The Blood Ship Part 8

The lady shook her head, frowned warningly, and spoke a soft, quick, sentence. "No, no--do not protest, do as they say!" Well she knew the futility of argument, and the danger to the one who argued. Indeed, even while she spoke, the mate took the parson by his shirt collar, and jerked him roughly into his place. And there he stood, by the c.o.c.kney's side, wearing an air of bewildered dismay both comic and tragic.

The mates renewed their choosing, and in a few more moments we were all gathered in two groups, regarding each other across the empty deck.

There were fifteen men in the mate's watch, but, because of Newman's absence, only fourteen had fallen to Lynch.

The Old Man handed down the articles to Mister Lynch. "All right, Mister, muster them," he said. "And (addressing us generally) if you don't recognize your names, answer anyway--or we'll baptize you anew!"

Lynch held the papers before his face. I thrilled with a sudden expectancy. Something startling was going to happen, I felt it in my bones. Some clairvoyant gleam told me the forepeak hatch was wide open now.

"Answer to your names!" boomed Lynch's great voice. "A. Newman!"

"Here!" was the loud and instant response.

As one man, we swung our heads, and looked forward. Sauntering aft, and just pa.s.sing the main hatch, was the man with the scar. He came abreast of us, and paused there in the empty center of the deck.

It was the lady, on the p.o.o.p above, who broke the spell of silence the man's dramatic arrival had placed upon all hands. She broke it with a kind of strangled gasp. "Roy--it is Roy--oh, G.o.d!" she said, and she swayed, and clutched the rail before her as though to keep from falling. She stared down at Newman as if he were a ghost from the grave.

But it was the manner of Captain Swope which commanded the attention of all hands. He was seeing a ghost, too, an evil ghost. It was like foc'sle belief come true--this man had sold his soul to the Devil, and the Devil was suddenly come to claim his own. He, too, stared down at Newman, and clutched the rail for support, while the flesh of his face became a livid hue, and his expression one of incredulous horror.

"Where have you come from?" he said in a shrill, strained voice.

Newman's clothes and face were s.m.u.tted with the grime from the peak, but his air was debonair. He answered Captain Swope airily. "Why--I come just now from your forepeak--a most unpleasant, filthy hole, Angus! And less recently, I come from my grave, from that shameful grave of stripes and bars to which your lying words sent me, Angus!

I've come to pay you a visit, to sail with you. Why, I'm on your articles--I am 'A. Newman.' An apt name, a true name--_eh_, Angus?

Come now, are you not glad to see me?"

It was unprecedented, that occurrence. A foremast hand badgering the captain on his own p.o.o.p deck; badgering Yankee Swope of the _Golden Bough_, whilst his two trusty buckos stood by inactive and gaping.

But, as I explained, there was an air about Newman that said "Hands off!" It was not so much his huge, muscular body; there was something in the spirit of the man that was respect-compelling; something lethal, a half-hidden, over-powering menace; something that overawed. He was no foc'sle Jack, no commonplace hard case; as he stood there alone, he had the bearing of a man who commanded large ships, who directed great affairs. And his bearing held inactive and over-awed those two fighting mates, while he mocked their G.o.d, Swope.

And Swope! The man became craven before Newman's upturned gaze. He was palsied with fear, stark fear. I saw the sweat beads glistening on his brow. He lifted a shaking hand and wiped them off. Then he suddenly turned and strode aft, out of our view, without a parting word to the mates, without even the time honored, "Below, the watch." In the quiet that was over us, we heard his footsteps as he walked aft.

They were uncertain, like the footsteps of a drunken man. We heard them descend to the cabin.

Newman turned his gaze upon the lady. She stood there, clutching the rail. Her body seemed frozen into the att.i.tude. But her face was alive.

Yes, alive--and not with fear or horror. There was a delight beyond the powers of description shining in her face. There was incredulity, with glad conviction overcoming it. Her eyes glowed. Her heart was in her eyes as she looked at Newman.

Newman spoke, and his voice was rich and sweet, all its harsh menace gone.

"I have come, Mary," says he.

She did not reply with words. But they looked at each other, those two, and although there were no more words, yet we gained the impression they were communing. Men and mates, we gaped, curious and tongue-tied. This was something quite beyond us, outside our experience. Bully Fitzgibbon, across the deck from me, pulled wildly at his mustache, and every movement of his fingers betrayed his bewilderment.

For what seemed a long time the man and the woman stood silent, regarding each other. The dusk, which had been gathering, crept upon us. The lady's face lost its clear outline, and became shadowy.

Suddenly she turned and flitted aft. We listened to her light footsteps descending to the cabin, as, a short while before, we had listened to the Old Man's.

When sound of her had ceased, Newman, without being bidden, stepped to the starboard side and fell into line beside me.

The mate finally broke the awkward silence. Lack of the usual sting from his voice showed how the scene had shaken him.

"Well--carry on, Mister!" he said to Lynch. "Finish the mustering."

The second mate read off the list of names. With the single exception of myself, not a man responded with the usual "Here, sir." Not a man recognized his name among those called; a circ.u.mstance not to be wondered at, for the list was doubtless made up of whatever names happened to pop into the Knitting Swede's mind. But the mates did not care about responses. As soon as Lynch was finished, Fitzgibbon commanded shortly, "Relieve wheel and lookout. Go below, the watch."

We of the starboard watch went below. Newman came with us, and he walked as he afterwards walked and worked with us, a man apart.

CHAPTER VIII

A man apart Newman was. We instinctively recognized that fact from the beginning. When we had gained the foc'sle, the rage in our hearts found expression in bitter cursing of our luck, the Swede, the ship and the officers. But Newman did not curse, nor did we expect him to. We sensed that he was glad he was at sea in the _Golden Bough_, that he was there for some peculiar purpose of his own. He was, of course, the dominant personality in the foc'sle, indeed, in the ship. But, strangely enough, we did not look to him for leadership. We regarded him curiously, and with awe and some fear, but we did not look to him to lead the watch. We felt he was not one of us. His business on the ship was not our business, his aim not our aim.

Because of this aloofness of Newman, I suddenly found myself occupying the proud position of c.o.c.k of the starboard watch. A foc'sle must have its leading spirit, and the c.o.c.kship is a position much coveted and eagerly striven for in most ships, decided only after combat between the fighting men of the crew. But the _Golden Bough_ had an extraordinary crew. The majority of the men in my watch were just stiffs, who possessed neither the experience nor desire to contest for leadership. The few seamen, besides myself and Newman, were squareheads, quiet peasants of Scandinavia and Germany, who felt lost and unhappy without somebody always at hand to order them about.

So, within half an hour after going below for that first time, I found myself giving orders to men and being obeyed. They were the first orders I had ever given, and, oh, they were sweet in my mouth! Think of it, my last ship I had been ordered about by the foc'sle c.o.c.k. I had gone to the galley at command and fetched the watch's food. Now, scant days after, I, a fledgling able seaman, was lording it over the foc'sle of the hottest ship on the high seas, and ordering another man to go after the supper. And he went. I think I grew an inch during that dog-watch; I know my voice gained a mature note it lacked before.

I was a true son of the foc'sle, you must understand, with the habits and outlook of a barbarian. This leadership I so casually a.s.sumed may appear a petty thing, but it was actually the greatest thing that happened to me since birth. This little savage authority I commenced to exercise over my companions by virtue of the threat of my fists, was my first taste of power. It awakened in me the driving instinct, the desire to lead, and eventually placed me in command of ships; it also gave me my first sense of responsibility, without which there can be no leadership.

During the supper, and after, I found myself watching and studying my companions. For I feared that my youth might later cause someone to question my c.o.c.kship, and I meant to fight for it in that event. But my scrutiny satisfied my natural confidence. There was no man in my watch I could not handle in either a rough-and-tumble or stand-up go, I thought, with the exception of Newman. He would not interfere with me--his interest lay aft, in the cabin, not in the foc'sle. In the port watch were two fighting men, my eyes had told me, the c.o.c.kney and the n.i.g.g.e.r. If they disputed my will in foc'sle affairs, I was still confident I should prove the best man. I felt my tenure of office was secure, and that new, delicious feeling of power quite effaced, for the moment, the memory of the day, and reconciled me to the ship.

This scrutiny I gave my companions was the first chance I had to fairly size them up, and I afterwards discovered that my first impressions of them, individually and collectively, were quite correct.

We were, as you know, thirty men before the mast, fifteen to a watch.

More than half of the thirty were of that cla.s.s known to sailors as "stiffs." This is, they were greenhorns masquerading on the articles as able seamen. And such stiffs! The Knitting Swede must have combed the jails, and stews, and boozing kens of all San Francisco to a.s.semble that unsavory mob.

In my watch, Newman, myself, and four square-heads could be called seamen. But the squareheads knew not a dozen words of English between them. The other nine were stiffs, various kinds of stiffs, broken men all, with the weaknesses of dissolute living stamped upon their inefficient faces.

Except two men. These two were stiffs right enough, and their faces were evil, G.o.d knows, but they plainly were not to be cla.s.sed as weaklings. I noticed them particularly that first watch below because they sat apart from the wrangling, cursing gang, and whispered to each other, and stared at Newman, who was lying in his bunk.

They were medium sized men, as pallid of face as Newman, himself, and their faces gave one the impression of both slyness and force. A grim looking pair; I should not have cared to run afoul of them on the Barbary Coast after midnight. I already knew the names they called each other--the only names I ever knew them by--"Boston," for the blond fellow with the bridge of his nose flattened, and "Blackie" for the other, a chap as swarthy as a dago, with long, oily black hair, and eyes too close together.

Even as I watched, they seemed to arrive at some decision in their whispered conversation. Blackie got up from the bench and crossed over to Newman's bunk. The latter was lying with his face to the wall.

Blackie placed his hand upon Newman's shoulder, leaned over, and whispered into his ear.

I saw Newman straighten out his long body. For an instant he lay tense, then he slowly turned his head and faced the man who leaned over him. On his face was the same expression of deadly menace he had shown the c.o.c.kney, back in the Swede's barroom.

Blackie could not withstand that deadly gaze. He backed hurriedly away, and sat down beside his mate. Then Newman spoke in low, measured tones, and at the first word the babel of noise stopped in the foc'sle, and all hands watched his lips with bated breath.

"I play a lone hand," he addressed the pair. "You will keep your mouths shut, and work, and play none of your deviltries in this ship unless I give the word. Otherwise--" The great scar on his forehead was blue and twitching, and his voice was deadly earnest. He did a thing so expressive it made me shudder. He lifted his hand, and carelessly placed his forefinger on the outer side of his bunk, and when he lifted it, two of the myriad c.o.c.kroaches that infested the foc'sle were mashed fiat on the board.

Blackie's face set sullenly, and the angry blood darkened his cheeks.

Boston wriggled uneasily on his seat, and cleared his throat as though about to speak. But, at the instant, Lynch's booming voice came into the foc'sle, calling the watch on deck, and putting an abrupt end to the scene.

There was an immediate scramble for the exit to the deck. Aye, the mates had put the fear of the Lord--and themselves--into us, and we were all eager to show how willing we were! But I heard Fitzgibbon without, as well as Lynch, and, from the gossip I had heard at the Swede's, I suspected the foc'sle was about to be introduced to the orthodox h.e.l.l-ship manner of turning to the watch. Both mates would meet us coming up, and the first man on deck would get a clout for not being sooner, and the last man a boot for being a laggard.

So I held back, and allowed another the honor of being first through the door.

This honor was seized by none other than Blackie. I suppose he was anxious to escape from Newman's disturbing gaze; anyhow, at the second mate's first summons, he bounded from the bench, and tumbled through the door. I followed immediately after, and saw my suspicions confirmed.

Mister Fitz was holding a lantern, and Mister Lynch had his hands free for business. He met Blackie's egress with a careless jab of his fist that up-ended the unfortunate stiff, and the injunction, "Hearty, now, you swabs! Lay aft!"