SHE OVERHEARS TWO SAILORS TALKING
For many days we met with very beautiful weather, and every day the sun
grew hotter and hotter. The moon enlarged and became a full moon, and
the prospect of the dark blue night, with the moon shining higher in
the heavens than ever I had seen her shine, and the stars in multitudes
of brilliants trembling in a very sheet of silver down to the vague,
obscure line of the horizon, was glorious and wonderful. Often on those
fine nights, instead of going to bed, I’d creep to the forecastle,
where nobody walked but the sentry and a seaman on the look-out.
There I would overhang the head rail and gaze down at the star-white
foam as it spread out with a soft, boiling noise from the steady,
shearing thrust of the cutwater. The sea was full of fire and many
strange shapes of dim, greenish flame swept past in the black water
as I looked. The moonlight lay upon the sails and they rose stirless
as carvings in marble. The stars glittered like jewels in the dark
arches under the sails and twinkled gem-like along the black lines of
the yards, and danced like the mystic fire of the corposant beyond the
trucks to the swaying of the fragile points of masthead.
Oh, it was at such times as these that I longed for Tom! What
happiness, I would think, to have his hand in mine; to be standing
here at his side, gazing up with him at the moon-whitened canvas,
or watching the sea-fire leaping in sparks amidst the rushing froth
on either hand! He had talked once of my going a voyage with him.
He had talked, too, of his carrying me to sea when we were married.
I could understand what I had lost when I stood lonely on that dark
forecastle watching the yearning breasts of canvas leaning from the
wind and thinking of the home that was low down behind the sea. My
heart beat with passion when, on these lovely moonlight nights, sweet
with the strong blowing of the trade-wind, I’d think of my dear one
locked up in the ’tweendecks below--imprisoned with the rest of them
since half-past six, to emerge from the pestilential atmosphere at
daybreak--for what?
Whilst I thus thought, I’d clench my hands in the agony of my mind till
the nails were driven into the palms of them.
But everything went along very quietly. Tables were knocked together,
and schools held on deck in the inclosure; that is, a proportion of the
schools. There was not room for all, and the convict classes alternated
between the ’tweendecks and the main-deck. The doctor speedily found
out that Tom was one of the best educated of the prisoners, and set him
to help in teaching the many wretches who knew not their alphabet. But
it rarely happened, as I have said, that I saw my sweetheart. Either I
was at work in the cuddy when he was on deck, or he was below, or the
schools broken up when I might have found leisure to watch him.
I often speculated upon the histories of the many convicts--chose a
face and mused upon it. My conviction--nay, my knowledge--that Tom was
as innocent as I of the crime for which he was being transported made
me think that there might be others as guiltless as he; and this sort
of fancy or sympathy often raised a passion of pity in me as I’d stand
staring at a convict, striving to fetch his life-story out of his face,
though, for all I knew, the man I watched might have been one of the
very worst scoundrels in the ship.
What affected me most was the guessing that lots of them must have
left wives and mothers, children and dear ones behind. I had heard the
doctor say that not above one out of every one hundred convicts ever
returned home, so that, unless the parents or the wives of the poor,
miserable felons followed them, they would be as completely sundered
from home ties as though they had been sentenced to the gallows instead
of to the hulks and transport. My eyes would moisten sometimes in thus
thinking whilst I watched a prisoner in some hour of leisure, fancying
a past for him. Once I saw this: Two children belonging to the soldiers
had strayed into the gangway alley and were playing there. I observed
a convict, a middle-aged man, watching them. A sudden spasm contorted
his face. He jerked down his hand in a snapping way, in some instant
anguish of memory, as though he cast something from him, and turned his
head and moved a few paces, then raised his cuff to his eye, with a
look-round afterward to see if he was noticed.
One evening I went forward, meaning to get upon the forecastle to
breathe the air. It was hot in the recess. Some women were seated round
the booby-hatch, and the noise of the children vexed the mood I was
then in. It was toward the close of the second dog-watch and dark. I
saw some figures on the forecastle, and learnt by the voices that Mr.
Stiles, Mr. Balls, and the sailmaker were of them. Therefore, that I
might be private, meaning to breathe in solitude upon the forecastle
later on, I went round to the lee side of the galley, the door of which
was closed, and stood there, looking at the dark sea above the line of
the bulwark-rail, for the ship was heeling over somewhat sharply this
night.
Though the noise of the pouring and foaming brine rose shrill and
strong, other sounds were very plainly to be heard. For instance, I
often caught what they said upon the forecastle, though the speakers
were at a distance. The main-deck was empty. A few figures moved
about the poop. Presently two sailors stationed themselves against
the foremost end of the galley, round the corner, so to say, facing
the lofty pillar of the foremast. I smelt the fumes of their coarse
tobacco. They could not see me nor I them; but what they said was as
distinct as though they stood alongside of me, spite of their speaking
in subdued voices. I knew not who they were, but guessed them to be two
forecastle hands.
‘I had a yarn along with Bob this morning,’ said one of them. ‘Them
gallus sentries are made up of eyes. Fust time I’ve been able to speak
to him.’
‘What’s he lagged for?’ said the other man.
‘Buzzlement. I knew it ’ud happen. He grew too confident and was ate
up with pride. He might be helping himself now, theayters and dancin’
kens as often as you like, lush to swim in and quids for his piece. But
the gallus fool must grow greedy; he takes too big a handful, and now
he’s outward-bound. But twelve bob a week and find himself! A covey
with Bob’s tastes, too, mind ye, and one of your gallus high-flyers
to rig out. But he says he ain’t sorry it’s over. He never felt
comfortable. His piece was always a-scolding and threatening to split
if the swag warn’t forthcoming; and, blow me, she stumped him, after
all, for split she did, but not afore she’d got another cully, in tow,
unbeknown to Bob, you take your oath.’
‘I heard Micky Volkins,’ said the other, ‘a-telling Bill Flanders
that he squeezed in a yarn with his old chum when they was washing
down. They scrubbed side by side. Micky says the old chum’s glad to
be going abroad. The shore-work took it out of him, but the hulk
gave satisfaction. The feeding was beef, soup, mutton, spuds, bread,
porridge, and treacle. I recollect the boiling. If a man’s sick, they
put him on sheep’s head, eggs, soft puddens, tea and butter, along
with brandy and wine, which they sarve out by the hounce. Is that
sailors’ fare? Strike my eyes if it ain’t good enough to go into irons
for!’
‘There’s only one sailor-man among ’em, Bob was a-saying,’ said the
first sailor.
‘Who’s he?’
‘Didn’t hear his name. Lagged for scuttling a vessel. Gallus good
job if the old man tried it on with this ship. Everything’s blooming
wrong. All the work comes upon a few. What’s good goes below; what’s
stinking’s sent for’ard. Well, I never shipped expecting to see Bob,
and I’m game to swap places, if they’ll consent. Look what’s done for
’em! Prayer-meetin’s, eddication up to the knocker, a doctor to physic
’em! If a man growls, he’s spoke to as a man. One of the convicts
complained to the doctor of the cooking. The gent sniffed and tasted,
said the man was right and winged the gallus cook. Let e’er a one of us
lay aft, and what’s a-goin to happen?’
The conversation was at this point interrupted by the second sailor
beginning to sneeze. He sneezed at least twenty times with a great
roaring noise. Mr. Balls came to the edge of the forecastle and cried
down: ‘Withered if there ain’t a grampus jumped aboard!’ The fit of
sneezing passed, and the fellow lighted his pipe afresh, and the men
resumed their conversation.
‘It’s gallus queer,’ said the first speaker, ‘that there should be only
one sailor among ’em.’
‘One navigator, perhaps,’ said the other.
‘Well, that may be. I wish they was all ships’ captains for my
part--skippers and mates. I’m gallus glad whenever I hear a skipper’s
lagged. But they’re too leary, bully. Ha, ha! They knows how to keep to
wind’ard, scrape and go as it often is.’
‘What’s the coveys made up of?’ said the second speaker.
‘I asked Bob that. “All sorts,” said he. “One’s a parson.”’ Here both
sailors laughed loudly. ‘A harbour missionary, lagged for fishing
through the slit in the mission box.’ Both men laughed loudly again.
‘You’ll know him, maty, by singling out the cove as carries his hands
as though he wore long thread gloves. Bob told me to twig him by that.’
‘Only one sea-captain?’ said the second speaker. ‘It must be the next
ship, then, that’s a-bringing of them out?’
Eight bells at this moment were struck; the boatswain sent some
thrilling message through the ship with his pipe; and, unwilling that
the two speakers should know that I had been a listener, I went softly
round the galley and made my way aft.
The reference to Tom in this conversation had struck me as strange. The
men undoubtedly meant Tom when they spoke of one of the convicts as
the only sea-captain amongst the prisoners. How should that be known?
The doctor was doubtless acquainted with the felons’ antecedents, but
he never talked and rarely answered questions. The convicts, then, had
made the discovery amongst themselves; this I thought extraordinary.
Tom might have admitted his calling to the fellows who shared his
sleeping berth, to the prisoners who formed the mess he was in; but
how should it be known to two hundred and twenty-nine convicts that
the two hundred and thirtieth was the only sea-captain amongst them?
Perhaps I mistook; a few had learned Tom’s calling, and one of those
few had talked with the sailor whose conversation with his mate I had
listened to.
I did not give the matter much thought; I should have given it much
less thought had not Tom been the man the sailors referred to. That
some of the sailors should have found friends amongst the prisoners
was quite in keeping with the looks of a few of the crew. I had often
thought that were the forecastle hands to shift clothes with the
malefactors, they would make wickeder-looking convicts than the bulk of
the prisoners.