Miss Farnham shook her head thoughtfully. "Isn't that putting them terribly low in the scale of humanity? Surely there must be some among them who are capable of better things." She was trying desperately hard to lead up to the stubble-bearded man, and it was the most difficult task she had ever set herself.
"Not among the black boys, I'm afraid. Now and then a white man drifts into a crew, but that's a different matter."
"Better or worse?" she queried.
"Worse, usually. It's a pretty poor stick of a white man that can't find something better than 'rousting' on a steamboat."
Here was her chance, and she took it courageously.
"Haven't you one man in the Belle Julie's crew who has earned a better recommendation than that, Captain Mayfield?"
"You mean that sick hobo who went into the river after M'Grath last night? I didn't know that story had got back to the ladies' cabin."
"It hasn't. But I know it because I was looking on. I couldn't sleep, and I had gone out to see them make a night landing. Why do you call him 'the sick hobo'?"
The captain was paying strict attention now, looking at her curiously from beneath the grizzled eyebrows. But he saw only the classic profile.
"That's what he is—or at least, what he let on to be when he shipped with us," he replied. Then: "You say you saw it: tell me what happened."