ou through a
two-inch bulkhead, and the like. The Chink's laying in his bunk, turned
the other way. "Why don't you go aboard of him," says I. The Dutcher
says nothing, but goes over to his own bunk and feels under the straw.
When he comes back he's looking queer. "By God!" says he, "the devil has
swiped my gun!"... Now if that's true there is going to be hell to pay
in this vessel very quick I figure I'm still master of this vessel.'"

"The evil eye," I grunted. "Consciences gone wrong there somewhere."

"Not altogether, Ridgeway. I can see that yellow man peeking. Now
just figure yourself, say, eight thousand miles from home, out on
the water alone with a crowd of heathen fanatics crazy from fright,
looking around for guns and so on. Don't you believe you'd keep an
eye around the corners, kind of--eh? I'll bet a hat he was taking it
all in, lying there in his bunk, 'turned the other way.' Eh? I pity
the poor cuss--Well, there's only one more entry after that. He's
good and mad. Here:

"'Now, by God! this is the end. My gun's gone, too right out from under
lock and key, by God! I been talking with Bach this morning. Not to let
on, I had him in to clean my lamp. There's more ways than one, he says,
and so do I.'"

McCord closed the book and dropped it on the table.

"Finis," he said. "The rest is blank paper."

"Well!" I will confess I felt much better than I had for some time past.
"There's _one_ 'mystery of the sea' gone to pot, at any rate. And now,
if you don't mind, I think I'll have another of your nips, McCord."

He pushed my glass across the table and got up, and behind his back his
shoulder rose to scour the corners of the room, like an incorruptible
sentinel. I forgot to take up my gin, watching him. After an uneasy
minute or so he came back to the table and pressed the tip of a
forefinger on the book.

"Ridgeway," he said, "you don't seem to understand. This particular
'mystery of the sea' hasn't been scratched yet--not even _scratched_,
Ridgeway." He sat down and leaned forward, fixing me with a didactic
finger. "What happened?"

"Well, I have an idea the 'barbarian' got them, when it came to the
pinch."

"And let the--remains over the side?"

"I should say."

"And then they came back and got the 'barbarian' and let _him_ over the
side, eh? There were none left, you remember."

"Oh, good Lord, I don't know!" I flared with a childish resentment at
this catechising of his. But his finger remain