A Tale intended to be after the fact. Being the experience of four menfrom the sunk steamer "Commodore"
None of them knew the color of the sky. Their eyes glanced level, andwere fastened upon the waves that swept toward them. These waves were ofthe hue of slate, save for the tops, which were of foaming white, andall of the men knew the colors of the sea. The horizon narrowed andwidened, and dipped and rose, and at all times its edge was jagged withwaves that seemed thrust up in points like rocks. Many a man ought tohave a bath-tub larger than the boat which here rode upon the sea. Thesewaves were most wrongfully and barbarously abrupt and tall, and eachfroth-top was a problem in small-boat navigation.
The cook squatted in the bottom and looked with both eyes at the sixinches of gunwale which separated him from the ocean. His sleeves wererolled over his fat forearms, and the two flaps of his unbuttoned vestdangled as he bent to bail out the boat. Often he said: "Gawd! That wasa narrow clip." As he remarked it he invariably gazed eastward over thebroken sea.
The oiler, steering with one of the two oars in the boat, sometimesraised himself suddenly to keep clear of water that swirled in over thestern. It was a thin little oar and it seemed often ready to snap.
The correspondent, pulling at the other oar, watched the waves andwondered why he was there.
The injured captain, lying in the bow, was at this time buried in thatprofound dejection and indifference which comes, temporarily at least,to even the bravest and most enduring when, willy nilly, the firm fails,the army loses, the ship goes down. The mind of the master of a vesselis rooted deep in the timbers of her, though he commanded for a day or adecade, and this captain had on him the stern impression of a scene inthe greys of dawn of seven turned faces, and later a stump of a top-mastwith a white ball on it that slashed to and fro at the waves, went lowand lower, and down. Thereafter there was something strange in hisvoice. Although steady, it was, deep with mourning, and of a qualitybeyond oration or tears.
"Keep 'er a little more south, Billie," said he.
"'A little more south,' sir," said the oiler in the stern.
A seat in this boat was not unlike a seat upon a bucking broncho, and bythe same token, a broncho is not much smaller. The craft pranced andreared, and plunged like an animal. As each wave came, and she rose forit, she seemed like a horse making at a fence outrageously high. Themanner of her scramble over these walls of water is a mystic thing, and,moreover, at the top of them were ordinarily these problems in whitewater, the foam racing down from the summit of each wave, requiring anew leap, and a leap from the air. Then, after scornfully bumping acrest, she would slide, and race, and splash down a long incline, andarrive bobbing and nodding in front of the next menace.
A singular disadvantage of the sea lies in the fact that aftersuccessfully surmounting one wave you discover that there is anotherbehind it just as important and just as nervously anxious to dosomething effective in the way of swamping boats. In a ten-foot dingeyone can get an idea of the resources of the sea in the line of wavesthat is not probable to the average experience which is never at sea ina dingey. As each slatey wall of water approached, it shut all else fromthe view of the men in the boat, and it was not difficult to imaginethat this particular wave was the final outburst of the ocean, the lasteffort of the grim water. There was a terrible grace in the move of thewaves, and they came in silence, save for the snarling of the crests.
In the wan light, the faces of the men must have been grey. Their eyesmust have glinted in strange ways as they gazed steadily astern. Viewedfrom a balcony, the whole thing would doubtless have been weirdlypicturesque. But the men in the boat had no time to see it, and if theyhad had leisure there were other things to occupy their minds. The sunswung steadily up the sky, and they knew it was broad day because thecolor of the sea changed from slate to emerald-green, streaked withamber lights, and the foam was like tumbling snow. The process of thebreaking day was unknown to them. They were aware only of this effectupon the color of the waves that rolled toward them.
In disjointed sentences the cook and the correspondent argued as to thedifference between a life-saving station and a house of refuge. The cookhad said: "There's a house of refuge just north of the Mosquito InletLight, and as soon as they see us, they'll come off in their boat andpick us up."
"As soon as who see us?" said the correspondent.
"The crew," said the cook.
"Houses of refuge don't have crews," said the correspondent. "As Iunderstand them, they are only places where clothes and grub are storedfor the benefit of shipwrecked people. They don't carry crews."
"Oh, yes, they do," said the cook.
"No, they don't," said the correspondent.
"Well, we're not there yet, anyhow," said the oiler, in the stern.
"Well," said the cook, "perhaps it's not a house of refuge that I'mthinking of as being near Mosquito Inlet Light. Perhaps it's a life-saving station."
"We're not there yet," said the oiler, in the stern.
II
As the boat bounced from the top of each wave, the wind tore through thehair of the hatless men, and as the craft plopped her stern down againthe spray splashed past them. The crest of each of these waves was ahill, from the top of which the men surveyed, for a moment, a broadtumultuous expanse, shining and wind-riven. It was probably splendid. Itwas probably glorious, this play of the free sea, wild with lights ofemerald and white and amber.
"Bully good thing it's an on-shore wind," said the cook; "If not, wherewould we be? Wouldn't have a show."
"That's right," said the correspondent.
The busy oiler nodded his assent.
Then the captain, in the bow, chuckled in a way that expressed humor,contempt, tragedy, all in one. "Do you think We've got much of a shownow, boys?" said he.
Whereupon the three were silent, save for a trifle of hemming andhawing. To express any particular optimism at this time they felt to bechildish and stupid, but they all doubtless possessed this sense of thesituation in their mind. A young man thinks doggedly at such times. Onthe other hand, the ethics of their condition was decidedly against anyopen suggestion of hopelessness. So they were silent.
"Oh, well," said the captain, soothing his children, "We'll get ashoreall right."
But there was that in his tone which made them think, so the oilerquoth: "Yes! If this wind holds!"
The cook was bailing: "Yes! If we don't catch hell in the surf."
Canton flannel gulls flew near and far. Sometimes they sat down on thesea, near patches of brown seaweed that rolled on the waves with amovement like carpets on a line in a gale. The birds sat comfortably ingroups, and they were envied by some in the dingey, for the wrath of thesea was no more to them than it was to a covey of prairie chickens athousand miles inland. Often they came very close and stared at the menwith black bead-like eyes. At these times they were uncanny and sinisterin their unblinking scrutiny, and the men hooted angrily at them,telling them to be gone. One came, and evidently decided to alight onthe top of the captain's head. The bird flew parallel to the boat anddid not circle, but made short sidelong jumps in the air in chicken-fashion. His black eyes were wistfully fixed upon the captain's head."Ugly brute," said the oiler to the bird. "You look as if you were madewith a jack-knife." The cook and the correspondent swore darkly at thecreature. The captain naturally wished to knock it away with the end ofthe heavy painter; but he did not dare do it, because anythingresembling an emphatic gesture would have capsized this freighted boat,and so with his open hand, the captain gently and carefully waved thegull away. After it had been discouraged from the pursuit the captainbreathed easier on account of his hair, and others breathed easierbecause the bird struck their minds at this time as being somehowgrewsome and ominous.
In the meantime the oiler and the correspondent rowed And also theyrowed.
They sat together in the same seat, and each rowed an oar. Then theoiler took both oars; then the correspondent took both oars; then theoiler; then the correspondent. They rowed and they rowed. The veryticklish part of the business was when the time came for the recliningone in the stern to take his turn at the oars. By the very last star oftruth, it is easier to steal eggs from under a hen than it was to changeseats in the dingey. First the man in the stern slid his hand along thethwart and moved with care, as if he were of Svres. Then the man in therowing seat slid his hand along the other thwart. It was all done withmost extraordinary care. As the two sidled past each other, the wholeparty kept watchful eyes on the coming wave, and the captain cried:"Look out now! Steady there!"
The brown mats of seaweed that appeared from time to time were likeislands, bits of earth. They were traveling, apparently, neither one waynor the other. They were, to all intents, stationary. They informed themen in the boat that it was making progress slowly toward the land.
The captain, rearing cautiously in the bow, after the dingey soared on agreat swell, said that he had seen the light-house at Mosquito Inlet.Presently the cook remarked that he had seen it. The correspondent wasat the oars then, and for some reason he too wished to look at thelighthouse, but his back was toward the far shore and the waves wereimportant, and for some time he could not seize an opportunity to turnhis head. But at last there came a wave more gentle than the others, andwhen at the crest of it he swiftly scoured the western horizon.
"See it?" said the captain.
"No," said the correspondent slowly, "I didn't see anything."
"Look again," said the captain. He pointed. "It's exactly in thatdirection."
At the top of another wave, the correspondent did as he was bid, andthis time his eyes chanced on a small still thing on the edge of theswaying horizon. It was precisely like the point of a pin. It took ananxious eye to find a light house so tiny.
"Think we'll make it, captain?"
"If this wind holds and the boat don't swamp, we can't do much else,"said the captain.
The little boat, lifted by each towering sea, and splashed viciously bythe crests, made progress that in the absence of seaweed was notapparent to those in her. She seemed just a wee thing wallowing,miraculously top-up, at the mercy of five oceans. Occasionally, a greatspread of water, like white flames, swarmed into her.
"Bail her, cook," said the captain serenely.
"All right, captain," said the cheerful cook.
III
It would be difficult to describe the subtle brotherhood of men that washere established on the seas. No one said that it was so. No onementioned it. But it dwelt in the boat, and each man felt it warm him.They were a captain, an oiler, a cook, and a correspondent, and theywere friends, friends in a more curiously iron-bound degree than may becommon. The hurt captain, lying against the water-jar in the bow, spokealways in a low voice and calmly, but he could never command a moreready and swiftly obedient crew than the motley three of the dingey. Itwas more than a mere recognition of what was best for the common safety.There was surely in it a quality that was personal and heartfelt. Andafter this devotion to the commander of the boat there was thiscomradeship that the correspondent, for instance, who had been taught tobe cynical of men, knew even at the time was the best experience of hislife. But no one said that it was so. No one mentioned it.
"I wish we had a sail," remarked the captain. "We might try my overcoaton the end of an oar and give you two boys a chance to rest." So thecook and the correspondent held the mast and spread wide the overcoat.The oiler steered, and the little boat made good way with her new rig.Sometimes the oiler had to scull sharply to keep a sea from breakinginto the boat, but otherwise sailing was a success.
Meanwhile the lighthouse had been growing slowly larger. It had nowalmost assumed color, and appeared like a little grey shadow on the sky.The man at the oars could not be prevented from turning his head ratheroften to try for a glimpse of this little grey shadow.
At last, from the top of each wave the men in the tossing boat could seeland. Even as the lighthouse was an upright shadow on the sky, this landseemed but a long black shadow on the sea. It certainly was thinner thanpaper. "We must be about opposite New Smyrna," said the cook, who hadcoasted this shore often in schooners. "Captain, by the way, I believethey abandoned that life-saving station there about a year ago."
"Did they?" said the captain.
The wind slowly died away. The cook and the correspondent were not nowobliged to slave in order to hold high the oar. But the waves continuedtheir old impetuous swooping at the dingey, and the little craft, nolonger under way, struggled woundily over them. The oiler or thecorrespondent took the oars again.
Shipwrecks are _ propos_ of nothing. If men could only train forthem and have them occur when the men had reached pink condition, therewould be less drowning at sea. Of the four in the dingey none had sleptany time worth mentioning for two days and two nights previous toembarking in the dingey, and in the excitement of clambering about thedeck of a foundering ship they had also forgotten to eat heartily.
For these reasons, and for others, neither the oiler nor thecorrespondent was fond of rowing at this time. The correspondentwondered ingenuously how in the name of all that was sane could there bepeople who thought it amusing to row a boat. It was not an amusement; itwas a diabolical punishment, and even a genius of mental aberrationscould never conclude that it was anything but a horror to the musclesand a crime against the back. He mentioned to the boat in general howthe amusement of rowing struck him, and the weary-faced oiler smiled infull sympathy. Previously to the foundering, by the way, the oiler hadworked double-watch in the engine-room of the ship.
"Take her easy, now, boys," said the captain. "Don't spend yourselves.If we have to run a surf you'll need all your strength, because we'llsure have to swim for it. Take your time."
Slowly the land arose from the sea. From a black line it became a lineof black and a line of white, trees and sand. Finally, the captain saidthat he could make out a house on the shore. "That's the house ofrefuge, sure," said the cook. "They'll see us before long, and come outafter us."
The distant lighthouse reared high. "The keeper ought to be able to makeus out now, if he's looking through a glass," said the captain. "He'llnotify the life-saving people."
"None of those other boats could have got ashore to give word of thewreck," said the oiler, in a low voice. "Else the lifeboat would be outhunting us."
Slowly and beautifully the land loomed out of the sea. The wind cameagain. It had veered from the north-east to the south-east. Finally, anew sound struck the ears of the men in the boat. It was the low thunderof the surf on the shore. "We'll never be able to make the lighthousenow," said the captain. "Swing her head a little more north, Billie,"said he.
"'A little more north,' sir," said the oiler.
Whereupon the little boat turned her nose once more down the wind, andall but the oarsman watched the shore grow. Under the influence of thisexpansion doubt and direful apprehension was leaving the minds of themen. The management of the boat was still most absorbing, but it couldnot prevent a quiet cheerfulness. In an hour, perhaps, they would beashore.
Their backbones had become thoroughly used to balancing in the boat, andthey now rode this wild colt of a dingey like circus men. Thecorrespondent thought that he had been drenched to the skin, buthappening to feel in the top pocket of his coat, he found therein eightcigars. Four of them were soaked with sea-water; four were perfectlyscathless. After a search, somebody produced three dry matches, andthereupon the four waifs rode impudently in their little boat, and withan assurance of an impending rescue shining in their eyes, puffed at thebig cigars and judged well and ill of all men. Everybody took a drink ofwater.
IV
"Cook," remarked the captain, "there don't seem to be any signs of lifeabout your house of refuge."
"No," replied the cook. "Funny they don't see us!"
A broad stretch of lowly coast lay before the eyes of the men. It was ofdunes topped with dark vegetation. The roar of the surf was plain, andsometimes they could see the white lip of a wave as it spun up thebeach. A tiny house was blocked out black upon the sky. Southward, theslim lighthouse lifted its little grey length.
Tide, wind, and waves were swinging the dingey northward. "Funny theydon't see us," said the men.
The surf's roar was here dulled, but its tone was, nevertheless,thunderous and mighty. As the boat swam over the great rollers, the mensat listening to this roar. "We'll swamp sure," said everybody.
It is fair to say here that there was not a life-saving station withintwenty miles in either direction, but the men did not know this fact,and in consequence they made dark and opprobrious remarks concerning theeyesight of the nation's life-savers. Four scowling men sat in thedingey and surpassed records in the invention of epithets.
"Funny they don't see us."
The lightheartedness of a former time had completely faded. To theirsharpened minds it was easy to conjure pictures of all kinds ofincompetency and blindness and, indeed, cowardice. There was the shoreof the populous land, and it was bitter and bitter to them that from itcame no sign.
"Well," said the captain, ultimately, "I suppose we'll have to make atry for ourselves. If we stay out here too long, we'll none of us havestrength left to swim after the boat swamps."
And so the oiler, who was at the oars, turned the boat straight for theshore. There was a sudden tightening of muscle. There was some thinking.
"If we don't all get ashore--" said the captain. "If we don't all getashore, I suppose you fellows know where to send news of my finish?"
They then briefly exchanged some addresses and admonitions. As for thereflections of the men, there was a great deal of rage in them.Perchance they might be formulated thus: "If I am going to be drowned--if I am going to be drowned--if I am going to be drowned, why, in thename of the seven mad gods who rule the sea, was I allowed to come thusfar and contemplate sand and trees? Was I brought here merely to have mynose dragged away as I was about to nibble the sacred cheese of life? Itis preposterous. If this old ninny-woman, Fate, cannot do better thanthis, she should be deprived of the management of men's fortunes. She isan old hen who knows not her intention. If she has decided to drown me,why did she not do it in the beginning and save me all this trouble? Thewhole affair is absurd.... But no, she cannot mean to drown me. She darenot drown me. She cannot drown me. Not after all this work." Afterwardthe man might have had an impulse to shake his fist at the clouds: "Justyou drown me, now, and then hear what I call you!"
The billows that came at this time were more formidable. They seemedalways just about to break and roll over the little boat in a turmoil offoam. There was a preparatory and long growl in the speech of them. Nomind unused to the sea would have concluded that the dingey could ascendthese sheer heights in time. The shore was still afar. The oiler was awily surfman. "Boys," he said swiftly, "she won't live three minutesmore, and we're too far out to swim. Shall I take her to sea again,captain?"
"Yes! Go ahead!" said the captain.
This oiler, by a series of quick miracles, and fast and steadyoarsmanship, turned the boat in the middle of the surf and took hersafely to sea again.
There was a considerable silence as the boat bumped over the furrowedsea to deeper water. Then somebody in gloom spoke. "Well, anyhow, theymust have seen us from the shore by now."
The gulls went in slanting flight up the wind toward the grey desolateeast. A squall, marked by dingy clouds, and clouds brick-red, like smokefrom a burning building, appeared from the south-east.
"What do you think of those life-saving people? Ain't they peaches?'
"Funny they haven't seen us."
"Maybe they think we're out here for sport! Maybe they think we'refishin'. Maybe they think we're damned fools."
It was a long afternoon. A changed tide tried to force them southward,but the wind and wave said northward. Far ahead, where coast-line, sea,and sky formed their mighty angle, there were little dots which seemedto indicate a city on the shore.
"St. Augustine?"
The captain shook his head. "Too near Mosquito Inlet."
And the oiler rowed, and then the correspondent rowed. Then the oilerrowed. It was a weary business. The human back can become the seat ofmore aches and pains than are registered in books for the compositeanatomy of a regiment. It is a limited area, but it can become thetheatre of innumerable muscular conflicts, tangles, wrenches, knots, andother comforts.
"Did you ever like to row, Billie?" asked the correspondent.
"No," said the oiler. "Hang it!"
When one exchanged the rowing-seat for a place in the bottom of theboat, he suffered a bodily depression that caused him to be careless ofeverything save an obligation to wiggle one finger. There was cold sea-water swashing to and fro in the boat, and he lay in it. His head,pillowed on a thwart, was within an inch of the swirl of a wave crest,and sometimes a particularly obstreperous sea came in-board and drenchedhim once more. But these matters did not annoy him. It is almost certainthat if the boat had capsized he would have tumbled comfortably out uponthe ocean as if he felt sure that it was a great soft mattress.
"Look! There's a man on the shore!"
"Where?"
"There! See 'im? See 'im?"
"Yes, sure! He's walking along."
"Now he's stopped. Look! He's facing us!"
"He's waving at us!"
"So he is! By thunder!"
"Ah, now we're all right! Now we're all right! There'll be a boat outhere for us in half-an-hour."
"He's going on. He's running. He's going up to that house there."
The remote beach seemed lower than the sea, and it required a searchingglance to discern the little black figure. The captain saw a floatingstick and they rowed to it. A bath-towel was by some weird chance in theboat, and, tying this on the stick, the captain waved it. The oarsmandid not dare turn his head, so he was obliged to ask questions.
"What's he doing now?"
"He's standing still again. He's looking, I think.... There he goesagain. Toward the house.... Now he's stopped again."
"Is he waving at us?"
"No, not now! he was, though."
"Look! There comes another man!"
"He's running."
"Look at him go, would you."
"Why, he's on a bicycle. Now he's met the other man. They're both wavingat us. Look!"
"There comes something up the beach."
"What the devil is that thing?"
"Why it looks like a boat."
"Why, certainly it's a boat."
"No, it's on wheels."
"Yes, so it is. Well, that must be the life-boat. They drag them alongshore on a wagon."
"That's the life-boat, sure."
"No, by ----, it's--it's an omnibus."
"I tell you it's a life-boat."
"It is not! It's an omnibus. I can see it plain. See? One of these bighotel omnibuses."
"By thunder, you're right. It's an omnibus, sure as fate. What do yousuppose they are doing with an omnibus? Maybe they are going aroundcollecting the life-crew, hey?"
"That's it, likely. Look! There's a fellow waving a little black flag.He's standing on the steps of the omnibus. There come those other twofellows. Now they're all talking together. Look at the fellow with theflag. Maybe he ain't waving it."
"That ain't a flag, is it? That's his coat. Why, certainly, that's hiscoat."
"So it is. It's his coat. He's taken it off and is waving it around hishead. But would you look at him swing it."
"Oh, say, there isn't any life-saving station there. That's just awinter resort hotel omnibus that has brought over some of the boardersto see us drown."
"What's that idiot with the coat mean? What's he signaling, anyhow?"
"It looks as if he were trying to tell us to go north. There must be alife-saving station up there."
"No! He thinks we're fishing. Just giving us a merry hand. See? Ah,there, Willie!"
"Well, I wish I could make something out of those signals. What do yousuppose he means?"
"He don't mean anything. He's just playing."
"Well, if he'd just signal us to try the surf again, or to go to sea andwait, or go north, or go south, or go to hell--there would be somereason in it. But look at him. He just stands there and keeps his coatrevolving like a wheel. The ass!"
"There come more people."
"Now there's quite a mob. Look! Isn't that a boat?"
"Where? Oh, I see where you mean. No, that's no boat."
"That fellow is still waving his coat."
"He must think we like to see him do that. Why don't he quit it? Itdon't mean anything."
"I don't know. I think he is trying to make us go north. It must be thatthere's a life-saving station there somewhere."
"Say, he ain't tired yet. Look at 'im wave."
"Wonder how long he can keep that up. He's been revolving his coat eversince he caught sight of us. He's an idiot. Why aren't they getting mento bring a boat out? A fishing boat--one of those big yawls--could comeout here all right. Why don't he do something?"
"Oh, it's all right, now."
"They'll have a boat out here for us in less than no time, now thatthey've seen us."
A faint yellow tone came into the sky over the low land. The shadows onthe sea slowly deepened. The wind bore coldness with it, and the menbegan to shiver.
"Holy smoke!" said one, allowing his voice to express his impious mood,"if we keep on monkeying out here! If we've got to flounder out here allnight!"
"Oh, we'll never have to stay here all night! Don't you worry. They'veseen us now, and it won't be long before they'll come chasing out afterus."
The shore grew dusky. The man waving a coat blended gradually into thisgloom, and it swallowed in the same manner the omnibus and the group ofpeople. The spray, when it dashed uproariously over the side, made thevoyagers shrink and swear like men who were being branded.
"I'd like to catch the chump who waved the coat. I feel like soaking himone, just for luck."
"Why? What did he do?"
"Oh, nothing, but then he seemed so damned cheerful."
In the meantime the oiler rowed, and then the correspondent rowed, andthen the oiler rowed. Grey-faced and bowed forward, they mechanically,turn by turn, plied the leaden oars. The form of the lighthouse hadvanished from the southern horizon, but finally a pale star appeared,just lifting from the sea. The streaked saffron in the west passedbefore the all-merging darkness, and the sea to the east was black. Theland had vanished, and was expressed only by the low and drear thunderof the surf.
"If I am going to be drowned--if I am going to be drowned--if I am goingto be drowned, why, in the name of the seven mad gods who rule the sea,was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees? Was Ibrought here merely to have my nose dragged away as I was about tonibble the sacred cheese of life?"
The patient captain, drooped over the water-jar, was sometimes obligedto speak to the oarsman.
"Keep her head up! Keep her head up!"
"'Keep her head up,' sir." The voices were weary and low.
This was surely a quiet evening. All save the oarsman lay heavily andlistlessly in the boat's bottom. As for him, his eyes were just capableof noting the tall black waves that swept forward in a most sinistersilence, save for an occasional subdued growl of a crest.
The cook's head was on a thwart, and he looked without interest at thewater under his nose. He was deep in other scenes. Finally he spoke."Billie," he murmured, dreamfully, "what kind of pie do you like best?"
V
"Pie," said the oiler and the correspondent, agitatedly. "Don't talkabout those things, blast you!"
"Well," said the cook, "I was just thinking about ham sandwiches, and--"
A night on the sea in an open boat is a long night. As darkness settledfinally, the shine of the light, lifting from the sea in the south,changed to full gold. On the northern horizon a new light appeared, asmall bluish gleam on the edge of the waters. These two lights were thefurniture of the world. Otherwise there was nothing but waves.
Two men huddled in the stern, and distances were so magnificent in thedingey that the rower was enabled to keep his feet partly warmed bythrusting them under his companions. Their legs indeed extended farunder the rowing-seat until they touched the feet of the captainforward. Sometimes, despite the efforts of the tired oarsman, a wavecame piling into the boat, an icy wave of the night, and the chillingwater soaked them anew. They would twist their bodies for a moment andgroan, and sleep the dead sleep once more, while the water in the boatgurgled about them as the craft rocked.
The plan of the oiler and the correspondent was for one to row until helost the ability, and then arouse the other from his sea-water couch inthe bottom of the boat.
The oiler plied the oars until his head drooped forward, and theoverpowering sleep blinded him. And he rowed yet afterward. Then hetouched a man in the bottom of the boat, and called his name. "Will youspell me for a little while?" he said, meekly.
"Sure, Billie," said the correspondent, awakening and dragging himselfto a sitting position. They exchanged places carefully, and the oiler,cuddling down in the sea-water at the cook's side, seemed to go to sleepinstantly.
The particular violence of the sea had ceased. The waves came withoutsnarling. The obligation of the man at the oars was to keep the boatheaded so that the tilt of the rollers would not capsize her, and topreserve her from filling when the crests rushed past. The black waveswere silent and hard to be seen in the darkness. Often one was almostupon the boat before the oarsman was aware.
In a low voice the correspondent addressed the captain. He was not surethat the captain was awake, although this iron man seemed to be alwaysawake. "Captain, shall I keep her making for that light north, sir?"
The same steady voice answered him. "Yes. Keep it about two points offthe port bow."
The cook had tied a life-belt around himself in order to get even thewarmth which this clumsy cork contrivance could donate, and he seemedalmost stove-like when a rower, whose teeth invariably chattered wildlyas soon as he ceased his labor, dropped down to sleep.
The correspondent, as he rowed, looked down at the two men sleepingunder-foot. The cook's arm was around the oiler's shoulders, and, withtheir fragmentary clothing and haggard faces, they were the babes of thesea, a grotesque rendering of the old babes in the wood.
Later he must have grown stupid at his work, for suddenly there was agrowling of water, and a crest came with a roar and a swash into theboat, and it was a wonder that it did not set the cook afloat in hislife-belt. The cook continued to sleep, but the oiler sat up, blinkinghis eyes and shaking with the new cold.
"Oh, I'm awful sorry, Billie," said the correspondent contritely.
"That's all right, old boy," said the oiler, and lay down again and wasasleep.
Presently it seemed that even the captain dozed, and the correspondentthought that he was the one man afloat on all the oceans. The wind had avoice as it came over the waves, and it was sadder than the end.
There was a long, loud swishing astern of the boat, and a gleaming trailof phosphorescence, like blue flame, was furrowed on the black waters.It might have been made by a monstrous knife.
Then there came a stillness, while the correspondent breathed with theopen mouth and looked at the sea.
Suddenly there was another swish and another long flash of bluish light,and this time it was alongside the boat, and might almost have beenreached with an oar. The correspondent saw an enormous fin speed like ashadow through the water, hurling the crystalline spray and leaving thelong glowing trail.
The correspondent looked over his shoulder at the captain. His face washidden, and he seemed to be asleep. He looked at the babes of the sea.They certainly were asleep. So, being bereft of sympathy, he leaned alittle way to one side and swore softly into the sea.
But the thing did not then leave the vicinity of the boat. Ahead orastern, on one side or the other, at intervals long or short, fled thelong sparkling streak, and there was to be heard the whirroo of the darkfin. The speed and power of the thing was greatly to be admired. It cutthe water like a gigantic and keen projectile.
The presence of this biding thing did not affect the man with the samehorror that it would if he had been a picnicker. He simply looked at thesea dully and swore in an undertone.
Nevertheless, it is true that he did not wish to be alone. He wished oneof his companions to awaken by chance and keep him company with it. Butthe captain hung motionless over the water-jar, and the oiler and thecook in the bottom of the boat were plunged in slumber.
VI
"If I am going to be drowned--if I am going to be drowned--if I am goingto be drowned, why, in the name of the seven mad gods who rule the sea,was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees?"
During this dismal night, it may be remarked that a man would concludethat it was really the intention of the seven mad gods to drown him,despite the abominable injustice of it. For it was certainly anabominable injustice to drown a man who had worked so hard, so hard. Theman felt it would be a crime most unnatural. Other people had drowned atsea since galleys swarmed with painted sails, but still--
When it occurs to a man that nature does not regard him as important,and that she feels she would not maim the universe by disposing of him,he at first wishes to throw bricks at the temple, and he hates deeplythe fact that there are no brick and no temples. Any visible expressionof nature would surely be pelleted with his jeers.
Then, if there be no tangible thing to hoot he feels, perhaps, thedesire to confront a personification and indulge in pleas, bowed to oneknee, and with hands supplicant, saying: "Yes, but I love myself."
A high cold star on a winter's night is the word he feels that she saysto him. Thereafter he knows the pathos of his situation.
The men in the dingey had not discussed these matters, but each had, nodoubt, reflected upon them in silence and according to his mind. Therewas seldom any expression upon their faces save the general one ofcomplete weariness. Speech was devoted to the business of the boat.
To chime the notes of his emotion, a verse mysteriously entered thecorrespondent's head. He had even forgotten that he had forgotten thisverse, but it suddenly was in his mind.
"A soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers,There was a lack of woman's nursing, there was dearth ofwoman's tears;But a comrade stood beside him, and he took that comrade's hand,And he said: 'I shall never see my own, my native land.'"
In his childhood, the correspondent had been made acquainted with thefact that a soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers, but he had neverregarded the fact as important. Myriads of his school-fellows hadinformed him of the soldier's plight, but the dinning had naturallyended by making him perfectly indifferent. He had never considered ithis affair that a soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers, nor had itappeared to him as a matter for sorrow. It was less to him than thebreaking of a pencil's point.
Now, however, it quaintly came to him as a human, living thing. It wasno longer merely a picture of a few throes in the breast of a poet,meanwhile drinking tea and warming his feet at the grate; it was anactuality--stern, mournful, and fine.
The correspondent plainly saw the soldier. He lay on the sand with hisfeet out straight and still. While his pale left hand was upon his chestin an attempt to thwart the going of his life, the blood came betweenhis fingers. In the far Algerian distance, a city of low square formswas set against a sky that was faint with the last sunset hues. Thecorrespondent, plying the oars and dreaming of the slow and slowermovements of the lips of the soldier, was moved by a profound andperfectly impersonal comprehension. He was sorry for the soldier of theLegion who lay dying in Algiers.
The thing which had followed the boat and waited, had evidently grownbored at the delay. There was no longer to be heard the slash of thecut-water, and there was no longer the flame of the long trail. Thelight in the north still glimmered, but it was apparently no nearer tothe boat. Sometimes the boom of the surf rang in the correspondent'sears, and he turned the craft seaward then and rowed harder. Southward,some one had evidently built a watch-fire on the beach. It was too lowand too far to be seen, but it made a shimmering, roseate reflectionupon the bluff back of it, and this could be discerned from the boat.The wind came stronger, and sometimes a wave suddenly raged out like amountain-cat, and there was to be seen the sheen and sparkle of a brokencrest.
The captain, in the bow, moved on his water-jar and sat erect. "Prettylong night," he observed to the correspondent. He looked at the shore."Those life-saving people take their time."
"Did you see that shark playing around?"
"Yes, I saw him. He was a big fellow, all right."
"Wish I had known you were awake."
Later the correspondent spoke into the bottom of the boat.
"Billie!" There was a slow and gradual disentanglement. "Billie, willyou spell me?"
"Sure," said the oiler.
As soon as the correspondent touched the cold comfortable sea-water inthe bottom of the boat, and had huddled close to the cook's life-belt hewas deep in sleep, despite the fact that his teeth played all thepopular airs. This sleep was so good to him that it was but a momentbefore he heard a voice call his name in a tone that demonstrated thelast stages of exhaustion. "Will you spell me?"
"Sure, Billie."
The light in the north had mysteriously vanished, but the correspondenttook his course from the wide-awake captain.
Later in the night they took the boat farther out to sea, and thecaptain directed the cook to take one oar at the stern and keep the boatfacing the seas. He was to call out if he should hear the thunder of thesurf. This plan enabled the oiler and the correspondent to get respitetogether. "We'll give those boys a chance to get into shape again," saidthe captain. They curled down and, after a few preliminary chatteringsand trembles, slept once more the dead sleep. Neither knew they hadbequeathed to the cook the company of another shark, or perhaps the sameshark.
As the boat caroused on the waves, spray occasionally bumped over theside and gave them a fresh soaking, but this had no power to break theirrepose. The ominous slash of the wind and the water affected them as itwould have affected mummies.
"Boys," said the cook, with the notes of every reluctance in his voice,"she's drifted in pretty close. I guess one of you had better take herto sea again." The correspondent, aroused, heard the crash of thetoppled crests.
As he was rowing, the captain gave him some whisky-and-water, and thissteadied the chills out of him. "If I ever get ashore and anybody showsme even a photograph of an oar--"
At last there was a short conversation.
"Billie.... Billie, will you spell me?"
"Sure," said the oiler.
VII
When the correspondent again opened his eyes, the sea and the sky wereeach of the grey hue of the dawning. Later, carmine and gold was paintedupon the waters. The morning appeared finally, in its splendor, with asky of pure blue, and the sunlight flamed on the tips of the waves.
On the distant dunes were set many little black cottages, and a tallwhite windmill reared above them. No man, nor dog, nor bicycle appearedon the beach. The cottages might have formed a deserted village.
The voyagers scanned the shore. A conference was held in the boat."Well," said the captain, "if no help is coming we might better try arun through the surf right away. If we stay out here much longer we willbe too weak to do anything for ourselves at all." The others silentlyacquiesced in this reasoning. The boat was headed for the beach. Thecorrespondent wondered if none ever ascended the tall wind-tower, and ifthen they never looked seaward. This tower was a giant, standing withits back to the plight of the ants. It represented in a degree, to thecorrespondent, the serenity of nature amid the struggles of theindividual--nature in the wind, and nature in the vision of men. She didnot seem cruel to him then, nor beneficent, nor treacherous, nor wise.But she was indifferent, flatly indifferent. It is, perhaps, plausiblethat a man in this situation, impressed with the unconcern of theuniverse, should see the innumerable flaws of his life, and have themtaste wickedly in his mind and wish for another chance. A distinctionbetween right and wrong seems absurdly clear to him, then, in this newignorance of the grave-edge, and he understands that if he were givenanother opportunity he would mend his conduct and his words, and bebetter and brighter during an introduction or at a tea.
"Now, boys," said the captain, "she is going to swamp, sure. All we cando is to work her in as far as possible, and then when she swamps, pileout and scramble for the beach. Keep cool now, and don't jump until sheswamps sure."
The oiler took the oars. Over his shoulders he scanned the surf."Captain," he said, "I think I'd better bring her about, and keep herhead-on to the seas and back her in."
"All right, Billie," said the captain. "Back her in." The oiler swungthe boat then and, seated in the stern, the cook and the correspondentwere obliged to look over their shoulders to contemplate the lonely andindifferent shore.
The monstrous in-shore rollers heaved the boat high until the men wereagain enabled to see the white sheets of water scudding up the slantedbeach. "We won't get in very close," said the captain. Each time a mancould wrest his attention from the rollers, he turned his glance towardthe shore, and in the expression of the eyes during this contemplationthere was a singular quality. The correspondent, observing the others,knew that they were not afraid, but the full meaning of their glanceswas shrouded.
As for himself, he was too tired to grapple fundamentally with the fact.He tried to coerce his mind into thinking of it, but the mind wasdominated at this time by the muscles, and the muscles said they did notcare. It merely occurred to him that if he should drown it would be ashame.
There were no hurried words, no pallor, no plain agitation. The mensimply looked at the shore. "Now, remember to get well clear of the boatwhen you jump," said the captain.
Seaward the crest of a roller suddenly fell with a thunderous crash, andthe long white comber came roaring down upon the boat.
"Steady now," said the captain. The men were silent. They turned theireyes from the shore to the comber and waited. The boat slid up theincline, leaped at the furious top, bounced over it, and swung down thelong back of the wave. Some water had been shipped and the cook bailedit out.
But the next crest crashed also. The tumbling, boiling flood of whitewater caught the boat and whirled it almost perpendicular. Water swarmedin from all sides. The correspondent had his hands on the gunwale atthis time, and when the water entered at that place he swiftly withdrewhis fingers, as if he objected to wetting them.
The little boat, drunken with this weight of water, reeled and snuggleddeeper into the sea.
"Bail her out, cook! Bail her out," said the captain.
"All right, captain," said the cook.
"Now, boys, the next one will do for us, sure," said the oiler. "Mind tojump clear of the boat."
The third wave moved forward, huge, furious, implacable. It fairlyswallowed the dingey, and almost simultaneously the men tumbled into thesea. A piece of lifebelt had lain in the bottom of the boat, and as thecorrespondent went overboard he held this to his chest with his lefthand.
The January water was icy, and he reflected immediately that it wascolder than he had expected to find it on the coast of Florida. Thisappeared to his dazed mind as a fact important enough to be noted at thetime. The coldness of the water was sad; it was tragic. This fact wassomehow so mixed and confused with his opinion of his own situation thatit seemed almost a proper reason for tears. The water was cold.
When he came to the surface he was conscious of little but the noisywater. Afterward he saw his companions in the sea. The oiler was aheadin the race. He was swimming strongly and rapidly. Off to thecorrespondent's left, the cook's great white and corked back bulged outof the water, and in the rear the captain was hanging with his one goodhand to the keel of the overturned dingey.
There is a certain immovable quality to a shore, and the correspondentwondered at it amid the confusion of the sea.
It seemed also very attractive, but the correspondent knew that it was along journey, and he paddled leisurely. The piece of life-preserver layunder him, and sometimes he whirled down the incline of a wave as if hewere on a handsled.
But finally he arrived at a place in the sea where travel was besetwith difficulty. He did not pause swimming to inquire what manner ofcurrent had caught him, but there his progress ceased. The shore was setbefore him like a bit of scenery on a stage, and he looked at it andunderstood with his eyes each detail of it.
As the cook passed, much farther to the left, the captain was calling tohim, "Turn over on your back, cook! Turn over on your back and use theoar."
"All right, sir." The cook turned on his back, and, paddling with anoar, went ahead as if he were a canoe.
Presently the boat also passed to the left of the correspondent with thecaptain clinging with one hand to the keel. He would have appeared likea man raising himself to look over a board fence, if it were not for theextraordinary gymnastics of the boat. The correspondent marvelled thatthe captain could still hold to it.
They passed on, nearer to shore--the oiler, the cook, the captain--andfollowing them went the water-jar, bouncing gaily over the seas.
The correspondent remained in the grip of this strange new enemy--acurrent. The shore, with its white slope of sand and its green bluff,topped with little silent cottages, was spread like a picture beforehim. It was very near to him then, but he was impressed as one who in agallery looks at a scene from Brittany or Holland.
He thought: "I am going to drown? Can it be possible Can it be possible?Can it be possible?" Perhaps an individual must consider his own deathto be the final phenomenon of nature.
But later a wave perhaps whirled him out of this small, deadly current,for he found suddenly that he could again make progress toward theshore. Later still, he was aware that the captain, clinging with onehand to the keel of the dingey, had his face turned away from the shoreand toward him, and was calling his name. "Come to the boat! Come to theboat!"
In his struggle to reach the captain and the boat, he reflected thatwhen one gets properly wearied, drowning must really be a comfortablearrangement, a cessation of hostilities accompanied by a large degree ofrelief, and he was glad of it, for the main thing in his mind for somemonths had been horror of the temporary agony. He did not wish to behurt.
Presently he saw a man running along the shore. He was undressing withmost remarkable speed. Coat, trousers, shirt, everything flew magicallyoff him.
"Come to the boat," called the captain.
"All right, captain." As the correspondent paddled, he saw the captainlet himself down to bottom and leave the boat. Then the correspondentperformed his one little marvel of the voyage. A large wave caught himand flung him with ease and supreme speed completely over the boat andfar beyond it. It struck him even then as an event in gymnastics, and atrue miracle of the sea. An over-turned boat in the surf is not aplaything to a swimming man.
The correspondent arrived in water that reached only to his waist, buthis condition did not enable him to stand for more than a moment. Eachwave knocked him into a heap, and the under-tow pulled at him.
Then he saw the man who had been running and undressing, and undressingand running, come bounding into the water. He dragged ashore the cook,and then waded towards the captain, but the captain waved him away, andsent him to the correspondent. He was naked, naked as a tree in winter,but a halo was about his head, and he shone like a saint. He gave astrong pull, and a long drag, and a bully heave at the correspondent'shand. The correspondent, schooled in the minor formulae, said: "Thanks,old man." But suddenly the man cried: "What's that?" He pointed a swiftfinger. The correspondent said: "Go."
In the shallows, face downward, lay the oiler. His forehead touched sandthat was periodically, between each wave, clear of the sea.
The correspondent did not know all that transpired afterward. When heachieved safe ground he fell, striking the sand with each particularpart of his body. It was as if he had dropped from a roof, but the thudwas grateful to him.
It seems that instantly the beach was populated with men with blankets,clothes, and flasks, and women with coffeepots and all the remediessacred to their minds. The welcome of the land to the men from the seawas warm and generous, but a still and dripping shape was carried slowlyup the beach, and the land's welcome for it could only be the differentand sinister hospitality of the grave.
When it came night, the white waves paced to and fro in the moonlight,and the wind brought the sound of the great sea's voice to the men onshore, and they felt that they could then be interpreters.
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