"Tell it!" Cappy snapped.

"The Retriever arrived at Grays Harbor this morning, Mr. Ricks. She's broken the record for a fast passage," and he handed Cappy Ricks a telegram.

"Bless my withered heart!" Cappy declared, and opened his other eye. "You don't tell me? Well, well, well! All Hands And Feet is making good right off the bat, isn't he?" Cappy chuckled. "Skinner, my dear boy," he bragged, "did you ever see me start out to pick a skipper and hand myself the worst of it?"

"No, sir," Mr. Skinner maintained dutifully, and turned away to hide a wicked little smile, which under the circumstances Skinner was entitled to.

"And you never will, Skinner. Paste that in your hat, boy. That big Swede, Peterson, can handle a ship as well as he can handle a refractory mate—and that's going some, Skinner—going some! I'm not surprised at his fast passage. Not at all, Skinner. Come to think of it, I'm going to fire that Scotchman in the Fortuna and give All Hands And Feet his berth. He has earned it."

He adjusted his spectacles and read:

Hoquiam, Washington, June 27, 19—.

Blue Star Navigation Company, 258 California St., San Francisco.

Arrived this morning, seventy-nine days from bar to bar, all hands well, including your special messenger. Offered him job as second mate, just to show I had no hard feelings, but he would not work, so I brought him home under hatches. Permitted him present his formal credentials this morning and turned over command of ship to him. Declined responsibility and left, saying you had promised him command four-masted schooner. Seemed trifle hurt, although it is seventy-nine days since I thrashed him. Consequently I am still in command and awaiting your instructions.

Peasley.

For a long time Cappy Ricks kept looking sternly at Mr. Skinner over the tops of his spectacles. There was blood on the moon again, and the silence was terrible. He kept rocking gently backward and forward in his swivel chair, for all the world as though preparing for a panther-like spring at Mr. Skinner's throat. Suddenly he exploded.

"I won't have another thing to do with the man Peasley!" he shrilled. "The fellow is a thorn in my side and I want peace! Understand, Skinner? I—want—peace! What in blue blazes do I pay you ten thousand a year for if it isn't to give me peace? Answer me that, Skinner."

"Well you said you wanted to attend to the shipping—"

"That'll do, Skinner—that'll do! You're an honorary member of the I-told-you-so Club and I'm thoroughly disgusted with you. Rid me of this man—immediately. If I ever get another telegram from the scoundrel I shall hold you personally responsible."

Forthwith Mr. Skinner acted. He went up to the office of the United States District Attorney and swore out a Federal warrant for the arrest of Matthew Peasley on a charge of mutiny and insubordination, assault and battery on the high seas, and everything else he could think of. The authorities promptly wired north to send a United States marshal down to Grays Harbor to arrest the culprit; and the following afternoon, when Cappy Ricks got back to his office after luncheon and picked up the paper, the very first thing his glance rested on was the headline:

MATE CHARGED WITH MUTINY!

Mutiny and sundry other crimes on the high seas are out of the ordinary; hence the United Press correspondent at Hoquiam had considered the story of Matt Peasley's arrest worthy of dissemination over the Pacific Coast.

Cappy Ricks read it, the principal item of interest in it being a purported interview with Matt Peasley, who, in choice newspaperese, had entered a vigorous denial of the charge. The story concluded with the statement that Peasley was a native of Thomaston, Maine, where he had always borne a most excellent reputation for steadiness and sobriety.

Cappy Ricks laid the paper aside.

Thomaston, Maine! So the man Peasley was a Down-Easter! That explained it.

"Well, I hope my teeth may fall into the ocean!" Cappy murmured. "Thomaston, Maine! Why, he's one of our own town boys—one of my own people! Dear, dear, dear! Well now, it's strange I didn't know that name. I must be getting old to forget it."

He sat in his swivel chair, rocking gently backward and forward for several minutes, after a fashion he had when perturbed. Suddenly his old hand shot out and pressed the push button on his desk, and his stenographer answered.

"Send Mr. Skinner in!" he commanded.

Presently Mr. Skinner came, and again Cappy eyed him over the tops of his spectacles; again the terrible silence. Skinner commenced to fidget.

"Skinner," began Cappy impressively, "how often have I got to tell you not to interfere with the shipping? Tut, tut! Not a peep out of you, sir—not a peep! You had the audacity, sir, to swear to a Federal warrant against the man Peasley. How dare you, sir? Do you know who the man Peasley is? You don't. Well, sir, I'll tell you. He's a Down-East boy and I went to school with his people. I'll bet Ethan Peasley was a relative of this boy Matt, because Ethan had a cousin by the name of Matthew; and Ethan and Matt and I used to hell around together until they went to sea.

"Lord bless you, Skinner, I can remember yet the day the Martha Peasley came up the harbor, with her flag at half-mast—and poor old Ethan was gone—whipped off the end of her main yard when she rolled!

"We were great chums, Ethan and I, Skinner; and I cried. Why—why, damn it, sir, this boy Matt's people and mine are all buried in the same cemetery back home. Yes, sir! And nearly all of 'em have the same epitaph—'Lost at Sea'—and—you idiot, Skinner! What do you mean, sir, by standing there with your infernal little smile on your smug face? Out of my office, you jackanapes, and call the dogs off this boy Matt. Why, there was never one of his breed that wasn't a man and a seaman, every inch of him.

"All Hands And Feet thrash a Peasley! Huh! A joke! Why, Ethan was six foot six at twenty, with an arm like a fathom of towing cable. Catch me turning down one of our own boys! No, sir! Not by a damned sight!"

In all his life Mr. Skinner had never seen Cappy Ricks so wrought up. He fled at once to call off the dogs, while Cappy turned to his desk and wrote this telegram:

San Francisco, California. June 28, 19—.

Matt Peasley, Care United States Marshal, Hoquiam, Washington.

Congratulations on splendid voyage. You busted record. Lindquist, in the John A. Logan, did it in eighty-four days in the spring of ninety-four. Draw draft and pay off crew, render report of voyage, place second mate in charge, and proceed immediately to Seattle to get your master's ticket. Will telegraph Seattle inspectors requesting waive further probation as first mate and issue license if you pass examination in order that you may accept captaincy of Retriever. Skinner, my manager, had you arrested. Would never have done it myself. I come from Thomaston, Maine, and I knew your people. Would never have sent the Swede had I known which tribe of Peasley you belonged to—though, if he had licked you, no more than you deserved. I want no more of your impudence, Matt.

Alden P. Ricks.

* * * * * *

For a week business droned along in Cappy Ricks' office as usual, interrupted at last by the receipt of a telegram from Matt Peasley to Cappy. It was sent from Seattle and read:

"Have now legal right to be called captain. Rejoin ship tomorrow. Wire orders. Thank you."

"God bless the lad!" Cappy murmured happily. "I'll bet he's going to make me a skookum skipper. Still, I think he's pretty young and sadly in need of training; so I'll have to take some of the conceit out of him. I'm going to proceed to break his young heart; and if he yells murder I'll fire him! On the contrary, if he's one of Ethan's tribe—well, the Peasleys always did their duty; I'll say that for them. I hope he stands the acid."

Whereupon Cappy Ricks squared round to his desk and wrote:

San Francisco, July 5, 19—.

Captain Matthew Peasley, Master Barkentine Retriever, Hoquiam, Washington.

Glad you have legal right to be called captain. Sorry I have not. Proceed to Weatherby's mill, at Cosmopolis, and load for Antofagasta, Chile. Remember speed synonymous with dividends in shipping business.

Blue Star Navigation Company.

When Cappy signed his telegrams with the company name it was always a sure indication he had discharged his cargo of sentiment and gotten down to business once more.

"A little creosoted piling now and then is bully for the best of men," he cackled. "For a month of Sundays that man Peasley will curse me as far as he can smell the Retriever. Oh, well! Every dog must have his day—and I'm a wise old dog. I'll teach that Matt boy some respect for his owners before I'm through with him!"



CHAPTER XII. THE CAMPAIGN OPENS

When Matt Peasley's Yankee combativeness, coupled with the accident of birth in the old home town of Cappy Ricks, gained for him command of the Blue Star Navigation Company's big barkentine, Retriever, he lacked eight days of his twenty-first birthday. He had slightly less beard than the average youth of his years; and, despite the fact that he had been exposed almost constantly to salty gales since his fourteenth birthday, he did not look his age. And of all the ridiculous sights ashore or afloat the most ridiculous is a sea captain with the body of a Hercules and the immature features of an eighteen-year-old boy.

Indeed, such a great, soft, innocent baby type was Matt Peasley that even the limited sense of humor possessed by his motley crew forbade their reference to him, after custom immemorial, as the Old Man. The formal title of captain seemed equally absurd; so they compromised by dubbing him Mother's Darling.

"If," quoth Mr. Michael Murphy, chief kicker of the Retriever, over a quiet pipe with Mr. Angus MacLean, the second mate, as the vessel lay at anchor in Grays Harbor, "Cappy Ricks had laid eyes on Mother's Darling before ordering him to Seattle to go up for his master's ticket, the old fox would have scuttled the ship sooner than trust that baby with her."

"Ye'll nae be denying the lad kens his business," Mr. MacLean declared.

"Aye! True enough, Mac; but 'twould be hard to convince Cappy Ricks o' that. Every skipper in his employ is a graybeard."

"Mayhap," the canny MacLean retorted. "That's because t'owd boy's skippers have held their berths ower long."

But Mr. Murphy shook his head. He had come up from before the mast in the ships of the Blue Star Navigation Company, and since he had ambitions he had been at some pains to acquaint himself with the peculiarities of the president of that corporation.

"Give Cappy Ricks one look into Matt Peasley's face and I'll be skippering the Retriever," he declared.

And in this he was more than half right, for Cappy Ricks had never met Matt Peasley, and when the Old Man made up his mind that he wanted the boy to skipper his barkentine, the Retriever, he was acting entirely on instinct. He only knew that in Matt Peasley he had a man who had shipped out before the mast and returned from the voyage in command of the ship, and naturally such an exploit challenged recognition of the most signal nature—particularly when, in its performance, the object of Cappy's admiration had demonstrated that he was possessed of certain sterling attributes which are commonly supposed to make for success in any walk of life.

Since Matt Peasley had accomplished a man's work it never occurred to Cappy Ricks to consider that the object of his interest might be a boy. Young he knew him to be—that is to say, Cappy figured the rascal to be somewhere between thirty and thirty-five.

Had he known, however, that his prospective captain had but recently attained his majority the Old Man would have ascribed Matt Peasley's record-breaking voyage from Cape Town to Grays Harbor as sheer luck, and forthwith would have set Master Matthew down for a five-year apprenticeship as first mate; for Cappy was the product of an older day, and held that gray hairs and experience are the prime requisites for a berth as master.

Any young upstart can run coastwise, put in his service sailing a ship from headland to headland, and then take a course in a navigation school, where in six weeks he can cram sufficient navigation into his thick head to pass the inspectors and get a master's ticket; but for offshore cruising Cappy Ricks demanded a real sailor and a thorough business man rolled into one.

Mother's Darling had returned to Grays Harbor from a flying visit to Seattle, where two grizzled old ex-salts, the local inspectors, had put him through a severe examination to ascertain what he knew of Bowditch on Navigation and Nichols on Seamanship. Naturally he did not know as much as they thought he should; but, out of sheer salt-water pride in the exploit of a stripling and in deference to a letter from Cappy Ricks requesting them to waive further probation as chief mate and issue Mr. Peasley his master's license if they found him at all competent—this in order that the said Peasley might take command of his barkentine, the Retriever, forthwith—the inspectors concluded to override the rules of the Department of Commerce, and gave Matt Peasley his master's license.

Upon his return from Seattle, Matt called at the telegraph office in Hoquiam and received his loading instructions from the owners. His heart beat high with youthful importance and the joy of victory as he almost ran to the water front and engaged a big gasoline launch to take him aboard the Retriever and then kick her into the mill dock at Cosmopolis. His ship was not where he had left her, however, and after an hour's search he discovered her several miles up the Chehalis river. Murphy was on deck, gazing wistfully at the house and wishing he had some white paint, when Matt Peasley came aboard. Even before the latter leaped to the deck Mr. Murphy knew the glad tidings—knew them, in fact, the very instant the boy's shining countenance appeared above the rail. The skipper was grinning fatuously and Mr. Murphy grinned back at him.

"Well, sir," he greeted young Matt, "I see you're the permanent skipper. I congratulate you."

"Thank you, Mike. And I hope you will have no objection to continuing in your berth as first mate. I realize I'm pretty young for an old sailor like you to be taking orders from—"

"Bless your soul, sir," Mr. Murphy protested; "of course I'll stick with you! Didn't you whale the big Swede Cappy Ricks sent to Cape Town to kick you out of your just due?" He reaffirmed his loyalty with a contemptuous grunt.

"What are you doing way up the river?" the captain demanded.

"Oh, that's a little liberty I took," the mate declared. "You're new to this coast; and, of course, when they ordered us to Grays Harbor I knew we weren't going to be able to go on dry dock, because there isn't any dry dock here. So, while you were in Seattle, I had a gasoline tug tow us up-river. We've been lying in fresh water four days, sir, and that'll kill most of the worms on her bottom."

"Hereafter," said Matt Peasley, "you get ten dollars a month above the scale. Thank you."

Mr. Murphy acknowledged his appreciation.

"Any orders, sir?" he continued.

Matt Peasley showed him Cappy Ricks' telegram and Mr. Murphy nodded his approval. He had been in port nearly a week and the whine of the sawmills and the reek of river water had begun to get on his nerves. He was ready for the dark blue again.

"There's something wrong about our cargo, I think," Matt remarked presently.

"Why, sir?"

"Why, down at the telegraph office this morning I met the master of the schooner, Carrier Dove, and when I told him my orders he snickered."

"Huh! Well, he ought to know what he snickered about, sir. The Carrier Dove just finished loading at Weatherby's mill," Mr. Murphy replied. "She's a Blue Star craft and bound for Antofagasta also. Her skipper's Salvation Pete Hansen, and it would be just like that squarehead to dodge a deckload of piling and leave it for us."

"Well, whatever it was it amused him greatly. It must be worse than a deckload of piling."

"There's nothing worse in the timber line, unless it's a load underdeck, sir. You take a sixty-foot pile with a fourteen-inch butt and try to shove it down through the hatch, and you've got a job on your hands. And after the hold is half filled you've got to quit loading through the hatch, cut ports in your bows, and shove the sticks in that way. It's the slowest loading and discharging in the world; and unless you drive her between ports and make up for the lost time you don't make a good showing with your owners—and then your job's in danger. Ship owners never consider anything except results."

"Well," the captain answered, "in order not to waste any more time than is absolutely necessary, call Mr. MacLean and the cook, and we'll go for'd and break out the anchor."

Immediately on his arrival from Cape Town, Matt Peasley had paid off all his foremast hands, leaving the two mates and the cook the only men aboard the vessel. He joined them now in a walk around the capstan; the launch hooked on and the Retriever was snaked across the harbor to Weatherby's mill. And, while they were still three cables' length from the mill dock, Mr. Murphy, who had taken up his position on the topgallant forecastle, to be ready with a heaving line, suddenly raised his head and sniffed upwind.

The captain had the wheel and Mr. MacLean was standing aft waiting to do his duty by the stern line. Presently he, too, raised his head and sniffed.

"I see you got it too, Mac," Mr. Murphy bawled.

"Aw, weel," Mr. MacLean replied; "Why worrit aboot a bridge till ye hae to cross it? D'ye ken 'tis oors?"

"What are you two fellows talking about and why are you sniffing?" Matt Peasley demanded.

"I'm sniffing at the same thing Salvation Pete Hansen laughed about," the mate answered. "I'll bet you a uniform cap we're stuck with a cargo of creosoted piling—and hell hath no fury like a creosoted pile."

When the vessel had been made fast to the mill dock Matt Peasley walked forward to meet his mate.

"What about this cargo of ours?" he demanded. "Remember, I'm new to the lumber trade on this coast. I have never handled any kind of piling."

"Then, sir, you're going to get your education like the boa constrictor that swallowed the nigger—all in one long, slimy bite."

He gazed at his boyish skipper appraisingly.

"No," he murmured to himself; "I can't do it. I like you for the way you whaled that big Swede in Cape Town, but this is too much."

"Why, I don't find the odor so very unpleasant," the master declared; "in fact, I rather like it, and I know it's healthy, because I remember, when my brother Ezra had pneumonia, they burned creosote in the room."

"Oh, nobody objects to the smell particularly, sir, though it's been my experience that anybody can cheapen a good thing by overuse—and we have three months of that smell ahead of us. It's the taste that busts my bobstay."

"Why, what do you mean?"

"Well, you see, sir, the odor of creosote is so heavy it won't float in the air, but just settles down over everything, like mildew on a pair of boots. So it gets in the stores and you taste it. You can store flour below deck aft and creosoted piling on deck for'd—and you won't be out two weeks before that flour is spoiled. Same way with the tea, coffee, sugar, mush, salt-horse—everything. It all tastes of creosote; and then the damned stuff rubs off on the ship and ruins the paintwork. And if the crew happen to have any cuts or abrasions on their hands they're almost certain to get infected with the awful stuff, and you'll be kept busy doctoring them. Then, the first thing, along comes a gale and you're shorthanded, and there's the devil to pay."

"Aye!" Mr. MacLean interrupted solemnly. "I dinna care for creosote mysel', sir; so, wi' your kind permission, I'll hae ma time—an' I'll hae it noo."

Matt Peasley bent upon the recalcitrant Scotchman a withering glare. "Very well, Mr. MacLean," he said presently, "I never could sail in the same ship with a quitter; so you might as well go now, when we can part good friends." He turned to Mr. Murphy. "How about you, Mike? Are you going to run out on me, too?"

Now, as between the Irish and the Scotch, history records no preponderance of courage in either, for both are Gaels and a comparison is difficult.

However, Scotchmen are a conservative race and will walk round a fight rather than be forced into it, while all that is necessary to make an Irishman fight is to impugn his courage.

Mr. Murphy had seen the fight ahead of the Retriever and he did not blame Mr. MacLean for side-stepping it. Indeed, he had intended pursuing the same course; but Matt Peasley, by his latest remark, had rendered that impossible. To desert now would savor of dishonor; and, moreover, Matt Peasley, though master, had called him by his Christian name. Mr. Murphy touched his forelock respectfully.

"I am not Scotch," he announced, with a slight emphasis on the pronoun. "Shame on you, Angus MacLean—ditching the skipper like that!"

"Sticks an' stones may break ma bones, but names'll never hur-rt me," Mr. MacLean retorted. "I tell ye I dinna care for creosote in ma porridge." And he followed Matt Peasley aft, where the latter paid him off and gave him five minutes to pack and get off the ship. Immediately after supper the cook followed the second mate; but, since the former was a Jap and probably the worst marine cook in the world, his departure occasioned no heartache.

"We'll board at the mill cook-house until we're loaded, Mike," Matt Peasley informed the mate. "They have a good Chink up there."

Mr. Murphy sighed as he loaded his pipe and struck a match for it.

"It does look to me, sir," he replied, with that touch of conscious superiority so noticeable in the Celt, "as though Cappy Ricks might have slipped this cargo to a Dutchman."

The Retriever commenced taking on cargo at seven o'clock the following morning, with Mr. Murphy on shipboard and Matt Peasley on the dock superintending the gang of stevedores. Ordinarily the masters of lumber freighters ship their crews before commencing to load, in order that sailors at forty dollars a month may obviate the employment of an equal number of stevedores at forty cents an hour; but Mr. Murphy, out of his profound experience, advised against this course, as tending to spread the news of the Retriever's misfortune and militate against securing a crew when the vessel should be loaded and lying in the stream ready for sea. Men employed now, he explained, would only desert. The thing to do was to let a Seattle crimp furnish the crew, sign them on before the shipping commissioner in Seattle, bring them aboard drunk, tow to sea, and let the rascals make the best of a bad bargain.

The hold was about half filled, and the ship carpenters were at work cutting ports in the Retriever's bows, when Matt Peasley discovered that the mill did not have in hand any order for lumber to be used as stowage to snug up the cumbersome cargo below decks and keep it from rolling and working in a seaway. Accordingly he wired his owners as follows:

Cosmopolis, Washington, July 7, 19—.

Blue Star Navigation Company, 258 California St., San Francisco, California.

No stowage.

Peasley.

Cappy Ricks having deliberately conspired to hang a series of dirty cargoes on his newest skipper, for the dual purpose of teaching Matt Peasley his place and discovering whether he was worthy of it, grinned evilly when he received that two-word message; and, not to be out-done in brevity, he dictated this answer:

San Francisco, California, July 7, 19—.

Captain Matthew Peasley, Master Barkentine Retriever, Care Weatherby's mill, Cosmopolis, Wash.

Know it.

Blue Star Navigation Company.

Matt Peasley's cheeks burned when he read that message. Indeed, could Cappy Ricks have been privileged to hear the terse remarks his telegram elicited, there is no doubt he would have sent Mr. Skinner up to the custom-house immediately to file a certificate of change of master.

"Ha!" Mr. Murphy snorted when Matt showed him the message. "I get the old sinner now. This is to be a grudge fight, Captain Matt. You wished yourself onto him in Cape Town against his will, and now he's made up his mind that so long as you wanted the job it's yours—only he'll make you curse the day you ever moved your sea chest into the skipper's cabin. He's going to send us into dogholes to load and open roadsteads to discharge; and if he can find a dirty cargo anywhere we'll get it. But it's carrying a grudge too far not to give us stowage."

"Well, it's his ship," Matt Peabody declared passionately. "If the old thief can gamble on good weather I guess I can gamble on my seamanship—and yours."

The mate inclined his head at the delicate compliment; and Matt, observing this, decided that a few more of the same from time to time would do much to alleviate a diet of creosote.



CHAPTER XIII. AN OLD FRIEND RETURNS AND CAPPY LEADS ANOTHER ACE

Three days before the Retriever finished loading, the captain wired a trustworthy Seattle crimp recommended by Mr. Murphy, instructing him to send down a second mate, eight seamen and a good cook—and to bring them drunk, because the vessel was laden with creosoted piling. Captain Noah Kendall, Matt's predecessor on the Retriever, had been raised on clipper ships and as he grew old had allowed himself the luxury of a third mate, to which arrangement Cappy Ricks, having a certain affection for Captain Noah, had never made any objection; but something whispered to Matt Peasley that the quickest route to Cappy's heart would be via a short payroll, so he concluded to dispense with a third mate and tack ten dollars a month extra on the pay-check of the excellent Murphy.

The Retriever was lying in the stream fully loaded when the crew arrived, convoyed by the crimp's runner. In accordance with instructions they were drunk, the crimp having furnished his runner with a two-gallon jug of home-made firewater upon leaving Seattle. One man—the second mate—was fairly sober, however, and while the launch that bore him to the Retriever was still half a mile from the vessel the breezes brought him an aroma which could not, by any possibility, be confused with the concentrated fragrance of the eight alcoholic breaths being exhaled around him. Muttering deep curses at his betrayal, he promptly leaped overboard and essayed to swim ashore. The runner pursued him in the launch, however, and gaffed him by the collar with a boat-hook; the launch-man, for a consideration, aided the runner, and the unwilling wretch was carried struggling to purgatory.

"Oh, look who's here!" Mr. Murphy yelled to the skipper, as the bedraggled second mate was propelled forcibly up the ship's companion-ladder to the waiting arms of the first mate. "Welcome home, Angus, my lad."

It was Mr. MacLean, their quondam second mate, cast back on the deckload of the Retriever by the resurgent tide of maritime misfortune. Mr. Murphy sat down and held himself by the middle and laughed until the tears ran down his ruddy cheeks, while Matt Peasley joined heartily in the mirth. The unfortunate Mr. MacLean also wept—but from other causes, to wit—grief and rage.

"I'm happy to have you with us again, Mr. MacLean," Matt saluted the second mate. "While your courage and loyalty might be questioned, your ability may not. So the crimp swindled you, eh? Told you he wanted you for another ship and then switched the papers on you, eh?"

"You should never trust a crimp, Angus," Mr. Murphy warned him. "And you should never do business with them unless you're cold sober. Let this be a lesson to you, my lad. Never be a drinking man and you'll never have to go to a crimp for a snug berth. Run along to your old room, now, Angus, and shift into some dry clothes, if you expect to finish the voyage."

"I'll gie ye ma worrd I'll desert in th' discharrgin' port!" Mr. MacLean burred furiously. "Ye hae me noo, body an' bones—"

"Aye, and we'll keep you, Angus. Have no fear of that. And you'll not desert in the discharging port. I'll see to that," Matt Peasley assured him.

When the last man had been assisted aboard Matt signaled for the tug he had engaged. By the time she had hooked on and towed them over the bar three of the seamen were sober enough to assist the skipper and the mates in getting all plain sail, with the exception of the square sails, on her, and, with a spanking nor'west breeze on her quarter she rolled away into the horizon.

Despite the fact that the Retriever's bottom was rather foul with marine growth, and the further fact that her master had to lay her head under her wing in a blow which, with an ordinary cargo, he would have bucked right into, the run to Antofagasta was made in average time. And when Matt Peasley went ashore to report by cable to his owners he discovered that Cappy Ricks had provided him with a cargo of nitrate for Makaweli.

"What did I tell you, sir?" Mr. Murphy growled when the captain informed him of the owners' orders. "I tell you, sir, the dirtiest cargo Cappy Ricks can find is too good for us. Praise be, the worst we can get at Makaweli is a sugar cargo."

Mr. Murphy's grudge against nitrate lay in the annoyance incident to taking on the cargo properly. Nitrate is very heavy and cannot, like sugar, be loaded flush with the hatches, thus rendering shifting of the cargo impossible. In loading nitrate a stout platform must be erected athwart ship, above the keelsons, in order that the foundation of the cargo may be laid level; for, as the sacked nitrate is piled, the pile must be drawn in gradually until the sides meet in a peak like a roof. It must then be braced and battened securely with heavy timbers from each side of the ship, in order that the dead weight may be held in the center of the ship and keep her in trim. Woe to the ship that shifts a cargo of nitrate in a heavy gale; for it is a tradition of the sea that, once a vessel rolls her main yard under, she will not roll it back, and ultimately is posted at Lloyd's as missing.

When the cargo was out Mr. Murphy went ashore and purchased a lot of Chinese punk, which he burned in the hold, with the hatches battened down, while Mr. MacLean, who had once been a druggist's clerk, and who, by the way, had concluded to stay by the ship, sloshed down the decks with an aromatic concoction mixed by a local apothecary. The remnant of their spoiled stores Matt Peasley, like a true Yankee, sawed off to good advantage on a trustful citizen of Antofagasta, and credited the ship with the proceeds; after which he got his nitrate aboard and squared away for the Hawaiian Islands.

The run to Makaweli was very slow, for the ship was logy with the grass and barnacles on her bottom. At Makaweli he found a sugar cargo awaiting him for discharge at Seattle; and, thanks to the northwest trades at her quarter, the Retriever wallowed home reasonably fast.



CHAPTER XIV. INSULT ADDED TO INJURY

When Matt Peasley's report of that long voyage reached the Blue Star Navigation Company it was opened by Mr. Skinner, who, finding no letter enclosed, had a clerk check and verify it, and then pass it on to old Cappy Ricks.

"Where's the letter that came with this report, Skinner?" Cappy piped.

"He didn't enclose one, Mr. Ricks."

"Im-possible!"

"All of Captain Peasley's communications with this office since he entered our employ have been by wire."

"But—dad-burn the fellow, Skinner—why doesn't he write and tell us something?"

"About what?"

"Why, about his ship, his voyage—any old thing. An owner likes to have a report on his property once in a while, doesn't he? Unless we happen to charter the Retriever for a cargo to her home port, you know very well, Skinner, we may not see her for years. Besides, I've never seen the man Peasley, and if he'd only write now and then I could get a line on him from his letters. I can always tell a fool by the letter he writes, Skinner."

"Well, then," Skinner replied. "Peasley must be a wise man, because he never writes at all. The only specimen of that fellow's handwriting I've ever seen is his signature on the drafts he draws against us. You will notice that he has even engaged a stenographer—at his own expense, so the clerk informs me—to typewrite his statement of account."

"Then that explains it, Skinner. The big-fisted brute can't write a hand that anybody could read. But, still, he should have dictated a letter, Skinner. The least he might have done was to say: 'Enclosed herewith find my report of disbursements for last voyage.' And then he could have slipped in some mild complaint about the creosote, the trouble he had in getting a crew, and so on.

"I don't see why you complain about a lack of correspondence, sir," Mr. Skinner protested. "For my part, I think it a profound relief to have a captain that isn't writing or wiring in complaints about slow dispatch in loading or discharging, his private feuds with marine cooks and walking delegates from the Sailors' Union. Confound these fellows that are always unloading a cargo of woe on their owners! It strikes me that they're trying to square themselves for incompetence."

"I agree with you, Skinner. But then, all the Thomaston Peasleys were quick-tempered and wouldn't be imposed on; and I hate to think I've picked the only one of the tribe who will dog it and never let a peep out of him."

"Oh!" said Mr. Skinner. "I see! You want him to start something with you, eh?"

Cappy evaded this blunt query, however, and turned his attention to the report.

"Hello!" he said. "I'm blessed if he hasn't anticipated the very question I should have asked. Here's a footnote in red ink: 'Decided not to carry third mate. Two mates ample.' And so two mates are ample, Skinner, though I used to humor Cap'n Noah with three. This confirms me in the belief that Peasley must be a young man, Skinner, and not afraid to stand a watch himself if necessary. And here's another footnote: 'Chief Mate Michael J. Murphy very gallantly declined to leave when he smelled the creosote, and was a tower of strength when it came to stowing the nitrate. He holds an unlimited mate's license, is sober, intelligent, courageous, honest and a hard worker. He goes up for his master's license this week!"

"Ah-h-h!" Cappy Ricks looked up, smiling. "Skinner," he declared, "it is as hard to keep a good man down as it is for a camel to enter the Kingdom of Heaven—I mean for a rich man to enter a camel—bother! I mean you can't keep a good man down, Skinner. And this is the reason: The first mate, Murphy, wanted to leave, but his loyalty would not permit it. Hence the man Peasley must be a good, fair, decent man, to inspire such loyalty. He is, and this report proves it. His action in bringing Murphy to our attention indicates appreciation and a sense of justice. Good! Skinner, make a note of the qualifications of Michael J. Murphy for a master's berth and give him the first opening."

He returned to a perusal of the report.

"Huh! Harump-h-h-h! 'Credit by skipper's rake-off on stores, and so on, $57.03.' Skinner, that proves the man Peasley is too decent and honest to accept a commission from the thieves who supply his vessel, because he knows that if they give him a commission they'll only tack it on to the bill, where he can't see it. Well! All the Thomaston Peasleys were honest, Skinner. No thanks to him. Still, it's a shame to give him another rough deal, for apparently he has—er—many—er—commendable qualities. Still—er—Skinner, I've just got to have a letter from the man Peasley, if it is only a letter of resignation. Get him another dirty cargo, Skinner, the dirtier the better."

The dirtiest cargo Mr. Skinner could think of, with the exception of a load of creosoted piling, was another cargo of the same. So he scoured the market and finally he found one on Puget Sound, whereupon he sent Matt Peasley a telegram ordering him to tow to the Ranier Mill and Lumber Company's dock at Tacoma, and load for Callao. At the same time he wired the Ranier people requesting them to be ready to furnish cargo to the Retriever the following day—this on the strength of a telegram from Matt Peasley received the previous day informing his owners that he was discharged and awaiting orders.



CHAPTER XV. RUMORS OF WAR

When four days had elapsed the manager of the Ranier mill wired the Blue Star Navigation Company that the Retriever had not yet appeared at their dock.

Now four days wasted means something to a big barkentine like the Retriever; and in the absence of any excuse for the delay Cappy Ricks promptly came to the conclusion that Matt Peasley was ashore in Seattle, disporting himself after the time-honored custom of deep-sea sailors home from a long cruise. There could be no other reason for such flagrant inattention to orders; for, had the man Peasley been ill, the mate, Murphy, whom the captain vouched for as sober and intelligent, would have had his superior sent to a hospital and wired the office for orders.

"Skinner," said Cappy, "send in a stenographer."

When the girl appeared Cappy Ricks dictated this wire:

Captain Matthew Peasley, Master Barkentine Retriever, Colman Dock, Seattle, Washington.

Are you drunk, dead or asleep? You have your orders. Obey them P.D.Q. or turn over command to Chief Mate Murphy.

Alden P. Ricks.

"There!" he shrilled. "I've signed my name to it. Sign a telegram Blue Star Navigation Company and these infernal skippers think a clerk sent it; but when they know the boss is on to them they'll jump lively. Bring me the answer to that as soon as it comes, Skinner."

However, the answer did not come that day. Indeed, the next day had almost dragged to a close before Mr. Skinner appeared with this telegraphic bomb:

Alden P. Ricks, 258 California St., San Francisco.

Neither! Been waiting my turn to go on dry dock. On now. Didn't reply yesterday because too busy driving toothpicks in vessel's bottom to plug up wormholes. If Murphy hadn't hauled into fresh water last time on Grays Harbor while I was in Seattle getting my ticket, her bottom would look like a colander now. Sixteen months in the water. You ought to be ashamed to treat a good staunch ship like that. Off dock day after to-morrow; will tow to Tacoma immediately thereafter. Meantime expect apology for insulting telegram.

Peasley.

Sixteen months without dry-docking! Why, her bottom must look like the devil! Cappy Ricks gazed long and earnestly at his general manager.

"Skinner," he said, "you're an ass! Why was not this vessel dry-docked before you sent her to Antofagasta?"

Mr. Skinner lost his temper.

"Because I didn't send her to Antofagasta," he replied sharply. "You did! And the reason she wasn't docked is because there isn't a dock on Grays Harbor. If you wouldn't interfere in the shipping, Mr. Ricks, and spoil my plans to satisfy your personal whims, the vessel would never have gone on that long voyage without being cleaned and painted."

"Enough!" Cappy half screamed. "It's a disgrace! Not another word, sir! Not another peep out of you. Why didn't you order the man Peasley to dock her? Why did you leave the decision to him? He knew his vessel was foul—he thought we ought to know it, also; and naturally he expected that when we ordered him to Seattle we would have made arrangements to put him on dry dock. Instead of which he had to make them himself; and I'm shown up as a regular, infernal—er—er—baboon! Yes, sir! Regular baboon! Nice spectacle you've made of me, getting me into a scrape where I have to apologize to my own captain! Baboon! Huh! Baboon! Yes; you're the baboon!"

"Well, I can't think of everything, Mr. Ricks—"

"Everything! Good Lord, man, if you'd only think of something! Send in a stenographer."

Mr. Skinner rang for the girl and retired in high dudgeon, while Cappy Ricks smote his corrugated brow and brought forth the following:

Captain Matthew Peasley, Master Barkentine Retriever, Hall's Dry Dock, Eagle Harbor, Wash.

"Yes; that was a grave oversight sending you to Antofagasta without docking you first. Express my appreciation of Murphy's forethought in killing some of the worms. Am not kind of owner that lets a ship go to glory to make dividends. Keep your vessel in top-notch shape at all times, though I realize this instruction unnecessary to you. Give the old girl all that is coming to her, including two coats X. & Y. copper paint. Replace all planking that looks suspicious.

Alden P. Ricks.

"I guess that's friendly enough," he soliloquized. "I think he'll understand. I don't have to crawl in the dirt to let him know I'm sorry."

Cappy had recovered his composure by the following morning and was addressing Mr. Skinner as "Skinner, my dear boy," when another telegram from Matt Peasley created a very distinct variation in his mental compass. It ran as follows:

Alden P. Ricks, 258 California St. San Francisco.

X. & Y. copper paint no good. That brand used last time; hence worms got to her quickly. Giving her two coats O. & Z. Costs more, but does the business. Renewed about a dozen planks. Repair bill about offsets profit on that infernal nitrate. Your apology accepted, but do not say that again!

Peasley.

"'Your apology is accepted!'" Cappy's voice rose, shrill with anger. "Why, the infernal—er—er—porpoise! Me apologize to a man I employ! By jingo, I'd fire him first! Yes, sir—fire him like that!" The old man snapped his fingers.

"Really, Skinner, I don't know what I'm going to do about the man Peasley. I want to befriend him, because he's one of my own people, so to speak; but I greatly fear, Skinner, I shall have to rough him. Here he is, disputing with me—with me, Skinner—the relative merits of copper paint. And not only disputing, sir, but disobeying my specific instructions. Also, he permits himself the luxury of criticism. Well! I'll not fire him this time; but, by the gods, I'll give him a blowing-up he'll remember. Skinner, send in a stenographer."

"Take letter," the old man ordered presently, and proceeded to dictate:

Captain Matthew Peasley, Master Barkentine Retriever, Care Rainier M. & L. Co., Tacoma, Washington.

Sir:—Your night letter of the fifth is before me and treasured for its unparalleled effrontery.

Please be advised that in future, when an extraordinary outlay of cash for your vessel's accounts is contemplated, this office should first be consulted. When, in your judgment, your vessel requires docking, repairs, new spars, canvas, and so on, you will apprise us before proceeding to run up a bill of expense on your owners. Your business is to navigate your vessel. Spending money judiciously is a fine art which no sailor, to my knowledge, has ever acquired.

Though admitting that the vessel needed docking, I maintain you should have wired us of that fact, whereupon we would have ordered you to the dry dock patronized by this company. It is customary for owners to express a preference for dry docks and copper paint; and in presuming to go counter to my specific instructions in the matter of paint you are prejudicing your future prospects with this company.

Another exhibition of your arrogance, impudence, general bad manners and lack of knowledge of the ethics of your profession will result in prompt dismissal from the service of the Blue Star Navigation Company.

Yours, and so on, Alden P. Ricks, President



CHAPTER XVI. WAR!

The receipt of Cappy Ricks' letter actually frightened Matt Peasley for about thirty seconds. Then he reread the last paragraph. Like a dutiful servant he forgave Cappy the letter's reference to arrogance, impudence and general bad manners; but the reference to his lack of knowledge of the ethics of his profession made him fighting mad.

Cappy Ricks might just as well have passed him the supreme insult of the seas: "Aw, go buy a farm!" He showed the letter to Mr. Murphy.

"Why, that's adding insult to injury!" the mate declared sympathetically.

The youthful master threw up both hamlike hands in token of complete surrender and profound disgust.

"There's the gratitude of an owner!" he raved. "He wires me my loading orders and never says a word about docking—though as managing owner it's up to him to know when the vessel needs docking. I can't plan her comings and goings so that at the proper time she'll find herself at a port with a dry dock. Of course when he wired me my loading orders I realized he wasn't going to dock me; so I took matters into my own hands. Why, Mike, I wouldn't skipper a ship so foul she can hardly answer her helm. How could I know he'd forgotten she needed docking? I'm not a mind reader."

"I suppose he's been so busy hunting another dirty cargo for us he hadn't time to think of the vessel," Mr. Murphy sneered, and added: "The dirty old skin-flint!"

"Well, I'll just tell Cappy Ricks where to head in!" Matt stormed. "Let him fire me if he wants to. I don't care to sail a ship—particularly a dirty ship—for any man who thinks I don't know my business. Mike, I'm going to send him a telegram that'll burn his meddling old fingers."

"Give him hell for me!" pleaded Mr. Murphy. "If he fires you I'll quit, too."

The result of this colloquy was that Cappy Ricks received this night letter the following morning:

Alden P. Ricks, 258 California St., San Francisco.

Referring your letter. Men that taught me nautical ethics expected things done without orders, minus thanks for doing them well, plus abuse for doing them poorly. Regard your criticism as out of place. Am not the seventh son of a seventh son. How could I know you had overlooked fact that vessel needed docking? Your business to plan my voyages to get me to dry-dock port at least once a year. When you wired loading orders, concluded you were cheap owner; hence decided dock her without orders. Expect to be fired sooner or later, but will leave good ship behind me so my successor cannot say, "Peasley let her run down." Had I waited orders, vessel would have been ruined. Yet you have not sufficient grace to express your thanks. Had I not acted in this emergency, you would have fired me later for incompetence, and blacklisted me for not telling you what you know you ought to know without being told.

Referring copper paint, I know from practical experience which brand is best; you know only what paint dealer tells you. Will not stand abuse for knowing my business and attending to it without instructions from landlubber! When you appointed me you said remember speed synonymous with dividends in shipping business. How can I make fast passages with whiskers two feet long on my keel? Send new flying jib and spanker next loading port. Send new skipper, too, if you feel that way about it.

Peasley.

"Well, Skinner," Cappy Ricks declared, "this is the first time a skipper in my employ ever talked back—and it'll be the last. I've had enough of this fellow's impudence, Skinner. He's right at that—blast him—but he's too much of a sea lawyer; and I won't have any employee of mine telling me how to run my business. Send in a stenographer."

When the stenographer entered Cappy Ricks said:

"Ahem-m! Harump-h-h-h! Take telegram: 'Captain Matthew Peasley, care Rainier Mill and Lumber Company, Tacoma, Washington. You're fired! Ricks.' Ahem! Huh! Har-ump! Take 'nother telegram: 'Mr. Michael J. Murphy, First Mate Barkentine Retriever'—same address as Peasley—'Accept this telegram as your formal appointment to command of our barkentine, Retriever, vice Matthew Peasley, discharged this day; forwarding to-morrow certificate of change of master.' Sign that: 'Blue Star Navigation Company, per Alden P. Ricks,' and get both telegrams on the wire right away."

Cappy turned to Mr. Skinner and chuckled sardonically.

"I'll bet that will gravel the man Peasley," he declared. "There's nothing harder on a captain than being fired, and succeeded by his own mate—particularly after he has so recently recommended that mate! Peasley will be wild—the pup!"

"Well," Mr. Skinner replied, "appointing Mr. Murphy certainly has this advantage,—he's there on the ground and we are thus spared the expense of sending a man from here."

"That's one of the reasons why I appointed him—one of three very excellent reasons, in fact. Now we'll wait and see what the man Peasley has to say to that telegram."

They had to wait about two hours, and this was what Matt Peasley had to say:

"Many thanks. The second mate and the cook quit the minute they discovered it was to be another cargo of creosoted piling; and now that I am fired Mr. Murphy has concluded that he might as well quit also. Will stick by ship, however, until you send my successor; meantime loading continues as usual."

"Well, that's what the man Peasley says!" Cappy snapped. "Murphy's quit, eh? Well, I guess Mr. Murphy hadn't received my telegram when Peasley sent this message. It'll take more than a cargo of creosoted piling to keep Murphy out of the master's cabin when he hears from me."

The stenographer entered with another telegram.

"Ah!" Cappy remarked, and rubbed his hands together in pleased anticipation. "I dare say this is from Mr. Murphy."

It was; and this is what the loyal Murphy had to say:

"I thank you for the consideration. Very sweet of you; but I wouldn't work for you again on a bet. You couldn't hand me a ripe peach! Master or mate, creosote tastes the same to me. At Captain Peasley's request am staying by vessel until new master arrives and hires new mate. Would have stuck by vessel for Old Man's sake if you'd slipped us cargo of uncrated rattlesnakes; but since I encouraged him to tell you things for good of your soul and you fired him for it I must decline to profit by his misfortune."

Silently Cappy Ricks folded that telegram and laid it on his desk; his head sagged forward on his breast and he fell to meditating deeply. Finally he looked up and eyed Mr. Skinner over the rims of his spectacles.

"Skinner," he said solemnly, "do you realize, my boy, that we have two extremely remarkable men on the barkentine Retriever?"

"They are certainly most remarkably deficient in respect to their superiors, though in all probability exceedingly capable seamen," Mr. Skinner answered sympathetically, for he had great veneration for the creator of the pay roll.

"I know," Cappy replied sadly; "but then, you know, Skinner, the good Lord must certainly hate a bootlicker! Skinner, I simply cannot afford to lose those two damned scoundrels in the Retriever. They're good men! And a good man who knows he's good will not take any slack from man or devil; so I cannot afford to lose those two. Skinner, I've got myself into an awful mess. Here I've been running by dead reckoning and now I'm on the rocks! What'll I do, Skinner? I'm licked; but, dang it all, sir, I can't admit it, can I? Isn't there some way to referee this scrap and call it a draw?"

"I see no way out of it now except to send another captain to Tacoma."

"Skinner," he declared, "you're absolutely no use to me in an emergency. When I made you my general manager, on a bank president's salary, I thought I'd be able to take it easy for the rest of my life." He wagged his head sadly. "And what's the result? I work harder than ever. Skinner, if I hadn't any more imagination than you possess I'd be out there on the corner of California and Market Streets peddling lead pencils this minute. Leave this problem to me, Skinner. I suppose I'll find a way out of it, with entire honor to all concerned. Holy sailor!" he added. "But that man Murphy is loyal—and loyalty is a pretty scarce commodity these days, let me tell you!"



CHAPTER XVII. CAPPY FORCES AN ARMISTICE

During the week that succeeded, Cappy Ricks did not once mention the subject of the Retriever and her recalcitrant skipper and mate; and Mr. Skinner argued from this that all was well. Finally one day Cappy came into the office and paused beside the general manager's desk. He was grinning like a boy.

"Well, Skinner," he piped. "I've just come from the Merchants' Exchange and I see by the blackboard that our Retriever cleared for Antofagasta yesterday."

"Indeed!" Mr. Skinner replied politely. "So you found a captain for her. Whom did you send?"

"Nobody," the old man cackled. "Matt Peasley took her out, and the manager of the Rainier mill wires me that Murphy went with him as chief kicker. What do you think of that?"

"Why, I'm—er—satisfied if you are, sir."

"Well, you can bet I'm satisfied. If I wasn't I'd have a revenue cutter out after the man Peasley and his mate right now. By golly, Skinner," he piped, and slapped his wizened flank, "I tell you I've worked this deal pretty slick, if I do say it myself. And all on dead reckoning—dead reckoning, and not a single day of demurrage!"

"Oh! So you wired Peasley and the mate and asked them to go back to work and forget they were discharged?" Mr. Skinner suggested witheringly.

"Skinner, on my word, you grow worse every day. You've been with me, man and boy, twenty-odd years, and in all that time you never saw anybody cover me with blood, did you?"

"No, sir."

"And you never will. Why, I managed this affair by simply forgetting all about it! When you're in a jam, Skinner, always let the other fellow do the talking. I just sat tight until I had a telegram from the man Peasley, informing me that the vessel would be loaded in two days and that his successor had not appeared as yet. I threw that telegram in my wastebasket; and when the vessel was loaded I had another telegram from Peasley, saying that the vessel was loaded, that his successor was still missing, and the mill manager was kicking and insisting that the ship be hauled away from the dock to make room for a steam schooner which wanted to load. So I filed that telegram in the wastebasket also. It was a night letter, delivered in the morning.

"When Peasley didn't get an answer by noon he wired again, saying that, as a favor to me, he would haul the Retriever into the stream, but would accept no responsibility for delay thereafter. He said further that, as a courtesy to me and his successor, he was shipping a crew that day in order that there might be no delay in sailing when the new captain arrived; so I thought I had better reply to that telegram, Skinner—and I did!"

"What did you say, Mr. Ricks?"

"I said: 'Please do not annoy me with your telegrams. You were fired a week ago, but it seems difficult for you to realize that fact. If demurrage results through my failure to get new skipper there in time, that is no skin off your nose. Your pay goes on until you are relieved, and you will be relieved when I get good and ready.' That telegram did the business, Skinner. He received it the day before yesterday and yesterday he towed out!"

Cappy Ricks burst into a shrill senile cackle that was really good to hear. As they grow old most men lose that capacity for a hearty laugh, but Cappy's perversity had kept him young at heart. The tears of mirth cascaded down his seamed old countenance now, and he had to sit down and have his laugh out.

"Oh, thunder!" he panted. "Really, Skinner—there's so much fun in business I wonder why a man can retire—just because he's made his pile! Skinner, I had it on the man Peasley a thousand miles—and he never guessed it! Dear, dear me! You see, Skinner, when he wired me he would not accept responsibility for demurrage to the vessel after she was loaded and hauled into the stream, he forgot that he had to accept responsibility for the vessel himself until his successor should arrive!

"Of course, the man Murphy could quit any time he desired; but if the skipper deserted the ship before being properly relieved, and then something happened to the vessel and I preferred charges against him, the inspectors might be induced to revoke his license—and he realized that. The knowledge made him hopping mad, Skinner; and when he got my telegram I knew he would begin to figure out some plan to make me mad! And, of course, I knew Murphy would help him out—the Irish are imaginative and vindictive; and—oh, dear me, Skinner—read that!" And Cappy handed his general manager the following telegram:

You are right. I will be relieved when I get good and ready, and I will not be ready until I get back from Antofagasta. Shipped crew yesterday afternoon. All arrived drunk. Next morning all hands sober. Realizing predicament, riot resulted. Fearing lose crew, Murphy and I manhandled and locked in fo'castle. When your telegram arrived it found Murphy minus front tooth, myself black eye. Can stand injury, but not insult. Hence you are stuck with us for another voyage, whether you want us or not. Will have towed out by time you receive this. Go to Halifax!

Peasley.

Mr. Skinner's face was cold and austere as he handed this telegram back to Cappy.

"So you made peace with honor, eh?" he sneered.

"Peace your grandmother!" Cappy chirped. "This war goes on until I get a letter from the man Peasley. Skinner, he and Murphy think they've done something wonderfully brilliant. When I wired him he would be relieved when I got good and ready it did him an awful lot of good to throw the words back in my face. Sure, Skinner! They think they're giving Cappy Ricks the merry ha-ha!"

"Well, of course, sir,"' said Mr. Skinner, "if this sort of horseplay is your fun—if it's your notion of business—I have no comment. You own fifteen-sixteenths of the Retriever, and you can afford to pay for your fancies; but if it was the last act of my life I'd fire that man Peasley in Callao and let him get home as best he could."

"Yes; I know," Cappy replied bitterly. "You fired him in Cape Town once—and how did he come home? He came home in the cabin of the Retriever—that's how he came home; and the Terrible Swede I sent to thrash him and fire him came home under hatches. Yes; you'd do a lot of things, Skinner—in your mind."

Mr. Skinner pounded his desk savagely. Cappy's retort made him boiling mad.

"Well, I'll bet I'd do something," he rasped. "I'd make that bucko suffer or I'd know the reason why."

"Skinner, that's just what we're going to do—just what we're doing, in fact. One of my ancestors sailed with the late John Paul Jones and ever since the Ricks' family motto has been: 'I have not yet begun to fight.' Now listen to reason, Skinner. The Retriever just came off dry-dock, didn't she? Well, it stands to reason she was dirty after that last cargo of creosoted piling; and it stands to reason, also, that the man Peasley slicked her up with white paint until she looked like an Easter bride. A Scandinavian doesn't give a hoot if his vessel is tight, well found and ready for sea; but a Yankee takes a tremendous pride in his ship and likes to keep her looking like a yacht. And just think, Skinner, how the man Peasley must have felt when he came off dry dock, all clean and nice, and then had to slop her up with another cargo of creosoted piling? Just think of that, Skinner!" and again he commenced his insane cackle.

"I have other, and more important things to think about," Mr. Skinner retorted icily. As a business man he was opposed to levity in the office. "What are your plans with reference to the Retriever? Do you wish to bring her back from Antofagasta in ballast?"

"Why, certainly not. Hunt a cargo for her, Skinner. We might just as well let the man Peasley know that though he's gone he's not forgotten. Use the cable freely and see if you can't pick up something for the return trip that will make those two firebrands sick at the stomach."

A month later Mr. Skinner stepped into Cappy's sanctum.

"Well," he announced. "I've got a return cargo for the Retriever."

"What have you got?" Cappy demanded anxiously; and Mr. Skinner told him.

"No?" said Cappy incredulously.

"Yes!" Mr. Skinner assured him.

Cappy's laughter testified to his hearty approval.

"Skinner, my dear boy," he cried. "I don't know what I'd do without you."

And then he laid his wicked old head on his desk and laughed until he wept. Indeed, Mr. Skinner so far forgot his code as to laugh with him.

"We'll stink those two vagabonds—those maritime outlaws—out of the ship," he declared.



CHAPTER XVIII. THE WAR IS RENEWED

The belief that they had come off victorious in their skirmish with Cappy Ricks cheered Matt Peasley and his mate for the first two weeks out from Puget Sound; after which the creosote commenced to season their food, and then the victory began to take on the general appearance of a vacuum. However, thanks to a clean keel and fair winds, they made a smashing passage and their sufferings were not unduly prolonged.

Immediately on his arrival at Antofagasta the young skipper reported by cable to his owners, thereby eliciting the following reply from Cappy Ricks:

"You stole ship. If you value your ticket bring her back with cargo agent provides."

Naturally this somewhat cryptic cablegram roused Matt Peasley's curiosity. He could not rest until he had interviewed the agent—and after that sop to his inquisitiveness he returned to the Retriever a broken man. The loyal and disgusted Murphy read the trouble in the master's face.

"What new deviltry's afoot now, Matt?" he demanded, in his eagerness and sympathy forgetting the respect due his superior.

"Green hides, Mike!" the skipper answered, in his distress failing to notice the mate's faux pas and making one himself. "Green hides, old pal; and they stink something horrible. Back to Seattle with the dirty mess, and then another cargo of creosoted—"

"King's X!" yelled Mr. Murphy. "I crossed my fingers the minute your face appeared over the rail. I quit—and I quit as soon as this piling is out. I tell you I won't keep company with green hides. No, sir; I won't. I tell you I will—not—do it! Why, we might as well have a dead hog in the hold! Captain Matt, I hate to throw you down in a foreign port; but this—is absolutely—the finish!"

"Do you value your ticket, Mike?" the captain queried ominously.

"What's a ticket when a man's lost his self-respect?" Mr. Murphy raved.

Matt handed him Cappy's cablegram and the mate read it.

"I think that bet goes double, Mike," the skipper warned him. "You signed for the round trip. I've got to go through—and there's strength in numbers."

"Well," said Mr. Murphy reluctantly, "I suppose I do attach a certain—er—sentimental value to my ticket."

"I thought you would. Cappy's got us by the short hair, Mike; and the only thing to do is to fly to it, with all sails set. We must never let on he's given us anything out of the ordinary."

Mr. Murphy shivered; for, as Cappy had remarked to Mr. Skinner, the mate was Irish, hence imaginative. He imagined he smelled the green hides already, and quite suddenly he gagged and sprang for the rail. Poor fellow! He had stood much of late and his stomach was a trifle sensitive from a diet of creosote straight.

Somehow they got the awful cargo aboard, though, at that, there were not sufficient hides to half load her; in consequence of which all hands realized that Cappy had merely given them this dab of freight to sicken them. They cursed him all the way back to Seattle, where the crew quit the minute the vessel was made fast to the dock.



CHAPTER XIX. CAPPY SEEKS PEACE

"Here's a telegram for you, sir," Mr. Murphy remarked when Matt Peasley came aboard after cashing a draft on the Blue Star Navigation Company to pay off his crew. It proved to be from Cappy Ricks and said merely:

"Discharge that cargo of hides or take the consequences!"

"The old sinner thought I'd dog it, I suppose," Matt sneered, as he passed the message to Mr. Murphy, who shivered as he read it. "I guess you're elected, Mike," the skipper continued. "The second mate has quit. However, it isn't going to be very hard on you this time. I was speaking to the skipper of that schooner in the berth ahead of us, and he gave me a recipe for killing the perfume of a cargo of green hides."

"If he'd given it to us in Antofagasta, I'd name a ship after him some day," Mr. Murphy mourned.

"Well, we've gotten it in time to be of some use," Matt declared. "You don't suppose I'm going to let this old snoozer Ricks get away with the notion that he put one over on us, do you? Shall we haul Old Glory down? No! Never! I'll just switch off the laughing gas on Cappy Ricks," and the young skipper went ashore and wired his managing owner as follows:

"Green hides are the essence of horror if you do not know how to handle them. Fortunately I do. Pour water on a green hide and you muzzle the stink. I judge from your last telegram you thought you handed me something."

When Cappy Ricks got that telegram he flew into a rage and refused to believe Matt Peasley's statement until he had first called up a dealer in hides and confirmed it. The entire office staff wondered all that day what made Cappy so savage.

By the following day, however, Cappy's naturally optimistic nature had reasserted itself. He admitted to himself that he had fanned out, but still the knowledge brought him some comfort.

"He's walloped me so," Cappy soliloquized, "he just can't help writing and crowing about it. If I didn't do anything else I bet I've pried a letter out of him. It certainly will be a comfort to see something except a telegram and a statement of account from that fellow."

However, when the report of the voyage arrived, Mr. Skinner reported that it contained no letter. Cappy's face reflected his disappointment.

"I guess you'll have to go stronger than green hides to get a yelp out of that fellow," Mr. Skinner predicted.

"Why, there isn't anything stronger than a cargo of green hides, Skinner," Cappy declared thoughtfully. He clawed his whiskers a moment. Then: "What have you got for her on the Sound, Skinner?"

"Nothing nasty, sir. We'll have to give him a regular cargo this time—that is, unless he quits. I've got a cargo for Sydney, ready at our own mill at Port Hadlock."

"Well, he hasn't resigned yet," Cappy declared; "so we might as well beat him to it. Wire him, Skinner, to tow to our mill at Port Hadlock and load for Sydney. If he believes we're willing to call this thing a dead heat he may conclude to stick. Tell him this is a nice cargo." Again Cappy clawed his whiskers. "Sydney, eh?" he said musingly. "That's nice! We can send him over to Newcastle from there to pick up a cargo of coal, and maybe he'll come home afire! If we can't hand him a stink, Skinner, we'll put a few gray hairs in his head."

These instructions Mr. Skinner grudgingly complied with; and Matt Peasley, with his hatches wide open and buckets of punk burning in the hold to dispel the lingering fragrance of his recent cargo—concluding that, on the whole, he and Mr. Murphy had come through the entire affair very handsomely indeed—towed down to Hadlock and commenced to take on cargo. If Cappy Ricks was willing to declare a truce then Matt Peasley would declare one too.

Matt's peaceful acquiescence in his owner's program merely served to arouse Cappy Ricks' abnormal curiosity. The more he thought of Matt Peasley the greater grew his desire for a closer scrutiny. The most amazing man in the world had been in his employ a year and a half, and as yet they had never met; unless the Retriever should happen to be loaded for San Francisco years might elapse before they should see each other; and now that he had attained to his allotted three score years and ten Cappy decided that he could no longer gamble on the future.

He summoned Mr. Skinner.

"Skinner, my dear boy," he announced with the naive simplicity that made him so lovable. "I suppose it's very childish of me, but I have a tremendous desire to see this extraordinary fellow Peasley."

"You can afford to satisfy your slightest whim, Mr. Ricks," he replied. "I'll load her for San Francisco after she returns from Australia. I daresay if he ever gets through the Golden Gate he'll call up at the office."

"Skinner, I can't wait that long. Many things may happen. Ahem! Harump-h-h-h! Wire the man Peasley, Skinner, to have his photograph taken and forwarded to me immediately charging expense."

"Very well, sir," Mr. Skinner responded.

"Well, I'll be keel-hauled and skull-dragged," Matt Peasley declared to Mr. Murphy. "Here's a telegram from the owners demanding my photograph."

Mr. Murphy read the amazing message, scratched his raven poll, and declared his entire willingness to be damned.

"It's a trap," he announced presently. "Don't send it. Matt, you look about twenty years old and for the next few years, if you expect to work under the Blue Star flag, you must remember your face isn't your fortune. You've got to be pickled in salt for twenty years to please Cappy Ricks. If he sees your photograph he'll fire you, Matt. I know that old crocodile. All he wants is an excuse to give you the foot, anyhow."

"But he's ordered me to send it, Mike. How am I going to get out of it?"

As has been stated earlier in this tale, Mr. Murphy had an imagination.

"Go over into the town, sir," he said, "and in any photograph gallery you can pick up a picture of some old man. Write your name across it and send it to Cappy. He'll be just as happy, then, as though he had good sense."

"By George, I'll just do that!" Matt declared, and forthwith went ashore.

He sought the only photographer in Port Hadlock. At the entrance to the shop he found a glass case containing samples of the man's art, and was singularly attracted to the photograph of a spruce little old gentleman in a Henry Clay collar, long mutton-chop whiskers, and spectacles.

Moreover, to Matt's practiced eye, this individual seemed to savor of a Down-Easter. He was just the sort of man one might expect to bear the name of Matthew Peasley; so the captain mounted the stairs and sought the proprietor, from whom he purchased the picture in question for the trifling sum of fifty cents. Then he bore it away to the Retriever, scrawled his autograph across the old gentleman's hip and mailed the picture to Cappy Ricks.



CHAPTER XX. PEACE AT LAST!

Mr. Skinner entered Cappy Ricks' office bearing an envelope marked "Photo. Do not crush or bend!" From the announcement in the upper right-hand corner the general manager deduced that the photograph was from Matt Peasley.

"Well, here's Captain Peasley's picture, Mr. Ricks," he announced.

"Ah! Splendid. Prompt, isn't he?" Cappy tore open the envelope, drew forth the photograph, scrutinized it carefully and then laid it face down on his desk, while he got out his spectacles, cleaned them carefully, adjusted them and gazed at the photograph once more.

"Ahem! Hu-m-m-m! Harump-h-h-h! Well, Skinner, life is certainly full of glad surprises," he announced presently, and added—"particularly where that man Peasley is concerned. I never did see the beat of that fellow."

"May I see his photograph, sir?" Mr. Skinner pleaded.

"Certainly," and Cappy passed it to the general manager, who glanced once at it and smiled down whimsically at Cappy.

"Yes, I agree with you, Mr. Ricks," he said. "Of all the surprises that man Peasley has handed us, this is the greatest."

Cappy nodded and smiled a little prescient smile. "Skinner," he said, "send in a stenographer. I'm going to send him a telegram."

He did. Matt Peasley blinked when he got it, and for the first time since he had commenced exchanging telegrams and cablegrams with the peculiar Mr. Ricks he was thoroughly non-plussed—so much so, in fact, that he called his right bower, Michael J. Murphy, into consultation.

"Mike," he said, and handed the mate the telegram, "what in the world do you suppose the old duffer means by that?"

Mr. Murphy read:

"Matt, I always knew you were young, but I had no suspicion you were a child in arms until I received your photograph."

"Serves you right," the mate declared. "I told you to send the photo of an OLD man."

"But I did, Mike. I sent him a picture of an old pappy-guy sort of man, with long, mutton-chop whiskers, glasses and an old-fashioned collar as tall as the taffrail."

"It beats my time then what he's driving at, Captain Matt. But then one can never tell what Cappy Ricks is up to. I've heard he's a great hand to have his little joke, so I daresay that telegram is meant for sarcasm."

Matt had a horrifying inspiration. "I know what's wrong," he cried bitterly. "He thinks I'm so old I ought to be retired, and that telegram is in the nature of a hint that a letter, asking for my resignation, is on the way now."

"Why—why—why?" Mr. Murphy stuttered, "did you send him the picture of Methuselah himself? Heaven's sake, skipper, there's a happy medium, you know. I meant for you to pick yourself out a man of about fifty-five, and here you've slipped him a patriarch of ninety. Sarcasm! I should say so."

They stared at each other a few seconds; then Mr. Murphy had an equally disturbing inspiration.

"By Neptune!" he suggested, "maybe you sent him the picture of somebody he knows!"

"Well, in that case, Mike, I'm not going to hang on the hook of suspicion. Maybe I can find out whose picture I sent," and away Matt went up town to the photograph gallery. When he returned ten minutes later Mr. Murphy, sighting him a block in the offing, knew the skipper of the barkentine Retriever for a broken man! Beyond doubt he had shipped a full cargo of grief.

"Well?" he queried as Matt hove alongside. "Did you find out?"

Matt nodded gloomily.

"Who?" Mr. Murphy demanded peremptorily.

"Cappy Ricks!" Matt almost wailed.

"NO!" Mr. Murphy roared.

"Yes! The old scoundrel was up here three years ago, visiting this mill—you know, Mike, he owns it—and the Retriever was here loading at the time. He and Captain Kendall were close friends, and they went over to that photograph shop, had their pictures taken and swapped—and like a poor, helpless, luckless boob I had to come along and buy the sample picture the photographer hung in his case. It never occurred to me to ask questions—and I might have known nobody but a prominent citizen ever gets into a show-case—"

"Glory, glory, hallelujah," Mr. Murphy crooned in a deep, chain-locker voice, and fled from the skipper's wrath.

An hour later, in the privacy of his cabin, Matt Peasley took his pen in hand and wrote to Cappy Ricks:

Mr. Alden P. Ricks, Dear Sir:—

I herewith tender my resignation as master of the barkentine Retriever, same to take effect on my return from Sydney—or before I sail, if you desire. If I do not hear from you before I sail I shall assume that it will be all right to quit when I get back from Australia.

I will not be twenty-three years old until the Fourth of July. I was afraid you wouldn't trust me with a big ship like the Retriever if you knew; so I sent you a photograph I purchased for fifty cents from the local photographer. I guess that's all—except that you couldn't find a better man to take my place than Mr. Murphy. He has had the experience.

Yours truly, Matt Peasley.

There were tears in his eyes as he dropped that letter into the mail box. The Blue Star Navigation Company owned the Retriever, but—but—well she was Matt Peasley's ship and he loved her as men learn to love their homes. It broke his heart to think of giving her up.

"Skinner," said Cappy Ricks, "I've got a letter from the man Peasley at last; and now, by golly, I can quit and take a vacation. Send in a stenographer." The stenographer entered. "Take telegram—direct message," he ordered, and commenced to dictate:

Captain Matthew Peasley,

Your resignation accepted. You are too almighty good for a windjammer, Matthew. You need more room for the development of your talent. Give Murphy the ship, with my compliments, and tell him I've enjoyed the fight because it went to a knock-out. Report to me at this office as soon as possible. You belong in steam. A second mate's berth waiting for you. In a year you will be first mate of steam; a year later you will be master of steam, at two-fifty a month, and I will have a four-million-foot freighter waiting for you if you make good. The picture was a bully joke; but I could not laugh, Matt. It is so long since I was a boy.

Cappy.

"Send that right away, like a good girl," he ordered. "He's about loaded and he may have towed out before the telegram reaches him. Or, better still, send the message in duplicate—one copy to the mill and the other in care of the custom-house at Port Townsend. He'll have to touch in there to clear the ship."

He walked into Mr. Skinner's office.

"Skinner," he said, "Murphy has the Retriever, and you're in charge of the shipping. Attend to the transfer of authority before she gets out of the Sound."



CHAPTER XXI. MATT PEASLEY MEETS A TALKATIVE STRANGER

Cappy Ricks' telegram to Matt, in care of the mill at Port Hadlock, arrived several hours after the Retriever, fully loaded with fir lumber, had been snatched away from the mill dock by a tug and started on her long tow to Dungeness, where the hawser would be cast off. It was not until the vessel came to a brief anchorage in the strait off Port Townsend, the port of entry to Puget Sound, and Matt went ashore to clear his ship, that the duplicate telegram sent in care of the Collector of the Port, was handed to him.

He read and reread it. The news it contained seemed too good to be true.

"I guess I won't clear her after all," he announced to the deputy collector.

The official nodded. "I didn't think you would," he replied. "I have a telegram from the custom-house at San Francisco, apprising me that Michael J. Murphy has been appointed master of the Retriever, so if she's to be cleared Captain Murphy will have to do the job."

"He's my mate, and if you'll wait about half an hour I'll go get the old Siwash," Matt replied happily, and started back to the Retriever in a hurry. He had been gone less than twenty minutes, a fact noted by the astute Murphy, who met his superior at the rail as the latter climbed up the Jacob's ladder.

"Why, you haven't cleared the old girl so soon, have you, sir?" he queried.

"Read that," Matt announced dramatically.

Mr. Murphy read the telegram. "Bust my bob-stay!" he murmured. "The dirty old assassin! The slimy old pile-worm! The blessed old duffer! After treating us like dogs for a year and a half he gives me the ship, sets you down for a two year apprenticeship in steam and says he's going to build you a four-million-foot freighter! The scoundrelly old renegade! Why, say, Matt, Cappy's been spilling the acid all over us and we never knew it. Somehow, I have a notion that if we had yelled murder when he was beating us he'd have had us both out of his employ while you'd be saying Jack Robinson."

"I believe you, Mike. But he needn't think he's going to grab two years of my precious young life before he'll trust me with a steamer. I have an unlimited license for sail, and if I can pass the examination for steam before the inspectors—and I can—I'll get my license immediately. Just consider the old boy's inconsistency, Mike. If a man can handle a square-rigged ship he ought to be trusted with anything; yet, when he gives me a steamer you'd think he was giving me a man's job! Fair weather or foul, you stand on the bridge and control your vessel with the engine room telegraph. Shucks! I wonder if that crotchety old joker thinks it will take me two years to learn how to dock a steam schooner?"

Mr. Murphy hitched his trousers, stuck his thumbs in his belt and glared at Matt Peasley. "See here, you," he declared, "you're a child wonder, all right, but the trouble with you is, you hate yourself too much. Listen to me, kid. I'm the skipper of the Retriever now and you're my friend, young Matt Peasley, so I can talk to you as a friend. You're a pretty skookum youth and I'd hate like everything to mix it with you, but if you start to veto the old man's orders you may look for a fine thrashing from me when I get back from Australia! I won't have you making a damned fool of yourself, Matt. If you are in command of a four-million-foot freighter by the time you're twenty-seven, you'll be the youngest skipper of steam afloat, and you ought to be down on your marrow bones giving thanks to the good Lord who has done so much for you, instead of planning insurrection against Cappy Ricks. The idea!"

"But what sense is there in waiting—"

"When I refereed the scrap between you and All Hands And Feet you took my advice, didn't you? You didn't say to me then: 'What sense is there in waiting? Let me go in and finish the job and have done with it,' did you?"

"But this is business, Mike. For a year and a half Cappy has been having a whole lot of fun out of me—"

"It might have been fun for him, but it came pretty near being the death of me," Mr. Murphy contradicted. "If that jag of green hides from Antofagasta was a joke, beware of Cappy Ricks when he's serious. He's serious about you, Matt. He's picked on you sight unseen, and he's going to do something for you. He's an old man, Matt. Let him have his way and you'll profit by it."

"Well, I'll see what he has to say, at any rate," Matt compromised, and they went below, Matt to pack his sea chest and Mr. Murphy to shave and array himself in a manner befitting the master of a big barkentine about to present himself at the custom-house for the first time to clear his ship.

An hour later Matt Peasley found himself sitting on his sea chest on the cap of the wharf, watching the Retriever slipping down the strait under command of Captain Michael J. Murphy, while a new chief mate, shipped in Port Townsend, counted off the watches. Presently she turned a bend and was gone; and immediately he felt like a homeless wanderer. The thought of the doughty Murphy in that snug little cabin so long sacred to Matt Peasley brought a pang of near jealousy to the late commander of the Retriever; as he reflected on the two years of toil ahead of him before men would again address him as Captain Peasley, he wondered whether the game really would be worth the candle; for he had all of a Down-Easter's love for a sailing ship.

He recalled to mind Mr. Murphy's favorite story of the old sailing skipper who went into steam and who, during his very first watch on the steamship's bridge, ordered the man at the wheel to starboard his helm, and then forgot to tell him to steady it—the consequence being that the helmsman held hard-a-starboard and the ship commenced to describe a circle; whereupon the old sailing skipper got excited and screamed: "Back that main yard!" Matt felt that should anything like that happen to him in steam and the news should ever leak out, he would have to go back to the Atlantic Coast rather than face the gibes of his shipmates on the Pacific.

The passenger boat from Victoria picked him up and set him down in Seattle that night, and the following morning he boarded a train for San Francisco to report to Cappy Ricks.

At luncheon in the dining car that day Matt Peasley found himself seated opposite a man who had boarded the train with him at Seattle. As the young captain plied his knife and fork he was aware that this person's gaze rested with something more than casual interest on his—Matt's—left forearm; whereupon the latter realized that his vis-a-vis yearned to see more of a little decoration which, in the pride of his first voyage, Matt had seen fit to have tattooed on the aforesaid forearm by the negro cook. So, since he was the best-natured young man imaginable, Matt decided presently to satiate his neighbor's curiosity.