“A dog-barking navigator is a coastwise blockhead that gets lost if he loses sight of land. He steers a course from headland to headland, and every little while on dark nights he stands in close and listens. Pretty soon he hears a dog barking alongshore. 'All right,' he says to the mate; 'we're off Point Montara. I know that Newfoundland dog's barking. He's the only one on the coast. Haul her off and hold her before the wind for four hours and then stand in again. When you pick up the bark of a foxhound you'll be off Pigeon Point.'”
Florry's laughter drowned a further description of the dog-barking navigator's wonderful knowledge of Pacific Coast canines, and after some small talk Matt said good-bye and hung up. When he left the telephone booth, however, he was a happier young man than when he had entered it, for he had now satisfied himself that while Cappy Ricks might arrogate to himself the right of proposing, his daughter could be depended upon to attend to the disposing. He went to his boarding house, paid his landlady, packed his clothes and sent them down to the Gualala, rubbing her blistered sides against Howard Street Pier No. 1. At seven o'clock next morning he was aboard her and at seven-five he superintended the casting off of the stern lines and his apprenticeship in steam had commenced.
CHAPTER XXVII. PROMOTION
Cappy Ricks was in a fine rage. A situation, unique in his forty years of experience as a lumber and shipping magnate, was confronting him, with the prospects exceedingly bright for Cappy playing a role analogous to that of the simpleton who holds the sack on a snipe-hunting expedition. He summoned Mr. Skinner into his private office, and glared at the latter over the rims of his spectacles. “Skinner,” he said solemnly, “there's the very devil to pay.”
Mr. Skinner arched his eyebrows and inclined a respectful ear. Cappy continued:
“It's about the Hermosa. Skinner, that dog-barking navigator you put in that schooner while I was on my vacation has balled us up for fair. I'll be the laughing-stock of the street.”
Parenthetically it may be stated that the Blue Star Navigation Company's schooner, Hermosa, had cleared from Astoria for Valparaiso with a cargo of railroad ties, and, for some reason which the captain could not explain but which Cappy Ricks could, the unfortunate man had become lost at sea, finally ending his voyage on a reef on one of the Samoan Islands. The Hermosa had been listed as missing and her owners had been on the point of receiving a check for the insurance on the vessel and her cargo when an Australian steamer brought news of her predicament in Samoa. Her captain sent word that she was resting easily and that he would get her off. Subsequently, Cappy learned that his dog-barking skipper had discharged his cargo of railroad ties on barges, in order to lighten the vessel and float her off with the aid of a launch. Unfortunately, however, he discovered a huge hole in her garboard, and before he could patch it an extra high tide lifted the vessel over the reef and sunk her forty fathoms deep in a place where nobody could ever get at her again.
“Yes, sir,” Cappy complained. “I'll be the laughing-stock of the street. Here's a letter from the insurance people, inclosing a check for a total loss on the vessel, but they repudiate payment of the insurance on the cargo.”
“Why?” demanded the amazed Skinner. “They insured those ties for delivery at Callao. They can't get out of it.”