Fate Knocks at the Door

Andrew Bedient at the age of seventeen in a single afternoon-indeed in one moment of a single afternoon-performed an action which brought him financial abundance for his mature years. Although this narrative less concerns the boy Bedient than the man as he approaches twice seventeen the action is worthy of account beyond the riches that it brought because it seems to draw him into somewhat clearer vision from the shadows of a very strange boyhood. April 1895 the Truxton of which Andrew was cook found herself becalmed in the China Sea midway between Manila and Hong Kong her nose to the North. She was a smart clipper of sixty tons burden with a slightly uptilted stern and as clever a line forward as a pleasure yacht. She was English comparatively new and properly used by the weather was as swift and sprightly of service as an affectionate woman. Her master was Captain Carreras a tubby little man of forty-five bald modest and known among the shipping as a perfect lady. He wore a skull-cap out of port; and as constantly except during meals carried one of a set of rarely-colored meerschaum-bowls to which were attachable bamboo-stems amber-tipped and of various lengths.