-Chee came and joined us. And, as usual,
Polynesia had a plan.

"Listen," she said, "I am certain this Ben Butcher is a smuggler and a
bad man. I am a very good judge of seamen, remember, and I don't like
the cut of this man's jib. I--"

"Do you really think," I interrupted, "that it is safe for the Doctor to
cross the Atlantic without any regular seamen on his ship?"

You see it had upset me quite a good deal to find that all the things
we had been doing were wrong; and I was beginning to wonder what might
happen if we ran into a storm--particularly as Miranda had only said the
weather would be good for a certain time; and we seemed to be having so
many delays. But Polynesia merely tossed her head scornfully.

"Oh, bless you, my boy," said she, "you're always safe with John
Dolittle. Remember that. Don't take any notice of that stupid old salt.
Of course it is perfectly true the Doctor does do everything wrong.
But with him it doesn't matter. Mark my words, if you travel with John
Dolittle you always get there, as you heard him say. I've been with him
lots of times and I know. Sometimes the ship is upside down when you get
there, and sometimes it's right way up. But you get there just the same.
And then of course there's another thing about the Doctor," she added
thoughtfully: "he always has extraordinary good luck. He may have his
troubles; but with him things seem to have a habit of turning out all
right in the end. I remember once when we were going through the Straits
of Magellan the wind was so strong--"

"But what are we going to do about Ben Butcher?" Jip put in. "You had
some plan Polynesia, hadn't you?"

"Yes. What I'm afraid of is that he may hit the Doctor on the head when
he's not looking and make himself captain of the Curlew. Bad sailors do
that sometimes. Then they run the ship their own way and take it where
they want. That's what you call a mutiny."

"Yes," said Jip, "and we ought to do something pretty quick. We can't
reach the Capa Blancas before the day after to-morrow at best. I don't
like to leave the Doctor alone with him for a minute. He smells like a
very bad man to me."

"Well, I've got it all worked out," said Polynesia. "Listen: is there a
key in that door?"

We looked outside the dining-room and found that there was.

"All right," said Polynesia. "Now Bumpo lays the table for lunch and we
all go and hide. Then at twelve o'clock Bumpo rings the dinner-bell down
here. As soon as B