"Ye dinna ken a' old Peter's talents," Macallister rejoined with a grin. "Architecture's useful and man has done fine work in stone, but for a pattern o' lightness, strength and beauty ye'll need to take a modern steel steamship. She must bear strains and stresses ye dinna bother aboot on land. A town hall, for example, is no designed for plunging through a steep head sea. Man! wi' a rule and a scriber, I'd design ye a better building than yon hotel."
Kit frowned and pulled out his watch. "Don Arturo is waiting for us."
"Just that! He stated eleeven o'clock. There was no inquiry aboot my convenience. Maybe the head o' a big steamship line likes to command, and deck officers touch their hats and run, but when ye send for an engineer ye use some manners."
Kit said nothing and started for the hotel. He was not an engineer, and at the Liverpool shipping office had been drilled to prompt obedience. The clerk, however, told him to wait and sent a page with Macallister to a room above.
"You are some minutes late," said Don Arturo, indicating a chair.
Macallister noted that the open window commanded the front of the hotel. In fact, when he stopped to criticise its architecture he imagined his stopping might be remarked.
"Three minutes, sir," he admitted, pulling out a black-metal watch. "On board a Spanish ship breakfast's no' very punctual."
Don Arturo knew something about Macallister; moreover he knew his type. Sometimes one may bully a merchant captain, but not a Scots engineer.
"You left your ship without leave," he said. "Are you willing to state your grounds for breaking the company's and the British Board of Trade's rules?"
"To begin with, the ship was Spanish for the time," Macallister rejoined. "Had there been work for me on board I might have stopped, but the captain was sick and the office had no use for the boat. Then I reckoned Mr. Musgrave might need me in Africa. In a sense, his business was the company's."