insincere. And when the moving picture
girl saw the captain speaking in an aside to Hen Lacomb, her doubts were
redoubled.

"Stand by!" someone on the steamer ordered. "We're sending a boat to
take the prisoner."

"This is a pretty how-d'-do!" blustered Captain Brisco. "They're going
to leave me short-handed, and just at a time when I'm likely to need
every man I can get, too," and he cast an anxious look around the
horizon. It had suddenly become quite dark. A bank of clouds, slate
colored, and fringed with an ominous yellow, had gathered in the west,
and there was a moaning in the air as though a far-off wind were sending
a message to those in peril to beware of its breath.

The sea, too, had a glassy look. The big waves rose sullenly, and sank
back into troughs, with an oily smooth motion as though they resented
being thus confined. It was like the action of some raging beast in
leash. There was a curious oppressiveness in the air, too, and more than
one found difficulty in breathing.

"What is it? Oh, what is it?" asked Ruth, as she came toward her sister.
"I feel as though something terrible were going to happen."

"Something _has_ happened!" Alice exclaimed. "They've got poor old Jack!
Isn't it a shame, when everything was going so nicely?"

"Got him!" questioned Ruth. "What do you mean?"

"It's those Britishers! They recognized this ship as the one on which
the mutiny occurred. She's been built over--the ship I mean--but the
steamer knew her--I mean some officer did. And they're going to take
Jack away. You know he told us how he broke out of jail, after he was
locked up on an unjust charge. Well, they want him for that, but he
doesn't want him to go--at least he pretends he doesn't."

Alice paused for breath--she needed it.

"Well!" exclaimed Ruth. "You may understand what you mean, but I don't,
my dear. Who wants whom, and who doesn't want whom--and what?"

Thereupon Alice explained how Captain Brisco had declared Jack should
not be taken, and yet how Alice, herself, believed he would give him up.

"But what does it all mean--that enmity you say Captain Brisco has
against Jack?" Ruth asked Alice, for Alice spoke about the time Jack had
fallen overboard, and mentioned how the sailor had said he was tossed
over the rail.

"I don't know what it means," the younger girl replied. "It is all queer
and mysterious, and it's getting worse. But I think there is some secret
between Captain Brisco and that H