“You stole ship. If you value your ticket bring her back withcargo agent provides.”
Naturally this somewhat cryptic cablegram roused Matt Peasley's curiosity. He could not rest until he had interviewed the agent—and after that sop to his inquisitiveness he returned to the Retriever a broken man. The loyal and disgusted Murphy read the trouble in the master's face.
“What new deviltry's afoot now, Matt?” he demanded, in his eagerness and sympathy forgetting the respect due his superior.
“Green hides, Mike!” the skipper answered, in his distress failing to notice the mate's faux pas and making one himself. “Green hides, old pal; and they stink something horrible. Back to Seattle with the dirty mess, and then another cargo of creosoted—”
“King's X!” yelled Mr. Murphy. “I crossed my fingers the minute your face appeared over the rail. I quit—and I quit as soon as this piling is out. I tell you I won't keep company with green hides. No, sir; I won't. I tell you I will—not—do it! Why, we might as well have a dead hog in the hold! Captain Matt, I hate to throw you down in a foreign port; but this—is absolutely—the finish!”
“Do you value your ticket, Mike?” the captain queried ominously.
“What's a ticket when a man's lost his self-respect?” Mr. Murphy raved.
Matt handed him Cappy's cablegram and the mate read it.
“I think that bet goes double, Mike,” the skipper warned him. “You signed for the round trip. I've got to go through—and there's strength in numbers.”
“Well,” said Mr. Murphy reluctantly, “I suppose I do attach a certain—er—sentimental value to my ticket.”
“I thought you would. Cappy's got us by the short hair, Mike; and the only thing to do is to fly to it, with all sails set. We must never let on he's given us anything out of the ordinary.”
Mr. Murphy shivered; for, as Cappy had remarked to Mr. Skinner, the mate was Irish, hence imaginative. He imagined he smelled the green hides already, and quite suddenly he gagged and sprang for the rail. Poor fellow! He had stood much of late and his stomach was a trifle sensitive from a diet of creosote straight.
Somehow they got the awful cargo aboard, though, at that, there were not sufficient hides to half load her; in consequence of which all hands realized that Cappy had merely given them this dab of freight to sicken them. They cursed him all the way back to Seattle, where the crew quit the minute the vessel was made fast to the dock.
“Here's a telegram for you, sir,” Mr. Murphy remarked when Matt Peasley came aboard after cashing a draft on the Blue Star Navigation Company to pay off his crew. It proved to be from Cappy Ricks and said merely:
“Discharge that cargo of hides or take the consequences!”
“The old sinner thought I'd dog it, I suppose,” Matt sneered, as he passed the message to Mr. Murphy, who shivered as he read it. “I guess you're elected, Mike,” the skipper continued. “The second mate has quit. However, it isn't going to be very hard on you this time. I was speaking to the skipper of that schooner in the berth ahead of us, and he gave me a recipe for killing the perfume of a cargo of green hides.”
“If he'd given it to us in Antofagasta, I'd name a ship after him some day,” Mr. Murphy mourned.
“Well, we've gotten it in time to be of some use,” Matt declared. “You don't suppose I'm going to let this old snoozer Ricks get away with the notion that he put one over on us, do you? Shall we haul Old Glory down? No! Never! I'll just switch off the laughing gas on Cappy Ricks,” and the young skipper went ashore and wired his managing owner as follows:
“Green hides are the essence of horror if you do not know howto handle them. Fortunately I do. Pour water on a green hideand you muzzle the stink. I judge from your last telegram youthought you handed me something.”
When Cappy Ricks got that telegram he flew into a rage and refused to believe Matt Peasley's statement until he had first called up a dealer in hides and confirmed it. The entire office staff wondered all that day what made Cappy so savage.
By the following day, however, Cappy's naturally optimistic nature had reasserted itself. He admitted to himself that he had fanned out, but still the knowledge brought him some comfort.
“He's walloped me so,” Cappy soliloquized, “he just can't help writing and crowing about it. If I didn't do anything else I bet I've pried a letter out of him. It certainly will be a comfort to see something except a telegram and a statement of account from that fellow.”
However, when the report of the voyage arrived, Mr. Skinner reported that it contained no letter. Cappy's face reflected his disappointment.
“I guess you'll have to go stronger than green hides to get a yelp out of that fellow,” Mr. Skinner predicted.
“Why, there isn't anything stronger than a cargo of green hides, Skinner,” Cappy declared thoughtfully. He clawed his whiskers a moment. Then: “What have you got for her on the Sound, Skinner?”
“Nothing nasty, sir. We'll have to give him a regular cargo this time—that is, unless he quits. I've got a cargo for Sydney, ready at our own mill at Port Hadlock.”
“Well, he hasn't resigned yet,” Cappy declared; “so we might as well beat him to it. Wire him, Skinner, to tow to our mill at Port Hadlock and load for Sydney. If he believes we're willing to call this thing a dead heat he may conclude to stick. Tell him this is a nice cargo.” Again Cappy clawed his whiskers. “Sydney, eh?” he said musingly. “That's nice! We can send him over to Newcastle from there to pick up a cargo of coal, and maybe he'll come home afire! If we can't hand him a stink, Skinner, we'll put a few gray hairs in his head.”
These instructions Mr. Skinner grudgingly complied with; and Matt Peasley, with his hatches wide open and buckets of punk burning in the hold to dispel the lingering fragrance of his recent cargo—concluding that, on the whole, he and Mr. Murphy had come through the entire affair very handsomely indeed—towed down to Hadlock and commenced to take on cargo. If Cappy Ricks was willing to declare a truce then Matt Peasley would declare one too.
Matt's peaceful acquiescence in his owner's program merely served to arouse Cappy Ricks' abnormal curiosity. The more he thought of Matt Peasley the greater grew his desire for a closer scrutiny. The most amazing man in the world had been in his employ a year and a half, and as yet they had never met; unless the Retriever should happen to be loaded for San Francisco years might elapse before they should see each other; and now that he had attained to his allotted three score years and ten Cappy decided that he could no longer gamble on the future.
He summoned Mr. Skinner.
“Skinner, my dear boy,” he announced with the naive simplicity that made him so lovable. “I suppose it's very childish of me, but I have a tremendous desire to see this extraordinary fellow Peasley.”
“You can afford to satisfy your slightest whim, Mr. Ricks,” he replied. “I'll load her for San Francisco after she returns from Australia. I daresay if he ever gets through the Golden Gate he'll call up at the office.”
“Skinner, I can't wait that long. Many things may happen. Ahem! Harump-h-h-h! Wire the man Peasley, Skinner, to have his photograph taken and forwarded to me immediately charging expense.”
“Very well, sir,” Mr. Skinner responded.
“Well, I'll be keel-hauled and skull-dragged,” Matt Peasley declared to Mr. Murphy. “Here's a telegram from the owners demanding my photograph.”
Mr. Murphy read the amazing message, scratched his raven poll, and declared his entire willingness to be damned.
“It's a trap,” he announced presently. “Don't send it. Matt, you look about twenty years old and for the next few years, if you expect to work under the Blue Star flag, you must remember your face isn't your fortune. You've got to be pickled in salt for twenty years to please Cappy Ricks. If he sees your photograph he'll fire you, Matt. I know that old crocodile. All he wants is an excuse to give you the foot, anyhow.”
“But he's ordered me to send it, Mike. How am I going to get out of it?”
As has been stated earlier in this tale, Mr. Murphy had an imagination.
“Go over into the town, sir,” he said, “and in any photograph gallery you can pick up a picture of some old man. Write your name across it and send it to Cappy. He'll be just as happy, then, as though he had good sense.”
“By George, I'll just do that!” Matt declared, and forthwith went ashore.
He sought the only photographer in Port Hadlock. At the entrance to the shop he found a glass case containing samples of the man's art, and was singularly attracted to the photograph of a spruce little old gentleman in a Henry Clay collar, long mutton-chop whiskers, and spectacles.
Moreover, to Matt's practiced eye, this individual seemed to savor of a Down-Easter. He was just the sort of man one might expect to bear the name of Matthew Peasley; so the captain mounted the stairs and sought the proprietor, from whom he purchased the picture in question for the trifling sum of fifty cents. Then he bore it away to the Retriever, scrawled his autograph across the old gentleman's hip and mailed the picture to Cappy Ricks.
Mr. Skinner entered Cappy Ricks' office bearing an envelope marked “Photo. Do not crush or bend!” From the announcement in the upper right-hand corner the general manager deduced that the photograph was from Matt Peasley.
“Well, here's Captain Peasley's picture, Mr. Ricks,” he announced.
“Ah! Splendid. Prompt, isn't he?” Cappy tore open the envelope, drew forth the photograph, scrutinized it carefully and then laid it face down on his desk, while he got out his spectacles, cleaned them carefully, adjusted them and gazed at the photograph once more.
“Ahem! Hu-m-m-m! Harump-h-h-h! Well, Skinner, life is certainly full of glad surprises,” he announced presently, and added—“particularly where that man Peasley is concerned. I never did see the beat of that fellow.”
“May I see his photograph, sir?” Mr. Skinner pleaded.
“Certainly,” and Cappy passed it to the general manager, who glanced once at it and smiled down whimsically at Cappy.
“Yes, I agree with you, Mr. Ricks,” he said. “Of all the surprises that man Peasley has handed us, this is the greatest.”
Cappy nodded and smiled a little prescient smile. “Skinner,” he said, “send in a stenographer. I'm going to send him a telegram.”
He did. Matt Peasley blinked when he got it, and for the first time since he had commenced exchanging telegrams and cablegrams with the peculiar Mr. Ricks he was thoroughly non-plussed—so much so, in fact, that he called his right bower, Michael J. Murphy, into consultation.
“Mike,” he said, and handed the mate the telegram, “what in the world do you suppose the old duffer means by that?”
Mr. Murphy read:
“Matt, I always knew you were young, but I had no suspicion youwere a child in arms until I received your photograph.”
“Serves you right,” the mate declared. “I told you to send the photo of an OLD man.”
“But I did, Mike. I sent him a picture of an old pappy-guy sort of man, with long, mutton-chop whiskers, glasses and an old-fashioned collar as tall as the taffrail.”
“It beats my time then what he's driving at, Captain Matt. But then one can never tell what Cappy Ricks is up to. I've heard he's a great hand to have his little joke, so I daresay that telegram is meant for sarcasm.”
Matt had a horrifying inspiration. “I know what's wrong,” he cried bitterly. “He thinks I'm so old I ought to be retired, and that telegram is in the nature of a hint that a letter, asking for my resignation, is on the way now.”
“Why—why—why?” Mr. Murphy stuttered, “did you send him the picture of Methuselah himself? Heaven's sake, skipper, there's a happy medium, you know. I meant for you to pick yourself out a man of about fifty-five, and here you've slipped him a patriarch of ninety. Sarcasm! I should say so.”
They stared at each other a few seconds; then Mr. Murphy had an equally disturbing inspiration.
“By Neptune!” he suggested, “maybe you sent him the picture of somebody he knows!”
“Well, in that case, Mike, I'm not going to hang on the hook of suspicion. Maybe I can find out whose picture I sent,” and away Matt went up town to the photograph gallery. When he returned ten minutes later Mr. Murphy, sighting him a block in the offing, knew the skipper of the barkentine Retriever for a broken man! Beyond doubt he had shipped a full cargo of grief.
“Well?” he queried as Matt hove alongside. “Did you find out?”
Matt nodded gloomily.
“Who?” Mr. Murphy demanded peremptorily.
“Cappy Ricks!” Matt almost wailed.
“NO!” Mr. Murphy roared.
“Yes! The old scoundrel was up here three years ago, visiting this mill—you know, Mike, he owns it—and the Retriever was here loading at the time. He and Captain Kendall were close friends, and they went over to that photograph shop, had their pictures taken and swapped—and like a poor, helpless, luckless boob I had to come along and buy the sample picture the photographer hung in his case. It never occurred to me to ask questions—and I might have known nobody but a prominent citizen ever gets into a show-case—”
“Glory, glory, hallelujah,” Mr. Murphy crooned in a deep, chain-locker voice, and fled from the skipper's wrath.
An hour later, in the privacy of his cabin, Matt Peasley took his pen in hand and wrote to Cappy Ricks:
Mr. Alden P. Ricks,Dear Sir:—I herewith tender my resignation as master of the barkentineRetriever, same to take effect on my return from Sydney—orbefore I sail, if you desire. If I do not hear from you beforeI sail I shall assume that it will be all right to quit when Iget back from Australia.I will not be twenty-three years old until the Fourth of July.I was afraid you wouldn't trust me with a big ship like theRetriever if you knew; so I sent you a photograph I purchasedfor fifty cents from the local photographer. I guess that'sall—except that you couldn't find a better man to take myplace than Mr. Murphy. He has had the experience.Yours truly,Matt Peasley.
There were tears in his eyes as he dropped that letter into the mail box. The Blue Star Navigation Company owned the Retriever, but—but—well she was Matt Peasley's ship and he loved her as men learn to love their homes. It broke his heart to think of giving her up.
“Skinner,” said Cappy Ricks, “I've got a letter from the man Peasley at last; and now, by golly, I can quit and take a vacation. Send in a stenographer.” The stenographer entered. “Take telegram—direct message,” he ordered, and commenced to dictate:
Captain Matthew Peasley,Your resignation accepted. You are too almighty good for awindjammer, Matthew. You need more room for the development ofyour talent. Give Murphy the ship, with my compliments, andtell him I've enjoyed the fight because it went to a knock-out.Report to me at this office as soon as possible. You belongin steam. A second mate's berth waiting for you. In a yearyou will be first mate of steam; a year later you will bemaster of steam, at two-fifty a month, and I will have afour-million-foot freighter waiting for you if you make good.The picture was a bully joke; but I could not laugh, Matt. Itis so long since I was a boy.Cappy.
“Send that right away, like a good girl,” he ordered. “He's about loaded and he may have towed out before the telegram reaches him. Or, better still, send the message in duplicate—one copy to the mill and the other in care of the custom-house at Port Townsend. He'll have to touch in there to clear the ship.”
He walked into Mr. Skinner's office.
“Skinner,” he said, “Murphy has the Retriever, and you're in charge of the shipping. Attend to the transfer of authority before she gets out of the Sound.”
Cappy Ricks' telegram to Matt, in care of the mill at Port Hadlock, arrived several hours after the Retriever, fully loaded with fir lumber, had been snatched away from the mill dock by a tug and started on her long tow to Dungeness, where the hawser would be cast off. It was not until the vessel came to a brief anchorage in the strait off Port Townsend, the port of entry to Puget Sound, and Matt went ashore to clear his ship, that the duplicate telegram sent in care of the Collector of the Port, was handed to him.
He read and reread it. The news it contained seemed too good to be true.
“I guess I won't clear her after all,” he announced to the deputy collector.
The official nodded. “I didn't think you would,” he replied. “I have a telegram from the custom-house at San Francisco, apprising me that Michael J. Murphy has been appointed master of the Retriever, so if she's to be cleared Captain Murphy will have to do the job.”
“He's my mate, and if you'll wait about half an hour I'll go get the old Siwash,” Matt replied happily, and started back to the Retriever in a hurry. He had been gone less than twenty minutes, a fact noted by the astute Murphy, who met his superior at the rail as the latter climbed up the Jacob's ladder.
“Why, you haven't cleared the old girl so soon, have you, sir?” he queried.
“Read that,” Matt announced dramatically.
Mr. Murphy read the telegram. “Bust my bob-stay!” he murmured. “The dirty old assassin! The slimy old pile-worm! The blessed old duffer! After treating us like dogs for a year and a half he gives me the ship, sets you down for a two year apprenticeship in steam and says he's going to build you a four-million-foot freighter! The scoundrelly old renegade! Why, say, Matt, Cappy's been spilling the acid all over us and we never knew it. Somehow, I have a notion that if we had yelled murder when he was beating us he'd have had us both out of his employ while you'd be saying Jack Robinson.”
“I believe you, Mike. But he needn't think he's going to grab two years of my precious young life before he'll trust me with a steamer. I have an unlimited license for sail, and if I can pass the examination for steam before the inspectors—and I can—I'll get my license immediately. Just consider the old boy's inconsistency, Mike. If a man can handle a square-rigged ship he ought to be trusted with anything; yet, when he gives me a steamer you'd think he was giving me a man's job! Fair weather or foul, you stand on the bridge and control your vessel with the engine room telegraph. Shucks! I wonder if that crotchety old joker thinks it will take me two years to learn how to dock a steam schooner?”
Mr. Murphy hitched his trousers, stuck his thumbs in his belt and glared at Matt Peasley. “See here, you,” he declared, “you're a child wonder, all right, but the trouble with you is, you hate yourself too much. Listen to me, kid. I'm the skipper of the Retriever now and you're my friend, young Matt Peasley, so I can talk to you as a friend. You're a pretty skookum youth and I'd hate like everything to mix it with you, but if you start to veto the old man's orders you may look for a fine thrashing from me when I get back from Australia! I won't have you making a damned fool of yourself, Matt. If you are in command of a four-million-foot freighter by the time you're twenty-seven, you'll be the youngest skipper of steam afloat, and you ought to be down on your marrow bones giving thanks to the good Lord who has done so much for you, instead of planning insurrection against Cappy Ricks. The idea!”
“But what sense is there in waiting—”
“When I refereed the scrap between you and All Hands And Feet you took my advice, didn't you? You didn't say to me then: 'What sense is there in waiting? Let me go in and finish the job and have done with it,' did you?”
“But this is business, Mike. For a year and a half Cappy has been having a whole lot of fun out of me—”
“It might have been fun for him, but it came pretty near being the death of me,” Mr. Murphy contradicted. “If that jag of green hides from Antofagasta was a joke, beware of Cappy Ricks when he's serious. He's serious about you, Matt. He's picked on you sight unseen, and he's going to do something for you. He's an old man, Matt. Let him have his way and you'll profit by it.”
“Well, I'll see what he has to say, at any rate,” Matt compromised, and they went below, Matt to pack his sea chest and Mr. Murphy to shave and array himself in a manner befitting the master of a big barkentine about to present himself at the custom-house for the first time to clear his ship.
An hour later Matt Peasley found himself sitting on his sea chest on the cap of the wharf, watching the Retriever slipping down the strait under command of Captain Michael J. Murphy, while a new chief mate, shipped in Port Townsend, counted off the watches. Presently she turned a bend and was gone; and immediately he felt like a homeless wanderer. The thought of the doughty Murphy in that snug little cabin so long sacred to Matt Peasley brought a pang of near jealousy to the late commander of the Retriever; as he reflected on the two years of toil ahead of him before men would again address him as Captain Peasley, he wondered whether the game really would be worth the candle; for he had all of a Down-Easter's love for a sailing ship.
He recalled to mind Mr. Murphy's favorite story of the old sailing skipper who went into steam and who, during his very first watch on the steamship's bridge, ordered the man at the wheel to starboard his helm, and then forgot to tell him to steady it—the consequence being that the helmsman held hard-a-starboard and the ship commenced to describe a circle; whereupon the old sailing skipper got excited and screamed: “Back that main yard!” Matt felt that should anything like that happen to him in steam and the news should ever leak out, he would have to go back to the Atlantic Coast rather than face the gibes of his shipmates on the Pacific.
The passenger boat from Victoria picked him up and set him down in Seattle that night, and the following morning he boarded a train for San Francisco to report to Cappy Ricks.
At luncheon in the dining car that day Matt Peasley found himself seated opposite a man who had boarded the train with him at Seattle. As the young captain plied his knife and fork he was aware that this person's gaze rested with something more than casual interest on his—Matt's—left forearm; whereupon the latter realized that his vis-a-vis yearned to see more of a little decoration which, in the pride of his first voyage, Matt had seen fit to have tattooed on the aforesaid forearm by the negro cook. So, since he was the best-natured young man imaginable, Matt decided presently to satiate his neighbor's curiosity.
“It's a lady climbing a ladder,” he announced composedly and drew back his sleeve to reveal this sample of black art. “I have a shield and an eagle on my breast and a bleeding heart, with a dagger stuck through it, on my right forearm.”
“I didn't mean to be rude,” the other answered, flushing a little. “I couldn't help noticing the chorus lady's shapely calves when you speared that last pickle; so I knew you were a sailor. I concluded you were an American sailor before I learned that you advertise the fact on your breast, and I was wondering whether you belong in the navy or the merchant marine.”
“I'm from blue water,” Matt replied pleasantly. “You're in the shipping business, I take it.”
“Almost—I'm a ship, freight and marine insurance broker.” And the stranger handed over a calling card bearing the name of Mr. Allan Hayes. “I'm from Seattle.”
“Peasley is my name, Mr. Hayes,” Matt answered heartily, glad of this chance acquaintance with a man with whom he could converse on a subject of mutual interest. “I haven't any post-office address,” he added whimsically.
“Going over to Columbia River to join your ship, I daresay,” Mr. Hayes suggested.
“No, sir. I'm bound for San Francisco, to get a job in steam and work up to a captaincy.”
“Wherein you show commendable wisdom, Mr. Peasley,” the broker answered. “A man can get so far in a windjammer—a hundred a month in the little coasting schooners and a hundred and twenty-five in the big vessels running foreign—and there he sticks. In steam schooners a good man can command two hundred dollars a month, with a chance for promotion into a big freighter, for the reason that in steam one has more opportunity to show the stuff that's in one.”
“How far are you going?” Matt demanded.
“I'm bound for San Francisco too.”
“Good!” Matt replied, for, like most boys, he was a gregarious animal, and Mr. Hayes seemed to be a pleasant, affable gentleman. “I suppose you know most of the steam vessels on this coast?” he continued, anxious to turn the conversation into channels that might be productive of information valuable to him in his new line of endeavor.
Mr. Hayes nodded. “I have to,” he said, “if I'm to do any business negotiating charters; in fact, I'm bound to San Francisco now to charter two steamers.”
“Freight or passenger?”
“Freight. There's nothing for a broker in a passenger vessel. I'm scouting for two boats for the Mannheim people. You've heard of them, of course. They own tremendous copper mines in Alaska, but they can't seem to get the right kind of flux to smelt their ore up there; so they're going to freight it down to their smelter in Tacoma.”
“I see. But how do you work the game to pay your office rent?”
“Why, that's very simple, Mr. Peasley. Their traffic manager merely calls me up and tells me to find two ore freighters for him. He doesn't know where to look for them, but he knows I do, and that it will not cost him anything to engage me to find them for him. Well, I locate the vessels and when I come to terms with the owners, and those terms are satisfactory to my clients, I close the charter and the vessel owners pay me a commission of two and a half per cent. on all the freight money earned under the charter. A shipowner generally is glad to pay a broker a commission for digging him up business for his ships—particularly when freights are dull.”
Matt Peasley nodded his comprehension and did some quick mental arithmetic.
“Why, you'll make a nice little fee on those ore boats,” he said. “I suppose it's a time charter.”
“Four years,” Mr. Hayes replied, and smiled fatly at the thought of his income. “Of course I'd make a larger commission if the freight rate was figured on a tonnage basis; but on long charters, like these I mention, the ships are rented at a flat rate a day or month. Say, for instance, I negotiate these charters at the rate of four hundred dollars a day, or eight hundred dollars a day for the two boats. Two and a half per cent. of eight hundred dollars is twenty dollars a day, which I will earn as commission every day for the next four years that the vessels are not in dry dock or laid up for repairs.”
“And you probably will earn that by one day of labor,” Matt Peasley murmured admiringly—“perhaps one hour of actual labor!”
Mr. Hayes smiled again his fat smile. He shrugged.
“That's business,” he said carelessly. “An ounce of promotion is worth a ton of horse power.”
“Well, I should say so, Mr. Hayes! But you'll have quite a search to find an ore boat on the Pacific Coast. There are some coal boats running to Coos Bay, but they're hardly big enough; and then I suppose they're kept pretty busy in the coal trade, aren't they? It seems to me that what you need for your business would be two of those big steel ore vessels, with their engines astern—the kind they use on the Great Lakes.”
“That is exactly why I am going to San Francisco, Mr. Peasley. There are on this Coast two ships such as you describe—sister ships and just what the doctor ordered.”
“What are their names?”
“The Lion and the Unicorn.”
Matt Peasley paused, with a forkful of provender halfway to his mouth. The S.S. Lion, eh? Why, that was one of Cappy Ricks' vessels! He remembered passing her off Cape Flattery once and seeing the Blue Star house flag fluttering at the fore.
“Were they Lake boats originally?” he queried.
Mr. Hayes nodded.
“What are they doing out here?”
“Right after the San Francisco fire, when fir lumber jumped from a twelve-dollar base to twenty-five, lumber freights soared accordingly,” Hayes explained. “Vessels that had been making a little money at four dollars a thousand feet, from Oregon and Washington ports to San Francisco, were enabled to get ten dollars; and anything that would float was hauled out of the bone yard and put to work. Old Man Ricks, of the Blue Star Navigation Company, was the first to see the handwriting on the wall; so he sneaked East and bought the Lion and the Unicorn. It was just the old cuss's luck to have a lot of cash on hand; and he bought them cheap, loaded them with general cargo in New York, and paid a nice dividend on them on their very first voyage under the Blue Star flag. When he got them on the Coast he put them into the lumber trade and they paid for themselves within a year.
“Then, just before the panic of 1907, old Ricks unloaded the Unicorn on the Black Butte Company for ten thousand dollars more than he paid for her—the old scamp! He's the shrewdest trader on the whole Pacific Coast. He had no sooner sawed the Unicorn off on the Black Butte people than the freight market collapsed in the general crash, and ever since then the owners of the Lion and the Unicorn have been stuck with their vessels. They're so big it's next to impossible to keep them running coastwise in the lumber trade during a dull period, and they're not big enough for the foreign trade. About the only thing they could do profitably was to freight coal, coal freights have dropped until the margin of profit is very meager; competition is keen and for the last six months the Lion and the Unicorn have been laid up.”
Matt Peasley smiled.
“They'll be hungry for the business,” he said, “and I'm sailor enough to see you'll be able to drive a bargain without much trouble.”
“I ought to get them pretty cheap,” Mr. Hayes admitted. “As you perhaps know, a vessel deteriorates faster when laid up than she does in active service; and an owner will do almost anything to keep her at sea, provided he can make a modest rate of interest on her cost price or present market value.”
“Naturally,” Matt Peasley observed as they rose from the table.
He purchased a cigar for Mr. Hayes, and as they retired to the buffet car to continue their acquaintance something whispered to Matt not to divulge to this somewhat garrulous stranger the news that he was a sea captain lately in the employ of the Blue Star Navigation Company and soon to enter that employ again. He had learned enough to realize that Cappy's bank roll was threatened by this man from Seattle; that with his defenses leveled, as it were, the old gentleman would prove an easy victim unless warned of the impending attack.
Therefore, since Matt had not sought Mr. Hayes' confidence nor accepted it under a pledge of secrecy, he decided that there could be nothing unethical in taking advantage of it. Plainly the broker had jumped to the conclusion that Matt was a common sailor—above the average in point of intelligence, but so young and unsophisticated that one need not bother to be reserved or cautious in his presence. Some vague understanding of this had come to Matt Peasley; hence throughout the remainder of the journey his conversations with the broker bore on every other subject under heaven except ships and shipowners.
In his private office Cappy Ricks sat on his spine, with his old legs on his desk and his head sunk forward on his breast. His eyes were closed; to the casual observer he would have appeared to be dozing. Any one of his employees, however, would have known Cappy was merely thinking. It was his habit to close his eyes and sit very still whenever he faced a tussle with a tough proposition.
Presently an unmistakably feminine kiss, surreptitiously delivered, roused Cappy from his meditations. He opened his eyes and beheld his daughter Florence, a radiant debutante of twenty, and the sole prop of her eccentric parent's declining years.
“Daddy dear,” she announced, “there's something wrong with my bank account. I've just come from the Marine National Bank and they wouldn't cash my check.”
“Of course not,” Cappy replied, beaming affectionately. “They telephoned about five minutes ago that you're into the red again; so I've instructed Skinner to deposit five thousand to your credit.”
“Oh, but I want ten thousand!” she protested.
“Can't have it, Florry!” he declared. “The old limousine will have to do. Go slow, my dear—go slow! Why, they're offering random cargoes freely along the street for nine dollars. Logs cost six dollars, with a dollar and a half to manufacture—that's seven and a half; and three and a half water freight added—that's eleven dollars. Eleven-dollar lumber selling for nine dollars, and no business at that! I haven't had a vessel dividend in six months—”
Mr. Skinner entered.
“Mr. Ricks,” he announced, “Captain Peasley, late of the Retriever, is in the outer office. Shall I tell him to wait?”
“No. Haven't we been itching to see each other the past eighteen months? Show him in immediately, Skinner.” Cappy turned to his daughter. “I want to show you something my dear,” he said; “something you're not likely to meet very often in your set—and that's a he-man. Do you remember hearing me tell the story of the mate that thrashed the big Swede skipper I sent to Cape Town to thrash him and bring the vessel home?”
“Do you mean the captain that never writes letters?”
“That's the man. The fellow I've been having so much fun with—the Nervy Matt that tried to hornswoggle me with my own photograph. Passed it off as his own, Florry! He hails from my old home town, and he's a mere boy—Come in!”
The door opened to admit Matt Peasley; and as he paused just inside the entrance, slightly embarrassed at finding himself under the cool scrutiny of the trimmest, most dashing little craft he had ever seen, Miss Florry decided that her father was right. Here, indeed, was a specimen of the genus Homo she had not hitherto seen. Six feet three he was, straight from shoulder to hip, broad-chested and singularly well formed and graceful for such a big man.
He wore stout shoes, without toe caps—rather old-fashioned footgear, Florry thought; but they were polished brightly. A tailor-made, double-breasted blue serge suit, close-hauled and demoded; a soft white silk shirt, with non-detachable collar; a plain black silk four-in-hand tie, and a uniform cap, set a little back and to one side on thick, black, glossy, wavy hair, completed his attire. He had his right hand in his trousers pocket; his left was on the doorknob. He glanced from her to her father.
“He's handsome,” thought Florry. “What a beautiful tan on his throat! He looks anything but the brute he is. But he hasn't any manners. Oh, dear! He stands there like a graven image.”
Matt Peasley's hand came out of his pocket; off came his cap and he bowed slightly.
“I am Captain Peasley,” he said.
Cappy Ricks, leaning forward on the edge of his swivel chair, with head slightly bent, made a long appraisal of the young man over the rims of his spectacles.
“Ahem!” he said. “Huh! Harumph!” Ensued another terrible silence. Then: “Young scoundrel!” Cappy cried. “Infernal young scoundrel!”
“I accept the nomination,” said Matt dryly. “You'd never know me from my photograph, would you, sir? I'd know you from yours, though—in a minute!”
Miss Florry tittered audibly, thus drawing on herself the attention of the skipper, who was audacious enough to favor her with a solemn wink.
“None of your jokes with me, sir!” said Cappy severely.
“That's just what I say, sir; none of your jokes on me! Those green hides were absolutely indecent.”
“Matt, you're a fresh young fellow,” Cappy charged, struggling to suppress a smile.
“And I was raised on salt water too,” Matt added seriously.
Cappy laughed.
“You're a Thomaston Peasley,” he declared, and shook hands. “Ever hear of Ethan Peasley back there?”
“He was my uncle, sir. He was drowned at sea.”
“He was a boyhood chum of mine, Matt. Permit me to present my daughter, Miss Florence.”
Miss Florence favored the captain with her most bewitching smile and nodded perkily. Matt held out his great hand, not realizing that a bow and a conventional “Delighted, I'm sure!” was the correct thing in Florry's set. Florry was about to accept his great paw when Cappy yelled:
“Don't take it, Florry! He'll squeeze your hand to jelly.”
“I won't,” Matt declared, embarrassed. “I might press it a little—”
“I know. You pressed mine a little, and if I live to be a thousand years old I'll never shake hands with you again.”
“I'll give her my finger then,” Matt declared, and forthwith held out his index finger, which Florry shook gravely.
“Well, well, boy; sit down, sit down,” Cappy commanded briskly, “while I tell you the plans I have for your future. I ought to have fired you long ago—”
“I shall always be happy to testify that you tried hard enough,” Matt interrupted, and Florry's silvery laugh filled the room. Cappy winced, but had to join with her in the laugh on himself.
“For the sake of your Uncle Ethan, and the fact that you're one of our own boys, Matt,” he continued, “I'll retain you if you behave yourself. As I believe I wired you, I'm going to put you in steam.”
“You didn't consult me about it, sir; but, to please you, I'll tackle steam. I'm very grateful for your interest in me, Mr. Ricks.”
“Huh! That's not true, Matt. You're not grateful; and if you are you have no business to be. I paid you a hundred and twenty-five dollars a month to skipper the Retriever; you earned every cent of it and I made you fight for the job; so, no thanks to me. And I know for a fact that you and Mr. Murphy cursed me up hill and down dale—”
“Oh, Captain Peasley!” Miss Ricks interrupted. “Did you curse my father?”
“She's trying to fluster me,” Matt thought. “She thinks I'm a farmer.” Aloud he said: “Well, you see, Miss Ricks, I had to work for him. However, Mr. Murphy and I have forgiven him. We're both willing to let bygones be bygones.”
“Young scoundrel!” piped Cappy, delighted beyond measure, for he was used to unimaginative, rather dull skippers, who revered their berths and stood before him, hat in hand, plainly uncomfortable in the presence of the creator of the payroll. “Dashed young scoundrel! Well, we had some fun anyhow, didn't we, Matt? And, as the young fellows say, I got your Capricorn. Very well, then. We'll make a new start, Matthew; and if you pay attention to business it's barely possible you may amount to something yet.
“I'm going to provide a berth for you, my boy, as second mate on the dirtiest, leakiest little bumboat you ever saw—our steam schooner Gualala. She's a nautical disgrace and carries three hundred thousand feet of lumber—runs into the dogholes on the Mendocino Coast and takes in cargo on a trolley running from the top of the cliff to the masthead. It'll be your job to get out in a small boat to pick up the moorings; and that'll be no picnic in the wintertime, because you lie just outside the edge of the breakers. But you'll learn how to pick up moorings, Matt, and you'll learn how to turn a steamer round on her heels also.”
“I never did that kind of work before,” Matt protested. “I stand a good chance of getting drowned, don't I?”
“Of course! But better men than you do it; so don't kick. In the spring I'll shift you to a larger boat; but I want you to have one winter along the Mendocino Coast. It'll about break your heart, but it will do you an awful lot of good, Matt. When you finish in the Gualala, you'll go in the Florence Ricks and run from Grays Harbor to San Pedro. Then, when you get your first mate's license, I'll put you in our Tillicum, where you'll learn how to handle a big vessel; and by the time you get your master's license for steam you'll be ready to start for Philadelphia to bring out the finest freighter on this Coast. How does that prospect strike you?”
Matt's eyes glowed. He forgot the two years' apprenticeship and thought only of the prize Cappy was dangling before him.
“If faithful service will be a guaranty of my appreciation—” he began; but Cappy interrupted.
“Nonsense! Not another peep out of you. You'd better take a little rest now for a couple of weeks and get your stomach in order after all that creosote. Meantime, if you should need any money, Skinner will fix you up.”
“I'll not need any, thank you. I saved sixteen hundred dollars while I was in the Retriever—”
“Fine! Good boy!” exclaimed Cappy, delighted beyond measure at this proof of Matt's Yankee thrift and sobriety. “But don't save it, Matt. Invest it. Put it in a mortgage for three years. I know a captain now that wants to borrow a thousand dollars at eight per cent. to buy an interest in one of our vessels. You shall loan it to him, Matt, and he'll secure you with the insurance. Perfectly safe. Guarantee it myself. Bring your thousand dollars round in the morning, Matt. Understand? No fooling now! Make your money work for you. You bet! If I'm not here tomorrow leave the money with Skinner.”
“Mr. Skinner is the general manager, isn't he?”
“Yes, and a mighty clever one, too. Don't you monkey with Skinner, young man. He doesn't like you and he doesn't bluff worth a cent; and if you ever have a run-in with him while I'm away and he fires you—well, I guess I'd have to stand by Skinner, Matt. I can't afford to lose him. Cold-blooded dog—no sense of humor; but honest—a pig for work, and capable.”
“I'll be very careful, sir,” Matt assured him. “Thank you for the vacation, the promised job, and the chance to invest my thousand dollars at eight per cent. And, now that my affairs are out of the way, let's talk about yours. I think I can get you a four-year charter for your steamer Lion—”
“Matt,” said Cappy Ricks impressively, “if you can get that brute of a boat off my hands for four years, and at a figure that will pay me ten per cent. on her cost price, I'll tell you what—I'll pay you a commission.”
“I don't want any commission, sir, for working for the interests of my employer. What do you reckon it costs a day to operate the Lion?”
Cappy drew a scratch pad toward him and commenced to figure.
“She'll burn a hundred and seventy barrels of crude oil a day, at sixty-five cents a barrel. That's about a hundred and ten dollars. Her wages will average seventy-five dollars a day; it costs twenty dollars a day to feed her crew; incidentals, say twenty dollars a day; insurance, say, four dollars a day; wireless, three and a half dollars; depreciation, say, two dollars and seventy-five cents a day; total in round figures two hundred and thirty-five dollars a day. I ought to get four hundred dollars a day for her; but in a pinch like the present I'd be glad to get her off my hands at three hundred and fifty dollars. But, no matter what the price may be, Matt, I'm afraid we can't charter her.”
“Why?”
“Because the Black Butte Lumber Company owns her sister, the Unicorn; she's a burden on their back, as the Lion is on mine, there's war to the finish between Hudner, the Black Butte manager, and myself, and he'll get the business. He's a dog, Matt—always cutting prices below the profit point and raising hob in the market. Infernal marplot! He stole the best stenographer in the United States from me here about three years ago.”
“Where is Hudner's office?” Matt queried.
“In this building—sixth floor.” Matt rose and started for the door. “Where are you going now, Matt?” Cappy piped.
“Why, you say the Unicorn will compete against the Lion for this charter I have in mind. That is true enough. I know the Black Butte Lumber Company will be approached for the Unicorn; so I'm going to get the Unicorn out of the way and give you a clear field with the Lion. I figured it all out coming down on the train.” And, without waiting to listen to Cappy's protestations, Matt left the office.