"That is all. The second mate is aboard, and the crew is one to be depended on. I'll go back myself in a day or two."
But Anthony frowned; and after Corkery had gone he continued to pace the floor.
"Ah, well," said Whitaker, after a time, approaching him, "it does no good to fidget. It's the hard season, and nothing else was to be expected. We can only wait until the ice is out, and the vessel can come comfortably up to her dock."
"But while excellent cargo is within hands' reach are we to sit here twiddling our thumbs?"
"What else can we do?" asked Whitaker cheerily. "When a ship is lodged in the river's gullet as this one seems to be, and there's a month or more of bad weather still to come, why fret and get in a state of mind?"
But this submissive state did not appeal to Anthony; he resented the easy air of the counting-room under defeat; so he thought hard about the matter during the day, and for most of the night; and the next morning found him in the public room of a tavern on Second Street where he heard Corkery was lodged. The mate sat before the tavern fire chipping bits of tobacco from a dark cake, with which to charge his pipe, and greeted Anthony with a nod; the young man drew a stool up to the fire and sat warming his hands at the blaze.
"They tell me," said Anthony, "that you are of this port and know the river and bay very well."
"Why," said Corkery, as he carefully chipped away at the tobacco, "I was a boy aboard a sloop that sailed between here and Bristol, carrying bricks; then I shipped on the New Castle packets. Yes, I can claim to know the river and bay quite well."
"How did you come up to the city?" asked Anthony.
"By sledge," replied the mate.