Next morning he was down at the wharves before six o'clock, smoking his pipe contentedly, after breakfasting sumptuously at a coffee-stall for sixpence. There was a little American barque lying alongside the Circular Quay, and some of the hands were bending on her head-sails. Tom sat down on the wharf stringer dangling his feet and watching them intently. Presently the mate appeared on the poop, smoking a cigar. He looked at Tom critically for a moment or so, and then said—
"Looking for a ship, young feller?"
The moment Tom heard him speak, he jumped to his feet, for he knew the voice, last heard when the possessor of it was mate of the island trading schooner Sadie Caller , a year before in Samoa.
"Is that you, Bannister?" he cried.
"Reckon 'taint no one else, young feller. Why, Tom Denison, is it you? Step right aboard."
Tom was on the poop in an instant, the mate coming to him with outstretched hand.
"What's the matter, Tom? Broke?"
"Stony!"
"Sit down here and tell me all about it. I heard you had left the Palestine . Say, sling that dirty old pipe overboard, and take one of these cigars. The skipper will be on deck presently, and the sight of it
would rile him terrible. He hez his new wife aboard, and she considers pipes ez low-down."