Men were rushing freight aboard on rattling trucks--parallel lines of
stevedores were working. There were many trunks, avant couriers of the
passengers.
He went aboard by the freight entrance and found his way to the row of
officers' staterooms. He recognized the gray-bearded veteran who was
pacing the alley outside the pilot-house, though the man was not in
uniform; it was the deposed master.
"Good morning, Captain Mayo," he said, without any resentment in his
tones. "I congratulate you on your promotion."
"I hope you understand that I didn't go hunting for this job," blurted
Mayo.
"I believe it's merely a matter of new policy--so Manager Fogg tells me.
Understand me, too, Captain Mayo! I harbor no resentment, especially not
against you."
He put out his hand in fine, manly fashion, and was so distinctly
the best type of the dignified, self-possessed sea-captain of the old
school, that Mayo fairly flinched at thought of replacing this man.
Captain Jacobs opened the door lettered "Captain." "All my truck is out
and over the rail. I'll sit in with you, if you don't mind, until Mr.
Fogg arrives. You're going to have a thick passage, Captain Mayo."
"It doesn't seem right to me--putting a new man on here in this fog,"
protested Mayo, warmly. "I ought to have her in clear weather till I
know her tricks. In a pinch, when you've got to know how a boat behaves,
and know it mighty sudden in order to avoid a smash, one false move puts
you into the hole."
"They seem to be running steamboat lines from Wall Street nowadays,
instead of from the water-front," said Captain Jacobs, dryly. "It's all
in the game as they're playing it in these times. There's nothing to be
said by the men in the pilot-house."
"I'm a sailor, and a simple one. I think I know my job, Captain Jacobs,
or else I wouldn't accept this promotion. But I've got no swelled head.
It's the proper and sensible thing for you to take the Montana out
tonight and let me hang around the pilot-house and watch you. If I can
prevail upon Mr. Fogg to allow it, will you make another trip?"
"I would do it to help you, but I'll be blasted if I'll help Fogg--not
if he would get down now and beg me," declared Captain Jacobs, showing
temper for the first time. "And if you had been pitchforked out as
I've been after all my years of honest service you'd feel just as I do,
Captain Mayo. You don't blame me, do you?"