ed
Rose, too?"

"What else?"

"But doesn't she know, or doesn't her uncle know, that he's a wife in
Boston?"

"Her uncle!" he snorted. "He's no more wit than my ship's cat."

"But Drislane knows--won't he tell her?"

"He don't seem to. A proud one, Drislane. Six months he's been with me
now in the _Sirius_, and if she isn't sure she wants him above anybody
else on this earth, then she needn't have him, that's all; or leastwise,
that's how I sense him. He wouldn't take no odds of the devil, that
lad."

I could believe that; and it set me to thinking.

"Maybe you're thinkin' now," he went on, "that she should be able to see
for herself what my cousin is? But what training has she had to judge o'
men? What other kind does she see aught of in her uncle's place? Indeed,
with her bringing up and what brains the poor girl has, she's done very
well, I'm thinkin', to ha' kept off the rocks as long as she has. A
hundred to one you'll find my fine cousin at the Tidewater to-night. But
I must be going. Good night to you."

* * * * *

Only the bartender was in the front room of the Tidewater, and he was so
busy peeking through a slide in the wall, the same through which he
passed the drink orders from the restaurant, that he did not hear me
come in. The door to the inner room was closed, but the low-powered
roars of people trying hard not to be noisy were oozing through.

"What's doing?" I called to the bartender. I had to call it twice to
make him turn around.

"It's the big captain of the _Orion_ and that little deck-hand
Drislane."

Anybody taking Drislane for a joke always did get my goat. "He's not a
deck-hand!" I bit out, "he's a seaman, and a good one. But what about
him and Captain Sickles?"

"It's about him an' the boss's Rose. The captain begins to abuse
Drislane somethin' fierce, an' he comes back at him. Then the captain
brings her into it. 'What would a girl be wantin' with a little runt
like you?' he says; and after that, 'I dunno but I'll take her to Boston
with me this trip,' and said it like he meant it. An' the little
Drislane he jumps into him two-handed, an' they're hard at it now."

I squeezed inside the door of the inner room. "Man-to-man fashion!" I
could hear, in the powerful voice of Captain Oliver, while I was
crowding through the ring of people to the open space in the middle of
the floor. "That's it--man fashion wi' the naked fists!" some scattering
voice