I
TO Captain Dixey, of the iron sea-going tug Ice King, lying tied up to her dock in Boston Harbor, came one winter’s morning a man in a fur coat and much bediamonded. “My name,” said the visitor, “is Wiley.”
“And wily is your nature,” thought Dixey, who, according to report, was not too unsophisticated himself.
“And I want to know what it will cost me for the services of your tug for one, two, three, or four days—a week, if necessary.”
“That will depend on the service.”
“Well, suppose I can’t just say what the service will be?”
“Then I can’t tell you just what the price will be.”
“Haven’t you a fixed price by the day?”
“For a fixed service, yes. A man comes to me and says, ‘What do you want to run down to Newport News to tow a barge, or say two barges, of coal—fifteen or eighteen hundred tons in a barge—to Boston?’ I tell him. I’ll tell you, if it’s anything of that kind.”
“’Tisn’t quite that.”
“Well, a man comes to me and says, ‘Say, I have a vessel under the lee of Cape Cod’—say it’s blowin’ a no’wester like now—a vessel say to anchor at Provincetown or Chatham——”
“Yes, yes, at Chatham——”
“— And you ask me what I’ll go and get her for and tow her to Boston? I’ll soon tell you, if you’ll tell me what her tonnage is.”
“Say a two-thousand-ton bark, and loaded with mahogany.”
“That’s a pretty big vessel and a pretty valuable cargo, and the wind’s liable to stay no’west for a while—blowin’ hard as it promises to, and a hard drag around Cape Cod and across the Bay in a no’wester——”
“I know, I know—but how much?”
“Me to leave right away?”
“Well, maybe not at once—say in a few hours. But I’m ready to engage you at once.”
“Well——”
“But wait—it isn’t exactly a tow from anchorage.”
“No. You see, it’s this way. I’m interested in this bark, and there’s a desperate sort of captain aboard, and she’s leaking, and I’m afraid that despite all instructions he’ll try and beat her around the Cape. And he mayn’t make it. And if he tries it and anything goes wrong—if he has to get help—say her sails blow off and she leaking— I’d like to be right there and pick her up.”
“Why, that’s salvage, and a towboat could claim salvage—if she really needed help.”
“The towboat could claim? You mean the owners of the towboat could claim the salvage?”
“Why, of course, the owners.”
“Well, if I charter her I’d be the same as the owner, wouldn’t I?”
“M-m— I don’t know but what you would.”
“Well, there it is.”
“H’m—where’d you say she was layin’— Chatham?”
“I didn’t say.”
“No? I thought you did.”
“You think too fast. How much for your boat from now till the job’s over?”
“Well, two thousand tons—her hull’d be worth a lot in itself. And mahogany—a two-thousand-ton ship ought to be carryin’ about a couple of million feet of lumber. And mahogany worth—how much a thousand is mahogany worth, anyway?”
“I don’t know.”
“No? Well, it’s worth a whole lot, that’s sure. Here’s the Morning Commercial News’ll tell. M-m—here’s pine, rough—spruce, planed—m-m—oak—m-m—mahogany—whew! Say, mahogany’s away up, isn’t it? Let me see now. I’ll do that job——”
“Charter me your tug——”
“Yes, charter you the tug for five thousand dollars for the whole job, and two hundred dollars a day—the two hundred a day in case there’s nothing doin’, in case that Skipper shouldn’t go clear crazy, you see, and put out and she leakin’.”
Wiley put on his hat. “You don’t want much, do you? Five thousand dollars! I’ll give you a thousand for the whole job, or two hundred for every day you’re under charter if we don’t get her.”
“No, no—a cargo of mahogany. Five thousand or nothing.”
“Don’t be unreasonable. You know I can get plenty for a thousand——”
“Not too many sea-going tugs right now. There’s always good pickin’ for a big tug in the Bay this time of year. And there’s a risk in your job.”
“A little. But I can get a tug just as good as yours for a thousand.”
“Can you? Then why don’t you?”
“Well, I will. Good-day.”
Captain Dixey gazed after Wiley going up the dock. “And so he can—for a thousand—if he don’t tell them too much. But that would be a rich haul, and I don’t see why I can’t do a little salvage business on my own account. Why not? She’s anybody’s prize that can get her. Two thousand tons and a bark—in the lee of the Cape somewhere, and loaded with mahogany—he said something about Chatham. It oughtn’t be too hard to find out.”
Within ten minutes Captain Dixey was sending off telegrams like an Associated Press-man. He got the answer he wanted, and some hours later, when the man in the fur coat was putting out in another iron sea-going tug, the Durlich, Dixey, in the Ice King, was not half a mile behind him going across the Bay.