“You are so mysterious, Syd,” cried Phil impatiently; “how can that girl’s face help us? There is probably no likeness between it and the culprit. It’s the face of his sweetheart, undoubtedly.” “Yes, but the fact that her face is here will cause him to try to regain it,” Sydney answered assuredly. “Do you believe that Lazar would recognize the face in the locket?” Phil questioned. “I might show it to him without telling him of the noise I heard before finding it.” “That’s what I was about to suggest,” replied Sydney; “the man who did the act is an enemy of Lazar’s; he may recognize the girl.” Phil immediately sought Lazar. “Come in.” Lazar’s voice answered the knock on his stateroom door. “Oh, it’s you, is it?” he said discourteously, without rising. “Well, what do you want here?” Phil was confounded. “I have a locket here which I found in the handling room yesterday while I was working on the cars,” he began hesitatingly. Lazar took the locket in his hand, then glanced up at the face of the speaker. “Well?” he inquired coldly. “There’s a face inside,” Phil stammered. “I thought you might know the owner in that way.” Lazar opened the locket, and if Phil had not been so much occupied nursing his injured dignity, he might have seen a flash of recognition in Lazar’s face. However, when he looked up it had passed away and a look of boredom had taken its place. “No, I don’t know her,” he answered shortly, handing Phil the locket. “Is that all?” “That’s all, sir.” [Illustration: _“WELL?” HE INQUIRED, COLDLY_] Phil withdrew in some confusion, anger and mortification struggling within him. “I am a child in that man’s hands,” he cried, as he reëntered his own room. “Syd, he awakes in me all the instincts of a brute. I can hardly keep my hands off him.” “Don’t let any one on board hear you express such sentiments,” Sydney continued gravely. “You must guard your tongue if you are to fight him successfully.” At evening “quarters” Phil saw Lazar in conversation with Captain Taylor, on the quarter-deck. As he passed them he overheard, from Lazar’s lips, words that made his face flush with anger. “I feel I can never trust him again, sir; his work has been very unsatisfactory from the beginning. I desire to have him relieved.” “So that is the reward for my hard work,” thought Phil, despairingly. After quarters he hesitated whether to go and tell the captain all the circumstances and endeavor to save his good name, or let matters take their course. He felt that Lazar did not believe that he was the cause of the damage, he only used it as a weapon against him. But how would the captain act? Would he demand an explanation? These reflections were cut short by an orderly at his elbow. “Mr. Penfield wishes to see you, sir,” announced he. “Mr. Perry, the captain has directed your assignment in his office,” the executive officer explained, as Phil saluted him a moment later. “Your duty in the turret will be taken by Mr. Marshall.”