Page:The Wireless Operator with the U.S. Coast Guard.djvu/262

 stateroom, where he locked the door, hung a cloth over the window, and got to work. For more than an hour he searched everywhere and found nothing out of the way. But when he got to work in the bunks, he found, tucked securely away under the top mattress, a peculiar little hammer. He put the room to rights again, uncovered the window-pane, picked up the hammer, and, concealing it in the palm of his hand, stepped out on deck.

He found himself face to face with the ship’s carpenter. A sudden lurch of the ship threw them together. Laughing, each grasped the other. As well as he could the quartermaster kept his fingers closed over the hammer-head, but the quick eyes of the carpenter saw the protruding ends of it.

“So you’re the fellow who borrowed that, are you?” he said. “I’ve been hunting all over for that hammer. Why didn’t you tell me you had borrowed it?”

For a moment the quartermaster was at a loss. He knew not what to say. Then he asked the carpenter to come with him to the captain.

“Captain,” said the quartermaster, when they had mounted to the bridge, “I have some things I would like to tell you. The carpenter here can help explain them.”

The captain stepped to the chart-room and dis