A dusty man just then rode a bicycle into the door-yard and dismounted to give the shipmaster a yellow envelope. “I guess you’re Captain Michael O’Shea,” said he. “The station agent got this telegram for you and asked me to stop and deliver it, seein’ as I was passin’ this way. How are you, Mr. Kent? Seen anything of that pesky firebug? I see you’ve got a new hired man in the garden.” “I’m thankful to say the firebug is letting me alone,” gravely answered the engineer. “I cal’late he heard the selectmen had offered a reward for him and he lit out of this neighborhood.” The messenger departed, and Captain O’Shea, glancing at the telegram, crumpled it in his fist and vouchsafed with a laugh: “’Tis from the man in New York, the agent in charge of that voyage to the Persian Gulf. For political reasons the job is postponed a matter of six months or so, and maybe it will be declared off altogether. The charter is cancelled and my contract along with it.” “I suppose you’re disappointed,” sympathetically began Johnny Kent. “Not so I shed tears. Something else will turn up. And ’tis me chance to take a vacation, Johnny. Thanks to our salvage job with the _Alsatian_ liner, I have more money than is good for me.” “Now’s your chance to buy that next farm and get it under way,” and the portly mariner was elated. O’Shea eyed his comrade as if suspecting that he shared the melancholy affliction of Bill Maguire. “You mean well, Johnny,” said he, “but you are subject to delusions. I will enjoy a vacation after me own heart. With the money that burns holes in me pockets, I will go frolickin’ out to China and do me best to find out what happened to Bill Maguire. I suppose I cannot coax ye to go with me.” “Pshaw, Cap’n Mike!” and the honest farmer looked surprised. “I’ve engaged a gang of men to begin cuttin’ my hay next week. And who’s to look after poor old Bill? I can’t seem to beat it into your head that I’ve turned respectable. The wilder the job, the better you like it.” “I have taken quite a fancy to this one,” and O’Shea’s eyes were dancing. “It has been haunting me, in a way, ever since I caught sight of the cruel brand and listened to the yarn of those Chinese gentlemen. As one seafarin’ man to another, I will do what I can to square the account of Bill Maguire.” “It’s the first time I ever laid down on you,” sighed Johnny Kent. “I do not hold it against ye,” warmly returned Captain O’Shea. “And maybe you ought to stand watch over Bill. It would be cruel to lug him out to China, for the sight of a pigtail gives him acute fits. And he would turn crazier than ever. Well, I will go it alone this time, Johnny. ’Tis a most foolish adventure, and by the same token it pleases me a lot.” III