itts brought some brandy from the medicine-chest, and gave him a
small quantity of it.

This stimulant revived him, and then he wanted to talk; but Pitts would
not permit him to do so. He remained with him, while Louis and Felix
went forward to report to the captain, and Don went to the engine-room
to tell Felipe the news.

CHAPTER XIV

THE CONSULTATION IN THE PILOT-HOUSE

Felipe Garcias, the first engineer of the Maud, had filled the same
position on board of her when she was owned and used by Ali-Noury Pacha.
He was a young man of eighteen now, a native of the Canary Islands, and
a very religious Catholic. The orgies conducted by His Highness on board
of the little steamer, not to say the crimes, had disgusted and revolted
the pious soul of the youth, and he had rebelled against his master.

For this he had been abused; and he had run away from his employer,
departing alone in the Salihe, as she was then called. After an
adventure with the unreformed Scott, the "Big Four" had been picked up
at sea in an open boat, and conveyed to Gibraltar, where the Fatime had
followed the Guardian-Mother from Funchal.

Felipe quieted his conscience for taking the steam-yacht by causing her
to be made fast to the Pacha's steamer, and leaving her there. At that
distance from his home the little craft was an elephant on the hands of
the owner, and he had sold her for a nominal price to one who had
disposed of her to the present owners. Don had been himself an engineer
on board of the Fatime; but he had been threatened when he criticised
affairs which occurred on board of her, and he was ill-treated. He
escaped from her at Gibraltar, and had been employed by Captain Ringgold
in his present capacity.

"The Fatime has gone to the bottom, Felipe," said Don as he entered the
engine-room. "There will be no more defiance of the laws of God and man
on board of her, for the present at least."

"God is good, and God is just," replied the chief engineer; but he did
not understand English quite well enough to comprehend the remark of
Don, who proceeded to repeat and explain it.

Captain Scott still remained at the wheel, and had not left it for a
moment. He was thinking all the time of what he had done, and wondering
what his recording angel had written down in regard to his action in the
greatest emergency of his lifetime.

"Mazagan is wounded in the shoulder; but Pitts thinks it will not prove
to be a fatal wound," said Felix