PING STARS HIMSELF.

Ping was not impatient, while waiting for Matt and McGlory to come back from the house boat, and he was not worrying. His callow mind was engaged with the wheels and levers of the Sprite's machinery, and he might be said to be enjoying himself, in his artless, heathen way.

His first acquaintance with the Sprite had not been of a pleasant nature, but Ping had overcome his awe and fear, to a large extent, by watching how readily the boat obeyed the touch of Motor Matt's hands.

The Chinese boy had observed all the details of starting, steering, and stopping. Sitting alone in the launch, he touched the various levers in proper order, again and again—touched them lightly, for he had no desire to make the boat turn a "summerset," as McGlory had said she would do if he got too free with his attentions.

The uproar and commotion that started abruptly on the house boat and continued at intervals for some time, naturally drew the Chinaman's eyes across the San Bruno. But the attraction of the motor was too much for Ping to withstand, and he jumped at a conclusion to assure himself that everything was well with Matt and McGlory, and returned to his childlike interest in the machinery.

Some one scrambled off the San Bruno into the Sprite. The rough boarding of the little launch caused her to sway and shiver and dance at the end of her painter.

"You makee plenty fuss, McGloly!" complained Ping, grabbing at the sides of the boat to hold himself upright.

Before he could look around a rough hand had caught his queue and jerked him over backward.

"Not a bloomin' word out o' you, chink!" hissed a menacing voice in Ping's ear. "Ahead with ye, now, and unloose the painter. If you don't hustle, I'll kick yer inter next week. This is a hurry-up call, and don't you fergit that!"

Ping didn't wait to argue the question. Rolling over the top of the hood, he knelt in the bow and tore the painter loose from the iron ring. The engine was chugging by the time he had finished, and when the Sprite started, under the impulsive hands of the strange white man, she leaped away with a jolt that rolled Ping back into the arms of the boat's captor.

With an oath, the man hurled Ping into the bottom of the boat. He would as soon have tumbled the Chinese boy into the water, and it was luck, rather than design, that kept Ping out of the wet.

Crawling back on the stern thwarts, Ping leaned on his elbows, blinking his little eyes and trying to guess what had happened.

Behind, over the swiftly growing stretch of water, he heard an uproar on the house boat, then the pant and throb of another engine.

The strange white man looked around and swore.

"They're chasin' me, but they won't get me!" he muttered. "If this boat can put me ashore ahead of 'em, I'll save my bacon dry-shod; an' if it can't, by thunder, I'll take to the water and swim!"

Ping heard this, and dwelt upon the words for some time. The strange white man was running away from the other devil-boat. What had the strange white man done? Were Matt and McGlory on the other devil-boat trying to catch him? Or was it the three bad 'Melican men who were doing the chasing?

Ping couldn't figure it out. About all he realized was that there was a race between the Sprite and the San Bruno. Inasmuch as the San Bruno belonged to the enemy, Ping hoped in his heart that the Sprite would leave her behind.

They were making for the shore of the cove, but the strange white man was handling the boat badly. He didn't push or pull the way Motor Matt did, and the imprisoned devil under the hood—the power that made the propeller whirl—coughed and spluttered with rage and pounded on the machinery with iron hammers.

It got on Ping's nerves, and he hoisted himself to a sitting posture.

"By Klismus," he cried frantically, "you lettee Ping lun engine! Him makee go chop-chop, keepee Splite away flom othel boat!"

The strange white man looked around with a snarl.

"Shut up!" he roared, "or I'll toss ye into the drink, so help me!"

Ping shut up. Lying back on the thwart he watched the other boat draw nearer and nearer. The shore was yet a good way off, and it was plain the San Bruno would overhaul the Sprite before the land could be reached. And how the good devil under the hood was fighting to do better! How hard it was begging the strange white man to treat it right, and let it work easier and take the Sprite away from the other boat.

Ping gave a deep groan. Oh, if he was only at the wheel, and the pull-things and the push-things!

He looked around for something to throw at the strange white man. If a monkey wrench, or a hatchet, had been convenient, then one Landers would probably never have known what struck him.

But, fortunately for Landers—and for Ping, too—no weapon was available, and the race went on. The shore was near now, but the San Bruno was nearer.

Ping, straining his eyes through the dark, could see the men on the San Bruno. There were three of them, and their boat was less than three lengths away!

Suddenly the Sprite slewed around, crosswise of the San Bruno's course. Ping started up with a frightened yell, a splash echoing in his ears.

There was no one at the wheel or the levers! Ping's almond eyes turned swiftly shoreward, and there they saw a form in the water, swimming strongly toward the land.

But Ping was not thinking of the strange white man, but of the Sprite. Hurling himself forward across the midship thwart, he seized the steering wheel and turned the launch in a wide circle.

A shout went up from the San Bruno.

"Halt, Landers! You can't get away with that money! Stop and drop alongside or we'll cut you down to the water's edge!"

Ping, naturally, couldn't understand this. The voice that had called out was not the voice of Motor Matt or McGlory. Since they were not on the San Bruno, then, of course, they must still be on the house boat.

The Chinese boy started back over the watery trail which the Sprite had recently traversed under the guidance of the white man. Carefully he doctored the motor, pulling and pushing as he had seen Matt push and pull, all the while breathing choice prayers in his native tongue to placate the demon in the engine.

The devil must have been placated, at least a little, for he did not clamor quite so loud, but at intervals he hammered in a way that was very distressing to Ping. However, Ping couldn't help it, so he settled himself down to his steering, occasionally throwing a look over his shoulder at the other boat.

The Sprite was gaining on her slowly. Ping continued to breathe his heathen prayers, and to beg the honorable demon to stop pounding in the machine and to put its extra power into the little wheel under the boat.

As the Sprite came closer and closer to the house boat Ping was able to see two figures on the upper deck.

Were they Motor Matt and McGlory? He guessed they were not, while hoping that they were. Anyhow, he would have to stop. His nerves fluttered as he wondered if he would be able to stop.

He had watched Matt as he brought the Sprite alongside the San Bruno. As he remembered it, Matt had begun to play with the levers before the launch was very near the larger craft.

Matt, it will be recalled, had done this in order to let the Sprite glide noiselessly to her berth. Ping repeated the manoeuvre, and McGlory danced around on the house boat's deck, fuming at the delay caused by the halted motor.

The San Bruno was almost bunting into the stern of Sprite as the two boys made flying leaps to get aboard. The impact of their bodies came within one of swamping the little craft, and Matt stumbled to the steering wheel and got busy without losing an instant.

Ping slid backward over the midship thwart, yielding his place meekly and gladly; and then, with McGlory, he watched while Motor Matt plucked the Sprite out of harm's way.

It was so neatly done that Ping's heart swelled within him, and he slapped his hands and said glad things in Chinese. One touch of Motor Matt's hand, and the demon stopped pounding. A hum as of an industrious hive of bees came from under the hood, and the launch gathered itself together and flung onward with a fresh burst of speed.

The San Bruno, those aboard her still under the impression that Landers was on the Sprite—perhaps, in the darkness, mistaking Ping for their renegade comrade—continued to give pursuit.

It was a hopeless chase, however, and when the Sprite gained her old berth at the Tiburon wharf the San Bruno had given up and turned back into the night.