e water and jumped up on the side with his hand
on the rigging to see. I s'pose his bad foot slipped and he went over
before I could move."

"We'll cruise about a bit," said Joe, loudly, turning to the men.

"Are you giving orders here, or am I?" said the mate sternly.

"I am," said Joe, violently. "It's our duty to do all we can." There was
a dead silence. Joe, pushing himself in between Ben and the cook, eyed
the men eagerly.

"What do you mean by that?" said the mate at last.

"Wot I say," said Joe, meeting him eye to eye, and thrusting his face
close to his.

The mate shrugged his shoulders and walked slowly aft; then, with a
regard for appearances which the occasion fully warranted, took
the schooner for a little circular tour in the neighbourhood of the
skipper's disappearance.

At daybreak, not feeling the loss quite as much as the men, he went
below, and, having looked stealthily round, unlocked the door of
the state-room and peeped in. It was almost uncanny, considering the
circumstances, to see in the dim light the skipper sitting on the edge
of his bunk.

"What the blazes are you doing, dodging about like this?" he burst out,
ungratefully.

"Looking for the body," said the mate. "Ain't you heard us shouting?
It's not my fault--the crew say they won't leave the spot while there's
half a chance."

"Blast the crew," said the skipper, quite untouched by this devotion.
"Ain't you taking charge o' the ship?"

"Joe's about half mad," said the mate. "It's wonderful how upset he is."

The skipper cursed Joe separately, and the mate, whose temper was
getting bad, closed the interview by locking the door.

At five o'clock, by which time they had cleared three masses of weed
and a barnacle-covered plank, they abandoned the search and resumed the
voyage. A gloom settled on the forecastle, and the cook took advantage
of the occasion to read Tim a homily upon the shortness of life and the
suddenness of death. Tim was much affected, but not nearly so much as he
was when he discovered that the men were going to pay a last tribute to
the late captain's memory by abstaining from breakfast. He ventured
to remark that the excitement and the night air had made him feel very
hungry, and was promptly called an unfeeling little brute by the men for
his pains. The mate, who, in deference to public opinion, had to keep up
appearances the same way, was almost as much annoyed as Tim, and, as for
the drowned man himself,