You had to climb ladders to the deck.
Inside she was comfortable. No hotel piazza could equal the _Helen
Mar_'s deck on a warm night, with the old southern stars overhead,
when a bunch of mule-drivers maybe would be forward talking, and I
and Stevey Todd aft with a couple of Spanish planters, or an agent,
or the officers of a warship maybe from England or the States. Over
on the hillside lay Captain Goodwin and most of the crew of the
_Helen Mar_, wishing us well, and close to starboard you heard
all night the tinkle of the Jiron River down in its channel. It was
twenty feet from the deck of the _Helen Mar_ to the ground, and
twenty feet from there to the river.
Portate was a pleasant little city in those days. It had pink-uniformed
soldiery for the city guard, and a fat, warm-tempered Mayor, who
used often to come up to the hotel and cool off when something
had stuck a pin into his dignity that made him feverish. Stevey
Todd was cook and I was manager. Business was good and the
company good at the Hotel Helen Mar.
CHAPTER IV.
SADLER IN PORTATE. THE NARRATIVE CONTINUED.
I don't know how Sadler got to be Harbour Master for the Transport
Company, but so he did, and he was a capable harbour master.
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