talk to me. You'd sell out your own mother."

"Them's fightin' words, Gib."

"Shut up."

"Gib, you tryin' to pick a fight with me?"

"No, but I would if I thought I wouldn't git a footrace instead,"
Gibney rejoined scathingly. "Cripes, what a double-crossin' I
been handed! Honest, Bart, when it comes to that sort o' work
Scraggs is in his infancy. You sure take the cake."

"I ain't got the heart to clout you an' make you eat them words,"
Mr. McGuffey declared sorrowfully.

"You mean you ain't got the guts," Mr. Gibney corrected him.
"Bart, I got your number. Good-bye."

Mr. McGuffey had a wild impulse to cast himself upon the Gibney
neck and weep, but his honour forbade any such weakness. So he
invited Mr. Gibney to betake himself to a region several degrees
hotter than the _Maggie's_ engine room; then, because he feared
to linger and develop a sentimental weakness, he turned his back
abruptly and descended to the said engine room.

On his part, Adelbert P. Gibney entered the cabin and glared long
and menacingly at Captain Scraggs. "I'll have my time," he
growled presently. "Give it to me an' give it quick."

The very intonation of his voice warned Scraggs that the present
was not a time for argument or trifling. Silently he paid Mr.
Gibney the money due him; in equal silence the navigating officer
went to the pilot house, unscrewed his framed certificate from
the wall, packed it with his few belongings, and departed for
Scab Johnny's boarding house.

"Hello," Scab Johnny saluted him at his entrance. "Quit the
_Maggie_?"

Mr. Gibney nodded.

"Want a trip to the dark blue?"

"Lead me to it," mumbled Mr. Gibney.

"It'll cost you twenty dollars, Gib. Chief mate on the _Rose of
Sharon_, bound for the Galapagos Islands sealing."

"I'll take it, Johnny." Mr. Gibney threw over a twenty-dollar
bill, went to his room, packed all of his belongings, paid his
bill to Scab Johnny, and within the hour was aboard the schooner
_Rose of Sharon_. Two hours later they towed out with the tide.

Poor McGuffey was stunned when he heard the news that night from
Scab Johnny. When he retailed the information to Scraggs next
morning, Scraggs was equally perturbed. He guessed that McGuffey
and Gibney had quarrelled and he had the poor judgment to ask
McGuffey the cause of the row. Instantly, McGuffey informed him
that that was none of his dad-fetched business--and the incident
was closed.

The three months that followed w