'I will give you ten pounds,' he said to Charlie on the following morning, 'and as you are not likely to be away much more than a week, it will, I think, be ample for your wants.'
Charlie thanked him heartily, and an hour or two later started for Grimsby. He knew the town well, and making his way to the docks, had little difficulty in finding where the Sparrow-hawk lay. She was coaling when he discovered her, and knowing that all hands would be busy, he sat down on the black scaffold-like dock and watched from a distance as truck after truck was tilted over, sending its load of coal into the shoot, down which it ran with a rattle on to the ship's deck. The trawler's men, black as niggers, shovelled the coal quickly into the hold. Fortunately the greater portion of the load had been taken aboard before Charlie arrived, and after waiting for about half an hour, he saw the last truck-load shot down. He knew then that in about an hour's time some of the Sparrow-hawk's men would be coming ashore. He watched them with interest as, having shovelled all the coal into the hold, they turned the hose on the deck, and with brooms and swabs worked hard to remove the coal-dust which coated everything. When this task was finished, the men gathered around two buckets and washed themselves. They needed washing badly.
"'I will keep these on,' he said to the shopkeeper."
The first two men who came ashore had friends waiting for them, so that Charlie had no opportunity of speaking to them. The third man to come ashore had no one waiting for him. He was a short, bow-legged little man, with a goatee beard and a small brass ring in the lobe of each ear. Charlie spoke to him.
'Thank you, sir,' the man answered, as he took the tobacco which Charlie offered. 'Smoking is not allowed here, so I will save it till I get outside the gates.'
'Are you a Grimsby man?' Charlie asked.
'No fear. I come from Gorleston. If this was Yarmouth I should be able to enjoy myself at home, but as it's Grimsby I don't expect to have much of an evening.'
Charlie felt that he had come across the very man he wanted.
'Come to my hotel and have a chat,' he suggested. 'I want some information about North Sea fishermen.'