king for him. You"--to the Red
Un--"double up; cry; do something. Start him off for the
doctor--anything, so you keep him ten minutes or so!"

The Red Un was still drowsy, and between sleeping and waking we are
what we are.

"I won't do it!"

The Senior Second held out a gold sovereign on his palm.

"Don't be a bally little ass!" he said.

The Red Un, waking full, now remembered that he hated the Chief; for
fear he did not hate him enough, he recalled the lifebelt, and his
legs, and the girl laughing.

"All right!" he said. "Gwan, Pimples! What'll I have?
Appendiceetis?"

"Have a toothache," snapped the Senior Second. "Tear off a few
yells--anything to keep him!"

It worked rather well; plots have a way of being successful in
direct proportion to their iniquity. Beneficent plots, like loving
relatives dressed as Santa Claus, frequently go wrong; while it has
been shown that the leakiest sort of scheme to wreck a bank will go
through with the band playing.

The Chief came and found the Red Un in agony, holding his jaw. Owing
to the fact that he lay far back in an upper bunk, it took time to
drag him into the light. It took more time to get his mouth open;
once open, the Red Un pointed to a snag that should have given him
trouble if it didn't, and set up a fresh outcry.

Not until long after could the Red Un recall without shame his share
in that night's work--recall the Chief, stubby hair erect, kind blue
eyes searching anxiously for the offending tooth. Recall it? Would
he ever forget the arm the Chief put about him, and him: "Ou-ay!
laddie; it's a weeked snag!"

The Chief, to whom God had denied a son of his flesh, had taken Red
Un to his heart, you see--fatherless wharf-rat and childless
engineer; the man acting on the dour Scot principle of chastening
whomsoever he loveth, and the boy cherishing a hate that was really
only hurt love.

And as the Chief, who had dragged the Red Un out of eternity and was
not minded to see him die of a toothache, took him back to his cabin
the pain grew better, ceased, turned to fright. The ten minutes or
so were over and what would they find? The Chief opened the door; he
had in mind a drop of whisky out of the flask he never touched on a
trip--whisky might help the tooth.

On the threshold he seemed to scent something amiss. He glanced at
the ceiling over his bunk, where the airtrunk lay, and then--he
looked at the boy. He stooped down and put a hand on the boy's he