Gibney.
"What's for breakfast, Scraggsy, old kid?" asked Mr. Gibney.
"Fried eggs," said Captain Scraggs, remembering Mr. Gibney's
partiality for that form of nutriment in the vanished days of the
green-pea trade. "Ham an' fried eggs an' a sizzlin' pot o'
coffee. Thought a way out o' our mess, Gib?"
"Not yet," replied Mr. Gibney as he rolled out of bed, "but eggs
is always stimulatin', and I don't give up hope on a full
stomach."
An hour later they were tied up under the coal bunkers, and at
Mr. Gibney's suggestion some twenty tons of sacked coal were
piled on top of the fo'castle head and on the main deck for'd, in
case of emergency. They lay in the harbour all day until about
four o'clock, when Mr. Gibney, by virtue of his authority as
supercargo, ordered the lines cast off and the _Maggie_ steamed
out of the harbour. Off Point Loma they veered to the south,
leaving the Coronado Islands on the starboard quarter, ten miles
to the west. Mr. Gibney was below with Captain Scraggs, battling
with the problem that confronted them, when the mate stuck his
head down the companion-way to report a large power schooner
coming out from the lee of the Coronados and standing off on a
course calculated to intercept the _Maggie_ in an hour or two.
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