86 THE BOY CAPTAIN.

and there was a good deal of risk, anyway, in what I did.
If the wind hadn’t sprung up, or the prisoners chanced
to turn rusty and showed fight, in fact, if almost anything
had happened to waste five minutes of time, the result
might have been very different.”

«But nothing did happen, and it was through your
own unaided exertions that we can now say we are
safe.”

“Not unaided by any manner of means, Miss Dunham,
when I had such a mate as you at the wheel. I want it
distinctly understood that if you had been a different
kind of a young woman, one of those, for instance, who
think it necessary to faint or scream when anything out
of the ordinary course happens, matters would not be in
as cheerful a condition as they are now.”

“J haven't done anything but stand at the wheel.”

“Tf you hadn’t been on board I should have been
obliged to steer, so you counted as one man, and a great
deal better you were than the majority of men; that I
can say without reasonable chance of contradiction.”

“Tf you are going to shower compliments so thickly,
perhaps it will be just as well that we don’t talk about
the battle. Do you have any objections to telling me
what you propose to do now?”

“Certainly not. It is my intention to get this brig
into Hong Kong.”

«Without any crew?”

“You forget that I have three men in the fore-
peak.”