THE MEETING
Now, owing to the way in which Priscilla kept her cabin when not
absolutely driven on deck by the foulness of the air below, she was,
strange as it must appear, quite ignorant of what was going on above
her. Had the steward not been exceedingly busy upon some domestic task,
he would, poor little man, have gladly carried her the news. But so it
was, the boat’s crew had been rescued, the boat hoisted inboard, and
things had all resumed their normal course without her being any the
wiser. And yet somehow she felt a lightening of the heart. She felt
sure, in spite of the coarse and brutal way in which her husband had
received her vision, that he had done, or would do, what she had asked
him--she had no anxiety upon that head at all. But then she was never
anxious now. She had cultivated unintentionally the serene detachment
of mind of those Indian devotees who, by dint of long meditation and
abstinence from all but the barest necessities in the way of food and
sleep, have attained unto a condition of mind that is favourable to
the detachment of body from soul without the catastrophe of death. Of
its psychology I know nothing, but I do feel that, given sufficient
will power, the human brain may be capable of some wonderful power of
sending thought waves out into the unseen. It does not matter, anyhow,
since I only wish to record the trance condition in which Priscilla
seemed now to spend most of her time.
But in some mysterious way she was subconsciously easier in her mind,
and that although she knew absolutely nothing about what was going on.
Also her husband seemed, for some reason or another, to be anxious
that she should not know. Perhaps he was ashamed, or whatever kindred
feeling to shame he might be capable of, to let her know that he had,
after all, obeyed her words and found that she had been absolutely
correct. Truth to tell, he was immensely impressed, and something very
like fear of his wife was slowly getting the mastery over him. Thus
days went by as the _Grampus_ drew steadily towards the great East
Indian Archipelago, and the rescued ones grew steadily well by dint of
careful letting alone and the help of their previous clean lives. Then
there came a day when Captain Da Silva took it upon him to have the
apparent head man of the boat’s crew he had saved brought aft to him,
and the following colloquy ensued. (It must be borne in mind that the
rescued men’s voices had only just returned to them.)
The Captain: ‘Wall, wut ship d’ ye b’long to?’ The Officer: ‘_Xiphias_,
sir, of New Bedford.’ A grunt from the skipper and a short interval
of silence. Then the skipper spoke again, after carefully rolling his
cigar between his lips, as if to extract the last grain of nicotine
out of it. ‘’N’ wut wuz ye doin’ t’ git lost? Sounds funny, grown
men like you air gittin’ lost.’ The scorn and contempt and utter
brutality of his manner passed all description. ‘Wall, sir,’ replied
the mate faintly, ‘the circumstances wuz peculiar. We left the ship
in chase of a whale just before a hurricane kem on, an’ I hung on t’
the whale mebbe a bit too long, so ’t we got outer sight o’ the ship.
’N’ then we’d all we knew t’ keep in shelter ov th’ carcass till thet
awful weather wuz over. ’N’ by thet time th’ whale wuz so blown up we
couldn’t stand his stink any longer, an’ we cut away from him an’ put
fur th’ Seychelles as near as I could judge. But there wuz only th’
lantern keg of bread an’ th’ ushal water, an’ thet’s all we’ve a-had
fur twelve days. If th’ boys hadn’t been th’ very best we sh’d all
a-ben mad long ago.’ Another spell of silence, broken at last by the
skipper saying: ‘S’pose you don’ reckon on ever seeing yewr ship agen,
hey? Le’s see, old man Hampden got her, er had her, I think. Ef so,
they ain’t ’nough of her left by this time t’ repair a whaleboat with.
He was a soft-hearted old greenie, anyhow, kinder pious, I seem to
remember, ’n’ didn’t know his nose fr’m the jibboom end.’ ‘Excuse me,
sir,’ said the mate suddenly, with some energy, ’thet kain’t be eour
Capt’n Hampden. I ben fishin’ fur two-an’-twenty year, and he wuz the
smartest skipper at anything a skipper ought to do ’at ever I gammed.’
‘Oh, shet yer big mouth, yew wouldn’t know a smart man w’en yew see
him. It’s the same man right enough. I knew him very well, an’ wouldn’t
ha’ carried him fur ballast in my ship. But I ain’t got no time t’ be
yarnin’ with yew, ner inclination either if yer come to thet. I’m jest
figgerin’ eout wut t’ dew with ye. I want a few han’s, an’ although
yew ain’t th’ kind I’d have if I c’d choose, y’r better than none, I
s’pose, an’ so I’ll ship th’ five of yew ’n’ give ye th’ 250th lay,
same’s th’ rest of th’ men ’r gettin’.’ ‘But, Captain,’ replied the now
thoroughly alarmed man, ‘I wuz mate of the _Xiphias_--I ben mate fur
th’ las’ ten years, ’n’ yew kain’t mean t’ take such a slice of my life
as to ship me here fur a three years’ cruise on a seaman’s lay. In th’
name ov common humanity, sir, yew kain’t mean it.’ And the big drops of
sweat started out of the poor fellow’s face. ‘Kain’t I!’ sneered the
skipper. ‘Jest yew say yew don’ know, and yew’ll be more ’n half right.
I k’n an’ dew mean just that thing. Yew’ll take my offer, yew an’ the
rest ov th’ great babies ’at come with ye, ’r if ye don’t yew’ll wish
yew’d been left to rot in thet boat. ’N’ mine yew, not a word outa yewr
heads, ’r ye’ll fine me t’ deal with, ’n I’ll try an’ teach ye wut a
smart cap’n is.’
Poor Mr. Pease! No braver man ever stepped, but he was weak and
trembling from exhaustion. A strong desire to live had returned to
him, and, moreover, he was overborne by the fierceness of the terrible
man with whom he was confronted, and he dimly remembered some of the
terrible stories current about him--of the dark deeds done by him in
the secret places of the sea, and up till now with impunity, because of
his phenomenal success as a whale-fisher. When will people in business
learn that it is a crime against man and God to condone, yes, connive
at abominable wickedness in those they have set over their employees,
because, forsooth, they are ‘smart men’? When will people learn to
brand a man as a demon, whatever his place in society or the Church or
in business, who, in his villainous methods of getting rich, brings woe
and death unto thousands of homes? When will ministers of the Gospel
dare to say to such men bringing their vilely acquired wealth and
pouring it into the coffers of the Church, ‘Thy money perish with thee!’
So with this terror upon him, Mr. Pease signed the articles, and his
crew followed suit, becoming by that act the slaves of the skipper
for the next three years unless some heaven-sent happening should
release them. And immediately, though they were yet so exhausted,
they were set to such work as they could do--making sinnet, scraping,
and mat-weaving. Well was it for them that no whales were sighted, or
assuredly they would have been called upon to take their places in the
various boats, under which severe treatment they would probably have
died.
It may perhaps be thought strange that as yet no allusion has been
made to the strange fact of Reuben and Priscilla being on board the
same ship at last. But really, as far as these two principal actors
in our story are concerned, it did not seem possible that anything
should come of it, the circumstances being so peculiar. As repeatedly
observed, Priscilla came on deck but little, for she could not bear
the jealous watchfulness with which her husband followed her every
movement. And in the fo’c’sle, or, indeed, out of it, such was the
terror under which all hands lived, not merely of the skipper, but of
his Portuguese allies, that any conversation concerning the skipper was
tacitly banned. No word ever passed between the white men about him or
his affairs. The Portuguese may have discussed him freely, but as it
was in their own tongue, no one but themselves was any the wiser. Thus
it came to pass that Reuben was on board the ship a month before he so
much as knew that the Captain had his wife with him, which is all the
more noteworthy from the fact that in small vessels like the _Grampus_
it is the rule that the Captain cannot sneeze in the solitude of his
state-room without it being known and commented upon all over the
ship in an hour. Poor fellows, they have so little to talk about. But
whalers generally needed to be exempt from this law. Their discipline
was much too strict for it to run even in the best of them, while in
the _Grampus_, as we have seen, it was in the highest degree dangerous
to mention the Captain’s name at all.
The ship had passed through the Straits of Sunda into the Java Sea,
and was one night, under the skilful pilotage of the skipper, working
her darkling way westward along the south coast of Borneo. There was
but little wind, except occasionally when a passing squall gave a
heavier puff than usual, causing the staunch and well-balanced ship to
heel like a yacht. Terrific peals of thunder and blazing flashes of
lightning followed one another in quick succession, for the heat of
the day was being healthfully dispersed over the sea from the land,
although in a somewhat terrifying manner. Rube was at the wheel,
his great figure erect and head slightly turned aside to listen for
the skipper’s slightest word, while keeping one eye fixed upon the
faithful little face of the compass suspended inside the skylight.
Suddenly there was an awful crash of thunder as if a Himalayan Range
were tumbling to pieces, a short breathless hush, and with a hiss as
of escaping steam, sky and sea were flooded with violet flame. As Rube
raised his arm instinctively to shield his face he saw by that brief
blaze a woman facing him within a few feet. For that vivid instant
the two faces were revealed, then utter blackness succeeded. Through
Priscilla rushed a spasm of fear. Who was this huge bearded stranger,
and whence had he come? More, why did the sight of him put her poor
deadened mind into such a ferment as the optic nerves experience when
after long darkness the eyes are suddenly exposed to the glare of day?
As she groped her way below these things flitted across her brain, but
never for one moment did she imagine why or how, and soon, very soon,
she resumed her listless introspective attitude again. She had only
crept up with some message to her husband of trivial import, and soon
the whole incident receded to the background of her mind.
As for Reuben, for one moment he thought he had been struck by
lightning, and with the stroke had come a vision of an angel, a
sorrowful angel outlined in living light. But the shock, great though
it was, did not suffice to unlock that closed door of memory, only to
let a few broken gleams of illumination through, tantalising, almost
maddening in their incompleteness. He soon recovered, and when relieved
from the wheel at eight bells, sought one of the American portion of
the old crew and whispered, ‘Is they a woman aboard this ship?’ ‘Hush,
for Heaven’s sake. If the skipper gits to know you’ve asked such a
question, or I’ve answered it, he’ll trice us up an’ flog us, sure’s
death. An’ ye kain’t breathe here without somebody listening. Yes.’
‘Thanks,’ replied Rube; and straightway going to his bunk he lifted up
his heart in fervent though silent prayer for the owner of that sweet
pale face. In doing this he but obeyed an irresistible impulse, since
he knew not at all of Priscilla’s suffering, and, indeed, even before
the accident which shut him off from the past, had always thought of
her as being full of happiness with her husband. Now, however, knowing
no more of who Priscilla was than of a person he had never seen or
heard of, he was full of a mysterious compassion for her, and felt that
he would gladly have laid down his life to serve her.
The crew of the _Grampus_ never ate any idle bread, but now they were
indeed having a time of travail. For Captain Da Silva was making
a passage to the Japan grounds, being mightily wroth because of
the ill-success which had attended him lately. The wonderful good
fortune enjoyed by him previously had been relegated to the limbo of
forgotten things. He felt no joy in it now, looked upon it as only
a bare reward for his phenomenal ability and smartness, of which no
man was more fully conscious than himself. So he harassed his crew by
night and by day, making, trimming, furling, sail; so that no breath
of wind should be wasted, and when, as occasionally happened, a dead
calm befell, getting all the boats out and setting their crews to tow
the vessel along with their oars. It was a fearful ordeal in that
climate, and some of the crew were only kept at it by sheer dread of
the skipper. They feared him more than sunstroke or death by sheer
exhaustion. It was this state of things which brought about a collision
between him and Reuben. The latter stalwart recruit being always so
willing and apparently eager to work, had hitherto escaped even the
usual opprobrious epithets with which most of the crew, except the
Portuguese, were favoured. But because no occasion of fault could be
found in him he was jealously watched by the skipper’s cronies, and, as
it was bound to do sooner or later, the longed-for opportunity came.
The boats had just returned to the ship, after a four hours’ tow in
the afternoon sun, because a little breeze had sprung up and relieved
them. The boat in which Reuben pulled midship oar had just come
alongside, and Mr. Pease, who had been pulling tub-oar (next to Rube)
had fainted, overcome by heat and exhaustion. Unfortunately, just then
the skipper looked over the side, and taking in the position of things
with one glance of his flashing eyes, shouted with an awful Portuguese
oath, ‘Start that lazy Yankee brute there, Pedro! Hit him, hit him
with anything!’ Pedro, not at all unwillingly, seized a bight of the
towline, and was just about to deal the unconscious man a tremendous
blow, when Rube, calmly turning round, seized the descending arm, and
with his other hand quietly wrenched the rope from the harpooner’s
fingers. The maddened Portuguese snatched his knife from his belt at
the moment of his release, and with his skipper’s yell of ‘Kill him,
kill him!’ piercing his ears, made one frantic stab at Rube. But as
calmly as he had caught the rope-wielding wrist, so now he caught the
murderous one, and with a quick twist made Pedro drop his knife into
the sea. A yell of pain escaped the Portuguese as his wrist cracked,
and Rube, releasing him, said quietly, ‘Sorry t’ hurt ye, shipmate,
but ye mustn’t kill, y’ know.’ By this time the skipper had recovered
from the speechlessness of rage into which he had been thrown by Rube’s
action, and shouted, ‘On deck with ye, on deck!’ All obeyed but the
man who had fainted: he was beyond obedience. As Rube stepped over the
rail the skipper met him with a blow of a heavy bludgeon of oak that
might have felled an ox. Right across the head and face it came, and
the splendid fellow dropped senseless and bleeding at his master’s
feet. Stooping, the latter dragged the unconscious body to the middle
of the deck, and sang out, ‘Up waist boat.’ But the white men stood
irresolute for one moment as if inclined to resent the vileness of this
last assault. That moment was fatal. For without a sign made every
Portuguese in the ship had ranged himself by the skipper, and in their
hands gleamed revolver barrels. Howling out the order again, the unled
whites seized the falls and ran the boat up on to her cranes. One of
the Portuguese asked if the man was to be lifted out of the boat, but
the skipper turned upon him with an oath so fierce that he shrank back,
regretting that he had spoken.
No one dared suggest aid to Rube, and so, with the knowledge that again
he had fully asserted his superiority over the white man, Captain Da
Silva went quite happy to his supper. And sitting there with his wife,
he could not forbear saying exultantly: ‘Nice crowd o’ hogs these
countrymen o’ yours are. I d’ ’no’ wut I wuz fool ’nough t’ take any
of ’em aboard here for at all. Some of ’em kem aboard through yew,
anyhow--one ’specially I remember just now. I’m goin’ t’ give myself
th’ pleasure of floggin’ him to-morrow, if he ain’t dead, and yew shall
be a witness to see it’s all done legally, y’ know.’ And he winked
hideously at her. She, poor thing, sat as usual silent and white,
hardly realising the horror of the whole thing. And her misery of mind
and body was only slightly increased when, as a sort of praise-meeting
to whatever devil they felt protected by, the skipper invited the
Portuguese harpooners below to a drinking bout, first locking
Priscilla into her room. The baffled Pedro was there with his arm in
a sling, looking a veritable fiend. ‘Never mind,’ said the skipper in
Portuguese, ‘yew shall have the flogging of that big Yankee beast if
he lives. What do you think of that?’ Pedro muttered some inarticulate
profanity and took another drink. He did not mind much what was done as
long as he ‘got even,’ as he termed it. And now it is time to draw a
veil over that bestial scene, worthy of the worst days of the pirates,
and especially those Portuguese pirates who sailed the China Seas
commanding gangs composed of all the scum of the Far East and outdoing
them all in cruelty.
On deck a stealthy figure had crept forward to where Rube lay, with a
mat to put under his head and a little water to moisten his parched
lips. It was the poor darky steward, who had been shut out of the
cabin while the drinking was going on, and who thus, for pity’s sake,
risked undergoing the same treatment. Not that it would have been much
novelty, for there was scarcely an inch of the poor wretch’s body which
had not its scar. And at last men get used to such treatment (some men,
that is) and take it as a matter of course. It is pleasant to record
that this poor samaritan was enabled to carry out his beneficent little
ministration unseen, save by Mr. Court, who still kept his watch,
although in a dogged sullen way that was intensely painful to see, but
which, strange to say, did not seem to detract from his efficiency.
But, as he said to himself very often in the solitudes wherein his
soul roamed during the night watches, was there ever an officer so
treated? He did not know, from his favourable position heretofore in
American ships, that many hundred British mercantile officers have
had to endure treatment even worse than his, because they have been,
as well as kept at arm’s length by the skipper and made to feel that
they were of less account than anybody on board, openly and constantly
reviled before all the crew, and then expected to maintain discipline.
Happily, with the morning came, instead of the shameful exhibition
purposed by the skipper, a diversion welcomed by all hands, except
Rube, who, but for his stertorous breathing, appeared to be dead. It
was the raising of a ‘pod’ of cow whales at daylight, with a brisk
breeze and everything in favour of a splendid day’s hunting. Rube was
dragged aft out of the way. Pedro, whose wrist was so badly strained
that he could not lift a harpoon with it, grumblingly took up his
station aloft for signalling purposes, and in ten minutes from the time
of sighting the whales five boats were away, the skipper leading as
usual. This, however, was to be an exception to the usual celerity of
capture shown by the _Grampus’s_ crew. In the first place, the whales
were going so fast that it seemed for a long while as if the chase
must be fruitless; and then, when at last the boats did rush in among
them, their movements were so marvellously agile that the danger was
very great. The skipper as usual seemed ubiquitous, compelling the
admiration of all by the way he manipulated his boat. He had already
killed his whale when he saw that Mr. Court was exceedingly hampered
by the movements of a loose cow, which behaved as if she understood
exactly how best to frustrate all the deadly intentions of the enemy of
her companion. Without a moment’s hesitation the skipper cut loose from
his whale, shouted to his men, and tore off to help the mate, leaping
like a flying fish from one boat to the other as they flew swiftly in
opposite directions. Snatching the lance from the hand of the amazed
officer, he had just dealt a tremendous blow at the fast whale with it,
when, as the boat lay off, the loose whale rose spectrally between,
on her back, with her jaws agape. Swiftly turning, those great jaws
closed, catching the skipper’s arm, with which he was poising his newly
straightened lance again, and dragging him headlong out of the boat.
Paralysed with horror, the mate stood for a moment, then stooped and
caught the skipper as he came bounding to the surface almost at the
spot where he went overboard. But in doing so Mr. Court overbalanced
himself, and he and the skipper, interlocked in each other’s arms,
went down again. The harpooner, a wonderfully smart black Portuguese,
immediately cut the line, allowing the whale to run, and after a minute
or two’s manœuvring, succeeded in bringing the mate and skipper to the
surface and into the boat, the latter almost dead.
[Illustration: THE LOOSE WHALE ROSE SPECTRALLY BETWEEN, ON HER BACK,
WITH HER JAWS AGAPE.
_P. 295._]
The best haste possible was made to the ship, and the skipper was
carefully lifted on board, laid on the deck aft, and his clothes cut
off as the only way of uncovering his wounded arm and side. All the
time the examination took place he was unconscious, so the mate was
able to dress the extensive lacerations, set two broken ribs and the
mangled arm, and make him fairly comfortable before he came to. Then
with very great care he was lowered through the cabin skylight and laid
upon the settee in his berth. Here he was left to the care of his wife,
while the mate returned to his arduous duties on deck. It is pleasant
to record that his first care was to see some adequate attention given
to the case of Rube, who was moaning and tossing ceaselessly in the
throes of brain fever.