“Um-hm. That was good judgment.”
“Tell me, Mr. Atwood,” asked the young lady innocently, “are all seafaring men very dictatorial under such circumstances?”
“Very—which?”
“I mean do they order people about and make them do all sorts of things, whether they wish to or not?”
“Sartin. Godfreys! I never asked nobody what they wished aboard the Ezry H. Jones.”
“And do they tell them to 'sit down and keep still'?”
“Gen'rally they tell 'em to get up and keep movin'. If they don't they start 'em pretty lively—with a rope's end.”
“I see. Even when they are—ladies?”
“Ladies? Godfreys! we never had but one woman aboard the Ezry. Had the skipper's wife one v'yage, but nobody ever ordered her around any to speak of. She was six feet tall and weighed two hundred. All hands was scart to death of her.”
“Suppose she had been ordered to 'sit down and keep still'; what do you think would have happened?”