"Your greasy tub was carrying one third more than ever should have been put on her, her equipment was no good, we ran into a storm and the engines quit."
"All them hides lost." Devil Chad was overwhelmed by this personal tragedy and could think of nothing else. "Couldn't you of done somethin'?"
"It wasn't my ship and they weren't my hides. What are you going to do for the families of the men who were lost?"
"Why should I do anything? They knew when they signed on that they was runnin' risks." Devil Chad turned his unreadable eyes squarely on Ramsay. "What do you want here?"
"Nothing."
"Ain't you the boy who wrote me from New York, an' asked me for a job?"
The man at the vat continued working and others stayed at their tasks, but Ramsay was aware of a rippling under-current. There was an uneasiness among the men, and a fear; and in spite of the fact that they kept busy they turned covert eyes on Ramsay and Devil Chad. The boy felt a flashing anger. Who was this man, and what was he, that so many others could live in almost craven fear of him?
"If you are," Devil Chad continued, still holding Ramsay in the cage of his eyes, "you can have the job but I hold back twenty-five cents a day until them hides are paid for."
"Take your job!" Ramsay exploded, "and go plumb to the bottom of the lake with it!"
"I warned you, boy," Devil Chad was talking softly now. "I warned you. I don't put up with flip people, an' now I'm goin' to teach you the lesson that I should of given you on the Holter."