THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Commodore Byron Me Candle ss
 
 "My God!" cried Beekman, staring into the white mist, 
 appalled by what he saw. Page 271 
 
 BY THE WORLD FORGOT
 
 By The World 
 Forgot 
 
 A Double Romance of the East and West 
 By CYRUS TOWNSEND BRADY 
 
 With Frontispiece 
 By CLARENCE F. UNDERWOOD 
 
 A. L. BURT COMPANY 
 Publishers New York 
 
 Published by arrangement with A. C. McCLURo & COMPANY
 
 Copyright 
 
 A. C. MoClurg & Co. 
 1917 
 
 Published September, 1917
 
 TO 
 
 MY GOOD FRIEND AND KINSMAIT 
 
 JOHN F. BARRETT
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 BOOK I 
 "Ship me sometvheres east of Sues" 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I A Clash of Wills and Hearts 1 
 
 II The Stubbornness of Stephanie 9 
 
 III Bill Woywod to the Rescue 20 
 
 IV A Bachelor's Dinner and Its Ending ... 35 
 V The Wedding That Was Not 45 
 
 VI Stephanie Is Glad After All 56 
 
 VII Up Against It Hard 64 
 
 VIII The Anvil Must Take the Pounding ... 80 
 
 IX The Game and the End 90 
 
 X The Mystery of the Last Words .... 104 
 
 XI The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral . . 112 
 
 BOOK II 
 
 "An' they talks a lot o' lovin', 
 But wot do they understand?" 
 
 XII The Hardest of Confessions 131 
 
 XIII The Search Determined Upon 143 
 
 XIV The Boatswain's Story 154
 
 Contents 
 
 BOOK III 
 "Where tJiere aren't no Ten Commandments" 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XV The Spirit of the Island 171 
 
 XVI The Speech of His Forefathers . . . . 181 
 
 XVII The House That Was Taboo 194 
 
 XVIII Moonlight Midnight Madness 204 
 
 XIX The Kiss That Was Different 214 
 
 XX The Message of the Past 223 
 
 XXI The Watcher on the Rocks 230 
 
 XXII Twice Saved by Truda 238 
 
 XXIII Truda Comes to His Prison 254 
 
 XXIV "So Farre, So Fast the Eygre Drave" . . 264 
 XXV The Indomitable Ego 273 
 
 BOOK IV 
 
 "I've a neater, sweeter maiden, 
 In a cleaner, greener land" 
 
 XXVI In Danger All 285 
 
 XXVII The Speechless Castaways 295 
 
 XXVIII They Comfort Each Other 307 
 
 XXIX The Island Haven 314 
 
 XXX Revelations and Withholdings 321 
 
 XXXI Vi et Armis 332
 
 BOOK I 
 
 'Ship me somewhere* east of Sues?'

 
 BY THE WORLD FORGOT 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 A CLASH OF WILLS AND HEABTS 
 
 ' TT^OR the last time, will you marry me?" 
 "No." 
 
 "But you don't love him." 
 
 "No." 
 
 "And you do love me?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I don't believe it." 
 
 "Would I be here if I did not?" 
 
 Now that adverb was rather indefinite. "Here" might 
 have meant the private office, which was bad enough, or his 
 arms, which was worse or better, depending upon the view 
 point. She could think of nothing better to dispel the rea 
 sonable incredulity of the man than to nestle closer to him, if 
 that were possible, and kiss him. It was not a perfunctory 
 kiss, either. It meant something to the woman, and she made 
 it mean something to the man. Indeed, there was fire and 
 passion enough in it to have quickened a pulse in a stone 
 image. It answered its purpose in one way. There could 
 be no real doubt in the man's mind as to the genuineness of 
 that love he had just called in question in his pique at her 
 refusal. The kiss thrilled him with its fervor, but it left 
 
 1
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 him more miserable than ever. It did not plunge him imme 
 diately into that condition, however, for he drew her closer 
 to his breast again, and as the struck flint flashes fire he gave 
 her back all that she had given him, and more. 
 
 Ordinarily in moments like that it is the woman who first 
 breaks away, but the solution of touch was brought about by 
 the man. He set the girl down somewhat roughly in the 
 chair behind the big desk before which they were standing 
 and turned away. She suffered him thus to dispose of her 
 without explanation. Indeed, she divined the reason which 
 presently came to his lips as he walked up and down the big 
 room, hands in pockets, his brows knitted, a dark frown on 
 his face. 
 
 "I can't stand any more of that just now," he said, refer 
 ring to her caress; "if ever in my life I wanted to think 
 clearly it is now and with you in my arms Say, for the 
 very last time, will you marry me?" 
 
 "I cannot." 
 
 "You mean you will not." 
 
 "Put it that way if you must. It amounts to the same 
 thing." 
 
 "Why can't you, or won't you, then ?" 
 
 "I've told you a thousand times." 
 
 "Assume that I don't know and tell me again." 
 
 "What's the use?" 
 
 "Well, it gives me another chance to show you how fool 
 ish you are, to overrule every absurd argument that you can 
 put forth " 
 
 "Except two." 
 
 "What are they?" 
 
 "My father and myself."
 
 'A Clash of Wills and Hearts 
 
 "Exactly. You have inherited a full measure, excuse me, 
 of his infernal obstinacy." 
 
 "Most people call it invincible determination." 
 
 "It doesn't make any difference what it's called, it 
 amounts to the same thing." 
 
 "I suppose I have." 
 
 "Now look at the thing plainly from a practical point of 
 view." 
 
 "Is there anything practical in romance, in love, in 
 passions like ours ?" 
 
 "There is something practical in everything I do and 
 especially in this. I've gone over the thing a thousand times. 
 I'll go over it again once more. You don't love the man you 
 have promised to marry ; you do love me. Furthermore, he 
 doesn't love you and I do Oh, he has a certain affection 
 for you, I'll admit. Nobody could help that, and it's prob 
 ably growing, too. I suppose in time he will " 
 
 "Love me as you do?" 
 
 "Never ; no one could do that, but as much as he could love 
 any one. But that isn't the point. For a quixotic scruple, 
 a mistaken idea of honor, an utterly unwarranted concep 
 tion of a daughter's duty, you are going to marry a man 
 you don't and can't love and " 
 
 "You are very positive. How do you know I can't?" 
 
 "I know you love me and I know that a girl like you can't 
 change any more than I can." 
 
 "That's the truth," answered the girl with a finality which 
 bespoke extreme youth, and shut off any further discussion 
 of that phase. 
 
 "Well, then, you'll be unhappy, I'll be unhappy, and he'll 
 be unhappy."
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 "I can make him happy." 
 
 "No, you can't. If* he learns to love you he will miss what 
 I would enjoy. He'll find out the truth and be miserable." 
 
 "Your solicitude for his happiness " 
 
 "Nonsense. I tell you I can't bear to give you up, and 
 I won't. I shouldn't be asked to. You made me love you ; 
 I didn't intend to." 
 
 "It wasn't a difficult task," said the girl smiling faintly 
 for the first time. 
 
 "Task ? It was no task at all. The first time I saw you 
 I loved you, and now you have lifted me up to heaven only 
 to dash me down to hell." 
 
 "Strong language." 
 
 "Not strong enough. Seriously, I can't, I won't let you 
 do it." 
 
 "You must. I have to. You don't understand. His 
 father gave my father his first start in life." 
 
 "Yes, and your father could buy his father twenty times 
 over." 
 
 "Perhaps he could, but that doesn't count. Our two 
 fathers have been friends ever since my father came here, 
 a boy without money or friends or anything, to make his 
 fortune, and he made it." 
 
 "I wish to God he hadn't and you were as poor as I was 
 when I landed here six years ago. If I could just have you 
 without your millions on any terms I should be happy. It's 
 those millions that come between us." 
 
 "Yes, that's so," admitted the girl, recognizing that the 
 man only spoke the truth. "If I were poor it would be quite 
 different. You see father's got pretty much everything out 
 of life that money could buy. He has no ancestry to speak
 
 'A Clash of Witts and Hearts 
 
 of but he's as proud as a peacock. The friendship between 
 the two families has been maintained. The two old men 
 determined upon this alliance as soon as I was born. My 
 father's heart is set upon it. He has never crossed me in 
 anything. He has been the kindest and most indulgent of 
 men. Next to you I worship him. It would break his heart 
 if I should back out now. Indeed, he is so set upon it that 
 I am sure he would never consent to my marrying you or 
 anybody else. He would disinherit me." 
 
 "Let him, let him. I've the best prospects of any broker 
 in New York, and I've already got enough money for us to 
 live on comfortably." 
 
 "I gave my word openly, freely," answered the girl. "I 
 wasn't in love with any one then and I liked him as well as 
 any man I had ever met. Now that his father has died, my 
 father is doubly set upon it. I simply must go through 
 with it." 
 
 "And as your father sacrificed pretty much everything to 
 build the family fortune, so you are going to sacrifice 
 yourself to add position to it." 
 
 "Now that is unworthy of you," said the girl earnestly. 
 ''That motive may be my father's but it isn't mine." 
 
 "Forgive me," said the man, who knew that the girl spoke 
 even less than the truth. 
 
 "I can understand how you feel because I feel desperate 
 myself; but honor, devotion, obedience to a living man, 
 promise to a dead man, his father, who was as fond of me 
 as if I had already been his daughter, all constrain me." 
 
 "They don't constrain me," said the man desperately, 
 coming to the opposite side of the big desk and smiting it 
 heavily with his hand. "All that weighs nothing with me.
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 I have a mind to pick you up now and carry you away 
 bodily." 
 
 "I wish you could," responded the girl with so much 
 honest simplicity that his heart leaped at the idea, "but you 
 could never get further than the elevator, or, if you went 
 down the stairs, than the street, because my honor would 
 compel me to struggle and protest." 
 
 "You wouldn't do that." 
 
 "I would. I would have to. For if I didn't there would 
 be no submitting to force majeure. No, my dear boy, it is 
 quite hopeless." 
 
 "It isn't. For the last time, will you marry me?" 
 
 "As I have answered that appeal a hundred times in the 
 last six months, I cannot." 
 
 "Are there any conditions under which you could ?" 
 
 "Two." 
 
 "What are they?" 
 
 "What is the use of talking about them? They cannot 
 occur." 
 
 "Nevertheless tell me what they are. I've got everything 
 I've ever gone after heretofore. I've got some of your 
 father's perseverance." 
 
 "You called it obstinacy a while ago." 
 
 "Well, it's perseverance in me. What are your con 
 ditions?" 
 
 "The consent of two people." 
 
 "And who are they ?" 
 
 "My father and my fiance." 
 
 "I have your own, of course." 
 
 "Yes, and you have my heartiest prayer that you may 
 get both. Oh," she went on, throwing up her hands. "I
 
 A Clash of Wills and Hearts 
 
 don't think I can stand any more of this. I know what I 
 must do and you must not urge me. These scenes are too 
 much for me." 
 
 "Why did you come here, then ?" asked the man. "You 
 know I can't be in your presence without appealing to 
 you." 
 
 "To show you this," said the girl, drawing a yellow 
 telegram slip from her bag which she had thrown on the 
 desk. 
 
 "Is it from him? I had one, too," answered the man, 
 picking it up. 
 
 "Of course," said the girl, "since you and he are partners 
 in business. I never thought of that. I should not have 
 come." 
 
 "Heaven bless you for having done so. Every moment 
 that I see you makes me more determined. If I could see 
 you all the time and " 
 
 "He'll be here in a month," interrupted the girl. "He 
 wants the wedding to take place immediately and so do I." 
 
 "Why this indecent haste?" 
 
 "It has been a year since the first postponement and 
 Oh, what must be must be ! I want to get it over and be 
 done with it. I can't stand these scenes any more than you 
 can. Look at me." 
 
 The man did more than look. The sight of the piteous 
 appealing figure was more than he could stand. He took her 
 in his arms again. 
 
 "I wish to God he had drowned in the South Seas," he 
 said savagely. 
 
 "Oh, don't say that. He's your best friend," interposed 
 the girl, laying her hand upon his lips.
 
 8 By the World Forgot 
 
 "But you are the woman I love, and no friendship shall 
 come between us." 
 
 The girl shook her head and drew herself away. 
 
 "I must go now. I really can't endure this any longer." 
 
 "Very well," said the man, turning to get his hat. 
 
 "No," said the girl, "you musn't come with me." 
 
 "As you will," said the other, "but hear me. That 
 wedding is set for thirty days from today ?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, I'll not give you up until you are actually married 
 to him. I'll find some way to stop it, to gain time, to break 
 it off. I swear you shan't marry him if I have to commit 
 murder." 
 
 She thought he spoke with the pardonable exaggeration 
 of a lover. She shook her head and bit her lip to keep back 
 the tears. 
 
 "Good-bye," she said. "It is no use. We can't help it." 
 
 She was gone. But the man was not jesting. He was in a 
 state to conceive anything and to attempt to carry out the 
 wildest and most extravagant proposition. He sat down at 
 his desk to think it over, having told his clerks in the outer 
 office that he was not to be disturbed by any one for any 
 cause.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE STUBBORNNESS OP STEPHANIE 
 
 AT one point of the triangle stands the beautiful 
 Stephanie Maynard; at another, George Harnash, 
 able and energetic ; at the third, Derrick Beekman, who was a 
 dilettante in life. George Harnash is something of a villain, 
 although he does not end as the wicked usually do. Derrick 
 Beekman is the hero, although he does not begin as heroes 
 are expected to do. Stephanie Maynard is just a woman, 
 heroine or not, as shall be determined. Before long the 
 triangle will be expanded into a square by the addition of 
 another woman, also with some decided qualifications for a 
 heroine ; but she comes later, not too late, however, to play 
 , deciding part in the double love story into which we are 
 to be plunged. 
 
 Of that more anon, as the sixteenth century would put it ; 
 and indeed this story of today reaches back into that bygone 
 period for one of its origins. Romance began where? 
 when ? All romances began in the Garden of Eden, but it 
 needs not to trace the development of this one through all 
 the centuries intervening between that period and today. 
 This story, if not its romance, began with an arrangement. 
 The arrangement was entered into between Derrick Beekman 
 senior, since deceased, and John Maynard, still very much 
 alive. 
 
 Maynard was a new man in New York, a new man on the 
 
 9
 
 10 By the World Forgot 
 
 street. He was the head of the great Inter-Oceanic Trading 
 Company. The Maynard House flag floated over every 
 sea from the mast heads, or jack staffs, of the Maynard 
 ships. Almost as widely known as the house flag was the 
 Maynard daughter. The house flag was simple but beau 
 tiful ; the daughter was beautiful but by no means simple. 
 She was a highly specialized product of the nineteenth 
 .century. Being the only child of much money, she was 
 everything outwardly and visibly that her father desired 
 her to be, and to make her that he had planned carefully 
 and spent lavishly. With her father's undeniable money 
 and her own undisputed beauty she was a great figure in 
 New York society from the beginning. 
 
 No one could have so much of both the desirable attributes 
 mentioned beauty and money and go unspoiled in New 
 York certainly not until age had tempered youth. But 
 Stephanie Maynard was rather an unusual girl. Many of 
 her good qualities were latent but they were there. It was 
 not so much those hidden good qualities but the dazzling 
 outward and visible characteristics that had attracted the 
 attention of old Derrick Beekman. 
 
 Beekman had everything that Maynard had not and some 
 few things that Maynard had in a small measure, at least. 
 For instance, he was a rich man, although his riches could 
 only be spoken of modestly beside Maynard's vast wealth. 
 
 But Beekman added to a comfortable fortune an unques 
 tioned social position ; old, established, assured. Those who 
 would fain make game of him behind his back such a 
 thing was scarcely possible to his face used to say that 
 he traced his descent to every Dutchman that ever rallied 
 around one-legged, obstinate, Peter Stuyvesant and his
 
 The Stubbornness of Stephanie 11 
 
 predecessors. The social approval of the Beekmans origi 
 nally, of course, Van Beeckman was like a lettre de cachet. 
 It immediately imprisoned one in the tightest and most 
 exclusive circle of New York, the social bastille from which 
 the fortunate captive is rarely ever big enough to wish to 
 break out. 
 
 Beekman's pride in his ancestry was only matched by 
 his ambitions for his son, like Stephanie Maynard, an only 
 child. If to the position and, as he fancied, the brains of 
 the Beekmans could be allied the fortune and the business 
 acumen of the Maynards, the world itself would be at the 
 feet of the result of such a union. Now Maynard's money 
 bought him most things he wanted but it had not bought 
 and could not buy Beekman and that for which he stood. 
 Maynard's beautiful daughter had to be thrown into the 
 scales. 
 
 Maynard had no ancestry in particular. Self-made men 
 usually laugh at the claims of long descent, but secretly 
 they feel differently. Being the Rudolph of Hapsburg of 
 the family is more of a pose or a boast than not. I doubt 
 not that even the great Corsican felt that in his secret heart 
 which he revealed to no one. Maynard's patent of nobility 
 might date from his first battle on the stock exchange, his 
 financial Montenotte, but in his heart of hearts he would 
 rather it had its origin in some old and musty parchment 
 of the past. 
 
 Beekman, who was much older than Maynard, had actu 
 ally helped that young man when he first started out to 
 encounter the world and the flesh and the devil in New York 
 and to beat them down or bring them to heel. A friendship, 
 purely business at first, largely patronizing in the beginning
 
 12 By the World Forgot 
 
 on the one hand, deferentially grateful on the other, had 
 grown up between the somewhat ill-sorted pair. And it had 
 not been broken with passing years. 
 
 Maynard, unfortunately for his social aspirations, had 
 married before he had become great. Many men achieve 
 greatness only to find a premature partner an encumbrance 
 to a career. However, Maynard's wife, another social 
 nobody with little but beauty to recommend her, had done 
 her best for her husband by dying before she was either a 
 drag or a help to his fortunes. The two men, each actuated 
 by different motives, which, however, tended to the same 
 end, had arranged the match between the last Beekman and 
 the first Maynard; and that each secretly fancied himself 
 condescending to the other did not stand in the way. The 
 young people had agreeably fallen in with the proposals of 
 the elders, neither of whom was accustomed to be balked or 
 questioned for old Beekman was as much of an autocrat 
 as Maynard. Filial obedience was indeed a tradition in 
 the Beekman family. There were no traditions at all in 
 the Maynard family, but the same custom obtained with 
 regard to Stephanie. 
 
 Young Beekman was good looking, athletic, prominent 
 in society, a graduate of the best university, popular, and 
 generally considered able, although he had accomplished 
 little, having no stimulus thereto, by which to justify that 
 public opinion. He went everywhere, belonged to the best 
 clubs, and was a most eligible suitor. He danced divinely, 
 conversed amusingly, made love gallantly if somewhat per 
 functorily, having had abundant practice in all pursuits. 
 For the rest, what little business he transacted was as a 
 broker and business partner of George Harnash, who, for
 
 The Stubbornness of Stephanie 13 
 
 their common good, made the most of the connections to 
 which Beekman could introduce him. 
 
 Beekman, who had taken life lightly, indeed, at once 
 recognized the wisdom of his father's rather forcible sug 
 gestion that it was time for him to settle down. He saw 
 how the Maynard millions would enhance his social prestige, 
 and if he should be moved to undertake business affairs 
 seriously, as Harnash often urged, would offer a substantial 
 background for his operations. 
 
 Stephanie Maynard was beautiful enough to please any 
 man. She was well enough educated and well enough trained 
 for the most fastidious of the fastidious Beekmans. In any 
 real respect she was a fit match for Derrick Beekman, indeed 
 for anybody. There was no society into which she would 
 be introduced that she would not grace. 
 
 From a feeling of condescension quite in keeping with 
 his blood young Beekman was rapidly growing more inter 
 ested in and more fond of his promised wife. Her feelings 
 probably would have developed along the same lines had 
 it not been for George Harnash. He was Beekman's best 
 friend. They had been classmates and roommates at college. 
 Harnash like Beekman was a broker. Indeed the firm of 
 Beekman & Harnash was already well spoken of on the 
 street, especially on account of the ability of the junior 
 partner, who was everywhere regarded as a young man with 
 a brilliant future. 
 
 Now Harnash hung, as it were, like Mohammed's coffin, 
 'twixt heaven and earth. He was not socially assured and 
 unexceptionable as Beekman, but he was much more so than 
 the Maynards. He did not begin with even the modest 
 wealth of the former, but he was rapidly acquiring a for-
 
 14 TSy the World Forgot 
 
 tune and, what is better, winning the respect and admiration 
 of friends and enemies alike by his bold and successful opera 
 tions. It was generally recognized that Harnash was the 
 more active of the two young partners. Beekman had put 
 in most of the capital, having inherited a reasonable sum 
 from his mother and much more from his father, but 
 Harnash was the guiding spirit of the firm's transactions. 
 
 Harnash, who was the exact opposite of Beekman, as fair 
 as the other man was dark, fell wildly in love with Stephanie 
 Maynard. To do him justice, this plunge occurred before 
 definite matrimonial arrangements between the houses of 
 Beekman and Maynard had been entered into. Harnash 
 had not contemplated such a possibility. The two friends 
 were in exceedingly confidential relationship to each other, 
 and Beekman had manifested only a most casual interest 
 in Stephanie Maynard. Harnash, seeing the present hope 
 lessness of his passion, had concealed it from Beekman. 
 Therefore, the announcement casually made by his friend 
 and confirmed the day after by the society papers over 
 whelmed him. 
 
 To do him justice further, while it could not be said that 
 Harnash was oblivious to the fact that the woman he loved 
 was her father's daughter, he would have loved her if she 
 had been a nobody. While he could not be indifferent to 
 the further fact that whoever won her would ultimately 
 command the Maynard millions, George Harnash was so 
 confident of his own ability to succeed that he would have 
 preferred to make his own way and have his wife dependent 
 upon him for everything. However, he was too level headed 
 a New Yorker not to realize that even if he could achieve 
 his ambition the Maynard millions would come in handy.
 
 THe Stubbornness of Stephanie 15 
 
 The thing that made it so hard for Harnash to bear the 
 new situation was the carelessness with which Beekman 
 entered into it. He felt that if the marriage could be pre 
 vented it would not materially interfere with the happiness 
 of his friend. Harnash had deliberately set himself to the 
 acquirement of everything he desired. Honorably, law 
 fully, if he could he would get what he wanted, but get it 
 he would. He found that he had never wanted anything 
 so much as he wanted Stephanie Maynard. Money and 
 position had been his ambitions, but these gave place to 
 a woman. He did not arrive at a determination to take 
 Stephanie Maynard from Derrick Beekman, if he could, 
 without great searchings of heart, but the more he thought 
 about it, the longer he contemplated the possibility of the 
 marriage of the woman he loved to the man he also loved, 
 the more impossible grew the situation. 
 
 At first he had put all thought of self out of his mind, or 
 had determined so to do, in order to accept the situation, 
 but he made the mistake of continuing to see Stephanie 
 during the process and when he discovered that she was 
 not indifferent to him he hesitated, wavered, fell. By fair 
 means or foul the engagement must be broken. It could 
 only be accomplished by getting Derrick Beekman out of 
 the way. After that he would wring a consent out of 
 Maynard. To that decision the girl had unconsciously 
 contributed by laying down conditions which, by a 
 curious mental twist, the man felt in honor bound to 
 meet. 
 
 Both the elder Beekman and John Maynard were men of 
 firmness and decision. Wedding preparations had gone on 
 apace. The invitations were all but out when Beekman was
 
 16 By the World Forgot 
 
 gathered to his ancestors there could be no heaven for 
 him where they were not after an apoplectic stroke. This 
 postponed the wedding and gave George Harnash more 
 time. Now Derrick Beekman had devotedly loved his stern, 
 proud old father, the only near relative he had in the world. 
 He decided to spend the time intervening between that 
 father's sudden and shocking death and his marriage on a 
 yachting cruise to the South Seas. It was characteristic 
 of his feeling for Stephanie Maynard that he had not hesi 
 tated to leave her for that long period. The field was thus 
 left entirely to Harnash. 
 
 The Maynard-Beekman engagement, of course, had been 
 made public, and Stephanie's other suitors had accepted 
 the situation, but not Harnash. He was a man of great 
 power and persuasiveness and ability and he made love with 
 the same desperate, concentrated energy that he played the 
 business game. He was quite frank about it. He told 
 Stephanie that if she or Beekman or both of them had 
 shown any passion for the other, such as he felt for her, he 
 would have considered himself in honor bound to eliminate 
 himself, but since it would obviously be un manage de 
 convenance, since both the parties thereto would enter into 
 it lightly and unadvisedly, he was determined to interpose. 
 And there was even in the girl's eyes abundant justification 
 for his action. 
 
 No woman wants to be taken as a matter of course. 
 Stephanie Maynard had been widely wooed, more or less all 
 over the world. Although she did not care especially for 
 Derrick Beekman, she resented his somewhat cavalier atti 
 tude toward her, and his witty, amusing, but by no means 
 passionately devoted letters, somewhat infrequent, too.
 
 The Stubbornness of Stephanie 17 
 
 Harnash made great progress, yet he came short of complete 
 success. 
 
 The Maynards were nobodies socially, that is, their ances 
 tors had been, and they had not yet broken into the most 
 exclusive set, the famous hundred and fifty of New York's 
 best, as they styled themselves to the great amusement of 
 the remaining five million or so, but they came, after all, 
 of a stock possessed of substantial virtues. Stephanie's 
 father was accustomed to boast that his word was his bond, 
 and, unlike many who say that, it really was. People got to 
 know that when old John Maynard said a thing he could be 
 depended upon. If he gave a promise he would keep it 
 even if he ruined himself in the keeping, and his daughter, 
 in that degree, was not unlike him. 
 
 Almost a year after his father's death Derrick Beekman 
 sent cablegrams from Honolulu saying he was coming back, 
 and George Harnash and Stephanie awoke from their dream. 
 
 "I love you," repeated Stephanie to Harnash in another 
 of the many, not to say continuous, discussions they held 
 after that day at the office. "You can't have any doubt 
 about that, but my word has been passed. I don't dislike 
 Derrick, either. But I'd give anything on earth if I were 
 free." 
 
 "And when you were free?" 
 
 "You know that I'd marry you in a minute." 
 
 "Even if your father forbade?" 
 
 "I don't believe he would." 
 
 "If he did we would win him over." 
 
 "You might as well try to win over a granite mountain, 
 But there's no use talking, I'm not free." 
 
 "It's this foolish pride of yours."
 
 18 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Foolish it may be. I've heard so much about the Beek- 
 man word of honor and the Beekman faith that I want to 
 show that the Maynard honor and faith and determination 
 are no less." 
 
 "And you are going to sacrifice yourself and me for that 
 shibboleth, are you ?" 
 
 "I see no other way. Believe me," said the girl, who had 
 resolved to allow no more demonstrations of affection now 
 that it was all settled and her prospective husband was on the 
 way to her, "I seem cold and indifferent to you, but if I let 
 myself go " 
 
 "Oh, Stephanie, please let yourself go again, even if for 
 the last time," pleaded George Harnash, and Stephanie did. 
 When coherent speech was possible he continued: "Well, 
 if Beekman himself releases you or if he withdrew or 
 disappeared or " 
 
 "I don't have to tell you what my answer would be." 
 
 "And I've got to be best man at the wedding ! I've got to 
 stand by and " 
 
 "Why didn't you speak before?" asked the girl bit 
 terly. 
 
 "I was no match for you then. I'm not a match for you 
 now." 
 
 "You should have let me be the judge of that." 
 
 "But your father?" 
 
 "I tell you if I hadn't promised, all the fathers on earth 
 wouldn't make any difference. Now we have lived in a 
 fool's paradise for a year. You're Derrick's friend and 
 you're mine." 
 
 "Only your friend?" 
 
 "Do I have to tell you again how much I love you ? But
 
 The Stubbornness of Stephanie 19 
 
 that must stop now. It should have stopped long ago. You 
 can't come here any more except as Derrick's friend." 
 
 "I can't come here at all, then." 
 
 "No, I suppose not. And that will be best. Let us put 
 this behind us as a dream of happiness which we will never 
 forget, but from which we awake to find it only a dream." 
 
 "It's no dream to me. I will never give you up. I will 
 never cease to try to make it a reality until you are bound 
 to the other man." 
 
 They were standing close together as it was, but he took 
 the step that brought him to her side and he swept her to 
 his heart without resistance on her part. She would give 
 her hand to Derrick Beekman, but her heart she could not 
 give, for that was in George Harnash's possession, and when 
 he clasped her in his arms and kissed her, she suffered him. 
 She kissed him back. Her own arms drew him closer. It 
 was a passionate farewell, a burial service for a love that 
 could not go further. It was she who pushed him from her. 
 
 "I will never give you up, never," he repeated. "Great 
 as is my regard for Beekman, sometimes I think that I'll 
 kill him at the very foot of the altar to have you." 
 
 Stephanie's iron control gave way. She burst into tears, 
 and George Harnash could say nothing to comfort her, but 
 only gritted his teeth as he tore himself away, revolving 
 all sorts of plans to accomplish his own desires. 
 
 To him came, with Mephistophelian appositeness, Mr. 
 Bill Woywod.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 BII/L WOYWOD TO THE RESCUE 
 
 fTIHE three weeks that followed were more fraught with, 
 unpleasantness, not to say misery, than any Stephanie 
 Maynard and George Harnash had ever passed. Of the 
 two, Harnash was in the worse case. Stephanie had two 
 things to distract her. 
 
 The approaching wedding meant the preparation of a 
 trousseau. What had been got ready the year before would 
 by no means serve for the second attempt at matrimony. 
 Now no matter how deep and passionate a woman's feelings 
 are she can never be indifferent to the preparation of a 
 trousseau. Even death, which looms so horribly before the 
 feminine mind, would be more tolerable if it were accom 
 panied by a similar demand upon her activities. Yet a 
 woman's grief in bereavement is never so deep as to make 
 her careless as to the fit or becomingness of her mourning 
 habiliments. Much more is this true of wedding garments. 
 
 Now if these somewhat cynical and slighting remarks be 
 reprehended, nevertheless there is occupation even for the 
 sacrificial victim in the preparation of a trousseau which, 
 were it not so pleasant a pursuit, might even be called labor. 
 The fit of Stephanie's dresses on her beautiful figure was 
 not accomplished without toil, albeit of the submissive sort, 
 on the part of the young lady. That was her first diversion. 
 
 For the second relief the girl had a great deal more con- 
 
 20
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 21 
 
 fidence in her lover's promise than he had himself in his 
 own prowess. Try as he might, plan as he could, he found 
 no way out of the impasse so long as the solution of it was 
 left entirely to him, and the woman was determined to be 
 but a passive instrument. 
 
 The obvious course was to go frankly to his friend and 
 lay before him the whole state of affairs in the hope that 
 Beekman himself would cut the Gordian knot by declining 
 the lady's hand. Two considerations prevented that. In 
 the first place, Beekman had confidingly placed his love 
 affair, together with his business affairs, in the hands of his 
 partner. Harnash had not meant to play the traitor but he 
 had been unable to resist the temptation that Stephanie pre 
 sented, and he simply could not bring himself to make such 
 a bare-faced admission of a breach of trust. Besides, he 
 reasoned shrewdly that even if he did make such a confession 
 it was by no means certain that Derrick Beekman would 
 give up the girl. His letters, since his cable from Hawaii, 
 had rather indicated a strengthening of his affection, and 
 Harnash suspected that the realization that his betrothed 
 was violently desired by someone else would just about 
 develop that affection into a passion which could hardly be 
 withstood. 
 
 In the second place, even if Beekman's affection for 
 Harnash would lead him to take the action desired by his 
 friend, there would still be Mr. Maynard to be won over. 
 Harnash had not been associated with Maynard as a broker 
 in various transactions which the older man had engineered, 
 without having formed a sufficiently correct judgment of 
 his character to enable him to forecast absolutely what 
 Maynard's position would be in that emergency. Maynard
 
 22 By the World Forgot 
 
 had a considerable liking and a growing respect for young 
 Harnash. He had casually remarked to his daughter on 
 more than one occasion that Harnash was a young man 
 who would be heard from. Maynard had observed that 
 Harnash strove for many things and generally got what 
 he wanted. 
 
 Perhaps that remark, which the poor girl had treasured 
 in her heart, had something to do with her confidence that 
 somehow or other Harnash would work out the problem. 
 But Harnash knew very well how terrible, not to say vin 
 dictive, an antagonist and enemy Maynard could be when 
 he was crossed. If Beekman withdrew from the engagement, 
 broke off the marriage, about which there had been suffi 
 cient notoriety on account of the first postponement after 
 the older Beekman's death, Maynard's rage would know no 
 bounds. He would assuredly wreak his vengeance upon 
 Beekman, and if Harnash were implicated in any way the 
 punishment would be extended to him. 
 
 Harnash knew that Beekman would not have cared a snap 
 of his finger for the older Maynard's wrath. He was not 
 that kind of a man. Nor would he himself have been 
 deterred by the thought of it had he been a little more 
 sure of his position financially. Whatever else he lacked, 
 Harnash had courage to tackle anything or anybody, 
 if there were the faintest prospect of success. But to 
 fight Maynard at that stage in his career was an impos 
 sibility. These weighty reasons accordingly decided him 
 that it was useless and indeed impossible to appeal to his 
 friend. 
 
 Again, while Harnash was accustomed to stop at nothing 
 to procure his ends, and while he had declared that he would
 
 Bill Woytvod to the Rescue 23 
 
 murder Beekman, he knew that although he meant it more 
 than Stephanie supposed, he did not mean it enough to be 
 able to do anything like that. His mind was in a turmoil. 
 He really was fond of Beekman, and if Stephanie and 
 Derrick had been wildly in love with each other Harnash 
 believed that he would have been man enough to have kept 
 out of the way and have fought down his disappointment as 
 best he could. As it was, there was reason and justice in 
 what he urged. Since Stephanie loved him and did not 
 love Beekman, and since Beekman's affection was of a placid 
 nature, the approaching union was horrible. 
 
 The wildest schemes and plans ran through his head or 
 were suggested to him after intense thought, only to be 
 rejected. The problem finally narrowed itself down to a 
 question of time. Harnash was a great believer in the func 
 tion of time in determining events. If he could postpone 
 the marriage again he would have greater opportunity to 
 work and plan. He had enough confidence in himself, 
 backed by Stephanie's undoubted affection, to make him 
 believe that with time he could bring about anything. There 
 fore he must eliminate Derrick Beekman, temporarily, at 
 least, and he must do it before the wedding. The longer he 
 could keep him away from Stephanie, the better would be 
 his own chance. If even on the eve of the wedding the 
 groom could disappear, the fact would tend greatly to his 
 ultimate advantage, provided Beekman were away long 
 enough. 
 
 He concentrated his mind on this proposition. How could 
 he cause Derrick Beekman to disappear the day before his 
 wedding, and how, having spirited him away, could he keep 
 him away long enough to make that disappearance worth
 
 24 By the World Forgot 
 
 while from the Harnash point of view ? That was the final 
 form of the problem in its last analysis. How was he to 
 solve it? 
 
 He could have Beekman kidnapped, and hold him for 
 ransom in some lonely place in the country. That was a 
 solution which he dismissed almost as soon as he formulated 
 it. The tiling was impracticable. He would have to trust 
 too many people. He could never keep him long in con 
 finement. He himself would probably become the victim of 
 continuous blackmail. In the face of rewards that would be 
 offered, his employees would eventually betray him. Sooner 
 or later, unless something happened to Beekman, he would 
 get out. Harnash had plenty of hardihood, but he shivered 
 at the thought of what he would have to meet when Beekman 
 came for an accounting, as sooner or later he would. He 
 would have to find some other way. What way ? 
 
 Now Harnash's misery was further increased by the fact 
 that Beekman had cabled him to go ahead with the prepara 
 tions for the wedding. The Beekman yacht had broken 
 down in Honolulu Harbor after that long cruise, and instead 
 of following his telegram straight home, there had been a 
 week of delay. He had explained the situation by cables 
 to Harnash, Stephanie, and her father. 
 
 After the yacht, her engines pretty well strained from 
 the year's cruise, had been put in fair shape, ten days had 
 been required for the return passage. Beekman had some 
 business matters to attend to in San Francisco and he did 
 not arrive in New York until a few days before the wedding, 
 which was to take place at the Cathedral of St. John the 
 Divine, the Bishop Suffragan and the Dean being the 
 officiating clergymen designate.
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 25 
 
 It was fortunate in one sense that Beekman had been so 
 delayed, for there was so much for him to do, so many 
 people for him to see, that he had little opportunity for 
 making love to his promised bride, and he had no chance to 
 discern her real feelings any more than he had to find 
 out Harnash's position. He had, indeed, remarked that 
 Stephanie looked terribly worn and strained, and that 
 George Harnash was haggard and spent to an extraordinary 
 degree ; but he attributed the one to the excitement of the 
 marriage and the other to the fact that Harnash had been 
 left so long alone to bear the burden of responsibility and 
 decision in the rapidly increasing brokerage business. 
 
 When he had swept his unwilling bride-to-be to his heart 
 and kissed her boisterously, he had told her that he would 
 take care of her and see that the roses were brought back 
 to her cheeks after they were married; and after he had 
 shaken Harnash's hand vigorously he had slapped him on 
 the back and declared to him that as soon as the honeymoon 
 was over he would buckle down to work and give him a long 
 vacation. Neither of the recipients of these promises was 
 especially enthusiastic or delighted, but in his joyous breezy 
 fashion Beekman neither saw nor thought anything was 
 amiss. 
 
 Never a man essayed to tread the devious paths of 
 matrimony with a more confident assurance or a lighter 
 heart. Nothing could surpass his blindness. 
 
 "You see," said Stephanie in a last surreptitious inter 
 view with Harnash, "he hasn't the least suspicion. He 
 hugged me like a bear and kissed me like a battering ram," 
 she explained with a little movement of her shoulders sin 
 gularly expressive of resentment, and even more.
 
 26 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Damn him," muttered Harnash, under his breath. "He 
 wrung my hand, too, as if I were his best friend." 
 
 "Well, you are, aren't you?" 
 
 "I was, I am, and I'm going to save him from " 
 
 "From the misfortune of marrying me ?" 
 
 "I don't see how you can jest under the circum 
 stances." 
 
 "George," said the girl, "if I didn't jest I should die. I 
 don't see how I can endure it as it is." 
 
 "Stephanie," he repeated, lifting his right hand as if 
 making an oath as, indeed, he was "I'm going to take 
 you from him if it is at the foot of the altar." 
 
 These were brave words with back of them, as yet, only 
 an intensity of purpose and a determination, but no practical 
 plan. It was Bill Woywod that gave the practical turn 
 to that decision on the part of Harnash. 
 
 Now George Harnash came originally from a little down- 
 east town on the Maine coast. That it was his birthplace 
 was not its only claim to honor. It also boasted of the 
 nativity of Bill Woywod. The two had been boyhood 
 friends. Although their several pursuits had separated 
 them widely, the queer friendship still obtained in spite of 
 the wide and ever-widening difference in the characters and 
 stations of the two men. 
 
 Running away from school, Bill Woywod had gone down 
 to the sea as his ancestors for two hundred years had done 
 before him. Left to himself, Harnash had completed his 
 high school and college course and had gone down to New 
 York as none of his people had ever done in all the family 
 history. Both men had progressed. Harnash was already 
 well-to-do and approaching brilliant success. He had thrust
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 27 
 
 his feet at least within the portals of society and was holding 
 open the door which he would force widely when he was a 
 little stronger. 
 
 Woywod had earned a master's certificate and was now the 
 first mate, technically the mate, of one of the ships of the 
 Inter-Oceanic Trading fleet, in line for first promotion to 
 a master. Woywod was a deep-water sailor. He cared little 
 for steam, and although it was an age in which masts and 
 sails were being withdrawn from the seven seas, he still 
 affected the fast-disappearing wind-jamming branch of the 
 ocean-carrying trade. 
 
 Indeed, the last full-rigged ship had been paid off and 
 laid up in ordinary. Just because it was the last wooden 
 sailing ship of the fleet, Maynard, whose fortune had been 
 not a little contributed to by sailing vessels in the preceding 
 century, had refrained from selling her. There was a sen 
 timental streak in the hard old captain of industry, as there 
 is in most men who achieve, and the Susquehanna had not 
 been broken up or otherwise disposed of. On the contrary, 
 every care had been taken of her. 
 
 The demands of the great war brought every ocean- 
 carrying ship into service again. The Su&quehanna was 
 refitted and commissioned. A retired mariner who had been 
 more or less a failure under steam but whose seamanship 
 was unquestioned was appointed to command. Captain 
 Peleg Fish was one of those old-time sailors to whom moral 
 suasion meant little or nothing. He was Gloucester born, 
 and had served his apprenticeship in the fishing fleet. There 
 after he had been mate on the last of the old American 
 clippers, had commanded a whaler out of New Bedford, and 
 knew a sailing ship from truck to keelson.
 
 28 By the World Forgot 
 
 He was a man of a hard heart and a heavy hand. His 
 courage was as high as his heart was hard or his hand was 
 heavy. He was also a driver. He drove his ship and he 
 drove his men. He had been a success on the Susquelianna 
 in her time, and because of that he had been able to get 
 crews and keep officers. Quick passages in a well-found ship, 
 and good pay, had offset his proverbial fierceness and bru 
 tality. He was now an old man, but sailing masters were 
 scarce. Officers and men were scarce, too, on account of the 
 war, and although the Inter-Oceanic Trading Company had 
 dismissed Captain Fish because of the way he had mis 
 handled the steamer to which they transferred him when 
 they laid up the Susquehanna, yet they were glad to call him 
 into service when they decided again to make use of that 
 vessel. 
 
 Grim old Captain Fish made but one condition. He was 
 glad enough to get back to the sea on which he had passed 
 his life on any terms, and doubly rej oiced that he could once 
 more command a wooden sailing ship instead of "an iron 
 pot with a locomotive in her," as he designated his last 
 vessel. That condition was that he should have Bill Woywod 
 for mate. The two had sailed together before. They knew 
 each other, liked each other, worked together hand and 
 glove, for Bill Woywod was a man of the same type as the 
 captain. The captain was getting old, too. He wanted a 
 stouter arm and a quicker eye at his disposal than his own. 
 Besides, Bill hated steam as much as Fish did. He was 
 a natural-born sailor, not a mechanic and engine driver. 
 Among the bucko mates of the past, Bill Woywod would 
 not have yielded second place to anybody. They had to give 
 Woywod a master's pay to get him to ship, but once having
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 29 
 
 agreed to do that, he entered upon his new duties with 
 alacrity. 
 
 The Susquehanna was a big full-rigged clipper ship of 
 three thousand tons. Given a favorable wind, she could 
 show her heels to many a tramp steamer or lumbering 
 freighter, and even not a few of the older liners. She was 
 carrying arms and munitions for the Russians and ran 
 between New York and Vladivostok through the Panama 
 Canal. 
 
 If there was one person rough, hard-bitten Bill Woywod 
 had an abiding affection for, it was George Harnash. When 
 ever his ship dropped anchor in New York the first person 
 -and about the only respectable person he visited was 
 his boyhood friend. To be sure, there was not much con 
 geniality between them. The only tie that bound them 
 was that boyhood friendship, but both of them were men 
 without kith or kin, and they somehow clung to that asso 
 ciation. Woywod was proud of his friendship with the 
 rising young broker, and there was a kind of refreshment 
 in the person of the breezy sailor which Harnash greatly 
 enjoyed, especially as the visits of the seaman were not 
 frequent or long enough to pall upon the New Yorker. 
 
 Harnash usually took an afternoon and night off 
 when Woywod arrived. They took in the baseball game 
 at the Polo Grounds, dined thereafter at some table d'hote 
 resort which Harnash would never have affected under 
 ordinary circumstances, but which seemed to Woywod the 
 very height of luxury. Then they repaired to some theatre, 
 usually one of the high-kicking variety avowedly designed 
 for the tired business man, which was extremely congenial 
 to the care-free sailor ; and not to go further into details it
 
 30 By the World Forgot 
 
 may be alleged that they had a good time together until far 
 in the night or early in the morning, rather. Harnash was 
 usually not a little ashamed next morning ; Woywod, never ! 
 With sturdy independence Woywod would alternate being 
 host on these occasions. On land and out of his element 
 he was a fairly agreeable companion in his rough, coarse 
 way. It was only on the ship that he became a brute. In 
 the nature of things the devotion, if such it could be called, 
 was all on Woywod's side. It was an aspiration on his 
 part and a condescension on the part of Harnash, however 
 much the latter strove to disguise it. 
 
 The Susquehanna had been loaded to her capacity and 
 beyond with war equipment for the Russian Government 
 and was about to take her departure from New York, when 
 Woywod, who had been prevented before by the duties 
 imposed by the necessity of getting the ship ready quickly 
 for her next long voyage, paid his annual or semi-annual 
 visit to his friend. Now these visits had become so thor 
 oughly a matter of custom that Woywod had established the 
 right of entrance. None of the clerks in the outer office 
 would have thought of stopping him, and although Harnash 
 was very strict in requiring respect for the sanctity of his 
 private office Woywod made no hesitation about entering it 
 unceremon i ously . 
 
 Like all sailors, he moved with cat-like softness and 
 quickness. He opened the door noiselessly and surprised his 
 friend seated at his desk, his face buried in his hands in an 
 attitude of the deepest de j ection. Friendship has a discern 
 ing power as well as greater passions. 
 
 "Why, George, old boy," began Woywod, laying his 
 hand on the other's shoulder, and that touch gave Harnash
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 31 
 
 the first warning that he was not alone, "what's the 
 matter?" 
 
 Harnash looked up quickly, rose to his feet as he recog 
 nized his visitor, and grasped him by the hand with a warmth 
 he had not shown in years. 
 
 "Bill," he explained, "I'm in the deepest trouble that 
 ever fell on a man, and you come like an angel in time to 
 help me." 
 
 Harnash must have meant a dark angel, but Woywod 
 knew nothing of that. 
 
 "What is it, old man?" he asked. "If it's money you're 
 needin' I got a shot or two in the locker an' " 
 
 "No, it's not money. I'm making more than ever." 
 
 "Been buckin' up agin the law an' want a free passage to 
 safety? Well, me an' old man Fish is as thick as peas in a 
 pod, an' the Susquehanna's at your service." 
 
 "It's not that, either." 
 
 "What in blazes is it, then ?" 
 
 "A woman." 
 
 "Look here, George," said Woywod, "I'm about as rough 
 as they make 'em an' there ain't no man as ever sailed with 
 me that won't endorse that there statement, but I never done 
 no harm to no woman an' if you've been " 
 
 "You're on the wrong tack again, Bill," interposed Har 
 nash, smiling. "It's a woman I love and who loves me." 
 
 "Well, I don't reckon I can help you there unless you 
 want me to be best man at the weddin'." 
 
 That suggestion struck Harnash as intensely comical, as 
 it well might, but he hastened to add diplomatically : 
 
 "I couldn't wish a better man if there were going to be 
 any wedding, but "
 
 32 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Do you love a married woman?" asked Woywod, going 
 directly to the point. 
 
 "Not exactly." 
 
 "What d'ye mean?" 
 
 "I'll explain if you'll only give me a chance," answered 
 Harnash, and in as few words as possible he put the sailor 
 in possession of the facts. 
 
 "So you want to get rid of the man, do you?" he asked, 
 when the story had been told. 
 
 "Yes. I don't want him harmed. I just want him out of 
 the way." 
 
 "And you think that I " 
 
 "If you can't help me I don't know who can." 
 
 "Look here, George," said Woywod, earnestly. "Is this 
 square an' above board ? Are you givin' me the truth ?" 
 
 "I aw." 
 
 "An* the gal loves you an' you love her an' she don't 
 love this other chap which she wants to git out of marryin' 
 him?" 
 
 "Right." 
 
 "Then it's easy." 
 
 "I thought you'd find a way." 
 
 "It don't take much schemin' for that. Just p'int him 
 out to me an' git him down on the river front some dark 
 night where I can git a hold of him, with a few drinks in 
 him, an' that'll be all there is to it. You won't hear from 
 him until the Swsquehanna gits to Vladivostok, an' mebbe 
 not then." 
 
 "I don't want any harm to come to him." 
 
 "In course not. I'll use him jest as gentle as I do any 
 man on the ship."
 
 Bill Woywod to the Rescue 33 
 
 "And he must never know that I " 
 
 "He won't know nothin'. When a man gits drunk enough 
 he can't tell what happens. You might tell yer lady friend 
 that this is a little weddin' present I'm makin' to my oldest 
 an* best friend, that is, if you git spliced afore I gits back 
 from Vladivostok." 
 
 "I'll surely let her know your part of the transaction. 
 When does the Susquehanna sail?" 
 
 "Thursday morning. Tide turns at two o'clock. We'll 
 git out about four." 
 
 "You don't touch anywhere?" 
 
 "Not a place unless we're druv to it by bad weather or 
 some accident. But if we do git hold of a cable I'll see that 
 he stays safe aboard, in case, which ain't likely, we're 
 obliged to drop anchor in any civilized port." 
 
 "Have you got a wireless aboard?" 
 
 "Nary wireless. When we take our departure from Fire 
 Island it's up to Cap'n Fish an' me an' the rest of us to 
 bring her in." 
 
 "There's no danger?" 
 
 "Well, there's always danger in sailin' the seas, but no 
 body never thinks nothin' about it with a good ship, well 
 officered, well manned an' well found. It's a damn sight 
 safer than the streets of New York with all them automobiles 
 runnin' on the wind an' by the wind an' across the wind an' 
 every other way at the same time. It's as much as a man's 
 life is worth to try to navigate a street. Never mind the 
 danger. We've got to settle a few little details an' then the 
 thing bein' off your mind we can have a royal good time. 
 You ain't got anything on tonight?" 
 
 "No engagement that I can't break. If it had been
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 tomorrow, Wednesday, it would have been different because 
 that is the night my friend " 
 
 "Oh, he's a friend of yourn. Why don't you tell " 
 
 "No use, Bill ; this is the only way. But because he is a 
 friend of mine I tell you I don't want him to come to any 
 harm or to get any bad treatment." 
 
 "If he buckles down to work an' accepts the situation he 
 won't get no bad treatment from me." 
 
 This was perfectly honest, for in the brutal school in 
 which he had been trained what he meted out to his men 
 was what he had been taught was right and what he believed 
 they indeed expected, without which indeed discipline could 
 not be maintained and the work of the ship properly done. 
 Harnash had some doubts as to Beekman's ability to buckle 
 down or willingness, rather, but he had to risk something. 
 The two friends put their heads together and the minor 
 details were easily arranged. 
 
 "Better tell the gal it's goin' to be all right, hadn't you?" 
 suggested Woywod. 
 
 "No," said Harnash, with a truer appreciation of the sit 
 uation. "I think I'll surprise her." 
 
 "It'll be a surprise, all right," laughed the big sailor. 
 "Well, you do your part an' I'll do mine an' if the man does 
 his part he'll come back to find you married an' he can make 
 the best of it. By the way, what's his name?" 
 
 "Is it necessary that I should tell you ?" 
 
 "No, 'tain't necessary an' perhaps on the whole it wouldn't 
 be best. If I don't know his name I can call him a damn 
 liar whatever he says it is, with a clear conscience," went on 
 the sailor blithely and guilelessly, as if conscience really 
 mattered to him.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 A BACHELOR'S DINNER AND ITS ENDING 
 
 BACHELORS' dinners, masculine pre-nuptial festivities, 
 that is, like everything else with which poor humanity 
 deals, may roughly be divided into two kinds, which fall 
 under the generic names of good or bad. Of course, in prac 
 tice, as in life, goodness often degenerates into badness and 
 badness is sometimes lifted into goodness. Such is the per 
 versity of human nature even at its best that when the dec 
 laration is made that Beekman's bachelor dinner was a good 
 one all interest in it is immediately lost! Bad is so much 
 more attractive in literature and in life. Perhaps it may 
 be said that while the dinner had not descended to the un 
 bridled license which sometimes characterized such affairs, 
 and while there were no ladies present in various stages of 
 shall it be said dress or undress nevertheless, the young 
 fellows who were present had a delightful time which if not as 
 innocent as the festivities of Stephanie's final entertainment 
 to her lovely attendants, was nevertheless quite what might 
 have been expected from clean, healthy, well-bred young 
 Americans with a reasonable amount of restraint. 
 
 The dinner was chosen with fine discrimination and epi 
 curean taste; it was cooked by the best chef, served at the 
 most exclusive club and accompanied by wines with which 
 even the most captious bon vivant could not take issue. 
 Perhaps some of the youngsters drank more than was good 
 
 35
 
 36 By the World Forgot 
 
 for them which instantly raises the question, how much, or 
 how little, if any, is good for a young man? They broke 
 up at a decently early hour in the morning in much better 
 condition than might have been expected. 
 
 Beekman was one of the most temperate of men. He 
 took pride in his athletic prowess and he still kept himself 
 in fine physical trim. A very occasional glass of wine 
 usually limited his indulgence. In this instance, however, 
 under conditions so unusual, he had partaken so much more 
 freely than was his wont his course being pardonable 
 or otherwise in accordance with the viewpoint that he 
 was not altogether himself. This was not much more due 
 to the plan of Harnash than to the solicitations of the other 
 friends who found nothing so pleasant on that occasion as 
 drinking to his health, and generally in bumpers. Indeed, 
 not once but many times and oft around the board they 
 pledged him and were pledged in return. 
 
 At the insistence of Harnash, Beekman had arranged to 
 spend the night at the former's apartment in Washington 
 Square. Harnash made the point that he was expected to 
 look after him and produce him the next morning in the best 
 trim, therefore he did not wish him to get out of his sight. 
 Accordingly, Beekman had dismissed his own car and when 
 the party broke up about two o'clock in the morning he 
 went away with Harnash in the latter's limousine. 
 
 At somebody's suggestion Beekman could never re 
 member whose, whether it was his or his friend's they 
 stopped at several places on the way down town for further 
 liquid refreshment of which Beekman partook liberally, 
 Harnash sparingly or not at all. It was not difficult for an 
 adroit man like Harnash, confronted by a rather befuddled
 
 A Bachelor's Dinner and Its Ending 37 
 
 man like Beekman, to introduce the infallible knock-out 
 drops, with which he had been provided by Woywod, into the 
 liquor. 
 
 As they crossed Twenty-third Street on their way down 
 town Harnash stopped the car. His chauffeur lived on East 
 Twenty-third Street, and Harnash dismissed him, saying he 
 would drive the car down to his private garage back of his 
 residence in Washington Mews himself. There was noth 
 ing unusual in this; the chauffeur subsequently testified 
 that he had received the same thoughtful consideration from 
 his employer on many previous occasions. When the chauf 
 feur left the car, the drug had not yet got in its deadly 
 work. Beekman was still all right apparently and the 
 chauffeur subsequently testified that when Beekman bade 
 him good-night he noticed nothing strikingly unusual. 
 Beekman seemed to be himself, although the chauffeur could 
 see that he was slightly under the influence of wine. 
 
 By the time the car, driven by Harnash with considerable 
 ostentation and as much notice as possible, for he wanted 
 to attract attention to his arrival, reached the garage, Beek 
 man was absolutely unconscious on the floor of the tonneau, 
 to which he had fallen. Harnash ran the car into the 
 garage, closed the doors with a bang, and ran across the 
 intervening court rapidly and noisily and up to his own 
 apartments. He was ordinarily a considerate young man, 
 and coming in at that hour he would have made as little noise 
 as possible, but on this occasion his conduct was different. 
 He stumbled on the stairs, banged the door behind him, fell 
 over a chair in his room, swore audibly. People subse 
 quently testified that they had heard him coming in and 
 one even saw him, quite alone.
 
 38 By the World Forgot 
 
 Without pausing an unnecessary moment in the room he 
 made his exit from his apartment by means of the fire escape, 
 and this time not a cat could have moved more silently. 
 Fortunately, the back of the house was in deep shadow and 
 there were no lights adjacent. The shadow of the fence 
 also served him. He reentered the garage, having taken 
 precaution the day before secretly to oil the doors. He 
 dragged his unfortunate friend and companion from the 
 limousine, stripped him of his overcoat and automobile cap, 
 which he put on himself. The coat he had previously worn 
 had differed in every particular from that of Beekman. He 
 removed Beekman's watch and other j ewelry and his money, 
 of which he carried a considerable sum. These articles he 
 stowed away in his private locker to which his chauffeur 
 did not have a key. He could remove them to his office safe 
 at his leisure. In Beekman's vest pocket he put a large roll 
 of his own money he could not steal, though abduction 
 was his intent and then he lifted him to the floor of his 
 runabout which stood in the garage by the side of the 
 limousine. 
 
 He next removed the number plates from the car, re 
 placed them with false ones, and ran the car out of the 
 garage by hand. Every part of it had been oiled so that its 
 movement was absolutely noiseless. Then he shoved the 
 car down the street, which was now deserted, until he got 
 some distance away from the garage. The only really risky 
 part of the enterprise was at that moment. Fortune favored 
 him or not, as the case may be. At any rate, no one 
 appeared. It was after three o'clock in the morning, the 
 street was deserted, and there was not a policeman in sight. 
 He climbed into the car, started it, and drove off.
 
 'A Bachelor's Dinner and Its Ending 39 
 
 He proceeded cautiously at first, seeking unfrequented 
 and narrow streets until he got far enough from the garage 
 to change his going to suit his purpose. After a time he 
 sought the broader streets and passed several people, mostly 
 police officers, but them he now took no care to avoid. He 
 drove near them so that they would notice his general build, 
 which was that of his friend, and the clothes he wore, which 
 were those of his friend, and indeed they testified afterward 
 that they had seen a man dressed as and looking like Beek- 
 man, exactly as he had anticipated. He drove past them 
 rapidly so as not to give them time for too close a scrutiny. 
 Also he doubled on his trail often. 
 
 When he reached a dark, lonely, and unfrequented block 
 near South Water Street he drew up before the door of a 
 dimly lighted, forbidding looking building, the sign on 
 which indicated that it was a sailors' boarding house. He 
 got out of the car, taking precaution to slip on a false 
 mustache and beard with which he had provided himself, 
 and tapped on a door in a certain way which had been indi 
 cated to him. The door was at once opened by a burly, 
 rough, villainous looking individual, the boarding house 
 master, obviously a crimp of the worst class. 
 
 "What d'ye want?" he growled out, scrutinizing the 
 newcomer by the aid of a gas jet burning inside the dirty, 
 reeking hall, whose feeble light he supplemented by a flash 
 from an electric torch which really revealed little, since 
 Harnash carefully concealed his already disguised face. 
 
 "I have something for Mr. Woywod." 
 
 "The mate of the Susquehanna?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Well, he told me to receive an' deliver what you got."
 
 40 
 
 "That was our agreement," said Harnash, the little dia 
 logue convincing each man that no doubt was to be enter 
 tained of the other. 
 
 "Well, where's the goods ?" 
 
 "In the car." 
 
 "Fetch him in." 
 
 "He's rather heavy. Perhaps you'll give me a hand." 
 
 "Oh, all right," answered the man, putting his electric 
 torch in his pocket. 
 
 The two went to the car and the man easily picked up the 
 unconscious Beekman and unaided carried him within the 
 door. Harnash followed. He observed the man glanced 
 at the numbers on the car and was glad that he had taken 
 the precaution to change them. The crimp now dropped 
 the unconscious Beekman in the hallway and turned to 
 Harnash. He found the latter standing quietly, but with 
 an automatic pistol in his hand. 
 
 "You needn't be afraid of me," said the man. 
 
 "I'm not," answered Harnash. He was ghastly pale and 
 extremely nervous, but not from fear of the crimp. "This 
 is just a matter of precaution." 
 
 "Well, what do I git out of this yere job?" asked the 
 man. 
 
 "I understand Mr. Woywod will settle with you for that." 
 
 "Well, he does, but what I gits from him is the price of 
 a foremast hand, an' 'tain't enough." 
 
 The crimp bent over Beekman, flashed the light on him, 
 and pulled out the roll of bills, which he quickly counted. 
 
 "It's fair, but I'd ought to git more. This here's a swell 
 job ; look at them clo'es." 
 
 "They're yours also, if you wish."
 
 A Bachelor's Dinner and Its Ending 41 
 
 "That's somethin', but " 
 
 "It's all you'll get," said Harnash, laying his hand on 
 the door. 
 
 The man lifted the torch. Harnash lifted the pistol. 
 
 "Just put that torch back in your pocket," he said. 
 
 "You're a cool one," laughed the man, but he obeyed 
 the order. 
 
 "If it is learned tomorrow that this man has disappeared 
 you'll receive through the United States mail in a plain 
 envelope a hundred dollar bill. If not, you get nothing." 
 
 "Suppose I croak him, how'd you know anything about 
 it?" 
 
 "Mr. Woywod has arranged to inform me, and he will 
 also put your part of the transaction on record, so if you 
 say a word you'll be laid by the heels and get nothing for 
 your pains. There are a number of things against you, 
 I'm told. The police would be most happy to get you, I 
 know. Just bear that in mind." 
 
 The man nodded. He knew when the cards were stacked 
 against him. After all, this did not greatly differ from an 
 ordinary job and he was getting, for him, very well paid 
 for his part of it. 
 
 "I got relations with Woywod an' lots of other seafarin* 
 men. My business would be ruined if I played tricks on 'em. 
 You can trust me to keep quiet." 
 
 "I thought so," answered Harnash. "Good-night." 
 
 He opened the door, stepped outside, closed the door 
 behind him, and waited a moment, but the crimp made no 
 effort to follow him. After all, it was only an every day 
 matter with him. Harnash next drove the car down the 
 street near one of the wharves, where he met Woywod.
 
 42 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Is it all right, George?" asked the latter. 
 
 "All right, Bill. He's at the place you told me to leave 
 him. Can you keep the crimp's mouth shut?" 
 
 "Trust me for that," said Woywod confidently. "He's 
 mixed up in too many shady transactions to give anybody 
 any information." 
 
 "I'll never forget what you've done for me," said Har- 
 nash. "Remember, use him well." 
 
 "No fear," laughed his friend as the two shook hands 
 and parted. 
 
 Then Harnash drove up the street, waited until he came 
 to a dark alley, turned into it, unobserved, got out of the 
 car, put Beekman's coat and hat into it, donned his own 
 overcoat and cap, which he had brought with him, and still 
 wearing the false mustache and beard changed the numbers 
 on the car, started it, and let it wreck itself against the 
 nearest water hydrant. 
 
 It was a long walk up town, even to Washington Square, 
 and he had to go very circumspectly because he did not now 
 wish to be seen by anyone. Again fortune favored him. He 
 gained the garage, crossed the court, mounted the fire escape 
 to his rooms, and sank down, utterly exhausted but 
 triumphant. 
 
 His defense was absolutely impregnable. No one could 
 controvert his story. He rehearsed it. He had come home 
 with Beekman after the dinner had terminated. They had 
 had one or two drinks on the way. They had dismissed the 
 chauffeur at Twenty-third Street. When they reached the 
 garage Beekman, moved by some sudden whim, had insisted 
 upon going back to his own apartment up town in Harnash's 
 little roadster. He had been drinking, of course. He was
 
 'A Bachelor's Dinner and Its Ending 43 
 
 not altogether in possession of his normal faculties, but 
 Harnash was in the same condition and therefore he had 
 not been too insistent. Beekman was as capable of driving 
 the car as Harnash had just showed himself to be. There 
 was nothing he could do to prevent Beekman from going 
 away. He could not even remember, when he was questioned, 
 whether he had tried it or not. At any rate, Beekman had 
 gone away in the roadster and Harnash had gone to bed. 
 So dwellers in the building who heard him come in testified. 
 One who happened to go to the window even had seen him 
 come in. No one had seen or heard him go out. Harnash 
 swore that he had not left the apartment until the next 
 morning. 
 
 Beekman, or a man dressed as he was known to be dressed, 
 had been seen by the police officers and others between three 
 or four in the morning, driving through the lower part of 
 the city in a small car the number of which no one had seen. 
 What he was doing in that section of the city no one could 
 imagine. During the course of the morning Harnash's car 
 was found, badly smashed from a collision, lying on its side 
 in a wretched alley off South Water Street. Beekman's 
 overcoat and cap were in the car and that was all there was 
 to it. 
 
 No matter what suspicions the crimp might have enter 
 tained, he kept his mouth shut and received the day after 
 the one hundred dollar bill in an unmarked envelope which 
 had been mailed at the general postoffice in the afternoon. 
 Even if he had spoken, he could not have thrown much light 
 on the situation. Not even the reward which was offered 
 could tempt him. His business demanded secrecy, abso 
 lutely and inviolable, and too many men knew too much
 
 44 By the World Forgot 
 
 about him, which rendered it unsafe for him to open his 
 head. He would not kill the goose that laid the golden egg 
 for him by making further business on the same lines impos 
 sible. He really knew nothing, anyway. 
 
 The secret was shared between two men, Woywod on the 
 sea and out of communication with New York, and Harnash 
 himself. So long as they kept quiet no one would ever 
 know. Even Beekman himself could not solve the mystery 
 when he returned to New York. It was most ingeniously 
 planned and most brilliantly carried out. Harnash con 
 gratulated himself. Stephanie Maynard would certainly 
 be his long before Beekman could prevent it. Still, George 
 Harnash was by no means so happy in the present state of 
 affairs as he had planned and hoped to be. And his trials 
 were not over. He had to meet Stephanie, the wedding 
 party, old John Maynard, the public press, and the public 
 what would the day bring forth?
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE WEDDING THAT WAS NOT 
 
 QTEPHANIE MAYNARD had passed a sleepless night. 
 ^-J Her love for George Harnash grew stronger and her 
 abhorrence of the marriage increased in the same degree as 
 the hour drew nearer. Too late she repented of her deter 
 mination. She wondered why she had not allowed Harnash 
 to take her away and end it all. What, after all, were 
 her father's wishes, or her own promises, or the worldly 
 advantages they would gain, or anything else, compared 
 to love? 
 
 Harnash had sent word to her the day before that she 
 was not to give up hope, that something would happen 
 surely, but now the last minute was at hand and nothing 
 had happened. A dozen times she started to call her lover 
 on the telephone and a dozen times she refrained. Finally 
 the hour arrived when the victim must be garlanded for the 
 sacrifice. At least, that is the way she regarded it. 
 
 She had not heard a word from her husband-to-be during 
 the morning. Under other circumstances that would have 
 alarmed her, but as it was she was only relieved. The wed 
 ding party was assembled at the brand new Maynard man 
 sion on upper Fifth Avenue. Two of the attendants were 
 school friends from other cities and they were guests at the 
 house. The wedding was to be followed by a breakfast and 
 a great reception which the Maynard money and the Beek- 
 
 45
 
 46 By the World Forgot 
 
 man position was to make the most wonderful affair of the 
 kind that had ever been given in New York. 
 
 With the publicity which modern society courts and wel 
 comes, while it pretends to deprecate it, the papers had 
 published reams about the most private details of the engage 
 ment, even to descriptions and pictures of the most intimate 
 under-linen of the bride. Presents of fabulous value, which 
 lost nothing in their description by perfervid pens, were 
 under constant guard in the mansion. Details of police kept 
 back swarms of unaccredited reporters and adventurous 
 sightseers. On the morning of the wedding day the street 
 before the Cathedral was packed with the vulgarly curious 
 long before eleven o'clock. The wedding was to be sol 
 emnized at high noon, and was to be the greatest social 
 event which had excited easily aroused and intensely curious 
 New York for a year or more. 
 
 The newer members of the exclusive social circle frankly 
 en j oyed it. And such is the contagion of degeneration that 
 the older members, while they affected disdain and annoy 
 ance, enjoyed it too. The newspapers had played it up 
 tremendously, and the affair had even achieved the signal 
 triumph of a veiled but well understood cartoon by F. Foster 
 Lincoln, the scourge and satirist of high society, in a recent 
 number of Life. 
 
 Everything was ready. The most famous caterer in New 
 York had prepared the most sumptuous wedding breakfast. 
 The most exclusive florist had decorated the church and 
 residence. Society had put on its best clothes, slightly 
 deploring the fact that as it was to be a noon wedding 
 its blooming would be somewhat limited thereby. More 
 tickets had been issued to the Cathedral than even that mag"
 
 The Wedding That Was Not 47 
 
 nificent edifice could hold and it was filled to its capacity so 
 soon as the doors were opened. The famous choir was in 
 attendance to render a musical program of extraordinary 
 beauty and appropriateness. 
 
 As it approached the hour of mid-day the excitement 
 was intense. Women in the crowd were crushed, many 
 fainted. Riot calls had to be sent out and the already 
 strong detachment of police supplemented by reserves. Thus 
 is the holy state of matrimony entered into among the busy 
 rich. With the idle poor it is, fortunately, a simpler affair. 
 
 It had been arranged that Derrick Beekman and George 
 Harnash should present themselves at the Maynard man 
 sion not later than eleven o'clock. From there they would 
 drive to the Cathedral in plenty of time to receive the wed 
 ding party at the chancel steps. At eleven o'clock a big 
 motor forced its way through the crowd and drew up before 
 the door. From it descended George Harnash alone. 
 
 That young man showed the effect of the night he had 
 passed. He was excessively nervous and as gray as the 
 gloves he carried in his hands. He was admitted at once 
 and ushered into the drawing room, which was filled with a 
 dozen young ladies in raiment which even Solomon in all his 
 glory might have envied, who were to make up the wedding 
 party. There also had just arrived the young gentlemen 
 who were to accompany them, who had all been at the 
 bachelor dinner. None of them exhibited any evidence of 
 unusual dissipation. They had slept late and were in 
 excellent condition. 
 
 "George, alone !" cried young Van Brunt, who was next 
 in importance to the best man, as Harnash entered the 
 room.
 
 48 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Where's Beekman?" asked Harnash apparently in great 
 surprise, as he glanced at the little group. 
 
 "Not here. You were to bring him. It's time for us to 
 get up to the Cathedral anyway. I'll bet the people are 
 clamoring at the doors now." 
 
 "They weren't to be opened till eleven-fifteen," said 
 Grant, one of the fittest members of the party. "It's only 
 eleven now. We've plenty of time." 
 
 "Well, you better beat it up now, then. Beekman will 
 be here in a minute, I'm sure," said Harnash. "We'll follow 
 you in half an hour." 
 
 As the young men who were to usher left the room the 
 girls fell upon Harnash. 
 
 "Mr. Harnash," said Josephine Treadway, who was the 
 maid-of-honor, "will you please tell us where Derrick 
 Beekman is, and why you didn't bring him along?" 
 
 "I can't," said Harnash. "As a matter of fact I " 
 
 "You'll tell me, certainly," interposed the voice that he 
 loved. 
 
 He turned and found that Stephanie, having completed 
 her toilet, had descended the stair and entered the room. 
 She was whiter than Harnash himself, but her lack of color 
 was infinitely becoming to her in her sumptuous bridal 
 robes, and the adoring young man decided then and there 
 that whatever happened she was worth it. 
 
 "Mr. Beekman," continued the girl, "was to be here at 
 eleven o'clock with you. It's after that now and you're 
 here alone. Where is he? Why didn't you bring him?" 
 
 "Miss Maynard," said Harnash formally, and in spite of 
 himself he could not prevent his lip from trembling, "I 
 don't know where he is."
 
 The Wedding That Was Not 49 
 
 "What!" exclaimed the girl, really astonished, as the 
 whole assembly broke into exclamations. Had Harnash 
 accomplished the impossible, as he had threatened? 
 
 "I can't find him," went on Harnash. He could scarcely 
 sustain Stephanie's direct and piercing gaze. He forced 
 himself to look at her, however. "I don't know where he 
 is," he repeated. 
 
 "But have you searched?" 
 
 "Everywhere. I called up his apartment on Park Avenue 
 at ten o'clock. They said he wasn't there and hadn't been 
 there all night. I started my man out at once in a taxicab, 
 jumped into my own car, and I've been everywhere the 
 office, his clubs I've even had my secretary and clerks tele 
 phone all the hotels on the long chance that he might be 
 at one of them." 
 
 "And you haven't found a trace of him? George Har 
 nash " began Stephanie, but Harnash was too quick 
 for her ; he did not allow her to finish. 
 
 "You will forgive me," he went on; "I did even more 
 than that in my alarm. I finally notified the police on the 
 chance that he might have been er er brought in." 
 
 He shot a warning look at Stephanie that checked further 
 inquiries from her. 
 
 "Why should he be brought in ?" asked Josephine Tread- 
 way, who had no reason for not asking the question. 
 
 "Why, you see," went on Harnash, "it's desperately hard 
 to tell, and I'd rather die than mention it, but under the 
 circumstances I suppose " 
 
 "Out with it at once," cried Stephanie. 
 
 "Well, we had a little dinner last night at well, never 
 mind where."
 
 50 By the World Forgot 
 
 "We had a dinner, too," said Josephine. 
 
 "Yes, but I imagine ours was er different. At any 
 rate, it didn't break up until quite late, or, I should 
 say, early in the morning, and we were not quite our 
 selves." 
 
 "But Derrick is the most abstemious of men." 
 
 "Exactly; so am I, and when that kind go under it's 
 worse than you understand," he added helplessly. 
 
 Stephanie nodded. 
 
 "When did you see him last?" 
 
 "Why er I'll make a clean breast of it." 
 
 "Do so, I beg you." 
 
 "Well, then, we were right enough when the dinner broke 
 up. Derrick and I left the others to their own devices. He 
 had arranged to spend the night with me. We stopped at 
 one or two places down town, but reached my quarters in 
 Washington Square about two or three o'clock." 
 
 Harnash paused and swallowed hard. It was an im 
 mensely difficult task to which he had compelled himself, 
 although so far he had told nothing but the truth. 
 
 "Go on," said Josephine Treadway impatiently as the 
 pause lengthened. 
 
 "He changed his mind after we put the limousine in the 
 garage and insisted on going back to his own rooms." 
 
 "Did you let him go?" 
 
 "I did." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 "Well, Miss Treadway, I couldn't help it, and, to be 
 frank, I didn't try. You see we were neither of us very 
 sure of ourselves and and " 
 
 "I see."
 
 The Wedding That Was Not 51 
 
 "He took my runabout, drove off and that's all." 
 
 "Have you found the runabout?" 
 
 "Yes, the police found it in an alley near South Water 
 Street, badly smashed. Beekman's overcoat and cap were 
 in the car." 
 
 "Do you think he has been hurt?" questioned Stephanie, 
 who had listened breathlessly to the conversation between 
 her lover and her maid-of-honor. 
 
 "I'm sure that he can't have Keen," returned Harnash 
 with definiteness which carried conviction to his questioner, 
 and no one else caught the meaning look he shot at her. 
 
 "And that's all?" asked Josephine. 
 
 "Absolutely all I can tell you," he replied truthfully, 
 none noticing the equivoke but Stephanie, who of course 
 could not call attention to it. 
 
 "You poor girl," said Josephine, gathering Stephanie in 
 her arms. 
 
 "It's outrageous. It's horrible," cried the girl, biting 
 her lip to keep back her tears. 
 
 She really could scarcely tell whether she was glad or 
 sorry, now that it had come; not that her feelings had 
 changed, but there was the public scandal, the affront, the 
 but she had not time to speculate. 
 
 "What is outrageous, what is horrible?" asked John 
 Maynard, coming into the room and catching her words. 
 "What can be outrageous or horrible in such a wedding as 
 we have arranged? Why, Stephanie, what's the matter? 
 You're as white as a sheet, and Harnash, are you ill ? You're 
 a pretty looking spectacle for a best man." 
 
 "Father," said his daughter, "they can't find Derrick." 
 
 "Can't find him!" exclaimed Maynard. <f Does he have
 
 52 By the World Forgot 
 
 to be sought for on his wedding day? If I were going to 
 marry a stunning girl like you, for all you're as pale as a 
 ghost, I " 
 
 "There's not going to be any wedding," said Stephanie, 
 mechanically. 
 
 "No wedding!" roared Maynard, surprised intensely. 
 "What do you mean? Are you backing out at the last 
 minute ?" 
 
 "No, it's not I." 
 
 "Look here, will some one explain this mystery to m?" 
 asked the man, turning to the rather frightened bevy of 
 girls. "It's eleven-thirty ; we ought to be starting. What's 
 the meaning of this infernal foolishness? You, Harnash, 
 what are you standing there looking like a ghost for? One 
 would think you were going to be married yourself." 
 
 "Mr. Maynard," said Josephine, taking upon herself 
 the task, "Stephanie has told you the truth. Mr. Harnash 
 has just come and he doesn't know where Mr. Beekman is." 
 
 "Doesn't know where he is?" 
 
 "He can't be found, sir," said Harnash. 
 
 "Do you mean to tell me that he has run away and left 
 my girl in the lurch ? By God, he'll " 
 
 "I'm sure it isn't that," said Harnash earnestly, "but the 
 fact is we had a bachelor dinner last night." 
 
 "Of course you did, but what has that to do with it?" 
 
 "Everything. I guess we indulged a little too much." 
 
 "Well, bachelors have done that fool thing since time and 
 the world began." 
 
 "Yes, but Beekman hasn't been seen since early this 
 morning, two or three o'clock." 
 
 "Who saw him last?"
 
 The Wedding That Was Not 53 
 
 "I did," said Harnash, briefly repeating his explanation. 
 
 "What did you do?" 
 
 "I 'phoned to his house and they said he hadn't been 
 there all night. I dressed, sent my man out in a taxi, took 
 my own car, summoned the office force to my assistance, and 
 Dougherty's detectives, and I've scoured the city for him." 
 
 "The police?" 
 
 "I have notified them, of course, as soon as they reported 
 the finding of my runabout. They're on the hunt, too. We 
 have even called up every hotel in the city. He's not to 
 be found." 
 
 "It must be foul play," said Maynard, taking Harnash's 
 account of it at its face value. 
 
 "I suppose so," said Harnasji, wincing a little, although 
 he would fain not, and again shooting a quick glance at 
 Stephanie, and then daringly following it with a quick ges 
 ture of negation to reassure her. 
 
 "Where that car was found it wouldn't take much to 
 interest a thief." 
 
 "No. He had a watch, jewelry, money. Indeed, I have 
 a dim remembrance of his flashing a roll in some place or 
 other." 
 
 "That will be it." 
 
 "Meanwhile what is to be done, sir?" 
 
 "It's a quarter to twelve now," said Josephine Tread- 
 way. 
 
 "God, how I hate this," said old Maynard. "Here," he 
 stepped to the door and called his private secretary, "Bent- 
 ley, drive up to the Cathedral like mad, tell the Bishop that 
 the wedding is called off. Yes, don't stand there like a 
 fish; get out."
 
 54 By the World Forgot 
 
 "But we'll have to give some reason to the people, explain 
 to the guests in the church," expostulated the secretary. 
 
 "Reason be damned," said Maynard, roughly. 
 
 "Excuse me," said Harnash, "it would be better for all 
 concerned, and especially Miss Maynard, if the matter were 
 explained at once, and fully. You wouldn't like to have 
 anyone think for a moment that she had been left in the 
 lurch." 
 
 "Mr. Harnash is right, sir. It must be explained as well 
 as it can." 
 
 "Very well, Bentley," said his employer. "Tell the 
 Bishop that Mr. Beekman has disappeared, that we are of 
 the opinion that he has met with foul play, that under the 
 circumstances there is nothing to do but call off the wedding 
 and have the explanation announced in the Cathedral in any 
 way he likes, and then get back here as quickly as possible. 
 Stephanie, I'd rather have lost half my fortune than have 
 this happen, but keep up your courage. I feel that nothing 
 but some dastardly work would have kept Beekman away. 
 He is the soul of honor and he was passionately devoted to 
 you. Don't faint, my dear girl." 
 
 "I'm not going to faint," said Stephanie, resolutely. 
 "Girls, I'm awfully sorry for your disappointment," she 
 faltered. 
 
 "Don't mind us," said Josephine. 
 
 "I'm afraid that perhaps you you " 
 
 "We're going at once," explained one of the bridesmaids, 
 "if you will have our motors called up." 
 
 "Of course," said Maynard. "Harnash, you attend to 
 that and then come to me in the library. William," he 
 added to the footman who came in obedience to his sum-
 
 The Wedding That Was Not 55 
 
 mons, "get me the chief of police on the telephone and when 
 the reporters come, and they will be here just as soon as 
 the announcement is made at the church, show them into the 
 library in a body. I've got to see them and I'll see them 
 all at once. Harnash, you come, too. You can tell the story 
 better than anyone."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 STEPHANIE IS GLAD AFTER ALL 
 
 THE sudden disappearance of one of the principals in 
 the Maynard-Beekman wedding was the sensation of 
 the hour. John Maynard was deeply hurt and terribly 
 concerned because he was very fond of Beekman, and be 
 cause in spite of his bold front the young man's failure to 
 appear had reflected upon his daughter. The lewd papers 
 of the baser sort, playing up the bachelor dinner, did not 
 hesitate to point this out, and insinuations, so thinly dis 
 guised that every one who read understood, appeared daily. 
 That there was not a word of truth in them was of little 
 consequence either to the writers who knew they were lying 
 or to the public, which did not. The clientele of such papers 
 was ready to believe anything or everything bad; espe 
 cially of the idle rich. 
 
 Reportorial and even editorial which is worse imag 
 ination was unrestrained. As the newspapers had devoted 
 so much space to the preparations, they did not stint them 
 selves in discussing the aftermath of the affair. The police 
 bent every energy to solve the mystery. Maynard was a 
 big power in public affairs and they were stimulated by a 
 reward of one hundred thousand dollars which Maynard 
 offered for tidings of the missing man, a reward which made 
 the wiseacres put their tongues in their cheeks as they 
 read of it. 
 
 56
 
 Stephanie Is Glad After All , 57 
 
 The gorgeous wedding presents were returned. The 
 lovely lingerie of the bride, which had been so talked about, 
 was laid away and the bride herself was denied to every 
 caller. Even George Harnash sought access to her person 
 in vain. The scandal, the humiliation, had made her seri 
 ously ill, and by her physician's orders she was allowed to 
 see no one. 
 
 However, the first person she did admit was George Har- 
 nash. Indeed, so soon as she was able to be about she called 
 him up and demanded his immediate presence. He had been 
 waiting for such a summons. He knew it was unavoidable. 
 It had to come. He dropped everything to go to her. He 
 was horrified when he saw her. He had got back some of his 
 nerve and equipoise to the casual observation, although he 
 still showed what he had gone through to a close scrutiny. 
 He had been catechized and cross-questioned, even put 
 through a mild form of the third degree by the police, but 
 little to their satisfaction. He could tell them nothing 
 definite. They got no more out of him than he had volun 
 teered at first. They were completely and entirely mystified. 
 
 Several steamers had sailed for various ports that day 
 and night, but it was easily established, when they reached 
 port, that they had not carried the missing man. They 
 completely overlooked the Susquehanna for reasons which 
 will appear. Beekman's disappearance remained one of 
 those unexplained mysteries for which New York was noto 
 rious. The reward still stood and the authorities were still 
 very much on the alert, but they were absolutely without 
 an} r clue whatsoever. Derrick Beekman had disappeared 
 from the face of the earth. Besides Harnash, there was only 
 one person in the city who had any definite idea as to the
 
 58 By the World Forgot 
 
 _____ 
 
 cause of his departure, and that was Stephanie Maynard. A 
 proud, high-spirited girl, she had suffered untold anguish in 
 the publicity and scandal and innuendo. 
 
 "My God, Stephanie !" cried Harnash, as she received him 
 in a lovely negligee in her boudoir. "You look like death 
 itself." 
 
 "And I have passed through it," said the girl, "in the 
 last week. Now, I want you to tell me where Derrick is." 
 
 "Stephanie," answered Harnash, "it would be foolish for 
 me to pretend that I don't know." 
 
 "It certainly would." 
 
 "I told you that I meant to have you and that I would 
 stop the wedding if I had to take you from the altar steps." 
 
 "But we didn't get that far." 
 
 "It amounts to the same thing. I er took him. It 
 was easier." 
 
 "Where and how did you take him?" 
 
 "Don't ask. I can't tell." 
 
 "And you have covered me with shame inexpressible. 
 I shall never get over it as long as I live. How could you 
 do it? How could you?" 
 
 "Are you reproaching me?" 
 
 "Reproaching you !" cried Stephanie. "Do you think I 
 could tamely endure this public scandal, this abandonment, 
 without a word?" 
 
 "But I did it for you." 
 
 "Yes, I suppose so, but that doesn't make it any less 
 humiliating." 
 
 "Stephanie, tell me, do you love Derrick Beekman?" 
 
 "No, I hate him." 
 
 "And me?"
 
 Stephanie Is Glad 'After 'All 59 
 
 "I hate you, too." 
 
 "Oh, don't say that." 
 
 "I wish I were dead," cried the girl. "I can never go 
 out on the street again. I can never hold up my head any 
 where any more, and it's your fault. What have you done 
 with him?" 
 
 "Do you want him back? Do you want to go through 
 with the marriage? Look here," said Harnash, "desperate 
 diseases require desperate remedies. I'll tell you this, and 
 that is all I will tell you. I am sure Derrick is all right. 
 He will come to no harm." 
 
 "Are you holding him a prisoner somewhere?" 
 
 "I am not." 
 
 "I don't understand." 
 
 "It is better not. It isn't necessary," answered Harnash 
 stubbornly. 
 
 "And you actually made away with him?" 
 
 "I got him out of the way, if that's what you mean. 
 But he's alive, well, and in no danger. I caused it to be 
 done " 
 
 "Are you sure of that?" 
 
 "Absolutely." 
 
 "Don't you know that you've done a criminal act?" 
 
 "Of course I know it. Do you think I'm a fool because 
 I'm crazy in love with you?" 
 
 "And don't you know you will have gained his eternal 
 enmity and the enmity of my father when they find this 
 out?" 
 
 "I don't care about anybody's enmity unless it's yours." 
 
 "Well, you've almost gained mine." 
 
 "Almost, but not quite. You feel horribly now. I
 
 60 By the World Forgot 
 
 understand. Do you think it has been j oy f ul to me to have 
 put my best friend out of the way and to have brought all 
 this scandal and shame upon you? But there was no other 
 way. You're mine in the sight of God and I'm going to 
 make you mine in the sight of men." 
 
 "But my father will never forgive you when he knows." 
 
 "I don't think he will ever find out my part, or Beekman 
 either." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "I can't explain, but if your father does find out what 
 can he do? In six months I'll be independent of anything 
 and anybody and when we are married we can laugh at him 
 and at the rest of the world." 
 
 "At Beekman, too?" 
 
 "Yes, even at him. Stephanie, you don't know what it 
 is to love as I do. For you I'd stop at nothing short of 
 murder. You didn't believe me when I said that, but I 
 meant it. I've made myself a criminal, I admit, but for 
 your sake. Now am I going to fail of my reward? Do 
 you want me to produce Derrick Beekman? Do you want 
 him to come back and throw me in jail and marry you? 
 Well, I didn't expect it; I didn't count upon it " this 
 was only a bluff, of course, since by no means could Harnash 
 have got back Beekman from the Swsquehanna then 
 "but if that is what you really want say the word. Can 
 you turn down a love like mine, that will stop at nothing 
 for your happiness ? I swear to you that I believe it is as 
 much for your happiness as my own. I won't say it is all 
 for you, because I want you, but I am thinking of you all 
 the time. I couldn't bear to see you in his arms. What is 
 the little bit of scandal? It will be forgotten. When you
 
 Stephanie Is Glad 'After 'All 61 
 
 are my wife I'll take care of you. If you don't want to live 
 here we'll live anywhere. If I pull off two or three big 
 deals that are in the air I'll be able to do anything. Oh, 
 Stephanie, you aren't going back on me now?" 
 
 "You know that I couldn't do that," answered the girl, 
 greatly moved by his passionate pleading. After all, she 
 did love this man and not the other. 
 
 "You're the kind of woman that a man will do anything 
 for. I'm sorry for Beekman, I'm sorry for everything, but 
 I'm going to have you." He came close to her as he spoke. 
 "Do you understand that?" he asked, raising his voice. "I 
 did it for you, you, and no man shall balk me of my reward. 
 If you won't come willingly, you shall come unwillingly." 
 
 "Oh," said the girl, "how horribly determined and wicked 
 you are, and yet " 
 
 As she looked up at him the passion with which he spoke, 
 rough, brutal as it was, quickened again her heart that she 
 thought was dead. For the first time in weeks the color 
 rushed into her face. 
 
 "That's right," said Harnash, watching her narrowly. 
 "I can still bring the blood to your cheeks." 
 
 He bent over her, he dragged her almost rudely from her 
 seat and crushed her against him. He kissed her as roughly 
 as he had spoken. 
 
 "This," he said, "pays for everything. If I'm found 
 out, if I have to go to jail, I don't care. I'm glad. You 
 love me. You can't deny it and in your heart of hearts 
 you're glad and you'll be gladder every hour of your life." 
 
 The girl gave up. After all, what possibility of happi 
 ness did she have except with Harnash ? More and more she 
 appeared before the world as a thing cast off and scorned.
 
 62 By the World Forgot 
 
 Harnash's position in society and business was improving 
 every day, but it was not that which influenced her. She 
 really loved him. She responded to his pleading. Mistaken 
 though he was, vicious as had been his design, that effort, 
 wrong as was his method, showed her how much he loved her. 
 
 "You're not going to fail me now, are you? You need 
 not answer. I can feel it in the beat of your heart against 
 mine." 
 
 "No," said the girl. "I'm yours, I suppose." 
 
 "Don't you know?" 
 
 "Yes, I know. No one else would want me, discarded." 
 
 "I want you. I'd want you if the whole world rejected 
 you." 
 
 "And you won't tell me where Derrick is ?" 
 
 "No, it's a heavy secret to carry in one's breast. I feared 
 that they would worm it out of me. You can't know what 
 I've gone through," he went on. "I've been suspected and 
 questioned and cross-questioned, but I never gave it away. 
 It was you who kept me up. The thought of you always, 
 you, you, you ! Meanwhile I'm slaving my life out, almost 
 wrecking my brain, to carry out these big deals, and when 
 it is over and I have you they can do their worst. Your 
 father, Beekman when he comes back " 
 
 "Oh, then he will come backP" 
 
 "Of course he will. And I'll face them all. I don't know 
 whether I have damned myself for you or not, but if I have, 
 I don't care," he went on recklessly. 
 
 "It was my fault, anyway," said the girl. "I should 
 have been stronger. I should not have agreed to such a 
 marriage, and I should not have kept the agreement when 
 I loved you."
 
 Stephanie Is Glad After AH 63 
 
 "You need not say that," said Harnash there was good 
 stuff in him "It is all my own plan and scheme. You 
 were bound, and there was only one way to break the bond. 
 Now I give myself six months. By that time the talk will 
 have died out and we will be married." 
 
 "I'll marry you," said the girl, "or I'll marry no one 
 else on earth, but before I marry you you must bring 
 Derrick Beekman into my presence and he must release me." 
 
 "That is a harder thing than what I have done, but I'll do 
 it. Provided you will help me." 
 
 "I will, but how?" 
 
 "When you see him you must tell him that you don't love 
 him and that you wish to marry me." 
 
 "Very well. I'll do that part." 
 
 "And I'll do the other." 
 
 "Promise me, on your word of honor." 
 
 "Honor!" exclaimed Harnash bitterly. "Do you think, 
 after what I have done, that I've got any honor, that you 
 could trust to ?" 
 
 "I'll be trusting myself to you," said the girl, "and you 
 know what that implies." 
 
 "Say that you are glad that it has happened as it has, 
 despite the scandal." 
 
 Stephanie looked at him a long time. 
 
 "You poor boy," she said, drawing his head down and 
 kissing his forehead in that motherly way which all women 
 have toward the men they love until the maternal affection 
 has a chance to vent itself in the right direction. "How 
 you must have suffered for me." 
 
 "It was nothing." 
 
 "Yes, I am glad," she said at last.
 
 CHAPTER VH 
 
 UP AGAINST IT HAKD 
 
 WHEN he went to bed, what time it was when he awak 
 ened, or where he was at that moment were facts 
 about which Derrick Beekman had no ideas whatsoever. At 
 first he was conscious of but one thing that he was; and 
 that consciousness was painful, not to say harrowing, to the 
 last degree. For one thing, he was horribly sick. The place 
 where he lay appeared to be as unsteady as his mental con 
 dition was uncertain. He was heaved up and down, tossed 
 back and forth, and rolled from side to side in an utterly 
 inexplicable way to his bewildered mind. And every mad 
 motion threw him against some bruised and painful portion 
 of his anatomy. 
 
 As he struggled to open his eyes it seemed to him that he 
 was lying in pitch darkness. His ears were assailed by a 
 concatenation of discordant noises, creaks, groans, thunder 
 ous blows of which he could make nothing. No one has ever 
 pictured hell as a place of reeking odors and hideous sounds. 
 Why that opportunity has been neglected is not known. Cer 
 tainly the popular brimstone idea of it is highly suggestive. 
 At any rate, the bad air and other indescribable odors, to 
 say nothing of the noises that came to him, added to his 
 physical perturbation and wretchedness. Under the cir 
 cumstances, the wonder was not so much that he did not 
 think clearly, but that he could think at all. It was only 
 
 64
 
 Up Against It Hard 65 
 
 after some moments of sickening return to consciousness 
 that he became convinced that he was alive and somewhere. 
 
 He lay for a little while desperately trying to solve the 
 problems presented to him by his environment, with but 
 little immediate success. Finally, as a help toward clear 
 ing up the mystery, he decided upon exploration. Though 
 the undertaking was painful to him, he made an effort to sit 
 up. His head came in violent contact with something which 1 
 he had not noticed in the obscurity above him and 
 nearly knocked him senseless again. After another violent 
 fit of sickness, he decided upon a more circumspect 
 investigation. 
 
 He felt about with his hands and discovered that he was 
 in some box-like enclosure one side of which seemed to be 
 open save for a containing strip against which he had been 
 violently hurled several times and which had prevented him 
 from being thrown out. This enclosure was in violently 
 agitated motion. At first, in his confusion, he decided 
 vaguely upon a railroad train, a sleeping-car berth, but he 
 realized that not even the roughest freight car would pro 
 duce such an effect as that unless the train were running on 
 the cross ties, in which case its stoppage would be immedi 
 ate. This pitching and tossing kept on. If he had been 
 in his clear senses, he would have known in an instant where 
 he was, but it was only after violent effort at concentration 
 that his aching head told him that he must be aboard a 
 ship! 
 
 He was familiar with steamers of the more magnificent 
 class, and with his own yacht, and the pleasure craft of his 
 friends, and he knew enough from reading to decide that 
 this was the forecastle of a ship. He decided that it was a
 
 66 
 
 wooden ship. The outer planking against which he lay was 
 of wood. He listened next for the beat or throb of a screw, 
 and heard none. Thinking more and more clearly, it came 
 to him that it was a sailing ship. As his eyes became used 
 to the obscurity, he saw abaft his feet and to his left hand, 
 for he lay head to the bows, well forward on the port side, 
 a square of light which betokened an open hatchway. He 
 strained his eyes up through the hatchway. He could make 
 out nothing. It was still daylight on deck, and that was 
 all he could decide. 
 
 As he lay staring stupidly, above the roar of the wind, 
 and the creaking and groaning of the straining ship and the 
 thunder of great waves against the bow as she plunged into 
 the head seas, he heard harsh voices. The tramping of many 
 feet, hurried, irregular, came to him ; then a sudden silence ; 
 a command followed, and again the massed and steady tram 
 pling of the same feet. A shrill, harsh-creaking sound 
 followed, as of taut rope straining through the dry sheaves 
 of a heavy block. Rude rhythmical sounds, sailors' chanties, 
 penetrated the wooden cave in one of the recesses of which 
 he lay. It was a sailing ship, obviously. They were mast 
 heading yards ; apparently setting or taking in sail. 
 
 What ship, and how came he aboard? By this time he 
 was sufficiently himself to come to a decision. He would get 
 out of that berth. He would mount the ladder, the top of 
 which he could see dimly nearest the hatch-combing, and 
 get out on deck. 
 
 He thrust one leg over the side of the berth, and as the 
 dim light fell upon it, he discovered that he was barefoot. 
 It had not jet occurred to him to examine his clothes. Being 
 asleep, he would naturally be wearing the luxurious night
 
 Up 'Against It Hard 67 
 
 gear he affected. Not so in this instance. Where the white 
 of his leg stopped he discerned a fringe of ragged trousers. 
 He felt them. They were tattered and torn, and inde 
 scribably foul and dirty. Mystery on mystery ! Cautiously, 
 so as not to hit his head a second time, he sat up and lowered 
 himself to the deck. Continuing his inspection, he was 
 horrified at the shirt which covered the upper half of his 
 body, and which fully matched the trousers. Where were 
 the clothes he had worn the night before? 
 
 It came upon him like the proverbial flash of lightning 
 from a clear sky that bachelor supper, the gay revelry,! 
 the wine he had drunk, his sallying forth with George Har-] 
 nash. He vaguely remembered their first stop; after that 
 nothing. Where were his watch, his studs, his money?) 
 He looked around carefully, with a faint hope that he might 
 see them. A dress suit was, of course, an absurdity at that 
 hour and in that place, but anything was better than those 
 filthy rags. There was nothing to be seen of them, of 
 course. 
 
 The horror and unpleasantness of the place grew upon 
 him. Lest he should give way to another tearing fit of 
 sickness, he must get up on deck. Clothes would come later, 
 and explanations. He staggered aft toward the foot of the 
 ladder, the violent motion of the ship and in his place, in 
 the very eyes of her, the motion was worst making prog 
 ress difficult. It was not that he lacked sea legs, nor was he 
 merely seasick. His unsteadiness and nausea came from 
 other causes. 
 
 As he put his foot on the ladder, like another flash came 
 the recollection that this was his wedding day. He was, 
 indeed, a day out in his reckoning, but that was to develop
 
 68 By the World Forgot 
 
 later. He stopped, petrified at the appalling thought. His 
 wedding day, and he in this guise on a ship! He groaned 
 with horror, clapping his hands to his face, and the next roll 
 threw him violently against the ladder, opening a cut in his 
 head so that the blood began to trickle down the side of 
 his cheek. 
 
 This seemed to have a good effect upon him. The blow, 
 as it were, dissipated some of his imaginings. It was an 
 assault that quickened the working of his mind. He rose 
 to the provocative stimulus of it. He got to his feet, 
 brushed the blood out of his eyes, mounted the ladder, and 
 stepped over the hatch-combing. 
 
 He found himself on the deck of a large, old-fashioned, 
 full-rigged sailing ship. A lookout paced across the deck 
 from side to side forward. Way aft he saw a flying bridge 
 just forward of the mizzenmast, on which two officers stood. 
 A number of men had tailed on to what he realized were the 
 f oretops'l halliards, upon which they were swaying violently, 
 constantly urged to greater exertions by a big, rough- 
 looking man who stood over them. From time to time they 
 broke into a rude chant, in order to apply their efforts 
 unitedly and rhythmically to the task of raising the fore- 
 tops'l yard, the sail of which had just been double reefed. 
 The men who had performed that task were tumbling down 
 from aloft on the shrouds on either side. Although he was an 
 amateur sailor, Beekman was familiar enough with ships to 
 realize much of what was going on. 
 
 It was a raw, rough day. There was a bite in the wind 
 which struck cold upon his unaccustomed body through his 
 rags. It was already blowing a half gale, with a fine 
 promise of coming harder, apparently, and they were reduc-
 
 Up 'Against It Hard 69 
 
 ing the canvas. As the ship was by the wind, sheets of cold 
 spray swept across the already wet decks. 
 
 While he stared, the men stopped jigging on the fore- 
 tops'l halliards. They were belayed, and at the mate's com 
 mand the crew lined up on the main tops'l halliards, ready 
 to sway away at command, while those topmen, whose busi 
 ness it was to handle the canvas on the mainmast, sprang 
 up on the sheer poles and rapidly ascended the ratlines. 
 In all these movements, which appeared confused, but 
 which were not, Beekman had stood unnoticed, but he was 
 not to escape attention much longer. The man who had 
 been directing the men on the halliards caught sight of him 
 as they were belayed. He turned and walked forward. 
 
 "Here, you sojer," he began roughly, "what in hell do 
 you mean by standin' aroun' here doin' nothin' ?" 
 "Are you talking to me?" 
 
 "Who else would I be talkin' to? D'ye think I'm 
 addressin' a congregation?" 
 
 "I'm not accustomed to this sort of speech, and I'll thank 
 you to modify it," answered Beekman, outraged by the 
 other's brutal rudeness, and quite forgetful of his appear 
 ance and condition. 
 
 He was a quick-tempered young man, and all his life he 
 had received deference and respect. He did not propose to 
 let anybody talk to him that way. 
 
 "Why, you infernal sea lawyer, you back-talkin' slob, you 
 dirty malingerer, what do you think you are; one of the 
 officers on this ship; a passenger?" 
 
 "Whatever I am, I'm not under your orders." 
 "You ain't, ain't ye ! I'll learn you what you are. Git 
 aft an' tail on to them halliards, an' be quick about it."
 
 70 By the World Forgot 
 
 "I'll see you damned first." 
 
 "What !" roared Bill Woywod. He balled his enormous 
 fist and struck viciously at Beekman. In a rough-and- 
 tumble fight the latter would have had no chance with the 
 mate, for what the officer lacked in science he made up in 
 brute force. Beekman was in a horrible physical condition 
 from his excesses and the result of the knockout drops which 
 had been administered to him, but his spirit was as strong 
 as ever, and his skill as great. He parried the blow easily 
 with his left, and sent a swift right to Woywod's iron jaw. 
 
 The main tops'l halliards had not yet been cast off, and 
 the men surged forward. Captain Peleg Fish, with an 
 amazing agility for one of his years, disdaining the accom 
 modation ladders, leaped over the rail of the bridge, dropped 
 to the deck, and ran forward, leaving the conning of the 
 ship to the second mate. 
 
 "Rank mutiny, by heck," shouted the captain, drawing a 
 revolver. "Stand clear, git back to them halliards, every 
 mother's son of ye, or I'll let daylight through ye. What's 
 the matter here, Mr. Woywod?" 
 
 Now, if Beekman had been in good condition, that blow 
 to the jaw might have put Woywod out for a few moments, 
 although that is questionable, but as it was, it had merely 
 staggered him. It lacked steam. But it was hard enough 
 to rouse all the devilry in the mate's heart. 
 
 "Do you need any help, sir?" continued Captain Peleg 
 Fish, handling his pistol. 
 
 "None. Stand back, men," he answered to the captain, 
 and shouted to the crew in one breath. 
 
 Woywod had taken one blow. He took another, for, as 
 he leaped at Beekman, who was not so thoroughly angry
 
 Up Against It Hard 71 
 
 that he did not stop to reason, the latter hit him with all his 
 force. Woywod partly parried the blow, and the next 
 moment he had the young man in his arms. He crushed him 
 against his breast; he shook him to and fro. He finally 
 shifted his hands to the other's throat and choked him until 
 he was insensible. Then he threw him in the lee scuppers 
 and turned aft, the crew falling back before him and 
 running to the halliards with almost ludicrous haste. 
 "What was the trouble?" asked Captain Fish. 
 "The lazy swab refused to obey my orders to tail on the 
 halliards with the rest of the men, an' then he struck me." 
 "Rank mutiny," shouted the captain. "Shall we put him. 
 in irons?" 
 
 "No, sir. We're not any too full handed as it is. He 
 evidently doesn't know the law of the sea. Perhaps he's not 
 quite himself. It's the first time he's been on deck since we 
 took our departure yesterday mornin'. Leave him to me, 
 sir; I'll turn him into a good, willin', obedient sailorman 
 afore I gits through with him." 
 
 "Very good. Bear a hand with the maintops'l," said the 
 captain, turning and walking aft. "It blows harder every 
 minute. I don't want to rip the sticks off her just yet, 
 although I can carry on as long as any master that sails the 
 sea," he added for the benefit of Salver, the second mate. 
 The sea was rising, and although the Susquehanna was a 
 dry ship, yet the wind had nipped the tops of the waves and 
 from time to time the spray came aboard. There was water 
 in the lee scuppers, and this presently brought back con 
 sciousness to Beekman. He sat up finally, and, no one paying 
 him any attention, watched the proceedings until the reefs 
 had been taken in the tops'ls and the ship prepared for the
 
 72 By the World Forgot 
 
 growing storm. He watched them with no degree of interest 
 but with black rage and murder in his heart. If he had a 
 weapon, or the strength, he thought he would have killed 
 the mate as the latter came toward him. 
 
 With a desire, natural under the circumstances, to be in 
 position for whatever might betide, he rose to his feet and 
 clung desperately to the pinrail, confronting the mate. The 
 men of the crew had scattered to their various stations and 
 duties. All hands had been called, but the ship having been 
 made snug alow and aloft, the watch below had been dis 
 missed, and some of them were already tripping down the 
 ladder into the forepeak. Beekman was left entirely to his 
 own devices. No one presumed to interfere between the mate 
 and this newest member of the ship's people. 
 
 "Well, you," began Woywod with an oath. "Have you 
 had your lesson ? Do you know who's who aboard this ship ? 
 Are you ready to turn to?" 
 
 "I'm ready for nothing," said Beekman hotly, "except to 
 kill you if I get a chance." 
 
 "Look here," said Woywod, "you're evidently a green 
 hand. Probably you've never been on a ship afore, an* 
 you don't know the law of the sea. 'T ain't to be expected 
 that you would. We gits many aboard that makes their first 
 v'yage with us. But there's one thing you do know, an' 
 that's that I'm your master." His great hand shot out and 
 shook itself beneath Beekman's face. "An* I'm your master 
 not only because I'm first officer of this ship, but because I'm 
 a better man than you are. I flung you into the lee scuppers 
 an' I can do it again. I'm willin' an' wishful to do it, too. 
 If you gimme any more mutinous back talk ; if you refuse to 
 turn to an' do your duty accordin' to the articles you signed
 
 Up Against It Hard 73 
 
 when you come aboard, you'll git it again. If you act like 
 a man instead of a fool, you'll have no more trouble with 
 me 's long as you obey orders. D'ye git that ?" 
 
 "I get it, yes. It's plain enough, but it makes no 
 difference to me." 
 
 "It don't, don't it?" 
 
 "No; and I'm not a member of this crew. I signed no 
 articles, and I don't propose to do a thing unless I please. 
 I want to see the captain." 
 
 "You gimme the lie, do you?" said Woywod, approach 
 ing nearer. 
 
 "Now, look here," said Beekman ; "I want you to under 
 stand one thing." 
 
 "What's that?" 
 
 "I'm not afraid of you. You can kill me. You've got 
 the physical strength to do it, although if I were not so 
 sick, there might be an argument as to that; so you might 
 as well quit bullying me. Oh, yes, I have no doubt but 
 what you could knock me over again, but I'll die fighting." 
 
 His hand clenched a belaying pin. He drew it out and 
 lifted it up. 
 
 "Mr. Woywod," the captain's voice came from aft, "is 
 that man givin' you any trouble again ?" 
 
 "I can deal with him, sir." 
 
 "Send him aft to me." 
 
 Of course, Woywod could not disobey so direct an order. 
 He had no relish for it, but there was no help for it. 
 Beekman himself took action. He shoved past the mate, 
 who, under the circumstances, did not dare to hit him, and 
 made his way staggering along the deck to the bridge, 
 where the mate followed him. Two or three of the crew
 
 74 By the World Forgot 
 
 came aft, but the mate drove them forward with curses 
 and oaths. 
 
 "Young man," said the captain, an old man of short 
 stature, but immensely broad shouldered and powerful, "do 
 you know what mutiny is?" 
 
 "I certainly do." 
 
 "Oh, you've been to sea before, have you?" 
 
 "Many times." 
 
 "On what ships?" 
 
 "Trans- Atlantic liners and my own yacht." 
 
 "Your own yacht!" The captain burst into a roar of 
 laughter. 
 
 "That's what I said." 
 
 "Do you know I'm the master of this ship?" 
 
 "I presume so." 
 
 "Well, then, say 'sir' to me, an' be quick about it." 
 
 "It is your due," said Beekman ; "I should have done it 
 before. I beg your pardon, sir." 
 
 "That's better. Now, what's this cock-an'-bull story 
 you're tryin' to tell me? Look here, Smith " 
 
 "That's not my name, sir." 
 
 "Well, that's the name you made your mark to on the 
 ship's articles when you were brought aboard, the drunkest 
 sailor I ever seen." 
 
 "That's exactly it," said Beekman. "I'm no sailor, and 
 my name is not Smith." 
 
 "What's your name ?" 
 
 "Beekman ; Derrick Beekman." 
 
 "How came you aboard my ship?" 
 
 "I suppose I've been shanghaied. I don't know any more 
 than you do ; perhaps not as much."
 
 Up Against It Hard 75 
 
 "You mean," roared the captain, "that I had any hand 
 in bringing you here?" 
 
 "I don't know anything about that. I only know that I 
 was to be married today, Thursday." 
 
 "'T ain't Thursday; it's Friday. You've been in a 
 drunken stupor since Thursday morning." 
 
 "Friday !" 
 
 Beekman looked about him with something like despair 
 in his heart. There was not even a ship to be seen in the 
 whole expanse of leaden sea. 
 
 "Captain What's your name, sir?" 
 
 "Well, the impudence of that," ejaculated Woywod. 
 
 "What difference does it make to you what the cap'n's 
 name is," sneered Salver. 
 
 "It's Peleg Fish, Smith-Beekman, or Beekman-Smith; 
 Captain Peleg Fish." 
 
 "Well, Captain Fish, I'm a member of an old New York 
 family and " 
 
 "Families don't count for nothin' here," said the captain. 
 "If that's all you've got to say, I've seen a many of them 
 last scions brought down to the fok's'l." 
 
 "I was engaged to be married to the daughter of John 
 Maynard. I presume you've heard of him." 
 
 "Do you mean the president of the Inter-Oceanic Trading 
 Company?" 
 
 "I do." 
 
 "Well, I've heard of him all right," laughed the captain. 
 "This is the Susquehanna. She belongs to his company. 
 We fly his house flag. Do you mean to tell me that you 
 claim to have been engaged to his daughter; a drunken 
 ragamuffin like you, the off-scourin's of Water Street,
 
 76 
 
 which the crimps unload on us poor, helpless, seafarin' men 
 as able seamen?" 
 
 "I was. I am. The wedding was set for yesterday. We 
 had a bachelor dinner on Wednesday night, and I guess we 
 all drank too much. At any rate, I don't know anything 
 further except that I woke up here." 
 
 "It's a likely story." 
 
 "That chap's got a rich imagination," sneered the second 
 mate. 
 
 "He'd orter be writin' romances," ejaculated Woywod. 
 
 "Enough," said Captain Fish. "Your story may be 
 true or it may not. I don't think it is, but whether it is or 
 not, it don't matter. You were brought aboard at two 
 o'clock Thursday morning. We tripped and sailed at four. 
 His name's on the articles, Mr. Woywod?" 
 
 "It is; John Smith. I witnessed his signature. He 
 couldn't write at the time, so someone held his hand an' he 
 made his mark." 
 
 "This is an outrage," roared Beekman. "What became 
 of my watch and clothes?" 
 
 "You had nothin' but what you've got on now when you 
 came aboard. Am I right, cap'n?" 
 
 "You are, sir." 
 
 "So you see there's nothin' for you to do but turn to an* 
 behave yourself an' obey orders. When the ship reaches 
 Vladivostok, an' we pays off, you can take your discharge 
 an' go where you please." 
 
 "I'll give you a thousand dollars tq go back to New York 
 and land me." 
 
 The captain grinned. Taking their cue from him, Mr. 
 Woywod and Mr. Salver exploded with laughter.
 
 Up Against It Hard 77 
 
 "You might as well make it ten thousand, while you're 
 about it." 
 
 "I will make it ten thousand," said Beekman, desperately. 
 
 "Nonsense !" 
 
 "Well, then, will you trans-ship me to some vessel bound 
 for New York?" 
 
 "We're short handed, sir," put in Woywod. 
 
 "Couldn't think of it," said the captain, who, of course, 
 disbelieved in toto Beekman's highly improbable story. 
 
 This was the richest and most extravagant tale he had 
 ever listened to. To do him justice, every voyage he had 
 ever sailed had produced someone who strove to get out of 
 the ship by urging some wildly improbable excuse for his 
 being there. 
 
 "Well, sir, if you won't do that, I suppose Colon will be 
 your first port of call, and you are going through the 
 Panama Canal. Let me get on the end of the cable there 
 and I'll get you orders from Mr. Maynard himself." 
 
 "I might be inclined to do that," said the captain face 
 tiously, "but the canal is blocked by another slide in the 
 Culebra cut, an' we're goin' around the Horn." 
 
 "Don't you touch anywhere?" 
 
 "Some South Sea island for vegetables an' water, mebbe, 
 but no place where there's a cable, if I can help it. When 
 I takes my departure I don't want nobody interferin' with 
 me an' sendin' orders after me." 
 
 "Is there a wireless on the ship ?" 
 
 "No. Now, if you've finished your questioning perhaps 
 you'll allow me to say a word or two." 
 
 "An* you may be very thankful to the cap'n for his 
 kind treatment, for I never seed him so agreeable to a man
 
 78 By the World Forgot 
 
 try in' to sojer out of work an' shirk his job afore," said 
 Woywod. 
 
 "Jestice, Mr. Woywod, an' fair treatment, even to the 
 common sailor, is my motto. As long as they obey orders, 
 they've got nothin' to fear from me, an' that goes for you, 
 Smith." 
 
 "Beekman," insisted the young man. 
 
 "Smith it was, Smith it is, Smith it will be. That's the 
 first order. Now, I'll give you a little advice. Mr. Woywod 
 and Mr. Salver is among the gentlest officers I ever sailed 
 with, so long as they ain't crossed. You turn to an' do 
 what you're told or you'll git it constantly; fist, rope's 
 end, belay'n pin, sea boots, or whatever comes handiest, an' 
 if you're obstinate enough, an' if it's serious enough, a 
 charge of mutiny, an' double irons. Understand ?" 
 
 Beekman nodded; the captain's meaning was clear. 
 
 "Go for'ard, now, an' remember, mutiny means a term 
 in prison at the end of the voyage, an' mebbe worse. How 
 ever you come aboard, you're here, an' bein' here, you got 
 to obey orders or take the consequences." 
 
 "I protest against this outrage. I'll have the law. I'll 
 bring you to justice." 
 
 "Belay that," said the captain, more or less indifferently. 
 "It don't git you nowhere. If you are well advised, 3 r ou'll 
 heed my suggestions, that's all." 
 
 Beekman was absolutely helpless. There was nothing 
 that he could do. Although more angry and more resent 
 ful than ever, he fully realized his impotency. He turned 
 to go forward. Bill Woywod stopped him. The passion 
 that the mate saw in Beekman's face, as he fairly gritted his 
 teeth at him, startled him a little. Most liars and malingerers
 
 Up 'Against It Hard 79 
 
 did not take it that way. They accepted the inevitable with 
 more or less grace. 
 
 "You're in my watch," said Woywod. 
 
 "More's the pity." 
 
 "An' it happens to be the watch below. One bell has jest 
 struck ; four-thirty. The watch below takes the deck at four 
 bells; six o'clock for the second dogwatch. I'll give you 
 till then to think about it. If you don't turn to then with 
 the rest an' do a man's duty, by God, you'll suffer for it."
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE ANVIL MUST TAKE THE POUNDING 
 
 BEEKMAN had never thought so hard in his life as he 
 did in the next hour and a half. Try as he would, he 
 could see no way out of the hideous impasse into which fate 
 had thrust him. He had not the faintest idea that his situ 
 ation was caused by the treachery of his friend. No sus 
 picion of betrayal entered his mind. He was certain it was 
 simply the result of accident, and no one was to blame except 
 himself. 
 
 He had got beastly drunk after that dinner. He had 
 driven down town with Harnash. They had stopped on the 
 way. They had finally separated. He had been assaulted, 
 robbed, and probably left senseless from drink and the 
 beating he had received. He hoped fervently that he had 
 put up a good fight before being beaten into insensibility. 
 Some crimp had picked him up, stripped him of his clothes, 
 put him into these filthy rags, and sent him aboard the ship. 
 By a legal mockery which would yet suffice, he had signed 
 the articles. There was no way he could convince the cap 
 tain of the truth of his story. Unless stress of weather or 
 accident drove the ship to make port somewhere, he could 
 communicate with nobody for six months, or until they 
 dropped anchor at Vladivostok. He was a prisoner. Neither 
 by physical force nor by mental alertness and ability could 
 he alter that fact or change conditions. 
 
 80
 
 The Anvil Must Take the Pounding 81 
 
 Fantastic schemes came into his mind, of course ; among 
 them the organization of the crew, a mutiny, the seizure of 
 the ship. But that would not be possible unless conditions 
 on the ship became absolutely unbearable; and even if it 
 were practicable, in all probability he might be leading the 
 whole body to death and disaster. Beekman knew some 
 thing about the organization and administration of the 
 Inter-Oceanic Trading Company. He knew their ships were 
 always well found and well provisioned. Given a well-found 
 ship and plenty of good food to eat, and a sailor will stand 
 almost anything. 
 
 Besides, most of these men knew fully the character of 
 Captain Fish, Mr. Woywod, and Mr. Salver. They were as 
 hard as iron, and as quick as lightning, and as ruthless as 
 the devil himself, but if the men did what they were told, 
 and did it quickly, and did it well, they got off with abuse 
 only, and a comparative freedom from manhandling. 
 
 All three officers were fine seamen. They could handle a 
 ship in any wind or sea as a skilled chauffeur handles a well- 
 known car in heavy traffic, and it is a great deal harder to 
 handle a ship than a car, especially a sailing ship. Blow 
 high, blow low, come what would, these men were equal to 
 any demand, and all that could be got out of timber and 
 cordage and canvas, to say nothing of steel wire, these 
 men could get. Also they were drivers. They would carry 
 to'gall'n'ts'l's when other ships dared show no more than a 
 close-reefed tops'l. Speed was a prime requisite with the 
 owners. The SusqueTianna, in particular, had to justify her 
 use, and Captain Fish took a natural and pardonable pride 
 in striving for the steamer record. All this pleased the men. 
 Sailors will put up with much from a skillful, energetic,
 
 82 By the World Forgot 
 
 alert, daring, and successful officer. They made quick runs 
 and drew high pay. Many of them had been attached to the 
 Susquehanna since she had been commissioned. They had 
 learned so to comport themselves as to avoid as much trouble 
 as possible. 
 
 Beekman was in the receipt of not a little rough, but 
 common-sense, advice from the watch below in the forecastle. 
 His own better judgment told him that the unpalatable 
 advice must be followed. Fish, Woywod, and Salver had it 
 in their power to harry him to death. His spirit, neverthe 
 less, rebelled against any such knuckling down as would be 
 required. At three bells in the first dogwatch one of the 
 ship's boys came to him with a message. 
 
 "Are you John Smith?" he said, stopping before him. 
 
 Beekman took his first lesson then and there. His inclina 
 tion was, as it had been, to shout his own name to the trucks 
 whenever he was questioned, but what was the use ? He bit 
 his lips and nodded. 
 
 "That's what they call me." 
 
 "Well, Mr. Gersey wants to see you." 
 
 "Who is he?" 
 
 "He's the ship's Bo's'n." 
 
 "Am I at the beck and call of everybody on the ship?" 
 
 "Look here, young feller," said an old, down-east sailor 
 named Templin, who, on account of his age and experience, 
 had been made the Bo's'n's mate of the port watch. "You've 
 had a lot of advice throwed into you, which you may or may 
 not foller. This last is worth 'bout as much as all the rest. 
 The Bo's'n ain't no certificated officer. He don't live aft. 
 He's got a position sort o' 'twixt fo'c's'l an' quarter-deck, 
 but there's no man aboard who can do more for you or agin
 
 The Anvil Must Take the Pounding 83 
 
 you than him. You seems to be a sort of a friendless damn 
 fool. We don't none of us believe your yarn, but we sym 
 pathize with you because we've been in the same sitooation, 
 all of us. Jim Gersey is a square man. You ain't had no 
 chance to run athwart his hawse, an' like enough he wants 
 to do you a good turn. You'd better go, an' go a-runnin'." 
 
 "Thank you," answered Beekman, rising and following 
 the boy to the boatswain's cabin, right abaft the forecastle. 
 
 "Look here, Smith " began that grizzled and veteran, 
 mariner, who had followed the sea all his life, and looked it. 
 
 "Smith is not my name." 
 
 "In course, it ain't, but it's the name you'll go by on this 
 ship. I don't know why it is, but every man I ever seed 
 articled on a ship without his consent got named Smith or 
 Jones. I've knowed some mighty respectable people o' them 
 names, an' I don't see why they've got to be saddled with all 
 the offscourin's o' creation, meanin' no offense," said the 
 rough, but somehow kindly, old man. "Smith it is, 
 an' " 
 
 "Smith goes," said Beekman briefly. "What's my first 
 name, if I may ask?" 
 
 "Reads 'John' on the articles." 
 
 "John's as good as any." 
 
 "Now, you're takin' things in the right spirit. I heerd 
 what you said to the officers, an' I seen how you got involved 
 with Mr. Woywod. I sized you up good and plenty. 
 Whether your yarn is true or not, an' I ain't passin' no 
 judgment on that, it's evident that you ain't used to the sea, 
 that you ain't used to rough work, I means, an' this yere is 
 new experience for you. I'm old enough to be your father, 
 an' it^jest occurred to me that it would be a thing I'd like to
 
 84 
 
 remember when I quits the sea an' settles down on a farm 
 I got my eyes on, that I took a young feller an' give him a 
 friendly hand an' a word o' warnin', an' that's why I sent 
 for you." 
 
 "I appreciate it more than I can tell. As man to man, I 
 assure you that my story is absolutely true. If I ever get 
 out of this alive, I'll remember your conduct." 
 
 " 'T ain't for that I'm tryin' to steer you a straight 
 course." 
 
 "I believe it." 
 
 "You've got to knuckle down, take your medicine, turn 
 to an' do your dooty like a man. There ain't three harder 
 men on the ocean to sail with than the old man an' them two 
 mates. I've been on many ships, an' under many officers, 
 but there couldn't be a worse hell ship than this one'd be if 
 the men didn't knuckle down. You can't talk back ; you 
 can't even look sideways. You got to be on the jump all the 
 time. You got to do what you're told, an' you got to do it 
 right. Tryin' won't git you nowhere. It's doin' it. They're 
 hell on every natural mistake." 
 
 "Why do men submit to it ? How can they get a crew ?" 
 asked Beekman fiercely. "I would almost rather die than 
 stand it." 
 
 "No, you wouldn't, sonny," said the loquacious old boat 
 swain quickly. "If what you say is true, an' I ain't sayin' 
 it ain't, you've got somethin' to live for, an' even if it ain't 
 true, you've probably got something to live for ashore. If 
 you're a fugitive from jestice, or anything o' that kind, 
 which we gits 'em of'en, there's plenty of other lands where 
 a man can disappear an' make a new start. An' men," he 
 went on, reverting to the other's question, "are willin' to
 
 The Anvil Must Take the Pounding 85 
 
 ship on the Susquehcmna, an' do it over an* over agin, 
 because she's well found, the grub's A-l, she's a lucky ship, 
 an' makes quick passages. The pay is high, an' the officers 
 are prime seamen, every inch o' them. If you do your dooty, 
 if you do it right, if you don't make no mistakes, you'll git 
 plenty o' hard language an' black looks, but that's all. If 
 you don't they'll haze you until your spirit's broke, aye, 
 until your life's gone. I'll do it myself," he added frankly. 
 "I ain't talkin' to you now as the Bo's'n of the ship, but jest 
 as man to man ; as an old man advisin' a young one. If I 
 find you shirkin', or sojerin', or puttin' on any airs, or 
 playin' any tricks, I won't be far behind Woywod and 
 Salver an' the old man. That's all." 
 
 "Mr. Gersey " 
 
 "Cut out 'Mister.' I ain't no quarter-deck officer." 
 
 "Well, then, Bo's'n. I've thought it over. I'll accept 
 your advice." 
 
 "It's the only thing you can do." 
 
 "That's true, and the only reason I do it. But, by 
 heaven, if I ever get ashore, and if I ever get Woywod 
 ashore, I'll pay him for it." 
 
 "There's many would like to help you at that job," 
 answered Gersey; "but the trouble is to git him ashore. 
 After ship's crews is paid off, they generally scatters an' 
 disappears, an' sailormen's memories is short. They count 
 on gittin' it hard from everybody, anyway. They've been 
 trained that way from the beginnin'. They grow so for 
 getful that after they get on another ship there's nothin' 
 too good to say of the last one in comparison. Do you 
 know anything about sailorin'?" 
 
 "I don't know any knot-and-splice seamanship, if that's
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 what you mean; but I'm a navigator, and I can sail my 
 own yacht. I can do a trick at the wheel. I've never been 
 on a full-rigged ship." 
 
 "What was your yacht ?" 
 
 "A steamer, of course." 
 
 "Show any canvas?" 
 
 "Not to speak of." 
 
 "Ever been aloft?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, I'll do my best to train you. You've got an awful 
 hard course to steer. You began bad by gittin' the mate 
 down on you, an' I've no doubt but what he'll be layin' for 
 you all the time, anyway." 
 
 "So long as he keeps his hands off me, I'll give him no 
 further chance for trouble." 
 
 "An' if he don't ?" asked the boatswain impressively. 
 
 "If he goes to that length " 
 
 " You'll have to stand it jest the same. Mutiny on the 
 high seas is the worst crime a sailor can be found guilty of. 
 Everybody ashore is on the side of the officers courts, an* 
 jestices, an' juries." 
 
 "I'd like to get that brute in a court," said Beekman 
 savagely. "I'd almost be willing to mutiny to do it." 
 
 "Take my advice on this p'int, too," said Gersey 
 earnestly. "The less a sailor man has to do with law sharks 
 an* courts ashore, the better off he finds hisself ." 
 
 Thus it happened that when four bells were struck, and 
 all the port watch were called, Beekman presented himself 
 with the rest, 
 
 "So you've decided to turn to, have you, you dirty rag 
 amuffin?" roared Woywod as the watch came tumbling aft.
 
 The ^Anvil Must Take the Pounding 87 
 
 "I have." 
 
 "Say, 'sir,' " cried the mate. 
 
 He had a piece of rattan in his hand, and he struck Beek- 
 man a blow on the arm. The hardest word he ever ejacu 
 lated in his life was that "sir" which he threw out between 
 his teeth. 
 
 "That's well," said Woywod. "Now, you assaulted me; 
 you've been technically guilty of mutiny, but I'll forgit 
 that. You turn to an' do your work like a man, an' you'll 
 have nothin' to fear from me, but if I catch you sojerin', 
 I'll cut your heart out." 
 
 Beekman couldn't trust himself to speak. He stood 
 rooted to his place on the deck until Woywod turned away. 
 It was singular how the environment of a ship turned a 
 fairly decent man ashore into a wolf, a pitiless brute, at sea. 
 Woywod knew no other way to command men. The men 
 with whom he had been thrown knew no other way to be 
 commanded. The mate had completely forgotten his friend's 
 instructions to treat Beekman with unusual consideration. 
 As a matter of fact, Woywod was harder on Beekman in 
 his own heart and in his intentions than on any other man 
 for several reasons. 
 
 Beekman had faced him. He had refused to be cowed. 
 He was not even cowed now. Beekman had struck him and 
 almost knocked him down. Beekman was a gentleman. In 
 every look, in every movement, he showed his superiority 
 over, and his contempt for, Woywod. Harnash had arrived 
 at the same social degree as Beekman, but he was careful, 
 because of his old affection, to treat Woywod exactly as he 
 had treated him in days gone by. Woywod knew he was 
 not without shrewdness that he was not on Harnash's
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 social level, or even upon an intellectual parity with him, but 
 Harnash never allowed the slightest suggestion of inequality 
 to appear in their intercourse, because he really liked the 
 man. When a man of inferior temper, quality, and charac 
 ter is placed in irresponsible charge of a man who surpasses 
 him in everything, the tendency to tyrannize is almost irre 
 sistible. In Woywod's mind, he himself was, somehow, 
 identified with justice and right. He was engaged in serv 
 ing a woman who, to his perverted apprehension, was to be 
 forced into a marriage with a man she hated, and that man 
 was before him, in his power. 
 
 Woywod was not all bad. He was the last exponent of a 
 certain kind of officer ; a very bad kind, it must be admitted, 
 but an efficient kind, as well. There were certain rudimen 
 tary principles of justice and fair dealing in him, and some 
 of those whom he abused worst realized that, and stood for 
 more from him than they would otherwise; but in the case 
 of Beekman, both justice and fair play were in abeyance for 
 the reasons mentioned. Woywod was determined to break 
 his spirit, and to ride him down, and Beekman sensed that. 
 It was to be a fight between him and the mate from New 
 York to Vladivostok, with every advantage on earth on the 
 side of the mate. 
 
 Beekman had as quick a temper as any man living. He 
 had never been forced to control it much. The world had 
 given free passage everywhere to him, backed as he had been 
 by those things before which men bow down. Whether he 
 could control himself, whether he could submit to the end, 
 he did not dare to say. He did not hope that he could, but 
 at least he would give it a fair trial. In his secret heart he 
 prayed that he might control himself, for, if he did not, he
 
 The Anvil Must Take the Pounding 89 
 
 was sure he would kill the mate by fair means or foul. He 
 wanted very much to live, if for no other thing than to 
 justify himself in the eyes of Stephanie Maynard, whose 
 present opinion of him he could well imagine. 
 
 He had not been the most ardent of lovers. He was not 
 the most ardent of lovers now. It was pride rather than 
 passion that made him crave that opportunity for justify 
 ing himself, although he deluded himself with the idea that 
 his heart was fairly breaking on account of her. Indeed, 
 a simple reflection might have convinced him of the falsity 
 of that proposition, because the predominant emotions that 
 mastered him were hatred of Woywod and longing for 
 revenge. 
 
 What would have been those emotions if he had known 
 that Woywod was but an instrument in the hands of another, 
 and that other a rival for the affections of his promised 
 wife, and one who had passed as his best friend?
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE GAME AND THE END 
 
 HAVING chosen his line of conduct, Beekman, with a 
 strength of will and purpose of which no one would 
 have suspected him, adhered to it rigidly, and the very fact 
 that he was unable to goad him into revolt inflamed the 
 passion and developed the animosity and hatred of Woywod. 
 The mate was perfectly willing and, indeed, anxious to 
 manhandle Beekman, but that little fundamental streak of 
 fair play made him keep his hands off when he had no cause. 
 To be sure, he sought diligently for cause and occasion, and 
 that he did not find it, angered him the more. 
 
 Beekman had never been face to face with a very difficult 
 situation of any kind. Life had been too easy for him. 
 There had been no special demands upon his character by 
 any very pressing emergency, and perhaps that made him 
 study the position in which he found himself more carefully. 
 Among other things, he decided to make himself popular 
 with the crew, and to do it by gaining their respect. Unlike 
 Ancient Pistol, he would be by no means "base, common, and 
 popular," if popularity was to be procured in that way only. 
 He had always been acclaimed a leader, in athletics at any 
 rate, both in the prep school, in the university, and after 
 ward among his friends and acquaintances. 
 
 Without stooping to their level, without truckling to their 
 prejudices by promises or bribery that is, he achieved that 
 
 90
 
 The Game and the End 91 
 
 object. He was easily the most popular man on the ship. 
 And it was no small tribute to his adaptability that one of 
 his quality and station could gain the universal approval 
 of so many men so radically different. In little ways that 
 fact presently became apparent to the quarter deck, and 
 Woywod resented that especially. It irked him exceedingly 
 that a man against whom he imagined he had a just cause 
 for grievance, and who had, from his point of view, entirely 
 merited his displeasure, should be upheld and acclaimed by 
 the rest of the men over whom he ruled with iron severity. 
 This was an affront to him, and an additional cause for 
 resentment, not to say hatred. 
 
 In all this, Beekman had not changed his opinion of 
 Woywod in the least degree. In return, he hated him with 
 a good, healthy, genuine hatred that grew with every pass 
 ing hour. It became increasingly hard for him to control 
 himself and to follow out his course in the face of Woywod' s 
 constant endeavors to arouse his temper. Indeed, quick and 
 passionate by inheritance, and by lack of restraint since 
 childhood, Beekman found himself marvelling at his own 
 self-control. 
 
 If it had not been that his course so thoroughly angered 
 the mate as in a certain sense to enable Beekman to get even 
 with him, he would have lost that control again and again. 
 As it was, his soul writhed under the sneers, the insults, the 
 brutal blackguarding, the foul language of Woywod, to 
 say nothing of the exactions, the unfair and almost impos 
 sible tasks that were heaped upon him. And Salver, taking 
 his cue from his superior, did his little best to make life a 
 burden to Beekman. Grim, stern, ruthless Peleg Fish rather 
 enjoyed it, too. With natural keenness, the master of the
 
 92 
 
 ship realized that it was a battle and a game between the two 
 men, and he delighted in it as a sporting proposition. 
 
 Perhaps the popularity Beekman had gained among the 
 crew helped him to bear these things. A few of them were 
 quick enough mentally to look beneath the surface. Jim 
 Gersey was of that small number. The young man had com 
 pletely gained that old man's confidence. Beekman had seen 
 the uselessness of persisting in his story, and he had made no 
 further references to it among the crew after that first day, 
 but with Gersey he made an exception. The old boatswain 
 was shrewd and worldly wise in a guileless sort of way. The 
 two had many long talks together, and the younger had at 
 last succeeded in convincing the older of the truth of his 
 tale. Without seeming to do it, the boatswain helped the 
 newcomer through many a difficult situation, and by 
 ostentatiously joining in the bullying he got from the 
 quarter deck, and by keeping secret his friendship, it was 
 not suspected aft. 
 
 Beekman had no suspicion as to how he got on the ship. 
 He supposed his presence was due to blind fate. He knew 
 that once he could get on the end of a telegraphic cable 
 he could free himself from his detestable position, but he 
 shrewdly suspected that if there were any way to prevent 
 that, Woywod, who acted with the consent and approval of 
 Fish, could be depended upon to stop it. Beekman had 
 talked that matter over with Gersey, and he had given the 
 boatswain an address and a message which the old man had 
 laboriously committed to memory. If Beekman were kept 
 on the ship, Gersey would send the cable from Vladivostok, 
 or from whatever civilized port they made. For the rest, 
 with a reckless disregard of expenditure, Beekman discarded
 
 The Game and the End 93 
 
 his filthy rags, and comfortably outfitted himself from the 
 ship's well-equipped slop-chest, his extravagant outlay being 
 deducted from his able seaman's pay, for which, of course, 
 he cared nothing. 
 
 In spite of the fact that she was well found, and the men 
 were well fed, and the passage was a quick one, and the 
 ship fairly comfortable, by the time the cruise drew on to 
 its end, the ship was usually a smouldering hell, and this 
 voyage was no exception. 
 
 The men had been driven hard. A succession of westerly 
 gales off Cape Horn had kept them beating about that 
 dreadful point for nearly two weeks, and even after they 
 had rounded it, for once the Pacific belied its name. The 
 wind shifted after they passed the fiftieth parallel, so they 
 had to face a long beat up to the line. Gale succeeded gale. 
 Such weather was unprecedented. It had never been heard 
 of by the oldest and most experienced seamen on board. 
 The men were worn out ; their nerves on ragged edge. The 
 severe straining the ship had got had made her take in water, 
 not seriously, but at a sufficiently rapid rate to require a 
 good deal of pumping. The steam pump broke down for a 
 time and the crew had to man the hand pumps. Their nerves 
 were on edge and raw, and the officers ground them down 
 worse than ever. 
 
 If Beekman had not improved in his physical condition, 
 he could not have stood his share of the work. He had been 
 an athlete at college, not heavy enough to buck the center 
 on a football team, but a marvelously speedy end, and a 
 champion at the lighter forms of athletics demanding agil 
 ity, alertness, and skill. In his after-college life, athletics 
 had continued to interest him if desultorily. He was still an
 
 By the World Forgot 
 
 A-l tennis player and a dashing horseman, but not much 
 else. 
 
 With the hard work, the coarse but substantial food, and 
 at first the regular hours, he developed amazingly. He got 
 to be as hard as nails. He had always been a fair boxer. 
 It was a science about which- Woywod knew nothing, and 
 although the mate was twenty pounds heavier and several 
 inches taller, to say nothing of broader shouldered, than 
 Beekman, the latter began to feel that in a twenty-foot ring 
 with foul fighting barred, he could master the officer. There 
 was no possibility of a meeting of that kind, however, so 
 the two, under the varying positions of an unusually trying 
 cruise, fought the battle of will and wit down one ocean and 
 half-way up the other, until the break came, the marvel 
 being not that it came when it did, but that it had been 
 postponed so long. 
 
 One of the members of the crew was a young Dutchman 
 named Jacob Wramm. He was not exactly half-witted. He 
 could hardly be called defective, even, but he was a dull, 
 slow-thinking, very stupid lad who had been shipped by the 
 crimp as an A. B., but who would never be rated higher than 
 a landsman. Beekman, who rapidly learned knot-and-splice 
 seamanship, and all the ordinary and extraordinary duties 
 of a sailor; who could get to the main royal yard or the 
 flying jibboom end as quickly as any man on the ship; 
 who could pass a weather earring in a howling gale as 
 securely as the most accomplished seaman; who could do 
 his trick at the wheel and hold her up to her course against 
 a bucking, jumping head sea with the best quartermaster 
 afloat, endeavored to teach and train Wramm in the niceties 
 of the sailor's art. He made some progress with him until
 
 The Game and the End 95 
 
 Salver caught him instructing the stupid Dutchman, who 
 was in the second mate's watch. He mentioned it casually 
 in the cabin to Woywod, and the latter at once found a 
 new object upon which to vent his spleen and to provoke 
 Beekman. 
 
 It was fortunate for Wramm that he was in the star 
 board watch. It was only when all hands were called and 
 Salver went forward, Woywod taking charge amidships, 
 where Wramm was stationed at the main mast, that he got 
 a chance at him. The slightest blunder on the part of the 
 Dutchman was treated as a crime. He was rope's ended, 
 rattaned, kicked, beaten like a dog. Only a certain slow, 
 stubborn obstinacy and determination in his disposition 
 kept the unfortunate man from jumping overboard. 
 Probably if Beekman had been in the same watch with 
 Wramm and both had been under Woy wod's command, some 
 thing would have happened sooner, but except when all 
 hands were called, Beekman was never near Wramm, 
 and even then Beekman's station was aloft in taking in 
 sail. 
 
 Wramm was not trusted on the yards. His duties were 
 at the fife-rails around the masts where the various ropes 
 which led from above were belayed. It was a responsible 
 position, but Beekman had gone over and over every bit 
 of every rope belayed to the iron pins in the fife-rails with 
 him. When Wramm once got a thing in his head after a 
 slow process, it was apt to stay there, and the Dutchman 
 finally became letter perfect. He could put his hands on 
 the various sheets, halliards, clewlines, buntlines, and others 
 unerringly even in the dark. That is, he could if he were let 
 alone and not hurried unduly.
 
 96 By the World Forgot 
 
 One night, the starboard watch being on deck in the 
 midwatch, at four bells, or two in the morning, the port 
 watch was called, all hands being necessary for the taking 
 in of sail. As usual, Captain Fish, annoyed beyond measure 
 at his bad luck and the head winds, had been holding on to 
 take advantage of a favorable slant in a whole-sail breeze, 
 which was developing into a hard gale. He had time and 
 distance to make up and he was going to lose no opportunity 
 with either. 
 
 As the wind was rising, and the sea, too, he had remained 
 on deck during Salver's watch, and at one o'clock in the 
 morning the watch had taken in the royals and the flying 
 jib. At two o'clock the captain, staring up through the 
 darkness at the jumping, quivering to'gall'nt masts, decided 
 that the time had come to furl the light canvas and take a 
 double reef in the tops'ls, in preparation for the blow 
 obviously at hand. He waited so long, however, before 
 coming to this decision, that he realized that he had peril 
 ously little time left in which to get the canvas off her 
 without losing a sail or perhaps a spar or two. 
 
 Like every man of his temperament, he held on till the 
 last minute and then summoned the port watch, which came 
 tumbling up from below at the call of the boatswain's mate, 
 to find Captain Fish storming on the bridge at their slowness* 
 Salver went forward to the forecastle to attend to the 
 foremast. Mr. Woywod, in the natural bad humor that 
 comes to any one who is awakened from a sound sleep in 
 the only four hours of that particular night appointed for 
 rest, took charge of the main, while the captain himself 
 looked out for things aft. The helm was shifted. The ship 
 forced up into the wind to spill the canvas. The braces
 
 The Game and the End 97 
 
 were tended. The sheets were manned. The order was 
 given to round in and settle away. 
 
 Wramm was the last man to get to his station. The men 
 not stationed at some place of observation during the watch 
 on deck had snugged down in such places as they could 
 find for sleep until called. Wramm was a heavy sleeper. 
 He had not been feeling well and had been awake even 
 during his watches in the night before. He slept like a 
 log. Woywod saw that he was not at his place at the main 
 fife-rail. Just before the order was given for the light yard 
 and topmen to lay aloft and furl and reef, Woywod, raging 
 like a lion, discovered Wramm sleeping in the lee scuppers 
 under the main pin-rail. He savagely kicked him awake, 
 dragged him to his feet, got his hand on his throat, shook 
 him like a rat, and finally flung him, choked and half-dazed, 
 against the fife-rail, with orders for him to look alive and 
 stand by or he would get the life beaten out of him. 
 
 When the order was given to slack away the main to'gall'nt 
 halliards, the slow-thinking, confused Dutchman made a 
 grievous mistake. He cast off and eased away the main 
 top'sl halliards, the descent of the yard began just as the 
 ship fell away a bit under the pressure of a heavy sea. 
 The main to'gall'nts'l filled again, the men at the lee and 
 weather braces, supposing everything was right, easing off 
 and rounding in, respectively, until the yard whirled about, 
 pointing nearly fore and aft. The starboard to'gall'nt sheet 
 gave way first under the drag of the main tops'l yard, but 
 not before the tremendous pressure of the wind had snapped 
 the to'gall'nt mast off at the hounds. There was a crash 
 above in the darkness. They caught a glimpse of white 
 cloud toppling overhead and streaming out in the darkness,
 
 98 By the World Forgot 
 
 and then the mast came crashing down on the lee side of 
 the main top and hung there threshing wildly about in the 
 fierce wind. 
 
 When the main topmen were sent aloft to clear away the 
 wreck, the tops'l halliards were belayed and then led along 
 the deck and the tops'l hoisted again. For once on the 
 cruise Beekman was not at his station, for the mate, instantly 
 divining what had occurred, as every experienced man on 
 the ship had done, had leaped to the fife-rail, with a roar 
 of rage, and had struck the bewildered Dutchman, almost 
 unaware of what had happened, with a belaying pin, which 
 he drew from the rail, and had knocked him senseless to the 
 deck. Even as Woywod rapidly belayed the tops'l halliards, 
 which Wramm had been easing off, he took occasion to kick 
 the prostrate man violently several times, and one of the 
 kicks struck him on the j aw and broke it. 
 
 Beekman, stopping with one foot on the sheer pole of the 
 weather main shrouds, had seen it all. The reason why he 
 had not gone aloft with the rest was because he had instantly 
 stepped back to the rail, leaped to the deck, and had run 
 to the prostrate form of poor Wramm, which he had 
 dragged out of the way of the men, who had seized the 
 halliards at the mate's call. As it happened, the angry mate 
 had struck harder than he had intended. Wramm's skull 
 was fractured, his jaw broken, and his body was covered 
 with bruises from Woywod's brutal assault. 
 
 When the wreck was cleared away, the canvas reduced, 
 the ship made snug, and the watch below dismissed for the 
 hour of rest that still remained to them, Woywod came 
 forward. The watch had taken Wramm into the forecastle 
 and laid him out on his bunk.
 
 99 
 
 "Where is that" he qualified Wramm's name with a 
 string of oaths and expletives, the vileness of which also 
 characterized him typically "who caused a perfectly good 
 mainto'gall'nt mast to carry away?" said Woywod, stop 
 ping halfway down the ladder leading into the f orepeak. 
 
 There was a low murmur from the watch below, a 
 murmur which was not articulate, but which nevertheless 
 expressed hate as well as the growl of a baited animal does. 
 Woywod was no coward. He was afraid of nothing on 
 earth. Bullies are sometimes that way, in spite of the 
 proverb. It was Beekman who spoke. 
 
 "He's here, sir," he began, in that smooth, even, culti 
 vated voice which Woywod hated to hear. "I think his skull 
 is fractured. His jaw is broken." 
 
 "An' a good thing, too. Perhaps the crack in his thick 
 skull will let some sense in him." 
 
 "It will probably let life out ir," answered Beekman, 
 with just an appreciable pause before the sir. 
 
 "Mutinous, inefficient, stupid hound," said Woywod. but 
 there was a note of alarm in his voice, which Beekman 
 detected instantly, and which some of the others suspected. 
 "Show a light here," he continued, coming down to the 
 deck and bending over the man. "One of you wash the 
 blood off his face," he said, after careful inspection. "I'll 
 go aft an' git at the medicine chest. He's too thick headed 
 to suffer any serious hurt. This'll be a lesson to him, an' 
 to all of you. I'll be back in a few minutes." 
 
 The mate was really alarmed, although he did his best 
 not to show it. 
 
 "Beg your pardon, sir," said Beekman, "but I want to 
 speak to the captain."
 
 100 By the World Forgot 
 
 "What you got to say to him?" 
 
 "I want to speak to him, sir." 
 
 "You can't do it now. Come to the mast tomorrow." 
 
 "I want to speak to him tonight." 
 
 "Let him speak to the cap'n," shouted Templin, one of 
 the most reliable men on the ship. 
 
 Instantly, as if given a cue, the whole watch broke into 
 exclamations. 
 
 "We'll all go aft with him to speak to the cap'n." 
 
 "That won't be necessary," said Beekman, quietly, 
 although every nerve was throbbing with indignation and 
 resentment. "Mr. Woywod will grant my request. There's 
 no need for the rest of you mixing up in this. Won't you, 
 Mr. Woywod?" 
 
 Now, Beekman was in his rights in appealing to the 
 captain at any time. Woywod cast a glance back at the 
 still, unconscious figure of Wramm and decided that perhaps 
 it would be best for him to temporize. He wanted to strike 
 Beekman down, and if it had not been for Wramm's condi 
 tion and the mutinous outbreak of the men, he would have 
 done so. He realized instantly what Beekman's popularity 
 meant. 
 
 "If Cap'n Fish ain't turned in," he said, surlily, "and is 
 willin' to see you, you can speak to him ; if not, you'll have 
 to wait till mornin'." 
 
 "I think it's probable that he's still awake, sir," said 
 Beekman. "He'll undoubtedly want to know what the 
 condition of Wramm is." 
 
 "I'll tell him." 
 
 "No, I'll tell him myself." 
 
 "You will," shouted Woywod, raising his fist.
 
 Tlie Game and the End 101 
 
 Beekman never moved. The men came crowding around. 
 
 "By sea law," said Templin, "he's got a right to see the 
 master of the ship, an' we proposes to see that he gits that 
 right." 
 
 "You mutinous dogs," cried Woywod, confronting them. 
 
 But they were not overawed, and they did not give 
 back. 
 
 "Come along," he said to Beekman, "an* you'll be sorry 
 you ever done it." 
 
 Without looking behind him, he sprang up the ladder 
 and, followed closely by Beekman, he went aft, descended 
 the companionway, and found Captain Fish seated at the 
 cabin table, on which a huge joint of cold meat and bread 
 were spread out, with some bottles and glasses to bear them 
 company. The captain was not alone. The steward, a 
 Spanish half-caste, named Manuel, had just brought in a 
 steaming pot of coffee from the galley. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Woywod," began Fish, "what about that 
 infernal lubber that caused the loss of the mainto'gall'nt 
 mast?" 
 
 "Smith, here, has come aft demandin' to see you an' 
 p'r'aps he'll tell you. Will you see him ?" 
 
 "What is it, Smith?" said the captain, sharply. 
 
 "Seaman Wramm," began Beekman, "is probably dying. 
 I'm not a doctor, but so near as I can make out he has a 
 fractured skull ; his jaw is certainly broken and he is covered 
 with bruises." 
 
 "How came he in that condition ?" asked the captain. 
 
 "That murdering blackguard yonder struck him over the 
 head with a belaying pin, kicked him when he was down 
 and "
 
 102 By the World Forgot 
 
 "By God !" cried Woywod, springing forward, "you dare 
 refer to me in that way ?" 
 
 "Steady, Mr. Woywod," said Fish, his eyes gleaming. 
 "I know how to deal with this man. Are you aware you 
 pretend to be a gentleman of education that your lan 
 guage is in the highest degree mutinous, that I can have 
 you put in double irons, and " 
 
 "Am I to stand by and see a poor, helpless, dull-witted 
 man, who has been hazed to death every day of this cruise 
 by your blackguardly assessors, beaten to death, killed 
 without a word?" 
 
 "You'd better look out for yourself rather than for him." 
 
 "I don't care what becomes, of me. I've had just about 
 enough of it. If that man dies, I'm going to bring a charge 
 of murder against this bullying scoundrel, and if you don't 
 put him in irons I'll bring it against you, too." 
 
 Beekman was beside himself with wrath. His temper was 
 gone. His control had vanished in thin air. The cumulative 
 repression of three months had been lost. He stepped 
 forward, shaking his fist in the captain's face. 
 
 "Manuel," said the captain, "tell Mr. Salver to send a 
 couple of men down here. Tell him to have the bo's'n fetch 
 me some double irons." Fish was white with wrath. "Do 
 you think I'll allow any wharf rat like you to talk like that 
 to me on my own ship? I've no doubt but that thick-headed 
 Dutchman will recover, but whether he does or not I'll deal 
 with him. You'll prefer charges against me, will you ? By 
 God, you can count yourself lucky if you're not swinging at 
 a yardarm tomorrow. For two cents I'd run you up now." 
 
 "With your permission, cap'n," began Woywod. "Keep 
 fast, Manuel, I can handle him alone. I've been itchin' fer
 
 The Game and the End 103 
 
 this chance ever since he came aboard. Now, Smith," he 
 laughed, evilly, "I've got you. I knew you couldn't keep 
 your temper." 
 
 Woywod stepped toward him. Beekman did not give 
 back an inch. 
 
 "If you lay a hand on me," he shouted, "if I have to die 
 for it the next minute, I'll " 
 
 But Woywod, who did not give him a chance to finish 
 the sentence, with fist upraised leaped forward. Beekman 
 hit him. It was a much more powerful blow than the first 
 he had delivered to the mate on the day that he waked up 
 and found himself shanghaied. Three months of hard 
 work and clean living and plain food had made a different 
 man of him. Woywod was lucky. He partly parried the 
 blow, but it struck him full on the chest and drove him 
 smashing back against the bulkhead by the side of Manuel. 
 The frightened steward hauled him to his feet. 
 
 The captain had arisen and was bawling for the officer 
 of the watch. He was oblivious to the fact that one of the 
 men was peering down into the cabin over the combing of 
 the skylight. There was a trample of feet on the deck 
 above. Salver himself appeared on the companion ladder, 
 but Woywod had got to his feet. He was black with rage, 
 mad with passion. He reached into the side pocket of his 
 short pea jacket and drew forth a heavy revolver. 
 
 "You're witnesses that he struck me," he cried, as he 
 raised the weapon, but again Beekman was too quick for him. 
 
 A big, broad-bladed carving knife was lying by the side 
 of a piece of salt beef on the table. Beekman clutched it, 
 and as Woywod pulled the trigger, he leaped forward and 
 buried it to the hilt in the mate's breast.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE LAST WORDS 
 
 SO POWERFUL was the stroke, so deep and inveterate 
 the hate that nerved the arm, that the sharp knife was 
 driven clear to the handle into Woywod's breast. The big 
 mate threw up his arms. He staggered back. The pistol 
 went off harmlessly and dropped on the table. Then the 
 huge hulk of the stricken man collapsed on the deck. Quick 
 as a flash Captain Fish leaned over and seized the weapon. 
 
 "Make a move an' you're a dead man," he roared, cover 
 ing Beekman. "Mr. Salver, I'll keep Smith covered with 
 this pistol until you get the double irons on him. Log a 
 charge of mutiny an' murder against him. If he resists, 
 you can go to any length to subdue him. I wouldn't like 
 him killed aboard ship, however. I'd rather see him hanged 
 ashore." 
 
 Salver grabbed Beekman by the shoulder. 
 
 "You, Manuel, go to his assistance," said Fish, still keep 
 ing him covered. "You infernal coward," he added to the 
 steward, who was as white as death and trembling like a 
 weather brace in a heavy wind ; "he can't do you no harm. 
 If he moves I'll put a bullet through him." 
 
 But Beekman had no desire to do any one any harm. 
 The blow that had let life out of Woywod had let the 
 passion out of Beekman. He stood staring and bending 
 over, he caught the man's last broken words. 
 
 104
 
 The Mystery of the Last Words 105 
 
 "Done for Tell Harnash I " and then silence. 
 
 Captain Fish came around the table as soon as Mr. 
 Salver had got a firm grip on one of Beekman's arms and 
 the steward had gingerly taken the other. Shoving the 
 pistol close into Beekman's ribs, he ordered the three men 
 on deck. A passing glance at Woywod told the captain 
 that his mate was dead. He could attend to him later. 
 Beekman must be secured first. 
 
 The boatswain had been awakened, and, according to 
 orders, he now came aft with the irons. Beekman was 
 handcuffed and irons were put on his ankles. He was 
 searched rapidly. His sailor's sheath knife was taken from 
 him and then 
 
 "Where'll we stow him, sir?" asked Mr. Salver. 
 
 There was no "brig," as a prison is called on a man-o'- 
 war, on the Susquehanna. Forward a little room had been 
 partitioned off on one side of the ship abaft the forecastle 
 for the boatswain. On the opposite side there was another 
 similar cabin occupied by the carpenter and sailmaker. The 
 captain thought a moment. 
 
 "Mr. Gersey," he said, at last, "you'll come aft to take 
 the second mate's watch. Mr. Salver will act as the mate. 
 Clear your belongings out of your cabin. We'll stow him 
 there for the present. Take a couple of men to help you 
 shift aft, an* be quick about it. When he's safely locked 
 in bring me the key. There's been mutiny an' murder 
 aboard my ship," he continued, loudly, for the benefit of 
 the watch. "This dog has put a knife in Mr. Woywod's 
 heart. Not a thing was bein' done to him. We were jest 
 reasonin' with him, treatin' him kind, as we do every man 
 on this ship. Manuel, here, can swear to that, can't you?'*
 
 103 By the World Forgot 
 
 "Yes, sir, of course, sir," cringed the steward, who was 
 completely under the domination of the brutal ship 
 master. 
 
 "I'll prepare a proper statement and enter it in the log, 
 to be signed by the steward and myself, in case anything 
 should happen to us," he continued. 
 
 "What'll I do with this man, sir, while we're waitin' for 
 Mr. Gersey to git his cabin cleaned out?" asked Salver. 
 
 "Lash him to the bridge yonder. I'll keep my eyes on 
 him until you git him safe in the bo's'n's cabin. See that 
 the door is locked yourself personally, and bring me the 
 key. Understand ?" 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "We don't dare to take no chances with such a desperate 
 murderer." 
 
 "No, sir; of course not." 
 
 "Men," shouted the captain, "you heard what's been 
 said?" 
 
 "We did, sir; an' we seen it all from the beginnin'," 
 answered a voice out of the darkness, a voice full of ugly 
 threat and menace, which the captain did not recognize and 
 thought best to pass unnoticed. 
 
 "Poor Mr. Woywod's been killed, you understand. Mr. 
 Salver will take his place as mate of the ship. Mr. Gersey 
 will come aft as second mate, to be obeyed and respected 
 accordin'." 
 
 "Damn good riddance," yelled another voice out of the 
 darkness, carefully disguised. 
 
 , This was too much. He could not overlook a remark of 
 this kind, and yet in the black night there was little he could 
 do, since the speaker was unrecognizable.
 
 107 
 
 "Who said that?" blustered the captain, handling his 
 pistol and peering forward. 
 
 There was no answer, of course. 
 
 "If the man who made that remark dares to repeat it in 
 daylight, I'll cut his heart out. An' if I hear any more 
 such talk, I'll let fly at the bunch of you as it is. Get 
 f or'ard an' to your stations." 
 
 The unknown commentator had obviously expressed the 
 prevalent opinion aboard the ship on the death of Mr. 
 Woywod. There was nothing else to be said or done then. 
 The captain's orders were carried out as a matter of course. 
 The excited men dispersed without comment, but with a 
 feeling that all the honors were with them. The boatswain 
 came aft, having stripped his cabin. The prisoner was 
 finally locked therein and left to himself. Bread and water 
 were handed to him sufficient to keep life in him and not 
 much else. The ship was hove to and Woywod was buried 
 the next morning with due ceremony, the captain himself 
 reading the service, the whole crew being mustered in due 
 form, but never a man was shot down into the vasty deep 
 with less of the spirit of prayer and forgiveness following 
 him than the mate who had met his just deserts, if the looks 
 of the crew, to which the captain was perforce oblivious, 
 gave any indication of their feelings. 
 
 Beekman's reflections could easily be imagined. To his 
 dying day he would never forget the surprised, puzzled 
 look on the mate's face, the change of his countenance from 
 mad passion to astonishment, from that amazement to pain, 
 to horror, to deadly fear ! He would never forget the con 
 vulsive struggle of the man on the deck at his feet, the 
 white bone handle of the knife sticking out of his breast
 
 108 By the World Forgot 
 
 and shining in the light of the big hanging lamp against 
 his blue shirt. There was a human life on his hands, cal 
 loused and hardened as they were. There was blood upon 
 them. Had the blood been shed righteously ? Had he been 
 well advised to give way to his passion? Had the fact 
 that he had gone there in behalf of another, a helpless 
 weakling, dying himself from the ruthless treatment meted 
 out to him, entitled him to take the mate's life? Would 
 the mate have shot him with that pistol? Was it self- 
 defense? Had that only been back of his blow and his 
 thrust? 
 
 Beekman had to admit that he hated the mate ; that he had 
 lusted to kill him. He realized in the flash of time that 
 had intervened between the blow and the thrust that he had 
 been glad of the excuse. Was he a murderer in the eyes 
 of the law, in his own consciousness, in his heart? He had 
 killed the mate, but the mate had beaten him in the long 
 struggle between them. He had sworn that the latter 
 should not provoke him, but he had done so and now he 
 was in peril of his life, grave peril. The presumption of 
 guilt is always against the sailor in charges of mutiny. It 
 would require the strongest evidence to establish his inno 
 cence. He knew of no witnesses, save the captain and the 
 steward. The steward was one man on the ship whom he 
 had not won. Indeed, having most of his relations aft and 
 living there in a bunk off his pantry, the steward was hated 
 by the men. He was a tale-bearer and a sneak. He had 
 to live aft for his own protection. He was purely a creature 
 of the captain's. He would swear to anything the captain 
 dictated. Beekman knew that, of course. 
 
 Before he had been bound to the ladder of the bridge
 
 109 
 
 Beekman had heard what the captain had said. The crew, 
 of course, could testify as to Woywod's character, but he 
 knew enough of sailors to realize they would scatter as soon 
 as they could get away from the ship. He could scarcely 
 depend upon them. There was old Gersey, but what could 
 he do? What could he hope from the Russian authorities 
 at Vladisvostok ? The captain would be hand and glove with 
 them, naturally. Things looked black for Beekman. 
 
 After a time, reviewing again all the scenes of the dread 
 ful drama his mind reverted to those final words of Woy 
 wod's. He remembered them perfectly. They were etched 
 upon his brain. 
 
 "Done for. Tell Harnash I " 
 
 He repeated those words. The first two were clear. But 
 the last three 
 
 "Tell Harnash I " 
 
 Tell Harnash what? Why tell Harnash anything? What 
 did he have to do with the present situation ? Harnash was 
 his friend. Harnash had arranged his bachelor dinner. 
 Harnash had jokingly plied him with wine, but so had the 
 others. Beekman was an abstemious, temperate chap. He 
 drank occasionally, in a moderate way, but never to excess. 
 It was Harnash who had taken the lead in urging him. He 
 had gone out from that dinner in the small hours of the 
 morning with Harnash, and the last person he remembered 
 was Harnash. Could Harnash have 
 
 Good God, no ! It was impossible. It could not be. 
 Such treachery, such criminality was unthinkable by a loyal 
 man like Beekman. There was no motive for it. The 
 business affairs of the firm were prosperous. At his partner's 
 insistence an expert had gone over the books on his return
 
 110 By the World Forgot 
 
 from Hawaii. There was not a thing wrong. He would 
 have trusted Harnash with everything he owned, and with 
 right. He could not have wanted to get him out of the 
 way, unless 
 
 Why had Harnash looked so haggard and miserable? 
 Why had Stephanie presented the same countenance? 
 Could those two He would not think it. Yet what could 
 Woywod have meant? 
 
 Suddenly Beekman remembered that he had heard Har 
 nash had a sailor friend, who at infrequent intervals was 
 accustomed to visit him. There had been some reference 
 to it. Beekman had never heard the man's name, and he 
 never chanced to have met him. Woywod had never referred 
 to Harnash in Beekman's hearing on that cruise until those 
 faltered words as he died. Could it be Woywod? It must. 
 Was it merely chance that Beekman had fallen into the 
 hands of Harnash's friend on the very night before his 
 wedding, when his last companion had been Harnash himself? 
 
 Now, Beekman was an intensely loyal man and he reso 
 lutely put these suspicions out of his mind, but they would 
 not stay out. Why should Woywod stare up at him with 
 fast closing eyes as he spoke? Did Woywod know who 
 Beekman was? Were those muttered words an admission? 
 By heaven, could it be that Harnash was in love with 
 Stephanie and she with him? 
 
 When Beekman asked himself that question he began 
 to go over the times in which he had seen the two together. 
 Little things, unnoticed and unmarked before now, grew 
 strangely significant. Beekman loathed himself for enter 
 taining the suspicions. It was not possible, yet Could 
 Stephanie herself be a party to it? That, too, was unthink-
 
 Ill 
 
 able. So it was that Harnash Yet those words ! Well, 
 if he could get out of this horrible situation now, so much 
 worse than it had been, he certainly would tell Harnash and 
 Harnash should tell him. Meanwhile, there was added to 
 his horror and regret the fact that Woywod was dead and 
 that he had killed him. 
 
 A strange and terrible reality, that, to this sometime 
 dilettante in life.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE TRIANGLE BECOMES A QUADRILATERAL 
 
 ERHAPS no one ever realizes so completely the immen- 
 sity of the world and the littleness of man as he who is 
 alone on the face of the waters. The deep becomes indeed 
 vasty when seen from a small boat in the center of an 
 unbroken horizon. It is a question whether the loneliness 
 of the desert is greater than the loneliness of the sea. Per 
 haps it depends upon the thinker and his temperament. 
 There is, of course, life in the sea in that it is usually quick, 
 in motion, and there is sound that accompanies it. 
 
 The desert is still, but in the desert you can get some 
 where. You know that beyond the horizon is some place. 
 Not even the flattest land but suggests change as it is 
 traversed. Somewhere within reaching distance hills rise, 
 mountains lift themselves in the air, oases beckon attract 
 ively. In the sea you may go for days and days and days, 
 each day like the other, and still find only the waste of 
 waters and the unbroken horizon. 
 
 Beekman had sailed every one of the seven seas, but in 
 some luxurious yacht or some mighty ocean liner. This was 
 the first time in his life he had ever been alone in a small 
 boat. Even the Susquehanna had long since faded out of 
 his view. The lights from her stern windows had been lost 
 during the night, and when day broke, although he eagerly 
 searched the northwest, there was no sign of her. Not even 
 
 112
 
 The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral 113 
 
 when he rose high on some uptossed wave could he catch a 
 glimpse of a to'gall'nts'l or a royal against the blue line of 
 the horizon. 
 
 He was glad and he was sorry to be alone. The gladness 
 manifested itself presently, but at first he was overwhelmed 
 by the sense of loneliness. The crew of the Susquehanna 
 had not mutinied openly, but they had taken matters in their 
 own hands and had done the best they could for the man 
 who had relieved them, whether righteously or unrighteously 
 they did not stop to speculate, from a tyranny that had 
 become unsupportable ; because, in his animosity to Beek- 
 man, Woywod had been harder than ever before on the 
 rest. 
 
 They had deliberately, if surreptitiously, provisioned the 
 whaleboat which hung from the davits astern. They had 
 filled her water breakers, had added a compass, had over 
 hauled her mast and sail, had thrown in a couple of blankets, 
 a tarpaulin, an axe and some tools and whatever else they 
 could come at, including a little bag of silver dollars from 
 their own scanty store, which might prove valuable in the 
 end. They had done this very quietly in the darkness, under 
 the leadership of Templin on the night following the death 
 of the mate. 
 
 They had chosen Mr. Gersey's watch for their operations 
 and he had been conveniently blind. Possessing themselves 
 of the carpenter's tools, they had bored holes around the 
 lock of the boatswain's room and had freed Beekman. With 
 cold chisels and hammers they had struck the fetters from 
 his wrists and ankles, grievously cutting him and bruising 
 him in the process. 
 
 "Mr. Gersey told us," said Templin to the astonished
 
 114 By the World Forgot 
 
 prisoner, "that he heard the old man an' Salver plottin' 
 the ship's position at noon today. There are islands with 
 white people on 'em about a hundred leagues to the west'ard. 
 The course'll be about sou'west-by-west. We've pervisioned 
 the whaleboat. She's unsinkable, with her airtight tanks 
 for'ard an' aft an' a good sailer. I follered you aft, per- 
 tendin' to overhaul the gear on' the mizzen mast last night. 
 Through the skylight I seen the mate threatenin' you with 
 a pistol in the cabin. We all believes you done perfectly 
 right. Wramm's dead. Died tonight, without never regainin' 
 consciousness. Woywod was a murderer, if ever there was 
 one, an' he got his jest desarts. We don't want to mutiny 
 an' git hung for it. Some of us has families. But we 
 don't mean you to suffer. The only way to save you is to 
 git vou out of the ship afore we lands at Vladivostok. It 
 seemeHPto us that a good sailor like you could easily make 
 them islands, an' then you can shift for yourself. It's a big 
 world. They'll never find you again. Here," he added, "is 
 a little bag o' dollars." He passed a bulging little bag into 
 the hands of the astonished Beekman. " 'Tain't much, but 
 it's all we got. I guess that's all." 
 
 "But I don't want to leave the ship." 
 
 "You'll be hung at the end of the v'yage if you don't," 
 said Templin, inexorably. "Them Russians ain't more'n 
 half civilized, anyway, an' they'll do pretty much as the 
 cap'n says. This is your only chance." 
 
 "Does Gersey know?" 
 
 "Of course. He's the one that made the whole plan, 
 only the officers ain't to know that." 
 
 "You don't expect to be able to lower that boat and cast 
 it adrift without attracting attention, do you ?"
 
 The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral 115 
 
 "In course not, but it's a dark night an' we're goin' to 
 git you down an' afloat, whatever happens." 
 
 "But the captain will immediately come after me." 
 
 "He can't brace the yards hisself an' work the ship alone 
 with only Salver an' the bo's'n, can he ?" 
 
 "I see, but I don't want to get you in trouble." 
 
 "Every man on the ship 'ceptin' the steward is with you, 
 an' we're simply not goin' to let him hang you." 
 
 "Templin, I want you to remember two names and an 
 address." 
 
 "What are they?" 
 
 "Harnash and Beekman, 33 Broadway, New York." 
 
 "That's easy," said Templin, repeating the words. 
 "Why?" 
 
 "That's my address when I'm home. If I ever get home 
 and any of you men want a friend, come there. I want 
 you to pass that around among the crew, every one of them. 
 You fellows didn't believe me, but now that I'm going I 
 want to tell you for the last time my story is true, and if 
 you want to be fixed for life, just come and see me there." 
 
 "Well, I hopes you gits there, Smith, or " 
 
 "Beekman." 
 
 "Beekman, then." 
 
 "And I, and I, and I," was heard from the various 
 members of the watch gathered about and speaking in low 
 tones. 
 
 "Now, come aft," said Templin, "an' tread soft. "There's 
 no use arousin' the old man if we can help it. Only needs 
 four of us to overhaul the gear an' lower away," continued 
 the ringleader, picking out three associates. "The rest of 
 you git down in the shadder of the rail on the lee side of
 
 116 By the World Forgot 
 
 the waist near the bridge. Mr. Gersey is keepin' a bright 
 lookout to windward. If you hear any noise, come aft on 
 the run." 
 
 Without making a sound, Beekman and his four devoted 
 friends passed under the bridge, crouching down in the 
 shadow of the lee rail until they were well aft and sheltered 
 from observation by the broad canvas of the spanker. Mr. 
 Gersey was on the other side of the bridge, staring hard 
 forward and up to windward in the most approved fashion. 
 
 "You'll find everything ready for steppin' the mast an' 
 spreadin' sail," whispered Templin. "The sea's fairly 
 smooth, the wind's blowin' from the east'ard. You'd better 
 git the canvas on her soon's you can. You hadn't ought to 
 be in sight of us at daybreak." 
 
 "What time is it now?" 
 
 Three bells were struck forward at the moment, a couplet 
 and then a single bell. 
 
 "Three bells, you hears," answered Templin. "You'll 
 have three hours, and with you goin' one way an' us another, 
 we'll be out of sight before daybreak. Remember, your 
 course is sou'west-by-west." 
 
 "I shan't forget that or anything. When you have a 
 chance bid Gersey good-bye for me and tell him not to 
 forget the cable. God only knows where I'll turn up or 
 when I'll get back, but when I do well, remember what I 
 said, Harnash and Beekman, 33 Broadway, New York." 
 
 He shook Templin's hand and nodded to the other three 
 and stepped into the boat. 
 
 "Lower away," whispered Templin. 
 
 Now the night was quiet. The breeze was not strong. 
 The creaking of the falls, since the sailors had taken pre-
 
 The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral 117 
 
 caution to grease them, was reduced to a minimum ; still, 
 some sound was made. Gersey had kept his eyes steadily 
 forward, although he knew, of course, everything that was 
 happening. He glanced around just as the Avhaleboat 
 disappeared below the rail. 
 
 As luck would have it, Captain Fish, who slept, of course, 
 in the stern cabin, happened to be wakeful. With an ear 
 trained and accustomed to all the ordinary noises of the 
 ship, anything out of common raised his suspicions. He . 
 heard the slight creaking. He sat up in his berth and 
 listened. The noise came from aft, overhead. He ran to 
 the stern window and peered through the open transom just 
 at the moment that the keel of the descending whaleboat 
 came on a level with the window. Fish slept with a revolver 
 under his pillow. He leaped back, grabbed the pistol, 
 jumped to the transom again to find himself staring into the 
 face of Beekman. 
 
 "Keep fast those falls," he roared, presenting his pistol. 
 
 Beekman was standing up in the boat, fending her off from 
 the stern with a boathook. Fish had turned on the electric 
 light the SusqueJumna was provided with a dynamo 
 and he was clearly visible. Beekman struck his arm with 
 the boathook, knocking the pistol into the sea. The next 
 instant there was a sudden roar on the deck above from 
 Gersey, who judged that it was now safe to give the alarm. 
 This outcry was followed by the trampling of many feet 
 and a swift rush of the falls through the blocks. There 
 was no necessity for concealment now. Templin and his men 
 lowered the boat with a run. 
 
 Beekman worked smartly. As soon as the boat was water- 
 borne he cast off the tackles and began tugging frantically
 
 118 By the World Forgot 
 
 at the mast. With seamanlike care, it had been so arranged 
 that what had been almost an impossible task for one man 
 in a hurry he could easily accomplish. The SusqueTianna 
 was sailing at a smart rate and she had drawn some distance 
 ahead before Captain Fish reached the deck. He was in a 
 towering rage. 
 
 "Mr. Gersey," he roared, "what does this mean, sir? The 
 prisoner has escaped, an' in your watch?" 
 
 "I know it, sir," answered Gersey. "The men have got 
 out of hand, sir." 
 
 "They have," exclaimed Fish. He had mounted half 
 way up the accommodation ladder of the bridge. Although 
 he was unarmed and clad only in his pajamas, he did not 
 hesitate on that account. 
 
 "I'll see about that," he roared. "I'll have no mutiny 
 on my ship." He ran toward the group seen blackly against 
 the white rail aft, shouting, "The man that did this will 
 swing for it." 
 
 "Scatter," cried a voice. 
 
 The group instantly dissolved in the darkness of the deck. 
 Fish made a grab at the nearest one, but a man behind him 
 ran violently into him. He lost his hold. In a moment 
 the quarter deck was deserted. The Susquehanna on her 
 present course had the wind broad abeam. 
 
 "Mr. Gersey," roared the captain, "call all hands and 
 stand by to wear ship. We must pick up that boat with 
 that murdering mutineer aboard." 
 
 "Aye, aye, sir. For'ard there. Call the other watch." 
 
 Now the other watch was awake and waiting. Some of 
 them, indeed, had participated in the affair of the night. 
 Scarcely had the boatswain's mate sounded the call, when
 
 The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral 119 
 
 the watch below came tumbling up from the forecastle. Mr. 
 Salver also joined the group on the bridge, rubbing his eyes 
 sleepily. The captain took charge himself. 
 
 "Hands to the weather braces," he cried, "ease off the 
 spanker sheet. Flatten in the head sails for'ard. Hard up 
 with the helm." 
 
 Not a man on the deck stirred. No one ran to the weather 
 braces. No one cast off the lee braces. The helmsman 
 remained immobile. The spanker sheet was not eased off. 
 The sheets of the head sails were not hauled aft. The 
 captain stared a moment in astonishment. 
 
 "Wear ship," he cried, "don't you hear me?" 
 
 "We heerd you," answered a voice out of the darkness, 
 "but we're not goin' to wear the ship." 
 
 "You refuse to obey orders?" 
 
 "We'll obey all other orders, same as we have allus done, 
 but we don't propose to pick up that there whaleboat." 
 
 "Who spoke?" roared the captain. 
 
 There was a movement in the groups of men in the 
 darkness. Templin's voice, well disguised, came first from 
 one side of the deck to the other, as he moved about while 
 he spoke. 
 
 "You might as well make up your mind to it, Cap'n Fish. 
 We're determined that no harm is to come to Smith. He's 
 gone. For the rest, we'll work the ship to Vladisvostok, 
 which we signed on for. You'll find us obeyin' orders same 
 as ever in the mornin'." 
 
 Captain Fish was black with rage. 
 
 "Mr. Gersey," he roared, "do you know anything about 
 this?" 
 
 "Not a thing, sir."
 
 120 By the World Forgot 
 
 "We done it ourselves," came up from the waist. 
 
 "Keep fast the braces," said the captain at last; "keep 
 her on her course." 
 
 Inasmuch as she had never been off her course and the 
 braces had not been touched, the commands were useless. 
 They were simply given to save the captain's face a little. 
 
 "Mr. Salver," he continued, "it's your watch below. I 
 want to speak to you in the cabin. Pipe down the watch 
 off, Mr. Gersey. We'll settle this matter in the morning." 
 
 But the captain knew and the men knew that the matter 
 was already settled. If the men hung together there was 
 no way by which the captain could discover the ringleader. 
 And he could not imprison the whole ship's company. They 
 had beaten him. The flight had been carefully planned 
 and carried out in a bold and seamanlike way. 
 
 "You've beat me," said the captain the next morning to 
 the crew as the watches were changed, "but there's a standin' 
 offer of five hundred dollars for any one who'll gimme the 
 details an' the names of the ringleaders. Meanwhile, if any 
 one of you gives me the least cause I'll shoot him like a 
 dog. Mr. Salver an' Mr. Gersey are both armed like me," 
 he tapped the heavy revolver hanging at his waist, "so 
 look out for yourselves. I've no doubt some of you'll 
 squeal. I'll find out yet. God help the men that did it when 
 I do." 
 
 The captain's bribe was a large one. There were men 
 in th'e forecastle who would have jumped at it, but a very 
 clear realization of what would be meted out to them by 
 their fellows if they turned traitor, kept them quiet. The 
 loyal men among the mutineers knew pretty well who were 
 to be suspected and kept close watch on them.
 
 The Triangle Becomes a Quadrilateral 121 
 
 Beekman knew nothing of all that, of course, the next 
 morning as he made his meager breakfast. He did not know 
 how long it would take him to reach those islands, the very 
 name of which he was ignorant, and it behooved him to 
 husband his resources'. After his breakfast he laid his 
 course by the compass. The breeze held steady. All 
 he had to do was to steer the boat. At nightfall he 
 decided to furl sail and drift. For one thing he needed 
 the sleep. 
 
 The next day, however, the breeze came stronger. It 
 gradually shifted from the southeast toward the north. He 
 reefed the sail down until it barely showed a scrap of canvas 
 and drove ahead of it. There was no sleep for him through 
 the night. He did not dare to leave the boat to her own 
 devices in that wind and sea. The wind rose with every 
 hour. The next morning it was blowing a howling gale 
 from the northeast. He could no longer keep sail on the 
 boat. He could not row against it. Fortunately, he had 
 foreseen the situation. He unstepped the mast and unshipped 
 the yard with which he pried up some of the seats and with 
 these and spare oars he made himself a serviceable sea 
 anchor, which he attached to the boat's painter forward, 
 cast overboard, and by this means drifted with the storm 
 being at the same time wet, cold, lonely, and very miserable. 
 He knew the boat was a lifeboat; its air tanks would keep 
 it from sinking, but if it ever fell into the trough of the 
 sea it would be rolled over and over like a cork. It would 
 (fill with water and refill in spite of his constant bailing. He 
 j:ould only trust to his sea anchor to keep the boat's head 
 ;:o the huge seas by which it was alternately uplifted and 
 last down in vast, prodigious motion. Had it not been