The hours dragged. He helped to close and batten the fore-hatch, and later performed similar service on the hatch aft. The main-hatch continued to gulp the black food which the chute fed to it.
Suddenly a tall young man appeared to Mayo. The stranger was smartly dressed, and his spick-and-span garb contrasted strangely with the general riot of dirt aboard the schooner. He trod gingerly over the dust-coated planks and carried two suit-cases.
“Here, George,” he commanded. “Take these to my stateroom.”
Mayo hesitated.
“I'm going as passenger,” said the young man, impatiently, and Mayo remembered what the captain had told the mate.
Passengers on coal-schooners, sailing as friends of the master, were not unknown on the coast, but Mayo judged, from what he had heard, that this person was not a friend, and had wondered a bit.
“I am not allowed to go aft, sir, without orders from the mate.”
“Where is the mate?”
“I think he is below, sir.”
“Asleep?”