The Pirate of Panama (Musaicum Adventure Classics). William MacLeod Raine

in the padded library with its shelves of books, its piano and music rack, and in the smoking room arranged to satisfy the demands of the most fastidious.

      I had resigned my place with Kester & Wilcox to help push the preparation for our departure, but I was still spending a good deal of my time in the office cleaning up some matters upon which I had been working. Much of the time I was down at the docks, and when I could not be there my thoughts were full of the Argos and her voyage.

      Since I was giving my time to the firm without pay I took the liberty of using the boy Jimmie to run errands for me. Journeying back and forth to the wharf with messages and packages, he naturally worked up a feverish interest in our cruise, even though he did not know the object of it. When he came out point-blank one morning with a request to go with us as cabin boy I was not surprised. I sympathized with Master Jimmie's desire, but I very promptly put the lid on his hopes.

      "Nothing doing, Mr. James A. Garfield Welch."

      "You've gotter have a kid to run errands for youse, Mr. Sedgwick," he pleaded.

      "No use talking, Jimmie. You're not going."

      "All right," he acquiesced meekly.

      Too meekly, it occurred to me later.