Wandering along, Blood and his companion came to Rafferty’s Wharf. Rafferty’s Wharf is a bit of the past, a mooring place for old ships condemned and waiting the breaking yards. It has escaped harbour boards and fires and earthquakes, healthy trade never comes there, and very strange deals have been completed in its dubious precincts over ships passed as seaworthy yet held together, as Harman was explaining now to Blood, “by the pitch in their seams mostly.”
As they came along a man who was crossing the gangway from the tank saw Harman and hailed him.
“It’s Jack Bone,” said Harman to Blood. “Walk along and I’ll meet you in a minute.”
Blood did as he was directed, and Harman halted at the gangway.
“You’re the man I want,” said Bone. “Who’s your friend?”
“Oh, just a chap,” replied Harman. “What’s up now?”
Bone took him by the arm, and led him along in an opposite direction to that in which Blood was going. Bone was the landlord of the Fore and Aft Tavern, half tavern, half sailors’ boarding house, situated right on Rafferty’s Wharf and with a stairway down to the water from the back premises. His face, to use Harman’s description of it, was one grog blossom, and what he did not know of wicked wharfside ways could scarcely be called knowledge.
“Ginnell is layin’ about, lookin’ for two hands,” said Bone. “He’s due out this evenin’, and it’s five dollars apiece for you if you can lay your claws on what he wants. Whites, they must be whites; you know Ginnell.”
Ginnell owned a fifty-foot schooner engaged sometimes in the shark-fishing trade, sometimes in other businesses of a more shady description. He had a Chinese crew, and, though the customhouse laws of San Francisco demanded only one white officer on a Chinese-manned boat, Ginnell always made a point of carrying two men of his own colour with him.
Being known as a hard man all along the wharfside, he sometimes found a difficulty in supplying himself with hands.
“Yes, I know Ginnell,” replied Harman. “Him and his old shark boat by repitation. I’ve stood near the chap in bars now and again, but I don’t call to mind speakin’ to him. His repitation is pretty noisy.”
“Well, I can’t help that,” said Bone. “I didn’t make the chap nor his repitation; if he had a better one, I guess ten dollars wouldn’t be lyin’ your way.”