hook, and with the tips
of my fingers found it to be a key!

Bounding out of my berth, I went to the door with it, certain that it
was a spare key to the stateroom. Cautiously I tried it in the large,
old-fashioned lock, and it turned back easily. I tried the knob, and the
door swung inward.

I closed it again and debated for a minute what I should do, and,
deciding that anything could not be worse than lying idle in a cell, made
up my mind to venture out and call upon Captain Riggs if I could find
him, or do a little spying on my own account to learn of any new
development since I had been dismissed from the saloon and imprisoned.

I held the door open a few inches for several minutes and listened for
some suspicious sound in the dark passageway. I remembered that Harris
had said something about a guard at the door, but although I strained my
eyes, in the darkness I could see no one. Each end of the passage was
capped by a penumbra of dim light, for although the sky was overcast, the
open air was not so dark as the intensified gloom of the passage.

My courage grew as I stood in the doorway, and I stepped out, closing the
door silently and not locking it, but knotting the key in the string of
my pajamas.

I listened for a minute at Meeker's door but heard nothing. His room was
next to mine, but further aft, with one or more doors between his and
where the passage gave on the open after-deck, Captain Rigg's room was on
the same side, but away forward, under the end of the bridge, close to
the open ladder which led down to the fore-deck.

In my bare feet I made no noise, and slowly made my way forward to see if
there was a light in Captain Riggs's room. Before I had gone far I
heard a murmur of voices, and then saw a sliver of light from the jamb of
a door. There was a conversation going on in the captain's room, but I
could not distinguish the voices. I went on to the forward end of the
superstructure and discovered a port-hole in the captain's cabin partly
open, and by going up three steps of the bridge-ladder I had a partial
view of the room.

Captain Riggs was fully dressed, and sat at a shelf which dropped from
the wall. He was sorting out papers, and Harris, the mate, was standing
over him, talking.

"You must be mistaken, Mr. Harris," I heard the captain say.

"Make me third cook if I be!" exclaimed Harris, who seemed to be in an
irritable mood. "I know what I'm talking about, cap'n! I run my thumbnail