"I'm the passenger--Mr. Bradish," the young man explained, promptly. "I
just made myself at home, put my stuff in a stateroom, and locked the
door and took the key. Is that all right?"
"May be just as well to lock it while we're at dock and stevedores are
aboard," agreed the mate.
"How soon do we pull out of here?"
The mate yawned again and peered up into the sky, where the first gray
of the summer dawn was showing over the cranes of the coal-pockets.
"In about a half-hour, I should say. Just as soon as the tug can use
daylight to put us into the stream."
The roar of the coal in the main-hatch chute had ceased. The schooner
was loaded.
"Go strike eight bells, Jeff, and turn in!" ordered the mate, speaking
to Mayo.
"Well, I'll stay outside, here, and watch the sun rise," said Bradish.
"It will be a new experience."
"It's an almighty dirty place for loafing till we get into the stream
and clean ship, sir. I should think taking an excursion on a coal-lugger
would be another new experience!" There was just a hint of grim sarcasm
in his tone.
"The doctor ordered me to get out and away where I wouldn't hear of
business or see business, and a friend of mine told me there were plenty
of room and comfort aboard one of these big schooners. That cabin and
the staterooms, they're fine!"
"Oh, they have to give a master a good home these days. That's a Winton
carpet in the saloon," declared the mate, with pride. "And we've got a
one-eyed cook who can certainly sling grub together. Yes, for a cheap
vacation I dun'no' but a schooner is all right!"
The two were getting on most amicably when Mayo went forward. He was
dog-tired and turned in on tie bare boards of his fo'cas'le berth.
No bedding is furnished men before the mast on the coal-carriers.
If a man wants anything between himself and the boards he must bring it
with him, and few do so. At the end of each trip a crew is discharged
and new men are hired, in order to save paying wages while a vessel is
in port loading or discharging. Therefore, a coastwise schooner harbors
only transients, for whom the fo'cas'le is merely a shelter between
watches.
But Mayo was a sailor, and the bare boards served him better than
bedding in which some dusky and dirty son of Ham had nestled. He laid
himself down and slept soundly.