"Yes," replied Captain Mostyn. "We've made arrangements for the steelwork to be shipped from there. Saves a lot of trouble sending it to East India Docks. We gain on the estimate that way, although, of course, we are practically chartering the _West Barbican_ for two or three days."
At ten on the following Thursday Peter Mostyn boarded the _West Barbican_. The ship was of about 7000 tons, single funnelled, and with two stumpy masts with telescopic topmasts and a sheaf of derricks to each. She was still coaling and her decks were deep in grimy dust. With the exception of the officers the ship was manned by lascars--a novelty so far as Peter was concerned.
A burly, jovial-featured man in a grimy uniform, and wearing a muffler under the turned-up collar of his tunic, greeted Mostyn as he stepped off the gangplank.
"Hello, you're our Sparks, aren't you?" inquired the man. "My name's Preston when it's not Salthorse. Just now it ought to be Coaldust. I'll take you along to see the Old Man, and, when he's done with you, come to me for the keys of the wireless cabin. I'm Acting Chief."
Picking his way between coal-bags, dodging knots of bizarrely clad lascars, who with shrill cries dragged the sacks of fuel to the bunker shoots, Peter followed the Acting Chief Officer to the for'ard end of the boat-deck, where the skipper of the S.S. _West Barbican_ had his cabin. Over the jalousied door was a brass plate with the word "Captain"; just below the plate was a card on which appeared, in bold and rather straggling handwriting, the intimation: "Don't knock--come in."
"Carry on, old son," urged Preston--and left Peter to his own devices.
For a brief instant Peter hesitated. Then, force of habit gaining the ascendancy, he knocked discreetly upon the white-enamelled door.
"What are you hanging on to the slack for?" demanded a bull voice. "Where are your blessed deadlights? Can't you read?"
The Wireless Officer opened the door and stepped briskly into the cabin.
Sitting in an arm-chair in front of a table littered with books and papers was a short, thick-set, bearded man. He was in his shirt-sleeves; a salt-stained uniform cap was perched on the back of his head, leaving exposed a wide, vein-traced forehead bordered on either side by closely cropped grey hair. His complexion was a dusky red, while his choleric blue eyes peered beneath a pair of beetling bushy eyebrows.