"Good!" cried the captain approvingly. "I knew you'd sailed with me too long to desert me when it came to a pinch."
"That makes ten of us altogether," observed Tyke Grimshaw.
"Eleven," put in Ruth. "Don't forget me."
"Eleven," repeated the master of the Bertha Hamilton, looking at her fondly. "You're a true sailor's daughter, Ruth. I'm proud of you, my dear."
"Eleven," said Drew. "That leaves twenty-five on the ship, including Ditty."
"Twenty-four," put in Tyke. "There's one less than there was a few minutes ago."
"Yes," agreed the captain sadly. "And I've no doubt the poor fellow was killed because he wouldn't join the rest of the gang. Twenty-four, then. That's pretty big odds against eleven."
"Beggin' your pardon, sir," said Barker, who was the oldest man of the crew, "but there's some of our mates over there that wouldn't never fight on the side of that Bug-eye—meanin' no disrespect to the mate, sir. Whitlock wouldn't for one, nor Gunther, nor Trent. I'd lay to that, sir."
"No, sir," put in Thompson; "an' Ashley wouldn't neither. No more would Sanders."
"I believe you, my lads," replied the captain. "They've sailed with us before. But even if they don't fight against us, they can't fight with us as things stand now. The very least that Ditty will do with them is to hold them prisoners until he's put the job through."