shed their light over piles of old cordage and heaps of
rusty chains flanking the low entrance.

Picking his way around some barrels of oil, he edged
along a line of boxes filled with ship's stuff until he
reached an inside office, where, beside a kerosene lamp
placed on a small desk littered with papers, sat a man
in shirt-sleeves. At the sound of O'Day's step the
occupant lifted his head and peered out. The visitor
passed through the doorway.

"Good evening, Carlin; I hoped you would still be
up. I stopped on the way down or I should have been
here earlier."

A man of sixty, with a ruddy, weather-beaten face
set in a half-moon of gray whiskers, the ends tied under
his chin, sprang to his feet. "Ah! Is that you, Mr.
Felix? I been a-wonderin' where you been a-keepin'
yourself. Take this chair; it's more comfortable. I
was thinkin' somehow you might come in to-night, and
so I took a shy at my bills to have somethin' to do.
I suppose"--he stopped, and in a whisper added: "I
suppose you haven't heard anything, have you?"

"No; have you?"

"Not a word," answered the ship-chandler gravely.

"I thought perhaps you might have had a letter,"