164 HUNTING IN THE ARCTIC 



"I was broke in Cairo, Egypt, for a while once and 

 had to hve on hand-outs and what I could get from tour- 

 ists. I would size up a man and go speak to him in his 

 own language and tell a sad story and get his coin — then 

 fake one on the next guy that looked easy. I got pretty 

 good at picking Frenchmen and Germans and English or 

 Americans. 



''But the 'Titanic' disaster finished me. It took all 

 my nerve away. I was working in the galley there, 

 washing dishes and so on. 



''My God, it was awful. I got into one lifeboat and 

 they threw me out. They threw me out of another and 

 at the third one they hit me on the head with a belaying 

 pin and when I woke up I was on deck and all the boats 

 had left. There was a couple more of us, so we threw a 

 hatch cover overboard and got to it and stayed on it till 

 we was picked up. 



"They had me down in Washington when they was 

 investigating the whole thing, and I told them the whole 

 story. But the lawyer that was looking out for the 

 main guy wouldn't let me talk. He wanted me to 

 answer just 'yes' or 'no' to his questions, and every time 

 I started to say anything more the Judge rapped on his 

 table and told me to stop. 



" 'I'm here to tell the whole truth,' I yelled out. 

 The Judge poxmded with his hammer (I remember think- 

 ing what a good hammer it would be for pounding a 

 beefsteak to make it tender) and says, 'You're fined 

 twenty-five dollars for contempt of court. ' 



" 'All right,' says I, and I says some more about that 

 guy. 'I'll make your fine fifty dollars,' says the Judge, 

 hammering away. 



" 'All right,' says I, for I was pretty mad and I told 



