Fire Mountain Part 22

Oftentimes Little Billy joined them and enlivened the session with his pungent remarks, or, on the fine evenings, treated them with wonderful, melting songs.

Martin had the uneasy feeling that Little Billy, of all the men on the ship, divined his pa.s.sion for Ruth. He seemed to feel, also, that Little Billy was, in a sense, a rival; with a lover's insight, he read the dumb adoration in the hunchback's eyes whenever the latter looked at, or spoke of, the mate.

But, of course, Ruth knew what was in Martin's mind and heart. Trust a daughter of Eve to read the light in a man's eyes, be she ever so unpractised by experience. It is her heritage. Nor did Martin attempt concealment of his love for very long. A dashing onslaught was Martin's nature.

Ruth teased him and deftly parried his crude attempts to make the grand pa.s.sion the sole topic of their chats. She would hold him at arm's length, and then for a swift moment drop her guard. It would be but a trifle--a fugitive touching of shoulders, perhaps--but it would shake Martin to his soul.

She would hold their talk to commonplaces, and then, as their hour ended, would transfix him with a fleeting glance that seemed to bear more than a message of friendship, and he would stand looking after her, weak and gasping, with thumping heart.

One evening they stood together on the forecastle head, watching the setting sun. Sky and sea, to the west, were ablaze for a brief s.p.a.ce with ever-changing gorgeous colors. The sheer beauty of the scene, added to the disturbing nearness of his heart's wish, forced Martin's rose-tinted thoughts to speech.

"I see our future there, Ruth," he said, pointing to the rioting sunset colors. "See--that golden, castle-shaped cloud! We shall live there.

Those orange-and-purple billows surrounding are our broad meadows. It is the country we are bound for, the land of happiness, and its name is----"

"Its name is 'dreamland'!" finished Ruth, with a light laugh. "And never will you arrive at your voyage's end, friend Martin, for 'dreamland' is always over the horizon."

She looked directly into Martin's eyes; the brief dusk was upon them, and her face was a soft, wavering outline, but her eyes were aglow with the gleam that set Martin's blood afire. Her eyes seemed to bear a message from the Ruth that lived below the surface Ruth--from the newly stirring woman beneath the girlish breast.

It was a challenge, that brief glance. It made Martin catch his breath. He choked upon the words that tried tumultuously to burst from his lips.

"Oh, Ruth, let me tell you--" he commenced.

Her laugh interrupted him again, and the eyes he looked into were again the merry, teasing eyes of his comrade. With her next words she wilfully misunderstood him and his allusion concerning the sunset.

"Indeed, Martin, that cloud the sunset lightened is shaped nothing like Fire Mountain, which is a very gloomy looking place, and one I should not like to take up residence in. And no bright meadows surround it--only the gray, foggy sea. Hardly a land of happiness. Though, indeed, if we salvage that treasure, we will have the means, each of us, to buy the happiness money provides."

"Confound Fire Mountain and its treasure!" exclaimed Martin. "You know I didn't mean that, Ruth! I was talking figuratively, poetically, the way Little Billy talks. I meant just you and I, and that sunset was the symbol of our love."

But he was talking to the air. Ruth was speeding aft, her light laughter rippling behind her.

Another night, when the brig was near the southern limit of her long traverse, they stood in the shadow, at the break of the p.o.o.p, and together scanned the splendid sky. Ruth was the teacher; she knew each blazing constellation, and she pointed them out for Martin's benefit.

But Martin, it must be admitted, was more interested by the pure profile revealed by a slanting moonbeam than by the details of astronomy and his mumbled, half-conscious replies revealed his inattention.

After a while, she gave over the lesson, and they stood silent, side by side, leaning on the rail, captivated by the witchery of the tropic night.

The heavens were packed with the big, blazing stars of the low lat.i.tudes, and the round moon, low on the horizon, cut the dark, quiet sea with a wide path of silver light. Aloft, the steady breeze hummed softly; and the ship broke her way through the water with a low, even purr, and the sea curled away from the forefoot like an undulating silver serpent. The wake was a lane of moonlight, barred by golden streaks of phosph.o.r.escence.

On the ship, the decks were a patchwork of bright, eerie light and black shadow. The bellying sails and the woof of cordage aloft, seemed unsubstantial, like a gossamer weaving. The quiet ship noises, and the subdued murmur of voices from forward seemed unreal, uncanny.

The unearthly beauty of the night touched strange fancies to life in Martin's mind--he was on a phantom ship, sailing on an unreal sea. The desirable, disturbing presence so close to his side enhanced his agitation.

His shoulder touched her shoulder, and he could feel the gentle rise and fall of her breast, as she breathed. The bodily contact made his head swim. When she raised her head to stare at the sky, a fugitive moonbeam caressed her face and touched her briefly with a wondrous beauty. Her curved, parted lips were almost within reach of his own at such instants; he had but to bend swiftly forward! Martin was all atremble at the daring thought, and he clutched the rail to steady himself.

Behind them, a golden voice suddenly commenced to sing an age-old song of love, "Annie Laurie."

Softly the hunchback sang; his voice seemed to melt into and become one with the hum of the breeze aloft and the snore of the forefoot thrusting apart the waters. It seemed to Martin that the whole world was singing, singing of love. His heart thumped, his breath came quickly, pin-points of light swam before his eyes.

The girl trembled against his shoulder. Martin leaned eagerly forward, and their eyes met. They both stiffened at that electric contact. His eyes were ablaze with pa.s.sion, purposeful, masterful; and in her eyes he again glimpsed the fresh-awakened woman, beckoning, elusive, fearful. For a brief instant they stared at each other, man and woman, souls bared. But that blinding moment seemed to Martin to encompa.s.s eternity. The songster's liquid notes fell about them, and they were enthralled.

The song ended. Quite without conscious movement, Martin put his arms about Ruth and drew her into a close embrace. He pressed his hot lips to hers, and with a thrill so keen it felt like a stab, he realized her lips returned the pressure.

It lasted but a second, this heaven. The girl burst backward out of his embrace. Martin's arms fell to his sides, nerveless, and he stood panting, tongue-tied with emotion. Nor did he have the chance to master himself and speak the words he wished, for Ruth, with a half sob, half laugh, turned and sped across the deck, and through the open alleyway door, into the cabin.

The next watch Ruth stood upon her dignity, and her manner was unusually haughty toward her slave. And the next day, in the dog-watch, he discovered that the old comradeship was fled. She was shy and silent, and she listened to his stammered apology with averted eyes and pink ears.

When Martin attempted to supplement his apology with ardent words, she fled straightway. And never again during the pa.s.sage did Martin find an opportunity to avow his love. He discovered that somehow Little Billy, or the boatswain, or Captain Dabney was always present at their talks. Her elusiveness made him very wretched at times. But then, occasionally, he would surprise her looking at him, and the light in her eyes would send him to the seventh heaven of delight.

There came the day when the little vessel reached the southern point of the great arc she was sailing across the Pacific. Martin came on deck to find the bows turned northward, toward the Bering, and the yards braced sharp to catch the slant from the dying trades.

The _Coha.s.set_ raced northward, though not as swiftly as she had raced southward. The winds were light, though generally fair, and the brig made the most of them.

The weather grew steadily cooler; the brilliant tropics were left behind, and they entered the gray wastes of the North Pacific. Forward and aft were smiling faces and optimistic prophecies, for the ship was making a record pa.s.sage. The captain's original estimate of seventy days between departure and landfall was steadily pared by the hopeful ones. The boatswain, especially, was delighted.

"Seventy days! Huh!" he declared. "Why, swiggle me stiff, we'll take the days off that, or my name ain't Tom 'Enery! 'Ere we are, forty-one days out, an' already we're in sight o' ice, an' runnin' free over the nawstiest bit o' water between 'ere an' the 'Orn! It'll be Bering Sea afore the week out, lad! And afore another week, we'll 'ave fetched the b.l.o.o.d.y wolcano and got away again with that grease! Bob Carew?

Huh--the _Dawn_ may 'ave the 'eels of us--though, swiggle me, what with my moons'il, an' that balloon jib, I'd want a tryout afore admitting it final--but it ain't on the cards that Carew 'as 'ad our luck with the winds. 'E's somewhere a week or two astern o' us, I bet. We'll 'ave the bleedin' swag, an' be 'alf way 'ome, before 'e lifts Fire Mountain--if he does know where the bloomin' place is!

"Ow, lad, just think o' all that money in a lump o' ruddy grease! Ow, what a snorkin' fine time I'll 'ave, when we get back to Frisco! 'Am an' eggs, an' a bottle o' wine every bloomin' meal for a week! Regular toff, I'll be, swiggle me--with one of them fancy girls adancin', and one o' them longhaired blokes afiddlin' while I scoffs!"

Only old Sails declined to be heartened by bright expectations. He wagged his gray head solemnly.

"The pa.s.sage is no made till we are standing off yon Island," he warned Martin. "Aye, well I remember the smoking mountain. Didna' that big, red loon aft split a new t'gan'-s'il the very next day, wi' his crazy carrying on of sail? Aye, I mind the place--a drear place, lad, wi' an evil face. I dinna like to see the la.s.sie gang ash.o.r.e there, for all the siller ye say the stuff is worth, an' I ken well she'll be in the first boat. 'Tis a wicked place, the fire mount, and I ha' dreamed thrice o' the feyed. Nay, I'll tell ye no more, lad. But do you give no mind to yon talk o' Bob Carew being left behind. He is the de'il's son, and the old boy helps his own. But keep ye a sharp eye on the la.s.s."

No more than this half mystical jargon could Martin extract from the dour Scot. MacLean would shake his head and mumble that feydom brooded over the brig and hint darkly of battle and bloodshed.

That night, in the privacy of their berth, Martin mentioned MacLean's dismal croakings to Little Billy. He was minded to jest about the pessimist, but, to his great surprise, the hunchback listened to his recountal with a very grave face. But after a moment Little Billy's smile returned, and he explained.

"Sails is a Highland Scot," he told Martin. "Of course he is superst.i.tious, as well as a const.i.tutional croaker. He claims to be a seventh son, or something like that, and to be able to foretell death.

When he speaks of a 'feyed' man, he means one over whom he sees hovering the shadow of death. He didn't say who was feyed, did he?"

"No, he wouldn't talk further," answered Martin. "What bosh!"

"Yes, of course," a.s.sented Little Billy. "You and I, with our minds freed of superst.i.tion, may laugh--but Sails, I think, believes in his visions. And, to tell you the truth, your words gave me something of a start at first. I have known MacLean a long time, you know. Last voyage, he told me one day that Lomai, a Fiji boy, was feyed, and that very night Lomai fell from the royal yard and was smashed to death on the deck. And once before that, before I became one of the happy family, he foretold a death to the captain. I am glad you told me about this. He didn't mention a name?"

"No. Just said he had dreamed three times of the feyed," said Martin, impressed in spite of himself.

"I'll speak to him, myself," went on Little Billy. "Won't do any good, though. He only tells one person of his foresight, and he has chosen you this time. But I wish--oh, what is wrong with us! Of course it is bosh! The old grumbler has indigestion from eating too much. I am going to read awhile, Martin, if the light won't bother you. Don't feel sleepy."

The hunchback clambered into his upper bunk and composed himself, book in hand. Martin finished his disrobing and rolled into his bunk, beneath the other. He was tired, but he didn't go to sleep directly.

His mind was busy. Not with thoughts of Sails and his ghostly warning--Martin had not been long enough at sea to be tinged with the sailor's inevitable superst.i.tion, and he was stanchly skeptical of supernatural warnings. Martin lay awake thinking of the deformed little man, ostensibly reading, a few feet above him.

For some nights, now, the hunchback had read late of nights, because he "didn't feel sleepy." Daily, Little Billy's lean face grew more lined and aged; in the past week his appearance had taken on a half-score years. He still retained his smile, but it was even wan at times. In his eyes lurked misery. Martin knew that the books he took to bed were mainly a subterfuge to enable Little Billy to keep the light burning.

For Little Billy was waging a battle with his ancient enemy, and he had grown afraid of the dark.

A week before, he had abruptly said to Martin:

"I gave the key of the medicine-chest to Ruth today. I won't be able to get at _that_ booze, anyway." To Martin's startled look, he added: "I want you to know, so you won't be surprised by the capers I am liable to cut for a while. You see, I am dancing to old Fiddler Booze's tune. I want to go on a drunk--every part of me craves alcohol. And I am determined to keep sober.

"Oh, it is nothing to startle you, Martin. I never get violent. Only, I'll be in plain h.e.l.l for a couple of weeks. Then the craving will go away, to return at ever shorter intervals, until I do get ash.o.r.e on a good bust. No, I'll keep sober till I reach sh.o.r.e again--whatever comes. No raiding the bosun's locker for sh.e.l.lac or wood-alcohol this voyage."