“Hereafter,” said Matt Peasley, “you get ten dollars a month above the scale.  Thank you.”

Mr. Murphy acknowledged his appreciation.

“Any orders, sir?” he continued.

Matt Peasley showed him Cappy Ricks’ telegram and Mr. Murphy nodded his approval.  He had been in port nearly a week and the whine of the sawmills and the reek of river water had begun to get on his nerves.  He was ready for the dark blue again.

“There’s something wrong about our cargo, I think,” Matt remarked presently.

“Why, sir?”

“Why, down at the telegraph office this morning I met the master of the schooner, Carrier Dove, and when I told him my orders he snickered.”

“Huh!  Well, he ought to know what he snickered about, sir.  The Carrier Dove just finished loading at Weatherby’s mill,” Mr. Murphy replied.  “She’s a Blue Star craft and bound for Antofagasta also.  Her skipper’s Salvation Pete Hansen, and it would be just like that squarehead to dodge a deckload of piling and leave it for us.”

“Well, whatever it was it amused him greatly.  It must be worse than a deckload of piling.”

“There’s nothing worse in the timber line, unless it’s a load underdeck, sir.  You take a sixty-foot pile with a fourteen-inch butt and try to shove it down through the hatch, and you’ve got a job on your hands.  And after the hold is half filled you’ve got to quit loading through the hatch, cut ports in your bows, and shove the sticks in that way.  It’s the slowest loading and discharging in the world; and unless you drive her between ports and make up for the lost time you don’t make a good showing with your owners—­and then your job’s in danger.  Ship owners never consider anything except results.”

“Well,” the captain answered, “in order not to waste any more time than is absolutely necessary, call Mr. MacLean and the cook, and we’ll go for’d and break out the anchor.”

Immediately on his arrival from Cape Town, Matt Peasley had paid off all his foremast hands, leaving the two mates and the cook the only men aboard the vessel.  He joined them now in a walk around the capstan; the launch hooked on and the Retriever was snaked across the harbor to Weatherby’s mill.  And, while they were still three cables’ length from the mill dock, Mr. Murphy, who had taken up his position on the topgallant forecastle, to be ready with a heaving line, suddenly raised his head and sniffed upwind.

The captain had the wheel and Mr. MacLean was standing aft waiting to do his duty by the stern line.  Presently he, too, raised his head and sniffed.

“I see you got it too, Mac,” Mr. Murphy bawled.

“Aw, weel,” Mr. MacLean replied; “Why worrit aboot a bridge till ye hae to cross it?  D’ye ken ’tis oors?”

“What are you two fellows talking about and why are you sniffing?” Matt Peasley demanded.

“I’m sniffing at the same thing Salvation Pete Hansen laughed about,” the mate answered.  “I’ll bet you a uniform cap we’re stuck with a cargo of creosoted piling—­and hell hath no fury like a creosoted pile.”