ng for the engine to be slowed, and I left the wheel and went
aft; some struggle was going on at the stern of the tug; a flash came
from there and the cracking of a shot. Suddenly all was light about me
as, aware of the breaking of the hawser and alarmed by the shot, the
searchlight of the _Miwaka_ turned upon the tug. The cut end of the
hawser was still upon the tug, and Spearman had been trying to clear
this when Stafford attacked him; they fought, and Stafford struck
Spearman down. He turned and cried out against me--accusing me of
having ordered Spearman to cut the line. He held up the cut end toward
Ramsdell on the _Miwaka_ and cried out to him and showed by pointing
that it had been cut. Blood was running from the hand with which he
pointed, for he had been shot by Spearman; and now again and a second
and a third time, from where he lay upon the deck, Spearman fired. The
second of those shots killed the engineer who had rushed out where I
was on the deck; the third shot went through Stafford's head. The
_Miwaka_ was drifting down upon the reef; her whistle sounded again and
again the four long blasts. The fireman, who had followed the engineer
up from below, fawned on me! I was safe for all of him, he said; I
could trust Luke--Luke would not tell! He too thought I had ordered
the doing of that thing!

"'From the _Miwaka_, Ramsdell yelled curses at me, threatening me for
what he thought that I had done! I looked at Spearman as he got up
from the deck, and I read the thought that had been in him; he had
believed that he could cut the hawser in the dark, none seeing, and
that our word that it had been broken would have as much strength as
any accusation Stafford could make. He had known that to share a
secret such as that with me would "make" him on the lakes; for the loss
of the _Miwaka_ would cripple Stafford and Ramsdell and strengthen me;
and he could make me share with him whatever success I made. But
Stafford had surprised him at the hawser and had seen.

"'I moved to denounce him, Father, as I realized this; I moved--but
stopped. He had made himself safe against accusation by me!
None--none ever would believe that he had done this except by my order,
if he should claim that; and he made plain that he was going to claim
that. He called me a fool and defied me. Luke--even my own man, the
only one left on the tug with us--believed it! And there was murder in
it now, with Stafford dying there upo