The Flying Bo'sun Part 10

While going down the companion-way to see how Riley and Charlie were getting along with their sewing, I thought, by a sudden noise, that they had begun to quarrel.

"Where the divil did you ever sew up a dead man?" came in Riley's voice, and "d.a.m.n you, pull that flap down over his face." Then I could hear boots and gla.s.ses being thrown around. "Get out of here, you black divil, it's eating your master you would be doing, pss-cat, pss-cat, you dirty, hungry-looking tiger!"

Then all was still for a few seconds. Then Old Charlie's voice saying, "Mike Riley, this is a terrible calamity that has happened to us, the loss of our captain. And Riley, this is not all. I am afraid there will be more."

"Ah, go wan wit your platting," said Riley, "Pull the seam tight around his neck. That is the way. Now sew it with a herring-bone st.i.tch. Hould on a minute, Charlie, till I get me last look at him. Faith, and be my sowl, he wasn't a very bad-looking man."

Here I walked into the room, saying: "When you are finished I will get you more help to carry him on deck. But leave a place open at the head so that we can put the weights in."

"Sinking him by the head is it you are, sir? Glory be to G.o.d, don't do that. Let him go down feet first, sir. Be Hivins, if you put him down be the head we will have the divil's own luck! I remember wan time on the auld lime-juicer 'King of the Seas,' the second mate died. We weighed him down by the head--begob, and it wasn't a week till ivery man av us had the scurvy."

"Riley," I laughed, "you are a very superst.i.tious man."

"It's you that are mistaken, sir. Sure an I'm anything but that, sir."

The cook interrupted us to ask if he could help in any way. I told him to help Charlie and Riley carry the body up on deck. Riley at once took command. "Charlie, you take the head, I will take the feet, and, Steward, you can help in the middle. Are you all ready? Up wit him, then,--be Hivins isn't he heavy?"

Charlie started towards the door so as to take the body out head first.

Riley promptly objected to this move, and propped the feet on the edge of the berth while he a.s.serted his authority.

"And it's take him out be the head ye'd be after doing? Where in blazes did you come from? Oh, you poor auld divil you! Whoever heard of takin'

a corpse out head first. Turn him around, bad luck to you, with his feet out. Sure, an it's walk out on his feet he would, if he were on thim.

Niver do that, Charlie, me boy, if ye want to prosper in this life."

We pulled two planks from the deck-load, and spiked cross-pieces on, while Riley supervised the weighing-down. Then all was ready to commit the body to the deep blue sea.

While the second mate was back-filling the foresail and hauling the main-jib to windward, to stop the ship for sea-burial, I fell to thinking of our Captain. Here he was, in the prime of life, about to be cast into the sea. No one to love him, no one to care, none but the rough if kindly hands of sailors to guide him to his resting-place. As I glanced around the horizon, and the broad expanse of the Pacific, I was overcome by loneliness. Ships might come and ships might go, and still there would be no sign of his last resting-place, no chance to pay respects to the upright seaman, the devoted husband and father. The silent ocean currents, responsible to no one, would be drifting him hither and thither.

The last few days and the terrible fight were telling upon me.

I was astonished to look around and find that I was alone with the dead. The only other person on deck was Broken-Nosed Pete at the wheel.

I went forward and sung out: "Come forward, some of you, and lend a hand here."

"Aye, aye, sir; we are coming," answered Riley's brogue.

There was something about Riley, in his simple seriousness and appeal to my humor, that was a great help to me just now. They came aft, every one of them, in their best clothes, with shined and squeaky shoes, looking very solemn. "Here," said I, "take a hand and shove the planks out so that the body will clear the bulwark rail when she rolls to windward." I was about to give the order to tip the plank, when I was interrupted by Riley saying excitedly: "Lord G.o.d, sir, aren't you going to say something over him?"

"Riley," I said as the crew gathered around, "I have nothing to say, except that I commit this body to the sea. Up with the plank."

"Hould on, hould on," cried Riley in despair. "Sure I wouldn't send a dog over like that! I will read the Litany of the Blissed Virgin Mary, and it don't make a d.a.m.ned bit av diffrunce whether he belaves it or not. Hould on, me boy, till I get my prayer book."

Riley returned from the forecastle cursing and swearing.

"Howly Mother av Moses, they have ate the Litany out av me prayer-book, and the poor sowl about to be throwed overboard."

"What is the matter, Riley?" I asked.

"Ah, the dirty divils! The rats has made a nest av me Holy Prayer-book!"

"Sanctified rats--" I was beginning profanely, when fortunately the cook interrupted me.

"What good will a prayer-book do him now? Your prayer-books, and flowers and beautiful coffins are only advertis.e.m.e.nts of ignorance. The man of thought today throws those primitive things away, or sends them back to the savages. You men will in time come to believe in a Creative Power of Organization, or a Material Force, but in your present state of ignorance you are carried away by a supernatural power destined for the poor and helpless."

While the cook was talking Riley was taking off his coat, and rolling up his sleeves. "It is poor and helpless we are, are we? You durty, fat, Dutch hound. Take back what you were saying," as he grabbed him by the neck, "or be me sowl it's over you go before the Owld Man. It is ignorant we are, and savages we are. Take that," hitting him on the jaw.

"Be Hivins and I'll not sail wit a heathen. Come on, me boys. Over wit him."

"Here, Riley," I said, "this must stop. Don't you know that you are in the presence of the dead? Every one has the privilege of believing what he wants to."

"He has that, sir, but begorra, he wants to keep it to himself."

"Men," said I, "we will raise the plank. While we are doing it let us sing, 'Nearer, my G.o.d, to Thee.'"

While we were singing the beautiful hymn, the old ship we loved so well seemed to feel this solemn occasion. Although held in irons by having her sails aback, she did salute to her former captain by some strange freak of the sea, coming up in the wind, and shaking her sails.

Before we finished the singing the cook was leading in a rich tenor voice, and by the time that the last sound had died away, our Captain had slid off into the deep.

"Let go your main jib to windward, haul in the fore-boom sheet." To the man at the wheel, "Let her go off to her course again."

CHAPTER XI

ASTRAL INFLUENCE--THE CREW'S VERSION OF THE UNKNOWN

With these orders the crew, although silent and solemn, went about their various duties in their shiny and squeaky shoes, the only remaining sign of what had come to pa.s.s.

I told the steward to throw all of the Captain's clothing overboard. He protested, saying, "Surely, sir, you won't destroy his blankets?"

"Oh, yes, Steward, there are enough germs in those blankets to destroy all of c.o.xey's Army."

This mention of c.o.xey's Army was a mistake indeed. He changed at once from the comparative refinement that the hymn had wrought in him, to the fiery rage of the soap-box orator.

"They were the men," he thundered, "who make life possible for you and me. Otherwise we should be ground in the mill of the l.u.s.t and greed of capitalism."

He started to lead off on the subject of equal distribution, when I interrupted:

"Steward, this is no place to expound your theories of Socialism. You have done much harm since you came aboard this ship. Here," pointing to Swanson, who was slowly recovering from his battle for supremacy, "is a man who was led to believe from listening to your radical doctrines that work was not a necessary element in his life. Living in your world of thought, he gained the impression that refusing to work and disobeying orders was a perfectly natural thing to do. Now let me impress you with this thought--while you are aboard this ship with me, I'll not tolerate any more of your ill-advised teachings to the crew."

Later, while he was throwing the Captain's bedding overboard, I could hear him say:

"... To the vile dust from whence they sprung, Unwept, unhonored and unsung."

December 20th, 1898. Our position of ship at noon today was four miles north lat.i.tude, longitude 147 19" west. In looking over the chart I found that the course had been laid out by the Captain before his death.

Although now seventy miles to the eastward of it, I decided with favorable winds to follow this line to the South Sea Isles.