e a pistol to you. Overboard with you, you greasy,
addlepated bounder! You're rotten, understand? Rotten! Rotten!
Rotten!"

"You owe me eight dollars an' six bits, Scraggs," Mr. McGuffey
reminded his owner calmly. "Chuck down the spondulicks an' I'll
get off your ship."

Captain Scraggs was beyond reason, so he tossed the money down to
the engineer. "Now git," he commanded.

Without further ado, Mr. McGuffey started across the deckload to
the fo'castle head. Scraggs could not see him but he could hear
him--so he pelted the engineer with potatoes, cabbage heads, and
onions, the vegetables descending about the honest McGuffey in a
veritable barrage. Even in the darkness several of these missiles
took effect.

Upon reaching the very apex of the _Maggie's_ bow, Mr. McGuffey
turned and hurled a promise into the darkness: "If we ever meet
again, Scraggs, I'll make Mrs. Scraggs a widow. Paste that in
your hat--when you get a new one."

The _Maggie_ was resting easily on the beach, with the broken
water from the long lazy combers surging well up above her water
line. At most, six feet of water awaited the engineer, who stood,
peering shoreward and listening intently, oblivious to the stray
missiles which whizzed past. Presently, from out of the fog, he
heard a grinding, metallic sound and through a sudden rift in the
fog caught a brief glimpse of blue flame with sparks radiating
faintly from it.

That settled matters for Bartholomew McGuffey. The metallic sound
was the protest from the wheels of a Cliff House trolley car
rounding a curve; the blue flame was an electric manifestation
due to the intermittent contact of her trolley with the wire, wet
with fog. McGuffey knew the exact position of the _Maggie_ now,
so he poised a moment on her bow; as a wave swept past him, he
leaped overboard, scrambled ashore, made his way up the beach to
the Great Highway which flanks the shore line between the Cliff
House and Ingleside, sought a roadhouse, and warmed his interior
with four fingers of whiskey neat. Then, feeling quite content
with himself, even in his wet garments, he boarded a city-bound
trolley car and departed for the warmth and hospitality of Scab
Johnny's sailor boarding house in Oregon Street.

CHAPTER V

Captain Scraggs continued to hurl other people's vegetables into
the murk forward for at least two minutes after Mr. McGuffey had
shaken the coal dust of the _Maggie_ from his feet, and was only
recal