But there is an end to all things, and on the twenty-ninth day out we crossed the line with a fair wind, and when Ralph figured out our position the next noon, he announced that we should probably be in Pernambuco inside of three days.
After much persuasion, I induced him to promise to stop at Fernando de Noronha on the way back long enough for me to go ashore, for the wind we now had would carry us a long way inside the island, and we should not even sight it. Three days later the first half of our journey was completed, and we were safely in port after a good passage of thirty-four days.
I found much to interest me in Pernambuco. The harbor was crowded with shipping, amongst which the British and Norwegian flags predominated; but my eyes were gladdened quite frequently by the sight of the stars and stripes. The head stevedore, who had charge of loading the brig, was a half-breed named Pedro. He spoke very fair English, and during one of our frequent talks, I casually mentioned Fernando de Noronha.
“Ah, Diabalo!” he exclaimed, his black eyes glittering, “My brother—poor Manuel—he is there!”
“Why, is he a prisoner?” I asked in surprise.
“What for else should he be there?” he replied, shrugging his shoulders. “Santa Maria! he will never come back.”
Then he related the story of Manuel, after which, by a little questioning, I found that Pedro knew several things about the island of interest to me. He said that occasionally, when vessels were becalmed there, a boat was sent ashore for melons, which grew in great abundance on a very small island near the larger one. A suit of clothes or a sack of flour would buy more melons than would go in the boat.
We were thirty-one days in Pernambuco discharging and reloading, but at last the stores were on board and everything ready, and the day before sailing, I accompanied Ralph to the Custom House to “clear the brig.”
We put to sea on Monday afternoon, and at daybreak next morning the convict island should be in sight, if the wind held at northwest. I was much excited, now that my hopes were so near fruition, for that something of value was concealed at the foot of the palm tree I did not doubt; else why had I dreamed of this out-of-the-way spot, of which I had never even heard?
That night we consulted together, and carefully matured our plans, for Ralph had come to take nearly as much interest in the outcome of the affair as I. He refused to go ashore himself, saying that it was against all custom for a captain ever to leave his vessel while she was on a voyage, but that Seth Hawkins and two of the crew should go in the boat with us.
“And now, Uncle,” said Ralph, “please realize one thing. In putting off a boat, I shall be doing something I’d do for no one but you, as it is the duty of a captain to take his vessel from one port to another without any unnecessary delay. So don’t lose any time on the island, for I shall feel guilty as it is.”
I grasped his hand warmly, and whispered: “Ralph, if I am any richer to-morrow night than I am now, you shall profit by it.”
He smiled, and said: “By the way, I shall have to let Hawkins into the affair to a limited extent, for he knows very well I’d not send ashore simply to get melons. He’s been with me two years, and can be trusted.”
Eight bells struck; the second dog-watch was over, and Ralph went below to turn in, while Seth Hawkins and I paced the deck together,—he telling me some interesting reminiscences of his life in Hong Kong, where he had once kept a sailors’ boarding house.
I rose very early next morning; in fact, it was but little past sunrise, and the crew had not finished “washing down.”
The mate was standing by the starboard taffrail, and after the usual “Good morning,” he was about to speak, when I exclaimed, pointing to the east, “Look! what great lighthouse is that?”
I had just seen it,—a distant outline clearly defined against the rosy eastern sky.
“That’s no lighthouse, though it does look like one. That’s the peak on your island.”
The last words were spoken with so peculiar an emphasis that I knew Ralph had told him our plans. He went forward, and I continued to devour that majestic peak, that gradually lost its shadowy appearance and assumed definite form.
The wind was light, and we raised it slowly. As I looked, a feeling of bewilderment stole over me. There was the peak of my dream to a certainty, and yet something was lacking. There should have been an island in front of it.
At two bells in the forenoon watch we could distinguish objects on shore. For some time past I had noticed a small islet near the main one, and as we continued to sail on, we gradually brought it between us and the peak on Fernando de Noronha. Then I recognized it all.
Ralph spoke to me, but I was speechless with emotion.
“Rouse yourself,” I at last heard him say; “In half an hour it will be time to launch the boat.”
Those words restored me, and I went below to make my preparations.
The boat was hoisted into the air by means of a bowline rigged over the fore yard-arm, and was then lowered over the side. Hawkins, a couple of hands, and myself entered it.
I noticed that instead of heading for Wood Island, as Ralph called it, we were making for Fernando de Noronha itself. “Where are we going, Mr. Hawkins?” I asked.
“We’ve got to get permission of the Governor, Mr. Spencer, before we can carry off any melons, or even land on that island,” he replied.
A number of soldiers were gathered about the rude quay, evidently much surprised to see a vessel stop at the island. When the mate and I stepped ashore, a distinguished looking man whom we had not seen before came forward and said something in Spanish, which I did not understand. Hawkins did, and bowed with a grace which I had never suspected him of possessing; and I knew that this was the Governor.
The mate possessed some knowledge of Spanish, and finally managed to make himself understood. The Governor evidently took him for the master of the brig, as the two addressed each other respectively as “Senor El Capitan” and “Excellenza,” which was all I could understand.
At a signal from the mate, one of our men brought a sack of flour from the boat, and we prepared to embark. Two of the soldiers advanced to the boat with us, and I saw them exchange glances of surprise. “They’ve seen that spade and pick-axe, the rascals!” said Seth, aside to me. “I’ve got leave to get all the melons we want,” he continued, as the men pulled away for the landing, “but that smirking Governor was a sight too polite and inquisitive to suit me.”
Wood Island is separated from Fernando de Noronha by a narrow channel, but Hawkins ordered his men to row around a point of land, to be out of sight from the quay, which was then something over a mile distant.
After grounding on the beach, a little wave carried us further up, and we all leaped out. Seth dispatched the two men towards the north end of the islet after melons, and as soon as they were out of the way, we grasped our tools and commenced the search for the rock, which ought to be near the shore.
We followed the beach all along that side of the islet, Seth eying me curiously, and occasionally admonishing me to “Look out for centipedes.”
Near the southern extremity, I came to a palm that seemed to me identical with the one of my dream, but not a solitary rock was there near it. After considerably more than an hour had elapsed, the mate ventured the remark that our prolonged stay on the island might arouse suspicion in the Governor’s mind, especially if the soldiers told him of the spade and pick-axe in the boat.
I had seated myself on the decaying trunk of a fallen tree to rest a moment, and wonder if my expedition was to result in failure, but at Hawkins’ words I started up.
I advanced towards a mango tree to refresh myself with some of the ripe fruit, when, through an opening in the underbrush, I saw it—the rock of my dream at last!
There could be no doubt of it. I breathlessly approached, and touched it with the spade.
This is what was scratched on the broad surface, in characters quite fresh and distinct: “Mas distante occidente.”
“Further west,” said Hawkins, behind me.
“Is that what it means in English?”
He nodded, and I turned to find the palm, which should be only a short way to the left.
Could this be it—this blasted trunk, looking as though lightning had struck it? Judging from its position it must be, and making a sign to Seth, we fell to with pick and spade.
We worked until I thought my back would break, and must have dug down more than three feet in the rich soil, when the spade struck an obstruction, and we heard the muffled grating of metal. Then the top of what seemed a small zinc box was uncovered.
Silently we toiled away, and within ten minutes more were able to drag forth the box from its resting place.
It was perhaps a foot square, and weighed so much that Seth and I took turns in lugging it along the beach towards the boat. Upon arriving there, I wrapped the box in a piece of tarpaulin, that the men might not see what it was, and placed it in the boat.
We saw nothing of our crew, but the sight of nearly a dozen immense water-melons laid on the beach proved that they had not been idle.
“Great Scott! I s’pose they’d bring melons for a week if I didn’t yell ‘Belay!’” ejaculated Seth; “how many do they think the boat can hold? I’ve got to hunt them up, for Captain Spencer wants no time wasted.”
He disappeared, and I occupied myself in devouring the box with my eyes, and speculating as to its contents. What fabulous wealth in gold and jewels was hidden away in that dull casket? Millions, possibly. In what century had it been buried? Through what scores and scores of years had this little islet been the hiding-place of the ancient box I now looked on? All other eyes that had beheld it must have long since mouldered into dust.
While absorbed in these reflections relating to the past, I was rudely recalled to the present by a crashing in the underbrush, and Seth Hawkins, with our men, appeared, running towards the boat.
“Lay aboard lively there, Mr. Spencer!” cried the mate.
Much alarmed, I tumbled in, and he followed a moment later. The men, a Scandinavian and a negro, were about to put some of the melons into the boat, when Seth cried, “Drop ’em, and pile in here, you sons of sea-cooks!”
They obeyed, and shoved off the boat, though greatly bewildered at leaving the island without the very fruit we had ostensibly come after. The oars were plied vigorously, and when about a ship’s length from the beach, I espied a catamaran [79] coming around the north end of the islet.
The truth burst upon us. “We are followed!” I exclaimed. Seth nodded.
“Why? Did the Governor not give us permission to land?”
“That’s true; but those dark-skinned devils that saw the spade and pick-axe like enough told him, and he’s bound to see what we’re up to. If they overhaul this boat, and see that box of yours, and find we’ve got no melons, there’ll be trouble. I’d have brought off a few, but they’d weigh the boat down too much. These Brazilians have no use for Americans, anyhow.”
Our situation was certainly unpleasant. We were nearly a mile from the brig, and the catamaran was not over half that distance astern of us, and running dead before the wind, which was freshening. I was beginning to wonder what Ralph could be doing, for he actually seemed to be going away from us, when the mate cried out: “Look! the brig’s in stays! the Captain’s putting her about, so as to fetch us on the starboard tack. Hurray!”
Five minutes later, the Sea Witch, with the wind abeam, was running down to us at nearly right angles, evidently aiming to go between us and our pursuers, who were now hardly a quarter of a mile astern. We easily made out five people on the catamaran, two of whom Seth thought were convicts, while one of the others he took for the Governor himself. The latter was waving something in a hostile manner, but as the brig was going six feet to the catamaran’s one, we no longer felt alarm unless our pursuers should use fire-arms.
The brig’s helm was now put down, and she shot up into the wind, thus checking her progress; when halyards were let go, and the light sails came fluttering in. We were only a couple of cable lengths away, and soon had the boat alongside, and my newly acquired property aboard.
The catamaran had given up the pursuit, and was on her way back to the island, those on board indulging in violent gesticulations as long as we could distinguish them.
Some time later, we were closeted in Ralph’s room (which was much larger than mine) with the box between us. It was necessary to bring tools from the carpenter shop to open it, and the first discovery we made was that the zinc was simply the covering for a wooden box, which my nephew said was made of teak, one of the rarest and most durable of woods. It was lined with sailcloth, and upon drawing this aside we saw a small crucifix. Beneath this was a folded paper, and then—a golden vision!
For one moment we stared at it in silence, when I stretched out my hand and took up a coin, half expecting to see it melt away. It bore the embossed head of Dom Pedro, and the date 1885, besides an inscription.
“Ha, this is modern!” I exclaimed, much surprised at the recent date.
“Wait,” said Ralph, as I prepared to turn out the contents of the box, “let me read this paper; it is in Spanish.
“This 34,000 M. is the property of Leon da Costa, Commander of His Imperial Majesty’s troops at Pernambuco, by whom it was here concealed September 16, 1889, pending the settlement of the dissentions which are now rending our unhappy country, and which make it unsafe for one enjoying the favor of the noble Dom Pedro to own property in Brazil.
“Invoking the blessing of the church, and the protection of Holy Mary, I here commit my all to Mother Earth.”
Neither of us spoke for a minute. I felt awed, as though a voice from another world had spoken.
“Ralph,” I said, slowly, “if I had known this treasure had been here but two years, and belonged to a man who is probably still living, I should never have taken it. As it is, I shall keep it until inquiries are made, but it shall not be used except in the event of this man’s death.”
Ralph bowed his head in acquiescence.
The milreis is the standard coin of Brazil, as I learned at Pernambuco, and is worth about fifty-five cents in our money, so that the box contained nearly $18,700, some of which was in currency.
“This Da Costa,” said Ralph, “evidently had the duty of conducting the convicts from Pernambuco to the island; and it was doubtless on one of these trips that he buried his money, though why he has let it remain so long puzzles me. And as for ‘Mas distante occidente,’ which you say was traced on the rock, the words were probably written as a guide to the location of the tree.”
The convict island faded away in the distance, the great peak being visible for several hours after all other parts had vanished; and that evening, long after the damp night-wind had stiffened the sails, and a drenching dew lay heavy on the bulwarks, I stood watching the glorious phosphorescent display in the brig’s wake, and marvelling over the strange fulfillment of my dream.
The inquiries which we instituted upon my return home resulted in the discovery that Leon Da Costa had died of yellow fever in 1890 at Santos, one of the chief ports of Brazil, and at the same time about the most pestilential and unsanitary place on the face of the earth. I had no further scruples about using the money, $5,000 of which I sent to Ralph, without whose assistance I should have accomplished nothing. He now owns two-thirds of the brig Sea Witch, of which vessel Seth Hawkins is still mate.
Occupying a prominent place in our parlor is a peculiar motto—the work of Alice. The figures are white, on a background of black, like this:
3° 50′ 30″ S. 32° 24′ 30″ W. |
It never fails to attract the attention of visitors, many of whom inquire what it signifies. We tell them it is a marine puzzle.
BRINGING IN A DERELICT.
The West India hurricane of August, 1893, was one of unusual severity, and caused great havoc among shipping on the Atlantic seaboard from Florida to Maine. Besides the large number of vessels lost by going ashore, many were abandoned by their crews at sea after having sprung a leak or become water-logged. A large part of these craft subsequently foundered, but a number of them were vessels bound from Georgia ports to Boston and New York with cargoes of hard pine lumber, and in these cases the vessels, after becoming full of water, “floated on their cargoes;” that is to say, the buoyancy imparted to the wrecks by the lumber in their holds kept them from sinking as they ordinarily would have done. Some of these derelicts have been known to float for a year or two, round and round in a beaten track, forming a source of great peril to navigation; until, the lumber becoming thoroughly saturated with water, the wreck finally sinks. In some instances the abandoned vessel is torn to pieces by the violence of successive storms before this stage has been reached.
The most remarkable case of this character is that of the American schooner Fannie E. Wolston, which was abandoned at sea in October, 1891, and was still afloat three years afterward. She was sighted scores of times during this long interval, and was more than once set on fire by passing vessels. Her travels brought her from Cape Hatteras to mid-ocean; from the tropical Bahamas nearly to the shores of Europe; and in almost every part of the North Atlantic she was frequently seen. Covered with barnacles and sea-weed, reduced to a mere skeleton, and with one rusty anchor still hanging from her bow, this celebrated derelict continued for thirty-six months her long pilgrimage without captain or crew. The bitter gales of three Atlantic winters, that disposed of the ill-fated Naronic and a hundred other staunch vessels were unable to sink the Fannie E. Wolston. When last seen in September, 1894, she had nearly completed the third year of her phenomenal career as an abandoned wreck, during which long period it is computed that her drift was more than eight thousand miles. She was the record-breaker of derelicts.
A sailing ship arrived at Philadelphia early in September, having on board the captain and crew of the brig Neptune, which had been abandoned four days previously, two hundred miles east of Cape Hatteras, while on a voyage from Savannah to Boston with a cargo of Georgia pine. Within a month the brig was sighted no less than five times by steamers arriving at New York—the last time being in Lat. 42° N., Long. 65° W., a point several hundred miles directly east from Boston. Thus in four weeks this derelict had drifted nearly six hundred miles to the northeast of the spot where she was abandoned.
Nothing having been done towards recovering her, at the expiration of a month the owners of the powerful ocean tug Atlas, of Philadelphia, determined to despatch that vessel in search of the Neptune; for, could the latter be brought into port, the owners of the tug would reap a profitable harvest in the way of salvage.
Accordingly, one fine autumn morning, the Atlas steamed out from the Point Breeze Oil Wharves on the Schuylkill River, with a three weeks’ supply of coal and all the most efficient apparatus for wrecking and sea-towing. She was a staunch tug of 800 horse power, and was equipped with a powerful electric search light. There were on board Captain James and ten men, besides Albert Shaw, the captain’s cousin, who had no connection with the tug, but had obtained permission to make one of the party more through a love of adventure than anything else.
After rounding the Delaware Capes and entering the open ocean, the course was laid N.E. by N., and Captain James remarked to his cousin as he finished examining the chart, “Yes, Al, if all goes well we ought to overhaul that brig within five days, somewhere about 44 and 62.”
“You appear to regard falling in with her as a foregone conclusion,” replied Mr. Shaw, somewhat surprised. He was a pale, slender young fellow of twenty-two, and was much more expert at entering up cash and taking off trial balances than at figuring latitude and longitude.
“Why,” answered the captain, “I’ve marked on this chart the date and the place where she was abandoned; then I’ve put down a cross and the date at the exact spot she’s been sighted five different times since, and by connecting all my crosses with a pencil mark and figuring the distance between each one, I can tell about how much and in what direction that wreck is drifting each day. She’s in the Gulf Stream, which she won’t get out of till I tow her out. There’s the dinner bell.”
The captain’s explanation had enlightened Albert as to the method to be pursued in locating the wreck; though, to tell the truth, he was a little skeptical in regard to the final outcome of the matter. There was a brisk sea running, and in spite of the table-rack, it required no little dexterity to prevent beef, vegetables and condensed milk from mingling in one confused jumble; but every one was in good humor, and the fresh, salt air had sharpened the appetites of those who gathered about the little table, and especially that of the captain’s cousin, who averred that he had not been so hungry in six months. Dinner over, Albert busied himself in exploring every part of the tug and investigating the night signals, when suddenly Captain James called to him from the upper deck. Upon ascending thither, he was informed that the Atlas was bearing down on a floating lumber yard. Looking ahead he saw, still some distance away, great quantities of planks floating about; in fact the ocean seemed literally covered with them, forming a curious sight.
The tug soon reached the outer edge of the moving mass, and Jim Speers, the mate, remarked as he surveyed the white clean planks with a critic’s eye, “Fine lumber, that. Some good-sized vessel’s lost her deck-load, I reckon.”
The planks rose and fell on the long regular swell, and as some of them were occasionally lifted partly out of water by a sea, their shining wet surfaces reflected the sun’s rays with dazzling brilliancy. In some places they were massed together so closely that it was difficult to find a passage through them, and though the greater portion of this valuable lot of timber was soon left behind, masses of planks were met continually for a distance of nearly twenty miles. Captain James took the bearings of the main body so as to report the matter upon reaching port.
A six-knot breeze was blowing next morning but the sun did not show himself, and noon having come with the sky still cloudy, the Captain was compelled to figure out his position by dead reckoning, which is not so accurate as a solar observation. He calculated that if everything went well, the tug should not be far from the Neptune at the end of twenty-four hours, providing his estimates of the brig’s drift were correct.
The afternoon wore on, and the skipper and his cousin had paced the narrow deck for some moments in silence, when the former remarked meditatively, “I had a queer experience with a derelict once,—just after I took this tug.”
“How was that?” asked Albert.
The captain finished filling his pipe with fragments of tobacco which he cut from a plug, and continued:
“It was about two years ago that I received orders to go after the derelict bark Pegasus. She had sailed from a Nova Scotia port for the West coast of Ireland with one million feet of deals aboard, and after being abandoned in a big blow was sighted several times. I’m a sinner if we didn’t cruise twenty-five hundred miles and use up half our coal when, on the twelfth day out as I came on deck, my mate said to me, “Captain, there’s a lame duck two points on the port bow.” (We seamen often speak of a crippled vessel as a lame duck.) Well, we’d run that bark down at last, and we lost no time in getting her in tow. After towing her two days, what do you think happened?”
“The hawser parted?”
“She sank—went right down—and I went back to port the most disgusted man in Philadelphia. We found, after we got in, that a steamer passing the wreck and considering her dangerous to navigation had set fire to her; but after burning the main deck nearly through, and a hole in the stern, the fire had been put out, probably by the seas which the bark shipped. This was only a couple of days before we sighted her. While we had her in tow I noticed that a good deal of lumber washed out every time a big sea struck her, and I didn’t like it much either, though I made no doubt she’d float till we reached port. But, as I said, she played me a mean trick and foundered about four hundred miles off the Delaware Capes.”
“That was tough luck,” commented Albert, as he glanced at the dial of the taffrail log which trailed astern—its brass rotator revolving rapidly just beneath the surface of the dark blue water.
Next day was bright and sunny, and an extra sharp lookout was kept, for it was hoped to sight the derelict within the next twelve hours. After ascertaining the tug’s position at noon, the course was changed to N.N.E., and things went on as before. Mr. Shaw pored over the chart of the North Atlantic, and was in a state of impatient expectancy all day, although the mate kindly informed him that they might not sight the brig for a week yet, if indeed they ever did.
It lacked but a few minutes of sunset, when the captain, who for some time had been standing near the pilot-house sweeping the horizon with his glass, cried sharply, “Starboard your helm, there!”
“What’s up now?” asked Albert, ascending the ladder to the upper deck.
“A wreck of some kind, dead ahead.”
Taking the glass, he saw nothing at first, but finally made out an object that looked like a pole sticking out of the water.
“That stick is the mast of a vessel,” replied the captain, in answer to Shaw’s inquiry, “and at least half of it is carried away. The hull must be awash too, or we could see it plainly now, for she can’t be over six miles off. If the craft was in her natural condition, I’d have sighted her long ago—at twelve miles certainly. A little more and we’d have run right away from her.”
“Does she look like a brig, sir?” asked Speers.
“Can’t make out her rig yet. The chap we’re after is hereabouts somewhere if I’ve calculated right,” said the captain, taking another survey of the object ahead.
The tug was rapidly closing up the gap between herself and the wreck, and the faces of those on board presented an interesting study. Captain James was anxious to know whether the wreck they were approaching was the brig he was in search of. The usual excitement caused by the sight of an abandoned vessel did not affect him; it was simply a matter of business. So also with Speers, though perhaps to a less extent. The majority of the crew contemplated the stranger with feelings akin to indifference. Many of them did not know the name of the vessel they were in search of,—neither did they care. But Albert was looking at a genuine wreck for the first time, and his heart beat faster as the ocean waif grew more and more distinct, with her shattered masts, disordered rigging and general appearance of desolation.
“Neptune!” cried Captain James, as he made out the gilded letters on the port bow. He had already formed the opinion that she was the craft of which he was in search, as enough of her spars were left to show that she had been square-rigged on her foremast, and brigs are now comparatively scarce.
When the tug was within a few rods of the Neptune, her boat was launched, and the mate, Albert, and two of the crew entered, when it was rowed around to the brig’s bows in search of a favorable place for boarding. A large rope, probably the starboard fore-brace, was entangled in the standing rigging in such a manner that fifteen or twenty feet of it trailed in the water alongside the wreck. The mate picked up the rope’s end, and drew the boat so close to the brig that, taking advantage of the next roll she gave towards him, he seized a lanyard and was soon on board. Albert and Joe Miller followed. The other man, known as “Sharkey,” remained in the boat to see that she did not get stove against the side of the wreck.
Speers took a cursory glance around, and then hailed the tug. “All ready, sir,” he cried. A rope had been fastened to one end of the tug’s big hawser, and the other end of this rope Captain James now hove, so that it landed on the brig’s forecastle deck. The mate and Joe Miller hauled it in, and secured the hawser to the brig’s bows. This important task having been accomplished, the boarding party proceeded to take a thorough survey of the wreck.
The foremast was gone at the lower mast-head, leaving the fore yard still in its place, upon which the tattered remnants of the foresail were still visible. It had apparently been clewed up without having been furled, and the winds of five weeks had whipped it into ribbons. The entire mainmast was gone about ten feet above the deck, and in falling had smashed the bulwarks on the port beam and quarter so that the water flowed all over the deck, where it was several inches deep. She was so low that her main deck was level with the ocean, and small seas were constantly toppling over her bows and low bulwarks, where they broke in showers of spray. The main boom was hanging over the side, while the bowsprit and all the jibs were entirely gone. The main hatch was battened down, but the fore was off, and upon looking below the cargo of lumber was seen pressed up close under the hatch, where it occasionally surged slowly from side to side in obedience to the sluggish motions of the brig. On top of the after house a small boat painted white was lashed, having in some way escaped the general destruction. The wheel and rudder appeared uninjured. There was a perfect litter of ropes, blocks, standing rigging, etc., floating about the deck, all tangled in a confused mass.
The party now entered the cabin. Everything here was drenched; the skylights were gone; fragments of glass encumbered all that portion of the floor not under water; and there was a damp, musty smell such as one encounters on entering a cellar not often opened. The captain’s compass was still in its place under the centre skylight, but its brass work was badly stained with salt water. The state rooms were in much the same condition as the cabin, and the whole port side of the after house seemed to be slightly stove. The companion-way door was ripped off, and nowhere to be seen.
On emerging from this dismal place the mate took a peep into the crew’s quarters. The rows of bunks in which the men had slept still contained a mouldy mattress or two, while a large cask that had doubtless been used as a table was rolling about the floor. A couple of rusty pannikins floated about in the shallow water. It was of course impossible to enter the lazarette or the fore peak, for they were submerged. All the provisions were ruined, but the scuttle butts contained plenty of fresh water.
Having finished his examination, Speers sent the boat back to the tug for a supply of provisions for Miller and Sharkey, who were to remain on the wreck to steer her. As soon as the stores were placed aboard, and a few directions given, Albert and the mate pulled away from the derelict, for a squall was making up in the north-west and it was high time to get under way. Mast-head lanterns were run up, and the two vessels started for Boston.
There was plenty to talk about that night, and Albert staid up long past the usual time conversing with the master of the tug, who was in a jubilant mood, and who more than once invited his cousin to “splice the main brace.” [101]
“The owners will have to give me credit for quick work this time,” the captain said. “Monday we left Philadelphia; Wednesday we picked up the derelict; and on Friday—or Saturday at furthest—we ought to steam up Boston Harbor. Speers says the brig’s cargo seems in good shape, and if so it should easily bring $7,000 at auction. The hull may fetch a thousand more. Not a bad haul, Mr. Shaw for five days’ work.”
“This derelict business seems profitable.”
“It is—if you can find the derelict. For instance, the schooner Sargent has been floating about the North Atlantic ever since last spring, with twenty thousand dollars’ worth of mahogany in her hold. There is a prize worth trying for, but although a score of vessels have sighted her, several of which attempted to tow her in, she is still drifting about with a small fortune on board. Last month some Baltimore parties organized an expedition and chartered a steamer to find the Sargent and bring her in. They searched for several weeks, and then returned to port considerably out of pocket, to find that a Cunarder had just seen the schooner not forty miles off the course they had taken.
“But I must go on deck; the night looks squally.”
Albert turned in, and dreamed of drifting about the ocean for many weeks on a water-logged wreck, which foundered the instant assistance was at hand and he escaped only by leaping out of his berth against the wall.
The heavily laden brig, submerged to her decks, offered a great resistence to the water, and when a brisk head wind sprang up, the powerful tug was scarcely able to make headway. Several rain-squalls were encountered during the night, and by sunrise there was every indication of a gale.
A heavy swell was running, the wind increased, and Captain James felt some concern for the safety of his tow. By noon a hard northwester had set in, accompanied by an ugly head sea. Both vessels were under water most of the time, nothing of the derelict being visible but her masts and deck-houses, while the tug struggled through the heavy rollers and blinding spray with only her smoke-stack and pilot house above water.
It was a day of anxiety. The wreck was simply a sodden mass of timber, without buoyancy, and dragged and pulled on the huge hawser in a manner that caused continual apprehension. Instead of rising to meet the big rollers, she went lurching and floundering through them; burying herself in the brine, and then coming up with a backward jerk that made the captain catch his breath. Even a steel hawser has its limits of endurance.
Night closed in chill and comfortless, with no sign of immediate improvement. Albert put on a life-preserver, braced himself in his bunk without undressing, and wondered if he should ever see terra firma again, while the cook shook his head and confided to a deck-hand that “this was what come of having landsmen aboard.”
The wind blew harder, and even a full steam pressure hardly sufficed to drive the Atlas along. The middle watch was half over when the straining tug plunged suddenly forward, rolling and pitching violently, as though freed from a cumbersome weight. At the same instant a muffled cry was heard by those on the upper deck. All knew its meaning—the derelict was adrift!
The night was black as pitch; mist and spray obscured everything; and almost before the order to reverse the engines could be given, the wreck was vanishing in the gloom. The tug’s head swung round and she started in pursuit.
Fifteen minutes sufficed to show Captain James the utter futility and peril of attempting to recover the brig until the gale moderated. The Atlas was being literally overwhelmed and forced under water by the furious seas which overtook her. She could not steam fast enough to escape them. One great comber bent the smoke-stack, smashed the pilot-house windows, tore away the life-boat, and bore the tug down until it seemed as though she would never come to the surface. It was madness to continue, and the Atlas was put about and hove to.
Never in his life had her captain suffered such keen exasperation as now. With water streaming from his oilers, he stood grasping the pilot-house rail, and watched the derelict’s mast head light glimmering astern like a will-o’-the-wisp; now hidden by a great wave,—now reappearing fitfully,—now swallowed up in the black night. He strained his eyes through the salt mist till they ached, but the dismantled wreck and her imperilled crew were seen no more.
The captain went below, and calculated as accurately as possible the tug’s position when the derelict broke adrift, the direction and velocity of the wind, and force of the current. Nothing could be done until the gale moderated. There was ample time for everyone to discuss the misfortune, and speculation was rife as to the fate of Joe Miller and Sharkey, who had last been seen at dusk, lashing themselves to the shrouds. This would save them from going overboard while the rigging held, but their slender stock of provisions must have been swept away or ruined by water, which would render their position desperate unless quickly rescued.
The gray dawn came, by which time the worst was over, and eager eyes scanned the sea for some trace of the brig. But the wreck, sitting very low in the water and with only a few feet of her masts left, had drifted out of the line of vision, though she was probably not fifteen miles away. Wind and sea were still boisterous, but the search began immediately.
The conditions in general seemed to favor a speedy recovery of the Neptune, for the wind was still in the same quarter, the day was clearing rapidly, and the wreck having no sails and being practically under water, could drift but slowly. But the brig’s condition, coupled with the fact that the tug herself sat very low, formed no slight obstacle to early success. Had the Atlas possessed a tall mast, the derelict might have been visible from it, but nothing could be seen from the roof of the pilot-house save the smoke of a steamer on the northern horizon. As time passed, bringing no tidings of the missing vessel, the excitement increased, and a handsome reward was promised any man who should first sight the wreck. Twice a false alarm was given, but the day waned until the shadows stole over the deep. Still there were no tidings.
Through the starlit night Captain James thought of his absent men and of the sufferings they must be enduring. He sent up rockets at intervals, though with little hope of an answer; for the Neptune’s signalling apparatus was doubtless ruined by water, and his men would be powerless to make their presence known.
The sea was calm at daybreak, the sun shone brightly as the hours flew by, and the tug covered many leagues, while the promised reward kept all hands on the alert. The Atlas overhauled a large bark, and spoke her, but she had seen nothing of the Neptune; and another day drew to a close.
One of three things had happened: the derelict had foundered, had been taken in tow by a passing steamer, or was still drifting helplessly about. The first supposition was improbable, if not impossible. Experience has shown that a vessel in the Neptune’s condition can survive tempests that send stout ships to the bottom. As to the second, the number of steamers having facilities for towing wrecks is small, and the castaway’s value must be great to induce one to attempt salving her. The last supposition was probably the true one. A vessel may float about the steam-traversed North Atlantic for weeks without being seen, and not five derelicts in a hundred are ever brought into port. After weighing the chances carefully, the captain came to the conclusion that the brig was still an aimless wanderer, though it was incomprehensible how she could have eluded so thorough a search.
The next day was but a repetition of the one preceding, and this continued until the days became a week. Hope was almost gone, the coal was two-thirds consumed, and still Captain James would not give up.
Finally, ten days after the loss of the Neptune, the Atlas abandoned the search and returned to Philadelphia.
As soon as she was sighted by the operator in the marine signal station, the fact was telephoned to the city; and when she reached the dock, one of the owners was on hand to meet her. Joe Miller and Sharkey were there also, sitting on a box of merchandise, and exhibiting no traces of suffering or emaciation.
The surprise of the tug’s people was great, but the captain was soon enlightened as to the derelict’s fate. That troublesome craft had been picked up the morning after she broke adrift, by a West India fruit steamer bound to Boston. Three-fourths of the steel hawser was still attached to the Neptune, so the steamer had only to fish up the broken end, secure it to her stern bits, and continue on her way. The weather remained fine and she reached her destination the second day afterward.
The division of the salvage money was a delicate matter. An abandoned vessel becomes the property of whoever brings her into port, but in the present instance the derelict was held to be the tug’s property even after she broke adrift, because she continued in possession of two of the tug’s crew, who remained on her from the time the hawser parted until she was safely beached on the mud-flats in Boston harbor. Consequently, she was not legally “an abandoned vessel” when the fruiter picked her up; nor could the latter have handled her at all except for the tug’s hawser. But the steamer had rendered an unquestioned service by towing the wreck into port, and was therefore entitled to a portion of the money. She was finally awarded 25%, while the remainder went to the Atlas.
The lumber cargo realized a trifle over $6,000 at auction, but the brig’s hull had been badly strained and battered in the last gale, and brought only $500. Her age, combined with her severe injuries, made it unprofitable to put her in sea-going condition, and she was converted into a lighter for transferring merchandise about Boston harbor, in which humble capacity she will probably end her days.
THE MONOMANIAC.
Chapter I.
The homeward passage from New Zealand is made via Cape Horn, and as westerly winds prevail all over the South Pacific, the craft bound back to the States has everything in her favor. Five weeks had elapsed since the thousand-ton bark Western Belle sailed from Auckland and Wellington for Boston, and on this June morning she was in the South Atlantic, steering a north-easterly course.
It was evidently mid-day, for the captain and mate were squinting at the sun through their sextants; while a young lady stood near, wondering, as she had often done before, how it was possible for such queer-looking instruments to aid in determining their exact position upon so vast an expanse of water.
She was slightly above the medium height, and decidedly pretty, with a fine color in her cheeks. The sun’s rays and ocean’s breezes had tanned her fair skin until, as she expressed it, “her dearest friends couldn’t have told her from a South Sea Islander.” A heavy blue flannel dress, sailor blouse, jaunty cap kept in place by a long pin, and rubber-soled tennis shoes—the finest things in the world to keep one’s footing in a heavy, sea—completed the picture; and there you have Miss Laura Blake.
“What would become of us, Captain, if you and Mr. Bohlman were to fall overboard, or otherwise disappear from the scene? It never occurred to me before, but there would be no one left to bring us into port. Mr. Freeman knows nothing about taking sights.”
Miss Blake said this half in jest, half in earnest. The captain regarded it as a good joke.
“No, the second mate has never used a sextant, I believe, though he could doubtless navigate the bark for some time by dead reckoning. Meanwhile, my dear young lady, you and Mrs. Evans could study my Epitome, and learn to take the sun yourselves.”
The idea of her aunt “taking the sun” caused a quick smile to overspread Miss Laura’s features.
“I’m afraid the Western Belle would soon run ashore, or go to the bottom, if we women undertook to sail her,” she replied. “As the widow of a sea-captain, Aunt Sarah believes she knows all about ships, but I fear it would require even more than her nautical knowledge to bring us into port.”
Captain Maxwell shared this opinion, but he was far too gallant a man to say so.
“Mrs. Evans certainly learned a great deal during the few voyages she made with her husband, and with your assistance, Miss Blake, there is no telling what you might not be able to accomplish. However, both Mr. Bohlman and I are not liable to fall overboard, so you will probably have no chance to distinguish yourselves as navigators.”
Though considerably past sixty, and with a head of snowy white hair, no one ever thought of Captain Maxwell as elderly. His dark eyes still shown with the fire of thirty, and every motion of the erect, military figure was surprisingly quick and agile. In ordinary conversation, his words were spoken with an effective deliberation that is none too common now-a-days, while a fine courtly air—“old fashioned” some people called it—lent additional dignity to his presence.
Mrs. Evans appeared at this moment emerging from the companionway, and Captain Maxwell hastened to place a chair for the widow of his old friend.
“Isn’t it a beautiful day, Captain?” the lady exclaimed. “I cannot recall a more delightful morning.”
“I agree with you, madam; it certainly is a fine day, although, as your niece says, a trifle cool perhaps.”
“Possibly. But we are approaching the Line, Laura, and it will become warmer as the bark sails north. For my part, I think this bracing air delightful, and have not regretted returning to Boston in this manner rather than by steamer to San Francisco. It reminds me of the two voyages I made with the late Captain Evans.”
The widow’s good-natured face beamed with amiability and placid content. She was a comely matron, and though not endowed with a great amount of intellect, its absence was in a measure supplied by the charms of a thoroughly feminine and womanly nature.
The ladies had been visiting relatives in Sydney, and had expected to return to America by the Oceanic Liner Monowai. Happening to meet Captain Maxwell on the street one day, he had jokingly proposed that they take passage with him to Boston. Mrs. Evans had known him well in past years, and she instantly regarded the plan with favor. Her niece, however, knew no more of sailing vessels than does the average landsman, who judges all craft of this description by the coasting schooners which he has casually noticed, and had a vague idea that it was flying in the face of Providence to go anywhere in one. Yielding to the joint entreaties of her aunt and Captain Maxwell, and considerably reassured by a view of the Western Belle, she at length consented, and had so far enjoyed the novelty of the trip exceedingly.
“Neither do I regret it, Aunt,” she said, “although it would be agreeable to know about what time we may expect to reach Boston. That is the one drawback to going anywhere on a sailing vessel—you can’t tell how long the voyage may last.”
“The time required to go from New Zealand back to the States does not vary much,” the captain answered, “and I think I can promise you, Miss Blake, that the trip will not greatly exceed ninety days. We have made a good run nearly every day so far, and ought to pick up the southeast trades next week.”
“Even if the voyage should require four months, it would be nothing dreadful, Laura. We seamen do not mind a few days more or less, do we, Captain?” said the widow.
Carl Bohlman, the portly mate, seemed a little surprised at this reckless disregard of time, while Captain Maxwell stroked his beard and looked rather doubtful.
“Perhaps not, madam. Your wide experience enables you to judge of such matters. I remember one time, though, when your late husband had the Davy Crockett, and I commanded the Sunrise, we were racing from Hong Kong to New York; and I can assure you that every minute and every hour were of the utmost importance. We both passed St. Helena on the fifty-eighth day out, but the Sunrise was beaten on the home stretch by twenty-four hours.”
“How exciting!” exclaimed Mrs. Evans. “Think of it—racing clear around the world! That was before I met my husband, but I have often heard him mention the affair.”
“It must be dangerous, Aunt. We have the pretty Cape pigeons to race with, which satisfies me perfectly. How sorry I shall be when we see the last of them.”
“You are timid, Laura, which is excusable in one of your limited experience. You have crossed the Atlantic twice, but running over from New York to Liverpool is a mere bagatelle. Crossing the Pacific is something, to be sure; but when you have doubled both Capes, and crossed the Line six times—well, then you can lay claim to being a sailor, and will not be easily alarmed.”
The widow glanced from one to the other and settled back in her chair with pardonable pride, after giving this account of her achievements. She was rewarded with a bow from Captain Maxwell, who then said:
“To change the subject, Mrs. Evans, you must have been very busy this morning. Unless I am mistaken, we have been deprived of your society since breakfast.”
“That is true, Captain. I have been putting the finishing touches on that rug, which I consider quite an addition to the cabin furniture. After that, I wrote for some time—and ah! that reminds me. I feel certain that the fresh-water tank in the bathroom has again been filled with salt water. While endeavoring to remove an ink-stain from my fingers, I found that the soap made no impression. That careless boy seems unable to remember which tank is for fresh water, and which for salt.”
The captain frowned.
“This is the second time since leaving port that Dick has made the same mistake. When I have worked out my sights, the matter shall be attended to.”
“That Dick Lewis needs a rope’s end,” observed the mate, as soon as Captain Maxwell had gone below, “and if the captain would let me, I’d give it to him.”
“There is something peculiar about that boy,” said Miss Blake. “Sometimes I think his mind is not quite right. You know what a mania he seems to have for fire-works, Aunt. We were not a week out before he was found to have matches and fire-crackers concealed in the forecastle. Then one afternoon not long ago he was discovered in the lazarette, although no one had sent him there.”
“That’s so, miss; and the captain thought Dick might have been fooling with the signal-lights and rockets. I hardly think that, though. Most likely he was after the eatables.”
“You can see, Laura, what sort of sailors the future generation of captains will have to contend with. Do you suppose such things ever happened on my husband’s ship? Fresh and salt water mixed together, matches and fire-works in the fo’k’sl, rockets and signals in the lazarette? Why, it is awful to think of!” And the widow shook her head, as she reflected on this extraordinary state of affairs.
“That boy in the second mate’s watch is worth a dozen of this one of mine,” Bohlman observed. “Freeman predicted he would be the day we divided up the watches, and he was about right. Don’t tell him I think so, though.”
The second mate had just come on deck, and Miss Blake said mischievously: “I shall tell Mr. Freeman what you said unless you promise to rig up a bo’s’un’s chair this afternoon, and hoist me up one of the masts.”
“I’ll do it, miss, if you say so,” replied Bohlman, “though you got scared the other time before you were a quarter of the way up.”
“Laura, I will not allow such a thing again. What would you think if I were to go aloft and haul over a buntline?”
“I should laugh, Aunt; I know I should,” and Miss Laura did laugh aloud, while the mate turned away to avoid showing his merriment at the comical idea of the widow overhauling buntlines.
“But really, Aunt, there is no danger in it, and Mrs. Brassey, in ‘Around the World in the Yacht Sunbeam,’ speaks of being drawn clear up to the mast-head in a bo’s’un’s chair. It is said, also, that Bernhardt climbed the rigging of a steamer one day when on her way to Australia.”
“Genius is always eccentric, my dear, and may do anything with impunity. But there—dinner is served. Let us go.”
One could not pass through the bark’s comfortable cabin without knowing that women were on board. The very arrangement of the chairs showed it. No matter how neat and tasteful a man may be—and Captain Maxwell was both—he can seldom give to a room or dwelling that indescribable air of home-like comfort and domesticity that a clever woman finds it so easy to impart. There was something cheerful in the appearance of the widow’s open work-box, with its pretty blue lining, and an anchor worked on the inside cover,—for Mrs. Evans affected everything nautical,—while a large rug or mat made of spun-yarn and sennit bore witness to her skill. The vessel’s name was neatly worked in the center. Several water-color paintings by Miss Laura ornamented the walls, and a globe of goldfish swung from the ceiling. An upright piano occupied the space between two doors. There was nothing especially elegant or luxurious, as the bark had never been intended for a passenger vessel, but everything was very pleasant and comfortable. The ladies had separate state-rooms, each of which contained but one berth, and was considerably larger than the average state-room on a passenger steamer.
After dinner, Captain Maxwell sent for Dick Lewis to come to the quarter-deck. This boy belonged to the mate’s watch, which was now off duty. He had not turned in, however, but could be seen with two others of the crew, washing his clothes in the lee scuppers.
It had rained hard the night before, and many of the hands availed themselves of the chance to catch the water for laundry purposes. Two lines were stretched from a starboard backstay to one on the port side, on which were hung shirts of various colors and patterns, patched overalls, towels, socks that had never been mates, and various other articles of apparel.
Dick came aft presently, and stood before the captain; a lanky, unprepossessing youth of sixteen or seventeen. A carroty head of hair, low forehead, white eyebrows and lashes, very pale complexion, and keen blue eyes which constantly shifted about—these were the most noticeable points of his appearance.
“Dick,” said Captain Maxwell, “for the second time within two weeks, you have put salt water in the fresh water tank. This must not happen again.”
“I must have put the funnel in the wrong hole, sir,” said Dick, not appearing much abashed.
“That is evident. Get a marline-spike from the second mate and then go out on the end of the jib-boom. Stay there and pound the rust off the chains until three bells strike. That may help you to remember. Go forward.”
The captain told Mr. Freeman what Dick was to do, and then went below for his nap. Out on the jib-boom, Dick performed his allotted task. What was passing in the boy’s mind, it would be hard to tell from the expression of his face. Resentment against Captain Maxwell? Scarcely. He seemed rather to be studying over some project. Now his lips moved, as though talking to himself. Then would follow a low chuckle, as of satisfaction at solving some intricate problem. At such moments, his knitted brows became smooth, and the chains were pounded with a vigor that seemed to give a kind of pleasure to the worker. Once or twice his revery was disturbed by a fancied footstep, and he furtively glanced around to see if anyone was watching.
Three bells had struck some little time before a hail from the deck attracted Dick’s attention.
“Jib-boom, there!”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“Time’s up, Dick. You must like to pound chains.” It was the second mate who spoke.
Dick felt for the foot-ropes, and remembering Mr. Freeman’s injunction not to let the marline-spike go overboard, he slung it round his neck, and made his way to the deck.
“Where are your ears, Dick?”
“On my head, sir.”
“No impudence, you lubber! Next time I’ll let you work till we make port. Hand over that marline-spike.”
“Yes, sir. Will you please tell me something, Mr. Freeman?”
“Maybe so, if I can. The mate says I don’t know anything.”
“I want to know, sir, how you send off those signal-lights, what I was forbid to touch. Are they like Roman candles?”
Freeman took hold of the youth’s arm, and said sternly, “Dick Lewis, don’t you ever think of those things. Why, d— it, you’re as crazy as a loon about fire-works! If you’ve got any more stowed away in the fo’k’sl, it’ll go hard with you. I’ve got nothing against you, Dick, but if I hear any more talk like this, it’s my duty to report to the captain. You’ll soon be in irons, at this rate.”
“I was only fooling, sir. Please don’t give me away.”
“’Vast talking, and go below. The watch is half over now.”
Dick disappeared into the forecastle, and Freeman meditated for some time over the possible meaning of the boy’s peculiar talk.
“He’ll bear watching,” he mused. “I’d better tell Bohlman not to send him into the lazarette, on any account. No, I won’t, either; the Dutchman’s too d—d arrogant, and thinks he knows it all. I’d only be told to mind my own business.”
Freeman had just reached this decision in regard to Dick, when a Greek sailor called Asso approached, and asked for more bath-brick.
The officer went to see how his watch were getting on with their job of cleaning the paint-work on the deck-houses, and found that buckets of water, swabs, and bath-bricks, were being used to such purpose that the white paint was rapidly assuming the appearance of new-fallen snow. Then there was a section of wire cable to be spliced, and other work to be seen to. Thus the afternoon passed, and Dick’s talk about the signals was banished from the second mate’s mind by the various duties of the hour.
Chapter II.
It was a fine evening. The full moon had risen out of the ocean in matchless splendor, and was rapidly changing its blood-red hues for more silvery tints, as it soared into the cloudless sky.
The captain and passengers were on the quarter-deck, while Mr. Freeman hung over the rail with the comfortable assurance that the bark was making a better run in the second dog-watch than she had in the first, when the mate had been in charge.
“I told you, Miss Blake, I should get a good breeze in my watch, and you see I’m as good as my word.”
“So I perceive; and now that you have it, see that it doesn’t fail us before morning. Otherwise I shall think your fine breeze all the result of luck. How pleasant it is to hear the water gurgling around the ship.”
Eight bells struck, and the dog-watch was over. The wheel and lookout were relieved, and Freeman went below, while Carl Bohlman came on duty to stand the first watch, which lasted until midnight.
“What are you thinking of, Aunt? For ten minutes you have not spoken a word.”
“The beauty of the night has cast a spell over me, Laura, and I was thinking of a favorite poem of mine. I never realized the significance of the first stanza more than on this evening, when we are out on the great ocean with every object bathed in white light.
“‘The dews of summer night did fall,
The moon, sweet regent of the sky,
Silvered the walls of Cumnor Hall,
And many an oak that grew thereby.’”
“Excellent, my dear madam,” said Captain Maxwell. “You have a fine poetic instinct.”
“The oaks that grew around Amy Robsart’s luxurious prison are replaced here by the bark’s masts and sails, captain, but the effect is not less beautiful.”
“A fine conception, Mrs. Evans, but we must remember that it is not summer in these latitudes, even though the dew is gathering, and you may take cold sitting there. Will you take my arm?”
They had paced the deck for some minutes, and the widow was relating some story that seemed greatly to amuse the captain, when the latter stopped suddenly, dropped on one knee, and stared at one of the deadlights’ near his feet.
“Good heavens! How you startled me, captain. Robinson Crusoe couldn’t have been more astonished when he saw the footprint in the sand, than you seem to be. What is it?”
“Worse than a footprint, Mrs. Evans. The moonlight prevented our noticing it sooner. Stand here—where your shadow falls on this deadlight. [132] Now what do you see?”
“A light reflected from below. Oh, Laura, the lazarette is on fire!”
Captain Maxwell was already disappearing through the hatchway, while the mate and Miss Blake ran up at the widow’s exclamation. Even the silent figure at the wheel started at the mention of the word fire.
It was but a moment before the master of the bark reappeared, bearing a lighted lantern in one hand.
“The cause for alarm is removed, ladies,” he said quietly. “There is no fire in the lazarette, though nothing short of a miracle prevented it. This lantern was standing on the floor beneath the deadlight and caused the reflection to appear. Mr. Bohlman, have you any idea how it came there?”
He spoke with apparent calmness, which Miss Blake readily saw was more feigned than real.
The mate hesitated a moment before answering: “Dick must have left it there, sir.”
“Dick must have left it there! So that bright boy of yours has been in the lazarette again without permission? If I don’t have him triced up to the spanker-boom in irons early to-morrow morning, my name’s not John Maxwell.”
“He was in the lazarette, sir, but not without permission. I sent him there just before supper to bring up a coil of old rope that was to be ravelled out. He wasn’t there ten minutes.”
Both ladies glanced at the mate in surprise at these words, and Captain Maxwell looked at his chief officer in a way that was anything but complimentary to the latter. The captain had a temper of his own, which was under excellent control, but he found it necessary to cross the quarter-deck twice before trusting himself to speak.
“After that occasion a week ago, when this boy was discovered in the lazarette doing God knows what, I should have thought your own judgment would have prevented your sending him there again. There are plenty of men in your watch, and if none of them knew where this old rope was, you should have gone yourself, rather than let that fool of a boy take a light into such a place.”
Bohlman smarted under this speech, though he maintained a discreet silence, knowing it would be useless to attempt to justify himself in the captain’s present humor. Inwardly, however, he cursed Dick Lewis for having forgotten the lantern, and thus bringing his superior’s censure upon himself.