gested, "maybe you sent him the picture of somebody
he knows!"

"Well, in that case, Mike, I'm not going to hang on the hook of
suspicion. Maybe I can find out whose picture I sent," and away Matt
went up town to the photograph gallery. When he returned ten minutes
later Mr. Murphy, sighting him a block in the offing, knew the skipper
of the barkentine Retriever for a broken man! Beyond doubt he had
shipped a full cargo of grief.

"Well?" he queried as Matt hove alongside. "Did you find out?"

Matt nodded gloomily.

"Who?" Mr. Murphy demanded peremptorily.

"Cappy Ricks!" Matt almost wailed.

"NO!" Mr. Murphy roared.

"Yes! The old scoundrel was up here three years ago, visiting this
mill--you know, Mike, he owns it--and the Retriever was here loading at
the time. He and Captain Kendall were close friends, and they went over
to that photograph shop, had their pictures taken and swapped--and like
a poor, helpless, luckless boob I had to come along and buy the sample
picture the photographer hung in his case. It never occurred to me to
ask questions--and I might have known nobody but a prominent citizen
ever gets into a show-case--"

"Glory, glory, hallelujah," Mr. Murphy crooned in a deep, chain-locker
voice, and fled from the skipper's wrath.

An hour later, in the privacy of his cabin, Matt Peasley took his pen in
hand and wrote to Cappy Ricks:

Mr. Alden P. Ricks,
Dear Sir:--

I herewith tender my resignation as master of the barkentine
Retriever, same to take effect on my return from Sydney--or
before I sail, if you desire. If I do not hear from you before
I sail I shall assume that it will be all right to quit when I
get back from Australia.

I will not be twenty-three years old until the Fourth of July.
I was afraid you wouldn't trust me with a big ship like the
Retriever if you knew; so I sent you a photograph I purchased
for fifty cents from the local photographer. I guess that's
all--except that you couldn't find a better man to take my
place than Mr. Murphy. He has had the experience.

Yours truly,
Matt Peasley.

There were tears in his eyes as he dropped that letter into the
mail box. The Blue Star Navigation Company owned the Retriever,
but--but--well she was Matt Peasley's ship and he loved her as men learn
to love their homes. It broke his heart to think of giving