THE START Rain was falling and the light had hardly reached the opening between the tall warehouses.

In the dock the water was smooth and shone with dull reflections, but the gates were open and the muddy swell the flood tide brought up the river splashed about the entrance.

Ponderous lorries rumbled across a bridge, indistinct figures moved and shouted on the pierhead, and men in wet oilskins splashed about _Terrier's_ deck.
She was a battered propeller tug and lay against the wall, with large cases of machinery lashed to her bulwarks, and a stack of coal built up beside the engine-skylights.

Her bunkers were full, but the fuel she carried would not last very long, and coal is dear at foreign ports.
Coils of thick wire rope and diving gear occupied her shallow hold, and Cartwright was annoyed because she could not take the massive centrifugal pump which he had sent by an African liner.

Some extra coal and supplies were loaded on a clumsy wooden hulk, but he durst not risk her carrying expensive machinery.
When he talked to the captain in the pilot-house, he was, on the whole, satisfied.