called to Helga to know if all was well with her, but she was silent, and, as I might suppose, asleep. I put out the light, as my custom now was, and, partially unclothing myself in the dark, got into my bunk and lay for a little watching the dance of a phantom star or two in the dim black round of the scuttle close against my head, sleepily wondering how long this sort of life was to continue, what time was to pass, and how much was to happen before I should be restored to the comfort of my own snug bedroom at home; and thus musing, too drowsy perhaps for melancholy, I fell asleep.

I was awakened by someone beating heavily upon the bulkhead of the next-door cabin.

'Mr. Tregarthen! Mr. Tregarthen!' roared a voice; then thump! thump! went the blows of a massive fist or handspike. 'For Gor' a'mighty's sake wake up and turn out!—there's murder a-doing! Which is your cabin?'

I recognised the voice of Abraham, disguised as it was by horror and by the panting of his breath.

The exclamation, There's murder a-doing! collected my wits in a flash, and I was wide awake and conscious of the man's meaning ere he had fairly delivered himself of his cry.

'I am here—I will be with you!' I shouted, and, without pausing further to attire myself, dropped from my bunk and made with outstretched hands for the door, which I felt for and opened.

It was pitch dark in this passage betwixt the cabins, without even the dim gleam the porthole in the berth offered to the eye to rest on.

'Where are you, Abraham?' I cried.

'Here, sir!' he exclaimed, almost in my ear, and, lifting my hand, I touched him.

'The crew's up!' he cried. 'They've killed the mate, and by this time, I allow, the Capt'n's done for.'

'Where's Jacob?'

'Gor' He only knows, sir!'

'Are you armed? Do you grip anything?'

'Nothen, nothen. I run without stopping to arm myself. I'll tell ye about it—but it's awful to be a-talking in this here blackness with murder happening close by.'

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