He hoisted himself on deck up a perpendicular ladder, and stumbled aft, over a score of obstructions, to where a small, thick–set, clean–shaven man with gray eyebrows sat on a step that led up to the quarter–deck. The swell had passed in the night, leaving a long, oily sea, dotted round the horizon with the sails of a dozen fishing–boats. Between them lay little black specks, showing where the dories were out fishing. The schooner, with a triangular riding–sail on the mainmast, played easily at anchor, and except for the man by the cabin–roof—"house" they call it—she was deserted.

"Mornin'—Good afternoon, I should say. You’ve nigh slep' the clock round, young feller," was the greeting.

"Mornin'," said Harvey. He did not like being called "young feller"; and, as one rescued from drowning, expected sympathy. His mother suffered agonies whenever he got his feet wet; but this mariner did not seem excited.

"Naow let’s hear all abaout it. It’s quite providential, first an' last, fer all concerned. What might be your name? Where from (we mistrust it’s Noo York), an' where baound (we mistrust it’s Europe)?"

Harvey gave his name, the name of the steamer, and a short history of the accident, winding up with a demand to be taken back immediately to New York, where his father would pay anything any one chose to name.

"H’m," said the shaven man, quite unmoved by the end of Harvey’s speech. "I can’t say we think special of any man, or boy even, that falls overboard from that kind o' packet in a flat ca’am. Least of all when his excuse is that he’s seasick."

"Excuse!" cried Harvey. "D’you suppose I’d fall overboard into your dirty little boat for fun?"

"Not knowin' what your notions o' fun may be, I can’t rightly say, young feller. But if I was you, I wouldn’t call the boat which, under Providence, was the means o' savin' ye, names. In the first place, it’s blame irreligious. In the second, it’s annoyin' to my feelin’s—an' I’m Disko Troop o' the We’re Here o' Gloucester, which you don’t seem rightly to know."

"I don’t know and I don’t care," said Harvey. "I’m grateful enough for being saved and all that, of course! but I want you to understand that the sooner you take me back to New York the better it’ll pay you."

"Meanin'—haow?" Troop raised one shaggy eyebrow over a suspiciously mild blue eye.

"Dollars and cents," said Harvey, delighted to think that he was making an impression. "Cold dollars and cents." He thrust a hand into a pocket, and threw out his stomach a little, which was his way of being grand. "You’ve done the best day’s work you ever did in your life when you pulled me in. I’m all the son Harvey Cheyne has."

"He’s bin favoured," said Disko, dryly.

"And if you don’t know who Harvey Cheyne is, you don’t know much—that’s all. Now turn her around and let’s hurry."

Harvey had a notion that the greater part of America was filled with people discussing and envying his father’s dollars.

"Mebbe I do, an' mebbe I don’t. Take a reef in your stummick, young feller. It’s full o' my vittles."

Harvey heard a chuckle from Dan, who was pretending to be busy by the stump–foremast, and blood rushed to his face. "We’ll pay for that too," he said. "When do you suppose we shall get to New York?"

"I don’t use Noo York any. Ner Boston. We may see Eastern Point about September; an' your pa—I’m real sorry I hain’t heerd tell of him—may give me ten dollars efter all your talk. Then o' course he mayn’t."

"Ten dollars! Why, see here, I—" Harvey dived into his pocket for the wad of bills. All he brought up was a soggy packet of cigarettes.

"Not lawful currency; an' bad for the lungs. Heave 'em overboard, young feller, and try agin."

"It’s been stolen!" cried Harvey, hotly.

"You’ll hev to wait till you see your pa to reward me, then?"

"A hundred and thirty–four dollars—all stolen," said Harvey, hunting wildly through his pockets. "Give them back."

A curious change flitted across old Troop’s hard face.