From Cappy Ricks' office Matt Peasley went to the rooms of the American
Shipmaster's Association, entered the telephone booth and called up
Florence Ricks. From the instant he first laid eyes on her, Miss Florry
had occupied practically all of Matt's thoughts during every waking
hour. He had assayed her and appraised her a hundred times and from
every possible angle, and each time he decided that Florry was possessed
of more than sufficient charm, good looks, sweetness and intelligence to
suit the most exacting. Matt wasn't ultra-exacting and she suited him,
and the fact that she was the sole heir to millions was the least of the
sailor's considerations as he dropped his nickel down the slot. Neither
did the identity of the young lady's paternal ancestor constitute a
problem, despite the recent interview with that variable individual.
Matt regarded Cappy somewhat in the light of a mixed blessing; while he
respected him he was a little bit afraid of him, and just at present he
disliked him exceedingly. And lastly, his own social and economic status
as second mate of the most wretched little steam schooner in the Blue
Star Navigation Company's fleet, failed to enter even remotely into
Matt's scheme of things.
The reason for this mental stand on his part was a perfectly simple and
natural one. To begin, he was a stranger to caste other than that of
decent manhood. The only rank he had ever known was that of a ship's
officer, and that was merely a condition of servitude. When ashore he
regarded himself as the equal of any monarch under heaven and treated
all men accordingly. Since he had never known any of the restrictions of
polite conventions behind which society entrenches itself in the world
occupied by such pampered pets of fortune as Miss Florence Ricks, Matt
Peasley failed to see a single sound reason why he should not indulge
a very natural desire for Cappy's ewe lamb--for a singularly direct and
forceful individual was Matthew. It was his creed to take what he could
get away with, provided that in the taking he broke no moral, legal
or ethical code; and if any thought of the apparent incongruity of a
sailor's aspiring to the hand of a millionaire shipowner's daughter had
occurred to him--which, by the way, it had not--he would doubtless have
analyzed it thusly:
“There she is. Isn't she a queen? I want her and there isn't a single
reason on earth why I shouldn't have her, unless it be that she doesn't
want me. However, I'll learn all about that when I get good and ready,
and if I'm acceptable Cappy Ricks and one of his employees are going
to have a warm debate--subject, matrimony. What do I care for him? He's
only her father, and I'll bet he wasn't half so well fixed as I am when
he got married. I'll just play the game like a white man, and if Cappy
doesn't like it he'll have to get over it.”
“Miss Florence,” Matt began, “this is Matt.”
“Matt who?” she queried with provoking assumption of innocence.
“Door Mat,” he replied. “Your daddy has just walked all over me at any
rate.”
“Oh, good morning, captain. Why, what has happened? Your voice sounds
like the growl of a big bear.”
“I suppose so. I'm hopping mad. The very first day I was ashore I turned
a nice little trick for your father. I wasn't on the pay roll at the
time, so we went into the deal together and chartered the Lion and the
Unicorn to freight ore for the Mannheim people from Alaska to Seattle.
I furnished the valuable information and the bright idea, and he
capitalized both. The result of the deal was that he has his own
steamer, the Lion, off his hands for four years, chartered at a fancy
figure. Also he chartered the Unicorn from her owner at a cheap rate and
rechartered at an advance of seventy-five dollars a day, and we split
that profit between us. That gives me an income of thirty-seven and a
half a day for the next four years, provided the Unicorn doesn't get
wrecked. Naturally I wanted to stay ashore, when there's money to be
made as easy as that--and he won't let me.”
“Oh, I'm so sorry, captain.”
“Well, that helps.”
“You do not have to go to sea, do you?” Miss Ricks queried hopefully.
“Yes, Miss Florry, I do; that's what hurts. Your father induced me
to invest all of my savings in a mortgage and a bond, and he has both
locked up in the Blue Star safe with that ogre Skinner in charge, so I
can't get them to realize on. Of course I could go to law and make him
give them to me, but he knows I'll not do that, so he just sits there
and defies me. And I neglected to take the proper business precautions
about my daily income from the charter of the Unicorn, and because I
cannot prove I have a divvy coming on that he says he won't give me a
cent of it. He says he'll credit my account on the company's books, and
when the Unicorn completes her charter he'll give it to me in a lump. In
the meantime he's going to invest it for me, and without consulting me.”
“Oh, dear,” said Miss Ricks sympathetically. “I'm so sorry dad's such a
busybody.”
“You're not half so sorry as I am. I'm flat broke, and in order to eat I
have to go to work, and in order to go to work I have to get a job, and
in order to get the job I have to take what your father offers me--in
fact, insists upon my taking. You see, Miss Florry, I'm almost a
stranger in Pacific shipping. I don't know any owners except your father
and I've never had any coastwise experience. It might be years before
I could get another job as master of a sailing ship, and most steamship
captains prefer to let some other captains break in their mates for
them. So you see I'm helpless.”
A silence. Then: “I'm going to sea in the Gualala to-morrow morning,
Florry.”
It was the first time he had dropped the “Miss,” but he dropped it
purposely now. Miss Ricks noticed the omission, which probably imbued
her with the courage to voice again her excess of sympathy. Said she:
“Oh, I'm so sorry, Matt!”
He thrilled at that. “Well,” he answered humorously, “for the first time
I'm glad I'm not a captain any more!”
Followed another brief silence, while Florry groped for the hidden
meaning behind that subtle retort; then he continued: “Your father
thinks I was a little presumptuous in calling at the house. He spoke to
me about it, Florry, so I'm not going to call any more until he invites
me. It's his house, you know. But he didn't say anything about not
telephoning to you or seeing you outside his confounded house, so I
suppose there's no necessity for me feeling badly about it, is there?”
This was a pretty direct feeler, but Florry parried it with feminine
skill.
“Of course you can telephone me whenever you get to port. You mustn't
take dad too seriously, Matt. Really he's very fond of you.”
“Professionally, yes. Socially, no. I think he wants to give me a good
chance to do something for myself in a business way later on, but he
made it pretty plain that he is the only member of the Ricks family I'm
to take seriously. Of course I expect to have something to say about
that myself, Florry, but I didn't tell him so. He's your father, you
know, and besides, a man can't make a very good showing on seventy-five
dollars a month. But if the Unicorn lives to complete her charter I'll
be up on Easy Street, even if I'll only be a plain sea captain when I
come into that money. Of course now I'm only a second mate on the worst
little steam schooner your father owns and I cannot say the things I
want to say--I don't mean to your father, Florry, but to you--”
“But you're a captain now,” Florry interrupted, in delicious terror
hastening to obstruct any further discussion of what a seventy-five
dollar man might have to say were he but in position to say it. “Why
should you go to work as a second mate--”
“I've been a captain of sail, Florry. Of course, if I had never been
master of a vessel of more than five hundred tons net register, or my
sailing license had been limited to vessels of that tonnage, I should
have to work up from second mate to master in steam. But any man who has
been master of a vessel of more than five hundred tons net register for
more than one year is entitled to apply for a license as master of steam
vessels, and if he can pass the examination he can get his license.”
“Then why don't you do that, Matt?” Florry inquired.
“I have. The idea of two years' probation as second and first mate
didn't appeal to me, so while I was waiting round to join the Gualala I
went up for my ticket as master of steam. I passed, but when I told your
father I had a license to command the largest steam freighter he owns,
he only laughed at me and told me the inspectors weren't running his
business for him. Just because I'm not twenty-three years old he says I
ought to have two years' experience in steam as mate before he gives me
command of a vessel. He says I'd better learn the Pacific Coast like he
knows his front lawn, or some foggy night I'll walk my vessel overland
and the inspectors will set me down for a couple of years.”
“Well, that sounds reasonable, Matt.”
“Yes, I'll admit there's some justice in his contention, so I'm going to
do it to please him, although I hate to have him think I'm a dog-barking
navigator.”
“Why, what's that?” Florry demanded.
“A dog-barking navigator is a coastwise blockhead that gets lost if he
loses sight of land. He steers a course from headland to headland, and
every little while on dark nights he stands in close and listens. Pretty
soon he hears a dog barking alongshore. 'All right,' he says to the
mate; 'we're off Point Montara. I know that Newfoundland dog's barking.
He's the only one on the coast. Haul her off and hold her before the
wind for four hours and then stand in again. When you pick up the bark
of a foxhound you'll be off Pigeon Point.'”
Florry's laughter drowned a further description of the dog-barking
navigator's wonderful knowledge of Pacific Coast canines, and after some
small talk Matt said good-bye and hung up. When he left the telephone
booth, however, he was a happier young man than when he had entered it,
for he had now satisfied himself that while Cappy Ricks might arrogate
to himself the right of proposing, his daughter could be depended upon
to attend to the disposing. He went to his boarding house, paid his
landlady, packed his clothes and sent them down to the Gualala, rubbing
her blistered sides against Howard Street Pier No. 1. At seven o'clock
next morning he was aboard her and at seven-five he superintended the
casting off of the stern lines and his apprenticeship in steam had
commenced.