“Yes, my man, you may consider yourself under arrest!” he said.

“Then you will notice I offer no resistance,” added Newman.  “I am unarmed, and eager to obey all legal commands of my captain.  Shall I lower my arms, and permit this gentleman to fasten the irons upon my wrists?”

“No less eager to break into limbo, than to break out of it—­eh?” commented the captain.  “Yes, I grant you permission to be handcuffed—­but not that way!—­turn around, and place your hands together behind your back.”

Newman promptly complied with the directions, and the carpenter stepped forward and slipped on the cuffs.

“Lock those irons tightly, Connolly,” Swope directed the tradesman.  “We have to deal with a desperate man, a tricky man, a damned jail-bird, Connolly.  Squeeze those irons down upon his wrists.  It doesn’t matter if they pinch him.”

From where I stood I could not see, but I could imagine the steel rings biting cruelly into my friend’s flesh.  I felt a rage against the captain which overcame the sick fear of what he might do to me.  But my rage was impotent; it could not help Newman.

Mister Lynch tried to help him; and by his action indicated plainly what was his position in the matter of the arrest.  He crossed the deck, and examined the prisoner’s wrists.

“These irons are too tight, and will torture the man,” he said to the captain.  “In my judgment, sir, it is not necessary to secure him in this fashion.”

“In my judgment it is,” was Swope’s bland response.  Then he added, “And now, Mister Fitzgibbon, and you, Mister Lynch—­if you will escort this mutinous scoundrel below to the cabin, I’ll see that this affair is properly entered in the logbook, and then we will put him in a place where he cannot work further mischief.  Connolly, you and your mate may go for’ard.”

A moment later I was alone on the poop.  So quickly and quietly had the affair been managed that none of the watch on deck seemed to be aware of it.  They were busied about the fore part of the ship at the various jobs Lynch had set them to.  But the tradesmen of the watch were not in sight, and I had no doubt they were forewarned, and had joined the port watch tradesmen before the cabin, to guard against any possible trouble.

I wondered what to do.  Do something, I felt I must.  If I sang out and informed the watch, the afterguard would reach me and squelch my voice long before my mates could lay aft.  And indeed, laying aft in a body was what the crew must not do.  That would be trouble, mutiny perhaps, and Newman’s injunction was to keep the peace.

I could do nothing to help my friend.  But I felt I must do something.  The cabin skylights were open, for it was tropic weather, and a murmur of voices ascended through the opening.  I could not distinguish words, but I felt I must know what they were saying to Newman, or about him.  So I took a chance.  I slipped the wheel into the becket, and crept to the edge of the skylights.