Moran of the Lady Letty, Page 3

  III. THE LADY LETTY

  Another day passed, then two. Before Wilbur knew it he had settledhimself to his new life, and woke one morning to the realization thathe was positively enjoying himself. Daily the weather grew warmer. Thefifth day out from San Francisco it was actually hot. The pitch grewsoft in the "Bertha Millner's" deck seams, the masts sweated resin.The Chinamen went about the decks wearing but their jeans and blouses.Kitchell had long since abandoned his coat and vest. Wilbur's oilskinsbecame intolerable, and he was at last constrained to trade hispocket-knife to Charlie for a suit of jeans and wicker sandals, such asthe coolies wore--and odd enough he looked in them.

  The Captain instructed him in steering, and even promised to show himthe use of the sextant and how to take an observation in the fake shortand easy coasting style of navigation. Furthermore, he showed him how toread the log and the manner of keeping the dead reckoning.

  During most of his watches Wilbur was engaged in painting the insideof the cabin, door panels, lintels, and the few scattered moldings; andtoward the middle of the first week out, when the "Bertha Millner"was in the latitude of Point Conception, he and three Chinamen, underKitchell's directions, ratlined down the forerigging and affixed thecrow's nest upon the for'mast. The next morning, during Charlie's watchon deck, a Chinaman was sent up into the crow's nest, and from that timeon there was always a lookout maintained from the masthead.

  More than once Wilbur looked around him at the empty coruscating indigoof the ocean floor, wondering at the necessity of the lookout, andfinally expressed his curiosity to Kitchell. The Captain had now takennot a little to Wilbur; at first for the sake of a white man's company,and afterward because he began to place a certain vague reliance uponWilbur's judgment. Kitchell had reemarked as how he had brains.

  "Well, you see, son," Kitchell had explained to Wilbur, "os-tensibleewe are after shark-liver oil--and so we are; but also we are on any laythat turns up; ready for any game, from wrecking to barratry. Strikeme, if I haven't thought of scuttling the dough-dish for her insoorance.There's regular trade, son, to be done in ships, and then there'spickin's an' pickin's an' pickin's. Lord, the ocean's rich withpickin's. Do you know there's millions made out of the day-bree andrefuse of a big city? How about an ocean's day-bree, just chew on thatnotion a turn; an' as fur a lookout, lemmee tell you, son, cast youreye out yon," and he swept the sea with a forearm; "nothin', hey, so itlooks, but lemmee tell you, son, there ain't no manner of place onthe ball of dirt where you're likely to run up afoul of so manythings--unexpected things--as at sea. When you're clear o' land lay tothis here pree-cep', 'A million to one on the unexpected.'"

  The next day fell almost dead calm. The hale, lusty-lunged nor'westerthat had snorted them forth from the Golden Gate had lapsed to a zephyr,the schooner rolled lazily southward with the leisurely nonchalance ofa grazing ox. At noon, just after dinner, a few cat's-paws curdled themilky-blue whiteness of the glassy surface, and the water once morebegan to talk beneath the bow-sprit. It was very hot. The sun spunsilently like a spinning brass discus over the mainmast. On the fo'c'slehead the Chinamen were asleep or smoking opium. It was Charlie's watch.Kitchell dozed in his hammock in the shadow of the mainsheet. Wilbur wasbelow tinkering with his paint-pot about the cabin. The stillness wasprofound. It was the stillness of the summer sea at high noon.

  The lookout in the crow's nest broke the quiet.

  "Hy-yah, hy-yah!" he cried, leaning from the barrel and calling throughan arched palm. "Hy-yah, one two, plenty, many tortle, topside, wattah;hy-yah, all-same tortle."

  "Hello, hello!" cried the Captain, rolling from his hammock. "Turtle?Where-away?"

  "I tink-um 'bout quallah mile, mebbee, four-piecee tortle all-sameweatha bow."

  "Turtle, hey? Down y'r wheel, Jim, haul y'r jib to win'ward," hecommanded the man at the wheel; then to the men forward: "Get the doryoverboard. Son, Charlie, and you, Wing, tumble in. Wake up now and seeyou stay so."

  The dory was swung over the side, and the men dropped into her andtook their places at the oars. "Give way," cried the Captain, settlinghimself in the bow with the gaff in his hand. "Hey, Jim!" he shouted tothe lookout far above, "hey, lay our course for us." The lookout nodded,the oars fell, and the dory shot forward in the direction indicated bythe lookout.

  "Kin you row, son? asked Kitchell, with sudden suspicion. Wilbur smiled.

  "You ask Charlie and Wing to ship their oars and give me a pair." TheCaptain complied, hesitating.

  "Now, what," he said grimly, "now, what do you think you're going to do,sonny?"

  "I'm going to show you the Bob Cook stroke we used in our boat in '95,when we beat Harvard," answered Wilbur.

  Kitchell gazed doubtfully at the first few strokes, then with growinginterest watched the tremendous reach, the powerful knee-drive, theswing, the easy catch, and the perfect recover. The dory was cutting thewater like a gasoline launch, and between strokes there was the leastpossible diminishing of the speed.

  "I'm a bit out of form just now," remarked Wilbur, "and I'm used tothe sliding seat; but I guess it'll do." Kitchell glanced at the humanmachine that once was No. 5 in the Yale boat and then at the waterhissing from the dory's bows. "My Gawd!" he said, under his breath.He spat over the bows and sucked the nicotine from his mustache,thoughtfully.

  "I ree-marked," he observed, "as how you had brains, my son."

  A few minutes later the Captain, who was standing in the dory's bow andalternately conning the ocean's surface and looking back to the Chinamanstanding on the schooner's masthead, uttered an exclamation:

  "Steady, ship your oars, quiet now, quiet, you damn fools! We're righton 'em--four, by Gawd, an' big as dinin' tables!"

  The oars were shipped. The dory's speed dwindled. "Out your paddles, siton the gun'l, and paddle ee-asy." The hands obeyed. The Captain's voicedropped to a whisper. His back was toward them and he gestured with onefree hand. Looking out over the water from his seat on the gun'l, Wilburcould make out a round, greenish mass like a patch of floating seaweed,just under the surface, some sixty yards ahead.

  "Easy sta'board," whispered the Captain under his elbow. "Go ahead,port; e-e-easy all, steady, steady."

  The affair began to assume the intensity of a little drama--a littledrama of midocean. In spite of himself, Wilbur was excited. He evenfound occasion to observe that the life was not so bad, after all. Thiswas as good fun as stalking deer. The dory moved forward by inches.Kitchell's whisper was as faint as a dying infant's: "Steady all,s-stead-ee, sh-stead--"

  He lunged forward sharply with the gaff, and shouted aloud: "I gothim--grab holt his tail flippers, you fool swabs; grab holt quick--don'tyou leggo--got him there, Charlie? If he gets away, you swine, I'll ripy' open with the gaff--heave now--heave--there--there--soh, stand clearhis nippers. Strike me! he's a whacker. I thought he was going to getaway. Saw me just as I swung the gaff, an' ducked his nut."

  Over the side, bundled without ceremony into the boat, clawing,thrashing, clattering, and blowing like the exhaust of a donkey-engine,tumbled the great green turtle, his wet, green shield of shell threefeet from edge to edge, the gaff firmly transfixed in his body, justunder the fore-flipper. From under his shell protruded his snake-likehead and neck, withered like that of an old man. He was waving his headfrom side to side, the jaws snapping like a snapped silk handkerchief.Kitchell thrust him away with a paddle. The turtle craned his neck, andcatching the bit of wood in his jaw, bit it in two in a single grip.

  "I tol' you so, I tol' you to stand clear his snapper. If that had beenyour shin now, eh? Hello, what's that?"

  Faintly across the water came a prolonged hallooing from the schooner.Kitchell stood up in the dory, shading his eyes with his hat.

  "What's biting 'em now?" he muttered, with the uneasiness of a captainaway from his ship. "Oughta left Charlie on board--or you, son. Who'sdoin' that yellin', I can't make out."

  "Up in the crow's nest," exclaimed Wilbur. "It's Jim, see, he's wavinghis arms."

  "Well,
whaduz he wave his dam' fool arms for?" growled Kitchell, angrybecause something was going forward he did not understand.

  "There, he's shouting again. Listen--I can't make out what he'syelling."

  "He'll yell to a different pipe when I get my grip of him. I'll twistthe head of that swab till he'll have to walk back'ard to see wherehe's goin'. Whaduz he wave his arms for--whaduz he yell like a dam'philly-loo bird for? What's him say, Charlie?"

  "Jim heap sing, no can tell. Mebbee--tinkum sing, come back chop-chop."

  "We'll see. Oars out, men, give way. Now, son, put a little o' that Yalestingo in the stroke."

  In the crow's nest Jim still yelled and waved like one distraught, whilethe dory returned at a smart clip toward the schooner. Kitchell latheredwith fury.

  "Oh-h," he murmured softly through his gritted teeth. "Jess lemmee laymee two hands afoul of you wunst, you gibbering, yellow philly-loobird, believe me, you'll dance. Shut up!" he roared; "shut up, you crazydo-do, ain't we coming fast as we can?"

  The dory bumped alongside, and the Captain was over the rail likequicksilver. The hands were all in the bow, looking and pointing to thewest. Jim slid down the ratlines, bubbling over with suppressed news.Before his feet had touched the deck Kitchell had kicked him into thestays again, fulminating blasphemies.

  "Sing!" he shouted, as the Chinaman clambered away like a bewilderedape; "sing a little more. I would if I were you. Why don't you sing andwave, you dam' fool philly-loo bird?"

  "Yas, sah," answered the coolie.

  "What you yell for? Charlie, ask him whaffo him sing."

  "I tink-um ship," answered Charlie calmly, looking out over thestarboard quarter.

  "Ship!"

  "Him velly sick," hazarded the Chinaman from the ratlines, adding asentence in Chinese to Charlie.

  "He says he tink-um ship sick, all same; ask um something--ship vellysick."

  By this time the Captain, Wilbur, and all on board could plainlymake out a sail some eight miles off the starboard bow. Even at thatdistance, and to eyes so inexperienced as those of Wilbur, it needed buta glance to know that something was wrong with her. It was not that shefailed to ride the waves with even keel, it was not that her rigging wasin disarray, nor that her sails were disordered. Her distance was toogreat to make out such details. But in precisely the same manner as atrained physician glances at a doomed patient, and from that indefinablelook in the face of him and the eyes of him pronounces the verdict"death," so Kitchell took in the stranger with a single comprehensiveglance, and exclaimed:

  "Wreck!"

  "Yas, sah. I tink-um velly sick."

  "Oh, go to 'll, or go below and fetch up my glass--hustle!"

  The glass was brought. "Son," exclaimed Kitchell--"where is that manwith the brains? Son, come aloft here with me." The two clambered up theratlines to the crow's nest. Kitchell adjusted the glass.

  "She's a bark," he muttered, "iron built--about seven hundred tons,I guess--in distress. There's her ensign upside down at themizz'nhead--looks like Norway--an' her distress signals on the spankergaff. Take a blink at her, son--what do you make her out? Lord, she'sridin' high."

  Wilbur took the glass, catching the stranger after several clumsyattempts. She was, as Captain Kitchell had announced, a bark, and, tojudge by her flag, evidently Norwegian.

  "How she rolls!" muttered Wilbur.

  "That's what I can't make out," answered Kitchell. "A bark such as sheain't ought to roll thata way; her ballast'd steady her."

  "What's the flags on that boom aft--one's red and white andsquare-shaped, and the other's the same color, only swallow-tail inshape?"

  "That's H. B., meanin: 'I am in need of assistance.'"

  "Well, where's the crew? I don't see anybody on board."

  "Oh, they're there right enough."

  "Then they're pretty well concealed about the premises," turned Wilbur,as he passed the glass to the Captain.

  "She does seem kinda empty," said the Captain in a moment, with a suddenshow of interest that Wilbur failed to understand.

  "An' where's her boats?" continued Kitchell. "I don't just quite makeout any boats at all." There was a long silence.

  "Seems to be a sort of haze over her," observed Wilbur.

  "I noticed that, air kinda quivers oily-like. No boats, no boats--an'I can't see anybody aboard." Suddenly Kitchell lowered the glass andturned to Wilbur. He was a different man. There was a new shine inhis eyes, a wicked line appeared over the nose, the jaw grew salient,prognathous.

  "Son," he exclaimed, gimleting Wilbur with his contracted eyes; "I havereemarked as how you had brains. I kin fool the coolies, but I can'tfool you. It looks to me as if that bark yonder was a derelict; an' doyou know what that means to us? Chaw on it a turn."

  "A derelict?"

  "If there's a crew on board they're concealed from the public gaze--an'where are the boats then? I figger she's an abandoned derelict. Do youknow what that means for us--for you and I? It means," and grippingWilbur by the shoulders, he spoke the word into his face with a savageintensity. "It means salvage, do you savvy?--salvage, salvage. Do youfigger what salvage on a seven-hundred-tonner would come to? Well, justlemmee drop it into your think tank, an' lay to what I say. It's all theways from fifty to seventy thousand dollars, whatever her cargo is; callit sixty thousand--thirty thou' apiece. Oh, I don't know!" he exclaimed,lapsing to landman's slang. "Wha'd I say about a million to one on theunexpected at sea?"

  "Thirty thousand!" exclaimed Wilbur, without thought as yet.

  "Now y'r singin' songs," cried the Captain. "Listen to me, son," he wenton, rapidly shutting up the glass and thrusting it back in the case;"my name's Kitchell, and I'm hog right through." He emphasized the wordswith a leveled forefinger, his eyes flashing. "H--O--G spells very trulyyours, Alvinza Kitchell--ninety-nine swine an' me make a hundred swine.I'm a shoat with both feet in the trough, first, last, an' always.If that bark's abandoned, an' I says she is, she's ours. I'm out foranything that there's stuff in. I guess I'm more of a beach-comber bynature than anything else. If she's abandoned she belongs to us. To 'llwith this coolie game. We'll go beach-combin', you and I. We'll boardthat bark and work her into the nearest port--San Diego, I guess--andget the salvage on her if we have to swim in her. Are you with me?" heheld out his hand. The man was positively trembling from head toheel. It was impossible to resist the excitement of the situation, itsnovelty--the high crow's nest of the schooner, the keen salt air, theChinamen grouped far below, the indigo of the warm ocean, and out yonderthe forsaken derelict, rolling her light hull till the garboard streakflashed in the sun.

  "Well, of course, I'm with you, Cap," exclaimed Wilbur, grippingKitchell's hand. "When there's thirty thousand to be had for the askingI guess I'm a 'na'chel bawn' beach-comber myself."

  "Now, nothing about this to the coolies."

  "But how will you make out with your owners, the Six Companies? Aren'tyou bound to bring the 'Bertha' in?"

  "Rot my owners!" exclaimed Kitchell. "I ain't a skipper of no oil-boatany longer. I'm a beach-comber." He fixed the wallowing bark withglistening eyes. "Gawd strike me," he murmured, "ain't she a daisy? It'sa little Klondike. Come on, son."

  The two went down the ratlines, and Kitchell ordered a couple of thehands into the dory that had been rowing astern. He and Wilbur followed.Charlie was left on board, with directions to lay the schooner to. Thedory flew over the water, Wilbur setting the stroke. In a few momentsshe was well up with the bark. Though a larger boat than the "BerthaMillner," she was rolling in lamentable fashion, and every laboringheave showed her bottom incrusted with barnacles and seaweed.

  Her fore and main tops'ls and to'gallants'ls were set, as also were herlower stays'ls and royals. But the braces seemed to have parted, andthe yards were swinging back and forth in their ties. The spanker wasbrailed up, and the spanker boom thrashed idly over the poop as the barkrolled and rolled and rolled. The mainmast was working in its shoe,the rigging and backstays sagged. An air of abandonment, of unsp
eakableloneliness, of abomination hung about her. Never had Wilbur seenanything more utterly alone. Within three lengths the Captain rose inhis place and shouted:

  "Bark ahoy!" There was no answer. Thrice he repeated the call, andthrice the dismal thrashing of the spanker boom and the flapping ofthe sails was the only answer. Kitchell turned to Wilbur in triumph. "Iguess she's ours," he whispered. They were now close enough to make outthe bark's name upon her counter, "Lady Letty," and Wilbur was inthe act of reading it aloud, when a huge brown dorsal fin, like thetriangular sail of a lugger, cut the water between the dory and thebark.

  "Shark!" said Kitchell; "and there's another!" he exclaimed in the nextinstant, "and another! Strike me, the water's alive with 'em'! There'sa stiff on the bark, you can lay to that"; and at that, acting on somestrange impulse, he called again, "Bark ahoy!" There was no response.

  The dory was now well up to the derelict, and pretty soon a prolongedand vibratory hissing noise, strident, insistent, smote upon their ears.

  "What's that?" exclaimed Wilbur, perplexed. The Captain shook hishead, and just then, as the bark rolled almost to her scuppers in theirdirection, a glimpse of the deck was presented to their view. It wasonly a glimpse, gone on the instant, as the bark rolled back to port,but it was time enough for Wilbur and the Captain to note the partedand open seams and the deck bulging, and in one corner blown up andsplintered.

  The captain smote a thigh.

  "Coal!" he cried. "Anthracite coal. The coal he't up and generated gas,of course--no fire, y'understand, just gas--gas blew up the deck--no wayof stopping combustion. Naturally they had to cut for it. Smell the gas,can't you? No wonder she's hissing--no wonder she rolled--cargo goesoff in gas--and what's to weigh her down? I was wondering what could 'a'wrecked her in this weather. Lord, it's as plain as Billy-b'damn."

  The dory was alongside. Kitchell watched his chance, and as the barkrolled down caught the mainyard-brace hanging in a bight over therail and swung himself to the deck. "Look sharp!" he called, as Wilburfollowed. "It won't do for you to fall among them shark, son. Just lookat the hundreds of 'em. There's a stiff on board, sure."

  Wilbur steadied himself on the swaying broken deck, choking against thereek of coal-gas that hissed upward on every hand. The heat was almostlike a furnace. Everything metal was intolerable to the touch.

  "She's abandoned, sure," muttered the Captain. "Look," and he pointedto the empty chocks on the house and the severed lashings. "Oh, it'sa haul, son; it's a haul, an' you can lay to that. Now, then, cabinfirst," and he started aft.

  But it was impossible to go into the cabin. The moment the door wasopened suffocating billows of gas rushed out and beat them back. On thethird trial the Captain staggered out, almost overcome with its volume.

  "Can't get in there for a while yet," he gasped, "but I saw the stiffon the floor by the table; looks like the old man. He's spit his falseteeth out. I knew there was a stiff aboard."

  "Then there's more than one," said Wilbur. "See there!" From behindthe wheel-box in the stern protruded a hand and forearm in an oilskinsleeve.

  Wilbur ran up, peered over the little space between the wheel and thewheel-box, and looked straight into a pair of eyes--eyes that werealive. Kitchell came up.

  "One left, anyhow," he muttered, looking over Wilbur's shoulder; "sailorman, though; can't interfere with our salvage. The bark's derelict,right enough. Shake him out of there, son; can't you see the lad's dottywith the gas?"

  Cramped into the narrow space of the wheel-box like a terrified hare ina blind burrow was the figure of a young boy. So firmly was he wedgedinto the corner that Kitchell had to kick down the box before he couldbe reached. The boy spoke no word. Stupefied with the gas, he watchedthem with vacant eyes.

  Wilbur put a hand under the lad's arm and got him to his feet. He wasa tall, well-made fellow, with ruddy complexion and milk-blue eyes, andwas dressed, as if for heavy weather, in oilskins.

  "Well, sonny, you've had a fine mess aboard here," said Kitchell. Theboy--he might have been two and twenty--stared and frowned.

  "Clean loco from the gas. Get him into the dory, son. I'll try thisbloody cabin again."

  Kitchell turned back and descended from the poop, and Wilbur, his armaround the boy, followed. Kitchell was already out of hearing, andWilbur was bracing himself upon the rolling deck, steadying the youngfellow at his side, when the latter heaved a deep breath. His throat andbreast swelled. Wilbur stared sharply, with a muttered exclamation:

  "My God, it's a girl!" he said.