boat leaping towards the
stern of the barge, and sprang on deck. The mate rose to his feet; but
the other pushed him fiercely aside, and picking up the handspike, which
lay on the raised top of the cabin, went below. Half an hour later
he came on deck with a fresh suit of clothes on, and his head roughly
bandaged, and standing in front of the mate, favoured him with a baleful
stare.

"Gimme that helm," he cried.

The mate relinquished it.

"You dog!" snarled the other, "to try and kill a man when he wasn't
looking, and then keep him in his wet clothes in the boat all night.
Make the most o' your time. It'll be many a day before you see the sea
again."

The mate groaned in spirit, but made no reply.

"I've wrote everything down with the time it happened," continued
the other in a voice of savage satisfaction; "an' I've locked that
hand-spike up in my locker. It's got blood on it."

"That's enough about it," said the mate, turn-ing at last and speaking
thickly. "What I've done I must put up with."

He walked forward to end the discussion; but the skipper shouted out
choice bits from time to time as they occurred to him, and sat steer.
ing and gibing, a gruesome picture of vengeance.

Suddenly he sprang to his feet with a sharp cry. "There's somebody in
the water," he roared; "stand by to pick him up."

As he spoke he pointed with his left hand, and with his right steered
for something which rose and fell lazily on the water a short distance
from them.

The mate, following his outstretched arm, saw it too, and picking up a
boat-hook stood ready, and they were soon close enough to distinguish
the body of a man supported by a life-belt.

"Don't miss him," shouted the skipper.

The mate grasped the rigging with one hand, and leaning forward as far
as possible stood with the hook poised. At first it seemed as though the
object would escape them, but a touch of the helm in the nick of time
just enabled the mate to reach. The hook caught in the jacket, and with
great care he gradually shortened it, and drew the body close to the
side.

"He's dead," said the skipper, as he fastened the helm and stood looking
down into the wet face of the man. Then he stooped, and taking him by
the collar of his coat dragged the stream-ing figure on to the deck.

"Take the helm," he said.

"Ay, ay," said the other; and the skipper disappeared below with his
burden.

A moment later he came on deck again. "We'll take in sail an