THE WRECKING OF THE KINGFISHER
As soon as the _Pacific Queen_ was moored at Auckland, Barnes saw that
Dave got most of the money due to him as wages, urging that he had not
enough clothes to keep him warm. Barnes did not like to lose the lad,
but he had youngsters of his own, and he knew Dave had been submitted
to more unkindness than necessary at the hands of the mate.
“Good-bye, kid,” he said, wiping his greasy hand to shake that of the
boy. “Heaven knows it’ll be a stroke of bad luck for any ship’s cook
that gets you to help him. I’m glad to be rid of you. But remember what
I’ve told you. Don’t jump aboard any old tub. You’re a smart enough
youngster except for your lack of brains and your impidence, and you
know how to take care of yourself a bit better now, but ships isn’t
all as comfortable as the _Pacific Queen_. I expect I’ll be bumping up
against you again somewhere or other. Don’t sign on to any craft where
the crew speak an un-Christian lingo, or they might flay you alive. I
learnt my lesson that way on a Portugee boat, afore you were thought
of.”
Carrying his suitcase, Dave went up the gangway, thrilled at the idea
of putting his feet on foreign soil. He spent some hours walking along
the wharves, where vessels of all nationalities, rigs, and sizes were
lying, each one busily loading or unloading. He did not feel in any
hurry. There was more money in his pocket than he had ever possessed at
any one time, and it was money of which he was proud, for he had earned
it.
Dave felt no compunction about having left the _Pacific Queen_. Mr.
Quick did not want him, and he did not want Mr. Quick. Now both
parties were satisfied. Barnes was the only person who really might
be inconvenienced, and he had said he could easily get some one else
“more useful and less impident.”
After amusing himself by watching the shipping for a while, Dave
decided to keep out of the way until the following evening, by which
time his old ship would have sailed. Boarding a street car, he
travelled at random to another part of the town, where he began to
search for a room. Seeing an elderly man digging in a cottage garden,
he spoke to him over the fence.
“Can you tell me where I could get a room for a few nights?” the boy
asked.
The man straightened his back.
“I don’t jest know,” he said, surveying Dave, who was wearing his only
respectable suit of clothes. “I’ll speak to my missis.”
The “missis,” a portly soul with a jovial face, came out.
“I’ve got an empty room that my son had afore he went up-country,” she
said. “You can have that if you don’t mind roughing it.”
“I’m used to roughing it, being a sailor,” replied Dave, feeling just a
little bit important.
“For the land’s sake!” the woman exclaimed, scanning him more closely.
“I’d never have thought it. You’re only a boy although you are so
tanned.”
Mrs. Higgins made Dave very comfortable, he having fallen into her good
graces at once; and the old people listened with great interest to his
story of the voyage, punctuating it with many questions, for they had
always been a stay-at-home couple. The boy spent several days with
them, being glad of the chance to stretch his legs ashore, and never
tired of seeing the strange sights.
Once Mrs. Higgins managed to extract his Brooklyn address from him
without arousing his suspicion. In the course of time Aunt Martha
received a motherly letter in which she learnt that her Dave was “all
well,” that he had fallen into good hands during his stay in New
Zealand, and that all his shirt buttons were put on and his socks
mended before he went to sea again.
Dave encountered some disappointment in the matter of ships. Naturally,
he hoped to get a vessel bound for either New York or Boston, but as
luck would have it the ships seemed to be clearing for nearly every
part of the world except those he wanted to reach. The only two
steamers bound for New York had full crews, and in his inmost heart the
boy was glad, as neither of them looked equal to the _Pacific Queen_.
His task involved tramping along miles of wharves and docks, and his
reception was not always as pleasant as that accorded to him by Captain
Chisholm. He was always civil, though, and consequently got a direct
answer to his questions, even though it was sometimes given a little
brusquely.
On the fifth day he received a definite offer of a berth on a
large English boat bound to Capetown and London, and it was a sore
temptation, the vessel being one of the most up-to-date freighters,
of between five and six thousand tons. Dave, however, was strongly
opposed to the idea of going so far from home. As it was, he had made
a very long trip, and he had a great desire to double back on his
tracks if possible, so he declined the job. But after several more
days had passed he began to grow anxious for he had spent a good deal
of his money on various articles which experience had taught him were
necessary. With considerable misgiving he went on board a small tramp,
at last, determined to accept any berth that was going, and in a few
minutes found himself engaged on the ancient steamer _Kingfisher_,
bound for Adelaide and Fremantle, Australia, in the capacity of cook’s
help and cabin-boy.
Dave bitterly regretted his choice before he had been at sea twenty-four
hours. The ship was one of the oldest afloat in those waters, and
proportionately dirty. Rats scuttled among the cargo, and even found
their way to the crew’s quarters. Either because the owners were
mean about paint, or because the skipper was indifferent, the old
_Kingfisher_ had a dilapidated appearance, and in anything but the
calmest weather she was known pleasantly by the crew as “the submarine,”
by reason of her trick of digging her nose into the waves instead of
riding on top of them.
But bad as her appearance and sailing qualities were, it was her
machinery which was worst, and Dave found that MacTavish, her Scottish
engineer, never tired of bemoaning his fate in having to drive such
“scrap iron.” The _Kingfisher_ was a much smaller vessel than the one
which had carried Dave to New Zealand, and he found that the various
officers had a proportionately smaller idea of their own dignity.
MacTavish had many chats with the boy, taking a certain amount of
interest in him because his own wife was a New York woman. But most of
his conversation was about that “rattle-box doon below.”
“I only shipped in her for this voyage,” he said, “and if ever we get
back to New Zealand, aboot which I have me doubts, I mean to have a
word with them owners for sendin’ such a bunch of trouble to sea.”
“She seems to be working all right,” Dave suggested mildly.
“_Seems_ to!” the Scot said in scornful accents. “I s’pose you’re
deaf on one side so you canna hear that clackety-clack. It fair gives
me toothache to listen to it. Dinna say I told you, but I have my
suspicions them engines was once used by Noah in the Ark. They’re worn
out, and it passes my wit to know how they hold together. Every bearing
is as loose as old age can make it, there isn’t a steam pipe that
doesn’t leak, and at night when I turn in I expect to find the whole
lot of junk has punched a hole in the bottom of the ship and fallen
through by mornin’.”
Although Dave guessed much of this was exaggerated, it did not tend to
make him feel any happier about his choice of ships.
“She’s got through all right before,” he said. “Let’s hope she will
last out this time.”
“Aye, she may,” observed the melancholy Scot, “and then again she
mightn’t. You know what happens to the pitcher that goes oftenest to
the well. One day this tub is going to attend a funeral, and it’ll be
her own. It gives me a pain in the spine to think what may happen if we
strike rough weather and she starts kicking up her heels. If that old
propeller gets out of the water, with a full head of steam driving it
at racing speed, I’ll be wishing myself back in bonnie Scotland.”
Dave found that a similar state of dissatisfaction reigned everywhere
on board, and the mates accordingly had to employ harsh measures in
dealing with the men. The food, too, was far from satisfactory, and
Dave had to work incessantly, if not for the cook for one of the
mates, if not for one of the mates then for the captain. He was kept
running all day and soon began to wish he had heeded Barnes’s warning
that he might go farther and fare worse. He consoled himself with the
reflection, however, that he was gaining more experience, continually
adding to his stock of learning in nautical matters. Hard work and the
life in the pure salt air were keeping him in the pink of condition.
His muscles were setting, and he already possessed more strength than
the average boy of his age. Being naturally ambitious, he began to
study the rudiments of navigation in his few spare moments, and in this
the second mate gave him some slight assistance, lending him one or
two books to read on the subject. One of his greatest hopes was to be
allowed to take a trick at the wheel, but this, of course, was out of
the question at present.
In spite of MacTavish’s misgivings, the _Kingfisher_ chugged her weary
way more than a thousand miles to the west, passed through Bass Strait
(where Dave got his first glimpse of the coastline of Australia)
and finally brought up with a wheeze and a cough of her engines at
Adelaide. There the ship was tied up for three days, unloading and
loading; and on several occasions the boy found time for a run ashore.
Before sailing from there he wrote again to his father, stating that he
was well and happy, and relating various incidents which he knew would
be of interest. He covered a whole sheet in telling of MacTavish and
his “bunch of trouble” down below, never dreaming what an important
part those old engines were to play in his career.
After casting off at Adelaide, the _Kingfisher_ passed Kangaroo
Island on her port beam, and entered the vast and stormy bay known as
the Great Australian Bight, where great currents meet and where the
elements rarely seem to be at rest. For full six hundred miles the
_Kingfisher_ had to plough her way through a wild sea, and MacTavish’s
life became a nightmare. Even when he went to his bunk he could not
sleep for fear of the man with his hand on the throttle allowing the
propeller to “race” as the vessel kicked her heels up; and as luck
would have it the leaky steam pipes began to bother him more than ever.
Twice they had to lay to in the trough of the sea while all hands in
the engine room struggled to repair some defect. The captain, who had
been in command of the ship for a number of years, apparently took
it as a matter of course. A voyage in the _Kingfisher_ without some
serious engine trouble would have seemed almost unnatural to him.
“My hair’ll be snow white,” the chief engineer complained to Dave
during a breathing spell on deck. “There’s something uncanny aboot yon
machinery. It’s foolin’ us all the time. The thing is possessed. It
waits patiently until we get one part patched up, before breaking out
in a fresh place, but no sooner we’ve got her running than she gets up
to her old games. I’m only waitin’ for one of the cylinder heads to
blow off or the boilers to bust, and then I’ll be able to light my
pipe in peace and watch the rest of her lie doon and die.”
But the boilers held and the cylinders never faltered. Worse trouble
was waiting around the corner for the unhappy Scot. Right in the middle
of the Bight, when the wind was blowing big guns and giant waves
were careering along, the _Kingfisher_ gave a plunge which left her
propeller in mid air for the space of several seconds before there
was time to shut off steam. MacTavish, feeling the vibration, knew
what was happening, and burst into a cold perspiration. If it had
occurred on any other ship, he would not have been so concerned; but
his “rattle-box” was in no condition to stand treatment of that kind. A
few hours later his worst fears were realized. An oiler reported that a
crack had developed in the main shaft, near the propeller.
The ship was promptly stopped, and MacTavish made a careful inspection
of the damage. For once, the captain was deeply concerned. He, too,
went down into the bottom of the ship, to see how bad the trouble was.
“She’s cracked at a flaw in the steel,” MacTavish declared, “and it’s
only a question of how much strain is put on her before she rips right
off as clean as a carrot. You’ll have to run at half speed, anyway,
Cap’n. If you make Fremantle, you’ll be lucky.”
For days after that the _Kingfisher_ crawled westwards, with the
engineers nursing her “scrap iron” jealously. She managed to scrape out
of the Bight and was already within a few hundred miles of Fremantle
when a southerly gale struck her in all its fury.
Suddenly, while the ship was pitching, she shuddered convulsively.
There was a grating noise in the engine-room, and then silence.
The propeller-shaft had parted, and they were at the mercy of the sea.
The only thing that was of the slightest assistance was a fore-and-aft
sail which had been rigged, but the canvas was rotten, and it split
from top to bottom in a violent gust.
For the first time in his life Dave was facing real danger.
Helpless as a log, the _Kingfisher_ ran before the storm hour after
hour. The crew could now do nothing but wait for a possible shifting of
the wind. It kept steadily in one quarter, however, and, when darkness
fell, the hopes of every one on board fell to zero. Rockets were sent
up, but there was no answering signal. All through the night Dave, with
the rest of the crew, stood on deck, anxiously looking for something in
the nature of a miracle to happen.
Dawn broke after an apparent eternity, only to accentuate the misery
of their position. Everywhere the sea was a mass of foam and seething,
white-crested waves. Soon the loom of low-lying land ahead became
apparent, and toward this they were carried remorselessly. At the
end of their cables dangled the two anchors, which, now that the
_Kingfisher_ was in shallower water, dragged and retarded her progress
somewhat, but did not hold.
“Stand by the boats,” the captain bellowed at last through a megaphone.
There were breakers about three cable lengths ahead.
Every man was already wearing a life-belt. The chance of getting
ashore, even in the boats, seemed a forlorn one, with such a sea raging.
All waited tensely for the moment when the vessel should strike the
ground. Just outside the grasp of the hungry breakers she hit the
bottom with a mighty thud which jarred her from stem to stern. The next
wave lifted her. Then she struck for the last time, and the days of the
old _Kingfisher_ were over.
Waves were breaking right over her when the men were struggling to
lower the boats. One boat, containing as many of the crew as could
scramble into her, capsized instantly, and Dave shuddered as he heard
the cries of the doomed men. He was standing at the side of the ship,
waiting with others for a favorable instant to jump into a boat that
danced crazily alongside. For a second the small craft was lifted
almost up to the rail, and he made a leap, landing, more by good
fortune than anything else, in the middle of the boat just as the men
in her began to pull away.
The next ten minutes were thrilling. Dave could not think of them for
months afterward without a vivid picture of it all flashing into his
brain.
There were more than a dozen sailors huddled together in the dancing
craft. Dave never knew the exact number. Far too heavily laden, she
stood no chance of reaching shore. Straight at the breakers she went.
It was neck or nothing. At the worst, the men in her could only die,
but they could die fighting for their lives.
The first wave toyed with the craft, lifting it like a cork before
passing on. Twenty feet behind it towered a silent, green wall of
water, the crest of which was just beginning to topple over with a
hissing, ominous sound. Relentlessly it rushed on, and Dave’s heart
sank, for he believed that his last moment had come.
The boat shot upward and spun round dizzily, half full of water. The
boy clutched one of the seats with nerveless fingers. Every second
he expected to feel the wave closing over him. Rowing was out of the
question. They were at the mercy of the sea. The boat met the next wave
broadside on. It came like some devouring monster, eager for its prey.
One of the crew, his nerves strung to breaking point, uttered a hoarse
cry as the mass of water struck them. The boat turned completely over,
and its occupants sank in a smother of foam, many of them to their doom.
Aided by the life-belt he was wearing, the boy struck out, gasping.
At one instant he came to the surface and took a choking breath. The
next moment another swirling breaker had caught and overwhelmed him
again. His mouth, ears, and nose were full of water. He was rolling
over and over and the last of his strength was fast ebbing away. When
his head emerged from the foam the thunder of the surf sounded fainter,
as though it were drifting away into the distance. Vaguely he wondered
what his dad and Aunt Martha were doing, far away at home; but his
thoughts were disconnected. He felt an inclination to sleep, although
he was being smothered all the time. If only he could get one more
breath!
For a flash he returned fully to consciousness, when a sharp pain shot
through his knee as it struck a rock. Then came forgetfulness.