llen to thinking more than before."

"Have you a father?"

"I don't know. I think he is dead, too, for I was enough to break his
heart, and I have never heard of him since. I hadn't any brothers or
sisters when I came away. I'm all that's left, and now there is a
longing coming over me to hunt up my father again before he dies, that
is--if--he--isn't--already--gone!"

It was no use. Fred Sanders, the wild, reckless youth, who had passed
through many a scene that would have made a man shudder, suddenly put
his hands to his face, and his whole frame shook with emotion. The
memories of his early childhood came back to him, and he saw again the
forms of those who loved him so fondly, and whose affection he
returned with such piercing ingratitude. Conscience had slept for many
years, but the gentle words of Inez had awakened its voice again. The
goodness of the girl, who was already like a loved sister to Sanders,
had stirred up the better part of his nature, and he looked upon
himself with a shudder, that one so young as he should have committed
his many transgressions.

No wonder that he felt so pressed down that he cried out in the
bitterness of his spirit that heaven was shut from him. It was hard
for Inez to keep back the sympathizing tears herself when she
witnessed the overwhelming grief of the strong youth.

The latter sat silent for some minutes, holding his face partly
averted, as if ashamed of this evidence of weakness--an evidence which
it is safe to say he had not shown for years, young as he was.

Ah, there were memories that had slumbered long which came crowding
upon the boy--memories whose import no one on board that strange craft
could suspect but himself, and whose work was soon to appear in a form
and with a force that neither Inez Hawthorne nor Mate Storms so much
as dreamed of.

CHAPTER XXXI

A STRANGE CRAFT

"I tell you a boy who uses his mother bad is sure to suffer for it
some time. I've seen so many cases that I know there's such a law that
governs the whole world. I thank heaven that I never brought a tear to
my mother's eyes."

The speaker was Captain Bergen, who was talking to Fred Sanders while
the two sat together on the proa, near midnight succeeding the
conversation mentioned between Inez and the youth Fred.

The latter might have believed, as he had jocosely remarked, that he
had captured a small party of missionaries, who were making a dead set
at him; but his feeling