“HUMPH!” said Guy to himself, as he shouldered his bundle and started toward Rupert’s boarding-house, “there is no danger that I shall have the police after me. If Flint is going out in the Morning Light of course I must go too, for he is the only friend I have in the world, and I am bound to stick to him. I don’t see what made that shipping agent grow so very cold and distant all of a sudden. I wish now, since he has shown himself so very independent, that I had examined that paper before I signed it. He was very polite until he got me to put down my name, and then he was almost ready to insult me. I can’t imagine what need I shall have of all these thick clothes he made me buy,” added Guy, as he shifted his heavy bundle from one shoulder to the other. “I thought it was warm up the Mediterranean. I knew he tried to fool me when he told me about the pearls and diamonds, but I don’t care. I shall see something of the world and be my own master, and perhaps when I return I will have money enough to take me out to the Rocky Mountains. I haven’t given up my idea of being a hunter, and I never shall.”

Guy passed a dreary afternoon at the boarding-house, in spite of the friendly efforts of the landlord to make things pleasant for him. That gentleman talked incessantly and told wonderful stories about the rapid promotions and sudden fortunes that were sure to fall to the lot of everybody who was fortunate enough to go up the Mediterranean on the clipper-ship Morning Light. But Guy, green as he was, did not believe them. He did not care to talk either, for he was very lonely and wanted to see Flint. Contrary to the landlord’s promise, the sailor did not make his appearance at the supper table, the host accounting for his absence by telling Guy that Flint did not feel very well and wanted to sleep as long as he could.

“May I see him?” asked the boy.

“No, he doesn’t want to be disturbed,” was the reply. “I have just been to his room to tell him you were here, and he asked me to tell you to go aboard your vessel at six o’clock, and he will come as soon as he awakes.”

Guy was not at all pleased with this arrangement. He did not believe that Flint had sent him any such instructions, and neither did he want to go away without seeing him. But he could not help himself, for at six o’clock precisely Smith, the shipping agent, appeared and ordered him to shoulder his bundle and come on.

The boy was obliged to obey. He followed the agent to the dock and into a yawl manned by two sailors, who immediately shoved off toward a vessel lying at anchor in the harbor.

Guy did not like the looks of her. If she was a clipper, he had hitherto had very erroneous ideas of marine architecture, he told himself. She looked more like the pictures he had seen of Dutch galliots.

When they reached her Guy followed the agent over the side, and one of the sailors threw his bundle up after him.

“Here’s an A. B. I have brought you,” said the agent, addressing himself to a man who came up to meet them.

“All right,” was the reply. “What’s his name?”

Guy started and looked sharply at the speaker. He was certain that he had seen him before. He was dressed like the man who had introduced himself to Flint as the second mate of the Santa Maria, and his voice was wonderfully like the mate’s, too. Guy tried to get a glimpse of his face, but it was effectually concealed by a tarpaulin and a heavy woolen muffler.

“His name is John Thomas,” said the agent, seeing that Guy did not answer the question.

“Take your dunnage into the forecastle, Thomas, and be ready to turn to at any moment,” said the man.

“I declare, he’s an officer,” thought Guy, “and I really believe he’s the second mate of the Santa Maria. If he is, how came he here on board the Morning Light? Dear me, I wish Flint would come.”

“Good-by, Jack,” said the agent, shaking the boy’s hand. “I’ve got you into tidy quarters, and shall expect to hear a good report of you.”

“What do you suppose keeps Flint?” asked Guy anxiously.

“I am sure I can’t tell. I have nothing to do with him, you know. Rupert shipped him—I didn’t. No doubt he’ll be aboard directly. Good-by.”

The agent disappeared over the side and Guy shouldered his dunnage and went down into the forecastle. Three or four of the bunks were already occupied, and, selecting one of the empty ones, Guy made up his bed in it, and then went on deck to look about him and await the arrival of Flint.

There were a few men on deck, the owners of the beds he had seen in the forecastle, but they did not notice Guy, and he was too much interested in his own affairs to have anything to say to them. Flint’s absence was the source of great anxiety to him. He could not account for it, and neither could he explain the remarkable resemblance between the man who met him as he came over the side and the second mate of the Santa Maria, whom he had last seen in the public room of the boarding-house.

“Could it be possible,” he asked himself—and at the thought the blood went rushing back upon his heart, leaving his face as pale as death itself—“that the agent had made a mistake and brought him to the Santa Maria instead of the Morning Light?”

“Great CÆsar!” thought Guy, catching his breath, “if that is the case I’m among the ghosts in spite of myself. I’ll ask some of these men. Of course they know the name of the vessel.”

As Guy was about to act upon this resolution his attention was attracted by the sound of oars, and running to the side he saw a large yawl approaching the ship.

His hopes arose wonderfully, but fell again when he discovered that there were but three men in the boat—two plying the oars and the other sitting in the stern with his hands on the tiller.

“Boat ahoy!” said the mate, leaning over the rail and speaking almost in a whisper.

“Rupert!” was the answer, given in the same cautious tone.

“All right,” exclaimed the officer. “I thought you were never coming. Stand by there, one of you, to catch the painter. Cap’n,” he added, thrusting his head down the companion way, “the boat’s come.”

Guy, being the nearest at hand, caught the painter as it came whirling up to him, and as he drew the boat up to the ladder that was quickly lowered over the side, he was surprised to see that she was loaded almost to the water’s edge.

A number of bundles and chests were piled in the bow, and the bottom was covered with men—probably a dozen or fifteen of them in all—who appeared to be asleep. Of those who managed the yawl one was Rupert, the boarding-house keeper, and the others were two of his assistants, who had rushed into the bar-room to quell the fight, or rather to help it along.

Guy recognized them at once. He wondered what they were going to do with the men who were lying on the bottom of the boat, and was not long in finding out.

The men must have been slumbering heavily, for the landlord and his assistants made no effort to arouse them, but lifting them in their arms, one after the other, carried them up the ladder and laid them in a row on the deck, as if they had been dead men.

The last one who was brought over the side was Dick Flint, limp and lifeless like the rest. Guy was greatly horrified and disgusted to see his friend in such a condition. He had been almost twenty-four hours trying to sleep off the effect of the “blow out” at which he had assisted. He must have been very drunk indeed.

“I wish to goodness I had stayed ashore,” said Guy, almost ready to cry with vexation. “I don’t want a drunkard for my companion, and I’ll tell Flint so at the very first opportunity. I believe home is the best place for a boy after all. If he gets whipped and scolded sometimes when he doesn’t deserve it, he always has plenty to eat, a good bed to sleep in, and isn’t obliged to associate with such wretches as these. Halloo! what is the captain up to, I wonder?”

The men had all been carried to the deck by this time, and now a piece of iniquity was enacted that struck Guy dumb with amazement. The captain and his mate, accompanied by the boarding-house keeper, approached the place where the sailors were lying. The former held in his hands a pen and a roll of paper, which proved to be the shipping articles Guy had signed in the agent’s office; the mate carried an inkstand and Rupert a lantern.

“What is this man’s name?” asked the captain, stopping at the head of the row and pointing with his pen toward one of the prostrate sailors.

“Richard Flint,” replied the landlord, “and he is an able seaman.”

The captain wrote Flint’s name and rate on the shipping articles, and then kneeling down beside him, placed the pen between his nerveless fingers, and seizing his hand in his own, described a cross with it upon the shipping articles. This done, the captain passed the pen over to his mate, who signed his own name opposite Flint’s, and the latter stood on the shipping articles in this way:

Although the whole proceeding was most outrageous, the form was according to law, and Flint, had he recovered his senses at that moment, would have been held for the cruise in spite of himself. Remonstrance would have been of no avail, and resistance would have rendered him liable to punishment.

But this was not all the wickedness that was perpetrated upon the unconscious seaman. While the mate was signing his name to the articles the captain produced his pocket-book and counted out forty dollars in bills, which he placed in Flint’s hand, and closing his fingers over them, turned to the man who lay next to him, and whom he shipped and paid in the same manner.

Guy had been a puzzled witness of the whole proceedings, but now he thought he begun to understand it.

“I have been lied to and cheated,” said he to himself. “Rupert and Smith both told me that Flint had signed articles and received his advance all fair and square; and if that was the truth, how does it come that he is being shipped and paid over again? I am afraid I have got myself into a scrape.”

Guy did not know just what sort of a scrape he had got into, and he could not stop to think about it then, for another matter demanded his attention. He was interested in Flint’s affairs, and knowing that the sailor could not take care of his money while he was in that condition, he started toward him, intending to take possession of it, and give it to him when he became sober; but what was his surprise to see Rupert step up to the insensible man, and coolly unclasping his fingers, put the money in his own pocket. In other words, he deliberately robbed Flint, and that, too, before the face and eyes of the captain and his mate, who, although they must have observed the act, did not pay the least attention to it. This was more than Guy could stand. He walked up to the captain and boldly charged Rupert with the theft.

“Captain,” said he, “do you see what this landlord is doing? He is stealing the advance as fast as you pay it to the men.”

The result of this exposure of the boarding-house keeper was just what Guy might have looked for had he taken time to consider the matter before acting. He supposed, in his simplicity, that the landlord would turn pale and tremble, like the guilty wretch he was, and that the captain, after compelling him to return the money, would arrest him on the spot, or unceremoniously kick him off his vessel. But nothing of the kind happened. Rupert looked a little surprised, but only gave Guy one quick glance and held the lantern lower, so that the captain could see to sign another name. The latter, however, arose hastily, placed his pen between his teeth, and seizing Guy by the throat, choked him until he was black in the face; and then, with a strong push, sent him sprawling on deck.

“There, now,” said he, “that’s the first lesson; and if it don’t learn you to keep a civil tongue in your head, and speak when you’re spoken to, I’ll give you another that’ll sink deeper. Turn to and carry that dunnage into the forecastle.”

The severe choking to which Guy had been subjected, and the jarring occasioned by his heavy fall on deck, had well-nigh proved too much for him. His head whirled about like a top, sparks of fire danced before his eyes, and his legs for the moment refused to support him. He was in no condition just then to carry heavy burdens, but he had heard the order and dared not disregard it. His last week’s experience on board the Ossipee had taught him that instant obedience and unquestioning submission is the whole duty of a foremast hand. He is looked upon as a slave, a beast of burden, an unreasoning brute, who has no right to any desires, feelings, or will of his own. If he receives a blow from a handspike that would brain an ox, he has no business to become insensible or get sick over it, but must jump up at once and resume his work with cheerfulness and alacrity. Guy, however could not do this, for he had not yet been sufficiently hardened. He pulled himself up by the fife-rail and clung to it several minutes before his head became steady, so that he could walk.

Was this the beginning of the “better times” which, according to Flint, he was to enjoy when once he was “fairly afloat?” Guy asked himself; and then seeing the captain looking his way, he released his hold on the fife-rail, and staggered toward the bundles belonging to the sailors, which lay where Rupert and his assistants had thrown them. With great difficulty, for he was still very weak, he raised one of them to his shoulder, and carrying it to the forecastle, threw it into one of the empty bunks.

As he was about to return to the deck he met two of the crew coming down the ladder carrying the insensible form of Dick Flint between them. They did not handle him very gently, but pitched him into one of the bunks as if he had been a log of wood, and laughed and passed some rough joke when his head came in contact with the hard boards.

“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves!” said Guy, indignantly. “This man is my friend, and too good a fellow to be jammed about in that way, even if he is drunk.”

“Well, now, who are you that comes here giving orders and making yourself so free?” demanded one of the men, turning fiercely upon Guy.

“I am a sailor like yourself, and a better one than you dare ever be,” retorted the runaway, little dreaming how soon he would be called upon to make good his boast.

“I ain’t saying nothing against that,” said the man, with a little more respect in his tones; “but I’d like to know what port you have sailed out of all your life that you can’t tell the difference between a man that’s drunk and one that’s drugged!”

“Drugged!” exclaimed Guy, utterly confounded.

“Yes; that’s what’s the matter with your mate. The last glass he took was doctored. You might pound him to death with a belaying-pin and never hurt him.”

“Drugged!” repeated Guy, some scraps of the conversation he had held with Flint at the boarding-house coming vividly to his mind. “What ship is this?” he asked suddenly.

“Why, didn’t you sign articles?”

“Yes, but I’m afraid I’ve been cheated.”

“No, I guess not,” said the sailor. “You came aboard with a clear head on your shoulders, so you’re all right.”

But Guy was quite positive that he was not all right. He would have given a month’s wages to know the name of the vessel he had shipped on, but dared not press the man to give a direct answer to his question, for fear that some strong suspicions that had suddenly arisen in his mind would be confirmed.

“I just know this is the Santa Maria,” said the boy to himself, at the same time casting a quick glance around the dimly lighted forecastle. “I know it as well as I know that I am alive. Everything goes to prove it. In the first place the men Rupert brought here in his boat are the same ones I saw playing cards in his house. Flint predicted that they would all be drugged and shipped aboard the Santa Maria, and things have turned out just as he said they would. But how did Flint himself manage to be caught in the trap? That’s what beats me. In the second place the mate, who witnessed the signatures on the shipping articles, is the same man I saw at Rupert’s, and who said he was an officer of the Santa Maria. I know him in spite of his tarpaulin and woolen muffler, for he’s got the same clothes on. Dear me! I wish Flint would wake up and tell me what to do.”

While Guy’s thoughts were running in this channel, he was working industriously at his task of carrying the sailors’ bundles into the forecastle, and finally he found Flint’s among them.

Hastily untying it, he took out two blankets, and rolling up one of them to serve as a pillow, he put it under his friend’s head and spread the other over his shoulders. As he was making his way up the ladder to bring down the last bundle, he heard the splashing of oars close by, and running to the side, saw a yawl approaching.

“Ship ahoy!” cried one of the men in the yawl.

“Halloo!” replied the mate.

“What ship is this?”

Guy listened with all his ears to hear the mate’s reply, but the officer leaned as far over the rail as he could, and spoke in a tone so low that Guy could not catch his words.

“When are you going to sail?” asked the man in the yawl.

“Just as soon as we can haul up our mud-hook,” replied the mate.

“Got your crew all aboard?”

“Yes.”

“Have you one among your hands of the name of Guy Harris?”

“Merciful Heavens!” thought Guy. “Who in the world can that be, and what does he want of me? Is it the detective who arrested Bob Walker in Chicago? Great Scott!”

Guy did not wait to hear any more of the conversation, but hastily catching up the bundle, threw it over his shoulders and ran into the forecastle.