"And two hundred lusty coolie boys
With twenty sampans wide,
Laid twice five hundred tons to where
The ship in stream did ride."
Trench laid down the sheets.
"That's not the end, Sharkey?"
"No, no. But that's the end of the Jim Joe part, which was hailed as so masterly a performance on Pay's part—getting those sampan men and coolies out of their beds on a night like that and to work at coaling ship for us—that I, the uncrowned poet laureate of the Asiatic squadron, was commissioned to do it in verse, which I proceeded to do one night; and got that far, swinging along fine and dandy, when the messenger called me for the mid-watch."
"And you never finished it?"
"I couldn't—not in rhyme. After that four hours' night-watch the rhymes were all gone from me. It was a rough night. A monsoon made out of the southeast——"
"Omit the professional jargon, Sharkey, and your professional troubles, and remember the first law of story-telling is to tell the story."
"Wizz!" murmured Sharkey. "But, thus encouraged, I proceed. Well, getting Jim Joe started with his twenty sampans and his two hundred coolies was only part of Pay's job that night. The big warehouse, where goods for our fleet and other craft were stored, was in charge of a Chinaman we called Hoo Ling, and he knew less English than Joe, and appreciated even less than Joe the need of quick action. The admiral's wireless message looked just like any other wireless message to this big chink, Hoo Ling. But it's a great thing to be a student of the Chinese and of Chinese customs and of Chinese mental processes. Pay wheedled Ling a little, bluffed him a little, touched on past friendships a little, on possible future business a lot, painted a picture of our warlike forces over to Chee Foo, touched—not too casually—on the so much greater love which the officers and men of the United States Navy bore for China than for Japan, and such other little subtleties as he could invoke or invent. At last the old fellow was moved to open up and let Pay pick out what packages were for the fleet.
"And so, with four yeomen of the ship roused from restful hammocks to make memoranda of the addresses as fast as he pried them loose from the main pile and called them out, and with twelve able seamen of the watch to hustle the packages along as fast as the yeomen recorded them, and with forty other bustling bluejackets to load them into the boats, Pay tore into that pile of freight, which was about as high and twice as long and wide as a three-apartment house. There were probably four or five thousand packages of various kinds to be overhauled, and they were addressed in four languages—English, German, French, and Chinese. If Pay was the only white man in that part of China who could have charmed that impassive old storekeeper out of his bamboo bed that time of night, he was probably likewise the only white man in port that night who could read those Chinese shopkeepers' addresses.
"Dry goods, wet goods, hardware, grocery stuff, butcher's stuff, jeweller's stuff, ship's stores, bales of cotton, bales of silk, curios, souvenirs, bicycles, sewing-machines, sacks of rice, sacks of coffee, sacks of potatoes, barrels of flour and of gasolene, auto tires, boxes of tea, quarters of beef and of mutton, cases of breakfast-food and of oil, packages all the way from the size of a finger-ring to packages the size of an auto-truck. You know what a big, husky chap Pay Totten is? Imagine him on a slushy, snowy night, stripped to the waist, wading into that pile—feet, shoulders, knees, hands, elbows, with his teeth almost—tearing out those packages, and from addresses in English, French, German, and especially Chinese, picking out flying such as were for our ships."