“Almost—I'm a ship, freight and marine insurance broker.” And the stranger handed over a calling card bearing the name of Mr. Allan Hayes. “I'm from Seattle.”
“Peasley is my name, Mr. Hayes,” Matt answered heartily, glad of this chance acquaintance with a man with whom he could converse on a subject of mutual interest. “I haven't any post-office address,” he added whimsically.
“Going over to Columbia River to join your ship, I daresay,” Mr. Hayes suggested.
“No, sir. I'm bound for San Francisco, to get a job in steam and work up to a captaincy.”
“Wherein you show commendable wisdom, Mr. Peasley,” the broker answered. “A man can get so far in a windjammer—a hundred a month in the little coasting schooners and a hundred and twenty-five in the big vessels running foreign—and there he sticks. In steam schooners a good man can command two hundred dollars a month, with a chance for promotion into a big freighter, for the reason that in steam one has more opportunity to show the stuff that's in one.”
“How far are you going?” Matt demanded.
“I'm bound for San Francisco too.”
“Good!” Matt replied, for, like most boys, he was a gregarious animal, and Mr. Hayes seemed to be a pleasant, affable gentleman. “I suppose you know most of the steam vessels on this coast?” he continued, anxious to turn the conversation into channels that might be productive of information valuable to him in his new line of endeavor.
Mr. Hayes nodded. “I have to,” he said, “if I'm to do any business negotiating charters; in fact, I'm bound to San Francisco now to charter two steamers.”
“Freight or passenger?”