He tossed it out on deck with a grunt of satisfaction. “Nothing to hurt!” he said to the engineer. “However, I'd rather be inside the capes in this blow. The old skimmer ain't what she used to be. Johnson, do you know that this schooner is all of two feet longer when she is loaded than when she is light?”
“I knew she was hogged, but I didn't know it was as bad as that.”
“I put the lead-line on her before she went into the coal-dock this trip, and I measured her again in the stream yesterday. With a cargo she just humps right up like a monkey bound for war. That's the way with these five-masters! They get such a racking they go wrong before the owners realize.”
“They'll never build any more, and I don't suppose they want to spend much money on the old ones,” suggested the engineer.
“Naturally not, when they ain't paying dividends as it is.” He stepped to the weather rail and sniffed. “I reckon the old man will be dropping the killick before long,” he said.
Mayo knew something of the methods of schooner masters and was not surprised by the last remark.
In the gallant old days, when it was the custom to thrash out a blow, the later plan of anchoring a big craft in the high seas off the Delaware coast, with Europe for a lee, would have been viewed with a certain amount of horror by a captain.
But the modern skipper figures that there's less wear and tear if he anchors and rides it out. To be sure, it's no sort of a place for a squeamish person, aboard a loaded schooner whose mudhook clutches bottom while the sea flings her about, but the masters and crews of coal-luggers are not squeamish.
Mayo, glancing aft, saw two men coming forward slowly, stopping at regular intervals. The light of a lantern played upon their dripping oilskins. When they arrived at the break of the main-deck, near the forward house, he recognized Captain Downs and the first mate. The second mate stepped out and replied to the captain's hail.
“Bring a maul and some more wedges!” commanded the master.