“Huh!  That’s not true, Matt.  You’re not grateful; and if you are you have no business to be.  I paid you a hundred and twenty-five dollars a month to skipper the Retriever; you earned every cent of it and I made you fight for the job; so, no thanks to me.  And I know for a fact that you and Mr. Murphy cursed me up hill and down dale—­”

“Oh, Captain Peasley!” Miss Ricks interrupted.  “Did you curse my father?”

“She’s trying to fluster me,” Matt thought.  “She thinks I’m a farmer.”  Aloud he said:  “Well, you see, Miss Ricks, I had to work for him.  However, Mr. Murphy and I have forgiven him.  We’re both willing to let bygones be bygones.”

“Young scoundrel!” piped Cappy, delighted beyond measure, for he was used to unimaginative, rather dull skippers, who revered their berths and stood before him, hat in hand, plainly uncomfortable in the presence of the creator of the payroll.  “Dashed young scoundrel!  Well, we had some fun anyhow, didn’t we, Matt?  And, as the young fellows say, I got your Capricorn.  Very well, then.  We’ll make a new start, Matthew; and if you pay attention to business it’s barely possible you may amount to something yet.

“I’m going to provide a berth for you, my boy, as second mate on the dirtiest, leakiest little bumboat you ever saw—­our steam schooner Gualala.  She’s a nautical disgrace and carries three hundred thousand feet of lumber—­runs into the dogholes on the Mendocino Coast and takes in cargo on a trolley running from the top of the cliff to the masthead.  It’ll be your job to get out in a small boat to pick up the moorings; and that’ll be no picnic in the wintertime, because you lie just outside the edge of the breakers.  But you’ll learn how to pick up moorings, Matt, and you’ll learn how to turn a steamer round on her heels also.”

“I never did that kind of work before,” Matt protested.  “I stand a good chance of getting drowned, don’t I?”

“Of course!  But better men than you do it; so don’t kick.  In the spring I’ll shift you to a larger boat; but I want you to have one winter along the Mendocino Coast.  It’ll about break your heart, but it will do you an awful lot of good, Matt.  When you finish in the Gualala, you’ll go in the Florence Ricks and run from Grays Harbor to San Pedro.  Then, when you get your first mate’s license, I’ll put you in our Tillicum, where you’ll learn how to handle a big vessel; and by the time you get your master’s license for steam you’ll be ready to start for Philadelphia to bring out the finest freighter on this Coast.  How does that prospect strike you?”

Matt’s eyes glowed.  He forgot the two years’ apprenticeship and thought only of the prize Cappy was dangling before him.

“If faithful service will be a guaranty of my appreciation—­” he began; but Cappy interrupted.

“Nonsense!  Not another peep out of you.  You’d better take a little rest now for a couple of weeks and get your stomach in order after all that creosote.  Meantime, if you should need any money, Skinner will fix you up.”