"He did, f'r I told him."
"Meaning to get me pulled?"
"Meaning nothing but wanting to be rid av the bothering little man. He said he was a friend av yours, and didn't care to be speaking to ye while ye was mixing with the naygurs. But that's all over and gone. What'll ye be doing next?"
Griswold took a leaf out of the past. Safety in a former peril had grown out of a breakfast deliberately eaten in a café next door to the Bayou State Security.
"What would I do but finish my job on the Julie?" he said, pushing the theory to its logical conclusion.
The mate shook his head. "Ye needn't do that; the cops might be coming down here and running you in again. How much pay have ye drawn?"
"Not any."
M'Grath took a greasy wallet from his pocket and counted out a deck-hand's wages for the trip.
"Take this, and I'll be getting it back from the clerk. It might not be good f'r ye to show up at the office. Where's yer hat?"
"It was lost in the shuffle out yonder at the mooring-ring."