Said that gentleman--"For you saw I wouldn't let the matter come up at the table. A lot of those men who signed this paper--which your grandson suggested last night, you know--" He smiled at Hugh. "Now, I am never touchy, and I know, commodore, that you're not. But, Lord, so many of us--maybe Democrats a little more than Whigs--are! We take our politics, like our bread, smokin' hot." He put away his smile. "My dear sir, to us the foreigner--as you saw last night at supper--has become a political problem, a burning question. Yet I propose to keep this whole subject so unmenacing to you personally, you owners of this boat, that I won't let a word be risked where any one might take even a tone of voice unkindly."
The senator tossed a hand in amiable protest: "Oh, sir, you see it much too small! My half of it is large enough for me, with forty times this young gentleman's experience. I don't see just this one boat and trip and these few hundred native-American citizens in deadly contact with a few hundred of Europe's refuse. I see--your passengers see--we view with alarm--a state of affairs--and a test case!"
The old commodore's eyes flashed to retort, but the senator forced a propitiative smile, adding: "However, let that pass just now, here's something else."
But as the old gentleman would have moved away, the senator, ignoring the suggestion, stepped across his path:--
"Last night, commodore, this matchless new boat"--he paused to let the compliment sink in, his eye wandering to Watson, who had sauntered down from the texas roof--"this _Votaress_, swept past everything that had backed out at New Orleans ahead of her."
"Built to do it," put in Hugh while the commodore, by a look, drew Watson to them and the senator flowed on.
"But, lying at Bayou Sara this morning," said the senator, "everything worth counting left us behind again."
"Good for you," said the senator. "Mr. pilot, this paper, of a hundred signatures, petitions this boat to put off her foreigners at Natchez Island. If that is refused, when and where are we likely to overhaul the _Antelope_?"
"_Antelope_? Let's see. We'd still be a-many a bend behind the _Antelope_ at sundown but fo' one thing. At Natchez she's got to discharge an all-fired lot o' casting an' boilers, things she can't put ashore 'ithout han'spikes, block-an'-taickle an' all han's a-cuss'n' to oncet. Like as not we'll catch her right there."