Bar breaking heavily.  At anchor inside.  Will cross out as soon as I judge it safe to do so.

Three hours’ delay, already, with the prospects exceedingly bright for the Quickstep’s lurking inside Humboldt Bar all night!  Mr. Skinner saw his passenger traffic gone to glory for that trip, so he sent a reply to Matt Peasley by wireless, as follows: 

You are advertised to sail from here for San Pedro at two o’clock to-morrow.  Hope you will permit nothing to militate against the preservation of that schedule.  Answer.

“That’s what comes of having an inexperienced man in the vessel,” he complained to the cashier.  “That fellow Peasley sees a few white caps on the bar, and he’s afraid to cross out.  Damn!  Kjellin had her three years and never hung behind a bar once.  Many a time he’s come down to Humboldt Bar and found half a dozen steam schooners at anchor inside, waiting for a chance to duck out.  Did Kjellin drop anchor too?  He did not.  Out he went and bucked right through it.”

Mr. Skinner waited at the office until six o’clock to get Matt Peasley’s answer.  He got it—­between the eyes: 

I have no jurisdiction over Humboldt Bar.

The Quickstep crossed out next morning, and Mr. Skinner wirelessed her master this message: 

Your timidity has spoiled San Pedro passenger business.  Drop Eureka passengers at Meiggs Wharf and continue your voyage.

Now it does not please any mariner to be told that he is timid, and, while Matt Peasley made no reply, nevertheless, he chalked up a black mark against Mr. Skinner and commenced to plan against the day of reckoning.

That was an unusually severe winter.  Four times Matt Peasley came down to the entrance to Humboldt Bar and came to anchor.  Three times he tried to cross out and was forced to change his mind; seven times did Mr. Skinner upbraid him.  The eighth time that Matt Peasley’s caution knocked the San Francisco passenger traffic into a deficit, Mr. Skinner sent him this message where the Quickstep lay behind Coos Bay Bar: 

What is the matter with you?  Your predecessor always managed to negotiate that bar, and this company expects same of you.

“He’s bound to run me out of this ship,” Matt soliloquized when he read that terse aerogram, “but I promised Cappy I’d stick six months and I’ll do it.  That penny-pinching Skinner wants me to cut corners and get myself into trouble so he can fire me.  I’ll not tell him the things I want to tell him, so I guess I won’t say anything—­much.”

He didn’t.  He just wired Mr. Skinner as follows: 

Any time you want to commit suicide I will furnish a pistol.