The Sea Bride Part 19

"Fix me up a cask," he said. "Big enough to hold all that.... We'll stow it dry...."

Eph scratched his head. He spat over the rail. "Fix you up a cask?" he repeated. "Oh, aye." He emphasized the p.r.o.noun; and Brander's eyes twinkled.

They packed the ambergris away in the captain's storeroom; the compartment at the bottom of the _Sally_, under the cabin, in the very stern. It rested there among the barrels and casks of food and the general supplies.... There was no access to this place save through the cabin itself; it was not connected with the after hold where water and general stores and gear were stowed away. Brander suggested putting it there; he came to Noll Wing with his request, and because Dan'l Tobey was with Noll, Brander framed his question in a personal form.

"I'd like to stow this below us here," he said. "Best it be out of reach of the men."

Dan'l scowled; Noll looked up heavily, met Brander's eyes. In the end, he nodded. "Where you like," he said sulkily. "Don't bother me."

Brander smiled; and the cask was hidden away below....

But it was not forgotten; it could not be forgotten. From its hiding place, the ambergris made its influence felt all over the vessel. It was like dynamite in its potentialities for mischief. The mates could not forget it; the boat-steerers in the steerage discussed it over and over; the men forward in the fo'c's'le argued about it endlessly.

It was a rich treasure, worth as much as the whole cruise was like to be worth in oil; and it was all in one lump.... That is to say, it was no more than a heavy burden for a strong man. Two men could have carried it....

A thousand acres of well-tilled farm land are worth a great deal of money; but this form of riches is not one to catch the imagination.

Wealth becomes more fascinating as it becomes more compact. Coal is more treasured than an equal value of earth; lead is more treasured than coal; and men will die for a nugget of gold that is worth no more than the unconsidered riches which lie all about them. Great value in small compa.s.s sets men by the ears....

Every man aboard the _Sally_ had a direct and personal interest in Brander's find of ambergris. And the matter of their debate was this: was the ambergris the property of the _Sally_, a fruit of the voyage; or was it Brander's? If it was a part of the profits of the cruise, they would all share in it. If it was Brander's, they would not....

Brander--and this word had gone around the ship--had spoken of it as his own. For which some condemned and hated him; some praised and chose to flatter him. If the worth of the stuff was divided between them all, Noll Wing and Dan'l Tobey would have the lion's share, and the men forward would have no more than the price of a debauch. If it were Brander's alone, they might beg or steal a larger share from him.

Or--and not a few had this thought--they might seize the whole treasure and make off with it....

The possibilities were infinite; the potentialities for trouble were enormous.

This new tension aboard the _Sally_ came to a head in the cabin; the very air there was charged with it. Dan'l and old Tichel were against Brander from the first; c.o.x was inclined to support him. Dan'l sought to sound Noll Wing and learn his att.i.tude....

He said to Noll casually, one day: "The 'gris will make this a fat cruise, sir."

Noll nodded. "Oh, aye.... No doubt!"

Dan'l looked away. "Of course, Brander doesn't intend to claim it all.... To push his claim...."

"Ye think not?" Noll asked anxiously.

"No," said Dan'l. "He knows he can't.... It's a part of the takings of the _Sally_...."

Noll wagged his head dolefully: "Aye, but will the man see it that way?"

"He'll have to."

The captain looked up at Dan'l cautiously. "Did you mark the greed in the one eye of Mauger when they came aboard?" he asked. "Mauger sets store by the stuff...."

Dan'l snorted. "Mauger! Pshaw!"

Noll shifted uneasily in his chair. "Just the same," he said, "Mauger holds a grudge against me.... He but waits his chance for a knife in my back.... And Brander is his friend, you'll mind."

"You're not afraid of the two of them.... There's no need. I'll undertake to see to that...."

"You're a strong man, Dan'l," said old Noll. "A strong, youthful man....

But I'm getting old. Eh, Dan'l...." His voice broke with his pity of himself. "Eh, Dan'l, I've sailed the sea too long...."

Dan'l said, with some scorn in his tone: "Nevertheless, you're not afraid...."

Then Faith opened the door from the after cabin; and Dan'l checked his word. Faith looked from Dan'l to her husband, and her eyes hardened as she looked to Dan'l again. "You'll not be saying Noll Wing is afraid of--anything, Dan'l," she said mildly.

"I'm telling him," said Dan'l, "that he should not permit Brander to claim the ambergris for himself."

Faith smiled a little. "You think Brander means to do that?"

"He has done it," said Dan'l stubbornly. "He claimed it in the beginning; he speaks of what he will do with it.... He speaks of it as his own."

"I think," said Faith, "that something has robbed you of discernment, Dan'l. Why do you hate Brander? Is he not a good officer?... A man?"

Dan'l might have spoken, but Brander himself dropped down the ladder from the deck just then; and Dan'l stood silently for a moment, watching....

Brander looked at Faith, and spoke to her, and to the others. Then he went into his own cabin and closed the door. They all knew the thinness of the cabin walls; what they might say, Brander could hear distinctly.

Dan'l turned without a word, and went on deck.

He met Tichel there, and told him what had pa.s.sed. Tichel grinned angrily.... "Aye," said the old man. "He comes and Jonahs us, so we sight no whale for a month on end.... And then is wishful to hold the prize that the _Sally's_ boat found." His teeth set; his fist rose....

And Dan'l nodded his agreement.

"We'll see that he does not, in the end," he said.

"Aye," said Tichel. "Aye, we'll see t'that."

Roy Kilcup was a partisan of Dan'l's, in this as in all things; and Roy alone faced Brander on the matter. He asked the fourth mate straightforwardly: "Look here, do you claim that ambergris is yours?"

Brander smiled at the boy. "Why, youngster?" he asked.

"Because I want to know," said Roy. "That's why!"

"Well," Brander chuckled, "others want to know. They're not sleeping well of nights, for wanting...."

"Do you, or don't you?" Roy insisted.

Brander leaned toward him and whispered amiably: "I'll tell you, the day we touch at home," he promised. "Now--run along."

Thus they were all concerned; but Noll Wing took the matter harder than any, because Mauger, whom he feared, was concerned in it. His worry over it gave him one sleepless night; he rose in that night and found the whiskey.... And for the first time in all his life, Noll Wing drank himself into a stupor.

He had always been a steady drinker; he had often been inflamed with liquor. But his stomach was strong; he could carry it; he had never debauched himself.

This time, he became like a log, and Faith found him, when she woke in the morning, unclean with his own vomitings, sodden and helpless as a snoring log. He lay thus two days.... And he woke at last with a scream of fright, and swore that Mauger was at him with a knife, so that Dan'l and Willis c.o.x had to hold the man quiet till the hallucination pa.s.sed.