Chapter FOUR (2)

“I’ve been sick ... now—better,” mumbled Wait, glaring in the light.—“You have been shamming sick,” retorted Captain Allistoun with severity; “Why...” he hesitated for less than half a second. “Why, anybody can see that. There’s nothing the matter with you, but you choose to lie-up to please yourself—and now you shall lie-up to please me. Mr. Baker, my orders are that this man is not to be allowed on deck to the end of the passage.”

There were exclamations of surprise, triumph, indignation. The dark group of men swung across the light. “What for?” “Told you so...” “Bloomin’ shame...”—“We’ve got to say somethink about that,” screeched Donkin from the rear.—“Never mind, Jim—we will see you righted,” cried several together. An elderly seaman stepped to the front. “D’ye mean to say, sir,” he asked, ominously, “that a sick chap ain’t allowed to get well in this ’ere hooker?” Behind him Donkin whispered excitedly amongst a staring crowd where no one spared him a glance, but Captain Allistoun shook a forefinger at the angry bronzed face of the speaker.—“You—you hold your tongue,” he said, warningly.—“This isn’t the way,” clamoured two or three younger men.—“Are we bloomin’ masheens?” inquired Donkin in a piercing tone, and dived under the elbows of the front rank.—“Soon show ’im we ain’t boys...”—“The man’s a man if he is black.”—“We ain’t goin’ to work this bloomin’ ship shorthanded if Snowball’s all right...”—“He says he is.”—“Well then, strike, boys, strike!”—“That’s the bloomin’ ticket.” Captain Allistoun said sharply to the second mate: “Keep quiet, Mr. Creighton,” and stood composed in the tumult, listening with profound attention to mixed growls and screeches, to every exclamation and every curse of the sudden outbreak. Somebody slammed the cabin door to with a kick; the darkness full of menacing mutters leaped with a short clatter over the streak of light, and the men became gesticulating shadows that growled, hissed, laughed excitedly. Mr. Baker whispered:—“Get away from them, sir.” The big shape of Mr. Creighton hovered silently about the slight figure of the master.—“We have been hymposed upon all this voyage,” said a gruff voice, “but this ’ere fancy takes the cake.”—“That man is a shipmate.”—“Are we bloomin’ kids?”—“The port watch will refuse duty.” Charley carried away by his feeling whistled shrilly, then yelped:—“Giv’ us our Jimmy!” This seemed to cause a variation in the disturbance. There was a fresh burst of squabbling uproar. A lot of quarrels were set going at once.—“Yes.”—“No.”—“Never been sick.”—“Go for them to once.”—“Shut yer mouth, youngster—-this is men’s work.”—“Is it?” muttered Captain Allistoun, bitterly. Mr. Baker grunted: “Ough! They’re gone silly. They’ve been simmering for the last month.”—“I did notice,” said the master.—“They have started a row amongst themselves now,” said Mr. Creighton with disdain, “better get aft, sir. We will soothe them.”—“Keep your temper, Creighton,” said the master. And the three men began to move slowly towards the cabin door.

In the shadows of the fore rigging a dark mass stamped, eddied, advanced, retreated. There were words of reproach, encouragement, unbelief, execration. The elder seamen, bewildered and angry, growled their determination to go through with something or other; but the younger school of advanced thought exposed their and Jimmy’s wrongs with confused shouts, arguing amongst themselves. They clustered round that moribund carcass, the fit emblem of their aspirations, and encouraging one another they swayed, they tramped on one spot, shouting that they would not be “put upon.” Inside the cabin, Belfast, helping Jimmy into his bunk, twitched all over in his desire not to miss all the row, and with difficulty restrained the tears of his facile emotion. James Wait, flat on his back under the blanket, gasped complaints.—“We will back you up, never fear,” assured Belfast, busy about his feet.—

“I’ll come out to-morrow morning—take my chance—-you fellows must—” mumbled Wait, “I come out to-morrow—skipper or no skipper.” He lifted one arm with great difficulty, passed the hand over his face; “Don’t you let that cook...” he breathed out.—“No, no,” said Belfast, turning his back on the bunk, “I will put a head on him if he comes near you.”—“I will smash his mug!” exclaimed faintly Wait, enraged and weak; “I don’t want to kill a man, but...” He panted fast like a dog after a run in sunshine. Some one just outside the door shouted, “He’s as fit as any ov us!” Belfast put his hand on the door-handle.—“Here!” called James Wait, hurriedly, and in such a clear voice that the other spun round with a start. James Wait, stretched out black and deathlike in the dazzling light, turned his head on the pillow. His eyes stared at Belfast, appealing and impudent. “I am rather weak from lying-up so long,” he said, distinctly. Belfast nodded. “Getting quite well now,” insisted Wait.—“Yes. I noticed you getting better this ... last month,” said Belfast, looking down. “Hallo! What’s this?” he shouted and ran out.

He was flattened directly against the side of the house by two men who lurched against him. A lot of disputes seemed to be going on all round. He got clear and saw three indistinct figures standing along in the fainter darkness under the arched foot of the mainsail, that rose above their heads like a convex wall of a high edifice. Donkin hissed:—“Go for them ... it’s dark!” The crowd took a short run aft in a body—then there was a check. Donkin, agile and thin, flitted past with his right arm going like a windmill—and then stood still suddenly with his arm pointing rigidly above his head. The hurtling flight of some heavy object was heard; it passed between the heads of the two mates, bounded heavily along the deck, struck the after hatch with a ponderous and deadened blow. The bulky shape of Mr. Baker grew distinct. “Come to your senses, men!” he cried, advancing at the arrested crowd. “Come back, Mr. Baker!” called the master’s quiet voice. He obeyed unwillingly. There was a minute of silence, then a deafening hubbub arose. Above it Archie was heard energetically:—“If ye do oot ageen I wull tell!” There were shouts. “Don’t!” “Drop it!”—“We ain’t that kind!” The black cluster of human forms reeled against the bulwark, back again towards the house. Ringbolts rang under stumbling feet.—“Drop it!” “Let me!”—“No!”—“Curse you ... hah!” Then sounds as of some one’s face being slapped; a piece of iron fell on the deck; a short scuffle, and some one’s shadowy body scuttled rapidly across the main hatch before the shadow of a kick. A raging voice sobbed out a torrent of filthy language ...—“Throwing things—good God!” grunted Mr. Baker in dismay.—“That was meant for me,” said the master, quietly; “I felt the wind of that thing; what was it—an iron belaying-pin?”—“By Jove!” muttered Mr. Creighton. The confused voices of men talking amidships mingled with the wash of the sea, ascended between the silent and distended sails seemed to flow away into the night, further than the horizon, higher than the sky. The stars burned steadily over the inclined mastheads. Trails of light lay on the water, broke before the advancing hull, and, after she had passed, trembled for a long time as if in awe of the murmuring sea.

Meantime the helmsman, anxious to know what the row was about, had let go the wheel, and, bent double, ran with long, stealthy footsteps to the break of the poop. The Narcissus, left to herself, came up gently in to the wind without any one being aware of it. She gave a slight roll, and the sleeping sails woke suddenly, coming all together with a mighty flap against the masts, then filled again one after another in a quick succession of loud reports that ran down the lofty spars, till the collapsed mainsail flew out last with a violent jerk. The ship trembled from trucks to keel; the sails kept on rattling like a discharge of musketry; the chain sheets and loose shackles jingled aloft in a thin peal; the gin blocks groaned. It was as if an invisible hand had given the ship an angry shake to recall the men that peopled her decks to the sense of reality, vigilance, and duty.—“Helm up!” cried the master, sharply. “Run aft, Mr. Creighton, and see what that fool there is up to.”—“Flatten in the head sheets. Stand by the weather fore-braces,” growled Mr. Baker. Startled men ran swiftly repeating the orders. The watch below, abandoned all at once by the watch on deck, drifted towards the forecastle in twos and threes, arguing noisily as they went—“We shall see to-morrow!” cried a loud voice, as if to cover with a menacing hint an inglorious retreat. And then only orders were heard, the falling of heavy coils of rope, the rattling of blocks. Singleton’s white head flitted here and there in the night, high above the deck, like the ghost of a bird.—“Going off, sir!” shouted Mr. Creighton from aft.—“Full again.”—“All right ...”—“Ease off the head sheets. That will do the braces. Coil the ropes up,” grunted Mr. Baker, bustling about.

Gradually the tramping noises, the confused sound of voices, died out, and the officers, coming together on the poop, discussed the events. Mr. Baker was bewildered and grunted; Mr. Creighton was calmly furious; but Captain Allistoun was composed and thoughtful. He listened to Mr. Baker’s growling argumentation, to Creighton’s interjected and severe remarks, while looking down on the deck he weighed in his hand the iron belaying-pin—that a moment ago had just missed his head—as if it had been the only tangible fact of the whole transaction. He was one of those commanders who speak little, seem to hear nothing, look at no one—and know everything, hear every whisper, see every fleeting shadow of their ship’s life. His two big officers towered above his lean, short figure; they talked over his head; they were dismayed, surprised, and angry, while between them the little quiet man seemed to have found his taciturn serenity in the profound depths of a larger experience. Lights were burning in the forecastle; now and then a loud gust of babbling chatter came from forward, swept over the decks, and became faint, as if the unconscious ship, gliding gently through the great peace of the sea, had left behind and for ever the foolish noise of turbulent mankind. But it was renewed again and again. Gesticulating arms, profiles of heads with open mouths appeared for a moment in the illuminated squares of doorways; black fists darted—withdrew ... “Yes. It was most damnable to have such an unprovoked row sprung on one,” assented the master.... A tumult of yells rose in the light, abruptly ceased.... He didn’t think there would be any further trouble just then.... A bell was struck aft, another, forward, answered in a deeper tone, and the clamour of ringing metal spread round the ship in a circle of wide vibrations that ebbed away into the immeasurable night of an empty sea.... Didn’t he know them! Didn’t he! In past years. Better men, too. Real men to stand by one in a tight place. Worse than devils too sometimes—downright, horned devils. Pah! This—nothing. A miss as good as a mile.... The wheel was being relieved in the usual way.—“Full and by,” said, very loud, the man going off.—“Full and by,” repeated the other, catching hold of the spokes.—“This head wind is my trouble,” exclaimed the master, stamping his foot in sudden anger; “head wind! all the rest is nothing.” He was calm again in a moment. “Keep them on the move to-night, gentlemen; just to let them feel we’ve got hold all the time—quietly, you know. Mind you keep your hands off them, Creighton. To-morrow I will talk to them like a Dutch Uncle. A crazy crowd of tinkers! Yes, tinkers! I could count the real sailors amongst them on the fingers of one hand. Nothing will do but a row—if—you—please.” He paused. “Did you think I had gone wrong there, Mr. Baker?” He tapped his forehead, laughed short. “When I saw him standing there, three parts dead and so scared—black amongst that gaping lot—no grit to face what’s coming to us all—the notion came to me all at once, before I could think. Sorry for him—like you would be for a sick brute. If ever creature was in a mortal funk to die!... I thought I would let him go out in his own way. Kind of impulse. It never came into my head, those fools.... H’m! Stand to it now—of course.” He stuck the belaying-pin in his pocket, seemed ashamed of himself, then sharply:—“If you see Podmore at his tricks again tell him I will have him put under the pump. Had to do it once before. The fellow breaks out like that now and then. Good cook tho’.” He walked away quickly, came back to the companion. The two mates followed him through the starlight with amazed eyes. He went down three steps, and changing his tone, spoke with his head near the deck:—“I shan’t turn in to-night, in case of anything; just call out if... Did you see the eyes of that sick nigger, Mr. Baker? I fancied he begged me for something. What? Past all help. One lone black beggar amongst the lot of us, and he seemed to look through me into the very hell. Fancy, this wretched Podmore! Well, let him die in peace. I am master here after all. Let him be. He might have been half a man once ... Keep a good look-out.” He disappeared down below, leaving his mates facing one another, and more impressed than if they had seen a stone image shed a miraculous tear of compassion over the incertitudes of life and death....

In the blue mist spreading from twisted threads that stood upright in the bowls of pipes, the forecastle appeared as vast as a hall. Between the beams a heavy cloud stagnated; and the lamps surrounded by halos burned each at the core of a purple glow in two lifeless flames without rays. Wreaths drifted in denser wisps. Men sprawled about on the deck, sat in negligent poses, or, bending a knee, drooped with one shoulder against a bulkhead. Lips moved, eyes flashed, waving arms made sudden eddies in the smoke. The murmur of voices seemed to pile itself higher and higher as if unable to run out quick enough through the narrow doors. The watch below in their shirts, and striding on long white legs, resembled raving somnambulists; while now and then one of the watch on deck would rush in, looking strangely over-dressed, listen a moment, fling a rapid sentence into the noise and run out again; but a few remained near the door, fascinated, and with one ear turned to the deck. “Stick together, boys,” roared Davis. Belfast tried to make himself heard. Knowles grinned in a slow, dazed way. A short fellow with a thick clipped beard kept on yelling periodically:—“Who’s afeard? Who’s afeard?” Another one jumped up, excited, with blazing eyes, sent out a string of unattached curses and sat down quietly. Two men discussed familiarly, striking one another’s breast in turn, to clinch arguments. Three others, with their heads in a bunch, spoke all together with a confidential air, and at the top of their voices. It was a stormy chaos of speech where intelligible fragments tossing, struck the ear. One could hear:—“In the last ship”—“Who cares? Try it on any one of us if—.”

“Knock under”—“Not a hand’s turn”—“He says he is all right”—“I always thought”—“Never mind....” Donkin, crouching all in a heap against the bowsprit, hunched his shoulderblades as high as his ears, and hanging a peaked nose, resembled a sick vulture with ruffled plumes. Belfast, straddling his legs, had a face red with yelling, and with arms thrown up, figured a Maltese cross. The two Scandinavians, in a corner, had the dumbfounded and distracted aspect of men gazing at a cataclysm. And, beyond the light, Singleton stood in the smoke, monumental, indistinct, with his head touching the beam; like a statue of heroic size in the gloom of a crypt.

He stepped forward, impassive and big. The noise subsided like a broken wave: but Belfast cried once more with uplifted arms:—“The man is dying I tell ye!” then sat down suddenly on the hatch and took his head between his hands. All looked at Singleton, gazing upwards from the deck, staring out of dark corners, or turning their heads with curious glances. They were expectant and appeased as if that old man, who looked at no one, had possessed the secret of their uneasy indignations and desires, a sharper vision, a clearer knowledge. And indeed standing there amongst them, he had the uninterested appearance of one who had seen multitudes of ships, had listened many times to voices such as theirs, had already seen all that could happen on the wide seas. They heard his voice rumble in his broad chest as though the words had been rolling towards them out of a rugged past. “What do you want to do?” he asked. No one answered. Only Knowles muttered—“Aye, aye,” and somebody said low:—“It’s a bloomin’ shame.” He waited, made a contemptuous gesture.—“I have seen rows aboard ship before some of you were born,” he said, slowly, “for something or nothing; but never for such a thing.”—“The man is dying, I tell ye,” repeated Belfast, woefully, sitting at Singleton’s feet.—“And a black fellow, too,” went on the old seaman, “I have seen them die like flies.” He stopped, thoughtful, as if trying to recollect gruesome things, details of horrors, hecatombs of niggers. They looked at him fascinated. He was old enough to remember slavers, bloody mutinies, pirates perhaps; who could tell through what violences and terrors he had lived! What would he say? He said:—“You can’t help him; die he must.” He made another pause. His moustache and beard stirred. He chewed words, mumbled behind tangled white hairs; incomprehensible and exciting, like an oracle behind a veil....—“Stop ashore—sick.—Instead—bringing all this head wind. Afraid. The sea will have her own.—Die in sight of land. Always so. They know it—long passage—more days, more dollars.—You—”

He seemed to wake up from a dream. “You can’t help yourselves,” he said, austerely, “Skipper’s no fool. He has something in his mind. Look out—say! I know ’em!” With eyes fixed in front he turned his head from right to left, from left to right, as if inspecting a long row of astute skippers.—“’Ee said ’ee would brain me!” cried Donkin in a heartrending tone. Singleton peered downwards with puzzled attention, as though he couldn’t find him.—“Damn you!” he said, vaguely, giving it up. He radiated unspeakable wisdom, hard unconcern, the chilling air of resignation. Round him all the listeners felt themselves somehow completely enlightened by their disappointment, and mute, they lolled about with the careless ease of men who can discern perfectly the irremediable aspect of their existence. He, profound and unconscious, waved his arm once, and strode out on deck without another word.

Belfast was lost in a round-eyed meditation. One or two vaulted heavily into upper berths, and, once there, sighed; others dived head first inside lower bunks—swift, and turning round instantly upon themselves, like animals going into lairs. The grating of a knife scraping burnt clay was heard. Knowles grinned no more. Davis said, in a tone of ardent conviction: “Then our skipper’s looney.” Archie muttered: “My faith! we haven’t heard the last of it yet!” Four bells were struck.—“Half our watch below gone!” cried Knowles in alarm, then reflected. “Well, two hours’ sleep is something towards a rest,” he observed, consolingly. Some already pretended to slumber; and Charley, sound asleep, suddenly said a few slurred words in an arbitrary, blank voice.—“This blamed boy has worrums!” commented Knowles from under a blanket, in a learned manner. Belfast got up and approached Archie’s berth.—“We pulled him out,” he whispered, sadly.—“What?” said the other, with sleepy discontent.—“And now we will have to chuck him overboard,” went on Belfast, whose lower lip trembled.—“Chuck what?” asked Archie.—“Poor Jimmy,” breathed out Belfast.—“He be blowed!” said Archie with untruthful brutality, and sat up in his bunk; “It’s all through him. If it hadn’t been for me, there would have been murder on board this ship!”—“’Tain’t his fault, is it?” argued Belfast, in a murmur; “I’ve put him to bed ... an’ he ain’t no heavier than an empty beef-cask,” he added, with tears in his eyes. Archie looked at him steadily, then turned his nose to the ship’s side with determination. Belfast wandered about as though he had lost his way in the dim forecastle, and nearly fell over Donkin. He contemplated him from on high for a while. “Ain’t ye going to turn in?” he asked. Donkin looked up hopelessly.—“That black’earted Scotch son of a thief kicked me!” he whispered from the floor, in a tone of utter desolation.—“And a good job, too!” said Belfast, still very depressed; “You were as near hanging as damn-it to-night, sonny. Don’t you play any of your murthering games around my Jimmy! You haven’t pulled him out. You just mind! ’Cos if I start to kick you”—he brightened up a bit—“if I start to kick you, it will be Yankee fashion—to break something!” He tapped lightly with his knuckles the top of the bowed head. “You moind that, my bhoy!” he concluded, cheerily. Donkin let it pass.—“Will they split on me?” he asked, with pained anxiety.—“Who—split?” hissed Belfast, coming back a step. “I would split your nose this minyt if I hadn’t Jimmy to look after! Who d’ye think we are?” Donkin rose and watched Belfast’s back lurch through the doorway. On all sides invisible men slept, breathing calmly. He seemed to draw courage and fury from the peace around him. Venomous and thin-faced, he glared from the ample misfit of borrowed clothes as if looking for something he could smash. His heart leaped wildly in his narrow chest. They slept! He wanted to wring necks, gouge eyes, spit on faces. He shook a dirty pair of meagre fists at the smoking lights. “Ye’re no men!” he cried, in a deadened tone. No one moved. “Yer ’aven’t the pluck of a mouse!” His voice rose to a husky screech. Wamibo darted out a dishevelled head, and looked at him wildly. “Ye’re sweepings ov ships! I ’ope you will all rot before you die!” Wamibo blinked, uncomprehending but interested. Donkin sat down heavily; he blew with force through quivering nostrils, he ground and snapped his teeth, and, with the chin pressed hard against the breast, he seemed busy gnawing his way through it, as if to get at the heart within....

* * * * *

In the morning the ship, beginning another day of her wandering life, had an aspect of sumptuous freshness, like the spring-time of the earth. The washed decks glistened in a long clear stretch; the oblique sunlight struck the yellow brasses in dazzling splashes, darted over the polished rods in lines of gold, and the single drops of salt water forgotten here and there along the rail were as limpid as drops of dew, and sparkled more than scattered diamonds. The sails slept, hushed by a gentle breeze. The sun, rising lonely and splendid in the blue sky, saw a solitary ship gliding close-hauled on the blue sea.

The men pressed three deep abreast of the mainmast and opposite the cabin-door. They shuffled, pushed, had an irresolute mien and stolid faces. At every slight movement Knowles lurched heavily on his short leg. Donkin glided behind backs, restless and anxious, like a man looking for an ambush. Captain Allistoun came out on the quarter-deck suddenly. He walked to and fro before the front. He was grey, slight, alert, shabby in the sunshine, and as hard as adamant. He had his right hand in the side-pocket of his jacket, and also something heavy in there that made folds all down that side. One of the seamen cleared his throat ominously.—“I haven’t till now found fault with you men,” said the master, stopping short. He faced them with his worn, steely gaze, that by a universal illusion looked straight into every individual pair of the twenty pairs of eyes before his face. At his back Mr. Baker, gloomy and bull-necked, grunted low; Mr. Creighton, fresh as paint, had rosy cheeks and a ready, resolute bearing. “And I don’t now,” continued the master; “but I am here to drive this ship and keep every man-jack aboard of her up to the mark. If you knew your work as well as I do mine, there would be no trouble. You’ve been braying in the dark about ‘See to-morrow morning!’ Well, you see me now. What do you want?” He waited, stepping quickly to and fro, giving them searching glances. What did they want? They shifted from foot to foot, they balanced their bodies; some, pushing back their caps, scratched their heads. What did they want? Jimmy was forgotten; no one thought of him, alone forward in his cabin, fighting great shadows, clinging to brazen lies, chuckling painfully over his transparent deceptions. No, not Jimmy; he was more forgotten than if he had been dead. They wanted great things. And suddenly all the simple words they knew seemed to be lost for ever in the immensity of their vague and burning desire. They knew what they wanted, but they could not find anything worth saying. They stirred on one spot, swinging, at the end of muscular arms, big tarry hands with crooked fingers. A murmur died out.—“What is it—food?” asked the master, “you know the stores have been spoiled off the Cape.”—“We know that, sir,” said a bearded shell-back in the front rank.—“Work too hard—eh? Too much for your strength?” he asked again. There was an offended silence.—“We don’t want to go shorthanded, sir,” began at last Davis in a wavering voice, “and this ’ere black....”—“Enough!” cried the master. He stood scanning them for a moment, then walking a few steps this way and that began to storm at them coldly, in gusts violent and cutting like the gales of those icy seas that had known his youth.—“Tell you what’s the matter? Too big for your boots. Think yourselves damn good men. Know half your work. Do half your duty. Think it too much. If you did ten times as much it wouldn’t be enough.”—“We did our best by her, sir,” cried some one with shaky exasperation.—“Your best,” stormed on the master; “You hear a lot on shore, don’t you? They don’t tell you there your best isn’t much to boast of. I tell you—your best is no better than bad.” “You can do no more? No, I know, and say nothing. But you stop your caper or I will stop it for you. I am ready for you! Stop it!” He shook a finger at the crowd. “As to that man,” he raised his voice very much; “as to that man, if he puts his nose out on deck without my leave I will clap him in irons. There!” The cook heard him forward, ran out of the galley lifting his arms, horrified, unbelieving, amazed, and ran in again. There was a moment of profound silence during which a bow-legged seaman, stepping aside, expectorated decorously into the scupper. “There is another thing,” said the master, calmly. He made a quick stride and with a swing took an iron belaying-pin out of his pocket. “This!” His movement was so unexpected and sudden that the crowd stepped back. He gazed fixedly at their faces, and some at once put on a surprised air as though they had never seen a belaying-pin before. He held it up. “This is my affair. I don’t ask you any questions, but you all know it; it has got to go where it came from.” His eyes became angry. The crowd stirred uneasily. They looked away from the piece of iron, they appeared shy, they were embarrassed and shocked as though it had been something horrid, scandalous, or indelicate, that in common decency should not have been flourished like this in broad daylight. The master watched them attentively. “Donkin,” he called out in a short, sharp tone.

Donkin dodged behind one, then behind another, but they looked over their shoulders and moved aside. The ranks kept on opening before him, closing behind, till at last he appeared alone before the master as though he had come up through the deck. Captain Allistoun moved close to him. They were much of a size, and at short range the master exchanged a deadly glance with the beady eyes. They wavered.—“You know this?” asked the master.—“No, I don’t,” answered the other, with cheeky trepidation.—“You are a cur. Take it,” ordered the master. Donkin’s arms seemed glued to his thighs; he stood, eyes front, as if drawn on parade. “Take it,” repeated the master, and stepped closer; they breathed on one another. “Take it,” said Captain Allistoun again, making a menacing gesture. Donkin tore away one arm from his side.—“Vy are yer down on me?” he mumbled with effort and as if his mouth had been full of dough.—“If you don’t...” began the master. Donkin snatched at the pin as though his intention had been to run away with it, and remained stock still holding it like a candle. “Put it back where you took it from,” said Captain Allistoun, looking at him fiercely. Donkin stepped back opening wide eyes. “Go, you blackguard, or I will make you,” cried the master, driving him slowly backwards by a menacing advance. He dodged, and with the dangerous iron tried to guard his head from a threatening fist. Mr. Baker ceased grunting for a moment.—“Good! By Jove,” murmured appreciatively Mr. Creighton in the tone of a connoisseur.—“Don’t tech me,” snarled Donkin, backing away.—“Then go. Go faster.”—“Don’t yer ’it me.... I will pull yer up afore the magistryt.... I’ll show yer up.” Captain Allistoun made a long stride, and Donkin, turning his back fairly, ran off a little, then stopped and over his shoulder showed yellow teeth.—“Further on, fore-rigging,” urged the master, pointing with his arm.—“Are yer goin’ to stand by and see me bullied?” screamed Donkin at the silent crowd that watched him. Captain Allistoun walked at him smartly. He started off again with a leap, dashed at the fore-rigging, rammed the pin into its hole violently. “I’ll be even with yer yet,” he screamed at the ship at large and vanished beyond the foremast. Captain Allistoun spun round and walked back aft with a composed face, as though he had already forgotten the scene. Men moved out of his way. He looked at no one.—“That will do, Mr. Baker. Send the watch below,” he said, quietly. “And you men try to walk straight for the future,” he added in a calm voice. He looked pensively for a while at the backs of the impressed and retreating crowd. “Breakfast, steward,” he called in a tone of relief through the cabin door.—“I didn’t like to see you—Ough!—give that pin to that chap, sir,” observed Mr. Baker; “he could have bust—Ough!—bust your head like an eggshell with it.”—“O! he!” muttered the master, absently. “Queer lot,” he went on in a low voice. “I suppose it’s all right now. Can never tell tho’ nowadays, with such a ... Years ago; I was a young master then—one China voyage I had a mutiny; real mutiny, Baker. Different men tho’. I knew what they wanted: they wanted to broach the cargo and get at the liquor. Very simple.... We knocked them about for two days, and when they had enough—gentle as lambs. Good crew. And a smart trip I made.” He glanced aloft at the yards braced sharp up. “Head wind day after day,” he exclaimed, bitterly. “Shall we never get a decent slant this passage?”—“Ready, sir,” said the steward, appearing before them as if by magic and with a stained napkin in his hand.—“Ah! All right. Come along, Mr. Baker—it’s late—with all this nonsense.”