I had no desire to be mixed up in a police affair, especially in the company of such scum as I was then among. I picked up my golf bag and swung my knapsack on to my back once more. Then I remembered about Donald. I could not leave him. I searched in corners and under the tables. He was nowhere in sight. "Is it the tinker?" asked the bar-tender excitedly. "Yes, yes!" "He's gone. He slunk out with his tin cans, through the back way, as soon as you got started in this scrap." I did not wait for anything more, for some one was unlocking the front door. I darted out the back exit and into the lane. Down the lane, in the darkness, I tore like a hurricane, then along the waterfront until there was a mile between me and the scene of my late encounter. I slowed up at a convenient horse-trough, splashed my hands and face in the cooling water and adjusted my clothing as best I could, then I strolled into the shipping shed, where stevedores and dock labourers were busy, by electric light, completing the loading of a smart-looking little cargo boat. A notion seized me. It was a coaster, so I knew I could not be going very far away. I walked up the gang-plank, and aboard. CHAPTER VI Aboard the Coaster An ordinary seaman, then the second officer of the little steamer passed me on the deck, but both were busy and paid no more attention to my presence than if I had been one of themselves. I strolled down the narrow companionway, into a cosy, but somewhat cramped, saloon. After standing for a time in the hope of seeing some signs of life, I pushed open the door of a stateroom on the starboard side. The room had two berths. I tossed my knapsack and clubs into the lower one. As I turned to the door again, I espied a diminutive individual, no more than four and a half feet tall,--or, as I should say, small,--in the full, gold-braided uniform of a ship's chief steward. He was a queer-looking little customer, grizzled, weather-beaten and, apparently, as hard as nails. He was absolutely self-possessed and, despite his stature, there was "nothing small about him," as an American friend of mine used to put it. He touched his cap, and smiled. His smile told me at once that he was an Irishman, for only an Irishman could smile as he did. It was a smile with a joke, a drink, a kiss and a touch of the devil himself in it. "I saw ye come down, sor. Ye'll be makin' for Glasgow?" Glasgow! I cogitated, yes!--Glasgow as a starting point would suit me as well as anywhere else. "Correct first guess," I answered. "But, tell me,--how did you know that that was my destination?" He showed his teeth. "Och! because it's the only port we're callin' at, sor. Looks like a fine trip north," he went on. "The weather's warm and there's just enough breeze to make it lively. Nothin' like the sea, sor, for keepin' the stomach swate and the mind up to the knocker." I yawned, for I was dog-weary.