Carfew and the 'Mary Q'

by Edgar Wallace

By EDGAR WALLACE

Author of "Sanders of the River," "Private Selby" "The Council of Justice," "Grey Timothy," "The People of the River," etc.

WHAT kindness of heart was concealed behind the seemingly unsympathetic exterior of Mr. Gustav Bahl nobody knows.

Carfew certainly does not.

I say "was concealed," having caught the habit from Carfew, who always speaks of Mr. Bahl as if he were dead.

When Carfew talks of his whilom enemy, it is in that tone of good-natured contempt which one reserves for the foolish people who die in their prime as a result of matching their wits against yours.

Thus he would say that this or that was "enough to make poor old Bahl turn in his grave," or "when old Bahl was alive"—an attitude of mind offensive to Bahl, who very properly hates and loathes Carfew, and would, but for the disgusting restrictions which the law imposes, do him grievous bodily harm.

Gustav Bahl, as all the world knows, is an exceedingly wealthy man. He is a director of an Assurance Company, chairman of the Grey Funnel West Coast Line, and sole stockholder of the South Atlantic Steam Packet Company, Limited.

He is a short man, in stature and speech, and he is oppressed with the fretful fear that all the money in the world which is not circulated viâ Bahl is being misapplied.

Carfew met Mr. Bahl at the dinner of the Mariners' Benevolent Fund. Our friend received an invitation in the form of a letter, written and signed by Mr. Bahl himself, and the letter was accompanied by a ticket.

Too late—it was when he was sitting down to dinner—he discovered that the letter was a lithographed one, artfully circulated amongst the moneyed classes, and that so far from the ticket being gratuitously bestowed, some five guineas were extracted from the too-confident diner who had been lured to the function.

The suave secretary, who made the round of the diners during the meal, had a little difficulty in extracting a subscription from Carfew. Had the unwilling guest—for unwilling he was at the price—tumbled to the swindle a little earlier, he would have been seized with a timely illness which necessitated a hasty withdrawal; but the ghastly realisation of the plot only came to him when he had finished the second course, and had consequently incurred some thirty shillings' worth of liability.

"It is for a good cause," soothed the secretary.

"I already subscribe to a mariners' benevolent fund," protested Carfew, remembering the money he dropped into the collecting boxes on Lifeboat Saturday.

"It is for a good cause," said the secretary monotonously.

"I haven't a cheque with me," said Carfew hopefully.

The secretary, with diabolical ingenuity, produced an assortment of blank cheques.

"It is rather an act of brigandage," the unhappy donor said, as he signed the cheque with a savage flourish.

"It's for a good cause," said the secretary.

Mr. Bahl himself gave nothing. On behalf of the companies he represented he presented a cheque for a hundred guineas, which had been collected from the various office staffs he controlled, and since the collection had been taken up on the principle that every name on the subscription list would be submitted to Mr. Bahl when the summer holiday arrangements were under consideration, the sums donated had been amazingly and uniformly generous.

Carfew did not enjoy his dinner. He bad never met Bahl in his life, but his instinct told him that the shipowner was a man who had too much money, and a complementary instinct informed him that he (Carfew) was the one man in the world who might deal with this tight-fisted millionaire.

After dinner there was an interval, to enable the guests to express their views to one another on the socialistic tendencies of the Government, and Carfew, with the easy confidence of one who has nothing to lose, made his way to Mr. Bahl.

That gentleman was the centre of a sycophantic circle, and through the ragged end of a cigar he was conveying his conviction that the country was going to the devil, when Carfew, bright and smiling, dawned upon him.

"Glad to meet you again, Mr. Bahl," he said.

"Glad to meet you, Mr.—er——"

"Carfew. Don't say that you've forgotten me," smiled Carfew.

"To be sure," said Mr. Bahl, comprehending the other in one swift glance, which appraised the standing, the bank balance, and the habits of life of his guest.

"I wanted to see you," said Carfew easily, "if you could give me an hour any day next week, except on Thursday. On Thursday," he continued, with a hint of severity, "I am attending a meeting of my board, and, since we are expected to pass a dividend——"

His expressive bands told the remainder of the story.

Mr. Bahl looked at him curiously. He had heard of Mr. Carfew, and recollected that fact in a dim way. Whether Mr. Carfew was a shipper or only a Life Governor of the Bank of England, he could not recall.

"Come and see me on Wednesday," he said, and Carfew nodded. It would have embarrassed him considerably had Mr. Bahl displayed any curiosity as to the object of the forthcoming visit.

Carfew acted on his impulses, and his main impulse had been to get back a portion of the five guineas which, as he chose to think, had been stolen from him by a trick. Before he bad left the awe-stricken circle which surrounded Mr. Bahl, he had decided that the five guineas was too small game, and he walked back to his flat in Jermyn Street that night weaving highly improbable dreams of "deals" from which he might derive future sustenance.

As for Mr. Bahl, he promptly forgot all about the forward young man who had forced his conversation upon him, and turned to a more important question which was at that moment obsessing him.

Now, Mr. Bahl was fabulously rich, and was therefore extremely mean, for it seems that the souls of the very rich are invariably those which leave it easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.

At the moment there was exercising Mr. Bahl's mind the question of the tugboat Mary Q. He prided himself that he had never spent so much as a brass farthing more than was necessary, either domestically or commercially, and here he was saddled with a dead loss of three thousand golden clinking sovereigns, and, moreover, such were the unpleasant circumstances, was personally liable for this sum.

He had purchased the Mary Q from a syndicate because he had received an inquiry from a South American port of authority, which offered four thousand pounds for a sea-going craft of a certain capacity.

Unfortunately, the inquiry had been addressed to him personally, so that there was no necessity for passing the transaction through the books of his firm, and there was an immediate profit to be had for his own enrichment. He cabled to his buyer, only to discover that the need had been supplied, and thus it came about that he found himself with a tug on his hands for which he had no use whatever.

Worse than this, he had purchased the boat without a proper survey, and it would seem that the Mary Q suffered from certain engine infirmities, on the subject of which her previous owners had been discreetly silent.

The Mary Q from that day became a ghostly nightmare with Mr. Bahl, and might, indeed, have brought him to an early end, only that Carfew happened along.

Carfew came into the Bahl sanctum as the twenty-third possible purchaser of the Mary Q took his leave.

"You'll never have another chance," Mr. Bahl was remarking, a little heatedly.

"We are willing to give two thousand, and put her into repair," said the agent, "and, of course——"

"Good morning," said Mr. Bahl briefly. Then to Carfew, and in another tone: "Ah, good morning, good morning, Mr. Carfew! sit down and have a cigar," he said, pointing to a chair. "Fact is, Mr. Carfew, I am annoyed. I was making an offer to Tangree, Smilson & Company—you saw that fellow going out?—a splendid offer. I have got a tug——"

And he unburdened himself of his trouble, yet in such a manner as to convey the idea that the main worry lay rather in the short-sightedness of people to whom he wished to act benevolently than in any desire on his part to carry through a profitable deal.

He spoke of the Mary Q, that splendid sea-going tug, built regardless of cost, fitted without parsimony—a tug capable of earning her owner a fortune, and now lying idle off Gravesend.

He was quick to seize an advantage, and when Carfew, with undisguised enthusiasm, questioned him on the point, he showed just how ownership of the Mary Q might lead an ambitious young man from comparative obscurity to a shining pinnacle of fame and affluence.

There was haulage—so much per ton burthen—salvage, tender work. One could get a Board of Trade certificate and use her in the summer months for a pleasure steamer—a yacht even. (This idea appealed immensely to Carfew.)

A tin of white enamel and a bit of polished brass, a few deck-chairs and a slip of carpet under the awning aft—awning aft and all accessories included in the sale price—and a man might go swaggering round to Cowes and take anchorage under the very nose of the Royal yacht.

"I must say it seems an idea," said Carfew thoughtfully.

Then, pursued the tempter, suppose the owner wanted a holiday, he might work her down to Ushant, Bordeaux, Bilbao, Vigo, Lisbon, Cadiz, Gib, and by way of the Moorish ports to the Coast. Think of the pickings for a man of spirit—and the adventure!

A sea-going boat, she could carry deck cargo cut and home—Manchester goods to the Coast, and copal, rubber, and bananas back to England. Likely as not, she would be saleable in one of those African ports, and the fortunate owner might return with a thousand or so profit. And he would sell this boat for three thousand, exactly the sum he had given for her. He produced a receipt as proof of his statements.

It happened that Carfew at that moment was weary of all the ordinary channels of speculation. There was in his bosom a sense of restlessness and oppression which comes to the man who eats too much and hails taxi-cabs automatically. He left the office of the Grey Funnel Line, his brain whirling with the splendid possibilities which lay ahead of him.

The very next day he went to Gravesend with Mr. Bahl's confidential man, and inspected the boat from stem to stern. She seemed big and solid, the brass telegraph on the bridge was very substantial and imposing. Carfew had an insane desire to pull the steam syren—a desire he obeyed, to the embarrassment of another tug's skipper, for the signal he made was "Going to Port," when, as a matter of fact, he was crossing the up-river tug to starboard.

He went down the river to the open sea, and came back to Gravesend on the tiny bridge.

Altogether, Carfew spent a delightful day, and on the Saturday following his trial trip, the Mary Q changed hands, and Carfew added to the list of his vocations, which were inscribed on his office door, that of "Shipowner."

•••••

Parker, who was Carfew's best friend and most fluent critic, listened in silence to a recital of Carfew's grievances.

"Of course," he was saying—this was a month after the purchase—"I never realised that the hands on the Mary Q were all Bahl's men, and that they were alternately sitting on the cylinder head—or whatever they call the infernal thing—and praying, whilst we were doing the trip. I thought it curious that the skipper had a life-belt within reach, but I imagined that it was a Board of Trade regulation. It has cost me twelve hundred pounds to put her into working order."

Parker nodded.

"In fact," he said, "you've been had. What does Bahl say?"

"He says, if I call again, he'll send for the police," said the gloomy Carfew.

Mr. Parker smiled sympathetically, but whether his sympathy was directed towards the disgruntled Carfew or the outraged Bahl, is a point for discussion.

"You've done the only wise thing," he said; "without the repairs she was worthless, according to your surveyor. What can you sell her for?"

Carfew shook his head.

"Whatever happens, I lose a thousand," he said, with a catch in his throat, for he hated to lose a thousand.

"I've got a crew, and a man I know has given me a few haulage jobs; it will just about pay the coal and wages bill. I'm sick, Parker. What can I do?" he demanded.

"Æquam memento rebus in arduis servare mentem," said Parker oracularly.

Carfew groaned.

"For Heaven's sake, chuck Latin and talk English!" he pleaded. "What do you mean?"

"Keep your wool on," translated Parker, "and wait till you find a purchaser who is as big an ass as you are."

"Good afternoon," said Carfew.

For three weary months the Mary Q patrolled the river, a veritable nobody's child, a tramp amongst tugs. Other boats were regularly employed, had snug homes and regular hours, were even distinguished by a certain uniformity of funnel. They had slipways for their moments of disorder, quays where they might drowse in the shade of tall warehouses; but the Mary Q loafed away from Tilbury to Lambeth Bridge, doing odd jobs in her humble way, earning the scorn which is due to the unattached.

Carfew had offers for his floating white elephant, but they were ridiculous offers.

The Mary Q became as much a nuisance to him as she had been to her former owner, until there came to him an offer through an agent—an offer much nearer Carfew's conception of equity than any other. This was a tender made on behalf of the Monrovian Municipal Authorities, and, in the argot of the times, Carfew fell for it.

For the first time since the tug had been on his hands, a spark of the old enthusiasm glimmered, and he made his hasty preparations for departure in quite the holiday spirit which he had anticipated would accompany all his associations with his new profession.

"I have had a cabin rigged up pretty cosily," he explained to Parker. "I shall navigate her down to Vigo and re-coal, then on to Gib. I shall put in a day or two at Tangier, then work her along the Moorish ports."

"I suppose you are taking somebody who understands navigation," asked the sceptical Parker—"somebody who knows that the east is opposite to the west, and all that sort of thing?"

Carfew had engaged a captain, a mate, four hands, and a cook. The captain was a man of many attainments, for he combined his extensive knowledge of seamanship with a perfect execution of concertina solos. His cook had been recommended by the chef of the Witz Hotel, and two of the hands were lifelong abstainers.

"You should have an interesting voyage," said Parker. "I can picture your cook preparing soles delices bonne femme, with the captain encouraging him with a selection from Grieg, and at least two of your crew weeping into their lemonade."

But Carfew was in too cheery a mood to be annoyed. So elated was he, that he must needs call upon Mr. Bahl. He might have been denied admission, but the clerk who took his card did not know him, and on the back of the card he had scribbled: "Sold the tug; want to tell you all about it."

"What did you get for her?" asked Bahl suspiciously.

"Five thousand," lied Carfew. "I am working her out to Monrovia to-morrow."

"To Monrovia?"

Bahl's eyebrows rose.

"To Monrovia," repeated Carfew.

Bahl looked thoughtful.

"Curiously enough," he said slowly, "I was selling the Monrovian people a boat. I've got a little two thousand tonner which isn't much use to us, and would be more useful than your tug. I suppose they know all about the engine troubles?" he demanded.

"There are no engine troubles," said Carfew wrathfully.

"Of course not."

"And look here," roared Carfew, thumping the. desk with his fist, "if you spoil my deal, I'll—I'll break your infernal head!"

Mr. Bahl smiled. He was a millionaire and felt safe, because people do not break the heads of millionaires. It isn't done. "Curiously enough," he said, as though speaking to himself, "I am leaving for Monrovia the day after to-morrow; one of my boats, the Shell King, is leaving for the Coast. I shall probably be waiting for you in Monrovia, and we will talk this matter over."

Carfew did not trust himself to speak. He made his way to the nearest telegraph office and wired to Gravesend.

Fortunately his belongings were aboard, and there was little to do in town, save to hand over the keys of his flat to a caretaker. He left the river that night on a falling tide, and came out of his unsteady cabin in the grey of the morning to see the white cliffs of Dover appearing and disappearing with sickening monotony over the dipping starboard gunwale. The tug was a cramped, cheerless habitation, and long before the tiny boat had bumped and shuddered its way round Ushant, Carfew had lost all the good spirits that had been his when the voyage started.

"Why the deuce does she roll?" he demanded of the captain.

"Why does she roll?" Captain Walter Worth was a stout man, with a trying habit of ekeing out his conversation with whole sentences stolen from the previous speaker.

"Well, sir, all tugs roll; but they are very, very safe."

He pulled away at a short and foul pipe, and shifted his feet to give him purchase against the next heavy roll, which, with a master mariner's eye, he saw was due.

Carfew, whose eye was in no way nautical, clutched a stanchion, and gave himself up for lost as the blunt nose of the tug bashed itself into the heavy waters.

"You get used to tugs after a bit," said the captain philosophically, "They ain't like ships, where you've got twenty officers messin' about—engineer this and engineer that. A tug can go where a liner can't. They look down on tugs, but what do they send for when they've got a broken shaft? Tugs! Who goes out to a ship that can't live in a sea? Tugs! You can earn more money in a week with a tug than you can earn with a—with a—a Dreadnought!"

Carfew said nothing. He was thinking principally of land—happy, motionless land; land that keeps still and doesn't fool about, throwing a chap off his feet and covering him from head to foot in dust.

"I haven't found a lot of money in tugs," he said at last, with some bitterness. "I wish I'd never seen this infernal craft."

Captain Worth pulled at his yellow-white moustache and eyed him severely.

"You've never found a lot of money in tugs, sir?" he said. "You wish you'd never seen this here tug? Come, come, sir! I don't like to hear a gentleman talk about tugs like that. Why, in my time, I've made thousands for owners and hundreds for myself out of tugs!"

He grasped the fore-rail of the bridge as a sea rose up and hit the little vessel a horrible nerve-racking buffet on the port bow.

Carfew, clinging on to the nearest support, saw the green waters pour smoothly over the tiny well-deck, cream and swirl for a moment, then, as the stout Mary Q asserted herself and brought her bows to daylight, he gazed fascinated at the spectacle of the waters rushing back to the parent sea in two miniature waterfalls.

"Phew!" he said, and felt hot. "We're in the Bay now, I suppose?"

"You're in the Bay now, sir, as you suppose," agreed the skipper gravely.

Seven days out of Gravesend—seven years sliced clumsily from Carfew's life—the Mary Q struck a storm, which made all Carfew's previous experience on the tug comparable with punting on a Crystal Palace lake.

It seemed that the horizon was alternately a dozen yards and twenty miles distant. The Mary Q did every trick in her repertoire except turn somersault. She stood on her head, she reared up, she went to sleep on her right side, and appeared unwilling to change her position; then she went to sleep on her left side, and seemed to enjoy the change. She took seas whichever way the seas happened to be running, and as they appeared to be running in all directions, she obligingly accepted service to one and all at the same moment. She lost her lifeboat; nobody thought it worth while to remark on the fact, Carfew's concern as centred on the problem: would she also lose him?

He had a horrible suspicion that, if she did, nobody would mention that fact, either. Perhaps, he thought, the mate might remark to the captain: "There goes Carfew—he floats very well for a landsman." And the captain might reply: "There goes Mr. Carfew—he does float very well for a landsman."

The storm passed, and the wind dropped in six hours from its rising, leaving the Mary Q afloat on a sea which it would be erring on the side of moderation to describe as mountainous.

Carfew, weary of body and—amongst other things—of soul, went to his cabin, and was strapped into his bunk by a sympathetic cook.

From sheer exhaustion he fell asleep, and when he woke, eight hours later, the seas had subsided till there was little more than a gentle swell.

He might have slept twenty hours, but he was awakened by the captain's hand on his shoulder.

"Are we going down?" he asked, and struggled to free himself of the strap with which a too faithful chef had bound him.

"Are we going down?" repeated the captain. "No, we ain't going down; we're coming up."

With deliberation he unstrapped his owner and helped him to the deck.

"We're comin' up smilin'," he went on. "Just get a cup of hot coffee for Mr. Carfew an' bring it up on the bridge."

It was a cloudless night. Overhead the stars winked and sparkled cheerfully.

"What is the time?" asked Carfew.

"What is the time?" replied Captain Worth. "It's three o'clock in the morning, or, as we say, six bells."

"And what the dickens do you mean," demanded an irritated and sleepy Carfew, "by calling me up at three o'clock in the morning, or, as you say, six bells?"

The captain, staggered no doubt by the plagiarism, made no reply. He led the way along the slippery deck and went clanking up the tiny ladder which led to the bridge, Carfew following.

"There," he said, and pointed westward.

Carfew looked, and saw somewhere on the horizon a faint glimmer of light. As he focussed his gaze, wondering exactly what it indicated, he saw a thread of fire rise slowly into the sky, describe a reluctant curve, and burst into a ball of blue stars.

He felt the captain's big hand on his arm, and it was trembling with excitement.

"Don't you go sellin' this tug to them niggers," said Captain Worth hoarsely. "You can make money out of tugs. Look at that signal!"

A Roman candle spluttered near the lights.

"Four blues, a green, an' a red. That's the Shell King, one of old Bahl's ships, and if I know anything about signallin', she's lost her propeller."

Carfew gasped.

In silence he watched as Captain Worth burnt an answering flare over one side of the bridge. The nose of the tug turned toward the distressed liner.

"Lost her propeller," said the captain, and his homely face was pleasantly fiendish in the blue light of the flare. "A passenger ship! She's worth ten thousand poun' to you, sir—we'll tow her into Bilbao. What a pity old Bahl ain't aboard!"

"He is!" said Carfew, and clasped the outraged captain in his arms.

{Copyright, 1914, by Edgar Wallace, in the United States of America.}