"Me too," said his new chief officer, who suddenly felt he needed urgently to meet his own kind again. Mr. Dainopoulos was all right of course, but Mr. Spokesly still retained the illusion that Anglo-Saxon superiority was accepted by the world like gravity and the other laws of nature. It would not do to make himself too cheap, he reflected. He had an unpleasant feeling that his late captain on the _Tanganyika_ would have stared if he had seen his chief officer hobnobbing with a money-changer and a Jewish youth of almost inconceivable honesty and destitution. Mr. Spokesly's wit, however, was nimble enough now to see that Captain Meredith himself had not always been a quiet, refined, and competent commander; and moreover, Captain Meredith might quite conceivably have seen and taken a chance like this himself, had he been in the way of it. But just now what was wanted was a chat and a drink with a friend. He would go down to the hotel and find the lieutenant. But this was not to be. As he entered the foyer of the hotel, a major and a round-faced person in civilian clothes regarded him with exaggerated attention. Their protracted examination of him made him feel somewhat self-conscious, and to ease the situation he spoke to them. "I'm looking for a friend of mine," he said, "a lieutenant in the Harbour Office. I don't know his name." "Don't know his name!" said the major, boring into Mr. Spokesly with his cold ironical stare. "I only met him this morning," he explained. "Me coming ashore from the _Tanganyika_, you see." "Oh, yes." This in a more human tone. "And him being the only man I know, pretty near, I was looking for him." "I see. Well, old chap, he's generally about pickled this time of day, if he's the man I think you mean. Up at the Cercle Militaire--d'you know it?--or the White Tower Bar. Better take a look along." "Thanks," said Mr. Spokesly with a slight smile. "Don't mention it. By the way, are you being sent home?" "I'm going on a local ship down to the Islands," he replied. "Not the _Kalkis_?" Mr. Spokesly nodded, and said he was going mate. "Well, look here. I'm Officer of Supply, you know. You might look me up--you know where it is--and we'll have a word about the cargo. Yes, in the morning." The major and his friend the censor, who was also a novelist, gazed after Mr. Spokesly as he went out. "I believe that fellow Dainopoulos is on the level after all," said the major, drawing hard at his cigarette. "I know his skipper is a Britisher, and this chap's all right, I should say. Well, he's making enough out of it to give us a fair deal." "Most of these local people are on our side, I think," said the other. "If we pay them more than the other side," added the major drily. And then they went up to get ready for their dinner.