It was high noon before the barge was alongside Minerva and the transfer of cargo could begin. This was an awkward way to do it, but the Japanese officials would on no account suffer Minerva to approach shore. With larger cargo it would have been well nigh impossible. But Minerva was laden with wootz, silk, and pepper, and the barge carried nothing but flasks of quicksilver, and bales of straw for packing it. Any of these items could be passed or thrown from hand to hand, and once they had got it organized the transfer went on at a terrific pace—a hundred men, sweating and breathing hard, could transfer tons of cargo in a minute. Steel, spice, and silk streamed out of Minerva ’s holds and were replaced by quicksilver. The outgoing and incoming flows grazed each other at one place on the upperdeck, where Monsieur Arlanc and Vrej Esphahnian sat at the table facing each other, each armed with a stockpile of quills, one tallying the quicksilver and the other tallying other goods. Every so often they would call out figures to each other, just making sure that the flows were balanced, so that Minerva would not rise too high or sink too low in the water.