While the crestfallen and unwilling Parkins deferred to the master mind, a wave of solemn curiosity passed through the cognoscenti of Cox's Piece. The Sailor was seen to doff his wonderful fur cap, which alone was a guaranty of untold possibilities in its wearer, to roll up solemnly the sleeves of his tattered blue seaman's jersey, and to take his place in the goal which had been formed by two heaps of coats. "He's a sailor," said Ginger, for the general information. But the statement was entirely superfluous. It was clear to the humblest intelligence that he was a sailor and nothing else, but Ginger knew the value of such an announcement. To a landsman--and these were landsmen all--a sailor is a sailor. Strange glories are woven round his visionary brow. He is a being apart. Things are permitted to him in speech and deed that would excite criticism in an ordinary mortal. For instance, the first shot at goal, which Ginger took himself by divine right, and quite an easy one, by design, for a real goalkeeper to parry, the Sailor missed altogether. Had he been aught but a sailor his reputation as far as Cox's Piece was concerned would have been gone forever. "Ain't got his sea legs yet." Ginger's coolness and impressiveness were extraordinary. "Been eight year at sea. Round the world nine times. Wrecked twice. Seed the serpent off the coast o' Madagascar. Give me the ball, Igson. Wait till he gets his eye in an' you'll see." Ginger's second shot at goal was easier than his first, and the Sailor, to the gratification of his mentor, was able to mobilize in time to stop it. "What did I tell yer?" said Ginger. "You'll see what he can do when he gets his sea legs." Within a week the Sailor was the unofficial hero of Cox's Piece. Ginger, of course, was the only authentic one. But he was too great a man ever to be visited by a suspicion of jealousy. Jealousy is a second rate passion, and whatever Ginger was he was not second rate. Besides the Sailor's remarkable success on Cox's Piece increased the prestige of his discoverer. The Sailor took to goalkeeping as a duck takes to water. The truth was he was a goalkeeper born, as a poet is born or a soldier or a musician. His slender body was hung on wires, his muscles were toughened into steel and whipcord by long years of hard and perilous training. Then his eye, keen and clear as a hawk's, was quick and true. Also he was active as a cat, and with very little practice was able to compass that _tour de force_ of the goalkeeper's art, the trick of flinging himself full length upon the ground in order to parry a swift shot at short range.