acquired a new box.

The only drawback to this feast of brotherly love lay in the fact that
he could not obtain the tete-a-tete he so earnestly desired with Bobby
Boynton. She was always with him, to be sure, but so was everybody else,
especially Mrs. Weston, who had been officially appointed to stand guard
over the situation.

The captain had been stung to active measure by a chance remark of Andy
Black's when they were alone at breakfast.

"Accept my condolences," that youth had lugubriously remarked. "You have
missed the chance of your young life."

"How's that?" asked the captain.

"By not getting me for a son-in-law. Miss Bobby broke the news to me at
the dance last night."

"Did she give you a reason?" asked the captain, arresting his cup in
mid-air.

"I didn't need one. I've been rooming with it ever since we left
Honolulu."

"She didn't say it was--"

"Oh, she as good as told me. Same old chestnut I've been handed out all
my life. Said she cared for somebody else, but that she'd never forget
me. I can't see much satisfaction in occupying a pigeon-hole in a girl's
heart when, another fellow's got the key to it."

The captain, was concerned with something far more serious than Andy's
matrimonial failures.

"What makes you think it's Hascombe?" he asked.

"What makes everybody think so?" asked Andy. "What makes him think so
himself?"

The captain lost no time in finding Mrs. Weston, and laying the case
before her.

"He's got to be headed off," he said anxiously. "It 's getting serious."

"It certainly looks so after yesterday and last night. But I can't for
the life of me see why you oppose it. He's really a tremendous catch,
and it's no wonder Bobby's head is turned. We are all a bit daft over
him since he condescended to notice us."

"Suffering Moses!" exploded the captain. "Let any fool come along and
shed a few drops of blood, then kiss his hand to the grand stand, and
he's got the women at his feet! I thought Bobby had more sense than to
cotton to that gilded rooster. I've a good mind to lock her up in her
stateroom until we reach Hong-Kong."

Mrs. Weston shook her head and smiled.

"You can't manage her that way. She is the sweetest thing that ever was,
but she is the kind of girl that can't be forced."

"Well, she shall be!" cried the captain, with savage determination. "I
headed her off once, and I'll do it again. I tell you, I'd rather see
her dead than married to an Englishman."