Free The Gold Seekers by William Stuart Long

oddly formal salute, a gleam of satisfaction lighting his dark eyes. He was a slim, tall man, of fine physique and a certain arrogance, who held himself erect, as if even in repose he were defying anyone who might feel inclined to question his ancestry or his claim to the aristocratic name he bore.
    “Here’s to a swift and safe passage, Saleh!” he said, addressing the white-bearded Javanese who had served his meal. “Thank God we shall soon be taking this ship to sea again, for I swear she is breaking her heart, just as I am, seeing this harbor full of vessels going to rot. We shall have our full complement by tomorrow evening.”
    Old Saleh eyed him pensively but accepted the brimming glass he was offered. His position, on the ship’s books, was that of master’s steward, but it was a privileged one, for he had been friend and mentor to the Dolphin’s owner for more than twenty years. His face was unlined, having the color and texture of ivory, which gave it a serenity that somehow belied the neatly trimmed white beard and the balding head. Saleh, Claus thought, was ageless.
    The old man drank the toast and observed, his tone faintly skeptical, “Full in number, perhaps—not in nautical skills. And you will make no profit from your passengers, master.”
    “I made a profit from my cargo,” Van Buren reminded him. “A thousand percent on lumber; and the flour sold at forty-four dollars a barrel, the potatoes at sixteen dollars a bushel—San Francisco prices, Saleh. And you know what our eastern fortune hunters paid to be conveyed here. I have almost covered the cost of this ship in a single voyage! Mr. Donald McKay is a genius when it comes to designing fast
    sailing ships, and I do not begrudge a cent of what he asked of me. The Dolphin is the finest vessel I have ever owned or commanded—truly the finest. She will pay for herself ten times over when we’re back in Sydney. She will cause a sensation when we drop anchor in the cove. No one will have seen her like, I promise you, and the tea traders will gnash their teeth with envy!”
    Saleh’s white brows rose, but Claus Van Buren ignored the implied doubts and smiled quietly to himself, his pride in his new 850-ton Boston-built clipper schooner proof against any criticism. True, she had been costly, but he had sold the old schooner Lydia—in which he had made the passage from Sydney to Boston—for considerably more than she would have fetched in Australia. The demand for ships to carry gold prospectors from the eastern states to California was now almost insatiable, and that had dictated the Lydia’s price, as well as that of the Dolphin herself; and those who had taken passage around the Horn on board his vessel had been willing to pay highly for the privilege of reaching their destination in under a hundred days.
    The Dolphin had not beaten the Sea Witch’s record, but she had taken only one day more… .
    “Come now, Saleh,” he urged, his smile widening into a boyish grin. “I can afford to be generous to the men of God and their families. Poor souls, they did not deserve to be stranded in this den of iniquity simply because their ship’s company deserted to the goldfields and left them to fend for themselves. Would you have me leave them here? There is no other cargo I can load from this place, and who, save our good missionaries, desires to leave it?”
    “The young man you signed on this evening,” Saleh pointed out gravely. “The one whose sister you also agreed to take for the cost of her food. That young man is from the goldfields, master—a farm boy, on his own admission, who will be of scant use as a seaman.”
    “Luke Murphy,” Claus supplied. “But the two he brought with him have served at sea—they both are Australians. And they assured me that they would send out three others, prime seamen, tomorrow morning.”
    “The boy Murphy is American. No doubt he will learn—he is willing enough, I am sure. But, master, he is too