slung the will out of the open port into the sea.

"That's how," he remarked. "I'm the heir. I found the bark; mine she is,
an' mine she stays--yours an' mine, that is."

But Wilbur had not even time to thoroughly enjoy the satisfaction that
the Captain's words conveyed, before an idea suddenly presented
itself to him. The girl he had found on board of the bark, the ruddy,
fair-haired girl of the fine and hardy Norse type--that was the
daughter, of course; that was "Moran." Instantly the situation adjusted
itself in his imagination. The two inseparables father and daughter,
sailors both, their lives passed together on ship board, and the "Lady
Letty" their dream, their ambition, a vessel that at last they could
call their own.

Then this disastrous voyage--perhaps the first in their new craft--the
combustion in the coal--the panic terror of the crew and their desertion
of the bark, and the sturdy resolution of the father and daughter to
bring the "Letty" in--to work her into port alone. They had failed; the
father had died from gas; the girl, at least for the moment, was crazed
from its effects. But the bark had not been abandoned. The owner was on
board. Kitchell was wrong; she was no derelict; not one penny could they
gain by her salvage.

For an instant a wave of bitterest disappointment passed over Wilbur
as he saw his $30,000 dwindling to nothing. Then the instincts of
habit reasserted themselves. The taxpayer in him was stronger than the
freebooter, after all. He felt that it was his duty to see to it
that the girl had her rights. Kitchell must be made aware of the
situation--must be told that Moran, the daughter, the Captain's heir,
was on board the schooner; that the "kid" found in the wheel-box was a
girl. But on second thought that would never do. Above all things, the
brute Kitchell must not be shown that a girl was aboard the schooner on
which he had absolute command, nor, setting the question of Moran's sex
aside, must Kitchell know her even as the dead Captain's heir. There was
a difference in the men here, and Wilbur appreciated it. Kitchell, the
law-abiding taxpayer, was a weakling in comparison with Kitchell, the
free-booter and beach-comber in sight of his prize.

"Son," said the Captain, making a bundle of all the papers, "take these
over to my bunk and hide 'em under the donkey's breakfast. Stop a bit,"
he added, as Wilbur started away. "I'll go with you. We'll have to bury
the old man."

Thr