Part 27 (1/2)
”Oh, very well. You're the boss, Mr. Ricks. But if I were in your place I would have an older and more experienced man to relieve him the moment he comes into the bay. You must remember, Mr. Ricks, that while he may run her very nicely during the summer months, he has had no experience on Humboldt Bay during the winter months--”
”Skinner, the only way he'll ever acc.u.mulate experience on that bar is to give him the opportunity.”
”He'll take big risks. He's very young and headstrong.”
”I admit he's fiery. But I promised him a s.h.i.+p, and he's earned her sooner than I planned, so, even if my decision loses the Quickstep for us, he shall have her. I'll be swindled if I ever did see the like of that boy Matt. He gets results. And do you know why, Skinner?”
”Because,” Mr. Skinner replied coldly, ”he's a huge, healthy animal, able and willing to fight his way in any s.h.i.+p, and at the same time clever enough to take advantage of your paternal interest in him--”
”Rats! I'll give you the answer, Skinner, my boy: He gets results because he does his duty and doesn't sidestep for man or devil. And he's able to do his duty and do it well because he has a clear understanding of what his duty is--and that, Skinner, is the kind of skipper material I've been looking for all my life. As for the boy's horsepower, let me tell you this: If Matt Peasley wasn't any bigger than I am, he'd fight any man that tried to walk over him. It's in his breed. d.a.m.n it, sir, he's a Yankee skipper, and when you've said that you're through. I guess I know. How much have we been paying that bully Kjellin?”
”Two hundred a month.”
”Too much! Pay Matt two-twenty-five and attend to the certificate of change of masters.”
When Mr. Skinner had departed Cappy sat back in his chair and closed his eyes, as was his habit when his gigantic brain grappled with a problem of more than ordinary dimensions. For fully ten minutes he sat absolutely motionless, then suddenly he straightened up like a jack-in-the-box and summoned Mr. Skinner.
”Skinner,” he said plaintively, ”I'm feeling a little run down. Will you please be good enough to book Florry and me pa.s.sage to Europe right away. I've never been to Europe, you know, Skinner, and I think it's time I took a vacation.”
Mr. Skinner smiled. ”Why all the hurry?” he queried.
”I want to try out a theory,” Cappy replied. ”I have a great curiosity, Skinner, to ascertain if there is any truth in the old saying that absence makes the heart grow fonder. And if it does, Skinner--why, the sooner I start the sooner I can get back.”
Mr. Skinner went out mystified. As Mark Twain's friend, Mr. Ballou, remarked about the coffee, Cappy Ricks was a little too ”technical” for him.
CHAPTER x.x.xI. INTERNAL COMBUSTION
The Quickstep had arrived in port again before Cappy Ricks and Florry could get away to Europe, so Matt came down by train from Los Medanos and was granted the meager comfort of a farewell with his heart's desire. Thereafter all comfort fled his life, for, with Cappy Ricks away, Mr. Skinner was high and low justice, and he was not long keeping Matt Peasley in ignorance of the fact that it was one thing to skipper a Blue Star s.h.i.+p for Cappy Ricks and quite another thing to skipper the same s.h.i.+p for the Blue Star manager. For Mr. Skinner had never liked Captain Peasley, and, moreover, he never intended to, for the master of the Quickstep was not sufficiently submissive to earn the general manager's approbation as a desirable employee, and Cappy Ricks was the only man with a will and a way of his own who could get along amicably in the same office with the efficient and cold-blooded Mr. Skinner.
Cappy wasn't outside Sandy Hook before Mr. Skinner had Matt on the carpet for daring to bring the Quickstep up river without a pilot. He demanded an explanation.
”I made careful note of all the twists and turns when the pilot took me up the first time,” Matt declared. ”It isn't a difficult channel, so I decided to save forty-five dollars the next time and take her up myself.”
”Suppose you'd buried her nose in the mud and we'd had to lighter her deckload to get her off,” Mr. Skinner suggested.
Matt grinned. ”If your aunt was a man she'd be your uncle, wouldn't she?” he parried. He had made up his mind not to take Mr. Skinner seriously. Mr. Skinner flushed, looked dangerous, but concluded not to pursue the investigation further.
Three weeks later, when making up to a dock at San Pedro, a strong ebb tide and a mistake in judgment swung the bow of the Quickstep into the end of the dock and a dolphin was torn out. In the fullness of time the Blue Star Navigation Company was in receipt of a bill for $112 dock repairs, whereupon Mr. Skinner wrote Matt, prefacing his letter with the query: ”Referring to inclosed bill--how did this happen?” Then he went on to scold Matt bitterly for his inability to handle his s.h.i.+p properly in making up to a dock.
Matt promptly returned Mr. Skinner his own letter, with this penciled memorandum at the bottom of the page: ”Referring to inclosed bill for dock repairs--the dock happened to be in my course. That's the only way I can account for it.”
For some time, whenever the Quickstep carried s.h.i.+ngle cargoes for the s.h.i.+ngle a.s.sociation, there had been disputes over her freight bill, due to continued discrepancies between the tally in and the tally out, and Mr. Skinner had instructed Matt to tally his next cargo into the s.h.i.+p himself and then tally it out again. Matt engaged a certified lumber surveyor at five dollars a day to do the tallying at the various mills, but at Los Medanos he tallied the cargo out personally. To a s.h.i.+ngle it agreed with the mill tally. Subsequently the manager of the drying yard reported a shortage of eight thousand s.h.i.+ngles, and again Mr. Skinner wrote Matt for an explanation, to which Matt replied as follows:
”Do not pay any attention to the yard manager's tally. Ours is right. A certified tallyman counted 11,487,250 in, and I counted 11,487,250 out, as I have already reported. Sorry I cannot reverse my decision. However, I have an idea which may account for the shortage: After the vessel is reported down river, the stevedores gather on the dock, and while waiting for us to arrive and commence discharging they whittle s.h.i.+ngles to pa.s.s the time away. I give you this information for what it may be worth.”
Mr. Skinner had the grace to see that he had been rebuked and left standing in a very poor light for one of his noted efficiency, so he did not pursue the subject further; but the next time Matt came to the office he jumped on him for carrying a dead-head pa.s.senger from San Pedro in the first cabin.
”Of course I carried him,” Matt replied. ”When I was before the mast in the Annabel Lee he was her skipper, so when I met him in Pedro minus his ticket and stony broke I gave him a lift to San Francisco. Mr. Ricks informed me that I would be permitted these little courtesies within the bounds of reason.”
”When Captain Kjellin had the Quickstep,” Mr. Skinner answered, ”he never carried dead-heads.”