The Blue Peter/The Strange Situation of Captain Brogger
II
THE STRANGE SITUATION OF CAPTAIN BROGGER
"Brogger is no class!" said the crowd for'ard in the Enchantress, a big barque belonging to Liverpool, and just then loading wheat at Portland, Oregon. "Billy Brogger is no class; but mean—mean to the backbone!"
They hated him worse than poison, for there are some kinds of poison that sailormen do not hate. And Jack Eales, who was the head and soul and mouthpiece of the starboard watch, for the hundredth time explained the reason of their hatred.
"On'y it ain't 'atred," said Eales, "it ain't 'atred. It's plain, straightforward despisery. I've sailed with rough and tough and 'ard skippers, and never 'ated 'em. But our 'old man' is religious without no religion. Oh, that's a mean thing, that is! And there's no pleasin' of 'im. Never a decent word, nor a tot out of 'im if we works our innards out. The skipper ain't no class! 'E lets on to despise sailormen, and calls us ignorant. And what's 'is word for ever when 'e's jawin'—'You no sailor, you!' And 'ere I am ready to lay my duff for a month of Sundays against 'alf a pint of dandyfunk that 'e couldn't make a four-stranded Mattie Walker to save 'is unsaved soul! Called me no sailor, didn't 'e, over a real nice job of wire splicin'! I'll bet the 'old man' couldn't do an eye splice in a piece of inch and an 'alf manilla without thinkin' about it. Those that know 'im say 'e was the clumsiest ass ever sent to sea. Went up six times for 'is second mate's stiff. Why, the mate and the second 'ere knows 'im for no seaman, and 'e's as 'andy with a 'ambone as a pig with a pianner. They two loaths 'im just as much as us!"
There was a deal of truth in the indictment, for Brogger would never have got a ship but for the fact that the chief owners of the Enchantress were his elder brothers.
"’Tis a pity we don't skip out here," said one of the men, "the old swine would have his work cut out to get a fresh crowd."
"Ay, it's a pity we're such a quiet, sober crowd," replied Eales, who on occasion was neither quiet nor sober; "but, as I showed you after our passage out 'ere, it would be money in Brogger's pocket and the owners' if we quit. And 'tis true 'e owns about three sixty-fourths of 'er 'imself. The boardin'-'ouse bosses are selling sailors at sixty dollars per 'ead. Flesh and blood are cheap to-day! I wish I could hinvent somethin' to get even with the 'old man' in this bally, rowdy, shanghain' old Portland. I'll give ten dollars to the son of a gun that gives me the least 'int of a working scheme to do it."
"D'ye mean it, Jack Eales?" asked the whole crowd.
"Don't jump down a man's throat simultaneous," said Eales indignantly, "for in course I means it. And what's more, I've got the stuff. I ain't relyin' on that blasted old devil dodger aft for no measly five bob a week. Since I took the pledge not to get drunk—real drunk, that is—more'n once a month, I can trust myself with money, and I've got it 'ere."
He kicked the chest on which he sat to show his bank.
"Blimy," said a young cockney called Corlett, who was the happiest chap on board, "I'll 'ave a shot for Jack's ten dollars!"
"My chest's not locked," said Jack, and among so friendly a crowd the suggestion, which was the friendliest joke, was marked up to Eales as happy wit.
"I'm in the race for that purse," said Bush, who was the oldest seaman on board.
"We're all after it," said the crowd, and for days afterwards they chased Jack Eales with absurd proposals, the very least of which was a felony, and the most pleasing absolute piracy.
"Oh, go to thunder," said Jack, when a lump of a chap called Pizzey proposed to scuttle the Enchantress as she lay alongside the wharf.
"Oh, very well," said Pizzey, who was much hurt at the way his plan was received, "but I'll have you know that if you do it after all, that ten dollars is mine."
The nature of seamen is so childlike, so forgetful, so forgiving, that without further and continual irritation they would have talked till the vessel was towed down the Willamette and the Columbia, and for that matter all the way to Liverpool. But the skipper saw to it that they had something to growl about. He kept them working a quarter of an hour after knock-off time three times a week. He cut down their usual five shillings a week to a dollar, on the ground that he was reckoning in dollars just then. The fresh grub he sent on board was enough, as they said in the fo'c'sle, to make a pig take to fasting. And he nagged and growled without ceasing till Plump, the mate, who was a very decent fellow, hated him worse than the crew did. He listened to the second mate Dodman, when Dodman burst out into long-suppressed bad language.
"I oughtn't to agree with you, but I do, I own it freely," said Plump, as they stood against the poop-rail and watched Brogger pick his way through the mud on the wharf. "I ought to tell you to dry up, Mr. Dodman, but I find it hard to do my duty."
"He's a miserable, mean, measly, growling, discontented devil," said Dodman in a red heat, as he mopped his forehead. "Comes and tells me I ain't fit to stow mud in a mud-barge. Ain't it true when he was second in this same old Enchantress he stowed sugar on kerosine? And if the old swab can rig a double Spanish burton, I'll eat this belayin' pin. Our skipper's a know-nothing, sir."
"It's my duty not to listen to you," said Plump sadly. "I don't hear you, Mr. Dodman."
"Then I'd like to roar it through a speakin' trumpet," said the insubordinate second greaser. "I'd love to put it into flags, and let every ship in Portland learn the precious truth. Didn't he say it was your fault, sir, that Smith skipped out last night?"
"He did," said Plump darkly, "when he'd told the best worker in the ship that he was a soldier! Told him he was a soldier!"
With the land alongside, what could any self-respecting seaman do but go ashore after so dire an insult? They say at sea 'a messmate before a shipmate, a shipmate before a dog, and a dog before a soldier.' It was no wonder Smith skipped, and was just then roaring drunk in Lant and Gulliver's, who were the boss boarding-house masters in Portland, and bought and sold seamen as a ranchman might cattle.
And that very night Corlett came up to Jack Eales as he was going ashore, and put his hand on his shoulder. The young cockney had a grin upon him which, property divided, would have made the whole ship's company look happy.
"That ten dollars is mine," said Corlett. "Jack, you're ten dollars short. I wouldn't part with my claim on it for nine dollars and ninety-nine cents."
"We've 'eard too many rotten dodges lately," said Eales, "to take that in. What's the news now?"
But Corlett shook his head.
"I'm for the shore with you, sonny, and I'll tell you goin' along."
He bubbled as he walked, and every now and again burst into a roar of laughter, which was so infectious that Eales joined in at last.
"You are a funny bloke," said Eales; "and I'll say this for you, Corlett: I've never looked on you as a fool."
And Corlett sat down on a pile of lumber and laughed till he ached.
"Me a fool! Jack Eales, I'm the smartest cove on this coast. My notion's worth an 'undred dollars. It's as clear as mud, and as easy as eatin' good soft tack, and so neat that I wonder at myself. And it fits everythin'—everythin'."
"Then out with it," said Eales.
And Corlett came out with it.
"By Gosh!" said Eales—"by Gosh!"
He collapsed upon an adjacent pile of lumber and gasped.
"You've no right to be at sea," he said presently; "a man with your 'ead, Corlett, ought to 'ave a public-'ouse in a front street, and nothin' to pay for drinks. I've only three dollars on me. 'Ere's a dollar and an 'all. I owe you eight-fifty."
He walked ten yards and came back again.
"You should 'ave bumps on your 'ead," he sighed. "This is hintellec', Corlett. It ain't mere cleverness, this isn't."
"You don't say so," said the cockney modestly.
"I do say so," replied Eales with great firmness; "I say it freely."
And they walked up town.
"You see," said Corlett, "’ow the 'ole thing stows itself away. It 'ardly needs management. Lant and Gulliver 'ates 'im, and they're that jealous of Shanghai Smith down in 'Frisco with 'is games, they'll jump at this. And then it's well known Mr. Plump ain't got 'is master's ticket. And young Dodman on'y got 'is second's ticket a v'yge ago. There'll be no goin' back on it if the agents find the right man. By the 'Oly Frost, Jack, we'll diskiver yet if old Brogger is 'alf a bally seaman anyway."
"It's a merricle, Coriett, it's a merricle!" said Jack Eales. "I never quite property understood what books I've looked into meant by the pure hintellec'. You're clean wasted at sea, so you are. To-night we'll think it over, and to-morrow you and me will go as a committee of deputation to Lant and Gulliver if we sees no flaw in the thing."
"Take my word, there ain't no flaw in it," said Corlett.
"I'm inclined to believe you," said Eales, almost humbly. "I never thought to own up that a man on board the Enchantress was my equal, let alone my superior."
He sighed, but Corlett encouraged him.
"’Tis on'y a fluke. Jack."
"No, no," said Jack; "no, no, this is real 'ead-work. I knows it when I sees it. I'm proud to be shipmates with you, Corlett. Shake 'ands again."
They shook hands, and presently Corlett spent the one dollar and fifty cents which he had earned by pure intellect.
"Perhaps I'm a fool to be at sea," he said to himself. "I shouldn't wonder if Jack's right."
And next evening they walked up to Lant and Gulliver's, and demanded to see either or both of the partners in private.
"’Tis puttin' our 'eads in the lion's mouth to come 'ere," said Jack Eales, "and you and me will do well not to touch a drop, whatever these land-sharks offer, Corlett. Doped drinks ain't for me just now. So don't go large at all, my son."
"I won't," said Corlett, "if none of 'em don't offer me a drink three times, I can 'old off it, Jack. Sayin' 'no' once is tol'rable easy. I can squeeze out a second if it's a case of 'ave to; but what I dread's the third."
Jack Eales nodded.
"The third time's what proves a man's principles, I own. I've gone to four times more than once soon after bein' very much under the weather. But 'ere we are."
They came to Lant and Gulliver's boarding-house, the whole front of which was a saloon. It looked a 'tough' house, and it was tough both inside and out. These gentry had a 'pull' in Portland which enabled them to do as they pleased, and the only thing that pleased them was to make money. Most of the other boarding-houses had been fined out of existence, owing to a law that Mr. Lant had lobbied for at Salem. His conduct in the matter had brought him much praise for noble disinterestedness. He had asked for fines of five hundred dollars for gross infractions of the law instead of fifty, and the unsuspecting Legislature said it was a splendid suggestion, and passed the Bill with unanimity. As a result, his rivals, who were comparatively poor scoundrels without his control of the police, shed their dollars once or twice and then went under, and he had a monopoly.
"Well, wot is it?" asked Lant, who had the eyes and jaws and nose of a pugilist, and the domed skull of a philosopher. "Wot's the trouble here? What ship are you off of?"
"We wants a private talk with you, sir," said Eales, who had never met Lant before, and was more scared of him than he would have been of any admiral. For Lant and Gulliver's reputation is world-wide—all men who go down to the sea in ships know them.
He wrinkled his brows at them and considered for a moment. Then he led the way into the private snuggery, in which as much scoundrelism had been concocted as if it had been the head office of a great Trust or the Russian Foreign Office.
"Spit it out," said Lant as he sat down.
"We're in the Enchantress, sir," said Eales.
"And you want to get out, eh? What's my runners about? Haven't they bin aboard of you yet?"
He frowned savagely, and Eales hastened to acquit any of his myrmidons of such gross negligence.
"Oh, yes, sir," he said, "they've been down every day, but on'y one man 'as quit. We don't want to leave 'er, but we ain't satisfied with the skipper, sir, and we know, or at least we suspect, that 'e ain't no favourite of yours neither, Mr. Lant, sir."
"Well, and if he ain't?" said Lant.
"’E do abuse you something awful; don't 'e Corlett?"
"Awful," said Corlett; "it's 'orrid to 'ear 'im."
"And 'e shipped nearly all real teetotallers to do you in the eye, sir," said Eales, "for 'e said, sir, as no sober man would 'ave nothing to do with you."
"Are you a teetotaller?" asked Lant.
"To-day I am," said Eales hurriedly. "I was drunk yesterday, and the day after I can't look at an empty bottle even without cold shivers, sir. And it's the same with my mate; ain't it, Corlett?"
"The sight of a tot would make me sick," said Corlett plaintively.
"Well, well," said Lant, "what's your game? Spit it out, I say. I can't give all my time to hearin' you've not the stomach of a man between you. Now, quick, what is it?"
But Eales stood first on one leg and then on the other.
"You, Corlett!"
"No, not me," said the seaman of pure intellect.
"Well, then, sir, Mr. Lant, does you 'ave any sort of respect for Captain Brogger, or would you like to get even for 'is most unkind language respectin' you?"
Lant looked him up and down, and for a moment was inclined to break out violently. But he hated Brogger, who had injured his prestige once before by taking out of Portland every man he brought into it, and he was curious besides.
"Suppose I'd like to do him up complete-ly," said Lant, staring at Eales hard.
"And make 'im fair redik'lus and the laughin' stock of the 'ole coast?"
"That would suit me," said Lant. "It would fit me like a dandy suit of clothes."
"’E's the nastiest, meanest skipper as ever lay in the Willamette; ain't 'e, Corlett?"
"I never 'eard of a measlier," said Corlett, looking for a cuspidor in order to accentuate his verdict.
"Then 'ere's for tellin' Mr. Lant the 'ole thing," said Eales desperately. And when he was 'through' with his scheme, Lant lay back in his chair and laughed till he cried.
"It's great," he said, "it's great. Holy Mackinaw, it's great! And you say he's no seaman?"
"’E ain't even a thing in place of it, sir," said Eales.
"And you really won't drink?"
Eales looked at Corlett, and Corlett looked at Ealse.
"We wouldn't mind takin' a bottle down on board, sir," said Corlett, who once more proved his intellectual capacity.
"And mind you keep your mouths shut," said Lant.
"Wild 'orses shan't drag a word out of us, sir," said Eales, "for when my mate's drunk 'e's sulky, and I'm 'appy but speechless."
And down they went on board the Enchantress with their bottle, while Lant held a council of war with his chief runner.
•••••••
Portland is a hard place; there is no harder place in the world. San Francisco, for all its reputation, which it owes so greatly to the gold times, is a sweet and easy health resort compared with the trading capital of Oregon. Oregonians from all parts of the State say it is a selfish city, with no more sense of State patriotism than an Italian city of the fifteenth century had of national patriotism. But in these days Portland is beginning to get a trifle nervous about its reputation. It is beginning to get written about, and the truth is told occasionally as to what goes on there. This is why a sudden and remarkable disappearance of Captain Brogger, two days before the Enchantress was due to be towed down stream to the ocean, caused rather more sensation than it might have done a few years ago. The newspapers took two sides, and regarded two hypotheses as needing no proof. The papers which were trying to make Portland smell sweetly in the nostrils of the mercantile world said that some of the boarding-house bosses might be able to clear up the mystery. They gave reasons for supposing that Brogger was not loved by the tyrants of the water-front. But other papers declared that he had been knocked on the head and dumped into the river by some of his own crew. One reporter declared that a more evil-looking lot of ruffians than the crowd on board the Enchantress never towed past Kalama. This journal was partially owned by Lant and Gulliver. They owned something of everything, even a judge. And the good police did what they were told, so long as it was possible. They set about a story that Brogger had committed suicide. The crew said he had been looking wild of late. Mr. Plump had no theory, and was only mad that he had no master's certificate. Young Dodman went round whistling, in spite of the fact that he was the last man to have a real shine with the skipper.
"I hope he won't come back, that's all," said Dodman. "If he does I'm for the shore, boys; I'm for the shore. I've not known what it was to be happy for months till now."
But Plump grew haggard running to the police and the agents. The Enchantress was full up to the deck-beams with the best Oregon wheat, and was ready to go to sea. Every hour's delay meant a notch against him with the owners. And yet, as the owners were the missing skipper's brothers, he did not like to hurry. But the agents, who cared about no man's brother, put their foot down.
"We've found you a captain, Mr. Plump."
"What sort?" asked Plump anxiously.
"He's a good man and well recommended, and a thorough seaman."
"That'll be a change," said Plump. "Poor old Brogger was fit to skipper a canal-barge. All right, if you say so. We're ready if your new man is. All we want is another hand, and he's coming on board to-night if we sail to-morrow. We've had luck that way, whatever else has gone wrong. If Brogger had lived I believe he'd have lost the whole crowd the way he was shaping. He grew meaner every day."
And that night the new skipper came on board. He shook hands with his officers, and in half an hour Plump had almost forgotten his want of a master's ticket, and Dodman was swearing by the new man; for Captain John Greig was a man, and no mistake! He was quick and hard and bright and humorous, and there was that about him which was better than any extra certificate—he looked a seaman, and was one. And he was as happy as he could be to get a good ship. The vessel in which he had been mate had gone home without him, owing to his getting smallpox.
"I think we shall do," said Greig. "I wonder what became of that old duffer Brogger? Well, it's an ill wind that don't serve some skipper. I'm a skipper at last, and with any luck I'll stay so."
Early next morning, just as the Enchantress was making ready to tow down the river, and when the whole world was still dark save where the dawn on the great peak of Mount Hood showed a strange high gleam to the eastward, Lant and Gulliver's chief runner came on board and saw the mate.
"The man we agreed to put on board is sick," said the runner, "and as all our crowd here is fixed up for, we've wired down to Astoria to our other house to send you a good man in his place."
"Right," said Plump, who was standing on the fo'c'sle head—"right you are. Ay, ay, sir, let go that head-line! Jump and haul—haul it in, men!"
The men were cheerful; there was something in the voice of a real man now on the poop that bucked them up. And they knew as well as Plump himself that he was happy to have got rid of Brogger. The Enchantress looked as if she was to be a happy ship on the passage home.
"You seem a derned happy family," said the runner to Jack Eales as he skipped ashore.
"So we are," said Jack. "But tell us what's the name of the chap that'll come aboard at Astoria."
"His name," said the runner—"his name—oh, it's Bill Juggins!"
For he knew that Jack Eales knew more than he 'let on.'
"The new man's name is Bill Juggins," he told Corlett five minutes later, as they began to move swiftly down the smooth dark waters of the Willamette while the early lights of the town still gleamed and the snowy peak of Mount Hood was edged with roses in a rosy dawn.
"’Is name is Juggins!"
He slapped his thigh and laughed. They lay that night off Astoria, and before the towline was again made fast to pull her out over the great Columbia bar the new hand was put aboard in the usual condition of alcoholic coma with not a little laudanum mixed with it. He was stowed in a bunk in the fo'c'sle, where he lay just as they threw him. But Jack and Corlett were as nervous now as two greenhorns on a royal yard.
"I'm all of a bally twitter, I am," said Jack Eales. "D'ye know, Corlett, I ain't sure we ain't done after all. I don't believe I ever see this joker before. Brogger 'ad a beard."
"And Lant and Gulliver 'ad a razor," said Corlett.
"Brogger was pippy and pasty and white as—oh—as white," urged Eales, "and this josser is as black as a mulatter."
"Walnuts grow in Oregon," said the wise Corlett. "D'ye think we might let the crowd into the racket?"
"No, no, man," said Jack, "don't let nobody, know as we 'ad 'alf an 'and in it. The cove's name may be Juggins, but we'll be jugged."
They were well out to sea, and the tug was a blotch of smoke to windward, before Bill Juggins, A.B., showed the faintest sign of life. And even then they only heard him grunt as he turned over uneasily and went off on another cruise in the deep seas of sleep.
"If he works like he sleeps," said the crowd in the second dog-watch, "he'll be a harder grafter than Smith that skipped. It's a wonder the second ain't been in after him."
But the new skipper and Plump and Dodman hit it off so completely that they sat together on the poop and told each other all about everything in the happiest way. For Greig, though he was a hard enough man in his way, had the gift of creating good humour along with respect.
"It's a wonder what became of my lamented predecessor," said Greig.
"He's certainly dead, sir," said Plump.
"As dead as mutton," agreed Dodman.
"It would be a compliment to put the ship in mourning, as he owned a share in her," said Greig; "and I think I shall do it."
"There's enough blue paint on board, sir," said the second, "to put a fleet into mourning, I don't know how it came here, for Captain Brogger didn't care to be extra lavish with stores."
It was Dodman's way of saying the deceased skipper was as mean as his brothers.
"Very well," said Greig; "you can do it as soon as you like, Mr. Plump. These are customs which I hate to see die out. And now I think I'll turn in."
As he went he added—
"I believe we shall get on very well together, gentlemen."
Plump and Dodman said they were sure of it, and when he had gone below they said—
"He's all right."
At midnight Plump went below too, and Dodman walked the weather side of the poop in a happier frame of mind than he had known since he came on board the vessel in Liverpool. The wind was fine and steady out of the east, and the Enchatress slipped through the water very sweetly.
"Damme," said poor Dodman, "I believe I could sing."
He walked aft, looked at the compass, stared over the taffrail at the wake, looked aloft to see if the gaff topsail, which was an ill-cut and ill-conditioned sail, was in decent shape, and then whistled. Being right aft he did not see a short, dark man come from the fo'c'sle and stagger along the main-deck. But Eales and Corlett saw him and left the rest of the starboard watch, who were yarning quietly on the spare topmast lashed under the rail.
"’E's come to," said Eales. "Holy sailor, this is a game!"
Bill Juggins, A.B., laid hold of a belaying pin in the fife rail of the main-mast, and swayed to and fro like a wet swab in a cross sea.
"Where am I?" said Bill Juggins. "This is a nightmare. I want to wake."
He held tight and pondered. But his brain reeled.
"I have no beard," said the new seaman; "I'm clean shaved. My hair's that short I can't catch hold of it. These ain't my clothes. I can't stand straight. But if this ain't my ship I'm mad."
"D'ye 'ear the pore devil?" asked Jack.
"I 'ears," said Corlett. "If 'e 'adn't told me I was a soldier I should say it was pafettick to 'ear him."
"This is a barque," said poor Juggins, "and so's the Enchantress. But she's at sea, and yesterday she was in Portland not ready to go for three days. This is a dream, it's an awful, awful dream. I'll wake up, I will, I will!"
He hung on the pin desperately, and as he stood there Dodman walked for'ard to the break of the poop. He whistled lightly.
"Dodman used to whistle," said the man in a nightmare. "I used to tell him I wouldn't have it. I said it was a street-boy's habit. I shall wake presently, oh yes."
"Who's that jabbering on the main-deck?" asked Dodman.
"It's me," said the jabberer weakly, as a cloud of laudanum floated over his brain. "It's me, and I don't know who I am."
But Dodman jumped as if he had been shot. This was a voice from the grave; there seemed no mistaking Brogger's wretched pipe. But before the second mate could speak Jack Eales intervened.
"’Tis the new 'and wot come aboard at Astoria, sir. 'Is name is Bill Juggins."
The man from Astoria wavered doubtfully and looked up at the poop.
"I know that voice," he murmured. "That's Dodman."
"The pore chap's very drunk yet, sir," said Eales.
"Take him away for'ard," said Dodman, with a gasp.
"My name—ny name's Brogger!" piped the man from Astoria.
"It's Juggins—Bill Juggins!" said Eales firmly, as he took him by the arm. "Brogger's dead, Juggins. 'E's dead and buried. Lant's liquor 'as been too much for you."
And Juggins burst into tears.
"I thought I was Brogger," he said feebly. "But poor Brogger had a beard."
"So 'e 'ad," said Eales; "and 'e was as white as veal, and you're a fine, 'ealthy, dark colour. Come back and doss it out, my son. The pafettick story of the pore chap's death 'as been too much for you."
He and Corlett led the man for'ard and put him in his bunk, where he wept copiously.
"What are you so sad about?" asked Corlett. "You're no better than a soldier!"
The whole watch crowded in after them.
"What's wrong?" they asked.
"The chap that's tanked up says 'e's Brogger," said Eales.
The whole watch laughed so that the port watch woke up and cursed them with unanimous blasphemy.
"But this josser says 'e's Brogger!" urged the starboard watch in extenuation of their gross infraction of fo'c'sle law.
"Then 'e's no seaman," said the sulky port watch, "for Brogger 'ardly knew 'B' from a bull's foot as a sailorman. Dry up, and let us go to sleep!"
But Brogger kept on saying he was Brogger, till Pizzey, the biggest seaman in the port watch, threatened to bash him if he wasn't quiet.
"But—but I know you all," said Brogger. "If I wasn't me, how should I?"
"More knows Tom Fool than Tom Fool knows," said Pizzey. And he used such horrible threats that the skipper was quailed and became quiet, and at last fell asleep.
And in the meantime Dodman went down below and woke up Plump, who was in his first sleep.
"What's wrong?" asked Plump, as soon as he found that he was being waked three hours before his time. "You're as white as putty, Dodman."
Dodman shook his head and could hardly speak. When he did speak, Plump fell back upon his pillow and gasped.
"Brogger ain't dead," said Dodman. "Mr. Plump, Brogger's on board."
"You're mad!" cried Plump.
"I wish I was," said Dodman. "This is a Portland plant—this is a coast game. They shaved him and browned him and drugged him, and he came aboard at Astoria as a foremast hand!"
There was a deep silence for at least five minutes, and then Plump said, almost with a wail—
"This is most disappointing!"
There was a strange look in Dodman's face; it was so strange that Plump sat up and looked at him.
"Between you and me, sir," said Dodman, "he used to make both of us uncomfortable."
"He did," said Plump.
"And he was no seaman."
"He wasn't fit to sail a paper-boat in a bath," said Plump.
"Then he's dead," said Dodman with a strange wink. And Plump's face lighted up slowly.
"He's still dead," said Plump. "And if the owners don't like it they can lump it. And, what's more, I don't believe our new skipper would stand aside now for any man that ever breathed."
"If he does he's not the man I take him for," said the second mate. "I shall get up that blue paint in the forenoon watch, sir."
"Get it up," said Plump. And in ten minutes he fell fast asleep again. For it takes more than a little to rob a seaman of his slumber. But at four bells in the morning watch he had to communicate the news to the new skipper, who was an early bird. He broke the news warily, for he dreaded lest the 'old man' should do something in a hurry which he and others might repent of afterwards.
"It would be a mighty strange thing, sir, if Captain Brogger wasn't dead after all," he remarked just a trifle nervously after Greig had walked the deck once or twice.
"He might rise up now and find his ship missing," said Greig with a chuckle. "After all, that's only what I did, Mr. Plump. I was crazy, luny, dotty, and raving with fever before I was taken out of the Winchelsea and when I came to she was days at sea."
He marched up and down again.
"And a dashed good man got my billet," he said, "and now I don't envy it him. It was a bit of luck my getting this, Mr. Plump, though in a way I own I'm sorry that you couldn't have it. I know that's tough."
Plump sighed.
"I'd ha' had my ticket, sir, but for a fluke that a youngster going up for second mate might have been ashamed of. A plus for a minus, and I was minus. You wouldn't like to step down for Captain Brogger now, sir?"
"Minus Brogger is plus me," said Greig. "I'd not step down to loo'ard for all the Brogger family up from the tomb."
"No more would I, sir," said Plump. "But"
"But what?" asked the 'old man.'
And Plump gasped a bit.
"Last night, sir"
Greig stared at him curiously.
"Don't hang in the wind like that!" he said sharply. "What is it?"
Plump burst out with what it was, and told Greig in a fine flow of words what the second mate had said.
"By crimes!" said Greig. "By all that's holy!"
He walked the deck for a minute, and then came back and stood close to his mate.
"Have you seen this man?"
"No, sir."
"Did Mr. Dodman believe him?"
"Dodman isn't a fool, sir. No doubt it seemed to him that the man had heard the tale of the captain's disappearance, and, having been on the drink, he took it into his head that he is Brogger."
Greig turned his back to the mate and stared to windward.
"It's delirium tremens, of course," he said. "That's plain. I'll see him after breakfast, unless he's sober and comes to his senses."
He went below.
"Crawl down now, and for a ghost!" said Greig. "If I do, I'll be damned!"
And just then Brogger was sitting up in his bunk, chewing his fingers and trying to reconstruct the lost days. He had elusive visions of strange interviews, he tasted strange drinks, his head ached with horrid drugs, he recalled strange snatches of talk by strangers. And out of the phantasmagoria of his jumbled vision there came sometimes the powerful and brutal face of Lant, of the firm of Lant and Gulliver.
"Someone hit me!" he said aloud. And Jack Eales, who was wide awake, heard him.
"Where am I? I'm in a dirty fo'c'sle!"
He seemed to remember vaguely that he had been out on deck in the night. He looked up and saw Eales' face dimly.
"What ship's this?" he asked.
"It ain't a ship," said Eales; "this is hell!"
Brogger shook his head dismally.
"It ain't—you're jokin' with me! What am I doin' here? Is this my ship?"
"You was shipped in her," said Eales. "You came aboard in Astoria. Your name's Juggins."
"I'm Brogger—Captain William Brogger!" said Brogger.
"Hush, hush!" said Eales. "Don't say it. All the men 'ere 'as sworn to 'ave Brogger's life if 'e's alive. They say Brogger was mean, and made them un'appy. 'E called good sailormen sojers; 'e give 'em bad grub; 'e wouldn't 'ave no clothes dried in the galley off the 'Orn; 'e never gave 'em no forenoon watch in. In the dirtiest weather he 'ad 'em makin' sennit between shortenin' and makin' sail. 'E wasn't no sailor, they says, to add to it all. And it's a sayin' 'ere that Brogger saved 'is life by bein' killed, same as the pig did 'is by dyin'. For Gawd's sake don't say you're Brogger, or there'll be blood knee-deep—if there's blood in Brogger!"
"I'll—I'll go aft," said Brogger tremulously.
"Don't you do it!" said Eales. "There's a new skipper on board; 'e's as fierce and 'ard as if 'e was a bucko tough out of a Western Ocean packet of the old days. 'E won't stand taff, nor any sort of guff; but 'e'll jump on your stummick quick."
"Oh, what shall I do?" moaned Brogger. "Why, I know you! You're Eales!"
"And you're Juggins!" said Eales fiercely. And just then in came one of the port watch and banged a tin can.
"Starbowlines, ahoy! Turn out, you sleepers!" he roared. "Turn out, turn out, my bully boys!"
The starboard watch yawned and groaned and grunted, and showed unwilling legs, and at last crawled out upon their chests as the boys brought the tea and grub in.
"Holy Moses!" said big Pizzey; "don't I remember that there was one of the starboard watch that allowed he was Brogger?"
"This is 'im," said Corlett, pointing. And the whole crowd roared.
"’E's no more like old beast Brogger than I'm like the mate," said Pizzey contemptuously. For Plump was a nice-looking man, and Pizzey had a face like a bruised apple. "Where's your beard, Brogger?"
"It's—it's shaved," said Brogger.
"And where did you get them brown 'ands and that ma'og'ny face? Brogger was as white as muck," said Bush. "And, besides, 'e's dead, and there's no more in it than that."
"I'm goin' aft," said Brogger. "There's a dreadful mistake somewhere."
But Corlett caught him by the tail of his jacket and sat him down on a chest suddenly.
"Less talk and more work, shipmate. Eat your breakfast."
He helped the poor devil to a pannikin of tea and to a tin plate full of bad bacon.
"This tea's beastly," he declared.
"Brogger's notion of wot's fit for sailors," said Corlett. "Drink 'is 'ealth in it."
And Brogger drank. The hot infusion of the Lord knows what did him good. The fumes of fusel oil and the clouds of laudanum rolled away from him.
"I know 'em all," he said—"I know 'em, every one. This is my ship; this is the Enchantress. If it isn't, I'm mad!"
He rose up suddenly and made a bolt for the door, and ran aft. As his evil luck would have it, the very first person he ran against was the new skipper, who looked at him very fiercely.
"Where the devil are you running to?" asked Greig, giving him a push in the chest that sent him reeling.
"I'm Captain Brogger," said Brogger with the most lamentably weak air of dignity. It sat on him like a frock-coat on a gorilla.
"The devil you are?" said Greig. "So you're still drunk. Go for'ard, or I'll cure you quick!"
But just then Plump came for'ard to the break of the poop.
"Mr. Plump, Mr. Plump," cried Brogger. It has to be owned that the mate started just a trifle at the sound of his voice. "Mr. Plump, I'm Captain Brogger, and who's this?"
"Stop," said Greig, "stop right here. Mr. Plump, do you recognise this man?"
It was impossible to recognise him by anything but his voice, and Plump truly denied that he saw the least resemblance to the dead skipper.
"Call Mr. Dodman," said Greig. And Dodman said he couldn't see the faintest likeness.
"Then how do I know you all?" asked Brogger.
"It's my belief you sailed with us three voyages back," said Dodman. "I seem to have seen you somewhere."
"That will do," said Greig; "go for'ard and behave yourself, or you'll find out, whether you're Brogger or Juggins, or the Lord Muck from Bog Island, that I'm captain here. Bo'-son!"
The bo'son came from the galley, where he was taking in the situation with the cook.
"Set this man to work," said Greig, "and keep your eye on him."
And Brogger went forward like a lamb.
"It's cruel! it's cruel!" said Brogger. But in less than two shakes of a lamb's tail he found himself getting paint out of the bo'-son's locker in company with Corlett and Jack Eales.
"What you've got to do, sonny," said Jack, who had half a mind to be sorry for him, "is to do your duty and do it smart and quick. Just now you're off-colour, so to speak, in spite of that 'ealthy complexion of yours, and you don't feel well. Exercise will do you good. We'll have you on a topsail-yard yet singin' out: '’Aul out to loo'ard' with the best." He turned to Corlett.
"What's all this bally paint for, Corlett?" he asked.
"Blamed if I know," said his mate.
But the other men were rigging up stages and getting them over the side, awhile the bo'son mixed the paint. It was blue, and Corlett stared hard at Eales.
"Well, I'm d-dashed," said Eales; "this is the queerest start!"
He watched the bo'son go up to the new hand and take him carefully by the collar.
"’Ere, you sculpin, take this pot and this brush and get down on this stage"
"What for?" asked Brogger. "I'm—I'm"
"Oh, no, you ain't," said the bo'son quickly,—"you ain't 'im by a long sight."
"It's blue paint," said Brogger weakly. "It's blue."
"Very blue," replied the bo'son drily. "And all that's white you'll paint blue."
He half-lifted Brogger on the rail, and watched him clamber down upon the stage. A strange, quiet ripple of laughter ran along the men at work.
"I—I don't understand," said Brogger to Eales, who was sitting on the stage with him.
"It's a good sea compliment to them that's gone," said Eales. "Paint, you beggar, paint."
The bo'son put his head over the rail.
"If you don't get to work. Juggins, I'll have to come down there and talk with you."
And the man who was spoken to knew of old what a terror the bo'son could be if he liked. He shivered and dipped his brush in paint. After he had made a few feeble strokes, the bo'son's head disappeared, and Brogger whispered to Eales—
"Who's it for?"
"It's for poor old Brogger," said Eales.