A NORTHER ON THE GULF.
When the port officers returned to shore they left behind four of the
custom-house men, who were to stay on board the _North Cape_ as
long as she lay there; and these men deposited their high hats in the
cabin and put on dark blue caps that they carried in their pockets,
rolled down their trousers, and thus, though still in their bare feet,
transformed themselves into respectable-looking citizens.
Kit heard the order given from the bridge, “Lower away the captain’s
gig!” and in a few minutes Captain Griffith followed the officers
ashore to arrange for lighters to land his cargo. He returned in time
for supper, bringing along a package of letters that had been handed
him at the custom-house--some for himself, and some for members of the
crew.
“I think I have something here for you, Christopher,” he said as he
passed through the cabin, where Kit was setting the table. “Yes,”
he went on, pausing under the lamp to look over the letters, “‘Mr.
Christopher Silburn, S. S. _North Cape_, Sisal, Yucatan.’ There’s
news from home for you. The mail steamer left three days behind us, but
she has beaten us down and gone on to Vera Cruz; so you will have a
chance to answer your letter when she comes back, in about a week.”
“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered, as the Captain handed him a letter
addressed in his mother’s familiar handwriting. He was delighted to
hear from home, but still the letter frightened him a little, for he
had not expected to hear while he was away, and his first thought was
that there must be something the matter. He hastily cut the envelope
open and read far enough to see that no one was sick, then put the
letter in his pocket till his work was done. It was not till the supper
dishes were washed and put away that he had any leisure, and then he
sat down under the cabin lamp and read it. The main letter was from his
mother, and there was a shorter one from Genevieve.
MY DEAR BOY [his mother wrote]: Though I have no news to tell you,
I want to send you a few lines by the first mail steamer, for I
don’t want you to feel that you are entirely cut off from home and
family. No matter how far away you are, you know we are always
thinking about you.
And I don’t want to tire you with a lot of advice, but I do hope,
my dear boy, that you will take care of yourself in every way. It
may be selfish in me to say so, but I want you to remember that you
have not only yourself, but your mother and sister too, to think
about and work for. You are all we have. I am sure you will do your
best wherever you are, but I want you to take great care of your
health. That is an unhealthy country you are in, and you must not
expose yourself to the hot sun. I will try to have some new shirts
ready for you when you get back to New York; and I think you had
better buy a few handkerchiefs, for you have not enough. And don’t
forget the little book I gave you, Kit.
YOUR LOVING MOTHER.
Then he unfolded the note from Genevieve.
DEAR KIT [she wrote]: This is the first note I ever wrote without
mother’s seeing it, but I do not want her to see this, because I am
going to write to you about father, and that always troubles her.
I want you always, when you are travelling about the world, to keep
your ears open for news of the _Flower City_ or some of her
boats. It may be foolish, but I never can believe that we shall not
see him any more. You know how many people have been shipwrecked
and then come home again years afterwards. You’ll do this, won’t
you?
Dear old Turk is trying to write to you. He heard me say that I was
going to write, so he sits here beside me, putting up first one paw
and then the other. I am sure he would write if he could. With love,
VIEVE.
He was about to read the letters over again, when the Captain’s bell
rang. All the doors and port-holes were left open now, for the heat was
intense even after dark, and he went into the Captain’s room without
knocking.
“Shut the door, my boy,” the Captain said; “I have something to say to
you;” and as Kit obeyed, he could not help wondering whether he had
done anything that he was to be scolded for. But the Captain’s first
words relieved his mind.
“I am going to put you at a job to-morrow that will require all your
brains,” he said. “The lighters will be here in the morning after
cargo, and I am going to send you ashore to make a list of every
package landed. I have to keep a sharp eye on these boatmen, or they
rob me. Everything will be checked off as it leaves the ship, and you
will keep a list on shore, and the goods go into the hands of our agent
in Sisal immediately, and he receipts for them.
“Now I want you to understand,” he continued, “that this is very
important work. I have never trusted such work to a cabin boy before.
If you miss a package, it may cost me a great many dollars. But I see
you have some brains, and I want you to use them, and do the work
carefully.”
“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered. “I will certainly do my best.”
Kit returned to the cabin, with a little flush on his face. He had seen
for some days that his position on the ship was much better than when
he started, but he had not dreamed of such an important commission as
this. It would give him a great amount of extra work to do, but what
of that? He was not afraid of work. Nearly any one in the crew would
jump at the chance to go ashore and do what he was to do. Copying the
manifests had given him extra work, but it had paid many times over by
giving the Captain a good opinion of him.
Immediately after breakfast next morning the gig was lowered again,
and the Captain was rowed ashore by two of the men, with Kit sitting in
the stern by his side. Kit knew how some of the crew were wondering to
see him going off in this style, but he had no chance to speak to them.
On the way they passed three of the lighters going out--open boats
about thirty feet long, very strongly built, with a single mast, each
with a large crew of half-clad Mexicans ready for work.
The Captain waited till the first of the lighters arrived with its
load, and showed Kit where he was to stand on the mole, as the Mexicans
call the wharf, and how he was to keep his list. Then he returned to
the ship, and the cabin boy was left to his own resources.
“I’m going to be roasted and broiled and frizzled here,” he said to
himself, “under this sun. But I can stand it if these fellows can. And
when there’s no lighter in sight I can get into the shade there beside
the warehouse.”
He soon found that he was to have company in the hot sun; for as the
agent had to receipt for the goods, he sent one of his own clerks
to check them off on one of the manifests that Kit had copied. The
clerk was a slender young man in a broad-brimmed Panama hat; and Kit
was greatly amused when he touched his hat to him, and called him
“Señor.” But the young man spoke a little English, and they soon became
acquainted.
“You are young for a supercargo, Señor,” the clerk said, in a lull in
the work.
[Illustration: “‘YOU ARE YOUNG FOR A SUPERCARGO, SEÑOR.’”]
Kit had read enough sea stories to know something about supercargoes,
though he did not know that he was doing the work of one at that minute.
“I’m not the supercargo, sir,” he replied; “I’m the cabin boy; we have
no supercargo.”
“Ah!” said the clerk; and it was still more amusing to see how
dignified he immediately became, and what a superior air he assumed.
But another trifling incident soon made him friendly again, for the
agent himself came down to the mole to inquire about something, and he,
too, touched his hat to Kit and called him Señor, whereupon the clerk
said something in Spanish that must have explained that Kit was only
the cabin boy, for the agent immediately replied, “Oh, cabin boy is he?
Well, he must be a good one, or he wouldn’t be put at this work. Bring
him up to the house to breakfast.”
Kit was under the impression that he had had his breakfast several
hours before, on board ship; but he followed Tom Haines’s advice to
“keep his eyes open and his mouth shut,” and before long he learned
that the southern custom is to take only a cup of coffee and a roll
in the early morning, and to wait till midday for the full breakfast,
which is really an early dinner.
About twelve o’clock there were no lighters in sight, for the boatmen
were eating their breakfast too, and the clerk took Kit through a
narrow street to a big one-story stone warehouse, the agent’s business
place, where, on a shady rear verandah, a long table was spread.
This was “the house” the agent had referred to; and by keeping both
eyes and ears open, Kit learned that it is the custom in Yucatan for
the proprietors and all the employees of large business houses to
eat together in the warehouses, a cook and waiters being kept on the
premises.
He was a little embarrassed to find that he was to be seated at the
right hand of Mr. Ysnard, the agent, near the head of the table; for he
was bright enough to see that the seats were arranged according to rank
in the firm, with the proprietor at the top of the table, the cashier
and chief clerks next, then the minor clerks, and the porters and boys
near the foot.
“Hadn’t I better go lower down, sir?” he asked. “I don’t think I belong
up here.”
“Oh, yes, you do!” Mr. Ysnard laughed; “you are my guest to-day, and my
guests always belong in the seat of honor.”
While the many courses were brought on, soup, fish, roasts, dessert,
and fruits, Mr. Ysnard asked Kit enough questions to keep him busy
answering--how long he had been on the _North Cape_, how he liked
it, where he lived, and all about himself. But when, after the meal was
finished, they all sat talking, and most of them smoking, he began to
grow uneasy.
“I shall have to ask you to excuse me, sir,” he said to Mr. Ysnard. “I
am afraid some of the lighters will be coming in, and I must not miss
anything.”
“Very true, my boy, you must attend to business,” Mr. Ysnard answered.
“And you can safely follow the example, Michel,” he called down the
table to Kit’s fellow-clerk on the wharf, who sat about the middle.
Together they returned to their work, and up to dark they had little
chance for conversation, for eight lighters were now busy bringing
cargo. When it was too dark to see longer, the gig was sent to take Kit
on board.
“Make way for the supercargo!” Chock Cheevers cried, as he stepped on
board. “Clear a gangway there. Don’t you see who’s come aboard?”
But the second mate had something more important to say.
“Bring your list into the chart-room,” he ordered, “and compare it with
my tally.” The second mate had been keeping the tally of everything
that left the ship; and when the comparison was made they corresponded
exactly, showing that on his first day, at any rate, Kit had made no
mistakes.
It seemed a little odd to go to washing dishes again after being a
clerk all day; but they were soon done, and next morning he was out
bright and early to clean the cabin and set the table. After breakfast
he was rowed ashore as before, but dressed this time in his thinnest
clothes. Even at eight o’clock the sun was burning hot, and the
cloudless sky seemed to indicate an intensely hot day. He was soon
to learn, however, that tropical skies change very rapidly. Five or
six of the lighters had come in with loads and returned to the ship,
when there came a single puff of wind from off the water that reminded
Kit of home. It was the first really cool thing he had felt since his
arrival in Yucatan; and this little puff, lasting only a few seconds,
was more than cool--it was actually chilly.
“Ah, that’s good!” he said to the clerk; “I wish they’d give us more of
that.”
The clerk shivered in his linen clothes, and pointed with one hand
toward the sky. There far in the north was a big dark-gray cloud, that
seemed to grow larger and darker as they looked at it.
“El Norte!” Michel exclaimed; and shivered again.
“What’s that?” Kit asked.
“A norther, you call it in English,” the clerk replied; “a great cold
storm from the north. That puts an end to our work for some days.
There’ll be a heavy sea on in a few minutes.”
“Then I ought to get back to the ship,” Kit said half to himself.
“You couldn’t do it,” said the clerk. “Look.”
He pointed seaward, and Kit saw all the lighters scudding toward shore
before a wind that they hardly felt yet on the mole. Thick black smoke
was pouring from the _North Cape’s_ funnel, and across the water
he heard the “click, click, click,” of the steam windlass.
“Why, she’s going off!” Kit cried; “she’s hoisting anchor!”
“Of course she is,” Michel laughed; “she’ll have to put to sea; she
can’t lie there in a norther, and you’ll see no more of her till the
storm is over. That often happens here.”
“And what becomes of a cabin boy who happens to be left on shore?” Kit
asked, half inclined to laugh at the predicament he was in.
“You’re better off here than on the ship,” Michel answered, “and we
won’t let you starve.”
By this time the whole sky was overcast, and frequent blasts of the
cold wind struck them. The foremost of the lighters arrived, and their
men worked like beavers to land what cargo they had. All about were
men on the beach drawing their boats far up on shore out of reach of
the heavy sea that they knew was coming. As fast as the lighters were
unloaded, they too were drawn up. It was as much too cold now as before
it had been too hot, but they had to stay on the mole till everything
was checked off.
“Now make a run for it to the warehouse!” It was the voice of Mr.
Ysnard, who had come down to see that all was left snug, and who
saw that both the youngsters were shivering. Already the spray was
beginning to fly over the mole, and in one glance seaward Kit saw that
the _North Cape_ was standing out into the Gulf. He was left alone
in Yucatan; but instead of waiting to worry over it, he took to his
heels and beat Michel to the warehouse by several yards.
There he hardly knew the place, it was so dark; for all the shutters on
the seaward side had been closed to keep out the wind, as there was no
glass in the windows. People were hurrying through the streets, and the
sky was growing blacker every minute.
“Now we’ll catch it, my boy,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, as he followed them
in, half soaked with spray. “Three days these things last, generally,
and then it takes two or three more for the sea to go down so that the
lighters can go out. So you are a prisoner in Mexico for five days at
least, and you will be my guest longer than you expected.”
“Thank you, sir,” Kit answered; “but I hope the ship will not be in any
danger.”
“Oh, no more than from any other storm. There is plenty of sea room,
and she will run out fifty or a hundred miles and keep her nose in the
wind. No, she will be all right.”
The breakfast table had to be set in the warehouse, as the verandah
was too much exposed to the wind; and Kit noticed that the norther
interfered with business and upset everything just about as much as an
earthquake would at home. The clerks really suffered from cold, though
Kit found it warm enough in the shelter of the building. The storm
increased every minute, and they soon began to hear the roar of the sea
breaking against the mole.
It was a relief to everybody when closing time came, five o’clock.
Mr. Ysnard’s open carriage arrived to carry him to his home in the
country, and he told Kit that he was to go along.
“But you must have something around you, in this wind,” he said; “I
think I can lend you a Mexican overcoat.” And he went into the office
and returned in a minute with two large red blankets, one for himself
and one for Kit.
“This is what we call a ‘serape,’”[1] he explained. “See, there is a
slit cut in the middle for the head to go through,” and he slipped the
blanket over Kit’s head and put his own on in the same way; and Kit
could not help laughing to see himself so suddenly transformed into a
young Mexican.
[1] Pronounced ser-rap-pa.
As they were driven through the streets he saw that Sisal was a
desolate little place of few houses, some of them of stone plastered
over and some covered with corrugated iron; and the streets were nearly
deserted on account of the norther, and most of the shutters closed.
The few men to be seen were all wrapped in serapes, which warmed the
shoulders, but could not warm the bare feet, nor heads covered with
straw hats.
Mr. Ysnard’s house was on the brow of a low hill overlooking the town
and the sea, and after the late dinner he took Kit into his “den,” as
he called it, and they had a long talk before bedtime.
“As you copied the manifests,” the agent said in the course of the
conversation, “you are familiar with all the marks on the cargo. You
may see some cases coming ashore without any marks at all. Those are
little private ventures by some of the officers or crew; and when you
see one of them all you have to do is let it pass without putting it on
your list, you know. They escape paying duty by slipping them through
that way.”
“No, sir; I have no instructions of that kind,” Kit answered. “My
orders are to make a list of everything brought ashore.”
“But if there should be a little profit in it for you?” Mr. Ysnard
suggested. “Suppose you were paid a small commission on everything that
slipped through without your seeing it?”
“I don’t think you ought to ask it of me, Mr. Ysnard,” Kit replied.
“The Captain trusts me, and I should be ashamed to betray him. I
couldn’t possibly do it.”
“Ah, my boy, I was just trying you,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, giving Kit
a hearty clap on the shoulder. “I am glad to see that you are not to
be tempted. That is just what we want to avoid, the landing of such
smuggled cases, for they get both the ship and the agent into a lot of
trouble. I suppose the Captain sent you ashore because he was sure he
could trust you.
“There is always room for bright young fellows who can be trusted,”
he added; “in fact, I could make room in my own business for a young
American of about your age. How would you like to leave the ship and
make more money in Sisal?”
The question came so suddenly that it almost staggered Kit; but he soon
made up his mind how to answer.
“I think it is very pleasant here, sir,” he said, “but I don’t believe
in changing. I have a good start on the ship, and don’t think I ought
to leave it; but I am very much obliged to you, sir, for the offer.”
When he went out in the morning, he saw that the Gulf was almost white;
partly with foam, and partly from the white sand that was stirred up
from the bottom. Tremendous seas were breaking over the mole, and great
sheets of spray were flying over several of the warehouses.
The norther prophets were right in saying that the norther would last
for three days. Every night Kit went home with Mr. Ysnard, but without
meeting his wife, as she was an invalid and seldom left her room. On
the fourth day the dark clouds drifted gradually away, the wind lulled,
and the tropical sun shone hot again. About noon he was delighted to
see the _North Cape_ steam back to her old place and drop her
anchor.
“But you’ll not get out to her for a day or two yet,” Mr. Ysnard told
him; “no small boat could go out till this heavy sea subsides. I am
going into the country in a few minutes to see how much my plantations
have suffered, and if you like, you can go along and learn something
about this hemp you are going to be loaded with.”
The carriage came early that day, and they were soon driving between
broad fields of cactus plants.
“That’s the stuff,” Mr. Ysnard told him; “it is the leaves of this
cactus that yield the hemp. You see some of the leaves are six feet
long and four or five inches broad. We cut off the leaves and soak them
in water, then run them through a machine that extracts the fibre. That
fibre is the hemp. Another machine cleans and straightens it, and we
dry it and press it into bales, and it is ready to go north to be made
into ropes and matting. Now you know something about the cargo you are
to carry.
“But you have no idea,” he continued, “of the condition of the workmen
who raise this hemp. We call them peons, and on most of the plantations
they are little better than slaves, though I am glad to say that it
is not so on mine. In this country a peon cannot leave the land he
belongs on while he is in debt to his master; and as they earn only
about twelve and one-half cents a day they are always in debt. A son
is responsible also for his father’s debts, so they are practically
slaves, with no chance of ever freeing themselves. It is a terrible
system.”
“Your plants do not seem to have suffered much from the wind, sir,”
said Kit; “maybe it is because you treat your men better.”
“Well,” Mr. Ysnard laughed, “there is no great merit in that. They do
better work for me because I treat them well, and it pays better in the
end. Slave labor is always the poorest.”
The next day the lighters ventured out again, and there was more work
for Kit on the mole. Then when the cargo was all landed the loading
began, and he was kept on deck to keep tally of the number of bales
received. That took six full days, and still there was no sign of the
mail steamer returning.
“The storm must have delayed her,” Captain Griffith said. “No use
to send letters home now; for she has to touch at Havana, and we go
direct, and we’ll beat her up. We’ll be off to-morrow.”
Kit asked and received permission to go ashore to say good-by to the
agent who had been so hospitable to him. He had spent so much time in
the little town that it almost seemed like leaving home again. Mr.
Ysnard shook his hand warmly at parting.
“I have enjoyed having you here,” he said. “I like to see a bright,
faithful young chap like you. Our young Mexicans are slow coaches
beside you American boys. I was going to send you out a barrel of
Mexican fruit that I had put up for you, so I’ll have it put in your
boat. Keep pulling, my boy, and some day you may be down here in a
better position than cabin boy.”
Kit tried to think it over as he returned to the ship, but he could
not explain to himself what he had done to make Mr. Ysnard take such
an interest in him. There was something about him, he could not help
seeing, that pleased both the Captain and the agent; and he was glad of
it, though he did not know what it was.
When the ship passed the Sandy Hook signal station, eight days later,
the flags that she set told the brief story of the homeward voyage.
“_North Cape_,” they said, “eight days from Sisal, with hemp.
Smooth passage.”
And when a few hours afterwards she lay at her old place in front of
Martin’s Stores, her bow almost rubbed against the stern of a little
tug.
“Why, that’s the _Triton_!” Kit said to himself, when he saw the
tug’s name. “That’s Captain Judson’s boat, from Bridgeport, and Captain
Judson is our near neighbor in Huntington. If he is going back, maybe
he will take my barrel of fruit up to Bridgeport.”
“Yes, going back to-night,” Captain Judson said, when Kit found him. “I
towed a yacht down yesterday. Take up a barrel of fruit for you? Aye,
that I will, lad--and take you too, if you can get off. I know somebody
up there who’d be glad to see you. Eh, my boy?”
Take him too! That was something that Kit had not thought of; but what
a surprise it would be for the folks at home to see him come walking
in! Within five minutes he had seen Captain Griffith and had readily
been granted a week’s leave of absence.