+“Have you ever heard of the steamer _Bavarian?”_
+
+“Of course! She belongs to Adolph Koenitz and flies the German flag.
+Since the war started she's been interned down in Mission Bay.”
+
+Redell nodded.
+
+“Adolph Koenitz never became an American citizen, despite the fact that
+he had lived in San Francisco twenty years and operated three steamers
+out of this port. He was a reserve officer in the German Navy; and when
+the war broke out he interned his ships, placed his entire estate in his
+wife's name and reported for duty. He perished in the Battle of Jutland,
+both his boys were killed at Verdun, and now his widow would like to
+sell the _Bavarian_ and get some cash. She had a large income from an
+estate in Germany, but the war cut that off.
+
+“Also, it appears that Koenitz was rather heavily involved, and the
+expense of maintaining those interned steamers, with their German crews
+aboard, has his widow badly worried; in fact, she has reached the point
+where she finds it necessary to sell one of the steamers in order to
+hang on to the other two. She has tried to raise a mortgage on the
+_Bavarian_, but nobody cares to loan money on an interned German
+steamer.”
+
+“Naturally,” Cappy replied sarcastically. “And I'm amazed that you
+should consider me boob enough to consider seriously buying the same
+steamer outright! Gus, I'd have about as much use for that steamer as
+I would have for a tail. Even if I should buy her now, and not use her
+until the war is over, I should be risking my money; for the German
+Government, if you remember, issued an order in 1915 forbidding its
+subjects to sell their interned ships without the consent of the said
+government. And, even if Mrs. Koenitz can procure the Kaiser's consent,
+I fail to see the wisdom of tying up three hundred thousand dollars in
+an idle investment.”
+
+“Ah, but under those circumstances she wouldn't be an idle investment.”
+
+“Yes, she would, my boy. Great Britain issued an Order in Council in
+1914 notifying all neutral nations that she would not sanction the
+transfer of registry of any German vessel. A few daring devils took a
+chance--and what happened? The British Navy overhauled the ships at
+sea and took them into a British port where a British prize court
+confiscated them. There is the case of the _Mazatlan_, for instance. She
+was German owned and flew the German flag; her owner put her under the
+Mexican flag, and subsequently she was sold at a bargain to one of our
+neighbors, who put her under American registry. Do you know where the
+_Mazatlan_ is now? Well, I'll tell you: She's freighting war munitions
+for Johnny Bull--and our optimistic neighbor isn't collecting the
+freight money either.”
+
+“Quite true, Mr. Ricks; quite true--in ordinary cases,” the Consul told
+him smilingly.
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet! I smell a mouse. Hum-m-m! That
+simplifies matters. We-l-l! If you are in position, Mister Consul, to
+give me your word of honor as a gentleman and an officer of your king
+that the British Navy will turn its blind side to the _Bavarian_ when
+she puts to sea, I'll buy the _Bavarian_ so fast it'll make your head
+swim. In return for this favor, of course, I am to charter the ship at
+the going rates to--”
+
+“Our ally, the Russian Government, Mr. Ricks. And you have my word of
+honor, which is all I can give you; for a deal like this, as you know,
+cannot be made in writing. I have had the matter up with the Admiralty,
+however, and permission has been granted me to give the verbal assurance
+of my government.”
+
+“I'll make a finger bet with your government, Mister Consul. As for
+Kaiser Bill's consent to the transfer--_heraus mit 'em!_ We'll get along
+without that. Wilhelm doesn't cut much ice with me these days and I'm
+willing to wager the price of the _Bavarian_ that such ice as he does
+cut will blame soon melt. Gus, you say Mrs. Koenitz wants to sell?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“And she doesn't care who buys?”
+
+“Not a particle! She's sore on the Kaiser; it's been thumbs down on
+Wilhelm ever since Adolph and the boys lost the number of their mess.
+She says to me: 'Herr Riddle, dot Kaiser orders war like I order beer!'
+However, there's an 'if' to the transfer. While we know the British
+Navy will not bother us should we buy the steamer, still enthusiastic
+Britishers all over the world will have their eyes on the _Bavarian_
+and clamor for her capture. Great Britain cannot publicly--or, at least,
+obviously--make any exceptions to her Order in Council, and we'll have
+to mess up that steamer's title and nativity to save John Bull's social
+standing. We must make a bluff at deceiving him. If we can show some
+sort of legal transfer to another flag J. B. can play blindman's buff
+with dignity and honor; otherwise nix!”
+
+Cappy Ricks' eyes sought the ceiling.
+
+“What have I done to deserve this?” he demanded of an invisible
+Presence. “Why am I afflicted thus? Job had his boils; but you and I,
+Augustus, are covered with a financial rash, bleeding at every pore, and
+with no relief in sight.”
+
+“I told you this was a tough one, Cappy. I've pondered the situation
+until my brain is addled like a last year's nest egg, and finally I've
+come to you as a last resort. If you can't cook up an airtight scheme,
+then there is no help; and I'm going to forget the _Bavarian_ and attend
+to some business more profitable and less debilitating.”
+
+“There must be an out, Gus. It's too good a thing to abandon. Suppose
+you and the Consul go away and give me time to concentrate my thoughts
+on this problem. It's a holy terror; but--Well, I've seen dogs almost as
+sick as this one cured.”
+
+“God bless you!” Mr. Redell murmured fervently. “Consul, let us depart
+and leave Mr. Ricks to himself. Call me up, Cappy, when you see a ray of
+light. Two heads are better than one, you know.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVII
+
+
+When his visitors had gone Cappy Ricks gave orders that he was not to be
+disturbed on any pretext whatever. Then he locked himself in, swung his
+legs to the top of his desk, slid low in his chair until he rested on
+his spine, bowed his head on his breast and closed his eyes. The battle
+was on.
+
+One hour later J. Augustus Redell entered breathlessly in response to a
+telephonic invitation from Cappy.
+
+“Gus,” the latter began, “am I right in assuming that you possess a
+reasonable amount of influence with that hair-trigger partner of yours,
+Live Wire Luiz?” Redell nodded. “And is Luiz absolutely trustworthy?
+Will he stay put and keep his mouth closed?”
+
+“He is my partner, Cappy. He's mercurial, but a gentleman. I'd trust him
+with my life, and I always trust him with my bank roll. He requires no
+watching.”
+
+“Good! Gus, send Live Wire Luiz down to Guaymas and have him incorporate
+the North and South American Steamship Company there, under the
+extremely flexible and evershifting laws of the Republic of Mexico. Luiz
+is a Peruvian and speaks Spanish, and knows the Mexican temperament. He
+can easily procure three Mexicans to act as a dummy board of directors;
+his own name, of course, for obvious reasons, must never appear in
+connection with this company. A thousand dollars ought to cover this
+Mexican expense.”
+
+“Consider that point attended to, Cappy.”
+
+“Fine! Now then, when this corporate vehicle is in running order and has
+opened an office in Guaymas, Live Wire Luiz will write your company, The
+West Coast Trading Company, saying that his company has been referred to
+you by some mutual friends in Guaymas. Of course Luiz doesn't sign this
+letter. It is signed by the North and South American Steamship Company,
+per the dummy secretary or president. The letter goes on to say that
+the latter company is in the market for a steamer, the general
+specifications of which, singularly enough, fit the _Bavarian._ The
+vessel is to be used for transporting troops up and down the west coast
+of Mexico and for freighting munitions from Japan; and in a delicate
+way it might be hinted that the de facto Mexican Government is the
+real buyer. A commission of five per cent is offered you for buying the
+vessel for them, said commission to be split fifty-fifty with the North
+and South American Steamship Company; this being the Mexican way of
+doing business, as you know.”
+
+“Consider that matter attended to also. I'll write the letter myself
+before Luiz starts for Guaymas, so I'll be certain the job will be done
+exactly right.”
+
+“As soon as you receive this letter you get busy and wire the North
+and South American Steamship Company that you have just the vessel they
+want, price three hundred thousand dollars. Live Wire Luiz will then
+cause a reply to that telegram to be sent, advising you that his clients
+would not balk at paying half a million! That, of course, is hint enough
+for you. Right away you see the old Mexican graft sticking out, and
+you say to yourself, 'Why not?' And you do! You reply to that telegram,
+saying you erred when naming the price in your first telegram; that it
+is five hundred thousand instead of three. Then you come down to me and
+I hand you three hundred thousand dollars in currency; for in such a
+transaction as this, checks, with their indorsements, provide a trail
+that may prove embarrassing. You take that money and deposit it in
+escrow in any local bank against a bill of sale of the _Bavarian_ from
+Mrs. Koenitz to the North and South American Steamship Company, of
+Guaymas, Mexico. Before doing so, however, have Mrs. Koenitz place
+the vessel under Mexican registry. She can do that through the Mexican
+Consul for the de facto government; and when the bill of sale is turned
+over to you, record it promptly with the Mexican Consul. Later you will
+record it in Mexico.
+
+“The vessel is now the property of the North and South American
+Steamship Company; and the North and South American Steamship Company
+is the property of Cappy Ricks and the West Coast Trading Company, per
+Senor Felipe Luiz Almeida. But we must never admit this. To have the
+North and South American Steamship Company transfer the vessel to us
+would be very coarse work indeed; so we must avoid that.”
+
+“How?”
+
+“I'll get to that presently. The steamer is now in our possession, and
+you will already have notified her German skipper and crew to hunt a
+new residence. You will then put an American skipper in charge and ship
+American engineers and a crew of parrakeets; and on the very day the
+sale is consummated, just before the customhouse closes, have the
+skipper clear the vessel for Guaymas and put to sea that night. Since
+she carries no cargo the collector of the port will not stop you; the
+risk of going to sea is all our own--if we care to take it.
+
+“The next day the newspaper boys will be hot on the trail. An interned
+German merchantman has suddenly transferred to Mexican registry and put
+to sea! Now! Inquiry at the customhouse and at the Mexican consulate
+shows that the vessel has been sold, and the trail leads straight to the
+office of the West Coast Trading Company. You are interviewed--and
+say nothing; and that day, when I appear on 'Change, these baffled
+journalists drive me into a corner and ask me what I think about it. And
+I'll tell them it's just another case of the lowly Mexican peon being
+hornswoggled by the foxy Americano. The Mexicans wanted a ship and asked
+the American to buy one for them. He did--only he forgot to tell them
+she was a German. She was such a good buy they snapped her up without
+asking questions, though in all probability the poor devils had no
+knowledge of Kaiser Wilhelm's edict that no German ships shall be sold
+without the consent of the German Government. I will say that it looks
+to me as if the ancient rule of _caveat emptor_ applied, and that the
+Mexicans are stung and have no comeback. Then, again, it may be a shrewd
+German trick to put something over.
+
+“Well, they make a snorting story out of what I give them; the frau's
+friends read it and think she's done something smart. Nobody feels
+sorry for a Mexican. Next morning you come out with a blast of righteous
+indignation and admit that you cannot or will not deny that the vessel
+was sold to parties representing the de facto Mexican Government. You
+deny, however, that you sold them a pig in a poke; and the papers print
+a copy of your letter to the North and South American Steamship Company
+specifically advising them that the vessel was a German and liable to
+prove an embarrassment. This, of course, clears you, and the blame for
+the graft is placed where it belongs--on the shoulders of the North and
+South American Steamship Company, which has deliberately stung the de
+facto government!”
+
+“Cappy,” said J. Augustus Redell admiringly, “you're immense!”
+
+“I accept the nomination. Upon her arrival in Guaymas the _Bavarian's_
+name is changed to _La Golondrina_, or _Sobre las Olas_, or _Manana_, or
+_Poco Tiempo_--whatever's right. I think we may safely gamble that she
+will arrive in Guaymas in the light of what the British Consul told us;
+and, in view of her departure unannounced, no British warship on the
+West Coast can get so far north as Guaymas in time to intercept her.
+
+“Well, having changed her name, she picks up a general cargo and comes
+back to San Francisco, where she goes on dry dock and is cleaned and
+painted, has her gear overhauled, fills up with fuel oil and stores,
+and--but that's enough. Now comes the blow-off.
+
+“Strange to relate, you haven't received a cent of that five-per-cent
+commission due you from the North and South American Steamship Company
+for buying the _Bavarian_ for them. The issue is in dispute. They claim
+you are not entitled to any commission, because you stung them with a
+German vessel; and you claim you told them she was a German, but that
+they needed her so badly they would take a chance. Also, the fact that
+she went to sea that time in such a hurry, and forgot to pay for her
+fuel oil and stores, looks rather suspicious; so, when the vessel comes
+off dry dock, with about ten thousand dollars' worth of bills against
+her, you decide to protect your claim for the commission--and, by the
+Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, Gus, you libel her! The news breaks into the
+papers, and next day every creditor of the ship files a libel on her,
+also, to protect his claim. Gus, she'll have so many plasters on her
+she'll look like a German coming home from the war.”
+
+J. Augustus Redell leaped from his chair and picked little Cappy Ricks
+up in his arms and hugged him.
+
+“Oh, Cappy! Cappy!” he yelled. “You're the shadow of a rock in a weary
+land--a cup of cool water in the suburbs of hell!”
+
+“Are you game?” Cappy gurgled.
+
+“Does a cat eat liver? Cappy, you've solved the problem! Naturally
+the North and South American Steamship Company does not directly or
+indirectly make any attempt to lift these libels and get the vessel to
+sea. Why? I'll tell you--or, rather, I'll tell the newspaper boys and
+they'll tell everybody. It will appear that as soon as the Mexican
+Consul here got an inkling of the apparent plan of the North and South
+American Steamship Company, of Guaymas, to sting Don Venustiano Carranza
+by slipping him a steamer with a clouded title, he must have wired Don
+Venustiano to round up the directors of the said company and give them
+the _ley fuga_. Fortunately for these culprits, however, they got next
+in time to get out from under. Mounting swift steeds, the entire board
+of directors fled north and east, never pausing until they had joined
+Pancho Villa; and we learn from some Border gossips that all three
+subsequently were killed in action. But, before leaving Guaymas, they
+left their tangled steamship affairs in the hands of their attorney--”
+
+“Nothing doing, Gus! They left their tangled steamship affairs in the
+hands of my attorney, and they gave him an absolute, ironclad, airtight
+power of attorney to sell the ship, receive and receipt for all money
+due the company, and so on, and so on, ad libitum, ad infinitum; said
+power of attorney being nonrevocable for five years.”
+
+“Great stuff! In due course the libelants sue in the United States
+District Court; your attorney appears for the defendants and confesses
+judgment, but pleads for a ten-day stay of execution until he can raise
+a mortgage on the vessel. But, strange to relate, the ten-day stay
+expires and the judgments against the steamer are not paid; so the judge
+of the United States District Court orders the steamer sold at public
+auction on the floor of the Merchants' Exchange to the highest bidder,
+to satisfy the claims of the creditors. Thirty days later the United
+States Marshal conducts the sale, and a gentleman named Cappy Ricks buys
+her in. The United States Marshal gives the said Ricks a bill of sale
+for her, which the said Ricks thereupon records in the United States
+Customhouse, and--”
+
+“_Und Hoch der Kaiser! Und Hoch der_ John J. Bull! We've finally got
+that clear American title we've been looking for. It makes no difference
+what the nationality of a vessel is; the minute she enters the
+territorial waters of the United States of America she is amenable to
+the laws of the United States of America, one of which reads thusly:
+'Thou shalt pay thy bills; and if thou dost not, then _poco tiempo_ thou
+shalt be made to pay them, even unto the seizure and sale of thy ship.'
+And with the purchase of that ship, under an order of sale issued by
+the United States District Court, she becomes a United States ship; we
+register her as such; and the United States simply has to stand back
+of the bill of sale it gave us. Germany knows that; England knows it;
+Austria knows it; and from the jackstaff of the late _Bavarian_, now
+renamed the _Alden M. Peasley_, in honor of my first grandson, there
+floats--”
+
+J. Augustus Redell raised his index finger, enjoining silence:
+
+“Now then! One, two, three! Down, left, up!”
+
+     _“O-ho, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
+         What so-ho pro-houdly we hailed at the twilight's last
+            gleaming?”_
+
+Cappy Ricks sprang to attention. Presently, through the partition, his
+cracked old voice reached Mr. Skinner:
+
+
+     _“Then conquer we must, when our cause is so just;
+         And this be our motto: 'May we nev-er go bust!'”_
+
+“What's doing here?” Mr. Skinner demanded, banging at the door, which
+was locked.
+
+“Go way back and sit down!” Cappy shrilled. “I'll show you and Matt
+Peasley where to head in, yet--see if I don't!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLVIII
+
+
+Cappy Ricks and J. Augustus Redell arrived at the Merchants' Exchange
+promptly at one o'clock on the date of the sale of the S. S. _General
+Carranza,_ as the _Bavarian_ was now called. Just inside the door they
+paused and looked at each other.
+
+“Whe-e-e-ew!” murmured Cappy Ricks. “All the shipping men in the world
+are here to bid on our property, Gus.”
+
+Mr. Redell whistled softly. “This,” he said, “will be some auction!”
+
+Cappy chuckled.
+
+“There is only one thing that a shipping man in this country has more
+respect for than an Order in Council--and that is an Order in the United
+States District Court!”
+
+“Naturally. It's backed up by our army and navy.”
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, somebody's sporting blood is going to be
+tested today; and something tells, me, Augustus, my dear young friend,
+that it's going to be Matt Peasley's.”
+
+“What makes you think so, Cappy?”
+
+Again Cappy chuckled.
+
+“Having used German methods to bring about this auction sale,” he
+confessed, “I concluded to steal a little more of this Teutonic stuff;
+so I established a system of espionage in Skinner's office and another
+in Matt Peasley's. Gus, I got a lot of low-down information on those two
+young pups; they're trying to slip something over on the old dog.”
+
+“Well, they'll never teach him any new tricks, Cappy.”
+
+“You know it! I observe that, as usual, Jim Searles will conduct the
+auction. He's climbing up on the block now, and, by the Toenails of
+Moses, Matt Peasley is on the job! Look, Gus! You can see his black head
+sticking up out of the heart of the riot.”
+
+As Cappy and Redell joined the crowd Jim Searles, by acclamation the
+auctioneer of the Port of San Francisco, rapped smartly with his little
+gavel, and a tense silence settled over the crowd.
+
+“This,” Mr. Searles announced, “will be a fight to a finish, winner take
+all. In accordance with an order of the United States District Court I
+am about to sell, at public auction, to the highest bidder, the Mexican
+Steamship _General Carranza_, ex-German Steamship _Bavarian_, to satisfy
+the following judgments: Mr. J. Augustus Redell--”
+
+“Cut it out!” roared Matt Peasley. “We've all read the list of
+creditors, and you're only gumming up the game. Come down to business
+Jim.”
+
+“Good boy, Peasley! Sure! Cut it out, Jim! Get busy!” A dozen voices
+seconded Captain Matt Peasley's motion and Jim Searles rapped for order.
+
+“How much am I offered?” he cried.
+
+“One million dollars!” roared Matt Peasley.
+
+On the fringe of the eager crowd Cappy Ricks leaned up against his
+friend Redell and commenced to laugh.
+
+“The young scoundrel!” he chortled. “He never said a word to me about
+this auction; he was afraid I'd butt in and block his purchase; so, for
+his impudence, I'll teach him a lesson he'll never forget. Bid, Gus! Bet
+'em as high as a hound's back.”
+
+“Captain Matt Peasley, representing the Blue Star Navigation Company,
+bids one million dollars. Chicken feed! Won't some real sport please
+tilt the ante?” Jim Searles pleaded. “Don't waste my time, gentlemen.
+It's valuable. Let's get this thing over and go back to our offices.”
+
+“One million five hundred thousand!” called J. Augustus Redell.
+
+“I called for a sport and drew a piker,” Jim Searles retorted. “Mr. J.
+Augustus Redell, of the West Coast Trading Company, bids a million and a
+half.”
+
+Young Dalton Mann, representing the Pacific Mail Steamship Company,
+raised his hand and snapped his fingers at the auctioneer.
+
+“And a hundred thousand!” he shouted.
+
+“And a hundred thousand!” Matt Peasley retorted.
+
+“And fifty thousand!” Mann flung back at him.
+
+Matt Peasley eyed his antagonist belligerently.
+
+“That's doing very well for a young fellow,” Searles complimented the
+last bidder. “Skipper Peasley, are you going to let this landlubber
+outgame you? He has bid a million and three-quarters. Think of the
+present high freight rates and speak up, or remain forever silent.”
+
+The bidding had so suddenly and by such prodigious bounds reached the
+elimination point that every piker present was afraid to open his mouth
+in the presence of these plungers. Matt Peasley licked his lips and
+glanced round rather helplessly. He knew he had about reached the limit
+of his bidding, but he suspected that Mann had reached his also.
+
+“And ten thousand!” he shouted desperately.
+
+“Cheap stuff! Cheap stuff!” the crowd jeered good-naturedly.
+
+Cappy Ricks nudged J. Augustus Redell as Mann waved his hand in token of
+surrender. “One million seven hundred and sixty thousand I am offered,”
+ the auctioneer intoned. “Any further bids?” He waited a full minute;
+then resorted to three minutes of cajolery, but in vain. There were no
+more bids.
+
+Jim Searles raised his hammer.
+
+“Going--once!” he called--and waited. “Going--twice!” Another pause.
+“Going--”
+
+“Two million dollars!” cried J. Augustus Redell; and a sigh went up from
+the excited onlookers.
+
+“Ah! Mr. Redell is a sport, after all! Two million, flat!” Searles
+looked down on Matt Peasley. “Die, dog, or eat the meat ax!” he warned
+the unhappy young man.
+
+“Let him have her,” Matt growled; and, very red of face, he commenced to
+shoulder his way through the crowd.
+
+“Beat it, Cappy; he's coming!” Redell warned the president emeritus.
+
+Cappy Ricks, dodging round the flank of the crowd, fled through the side
+entrance of the Merchants' Exchange; and he was tranquilly smoking a
+cigar in his private office when Matt Peasley dropped in on him an hour
+later. Cappy eyed him coldly.
+
+“Is Skinner back from luncheon?” he demanded. Matt nodded. “Tell him to
+come in here. I want to see him,” Cappy continued ominously. “And you
+might stick round yourself.”
+
+Mr. Skinner made his appearance.
+
+[Illustration: “Two million dollars'” cried J Augustus Redell.]
+
+“Close the door,” Cappy commanded.
+
+Mr. Skinner looked a little startled and surprised, but promptly closed
+the door.
+
+“You wanted to see me, Mr. Ricks?” he queried.
+
+Cappy Ricks edged forward until he was seated on the extreme edge of his
+chair. Then he rested a hand on each knee, bent his head, and glared at
+the unhappy Skinner over the rims of his glasses. After thirty seconds
+of this scrutiny he turned to his son-in-law.
+
+“Well,” he said, “I hear you've been attending an auction sale and
+making a star-spangled monkey of yourself bidding a million seven
+hundred and sixty thousand dollars on that Mexican steamer. Matt, have
+you taken leave of your senses?”
+
+“No, sir--not quite; but Gus Redell has. He bought her in for two
+million dollars. Of course he was acting for somebody else, because
+every cent he has is working overtime in the West Coast Trading
+Company.”
+
+“Oh!” Cappy murmured. “Then you didn't get her, after all?”
+
+“No, sir! So perhaps you'd better not holler until you're hit.” Matt
+sighed. “By Neptune,” he declared, “I'd give a cooky to know the name of
+the crazy man who paid two million dollars for that steamer!”
+
+“Behold the lunatic, Matt! Grandpa Ricks, in his second childhood! Gus
+Redell was bidding for me, sonny.”
+
+Matt Peasley sat down rather limply and stared at the president
+emeritus.
+
+“Cappy,” he said presently, “you sent a boy to do a man's work. I had
+the boat bought for a million seven hundred and sixty thousand! For
+heaven's sake, why didn't you tell me you wanted her? And I would have
+laid off. For the love of heaven, why did you go bidding against me?”
+
+“Why didn't you tell me you wanted her, you big simp?” Cappy retorted.
+“You never said a word to me; and naturally Redell thought you were
+acting for somebody else. He had orders from me to get her and damn the
+cost--and he fulfilled his orders.”
+
+“A comedy of errors, truly!” Mr. Skinner observed witheringly.
+
+Matt Peasley raised his huge arms and clenched his great fists in agony.
+
+“Oh, Cappy! Cappy!” he pleaded. “Won't you please retire? You're just
+raising hell with the organization!”
+
+“All right, Matt; I'll retire. But, before I do, I'm going to give
+Skinner a piece of my mind. Skinner, what the devil do you mean by going
+up to the Marine National Bank and borrowing a million dollars on the
+credit of the Ricks Lumber Company? I admit I have given you entire
+charge of the lumber end, and you were quite within your rights when
+you negotiated the loan and signed the note as president; but how did it
+happen that you didn't consult with the old man, if only as a matter of
+common courtesy?”
+
+“I-I-that is, I-well, I didn't mean to be discourteous, Mr. Ricks. Oh, I
+wouldn't have you think, sir--”
+
+“No; you'd have me be a dummy if you could. Why, you almost put the
+skids under me; because, when I went up to the Marine National to make a
+little personal loan in a spirit of preparedness, I discovered that the
+loan you had been given on my assets had jazzed my personal credit all
+to glory! I used to be able to borrow a million dollars on my bare note;
+but I'll be shot if they didn't make me dig up a lot of collateral this
+time! Skinner, I wouldn't have thought that of you. After trusting you
+as I have done for a quarter of a century, to find you giving me the
+double-cross just about breaks my heart. Great Godfrey, Skinner,
+how could you be so false to me? I expect that sort of thing from
+Matt--those one loves the best always swat one; but from you--Skinner,
+I don't know what prevents me from demanding your resignation here and
+now, unless it be because of your previous splendid character and loyal
+service.”
+
+“Oh, Mr. Ricks, Mr. Ricks!” Poor Skinner held up his hands appealingly
+and commenced to weep. “Please do not think ill of me. I swear--”
+
+“You loaned the Ricks Lumber Logging Company's million dollars to Matt
+Peasley to help buy that steamer for the Blue Star Navigation Company;
+and he, the son of a pirate, went to work and borrowed it from you,
+well knowing he had no business to do so. What are you paying the Marine
+National for that money?”
+
+“Five per cent,” Skinner sniffled, for his heart was broken.
+
+“What are you soaking the Blue Star Navigation Company for it?”
+
+“Six,” Skinner confessed miserably.
+
+“That's all right, Skinner, my boy. Cheer up! I forgive you. That little
+profit of one per cent saves your bacon, boy. I guess there's some good
+left in you still; and I'm happy to have this evidence that, though I
+own both companies, you have not forgotten you are responsible for the
+profit-and-loss account of one of them, and Matt Peasley for the other.
+You did quite right to claim that one per cent jerk from Matt. Business
+is business!”
+
+“Yes, you bet it is!” Matt Peasley struck in. “And I want you to lay
+off on Skinner, because what he did was done in fear and trembling, and
+under duress. We were both afraid you'd block the purchase; so we agreed
+to keep our plans secret from you, because--Well, somehow I did want
+that bully big boat the very worst way.”
+
+“And that's exactly the way you set about getting her, Matthew. However,
+you're young--you don't know any better; so I forgive you. Of course
+I realized you wanted, that steamer, boy. I knew your heart was set on
+seeing our house flag floating from her mainstruck; so I--Well, I just
+thought I'd get her for you, to sort of square myself for those two
+bonehead plays I pulled earlier in the year.”
+
+“Oh, but you shouldn't have paid two millions for her, Cappy! Business
+is one thing and sentiment is another.”
+
+“Why, I didn't pay any such price for her! Originally I bought her, as
+a German, for three hundred thousand dollars; in addition to that I've
+spent about ten thousand dollars improving her, and maybe five thousand
+more fussing up the trail of my operations so no smart secret-service
+operative could come round and hang something on me.” He reached into
+his coat pocket and drew forth the United States Marshal's bill of sale.
+“Here, sonny,” he announced, “is your Uncle Sam's certificate of title.
+Hustle up to the customhouse and get it recorded; then make out a bill
+of sale for a one-third interest to the West Coast Trading Company and
+record that also. Then change her name to _Alden M. Peasley_, in honor
+of your first-born, and put her under these two flags.”
+
+He jerked open a drawer in the desk and brought forth a bright new
+edition of Old Glory, followed by the familiar white muslin burgee with
+the blue star.
+
+“Skinner!”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“The United States Marshal has paid all the debts of the _Alden M.
+Peasley_, and this afternoon he'll send his check for the proceeds of
+the sale still remaining in his hands to my lawyer, who holds a most
+ungodly power of attorney from that dummy Guaymas corporation Live Wire
+Luiz organized to buy the ship for us. Our attorney will cash that check
+and send the cash down to you. Please bank it to my credit and take up
+that note I gave the Marine National; then get the securities I hocked
+and tuck them back in my safe-deposit vault. As for the interest at five
+per cent, which the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company will have to pay on
+that million you borrowed to help Matt Peasley hornswoggle father, you
+just charge that to your personal account as a penance for your sins. As
+for the six per cent you pay the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company for
+the money loaned your Blue Star Navigation Company, Matt Peasley, just
+charge that to your personal account as a penance for your sins.”
+
+Both culprits nodded dazedly.
+
+“Now,” Cappy continued, “I'll tell you something else: The _Alden M.
+Peasley_ belongs to the West Coast Trading Company and Alden P. Ricks;
+they own one-third for bringing the deal to my attention and furnishing
+some labor, and I own two-thirds, or the lion's share, for doing a
+lion's work--to wit, putting up the cash and promoting the deal to a
+clean title. Consequently, though you two boys own a nice little block
+of stock in the Blue Star Navigation Company, you don't own a red cent
+in the _Alden M. Peasley_, because she doesn't belong to the Blue Star
+Navigation Company, but to the president emeritus thereof. However, as
+I am about to retire for keeps this time, I'll tell you what I purpose
+doing with my two-thirds of the _Alden M. Peasley_: Skinner, my dear
+boy, I kidded you into tears. Bless you, boy, it broke your heart when
+you thought your old boss figured you'd quit being Faithful Fido,
+didn't it? Skinner, loyalty like yours is very, very precious; and your
+affection is--er--Skinner, you human icicle, you can't bluff me! I'm on
+to you, young feller! Matt, you prepare a deed of gift for one-half of
+my two-thirds interest to Skinner, and take the other half for yourself;
+and when the _Alden M. Peasley_ has earned what I put into her, credit
+my account with it. After that, you and Skinner and Gus Redell and Live
+Wire Luiz can collect the dividends.”
+
+“Oh, Mr. Ricks! This is too much,” Skinner began.
+
+“Tut, tut, sir! Not a peep out of you, sir! How dare you argue with me?
+Now just one word more before you fellers go: The next time you boys go
+bidding on a ship at auction, take a leaf out of Cappy Ricks' book and
+bid against yourself! You can always scare the other fellows off that
+way; the sky is the limit--and you're bound to get your money back. So
+you should _Ish ka bibble_.
+
+“Now you two young freshies go back to your desks and try to learn
+humility. Thus endeth the first lesson, my children.”
+
+Matt Peasley came close to Cappy and put his big arm round the little
+old man.
+
+“Cappy,” he whispered, “please don't retire!”
+
+“All right, son,” Cappy answered; “but get that infernal cry-baby,
+Skinner, out of my office. He's breaking my heart.”
+
+If J. Augustus Redell had been content to sue for peace following his
+deal with Cappy in Australian wheat, all would have been well for that
+young man. Alas! As we have already stated, he was young--and there
+is an old saying to the effect that youth must be served. J. Augustus
+Redell, like Oliver Twist, desired more. His triumph over Cappy in the
+wheat deal merely whetted his desire for more of the Ricks blood, and
+in the end the ingenious rascal evolved a plan for making Cappy the
+laughing stock of the Bilgewater Club for a month of Sundays.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XLIX
+
+
+MONSIEUR LE CAPITAINE RICKS
+
+Cappy Ricks entered his office at the unheard-of hour of eight-thirty.
+On his way to his sanctum at the end of the long suite of offices Cappy
+paused in the lair of Mr. Skinner, who looked up, amazed.
+
+“Hello!” he saluted the president emeritus. “What brings you down on the
+job so early this morning, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“I've got a hen on,” Cappy replied briskly. He glanced at Skinner and
+rubbed his hands together. “Skinner, my dear boy,” he continued, “this
+is a one-horse concern.”
+
+“Three sawmills with a combined output of a million feet a day on a
+ten-hour shift--not to mention a billion feet of stumpage--isn't my idea
+of a one-horse concern,” Mr. Skinner retorted with some asperity.
+
+“Tut, tut, Skinner! I'm not referring to the lumber end at all; so don't
+get touchy. I'm referring to the Blue Star Navigation Company. It's a
+dinky proposition.
+
+“Forty-two vessels--windjammers, steam schooners and foreign-going
+freighters--” began Mr. Skinner; but Cappy cut him short:
+
+“Foreign-going grandmothers! We've got the _Narcissus_ and the
+_Tillicum_.”
+
+“How about my boat--the _John P. Skinner?_”
+
+“Oh, yes! That one we scraped up off the bottom of Papeete Harbor,”
+ Cappy answered maliciously. “Well, that makes three; and really the
+_Skinner_ and the _Narcissus_ are the only vessels built to go foreign.
+Remember, Skinner, we built the _Tillicum_, for the coast-wise lumber
+trade, even though she's so big our competitors thought when we launched
+her we were crazy to build such a whale for that trade.”
+
+“Well, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“We ought to have more big bottoms, Skinner. We'll have hell-cracking
+freight rates during the war and for a long time thereafter--and here we
+sit round like a lot of dubs, too conservative to help ourselves to the
+gravy. Why, you and Matt Peasley ought to be knitting socks in an old
+ladies' home, for all the progressiveness you're displaying.”
+
+“I am not in charge of the shipping end, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“No; but you've got a tongue in your head, haven't you? You were
+practically in charge of the Blue Star for more than six months--during
+the entire period Matt was at sea in the _Retriever_ and we thought he
+was a goner. Why, dog-gone you, Skinner, even when you thought Matt was
+dead you didn't suggest increasing the fleet. I'm surprised, Skinner, my
+boy, that in my old age, after gathering a lot of young fellows round me
+to carry on the business, I've still got to be the bell mare!”
+
+Mr. Skinner had nothing to say to this; if he had it is doubtful whether
+he would have said it, for he had been too long with Cappy Ricks not
+to know the signs when the old gentleman took the bit in his teeth and
+declared for a new deal.
+
+“I'm going into my office to do some tall thinking, Skinner,” Cappy
+continued. “Remember! No visitors until I've threshed this whole
+business out to my satisfaction. I'm not in to anybody.”
+
+Cappy retired to his office, sat down on his spine in his upholstered
+swivel chair, swung his thin old shanks to the top of his desk, bowed
+his head on his breast, and closed his eyes. Scarcely had he done so
+when the door opened and Matt Peasley thrust his head in.
+
+“Well, Matt?” Cappy queried without opening his eyes.
+
+“I have an offer of forty thousand dollars for our old bark _Altair_,
+Cappy. What do you think we ought to do?”
+
+“Take it!” Cappy shrilled. “You jibbering jackdaw! Grab it! She's been
+a failure since the day I built her; never balanced, always burying her
+nose in the seas, and drowning a sailor about once a year. If we keep
+that ship much longer she'll sail herself under some day and we'll be
+out the forty thousand. _Altair!_ Fancy name! Skinner got it out of Ben
+Hur. He'd been in the shipping game ten years then and hadn't learned
+that was the name of a star! We should have called her the _Water
+Spaniel_. Sell her, Matt, and we'll put the money into a steamer that
+can run foreign.”
+
+“If you can tell me where we can buy, even at three times her intrinsic
+value, a steamer that will run foreign, I'm willing to consider selling
+the _Altair_. Just at present she's earning big dividends; and until we
+can find a place to invest her selling price, the money will earn six
+per cent instead of sixty, as at present.”
+
+“Clear out and let me think!” Cappy commanded, and Matt Peasley retired
+to Mr. Skinner's office.
+
+“Have you noticed the old gentleman lately?” he inquired of Skinner.
+“Ever since his grandson arrived grandpa has been paying attention to
+business.”
+
+“He's dissatisfied with his own and our efforts thus far. He thinks he's
+been a piker and that you and I are his first-assistant pikers. He has
+ships on the brain.”
+
+“He's getting pretty cocky,” Matt agreed; “but, at that, I guess he has
+a license to be.”
+
+“I've been with him twenty-six--yes, twenty-seven--years; and I know
+him, Matt. He's cooking up something prodigious--and it will soon be
+done.”
+
+The door of Cappy's office opened and Cappy stood in the entrance.
+
+“Skinner,” he ordered, “get me a letter of credit for about twenty
+thousand dollars. I'm going travelling.”
+
+“Where?” Matt and Skinner queried in chorus.
+
+“To Europe.”
+
+“You're not!” Matt Peasley declared. “You're liable to be torpedoed en
+route.”
+
+“I know, but then, too, I'm liable not to be; and if I am, why, I'm an
+old man, and I'll only be cheating the devil by a few years or a few
+months. Come in here, you two dead ones.”
+
+They followed him into his office.
+
+“We need some steamers,” Cappy announced. “Every shipyard in the United
+States that could build the kind of steamer we want is full up with
+contracts for the next three years; so I'm going to Norway or Sweden
+or Denmark, or some non-belligerent European country, and see whether I
+can't place some contracts there for a couple of real freighters. Then,
+too, I may be able to pick up good vessels over there at a reasonable
+price. Under the Emergency Shipping Act we can get them provisional
+American registry--and that's all we need. Before a great while Uncle
+Sam is going to turn his antiquated shipping laws inside out, and any
+foreign-built boats we may acquire now will be given the right to run in
+the coastwise trade also.”
+
+“See here, Cappy,” Matt reminded the old man; “you're retired and I'm
+in charge of the destinies of the Blue Star Navigation Company. I don't
+want you working yourself to death.”
+
+“You mean you don't want me butting in. Nonsense! What's the use of
+having a grandson if a fellow doesn't hustle up something for the boy to
+sharpen his teeth on when he grows up? Here I've been living from day to
+day, just marking time on the road to eternity and figuring life wasn't
+worth while because the stock was going to die out with me. Up until
+recently I was content with a little old one-horse business; but now, by
+the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, boy, we've got to get out and shake a leg!
+Freighters! That's what we want. Big, well-decked tramps, flying the
+Stars and Stripes in every port on earth. Why, what kind of a nation are
+we getting to be, anyway? We're a passel of mollycoddles, asleep on the
+job. We haven't half enough ships to coal our navy. In the event of war
+it would take us a week to dig up ships enough to transport the New York
+Police Department. I tell you, Matt, when I'm gone you'll have to have
+something for that grandson of mine to do or he'll grow up into one of
+these idle-rich, ne'er-do-well, two-for-a-quarter dudes. You bet I've
+been doing a deal of thinking lately. We can't send that boy to college,
+and spoil him before he's twenty-five. We'll run that young man through
+high school; just about that time he'll begin to get snobbish and we'll
+take that out of him by sending him to sea as a cadet on one of our own
+ships. We'll teach him democracy--that's what we'll teach him. When
+he's twenty-one he'll be a skipper like his forebears and you'll be only
+about forty-six. Good Lord! To think of you two young fellows running my
+Blue Star ships--and not enough ships to keep you busy! Preposterous! I
+can't consider--Well, Hankins, my dear boy, what's troubling you?”
+
+Mr. Hankins, the secretary, had entered.
+
+“I wanted to see Mr. Skinner a moment. I'll wait. Didn't know you were
+busy.”
+
+And he started to retire. Cappy checked him: “Finish with Skinner,
+Hankins. He'll be in consultation here with Matt and me for an hour
+yet.”
+
+“I just wanted to know, Mr. Skinner, whether all those cablegrams to
+Captain Landry, of the _Altair_, are to be charged to general expense,
+Captain Landry's personal account, or to the _Altair_.”
+
+“It seems to me you should charge them to Captain Landry, Hankins,”
+ Mr. Skinner spoke up. “It isn't ship's business and it isn't Blue Star
+business. If he wants this office to cable him every day about his
+family--”
+
+“Here! What's this you're talking about, Skinner?” Cappy interrupted.
+
+“When Captain Landry sailed for Callao his wife didn't accompany him--”
+
+“Lucky rascal! He told me he was expecting an heir.”
+
+“And he's still expecting that heir.”
+
+“Naturally,” Mr. Hankins explained, “he's been anxious for news;
+and ever since his arrival in Callao he's cabled us every other
+day--latterly every day--asking whether the baby has been born, and
+whether it's a boy or a girl.”
+
+“A very pardonable human curiosity, my boy. Proceed.”
+
+“Unfortunately the baby appears to be held up on demurrage and I think
+we've spent at least fifty dollars cabling to Landry that the youngster
+has failed to report. I imagine the skipper has spent twice that sum
+inquiring for news--”
+
+“Of course! It's his first baby, isn't it? You must allow for human
+nature.”
+
+“I thought we would--for the first half dozen cablegrams; but after it
+became a habit it appeared that Landry ought to pay for his fancies.”
+
+“He should,” Mr. Skinner declared firmly. “Charge the cablegrams to
+Landry.”
+
+“Nothing doing!” piped Cappy. “Charge 'em to general expense. Dang you,
+Skinner, I despair of ever breaking you of that habit of operating on
+the cheap!”
+
+“Oh, very well, sir--only the expense is getting to be quite an item.”
+
+“I'm just about to send him another cablegram,” Mr. Hankins declared
+fretfully. “The _Altair_ is due to sail from Callao and the baby is
+still unborn; it will be two months old, at least, before the skipper
+gets any further news.”
+
+“Let's see your cablegram,” Cappy ordered, and Mr. Hankins passed
+it over. Cappy read it. “Holy suffering sailor!” he cried. “Why this
+concern isn't in the hands of a receiver is a mystery to me.” He looked
+up at Mr. Hankins with blood in his eye. “Here you are, Hankins, trying
+to saddle a bill of expense on a poor, heartbroken, anxious, embryo
+parent-to-be. Knowing full well that he only makes a hundred and
+fifty dollars a month, you admit to an endeavor to stick him for fifty
+dollars' worth of cablegrams from this end, not to mention those from
+his end. If you had spent your time, sir, figuring out a way to cut down
+that cable expense, instead of discovering a rotten way to get rid of
+it--Why, look here! You can use your code book and save a couple of
+dollars.”
+
+“Code book!” Mr. Hankins protested indignantly. “Why, who ever heard of
+a code book for cabling on baby business?”
+
+“Use your shipping code. Here; hand me that code book. There's bound
+to be something to fit the occasion--there always is. Hum-m-m! Ahem!
+Harumph-h-h! Let us see what we shall see under the head of cargoes;
+Loading! Discharging! Demurrage! Ahem! That won't do. He'd be liable to
+confuse it with the ship's business. Harumph-h-h! Arrivals. Now we have
+it. Landry has been asking of an expected arrival, hasn't he?” Cappy
+ran his index finger down the page. “Here you are, Hankins. Hum-m-m!
+Afilamos--meaning no new arrivals. Naturally Landry will say to himself:
+'Well, for heaven's sake, when will that child arrive?' We should
+enlighten him on that point.”
+
+“We cannot.”
+
+“Very well, then. Say so. Here you are. Affumicata--meaning: We cannot
+guarantee time of arrival. Hankins, have you talked with Mrs. Landry's
+physician in order to get the latest ringside reports?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“What does he say?”
+
+“Well, he says he thinks it will be twins, in a couple of days at the
+most.”
+
+“Good news! Here you are. Afilaba--meaning: Heavy arrivals expected
+shortly. Now then, Hankins, he'll want some news of his wife, won't he?
+How about her?”
+
+“She went to the hospital this morning.”
+
+Cappy closed his eyes and pondered; then once more took up the code
+book. Followed a silence. Then:
+
+“Bully! He'll understand perfectly, being a sailor. Desdoble--meaning:
+Is now in dry dock. And, of course, Landry will want to know whether his
+wife is in any danger. Danger! Danger! Ships are sometimes in danger.
+When? When they're wrecked, of course. Let us look under the head of
+wrecks... No; nothing seems to fill the bill. Wreck, wrecked, worse,
+writ, write, wrong--ah, I have it! Wohlgemuth--meaning: There is nothing
+wrong.” He looked up at Mr. Hankins. “Now there's the kind of cablegram
+to send--even on baby business. Those four code words translated mean:
+No new arrivals; heavy arrivals expected shortly; is now in dry dock;
+there is nothing wrong. Literally translated it means: Baby not born
+yet; twins expected shortly; your wife now in hospital; everything
+lovely! I suppose, Hankins, you have carbon copies of all these
+cablegrams you've been sending?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Code them all, so far as possible, and ascertain how much money you
+might have saved the Blue Star by the exercise of a little common sense;
+then charge the cablegrams, on the coded basis, to our general expense,
+and charge to your personal account the sum you might have saved by the
+exercise of the ingenuity and efficiency I have a right to expect of a
+man who draws down as fat a salary as you do.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER L
+
+
+Mr. Hankins withdrew, greatly crestfallen, and the despot of the Blue
+Star office turned to his trusted lieutenants.
+
+“Well,” he declared, “one after the other you have to come to the old
+man to be shown. I guess I've proved to you two boys this morning that
+I'm to be trusted with buying a few ships and letting contracts for a
+few more, haven't I?”
+
+“I don't like the idea of Cappy Ricks on a steamer that's likely to be
+torpedoed. I don't want you to go to Europe alone--”
+
+“I'm not going alone. Captain Mike Murphy, our new port captain, is
+going with me. I wouldn't think of buying a steamer unless that splendid
+fellow O.K.'d the hull. And Terry Reardon, our new port engineer, will
+accompany me also. Terry has to O.K. the engines. Between the three of
+us, it's going to take a smart trader to sell us any junk, I'm telling
+you!”
+
+“I ought to go with you,” Matt suggested.
+
+“You have your work at home, attending to the fleet. It isn't much of a
+fleet, I'll admit; but such as it is it requires some attention. I'll be
+the chief scout of this organization and see whether I can't rustle
+up some major-league vessels from some of those bush-league European
+owners.”
+
+“I've had a fine time getting good men to take their places in the
+_Narcissus_ since you promoted Mike and Terry in my absence!” Matt
+complained. “Mike and Terry know her well--and she's such a big brute to
+handle.”
+
+“Where is the _Narcissus_, by the way?”
+
+“Loading nitrate at Tocopilla and Antofagasta, Chile. This is her last
+voyage under the old charter.”
+
+“Got any new business in sight for her?”
+
+“I won't have the slightest difficulty getting another nitrate charter
+and at a rate double what she's been getting.”
+
+“Every vessel taken off the nitrate run stiffens the freight rate in
+these days, when they have to have so much nitrate in the manufacture
+of war munitions,” the astute Cappy declared. “If I were you, Matt,
+I'd find her a good outside cargo or two, and then slip her back in the
+nitrate business again. Freights may have advanced in the interim.”
+
+“I have a mighty profitable cargo offered me this morning, Cappy. An
+agent of the British Government called on me and offered a whopping
+price for carrying a cargo of mules and horses from Galveston to Havre.
+I think I shall turn the proposition down. It's too dangerous, Cappy.”
+
+“You mean we might have our ship blown up by a German submarine?”
+
+Matt nodded.
+
+“Well, we'd collect our freight in advance, wouldn't we? And the British
+Government will guarantee to reimburse us if the ship is lost, will it
+not? Well, then, where's the risk?”
+
+“There's the danger to the crew.”
+
+“Any man that goes to sea knows he has to take a chance. Bet you Mike
+Murphy could take that cargo of livestock across and bring another cargo
+back. He's luckier than a cross-eyed coon. And another thing, Matt:
+If you accept that business we can kill two birds with one stone--yes,
+three--because Mike and Terry and I will cross over on the _Narcissus_
+and save the price of transportation from here to New York, and from New
+York to Liverpool. Then, while the _Narcissus_ is discharging and taking
+on another cargo, we'll go scouting for available steamers.”
+
+“It might be done, though I hate to think of it Cappy. If we lose the
+vessel they'll pay us a million and a half for her, of course--and she
+cost us less than three hundred thousand a year ago. And, as you say,
+we'll collect the freight in advance. They're very anxious to get the
+_Narcissus_. She's a whopping big boat, and that's the kind of a vessel
+they need for a horse transport.”
+
+“Yes; and, by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, it will be a bully vacation,
+and a bully vacation is something I haven't had since the night of the
+big wind in Ireland. Moreover, I combine business with pleasure, which
+is always desirable; and, if that isn't excuse enough, I want to tell
+you it's cheaper to travel dead-head on our own boats than to pay for
+three round-trip tickets to Europe on a Cunard liner.”
+
+“But suppose a German submarine--”
+
+“Matt, all my life I've played a quiet, safe, sane, conservative game.
+I've always longed for adventure and never had it. Why, just consider a
+moment what a tiresome thing life would be were it not for the
+prospect of death at any moment! That's all that keeps us hustling,
+my boy--trying to put over a winning run before the game is called on
+account of darkness. Hell's bells! Don't try to scare me with a sheet
+and the rattle of old bones. Suppose they do blow us up? We don't lose a
+dollar; in fact, we make money--and we can take to the boats, can't we?”
+
+“They only give you fifteen minutes--”
+
+“We'll have the boats swung overside, provisioned and ready, two days
+ahead.”
+
+“But they don't care how far out to sea they leave you. I spent two
+weeks in an open boat once and I know you can't stand two days. The
+exposure--”
+
+“When we get down to Galveston,” Cappy interrupted triumphantly, “I'll
+have Mike Murphy buy a nice, staunch little secondhand motor cruiser,
+thirty-eight or forty feet long, with plenty of power and comfortable
+living accommodations for half a dozen people. Mike will arrange for
+extra oil and gasoline tankage, and we'll swing this cruiser in on the
+main deck and let it rest there in a cradle, with the slings round it,
+ready to lift overside with the cargo derricks at a minute's notice.
+I'll be as snug in that little cruiser as a bug under a chip--and we'll
+tow the lifeboats. So that settles it--and if it doesn't I'd like to
+know who's the boss of this shebang, anyhow!”
+
+Mr. Skinner glanced covertly at Captain Matt Peasley and shook his head
+almost imperceptibly, as who should say: “Better give in to him, Matt.
+I know him longer than you do; he'll have his way if it kills him.”
+ And Matt took the hint, with the result that some six weeks later Cappy
+Ricks, accompanied by his faithful port captain and his equally faithful
+port engineer, cleared for Galveston aboard the Sunset Limited. And at
+Galveston began the only real vacation Cappy Ricks had ever had.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LI
+
+
+To begin, there was the task of superintending the installation of the
+accommodations for the cargo of mules and horses. Cappy was particularly
+interested in the ventilating system below decks, for he was fond of
+horses and had resolved to deliver the cargo without the loss of a
+single animal. Of no mediocre turn of mind mechanically, he, assisted by
+Terry Reardon, made a few suggestions that the British veterinaries in
+charge were very glad to accept.
+
+The real enjoyment of the trip, however, Cappy found down at the
+breaking corrals where the horses were detraining. They were all young
+and full of life, and fully ninety per cent of them had only been
+halter-broken. In the lot was many an outlaw whose ancestors had run
+wild for generations in Nevada; and as the delivery contract specified
+that a horse to be accepted must be broken--God save the mark!--as
+Terence Reardon remarked after seeing one passed as broken, following
+five minutes of furious pitching and squealing--Cappy Ricks was one of
+the first at the corral and the last to leave. Perched on the topmost,
+rail, he piped encouragement to the lank, flat-bellied border busters
+who, a dozen times a day, risked life and limb at five dollars a bust.
+
+Mike Murphy and Terence Reardon, who had ridden more than one China Sea
+typhoon and West India hurricane, marvelled that men should take such
+risks for any amount of money. Privately they considered Cappy Ricks
+an accessory before the fact, inasmuch as Cappy hung up at least five
+hundred dollars in small prizes for the vaqueros. Whenever they had
+a “bad one” they could always induce Cappy to offer ten dollars for
+staying two minutes and five dollars a minute for each minute over the
+limit--which seldom reached two minutes. Also, Cappy was willing to
+furnish two silver dollars whenever some adventurer thought he could put
+a dollar between each leg and the saddle and have the dollars there when
+the horse surrendered. They ran in a couple of trained buckers on Cappy
+and depleted his bank roll considerably before he began to smell a rat.
+
+To these plainsmen, charged with the destinies of the mounts for the
+young British soldier, Cappy Ricks was known familiarly as Cap. Before
+the last of the horses had been passed as broken and hustled aboard the
+big _Narcissus_, Cappy knew each horse wrangler by his first name or
+nickname, and had learned the intricacies of many hitherto unheard-of
+games of chance that flourish along the Rio Grande. He was an expert
+at cooncan, and Pangingi fascinated him; then they taught him Mexican
+monte, and one worthless individual stole an ace out of the deck,
+whereupon all hands had a joyous hack at Cappy, who, when informed
+privately by his friend, Sam Daniels, foreman of the outfit, that he
+was in bad company and being skinned alive, went uptown and bought some
+specially constructed dice, which he introduced brazenly into a crap
+game, thereby more than catching even. He was the last man in the world
+a gang of wicked cowboys would suspect of guile; all of them, quite
+foolishly, thought he had more money than brains.
+
+Eventually, however, the _Narcissus_ was loaded, Cappy moved into the
+owner's suite, and his new-found friends bunked in a temporary deck
+house forward when they weren't busy below decks playing chambermaid to
+the cargo. And with Cappy's motor cruiser swung in the cradle, ready
+for launching from the main deck aft, the _Narcissus_ slipped out of
+Galveston and went snoring across the Gulf of Mexico, bound for Le
+Havre.
+
+Mike Murphy was not happy, however. He resented Cappy Ricks, who would
+persist in going below to inspect the cargo and in consequence smelled
+like a hostler. Moreover, Michael was the port captain of the Blue
+Star Navigation Company now and not the master of the ship; and the
+_Narcissus_ wasn't out of sight of land before Mike made the discovery
+that the boatswain of the ship was absolutely inefficient, that the cook
+was wasteful, that the first officer was too talkative, and the skipper
+too easy-going.
+
+And these conditions, on a ship he had once commanded, irked Murphy
+exceedingly. Terence Reardon was in much the same state of mind. Being
+port engineer, he investigated the engine room and found that his
+favorite monkey wrench had been lost; there were two leaky tubes in
+the main boiler; the ash hoist was out of kilter; his successor in the
+_Narcissus_ was carrying ten pounds of steam less than Terence used to
+carry; and there was something not quite right with the condenser.
+The engine room crew Terence characterized to Mike Murphy as a gang of
+“vagabones,” and hinted darkly at sweeping changes when the ship should
+get back to the United States. Once he went so far as to state that he
+might have expected as much when, upon leaving the _Narcissus_ to become
+port engineer, he had given her to his old first assistant; since he had
+never known a first assistant, barring himself, to make a good chief!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LII
+
+
+On the very day the _Narcissus_ left Galveston the German submersible
+V-l4 left her base at Zeebrugge, with oil and torpedoes sufficient to
+last her on an ordinary three weeks' cruise, and promptly headed for
+that section of the Atlantic where information and belief told her
+commander the hunting would be good. And it was--so good, in fact, that
+to the very great disgust of her crew she had just two torpedoes in
+stock when the man on watch at her periscope reported a large freight
+steamer to the west. Promptly the V-l4 submerged and proceeded on
+a course calculated to intercept the freighter, which presently was
+discovered to be the U.S.S. _Narcissus_.
+
+The captain of the V-l4 almost licked his chops. He had heard of the
+_Narcissus_. The neutrality laws of the United States had prevented him
+from hearing of her by wireless when she cleared from Galveston, but
+he had been on the lookout for her, just the same, ever since a Dutch
+steamer from New York, with an alert German chief mate, had touched at
+Copenhagen, from which point the dispatches that mate carried had
+gone underground straight to the office of the German Admiralty. The
+information anent the _Narcissus_ had been brief but illuminating:
+She had been chartered to carry horses for the British Government from
+Galveston to Le Havre, and the word to get her at all hazards had been
+passed to the submarine flotilla.
+
+Captain Emil Bechtel, of the V-l4, did not possess an Iron Cross of any
+nature whatsoever, and as he studied the oncoming _Narcissus_ through
+the periscope he reflected that this big brute of a boat would bring him
+one, provided he was lucky. He remembered he had but two torpedoes left,
+and under the circumstances he paused to consider.
+
+Clearly--since the _Narcissus_ was laden with horses and mules for the
+enemy she was carrying contraband--she must not escape. On the other
+hand, there had been a deal of unpleasantness of late because President
+Wilson had been protesting the sinking of vessels without warning--and
+the _Narcissus_ was a United States steamer. Consequently if he
+torpedoed her without warning the temperamental Kaiser might make of
+Captain Emil Bechtel what is colloquially known as the goat; whereas,
+on the other hand, should he conform to international law and place her
+crew in safety before sinking her, there was a chance that her wireless
+might summon a patrol boat to the vicinity--Bechtel had sighted one less
+than an hour before--and patrol boats had a miserable habit, when they
+sighted a periscope, of shooting it to pieces.
+
+Then, too, it was just possible that the perfidious English had mounted
+a couple of six-inch guns on her after getting to sea--and the German
+knew a six-inch shell, well-placed, would send his vessel to the bottom.
+Moreover, it was sunset; in half an hour it would be twilight; he had
+no knowledge of the speed of the _Narcissus_ and she might try to make a
+run for it, thus forcing him to come to the surface and shell her should
+he miss with his torpedoes. Further, if he attacked her and she escaped,
+there was an elderly gentleman with whiskers back in Berlin who would do
+things to him if the Kaiser didn't.
+
+There was, however, one course open to the German. To his way of
+thinking, during the exciting diplomatic tangle with the United States,
+he would be damned if he did and damned if he didn't; but if he did, and
+nobody could prove it, old Von Tirpitz would ask no questions.
+
+“I'll let her have it,” Captain Emil Bechtel concluded; and he passed
+the word to get ready.
+
+A minute later Cappy Ricks, smoking his after-dinner cigar on the bridge
+of the Narcissus with her skipper and Mike Murphy, pointed far off the
+port bow.
+
+“There's a shark or a swordfish, or something, breaching,” he said. “I
+can see his wake.”
+
+Mike Murphy took a casual glance in the direction Cappy was pointing,
+while the master of the _Narcissus_ reached for his marine glasses and
+lazily put them to his eyes.
+
+“Shark be damned!” yelled Murphy. “It's a torpedo or I'm a Chinaman!
+Hard-a-starboard!”
+
+He leaped for the engine-room telegraph and jammed it over to Full Speed
+Astern; then dashed into the pilot house and commenced a furious ringing
+of the ship's bell, summoning the crew to boat drill, the while his
+anxious eye marked the swift progress of the white streak coming toward
+them. What wind there was happened fortunately to be on the vessel's
+port counter, and as the helmsman spun the wheel the big vessel fell off
+quickly and easily, while the rumble of her shaft, suddenly reversed,
+fairly shook the ship. To Cappy Ricks it seemed that the vessel must be
+brought up standing, like one of the broncos he had seen ridden with
+a Spanish bit; but a big ship under full headway is not stopped very
+abruptly, and the _Narcissus_ swept on, turning as she went in order to
+offer as little target as possible to the torpedo.
+
+“Will we make it, Mike?” Cappy Ricks queried in a very small, awed
+voice.
+
+Mike Murphy turned and found his owner at his elbow.
+
+“I hope it hits her forward,” he replied. “That motor cruiser is cradled
+aft and we might save it. They never hailed us--ah-h-h, missed!”
+
+The torpedo flew by, missing the big blunt bow by less than three feet.
+
+“I guess they'll get us just the same,” Mike Murphy murmured quietly;
+“but we're going down fighting.”
+
+And, disregarding the master of the _Narcissus_, who was staring
+vacantly after the flying torpedo, he rang for Full Speed Ahead, and
+called down the speaking tube to the chief to hook her on for all he
+had; then, with his helm still hard-a-starboard, he swung the ship in
+as small a circle as possible and headed her at full speed back over the
+course so recently traveled by the torpedo.
+
+“That was a beautifully timed shot--that last one,” he informed Cappy
+Ricks admiringly. “If we'd sighted it thirty seconds later--”
+
+“Where the devil are you going, man?” Cappy yelled frantically.
+
+“I'm going to give that fellow a surprise,” Murphy growled. “He expected
+us to run for it after that first one missed--and I'm running for him!
+He may not get me with the next one if I come bows on--and I might ram
+him! I'll take a chance. Keep your eyes open for his periscope.”
+
+Aboard the V-l4 Captain Emil Bechtel said nothing, but thought a great
+deal--when he saw that his first torpedo had missed its prey. He was
+in for it now; he had started something and he had to go through. And,
+anticipating that the _Narcissus_ would show him her heels and steer
+a zigzag course, he immediately launched his last torpedo as the horse
+transport lay quartering to him.
+
+To his disgust, however, the steamer, having avoided the first torpedo,
+did not run as he had anticipated. Instead, she continued to turn round
+on her heels, each revolution of her wheel lifting her out of the course
+of the second torpedo, since the submarine had fired slightly ahead of
+the vessel, knowing that if she continued for two minutes on the course
+he expected her to take she would steam fairly across the path of the
+huge missile. So he missed again--the torpedo slid under her stern--and
+here was that demon horse transport bearing down on him at full speed
+and with a bone in her teeth.
+
+“The jig is up,” murmured Bechtel, and gave the order to submerge
+deeper, for he would not risk showing his periscope to the keen eyes on
+that bridge.
+
+For ten minutes he waited, while the submarine scuttled blindly out
+of the path of the onrushing transport; then, concluding that the
+_Narcissus_ had passed him, he came up and took a look round. He was
+right. A cable length astern and another off his port quarter the
+steamer was plunging over the darkening sea, and Captain Emil Bechtel
+knew he had her now; so promptly he came to the surface.
+
+Mike Murphy, glancing off his starboard quarter, saw her periscope come
+swiftly up; then her turret showed; then her turtle deck flashed for a
+moment on the surface, like a giant fish, before she rose higher and the
+water cascaded down her sides.
+
+Cappy Ricks' anxious face turned a delicate green; he glanced up at his
+bully port captain as if in that rugged personality alone could he hope
+for salvation. Murphy caught the glance, shook his head, walked over to
+the engine-room telegraph and set the handle over to stop.
+
+“No use, sir,” he informed Cappy. “That Dutchman is out of torpedoes, so
+he's coming up to shell us. We'll heave to and save funeral expenses.”
+ He turned to the master of the _Narcissus_. “Captain, I'll stay on the
+bridge and conduct all negotiations with that fellow; get your mates,
+round up everybody and prepare to abandon the ship in a hurry. Get the
+motor cruiser overside first.”
+
+As the captain hurried away, Terence Reardon came up on the bridge. The
+port engineer's gloomy visage portended tears, but through his narrowed
+lids Cappy Ricks saw not tears, but the light of murder. Terence did
+not speak, but thoughtfully puffed his pipe, and, with Murphy and Cappy
+Ricks, watched the booby hatch on the submarine's deck slide back and
+her long, slim, three-inch gun appear, like the tongue of a huge viper.
+
+Heads appeared round the breech of the gun; so Michael J. Murphy seized
+a megaphone and shouted:
+
+“_Nein! Nix!_” accompanying his words with wild pantomime that meant
+“Don't shoot!”
+
+Captain Emil Bechtel was vastly relieved. He was not an inhuman man,
+even if, on occasion, as has already been demonstrated, he could, for
+the sake of national expediency, sink a ship without warning. Having
+missed with both torpedoes, he could now, in the event of national
+complications, enter a vigorous denial of any affidavits alleging an
+attempted breach of international law, and his government would uphold
+him. This knowledge rendered him both cheerful and polite, as he hove to
+some hundred yards to starboard of the _Narcissus_ and informed Captain
+Michael J. Murphy that the latter had just fifteen minutes in which to
+save the ship's company; whereat Michael J. proved himself every inch a
+sailor, while Terence P. proved himself a marine engineer. If there was
+a word of opprobrium, mundane or nautical, which the port skipper didn't
+shout at that submarine commander, the port engineer supplied it. In
+all his life Cappy Ricks had never listened to such rich, racy, unctuous
+abuse; it lifted itself about the level of the commonplace and became a
+work of art. Cappy was horrified.
+
+“Boys! Boys!” he pleaded. “This is frightful!”
+
+“What do you expect from a German, sir?” Murphy demanded. “Frightfulness
+is his middle name.”
+
+“I mean you two--and your language. Stop it! You'll contaminate me.”
+
+“Well, sor,” Terence Reardon replied philosophically, “I suppose there's
+small use cryin' over spilt milk--musha, what are they up to now?”
+
+“They're dragging a collapsible boat up from below,” Mike Murphy
+declared. “That means they're going to board us, place bombs in the
+bilges, and sink us that way. They know blamed well we've wirelessed for
+help and a patrol has answered; so that--”
+
+“No profanity!” Cappy shrilled.
+
+“So he has decided he won't try to sink us by shell fire with such a
+small gun. It'll be dark in five minutes and he's afraid the flame of
+the discharge or the reports of the gun may guide the patrol boat here
+before he's finished his job. Oh, wirra, wirra!”
+
+Murphy's surmise proved to be correct, for he had scarcely finished
+speaking before the submarine commander hailed him and ordered him to
+let down his gangway. Terence P. Reardon's eyes flamed with the lust for
+battle.
+
+“Be the great gun av Athlone,” he cried, “if they're comin' aboard sure
+we can get at them!”
+
+Murphy's rage vanished as suddenly as it had gripped him; he smiled at
+Terence affectionately, approvingly.
+
+“You with your monkey wrench, eh, Terry, my lad? And they with automatic
+pistols and wishful of an excuse to use them, not to mention the
+nitroglycerin and guncotton bombs they'll be carrying--a divilish bad
+thing to have kicking round in a free-for-all fight?” he queried.
+
+Terry's face showed his deep disappointment.
+
+“They'll see us all in the boats,” Murphy continued; “then they'll go
+below, set the bombs, light a slow fuse to give them time to get back to
+the submarine--and then--”
+
+“With all these poor dumb beasts aboard?” Cappy Ricks quavered.
+“Horrible! Horrible! I could kill them for it.”
+
+“I could kill them for a greater crime than that,” his port captain
+reminded him. “Didn't they try twice to sink us without warning? Damn
+them! They're forty fathoms outside the law this minute.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIII
+
+
+For the first time in his life Cappy Ricks was in financial and physical
+danger coincidently. Old he was, and a landlubber, for all his courtesy
+title; but in his veins there coursed the blood of a long line of
+fighting ancestors. It occurred to him now that in all his life he had
+never cried “Enough;” that always, when cornered and presumably beaten,
+he had gone into executive session with himself and, fox that he was,
+schemed a way out. In this supreme moment there came to him now the
+words of the gallant Lawrence: “Don't give up the ship!” They inspired
+him; his agile old brain, benumbed by the shock of the exciting events
+of the last quarter of an hour, threw off its paralysis; his little
+five-feet-four body thrilled with the impact of a sudden brilliant idea.
+
+“I have it!” he piped. “By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, it might be done!
+Mike, the submarine lies to starboard. Tell the mate to lower the port
+gangway.”
+
+Murphy ran out on the end of the bridge and bawled the order. Then he
+came back, and he and Terence and Cappy Ricks put their heads together
+while in brief, illuminating sentences Cappy Ricks unfolded the fruit of
+his genius.
+
+“Tell me,” he pleaded when he had finished, “is that scheme
+practicable?”
+
+“It might be done, sir,” Mike Murphy assented.
+
+“I'll thry anything the wanst,” Terry Reardon almost barked.
+
+“It means some fighting--probably some killing.”
+
+“Sorra wan av me'll feel broken-hearted at killin' the likes av that
+Dutchman,” Terry answered. “Shtill, we'll be needin' some help, I'm
+thinkin'.”
+
+“We'll get it, or I'm no judge of human nature. Mike, pass the word for
+Sam Daniels, the boss of muleteers and broncho busters. Sam used to be a
+Texas Ranger.”
+
+Accordingly Sam Daniels was sent for and arrived on the jump.
+
+“Sam, my dear boy,” said Cappy calmly, “I'm enlisting volunteers to
+raise hell with that submarine. They're going to put bombs in the bilges
+and blow up the ship.”
+
+“Count me in, Cap,” Sam Daniels replied laconically. “Want me to rustle
+up a couple of the boys?”
+
+“Yes, about three real ones--boys that are handy with a six-shooter.”
+
+“I guess most of the boys from the border have their guns in their war
+bags. I'll go get them together.”
+
+He did--in about three minutes; by which time the collapsible boat from
+the submarine had been launched and was pulling toward the _Narcissus_.
+While her master directed them to pull round to the port gangway, Sam
+Daniels slipped down unobserved into Number Three hatch, two of his
+horse wranglers disappeared with an equal lack of ostentation down the
+gangway into Number Two hatch, and a third man went forward and down
+Number One. The trap was set.
+
+A stout young lieutenant clad in soiled dungarees, his uniform cap
+alone denoting his rank, came briskly up the companion, followed by four
+jackies carrying the bombs. A fifth man remained in the boat, fending it
+away with a boat hook from the tall black side of the _Narcissus_.
+
+“Who commands here?” the German demanded in most excellent English.
+
+“I do,” the master of the _Narcissus_ replied, and stepped a pace
+forward.
+
+“Then hurry and get your boats overside. We're going to bomb the ship,
+and if anybody remains aboard when those bombs explode it will be his
+fault, not ours.”
+
+The motor cruiser had already been dropped overboard, and the
+life-boats, having been for two days swung out in the davits, were
+quickly filled and lowered away. As each boat pulled clear of the ship
+the man in charge of it was ordered by the submarine lieutenant to stay
+to port of the _Narcissus_, and to pull well clear of the ship before
+proceeding to pass the towing painters to the cruiser.
+
+“Are all your men off the ship?” the officer queried of the skipper as
+the latter entered the last boat and gave the order to lower away.
+
+“All off; I've accounted for all of them,” was the answer.
+
+The German waited until the boat had slipped away in the gloom before
+turning to his command.
+
+“Proceed!” he said briefly; and, followed by his four men, he led the
+way down the cleated temporary gangway built diagonally down Number
+Three hatch to accommodate the horses when they had been led aboard.
+
+The better to facilitate their progress, Terence Reardon had turned on
+all the electric lights in the ship, and the detail proceeded quickly
+to the lower hold, where they set two bombs and piled double-compressed
+baled hay round them, with the fuse leading out from under the bales.
+In addition to blowing a hole in the ship they were taking the added
+precaution of setting her afire after the explosion.
+
+From the spot where the bombs were set a long alleyway, lined on each
+side with the rumps of horses, each neatly boxed in a stall just wide
+enough and long enough to inclose him firmly and hold him on his feet in
+the event of rough weather, led forward and aft to the bulkheads. And
+in one of these stalls, close up against the rump of a horse he could
+trust, Sam Daniels, the ex-Texas Ranger, crouched, with one eye round
+the corner of the stall, calmly watching the grim proceedings. Something
+told him that, having arranged the bombs in that hold, the enemy would
+not light the fuses until he had set similar bombs at the bottom of the
+other hatches; then, all being in readiness, a man would be sent into
+each hold to light the fuse, scurry on deck, descend to the waiting
+boat, and be pulled clear of danger before the fuses should burn down to
+the fulminating caps.
+
+So Daniels waited until the men were about to pick up the remaining
+bombs and ascend to the deck; whereupon he stepped quietly out into
+the alleyway, a long-barreled forty-five in his hand, and pussyfooted
+swiftly toward the Germans, whose backs were now turned toward him.
+Halfway down the alleyway, on one of the heavy six-by-six-inch uprights
+temporarily set in to support the weight of the hundred mules on the
+deck above, was the electric switch controlling the circuit in that
+hold--and Sam Daniels reached up and turned it down. Instantly the hold
+was in darkness; and then the horseman spoke:
+
+“Hey, you Dutchies! Stay right where you are! I want to have a little
+powwow with you before you go any farther.”
+
+Having said this, the astute Mr. Daniels, out of a vast experience
+gained while fighting Mexicans and outlaws in the dark, promptly lay
+down. In case the enemy should become rattled and fire at the sound of
+his voice he preferred to have plenty of room for the bullets to pass
+over him.
+
+“Who's there?” the lieutenant demanded in English; and by the firm,
+resolute voice the Texan knew that the German was not rattled and that
+his men would not fire unless he gave the word.
+
+“Great thing, this naval discipline!” Mr. Daniels soliloquized. Aloud he
+replied:
+
+“The fastest, straightest little wing shot with a six shooter that ever
+was, old-timer!”
+
+“What do you purpose doing, my friend?”
+
+“I purpose giving you some good advice; though whether you accept it or
+not is a matter of indifference to me. You will observe that this hold
+is in comparative darkness. I say comparative, because through the hatch
+space a certain amount of light is projected from the deck above, and
+you and your men are standing in that light, whereas I am in the dark. I
+can see you and you cannot see me. I have a forty-five caliber revolver
+in my hand and another in reserve. There are five of you fellows,
+constituting a fair target--and I seldom miss a fair target. I can kill
+all five of you in five seconds. Of course some of you may manage to
+fire at the flash of my gun and accidentally kill me; but--make no
+mistake about it, son--I'll get you and your gang before I kick the
+bucket. Now, then, which do you want to do--live or die? I'm going to
+be fair to you fellows and give you some choice in the matter--which is
+more than you did when you launched those two torpedoes at us. Speak up,
+brother! I'm a nervous man and dislike suspense.”
+
+The German lieutenant glanced at his men, who had not yet touched the
+other bombs and were looking stolidly at him for orders. He licked his
+lower lip and scowled, sighed gustily--and made a swift grab for his
+automatic. A streak of flame came out of the dark alleyway and the
+German's arm hung limp at his side. He had a bullet in his shoulder.
+
+“Told you I was a wing shot!” the plainsman cautioned him pleasantly.
+“I would have put that one through your heart if I didn't need an
+interpreter. I imagine these roustabouts with you only speak their
+mother tongue.”
+
+“What do you want me to do?”
+
+“Well, first, I want you to leave that high explosive right where it is.
+Then I want you to deposit all your sidearms on the floor, and have your
+men do likewise.”
+
+The German had had his lesson and arrived at the conclusion that valor
+without discretion is not good business. He slipped his belt off and let
+it drop to the floor; at a word from him his men did likewise, whereupon
+Daniels stood up, threw on the electric switch, and revealed himself and
+his artillery to the gaze of the invaders.
+
+“Forward; in a bunch, up the gangway!” he ordered.
+
+They obeyed. As the Texan passed the little heap of belts, with the
+automatics in the holsters attached, he gathered them up and followed.
+Just before the procession reached the main deck he halted them and
+whistled--whereupon Michael J. Murphy, Terence P. Reardon and Cappy
+Ricks came to the edge of the hatch and peered over.
+
+“Well, look who's here!” Cappy exclaimed maliciously. “Five nice little
+pirates, who would sink my _Narcissus_ without so much as a be-damned to
+you! Mike, bring the irons. Terence, my boy, restrain yourself. If you
+use that monkey wrench until I give the word the Blue Star Navigation
+Company will have a new port engineer. Undress these fellows. Just
+remove their caps and outer garments--and be quick about it.”
+
+“Tell them to molt--_muy pronto!_” Sam Daniels ordered the lieutenant,
+who relayed the order in a voice that had in it a suspicion of tears.
+
+In three minutes they were undressed and handcuffed together; leg irons
+were put on them, and they were expeditiously gagged and chained to a
+stanchion.
+
+“Now then, Terence, I have work for you and your monkey wrench,”
+ Cappy continued. “You're about the same size as this officer. Into his
+dungarees and uniform cap; and don't forget to slip on his belt, with
+the automatic.”
+
+“In two shakes av a lamb's tail, sor. What next?”
+
+“As you run down the gangway to the waiting boat, hold your handkerchief
+over that Irish mug of yours. Pretend you're blowing your nose. The man
+in the boat won't recognize you until you're on top of him.”
+
+“Wan little love tap--no more!” Terence breathed lovingly.
+
+“When Terence has tapped him, Sam,” Cappy continued, “you go down and
+help to get him out on the landing stage. He'll be off our hands there
+and the submarine people cannot see what's happened to him. They're
+still lying on our starboard beam.”
+
+Terence and the deadly Samuel disappeared, to return presently and
+report all well. Thereupon Michael J. Murphy retired to the port side of
+the house, lit a kerosene torch he had brought up from the engine room
+and waved it. He waited. Presently, in the gloom off to port, he saw
+the red and green side lights of the little cruiser. For a moment both
+lights were visible; then the master of the _Narcissus_, now in charge
+of the cruiser, ported his helm and showed his red only. Murphy waited,
+and presently both red and green showed again.
+
+“Starboard now, and show your green,” Murphy pleaded.
+
+The red went out and the green alone showed; so Mike Murphy extinguished
+his torch and rejoined Cappy Ricks, Terence and the ubiquitous Mr.
+Daniels.
+
+“Sam, my dear boy,” Cappy was saying as Murphy came up, “Mike and
+Terence own in the _Narcissus_ and they work for me--hence their
+alliance. You owe me no fealty--”
+
+“The hell I don't, Cap!” Sam retorted lightly. “You're a fine old sport,
+and I'm for you till the last dog is hung.”
+
+“Sam, I am deeply grateful. Your friendship is very dear to me indeed.
+I have a twenty-two-thousand acre ranch down in Monterey County,
+California--don't know why I bought it, unless it was because it was
+a bargain and ranch property in California is bound to increase in
+value--and you're my foreman if we ever get out of this with a whole
+skin. I'll make it the best job you ever had, Sam.”
+
+“Thank you, Mr. Ricks!” A moment before it had been Cap. “If you never
+saw a man fight for a good job before, just watch me!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIV
+
+
+The horse tenders in the other holds were summoned and informed that for
+the present the _Narcissus_ would not be bombed. Quickly two of them,
+with Mike Murphy and Sam Daniels, donned the dungarees and caps of the
+prisoners and strapped on their belts containing the automatics in their
+holsters. In the interim Terence had descended to the collapsible boat
+bumping at the gangway and fended her off until Sam Daniels, the two
+cowboys and Mike Murphy joined him; whereupon Terence took one pair of
+oars, while Murphy handled the other, and the boat crept out from the
+steamer and headed directly for the submarine, which had been ratching
+backward and forward under a dead-slow bell, watching the towering black
+hulk of the _Narcissus_ rolling idly. A light showed on the turret of
+the submarine, outlining vaguely the figures of half a dozen men on her
+small deck.
+
+The disposition of Mike Murphy's forces was such that the chances of the
+enemy detecting the substitution of the boarding party before it should
+reach the submersible were reduced to a minimum. In the bow of the
+collapsible one of the cowboys sat, facing the stern; Terence and Mike
+also faced the stern, by reason of the fact that they were rowing; and
+Sam Daniels and the other cowboy, seated in the stern sheets, were under
+orders to turn and look back at the _Narcissus_ as the boat came within
+the radius of the meager light from the submarine's turret. Thus they
+ran little risk of premature discovery.
+
+“For,” as Cappy Ricks sagely reminded them just before they pulled away
+from the _Narcissus_, “the German is both cautious and cocksure. The
+capture of his bombing party has been effected without a sound; the
+commander saw our men leave the steamer in the boats; he sees the
+_Narcissus_ now not under command and wallowing; he figures that all is
+lovely and the goose honks high. Therefore, he will be off his guard,
+since his suspicions have not been roused. His deck is very dimly
+lighted by that single light on the turret, and he knows that light is
+sufficient to guide the boat party back to the submarine. There is no
+sea running to speak of; so it will not be necessary for him to turn his
+searchlight on you to light the way for you.
+
+“Moreover, he will not care to use his searchlight, because it may guide
+a patrol boat to this spot, and Terence has very carefully turned out
+all the lights on the ship which might be visible from a distance,
+because that is precisely what that lieutenant would or should have done
+if we had given him time. And when you row toward that submarine, row
+like the devil, because that's the way the bombing party would row in
+their hurry to board the submarine and steam clear of the explosion.
+It is my guess that the instant you heave alongside you will be snagged
+with boat hooks by the men on her deck. In the excitement of making a
+quick get-away nobody will be looking into your faces, anyhow; they'll
+see your familiar dungaree suits and caps; some of them may even give
+you a hand to help you when you leap aboard. Do not despise such help;
+just extend your left hands and before you let go the enemy's right bend
+your guns--and you, Terry, your monkey wrench--over their heads. You'll
+have the deck in a pig's whisper! Then, Mike, the rest is up to you.
+I've made the ball; now you fire it.
+
+“I take it the submarine will be in such a hurry to get away that all
+the men on her deck will reach down and snake the boat in; once out of
+danger, they'll plan on knocking that collapsible down and storing
+it away at their leisure. Tackle 'em while they're busy with the
+boat--provided you get aboard unsuspected. Terence, remember to shout
+the minute you go into action--and I'll give you fighting light.”
+
+Following these instructions, Cappy had very solemnly shaken hands all
+round and departed for the bridge, where he removed the canvas covering
+from the searchlight, bent the reflector toward the submarine, and
+waited, with his nervous old finger on the switch.
+
+In pursuance of Cappy Ricks' instructions, Mike Murphy and Terence
+Reardon rowed furiously toward the submarine--so furiously, indeed, that
+the harsh grating of their oars in the rowlocks apprised Captain Emil
+Bechtel of their approach some seconds before the boat was visible. At
+his brisk command the men on deck stepped down to the low pipe railing
+on the port side of the deck, prepared to snag the boat the instant she
+drew alongside. When he could hear the sound of the commander's voice,
+Mike Murphy chanced a quick look over his shoulder, noted the position
+of the submarine, and turned his head again.
+
+“Four more strokes, Terry; then ship your oars,” he cautioned the
+engineer in a low voice.
+
+At the fourth stroke Terence obediently shipped his oars; with a deft
+twist of one oar, Murphy straightened the boat and shot neatly in
+alongside the submarine, the deck of which was less than three feet
+above the water. As Cappy Ricks had anticipated, the men on that deck
+promptly snagged the boat at bow and stern with boat hooks--and on the
+instant Cappy Ricks' bully boys leaped for their prey.
+
+As luck would have it, Terence P. Reardon was the only one offered a
+helping hand--and he did not despise it; neither did he forget Cappy's
+last instructions. With neatness and ample force he brought his monkey
+wrench down on the German's skull; and then to Cappy Ricks, waiting
+on the bridge of the _Narcissus_, came the ancient Irish battlecry of
+_Faugh-a-ballagh!_ For the benefit of those not versed in the ways of
+the fighting Celt, be it known that _Faugh-a-ballagh_ means Clear the
+Road. And history records but few instances when Irish soldiery have
+raised that cry and rushed without clearing a pathway.
+
+The fight was too short and savage for description. Suffice it to say
+that not a shot was fired--the work was too close for that, for the
+surprise had been complete. Even before Cappy Ricks could focus the
+steamer's searchlight on the fracas, it was over. Terence P. Reardon got
+two in two strokes of his trusty monkey wrench; Sam Daniels and his
+two fellow-bronco-busters each laid open a German scalp with the long
+barrels of their forty-fives; and Michael J. Murphy, plain lunatic-crazy
+with rage, disdaining all but Nature's weapons, tied into the amazed
+Captain Emil Bechtel under the rules of the Longshoremen's Union--which
+is to state that Michael J. Murphy clinched Emil Bechtel, lifted him,
+set him down hard on his plump back, crawled him, knelt on his arms, and
+addressed him in these words:
+
+“Hah! (A right jab to the face.) You would, would you? (Left jab to
+face.) You pig-iron polisher! (Bending the nose back forcibly with the
+heel of his fist.) When I get (smash) through with your (smash) head
+(smash) it'll be long (smash) before you'll block (smash) your hat again
+(smash) on the Samson post, you--”
+
+“Out av me way, Michael, lad, till I get a kick at his slats!” crooned
+Terence P. Reardon, heaving alongside.
+
+“You gossoon! Take care of the scuttle; don't let them close it down,
+or they'll submerge and drown us. Leave this lad to me, I tell you. He's
+the captain, and why shouldn't he be killed by one of his own rank?”
+
+Thus rebuked, Terence curbed his blood-thirsty proclivities. Leaving
+his countryman to beat his devil's tattoo on the submarine commander,
+Terence leaped to the open scuttle just in time to bang another head as
+it appeared on a level with the deck.
+
+“Let that be a lesson to you!” he called as the unconscious man slid
+back down the companion into the interior of the vessel.
+
+Then he sat on the lid of the scuttle, poised his monkey wrench on high
+over the scuttle, and awaited developments, the while he tossed an order
+over his shoulder to Sam Daniels:
+
+“Bring me the bum!”
+
+“Which one?” Mr. Daniels queried.
+
+“The German bum, av coorse,” Terence retorted waspishly.
+
+“But all these bums are Germans--”
+
+“Not that kind av a bum!” howled Terence. “I mean the bum in the boat.”
+
+Thus enlightened, Sam brought a bomb from the boat and handed it to the
+engineer. In the interim Mike Murphy had polished off his man to his
+entire satisfaction and joined Terence at the scuttle, while one of the
+horse wranglers, a cool individual and a firm believer in safety first,
+collected the weapons from the fallen.
+
+Mike Murphy approached the scuttle and bawled down it to the amazed and
+puzzled crew below. As a linguist Mike was no great shakes, particularly
+when called upon to juggle German; but he was a resolute fellow and not
+afraid to do his best at all times. Consequently his hail took the form
+of “Hey! _Landsmann!_”
+
+Something told Terence Reardon that Michael was through; so he added his
+mite to the store and bellowed:
+
+“_Spreckels die deutsch,_ ye blackguards?”
+
+Then both sat back to await developments. Presently a voice at the foot
+of the companion said:
+
+“Hello dere! Vat iss?”
+
+“Vat iss? Hell iss! Dot's vat! Listen to me, you Dutchy. I'm the skipper
+of that horse transport your commander tried to sink without warning,
+and I'm in command of the deck of this craft, with the scuttle open; and
+you can't submerge and wash me off, either. When I give the word I
+want you and your men to come up, one at a time and no crowding. And if
+you're not up five minutes after I order you up I'll not wait; I'll
+set a bomb in your turret, back off in the small boat and kill with
+revolvers any man that tries to come up and see where the fuse is
+burning in order to put it out. Do you surrender, or would you rather
+die?”
+
+“Vait a minute und I find oud,” the German answered promptly.
+
+It required five minutes for a council of war below decks; then the
+interpreter came to the foot of the companion and informed Mike Murphy
+that, considering the circumstances, they had decided to live. In
+the interim the skipper of the _Narcissus_ had arrived, with
+re-enforcements, in the cruiser, and reported that his crew was getting
+back aboard the steamer as fast as possible and would have her under
+command again in a minute. At Murphy's order the unconscious Germans
+were put aboard the cruiser; later, when the remainder of the
+submersible's crew came up, one at a time, they were disarmed and lined
+up on the little deck; whereupon Michael J. Murphy addressed their
+spokesman thus:
+
+“Listen--you! It would be just like you to have set a time bomb
+somewhere in this submarine to blow her up after you were all safely out
+of her. If you did you made a grave tactical error. You're not going
+to leave her for quite a while yet. You're going to sit quietly here on
+deck, under guard, while the steamer hooks on to this submarine and tows
+her; and if my prize crew is blown up, remember, you--”
+
+The spokesman--he was the chief engineer, by the way--yelled “_Ach,
+Gott!_” and leaped for the scuttle. Mike Murphy followed him into the
+engine room in time to see him stamp out a long length of slow-burning
+fuse.
+
+“Any more?” Murphy queried.
+
+“Dot von vas sufficient, if it goes off,” the German answered simply.
+
+“All right!” Mike Murphy replied. “I'll take a chance and so will you.
+You'll stay aboard and run those oil engines.”
+
+Half an hour later with the submarine's crew safely under lock and key
+on the _Narcissus,_ the big freighter continued on her course, followed
+by the captured submarine, with Michael J. Murphy in her turret and a
+quartermaster from the _Narcissus_ at her helm. In the engine room her
+own engineer grudgingly explained to Terence P. Reardon the workings of
+an oil engine and the ramifications of the electric-light system--and
+during all of that period the deadly monkey wrench never left the port
+engineer's hand.
+
+Sam Daniels and his comrades were once more back aboard the _Narcissus,_
+attending to the horses; and Cappy Ricks, his heart so filled with pride
+that it was like to burst, occupied the submarine's turret with the
+doughty Michael J. For an hour they discussed the marvelous coup until
+there was no angle of it left undiscussed; whereupon fell a silence,
+with Michael J.'s eyes fixed on the dark bulk ahead that marked the
+_Narcissus_, and Cappy's thoughts on what Matt Peasley and Mr. Skinner
+would say when they heard the glorious news.
+
+For nearly an hour not a word passed between the pair.
+
+Presently Cappy's regular breathing drew Murphy's attention to him. He
+had fallen asleep in his seat, his chin bent on his old breast, a little
+half-smile on his lips. And as Murphy looked at him pridefully Cappy
+spoke in his sleep:
+
+“Holy sailor! How Mike Murphy can swear!”
+
+Terence P. Reardon came to the foot of the little spiral staircase
+leading to the turret.
+
+“Michael, me lad,” he announced, “the internal-combustion ile ingin'
+is the marine ingin' av the future. They're as simple as two an' two is
+four. Listen, _avic!_ Does she not run like a twenty-four-jewel watch?
+An' this man that invinted thim was a Ger-r-man--more power to him!
+Faith, I'm thinkin' if the Ger-r-mans were as great in war as they are
+in peace 'twould need more nor the Irish to take the measure av thim!”
+
+“Irish?” Mike Murphy answered irritably. “Terence, quit your bragging!
+God knows the Irish are great--”
+
+“The greatest in the wide, wide wur-rld!” Terence declared, with all the
+egotism of his race.
+
+“Whist, Terry! There's a little old Yankee man aboard; if you wake him
+up he'll call you a liar.”
+
+“The darlin' ould fox!” Terry murmured affectionately, and went back to
+his engines.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LV
+
+
+The entire office force of the Blue Star Navigation Company and the
+Ricks Lumber & Logging Company had assembled in the general office to
+greet Cappy Ricks, Mike Murphy and Terence Reardon upon their return
+from Europe, and to hear at first hand the story of their wanderings and
+adventures. And when the wondrous tale had been told, and business was
+once more resumed, Matt Peasley, Mr. Skinner, Mike and Terence convened
+in Cappy Ricks' office for further discussion.
+
+“We sent that half million dollars to New York to be transferred to the
+credit of the French Government when the bill of sale for that steamer
+should be deposited with the bank there,” Matt remarked presently. “What
+kind of a vessel did you buy, Cappy? What are her dimensions?”
+
+“What kind of a ship did I buy?” Cappy piped. “Hum-m-m! A ship is good.
+I bought four; and--believe me!--they're no skiffs, either. All of them
+are big foreign-going steel tramps, with lots of speed and power.”
+
+“Four for half a million dollars?” Matt Peasley cried unbelievingly.
+
+“They would have cost anybody else a million and a half; but--er--well,
+you see, Matt, I had a stand-in with the right people. The four vessels
+I bought were all prizes of war--German merchantmen converted into
+commerce raiders, which had slipped through the cordon of British
+cruisers and got into the North Atlantic, where French cruisers
+overhauled them and brought them into port. They were all there and up
+for sale to the highest bidder when we got there with the horses and our
+captured submarine.
+
+“I bid half a million for the lot, which is probably about half of
+what it cost to build them; and there was a Frenchman and an Englishman
+bidding against me. They each had me topped, and the vessels
+were knocked down to the Frenchman; but when he found I was a
+competitor--that I was Monsieur le Capitaine Ricks--that's what
+they called me, Matt--in command of the party that captured a German
+submarine, intact and without the loss of a single man on either
+side-say, Matt, the stuff was all off!
+
+“He and the Englishman went into a conference; and the result was, the
+Frenchman ran out on his bid and forfeited his ten-per-cent certified
+check. That left the Englishman the next highest bidder; and he ran out
+on his bid and left the ships to me! Then the Englishman shook hands
+with me and the Frenchman kissed me. I thought the least I could do was
+to make good to them on the earnest money they had forfeited, and they
+accepted it. Then the President of France heard about it and came down
+to Brest to see me; and he kissed me, too, and gave me the Officers'
+Cross of the Legion of Honor. I didn't tell him I was just a private
+in the ranks. Oh, no! Nothing doing. I was introduced as Monsieur le
+Capitaine Ricks--and that settled it. I was an officer, for all my
+courtesy title; and I took the Cross, because I was prouder than Punch
+to have it.
+
+“Then the Chamber of Deputies met and voted the Frenchman and the
+Englishman back their forfeited earnest money; and they gave me back
+my checks, and I wrote new ones for the same amount and split the swag
+fifty-fifty between the two nations for the care of their wounded.
+Then I gave a dinner aboard the submarine, and President Poincare was
+present. I presented the submarine, with the compliments of the Blue
+Star Navigation Company, to the Republic of France, and the President
+accepted, all hands went out on deck and we cracked a bottle of
+champagne over that submersible's bows and rechristened her.”
+
+“What name?” Matt and Skinner chorused.
+
+“The Shamrock--out of compliment to Mike and Terence.”
+
+“Fine!” Matt cried. “Then what?”
+
+“Nothing, Matt. Our business was finished and I was anxious to get
+back on the job; so we engaged skippers and crews to bring our four
+freighters to New York, and came home.
+
+“Better step lively, boy, and dig up some business for them! Mike will
+give you the data on their tonnage.”
+
+Matt drew Mike Murphy aside.
+
+“Tell me, Mike,” he whispered, “did the old man get soused at that
+dinner aboard the _Shamrock?_”
+
+“Look here, Matt,” Murphy answered; “what Monsieur le Capitaine Ricks
+does outside of office hours is none of my business--or yours, either.
+And if you don't like that answer help yourself to a new port captain.
+I'm not telling everything I know, Matt.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVI
+
+
+On the morning of April 3, 1917, Cappy Ricks came down to his office,
+spread a newspaper on his desk and carefully cut from it the war address
+of President Wilson to Congress, made the night before. This clipping
+the old gentleman folded carefully; he placed it in an envelope, sealed
+it and wrote across the face of the envelope: “Property of Alden Matthew
+Peasley.” Then he summoned Mr. Skinner, president of the Ricks Lumber &
+Logging Company.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he began, “have you read the President's Message
+to Congress?”
+
+“I have,” replied Skinner.
+
+“I guess that President of ours isn't some tabasco, eh? By the Holy
+Pink-Toed Prophet, he's just naturally read Bill Hohenzollern out of the
+party. Bully for Woodrow!”
+
+Mr. Skinner's calm cold features refused to thaw, however, under the
+heat of his employer's enthusiasm, seeing which Cappy slid out to the
+edge of his chair and gazed contemplatively at Skinner over the rims
+of his spectacles. “Hum-m-m!” he said. The very tempo of that
+throat-clearing should have warned Mr. Skinner that he was treading on
+thin ice, but with his usual complacence he ignored the storm signal,
+for his mind was upon private, not public affairs.
+
+“I'm offered the old barkentine _C. D. Bryant_ for a cargo of redwood to
+Sydney,” he began. “The freight rate is two hundred and twenty shillings
+per thousand feet, but the _Bryant_ is so old and rotten I can't get any
+insurance on the cargo if I ship by her. I'm just wondering if--”
+
+“Haramph-h-h! Ahem-m-m!”
+
+“--it's worth while taking a chance to move that foreign order.”
+
+“Skinner!” Cappy almost shouted.
+
+Mr. Skinner looked at him, startled.
+
+“How can you think and talk of old barkentines and non-insurable foreign
+cargoes at this crisis in our country's history?” the autocrat of the
+numerous Ricks corporations shrilled furiously. “Dad burn your picture,
+Skinner, are you human? Don't you ever get a thrill from reading a
+document like this?”--and he tapped the envelope containing the press
+clipping. “What kind of juice runs in your arteries, anyhow? Red blood
+or buttermilk? Is your soul so dog-goned dead, crushed under the weight
+of dollars, that you have failed to realize this document is destined to
+go down in history side by side with Lincoln's Gettysburg speech? I'll
+bet you don't know the Gettysburg speech. Bet you never heard of it!”
+
+“Oh, nonsense, Mr. Ricks,” Skinner retorted suavely. “Pray do not excite
+yourself. Suppose war does impend? Is that any reason why I should
+neglect business?”
+
+“Of course it is, you gibbering jackdaw! I feel like setting fire to the
+building, just to celebrate. Can't you step into my office on a day like
+this and discuss the country and her affairs for five minutes, just to
+prove you're an American citizen? Can't you rejoice with me over these
+lofty, noble sentiments--”
+
+“Words, words, empty words,” warned Mr. Skinner, always a reactionary
+Republican.
+
+“Skinner,” said Cappy with deadly calm, “one more disloyal peep out of
+you and I shall have no alternative save to request your resignation. I
+think you're a pacifist at heart, anyhow!”
+
+“Huh,” snorted Skinner. “You've changed your tune, haven't you? Who
+trotted up and down California Street last fall, soliciting campaign
+contributions for the Republican nominee from the lumber and shipping
+interests? Wasn't it Alden P. Ricks? Who thought the country was going
+to wrack and ruin--”
+
+“That was last fall,” Cappy interrupted shrilly. “We live and
+learn--that is, some of us do,” he added significantly. “Never mind
+about my politics last fall; just remember I haven't any this spring.
+I'm an American citizen, and by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, some German
+or Germans will find it out before I'm gathered to the bosom of Abraham.
+I have a right to disapprove of my President if I feel like it, but I'll
+be shot if I'll let anybody else pick on him.” And Cappy shook his head
+emphatically several times like a squinch-owl.
+
+“Oh, I'm for him, now that we're committed to this war,” Skinner
+declared in an effort to soothe the old man.
+
+“Sure! We're locking the stable door after the horse has been stolen. If
+we'd been for him when the _Lusitania_ was sunk instead of being divided
+in our opinions and swayed in our judgment by a lot of hysterical
+pacifists and German propagandists we'd have been into the war long
+ago and saved millions of human lives; we'd have had the war won.” He
+sighed.
+
+“What a prime lot of jackasses we Americans are!” he continued. “We talk
+of liberty and demand license; we prate of democracy and we're a nation
+of snobs!”
+
+“You wanted to see me about something,” Skinner reminded him.
+
+“Ah, yes; I was forgetting. This envelope, Skinner, contains the
+President's address. Take it and put it in the vault, and when my
+grandson is twelve years old give that press clipping to his mother and
+tell her I said she was to read it to the boy and make him learn it
+by heart. I won't be on hand to do the Americanizing of that youngster
+myself, and most likely Matt Peasley will be too busy to think much
+about it, so I'm taking no chances. You rile me to beat the band
+sometimes, Skinner, but I'll say this much in your favor: I have never
+known you to forget anything.”
+
+“Thank you, sir.”
+
+Mr. Skinner took the envelope and departed, and Cappy rang for a
+stenographer.
+
+“Take a telegram, fast day message,” he barked: “'His Excellency, The
+President, White House, Washington, D. C. Dear Mister President: I did
+not vote for you last fall, but your address of last night makes
+me ashamed that I did not. I am controlling owner of the Blue Star
+Navigation Company, operating a fleet of fifty vessels of various kinds,
+twelve of which are foreign-going steam freighters. Am also controlling
+owner of the Ricks Lumber & Logging Company, cutting a million feet of
+lumber daily. Everything I control, every dollar I possess, is at the
+service of my country. God bless you, sir! Alden P. Ricks.'
+
+“That sounds sloppy, but it's the way I feel,” Cappy declared. “When
+a man has a big heart-breaking job to do and a lot of Philistines are
+knocking him, maybe it helps him to retain his faith in humankind to
+have some fellow grow sincerely sloppy and slip a telegraphic cheer in
+with the hoots. Besides, if I didn't let off steam today I'd swell up
+and bust myself all over the office--”
+
+The door opened and Mr. Terence P. Reardon, port engineer of the Blue
+Star Navigation Company, entered. Mr. Reardon's right eye was in deep
+mourning and at no very remote period something--presumably a fist--had
+shifted his nose slightly to starboard; indeed, even as he entered
+Cappy's office a globule of the rich red Reardon blood trembled in each
+of the port engineer's nostrils. His knuckles were slightly skinned and
+the light of battle blazed in his black eyes.
+
+“Terence, my dear, dear fellow,” murmured the horrified Cappy, “you look
+as if you had been fed into a concrete mixer. Have you been fighting?”
+
+“Well, sor,” Mr. Reardon replied in his deep Kerry brogue, “ye might
+call it that for lack of somethin' more expressive. I've just fired the
+chief engineer o' the _Tillicum.”_
+
+“Mr. Denicke? Why, Terry, he's a first-rate engineer. I'm amazed. He was
+with us ten years before you entered the employ--worked up from oiler;
+in fact, I must have an explanation of your action in this case,
+Terence.”
+
+“He called the President a nut. I fired him for that. Then he said the
+Kaiser was the greatest single force for civilization that ever was, an'
+wit' that I gave him a lift under the lug an' we wint at it. He's in
+the Harbor Receivin' Hospital this minute, an' I'm here to tell ye,
+sor, wit' all respect, that if ye don't like the way I've treated that
+Dutchman ye can get yerself a new port ingineer, for I'll quit, an'
+that's somethin' I'm not wishful to do.”
+
+Quite calmly Cappy Ricks pressed the buzzer on his desk. The cashier of
+the Blue Star Navigation Company entered. “Son,” said Cappy, “hereafter,
+when making out Mr. Reardon's pay check, tack onto it twenty-five
+dollars extra each month. That is all.”
+
+“Thank you, sor,” murmured Mr. Reardon, quite overcome.
+
+“Get out!” cried Cappy. “You're a vision of sudden death. Go wash
+yourself.”
+
+As Mr. Reardon took his departure Cappy sighed. “If Skinner only had a
+set of works like that port engineer!” he murmured. “If he only had!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVII
+
+
+It will be recalled that war with Germany was declared on Good Friday.
+Bright and early on Saturday morning Cappy Ricks arrived at his office
+and immediately summoned Mr. Skinner.
+
+“Skinner, my dear boy,” he chirped, “'the tumult and the shouting dies.
+We're down to brass tacks--at last; and now is time for all good men and
+true to come to the aid of the party. I'm too old to bear arms, and when
+I was young enough bantam battalions weren't fashionable; nevertheless,
+I am enlisting for the war, and I start in this morning to do my part. I
+won't wear any uniform, but believe me, Skinner, I'm the little corporal
+who's going to mobilize the Blue Star Navigation Company and the
+Ricks Lumber & Logging Company, together with all and sundry of their
+subsidiary corporations. I'm starting with you, Skinner. Are you
+figuring on enlisting?”
+
+“Certainly not, sir. I'm forty-three years old, married--”
+
+“No excuses necessary, Skinner. Even if you had planned to enlist I
+would have forbidden the banns. You'd make a bird of a paymaster or
+quartermaster, but as an enlisted man--well, the other bad soldier boys
+would toss you in a blanket. So I'll assign you to a job in civil life.
+Skinner, what do you know about aeroplanes?”
+
+“Absolutely nothing, except that they fly.”
+
+“Then learn something! Skinner, the ideal wood for aeroplane
+construction is clear Pacific Coast spruce. I've been reading up on the
+subject. Inasmuch as this war must be won in the air, you can imagine
+the number of aeroplanes the country must turn out in the next eighteen
+months. Stu-pen-dous, Skinner, simply stu-pen-dous! Try to visualize
+the wastage alone in the aeroplanes on the battle fronts; consider the
+thousands of seaplanes that will scour the Atlantic on the lookout
+for submarines, and then ask yourself, Skinner, what the devil those
+overworked army and navy officers in Washington are going to do about
+laying in a supply of clear Pacific Coast spruce before these pirates of
+lumbermen get next and boost the price clear out of sight. Skinner, what
+is clear spruce worth at the Northern mills today?”
+
+“About fifty-five dollars per thousand, sir. For years clear spruce
+never rose in price beyond thirty-five dollars, but purchases by the
+British Government have shot the price up during the past year.”
+
+“Exactly! And purchases by the United States Government will shoot the
+price up to a hundred and fifty dollars a thousand if you and I don't
+get busy. Now then, Skinner, listen to me! We have a couple of thousand
+acres of wonderful spruce timber adjacent to our fir holdings at
+Port Hadlock, Washington. Wire the mill manager to swamp in a logging
+railroad to that spruce timber, put in logging camps and concentrate
+on spruce. The clear stock we'll sell to the Government, and the lower
+grades will be snapped up by the box factories.”
+
+Mr. Skinner nodded his comprehension of the order and Cappy continued:
+“Wire our mill managers at Astoria, Oregon and Eureka, California,
+to log out all the spruce they come across among the fir. As for
+you, Skinner, accept no more orders for clear spruce from our regular
+customers, and go easy on accepting orders for any kind of lumber
+from our Eastern customers. All those car shipments must be made up of
+kiln-dried stock, and we'll want most of the space in our dry kilns to
+cook this clear green spruce for Uncle Sam, because he's going to want
+it in a hurry, and if he can't get it when he wants it--why, chaos has
+come again and all hell's let loose!”
+
+“What price do you propose charging the Government for this clear
+spruce?” the cautious Skinner queried. He owned a little stock in the
+Ricks Lumber & Logging Company and already he had a vision of an extra
+dividend.
+
+“Absolute cost plus ten per cent,” replied Cappy promptly. “No excess
+profits at the expense of the country at war, Skinner.”
+
+He gazed upon Skinner contemplatively for several seconds. “And mind you
+don't figure the cost too liberally,” he warned him.
+
+“Very well, sir. Is that all?”
+
+“Not by a jugful! You scatter round the market and buy up every stick
+of clear two-inch spruce sawed and on hand at the Northern mills. Buy
+at the market, but do not hesitate to go five dollars over the market if
+necessary to get the stock. Then place orders for all the clear spruce
+the mills can cut and deliver within the next six months, and we'll have
+the market hog tied.
+
+“Got to do it, Skinner. I tell you there isn't a whole lot of difference
+between a lumberman and a manufacturer or a food speculator. When he
+gets the public foul, doesn't the public pay through the nose? Haven't
+we been doing it ourselves in the matter of ship freights? But we must
+reform, Skinner, we must reform and get down to a cooperative basis,
+no matter how great the agony. On this spruce deal alone, for instance,
+we'll save the Government a couple of million dollars. See if we don't.”
+
+“We're entitled to a liberal profit,” Mr. Skinner protested. “If--”
+
+“No ifs, buts or ands! Obey orders! About the time we have the market on
+clear spruce well cornered the lumbermen's boys will be in the army
+and the lumbermen themselves will have begun to realize that they must
+sacrifice something for their country. And once we're sane we'll be able
+to work hand in glove with the Government. The United States of America
+has been money-mad for a long time, Skinner, but this war is going
+to spiritualize us and show us that there's a lot more in life than
+dollar-chasing. Hop to your job, P. D. Q., Skinner, my boy; and as you
+pass out send Captain Matt Peasley in to me.”
+
+Matt Peasley came smilingly into his father-in-law's office. “Well,
+Cappy,” he hailed the old gentleman, “I understand you've come out of
+your retirement.”
+
+“You're damned whistling, I have!” Cappy rejoined. “Something doing,
+boy, something for everybody! Have they told you about it in the general
+office?”
+
+“Told me about what?”
+
+“About the President asking me if I would cooperate with him to the
+extent of serving as the Pacific Coast member of the Shipping Board?
+I guess that isn't some honor, eh? How the devil he ever dug up an old
+fossil like me is a mystery. I wired him, advising that he appoint a
+younger man, but he replied that he knew I was the livest shipping man
+in the country and an American through and through. So, of course, Matt,
+I have accepted.”
+
+“Your forty odd years' experience will be of inestimable value to the
+country in this emergency,” Matt declared heartily. “I'm proud of you.”
+
+“Thank you, son. Now then, Matt, to business! The Government's going to
+need every one of our ships that can run foreign.” Matt nodded. “Very
+well, then,” Cappy continued; “as fast as their present charters lapse,
+decline to recharter except for single trips. We must go on a war
+basis and be prepared to turn our ships over to the Government on short
+notice. I'll be too busy to keep my eye on the details of the Blue
+Star's transactions with the Government, so I'll give you a straight tip
+now--I want no gouging. Remember that, Matthew, my son.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LVIII
+
+
+The following day Cappy had a call from Sam Daniels.
+
+“Hello, Sam,” Cappy greeted his lanky ranch manager. “What brings you
+up to town? Not that I'm not glad to see you, for I was on the point of
+writing you on some matters that had occurred to me.”
+
+“I've come up to resign my job,” Daniels declared humbly.
+
+“Resign the best job you've ever had, Sam!” Cappy was amazed.
+
+“To resign the best job I ever will have, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+Mr. Daniels hitched his chair close to his employer's desk. “Boss,” he
+said, “I'm awful sorry, but I'm goin' soldiering.”
+
+Cappy Ricks sprang to his feet with an oath. “You're not!” he shouted.
+“I won't hear of it. You're too valuable a man to go into the army and
+get yourself killed--particularly since you can do your share at
+home. Why, I was just going to write you and give you your orders for
+patriotic duty. You go back to the ranch, Sam, and get busy. Plant
+spuds, wheat, oats, barley, corn--plant all you can of it. Raise
+heifers, sheep, hogs, cows, bulls, calves, turkeys--everything that can
+be eaten. Raise horses--and in particular, raise mules.”
+
+“I'd rather raise hell with a bunch of Germans,” Sam Daniels declared
+feelingly.
+
+“Your job is to help produce cereals and canned beef for the
+hell-raisers,” Cappy declared. “The army will want horses for the
+artillery and mules for the transport. Why, this war may last for years.
+Sam, you infernal scoundrel, you get back on the farm. You're forty-five
+years old and you've been shot and whittled enough in your day to last
+you the remainder of your natural life. Let the young fellows do the
+fighting abroad, while you and I and the other hasbeens do it at home.”
+
+“I'd a heap rather lay off in the brush somewheres an' snipe Germans,”
+ Mr. Daniels pleaded. “On the level, boss, if they'll give me a
+Springfield rifle with telescopic sights I'll guarantee to sicken
+anythin' I get a fair sight on at a thousand yards.”
+
+“In-fer-nal scoundrel! How dare you argue with me! You get back on your
+job!”
+
+“Boss, I'm going into the army,” Daniels announced sadly, but
+nevertheless firmly. “I'm givin' you a month's notice so you can get a
+man to take my place.”
+
+Cappy surrendered. “All right, Sam. If you survive, your job will be
+waiting for you when you get back. However, you needn't give me any
+notice. I'll have another man in charge of the ranch to-morrow, and you
+can enlist today.”
+
+“And you're not sore at me, Mr. Ricks?”
+
+“Sam, I'm proud of you. Wish I were young enough to go it with you. Are
+you in a hurry to get to France?”
+
+“Certainly am.”
+
+“Then join the marines. They always go first. Good-bye, Sam. Good luck
+to you and God bless you! Draw your wages as you go out and tell the
+cashier I said to give you an extra month's wages for tobacco money.”
+
+Mr. Daniels withdrew, visibly filled with emotion. Ten minutes later
+Cappy Ricks, watching at his office window, saw Mr. Daniels cross the
+street and enter the marines' recruiting office. Immediately Cappy
+called that recruiting office on the telephone and asked for the doctor.
+
+“Look here, doctor!” he said. “In a few minutes a lanky, battle scarred
+rancher is coming in to be examined. I don't want him to enlist. He's
+my ranch manager and worth more to the country in his job than at the
+Front. You turn him down physically, doctor, and I'll guarantee to
+send you five fine recruits instead of that old fossil. His name is Sam
+Daniels, and I'm Alden P. Ricks, of the Blue Star Navigation Company,
+across the street.”
+
+“We need an automobile to send our recruiting sergeant out through the
+state,” the wary medico replied. “Now, if you could loan us one--”
+
+“I'll have my own car and chauffeur over in half an hour, and you keep
+him as long as you need him,” Cappy piped. “Only tell Sam Daniels he's
+faltering on the brink of the grave and send him back to me.”
+
+An hour later Mr. Daniels slouched into Cappy Ricks' office. “Well,
+Private Daniels,” the old man saluted him, “you look downcast. Has
+something slipped?”
+
+“I should say it has. The doc over to the recruitin' office says I got a
+heart murmur from smoking cigarettes, which it's a cinch the excitement
+o' battle brings on death from heart failure, an' then folks would say I
+died o' fright.”
+
+“He's crazy Sam! Tell him to go chase himself.”
+
+“I guess he's right, Mr. Ricks. He 'most cried to let me go, an' was for
+waivin' the heart murmur, but it seems I got a floatin' kidney, an' flat
+feet. Gosh, I never knew I had flat feet, but then I've rid horses all
+my life an' ain't never hiked none to speak of.”
+
+He was silent several minutes, studying the pattern of the office
+carpet. Presently he looked up. “Is my successor at the ranch already
+appointed?” he queried.
+
+“Go back to the fields and the kind-faced cows, Samuel,” quoth Cappy
+gently. “Hurry, or you'll miss the train.”
+
+Sam Daniels fled, and hard on his heels came Mrs. Michael J. Murphy,
+_nee_ Miss Keenan. It will be recalled that prior to her happy alliance
+with Michael J. Murphy, Mrs. Murphy had been Cappy Ricks' favorite
+stenographer. He received her cordially.
+
+“Now then, what's gone wrong, my dear?” he demanded. “Have you and Mike
+been making a hash of your married life that you should come in here on
+the verge of tears?”
+
+Mrs. Murphy blinked away a tear or two and sat down. “Some of the boys
+in the office will be enlisting, Mr. Ricks,” she faltered. “I wonder
+if there might be a vacancy for me--if I might not have my old position
+back?”
+
+Cappy Ricks was genuinely concerned. “Why, Mike won't let you earn your
+living,” he declared. “Why do you make such an extraordinary request?”
+
+“For Mike's sake, Mr. Ricks. Of late he has been very nervous and
+distrait; scarcely touches his meals, and thinks, talks and dreams of
+war. Last night he dreamed he was back in the navy and shouted out an
+order that woke him up.”
+
+“Come to think of it, I believe Mike did spend several years in the navy
+prior to going into mercantile marine,” Cappy observed. “So he has the
+war fever again, eh? Wants to go back?”
+
+“Ever since he received a letter from the Navy League. They're searching
+out all the old navy men--gun pointers particularly--and asking them to
+come back to help train the young fellows just coming into the service.
+Mike was a gun pointer--”
+
+“Well, what in thunder is he hesitating for?” Cappy piped wrathfully.
+
+“About me. Mike's married to me, you know, and he worries about
+what will happen to me if he should be killed. He knows I'll be
+broken-hearted if he enlists--he's afraid I'll not let him go. But if I
+got my job back and was self-supporting, Mike's conscience would be--”
+
+“Do you want him to go?”
+
+“No, Mr. Ricks, but he must go. I do not want to make a coward or a
+slacker out of Mike. I've got to do my part, you know.”
+
+“My dear,” said Cappy feelingly, “you're a noble woman. Go back and
+attend to your little home; Mike may go whenever he's ready and his
+salary with the Blue Star will go on while he is in the navy; his job
+will be waiting for him when he comes back. Good old Mike! How dreadful
+a crime to hobble that Irishman with a first-class fight in sight.”
+
+When Mrs. Mike had left the office Cappy stiffened out suddenly in
+his chair, clenched his fists and closed his eyes, as if in pain. And
+presently between the wrinkled old lids two tears crept forth. Poor
+Cappy! He was finding it very, very hard to be old and little and out
+of the fight, for in every war in which the United States had engaged
+representatives of the tribe of Ricks had gladly offered their bodies
+for the supreme sacrifice, and as Cappy's active mind ran down the long
+and bloody list his heart swelled with anguish in the knowledge that
+he was doomed to play an inglorious part in the war with Germany. Mr.
+Skinner coming in with a letter to Cappy, observed the old man's emotion
+and asked him if he was ill.
+
+“Yes, Skinner, I am,” he replied. “I'm sick at heart. God has given
+me everything I ever wanted except six big strapping sons. Just think,
+Skinner, what a glorious honor would be mine if I had six fine boys to
+give to my country.” His old lips trembled. “And you could bank on the
+Ricks boys,” he added. “My boys would never wait to be drafted. No,
+sir-ree! When they heard the call they'd answer, like their ancestors.
+
+“Skinner, what has come over our boys of this generation? Why don't they
+volunteer? Why does the President have to beg for men? Has the soul
+of the idealist been corroded by a life of ease? Did the spirit of
+adventure die with our forefathers? Is it any harder to die just because
+war has become more terrible--more deadly? Oh, Skinner, Skinner! To be
+young and tall and strong and whirled in the cycle of vast events--to
+play a man's part in a glorious undertaking--to feel that I have
+enriched the world with my efforts, however humble, or with my body
+revitalized the soil made fallow by a ravishing monster. I feel,
+Skinner--I feel so much and can do so little.”
+
+Nevertheless, he did do something that very afternoon. One after the
+other he examined all the young men in his employ, discovered which of
+them could afford the luxury of enlisting and then asked them bluntly
+whether they were going to enlist. Three of them said they were, and
+Cappy promised each of them a month's salary the day he should report to
+him in uniform. Nine others appeared to be uncertain of their duty,
+so Cappy fired them all, to the great distress of Mr. Skinner and Matt
+Peasley. Cappy, however, turned a deaf ear to their remonstrances.
+
+“A man who won't fight for his country is no good,” he declared; “and I
+won't keep a no-good son of a slacker on my pay roll. Get married men
+or men who have been rejected for military service to take the places of
+these bums who haven't courage enough even to try to enlist.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LIX
+
+
+The campaign for the Liberty bonds brought Cappy an appointment from
+the mayor as captain of a corps of volunteer bond salesmen to work
+the wholesale lumber and shipping trade, and for three weeks the old
+gentleman was as busy as the proverbial one-armed paper hanger with
+the itch. He was obsessed with a fear that the bond issue would be
+under-subscribed by about a billion and a half and result in the
+United States of America being accorded a hearty Teutonic horse laugh.
+Consequently he made five separate subscriptions on his own account, and
+just before the lists closed on the last day he was again overcome with
+apprehension and subscribed for an additional ten thousand dollars'
+worth for his grandson! When the result of the Liberty-bond campaign was
+made known he almost wept with joy and gave a wonderful dinner to his
+corps of salesmen, after which he went down to his ranch to rest for a
+week and see what Sam Daniels was up to.
+
+The morning he returned to town, prepared to leap, heart and soul into
+the hundred-million-dollar Red Cross drive, he had a visit from his port
+captain, Michael J. Murphy.
+
+“Well, sir,” Murphy announced, “I've cleaned up all the little details
+in my department, your new port captain is on the job, and I'm about to
+go over to the naval training station on Goat Island and hold up my hand
+again. But before I go, sir, I want to express to you something of what
+I feel for what you've done for me and mine.”
+
+“Tut, tut. Not another peep out of you, sir!” Cappy commanded. To be
+thanked for anything always made him feel uncomfortable. “What branch of
+the service do you hope to get into, Mike?”
+
+“I want to get aboard a destroyer, sir, though they're the divil an' all
+to live aboard. They offer the best chance for action. Patrolling the
+submarine zone, you know.”
+
+“Gosh,” Cappy groaned; “everybody's got the submarines on the brain,
+and I'm tagging along with the rest. Mike, I swear I can't sleep nights,
+thinking of this war. It breaks my heart to realize I'm out of it. And
+because I'm a shipping man, naturally my fool brain runs to submarines
+and how to control them. Mike, I have a great yearning to sink a
+submarine; the screams of those scoundrels aboard her would be music to
+my ears.”
+
+“It's a serious problem,” Murphy declared soberly; “but I'm hoping our
+Yankee ingenuity will solve it.”
+
+“Well, we haven't done it to date, and in the meantime all the nut
+inventors in the world are sending their nut ideas in to the National
+Council of Defense. Of course I have a bright idea too. I'm a great hand
+at hatching cute schemes, you know. However, I differ from the average
+submarine nut in this--that I want to try out my theory in practice
+before submitting it to an expectant world. Still, I'd need you to
+help me; and now that you're going into the navy I suppose I'll have to
+forget it.”
+
+“I seem to remember a scheme of yours that resulted in the capture of
+a submarine last year,” Murphy reminded the old man. “That was a bully
+scheme, and I'm willing to wager that the head which produced it
+can produce another just as good. Tell me your plan for eliminating
+submarines, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“My scheme doesn't contemplate a continuous performance,” Cappy hastened
+to explain, “but it might work out once or twice--and in this great
+international emergency anything is worth trying once. I could
+demonstrate my theory in about two months--with your help.”
+
+“Then,” declared Michael J. Murphy, “I'll wait until you give the
+demonstration before enlisting in the navy.”
+
+“Bully for you, Mike! I'll declare Terry Reardon in on the experiment
+also, for the reason that one of the ingredients required is a chief
+engineer with courage to spare. Now then, for my scheme: Do you know the
+_Costa Rica?_”
+
+“That old steamer that used to run to Panama for the Pacific Mail?”
+
+“The same.”
+
+“What about her?”
+
+“She's in the bone yard--laid up for keeps, Mike. Her plates are so
+thin and soft the least jar would punch a hole in her; she's wrecked
+and strained from fifty years of service; her engines are worn out, her
+boilers are burned out, her gear is antiquated, and even in these
+times of abnormal freight rates she's too far gone to patch up and
+keep running. They kicked her up in the mud of Oakland Inner Harbor
+yesterday, and there she'll be stripped of everything of value and left
+to rot. My plan, Mike, is to buy the old _Costa Rica_ for a couple of
+thousand dollars, turn Terence Reardon and his gang loose on her engines
+and boilers for a couple of weeks and take the old coffin out for one
+final voyage. She can make eight or nine knots in good weather, and if
+she's torpedoed the loss will be trifling. Will you run the risk and
+take her out for me, Mike?”
+
+“Yes, sir. What for?”
+
+“As a decoy.”
+
+“I don't understand.”
+
+“We'll put a hand-picked crew aboard her, Mike; we'll arm her fore and
+aft with six-inch guns, which we can readily get from the navy now
+that it's the fashion to arm merchantmen; and then go cruising in the
+submarine zone. You can pick up a few old navy men for a gun crew and
+train some of the Costa Rica's crew, can't you?”
+
+“If we can get somebody to give me the range and manage to get the
+gun loaded somehow, I'll do the gun pointing; with half a chance I'll
+guarantee results.”
+
+“And that is exactly what I plan to give you--half a chance,” Cappy
+declared enthusiastically. “The Costa Rica isn't worth two hoots in a
+hollow, but she still looks enough like a steamer to attract submarines;
+and during this fine summer weather we can chance a final voyage with
+the old wreck.”
+
+“Where do you get this 'we' stuff, Mr. Ricks?” Mike Murphy queried
+bluntly. “You're not figuring on going to sea in that coffin, are you?”
+
+“I most certainly am so figuring. I take my fun where I find it, Mike,
+and if I'm to plan and pay for this experiment--then, by gravy, I'm
+going to be on deck to watch it work out if it's the last act of my
+sinful career.”
+
+“But if they fire on us you may be killed.”
+
+“We'll be firm' back at 'em, won't we? And if I'm killed in action,
+won't that be a fitting finish for a Ricks?”
+
+“We may be afloat in an open boat for a week. I don't want you to die of
+exposure, sir.”
+
+“Forget it, Mike! I've been charged off to profit and loss for so many
+years it makes me ill to think of them. And you remember, my dear Mike,
+
+   _“'To every man upon this earth
+    Death cometh soon or late;
+    And how can man die better
+    Than facing fearful odds
+    For the ashes of his fathers
+    And the temples of his gods?'_
+
+Don't argue with me, Mike. My mind is quite made up. I'm going
+into action in this war, for, as I said before, I'll try anything
+once--particularly when it isn't very expensive and I can afford the
+luxury. We're going to buy the _Costa Rica_, take her into the submarine
+zone and lose her, but, by the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet, we'll take a
+submarine with us!”
+
+“Not if the German sees us first.”
+
+Cappy leaned forward and laid his index finger impressively on Michael
+J. Murphy's knee. “That's the only way we can hope to win,” he declared.
+“We must make certain the submarine sees us first. Mike, a German is a
+rabid disciple of law and order; anything out of the usual run of things
+upsets him terribly; he never makes allowance for the unexpected or for
+the other fellow's point of view. To be more exact, Mike, I figure
+that German psychology is the only kind of psychology a German can
+understand. And to tell you the truth, Mike,” he added musingly, “there
+are blamed few people who can understand mine.”
+
+Michael J. Murphy nodded a vigorous indorsement to this last remark, and
+Cappy went on: “Do you think any proud and arrogant skipper of a German
+submarine would ever suspect an American citizen of such a harebrained
+scheme as the sending out of a rusty, creaking old rattletrap of a
+steamer that can't get out of her own way, for the avowed purpose of
+destroying him and his sub? No sir! His microphones will tell him, while
+he is still totally submerged, that his approaching prey is a slow poke
+and cannot possibly outrun him; then he'll come up, take a look and
+clinch his conclusions--after which he will attack.”
+
+“True for you sir. He'll launch his torpedo and dive before I can get a
+shot at him or correct my range to hit him; then the torpedo will hit
+us and we'll go up like a shower of mush--probably with half a dozen men
+killed and nothing accomplished in the way of a return swat.”
+
+“That was the program a few months ago,” Cappy retorted triumphantly.
+“Have you noticed, however, that since merchantmen have been armed
+the submarines are more and more prone, when attacking in daylight, to
+pursue a steamer at a reasonable distance and rake her with shell
+fire? If a vessel is fired on and her skipper, looking back, notes the
+position of the submarine and realizes that he cannot possibly outrun
+her and that she outranges him, what does he do, Mike?”
+
+“He does the sensible thing. Heaves to to avoid loss of life, gets his
+men into the boats and abandons his ship to the Hun.”
+
+“Precisely! And if the Hun thinks he is not likely to be disturbed for a
+couple of hours, what does he do?”
+
+“Why,” said Murphy, “he comes aboard, removes all the stores he
+can--particularly engine oil--and strips the vessel of all her brass,
+copper and bronze fittings. These metals are very scarce in Germany and
+they need all they can get in the manufacture of munitions.”
+
+“Correct! And we must bear in mind, Mike, the fact that a German is
+naturally thrifty; if he can sink a ship with shell fire or bombs set
+in her bilges he will not waste on her a torpedo that costs from ten to
+twenty thousand dollars. Now, will he?”
+
+“Well, I wouldn't, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“Then my plan is absurdly simple. We merely provide a gorgeous
+opportunity for the enemy; we inculcate in him the idea that he is about
+to pick a soft one--then: Alas, poor Yorick!”
+
+Michael J. Murphy rose and put on his hat. “Where are you going, Mike?”
+ Cappy demanded.
+
+“I'm going up to the navy yard at Mare Island,” the port captain
+declared, “to see if I cannot pick up a couple of six-inch rifles of
+the model they used when I was in the navy. They're obsolete now, but
+I understand them--and while I'm getting the guns I'll pick up four or
+five old navy men. Leave it to me, Mr. Ricks.”
+
+“We'll give 'em hell!” shouted Cappy.
+
+“We will!” quoth Michael J. Murphy with conviction.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LX
+
+
+Two weeks later the old _Costa Rica,_ looking somewhat youthful in a
+new coat of black paint and with a huge American flag painted on each
+topside, slipped quietly out of San Francisco in ballast and for the
+last time turned her nose toward Panama. In the brief period given him
+in which to overhaul her interior, Terence P. Reardon had accomplished
+wonders, and an hour after Mike Murphy had taken his bearings from Point
+San Pedro and laid out his course the chief came into the chart room to
+announce that the old girl was doing eight knots and, barring unexpected
+bad weather, would continue to do it without falling to pieces. “If I
+could have spint two thousand dollars more on her,” Terence declared, “I
+believe I could get another knot out av her. Time was whin she could do
+sixteen.”
+
+Cappy Ricks, enjoying his afternoon cigar in the snug chart room,
+snorted vigorously. “I don't very often take a notion to throw my money
+into the sea, Terence,” he reminded his port engineer, “but when I do
+get that reckless I limit myself to twenty thousand dollars, and that,
+in round figures, is what this old ruin will stand me about the time the
+torpedo blows you up on top of the fiddle. However, that is a trifling
+investment if we succeed in destroying a late-type German submarine with
+a couple of hundred thousand dollars' worth of torpedoes aboard. As a
+sporting proposition it's somewhat more expensive than golf, but the
+excitement makes up for the added cost.”
+
+“The old box is alive with rats and bedbugs,” Murphy complained.
+
+“If they annoy you, Mike, my boy, comfort yourself with the thought that
+they're all going to be drowned,” Cappy replied gayly.
+
+Slowly the old packet wallowed down the coast, the while her crew, under
+Mike Murphy's supervision, built gun platforms fore and aft. Following
+their completion, the two six-inch guns Cappy had succeeded in getting
+from the navy were lifted out of the hold with the aid of the cargo
+winch and placed in position, one forward and the other aft. Thereupon
+the mate took charge of the _Costa Rica,_ while Mike Murphy drilled his
+crew in range finding and celerity in loading the piece. Pointing the
+gun was entirely up to Murphy and, needless to state, the task was in
+capable hands, as was frequently demonstrated during target practice as
+they loafed down the coast.
+
+Upon arrival at Panama the _Costa Rica's_ bunkers were replenished
+and an extra supply of sacked coal was piled on deck, for with her
+patched-up boilers the old steamer was a hog on fuel. Then the mechanics
+and carpenters and all men not vitally needed aboard for the remainder
+of the voyage were put ashore and furnished with transportation back to
+San Francisco by the regular Pacific Mail liner. Next, the name on the
+bows of the _Costa Rica_ was painted out, the name boards at each end of
+her bridge removed and the raised-letter record of her identity and
+home port chipped off her stern; following which Cappy Ricks, Terence
+P. Reardon and Michael J. Murphy commended their souls to their Creator,
+and the _Costa Rica_ slipped leisurely through the ditch and out into
+the Caribbean Sea.
+
+Fourteen days later Mike Murphy dropped round to Cappy Ricks' cabin.
+“We're in the danger zone, sir,” he announced. “And from now on we're
+liable to meet one of the larger type of U-boats that operate a couple
+of thousand miles from the base at Zeebrugge.”
+
+“Very well,” Cappy replied calmly. “Whether torpedoed or shelled, your
+instructions are the same. Forbid the wireless operator to send out a
+call for help, heave to immediately and get the men into the boats and
+away from the ship. Terry Reardon will remain on duty in the engine
+room, provided it isn't wrecked by a torpedo and the engine room
+crew killed; you and your gun crew will remain aboard and hide in the
+forecastle if it's action front, and in the auxiliary steering-gear
+house if it's action rear. I will relieve the quartermaster, take charge
+of the wheel and direct the action. If I see that there isn't going to
+be any action we'll put on life preservers, jump overboard and be picked
+up by our men in the boats. However, something tells me, Mike, that
+we're going to have a crack at--”
+
+At that very instant something rapped the _Costa Rica_ terrifically
+on the starboard side amidships and tore through her with a grinding,
+wrenching noise, followed by an explosion.
+
+“There's the crack you were speaking of, sir,” Murphy yelled and started
+for the door. Cappy Ricks grasped him frantically by the arm. “Was that
+a shell or a torpedo?” he cried. His voice, thin and shrill with age,
+quavered now with excitement.
+
+“It was a shell,” Murphy answered. “Went through the second cabin.”
+
+“Then that German belongs to Alden P. Ricks,” Cappy declared, and
+scurried for the pilot house. “Out and into life-boats!” he ordered the
+quartermaster, and shoved him away from the wheel. “Set her over to slow
+speed ahead,” he called to the mate, who was standing stupidly, gazing
+at the white puffs of smoke that marked the position of the submarine
+two miles off the starboard bow. The mate came to life, jammed over the
+handle of the marine telegraph and, obeying an order bellowed to him by
+Mike Murphy from the main deck, abandoned the bridge for the boat deck,
+there to superintend the task of getting the men away from the ship.
+
+His first thrill of excitement having subsided, Cappy carefully drew
+the little half curtains on the pilot-house window, leaving a small
+slit through which he could observe the submarine without being observed
+himself, for it was no part of his plan to disclose to the enemy the
+fact that the ship was not entirely deserted--and that the submarine
+commander should jump to the conclusion that she was deserted by all
+hands was precisely the condition that Cappy desired to bring about.
+
+Down in the engine room the indomitable Terence Reardon, with one hand
+on the throttle and one eye on the steam gauge, put the _Costa Rica_
+under a dead-slow bell; she seemed scarcely to move, yet she had
+sufficient steerage way to enable Cappy to keep her pointed in the
+general direction of the submarine, the commander of which, seeing the
+crew of the Costa Rica scurrying for the boats, contented himself with
+sending over half a dozen shells for the purpose of hurrying them along;
+then he ceased firing, and when the boats pulled out from the ship in
+tow of a motor lifeboat and his powerful glasses showed neither guns nor
+sign of life upon the _Costa Rica's_ decks, he did exactly what Cappy
+Ricks figured he would do.
+
+He circled warily round his prize, but the absence of frantic wireless
+calls for help lulled his suspicions, and presently he bore down upon
+her, hove to two cable lengths abreast the wallowing hulk and watched
+her fully five minutes for a possible trap, for the absence of any name
+puzzled him. His suspicions subsided at length, however, the hatch
+in her turtle deck slid back and men appeared, dragging up a small
+collapsible boat.
+
+Slowly, slowly--so gradually that it seemed the old vessel was merely
+drifting, Cappy brought the _Costa Rica_ round until her bow pointed
+toward the submarine. Mike Murphy, standing just inside the forecastle
+door, kept his glance on the slit in the curtains on the pilot-house
+window-and presently Cappy motioned violently to him.
+
+“To the gun!” ordered the captain. Followed by his gun crew he dashed
+out of the forecastle and up the companion ladder to the forecastle
+head. A jerk at a lever connecting a cunningly constructed set of
+controls, and the false topsides on the forecastle head flopped to the
+deck, revealing Mike Murphy's six-inch gun. Cappy saw him deflect the
+gun while another man traversed it; for five seconds his eyes pressed
+the sight, and when the gun remained motionless Cappy knew that the hull
+of the submarine was looming fairly on the intersection of the cross
+wires in the sight. The range was point-blank!
+
+Quick as were Murphy and his crew, however, the gun crew of the
+submarine was quicker. Before the _Costa Rica's_ gun was properly laid,
+a shell from the submarine flew a foot over the heads of the Murphyites
+and burst fifty yards beyond the ship. “Ah, missed!” breathed Michael J.
+and raised his hand. The gunner released the firing pin and the six-inch
+projectile with which the gun had been loaded for two days crashed into
+the submarine at her water line.
+
+A terrific explosion followed the shot. Cappy Ricks, gazing popeyed
+with horror, saw the submarine disintegrate and disappear in a huge
+water-spout; when the water settled only a vast and widening smear of
+heavy fuel oil showed where she had been.
+
+From the forecastle head Michael Murphy yelled to Cappy Ricks. “Well,
+are you satisfied, sir?” On his part, Cappy, jubilant, even in the
+instant when he knew thirty new faces were already whining round the
+devil, dashed out on the bridge, seized the whistle cord and swung on
+it. A sad, nautical sob from the _Costa Rica's_ siren answered him, and
+ten seconds later Terence Reardon whistled up the bridge. Cappy let go
+the whistle cord and took up the speaking tube. “Hello,” he piped.
+
+“What the divil do ye mean be blowin' that whistle?” roared Terence,
+thinking he was addressing the mate. “Wit' me alone in the engine
+room how d'ye expect me to keep shteam up on this ould hooker wit' you
+blowin' it off in the whistle! Take shame to yourself!”
+
+“Mike sunk the submarine! Mike sunk the submarine!” Cappy shrilled
+over and over again. “Come up, Terence, and see the oil. See the oil,
+Terence, see the oil! Mike sunk the submarine, Mike sunk it. Bully for
+Mike! Oh, bully! Bully! Bully! Mike sunk it, but I schemed it. Come up,
+Terence, I'm going to faint.”
+
+And then, with shrill yips of delirious delight he slid down the
+companion to the main deck, to be gathered in Michael J. Murphy's
+arms and hugged and passed to the gun crew, who hoisted him to their
+shoulders and paraded joyously and blasphemously round the deck.
+
+“I told you he wouldn't use a torpedo if he could do the trick with
+shells,” Gappy shouted. “I told you he'd board us if we didn't wireless
+for help. Ha, ha, ha! Te-hee!” And he burst into shrill cachinnations.
+“I out-thought the scoundrel--goin' to get a patent on my idea--turn
+it over to the Government--oh, Mike! Oh, Terence! Get the steward back
+aboard. We must have some liquor. They used to serve grog in the old
+navy after a victory, didn't they? Yi-yi-yi!”
+
+Terence P. Reardon came up and proffered his greasy paw, the while
+his quizzical glance swept the oily sea. “Well, sor,” he remarked
+philosophically, “what wit' bein' a Christian I'm a little bit sorry
+the Dutchman lost, but back av that again I'm a little bit glad we won.
+Michael, do you get those blackguards o' mine down below as quick as ye
+can, or we'll be all day gettin' shteam up agin in this ould brute av a
+ship.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER LXI
+
+
+Two days passed uneventfully; then shortly before sunset on the third
+day the look-out reported a periscope about a thousand yards distant and
+three points off the port bow. Cappy Ricks' old knees promptly commenced
+to knock together with excitement.
+
+“Here's where Terence gets that torpedo if he doesn't come up out of the
+engine room,” Mike Murphy remarked laconically, and promptly whistled
+Terence on the engine room speaking tube. “Come up or be blown up,” he
+yelled.
+
+“Divil a fear! We're comin',” Terence replied.
+
+The chief and his crew had just reached the deck when the black shining
+turtleback of the submarine broke water.
+
+“They have to come to the surface to discharge a torpedo,” Murphy
+explained to Cappy Ricks.
+
+“Great Godfrey! Here it comes!” shrilled Cappy, and watched, fascinated,
+the wake of the torpedo as it raced toward them. Just as Terence Reardon
+and his engine crew came panting up on the bridge, the old _Costa Rica_
+walked into it. “Me ingine room! I knew it!” cried Terence. Then the
+explosion came.
+
+From where he lay on his back, half stunned, Cappy Ricks saw water and
+wreckage fly high in the air. The _Costa Rica_ shivered. So did Cappy.
+Then the debris descended, and Cappy, choked with salt water, dimly
+realized that Terence Reardon had him in his arms and was carrying
+him down to the boat deck, where the motor lifeboat swung wide in the
+davits.
+
+“Here, take the boss from me,” Terence commanded, and passed Cappy to a
+negro fireman, who carried the old man forward and laid him on a pile of
+blankets, previously placed there for just such an emergency.
+
+Then the lifeboat commenced to drop away from the towering black
+topside and Cappy was aware of Michael J. Murphy's face--white, anxious,
+terrified--gazing down at him from the ship's rail.
+
+“I'm just suffering from the shock,” Cappy called. “Mike, you 'tend
+to business. Remember what I told you and tell the crew to keep their
+mouths shut. He'll do the natural thing and walk into your hand.”
+
+Murphy, reassured, waved his hand, and with his gun crew fled aft to
+the little house that protected the auxiliary steering gear from the
+weather, where they concealed themselves. In the meantime the other
+lifeboats had been lowered away; the painter from the third boat was
+passed to the second, which in turn passed its painter to the motor
+boat, and the ship's company hauled clear of the shattered, sinking
+ship. The _Costa Rica_ was going down by the head, and Cappy, curious as
+any human being, sat up to watch his decoy disappear.
+
+The submarine steamed up to them. “What vessel is that?” her commander
+shouted from the conning tower in excellent English.
+
+“The American steamer _Soak-it-to-'em_, of Rotten Row,” Cappy Ricks
+replied, “carrying a cargo of post holes. She has three decks and no
+bottom.”
+
+“How do you spell the name?” the German bawled.
+
+“Can't hear you,” Cappy fibbed. Then, _sotto voce_, to Mr. Reardon:
+“Kick her ahead, Terry.”
+
+“How do you spell the name?” the submarine captain repeated.
+
+Cappy jibbered something unintelligible, and Mr. Reardon added to the
+puzzle by bellowing the information that the _p_ was silent, as in
+pneumonia. All this time the motor boat was putting distance between
+itself and the submarine, and the disgusted German, as a last resort,
+steamed away and circled round the rapidly lifting stern of the doomed
+_Costa Rica_, confident that there he would find the record of her
+identity and home port--information which, in his methodical German way,
+he desired to include in his official report to the Admiralty. And while
+he ratched slowly past, striving to find with his binoculars that which
+was not, Michael J. Murphy and his bully boys came aft with a rush, tore
+aside the tarpaulin that screened the stern gun and expeditiously opened
+fire. To Cappy Ricks' horror Murphy's first shot was a clean miss, and
+instantly the big sub started to submerge with a hoarse sucking sound
+that brought despair to Cappy Ricks' heart. She was halfway under before
+Murphy's gun was reloaded, but quite calmly the gun was traversed and
+deflected until the black stern flashed across the intersection of the
+wires in the sight; then Murphy's hand dropped and the gun roared.
+
+“That'll do nicely, lads,” he told his crew. “Tore the stern off her
+that time; and from this dive she'll not come up. Cappy Ricks was right.
+He banked on human nature, and if curiosity isn't a human trait then I'm
+a Chinaman. Overboard with you, and away before the old girl goes under
+or we'll be sucked down in the vortex.”
+
+And overboard they went, to be picked up five minutes later by Terence
+and Cappy in the motor lifeboat. “You were right, Mr. Ricks,” cried
+Murphy as he scrambled into the boat. “Curiosity killed the cat!”
+
+“Yes, and it's blamed near killed me,” Cappy declared feebly. “Some of
+that debris came down and hit me a slap on the dome--Jerusalem! There
+goes my decoy--peace to her bones!”
+
+The _Costa Rica_ dove to the Port of Missing Ships. Michael J. Murphy,
+however, did not turn to see her disappear; he was gazing, instead, at
+a thin red trickle that came from under Cappy's cap band and was running
+down his wizened neck. “Mr. Ricks,” he said anxiously, “you're wounded.”
+
+Cappy rubbed the sore spot, and when he withdrew his fingers they were
+bloody.
+
+“By the Holy Pink-Toed Prophet!” he gasped wonderingly. “You're right,
+Mike. I've been wounded in action with the enemies of my country! So
+help me, Mike. I've actually lived to shed my blood for the Stars and
+Stripes, like any other Ricks.”
+
+He gazed wonderingly at Mike Murphy. “Now I can die happy,” he murmured.
+“I've done my bit.”
+
+“Yes, begorra,” rumbled Terence P. Reardon, “an' if I have my way about
+it ye're honorably discharged from the service this minute, Misther
+Ricks. I'll gallivant no more wit' you in ye're ould breadbaskets av
+shteamers. 'Tis highly dangerous an' no business for a man of family.”
+
+Mike Murphy grinned at his colleague. “For all that, Terence,” he
+declared, “you must admit that Mr. Ricks' scheme for destroying
+submarines is the only practical one yet devised.”
+
+“Thrue for ye, Michael. But shtill, like all fine invintions, the idjea
+has its dhrawbacks. Now if we could only be sure av a continyous supply
+av ould ships for use as decoys--”
+
+“I see a smudge of smoke,” cried Gappy Ricks.
+
+Mike Murphy followed the old man's pointing finger. “There's only
+one kind of boat makes a smudge like that,” he declared; “and it's a
+destroyer. Safe and well out of a glorious adventure. Faith, we're
+the lucky devils; and by this and by that, I'll enlist aboard that
+destroyer, now that I'm here on the job.”
+
+“Do--an' good luck to you!” murmured Terence.
+
+“Amen,” said Cappy Ricks, and fingered his trifling but honorable wound.
+“Gosh!” he murmured. “If Skinner could only know a thrill like this!”
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Cappy Ricks Retires, by Peter B. Kyne
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