There was one circumstance that counted against Brander in the eyes of
James Tichel, of Mr. Cox, and of some of the crew. This was the fact
that for close on a month after he was made an officer, the _Sally Sims_
sighted not one loose whale.
There were fish all about them. During the interval, they sighted three
other whaling craft, and stopped to gam with them. Two of the three were
cutting in when the _Sally_ sighted them; the third had just finished
trying out the blubber of a ninety barrel bull. But the _Sally_ sighted
not so much as a spout. And old Tichel, who had the superstitions of the
sea in his blood, began to look sidewise at Brander, and whisper that he
was a Jonah....
That new moon in whose light Dan'l tried to plead with Faith was another
ill omen. Noll Wing, coming on deck the first night the moon appeared,
saw it first over his left shoulder when Faith called to him to look. He
swung his head to the left.... Saw the moon.... And old Tichel's cry was
too late to stop him. Faith laughed at the second mate; Noll grumbled at
him. But Tichel clung to his doubts; and Willis Cox was converted to
them by the indisputable fact that the _Sally_ sighted no whales.
The men on a whaling vessel have an interest in the cruise. They are not
paid for the work they do, for the time they spend.... They are paid
according to the earnings of the vessel. Their salary, or wage, is
called a "lay." This ranges from the captain's lay down to that of the
greeny. The captain's is a twelfth; or at least this was Noll Wing's
lay. The greenies on the _Sally Sims_ were on a hundred and
seventy-fifth lay. Which, being interpreted, means that out of every
twelve barrels of oil which the _Sally_ brought home, one belonged to
the captain; and out of every hundred and seventy-five, one belonged to
each of the green hands. The captain got one in twelve, the mate one in
eighteen; the second mate got one in twenty-eight, and so the shares ran
down the scale. The lays were so arranged that out of every hundred and
seventy-five barrels, some fifty-five went to the officers and crew,
while the remainder went to the owner to pay the expenses of the voyage
and give him his profits.... Three per cent., or six, or a hundred, as
the luck of the cruise might decide.... The crew were sure of their
money, such as it was, before the owner got his; for it was the custom
of old Jonathan Felt to pay off his men at the current price of oil
before figuring his own profit or loss.
The effect of this arrangement was to give the mates and the men an
incentive to harder effort. The effect was to make them acutely
interested in the success of the cruise. And by the same token, the ill
luck which now beset the _Sally_ tended to fret their tempers and set
them growling about their tasks....
Some blamed Brander; some blamed Noll Wing; some blamed their luck....
Brander felt the strain as much as any of them. He was, in addition, an
untried man; he had not yet had his chance to strike a whale, and that
is the final test of a whaler's officers. When he was taken into the
cabin and given a boat, he was forced to be content with the poorest
material aboard. That is the fourth mate's luck. He had Mauger, the
one-eyed man; he had Loum as his harpooner; and he had to fill out his
crew three others who were weak hands at the oars and slack at every
task.
He set himself to whipping this crew into shape; and in the luckless
days when the _Sally_ idled with double watches at the mastheads, he
used to take his boat off and push the men to their work, training
steadily, fighting to put pith into them. He was not a man given to the
use of his fists; neither had his tongue the acid bite of Dan'l Tobey's.
But he had a way of railing at the men good-naturedly, abusing them with
a smile, that made them laugh and tug the harder at their oars; he won
from them more than they had ever given before.... And he inspired in
them a distinct loyalty which gave birth, in time, to a pride in their
boat which pleased Brander, and promised well.
Mauger, in particular, was Brander's shadow and slave. The one-eyed man,
who had been turned into a chuckling and harmless nonentity by the
captain's blow and kick, found Brander kindly. And he repaid this
kindliness with a devotion that was marked by every man aboard.... This
devotion was marked, above all, by Noll Wing. And Noll, in whom fear of
the one-eyed man was growing like a cancer, dreaded Brander all the more
because of it.
Noll and Faith were playing cribbage in the after cabin one night; and
the door into the main cabin was open. Faith sat on the seat across the
stern, and Noll was in a chair, his back to the door, his knees
supporting the board they used as a table. Brander came down from the
deck with word that one of the men had cut himself with his clasp knife;
he wanted to go to the medicine chest in the after cabin for materials
to care for the wound. The sea was turbulent; the _Sally_ was rocking on
it; the rigging was creaking and the timbers of the old craft groaned
aloud. This tumult drowned the noise of Brander's footsteps as he came
down the ladder and across the main cabin. When he appeared in the
doorway behind Noll, Faith saw him. Noll neither saw nor heard till
Brander said quietly:
"Sorry to bother you, sir...."
Noll, whose nerves were shaky, whirled up from his chair; the board slid
from his knees, the cards were spilled.... His face was ghastly with
fright; and when he saw Brander, this fright turned to rage.
"Damn you, Brander," he cried. "Don't you sneak up on me like that
again...."