, "and, by the everlastin'! I won't now. We've got to have a flag."

So, from an old pair of blue overalls, a white cotton shirt, and the
red hangings of the church pulpit, he made a flag and hoisted it to the
truck of his queer command. They provisioned her, gave her a liberal
supply of fresh water, and, one morning, she passed through the opening
of the lagoon out to the deep blue of the Pacific. And, hidden in her
captain's stateroom under the head of his bunk, was the ten thousand
dollars in gold. For Nat had sworn to himself, by "the everlasting"
and other oaths, to deliver that money to his New York owners safe and,
necessary expenses deducted of course, untouched.

For seven weeks the crazy nondescript slopped across the ocean. Fair
winds helped her and, at last, she entered the harbor of Nukahiva, over
twelve hundred miles away. And there--"Hammond's luck," the sailors
called it--was a United States man-of-war lying at anchor, the first
American vessel to touch at that little French settlement for five
years. The boat they built was abandoned and the survivors of the Sea
Mist were taken on board the man-of-war and carried to Tahiti.

From Tahiti Captain Nat took passage on a French bark for Honolulu.
Here, after a month's wait, he found opportunity to leave for New York
on an American ship, the Stars and Stripes. And finally, after being
away from home for two years, he walked into the office of his New York
owners, deposited their gold on a table, and cheerfully observed, "Well,
here I am."

That was the yarn which Trumet was to hear later on. It filled columns
of the city papers at the time, and those interested may read it, in all
its details, in a book written by an eminent author. The tale of a Cape
Cod sea captain, plucky and resourceful and adequate, as Yankee sea
captains were expected to be, and were, in those days.

But Trumet did not hear the yarn immediately. All that it heard and all
that it knew was contained in Captain Nat's brief telegram. "Arrived
to-day. Will be home Thursday." That was all, but it was enough, for
in that dispatch was explosive sufficient to blow to atoms the doctor's
plans and Keziah's, the great scheme which was to bring happiness to
John Ellery and Grace Van Horne.

Dr. Parker heard it, while on his way to Mrs. Prince's, and, neglecting
that old lady for the once, he turned his horse and drove as fast as
possible to the shanty on the beach. Fast as he drove, Captain Zeb