“That’s right,” agreed Mr Rogers.  “You’ve common ground in the Widow-woman.”

“The—?”

“The Widow at Windsor, as they call her.”

“Oh!  I thought for a moment—­”

“There’s widows and widows,” Mr Rogers blinked mischievously.  “But look here—­what’s this I’m told about your interferin’ down at the Harbour Board, tryin’ to get the Commissioners to regylate the ladin’ o’ vessels?”

“Well, and why not?” asked ’Bias.

“Why not?  For one thing you bet it isn’ the Commissioners’ business.”

“It ought to be somebody’s business to stop what’s goin’ on.  Say ’tis mine, if you like.”

“Look ’ee here, Cap’n Hunken,” said Mr Rogers, showing his teeth.  “If that’s your game, better fit you was kickin’ up a rumpus on the Parish Council than puttin’ a spoke into honest trade.  I didn’ make room ’pon the Board for you to behave in that style.”

“I don’t care whether you did or you didn’,” retorted ’Bias sturdily.  “And ‘honest trade’ d’ye call it? robbin’ the underwriters and puttin’ seamen’s lives in danger.”

“Eh? . . . You’re a nice man to talk, I must say!  Come to me, you do, and want me to get you anything up to twenty per cent without risk.  How d’ee think that’s done in these days, with every one cuttin’ freights?  I gave you credit for havin’ more sense.”

’Bias stared.  “See here,” he said slowly, “if I’d known that hundred pound was to be put into any such wickedness, I’d have seen you further before trustin’ you with it.  As ’tis, I’ll trouble you—­”

“Hold hard, there!” Mr Rogers interrupted.  “You’re in a tarnation hurry every way, ’twould seem.  Who told you as I’d put that hundred into any vessel below Plimsoll mark?”

“I thought you hinted as much.”

“Then you thought a long sight too fast.  If you must know, your money’s in the old Saltypool, and old as she is, that steamship might be my child, the way I watch over her.”

“The Saltypool! Why, she’s the most scand’lous case as has gone out of harbour these three months!”

“Eh?”

“I saw her with my own eyes alongside No. 3 jetty, the evenin’ before she sailed.  A calm night it was too; and she with her Plimsoll well under and a whole line o’ trucks waitin’ to be shot into her.  She went out before daybreak, if you remember, and God knows how low she was by that time.”

Mr Rogers’s jaw dropped.

“The idiots!” he muttered.  “When I told ’em—­” He broke off.  “I say, you’re not pullin’ my leg?”

“Saw her with my own eyes, I tell you,” ’Bias assured him, wondering a little; for the old sinner’s dismay was clearly honest.

“Then all I say is, you can call Fancy and tell her to fetch me a Bible, if there’s one in the house, an’ I’ll swear to you I never knew it, an’ I never seen it.  What’s more, I’ll sack the captain, an’ I’ll sack the mate.  What’s more, I’ll cable dismissal out to Philadelphy.  What’s more—­”