"Where did yo' learn pilotin'?" asked a Conch, grinning and spitting
as close to the pilot's toes as he could without hitting them.
"I'm learning it now," said Macreary, cheerfully, sitting down and
gazing over the sea to where the tiny speck of the bark's topmast
showed above the horizon. He was not going to show how absurd and
mean he felt to that crowd, so he sat and gazed apparently calm and
unruffled, without a sign of the burning shame which seemed to stifle
him.
He was now silent and thinking. There was a short cut along a narrow
and tortuous channel which would let the vessel out to sea close to the
point of the dry coral bank, or end of Cay. He thought he might know
it, although he had only been through twice before. The wreck lay only
a few miles beyond, and even now the white glint of the rival wrecker's
sails showed plainly that he would board the prize first and claim the
salvage. But the memory of the big black mate's hand was too strong
upon him, and he kept silent. The _Sea-Horse_ was working up behind the
reef and it was noticeable how smooth and sheltered the sea was in its
lee. It would make a fine harbour for a vessel caught working upon the
wreck in a heavy easterly, if she could navigate the channel. But the
master of the _Sea-Horse_ knew nothing of the channel, and he would
have sooner thrown the pilot overboard than trusted him again. He stood
out behind the Cay and made a good offing, reaching well off into the
open ocean in spite of the fact that he would have ten miles further to
go.
But Macreary sat silent and watched the horizon where the black speck
rose. He was not thinking about the wreck. To him it was nothing
whether a Conch or two should make a little money from the disaster
of a sailor. His thoughts were back with the strange men he had left
upon the Cay of the Great Bahama, the little band led by the tall and
muscular Jones, leader of the Sanctified people who sought refuge from
the strife of the world upon the sun-beaten reefs of the Bahama Bank.
Jones had taught him to read. Jones had read to him from the Book of
all Books, the relic of an ancient literature, revised, rewritten and
put together in somewhat disconnected pieces, the Bible of the most
enlightened people upon the face of the world. And in it he had heard
the words of wisdom as set down by men who had gone before, men who
had lived their lives and who had learned from experience. And the
philosophy of these men he believed was true, for they had lived their
lives out and had left behind them the results of years of life. It
was not the one tale of a single man, which must necessarily be narrow
and worthless, but it was the gatherings of the teachings of many who
had been in positions to learn. Yes, what Jones had read him was the
philosophy of ages. And Jones had read to him, "Hide not thy light
under a bushel," and he had told him that it meant to use what talents
he possessed, to try to do what he thought he was able to--and not hang
back. He felt abashed and ashamed beyond expression at his failure,
for he had believed he was a fit pilot over the Bank. He founded his
belief upon the fact that he had gone fishing many times in a small
skiff in the vicinity of the island and had twice gone southward along
the edge of the Bank; he had noticed many times how the water shoaled
from the deep ocean to the white water of the coral reef. It was hard
to account for his failure, he thought, with men aboard who must have
seen the bottom as plainly as he, himself, could--and then the big
black man's mortifying stroke----
The vessels stood toward the wreck under the impetus of the easterly
breeze, the _Buccaneer_, a point free, raced up and let go her anchor
close under the bark's lee in just enough water to float. Then her
skipper putting forth in a small boat boarded the _Ramidor_ just as
the _Sea-Horse_ came through the breakers on the edge of the Bank. She
cleared the bottom by a few inches, although the wash of the sea swept
her decks and drenched the men standing by to take in the mainsail
and let go the hook. Sanders ran her well in behind the wreck and
rounded to, scraping up the sand with the keel, and anchored behind the
_Buccaneer_. It was close work and a heavy sea would drop both vessels
heavily upon the reef. They must make good use of the smooth water, and
Sanders hailed his lucky rival to get what he could.
"See ye got a wrack there," said he, calling to the long Yankee
skipper, who smiled at him from the bark's quarter-deck.
"Talk like ye never see it afore. Wonder ye didn't notice it bein' as
ye were headin' this way. Strange how these Dagoes pile up thar ships,"
answered the skipper of the _Buccaneer_.
"Don't suppose ye want to whack up, hey? An' have us turn to an' help
with the cargo?"
The long skipper squirted a stream of tobacco juice over the side in
derision.
"I reckon ye think we're out here fer our health, hey?" he roared.
"What d'ye think we're doin' around here anyways? I want to let ye know
right sudden that this wrack is mine--ye keep off. Ye know what will
happen if there's any monkey business. I won't stand any foolishness."
"'Twouldn't do fo' toe nab him, hey?" asked the black mate of the
_Sea-Horse_, turning to his captain. "We kin take him, sho', an' make a
divide with it. We got here about the same time he did."
"I'm afeard we better not," said Sanders. "Too many witnesses--they'll
swear they got here first--I've a notion to pitch that pilot overboard."
The beaten sloop lay all that day off the wreck, her crew fuming and
her captain and mate trying to devise some means to get a hold upon the
bark. At dark Sanders rowed over to the _Buccaneer_ and tried every
means from bluff to bribery to get in a claim, but the _Buccaneer's_
crew held out solidly. Finally they compromised matters by signing on
as labourers at a dollar and a half per day to help the _Buccaneer's_
crew to work the wreck. It was the best they could do for the present
and they went sullenly to work with the hope something would turn up to
favour them.
Two days passed and the bright summer weather held. The sea was smooth
as glass and the wreckers lay in safety. Far away to the northward the
glint of the dry coral bank showed at low water. Nothing else broke the
eternal blue line of the horizon.
Macreary was not turned to with the rest but kept aboard the
_Sea-Horse_ as ship-keeper. He helped cook the meals and was kept
busy with cleaning. As he was alone a good deal, he spent much time
in gazing over the sea, figuring on the channel which led five or six
miles to the northward to the deep water behind the dry bank. If they
had only let him try it, he might have worked them through in time.
It was crooked, worse than a letter S to sail through, but the bark
was worth several thousand dollars to the salvors--and he had lost. He
would have been well paid if they had made her in time.
The crew of the _Sea-Horse_ took some pains to tell the wreckers how it
was the fault of their pilot that they lost. The Conchs laughed at him
in derision whenever they boarded the sloop at meal times, and he was
so much set upon by both crews that he begged Sanders to put him aboard
the first vessel sighted. The third day two more wrecking vessels came
upon the scene, but as the bark was now pretty well stripped, the
salvors would have none of them. One of the strangers stood away, but
the other came to anchor, leaving her mainsail up ready to go at a
moment's notice.
"Hey, don't ye want a pilot?" asked the long skipper of the
_Buccaneer_, calling to the stranger. His hail was the cause of much
amusement to the two working crews. They stopped and looked over at the
little vessel, whose three men sat in a row upon her rail watching the
wreck.
"We've the best pilot on the bank," said Sanders, trying to hide his
sarcasm by a frown. "We thought maybe as ye ware goin' on ye might want
him."
"I reckon I'll take him," said one of the three. "I ain't goin' no
farther'n th' Bahama, an' ef he don't mind he can take us across the
Bank."
"Git him," said Sanders, "there he is," and he pointed to the
_Sea-Horse_ where Macreary sat fishing. Then all hands had a good laugh
and went on with their work, hiding their amusement from the strangers.
It would be a good joke. They would have the pleasure of seeing the
vessel piled up before she drew out of sight.
The three men on the new arrival were in no hurry. They fished a little
while and finally one of them rowed across the twenty fathoms of
intervening water to Macreary, who had heard the conversation and was
ready. As he dropped into the small boat he looked to the southward and
noticed a heavy bank of cloud rising. He said nothing until aboard the
sloop and then asked to look at the glass. It was falling rapidly.
"There'll be a bit o' dirty weather comin'," he said, as he came on
deck and joined the fishermen.
"Is there air harbour round erbouts?" asked Captain James, baiting his
hook. He was in no hurry to get under way.
"There's good water behind that cay up yander," said Macreary.
"How fer?"
"'Bout five mile."
"All right, we'll start just afore dark--kin make it in thirty or fo'ty
minutes with a breeze, hey?"
"I reckon," said Macreary, looking anxiously at the weather to the
southward. Then they hauled up fish for a couple of hours until the
sunshine turned a brassy colour and finally died away as the cloud bank
covered the western sky.
The men aboard the bark began to get nervous. Sanders went aboard
the _Sea-Horse_ with his mate and they hoisted the mainsail close
reefed, making ready to get to sea in case of trouble. The skipper of
the _Buccaneer_ finally knocked off also, and soon the clanking of
windlasses broke the silence of the tropical evening. They were getting
ready to get away at the first shift to the eastward, for the sea would
break heavily where they lay in a strong wind. There was much to carry
away, but they would take no chances. The most valuable part of the
wreck's belongings were already on deck waiting to be transferred to
the _Buccaneer_, and she would lie by with a man aboard the bark to
watch and take charge.
"I wouldn't be surprised if it blowed," said Captain James of the
little sloop _Seabird_. "I reckon we'll stop fishin' an' pull out afore
it's too hot. I wouldn't keer to be the man left in thet bark, hey?"
"If they abandon her, it's fair play all over agin to the first man
what gets aboard," said one of his men. "I don't believe the wessel is
badly hurt, anyways."
The heavy bank of cloud rose rapidly. A flash of lightning lit the
gloom of the evening and the edge of the pall swept past overhead. It
was travelling rapidly. To the southward the growing darkness seemed
to melt into the blackness above like a smooth black wall of mist. A
murmur of unrest came over the sea, a weird far-reaching cry vibrating
through the quiet atmosphere, rising and falling like the distant
voices of a vast host.
Sanders, who had signed on his men as helpers, could gain nothing by
staying. He had signed away his future rights, therefore he lost no
time in getting up his anchor and standing out to sea with his canvas
shortened for trouble and everything being made snug.
The _Buccaneer_ crew were struggling with as much gear as they could
carry to get it aboard their ship before the sea began to make if it
blew. All hands were overside hurrying the work, and even the two men
who were to remain aboard to take charge were helping and had left
the bark's deck when a line of white showed to the southward upon the
black sea. There was a puff of wind, cool and whirling as though it
had dropped from some great height in the realms of snow. The surface
of the heaving swell ruffled, a blinding flash of fire followed by a
crash; then a few moments of silence broken gradually by a deep-toned
roar growing louder and louder. The line of white bore down upon the
vessels, and as it came the darkness grew blacker. There was a fierce
rush of wind, and with a burst as though fired from a gun, the blast of
the squall struck the vessels and bore them prone with its sweep.
The _Buccaneer's_ mainsail tore to bits as she lay upon her beam ends,
her anchor parted, and in a moment she was going out to sea, every
man aboard of her struggling with the flying strips of canvas. The
wind had come from the southward and with just enough slant to allow
her to clear the shoal water and make the open ocean. Macreary, with
nothing to do but watch the coming squall, let go the halliards of the
_Seabird's_ sail, and her crew had managed to get a line around it
before the weight of the wind struck. The captain reached the wheel and
managed to pay her off somehow, dragging the anchor which had been hove
short as though it were a bit of iron hanging to the line. Then handing
the spokes to his pilot, he pointed to the northward, where the dry
bank of the cay had just disappeared in the storm.
"Git in--behind--harbour," he bawled, and as the words came brokenly
above the roar, Macreary knew he meant to run the crooked channel for
harbour behind the reef.
The two men hove up the anchor while the _Seabird_ tore along ten
knots with nothing save her mast to pull with the wind. Macreary swung
her first this way and then that, blindly, stupidly, and unreasoning,
but with rising hopes as the wind beat down the sea into an almost
level plain of water white as milk. He held her north by west, making
as much westing as he could, blindly hoping to make enough inside the
reef to clear the end of the bank and gain the shelter beyond. All was
blackness ahead and there was no way of telling when he reached the
dry bank; no way of telling when he should round her to and drop both
anchors with every fathom bent on to hold them, but he kept on.
"Hide not thy light under a bushel," came the words of the tall
preacher! They seemed to flit before his half-blinded vision. He who
must make a living at something would do it at what he thought he could
do best. He must surely know more about those waters than the Conchs
who lived to the southward, for he had fished upon them for two years.
His ideas about piloting were vague and absurd, but he did not know it.
It seemed to him that all he must do was to show the way the best he
could, and it was not in keeping with the teachings to hold back. It
would be more immodest to feign ignorance of the banks than to admit a
knowledge of them. He had known people who were so backward that they
always waited to be sought out by others and pressed to do things,
which by all nature they should have offered to do at once. To him
these people were truly immodest and their very quietness seemed to
savour of a tremendous egotism. They seemed so satisfied and complacent
in their knowledge, so superior that unless they were flattered by
being sought out and offered a handsome reward, they would rather carry
their wisdom to the grave than offer it. It was "hiding a light under a
bushel," in the sense the tall man of the Sanctified Band of pilgrims
taught it.
The wind drove the little vessel wildly before it. The sea began to
make astern, and as he turned his face to look backward a spurt of
spray and foam half-choked him. The roar of the gale grew louder. The
captain's voice came brokenly to him through the gloom, and he saw him
standing close to the companion hatch gazing ahead and holding on with
both hands, his face thrust forward and his sou'wester pushed back as
though to aid him to see some mark to steer by to safety.
Five, ten, fifteen minutes flew by. If they missed the shelter of the
reef and the deep water behind it, they would certainly pile up on the
shoals beyond, where the sea would fall with tremendous violence in
less than an hour. Already the lift astern was growing quicker and the
white plain of water was rolling up into a dangerous sea. He swung the
little vessel hard to port, thinking to find better water, and as he
did so she took the ground heavily, throwing her captain with force
against the coamings.
"Keep her off--breakers--windward," came the cry as from a great
distance.
He rolled the wheel up mechanically and she was tearing away again into
the darkness, going clear as though she had touched soft mud instead of
hard coral rock.
A burst of wind tore over them with a droning roar. The little vessel
lay down to the pressure. Then gathering herself upon a sea she rushed
ahead.
The blackness grew thicker. Macreary could hardly see the loom of the
mast forward. Then a flickering flare of lightning lit the storm and
right ahead showed a strip of dry yellow sand. It was a mile off yet,
but they were going fast. Macreary hove the wheel to port and kept it
there until the little ship buried her starboard deck-strake in the
foam.
"Will--make--" came the voice of the captain.
Macreary did not know whether she would or not, but he would try to,
and setting his teeth hard he gave up all thought of answer. The
minutes flew by. He knew they were going fast. They would go a mile in
five minutes even with the lessened headway of the reaching vessel. How
could he guess the time in that awful turmoil of roaring wind and sea?
He waited and waited. She must be nearly there. The strain was getting
awful. Would he go past? He must be up with the point now--but no, he
would hold her a minute longer. It must be made or lost in one throw
of that wheel, and to lose it meant death to all hands. The blackness
ahead was solid. No eye could penetrate it ten feet. Oh, for another
flash of lightning!
"Will she--" came the voice of the captain, questioning, querulous,
borne back the few intervening feet through the flying atmosphere. He
did not know and it angered him to have such a question asked.
How could he tell?
He was panting with exertion and smothered with drift and spray.
Suddenly he hove the wheel to starboard. The little vessel leaped
forward, straightened out before the gale, then rounded with her head
to the eastward. It was done anyhow. If they were clear, all right. If
they had missed, they would strike within five minutes.
"Get--anchors--all cable," came the voice of the captain.
Macreary could see nothing forward, but he knew the men were doing what
they could to obey. Minutes passed, the vessel rose and fell, but she
had not struck yet. He held the wheel, and closed his eyes. The sea
seemed smoother. Ahead it was evidently smoother still. The great lift
of the outside sea was growing less and less. Five minutes more and
the _Seabird_ was in another foam-covered plain of water which had no
rolling sea.
"Go," came a cry. It was echoed by a faint shriek somewhere. A shaking
of the vessel followed as the chain ran out. Suddenly she brought up
and swung right into the eye of the storm, the rush of wind striking
Macreary in the face and forcing his sou'wester back upon his head.
There was a quick but light rise and fall as the _Seabird_ headed the
sea, and Macreary lashed the wheel fast in the beckets.
A form brushed against him and the captain yelled in his face: "She's
holdin'--both anchors with forty fathoms--can't get loose unless it
blows the water off the earth," and then he pushed the hatch-slide and
went below.
In a few minutes all hands were in the little cabin and a light was
struck. It showed four men with streaming oilskins and soaking faces,
whose expressions still bore marks of extreme anxiety. Three of them
looked at each other and then cast glances at Macreary.
"That was a pretty good job, pilot," said Captain James. "We had a
close call there once--suppose you got mixed with the steering gear,
hey?"
Macreary said nothing. He was like a man who had suddenly awakened from
a horrible nightmare.
"Well, you won't lose nothin' by this trip," went on the captain; "them
fellows will be blown off fifty miles before morning--and there ain't a
soul aboard the bark--she's ourn, and that's a fact."
V
At the End of the Reef
The light-keeper at Fowey Rocks had been given a new assistant, and
the new man was Bahama Bill, the giant wrecker and mate of a sponging
sloop. He was a negro Conch, so-called on account of the diet upon
which many of the native Bankers were supposed to live, the Conch
proving an easy and nourishing meal for the lazy and incompetent
reefer. But the name soon applied to all alike, and the Conch, instead
of becoming a word of opprobrium, stood for all men who made the Reef
or Great Bahama Bank their home.
William Haskins, otherwise known as Bahama Bill, was a Fortune
Islander, and his acceptance of the keeper's position was but
temporary, taking the place of the assistant who was absent on his
quarterly leave. The head keeper, an old man, seldom left the light.
It was summer-time and the air was warm with the tropical heat of
the coast. The distance from the land kept the lighthouse cooler
than ordinary, but the hot Stream flowing past at a temperature
of eighty-three degrees gave no cooling effect. The days of the
assistant's absence dragged slowly along, the old keeper tending the
light with his usual care. Then came a season of frightful humidity and
glaring sunshine, lasting many days, the mercury standing always at
ninety-five or more.
Bahama Bill spent the warm weather loafing about the town of Miami,
and as he was in no hurry to go back to the light, he took pains to
spend what money he possessed in whatever finery he thought befitted
his magnificent personal appearance best. Standing several inches over
six feet and being enormously solid and broad in proportion, he was an
object of admiration to the many black men who loafed along the Florida
shore. With the Seminoles he had nothing whatever to do, for these
Indians showed their distaste for negroes so plainly that it was with
difficulty trouble was avoided whenever the men of the Glades came to
town to trade their deerskins for ammunition. Bahama Bill stuck to his
class until it was past the time for him to return to the light, and
then started off, rigged out clean and shipshape in a small boat.
The old keeper of the Fowey Rocks lighthouse came out upon the gallery
to take the morning air. The sun was shining and the warm wind from the
Gulf Stream blew lazily through the doorway into the lantern-room. The
blue sea sparkled in the sunshine, and the long, easy roll of the swell
told of calm weather offshore. It was a perfect day, a day of peace and
quiet, upon the end of the great Florida Reef, which stretched away
for miles to the southward. Eastward nothing rose above the blue rim
which compassed all. To the northward the low line of hummocks showed
where Virginia Key and Key Biscayne rose above the water some ten miles
distant. To the westward the little lump of Soldier Key showed where
there might be a solitary human within a dozen miles. And all about
the blue sea sparkled in the bright light, taking on the varicoloured
hues found above the coral banks. Near the lighthouse, in three feet of
water, the coral showed distinctly even from the height of the tower.
Old man Enau gazed down at it, watching the bright green tinge melt
to deeper colour until, in three fathoms, the pure limpid blue of the
great stream flowed past uncoloured and undefiled. Fish were swimming
around the iron piles of the lighthouse; great big bonito, sinuous
barracuda, and now and then a shark would drift up to the iron pillars
and bask a moment in the shade of the tall structure which rose above
the coral bank to the height of a hundred feet and more, standing like
a huge long-legged spider upon its iron feet in the shallow water.
The quiet of the morning was oppressive to the keeper. Not a sound rose
from the reef save the low roll of the sea as it broke upon the edge of
the bank, not the cry of a single sea-bird to break the great stillness
and beautiful quiet of the day. The old man had been in the light for
three years. To him the world was that eternal sea bounded by the blue
rim and spotted in one or two places by the distant Keys. Whatever he
had seen of human life he left behind him when he took the position
as keeper. He had tried to forget. And now, as the years passed, his
memories were fading. The human struggle was over. The thought of what
he had seen and done was dimmed in the glare of the tropic sunshine,
and the shadow of his past had faded to nothing.
He had a fine old face. Rugged and burned from the weather on the
reef, his features still bore traces of culture. His nose was straight
and small, and his eyes were bright and blue, the deep blue of the
surrounding sea, which had kept him apart from his fellow men so long.