With the coming on of winter, however, Matt’s troubles with Mr. Skinner really commenced, although, in all justice to Skinner, the general manager was merely following out his theory of efficiency, and in respect to the matter upon which he deviled Matt Peasley most he did not differ vastly from many managing owners of steam schooners on the Pacific Coast.  The trouble lay in the fact that the Quickstep carried passengers.  While she was a cargo boat, and hence had no regular run or sailing schedule, her cabin accommodations were really very good and her steward’s department excelled that of the regular passenger boats.  By cutting the regular passenger rates from twenty-five to forty per cent. and advertising the vessel to sail at a certain hour on a certain date from a certain pier, free-lance ticket brokers found no difficulty in getting her a fair complement of passengers each trip.  There was a moderate profit in this passenger traffic, and Mr. Skinner was anxious to increase it.

The difficulty surrounding the passenger business in the steam-schooner trade, however, lies in the uncertainty of a vessel’s arrival and departure.  It is all guesswork.  Thus Matt Peasley, with his cargo half discharged at San Pedro, would estimate that he would sail from that port, northbound via San Francisco to some Oregon or Washington port for another cargo, at noon on the following day.  Accordingly, he would wire his owners, who would immediately advertise the sailing of the vessel from San Francisco forty hours later, the Quickstep’s average running time between San Pedro and San Francisco being about thirty-eight hours.  If the master’s estimate proved correct and there were no strong head winds to retard the vessel, she would sail within an hour or two of the advertised time, whereas a delay of six to eight hours in the arrival of the vessel at San Francisco might mean the loss of all the passenger business garnered for that trip; for competition was keen, and the ticket agents, selling on a commission of one dollar per ticket, would switch the traffic to some other vessel sailing earlier rather than have the tickets canceled and thus lose the commission.

When through delay or miscalculation the vessel lost passenger traffic out of a port other than San Francisco, Mr. Skinner did not feel discouraged.  To lose passengers out of San Francisco, where the home office of the Blue Star Navigation Company was located, however, savored of a reflection on his efficiency, and caused him much bitter anguish.  Consequently, when Matt Peasley, with a full passenger list from Eureka to San Francisco, wired Mr. Skinner that he would leave his loading port at two P. M. on Wednesday, Mr. Skinner allowed him twenty-two hours for landing his passengers from Eureka to San Francisco and taking on another load for San Pedro, whither the Quickstep was bound on that voyage.  As a result the Quickstep was advertised to sail from San Francisco on Thursday at two P. M., and the agents were notified to commence selling tickets.  Judge of Mr. Skinner’s perturbation, therefore, when he received the following wireless from Matt Peasley at five o’clock on Wednesday: