The Flying Bo'sun Part 5

The word "king" was a red flag to a bull to him. The presence of the Captain coming down the companion-way was all that saved me from the fate of all reigning monarchs.

Tongues and sounds of the Alaska codfish come pickled in brine and packed in firkins, and are sold princ.i.p.ally to marine shipping. All that is required in the process of cooking is to freshen them overnight, boil and serve with drawn b.u.t.ter. They are an enviable breakfast delicacy on land and sea.

The cook, although upset by my reference to kings, lost none of the dignity of serving the byproduct of the Alaska cod. The Captain had little to say during the morning meal, and seemed worried about something.

On my leaving the table he remarked: "Get your palm and needle. I want you to work with me on the spare sails, they are in bad shape."

The spare sails were indeed much in need of repair. Where they were not worn threadbare, they had been chewed by the rats. While we were sitting side by side sewing, this afternoon, we talked of many things--ships and shipping, and foreign ports.

"Do you know," said he, "that trip that took me to South America when my wife died was going to be my last trip." He stopped sewing. "You see, she would never complain of being sick. Of course, I was away most of the time, spending about two weeks a year at home with her and the children. It was while I was home that trip, that I noticed how poorly she looked, and that cough, and realized how much she must have suffered. The doctor told me she might live for years with proper care and right climatic conditions. She and I talked it over and decided that on my return trip I would give up the sea for good, and devote my time to her and the children on a farm in Southern California. When I returned from Valparaiso and found that poor Bertha was dead, and the boys living with their aunt, it was more than I could stand."

With tears streaming from his eyes, unconscious of the vast Pacific, the ship he was in, or even the crew around him, he murmured softly to himself:

"My wife, my wife,--gone, gone." In this intense moment a ball of sewing twine rolled from his knee, and, reaching for it, he said: "Do you know that sometimes I think she is with me."

CHAPTER V

THE SHARK--"TO h.e.l.l WITH SHARK AND SHIP"

I was so overcome by the Captain's tears and his great love for his deceased wife, that I failed to hear Old Charlie calling me from the wheel until he attracted my attention by pointing over the stern.

"What is wrong?" I asked, thinking that perhaps the log line had carried away.

"A black fin on the starboard quarter, sir."

"What is that?" said the Captain, throwing the sail aside and walking aft.

"It is a shark, sir," said I, "and a black one."

Instantly all love and human kindliness left him. Jumping down onto the p.o.o.p deck and looking over the rail.

"By Heavens, you are right," he cried, "he must be twenty feet long. Run to the pork barrel and get a chunk of meat while I get the shark hook."

"Aye, aye, sir." In the excitement it did not take me long to reach the cook's salt pork barrel, and grabbing about ten pounds of salt horse I was aft again in a minute. The Captain was bending a three-inch rope into a swivel on a chain. The chain is about six feet from the hook.

When the shark comes down with his six rows of teeth on each jaw, it takes more than manila rope to stop him, hence the quarter-inch chain.

The Captain was very much excited. "Here, d.a.m.n it. No, he will nibble it off the hook if you put it there. That is it. The center. Now over the side with it. Slack away on your line there. That is enough. Make fast."

"All fast, sir," said I.

In our excitement of the morning we had forgotten to take our observation for lat.i.tude. It was now past eight bells with the cook ringing the bell for dinner. The black fin was swimming around the salt horse, and it was easy to decide between them.

"By G.o.d, there," pointing astern, "is another one," said the Captain.

"Why in blazes don't he take the bait?"

No sooner said than done. The big black fin turned over on his back and swallowed meat and hook, then righting himself and feeling grateful for so small a morsel, and starting to swim away, he found that he was fast to the end of a rope.

No one realized it more than the Captain. With a shout that could be heard all over the schooner: "Lay aft, all hands," he cried, "and lend a hand to pull in this black cannibal."

With all hands aft, including the cook,--his presence is always needed in emergencies like this,--"Get that boom tackle from off the main boom," he continued, "and you," pointing to Olsen, "get a strop from the lazarette and fasten it up in the mizzen-rigging."

"If I go down there," said Olsen, pointing to the lazarette hatch, "the cat may get out."

"To h.e.l.l with the cat," said the Captain, "this is no time to stand on technicalities. Get the strop and get it up d.a.m.ned lively."

Meantime the cook forgot that he was the humble dispenser of salt horse and pea soup. He who had fought the land sharks for years, he who had stood hour after hour in the sweltering sun declaiming against the crimps and other parasites of the Barbary coast, was it not befitting that he should lead the charge on this black monster of the deep?

The Ballot-Box Cook, for this is the name I gave him, was standing abaft the mizzen-rigging, with unkempt iron-gray hair waving in the wind, a greasy ap.r.o.n, and bare feet. His large red nose had never lost any of its cherry color, as one would expect it to, under the bleaching influence of long voyages. His large supply of extract of lemon, with its sixty per cent of alcohol, is not to be deprecated in these times, when diluted to a nicety with water and sugar.

On this particular day he had not neglected his midday tonic. Tucking his dirty ap.r.o.n into the belt that supported his overalls, and jumping down from the deck-load to the p.o.o.p deck, he exclaimed with the wildest gestures:

"Holy Moses, men, don't let him get away."

From the way that the shark was thrashing and beating the water, one would think that the three-inch rope would part from the strain at any minute.

"Stop the ship!" cried the cook.

"Stop h.e.l.l," retorted the Captain.

"You will never land him," insisted the cook; "she has too much b.l.o.o.d.y way on her."

"I'll attend to this ship; I am master here," said the Captain angrily.

"Master, you are?" here discipline between master and cook was fused away into the northeast trades. The cook, coming to attention with all the dignity of a newly-made corporal, said: "Captain, I'll have you understand that I have no masters, and"--shaking his fist at the Captain, and slapping himself on the breast, "do you think that I have always been a sea-cook?"

Under other conditions the Captain would have had him put in irons, but there was now too much at stake for him to even think of such a thing.

For is not time the essence of all things? With this demon of the sea dangling on the end of a sixty-foot line, every minute seemed a century with the chance that hook, meat and line might sail away into fathomless depths.

"Get to h.e.l.l forward to your galley! I will send for you when I need you"--Here the cook, with rage interrupted:

"To h.e.l.l with you, shark and ship! The American Consul shall hear about this!" With this parting shot he slouched forward to the galley.

"Here, d.a.m.n you, here," continued the Captain, forgetting him on the instant. "Here, you, Nelson, put a sheep-shank in the shark-line--now hook your block in. That's the way. Hoist away on your tackle." After giving these orders he hopped up on the deck-load to direct the course of the incoming shark. With the crew pulling all their might, we could not get him in an inch.

"If we wait a little while, Captain," said Olsen, "he may drown."

"Drown be d.a.m.ned, who ever heard of a shark drowning? Get a s.n.a.t.c.h-block, hook it into the deck-lashing, take a line forward, and heave him in with the capstan."

Leaving the second mate with the crew to heave in the shark, I walked aft to join the Captain. While pa.s.sing the galley I could hear the cook singing, "Marchons, marchons,"--I knew it would be dangerous to interrupt him.

After heaving about twenty minutes the shark was alongside with the head about three feet out of water.

"Belay!" roared the Captain, "come aft, here, a couple of you. Slip a running bowline over his head, we must not lose him. That is the way.

Take a turn around the mast. All right aft. Heave away on your capstan."