"Good gracious me!" exclaimed Mrs Major Negus, jumping up in a fright
from the comfortable nap which she had been taking in a lean-back chair
on the poop; "where is that unhappy boy? He'll be the death of me some
day!"
"I'm here, ma!" shouted out Maurice from the forecastle. "Do come,
everybody. It's such fun! Ah, there, the big one has just got such a
whack and is in a terrible wax. He's hunting about for the little one,
who has dived away from him out of reach!"
"Fokesall, ahoy!" hailed Mr Adams, who had charge of the deck; "what's
the matter forward!"
"Only a fight, sir, between a black-fish and a thresher," answered Ben
Boltrope, the carpenter, an old man-o'-war's man, and one of the most
efficient hands of the _Nancy Bell's_ crew.
"A fit!" exclaimed Mr Zachariah Lathrope, drawing his long telescopic
legs together and rising into a sitting posture on the top of the cabin
skylight, where he had been taking his usual afternoon siesta instead of
putting himself to the trouble of going below and turning into his bunk,
as was his usual wont after luncheon. "A fit! Wa-al I guess I'm on. I
allers likes to hitch in with a muss!" and, so saying, the lanky
American was soon scrambling down the poop-ladder and making his way
forward, followed by all the remainder of the passengers--Mrs Major
Negus, of course, going to look after her darling boy, while Frank
Harness accompanied Kate Meldrum, as he said, to "take care of her,"
although, as her father was not far distant, it might have been supposed
that his protecting arm was not so absolutely necessary as he thought!
A very strange spectacle was seen, when the party, after diving beneath
the slackened sheets of the mainsail, that flapped about an inert mess
of canvas above their heads, and picking their way past the galley and
windlass, at last climbed up into the bows of the ship, where the
majority of the crew had already assembled and taken up vantage points
in the rigging, half-way up which was Master Maurice, waving his hat
wildly in a great state of excitement, and the master as it were of the
situation.
"There they are!" said he pointing to where the water was lashed up and
broken into foam, about half a mile ahead of the ship, amidst which a
couple of dark bodies could be seen tumbling about--one occasionally
jumping up high in the air and coming down on the other with a thud, and
a smack that sounded like the crack of a whip, or report of a rifle.
"There they are, Miss Meldrum, I saw them first!"
"Come down out of that, sir, at once!" screamed out his mother, with a
pant and a puff between each word, her breath having been almost taken
away by her unusually quick movements in getting forwards. "Have I not
ordered you never to go up those ropes?"
"Oh, bother, ma!" exclaimed the young hopeful, paying not the slightest
attention to his mother's command. He had been so spoilt, petted at one
time and scolded another, that all her authority over him was lost save
in name. "There! bravo, little one--oh, my, wasn't that a good one,
now?"
And so, Mrs Major Negus--abandoning any expectation of making Maurice
descend from his perch in the shrouds, where, however, she could see
that he was in no imminent danger, for he had one of the sailors on
either side of him who would catch him should he slip--was obliged
perforce to do as all the rest were doing and gaze at the thrilling
marine drama that was being acted out with such tragic earnestness on
the surface of the deep before their eyes.
A black-fish--which, it may be mentioned here, for the benefit of the
uninitiated, is a species of cachalot, although differing from the true
spermaceti family of whales in having the spout-holes placed on the top
of the head, in place of on the snout, and the pectoral fins shorter--
was being assailed by its bitter enemy the thresher or "fox shark."
This latter is one of the most peculiar fishes to be seen throughout the
length and breadth of the ocean, that world of living wonders; for it
has a most extraordinary face, or head, which is more like that of an
ape than of one of the piscine tribe; while its tail is divided into two
lobes or blades, one of which is small and insignificant, and the other
larger than the body of the animal, curling up at the end like the tail-
feather of a bird of paradise.
There could be no comparison between the two combatants, in respect to
size at least; for, while the whale was some fifty feet long--nearly a
third of the length of the _Nancy Bell_--the thresher could not have
exceeded thirteen feet; and as for girth, the former was in proportion
like a portly, Daniel-Lambert sort of man put by the side of a starving
street urchin of seven. The only advantage the thresher apparently
possessed was in its eyes, which, when one could get a glimpse of them,
looked like those of a hawk; while the unwieldy cetacean had little tiny
optics, not much bigger than those of a common haddock, which were
placed in an unwieldy lump of a head, that seemed ever so much bigger
than its body, with a tremendous lower jaw containing a row of teeth,
each one of which was nearly a foot long.
The thresher, seemingly, had only the advantage of his antagonist in the
proportionate size of his eyes; but, "just wait till you have seen him
use his long feather-like tail!" as Maurice Negus said, and you will
arrive at the conclusion that the combatants were not so very unequally
matched after all.
The very size of the black-fish militated against his chances for, while
it took him more than his own length to turn in the water, the thresher
darted, here, there and everywhere, like an eel--just getting out of his
reach when the other thought he had got him and had opened his ponderous
jaws to crush him. It was at this moment that his agile tormentor,
seizing his opportunity, would leap out of the water and give the whale
a "whack" on his side behind the fin, one of his tenderest spots, the
blow resounding far and wide over the water and probably leaving a weal
if not an indentation in the animal's side.
Mr Zachariah Lathrope got quite interested, bobbing from one side of
the topgallant-forecastle to the other, and trying to obtain the best
view he could of the contest.
"Bully for the little scorpion, marm!" he exclaimed to "the Major," as
he shoved his hands down into his trouser pockets and seemed to lift
himself up in his eagerness. "I'll bet my bottom dollar he'll fix that
air whale to rights! By gosh, that wer a sockdolager; I guess the big
varmint is kinder gettin' riled!"
The whale here spouted and fluked his tail, diving down for a moment
beneath the surface; but, he did not long disappear, and when he came up
shortly afterwards nearer the ship, the spectators could see that the
water around him was dyed with blood.
As the black-fish rose, the thresher, who evidently had been waiting for
him and knew the precise spot where he would reappear, threw himself up
in the air, turning a sort of summersault; and, "whack!" came his whip-
like tail round his victim's body, the whale seeming to writhe under the
blow as if driven half mad with pain.
"Look, look!" exclaimed Florry Meldrum, "the thresher isn't alone; what
are those long-nosed fishes swimming about under the whale? They seem
to be helping the other one!"
"You're right, Florry," said her father, "they are swordfish. What you
think are their noses are long projecting saw-like blades, and they are
the whale's deadliest enemy. I never saw them, however, attacking one
in company with a thresher before: they must have formed an alliance for
the express purpose, as they have really nothing in common."
"It reminds me, mister," said the American, putting a chew of tobacco in
his mouth pensively, "of a bull fit I once see in Carthagena when I was
to Spain some years ago. That air thresher is jist like the feller all
fixed up with lace and fallals called the Piccador, who used to stir up
the animile with squibs and crackers and make him fly round like a dawg
when he's kinder tickled with a flea under his tail; and the sword-fish,
as you calls them outlandish things, are sunthen' like the Matador that
gives the bull his quietus with his wepping. That air power of blood
that you see, I guess, is from them, and not from t'other's cow-hide of
a tail!"
"Golly, massa, you speaks for true," said Snowball, who formed one of
the party of lookers-on, abandoning his coppers in the galley in order
to see the fun. "Bress de Lord! see how dat long snout chap dere gib
him goss now!"
It really seemed an organised attack.
As soon as the back of the black-fish appeared above the surface, the
thresher, springing several yards out of the water, descended with great
violence on the object of its rancour and inflicted what sounded like a
hearty slap with its tail, the sword-fishes in their turn striking the
whale from below; so that, try how he might, the unhappy monster of the
deep could not escape his persevering foes.
"Sure and be jabers it bates Donnybrook Fair entirely!" said Mr
McCarthy, who had also come up from below, the news having also reached
him of what was taking place. "The poor baste will soon be bate into a
cocked hat with all them ragamuffins on to him at once! It's liking to
help him I'd be if I saw the chance!"
But the doom of the black-fish was evidently by this time sealed and
human aid was powerless to assist him: all could see for themselves that
the last act in the drama was close at hand!
Suddenly, the thresher gave another violent bound upwards into the air
from the surface of the ensanguined water, leaping almost over the
whale; and, as he fell back again into the sea, his tail, which was bent
like a bow, delivered a terrible lash, surpassing any of its previous
attempts. At the same time, as if by a concerted movement, those on
board could see--for the combatants were now so close alongside the ship
that the bight of a rope could have been easily hove over them--one of
the sword-fish made a dart at the exposed flank of the whale, burying
its ugly saw-like weapon almost up to the head and inflicting a wound
that must have been mortal.
The black-fish instantly emitted a sort of hollow muffled roar; and,
sending up a fountain of watery spray mixed with blood from its spout-
holes, splashed the sea violently with its formidable flukes, after
which it rolled over, rocking from side to side in its last dying flurry
or death agony.
"I guess he's a gone coon!" said the American, hitching up his trousers
again and turning over the quid of tobacco in his mouth. "It seems a
terrible pity to waste him though. There's a powerful sight of blubber
in that air animile!" and the speaker appeared to gaze sadly at the
carcase of the conquered cetacean as it floated by.
"It's all over," said Mr Meldrum, turning from the now pitiful
spectacle with disgust. "Come away, girls!" But Kate had long since
left the scene, the sight not having been of a nature to suit her tender
heart; and, she was now far away aft with Frank Harness, sitting in a
secluded corner of the poop, where she could see nothing of the
sanguinary ending of the contest. Florry, on the contrary, had remained
to the last, as well as Mrs Major Negus--who, it may be observed, had
watched the struggle from its commencement to its close with almost as
much interest as her enthusiastic son and heir; and Mr Meldrum had much
difficulty in tearing the little girl away from her rapt contemplation
of the dead whale.
"Stop a minute, papa," she urged when he took hold of her arm to draw
her from the rail. "Do look! they have all left him now they have
killed him. I wonder what they quarrelled about?"
"Sure, an' just for the same rayson, missy, that Christians hate sich
other," said Mr McCarthy, "just for no cause at all, but bekaze they
can't help it, alannah! And now that the little divils have kilt him,
sure they've swum off and left the poor crathur to die, just the same as
some ov us does to sich other, more's the pity, by the same token!"
It was true enough.
The thresher and his active allies had all at once disappeared, how,
when, or where, none of those looking on could tell; the lifeless body
of the black-fish only remaining in evidence of the battle that had
taken place.
There it was, floating sluggishly on the heavy rolling swell of the
ocean, in solitary grandeur; for the dolphins and "Portuguese men-of-
war" that had been seen earlier in the afternoon had taken themselves
off as soon as the light began--evidently preferring calmer scenes and
not relishing the proximity of such inveterate enemies of their several
species as the late combatants.