In the Sargasso Sea by Thomas A. Janvier (smart books to read .TXT) 📖

>bad certainties that my thoughts shot around from speculation upon

Captain Luke’s possible perils into consideration of what seemed to be

very real perils of my own.

 

With the cutter close aboard of us, and with the captain and both the

mates swearing at them, I suppose that the men at the hatch—who were

swinging the things below with a whip—got rattled a little. At any

rate, some of them rigged the sling so carelessly that a box fell out

from it, and shot down to the main-deck with such a bang that it burst

open. It was a small and strongly made box, that from its shape and

evident weight I had fancied might have arms in it. But when it split

to bits that way—the noise of the crash drawing me to the hatch to

see what had happened—its contents proved to be shackles: and the

sight of them, and the flash of thought which made me realize what

they must be there for, gave me a sudden sick feeling in my inside!

 

In my hurried reading about the West Coast—carried on at odd times

since my meeting with the palm-oil people—I had learned enough about

the trade carried on there to know that slaving still was a part of

it; but so small a part that the matter had not much stuck in my mind.

But it was a fact then (as it also is a fact now) that the traders who

run along the coast—exchanging such stuff as Captain Luke carried for

ivory and coffee and hides and whatever offers—do now and then take

the chances and run a cargo of slaves from one or another of the lower

ports into Mogador: where the Arab dealers pay such prices for live

freight in good condition as to make the venture worth the risk that

it involves. This traffic is not so barbarous as the old traffic to

America used to be—when shippers regularly counted upon the loss of a

third or a half of the cargo in transit, and so charged off the

death-rate against profit and loss—for the run is a short one, and

slaves are so hard to get and so dangerous to deal in nowadays that it

is sound business policy to take enough care of them to keep them

alive. But I am safe in saying that the men engaged in the Mogador

trade are about the worst brutes afloat in our time—not excepting the

island traders of the South Pacific—and for an honest man to get

afloat in their company opens to him large possibilities of being

murdered off-hand, with side chances of sharing in their punishment if

he happens to be with them when they are caught. And so it is not to

be wondered at that when I saw the shackles come flying out from that

broken box, and so realized the sort of men I had for shipmates, that

a sweating fright seized me which made my stomach go queer. And then,

as I thought how I had tumbled myself into this scrape that the least

shred of prudence would have kept me out of, I realized for the second

time that day that I was very young and very much of a fool.

III

I HAVE A SCARE, AND GET OVER IT

 

I went to the stern of the brig and looked at the tug, far off and

almost out of sight in the dusk, and at the loom of the Highlands,

above which shone the light-house lamps—and my heart went down into

my boots, and for a while stayed there. For a moment the thought came

into my head to cut away the buoy lashed to the rail and to take my

chances with it overboard—trusting to being picked up by some passing

vessel and so set safe ashore. But the night was closing down fast and

a lively sea was running, and I had sense enough to perceive that

leaving the brig that way would be about the same as getting out of

the frying-pan into the fire.

 

Fortunately, in a little while I began to get wholesomely angry; which

always is a good thing, I think, when a man gets into a tight

place—if he don’t carry it too far—since it rouses the fighting

spirit in him and so helps him to pull through. In reason, I ought to

have been angry with myself, for the trouble that I was in was all of

my own making; but, beyond giving myself a passing kick or two, all

my anger was turned upon Captain Luke for taking advantage of my

greenness to land me in such a pickle when his gain from it would be

so small. I know now that I did Captain Luke injustice. His subsequent

conduct showed that he did not want me aboard with him any more than I

wanted to be there. Had I not taken matters into my own hands by

boarding the brig in such a desperate hurry—just as I had hurried to

close with his offer and to clinch it by paying down my

passage-money—he would have gone off without me. And very likely he

would have thought that the lesson in worldly wisdom he had given me

was only fairly paid for by the fifty dollars which had jumped so

easily out of my pocket into his.

 

But that was not the way I looked at the matter then; and in my heart

I cursed Captain Luke up hill and down dale for having, as I fancied,

lured me aboard the brig and so into peril of my skin. And my anger

was so strong that I went by turns hot and cold with it, and itched to

get at Captain Luke with my fists and give him a dressing—which I

very well could have done, had we come to fighting, for I was a bigger

man than he was and a stronger man, too.

 

It is rather absurd as I look back at it, considering what a taking I

was in and how strong was my desire just then to punch Captain Luke’s

head for him, that while I was at the top of my rage he came aft to

where I was leaning against the rail and put his hand on my shoulder

as friendly as possible and asked me to come down into the cabin to

supper. I suppose I had a queer pale look, because of my anger, for he

said not to mind if I did feel sickish, but to eat all the same and I

would feel better for it; and he really was so cordial and so pleasant

that for a moment or two I could not answer him. It was upsetting,

when I was so full of fight, to have him come at me in that friendly

way; and I must say that I felt rather sheepish, and wondered whether

I had not been working myself up over a mare’s-nest as I followed

him below.

 

We had the mate to supper with us, at a square table in the middle of

the cabin, and at breakfast the next morning we had the second mate;

and so it went turn and turn with them at meals—except that they had

some sort of dog-watch way about the Saturday night and Sunday morning

that always gave the mate his Sunday dinner with the captain, as was

the due of his rank.

 

The mate was a surly brute, and when Captain Chilton said, in quite a

formal way, “Mr. Roger Stetworth, let me make you acquainted with Mr.

George Hinds,” he only grunted and gave me a sort of a nod. He did not

have much to say while the supper went on, speaking only when the

captain spoke to him, and then shortly; but from time to time he

snatched a mighty sharp look at me—that I pretended not to notice,

but saw well enough out of the tail of my eye. It was plain enough

that he was taking my measure, and I even fancied that he would have

been better pleased had I been six inches or so shorter and with less

well-made shoulders and arms. When he did speak it was in a growling

rumble of a voice, and he swore naturally.

 

Captain Luke evidently tried to make up for the mate’s surliness; and

he really was very pleasant indeed—telling me stories about the

Coast, and giving me good advice about guarding against sickness

there, and showing such an interest in my prospects with the palm-oil

people, and in my welfare generally, that I was still more inclined to

think that my scare about the shackles was only foolishness from first

to last. He seemed to be really pleased when he found that I was not

seasick, and interested when I told him how well I knew the sea and

the management of small craft from my sailing in the waters about

Nantucket every summer for so many years; and then we got to talking

about the Coast again and about my outfit for it, which he said was a

very good one; and he especially commended me—instead of laughing at

me, as I was afraid he would—for having brought along such a lot of

quinine. Indeed, the quinine seemed to make a good deal of an

impression on him, for he turned to the mate and said: “Do you hear

that, George? Mr. Stetworth has with him a whole case of

quinine—enough to serve a ship’s company through a cruise.” And the

mate rumbled out, as he got up from the table and started for the

deck, that quinine was a damned good thing.

 

We waited below until the second mate came down, to whom the captain

introduced me with his regular formula: “Mr. Roger Stetworth, let me

make you acquainted with Mr. Martin Bowers.” He was a young fellow, of

no more than my own age, and I took a fancy to him at sight—for he

not only shook my hand heartily but he looked me squarely in the eyes,

and that is a thing I like a man to do. It seemed to me that my being

there was a good deal of a puzzle to him; and he also took my measure,

but quite frankly—telling me when he had looked me over that if I

knew how to steer I’d be a good man to have at the wheel in a gale.

 

The captain brought out a bottle of his favorite arrack, and he and I

had a glass together—in which, as I thought rather hard, Bowers was

not given a chance to join us—and then we went on deck and walked up

and down for a while, smoking our pipes and talking about the weather

and the prospects for the voyage. And it all went so easily and so

pleasantly that I couldn’t help laughing a little to myself over

my scare.

 

I turned in early, for I was pretty well tired after so lively a day;

but when I got into my bunk I could not get to sleep for a long

while—although the bunk was a good one and the easy motion of the

brig lulled me—for the excitement I was in because my voyage fairly

was begun. I slipped through my mind all that had happened to me that

day—from my meeting with Captain Luke in the forenoon until there I

was, at nine o’clock at night, fairly out at sea; and I was so pleased

with the series of lucky chances which had put me on my way so rapidly

that my one mischance—my scare about the shackles—seemed

utterly absurd.

 

It was perfectly reasonable, I reflected, for Captain Luke to carry

out a lot of shackles simply as “trade.” It was pretty dirty “trade,”

of