"It lies between you and me," he went on. "The evidence at present is
all against you, while there is nothing against me, and nothing in my
record to indicate that I would set fire to the house I had lived in,
but did not own."
"But if your record was known," I growled, "there would be indications
bearing upon this."
"I see. You have listened to my sister. Do you think she would come
into court and swear away the liberty of her brother?"
A chill passed through me at this, but I answered doggedly: "Don't
know. It depends, I suppose, upon how much she thinks of her precious
brother."
"And also," he said softly, "upon how much _you_ think of _her_.
She took you--in my behalf, of course, though that might not be
proved--into her home at midnight when I was supposed to be in
Philadelphia. Do you care to have her cross-examined upon that point,
first by the prosecuting attorney who will try you, and then by my
lawyer in case I am tried?"
"Damn your wretched heart and soul!" I yelled. "Would you shield
yourself behind your sister's good name? Would you permit it, even to
save your miserable life?"
"Not so loud, please. I answer that question in kind. Would you?"
"No!" I thundered. "A thousand times no!"
"Then plead guilty. My sister, who is a very resourceful and
self-possessed girl, turned in the fire alarm as the quickest way
to end our little difficulty, and she is in New York this morning,
believing that you and I walked out. But it was I who notified the
policeman of my discovering a firebug at work in my deserted home.
You have given a wrong name, and she will not be interested in the
little noise your trial will make--unless, I suppose, you arouse that
interest."
He got up to call the warden, and I was upon him as the words left his
lips. But I did not harm him much; I had not the time. I dropped him at
the muzzle of the warden's pistol, and cooled down at my leisure.
I did not plead guilty; I remained doggedly silent, however, and not
even the efforts of the lawyer appointed to defend me availed to
mitigate my sentence. I had been caught red-handed, had made a furious
assault upon the kindly disposed tenant of the house I had fired, and
this, indicating a deep, dark vengeance based upon some real or fancied
wrong, brought me the swift, harsh decree of Jersey justice--five years
in the Trenton penitentiary. And so not even notifying my captain, I
sank out of sight as completely as though I had signed for a voyage and
sailed.
Five years behind the bars will alter the character--yes, even the
soul--of any man living. And I do not claim that mine was changed
for the better. I began that five years with the faint hope that,
somehow, Grace Morton would learn of my plight and devise means to
free me. Then, as this hope left me with the passing of the months,
a dull, apathetic inertia took possession of me, and I worked, ate,
and slept as mechanically as an animal. Then came the meridian of my
imprisonment, when two years and a half had expired, and I could look
forward to release. With this prospect in view my mind woke to a keener
activity than it had ever known under the spur of ambition; for that
ambition was based upon a love for a girl that was now eclipsed by a
hatred for her brother. I looked forward to freedom, not that I might
win that girl, but that I might find that man--somewhere, and alone.
As for Grace Morton, the doubt often came to my mind as to whether I
ever had loved her. I had really known her only as a prattling child;
I had met her once, as a woman, and in the fervor of my sudden emotion
had embraced and kissed her. Was that love? Was her acquiescence the
sign of a mental invitation, or only the acceptance of a matter of
course? Was the sister of such a brother worth loving?
Yet these unsettled doubts invariably crystallized unto the hope that
she would so prove herself, and with this hope in mind my plans for
vengeance never embraced the killing of my enemy, only the meeting
with him, alone in some secluded place, where I could use my superior
strength and skill and thrash him within an inch of his life.
In one way my imprisonment had refined me, or rather, worn off the
rough spots acquired at sea. Good behavior had brought no commutation
of my five years' sentence, but it had brought me light tasks instead
of hard ones, and one of these was the care of the prison library,
which gave me communion with many good books.
So I emerged at last with none of the working sailor about me except
in my mind, and none of the prisoner except the cropped hair and cell
pallor. These last I got rid of in a short coasting voyage before the
mast, and then, with my chest, money, and discharges replevined from
the Philadelphia boarding master who had faithfully cared for them, I
visited my old home. Here I learned that my imprisonment was not known
and that George Morton and his sister were traveling in Europe for the
shattered health of the former. Then, with the unregenerate hope that
soon it would be given me to shatter that health still further, I went
back to my battle of life, for in love, war, or work a man must live.
Luck was with me from the start. I signed before the mast and filled a
sick second mate's place before the ship had reached the line. And at
Hongkong found my old captain, who had a first mate's berth vacant, and
was glad to get me back without asking questions. A few questions to
him, however, brought out the reason of this delicacy.
"If you young fellows knew," he remarked dryly, "all that you surely
learn later, you'd let the stuff alone. I'm part owner here, and when
you went on that drunk and quit me I had made up my mind to put you in
command. 'Tend to business, now, and you can take her out next voyage."
"I'll make good, sir," I answered, pleased with the prospect, and
willing to be thought an ex-drunkard rather than an ex-convict.
"But keep still about it," he said. "The principal owner is on board
for the trip home. Your job is to impress him before the proposition is
put up to him. He's somewhat crotchety and queer."
I joined the ship--a big, black, skysail yarder, filled to the hatches
with sugar and jute--as she was lifting her anchor. We went to sea in
a gale, and for two days and two nights I had not time to unpack my
chest, much less to take note of my surroundings and the impression
I was creating as a first mate fitted to command. I saw the owner
occasionally in the brief lulls of shortening down--a tall, spare
figure, muffled to the nose in a hooded mackintosh--but I did not meet
him until the morning of the third day out, when, after an hour or two
of sleep, I turned out for a look around before going to breakfast, and
there, in the forward companion, ran plump into him. The next moment
I had him by the throat, position, prospects, honor, love, and liberty
going down before the uprush of rage and hatred.
There flashed into my mind at that moment a memory from boyhood,
forgotten through the years, of his father being largely interested
in shipping, but it was futile, irrelevant, and left me as it came;
then, while he sagged under my grip, there came to me the picture of
Grace Morton's frightened face as she had turned it up to me in the
lamplight. But I forced it from me. That love is dead, I thought, and
I hissed the thought through my teeth with my curses. Then, thinking
of the long, bitter years in prison, the suffering and the shame, the
thwarted hopes and plans, the struggle to maintain my integrity for
the sake of a girl that had forgotten me, and knowing only that the
cause of it all was right here, in my hands, I felt what I had not felt
before--the impulse, the desire, and the self-justification to kill.
But I did not kill him. I relaxed my hold and looked into the same
frightened face that had appealed to me once before. Older now, with
lines of care and trouble in it, but more womanly and commanding. She
stood in the dining-room door, and had commanded me to stop; and I
obeyed her. Her brother slunk past her into the dining-room. The second
mate was on deck, the steward had not come aft with the breakfast. The
captain had not come through from the after cabin. None but the girl
had seen the assault.
"Go to your room, George," she called to him through the door. "Wait
for me, and say nothing to the captain."
Then she turned, and calmly regarded me. On my part, I stood before her
like a culprit, trembling, and with my tongue dry against the roof of
my mouth.
"Jack," she said, "I have watched you through this window since we
sailed, watched you in your strength and mastery of your calling. And
I have listened to your voice, that roused me from sleep on the first
night, and which I recognized as yours. And I said to myself that you
were a man, that you must be a man, and that I may have misjudged you.
But here, you assault an invalid for a quarrel over five years old,
that began in my behalf, I admit, but which ended in your own."
"An invalid," I managed to say. "A quarrel--in my behalf? Go on,
please, Miss Morton."
"In your own," she repeated. "Of course, I do not know how men feel,
and what the best may say at times about--about a woman. But could you
not let it drop, instead of resuming it here, on this ship, where I am
a passenger?"
"Please explain. You let _me_ drop, Miss Morton, when I needed you; but
I have not complained. It seems that the slightest inquiry must have
apprised you of my extremity. It seems that something might have been
done that would not compromise you."
It was her turn to be mystified. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Do you
deny me dignity, self-respect, pride, or confidence in myself? Could I
_inquire_ about a man who had taken advantage of my momentary weakness
and boasted of it? Not only boasted, but threatened to a member of my
family that he would follow up his advantage for revenge at a beating?"
"Boasted! Revenge at a beating! Grace, explain yourself. You are
accusing me of something. What is it? Boasting that I kissed you?"
"That," she said, looking defiantly into my face, while two red spots
came to her cheeks. "That, and threatening my brother, after your
defeat at his hands, with making your mastery complete."
"The damnable scoundrel!" I said explosively. "Did he tell you that
lie? Did he say that he defeated me?"
"I saw him getting the best of you," she said, with a little doubt in
her face.
"Because I did not want to hurt your brother. Did you turn in an alarm?"
"Yes."
"Before the firemen came your brother had got away from me and ran.
Then I, remaining to extinguish the fire, was arrested for causing it."
"Arrested?" Her eyes opened in wonder and alarm.
"And the best proof, Miss Morton," I said grimly, "that I am too much
of a man to boast about a woman, is that I served five years in Trenton
prison rather than call upon you to clear me."
"You did? Jack!"
Tears started to her eyes, but I went on relentlessly:
"The case was well outlined to me by your brother on the morning after
my arrest. He had sent the policeman into the house after me, and
having succeeded so far, called upon me in jail to carry it further. I
was to plead guilty so as not to attract attention to him. The evidence
was against me. I was caught adding fuel to the fire, and with my face
and clothing smeared with oil. My only chance was that the girl that
I loved would come forward. She did not, and I could not ask her. No
doubt, your brother told you that lie to kill any interest or curiosity
you may have felt concerning me."
For a moment I thought she was going to faint. She paled to the tips of
her small ears, staggered back, and leaned against the bulkhead, her
lips parted and her eyes staring at me in wonder and horror.
"Why--why," she gasped, "why did you not tell me?"
"To ask that you save me at your brother's expense?" I answered.
"To place you on the stand, where the lawyers could bait you? To
compromise you? To shield myself behind a woman's good name? No, Miss
Morton, whatever I may have become under the influence of stripes and
confinement, I was, at that time, a graduate of Annapolis--an officer
and a gentleman."
She shrank away from me and seemed about to fall. Then, having spoken
my mind, the bitterness left me, and I would have gone back to prison
could I have unsaid my words. The old love replaced the hate, and I
reached forward, just to touch her hand, if I might; but she drew it
away.
"Don't," she whispered weakly. "Don't. I didn't know; I didn't know."
She was not speaking to me, and for a moment I hesitated. Then I
forcibly turned her face to mine and looked into her eyes, swimming
with tears. "It's all right, Grace," I said huskily. "Never mind."
"I would have come," she said, in a firmer voice, "but I did not--"
I had my arms around her now, and for a moment she lay unresisting, her
face close to mine; but the next moment she struggled free.
"The girl that you loved," she said softly, accenting the last word.
"And love now," I rejoined, seizing her again. Then I flung her from me
and bolted into my room, on the port side of the passage.
The captain had appeared in the dining-room, and seven bells--breakfast
time--rang on deck. When she reached the deck I went in to my breakfast.
That evening, in the last dog-watch, Grace came to me at the
weather-mizzen rigging.
"I have questioned him, Jack, and at last he admitted it," she said.
"He is a nervous wreck, has been so for a year, and now I know why.
Your term was coming to an end and for fear of you he has dragged me
all over Europe and the Orient. He had you watched and knew by cable
that you had shipped for Hongkong, but did not imagine that you would
join this ship, which he found here on our arrival. He did not expect
you here for a month."
"We made a fast passage out," I answered. "But what about him? What is
to be done with him? Is he still a pyromaniac?"
"I do not know. It is congenital, and may break out at any time. But at
any rate, I am through with him. He has forfeited all my regard. When
we get home I shall remain there."
"And I suppose you do not want the captain informed of his weakness for
fire?"
"Not unless you think it necessary, Jack."
"I think not," I said. "He is very properly scared and subdued, and
knows that I will be watching him."
There was little further intercourse between George Morton and myself.
He appeared on deck occasionally, but usually in my watch below, and
when we met he would turn his head away, much to the chagrin of the
captain, who had no knowledge of conditions. He was pale, emaciated,
and fidgety in his manner, evidently a very sick man, and beyond
all thought of punishment; but I felt no regret at the loss of my
vengeance--I had won something better, and was content.
His attitude toward his sister, however, was one of doglike devotion
and apology, while hers was one of toleration and contempt. He would
hasten to meet her at the companion, to help her to a seat, to bring
rugs or books, satisfied if she murmured a mere word of thanks. Then he
would banish himself and look at her hungrily, waiting to be called.
There is no doubt that, up to the limits of his narrow soul, he loved
his sister; but it was a love based upon possession--the property
instinct, the love of a dog for a cached bone, a bird for its perch, a
cat for those who have housed and fed her. He had lost something, and
wanted it back; and as it was lost forever I feared for that other love
that was part of his being--his love of fire.
I could not watch him when asleep, nor depute the task to others--all
I could do was to overhaul the deck and force pumps, make up an extra
supply of draw-buckets, and examine all approaches to the inflammable
jute in the hold. In that last I found nothing to alarm me. It could
not be reached except through the hatches, which were all battened
down. And it was all in the lower hold; on top of the ballast tiers of
sugar, and above it, stowed in the 'tween deck, was the rest of the
sugar. He could not set fire to the sugar, even if he reached it.
Yet in the hot, blistering heat of the Indian Ocean, when we had lain
for days in a calm that was harder on our nerves than a hurricane,
smoke filtered up through the seams in the cabin flooring--smoke with
the pungent odor of burning jute; and the first man to notice it was
George Morton.
"Done it, by heavens!" I growled, as I turned out in answer to the
captain's quiet call.
There was a consultation in the cabin of the after-guard, to which
were called the cook and steward, carpenter and sailmaker, and the two
boatswains from the forecastles. All of these reported the smell of
smoke in the compartments of the forward house, and the boatswain said
that it was plainly noticeable at the fore and main hatches. Grace
and her brother were listening; in Grace's face were uncertainty and
apprehension, in her brother's, as he darted furtive glances at me, the
deadly fear of immediate denunciation; but whether there was guilt or
not I could not determine.
No one could guess how the fire had started, and only two points were
elucidated from the discussion, both bearing upon the captain's opinion
that nothing could be done at present but to keep the hatches on and
smother it. The carpenter ventured the opinion that the fire could not
be smothered. "For the ship is a sieve, captain," he said. "You know I
told you so in Hongkong, and wanted you to calk her, topsides, deck,
and all. There's millions of little holes to let the air in."
"And even so," added Morton, "the interstices between the barrels of
sugar hold air that can be drawn upon."
"Right," said the captain impatiently, and a little sadly. "But it's
too late to calk every seam in this ship, and if it don't smother out,
and we can't make port, this ship is gone. All we can do is wait, for
if we open hatches and jettison sugar to get at it, we'll only give it
more draft."
So, we waited, but while waiting, headed the ship toward Calcutta, if
not to save our lives, at least to meet with some craft that could
deluge our jute with water--a large steamer, with power pumps and hose.
But nothing came our way, and the days and weeks went on, with the
deadening calm still engulfing us, and the deck growing hotter each
hour. Soon the smoke became visible, curling up in countless little
spirals, where the minute holes gave it egress.
Morton faced me one day, his eyes wide open and his face twitching. "I
know what you think," he stammered. "You think I set fire to the cargo.
But I swear by all I reverence that I did not. My sister believes in
me."
"Mr. Morton," I answered, steadily as I could, for I never was my real
self in his presence, "perhaps you did not. But all that makes me
think so is my utter inability to comprehend how you could do it. A man
who will fire a seminary will fire a ship at sea."
He slunk away from me, so pitiable and wretched an object that
immediately I was sorry for my words. After that I spoke kindly to him
whenever it was necessary to speak at all.
Work went on as usual; not that, in this doomed ship, painting and
scrubbing were necessary, but to keep the crew's minds off the danger
and the formulating of futile plans and suggestions--which always
comes of idleness. But in spite of this, mutterings of discontent were
heard, and in the interests of peace, I abolished all work except the
continuous washing down of the hot deck, night and day. And at this
monotonous work men would go to sleep in their tracks, waking when they
fell over.
I had long noticed the peculiar mental effect of the jute smoke
on myself, at first a tendency to day-dreams and a lazy, sleepy
indifference to our danger; later a trancelike condition in which
voices were not heard, or if heard not noticed, and the whole inner
consciousness busy with serene contemplation of the past, the present,
and the future, mingled with visions of green trees and flowers, sounds
of tinkling water, and music that seemed not of earth.
All this brought no misgiving to my mind until I wakened, prone upon
the blistering deck one night, with no recollection of my falling. Then
I regarded it as serious, and in the morning spoke to the captain.
"Yes, we must quit," he said mournfully, "while we have our senses.
It is the soporific principle of the jute, akin to that of hasheesh,
which is made from Indian hemp. No one could sleep below without that
continuous narcotic, and such sleep is dangerous. I had trouble waking
you yesterday. Capsize the boats and provision them. The ship may
burst into flames at any moment, and when she does, she'll go quickly.
She's dry as a chip."
We numbered about thirty, all told, and to accommodate this many we had
three good boats, upside down on the forward house. These I soon had
over the side, floating light upon the smooth sea at the ends of their
painters, and we provisioned them as heavily as was safe with our added
weight. When all was ready I reported.
"And none too soon," answered the captain. "Look there!" He pointed
forward, where the tarpaulin of the main hatch had lifted like a great
bubble from the pressure of hot air and gases beneath. "There is
dunnage under the hatch and it is afire, Mr. Morton," he said, turning
to our passenger, "you and your sister will go in the boat with me. I
will bring her up when I bring my papers."
I had no mind for this. I turned away, and while directing the manning
of the boats, did some deep and desperate thinking. Put her in an open
boat with a lunatic brother and a doddering old skipper, I fumed? Not
much.
As the men swarmed down, Grace appeared in the forward companion. I
beckoned to her, and she came. We had already rigged a whip from the
fore yardarm, and in a "bosun's chair" at the end of this I quickly
hoisted her over the side and into my boat. George, leaving his sister
to the captain's care, had descended to his boat on the other side.
When all were over but the captain and myself, the former appeared on
deck.
"Where is Miss Morton?" he called. "I cannot find her."
"In the boat, captain," I truthfully yelled. "Hurry up, sir. There's no
time to lose."
I pointed, as he had done, to the main hatch. The bubble had burst,
and up from the rent rose a column of smoke.
"Go ahead, sir," he answered. "I must be last."