“’Tis a pity ye let him get away. If he wanders into the Chinese city amongst some of thim native friends of his ’twill be the divil and all to find him again. So he’s still alive!”
“I sat and talked with him and he discoursed nightmares.”
“He has lived thim,” said Paddy Blake.
“I had him and I lost him,” was O’Shea’s melancholy exclamation. “An oakum-whiskered Dutchman by the name of Spreckels breezed in under full sail and welcomed this McDougal like a long-lost brother, and carried him off to sea before ye could blink. It was comical. And I sat there like a wooden figure-head and let him go.”
“In the Wilhelmina Augusta—four-masted steel bark bound out to Hamburg. It was a lucky stroke for McDougal.”
“And most unlucky for me,” sighed O’Shea. Then he pulled himself together, and spoke in his hearty, masterful way. “Come along, Paddy Blake, and find me a tug. We will chase McDougal down river for the sake of a conversation with him.”
“Captain Spreckels had the Arrow, and she’s fast,” said Paddy Blake. “He has a good start of ye, and his bark will be ready to sail as soon as he boards her.”
“Then we’ll chase him out to sea. I have come too far to lose McDougal by letting him slip through me fingers,” and the demeanor of Captain Michael O’Shea discouraged further argument.
Paddy Blake jammed the tall hat on the back of his head, unbolted the door, and whisked through the bar-room with such speed that the shipmaster’s long strides could hardly keep up with him. They turned into the street that led to the water-front and hastened to a lighted corner of the bund where stood several ’rickshaws. Paddy darted at the drowsy coolies who were squatted on the pavement, cuffed a couple of them, and gave an order in pidgin English. They jumped into the shafts, the passengers climbed aboard, and the vehicles went spinning along the thoroughfare.
As they drew abreast of the lights of the anchored shipping, Paddy Blake looked along the landing-berths of the smaller steamers and exclaimed with an explosion of profane surprise: