been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate.

We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin--Captain Whidden, Mr.
Thomas, Mr. Falk, and Roger, whose duties included oversight of the cargo,
supervision of matters purely of business and trade in foreign ports, and a
deal of clerical work that Captain Whidden had no mind to be bothered with;
three in the steerage--the cook (contrary, perhaps, to the more usual
custom), the steward, and the carpenter; and fourteen in the forecastle.

All in all I was well pleased with my prospects, and promised myself that I
would "show them a thing or two," particularly Roger Hamlin. I'd make a
name for myself aboard the Island Princess. I'd let all the men know that
it would not take Benjamin Lathrop long to become as smart a seaman as
they'd hope to see.

Silly lad that I was!

Within twenty minutes of that idle dream the chain of circumstances had
begun that was to bring every man aboard the Island Princess face to face
with death. Like the small dark cloud that foreruns a typhoon, the first
act in the wild drama that came near to costing me my own life was so
slight, so insignificant relatively, that no man of us then dreamed of the
hidden forces that brought it to pass.

On the forecastle by the larboard rigging stood a big, broad-shouldered
fellow, who nodded familiarly at the second mate, cast a bit of a leer at
the captain as if to impress on the rest of us his own daring and
independence, and gave me, when I caught his eye, a cold, noncommittal
stare. His name, I shortly learned, was Kipping. Undeniably he was
impudent; but he had, nevertheless, a mild face and a mild manner, and when