reated as such. Cast our
new sailing-master adrift there, some of you, and let him go back to his
berth."

Williams' order was promptly obeyed; and Ned, half-dazed, rose to his
feet, advanced to the door, and then stopped. "What about Captain Blyth
and Mr Manners?" he asked. "What are you going to do with them?"

"They will have to put up with such accommodation as they can find here
until we have an opportunity to land them," was the reply. "But make
your mind easy on their account, Mr Damerell; their comfort will be
properly looked after, and no harm will come to them _unless an attempt
is made to retake the ship_. In such a case as that I won't answer for
the consequences. The blame for whatever happens must fall upon the
shoulders of them that bring it about."

Ned was obliged to be content with this; and with a heavy heart he
turned and left the deck-house, not daring to look his commander in the
face, and feeling as guilty in his new dignity as though he had
voluntarily thrown in his lot with the mutineers, notwithstanding the
fact that pressure had been brought to bear upon him which he was
equally powerless to avoid or to resist.

Ned's first act, on returning aft, was to enter Captain Blyth's state-
room, with the object of securing the keys of the arm-chests; but the
mutineers seemed to have been beforehand with him, for the keys were
gone. He next sought the lock-up tin box in which the ship's papers
were kept; but here, too, the mutineers had been ahead of him, for the
box, as also the captain's desk, was missing. Being thus foiled in the
only matters which occurred to him at the moment, he left the state-
room, closing the door after him as silently and reverently as if the
captain's dead body had been lying there, and reluctantly returned to
his own berth. Not to sleep, of course, that was utterly out of the
question, the poor lad was so overwhelmed with consternation at the
unexpected seizure of the ship, and with dismay at the way in which he
had been compulsorily identified with the movement, that he just then
felt as though he would never be able to sleep again. No; sleep and he
were strangers, at least for the time being, so he flung himself down on
the sofa-locker and tried to think. But for the first half-hour or so
even the power of thought was denied him. The catastrophe had been so
utterly unattended by any warning that it was like a levin stroke
falling from a cloudless sky, and