“Then, too, the schedule of the ships on the Atlantic side of the Canal doubtless had been made up already, with a view to handling this cargo ex-Tillicum, and to lose the cargo would throw that schedule out of joint; in fact, from whatever angle I viewed the situation, I could see that the railroad company would prefer to give up its twenty per cent. rather than decline my terms.  They might think their competitor had already made me an offer!  Of course, it was all a mighty bluff on my part, but bluffs are not always called, particularly when they’re made good and strong; and, believe me, my bluff was anything but weak in the knees.  I told the Panama people to wire their reply to me at San Diego, and when I got to that city, twenty-four hours later, their answer was awaiting me.”

“They called your bluff?” Mr. Skinner challenged.

“Pooh-pooh for you!” Matt laughed.  “God is good and the devil not half bad.  I got the guaranties I asked for, old dear!  Don’t you ever think I’d have been crazy enough to go to Panama without them.”

Cappy jerked forward in his chair again.

“Matt,” he said sternly, “you have defaulted in your payments to the Blue Star Navigation Company to the tune of eighteen thousand dollars, and I’d like to hear what you have to say about that.”

“Well, I couldn’t help it,” Matt replied, “I was shy ten thousand dollars when Morrow & Company defaulted on me, and I was at sea when the other payment fell due.  However, you had your recourse.  You could have canceled the charter on me.  That was a chance I had to take.

“Why didn’t you grab the ship away from me?  If you had done that you would be in the clear to-day instead of up to your neck in grief.”

“We’ll grab her away from you to-day—­never fear!” Cappy promised him.  “I guess we’ll get ours from the freight due on that cargo of steel rails you came home with.”

“You have another guess coming, Mr. Ricks.  You’ll not do any grabbing to-day, for the reason that somebody else has already grabbed her.”

“Who?” chorused Cappy and Skinner.

“The United States Marshal.  Half an hour ago the Pacific Shipping Company libeled her.”

“What for, you bonehead?  You haven’t any cause for libel, so how can you make it stick?”

“The Pacific Shipping Company has cause, and it can make the libel stick.  The first mate of the Tillicum assigned to the Pacific Shipping Company his claim for wages as mate—­”

“Matt, you poor goose!  The Pacific Shipping Company owe him his wages.  Your dink of a company chartered the boat, and we will not pay such a ridiculous claim.”

“I do not care whether you do or not.  That libel will keep you from canceling my charter, although when you failed to cancel when I failed to make the payments as stipulated, your laxity must be regarded in the eyes of the law as evidence that you voluntarily waived that clause in the charter; and after you have voluntarily waived a thing twice you’ll have a job making it stick the third time.”