“Like what?” I suggested gently, hoping much.

But it was of no use.  Trunnell looked at me queerly for a moment as if undecided to give me his confidence.  Then he resumed his walk athwart the deck, and I went forward to the break of the poop and took a look at the head sails.

The night was growing darker, and the breeze was dying slowly, and I wondered why the skipper had not come on deck to take a look around.  He was usually on hand during the earlier hours of evening.

I reached the side of the third officer, and stood silently gazing at the canvas which shone dimly through the gathering gloom.  As we had always been separated on account of being in different watches, I had never addressed the third mate before save in a general way when reporting the ship’s duties aft.

“Pretty dark night, hey?” I ventured.

The third officer looked hard at me for the space of a minute, during which time his face underwent many changes of expression.  Then he answered in a smooth, even tone.

“Sorter,” said he.

This was hardly what I expected, so I ventured again.

“Looks as if we might have a spell o’ weather, hey?  The wind’s falling all the time, and if it keeps on, we’ll have a calm night without a draught of air.”

“What do you mean by a ca’m night without a draft of air?” asked the young fellow, in a superior tone, while at the same time I detected a smile lurking about the corners of his eyes.

If there’s one thing I hate to see in a young fellow, it is the desire to make fun of a superior’s conversation.  Being an American sailor, I had little use for r’s in every word which held an a but I had no objection to any one else talking the way they wished.  I was somewhat doubtful just how to sit upon this nebulous third mate, so I began easily.

“Do you know,” said I, “there are a great many young fellows going out in ships as officers when they could be of much more benefit to people generally if they stayed home and helped their mothers to ‘bark cark,’ or do other little things around the nursery or kitchen.”

As I finished I thought I heard some one swear fiercely in a low tone.  I looked over the poop rail down to the main deck beneath, but saw no one near.  The third officer seemed to be lost in thought for a moment.

“It isn’t good to be too clever,” said he, in the tone which was unmistakably a woman’s.  “When a person is good at baking cake, or ‘barking cark,’ as you choose to call it, the sea is a good place for them.  They can look out for those who haven’t sense enough to perform the function.”

I had a strong notion to ask him outright if he was fitted to perform the function, but his superior air and the feeling that I might make a mistake after all and incur the displeasure of the beak-nosed skipper deterred me.  But I was almost certain that our third mate was a woman.