“Good heavens, man, the police will take me, and there will be a trial, and everything I have done will be distorted and misunderstood! I shall be eternally disgraced! They will give me penal servitude!” “Your fault for earning it,” said the captain. “You fool!” broke out Shelf with a fresh snarl; “don’t you see you are robbing yourself? If you give me up you lose your own miserable £300. If you get me off you’ll pocket £1500. Hang it, man, I’ll give you three thousand!” “You said,” retorted the captain, “you’d got some pickings out of this wreck with you! Well, I guess the proper owners’ll have that when the time comes, and I shall have my sixty-fourth, or whatever it is, along with the rest. I know twenty decent men who’ve got about all they own in your rotten concerns, and I wouldn’t think it a fair thing to feather my own nest whilst they got skinned to the bone.—I’ll trouble you, Mr. Theodore Shelf, to take your hand off my arm, or you’ll get your bally teeth knocked down your throat. Don’t you come near me any more—you ain’t wholesome!” “I will take one of the boats,” said Shelf, desperately, “and get out into the Channel, and try and get picked up by some outward-bound steamer.” “You will do,” retorted the captain, “nothing of the sort. There’s a tug coming up now to our assistance, and I shall send you off to Bideford in her in charge of my mate. If you’re awkward, you shall travel with a pair of rusty handcuffs on your heels. I’m going,” said the captain, with an acid grin, “to make a bid for popularity in the newspapers. I’m going to be known as the man who nabbed you when you tried to bolt, and I hope I shall get some sympathy for it; and I hope some one will be kind enough to give me another berth in consequence.” “Just hear me one minute more,” Shelf pleaded. “I’ve got no use for any of your talk,” said the captain, sturdily; “and there’s the boat in the water. Down you get into her, or else you’ll be put by a pair of quartermasters. You’ll board the tug, and my mate’ll see you safe ashore in Bideford. After that, you can go to the devil for me; but I expect the police’ll be waiting ready for you.”