Captain Downs whirled and found Mayo there. "How do you dare to speak to
me, you tin-kettle sailor?" demanded the master. In his passion he went
on: "You're aboard here under false pretenses. You can't even do your
work. You have made this vessel liable by assaulting a passenger. You're
no good! With you aboard here I'm just the same as one man short." But
he had no time to devote to this person.
He turned away and began to revile his mates and his sailors, his voice
rising higher each time the rampaging boom crashed from side to side.
One or two of the backstays had parted, and it was plain that before
long the mast would go by the board.
"If that mast comes out it's apt to smash us clear to the water-line,"
lamented the captain.
"If you can make your herd of sheep give me a hand at the right time,
I'll show you that a tin-kettle sailor is as good as a wind-jammer
swab," said Mayo, retaliating with some of the same sort of rancor that
Captain Downs had been expending. In that crisis he was bold enough to
presume on his identity as a master mariner. "I'd hate to find this kind
of a bunch on any steamboat I've ever had experience with."
Then he ran away before the captain had time to retort. He made a slide
across the danger zone on his back, like a runner in a ball game. This
move brought him into a safe place between the mainmast and the mizzen.
There was a coil of extra cable here, and he grabbed the loose end and
deftly made a running bowline knot. He set the noose firmly upon his
shoulders, leaped up, and caught at the hoops on the mizzenmast.
"See to it that the line runs free from that coil, and stand by for
orders!" he shouted, and though his dyed skin was dark and he wore the
garb of the common sailor, he spoke with the unmistakable tone of the
master mariner. The second mate ran to the line and took charge.
"This is a bucking bronco, all right!" muttered Mayo. "But it's for the
honor of the steamboat men! I'll show this gang!"
He poised himself for a few moments on the crotch of the boom, clinging
to the cringles of the luff--the short ropes with which the sail is
reefed.
As he stood there, gathering himself for his desperate undertaking,
waiting for opportunity, taking the measure of the lashing and insensate
monster whom he had resolved to subdue, he heard Captain Downs bawl an
impatient command: "Passengers go below!"