Chapter II: Part 2

The age of the giant fluctuated. Once he had had an indistinct remembrance of being about twenty-five; now he had leaped suddenly to forty. Something had evidently made him feel aged, and the clerk was amused, for he felt that it must indeed have been a heavy debauch to produce such an effect.

The Islander, or rather the American now, glanced uneasily at the ship's papers. He was signing on for a cruise in a yacht, and the United States articles with their red spread-eagle upon their edges attracted his attention. He could not read the announcement of the government "whack," or ration, as prescribed by law, and he had heretofore signed without looking. Now the papers interested him, and he bade the clerk read them. His voice was low and gentle, but it had nothing except command in each word, and this annoyed the clerk. He read slowly and with bad grace, looking up now and then at the captain, who stood waiting for his man and giving a glance which told plainly that here was a pirate who would probably make no end of trouble aboard his ship. But men like the Conch were extremely rare and he would have him, so he waited impatiently while the clerk read and the rest listened, hearing probably for the first time in their lives the contents of a set of articles which they had always treated with the high disdain existent in all sailors. When the clerk finished, the giant took the pen in his fingers and scrawled "Bahama Bill" in large, wabbly letters to his place on the list as second mate for a voyage to some port north of New York, three months and discharge.

"S'pose you write William Haskins under that?" said the clerk, sourly. The giant growled out something, but did as told. Then the papers were finished.

The captain led the crew down to the vessel, the mainsail was hoisted, and as the anchor broke clear and the head-sails were run up, the little gun upon her quarter crashed a salute which echoed and reechoed over the quiet harbour. Then the _Caliban_ stood out into the Gulf Stream and was off, leaving the loafing Cubans and listless Conches upon the docks, gazing after her over the heaving blue surface streaked and darkened by the breath of the trade-wind.

The _Caliban_ was a well-appointed yacht, and her master was a yacht-captain. That is, he was not a navigator, but simply a Norwegian sailor who had had the address to impress the owner favourably, and consequently, there being no examination for a license necessary, the owner had placed him in command in the usual manner. The chief mate was a square-head like the master, the owner allowing the captain the choice of officers, retaining only the cook and steward as his own protégés for the comfort of the cabin. Under a schooner rig, the vessel had cruised through the West Indian waters, and had lost her second mate and crew the day she touched at Key West, the party making the "pier-head" jump the day after being paid off. In disgust, the owner left her and took passage for the fashionable hotel at Miami, leaving his captain to find a crew and follow as soon as possible.

The morning of the second day out, the yacht swung around Cape Florida, and stood into Biscayne Bay, rounding to on the edge of the channel near the large and fashionable hotel, and dropping her hook, the rattle of her anchor-chain was drowned in the crash of her six-pounder. The captain went ashore in full uniform, and the first officer turned in, leaving the second mate in charge leaning easily upon the rail and gazing after the vanishing form in gold braid.

The uniform of the second mate was a misfit. There were no clothes among the slops that would fit his frame, but he gloried in a cap with braid stuck rakishly on his head, and while his legs were incased in white ducks rolled to the knees, his huge torso was covered by no more than a course linen shirt. This he wore split up the back and open in front, and he was comfortably indifferent to the excellent ventilation it afforded.

It was early in the morning and few people were stirring near the great hotel. The captain disappeared in the direction of the town, and while the second mate gazed, he saw a boat pulling rapidly toward him from the hotel dock.

Soon a man, rowed by a boy, came alongside.

"Is the owner aboard?" he asked, nervously.

"No, sah," said Bill, squinting at him.

"Who's in command?" he inquired.

"Me, sah."

"Well, don't fire that gun again. You scare all the invalids in the hotel. We can't have our people frightened this way."

"She goes agin at eight bells," drawled Bill. "Have to raise de colours by him. If you don't like dat little gun, jest please move yer shack."

"Don't you dare to talk to me like that! Do you know who I am?" bawled the man, standing up.

"Naw, I don't know yer--an' de wust is, yo' clean forgot me. Now don't yo' git too noisy, Peter Snooks, er whatever yer name is--ef yer do, I'll set on yer. If yer don't like de noise, move yo' shack. I ain't got no orders to pull de hook."

The man swore and threatened, but the second mate smiled good-naturedly, until the man rowed away vowing vengeance.

"That's the dockmaster, sir," said a sailor standing near. "He'll make a lot o' trouble--I know him."

"Fergit him," said the second mate, in a low tone, but in a manner which closed the incident.

At eight bells the gun crashed a salute, and, either by chance or otherwise, it pointed directly at the windows of the huge edifice filled with the rich Northern guests. The glass fairly rattled with the shock.

The day wore on without incident, until the captain came aboard, a bit the worse for liquor and with the news that the owner had left for St. Augustine, leaving orders for the yacht to follow.

It was quiet, and the schooner rode at anchor in a bay of pond-like smoothness. The men lounged about the decks or gazed over the side at the bottom, which could be seen through the clear water. They would stand out at sunrise, but the captain told no one of this intention, and those ashore expected her to be a fixture of a week or more. The sun went down in a bank to the westward and the semi-tropical night came dark and quiet upon the sea.

Through the deepening gloom, a shadow came stealing around the wooded point of Cape Florida. With her mainsail well off to the gentle southerly breeze, the wrecking-sloop _Sea-Horse_ slipped noiselessly through the water, swinging around the channel buoy and standing like a black phantom for the mouth of the Miami. She came without a sound, not even a ripple gurgling from her forefoot; and not a ray of light showed either from her rigging or from her cabin-house. At the wheel, a figure stood silent in the night, a slight turn of the spokes now and then being the only movement to show that the image was that of a man steering. Strung along the deck-house and rail lay six other human forms, but they were as quiet as though made of wood. Not even the glow of a pipe relieved the silent gloom. The wrecker drew near the yacht. The man at the wheel leaned slightly forward over the spokes and peered long and searchingly at her from under the main-boom. Then she drifted past, and as she did so eight bells struck, sounding clear and musical from the forecastle. In the glare from her anchor-light, a giant form showed upon the yacht's forecastle-head--the black second mate, who was taking a look at the anchor-cable before settling himself for a smoke. The wrecker passed and disappeared around the point, and the second mate of the _Caliban_ stretched himself along the heel of the bowsprit and watched the distant loom of the keys whence the low, murmuring snore of the surf sounded. Two bells struck and aroused him for a moment. The man on lookout asked permission to go below for a bit of tobacco, and then after he had watched his figure vanish down the hatchway, the mate turned toward the shore where the lights sparkled over the bay.

A slight rippling sound attracted his attention, and he looked over the side. It sounded like a large fish of some kind making its way clumsily along near the surface. The black water flared in places, and a continuous flashing of phosphorus shone along the cheek of the bow when the tide was shoved aside. Something dark showed at a little distance, but it passed astern and the rippling sound died away. Haskins, who was half-fish from habit and as watchful as a shark, went to the taffrail and leaned over. The water seemed like ink in the gloom, but he scanned it steadily and patiently. Nothing showed upon the dark surface, and he smoked for half an hour, until his usually alert senses began to wander. He was getting sleepy. Then the rippling sound began again on the offshore side. He remained quiet and listened. This time the rippling sounded like a fish going against the current, and the glare of the disturbed water showed now and again as the body approached. Suddenly it seemed as if the creature passed under the yacht's bottom. The rippling died away, and the second mate stepped to the side to see if it would rise again. Nothing showed in the blackness under her counter, but from down there came a peculiar scraping sound. It continued, and he peered over to see the cause. The raking stopped instantly. He remained quiet and it began again, a peculiar scraping as though something were scratching against the vessel's bilge.

Suddenly a sound of heavy breathing came from the water. Haskins started, drew himself down upon the rail and listened intently. Yes, he recognized it now, distinctly. It was the breathing of a man.

While he lay upon the rail listening, he was thinking rapidly. There were few men who would swim out in the bay at night, and there was none who would swim out there without some sinister object. He thought of the dockmaster and his talk of revenge, but he knew the dockmaster was not a diver. There could be only one or two men on the Florida Reefs for wrecking, and these men were among the crew of the _Sea-Horse_, the sloop in which he had been mate for the past season. Then he remembered a phantom-like shadow which had drifted past in the earlier hours of the evening, and he was satisfied he knew his man. It was the captain of the wrecking-sloop, and his object was plain to the diver. It was an old game, a game he had indulged in many times himself in the days gone by. He knew the long, desperate swims through the dangerous waters of West Indian and Florida reefs; the fierce struggle alongside to hold the body silent in a tideway while with hook and bar the wrecker worked at the oakum in the seams just a strake or two below the water-line; then the inrushing flood and settling ship, and daylight finding a panic-stricken captain and mutinous and half-dead crew with swollen arms and aching backs from a night's hopeless work at the pump-brakes. He could picture the approaching wrecking-sloop, with her apparently amazed crew and the vulture-like descent upon the soon-abandoned vessel whose only damage was really the working out of several pounds of oakum from seams which were manifestly improperly calked. Then the investigation and salvage, for even when the marks showed plain of either bar or hook, there was never the slightest evidence against the wrecker.

Bahama Bill knew the game well, and he smiled a little as he listened. Then he took off his cap with the gold braid and laid it upon the deck, and leaned far out over the side. Suddenly, through the darkness, he made out a face looking up at him from the water. There was nothing said. He recognized the captain of the _Sea-Horse_, and he knew him to be a man who seldom wasted words. There was only the long, hard scrutiny, the study of man's mind by man; each trying to fathom the other's thought, for the sudden resolve which always comes quickly to men of action.

While they gazed, a sudden noise from aft attracted attention. It was the surly mutterings of the drunken yacht-captain, who had come on deck for a breath of air. The sight of him annoyed the second mate. It caused a revulsion of feeling within him he could not understand. The responsibility of his position became apparent for the first time. Among his kind the rigid law of superiority and control had always obtained while afloat. Ashore it was different. There restraint was cast to the winds, and he had often been one of the wildest and most dangerous men in the seamen's resorts between Key West and Panama. Here the sight of the drunken captain made him quiet and thoughtful. Whatever relations he had intended should exist between himself and the wrecker, it was now plain to him that he was an officer holding a responsible position. It came to him suddenly at the sight of the incapable commander. He would maintain his dignity and responsibility.

This feeling was upon him before he was half aware of it, and he turned again to the man overside.

"Get away quick," he said, in a low tone.

The wrecker knew his meaning, and his resolve was taken. He would follow the game out. He had swum a full half-mile, and the stake he was playing for was high.

"It's a half share if you keep your mouth shut," said the wrecker. "I thought you had some sense."

"De dock-marshal tol' yo' I was heah," said Bill, "but he forgot to tell yo' I ain't de mate o' de _Sea-Horse_. Yo' clean side-stepped dat."

"If anything happens to me, the boys know you are aboard. Your friend the dockmaster saw to that. They burnt a nigger to the stake last week," said the wrecker, meaningly.

"Yo' better go ashore, Cap'n. I ain't de mate o' de _Sea-Horse_." His tone was low and measured, and it left no further room for argument.

The tipsy yacht-master had gone below again, gurgling the words of a ribald song. He had seen nothing. The deck was deserted by all save the second mate.

"Swim out," said Bill, decisively.

"Well, I'll rest a minute first," said the wrecker. He made his way forward and climbed upon the bobstay, the second mate going on the forecastle to watch him. The man on the lookout had not come from below yet, and the wrecker noticed it. He was furious at his former mate, and his hand felt instinctively for the knife in his belt. The Conch dared not hurt him, for the crew of the _Sea-Horse_ would surely make him pay the penalty if he did. A call to the men aboard would put an end to wrecking operations, but the giant disdained any help. He would settle the matter quietly, as was best, and the men of the wrecking-sloop would have no real cause for revenge. The second mate had no desire to make unnecessary trouble for himself. He would have to return some day for the reckoning.

The legs of the wrecker shone white below his trunks, and were in sharp contrast against the black water in which they were half submerged. The man was thinking quickly, and waiting a few seconds before making the desperate attack with his knife. Once rid of the mate, all would be clear for action. Haskins knew his man and suspected something, but he sat silent upon the knightheads and waited.

Suddenly he saw a long flaming streak in the water. The man on the bobstay swore furiously. There was a great splash, a hoarse cry, and the second mate was forward alone.

It was all so sudden, he had hardly time to realize its meaning. Then, as the man who had gone below rushed up, he seized his sheathed knife and plunged into the blackness ahead. A thrashing of the water to starboard located the wrecker, who had been seized by a dog-shark and was cutting and struggling wildly for liberty. His white legs, lying motionless and half submerged, had tempted the fish to strike. In motion and under water, the danger had been slight. Now the scavenger, who was about five feet long, had seized hold, and with its natural bulldog tenacity was pulling the wrecker steadily seaward in spite of his struggles. He had used his knife freely, for the fish made no attempt to draw him under. The small shark of the reef, for some reason, fights upon the surface, sinking only after all resistance is over. It was to this peculiarity that the wrecker owed his life.

The big mate, Haskins, knew what had happened. He knew also the chances, and he drove ahead through the black water, leaving a flaming wake behind. The man on lookout, thinking the black giant had gone mad, dived below with the news that he had plunged overboard and committed suicide. At first, Haskins could only make out a slight disturbance in the water, which was rapidly moving toward the entrance. Then, as his eyes, long used to sea-water, made out the dark lump which was his former captain's head, he half rose from the sea and with tremendous overhand strokes fairly lifted himself forward, his knife grasped with point in front. In a few moments he was up with the fracas. The wrecker saw him coming, and called out. He seized him, and then all three went below the surface with the force of the fish's tug.

Reaching along the wrecker's leg, Haskins drove his knife with force just behind the shark's jaw-socket. The blow abated the scavenger's zeal, and they arose to the surface. A second lunge and the fish let go and disappeared. Then the wrecker's body relaxed, and Haskins was swimming upon the quiet surface of the bay, holding the sinking head above water.

Far away, the dark outlines of Virginia Key showed, a low black lump on the horizon. Beyond it, the dull snore of the surf came over the water. A good hundred yards against the tide, the anchor-light of the yacht shone. It would be almost impossible to drag the insensible man to her, even should he dare. There was only one way out of the scrape, and Haskins with resolute mind saw it and began the struggle at once. He headed for the mouth of the river, where he knew the _Sea-Horse_ lay waiting, just behind the point.

On through the blackness he swam. The first mile seemed endless, and still the lifeless form of the wrecker dragged helplessly in his wake. Another, and his teeth were shut like a vise and his breath was panting loudly over the quiet water. He turned the point, and saw the loom of the _Sea-Horse_ as she rose at anchor beyond the shadow of the trees upon the banks.

Suddenly a man hailed in a low tone. The mate made no answer, but headed for the bobstays and grasped them. Then he rested. Half an hour later, the captain of the wrecker came to in his bunk and viewed his bandaged leg. A lamp burned dimly in the cabin, and he made out the form of the black mate lying in a bunk, snoring loudly. Several of the crew were sitting around waiting until he could give the details of the affair, and now they crowded forward. The plot was a failure owing to Haskins. He told of the huge mate's interference and of the stroke of the dog-shark. Then they burst forth with imprecations so loud that Haskins awoke. Knives glinted in the dim light and a half-dozen sinister faces formed a crescent above him, but he was very tired. He gazed for nearly a minute through half-closed lids at the threatening men. He thought he heard the captain calling weakly for the men to let him alone. What he had done for him was not entirely lost. Then he gave a snort of contempt and turned his back to them and slept.

Even the boldest held back. The conscious power of the man and his disdain for them all were too much even for the most desperate. They drew away sullenly and listened to their captain, and then as his words, whispered low, began to have effect, they left the cuddy. Silently they hoisted the mainsail and carefully drew in fathom after fathom of the cable. The jib was hoisted and the _Sea-Horse_ stood out and passed like a dark shadow from the harbour. As the sun rose and gave colour to the sea, the deep blue of the wind-broken surface told of the Gulf Stream. The land had disappeared astern.

In the early morning, the yacht-master put sail on the _Caliban_ and stood out for New York. He had a full crew lacking a second mate, and they carried the story North how they had shipped a black giant who had gone mad during the night and plunged to his death over the knightheads.

IV

Barnegat Macreary

"Put that fellow in the lee rigging and let him chuck the lead awhile," said Captain Sanders. "Sink me, but he is a queer one. Where did ye say he hailed from?"

"Hey, Peter, where did yo' hatch?" asked the big black mate in a voice deep and loud enough to be heard half a mile. The man he addressed was standing near the mast explaining to the wrecking crew gathered about him how he had once been quartermaster in a man-of-war. He looked aft at the hail.

"I'm from the Berhammers," said he.

"Born there?" asked the captain.

"No, I live on the Great Berhammer--I'm a sailor man, sir."

"Put him in the lee rigging an' let him sound across the Bank. If he knows half as much as he says he does, he'll see us across all right enough. It's getting mighty shoal now. Look at that nigger head pokin' up yander." And he pointed to a piece of coral that came within a few feet of the surface of the clear blue water. The bottom was plainly visible two fathoms below and the wrecking sloop, _Sea-Horse_, needed at least one to go clear with the rise and fall of the sea.

"Git to lor'ard there, quartermaster, an' heave the lead," bawled the mate, looking the man squarely in the eyes.

"But I shipped as a sailor----"

"Git thar quick an' sudden," roared the black giant, rising from the cuddy hatch coaming. He had heard the loud tone of the man forward telling his latest yarn.

A look of amazement and concern came over the face of the man from "Berhammer," but he hesitated no longer. Seizing the lead which lay always ready in a tub of line near the windlass, he made the lee side and hove it far ahead.

The _Sea-Horse_ was passing over the Great Bahama Bank near its extreme northern end, and at a part where even the mate had never been. She had stopped off the island a few hours before to take on the stranger for pilot and continue her way to a wreck reported on the eastern edge of the shoal water.

"Plenty o' water here," he yelled, as the lead-line came perpendicular.

"How much?" asked Sanders.

The man hove again.

"Not much water here," he cried, as the line suddenly stopped running out.

The mate started forward, looking over the side.

"Not much water here," called the man again.

There was a sudden jar, followed by a grinding, grating sound from below.

"Deedn't I tole yo' so," sang the fellow in an even tone, heaving the lead again as though nothing had happened. A sounding slap from the big mate's hand finished proceedings in the rigging, and a volley of oaths from Sanders, coupled with orders to get a kedge anchor out to windward, put new life in the scene upon the sloop's deck.

Macreary, still smarting from the big black mate's blow upon his stern-sheets, fell to with the rest, and by dint of much heaving upon a new hawser bent to an anchor carried well to windward, the _Sea-Horse_ was finally hove off the bank. They were materially helped in this by the gentle heave of the swell, which lifted the wrecking sloop easily and dropped her with a crash at each sea.

When she floated there were several very discontented men aboard who looked as though they would make it squally weather for the pilot before they reached the wreck on the Bank.

The wreck of the _Ramidor_, a small Brazilian bark bound for Rio, lay upon the edge of the Bahama Bank in about a fathom of water. She had been driven there in a heavy gale from the eastward and had gone in upon the shoal about a quarter of a mile, lying upon her bilge where the sea in calm weather just broke clear of her, the wash of foam striking against her high black sides and spurting skywards. In a heavy sea, the break was far to windward of her, and in consequence she was in no immediate danger of going to pieces with the smash. She had been sighted by several wreckers, and the _Sea-Horse_ and _Buccaneer_ were on their way to her, each hurrying with all speed to claim the salvage. The _Buccaneer_ was at work on the Caicos Bank, and the _Sea-Horse_ at Cape Florida when the news reached them. The former manned by English negroes and navigated by a long, lean Yankee skipper, had stood to the eastward and northward, coming in sight of the wreck about the time the _Sea-Horse_, picking her way across the shoals, raised the slanting topmasts of the _Ramidor_ beyond a dry coral bank which forced her to make a long détour to the southward. She had taken on the pilot to save time and cut across the shoal places as close as possible, and he had run them ashore most ignominiously when within ten miles of their destination.

Macreary finished coiling down the hawser after the kedge was hoisted aboard, and then he joined the rest who sat upon the hatch. He was much abashed at heart, but tried not to show it, swaggering with a careless air among the men who glared at him.

"Blamed fine quartermaster you make," snarled one; "must have been on one o' them ten-foot sand barges wot takes offal to sea an' dumps it. I once knowed a fellar like you wot was quartermaster o' one."

"Capting, too, hey?" growled a Swede. "Crew were a yaller dawg?"

"Where did yo' learn pilotin'?" asked a Conch, grinning and spitting as close to the pilot's toes as he could without hitting them.

"I'm learning it now," said Macreary, cheerfully, sitting down and gazing over the sea to where the tiny speck of the bark's topmast showed above the horizon. He was not going to show how absurd and mean he felt to that crowd, so he sat and gazed apparently calm and unruffled, without a sign of the burning shame which seemed to stifle him.

He was now silent and thinking. There was a short cut along a narrow and tortuous channel which would let the vessel out to sea close to the point of the dry coral bank, or end of Cay. He thought he might know it, although he had only been through twice before. The wreck lay only a few miles beyond, and even now the white glint of the rival wrecker's sails showed plainly that he would board the prize first and claim the salvage. But the memory of the big black mate's hand was too strong upon him, and he kept silent. The _Sea-Horse_ was working up behind the reef and it was noticeable how smooth and sheltered the sea was in its lee. It would make a fine harbour for a vessel caught working upon the wreck in a heavy easterly, if she could navigate the channel. But the master of the _Sea-Horse_ knew nothing of the channel, and he would have sooner thrown the pilot overboard than trusted him again. He stood out behind the Cay and made a good offing, reaching well off into the open ocean in spite of the fact that he would have ten miles further to go.

But Macreary sat silent and watched the horizon where the black speck rose. He was not thinking about the wreck. To him it was nothing whether a Conch or two should make a little money from the disaster of a sailor. His thoughts were back with the strange men he had left upon the Cay of the Great Bahama, the little band led by the tall and muscular Jones, leader of the Sanctified people who sought refuge from the strife of the world upon the sun-beaten reefs of the Bahama Bank.

Jones had taught him to read. Jones had read to him from the Book of all Books, the relic of an ancient literature, revised, rewritten and put together in somewhat disconnected pieces, the Bible of the most enlightened people upon the face of the world. And in it he had heard the words of wisdom as set down by men who had gone before, men who had lived their lives and who had learned from experience. And the philosophy of these men he believed was true, for they had lived their lives out and had left behind them the results of years of life. It was not the one tale of a single man, which must necessarily be narrow and worthless, but it was the gatherings of the teachings of many who had been in positions to learn. Yes, what Jones had read him was the philosophy of ages. And Jones had read to him, "Hide not thy light under a bushel," and he had told him that it meant to use what talents he possessed, to try to do what he thought he was able to--and not hang back. He felt abashed and ashamed beyond expression at his failure, for he had believed he was a fit pilot over the Bank. He founded his belief upon the fact that he had gone fishing many times in a small skiff in the vicinity of the island and had twice gone southward along the edge of the Bank; he had noticed many times how the water shoaled from the deep ocean to the white water of the coral reef. It was hard to account for his failure, he thought, with men aboard who must have seen the bottom as plainly as he, himself, could--and then the big black man's mortifying stroke----

The vessels stood toward the wreck under the impetus of the easterly breeze, the _Buccaneer_, a point free, raced up and let go her anchor close under the bark's lee in just enough water to float. Then her skipper putting forth in a small boat boarded the _Ramidor_ just as the _Sea-Horse_ came through the breakers on the edge of the Bank. She cleared the bottom by a few inches, although the wash of the sea swept her decks and drenched the men standing by to take in the mainsail and let go the hook. Sanders ran her well in behind the wreck and rounded to, scraping up the sand with the keel, and anchored behind the _Buccaneer_. It was close work and a heavy sea would drop both vessels heavily upon the reef. They must make good use of the smooth water, and Sanders hailed his lucky rival to get what he could.

"See ye got a wrack there," said he, calling to the long Yankee skipper, who smiled at him from the bark's quarter-deck.

"Talk like ye never see it afore. Wonder ye didn't notice it bein' as ye were headin' this way. Strange how these Dagoes pile up thar ships," answered the skipper of the _Buccaneer_.

"Don't suppose ye want to whack up, hey? An' have us turn to an' help with the cargo?"

The long skipper squirted a stream of tobacco juice over the side in derision.

"I reckon ye think we're out here fer our health, hey?" he roared. "What d'ye think we're doin' around here anyways? I want to let ye know right sudden that this wrack is mine--ye keep off. Ye know what will happen if there's any monkey business. I won't stand any foolishness."

"'Twouldn't do fo' toe nab him, hey?" asked the black mate of the _Sea-Horse_, turning to his captain. "We kin take him, sho', an' make a divide with it. We got here about the same time he did."

"I'm afeard we better not," said Sanders. "Too many witnesses--they'll swear they got here first--I've a notion to pitch that pilot overboard."

The beaten sloop lay all that day off the wreck, her crew fuming and her captain and mate trying to devise some means to get a hold upon the bark. At dark Sanders rowed over to the _Buccaneer_ and tried every means from bluff to bribery to get in a claim, but the _Buccaneer's_ crew held out solidly. Finally they compromised matters by signing on as labourers at a dollar and a half per day to help the _Buccaneer's_ crew to work the wreck. It was the best they could do for the present and they went sullenly to work with the hope something would turn up to favour them.

Two days passed and the bright summer weather held. The sea was smooth as glass and the wreckers lay in safety. Far away to the northward the glint of the dry coral bank showed at low water. Nothing else broke the eternal blue line of the horizon.

Macreary was not turned to with the rest but kept aboard the _Sea-Horse_ as ship-keeper. He helped cook the meals and was kept busy with cleaning. As he was alone a good deal, he spent much time in gazing over the sea, figuring on the channel which led five or six miles to the northward to the deep water behind the dry bank. If they had only let him try it, he might have worked them through in time. It was crooked, worse than a letter S to sail through, but the bark was worth several thousand dollars to the salvors--and he had lost. He would have been well paid if they had made her in time.

The crew of the _Sea-Horse_ took some pains to tell the wreckers how it was the fault of their pilot that they lost. The Conchs laughed at him in derision whenever they boarded the sloop at meal times, and he was so much set upon by both crews that he begged Sanders to put him aboard the first vessel sighted. The third day two more wrecking vessels came upon the scene, but as the bark was now pretty well stripped, the salvors would have none of them. One of the strangers stood away, but the other came to anchor, leaving her mainsail up ready to go at a moment's notice.

"Hey, don't ye want a pilot?" asked the long skipper of the _Buccaneer_, calling to the stranger. His hail was the cause of much amusement to the two working crews. They stopped and looked over at the little vessel, whose three men sat in a row upon her rail watching the wreck.

"We've the best pilot on the bank," said Sanders, trying to hide his sarcasm by a frown. "We thought maybe as ye ware goin' on ye might want him."

"I reckon I'll take him," said one of the three. "I ain't goin' no farther'n th' Bahama, an' ef he don't mind he can take us across the Bank."

"Git him," said Sanders, "there he is," and he pointed to the _Sea-Horse_ where Macreary sat fishing. Then all hands had a good laugh and went on with their work, hiding their amusement from the strangers. It would be a good joke. They would have the pleasure of seeing the vessel piled up before she drew out of sight.

The three men on the new arrival were in no hurry. They fished a little while and finally one of them rowed across the twenty fathoms of intervening water to Macreary, who had heard the conversation and was ready. As he dropped into the small boat he looked to the southward and noticed a heavy bank of cloud rising. He said nothing until aboard the sloop and then asked to look at the glass. It was falling rapidly.

"There'll be a bit o' dirty weather comin'," he said, as he came on deck and joined the fishermen.

"Is there air harbour round erbouts?" asked Captain James, baiting his hook. He was in no hurry to get under way.

"There's good water behind that cay up yander," said Macreary.

"How fer?"

"'Bout five mile."

"All right, we'll start just afore dark--kin make it in thirty or fo'ty minutes with a breeze, hey?"

"I reckon," said Macreary, looking anxiously at the weather to the southward. Then they hauled up fish for a couple of hours until the sunshine turned a brassy colour and finally died away as the cloud bank covered the western sky.

The men aboard the bark began to get nervous. Sanders went aboard the _Sea-Horse_ with his mate and they hoisted the mainsail close reefed, making ready to get to sea in case of trouble. The skipper of the _Buccaneer_ finally knocked off also, and soon the clanking of windlasses broke the silence of the tropical evening. They were getting ready to get away at the first shift to the eastward, for the sea would break heavily where they lay in a strong wind. There was much to carry away, but they would take no chances. The most valuable part of the wreck's belongings were already on deck waiting to be transferred to the _Buccaneer_, and she would lie by with a man aboard the bark to watch and take charge.

"I wouldn't be surprised if it blowed," said Captain James of the little sloop _Seabird_. "I reckon we'll stop fishin' an' pull out afore it's too hot. I wouldn't keer to be the man left in thet bark, hey?"

"If they abandon her, it's fair play all over agin to the first man what gets aboard," said one of his men. "I don't believe the wessel is badly hurt, anyways."

The heavy bank of cloud rose rapidly. A flash of lightning lit the gloom of the evening and the edge of the pall swept past overhead. It was travelling rapidly. To the southward the growing darkness seemed to melt into the blackness above like a smooth black wall of mist. A murmur of unrest came over the sea, a weird far-reaching cry vibrating through the quiet atmosphere, rising and falling like the distant voices of a vast host.

Sanders, who had signed on his men as helpers, could gain nothing by staying. He had signed away his future rights, therefore he lost no time in getting up his anchor and standing out to sea with his canvas shortened for trouble and everything being made snug.

The _Buccaneer_ crew were struggling with as much gear as they could carry to get it aboard their ship before the sea began to make if it blew. All hands were overside hurrying the work, and even the two men who were to remain aboard to take charge were helping and had left the bark's deck when a line of white showed to the southward upon the black sea. There was a puff of wind, cool and whirling as though it had dropped from some great height in the realms of snow. The surface of the heaving swell ruffled, a blinding flash of fire followed by a crash; then a few moments of silence broken gradually by a deep-toned roar growing louder and louder. The line of white bore down upon the vessels, and as it came the darkness grew blacker. There was a fierce rush of wind, and with a burst as though fired from a gun, the blast of the squall struck the vessels and bore them prone with its sweep.

The _Buccaneer's_ mainsail tore to bits as she lay upon her beam ends, her anchor parted, and in a moment she was going out to sea, every man aboard of her struggling with the flying strips of canvas. The wind had come from the southward and with just enough slant to allow her to clear the shoal water and make the open ocean. Macreary, with nothing to do but watch the coming squall, let go the halliards of the _Seabird's_ sail, and her crew had managed to get a line around it before the weight of the wind struck. The captain reached the wheel and managed to pay her off somehow, dragging the anchor which had been hove short as though it were a bit of iron hanging to the line. Then handing the spokes to his pilot, he pointed to the northward, where the dry bank of the cay had just disappeared in the storm.

"Git in--behind--harbour," he bawled, and as the words came brokenly above the roar, Macreary knew he meant to run the crooked channel for harbour behind the reef.

The two men hove up the anchor while the _Seabird_ tore along ten knots with nothing save her mast to pull with the wind. Macreary swung her first this way and then that, blindly, stupidly, and unreasoning, but with rising hopes as the wind beat down the sea into an almost level plain of water white as milk. He held her north by west, making as much westing as he could, blindly hoping to make enough inside the reef to clear the end of the bank and gain the shelter beyond. All was blackness ahead and there was no way of telling when he reached the dry bank; no way of telling when he should round her to and drop both anchors with every fathom bent on to hold them, but he kept on.

"Hide not thy light under a bushel," came the words of the tall preacher! They seemed to flit before his half-blinded vision. He who must make a living at something would do it at what he thought he could do best. He must surely know more about those waters than the Conchs who lived to the southward, for he had fished upon them for two years. His ideas about piloting were vague and absurd, but he did not know it. It seemed to him that all he must do was to show the way the best he could, and it was not in keeping with the teachings to hold back. It would be more immodest to feign ignorance of the banks than to admit a knowledge of them. He had known people who were so backward that they always waited to be sought out by others and pressed to do things, which by all nature they should have offered to do at once. To him these people were truly immodest and their very quietness seemed to savour of a tremendous egotism. They seemed so satisfied and complacent in their knowledge, so superior that unless they were flattered by being sought out and offered a handsome reward, they would rather carry their wisdom to the grave than offer it. It was "hiding a light under a bushel," in the sense the tall man of the Sanctified Band of pilgrims taught it.

The wind drove the little vessel wildly before it. The sea began to make astern, and as he turned his face to look backward a spurt of spray and foam half-choked him. The roar of the gale grew louder. The captain's voice came brokenly to him through the gloom, and he saw him standing close to the companion hatch gazing ahead and holding on with both hands, his face thrust forward and his sou'wester pushed back as though to aid him to see some mark to steer by to safety.

Five, ten, fifteen minutes flew by. If they missed the shelter of the reef and the deep water behind it, they would certainly pile up on the shoals beyond, where the sea would fall with tremendous violence in less than an hour. Already the lift astern was growing quicker and the white plain of water was rolling up into a dangerous sea. He swung the little vessel hard to port, thinking to find better water, and as he did so she took the ground heavily, throwing her captain with force against the coamings.

"Keep her off--breakers--windward," came the cry as from a great distance.

He rolled the wheel up mechanically and she was tearing away again into the darkness, going clear as though she had touched soft mud instead of hard coral rock.

A burst of wind tore over them with a droning roar. The little vessel lay down to the pressure. Then gathering herself upon a sea she rushed ahead.

The blackness grew thicker. Macreary could hardly see the loom of the mast forward. Then a flickering flare of lightning lit the storm and right ahead showed a strip of dry yellow sand. It was a mile off yet, but they were going fast. Macreary hove the wheel to port and kept it there until the little ship buried her starboard deck-strake in the foam.

"Will--make--" came the voice of the captain.

Macreary did not know whether she would or not, but he would try to, and setting his teeth hard he gave up all thought of answer. The minutes flew by. He knew they were going fast. They would go a mile in five minutes even with the lessened headway of the reaching vessel. How could he guess the time in that awful turmoil of roaring wind and sea? He waited and waited. She must be nearly there. The strain was getting awful. Would he go past? He must be up with the point now--but no, he would hold her a minute longer. It must be made or lost in one throw of that wheel, and to lose it meant death to all hands. The blackness ahead was solid. No eye could penetrate it ten feet. Oh, for another flash of lightning!

"Will she--" came the voice of the captain, questioning, querulous, borne back the few intervening feet through the flying atmosphere. He did not know and it angered him to have such a question asked.

How could he tell?

He was panting with exertion and smothered with drift and spray. Suddenly he hove the wheel to starboard. The little vessel leaped forward, straightened out before the gale, then rounded with her head to the eastward. It was done anyhow. If they were clear, all right. If they had missed, they would strike within five minutes.

"Get--anchors--all cable," came the voice of the captain.

Macreary could see nothing forward, but he knew the men were doing what they could to obey. Minutes passed, the vessel rose and fell, but she had not struck yet. He held the wheel, and closed his eyes. The sea seemed smoother. Ahead it was evidently smoother still. The great lift of the outside sea was growing less and less. Five minutes more and the _Seabird_ was in another foam-covered plain of water which had no rolling sea.

"Go," came a cry. It was echoed by a faint shriek somewhere. A shaking of the vessel followed as the chain ran out. Suddenly she brought up and swung right into the eye of the storm, the rush of wind striking Macreary in the face and forcing his sou'wester back upon his head. There was a quick but light rise and fall as the _Seabird_ headed the sea, and Macreary lashed the wheel fast in the beckets.

A form brushed against him and the captain yelled in his face: "She's holdin'--both anchors with forty fathoms--can't get loose unless it blows the water off the earth," and then he pushed the hatch-slide and went below.

In a few minutes all hands were in the little cabin and a light was struck. It showed four men with streaming oilskins and soaking faces, whose expressions still bore marks of extreme anxiety. Three of them looked at each other and then cast glances at Macreary.

"That was a pretty good job, pilot," said Captain James. "We had a close call there once--suppose you got mixed with the steering gear, hey?"

Macreary said nothing. He was like a man who had suddenly awakened from a horrible nightmare.

"Well, you won't lose nothin' by this trip," went on the captain; "them fellows will be blown off fifty miles before morning--and there ain't a soul aboard the bark--she's ourn, and that's a fact."

V

At the End of the Reef

The light-keeper at Fowey Rocks had been given a new assistant, and the new man was Bahama Bill, the giant wrecker and mate of a sponging sloop. He was a negro Conch, so-called on account of the diet upon which many of the native Bankers were supposed to live, the Conch proving an easy and nourishing meal for the lazy and incompetent reefer. But the name soon applied to all alike, and the Conch, instead of becoming a word of opprobrium, stood for all men who made the Reef or Great Bahama Bank their home.

William Haskins, otherwise known as Bahama Bill, was a Fortune Islander, and his acceptance of the keeper's position was but temporary, taking the place of the assistant who was absent on his quarterly leave. The head keeper, an old man, seldom left the light.

It was summer-time and the air was warm with the tropical heat of the coast. The distance from the land kept the lighthouse cooler than ordinary, but the hot Stream flowing past at a temperature of eighty-three degrees gave no cooling effect. The days of the assistant's absence dragged slowly along, the old keeper tending the light with his usual care. Then came a season of frightful humidity and glaring sunshine, lasting many days, the mercury standing always at ninety-five or more.

Bahama Bill spent the warm weather loafing about the town of Miami, and as he was in no hurry to go back to the light, he took pains to spend what money he possessed in whatever finery he thought befitted his magnificent personal appearance best. Standing several inches over six feet and being enormously solid and broad in proportion, he was an object of admiration to the many black men who loafed along the Florida shore. With the Seminoles he had nothing whatever to do, for these Indians showed their distaste for negroes so plainly that it was with difficulty trouble was avoided whenever the men of the Glades came to town to trade their deerskins for ammunition. Bahama Bill stuck to his class until it was past the time for him to return to the light, and then started off, rigged out clean and shipshape in a small boat.

The old keeper of the Fowey Rocks lighthouse came out upon the gallery to take the morning air. The sun was shining and the warm wind from the Gulf Stream blew lazily through the doorway into the lantern-room. The blue sea sparkled in the sunshine, and the long, easy roll of the swell told of calm weather offshore. It was a perfect day, a day of peace and quiet, upon the end of the great Florida Reef, which stretched away for miles to the southward. Eastward nothing rose above the blue rim which compassed all. To the northward the low line of hummocks showed where Virginia Key and Key Biscayne rose above the water some ten miles distant. To the westward the little lump of Soldier Key showed where there might be a solitary human within a dozen miles. And all about the blue sea sparkled in the bright light, taking on the varicoloured hues found above the coral banks. Near the lighthouse, in three feet of water, the coral showed distinctly even from the height of the tower. Old man Enau gazed down at it, watching the bright green tinge melt to deeper colour until, in three fathoms, the pure limpid blue of the great stream flowed past uncoloured and undefiled. Fish were swimming around the iron piles of the lighthouse; great big bonito, sinuous barracuda, and now and then a shark would drift up to the iron pillars and bask a moment in the shade of the tall structure which rose above the coral bank to the height of a hundred feet and more, standing like a huge long-legged spider upon its iron feet in the shallow water.