Through the afternoon Captain Michael O’Shea, now master of the aged river steamer _Whang Ho_, was the busiest and most energetic of men. A hundred and one things presented themselves as necessary to be done. When at length he hurried into the Hotel London shortly before the supper-hour his men were waiting, hopeful, expectant, cheerful, smoking his cigars and with the three drinks apiece tucked under their belts. Among them was a lanky, solemn person with a pair of gray side-whiskers and a leathery complexion crisscrossed by a net-work of fine wrinkles. His whole appearance was eminently decorous and respectable and he seemed to have strayed into the wrong company. It was not far-fetched to conjecture that he might be a missionary from some station in the Chinese hinterland who had kindly concerned himself with the souls of this congregation of black sheep. Captain O’Shea bowed to him with a puzzled, respectful air, at which the pious stranger remarked: “Inspector Burke told me to report here and be damn quick about it. I am Kittridge, and I hear you are wanting an engineer.” “Excuse me, Mr. Kittridge. I came near mistakin’ you for a sky-pilot. And so your favorite pastime is beating up Sikh policemen! I have a job for ye at double the wages you got in your tramp steamer, whatever they were. Are you willing?” “I would sign on with the devil himself to get clear of this blankety-blank pig-hole of a blistering Shanghai,” promptly exclaimed Mr. Kittridge. “Where’s your ship? Shall I go aboard at once?” “Please take a look at the engine-room and report to me here. She is the _Whang Ho_, tied up at the China Navigation Company’s wharf. Don’t be too critical, but if there’s work that is absolutely necessary I will send ye machinists to work all night.” “I know the condemned little hooker by sight,” bitterly quoth Mr. Kittridge with a tug at his starboard whisker. “Very well, sir. I will take a squint at her and make out my list of engine-room stores. Can you get them to-night?” “The ship-chandler is waiting to hear from me, and I have sent word to the machine-shop,” briefly answered O’Shea. Paddy Blake had very promptly raked up the required number of Chinese hands and was ready to deliver them on board whenever required. To the Hotel London he came, towing by the arm a most extraordinarily bent and shrivelled anatomy with a wisp of a white queue, whom he turned over to Captain O’Shea with the explanation: “Here is a river and coastwise pilot for ye that is as wise as Confucius. And by the same token, I have no doubt that he was once pilot aboard the junk of that grand old philosopher himself. Or maybe he was shipmates with Noah.” The ancient mariner croaked a phrase or two in a grating, rusty voice, and O’Shea dubiously observed: “If he talks no English at all how will I tell him where I want to go?”