When the Merian was three days out from Portland the frightened cattleman stiff known as “Wrennie” wanted to die, for he was now sure that the smell of the fo’c’sle, in which he was lying on a thin mattress¹ of straw covered with damp gunny-sacking, both could and would become daily a thicker smell, a stronger smell, a smell increasingly diverse and deadly.

Though it was so late as eight bells of the evening, Pete, the tough factory hand, and Tim, the down-and-out hatter, were still playing seven-up at the dirty fo’c’sle table, while McGarver, under-boss of the Morris cattle gang, lay in his berth², heavily studying the game and blowing sulphurous fumes³ of Lunch Pail Plug Cut tobacco up toward Wrennie.

Pete, the tough, was very evil. He sneered⁴. He stole. He bullied⁵. He was a drunkard and a person without cleanliness of speech. Tim, the hatter, was a loud-talking weakling, under Pete’s domination. Tim wore a dirty rubber collar without a tie, and his soul was like his neckware.

McGarver, the under-boss, was a good shepherd among the men, though he had recently lost the head foremanship by a spree complicated with language and violence. He looked like one of the Merian bulls, with broad short neck and short curly hair above a thick-skinned deeply wrinkled low forehead. He never undressed, but was always seen, as now, in heavy shoes and blue-gray woolen⁶ socks tucked over the bottoms of his overalls⁷. He was gruff and kind and tyrannical and honest.

Wrennie shook and drew his breath sharply as the foghorn⁸ yawped out its “Whawn-n-n-n” again, reminding him that they were still in the Bank fog; that at any moment they were likely to be stunned

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