Next morning, at daylight, the Narcissus went to sea.
A slight haze blurred the horizon. Outside the harbour the measureless
expanse of smooth water lay sparkling like a floor of jewels, and as
empty as the sky. The short black tug gave a pluck to windward, in the
usual way, then let go the rope, and hovered for a moment on the quarter
with her engines stopped; while the slim, long hull of the ship moved
ahead slowly under lower topsails. The loose upper canvas blew out
in the breeze with soft round contours, resembling small white clouds
snared in the maze of ropes. Then the sheets were hauled home, the yards
hoisted, and the ship became a high and lonely pyramid, gliding, all
shining and white, through the sunlit mist. The tug turned short round
and went away towards the land. Twenty-six pairs of eyes watched her
low broad stern crawling languidly over the smooth swell between the two
paddle-wheels that turned fast, beating the water with fierce hurry. She
resembled an enormous and aquatic black beetle, surprised by the light,
overwhelmed by the sunshine, trying to escape with ineffectual effort
into the distant gloom of the land. She left a lingering smudge of smoke
on the sky, and two vanishing trails of foam on the water. On the place
where she had stopped a round black patch of soot remained, undulating
on the swell--an unclean mark of the creature's rest.
The Narcissus left alone, heading south, seemed to stand resplendent
and still upon the restless sea, under the moving sun. Flakes of foam
swept past her sides; the water struck her with flashing blows; the land
glided away slowly fading; a few birds screamed on motionless wings over
the swaying mastheads. But soon the land disappeared, the birds went
away; and to the west the pointed sail of an Arab dhow running for
Bombay, rose triangular and upright above the sharp edge of the horizon,
lingered and vanished like an illusion. Then the ship's wake, long and
straight, stretched itself out through a day of immense solitude. The
setting sun, burning on the level of the water, flamed crimson below
the blackness of heavy rain clouds. The sunset squall, coming up from
behind, dissolved itself into the short deluge of a hissing shower. It
left the ship glistening from trucks to water-line, and with darkened
sails. She ran easily before a fair monsoon, with her decks cleared
for the night; and, moving along with her, was heard the sustained and
monotonous swishing of the waves, mingled with the low whispers of men
mustered aft for the setting of watches; the short plaint of some block
aloft; or, now and then, a loud sigh of wind.
Mr. Baker, coming out of his cabin, called out the first name sharply
before closing the door behind him. He was going to take charge of the
deck. On the homeward trip, according to an old custom of the sea, the
chief officer takes the first night-watch--from eight till midnight.
So Mr. Baker, after he had heard the last "Yes, sir!" said moodily,
"Relieve the wheel and look-out"; and climbed with heavy feet the
poop ladder to windward. Soon after Mr. Creighton came down, whistling
softly, and went into the cabin. On the doorstep the steward lounged,
in slippers, meditative, and with his shirt-sleeves rolled up to the
armpits.
On the main deck the cook, locking up the galley doors, had an
altercation with young Charley about a pair of socks. He could be heard
saying impressively, in the darkness amidships: "You don't deserve a
kindness. I've been drying them for you, and now you complain about
the holes--and you swear, too! Right in front of me! If I hadn't been a
Christian--which you ain't, you young ruffian--I would give you a clout
on the head.... Go away!" Men in couples or threes stood pensive or
moved silently along the bulwarks in the waist. The first busy day of
a homeward passage was sinking into the dull peace of resumed routine.
Aft, on the high poop, Mr. Baker walked shuffling and grunted to himself
in the pauses of his thoughts. Forward, the look-out man, erect between
the flukes of the two anchors, hummed an endless tune, keeping his eyes
fixed dutifully ahead in a vacant stare. A multitude of stars coming out
into the clear night peopled the emptiness of the sky. They glittered,
as if alive above the sea; they surrounded the running ship on
all sides; more intense than the eyes of a staring crowd, and as
inscrutable as the souls of men.
The passage had begun, and the ship, a fragment detached from the earth,
went on lonely and swift like a small planet. Round her the abysses of
sky and sea met in an unattainable frontier. A great circular solitude
moved with her, ever changing and ever the same, always monotonous and
always imposing. Now and then another wandering white speck, burdened
with life, appeared far off--disappeared; intent on its own destiny.
The sun looked upon her all day, and every morning rose with a burning,
round stare of undying curiosity. She had her own future; she was alive
with the lives of those beings who trod her decks; like that earth which
had given her up to the sea, she had an intolerable load of regrets and
hopes. On her lived timid truth and audacious lies; and, like the earth,
she was unconscious, fair to see--and condemned by men to an ignoble
fate. The august loneliness of her path lent dignity to the sordid
inspiration of her pilgrimage. She drove foaming to the southward, as if
guided by the courage of a high endeavour. The smiling greatness of
the sea dwarfed the extent of time. The days raced after one another,
brilliant and quick like the flashes of a lighthouse, and the nights,
eventful and short, resembled fleeting dreams.
The men had shaken into their places, and the half-hourly voice of the
bells ruled their life of unceasing care. Night and day the head and
shoulders of a seaman could be seen aft by the wheel, outlined high
against sunshine or starlight, very steady above the stir of revolving
spokes. The faces changed, passing in rotation. Youthful faces, bearded
faces, dark faces: faces serene, or faces moody, but all akin with the
brotherhood of the sea; all with the same attentive expression of eyes,
carefully watching the compass or the sails. Captain Allistoun, serious,
and with an old red muffler round his throat, all day long pervaded the
poop. At night, many times he rose out of the darkness of the companion,
such as a phantom above a grave, and stood watchful and mute under the
stars, his night-shirt fluttering like a flag--then, without a sound,
sank down again. He was born on the shores of the Pentland Firth. In his
youth he attained the rank of harpooner in Peterhead whalers. When he
spoke of that time his restless grey eyes became still and cold, like
the loom of ice. Afterwards he went into the East Indian trade for the
sake of change. He had commanded the _Narcissus_ since she was built. He
loved his ship, and drove her unmercifully; for his secret ambition was
to make her accomplish some day a brilliantly quick passage which would
be mentioned in nautical papers. He pronounced his owner's name with a
sardonic smile, spoke but seldom to his officers, and reproved errors
in a gentle voice, with words that cut to the quick. His hair was
iron-grey, his face hard and of the colour of pump-leather. He shaved
every morning of his life--at six--but once (being caught in a fierce
hurricane eighty miles southwest of Mauritius) he had missed three
consecutive days. He feared naught but an unforgiving God, and wished to
end his days in a little house, with a plot of ground attached--far in
the country--out of sight of the sea.
He, the ruler of that minute world, seldom descended from the Olympian
heights of his poop. Below him--at his feet, so to speak--common mortals
led their busy and insignificant lives. Along the main deck, Mr. Baker
grunted in a manner bloodthirsty and innocuous; and kept all our noses
to the grindstone, being--as he once remarked--paid for doing that very
thing. The men working about the deck were healthy and contented--as
most seamen are, when once well out to sea. The true peace of God begins
at any spot a thousand miles from the nearest land; and when He sends
there the messengers of His might it is not in terrible wrath against
crime, presumption, and folly, but paternally, to chasten simple
hearts--ignorant hearts that know nothing of life, and beat undisturbed
by envy or greed.
In the evening the cleared decks had a reposeful aspect, resembling the
autumn of the earth. The sun was sinking to rest, wrapped in a mantle of
warm clouds. Forward, on the end of the spare spars, the boatswain
and the carpenter sat together with crossed arms; two men friendly,
powerful, and deep-chested. Beside them the short, dumpy sailmaker--who
had been in the Navy--related, between the whiffs of his pipe,
impossible stories about Admirals. Couples tramped backwards and
forwards, keeping step and balance without effort, in a confined space.
Pigs grunted in the big pigstye. Belfast, leaning thoughtfully on his
elbow, above the bars, communed with them through the silence of his
meditation. Fellows with shirts open wide on sunburnt breasts sat upon
the mooring bits, and all up the steps of the forecastle ladders. By the
foremast a few discussed in a circle the characteristics of a gentleman.
One said:--"It's money as does it." Another maintained:--"No, it's the
way they speak." Lame Knowles stumped up with an unwashed face (he had
the distinction of being the dirty man of the forecastle), and showing a
few yellow fangs in a shrewd smile, explained craftily that he "had
seen some of their pants." The backsides of them--he had observed--were
thinner than paper from constant sitting down in offices, yet otherwise
they looked first-rate and would last for years. It was all appearance.
"It was," he said, "bloomin' easy to be a gentleman when you had a clean
job for life." They disputed endlessly, obstinate and childish; they
repeated in shouts and with inflamed faces their amazing arguments;
while the soft breeze, eddying down the enormous cavity of the foresail,
distended above their bare heads, stirred the tumbled hair with a touch
passing and light like an indulgent caress.
They were forgetting their toil, they were forgetting themselves.
The cook approached to hear, and stood by, beaming with the inward
consciousness of his faith, like a conceited saint unable to forget his
glorious reward; Donkin, solitary and brooding over his wrongs on the
forecastle-head, moved closer to catch the drift of the discussion below
him; he turned his sallow face to the sea, and his thin nostrils moved,
sniffing the breeze, as he lounged negligently by the rail. In the
glow of sunset faces shone with interest, teeth flashed, eyes sparkled.
The walking couples stood still suddenly, with broad grins; a man,
bending over a wash-tub, sat up, entranced, with the soapsuds flecking
his wet arms. Even the three petty officers listened leaning back,
comfortably propped, and with superior smiles. Belfast left off
scratching the ear of his favourite pig, and, open mouthed, tried with
eager eyes to have his say. He lifted his arms, grimacing and baffled.
From a distance Charley screamed at the ring:--"I know about gentlemen
more'n any of you. I've been intermit with 'em.... I've blacked their
boots." The cook, craning his neck to hear better, was scandalised.
"Keep your mouth shut when your elders speak, you impudent young
heathen--you." "All right, old Hallelujah, I'm done," answered Charley,
soothingly. At some opinion of dirty Knowles, delivered with an air of
supernatural cunning, a ripple of laughter ran along, rose like a wave,
burst with a startling roar. They stamped with both feet; they turned
their shouting faces to the sky; many, spluttering, slapped their
thighs; while one or two, bent double, gasped, hugging themselves with
both arms like men in pain. The carpenter and the boatswain, without
changing their attitude, shook with laughter where they sat; the
sailmaker, charged with an anecdote about a Commodore, looked sulky; the
cook was wiping his eyes with a greasy rag; and lame Knowles, astonished
at his own success, stood in their midst showing a slow smile.
Suddenly the face of Donkin leaning high-shouldered over the after-rail
became grave. Something like a weak rattle was heard through the
forecastle door. It became a murmur; it ended in a sighing groan. The
washerman plunged both his arms into the tub abruptly; the cook became
more crestfallen than an exposed backslider; the boatswain moved his
shoulders uneasily; the carpenter got up with a spring and walked
away--while the sailmaker seemed mentally to give his story up, and
began to puff at his pipe with sombre determination. In the blackness of
the doorway a pair of eyes glimmered white, and big, and staring. Then
James Wait's head protruding, became visible, as if suspended between
the two hands that grasped a doorpost on each side of the face. The
tassel of his blue woollen nightcap, cocked forward, danced gaily
over his left eyelid. He stepped out in a tottering stride. He looked
powerful as ever, but showed a strange and affected unsteadiness in
his gait; his face was perhaps a trifle thinner, and his eyes appeared
rather startlingly prominent. He seemed to hasten the retreat of
departing light by his very presence; the setting sun dipped sharply,
as though fleeing before our nigger; a black mist emanated from him; a
subtle and dismal influence; a something cold and gloomy that floated
out and settled on all the faces like a mourning veil. The circle broke
up. The joy of laughter died on stiffened lips. There was not a smile
left among all the ship's company. Not a word was spoken. Many turned
their backs, trying to look unconcerned; others, with averted heads,
sent half-reluctant glances out of the corners of their eyes. They
resembled criminals conscious of misdeeds more than honest men
distracted by doubt; only two or three stared frankly, but stupidly,
with lips slightly open. All expected James Wait to say something, and,
at the same time, had the air of knowing beforehand what he would say.
He leaned his back against the doorpost, and with heavy eyes swept over
them a glance domineering and pained, like a sick tyrant overawing a
crowd of abject but untrustworthy slaves.
No one went away. They waited in fascinated dread. He said ironically,
with gasps between the words:--
"Thank you... chaps. You... are nice... and... quiet... you are! Yelling
so... before... the door...."
He made a longer pause, during which he worked his ribs in an
exaggerated labour of breathing. It was intolerable. Feet were shuffled.
Belfast let out a groan; but Donkin above blinked his red eyelids with
invisible eyelashes, and smiled bitterly over the nigger's head.
The nigger went on again with surprising ease. He gasped no more, and
his voice rang, hollow and loud, as though he had been talking in an
empty cavern. He was contemptuously angry.
"I tried to get a wink of sleep. You know I can't sleep o' nights.
And you come jabbering near the door here like a blooming lot of old
women.... You think yourselves good shipmates. Do you?... Much you care
for a dying man!"
Belfast spun away from the pigstye. "Jimmy," he cried tremulously, "if
you hadn't been sick I would------"
He stopped. The nigger waited awhile, then said, in a gloomy tone:--"You
would.... What? Go an' fight another such one as yourself. Leave
me alone. It won't be for long. I'll soon die.... It's coming right
enough!"
Men stood around very still and with exasperated eyes. It was just what
they had expected, and hated to hear, that idea of a stalking death,
thrust at them many times a day like a boast and like a menace by this
obnoxious nigger. He seemed to take a pride in that death which, so far,
had attended only upon the ease of his life; he was overbearing about
it, as if no one else in the world had ever been intimate with such
a companion; he paraded it unceasingly before us with an affectionate
persistence that made its presence indubitable, and at the same time
incredible. No man could be suspected of such monstrous friendship! Was
he a reality--or was he a sham--this ever-expected visitor of Jimmy's?
We hesitated between pity and mistrust, while, on the slightest
provocation, he shook before our eyes the bones of his bothersome and
infamous skeleton. He was for ever trotting him out. He would talk of
that coming death as though it had been already there, as if it had been
walking the deck outside, as if it would presently come in to sleep
in the only empty bunk; as if it had sat by his side at every meal.
It interfered daily with our occupations, with our leisure, with our
amusements. We had no songs and no music in the evening, because
Jimmy (we all lovingly called him Jimmy, to conceal our hate of his
accomplice) had managed, with that prospective decease of his, to
disturb even Archie's mental balance. Archie was the owner of the
concertina; but after a couple of stinging lectures from Jimmy he
refused to play any more. He said:--"Yon's an uncanny joker. I dinna ken
what's wrang wi' him, but there's something verra wrang, verra wrang.
It's nae manner of use asking me. I won't play." Our singers became mute
because Jimmy was a dying man. For the same reason no chap--as Knowles
remarked--could "drive in a nail to hang his few poor rags upon,"
without being made aware of the enormity he committed in disturbing
Jimmy's interminable last moments. At night, instead of the cheerful
yell, "One bell! Turn out! Do you hear there? Hey! hey! hey! Show leg!"
the watches were called man by man, in whispers, so as not to interfere
with Jimmy's, possibly, last slumber on earth. True, he was always
awake, and managed, as we sneaked out on deck, to plant in our backs
some cutting remark that, for the moment, made us feel as if we had
been brutes, and afterwards made us suspect ourselves of being fools. We
spoke in low tones within that fo'c'sle as though it had been a church.
We ate our meals in silence and dread, for Jimmy was capricious with his
food, and railed bitterly at the salt meat, at the biscuits, at the tea,
as at articles unfit for human consumption--"let alone for a dying man!"
He would say:--"Can't you find a better slice of meat for a sick man
who's trying to get home to be cured--or buried? But there! If I had a
chance, you fellows would do away with it. You would poison me. Look
at what you have given me!" We served him in his bed with rage and
humility, as though we had been the base courtiers of a hated prince;
and he rewarded us by his unconciliating criticism. He had found the
secret of keeping for ever on the run the fundamental imbecility of
mankind; he had the secret of life, that confounded dying man, and he
made himself master of every moment of our existence. We grew desperate,
and remained submissive. Emotional little Belfast was for ever on the
verge of assault or on the verge of tears. One evening he confided to
Archie:--"For a ha'penny I would knock his ugly black head off--the
skulking dodger!" And the straightforward Archie pretended to be
shocked! Such was the infernal spell which that casual St. Kitt's nigger
had cast upon our guileless manhood! But the same night Belfast stole
from the galley the officers' Sunday fruit pie, to tempt the fastidious
appetite of Jimmy. He endangered not only his long friendship with
the cook but also--as it appeared--his eternal welfare. The cook was
overwhelmed with grief; he did not know the culprit but he knew that
wickedness flourished; he knew that Satan was abroad amongst those men,
whom he looked upon as in some way under his spiritual care. Whenever he
saw three or four of us standing together he would leave his stove, to
run out and preach. We fled from him; and only Charley (who knew the
thief) affronted the cook with a candid gaze which irritated the good
man. "It's you, I believe," he groaned, sorrowful and with a patch of
soot on his chin. "It's you. You are a brand for the burning! No more of
your socks in my galley." Soon, unofficially, the information was spread
about that, should there be another case of stealing, our marmalade
(an extra allowance: half a pound per man) would be stopped. Mr.
Baker ceased to heap jocular abuse upon his favourites, and grunted
suspiciously at all. The captain's cold eyes, high up on the poop,
glittered mistrustful, as he surveyed us trooping in a small mob from
halyards to braces for the usual evening pull at all the ropes. Such
stealing in a merchant ship is difficult to check, and may be taken as
a declaration by men of their dislike for their officers. It is a bad
symptom. It may end in God knows what trouble. The _Narcissus_ was
still a peaceful ship, but mutual confidence was shaken. Donkin did not
conceal his delight. We were dismayed.
Then illogical Belfast reproached our nigger with great fury. James
Wait, with his elbow on the pillow, choked, gasped out:--"Did I ask
you to bone the dratted thing? Blow your blamed pie. It has made me
worse--you little Irish lunatic, you!" Belfast, with scarlet face and
trembling lips, made a dash at him. Every man in the forecastle rose
with a shout. There was a moment of wild tumult. Some one shrieked
piercingly:--"Easy, Belfast! Easy!..." We expected Belfast to strangle
Wait without more ado. Dust flew. We heard through it the nigger's
cough, metallic and explosive like a gong. Next moment we saw Belfast
hanging over him. He was saying plaintively:--"Don't! Don't, Jimmy!
Don't be like that. An angel couldn't put up with ye--sick as ye are."
He looked round at us from Jimmy's bedside, his comical mouth twitching,
and through tearful eyes; then he tried to put straight the disarranged
blankets. The unceasing whisper of the sea filled the forecastle. Was
James Wait frightened, or touched, or repentant? He lay on his back with
a hand to his side, and as motionless as if his expected visitor
had come at last. Belfast fumbled about his feet, repeating with
emotion:--"Yes. We know. Ye are bad, but.... Just say what ye want done,
and.... We all know ye are bad--very bad...." No! Decidedly James Wait
was not touched or repentant. Truth to say, he seemed rather startled.
He sat up with incredible suddenness and ease. "Ah! You think I am bad,
do you?" he said gloomily, in his clearest baritone voice (to hear him
speak sometimes you would never think there was anything wrong with that
man). "Do you?... Well, act according! Some of you haven't sense enough
to put a blanket shipshape over a sick man. There! Leave it alone! I
can die anyhow!" Belfast turned away limply with a gesture of
discouragement. In the silence of the forecastle, full of interested
men, Donkin pronounced distinctly:--"Well, I'm blowed!" and sniggered.
Wait looked at him. He looked at him in a quite friendly manner. Nobody
could tell what would please our incomprehensible invalid: but for us
the scorn of that snigger was hard to bear.
Donkin's position in the forecastle was distinguished but unsafe. He
stood on the bad eminence of a general dislike. He was left alone; and
in his isolation he could do nothing but think of the gales of the
Cape of Good Hope and envy us the possession of warm clothing and
waterproofs. Our sea-boots, our oilskin coats, our well-filled
sea-chests, were to him so many causes for bitter meditation: he had
none of those things, and he felt instinctively that no man, when
the need arose, would offer to share them with him. He was impudently
cringing to us and systematically insolent to the officers. He
anticipated the best results, for himself, from such a line of
conduct--and was mistaken. Such natures forget that under extreme
provocation men will be just--whether they want to be so or not.
Donkin's insolence to long-suffering Mr. Baker became at last
intolerable to us, and we rejoiced when the mate, one dark night,
tamed him for good.
It was done neatly, with great decency and decorum, and with little
noise. We had been called--just before midnight--to trim the yards, and
Donkin--as usual--made insulting remarks. We stood sleepily in a row
with the forebrace in our hands waiting for the next order, and heard in
the darkness a scuffly trampling of feet, an exclamation of surprise,
sounds of cuffs and slaps, suppressed, hissing whispers:--"Ah! Will
you!"... "Don't!... Don't!"... "Then behave."... "Oh! Oh!..." Afterwards
there were soft thuds mixed with the rattle of iron things as if a man's
body had been tumbling helplessly amongst the main-pump rods. Before we
could realise the situation, Mr. Baker's voice was heard very near and a
little impatient:--"Haul away, men! Lay back on that rope!" And we did
lay back on the rope with great alacrity. As if nothing had happened,
the chief mate went on trimming the yards with his usual and
exasperating fastidiousness. We didn't at the time see anything of
Donkin, and did not care. Had the chief officer thrown him overboard, no
man would have said as much as "Hallo! he's gone!" But, in truth, no
great harm was done--even if Donkin did lose one of his front teeth. We
perceived this in the morning, and preserved a ceremonious silence: the
etiquette of the forecastle commanded us to be blind and dumb in such a
case, and we cherished the decencies of our life more than ordinary
landsmen respect theirs. Charley, with unpardonable want of _savoir
vivre_, yelled out:--"'Ave you been to your dentyst?... Hurt ye, didn't
it?" He got a box on the ear from one of his best friends. The boy was
surprised, and remained plunged in grief for at least three hours. We
were sorry for him, but youth requires even more discipline than age.
Donkin grinned venomously. From that day he became pitiless; told Jimmy
that he was a "black fraud"; hinted to us that we were an imbecile lot,
daily taken in by a vulgar nigger. And Jimmy seemed to like the fellow!
Singleton lived untouched by human emotions. Taciturn and unsmiling, he
breathed amongst us--in that alone resembling the rest of the crowd.
We were trying to be decent chaps, and found it jolly difficult; we
oscillated between the desire of virtue and the fear of ridicule; we
wished to save ourselves from the pain of remorse, but did not want
to be made the contemptible dupes of our sentiment. Jimmy's hateful
accomplice seemed to have blown with his impure breath undreamt of
subtleties into our hearts. We were disturbed and cowardly. That we
knew. Singleton seemed to know nothing, understand nothing. We had
thought him till then as wise as he looked, but now we dared, at times,
suspect him of being stupid--from old age. One day, however, at dinner,
as we sat on our boxes round a tin dish that stood on the deck within
the circle of our feet, Jimmy expressed his general disgust with men and
things in words that were particularly disgusting. Singleton lifted his
head. We became mute. The old man, addressing Jimmy, asked:--"Are you
dying?" Thus interrogated, James Wait appeared horribly startled and
confused. We all were startled. Mouths remained open; hearts thumped,
eyes blinked; a dropped tin fork rattled in the dish; a man rose as if
to go out, and stood still. In less than a minute Jimmy pulled himself
together:--"Why? Can't you see I am?" he answered shakily. Singleton
lifted a piece of soaked biscuit ("his teeth"--he declared--"had no edge
on them now") to his lips.--"Well, get on with your dying," he said with
venerable mildness; "don't raise a blamed fuss with us over that job.
We can't help you." Jimmy fell back in his bunk, and for a long time lay
very still wiping the perspiration off his chin. The dinner-tins were
put away quickly. On deck we discussed the incident in whispers. Some
showed a chuckling exultation. Many looked grave. Wamibo, after long
periods of staring dreaminess, attempted abortive smiles; and one of
the young Scandinavians, much tormented by doubt, ventured in the second
dog-watch to approach Singleton (the old man did not encourage us much
to speak to him) and ask sheepishly:--"You think he will die?" Singleton
looked up.--"Why, of course he will die," he said deliberately. This
seemed decisive. It was promptly imparted to every one by him who had
consulted the oracle. Shy and eager, he would step up and with averted
gaze recite his formula:--"Old Singleton says he will die." It was a
relief! At last we knew that our compassion would not be misplaced, and
we could again smile without misgivings--but we reckoned without Donkin.
Donkin "didn't want to 'ave no truck with 'em dirty furriners." When
Nilsen came to him with the news: "Singleton says he will die," he
answered him by a spiteful "And so will you--you fat-headed Dutchman.
Wish you Dutchmen were all dead--'stead comin' takin' our money inter
your starvin' country." We were appalled. We perceived that after all
Singleton's answer meant nothing. We began to hate him for making fun
of us. All our certitudes were going; we were on doubtful terms with
our officers; the cook had given us up for lost; we had overheard the
boatswain's opinion that "we were a crowd of softies." We suspected
Jimmy, one another, and even our very selves. We did not know what
to do. At every insignificant turn of our humble life we met Jimmy
overbearing and blocking the way, arm-in-arm with his awful and veiled
familiar. It was a weird servitude.
It began a week after leaving Bombay and came on us stealthily like any
other great misfortune. Every one had remarked that Jimmy from the first
was very slack at his work; but we thought it simply the outcome of his
philosophy of life. Donkin said:--"You put no more weight on a rope
than a bloody sparrer." He disdained him. Belfast, ready for a fight,
exclaimed provokingly:--"You don't kill yourself, old man!"--"Would
you?" he retorted with extreme, scorn--and Belfast retired. One morning,
as we were washing decks, Mr. Baker called to him:--"Bring your broom
over here, Wait." He strolled languidly.
"Move yourself! Ough!" grunted Mr. Baker; "what's the matter with your
hind legs?" He stopped dead short. He gazed slowly with eyes that bulged
out with an expression audacious and sad.--"It isn't my legs," he said,
"it's my lungs." Everybody listened.--"What's... Ough!... What's wrong
with them?" inquired Mr. Baker. All the watch stood around on the wet
deck, grinning, and with brooms or buckets in their hands. He said
mournfully:--"Going--or gone. Can't you see I'm a dying man? I know
it!" Mr. Baker was disgusted.--"Then why the devil did you ship aboard
here?"--"I must live till I die--mustn't I?" he replied. The grins
became audible.--"Go off my deck--get out of my sight," said Mr. Baker.
He was nonplussed. It was a unique experience. James Wait, obedient,
dropped his broom, and walked slowly forward. A burst of laughter
followed him. It was too funny. All hands laughed.... They laughed!...
Alas!
He became the tormentor of all our moments; he ''was worse than a
nightmare. You couldn't see that there was anything wrong with him: a
nigger does not show. He was not very fat--certainly--but then he was no
leaner than other niggers we had known. He coughed often, but the most
prejudiced person could perceive that, mostly, he coughed when it suited
his purpose. He wouldn't, or couldn't, do his work--and he wouldn't
lie-up. One day he would skip aloft with the best of them, and next time
we would be obliged to risk our lives to get his limp body down. He
was reported, he was examined; he was remonstrated with, threatened,
cajoled, lectured. He was called into the cabin to interview the
captain. There were wild rumours. It was said he had cheeked the old
man; it was said he had frightened him. Charley maintained that the
"skipper, weepin,' 'as giv' 'im 'is blessin' an' a pot of jam." Knowles
had it from the steward that the unspeakable Jimmy had been reeling
against the cabin furniture; that he had groaned; that he had complained
of general brutality and disbelief; and had ended by coughing all over
the old man's meteorological journals which were then spread on the
table. At any rate, Wait returned forward supported by the steward, who,
in a pained and shocked voice, entreated us:--"Here! Catch hold of him,
one of you. He is to lie-up." Jimmy drank a tin mugful of coffee, and,
after bullying first one and then another, went to bed. He remained
there most of the time, but when it suited him would come on deck and
appear amongst us. He was scornful and brooding; he looked ahead upon
the sea, and no one could tell what was the meaning of that black man
sitting apart in a meditative attitude and as motionless as a carving.
He refused steadily all medicine; he threw sago and cornflour overboard
till the steward got tired of bringing it to him. He asked for
paregoric. They sent him a big bottle; enough to poison a wilderness
of babies. He kept it between his mattress and the deal lining of the
ship's side; and nobody ever saw him take a dose. Donkin abused him to
his face, jeered at him while he gasped; and the same day Wait would
lend him a warm jersey. Once Donkin reviled him for half an hour;
reproached him with the extra work his malingering gave to the watch;
and ended by calling him "a black-faced swine." Under the spell of our
accursed perversity we were horror-struck. But Jimmy positively seemed
to revel in that abuse. It made him look cheerful--and Donkin had a pair
of old sea boots thrown at him. "Here, you East-end trash," boomed Wait,
"you may have that."
At last Mr. Baker had to tell the captain that James Wait was disturbing
the peace of the ship. "Knock discipline on the head--he will, Ough,"
grunted Mr. Baker. As a matter of fact, the starboard watch came as near
as possible to refusing duty, when ordered one morning by the boatswain
to wash out their forecastle. It appears Jimmy objected to a wet
floor--and that morning we were in a compassionate mood. We thought
the boatswain a brute, and, practically, told him so. Only Mr. Baker's
delicate tact prevented an all-fired row: he refused to take us
seriously. He came bustling forward, and called us many unpolite names
but in such a hearty and seamanlike manner that we began to feel ashamed
of ourselves. In truth, we thought him much too good a sailor to annoy
him willingly: and after all Jimmy might have been a fraud--probably
was! The forecastle got a clean up that morning; but in the afternoon
a sick-bay was fitted up in the deck-house. It was a nice little
cabin opening on deck, and with two berths. Jimmy's belongings were
transported there, and then--notwithstanding his protests--Jimmy
himself. He said he couldn't walk. Four men carried him on a blanket. He
complained that he would have to die there alone, like a dog. We grieved
for him, and were delighted to have him removed from the forecastle. We
attended him as before. The galley was next door, and the cook looked in
many times a day. Wait became a little more cheerful. Knowles affirmed
having heard him laugh to himself in peals one day. Others had seen him
walking about on deck at night. His little place, with the door ajar
on a long hook, was always full of tobacco smoke. We spoke through the
crack cheerfully, sometimes abusively, as we passed by, intent on our
work. He fascinated us. He would never let doubt die. He overshadowed
the ship. Invulnerable in his promise of speedy corruption he trampled
on our self-respect, he demonstrated to us daily our want of moral
courage; he tainted our lives. Had we been a miserable gang of wretched
immortals, unhallowed alike by hope and fear, he could not have lorded
it over us with a more pitiless assertion of his sublime privilege.