ound my work, I did not mind him very much. He
let me go on playing doctor to the crew because he thought it hurt me
to see and handle those poor creatures. Oh, it did hurt! But the
work, the being useful--it has saved me, Roy, it has kept me sane."

"He's a good man, none better," said Chips, still talking about Lynch,
"but he's too soft for a bucko's job in this wagon."

"Five years; good God! The prison was heaven compared to what you have
lived through. Oh, my poor darling! And he--the vile brute----"

"No, no, not that attitude! You have promised--" exclaimed the lady.

"He's not soft," Sails disputed with Chips. "He's as hard as they're
made. But he's a square-shooter, Lynch is, and the rest o' us ain't.
That makes the difference. Now we got good reasons to do anything the
skipper says, we being what we are, and him being what he is, and we
knowing he can turn us up, and will, if we don't suit. But Jim
Lynch--not Swope, or any other man, has a hold on him."

"No man, maybe," says Chips. "But in the other quarter, now. If Lynch
ain't soft there, I'm a soldier."

"Who ain't a bit soft in that quarter?" Sails demanded. "I'm mighty
sorry for her, same as you are, same as everyone is, save Fitz. If it
wasn't that Swope has me body and soul, I'd side with Lynch, b'Gawd, in
anything he wanted to start."

"Shut up!" exclaimed Chips. "That's damn fool talk to come out o' your
mouth."

"Oh, you have softened me, Mary, you have unmanned me!" I heard Newman
say. "I came to this ship to kill, and now--there is little bitterness
left in my heart. I am only eager now to be gone with you beyond his
reach."

"I am glad, more glad than I can tell," the lady told him. "His lies
have ruined your life, and mine, but I do not want you to stain your
hands with his blood. Oh, there has been so much bloodshed! You must
not; you have promised!"

"Yes, and I will keep my promise," said Newman. "But you have
promised, too, and you know how I qualified my promise. We cannot take
too many chances with him, and you know that he has no scruples about
shedding blood. He knows, he must know, that I do not intend to leave
you in his hands; he must realize, also, that now he is not safe so
long as either of us is alive and at large. Why, dear, you know the
trap he is preparing!"

"Yes, yes, I know," was the response. "But my prayer is that we may
get away before he is ready."

"It is my prayer, too," said New