"Well, why in the world didn't you let us know you were coming?"
"Say, don't kid yourself. You knew I couldn't stay behind." Fraser blew a cloud of smoke airily. "I never start anything I can't finish, I keep telling you, and I'm going to put this deal through, now that I've got it started." With a half-embarrassed laugh and a complete change of manner, he laid his hand upon Boyd's shoulder, saying: "Pal, I ain't much good to myself or anybody else, but I like you and I want to stick around. Maybe I'll come in useful yet—you can't tell."
Emerson had never glimpsed this side of the man's nature, and it rather surprised him.
"Of course you can come along, old man," he responded, heartily. "We're glad to have you."
To one who has never witnessed the spring sailing of a Northern cannery-tender, the event is well worth seeing; it is one of the curiosities of the Seattle water-front. Not only is there the inevitable confusion involved in the departure of an overloaded craft, but likewise there is all the noisy excitement that attends a shipment of Oriental troops.
The Chinese maintain such a clatter as to drown the hoarse cries of the stevedores, the complaint of the creaking tackle, and the rumble of the winches. They scurry hither and yon like a distracted army, forever in the way, shouting, clacking, squealing in senseless turmoil. They are timid as to the water, and for them a voyage is at all times beset with many alarms. It is no more possible to restrain them than to calm a frightened herd of wild pigs, nor will they embark at all until their frenzy has run its course and died of its own exhaustion. To discipline them according to the seamen's standard is inadvisable, for many of them are "cutters," big, evil, saffron-hued fellows, whose trade it is to butcher and in whose dextrous hands a knife becomes a frightful weapon.
The Japs, ordinarily so noiseless and submissive, yield to the contagion and add their share to the uproar. Each man carries a few pounds of baggage in bundles or packs or valises, and these scanty belongings he guards with shrieking solicitude.
While the pandemonium of the Orientals who gathered to board The Bedford Castle was sufficient in itself to cause consternation, it was as nothing to that which broke loose when the fishermen began to assemble. To a man they were drunk, belligerent and, declamatory. A few, to be sure, were still busy with the tag ends of the cargo, but the majority had gone to their lodgings for their packs, and now reappeared in a state of the wildest exuberance; for this would be their last spree of the season, and before them lay a period of long, sleepless nights, exposure, and unceasing labor, wherein a year's work must be crowded into three months. They, therefore, inaugurated the change in befitting style.
On the whole, no explosive has ever been invented that is so noisy in its effect, so furiously expansive in its action, as the fumes of cheap whiskey. The great dock-shed soon began to reverberate to the wildest clamor, which added to the fury of the crowd outside. The strikers, unable to enter the building, flowed down upon the adjoining wharf, or clambered to the roofs nearby, whence they jeered insultingly. Among them was a newspaper photographer, bent on securing an unusual picture for his publication, and in truth the scene from this point of view was sufficiently novel and striking.
The decks of the big, low-lying tramp steamer were piled high with gear of every description. A trio of stout tow-boats were blocked up amidships, long piles of lumber rose higher than a man's head, and the roofs of the deck-houses were jammed with fishing-boats nested, one inside the other, like pots in a kitchen. Every available inch was crowded with cases of gasoline, of groceries, and of the varied provisions required on an expedition of this magnitude. Aft, on rows of hooks, were suspended the carcasses of sheep and bullocks and hogs; there seemed to be nowhere another foot of available room. The red water-line of the ship was already submerged, yet notwithstanding this fact her derricks clanged noisily, her booms swung back and forth, and her gaping hatches swallowed momentary loads. Those fishermen who had come aboard early had settled like flies in the rigging, whence they taunted their enemies, hurling back insult for insult.