41 Lure O Gold 1904

"
"
The Lure o
Gold
bob ! She s got to work in some way. If we had coal,
we could make port in five days easy enough.
We are
only about seventeen hundred miles out."
"Wouldn t Seattle be quicker to make than San
Francisco ?
"Oh, we could get coal at Victoria before Seattle;
but do you know where we are? That infernal taifung,
as Sing calls it, has blown us away
down the
Pacific. Honolulu or San Francisco is about a stand
off just now; and I prefer San Francisco.
You know
we re chartered for that Philippine trip
and must be in
port by the first of the month. This is the 22d. Eight
days are all the time we ve got."
"
Well, Captain, I m awfully sorry,
don t
and I know you
like to be bothered about such matters just now,
but I wish you would let three men go
down in the
hold with us and Mr. Nason, and find this young man s
gold."
Oh, wait till
you get to port, whenever that ll be,"
said the Captain, in the worst humor I had ever seen
him display.
"If the gold s down there, it ll
keep.
There s no use bothering about it. There s nothing
in the hold but a lot of busted beer bottles, a dead man,
and maybe a little dunnage. And that yarn about
[150]