Condy exhibited his reporter's badge.
"I represent 'The Times,'" he said, with profound solemnity, "and I want to see the officer in charge." The sailor fell back upon the instant.
"Power of the press," whispered Condy to Travis as the two gained the deck.
A second sailor directed them to the mate, whom they found in the chart-room, engaged, singularly enough, in trimming the leaves of a scraggly geranium.
Condy explained his mission with flattering allusions to the whaleback and the novelty of the construction.

The mate--an old man with a patriarchal beard--softened at once, asked them into his own cabin aft, and even brought out a camp-stool for Travis, brushing it with his sleeve before setting it down.
While Condy was interviewing the old fellow, Travis was examining, with the interest of a child, the details of the cabin: the rack-like bunk, the washstand, ingeniously constructed so as to shut into the bulkhead when not in use, the alarm-clock screwed to the wall, and the array of photographs thrust into the mirror between frame and glass.

One, an old daguerreotype, particularly caught her fancy.

It was the portrait of a very beautiful girl, wearing the old-fashioned side curls and high comb of a half-century previous.

The old mate noticed the attention she paid to it, and, as soon as he had done giving information to Condy, turned and nodded to Travis, and said quietly: "She was pretty, wasn't she ?" "Oh, very!" answered Travis, without looking away.
There was a silence.