Captain Swope did not emerge from the cabin that day, nor the next day,
nor the next. But we obtained plain confirmation of the lady's word he
was drinking, when, every morning the Chinese cabin boy brought empty
bottles out on deck and heaved them overboard. Whereat, all the
thirsty souls forward clicked their tongues and swore.
But this interim, during which Yankee Swope stayed below, and moped and
drank, was, you may be sure, no peaceful period for the foc'sle. The
_Golden Bough's_ mates could be trusted to hustle the crowd whether or
not the skipper's eyes were upon them. There was bloody, knock-about
work with belaying pin and knuckles, while the ship settled down into
deep sea form, and the mob of stiffs learned to keep out of its own way
and hand the right rope when yelled at.
Since leaving port, the _Golden Bough_ had been standing a southerly
course, on a port tack. Now, on the third day, the wind hauled around
aft, and came on us from the nor'east, as a freshening gale. We
squared away, and went booming down before it, true clipper style. By
nightfall it was blowing hard, and the kites were doused.
The night came down black as coal tar, with an overcast sky, and
lightning playing through the cloud in frequent, blinding flashes. My
watch had the deck from eight to twelve, and Mister Lynch (and his
satellites, Chips and Sails) kept us hustling fore and aft, sweating
sheets, and taking a heave at this and that.
Few watches in my life stand out so sharply in my memory. And it was
not the near tragedy that concluded it that so impressed my mind; it
was the sailing. For Lynch was cracking on, and there was no
faint-hearted skipper interfering with his game. Indeed, had Swope
been on deck before the hour when he did come up, I do not think he
would have protested. This reckless sailing was what made half the
fame of the _Golden Bough_. It was said that Yankee Swope sailed
around Cape Stiff with padlocks on his topsail sheets! And this night
we showed the gale the full spread of her three t'gan's'ls, and the
ship raced before the wind like a frightened stag.
Oh, I had seen sailing before. I had been in smart ships, had run my
Easting down in southern waters more than once, had made the eastern
passage of the Western Ocean with the winter storm on my back the whole
distance. But this night was my introduction to the clipper style,
where the officers banked fifty per cent on their seamanship, to avert
disaster, and fifty per cent on blind chance that the top hamper would
stand the strain. An incautious system? Aye, but cautious men did not
sail those ships.
It was so dark we had to feel our way about the decks. I could not see
the upper canvas, but I could imagine it standing out like curved sheet
iron. Every moment I expected to hear the explosion of rent canvas, or
the rattle of falling gear on the deck. Not I alone thought so, for
once when Chips and Sails went to windward of me, I heard Sails bawl to
his companion,
"He'll have the spars about our ears before the hour is out!"
"Not he," responded Chips. "Trust Lynch and his luck!"
True enough. The hour passed, and another, and Lynch still carried on
without mishap. Indeed, the wind had moderated a bit.
Throughout the watch I kept close by Newman's side. That warning, to
look behind me in the dark, had by no means escaped my mind. When we
came on deck, Newman said to me, "A good night for a bad job, Jack!
Keep your eyes open!" Small advice on such a night, when a man could
not have seen his own mother, stood she two feet distant!
That warning had puzzled me, and I did not dare question Newman
concerning it. He was not the kind of man one could question. But
what was likely to lurk in the dark? "Death," said he. Did that mean
he feared a stealthy assassination, a knife thrust from the dark? Did
he think that Captain Swope was planning the cold-blooded murder of an
able seaman?
There was the question. In one way, it opposed my reason. Of course,
this was a hell-ship, and murder might very well take place on board.
But that the captain should deliberately plot the removal of a foc'sle
hand! Able seamen were not of such importance in a hell-ship.
Yet Newman was more than a foremast hand. God knew who he was, or what
his business in the ship, but it was plain he was Swope's enemy, and
there was a private feud between them. His mere appearance had caused
the Old Man to run below, and remain hidden for three days! . . .
There was the lady. She was Newman's friend. She knew the Old Man's
moods, and she was positive about it. The warning was doubtless well
founded, I concluded. And Newman was my friend, my chum for the
voyage, I hoped. If there were danger for him in the dark, it were
well his friend stayed handy by. So, throughout that black watch, I
stuck as close as possible to his elbow.
Six bells went when the watch was forward at a job. Suddenly, down the
wind, came a dear, musical hail, from aft.
"Ahoy--Mister!"
"B'Gawd, the Old Man's on deck!" ejaculated Lynch to his assistants.
Then he bellowed aft, "Yes, sir?"
"Reef t'gan's'l's, Mister!" came the command.
"_Eh_!" blankly exclaimed Lynch. "Now, what is he up to?" But he
yelled back his acknowledgment, "Reef t'gan's'ls, sir!"
When the sails were clewed up, Newman and I were ordered aloft on the
mizzen. The stiffs were useless aloft on such a night, and the fore
and main were given the handful of squareheads and the two tradesmen.
When we jumped for the sheer pole we passed within a foot of a figure
lounging across the rail at the poop break, and we knew it was Swope.
There had been no word from him since the initial order.
It was so dark we did not see his face. As we swung up into the mizzen
rigging, Newman shouted words in my ear that I knew the wind carried to
the captain.
"The devil is abroad, Jack, and there is hell to pay!"
And when we had gained the yardarm, he added, "It is coming, Jack; one
hand for yourself and one for the ship!"
But he did not act upon the advice himself. No more did I. Indeed,
one needs both arms and a stout back to pass reef points. We leaned
into the work, put our united brawn into it, and progressed briskly.
All the while I stared beneath me, into the whistling, inky void,
trying to discern that spot on the deck below, where the braces that
held this yard steady were made fast. I felt this lofty spot was no
healthful abiding place for Newman and me. I had a premonition of what
was coming!
Yet, when it did come, I was caught unawares. I felt the wood I leaned
on draw suddenly away from me. There came a jerk that nigh snapped my
neck. My feet left the foot rope, and I was falling, head foremost,
into the blackness. They said I screamed loudly. I was not conscious
I opened my mouth.
It is strange, the trick a thing like that can play with one's senses.
I seemed to be falling for moments, an immeasurable distance.
Actually, the whole thing occurred in about a second's space, and my
feet just about cleared the yardarm when Newman's grip fastened upon my
ankle.
My face was buried in the smothering folds of the threshing sail; then
Newman had drawn me up until my body balanced on the yard. A second
later my feet were again on the foot rope, and my hands fastened for
dear life to the jackstay.
I was conscious of using my voice then. Aye--but I swore! "By heaven,
he let go the port brace!" I yelled to Newman.
For answer, Newman grabbed me around the waist, just as a fork of
lightning zigzagged through the sky. For the briefest instant, the
ship stood out in a bright light. Far below us, on the deck, we saw
Captain Swope standing, looking up at us. Then blackness again. I
felt myself for a second time jerked clear of my foothold--to
immediately wrap my limbs about a wire rope. For Newman had leaped for
a backstay, as the yard swung close, and carried me with him.
For a moment we hung there, one above the other, then we commenced to
slide to the deck. Mister Lynch's voice came booming up to us, and we
saw the light of a lantern bobbing about. A moment later we clattered
off the poop, on to the main deck.
A group was bunched together in the lee of the cabin, Captain Swope,
and Lynch and the tradesmen. Lynch carried the lighted hurricane lamp
that hung handy in a sheltered nook during the night. Forward, a
respectful distance, the stiffs of the watch made a vague blot in the
gloom. As, we came down the poop ladder a voice I recognized as
Boston's called to us from this last group, "He tried to get you, Big
'Un!" So I knew that the lightning flash had revealed to the watch
what it had revealed to us.
"The brace was slipped," said Newman to Lynch.
"I know," replied the second mate, shortly. There was contempt in his
voice, and I knew, when I looked at his grim, disdainful face, that he
had had no hand in the affair. Bucko Lynch might kill a man in what he
considered the line of duty, but snapping men off a yardarm was not his
style. But I also knew that he was an officer of an American ship, and
would consider it his duty to back up his captain no matter what
villainy the latter attempted.
Swope smiled sweetly at us. One might think that a man, even a ship's
autocrat, when detected in an attempt at cold-blooded murder, would
make some specious explanation of his act. Not Swope. No hypocritical
contrition showed in the face the lantern lighted; rather, a cool,
pitiless inhumanity that squeezed my bowels, even while rage surged
within me.
We had understood that Swope was drunk for the past three days, but the
smiling features showed no mark of his dissipation. Neither did he
exhibit any of the fear he had shown at Newman's sudden appearance the
other afternoon. It was plain that Captain Swope had taken heartening
counsel with himself regarding the danger he might incur from Newman's
presence on board. Whatever was the mysterious feud between the two,
Swope had the upper hand. He rested secure in the knowledge of his
power as captain, in his knowledge of Newman's helplessness as a mere
foremast hand.
And so he smiled, and said musingly, and distinctly, to Newman, "A miss
is as good as a mile, eh? But it is a long passage!" The cool
insolence of it! God's truth, it chilled me, this careless confession
of the deed, and threat of what the future held. And then, as though
to remove the last possible doubt in our minds that the slipping of the
brace was an accident, that the whole job of striking sail was but a
pretext to get Newman aloft, Swope turned to the second mate.
"I think she'll stand it, Mister," he said. "You may as well shake out
the t'gan's'l's again!"