As he spoke, however, a small boat crept out from some little cove about three hundred yards round the bay. It contained a man, who rowed it leisurely toward the wharf. We leaned over the wooden rail and waited.
The man ran the boat into the shingly beach, pulled in his oars, climbed out and made toward us. An Airedale dog, which had evidently been curled up in the bottom of the boat, sprang out after him, keeping close to him and eyeing us suspiciously and angrily.
In appearance the man reminded me of one of R. L. Stevenson's pirates, or one of Jack London's 'longshoremen.
He wore heavy logging boots, brown canvas trousers kept up by a belt, and a brown shirt, showing hairy brown arms and a bared, scraggy throat. A battered, sun-cast, felt hat lay on his head. His face was wrinkled and weather-beaten to the equivalent of tanned hide. He wore great, long, drooping moustaches snow white in colour. His eyes were limpid blue.
"It's you, Mr. Horsfal," he mumbled rather thickly, in a voice that seemed to come from somewhere underground; "didn't know you in the distance."
"Jake,—shake with Mr. George Bremner;—he's going to supervise the place and the new store, same as I explained to you two weeks ago. Hope you make friends. He's to be head boss man, and his word goes; but you'll find him twenty-four carat gold."
"That's darned fine gold, boss," grunted Jake.
He held out his horny hand and grasped mine, exclaiming heartily enough:
"Glad to meet you, George."
He pulled out a plug of tobacco from his hip pocket, brushed some of the most conspicuous dirt and grime from it, bit off what appeared to me to be a mouthful and began to look me over.