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He called first at the office of Penwenn, Penwenn & Co.

An old, one-armed fellow with a roll in his legs and bright buttons on his coat took the name of Captain Douglas to Mr. Penwenn; and after a long time he came back with an air of humbleness to say that Mr. Penwenn would see him at once.

The one-armed man led on, rolling down the wide hall like a dismasted clipper in a seaway. They passed an open door, where bareheaded men with pens behind their ears lay peeringly against a high, sloping desk, as if grappling and pinning down the ledgers before them; and still another doorway, that showed a cavernous store-room in which queer odours mingled, swirling the thoughts to far Eastern market-places. A row of closed doors, then one with a highly-polished brass plate: "Mr. Penwenn, Jr."

Mr. Penwenn, Jr., had become the only Penwenn; but the firm's name remained unchanged, and "Jr." stayed on the brass plate, which was shined by the one-armed sailor every morning.

The office was small and filled with big chairs, worn slick by the heavy bodies of sea captains, for a captain just ashore sits in a chair with much more weight than can be accounted for by gravitation. Many dust-covered things were set about on the shelves—a broken nautilus; a small jade god—or demon perhaps; a lacquered box or two; a chunk of sandalwood; and strange plumes from an unknown bird. Under glass was the model of a Penwenn ship, and about on the walls were pictures of other ships and shipping scenes. On the top of Mr. Penwenn's desk the photograph of a pretty young woman smiled perpetually through a heavy silver frame, through which the faces of other women, one after another, had peered, and listened to the strange jargon of sea-trading, echoes of storms that had smashed things, mutterings of unruly crews more dangerous than the storms.