"I can't go any further, and you see they're very sick."
The skipper was understood to say that his ship was not a several adjectived hospital, but Austin only smiled, for he was acquainted with that kind of man, and aware that he was, at least, as likely to do him a kindness as an elaborately got up mailboat's skipper.
"Well," he said, "if you won't have us, I'll take them back and bury them. It's tolerably sure to come to that. Two of us will not eat much, any way, and we'll be quite content to sleep on deck."
There was no answer for a moment, and then, as the bridge came slanting down, the man who leaned out from it laughed.
"It's a puncheon of oil to nothing, and I've been hard up myself," he said. "The next thing is, how the devil are you going to get them up? We've stowed away our ladder."
"Then it'll have to be a sling. I'll steady them up when she rises, and some of your crowd can hand them in."
It was done with difficulty, for the steamer rolled with a disconcerting swing, and then Austin grasped Bill's hand before he went up the rope. A gong clanged sharply, the launch slid astern, and several seamen carried the two bundles of foul blankets away. While Austin watched them vacantly a hand fell upon his shoulder, and propelled him into a room beneath the bridge. Then he heard a harsh voice:
"There isn't any factory I'm acquainted with hereabouts. Where d'you get that oil from?" it said.
Austin sat down on the settee and blinked at the burly, hard-faced man in front of him.
"I don't know if you'll be astonished, but we really came by it legitimately," he said. "In fact, we got it out of a stranded steamer—one we're endeavouring to heave off, you see."