The Sailor

XIII

The floor of the galley gave Henry Harper his first start on the road to manhood. He got so far along it as to be only a little afraid of the Chinaman. But that was his limit for some little time to come. Meanwhile he continued in the punctual discharge of his duties, and for some months things seemed to go fairly well with him. But at last there came a fatal day when the sinister figure of Mr. Thompson appeared once more upon the scene. The boy was told briefly and roughly that the ship was short-handed, that he was wanted aft at once, and that he had better take his truck along with him.

From that hour the current of his life was changed. For many a day after that he was to know neither peace nor security. He had been called to bear a part in the terrific fight that went on all day and all night, between this crazy windjammer and the forces of nature.

For days and weeks the brain of Henry Harper was a confused horror of raging seas, tearing winds, impossible tasks, brutal and savage commands. He did his best, he kept on doing it even when he didn't know what he was doing, but what a best it was! He was buffeted about the slippery decks by the hand of man or the hand of nature; he understood less than half of what was said to him, and even that he didn't know how to set about doing. The Margaret Carey was so ill found that she seemed at the mercy of the great gales and the mighty seas of the Atlantic. She was flung and tossed to all points of the compass; her decks were always awash; her furious and at times half demented Old Man was always having to heave her to, but Henry Harper was never a hand's turn of use on the deck of that hell ship.

He was so unhandy that in the port watch they christened him "Sailor." There wasn't a blame thing he could do. He was so sick and sorry, he was so scared out of his life that the Old Man used to get furious at the mere sight of him.

For weeks the boy hardly knew what it was to have a whole skin or a dry shirt. The terrible seas got higher and higher as they came nearer the Horn, the wind got icier, the Old Man's temper got worse, the ship got crazier, the crew got smaller and smaller by accidents and disease; long before Cape Stiff was reached in mid-Atlantic the Margaret Carey was no habitation for a human soul.

Sailor's new berth in the half-deck was always awash. Every time he turned into it he stood a good chance of being drowned like a rat in a hole. The cold was severe. He had no oilskins or any proper seaman's gear, except a pair of makeshift leggings from the slop chest. Day after day he was soaked to the skin, and in spite of Johnnie's overcoat and all the clothes in the bundle Mother had given him, he could seldom keep dry.

Every man aboard the Margaret Carey, except the Old Man and Mr. Thompson, and perhaps the second mate, Mr. MacFarlane, in his rare moments of optimism, was convinced she would never see Frisco. The crew was a bad one. Dagoes are not reckoned much as seamen, the Dutchmen were sullen and stupid, none of the Yankees and English was really quite white. The seas were like mountains; often during the day and night all available hands had to be literally fighting them for their lives.

All through this time Henry Harper found only one thing to do, and that was to keep on keeping on. But the wonder was he was able even to do that. Often he felt so weak and miserable that he could hardly drag himself along the deck. He had had more than one miraculous escape from being washed overboard. His time must come soon enough, but he could take no step to bring it nearer, because he felt that never again would he be able to arrange the matter for himself. Something must have snapped that night he had waited on the wrong rail for the engine. Bowery Joe, the toughest member of the crew, a regular down-east Yankee, who liked to threaten him with a knife because of the look on his face, had told him that he ought to have been born a muddy dago, and that he was "short of sand."

There seemed to be something missing that others of his kind possessed. But he had many things to worry about just then. He just kept on keeping on – out of the way of the Old Man as well as he could – out of the way of the fist of the second mate – out of the way of the boots and the knives of all and sundry – out of the way of the raging, murderous sea that, after all, was his only friend. The time came when sheer physical misery forced him to be always hiding from the other members of the crew.

One morning the Old Man caught him skulking below after all hands had been piped on deck to get the canvas off her. The Old Man said not a word, but carried him up the companion by the nape of the neck as if he had been a kitten, brought him on the main deck, and fetched him up in the midst of his mates at the foot of the mast. He then ordered him aloft with the rest of them.

In absolute desperation Sailor began to climb. He knew that if he disobeyed he would be flung into the sea. Clinging, feet and claws, like a cat, for the sake of the life he hadn't the courage to lose, he fought his way up somehow through the icy wind and the icier spray that was ever leaping up and hitting him, no matter how high he went. He fought his way as far as the lower yardarm. Here he clung helpless, dazed with terror, faint with exhaustion. Commands were screamed from below, which he could not understand, which he could not have obeyed had he understood them, since he now lacked the power to stir from his perch. His hands were frozen stiff; there was neither use nor breath in his body; the motions of the ship were such that if he tried to shift a finger he would be flung to the deck he could no longer see, and be pulped like an apple. So he clung frantically to the shrouds, trying to keep his balance, although he had merely to let go an instant in order to end his troubles. But this he could not do; and in the meantime commands and threats were howled at him in vain.

"Come down, then," bawled the Old Man at last, beside himself with fury.

But the boy couldn't move one way or the other. At that moment it was no more possible to come down than it was to go up higher.

They had to roll up the sails without his aid. After that the fury of the wind and the sea seemed to abate a bit. Perhaps this was more Henry Harper's fancy than anything else; but at least it enabled him to gather the strength to move from his perch and slide down the futtock shrouds to the deck.

The Old Man was waiting for him at the foot of the mast. He took him by the throat.

"One o' you fetch me a bight o' cord," he roared quietly. He had to roar to make himself heard at all, but it was a quiet sort of roar that meant more than it could express.

He was promptly obeyed by two or three. There was going to be a bit of fun with Sailor.

Frank, an Arab and reckoned nothing as a seaman, was the first with the cord, but Louis, a Peruvian, was hard on his heels. The boy wondered dimly what was going to happen.

The Old Man took hold of his wrists and tied them so tightly behind him that the double twist of cord cut into his thin flesh. But he didn't feel it very much just then. The next thing the boy knew was that he was being dragged along the deck. Then he realized that he was being lashed to the mizzen fife-rail while several of the crew stood around grinning approvingly. And when this was done they left him there. They left him unable to sit or to lie down, or even to stand, because the seas continually washed his feet from under him. There was nothing to protect him from the pitiless wind of the Atlantic that cut through his wretched body like a knife, or the yet more pitiless waves that broke over it, soaking him to the skin and half dashing out his life. Mercifully the third sea that came, towering like a mountain and then seeming to burst right over him, although such was not the case, left him insensible.

He didn't know exactly how or when it was that he came to. He had a dim idea that he was very slowly dying a worse death than he had ever imagined it was possible for anything to die. It was a process that went on and on; and then there came a blank; and then it started again, and he remembered he was still alive and that he was still dying; and then another blank; and then there was something alive quite near him; and then he remembered Mother and tried to gasp her name.

When at last Henry Harper came to himself he found he was in the arms of Mr. Thompson. The Old Man with the devil in his eyes was standing by; all around the Horn he had been drinking heavily. Mr. MacFarlane, Mr. Petersen the third mate, and some of the others were also standing by.

The boy heard the Old Man threaten to put Mr. Thompson in irons, and heard him call him a mutinous dog. Mr. Thompson made no reply, but no dog could have looked more mutinous than he did as he held the boy in his arms. There was a terrible look on his face, and Mr. MacFarlane and the others held back a bit.

It chanced, however, that there was just one thought at the back of the Old Man's mind, and it was this that saved Mr. Thompson, also the boy and perhaps the ship. He feared no man, he had no God when he was in drink, and he didn't set much store by the devil as a working institution; but drunk or sober he was always a first-rate seaman and he cared a great deal about his ship. And he knew very well that except himself Mr. Thompson was the only first-rate seaman aboard the Margaret Carey, and that without his aid there was little chance of the vessel reaching Frisco. It was this thought at the back of the Old Man's mind that prevented his putting Mr. Thompson in irons.

The boy lay longer than he knew, hovering much nearer to death than he guessed, in Mr. Thompson's bunk, with Mr. Thompson's spare oilskins over him, his dry blankets under him, and Mr. Thompson moistening his lips with grog every few minutes for several hours. It was a pretty near go; had Henry Harper known how near it was he might have taken his chance. But he didn't know, and in the course of two or three days nature and Mr. Thompson and perhaps a change in the weather pulled him through.

All the way out from London until the third day past the Horn the weather had been as dirty as it knew how to be; and it knows how to be very dirty indeed aboard a windjammer on the fifty-sixth degree of latitude in the month of December, which is not the worst time of the year. But it suddenly took quite a miraculous turn for the better. The wind allowed Mr. Thompson to shift the course of the Margaret Carey a couple of points in two hours, so that before that day was out the old tub, which could not have been so crazy as she seemed to Henry Harper, was running before it in gala order with all her canvas spread.

During the following morning the sun was seen for the first time for some weeks, and the port watch gave it a cheer of encouragement. By nightfall the wind and the sea were behaving very well, all things considered, and they shared the credit with Mr. Thompson of having saved the life of Henry Harper.

The Old Man's temper began to mend with the weather. He was not all bad – very few men are – it was merely as Mr. Thompson had said, that when drink was in him he was a devil. The dirtier the weather the more drink there was in him, as a rule. When the sun shone again and things began to look more hopeful, the Old Man's temper improved out of all knowledge.

The Old Man set such store by seamanship that it was the one quality he respected in others. His world was divided into those who were good seamen and those who were not good seamen. If you were a good seaman he would never forget it in his dealings with you; if you were not a good seaman, whatever else you might be, you could go to hell for all that he cared. And of all the seamen he had shipped in the course of a pretty long experience as a master mariner, he had never, in his own judgment, come across the equal of Mr. Thompson. This was his fifth time round the Horn with that gentleman as mate, and each voyage increased the Old Man's respect for his remarkable ability. He had never seen anything better than the style in which the mate got the old ship before the wind; nothing could be more perfect than the way she was moving now under all her canvas; and that evening in the cabin, after supper, the Old Man broached a bottle of his "pertickler" and decided upon some little amende to the mate for having threatened to put him in irons.

"That bye is no use on deck," he said. "He had better come here and make himself useful until he gets stronger."

The Old Man meant this for a great concession, and Mr. Thompson accepted it in the spirit in which it was offered. The Old Man now regarded the boy as part and parcel of Mr. Thompson's property, and it was by no means certain, such is the subtle psychology of active benevolence, that Mr. Thompson did not regard the boy in that light also. At any rate the boy looked on the mate as his natural protector. Henry Harper craved for someone to whom he could render homage and obedience. He would have reverenced the Old Man had he been worthy of such an emotion; as it was he had to fall back on the mate, a rough man to look at, and a very bad one to cross, but one to whom he owed his life, and the only friend he had.

It took Henry Harper a fortnight to get fairly on his legs again. Then he was able to come on deck as far as the break of the poop. Much seemed to have happened to the world since he had been below. He found the sun shining gloriously; there was hardly a puff of wind; the crew in high good humor were cheerfully mending sails. It was not the same ship, it was not the same sea, it was not the same world he had left a long fortnight ago. He was amazed and thrilled. The slum-bred waif had no idea that any world could be like this. Moreover, the convalescent stage of a dangerous illness was cleansing and renewing him. For the first time since he had been born he forgot the burden of his inheritance. He was suddenly intoxicated by the extraordinary majesty and beauty of the universe.

The sea, what an indescribably glorious thing! The sky without a cloud in it! He had never seen any sky at Blackhampton to compare with this. The air, how clean and bright it was! The mollymawks with their beautiful white breasts were skimming the green water. It was a glorious world. He heard a dago singing at his work. He almost wanted to sing as well.

He got a needle and some packthread and sat down on the afterhatch and suddenly made up his mind to do his best. He could make nothing of his life, or of his circumstances. His wretched body was all sore and bruised and broken; his head was still going round and round; he didn't know what he was, or why he was, or where he was; but a very glorious earth had been made by Somebody, just as a very miserable thing had been made by Somebody. However, let him keep on keeping on.

He had gone too far, thus early in life, for self-pity. Besides there was too much happening around him, too much to look at, too much to do to think very deeply about himself. Yes, it was a very wonderful world. The sun began to warm his veins as he sat plying his needle, such a sun as he had never known. The colors all around were simply marvelous; blues and yellows, greens and purples! There was nothing at Blackhampton to compare with them. The dago seated near had set down his needle, had dabbled his hand in the water, had begun to sing louder than ever. Yes, Blackhampton was not to be compared with such a world as this.

For the next three weeks things began to go a bit kinder for Henry Harper. Each day grew warmer, more gorgeous; there was no wind to speak of; the sea became so smooth that it might have been the West Norton and Bagsworth canal. And as it was clearly realized by the rest of the crew that for some mysterious reason Sailor was now under the extremely powerful protection of Mr. Thompson, they were careful to keep their hands off him, and also their boots. This made life a little duller for them, but a bit easier for Henry Harper.

XIV

Three weeks or so this good life went on. Horror unspeakable was at the back of the boy's mind. There were things he could never forget as long as life lasted. At any moment they might return upon him; but during those days of sun and calm Henry Harper was in an enchanted world. It was so warm and fair that he retrieved Johnny's overcoat and Mother's bundle from his bunk where they had been a long time soaking, spread them on the deck to dry, and had them for a pillow when he slept that night underneath the stars.

But the good days were soon at an end. Each one after the twenty-second got hotter and hotter; the twenty-fourth was quite unpleasant; the heat on the twenty-seventh became almost unbearable. They were now in the doldrums in a dead calm.

"Shouldn't wonder if we find trouble before we get to the China seas." Thus Mr. MacFarlane, the second mate, a prophetic Scotsman, in Henry Harper's hearing.

Mr. MacFarlane was right, as he generally was in these matters – more so perhaps than he had reckoned, for they managed to find a good deal of trouble before they got to the China seas.

For several days there was no stir in the air. The heat grew worse; and then one afternoon it suddenly became very dark, without any apparent reason. Mr. Thompson went about with a face uglier than usual, and Mr. MacFarlane said they were cutting straight into the tail of a typhoon; and then there was an anxious consultation with the Old Man on deck.

Mr. Thompson's face got uglier as the sky got darker, and the sea became like a mixture of oil and lead. It was almost impossible to breathe even on deck; there wasn't a capful of air in the sails or out of them; all the crew had their tongues out; and instead of eating his supper that evening the Old Man opened a bottle of his "pertickler."

The boy turned in that night, in the new berth that had been found for him by Mr. Thompson's orders, with a feeling that something was going to happen. For one thing the Old Man looked like having the devil in him again before the morning. Moreover, the heat was so intense that sleep seemed out of the question.

However, the boy fell asleep unexpectedly, and was presently awakened in a stifling darkness by a sudden awful and incredible sound of rushing and tearing. He sat up gasping for air and wondering what it was that had happened.

Afraid to stay where he was, for it was certain that something terrible had occurred, he got out of his bunk and groped his way as well as he could through the darkness, and at last made his way on deck. Here it was as black as it was below; all the lights were out; the sky was like pitch; the sea could not be seen; but he knew at once the cause of the tearing and rushing. It was the wind.

The wind was blowing in a manner he would not have thought to be possible. Its fury was stupendous. It was impossible to stand up in it, therefore he did the only thing that he could: he lay down.

Some time he lay on the deck, unable to move forward a yard, or even to return whence he came, such was the pressure that held him down. Then it was he felt a new kind of terror. This was more than physical, it seemed beyond the mind of man. They had had high winds and fierce storms at Blackhampton, but never had he known or guessed that there could be a thing of this kind. Such a wind was outside nature altogether. It seemed to be tearing the ship into little bits.

Several times he tried to rise to his feet in the darkness and find his way below, but it was no use. Flesh and blood could not stand an instant against such a rage as that. And then as he lay down again full length, clutching the hot deck itself for safety, he began to wonder why no one else was about. Slowly the truth came to him, but not at first in a form in which he could recognize or understand it. It seemed to creep upon him like a nightmare. All the crew and Mr. Thompson and the Old Man had been blown overboard, and he was drifting about the world, a strange unbelievable world, alone on the ship.

He began to shriek with terror. Yet he didn't know that. It was not possible to hear the sound of his own voice. He lay writhing on the deck in a state of dementia. A caveman caught and soused by his first thunderstorm could not have been more pitiable. He was alone, in this unknown sea, in this endless night, with all eternity around him.

Again he tried to rise from the deck, but he was still held down, gasping and choking, by a crushing weight of wind. It would be a merciful thing if the ship went to the bottom. But even if it did his case might be no better. Then came the thought that this was what had happened. The ship had foundered, and this tempest and this appalling darkness were what he had heard the Reverend Rogers speak of, at a very nice tea party at the Brookfield Street Mission Hall to which he had once been invited, as "the life to come."

Henry Harper remembered that "the life to come" was to be a very terrifying business for "those who had done evil," and according to the Reverend Rogers all men had done evil; moreover, he had dwelt at great length on the Wrath of the Supreme Being who was called God.

Henry Harper was in the presence of God. This terrific wind in which it was impossible for any created thing to exist was the Wrath of the Supreme Being. Such a thought went beyond reason. It was a key which unlocked secret chambers in the inherited memory of Henry Harper. Many were the half remembered things of which he had had experience through former eons of time. The idea of God was the chief of these.

Half mad with subconscious recollection, he began to crawl like a snake on his belly along the deck. The key was unlocking one chamber after another in his soul. Now he was a fire worshiper in a primeval forest; now he was cleansing his spirit in the blood of sacrifice; now he was kneeling and praying; now he was dancing round a pile of stones. He was flooded with a subconscious memory of world-old worship of the Unseen, a propitiation of the thing called God.

He was a caveman in the presence of deity. Shuddering in every pulse of his being he pressed his face to the hot boards of the deck. The secret chambers of his mind were assailing him with things unspeakable. Even the Reverend Rogers could not have imagined them.

All at once he rolled up against something soft in the darkness. With a thrill of hope he knew it was a living thing. It was a dago bereft like himself. Lying with his sweating face pressed to the deck, he also was in the presence of deity.

The noise was too great for their voices to be heard, but each knew that the other was alive, and they lay side by side for two hours, contriving to save their reason by the sense of each other's nearness.

After that time had passed they were able to crawl into shelter. Here they found others of the crew in varying states of terror and stupefaction. But it was now getting lighter, and the wind was blowing less. The worst was over. It seemed very remarkable that the Margaret Carey was still afloat.

In two hours more the wind had died. An hour after that they saw the sun again and the ship kept her course as if nothing had occurred. Indeed, nothing had occurred to speak of, in Mr. Thompson's opinion, except that two members of the crew had fetched away and gone overboard, and they could ill afford to lose them, being undermanned already.

It was now the boy's duty to wait on the Old Man in the cabin. This was more to his taste than having to lend a hand in the port watch. He was not the least use on deck, and was assured by everybody that he never would be, but in the cabin he was very alert and diligent, and less inefficient than might have been expected. He was really very quick in some ways, and he laid himself out to please the Old Man with his cheerful willingness, not that he felt particularly willing or cheerful either, but he knew that was the only way to save his skin. At any rate, Sailor was not going back into the port watch if he could possibly help it.

For such a boy as he, with an eager, imaginative brain always asking questions of its profoundly ignorant owner, the cabin was a far more interesting place than the half-deck or the forecastle. There was a measure of society in the cabin; Mr. Thompson and Mr. MacFarlane sometimes fraternized with the Old Man, after supper, and their discourse when they turned to and smoked their pipes and discussed a noggin of the Old Man's "pertickler," of which they were great connoisseurs, was very well worth hearing.