hat time I wore a pointed beard. This I shaved. Also I was accustomed
to use eye-glasses. The trouble was merely a slight astigmatism which
bothered me only in reading or close inspection. I could get along
perfectly well without the glasses, so I discarded them. I had my hair
cut rather close. When I had put on sea boots, blue trousers and shirt, a
pea jacket and a cap I felt quite safe from the recognition of a man like
Dr. Schermerhorn. In fact, as you shall see, I hardly spoke to him during
all the voyage out.

Promptly at six, then, I returned with a sea chest, bound I knew not
whither, to be gone I knew not for how long, and pledged to act as second
officer on a little hundred-and-fifty-ton schooner.

II

THE GRAVEN IMAGE

I had every reason to be satisfied with my disguise,--if such it could
be called. Captain Selover at first failed to recognise me. Then he burst
into his shrill cackle.

"Didn't know you," he trebled. "But you look shipshape. Come, I'll show
you your quarters."

Immediately I discovered what I had suspected before; that on so small a
schooner the mate took rank with the men rather than the afterguard.
Cabin accommodations were of course very limited. My own lurked in the
waist of the ship--a tiny little airless hole.

"Here's where Johnson stayed," proffered Selover. "You can bunk here, or
you can go in the foc'sle with the men. They's more room there. We'll get
under way with the turn of the tide."

He left me. I examined the cabin. It was just a trifle larger than its
single berth, and the berth was just a trifle larger than myself. My
chest would have to be left outside. I strongly suspected that my lungs
would have to be left outside also; for the life of me I could not see
where the air was to come from. With a mental reservation in favour of
investigating the forecastle, I went on deck.

The _Laughing Lass_ was one of the prettiest little schooners I ever
saw. Were it not for the lines of her bilges and the internal arrangement
of her hold, it might be imagined she had been built originally as a
pleasure yacht. Even the rake of her masts, a little forward of the
plumb, bore out this impression, which a comparatively new suit of
canvas, well stopped down, brass stanchions forward, and two little guns
under tarpaulins, almost confirmed. One thing struck me as peculiar. Her
complement of boats was ample enough. She had two surf boats, a dingy,
and a dory slung to the davits