the news.

"She's been with us these last two trips," replied the mate. "She's had
business to settle in London, and she's been going through your lockers
to clear up, like."

"My lockers!" groaned the skipper. "Good heavens! there's things in them
lockers I wouldn't have her see for the world; women are so fussy an' so
fond o' making something out o' nothing. There's a pore female touched
a bit in the upper storey, what's been writing love letters to me,
George."

"Three pore females," said the precise mate; "the missis has got all
the letters tied up with blue ribbon. Very far gone they was, too, poor
creeters."

"George," said the skipper in a broken voice, "I'm a ruined man. I'll
never hear the end o' this. I guess I'll go an' sleep for'ard this
voyage, and lie low. Be keerful you don't let on I'm aboard, an' after
she's home I'll take the ship again, and let the thing leak out gradual.
Come to life bit by bit, so to speak. It wouldn't do to scare her,
George, an' in the meantime I'll try an' think o' some explanation to
tell her. You might be thinking too."

"I'll do what I can," said the mate.

"Crack me up to the old girl all you can; tell her I used to write to
all sorts o' people when I got a drop of drink in me; say how thoughtful
I always was of her. You might tell her about that gold locket I bought
for her an' got robbed of."

"Gold locket?" said the mate in tones of great surprise. "What gold
locket? Fust I've heard of it."

"Any gold locket," said the skipper irritably; "anything you can think
of; you needn't be pertikler. Arter that you can drop little hints about
people being buried in mistake for others, so as to prepare her a bit--I
don't want to scare her."

"Leave it to me," said the mate.

"I'll go an' turn in now, I'm dead tired," said the skipper. "I s'pose
Joe and the boy's asleep?"

George nodded, and meditatively watched the other as he pushed back
the fore-scuttle and drew it after him as he descended. Then a thought
struck the mate, and he ran hastily forward and threw his weight on the
scuttle just in time to frustrate the efforts of Joe and the boy, who
were coming on deck to tell him a new ghost story. The confusion below
was frightful, the skipper's cry of "It's only me, Joe," not possessing
the soothing effect which he intended. They calmed down at length, after
their visitor had convinced them that he really was flesh and blood
and fists, and the boy's attention being di