t of his resentment in the later watches of the night.

They evidently did; for this morning I noted a black eye on John Hackey,
a San Francisco hoodlum, and Guido Bombini was carrying a freshly and
outrageously swollen jaw. I asked Wada about the matter, and he soon
brought me the news. Quite a bit of beating up takes place for'ard of
the deck-houses in the night watches while we of the after-guard
peacefully slumber.

Even to-day Mr. Pike is going around sullen and morose, snarling at the
men more than usual, and barely polite to Miss West and me when we chance
to address him. His replies are grunted in monosyllables, and his face
is set in superlative sourness. Miss West who is unaware of the
occurrence, laughs and calls it a "sea grouch"--a phenomenon with which
she claims large experience.

But I know Mr. Pike now--the stubborn, wonderful old sea-dog. It will be
three days before he is himself again. He takes a terrible pride in his
seamanship, and what hurts him most is the knowledge that he was guilty
of the blunder.

CHAPTER XXI

To-day, twenty-eight days out, in the early morning, while I was drinking
my coffee, still carrying the north-east trade, we crossed the line. And
Charles Davis signalized the event by murdering O'Sullivan. It was
Boney, the lanky splinter of a youth in Mr. Mellaire's watch, who brought
the news. The second mate and I had just arrived in the hospital room,
when Mr. Pike entered.

O'Sullivan's troubles were over. The man in the upper bunk had completed
the mad, sad span of his life with the marlin-spike.

I cannot understand this Charles Davis. He sat up calmly in his bunk,
and calmly lighted his pipe ere he replied to Mr. Mellaire. He certainly
is not insane. Yet deliberately, in cold blood, he has murdered a
helpless man.

"What'd you do it for?" Mr. Mellaire demanded.

"Because, sir," said Charles Davis, applying a second match to his pipe,
"because"--puff, puff--"he bothered my sleep." Here he caught Mr. Pike's
glowering eye. "Because"--puff, puff--"he annoyed me. The next
time"--puff, puff--"I hope better judgment will be shown in what kind of
a man is put in with me. Besides"--puff, puff--"this top bunk ain't no
place for me. It hurts me to get into it"--puff, puff--"an' I'm gem'
back to that lower bunk as soon as you get O'Sullivan out of it."

"But what'd you do it for?" Mr. Pike snarled.

"I told you, sir, because he annoyed me. I got tire