"Flaherty," he said, "I think you're a liar."
"The same to you and many of them," Flaherty replied, not a whit abashed. "You said she was an eight thousand ton tramp."
"I never went so far as to say I'd been aboard her on trial trip, though--and I did cut down her tonnage, showin' I got the fragments of a conscience left," Hicks defended himself.
He closed the book with a sigh and placed it back on the shelf, just as the door opened to admit no less a personage than Batholomew McGuffey, late chief engineer, first assistant, second assistant, third assistant, wiper, oiler, water-tender, and stoker of the S.S. _Maggie_. With a brief nod to Jack Flaherty Mr. McGuffey approached Dan Hicks.
"I been lookin' for you, captain," he announced. "Say, I hear the chief o' the _Aphrodite's_ goin' to take a three months' lay-off to get shet of his rheumatism. Is that straight?"
"Well, say, I'd like to have a chance to substitoot for him. You know my capabilities, Hicks, an' if it would be agreeable to you to have me for your chief your recommendation would go a long way toward landin' me the job. I'd sure make them engines behave."
"What vessel have you been on lately?" Hicks demanded cautiously, for he knew Mr. McGuffey's reputation for non-reliability around pay-day.
"I been with that fresh water scavenger, Scraggs, in the _Maggie_ for most a year."
"He fired me," McGuffey replied honestly. "If he hadn't I'd have quit, so it's a toss-up. Comin' in from Halfmoon Bay last night we got lost in the fog an' piled up on the beach just below the Cliff House----"
"This is interesting," Jack Flaherty murmured. "You say she walked ashore on you, McGuffey? Well, I'll be shot!"
"She did. Scraggs blamed it on me, Flaherty. He said I didn't obey the signals from the bridge, one word led to another, an' he went dancin' mad an' ordered me off his ship. Well, it's his ship--or it _was_ his ship, for I'll bet a dollar she's ground to powder by now--so all I could do was obey. I hopped overboard an' waded ashore. I suppose all my clothes an' things is gone by now. I left everything aboard an' had to borrow this outfit from Scab Johnny." He grinned pathetically. "So I guess you understand, Captain Hicks, just how bad I need that job I spoke about a minute ago."