“Get up, you brute!” Matt ordered. “You got the wrong pig by the ear that time.”
“My leg ban broken,” Kjellin whimpered.
“I wish it was your neck,” Matt replied with feeling, and bent over to examine his fallen foe. When he grasped Kjellin by the right shoulder, however, the Finn screamed with pain, so Matt called the steward, and together they lifted him and carried him to his berth.
“I'll bet a cooky you're a total loss and no accident insurance,” Matt soliloquized. “You're not worth it, but for the sake of the owners I'll get a doctor to look you over,” and he went ashore at once. When the doctor had looked Thorwald Kjellin over his verdict was a broken tibia, a broken radius and a broken clavicle.
Matt was concerned. “I don't think I ever had any of those things to get broken,” he declared humorously, “but if mere words mean anything I'll bet this is a hospital job.” The doctor nodded, and Matt turned to the captain: “Do you want to go to the hospital in Eureka or in San Francisco?”
“I ban vant to go home,” the Finn moaned.
“Very well, captain; I guess your successor will bring you there. I'm going up to the mill office now to report to the owners by telephone.”
“Dot ban't none o' your business, Peasley,” Kjellin protested. “Dot is der first mate's job. You ban fired.”
“Yes, I know. Now I'm back-firing,” Matt retorted.
Fifteen minutes later he had Cappy Ricks on the long-distance telephone.