Chapter 5 - Page 2

many-windowed, arcaded palace upon a hill laid out in roads and gardens.
And lately he had been taking about a duke in his Master-Attendant's
steam-launch to visit the harbor improvements. Before that he had "most
obligingly" gone out in person to pick out a good berth for the ducal
yacht. Afterwards he had an invitation to lunch on board. The duchess
herself lunched with them. A big woman with a red face. Complexion quite
sunburnt. He should think ruined. Very gracious manners. They were going
on to Japan. . . .

He ejaculated these details for Captain Whalley's edification, pausing
to blow out his cheeks as if with a pent-up sense of importance, and
repeatedly protruding his thick lips till the blunt crimson end of his
nose seemed to dip into the milk of his mustache. The place ran itself;
it was fit for any lord; it gave no trouble except in its Marine
department--in its Marine department he repeated twice, and after
a heavy snort began to relate how the other day her Majesty's
Consul-General in French Cochin-China had cabled to him--in his official
capacity--asking for a qualified man to be sent over to take charge of a
Glasgow ship whose master had died in Saigon.

"I sent word of it to the officers' quarters in the Sailors' Home," he
continued, while the limp in his gait seemed to grow more accentuated
with the increasing irritation of his voice. "Place's full of them.
Twice as many men as there are berths going in the local trade. All
hungry for an easy job. Twice as many--and--What d'you think,
Whalley? . . ."

He stopped short; his hands clenched and thrust deeply downwards, seemed
ready to burst the pockets of his jacket. A slight sigh escaped Captain
Whalley.

"Hey? You would think they would be falling over each other. Not a bit
of it. Frightened to go home. Nice and warm out here to lie about a
veranda waiting for a job. I sit and wait in my office. Nobody. What
did they suppose? That I was going to sit there like a dummy with the
Consul-General's cable before me? Not likely. So I looked up a list of
them I keep by me and sent word for Hamilton--the worst loafer of them
all--and just made him go. Threatened to instruct the steward of the
Sailors' Home to have him turned out neck and crop. He did not think
the berth was good enough--if--you--please. 'I've your little records by
me,' said I. 'You came ashore here eighteen months ago, and you haven't
done six months' work since. You are in debt for your board now at the
Home, and I suppose you reckon the Marine Office will pay in the end.
Eh? So it shall; but if you don't take this chance, away you go to
England, assisted passage, by the first homeward steamer that comes
along. You are no