[Yelling.] I’m not going—I’m not going. You don’t know—you didn’t see it! The last voyage she had a foot of water in her hold!
Kneir.
The last voyage? A ship that has just returned from her fourth voyage to the herring catch and that has brought fourteen loads! Has it suddenly become unseaworthy, because you, you miserable coward, are going along?
Bar.
[With feverish anxiety.] I looked in the hold—the barrels were floating. You can see death that is hiding down there.
Kneir.
Bilge water, as in every ship! The barrels floating! Tell that to your grandmother, not to an old sailor’s wife. Skipper Hengst is a child, eh! Isn’t Hengst going and Mees and Gerrit and Jacob and Nellis—your own brother and Truus’ little Peter? Do you claim to know more than old seamen? [Fiercely.] Get up! I’m not going to stand it to see you taken aboard by the police——
Bar.
[Crying.] Oh, Mother dear, Mother dear, don’t make me go!
Kneir.