THE CAPTAIN'S BIRTHDAY
Now in this business of transferring the four men Hardy noticed that
the captain made no reference to Miss Armstrong. Another captain would
have asked her if she wished to go home: perhaps, indeed, would have
sent her home without asking her. Was it because Captain Layard knew
she had no home? Hardy hoped it might be that, but suspected it was
not so. This ship wanted no stewardess; the girl was one more to feed,
and owners do not love liberality in their captains. In short, the
mate came to the conclusion that the captain's benevolence in keeping
the girl and giving her a passage to Australia for nothing was due to
hallucination, and the thought was uneasiness itself both for Julia's
sake and the ship's.
It was the day following the transshipment of the men that he found an
opportunity during the captain's absence to take a turn with the girl
and talk to her. The sun was shining a little hotly, and the clouds
were sailing fast. Each round of swell, as it came under-running the
ship out of the northeast, was ridged and wrinkled with arches of foam,
and the day was alive with the music in the rigging, with the speckled
wings of sea-birds in the wake, and the smoke-like shadow of vapour
floating through the sunshine on the water.
After the couple had talked a little, Hardy said:
"How does the captain treat you?"
"Very kindly," she answered.
"I keep an eye upon him," he said, "but it will not do to seem to hang
near when he is talking to you. He might round and become fierce, for
from madness you may expect anything. What is his talk about?"
"Chiefly his lost child."
A seaman who was in the main-rigging putting a fresh seizing to a
ratline looked at the girl, and thought deep in himself, Oh, lovey,
what a figure! But what that whiskered heart admired most was the
coquettish cock of her head, the grace of one hand upon her hip, the
charm of her motions as she walked, her posture when she turned aft
or forward on the return that was like a pause in some sweet dancer's
movements. Yes, Jack can keep a bright lookout when a girl heaves in
sight, but the mighty Charles Dickens is right in holding that Jack's
Nan is often the unloveliest of the fair.
"Does he go on thinking that you know where his child is?" said Hardy.
"Yes. It is a fixed delusion, though I cannot humour it--it is too
sad--in spite of your wish."
"The oddest part to me," said Hardy, "is the reason he shows in his
professional work. He doesn't confound things; the sail he talks of is
the sail it is; he still knows the ropes. The flicker of the leach of a
topgallantsail will set him wanting a small pull on the leebrace."
"How does he manage with the navigation?" asked the girl.
"He works it out as I do. He finds the ship's position to a second.
This may be the effect of habit, but is not custom beaten into rags
by insanity, like the head of an old drum? It's not so in this case,
and the crew mayn't find him out till the pilot boards us, and guess
nothing until they hear that the doctors have locked him up."
"Then what does his madness signify?" said the girl. "He'll be as good
as the sanest if we arrive safely."
"Ah, but it's the getting there! It's the what may happen to-morrow, or
to-morrow, or to-morrow, and that is going to make my hair gray, Miss
Armstrong."
"Call me Julia," she said, looking at him with a sudden light in her
eyes.
"Why should I take that liberty?" he replied, smiling.
"Because I should love it," she answered.
"I'll not call you Julia before him," he exclaimed, with a note of
fondness which brought a charming expression into her face, as the
kisses of a shower freshen the perfume of the rose. "It must be a stiff
Miss Armstrong or I am no mate," and then they fell to talking a little
nonsense.
A day came, and it was the fifth day dating from the drowning of the
little drummer, and it was a Friday, in all tradition a black day for
the sailor; and nobody, I think, has taken notice that it was Friday
when Nelson, full of instinctive assurance that he would never return
alive, kissed his sleeping child and started to join his ship for
Trafalgar.
The captain, Miss Armstrong, and Mr. Hardy sat at breakfast. The ship
had made good way; not many parallels lay between her and the northern
verge of the tropics. The sun poured his light in fire, and the
flying-fish sparkled under the bows.
The sailors had noticed nothing in the captain to set them growling
suspicion into one another's ears with askant looks aft. If Mr. Candy,
who lived close to the skipper, had taken any sort of altitude of the
poor man's mind, he kept his observation secret; or it might be that he
believed the captain was a little upset by the loss of his child, and
he had not the penetrating sagacity of Hardy.
The wind had fallen light, and the motions of the ship were as easy as
a swimmer's. Hardy had noticed in the captain's face when they met that
morning an expression of lofty triumph, of sublimated self-complacency
such as a man deranged by conquest and acclamation might wear as he
passes slowly through the huzzaing crowds. He seemed self-crowned, and
might have reminded a better student than Hardy of one of Nat Lee's
heaven-defying stage-kings.
"To-day is Friday," said the captain, addressing Miss Armstrong, "and
what day do you think it is?"
Julia thought awhile, for she fancied he meant something in the almanac.
"I don't know, captain," she answered.
"It is my birthday," said the captain, "and Johnny is waiting somewhere
to kiss me."
Hardy was about to deliver with all the respect of a mate a sentence of
congratulation, but the closing words of the captain silenced him.
"I wish you many happy returns of the day," said Julia.
"You might like to know how old I am," said the captain, with an
indescribable look at the girl, "but every man should respect the
secret of his birth. Until we come to sixty we like to be thought much
younger, and when we come to eighty we tell lies that our friends
may think us ninety. I have good reason to congratulate myself upon
my birthday. I cannot believe that the Red Ensign ever floated over
a better seaman than I, a man who is both a gentleman and a sailor,
and it has been my privilege," he continued, talking as though he was
making an after-dinner speech, "to have dignified by my behaviour and
breeding a service that in public opinion is in want of dignity."
Hardy burst into a laugh; he could not help it, but he instantly
apologised by saying that the captain's words made him think of the
first skipper he sailed with, betwixt whose legs, as he stood, you
could have fitted an oval picture, and whose face for beauty might have
been picked out of the harness cask.
The captain with a slight frown cast his eyes upon the mate, and said,
"Johnny shall be a sailor. His mother would have desired him to serve
the queen at sea, but he shall perpetuate _me_ under the flag I serve."
This was followed by a short silence; the others found nothing to say.
It was perhaps one of the saddest illustrations of madness on record,
and it set the listeners' hearts pining to do something that was denied
to their sympathy and distress.
"The men shall have a holiday," said the captain, who was scarcely
eating. "It is my birthday, and they shall drink my health at eight
bells. You will drink my health, Mr. Hardy, and you, Miss Armstrong?"
They answered that they would drink his health with the greatest
pleasure.
"You and Mr. Candy in rum, Mr. Hardy; you'll drink with the men, for I
like the officers of my ship to be associated with the crew on festive
occasions."
"I will gladly drink with the men, sir," responded Hardy.
"Rum is not a fit drink for young ladies," continued the captain,
with a faint smile, "and you, Miss Armstrong, will drink my health in
claret--a wine which shall not hurt you, because 'tis light and old and
nourishing."
Julia bowed. Hardy was wondering what the men would think, but if
they thought this unusual deviation from sea routine odd, they would
certainly like it and hope for more. It was an exhibition of insane
generosity, of lunatic kindness, and the mate could see nothing else in
it.
In obedience to the captain's instructions he went on deck, sending
Candy below to his breakfast, and called the boatswain aft.
"It's the captain's orders," said he, "that the men shall knock off
work all day."
The boatswain stared. "All day, sir?" he said.
"It's his birthday," answered Hardy. "And all hands will drink his
health in good Jamaica rum at eight bells, served out on the capstan
head."
Innumerable wrinkles overran the boatswain's face as grin after grin
rippled about his gale-hardened skin. He looked as if he would like to
say that here was a traverse that beat all his going a-fishing. But
the immense pleasure that beamed in his expression was full assurance
of the reception the crew would give the news.
He walked slowly forward, and the men wondered at his deep and constant
grin. "One of the mate's stories, I reckon," thought Bill, and Jim also
thought that some joke of the mate had started the boatswain on that
smile. When he reached the forecastle the boatswain put his silver
whistle to his lips and blew the shrill music of "All hands!" and a
hundred little birds of the groves and woods seemed to be perched in
song upon the yards and rigging.
The fellows who were below came tumbling up, startled by that call in
fine weather. In a very little time the whole of the crew had gathered
round their forecastle leader, who, after clearing his throat and
gazing about him with his profound smile, said:
"Lads, it's the capt'n's birthday, and it's to be a holiday for you all
right away through, with liquor at noon to drink his health in."
Sailors are usually so badly treated by all variety of shipowners'
sullen deafness to their grievances, that when on rare occasions,
sometimes originating in madness, they are well treated, their
astonishment is a phenomenon of emotion. It seems unnatural, they
think. A beautiful mermaid with a gilded tail and flowing hair of
bronze, with her white revealed charms made entrancing by the soft
blue of the water, could not amaze them more than a skipper's kindness
taking the form of Layard's.
A brief spell of silence fell upon them as they looked at one another
and at the boatswain.
"Ain't yer coddin' us?" said a man.
"Fill your pipes, and go a-courting," answered the boatswain. "I'm for
taking advantage of it when it comes, which ain't ever too soon or
often."
This convinced the crew, who delivered a loud cheer, and then began to
talk and scatter, all of them feeling a bit aimless, for it wasn't like
going ashore.
Hardy, who was keeping the deck whilst Candy breakfasted, watched the
proceedings on the forecastle, and wondered if this stroke of the
captain was going to give them any idea of the truth. But why should
it? If they suspected, through this act of kindness, that the boy's
loss had shifted the "old man's" ballast, they would only hope that a
long time would pass before his mental cargo was trimmed afresh. But
in truth they did not know that their captain was insane, and even
Candy, who was below sitting at the table and listening to the skipper
conversing with Miss Armstrong, would not have kissed the Book upon it.
Presently Mr. Candy came on deck, but Hardy, whose watch below it was,
thought he would stay a little and talk to Miss Armstrong, and observe
the captain if he should appear. Very soon after Mr. Candy arrived
Julia rose lightly through the companion-hatch. She was now looking
quite well, better indeed than she looked when Hardy first met her.
Again he found himself admiring her faultless figure and the pose of
her head, enchanting through its unconsciousness.
"Where is the captain?" he asked her.
"I left him at the table," she replied. "He was not in the cabin when I
came out of my berth."
"I hope it won't end in his destroying himself," exclaimed Hardy.
"There is a great deal of goodness and humanity in the poor fellow's
heart, and it's dreadful to see a man struggling to conquer his brain's
disease. Who can tell what passes in the minds of such people? But what
am I to do? He is Prime Minister aboard this ship, and those are the
people," said he, nodding toward the crew, "who must turn him out."
"Have you told them they are to have a holiday?" she asked.
"Don't they look like it?" he replied.
"How'll they spend it?" she inquired.
"In loafing and smoking and sleeping. If the captain's liberal with his
grog-- Well, the drummer's gone out of their heads--'tis the way of the
sea: a bubble over the side, a broken pipe in a vacant bunk, and the
ship sails on. They may dance and sing songs; and I hope they will,
for God knows the captain is depressing enough, and I like to see the
hornpipe danced."
Meanwhile where was Captain Layard? He was in his cabin seated close
to the medicine-chest, which stood open, and reading a thin volume all
about poisons, and the quantities to be administered when given for
sickness. His great dog lay beside him. He read with a knitted brow,
and sometimes sank the volume to lift with his right hand some bottle
of poison out of its little square place. He would look at it and then
refer to the book.
In this singular study, fearful with the menace of the light in his
eyes, tragically portentous with the lifting look of triumph and the
insane smile, he spent about half an hour, and then closing the lid of
the medicine-chest, he stood up and looked at the drum, and softly
wrung his hands with a heart-moving expression, whose appeal lay in
the soul's perception seeking to pierce in vain the torturing and
bewildering veil of disease; for it is not the immortal soul of man
which is mad in madness, and this belief is God-sent; the soil buries
and resolves to ashes the mania that destroys, and the purified soul is
liberated to await the judgment of God--its Home.
After a few minutes he stepped into the cabin and called the attendant,
who was handling crockery and glasses in the pantry. The fellow stepped
out.
"Jump below into the lazarette," said the captain, "and draw a bucket
of rum. I want plenty. This is my birthday, and all hands will drink my
health."
The man was not at all astonished; he had got the news from the
forecastle. He was a sort of steward, and knew the ropes in the
lazarette. The little hatch was just abaft the captain's chair, and
was opened by an iron ring. The man accepted the captain's orders
literally, disappeared, and returned with a clean, big bucket.
The lazarette is an after-hold, a compartment of a ship in which in
those times all sorts of commodities used to be stowed, chiefly edible,
and for cabin use. The man lifted the hatch-cover--the hatch was no
more than a man-hole--and by help of the light, which shone down upon a
cask that was almost immediately under, pumped the bucket nearly full.
The captain went to the hatch and looked down, and exclaimed:
"Hand it up; I'll help you." He received the bucket and placed it on
the deck, and the man sprang through the hatch and replaced the cover.
"Take it into my cabin," said the captain, "and bring it on deck when I
send you for it."
And this was done, and the man went on deck whilst the captain entered
his berth and closed the door.
"I have drawed enough to swim ye," said the cabin-attendant to Bill.
"'Tain't like being in port, though," answered Bill, whilst Jim and
several others like him grinned at the news of the grog. "When I takes
a drop, I'm for dancin', and where are the gurls?"
"Ah!" echoed Jim in a sigh born of lobscouse and the livid fat of
diseased pork.
Finding that the captain did not make his appearance, Hardy kept
the deck with Julia. Again they talked of the old home, the drunken
stepmother, the withering indifference of the retired Commander R. N.
to the loneliness and helplessness of his child, and to her prospects
in life.
Hardy spoke of it with heat, and the girl's face was often hot with the
passion of memory.
"What should I have done without you?" she said once and again,
and still again. "But if I cannot find employment in Australia, I
must return in this ship," and she looked at him with the eyes of a
sweetheart.
"If anything happens to Captain Layard," said he, "no doubt I shall get
command."
Now, "If anything should happen" is the roundabout of "If he should
die," and people modestly thus speak of death as though it was
anything, as though it was not the _only_ thing that is real, to be
expected without fear of disappointment.
"I believe he will grow quite mad long before we arrive at Melbourne,"
said Julia; "but even taking him as he is, would the agents trust him?"
"You want to come home in this ship, Julia?" said Hardy.
"You are the only friend I have in the world," she answered; and thus
they cooed without billing, for Jack was in strength forward, and the
second mate walked the deck to windward, and a sailor stood at the
wheel.
About a quarter before noon, but not till then, the captain emerged
with his sextant. If he had come up with a face of madness, the sextant
he held would have clothed him with all the sanity he needed in the
sailors' opinion. But his face showed no distinctive marks of the
condition of his mind, the expression was even calm; he seemed as one
who was about to realise the consuming hope of his life; the shadow of
the coming event subdued him. The crew were on deck gathered forward
in all variety of sprawling posture, smoking and talking, with teeth
sharpened by the hard and bitter fare of the sea. Also seven bells
having been struck some time since, they knew that noon and a bumper of
old Jamaica were at hand, and every eye was directed aft.
Hardy disappeared and returned with his sextant, and Candy fetched his,
and the three men fell to screwing down the sun till its lower limb was
like a wheel upon the ocean line. The captain never spoke, and Julia
studying his face noticed the subdued look and the calmness, and felt
a little despairful, for, poor heart, she was in love, and wanted the
captain to go raving mad that Hardy might get command and marry her at
Melbourne, and bring her home. O God, what joy for a heart so long
joyless! A home, a protector, a husband, on whose breast she could lean
with her lips at his ear in softest murmurings of wifely confidence.
"Eight bells! Make it the bell eight!" and the four double chimes rang
gladly along the decks and up aloft.
"Pass the word for the cabin servant," said the captain, speaking and
looking as collectedly as the sanest of skippers might show in that
first command of tacking, "Ready about!"
The man came aft in a hurry, impelled by the thirsty yearning of the
forecastle mob, and in a couple or three minutes he was standing at
the capstan just abaft the mast with a bucket on the "head," and a
tot measure in his hand. The captain stood close to the man, and the
crew gathered around. The Newfoundland stood at his master's side. Now
was to be seen the most glowing canvas in the panorama which unfolds
this ship's adventure. The picture was alive with its crowd of faces
of seamen watching the lips of their commander, alive with the colour
and diversity of their apparel, with the silent breathing of the white
breast soaring to the height of the fiery streak of bunting, which
trembled in a dog-vane from the main-royal truck. The sea was soft in
caress and note, and Julia thought of the wayside fountain to which
_she_ as well as Hardy had listened in the night, when, in the pause,
she heard the fall of the shower under the bow.
"My lads," began the captain, and Hardy watched him with strained
attention, believing that the crew would see it, "this is my birthday,
and I am departing from the custom of the sea in making a general
holiday of it."
He grew pale and paler as he spoke, but his voice did not falter, and
no change was visible in his expression save that a light as of secret
exultation brightened his eye and accentuated his pallor.
"I have always tried to make a good master to my men, and to treat them
like men and sailors, and not as dogs which other captains seem to find
them."
This was attended by a growl of appreciation.
"So, my lads," continued the captain, "as this is my birthday, one and
all of you, the mates, and the lady last, but not least, shall drink my
health, and the health of the little boy who has left his drum behind
him."
"May God bless you and him!" said one of the men, for this proved to be
one of those touches of nature which made all those rough hearts akin.
"Now serve out--serve out, and handsomely!"
The boatswain drank first. And again and again and again the measure
was filled until all hands of the sailors, saving the man at the wheel,
had swallowed the fiery draught, many with a smack and a smile of
relish. Then the wheel was relieved, and another bumper was swallowed
with a "Many 'appy returns of the day, sir."
"Drink," said the captain to the attendant, and the man drained a full
dose.
"Sweeten the measure for the two mates," said the captain.
This was quickly done. And then Hardy drank and then Candy, for both
had the throats of the sea, which seem lined with brass when 'tis ten
per cent. above proof. "Your health, sir"--and--"your health, sir," and
the mates took it down.
"Now, Miss Armstrong, you will drink my health," said the captain, and
with the gallantry of an old beau he took her by the hand and led her
into the cabin. She glanced at Hardy with a smile before she vanished.
The men scattered as they went forward to get their dinner. The captain
took a wine-glass from a rack, and a bottle from a locker, and filled
the glass with red wine.
"Drink to me and to the boy I am seeking, and then tell me where he
is," he exclaimed as he extended the glass. She took it, and said with
forced cheerfulness to humour him:
"Your health, Captain Layard, and many happy returns of this day, and
my heart's gratitude to you for your kindness to me. And God will some
day show you where your child is."
She drank half the contents of the glass. His eyes sparkled, and his
face was grotesque with the workings of his dreadful exultation.
"Oh, you must drain it--you must drain it, Miss Armstrong, or it'll be
bad luck and no pledge."
She drank the glass empty, and put it down upon the table. He gazed at
her with extraordinary intentness as though he listened to hear her
words, then swiftly entered his cabin, closed and bolted the door, and
pulling out a loaded revolver from under the pillow in his bunk, seated
himself, and with the weapon upon his knee in his grasp sat hearkening,
with his eyes fastened upon the door.
The time slowly passed and still he continued to sit, grasping the
pistol upon his knee, with his eyes of madness fixed upon the door.
His face was now revolting with its look of burning expectation and
triumph. Suddenly a stream of sunshine moved slowly, like a spoke of a
softly revolving wheel, over the carpeted deck of the captain's cabin,
and any one might have known by the motions of the ship that she was
not under command. You heard faint, vague sounds of trampling above, a
dim noise as of a sick crowd poisoned by vapour and feebly struggling
to escape, and in the midst of it the captain's door was struck: the
blow was languid and repeated three or four times only, and no noise
attended it.
The madman sprang from his chair and stood erect with the revolver half
raised from his side, and his eyes sparkled in his face that was dark
with murderous intent. Thus he stood whilst the spoke of light through
the port-hole moved gradually round the cabin until it vanished, by
which time all was silent without. The unhappy man resumed his seat
and former posture, and thus it went for half an hour at least; then,
always grasping his murderous weapon, he walked like one in the chamber
of death, carefully opened the door, and peered out.
The first sight he witnessed was the figure of the chief mate, Hardy,
stretched at its length and on its side within a pace or two of the
threshold, and upon the locker on the port side of the table, a
cushioned locker as comfortable as a couch, lay the form of Julia
Armstrong; her right arm hung down, and she lay as apparently dead as
Hardy. The captain stepped across the body of the mate and looked with
devouring, sparkling eyes at the girl, while he seemed to listen for
sounds above. Nothing was to be heard save the inner grumbling of the
ship as she swayed helpless in arrest. Now and again the wheel chains
clanked to the blow of the sea upon the rudder.
The captain went to the girl's side and looked at her: her face was
placid, pale, ghastly, and her lips a bright red. Thus exactly did
Hardy's face show, and any one experienced in the symptoms of poisoning
by laudanum or morphia would have known that these two people had been
heavily drugged, even perhaps unto death.
It was the birthday of a madman in search of his drowned child, and
they had drunk his health and the little drummer's. His face took on an
air of hurry and bustle, and, always gripping his revolver, he stepped
nimbly to the companion-steps and mounted them. He raised his head
just above the companion-hood and looked; he saw that the man who had
stood at the wheel was lying motionless beside it. Almost abreast of
the companion was the curved form of Candy, who seemed to have been
doubled up and then reeled into lifelessness. A few prostrate forms
were to be seen forward, in the waist and about the forescuttle. They
lay lifeless in the sleep or death of the drugged draught in which they
had pledged their captain. In the forecastle lay the rest, some on the
deck, some in their bunks, and every face showed as Hardy's and the
girl's, placid, pale, and ghastly, and the lips a bright red. All the
symptoms had been expended, the first pleasurable mental excitement,
then the weariness, the headache, the intolerable weight of limb, the
spinning and sickening giddiness, the drowsiness, the stupor, and now
insensibility or death.
The captain rose in the hatch to his full height and stepped on to
the deck, followed by the dog, which went to Candy and smelt him, and
then with a low, uneasy growl went to the figure beside the wheel and
sniffed at it. With a dreadful smile of hope and rejoicing the captain
thrust the pistol into a side pocket and, going to the wheel, put the
helm hard a-starboard, and secured it by several turns of the end of
the mainbrace.
This done, always preserving his horrible expression of lofty
exaltation, he took the breaker out of the bow of the port
quarter-boat, filled it from the scuttle-butt, and replaced it. God
knows how he was directed in what he did; the instincts of habit and
knowledge must have governed him. It is certain that he made his
preparations for departure with the sanity of a healthy brain. His dog
closely followed him, and seemed afraid. He then went below into the
pantry and returned with his arms full of food, which he placed in the
stern-sheets along with a tumbler which he pulled out of his pocket. He
moved rapidly and his lips often worked, and he'd flash his gaze along
the decks at that memorable, tragical picture of ship with lifeless
figures upon the planks, with all her white canvas curving inwards,
stirless in the stream of the breeze. She seemed to have been drugged
too, and rolled with a kind of stagger upon the soft folds of the swell.
He went below again, the dog at his heels, and, entering his cabin,
took a dog-collar and chain out of a locker and secured the noble
animal to a leg of the table, which was cleated and immovable. When he
had done this he pressed his lips to the dog's head and sobbed dryly
and sighed, for the light in his eyes was too hot a fire for tears. The
dog whined and wagged its tail, and looked a hundred questions with its
gentle eyes.
"I shall bring him back, I shall bring him back, Sailor!" the captain
muttered to the Newfoundland.
And all this time Hardy lay close beside the dog as dead to the eye as
any corpse under the ground.
The captain went to the side of the girl and picked her up off the
cushioned locker with the ease of a man lifting a child. With her
motionless form in his arms he gained the deck and laid her in the
boat, passing her under the after-thwart, so that her head lay low in
the stern-sheets. He sprang for a colour in the flag-locker and placed
the bunting that was ready rolled under her head. She never sighed, she
never stirred. Not paler nor calmer could her face have shown on the
pillow of death.
Now the boat was to be lowered, and he went to work thus: he cast
adrift the gripes which had held the boat steady betwixt the davits,
and then he slackened the falls at the bow, belaying the tackle, and
then he slackened the falls at the stern, belaying the tackle; and
so by degrees the boat sank in irregular jerks to the surface of the
water. He sprang on to the bow tackle and descended with the nimbleness
of a monkey, with wonderful swiftness unhooked the blocks, and the boat
was free. Next he stepped the mast upon which the sail lay furled, then
the rudder; then shoved clear and hoisted the small square of lug, and
in a few minutes he was blowing away gently into the boundless blue
distance, looking all about him with a proud but ghastly smile for a
sight of his missing boy, whilst the girl lay like the dead in the
bottom of the boat.