Matterson's light voice calling down the companionway brought the old mariner to his feet.
Gleazen, who had seemed to be on the point of making some ill-tempered retort, slumped back in his chair as Captain North rose.
"What will you have, Mr. Matterson?"
"I wish you'd come on deck, sir," came Matterson's reply. "I'm in doubt whether or no we're drifting."
"Drifting?"
The old man went up with haste, and I followed close at his heels.
"I don't like the feel of the lead," he remarked, when, after gaining the deck, he laid hands on the lead-line. "But what with the current of the river and our pitching, I can't be sure. Are those breakers to leeward?"
"I think, sir," Matterson replied, "that they are only the white tops of the waves."
Matterson showed more genuine deference now than I had ever seen in him before, which in itself went far to convince me that affairs were going badly.