THE MOUTH CLOSES.

When the hatch was closed, and Matt had shut himself into the hull of the boat, he found that he was in cramped quarters.

The air was stifling, and the smell of bilge water was extremely unpleasant. He could not sit up without knocking his head against the deck beams, and he was entangled in a scattered pile of firewood. But if he got where he wanted to go he must contrive to move forward.

Taking a match from his pocket, he struck it on his trousers, and looked about him in the feeble gleam.

The firewood was not all he had to contend with. In addition to that, the hold was half full of boxes and casks.

Making mental note of a course that would take him forward with least trouble from the fuel and food supplies, he pinched out the match and crawled carefully.

He realized, presently, that the voices from the cabin were coming to his ears in increased volume; in fact, he was hearing them much more distinctly than when he had been at the window outside the cabin. Their distinctness became much more apparent the farther he advanced; not only that, but they served to help him locate himself. When the voices were directly over his head he paused.

The floor boards of the deck had spread slightly, and the cracks were lined with threads of lamplight. This explained the distinctness with which the voices reached his ears. Sitting up, he stifled his breathing while he listened.

"You fellers might just as well understand this from the start off—that money stays together, all in a wad, until we get safe out o' 'Frisco. Then there'll be a divvy, and not before."

Red-whiskers was the speaker. Matt had no difficulty in recognizing his raucous voice.

"Is that square, John?" demanded one of the others. "Ain't Ross an' me entitled to our share, here an' now, if we want it?"

"You're entitled to your share, Kinky, and you're going to get it, but not until we're out of the woods. I'd have whacked up to-night, but for that raw deal we had worked on us at the foot of Clay Street. This Motor Matt, it's as plain as a pikestaff, is trying to help Lorry. Lorry himself wouldn't have the nerve to play a game like that. Why, he stole the money himself, see, and he ain't goin' to ask the law to step in and help him get the stuff back. But this Motor Matt—well, from all I can read about him, he's all nerve and is given to meddling. We've got to quit this house boat and sail on that Jap steamer to-morrow. I'll pay our passage to Honolulu out of the funds, and when we get to where we're going we'll go snucks, share and share alike."

"I want mine now," struck in a third voice.

"That's you, Ross," growled Red-whiskers. "You want to do some gamblin' and drinkin', which is the worst things you could possibly do, not only for yourself, but for Kinky and me. I'll not have it that way. When we get in a safe place, we'll split the loot into three parts, and you can take what's coming to you and go to ballyhack, if you want to. But you can't tune up around 'Frisco while I'm in the town."

"What's to be done with the San Bruno?" asked a voice which Matt identified as belonging to Kinky.

"We'll use her to take us to 'Frisco, in the morning, just before the steamer leaves. Then we can turn her over to her owner, pay him what's coming, and hustle for the dock where we load ourselves for the Sandwich Islands. I'm calculating we'll be safe enough there."

"O' course," spoke up the voice of Ross, "all I want's to do the right thing by everybody an' have the right thing done by me. I ain't putting up no holler, an' don't think that for a minute; but I'm just about strapped. I haven't got more'n two bits in my jeans."

"Well, you'll have three thousand of your own before you're a week older, Ross, and I'd advise you to do the same as I intend to do—invest it in a pineapple plantation in the islands."

"Oh, splash! I'm going to invest my money in a distillery," and Ross finished with a reckless laugh, only he used a harsher expletive.

"It wouldn't be like you if you didn't," grunted Red-whiskers.

"Speaking along this line," spoke up Kinky, "reminds me that I'm dryer'n the desert of Sahary. Suppose we open a bottle?"

"That hits me," agreed Ross promptly.

"I'll go you—for just one bottle," came from the red-whiskered leader of the trio.

Ross chuckled.

"John likes his nip jest as well as anybody," said he.

"What of it?" demanded the leader. "If I've got the sense to take no more than is good for me, what's the odds? The trouble with you, Ross, is that you never stop until you make a fool of yourself. Let me tell you something: Whisky is the worst enemy a man ever had. It'll give him a little 'Dutch courage' for a piece of crooked work, I grant you, but if a crook hangs onto the drink it will ruin him in the end. That's right."

This was refreshing doctrine to come from such a man as Red-whiskers. Matt listened to his talk with a half smile.

"Get the stuff, Kinky," said the impatient Ross.

There was a sound of moving feet across the floor. The next moment a match was lifted directly over Matt's head and a flood of lamplight revealed him to Kinky. The scoundrel flung back with a wild yell.

Matt waited for no more. With a pounding heart he scrambled over boxes and casks and stove wood on his way toward the other hatch.

A confused babel of voices reached him from the cabin; feet could be heard running over the floor, and some one raised a great clatter dropping into the hold.

"Come out here!" shouted a fierce voice. "Come out, I say, or I'll shoot!"

Matt was willing to run the risk of stopping a bullet, there in the darkness, and he was in altogether too big a hurry to throw up a barricade between him and the man with the gun.

Rising on his knees, he lifted his hands to the hatch. No shot was heard, and Matt reflected that the scoundrels would not dare fire a revolver for fear of attracting attention from the other house boats in the cove.

To throw back the hatch took only an instant, but, as the young motorist scrambled through the opening, he was seized by the shoulders and hurled roughly to the deck.

He was up again almost as soon as he was down.

"Landers!" bellowed a gruff voice; "where the deuce is Landers? Take him, Kinky. I guess the two of us are enough without Landers. I'll head him off on this side."

Matt felt a pair of arms go around him from behind. With a fierce effort, however, he twisted clear of the clutching hands, whirled and struck out with his fist.

An exclamation, more forcible than polite, was jolted out of Kinky.

"Hang it!" the scoundrel added, "he's got a fist like a pile driver. Lay for him, Ross! I'm wabbling."

Before Motor Matt could turn and defend himself against Ross, Red-whiskers bolted through the open cabin door.

"Don't make so much noise, you fellows!" he called angrily. "Every house boat in the cove will be——"

Then he saw Matt. The latter had sprung to the edge of the deck with the plain intention of diving overboard.

Before he could carry out his plan Ross and the leader of the three men had him by each arm and had jerked him roughly back.

Matt struggled with all his power, but there were three against him, and he was thrown to the deck and dragged into the cabin, one of the men holding a hand over his mouth to prevent outcry.

The cabin was divided into two rooms, and Matt was half dragged and half carried through the darkness of the first room into the glaring lamplight of the one beyond.

"Put him in that chair over there," ordered the red-whiskered man. "You needn't be afraid he'll yell, Kinky," he added, with savage menace, "so take your hands from his mouth. If he lets out a whoop, or tries to bolt, I'll fire, even if the noise brings a tender from every house boat in the bay."

One look into the gleaming eyes of Red-whiskers was enough to warn Matt that discretion demanded passive compliance with the wishes of his captors.

Kinky removed his hands from Matt's lips, and Ross released his arms. Both men stepped to one side, glaring at him curiously and vindictively.

Red-whiskers, a revolver lying on his knees, was sitting on the cushioned bench, directly facing Matt. With a steady hand he was lighting a fresh cigar.

"Pull the window shades, Kinky," said he calmly. "Ross, lock both doors and put the keys in your pocket. We'll have a little heart-to-heart talk with Motor Matt, and I don't want Landers to see what we do, or hear what we're talking about."

Motor Matt, blaming himself for what had happened, sat quietly and wondered what was to come.