"It looks fair enough on the surface, but I tell you there is something back of it," said the boy, confidently. "He pretends to take it for granted that I am a rebel, but he doesn't really believe it, and this proposition of his is intended to try me and find out where I stand. Almost the last question our class debated in school was: "Is a man ever justified in acting from policy rather than principle." I took the negative, and contended that he ought to act from principle, let the consequences be what they might; but I don't think so now. I shall join that rebel privateer, and I shall do it because I am sure something will happen to your house if I don't. Now please don't say a word about it. I feel bad enough as it is." If Mr. Beardsley really was testing the boy hoping to find him wanting, he was doomed to be disappointed, for promptly at half-past two the next afternoon Marcy rode into his yard and went with him to see the schooner, which was hidden in a bayou half a mile away. Marcy knew the little craft as well as he knew his own, but her appearance had been so greatly changed that he would not have recognized her if he had seen her on the sound. Her black hull had been painted white, so that she would not offer so fair a mark for the cannon of any cruiser she might be unlucky enough to fall in with; her midship section had been changed into a berth-deck, and she had gun-decks fore and aft. The two white men who had charge of her had hoisted her canvas to give it an airing, and Marcy saw a large figure "9" painted on her fore and main sails. "That's to make folks believe that she is a pilot-boat," chuckled Mr. Beardsley. "We'll be almost certain to find some fellow creeping along inside of Diamond shoals, thinking of no danger, and he'll never try to sheer off when he sees us coming, kase he'll think we're friendly. He'll think different when he sees a puff of smoke go up from our bows, but then it will be too late for him to square away. Good scheme; don't you think so?" Although Marcy had never felt greater contempt for a man in his life, he managed to get through the interview to his satisfaction; but whether or not Mr. Beardsley was satisfied, the boy could not tell. Sometimes he acted as if he was, and then again he looked and talked as if he suspected that Marcy was not half as enthusiastic as he pretended to be, and that his heart was set on something besides privateering.