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Page 122
"What is it? Don't you know what it is?" replied Shuffles, angrily.
"Upon my life, I don't know."
"You have been a traitor," exclaimed Shuffles, with savage earnestness.
"O! have I?"
"You know you have."
"Perhaps you would be willing to tell me wherein I have been a traitor,"
added Pelham, laughing; for he was enjoying the scene he had witnessed
in the waist, when, one after another, the "outsiders" had made the
signs to his rival.
"You have betrayed the secrets of the Chain."
"Have I?"
"Didn't you give the signs to Paul Kendall, the captain, and half a
dozen others?"
"But, my dear fellow, they are members," replied Pelham, chuckling.
"They are not? and you know they are not."
"But, Shuffles, just consider that all of them voted for you."
"I don't care for that."
"I do. You recognized them as members first, and I couldn't do less than
you did."
"You are a traitor!" said Shuffles, red in the face with passion; and
the word hissed through his closed teeth.
"Well, just as you like: we won't quarrel about the meaning of words,"
replied Pelham, gayly; for he enjoyed the discomfiture of his rival, and
felt that Shuffles deserved all he got, for the foul play of which he
had been guilty on the ballot.
"You pledged yourself to be honest, and stand by the vote, fair or
foul."
"Very true, my dear fellow? and I do so. Give me your orders, and I will
obey them."
"But you have exposed the whole thing," retorted Shuffles. "What can we
do now, when Kendall and the captain know all about it?"
"They don't know any more than the law allows. Besides, they are
members. Didn't they vote for you? Didn't they know beans?" continued
Pelham, in the most tantalizing of tones.
"Do you mean to insult me?" demanded Shuffles, unable to control his
rage.
"Not I. I respect you too much. You are the captain--that is to be--of
the ship," laughed Pelham. "The captain, the second lieutenant, and all
the flunkies, voted for you? and, of course, I couldn't be so deficient
in politeness as to insult one who----"
At that moment Pelham removed his hand from the sheet, and Shuffles,
irritated beyond control at the badinage of his companion, gave him a
sudden push, and the fourth lieutenant went down into the surges, under
the bow of the ship.
As Pelham disappeared beneath the waves, Shuffles was appalled at his
own act; for even he had not sunk so low as to contemplate murder. The
deed was not premeditated. It was done on the spur of angry excitement,
which dethroned his reason. The chief conspirator had so often and so
lightly used the language of the League, about "falling overboard
accidentally," that he had become familiar with the idea; and, perhaps,
the deed seemed less terrible to him than it really was. When the act
was done, on the impulse of the moment, he realized his own situation,
and that of his victim. He would have given anything at that instant, as
he looked down upon the dark waves, to have recalled the deed; but it
was too late. Self-reproach and terror overwhelmed him.
"Man overboard!" he shouted with desperation, as he threw off his
pea-jacket, and dived, head foremost, from the forecastle into the sea.
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