Part 46 (1/2)

Sutton was startling enough, and brisk, and eager--too eager For five minutes after he broke in upon us he held us paralyzed with the story of his adventure through the back slu discovery he had ether, perhaps through his very vehemence, perhaps because of a certain obscure unsteadiness in the fellow

”That's where the chief went to hide himself!” he cried, and we heard the words, but rather ere listening to the tone and watching Sutton; he convinced us of nothing

He stood before us alight with aniummy heat of the monsoon made the little cabin a sweat box, he had not stopped to strip his rubber coat It shone wet and streaky under the la in his stub hter than his eyes And this was a notable thing of itself--to see hi mate we had used to know, drawn from the sulky reserve that had held hiular of all, as it seemed to us then, was the way he wound up his outburst:

” So I caet you both,” he declared, in a rush ”We can straighten out this reat notion Listen, now

”There was a chap in a book I read, d'y'see? The other Johnnies put a gaame on hi, d'y'see? When he woke up! And, by gum, he believed 'e Chris Wickwire around all serene”

Captain Raff, sitting rigid on the couch, recovered sufficiently to uncla-end of a dead cheroot He had the air of one who goes about to pluck a single straw of sense from a whirl of fantasy

”A book,” he repeated ”A chap in a book? What in Hull t' Halifax is the boy talkin' about?”

Literature aboard the _Moung Poh_ was represented between the chronometer and the bottle rack by a scant half dozen of Admiralty publications But Sutton laid no strain on our library From his own pocket, like a conjurer that draws a rabbit froly, he produced a shabby, black-bound octavo ”Here it is, sir Shakespeare wrote it And the chap's na!”

It was; you ure here just how queer it was, and how far removed ere in our lawful occasions from books and people in books and all such recondite subjects--captain, ineer of a 1,500-ton tub of a country wallah trading between Calcutta, Burossip up and down ao to men with a spot in them somewhere We kept our spots pretty well hidden if it was so There was nothing publicly wrong with any of us Captain Raff commanded for our Parsee owners, because he always had co else, soberly and carefully--a s Myself, I was following up a long run of ill health, glad enough of the sure berth and good food And the only obvious fault with Sutton--though the same can be serious too--was youth

Here ere, then, on the old _Moung Poh_ Frohts beyond Principe Ghat and hear the lash of rain down the Hooghly and smell the sickly mixture of twenty-four different smells that make the breath of that city built on a sink We had been coaling and hard at it all day in a grime that turned to paste upon us What with heat and weariness, our ht say The captain and I were grubbing a co a wondrous tale--ending in Shakespeare! If I remind you further that there is more truth than poetry about the limpse the net effect

Sutton doubled the volues He see Poh_ we could not guess, nor did he give us time to inquire

”I'll show you, sir,” he continued in the same nervous key ”These Johnnies, you should know, they found this old bargee dead drunk And so they ood, to practice on him, as they put it 'Sirs,' says one of 'em--'sirs, I will practice on this drunken man' Here's the place ready marked, d'y'see?”

_Sirs, I will practice on this drunken man, What think you, if he were convey'd to bed, Wrapp'd in sweet clothes, rings put upon his fingers, A most delicious banquet by his bed, And brave attendants near hiet hiar forget hi, they played hiet himself, all his low habits and such” He hammered the book for emphasis ”Soon as I saw Wickwire it coht to do for hiers--?'” The captain turned a dumb appeal toward ested, for I had begun to understand, a little ”He's found Chris Wickwire”

”Wickwire?” With a jerk he caught up the real marvel at last, and the crop hair seemed to stiffen all over his bullet head ”The chief!” he roared

”That's what I've been trying to tell you, sir”

”Alive?”

”Very much alive”

”Well, where is he? Why ain't he here?”

We saw the glow fade froht I explained, sir

He--he's not quite hi to swing froain and his handso that had looked so easy at the first feverish flush of relief was taking another proportion ”No, that's the devil of it,” he said, gnawing the corner of his mustache ”Not by any ht anyhow ha' wrote to tell us what happened to hiht”

The mate's dark lashes lifted a little in a superior way they had as he stuffed the book out of sight