him to waste valuable time in so small a matter as the identity of the combatants. He knew that one of them was his new roommate, the other a prowling thief, and being uncertain in the poor light as to which was which, he let the Goddess of Chance direct his energies.

[Pg 61]

At the other end of the passage-way the boat's officer, now reinforced by so many willing helpers that the affair was fast taking on the air of a riot, at last managed to drag the thief's lookout from the human tangle and hustle him into the eager hands of three of the crew, leaving the rescuers to fight it out among themselves, which they were doing with praiseworthy energy and impartial and indefinite aims. Considering that they did not know whom they were fighting, nor why, they were doing so well that Tom wondered what force could withstand them if they should become united in a compelling cause and concerted in their attack.

At the inner end of the passage, having beaten, choked, and gouged the thief into an inert and senseless mass, the bullwhacker turned his overflowing energies against his new and too enthusiastic friend, and they rolled into the stateroom, out again, and toward the heaving pile at the upper end of the hall. Striking it in a careless, haphazard but solid manner, just as it was beginning to[Pg 62] disintegrate into its bruised and angry units, the fighting pair acted upon it like a galvanic current on a reflex center; and forthwith the scramble became scrambled anew.

[Pg 62]

Finally, by the aid of capstan-bars, boat hooks, axe handles, and cordwood, the boat's officers and crew managed to pry the mass apart and drag out one belligerent at a time. They lined them up just as Captain Newell galloped down the passage-way, dressed in a pair of trousers, reversed; one rubber boot and one red sock and a night shirt partly thrust inside the waistband of the trousers; but he was carefully and precisely hatted with a high-crowned beaver. He looked as if he were coming from a wake and going to a masquerade. Notwithstanding the very recent and exciting events he received a great amount of attention.

"What-in-hell's-th'-matter?" he angrily demanded, glaring around him, a pistol upraised in one hand, the other gripping a seasoned piece of ash. "Answer-me-I-say-what-in-hell's-th'-matter-down-here?"

"There was a fight," carefully explained the weary officer.

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