The Devil's Admiral

Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
An Adventure Story
1913
I. Missionary and Red-Headed Beggar II. Red-Headed Beggar and Missionary III. The Spy and the Dead Boatswain IV. I Go Aboard the Kut Sang V. The Dead Man in the Passage VI. The Red-Headed Man Makes an Accusation VII. I Turn Spy Myself VIII. Mr. Harris Has a Few Ideas IX. A Fight in the Dark X. The Devil's Admiral XI. A Council of War XII. The Battle on the Bridge XIII. We Plan an Expedition XIV. The Pursuit Ashore XV. Two Thieves and a Fight XVI. The Gold and the Pirates XVII. The Art of Thirkle XVIII. Big Stakes in a Big Game XIX. One Man Less in the Forecastle Mess XX. The Last
Captain Riggs had a trunk full of old logbooks, and he said any of them would make a better story than the Kut Sang . The truth of it was, he didn't want me to write this story. There were things he didn't wish to see in type, perhaps because he feared to read about himself and what had happened in the old steamer in the China Sea.
Folks don't care nothing about cargo-boats, he would say, taking his pipe out of his mouth and shaking his head gravely, whenever I hinted that I would like to tell of our adventure of the Kut Sang . They want yarns of them floating hotels called liners, with palm-gardens in 'em and bands playing at their meals and games and so on going from eight bells to the bos'n's watch.
It was mostly fighting in the Kut Sang , and the mess you and me and poor Harris and the black boy there got into wouldn't be just the quiet sort of reading folks want these days. It was all over in a night and a day, anyway—look at them Northern Spy apples, Mr. Trenholm!
He wanted to forget the Kut Sang and the awful night we had in her. He imagined he didn't figure to advantage in the story, and he winced when I mentioned certain events, although I always insisted that he was the bravest man among us, having a better realization of the odds against us. Those who have faced danger know it takes a brave man to admit that he is beaten, and still keep up the fight.