mate, the crew ascended to the forecastle head, took the windlass bars
from their rack and set them in their places. As they leaned their
weight upon them some grunted like pigs. Some laughed stupidly. Jukes
alone was silent.
The ship lifted a little to the tide beneath her. A flag at her peak
fluttered. A wisp of smoke passed over her as the tugboat steamed ahead.
The crew stamped slowly round and round the windlass, heaving the
anchor in. The cable clanked at the hawse pipe. Tide and cable spoke of
clean and windy things.
The reek of liquor grew fainter. The wind came fresher. The mate said--
“Someone sing!”
One of the sailors began to sing a forecastle song, a chantey, a
ballad with a wailing chorus. His voice, at first spiteful, sneering,
and contemptuous, the voices of the others, also at first spiteful,
sneering, and contemptuous, became presently attuned to the sounds of
wind and tide and cable. They no longer cursed, or grunted like pigs.
The stamp of the shore was falling from them.
The ship passed swiftly from the harbour heads. The tugboat let go her
towline. Some of the men went aloft, to loose sail. Talking in low
voices, others waited by sheet and halyard; ready to hoist when the
mate’s order came. Jukes stood apart, detached, solitary, brooding.
He looked like a bear lately released from an unclean cage, and still
uncertain of its freedom.
The mate called--
“Hoist away, main tops’l!”
The men grasped the halyards and lay back, setting their weight upon
them. Straining to raise the heavy sail, they failed. They tried, and
failed again.
“You there! Lend a hand here!” called the mate to Jukes.
The men waited while Jukes slowly approached. As he laid hold on the
rope he seemed to shake himself. He drew a long deep breath. He reached
up, higher and higher. His great chest expanded.
The mate called--
“All together, now!--_Lay back!_”
The tackle rattled noisily through its three-fold blocks. The sail
slid, threshing and filling, to its masthead.
“Bully boy!” said the mate.
A sailor repeated--
“Bully boy!”
Jukes remained silent, sombre, brow-beclouded. While sail on sail was
spread, the crew all hauling to his leadership, he took no notice of
anyone or anything. He paid no heed at all to their admiring comments.
The shore line faded astern. The day passed. The sun sank. Night fell.
The sailors sat in the forecastle.
“’Ow long was you ashore?” asked one.
“Three days. How long was you?” came the reply.
“I come in the same day as you, then. I been three days ashore.”
“We was five months at sea,” said the other, “three days in port, an’ I
don’t know nothin’ about ’em.”
The dozen sailors discussed their stays in port. Not one of them had
been ashore over five days. Each had accepted a drink from the boarding
master’s bottle. Between then and now no one of them knew aught of what
had taken place.
“We was two hundred days on the passage out,” said one. “We was posted
missin’. Four days in port, an’ back to sea agin!”
They were from half a dozen different ships.
“How long was you ashore?” asked one, turning to Jukes. Jukes seemed
not to hear him.
“He don’t know,” laughed one.
“We don’t none of us know much, or we’d not be here,” another grumbled.
“After this v’yage I quits the sea,” another asserted.
“Me, too,” another.
“Yuss!--You will!” chuckled a third.
“I’ll do wot I please,” retorted the other.
“Same as you always ’ave! Me, too,” another said. “Haw, haw, haw!”
Turning to Jukes the last speaker asked--
“Wot will you do w’en she gits in, ol’ matey?”
Jukes rose and left the forecastle. For a long time he sat motionless
on the bulwark, his head bowed, his great hands upon his knees, his
figure dim against the starry sky. When eight bells struck and his
comrades started aft to answer to the muster roll he crossed the deck
and reëntered the forecastle. His step seemed to falter as he neared
the dingy lamp. Looking about him to make sure that he was all alone,
he drew from a pocket a small oilskin package; untied and took from it
a faded kerchief--an old bandanna. Loosening the knots, he drew from
its crumpled folds an envelope. The envelope, drab and dirty like the
kerchief that protected it, bore the mark of a distant port, and of a
yet more distant date.
A picture but little larger than a postage stamp fell to the table and
lay face up. The letter, dog-eared and torn from much handling, was
like the picture--commonplace, yet smiling and hopeful. As Jukes looked
hungrily at the picture his face grew haggard. His lips moved as he
read the old letter over.
Startled by a shout from the quarterdeck, Jukes thrust letter and
picture back within the bandanna, folded the oilskin about them, and
hurried out to answer to his name.
* * * * *
A month was gone. Barefooted, bare of arm, Jukes walked from the wheel.
The sunset glowed in his weathered face. The sails above him shone.
Below him shone the sea. He gave the course to the mate and went to
join his fellows on the hatch.
“A fine man that, Mister,” said the skipper to the mate.
“’Ow would you like to ’ave a little place ashore?” asked one sailor of
another on the hatch.
“I ain’t goin’ to sea no more after this passage,” answered the other.
Jukes lighted his pipe and sat among them. The sea was blue-black; the
sky blue-black above. Whispering from horizon to horizon the sea crests
murmured of clean, free, windy things.
“’Ow would you like to ’ave a little place ashore?” asked the last
speaker of Jukes.
Jukes turned and faced the man. His eyes shining and eager, he drew the
oilskin package from his pocket. They gathered round him as he opened
it. They passed the picture from hand to hand.
“I wisht as I was ’im,” muttered one and another.
They looked at him enviously, seated serene and confident among them.
* * * * *
Another month was gone.
A canopy of cloud hung low over the mastheads. It was without break, or
rift, uniform from horizon to horizon. It was of that cold gray that
presages snow. Because it was uniform it seemed to be without motion.
Beneath it the cañon hollows of the sea were black. From horizon to
horizon white sea cataracts roared.
Every two hours a sailor peered from the forecastle. Watching his
opportunity, leaving those behind him to close the door, he sprang to
the deck. Now running a few steps, now desperately clinging to the
wire-tight life line, now leaping high into the rigging to escape the
raging sea, he battled a slow way to the wheel; whence the helmsman
whom he relieved made an equally precarious passage to the forecastle.
It was midday when Alf Jukes opened the forecastle door. Unlike the
others, he did not hesitate, or pause to scrutinize the chances
of the deck. Though in the past two days no man aboard had slept,
there was no sign of weariness about him. As he opened the door he
looked with a casual but comprehensive glance to the gale-whipped and
snow-laden sky. Then, stepping to the waist-deep smother of the forward
deck, he turned and deliberately banged the door behind him. Head
unbowed, gaze straightforward, light hands upon the rigid life line,
he strode surefooted through the tempest’s rage. When an insweeping
sea completely submerged him, the mate, who was watching from by the
helmsman’s side, made for the chart room and bellowed to the skipper.
Jukes’s head and shoulders reappeared as the skipper leaped out to the
poop deck.
The groan of the ship’s hull, the creak and outcry of a hundred
straining blocks, the clack of chains and parrals, were inaudible. Had
the three masts simultaneously splintered and gone over the side, not a
sound would have been heard.
The skipper and mate looked amusedly into each other’s faces. Alf
Jukes’s shoulders, his gripping hands, his arms, the every motion of
his entirely reckless body, appeared as the limbs and motions of a
gambolling schoolboy. By the toss of his chin, by the shake of his
head, by the partings and closings of his stubble-surrounded lips, the
universe might observe that Jukes, on his way to relieve the wheel, was
singing.
Pointing to the helmsman, the skipper yelled an order into the mate’s
ear. The mate nodded. Waylaying the man, the mate dragged him into the
chart room. So ordered by mate and skipper, the exhausted helmsman
sought shelter in the chart house instead of attempting to reach the
forecastle.
When sailors looked from the forecastle door to see what was become of
Jukes, or of the man whom he had gone to relieve, it was to see the
mate gesticulating to them to go back; voicelessly ordering them to
remain where they were.
Afternoon passed, and no man ventured to the wheel’s relief.
Toward dusk the wind fell, its uproar ending abruptly--as if a
multitude of yelling maniacs had leaped from a precipice edge to
instant extinguishment. The crests of the sea died down. The horizons
widened. For a little while gray ocean rolled under gray sky.
Snow fell. The horizons were blotted out.
Skipper and mate descended to the saloon. Jerking the door of the
steward’s pantry open, the skipper shouted for the steward. A trapdoor
in the pantry deck opened slowly, and the steward, who had laid hidden
below, arose. His teeth chattered. For a moment he looked dazedly up
at the skipper; then, realizing that the storm was over, that the ship
still floated, and that it was long since he had served a meal, passed
out to the deck and made haste to the cook’s galley.
“We’ll set sail when the moon rises,” said the skipper to the mate.
Skipper, mate, steward, cook, and sailors buried their noses in
pannikins of steaming coffee. Ravenously devouring hash made of pork
scraps mixed with pulverized sea biscuit, they forgot the fury of the
recent storm, forgot that it was snowing--forgot Alf Jukes.
The ship rolled easily. Blocks whined. Sails flapped. A pleasant odour
of tobacco smoke arose in cabin, galley, and forecastle.
The clouds lifted. The snow ceased. A wan light illumined deck and
rigging.
“Loose them upper tops’ls!” bawled the mate.
Some of the sailors climbed aloft to cast the gaskets off. Others
gathered at the halyards, ready to hoist away. Snow, disturbed by the
feet of the climbers, fell on the heads and shoulders of those below.
Flapping their arms, shaking their fists, the men on deck swore at
the climbers, who, envying them the comparative comfort of the deck,
replied with gibes and curses.
A man aloft called--
“All ready on the main!”
The mate said--
“Hoist away!”
The men lay back, straining on the stiff swollen rope. The sail refused
to move.
“W’ere’s Alf?” asked one of the sailors.
“Jukes!” called the mate, “Jukes!”
They looked aloft, seeking Jukes.
“’Ee ain’t aloft,” said one.
“He’s at the wheel,” said the mate, remembering. “One o’ you men
relieve Jukes.”
“I forgot ’im,” said one.
“Me, too,” another.
Alf Jukes came forward from the wheel. Snow was thick on his
sou’wester, and on his shoulders. Snow was frozen on his sleeves and
oilskin trousers. His hands, his lips, were blue.
“Lend a hand here, Jukes,” said the mate.
Jukes strode to the halyards and reached up. His great chest expanded
as he reached higher and higher.
“All together--_now!_” said the mate.
Jukes laid his weight upon the halyards. The sheaves rattled. The yard
began to rise.
“Bully boy!” said the mate. A sailor grunted, “Bully boy!”
Their feet tramping soundlessly in the deep snow, the men ran the
topsail to its masthead.
“All ready on the fore,” called a man from aloft.
“Go eat,” said the mate to Jukes, his accents crisp and clear in the
stillness.
Preceding the others, Jukes walked to the fore topsail halyards as if
he had not heard.
When sail was set there was neither coffee nor hash left. The cook’s
skilly pots and hash kids were washed, and hung on the taut wire above
his stove. Jukes munched sea biscuit, and took a drink of cold water.
“That fellow Jukes is a good man, Mister,” said the skipper to the mate.
“Jukey ain’t afeard o’ naught,” said a sailor, “I wish as I was ’im.”
Night passed.
* * * * *
A bright sun shone on the ship at anchor. Sails were furled, ropes
coiled. From the fore bulwarks, the sailors watched a boat rowed by two
men approaching.
Jukes sat alone upon the forecastle head. Gazing shoreward, he saw
masts and spars, steeples and roofs. Chimneys smoked. Windows glinted.
Beyond the town he saw low hills, with treetops blowing. His eyes were
hungry.
Noticing the approaching boat, Jukes rose to his feet. His teeth
clenched, a scowl on his face, he paced to and fro. He looked like a
bear come too close to the dwellings of men--suspicious, undetermined,
afraid of the world and of himself.
Hands extended, eyes a-twinkle, faces beaming, a sailor’s boarding
master and his crimp climbed aboard.
“Did ye have a good voyage, boys? W’ere are ye from? You’re come to a
good port this time!”
The boarding master entered the forecastle. Seating himself, looking
amicably up to the expectant and childish faces of the sailors, he drew
a bottle from his pocket.
“The best, boys! I’d never offer ye any but the best.”
One of them grasped the bottle.
“Don’t swaller it all!” cried one of the sailors.
“’Old ’is arm!” another.
“’S’all right, boys. There’s plenty more,” grinned the boarding master.
The crimp came from the boat, bottles in his pockets.
The forecastle reeked of cheap and abominable liquor. Presently one of
the sailors asked--
“W’ere’s Jukey?”
The crimp left the forecastle, to seek the missing man.
“The boys wants you,” said he, discovering Alf Jukes alone upon the
forecastle head. He took a bottle from his pocket and held it out to
Jukes.
Uttering a low coughing grunt, Jukes struck savagely at the crimp. The
bottle fell, and broke upon the deck. Cursing Jukes, the crimp beat a
hasty retreat.
With a half pannikin of unspilled liquor in it, the lower half of the
bottle remained upright against the windlass.
Alf Jukes looked down. Nostrils quivering, fingers twitching, he
uncertainly approached the broken bottle. He stooped, lifted the
bottle, and stretched out a hand; as if to hurl it to the water. He
hesitated; drew in his hand, and sniffed. Another moment and he flung
the emptied fragment over the forecastle rail.
“Hey, Jukey! Come on down, ol’ son!” called one of his comrades,
looking up from the forecastle.
Jukes descended and entered the forecastle. His fellows slapped him on
the back. The boarding master thrust a bottle in his hand. As Jukes
took it, one of his comrades tried to snatch it from him, and a bellow
of laughter rose as the sailor went sprawling on the deck.
The bottles passed around.
“No more ships for me,” said one.
“Nor me, boys,” said another.
Jukes drank silently.
By and by the sailors shouldered their sea bags and followed the
boarding master and his crimp from the forecastle. Jukes towering
heedless among them, they shoved and elbowed one another aside, making
for the boat. Pointing to other ships near by, they cursed them. They
cursed the ship they left. They chattered confidingly to the boarding
master, who promised them one and all an easy job on the land. As Jukes
grasped the stroke oar and set the pace ashore they shouted their
approval.
“Ol’ Jukey!” they cried, and “Good ol’ Jukey!”
They laughed to see the way the boat drove through the water, with
Jukes’s great muscles surging her along. They jumped ashore and turned
their backs forever on the sea. Without a glance behind, they followed
Jukes across the street; Jukes at the boarding master’s heels, the
crimp behind them all.
Hours passed. Besotted sailors lolled on dirty cots about a dirty room.
They quarrelled, forgot their quarrels, and embraced each other. They
smoked, and spat, and sang. The leering crimp came in, and went, and
came, and went again, and called them each by name--quick-fitted names.
“’Ere, old Cork-fender, lap it up now! It’s good for sailor’s gizzards.”
“Gimme yer empty glass ’ere, Queer-fellow!”
“Young Bandy-shanks, you’ve ’ad enough! You’re young.--Another? All
right, then. Wot’d yer mommer say?”
“Aw, haw! haw! haw!”
“Drink hearty, Jimmie Bilge! There’s plenty more.”
Ignoring their quarrels and embraces, taking no part in their noisy
songs, Alf Jukes held out his glass for filling and refilling. The
crimp winked at him deferentially.
Evening came. Save for loud snores, heavy breathing, and now and then
a mumbled, sleepy oath, the room was quiet. Steady-handed still, Jukes
stood erect amidst the wreckage of his fellows and emptied his glass.
In the barroom adjoining, the boarding master reached a black bottle
from beneath the bar. Alf Jukes came from the back room as he replaced
it. Resolve in his face, he stepped toward the street.
Three brimming glasses stood upon the bar. Lifting one to his own lips,
the boarding master pushed another out toward Jukes.
“Here, big boy! Don’t run off so soon!” he quickly called.
Jukes stopped and hesitatingly looked toward the bar. The crimp and
boarding master raised their glasses.
Jukes took the proffered glass, lifted, and drained it in one long
straight swallow; then turned and strode toward the street door again.
Midway, he staggered.
The boarding master and the crimp came from behind the bar. They lifted
Jukes, carried him to the dusky street, and dumped him in their boat.
“That fills _her_ crew,” growled the boarding master with a nod to the
riding light of a ship at anchor close inshore.
* * * * *
Dawn was breaking. Stars were fading. Mastheads of anchored ships
swayed easily against the opening sky. A ship’s mate banged upon the
forecastle door, rousing his crew. A drowsy sailor lurched off to the
galley, fetching the morning coffee.
“How long was you ashore?” asked one sailor of another.
“Wot day is it?” came the reply. The questioner chuckled.
Some surly, some indifferent, they sipped their coffee.
The mate looked in.
“Rouse out here, now! Get up and man that windlass!”
They straggled to the deck. But Jukes lay sleeping still, his face to
the bulkhead. The mate stepped in and shook him. He wakened slowly.
“Tumble out, here, you!”
Jukes climbed from the bunk and looked about him.
“Come on, now! You’re at sea, my man. Get out of here!”
With a long staggering stride, Jukes passed out to the new ship’s deck.
The wind blew in his hair. The tide sang by.
Jukes turned, wild-eyed, and faced the mate. Men on the forecastle head
looked down and laughed to hear him curse. He gazed up at them, vacant
eyed. He looked toward the shore, saw his old ship, and shuddered.
“Come on, my man!” the mate said. “You’re at sea.”
Alf Jukes ascended to the forecastle head.
“Sing, someone!” said the mate, “sing and let’s get her away.”
A sailor leaning on a windlass bar began to sing a forecastle song, a
chantey, a ballad with a wailing chorus. The tugboat’s smoke whirled
by. The chorus rose and fell. The cable clanked.
“W’y don’t ye sing, shipmate?” a sailor asked of Jukes.
Alf Jukes let go his windlass bar. Fists clenched and arms upraised,
his curses ringing loud above his comrades’ song, he looked upon the
shore.
“Come on, my man,” the mate said. “You’re at sea.”
* * * * *
Weeks were gone by. It was black midnight. No star shone. Sails hung
invisible. Long swells rolled sluggishly beneath the keel. The ship’s
bow rose, dipped to deep hollows, and arose again.
Half naked in the hot night, Alf Jukes lay slumbering. The watch below
slept soundly all about him. The watch on deck sat talking on the hatch
without.
Sails flapped to the long roll of the ship. Chains clinked upon the
lower masts. Blocks chattered squeakily. Now and again a heavy rope,
a sheet or lazy tack, thud-thudded against the ship’s side. The wheel
cluck-clucked. The sailors’ voices rose and fell, a mumble from the
hatch.
Poring above a chart, the skipper sat in his chart room. Presently he
rose, looked out to the dark night, listened awhile, and went below.
An hour passed.
High and sudden, the mate’s voice rang above the noises of the night,
and, answering quick commands, gloom-hidden sailors leaped up and
rushed to the braces.
The skipper ran, pajama-clad and shouting, to the deck. The watch on
deck were shouting at the ropes. A deep, long, grumbling roar was all
about--the growl of rollers bursting on a reef.
A sailor yelled at the forecastle door, wakening the sleepers of the
watch below. Blackness was like a wall. The skipper was shouting
orders. The mate was shouting; the grumbling rumble coming closer,
louder.
The ship quivered. A rending sound rose sharp above the roar, died,
and arose again. A topmast splintered and went overboard. Torn canvas
snarled. Blocks skirled. The ship slid on, settling beyond the reef.
Last from his bunk came Jukes. Striking a match, he held it high, and
by its feeble flare saw the crazed struggle of his comrades all yelling
at the door. Fallen men clutched madly at the feet that trampled them.
Water lapped into the forecastle. The match went out. The ship lurched
heavily.
Jukes stepped from the emptied forecastle into water knee deep. As he
slid barefooted to the rigging, the water rose to his waist. He gripped
the shrouds and swung himself aloft. The water followed. He climbed,
cat-nimble. The water followed close. He heard a last useless order
from the skipper. Someone screamed, “The boat!” A shriek ended in a
groan close to him. A hand clutched his bare foot. He bent to grasp the
hand; but it slipped, and he touched only water.
Save for the growl and long wash of the sea there was no sound.
Alf Jukes was swimming.
Dawn came, and, treading water, Jukes gazed round the sea. He struck
out, swam with strong steady strokes, and presently swung himself upon
a piece of drifting wreckage.
The horizon was empty, the sky without a cloud. The sea was flat.
The sun rose. It beat on the bare white skin of Alf Jukes.
Jukes took a little oilskin package from his pocket and wedged it in
the centre of the raft. He slipped off his dungaree trousers and dipped
them in the sea. The dripping dungarees in his hand, he stood stark
naked and once more gazed around. The sea was empty. His head by the
raft’s edge, he lay down and covered himself as well as he could with
the wet dungaree. The sun climbed higher.
Now and again Jukes splashed his great hands in the water, wetting his
head and upper limbs afresh. Except upon the raft there was no motion
anywhere in sky or sea.
By and by Jukes rose. His eyes searched the horizon. It was empty. He
dropped the dungarees and dived deep. He swam down and down, seeking
the cooler depths. He glimmered white, far under the unrippled blue
water. When he rose to the surface again he held to the edge of the
raft. The raft gave no shade. He reached for, and covered his head
with, the dungarees. The sun was overhead when he drew himself up,
and, holding to the edge of the raft, looked all about again.
Suddenly Jukes hurled himself upon the raft. His body, glistening in
the sun, he watched a long green shape dart under him.
For the rest of the day Jukes dipped his dungarees in the sea and
covered himself as best he could. All day a sharp green fin cruised
slowly round. When the sun dipped there were red fiery patches on the
marble-white skin of his back, on his thighs and shoulders.
Stars wakened. Long after day was gone Jukes curled himself in the
middle of the raft and went to sleep. Thirst wakened him. He dipped the
dungarees in the sea and wrapped them round his neck.
Night passed. At dawn the horizon was empty. Fins cruised to and fro on
all sides. Snouts broke the still blue water. The sky was cloudless.
When Jukes dipped his dungarees, jaws snapped on them. He wrenched, and
a leg of the dungarees remained in his hands. He wrapped it about his
neck, and crouched down. The sun climbed higher.
Jukes rocked a little to and fro. Now and again a low coughing grunt
escaped him.
Day passed. Night came, starry and still. Snouts nosed around the
raft’s edge. Fins darted to and fro, rippling the windless water. Jukes
slept fitfully, dreamed, wakened, dozed, and dreamed again. Night
passed.
At dawn Jukes climbed unsteadily to his feet. His lips were black, his
skin scarlet. He moaned. His tongue was swollen.
A quarter of a mile from the raft a dense black cloud was slowly
crossing the equatorial sky. A sheer wall of water fell from the cloud
to the sea. Flying fish leaped at the rain’s foot. White birds preyed
on them from above, silver-bellied fish from below. The snouts were
gone, to join in the preying.