"You never asked, Harve. I'll tell you about it some day, if you care to listen. Try a stuffed olive."
"Troop says the most interesting thing in the world is to find out how the next man gets his vittles. It's great to have a trimmed-up meal again. We were well fed, though. But mug on the Banks. Disko fed us first-class. He's a great man. And Dan—that's his son—Dan's my partner. And there's Uncle Salters and his manures, an' he reads Josephus. He's sure I'm crazy yet. And there's poor little Penn, and he is crazy. You mustn't talk to him about Johnstown, because—
"And, oh, you must know Tom Platt and Long Jack and Manuel. Manuel saved my life. I'm sorry he's a Portuguee. He can't talk much, but he's an everlasting musician. He found me struck adrift and drifting, and hauled me in."
"I wonder your nervous system isn't completely wrecked," said Mrs. Cheyne.
"What for, Mama? I worked like a horse and I ate like a hog and I slept like a dead man."
That was too much for Mrs. Cheyne, who began to think of her visions of a corpse rocking on the salty seas. She went to her stateroom, and Harvey curled up beside his father, explaining his indebtedness.
"You can depend upon me to do everything I can for the crowd, Harve. They seem to be good men on your showing."
"Best in the Fleet, sir. Ask at Gloucester," said Harvey. "But Disko believes still he's cured me of being crazy. Dan's the only one I've let on to about you, and our private cars and all the rest of it, and I'm not quite sure Dan believes. I want to paralyze 'em to-morrow. Say, can't they run the 'Constance' over to Gloucester? Mama don't look fit to be moved, anyway, and we're bound to finish cleaning out by tomorrow. Wouverman takes our fish. You see, we're the first off the Banks this season, and it's four twenty-five a quintal. We held out till he paid it. They want it quick."
"You mean you'll have to work to-morrow, then?"
"I told Troop I would. I'm on the scales. I've brought the tallies with me." He looked at the greasy notebook with an air of importance that made his father choke. "There isn't but three—no—two ninety-four or five quintal more by my reckoning."