"I'll go and hail my skipper," said Shirley, "if you'll let me have a speaking-trumpet."
"No," said the other, "I don't want you to do that. I don't mind tellin' you that I don't trust you. I've got very heavy responsibility on me, and I don't know who you are no more than if you was a porpoise come a-bouncin' up out of the sea. I don't want you and your skipper holdin' no conversation with each other until I've got this matter settled to my satisfaction, and then I can put you on board your vessel, and go ahead on my course, or I can turn back, just whichever I make up my mind to do. But until I make up my mind, I don't want no reports made from this vessel to any other, and no matter what you say when you are hailin', how do I know what you mean, and what sort of signals you've agreed on between you?"
Shirley was obliged to accept the situation, and when Burke had ceased to hail, he was allowed to go on deck. Then, after waving his hat to the yacht,--which was now at a considerable distance, although within easy range of a glass,--Shirley lighted his pipe, and walked up and down the deck. He saw a good many things to interest him; but he spoke to no one, and endeavored to assume the demeanor of one who was much interested in his own affairs, and very little in what was going on about him.
But Shirley noticed a great many things which made a deep impression upon him. The crew seemed to be composed of men not very well disciplined, but exceedingly talkative, and although Shirley did not understand French, he was now pretty sure that all the conversation he heard was in that tongue. Then, again, the men did not appear to be very well acquainted with the vessel--they frequently seemed to be looking for things, the position of which they should have known. He could not understand how men who had sailed on a vessel from Southampton should show such a spirit of inquiry in regard to the internal arrangements of the steamer. A boatswain, who was giving the orders to a number of men, seemed more as if he were instructing a class in the nautical management of a vessel than in giving the ordinary everyday orders which might be expected on such a voyage as this. Once he saw the Captain come on deck with a book in his hand, apparently a log-book, and he showed it to one of the mates. These two stood turning over the leaves of the book as if they had never seen it before, and wanted to find something which they supposed to be in it.