There was no need, in this marvellous ship, for mechanics to swing the propeller at the start. Again electricity from the ship's dynamo was employed, and the starting device was a miracle of ingenuity, worked from the pilot's cabin. Mr. Vargus, though I offered to loosen his bonds at the feet, absolutely refused to walk, and Danjuro carried him up the ladder and threw him upon the floor of the cabin like a sack of corn. Gascoigne, now very white and silent, was more amenable. It seems that Vargus had acquainted him with everything that had passed as they lay together on the ground. "I'll go all right, sir," he said to me, as I helped him to his feet. As I had the muzzle of my pistol in the small of his back, he couldn't well do anything else, but he lost nothing by being civil. "I can't believe that the Chief's dead and everything's finished," he said, with a curious sort of sob. I realized that all sense of right and wrong had left this youth early. He was the true stuff of which criminals are made, incapable of putting himself in the place of his victims, and while bitterly conscious of defeat and punishment to come, incapable of remorse. Without a trace of pose this man behaved just as if he were an officer captured by the enemy in war-time, and I dare swear he felt just like that. There is only one thing to do with these abnormals that get themselves born now and then--destroy them. Morally I felt sure that Gascoigne was not a hundredth part so responsible as Vargus. But one was born a criminal, and, from that point of view, insane. The other had had the capabilities of sainthood, but had opened his soul to the Dweller on the Threshold and was doubly lost. We went slowly towards the ship. "Good old bird!" he said, as any public schoolboy might have said it. "I expect this'll be the last cruise I ever take in her." "Or in any ship at all," I answered. "I suppose you've no illusions as to what's in store for you?" "No, I suppose it's a hanging job," he replied, and I assented, though, as you will learn, both his anticipations were to prove wrong. Danjuro and I shifted Vargus out of the main cabin into the small one where the tools and spare parts were stored. We didn't want Constance to see him, and he was so well secured that he couldn't possibly do any harm. Gascoigne we left for the present on one of the seats, and I hurried to fetch the two women, passing Thumbwood, still at his post. "Everything is arranged," I called out, as I ran through Helzephron's room. "We are going to fly to Plymouth at once in the Pirate Ship." The maid Wilson shrieked. "Oh, Sir John, that awful ship! I couldn't go in 'er again, not for my life. Let's go in a taxi, Miss, please 'ave a taxi; I couldn't face the ship."