"That's a fact!" said Johnny. "I ought to stop it, for you are not the master of the Storm King now. I expect Bill Steele will be her next captain.
"Bill Steele!" repeated Tom. "Not the colonel of the academy battalion?"
"That's the very fellow. She couldn't be in better hands, for I understand that he is a capital sailor. He is a New Bedford boy, and, of course, knows all about a boat."
"O, now, how is he going to get her?" asked Tom, who was very much astonished at this information.
"Why, haven't you heard that your father has presented her to the principal of the academy? Well, it's a fact. Mr. Graves told me all about it, not five minutes ago."
"Then I can't be a trader!" whined Tom, hiding his face in his handkerchief. "I won't stand it; that's just all about it! If I don't sail that sloop, nobody shall. I'll sink her so deep in the bay that she can never be raised again!" As Tom said this, he abruptly left Johnny and walked rapidly down the street.
This was by far the severest blow he had yet experienced. To be obliged to see that fine little yacht, which had been built in accordance with his orders, which every one in the village so much admired, and which he had so long regarded as his own property, to see her pass into the hands of some one else, and the very one of all others he most despised, was more than he could endure. Bill Steele seemed to be his evil genius. He had obtained possession of the silver eagles, and received the colonel's commission, for which Tom had worked so hard; and now, he was to be the captain of the Storm King! If the principal had purchased the yacht, Tom thought he would not have felt so badly about it; but his own father had bought her, and, instead of giving her to him, as he ought to have done, and setting him up in business as a trader, he had presented her to the faculty of the military school, when he knew, all the while, that his son disliked every one of them. Another thing that made Tom very angry, was the thought that he himself had been the bearer of the letter in which his father offered the yacht for the principal's acceptance. If he had met Johnny five minutes sooner, he never would have carried that letter to its address. He would have torn it up, or thrown it into the harbor. Tom was sorely distressed. It was no easy matter to keep back his tears, but having been given many opportunities to practice self-control, during the course of his varied and eventful life, and being at that very moment on one of the principal streets, where people were constantly passing him, he struggled manfully with his emotion, and even succeeded in forcing a smile upon his face. By the time he reached the office he had so far choked down his feelings, that a stranger would never have imagined him to be a disappointed boy, or that he regarded himself as the most abused person in existence.
During all that forenoon he performed his duties as usual, and when he went home, to dinner with his father, the latter told him what he had done with the Storm King. "Mr. Graves built her expecting that I would pay for her," said he, "and, of course, I could not disappoint him."
"But why didn't you give her to me?" inquired Tom. "They have no use for her at the academy."