Chapter 6 - Page 2

stood back, winking one to the other
and full of joy; but Disko and Salters wrangled seriously till
evening, Salters arguing that a cattle-boat was practically a barn
on blue water, and Disko insisting that, even if this were the
case, decency and fisher-pride demanded that he should have kept
"things sep'rate." Long Jack stood it in silence for a time, - an
angry skipper makes an unhappy crew, - and then he spoke across
the table after supper:

"Fwhat's the good o' bodderin' fwhat they'll say?" said he.

"They'll tell that tale ag'in' us fer years - that's all," said
Disko. "Oil-cake sprinkled!"

"With salt, o' course," said Salters, impenitent, reading the
farming reports from a week-old New York paper.

"It's plumb mortifyin' to all my feelin's," the skipper went on.

"Can't see ut that way," said Long Jack, the peacemaker. "Look at
here, Disko! Is there another packet afloat this day in this
weather c'u'd ha' met a tramp an', over an' above givin' her her
reckonin', - over an' above that, I say, - c'u'd ha' discoorsed
wid her quite intelligent on the management av steers an' such at
sea'? Forgit ut! Av coorse they will not. 'Twas the most compenjus
conversation that iver accrued. Double game an' twice runnin' -
all to us." Dan kicked Harvey under the table, and Harvey choked
in his cup.

"'Well," said Salters, who felt that his honour had been somewhat
plastered, "I said I didn't know as 'twuz any business o' mine,
'fore I spoke."

"An' right there," said Tom Platt, experienced in discipline and
etiquette -" right there, I take it, Disko, you should ha' asked
him to stop ef the conversation wuz likely, in your jedgment, to
be anyways - what it shouldn't."

"Dunno but that's so," said Disko, who saw his way to an
honourable retreat from a fit of the dignities.

"'Why, o' course it was so," said Salters, "you bein' skipper
here; an' I'd cheerful hev stopped on a hint - not from any
leadin' or conviction, but fer the sake o' bearin' an example to
these two blame boys of aours."

"Didn't I tell you, Harve, 'twould come araound to us 'fore we'd
done'? Always those blame boys. But I wouldn't have missed the
show fer a half-share in a halibutter," Dan whispered.

"Still, things should ha' been kep' sep'rate," said Disko, and the
light of new argument lit in Salters's eye as he crumbled cut plug
into his pipe.

"There's a power av vartue in keepin' things sep'rate," said Long
Jack, intent on stilling the storm. "That's fwhat Steyning of
Steyning and Hare's f'und when he sent Counahan fer skipper on the
Manila D. Kuhn, instid o' Cap. Newton that was took with
inflam't'ry rheumatism an' couldn't go. Counahan the Navigator we