old man's dead now, but his son has inherited a third
interest in the _Bertha Hamilton_, while I hold the other two-thirds.
I renamed her when I got control of the bonny craft. I hope some day
to buy out Parmalee's share and become the sole owner."

"You're a lucky man," congratulated Tyke warmly. "It must be great
when you tread the plank to feel that you're not only boss for the time
being, but that you actually own her. What is she like? How big is
she? And how much of a crew do you ship?"

"She's three stick, schooner rigged," replied the captain. "A hundred
and fifty feet over all and carries a crew of about thirty. Oh! she's
a sailing craft, Tyke. She's not afoul with steam winches and the
like. And she's a beauty," he added, his eyes kindling with pride.
"There are mighty few ships on this coast that she can't show a pair of
heels to, and she's a sweet sailer in any weather. She stands right up
into the wind's eye as steady as a church and when it comes to reaching
or running free, I'd back her against anything that carries sails."

"But how about your other engagements?" suggested Grimshaw. "Is she
chartered for a voyage anywhere soon?"

"That's another rare bit of luck," returned the captain. "I had an
engagement to-day with Hollings & Company, who were thinking of having
me take a cargo for Galveston. If I hadn't run plump into this
treasure business as I did, there isn't any doubt but I would have
closed with them to-day. But now it's all off. I'll see them this
afternoon and tell them they'll have to get somebody else."

Tyke sat down heavily in his chair and wagged his grizzled head
solemnly.

"It's beyond me," he said. "It must be meant. Here we might be weeks
or months before we could git a ship that suited us, if we got it at
all; but along comes Cap'n Rufe here with the very thing we want. If I
was superstitious,"--before his stony stare they sat unwinking--"I'd
think for sure there was something in this more'n natural. It can't
be, after all this, that we're going on a wild goose chase."

"Well," replied Captain Hamilton cautiously, "it may be that after all.
Things certainly have worked to a charm so far, but that doesn't prove
anything. 'There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip,' and this
may be one of them. When all is said and done, it's a gamble. For all
we know, the doubloons may have been taken away a hundred years ago,
and all we'll find after we get there may