The after-rail of the chart-room deck looked almost directly down the
hatch whereon the fight was to take place. As Noyes was taking his
position by the rail he guessed that the bosun must have just said
something which pleased the crew, for most of them were still laughing
heartily.
Kieran, on a camp-stool, waited for the laughter to simmer down. He
fixed a mocking eye on the bosun. "And so you're a whale, eh? And you'll
learn me what a whale can do to little fishes? Well, let me tell you
something about a whale, son. A whale is a sure enough big creature, but
I never heard he was a fighting fish before. Now, if you knew more
about some things, you'd never called yourself a whale, but a thrasher.
There's the best fighting fish of them all--the thrasher. The thrasher's
the boy with the wallop. He's the boy that chases the whale, and leaps
high out of the water, and snaps his long, limber tail, and bam! down he
comes on that big slob of a whale and breaks his back. All the wise old
whales, they take to deep water when they see a thrasher hunting
trouble. It's the foolish young whales that don't know enough to let the
thrasher alone."
Noyes noted that the crew laughed more loudly at the bosun's rough jeers
than at the more sharply pointed comment of the pump-man. But looking
them over, he began to understand; these men were nearer to the bosun's
type than the pump-man's. And also, no crew could long remain ignorant
of which it was the captain favored. If the pump-man won, they would
benefit by it, whether they were with him or no--some selfish instinct
in them taught them that; while if the bosun were to win (and who could
doubt that, looking at the two men?), why, 'twould be just as well to
fly their colors early.
Yet there were those who favored the game-looking pump-man. Two or three
had the courage to say so. It was these who cried out to give him fair
play when some ten or a dozen were for rushing him off the hatch before
the fight had begun at all.
Kieran thanked these with a grateful look. "That's all I want--fair
play. Keep off the hatch and give us room to move around in."
And yet it did seem for a moment as if the pump-man was to get no fair
play, as if the bosun's adherents would overwhelm him as he stood there
on the hatch. And Noyes experienced an unpleasant chill and began to
appreciate the nerve of this man who defied a crowd of alien spirits
aboard a strange ship. It was more than physical courage, and when they
were making ugly demonstrations toward the pump-man it was in pure
admiration of his nerve that Noyes called out: "Hold up--fair play! Fair
play, I say--he's only one."
Coming from the passenger, it was the psychological act at the
psychological moment. They drew back, and Kieran, looking up, put his
thanks in his look.
The two men faced each other. Kieran eyed the other critically. Up and
down, from toe to crown, he estimated his bulk; and then, taking a step
to one side, he eyed him once more, as if to get the exact depth of him.
"Well," said the bosun, and harking to his rising voice, his growling
adherents simmered to silence, "now yer've seen me, what d'yer think?"
"I've seen 'em just as big, hulks of full your length and beam and
draught, and in a breeze I've seen vessels of less tonnage make 'em
shorten sail."
"And so yer've been in the wind-jammin' line, huh?"
"That and a few others," answered Kieran tranquilly.
"Yer'll understand a talk then. An' here's a craft won't take any sail
in before you. And yer quite a hulk in the water yourself, now yer've
come out where we c'n get a peek at yer."
"You ought to see me when I'm hauled out on the ways," retorted Kieran.
"A fair little hulk out of water I may be, but it's below the
water-line, like every good ship, I get my real bearings. But shall we
get to business? I've been hearing about you for years. And for what
you're going to do to me since I've come aboard--" Kieran threw up his
hands. "Oh, Lord, they tell me you drove your naked fist through the
wall of a saloon up on West Street before the ship put out."
"Yes, an' I can drive it through the side of you to-day."
"Man! and I'm not wall-sided either. You must be a hellion. But"--to
Kieran's ears had come the sound of muttering in the crowd--"shall we
get at it? We ought to make a good match of it. You may be a bit the
bigger, but no matter. Three or four inches in height and sixty or
seventy pounds, what's that? What d'you say?"--he turned to the
crew--"he's big enough to pull a mast down on deck. Are the two of us to
settle it here without interference? In the old days men fought so, the
champions in front of the armies, and the winning man allowed to ride
back unharmed to his comrades."
That picture, as the wily and eloquent pump-man painted it, impressed
them. And he looked so frail beside the bosun! They drew well back now;
all but one, the crafty carpenter, crony of the bosun and eager tool of
the captain. There was that in the pump-man's eyes--the carpenter
stepped to the big man's shoulder. "Listen to me. This man's no
innercent. I've seen his picter somewheres."
"An' he'll see something of me in a minute, an' more than a picksher. Go
away!" The boson shoved the carpenter aside.
"What I like about you, bosun"--Kieran, having shed his dungaree coat,
stood now for a moment with a hand resting easily to either side of his
waist--"and it sticks out all over you, is your love of a fight.
And"--under his breath this, so only the bosun could hear it--"I'm going
to satisfy that love of yours to-day so you'll stop your ears up if ever
again you hear a man even whisper fight. Yes"--drawing off his
undershirt, cinching his trousers straps above his hips, and resuming
his easy speech--"I do love a real fighting man. But your friends"--he
waved his hand toward the crew--"they must all stand that side. I want
no man between me and the rail this side, no man behind me. 'Tisn't
fair." He turned to them. "Play me fair in that. I'm giving your man the
slope of the hatch, and he's tall enough in all conscience without. So
let no man stand behind me."
The arms and torso of the pump-man, as he stood there naked to the
waist, amazed Noyes. It surprised them all. He had seemed only a
medium-sized man under the concealing dungarees. Noyes saw now that he
was a bigger man by fifteen or twenty pounds than he had had any idea
of; and were he padded with twenty pounds more, he would still be in
good condition. Not a lump anywhere; not a trace of a bulging muscle,
except that when he flexed his arm or worked his shoulders by way of
loosening them up he started little ripples that ran like mice from neck
to loins under the skin; and when, with this shoulder movement, he
combined a rapid leg motion, Noyes fancied he could trace the play of
muscle clear to his heels. His skin, too, had the unspotted gleaming
whiteness of high vitality.
"He's a reg'lar race horse--a tiger," burst out from one admirer in the
crowd.
The bosun, also stripped of his upper garments, looked all of his great
size, and, moving about, showed himself not altogether lacking in
agility. Lively, indeed, he was for his immense bulk, although, compared
to the pump-man in that, he was like a moose beside a panther. "It ain't
goin' to be so one-sided after all," whispered some one loudly, and
recalled the pump-man's leaping across the hatch that very morning. And
now, as he ducked and turned, seeming never to lack breath for easy
speech, there were others who were beginning to believe it would not be
so one-sided either.
"Speaking of wind-jammers, I remember"--the bosun had rushed past him
like a charging elephant--"hearing my old grandfather tell of seeing a
three-decker manoeuvring once. She'd come into stays about the middle of
the morning watch, he said, and maybe toward three bells in the second
dogwatch they'd have her on the other tack. A ship of the old line she
was, a terrible fighter, if only fighting was done from moorings; but
there were little devils of frigates kept sailing 'round and 'round her.
What? Why don't I stand up? Stand up, is it? Why, man, I don't see where
I've been hove-down yet. Hove-down, no, nor wet my rail yet. And is it
you or I is fighting this end of it? Is it?"--a subtle threat with his
left, one cunning feint of his right, one whip-like inboring of the left
hand, and up came the bosun all-standing.
"You're easy luffed," jeered Kieran. "A moment ago you were drawing like
a square-rigger before a quartering gale, and now you're shaking in the
wind--yes, and likely to be aback, if you don't watch out."
The teeth locked in the bosun's head--so hard a jolt for so smoothly
delivered a blow! He gazed amazed. Again a deceptive swing or two, a
fiddling with one hand and the other, a moment of rapid foot-work, a
quick side-step, and biff! Kieran's left went into the ribs--crack! and
Kieran's right caught him on the cheek-bone and laid it open as if hit
with a cleaver.
"Devil take it!" exploded Kieran, "I meant that for your jaw. It's this
slippery tarpaulin." He slid his foot back and forth on the black-tarred
canvas. "The cook's been dropping some of his slush on it, and you,
bosun, didn't see to it that it was cleaned. You ought to look after
those little things or the skipper'll be having you up to the bridge.
But, come now, just once more"--he curved his left forearm
persuasively--"once more and--"
But having caught the flame in the eye that never once looked away from
his, the bosun wanted no more of that long-range work. It must be close
quarters thereafter, or he foresaw disgrace. He appealed to the men at
his back. "He won't stand up like a man. He leaps around like a bloody
monkey."
"That's right, bosun. Stand up to him there, you!" That was the
carpenter's voice. And others followed. 'Twasn't so men'd been used to
fightin' on oil-tankers. No, sir. "Stand to him breast to breast!" The
carpenter led further clamorous voices.
"Aye, breast to breast be it." Kieran was standing at ease. "And yet you
all been telling how he drove his fist through a pine plank the other
day up on the New York water-front."
"Yes, an' I c'n drive it through you, if yer come close to me."
"Close to you? Is this close enough to you?" No more side-stepping, no
more swift shifting--just a straight step in, and they were clinched.
With arms wrapped around the body of the other, each an inside and
outside hold, and fingers locked in the small of the other's back, they
were at it. One tentative tug and haul and the bosun began to see that
he would need all his strength for this man. Another long-drawn tug and
he began to fear the outcome. Again, and in place of his foe coming to
him, it was his own waist he felt drawn forward. Slowly he felt his head
falling back, and gradually his shoulders followed. In toward Kieran
came the hollow of the big man's back, and the big man knew he had met
his master; and, bitterest of all, this man poured galling words into
his ear as he bore him back; gibing words, in so low a voice that they
reached no further than the ear for which they were intended.
"Your own favorite Cumberland grip--where's the whale strength of you
now, Bruiser Bill--your buffalo rush, hah? It's my weakness to make a
show of you here on this deck--you, my Bruising Bill, the boastful lump
of muscle that you are. Just muscle, no more. And now where are
you--where, I say?"
The long, smooth muscles of Kieran's back were gathering and swelling.
His waist, contrasted with the splendid development under his shoulders,
looked slim as a corseted girl's; and not Noyes alone was noting them.
Every muscle in the smooth-skinned body--it seemed as if he drew them
from his very toes for service in that hug.
The bosun's breath was coming in labored gasps, yet still that terrible
man kept holding him close, drawing his waist to him and increasing his
pressure as he drew. "You've the tonnage and engine-room of a
battleship," jeered Kieran, "but you've only the steam of an East River
tug. And a low-pressure tug at that. And what little steam you had is
gone. You've a big engine but no boiler. And you know what use an engine
is without a boiler, don't you? Well, that's you, son--your steam's
gone."
The swimming head kept falling backward toward the ground. And for
Kieran, as he felt his enemy weaken, the purple lights were flashing
again. The call of battle was ringing in his ears; came back to him the
memory of more careless days, when he lived for this kind of thing.
After all, what was life but a means whereby to give one's spirit play?
And yet again--and yet--was he no more than a brute himself? What was
the use? What good would it all do? And suddenly he loosed his grip, and
the inert body of the bosun rolled down the tarpaulined hatch and onto
the steel deck.
Noyes found himself gasping, almost as if he were in the fight himself.
Then he noted that Kieran had raised his hand and was addressing the
crew. "Holdup! You said the fight would settle it. Mind your words
now--fair play for one against you all. Fair play, I say," and they
might have scattered before this blazing, fighting pump-man in the full
lust of his power but for the carpenter, who poised a hammer to throw.
"What! you would!" yelled Kieran. A leap, a pass, and his fist smashed
into the lowering face. Over keeled the carpenter, a tall man, like a
falling spar.
"Put that man in irons!" Noyes jumped at the voice. The captain was
leaning over the rail beside him.