"Where Angels Fear to Tread" and Other Stories of the Sea Part 11

They obeyed him as they could, and in a few hours more there was less fury in the blast and a slight rise in the barometer.

"I was right," said the captain. "The center will pa.s.s us now. We're out of its way."

They brought the brig around amid a cras.h.i.+ng of seas over the port rail, and stowing the staysail, pinned her again on the port tack with the tarpaulin. But a few hours of it brought an increase of wind and a fall of the barometer.

"What in d--nation does it mean, Angel?" cried the captain, desperately. "By all laws of storms we ought to drift away from the center."

The mate could not tell; but a voice out of the night, barely distinguishable above the shrieking wind, answered him.

"You--all-fired--fool--don't--you--know--any--more--than--to--heave--to --in--the--Gulf--Stream?"

Then there was the faintest disturbance in the sounds of the sea, indicating the rus.h.i.+ng by of a large craft.

"What!" roared Swarth. "The Gulf Stream? I've lost my reckoning. Where am I? s.h.i.+p ahoy! Where am I?"

There was no answer, and he stumbled down to the main-deck among his men, followed by the mate.

"Draw a bucket of water, one of you," he ordered.

This was done, and he immersed his hand. The water was warm.

"Gulf-Stream," he yelled frantically, "Gulf Stream--how in h----l did we get up here? We ought to be down near St. Helena. Angel, come here.

Let's think. We sailed by the wind on the southeast trade for--no, we didn't. It was the northeast trade. We caught the northeast trade, and we've circled all over the Western Ocean."

"You're a bully full-rigged navigator, you are," came the sneering, rasping voice of Tom Plate from the crowd. "Why didn't you drop your hook at Barbados, and give us a chance for our eyes?"

The captain lunged toward him on the reeling deck; but Tom moved on.

"Your time is coming, Tom Plate," he shouted insanely; then he climbed to the p.o.o.p, and when he had studied the situation awhile, called his bewildered mate up to him.

"We were blown out of the north entrance o' the bay, Angel, instead of the south, as we thought. I was fooled by the soundings. At this time o' the year Barbados is about on the thermal equator--half-way between the trades. This is a West India cyclone, and we're somewhere around Hatteras. No wonder the port tack drifted us into the center. Storms revolve against the sun north o' the line, and with the sun south of it. Oh, I'm the two ends and the bight of a d--d fool! Wear s.h.i.+p!" he added in a thundering roar.

They put the brig on the starboard tack, and took hourly soundings with the deep-sea lead. As they hauled it in for the fourth time, the men called that the water was cold; and on the next sounding the lead reached bottom at ninety fathoms.

"We're inside the Stream and the hundred-fathom curve, Angel. The barometer's rising now. The storm-center's leaving us, and we're drifting ash.o.r.e," said the captain. "I know pretty well where I am.

These storms follow an invariable track, and I judge the center is to the east of us, moving north. That's why we didn't run into it when we thought we were dodging it. We'll square away with the wind on the starboard quarter now, and if we pick up the Stream and the gla.s.s don't rise, I'll be satisfied to turn in. I'm about f.a.gged out."

"It's too much for me, Bill," answered Mr. Todd, wearily. "I can navigate; but this ain't navigation. This is blindman's-buff."

But he set the head-sail for his captain, and again the brig fled before the wind. Only once did they round to for soundings, and this time found no bottom; so they squared away, and when, a few hours later, the seas came aboard warm, Swarth was confident enough of his position to allow his mind to dwell on pettier details of his business.

It was nearly breakfast-time now, and the men would soon be eating.

With his pistols in his coat pockets he stationed himself beside the scuttle of the fore-hatch,--the entrance to the forecastle,--and waited long and patiently, listening to occasional comments on his folly and bad seamans.h.i.+p which ascended from below, until the harsh voice of Tom Plate on the stairs indicated his coming up. He reached toward Tom with one hand, holding a c.o.c.ked pistol with the other; but Tom slid easily out of his wavering grasp and fled along the deck. He followed his footsteps until he lost them, and picked up instead the angry plaint of the negro cook in the galley amids.h.i.+ps.

"I do' know who you are, but you want to git right out o' my galley, now. You heah me? I'se had enough o' dis comin' inter my galley. Gwan, now! Is you de man dat's all time stealin' my coffee? I'll gib you coffee, you tras.h.!.+ Take dat!"

Captain Swarth reached the galley door in time to receive on the left side of his face a generous share of a pot of scalding coffee. It brought an involuntary shriek of agony from him; then he clung to the galley-las.h.i.+ngs and spoke his mind. Still in torment, he felt his way through the galley; but the cook and the intruder had escaped by the other door and made no sound.

All that day and the night following he chose to lie in his darkened state-room, with his face bandaged in oily cloths, while Yank Tate stood his watch. In the morning he removed the bandages and took in the sight of his state-room fittings: the bulkhead, his desk, chronometer, cutla.s.s, and clothing hanging on the hooks. It was a joyous sight, and he shouted in gladness. He could not see with his right eye and but dimly with his left, but a scrutiny of his face in a mirror disclosed deep lines that had not been there, distorted eyelids, and the left side where the coffee had scalded puffed to a large, angry blister. He tied up his face, leaving his left eye free, and went on deck.

The wind had moderated, but on all sides was a wild gray waste of heaving, white-crested combers, before which the brig was still scudding under the staysail. Three miles off on the port bow was a large, square-bowed, square-yarded s.h.i.+p, hove to and heading away from them, which might be a frigate or a subsidized Englishman with painted ports; but in either case she could not be investigated now. He looked at the compa.s.s. The brig was heading about southeast, and his judgment was confirmed. Two haggard-faced men with bandaged eyes were grinding the wheel to starboard and port, and keeping the brig's yaws within two points each way--good work for blind men. Angel Todd stood near, his chin resting in his hand and his elbow on the companionway. Forward the watch sat about in coils of rope and sheltered nooks or walked the deck unsteadily, and a glance aloft showed the captain his rigging hanging in bights and yards pointed every way. She was unkempt as a wreck. The same glance apprised him of an English ensign, union down, tattered and frayed to half its size, at the end of the standing spanker-gaff, with the halyards made fast high on the royal-backstay, above the reach of bungling blind fingers. Tom Plate was coming aft with none of the hesitancy of the blind, and squinting aloft at the damaged distress-signal. He secured another ensign--American--from the flag-locker in the b.o.o.by-hatch, mounted the rail, and hoisted it, union down, in place of the other. Then he dropped to the deck and looked into the glaring left eye and pepper-box pistol of Captain Swarth, who had descended on him.

"Hands up, Tom Plate, over your head--quick, or I'll blow your brains out!"

White in the face and open-mouthed, Tom obeyed.

"Mr. Todd," called the captain, "come down here--port main-rigging."

The mate came quickly, as he always did when he heard the prefix to his name. It was used only in emergencies.

"What soundings did you get at the lead when we were blowing out?"

asked the captain. "What water did you have when you sang out 'a quarter six' and 'a quarter less six'?"

"N-n-one, capt'n. There warn't any bottom. I jess wanted to get you to drop the other anchor and hold her off the reef."

"Got him tight, cappen?" asked the mate. "Shall I help you hold 'im?"

"I've got my sight back. I've got Tom Plate under my gun. How long have you been flying signals of distress, Tom Plate?"

"Ever since I could see, capt'n," answered the trembling sailor.

"How long is that?"

"Second day out, sir."

"What's your idea in keeping still about it? What could you gain by being taken aboard a man-of-war?"

"I didn't want to have all the work piled on me jess 'cause I could see, capt'n. I never thought anybody could ever see again. I slept partly under No. 2 gun that night, and didn't get it so bad."

"You sneaked into my room, got my keys, and raided the treasure-chests.

You know what the rules say about that? Death without trial."

"No, I didn't, capt'n; I didn't."

"Search him, Mr. Todd."

The search brought to light a tobacco-pouch in which were about fifty unset diamonds and a few well-jeweled solid-gold ornaments, which the captain pocketed.

"Not much of a haul, considering what you left behind," he said calmly.

"I suppose you only took what you could safely hide and swim with."

"I only took my share, sir; I did no harm; I didn't want to be driftin'

round wi' blind men. How'd I know anybody could ever see any more?"

"Sad mistake, Tom. All we wanted, it seems, was a good scalding with hot coffee." He mused a few moments, then continued: "There must be some medical virtue in hot coffee which the doctors haven't learned, and--well--Tom, you've earned your finish."

"You won't do it, capt'n; you can't do it. The men won't have it; they're with me," stuttered the man.

"Possibly they are. I heard you all growling down the hatch yesterday morning. You're a pack of small-minded curs. I'll get another crew. Mr.