oad--and under
the law no railroad-owned ship may use the Canal."

Matt's eyebrows arched.

"Ah!" he murmured. "Then that's one of the reasons why she's a white
elephant on their hands."

"Got a customer for her?" Jerry queried shrewdly. "A fellow ought to be
able to pick the Narcissus up rather cheap."

Matt shook his head negatively.

"Happened to pass her in a launch a couple of hours ago, and the sight
of the barnacles on her bottom just naturally graveled me and roused my
curiosity. Much obliged for your information." And Matt excused himself
and strolled over to the counter of the Hydro-graphic Office to look
over the recent bulletins to masters.

The information that the whistling buoy off Duxbury Reef had gone adrift
and that Blunt's Reef Lightship would be withdrawn for fifteen days for
repairs and docking interested him but little, however. In his mind's
eye there loomed the picture of that great red freighter, with her foul
bottom, rusty funnel and unpainted, weather-beaten upper works.

"Her bridge is pretty well exposed to the weather," he murmured. "I'd
build it up so the man on watch could just look over it. I noticed
they'd had the good sense to house over her winches, so I dare say
they're in good shape; her paint will have prevented rust below the
water line, and I'll bet she's as sound as the day she was built. I
think I'd paint her dead black, with red underbody and terra-cotta upper
works." He pondered. "Yes, and I'd paint her funnel dead black, too,
with a broad red band; and on both sides of the funnel, in the center of
this red band, I'd have a white diamond with a black P in the center
of it. By George, they'd know the Peasley Line as far as they could see
it!"

He would have dreamed on had he not bethought himself suddenly of his
modest capital--fifty thousand-odd dollars, out of which he owed Cappy
Ricks a considerable sum on a promissory note due in one year. On such
a meager bank balance it would not do to dream of buying a vessel worth
nearly four hundred thousand dollars. Why, it would require twenty
thousand dollars to put her in commission after all these years of
idleness, and she had to have another boiler because she was a hog on
coal; and, in addition, her operating cost would be between nine and ten
thousand dollars a month.

Matt shook his head and looked round the great room as though in search
of inspiration. He found it. His wandering glance finally came to rest
on J