The Seiners Part 19

XXVIII

IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN

We left Clancy's boarding house and went over to old Mrs. Arkell's place, where most of the skippers who were going to race next day had gathered. Clancy at once started in to mix milk-punches. And he sang his latest favorite, with the gang supping his mixture between the stanzas:

"Oh, hove flat down on Quero Banks Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks, And the way she was a-settlin' was an awful sight to see"--

Then Wesley Marrs sang a song and after him Patsie Oddie followed with a roarer.

The punch-mixing, singing and story-telling went on and in the middle of it Tom O'Donnell came driving in. He was like a whiff of a no'the-easter out to sea. "Whoo!" he said. "Hulloh, Wesley-boy--and Patsie Oddie--and Tommie Ohlsen--and, by my soul, Tommie Clancy again.

Lord, what a night to come beating down from Boston! What's that, Wesley?--did the Colleen outfoot the cutter down the Cape sh.o.r.e way?

Indeed and she did, and could do it over again in the same breeze to half their logy old battles.h.i.+ps. Into Boston I was Monday morning, and the fish out of her the same morning. Tuesday I took her across to Cape Cod, tuning her up, and into Provincetown that night. Next day it was blowing pretty hard. A fine day for a run across the Bay, I thinks, and waits for maybe a Boston vessel, one of the T Wharf fleet.

For I'll go to Boston, I thinks, to put the Colleen on the railway to-day, because maybe in Gloucester I may have to wait--or may get no chance at all--with half a dozen or more that will be waiting to be scrubbed for the race. And who comes along then but Tom Lowrie.

'Waiting for me?' he asks, and I tells him I was hoping it would be the new Whalen vessel. 'Here's one that's as good as any Whalen vessel,' he says--'as good as anything out of Boston--or Gloucester,'

he says. So across the Bay we had it out. And, gentlemen, I'm telling you the Colleen sailed--all the wind she wanted. She came along, and Lowrie--by the looks of things then--he's sailing yet. Well, I never did like that forem'st that was in the Colleen, and so, thinks I, here's a chance to test it--and why not, with the race coming on? So I jibed her over off Minot's just--and sure enough it cracked about ten feet below the mast-head."

"You were satisfied then, Tom?"

"Sure and I was. And better before the race than in the race. And next day--that's to-day--we spent putting in a new stick. I had to take what I could get to save time, and I don't think it's what it ought to be and maybe it won't last through to-morrow. But, anyway, you want to have an eye out for the Colleen to-morrow, for I'm telling you I never see her sail like she did yesterday coming across the Bay. Ask Tom Lowrie next time you see him. Well, to-night I had to beat down here to be sure and be here in time, and so out we put--and here I am.

Blowing? Indeed and it is. And thick, is it? Standing on her knight-heads and looking aft you c'd no more than make out her side-lights. We came along, and Boston inner and outer harbor crowded with vessels, steamers and sail, waiting for it to moderate so they c'd put out. A blessed wonder it was we didn't sink somebody--or ourselves. Outside we went along by smell, I think, for only every once in awhile could we see a light. One time we almost ran into something--a fisherman it must have been, for I s'pose only a fisherman would be going in on a night like this--out of a squall of snow and blackness she came--man alive! but, whoever she was, she was coming a great clip. Winged out and we didn't see her till the end of her bowsprit caught the end of our main-boom--hauled in we were to two blocks--and over we went on the other tack--yes, sir, over on the other tack. Thinks I, ''Tis a new way to jibe a vessel over.' And the end of her fore-boom all but swept me from beside the wheel and over the rail as she went by--she was that close. And I sings out to her, 'Won't you leave us your name so I can thank you next time we meet?'

but Lord, not a word out of him. He kept on to Boston, I suppose, and we kept on to Gloucester, and here I am."

"And the Colleen, Tom--she's all right?"

"Right, man? Watch her to-morrow. Barring that forem'st being too light--but whoever looked for a breeze like this?--two days and three nights now and blowing harder all the time. But never mind, she'll make great going of it to-morrow. Divil take it, but we'll all make great going of it. Tommie, dear, what's in the bowl? Milk? Man, but don't be telling me things like that--and the one thing the doctors warn me against is heart-trouble. Ah, milk-punch--that's better, man.

A wee droppeen. Look at it--the color of the tip of a comber in twelve fathom of water and a cross-tide. Well, here's to every mother's son of us that's going to race to-morrow. May ye all win if the Colleen don't--all but you, Sam Hollis. But where's he gone--into the other room? Well, if he was here 'twould be the same. He's got a vessel that can sail. Let him sail her to-morrow and win, if it's in her--or in him. But a thousand dollars--and outside my house and vessel, Lord knows, it's all the money I've got in the world--beyond my house and vessel--a thousand dollars the Colleen beats the Withrow. h.e.l.lo, there--what d'y'say, Sam Hollis--the Colleen and the Withrow--a thousand dollars, boat for boat. But where the divil is he? Gone? Are you sure? Gone! But a queer time to leave a party--just when it's getting to be real sociable."

"Never mind the betting now, Tom," spoke up Wesley Marrs. "Let the owners have that to themselves. And according to accounts some of them are having it. Fred Withrow and old Duncan are ready to go broke over the race to-morrow. Whichever loses, he'll remember this race, I'm thinking. Here's hoping it won't be Duncan. So to the devil with the betting, Tom. Some of us have bet all we could afford--some of us more than we could afford, I callate. Let's have a song instead, Tom."

"Anything to please you, Wesley," and O'Donnell began to sing. He started off first with his

"Oh, seiners all and trawlers all,"

but Alec McNeill and Patsie Oddie interrupted. "Oh, give us the other one, Tom--the Newf'undland and Cape Sh.o.r.e Men."

"Ha!" laughed O'Donnell, "it's the mention of your own you want--you and Patsie there. Well, it's all one to me. Any man from any place, so long as he's a fair man and a brave man, and Lord knows ye're both that. Well, here's to you both--a wee drop just, Tommie--easy--easy,"

and he began:

"Oh, Newf'undland and Cape Sh.o.r.e men, and men of Gloucester town, With ye I've trawled o'er many banks and sailed the compa.s.s roun'; I've ate with ye, and bunked with ye, and watched with ye all three, And better s.h.i.+pmates than ye were I never hope to see.

I've seen ye in the wild typhoon beneath a Southern sky, I've seen ye when the Northern gales drove seas to mast-head high, But summer breeze or winter blow, from Hatt'ras to Cape Race, I've yet to see ye with the sign of fear upon your face.

Oh, swingin' cross the Bay Go eighty sail of seiners, And every blessed one of them a-driving to her rail!

There's a gale upon the waters and there's foam upon the sea, And looking out the window is a dark-eyed girl for me, And driving her for Gloucester, maybe we don't know What the little ones are thinking when the mother looks out so.

Oh, the children in the cradle and the wife's eyes out to sea, The husband at the helm and looking westerly-- When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's blood foam?

Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home.

West half no'the and drive her, we're abreast now of Cape Sable, It's an everlasting hurricane, but here's the craft that's able-- When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's blood foam?

Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home.

Oh, the roar of shoaling waters and the awful, awful sea, Busted shrouds and parting cables, and the white death on our lee; Oh, the black, black night on Georges when eight score men were lost-- Were ye there, ye men of Gloucester? Aye, ye were--and tossed Like chips upon the water were your little craft that night, Driving, swearing, calling out, but ne'er a call of fright.

So knowing ye for what ye are, ye masters of the sea, Here's to ye, Gloucester fishermen, a health to ye from me.

And here's to it that once again We'll trawl and seine and race again; Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!'

We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,'

And all together let us go beneath the ocean's roar."

I never again expect to hear a sea song sung as Tom O'Donnell sang it then, his beard still wet with the spray and his eyes glowing like coal-fire. And the voice of him! He must have been heard in half of Gloucester that night. He made the table quiver. And when they all rose with gla.s.ses raised and sang the last lines again:

"And here's to it that once again We'll trawl and seine and race again; Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!'

We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,'

And all together we shall go beneath the ocean's roar----"

any stranger hearing and seeing might have understood why it was that their crews were ready to follow these men to death.

"The like of you, Tom O'Donnell, never sailed the sea," said Patsie Oddie when they had got the last ro-o-ar--"even the young ladies come in off the street to hear you better."

He meant Minnie Arkell, who was standing in the doorway with her eyes fixed on O'Donnell, who had got up to go home, but with Wesley trying to hold him back. He was to the door when Minnie Arkell stopped him.

She said she had heard him singing over to her house and couldn't keep away, and then, with a smile and a look into his eyes, she asked O'Donnell what was his hurry--and didn't he remember her?

In her suit of yachting blue, with glowing face and tumbled hair, she was a picture. "Look at her," nudged Clancy--"isn't she a corker? But she's wasting time on Tom O'Donnell."

"What's your hurry, Tom?" called Wesley. "Another song."

"No, no, it's the little woman on the hill. She knew I was to come down to-night and not a wink of sleep will she get till I'm home. And she knows there'll be bad work to-morrow maybe and she'd like to see me a little before I go, and I'd like to see her, too."

"She's a lucky woman, Captain O'Donnell, and you must think a lot of her?" Minnie Arkell had caught his eye once more.

"I don't know that she's so awfully lucky with me on her hands,"

laughed O'Donnell, "but I do think a lot of her, child."

"Child? to me? But you don't remember me, Captain?"

"Indeed, and I do, and well remember you. And it's the beautiful woman you've grown to be. But you always were a lovely child. It's often my wife spoke of you and wondered how you were. She's heard me speak of your father a hundred times, I know. A brave man your father, girl.

And she'll be glad to see you any time, little girl--or the daughter of any fisherman lost at sea. If ever you have a blue day, go to her, for 'tis she has the heart--and, G.o.d bless her, an extra weakness for orphans. Her own children some day--there's no telling. But good-night to you, dear"--he patted her head--"good-night all. Wesley, Tommie, Patsie--all of ye, good-night. In the morning we'll have it out." Out the door he went, and I fancied there was almost a blush on Minnie Arkell's face.

Tom O'Donnell was the kind of a man a fellow would like to have for a father.

XXIX

MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME

From Mrs. Arkell's we walked back to Clancy's boarding house. Clancy wanted to see how they made out with the punch. We found several of them up in the wind, and so no great danger of them. But two or three of them, Dave Campbell particularly, were running wild. "Boomed out and driving," said Clancy, and began to remonstrate with Dave on the evils of intemperance. He went on quite awhile, but Dave showed no signs of remorse. "Wait and I'll fix him," said Clancy, and obeying a motioning with his head two or three of the sober ones followed him out.