hed to his desk, and without delay signed John Kieran as pump-man
for the Gulf voyage of the oil ship _Rapidan_.

II

It lacked two minutes to sailing time, and the passenger was in the
cabin mess-room, when he heard the exclamation. "Here he comes now."

He looked through the air-port. Out on the deck was a huge fellow gazing
up the dock. The passenger, who knew the big man for the boson, gazed up
the dock also and saw that it was the pump-man coming; and he was
singing cheerily as he came:

"Our ship she was alaborin' in the Gulf o' Mexico,
The skipper on the quarter--"

Usually it is only the drunks who come over the side of an oil-tanker
singing, but this was no drunk. Drunks generally make use of all the
aids to navigation when they board a ship. Above all, they do not ignore
the gang-plank. But this lad wasn't going a hundred feet out of his way
for any gang-plank. He hove his suit-case aboard, made a one-handed
vault from dock to deck (and from stringpiece to rail was high as his
shoulder), and when he landed on deck it was like a cat on his toes; and
like a cat he was off and away, suit-case in hand, while those of the
crew who had only seen him land were still wondering where he dropped
from.

The big man plainly did not like the style of him at all. "Here you!"
he bellowed, "who the hell are _you_?"

And the new-comer ripped out, "And who the hell are _you_ that wants to
know?"

"Who'm I? Who'm I? I'll show yer bloody well soon who I am."

"Well, show me."

"Show yer?"

"Yes, you big sausage, show me."

"Show yer? Show yer?" The big man peered around the ship. Surely it was
a mirage.

At the very first whoop from the big man the pump-man had stopped dead,
softly set down his suit-case, and waited. Now he stepped swiftly toward
the big man. And to the passenger, looking and listening from the cabin
mess-room, it looked like the finest kind of a battle; but just then the
captain came up the gang-plank calling out, "Cast off those lines. And
don't fall asleep over it, either." The deck force scattered to carry
out his orders. The pump-man picked up his suit-case and went on to his
quarters.

Next morning (the ship by now well down the Jersey coast and the
passenger on the bridge by the captain's invitation) again was heard the
carolling voice:

"Our ship she was alaborin' in the Gulf o' Mexico,
The skipper on the quarter, with eyes aloft and low.
Says he, 'My bucko boys--'"

th