"Hsh!" he said at last. "I'm figurin' out my responsibilities in my own mind. It's a matter o' jedgment."

Dan stole up and plucked Harvey by the elbow. "Don't go to tamperin' with dad any more," he pleaded. "You've called him a thief two or three times over, an' he don't take that from any livin' bein'."

"I won't!" Harvey almost shrieked, disregarding the advice, and still Troop meditated.

"Seems kinder unneighborly," he said at last, his eye traveling down to Harvey. "I don't blame you, not a mite, young feller, nor you won't blame me when the bile 's out o' your systim. 'Be sure you sense what I say? Ten an' a haʼaf fer second boy on the schooner-an' all f'und-fer to teach you an' fer the sake o' your health. Yes or no?" "No!" said Harvey.` "Take me back to New York or I'll see you

He did not exactly remember what followed. He was lying in the scuppers, holding on to a nose that bled, while Troop looked down on him serenely.

"Dan," he said to his son, "I was sot agin this young feller when I first saw him, on account o' hasty jedgments. Never you be led

astray by hasty jedgments, Dan. Naow I'm sorry for him, because he 's clear distracted in his upper works. He ain't responsible fer the names he's give me, nor fer his other statements-nor fer jumpin' overboard, which I'm abaout ha'af convinced he did. You be You be gentle with him, Dan, 'r I'll give you twice what I 've give him. Them hemmeridges clears the head. Let him sluice it off!"

Troop went down solemnly into the cabin, where he and the older men bunked, leaving Dan to comfort the luckless heir to thirty millions.

"I

CHAPTER II

WARNED ye," said Dan, as the drops fell thick and fast on the dark, oiled planking. Dad ain't noways hasty, but you fair earned it. Pshaw! there's no sense takin' on so." Harvey's shoulders were rising and falling in spasms of dry sobbing. "I know the feelin'. First time dad laid me out was the last—and that was my first trip. Makes ye feel sickish an' lonesome. I know."

"It does," moaned Harvey. "That man 's either crazy or drunk, and—and I can't do anything."

'Don't say that to dad," whispered Dan. "He's set agin all liquor, an'—well, he told me you was the madman. What in creation made you call him a thief? He's my dad." Harvey sat up, mopped his nose, and told the story of the missing wad of bills. "I'm not crazy," he wound up. "Only — your father has never seen more than a five-dollar

bill at a time, and my father could buy up this boat once a week and never miss it."

"You don't know what the We're Here's worth. Your dad must hev a pile o' money. How did he git it? Dad sez loonies can't shake out a straight yarn. Go ahead."

"In gold mines and things, West."

"I've read o' that kind o' business. Out West, too? Does he go around with a pistol on a trick-pony, same ez the circus. They call that the Wild West, and I've heard that their spurs an' bridles was solid silver.”

"You are a chump!" said Harvey, amused in spite of himself. "My father has n't any use for ponies. When he wants to ride he takes his car."

"Haow? Lobster-car?"

"No. His own private car, of course. You've seen a private car some time in your life?"

"Slatin Beeman he hez one," said Dan, cautiously. "I saw her at the Union Depot in Boston, with three niggers hoggin' her run." (Dan meant cleaning the windows.) "But Slatin Beeman he owns 'baout every railroad on Long Island, they say; an' they say he 's bought 'baout ha'af Noo Hampshire an' run a

line-fence around her, an' filled her up with lions an' tigers an' bears an' buffalo an' crocodiles an' such all. Slatin Beeman he 's a millionaire. I've seen his car. Yes?"

"Well, my father 's what they call a multimillionaire; and he has two private cars. One's named for me, the Harvey,' and one for my mother, the Constance.'"

6

"Hold on," said Dan. "Dad don't ever let me swear, but I guess you can.

'Fore we

go ahead, I want you to say hope you may

die if you 're lying."

"Of course," said Harvey.

"Thet ain't 'nuff.

I ain't speakin' truth.'

Say, 'Hope I may die if

Hope I may die right here," said Harvey, "if every word I've spoken is n't the cold truth."

'Hundred an' thirty-four dollars an' all?" said Dan. "I heard ye talkin' to dad, an' I ha'af looked you'd be swallered up, same 's Jonah."

Harvey protested himself red in the face. Dan was a shrewd young person along his own lines, and ten minutes' questioning convinced him that Harvey was not lying—much. Besides, he had bound himself by the most