The Harbor Master Part 9

"An' step lively, d.a.m.n ye, or I'll be comin' up to ye wid a bat in me hand," he concluded, knowing that it was not the time to display any sign of weakness. Then he went down the companion, entered the water, which had drained out with the ebbing tide until it reached no higher than to his waist, and waded aft to the lost captain's berth. He felt decidedly uneasy, shot glances to right and left at the narrow doors of the state-rooms and experienced a sensation of creeping cold at the roots of his hair; but he forced himself onward. He soon regained the deck with the big medicine-chest in his arms. He was received by a growl of admiration from the little group of wounded. The men on the cliff looked down in silence, those who had taken part in the recent panic deeply impressed by the skipper's action. The brandy had already been lowered to the deck, and the bottles were uncorked. The skipper placed the chest on the upper side of the hatch, and saw to the fair distribution of the liquor. He pa.s.sed it around with a generous hand; but the doses administered to Nick Leary and the man with the broken leg were the most liberal. He attended to Nick's cheek first, drawing the lips of the wound together with strips of adhesive plaster from the medicine-chest, and then padding and bandaging it securely with gauze and linen.

"That bes fine, skipper. Sure, it feels better now nor it did afore it was cut," mumbled Nick, gazing at the other with dog-homage in his eyes.

By this time, Bill Lynch, of the broken leg, was oblivious to the world, thanks to the depth and strength of his potations. The skipper cut away a section of the leg of his heavy woollen trousers, prodded and pried at the injured limb with his strong fingers until the fracture was found, put a couple of strong splints in place, and bandaged them so that they were not likely to drop off, to say the least. He then made a sling of a blanket and sent his drunken patient swaying and twirling aloft in it to the top of the cliff. The other injured persons went ash.o.r.e in the same way, one by one, like bales of sail-cloth. At last only the skipper and the dead woman were left on the wreck. The skipper stood with a scowl on his dark face and considered her. He drew the blanket sling toward him, and stood toward the poor clay.

"I'll send her up to ye for dacent burial," he shouted.

This suggestion was answered by a yell of protest from the men on the cliff.

"If ye be afeard o' her, ye white-livered swile, what d'ye want me to do wid her?"

"T'row her overboard! Heave her into the sea!" "Aye, t'row her overboard. She bes the devil hisself! T'ree good lads bes kilt dead by her already. T'row her overboard!"

"There bain't a man amongst ye wid the heart o' a white-coat," returned the skipper. "Afeared o' a poor drownded wench, be ye?"

This taunt was received in sullen silence. The skipper stood firm on the listed deck, his feet set well apart and his shoulders squared, and leered up at them. Then, stooping forward quickly, he plucked the pendants from those bloodless ears, and set the body rolling into the starboard scuppers and overboard to the frothing surf and s...o...b..ring rocks. From the cliff a cry as of mingled relief and dismay rang down to him. He moved forward and swarmed the foremast to the cross-trees. There he paused for a few moments to glance across. He saw that Bill Brennen, Nick Leary, his brother Cormick and several of the men whom he had rescued from the flooded cabin had cl.u.s.tered around the sh.o.r.e-end of the hawser. He saw that they feared treachery. He made his way across, cool, fearless, with a dangerous smile on his lips.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SKIPPER STRUGGLES AGAINST SUPERSt.i.tION

"She lays snug enough. We'll break out the freight, to-morrow," said the skipper.

"Aye, skipper, aye," returned Bill Brennen, with an unsuccessful attempt to put some heartiness into his tones; but the others did not say a word. They made litters for the dead and wounded, gathered up the spoils of the cabins, and set off sullenly for Chance Along. The skipper stood to one side and watched them from under lowering brows. At the first stroke of misfortune they were sulking and snarling at him like a pack of wolf-dogs. They evidently expected a boat-load of gold from every wreck, and no casualties. He despised and hated them. He hurried after them and called a halt. He ordered them to break open the s.h.i.+p's boxes.

They obeyed him in sullen wonder.

"If ye find any gold," he said, "count it an' divide it amongst ye. An'

the same wid the rest o' the gear. An' here bes somethin' more for ye!"

He tossed the purse and the earrings to them. "Take 'em. Keep 'em. I take no shares wid a crew like ye--not this time, anyhow, ye cowardly, unthankful, treacherous swabs! Aye, count the gold, d.a.m.n ye! an' stow it away in yer pockets. I bes makin' rich men o' ye--an' at a turn o' bad luck ye all be ready to knife me. D'ye think I kilt them t'ree dead fools? Nay, they kilt themselves wid fear of a poor drownded woman!

T'ree more would ha' bin stunned and drownded but for me. Holy saints above! I bes minded to leave ye to fish an' starve--all o' ye save them as has stood to me like men an' them o' me own blood--an' go to another harbor. Ye white-livered pack o' wolf-breed huskies! Ye cowardly, snarlin', treacherous divils. Take yer money. I gives it to ye. Go home an' feed on the good grub I gives to ye an' drink the liquor ye'd never have the wits nor the courage to salve but for me! Go home wid ye, out o' my sight, or maybe I'll forgit the flabby-hearted swabs ye be an'

give ye a taste o' me bat!"

The skipper's fury increased with the utterance of every bellowed word.

His dark face burned crimson, and his black eyes glowed like coals in the open draught of a stove. His teeth flashed between his snarling lips like a timber-wolf's fangs. He shook his fist at them, picked up a birch billet, which was a part of the wrecking-gear, and swung it threateningly. About eight of the men and boys, including young Cormick Nolan, Nick Leary and Bill Brennen, stood away from the others, out of line of the skipper's frantic gestures and bruising words. Some of them were loyal, some simply more afraid of Black Dennis Nolan than of anything else in the world. But fear, after all, is an important element in a certain quality of devotion.

The main party were somewhat shaken. A few of them growled back at the skipper; but not quite loud enough to claim his attention to them in particular. Some eyed him apprehensively, while others broke open the s.h.i.+p's and pa.s.sengers' boxes. They found minted money only in one of the captain's dispatch-boxes--two small but weighty bags of gold containing about two hundred sovereigns in all. This was the money which the dead captain had been armed with by his owners against harbor-dues, etc. The funds which the pa.s.sengers must have possessed had doubtless been flung overboard and under along with the unfortunate beings who had clung to them. The sullen, greedy fellows began to count and divide the gold.

They were slow, suspicious, grasping. The skipper, having fallen to a glowing silence at last, watched them for a minute or two with a bitter sneer on his face. Then he turned and set out briskly for Chance Along.

The loyal and fearful party followed him, most of them with evident reluctance. A few turned their faces continually to gaze at the distributing of the gold and gear. The skipper noted this with a sidelong, covert glance.

"Don't ye be worryin', men. Ye'll have yer fill afore long, so help me Saint Peter!" he exclaimed. "No man who stands by me, an' knows me for master, goes empty!"

He did not speak another word on the way or so much as look at his followers. He strode along swiftly, thinking hard. He could not blink the fact that the needless deaths of the three men in the cabin of the _Royal William_ had weakened his position seriously. He could not blink the ugly fact that the day's activities had bred a mutiny--and that the mutiny had not yet been faced and broken. It was still breeding. The poison was still working. In a fit of blind anger and unreasoning disgust he had fed the spirit of rebellion with gold. He had shattered with his foot what he had built with his hands. The work of mastery was all to do over again. He had taught them that his rights were four shares to one--and now he had given them all, thereby destroying a precedent in the establis.h.i.+ng of which he had risked his life and robbing himself and his loyal followers at the same time. The situation was desperate; but he could not find it in his heart to regret the day's work; for there was the girl with the sea-eyes, lying safe in his own house this very minute! A thrill, sweet yet bitter, went through his blood at the thought. No other woman had ever caused him a choking pang like this. The remembrance of those clear eyes shook him to the very soul and quenched his burning anger with a wave of strangely mingled adoration and desire. He was little more than a fine animal, after all.

The man in him lay pa.s.sive and undeveloped under the tides of pa.s.sion, craving, brute-pride and crude ambitions. But the manhood was there, as his flawless courage and unconsidered kindness to women and children indicated. But he was self-centred, violent, brutally masterful. Women and children had always seemed to him (until now) helpless, harmless things, that had a right to the protection of men even as they had a right to remain ash.o.r.e from the danger of wind and sea. The stag caribou and the dog-wolf have the same att.i.tude toward the females of their races. It is a characteristic which is natural to animals and boasted of by civilized men. Dogs and gentlemen do not bite and beat their females; and if Black Dennis Nolan resembled a stag, a he-wolf, and a dog in many points, in this particular he also resembled a gentleman. Like some hammering old feudal baron of the Norman time and the finer type, his battles were all with men. Those who did not ride behind him he rode against. He feared the saints and a priest, even as did the barons of old; but all others must acknowledge his lords.h.i.+p or know themselves for his enemies. To Black Dennis Nolan the law of the land was a vague thing not greatly respected. To Walter, Lord of Waltham, William the Red was a vague personage, not greatly respected. Walter, Lord of Waltham, son of Walter and grandson of Fitz Oof of Normandy; Skipper of Chance Along, son of Skipper Pat and grandson of Skipper Tim--the two barons differed only in period and location. In short, Black Dennis Nolan possessed many of the qualities of strong animals, of a feudal baron, and one at least of a modern gentleman.

The skipper was overtaken and joined by his young brother at the edge of the barrens above Chance Along. They scrambled swiftly down the path to the cl.u.s.tered cabins. At their own door Cormick plucked the skipper's sleeve.

"They was talkin' o' witches," he whispered. "d.i.c.k Lynch an' some more o' the lads. They says as how the comather was put on to ye this very mornin', Denny."

The skipper paused with his hand on the latch and eyed the other sharply.

"Witches, ye say? An' d.i.c.k Lynch was talkin', was he? Who did they figger as put the spell on to me?"

"The la.s.s ye saved from the fore-top. Sure, that's what they all bes sayin', Denny. Mermaid, they calls her--an' some a fairy. A witch, anyhow. They says as how yer luck bes turned now--aye, the luck o' the entire harbor. 'Twas herself--the spell o' her--kilt the t'ree lads in the cabin, they be sayin'. Their talk was desperate black, Denny."

"'Twas the poor dead, drownded woman, an' their own cowardly souls, kilt 'em!"

"Aye, Denny, so it was, nary a doubt; but they shot ye some desperate black looks, Denny."

"Well, Cormy, don't ye be worryin'. Fifty t'ousand squid like d.i.c.k Lynch couldn't frighten me. The comather, ye say? Saints o' G.o.d! but I'll be puttin' it on themselves wid a club! Bewitched? What the divil do they know o' witches? Fishes bes all they understands! Black looks they give me, did they? I'll be batin' 'em so black they'll all look like rotted herrings, by the Holy Peter hisself! Aye, Cormy, don't ye worry, now."

At that he opened the door quietly and stepped inside with a strange air of reverence and eagerness. The boy followed softly and closed the door behind him. The fire roared and crackled in the round stove, but the room was empty of human life. Wet garments of fine linen hung on a line behind the stove. The inner door opened and old Mother Nolan hobbled into the kitchen with a wrinkled finger to her lips.

"Whist wid ye!" she cautioned. "She be sleepin' like a babe, the poor darlint, in Father McQueen's own bed, wid everything snug an' warm as ye'd find in any marchant's grand house in St. John's."

She took her accustomed seat beside the stove and lit her pipe.

"Saints alive! but can't ye set down!" she exclaimed. "I wants to talk wid ye, b'ys. Tell me this--where bes t'e rest o' the poor folk from the wrack?"

"She bes the only livin' soul we found, Granny," replied the skipper.

"She was lashed in the foremast--an' t'other spars was all over the side. We found a poor dead body in one o' the cabins--drownded to death--an' not so much as another corpse. Aye, Granny, 'twas a desperate cruel wrack altogether."

The old woman shot a keen glance at him; but he returned it without a blink.

"Didn't ye find no more gold an' diamonds, then?" she asked.

"We found some gold. I give it all to the men."

"An' what was the cargo?"

"Sure, Granny, we didn't break into her cargo yet. There was a rumpus--aye, ye may well call it a rumpus! Did ye say as she bes sleepin', Granny?"

The old woman nodded her head, her black eyes fixed on the red draught of the stove with a far-away, fateful, veiled glint in them which her grandsons knew well. She had ceased to puff at her pipe for the moment, and in the failing light from the window they could see a thin reek of smoke trailing straight up from the bowl.

"Aye, sleepin'," she mumbled, at last. "Saints presarve us, Denny! There bes fairy blood in her--aye, fairy blood. Sure, can't ye see it in her eyes? I's afeard there bain't no luck in it, Denny. Worse nor wracked diamonds, worse nor wracked gold they be--these humans wid fairy blood in 'em! And don't I know? Sure, wasn't me own grandmother own cousin to the darter o' a fairy-woman? Sure she was, back in old Tyoon. An' there was no luck in the house wid her; an' she was a beauty, too, like the darlint body yonder."

The skipper smiled and lit his pipe. The winter twilight had deepened to gloom. The front of the stove glowed like a long, half-closed red eye, and young Cormick peered fearfully at the black corners of the room.

The skipper left his chair, fetched a candle from the dresser and lit it at the door of the stove.

"We bes a long way off from old Tyoon, Granny," he said; "an' maybe there bain't no fairies now, even in Tyoon. I never seen no fairy in Chance Along, anyhow; nor witch, mermaid, pixie, bogey, ghost, sprite--no, nor even a corpus-light. Herself in yonder bes no fairy-child, Granny, but a fine young lady, more beautiful nor an angel in heaven--maybe a marchant's darter an' maybe a king's darter, but nary the child o' any vanis.h.i.+n' sprite. Sure, didn't I hold her in me two arms all the way from the fore-top o' the wrack to the cliff?--an'

didn't she weigh agin' me arms till they was nigh broke wid it?"

"Denny, ye poor fool," returned Mother Nolan, "ye bes simple as a squid t'rowed up on the land-wash. What do ye know o' fairies an' the like?

Wasn't I born on a Easter Sunday, wid the power to see the good people, an' the little people, an' all the tricksy tribes? The body o' a fairy-child bes human, lad. 'Tis but the heart o' her bes unhuman--an'

the beauty o' her--an' there bain't no soul in her. Did ye hear the voice o' her, Denny? Holy saints! But was there ever a human woman wid a voice the like o' that?"