My Danish Sweetheart Volume II Part 17

'They are a people to live on good terms with,' said Helga, looking at me.

'They are a people,' said the Captain, nasally accentuating his words, 'who are to be brought to a knowledge of the Light; and, in proportion as the effort is dangerous, so should the worker glory in his task.'

He gazed at Helga, as though seeking her approval of this sentiment. But she was looking at me with an expression of anxiety in her blue eyes.

'I gather,' said I, with curiosity stimulated by thought of the girl's and my situation aboard this homely little barque, with her singular skipper and wild, dark crew--'I gather, Captain Bunting, from what has pa.s.sed, that the blow you are now levelling at these fellows'

superst.i.tions--as you call them--is aimed at their diet?'

'Just so,' he answered. 'I am trying to compel them to eat pork. Who knows that before the equator be crossed I may not have excited a real love for pork among them? That would be a great work, sir. It will sap one of the most contemptible of their superst.i.tions, and provide me with a little crevice for the insertion of the wedge of truth.'

'I believe pork,' said I, 'is not so much a question of religion as a question of health with these poor dark creatures, bred in hot lat.i.tudes.'

'Pork enters largely into their faith,' he answered.

'So far, you have not been very successful, I think?'

'No. You heard what Vanjoor Nakier said. The wasteful wretches have for the third time cast their allowance overboard. Only think, Miss Nielsen, of wilfully throwing over the rail as much hearty excellent food--honest salt pork and very fair peasoup--as would keep a poor family at home in dinners for a week!'

'What do they eat instead?' she asked.

'Why, on pork days, biscuit, I suppose. There is nothing else.'

'You give them beef every other day?' said I.

'Beef and duff,' he answered; 'but I shall stop that. Famine may help me in dealing with their superst.i.tions.'

It was not for me, partaking, as Helga and I were, of this man's hospitality, using his ship, dependent upon him, indeed, for my speedy return home with Helga--it was not for me, I say, at this early time at all events, to remonstrate with him, to tell him that, exalted as he might consider his motives, they were urging him into a very barbarous, cruel behaviour; but, as I sat looking at him, my emotion, spite of his claims upon my kindness, was one of hearty disgust, with deeper feelings working in me besides, when I considered that, if our evil fortune forced us to remain for any length of time on board _The Light of the World_, we might find his theory of conversion making his ship a theatre for as bad a tragedy as was ever enacted upon the high seas.

On a sudden he looked up at a little timepiece that was ticking against a beam just over his head.

'Have you any acquaintance with the sea, Mr. Tregarthen?' he asked.

'Merely a boating acquaintance,' I replied.

'Can you stand a watch?'

'I could keep a look-out,' said I, a little dismayed by these questions, 'but I am utterly ignorant of the handling of a ship.'

He looked reflectively at Helga, then at me, pulling down first one whisker, then the other, while his thick lips lay broad in a smile under his long hooked nose.

'Oh, well' said he, 'Abraham Wise will do.' He went to the cuddy door and called 'Forward there!'

'Yaas, sah,' came a thick Africander-like note out of the forecastle obscurity.

'Ask Abraham Wise to step aft.'

He resumed his seat, and in a few minutes Abraham arrived. Helga instantly rose and gave him her hand with a sweet cordial smile that was full of her gratification at the sight of him. For my part, it did my heart good to see him. After the tallowy countenance and odd talk of the Captain and the primrose complexions and scowling glances of his Malays, there was real refreshment to the spirits to be got out of the homely English face and English 'longsh.o.r.e garb of the boatman, with the man's suggestions, besides, of the English Channel and of home.

'And how is Jacob?' said I.

'Oh, he's a-feeling a little better, sir. A good bit down, of course, as we both are. 'Taint realizable even _now_.'

'Do you refer to the loss of your lugger?' said Captain Bunting.

'Ay, sir, to the _Airly Marn_,' answered Abraham, confronting him, and gazing at him with a steadfastness that slightly increased his squint.

'But surely, my good fellow,' cried the Captain, 'you had plenty of time, I hope, to feel thoroughly grateful for your preservation from the dreadful fate which lay before you had Providence suffered you to continue your voyage?'

'Oi dunno about dreadful fate,' answered Abraham: 'all I can say is, I should be blooming glad if that there _Airly Marn_ was afloat again, or if so be as we'd never fallen in with this here _Light of the World_.'

'It is as I told you, you perceive,' exclaimed the Captain, smiling and addressing Helga and me in his blandest manner: 'as we descend the social scale, recognition of signal and providential mercies grows feebler and feebler, until it dies out--possibly before it gets down to Deal boatmen. I want a word with you, Abraham Wise. But first, how have you been treated forward?'

'Oh, werry well indeed, sir,' he answered. 'The mate showed us where to tarn in when the time comes round, and I dessay we'll manage to git along all right till we gets clear of ye.'

'What have you had to eat?'

'The mate gave us a little bit o' pork for to be biled, but ye've got a black cook forrads as seemed to Jacob and me to take the dressing of that there meat werry ill.'

The Captain seemed to motion the matter aside with his hand, and said:

'My vessel is without a second mate; I mean, a man qualified to take charge of the deck when Mr. Jones and I are below. Now, I am thinking that you would do very well for that post.'

'I'd rather go home, sir,' said Abraham.

'Ay,' said the Captain, complacently surveying him, 'but while you are with me, you know, you must be prepared to do your bit. I find happiness in a.s.sisting a suffering man. But,' added he nasally, 'in this world we must give and take. You eat my meat and sleep in what I think I may fairly term my bedroom. What pay do I exact? Simply the use of your eyes and limbs.'

He glanced with a very self-satisfied expression at Helga. It seemed, indeed, that most of his talk now was _at_ her when not directly _to_ her. She had come round to my side of the table after leaving Abraham, and giving her my chair, I stood listening, with my hand on the back of it.

'I'm quite willing to tarn to,' said Abraham, 'while I'm along with ye, sir. I ain't afeared of work. I dorn't want no man's grub nor shelter for nothen.'

'Quite right,' said the Captain; 'those are respectable sentiments. Of course, if you accept my offer I will pay you, give you the wages that Winstanley had--four pounds a month for the round voyage.'

Abraham scratched the back of his head and looked at me. This proposal evidently put a new complexion upon the matter to his mind.

'You can handle a ship, I presume?' continued the Captain.

'Whoy, yes,' answered Abraham with a grin of wonder at the question: 'if I ain't been poiloting long enough to know that sort o' work, ye shall call me a Malay.'

'I should not require a knowledge of navigation in you,' said the Captain.

Abraham responded with a bob of the head, then scratching at his back hair afresh, said:

'I must ask leave to tarn the matter over. I should like to talk with my mate along o' this.'

'I'll put him on the articles, too, if he likes, at the current wages,'

said the Captain. 'However, think over it. You can let me know to-morrow. But I shall expect you to take charge during the middle watch.'

'That I'll willingly dew, sir,' answered Abraham. 'But how about them Ceylon chaps and Malays forrads? Dew they understand sea tarms?'