Chapter II

Cappy Ricks was at his office at eight-fifty the following morning. At eight-fifty-two Mr. Terence Reardon, plainly uncomfortable in a ready-made blue-serge Sunday suit purchased on the Embarcadero for twenty-five dollars, came into the office. He was wearing a celluloid collar, and a quite noticeable rattle as he shook hands with Cappy Ricks betrayed the fact that he also was wearing celluloid cuffs; for, notwithstanding the fact that he bathed twice a day, Mr. Reardon's Hibernian hide contained much of perspiration, coal dust, metal grit and lubricating oil, and such substances can always be washed off celluloid collars and cuffs. To his credit be it known that Terence Reardon knew his haberdashery was not au fait, for his wife never failed to remind him of it; but unfortunately he was the possessor of a pair of grimy hands that nothing on earth could ever make clean, and even when he washed them in benzine they always left black thumb prints on a linen collar during the process of adjustment. He had long since surrendered to his fate.

At eight-fifty-four Mike Murphy arrived. Murphy was edging up into the forties, but still he was young enough at heart to take a keen interest in his personal appearance, and a tailor who belonged to Michael's council of the Knights of Columbus had decked him out in a suit of English tweeds of the latest cut and in most excellent taste.

"Good morning, captain," Cappy Ricks greeted him. "Ahead of time as usual. Meet Mr. Terence Reardon, late chief of the Arab. He is to be a shipmate of yours--chief of the Narcissus, you know.

"Mr. Reardon, shake hands with Captain Mike Murphy. Captain Murphy has been in our employ a number of years as master of sail. The Narcissus will be his first command in steam."

"Terence Reardon, eh?" echoed Mike Murphy pleasantly. "That sounds like a good name. Glad to meet you, chief. What part of the old country are you from? The West?"

The wish was father to the thought, since Mike was from the West himself.

"I'm from the Nort'--from Belfast," Mr. Reardon replied in a deep Kerry brogue, and extended a grimy paw upon the finger of which Mike Murphy observed a gold ring that proclaimed Mr. Terence Reardon--an Irishman, presumably a Catholic--one who had risen to the third degree in Freemasonry.

Cappy Ricks saw that ring also, and started visibly. A Knight Templar himself, Terence Reardon was the last person on earth in whom he expected to find a brother Mason. He glanced at Mike Murphy and saw that the skipper was looking, not at Mr. Reardon, but at the Masonic emblem.

"Sit down, chief," Cappy hastened to interrupt. "Have a chair, captain. Mr. Reardon, my son-in-law, Captain Peasley here, tells me you were chief of the Narcissus when she was on the China run for the Oriental Steamship Company."

Mr. Reardon sat down