"It's only an eight-hour run from here," said Dare.
"Ten on a day like this," declared Ben.
"I hope we'll be able to land," said Dare anxiously. "It's pretty rough."
"We'll lose this sea when we rounds into the Bay," Ben told him. "There's smooth water off Saltern. Never fear, we'll land all right."
"I hope so!" ejaculated Dare.
"I say, Ben," he added, a little later, "do you suppose it's true what that chap was saying about those Saltern fellows being the hardest lot going?"
"I don't disbelieve it," said the old sailor. He put his hand in his pocket and drew out a black-bowled clay pipe of incredible age, and began to fill it dotingly. Dare remained silent while the rite was being performed, gazing the while on the grizzled veteran.
Ben was also "sixty if he was a day," but hard as nails yet. His face, tanned the colour of a barked sail, was battered and ugly, but good nature lit it and made it human and friendly. His short stature, long arms, bowed legs, and slightly leaning-forward posture gave him the appearance of a gorilla; but there the resemblance ended, for under his hardened exterior he had the tender heart of a child.
"There's one of 'em in the steerage," he said when his pipe was drawing well.
"One of what?" asked Dare.