THE LAST PILOT SCHOONER

The new steam pilot-boat will go into commission off the Delaware

Capes early next week. This change from sail to steam is another

blow at the romance of blue water. Six of the eight trim schooners

of the Delaware fleet have already been dismantled, not only the

_Albatross, Number One_ is cruising on the station. She will be

laid up as soon as the steamer is ready to put the pilots aboard

incoming vessels. Every ocean voyager will regret the passing of

the pilot schooner. These stormy petrels among sailing craft have

been the first messengers from the looked-for land, as specks in

the tumbling waste of sea, or lying hove to in all weathers....

Wilson threw his doubts overboard. All he had ever read of bellying

canvas, whipping spars, and lee rails awash leaped into the foreground

of his boyish imagination. Here was his chance for such a "descriptive

story" as he had dreamed of through weeks and months, this last cruise

of the last pilot schooner. He dashed into the art room, snatched

up the waiting camera, and bolted for the station. After he dropped

panting into a seat of the accommodation train for Lewes, he found

himself already overhauling his stock of sea-lore and sailor adjectives.

There was time for reflection in this four-hour journey to the sea,

and ere long, sober second thought began to overtake his first wild

elation. The young reporter's doubts came trooping back. He remembered

now that he had never written a line of "ship-news" for the _Standard_.

He blushed to confess to himself that his life on salt water had been

bounded by the decks of river excursion steamers. And what had he ever

done worth the notice of the managing editor? Of course, he had worked

hard, and the world, at least in fiction, occasionally rewarded honest

merit in lowly places with unexpected largess. But any "star man" of

the staff would have given a week's salary for such a note as this

from the chief executive of the _Standard_. And he, James Arbuthnot

Wilson, was indubitably the rawest and humblest recruit of that keen

and rough-riding squadron of talent.

An inevitable reaction swung his mood into the forebodings. The train

was loafing along the upper reaches of Delaware Bay when he re-read

the intoxicating note, and caught himself repeating "Dear Mr. Wilson,"

with a sudden glimmer of association. In another miserable moment the

youth's beautiful dream was wrenched from him. What a fool he had

been! "Wilson," "Wilson," he muttered and burst out:

"Of course, there is another Wilson, the tip-top man of the staff. It's

the Wilson who's been filling in as chief of the Washington Bureau for

six months. I heard somebody say the other night that 'Doc' Wilson was

coming back, and was to go on general work again. He must have turned

up over Sunday. And that new boy put his note in my box. Well, I am IT."

Young James Arbuthnot Wilson squeezed back a smarting tear. He did not

try to fence with this surmise. There was no room for doubt that the

kind words and the pleasant outing had been aimed at his high-salaried

elder. James Arbuthnot had never clapped eyes on the gifted "Doc"

Wilson, whose Washington dispatches had carried no signature and

whose distant personality had made no impression upon this wretched

understudy of his.

How could the pilgrim muster courage to go back and face the issue? He

would be the office butt--Well, he could resign, but most likely, he

reflected, dismissal would be the instant penalty of this incredibly

presumptuous blunder. The only thing to be done was to drop off at the

next way station and return to the scene of his downfall. But to his

stammering plea the brakeman returned:

"Next train up won't get along here till late to-night. You better

go through to Lewes instead of waiting seven hours at one of these

next-to-nothing flag stations."

The reporter slumped into his seat and looked through the open window.

The tang of brine was in the breeze that gushed up the bay with the

rising tide. Across the green fields he began to glimpse flashing blue

water and bits of the traffic of far-off seas. A deep-laden tramp

freighter was creeping toward her port, a battered bark surged solemnly

in tow of an ocean-going tug, and a four-masted schooner was reaching

up the bay with every sail pulling. Across the aisle of the car

Wilson noticed, with a melancholy pleasure, four deep-tanned men of

rugged aspect, who played cards with much talk of ships and tides and

skippers. They belonged in this picture.

Wilson thought of the stewing city far behind him, and the spirit of

some sea-faring ancestor was whispering in his ear. Yes, by Jove! he

would see the tragic venture through after all. It were better to

return with a "story," and fall with colors flying than to slink back

to empty ridicule. Let them try to overtake him if they dared. This was

"Mr. Wilson's" mission, and no one could snatch it from him.

When the train labored into Lewes, the fugitive looked across the flats

to the cuddling arm of the Breakwater and the shining sea beyond. With

the instinct of the hunted, he made ready to flee in this direction,

away from the station and the town. As he dropped from the car, a man

in the uniform of a station agent climbed aboard and shouted:

"Telegram for Mr. Wilson. Is Mr. Wilson aboard? Urgent telegram for Mr.

J. A. Wilson."

Mr. Wilson's pulse fluttered as he dove behind the warehouse across

the tracks, while the hoarse cry of the station agent rang horribly

in his ears. The long arm of the _Standard_ had almost clutched him

by the collar. As he hurried down the nearest street to the water, he

saw heading toward him a lusty youth of a sailorish cut, who eyed the

camera case as if hasty suspicions were confirmed.

"Is your name Wilson?" demanded the stranger. "If it be, come along

with me. I'm from the _Albatross'_ boat-crew."

Wondering how much guilt was written in his face, Wilson fervently

shook the hand of the briny youth. They fared toward the pier, while

the convoy explained:

"You're in luck. We're ready to go to sea as soon as you get aboard.

Hit it just right, didn't you? The pilots'll be glad to see you

again. They was tickled to death over the piece you wrote for the

paper when the _Eben Tunnell, Number Three_, come in after fightin'

through the '88 blizzard, and specially what you wrote about ol' 'Pop'

Markle stickin' by the _Morgan Castle_ when she ketched fire off the

Capes two year ago. And, say, they still talk about that jack-pot

you sky-hooted clean through the cabin skylight, and how th' Pilots'

Association went in mournin' for thirty days after that poker game.

Two o' them boys is aboard this cruise, with the chips all stacked an'

waitin', and their knives whetted. I'm sorry I missed the fun before."

James Arbuthnot Wilson gulped hard at these lamentable tidings. He was

vaulting from the frying-pan into the fire. These rude and reckless men

would probably heave him overboard. And, alas, the penny-ante of his

mild college dissipations had left him as deficient in poker prowess

as in sea-lore. The foremast hand from the _Albatross_ was somewhat

crestfallen over his capture. If this slip of a boy was the seasoned

and capable "Doc" Wilson, able to hold his own in all weather and any

company, then appearances were basely deceiving, and the escort felt a

sense of personal grievance.

The boat was waiting at the pier and the four slouching seamen rowed

out to the black schooner, which lazily rolled her gleaming sides off

the end of the Breakwater. Wilson climbed awkwardly aboard and was

saved from sprawling his length on deck by a strong hand, which yanked

him in a welcoming grip. Then a stocky man with a grizzled mustache

stepped back and fairly shouted:

"Why, hell! You ain't 'Doc' Wilson. What kind of a game is this? I

popped up from below in time to see your hat coming over the side. Kick

me, please. I'm dreamin', as sure as my name's McCall."

He fished a rumpled telegram from his blue clothes, and flourished it

before the nose of his guest, as he cried formidably:

"Read that!"

"'Doc' Wilson, of the _Standard_, will be down on afternoon train.

Take him aboard and treat him right."

Young Wilson looked at the half mile of water between the schooner and

the beach, and thought of trying to swim for it. But the bully-ragging

tone of the pilot struck a spark of his latent pluck and he answered

with some spirit:

"I'm mighty sorry you're so disappointed. My name is Wilson, James

Arbuthnot Wilson, of the _Standard_. The order to join your boat was

delivered to me. If there's been a mistake, and I'm so unwelcome, I'll

have to put you to the trouble of setting me ashore again."

The innate hospitality of his kind smothered the pilot's first

emotions, and he regretted his rudeness as he smote the lad on the back

and shouted:

"All right, Jimmy Arbutus. I guess there's no great damage done. It's

now or never for your newspaper, and if we can't carry the skipper,

we'll get along with the mate of your outfit. And we'll give you a

cruise to make your lead-pencil smoke. Tumble below and shake them

natty clothes. The boat-keeper will fit you out with a pair of boots

and a jumper."

Sore and abashed, with the hateful emotions of an intruder, Wilson

crept below and faced another ordeal. In the pilots' roomy cabin,

which ran half the length of the schooner, four men were changing

their clothes and tidying up their bunks. One of them emerged from the

confusion to yell at the invader's patent leather ties:

"Hello, Doc, you old pirate. Is that you? Glad to see you aboard. Well,

I will be damned!"

His jaw dropped and he looked sheepish as a hurricane voice came

through the open skylight:

"Don't hurt the kid's feelin's. I've done plenty of that. This is Jimmy

Arbutus Wilson, apprentice to 'Doc,' and he's doin' the best he can.

'Doc' got stranded somewheres, and the lad is takin' his run. I don't

fathom it a little bit, but what's the odds?"

The passenger was introduced to all hands, who showed a depressing lack

of enthusiasm, and the pilots returned to their tasks. Wilson retired,

blushing and confused, to the edge of his bunk. Presently the oldest

man of the party sat down beside the intruder, and shook his hand for

the second time. Wilson raised his downcast face to the white-haired

veteran, who said softly:

"Now, sonny, don't let the boys rile you none. They're kinder sore on

some of the greenhorns that writes pieces all wrong for the Philadelphy

papers, and this 'Doc' Wilson knows sailor ways and sailor lingo, and

they sorter took a shine to him and his style. But fur's I know, you

can write rings around him. And Old Pop Markle, as they calls me, will

see you through, blow high, blow low. It's my last cruise, this is. I'm

past seventy year, sonny, and my oldest boy is a pilot; he brought a

tanker in yestiddy, and my grandson is servin' his apprentice years,

and he'll be gettin' his papers pretty soon. It's time for me to quit.

I was goin' to lay up ashore in the spring, but I kinder wanted to

wind up with the old _Albatross_. Better come on deck, sonny; we're

shortenin' cable."

Wilson smiled his gratitude at the gentle and garrulous old pilot,

whose smooth-shaven face was webbed with fine-drawn wrinkles, as if

each salty cruise had left its own recording line. The blue eyes were

faded from staring into fifty years of sun and wind, but they held a

beaming interest in the welfare of this tyro struggling in the meshes

of hostile circumstance.

The reporter followed his guardian on deck, and his spirits swiftly

rose. The _Albatross_ was paying off under a flattened forestaysail,

while her crew tailed onto the main-sheet with a roaring chorus,

for they, too, felt a thrill of sentiment in this last cruise. The

wind held fresh from the south'ard, and under the smooth lee of Cape

Henlopen the _Albatross_ shot seaward, as if they were skating over a

polished floor. Now the pilots came tumbling up, and shouted as they

turned to and helped set the maintopsail and staysail. The schooner

staggered down to it, until the white water hissed over her low

bulwark, and sobbed through the scuppers. "Old Pop" Markle slapped his

knee and cried huskily:

"Give her all she'll stand, boys. It's like old times when we raced

that dodgasted _Number Four_ and hung to the weather riggin' by our

teeth, and bent a new suit of sails every other cruise."

Holding the wind abeam, the _Albatross_ drove straight out to sea,

and then, once clear of Cape May, slid off to the north'ard. Now, the

quartering sea picked her up and she swooped down the slopes and tried

nimbly to climb the frothing hills, as the jolly wind smote her press

of canvas and jammed her smoking through them. A new exhilaration

surged in young Wilson's veins. He was drinking it all in, the buoyant

flight of the low, slim schooner, the intimate nearness of the sea,

the sweetness of the wind, and the solemnity of the marching twilight.

He would not have been elsewhere for worlds. Then the fat and sweating

face of the cook appeared from below, and bellowed an inarticulate

summons.

The pilots obeyed with ardor, and Wilson followed timidly in their

wake. Supper smoked on the cabin table, and the guest was glad to

survey the stout fare of hash, cold meat, potatoes, green peas,

flaky hot biscuits, and a mammoth pudding. "Old Pop" Markle took the

youngster under his protecting wing, and found a seat on the locker

beside his own. The reporter fell to, while the pilots chatted with

bursts of gusty laughter. He made one desperate rally to join the talk,

and in a quiet moment asked a neighbor:

"How do you know when a ship wants a pilot?"

"We generally have a trained green parrot that flies over and asks

'em," was the cruel response. "But we ran short of stores last cruise,

and had to eat him. This voyage we intend to mail 'em postal cards."

There was an appreciative roar, and Wilson winced as "Old Pop" Markle

whispered:

"Don't mind that Peter Haines. He's got a heart as soft as mush. It's

only their skylarkin', sonny. Hit 'em back. That's what they like."

But the victim had lost all self-confidence, and now he was beginning

to feel dizzy and forlorn. The smell of food, the heat, and the jerky

plunging of the cabin were overwhelming. He staggered to his bunk and

crept in. This was the last blow, that on top of his false pretences he

should be laid low before the eyes of this hostile crowd. He knew not

what happened, until hours after he awoke from a semi-stupor to find

"Old Pop" Markle sponging his face with cold water and calling in his

ear:

"There's a steamer coming up from the east'ard. Brace up and get on

deck. It's a pretty sight."

The boy clambered through the companionway as the boat-keeper touched a

match to an oil-soaked bunch of waste in a wire cage at the end of his

torch. The schooner and the near-by sea were bathed in a yellow glare.

Out in the darkness a blue Coston light glowed a response. Some one

shouted: "On deck for the skiff," and five minutes later the boat-crew

was pulling off in the night to the waiting steamer, with a pilot in

the stern-sheets.

"There goes your friend, Peter Haines," chuckled "Pop" Markle. "I

knowed you'd take it hard if I didn't give you a chance to say good-bye

to him. He won't pester you no more this cruise."

The wind blew some of the cobwebs from poor Wilson's muddled head, and

he felt refreshed. Soon the pelting spray drove him below deck and he

curled up on a locker, watching the poker game from which youth and

inexperience barred him. And what was more cutting, he was not even

asked to play.

"It would be like taking pennies from a blind child," callously

commented the strapping McCall who had welcomed him aboard. But the

white-haired patriarch of them all did not join the game, and he said

cheerily to Wilson:

"You're too young and I'm too old to be wastin' our wages in them

pursuits, ain't we, sonny? There's an old lady and a cottage at Lewes

that takes care of my rake-off. And instid of raisin' the limit, I

raise vegetubbles for my fun."

Wilson opened his bruised heart and told the old pilot the story of his

venture, and felt relieved that his masquerade had been thrown away.

"Pop" Markle's blue eyes twinkled:

"See here, Jimmy Arbutus, I'll see that you write a fust-rate piece for

your paper. Ask me anything your amazin' ignorance tells you to. The

boys wanted me to take in the fust vessel we met, and was willin' to

shove their turns aside, but I told 'em it was my last cruise, and I

was goin' to see her through to the finish. So we've lots of time to

talk pilotin' together. What was the most remarkable experience ever I

had? Pshaw, that sounds like a full-rigged reporter, sonny, really it

does.

"Well, I never got drownded boardin' a vessel, but I once fell afoul

of a skipper that was a worse blunderin' idjit than you've been.

It may sound kinder comfortin' to you. About fifty miles off the

Capes, I clumb aboard an Italian bark. Her captain said he was bound

for Wilmington, and would I take him in? He got a tow-boat at the

Breakwater, and we were goin' up the river all right, when plumb by

accident this benighted Dago imparted to me that he was bound for

Wilmington, North Caroliny. 'Great Scott! You dodgasted lunatic,' says

I, 'you're pretty nigh up to Wilmington, Delaware.' He went crazier

than ever, and put about for sea after I showed him on the chart where

he was at. He had been runnin' by dead-reckonin', and didn't know

where he was. So, when he picked up a pilot and found he was headed all

right for Wilmington, he figured his troubles were over. So there's

worse than you afloat, Jimmy Arbutus."

At his suggestion, Wilson dug up his notebook and scribbled therein

many other yarns, for the old pilot warmed to his task, and insisted

that each of the poker players should contribute a story to the fund.

When he was routed out for breakfast, the party had lost another

pilot who had found his ship at daybreak. The wind had drawn into the

northeast, and the _Albatross_ was snuggled down under double reefs.

The barometer was falling, and the boat-keeper shook his head when the

pilots insisted upon edging further off shore.

"Drive her till she cracks," shouted McCall. "This is the trip when we

keep going till we get our ships. The _Albatross_ goes home empty, you

bet your boots."

With much daring and difficulty one man was put aboard a liner late

in the afternoon. Three pilots were left, and they swept Wilson into

their genial comradeship, as the little party clawed its way to supper,

and hung onto the table by its eyelids. In his mind, Wilson began to

see the page story, "full of human interest and color." To-morrow he

would work at his "introduction," and the thought of really making

a start at filling those stately columns was perturbing. He felt

something like stage-fright at the notion of it.

Before midnight, James Arbuthnot Wilson had forgotten his "story," and

was thinking only of the awful turmoil above him. The wind had leaped

to the might of a sudden summer gale. The schooner was hove to and

battened tight, and like a tightly corked bottle she danced over the

shouting seas. Made sick and giddy, Wilson sought "Old Pop" Markle, who

was peacefully snoring in the next bunk, and shook him awake.

"Pshaw, sonny," the old man muttered, "she's safer than a big ship.

She'll rare and tear and sputter till it blows over. If it'll ease your

mind any, I'll take a peek on deck."

The pilot slipped into his oil-skins and vanished.

"It's pretty thick," he said when he came below, "but there ain't no

great sea on, not for us. Rainin' hard and blowin' some. McCall is

standin' watch with the boat-keeper. You're safer than if you was in

the _Standard_ office. You can't lose your job out here, Jimmy."

Somewhat comforted, Wilson tried to sleep. It was a terrifying

experience for the greenhorn, with more "local color" than he had

bargained for. Some time later in the night he was half dreaming that

"Doc" Wilson was holding his head under water and drowning him with the

most enjoyable deliberation.

With a crashing sound like the explosion of a great gun in his ears, he

was flung headlong clear across the cabin, and on top of him came "Old

Pop" Markle, sputtering harmless curses. The cabin floor sloped like

the side of a house and stayed there as Wilson scrambled to his hands

and knees. Then came a more sickening lurch, and before the hanging

cabin lamp was smashed against the deck-beams, the lad saw that the

old man was dazed. He gave him a hand, and together they climbed the

slope, and grasped the legs of the stationary table. They heard the

other pilots stumble up the companion ladder, and hammer back the

hatch, with yells of terror lest they be trapped.

Forward of the cabin bulkhead, they heard the roar of inrushing water,

and smothered outcries among the watch below. While the old man and

the boy tried to grope their way aft to the ladder, the sea crashed

through the bulkhead door from the galley beyond, and instantly they

were picked up and hurled aft, choking and fighting for life. Wilson

chanced to grasp a step of the ladder, and with his free arm pulled

"Old Pop" Markle to this refuge. The reporter did not want to die, and

he knew that death dragged him by the heels. And it was with no heroic

prompting that he pushed the old man up ahead of him. It was done on

the instant, as one friend would help another in a pinch, without

wrought-out purpose.

The water was sucking at his waist as he fought his way up, and partly

out, and managed to double himself over the hatch coaming, with the

old man's legs across his shoulders. Thus they were half jammed in the

cramped exit. Just then the flare torch was lighted by a seaman. In the

yellow glare "Old Pop" Markle saw the two pilots and two, only two, of

the crew wrestling with the one skiff left at the davits. One of them

stopped to beckon wildly to the old man and started to go to his aid.

In this moment the schooner lurched under with a weary, lifeless roll,

and a black sea stamped across her sodden hull. It licked up the boat

and the handful of toiling men, it leaped forward and pulled down the

black figure with the torch. The two men still jammed in the hatchway

were cruelly battered, but they could not be wrenched away. And when

the towering comber had passed, there was darkness and silence, and no

more shouting voices on the schooner's deck.

The old pilot wriggled free and got his hands on a life-buoy that

hung within his reach at the after end of the cabin hatch. Wilson

dragged himself after him, and pitched against a splintered mass of

planking upended against the wheel. They listened and heard a steamer's

imploring whistle, and one faint cry off to leeward. "Pop" Markle

groaned as he fumbled in the darkness and laboriously passed a tangle

of line around the wreck of the skylight cover to which Wilson was

clinging.

"Hang on, sonny," he gasped. "I've made the buoy fast to the loose

timber. We'll go off together with the next sea, sure. My God! here it

comes."

The dying schooner seemed to sink from beneath them, and clinging to

their frail bit of a raft, they were spun off to leeward in the arms of

the sea that swamped the rock-ballasted _Albatross_. Turned over and

over, the two men fought for breath until the skylight cover righted,

and they came to the surface. They slid swiftly into a murky hollow,

and were borne to the tattered crest whose froth was strangling.

But the wind was falling fast. Such seas as those which had broken

over the helpless _Albatross_ were running in swollen billows when

they met no barrier to check them. Therefore the castaways could

cling and breathe, and even made shift to pass the loose ends of the

line around their waists while they waited for the end. Now their

spray-blinded eyes dimly saw the lights of the steamer that had bitten

halfway through the pilot-schooner. She was blundering far to windward,

and her signal rockets cut red gashes in the night. They could watch

her swing in a useless circle as she sought to find the craft she

had struck. Drifting away to leeward, the old pilot and the young

reporter tried to shout, but their little rasping cries were pitifully

futile. They coughed the racking brine from their throats, and saw the

last rocket soar, saw the steamer's lights fade in the rain, become

twinkling points and vanish.

[Illustration: _The last of the "Albatross."_]

There were no words between them until the day began to break. Now and

then one sought the other's hand and found a feebly responsive grip.

Thus they knew that death had not come to the little raft. With the

gray light, the wind veered round to the south'ard, and except for

the swinging swell, the sea was smoothed to summer gentleness. The

eternal miracle of dawn had never come to more grateful hearts than

these two. Youth had survived the battering ordeal with mind still

alert, but old age was near passing with hurts and exhaustion. Now

that he could see no help, the boy so managed it that the pilot could

lie half across the life-buoy, which floated high with the supporting

planking beneath it.

"Them as wasn't drownded and smashed in their bunks, couldn't swim,

or none to speak of," sighed the old man. "I knew 'em all from boys.

Two left.... And we're the most wuthless of the lot, sonny. But you

may learn how to make an honest livin' some day.... Don't bother with

me.... I'm due to go.... The old lady has the cottage, and there's the

pension from the Pilot's Fund.... And two more pilots in the family....

Ain't you sorry you didn't let 'Doc' Wilson come?"

The boy sputtered:

"No, we aren't dead yet, and if we're picked up it's the story of a

lifetime. I don't believe the Lord saved us from the wreck to die on a

summer morning like this. And, my, but you were good to me, Mr. Markle."

They floated in silence while the June sun rose higher, and heat and

thirst piled up their wretchedness. The seasoned fiber of the old man

had been toughened for such a stress as this. He hung on grimly because

he had always hung on grimly to whatever life set him to endure.

Although they were out on the edge of traffic bound in and out of the

Delaware Capes, he still hoped, but mostly for the boy.

Six hours after the _Albatross_ had gone to the bottom, a boat from a

crippled brig, laden with salt from Turk's Island, picked up a bit of

wreckage to which were lashed a white-haired man and a beardless lad.

Both were too weak to talk, and the British skipper had them put into

bunks, and poured raw Jamaica rum down their throats. Wilson was the

first to revive, but he could not rise, and had to content himself

with tidings that the pilot was alive and conscious. Night had come

before the reporter could totter as far as the mate's cabin and see

his comrade.

The pilot's leathery face was strangely bleached, and he could no more

than whisper with a faltering huskiness:

"God bless their poor souls. They was all neighbors of mine. Hello,

Jimmy Arbutus, have you begun to write that piece for the paper?

There's something wrong with my insides. I think I busted some of 'em

when we was jammed in that hatch. Well, we're going home, my son. Are

you all taut again?"

Wilson tried to hide his anxiety and set himself to nursing the old

man as best he could. His clumsy attentions were received with a sweet

resignation, but the old man showed signs of impatience. At length,

unable to restrain his desire, he asked:

"Why don't you begin to write your piece instead of wastin' time on my

old hulk? I want to see it's done all ship-shape. We ain't goin' to

have no 'Doc' Wilson nor a lot of fresh young pilots laughin' at our

blunders. I'll overhaul the writin' for you."

Wilson was eager to begin. The skipper found a half-filled log-book,

and the butt of a pencil, and the reporter sat by the pilot's bunk, and

wrote with frowning effort. His labor was so evident that at length the

interested pilot asked:

"You seem to be making heavy weather of it, Jimmy. Mind my lookin' over

the nigh end of it?"

Wilson passed the log-book over with a flutter of expectancy. He was

proud of his opening paragraphs. He flattered himself that he had

caught the spirit of the tragedy of the last and lost pilot-schooner.

The old man read them with puckered brow, and laid the book down

without comment. Wilson waited and had to break the awkward silence:

"Anything the matter with that?"

"Well, I had only a common school education, and I've been at sea fifty

years. I'm no judge, I guess. It's too high-falutin' for me. Those

dictionary words are mighty imposin', and the opening verse of poetry

looks gilt-edged. But, well, every man to his trade."

The very young reporter looked hurt, and the pilot tried to soothe him

by flatly denying the truth of everything he had said. Wilson put the

book away and went on deck. In his mind there was a glimmering notion

that his literary method might be open to criticism. The old fear and

lack of self-confidence came back. He would rest another day and try

again.

Next morning the brig was beating against a baffling wind, and the

Delaware Capes were two hundred and fifty miles away. A mattress was

brought on deck, and the old man was laid on it beneath an awning. He

was growing weaker, and began to fret when he found the brig was making

so little headway toward her port and his home. Wilson was moody and

worried about his comrade. He had no heart for his "story."

After a while the British skipper sat down beside the old man, and

began to ask him about the loss of the _Albatross_. The pilot began

with the start of the last cruise, and with crisp and homely detail,

and with many breaks in his voice, he carried the tale down to the loss

of the vessel, the loss of his comrades, and the escape of the oldest

and youngest of those that had sailed in her. And because he felt it

all so deeply, the story did not once wander from its chartered course.

Wilson pulled himself together and picked up his log-book. He felt

that it was his duty to write what he heard. When he had finished, the

scales fell from his eyes, for at a great price he had been taught to

discern that virtue of simplicity which most of his craft must spend

years to learn. When the pilot fell into a doze, he stole below and

began to write his "story." It was not all as the pilot had told it,

but its backbone and its vitals belonged to the simple and untutored

old man. Next day when he read it to "Pop" Markle the pilot brightened

and observed:

"Any sailor could understand that, my lad. It sounds as dodgasted

ordinary as if I had wrote it myself. The pilots will think a heap of

that piece. I want you to hold your job, sonny."

The third day passed, and then the fourth, and the booming head wind

was holding the lubberly brig out of sight of the Delaware Capes. The

pilot insisted that he be carried on deck whenever the sun shone. He

was looking for the Henlopen light. When he was not drowsy, he would

talk of home to his young comrade, for all his thoughts were flocking

thither.

"I don't think I'm going to fetch it, sonny," he murmured when the

fifth day broke with no land in sight. "It looks like you're going to

be the sole survivor of the _Albatross_. That will make your piece a

heap stronger, won't it? My own boy couldn't have done more for me than

you have. If we don't pick up the Capes by noon, I want you to write a

letter for me to Mary, that's my wife. You can take it ashore at Lewes.

You'll find the cottage easy enough. And you must go around and look at

my vegetubbles. One of my boys will be home, and he'll see that they

get my hulk to the buryin' ground. The skipper here has promised to

anchor long enough to send me ashore."

Wilson choked, and tried to cheer the old man. But the faded blue eyes

were serene with the foreknowledge of his end. The letter was written

at his dictation, and Wilson sobbed while he went below to find an

envelope in the skipper's desk. Then the pilot tried to sign it, and

his knotted brown fingers held the pencil while Wilson helped him trace

the wavering:

"Your loving Seth."

Late in the afternoon of this, the fifth day, a tiny shaft, like a

beckoning finger, cut the cloudless western skyline. Seth Markle heard

the shouts of the men clustered forward who were eager to bring him the

longed-for news. Wilson and the skipper came to him, and propped him up

in his pillows on the poop-deck.

"Henlopen light," he whispered. "Henlopen light, and Lewes just around

the Point."

The dim light of life burned brighter in this draught of hope, but soon

waned lower than before. After a long silence, the old man tried to

speak. Wilson put his ear close to the resolute mouth, and could barely

hear:

"Tell her how good you've been to me. I--I hope the piece is all right.

The last cruise.... Oh, Mary, you're waiting around the Point of the

Cape."

He was alive until sunset, but he did not speak, except once when

Wilson thought he heard a fluttering whisper of "Mary," and after that

the rough-hewn face became very peaceful.

The brig crept into the lee of the Breakwater soon after daylight next

morning. Wilson went ashore and found the cottage with the marvelous

vegetable garden, and a sweet-faced woman who read her letter while the

bearer walked softly among the cabbage rows, and noted, with a quick

pang, how lovingly they had been tended. Presently Mary Markle came to

him, and put her motherly arms around his neck and kissed him through

her tears. They went to a near-by cottage where dwelt the eldest son.

There Wilson left them. Before he went away he said:

"He was the best friend I ever had. I'm coming down day after

to-morrow. May I go to the church with you?"

He had to tarry in the streets, for the news had spread, and other

weeping wives of pilots and seamen pressed around him. When, as

tenderly as possible, he was able to leave them, he went to the

telegraph office and sent this message to the managing editor of the

_Standard_:

"Just landed. Am sole survivor of pilot schooner _Albatross_ run down

and foundered a week ago. Will report with my story at noon."

On the train Wilson added to his "story" in the old log-book the facts

of the last days of Pilot Seth Markle. His pencil quivered and balked

when he recalled the words and face of his gentle old critic, and

somehow, through his tears, he brought the narrative of the last cruise

to its unadorned conclusion. Then he closed the book and leaned back

with a great weariness. Now he was passing that bright vista of shore

through which he had first seen the Bay, where he had chosen to advance

rather than to retreat. Those intervening days seemed like years of

life. He had gone away a boy, he was coming back a man.

When the young reporter walked into the _Standard_ office, the first

man to greet him was a bald and bulky stranger with an impressive

manner, who said:

"Ah, the young hero, I presume. You had a great streak of luck, didn't

you? Glad to see you pulled through. My name is Wilson. I'm to take

your notes at once and work up the story from them. We're going to play

as the leading feature in to-morrow's paper, and follow up with a page

for Sunday."

Young Wilson looked at "Doc" Wilson with a new assertiveness and threw

back his slight shoulders as he replied:

"No, thank you. Nothing doing. My story is written, and it's going to

be turned in to the boss as it stands. I'm going in to see him now."

"Oh, nonsense," snapped "Doc" Wilson. "I can understand your wanting

to do the story, and your head being swelled a bit and all that. But

if you want to hold your job you'd better fork over your notes without

any more fuss about it. The old man passed it out that he was going to

fire you, anyhow. I'll say a good word for you if you can produce the

goods."

Young Wilson brushed past his elder, who stood dumbfounded at the

insolence of the "pup." Then the managing editor was confronted by an

unabashed intruder, who announced:

"Here's my story, sir. There's about six columns of it. And it's all

ready to be edited. And no 'Doc' Wilson nor anybody else is going to

rewrite it until you've passed on it."

The managing editor saw a bedraggled figure with a firm-set jaw and

a level glance which looked him squarely in the eyes. He took in the

sea-stained clothes, and the burned and grimy face, and smiled as he

said:

"I'll read it, Mr. Wilson. Go home and come back at six o'clock. Then

we'll talk it over. You've been through a tremendous experience,

haven't you? It's your story. Don't fret about that."

When James Arbuthnot Wilson next entered the managing editor's office,

that dignified personage grasped his hand and exclaimed:

"My son, why haven't I known you could write a story like this? It's

the real thing. It's a masterpiece. Where did you learn how?"

The boy's face twitched as he said very slowly:

"The man who taught me how died in sight of home. It's his story. It

isn't mine at all. I want a day off, if you please, to go down to Lewes

again. I'm--I'm the last of the _Albatross_."