CHAPTER XXV
THE EDUCATION OF THE SKIPPER
In spite of the gravity of his position, a smile broke over Mr. Court’s rugged face as he realised the situation. All unversed in any Machiavellian arts of diplomacy, he had unwittingly, by straightforward conduct, driven a wedge into the base of the vile edifice so laboriously reared by his commander. For it was impossible for him to help seeing how deep was Manuel’s resentment at the treatment meted out to him by the Captain, although the reason for the outburst was entirely hidden from the mate. He was seriously troubled in his mind, though, about Priscilla. How to proceed in order to save her from another painful illness he did not know. For he felt that, though he could and would dare a good deal now to keep the ship from becoming a den of wild beasts as far as the crew was concerned, interference between the skipper and his wife was quite another matter.
Yet, could he see her die? For that sad event seemed to him entirely probable within the next few days. She looked so frail, almost transparent, wax-like, in her perfect colourlessness of skin from her long seclusion, and, which alarmed him most,—there was a vacant, far-away look in her eyes that was most uncanny to him. He discussed the situation at great length with the second mate, who was fast recovering from the morbid condition of mind into which he had been thrown by the continued success of the skipper. But discuss asthey might there seemed no solution of this difficult problem—indeed, as they vividly remembered, the chief difficulty was Priscilla herself, who, loyal to the core, would not, whatever her sufferings, do or say anything which might in her estimation weaken her husband’s authority.
So, with a heavy sigh, the two good fellows would close their conference and part, the one to his dreamless bunk, the other to his four hours’ tramp up and down the small area of theGrampus’squarter-deck, revolving, almost maddeningly, all sorts of schemes for a further amelioration of the present conditions.
I fear that many ship officers, whether of merchant ships, whaleships, or men-of-war, deliberately cultivate a kind of stultification of the mental faculties while on watch. The mechanical side of the brain previously spoken of will go on doing its part no matter how dense have become the thinking processes. But that any intelligent man should set himself to become a Peter Bell, who ‘whistled as he went for want of thought,’ is akin to the idea of a man who should hermetically seal up his nostrils so that he should not smell, or render himself colour-blind so that pictures should not appeal to him, or cultivate stone-deafness in order not to enjoy harmony. It is true that to a highly sensitive, overstrung organisation such an ordeal as a cruise in a whaler must be a terrible one. For there are no inducements to ‘get there.’
‘Day after day, day after day,We stuck, nor breath nor motion;As idle as a painted shipUpon a painted ocean.’
‘Day after day, day after day,We stuck, nor breath nor motion;As idle as a painted shipUpon a painted ocean.’
‘Day after day, day after day,We stuck, nor breath nor motion;As idle as a painted shipUpon a painted ocean.’
‘Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.’
This condition of things, so wonderfully portrayed by Coleridge, is well-nigh intolerable to a merchantman, whose employment probably depends upon the smartness of his passage: to the whaler it matters no more than it does to the steamship, for exactly the opposite reason. The one doesn’t care because his engines are doing the work and his ship’s swift passage through the stagnant air makes a pleasant breeze; the other doesn’t care because he isn’t going anywhere, and consequently the longer he loiters where he is the more chances there are of his seeing what he wishes to see—whales.
In the foc’s’le there was a marked improvement in the mental and moral atmosphere. Released from the awful nightmare of the skipper’s presence, and quite conscious of the fact that the officers were in sympathy with them, the white men grew cheerful and spoke boldly. Moreover, the disarmament of the Portuguese had a splendid effect. It enabled men, hitherto silent under gross provocation because they wanted to live a little longer, to lift up their heads and speak with the enemy in the gate. This feeling of freedom culminated one day in a huge Portuguese ordering a smart little Yankee from Edgar town to ‘git away wiv that face while I sit-a down comf’ble.’ The invited party, being at the time sitting on a stool he had made himself, felt naturally aggrieved, and with a considerable amount of spirit retorted in terms that need not be clearly set down, at the same time retaining his seat. The Portuguese stared stupidly for a breathing space or two, then seizing the little Yankee, flung him in a cluckingheap across the foc’s’le. But Rube was sitting next to Hiram, and immediately rose, seized the wrists of the black man, and forcing him backwards on to the deck, sat on his chest, saying: ‘Looky here, my friend, we’ve done with this fun. They’s goin’ to be no more of it onless yew’re prepared to take on the job of killing every white man aboard. I doan’t kyar much which way ’tis, butthishez t’ be stopped anyhow.’ As soon as he had finished speaking every white man sprang to his feet cheering lustily. The Portuguese looked at each other, Reuben’s understudy was allowed to rise, looking foolish and—nothing happened. There was a sense of relief all round, for all felt that the power of the tyrant was broken. And in half an hour all the watch was as chummy as possible, even the bruised Hiram feeling quite satisfied—at least he expressed himself so to be.
Naturally there was a perceptible falling-off in the smartness with which the ship was worked. That was inevitable. In a small unlimited monarchy, such as a ship must be, you cannot have divided rule without a certain loss of power. Mr. Court fought against this tendency with all his might, but do what he would he could not quite overcome it. Still, the only visible effect of the ferment that was going on below was that no whales were sighted, and that of course might be due to natural causes. Four times every day Mr. Court went below and attended on his skipper, always looking stealthily at Mrs. Da Silva as he did so, whenever he could look unobserved, and endeavouring to note any change that should make it imperative for him to interfere actively on her behalf. There was none, however.She seemed to exist and do her duty to her husband automatically, but to grow no worse even in the close confinement of that tiny cabin. But anything more absolutely hopeless than her whole pose was surely never seen.
There was a great change in the skipper, though. Since his mad outburst of rage at Manuel and its result he had to all outward seeming been a different man. His injuries, so rudely handled, resented fiercely their treatment, and for long he had lain in high fever, alternating with periods of utter exhaustion. Only his splendid physique and iron constitution, aiding the careful nursing he received, pulled him through. And as he slowly progressed towards convalescence, he looked strangely at Priscilla, not gratefully, but with some such expression as the West African savage regards his ‘ju-ju,’ believing it all powerful to harm or help him as the case might present itself to the reasoning powers of the dreadful thing. A resolution slowly shaped itself in his brain that come what would he must be very careful of this white, frail woman, who seemed to have passed completely beyond the reach of all the emotions. And he determined to get better in order to carry out this resolve, although had he been capable of entertaining the feeling it would surely have forced its way into his dark heart that the best way in which he could treat his wife would be to die, and set her free from the hourly horror of his companionship, which for obvious reasons has not been insisted upon definitely here.
So he mended rapidly—so rapidly, in fact, that oneweek after he had come to the conclusion above noted he was seated on the top of the little deck aft with Priscilla by his side, both luxuriously inhaling the sweet air as the homely old ship wallowed along northward. It was a heavenly afternoon. The sky had the appearance of a great green field—the first tender, unsullied green of spring, upon which lay billowy masses of fleecy cloud, motionless as masses of whitest wool and arranged in regular rows converging to a point in the south-east. An unaccountable longing for the peace of those heavenly solitudes, a desire to leave behind her the weighing down of her earthy part possessed Priscilla’s soul, and quite unnoted by her the heavy tears rose to her eyes, coursed down her thin cheeks and dropped upon the deck. He, stealthily watching as usual while he was awake, became alarmed, because he had not seen a tear for so long. ‘Wut ails ye, Pris?’ he inquired anxiously. ‘Ain’t sick, air ye? C’n I order y’ anythin’—c’n I do anythin’?’
Immediately the gracious fountain ceased to flow, and, turning, she looked steadily at him, saying, ‘No, thank you, Ramon; I want nothing.’
‘Wall, wut ye cryin’ fur, then?’ he demanded irritably.
‘I don’t know, Ramon, and, what is more, I didn’t know that I was crying until you spoke.’
Then, to her great relief—for her dread was a long and acrid cross-examination by her husband upon any subject whatever—the skipper half rose from his chair and hissed out, ‘Whar’s the watch? Wut ye all doin’? Look thar!’ Involuntarily Priscilla looked where he pointed, and was filled with admiration and wonder. A mighty sperm whale had risenfrom unknown depths and roamings within a cable’s length of the ship and lay there, clearly visible in the beautifully transparent blue of the sea, almost motionless. All his majestic outlines defined themselves to the eye, the great down-hanging shaft of the jaw, the huge rotundity of the belly, and the vast fans of the flukes that, apparently motionless, were in reality quivering with receptivity like the diaphragm of a telephone. She had never before seen a whale at close quarters, never had an opportunity of admiring this, the mightiest of all God’s creations in the plenitude of his powers and in his own proper element, and the sight filled her with awe.
The reason of the whale’s nearness to the ship, not merely without alarm—for that can readily be understood, since whales, like other animals, long unmolested become perfectly tame—but without having been previously seen, is not to be very clearly stated. When such an occurrence does take place on board a whaleship there is usually much unpleasantness, because the captain is bound to believe that it proves that the watchers aloft are neglecting their duty, or they would have reported the proximity of the whale before. The supposition is only reasonable because really from the masthead of a ship on a fine day, such as this was, the whole vast circle spread out beneath one looks so small, and objects upon it are so clearly defined, that it seems impossible for four pairs of eyes to miss the spout of a whale. And as the distance from that height to the visible horizon is not less than fifteen miles, within which in such weather a sperm-whale’s spout should be clearly discernible, the whale should have risen twice withinthe visible range to spout. His utmost speed when going for all he is worth is only about fourteen miles an hour, his usual cruising speed when underneath only about three or four. He can stay down an hour, but rarely exceeds forty-five minutes, and he does not care, unless driven by necessity, to travel fast under water. When he does come to the surface, too, after a stay beneath of that length, he must stay up until he has finished a certain number of inspirations and expirations or ‘spoutings out’—fifty, sixty, or seventy, as the case may be. And no matter how hardly he may be pressed by enemies, this always holds good. Yet I have seen a sperm whale rise in ghost-like fashion almost alongside the ship during a stark calm on a day when sea and sky were one flawless expanse of blue, blending into each other at the horizon so perfectly that no one could tell exactly where sea ended and sky began. All hands were most eager to ‘raise whale,’ for the bounty offered was five pounds—equal to twenty-five dollars—and we had fine men at the mastheads. Yet our first intimation of his appearance was given by himself spouting almost alongside. As silently as shadows we prepared to go after him, but as the boats were about to be lowered he disappeared, nor did we ever catch a glimpse of him again, although all hands clustered aloft straining their eyes in every direction. He vanished so unaccountably that there was an uneasy feeling on board that what we had all seen was no whale at all, but a sportive spook sent to befool us by some sarcastic sea-demon. There is no doubt that both coming and going were exceptions to all the ordinary laws governing the actionsof the whale-folk.
All this explanatory matter, taking so long to set down, was as familiar as breathing to Captain Da Silva, yet his only emotion upon ‘raising’ the whale so closely alongside was black, murderous rage. He dared not shout for fear of scaring or ‘galleying’ the whale. But his enforced quiet made his hissed-out orders sound all the more furious. The men flew to their stations silently. The boats were lowered by inches at a time, and with the utmost deliberation, lest the rattle of the patent sheaves should alarm the as yet unconscious monster. Only two boats went—the mate’s and the second mate’s—and the skipper sat on his high perch and watched them depart with bitter muttered comments upon all they did. Every movement was criticised as if the makers of it were ‘greenies’ just commencing the great business. And the worst of the matter was that the men in the boats knew this. It made them less confident than they would otherwise have been, and therefore they felt as if they were going into a fight whereof the issue was already half decided against them.
Still, they paddled steadily towards the foe without him betraying by the slightest sign a knowledge of any danger likely to be threatening him. By common consent the boats parted company as they neared him, and came on at the great head sheering slightly to either side. Suddenly he saw them or felt them—no one knows which it is—and with one great sweep of his flukes he leapt forward. Too late. Both boats closed in on him like sentient destroyers, and as if at one signal the harpoons flew from either harpooner’s nervous hands and sank quivering intothe flank of the whale. Instead of turning to fight, as usual, he settled at once, quite quietly, and immediately the attackers felt an impetus forward, steady and increasing. Away he went, well below, only momentarily breaking the surface to spout, and getting up speed in such a fashion that in a very few minutes, despite the smoothness of the sea, it was evident that all the boatmen could do was to hold on and wait until their gigantic steed tired.
On board the skipper watched with eyes aflame, blaming them all impartially for what he was pleased to call their idiotic behaviour, only his expressions were not so mild as that, and cursing his inability, owing to the absence of wind, to follow them up. Priscilla watched too, fascinated, and all unconscious of the danger the brave fellows were in. And then, with a suddenness seen only in tropical latitudes,
The sun’s rim dips; the stars rush out;At one stride comes the dark;
and the fleeing boats fade from view. Only then does it dawn upon her what awful danger these men are in, and even then, such is the deadness of her mind, she cannot bring herself to realise as she thinks she ought to do the peril of her shipmates. There is a great silence on board. No one can do anything but wait, except the Captain, who can, and does, keep up a muttered succession of evil words in his own language. The leaden-footed minutes creep along, the heavy dews fall, a solemn silence, only accentuated by the creak of a spar or the slight rattle of a block, reigns supreme, for the Captain has gone below, and she is up there quite alone. And suddenly reliefcomes. Into her dry heart there steals the blessed consciousness of God’s loving presence, her almost deadened mental perceptions revive on the memory of ‘I will never leave thee nor forsake thee,’ and immediately she is able to pray. Not for herself—that has not yet come—but for the safety of those whom she has seen go out into the night. Most fervently she implores the Father that they may be preserved through the perils around them, and that when they return (as she at once feels assured they will) her terrible husband may be merciful to them. As she forms the petitions in her heart there is a great cry from many throats, a rushing, roaring sound, a crash, and the babel of many voices. All hands spring into violent activity, and high over all the other sounds rises the voice of the Captain. Another boat is lowered into the darkness, which is presently illuminated in ghastly fashion by a blue light which is fired and spreads its glare all around the ship.
We must leave Priscilla for a few minutes suffering all the tortures of uncertainty, and avail ourselves of our privilege of knowing at once all that is happening. Dragged away at such speed in the darkness, and dependent entirely upon the phosphorescent glare in the water for their knowledge of the whale’s whereabouts, the two boats’ crews were in no enviable case. But the officers did their manful best, whenever a slackening in the whale’s speed gave them opportunity to get near him, to hurl lances and fire bombs into his shadowy-looking mass. But all had apparently been of little or no avail in staying his forward rush, and as for its direction they knew absolutelynothing. In the midst of this confusion there suddenly towered up before them the great bulk of the ship, menacing like the shadow of death. Both officers drew knives and touched the tow lines, yelling at the same moment, ‘Lay off—lay on!’ So as the impetus brought them alongside, instead of coming end on at that great speed and being dashed in pieces, one sheered to port and the other to starboard, both intact and safe. They heard the crash, though, in the midst of that strange evolution, and feared the worst. It was not, however, as bad as they feared, although bad enough. The whale, nearing his end, and collecting all his powers to meet it, had suddenly become instinctively aware of the ship confronting him, and, swerving to the left almost cleared her. But his great head struck the rudder such a tremendous blow that it was wrenched from the sternpost, without, however, doing that essential portion of the ship any damage. The rudder was simply gone clean, and none of them ever saw it again.
Then were heard the strange noises made by a whale in its dying agonies close alongside the ship. She rolled and heaved in the swell he made, but he was not near enough to give her another blow. Presently the silence closed in upon them again. It was broken by the skipper, who, excited beyond endurance, yet compelled to inaction, almost screamed, ‘’Longside thar! See anythin’ of th’ whale? Hez he stove in th’ counter, or wut? ’R ye all dead? ’n’ ef y’ ain’t, why’nt ye do somethin’ or say somethin’ ’r make a sign?’ Then compliments after his foul fashion.
Presently up out of the darkness came a voice, Mr. Court’s:
‘All right, sir, we’ve got hold of him; just passin’ tow-line.’
There was a growl like that of a wild beast in response, and an order to light up all the suspended cressets. All hands girded up their loins for the long night’s work pending, and as the tow-line was passed on board bent their backs to the task of hauling the great whale alongside, thinking meanwhile of the possibility of his having started a butt when he collided with the stern fittings. Priscilla, her heart full of gratitude for answered prayer, went below, lay down, and in a few minutes slept the blessed sleep of a relieved mind.
All through the night, goaded on by the rasping voice of the skipper, who, perched aloft upon the after platform, suffered terribly from his inability to make himself felt as well as heard, the weary men toiled on. And to such good purpose that when the pageant of morning blazed forth upon the welcoming sky they had actually consummated the cutting-in, and were all ready for the trying-out. The skipper having hobbled below, Mr. Court proceeded to set blubber watches of six hours each, but also gave word to go easy, for he knew, judging by his own feelings, how spent all hands were, and he would not be so foolish as to lay them up. The relieved ones had just cast themselves down as they were and passed into the depths of utterly exhausted nature’s refreshment when, as Mr. Court was diving below to his well-earned rest, the skipper reappeared shouting, ‘Lay aft here, yew lazy hogs, ’n’ rig a stage over the stern. I want ter git a jury rudder rigged.’Returning to the deck, Mr. Court said gravely, ‘Captain, that kind o’ thing wunt work no more. Yew’ve gut t’ be reasonable. I wunt let ye play the fool with men’s lives any more, and ef yew’re goin’t’ shoot, shoot quick, ’r ye’ll be too late.’ And Captain Da Silva saw, to his intense amazement, a revolver-barrel gleaming in the fingers of the officer whom in his blind passion and prejudice he had abused as a coward.
His sufferings were terrible to witness. His keen intelligence showed him clearly that at present, at any rate, the mate had the key of the situation, and that again he must stoop to dissimulation where he had been used to enforce his will with the utmost disregard of what anyone thought or felt. At last, when the first few agonising spasms had passed, he mastered himself by a supreme effort and said huskily, ‘All right, Mr. Court. It’s yewr call. It’ll be mine some day. Meanwhile we’ll keep eour trouble indoors.’
Raising his voice a little for the benefit of the few haggard-looking, anxious men who were clustered about the mainmast awaiting the word to come aft and recommence work, he said, ‘Oh, all right, Mr. Court; I guess we’ll leave it a bit. Don’ look ’s if we sh’d hev enny change in th’ weather fur a while, anyhow. We’ll git on with th’ tryin’-out, ’n’ leave th’ repairs until she’s cleaned erp agen. Thet’ll do th’ watch below,’ he snarled in conclusion. And the worn-out men shuffled away.
Without another word Mr. Court descended to his bunk, not, to be sure, without many misgivings as towhether, in the absence of any defence to his sleeping-place, any door to bar, he should, in the quaint sailor phrase, ‘wake up and find himself dead.’ But he reasoned, and correctly, that under present conditions the skipper would hardly proceed to open murder, for open it must be since four men would be in full view of the crime if it were done while he slept. And with a final, ‘Well, I kain’t he’p it, anyhaow; mout so well die this way ’s any other, fur all I k’n see,’ the mate turned in, put his loaded revolver under his pillow, and in two minutes was fast asleep.
The Captain, in spite of his weakened body, of his still aching limbs, paced the narrow limits of the cabin like a caged leopard, his mind seething with deadly thoughts about the mate and, in a lesser degree, all the members of his crew. For this was the first voyage of his career as captain that any of his ship’s company had been able to oppose his will successfully. Also it was the first voyage of his life that he had suffered so much in his own body, and he was gravely in doubt as to what the change meant. He was inclined to lay all his disasters at the door of his wife; but of her he was now quite afraid, and, moreover, satisfied that if he were not very careful in his treatment of her worse misfortunes would befall him. These thoughts worried him so much that he had recourse to the bottle, the great store of fiery liquor he had brought on board at Brava having been only slightly encroached upon. And after a few glasses and a couple of cigars he was reassured as to his own importance and power, feeling, indeed, that his recent fears were quite unwarranted. And yet he could not help casting a curiously furtive glance at the pale, mask-likeface of his wife.
The next day, his physical improvement having been well maintained, he took full charge at eight bells in the morning, and all hands fell obediently into line at his word. Work on the blubber proceeded apace, but there was a much more important duty to perform, and that was the rigging of a contrivance by means of which the ship might be steered. Here Captain Da Silva shone as a perfect seaman. He ordered a spar about the size of a medium scaffold-pole to be made into a huge oar, the blade being formed of stout planks bolted together athwart, and the interstices on each side of the spar filled with old chain for weight to keep the machine down. A solid crutch, lined with leather and well greased, was fixed on the taffrail for the upper part of the spar to work in, with plenty of play allowed, but strong lashings to prevent its jumping out of its bed. Also a severe holdfast was made just above the blade of the ‘oar,’ into which a stout tackle was hooked on either side; the upper blocks of these tackles were led to outriggers over each quarter, and the falls passed into the barrel of the steering wheel. And—of course recognising that a vast amount of uninteresting but essential detail has been left out—that is how Captain Da Silva rigged his jury-rudder. It was so successful, too, that three days afterwards he navigated his ship into the difficult harbour of Port Lloyd with it, none of the captains of whaling ships anchored there noticing any difference, except that there were one or two remarks about theGrampus’swild steering and a little wonder as to what she was towing astern.
Before going into the harbour Captain Da Silva called all hands aft and made them a speech. He said: ‘Men we’re a-goin’ in here fur repairs, wood, an’ water. Any of ye ’at wants t’ run away ’ud better make erp yewr mines before yew go fur the wust floggin’ y’ ever had w’en yew’re brought back. ’N’ yew will be, fur I’m goin’ t’ offer one hundred dollars reward fur any deserter brought back to the ship dead er alive. ’N’ thar’s lots er folks here as’d kill a man fur one dollar, let alone a hundred. No gammin’ allowed. This ship’s ben runnin’ slack. I’m goin’t’ tighten things up a bit. Naow git.’ And as all hands slunk away the skipper cast a triumphant glance at the officers as who should say, ‘What are you going to do now?’ There was no answering look. Who could reply to a challenge like that without putting himself irrevocably in the wrong?
Now it would be useless to recapitulate the proceedings at Port Lloyd, so tame and commonplace were they. The men were kept at work not merely from daylight till dark, but before daylight till after dark, doing all the thousand-and-one things needed when a whaleship comes into harbour after a long cruise. No boats other than her own were allowed near the ship, so the men got no fresh fruit, while no fresh beef or vegetables were sent on board by the skipper, so that all the fresh food obtained by the hungry men was fish, which, fortunately for them, bit at night and were caught in fairly large numbers. The skipper went ashore but very little; when he did, he now took Priscilla with him, closely muffled up so that no one should see her but himself. He saw none of his fellow-skippers, and cared nothing that he was the talk of the harbour. At the end of four days heordered the windlass to be manned, and took theGrampusout to sea again, no man but himself knowing whither he was bound.