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Title: The Viking Blood: A Story of Seafaring

Author: Frederick William Wallace

Release date: September 24, 2012 [eBook #40853]

Language: English

Credits: E-text prepared by sp1nd, Matthew Wheaton, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)


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THE VIKING BLOOD

A Story of Seafaring

by

FREDERICK WILLIAM WALLACE

Author of "Blue Water," "The Shack-locker," etc.







Hodder and Stoughton
Limited Toronto

Copyright, Canada, 1920
by
The Musson Book Co., Limited
Publishers, ... Toronto.




    TO

    V. S. W.


    There's few who know the ocean road,
      Its way by reef and bar:
    It keeps its secret guarded well,
      In league with sun and star;
    But if you tramp it year by year,
      And watch it wild and still,
    Its heart will open unto you,
      And lead you where you will.

                          _The Sea Road_.




CHAPTER ONE


He was christened Donald Percival McKenzie, but his mother preferred
to call him Percival. The father, however insisted on the "Donald" and
demanded that it be given priority over whatever appellation the
mother might desire to add to the rare old Highland surname of
McKenzie.

Captain McKenzie received the news of his son's arrival into the world
just as his ship was leaving the coaling station at Cape Verde
Islands, but his wife's suggestion of "Percival" caused him to hold
the ship to an anchor while he dashed off a letter protesting against
the tacking of such a namby-pamby name on to a son of his. "'Donald'
is the name I have set my heart on, Janet, and I won't have the name
of McKenzie defiled by any such English designation as 'Percival'. I
won't have any Percy McKenzies in my family." Then, to conciliate his
wife, who, he felt, deserved some consideration, he added, "You may
call him Percival also if you've set your mind on it, but remember,
Donald comes first!" So Donald Percival McKenzie it was, and thus it
is inscribed in the Register of Births for the City of Glasgow, in the
County of Lanark, Scotland, in the year of our Lord, Eighteen Hundred
and Seventy-six.

Though registered thus by the laws of church and state and in the mind
of the father, yet the mother won her desire for a time and omitted
the "Donald" when addressing, or referring to, her son. It was only
during Captain McKenzie's brief home visits between voyages that
young Donald Percival discovered that he had another appellation which
he was expected to answer to. This discovery became a most pleasing
one when the boy advanced to those years of discretion when he might
fraternize with his fellows on the aristocratic "Terrace" where he
resided. Glasgow youngsters, inheriting antipathies through Scotch or
Irish ancestry, scorned anything savoring of "English" and the name of
"Percy" could only be applied to an "Englisher" or a boy so anglicized
by his "Maw" as to be only worth giving a licking to wherever and
whenever met. When one's mother hails from Inverness and speaks the
pure melodious English peculiar to that part of Scotland, it is
difficult for a lad to disprove connection with southron
antecedents--especially in the face of such circumstantial evidence as
a name like Percy, and an accent free from rolling "r's" and Scottish
idioms.

This was what young McKenzie had to fight against. Even though he
could scrape through the language test and deliver himself of a
guttural "Och, awa!" and pronounce "loch" without calling it "lock,"
yet the "Percy" damned him. He had attained the age of seven--a rather
delicate boy, much petted and spoilt by his mother--when he rebelled.
The juvenile denizens of the Terrace had jeered at him--calling him
"Percy, dear!" and added injury to insult by throwing mud and
profaning his white starched collar with unclean hands. "They called
me a mammy's boy," he sobbed, "'n they said I was English, 'n they
said English was no good 'cause they ran away from the Scotch at
Bannockburn an' Stirling Bridge. I'm _not_ English, am I, mamma?"

"No, no, dear," soothed the mother. "How dare those vulgar little
scamps abuse my little pet! Don't cry, my wee lamb! I shan't let you
go out and play with them any more----"

A renewed howl came from Donald Percival. "But I wanna play with them,
mamma! I don't wanna be kept in! It's all your fault for calling me
'Percy'! I don't wanna be called Percy! I wanna be called Donal' same
as daddy calls me. And, mamma, please don't call me Percy any more. I
like Donal' better!"

There had been several incidents of this nature, and Mrs. McKenzie was
now forced to address her offspring publicly by his first name. But
the other died hard and practically blasted young Donald's life in the
locality in which he lived. Only when the family removed to a distant
neighborhood did the youngster feel free to begin life with a clean
sheet.

There is a psychology in nomenclature which reflects the characters of
the parents. "Percival" aptly described that of Mrs. McKenzie. As
plain Janet McKinnon she grew up in the bucolic atmosphere of a small
Invernessshire farm, where she had, at an early age, to help her
mother milk cows, clean byres, plant and gather potatoes. In summer,
she ran around barefoot; in winter she wore heavy boots and homespun
stockings and red flannel petticoats. The farm was a poor one and the
McKinnon family was numerous and hungry. Janet at sixteen was sent out
to "service" as a maid-of-all-work in the home of a Glasgow baillie.

The baillie had made some "siller" in the scrap-iron business and
hankered after the desirable municipal eminence of Lord Provost of
Glasgow. As he and his wife were rather crude personages, he realized
that some training in deportment and society mannerisms was necessary,
and his establishment became something of a stamping ground for
professors of dancing and deportment, English governesses and
impecunious connections of artistocratic families. Janet, the maid,
absorbed much of the atmosphere with which she was surrounded and
unconsciously aped a great deal of what she saw being dinned into the
baillie and his kindred.

"Bonny Janet McKinnon"--good-hearted, healthy, quick-witted, and a
pretty figure of a lass, though rather proud and vain--followed the
baillie in his steps up the social ladder, and while a domestic in the
future Lord Provost's house, met handsome, rollicking Alec McKenzie,
chief officer of the Sutton Liner _Ansonia_ in the New York trade.

McKenzie could claim good family of ancient Highland lineage. His
father was a celebrated physician and a younger brother of Sir
Alastair McKenzie of Dunsany Castle. The McKenzies of Dunsany,
however, were "penniless folk wi' a lang pedigree" and the knight drew
but a meagre income from the bare northern crofts and moors which he
owned, and were it not for the wealthy English and American sportsmen
who yearly leased the place for the autumn shooting, the Laird of
Dunsany would have been forced to work to keep himself and to pay the
interest on his mortgages. The doctor was more absorbed in the theory
than in the practice of his profession, and, after devoting enough
attention to remunerative patients to provide the means for giving his
two sons a good education, he retired to his laboratory and
practically remained there until he died, and the proceeds from the
sale of his books and instruments were just sufficient to pay his
debts and bury him. The doctor's wife pre-deceased her husband by
several years, and the two sons--Alexander and David--scarce knew
their parents. When Dr. McKenzie died, David went into the office of a
Glasgow ship broker and absorbed the hard-fisted doctrines of a
parsimonious and none too scrupulous employer, while Alec went off in
a sailing ship to sea.

By the time Alec had struggled to the sublimity of a chief officer's
berth in a liner, where the donning of much gold braid was compulsory
and the acceptance of a monthly wage of twelve pounds was scarcely in
keeping with the dignity and responsibility of the position, David had
scrimped and scraped enough cash together to purchase several
sixty-fourths in a sailing ship and had blossomed out as a ship-owner.
Through his shipping connections, David became friendly with the
baillie scrap-iron merchant, and the friendship grew into intimacy
when the baillie learned of McKenzie's connection with the Laird of
Dunsany. With the tuft-hunting dealer in iron tooting a horn for him
as "Ma freen, David McKenzie, nephew o' Sir Alastair McKenzie o'
Dunsany Castle, ye ken!" the ship-broker brother prospered, while
Sailor Alec sweated and mucked about at sea.

It was during one of Alec's shore spells in Glasgow that David so
forgot himself as to take his seaman brother up to the baillie's
mansion for dinner. The dinner was memorable in more ways than one. To
Alec, who had travelled much and was quite at home in any society, the
baillie and his brood constituted a comedy. Six red-headed imps of
various ages surrounded the board and monopolized most of the
conversation and the food. Grimy fingers were surreptitiously thrust
into the preserves to be licked off under the table-cloth, and nimble
juvenile digits pilfered the choice sugar embellishments of sundry
cakes. The baillie sat beaming at the head of his festive board and
reproved those precocious excursions with divers--"Dinna touch the
jeelies, Wully!" or "Pit that cookie back on the plate, Jeanie!" while
to his guests he murmured admiring asides--"Aw, the wee laumbs!
They're hungry, the wee doos!" David sat stony-faced, but Alec almost
exploded. "Lambs and doves are they?" he thought. "They're worse than
a swarm of galley rats!"

The baillie's lessons in correct society conduct showed themselves
every now and again by the occasional "Eengleesh" which he introduced
into his conversation, but to Alec these utterances were a farce.
"Mister McKinzie, will you partake of the toastit _breed_?" "Kindly
_pawss_ the mulk to your _mummaw_, John!" "Let the _myde_ take an' gie
ye a clean plate, Captun--the bairns have dirtied the yin you 'ave!"
The latter caused the sailor to choke in his serviette and he looked
up to catch the sparkling brown eyes of Janet McKinnon.

"Pardon me, sir!" she murmured demurely as she deftly replaced the
"dirtied yin."

"Oh--ah--thanks awfully!" stuttered Alec, who suddenly realized that
something eminently desirable in femininity was ministering to his
wants. During the rest of the dinner the worthy alderman's _faux pas_
were hugely enjoyed by at least two persons, and Alec's roving eyes
shared silent amusement with those of the "myde" whenever the
unconscious host delivered himself of a particularly atrocious
observation.

Janet McKinnon, with her soft speech, her rosy Highland features and
pretty figure attracted the simple sailor heart of Alec McKenzie. He
had met many women in the manner that sailors meet them--lightly met
and readily forgotten. He had murmured "pidgin" to the sing-song girls
of Nagasaki and Yokohama; had bandied Yankee slang and bought drinks
for the damosels of the "Barbary Coast" in San Francisco, and
applauded the gyrations of the dancing houris of the Near East; but
these were but diversions of the moment and had left no impression on
the heart. Women of the more respectable sort he had met casually on
ocean passages, but he had never allowed himself to become enamored of
any. The inequality of his position as a poor sea-ranging mate; the
lack of opportunity for becoming acquainted on short voyages, and
drastic regulations of duty and ship-board intercourse, precluded all
ideas of marrying.

On a salary of twelve pounds per month, with uniforms to buy and shore
living to pay, a man cannot fraternize with his feminine equals in the
social scale and Alec McKenzie never tried it. He was a handsome man,
well-built, broad-shouldered, with blonde curly hair, a flowing silky
moustache and clipped beard. With his light hair, tanned skin, keen
blue eyes, high forehead and cheekbones and straight, determined
mouth, he looked a veritable viking--a modern example of atavistic
character descending from those Norse raiders who found the Scots
Highlands congenial habitation for permanent residence.

Thirty-eight years of age, and celebrated as "the smartest mate that
ever took a ship out the Clyde," Alec McKenzie felt that in Baillie
Ross's maid he had met his affinity, and next evening he boldly called
at the servants' entrance to the Ross home and inquired of the old
cook who answered the door "if Miss Janet was in?" (That was the only
name he knew so far.) He was ushered into the servants' parlor in the
basement of the house, and Janet awaited his overtures with
astonishment, not unmixed with suspicion as to his motives. Blushing
and more abashed than he had ever felt in his life, he came to the
point with a sailor's straightforwardness. "I saw you last night, Miss
Janet, and I like you. I'd like to know you better. My name is
McKenzie--Alec McKenzie--and I'm a chief officer on one of Sutton's
ships. What is your name, may I ask?"

Still surprised and confused, Janet had murmured, "Jeanette McKinnon,
sir!" (Janet had absorbed some of her master's ideas and 'Jeanette'
sounded more aristocratic.) "Well, Miss McKinnon," said Alec, more at
ease, "if you care to, we might go to a play or a music hall to-night.
What do you say?"

Miss McKinnon consented, and thus the wooing was begun. When she
doffed the cap and apron of domestic servitude and donned her "walking
out" clothes, Janet, with her shapely figure, her dark hair and
sparkling brown eyes, and the rich Highland bloom in her cheeks, was a
woman deserving of more than a passing glance. She had many admirers,
but they were of the class whose business brought them to the kitchen
door, and she would have none of them. The butcher, the grocer, the
gas-meter man, and the police officer on the beat had all made a set
for the alderman's pretty maid only to be haughtily rebuffed in the
manner affected by the poor but beautiful heroines in the
_feuilletons_ of the Glasgow Weekly Herald or the Heartsease Library.

Sailor Alec, absolutely unaffected by the conservatism of class and
setting no value upon aristocratic connections, felt that there was
nothing out of the way in his courting a domestic servant. There was
no sign of plebeian origin in Miss McKinnon's manners and pleasant
Inverness-shire speech; her hands were small and well-kept, and she
had a neat foot in spite of the bare feet and "brogans" of youthful
days. In his eyes, she was pretty, intelligent, and desirable, and he
made up his mind that he would ask her to marry him at the first
opportunity.

For almost a year, McKenzie courted Janet McKinnon, and during the
week his ship was in Glasgow between voyages to New York, he would
spend every evening with her. The old cook, who had a sailor brother,
connived at the meetings, kept guard over the parlor, and helped Janet
to get off duty when McKenzie called, but she would damp Miss
McKinnon's spirits every once in a while by remarking what "a
harum-scarum lot them sailors was" and what great chaps they were "for
drinkin' an' spendin' their money on furrin wimmin oot in Chinay,
Injy, Rio Grandy an' sich-like heathen parts!"

It was a somewhat hazardous wooing, and many were the occasions when
McKenzie would be waiting for Janet in the servants' parlor
downstairs, during which time his lady-love would be waiting on his
brother David at the baillie's table upstairs. David was blissfully
unconscious of Alec's doings when in port, as neither of the brothers
kept intimate touch with each other. David looked upon Alec as a "puir
waster" and the latter sympathized with David for living the life of a
"crab"--"jewing and shrivelling his soul for dollars." "Poor Dave," he
would say to Janet. "Working day and night over his books in a dusty,
dingy hole of an office. Chopping down expenses in the miserable
hookers his firm runs. Scratching, grubbing and saving money--that's
all he lives for. Poor chap! He doesn't know what life is! He's never
seen the world or its beauties. He'll fetch up as a miserable miser
some of these days!"

When David thought of Alec, which was not often, it was with scorn and
irritation. "Shiftless beggar! No ambition! Sooner waste his life and
talents at sea working for someone else rather than save his money and
have someone working for him. Suttons pay their mates too well. As
long as he has money to spend he'll chuck it around like a drunken
sailor and some of these days when he is played out he'll come to me
to help him!" David, in a way, was a better judge of human nature than
Alec. Though a splendid seaman and navigator, Alec was not aggressive
nor overly ambitious. He needed prodding. At sea, he carried out his
duties faithfully and well because they were prescribed for him, and
he hoped for the day when Suttons would give him a command. He would
wait for it to come to him, rather than work to speed the day. When
the command came, he would ask Janet to marry him. On a mate's pay, he
couldn't save anything, but when he got a ship of his own, he would
take the plunge, marry, and fit out a home on his first month's pay as
master.

However, man proposes and God disposes. It was one of the red-headed
imps of the baillie's progeny who precipitated matters. This youngster
awoke about ten o'clock one evening feeling hungry. He had vivid
recollections of the cook baking a batch of lovely "traykle scones"
during the afternoon and he made his way to the basement with feline
tread and upon robbery intent. The half-opened door of the servants'
parlor revealed a most astonishing tableau to his inquisitive vision
and, recognizing the actors, he felt that it was worth while securing
an audience to share the sight with him. Creeping upstairs to his
father's library, he astonished the worthy baillie and his wife, and
almost stunned David, who happened to be there that evening, by
shouting excitedly, "Yon yella-heided Captun that was at oor hoose fur
dinner wi' Mister McKinzie a while syne is doon-stairs in the slavey's
room wi' Jinnut on his knee!"

Janet and Alec received a rude shock a minute later when the astounded
baillie, his wife, brother David and the red-headed Ross hopeful
sallied into the sitting-room and caught the lovers in the act of
embracing.

"Captun McKinzie!" stuttered the baillie. "Whit is the meanin' o'
this?" Alec jumped to his feet, blushing furiously, but withal, deadly
calm. "Why, nothing at all, baillie. But isn't this rather
unceremonious? Should have knocked, don't you think?"

When the baillie commenced to stammer in confusion, Mrs. Ross felt
that it was her place to talk and she applied herself to Janet.

"McKinnon," she said icily. "I'm surprised an' deesgusted! I niver
thocht ye were that sorrt of a gyurl! You'll pack yer traps an' get
away frae here immediately! Sich carryin'-ons in ma hoose!" And she
snorted in contemptuous indignation.

Poor Janet's eyes filled with tears. She was deathly pale, but held
her head high with something of the dignity of her Highland forebears.
"There have been no carrying-ons, madam!"

"Don't gie me ony of yer impertinence, ye trollop!" cried madam, and
David interjected, staring coldly at his brother, "I should have
thought, Alec, that you would have shown more delicacy and respect for
your family than to be carrying on a clandestine--er--ah--" He
stammered and racked his brains for a word which would fit without
being too crude, when Alec interrupted him.

"I know what you were going to say, dear David," he retorted coolly,
"but just let me warn you not to say it! Miss McKinnon"--he turned and
bowed slightly to the baillie's wife--"will pack up her things and
leave here immediately, for to-morrow she'll become my wife!"

"Your _wife_!" chorused the trio. Young Ross was temporarily
absent--having found the treacle scones.

"Yes, my _wife_!" answered Alec, drawing the weeping Janet to him, and
raising his eyebrows, challenged, "Is there anything so very
extraordinary in that?"

David laughed bitterly--a harsh, mirthless cackle. "Your wife," he
sneered. "A common slavey! Don't be foolish, Alexander. If you believe
that is _necessary_"--he emphasized the word--"I think we could fix it
up without disgracing our family."

Alec stepped quickly before his brother and in the ominous glint in
his eye and in the grim set of his jaw, David saw an expression he had
never viewed before in the "shiftless waster," and he recoiled
involuntarily. "Look here, Dave," said the other, with menace in his
tones, "don't you dare make such beastly insinuations. I'm going to
marry Miss McKinnon. I have always intended to marry her, and my
relations with her have been square and above-board. I don't consider
I'm disgracing the family, and family doesn't enter into the thing at
all. If you feel hurt about my affairs, you are at liberty to up hook
and part company, that's all. I don't want to hear another word about
it from anybody!"

David's pale face grew dark. He was furious, but his fury was kindled
by pure selfishness and not through any affection for Alec or interest
in his welfare. He felt that his brother had disgraced him in the eyes
of the Ross family. He was afraid the incident would become the
subject of vulgar gossip and tasty quip to scarify his dignity among
the brokers on "the Street" and the Shipbrokers Association. They
would be sure to stop him and remark callously, "Heard a brother of
yours got in a mess with Baillie Ross's slavey and had to marry her!"
To his mean, narrow soul there could be no other viewpoint.
Clean-hearted love and honor had no place in his shifty mentality. He
almost screamed in excess of rage, "Very well, Alexander! If that's
your intention, go ahead! From this hour I absolutely disown you as a
brother. You are nothing to me from now on. Go to the devil your own
way!" And he turned to the others, "Come, Mrs. Ross! Come, Baillie!
Let's leave this fellow and his woman!"

That night, Alec took Janet to a hotel and left her there after
caressing her tears and fears away. Next morning, he was down to his
ship early and borrowed five pounds from the chief engineer. He saw
his skipper and secured two days leave of absence, and was in his
berth packing up a few necessary clothes in a portmanteau when the
steward announced that a gentleman would like to see him. Thinking it
was David, Alec said, "Send him in!" and waited, prepared for a stormy
session. But it was not David--David was through with him. It was
Baillie Ross, and he fussed into the narrow berth, red-faced and
perspiring.

"Ma puir laddie!" he puffed sympathetically. "I was real sorry aboot
last nicht, ye ken. I didny know ye were coortin' Jinnut, and I'm no
blamin' ye. She's a nice lass--a guid lass--a rale comely yin! Noo,
laddie, ye're gettin' merrit to-day, ye say? Huv ye ony money?"

"I've got enough to get married on, anyway, sir," replied Alec.

"Aye, aye, laddie, but that'll no be much, I'm thinkin'. Weel, weel,
Jinnut is a nice lass an' she was wi' us fur a guid mony years, sae
here's a wee bit weddin' present tae th' baith o' ye! Guid luck tae
ye, an' if ye ever want help, dinna be frichtit tae gie me a call.
Tellyphone me at ma office first though. I widny want Mistress Ross or
yer brither tae ken I was seein' ye. Guid luck an' guidbye!" He fussed
out again leaving the astonished Alec gazing at the two ten pound
notes which the good-natured alderman had thrust into his hands.

They were married quietly that afternoon and spent a brief honeymoon
around Loch Katrine. Three days later, McKenzie was at his station on
the fo'c'sle-head of the _Ansonia_ watching the tug straighten her out
on the first mile of the run from Plantation Quay to the East River
wharves. He was supremely happy, and as his ship swung down the roily
river, his thoughts were of his bride of three days awaiting his
return in a quiet but inexpensive lodging-house, and facing the future
on an income of twelve pounds per month.




CHAPTER TWO


Janet made Alec McKenzie a good wife. She supplied the ambition and
aggressiveness which her husband lacked. No one could say he lowered
himself by marrying Janet McKinnon, for she was quick to realize her
husband's assets in the way of family connections and genuine ability,
and she carried herself as if she were the accepted niece, by
marriage, of the Laird of Dunsany. Other mates' wives called on her,
more out of curiosity than kindness, but she would have none of them
and treated them coldly. Her demeanor impressed the visitors, as it
had already impressed the landlady, and the latter bruited the story
that her lodger was the daughter of a "Hielan' Chief--somewhat rejuced
in circumstances." Mrs. McKenzie did not deny the story; she rather
accepted it and even hinted at it in casual conversation with gossipy
callers.

Alec was a first-class chief officer, but that wasn't good enough for
Janet. She longed for the day when she could be referred to as "Mrs.
McKenzie--wife of Captain McKenzie of the S.S. _So-and-so_," and she
worked skilfully to that end. After much manoeuvering, she struck up
an acquaintanceship with Mrs. Duncan, wife of the marine
superintendent of the Sutton Line, and never missed an opportunity to
impress upon that simple lady the fact that Alec was a nephew of Sir
Alastair McKenzie, and brother to David McKenzie the ship-owner on
Bothwell street.

Though McKenzie longed for promotion, yet he was cursed with a
sailor's bashfulness in seeking office, and of his own volition he
would make no move which would cause his skipper to eye him askance as
a man to be watched. He had known over-ambitious mates who had been
"worked out" of the Line by superiors who felt that their positions
were imperilled by such aspiring underlings, and he abhorred the
thought of being classed as an "owner licker." But Janet had no such
scruples. She was out to speed the day, and before she had been a year
married, she had called on her late employer, Baillie Ross, and sought
his interest in Alec's favor. Ross was climbing in municipal politics
and had recently been elected a director of the Sutton Line, and he
appreciated Janet's efforts to "rise in the warl'." At the first
opportunity, he casually mentioned to the Managing Director of
Suttons' that they had "a maist promisin' young officer in Mr.
McKinzie, chief mate o' the _Ansonia_. He's a nephew o' Sir Alastair
McKinzie an' a brither tae David McKinzie--the risin' ship-broker. He
wad mak' a fine upstaundin' Captun fur wan o' yer boats some day, and
_I wad like tae see him get on_!"

The Managing Director was wise in his day and generation and made a
note of McKenzie's name, but he was too much of a Scotch business man
to promote officers unless they had ability. Captain Duncan was called
in one day and engaged in casual conversation by the manager. "What do
you know of McKenzie, chief officer of the _Ansonia_?" Duncan had been
primed by his wife. "A fine smert officer, sir," answered the marine
superintendent. "Keeps a nate shup and always attends to his wark."

"Drink?"

"No, sir! I've never heard tell o' him bein' a man that used liquor."

"How does he stand in seniority?"

"There's twa or three mates ahead o' him in length o' service, but
nane ahead in smertness. He's well connectit, sir. Nephew tae Sir
Alastair McKenzie and he's merrid on a Hielan' Chief's dochter--a fine
bonny leddy, sir!"

The Managing Director turned over a fyle of papers.

"McCallum, master of the _Trantonia_, has knocked the bows off his
ship in going out of Philadelphia and it has cost us a lot of money.
When the _Ansonia_ comes in this time, you can find a new chief
officer for her. We'll sack McCallum and give McKenzie command of the
_Trantonia_."

Duncan told his wife the news that evening over the tea table and that
worthy lady bustled over with the tidings to Janet. "Mrs. McKenzie,"
she gasped, blowing and puffing as she flopped down in Janet's
parlor-bedroom. "Jeck cam' hame th' nicht an' tells me yer husband's
tae be made captun o' th' _Trantonia_! Ye'll can ca' yersel' Mistress
Captun McKenzie efter this!"

Janet felt like embracing her visitor, but restrained her delight and
murmured. "So kind of you to come over and tell me, Mrs. Duncan. I
appreciate your thoughtfulness. I must write to-night and inform his
uncle, Sir Alastair, of the promotion"--the latter was a white fib for
Mrs. Duncan's benefit--"he'll be pleased, I'm sure."

When Alec arrived home, he was delighted with his good fortune even
though the _Trantonia_ was one of the smallest and oldest steamers in
the Line and had long been relegated to the cargo trade. But she was a
ship, and size made no difference in the status of ship-masters. The
pay--seventeen pounds per month--would enable them to take up house.
Everything was glorious and Alec marvelled at his good luck in being
promoted ahead of mates senior to him in service, and he was not above
voicing regrets for the unfortunate officers who suffered through his
advancement.

"Poor old Johnson," he said. "Been due for a command these ten years.
This will break his heart. Moore is ahead of me and should have got
the next vacancy, for he's a smart, able man. And old McCallum, whose
shoes I jump into. I'm awfully sorry for him, for he's got a large
family and nothing laid by. He'll have to go mate again in his old age
or take a job as watchman around the docks. It's cruel hard, but this
is the mill of the British Merchant Service these days. We jump ahead
over the bodies of the poor devils who slip on the ladder, and God
help those who slip!"

Janet did not share his sympathies and felt rather annoyed. "Why
should you fret about them? They wouldn't worry about you. Now, let's
go and look for a house, dear. There's a lovely three-room-and-kitchen
to let in Ibrox, which is a nice neighbourhood and many Captains live
there." She did not enlighten him as to how he got his promotion.

With Janet spurring him on, McKenzie rose from command to command. For
three years he ran the gamut of the Company's old crocks until, when
Donald Percival was born, he was master of a big five-thousand tonner
in the River Plate trade and drawing a salary of twenty pounds per
month.

McKenzie was happy then, and would have been quite content to remain
as master of a Sutton freighter doing the run from Glasgow to the
Plate. It was an easy fine-weather trade and he was drawing twenty a
month, and occasionally making a pound or two in commissions. There
was only his wife and Donald to support, and he had a comfortable home
in Ibrox--three rooms and kitchen on the second flat, with hot and
cold water, and a vestibule door off the stair landing--a real snug
spot. At sea, he was not over-worked, having a purser to write out
manifests and bills of lading, and he had plenty of time to read and
smoke and take it easy. But with the coming of Donald Percival,
Janet's ambition expanded. "Percival must have a nurse," she wrote to
her husband, "and there are several expenses to be met in connection
with our darling boy. You must get out of the cargo trade and into the
passenger ships, dear. Mrs. Davidson tells me her husband is getting
thirty pounds a month as captain of the _Zealandia_ in the Canadian
emigrant service. You must think of your connections. I shudder when I
imagine you coming up from Buenos Ayres with your ship full of smelly
cattle and sheep ... the passenger ships are more genteel ... the
doctor's bill is quite heavy, dear, and I have retained the services
of a good nurse, as I do not feel equal to housework yet and Percival
requires much care and attention...."

His wife's letter contained a memorandum of the expenses attendant
upon the ushering of Donald Percival into this mundane sphere, and it
caused McKenzie to break out into a cold sweat. "Raising kids is a
devilish expensive business," he confided to the mate, who had
"raised" six. "This youngster of mine stands me something like sixty
pounds!" "Saxty poonds?" gasped Mr. McLeish. "Losh, mon, but yer
mistress mun be awfu' delicate! Mistress McLeish brings them tae port
ivery year an' five quid covers the hale business.... Saxty poonds for
yin bairn? I c'd raise a dizzen for that amoont o' siller. Ye'll need
tae be lucky, Captun, an' fall across some disabled shups yince in a
while if ye're plannin' tae have a family. Saxty poonds? Ma
conscience!"

It was through a streak of God-given luck that the sixty pounds was
paid, and Donald could thank the Fates for sending an Italian emigrant
ship with a broken tail-end shaft across the path of his worried
Daddy. McKenzie picked her up in a gale of wind south of Madeira, and
he had his boats out and a hauling line aboard her ahead of a hungry
Cardiff tramp who had been standing-by for eight hours waiting for the
weather to moderate. "Sixty pounds has to be earned," muttered
McKenzie in his beard, "and there's no Welsh coal-scuttle going to
prevent me from getting it." After a strenuous time, and parting
hawser after hawser, McKenzie plucked the Italian into Madeira, and
the salvage money that came to him afterwards ensured his son's future
as a free-born citizen.

The incident was used by Janet as a stepping-stone to her ambitions.
After the salvage money had been awarded, she chased her husband "up
to the office" and made him interview the Managing Director and ask
for a command in the passenger trade. The official listened
courteously to McKenzie's plea (dictated by Janet) and as Suttons had
benefitted considerably by the Captain's picking up the helpless
Italian, the promotion was forthcoming. With a sigh of regret,
McKenzie carted his belongings from the comfortable River Plate
freighter to the master's quarters on the _Ansonia_--the old ship he
had served in as chief officer.

The _Ansonia_ was not the smart flyer of his younger days, but she
still carried passengers. Second cabin and continental steerage
thronged her decks outward from the Clyde to Boston, and four-footed
passengers occupied the same decks homeward. Those were the days of
the cheap emigrant fares--when the dissatisfied hordes of Central
Europe were transported to the Land of Liberty for three pounds
fifteen--and the _Ansonia_ would ferry them across in eleven days.
McKenzie drove her through sunshine and fog, calm or blow, and took
chances. There was no money in slow passages at the cut-rates
prevailing, and Alec often wished he were jogging to the south'ard in
his nine-knot freighter with but little to worry him. In the
_Ansonia_, the first grey streaks came in his blonde hair, and the
lines deepened around his mouth and eyes.

Janet was happy for a time, but Suttons had better and faster ships
than the one her husband was commanding. Their skippers were getting
more money and were able to maintain "self-contained villas" and keep
a servant. The return cargo of cattle which was the _Ansonia's_ paying
eastward freight offended Janet's sensibilities. She did not care to
have Mrs. Sandys--wife of the master of the Sutton "crack"
ship--asking her at a select "Conversazione" or "high tea"--"How many
head of cattle did your husband lose last voyage?" or "I don't suppose
you visit your husband's ship, Mrs. McKenzie. Those cattle boats are
simply impossible!"

Janet, in her younger days, was not above laboring in odoriferous
cattle byres, but, with her exalted station in life, the mere thought
of the _Ansonia's_ cluttered decks and the honest farm-yard aroma
which pervaded her and could be smelt a mile to loo'ard on a breezy
day, gave her a sinking feeling and dampened her social ambitions.

She felt that she had exhausted all her "string pulling" resources, so
she applied herself to imbuing her husband with more aggressiveness.
Though passionately fond of his wife, yet there were times when
McKenzie felt that he was being _hounded_ ahead. Every cent he earned
was spent in what his wife called "style," and what Alec called "dog."
Janet dressed expensively and did much entertaining, and young Donald
Percival was petted, spoiled, and cared for in a manner far beyond the
rightful limits of a master mariner's pay.

"Make yourself popular with the passengers, dear," counselled his
wifely mentor, "and drive your ship. Suttons like fast passages--"

"Aye," interrupted Alec somewhat bitterly, "but they don't like
accidents. You know what happened to poor Thompson of the _Syrania_?
Driving his ship in a fog to make fast time he cut a schooner in half
and stove his bows in. Suttons lost a pile of money over that, and
Thompson got the sack and is black-listed. His ticket was taken from
him and he barely escaped being tried by an American court for
manslaughter. I saw the poor chap in Boston this time, and what d'ye
think he was doing? Timekeeping for a stevedore firm and getting ten
dollars a week! A man who had commanded an Atlantic greyhound!"

Janet listened impatiently. "Oh, that was just his ill-fortune. I
heard that he was in his bunk when the accident happened--"

Her husband made a gesture of mild irritation. "Good heavens, Janet! A
man must sleep sometime," he said. "Thompson had been on the bridge
for sixty hours and was utterly played out. But that made no
difference. It was his fault. He was driving her full speed in a fog
and that's where they got him--even though Suttons were driving him
with their unwritten instructions--'Be careful with your ship,
Captain, but we expect you to make good passages!' Drive your ship,
but look-out if anything happens to her! That's the English of that!"

By persistent urging, Janet's exhortations had effect. McKenzie
hounded the old _Ansonia_ back and forth along the western ocean lanes
and grew more grey hairs and deeper lines on his face with the worry
and anxiety of long vigils on her bridge staring into the clammy
mists through which his ship was storming. With a chief engineer who
loved her wonderful old compound engines and who was willing to drive
them, McKenzie commenced clipping down the _Ansonia's_ runs until one
day she raced into Boston harbor an hour ahead of her best record
twelve years before, and two days ahead of a rival company's crack
ship, which had left Glasgow at the same time.

The Boston newspapers, heralding the feat and containing a cut of
Captain McKenzie and the ship, were forwarded to head office by the
Boston agents. The Managing Director was delighted over the defeat of
the rival company's crack ship, for the American papers played it up
strong, with two-column, heavy type head-lines and exaggerated
description. After perusal, the canny Scotch manager gave some thought
to McKenzie--the Yankee reporter dilated on the sub-head, 'Scotch
baronet's nephew commands Sutton record breaker,' (Alec had never
opened his mouth about the relationship)--and he began to consider him
seriously as master for the Sutton New York-Glasgow express steamship
_Cardonia_.

A wealthy American, returning to the States after a lease of Dunsany
Castle, unconsciously gave Alec the promotion which the manager had
considered and postponed. The American was rich and fussy, and when
booking his passage, had demanded to do so through the manager. "I
want a suite amidships, sir, 'n I want tew travel in a ship that kin
travel along, as I ain't none too good a sailor. I want to sail with a
skipper that'll make her travel some. 'N bye-the-bye, I saw by a
Boston paper that one of yewr skippers is related to Sir Alastair
McKenzie. I leased the old boy's castle for a while 'n a fine old bird
he is. I'd like mighty fine tew cross the pond with this here McKenzie
if he's on a fast packet, but ain't he on one of those twelve-day
hookers to Boston?"

The manager had made up his mind. A man with McKenzie's connections
would bring lucrative business and be popular in the New York trade.
The other masters in line for promotion would have to wait. "Captain
McKenzie _was_ in the _Ansonia_--one of our intermediate ships--but
we have now placed him in command of our New York Express steamship
_Cardonia_ and we can fix you up splendidly in her." The American
booked passage, and McKenzie commanded the _Cardonia_.

With the promotion came a substantial increase in salary and Janet
felt that her ambitions were realized--for a time at least. New worlds
to conquer would suggest themselves bye-and-bye. The flat in the
Terrace was given up, and a somewhat pretentious eight-roomed red
sandstone villa in a suburban locality was rented, expensively
decorated and furnished, and Mrs. McKenzie, with Donald Percival and a
capable Highland "general," moved in and laid plans for attaining the
rank of first magnitude in the firmament of the local social stars.




CHAPTER THREE


Donald Percival McKenzie was eight years old when the red sandstone
villa became his habitation. He was glad to leave the Terrace where
they formerly lived as his life in that locality, as far as relations
with lads of his own age were concerned, had been none too happy. The
migration to Kensington Villa, as the red sandstone eight-roomer was
called, was accompanied by a determined ultimatum from young McKenzie
that his mother drop the name "Percival" altogether and call him
"Donald" in future. As the ultimatum was presented with considerable
howling and crying and threats of atrocious behavior, the mother felt
that she would have to make the concession.

With this bar to congenial juvenile fraternization removed, Donald
felt free to begin life on a new plane. The youthful residents of the
suburb he now lived in were "superior." They did not run around
barefooted in summer, nor wear "tackety" or hobnailed boots in winter.
Not that Donald scorned either of these pedal comforts. Bare feet were
fine and cool and "tackety" boots gave a fellow a grand feeling of
heftiness in clumping around the house, in kicking tin cans, and in
scuffling up sparks through friction with granolithic sidewalks.
Though superior in mode of living and dress compared with the less
favored lads of Donald's former habitation, yet his new chums were
very much akin to the latter in their scorn and hatred for anything
savoring of "English," and Donald hadn't been in the neighborhood two
days before he had to prove his citizenship in fistic combat with a
youthful Doubting Thomas.

The other lad was bigger and older than Donald and had the name of
being a fighter. He gave young McKenzie a severe drubbing and the
latter had to go home with his clothes torn and his nose bleeding. The
mother was furious and intended to see the other boy's parents about
it, but Donald wouldn't allow her to do so. Instead, he remained home
for an hour or two, changed into a garb less likely to spoil or hinder
the free swing of his arms, and then slipped out to have another try
at defending his name. Once again, Donald, in pugilistic parlance,
"went to the mat for the count," but in rising he announced his
intention of coming back at his fistic partner later--"after I take
boxing lessons an' get my muscle up." Donald's determination, and
possibly the threat, had considerable effect upon Jamie Sampson, who
immediately made conciliatory advances. "I don't want tae hit ye any
more," he said. "Ye're a wee fella'--"

"Am I Scotch?" queried Donald aggressively.

"Shair, ye're Scoatch!" Jamie admitted heartily--adding, "And I'll
punch any fella's noase that says ye're no. Let me brush ye doon,
Donal'!"

Through the exertion of the "fecht" Donald caught a cold and was laid
up for two weeks, but he felt that it was worth it as he had gained
the friendship of Jamie Sampson--"the best fighter on the Road, mamma,
and you should see how he can dunt a ba' with his heid!" Donald's
description of Jamie's prowess in using his skull for propelling a
foot-ball caused Mrs. McKenzie some pain at the language used, and to
her husband she said, "Donald must go to school soon, but we must send
him to a place where he will learn to talk nicely. I think we'll send
him to Miss Watson's private school. She's English and very
particular."

Captain McKenzie looked thoughtfully at his son and sighed. "He's not
very strong," he murmured, "but he's got spirit if he hasn't got
stamina. Fancy him going for that big lad again after getting a
licking! Aye, aye, Janet, he's a hot-house plant, but maybe he'll grow
out of it if we're careful."

Petted and coddled by both parents; seldom rebuked or disciplined,
young Donald was inclined to be "babyish" and somewhat arbitrary. He
was a rather delicate child--a not unusual exception to the law of
eugenics where both parents were ruggedly healthy--and his frequent
sicknesses kept him much at home and in the society of his mother. He
was clever beyond his years and had mastered "A, B, C's" and
"pot-hooks and hangers" prior to his fifth birthday, while at seven,
he could read and write in a manner superior to most thick-skulled
Scotch youngsters of ten. He showed surprising evidences of artistic
talent at an early age, and the blank cover pages and flyleaves of
most of the books in the McKenzie library were adorned with pencil
drawings of railway locomotives and ships--mostly ships. Captain
McKenzie seldom arrived home from a voyage but what he had to pass
critical comment upon his son's artistic conceptions of the _Cardonia_
ploughing the seas in every manner of weather imaginable. There would
be the _Cardonia_ driving through a veritable cordillera of cresting
combers--billows which caused the Captain to shudder involuntarily and
declare that they were so wonderfully realistic that "he could feel
the sprays running down his neck when he looked at them!" The
_Cardonia_ would again be presented in odious comparison with a rival
company's ship, and the latter was always dwarfed in size and far
astern. In Donald's eyes, the _Cardonia_ was superior to anything
afloat--even the crack Liverpool greyhounds of the day were mere
tug-boats compared to her.

Occasionally other ship-masters would accompany Captain McKenzie home
to dinner when his ship was in port, and these were red-letter days
for Donald. After dinner, the seafarers would retire to the
drawing-room and, with pipes or cigars alight and seated before the
grate fire, the talk would inevitably drift to ships and shipping.
With ears open and drinking in the conversation, Donald would be
seated on a cushion in front of the blaze, revelling in the gossip,
and unconsciously absorbing the spirit which, for ages, has set the
feet of Britain's youth a-roving o'er the long sea paths.

Mrs. McKenzie would catch the look of rapt attention on her son's face
and with the long foresight of a mother's mind she would realize that
such talk was not good for a boy to hear if he were to be kept to home
and home pursuits. Besides, she had a fear of the sea--a fear which
was growing on her with time, and only her husband's monthly
home-comings lifted an unknown dread from her heart which returned
with his "good-byes." Though ambitious, proud, extravagant and
somewhat callous where the welfare of others was concerned, yet she
adored her husband and her son, and if put to the choice, would gladly
relinquish her social aspirations for their sakes.

When the wild winter gales raged on the Atlantic and ships were posted
as missing or came in with decks swept, Mrs. McKenzie had her share of
dreadful fears, as have all seamen's wives at these times, but her
husband had been so consistently fortunate that she almost believed
him to be invulnerable to ocean's caprices. True, there were occasions
when the news of the loss of a neighbor's husband at sea would cause
her to frame resolutions to save for such a contingency, but ambition
would dominate these good intentions and she would console or deceive
herself with the thought that "Alec is young yet. He's never had an
accident, and we'll save when Donald is through college."

To her perverted mentality, accidents could happen to others, but they
couldn't happen to Alec. She preferred to think of the sea-captains
who had safely dodged the wrath of the sea and who had retired to snug
stone villas in sea-side towns where they took their ease growing
geraniums and roses and acknowledging the whistle or flag salutes of
brother masters in active service as they passed by. On her lonely
couch, she dreamed of the future days when Alec would retire from the
sea for all time; when she would have him always with her, and when
young Donald Percival--man grown--would be a coming Glasgow architect,
designing structures destined to be the admiration of all eyes.

In conning over her lifetime so far, Janet felt a great pride in her
accomplishments. From the "but and ben" of a poor Highland farm she
had travelled far, and to her credit it must be said that she had
worked and studied hard to keep pace with her social progress. Her
humble origin and the menial service of her pre-marital days had been
skilfully covered, and her quick and active mind readily absorbed the
"correct" conversation, deportment and pursuits which should
necessarily accompany the social status of a "Captain's wife whose
husband was in the New York passenger service, and whose salary was
four hundred pounds a year!"

Since her marriage she had dropped home ties. She felt that she owed
her parents but little. They had brought her into the world, fed and
clothed her for a few years and were glad when she had gone into
"service" in Glasgow. She was off their hands then, and ten brothers
and sisters more than filled her place at home. Neither her father nor
mother could write, and the only time she saw her family again was
when they arrived in Glasgow en route to Canada. They were now out on
a homestead in "Moose Jaw, Chicago, Sacramento or some such outlandish
place," and she had heard nothing from them since they emigrated.

Baillie Ross had attained the coveted Lord Provostship, but with the
honors of the office, he had become unapproachable to Janet. David
McKenzie was flying his own house-flag on several sailing-ships, but
he had discouraged advances by cutting Captain and Mrs. McKenzie
"dead" on the few occasions during which they came face to face. "To
the devil with him!" laughed Alec on the first non-recognition. "I can
get along without him. His name is a curse in the mouths of sailormen
and his ships are notorious as 'work-houses' and 'starvation packets.'
Better not to claim acquaintance with such a brother. He was never
anything to me anyhow!"

Alec had written to his uncle upon one occasion--just a friendly
letter telling of his progress at sea (he was in the _Cardonia_ then),
but Sir Alastair had answered curtly, stating that "David had informed
him of his (Alec's) doings and he didn't care to hear any more about
them!" Alec read the letter thoughtfully, and mentally pictured the
story David would spin to the Baronet. With a bitter smile, he threw
the letter in the fire and wiped both his brother and his uncle
forever from his affections.

Thus, unencumbered or blessed with relations, the McKenzies ploughed
their own furrow and lived happily in their own select sphere. Donald
went to the private school and showed exceptional brilliancy at his
books, even though his tuition was interrupted often by spells of
ill-health. His frequent sicknesses worried the mother, until a famous
Glasgow specialist had examined the lad and given his verdict. "He's
as sound as a bell, madam, but he has a cauld stomach. Keep his feet
warrm and dinna gie him a lot of sweet trash to eat. Dinna coddle him.
Let him rin the streets--it's the life of a laud rinning and jeuking
aboot--and by the time he's twalve or fourteen he'll be as tough as a
louse and as hard tae kill!" Couched in homely Doric, the advice of
the great Doctor Chalmers--famous throughout Great Britain for his
skill and common-sense prescriptions--assuaged Janet's fears and
opened up a desirable vista to Donald Percival.

Captain McKenzie's interpretation of the great physician's advice was
to insist on Donald being sent to a public school. "Let him get along
with real boys, Janet," he maintained. "He's ten years old now and
should be able to take care of himself. If you coddle him too much,
he'll be a namby-pamby baby instead of a live boy--"

"But think of the rough characters he'll meet?" objected his wife.

"He'll have to meet them sometime and the sooner the better. He isn't
going to be a monk that you should want to keep him so inviolable.
Now, Janet, take him away from that kindergarten he's attending and
put him in the Gregg Street Public School right away." Captain
McKenzie was determined, and next day Janet took her ewe-lamb to the
public school in a cab and waited on the head master.

That worthy pedagogue assured Mrs. McKenzie that her hopeful would be
well looked after and that his morals would not necessarily be
contaminated by association with _his_ scholars, and he mentally
wondered how it was that all mothers imagined their own children were
lambs and those of others, wolves and jackals. Twenty years of driving
the rudiments of knowledge into the thick and stubborn skulls of
Scotch youngsters had made him cynical, and he looked upon Donald as
another mild-looking angel with probable devilish propensities.

Young McKenzie was given an examination to determine the grade or
class he was fitted for, and surprised the examiner by his general
intelligence. He was then taken and enrolled on the register of the
Fifth Standard, and a saturnine male teacher gave him a number and a
desk which he had to share with a shock-headed urchin who wore a blue
woollen "ganzey" and "tackety" boots. Shock-head glanced over Don's
black velvet suit and white collar with ill-concealed disdain and,
having taken the measure of his desk-mate, inquired huskily, "Can ye
fight?"

On Donald not deigning to answer this "rude, rough boy," Shock-head
felt encouraged to try the newcomer's spirit by a lusty jab in the
ribs with his elbow. Young McKenzie returned the prod with interest,
which caused Shock-head to grunt and make a swing with his fist. The
eagle-eyed teacher spied the movement and haled the aggressor to the
floor. Producing a snakey-looking leather strap from his pocket, Mr.
Corey took a great deal of the belligerency out of Shock-head by
administering six stinging blows with the strap on the culprit's
outstretched palm. "Now, sir, go to your seat and leave the new boy
alone!"

Shock-head never made a whimper, but returned to his seat and
endeavored to cool his injured palm by spitting and blowing on it.
Such hardihood appealed to Donald and he whispered in the parlance he
was supposed to eschew, "You're a gey tough yin!" The other, still
blowing, nodded and whispered with unmoved lips, "Ah've taken twinty
swipes an' he couldny make me greet!"

At this juncture the bell for "minutes" or recess was tolled and
Donald filed out in company with Shock-head, who evidently bore no
malice.

"Whit's yer name, new fella'?"

"Donald McKenzie! What's yours?"

"Joak McGlashan! Whaur d'ye leeve?"

"Maxwell Park! Where do you live?"

"Thurty-seevin M'Clure street an' up three stairs. Whit does yer
faither wurrk at?"

"He's a sea captain--in the Sutton Line!" declared Donald proudly. The
other paused and looked at him in surprise. "Is he? Whit boat is he
on?" There was curiosity in his tone.

"The _Cardonia_!"

McGlashan made an exclamation of pleased astonishment. "My! but that's
funny," he said. "Ma faither's bos'n on the _Cardonia_ an' he's great
pals wi' your auld man. They get on fine thegither. Jist think o' that
noo! Is she no th' fine shup th' _Cardonia_? Did ye ever see th' bate
o' her?" And the two boys were chums instantly.

Mrs. McKenzie came down at four and took Donald home in a cab. "And
how did you get on, dear?" she asked--nervously glancing at the noisy
mob of school children who were lingering around to watch "the toff
gaun hame in a cab!"

"Fine, mamma, fine! I've got a chum already--Joak McGlashan--and his
papa's bos'n on the _Cardonia_! He says his pa's great pals with my
_old man_!"--(Mrs. McKenzie gasped)--"and mamma, Joak is a gey tough
yin!"--(Another gasp)--"he can stand twenty swipes on the hand from
the teacher's strap without bubblin'! Aye, an' he's going to put a
horse-hair on his hand next time he gets punished and he'll split
Mister Corey's strap to bits. I'm going to bring Joak out to tea some
time soon"--(the mother shuddered)--"and he's going to learn me to
stand on my hands and skin the cat and sklim a lamp-post!" At the
mention of this contingency and the terms used in naming certain
athletic accomplishments, Mrs. McKenzie reached for her smelling salts
and felt that the carefully built fabric of years was crumbling.

To her husband that night, Janet said dolefully, "I'm afraid Donald is
going to lose all his gentility and good manners at that common
school. He has chummed up already with a Jock McGlashan who says that
his father is a great 'pal' of yours--a boatswain or something on your
ship--"

McKenzie laughed. "Oh, yes!--McGlashan! Well! He's a good honest sort
of a fellow and he's sailed with me a good many years. It won't hurt
Donald to be democratic. When I was a young chap I ate and slept and
shared clothes and tobacco with fellows who are quartermasters with me
now, and good chaps they are too. Don't bring our boy up to believe
he's better than anybody else. If you do, he'll be like a young
bear--all his troubles before him."

"But Donald wishes to bring this McGlashan boy up here to play with
him!" protested Janet. "Just think of the manners of M'Clure street
being introduced here!"

The other smiled and patted his wife's hand. "Don't worry, dear. If
Donald wants young McGlashan to play with him here, let him do so.
Better to have McGlashan here than have Donald go down to M'Clure
street. He won't learn any more deviltry from my bos'n's kid than he
would from young Sampson or the other imps who live in this
neighborhood." Then, in a kindly tone, he added significantly, "You
know, Janet, I was never one for making distinctions in breed or
birth. One finds true gentlemen and real ladies dressed in the meanest
clothes and serving in the humblest capacities. Let Donald have plenty
of rope and don't coddle him too much."

Young McKenzie's introduction to public school life was rather a
severe trial to a delicately nurtured boy, who had so far been, as
jeering school-mates declared, "tied tae his mither's apron strings!"
His undoubted cleverness in the school-room commanded no admiration
from his kind. On the other hand, he was reviled and held up to
contempt as one who was false to school-boy traditions by actually
studying his lessons--"tae keep in wi' th' teacher!" The majority of
Scotch boys preferred to have their lessons driven into their hard
heads by dint of much corporal punishment rather than lose valuable
play hours by "dinnin' ower their buiks."

The fact that he lived in a villa in a select suburb, took piano,
singing and dancing lessons, and wore nice clothes and a white linen
collar--clean every morning--militated against him for a time. To his
blue-jerseyed companions, white collars were the trade-marks of a
"bloomin' toff" and fair game for desecrating with ink and muddy paws.
Mrs. McKenzie used to tremble with indignation at the sight of her
son's collar on his return from school, but after a month the soiled
linen ceased to offend her eyes, as Donald simply removed his collar
before entering school and put it on again prior to his entering his
home.

He would have fared worse had it not been for Joak McGlashan. Joak was
a "tough yin" and had considerable renown as a fistic gladiator. The
arena for these encounters was a piece of waste land near the school
and screened from the eyes of prowling "polismen" by a high
bill-posting boarding. "Efter fower o'clock" was the invariable hour
of combat, and many the time Donald arrived home late for tea through
acting as second for the invincible Joak. These after-school fights
were often sanguinary affairs and the Scotch stubborness and pugnacity
were well exemplified in the savagery of the contestants. Scratching,
kicking, and hitting a downed man were strictly taboo, but everything
else went, and to see the appreciative looks on the faces, and hear
the excited yells of the spectators during one of these "after four"
meetings, one would be convinced that the Scottish youth was not far
removed from his barbaric ancestor.

No boy in the school could avoid doing a round or two behind the
bill-boards within a month of his entry into the Gregg street
institution. If he hadn't trampled the hallowed mud of the spot as a
combatant it was either because he was too big and strong to be
challenged, or because he was a coward. If the latter, his life would
be made a misery to him and he would either have to leave the school
or go into the arena with the weakest of his tormentors and either
beat him or be beaten. A boy who had fought, whether licked or not,
had proved himself and would be unmolested.

In due time Donald's hour of trial came. A dock-lumper's hulking son
had usurped Donald's hook in the cloak room and had thrown his coat on
the floor. Donald saw the action and resented it by throwing the
other's coat off. No blows were exchanged at that time, as the
argus-eyed janitor was around, but Luggy Wilson--the big
fellow--doubled up his fist and tapped his nose significantly, saying,
"Efter fower! Ah'll do ye! Ye'll fight me, McKenzie--dirrty toff!"

Luggy was big and strong but lacked "sand." Donald was endowed with
plenty of "grit," and in the fight that followed behind the
bill-boards after school, he came off the victor. A lucky punch on
Luggy's proboscis drew blood, and when the big fellow sighted his own
gore he ran away home. Intoxicated with the exhilaration of victory,
Donald insisted on Joak accompanying him to Maxwell Park as a reward
for seconding him, and Joak, feeling just pride in his protégé, was
glad to go and be in a position to give Captain McKenzie an
eye-witness's account of the fracas.

It was almost six o'clock when Donald, accompanied by Joak, burst into
the McKenzie drawing-room. Both Captain and Mrs. McKenzie were at home
and the Presbyterian minister and his wife--particular folk--were with
them awaiting dinner. At the sight of her son--covered with mud, with
swollen lips and a rapidly blackening eye, and accompanied by a
shock-headed youngster in blue woollen jersey and hob-nailed
boots--Mrs. McKenzie nearly fainted.

"Ah've had a fight, mamma!" ejaculated Donald, relapsing into the
language of the street. "Ah licked a big fella ca'd Luggy Wulson. He
was a big lump with nae guts and I bliddied his beak and gave him a
keeker! Didn't I, Joak?"

"Ye did!" grunted Joak laconically, taking in the luxurious
surroundings of his "pal's hoose."

Mrs. McKenzie rang for the maid and gasped, "Mary! Take these boys out
in the kitchen and clean them!"

The minister and his wife sat very prim and quiet. Mrs. McKenzie felt
that her darling had fallen from his pedestal, while Captain McKenzie
strode to the bay window and looked out with smiling eyes--secretly
delighted--and proud to know that he had a son that was "all boy."




CHAPTER FOUR


Two years at the Gregg Street Public School saw Donald in that exalted
grade of learning known as the "Ex-sixth"--a sort of educational
Valhalla which conferred a brevet rank upon one and caused the
scholars of lesser degree to look up to its members with awe. The
pupils of the Ex-sixth were supposed to have out-grown "the strap,"
and their curriculum led them into the envied precincts of the school
laboratory, where, at certain times, they could do all sorts of
wonderful things with Bunsen burners, and test tubes, and hydrometers
and such like. In this class a fellow could make gun-powder on the sly
and color his knife or a white-metal watch and chain to look like gold
by dipping it in copper sulphate.

Though Donald could boast of no prowess at the strenuous athletic
games of football, running, jumping, etc., yet he developed remarkable
ability as a swimmer. Swimming lessons were compulsory in the Gregg
Street School and a fine swimming bath was attached to the
institution, and the scholars had to take at least two lessons a week
under the tutelage of a master of the natatory art. Young McKenzie
took to the water like a duck, and his proficiency made him a favorite
with the master and a contestant in inter-school matches, and during
his year in the Ex-sixth he won the Glasgow Amateur Swimming Shield
for schoolboys under 14 years of age.

His educational progress at the school had been marked by
commendation and praise. He was an example to all, and on the "Prize
Day" he invariably trotted home loaded with gift-books marked inside
the cover, "Presented to Donald P. McKenzie for Excellence in
Drawing," or maybe it was for history, composition, geography, or some
such subject in which he excelled. The constant repetition of
McKenzie's name on "Prize Day" caused less-favored youngsters to feel
bored and to express their desire to give the clever one "a punch on
th' noase" for being so mentally efficient. This desideratum was
expressed _sotto voce_ and to intimates, as McKenzie's fame as a
fighter had been established since his encounter with Luggy Wilson,
and who McKenzie couldn't fight, his chum, Joak McGlashan could, so he
was treated with considerable respect for a "toff that wuz clever at
learnin'."

Joak's intellectual powers kept him to the Fifth Standard, and it was
doubtful if he would go beyond that grade. He would never have
retained his place in it were it not for Donald, who primed him and
did his home work for him during the time the two were class-mates.
Bos'n McGlashan used to regard with some wonder a prize book which his
son had won for "General Excellence in Drawing" while with Donald in
the Fifth Standard, and wonder still more when during Joak's second
year in the Fifth his drawing percentage was the lowest of any in the
class. Joak explained this inexplicable loss of artistic ability by
stating that he had sprained his thumb and couldn't hold a pencil like
during the prize-winning year, but to Donald he regretted the
deception as one which gave him a lot of unnecessary work in trying to
live up to it. The "sprained thumb" excuse came as a grateful relief.

Though separated by the gulf of learning, Donald and Joak fraternized
as of yore, but Mrs. McKenzie absolutely refused to allow the
McGlashan boy to come to the villa in Maxwell Park. Donald's frequent
lapses from the ethics of polite society in occasional interlardings
of his conversation with "Glesca" vernacular, and in lengthy absences
on Saturdays and holidays from the precincts of the villa, were laid
to the baneful influence of Joak. Joak was blamed for Donald's
home-comings with dirt-bespattered clothing and grimy face. Joak was
the leading spirit in those all-day pilgrimages "doon to the Docks,"
and Joak was to be indicted for sending Donald home one day soaked to
the skin after he had fallen off a raft which they had constructed to
sail on the stagnant waters of a railway cut.

Saturday was a day of days with the boys. It was the day in which they
toured the Port of Glasgow and conned its multifarious shipping; when
they trudged from dock to dock, and basin to basin and appraised the
model and rig of every craft that lay therein. "There's a bonny boat
fur ye noo, Donal'," Joak would say as he eyed a liner with
white-painted upper works and yarded masts. "She's a big yin--an Injia
boat, Ah'm thinkin'!" Donald would scan her with a sailorly eye.
"She's not an India boat, Joak. She's in the North Atlantic trade.
There's no coolies aboard her. There's always coolies on an India
boat. Now, just look at that big sailing-ship beyond the bend. There's
a boat for ye! Let's go down and maybe we can get aboard her." Thus
the pilgrims would go--dodging shunting engines and rumbling
coal-trucks, cargo hoisting cranes and Dock Police--and the middle of
the day would find them trudging up the odoriferous and noisy confines
of M'Clure street, where at number thirty-seven, up three flights of
stone stairs, Donald would find a welcome and a bite to eat from the
big-hearted Mistress McGlashan. Of course, Mrs. McKenzie knew nothing
of these social calls on her son's part. If she did, Donald's Saturday
pilgrimaging would have been ruthlessly cut short.

It was a memorable day when in their prowls around the docks, Donald
and Jock saw a wonderfully fine ship come up the river and moor at the
Sutton Line quay. She was a new purchase of Sutton's--a former London
East India liner, and Suttons had bought her to put her in the New
York trade as an off-set to a brand new ship which their rivals had
just launched. Both boys admitted that the "new yin" was finer than
the _Cardonia_, and both inwardly voiced the hope that their
respective daddies would have the privilege of sailing on the latest
addition to the Sutton fleet.

At school a week later, Donald sought his chum with portentous news.
"My father's going as Captain of the new ship, and she's to be called
the _Sarmania_. Isn't that fine, Joak?"

Next morning young McGlashan had news. "Ma faither's gaun as bos'n o'
th' new yin, Donal'. He told me this morrn, an' he's gey prood. She's
th' finest shup oot th' Clyde, he says!"

When Captain McKenzie discussed the new ship with his wife, Donald
showed a surprising knowledge of the vessel's rig, design and tonnage.

"By George, young man," exclaimed the father, "how do you happen to
know so much about the ship?"

Mrs. McKenzie laughed. "What is there he doesn't know?" she said. "Why
he spends all his Saturdays and holidays wandering around the docks
with that McGlashan imp and I can't prevent him. I'm always in fear
that he'll be killed or drowned there some day."

Captain McKenzie looked at his son. "What is the idea?" he enquired.
"Why this craze for dock-wandering and ship-worshipping?"

"Why?" reiterated Donald slowly. "Why? Because I intend to go to sea
myself some day!"

Captain McKenzie looked his son over critically and stroked his beard.
Donald was twelve years old then--a tall, slim, comely lad. He had his
mother's dark hair and large dark brown eyes. The eyes were clear and
sparkling and expressive of the boy's emotions and served to lend
distinction to a face which might otherwise be characterized as
"plain." His forehead was high; the nose was straight and the mouth
large and firm, but there was a pallor to the skin which did not
betoken rugged health, although he was wiry enough. His hands were
small, with long artistic fingers, and as he looked at them, Captain
McKenzie could not imagine those frail hands digging for finger-hold
into the rough canvas of a wet topsail. Nor could he vision this
carefully nurtured lad scrambling aloft on a dark, dirty night to the
dizzy height of a swaying royal-yard, or tugging and hauling at wet
ropes on a sluicing deck. A boy who had been trained in painting,
music, singing, dancing and the culture of the drawing-room to herd
with rough-spoken men who looked upon such accomplishments as
effeminate and worthy only of curseful scorn; a boy that had never
slept anywhere but in a warm, downy bed; who had never wanted for
anything; who had never known cold and hunger; who had been petted and
waited upon by a doting mother--Pah! The sea would kill him ere he had
been a dog-watch in a ship's company!

The father spoke quietly. "Donny, my lad," he said, drawing his son to
his knee, "you must give up that notion. The sea would kill you,
laddie. You're not strong enough for that life, and it's a dog's life
at the best of times. Why, boy, I'd rather be a farmer with a snug
place ashore than skipper of the _Sarmania_ to-day."

"But Nelson was a delicate boy, daddy," protested Donald, "and he came
along all right."

"Yes, Donny, but Nelson was a man in a million. He was a solitary
exception. I've seen poor little shavers go to sea and have to be
taken ashore on a mattress absolutely crocked up for the remainder of
their days. You'd be wasted at sea, laddie. You have ability and
talents far beyond what I have, and if you develop them you should be
wealthy and famous by the time you're my age. No, no, boy! You must
get that sea-fever out of your head. It's no good, believe me!"

"Joak McGlashan's going to sea, Dad, and we both planned to go
together when we were fifteen or sixteen."

The father smiled. "How are you going to work that? McGlashan's folks
could never afford to apprentice him. He'd have to go in the fo'c'sle
as a boy."

"Well, Dad, we planned we might go in a steamer together as deck-boys
and serve our time. The sailing-ships might be too hard for me at
first, but a steamer would be easier--"

The Captain burst into a guffaw. "You think so, eh? Let me tell you
that you'll do more real back-breaking and menial work aboard of a
steamer than you'll do on a sailing-ship. On a steamer! Huh! Shoveling
ashes and cleaning out holes that a man couldn't get into! A dirty
deckboy at the beck and call of every ordinary seaman--and on a
steamer! God forbid! They don't make sailors on steamers, and even if
you served your time in steam and got a master's certificate, there
isn't a ship-owner would give you a ship, nor would you obtain the
respect of officers and crew if you did get one. There's no back-door
for reaching the bridge in sea-faring. You have to serve your time in
sail, and go thro' the mill, otherwise you'd never get to be more than
a common deck-hand no matter how clever you were. There is a
time-keeper down in the wharf office with an Extra Master's
certificate, and he can't get even a second mate's berth. Why? Because
he served his time in steam. He knows all about navigation, but he
couldn't put a square-rigger about, and that has damned him in the
eyes of owners and sailormen. He might have the theory, but he hasn't
the practice, and that cooked his goose. Now, sonny, we'll just drop
all this notion of going to sea and you'll study hard and be an
architect and stay home and keep your mother company. One of us at sea
is enough!"

Donald left the room abruptly and Mrs. McKenzie sat beside her
husband. "I'm so glad you have talked to Donald, Alec," she said.
"He's just crazy about going to sea, and I've heard nothing but ships,
ships, and ships for months. He gloats over that sailing ship picture
there and reads nothing but sea-stories, and I think that he and that
McGlashan boy spend all their spare time around the docks. I hope you
can drive the fancy out of his head."

"All British boys have the fever at some time in their youth," said
the Captain with a laugh. "He'll get over it. He can't go to sea
unless he runs away, and I'm sure he won't do that!"

Upstairs in the privacy of his bedroom, Donald was prone on a sofa
crying bitterly. His dreams and ideals had been ruthlessly smashed. He
felt bitterly the lack of health and strength to do what other boys
could do. How could he face Joak and tell him that he couldn't
accompany him in his sea-faring? It was hard to give up the idea after
dreaming and weaving fancies around it so long. For an hour he lay
alone in his misery, until the father and mother found him and petted
and caressed him back to smiles again. "Don't fret, Donny-boy," said
the father, who understood. He drew the boy to him and brought the
wan, tear-stained face to his shoulder. "I tell you what I'll do,
sonny," he said.

Donald looked up expectantly. "What, daddy?"

"Next May, if all goes well, I'll take you and mamma on a voyage to
New York and back. How's that?"

"Hurray!" All disappointment was forgotten in the promise, and the boy
alternately hugged his father and skipped around the room in joyful
antics. "Won't that be great! Hurray! Jingo! I must tell Joak. And in
the _Sarmania_ too! I can hardly wait until the winter's over. Just
think of it, mamma! To New York! Three thousand miles across the
Atlantic!" His delight knew no bounds and seafaring ideals were, for
the nonce, postponed.

On a brumal November day, the _Sarmania_ was to sail on her first trip
under the Sutton house-flag. Captain McKenzie had bidden his family an
affectionate farewell early in the morning and had driven away in a
cab with his white canvas sea bag and portmanteau on the "dicky."
Mother and son had watched the four-wheeler rattle down the road and
had waved to the Captain peering for a last glance of home through the
window. Partings are holy moments, fraught with memories and fears,
and both watched the conveyance disappear from sight without speaking.
"Mamma," said Donald, when they entered the house again, "what do you
say if we take a cab this afternoon and drive down to Renfrew and see
the ship pass down the river. I'd like to see daddy's ship going down
to the sea." The idea appealed to Mrs. McKenzie and she assented
eagerly. "And mamma," continued Donald, "I'd like to ask a favor and I
hope you'll grant it."

"What is it, dear?"

"Let me go and get poor Joak McGlashan and take him with us. His papa
is on the _Sarmania_ too, and I'm sure it would be a great treat for
him to see the ship."

Mrs. McKenzie's lips pursed and she was about to refuse gently, but
something had softened her heart towards the undesirable Joak, and she
gave permission. Donald grabbed his hat and coat and was off to
thirty-seven M'Clure street.

Later in the day a cab plodded down to the grassy banks of the Clyde
at Renfrew and the occupants got out. Joak had had a hair-cut and wore
a collar--an adornment which chafed his neck and made him feel like a
"bloomin' toff." In Mrs. McKenzie's eyes, the youth, thus adorned,
looked quite passable, and were it not for his "atrocious
conversation," she would have been impelled to invite Joak to tea on
occasions. Joak's dialect, however, barred him from the polite society
of Maxwell Park, and Mrs. McKenzie felt that the restrictions could
not be relaxed.

The party sat on a seat by a river-side path until Donald, who had
been scanning the roily windings of the Clyde citywards, discerned
three tall masts coming slowly around a bend. "Here she comes!" he
cried.

Slowly and majestically the liner swung into view, with a
paddle-wheeled tug straining at a stern hawser, and the boys scanned
her over with appreciative delight. The _Sarmania_ was, indeed, a
queen among ships--a long, straight-stemmed, black-hulled dream of a
vessel, flush-decked from stem to stern, with white painted rails,
stanchions and life-boats in orderly array, and varnished teak
deck-houses, whose brass-rimmed ports glittered in the cold November
daylight. A lofty, black, red-banded funnel arose from a phalanx of
ventilators amidships, and three tall pole masts, with square yards
crossed on the fore, added to the appearance of a handsome ship.

The pilot-jack flew from a stem-head staff just in front of the
uniformed Chief Officer standing up in the eyes of her; the graceful
Stars and Stripes waved from the fore-truck, while the Sutton house
flag and a red mail pennant decorated the other masts. Astern, from
the jack-staff lazily waved "the old red duster"--the "blood and guts
of Old England"--the red ensign of Britain's Merchant Marine, and "The
Flag" never floated from a nobler looking ship.

Mrs. McKenzie saw not the ship. Her eyes were riveted on the high
bridge which stood, spider-like, on stout iron stanchions forward of
the long funnel, and upon which strode her husband, uniformed, alert,
and monarch absolute of the little world he ruled. Captain McKenzie
paused in his thwartship pacings and whipped up a pair of binoculars
to his eyes. The boys were swinging their caps and shouting; Mrs.
McKenzie was waving a handkerchief. The Captain spied them, and taking
off his uniform cap waved heartily. He turned for a moment and gave an
order. A burst of steam whirled up from the liner's funnel and the
syren blared forth a farewell roar. "He's blawin' th' whustle tae ye!"
yelled Joak. "Ah see ma faither at the front o' the shup. Haw,
faither! Haw, faither!" And Joak yelled himself hoarse at the stocky
figure which detached itself from a knot of seamen and waved a cap at
the rail.

Slowly the fine ship glided past, decks thronged with passengers, and
a column of black smoke ascended from the funnel as the firemen stoked
for "a full head of steam." The stern tug came abreast of the
watchers, and the ship swung around a bend and slowly vanished.

Mrs. McKenzie called the boys, and with something of an ache in her
heart, she drove home--remaining silent while the others chattered and
described the fine points of the wonderful ship their fathers sailed
in.

The _Sarmania_ arrived in New York after a rapid passage, and Donald
and Joak had discussed stealing down to the river-side when the ship
was due back and watching her come in, but the December weather had
set in with gales of wind and rain and the time of the ship's arrival
was problematical, so they gave up the idea and decided to meet the
ship at the quay should the time of day be appropriate.

On a cold, wet winter's morning, Donald trudged to school, intending
at lunch hour to go down to the wharf office and ask if there was any
word of the _Sarmania_, which was then due. Joak was not present that
morning, but that was nothing unusual, as Joak was becoming tired of
the Fifth Standard and played truant often. The morning dragged
slowly. It was a dark, dismal Glasgow day--a day of sullen clouds and
slashing rain--when the street lamps remained alight to do the work of
the skulking sun, but Donald hummed softly at his work and looked
forward to an evening with his father and a recital of the wonderful
_Sarmania's_ maiden passage in the New York trade. He would be in that
day, sure enough! He was a day late, but they always gave a day extra
on winter passages, and Alec McKenzie seldom exceeded it.

Noon came and Donald was seated in a corner of the play-ground shed
eating a lunch and kicking his legs to keep warm, when Joak--a grimy,
wet and haggard Joak--came running up. Donald noticed that the tears
were streaming from his eyes. "Who hit ye?" he gasped as he stood up
and caught his staggering chum.

Joak ignored the question. "Oh Donal', it's awfu', it's awfu'! Ah
dinna ken what to say!" And the tears and sobs burst forth anew.

Donald was alarmed. "What is the matter, Joak? Tell me, quick!"

Joak looked up from the bench upon which he had thrown himself prone
and in a voice punctuated by sobs and moans, told the news.

"We're orphans, Donal'. Th' _Sarmania's_ jist cam' in an' your faither
an' my faither is no aboard her. They were lost oot on the Atlantic!"

The lunch dropped from Donald's hand. For a moment he stood paralyzed,
staring at his weeping chum. The dreadful sense of his loss benumbed
his brain and he almost felt like laughing insanely. Then reason and
realization came rushing back, and he fled from the school and ran,
with fear urging him, to his mother and home.




CHAPTER FIVE


Donald rushed into the house to find visitors in the front parlor with
his mother. He peered through the curtain and saw her seated on a
lounge, deathly pale, and twisting a sodden handkerchief in her
fingers. By her red-rimmed, swollen eyes, Donald knew she had been
crying. The visitors were Captain McGillivray, the Sutton Line Marine
Superintendent, and a burly man in uniform whom Donald recognized as
Mr. McLeish, Chief Officer of the _Sarmania_. Both men rose to their
feet as Donald slipped in and ran to his mother's side. Clasped in her
arms and crying silently, he listened to Mr. McLeish's story--told
with all technical embellishments through nervousness and an effort to
keep from tears. Poor, honest, simple-hearted McLeish! It was a hard
task they gave him!

"Ye see, Mistress McKenzie," he proceeded huskily, "we left Sandy Hook
on the morn o' the sixth o' December an' ran intae a succession o'
heavy easterly gales. We made twenty west four days ago, when it
sterted in tae blow worse'n ever frae the east'ard and an awful sea
made up. Th' Captain didny dare steam her in th' face o' sich a wind
an' sea, so he keppit her heid to it and turning over jist enough to
give her steerage-way. Yer husband, madam, was a wonderful sailor and
he handled that _Sarmania_ beautifully, and mind ye, she's a shup that
needs carefu' handlin'--bein' a long, deep shup wi' no much beam. As I
was sayin', we kep' her bows-on to it waitin' for a let-up, and at
fower in th' mornin' I had jist cam' doon aff the bridge tae go tae
ma room. The Captun, yer husband, was up on the bridge wi' th' second
mate, Mister Murphy, and a quarter-master in th' wheel-hoose, when she
shipped a nasty sea what carried away a ventilator on the fore-deck.
The bos'n and three men were pluggin' th' place when the shup fell
down in a reg'lar hole, they tell me. Ah was jist in ma room, at th'
time, and I could feel th' shup slidin' doon jist as if th' sea had
droppit from under her bottom. Ah rin tae the door o' the alley-way
and looks oot tae see a tremendous comber pilin' up ahead. It was a
terrifyin' sea, that yin, madam, and I never saw anither like it in a'
ma sea-farin'! Then it must ha' hit th' shup, for she staggered
somethin' awfu' and I couldny hear nought for a meenut or twa but the
crashin' and the roarin' of it. Ah laid on ma back in the alley-way in
water and I thocht th' _Sarmania_ was done for an' goin' to the
bottom. Then I pickit masel' up an' went oot on deck and I found th'
whole bridge and wheel-house gone, the funnel, hauf o' the ventilators
and a' th' boats. She was stripped to bare decks and stanchions,
madam, but worst of all, madam, yer husband was gone! Aye, him an' the
second mate, and the quartermaster at the wheel, and th' bos'n and
fower men. Eight gone, madam, and fower sae badly mashed up that I
doot if they'll leeve!" McLeish paused and blew his nose violently.
"That's a' there is tae tell, madam," he murmured. "Ah'm awfu'
sorry--awfu'----sorry!" He repeated the words in a daze like a man
tired out.

Captain McGillivray arose to his feet. "Mrs. McKenzie," he said
quietly, "we'll no keep ye from yer sorrow. Ye've had a terrible blow,
but that's what comes tae sailors' wives at times. The Loard giveth
and the Loard taketh away. Blessed is the name of the Loard. May He
give ye comfort and strength in yer sair affliction!"

"Amen tae that!" murmured McLeish, and the two men took their leave.

       *       *       *       *       *

Janet was left with nothing. Alec had never taken out insurance of any
kind, and both husband and wife had lived up to every cent of income.
There were many bills to be paid--caterer's bills; dressmaker's
bills--useless debts, most of them, and the furniture of Kensington
Villa had to be sold to pay them. Aye, Janet was suffering and paying
the price of folly, and the double load of sorrow and recrimination
was all that she could bear.

The huge tidal wave that swept McKenzie and his men to their graves in
the chilly depths of the Atlantic did more than that. It swept the
McKenzies from comparative affluence into stark poverty. It also
cleared from Janet's eyes the scales of false pride, and she was not
too proud to go down and mourn with poor McGlashan's widow ere she
left Glasgow and her fair-weather friends.

The bos'n's wife would get along. An older son was out earning a
little, and Joak would have to do his bit also. Aye, she would manage.
She had a few pounds laid by and wouldn't starve. Poor Joak was
"greeting" when Donald bade him "Good-bye." "I'll meet you again some
day, Joak," he said, "and I'll write you, never fear!"

The management of Sutton's had sent a cautiously-worded letter of
regret, and took the liberty of "enclosing our check for fifty pounds,
which no doubt would be useful." They presumed, with the good salary
that Captain McKenzie had enjoyed, that Mrs. McKenzie would have
prepared for possible contingencies, and that she would be
comfortable.

The fifty pounds represented Janet's sole capital after all debts had
been paid, and with this in her purse and a few boxes and trunks of
personal clothing, she and Donald vanished from the ken of the
aristocratic denizens of Maxwell Park. The tired-looking, dull-eyed
woman in deep mourning who left the suburb that cold January morning,
had but little resemblance to the haughty and conceited _Jeanette_
McKenzie of a month before. Janet had commenced to learn a new
lesson--a lesson which is oft intoned in cold Scotch kirks, "Beware of
sinful pride! The pride of thine heart has deceived thee and though
thou shouldest make thy nest as high as the eagle, I will bring thee
down from thence, saith the Lord!" Aye, better the sight of eyes that
see humbly than the blindness of vanity and desire!

Mother and son landed in a sea-port town not fifty miles from Glasgow
and Janet rented a small furnished house in a modest street. The
neighbors wondered who the "stylish lookin'" newcomers were, yet they
evinced no great surprise when a printed placard was hung up in the
front window with the legend, "Furnished Lodgings." Buchan Road gossip
sized the matter up in a few words. "Weedah-wumman left sudden-like
an' naethin' pit by!" Such incidents were common in that locality.

And thus they lived for a space. The mother relapsed to the honest
toil of her former days and just "managed" and no more to make ends
meet, and Donald earned a few shillings per week as boy in the office
of a local ship-yard. Both worked hard and were happy, and life went
along uneventfully for two years.

Then came Mrs. McKenzie's decision. Donald was not getting ahead in
the shipyard office. The boy was restless and found it hard to apply
himself to ledgers and journals. He had no liking for a clerical life,
and he was reaching the age where he did not know what he wanted to
do. Mrs. McKenzie had her secret ambition to see her son an architect,
but in her present circumstances she couldn't afford it. There was one
source of possible assistance she had never appealed to. She would try
it right away.

On a drizzling spring day, the mother, still comely and dressed in
black, accompanied by Donald--a bit taller, perhaps, but unchanged in
features, and clad in carefully brushed clothes and with a clean white
collar on and shining black boots--stopped in front of an office
building in Bothwell Street, Glasgow. A brass plate bore the legend
they sought--"D. McKenzie & Co., Ship Owners & Ship Brokers."

Entering a rather gloomy office they waited at a counter until a lanky
clerk of undeterminable age unlimbered himself from a high stool and
brusquely asked, "What can we do for ye?"

"I want to see Mr. McKenzie, if he is in."

"He's in," grunted the clerk. "Have ye a kerd? And what's yer business
with him?"

"Purely private and personal," replied Janet, producing a visiting
card--relic of better days.

The clerk scanned the name and became obsequious. "Wait a minute,
ma'am," he said, and he took the card into a private room. He seemed
to be gone a long time--long enough for Donald to scan his uncle's
office and its contents. There were several pictures of ships on the
wall, a few maps, and insurance calendars. Numerous old-fashioned
desks and cupboards littered the place, while an old-maidish female
clerk sat at a window writing in a large book, and a bent-backed,
grey-haired man was copying letters in a press. Everything in the
establishment, material and human, seemed to be old and dried-up and
mean looking. The windows were grimy, and even the driving spring rain
failed to make them clearer. Donald figured that the grime was on the
inside.

The boy's attention was centered on a picture of a large iron barque
on the wall in front of him. It was a big ship--heavily sparred--and
it was riding along with all sail set over a sea like corrugated iron.
Painted on the frame was the legend, "Barque _Dunsany_, D. McKenzie &
Co., Glasgow, Owners." Donald was studying the painting, when the
lanky clerk issued from the sound-proof inner chamber. Addressing Mrs.
McKenzie, he said, almost insolently, "Mr. McKenzie cannot see you!"

Janet colored. "Why?" she asked calmly.

"He gave no reasons, ma'am," said the clerk. "Simply said he didny
want to see you on any matter or any excuse."

The mother went white. Her mission had failed and she was too proud to
plead. "Come, Donald," she said. "We'll go!"

They had hardly reached the stairs before the clerk caught up to them.
"Mr. McKenzie has changed his mind," he exclaimed. "He will see you if
ye'll come back with me."

A minute later they were ushered into the private office and stood
facing the man--Alec's brother--who in bitterness and unreasonable
pride had kept himself aloof from them for eighteen years.

He was seated before a large table littered with papers and books--a
hard-visaged, stiff-mouthed man, pallid-faced and stern-looking. His
thin hair straggled over his forehead, unkempt, and he sat back in his
chair with his head hunched into his collar, his clean-shaven chin
sunk into his chest, and regarded the McKenzies through steel-rimmed
spectacles with searching, unfriendly eyes.

There were two chairs in the office and he indicated one with his
hand. "Sit doon, madam!" he said in a harsh voice. "The boy can
stand!" And he glanced sternly at his brother's son.

Donald stood up with his hat in his hand and stared at his uncle with
feelings of resentment and dislike bubbling within him. It was
difficult for him to believe that this hard-faced ship-broker and his
laughing, rollicking, blue-eyed daddy were of the same blood and born
of the same mother.

McKenzie spoke and his voice burred with Scottish accent and grated
like a saw on iron. "What d'ye want me to do for ye, madam? Ye've come
to me wanting something, or I've missed my guess!"

Donald could notice a look as of pain cross his mother's face as she
nervously twisted her black-gloved fingers. She looked old that
morning. "I've come to see if you can do anything to help Donald--my
boy here," she said, a trifle nervously.

"In what way?" rasped the ship-broker.

"Well, sir," continued Mrs. McKenzie, "he has a natural talent for
drawing, and it was Alec's wish that Donald become an architect, and
it was our intention to put him through College, but, as you know, my
husband went"--here she faltered--"and--and--I--I was unable to give
him the schooling necessary. I--I thought, that, maybe for Alec's
sake, you would help Donald in some way and put him through school for
an architectural training."

David McKenzie listened unemotionally. "Humph!" he grunted, then with
his searching eyes on Janet, he enquired in the manner of a
prosecutor:

"Did you save no money from my brother's salary? I understand he was
gettin' big money from Sutton's--four hundred pounds a year as
master--for a considerable time before he was drowned."

Mrs. McKenzie winced. "I saved nothing," she murmured.

"So!" The prosecutor's voice grated on. "Ye were penniless when Alec
went? Aye! Ye spent what he earned like watter. Ye lived in a villa
and in a style fitted for people with an income twice what Alec was
gettin'. I ken all aboot it, for I made enquiries. And noo ye're
keepin' a lodgin'-hoose and comin' tae me tae help pit yer son through
tae become an architect." He paused and leaned further back in his
chair. "Why should I be asked to do this?"

"Why?" Mrs. McKenzie repeated the word dazedly. "Why? Well, I thought
as you were Alec's brother you'd be glad to do something for his son!"

"So!" Donald stood inwardly furious at the manner in which this
dead-souled man was tongue-lashing his mother. "So! The lesson ye have
learned--or ought to have learned--hasny driven the high-falutin'
notions oot yer head! Ye think because the lad can draw a bit that he
should be an architect. It's a wonder tae me ye didny want him tae be
an artist and ask me tae send him tae Paris!" McKenzie's eyebrows
elevated sarcastically and he continued. "Madam! Your coming to me for
such a thing is jist as big a piece o' presumption as if the mother of
yin of those pavement-artists came tae me on the same mission! Neither
you nor yer son have any more claim upon my charity than they would
have! If he could write poetry, ye'd want me to help him be a poet, I
s'pose? Now, look here, madam!" He tapped the table with a pencil.
"You're in no position to have such notions! It was your
high-and-mighty ideas that placed ye in the way ye are to-day! If your
boy is clever at drawing, pit him tae work with a hoose painter or a
sign painter. Let him get tae work. He's auld enough!" Then almost
fiercely to Donald. "How old are ye, boy?"

"Fifteen last October, sir!" answered the boy calmly.

"Old enough tae go to sea!" growled David McKenzie. "Would ye go to
sea, boy, after what happened to yer father?"

"I would," answered Donald wonderingly, "if I knew that mother was
provided for."

Mrs. McKenzie interposed. "I wouldn't allow him to go to sea!"

The other took no notice, but reached for a pad of paper. "Give me yer
address," he grated. "I'll see what I can do for ye, but, I'll say
this, that I'll not be makin' an architect oot of that boy there. You
may go!"

He neither rose from his seat or made any offer to shake hands. Mrs.
McKenzie hesitated for a moment at the door of the room, but David was
absorbed in some letters and did not look up. "Thank you! Good day!"
she said dully, and Donald echoed, "Good day, sir!" He took no notice,
but when they left, he jumped up and locked his office door and sat
for a long time staring out of the grimy window--oblivious to
respectful taps on the closed panels. From a scrutiny of the grey sky,
he turned and stared fixedly at a small photograph on his desk--a
picture of a young boy--and the stern look faded from his face. It was
his own son. For a minute he gazed on the picture with eyes in which a
strange light of almost idolatrous affection glowed, then he turned
and picked up Mrs. McKenzie's card and the bitter, sneering expression
returned as he murmured, "_Aye! I'll look after her brat!_"

The McKenzies were out on the street again when Donald clasped his
mother's hand. "The old beast!" he said. "How I hate him!" The mother
made no answer. She had only been with David for five or ten minutes,
but in that time he had wounded her to the soul and she felt that all
that he said was true.

They went home and tried to forget the memory of that hateful
interview, but a week later came a letter from David McKenzie.

"Dear Madam:"--it ran--"I have considered your case carefully. I will
give your boy the benefit of a free apprenticeship on a new vessel
which will be ready for sea in a month or two. For yourself, I am
enclosing a letter to the manager of the Ross Bay Hydropathic, Ross
Bay, Ayrshire, and if you will present this to him on May 1st, he will
give you a position there as assistant matron. Yours truly, David
McKenzie." There was a postscript which ran:--"I will advise you when
your boy should report here at my office. I will provide him with the
outfit necessary. D. McK."

Janet read the curt offer and for a moment she stared into space.
"Donald to go to sea! The sea that had torn her husband--his
father--ruthlessly from her! And poor Joak's father too! The sea that
yearly made widows of so many Glasgow wives...." She remembered her
dead husband's words, "The sea would kill you, laddie ... and it's a
dog's life at the best of times!" She threw the letter down on the
table. No! she wouldn't accept David's offer. It was the cruelest blow
he had yet dealt her. She would manage somehow, but she'd keep Donald
by her.

"What does he say, mamma?" Donald picked up the letter and read it.
The mother stared at him as he read and she noticed the look in his
eyes with an unknown fear gripping her heart. Ere he had laid the
missive down she knew what was in his mind.

"Mother, dear," he said, slipping his arm around her neck, "I want to
go!"

For a moment she remained silent and her mind ran back to a day two
years ago. McLeish, mate of the _Sarmania_ was talking. "It was a
terrifyin' sea, that yin, madam ... and when I pickit masel' up ... I
found tha whole bridge and wheelhouse gone ... and worst of all,
madam, yer husband was gone! Aye, him an' th' second mate, an' th'
quarter-master, the bos'n an' fower men ... an' fower sae badly mashed
up that I doot if they'll leeve! And that's all there is tae tell,
madam!" She shuddered at the horrible memory of it. The frightful
wall of grey-green sea rising up, curling and roaring. The terrible
crash as it engulfed the ship, and the bare wet decks, twisted iron
work and debris which remained. The others--the human victims--were
carried away in the maw of the monster--whipped from life into death
with a suddenness which was staggering. "No! no! no!" she cried,
clasping her son to her in a frenzy of fear. "You shan't go! He shan't
send you!" But in spite of her objections, she knew that the
irresistible lure of the sea would take her son from her and that the
ties of love and home were powerless against the magic of its
adventure and romance.




CHAPTER SIX


In a month's time, Donald received a curt note from his uncle to come
to Glasgow and to be at the office at "nine sharp." He entered the
gloomy chambers at ten minutes to the appointed hour and stood waiting
outside the counter. At nine, David McKenzie entered the office and
Donald greeted him with a respectful "Good morning, sir!" The uncle
turned and glared at him through his glasses. "Oh, ye're here, are
ye?" he rasped. "Jist wait in the office here until I want ye!" Then
he entered his own private room and left his nephew cooling his heels
until nigh twelve o'clock. By that time Donald had scrutinized every
article in the dingy office and had surmised the characters of the old
maidish clerk at the window, the grey-headed bookkeeper, and the lanky
youth, perched like the gods on Olympus, on the long stool. People
occasionally came in with papers--bills of lading and so on--and once
or twice, shawled women entered and asked if there was any word of the
_Dunlevin_. The _Dunlevin_ was evidently one of his uncle's ships,
thought Donald, and he wondered what would be the name of the ship he
would go to sea in.

At noon, a stocky man dressed in rough woollen serge entered. He
appeared about fifty-five years of age and wore a square-topped bowler
hat and heavy black boots, and had a face as red and as round as a
harvest moon. He turned and glanced at Donald as he laid an umbrella
on the counter, and the lad saw that he was clean-shaven save for a
fringe of whisker under the chin. He had a bulbous red nose and small
blue eyes--hard, mean-looking eyes, Donald thought--and his red face
was pitted with the marks of small-pox. In a quiet tone--Donald
expected a husky roar--he asked the lanky clerk "if Mister McKenzie
could see him noo?"

"He's expectin' you, Captun," said the clerk, and he vanished into the
private room.

A few moments later, the Captain entered the sacred precincts, and
after a while David McKenzie appeared at the door and cried, "Come in
here, boy!"

Donald entered the private office and found the red-faced man seated
in a chair with his umbrella between his knees and a pair of ham-like
fists clasping the handle of it.

"This is the lad I was speaking about, Captain," said the ship-owner
in his grating voice. Turning to Donald, he said, "Boy, this is
Captain Muirhead, master of oor new ship, the _Kelvinhaugh_. As you
will be going to sea in that ship wi' Captain Muirhead, it's no too
early for ye to get acquainted." Donald stepped forward and shook
hands with the Captain, who smiled and murmured something about, "Gled
tae have ye come with me, mister. Hope we'll get along." Donald
thought he would like Captain Muirhead, but he mistrusted those
piggish blue eyes of his.

"Now," said his uncle, seating himself at the table, "we'll fix up
this indenture business an' th' Captain will take ye along to an
outfitter's shop and get ye a kit. Ye'll get doon aboard the ship next
Monday mornin' at five o'clock--no six o'clock or sevin o'clock--but
five sharp, and if ye pay attention to your work and do your duty,
ye'll have a chance tae become master of a ship yersel' some day. Now,
ye can sign yer name to these indentures."

The business of signing the apprentice seaman's indentures was soon
completed and Donald voluntarily bound himself apprentice unto David
McKenzie & Co., and signed his name to "faithfully serve his said
master and obey his and their lawful commands ... and said apprentice
will not, during the service of four years, embezzle or waste the
goods of his master; nor absent himself without leave; nor frequent
taverns or alehouses; nor play unlawful games, etc., etc. Whereof the
said master hereby covenants with the said apprentice to teach the
said apprentice the business of a seaman and provide the said
apprentice with sufficient meat, drink, lodging, washing, medicine and
medical or surgical assistance." Donald saw these paragraphs and noted
them vaguely as he inscribed his name to the document prescribed for
the purpose by the British Board of Trade. Then in company with
Captain Muirhead, he went to an outfitters on Jamaica street and
procured a sea kit.

It was a poor lot of truck that his Uncle David was purchasing for
him, and the Captain evidently had instructions to keep the cost down
to a certain figure. A mattress--a common jute bag stuffed with
straw--and a blanket of thin shoddy came first. Then Donald was
measured for a cheap blue serge uniform. A peaked uniform cap, with
the "Dun Line" house-flag on the badge; a suit of two-piece oilskins,
a pair of leather sea-boots, a sou'wester, two suits of dungarees, two
woollen jerseys, some underwear and socks, towels, soap, matches,
knife, fork, spoon, an enamel mug and a deep plate practically
completed the outfit which was hove into a cheap pine chest with rope
handles. The Jew salesman threw in a belt and a sheath-knife "as a
present," and the Captain said to Donald, "Ye've got a rig there fit
to go 'round the Horn, mister, and a sight better'n I had when I first
went to sea!"

The cheap junk which constituted an outfit and which was packed in
Donald's chest, appeared quite all right to him and he was delighted
with every article. He longed for the day when he could don the
brass-buttoned blue suit and wear the badged cap of an apprentice
seaman. He pictured himself swaggering ashore in foreign ports, with
the cap set back on his head--in the manner approved of by
'prentices--and with the chin strap over the crown. "Ye'll get yer
suit in two days, sir!" said the tailor. "Will you call, or will I
send your kit?" As Donald wasn't sure if he would be in the city, he
said that he would call.

Before taking a train for home, he asked some questions of the
uncommunicative Captain Muirhead, and found out that the _Kelvinhaugh_
was a brand-new four-mast barque of about 2,500 tons, and that she was
loading railroad iron for Vancouver--a long round-the-Horn voyage.
They would probably get a homeward cargo of grain from the West Coast,
and then again they might charter to load lumber at Vancouver for
Australia or South Africa--the Captain couldn't say. Vancouver!
Australia! South Africa! thought Donald. What names to conjure with!
How he would roll them off his tongue--easily and nonchalantly, as a
sailor would. "Aye, I'm sailing to-morrow. 'Round the Horn to
Vancouver, and then across the Pacific to Australia maybe. Be back in
a year or eighteen months. So long!" As the train sped home, he sat in
a corner of the third-class compartment and thought of the wonder and
romance of it all. Running down the "Trades"; crossing the "Line" and
doubling the stormy, storied Horn! That was the life for a red-blooded
boy! And some of those future days he pictured himself pacing a
liner's bridge--monarch of all he surveyed--and saying, as he had
heard his father say: "My ship did this!" or "My ship carried them!"
Oh, it was fine castle building, and he actually blessed his uncle for
the chance he had given him and forgave his bitter words and brutal
mannerisms.

Mrs. McKenzie did not share his enthusiasm. His jubilation at getting
away to sea; his description of the ship, the voyage, his uniform and
prospects for the future were like salt on an open wound, and she
would listen mechanically to his chatter, but her mind was far away
and her heart was full of bitterness. She would be alone--frightfully
alone--and she would be afraid. Donald, her baby boy, out at sea in
that ship with rough men and living a rough life! She had heard her
husband talk of his sailing-ship days and she remembered his worst
experiences.

Could Donald stand such a life? She was afraid, and she felt that her
boy was going on a journey the outcome of which she was unable to
forecast.

Sailing day came on winged feet and mother and son journeyed to
Glasgow on the Sunday morning. They strolled through the Kelvingrove
Park on the bright Sabbath afternoon, just as they used to stroll when
Captain McKenzie was home and they were all together, and the
recollection of those happy days made the mother feel that life was
dealing harshly with her. But, whatever her feelings were, she hid
them for Donald's sake and under a smiling mask concealed the anguish
which was gnawing at her heart. What a brave little chap he looked in
his badged cap and brass-buttoned uniform! There was a flush on his
cheek and a glow in his eyes that she had never seen before. Aye! the
magic of the great waters was calling to one bewitched and whose sole
acquaintance with the sea was in the sight of the ships, the talk of
sailormen, and through the Viking strain in the British blood!

They had tea together and went to church in the evening. Strangely
enough the preacher chose as his text, "The Sea is His!" and his
discourse went direct to the mother's heart. In all that great church
there was only one to whom his slowly intoned words had a significant
meaning. "The Sea is His! He made it!" the preacher said--his
utterance rich with homely Doric. "Never the man born of woman
throughout the ages of earth could arrest its tides or command its
resistless waves. Ships traverse its wastes, but make their voyagings
only through His sufferance--a momentary loosing of His hurricanes and
they could be blotted out as utterly as though they never existed. It
is irresistible in its fearful power, and in a mere minute of time the
most marvellously wonderful, and the mightiest creations of our human
handiwork can be swept into utter oblivion, with never a trace of
where stone stood upon stone, or iron riveted to iron. It can be
neither pathed or bridged, harnessed or commanded, and all the skill
and ingenuity of man has failed, and will ever fail, to share with God
the proud boast that the sea is subject to any bidding but His. Only
He who walked on Galilee could order, 'Peace! be still!' and have His
mandate obeyed. The sea is His, my brethren, and those who traverse
verse its unmarked paths would do well to sail with God in their
hearts, for it is only God who can save and protect them in their
journeyings o'er its vast and restless expanse!"

The congregation knew the truth of the preacher's words. They were
ship-builders, many of them, and they wrought in the yards that made
the old Clyde-side city famous. They knew what the sea called for in
the structures which they framed and plated and rigged; they knew what
the sea could do to iron and steel stanchion, frame, beam and plate.
Many a twisted wreck had come to their hands to be straightened,
untwisted, flattened out and replaced. "Goad, aye! we ken its
handiwork!" they muttered. In their cold Scotch perception, this was
the manner in which they comprehended the power of Him who calmed
Galilee.

Mother and son sat up talking late into the night. It was the mother's
hours and she used them as a mother would with a son who was leaving
her for a space of months, and maybe, years. She told of old remedies
for this ail and that ill. She gave him motherly cautions regarding
wet feet, damp bedding and draughts. She gave him a little ditty-bag
well furnished with needles, cottons, threads, darning wool, buttons
and such like, and her last and greatest gift was a small Bible. They
were holy hours, and they sat and talked until her regard for his
sleep caused her to send him reluctantly to bed. She came to him then
and tucked him in and kissed him as she always did, and when she went
away, her tears wetted his cheek. He tried, as boys do, to carry it
off "big," but when she left him he cried, too, as many a brave man
has cried in similar partings since the world was young.

He awoke at four next morning to find his mother beside his bed. She
had never closed her eyes, but now she was smiling. She wasn't going
to send him to sea with tears and heart-burnings to pain his
recollections of parting. He dressed hurriedly, gulped the tea and
toast she had procured for him, and sat awaiting the cab which was to
take him down to his ship. His sea-chest was packed and ready, and
the mother had gone through it and replaced to the best of her ability
some of the shoddy gear which she knew would never stand sea-faring.

They heard the rattle of the wheels and hoofs on the stony street. The
mother clasped her son in a close embrace. "Don't you worry about me,
dear," she said. "I shall go to the Hydropathic and I will be quite
comfortable there. Be a good boy and take care of yourself. God bless
you and keep you, dear, and may your dear father watch over you!"

The cab-man came up into the room and the wet streamed off his
clothes. "Dirrty mornin', ma'am," he said huskily. "Ah'll jist hond
this box doon." And he shouldered the sea-chest and led the way.

The boy entered the cab and drove away, and Mrs. McKenzie stood in the
rain at the door and watched it vanish just as she had watched, many
times, the departures of her husband. "He's gone! he's gone!" she
murmured dully, and only turned to enter the house when the woman who
kept it led her away with a "Cheer up, mum! He'll be back, never fear!
Come and hae a cup o' tea. It's guid med'cine fur a sair heart!"




CHAPTER SEVEN


The _Kelvinhaugh_ was lying in the Queen's Dock and the cab rattled
down the silent streets which glistened wet in the glow of the
gas-lamps. It was a typical Glasgow morning--dark, cheerless and with
a cold drizzle descending from the brooding skies. They passed
men--hands in pockets and shoulders hunched--hurrying through the rain
to their "wurrk." Dock policemen loafed under the eaves of the sheds,
standing like statues with their oilskin capes reflecting the vagrant
flickering of near-by gas jets. It was a ghastly morning to be going
to sea, and Donald's spirits were at a very low ebb. There was very
little romance in this sort of thing.

The clatter of hoofs stopped and the cabman hailed a passer-by. "Hey,
you! Whaur's th' _Kelvinhaugh_ lyin'?"

"Twa berths doon!" came the answer. The hoofs and wheels clattered
again and ceased a minute later. The Jehu came down from his "dickey."
"Yer shup's lyin' here, mister," he said. "Ah'll kerry yer box an'
gear tae th' gang-way."

Donald followed him through a cargo shed, dark and dismal in its
emptiness. Some sparrows were quarrelling up in the rafters and two
pigeons picked vagrant ears of corn from the bare stone floors. Over
at an open quayside door, a knot of people were standing, and through
the opening one got a glance of the gleaming wet mast of a ship and
vertical parallels of new manilla cordage. To this door the cabman
shouldered Donald's sea-chest and bed gear and tumbled it down at the
shore end of a narrow gang-way. "Ah'll hae tae leave ye here, mister,"
he said huskily. "Ah canny trust ma hoarse tae staund verra long....
Aye! that'll be two shullin' for you, sir! Thankye, mister, and a
pleasant voyage tae ye!"

The people around the gang-way turned and stared at the boy. There
were several shawled women among them, evidently seeing their men off,
and some of the men appeared to be very drunk. As Donald pushed
through them to get to the gang-way, a man laughed and said, "Make way
fur th' binnacle-boy!" Some of the women laughed also in a manner
which testified to the brand of "tea" they had been imbibing that
morning.

The gang-way was laid on the ship's rail and opposite the half-deck,
in the door of which a young fellow was standing looking at the dock.
Donald addressed him. "Will you give me a hand to get my chest and
bedding aboard?" The other growled an "Alright!" and came ashore. He
was a youth of about twenty--a big fellow with pleasant features--but
he had a glum look in his eyes, and there was a downward droop to his
mouth. He followed Donald and roughly elbowed a passage through the
group at the gang-way end. One of the shawled women blocked his way
with a challenging look on her coarse face, but the youth shouldered
her aside ruthlessly, saying, "Out of my way, you----!" Donald was
shocked at such treatment of a woman, but he was shocked still more by
the oath-besprinkled retort which came from the aggrieved one's lips.

Both lugged the chest up the gang-way, while the lady of the shawl
spoke her mind. "Ye lousy pair o' brass-bound poop ornaments!" she
shrieked. "Ah'd like tae gie ye a scud on yer bloody jaws, ye blankety
blank----" One of the drunks beside her whipped his wet cap off his
cropped skull and gave the virago a resounding slap across the mouth
with it. "Haud yer tongue, ye gabby----!" he growled, but he got no
further. With a wild shriek, she turned on him. Off went the shawl,
and a fiend of a woman, with tousled hair flying and practically
naked above the waist, dug her nails into cropped-head's ugly face and
scraped him from hair to chin. The two of them set-to in
earnest--swearing, clawing, punching and kicking like a pair of
wild-cats--and the others looked on without attempting to interfere.

Heavy footsteps came padding up the shed. "Chuck it! Here's the
polis!" cried someone, and a stalwart Highland policeman grasped the
combatants and swung them apart. "Lemme get at him!" howled the
woman--a shocking sight in her _deshabille_, but the policeman had her
by the arm and held her off in a mighty grip. "Is that your shup?" he
asked the man. "Aye, Ah'm sailin' in her!" growled the fellow, wiping
the mud and blood off his ugly face. The officer of the law released
the woman and marched the man up the gang-plank. At the rail of the
ship he roared, "Hey! tak' this fella aboard an' lock him up!" And he
swung him down on the barque's main-deck with no gentle hand. Someone
took the man and stowed him away.

Donald had seen his chest stowed inside the half-deck and had watched
the rumpus on the dock. "Isn't that awful?" he said, utterly shocked.
The glum-looking youth grunted. "That's nothing! You'll see worse'n
that some day!" Then the glum look faded somewhat and he regarded
Donald curiously. "You're a new chap?" he enquired. "First voyage,
eh?"

Donald nodded. "What's your name?" enquired the other.

"Donald McKenzie."

"Mine's Jack Thompson." Both boys shook hands. Donald felt that he
would like Thompson. They sat down at a small mess-table and talked.
Thompson had been at sea three and a half years. He had six months of
his time to serve and hoped to go up for his second mate's ticket by
the time the _Kelvinhaugh_ made a home port--"if she ever makes a home
port," he added gloomily.

"Why?" asked Donald. He had glanced around the ship and she seemed to
be a splendid vessel. Everything was brand-new and shining. "She seems
a fine ship!"

"Fine hell!" growled the other disgustedly. "She's nothing but a big
steel tank and a cheap one at that! A great big lumbering, clumsy,
four-posted box, built by the mile and cut off by the yard, that'll
give us merry blazes when we get outside. I can see what's before us.
She'll be dirty, wet, and a bloody work-house from 'way-back. That's
what she'll be. If I had of seen her before yesterday, I'd have
skipped--'pon my soul I would!"

Donald was not unacquainted with the idiosyncrasies of sailors, so he
put Thompson's pessimism down to a sailing-day grouch. They talked a
while and Donald learned that there would be two other apprentices who
would join the ship at Greenock--a port at the mouth of the Clyde.
These lads, together with Thompson and Captain Muirhead, had been
together on the barque _Dunottar_, but this ship had been run into and
sunk in the Irish Channel a few months back. The "Dun Line" people had
bought the _Kelvinhaugh_ on the stocks to take the lost vessel's place
in a charter for carrying railroad iron out to the Pacific Coast for
one of the Canadian railways. There had been four apprentices on the
_Dunottar_, but one of them was drowned when the ship went down. "A
first voyager, too," said Thompson, "but the ruddy young fool went
back to save some of his gear and got caught!"

"What kind of a man is Captain Muirhead?" enquired Donald.

"From what I've seen of him," replied the other bluntly, "I don't like
him much. He was only on the _Dunottar_ the voyage she went to the
bottom, and as she slid for Davy's Locker four days after leaving port
we didn't get time to get acquainted. He's a mean josser and a
bad-tempered one too. But what can you expect in one of these ships?
McKenzie only pays his skippers twelve pounds a month. Good men
wouldn't go to sea in them for that." Staring curiously at Donald, he
asked, "Your name is McKenzie. Are you any relation to the owner of
these hookers?"

"Yes," replied the other. "He's my uncle."

Thompson whistled and said aggressively, "Well, you can tell your
uncle next time you write to him that he's a lousy, miserable swine
and that his ships are the worst-fed, worst-rigged, rottenest,
under-manned hookers afloat! Wouldn't I jolly well like to have him
aboard one rounding Cape Stiff! He'd get a belly-full of it--the
blasted two-ends-and-the-bight of a skin-tight Glasgow miser!"

Donald was not surprised at this freely-expressed opinion of his
uncle, but he quickly disabused Thompson's mind of any intention of
writing him. "My uncle isn't in love with me, and probably doesn't
care two pins about me!" he said shortly.

Thompson laughed. "Oh, well," he said, "we're in for it now, and we've
got to stick it out. Now, sonny, I'm going to give you some tips.
First of all, I'm top-dog in this half-deck. I'm the senior apprentice
and what I say goes--in here. Remember that!" Donald nodded. "Now,"
continued the other, "you seem a nice little chap, so I'll take you in
hand. You take this upper bunk here and chuck your bed-sack and
blanket into it. These upper bunks are the best when the water is
sloshing in here a foot-and-half deep. Don't you give that bunk up on
any pretence. The others will have to take the lowers, whether they
like it or not. Serve 'em right for being 'last-minute-men' and not
joining the ship here." Donald hove his bedgear into the bunk.
Thompson glanced at the stuff and felt the blanket. "Where did you get
that junk? Your uncle fitted you out, ye say? God help ye! It has his
trademark--a Parish Rig, a donkey's breakfast and a bull-wool and
oakum blanket! I can see he don't love ye! Now, son, get those
brass-bound rags off and get into your working clothes. You'll have to
turn-to in a minute or so. We're waiting for the tugs and the Old
Man."

While Donald was changing his clothes the door opened and a tall man
about thirty years of age and clad in an oilskin coat and with a
badged cap on his head peered inside. He had a clean-cut face, an
aquiline nose, piercing grey eyes, a flowing reddish mustache, and he
was smoking a cigarette.

"Get ready, naow!" he said in a nasal drawl which bespoke his
nationality as American. "I'll want ye in a minute or so."

Thompson looked up from the chest he was unpacking. "Yes, sir, we'll
be ready, sir. And, Mr. Nickerson, sir, it's a dirty morning. Would
you care for a nip, sir!"

The other swung his sea-booted feet over the washboard, entered, and
closed the door. "Produce th' med'cine young feller," he drawled. "The
Old Man will be singin' out in a minute. Who the devil is this
nipper?" He indicated Donald with a jerk of his head.

"The new apprentice, sir," answered Thompson. "Just joined. First
voyager, sir."

The tall man fixed Donald with his gimlet eyes. "What's yer name,
nation, an' future prospects? Donald McKenzie, eh? Scotch, I cal'late,
an' goin' to be a sailor I reckon. Waal, let me tell ye, ye're a
bloody fool an' ye'll know it before ye've bin a dog-watch at sea. I'm
the mate of this bally-hoo of blazes, and my name's Judson Nickerson
and I hail from Nova Scotia. When you address me you say 'Mister' and
'sir,' and when I address you, you jump, see?" He thrust forth a
mighty fist and crushed Donald's hand in a vice-like clasp. "You be a
good boy, obey orders an' look spry, and we'll get along fine. Skulk,
sulk or hang back, and I'll make you wish you'd never been born!"

Thompson brought forth a bottle of whisky from his chest and handed it
to the mate, who tilted it to his lips and swallowed a noggin which
caused Donald to stare in amaze. Mr. Nickerson noticed the boy's
wide-opened eyes, and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand,
laughed. "Never seen a man drink, sonny?" he asked. "Cal'late afore
ye've made a voyage or two--ef ye live it out--ye'll drink a bottle at
a sitting." He swung outside again with a parting word to get ready.

Thompson took a swig at the bottle and put it back in the chest,
saying, "I'm not going to give you a slug, nipper. You'll learn quick
enough without me starting you off! Curse it! The only way to go to
sea is half-drunk anyway."

There were numerous shouts out on deck and sea-booted feet clattered
outside the half-deck door. The crew were being mustered. Mr.
Nickerson could be heard singing out, "Look slippy, naow, you damned
Paddy Wester! Get that gear away out o' that!" and "Bos'n! Bos'n!
Where in hell is that ruddy bos'n? Aft there an' git that hawser on
th' poop an' ready to pass daown to the tug!" Then came a kick at the
half-deck door. "Turn out, naow, an' single them lines aft here!"
"Aye, aye, sir!" cried Thompson, and he went out on deck followed by
Donald.

The grey dawn was dimming the light of the gas-jets and the morning
looked clammy and cold. A number of men were working around the
barque's decks, and there was a crowd of people on the dock looking
on. Up the poop ladder scrambled the two boys--Thompson leading--and
they proceeded to the port bitts--there to wrestle with a snakey wire
mooring hawser and drag it aboard through a quarter-chock. There was a
light in the cabin and it shone up through the skylight. McKenzie
thought it must be nice and warm and homey down below as he tugged on
the cold, wet wire, grimy with coal-dust, and hard on his tender
hands.

A big hulking fellow scrambled up the ladder and stood beside them.
Donald glanced at him. He had straw-colored hair and a broad, ugly,
clean-shaven face. "Vind dot blasted wire on der drum!" he growled at
the sweating boys. "Vy der blazes don't you use your brains! Fetch der
end oop here und vind her!" Thompson dragged the end of the wire to an
iron drum and wound while Donald "lighted" the hawser along. "Who's
that chap?" asked Donald, when the man had turned away.

"The ruddy Dutchman we have for a second greaser," replied Thompson
with an oath. "Mister Otto Hinkel--a square-head from Hamburg--and a
stinkin' 'yaw-for-yes' swine if there ever was one!"

Under the orders of the Nova Scotia mate, the two were kept busy at
various tasks, and within an hour of the time he had come aboard,
Donald began to be disillusioned. There was very little romance in
what he had seen, heard or done so far. Toiling and sweating in the
cold, wet and muck on the barque's decks, with drunken, fighting men
falling foul of them, and cursed at by officers--themselves ill
tempered and harassed--who seemed to be absolutely heartless and
apparently ready to enforce orders with a blow or a kick, Donald began
to recall his father's words, "It's a dog's life at the best of
times!" The scenes on the wharf disgusted him, and during a "knock
off" to gulp a mug of coffee in the half-deck, he witnessed another
dock-side altercation between two "ladies" who both appeared to have a
claim of some sort on a stolid Swede, who, drunk and hardly able to
stand, stood looking stupidly on.

"Ay tell ju," screamed one of them, "he's my hosbond dot man is! His
wages cooms to me!"

"Ye're a liar!" shouted the other, who was Scotch. "He merrit me two
years ago! Ah hae ma merridge-lines tae prove it, which is a thing you
havny got ye dirrty Dutch----" And she applied an epithet which
implied that the lady in question had never received the benefit of
clergy in lawful ratification. "Ah, ken ye, ya yalla-haired trollop!
Ye hae a boat-load o' husbands! There's yin in ivery shup that gaes
doon the Clyde----" And casting aside their shawls in the approved
Broomielaw fashion, both went for one another in a scratching and
hair-pulling contest of most disgusting savagery.

The big Highland dock-policeman sauntered up, and with a blasé
expression on his ruddy face tried to separate the combatants. They,
however, resented interference and attacked him. His helmet rolled
off, to be slyly kicked into the dock by one of the onlookers who
detested policemen, and the two women gave him a tough tussle.
Grabbing the Swedish damsel, he shoved the Scottish maid on her back
in the mud, and blew his whistle. Another policeman ran up. "Pit yer
cuffs on that Moll lyin' doon an' bring the barra'," said the
helmetless one. "We'll tak them baith to the offis!" The prostrate
woman was evidently too drunk to rise, but kicked and struggled
fiercely as the policeman snapped the handcuffs on her wrists. Then
she lay in the mud with the rain pouring on her naked shoulders,
weeping and cursing, while her opponent struggled in the officer's
iron grip. In a few minutes the other policeman appeared with a long,
coffin-like hand-cart on two wheels. The lady in the mud was hoisted
into it, kicking and screaming, and effectually confined by means of
two straps. With one officer pushing the hand-cart, and the other
dragging the Scandinavian woman, the procession started up the shed,
followed by the "boos" and groans of the spectators.

The man who was the cause of all the row suddenly seemed to wake up.
Reaching around the back of his belt, he pulled out a sheath-knife,
and shouting, "Ay kill dot feller!" staggered, brandishing the knife,
after the policemen. Mr. Nickerson had been calmly watching the fracas
from the poop, but when he saw the man moving off, he sprang from the
poop rail to the dock, and in two or three long strides, reached the
belligerent Swede. In less time than it takes to relate, he had
knocked the fellow to the ground, and had twisted the knife out of his
hand and sent it spinning along the stone floor of the shed. Then with
a mighty heave, he jerked the man to his feet, rushed him up the
gang-way, and then hove him from the height of the to'gallant rail to
the deck. Leaping after the now thoroughly cowed sailor, the mate
booted him into the fore-castle, and then, pensively pulling at his
mustache, walked nonchalently aft along the main-deck to the poop,
utterly oblivious to the cries of "Bucko!" "Yankee bruiser!" "Come up
here an' try yer fancy tricks an' we'll pit a heid on ye!" which came
from the coterie on the quayside.

Donald was nauseated by the sights he had witnessed and the manner in
which Mr. Nickerson had handled the Swedish sailor frightened him with
its brutality. He could hear the heavy thud of the mate's boots as
they were driven into the ribs and back of the man, and it sickened
his sensitive soul.

"Ye're looking white about the gills, kid!" remarked Thompson
sarcastically. "What's worrying ye?"

"Mister Nickerson--and that sailor!" mumbled Donald.

"Huh!" said the other coolly. "He handled him fine! That's the proper
Yankee fashion, though I guess our Old Man wouldn't like to see the
mate hustle them like that around the dock. Liable to get into
trouble. This is a British ship and the authorities won't stand for
manhandling if it can be proved."

It was broad daylight now and the two tugs were alongside. The Blue
Peter was flying at the fore, and the Red Ensign from the jigger gaff.
Captain Muirhead and the pilot appeared on the poop--the former in his
square-topped bowler hat. Coming to the break of the poop, the skipper
sung out to the mate, "All hands aboard, mister?"

"Two men short, sir!" answered the mate. "Shipping master says he'll
try and locate them and send them daown to Greenock!"

The master grunted, "We'll no get them, that's sure. Weel, we hae tae
get oot o' this. Staund-by fur lettin' go fore'n aft. Send a hond tae
th' wheel!"

Mr. Nickerson motioned to Thompson. "Go'n take the wheel, you! I
cal'late there ain't a sober man in th' fo'c'sle. An' you, nipper," he
said to Donald, "jest stand-by under the break ontil I want ye. Ye're
not much account yet awhile!"

The tow-boat whistled for the swing-bridge at the dock entrance to
open, and slowly dragged the deep-laden barque away from the quay. As
the single mooring lines were cast off, the onlookers gave a few
"Hurrays!" and the women and men yelled to the members of the crew.
"Ta, ta, Joak! Bring me hame a parrot--yin that can talk!" "So long,
Gus! Look oudt for dot mate! He's a nigger-driver!" Mr. Nickerson was
up on the fo'c'sle-head rousing his Jacks around, and he came in for a
number of complimentary epithets. The cook lounged in the door of his
galley and as they passed through the swing-bridge piers, he waved his
apron at the crowd of workmen waiting to cross and shouted the
time-honored outwardbounder's fare-ye-well, "Urray for the pier 'ead
an' th' bloody stiy-at-'omes!"

"Ye may well say it, Slushy!" bawled a man on the pier. "For I'm
thinkin' ye'll be payin' yer debts wi' th' foretopsail-sheet an' maybe
the polis is lookin' for ye!" The shot evidently went home for cookie
vanished.

Out through the dock walls went the barque, just as the shipyard
whistles were blowing for eight o'clock, and with the stern tug
straightening her out in the river channel, the ship responded to the
pull of the hawser ahead and glided down to the sea.

Donald tramped up and down under the break of the poop keeping himself
warm, and in one of his turns he espied a female figure, waving a
handkerchief, standing near the Kelvinhaugh Ferry slip. He waved in
return. It was his mother, and he leaned over the high rail and
watched her until the rainy mist veiled them from each other. Then he
turned inboard with a lump in his throat and tears in his eyes. He was
feeling miserable, and oh, so lonely! Leaning his head against the
rail he began to cry.

"Vot de hell is de matter mit you, boy?" cried a strident voice from
above. Donald turned to see the German second mate looking down at him
from the poop rail.

"Nothing, sir!"

"Den if nodings is de matter," growled the other, "you yust belay dot
weepings or I gif you somedings to weep for! You go forrard dere und
haul down dot Blue Peter und bring it aft here und be damned smardt
aboudt it!"

Three hours a member of a ship's company and Donald was pretty well
sick of it all. Nothing of the glory, adventure and romance of the sea
and ships had yet unfolded itself to his eyes. No! all he had seen was
sordid wharf-side bickerings, evil women and sodden men; dirty menial
work and cruel words; autocratic authority, brutality and a scoffing
callousness for fine feelings. He thought of these things as he coaxed
the outward-bound bunting down and clear of the mazy web of rigging
aloft, but with the sight of the sky and the soaring spars and the
river gulls, came new heart and determination, and he murmured to
himself, "Others have gone through it and came out all right. My daddy
came through it all right, and so shall I!"




CHAPTER EIGHT


The tug pulled the _Kelvinhaugh_ to the Tail of the Bank and the
barque dropped her anchor there. During the journey down the river the
second mate kept Donald busy on odd jobs, and several times he was in
close proximity to Captain Muirhead, but the latter never even greeted
him by word or look. When the tug departed, the Captain eyed the sky,
cloudy and overcast, and went below to his cabin. Hinkel also went
below, after ordering Donald to sweep up the poop, and he was sweeping
when Mr. Nickerson came aft.

"Waal, boy, what d'ye think of it all?" he enquired blithely. "Goin'
to like it?"

"I'll like it after a while, sir," answered Donald with a smile. "When
I get more used to the ship and the work."

The mate laughed and a saturnine smile came over his sharp features.
"Which means you don't think a hell of a lot of it so far, eh? Waal,
son, ye're dead right. It's a dog's life, and the man who goes to sea
for a livin' nowadays 'ud go to hell for pleasure!" And after
delivering the ancient deep sea proverb, he too turned and went below.

After sweeping up the poop, Donald went down to the half-deck and
found Thompson having his dinner. "Come along, nipper!" he cried
cheerfully. "What'll you have? Roast stuffed duckling with baked
potatoes, string beans and brussels sprouts, jam roly-poly and
coffee! How would that suit you?"

"That would suit me fine!" exclaimed Donald eagerly looking for
evidences of such a menu.

"You bally well bet it would suit you!" laughed Thompson, "but there
ain't no sich luck, as the Yankees say! Here's your chow! Dig in and
curse your uncle!" As he spoke he pushed a large tin pan containing
mushy potatoes and a fat, disgusting lump of pork, towards Donald. He
also indicated a hook-pot and a small wooden half-pail. "There's the
tea and coffee in the pot--it's coffee in the morning and tea at other
times, but it's the same stuff--and there's hard bread in the barge
there. Sink me! I don't know why I left a comfortable home to go
knocking around in one of these mean Scotch ships!"

Donald helped himself to the food and made a meal of the worst viands
he had ever swallowed in his life. "Is it always like this?" he asked,
disgustedly pushing the mess-kit away from his sight.

"Always like this?" echoed Thompson in mock indignation. "Well, I'm
blowed! Godfrey, nipper, you'll appreciate chow as good as that afore
this trip's ended! Yes, siree! you'll learn to thank the good Lord for
a penny herring and a slice o' white bread and a real potato yet. And
you'll eat your fill o' rotten grub afore you hit the beach again, my
son! Such ungratefulness, Oliver Twist!--damned if it ain't!"

Thompson would have continued in this strain for a while, but there
came a tug at the half-deck door and two youths leaped in dragging
bags and chests. "Hullo, Jack!" shouted both in unison. "Here we are
again!" Both were dressed in apprentice's uniform and were chunky lads
around sixteen years of age. "Who's the new chum, Jack?" queried
one--a chubby, curly-haired chap with a pleasant smile and nice white
teeth.

Thompson waved a lazy hand. "McKenzie, meet Jenkins and Moore. Jenkins
has done one stretch, but Moore has only four days of his four years
in. Jenkins here is a fat-head for sleep, while Moore is a young
sailor but a damned old soldier and would sooner skulk than work. Now
you know them!"

Jenkins laughed, but Moore scowled. He was a swarthy complexioned lad
with a large ugly mouth and beady black eyes. Donald sized his two
shipmates up quickly. Jenkins would be alright, but Moore would be
quarrelsome. Two minutes later, his deductions were verified when both
started to protest at having to take lower bunks. "I say, Thompson,
old man," said Jenkins, "the nipper will have to turn out of that
bunk--"

"No he won't," answered Thompson, calmly smoking away. "I told him to
put his truck there and he'll stay there!"

"Oh, I say, dam'-it-all," expostulated Jenkins. Moore started to pull
Donald's stuff out of the bunk. Donald jumped to his feet. "What the
deuce are you doing with my things?" he cried calmly.

"I'm goin' to take this bunk," he growled. "If you or Jenkins want a
punch in the jaw, I'll give it to you!"

Donald realized in a flash that his comfort in future absolutely
depended upon himself--nobody else would help him here, so he gave
Moore a blow on the mouth with all the power of his right fist. The
Irish lad's beady eyes snapped savagely, and with the blood streaming
from his cut lips, he went for Donald and the two mixed it up in a
proper rough and tumble.

Thompson jumped from the seat and hauled Moore away. "You leave
McKenzie and his bunk alone, you blighter, or I'll wipe the deck with
you! You take that bunk there and be blamed glad to get it!" And he
hove Moore down into the worst located of the two lowers.

Donald sat down panting with an eye which was rapidly discoloring. "I
say, Jenkins," he said to the other apprentice, "I'm sorry to have
done you out of a good bunk, but I'm game to toss you for it--" "No,
you won't," laughed Jenkins. "It serves me right for not joining the
ship in Glasgow. First come, first served. You keep the bunk, nipper.
Let's have a drink!" He produced a bottle of whisky, and on Donald
refusing to join in, they offered a drink to Moore, who sullenly
accepted.

This whisky drinking by lads of sixteen and twenty rather shocked
Donald, but he had scarcely been an hour in the company of the three
before he heard enough to convince him that there wasn't much in the
way of vice they didn't know. The drinking, swearing, and the
recounting of vicious adventures and questionable stories caused
Donald to wonder why such wickedness was not visited by instant
retribution from Heaven. Blasphemy and the ribald use of the most
sacred things seemed to roll from the tongues of his companions like
water from a fountain.

Thompson had been applying himself to the bottle rather heavily and he
was fast becoming "tight." He turned around to Donald, who was sitting
on his chest listening to the talk. "Look at that poor l'il devil
there!" he drawled thickly. "I like that l'il feller--he's such a
pale-faced skinny l'il nipper. He c'd crawl through a ring-bolt, by
Godfrey! Ne'mind, son! You've jus' got t' learn to drink a four-finger
nip 'thout blinkin' or coughin', an' learn to spin nine hundred dirty
yarns, an' swear to music, an' keep watch snoozin' between bells, an'
you'll be a real dyed-in-the-wool shellback, with every finger a
fishhook, and every hair a ropeyarn, an' blood of Stockholm tar!"
Thompson rambled on. "His uncle owns this hooker. Th' lousy Scotch
miser! But he don't love that kid, he don't. Sends him to sea in this
ruddy coffin an' fits him out with a donkey's breakfast and a dog's
wool blanket an' a kit ye could shoot peas through--"

A heavy tramp of sea-booted feet halted outside. Jenkins whipped the
bottle away, as the broad ugly face of Mr. Hinkel appeared in the
door. "Now, den, vot are you lazy defils loafin' avay your time in
here for?" he rasped in his guttural brogue. "Gome oudt of dot und
bear a hand to bend der flying yib und overhaul some of der gear
aloft. Dam' rigger's snarls everywhere und dam' lazy boys loafin' und
yarnin' und egspecting Gottalmighty to do der vork!" He slammed the
door and Jenkins extended a spread hand with a thumb to his nose,
while Thompson cursed the second mate for a "beastly yumping yiminy
Yudas Dutchman!"

The boys toiled and mucked all afternoon in the rain and bitter wind,
and Donald crawled to his bunk at seven that evening aching in every
limb and muscle and with his hands skinned and painful. For hours he
tossed around listening to the snores of his ship-mates, and the
sighing of the rain-laden wind in the gear aloft. It had been an
eventful day, but a day in which his clean ideal of a sea-life had
been rudely shattered. He was seeing it now in its naked, unvarnished,
unromantic reality, and he was realizing that if he would hold his own
he must protect his rights by physical force and steel himself to
endure many hardships in soul and body; case-harden his finer
feelings, and rigorously restrain all impulses of sympathy and the
fine charity which can be exhibited ashore. His father was the
embodiment of all that was good and honorable and kind, yet, no doubt,
he was as unimpressionable and as callous as Thompson or even Mr.
Nickerson, while roughing it in his early days at sea. He thought of
Thompson and Jenkins. Both these lads were "straight" according to
youthful ethics, but how rough and tough they were in their sea-life,
yet, in their homes they were possibly, and probably, as fine, true
and as honorable young fellows as those environed by gentler walks of
life. Sea-ways were not shore-ways, and it did not take Donald long to
find out that a sea-life would make of a man exactly what he himself
desired. Youth was left very much to his own resources. There was no
mother to caress or to correct in a ship's half-deck, and in the ruck
of it all, with its disgusting familiarity, evil talk and callousness,
the lad who had the instincts of a gentleman and a clean heart
implanted in him, would come through it without being contaminated in
mind or speech or diseased in body.

The _Kelvinhaugh_ lay for three days at the Tail of the Bank getting
ready for sea. Though a brand new ship and fresh from the riggers'
yard, yet there was more to do in getting her ready than in a craft
that had been under sailors' hands for a dozen voyages. Standing gear
had to be screwed up again, running gear rove off through the right
leads and a hundred and one small gadgets installed which riggers omit
and sailors have to fit. In this work, Donald did his share and spent
many hours aloft working with the other lads. There was a rare thrill
in this climbing and toiling with good honest cordage up in the tops
and on the yards--and he felt that clambering and swinging about on
the barque's dizzy eminences savored of the real adventure of
sea-faring. Like all boys, he could climb, and being free from
giddiness, he thoroughly enjoyed the view from aloft. Looking down on
the ship, she appeared to his unsailorly eye, a most beautiful model,
and the men working on deck seemed as pigmies, while he, suspended
like Mahomet's tomb, between sea and sky, felt a strange
exhilaration--a sensation which lent zest to the work and made him
look to the future with a happier heart. Alas, he was unconsciously
imbibing the doctrines of all sailoring, in which one remembers the
good times and forgets the hardships and the miserable days.

On the third day there was enough blue in the sky "tae mak' a
Hielanman a pair o' breeks" and the wind was coming away fair for a
slant south. The two short-shipped men had turned up, dazed and
useless in the aftermath of a carouse, and were in the fo'c'sle
"sleeping it off." At nine a tug came out, and the bos'n having got
steam up in the donkey, the anchor was hove up without capstan-bar or
chantey, and the _Kelvinhaugh_ trailed at the end of a tow-line down
the Firth of Clyde with a fresh northerly breeze whipping the short
combers into white-capped corrugations.

By mid-afternoon the barque had pulled through the Cumbraes and the
captain was up on the poop squinting around. He had discarded his
shore toggery and slumped around in a cloth cap, a cardigan jacket,
heavy woollen pants and carpet slippers. After a long scrutiny of sky
and sea, and a tap at the mercurial barometer hanging in the
chart-house, he spoke to the mate. "We'll get the muslin on her when
she comes up wi' Arran. Wi' this northerly we're no needin' a tug and
A'm thinkin' we'll be safe in rinnin' doon the Irish Channel."

The mate nodded. "Aye, sir. Looks like a fair wind, sir!" And he
sniffed at the breeze like a hound scenting his quarry. The Old Man
grunted and resumed his pacing along the weather side of the poop.

When the high purple-heathered hills of Arran came abeam, the master
ceased his pacing. "Get yer tops'ls on her, mister!" he ordered the
mate, and his quiet command seemed to galvanize ship and crew to
stirring action. "Loose tops'ls!" roared Mr. Nickerson, and the hands
working on "stowing-away" jobs, at which they were time-spinning,
seemed to be imbued with new life. "Loose tops'ls--he says!" cried the
bos'n directing his squad. "Move yerselves, blast ye! Loose th' fore,
you! Main an' mizzen you! Look spry now, my sons, or ye'll have th'
mate down among ye wi' some Yankee salt to put on yer tails!" The
latter _sotto voce_.

Donald went up with Thompson to the lower mizzen topsail yard, and
under the senior apprentice's direction, cast the confining gaskets
adrift. Almost simultaneously from the three masts came the shout,
"All gone, sir. Sheet home!" As the canvas rustled and flapped from
the yards and bellied in the restraining gear, the mate's nasal
bawlings could be heard injecting action. "Lay daown from aloft you
skulkers 'n get some beef on them tops'l sheets. Look slippy naow!"
The chain sheets rattled and clanked through the sheaves as the men,
standing on the fife-rail and deck, hove down, "hey-ho'ing!" and
barking, on the slack and brought the lower clews of the fore lower
topsail nigh to the sheaves of the fore-yard-arms. A man squinted
aloft after the last sweat had been given at the sheets. "What a hell
ov a poor cut sail," he remarked.

"To yer main an' mizzen tops'ls naow!" came the mate's roar. "Never
mind gamming. Ye're not on a spouter (whaler)!" Main and mizzen lower
topsails were set to the wind, and the _Kelvinhaugh_ started to drive
ahead on her own and the tow-rope began to light up. "Up on yer
foretopm'st-stays'l!" "Stand-by to get that tow-line aboard. For'ard
with ye!" The tug blew a blast of her whistle and made a wide sheer
from under the bows. The tow-rope was let go, and while twenty men
hauled the wet, snakey manilla aboard over the foc'slehead, the tug
steamed around and came up on the barque's weather quarter to receive
a material valediction--in the shape of a bottle of whisky--and the
last letters. Donald saw the package being thrown down on the tug's
decks at the end of a heaving-line, and he watched with some anxiety
for the safety of the hastily-written note which he had indited to his
mother. It was a cheerful note--full of optimism which he did not feel
when writing it, and he played up the most promising and alluring
aspects of a sea-life and the men in whose company he would be for
many months. Poor lad! the romantic ideal was fast fading and it was
hard to write paragraphs of happy fiction with Thompson and Jenkins
swapping gloomy prognostications for the future over the mess-table.

The tow-boat blew a long farewell blast from her whistle and dropped
astern. Within five minutes she had swung around and was steaming up
the Firth as fast as her slatting paddle-blades would take her, and
with her went the _Kelvinhaugh's_ last link with the land for many a
long day.

"Upper tops'ls naow!" came the order, and under the curseful
directions of the two mates and the bos'n, able-bodied, ordinary and
apprentice seamen were hustled from job to job, and in the midst of
the action, Donald scarce realized that he was assisting to carry out
those wonderful manoeuvres over which he had gloated in printed
page. Somehow the actual seemed different from the visionary. There
was surly venom in the barking orders of--"Tops'l halliards naow an'
put yer bloody backs into it you lazy hounds!" and such bitter remarks
as "Struth! A poor bunch of beef in this crowd. Sailormen have all
died an' nawthin' left naow but skulking kids an' broken-down sojers!"
which came from the mate. In the novels the mate was usually a bluff,
fatherly old codger who sung out "Heave away, my lads!" or "Haul away,
my hearties!" in a hurricane roar, and with many good-humored asides
interspersed between orders, but in cold realism on the _Kelvinhaugh_,
Donald felt that Mr. Nickerson was only using his tongue because he
was denied the use of his fist and boot, and the hulking German second
mate growled and grunted and pushed in sullen self-restraint because
British sea laws forbade him commencing the voyage by killing someone.

Running with square yards past the Arran hills, the deep-laden barque
ploughed along with all hands sweating at the halliards and sheets and
dressing the _Kelvinhaugh_ in her "muslin." Her tops'l yards were
heavy, and it did not take the old hands in the crew long to realize
that they had signed in a "work-house" in this short-handed,
heavily-sparred craft. With the tops'l halliards led to a main-deck
capstan, the crew stamped around straining at the bars in sullen
silence. The stolid, brutal German barked guttural curses--he was too
thick-headed to notice anything unusual in this silent labor, but the
keen-eared mate sensed the absence of the deep-water working chorus,
and he was down on the scene in a minute giving tongue.

"Come on thar', bullies! Ain't thar' a chantey-man in the crowd?
Strike a light someone! A chantey does the work of ten men, so walk
her raound an' sing aout!" A West Indian negro showed his white teeth
in an ingratiating smile and the mate spied him. "A black-bird to sing
every time!" he cried. "Come you coon--loosen up yer pipes an' shout
an' walk them tops'l yards to the mast-head!" Thus encouraged, the
negro commenced in a clear tenor,

    "Shanandoah, I love yore daughter!"

"Bark you hounds!" roared the mate. "Sing aout an' heave 'round!" And
the chorus was timidly voiced in half-a-dozen keys.

    "Away! My rolling river!"

The black soloist pushed and sang.

    "Oh, Shanandoah, I loves to hear yo!"

Then the crowd, warming to their work, roared in unison.

    "Ah, ha, we're bound away--
    'Cross the wide Missouri!"

The ancient chantey "took hold" and the men woke up from their sullen
apathy and stamped around the clinking capstan roaring the plaintive
refrains to the negro's quavering solo. The mate stood watching with a
smile on his keen visage. "That's what we want to hear aboard these
hookers!" he said. "When I don't hear a craowd singin' out they're
liverish and I'm ready to dose 'em up with a double whack of black
draught!"

Whether it was through a new spirit of cheerfulness at getting under
sail or through dread of the old sea medicine, the crowd commenced
chanteying, and in hauling out the topgallantsail sheets and
mastheading the royal yards, Donald felt something of seafaring
romance, amidst the hard work and his burning hands, in lustily
bawling the ancient choruses of "Sally Brown I love yer daughter!"
"Whisky Johnny," or "On the plains of Mexico."

By the time Pladda was abeam, it was becoming dark, and the barque,
sail-clad from scupper to truck, was rolling, a creamy "bone in her
teeth" from her blunt bows and slugging along with a slight roll to
port and starboard. With the blue bulk of Ailsa Craig ahead over the
jib-boom and her royals and fores'l set, the big wind-jammer began to
smell the windy spaces of her unsailed traverses, while aft on the
poop paced the Old Man--proud of his new command and anxious to see
how she was shaping up. Down in the half-deck, Donald, aching in bone
and muscle, and with hands blistered, skinned and paining, gulped his
tea in a daze, with but one consuming desire--to get into his bunk and
court blessed oblivion.




CHAPTER NINE


"Clang-Clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang!" Four double
tolls sounded on the bell aft betokened the sea-time of eight bells in
the second dog-watch, or 8 p.m. shore time. Donald was half dozing in
his bunk and listening aimlessly to the hardened Thompson holding
forth to Jenkins. "Mark my words ... a ruddy workhouse. No takin' yer
ease on this lime-juicer ... nigger-drivin', back-breakin' starvation
Scotch tank ... rotten dead cargo.... She'll be a truck to steer ...
and a swine to tack. All day to-day ... sweating ... calashee
watch...." He growled away pessimistically while Donald nodded with
eyes closed. Moore was in his bunk asleep. He, like Donald, was tired
and sore, but bore it in sulky silence.

"Lay aft all handts!" bawled Mr. Hinkel on the main-deck. Jenkins gave
Donald a rude shake and brought him to wakefulness with a yell.
"Muster out on deck, nipper! Picking the watches, I guess!"

Donald scrambled out into the darkness. The barque was running with
her yards square and the trucks swayed slightly across the stars. A
light was blinking abeam, and the following wavelets plashed and
hissed against the vessel's sides. The men were coming from for'ard
and collected in knots under the poop-break. "Come up on the poop,
men!" cried the mate, leaning over the rail.

Up on the poop the wind blew cold and Donald shivered. The mate stood
by the lighted binnacle with the ship's articles in his hands.

"Sing aout naow while I call school!" he said, and he read:

"Jones!"

"Here, sir!" came from one of the crew.

"Stand to one side after you answer your names!" ordered the officer.

"Barclay!" The black chantey-man answered and joined Jones, and the
mate mustered representatives of four continents as he drawled,
"Valdez!"--"Si, senor!"

"Hansen!"--"Yaw, sir!"

"McLean!"--"Aye, mister!"

"Yedon--what th' hell is this? Yedon--"

A man answered, "Yedonowskivitch, sir!"

"'Struth," growled the officer, "yer blasted name is as long as a
flyin' jib'alliard! Yed is your name from now on!" The Russian grunted
and joined the men who had been checked off.

Englishman, Irishman, Scotchman, Welshman, Japanese, Swede, Dane,
German, Norwegian, Russian, Canadian, American, West Indian, Spaniard
and South African represented the _Kelvinhaugh's_ laborers, and as
Donald viewed them, he wondered how it was possible for such a
cosmopolitan and ill-favored gang to be gathered together. Dressed in
various garbs, scarcely one looked to be a sailor, but the keen-eyed
mates knew that clothes and general appearance do not mark the man who
is rated "Able Bodied" and who can "hand, reef and steer." When the
watch picking began, the first man Mr. Nickerson picked was the
cropped head McLean, whose face still carried the marks of the clawing
he had received on the Glasgow dock, yet Donald would have sworn that
this fellow was a steamship fireman or a ship-yard laborer. But they
were a small, weak-looking crowd after all, and when the boy scanned
the little group and allowed his eyes to wander over the barque's
great hull and the mighty fabric towering aloft--ponderous and
unwieldy in the gloom--he realized something of Thompson's forebodings
and compared the little company of ill-assorted humans, who were to
work the ship to her destination, to a squad of pigmies doomed to
undertake the tasks of giants.

Much to his dismay, Donald found himself listed with the
"starbowlines," under the broad-faced Mr. Hinkel. Thompson was picked
for the mate's watch and would rank as "acting third mate," and Chubby
Jenkins was along with him. For a watch-mate, Donald had the surly
Moore, and he felt that the luck was against him every way.

"Alright, men," said Mr. Nickerson when the watch picking was over.
"Starboard watch keeps the deck until midnight. Relieve the wheel and
look-out, and go below the port watch!"

Though dreadfully tired and aching in every bone and muscle, Donald
had to remain on deck until mid-night, and Mr. Hinkel, with brutal
directness, gave him a lecture on his watch-keeping duties. "You keep
oop here und avake and don't you let me catch you skulkin'. You keep
der binnacle lamps trimmed und vatch der time und strike der bells und
you keep handy so dot I can see you on der lee side der poop!" And
with a few curseful remarks about being pestered with useless, lazy
boys, he turned and began pacing to windward. For four long hours,
Donald trudged with leaden feet on a monotonous round--binnacle to
cabin gangway (to squint at the clock) and gangway to poop bell.
Feeling "played out," he heaved a sigh of relief when midnight came
around and he belled the news with a feeling of anticipatory pleasure
in the hours of restful sleep to come.

Utterly exhausted with a "calashee" (all hands working) watch of
eighteen hours--the most of which was hard labor--Donald kicked off
his boots and rolled into his bunk "all standing" and slept like a
dead man until Jenkins yelled "Eight bells! Turn out!" at 3.45 a.m.
Moore, who had dodged the second mate during the first watch and had
stolen a snooze then, turned out, dressed and went on deck without
giving his watch-mate another shake. When the starbowlines mustered
aft, Donald was missing, and only reported after Thompson had roused
him out of a heavy slumber.

The tyrannous Mr. Hinkel had something to say when McKenzie came up on
the poop ten minutes after the bell had tolled. "Vy der hell dond't
you turn oudt ven you are called?" he snarled. "By Gott, I'll make you
spry!" He turned and sung out to the bos'n. "Gedt a pot of slush und
let dis lazy defil grease down der yigger-top-masdt!" Donald went to
the lee side of the poop, nervous and apprehensive at the nature of
the punishment to be meted to him for lack of punctuality in turning
out on his second watch in the ship.

The bos'n, a kindly Dane, who had sailed so long in English ships as
to have sunk his nationality, brought the tin slush-pot upon the poop
and called to the wondering Donald. "Here, son," he said quietly so
that the second mate could not hear. "Dam' shame sendin' a raw nipper
like you aloft on a job like this for bein' a minute or two late. In
decent ships the new boys ain't allowed above the tops until they've
bin a month at sea. Howsomever, son,"--rigging a bos'n's chair to the
halliards as he talked--"don't git narvous. I'll tend th' halliard an'
lower ye down as ye sing out. Put the lanyard o' this slush-pot aroun'
yer neck an' grease th' mast wit' yer hands. Tie this bit o' line
aroun' th' topm'st when ye get above th' eyes o' the riggin' so's ye
won't swing out when she rolls. Don't be scared, son, you'll be
alright."

"I'm not scared, bos'n," answered Donald, taking his seat in the
chair, with the foul smelling pot of grease around his neck. Up to the
block of the halliard he went--clutching the mast, as the bos'n
hoisted him up, to keep from swinging, pendulum-wise, with the roll of
the barque. It was dark, but clear, and the stars shone bright in the
cold morning air. Far away to port a light blinked somewhere on the
Galloway coast, and from his lofty perch, he could see the wake made
by the ship's passage fading into the murk astern. The rolling of the
vessel was more pronounced up aloft, and before he commenced
"slushing-down," he took a turn of the line around the mast as the
bos'n had advised, but even then, he swayed ominously and the grease
smelt indescribably foul.

Dipping his sore hands into the mess, he massaged the smooth pole with
the grease as the bos'n lowered him down. It was very cold up aloft
and the rolling and the foul smell of the slush was making him dizzy
with nausea. Within a few minutes, he was deathly sick and hung to the
spar, white-faced and with the perspiration breaking out on him. Try
as he might to regain control of himself, Donald had to succumb to the
dreadful _mal-de-mer_, and with a feeble "Look-out, below!" he made
his first contribution to Neptune.

A volley of German curses from the poop apprised him of the fact that
the second mate had received evidence of his indisposition--Mr. Hinkel
having, unfortunately, strode to loo'ard just when Donald was ejecting
the "longshore swash out of his stomach." The realization of what had
happened frightened all the sea-sickness out of him, and he resumed
his task, fearful of the consequences when he reached the deck. Coming
down the mast, he wondered, as he had often wondered of late, what
fascination there was in a sea-life that sent lads to sea.

On deck again after the job was done, the bos'n met him with a grin.
"Ye put it all over th' secon' greaser," he said. "He's for'ard
cleaning himself off." Donald felt too nervous to smile. Mr. Hinkel
would have something to say to him when he came aft.

While he was talking to the bos'n, Captain Muirhead slipped quietly
around the chart-house and stood before them. "Whaur's the second
officer?" he said in a quiet, but ominous tone.

"Th' lad here, sir, was up aloft slushin' down an' took sick an'
Mister Hinkel got it, sir," answered Martin somewhat eagerly. "He's
gone for'ard to get somethin' to clean hisself off with, sir!"

The Old Man muttered unintelligibly under his breath, stared over the
port rail at something ahead, and then gave a quiet-spoken order to
the man at the wheel. The helm was shifted, and when the second mate
came aft, the skipper called him. Pointing into the gloom for'ard, he
said: "Do you see that ship ahead?" Hinkel followed the direction of
the Old Man's hand. "Yaw, sir!" he answered. A new phase of the silent
Captain Muirhead's character was revealed to Donald in the violent
outburst which came from his lips. "Then what th' hell dae ye mean by
leavin' th' poop afore we're clear o' th' Firth," he thundered in a
strident voice so utterly different from his usual quiet-spokeness.
"What's yer look-out doin'? Asleep, I suppose? Damn yer bloody eyes,
we'd ha' been intae that fella if Ah hadna jist spied her! Your place
is here, mister, especially while we're in th' midst o' Channel
traffic. Ye'll no dare tae leave this poop in your watch onless Ah'm
here, or th' mate, or unless it's necessary fur th' safety o' th'
shup! Awa' forrit an' see if yer look-out's awake!"

Hinkel made no reply but slouched down the poop ladder, and a moment
after his guttural cursing could be heard as he dressed down the
sleepy watchman on the fo'c'sle-head. "Hinkel will not love you for
this night, son," remarked the bos'n. "He's an ugly swine, so keep out
of his way."

Donald discreetly kept to loo'ard when Hinkel came aft again. The
captain paced the poop for a spell and then went below. Donald heard
the second mate growl something to the man at the wheel, and a moment
afterwards turned to find the hulking German in the gloom alongside of
him. Hinkel grasped him by the arm in a grip that made him wince. "Jou
verdammt schweinehunde!" he snarled through gritted teeth and shaking
the boy violently. "Mein Gott! Ich like fur kick jou in der
vasser--jou cursed rat! Jou look oudt! I'll sveat jou fur dis!" In his
rage he was almost unintelligible and he concluded by heaving Donald
violently away from him.

During the rest of the watch the boy attended most assiduously to his
duties, as he knew he had made an enemy who would only need a slight
excuse to wreak vengeance on him, but in a way that would be upheld by
the British Merchant Shipping laws and the officials administering
it.

With a fair wind and fine weather, the _Kelvinhaugh_ cleared the St.
George's Channel and swung away S.W. across the broad expanse of the
North Atlantic for the equator and on the deepwaterman's track which
would bring her in the vicinity of the land again at Cape San Roque on
the Brazilian coast. It was fine weather for the ship, but it wasn't
fine weather for Donald. Captain Muirhead ignored him absolutely, at
least by speech, though he watched him at work often with furtive
glances. The Old Man was not much of a conversationalist, but he did
talk to the other apprentices, and his ignoring of young McKenzie was
commented on in the half-deck. Thompson summed it up, rather brutally,
but Donald knew that he meant it in a kindly spirit. "Nipper," he
said, "your uncle has no love for you or the Old Man would be falling
all over you. Your stingy Scotch relative looks upon you as a charity
brat--it don't need but half an eye to see that, for he sent you to
sea parish-rigged, with an outfit as mean as what ye'd get from a
boarding-house master in Jerusalem. He shoved you off here as the
cheapest thing he could do--an apprentice without a premium paid
down--and he'll see that you work for your keep and clothes. The
skipper knows it, and that square-headed Hinkel knows it, for he'd
never dare treat any of us other fellows the way he treats you. Your
best friend aft here is that hard-case Blue-nose mate.... And, say,
kid, just you make that skulker Moore do his share. He's sojerin'
around in here smoking and loafing while you're on deck. Why doesn't
Hinkel get after _him_, I'd like to know? You just bring Moore to his
bearings, kid, and jab him one on the jaw if he gets lippy!" Donald
thanked the senior apprentice with tears in his eyes. Ever since he
had come aboard this ship, it had required all his nerve and courage
to keep from breaking down at the petty tyrannies and persecutions of
the second mate. The captain must be abetting his officer, or why
didn't he interfere in cases where, as Donald knew, he, as an
apprentice, was not supposed to be ordered to perform. Tasks, which in
most ships were done by older hands, were delegated to McKenzie, and
he carried them out cheerfully, thinking that he was going through the
rigorous course prescribed for those who would become "compleat and
perfect seamen."

Mr. Nickerson seemed indeed to be his best friend among the after
guard. Though not in the mate's watch, yet that officer did not take
long to size Donald up as a lad having the right spirit in him for a
sailor. He was willing and jumped to obey a command. He was
intelligent and mastered the intricacies of the big barque's rigging
and gear in less time than most green hands would have taken to
determine bow from stern and starboard from port. In the dog-watches
and on Sundays, the mate took Donald in hand and taught him how to
steer, and by the time the _Kelvinhaugh_ had picked up the north-east
trade winds in the latitude of the Canaries, he was able to take a
wheel in fine weather and steer "by the wind" or by compass.

The Nova Scotian's lessons were forceful and not readily forgotten. "I
jest show a boy once," he used to say, "an' then I expect him to go
ahead an' do it himself. When I have to show a thing twice I ram it
home with a rope's end!" Jenkins and Moore--the latter especially--had
cause to fear the mate's teachings, but Donald stood high in his favor
through his intelligent grasp of things and the will to master a
problem. To the other apprentices and in the eyes of the hands
for'ard, Nickerson was a "ruddy Yankee bucko," and it must be
admitted, the epithet was justified, for he was a "taut" hand and made
no bones about using his fist or boot to accentuate "nippiness."

By the time the barque caught the "trades," and in spite of the
miserable food supplied, young McKenzie had toughened up wonderfully.
The continual "horsing" to which he was being subjected by his watch
officer seemed to be the very elixir necessary to building up his
apparently frail constitution. His muscles and sinews hardened and
developed; his eyes were clear and bright, and the sallowness of his
face became replaced by a healthy tan. The soft hands became hard and
horny-palmed, while his movements were quick and active under the
spur of the mate's teachings and the second mate's spite. If the sea
killed some boys, it was making a man of Donald, and he recalled the
old Glasgow specialist's advice to his mother, "He'll be as tough as a
louse an' as hard tae kill!"

While he had benefitted physically through a sea-life, his boyish
ideals of the romance and adventure of seafaring had been ruthlessly
shattered. His treatment on the _Kelvinhaugh_ had practically killed
all the thrilling fancies and dreams of his home days. He was
beginning to realize his father's words, "It's a dog's life at the
best of times!" and even the blue-skied "trades," with the barque
bowling along through the azure ocean under clouds of brand-new
canvas, white as snow, failed to awake in him the same enthusiasm as
the ideal about which he had dreamed. True! they were glorious
days--for a passenger or the officers, maybe--but for Donald,
hard-worked and living on wretched provender and environed by men
whose imaginations were dead, the "trade" latitudes were but periods
in a voyage, just as summer and winter were seasonal phases in a
calendar year. Had he gone to sea under better auspices, his enjoyment
of the sea and its glories would have been different.

There was one lesson he did learn and which he ever afterwards
retained as a permanent part of his character, and that was dependence
upon himself and the submergence of sensitiveness and meek toleration
of injustices from equals. The rough talk of the half-deck and the
cutting jibes of his shipmates no longer wounded his sensibilities.
While he retained his inbred gentleness, yet he case-hardened it with
an armor of indifference not to be easily penetrated. Physically, he
resented being imposed upon by others not entitled to command
obedience, and gained his first step in that resolution in a "show
down" with his apprentice watch-mate, Moore.

The surly youth had never forgiven McKenzie for the bunk episode when
the ship was at Greenock. He also attempted, by reason of the fact
that he had served four days of his time at sea in the lost
_Dunottar_, to claim seniority over Donald and to delegate to the
latter the job of "Peggy" for the half-deck. Donald was willing to do
his share of fetching the food from the galley and in cleaning out the
apprentice's quarters, but he began to resent doing all of it. Moore
considered that Donald's willingness to do mess-boy work for the crowd
was a tacit acknowledgment of his seniority and freedom from such
menial tasks, but he over-stepped the bounds one dog-watch when he
insolently ordered McKenzie to sweep up the floor of the boys'
quarters, after he had littered it with shavings from a model which he
was whittling. Donald had swept the half-deck out earlier in the day,
and calmly told Moore that "as you've made the mess, it is up to you
to clean it up!" Thompson was in his bunk reading, but hearing the
words between the two, he knocked off to watch events.

"D'ye hear me, nipper!" growled Moore threateningly. "I told you to
clane this litter up. Git now or I'll be after makin' ye!"

Donald stood up, determined and very cool. "Moore!" he said calmly,
"I've made up my mind that I'm a better man than you, so put up your
hands, for I'm going to knock the tar out of you!" And he went for the
other like a shot out of a gun.

Moore was bigger and heavier than Donald, but he was one of the kind
who "sojered" in a heave or a haul and only exerted his strength when
he had to. When Donald was toiling under Hinkel's eye, Moore was
"sun-fishing" somewhere. Hinkel was too busy horsing McKenzie to care
a continental what Moore was doing, and it was thought by some of the
hands that the second mate had received a substantial monetary
consideration from the Irish lad to allow him a "jack-easy" time.
Moore's people were wealthy brewers in Liverpool, and he went to sea
with plenty of money. However, Mr. Hinkel's attentions to Donald
proved Moore's undoing. As a physical developer of soft muscles, the
second mate had been a success as far as Donald was concerned, and
within five minutes, the younger lad had Moore backed up against the
bulk-head and was "knocking the tar" out of him with fists as hard
and as bony as though shod with knuckle-dusters. Thompson was sitting
up in his bunk betting plugs of tobacco on the outcome of the "mill"
with Jenkins and the bos'n, who were watching from the door. The
sail-maker and carpenter were craning through the ports, thoroughly
enjoying the "scrap" and murmuring, "Good fur the wee fella! He's a
richt nippy yin wi' his dukes!"

Moore, badly mauled, hauled down his flag, and Donald broke away from
him. With a new gleam in his eyes--both puffed from some of Moore's
shots--he said, "From now on, Moore, you'll go half and half in any
work that's to be done in here, and you'll begin now and do a week's
"Peggy" for what I've been doing since we up-hook'd, or I'll turn to
and plug you some more!"

Thompson laughed. "That's talking, nipper," he said, "ride him down!
You gave that Irish puddler just what he was bearing up for!" And
Donald felt that he had gone a step up on the ladder of the spirit
that makes the man.




CHAPTER TEN


The monotonous routine of uneventful sea-life saw the big barque
across the equatorial line, and the usual spell of windless calms had
to be endured when the _Kelvinhaugh_ left the dying trade winds astern
in nine degrees north. After a stretch of twenty-five days, "bracing
up" and "squaring away" to innumerable "cat's paws" and flickering
zephyrs, the vessel picked up the south-east trades a few degrees
south of the line and, braced sharp up, made brave sailing for such a
huge heavily laden craft. So far the weather had been fine and the
barque had not yet been called upon to match her clumsy fabric with
angry wind and sea.

It does not take a ship's company long to size up the condition of
things aboard ship, and fo'c'sle and half-deck gossip showed that the
hands had pretty well taken the measure of the after-guard. Captain
Muirhead turned out to be a cheap skipper, a sulky old bear, an
indifferent sailor and over-fond of the bottle. In the calm, windless
doldrums, he never came up on deck but what the aroma of whisky
travelled with him. On these occasions he was more talkative than
usual, and exhibited a fondness for yarning with the second mate. The
big German would act so openly servile during these phases of the
captain's favor, that the crew had him designated as a "ruddy skipper
licker." Curiously enough, when the Old Man was sober, he treated
Hinkel to the rough side of his tongue pretty frequently, and would
often call him to task for errors and omissions in seamanship.

With Mr. Nickerson the case seemed to be different. The master had
very little to say to him at any time, but the mate acted on numerous
occasions as if he had but little use for his commander. Nickerson was
undoubtedly a splendid seaman, and Martin, the bos'n, openly averred
that he was the smartest mate he had ever sailed with as far as his
seamanship was concerned. Thompson bore testimony to the Nova
Scotian's skill as a navigator, and stated that he had taught him
wrinkles in working difficult problems which would have stumped many
an extra master. But Mr. Nickerson's harsh treatment of the crew did
not win him their affections, though it commanded their fear and
respect.

As the days passed, Donald prayed fervently for the voyage to end.
Hinkel was fast making his life a burden to him, while Thompson's and
the bos'n's gloomy prognostications of the future in the barque did
not tend to hearten his outlook on the days to come. The boy did not
worry much about the third mate's prophecies of disaster, but when
Martin began growling, it was time to take notice. "Mark me well,"
croaked he to the hands, "we'll catch hell in this hooker. Th' pitch
o' th' Horn in July ain't a good season for this big hulk down there,
an' she'll be a man-killer! Mark me well! Them big heavy yards an'
sails an' a long ship an' a deep ship means work an' dirt. She's
slower'n blazes in answerin' her helm and a lazy swine in coming
about--always gittin' in irons. An' she'll be wet ... a ruddy
half-tide rock! Th' grass'll grow on them there decks afore we get
around. Aye! Mark me well! There'll be th' devil to pay an' no pitch
hot when we git _down there_!"

The continual croaking about "down there" had but little effect upon
Jenkins and Moore. Both had never rounded the Horn; could not imagine
its frightfulness, and were not worrying. "Come day, go day, God send
Sunday!" was their motto. The barque was so big and new that the Horn
had no terrors in their imaginations. In a smaller, older ship it
might be bad, but in the big new _Kelvinhaugh_?--Tcha! there was
nothing to it! Donald, however, was not so optimistic. Possibly the
nigger-driving he was continually subjected to somewhat obscured any
rosy outlook on the future. Anyhow, he prepared for the worst and did
what he could to make his poor kit fit for dirty weather and a long
spell of it. Jenkins and Moore had plenty of clothes--they would pull
through alright, but Donald, with his wretched rig, knew that he would
get nothing more to augment it this side of the Horn. In such straits
a boy could not but wish that the voyage would end.

Hinkel became more tyrannous as the barque reached to the south'ard,
subjecting McKenzie to numerous petty tyrannies known in seafaring
parlance as "work-up jobs." A favorite trick of the second mate's was
to tug slyly on the bunt and leech-lines--breaking the twine or yarn
which kept them from chafing the sails. He would then sing out for
McKenzie to lay aloft and overhaul and stop the gear from the royal
down, generally around the end of a watch. Poor Donald would have to
skip up with a fist-full of rope-yarns and finish the task by the time
his watch had been anywhere from half to an hour in their bunks. Aye,
there are a hundred and one ways in which a despotic officer can break
the spirit of a man or boy at sea! One incident north of the Plate
showed the true calibre of the man, and gave Donald an experience he
was never likely to forget. It was one of the outstanding incidents in
his career and one of the most humiliating. Thompson had called him at
the end of the first night watch. There was a strong breeze blowing
aft and the barque was slugging along under all plain sail. As he
pulled on his clothes, Thompson remarked jocularly, "You're shapin' up
not too bad as a shell-back, nipper, but there's one thing you can't
do yet."

"What's that?"

"You can't chew tobacco," replied the other with a grin. "Until you
can masticate a quid you can't call yourself a genuine deep-waterman."
"I'll go you," said Donald. "Gimme a bite of your plug." And with a
liberal chew in his cheek, he jumped out on deck and reported aft.

The second mate had some work for the watch for'ard and told Donald to
take the wheel. The sea was slapping under the ship's stern and
causing the wheel to buck heavily, and the boy could only manage her
by putting his foot on the spokes at intervals in order to rest his
sorely strained arms. For almost an hour he steered and chewed on his
quid, but the wrenching of the wheel was beginning to exhaust him. He
had just put his foot on the lower spokes when he was conscious of Mr.
Hinkel's presence at the lee side of the wheel-box. At the same moment
a heavier sea than usual smashed under the counter and the wheel
jerked savagely--knocking his foot away. Grasping the spinning spokes
with his two hands he tried to arrest the violent whirl, but before he
could exert his strength, he was hurled completely over the wheel-box
and up against the second mate. The officer slipped to his knees, but
jumped up in a flash and arrested the whirling spokes. Donald lay
across the grating with all the breath knocked out of him and deathly
sick through swallowing the tobacco he had been valorously
masticating.

Hinkel yelled viciously for a hand to take the wheel--kicking the
prostrate Donald violently with his heavy boots and swearing vengeance
as soon as he could leave the jerking spokes. Donald was too sick to
take much heed and lay across the grating horribly ill.

"Jou verdammt schweine!" bawled the furious German as soon as he was
relieved. "Ich teach you!" He grabbed the boy by the arm and dragged
him across the deck, swearing in mixed English and German. Over to the
hen-coops at the fore-end of the poop he hauled the unresisting
apprentice, and opening up a door, jammed him headfirst in among the
screeching fowls. Slamming the barred door down again, he turned the
catch, and stood up. "Stay in dere dis vatch!" he snarled. "I'll teach
jou to gedt fonny me vit!"

Too sick to protest or cry out, Donald lay prone inside the narrow
coop while the few remaining inmates clucked and squawked and pecked
at his head. At that moment he only wished to die and end his misery,
and this feeling, together with the violent jar he had received at the
wheel, the tobacco in his stomach and the foul odor from the floor of
the coop, sent him off into a faint.

He came-to a short time later to find himself being pulled out of the
coop by Mr. Hinkel, and he heard Mr. Nickerson saying, "Bring him
out!" in a voice as harsh as a file. The mate was in his shirt and
under-drawers, and when Donald was hauled from his foul prison, the
chief officer bent down and asked, "What in blazes were you doing,
boy?" Donald related dully how he had been thrown over the wheel-box.
The second mate broke in. "I tell jou, sir, he vos star-gazink und let
der veel go! She nearly broached mit der jung fool's monkey-tricks--"

The Nova Scotian leaned forward and peered menacingly into the
German's face. "Listen, Hinkel," he said slowly and in a voice as hard
as steel, but as ominous as a death threat, "I've got your flag an'
number, my bucko, and if I catch you man-handlin' that boy again I'll
break you like a dry stick. You measly Dutchman!" That was all he
said, quietly, so that the man at the wheel could not hear, but Hinkel
was visibly impressed and without a word, turned militarily on his
heels and walked to loo'ard. The mate watched him for a moment and
bent down and raised Donald to his feet. "Go to yer bunk, boy, an'
stay there for the rest of the watch." Donald staggered away feeling
unspeakably grateful to his champion, and with a fixed determination
to forever eschew at least one of a "dyed-in-the-wool" shell-back's
accomplishments.

That the second mate hated him, Donald knew, though he was completely
at a loss to account for the continual hazing by the brutal German.
Possibly, he thought, it was because the fellow was a natural bully,
and Donald's misfortune in getting the second mate into trouble with
the skipper for being off the poop on the night in the Firth of Clyde
may have accentuated Hinkel's spite.

The captain's attitude was also unaccountable to Donald's reasoning.
During the whole of the time he had been on the barque, Captain
Muirhead had never spoken to him, nor had he taken notice of him in
any way save by furtive glances. The man had no reason to dislike
Donald, yet after the familiar conversations they had had together at
Glasgow, he had now closed up like a clam, though to the other boys he
often passed friendly remarks, and on occasions, corrected them with
the rough side of his tongue. To Donald, he neither spoke friendly or
otherwise, and the boy wondered why the skipper maintained such an
attitude towards him. Thompson often commented on the fact and put
forth several conclusions. "He's either afraid of you because you're
the owner's nephew, or else he doesn't care a continental about you
because you're a charity 'prentice. It's one thing or the other,
sure."

Off the Plate, Donald underwent another bitter experience which left a
deep and lasting impression upon him and served to put the captain in
the proper category of relationship. An English barque, homeward
bound, had passed and McKenzie was on the poop handing code flags for
the Old Man who spoke the barque and asked to be reported. It was
blowing fresh abaft the beam, but the sea was smooth save for a long
swell from the south'ard. The last hoist was flying from the
spanker-gaff, when the halliard parted and the bunting came fluttering
down on the poop. The other ship had got the signal, however, as her
answering pennant was up, and Captain Muirhead gruffly told Mr. Hinkel
to stow the flags away. During the afternoon in the second mate's
watch, the Captain suddenly told Hinkel to have the halliard rove off
again as he might require it at any time. "Ye don't need tae top up
th' gaff, mister," the Old Man added. "Send yin o' thae boys up. That
young McKenzie is spry enough tae reeve it off!"

As the ship was running, the spanker was furled, but to shin up a
slippery spar standing out from the jiggermast at an angle of about
thirty-five degrees is no easy task even in a dock, and with the
vessel rolling and the gaff swaying, even though braced with the
vangs, the job was exceedingly risky, and able seamen would have
refused to do it. Donald, however, made no demur, but jumped to obey
the second mate's guttural command. With the light halliard in his
hand, he clambered up the jigger shrouds and swung down from the top
on to the gaff and sat astride it facing towards the stern of the
ship.

With the halliard in his teeth, he started to clamber up the pole with
his arms and legs encircling it, but owing to the fact that it was a
scraped spar and recently "slushed," the task of shinning it was
exceedingly difficult. Several times he hauled himself up, only to
slide back, and once or twice the swaying of the ship almost caused
him to slip off altogether.

"Oudt jou go, now, und no verdammt nonsings!" bawled Hinkel sixty feet
below. Captain Muirhead was pacing to windward absolutely unconcerned
and scarcely bestowing a glance at the boy clutching the precarious
gaff. Several of the men, working in the waist, knocked off to watch
the performance and the bos'n growled, "Gaudy shame! That boy can't
shin that greasy gaft. A ruddy work-up job, that what I calls it.
They're hazin' that nipper."

Nervous and somewhat apprehensive as to his ability to get out to the
gaff-end, Donald essayed it once more. Gripping the spar with all his
strength, he made a desperate effort and halted for breath a few feet
short of the vangs out and above him. The swaying was worse out there
and he was almost exhausted. Hanging on to the gaff was as hard as
climbing out on it, so, perspiring and fearful, he made another
shuffle. At the moment when he had almost reached the gaff-end, the
weather vang carried away; the gaff swung to loo'ard and Donald was
hurled violently off the spar. He cleared the poop rail by a few
inches in his descent and plunged head-first into the sea.

Martin, the bos'n, had been waiting for just such an eventuality and
he was up the poop ladder in a flash, and had thrown one of the poop
life-buoys over. Without waiting for orders, the man at the wheel put
the helm down and the barque was coming sluggishly up into the wind,
with canvas rustling and banging. "Keep her off! Keep her off!" bawled
the Old Man. "Damn an' blast ye! Who told ye tae pit her doon? Dae ye
want tae tak' th' sticks oot o' her--"

The mate, in shirt and trousers, suddenly appeared aft and elbowed the
captain away from the wheel. His lean face was convulsed with fury.
"You white-livered hound!" he roared. "Ye'd leave that kid t' drown,
would ye? Not ef I know it! Ease yer helm down!" The captain stood,
astounded, red-faced and gasping, while Hinkel ran for'ard to do
something or get out of the way.

Nickerson leaped to the break of the poop. "Back yer mainyard!" he
bawled. "Aft here an' git the quarter-boat away! Rouse out the
hands--cook an' all! Aloft you, Jenkins, and keep him in sight!" Under
the spur of his curses the men skipped around, and the life-boat was
out of the chocks, swung out and lowered away in record time. Six men,
led by Martin, the bos'n, swarmed down into her, and soon had the oars
shipped and manfully pulled away in the direction indicated by Jenkins
up in the jigger-rigging.

"D'ye see him, boy?"

"Yes, sir," Jenkins answered. "He's got hold of the ring-buoy and is
about half a mile away off the beam."

"How's th' boat headin'? Kin they see him?"

"They're heading right for him, sir!" replied the apprentice.

Captain Muirhead came to himself at this juncture--he had remained
beside the wheel seemingly petrified by the mate's action in
countermanding his orders--and he walked over to Mr. Nickerson with a
face dark with rage. "Mr. Nickerson," he said, in a harsh, tense
voice, "Ah'll log you for this, by Goad! It's bliddy mutiny--no less!
It's--" He stopped at a loss for words in his passion. The Nova
Scotian gave him a contemptuous glance. "You log an' be damned to
you!" he said coolly. "You an' your 'take th' sticks out of her' in a
moderate breeze!" Then with a strange look in his eyes, he peered
truculently into the captain's face. "There's something blame' fishy
about this!" he said significantly. "What are you up to? Are you
trying to get rid of that kid?" Then threateningly he added, "Let me
tell you, sir, that if anything happens to that nipper aboard this
ship, I'll have _you_ jugged for it. I've got friends in Vancouver
who'll take you in hand, sir, an' you'll find they're rough an' ready
on that part o' the West Coast!"

The captain, with suddenly subdued expression on his face, was about
to say something, but evidently thought better of it. Instead he
remarked quietly, "When ye get yer boat aboard, pit her on her course
again. If th' laud wants a drap o' whusky, Ah'll gie ye some for him."
Then apologetically, "Ah got a bad fricht, an' didny ken whit was
happenin' when Ah gied th' man th' order." And as he turned away,
Nickerson stared at him curiously and muttered, "Liar!"

Donald's plunge into the sea knocked the breath out of him for a
moment, but when he came up, gasping and half-stunned, he saw, as in a
dream, a life-buoy being thrown over the barque's taff-rail. When he
regained his bearings he swam for it, and succeeded in reaching and
hanging on to the circle of canvassed cork. He held on for an
indefinite period, during which time he saw the _Kelvinhaugh_ coming
to the wind, and rising on top of a swell, he made out a quarter-boat
pulling towards him. He shouted several times, and in a daze, heard
voices. "Here he is! Steady all! Easy starboard! Pull port! 'Vast
pulling all!" Then he was grabbed by the arms and hauled aboard the
boat, where he lay on the bottom boards and vomited the salt water he
had swallowed.

Feeling sick and shaky, he was carried into the half-deck, and
Thompson and the steward took his clothes off and rolled him up in
warm blankets and put him in his bunk. He was given a stiff drink of
hot whisky and almost immediately went off to sleep, and the talk of
the other apprentices at tea only woke him after he had slept like a
log for almost five hours.

"How're ye feeling, nipper?" enquired Thompson kindly. "Good? That's
fine. Ye're gettin' to be a reg'lar hell-diver, you are, and, my eye!
didn't you cause a rare rumpus!" And he told what had happened after
Donald had taken the plunge. "That measly squarehead of a Hinkel is
trying to do for you!" added the senior apprentice solemnly. "You
should have seen him when the mate came up on deck an' shoved the Old
Man away from the wheel. The big Dutchman runs for'ard yelling in
Doytch an' what th' blazes he was saying nobody knew. I think he was
running away from Nickerson. If you wanted to see a reg'lar genuine
'stand-'em-up-and-knock-'em-down,' 'give-me-none-of-yer-sass' Western
Ocean bucko look on a man's face, it was on the mate's when he called
the Old Man 'a white-livered hound!' I guess Hinkel thought he would
lay _him_ out with a capstan-bar, so he skedaddled!"

Donald had got his clothes from the galley, where they had been dried
by the cook, and was sitting in the apprentice's berth talking with
Jenkins, when Mr. Nickerson looked in. He gave Donald a sharp glance.
"Nipper," he said, curtly, "you'll come in my watch after this.
Jenkins will go in the second mate's."

The mate had just come from for'ard after questioning the bos'n. "Them
spanker vangs, sir, were all right when I examined them day afore
yest'day, sir," Martin had said. "The tackles are brand new and there
ain't been nothin' to cause a chafe or enough strain to strand th'
rope. Them strands, sir, were filed or scraped, sir, to make believe
they was chafed or wore, and I thinks, sir, as how that second mate
did it."

"And the signal halliards?"

"They was alright, sir. Th' Old Man, sir, jest made a slippery bend on
th' flag, I guess, and it carried away an' un-rove."

Mr. Nickerson nodded. "You jest keep your tongue between your teeth,
Bose, an' don't open your trap about th' matter to anybody. I'll look
into this." And he walked to the half-deck and gave Donald a change of
watch.




CHAPTER ELEVEN


Donald was to go on duty with the mate's, or port watch, at midnight,
but he was awakened suddenly at six bells by loud shouting on deck and
the violent careening of the ship. Hinkel could be heard bawling,
"Ledt go royal und to'gallundt halliards and clew up! All handts!"
Then Jenkins opened the half-deck door for a second and yelled, "Roll
out! Look alive!" and mingled with his shout came the booming roar of
wind, the swash of heavy water and the thunder of slatting canvas.

"A ruddy pampero!" cried Thompson, leaping from his bunk and pulling
on his boots. "Jump, kid, she's on her beam ends!" Donald dropped to
the sloping floor of the berth, hauled his boots on the wrong feet,
and sprang after Thompson into the darkness. When he got outside he
cannoned into someone running aft, who cursed him and vanished in the
howling blackness. The lee scuppers were a boiling froth of water
waist deep, and up aloft the canvas was thundering as the royal and
t'gallant yards came down by the run. The ship was over on her port
side at an alarming angle, and for a minute Donald could do nothing
but hang on to the mizzen gear, gasping and dazed, until he got his
bearings.

The German second mate was barking commands from the break of the poop
when something banged aloft. A voice shouted, "Maint'gallan's'l's
gone!" Then Thompson grabbed him by the arm. "Bear a hand haulin' up
yer mains'l!" he roared, and Donald scrambled for'ard along the
sloping decks and hauled on the gear with a mob of "hey-ho'ing,"
swearing men. Then the mate appeared--(the captain was on the
poop)--and he gave tongue. "What in hell are you all adoin' here?" he
snarled. "Aloft an' stow th' fore an' main r'yals you boys! Git some
beef on those bunt-lin's, you hounds, or I'll kick some go in you!
None of yer 'You pull now, Bill, I pulled last' work here!"

From the height of the main-royal-yard, Donald could see the water to
windward white with foam. The stars were shining clear and bright to
the westward, but all was black in the eastern sky and the wind blew
in savage gusts, which gave them a hard tussle in subduing the
bellying, slatting canvas. By the time they had got the two royals
confined in the gaskets, the barque had come to an even keel and was
running before the blast under six topsails and foresail.

The crew had hauled up the cross'-jack, mainsail, and hauled down the
fore-and-aft sails and were aloft stowing the big t'gallan's'ls as the
barque swung off, staggering and rolling scuppers under in the cross
sea which was running, and as soon as the boys came down from the
royal yards, the mate chased them up the mast again to help furl the
mizzen-upper-topsail, which had been let go. On the completion of this
job, and when the crew were pretty well exhausted with pulling,
hauling and lifting, Thompson voiced the opinion of all hands: "God
help us when we strike some real wind and have to get the muslin off
her in a hurry," he said gloomily. "Those big yards and sails will
take charge of us then. We'll have to let the canvas blow away and pay
for it."

"Pay for it?" queried Donald innocently. "What d'ye mean?"

The senior apprentice laughed grimly. "I was referring to the old yarn
about a 'prentice boy who had a rich father. The mate ordered him up
one-time to stow the mizzen-royal in a squall. The kid squints aloft
and didn't like the look of the job, so he says to the mate, 'Oh, let
it blow away, sir; father will pay for it!' That's what we'll have to
do on this hooker, I'm thinking. I shiver when I think of handling
those big courses and tops'ls of ours in a real Cape Horner. We'll
catch it down there and no blushing error! If we only had _men_ for'ad
instead of flabby-muscled dock-rats we might get through, but it'll be
all hands every time there's a job o' work."

"How about that donkey engine?" queried Donald. "Isn't that supposed
to help in the heavy work?"

Thompson laughed sarcastically. "A fat lot you know, nipper!" he
cried. "Your lousy Scotch ship-owner puts in a donkey and cuts down the
crew, but he gives orders to the skipper that the donkey is not to be
used except on extra-special occasions. The donkey is the greatest
curse of sailormen these days and the owner reaps the benefit. He cuts
down the crew on the work it is _supposed_ to do, and saves money in
port by using it for loading and discharging cargo. That's your
labor-saving donkey for you!"

The two boys were in the half-deck changing their wet clothing and
donning their oilskins for a "stand-by" until their watch was called
at midnight, but Mr. Nickerson looked in and ordered them out. "Bear a
hand an' get that maint'gallan's'l unbent from the yard an' sent down.
It'll put ye in trim for Cape Stiff!"

The "pampero" was the first real dusting the barque had tackled, and
the old timers shook their heads ominously and muttered dread
prophecies of times to come. In the weight of the squalls blowing, and
under heavy weather sail, she made a dirty job of it, and it took two
men at the wheel, sweating, to try and steady her. Big seas piled up
astern and, overtaking the sluggish, deep-laden barque, broke on both
quarters and crashed aboard--filling the decks from fo'c'sle-head to
poop deck. "A ruddy half-tide rock!" growled the men as they worked in
water, waist-deep, handling the remains of the maint'gallan's'l, a
brand-new heavy weather sail, which had split in several places.
"Cheap gear for a cheap ship!" commented the sailmaker.

By the time the pampero had blown its edge off, Donald returned to
his binnacle-trimming and time-keeping job on the poop, and the
barque, braced sharp up and with lower stays'ls set, was plunging and
diving on her course to the Falklands and Cape Horn. There was a cold
bite to the wind that Donald had never felt before--precursor of the
bitter windy latitudes they were running into--and he scrambled into
the kindly lee of the chart-house. The lee port-hole was open and
Donald could hear the angry voice of the captain laying down the law
to the second mate. "Ye wur asleep on watch, mister," he was saying,
"or ye'd ha' seen that squall makin' up. It's a wonder tae me ye didny
jump th' masts oot of her.... She was in th' thick of it afore ye sung
out. Ye're a damned worthless sojer--that's whit ye are--an' yer spell
in jyle has made ye forget all th' seamanship ye iver knew...." Donald
opened his eyes. "Spell in jail?" He wondered, and as he had no
respect for either the Old Man or Hinkel, he kept his ears agog for
more. "Don't gie me ony back chat!" the skipper was shouting, "or I'll
dis-rate ye an' send ye forrard.... an' ye know what th' men'll dae if
they ken ye wur th' man what...." The boy strained his ears to catch
the remainder of the sentence when the mate's strident voice
interrupted with--"Boy! boy! Where'n Tophet has that ruddy young sojer
skulked to? Oh, ye're there, are ye? D'ye know it's five minutes of
eight bells? Look smart, naow, an' call th' starboard watch or I'll
trim yer hair for ye!"

Life under Mr. Nickerson's command was Heaven compared to his watches
with the bullying German, and Donald experienced a revival of spirits
at the change. Not that the Nova Scotian was an easy task-master. By
no means! But Nickerson was too much of a man to bully and ill-treat a
boy, though he was not so particular with the 'fore-mast hands. He was
a "driver" in every sense of the word and kept Thompson and McKenzie
up to the mark, but he never set them at useless "work-up" jobs.
Thompson, as an apprentice almost out of his time, he did not
interfere with much--Thompson was an able fellow, anyway, and would
make a smart officer when he got his ticket--but Donald was the
mate's particular protégé, and many a time the lad wished he did not
stand so high in the officer's favor.

"Boy," said the mate one afternoon a day or two after the pampero, "I
want to see ef ye've lost yer nerve after floppin' off that there gaff
th' other day. Naow, son, d'ye think ye kin shin up to that main truck
an' reeve off a signal halliard?" Donald stared up at the dizzy height
of the main-mast to where the truck capped it--a good one hundred and
eighty feet above deck--and felt some trepidation at the thought of
the job. Nickerson was watching him narrowly. "Haow abaout it, boy?"
he said.

"Yes, sir!" answered Donald after a moment's hesitation. "I'll go up,
sir!"

"Well, then, ask th' bos'n to give ye a coil o' signal halliard stuff
an' shin it up. Sharp, naow!" Everything with the mate was "Look
alive!" "Jump!" or "Nip along, you!" with a few blistering oaths added
to put the proper amount of "go" into the command. Anything moving
slow was the officer's _bete noir_, and the men used to remark that he
"sh'd ha' bin a ruddy ingine-driver on a perishin' mail train!"

Donald moved "sharp" and started aloft. There was a light breeze and
enough swell to cause the masts to sway in an arc of ten degrees. He
made the royal yard without difficulty--he had been up there often
before and under worse conditions--and after his climb up the Jacob's
ladder, he rested with his feet on the yard and held on to the eyes of
the royal rigging. From this giddy perch he had a wonderful view of
the ship one hundred and fifty feet below, and the fore-shortening of
her hull from this height made him feel as if this weight aloft would
cause her to capsize. Below him the sails bellied out in a succession
of snow-white curves--full and rounded with the wind and each silently
pulling the ship along--and the spreading rigging looked like a
spider's web radiating from where he stood. All around was sea and sky
and the wake of the barque could be seen making a foamy path through
the greeny-blue of ocean, with a few sea-birds wheeling above it. A
gull sailed past him--squawking as if in jealous anger at the boy
invading its ethereal realm, then the mate's stentorian voice floated
up from below, "Nip up, naow! Ye've bin sight-seein' long enough!"

Glancing up at the thrusting height of the sky-sail pole to the truck
thirty feet above, a slight wave of fear came over him--an aftermath
of his jigger-gaff experience--and he closed his eyes for a moment
until his nerve returned. There was no skys'l yard crossed on the
_Kelvinhaugh_ and no means of getting up to the truck save by shinning
up the greasy pole with the aid of the skys'l back-stay. With the
halliard in his teeth, he took a long breath and grasping the stay
with one hand and encircling the mast with his left arm and his legs,
he started up and reached the eyes of the skys'l rigging, perspiring
and gasping. From the eyes of the rigging, the pole up-thrust, smooth
and bare, for about eight feet and, gulping a deep breath, he wriggled
and grasped the smooth spar with his two hands. In a few seconds he
brought the round sphere of the truck on a level with his head, and
hanging on to the mast with legs and his left arm, he took the
halliard from between his teeth and thrust it up through the sheave in
the truck with his free hand.

By this time he was almost exhausted with the effort of the climb and
holding the weight of his body on the greasy spar with one arm. But
though he had thrust the end of the halliard up through the sheave, he
had yet to bring the end down through the pulley hole, and this called
for a hand to hold the line and another to reeve it down through. The
rolling of the ship was swaying the mast, and, as he hung desperately
on to loo'ard, the dead-weight of his body almost wrenched the muscles
out of his shoulders and arms. The swinging of the mast was nauseating
him in his excited condition, and he felt his strength gradually
ebbing. The breath was hissing through his clenched teeth in rapid
gasps; his heart was pounding fiercely, and his imagination began to
picture horrid visions of him hurtling through the air and crashing to
the deck.

"I've got to do it! I've got to do it!" he panted, and making a
supreme effort he thrust the line into his left hand, and reaching
over the truck with the other, pushed the end down and through.
Grasping this in his teeth, he slid down the pole, caught the skys'l
backstay and swung down to the spreader of the cross-trees.

Exhausted, sick and shaky, he sat on the spreader for a few moments
until breath and composure was restored, and then he came down on deck
and belayed the halliard. Mr. Nickerson was smoking a clay pipe and
leaning back in a corner of the poop rail when he mounted the ladder
and reported, "Halliard's rove, sir!" The mate looked quizzically at
him for a second, and taking the pipe from his mouth, remarked, "Ye
were a hell of a long time doin' it!" After accomplishing what, to
Donald, seemed a most hazardous and herculean feat, this was all the
praise he got. It was the way of the sea!

In the night watch the mate called Donald over to him. It was a quiet
evening--cold but clear, and with a moderate breeze blowing. "Son," he
said, "would you go aloft again to-morrow an' reeve another signal
halliard?"

"Yes, sir!" answered the boy bravely, and wondering what was coming.

"Y'ain't scared?"

"Not now, sir. I was while I was up there, but I won't be next time."
Nickerson seemed pleased. "That's why I sent you up, boy," he said. "I
wanted to see if your nerve was good. You'll do, son!" He puffed away
at his pipe for a spell.

"What d'ye cal'late makes the Old Man an' Hinkel treat you the way
they do? S'pose ye spin me something of how ye come to go to sea." He
spoke kindly.

McKenzie told him in a short narration the events which were
responsible for his being on the _Kelvinhaugh_. The mate plied him
with questions and grunted at the answers. "So yer old man was skipper
of the _Ansonia_, was he?" he ejaculated one time during the boy's
story.

"Yes, sir! Did you know him?" Donald had not mentioned the _Ansonia_.
Nickerson affected not to hear. "Go on with yer yarn," he growled, and
when Donald had finished, he asked, "This Hinkel, naow. Hev ye ever
seen him afore? No? D'ye know anything about him?"

"Well--er--I'm not sure," said the boy doubtfully, "except what I
overheard the other night." And in answer to the officer's queries, he
told him of the "spell in jail" and "if the men knew you were the man"
fragments which had come to his ears through the open port. Mr.
Nickerson was greatly interested. "Humph!" he commented. "Said he'd
been in jail did he?" Then he straightened up with a jerk and slapped
the rail with his hand and the smack made Donald jump. "I've got him,
by thunder! I've got him dead to loo'ard this time!" he ejaculated. "I
knew I wasn't far out when I told him the other night I had his flag
and number!" Then quietly he said, "Son, did ye ever hear the story
about the ship _Orkney Isles_ and a little 'prentice boy name of Willy
McFee? No? Well, alright! Ask McLean to step aft here a moment and you
skin along and see what time it is instead of yarning here. Hump
yourself naow!" Donald "humped"--smiling at the young officer's
peculiar manner.

Holding on down the South American coast, the _Kelvinhaugh_ began to
prepare for the ordeal ahead. Her winter weather canvas had already
been bent, and the carpenter was busy re-wedging the hatches and with
his crony, the bos'n, getting the ship's gear chocked, lashed and
restowed. They went about their work with ominous head-shakings, and
the ordinary seamen were beginning to exhibit signs of nervousness
with the ceaseless recital of the barque's faults and the Horn in
winter, which the old-timers were forever croaking about. In the
dog-watches, there was less yarning and skylarking around the
fore-hatch, and oilskins, re-patched and re-oiled, hung in the sun
around the fore-rigging--unmistakable forecasts of dirty weather ahead
in the coming days.

In the half-deck, the boys spent their evenings yarning and playing
cards--all but McKenzie, who was busy overhauling his wretched kit.
Moore had a splendid outfit of everything in the way of oil-clothes
and warm clothing, so he didn't worry--neither did he offer to augment
Donald's meagre rig. Thompson and Jenkins had a miscellaneous
collection of clothing sadly in need of overhaul, but they were young
and thoughtless. The Horn didn't scare them! No, by Jupiter, _they_
were rough and tough and had hair on their chests--they would start
straightening out their gear in plenty of time. When she crossed
forty-five south it would be time enough to make and mend for
fifty-five! So they bragged, but it was safe bragging, as they knew
they'd have the captain's slop chest to fall back on. Thompson had
rounded the Horn before, but he did it in summer from Australia, and
with a brave west wind astern. He'd never experienced the passage in
winter, and he was not impressed. McKenzie was an "old woman" for his
pains, they said, but Donald preferred to heed the advice of men like
Martin and McLean and to prepare, as the bos'n and chips were
preparing the ship. They weren't doing that for nothing. Not by a long
shot!

So he stitched and patched and oiled and did the best he could with
his shoddy gear, and the best was not enough. He knew it, but he did
not complain. One may growl about the ship, the weather, the mates and
things extraneous, but lamentations about one's bodily ills or aches,
the work one has to do, a wetting or a freezing, is bad form aboard
ship and receives no sympathetic hearing. "Serve you dam' well right.
What did you come to sea for?" is the invariable answer to such
whines.

The barque crossed "forty-five" in a chilly blow, and for two days
they had wild tussles aloft with wet, heavy canvas, and severe
knockings about on flooded decks hauling on clewing-up gear or braces,
downhauls and halliards. Then the "hairy chesters" began to get busy,
but the time had gone when oilskins could be re-oiled and dried in the
sun. The days were shortening rapidly and the sun's warmth was
becoming nullified by the chill of the high latitudes. Each knot they
reeled off to the south'ard saw the sea changing from a warm blue to a
frigid green, and azure skies to a gloomy lead-colored pall, solid
with potential gales.

Captain Muirhead was nervous--all hands could see that. He spent more
time on deck and hovered between barometer and binnacle, and when the
ship came up with fifty degrees south, he ordered the royal yards sent
down on deck--much to the unvoiced scorn of the mate--and the
_Kelvinhaugh_ was now reduced in canvas to nothing above her big
single topgallantsails.

Nickerson sneered mentally. "How does the looney think she's agoin' to
make her westing under these clipped kites? All right to send down
yards in a light ship, but this heavy drogher.... Huh! Ef it was some
of th' Bluenosers or Saint John packets I've sailed in, they ratch her
around under skys'ls, by Jupiter! No wonder these limejuicers never
make a passage when they have these careful old women in command of
them. Huh!"

They wallowed down past the Falklands in remarkably fine weather
for the latitude, and headed for Cape St. John on Staten
Island--easternmost sentinel to the stormy Horn. There was no doubt
now of the times ahead. Snow had fallen once or twice, and ice had
formed on deck and lower rigging in early morning hours, but the
gales...?

"I don't like this," growled Martin to Donald one dog-watch, as they
peered at the yellow sunset over towards the Fuegian coast. There was
a long rolling sea coming up from the south'ard, with the push of the
Pacific Antarctic drift, and the wind had been "knocking her off" all
the afternoon, until the yards were braced "on the back-stays." There
was a chilly spite in the breeze, which was beginning to pipe up a
mournful note in the wire standing rigging, and the south was a black
wall, in which sea and sky merged as one. "There's dirt acomin' afore
long ef I know the signs, but that ruddy Dutch greaser don't know
enough to strip her for it. Ef I was you youngster, I'd go'n turn in
right now an' catch up on sleep, for, mark me well, it'll be Cape
Stiff afore mornin'!"

Donald took the bos'n's advice and, refusing to join the little game
of "nap" which the half-deckers were playing for plug-tobacco stakes,
he rolled into his bunk and slept, but not before he had placed his
boots and oilskins in a handy place.

He was in the midst of a delightful dream some hours later, wherein he
was a spectator watching a young, lean, hawk-nosed pirate, strangely
like Mr. Nickerson, prodding his Uncle David, Captain Muirhead and
Hinkel down a plank out-thrust from the side of the _Kelvinhaugh_. At
the barque's jigger-gaff flew a black flag, upon which was the skull
and cross-bones in white. Uncle David was screaming for mercy, and
Nickerson was jabbing him in the back with the point of a huge
cutlass. Then the scene changed and the mate was pouring bags of
golden sovereigns into his lap and telling him to take them home to
his mother. "Buy a castle, son," he was saying, "and one with
beautiful trees and gardens with wonderful flowers--flowers with nice
smells to them--geraniums, roses, honey-suckles, rhododendrons,
mignonettes, and don't forget pansies, pretty velvet-petaled
pansies--" There came a frightful lurch of the ship which flung him
rudely against the steel wall of the berth, a roaring of a big wind on
deck and the staggering crash of heavy seas cascading over the rails.
Guttural yells sounded from the poop. "Led go to'gallundt halliards!"
and someone bawled through the half-deck ventilator. "All out for
God's sake!" In the dark, Donald grabbed his boots and oilskins and
Thompson shouted, "Hell's bells! Strike a light someone! Here's Cape
Horn!"




CHAPTER TWELVE


They jumped out on deck into a wind that nearly took their breath
away, and it was as black as the inside of a tar-pot, save where the
sheen of the foam to loo'ard illuminated the darkness. Spray and sleet
slashed through the air, and the wind was as keen as the edge of a
knife--a squall that shrieked in the tautened weather rigging, and
which was playing a devil's tattoo with the clewed-up canvas aloft,
and orders were being volleyed from the bridge which ran clean from
the poop to the fo'c'sle head. "Haul up yer cro'jack! Haul up yer
mains'l! Aloft an' stow!"

The combers were crashing over the weather rail in solid cascades, and
the scupper-ports were not large enough to carry it off. As the big
logy barque did not rise to the seas, the lee side of the main-deck
was awash to the height of the to'gallant rail, and in this bitter,
swirling brine the crew, manning the furling gear, tugged on the
swollen ropes--slipping, washed along and sliding on the sloping
decks--in water up to their waists, while the mate, leaning over the
bridge rail, cursed and flayed them to herculean exertions with bitter
jibes and frightful threats.

The four apprentices and an ordinary seaman went up to the
mizzen-t'gallan's'l, the yard of which had been braced to spill the
sail already clewed up, and with Thompson at the bunt, singing out,
they dug their fingers into the hard, wet canvas in an effort to catch
hold and pick it up. "Now, my sons!" bawled the senior apprentice.
"All together! Sock it to her! Dig your claws into the creases an'
hook her up! What th' hell's a bit of canvas anyway to five husky
men!" But picking up the sail in other blows and picking it up in a
Cape Horn snifter is a horse of another color. Twice they had it
almost on the yard, and twice the squall slatted it away from them.
Donald's fingers were bleeding at the nails and his hands were numb
with the cold, while the ordinary seaman with him on the weather
yard-arm was cursing and whining with the chill and the strenuous
labor. "Pick it up, damn you, pick it up!" shouted Thompson. "Now,
boys, all together!" They dug in, hauled the canvas up bit by bit, and
had almost got it on the yard and ready to pass the gaskets, when
Moore gasped, "Aw, t' hell with it!" and let his portion of sail go.
The wind ballooned the loosened fold and whipped the canvas out of the
others' straining fingers. Thompson gave a growl of rage and instantly
clawed his way along the foot-rope and jack-stay to where Moore hung
inside of Jenkins at the lee yard-arm. "You miserable skulking hound!"
he yelled, kicking Moore savagely with his rubber-booted foot. "I've
a--(kick)--dashed good--(kick)--mind to--(kick)--boot you into
the--(kick)--ruddy drink! You dare let go again while a kid like
McKenzie, half your weight, holds on!"

Whimpering and crying like a baby, Moore bent over the yard while
Jenkins at the lee yard-arm encouraged him by further threats, and the
five began their muzzling work again. "Now then, my sons, up with
her!" yelled Thompson. Beating at the stiff canvas with numb and
bleeding fingers, they fought like devils for hold while the sleet
slashed at their faces and the cold caused their oilskins to become as
rigid as though cut from tin. A hundred feet above the ship, they
struggled desperately on precarious, swaying foot-ropes, leaning over
the jerking yard and using both hands and trusting to finger-hold to
prevent being blown or hurled off. It was strenuous work--work which
called for tenacity of purpose and the exercise of every ounce of
strength, and when, after taking a yard arm at a time, they finally
got the sail rolled up and secured by the turns of the gaskets, they
scrambled into the cross-trees, breathless and utterly exhausted.
Bitter work for boys, truly! But they would be called to more
desperate tasks ere the _Kelvinhaugh_ made to the west'ard of the
Horn!

They scrambled down on deck to be greeted by Mr. Nickerson.
"Where'n Tophet hev you lazy young hounds bin to? Stowin' th'
mizzen-t'gallan's'l, eh? Why, curse yez, I've a mind t' set it again
an' give ye some sail drill!" Scant praise for strenuous
accomplishments! As Donald came aft again--dodging the seas which
were, ever and anon, tumbling over the rail--he felt miserably wet and
cold under his oil-skins and jumped into the half-deck to examine
himself. In spite of the marline which he had tied around his wrists
and over his boots, and the "soul-and-body" lashing around his waist,
his cheap oilskins allowed the water to soak through the shoddy
fabric, and as wet-resisters, they were worthless. Having no others to
wear, he had, perforce, to put up with the discomfort and pray for
fine weather.

During the middle watch the wind stiffened and the _Kelvinhaugh_ was
making heavy weather of the going. The captain was on the poop
watching the ship, and as Donald passed to loo'ard of him to make it
four bells, he had evidence that the Old Man had been having a nip.
The mate, a long, rangy statue in an oilskin coat, sou'westered and
sea-booted, lounged in his favorite corner sucking away at a dry clay
pipe and watching the straining leach of the mizzen upper-tops'l. It
was snowing by now and the flakes could be seen driving athwart the
ship in the light of the skylights and the binnacle. The skipper
turned from the rail over which he had been leaning, and called the
mate to him. Donald, pacing to loo'ard, heard snatches of the
conversation down the wind. "That fella Hinkel," the Old Man was
saying. "No worth his saut as a second mate. He canna be trusted ...
canna dae his wark. When this blow cam' on her he was snoozin'
somewheres ... doesna ken a squall when he sees th' signs ... nae
guid!"

The mate's nasal voice advised, "Hoof th' square-head scum forrad!"
"Aye! Ah'm thinkin' so.... Ye might take him in hond, mister, an'
shunt him oot. Ah'll make the entry in th' log ... incompetent an'
derelict in duty ... that's th' ticket. Tell him at eight bells ...
an' we'll pit Martin in his place ... auld hand and a smert man....
Thompson's too young." Donald could see the tall figure of the mate
straighten up and a saturnine laugh came from his direction. "I'll
shunt him, sir!" he said.

When Donald called the watch prior to eight bells, he told Thompson
the news he had overheard. "Breaking the second mate, is he?"
ejaculated Thompson, gleefully tugging his boots on again over wet
stockings. "Jerusalem! I wouldn't miss the fun for a farm. I'm going
to hang around for a bit afore turning in." They slipped out in the
wake of Moore and Jenkins and just reached the poop-break in time to
hear a furious altercation on the deck above. The second mate was
shouting, "Send me forrad? Send me forrad? Ju candt do id! I my work
know id!" "Ye're a damned bluff from A to Zee!" came Mr. Nickerson's
nasal bawl. "Ye're a boy-bully--a ruddy, no-account squarehead from
Heligoland or Hamburg! You're a common A.B. from this minute, Dutchy,
an' ef ye don't move along off this poop an' forrad where ye belong
I'll help ye with th' toe of my boot! Shift naow! Look nippy!"

There was a sound of oaths and blows in the darkness--a stamp of
sea-booted feet--a guttural curse--and a bulky form came hurtling down
the poop ladder. It was Hinkel, and the boys could see his
face--ferocious in the light from a port-hole. He had been thrown
clear down on the main-deck from the poop, and before he could pick
himself up, Nickerson came flying down on the hand-rails with his
sea-booted feet clear of the steps. In his dive down the ladder, he
landed on the ex-second mate's prone body, and commenced booting him
in a manner supposed to have passed away with the Western Ocean
packet-ships.

"You sojer! You no-sailor, you! You slab-sided gaffer o' Fielding's
gang! I'll work yer old iron up, my son!"--and he kicked Hinkel into
the lee scuppers, where the fellow wallowed in the water attempting to
rise to his feet. "I got yer number, you German sauerkraut! I had it
the night you jammed McKenzie into th' hen-coop! It's an old trick o'
yours, ain't it? Well, here's something--(kick-kick)--for poor little
McFee--(kick-kick)--an' yer hen-coop dodge on the _Orkney Isles_!" He
knocked off, panting, while Hinkel scrambled to his feet and looked
sullenly at the avenging Nickerson.

The men had gathered aft, wondering spectators of the scene, and the
mate swung around and addressed them. "This joker here is dis-rated
an' sent forrad. He's an A.B. from naow out! He's th' squarehead what
served two years in San Quentin penitentiary in 'Frisco for killing a
boy named McFee on the ship _Orkney Isles_! Naow, ye know th' hound,
an' ye'll know haow t' treat him!" Then to Hinkel, "Forrad, you scum,
or I'll help ye! Th' stoo'ard'll shoot yer duds aout in th' morning!"
And Hinkel, with all the fight kicked out of him, slunk away from the
mate's vicinity and disappeared into the darkness.

In the half-deck, after they had pulled off their wet clothes,
Thompson and Donald discussed this momentous incident. "And who was
McFee?" enquired the latter. Thompson wrung out a soaked shirt and
hung it up. "From what I have heard, he was a young first-voyager on a
Glasgow ship called the _Orkney Isles_. He wasn't a bright kid--I
think he was soft in the nut a bit--but he was a 'prentice on that
hooker bound from London to 'Frisco 'bout three years or so ago. It
appears that her second mate--(this Hinkel, I suppose, though he
wasn't called Hinkel then. His name was Hemelfeldt, I think)--got
adown on the kid and almost bullied the life out of him. Off the Horn,
the youngster refused to do something, and this swine jammed him into
the hen-coop and kept him there the whole of a bitter, freezing watch.
The boy had no coat or oilskins on, and he was almost frozen to death.
He took ill, but this bucko hauled him out of his bunk and made him
work around in the wet and the cold at various work-up jobs, and the
little beggar took pneumonia and died. When the ship got to 'Frisco,
the other 'prentices and some of the men complained to the
authorities, and Hinkel or Hemelfeldt was arrested, convicted and
sentenced to two years in a California prison. The way he ill-used
that kid was the talk of the Coast at that time. That's the yarn as I
know it, and I tell you, son, I wouldn't care to be in Hinkel's shoes
from now on. Between the mate and the hands for'ard, his life will be
merry hell from 'naow aout'--as Nickerson says!"

Now commenced a period which Donald and all the hands never wished to
experience again. The savagery of the Horn latitudes in winter-time
buffeted them in all its bitter hellishness, and the heavily laden
barque was smashed and banged about in a manner which beggars
description. Gale succeeded gale, with all their concomitants of
bitter cold, driving sleet and snow, and tremendous seas. Twice they
sighted the lonely light on Cape St. John, and twice they were driven
back to flounder in the big combers and rips of Burdwood Bank, hove-to
under scanty canvas. During the lulls in the gales they would get sail
on her and attempt to make their westing, but the trailing log would
only record a few miles in the desired direction before a blast of
wind and snow would call for strenuous clipping of the _Kelvinhaugh's_
wings. "Clew up! Haul down! Let go! All hands! Aloft and furl!" became
dreaded and commonplace commands. On certain tantalizing occasions the
wind came away fair for a slant and the crew would have a breathing
spell, praying and hoping that they would get around "this time," but
a fresh gale would strike in from another quarter and the weary watch
below would be roused from slumber by the raucous hail of "All hands
wear ship!" And wearing ship was the easiest way to tack her, and an
operation which the _Kelvinhaugh_ made a dirty job of. As the helm was
put up in the smooths, the barque would expose her long, deep
broadside to the mountainous combers, and she seldom wore 'round
without shipping it green the whole length of her. In paying off, and
in coming to the wind on the other tack, the big four-master swung
around so slow that she courted destruction, and several times, the
crew, huddled together on the comparative safety of the poop, never
expected to see her emerge from boarding combers which would bury her
completely from fo'c'sle-head to poop-break.

Added to the cruelty of the weather were the long, dark hours of the
high latitudes in mid-winter, and what little daylight there existed
was as gloomy as night with lowering, leaden skies and the black
squalls slashing out of the west. It was here, in the "stand-by"
latitudes, in fifty-five south, that Donald McKenzie had all the
romantic ideals of sea-faring knocked out of him. It was here where he
learned that he had come to sea to be disillusioned and that romance
existed mainly in the printed page, the picture and the imagination of
boys and poets. The man who writes and sings best of the sea is the
man who has been but little acquainted with the hardship and
monotonous drudgery of a sailor's life. Young McKenzie came to sea to
realize the romance he dreamed of. He had run from fifty-five north to
fifty-five south and retrospection failed to bring out any phase of
his life on the _Kelvinhaugh_ as being anything other than desperately
hard work, relieved by spells of tiring monotony. He slept and ate in
a steel tank with white painted walls pierced by starboard and port
doors and two port-holes, and furnished with a deal table and two
plank seats. Four bunks, two uppers and two lowers, completed the
furnishings of this combined bedroom, dining room and parlor. True,
there was a small bogey stove, but this was more of an ornament than
an article of utility. There was no fuel supplied to keep it alight,
and only on rare occasions (when the boys stole some coal from the
donkey-boiler room, or when some chips and shakings could be secured)
was a fire ever kindled in it. In this cubby-hole, jammed up with four
sea-chests, suitcases, sea-boots on the floor and oilskins and
clothing on the walls, the four lads, "gentlemen rope-haulers," lived
during their hours of relief from duty. The unsheathed steel walls and
overhead beams dripped moisture, which made rusty streaks from the
rivet-heads, or dropped on the upper bunks or to the floor--there to
add their quota of damp discomfort to the salt water which squirted
through the jambs of the door every time she shipped a "green" one.

Chiseled into one of the overhead beams ran the legend--"Certified to
accommodate four seamen." Thompson, with the aid of an indelible ink
pencil had altered this to a more fitting rendition--"Certified to
_suffocate_ four seamen," and in the stormy latitude of fifty-five
south, with doors and ports tight shut, and bedding, blankets and
clothing sopping wet and exuding their own peculiar aroma, mixed with
those of the parrafin-oil lamp, tobacco reek, food, boot-grease and
damp oilskins, the amended version was nearer the truth.

McKenzie's companions, also, were "hard-bitten," or had become so
through the environment. Clad in filthy garments, and unwashed through
lack of fresh water and opportunity, they wolfed their wretched food,
cursed and blasphemed and bullied one another in a manner that would
have shocked their parents. There was little consideration given them
by their superiors and they, in turn, had but little consideration for
each other, though all, except Moore, would do what they could for a
ship-mate in sharing clothing and tobacco. It was a rough comradeship,
but a true one, nevertheless, and while such weaknesses as sympathy or
sentiment were tabooed, yet each would stand by each in a pinch or
time of peril.

For a boy brought up as Donald had been, he had shaped up remarkably
well. He had been bullied and knocked about a great deal more than any
of the other apprentices on the _Kelvinhaugh_, but hardship seemed to
have toughened him and he stood the physical grind as well as the
best--sure evidence of untainted blood and wiry stock of Highland
forebears. Mentally, he had received the greatest gruelling, but, in
addition to quick wit and keen intelligence, he had the rare faculty
of adaptability, and without losing his finer feelings or allowing
them to become demoralized, he fitted himself to his environment, but
kept a leash on his talk and actions which may be summed up in
Thompson's characterization of him--"a dashed clean, plucky little
nipper who always plays the game!"

Clean, plucky, and "playing the game"--a delicately nurtured lad--a
mother's boy--but bred from good stock and holding to his ideals with
true Scotch tenacity--was Donald McKenzie. The romantic aspect of a
sea life had faded away, but there still remained the thought that he,
a lad of sixteen had done things, could do things, that strong, grown
men ashore would hesitate and refuse to tackle. The bitter grind of
seafaring tempered his boyishness and taught him self-reliance and
courage; the rigor of the discipline had taught him to obey without
question, and when a man can obey, he is fitting himself for command.
He had gone through the first degree; had been initiated into the
great fraternity of seafarers, and he knew seafaring for what it
was--shorn of its false romance--a gruelling grind which called for
men of courage, men who were willing to cut themselves adrift from the
comforts and allurements of the land, and who became as a race apart.
With romance shattered, he was willing to stick to the end, to go
through the mill until he reached the goal where he could take
something from the sea which had exacted so much from him. It had
ruthlessly claimed his father and seared the soul of his mother, but
he, an apprentice seaman, was learning its ways, its varying moods,
and as a seaman, he was acquiring the sea-cunning and strategy to use
it for his will. That was his new ideal. He would take something from
the sea which had already exacted so much from him!




CHAPTER THIRTEEN


Six weeks of desperate effort! Six weeks of plunging in Cape Horn
"graybeards," during which time the _Kelvinhaugh's_ crew plumbed the
depths of physical and mental misery; physical--in the savagery of the
weather, the ceaseless grind of back-breaking labor and the
wretchedness of living conditions; mental--in the seemingly endless
succession of gales thwarting their passage of the stormy corner at
the foot of the world and the relentless tyranny of the hard-driving
Nova Scotian mate. When they retired to the comparative comfort of
their sopping bunks praying for a rest, it was Nickerson who roused
them out and drove them from task to task with lurid oaths and fearful
threats. And they knew his threats were not idle phrasings--many a
skulker had felt the weight of his fist and boot. "Rest?" he would
voice their mental desires. "Rest when ye're dead. Ye'll have rest
enough then, by Godfrey!"

Day after day, with the yards on the backstays, clawing along in the
teeth of the westerlies, under all the driving sail the wind would
allow, the _Kelvinhaugh_ traced a spider's web of traverses in the
area bounded by sixty and seventy degrees west longitude and
fifty-four to fifty-eight south latitude, and failed to win past the
desired meridian. Captain Muirhead proved in those days of stress to
be "poor iron." He was vacillating and easily discouraged, and, worst
of all faults in a ship-master, he was endeavoring to stiffen his
nerve with excessive drinking. When the whisky was in him he forgot
his worries, and as the days crept along with no change in the
weather, he betook himself more and more to his liquid solace, and
left the sailing of the ship to the mate.

In the intervals between "bouts," Captain Muirhead would show his
weakness as a commander by seeking affirmative advice from the Nova
Scotian. "Don't ye think, mister, it would be a guid notion tae square
away an' mak' a runnin' passage of it to the east'ard by the Cape an'
across the Indian Ocean an' th' Pacific?" or "Would it no be better
tae knock off an' put in tae Port Stanley in th' Falklands an' lie
there 'til the edge is aff this awfu' weather?" To these suggestions
the mate gave but one answer, "Sock it to her an' drive her around!"
To this the master would shrug his shoulders and protest querulously,
"Ye canna do that wi' this ship, mister! She's no built fur drivin'!
Ef she was a double-stayed ship an' wi' a big crowd for'ard, ye micht,
but drive her, an' she'll shed her sticks or she'll dive tae th'
bottom. She's no sea-kindly. She's a long, heavy, logey barge wi' nae
lift tae her. Pit sail tae her an' she'll jist scoff everything aff
her decks. She's a lubberly, meeserable bitch of a scow, an' if it
wasna that I was on a lee-shore an' jammed in a clinch I'd never ha'
took her.... Nickerson, ma laud, never let an owner get a grup on ye!
Ef ye do, ye're done! Aye ... done!" When he had liquor in him, the
Old Man was unusually talkative and hinted at things which Nickerson
noted carefully.

The mate undertook to drive her one day when the skipper was below,
"keeled over" by an unusually stiff bout with the bottle. Under three
t'gallants'ls he was ratching her to windward in a heavy wind and a
"nose-end" sea, when the barque took a dive into a towering
"greybeard" which thundered over the fo'c'sle-head, buried the for'ard
house and stove-in the fore-hatch. Another sea would have finished her
had it been allowed to pour its tons of chilly brine down into the
uncovered hold, but Nickerson had the helm up and the barque wore
round and running before the wind ere such a disaster could happen.
When the Old Man heard of it, he made a noisy, but weak, remonstrance,
and celebrated the escape from Davy Jones' locker by another solitary
spree.

Under the grind of the ceaseless gales, the bitter cold, and the
continual round of laborious work in water and wet clothing, the crew
began to play out. Seldom a watch reported aft but one or two of their
numbers were in their sodden bunks useless through rheumatism, cramps,
sea-water boils, shivering fits, bruises or sheer exhaustion. The
panderers to shore vices collapsed under the drilling of Cape Stiff
and they received scant consideration. Nickerson or Martin would go
for'ard and diagnose the case. If the sufferer was fit to pull on a
rope--out he would have to come--sick or not. Skulkers and sufferers
from "Cape Horn fever" had their ailment quickly cured by the "laying
on of hands" or "repeated applications of sea-boot." Sick men received
the best treatment the medicine chest and the ship could
afford--enough to bring them on deck when the necessity arose.

The former second mate, Hinkel, went through a severe drilling.
Loathed and despised by the men among whom he was forced to live;
bullied by the Britishers and treated with contempt by the "Dutchmen"
and "Dagoes," his watches below were but little better than his
watches on deck under the eagle eye and scorching tongue of the young
Nova Scotian mate. Nickerson roused him around with a vengeance, and
the man had his crimes rowelled into him when the mate "rode him down"
and used the spurs. Tender-hearted little McKenzie was really sorry
for his late tormentor, but he had miseries of his own to keep his
sympathies for.

The boy was suffering terribly through the wretched clothes he had
been supplied with. He was never dry during the knocking about off the
Horn, and his feet and fingers were chilblained with the cold. He had
waited on the captain and asked for a re-fit from the slop-chest, but
the Old Man curtly dismissed his plea by stating sourly, "Mister
McKenzie told me that the rig he bought ye was tae do ye th' trip
until we were bound hame. He'll no pay me for onything I may gie ye
oot ma slop-kist. Awa' wi ye an' start a tarpaulin muster with yer
pals in th' hauf-deck!" Thompson and Jenkins spared what they could.
The sullen Moore made no offers.

One bitter day the mate found him huddled in the lee of the
chart-house crying with the misery of sodden clothing and aching
fingers and toes. His sea-boots had burst from their soles and he had
"frapped" and covered them with strips of canvas and old socks. His
oilskins were patched and coated with pitch and oil to render them
waterproof, and upon his hands he had a pair of discarded woollen
socks as mittens. The officer stood and scrutinized the little pinched
face peering from under the thatch of a painted sou'wester, and his
eagle eye spied the tears and the make-shift clothing. "Hell's
delight, boy, but is that the best rig you kin muster for this
weather? Hev ye bin pipin' yer eye?" He spoke harshly.

"No, sir," replied Donald, straightening up. "The wind was making my
eyes water. I'm all right, sir!"

The young Nova Scotian looked at him for a moment and then his stern
face lit up with a smile of almost brotherly affection--and smiles on
Nickerson's face were rare in fifty-six south. Stepping up to the lad,
he put his arm over his shoulder in a big brotherly way. "Dern my
stars'n eyes, son, but you've got grit, guts'n sand in that skinny
carcase of yours. I like your style, sonny--blister me ef I don't!
Wouldn't the Old Man give you a new rig from the slop-chest?" Donald
told of the skipper's charity and the mate's face resumed its stern
saturnine look. He was silent for a moment. "Come below with me,
sonny, and we'll try and square up that pierhead rig of yours." And
Donald followed him down to the saloon and along to the steward's
quarters.

"Looky here, Johnson," said Nickerson sharply to that individual,
"open up that slop-chest an' give this nipper a full rig-out!"

The steward stared. "Why, sir, I--I cawn't do that," he stammered.
"The slawps belong to the kepting, sir, h'an 'e gyve h'orders, sir,
that McKenzie 'ere wos not to be h'allowed to dror anyfink--"

The masterful mate interrupted sternly, "Naow, looky-here, you
stew-pot walloper, you'll jest bloody well do as I tell you, or I'll
trim yer hair. I don't care a tinker's dam what the 'kepting' has
said. I'm not agoin' to allow this here youngster to freeze to death
on a Scotch lime-juicer's charity. You give him the duds pronto, an'
you kin charge them up to his uncle--the owner of this packet!" And he
concluded by fixing the steward with a ferocious scowl and the
familiar spur to action, "Look slippy naow!" And Donald went into the
half-deck with a full kit of fairly good gear, which he donned with
heartfelt thanks to the mate, and some little, but not much,
trepidation as to what the captain would say about the forcible
commandeering of his treasured "slops."

However, as events turned out, the captain was put in a position where
his remarks would carry but little weight. For weeks he had been
drinking heavily and the navigation of the ship had been left almost
entirely to the mate. He kept to his quarters in the after cabin,
sitting before the stove soaking himself in whisky and hot water. When
he came on deck, it was to curse the ship and the weather, and to
suggest putting the barque before it for a run around the world to the
east'ard, or to put into the Falklands. After making these
suggestions, he would retire to the warm stove and the "mountain dew"
again.

One morning at the change of the watch, when the barque was rolling
scuppers-under in an ominous Cape Horn calm, Mr. Nickerson and Martin
called their respective watches aft. The mate leaned over the poop
rail and addressed them. "Men," he said quietly, "the master of this
hooker is continually drunk and incapable of handling the ship. Naow,
we want t' git along, and I cal'late I kin git her along. Mister
Martin and I have talked the matter over, and we have come to the
conclusion that it is the best for all hands if I take over the
command of the ship. What d'ye say, men?"

The men may not have loved Nickerson as an officer, but they admired
and respected him as a sailor. They all knew that the Old Man was a
"rum hound" and a weakling, and they had already chewed the matter
over in fo'c'sle parliaments and wished for something to happen to get
them away from "Cape Stiff." Nickerson couldn't be any worse as master
than as mate. The assent was unanimous.

"I will make the necessary entries in the ship's log, and I will ask
you men to come aft here an' sign yer names to it," said the Nova
Scotian. "And, naow," he added, "as I am in command of the vessel, I
want some action. Ye'll git those three r'yal yards crossed again
right naow while this quiet spell lasts--" The men looked glum--royals
prophesied more work setting and furling--"and as you men have to work
hard, it is only right that ye sh'd be fed properly and have warm
quarters. I'll order the stoo'ard to improve your whack, and while
we're down south here I'll see that ye git coal for yer stoves. Naow,
turn-to both watches!" The glum looks were replaced by grins and
appreciative smiles, and under the direction of Martin, now acting as
mate, the men set to work getting the royal yards off the skids and up
aloft on the masts where they belonged.

The senior apprentice, Thompson, was made acting-second mate and would
be in charge of the starboard watch. Martin, the former bos'n, though
uncertificated, was a first class seaman, and was quite capable of
taking the mate's place. McLean, of the cropped head--cropped no
longer--was promoted to bos'n and donkey-man.

When Thompson came into the half-deck to remove his gear into the
cabin, he had some interesting news. "The skipper was full as a tick
when Nickerson and Martin broke the sad news to him. He kicked up an
awful rumpus and lugged a revolver from under his bunk mattress, but
our Bluenose mate rushed him and wrenched it out of his hand. Then
Nickerson told him he had the choice of being carried to Vancouver in
irons, or of staying in the after cabin, and the old soak took the
best choice. He had three cases of whisky and a small keg of rum in
his clothes cupboard, and the mate left him the whisky--telling him
to enjoy himself for the rest of the passage lapping it up. It was a
hot session, believe me, and old Muirhead cursed enough to blister the
paint. That Limehouse wharf-rat of a steward kind of sided with the
Old Man, but Nickerson settled his hash by telling him if he tried any
monkey business he'd send him for'ard and ride him down like a
maintack. So the skipper is a prisoner in his quarters and the steward
is skipping around licking Nickerson's boots. It's a rare tear, my
sons, and believe me, chums, we're going to have some fun from 'naow
aout' as our new skipper says."

McKenzie and Jenkins expressed joy at the change in
affairs--especially at the allowance of coal and improved grub--but
Moore remarked that "Nickerson was exceeding his rights and had been
tryin' to run the ship ever since we left port!" This brought Thompson
on him. "Listen, you moocher!" he said, threateningly. "You're going
to sweat in future! You came to sea to learn to be a sailor, and as
long as you're on this packet you'll do your whack. You've been
shoving it on to McKenzie and Jenkins all along, but you won't now.
You're coming into the starboard watch with me, and I'm going to look
after you. I'm not one of the half-deck gang now. I'm second mate of
this hooker, and you'll address me as 'Mister Thompson' and you'll
clap 'sir' on to your answers, and you'll work, you bally sojer, or
I'll know the reason why." And with a portentous look at the sullen
apprentice, he left for the cabin.

The foggy calm lasted about eight hours, and while the big barque
wallowed in the trough of the mountainous swells, the crew sent the
royal yards aloft, shackled on the gear and bent the sails. A sight of
the sun at noon and in the short afternoon placed the ship in 56° S.
latitude, and 63° W. longitude--a poor showing for six weeks' effort.
But with the change in commanders and conditions, all hands hoped for
better times and a fair slant to push the barque to the west'ard of
the seventieth meridian. The older hands, however, knew the vagaries
of the Horn latitudes, and calms were invariably the fore-runners of
fiercer gales. By the manner in which Nickerson hovered around the
mercurial barometer in the cabin entrance; his hopeful tapping of the
glass to hasten its prophecies, and his continuous scrutiny of the sky
and horizon, they knew he was looking for something to happen, and
wondering where it was coming from.

The short day came to a close and tea-time found the barque rolling
her lower yard-arms into the tremendous swells. The gear aloft banged
and crashed and the sails flapped thunderously, while water spurted in
through scupper hole and clanging wash-port and swashed across the
decks. Lying thus, helplessly becalmed, in an atmosphere chill with
winter cold, and under a sky as black as ink, they waited for the wind
which they knew was coming.

At the close of the second dog-watch it began to snow, and within an
hour the barque was filmed with the flakes and appeared as a
ghost-ship in the velvet darkness. When the first flakes began to
fall, Nickerson ordered the stowing of the cro'jack, the
t'gallants'ls, the mains'l, and the mizzen upper-topsail. All
fore-and-aft sails were down except the fore-top-mast-stays'l, which
is seldom hauled down at sea. As the men rolled the canvas up on the
swinging yards their voices floated down out of the blackness aloft
like unto spirits crying in the dark. The swishing canvas and the
falling of the snow in the windless air, combined with the aerial
shouts to conjure a picture in McKenzie's Celtic imagination as of
"giants aloft sweeping the floors of Heaven with mighty brooms!"

At midnight the ship wallowed in a world of sheer blackness, in which
neither sea or sky could be defined. Albatrosses, driven to rest on
the water through lack of wind to bear their mighty pinions, squawked
mournfully in the dark, and their cries, mingling with the tolling of
the ship's bell as she rolled, filled the night with eerie warnings
distinct from the screeching, clanking, flap and rattle of the sails,
chains and gear aloft. "That's an auld sailor frae Fiddler's Green,"
remarked McLean, when the squawks of the albatross came out of the
murk. "He's givin' us warnin' tae stand by fur dirt. Auld sailormen
never die ... they gang tae Fiddler's Green, which is a pleasant
harbor seven miles tae loo'ard o' hell, whaur ye never pay fur yer
drinks. It's all free tae auld sailors--smokes an' drinks. When ye
wants a cruise around, ye jist turn intae yin o' them albatrosses....
Aye! A great-place fur sailormen is Fiddler's Green!"

"Is there no Heaven or Hell for sailors, Mac?" asked Donald.

"Nane ava', laddie! Jist Fiddler's Green--that's Heaven. There's nae
hell fur sailors. Tae wurrk hard, live hard, die hard an' go tae hell
after all would be hard indeed! Na! na! we get oor taste o' hell in
these things ... up on a tops'l yard ... doon hereabouts!" And he
sighed--content with his philosophy.

One bell had struck when Nickerson's voice cut through the darkness
and brought the standing-by watch to vigilance. "Lee fore brace!" The
helmsman stood stolidly at the wheel staring into the binnacle and
awaiting orders to swing the ship in the direction the wind and master
dictated. "How's her head?"--the nasal tones again.

"South by west, sir!" came the answer, and the man had no sooner
spoken when the sails gave a thunderous flap and a shrieking squall
came out of the west. The ship, without way upon her, rolled her
monkey-rail under to loo'ard and the sea plunged over the bulwarks and
filled the lee deck. Nickerson cursed. "West again, blast it! Another
nose-ender!"

The sails, braced sharp up, took the wind and lifted the vessel
through the water and away she plunged--smashing her blunt bows into
the seas, and with her jib-boom pointed for the South Pole. Down the
wind came the sleet, which blew athwart the ship like chaff from a
blower, and which adhered to the gear and froze in the increasing
chill--adding to the misery of the crew in handling ropes, jammed in
the blocks and fair-leads, and sails, hard as iron with frost and
snow-skin. The long swell began to define itself in the darkness with
ghostly foam caps which grumbled, hissed and roared, and the
_Kelvinhaugh_ invited them aboard in every part of her except the
poop--which, rejecting the solid green, nevertheless had to accept
the sprays, and these, freezing in their flight through the air,
slashed the poop's occupants with shot-like hail.

Within an hour of its coming, the squall proved too much for the
barque, but Nickerson had no intention of wearing ship and letting her
scud before its fury. He was out to make westing, and if he could not
pick up a slant in the vicinity of the Cape, he would drive her
south--aye, even to the edge of the Antarctic ice--and work to the
west'ard from there. He kept her on her southerly course and ordered a
further reduction of sail.

It was in getting the big foresail to the yard that Donald, in company
with both watches, got a taste of Cape Horn devilishness. Strung along
the ice-coated foot-ropes--ten hands on each yard-arm, with the
gaskets aft of them, struggled and fought like demons with the
threshing canvas, endeavoring to burst the confining bunt-lines and
leach-lines. Clutching the jack-stay with one hand for self and using
the other for the ship was no use. In the _Kelvinhaugh_, short-handed
and with heavy gear, it had to be two hands for the ship and God help
the man who was caught unawares by a back-flap of the rebellious
canvas, or who lost his footing or balance on the foot-rope!

Slashed with hail-like spray, cut with slivers of ice flicked from the
sail or the gear aloft, and chilled with the biting cold, they
struggled in the dark, panting, swearing, clutching at canvas, rigid,
bellying, iron-hard and full of wind, and spurred on by the
oath-besprinkled exhortations of Martin and Thompson and McLean at the
bunt and lee and weather yard-arms. "Up with her, ye hounds!" they
were encouraged. "Put yer guts into it an' grab ahold! Lay back, you
swine, an' I'll boot you off th' yard inter th' drink! Now, me
sons--an' ye know what sons I mean--altogether! Up with her!"

Each man and boy clutched his portion of sail with numb fingers and
muzzled it between his chest and the yard, and paused for breath. Then
another clutch, another heave up, and another band of sail was added
to the imprisoned roll. Many times, a fiercer gust would fill an
opening of the canvas and battle for the mastery, and often, in spite
of a roared "Hang on all!" the hard-won portions would be wrested from
a weak clutch and the wind would claim the sail from all and the awful
fight would have to be waged again.

In this desperate struggle they worked themselves into a sort of
Berserker frenzy of strength and determination to master flogging
canvas, wind, weather, and the limitations of the human constitution.
The sail _had_ to be furled. There was no getting away from that. The
Anglo-Saxons showed the grit of their northern blood and tugged and
hauled and gasped blistering blasphemies in a savage rage at the
opposition of wind and canvas to their muscles and brains, while the
Latins and others hung on to the jack-stay, useless, apathetic,
whining and remonstrating feebly at the kicks and curses bestowed on
them by their sturdier shipmates.

"You yellow dogs! Oh, you herring-gutted, paperbacked swine!" snarled
Thompson at two frightened, cowering seamen alongside him. Then, with
up-raised fist, he threatened in hoarse rage, "Grab-ahold, curse you!
Grab-ahold, or I'll jam my fist into the monkey-mug they gave you for
a face when they made ye! Never mind grabbin' that jack-stay! Grab
canvas! That's what ye're up here for, you--you--" he paused for a
suitable epithet, but none coming to mind, he broke off in disgust and
beat at the sail as if he were beating the men he had threatened.

Forty minutes aloft and twenty men had failed to subdue the sail.
Martin at the bunt stood on the truss and clutched the chain sling.
"Now, men," he bawled hoarsely while the canvas jigged a rigadoon
below them, "we're going to make one more try--just one more, and
she's _got_ to come this time. If any man sojers or lays back on the
job, I'll kill him--s'help me God, I will! Now then! A-a-all
together!" And they bent to the task again--cursing, whining, crying,
and wishing the fores'l, the ship, and everyone aboard her in
sulphurous flaming hell.

They got the rolled-up canvas on the yard at last and were passing the
bunt and quarter gaskets when someone gave a guttural yell in the
blackness, and two of the men instinctively felt that a man was gone
from between them. "Somebody's fell off the yard!" cried a seaman
sensing the gap in the ranks along the foot-rope. "Who is it? Where
did he go?" yelled Thompson, who was on the fateful yard-arm.

"Hinkel, I think, sir!" The second mate swung back of the men along
the foot-ropes to the truss and scrambled down the weather rigging,
followed by Martin. Dodging a boarding sea, both men slid down to
loo'ard behind the for'ard house and scanned the lee scuppers. "He
ain't there!" shouted Martin. "Must ha' gone over the side!"

"Might have fallen on top of the house," cried Thompson climbing the
ladder. A moment later his hail brought Martin up. "He's here. It's
Hinkel, and he's alive, though unconscious. Get some of the hands and
we'll get him aft!"

The former second mate was carried into the cabin and placed in a
spare bunk. He was unconscious and bleeding from a cut on the head.
His arms and legs hung limp, and at the moment, it was impossible to
determine the extent of his injuries. "Tell the stoo'ard to attend to
him," said Captain Nickerson. "I'll look him over later."

Crashing and floundering in the big seas under shortened sail, the
_Kelvinhaugh_ staggered south, driven by the fury of the gale and
filling her decks with frigid brine in monotonous regularity. All
hands were sodden, frozen and exhausted, but as they huddled around
the bogie-stoves in fo'c'sle and half-deck, "standing-by," they
murmured curseful thanks for the grateful warmth to the iron man who
paced the poop and studied glass, ship, wind and sea with an eye
vigilant for the weak opening in Cape Horn's armor of implacable
spite.




CHAPTER FOURTEEN


With all sail stripped off her and a tarpaulin lashed in the weather
jigger rigging, the grey daylight revealed the _Kelvinhaugh_ lying
hove-to in a sea which words fail to describe. It was a veritable
battle of the elements--wind and ocean wrestling for the mastery--and
the unfortunate barque was in the "No Man's Land" of contending
forces.

The crew were huddled in their swaying bunks absolutely exhausted in
body and spirits. They had put in a desperate period from midnight to
dawn, and they felt that another such ordeal was beyond their powers
of strength and endurance. They were ready to give up and let the ship
go where sea and wind listed, and even Nickerson, driver that he was,
could get no more effort out of them. Hour after hour throughout the
night they reefed and hauled sail off the barque, and eventually
hove-to under fore and main lower topsails. When the main-topsail
split in a frightful gust, they stowed the remaining canvas as best
they could, and set a staysail of storm fabric. When this small patch
burst, they unrolled a tarpaulin hatch-cover in the jigger rigging and
seized it there to keep her head up to the mountainous sea.

"Ef she was only a real ship...." growled Nickerson disgustedly, but
she wasn't. She was the _Kelvinhaugh_--a cheap product of slack times
in Clyde shipyards; a stock article for sale at a cheap price, ugly,
ill-designed, ill-equipped, over-loaded and under-manned. Her crew
knew it that day, and hove-to, their master allowed them to turn in
all-standing, and recuperate for the next call to battle. No look-out
was kept--there was but little use for a lookout with the ship not
under command--and only McLean, tending the lashed wheel, and
Nickerson, tenanted the spray and rain-drenched poop. These two
men--thorough seamen both--communed together, exchanging weather-lore
and experiences and planning to beat the fierce west wind of the
"Roaring Fifties" with a ship that was not designed or fabricated or
laden to do what ships are called upon to do in the wind-hounded seas
of the high latitudes.

The Nova Scotian, oil-skinned and sea-booted, his lean face reddened
by the wind and his keen grey eyes peering forth from swollen lids,
came out from the shelter of the cabin companionway and squinted to
the south'ard. "I think, McLean, it's haulin' southerly a mite!" he
remarked in a voice harsh with much shouting.

McLean rolled up his sou'wester thatch with a mittened hand and
glanced around--sniffing the air like a hound. "Yes, sir, I b'lieve it
is. It's clearin' a bit to the west'ard, sir. There's a wee bit break
yonder."

Sagging off to loo'ard, the big barque rolled and plunged ponderously
in the swing of the big Horn seas which, ever and anon, swashed over
the rails and filled the decks until the clanging wash-ports drained
the boarding brine away. Her four heavy masts, denuded of canvas,
described wild arcs across the grey skies, while the wind shrieked and
thrummed in halliards and wire stays, and clanking chains and chafing
parrals added their notes to the general pandemonium. The running gear
blew out in great curves to loo'ard and the ends of the halliards,
washed off the belaying pins, floated across the swashing decks in an
inextricable tangle of snakey coils, or trailed overboard through the
ports. In the lee of the houses or the tarpaulin in the jigger
rigging, the two men swayed their bodies to the violent lurches, both
watching for the hoped-for signs. McLean read them by sea-lore and
sailorly instinct alone--the skipper combining these qualities with
more scientific forecasts in squints at barometer and compass.

After an hour, Nickerson rubbed his hands together and swung his arms.
He laughed--a hoarse, crow-like chuckle--and remarked to the bos'n,
huddled in his oilskins and standing alternately on one foot to ease
numb toes, "She's shifting, my bully. We'll get our slant this time, I
cal'late. Sing out to the stoo'ard to give us a mug-up of coffee and
bite here, and then we'll rouse out the hands and get the muslin on
her."

Thompson appeared while they were quaffing the hot brew. "Captain," he
said, "Hinkel wants to see you. He thinks he's dying." The skipper
smiled saturninely. "I'll look him up in a spell. He won't cash in his
chips yet awhile. I cal'late I hev time to finish my coffee an' cake
afore he pegs aout, eh?"

A few minutes later he went into the berth where Hinkel was lying.
Earlier in the morning he had examined him, and finding only a broken
collar bone and a number of bruises, he had set the bone as well as he
could and left him to the care of the Cockney steward. "Well, what's
ailin' ye?" he asked harshly.

"Do ju t'ink I'm goink fur to die, kaptan?" He asked the question
apprehensively.

Nickerson looked at the German shrewdly. "Naow, I ain't sure but what
you might slip your cable. I can't tell what ails ye altogether. Ye
might be injured internally. A man don't fall sixty feet or so an'
land on a hard deck-house an' git away with a cut finger. No, siree!
One o' yer ribs might ha' busted an' pierced a lung an' ye'd bleed to
death internally. Hev ye any pain thereabouts?"

"Yaw, kaptan, I have dot pain in dot place und I t'ink ju right
maybe." His owlish German face screwed up in an expression of pain as
the rolling of the ship racked his injured body. He showed fear in his
eyes--fear of death--and he spoke hoarsely and rapidly. "Kaptan! I ju
musdt dell somedings! Ju lisden blease!"

When the skipper left Hinkel's room, he had a curious expression upon
his hard young visage. "Miserable sculpin!" he muttered. "It would be
a damned good thing if he did die!" On deck again, McLean enquired
respectfully, "Wull the Dutchman pull through, sir?"

"Aye, he won't die," came the reply. "Not much the matter with him but
sheer funk, I cal'late. We'll have to board him until we strike port,
and he'll be no more use to us than the Dutchman's anchor what was
left on the dock." Then with a squint at the compass and a glance to
windward, he continued, "Rouse the hands aout, McLean, an' git th'
tops'ls on her! This hellion of a wind is comin' away fair for a slant
an' we've got to make the best of it!" And he stamped his feet on the
slushy deck and chuckled.

And they made the best of it! With a southing wind blowing stiff from
the icy Antarctic wastes, they "put it to her!" as the sailors say,
and sail after sail was cast loose, sheeted home, and yards mastheaded
to the chorus of rousing chanteys. The crew, unkempt and unwashed,
weary, wet and bruised, but rejuvenated with the thought of getting
under way again to the west'ard, worked and chanteyed with a
will--tugging and heaving on sloshing, rolling decks and blessing "old
bully-be-damned" aft for raising a breeze which would speed them from
these accursed latitudes. Let him pile the rags on! They would stand
the racket, by Jupiter! No sail-carrying, no cracking-on, could
affright them now after what they had gone through. They had plumbed
the depths of uttermost misery. Six sanguinary weeks and three gory
days banging around the back door of Tophet in a perishing,
misbegotten, barnacle-bottomed barge of a ruddy work-house misnamed a
barque; reefing and fisting sail in hail-squalls and sleety gales,
bursting their hearts out on heavy gear and being drenched in chilly
water and washed violently along and across the decks, and enduring
all this for a measly pittance--they had had enough of it. Drive her
or drift her! but get her away from Cape Stiff, the grey skies, the
snow, frost, ice, gales, albatrosses and mollyhawks, and they would be
thankful for small mercies.

Captain Nickerson paced the swaying poop smoking his pipe. Two men
were at the wheel--skilled hands for lee and weather spokes. Thompson
was for'ard and Martin flitted along the bridge from poop to
fo'c'sle-head. The foresail and upper and lower tops'ls had been set
and the barque was beginning to storm ahead under the urge of the wind
in their woven fabric. "Give her th' main t'gallan's'l, mister,"
commanded the Old Man, and when the sail was sheeted home and the yard
hoisted, he studied the straining canvas and spoke again. "Set the
fore an' mizzen t'gallan's'ls, mister. She'll lug them. What she won't
carry, she can drag!"

Under this canvas the _Kelvinhaugh_ stormed along, headed nor'west by
west magnetic, and with the bitter gale over the port quarter hounding
her through the huge grey-green seas which, in this latitude, sweep
around the world.

The men, after setting the topgallantsails, dived into the fo'c'sle
for a warm-up and a lay-back. The barque was driving the sprays as
high as her lower mast-heads and the gear began to freeze up in the
chill of the wind from off the Antarctic ice. But they didn't care.
She was making westing, and the Olympian Bluenose aft was driving his
wind-harried steed up into fairer and warmer latitudes. The
_Kelvinhaugh_, built by the mile and cut off by the yard as she was,
wriggled her long body through the sea, and her blunt bows shouldered
the east-bound combers and she staggered to their tremendous impact.
The great Cape Horn "greybeards" roared past, seeming to say: "We'll
give you a chance now you poor devil!" when the barque would give a
swaggering lift to her bows like a woman tossing her head, and she
would seem to retort insolently: "The deuce you will!" as she elbowed
a small half-surge out of the way. Then up would come a big brother
comber, racing and roaring in the wake of the little fellow, and the
ship, conceited in the irresistible weight of four thousand tons of
hull, spars and cargo, would try the same tactics. Crash!
Burr-r-roomb! a halt, a stagger, a thunderous roar as of a cataract,
and a slow lifting as tons of chilly brine swirled through the
clanging scupper-ports, and the big fellow would speed on his
easterly run to Australia, hissing a warning--"Go easy, you silly
trollop, or we'll smash you, stave you, rip and rend you, and plunge
you down to roost on the splintered pinnacles three hundred fathoms
below!"

Nickerson slapped the weather poop rail with his hand. "Go it, you
scow! Travel naow an' let's see what ye kin do. You've a hundred an'
seventy-five miles to make to Diego Ramirez, so slog along, you big
ugly plug, slog along!" And to Donald, "standing-by" on the lee-side
of the poop, he grinned, "Heave the log, son!"

The hands for'ard had an eye on the poop. "What's he doin'?" queried
someone--"he," of course, meant Nickerson.

"They're heavin' th' log," came the reply from an observer.

"Humph," grunted a fo'c'sle oracle. "Bet he'll be singin' out for th'
ruddy main-r'yal in a minute!"

McKenzie, Jenkins and an ordinary seaman had finished their speed
recording task and were reeling in the line. "What's she makin'?"
asked the Old Man.

"Ten and a half, sir!"

Nickerson nodded. "Ornery old barge," he grunted, "an' this is her
best point o' sailing." Then to Thompson, "Mister! Give her th'
main-r'yal!"

The fo'c'sle observer qualified as a long-distance lip-reader. "He's
told young Thompson to give her th' main-r'yal. Spit on yer hands,
lads, an' limber yer j'ints for a pull at sheets 'n halliards--"
Thompson had run along the bridge and his voice interrupted the
prophet's observations, "Main-royal, men! Lively now!"

Moore was sent aloft to cast the gaskets adrift, and on deck the crew
sheeted home and mast-headed the yard to "_A Yankee ship came down
the river_," and they chorused and hauled the sheets to the
t'gallantyard-arms and yanked the yard up ere Moore was off it. Soloed
the chanteyman:--

    "_Were you ever in Congo River?_"

The crowd chorussed:--

    "_Blow, boys, blow!_"

The chanteyman piped again:--

    "_Where fever makes the white man shiver!_"

And the men roared:--

    "_Blow, my bully boys, blow!_"

In the cold and the wet, in day-light and dark, on sloshing decks they
hove and hauled--bawling out the old-time sea choruses as if in
defiance to the shriek of the wind and the roaring water. They yelped
and barked on "_Ranzo_"; stamped to "_Blow the man down!_" and "_In
Amsterdam there lived a maid_," and wailed plaintively to
"_Lowlands_," "_Shenandoah_" and "_Fare-well you ladies of Spain_."
The chantey is rare melody--inane and unimpressive ashore, but
wonderfully inspiring when sung to the organ roll of a big wind, and
the human voices rose above the material accompaniment of clanking
chains, humming shrouds, clanging wash-ports, the boom of the gale
aloft, and the swish and thunder of the sea.

All day and night they drove her storming, decks filled to the rail
and wire shroud and steel framing twanging and screeching to the
strain of the driving. In the half-deck the boys laid in their
bunks--the water a foot deep on the floor--and watched the chilly
brine spuirting in through the jambs of the doors and felt the jarring
of the steel house as the seas smashed against it. The place dripped
water; their blankets and bed-sacks were sopping, and they were wet,
cold and hungry, but the aspect of things had changed. The brave
southerly--friend of the outward-bounder in fifty-six south--was
blowing stiff and strong and driving them away from the regions
accursed.

In the grey twilight of the succeeding day, when the patent log had
recorded their distance, they cast the deep-sea lead over the bows and
Nickerson fingered the line aft on the poop and noted the marks with
contentment. "Sixty-five fathoms! She's makin' her westing all right!"
Then to McKenzie, he said, "Son! Nip aloft an' see if you kin make
out anything like steep rocks or the land ahead. Take these glasses
with you."

From the elevation of the t'gallant rigging he scrutinized the bleak
expanse of sea--greying in the half-light--and picked up a dog's tooth
of black rocks against the sky-line far to the northward. "Land ho!"
he shouted, pointing with his arm. On deck again, he described them to
the captain. "Humph!" grunted he with satisfaction on his stern
visage, "Diego Ramirez, I cal'late, or it might be Ildefonso. We're
gittin' along.... Mister Thompson! At eight bells you'll git th' fore
an' mizzen r'yals on her. This southerly'll ease off as we run north."

In the middle watch that night, Nickerson called Donald to him.

"How're ye feelin' naow, son? Warm enough these days?"

"Yes, sir! Thanks to you," replied the boy.

The skipper puffed at his pipe and settled himself comfortably on the
rail in his favorite angle. "Son," he said, after a pause, "what d'ye
plan to do when we reach Vancouver? Stick with the ship, eh?"

Donald nodded. "I'll have to, sir. I can't do anything else."

"Ye don't have to, son," said the other quietly, "and ef you'll take
my advice, you won't. This hooker ain't fit to sail in. She'll go to
the bottom some of these days. Now, your uncle .... he's a swine from
'way back and you'd be safer away from him and his ships. He don't
care a cuss for you--in fact, I know he hates you like poison. You'd
better plan on skipping aout, sonny, when we get tied up to a
Vancouver wharf. Whatever you do, don't sail in this or any of your
uncle's ships."

McKenzie was impressed with the Nova Scotian's manner. Desert the
ship? He had given the matter some thought before, but had dismissed
the idea in his determination to serve his time and climb the ladder
to command. "How about my future at sea, sir?" he enquired perplexed.
"If I run away from the ship, how am I going to get on in my
profession?"

"Do you want to go ahead in this rotten business?" exclaimed the
captain earnestly. "What is there for a clever young nipper like you
in the lime-juice merchant service these days? Why, boy, you'd make
more money and have a better time of it on a Grand Bank fishing
schooner. Aye! in the Canadian coasting trade, the skipper of a
three-master'll make more money than the brass-bound commander of many
a big liner in the passenger trade! I'm telling you, son, and I don't
want you to spill it to your pals, that I'm not agoin' to stay in this
bally-hoo of blazes when she gits safely tied up. I've got friends in
Vancouver and Victoria, and I'm goin' into something on the Coast or
else back home in Nova Scotia. I've had enough of this slavin' and
drivin' and sailin' ships with useless, spineless dock wallopers and
sun-fish for crews.... Aye! I'm tired of it.... Howsomever, son, I've
taken a shine to you, and ef you'll follow me, I'll take care of you,
and I'll guarantee in a few years you'll be able to bring your mammy
aout to Canada an' live happily ever after as the story-books say."

Donald nodded. "It sounds good, sir. I'll think over it, and I thank
you for your kindness."

Nickerson knocked his pipe out on the rail and stretched himself.
"Alright, son, think it over, and say--nip along for'ard an' see ef
them light-tower windows ain't covered with snow or ice. Those
mole-eyed lookouts 'ud never think of giving 'em a look-over even
though they'll hail 'the lights are burnin' bright!'"

As the skipper surmised, the glasses of the side-light towers were
filmed with frozen spray and the lights were barely visible. Donald
cleared them and had hardly done so before he made out the ghostly
loom of a large ship ahead. No side-lights were visible, but he needed
no second look to convince him it was a ship close-hauled and not a
trick of the imagination. The look-out, coming up from a stolen visit
to the fo'c'sle, saw it too and yelled.

Donald, knowing that a running ship must keep clear of a vessel
close-hauled, shouted, "Hard down! Hard down! Ship dead ahead!"
Nickerson must have heard him and acted, as the _Kelvinhaugh_ swung
up to the wind and the watch tumbled up to the braces and trimmed the
yards as she came up. The other vessel careered past--a big,
deep-laden three-masted ship with painted ports--and as she went by to
loo'ard, a voice sung out, "What ship?"

"_Kelvinhaugh_--Clyde for Vancouver! What--ship--is--that?"

"_Craig Royston_--Frisco to Falmouth!" And she was swallowed up in the
night.

"Weather braces!" came the command from the poop, and the
_Kelvinhaugh_ swung on her course again--her crew having heard the
first strange voice in four long and weary months.

When McKenzie came aft again, the skipper met him. "Smart boy!" he
complimented. "I just h'ard ye in time. Another minute and that feller
would ha' bin slap-bang into us or us into him. Go down in the cabin
an' rouse that skulkin' stoo'ard aout an' tell him to make a mug-up
for the two of us!"

With such small rewards were deeds of vigilance, nerve and hardihood
commended--a cup of tea and a piece of soggy cake or a cabin biscuit!
At sea, however, on a deep-water ship, one is thankful for small
mercies, and to men and boys who lived as the _Kelvinhaugh's_ did, a
little bit of warming fire, a mite of extra food, and a cup of
indifferent tea stood out in the monotonous drudgery of sea-life as
pleasant sensations and bright reminiscences in the midst of drab
memories.




CHAPTER FIFTEEN


Captain Nickerson drove the _Kelvinhaugh_ in genuine "Down-east"
fashion, and the big barque made the best speed it was possible to
attain in such a model, and with such a weak crew. The cheap gear gave
trouble, sheets parted, shackle-pins broke, braces carried away, and
the sail-maker--who had looked for a fairly easy time in a new ship
with new gear--was kept busy mending split sails, while the men had
their fill of bending and unbending canvas. "Nah yer gets an h'idear
o' wot h'its like h'on them ruddy Bluenose packets!" growled a seaman.
"Ye spends orl yer watches h'on deck wiv the hand-billy and the strop
and ascrapin', apaintin' and apolishin' h'of 'em, and orl yer watches
below sendin' dahn, amendin' and abendin' th' bloomin' canvas they
busts h'in their sail draggin'. Ho, them's th' perishin' packets for
'ard work, me sons! Them Bluenose mytes, like h'our fella there, lies
h'awake nights thinkin' up work for the 'ands, they does, bli'me!"

"A reg'lar plug!" Nickerson would growl, when, with a stiff breeze and
under all the sail she'd stand, the log would only record a speed of
nine or ten knots. These were records for the _Kelvinhaugh_! Her usual
gait was around five and six sea miles per hour with breezes in which
a clean-lined British or American clipper would be running her two
hundred and forty miles from noon to noon.

The Nova Scotian was no believer in ambling along. He slept during the
day and kept the deck at night, driving the big barque along by every
trick of wind-coaxing he knew. In the "variables" off the Chilean
coast he box-hauled her in the flukey airs, and when the squalls came
down, it would be--"Stand by yer r'yal halliards!"--but no command to
"clew up and let go" would be given unless the skipper judged the
weight of the wind to be too much for sail and mast to stand.
Nickerson would sooner split a sail than take it in--so the hands
averred--but headway is more often made at the expense of canvas than
by mothering it, as the Yankee clipper ship records show.

From the strenuous, desperate labors of the high latitudes, the crew
progressed to the monotonous grind of scraping, chipping rust, and
painting. Decks were sanded and scrubbed clean to new wood and then
oiled; rigging was set up and "rattled down," or rather "up," as the
fashion now is, and Donald, with the other two boys, had his fill of
tarring and slushing. Nickerson's liberal use of the ship's paint
would have caused David McKenzie to sweat blood could he have seen it,
but by the time the barque had crossed the Pacific equator, she was
scraped, scrubbed, painted and varnished until she looked like a yacht
inboard. The running gear was overhauled from spanker-sheet to
flying-jib down-haul; the standing rigging was tarred down and set up
bar taut, and the brass-work--what there was of it--shone until it
glittered like new-minted gold in the sun. All of this spelt "work,"
and Martin and Thompson would feel that they had done all they could
do in "sprucing her up," but the artistic eye and labor finding
imagination of the skipper would suggest some other job "to keep the
hands from gittin' hog-fat an' lazy"--even to the extent of polishing
"Charley Noble"--the galley funnel.

Through the sweltering heat of the "Line" and its heavy down-pours and
thunderstorms, the _Kelvinhaugh_ was coaxed into the north-east trades
again, and when the Tropic of Cancer had been crossed, the crew felt
that they were almost in port and they fervently longed for the day
when they could set foot on shore once more. Would they ship in the
_Kelvinhaugh_ again? Not by a perishin' condemned sight! They had had
enough of her--these lean, taut-muscled sea-wolves. Their voyage in
the ship had been a nightmare, and their desire to "hit the beach" was
accentuated by the daily lessening quantity and bad quality of the
beef, pork, flour and biscuit which was being served out. The voyage
had been over-long and food was running low. Fresh water had been
secured in the tropical down-pours, but the tanks were foul through
want of liming. Even the lime-juice--a feature of British
sailing-ships on long voyages--was scarce and only served to those men
who showed symptoms of scurvy.

McKenzie--the pale-faced, sensitive little mother's boy of six months
back--had developed into a lithe, hard-muscled youth--"tough as a
church rat," as the skipper remarked--and he had thrived wonderfully
in the cruel grind of "lime-juice" seafaring. As a sailor, he was far
ahead of the other two boys--thanks to Hinkel's hounding and
Nickerson's drilling. Moore was useless, and would never amount to
anything at sea. He was the stuff "they don't make sailors of," as
Martin sarcastically remarked, while Jenkins, though a willing lad and
of considerably more sea experience than McKenzie, was slow to learn
and was of the kind that acquired knowledge in time through
sub-consciousness of repeated lessons and dint of much driving them
in. Compared with his previous voyage on another ship, his experiences
in the _Kelvinhaugh_ had sickened him, and he talked of "cutting his
stick" and serving the balance of his time before the mast in another
ship.

In the less strenuous hours of the tropic latitudes, Donald had time
to think, and he made up his mind not to remain by the _Kelvinhaugh_.
His life on her had knocked his ideas of the future "galley west," and
while he intended to remain at sea-faring, he did not plan to serve
out his time under the McKenzie house-flag. Nickerson's ominous advice
had impressed him. He felt that the skipper knew more than he cared to
tell him, and if the Nova Scotian would keep his word, he would
follow his fortunes and take a chance on his future. In common with
the inmates of fo'c'sle, half-deck and cabin, Donald looked forward to
the end of the voyage. "The more the days, the more the dollars!"
sailors say, but none of the _Kelvinhaugh's_ crowd were anxious for a
long voyage pay-day.

As they crawled up the North Pacific, gossip fore-and-aft wondered
what would become of Captain Muirhead. He had "lapped up" all his
supply of spirits and was now sullen, sober and sick looking. For a
while each day he appeared on deck, and the men wondered at
Nickerson's charity in allowing the deposed master such freedom, but
the Bluenose evidently had Muirhead "jammed in a clinch," for he made
no move to secure his usurped position either by word or deed. The
dis-rated Hinkel was for'ard again with his arm in a sling, and useful
only to the cook. The fo'c'sle would have none of him. He was a
veritable ocean leper, and ate in the galley and slept in a berth
intended for a painter.

Six months and ten days out from Greenock, the _Kelvinhaugh_ stood in
and raised the land. When the hail came from a man who had been making
up gaskets on the foret'gallant-yard, all hands tumbled up for a look.
There was a light wind from the nor'west and they ambled towards the
high coast line, which stretched as far as the eye could discern. When
darkness fell it gave them a definite position in the flashing light
on Estevan Point, Vancouver Island. Thrice welcome beam! Harbinger of
the seaman's yearning for stable earth, trees, grass and flowers, cosy
homes, bustling streets and the concomitants of the land!

During the night, as they drifted down the coast towards the Straits
of San Juan de Fuca, the crew roused a big towing hawser up onto the
fo'c'sle-head; knocked the plugs out of the hawse-pipes, rove the
chains through them and shackled on the anchors under the auspices of
"chips" the carpenter. Overhauling the ground-tackle! Happiest of
deep-sea tasks--fore-shadowing of a voyage's end.

Dawn found them standing in between the land, with a flood tide aiding
the light wind in squared yards. With the breeze fair for a run up the
Straits, Nickerson intended to save a stiff tow-bill, and they held
along past the Vancouver Island shore in a drizzle of rain--typical
fall weather on the West Coast. Shipping was more numerous now and
tramp steamers with lumber deck-loads, and three-masted schooners
forged out of the haze outward-bound from British Columbian and Puget
Sound ports. Early morning brought them the sight of a beautiful
clipper-bowed, two-funneled Canadian Pacific liner, which flashed past
them, bellowing raucously in the mist. A lithe, white-painted ghost of
a ship she appeared as she slipped along at fifteen knots. "She's
bound for Yokohama, Shanghai and Hong Kong--Japan and China," remarked
Thompson to Donald. "Japan and China?" echoed McKenzie dully. "Ah,
yes.... Japan and China!" Romance to him was dead, and the mention of
these far-off destinations in the mystical Orient failed to awaken a
spirit of world-wandering. Different, indeed, from the time, six
months back, when he dreamed glorious imaginings of the coming voyage
"out west," and when the words, "Aye, I'm sailing to-morrow. 'Round
the Horn to Vancouver..." conjured a wonderful vista of romantic
sights and experiences.

Aye! aye! he had been around the Horn and Vancouver was a mere jog
ahead, but the youthful glamor of his shore dreams was gone. To
realize his dreams he had experienced hard work, hard fare and hard
knocks, and the price was too heavy for the realization of the ideal.
A sailor's life...? He found himself unconsciously echoing his
father's words, "It's a dog's life at the best of times!"

Still, he ruminated, maybe he hadn't been given a square deal? Maybe
he had struck it tough? He thought over the yarns of his shipmates for
opposition reasonings, but a mental summary of their reminiscences
failed to bring up any expression from them of infatuation for a
seafaring life. "Seafarin'? Aye, mate, it's all segarry in yer
bloomin' yacht when you is the bloomin' owner; when you lies in yer
blinkin' bunk 'til nine an' presses th' button for the stoo'ard to
bring yer blushin' cawfee; when you lolls around in a deck-chair or an
'ammick under an awnin' aft an' has another flunkey amixin' ye up gin
an' bitters, an' arfs-an'-arfs, an' whiskies an' sodies, an' when
ye're sick o' rollin' about, ye jest ups an' tells th' skipper to run
yer boat inter th' nearest pleasant 'arbor. That's real seafarin'! Any
other way is plain hell!" So Cock-eyed Bill expressed his ideas one
night, and the growl of assent which came from the audience seemed to
confirm the sentiments. To them it was all "a hard drag"--a monotonous
round of drudgery in an unstable ship-world in climates torrid,
temperate and frigid, and punctuated by spells of desperate effort and
nerve-breaking thrills. When sailors talked of good times, they were
memories of shore jaunts and sprees. The fun and pleasant memories of
those sea-toilers invariably savored of "the big night we had at Red
Riley's place in 'Frisco," or "Larrikin Mike's dance hall in
Sydney"--never at sea! And yet, in spite of it all, men would go back
to the sea and the ships again--tire of "the beach" and sign and ship
for another spell of knocking about. What was it? he asked himself.
What was the indefinable something which irresistibly drew men back to
sea-faring after drinking deep of its cup of loneliness, monotony,
hardship and misery? He could not answer--not yet. He was but an
initiate in the lodge of the sea. He had other degrees to master and
he had not yet been ashore and alone with his sea memories. When the
voyage was over and he was free from the ship and his shipmates; when
he was safe on the beach and fraternizing with landsmen who knew
nothing of the degree he had worked, nothing of the sea and
sailormen--then would old ocean's magical lure get aworking. His time
would come--some day--_if he were of the genuine Viking blood_.

The wind died in the forenoon watch and in an "Irishman's hurricane"
of up-and-down drizzle, the _Kelvinhaugh_ drifted, tide-borne, on a
glassy sea. Far to the west a square-rigger was lying becalmed; the
C.P.R. liner's smoke hung low along the horizon, and the serrated
peaks of the Olympics loomed high to starboard. The waters of the
Straits were dotted, here and there, by fishing boats, and slabs of
bark and huge tree-roots drifted past with the tide or current.
Nickerson relaxed his work-bill for once, and the crew, except the
wheelsman and look-out, took shelter from the rain and discussed the
future.

Poor sea-children--they had all been burnt by the fire of their
experiences, and all were for "slingin' their hook" from the
_Kelvinhaugh_. They had it all planned out. Some of the Scandinavians
had friends in the fisheries and they would look them up and land a
job handling salmon nets or halibut trawls. No more wind-jammering
deep-water for them "by yiminy!" A green hand announced his intention
of making for the Klondyke gold fields--that being the incentive which
sent him fore-the-mast on the _Kelvinhaugh_. Some of the others
planned getting work ashore, or, failing that, they would make for
Puget Sound ports or San Francisco "where the boarding-house masters
treat a feller right an' a man could take a pick o' ships to sail in
ef he didn't get drunk!" That was the ticket! 'Ware mean Scotch
barques with ornamental donkey-boilers and four heavily-sparred masts
and eight able seamen's bunks forever empty in the fo'c'sles. They
knew the Scotch shipowner, by cripes! It was them that invented hard
work and small pay. Didn't they start the donkey-boiler dodge? Didn't
they invent these four-masted hookers with their fore, main and mizzen
sails all the same size, so that the tops'l of the one could be used
on the tops'l of the other, thus saving a spare suit of sails for
every mast--a Scotch money-saving dodge! And they brag of the handy
four-mast barque which could carry a whacking big cargo and only
needed, with the donkey, a small crew to work the ship! More Scotch
shrewdness! Aye, they sat in their offices in Bothwell street, and
Hope street and Neptune Chambers and thought these schemes out! The
_Kelvinhaugh_ was a sample, and when Cock-eyed Bill admitted with
pride that "doin' twelve months hard in Barlinnie Jail was a blushin'
holiday compared with this v'y'ge," they perished and blistered their
sanguinary eyes and cursed Scotch economy in ships, food, and
creature comforts. Young McKenzie, listening, felt a pang of shame for
the economical characteristics of his countrymen.

The muggy night found the barque still with the wind "up and down the
mast." For'ard, the crew were packing their bags and having a
sing-song--the first for months. Aft, McKenzie, Jenkins and Moore
(sullen no longer) yarned of their experiences and discussed the
future. Donald was non-committal--"he probably would stick by the
ship"; Jenkins was going to "fly the coop between two suns--clothes or
no clothes" and put his time in on some other ship as a seaman
'fore-the-mast, and take his chance on securing a clean discharge.
Moore had enough of the _Kelvinhaugh_ and a sea-faring life to last
him the rest of his days. He would cable "Pa" from Vancouver to send
him the price of a ticket home. After a month or so's rest, he would
enter the brewery's office, where he could make up invoices instead of
gaskets. No more "Up you go, you skulker, and overhaul and stop the
royal buntlines!" and perching and hopping around the lofty branches
of the trees which grew from a windjammer's decks. "It's all right for
a bally bird," he said, and the other two loathed him for lack of
sand. A "stuck sailor," forsooth, and the beer factory would suit him
handsomely!

A light southerly sprung up with the cessation of the rain in the
middle watch, and "Lee fore-brace!" roused the hands out to haul the
yards aft and trim sail to the wind. Early morning found them around
Beechy Head, Race Island, and off Royal Roads at the entrance to
Victoria Harbor, and they backed the main-yard while a pilot boarded
them. He was a brother Bluenose and scrambled up the Jacob's Ladder
with a "Got here at last, cap'en!" as if he had long been expecting
the ship. His boat's crew hove up a bundle of newspapers, which
Captain Nickerson took and failed to read, as they were filched
shortly afterwards by the half-deckers--hungry for news and wondering
if Canadian papers contained British football and cricket results.

The greetings done with, the pilot glanced around. "Cal'late, cap'en,
ye'd better bring-to here in Royal Roads an' let go yer killick.
Carmanah got yer number yesterday and your Vancouver agents are
sending over a big tug to lug you in. Devil of a current runs through
the channel hereabouts ... pull you through them at slack water.
Better clew up yer muslin naow an' edge in an' let go off th' shore
there. Th' quarantine people will look ye over here, but I guess there
ain't much ailin' your crowd but hard muscles and empty bellies." And
he chuckled reminiscently.

The barque glided slowly in to the anchorage as sails were being
clewed up and the yards lowered. "Come-to hereabouts, cap'en," said
the pilot. The helmsman put the wheel over, and when the ship lost
headway, the skipper sung out, "Leggo y'r anchor!" The carpenter, in
the eyes of her, swung his maul and knocked out the pin of the
chain-stopper, shouting "Stand clear!" as the mud-hook plunged into
the water with the chain thundering and rattling through the
hawse-pipe. Then came a moment of silence--a further rattle of heavy
cable-links--and a jarring tremor betokened that the ship had taken up
the chain and that the anchor had bitten the bottom. "Anchor's
holding, sir!" came the hail from for'ard. "Alright!" grunted
Nickerson, and to Martin he said, "Naow, git her canvas stowed ... an'
make it a harbor furl. She'll not need sail for a while naow!" His
lean young face had a complacent grin as he puffed on a cigar. He had
worked the old scow in, and the _Kelvinhaugh_ had completed her first
voyage under canvas--a passage of one hundred and ninety-five days.

Nickerson and the pilot went below, and the men working on the poop
noticed that both they and Captain Muirhead were sitting around the
saloon table chatting away in the most friendly manner. "A rum go!"
they remarked. "What's in the wind?" But the young Nova Scotian was
evidently playing a game of his own. "Yes," he was saying to the
pilot, "Captain Muirhead has been a very sick man. Knocked out down
south ... have had to take his place ever since. Second mate fell
from aloft ... hurt...." The pilot was murmuring his sympathies and
Muirhead was shaking his head as if in corroboration of Nickerson's
testimony. In truth, he did not look a well man. The long confinement
had washed the sea-tan off his pock-marked features and, no doubt, his
heavy drinking had affected his system.

With the rest of the hands, Donald was aloft helping to furl the sails
into that neat uncreased roll which is known as a "harbor stow." They
took their time at the job. None of your lump, bulgy furls, like "a
bunch of tricks," with a bunt like a balloon and clew-lugs sticking
out like a whale's flukes, in a harbor stow. That sort of thing was
all right for Cape Horn, where it was roll 'em up anyhow and get the
gaskets 'round them, but the last furl had to be a furl where the
canvas would lie, without a crease, like a white ribbon along the
yard, and the gaskets would be passed like unto a neat serving. With
sails stowed, they clambered to the deck and braced the yards
faultlessly square; took up the slack in running gear and faked it
down on the belaying pins in neatly stopped coils. When this was done,
the _Kelvinhaugh_ looked, in the placid water of the Roads, a proper
picture of an inward-bound deep-waterman. No seaman could mistake the
clean paintwork and scrubbed decks _inboard_ and the taut rigging and
well-furled sails aloft for an outward-bounder. The chafing gear on
the stays and the rusty, sea-washed and red lead patched hull told its
unmistakable story, for every sailor knows a wind-jammer goes to sea
with a clean hull, but with cluttered decks and riggers' snarls and
"Irish pennants" (loose ends) aloft, and a ship is in her best trim
after her sailormen have toiled on her between port and port.

A launch brought the port doctor out and he glanced perfunctorily at
the lean, hungry-looking mob lined up on the deck for inspection. He
examined Hinkel's mended bones and muttered, "A good job--well done!"
A professional compliment to Nickerson's surgery, truly! He then went
into the cabin, and when he came up again, Thompson heard him say to
Nickerson, "Your skipper has a bad liver ... been drinking too much,
I'm afraid.... Sick man ... better be careful!" And he went over the
rail.

Shortly after the man of medicine departed, a big deep-sea tug came
around a point and forged towards them. She had a huge rope fender
over her bows and several wooden ones trailing along her sides. A
wheel-house was perched forward on her superstructure, and it was
profusely ornamented with nameboards in gilt and a spread-winged eagle
crowned its roof. Donald had never seen such a tug before and he was
interested in the fine points of difference between it and the
low-riding, paddle-wheeled craft which had hauled them to sea over six
months agone. She ranged handily alongside, with her skipper half in
and half out of the wheel-house. He was in shirt-sleeves and wore a
hard bowler hat, and looked like a drygoods clerk, but he knew how to
handle his craft. When she was fast alongside, he sung out to the
pilot, "Better get yer hook _hyak_ (quick)!" he drawled--masticating a
quid with jaws that never ceased to work. "I wanna git this big hooker
through in slack water afore them _skookum_ (strong) currents start
arunnin'! This one'll be a sight worse'n any raft o' big timber by th'
looks o' her, I reckon!" Punctuating his conversation with Chinook
idioms, he chewed and yarned with the pilot and Nickerson while the
crew prepared to get under way again.

McLean had steam up in the donkey, and it hove the anchor short amid
fervent comment from the barque's crowd. "Fust time that ruddy
ornament has worked sence we left for out!" they remarked. "Pity they
couldn't ha' used it them times we was doin' ruddy watch-tackle drill
or handlin' them cussed yards!" Aye, but coals cost money and
muscle-power was cheaper, and these were days of low freights.

In tow of the steamer, the _Kelvinhaugh_, with a man at her wheel,
glided out of the Roads, rounded Discovery Island and pulled into Haro
Strait. The pilot and Nickerson paced the poop exchanging news and
views, and Nickerson evidently astonished his fellow countryman,
judging from the "Waal, I swan's!" and "Th' hell ye say's!" which came
from the pilot's lips. "Aye ... lucky to get here ... a slow ship,"
the captain was saying.

The pilot glanced around. "New ship, too ... ye hev her spruced up.
Not like aour old Bluenose packets, whittled out of the bush above
tide-water, eh? A lime-juicer for discomfort ... no wheel-house to
keep the man at the wheel out of the cold and the wet. Stand in the
open an' freeze an' be damned to you! That's th' lime-juice way for
ye!" The tug was plucking the big barque along at a faster clip than
she usually made under sail and the reek of her Nanaimo coal gave the
barque's crew a tantalizing memory of Glasgow's bituminous atmosphere.
The tide was running in strong astern of the ship and helped to shove
her along, but soon it was noticed to slacken when they hauled through
the island-studded channels.

Donald, working on "stow away jobs," feasted his eyes on those
islands--rugged, rocky, dense with rank undergrowth and lofty with
mighty cedars, spruce and red pine. Huge fallen trunks thrust their
tops into the water, and mighty gnarled roots--"snags" the pilot
called them--danced in the tide swirls or lay stranded on the beaches.
Bare rocks were passed, upon which seals basked or slipped into the
quiet water when the ships loomed near, and ever and anon, they passed
fishermen in open boats, towing trolling-lines to entice the
clear-water salmon. Once a Siwash Indian family in a dug-out canoe,
made from a single cedar log, swung lazily under the barque's stern,
and the head of the family imperturbably continued his paddling in the
wash from the "_skookum sail-ship_," while his "_klootch_" (woman)
cuffed her curious brood to the dug-out's floor. "Yon's an Injian,"
observed McLean to Donald. "A rid Injian. There's lots o' them in
these parts." And Donald's thoughts turned for a space to the stirring
tales of Fenimore Cooper and the "Buffalo Bill Library." "Do they
scalp and go on the war-path nowadays, Mac?" he enquired.

The bos'n laughed. "They're gey good at scalpin' th' heid aff a whusky
bottle if they can get yin. Ah was a year on this coast yin time ...
tradin' ... up north. We sold them whusky for pokes o' gold an' skins.
They're quiet folk ... no th' scalpin' kind."

Threading around the channels and dodging dangerous up-rooted trees as
long as the ship's main-yard, called for good steersmanship. "A lazy
hooker!" remarked the pilot. "A slow ship in stays, I reckon?"
Nickerson nodded. "Slower'n scullin' a loaf o' bread 'cross a tub o'
Porto Reek molasses in January!" he answered--quoting a "Down-east"
phrase indicative of the extreme in tardiness. "Aye ... boxhaul her
around or wear ship most of the time ... a condemned scow!" The pilot
laughed. "Minds me o' th' time I was a kid in an ol' three-mast
schooner timber-droghin' from Nova Scotia to the West Indies ... flat
on the bottom ... wake 'ud be forrad o' th' fore-riggin' ... took a
whole watch to tack her in and the whole ocean for sea-room. Haul
daown heads'ls an' fores'l, sheet in mains'l an' spanker 'n roll th'
wheel daown. Then slack yer after canvas, h'ist fores'l an' jibs ...
sheets to wind'ard ... an' she'd git around ... maybe!" And he
chuckled over the reminiscence.

From Haro Strait, they emerged into the placid waters of the Gulf of
Georgia, and in a lifting of the shore haze, the wonderful beauty of
the coast ranges on Vancouver Island, and the mainland burst on the
vision. All around the horizon the great peaks thrust their summits
into the ether and fleecy wisps of mist caressed their tree-clad
slopes. Far to the east, dominating them all, Mount Baker, Queen of
the Cascades, hove her snow-crowned crest almost eleven thousand feet
above the level of the sea.

McKenzie was entranced with this tow-line voyage. This was the
happiest day of his seafaring, and Nature's prodigality in this
wonderful country charmed and fired his imagination. He remembered his
last sight of land the breadth of two continents away--a dog-toothed
spur of wave-lashed granite, a splinter of stone from the tail of
America's tremendous vertebrae--Diego Ramirez rocks to the west'ard of
the Horn. Aye! things were different then, but even the Ramirez were
good to look upon ... a welcome milepost on a hard traverse.

In mid-afternoon, with no work to do but watch the nip of the towing
hawser, and undisturbed by the fear of an oath-besprinkled command, he
sat on a fo'c'sle head bitt and absorbed the wonders of that
hundred-mile drag. In the words of the fare-well chantey:--

    "_The sails were furled--the work was done!_"

And he relaxed and dreamed and feasted his eyes and starved soul on
the magnificent panorama which was unfolded with every mile the ship
made up the Gulf. Aye, here was romance! The thrill of having
travelled a hard, dreary road and stepping, all of a sudden, into
Fairyland. Only those who have experienced it can realize the
heart-hunger for the land after six months of nothing but heaving,
restless sea. McKenzie forgot the sea and the ship and the voyage and
unleashed his soul and imagination to appreciate the glories of the
serried peaks which ringed him around, and the gem-like islets set
like emeralds on the turquoise of the water.

In the dog-watch, when the sun was setting in an oriflamme of red and
gold behind the western peaks, and the lazy waters of the Straits
mirrored the lights and shadows in brilliant crimson, gold and blue,
they towed past the Fraser River estuary, and the Sand Heads
light-ship gleamed scarlet in the sun-glow. Numerous sailboats dotted
the turbid flood at the mouth of the river--their occupants setting
the twine to enmesh the river-seeking salmon. "Fushin' fur salmon tae
be tinned--or canned, as they ca' it oot here," vouchsafed McLean.
"They turn oot millions o' tins o' salmon up yon Fraser River. Them
fishermen are nearly a' Japs, an' there's a wheen o' them on this
coast ... aye, an' Chinks an' Hindoos an' sich-like Mehommedahs!"

It was dark when the tow-boat swung the barque around Point Grey and
headed in for the Burrard Inlet Narrows. Between Prospect Point and
the high-wooded slopes of the opposite shore, they pulled through a
narrow channel, and the huge trees of Stanley Park commanded Jenkins'
admiration. "By golly," he cried, "I don't know whether it's a trick
of the moonlight or not, but did you ever see such monsters? They're
higher'n the masts of this ship!" No indeed! Donald never had, but he
promised himself a closer scrutiny of those lofty trunks at the first
opportunity.

Round a picturesque cliff, capped by a brilliant light, they hauled,
and the City of Vancouver burst upon their vision with a blaze of
twinkling electrics, which spun twisting threads on the mirror of the
harbor waters. The Queen City of the West! It has been called thus,
but to one sea-wearied lad it was Fairyland--a veritable Valhalla for
ship-tired Vikings--and he hungered for the moment when he could set
foot ashore and roam its streets. The fo'c'sle crowd gladdened at the
sight of a town again, and McLean and other old-timers were busy
answering eager questions. "Is the beer good an' cheap ashore here?"
or "Is this der place where dot Two Bit Hilda has dot haus mit der
lager und der gals?" "Aye, aye," McLean was saying, "ye can get a' th'
whusky an' gurls ye want here if ye hae th' dollars. Let me tell ye
aboot th' time...." Donald listened carelessly to a vicious adventure.
It did not affect him. He was staring longingly at the city and the
snow-clad heights around and paid no attention to the excursions in
vice which the crew were planning. Nature's beauties had no place in
their make-up. It was whisky and women, and most of them knew the
beauty spots of the world only by the price and quality of the liquor
to be procured therein. Poor devils! It was their idea of pleasure,
and after what they had gone through, it was corporeal joys they
appreciated rather than mental.

He was brought to things material by the warning shriek from the
tow-boat's whistle, which found an echo in the lofty heights. "Stand
by, forrad!" came Nickerson's voice. The men shambled to the bows.
"Haul in yer hawser!"

The steamer slipped the rope and the barque rounded up and threw her
great hull and spars athwart the moon-path. "Leggo yer anchor!" came
the strident command from aft. A plunge--a roar--a rattle of
chain--and silence. The awakened waters showed new facets to the
moon-glare and spread in concentric rings away from the disturbing
hull, and with a voice hailing from the departing tug, "We'll berth
you at five!" the _Kelvinhaugh_ lay quiet and motionless at the end of
her chain, like a tired horse that had travelled a long and weary
road.




CHAPTER SIXTEEN


The _Kelvinhaugh_ lay alongside a wharf and her steam donkey was
working, as it never worked at sea, slinging the long bars of railway
iron out of the holds by yard-arm tackles. It was a noisy discharge,
as the rails clanged sonorously on impact with each, and the whole
harbor rang with the sound.

All the ship's company had departed, with the exception of Captain
Muirhead, the steward, and the four apprentices. Though chartered to
load lumber at Hastings Mills for Australia, Muirhead had paid the
crew off--a rash and unwise act, as he would find when he came to ship
another--but he was probably willing to take a chance and get rid of
all witnesses to his disgrace and deposition from command. Judson
Nickerson had gone, too, but before he took his dunnage ashore, he
called Donald and said, "I'm going ashore for a spell, but I'll give
you a hail later. Don't run away or do anything foolish until I
communicate with you. Let on that you intend to stand by the ship!"

Thompson was now "out of his time" and the skipper had given him
permission to leave and go home to take the examination for second
mate, but he had asked him to stand by the ship for a while until a
mate was signed on. Moore had cabled his "Pa" for a remittance to take
him home and away from sea-faring. He was seldom aboard the ship, and
spent most of his time ashore "sun-fishing" around bowling alleys and
billiard parlors with young loafers of a similar cut of jib to
himself.

Hinkel vanished after being paid off, and he was never seen again
around Vancouver. It was thought that he had shipped to the north in a
coasting packet running supplies up to St. Michaels or Nome for the
thousands of gold-seekers who were swarming into the Yukon with every
north-bound ship. McLean and Martin had succumbed to the gold-fever
and had shipped as hands on Alaska steamers, and the others had
scattered to the four winds of Heaven shortly after being paid off.
Donald recalled their shouting of the fare-well chantey as they warped
the barque alongside the wharf:--

    "The work was hard, the voyage was long,
      Leave her, Johnny, leave her!
    The seas were high, the gales were strong,
      And it's time for us to leave her!

    She would not steer, nor stay, nor wear,
      Leave her, Johnny, leave her!
    She shipped it green, and made us swear,
      And it's time for us to leave her!

    The sails are furled, our work is done,
      Leave her, Johnny, leave her!
    And now on shore we'll have some fun,
      And it's time for us to leave her!"

Roaring this nautical valediction, they belayed and coiled down, and
when Martin had said, "That'll do, men!" they tumbled their dunnage
over the rail and hied along to Pete Larsen's Place or Two Bit Peter's
Sailors' Boarding House and Nautical Emporium--glad to get away from
the "bloody starvation Scotch work-house" which they called the
_Kelvinhaugh_. Aye! in a week or two, in all probability, they would
be outward-bound again in something as bad, and the much-anathematized
_Kelvinhaugh_ would be glorified in "my last ship" reminiscences.

Donald and Jenkins worked from six to five painting and doing odd
jobs, under the orders of Thompson and Captain Muirhead--the mystery
of whose reinstatement had not yet been cleared up. He was not the
same man, however, and he spoke quite kindly to Donald on several
occasions, and even gave him a dollar with which to see the sights. A
dollar did not go far on the West Coast in those hectic days, with
prices enhanced by the gold-seekers' demands, but Jenkins had received
something from home, and he generously "stood on his hands" and shared
with the others.

A great packet of letters from his mother made Donald happy. She was
well and getting along all right in the Hydropathic and had no
complaints, though she was lonesome for her darling boy. These
motherly missives usually contained many warnings about sleeping in
damp bed clothes, sitting in draughts, and the danger of wearing wet
socks. There was also much well-meant advice about the dire results of
"overloading his stomach," and requests not to "eat too much rich
food." Donald smiled grimly when he read these paragraphs. God knows
there was no danger of overloading his stomach on any "rich" food in a
starvation Scotch barque! Pea soup, hard biscuit, salt beef and pork,
occasional potatoes and "duff," tea and coffee (water bewitched),
constituted the bulk of the "rich food" he had lived on, and there
wasn't too much of it at any time, and latterly, he had tautened his
belt on the meagre feed to delude his imagination into the belief that
his stomach was full!

Thompson--a four-years' voyager--received similar reminders from home.
"The dear old mater thinks I should wear goloshes and an umbrella on
deck when it is raining," he said with a laugh. "What mothers don't
know won't hurt them."

With Captain Muirhead's dollar, Donald wrote several letters home and
got his photograph taken standing alongside one of the giant cedars in
Stanley Park. The photo cost him "four bits," or fifty cents, but he
thought it would be the best thing he could send, and cheerfully spent
the money.

The _Kelvinhaugh's_ cargo had been nearly all cleared out of her, when
a boy delivered a note to "Mr. Donald McKenzie." It was from
Nickerson, and it requested him, briefly, to meet him ashore at a
certain corner at seven o'clock, and not to say anything to the others
about it. Donald cleaned up, and slipped away from Jenkins and
Thompson by saying he was "going up street to post a letter."

Captain Nickerson, looking prosperous and smoking a cigar, met him at
the appointed time and they went to a Chinese cafe and ordered
something to eat. "Now, Donald," said the other--it was the first time
he had ever addressed him thus--"what do you plan to do? Are you going
to stick by the ship?"

McKenzie had spent many hours thinking over matters, and he was unable
to make up his mind. Since the ship had been in port, the miseries of
the passage had been forgotten, and he had already gotten into that
frame of mind--common to all sailors--wherein he thought that his
future sea-faring would be easier. He knew the ropes now, and, of
course, it had been his first voyage, and it had been an unusually
rough one. If he was to get on in his chosen profession, he would have
to go through his apprenticeship. He voiced these thoughts to
Nickerson, who nodded understandingly.

"Naow, sonny," he said, when Donald had finished. "I know haow ye
feel, but I'm agoin' to tell you something. Do you know that your
uncle shipped you on that hooker to get rid of you? Do you know that
Muirhead and Hinkel tried to do you in? Did you know that the two of
them framed up that jigger-gaff accident off the Plate, and that
Hinkel cut the tackle rope of the gaff vang to make sure you'd go
overboard? Do you know that Muirhead tried to leave you to drown, and
that I just came on deck in the nick of time and made him bring the
ship to the wind while we got a boat over? No? Waal, son, ye may look
flabbergasted, but it's gospel truth! They tried every dodge they
could think of outside of plain murder, and it was me that spiked
their guns!"

Donald stared at him in open-eyed astonishment, but the other's stern
features betrayed no emotion, and he puffed his cigar and continued.

"I took you out of Hinkel's watch after the jigger-gaff incident to
save your life when I got wind of the game. The skipper got cold feet
then and gave up all ideas of doing away with you. Off the Horn, the
ship got him frightened--blamed frightened--and he knew that Hinkel
was no good as a second mate, so he agreed to break him and send him
for'ard. Hinkel had fallen down on his job and the skipper was scared
of me, and it was me that put that Dutchman out of the afterguard.
Then when Hinkel got hurt and thought he was going to die, I got a
long confession out of him and it don't show your uncle up in a good
light." He paused, took a drink of coffee, and puffed on his cigar.

"Aye, son, your uncle is a downy bird--a proper queer-feller! He had
old Muirhead under his thumb for some ship-scuttling job which he did
for some one, and the old cuss was in dead fear it would be found out,
and he would do any dirty work your uncle asked him to do. Then this
Hinkel was another rotter, and another of your uncle's assassins. You
ain't likely to know it, but your skunk of a relative was managing
owner of the _Orkney Isles_, and I have good reason to believe he got
palm-oiled to get that half-baked apprentice McFee out of the way. I
think McFee's step-father engineered that job and Hinkel confessed to
me, when he thought he was agoin' to die, that he got paid for doing
it through your measly uncle. Aye, aye,--the more I learn about some
ship-owners the more I feel sure that hell 'ull be overcrowded!"

"What--what would be his reason for trying to get rid of me?" Donald
enquired in a daze at Nickerson's astounding revelations.

"Hard to imagine," replied the other. "You ain't got any money and
there ain't nobody to benefit by your death, is they?"

Donald pondered for a minute. "No! I can't think of anything. There's
only mother and I. When the dad was drowned, he left nothing."

Nickerson grunted and gazed on the smoke from his cigar. "He's got
some deep object, son," he said after a pause, "and I'll take time to
find it aout." He did not speak for several moments, then he threw
away his cigar and turned to Donald.

"Now, son," he said kindly, "I've taken a shine to you and I know
you've had a rough deal, an' that you're a poor little devil of an
orphan with nobody to look after you. I knew your daddy, though I
never told you. We were shipmates one time and he did me a good
turn ... never mind what. I've been a wild one in my day and should be
further ahead than what I am. But I'm going to settle daown. I'm
agoin' back home and I'll take you along if you care to come. You'd
better get clear of your uncle and your uncle's ships, and we'll frame
up a dodge on him if you're game. Will you skip naow after what I have
told ye?"

"Yes, I will!" replied Donald emphatically. "I don't want to stay.
I'll run away to-night and go anywhere and do anything to get away
from that ship."

"Don't hurry," said the Nova Scotian. "Wait until I'm ready and I'll
tell you what to do. I have been around with some friends of mine who
own sealing schooners. One of them wants me to take a contract to
deliver a schooner in Halifax--taking her 'round the Horn from
Victoria. This sealing game is getting played out here naow, and
there's a lot of trouble on between the Canadian and American
Governments about saving the Behring Sea seals and putting a stop to
the fishery altogether. Ef I agree to take this vessel around, I'll
take you along with me and I'll see that you are paid seaman's wages.
You won't have a hard time, and you'll find one of these sealers make
a fine able craft for rough voyaging. They'll make better shape of a
Horn passage than that ugly barge we jest came around in, and the
trip'll do ye good. When we git 'round to Halifax then we'll discuss
the future. Ye kin either go home or come into the Bank fishing game
with me. We'll see. Naow, Donald, here's a couple o' dollars. Skip off
an' see the sights. Don't say anything to the other lads and stand-by
for a hail from me later." "What about the captain?" asked Donald
anxiously, "will he do something to me now?"

"He won't harm you," replied the other smiling. "He's pickled that
liver of his until it's like a sponge. He may never take the
_Kelvinhaugh_ to sea again." He rose, paid the bill, and left Donald
on the street, much astonished, perplexed, and speculating on the tale
he had listened to.

And Judson Nickerson? he thought. Could he trust him? The young Nova
Scotian was a peculiar fellow. A hard master--a driver--and quick with
his feet and hands--a regular sailor banger! Donald thought of the way
in which Nickerson kept him skipping around on the _Kelvinhaugh_; his
bitter, oath-besprinkled commands, and his callous remarks in lieu of
praise for strenuous accomplishments. And yet Nickerson had been his
best friend. He had saved his life when he fell from the jigger-gaff;
saved him from Hinkel's studied hazing, and had secured him warm
clothes when he was perishing with cold off the Horn. He had done him
many kindnesses, but he had awed Donald with his shipboard severity.
He called to mind the time he had sent him aloft to reeve a signal
halliard through the main-truck ... but that was to test him. It could
not be called bullying. Nickerson was a hard officer, but he had never
hit any of the boys, though he horsed them around. Yes! he felt he
could trust Nickerson. He was a capable, aggressive sort of fellow,
but under his stern manner he had a kind heart, and his piercing grey
eyes looked honest, and he was undoubtedly gentle at times. And he had
known his father! Was he doing these favors for Donald as a return for
something his father had done for him?

And his Uncle David! Why should he want to get rid of him? What had he
done, or in what manner did he stand in the way of his uncle's unknown
objective? He racked his brain to solve this problem, but reached no
satisfactory conclusion. He believed Nickerson's story, and a review
of his voyage on the _Kelvinhaugh_ recalled many incidents in which
his life hung by a thread. If it had not been for Nickerson he would
never have seen the land again ... no doubt of that. He had been sent
to sea to be made away with, and he shivered at the thought of his
many narrow escapes from death.

The _Kelvinhaugh_ had discharged her cargo of rails and hauled over to
Hastings Mills to load lumber for Australia. Moore had received his
remittance and had gone, and nobody mourned him. He came aboard and
packed his dunnage with Thompson, Jenkins and McKenzie looking on.
"Why don't you give that gear to some of us?" Thompson had remarked,
but Moore replied, "I want to take it home with me."

"Aye," sneered the other, "you'll go home in your brass-bound rags and
cut a dash blowing about your passage around Cape Stiff. Believe me,
you cub, you've nothing to blow about! You want to tell your girl what
a ruddy sojer you were, and tell her that I was going to boot you off
a yard one time for having no guts. Aye! you ain't worth
carrying--even as ballast--and the sooner you get to your pa's beer
factory the better for you. You can help him stick the labels on the
bottles--that's your trick, young fellow-my-lad!" And with the other
three lads jeering at him over the rail, he slinked off in a hack to
catch the C.P.R. transcontinental train for Montreal.

Thompson was looking for a passage to England in a Blue Funnel liner,
and planned to ship in one 'fore-the-mast. Jenkins did not know what
to do. He didn't want to sail again in the barque, but he thought he
would hang on to her for board and lodging and skip out just before
she sailed. Donald was non-committal and said nothing about his future
intentions.

They had some pleasant times in Vancouver, and in company with four
other apprentices from an English ship, also loading at the Mills,
they toured the beauty spots of the vicinity. Sundays, they spent at
English Bay--bathing and picnicing, or drove to New Westminster and
Steveston on the Fraser River and looked over the numerous salmon
canneries established there. One time they made up an excursion to
Capilano Canyon; other events were boat sails up to Port Moody or up
the North Arm of Burrard Inlet. The towering mountains had a strange
fascination for Donald, and he loved to watch their lofty crests
reflect the colors of the westering sun or enhalo themselves with
wispy vapors when the clouds hung low. He set out one day to scale the
"Sleeping Lions" which guard Vancouver's bay, but a few yards plunging
among the muskeg, rocks, and huge fallen trunks of trees, made him
give up the attempt.

One of the foremen at the Mill kept an "open house" for
'prentice-boys, and Donald often went up with other lads and played
the old piano. It seemed strange to him to be fingering the keys
again, and it took some time to get his stiffened fingers limbered up.
As a piano player, McKenzie was very much in demand, and "sing-songs"
at the genial Mr. Harrigan's bungalow became almost nightly events.
Another artistic accomplishment was renewed when he made sketches of
Vancouver scenery and mailed them to his mother. He did not feel like
sketching while at sea, but during the placid hours of port life, the
mood returned, and with pencil and crayons, he limned the sights
around while Thompson and Jenkins admiringly looked on. "If I could
draw like that, nipper," remarked the former, "I'd be cussed if I'd
ever go to sea. I'd sooner squat on Jamaica Bridge and make chalk
pictures of herrings, and mountains, and fruit, on the paving-stones
for pennies. Hanged if I wouldn't!"

A month passed very pleasantly, when he got a message from Captain
Nickerson, and in company with the Nova Scotian he dropped into the
Chinese cafe.

"Naow, son," said Nickerson, when they were seated with coffee before
them, "I'm all fixed up. I'm agoin' to take a ninety-five ton sealing
schooner called the _Helen Starbuck_, around to Halifax soon's I git a
crew of four or five able hands. Naow, tell me, Donny-boy, d'ye s'pose
young Thompson 'ud like to go along with me? And young Jenkins? I'd
gladly give them a lift out o' that big barge ef they'd care to ship.
D'ye think they would?" Donald felt pretty sure that both would go if
they got the chance.

"Good!" replied the other. "We'll sound 'em later to-night. I s'pose
you can get 'em some time this evening? Right! Naow, I've thought up a
dodge for your uncle's benefit. You go on that lumber wharf to-morrow
night and pretend you're goin' fishin'. Lay your brass-bound coat on
the wharf, an' git a big rock, or anything that'll sink, and you jest
give a yell for help an' heave it in. Chuck yer cap in afterwards, an'
sling your hook from th' wharf as hard as you can pelt. I'll wait for
you at the head of the dock in a quiet spot an' we'll slip away. As
for your clothes, Thompson kin bring them away with him ef he comes
with us."

Donald opened his eyes in wonder. "What is the object of pretending
I'm drowned off the wharf?"

The other smiled knowingly. "Two objects! First--it will prevent old
Muirhead from notifying the police that you have deserted.
Second--he'll inform your uncle of your death, and then you'll see
what the game is. Write and tell your mother what you are doing and
she can keep an eye on things over there. Naow, skip along an' find
Thompson an' Jenkins!"

Two days later, Nickerson and the three apprentices sailed on the
night boat for Victoria. All were dressed in cheap store clothes and
looked like laborers or fishermen, and in Thompson's sea-chest and
dunnage bag reposed the best parts of Jenkins' and McKenzie's kit.
Thompson had left the ship openly and with a clear discharge from the
captain, on the plea that he was going to join a steamer in Victoria.
Jenkins had skipped out "between two days," and his name and
description was on the police blotter of Vancouver as a runaway
apprentice, who, when apprehended, was to be kept in confinement until
such time as the barque was ready for sea. McKenzie, alas! had fallen
off the wharf while fishing and was drowned, and Captain Muirhead
tersely reported the matter to D. McKenzie, Esq., Bothwell St.,
Glasgow, without any elaborate explanations. _Mr. McKenzie, no doubt,
would consider that the job was satisfactorily accomplished._

Next morning early, they stepped off the steamer at Victoria and hired
a boatman to put them aboard of a trim, black, copper-bottomed, two
topmast schooner lying in company with a small fleet in the Inner
Harbor. Nickerson said that they were all ready to sail, and the
quartette tumbled aboard the little vessel.

"Naow, boys," said the Nova Scotian, "Thompson'll live aft with me and
act as mate. Donald an' Jenkins here'll live for'ard in the fo'c'sle.
It's nice an' comfortable compared with the _Kelvinhaugh_. There's two
other hands an' the cook aboard an' daown havin' breakfast, I
cal'late, so we ain't noways short-handed. We'll hev a bite to eat,
an' then we'll git under way!"

Donald and Jenkins clambered down the fo'c'sle ladder and found three
men eating at the triangular table fixed between the fore-mast and the
pawl-post. They looked up when the boys jumped down, and one of them
rose to his feet with a shout.

"Donal'!"

It was McKenzie's school-boy chum--"Joak" McGlashan!




CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


"Hae some o' these beans, Donal'!" urged Joak, piling his old chum's
plate, "they're good an' fillin' an' I cooked them masel' Boston
fashion. Jist tae think we sh'd meet like this! (Here's some broon
bread.) It's simply astonishin'! (There's new-made dough-nuts.) Ah,
canny get over it! (There's apple pie an' coffee--help yersel'.)
Wonders'll never cease!"

Donald hadn't gotten over his surprise, and with a mouth full of the
food which his chum was pressing upon him, he stared at McGlashan--a
big strapping lad of eighteen, with a cook's white apron around his
waist. "How did you get out here, Joak?" he asked eventually.

"I came oot as a cook's helper in a C.P.R. boat--a new ship what was
built on the Clyde," explained Joak. "Then I went cookin' on tugs
towin' logs, and I made a trip to the coast o' Japan an' th' Behring
Sea on yin o' they sealers. I'm anxious to get hame noo, so I took
this job. An' you, Donal', hoo did you come tae hit th' West Coast?"

Captain Nickerson and Thompson dropped down for breakfast. "Sailors
meet old _tillicums_ in all sorts of odd places," remarked the former,
when he heard of McKenzie and McGlashan. "It's not surprising. I met
my brother Asa aboard a barque in Antwerp one time. I was
'fore-the-mast and he was second mate, and I was kinder slow gettin'
along to man the windlass and he hustled me. When I looked around, it
was brother Asa. 'Where'n hell did you spring from, Jud?' he says. I
told him I had just shipped so's to git home. 'Waal,' says he, 'I'm
headin' for home also, but don't you forget I'm second mate o' this
hooker. So slide along an' put some beef on them windlass brakes or
I'll make you wish you'd never seen me!'" He chuckled over the
recollection.

While eating breakfast, Donald had a chance to size up the _Helen
Starbuck's_ company. In addition to McGlashan, who had shipped as
cook, there were two able Scandinavians--Axel Hansen and Einar
Olsen--quiet young fellows about thirty years of age with the heavy
build of their breed--good muscle and beef for a tussle with wind and
canvas. With six hands and the Captain, the _Helen Starbuck_ was well
manned.

Jenkins had some fear of Nickerson, and the latter perceived it.
"Don't look as ef I was goin' to eat you, boy," he said with a laugh.
"I'm no bucko! I cal'late you're thinkin' o' th' _Kelvinhaugh_, eh?
Waal, son, I had to be a taut hand there. She was short-handed and a
lime-juicer. The hands were a scrap lot, and ef I didn't run them an'
keep them up to the mark, they'd have run me. I had to drive the crew
to drive the ship. Slack-up with those scum, and they'd lay-back an'
take it easy. A little touch of down-east fashion is great med'cine
for putting ginger into a hard-bitten crowd an' keepin' 'em spry. But
we don't need that here. It sh'd be a reg'lar yachtin' trip ef we all
pull together." And he smiled in a manner which reassured the anxious
"Chubby."

Breakfast over, they tumbled up on deck and hoisted the big mainsail.
It was quite a heavy pull, but they all tallied on to a halliard at a
time and got peak and throat up by stages. "Naow, boys," said the
skipper. "You square-rig men'll have to get on to fore'n aft sail. The
mains'l is h'isted by peak an' throat halliards as far as they'll go,
then ye'll take up the slack an' sweat up by these two jig-tackles
which are made fast to the other end of the halliards. The throat-jig
and the peak-jig are on opposite sides the deck and are made fast by
the rigging. There's jigs on the fores'l and on the forestays'l and
sometimes on the jib. This schooner carries mains'l, fores'l,
forestays'l or jumbo, as we sometimes call it, and jib. These are
known as the four lowers. Then for light sails, we carry a main and
fore-gaff-tops'l, and a stays'l which sets between the masts. On the
fore, we kin set a balloon jib, an' for running in a long steady
breeze like the Trades, we have a square-sail setting on a yard which
we kin h'ist up the forem'st. Naow, ye have it all. Ship yer windlass
brakes an' heave short the anchor!"

With a pleasant westerly breeze they got outside of Victoria harbor
under four lowers and into the Straits of San Juan de Fuca. Here they
set the watches for the voyage--Captain Nickerson, Axel Hansen and
Donald in the starboard; Jack Thompson, Einar Olsen and Chubby Jenkins
in the port. McGlashan, as cook, stood no watch, but was expected to
give a hand whenever called upon.

The _Helen Starbuck_ was a Nova Scotia built, clipper-bowed schooner
of 95 tons and about 100 feet overall by 23 feet beam. She was
originally built for the Grand Bank fisheries, and was of the model
known as "tooth-pick"--so-called from her clipper bow and long pole
bowsprit. With a hardwood hull, plentifully strengthened by hanging
knees between deck-beams and ribs, and fine lines with a deep skeg
aft, she was of a type of craft which could sail fast and stand the
hardest kind of weather. For sealing, her bottom to the water-line was
sheathed with copper--preventive of marine growths and toredo borings
in tropical waters. The forecastle was located under the main-deck and
ran right up into the bows. The galley was situated in the afterpart
of the fore-castle, and the rest of the apartment was lined, port and
starboard, with two tiers of bunks which ran right up into the peak. A
table was fixed between the fore-mast and the windlass pawl-post, and
lockers ran around the lower-bunks and were used as seats. The after
part of the fo'c'sle was fitted with numerous cupboards and shelves
for the storage of supplies, and in handy proximity to the cooking
range there was a built-in table and a sink.

Under the fo'c'sle floor an iron water-tank capable of carrying 1,200
gallons was fitted, and fresh water could be procured at the sink by
means of a hand-pump. Entrance to this sea-parlor was obtained through
a companion way and a ladder leading down from the deck. Light came
from a small skylight above the galley and by deck-lights.

Amidships, and in what would be the fish hold of a fishing schooner,
there was a room fitted with bunks and known as the steerage. In
sealing, the hunters would berth in this place. Directly aft, the
cabin was located between the main-mast and the wheel. It was a small
apartment containing four double bunks--two on each side--with lockers
all around. A table took up the forward bulk-head, and a small heating
stove stood in the centre of the apartment. Upon the bulk-head for'ard
hung a clock and a barometer, and a small shelf contained books of
Sailing Directions, Coast Pilots and other nautical literature. As the
cabin floor was only four feet below the main-deck, full head-room was
given by means of a cabin trunk or house which rose about two and a
half feet above the deck. A companion on the after-part of the house
gave entrance into the cabin.

The wheel was of iron and operated a patent screw-gear which turned
the rudder post. The compass was in a wooden binnacle placed on the
starboard side of the cabin roof, where it could be readily seen by
the steersman who usually steered on the starboard side of the wheel.
The schooner steered like a yacht, and a spoke or two of the wheel
swung her either way almost instantly.

The mainsail was a big stretch of canvas and carried a main-boom
sixty-five feet long. The main-mast was eighty feet from deck to
mast-head, and the topmast thrust itself another forty feet higher.
The fore-mast with topmast was some ten feet shorter, and the foresail
was a long narrow sail with a 25-foot boom. Amidships, the schooner
carried two carver-built boats, lashed bottom-up to deck ring-bolts,
the other boats usually carried by a sealer having been disposed of.

This then briefly describes the little craft which these seven
adventurers planned to sail down and up the combined length of two
oceans--from the North Pacific to the North Atlantic--a run of from
thirteen to fourteen thousand miles. "I'm out to do it in less than a
hundred days," said Captain Nickerson grimly, "an' barring accidents,
we'll do it!"

They worked down the Straits of San Juan de Fuca in the teeth of a
light westerly, and Donald was charmed at the manner in which the
schooner sailed and tacked. "Not like the _Kelvinhaugh_, sir," he
remarked to the skipper. "And how easy she steers! A touch of the
spokes swings her." "You're right there, son," said the other. "Let me
tell you that you're aboard one of the finest kind o' craft whittled
out o' wood. You're not in a steel barge this time. This packet will
lay up to less'n four points of the wind an' sail; the _Kelvinhaugh_
would never steer closer'n seven. And when we strike some weather and
wind you'll find a difference too. No sloshing decks on this hooker
onless she trips up."

When Cape Flattery blinked a fare-well to them that night, Captain
Nickerson set the course for a Great Circle swing to Cape Horn. "I'm
goin' to shoot her right daown and I reckon we won't haul up anywhere
this side of Cape Stiff," he remarked to Donald and Thompson that
evening. "Are you going to try the Straits of Magellan, sir?" asked
Donald. The skipper shook his head. "I have thought it over, but as
I've never been through them, and seein' as it's a reg'lar hell-hole
of narrow channels an' currents an' chock-full o' willy-waws an'
squalls, I cal'late we're safer in open water. We'll run _Helen_
around the Horn an' we'll stop in at Monte Video for fresh meat, water
and a run ashore. Naow, boys, we'll hang out the patch an' let her
go!" And with the balloon-jib and stays'l hoisted and sheets aft, the
_Helen Starbuck_ swung away on the old deep-waterman's track for the
Line and Cape Horn.

They took their departure from Cape Flattery, and Donald streamed the
patent taff-rail log. The schooner was snoring ahead to a brisk
westerly, and rising and falling gently over a long rolling sea with
but a slight heel to port. Axel Hansen had the wheel and Donald stood
by the windlass for'ard keeping a look-out and giving an occasional
glance at the side-lights in the fore-rigging. The night was spangled
with stars and the bow-wave sang a low grumbling note which was
conducive to sleep, but McKenzie had been too well trained aboard the
_Kelvinhaugh_ to nod on watch, so he leaned over a windlass bitt and
held communion with his thoughts.

He was genuinely happy now, and something of real appreciation and
love for the sea was beginning to awaken in his heart. In the
_Kelvinhaugh_ he never got a chance to become enamoured of sea-faring.
His first hour aboard that ship in the Glasgow dock was the beginning
of the disillusionment which finished at Royal Roads. The bullying,
rough treatment, hard work and poor food on the barque had stifled the
romantic spirit which had sent him aroving, but on this schooner, with
good fare, warm comfortable quarters and chummy ship-mates, everything
was different. Captain Nickerson--whom he had regarded with feelings
akin to terror on the barque--seemed to have changed utterly. No
longer did the Nova Scotian rip out strident commands punctuated with
bitter oaths, nor did he maintain the Olympian aloofness of other
days. The chummy, even-tempered, good-humored Canadian in command of
the _Helen Starbuck_ seemed to have no connection with the truculent,
swearing, heavy-handed "bucko" mate of the lumbering _Kelvinhaugh_.

It was a grateful change all 'round. The bitterness and misery of
other days was but a reflection of the nature of the _Kelvinhaugh's_
owner. David McKenzie's harsh and vindictive soul was re-incarnated in
his ship. She, like him, was ugly in form and character; her crew were
the sweepings of the port--ill-fed, over-worked and driven like dogs
to do the work which was required of them; her master was a "wrong
'un"--a tool of the owner and half-incompetent. Hinkel--another
incompetent and another "wrong 'un"--helped to complete the sordid
combination into which young McKenzie was thrust ... to be "polished
off." What was his uncle's object?

Donald did not know a great deal about his Uncle David. His father had
seldom mentioned his name, and his mother knew nothing of her
husband's brother save what little that Alec had told her, and her
impressions from two interviews--both unpleasant. He did know that
David McKenzie was a rich man and had interests in many ships. He knew
also that he had married late in life and that he had one child.
(Donald wondered if his manner to his wife and child was as coarse and
as cruel as his treatment of Alec's wife and boy.)

Thinking of his relative led him to his father's uncle, Sir Alastair
McKenzie. Was he involved in this peculiar business? Was there any way
in which Donald might interfere with a succession to the McKenzie
title and estate? He pondered over this conjecture, but was forced to
dismiss it as improbable. Sir Alastair had a son, and the McKenzie
heritage was nothing to covet. The estate was mortgaged to the hilt
and Sir Alastair was nothing more than a plain Scotch farmer. If Sir
Alastair and his son died, the title would go to David McKenzie.
Therefore, Donald reasoned, this motive must be eliminated. It was a
mystifying business, and the ship-owner's desire to get rid of his
nephew must be put down to sheer hatred or to a motive unknown.

"I'm away clear of the beast now, so why should I worry my head about
him?" said the boy to himself. "I'll make this trip with Nickerson and
follow his fortunes in Nova Scotia, and as soon as I get money enough
I'll send for mother and bring her to Canada." He squinted around at
the side-lights, and seeing nothing in the shape of a vessel ahead,
went aft to relieve Hansen at the wheel.

With no untoward incident to mar their passage, the _Helen Starbuck_
romped down the parallels and swung into "the heel of the North East
Trade." Boomed out, and with square fores'l set, the schooner made
brave sailing in the grip of the steady Trade wind and the patent log
recorded twelve knot speeds hour after hour. These were glorious days
under azure skies flecked only by the fleecy Trade clouds and
brilliant with warm sunshine, and steering the able schooner in such
weather was a period of rare delight to a lover of the sea and sail.
Under the drive of the unvarying breeze, the deep blue of the sea
rolled to the horizons in regular corrugations--their crests a broil
of foam which flashed in the sun. Running before the wind, the _Helen
Starbuck_ stormed over the watery undulations with a roaring welter of
foam under her sharp fore-foot, and the wake of her passage seethed
like champagne and streamed astern--a path of foam-lacings defined for
miles in which the log-rotator spun up the knots and the gulls dived
for illusive food.

Lazy days, truly! When the crew, bare-footed and clad only in shirt
and trousers, steered or worked in the sun. When the Skipper,
similarly attired, smoked and paced the quarter, hour after hour, or
lounged on the cabin house reading old papers and magazines--breaking
off only to take morning and afternoon sights for longitude, with
Thompson or Donald jotting down the chronometer time, and the noon
observation for latitude. On clear nights, he invariably amused
himself taking star sights and working them up. Navigation was a hobby
with Nickerson, and during the run down the Trades, he initiated
Donald into its mysteries until he was able to work out the ship's
position accurately. Many a night the skipper would stop in his deck
pacing and say to McKenzie, "Skip below, son, an' bring up my sextant.
We'll take a star." And when the workings of the celestial
triangulation were explained, he would hand the sextant over to Donald
and ask him to take a sight and work it out alone. These diversions,
with a trick at the wheel, a spell on look-out, and some scraping,
painting and "sailorizing" during the day, helped to make the watches
pass pleasantly.

There was no loafing on the _Helen Starbuck_. Loafing breeds
discontent, and Nickerson found enough work to keep the hands busy
apart from steering and sail-trimming. The vessel was painted from
stem to stern, inside and out, and when nothing more in the painting
line appeared to be done, the Skipper had all the bitts, sky-lights,
companions, fife-rails and ladders--previously painted--scraped,
sand-and-canvased, and varnished. Every scrap of brass-work on the
schooner was polished bright; anchors and cable chipped and painted,
and then a complete overhaul of the rigging was started.

Though Donald had picked up a good deal of sailorizing aboard the
_Kelvinhaugh_, yet it was on the _Helen Starbuck_ where he really
completed his knowledge of knotting and splicing, worming, parcelling
and serving. On the barque, iron turn-screws took the place of the
lanyards and dead-eyes which the schooner used to set up her rigging;
iron rods were seized to the shrouds in place of rope rattlins, and
wire rope and iron blocks were used wherever possible. On the _Helen
Starbuck_, with the exception of the stays and shrouds, it was honest
hemp and manilla--grand stuff for a sailor's hands, and under the
tutelage of the Norwegian seamen, Donald learnt all the fine points of
"marline-spike seamanship," in setting up rigging, stropping blocks,
hitching and seizing rattlins, turning in dead-eyes, making
chafing-mats and sennet, and the hundred and one accomplishments of
fingers, fid, marline-spike, and serving mallet. Sailorizing was fine
work for a "Trade" day when one could sit in the sun "passing the
ball" in a serving job, or sit, perched aloft, seizing new rattlins,
or overhauling some of the gear in the cross-trees. Engaged in such
pleasant tasks, Donald would feel a returning wave of the romantic
sea-fever which had caused him to choose a sailor's life. Under the
better auspices of his present existence, he began to love his chosen
profession, but it was only on this small schooner that he really
understood and appreciated the lure of the sea and sail. Sea-faring on
the _Kelvinhaugh_ had been a nightmare.

Young McKenzie's eight months from home had worked a wonderful change
in him, both mentally and physically. The hard grind on the
_Kelvinhaugh_ had toughened his muscles and steadied his nerves, while
the discipline had mentally improved him by making him a "do-er"
rather than a "dreamer." With the contented mind, better food and
better quarters on the schooner, he had put on flesh and filled out.
There was a healthy tan in his cheeks, and his dark brown eyes
sparkled with vitality and keen intelligence. The Skipper noticed the
change and remarked: "By Godfrey, son, you're starting to beef up!
Your mammy'll never know you now for the skinny, pasty-faced kid that
left her apron strings in auld 'Glesca' a while ago. Well, boy, ye're
getting stout and strong--see'n don't lose it by drinkin' an' muckin'
about in shore dives, for many a good sailor has bin dumped to the
fish rotten with drink and the diseases of vice." He paused and gave
Donald a keen glance. "Are you religious, son?"

The boy returned his gaze. "I'm not a crank on it, sir, but I read my
Bible on Sundays and say my prayers at night," he replied.

The Captain nodded. "Good," he said. "Carry on with that an' you won't
go wrong. It's when a lad gets adrift from his mother's teachings and
kinder loose about religion that he trips up. Of course, there are
times when a man can't be too much of a devil-dodger or a Holy
Joe--such as when you have to drive a deep-laden ship with a poor,
spineless bunch o' hands an' feet. They won't do anything by preachin'
to 'em or askin' 'em politely. No, siree! You have to bang 'em some
an' haze 'em and curse 'em to get the work done. That's what I had to
do on the _Kelvinhaugh_, but don't imagine that I'm a heathen or
anything like that. I was well brought up, and read my Bible and went
to church and all that, and I still believe in God and the Ten
Commandments, though I don't put much stock on the rest of the frills.
Religion for a sailor should be simple and free from the gadgets of
ritual and all that sort of truck. And this hell-fire bunk! Who
believes that? Aye, as sailors say--'To work hard, live hard, die hard
an' go to hell after all would be hard indeed!'"

Nickerson often talked in this strain--especially in the quiet night
watches, and as this calmer side of the young Nova Scotian's character
revealed itself, Donald began to regard the man with affection mixed
with admiration for his capable two-fisted manhood and iron nerve.
Judson Nickerson was the type of Nova Scotian who built ships and
sailed them: whose seamanship was renowned among sailormen the world
over, and whose ships were to be found all over the seven seas in the
palmy days of wooden hulls--the days of "wooden ships and iron men."

He regaled Donald with tales of the Grand Bank fishermen: their
seamanship: their wonderful schooners, and the freedom and camaraderie
of their life. "And these fellows make money, too," he explained.
"Skipper of a Bank schooner can make a sight more money in a year than
most of your brass-bound liner masters. And they live well--best o'
grub and the best o' cooks. None of yer hard biscuit, bull-meat an'
salt junk aboard those hookers. All of them have comfortable homes
ashore with a bit of land which they farm a little ... snug an'
comfortable. I know the game on the Banks, son, for I first went
seafaring on a fisherman and put in three years at the life off and
on, and believe me, when we reach home this time I'm agoin' back to
it. No more of this knockin' about the world for me, shovin'
lime-juice windjammers south an' north-about. I've had my spell at it,
and now I'm goin' home to God's country. And, son, ef you're wise,
you'll keep under my lee and get in on my game!"

Fishing for cod on the Grand Banks of the North Atlantic did not
appeal much to Donald. To him, it seemed a poor life, and he had the
notion that fishermen were wretched creatures who lived in a state of
semi-poverty and who toiled, year in and year out, barely making a
living. Fishing seemed a messy business--an uncouth trade among
uncouth men. With his ideals and education, how was he going to fit
into that life? Captain Nickerson's anecdotes of the Nova Scotia
fishermen failed to awaken in him a fair idea of their type, their
work, and their industry. He listened to the yarns, however, and
endeavoured to appreciate them in proper perspective, but when one is
absolutely ignorant of fishing and unacquainted with colonial life, a
lack of understanding can be forgiven. Donald often wondered why
Nickerson--splendid seaman and skilled navigator and holding a
Liverpool certificate of competency as master foreign--should be
anxious to return to the existence and labor of a deep-sea fisherman.
A man of Nickerson's ability would, in time, rise to command a liner.
He was well educated, though in his conversation he slipped into
vernacular and ungrammatical phrases, and he had studied and delved
deep into the profound sciences of nautical astronomy, oceanography
and the errors and attractions of the compass. The man had read a
great deal of thoughtful literature, and surprised Donald on numerous
occasions with his intimate acquaintance of such subjects as political
economics, histories of ancient civilizations, shipbuilding, sea trade
and sea power in vogue in many countries. Truly, he was a strange
character, and Judson Nickerson, mate of the _Kelvinhaugh_ and Captain
Nickerson of the _Helen Starbuck_ seemed to be a typical Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde of the sea.

He talked a great deal with young McKenzie--possibly because the
youngster was better read and more thoughtful than the others of the
_Starbuck's_ company, and one night, when Donald was on the look-out,
he sat on the cable-box and told how he had met the boy's father.

"Ye know, son, I didn't know you were Alec McKenzie's boy until that
night after you rove the main truck flag halliard when you told me
your story. I told you a while back that I knew your dad, and that he
did me a good turn. He was skipper of the _Ansonia_ at the time, and I
came out to New York in her as quartermaster. I got ashore in the Big
Burg and went out on a drunk, and returned to the ship just before
sailing day with only what I stood up in--having sold my shore-clothes
and overcoat for rum. When I got aboard there was a letter awaiting me
from my father saying that mother was very ill and for me to come home
at once. I hadn't a cent, but when I went to the skipper--your
father--and told him the circumstances, he gave me a hell of a raking
over and loaned me fifty dollars to get home.... I'm ashamed to admit,
Donald, that I never paid it back. I was pretty wild in those days....
I always intended to pay him the money, but I never had it. Fifty
dollars was a mate's monthly wages in those days an' not easily
picked up. However, I'll square it up with you when we get to Halifax,
for it's always bin on my mind. It was darn decent of him to do what
he did for a blame' quarter-master, but Alec McKenzie was famous for
his open-handedness. So that's how I came to be under obligations to
your daddy." He chatted for a little while and went aft--leaving
Donald with yet another incident of the strange manner in which
sailormen from the ends of the earth get acquainted with each other.

The North-east Trades flickered out in fitful breezes and
thunderstorms, and they ran out of the pleasant "flying-fish weather"
into the calms and the cats-paws of the "Doldrums." In the light airs
the _Helen Starbuck_ seemed to ghost along as though she had an engine
in her, and Captain Nickerson saw to it that all sail was trimmed to
take advantage of every puff. They sighted several square-riggers
lying becalmed and Thompson chuckled when he saw them swinging their
yards to the flickering zephyrs. "Look at that pound an' pint limey
off to starb'd," he would say. "Aren't you thankful you're not aboard
that blighter now? There's a puff! It'll be 'Lee-fore-brace, you
hounds!' There they go wind-milling. Jupiter! who would want to go to
sea in one of them after being in a fore-and-after like this?"

One morning they drifted close to a big full-rigged ship with painted
ports, bound south. She was the _Phalerope_ of Liverpool from San
Francisco with grain to Falmouth for orders, and her master hailed the
schooner.

"What ship? Where bound?"

"_Helen Starbuck_--Victoria to Halifax, Nova Scotia!" bawled Captain
Nickerson.

"Come aboard an' have a yarn, captain!" came the invitation.

Nickerson grinned. "Sorry--can't stop!" he hailed. "I'll report you in
Monte Video. So long!"

They glided past the towering ship, and Thompson yelled to the men
peering over the for'ard rail. "What's the matter--anchor down?"

"G'wan you sliver!" returned a voice. "'Ow did you git aht 'ere? Wos
you blowed off?"

"Run along you an' get your weather braces off the pins!" shouted the
_Starbuck's_. "You're due for another slew around if your mate's
awake!"

They had no sooner shouted this jeering advice before a bellow from
the ship's poop echoed along her decks. "Round in your weather
braces!" At which the schooner's crew laughed noisily. The _Helen
Starbuck_ glided ahead with Donald jocularly coiling up the main-sheet
and heaving it over the taff-rail--suggestive of a tow.

From the blistering heat of the Line they slid into the "Variables"
and picked up the dying breath of the Southeast Trade winds. For two
days they trimmed sheets to the ever-increasing puffs--each watch
betting with the other as to who would have the log spinning for at
least an hour of steady going--and it was "Lucky" McKenzie who picked
the wind up and won the tobacco. It came after a heavy rain-storm in
the middle-watch, and he was standing naked at the wheel enjoying a
wash and a cooling-off at the same time. When the rain died away the
sails flapped to a cool southerly breeze. The skipper was below, but
when he heard Donald singing out to Hansen to "sheet in jib and
fores'l" he came up on deck and assisted in bringing the main boom
aboard. Light at first, the breeze stiffened until the schooner was
snoring along with a flash of hissing foam streaming aft, and Donald
was shivering at the wheel. "That's right, son," said the captain,
jocularly. "You jest coax her along as you are. Anytime we want to
raise wind you'll shed your duds." And for an hour he kept Donald
steering in his nakedness.

With the steady Trade shoving them along on the starboard tack they
crossed the latitude of 25° south, and one morning at dawn Donald came
on deck to find the skipper gazing through his binoculars at a black
spot abreast of the rising sun-glow. "What is that, sir? A ship?"

The captain handed the glasses over. "That's Easter Island, son! Have
a squint, for it's the last land you'll see between here an' Cape
Horn!"




CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


Joak McGlashan's troubles started when the _Starbuck_ crossed 45°
south. The pleasant zephyrs of the Trades were a memory of the past;
the gentle undulations of the fine weather latitudes which hove the
schooner gently along their swelling bosoms gave place to long
rollers, which had the vessel sliding down their declivities and
almost standing on her bowsprit, and then climbing up a watery hill
with her long toothpick looking for the Southern Cross.

Joak had to work around his stove during this ocean fandango; he had
to cook and prepare meals with his galley floor sliding and sloping
under him at angles which called for gimballed joints and adhesive
feet. When they swung into the "Roaring Forties" the skipper had given
Joak a warning of what was to come. "Mouse your pots an' kettles,
cook, the _Starbuck's_ bound to the east'ard!" he said with a grin.
"See all yer cut glass an' silver well stowed, chocked up, tommed off,
an' shored, for she'll do some queer prancing from now on!"

"Aye, captain," returned Joak ruefully. "She's beginnin' tae jump
aboot, but let me tell ye, ef ye want guid bread ye'll hae tae rin her
steadier fur I canna get ma dough tae rise wi' th' shup jugglin' about
like a jumpin'-jack!" And with this dire remark he grabbed at a
sliding pot and chocked it off on top of the stove with a rolling
rod.

The fiddles were shipped on the fo'c'sle table, and a minimum of
dishes were placed upon it at a time. The men ate with their mugs of
tea or coffee in their hands, and with a protective arm around their
plates, for _Helen_ was beginning to dance. On deck, everything was
double-lashed for heavy weather; the foretopmast had been sent down,
and the balloon jib and foretopsail rolled up and stowed away in the
sail locker. Under winter rig of four lowers the schooner was swinging
into the long rollers of the "Forties" and getting ready for her
"easting."

The cold weather came upon them quickly, and Donald donned his winter
clothes and saw to boots, mittens, socks, and oil-skins. Though it was
supposed to be summer time down south, yet it was bitterly cold and
the only tangible evidence of the season was the long daylight--the
duration of darkness being but four hours, as the sun was south of the
Line. The blue color of the middle-latitude seas had changed to a
chill grey-green, and as they made their southing the wind hauled more
westerly and blew hard with a vigor and intensity which reminded
Donald of other days in this part of the world. At times they glimpsed
on the far horizon great islands of dazzling white--outriders of the
Antarctic ice, lofty, immense in area, and dangerous in calms and
thick weather.

With the single-reefed mainsail boomed over the quarter, whole
fores'l, jumbo and jib, the _Helen Starbuck_ commenced to show her
heels in the windy latitudes south of fifty. Twelve knots, thirteen
knots, fourteen knots were common hourly readings in the gusts, and
Nickerson would grunt with satisfaction when he picked off noon to
noon runs of three hundred sea miles. Rare travelling, surely! And he
would pace the weather alley glancing at sail and sheet to scent a job
for the watch in jigging-up slack canvas or yanking a boom inboard.
Occasional snow flurries came down the wind and it was bitter on deck
o' nights, but there was always a warm bunk in a warm cabin or
fo'c'sle to turn into; good eatable grub at meal times, and a "mug up"
of hot coffee or a bite of soft bread or pie for a man to warm his
blood with during, or after, a chilly watch.

Then came the day, when, steering east by south, they started to "run
their easting down." They were south of Cape Piller and had got into
the swing of the tremendous sea which sweeps around the world in that
latitude. The western wind blew hard and strong and Nickerson had the
mainsail stowed, the big main boom in the crotch well secured by the
crotch-tackles, chain guys and topping-lift, the jib furled and triced
up on the fore-stay to keep it from freezing on to the bowsprit, and
the jumbo was in the stops.

Under the whole foresail and the squaresail, they were running her
before it--a job for nervy men--and the great rollers of the Southern
Ocean were piling up in vast battalions, crowned with acres of
seething, roaring foam, and almost half a mile from crest to crest. In
these mighty undulations, the _Helen Starbuck_ was storming along with
the wind whistling in her rigging and a bawling welter of white water
sheering away from her sharp bows.

Joak, imprisoned in the fo'c'sle, was endeavouring to cook under
conditions which rendered culinary work a herculean task. It was one
hand for himself and one for the ship, and he hung between sink and
stove doing his best and feeling half sick with the heat of his
battened-down fo'c'sle, and the violent swoops and leaps of the ship.
Aft in the cabin the watch below slept in the spare bunks so as to be
handy for a sudden call. Two men steered, lashed to the wheel-box, and
Nickerson stood, muffled to the eyes, in oil-skins and sea-boots, on
top of the cabin house with an arm thrust through a stop of the furled
mainsail. He was constantly on deck watching ship and sea, looking out
for ice, and, ever and anon, grunting advice to the wheelsmen.
Steering a running ship in such a sea called for vigilance and skill.
Once let her broach-to amid those Cape Horn grey-beards, and she would
be gone--rolled over and smashed into kindling in the twinkling of an
eye.

Up, up, up, the slopes of these frightful hills of brine she would
climb--poise for a moment amidst the roaring white water of the crests
with her keel showing clear to the foremast--and then, with a wild
swoop, her bows would drive down the fore-front of the comber into the
trough with the creaming surge-tops growling, roaring and curling
above and behind her. Many times they piled up astern--walls of
grey-green water full thirty feet above their heads--and when almost
under their toppling crests, the brave little vessel would leap
forward and the giant comber would plunge over and break on each
quarter in a thundering broil of foam which drowned all other sounds.

The two Norwegians and Donald were the only hands who would steer the
schooner running in this sea. Thompson and Jenkins refused to tackle
the wheel, and Nickerson would not insist. Good steersmen are born,
not made, and only men who had an instinctive knowledge of a vessel's
ways, who could forecast what she would do a few seconds after, were
able to twirl the spokes to correct that little swing which might lead
to broaching and disaster. Most seamen can steer a good trick by
compass or by the wind in a moderate breeze, but it takes a
master-helmsman to steer running before a gale and a giant sea. The
Norwegians inherited their steersmanship through centuries of Viking
ancestry; McKenzie, through quick wit, sensitiveness and steady nerve.

The wonderful seaworthiness of the schooner was fully apparent during
that storming to the east'ard. She was as buoyant as a cork and no
heavy water struck her decks. Sprays would slop in over the waist or
over the bows when she over-ran a sea, but the quarters were dry and
never a dollop came over the taff-rail. "Ef ye were in the
_Kelvinhaugh_ naow," remarked the skipper, "I'd hate to think o' what
she'd be doing. I cal'late she'd be pooped in this a dozen times in a
watch and her main deck 'ud be full to the rail with them greybeards
overtaking her."

They wolfed their food in the fo'c'sle, mug and food in hand, and they
had to watch their chance to jump below without bringing an unwelcome
sea down the half-opened hatch. Joak did his best to cook something,
but after many disasters, he confined his efforts to tea and coffee,
biscuits and soup, and the others did not grumble but praised him for
his efforts.

"This ain't nawthin'," remarked the skipper with a grin. "I've seen it
ten times worse'n this daown here. I recollect once bein' two weeks in
the hollow o' one sea an' when we came up on the crest of it we c'd
look daown the chimneys in China, by Godfrey!"

It was dangerous going, and the skipper fully appreciated it. He was
anxious, and when the black squalls of rain and sleet came driving
down upon them, he watched the straining sails and spars with eyes of
concern. It was now that the sailorizing of the Trade latitudes would
be put to the test. A drawn splice, a slip-shod mousing, a stranded
rope or a broken shackle ... and disaster might follow swiftly. He
spent his time between his cabin-roof look-out and the vicinity of the
foremast scanning the over-taxed gear. When the squalls came driving
down, he was doubly concerned.

West of the Ramirez in the grey dawn, the gale stiffened into a wind
which her sail could not stand. A violent gust carried the squaresail
away and it flew down the wind like a snowflake. The schooner was
trembling under the weight of the whole foresail and the mast
threatened to go by the board. Nickerson called all hands, cook as
well, and said: "We've got to reef that fores'l and reef it running as
we can't come to the wind in this sea. Donald will take the wheel, and
the rest of us will tackle the sail." And to Donald he said in words
pregnant with meaning, "Son, you want to steer as you never steered
before. Watch her like a hawk and give her jest th' least little shake
so's we kin git that fores'l daown a bit ... and don't let her lose
way or come up!"

Donald took the spokes and the others went for'ard along the swaying,
sloshing decks. A terrible sea was running and the air was white with
driving sleet, while the wind screamed in the shrouds and plastered
the naked main-mast with wet snow.

The six men for'ard cast off the halliards and four had hold of the
gaff-downhaul. "Shake her a mite, son!" roared Nickerson in the teeth
of the wind. Donald glanced astern at the sea, then eased the wheel
down gently--watching the sail anxiously and murmuring a heartfelt
prayer. The schooner tore along, yawing and plunging, but she started
to come up with the turn of her rudder and Donald met her with
unerring instinct. The vessel swung around in the trough, the sail
commenced to flutter, and the men hauled the gaff down with lurid
deep-water oaths and yells of encouragement. "Swing her off! Swing her
off!" bawled Nickerson, fearfully eyeing a big greybeard which was
racing down on them, but McKenzie had acted ere he sung out.

With the fore-gaff held fast by the down-haul, and the reef cringle on
the leach sweated down to the boom by a tackle, the sail bellied out
like a balloon in the squalls, and as the schooner raced off before
the wind again the six men and boys started to get the tack of the
sail down to the goose-neck of the fore-boom. They tugged and hauled
with numb fingers, but the sail was iron-hard and full and refused to
"light up." "It 'ud take a whole fishing gang o' twenty men to reef
that fores'l naow!" panted the skipper. "We'll hev to shoot her up
again to git that tack-earring passed." He clawed his way aft to the
wheel.

"Ye'll hev to shake her again, son," he shouted. "Be damned careful,
naow, an' don't let her lose way or git tripped up."

Watching his chance, Donald eased the helm down and yelled, "Now!" The
sail flapped and jerked at the restraining sheet and down-haul while
Nickerson and the gang hove down the tack-cringle with tugs and oaths.
The schooner was sidling along in a momentary lull in the squalls with
way upon her, when Donald saw the shadow of a big sea before him. He
flashed a look astern; saw it piling up with a crest of foam, roaring
and seething, and he screamed, "Look out, ahead!" and clawed the helm
up as it thundered over the taff-rail and engulfed him in tons of
chilly brine.

The water tore at his lashing and he hung to the wheel with his arms
thrust through the spokes. While under water he instinctively
shouldered the wheel up a bit to prevent a gybe; there was a roaring
as of Niagara in his ears; red lights danced before his eyes; his
lungs filled to bursting, while his strained muscles pained fearfully.
Then his eyes glimpsed the daylight, and he straightened up off the
wheel-box with a dull pain in his left side, while the gallant little
vessel lifted ahead and rolled the water off her decks over both
rails.

"All right, nipper?" came a voice from for'ard.

"Aye, all right!" he gasped faintly, steadying the schooner in a
violent yaw. Dazed and panting for breath, he stood hanging on to the
spokes and steering by instinct. They had got the fores'l tack tied
down and were tying the reef-points. In a few minutes the sail was
reefed, the down-haul cast off, and the gaff hoisted up again. Then
they trooped aft, clawing their way along the slushy decks.

"Yer face is all over blood!" cried the skipper staring at Donald.
"Did that sea hurt ye?"

The boy wiped the blood away from a wound in his forehead where his
head had struck the handholds of the wheel-spokes. "That's nothing,
sir," he replied. "I, couldn't help letting that sea come aboard ...
it caught us as she was coming to in the trough."

"Of course you couldn't help it," said the other. "You did blame'
fine! You must ha' swung her off an' steadied her while that comber
had you under. From for'ard, there was nawthin' to be seen aft here
but th' main-boom stickin' aout! Waal, she's all right naow. Under
that rag of a fores'l she'll run like a hound. Ain't there th' hell of
a sea runnin' though? A square-rigger 'ud be sloshin' through this
under a fore-lower-tops'l--" He stopped and pointed at the smother
down to starboard. "Look!" he shouted. "There's a poor devil of an
outward-bounder! See him? Hove to!"

The _Starbuck's_ crew stared in the direction indicated and glimpsed
in the lift of the sleet squalls a big grey-painted barque lying under
a mizzen stays'l and a goose-winged lower maintops'l with the lee clew
hauled out. "Poor devils ... beatin' to the west'ard off th' pitch o'
th' Horn ... sooner be on this hooker, captain!" shouted Thompson, and
his remarks seemed strange when one made comparisons between the big
wall-sided barque with her spacious decks and human complement of
twenty-five or thirty men, and the little 95-ton _Helen Starbuck_ and
her seven hands all told. But Thompson was learning that size did not
mean seaworthiness or even comfort, and an able little schooner of
Bank fisherman model was to be preferred to a huge steel box like the
_Kelvinhaugh_ for ocean ranging.

The pain in McKenzie's side was beginning to make him wince when a
kick of the wheel jarred his body, and the skipper noticed it. He came
close to the lad and shouted in order to be heard above the noise of
wind and sea, "Hurt anywhere?"

The boy nodded and grinned stoically. "Think I've bust a 'slat,'
sir!"--using West Coast slang. "Got hove down on wheel ... left
side ... when sea hit her that time." Nickerson shoved back the hatch.
"Olsen! Relieve the wheel!" And when he came up he motioned to Donald
to go down into the cabin.

When McKenzie was divested of his upper clothing, examination revealed
an ugly bruise just below the heart. With Thompson and Chubby holding
the boy from sliding off the locker, the skipper examined the spot,
tenderly feeling the bruise with his fingers. "You sure have, son!" he
murmured. "Two slats are sprung, me son! Waal, can't be helped, but
ye'll do no deck work or steering for a spell, boy. You've done yer
trick, anyway, so we'll doctor ye up without kickin'!" And he first
proceeded to doctor Donald by giving him a stiff dose of salts!

"Ugh!" protested McKenzie after he had swallowed the nauseous dose.
"Is this a sailor's cure-all? If a man breaks a leg or a rib, why
should he be dosed with this muck?"

Nickerson laughed. "It may seem unnecessary, but it ain't, for the
salts will put your system into a condition which will help the bones
to knit. There's good medical logic in that, son!" Dosed, rubbed with
liniment and bandaged, Donald was shored by pillows and rolled up
blankets into a cabin bunk and ordered to remain there for the rest of
the day.

"Durned plucky kid!" remarked the skipper to Thompson.

"Always was," answered the other. "Game to the core! Good stuff in
him! Always plays cricket!" An odd British Public School expression,
the latter. Fulsome praise, truly, from two such men--English and
Canadian master-seamen!

Flying along on the wings of the wind the _Helen Starbuck_ made brave
running of it under the reefed foresail, and when Nickerson managed to
get a noon sight in spite of successive squalls and sliding decks, he
figured out the ship's position and remarked gleefully to Donald,
"She's run ahead of the log, son! We'll haul her up this afternoon.
Cape Stiff'll be in sight off the port bow in a while. She's run sixty
miles in four hours--good travelling! Thought I sighted the Ramirez
rocks at eight this morning ... to th' norrad. Old Man Horn should be
loomin' up from th' riggin' naow ef it's anyways clear inshore." Cape
Horn in sight! The storied Stormy Horn--locale of a thousand epics of
the sea since Schouten and Drake braved its tempestuous corner.
"'Round Cape Horn!" A sailor's boast--conferring a brevet rank on the
man who had gone through the mill off Cape Stiff! Donald's imagination
thrilled at the thought of viewing the wind-and-wave-beaten milestone
at the foot of the world. "I'd like to see it, sir," he pleaded. "Call
me when it is sighted, please!"

Nickerson laughed. "Waal, son, ye're more eager than I am. I wouldn't
care a cuss ef I never saw it. Ef it was old Cape Sable or Nigger Cape
or Sambro or Eastville Heads, naow! Why, I'd jump to the spreaders for
a squint, but Cape Stiff? Ugh!" And he spat disgustedly. He buttoned
up his oilcoat and clambered on deck, and a minute or two later Donald
could hear his voice. "Aye ... to th' norrad ... high peak with
smaller ones. See it? Aye ... alright." The companion hatch was shoved
back and Donald was out of his bunk and pulling on his boots when the
captain came down. "Hell's main hatch is in sight," he cried with a
laugh. "Where they brew the gales and sailor's misery.... Lemme help
ye with yer coat. It ain't rainin' naow an' th' sun's aout. I'll bowse
ye up on th' cabin roof."

About eight miles distant, the Ultima Thule of the South American
continent reared its hoary head--a pinnacle of weather-worn granite,
which, with the lower hills of Horn Island and the land behind, made
the whole appear like a crouching lion facing the west. It stood
clearly defined for a space--blue against the rain and mist behind and
dull red where its northern slopes caught the sun--a monument of
strenuous endeavour; a monolithic memorial to seamen's a courage and
suffering, and the bones of ships and men in the waters below. Around
its splintered base the mighty combers of a world-around wind-hounding
smashed themselves in acres of foam, roaring and hissing in sullen
fury at the implacability of the rock which forever bars their
passage. Tremendous! Inspiring! Irresistible! The storied, stormy
Horn!

A moment later it was blotted out by a snarling snow squall just as
though the God of those seas had rung down the curtain on a sight not
given to every sailor's eyes. Donald was assisted to his bunk again.
He had seen the Horn and his romance-hunger was satisfied.

When Horn Island had swung to the port quarter, Captain Nickerson
called the hands. "We'll gybe that fores'l over naow and make our
northing. Hook the boom-tackle into that fore-boom and ease her over,
and look out in case she ships a sea!" The relieving tackle was
hooked on to ease the fore-sheet when the boom came over, and Hansen
was instructed to put the helm up. The vessel swung to the nor'rad,
the fores'l gave a mighty flap, and with a "whish!" and a "crash!" and
the screech of the tackle-rope whirring through the blocks, the sail
swooped over and brought up on the patent gybing gear with a jarring
shock. "Let 'er go nothe-east by east!" cried the skipper. "We'll run
her through the LeMaire Straits an' dodge this sea. I cal'late the
rips o' the Pacific drift and the Patagonia current ain't agoin' to
bother us much in there ... we'll try it. Can't be worse'n the Bay o'
Fundy 'round Brier Island."

They negotiated the Strait without difficulty--sighting the high
cliffs of Staten Island and Terra del Fuego in their passage through
the treacherous channel, and after leaving the sterile, snow-capped
highlands of Cape San Diego astern, they swung off shore again, and
ran over by the West Falklands and up the South American coast.

Back into warmer climes, they busied themselves overhauling the
schooner's rigging after the strain of the easting run, and on the
morning of a fine summer's day they struck soundings in the muddy
estuary of the River Plate. Under all sail with the wind blowing down
the river, they snored through the muddy water and picked up the
English Bank light-ship. Four hours later, they stood in and dropped
head-sails and anchor in the outer roadstead of Monte Video.

Reporting at the Customs House that they only came in for water, wood
and supplies, they procured these necessities and spent a couple of
days seeing the sights of the beautiful Uruguayan city. Donald sent
off a long letter to his mother telling her of the voyage so far and
his future prospects. Before sunrise one morning, the _Helen Starbuck_
slipped away on the last leg of her long, long trail.

The voyage up the South Atlantic, over the Line, and into the North
Atlantic was practically a repetition of their Pacific passage, and
with much the same daily round of duties. It was not all plain
sailing. They experienced several blows, and some they had to ride
out hove-to under foresail and jumbo. The worst of these was near
home, between La Have and Western Bank, and here, for the first time,
Donald saw numerous Bank fishing schooners lying-to like themselves.

"Son, these are fishermen!" cried Nickerson, pointing to six or eight
vessels riding out the blow around them. "They're hanging on to the
ground until it moderates. Ef they had a full trip below, they'd be
hoofin' it for Boston or Gloucester under all she'd stand. It takes a
breeze o' wind to stop those fellers--they're sail-draggers from
'way-back. You'll see some joker giving her 'main-sheet' for home in a
while."

In a blurry easterly squall of sleet that night, Donald saw one of
them "giving her main-sheet" for home. She stormed out of the
smother--a long, lean schooner under reefed mainsail, whole foresail
and jumbo, and she flew ahead of the _Starbuck_ on the wings of the
wind--riding over the seas like a duck, with the main-boom over the
quarter and well topped up to keep it clear of the wave-crests when
she rolled to loo'ard. There was something inspiring in the manner in
which she raced out of the gloom--a ghostly vessel literally bounding
over the seas. A pile of dories were nested on her deck amidships, and
as she swung past, someone hailed, "Hi-yi! haow's fishin'?"

Nickerson chuckled delightedly. "Naow, there's a hound!" he remarked.
"Swinging off for Boston or Gloucester with a hundred thousand o' cod
and haddock below. Dory-handliner, by the looks o' her. Her gang will
be below playing cards or mugging-up or snoozing, and only two on deck
seeing her home! These fellers are sailors, my son! Winter and summer,
they're sloggin' in and aout, and nawthin' bothers them. I'd sooner be
skipper of that hooker than commander of the _Teutonic_! I'd have more
fun and I'd make more money."

When the _Starbuck_ got under way again under reefed canvas, fishing
schooners passed her bound west under their whole four lowers.
Sometimes two vessels would come driving up out of the snow
squalls--racing for port with sheets flat aft and the lee rail under
in a broil of white water, and a mob of oilskinned men lounging around
the quarters of the respective ships watching the going and betting on
the outcome. Beautiful schooners they were, and Donald could not
believe that such yacht-like craft were employed in the humble
pursuits of fishing.

"There's hundreds of these craft on this coast," remarked Captain
Nickerson, "and they're all fine-lined, able vessels. They're built to
sail fast and they're rigged an' sparred to stand the drag. They draw
a lot of water aft and they carry a pile of iron and stone ballast.
That's why they can sail an' make a passage while we're lying-to. Even
in this able packet, we wouldn't dare to try to sail by the wind like
those jokers in that snifter."

Donald was profoundly impressed and he began to regard casting his lot
with the North American Bank fishermen as something to be desired--a
phase of seafaring with remunerative and romantic attractions, and
when he saw more of them, crossing the southern edge of Western Bank,
the spell of this adventurous, daring, sailorly life began to get a
hold on his imagination, and he made up his mind to give it a trial.
Incidents, related by Nickerson, of the camaraderie among the crews,
their superb seamanship, and the good living aboard their vessels also
influenced his decision to experience these things himself.

On a bright winter's morning when the sea, ruffled by a moderate
westerly breeze, rolled blue under a clear, cloudless sky, to the
horizon, the skipper pointed over the port bow. "Old Nova Scotia's
showin' up naow!" he said with a grin. "Ye'll see the rocks and spruce
in a while, and if it holds like this, we'll drop the killick in
Halifax to-day. We're running in to the shores of God's Country--Nova
Scotia!" He uttered the last sentence with unusual feeling in his
voice.... Judson Nickerson--hard-case blue-waterman, world ranger, and
a perfect seaman--was glad to be nearing home after many years.

The faint haze on the horizon ahead defined itself, as they drew near,
into wooded hills--green with spruce and coniferous trees--and
patched, here and there with snow which gleamed dazzling white in the
sunshine. A depression in the land, over which smoke could be
discerned, marked the City of Halifax, and, ahead of them an Atlantic
liner was standing in for the port.

Captain Nickerson was pacing up and down the quarter, smoking and
talking to the runaway apprentices, and Thompson lounging aft. "You
two chaps"--meaning Thompson and Jenkins--"will have no trouble in
getting a ship for England here. You can either go as a passenger or
ship as quarter-master or 'fore-the-mast. It's only a ten-day jump
across the pond and a mere hoot-in-hell to the fifteen thousand mile
we've traversed in this hooker. There's Chebucto Head to port an'
Devil's Island to starb'd ... we're gettin' inside the harbor naow ...
due north by compass takes her right up." And he chatted and joked
with the boys in buoyant spirits at getting home--a vastly different
Nickerson from the bawling, truculent wind-jammer officer of other
days.

Slipping along in smooth water, they found themselves once more
encompassed by green earth and human habitation, and it was good to
look upon by eyes wearied by countless leagues of restless sea.
Herring Cove, with its fishermen's cottages nestling among the winter
greenery, slipped past to port, and the village looked snug and homey
and "landish" to these world sailors. Thrumcap, Maugher's Beach, and
McNab Island glided by, and they lowered the stays'l for the last time
as they ran through the passage of George Island at the neck of the
harbor. The fair city of Halifax burst upon their vision then--row
upon row of houses rising from the wharves and warehouses of Water
Street to the Citadel Hill, which overlooked the eastern outpost to
the Dominion which the _Helen Starbuck_ had run the length of two
oceans to span from west to east. Victoria to Halifax! A long traverse
truly for a small schooner around the Horn, and when they let the
headsails run and dropped the anchor behind George Island, Captain
Nickerson smacked his fist on the wheel-box and laughed. "Victoria to
Halifax raound Cape Stiff in a hundred an' twenty days! Not too bad
for a little hooker--not too bad! With a little more ballast and a
couple more hands to fist sail in a breeze, we'd ha' done it in a
hundred! But, it was a fair sail ... a fair sail!"

Donald and Thompson pulled the skipper ashore, and loafed for an hour
on Water Street. The paving stones felt hard to their feet after
months of a vessel's decks, and they kept their body muscles
instinctively keyed up to meet the lurch and sway which did not come.
"Looks something like an Old Country town," said Thompson, after they
had strolled around a bit. "Let's get a newspaper an' see what's
happened since we left. Chubby will want to know if there's been
anything doing in soccer."

Captain Nickerson joined them after a while. "We're to leave the
schooner where she is," he said. "The new owners will tow her in to
their own wharf to-morrow. We'll strike our flag and pay off in the
morning."

By the next day afternoon, they had their dunnage out of the _Helen
Starbuck_ and Donald cast a regretful glance at the wonderful little
vessel in which they worked such a long, watery traverse. As he gazed
at her lying quiet and still behind the Island, he thought of those
wild and windy days "running the easting"; of Cape Horn and the
Le-Maire Straits, the wild seas and the scorching calms "down to the
south'ard!" Aye! these were romantic days--days he would never forget,
and as he clambered up on the wharf, he waved an adieu to the anchored
schooner. "Good-bye and good luck!" he murmured. "You're a brave and
gallant little ship--_Helen Starbuck_!"

The little band of adventurers parted company shortly
afterwards--Olsen and Hansen to a boarding house where they would meet
others of their kind, and Chubby and Thompson to try their luck at
getting over to Liverpool by working their way, or as steerage
passengers.

"So-long, nipper!" said Thompson to Donald. "Good luck to you in
future. We'll maybe meet again some day!" Chubby wrung Donald's hand
but said nothing. His heart was too full for words. "So long, Chubby!"
said McKenzie. "Try and make Uncle give you your premium back, but
don't say that I'm alive. So long!"

Joak McGlashan remained with Captain Nickerson and Donald. He would
stay a while and try his hand "cookin' at the fushin'" before going
home, and he, like Donald, would sail in the wake of the redoubtable
Judson Nickerson, and see where that worthy would lead them.




CHAPTER NINETEEN


"Naow, boys," Nickerson was saying, "we'll take the little packet
steamer to-night an' go home to my people's place daown the shore at
Eastville Harbor. It's a little fishing an' boat-building taown, but
it's a pleasant place an' pleasant folks live there. I called the old
mother up on the telephone a while back an' told her I was blowing
home with a couple o' ship-mates and they'll sure give us a welcome!"

"How about getting some decent clothes," ventured Donald, looking
ruefully at his rough sea-duds.

"Clothes be hanged!" ejaculated the skipper. "Get a hair-cut and a
bath--that's more to the point. We're not sticklers for clothes daown
aour way. Buy clothes when you've money to blow--not when you've a
measly twenty dollars in your jeans between you and destitution."

Donald had been paid at the rate of twenty-five dollars a month for
the trip around, and Nickerson had also squared up his indebtedness to
Donald's father. Of the hundred and fifty dollars which he had
received, Donald remitted one hundred and twenty-five to his
mother--telling her to keep it for passage-money when he had prepared
a home in Canada for her to join him. Joak, as cook, drew one hundred
and sixty dollars out of the venture, while Nickerson had a roll of
bills in his pocket as thick around as a cable hawser.

Giving their sea-bags to an expressman to deliver at the boat, the
trio loafed around Halifax until evening, when they boarded a little
wooden steamer with a high superstructure aft and a fore-deck piled
with barrels and boxes of assorted merchandise. A middle-aged man in
shirt sleeves, with a rotund form and round, red, good-humored face
leaned out of the wheel-house window smoking and watching the
deck-hands chocking and lashing the cargo. To this worthy, Captain
Nickerson shouted facetiously.

"Waal, naow, Cap'en Eben, haow's tricks? I see you're still splashin'
araound in ten fathom and in smell of the land!" The other took his
pipe from his mouth and stared curiously at Nickerson. "Ye've got me
guessin', matey," he drawled. "I ain't seen you afore, hev I? An' yet
that face o' your'n seems mighty familiar--"

Nickerson laughed. "Eben Westhaver!" he said, "d'ye recollect th' time
we shipped on that coal drogher an' took sixty days to run from Sydney
to Saint John an' you lost your only pair of pants by gettin' them--"
The listeners had no opportunity of learning how Captain Westhaver
lost his only pair of pants, as he jumped out of the wheel-house with
hand outstretched, shouting, "Young Juddy Nickerson, by the Great Hook
Block! An' where'n Tophet hev you sprung from? H'ard ye was
lime-juicin' ... ain't seen ye raound for nigh four or five year.
Well, well, an' haow be ye, Juddy-boy?" And the two men started a
"gamm" in which Nickerson narrated and Eben listened and interjected
strange "Down-east" ejaculations--"I reckon you did!" "Th' devil ye
say!" "Waal, I swan!" and "D'ye tell me so!"

The boys were lolling over the steamer's rail gazing on the wharf,
when Nickerson called them over and introduced them to Captain
Westhaver. "Come into the wheel-house, my sons," he invited. "Set ye
daown, fill up yer pipes, and make yourselves to home. I reckon ye
ain't had much layin' back of late ... a long v'y'age ye made in that
little hooker ... a long v'y'age!" Then, addressing Nickerson, he
continued. "Not much change in Eastville Harbor sence you left,
Juddy. Fishin's good. Sev'ral noo vessels in the salt Bank fleet, and
they're buildin' a few every year. Your father is kept full o' work at
his yard. The old man's pretty hearty, Jud--don't age any, an' your
mother's spry--purty spry for a woman what had all the sickness she's
had. Guess they'll be glad to see you home an' to know you're home for
good. Goin' to take a shot at the fishin', are ye? Ain't forgot haow
to rig trawls, bait up, an' haul gear in the bow of a dory, hev ye,
Jud? When a man's bin a brass-bound mate in lime-juicers, he's li'ble
to git kinder soft--"

Nickerson snorted indignantly. "By the Lord Harry, Eben Westhaver," he
said grimly, "I'd give a lot to see you a 'brass-bound mate in a
lime-juicer' as you call it! You'd sweat some, by Godfrey! Ef you was
mate of the four-posted scow that Donald here and I were in and
shovin' her araound from Glasgow to Vancouver--seven weeks' beatin'
about off Cape Stiff--you wouldn't be so glib with yer talk abaout
gittin' soft. It 'ud trim some of the bilge off that ol' belly o'
yours, I'd swear! You prate of hard times coastin'? Wait 'til you've
been southabout in a starvation Scotch wind-jammer big enough to carry
this coaster on her davits and with hardly enough men in two watches
to swing her yards raound. I was mate and skipper of a twenty-five
hundred ton four-mast barque, Eben, an' Scotch, an' tight Scotch at
that. Ef you know ships, you'll know what that means--gear, stores and
crowd--cheap and scanty. Six ruddy months and two blushin' weeks on
the passage ... a reg'lar blinder too! Second mate--a no-nothing
Squarehead! Old Man--a cowardly old rum-hound! Kicked the greaser
forrad and locked the skipper in his room when off the Horn, and took
the ship to port myself ... would never ha' got there else. An' you,
you fat old coaster, lyin' back and takin' it easy, to talk about me
gittin' soft. I like yer blushin' gall!" And he grunted in mock
resentment at the imputation.

The other laughed and lit up his pipe. "Well, Juddy, you were always
the boy to tackle hard traverses!" he remarked calmly. "Why didn't
you stay to home? There was no call for you to go barging araound.
Your folks are snug ... ye've bin a dam' fool!"

A far-away expression came into the other's keen grey eyes and the
stern lines of his sea-tanned face softened. Pulling at his mustache,
he sighed. "You're right, Eben," he said at last, "I _have_ been a
dam' fool! I don't see what should ever take our Nova Scotians away
from our own country. But I've seen a lot and I've l'arned a lot. I've
got an English Board of Trade certificate as master and I've handled
big ships. I haven't chucked my money araound either. But after all
I've seen and experienced, I've found nawthin' to beat Nova Scotia,
and I believe I'll make more money and be better off all raound if I
stick by home and take a vessel to the fishin'. And money ain't
everything. To be home is worth more than any money. These are my
honest convictions and I'm agoin' to try them aout. Yes, sir, me and
my two young buckos here."

They left Halifax about midnight and steamed out of the harbor and to
the west'ard. Chebucto flashed them a "Good morning!" when the little
packet rounded the Head to negotiate the ledge-strewn channels behind
Sambro Island, and picking up the lights, she poked into coves and
inlets and delivered her parcels on silent wharves. Sometimes a sleepy
wharfinger would awake at the steamer's whistle and emerge from a
nearby shed. "Two bar'ls fish for daown th' shore, Cap!" he would
growl drowsily, and after the two "bar'ls" were hustled aboard, he
would pocket his receipt and depart for bed again with a "Fine
mornin', Cap. Hope ye strike no fog this time!"

Donald and Joak were awakened early by Captain Nickerson. "Gittin' in
naow, boys," he said. "We're jest coming up by Eastville Cape and it's
a fine morning." The boys rolled out of the berths in which they had
been sleeping "all standing," and after a wash, they went on deck. It
was indeed a fine morning--a glorious March morning of clear blue sky
and brilliant spring sunshine, and the cool off-shore breeze seemed to
carry the odors of balsam and spruce from the wooded shores which they
were approaching. Eastville Cape, a high, rocky promontory, crowned
by a white painted light-house and a warm-looking forest of evergreen
spruce, flanked the entrance to a spacious cove or bay surrounded by
gentle slopes of tilled fields and green spruce bush. The entrance was
somewhat devious by reason of numerous underwater ledges on the
western side, but the channel was evidently wide enough to be
negotiated by a schooner, even with the wind ahead, as one could be
seen tacking up the passage abreast of the packet steamer. The Cape
faced a twin brother west of the ledges, and the two headlands stood
like grey stone sentinels watching the Atlantic and guarding the bay
behind.

On either side of the passage, green slopes, flecked with the remains
of the winter's snow in the sun-shaded hollows, rose abruptly from the
sand and shingle beaches, and nestling among the spruce clumps, white
wooden cottages with cedar shingle roofs, peered cosily from out of
the wind-break of greenery. A strip of tilled ground invariably
flanked the gentler slopes of those cottage estates, and on the beach,
dories and boats betokened that the owners farmed both land and sea.
"Those are all fishermen's houses," explained Captain Nickerson. "They
farm a little, cut spruce logs, and fish alongshore for lobsters, cod,
haddock, mackerel and so on in season. Some o' them go vessel fishing
on the Banks in summer. It's a pretty place."

It was indeed a pretty place. Donald thought it was magnificent. The
clean stone beaches, with here and there a strip of white sand, the
rocks, bold and rugged and with verdure growing in the fissures, the
grassy slopes at odd intervals and the clumps of evergreen, the all
surrounding hills clothed with thick forests of coniferous trees, and
the clear pellucid waters of the Bay, made a picture which an artist
would itch to portray on canvas.

Threading the passage, the steamer headed across the widening inlet
for a wharf environed by a number of neatly-painted wooden houses--the
homes and marts of Eastville Harbor's citizens. The gaunt trunks of
maples and elms rose from among the habitations--not yet clothed in
their leafy garments--and a tall church spire stood out behind the
town--stark white against the brown and green of the hillside.
Numerous anchored schooners of beautiful model, but with booms bare of
furled canvas, betokened fishermen laid up until the spring fishery
called them into service, and when the packet steamer glided between
them, she roared a greeting to the town, and the hills echoed to the
blast of her whistle.

Captain Nickerson pointed to a spot on the shore below the wharf where
the white ribs of a vessel showed up against the dull red of a shed.
"There's my father's yard," he said. "That's a schooner he's building.
That white-painted house up on the hill an' half hidden by a spruce
bush is our family shack an' where I first saw the light o' day." They
were coming into the wharf now, and a number of men and women stood
upon it awaiting the arrival of freight or friends, or actuated by
curiosity to see "who was on th' boat." A half-a-dozen wagons and one
or two slenderly-built buggies were hitched to the back-rails of the
wharf--their horses placidly unconcerned at the bustle when mooring
lines were made fast and the gang-plank shoved ashore.

When Captain Nickerson stepped on the dock, a tall, clean-shaven man
about sixty-five years of age, with wisps of white hair showing from
under his soft black hat, detached himself from the knot of
spectators. He had a ruddy complexion and keen grey eyes, and his
spare figure, slightly stooped at the shoulders, was dressed in blue
jean overalls, to which flecks of shavings and sawdust adhered. He
wore a white shirt--a Sunday relic--and his low, turn-down collar and
black string bow tie gave him an air of distinction which his
workman's garb failed to disguise. He greeted Captain Nickerson in a
deep, booming bass. "Judson! Here you are!" The other swung around.
"Hullo, father. How are ye?" They shook hands heartily but with no
ostentatious show of affection, and the older man laughed. "Not much
change in you, Judson," he said, "a mite stouter I cal'late--not
much--an' you're looking well. Mother got your telephone message--"

"And how is mother! I hope she's well?"

"She's bin pretty good, Judson, pretty good," answered the father.
"She's bin up early this morning gittin' a rousin' breakfast ready for
you. Er--where's your friends?"

The captain turned around. "By Jupiter, I nearly forgot them," he
cried. "I was so pleased to see you, father, an' to git home." He
beckoned Donald and Joak to him. "Come up, boys. Father, this is
Donald McKenzie an' John McGlashan--two Scotch lads that came around
from Vancouver in a schooner with me. Donald was a 'prentice in the
barque I left Glasgow in an' we've got quite chummy. I asked them to
come home with me ontil they got a chance to look around."

Nickerson, Senior, extended a welcome hand, and boomed forth that he
was glad to meet them and glad to have them stay a while. Donald liked
the genial face of the old ship-builder and wondered if he, like his
son, had dormant characteristics of truculent aggressiveness. Maybe,
he had, when he was younger, thought Donald, but age had calmed his
spirit. That booming voice, and the tattoo marks on the old
gentleman's hands, betokened a sailor, and when he glanced at his
face, so much like Judson's, with its aquiline nose, strong jaw and
set mouth, he could readily imagine him singing out biting commands
from the quarter-deck of a ship years agone. Age, however, had
softened the stern lines of his countenance; the grey eyes beamed
kindliness and there was a merry twitch about the corners of
the mouth, while the silvery hair gave the old gentleman a
patriarchal appearance. They were a dominant race--these Nova
Scotians--strong-minded, aggressive descendants of those puritanical
British pioneers who left the Mother Country for a savage colony
because it would not give them the freedom of life and religion which
they craved.

As they walked up from the wharf to the tree-lined Main Street,
Captain Nickerson was the recipient of many greetings. "How're ye,
Jud? Home again an' agoin' to stay, eh? Glad to see ye!" was the
general tenor of these hearty, loud-voiced welcomes, and Donald was
impressed with their evident sincerity. People who spoke loud
betokened characters of bluff straight-forwardness--straight, simple
living folks who believed in themselves; confident, clear-headed and
hearty, and Donald was enamoured of this colonial quality. He liked
these people already.

Walking along a plank side-walk--interrupted at intervals by the giant
trunks of ancient elms--and flanked by neat wooden houses painted in
whites, greys and yellows with trimmings of contrasting shades, they
swung off at a big red building with the sign "ENOS NICKERSON & SON,
VESSEL BUILDERS & SPAR MAKERS," and approached a large square house
painted the universal white with green trimmings. It was set up on a
bank or small hill over-looking the yard and harbor, and a number of
fine elms and spruce encircled the place and gave it a comfortable
appearance. A wide verandah was constructed in the front of the house,
and upon it Donald could see two female figures--one of whom was
gesticulating wildly, while the other was shading her eyes with her
hands against the eastern sun.

"There's mother an' Ruth on th' gallery," remarked the old gentleman.
"Ruth has done nawthin' but talk about ye comin' sence you 'phoned
yestiddy, Judson, an' I cal'late she's made a big mess o' that
choc'late fudge which you useter be so fond of." Donald smiled to
himself at the thought of the hard-case Bluenose mate having a
penchant for chocolate "fudge." It seemed rather ludicrous.

When the quartette toiled up the steep beach-gravel path to the steps
of the house, Captain Nickerson jumped lightly on to the verandah and
clasped his mother in his strong arms. She was a silver-haired, rosy
cheeked little woman of about the same age as her husband, but she
showed none of his phlegmatic greeting when she hugged and kissed her
roving, sea-bronzed son. While the mother claimed his arm and cheek on
one side, Ruth, a dark-haired, pretty girl of sixteen or seventeen,
hung around his neck on the other and Judson was literally "boarded"
with welcoming salutations "port and starboard." "Oh, Juddy, my boy,
I'm glad you're home," cried the mother with joy in her eyes. "How
fine and well you look----"

"And I'm glad too, Juddy!" exclaimed Ruth retaining her clasp around
her brother's neck and punctuating her welcome with kisses. "I've been
up since four this morning getting your room in order and fixing up
your clothes, and I've made you a big plate-full of fudge, Juddy--"

Donald stood at a respectful distance watching the reunion with odd
thoughts. Judson seemed to show up in still another light. The
hard-fisted, swaggering and domineering mate of the _Kelvinhaugh_ ...
hugged and kissed by a dear little mother and a sweet little sister
and caressing them affectionately in return! One would have thought
that a man like Nickerson would scorn these things. And Ruth
Nickerson! Donald was much interested in her. He was going to be made
acquainted with her. He had not spoken to a girl for almost a year,
and he had not fraternized with the sex since disaster overtook the
McKenzie family and his social circle was swept away with it. He had
yearned, many times, to have a girl to whom he could write and tell of
the things he was seeing and experiencing. He hungered for a girl's
company. He idealized them in a clean, manly way, and the rough
immoral talk of his shipmates on the subject of girls always jarred on
his sensitive nature. Before he even met her, Donald was hoping that
Ruth Nickerson would prove "chummy." Her face, figure and manner had
already charmed him wherein he showed himself a genuine sailor by
falling half in love with the first girl he met.

"Come up, boys. I want you to meet my mother and sister." Captain
Nickerson swung around with an arm encircling his mother's and
sister's waists. "Mother--this is Donald McKenzie and John McGlashan."
Donald clasped her hand and bowed; Joak made a respectful salute by
touching his forelock. "And this is my sister Ruth--John McGlashan and
Donald McKenzie!" In this case, Joak shook the girl's hand murmuring,
"Pleased tae meet, ye, Miss!" while McKenzie, overcome by shyness and
almost reverential awe, bowed and stammered an acknowledgement of the
introduction. Ruth gave both lads a casual glance from her sparkling
blue eyes and led her prodigal brother into the house. "Nice wee
lassie----" whispered Joak, but Donald scowled. He wished he had some
respectable clothes and a collar on.

"Step right in, my sons," boomed old Mr. Nickerson. "Make yerselves to
home an' don't stand on ceremony--" And his wife looked back and
chimed in. "That's right, Enos. Show the boys their room. We'll have
breakfast right away."

Up in the large airy bed-room with its huge wooden bed and old
fashioned furniture and numerous picked-rag carpets, Donald washed and
surveyed his rough clothing. "I wish the Skipper had given me a chance
to get some new gear," he remarked regretfully. "I feel like a tramp
in these rags."

Joak laughed and gave his friend a malicious glance. "Och, I wadna
worry aboot yer claes. Miss Nickerson'll fa' in love wi' ye withoot
yer bein' a dude. That's what's makin' ye sae parteecular ... th' wee
lassie!" Noting the scowl on his chum's face, he changed the subject.
"It's a bonny place this, an' this hoose wad cost a big rent in
Glesca. Wha' wad have thought Cap'en Nickerson had a hame like this? I
thought he was gaun tae take up tae yin o' them fishermen's shacks in
the woods yonder!" And he stared around the spacious bed-chamber with
appreciative eyes.

They went down to the dining-room--a lofty apartment and furnished
with heavy walnut and maple furniture of antique make. The woodwork
and doors were painted a dull white, and Donald's artistic eye was
entranced with the simple Colonial design of architraves and panelling
of doors and china cabinets. A large square table was already laid
with the breakfast, and Donald found himself seated opposite Ruth
Nickerson and with the old shipbuilder and his wife at the ends of the
board.

It was a merry feasting--a meal which McKenzie enjoyed silently in
being once more in the environment of a home with white linen, silver
and china and womenfolks. It was like picking up the thread of a life
one has missed for many months. Nickerson must be feeling that way
also, thought Donald, for in his Skipper he now saw a man he had never
known before. The saturnine Judson; he of the Olympian air, scathing
vocabulary and truculent disposition of _Kelvinhaugh_ days had
vanished, and there now appeared a laughing, teasing, joking young
sailor with nice table manners and language, which, while idiomatic,
was faultlessly correct. The stern lines had completely disappeared
from his bronzed face, and he looked as young as his age.

During the breakfast, Donald was silent but observant, and the most of
his observations were of the pretty young girl opposite him. There was
a feeling in his breast he had never felt before when he glanced at
her; a feeling that caused him to admire her fresh young beauty in
face and form and to hunger for possession. The age-old instinct of
adolescent youth was awakening within this clean-hearted, red-blooded
sea boy, and he was forming new impressions and a new appreciation of
the opposite sex. Seventeen is the impressionable age.

McKenzie's shy glances brought no response from Ruth's sparkling blue
eyes. Her attention was wholly taken up with her brother and Joak,
whose peculiar speech and mannerisms gave her much secret delight.
Captain Nickerson readily sensed this and he skilfully drew the
unconscious McGlashan out for the amusement of his roguish sister.
"D'ye mind the day, Joak, when you told me to get the mains'l off her
because you couldn't get your bread dough to rise?"

"Aye, captain, I do that!" replied Joak, stuffing his mouth full of
crisp bacon. "Yon was an awfu' windy day an' she was jumpin aboot like
a lone spud in a wash b'iler! _You_ ken, Miss"--addressing Ruth--"it's
no easy gettin' a batch o' dough tae rise if th' whole place is
jumpin' an' jigglin' an' jooglin' aboot!" Miss Nickerson nodded
sympathetically.

"And your pea soup, Joak," continued the skipper. "The peas would be
as hard as bullets when you started to boil them, but you'd stick a
lump of washing soda in the pot and soften them up!"

Joak shook his head vigorously. "Naw, captain," he retorted
vehemently. "I never did that! Sody is awful' hard on the guts----er,
excuse me! I mean, stummick, and it 'ud soon tak' th' linin' aff yer
insides. Naw, I saffened them up wi' a guid soakin' in warm water.
That's a'!"

Ruth's face was crimson, but she did not laugh. Joak was taking
everything very seriously.

"I've heard Judson talk of a number of strange sea dishes with queer
names," she observed. "Cracker-hash, dandy-funk, three-decker-pie, and
what was that goose story you used to tell, Judson? That was a new way
of cooking." Donald could have sworn that she winked a roguish eye at
her brother.

"Oh, ah, yes ... the goose story," said Judson taking up the cue. "I
don't think Joak knows how to do that--though he might.... It happened
aboard a ship I was on one time. The skipper had invited some friends
off to have dinner aboard and had told the cook to get a goose ready
for cooking. A while later the old man got a message saying his
friends could not come, so he called the cook and said. 'These people
are not coming for dinner to-day so we'll postpone the goose!' The
cook goes out scratching his head and when he gets forrad he says to
the crowd. 'I knows how to b'ile 'em. I knows how to bake 'em, and I
knows how to fry 'em, but I'll be hanged if I know how to postpone
'em!'" He finished the yarn without a smile. For a moment Joak stared
at him in serious perplexity, and then blurted, "I wouldna know how
tae postpone it masel'!"

Everybody laughed, while Donald felt like kicking his schoolboy chum
for his simple density. Ruth, after enjoying the joke, eased Joak's
discomfiture by explaining the meaning of "postpone." "Oh, aye,
that's it, is it?" cried McGlashan laughing boisterously. "That's a
good yin--a gey good yin! I don't remember ever gettin' that worrd at
school. Did we get that yin, Donald?"

Thus appealed to, McKenzie answered with some annoyance, "Of course
you did! You must have forgotton."

"Then you two were at school in Scotland together?" Ruth gave Donald
the first direct glance of the meal.

"Aye, Miss," cut in Joak. "We were chums an' went tae school thegither
since we were wee fella's. Donal' an' me's had some rare tares when we
were kids."

The tolerantly humorous look in Ruth's eyes annoyed Donald. He felt
that she classed him on a par with Joak and it vexed his conceit.
There was a hint of patronage in the direct manner in which she
addressed and looked at the both of them--a manner which left Joak
unaffected, but which made McKenzie squirm. He felt instinctively that
Judson's sister regarded the two of them as odd creatures her brother
had brought home from sea--brought home much as he might bring home a
parrot, a cardinal bird, or a monkey, and because he was anxious to
create a good impression on Ruth, he resented it.

Later in the day his resentment was intensified when he overheard Ruth
talking to her brother Asa's wife on the gallery. "Yes, Juddy came
home this morning," she was saying, "and you know what Juddy is for
bringing home strange characters. This time he arrives with two queer
Scotch boys. One talks the strangest gibberish and positively can't
see a joke, while the other doesn't talk at all but gives you the
queerest looks. I'm not sure but what both of them are a little
off----" Donald blushed furiously and moved away, seething inwardly.
His pride was hurt. To Miss Nickerson, he would, in future, be
ordinarily civil and courteous, but nothing more.

The skipper did not believe in loafing around home. That same
afternoon he took the boys down to the harbor to look at a schooner in
which he proposed buying an interest. "Father already owns a half
share in her and he's willing to fit her out for salt Bank fishing if
I'll take her and get a gang together. I can place you in her as cook,
Joak, and I'll take you along, Donald, and make a fisherman out of
you. There she lies! The _West Wind_ is her name and she's about the
same build and tonnage as the _Helen Starbuck_."

They tumbled into a dory and pulled out to a schooner lying to an
anchor among the fleet. Into cabin, hold and forecastle they went, and
after a careful examination, Captain Nickerson expressed himself as
satisfied. "This is a fine little vessel, boys," he remarked. "Give
her a bit of an overhaul and she'll be a better vessel than the _Helen
Starbuck_. I'll take her over, and we'll get to work right away, boys,
and fix her up for the spring voyage. What d'ye say? Are ye both game
to try your hand at the fishin' with me?"

Donald and Joak answered together, "We are, sir!"




CHAPTER TWENTY


Within a day or two of his arrival in Eastville Harbor, Donald saw the
beginnings of great activity among the anchored fleet of fishing
schooners in the Bay. Almost simultaneous with the commencement of the
_West Wind's_ overhauling, every vessel in the fleet was tenanted by
sail-benders and riggers, painters and caulkers, and the water front
rapidly took on a lively appearance with the hauling of schooners to
the wharves to receive supplies, fresh water, salt and gear. Fishermen
were streaming in from outlying villages and back-country
farms--emerging like the bears and squirrels from a winter's
hibernation--to sign up with the skippers for the spring fishing
voyage. Eastville became a hive of industry and the street corners and
stores were fishermen's parliaments where the costs of salt, trawl
lines, hooks, oil-clothes and sea-boots were discussed and the price
per quintal of the season's fish was forecasted.

Donald did not see a great deal of the Nickerson family except at meal
times, kitchen snacks and lunches, mostly at which Mrs. Nickerson and
Ruth merely waited on the men. They rose early in the morning and got
aboard the vessel by 6.30 a.m., and with an hour for dinner at noon,
they worked until darkness called a halt. Joak was busy overhauling
his galley gear and painting fo'c'sle and cabin, while Donald and
Captain Nickerson worked on the rigging and sails.

When the heavy work of bending sails was finished the skipper said,
"Naow, Donny, boy, I'll leave you to reeve off halliards and sheets
and hitch and seize noo rattlins, 'cause I've got to skin araound
among the boys and git an eight dory gang--that means sixteen men--two
to a dory. I'm agoin' to hev a job gittin' them 'cause they'll prefer
to ship with old skippers who know the game, but I'll scrape up a
crowd somehow."

And Donald was left alone for almost a week, during which time Captain
Nickerson drove around the country trying to pick up men. He would
return after dark from these excursions tired with driving and
talking. "Th' fellers araound here have become most cussedly
conservative sence I left home," he gloomily remarked one night.
"They're all glad to see me, but when it comes to shippin' with me,
they're either signed up with someone else or they're afraid they'll
lose a chance o' making money by sailing with a green skipper. I
haven't got a one yet and I've tried hard for a'most a week. There's
men to be had, but haow to git them beats me."

Donald had met quite a number of the Eastville fishermen and had
yarned with them enough to form a general opinion of their
characteristics. They treated him very cordially and had freely
discussed Captain Nickerson's chances of picking up a crew. "He's a
good sailorman an' navigator," they admitted, "and he's fished some,
but we doubt ef he knows the grounds an' where to pick up th' fish. He
ain't never bin skipper afishin' an' fellers ain't agoin to take
chances with a green skipper when there's so many high-liners alookin'
for crews." Donald readily saw the point and he gave some thought to
the matter, and from his observations of fishermen character he made a
novel suggestion to Judson.

"It seems to me, captain," he said, "that you've got to spring
something unusual on these chaps--something that will appeal to their
sporting instincts, and from what I know of them and you I think it
can be worked. You may be an Eastville man, but you're different from
these chaps in a good many ways." And he explained his idea.

The skipper listened intently with a broadening smile on his face, and
when Donald had finished he thrust forth his hand. "Good! Lay it
there, boy. I'll do it, by Godfrey! Let's write it out and we'll git
it printed and mailed at once!" And he rose to his feet, stamping and
chuckling.

Two or three days later every fisherman in Eastville and vicinity
received the following printed notice in his mail box:

     Dear Sir,--

     The undersigned has taken over the command of the schooner
     "West Wind," and will fit out for salt fishing this spring.

     Several fishermen have expressed their doubts as to my ability
     to catch fish and make a good stock. I wish to state that I
     will lay five hundred dollars with any man, even money, that I
     will, this season, be the high-line eight dory vessel of the
     Eastville Harbor fleet.

     I am now picking up an eight dory gang, and want only young,
     hardy men and good fishermen. No married, tired, or nervous men
     need apply.

     Yours for fish,

     JUDSON K. NICKERSON.

The effect was wonderful! All the young, reckless spirits in the
district camped on Nickerson's doorstep and he had his pick of the
best in making up his eight dory gang--sixteen young bloods, strong,
single, and tough, and endowed with a dash of the sporting spirit
which would ensure their being of the breed to "stand the gaff" in
winning their skipper's bet.

Nickerson was delighted. "That sure was a great stunt, Donny, boy," he
cried. "I've got a gang of young toughs--a bunch that'll work 'til
they drop an' who'll swing dories over when the gulls can't fly to
wind'ard! They're the kind for makin' a big trip 'cause they'll work
like the devil to beat the old timers, and they'll fish when the
married men an' the' narvous men'll be for stayin' aboard. I'd ha'
never thought o' that stunt if it wasn't for you, by Jupiter!"

"Do you suppose anyone will take up your bet?" enquired Donald
somewhat anxiously. The other thought for a moment before answering.

"Yes!" he replied. "Some skipper will call me--some high-liner. Lemme
see--who is there runnin' eight dories? Wilson?--No, he's too tight!
Wallace?--A big family an' no money to blow! It'll be either Smith or
Ira Burton. Burton will call me sure! He don't like me sence I gave
him a trimming for insulting little Vera Knickle. ... Yes, it'll
likely be Burton. He'll itch to take my money an' show me up as a
windy bluff. Mark me, Donald, we'll have Burton to fight against, and
he'll take some trimming, too!"

Jud Nickerson's wager was the talk of the fleet and the news spread up
and down the shore. Young fishermen came in from other ports to ask
for a "sight" with Nickerson, and he regretfully turned them away. He
had his gang now--a cracking good crowd--Jud Nickerson's "hellions"
they were called, and down on the wharves and in the outfitters and
barber shops, the old skippers smiled sourly and "cal'lated that Jud
Nickerson was agoin' to fish lime juice fashion," and they reckoned
some day he would spring a surprise in the way of a vessel with
"injy-rubber" dories that would stretch with a big load of fish, and
leather sails for running a vessel to port in a breeze.

The _West Wind_ was duly hauled alongside the wharf and her gang were
aboard getting salt into the hold bins and rigging up their trawling
gear. This was a job which Captain Nickerson advised Donald to "get
hep to," and he sat with the fishermen on the _West Wind's_ sunny
decks practising the knotting of "gangens,"[1] the "sticking" of same
into the "ground line" of the "trawl" or long-line, and the bending on
to the gangens of the seven or eight hundred hooks which go to make up
a seven-"shot" tub of trawl gear. The Eastville harbor fleet of
twenty-five or thirty schooners were nearly all "salt Bankers"--that
is, they engaged in a deep sea fishery on the off-shore "Banks" or
shoal water areas of the Western North Atlantic, and their catch of
cod, hake, pollock, haddock and cusk were split and put down in salt
aboard the vessels. Cod, however, was the commonest fish caught, and
when the salted catch was landed, it was prepared for export to West
Indies and South America by being dried on racks or "flakes" exposed
to open air and sun. Flakes, hundreds of feet long, were built on the
sunny slopes of the hillsides around the harbor, and during the summer
months these would be covered with hundreds of thousands of split
salted codfish caught on the Banks from Le Have to Grand. When
thoroughly dried these fish were graded, packed in casks and drums,
and shipped to the West Indies and South America, where, as "bacalhao"
it is much esteemed by the Latins and colored populations.

  [1] Pronounced "gan" as in "began" and "gen" as in "gent."

Donald knew a good deal about sailing a schooner, but he knew
absolutely nothing about fishing in any form. His notion of "trawling"
was steam trawling wherein a huge bag net was towed over the bottom by
a steamer specially built and equipped for the purpose. In Scotland
this method of deep-sea fishing was universal. Trawling, so-called, in
Canada, was a different operation altogether, and consisted in
catching fish by means of lines about 2,100 feet long, into which, at
28 or 40 inch intervals, a "snood" or "gangen" about 36 inches long
was stuck and hitched through the strands of the main or "ground"
line. To this snood or gangen was hitched a black japanned hook and
from seven to eight hundred hooks depended to a "string" or "tub" of
trawl gear. The whole of this long line was coiled down in tubs
usually made from cutting down a flour barrel, and six to eight tubs
of trawl went to each dory.

The dory is a flat-bottomed, high-sided boat peculiar to the North
Atlantic coasts of the American continent. It is thus constructed for
wonderful seaworthiness when properly handled, and by having removable
thwarts and other fixtures, it can be "nested" within other dories on
the schooner's decks. From six to twelve such boats can be carried
"nested" one within the other on the port and starboard sides of a
vessel's waist. From these dories, when launched on the fishing
grounds, two fishermen set the long trawls with every hook baited and
the line anchored along the bottom.

Young McKenzie found himself in an enchantingly novel world of
seafaring and learning something new every day. He had recovered from
his surprise at the beautiful class of vessel employed in the Canadian
deep-sea fisheries, and the comfort of their forecastles and cabins,
but what delighted him still more was the class of men who went to sea
in these fishing craft. They were fishermen and farmers and lumbermen
and seamen all rolled into one, and as they sat in the sun rigging up
interminable fathoms of tarred cotton lines into fishing gear, their
conversation would range from the planting of potatoes to the care of
a "galled" ox; from the cutting of spruce "piling" and the clearing of
an alder swamp to the forty fathom talk of searoads and sailormen.
Most of them had been to the West Indies in schooners, brigs and
barquentines. They talked glibly of Demerara, Trinidad and its "Pitch
Lake"; the Sugar Loaf at Rio; the Prado and Malecon of Havana, and the
salt pans of Turk's Islands. They chewed tobacco, joked and yarned in
a strangely fascinating drawl, and Donald's seafaring blood would be
thrilled by their unaffected relations of wild battles with sea and
wind, and times when the sudden hurricane blows of spring and fall
"blew th' gaul-derned fores'l, jumbo'n jib clean aout of her 'n left
us stripped to bare poles 'n th' gaul-derned ledges to loo'ard!"

They all addressed each other by baptismal names and Donald was struck
by the number of Biblical appellations, and also the odd Freemans,
Wallaces, Bruces, Wolfes, Lincolns and other Christian names which
sounded strange to his ears and betokened the liberty-loving spirit of
ancestors. They were a fine type--lean, strong-muscled, sun-tanned,
good humored and coolly daring, and Donald looked forward to life
among them with anticipatory pleasure. In these craft and with these
men for shipmates, he felt the fascination of the searoads coming
over him stronger than ever, and the hateful memory of the days on
the _Kelvinhaugh_ were passing into oblivion.

They were almost ready for sea, and Captain Nickerson and Donald were
standing on the wharf superintending the loading of some supplies,
when the skipper gave a grunt. "Here's Burton acomin'!" They turned
around to see a tall, raw-boned, sandy-haired man about forty stepping
towards them. He had a clean-shaven face, a hard mouth, and cold grey
eyes. "Hello, Jud," he said in a high-pitched drawl. "See ye're back
with us again. Lime-juicin' too much for ye these days?"

Nickerson grunted. "Cal'late lime-juicin' didn't hurt me any," he said
coldly. "But a man likes to be home an' among his folks once in a
while."

The other picked up a pine splinter from the wharf, and producing a
knife, began to whittle it. After a pause, he spoke again. "See ye're
agoin' in fer fishin'. Ye've a smart vessel there."

"Yep! She's able!" answered Judson shortly.

Another pause. "Reckon ye can catch a trip o' fish?" Still whittling,
he asked the question without taking his eyes from the pine sliver.

"Reckon I kin!" replied Nickerson, and fixing the other with his
steely glance, added, "I plan to be high-line eight-doryman this
season."

Whittling away, Captain Burton nodded slowly. "Umph!" he piped after a
thoughtful pause. "Cal'late, Jud, I hev five hundred toad-skins loose
what says you ain't agoin' to be ahead o' th' _Annie L. Brown's_ gang
spring trip to fall."

Judson laughed sarcastically. "The _Annie Brown_? Why ef I couldn't
trim that crowd of old women I wouldn't 'temp to go afishin'. I am out
to trim an abler gang than the _Annie's_." There was a grin on the
faces of the loafing _West Winders_ who sensed what was in the air and
who hung around within earshot. Burton noted the grins and reddened.
"I said, Jud, that the _Annie L. Brown_ hez five hundred dollars to
put up agin yore hooker. Do you take it, or do you not?"

"Of course I'll take it, Captain Burton," answered the other with a
careless laugh. "If you have the money with you I'll take it naow
'stead of later."

Burton threw the stick away and snapped his knife. "I'll leave th'
money with Bill Smith, th' harbor-master, an' you kin leave yores
there too. I'm sailin' day after t'morrow." Without another word, he
turned and stalked up the wharf. Nickerson turned to his grinning
gang. "That's the joker we're up against," he said, "and, take it from
me, he'll be a tough one to beat. He has a good gang and an able
vessel and he's a good fish-killer. We'll have to hustle some to get
that money, bullies."

A fisherman laughed. "You find th' fish, Cap," he said, "an' you'll
find that 'hustle' is aour middle name. Ira Burton's 'toadskins' look
mighty good t' me!"

Joak had removed his dunnage down aboard the schooner and lived on her
with some of the men. Donald wanted to do the same, but the Skipper
told him to remain at the Nickerson home until he, himself, went
aboard. Though he appreciated and enjoyed Judson's kindness, yet he
felt the lack of presentable clothes--especially when Ruth was about,
for, by her actions and manner towards him, he felt instinctively that
she looked upon him as a common Scotch sailor-boy of a social status
far beneath her. She was neither unkind nor discourteous, but she
treated him exactly as one would treat a hired man. This jarred
McKenzie's pride considerably, and when Ruth was around he refrained
from conversation and confined himself to mere affirmative or negative
answers when she addressed him.

The evening before sailing came, and Donald trudged up from the vessel
clad in overalls and rubber boots, and grimy with loading stove coal.
When he stepped up on the verandah of the Nickerson home, he spied
Ruth seated before an artist's easel and intent on painting a view of
the harbor. Anything savoring of art appealed to Donald and he could
not resist walking up and looking at the young lady's effort. He felt
instinctively that he would be snubbed. At the sound of his footsteps
she turned around and gave him a careless glance such as one would
give the milk-man or a pet cat.

"Good evening, Miss," ventured Donald politely. "I see you are an
artist." "I do a little painting," she replied curtly, continuing her
work. For a space he watched her brushing in the colors, and his
artistic eye detected many mistakes which were spoiling an otherwise
creditable canvas. The girl evidently lacked training though she
possessed ability. When she paused to squeeze some color on to a
palette, Donald noticed that her fingers were long and well
shaped--tokens of artistic temperament. "Well, what do you think of
it?" she said without looking up and with a touch of patronizing
tolerance in her words.

"I think it is very good in parts," replied Donald quietly, "but--"
"Yes, but--?" She was looking at him with arched eye-brows, and there
was a trace of resentment in her voice seeming to infer "What do you
know about art?"

McKenzie smiled. "I was going to say, if you'll permit me, that your
perspective is a little bit out," he answered calmly. "Your schooner
is too large for the shed in the fore-ground, and the detail on the
further side of the harbor is too harsh. It should be toned down a
bit--" He paused, noting the angry flush which was rising to her face.
"Go on!" she snapped--almost rudely. "What else is wrong with it?" Her
tone was irritable, and Donald, thinking of her conversation with her
sister-in-law the day he and Joak arrived, proceeded without mercy,
"Your sky is too much of a greeny-blue--you need more cobalt in it.
Your water should reflect the sky more, and your clouds are somewhat
heavy. A little dash of white and Naples yellow mixed in the centres
would lift them out more. And, pardon me, for a sunny day, you should
have worked more of a yellow tinge into all your colors--" He said no
more, for with an indignant toss of her head and a sparkle of temper
in her blue eyes that made her look very fascinating, she jumped up
from the stool and throwing down her brush, stalked into the house,
saying tartly, "If you're so smart--finish it yourself and let us see
if you are as good an artist as you are a critic!" Donald stared after
her--somewhat pleased that he had stirred this self-possessed young
beauty, and yet somewhat regretful at having offended her. Any
unpleasant rifts in his relationships with any person always annoyed
McKenzie. He would rather endure than inflict. He turned and scanned
the painting, and the artist in him came to the fore. Throwing off his
overall jacket, he sat down, picked up the palette and brushes, and
started to work. Under his trained eyes and hands the crudities were
painted out or toned down, and when Captain Jud came up from the wharf
he had transformed the picture into something, which, while yet
amateurish, betokened the handiwork of a true artist. "Aye, aye,
painting something, are ye?" was the Skipper's greeting.

"No," answered the other. "I took the liberty of retouching your
sister's picture. It is her painting, and it is very good." He rose
and followed Judson into the house.

He had been gone but a minute before Ruth slipped silently around a
corner of the verandah. "He says 'it's very good' does he?" she
murmured. "Let's see what our Scotch sailor-artist-critic has done."
But when she looked at the canvas, her pique gave way to genuine
admiration. "Oh!" she ejaculated softly. "He _is_ an artist after
all!" Then perplexedly. "I wonder where he learned?" Still wondering,
she lifted the canvas from the easel and took it up to her room.

They had supper in the big dining-room that evening--it was a special
meal for the departing sailors--and Donald wore a white duck shirt
with a turn-down collar--a dollar purchase which catered in a measure
to his desire for clean white linen. With his face and hands well
scrubbed, and his hair brushed, he looked eminently respectable and
felt more at ease. Clothes and personal appearance are two extremely
important factors in the self-respect of youth--especially so when the
admiration of a girl is to be gained. McKenzie's dollar shirt added
enough to his personal appearance to command Ruth's attention, and
during the supper she shot shy glances at him and wondered why she
hadn't noticed what fine eyes and teeth and hands this tanned young
seaman possessed. His artistic criticism set her to thinking. She
pondered over his manner of conversation and his actions when she and
her mother were around. He spoke with a Scottish accent, but then,
unlike McGlashan, his language was faultlessly correct. His table
manners, she noticed now, were according to all the canons of
etiquette. He did not tuck his serviette into his shirt-neck; he
wielded his spoon in the prescribed way when taking soup, and he held
and used his knife and fork properly and not in the "scrammy-handed"
manner she expected from a common sea-boy. The Nickersons were
superior people, and noted these things and lived correctly
themselves. They were seamen and ship-builders, fish merchants and
timber merchants, but others of the family had taken up the higher
professional arts and doctors, clergymen and lawyers were numbered
among them. The Skipper's maternal uncle was a lawyer and a member of
the Dominion House of Commons--not that this political honor may be
cited as a criterion of breed--but it was evidence of the fact that
the family were "particular and knowing folk."

They were to sail for the fishing banks on the morrow, and Judson
suggested they have a little family party. Brother Asa and his wife
were invited over, and they were bringing with them a cousin who was
visiting them; a young woman a year or two older than Ruth. "Now,
Sis," said Jud to his sister, "you can get busy an' make up a whack of
that choc-late fudge for me to take to sea with me. I c'd eat a bar'l
of it right now!"

Asa Nickerson, older than Judson, but almost identical in looks,
speech and manner, came in with his wife and her cousin Helena Stuart.
Helena was petite with soft brown eyes and pretty fair hair--a rather
striking girl and with a face and form which matched her hair and
eyes, she would attract admiring attention anywhere. When she greeted
Ruth and the two were together, Donald thought he had never seen
finer-looking girls. Judson was evidently struck with Miss Stuart, and
it wasn't long before he managed to escort her off to the kitchen to
superintend his sister's fudge making. Donald, in the odd habit he had
of conjuring up contrasting memories, smiled to himself when the
Skipper, in his most polite and persuasive manner, offered Miss Stuart
his arm in mock courtesy and led her laughingly away to a
candy-boiling. He thought of a rain-lashed, heaving deck and the
drumming of a big wind aloft and an oil-skinned, sea-booted Judson
leaning over the bridge rail of the _Kelvinhaugh_ and rasping out,
"Put yer ruddy guts into it, you lousy hounds, or I'll bash the ugly
mug of th' swine that hangs back!" with a liberal sprinkling of biting
oaths for better measure. Truly, seafarers live lives of contrasts not
alone in the element they live part of their lives, but in the nature
of their work and the herding of men with men far from refining
influences.

Donald was left with the older people, and he sat quietly listening to
their small talk. Asa spoke to him once or twice, but eventually got
embroiled in a discussion with his parents as to the correct manner in
which to feed a nine-months-old child--which discussion, while of
interest to married people, bored McKenzie dreadfully, and several
times he felt like making a bold move by leaving and repairing to the
kitchen, where, from the shrieks and laughter, the girls and the
Skipper were having a jolly time over the manufacture of the chocolate
confection.

He was about to slip out, when Mrs. Asa went to the piano and
commenced running her fingers over the keys. "Play us a tune,
Gertrude," boomed the old ship-builder. "My ol' favorite,
y'know--'Sweet Dreamland Faces'--an' ye might sing it too,
Gerty-girl."

The daughter-in-law picked out the music but demurred at the singing.
"You know, father, I can't play and sing at the same time. If I had
someone to play, I'd sing. Helena would play for me, but I hate to
disturb her. She's having a good time in the kitchen by the sounds."
Donald, tired of sitting and doing nothing and itching to get his
fingers on piano keys once more, rose to his feet. "Possibly I can
help you," he said quietly. "I haven't played the piano since we left
the West Coast, but I'll try."

Young Mrs. Nickerson looked somewhat surprised, but smiled and vacated
the stool. Donald sat down and fingered the keys. His fingers were
stiff with the hard usage of sea-faring, but he swung readily into the
easy score, and soon Mrs. Asa was singing the sweet old song in a
pleasing voice to his accompaniment. When it was finished amid the
plaudits of the listeners, the singer complimented the young fellow on
his playing. "You play well," she said. "Do you sing? I'm sure you do!
Won't you play and sing for us?"

Rather than hazard a resumption of the baby-food conversation, Donald
murmured with a self-conscious blush that he would try, and without
any preliminaries he touched the keys and in a clear baritone rendered
"Ye Banks and Braes o' Bonnie Doon." As he sang the famous old
Scottish song, memories of his mother and home in far-away Scotland
surged to mind. He forgot the company and sang with closed eyes. He
was lonely and more than a little home-sick, and the yearning
suggested by the words and its plaintive air rang in his voice, and
his quiet touch on the piano mingled with his singing and combined to
make it a song from the heart and soul of a wanderer far from his
native land.

    "Ye mind me o' departed joys--
    Departed.... Never to return!"

When he finished there was an awed silence, and he swung on the stool
to see Judson and the two girls standing in the doorway. Helena
Stuart, her eyes glowing, walked over to the piano. "That was lovely,
Mr. McKenzie," she murmured admiringly. "Won't you sing something
else?"

Donald was embarrassed. "I--I'd like to hear _you_ play or sing
something, Miss," he stammered. "Will you, please?"

"By Jingo, Donny-boy," cried the Skipper, "I've been with you nigh a
year naow and I never knew you could play or sing like that! I've
h'ard you chanteying, but, if I could play and sing like you can I'd
be hanged if I'd go to sea."

Miss Stuart had been rummaging through a music cabinet. "Here we are,
Mr. McKenzie," she cried. "Here's a pretty thing--'In Old Madrid!' Do
you know it? Fine! If you'll sing it with me, I'll play." She
commenced the prelude and they sang the quaint old song. It was a
favorite of Donald's and savored of the romance which forever appealed
to his nature. Songs of feeling awakened responsive chords within him
and his voice contained the subtle intonations of correct
interpretation of the words.

    "Her lover fell long years ago for Spain--"

He could conjure a picture of gallant _conquistadores_--_caballeros_
and _hidalgos_ of chivalrous Castile ... the lover--an armored knight
lying stark on a stricken field with a Moorish arrow or javelin in his
heart ... and her dainty glove would be fixed in his helm. He visioned
her anguish when the dreadful news was brought to her--

    "A convent veil ... those dark eyes hid,
    And all the vows that love had sigh'd ... were vain!"

In such a song he could feed his soul on the sentiment which he
hungered for. Miss Stuart's soprano blended well with his expressive
baritone and delighted the listeners who felt they were being truly
regaled with singing of a high order. Ruth, too, was delighted, but
deep down in her heart was a twinge of bitterness, of jealousy, of
recrimination. This young stranger had lived under her father's roof
for almost a month and it was only on the eve of his departure for the
fishery that she discovered his worth and talents. She had ignored him
for a common sailor lad--a ship laborer--and here he was displaying
culture superior to her own. Later, she catechised her brother. "Who
is this McKenzie boy? He's no common fellow like that cook of
yours--that impossible McGlashan. Where is his family? Where does he
come from?"

Judson laughed. "What did you think he was, Sis? Some hoodlum I picked
off the dock? Why, honey, his father was a well-known sea-captain in
the New York trade ... drowned at sea. The boy is very clever and very
well educated. His uncle owns a fleet of ships and Donald was an
apprentice or cadet on the barque I was mate of. They knocked him
about so much on her that I got him to skin aout in Vancouver and come
with me. He's a thorough gentleman in every way and one of the
pluckiest and nerviest youngsters I ever was shipmates with. He's gone
through something, that lad!"

When her brother had finished, Ruth looked at him accusingly. "Judson
Nickerson," she said. "I'm vexed with you! You tell me all this when
he is going away, and here for almost a month I've kept him at a
distance thinking he was only a sailor you had hired. We might have
had a lot of pleasant evenings here if you hadn't been so thoughtless.
You come home to eat and sleep, and when we are around you kept Mr.
McKenzie from getting better acquainted with your eternal
ship-and-fish-talk monopolizing his evenings. I--I could _beat_ you,
Judson--yes! thrash you well!" And she stamped her foot angrily, while
the Skipper stammered excuses and finally laughed at her chagrin. "It
took Helena to find aout my friend's qualities," he teased. "_You_
judged him by his clothes. He wanted to dress himself up, but I told
him to save his money as he didn't have much. This'll teach you, Sis,
that all my guests are not rough-necks and shellbacks!"

In the parlor, Helena and Donald were entertaining the company by
singing and playing, and in the congenial atmosphere the young fellow
cast off his reserve. He felt that he was once more picking up the
threads of the things he delighted in, but had lost for a space. With
generous praise from his audience, admiring glances and expressions
from pretty Miss Stuart, and a desire to revenge himself upon Ruth
for her neglect and tolerant behavior towards him, he expanded and did
his best.

When Ruth came from the kitchen with her brother and noticed the
friendly intimacy of the two young people at the piano, she suggested
a dance as a diversion. "Gerty will play a waltz for us and we can go
into the dining-room. Juddy--push the table back, and--" in a
whisper--"take Helena for your partner. I'll find out if your friend
has other accomplishments."

When Mrs. Asa trilled out the "Blue Danube," Ruth approached Donald.
"Will you waltz with me?" she asked with a winning smile. The youth
looked up at her with surprise in his eyes, colored slightly, and
glanced at his heavy boots. "I--I'm afraid I can't do much with these
on," he answered hesitatingly, "and I expect I'm sadly out of
practice--"

"Let's try anyway," she suggested, and Donald slipped his arm around
her waist and stepped off in time to the music. He held her very
gingerly at first, but in the swing of the dance he tightened his
embrace of her lithe figure. Though nervous and afraid of stepping on
her dainty feet with his heavy brogans, and somewhat abashed in
holding a pretty girl to him in such close proximity, he,
nevertheless, piloted her through the rhythmic whirl in a creditable
manner which bespoke a graceful dancer. Panting, and with eyes glowing
and cheeks blooming, she called a halt. "Oh, I'm out of breath," she
gasped. "Let's sit down. Juddy and Helena will dance all night."

He escorted her to a corner of the dining-room and sat beside her. All
his resentment against her previous treatment of him had vanished and
he felt strangely buoyant and happy. For a moment neither spoke. "I'm
so sorry I was rude to you about my painting this afternoon," ventured
Ruth at last with a shy glance towards his face. "You were quite right
in your criticisms and you altered it wonderfully. I had no idea you
were so clever. You must have studied painting..."

Donald nodded. "I always loved drawing and painting," he replied. "My
art lessons were the only ones I really enjoyed."

"And music and dancing and singing?"

"I took lessons in all because Mother made me do so," he answered
smiling. "I did not like them at the time, though I appreciate such
education now."

She looked at him to see if he was passing a compliment, but in his
expression there was no evidence of such. "Your Mother must miss you
very much," she observed. "Whatever sent a clever boy like you to sea?
Art, music and drawing-room accomplishments have a mighty little place
on a fishing boat. It's a miserable life, though Juddy thinks it is
the only occupation."

"Men must work," replied the youth.

"Granted! But seafaring! Fishing! Why not some occupation where you
can make use of your artistic gifts--?"

"There are better artists than I am walking the streets of Glasgow and
London who will draw excellent crayon pictures for a sixpence." He
smiled and added. "I loved the sea!"

She sensed the past tense and repeated wonderingly. "Loved?"

Helena walked into the room in time to hear Ruth's query. "What's
this? What's this? Who talks of love?" Donald blushed furiously.
Helena laughed. "All right, Mr. McKenzie, don't feel so embarrassed.
I'll respect your confidence. I suppose Ruth was flirting as usual.
I've just come to call you in for a cup of coffee and some cakes."

They returned to the room again and had refreshments. Then Mr. and
Mrs. Asa Nickerson and Helena took their departure--the latter very
cordially shaking Donald's hand and wishing him a pleasant voyage and
trusting to meet and enjoy some singing again. "And don't let Ruthie
trifle with your affections," she added with a roguish glance at her
friend. "She's an awful flirt." Miss Nickerson smiled demurely. "Go
'way home," she cried, "or I'll have a reputation I don't really
deserve."

When they departed the Skipper clapped Donald on the back. "We'd
better turn in naow, Don," he said. "We'll roll aout at four an' get
aboard and aout down the shore for aour bait. We've got to get busy if
we're agoin' to get Ira Burton's money away from him."

Donald turned shyly to Ruth. "I suppose I'd better wish you 'Good-bye'
now--"

The girl shook her head. "No! I'll be up and give you and Juddy your
breakfast. Good-night!"




CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE


They got the _West Wind_ down to the end of the wharf on a cold March
morning. It was dark and the sky was overcast, and as he hauled on the
schooner's mooring lines, Donald wondered how it was that ships
invariably seemed to sail at unearthly morning hours--hours when the
soporific influence is strongest and vitality is at its lowest ebb. He
called to mind the morning he came down to the _Kelvinhaugh_, and the
spirit of romance and adventure which filled him then, until the
actual experiences of sea-faring in the barque dissipated his rosy
visions and made him wonder what there was in the life that sends lads
to sea. He recalled the stirring voyage in the _Helen Starbuck_--an
adventure which brought back some of the glamor and fascination of the
windy sea-roads to his soul, and now he was outwardbound on a new
traverse with the deep-sea fishermen of Nova Scotia. Would he like the
life? He wondered. If he didn't, he would have to make a cast back
into the merchant service, or give up all thoughts of a nautical
vocation and stay ashore. He didn't like the thought of the latter
alternative--sure testimony that Old Ocean had him in its thrall.

"All right, boys, she's daown far enough!" Skipper Nickerson was
singing out. "Aft here, my sons, an' git yer mains'l on her." Eighteen
men tallied on to the throat and peak halliards, and with the skipper
directing them with a "Hold yer peak! Up on yer throat!" and
vice-versa, they soon had the big sail up. "Throat an' peak jigs,
naow, boys!" and the gang swayed up the sail until it set like a
board, with the wrinkles running from peak to tack.

"Fores'l, naow, an' when you're ready, give her th' jumbo!" To Donald,
"Jump on the wharf, Don, an' cast off th' bow line, then stand-by yer
starn line."

They soon got the foresail up, jigged and the halliards belayed, and
Donald cast off the bow line as the jumbo, or fore-stays'l was run up.
"Make yer jumbo tail-rope fast to wind'ard!" cried Captain Nickerson,
"and when she pays off, give her the jib an' hang on to yer
weathersheet!"

Standing by the stern mooring, Donald gazed up at the Nickerson home
and fancied he could see a female figure looking out of one of the
upper windows. He saw her wave a handkerchief, and he returned the
fare-well gesture. It was Ruth Nickerson--he could see that even in
the half light--and he wondered if she was waving to him or her
brother. He waved again, and the salute was returned. "Alright, Don!"
came the skipper's voice. "Leggo yer starn mooring an' jump aboard!"
He slipped the loop off the spile and leaped aboard as the _West Wind_
payed off with her heads'ls a-weather. The skipper spun the wheel and
paced athwart the quarter staring at the anchored vessels ahead--some
of whom were getting under way.

"Your sister is at the window, captain," said Donald, still looking up
at the house. The other turned and waved a hand. "Good little kid is
Ruthie," he remarked to McKenzie. "A good little girl--full of fun,
an' clever as they make 'em. She always was a favorite of mine. I've
got a box of chocolate mush in my bunk which she gave me this
morning--" Donald would have liked to continue the conversation in
this strain, but the skipper broke off. "Skip for'ard, Don, an' leggo
that tail-rope an' weather jib sheet!"

The schooner glided down the harbor with a light air filling her
sails. The men had gone below to the fore-castle and cabin awaiting
breakfast, and were filling in the time by working on their lines and
hooks. Donald, shipped as spare hand, was supposed to work under the
captain's orders and to look after the vessel's gear. Fishermen do no
work on the schooner's hull or gear when at sea. All overhauling must
be done in port. The fishing crew ship only to fish, handle sail,
steer and keep watch. The spare hand is supposed to make all repairs
to the vessel's rigging while at sea, and to look after the stops,
reefing and furling gear. When the men are out in the dories fishing,
or when they are dressing fish, he must assist the skipper in sailing
the schooner, in getting dories hoisted in or out, and wherever he can
be of use.

Donald busied himself coiling up halliards and picking up gaskets, and
as he worked, he whistled a song to himself and thought of Ruth
Nickerson. He had seen her that morning. She had come down in slippers
and a pink silk kimono, and he thought that she looked ravishingly
pretty in such a garb. While he and the skipper were drinking a cup of
coffee which she had prepared, he wondered how she could look so
dainty and fresh at four o'clock in the morning. Her eyes were bright
and her cheeks had a healthy bloom in them like the Okanagan apples he
had seen out in British Columbia, and she teased both of them about
the bet with Ira Burton. "If you lose," she said, with a laugh, "Juddy
and you will have to go to Halifax and go on the stage. You play the
piano and sing, and Juddy will take the money. I'm sure he can look so
fierce sometimes that people will be glad to give you something." And
they all had laughed heartily at the thought.

How he envied brother Juddy when she threw her arms around his neck
and hugged and kissed him! A young fellow of seventeen is at the
susceptible age, and Donald was not blind to the charms of the fair
sex, even though he had had but little opportunity to tread the
primrose path of dalliance with fascinating young ladies. How he
blessed his mother for keeping him to his piano, singing and dancing
lessons! He had looked upon these accomplishments with scorn in his
Glasgow days, and had carefully hidden them from Joak and his other
school-boy chums. "A lassie's wurrk," they would have jeered. "Ye sh'd
take knittin' an' croshay lessons as weel!" Aye! he appreciated such
culture now!

She said "Good-bye!" with a simple clasp of the hand, and the memory
of the soft, warm pressure of her small fingers in his roughened fist
thrilled him yet. "I hope to see you when you come back," she added,
and he had stumbled away in the dark of the morning with a pang of
regret at leaving. He did not know why he should have felt that way,
but the fact remained that he did, and he was glad when he saw her
again waving from the window.

When the Lower Eastville Head came abeam, the cook sang out,
"Breakfast!" and Donald went down into the fo'c'sle. Nine fishermen
were already seated, and when he came below they shouted, "Make room
for Scotty McKenzie--an' ol' Cape Horner but a noo trawler! Sit ye
daown son, an' eat hearty an' give th' ship a good name!" They were a
merry crowd, and Donald compared them with the all-nation scrubs of
the _Kelvinhaugh_ and the wretched provender which they had to eat
aboard the barque. It was vastly different here! There was a blue
checkered tablecloth spread over the triangular table, and upon it
were heaped enamelware pots of first-class porridge, sausages, fried
eggs, new white bread, doughnuts, biscuits and cheese. Each man ate
off white graniteware plates and drank steaming coffee out of
china-clay mugs--no tin pannikins and cups on a Bank fisherman! As
they "scoffed" the good victuals, they joked boisterously over the
wager with Ira Burton, and "cal'lated when they got agoin' they'd trim
him daown to his boot-straps, by Judas!" There were no sullen faces or
growling oaths from this crowd. Every man wore a contented smile, and
they talked and joked and chaffed, but managed to get away with the
food in spite of the conversational interruptions.

"This minds me o' the time I wuz cookin' on a Behring Sea sealer,"
remarked Joak to Donald. "They were a' like these chaps--a verra jolly
bunch." McGlashan, as cook on a fisherman, held an exalted position.
Everybody tried to "stand in" with him, and on a Banker, the cook and
the skipper are the two officers whose word is law and whose commands
must be obeyed.

They ran into South-east Harbor that afternoon and dropped anchor off
the Cold Storage Company's wharf. Nickerson went ashore to procure a
quantity of frozen herring for use as bait, but found that he could
only purchase a few barrels, as several salt Bankers had already
spoken for the available supply. Captain Ira Burton had left for the
fishing grounds that morning with a full baiting, and this fact caused
Nickerson to hustle aboard what he could get. "Hang the patch on her!"
he shouted. "Burton's off and he's got plenty bait. We'll have to
start with what we have and run in for more later."

Under four lowers, they sped out of the harbor to a freshening
sou'-west breeze, and the skipper set the watches. "Number One dory
will take first wheel and look-out," he said, "and the other seven
will follow. It'll be one hour and a half to a watch, but Donald and I
will look after her this afternoon while you fellers bait yer gear.
Draw for baiting places now!"

Hardwood planks were fixed around the cabin house and the gurry-kid--a
huge box for'ard of the house and used for stowing fish-offal while in
port or odd gear at sea--and a man went around with a piece of chalk
and marked and numbered off certain spaces on the planks. Upon these
planks or "bait boards," the fishermen cut their bait, and certain
spots were more desirable than others--hence the drawing for places.
When this was accomplished, the skipper sung out for the stays'l to be
hoisted, and told Donald to stream the taff-rail log. "Four miles off
Salvage Island and four o'clock," remarked the captain. "A hundred an'
thirty miles to make to the sou'-west edge of the Western Bank. Take
the wheel, Donald, and let her go east by south half south. I'll help
the boys bait up!"

Seated on the wheel-box, he steered the able little schooner and
listened to the conversation of the fishermen. The breeze was blowing
fresh and there was a short sea running and the vessel was laying down
to it with the water squirting in through the lee scuppers, and she
was pulling over the rollers as gracefully as a steeple-chaser at a
low hurdle. The well-made sails were full with the wind, and it
thrummed in the rigging and under the booms, while the foam from the
sharp bows hissed and bubbled to loo'ard and raced aft to mingle with
the wake astern. A myriad of gulls, attracted by the herring offal
which was being whisked overboard every now and again, wheeled and
squawked around them, and their graceful winging, with the buoyancy
and gentle pitching and rolling of the flying schooner, combined to
make a picture symbolical of the poetry of sea motion. Wing and sail
were closely allied in this exhilarating off-shore flight, and
McKenzie was thrilled with it to a degree which he had never felt
before.

Chop, chop, chop! went the men's knives on the baitboards as they
deftly severed the frozen herring into portions for garnishing the
hundreds of hooks which went to a tub of trawl. With yellow oilskins
on their stalwart bodies, they stood around the quarters, singing and
bantering one another--a picturesque crowd of clear-eyed, hard-muscled
men. True sons of the sea! thought Donald, and he steered and listened
to a ballad which one of the men was trolling:--

    "The galley was as high as the handle of a broom,
    For'ad of the cabin, underneath the main-boom,
    It warn't very big, an' I hadn't much room,
    For cookin' on th' pine-wood dro-o-gher!

    I had no room to move abaout,
    When I was in, my starn stuck aout,
    Th' stove would smoke an' make me shout--
    Whoo! While cookin' on th' pine-wood dro-o-ogher!"

The crowd chopped bait and howled the last line with gusto--drawling
the "dro-o-gher!" with all a chantey-man's vim, until it wound up with
the final verse of the cook's troubles on the "pine-wood drogher."

    "I kissed the stove a long farewell,
    An' wished the maker a mile in h----l,
    An' th' builder of the galley there as well,
    An' I flew from th' pine-wood dro-o-gher!"

A howl of guffaws greeted the last verse, and with a "Tune her up
again, Tommy-boy!" the ballad singer broke into another Blue-nose
"Come-all-ye" describing the voyage of an Annapolis barquentine to
Demerara. The singer worked her every foot of the way to her
destination and back, and even dilated upon the flirtations of the
crew in the South-American port.

    "We wish aour fr'en's could see us naow,
    You bet they would be shy,
    For we have sweethearts by th' score,
    Though we court 'em on the sly;
    Daown comes a yaller gal--dressed up like a queen,
    Enquiring for th' stoo'ard of Corbett's barquentine."

There was a rare, seaman-like swing to a verse which ran:--

    "Under a goose-winged tawp-s'l, an' a double-reef'd main-sail,
    With her head towards th' nor'ad, boys, she rides a furious gale;
    If brother Tom could see us naow, an' hear those wild winds blow
    He'd thank th' Lord that he was out of Corbett's gundalow!"

With the droning of the wind, the seething of the sea, and the
squawking of the gulls as accompaniments, this deep-sea concert went
on, and every man worked like a busy tailor baiting his gear and
chiming in the choruses. Someone struck up an inspiring song about the
record run of the fishing schooner _Mary L. MacKay_, and it reflected
the spirit of those hardy Banksmen.

    "We lashed th' hawser to th' rack, an' chocked th' cable box,
    An' over-hauled th' shackles on th' fore an' main-sheet blocks;
    We double griped th' dories as th' gang began to pray,
    For a breeze to whip the bitts from aout th' _Mary L. MacKay_.

    We slammed her to Matinicus, an' th' skipper hauled th' log:
    'Sixteen knots an hour, by gum! Ain't she th' gal to slog!'
    An' th' wheelsman he jest shouted as he swung her on her way,
    'You watch me tear the mains'l off th' _Mary L. MacKay_!'

    To the wheel was lashed th' steersman as he soaked her thro' th' gloom,
    And a big sea hove his dory-mate clean over th' main-boom,
    It ripped the oil-pants off his legs an' we could hear him say:
    'There's a power o' water flyin' o'er th' _Mary L. MacKay_!'"

Captain Nickerson leaned over the taff-rail and glanced at the log
dials. "Ten knots, Donny-boy," he murmured happily. "She can travel
this one! Sock it to her, son!" And he jumped back to assist in the
baiting up. When supper was announced, the work was finished and the
watches were set. McKenzie lazied the evening away stretched out on a
cabin locker listening to the yarns of his ship-mates. Some of their
quiet relations were the very heart of adventure and hazard. "You'll
mind th' time, skipper, when the _Annie Crosby_ was hove down and came
up with a dory hangin' to her fore spreader!" or "Was you around in
that bad blow when Harry Winslow soaked his vessel over th' Cape
ledges an' smashed th' skeg off her bangin' over the rocks! He _was_ a
haound, that Winslow!" Aye, they know thrills who fish the Banks--the
thrills of "Breakers ahead!" and the desperate clawing off a
lee-shore; the scares of the smoking mists, sinister with the raucous
bellowings of driving liners; the exhilarating drives for port in a
brave wind, and the lying-to in piling seas, blinding snows and savage
gales! Donald lolled with sparkling eyes and open ears drinking it all
in until the last yarner had knocked out his pipe and rolled into his
bunk.

Joak turned them out for breakfast next morning at four. It was black
dark, and they ate in the light of oil lamps while the schooner tore
along on her east by south course. "She's run a hundred an' twenty
miles naow," remarked a fisherman just relieved from his "trick."
"This one's a grand little hooker to sail! Steers like a witch!" He
sat down at the table. "I'm as hungry as a bear. Slap some o' them
beans on this plate, Westley-boy, an' give th' bread an' butter a fair
wind this way."

At five, the Skipper shot the schooner up in the wind. "Take a cast of
the lead, Don!" he cried, and when the youth gave him the sounding,
"Thirty-five fathoms, sir!" he examined the tallow on the bottom of
the lead. "Fine sand. Right! Call the gang, Donald! We'll hoist the
dories over here an' spin the gear aout! There's a fellow to wind'ard
there dressing down fish." As he went for'ard, Donald looked to the
sou'west and saw the twinkle of torch-lights low down on the far
horizon--unmistakable sign of a Banksman at work.

The men came from below, oil-skinned and booted, and with mittens and
woollen caps on, for the air was biting and cold. They began getting
the tubs of trawl, anchors and buoys ready, and scurried around
picking up the impedimenta necessary for going overside in the dories.
"Lower away top dories!" bawled Judson from the wheel. Though this was
his first order as a fishing skipper yet he seemed to have adapted
himself to the life as if he had known no other. The experiences of
his younger days came readily to mind and hand and he carried on as
though he had never seen the "lime-juice" merchant service.

The four fishermen who went in the two dories (nested on top of the
port and starboard sets) placed their thwarts and pen-boards in
position, kicked the dory-plug into its hole in the bottom of the
boat, and saw to it that two pairs of oars, sail, water-jar,
bait-knife, bailer, bow-roller and gurdy-winch were in place. Then
they hooked the dory hoisting tackles into the bow and stern beckets
of the twenty-foot boats, and with two men heaving on the fall of each
tackle, they swung the dory to the rail. Throwing in anchors, buoys
and buoy lines, they shoved the little craft out and lowered her into
the water while Donald held her alongside by the painter. Joak did the
same for the dory on the port side.

One of the fishermen jumped into the boat, while his dory-mate handed
him down the tubs of baited trawls. "Set two tubs, boys," advised the
skipper, "and if fish are strikin' we'll spin th' whole string. Pull
to the east'ard when you're setting your gear!" The two fishermen
jumped into the dory and Donald allowed the boat to drift astern and
belayed the painter to the taffrail pin.

Within a very short time, all eight dories were overboard with their
crews in them, and the schooner towed them along in a string of four
in line ahead from each quarter. Heading the vessel away from the
schooner to windward, the skipper waved his hand. "Leggo port dory!"
The last dory on the port string cast off. One man shipped the oars
and pulled to the eastward, while the other hove the trawl-buoy over
and payed out the anchor line. When the line had run out sufficiently
for a thirty-five fathom depth of water, he bent the end of the baited
line to the crown of the light trawl anchor and hove it overboard.
Placing the tub of trawl-line before him in the stern-sheets of the
dory, the fisherman commenced throwing the baited gear out by means of
a heaving stick which he held in his right hand, while his dory-mate
rowed the boat. It did not take long before the two thousand odd feet
of trawl was whisked out and the end line of the second tub was bent
to the tub-end of the first and shot overside in a similar manner.
When the whole line was in the water, another anchor was bent to the
baited gear and thrown over, and the fishermen hung to the anchor-rode
until it was time to haul the trawl. With a buoyed anchor at the first
end and another at the last end, the four thousand feet of line with
its sixteen hundred baited hooks, was securely stretched along the sea
floor, and in readiness to entrap the hungry cod and haddock which
roamed over the bottom looking for food.

All eight dories were cast off from the schooner and all set their
trawls at a distance of about half a mile from each other, and when
the last dory was slipped, the skipper put the schooner about, and
with the jumbo belayed to windward, the mainsheet eased off, and the
wheel made fast a spoke from hard-down, the _West Wind_ lurched along
in that semi-hove-to condition known in fishermen's parlance as
"jogging." Joak went to his galley to get dinner ready; Captain
Nickerson shipped the fish-pen boards on the schooner's decks between
rail and cabin house, and Donald whetted dressing knives.

As they worked, Captain Nickerson kept up a running fire of
explanations about the fishery, and Donald listened with increasing
interest. "This manner of running dories aout is called making
'flying-sets,'" said Judson, "and the schooners fishing fresh for
market usually work this way. If we strike good fishin' hereabouts,
we'll let go the anchor an' ride to that big cable hawser, an' th'
men will pull away from th' vessel an' set their gear all 'round her.
Ef we do that, we'll stow all th' sail an' hoist a trysail, or ridin'
sail on th' main to steady her an' keep her headin' up to her cable.
We're only setting' two tubs this time to try th' ground aout, but ef
fishin's good, we'll run four or six tubs an' buoy them an' leave them
in th' water. Th' boys'll under-run th' trawls then--takin' th' fish
off th' hooks an' re-baiting them without liftin' th' whole tub o'
gear out o' th' water. You'll notice that each trawl buoy has a short
stick with a black-ball or flag on it inserted into it. That marks th'
gear an' enables us to pick it up easily. They'll start ahaulin' th'
lines in half an hour, an' we'll see ef there's any fish hereabouts."

They jogged past a dory which was hauling in their gear. A fisherman
stood in the bow and pulled the line up from the bottom over a
lignumvitæ roller fixed in the bow-gunnel. His dory-mate stood
immediately behind him with the empty trawl tub, and as his mate
hauled, he coiled the gear down in the tub again. "There's a scale!"
cried Judson. The fisherman in the dory had a big cod on his line and
he lifted it up with his right hand and swung it deftly behind him
with a sharp jerk which tore the hook out of the mouth of the fish and
sent it wriggling into the penned-off fish pound in the dory bottom.
Donald could see a number of fish being hauled up, and the skipper was
scanning the other dories through his glasses. "They're all gittin'
something," he remarked. "I hope there's fish here, for we've got to
hustle. Ira Burton'll have a full deck by naow I reckon, an' he's got
plenty bait to keep him agoin'!"

They started picking up the dories shortly afterwards, and as they
came alongside, Donald and Joak caught their painters and allowed them
to drift abreast the quarters. Pitching and rolling in the swell, the
fishermen forked the cod, haddock and pollock up into the deck
pens--counting the catch as they threw the fish aboard. "A hundred an'
twenty-one!" sung out a fisherman. A couple of forks or "pews" spun
over the rail, followed by the two dory-mates. "Tie yer dory astern,"
said Captain Nickerson. "Go'n have a bite an' spin aout four tubs.
We'll let go the anchor here."

When the eight dories delivered their catch, there were five thousand
pounds of cod, pollock and large haddock in the pens. Donald had never
seen so many fish in his life before. "Is that a good catch, skipper?"
he asked. The other pursed his lips. "Only fair," he replied. "I've
seen th' whole quarter full o' fish on two tubs, but it ain't a good
sign to strike fish right away. We'll get a deck later."

They anchored the schooner on the Bank and after furling sail, the
gang bent and hoisted the trysail or riding sail, had a "mug up" of
tea and cold victuals, and pulled away in their dories to set and haul
their lines again. They were "on fish," and when they left their
buoyed trawls at nightfall, there was fifteen thousand pounds in the
deck pens. After supper, the work of "dressing down," splitting and
salting the catch began.

Several kerosene torches with huge wicks were set alight on the cabin
house; dressing tables were rigged, and the men, armed with sharp
knives, commenced gutting and beheading and splitting open the fish.
They were adepts at the work, and Donald watched them with wonder.
"Slop!" a large cod would be slapped on to the table; a fisherman
would seize it in his gloved hand and give it a slash with a knife
across the throat and up the belly; his neighbour would scoop the
viscera and gills out with one motion and snap the head off with
another, and, when passed around the board, the beheaded and
disemboweled fish would be whisked into a huge tub of salt water,
split from nape to tail and scraped free from blood and adhering
viscera. After a sousing in the tub, it would be hove out to drain in
a pen alongside the fish room hatch, and finally it would be shot
below, where the "salters" in the hold would pile it neatly in a pen,
skin down, and cover it liberally with coarse salt.

The men worked like Trojans in the glare of the torches--gossiping and
singing--and the low hum of their talk would be punctuated by a shout
for a fresh knife, a drink of water, or a pipe or a chew of tobacco.
The skipper seemed to be everywhere. One minute he would be pitching
fish down into the hold; another time he would be slapping fish on to
the dressing tables. He jumped around whetting knives, lighting
torches, and occasionally gutted fish. "You ain't forgot haow to split
'em, Cap!" remarked a man, complimenting his dexterity with the knife.
Nickerson laughed. "When a feller has spent three years of his boyhood
days doin' this, he ain't likely to forget--even though he has been
deep-waterin' since. I was two seasons with old Abner Westhaver in the
_Carrie Watson_, and he kep' a boy ahumpin'--believe me! I've split
ten thousand pounds hand-runnin' many a time with that ol' Turk, an'
he wouldn't let ye straighten yer back 'til the work was done."

In the spells between assisting the men, Donald sat on the wheel-box
and surveyed the scene. The schooner, with all canvas furled, except
the try-sail on the main, rolled gently to the swell--her shining
spars and new running gear outlined in the glare from the flaming
torches. These flickering flares limned the rugged faces of the
fishermen at work and illuminated the objects within their effulgent
radius in the manner of Rembrandt. Decks gleamed wet like a city
street on a rainy night; the slimy bodies of the fish and the oilskins
of the men stood out vivid against the darkness where the light caught
them. All around was the night--opaque, impalpable, and only definable
when a heavier swell lifted its crest above the low quarter and caught
the torch glow. Sea birds squawked in the blackness--quarrelling over
the choice scraps of viscera dumped overside--and occasionally flying
into the circle of light, so near that Donald could discern their
unwinking, bead-like eyes as they poised for a moment above the rail.
There were myriads of gulls around while they were dressing fish; when
the work was done, they vanished. "Them beggars knows," observed a
fisherman to McKenzie. "They'll keep away ontil they sees you begin to
rig th' dressing keelers, then they're round in hundreds. Winter
time's th' time for gulls ... don't see 'em so much in summer.
Stinkin' Carey Chickens then ... hundreds of 'em. Fly agin yer face
when dressin' daown fish by torches an' 'most choke ye with th'
carrion smell of 'em. Deep-water sailors think Carey Chickens are
sacred. We fishermen take no 'count of 'em ... snip their heads off
with th' dress-knife when they flops in front of ye."

When the last fish was below and in the salt, Donald cleaned up the
decks and the men proceeded to bait up their gear and prepare bait for
taking out with them on the morrow. Then, with draw-buckets of clean
salt water, they washed their oilskins free of fish slime, wrung out
their gloves and mittens, and went below to fo'c'sle and cabin for a
mug-up, a smoke, and a long, satisfying "kink" in a warm, comfortable
bunk. "Breakfast at two, boys," Captain Nickerson said. "We'll get the
gear 'bout three an' set an' haul all day to-morrow. We've got to
hustle day an' night to trim Ira Burton." And to McKenzie, he said,
"Go'n turn into your pew, Don. I'll keep watch 'til midnight, then
I'll give you a hail. We'll catch up on sleep when the boys are out in
the dories to-morrow."

Donald rolled into his berth in the cabin after a "mug-up" of molasses
cake and coffee from the "shack locker" or quick lunch cupboard in the
forecastle. He felt tired but happy, and soon closed his eyes, lulled
to slumber by the steady ticking of the cabin clock, the regular
snores of his shipmates, and the gentle rolling of the vessel. As he
slept he dreamed that he was skipper of a fishing schooner as big as
the _Kelvinhaugh_, running a hundred dories, and that he had brought
her in full of fish and had won Ira Burton's money. Ruth Nickerson met
him on the dock as he landed and threw her arms around his neck and
kissed him. With a satisfied "Um-hum!" he rolled his back to the light
of the lamp and "sounded for forty fathoms," while Nickerson paced the
weather quarter, smoking and planning how he, a green fishing skipper,
would "get to wind'ard" of an old fish-killer like Ira Burton.




CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO


After three days' hard fishing, they cleaned up the fish on their
first "berth," and when it "thinned out" they hoisted sail and anchor
and shifted to the northward. Every day was not a good fishing day.
Sometimes they got a mere handful of cod or haddock, and there were
other days when the April fogs were so dense that Captain Nickerson
had to keep the dories aboard, in spite of his desire to get "a trip
of fish" quickly. These were the days when Donald experienced the grey
terror of the Banks--the soaking, impenetrable fog which would steal
up apparently from nowhere and settle over the sea in a heavy pall of
finely atomized mist which defied sight and played strange tricks with
sound. The fishermen hated fog, and well they might. McKenzie got an
idea of their antipathy one day when a huge New York liner almost
"got" them as she whirled past them in the vapor. So close was she,
that they had to let the main-boom run to the end of the sheet or the
steamer would have struck it as it lay in the crotch. All hands were
frightened, and standing on the rolling schooner's deck, they shook
their fists at the receding liner and howled picturesque oaths.
"Half-speed on the telegraph, half speed in the log, but the engines
turning up their maximum revolutions," growled the skipper, and Donald
thought of how his father had to drive his ship through these foggy
wastes and possibly just escape destroying a schooner as this steamer
had narrowly missed sending the _West Wind_ to the bottom. During
thick weather, while at anchor on the Banks, in daytime, they kept the
bell tolling and fired a shot-gun when steamers were heard blowing in
the vicinity. At night, they kept torches alight. When under way, they
relied on sharp ears and eyes and a mechanical fog-horn, which emitted
a sound a trifle more audible than the buzz of a bee.

Fog, however, did not always keep the fishermen aboard. If it was
thin, or if there were signs that it would dissipate shortly, the
dories went over the rail, and the fishermen pulled into the mist with
only a kerosene torch, a tin trumpet or a conch-shell, rudely cut at
the end of the spiral to make a bugle-like blast when blown, to
protect them. Donald had only been a week at sea on a fisherman when
he learned of what calibre these Banksmen were. He saw them pull off
in their frail dories in mists; in sharp March and April snow-squalls,
and in moderately heavy breezes, when the seas were cresting and the
spring rains were pelting down. They went over the rail in the dark of
early morning, with brooding sky and a hint of storm in the air, and
with torches aflare on their dory gunnels, they set and hauled their
gear, until the wind and sea decreed that it was dangerous to defy it
longer. Were it not for their skipper's signal to come aboard, they
would have fished until the most timid of their gang buoyed the gear
and pulled for the schooner, but there were no timid men in the _West
Wind's_ crowd.

They fished hard on the _West Wind_, harder than they would have
ordinarily, but there was a bet to be won, and it was safe to assume
that Ira Burton on the _Annie Brown_, was working "double-tides" and
"wetting his salt" as fast as he could. Captain Nickerson kept his men
at it, and he did not spare himself. He worked harder than any of
them, and called up all his sea-lore and fish-lore to bring the finny
spoils aboard. At odd intervals, he produced blue-books and pamphlets
on icthyological subjects from his bunk shelf and studied the
migrations of fish and the distribution of plankton and the various
other marine minutiæ upon which the cod, haddock and other demersal
species are supposed to feed. Two or three times a day, he lashed a
thermometer to the lead-line and recorded bottom temperatures.
Temperatures and salinity of the surface waters were taken by him
regularly and recorded in his private log. Donald attempted to assist
him in this work, and the two of them pored over the scientific
literature and incidentally cursed the writers for recording their
researches in language beyond their common school educational
understanding.

The men looked upon this scientific work with scorn. "A blame'
thermometer ain't agoin' to tell him whar' th' fish are," they said.
"Let him fix a camerar to that there lead an' photygraft th' bottom to
tell us whar' th' fish an' th' rough spots are. That's th' ticket. Ira
Burton don't fish thataway. No, siree! That guy hez th' mind of a cod,
an' they say he jest picks one up aout o' th' pen an' he goes below
with it an' talks to it, an' he'll come up a while after an' say:
'We'll fish araound here some more. They're thick on th' bottom in
this here spot!' That's Burton's way." And some joker would raise a
laugh by picking up a big codfish in his arms and asking it the
whereabouts of the main body of its family.

They were doing very well, however, and when an ugly easterly sprung
up, they took advantage of the break in the weather to run into port
and secure more bait. On the run-in, the men caught up on sleep, and
the skipper and Donald sailed the vessel the fifty or sixty miles to
port under a reefed mains'l and through a spiteful wind and sea. They
only remained long enough to secure bait and some supplies, and shot
out again on the last of the easterly blow.

Working the grounds around Sable Island, they swung off for Eastville
Harbor with over a thousand quintals of fish in salt below, and
arrived in the home port on May 10th, after nearly two months'
absence. Ira Burton had been in and was gone again, and nobody knew
how much he had landed. The fish had been weighed by his own men, and
the tally was kept a secret. It was a good "jag" gossipers averred,
and various estimates were given--none of which could be credited.

"We'll git aour fish aout, salt an' supplies aboard, an' we'll skin
aout too," said the skipper. "An' we'll see what's what at the end of
the season."

It was early morning when they arrived in Eastville Harbor, and the
skipper and Donald surprised the Nickerson family by stamping into the
house before a soul was stirring. The first one downstairs was Ruth,
who greeted them both warmly, and asked excited questions about the
_West Wind's_ catch. "Will you beat Captain Burton, Juddy?" she cried.
"He's landed his spring trip and people say it was a record one--" She
broke off and turned to Donald. "And how do you like the fishing, Mr.
McKenzie?" she enquired interestedly. "I suppose you're glad to get
back. Are you going to stick at it?"

McKenzie answered enthusiastically, "I surely do like the fishing life
and I intend to stick at it. I've enjoyed myself immensely. Of course,
I'm glad to get back for a spell--"

"It ain't agoin' to be a long spell though," interrupted Judson, who
was worrying about Ira Burton. It was not the chance of losing five
hundred dollars that caused him anxiety, but rather the blow to his
prestige--the horror of losing and being called a "windy bluff."
Masterful men of the Nickerson type cannot stand ridicule. "We'll skip
aout again to-morrow morning, I cal'late."

The girl's face fell at his announcement. "Why do you want to run away
like this, Juddy, dear," she asked plaintively. "Surely one day won't
make much difference between now and September?"

Her brother laughed. "Won't it?" He patted her on the shoulder. "It
might put us in the hole. A pile o' fish can be salted down in one
day, Ruthie. No, no, Sis, we can't stay longer--much as we'd like to."
Donald, feasting his eyes on Ruth's pretty face and lithe figure,
mentally echoed her desire and anathematized Ira Burton and his wager.
He regretted for a moment his fertile imagination in suggesting such a
scheme to Judson.

When the skipper left to go upstairs to see his parents, Donald sat
and chatted with Ruth, who was engaged in laying the table for
breakfast. "You'll be interested to know that Miss Stuart is staying
with us just now," said the girl. "I left her in bed fast asleep--"

"No you didn't, Ruth," came a laughing voice from the stair. "Here I
am wide-awake." And Helena came down into the room and greeted
McKenzie cordially. "This is indeed a pleasant surprise. Did Captain
Nickerson win his bet?" Donald explained to her that the wager would
not be decided until the end of the season in September.

It was very pleasant sitting in the sun-flooded dining room and
chatting with two pretty girls--very pleasant indeed. After weeks in
the intimate society of hairy-chested men, whose conversation was
red-blooded and direct, it was distinctly refreshing to be talking
"nice" and listening to soft musical voices. Donald's artistic eye
appreciated the soft hair, clear skins and sweetly moulded figures of
the two young women, and when he gazed at Ruth there was a light in
his eyes which told of the loveflame kindling in his heart. It was
spring, and through the windows and the open door, the sunshine was
streaming in and the birds were singing and chirping in all the
joyousness of the season's warmth. The trees were breaking into leaf
and the grass was bright green and goodly to look upon by eyes weary
with the monotony of eternal leagues of sea. The sky stretched
faultlessly blue overhead and the waters of the harbor gleamed gold in
the sun, while the air was as clear as a bell and redolent of warm
earth and the scent of balsam and spruce. When old mother earth breaks
from the thraldom of winter, the heart grows light and fancies turn to
love.

Ruth had finished laying the table. "Now, Helena," she said, "you can
go in the kitchen and fry up some eggs and bacon and make some coffee.
When Juddy comes downstairs he'll help you. I want to show Mr.
McKenzie the dear little bird's nest we found yesterday." And turning
to Donald, she continued, "There are four beautiful little eggs in
it. Come on, Mr. Fisherman!" And nothing loath, Donald followed her
out into the sunshine, feeling favored and happy. This was a girl for
his heart! A girl who appreciated Nature in all her loveliness, and
when she pointed out the hidden nest in a hushed voice there was a
tenderness in her tones which betrayed affections, deep, true, and
worth winning.

At the breakfast table, he spent a happy hour. Ruth waited upon him
assiduously, and in thinking about her, he gave vague answers to old
Mr. and Mrs. Nickerson's questionings regarding his fishing
experiences. What Ruth was doing for him, Helena was doing for Judson,
and when he glanced at the smiling, laughing, joking skipper, McKenzie
blessed the day that saw him a member of the _Kelvinhaugh's_ ship's
company under such a man. In those days he little dreamed of such
present hours.

When Donald had finished his fourth cup of coffee, Ruth jumped to her
feet with an exclamation. "Oh! I almost forgot. Here's a letter that
came for you while you were away. I must apologize for not giving it
to you before. We'll excuse you while you go and read it."

It was from his mother, and it was a long epistle full of loving
expressions and scarcely veiled fears. She was appalled at his
experiences aboard the _Kelvinhaugh_, and extremely nervous about his
voyage in the _Helen Starbuck_, and when his letters came from Halifax
and Eastville announcing his safe arrival, a great load had been
lifted from her heart. "You know, dear laddie, you are all I have now,
and if anything happened to you I would not care to live," it read.
"And, oh, my bonny, but I'm lonesome for you and longing for the day
when we'll be together again.... I'm so pleased you have found such a
friend in Captain Nickerson. I'm sure he is a splendid gentleman, and
I hope your step in going into the Canadian fisheries will be
successful and promising. I am longing for the time when I shall come
out to Nova Scotia and make a home for you there. Your remittance of
$150 came to hand safely, but I am sorry to confess, dear, that I had
to break into it. Your uncle wrote me the enclosed letter, telling me
of your death by drowning--which, of course, I knew was not true, as
you explained the circumstances in your letter from British
Columbia--but shortly afterwards I was dismissed from the Hydropathic
for some unknown reason, and I feel sure David McKenzie was at the
bottom of it. I found some little difficulty in getting another place,
and it was during this period that I had to use the money you sent me.
Now, do not worry about me. I have since secured a position as night
matron in the Davidson Home for the Aged and Infirm--a lovely place
just outside of Glasgow--and I am very comfortable here." The letter
concluded with those affectionate paragraphs which only mothers can
write.

He turned his attention to the enclosed letter from his uncle. It was
typical of the man--abrupt in phraseology and entirely lacking in
courtesy or sympathy.

     "Dear Madam," it ran, "the master of the _Kelvinhaugh_ advises
     me that your son, Donald McKenzie, was drowned while fishing in
     Vancouver harbor on the evening of Sept. 30th, 189--. His body
     was not recovered. Yours truly, DAVID MCKENZIE & CO., per D.
     McK."

Donald smiled bitterly. "Short, sweet and utterly damnable!" he
muttered, and he crushed it savagely in his strong fingers. He opened
his mother's letter again and perused it thoughtfully, trying to read
between the lines. There was a lot left unsaid in that letter, and he
knew his mother was hard put to it when she was forced to use the
passage-money. David McKenzie was apparently as vindictive as ever, he
ruminated grimly. The beast! Curtly announcing Donald's death to his
mother and then having her discharged. How had she fared after leaving
the Hydro? His imagination pictured fearful things and he stared out
of the window unseeing and unconsciously gritted his teeth. Put him
before David McKenzie again and let the swine treat his mother as he
did before and he would tear the heart out of the hound with his bare
hands! The perspiration broke out on his forehead in excess of silent
rage as the old fury of Highland blood boiled within him thirsting for
revenge....

A hand was placed on his shoulder and a girl's voice roused him. "I
hope you had good news from home, Mr. McKenzie?" It was Ruth, and she
was looking at him with an expression of concern in her deep blue
eyes.

"We-e-ell, yes," he answered cheerfully--the old passion dying
instantly at the sound of her voice. "It is not bad news. Mother is
well and happy."

She smiled. "I was afraid by the look on your face when you read your
letter that something unpleasant was troubling you." Donald laughed
and crumpled the letter into his pocket.

"Are you going to be here this evening?" asked Helena, coming over.
"If you are, we might have some music and a little dance. What do you
say, Ruth?"

"Surely, surely," answered the other, "and I'm going to ask Mr.
McKenzie to look over some of my recent daubs in the painting line.
And, now, coming down from the sublime to the ridiculous, Helena, come
and help me clear the table."

Lolling on the window-seat, McKenzie's thoughts flew back to his
mother in the Glasgow Home. He was anxious to see her again and to
have her with him. She must be lonely--very lonely. He was deeply
immersed in thought when Ruth, on her way to the kitchen with a pile
of dishes, stumbled over a rag mat and sent the crockery crashing to
the floor. Donald was on his feet in a second. "I'm so sorry," he said
apologetically. "I should have given you a hand to clear the things
away. I'm forgetting my manners. Allow me to pick the pieces up!" He
dropped to the floor while the girl regarded him with shining eyes.
Such chivalry in domestic mishaps was unusual.

He collected the broken dishes and carried them into the kitchen, and
when Ruth rolled her sleeves up to wash the breakfast things, he
smiled and held out his hand. "Give me the dish-rag, Miss Nickerson,
and I will wash up. You can dry the things." When she demurred, he
added, "Oh, I'm an old hand at this work. I used to do it for mother
many a time." And he took the dish-cloth gently away from her, while
she mentally remarked on his courtesy with something of regret. "This
delightful boy--a fisherman! Wasting his fragrance on the desert
air ... it's too bad." Fishing, as an occupation did not stand very high
in Ruth's estimation. She was of a romantic turn of mind and longed to
be a modern Una, but the thought of choosing her knight from among
sea-roving fish-killers did not appeal to her imagination. She rather
fancied this stalwart, dark-eyed, confident, cultured youth, but his
profession...? It was the fly in the ointment!

The others had vanished for the time being, and together in the
kitchen, Ruth and Donald washed and dried, chatting, teasing and
laughing until Judson stuck his head around the door. "Oh, there you
are," he cried. "Washin' dishes? Well, well! I cal'late, Ruthie,
you'll have to let your galley-help come along with me. We have a lot
to do an' darn small time to do it in. Come on, Don!" Donald
regretfully relinquished the dish-cloth and wiped his hands, while
Ruth voiced her indignation. "That's you, Judson Nickerson!" she
scolded jocularly. "Always spoiling a pleasant little party by
dragging my visitor off. You may boss him, but, thank goodness, you
can't boss me!"

Her brother looked humorously at her--pulling pensively at his
mustache. "No, by Jupiter, Ruthie-girl," he said, edging towards the
door as he spoke, "I could boss a whole shipload of roughnecks, but I
wouldn't attempt to boss a little spitfire like you."

As he passed through the door after Judson, McKenzie whispered, "This
is the first time I have really enjoyed dish-washing. I'll help you
to-night, if I may." And with the sparkling glance from her laughing
eyes envisioned in his memory, he strode down to the wharf with a
heart as light and care-free as though trouble never existed.

Down at the wharf they tallied the fish out, and kept the score
secret. Then supplies were hustled aboard, and Donald and the skipper
worked until afternoon sending up the _West Wind's_ fore-topmast and
bending the balloon jib. They dined on the vessel, and when tea-time
came, she was ready for the long summer trip with salt, fresh
victuals, and water aboard. "We'll get under way at six in the
morning," said the skipper finally, and he and Don went up to the
house.

Donald had been worrying considerably about his mother, and he
confided his troubles to the skipper. "I want to bring her out here,
captain," he said, "but I don't know if I can afford to keep her on my
wages. I am getting thirty dollars a month as spare hand on the _West
Wind_, and I own that is good money for a chap my age, but could I
keep mother on that out here?"

The other thought for a moment. "I'm afraid not, Don," he said. "You'd
need to earn at least forty-five dollars monthly to keep a home an'
your mother anyways comfortable. However, son, you jest plug along
this summer an' get on to the fishin' so's you kin go in a dory--then
you'll earn more money. This fall, I'm goin' to go master of a big
schooner running fish an' lumber to th' West Indies, an' I hope to
take you along as second mate. You'll get fifty a month then, an' next
spring you'll go in the dory as a fisherman, and ef we strike it right
there's no reason why you shouldn't make six to eight hundred dollars
for the season's work. Fishin' summers an' makin' West Indie voyages
in the winter ought to keep you pretty comfortable for a while. But I
hope in a year or two to see you skipper of your own vessel. With your
brains an' ability, there's no reason why you shouldn't."

Donald smiled. "That's what I hope, Skipper," he said, "but I want to
write mother to-night and give her something definite. I am thinking
of shipping over to Glasgow and bringing her out when we get back. Can
I do it?" "No reason why you can't," replied the other. "It'll only
take you a month to make the trip. S'pose you leave in October, you
can be back in time to sail with me in December. You should have a
couple of hundred dollars to draw come September. You'll be in good
trim then. That'll more than pay her passage out an' yours too." The
lad laughed happily. "That's right, Captain!" he exclaimed, "I'm just
longing to bring her out here. I love this country, and the people,
and I've never regretted going fishing. The past two months have been
a revelation to me, and I've enjoyed every bit of it. The work is hard
when it comes, but there are lots of slack spells to make up for the
hard drags; the living is first class, and there is an element of
hazard and gamble in this fishing game which seems to have got me in a
spell--"

Judson slapped him affectionately on the shoulder. "You've said it
there, Don! That's it! The gamble of it all; the hard work for hard
dollars, and the harder you work--the more you make. We have good
times, good quarters and good grub, and, better'n all, you sail in
able craft an' with able men. That's why I chucked up the other game.
I was fed up mucking about in lime-juicers an' tryin' to get work done
with the no-sailors an' sojers that go in them nowadays. I rushed
them, cursed them, and even banged them at times, but I didn't do that
for the fun of it. I did it--played the bucko--because I had to,
that's why! Your lazy lime-juice shell-backs give Yankee and Bluenose
ships a hard name. Why? Because in aour ships a man had to be what he
signed for. If he was an A.B., he had to do A.B.'s work. If he
couldn't, God help him! We wouldn't put up with sojerin' or slack lip
in aour ships, an' that's why we had the smartest wooden wind-jammers
in the world. Where did you find your best British seamen? In American
and Canadian ships--where they were appreciated and well-fed. No
Yankee or Bluenose officer ever man-handled a good seaman. It was the
bums, the hoodlums, an' the Paddy Westers who tried to run the ship,
that we booted an' belaying-pinned, for that was the only language
they understood and respected. I was long enough in British ships to
have been soured on them. I've seen sails blown away an' gear
destroyed simply because the crew shirked their duty and the
officers--good enough men--couldn't make them do it for fear of bein'
hailed afore a British Consul on the charge of misdemeanors against
the Merchant Shipping Act." He paused and spat disgustedly.
Continuing, he said, "Naow, take yourself! You maybe thought I was a
mite severe with you on th' _Kelvinhaugh_? I never ill-used you,
though I made you hustle. Why? Because I saw you had the makings of a
sailor in you an' I wanted to instill smartness in you. You'll never
forget my lessons, Don, and I'll guarantee when you get a command of
your own, you'll want your crew to skip araound lively an' work, and
ef they don't, you'll know haow to handle 'em!"

They were on the verandah of the Nickerson home by now, and were
greeted by Helena and Ruth. "Don't you believe all Juddy tells you,
Mr. McKenzie," said Ruth, smiling. "He'd make one believe he was a
terrible man at sea. I don't believe he would hurt a fly!" Donald
laughed heartily. His memory flashed back to _Kelvinhaugh_ days and he
recalled some incidents in "brother Juddy's" career which rather
belied his sister's opinion. The skipper himself grinned foolishly,
and glanced from Donald to Helena Stuart. "How did he treat you on
that Scotch ship, Mr. McKenzie?" enquired Ruth. "Was he kind to you?"

"He was my best friend," said Donald seriously, "and did a great deal
more for me than I can ever repay. Your brother, in my humble opinion,
is the most capable and the best-hearted man that I ever knew and--"
"Belay! belay!" cried the skipper, reddening somewhat as he saw
Helena's dark eyes staring at him. "These compliments are liable to
unship a fellow's modesty." And he caught his sister by the arm and
led her into the house, while Helena and Donald remained seated on the
veranda steps.

"Tell me," said the girl after an exchange of small talk. "What sort
of a man is Captain Nickerson at sea? You seem to have a great
admiration for him."

"I have," replied Donald enthusiastically. "He is the ablest man I
have ever known outside of my own father. He is fearless, but not
reckless. He has wonderful endurance and a cultivated mind, and he has
a heart as big as his body. He is a man's man all through!"

Helena made a mental addition, "but evidently not a woman's man."
Aloud, she asked quietly, "Has he--er--do you know if he is anything
of a ladies' man?" There was a curious note in her voice which caused
Donald to glance at her with a quizzical expression.

The youth replied slowly, "Well, now, I don't believe he is."

"How comes it that he has escaped marriage?" she enquired. "They marry
young down here, and he seems to be a fine sort of a man. He must be
around thirty-five now."

"He's thirty-three, I believe," answered Donald. "From what he has
mentioned at odd times, I gather that he was engaged to a girl once
and she jilted him. That's all I know."

Murmuring "Too bad, poor man!" Helena changed the subject and they
talked for a space on other topics, until Mrs. Nickerson called them
in for supper.

After the meal, the young people went into the parlor, and Donald and
Helena played and sang. This did not suit Ruth, who got rather tired
of seeing Mr. McKenzie monopolized by her friend, and as Mrs. Asa was
unable to come over and play for them that evening, she suggested a
walk in lieu of dancing.

"Let us stroll out by the Eastville Cape," she said. "It's a glorious
night and there's a full moon."

"That's a good idea," exclaimed Donald eagerly. "I've almost forgotten
how to walk after two months on shipboard." The skipper, clean-shaven,
and looking bronzed and handsome in his shore clothes, murmured
approval and stood awkwardly to one side as the girls passed out.
Donald and Helena went on to the gallery, and Ruth turned to her
brother. "Go on, now, you big calf," she said quickly. "Go and take
Helena. Don't be hanging back like a country bumpkin."

Judson grinned sheepishly. "Haow do I know she wants to go with me?
Maybe she prefers Donald."

His sister made an impatient gesture. "Don't you like Helena?" she
snapped.

The skipper, reddening under his tan, stood irresolute. "Sure I do,"
he replied, "but I don't want to force my company on her!"

"'Faint heart never won fair lady,'" quoted Ruth sharply. "Go and ask
her to walk with you, and when you talk with her, try and say
something interesting!" And she pushed him out on the gallery towards
the others. Feeling considerably more nervous than he ever felt during
a strenuous watch at sea, Judson took the easier course and addressed
Donald. "Will you walk with Ruth, Don? She's tired of me an' I'm
afraid of her! She's got an awful tongue!" Donald was only too pleased
to make the exchange, and they sauntered down the road towards the
headland.

It was a most entrancing night--a night of dark azure sky brilliant
with moonlight and myriad stars--and the waters of the bay glittered
like silver in the glow from the moon. The warm southerly wind was
perfumed with the scent of budding and flowering herbage and the
balmy, resinous odors of spruce and balsam. The frogs in the field
ponds were crooning their nightly lullabys, and their continuous
croaks served as an orchestral accompaniment to the sweet warbling of
the robins and other songsters of the twilight hours. Somewhere in a
spruce thicket a whip-poor-will was calling, and over on the rocks of
the passage, the gulls sounded weird cries, as if in plaintive
greeting to a coasting schooner standing out to sea with the ebb tide.
She sailed across the moon-path on the water, and for a moment her
hull and sails stood up in silhouette against the silvery background,
then she slipped out of the glare and faded into the darkness, with
but the red glow of her port light to mark her presence.

"Isn't this lovely?" exclaimed Ruth softly, as they sat down in a
hollow of the Cape and looked over the harbor and passage. "This is a
favorite spot of mine, and I love to come here in summer and look at
the sea."

Donald sat on the grass beside her with his arms around his knees. The
spring air was inoculating him with its exhilaration, and a strange
sensation of pleasant enjoyment of life was taking possession of him.
He breathed deep of the warm-scented breeze, and stared at his
partner's pretty features illuminated by the moon-glare. Her face was
turned away from him, and her profile, crowned with a luxuriance of
dark tresses, looked almost Madonna-like in the silvery glow, and
Donald was thinking how delightful it would be to slip his arms around
those rounded shoulders and, holding her closely to him, kiss her upon
that rosy mouth. "In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to
thoughts of love!" Donald recalled the famous phrase and sighed. Ruth
turned. "What are you thinking of, Mr. McKenzie?" she asked, smiling.
For a moment he could not answer, but the "Mr. McKenzie" jarred him.
It did not fit in with the night, and he replied boldly, "I was
thinking how much nicer it would be--for me, at least--if you would
not be so formal. I would like you to call me Don, instead of 'Mister
McKenzie,' and I would also like to call you Ruth. Ruth is such a
pretty name, and should not be masked under the conventional 'Miss'."
He paused and looked at her with wide dark eyes faintly smiling.

The girl bent her head and picked at the grass. "If you would like me
to call you 'Don,' I certainly will--Don," she said with a flash of
her eyes.

He gave a little laugh. "And I hope you will permit me to call you
'Ruth'--Ruth!" With this primary barrier to intimate acquaintanceship
broken down, they sat and talked as only young men and women of "sweet
seventeen" know how, and they voiced the thoughts which came to mind
inspired by the beauty of the night, but Donald dare not give
expression to all the ambitions and desires inspired in him by the
charming young woman at his side. She was very lovable, he thought,
and he knew that his boyish heart was already captivated by her fresh
young beauty and the glory of her clear and deep blue eyes. He always
adored blue eyes, and Ruth's reminded him of the sea and sky in the
track of the Trades--the fine weather, azure when the sun would be
shining, and the flying-fish leaping from the murmuring wave-crests of
the tropical sea--the deep, unfathomed blue.

"I wonder where Juddy and Helena went to?" suddenly exclaimed Ruth.
Donald laughed and his teeth gleamed white in the moonlight. "Nice
teeth!" mentally remarked Ruth.

"I think I can hear him talking on top of the Cape," he answered.
"Listen!" In the quiet of the evening, Judson's voice floated down to
them. He was giving Helena a lesson on the stars, and they could
imagine him pointing them out.

"There's Ursa Majoris! There's Polaris! Arcturus! Sirius! Andromeda!
Cassiopeia!" and so on. Ruth chuckled. "Juddy evidently has scared up
something interesting for Helena. She adores that sort of thing. I was
afraid he would find nothing to talk about but royal sails and gallant
topsails and that sea stuff."

"You misjudge your brother, Ruth," said Donald. "He is a well-read man
and can converse on many subjects not connected with the sea and
ships."

"He ought to be. He was at school long enough. He had a good
education, though, by the way he talks sometimes, you'd think he never
saw the inside of a school-room. But I'm very fond of Juddy. I like
him the best of all, and I would like to see him married and settled.
Don't you think Helena and he would make a good match?" She watched
him curiously when she asked the question.

"I most certainly do," replied Donald heartily. He thought he detected
a faint expression of relief on her face at his answer, and the
thought pleased him mightily.

"We'd better skip along, folks! There's a fog rolling in." It was
Judson calling from the hill path. Regretfully, Donald rose and
assisted Ruth to her feet, and taking her arm, helped her up the
slope. When upon the path again, he evidently labored under the
delusion that his partner was short-sighted or unable to walk without
assistance, as he failed to withdraw the aiding arm. To his secret
delight, the girl made no protest or attempt to withdraw. Upon such
trivial actions do we record another knot ahead on the log slate of
love!

Back on the verandah of the house, they separated into two groups, and
the intimate hour passed all too quick for Donald. The skipper struck
a match and looked at his watch. He would have liked to have sat the
whole night out with Helena, but he had the old-fashioned notion that
half-past ten was a pretty late hour ashore. "I suppose you girls'll
be making for bed naow?" he observed regretfully.

"I guess we must," said Helena, smiling to herself. Helena was city
bred. "What time do you sail, Judson?"

"We'll go out on the first of the ebb-tide at six, I expect."

"I'll be up at five to give you a cup of coffee," said Ruth. Her
brother protested. "No use of your getting up to do that, Sis. Don and
I will go right down aboard th' vessel. McGlashan will have breakfast
all ready--"

"And I suppose you prefer your old cook's coffee to mine!" interrupted
Ruth tartly. McKenzie unconsciously voiced her protest. He wanted to
see all he could of her.

Judson slipped his arm around his sister's shoulders. "There, there,
naow, Petsy!" he soothed. "She shall get up an' make her brother an'
Don a cup of coffee. It shall never be said we refused yours for any
old cook's brew of water bewitched. We'll see you in the morning." He
turned and extended his hand to Helena.

"I guess I'd better bid you good-bye--"

"In the morning," she answered. "I'll be up with Ruth. Good-night!"

Donald retired that night feeling indescribably happy. He felt that he
was on the high road to winning Ruth Nickerson's heart and hand. He
was in love with her, he admitted. He wanted her for his own, and he
felt that she was favorably disposed towards him. This being his first
love, he had no precedents to disillusion him or conjure up obstacles.
It would take time, he knew. He had to make a home for his mother
first and a position for himself. He would work hard and study for
master, and when he skippered his own vessel, he would be all right.
Then he would build a house in the hollow near the Cape--the place
they had visited that evening--and he would ask Ruth to marry him. As
he planned, so he dreamed, and everything was plain sailing and fine
weather.

"Skin up you an' loose y'r mizzen r'yal!" came a snarling voice in his
ear. Old habit made Donald leap up, rubbing his eyes and wondering if
he had committed the crime of sleeping on watch. Judson, lighting the
lamp, laughed. "By gum, Don, that fetched you! I'll bet you thought
you were aboard th' _Kelvinhaugh_ and that I was singin' aout?"

They went downstairs smiling, and found Ruth scurrying around laying
cups on the table. She was in a kimono, and looked, in Donald's eyes,
a picture of feminine loveliness. "Some day," he mused, "she would be
making a snack specially for him when he was going out on an early
morning tide." Alas! his shore hours were too short. He would not see
her again until the fall.

Helena came down, and they all drank the coffee as in a mystic
farewell rite--a valedictory communion. It is wine and the wafer for
the soldier going into battle, but it is coffee and biscuits for the
sailor going to sea!

Seamen hate farewells. Make a brave welcome if you must, but let us
slip away to sea unobtrusively--between sunset and dawn--with the last
ringing laugh in our ears, but do not let us go regretfully, with the
memory of a long hand-clasp and hint of tears in an upturned face.
These are the usual seamen's desires--merely to depart with a
nonchalant "So long!", but Donald had no notion of such a curt
parting. He wanted to spin the bitter-sweetness of it out, as lovers
are fain to do. He gave Ruth's hand a warm squeeze and held it for a
moment. She was looking at him with wide-open blue eyes, with a hint
of fear in them. "Good-bye, Ruth," he said quietly, "I hope to see you
when we come back. Good-bye!" She murmured something, and abruptly he
swung away.




CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE


The _West Wind_ slipped out of the harbor and Don stared up at the
Nickerson house to see if Ruth would wave. A female figure stood on
the verandah and Donald made a farewell gesture with his cap. It might
have been Ruth--he was not sure--but the girl waved in return, Donald
was certain, and the skipper, taking a squint through his binoculars,
said it was his sister.

"Wonder where Helena is?" said McKenzie.

"Oh, guess she's in the house somewhere," replied the skipper somewhat
dolefully, looking back at the receding house on the hill. He turned
to the wheel. "She's a mighty fine girl, Miss Stuart," he remarked,
looking aloft at the main-gaff. The other smiled. "She sure is,
Captain. A fine girl!"

Clear of the Eastville Cape, they hoisted the light sails and headed
up the coast to the eastward, bound for the Magdalen Islands in the
Gulf of St. Lawrence for a baiting of fresh herring. With this
secured, they would fish in the Gulf and on the Newfoundland Banks
during the summer, until their "salt was wetted." "We've got to hustle
to beat Ira Burton," remarked the skipper. "He's at the Islands now,
I'll be bound, and yet ... he may not. I h'ard there was a mull of ice
in Canso Straits and I'm wondering what is the best course to take."

Next morning they were up with Cranberry Island--the north-eastern
extremity of Nova Scotia, and the skipper piloted the schooner into
Canso Harbor. "Um!" he grunted as he scanned the anchorage. "No
schooners here. Must ha' gone up the Straits." They came to an anchor,
dropping the headsails only, and the skipper and Don pulled ashore in
a dory. "We'll go up to the Post Office first, Don, an' see the
weather bulletins, and then we'll do some scouting around for news of
what's doing in the Straits." At the Post Office, Captain Nickerson
asked to see the weather reports for two weeks past, and when they
were handed to him, he read them carefully. Then he went to a
telephone and called up Port Hawkesbury--a small town in the Straits
about twenty-five miles from Canso. When he came from the telephone he
had a concerned look on his face and was pulling nervously at his
moustache. "Ira Burton was there a day or two ago," he said, "but they
tell me he slipped away in the night. Naow, I see by the bulletins
that the wind for the last two weeks a'most has been from a quarter
that'll drive all the Gulf ice into the mouth of Canso Straits, and
it'll need a stiff southerly or easterly to clear it. I'm thinkin'
Burton has figured that all aout, and he'll be gone north-about, same
as I'm plannin', and he'll get to the Madaleens through Cabot Straits.
When the drift ice is crowdin' down here it'll be clear up above."

They got aboard, they got their anchor, hoisted the headsails and shot
out of Canso and up the coast and around Cape Breton Island. In the
Gulf of St. Lawrence, between Cape North and the islands of St. Paul,
they came up with two fishing schooners steering west. It had just
broken daylight and the wind was light, and when the day grew brighter
they saw that one vessel was a Lunenburg schooner of a new model, but
the sight of the other craft caused Nickerson to jump below for his
binoculars.

"It's Burton!" he cried, after a short scrutiny. "I'd know his old
hooker's small fores'l and long bowsprit anywheres." He paced the
quarter, whistling softly to himself--a curious whistle, as though he
were calling a dog--and ever and anon he would murmur, "Come wind!
Come wind! Come wind!" The gang stared at the schooners to leeward
and one of their number pulled a bait-knife from a cleat. "I'll raise
something," he said with a laugh. "I'll stick this in th' forem'st.
That'll raise a breeze, by Jupiter! Never knew it to fail yet!"

The wind was light and variable under the lee of the Cape Breton
mountains, towering a thousand feet high to port, but when they glided
past Cape St. Lawrence, it came away in fresh gusts from the
south'ard. The sky was overcast and there was a rainy haze around the
horizon.

"It's agoin' to blow right enough," said Nickerson, taking over the
wheel from Donald. "We'll get aour breeze afore long ... all we want
of it!" And he sniffed the air and looked to leeward. The other
schooners had caught the draught flowing over St. Lawrence's high
head-land and were bowling off for the Magdalen Islands and rapidly
leaving the _West Wind_ astern.

"Jig up everything, boys!" bawled the skipper. "An' get yer sheets
aft. We'll have a little shoot of fifty miles with those jokers ahead,
and I be damned if we're agoin' to be the last. Th' Lunenburger might
trim us, but I'll be cussed if Burton does. They're mayn't be much
herring at the Islands, but we want to get what there is an' get it
quick!" The breeze caught the _West Wind_ as the gang sweated up and
sheeted-in, and she tore after the other vessels under four lowers,
main-topsail, main-staysail and balloon jib. Nickerson himself took
the wheel and held her to a N.W. by W. course for Amherst Harbor on
Amherst Island of the Magdalen group.

The barometer had dropped to 29.6, and with the southerly came a cold,
rainy mist. Within a half-hour of its commencement, the wind stiffened
into a squally blow and a short, violent chop arose, which had the
schooner plunging and rolling and driving sprays over her bows. But
through it all, she was running along like a hound, with the
white-water racing aft and the wake abroiling.

"It kicks up nasty here," remarked the skipper from the wheel.
"There's a surface current of the water from the melting ice up the
River St. Lawrence streaming down the Gulf this time of year, and it
sets hard to the east'ard. With this southerly blowing across it and
the tide arunning up the Gulf and only twenty fathom under our bottom,
it makes a dirty jobble of sea hereabouts."

When the ice moves out of the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the spring, the
migrating herring "strike in" around the shores of the Magdalen
Islands in countless swarms. They have done so for many years, and the
inhabitants of those bleak and isolated islets trap them in nets as
they seek the shores to deposit their spawn, and while some are
pickled and barrelled for use as food, a considerable quantity is sold
to the fishing schooners for use as bait. In May and June, a large
fleet of Canadian, American, Newfoundland and French fishing craft
repair to the Magdalens to secure fresh bait, and the rule is "first
come, first served." Nickerson knew this, and the skippers of the
other schooners knew it, too, and all three drove their vessels as
hard as they would go. A further incentive to speed lay in the fact
that there would be a fleet of a hundred sail storming out from Canso
Straits with the southerly driving the ice barrier away. With so many
vessels hunting for bait, the demand would be greater than the supply.

Within an hour the breeze had freshened into half a gale, and the
three schooners were laying down to it with their lee scuppers awash
and their decks, gear and canvas drenched with spray and rain. On the
_West Wind_, which was slightly astern of the other two, the gang were
all on deck and lounging aft with sou'westers and oilskins and
sea-boots on, and the skipper, seated astride of the wheel-box,
gripped the spokes in his strong hands and glanced, ever and anon, at
sails, compass and the schooners ahead and to leeward.

There is nothing a Bank fisherman loves more than a race. Not one of
your summer jaunts of a few miles on a measured course in a ladies'
wind, but a genuine thrash to windward in a scupper breeze with all
the "muslin" hung. A race of fifty, or a hundred miles, or even more,
which gives the contestants a chance to show what they can do, is
fishermen's sport, and Donald got an opportunity, in this fifty-mile
"shoot" to the Magdalens, to see the Banksmen on their mettle.

With faces wet and reddened with the wind and slashing rain and spray,
oilskins glistening and dripping water, the men lolled on the cabin
house, laughing and joking, singing and smoking, and when she rolled
down in the puffs, they howled with hilarious delight and prayed for a
breeze "to tear a patch off'n her!"

"Neptune! Boreas! Amphitrite! and all the little windy sea-gods, give
us a breeze!" shouted Nickerson, laughing at McKenzie. He had hardly
spoken, when, with the suddeness which is a characteristic of Gulf
"blows," the southerly began snapping up in savage squalls. The
schooners to leeward were blotted out in the rainstorms, and the _West
Wind_, with never a sheet started, dragged her lee rail under and the
lower dead-eyes of the rigging tore through the broil of water to
loo'ard and the scuppers frothed half-way up the deck. It was brave
sailing, as over the short, savage seas the schooner plunged and
reared, and clouds of spray enveloped her as she stormed along at
fourteen knots.

Bang! With a report like a shot from a gun, the main-gafftopsail
split, and within a moment slatted into a sunburst of ribboned rags.
"Clew up what's left!" bawled the skipper calmly, and to Donald he
shouted. "A job o' sail mending for you, son! I hope ye can handle
palm an' needle?"

The other grinned. "You bust 'em and I'll sit up nights mending 'em,"
he shouted excitedly. "This is what I call sailing! Give it to her,
Skipper, and trim our friend Burton there."

Nickerson nodded. "Leave it to me!" he replied grimly. "I'll trim him
or jump the masts out of this one, by Jupiter!" And by the look in his
eyes, he meant it.

The rags of the topsail were scarce clewed up when another blast
struck the _West Wind_ and she rolled down until her whole lee deck
vanished out of sight in the seething water. The gang jumped like
scared cats for the weather rail and the port nest of dories, and from
these places they actually looked down into the foaming water which
churned and sloshed over the cable and the nest of dories on the
starboard side. With the vessel heeling over at a dangerous angle, the
men glanced nervously at the skipper, but that individual was hanging
on to the wheel-spokes, chewing nonchalantly, and standing with his
feet braced against the side of the wheel-box. "That guy's a perishin'
terror!" shouted someone excitedly. "I wonder ef he knows what a
vessel'll stand? He'll spill us all into th' drink afore we're
through, by Judas!"

Cr-a-ack! Bang! Bang! Flap! Flap! A thundering row aloft--the big
staysail was adrift, slatting and banging and threatening to whip the
top-mast out of her. "Stays'l sheet's carried away! Belayin' pin
broke!" cried a fisherman, and the skipper barked, "I reckon so! Get
that sheet, boys, an' make her fast again!"

A mob of oilskinned men slid down into the water to leeward and
scrambled up the slack lee main rigging. Aloft, the sail was thrashing
about and the sheet was whirling around like a whip and slashing at
the rigging as the canvas flogged in the wind. When the rope flicked
inboard, a dozen hands would make a grab for it.

"Shoot her up, Skipper--" shouted a fisherman.

"An' be damned!" bawled Nickerson, with something of his old
_Kelvinhaugh_ truculence. "None o' you fellows got guts enough to grab
a loose bit o' string? Don't be scared of it--'twon't bite ye!" Thus
adjured, and after receiving some savage blows from the snapping rope,
they managed to grab it, and while sixteen men stood up to their
thighs in water laying their weight on the straining sheet which held
the sail, Donald jammed an iron belaying pin into the rail and took a
turn of the rope around it. With wild shouts and lurid phrases, the
fishermen hauled in the slack and belayed, then returned, panting to
their weather-side perches.

A man jumped out of the fo'c'sle companion in the sprays and clawed
his way aft. He was laughing. "Golly, fellers, ye sh'd be below in th'
fo'c'sle naow!" he shouted above the roar of wind and sea. "Cook's
wild! She's chucked all his pots off'n th' stove an' half his plates
are smashed. Th' fo'c'sle floor is slushin' with pea-soup, rice
pudding an' beans an' everything's swilling with th' water acomin'
daown th' scuttle and th' ventilator. Scotty's in one hell of a rage
and he's alyin' in his bunk cursin' an' swearin' that he won't cook or
clean up a gol-derned thing ontil this here sail-draggin' is over!"

The skipper grinned and gave a hasty glance to windward. "By Gorry,
boys, there's a black squall acomin'," he bawled quickly. "Jump an'
haul daown yer balloon an' stays'l or th' sticks'll go. Look sharp!"
The men raced to obey the command; halliards were cast off; downhauls
manned, and as the canvas was dragged from aloft, bellying and
flapping thunderously, the squall struck the vessel as the skipper
eased the helm down.

The _West Wind_ seemed to stagger to its onslaught and rolled over
until the sea rose to the lee-side of the cabin house and frothed over
the coamings of the main-hatch. Donald, at the stays'l downhaul,
thought she was going to capsize, and one of the men yelled in fright,
"God save us! She's goin' over--she's goin' over! Cut yer dory gripes!
Cut yer dory gripes!" Two men reached for bait-knives and began to
hack at the stout ropes that lashed the weather nest of dories, when
the skipper roared menacingly, "Leave them gaul-derned gripes alone,
you crazy lunk-heads! She's all right, I'm tellin' ye! 'Tis only a
puff!"

"Only a puff?" growled a fisherman. "Only a puff? Another like that
one and there'll be a drowndin' scrape araound here--" He stopped and
yelled, "For th' roarin' ol' Judas! Look at him! He's swingin' her
off! He's swingin' her off!" Nickerson was spoking the helm up, and
Donald hung on to the main-rigging in time to save himself from flying
over the lee rail when she careened to the weight of the wind. "This
is th' perishin' worst I ever saw in sail-draggin'!" remarked someone
huskily. "Does that bucko at th' wheel there think he's sailin' th'
_Flyin' Cloud_ 'round Cape Horn? Ef he don't strip her or lift th'
spars out the ol' hooker yet, I'm a Dutchman!"

The least concerned in the crowd was Nickerson. Cool and calm, with a
truculent look on his stern face, he strained at the spokes with just
the suspicion of a grin on his lips. With his bronzed face streaming
water and his mustache dripping, he glanced into compass and up at the
straining sails and gear with exultant eyes. "Good iron! Good timber!"
he murmured, and broke into the words of an old chantey--

    "Blow, winds, blow!
    To Cal-i-for-ni-o!
    There's plenty of gold, so I've been told,
    On the banks of Sacramento!"

The man seemed to be carried away with the thrill of it--this wild,
roaring, hurling through the water, and Donald gazed on vessel and
steersman with shining, worshipping eyes. Here was a man--a marine
Ajax defying the wind and sea!

It was an inspiring sight, truly! The whole lee side of the schooner
was under from cat-head to the end of the cabin house, and she was
storming along, leaping and plunging, with the sea to leeward in a
welter of white water, seething and roaring, in the drive of her
passage. The wind was whistling in the rigging and drumming in low
thunder from under the bending booms, and with sheets and weather
shrouds bar-taut and the sails as full and as hard as though cut in
marble, the _West Wind_ tore along with her gang hanging on to the
weather gear and her skipper holding her cleaving bow down to her
course.

"Look at Burton!" yelled someone. In the lift of the rain, they saw
the _Annie L. Brown_ astern and running off. Her foretopmast had
carried away and her balloon jib, the topmast, and a raffle of wire
stays and halliards were being salved by her crew. "He's out of it
now," remarked a fisherman, "but he did well. Where's th' Lunenburg
feller?"

For a minute she could not be discerned, but when the rain dissipated,
she showed up on the beam, forging along under her four lowers. She
was a big vessel--a West India voyager, strongly rigged and well
ballasted. The first fury of the squall was easing off now and the
_West Wind_ was showing her rail again.

"Away ye go on yer stays'l!" bawled Nickerson. "That feller'll trim us
ef we don't watch aout!" And when the big fisherman's stays'l went up
between the masts, the whole gang tallied on to the sheet and swayed
it down with excited yells, and the schooner rolled her rail under
again.

In his seafaring, Donald had never experienced such a contest. He had
seen some sail-carrying on the _Kelvinhaugh_ and _Helen Starbuck_, but
nothing to equal this. Judson was pressing the vessel to the limit,
but he could do it, as he had nineteen husky men he could depend on to
haul the sail off her when the time came. In the _Kelvinhaugh_, with
her gang of no-sailors and weaklings, it couldn't be done; in the
_Starbuck_, with a small crowd, it would be suicidal. "If it were only
for these races alone, I'd love this fishing game," said Donald to the
skipper. "This is simply great!" And he chuckled and snapped his
fingers with the exhilaration of this windy driving of wood, iron and
canvas.

With the stays'l on her, the _West Wind_ drew ahead and the
Lunenburger was evidently content to allow her the advantage, as he
did not send his stays'l up. It was found out afterwards that he had
none to send up--it having split to rags in one of the squalls. The
skipper laughed. "We've trimmed 'em both," he remarked happily. To
Donald, he said, "Read the log!"

"Forty-six miles, skipper!"

"Good!" he said. "Forty-six miles in three hours and a half is fair
going. We must ha' logged sixteen knots in some o' them bursts of
wind. It's easing off naow--her rail's showin'." And he grinned
contentedly, while a fisherman remarked, "We kin trim Burton sailin'
anyway, an' I cal'late we kin trim him afishin' too--"

"Land ahead!" came the shout from for'ard. The skipper peered into the
rainy mist and put the wheel over a spoke. A huge block of reddish
stone showed up on the port bow a mile ahead. "Entry Island!" he
observed. "I steer as good as Captain Clincher when he laid a course
for the Eddystone Light and knocked it daown! Ye can keep a look-out
for Pearl Rock buoy on the starb'd hand and get fifteen fathom of
chain over th' windlass."

When they passed the island, the sea became smoother and the wind
eased off. A misty rain was falling, which obscured the land, but a
steamer could be seen anchored ahead. "Ice-breaker or Fishery Cruiser,
I cal'late," said Judson. "He'll be anchored in plenty water, so we'll
jest jog to the west'ard of him without letting go the hook. Haul yer
stays'l daown an' git a dory over!"

They ran slowly past the Fishery Cruiser, and a rising of the mist
revealed the bare hills of Amherst Harbor and the little wooden houses
of the village. A flag was flying from a staff on a hill above the
harbor, and the skipper commented, "There's the bait flag aflyin'!
There must be bait around somewheres." Leaving the schooner in charge
of Donald, Captain Nickerson jumped into a dory and was pulled ashore.
Within half an hour he was aboard. "There's a little herring at
Alright Island," he announced. "Ef we're spry, we'll get it. Slack off
yer sheets!" He took the wheel again. "We're darned lucky," he said.
"There's been a lot of bad weather here an' they haven't had much
herring so far. Burton'll have a job to get any for a while."

They stood over for Cape Alright a few miles away, and met the
Lunenburg schooner running into Amherst. Nickerson hailed him. "Come
over to Alright, Cap'en! There's some herring there--enough for two of
us!" The other skipper waved his hand and his schooner followed in the
_West Wind's_ wake.

Off the island, the dories were hoisted out and pulled in to the traps
anchored off the beach. Here they were loaded with living herring
bailed from the seine, and the men rowed back to the _West Wind_,
sitting in herring up to the thwart strips. With eight dory-loads
aboard and stowed on ice in the hold, the skipper chuckled gleefully,
"Me'n th' Lunenburg feller hev scoffed all the bait hereabouts. Ira
Burton'll hev to do some pokin' araound these Islands when he hits
here, and he'll hev fifty or a hundred other craft to compete against.
Now, boys, we'll get under way an' start for the grounds. We'll shoot
for th' Straits and the Western Bank again."

As they ran out of the bay, the mist lifted and the _Annie L. Brown_
came bowling up. Her fore-topmast showed but a splintered stump just
above the fore-mast cap. "Haul in by him, skip!" earnestly requested
the gang, and Judson swung the _West Wind_ towards the oncoming
schooner. As she approached, the _West Winders_ seized herrings, and
holding them aloft, jeered and yelled, "Thar ain't no more, bullies!
We scoffed 'em all!" Sallies and jibes flew thick and fast between the
rival crews, but the two skippers steered and remained silent.

"Why'n blazes, Harry, don't ye ship in a craft what kin sail?" roared
a _West Winder_ to a friend on the _Brown_.

"There goes the Old Trawler's Home!" shouted another in derision.
"Come a trip with us, me sons, an' you'll bait small an' catch large,
as well as learn haow to sail a vessel. Why ain't you got yer ridin'
sail on her? Ye're gittin' reckless!" And so they jibed and shouted
until the other vessel passed out of hearing.

Running to the south'ard for the Canso Straits, the wind veered and
the mist blew away and revealed a wonderful sight. Standing in to the
Islands under all sail, came a mighty Armada of fishermen--fifty or
sixty beautiful, clean-lined schooners, yacht-like with their white
canvas and painted and varnished spars--and all were racing for bait.
With booms sheeted in and decks sloped at angles which had the froth
boiling in the scuppers, they stormed along with the white-water
shearing away from their sharp bows and their crews shouting and
bawling rude jests at each other. The _West Wind_ ran down among them,
and as they flew past, she was greeted with cheers as the "first
hooker to bait at the Madaleens!"

"Any herrin' left for us?" they enquired in stentorian tones. And this
question was asked by all the vessels which passed them within hail.

"By George," exclaimed McKenzie, "but this is a sight! This is worth
coming a long way to see. It's wonderful!"

"Aye," remarked Judson, "it's a great snarl of canvas, an' many a
wealthy yachtsman would give a thousand dollars to be in that fleet
racing for the Islands. This happens every spring in aour fisheries,
an' when they're all anchored in Pleasant Bay of a night, their ridin'
lights make 'em look like th' streets of a town."

Within an hour, they passed the stragglers, and soon they came up with
evidences of the blockade in the pieces of floating field ice which
littered the sea ahead. As far as the eye could discern, the white
pans of ice flecked the green of the water, but it was small and mushy
and not particularly dangerous. A good look out was kept and the
vessel was steered to avoid the large pieces, and by nightfall, she
passed through them into clear water.

The May days slipped into the summer days of June and the _West Wind_
wandered from Bank to Bank, with her crew working hard from daylight
to dark. On Sundays they rested, though a good many fishermen work
Sundays, yet Nickerson remarked, "We're workin' double-tides on this
hooker, and a Sunday lay-off gives a feller a chance to rest up. We
can work all the harder for it."

"Do all the fleet work like we do?" enquired Donald.

"No, indeed they don't," replied the skipper. "We're only driving like
this because we're out to win that bet. The other Bankers take it
easier, an' they loaf around a lot. You take it this spring. The fleet
lay around Port Hawkesbury for a week doin' nawthin', then they'd lay
around the Madaleens for another week, maybe. Then they'd run off to
the Banks an' fish their bait, an' then some of them'll start cruisin'
around Noof'nland ports for the capelin bait. In the blows, they'll
run in to port an' lay ontil it's over, but _I_ don't believe in that.
I'd sooner ride it aout hove-to an' keep the drift of her an' hang on
to the grounds. By using my knowledge of navigation, I can always make
my berth again, but some of these other skippers have to run in to the
land to get a new departure from which they'll steer to the Banks
again ... which wastes time. Then again, all these fellers won't h'ist
dories over in thick or hazy weather like we do, and if I hadn't a
good husky, willing gang, we wouldn't do it either."

"What counts in successful fishing--luck or work?"

"Luck--some," replied Judson, "but mostly work. You take all the
Gloucester an' Lunenburg high-liners--they're all hustlers. They work
hard, skippers and men, and it pays them when the share checks are
given aout. Some of those smart high-line skippers will make as much
as two thousand dollars out of the summer's fishin', and if they fish
winters as well, they'll often make five thousand in the year. Haow
many liner skippers are gettin' a thousand pounds a year? I doubt if
there's a one! I claim this work ain't as hard as when I was in th'
merchant service. What was I gettin' as mate of that _Kelvinhaugh_?
Nine ruddy pounds a month! Forty-five measly dollars! D'ye wonder at
me gittin' aout? What do _you_ think?"

Donald looked over the summer sea at the dories, which here and there
dotted its blue expanse. In every boat two men were pulling the lines
up from the ocean floor and toiling like beavers. Not heart-breaking,
hopeless toil, but work at which a man can sing, at which he is
wresting silver dollars for his effort. Some of them were singing, and
their voices carolled across the lazy water. When the heart is glad
there is no hardship in toil! From the sea, he gazed on the schooner
sluggishly rolling in the swell, with a cheeping of boom jaws and a
pattering of reef-points on the great stretches of canvas which reared
aloft. It was very quiet and peaceful. For'ard, McGlashan, in white
apron, was shifting his galley funnel for a better draught, and he,
too, was crooning a lay to--

    "Bonnie wee Leezie--tha floo'er o' Dundee!"

A delicious whiff of fresh-baked bread floated aft, suggestive of the
good fare upon which they lived, and the summer breeze blew soft and
warm. In the pens were a number of fine cod-fish awaiting the
splitter's knife, and on the cabin roof was a pillow where he and
Judson had been dozing in the sunshine after the dories left the
vessel. The memory of his days in the fishing fleet passed through his
mind and they were pleasant memories. He thought of what he had seen
of the sea in the past; thought of the rollicking, good-natured
fellows he was now shipmates with, of Eastville and its people, and
taking a deep breath, he replied, "This is the life, Skipper, and the
more I see of it, the more I am convinced that you are a wise man!"

They fished steadily throughout the long summer days and worked to the
north and east. On St. Pierre Bank they "jigged" a great baiting of
squid--an octopus-like creature which may be caught near the surface
on calm nights by dangling a small, umbrella-like hook overside. The
squid enveloped the jig with its tentacles and would be whisked aboard
squirting sepia in protest. With this bait--beloved by cod--they
fished on St. Pierre and over on Grand Bank, and the rough grained
salt in the bins got lower and lower, and the kenched cod in the
fish-room grew daily higher, and the _West Wind_ settled deeper in the
water with the weight of it.

Times there were when they fished in plenteous company, and many a
dawn would show sails all around the horizon. Oft-times they swung a
dory over and "visited"--sitting in a stranger's cabin with all hands
crowded in listening while the skippers talked "fish." In these
visits, Nickerson would pick up all the news and gossip of the great
fleet which did business on the huge watery areas from Le Have to the
Virgin Rocks, and he would give information and prospects as freely as
the other man. On one occasion they boarded a large French topsail
schooner out from St. Servan, and Donald essayed a conversation in
halting French. The outcome of this visit did not result in much
fishery news, but the skipper received a bottle of cognac in return
for a few plugs of tobacco, and McKenzie came away wondering how the
deuce the Frenchmen got around in the clumsy, straw-stuffed _sabots_
and ponderous cow-hide, wood-soled sea-boots they wore.

In mid-August, they ran down to Western Bank again on the strength of
a rumor that cod were extremely plentiful there, but they had only
made one set when one of the crew developed a sickness which looked
suspiciously like typhoid fever.

"We'll run to Eastville, Donald," said Judson. "We'd better land
Wesley at his home and we'll fill up the tanks with water that we're
sure of." At this announcement, McKenzie felt a strange thrill.
"Eastville ... Ruth!" The names were synonymous, and it was quite
possible that the skipper had the same incentive, but with a different
objective. Under all sail, they crowded her home in a rare sailing
breeze, and "with the Eastville girl ahauling on the tow-line," they
stormed in past the Capes on a lovely August morning and tied up to
the dock. Wesley, muffled in blankets, was landed and rushed to his
home, and the doctor pronounced it as a touch of typhoid, not a bad
case, but enough to keep him in bed and ashore for a spell.

"I'll have to pick up another man for his dory," said Judson, but
Donald broke in, "How about me, Skipper? Don't you think I'm able
enough to go in the dory with Jack Thomas?" The skipper laughed. "If
Jack will agree, I will! It'll leave me without a spare hand, though,
but as the summer's near over, I don't mind." Jack Thomas was
agreeable, and McKenzie would go in the dory as a full-fledged
fisherman when the _West Wind_ made her next set.

After landing the sick man and giving orders for the tanks to be
disinfected and re-filled, Judson and Donald went up to the house.
Donald, feeling strangely elated, walked with springing steps,
wondering if Ruth would be as glad to see him as he to see her. There
was no sign of her on the veranda when they approached, and it was
Mrs. Nickerson who met them, surprised and pleased. McKenzie nervously
awaited Ruth's appearance.

"Where are the girls?" enquired the skipper, after kissing his mother.

"They've both gone to Halifax for a visit," replied the old lady.
"Just went this morning, too. Isn't that too bad!" Donald said
nothing, but felt it was a calamity. Another month now before he would
see her again, and a month is an age when one is in love. He felt
very blue, but when Judson was called away to the telephone, he perked
up and chatted with Mrs. Nickerson as amiably as if he had never been
disappointed in his life.

When the skipper came back, he announced, "Tom Haskins wants to buy
aour fish. Wants to git some dried an' shipped afore the fleet comes
in, and he offers a good price. We'll unload right away and git aout
to-night so's we'll git a day's fishin' to-morrow. We'll come up for
supper, mother."

With Captain Bill Smith, the harbor-master, checking the weights as
they discharged the fish, they emptied the _West Wind's_ hold clean to
the floors. "You got a good jag, Judson," said the Captain. "You must
ha' fished hard to git all them in that time."

"D'ye s'pose we'll be high-line, Cap'en?" asked Jud with a twinkle in
his eye.

The old harbor-master bit off a chew of tobacco. "Ye might," he
answered non-committally. "Ye never kin tell."

"Burton, naow--d'ye s'pose he landed as much as we did on his spring
trip?" queried Nickerson quizzically.

"He might have," replied the old man, with an unemotional visage. "Ye
never kin tell ... 'til th' tally's published." Judson chuckled and
clapped the other on the back.

"Closer'n a clam, you are, Cap'en, but you're quite right. I'm agoin'
to beat him sure! I'm off to-night for another jag."

That evening they slipped out of Eastville for the Banks again.




CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR


After making a few sets on Western Bank, they ran up on to Grand again
and anchored on the south-western edge of the ground. Donald went in
the dory with Jack Thomas, and the two of them got along very well
together, but Donald found the dory work considerably different from
the deck labor of a fishing vessel. Rowing the heavy boat to windward
or against the tide for a mile or two was genuine hard work, and
hauling a trawl against the same wind and tide for the best part of a
day was a job well-calculated to try the muscles of the arms and back.
However, with time, he soon "caught on," and after a couple of weeks
over the side, he could do his share of hauling trawl in the dory-bow
and at baiting up the gear.

When he got into the swing of it, Donald really enjoyed the work.
There was something indescribably alluring in being out on old ocean's
breast in a frail boat a hundred miles from the nearest land and
pulling up the finny spoil from the sea floor, anywhere from two
hundred to five hundred feet below. And one never knew what was on the
hooks until they were hauled up fathom by fathom, but standing in the
dory bow on smooth days, one could see a long way into the pellucid
green, and the wriggling fish would show a flash of white belly thirty
or forty feet from the surface. To the man of scientific leanings,
much could be learned from this very intimacy with the ocean. Whales
often broke water within a biscuit toss of the dories, and
sharks--snapping at the fish on the trawl--were common sights.
Porpoises and black-fish played around them in schools on numerous
occasions, and Donald once witnessed a most terrific fight between a
whale, a sword-fish and a thrasher. Prodded or slashed by the
sword-fish from below and flayed by the tail of the thrasher from
above, the huge cetacean forged to the surface and hove its great bulk
out of the sea in a desperate effort to shake off its tormentors, and
the splash of its impact with the sea again reverberated across the
water for miles.

Besides cod, haddock, cusk, pollock and hake, which they usually got
on the hooks, a numerous variety of other fish were caught, and Donald
examined them with studious interest. Star-fish of many kinds, sea
anemones, sea vegetables--lemons, cucumbers, potatoes and cabbage,
came from the depths, besides crabs, scallops and cockles, and odd
fish species, such as sculpins, anglers or monk-fish, dogfish,
wolf-fish, cat-fish, lump-fish, halibut, flounders, skate and others.
These "curiosities" he brought aboard and examined and dissected, and
the postmortems often revealed strange facts. In the stomach of an
angler would be found a large spiny sculpin; in that of a wolf, or
cat-fish, the crushed shells of scallops and crabs ground up by the
powerful jaws and canine teeth of these fish, and Donald would wonder
how it is possible for such tough fare to be digested.

Sometimes they had the sea all to themselves; at others, the horizon
would be dotted with fishing craft, and occasionally they would be in
company with a St. Malo barque, or St. Servan brig, fishing on the
ground. Oftentimes, steamers would pass, but, strangely enough, more
could be _heard_ in fogs, than _seen_ in clear weather. On a memorable
occasion, they saw a huge iceberg stranded on the Eastern Shoals of
Grand Bank, and they sent the dories in to pick up pieces of the
broken ice drifting to leeward of the monster for the purposes of
keeping their squid bait fresh.

Thus the August days passed and time slipped along into September.
Days of lazy calms, when the sea stretched oily and undulated with a
slow heave like the breast of a giant in slumber, and the vessel
rolled so lightly as to be almost imperceptible; days of brave west
winds, when the sea was whipped into blue corrugations crested with
foam which glistened in the sun and tossed the dories up and down on
comber and trough; days of storm, with rain and savage squalls, which
forced the schooner to drift under a foresail and jumbo until the blow
passed and they could commence fishing again after the enforced, but
welcome rest; and most dreaded of all, days of smoking fogs which
covered the sea in a thick, viewless pall and kept the fishermen
nervous and wide-awake for the shrieking sirens of the liners racing
across the Banks. And they had reason for fear!

On September 12th, the _West Wind_ was lying to a hawser anchor in
twenty-six fathoms on the eastern edge of Banquereau, or Quero Bank.
It was foggy when the men went over the side in the morning, and
towards noon the fog shut down so thick that Captain Nickerson decided
to keep the gang aboard after they discharged their first haul of
fish. The first dory to get alongside was Thomas and McKenzie, and
they pitched their catch out and hoisted their dory on the rail and
left the tackles hooked into the bow and stern beckets. Thomas went
down into the forecastle to get a mug of tea from McGlashan, while
Donald went aft to talk with the skipper. While they sat chatting on
the cabin house, they were startled out of their wits by the jarring
roar of a steamer's whistle close aboard.

Thomas, in the forecastle, was up on deck in a trice, closely followed
by Joak, and Nickerson bawled, "Ring th' bell! Ring th' bell! He's
acomin' slap bang for us!" Donald jumped down into the cabin for the
skipper's shot-gun and a few shells, and was just coming up the
companion steps when he heard Nickerson shout, "God Almighty! He's
into us!" There was a terrific crash, followed instantly by the
rending, grinding and splintering of wood, and as the schooner rolled
down, McKenzie leaped out of the cabin companionway in time to avoid
the sweep of the mainmast and maintopmast as it thundered down across
the quarter. For a second he was dazed, and only conscious of a huge
bulk immediately back of him, then the deck tilted up beneath his feet
and he was hurled violently into the water.

His first instinct was to swim away from the monster smashing and
rending him, and with his head down he trudgeoned hard for almost half
a minute. Then, pausing for breath, he swung around, and trod water.
The first thing that met his eyes was the rust-streaked hull of a
large steamer gliding past in the mist but a scanty fifty feet away.
He could see her funnel and boat deck looming in the fog, but his
vision was mostly centred on the red strake of her water-line, a
white-painted load-line mark, the condenser water pouring from a
sluice in that blank wall of riveted steel plating, and the broil of
foam from the churning screw. The latter sight caused him to swing
around again and swim for a frantic half-minute. He did not want to
get caught in that vortex and cut to pieces, and when he had exhausted
himself in his spurt, he turned under the ship's stern and read the
name, _Livadia--Piraeus_.

Panting for breath, he attempted to shout, but was unable to render
more than a husky croak, "Help! Help!" A piece of the schooner's deck
surged up out of the water close beside him, and as he grasped it, he
saw the _Livadia's_ fantail become misty in the fog, and finally
vanish altogether. "Swine!" gasped Donald. "He's leaving us.... Greek
swine!" And for a minute he clung to the wreckage regaining his wind
and scattered senses.

"Help! Help!" A faint cry came out of the mist to his right. It
sounded like the skipper's voice. "Hold on! I'm coming!" shouted
Donald, and taking a deep breath, he slipped into the sea again and
struck out in the direction of the cry. Dodging pieces of splintered
timber, he came upon Nickerson hanging to the cover of the wheel-box.
It was scarce enough to float him and his head was very low in the
water, while every now and again he would go under altogether. Blood
flowed from a gash in his scalp, and by the look on his face he was
nearly all in.

"Here I am, Skipper!" cried Donald, swimming up to him and thrusting
an arm under his elbow to lift his head out.

Judson's eyes turned and looked into his. "I--I--can't--swim!" he
gasped. Donald nodded. "Don't get nervous, Jud!" he cried,
reassuringly. "I'll fix you up in a minute if you'll do as I tell you.
Grab that box with both hands and kick your feet out like a frog."

"Can't.... Too--heavy--boots!" gasped the other.

"Wait! I'll slip them off!" And Donald, free of his own, ducked under
and hauled the skipper's heavy leather boots off his legs. Blowing and
puffing, he came up. "Now you're all right," he said. "Do as I tell
you and I'll get you over to a larger piece of wreckage."

The skipper nodded and commenced striking out with his feet. Donald,
treading water beside him, scanned the sea for wreckage. At last he
spied what looked like the main-mast about a hundred feet away. "I see
the mast over there," he said. "You keep paddling, Jud, and I'll swim
over and bring back a line and tow you!" In a few minutes he was back
with the gaff-topsail sheet, and hitching this through a ring in the
wheel-box cover, he cautioned Judson to hang on. Swimming over to the
mast with the line in his teeth, he gained the spar and managed to
haul the skipper up to it.

Sitting astride the long pole, Donald caught Nickerson by the
shoulders and dragged him over it. Judson was heavy, and he seemed to
have no strength in his arms, and McKenzie was pretty well played out
by the time he got the skipper on the spar and with his legs astride
of it. "Take a breather for a spell, Skipper," he said. "Just lie
quiet. I'll see that you don't roll off." For ten minutes Nickerson
lay prone--sick with the salt water he had swallowed--but after a
while, the color returned to his face and he looked up.

"I'm all right naow, Don," he said. "Who was that sweep that hit us?
Don't appear to have stopped ... or launched a boat."

McKenzie replied with bitterness in his voice, "A dirty Greek. I got
her name--_Livadia_ of Piraeus."

Nickerson nodded. "That's near Athens," he observed. "A clumsy,
lubberly Greek. He cut his stick for fear of the consequences, but he
won't get away with it. We'll make him sweat, by Godfrey! _Livadia_ of
Piraeus! Humph!"

Pieces of the _West Wind_ floated past them in the smooth sea, and the
skipper began identifying them. "There's a bit of the cabin house.
There's a bait-knife still stuck in the cleat, see? There's the chain
cable box, and there's a slew o' pen boards. Some of the boys'
blankets over yonder--Godfrey! my head's buzzin' and achin'. Th'
main-mast or the gaff gave me a devil of a wipe when it came down an'
knocked me overboard!"

Nickerson evidently received a hard blow, and as time passed he began
to jabber meaningless phrases. "I want a drink in the worst way, Don,"
he cried. "Get me a drink, like a good chap!" It was very quiet on the
water and the fog blanket lay very thick. Donald was shouting for help
at intervals, but the mist seemed to stifle his voice. The prospects
were beginning to look black, and he yelled and shouted until his
voice began to crack. Real fear began to clutch at his heart. If other
vessels or dories were in the vicinity, they might pass close by and
never see or hear them.

They had been on the spar for almost an hour, and Donald was really
anxious. Nothing could be heard save the lapping of the water around
the broken mast and Nickerson's mutterings. He was lying face down,
apparently oblivious of his surroundings, and McKenzie had passed a
line around his body to prevent him sliding off. He collected his
energies for another spell of yelling and had bawled the first "Help!
Help!" when an answer came, "Keep ashoutin' 'til we pick you up!"

In a voice as hoarse as a crow's, he continued crying out, until a
dory loomed out of the mist and rounded alongside the spar. She was a
fisherman's dory, and there were two men at the oars.

"Get the skipper in first," croaked Don. "He's had a crack on the
head. Who are you? Where's your vessel?"

"We're off the _Frank and Mary_--of Gloucester," replied one of the
men. "We picked up th' rest o' your gang in th' dories, an' some of us
are scoutin' around lookin' for youse."

"Did you get our cook and my dory-mate--a man called Thomas?" asked
Donald anxiously, as he clambered into the boat.

The fisherman shook their heads. "Naw," they answered. "We only picked
up fellers in dories. We never got any fellers but youse out the
water." McKenzie's heart flopped like a lump of lead in his breast.
"Poor Joak," he murmured almost tearfully. "Poor Joak ... my old chum.
And Jack Thomas ... one of the best!" He looked over the mist-wreathed
water with his fingers twining together nervously. Then he recalled
the vision of a steel stem--grinding, smashing and rending--the Beast
of the Banks--and he ground his teeth in an excess of rage and
bitterness at the suddeness and the ruthlessness of their hurling into
Eternity. He gripped the dory gunnel convulsively in fingers of steel.
"They'll pay for this! They'll pay for this!" he cried aloud.

"You got th' steamer's name?" queried a fisherman, pulling away.

McKenzie started. "Aye ... we got her name!"

A big schooner under sail loomed out of the mist and a voice shouted,
"Here they are, an' they've got a couple o' them!" Within a minute
they rounded up alongside and the skipper was handed over the rail and
taken down into the cabin. He was in a dazed state from exhaustion and
the effects of the blow on the head. Donald, little the worse for his
experience, went down into the forecastle, where he was surrounded by
the _West Wind's_ gang and questioned as to how it all happened. After
he had related the affair as he knew it, they shook their heads
dolefully. "Poor cook! Poor Thomas!" they murmured. John McGlashan and
James Thomas could be listed with the yearly toll of the Banks.

     "Drowned on Banquereau when the fishing schr. _West Wind_ of
     Eastville, N.S., Nickerson, Master, was run down while at
     anchor and sunk by the Greek steamer _Livadia_ of Piraeus."

That would be their epitaph! After drinking a cup of hot coffee and a
bowl of warm soup, Donald turned into a bunk, and thinking over the
loss of his chum and his dory-mate, cried--not like a baby--but like a
man.

He lay quiet for an hour, then he got up. His clothes were being dried
at the cook's stove, so he wore a pair of pants and a sweater lent him
by one of the _Frank and Mary's_ crew. "How're ye feelin'?" asked the
men lounging around on the lockers and bunks.

"Not so dusty," answered McKenzie.

"Yer skipper says ye saved his life," observed the cook from the
stove. "He was jest alettin' go when you came up an' hauled him to
that spar. It's a great thing to be able to swim."

"How is he?" enquired the youth eagerly.

"He'll be alright," replied the other. "I fixed up his head an' gave
him a slug of old Jamaikey to wash the salt water outa his stomach.
He's asleep now, but he'll be fit when he wakes."

One of the _West Wind's_ crowd spoke. "We've cruised all around the
wreckage, Donald, but thar' ain't no sign of the cook or Thomas.
Cal'late they must ha' gone under when th' steamer crashed into yez.
Lucky thing for us we was out in the dories, or there'd ha' bin a
bigger drowndin' scrape."

McKenzie sat quiet for a moment, until he heard the dull mutter of a
bow wave outside and felt the slight rolling of the vessel. "Under
way?" he enquired.

"Baound fur Halifax," answered the cook. "Aour skipper's agoin' to
land yez there." He busied himself around the stove for a while and
then remarked, "Lucky thing for youse fellers that you landed most of
yer season's fish. You ain't agoin' to lose too much--"

"Won't we?" ejaculated a _West Winder_. "We'll lose a bet we had with
the _Annie L. Brown's_ gang. I had a hundred dollars on that. Th'
skipper had five hundred, an' most of the boys put up a dollar or two.
We'd ha' trimmed that outfit hands daown. Ira Burton ain't in it with
Jud Nickerson fur ketchin' fish." And he growled anathema on the
Grecian ship.

Captain Nickerson was himself again by supper time, but was dreadfully
upset on hearing of the loss of McGlashan and Thomas. "I would have
gone, too, if it hadn't been for you, Donny-boy," he said. "Can't
swim, y'know, and there's not many fishermen that can. Water's too
cold around our coasts for bathing. You pulled me through, son--"

"Just as you did on a good many other occasions," interrupted Donald,
"so that makes us quits."

The skipper smiled faintly. "We also lose our bet, I'm afraid, though
I don't think Ira Burton can collect from us. However, it don't
matter. I'll get another vessel again--the _West Wind_ was
insured--and I'll have no trouble next season in getting a
gang--that's certain."

They were landed in Halifax forty hours after the accident, and
Captain Nickerson immediately reported the facts of the collision to
the marine authorities. As luck would have it, the Grecian steamer was
then in the harbor. She had made no report of the mishap--a damning
feature--and, as she was about to sail for Baltimore, she was libelled
and held, and her master and watch officers were hailed before the
authorities to explain. At first they absolutely denied sinking any
schooner, or even scraping one, and they had even altered the ship's
log-book to show that they were not in the vicinity when the collision
happened, but under expert cross-examination their story broke down,
even though they refused to admit the facts. Inspection of the
steamer's bows revealed dents and scrapes freshly painted over, and
eventually, a sailor with a grudge, failed to corroborate the
officers' evidence and bluntly stated that they had run down an
anchored schooner on the Banks and deliberately steamed away from the
scene. The master and owners of the _Livadia_ were required to furnish
bonds for fifty thousand dollars before the steamer was allowed to
proceed. The official inquiry was set for the week following, at
which all parties were required to attend the Court in Halifax.

Captain Nickerson, Donald and the _West Wind's_ crew boarded the
packet steamer that evening for Eastville Harbor, and just a minute
prior to sailing, two men came running down the wharf. Shouting "Wait
a minute!" they ran up the gang-plank and staggered into the midst of
the _West Wind's_ crowd, who greeted their unceremonious boarding with
incredulous oaths and shouts of surprise. _It was Joak McGlashan and
Jack Thomas!_

"Where in the name of all that's sacred did you fellers spring from?"
gasped the skipper, while Donald grabbed Joak to see if he were really
alive. "Jist came in, Skipper," answered McGlashan breathlessly. "Jist
got put aff a schooner a wee while ago an' we've had tae rin like
blazes tae catch this wee boat here. They tel't us on the wharf that
yez was a' picket up."

"By Jingo, Joak," said McKenzie, "I've been weeping over you as being
drowned on Quero. How the deuce did you escape?"

"Gimme a chanst tae get ma wind!" McGlashan sat down on a pile of
freight and wiped the perspiration from his brow. "It was like this,
ye see," he said, when he had recovered his breath. "We came up on
deck when yon steamer whustled, an' we ran fur the dory which Donald
and Jack had jist left hanging on the rail. The steamer hit her abaft
the main-mast, aboot the gurry-kid, and it didna hit the dory. Me'n
Jack jist tumbled intae it, and when the mast went, the dory went
intae the water. We lost the oars and were driftit awa' frae the
schooner, but efter two hours floatin' aboot we were picket up by a
Yankee schooner and landed in Halifax a while syne. That's all there
is tae tell, except that we were sure the skipper and Donald were
lost, as we knew you were baith aft when the steamer hit." He gave a
deep sigh and continued. "Anyway, we're all here, thank God, but the
schooner's gone, and ma good clothes are gone, and ma alarrm clock,
too, and I had a fine codfish chowder on the stove fur yer dinners
that day that also went--" He spoke so solemnly that the listeners
laughed immoderately. "By gorry, cook, you're a haound!" they
chuckled. What was at first thought to be a tragedy, was now looked
upon as an experience, an incident for yarning and joking about, and
they spent much time in chaffing McGlashan about the loss of his
"alarrm clock," his clothes and the chowder.

Arriving back in Eastville Harbor, Donald and the skipper were
disappointed to find that Ruth was in Halifax staying with the
Stuarts. Had they known, they would have looked the girls up before
coming home. However, they would be in Halifax at the inquiry the
following week, and Donald looked forward to seeing Ruth then with
feelings of anticipatory pleasure. He had not seen or heard from her
for four months, and when a youth is in love with a pretty and very
desirable girl, four months is a terribly lengthy period.

At the Nickerson home, Jud's parents were kindness personified. Old
Mrs. Nickerson took Donald in hand and purchased him an outfit of both
sea and shore clothes. They were not expensive clothes, but they were
of good wearing stuff. For the first time in over a year, he possessed
a shore suit, and, even though it was ready-made store clothes and of
a fit and pattern a good deal poorer than he had worn at other times
and in other circumstances, he was glad to have them and to know that
he could call on Ruth in Halifax without qualms as to his personal
dressing. He fancied nice clothes, and would like to be able to
purchase a complete rig-out of good quality and finished tailoring,
but when a lad is earning thirty-five dollars a month and saving to
make a home for his mother, he cannot spend money in dress. Donald
accepted Mrs. Nickerson's gifts with deep appreciation, but with a
sneaking suspicion that Judson had engineered the whole thing as a
reward for services rendered.

The _West Wind's_ two trips of fish were sold, and the skipper
announced that they had landed altogether three thousand five hundred
quintals. Had they completed the season, the _West Wind_ would have
made a record catch, but, as it was, the crew were eminently satisfied
with share checks in the neighbourhood of $600 per man, with a
possible addition for gear, clothes and fish lost when the collision
case was tried and judgment secured against the Greek steamer's
owners. Donald received a check for $140. "And there's more acomin' to
you," said Judson when he paid him. "You'll draw a fisherman's share
for this last trip, but we've got to get the money from those Greeks
first. They'll pay us enough to help build a new vessel, for the fish
we lost, and all our outfit and gear. They'll _have_ to pay, for they
haven't a leg to stand on. The money is as good as ours naow!" And he
chuckled grimly.

When the inquiry was over, Donald intended to ship in a vessel for
Glasgow and bring his mother out to Nova Scotia. He had already
written her to that effect, and before he went to Halifax, he and Mrs.
Nickerson arranged to rent a neat little cottage on the hill street
just back of the town, and not far from the Nickerson home. It was
secured furnished, and as it was at present untenanted, Donald worked
around the place for a few days painting the floors, doors and
wood-work, after scrubbing it out thoroughly from top to bottom. It
was not a large cottage, but it was a warm one, and built of squared
spruce logs shingled on the outside and match-boarded inside. There
was a kitchen addition, and the main part of the house had a
dining-room, parlor, and two small bedrooms upstairs. It was a vastly
different place from the red sandstone villa in Maxwell Park, with its
tiled bathrooms, hot and cold water, electricity and gas, but it was
clean and cosy, and the rent was extremely moderate. The furniture
was plain and meant to be utilized. Most of it was made by
ship-carpenters, and there was no veneer or elaborate carvings. The
beds were of wood, and in lieu of springs, there were mattresses of
plucked feathers so soft and downy that one almost vanished in their
cosy embrace. Picked rag mats covered the floors, and the place was
heated in winter by a small box stove which burned wood, and which
stood in the dining-room, and disseminated heat into the parlor
through a square opening in the wall.

An acre of good garden ground went with the place, and there was a
small building suitable for a stable and wood-shed immediately back of
the dwelling. A well, equipped with a pump, stood near the kitchen
door in handy proximity to save laborious water carrying, and the
former tenants had planted vines which clustered over the little front
porch, and there were rose bushes, lilacs, and hollyhocks around the
front and sides of the house.

On the eve of his departure for Halifax and Scotland, Donald viewed
his future home and tried to imagine what it would be like when his
mother arrived and was installed within. He could picture her reading
by the stove of a winter's night, or working in the garden in summer.
She would have chickens, of course, and maybe a pig or two. His mother
knew all about these things. Then he thought of Ruth.... Of course,
she wouldn't live in a cabin like that, but by the time he was in a
position to marry her, he hoped to have a home of his own--a big
wooden house like what other Eastville skippers owned--a house with
four or five bedrooms, hot air furnaces and plastered walls and modern
plumbing. They all had pianos, a horse and buggy, and good furniture
imported from Halifax. He would get that ... in time. He'd go with
Judson in the dory again next summer, then he would go to navigation
school in Halifax and get his second mate's ticket for off-shore. He
was able to pass the examination now, but he hadn't the necessary
sea-time in to qualify. Another year or two fishing and he would go
skipper--fishing in the summer and running fish and lumber to the West
Indies in winter. He would be skipper, if all went well, by the time
he was twenty, and when he attained his majority, he would ask Ruth to
marry him. With these pleasant thoughts, he squared up a rumpled rag
mat on the floor of his future home, straightened a deal table and
studied the effect of a cheap vase--he knew it was cheap and gaudy and
he wanted to stow it away--on the sideboard--and after a final look
around, he gave a satisfied sigh and locked the front door. At the
front fence, he looked back at the cottage--nestling cosily amid a few
dwarf spruce--and whistling cheerfully he swung down the road
ruminating over a suitable name for his coming domicile. "Shelter
Harbor! That's a good one," he murmured. "I think mother would like
that. M-m! Shelter Harbor--that's the name, for it'll be a shelter
harbor for the both of us!"




CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE


The _West Wind's_ crew arrived in Halifax on a Monday morning at the
end of September to attend the inquiry, and the evidence was given by
both sides. The Greeks had no case. It was proved that they were
navigating at full speed in a dense fog; that a proper look-out was
not kept; and that sound signals were not given at the intervals
required by the International Rules of the Road for navigation "in
fog, mist, snow or heavy rainstorms." The Court severely condemned the
absolute disregard for Articles 15 and 16 of the Rules, and the
Commissioner was most scathing in his remarks regarding the conduct of
the Greeks in running away from the vicinity after sinking the
schooner. To the Greek master and watch-officers he said, "Your conduct
on this occasion was such as to merit for you the scorn and contempt
of all seafarers, and your action can only be characterized as one of
the most despicable cowardice. If this Court had power to deal with
your certificates, we would have no hesitation in cancelling for all
time that of the master, and the second and fourth mates, in order
that such callous brutes may never hold a position of responsibility
at sea again; as it is, a copy of this judgment will be handed to the
Grecian Consul!" The _West Wind_ secured a judgment against the
_Livadia_, and the Greeks left the Court Room amidst the hisses of the
spectators. An Admiralty Court action for damages was immediately
entered by the owners and crew of the fishing schooner, and the
skipper remarked to Donald, "We'll win our case. You can go over to
Glasgow naow an' bring your mother aout. I'll have a berth in my West
Indiaman for you when you get back."

That evening after supper at their hotel, the skipper and Donald went
to the Stuart home to call on Helena and Ruth. Judson had telephoned
earlier in the day that they would be around, and McKenzie was wildly
excited at the thought of seeing Ruth once more. With his new suit on,
he felt more presentable, though he was not altogether pleased with
the cut of the garment, nor the pattern. The collar did not "sit"
nicely and the coat sleeves reached the knuckles of his hands. The
pants seemed horribly wide, and they had a loose feeling around the
waist. Mrs. Nickerson had spoken of their roominess as just the thing
for a growing lad, but then the dear old lady did not know that the
"growing lad" was in love, and therefore more than usually fastidious
and critical of personal appearance. The pattern--a pepper and salt
effect--gave Donald the creeps to look at it, but there was one thing
in the outfit's favor, and that was the strength and durability of the
cloth. As Donald soliloquised, "This suit was built--not tailored.
They sewed it with sail-twine and lined and stiffened it with
double-ought storm canvas. It would make a grand sail when everything
else blew away!" After numerous surveys in the mirror, straightenings
of tie and collar, and buttonings and unbuttonings of the coat and
vest, the skipper remarked with a grin, "Oh, you'll do, Donny-boy!
With that rig on, you look as handsome as a silver dollar on a Swede's
pants, or a monkey's eye in a frying-pan. Anybody that walks aout with
you naow sh'd be as proud as a dog with two tails. Knock off yer
glass-goggling and we'll git along!" And blushing self-consciously,
Donald followed him--inwardly condemning the fit and texture of his
gift suit.

The Stuarts lived in a fine house not far from the Public Gardens, and
when the skipper rang the bell, Donald gave his drooping sleeves a
hitch up and patted the recalcitrant collar into place. A maid
answered the door and ushered them into a parlor. Judson was
perfectly at ease. Donald, who ought to have felt at home in such
surroundings, sat on a spider-legged gilt chair feeling awkward and
out of place.

A rustle of skirts, a ripple of laughter, and Helena and Ruth entered
the room. McKenzie's heart leaped and he rose to his feet, and while
Ruth was greeting her brother with hugs and kisses, Helena, looking
particularly charming and attractive, walked over to him. "I'm so glad
to see you again, Donald," she said sweetly. "And you're not looking
any the worse for your shipwreck out on the Banks." She shook hands
and turned to the skipper, "And how is Captain Judson?" And the two of
them drew away to a corner sofa, leaving Ruth standing before
McKenzie.

She had her dark hair coiled up and wore a dress of some pink silky
material, which showed her slim girlish figure to advantage. There was
a soft rose blush in her cheeks and her blue eyes sparkled as she
advanced to Donald, but he, with the critical discernment of the
love-lorn, thought there was a hint of coldness in her gaze. It might
have been reserve. "And how are you, _Mister_ McKenzie?" she enquired
calmly. Donald mentally winced at the _Mister_, and instinctively felt
the reserve, the chill--just a suspicion of it--in her voice and
manner. He clasped her hand warmly and inclined his head with a
courteous gesture. "I'm very well--Ruth," he answered quietly, "and
you?" He raised his large dark eyes to her face and continued, "I
needn't ask for my sight tells me you're the picture of health."
Mentally he added, "And lovelier than ever!"

She sat down in a chair near-by and Donald admired the ease and grace
with which she walked. He was keen to notice all the little traits and
points in her carriage and manner and in the sedate environment of the
Stuart home, it was evident that Ruth had adopted her "city manners"
in dress and actions. They murmured a few commonplaces about the
weather, while McKenzie noticed that she had small neat feet and wore
white silk stockings and fine kid dancing slippers. He liked to see a
girl attired in nice frocks and "things" feminine, fluffy, soft,
silky and lacey, but Scotch-like, he mentally figured the cost and
wondered when he would earn enough to provide a wife with the articles
he would like to see her clothed in.

"You had quite a mishap out on the Banks, I hear," she observed,
leaning back and gazing at him with steady eyes. McKenzie imagined she
was looking critically at his suit and he hitched the sleeves up off
his knuckles before he replied. "Yes! It was quite a smash-up. It
might have been worse if we'd all been aboard the schooner. McGlashan
regrets losing an alarm clock and a fine chowder which he was cooking
at the time--" He smiled as Ruth laughed and revealed her white, even
teeth. The ice seemed to be broken by his remark, and soon the pair
were chatting away and rivalling the skipper and Helena, who were
conversing most earnestly.

They talked about Eastville, and Donald told of his renting a house
for his mother, and how he hoped to be leaving Halifax that week to
bring her out to Canada. Ruth nodded interestedly and asked many
questions, but not once during her conversation did she address him as
"Donald," and the youth puzzled his brains to account for this sudden
formality. Was she trying to keep their intimacy upon the plane of
"merely friends and nothing more"? Donald worried.

"Do you intend to remain at the fishing?" she asked. Something in the
tone of her voice lent moment to the question.

"Yes!" replied the other. "I'm in it now, and I intend to make it my
work. I like the life. It's full of interest and every day brings
something new. Your fishermen are splendid chaps and dandy shipmates,
and these fishing schooners are wonderful vessels--comfortable and
seaworthy. I hope I shall be skipper of one by the time I'm
twenty-one."

"It's a hard life and a dangerous life though," said the girl, with a
far-away look in her blue eyes. "It must be awful to be a fisherman's
wife. In those terrible winter gales ... a lot of fishermen are
drowned. Just think what might have happened on Juddy's boat if that
collision had occurred at night and you were all in bed. A good many
of you would have been drowned. We've had accidents of that sort
before in Eastville ships and I know--" She shuddered half-fearfully.

"You can get drowned on other craft besides fishermen," observed
Donald. "I'll bet there are as many people killed in Halifax in a year
as there are drownings from vessels on the Banks. There's a good many
fishermen out there at times--Lunenburg has twenty-five hundred men in
her fleet alone--and look at the crowds from Gloucester, Boston,
Newfoundland, France and other places." He regarded her intently and
gave his creeping cuffs another upward hitch.

"That may be so, Mr. McKenzie," said Ruth decidedly, "but if the
fishermen do not worry, their women do. I'd go crazy if I had a
husband out at sea in those fogs and cyclones. It's bad enough to have
Juddy in that risky, messy business, but a husband--?" She closed her
eyes for a moment, while Donald stared at her with a strange tremor in
his breast. It was as though he had received a blow and the
impressions left by her words were painful. If he were to be at all
favored by Ruth's heart and hand, it was evident that he would have to
change his profession, unless she changed her views.

They chatted on other subjects for a while and McKenzie noticed that
his companion was glancing every now and again at the ormolu clock on
the mantel, and when she answered his questions she seemed abstracted
and her remarks were terse and spoken in a manner which betokened that
she was forcing the conversation. A ring came at the door-bell, and as
the maid pattered down the hall to answer it, Ruth sat up in her chair
and straightened out her frock. "She's expecting someone," mentally
surmised McKenzie, and his spirits dropped a shade when he heard a
male voice speaking to the maid. Helena looked over at Ruth with a
knowing smile. "That's Walter, I guess!" she whispered, and Miss
Nickerson colored a trifle and looked expectantly at the door of the
room.

The male voice spoke in the hall. "Miss Nickahson's in the pawloh,
eh?" and they all rose as a young man about twenty entered the room.
He was an athletic-looking fellow, dressed in the height of fashion,
and he wore a striped tie and clothes of a cut much affected by
college students. His sandy hair was long and parted in the middle; he
had blue eyes, teeth with much gold filling in them, and a face which
was clear-skinned, regular and good-looking. Smiling, he advanced to
Miss Nickerson and extended a white, well-manicured hand. "Good
evening, Ruth," he said breezily, "and how do I find you to-night?"
The girl took his hand and murmured something while the color deepened
in her cheeks. The visitor then wheeled and greeted Helena, who
introduced Judson and Donald. "I'm happy to meet you, Captain! How do,
McKenzie!" he drawled in the stilted English of certain Haligonians
who endeavor to ape the style and accent of the Naval Dock-yard and
Garrison fops. The skipper gave him a sharp, keen, appraising glance
and Donald could note a hostile light in Judson's eyes.

Mr. Walter Moodey strode lightly across the room and, drawing a chair
with him, sat down alongside Miss Nickerson. After pulling up his
immaculately creased pants and revealing a fancy colored sock above
sharp-toed shoes, he leaned towards the girl in a cool, self-possessed
manner. "Have you rested up since the dawnce the otha' night?" And the
two were soon engaged in bubbling reminiscences, while Donald sat
quiet and with a complacent look on his face which did not accord with
the feeling in his breast. At last, Ruth, conscious of her neglect,
turned to him with an effort to include him in the conversation. "Mr.
McKenzie is going over to Scotland this week to bring his mother out
to Canada," she said. "Now, isn't he a good boy?"

Mr. Moodey endeavored to look interested. His keen eyes rambled over
Donald's clothes, and conscious of the scrutiny, McKenzie squirmed in
his chair and hitched his sleeves up. "Ah, really!" He pronounced it
"rully." "Going ovah in the _Sardonia_, Mistah? She sails for Glasgow
this week." Donald gave him a clear-eyed gaze. "I don't know what ship
I'm going on," he answered.

"You haven't booked your passage yet? Bettah hurry--all the ships are
full--"

"Are you going as a passenger?" queried Ruth absently.

McKenzie reddened slightly. "No! I'm shipping before the mast if I can
get a chance," he answered calmly.

Moodey's eyebrows went up. "Oh!" He pronounced it "Ow!" "I see! You're
a sailoh then I take it?"

"I'm a fisherman," said Donald bluntly. Judson on the sofa with Helena
was listening intently while carrying on a tête-à-tête with his fair
companion.

"Oh, really!" The eyebrows went up still further and McKenzie thought
Mr. Moodey was about to hold his nose. His manicured fingers did lift
towards his face, but he changed his mind and pulled a silk
handkerchief out of his sleeve and carefully smoothed his hair back
from his forehead. "You ketch cods and kippahs and all that sort of
thing, do you? Out on the Banks, eh? It must be an awfully jolly life
pulling nets all day long--makes one think of the Apostles, eh,
what?--but it's such a messy, smelly one, I should imagine, eh?"

"We don't pull nets," said Donald a mite aggressively. "We use hooks
and lines."

"Quite so! Quite so!" returned Moodey unabashed. "I forgot ... cods.
Good money in cods, McKenzie?" There was a tone in his voice that
Donald did not like, nor Judson either. The latter had been listening
to the conversation and he wheeled around from Helena and observed in
a steely significant voice, "You sh'd know that, Moodey. Your old
gran'pop made all his little whack on the fishflakes. Many a cod the
ol' man split, salted an' turned on the flakes himself, and a terror
to bargain was the same Salt Hake Moodey. Useter cut th' whiskers off
the hakes an' try an' pass 'em off as cod-fish--" Both Moodey and Ruth
were fidgetting, and Helena, sensing something, rose and beckoned to
Donald. "Come on, Don! Let's have some music."

They spent some time at the piano playing and singing together. Mr.
Moodey exhibited some surprise at McKenzie's talents at first, but
latterly slid back in his chair with an air of boredom. They were
singing old songs and Walter did not care much for them, though Ruth
was listening with appreciation, and several times when he started to
speak, she held up her hand for silence.

"I say, old chap," he said to Donald at the conclusion of a piece,
"cawn't you give us something with a little life to it? That old
fire-side and heart-throb stuff is awfully depressing, don't y' know?
Give us some musical comedy or light opera stuff--but, I don't suppose
you know anything in that line?" The slight, and possibly
unintentional, sarcastic note in his voice when he spoke the last
words annoyed Donald. He would show this Halifax fop that a fisherman
wasn't necessarily a creature without culture or education, and when
it came down to playing and singing snatches from musical comedies or
operas--Huh! he had possibly seen and heard more of them in Glasgow
than Moodey ever knew existed.

"What'll you have? What do you know?" queried Donald calmly, without
turning from the piano. "_Florodora?_ _San Toy?_ _The Geisha?_
_Mikado?_ _The Cingalee?_ _Pinafore?_"

Walter's expressive eyebrows went up. "Oh, you do know something in
that line? How odd. Let's see--! Give us that snappy thing from
_Pinafore_! It's called 'Tell me, pretty maiden, are there any more at
home like you?'" A snort of disgust was barely stifled by Judson, and
without a smile on his face, Donald remarked, "That's from
_Florodora_!" And he played the song from memory while Helena sang.
For a while he remained at the piano running off several well-known
pieces, and occasionally he carolled the words. He was playing and
singing for a purpose. He wanted to show Mr. Moodey--whom he looked
upon as a rival for the affections of Ruth Nickerson--that he was
quite at home in the culture that was supposed to be Mr. Moodey's, and
he also wanted to impress Ruth that Mr. Moodey had nothing on him when
it came to social accomplishments. Were it not for the wretched
clothes he was wearing and which had taken a lot of his self-assurance
away from him, he could have crossed swords with the other youth in
anything.

Ruth was warming up to him again, and several times she asked him to
sing and play pieces which she selected from Helena's music cabinet,
and Donald played them with a great deal of pleasure. Mr. Moodey's
star was going down a little and he knew it, and Donald knew it. Both
youths were carrying on a subtle duel of wits which the girls were not
aware of, though Judson, keen judge of human nature that he was,
reclined on the sofa lazily and mentally seconded and applauded his
young protégé.

When Donald had played a number of pieces--purposely working in
snatches from "Il Trovatore," the sextette from "Lucia" and other
well-known airs popular among people who appreciate real music--Ruth
called to him. "Come over and have a rest, Donald," she said sweetly.
"You've been doing the lion's share of the entertaining and we've
enjoyed it immensely. I cannot understand how you can play so well
from memory and with such little practice, and it is too bad that your
talents should be lost to your friends by your going off to sea for
the best part of your life." She gave him an admiring glance from her
blue eyes and McKenzie felt very happy. His little bit of "swank" was
evidently worth the effort, for she had called him by his first name
again, and his youthful heart fluttered. Moodey was quick to note the
familiar appellation too, and he felt that he must do something to
pull his stock up to par.

"Er--Ruth," he said. "You're coming down to the game to-morrow
afternoon, aren't you? We're playing Acadiaville for the championship
and it'll be a tough game to-morrow afternoon, aren't you? We're
playing ball, McKenzie?"

"I used to play a bit while at school in Scotland."

"Rugby?"

"No! Soccer--Association."

"Oh," Walter gave a half-sneer. "That's a kid's game. We play Rugby."

Miss Nickerson interposed. "You know, Donald, Mr. Moodey here is a
great athlete. He is captain of the college team and immensely popular
here in Halifax. He is what they call a 'grid-iron hero'."

"A grid-iron?" The term puzzled Donald. "That's what they use in
cooking. Nothing to do with eating, has it?"

Ruth laughed and Moodey looked dark. "A grid-iron," he explained,
frostily, "is a slang term for a football ground. It is marked out in
squares like a grid-iron." And as Ruth was still laughing, he gave
Donald a look which gave him a hint of the "hero's" feelings towards
him.

Mr. Moodey was now launched into a subject in which he could shine,
and he commanded Ruth's attention for several minutes telling her of
past games, the prospects for the morrow, and a good deal of his talk
centered around his own personal prowess. "I'm in great shape now," he
observed. "I've trained down until I'm as hard as nails." He raised
his right arm and flexed his biceps. "Feel that, Ruth! Hard, isn't
it?" Ruth felt. "Oh, it certainly is hard!" she exclaimed. "You must
be strong, Walter. Just feel his muscle, Donald!" There was a merry
twinkle in her eye when she made the request. Donald, feeling rather
nauseated at Moodey's brag, gave the muscle a squeeze with his fingers
which caused Walter to wince a trifle. A sailor's grip, with fingers
toughened by canvas clawing and rope hauling, is not to be despised,
and McKenzie purposely gave the "grid-iron hero" a hard nip and Moodey
felt that he would like to get McKenzie where he could hit him for it.

Totally unconscious of the veiled hostility between the two, Ruth
chattered away, addressing her talk to both. When Donald spoke to
Moodey he was icily polite; when Moodey passed remarks to Donald, they
were thinly sarcastic and he, on occasions, introduced a nasty trick
of imitating McKenzie's slightly Scotch accent. Had the circumstances
been otherwise, Donald would not have taken any notice, but when these
conversational shots occurred, the young sailor felt like giving the
college man something more painful than the retort courteous. With the
two youths playing a dual role, the evening passed until Helena, who
had been holding an earnest colloquy with the skipper, cried out, "Did
you know that, Ruthie? Judson tells me that Donald saved his life when
the steamer ran them down. They were in the water for an hour." Ruth's
fine eyes flashed to Donald's face and there was an expression of
surprise and fear in their blue depths. He flushed and squirmed on his
chair and shot the creeping sleeves up again as Moodey drawled, with
another eye-brow raising, "Oh, really!"

"He sure did," vouchsafed Judson. "If it wasn't for him I wouldn't be
here now. You can thank him, Ruth, that your dear brother is not
feeding the fish on Quero Bank this night, for I was nearly a goner."

The girl glanced from McKenzie to her brother with a strange look on
her face. "I--I didn't know there was anything like this in your
accident," she said quiveringly. "I--I thought you were all picked up
in your dories a few minutes after the collision. That's what you
said, Juddy. You said it was nothing--"

"Juddy evidently didn't tell you the whole story," interrupted Helena.
"He has just been telling me how Donald swam about in the sea and
found him just as he was going under, and held him up and eventually
got him over to a spar and upon it. They were both thrown into the sea
by the steamer's bow and had a dreadfully narrow escape."

Ruth remained speechless for a moment, as if trying to comprehend it
all, then she gave McKenzie a most expressive glance--a look of
unspoken thankfulness--and she leaned forward and murmured softly to
him, "I don't know what to say, Donald, but--we'll talk about it
again." And the youth blushed still redder, felt hot, and to cover his
confusion, patted the recalcitrant coat collar into place.

Mr. Moodey, after a period of silence, cleared his throat. "You're a
swimmah, McKenzie?" he enquired.

Donald nodded. "I can swim a little."

"Jolly useful thing to know," continued the other, "specially if one's
a fisherman. They're always getting spilled out of their boats. I do
some swimming myself. It is one of the sports I pride myself on. Just
won this trinket the otha day for swimming out at the Nor'west Arm."
He took a watch-fob out of his pocket and handed it to Donald. It was
a gold medallion--a first prize for a half-mile contest--and Donald
knew enough about swimming to give Moodey credit for being an athlete
of distinction. "That's very nice," he remarked, handing the fob back.
"I've done a little racing when I was at school. Y'know, in Glasgow
schools swimming is compulsory, and I rather liked it." Modestly, he
made no mention of having won the Glasgow Amateur Swimming Shield for
schoolboys under 14 years of age.

After Helena's revelation, Moodey became quite cordial. He realized
that McKenzie was a superior sort of a fellow in spite of his vocation
and his frightful taste in clothes, and he dropped his patronizing and
sarcastic attitude towards him. Besides, he found in McKenzie a
foe-man worthy of his steel and he was quick to assume that any
baiting of the Scotch lad would lose him Ruth's friendship. It was
evident that this McKenzie chap had a strong stand-in with the
Nickersons and Helena Stuart, and an exhibition of antipathy would
probably end in Mr. Moodey being the loser. With the change in both
Ruth's and Moodey's attitude towards him, Donald found himself
spending the most enjoyable period of the evening.

After having some cake and coffee, the men rose to depart. Moodey took
his leave first--saying that he was in training and would have to get
to bed early for the game on the morrow--and he shook hands quite
cordially with Donald. "Try and get around to the game to-morrow
afternoon, old chap," he said, "and if you're going to be in Halifax
for a few days, why we might go over to the Arm and have a swim
togethaw." And after saying to the girls that he would look for them
in the grand stand--front row--next afternoon, he said "Good-night!"
and departed.

When McKenzie was leaving, Ruth took him to one side. "It was lovely
of you to come," she said sweetly, giving him a squeeze of the hand
and a glance from her blue eyes which set his heart in a whirl. "And
you've been so nice and obliging in playing and singing for us. And,
moreover, we Nickersons are very much in your debt for what you
did ... out on the Banks." Donald made a deprecatory gesture. "It was
nothing. I am a good swimmer," he murmured happily.

"If you are going to be in town to-morrow, Donald," said Helena, "you
must come up and have tea with us. Judson is coming, too." And when
Ruth echoed the invitation, Donald accepted with delight.

At their hotel that night, Judson seemed in great spirits. He and
Helena had had a wonderful evening together, and he was feeling very
happy. He whistled and hummed a song to himself as he undressed for
bed, and Donald knew things were going well with him. McKenzie was in
a similarly joyous mood. He felt that he had left Ruth on an extremely
good footing and Moodey ceased to worry him, and when Judson remarked
from the depths of his blankets, "I'd like to have that Moodey pup in
my watch aboard a wind-jammer for a spell, I'd give that haw-hawing
specimen of the cod-fish aristocracy a hot time, by Jupiter! I'd
harden his muscles up, by Jingo! Hear him talk as though he didn't
know what a codfish was ... and his old gran'pop made a fortune out of
the codfish he jewed aout of the poor devils of fishermen up the shore
and on the Gaspe coast. Huh! Him and his 'kippahs' and his 'pulling
nets all day long'--"

McKenzie laughed. "Oh, he's all right. He's a decent sort of a chap.
It's just his manner and the way he has been brought up."

Next morning he went down to the Shipping Master's office to see about
getting signed on in a steamer for Glasgow. The captain of a ship was
in the place at the time, and when McKenzie asked the official if he
was looking for any men to a British port, the ship-master turned and
spoke. "You looking for a ship?" Donald nodded. "Yes, sir! I'd like to
ship for the run to Glasgow, or, failing that, to any British port."

The other looked him over critically. "I'm looking for a hand--an able
seaman--and I'm Glasgow bound. Ever been to sea before?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Show me your discharges."

"Haven't got any," said Donald, slightly flustered.

"What ships were you serving in?"

"I made a voyage from the Old Country to the Pacific Coast in a
barque, and from Victoria, B.C., to Halifax in a schooner. I've been
fishing on a Banker for the past four months."

The captain looked at him narrowly. "You're Scotch, eh? What barque
were you in, and what did you do aboard her?"

"Never mind the name of the ship, sir, but I was serving my time--"

The other grunted. "Huh! Runaway apprentice, I guess, eh?"

Donald laughed, and after a pause he said, "The skipper of the
schooner I came around the Horn in is in Halifax now. He'll vouch for
me."

The Shipping Master looked over the desk. "Was that the _Helen
Starbuck_?"

"Yes, sir!"

The official smiled and observed to the captain, "I reckon, Cap'en,
that a lad that has made a voyage from the Coast to Halifax in a
ninety-five-ton schooner is a sailor."

The master nodded. "Can you steer?"

"Of course, but sail only."

"We-e-ell," the captain gave him a searching glance, "I guess you'll
do. You look bright. I'll sign you as an A.B. How's that?" McKenzie
replied in acceptance.

"Alright, Mister, sign him up!" Then to Donald he said, "Get your
clothes and get down aboard the ship right away. We're ready to sail.
Hurry now."

Donald had only time to run to his hotel, collect his sea kit and pay
the bill. Judson was out, but he scribbled a note to him and left it
on the dressing table. "Confound it!" he muttered, as he walked down
to the dock. "I didn't expect to get hustled out like this. And I was
looking forward so much to that tea to-night. Now it's all off and I
haven't even got a chance to telephone her. Hang the luck!"

That evening he was eating his tea in the starboard fo'c'sle of a big
freighter, in company with an all-nation gang of deck-hands, and the
place was swinging to the roll of the off-shore swell, while the
shores of Nova Scotia were fading away in the dim distance astern as
the propeller drove the steamer for Glasgow and his mother.




CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX


Donald was talking. "And, Mother, I've got the house and everything
all ready for you. All you've got to do is step into it. It's a pretty
little place up on a hill overlooking the harbor. Of course, it isn't
anything like our old home in Maxwell Park, but it'll do until I can
save some money to build another--"

Mrs. McKenzie, looking just a shade older, but there were little lines
around the eyes and mouth which told a story not of Time's making,
gazed lovingly at her sea-bronzed son. How he had grown! And how
strong and handsome he was! The sight of him revived memories ... he
reminded her of him who went out to Eternity in the maw of a big
Atlantic comber not so many years ago. She realized that the
pale-faced, sensitive little chap of two years ago had vanished, and
in his place was a strapping, ruddy-visaged youth who was almost a
man. His dark eyes flashed with the fire of life and the enjoyment of
it, and there was a timbre in his voice which expressed confidence,
fearlessness, and the ability to command if necessary. The sea had
worked wonders in him. It had given her a new son, and her heart
filled with pride at the capable, possessive manner in which he
sketched out her future with him. She drew his face down to hers and
kissed him on the cheek. "Anywhere with you, my bonny, will be home.
Be it cot or palace, it will be yours, Don, and it's proud I'll be to
keep it neat and sweet for my laddie."

Donald laughed happily. "Mother, do you remember when the
_Kelvinhaugh_ towed out? I saw you standing at the ferry slip by
Shearer's Yard that morning. My, but I was feeling miserable then! I
was ready to run away if I could."

The mother rose and opened a drawer. They were seated in her room at
the Home for the Aged, and Donald had just arrived from Glasgow but an
hour before. "Here's a clipping from a paper I saved for you," she
said. "It's about the _Kelvinhaugh_, and many's the prayer I've made
in thankfulness." Donald took the piece of newspaper, read it, and
whistled. It ran--a terse, unsentimental record of disaster:--

     LOSS OF A GLASGOW BARQUE.

     SYDNEY, N.S.W., Jan. 15:--The ship _Castor_ arrived here to-day
     from Chemainus, B.C., and reports passing a large quantity of
     wreckage in lat. 31 degrees North, long. 152 degrees West,
     which seems to prove the loss at sea of the Glasgow four mast
     barque, _Kelvinhaugh_. The wreckage consisted of lumber, yards
     and upper masts, and a damaged life-boat bore the name
     _KELVINHAUGH--GLASGOW_. The master of the _Castor_ is of the
     opinion that the barque foundered by capsizing in a squall. The
     ill-fated vessel carried a crew of twenty-five men, most of
     whom were signed on in Vancouver, B.C., from which port she
     loaded lumber for Sydney, N.S.W. She was a new vessel of 2,500
     tons, commanded by William Muirhead of 972 Glenburn Road,
     Glasgow, and owned by D. McKenzie & Co., Glasgow.

He laid the clipping down and looked into space. "So she went ... just
as Nickerson said she would. We're lucky ... darned lucky!" The mother
nodded as he spoke his thoughts aloud. "You don't know how thankful I
was that you had left that ship when I read that," she said. "Just
think ... if you had remained in her. It would have been dreadful!"

Donald slipped his arm around her shoulders and laughed. "I'm not born
to be drowned, Mother," he said. "Now tell me, what do you know about
that lovely uncle of mine? Is he dead, knighted, in jail, or what?"

Mrs. McKenzie gave a contemptuous grimace as she replied, "The wicked
ever prosper, Donald. He seems to be getting along wonderfully. I see
his name in the papers quite often, and he is reputed to be one of the
wealthiest men in Glasgow. He has a whole fleet of tramp steamers
now--the Dun Line--"

"It's well named," interrupted Donald grimly. "He should spell it
D-O-N-E--for it has been by _doing_ poor sailors and insurance
companies and others that he has made progress. I wonder what his
object was in trying to 'do' me? The fellow apparently meant to have
me put out of the way."

"I haven't the faintest idea, sonny-boy. I thought possibly it might
be something in connection with the Dunsany title and estate, but I
can't, for the life of me, see how you would have anything to do with
it. Sir Alastair died last year and his son, Roderick, inherited the
title and the property. I don't know much about him, except what I've
heard in various ways. He's a professional man of some kind, unmarried
and in poor health, and he spends most of his time in England. Your
Uncle David would claim the title should anything happen to Roderick,
and when David passed on, it would go to his son--young Alastair.
About the only decent trait in that man is the affection he seems to
have for that boy--so I've been told--and I only hope, some day, that
he is punished through his son for what he has done to you--" The
fierce spirit of the Highlander flamed in her eyes.

"Hush! hush! Mater dear, don't talk like that," Donald said, patting
her hands. "What do we need to care for him now? Let him slip away as
a bad memory. There'll come a time when he'll have to pay the price,
but we needn't be the ones to present the bill. Now, Mater, we'll go
up to Glasgow to-morrow and book passage for Halifax. I have reserved
two second cabin berths in the _Ontarian_, sailing Saturday." He
paused and gave her a keen scrutiny. "Bye-the-bye, Mother," he asked
gravely, "what made you use the passage-money I sent you? I mean,
what caused you to use it after leaving the Hydro?"

She tried to evade the question, but he insisted, and after much
coaxing she told the story. Dismissed suddenly and without a reference
from the Ross Bay Hydropathic, she had tried for place after place,
until she was forced to accept a position as waitress in a workman's
coffee room. "Good God!" ejaculated Donald. "In a workman's coffee
room? A waitress...?" Frightful thoughts went through his mind and his
mother seemed to divine them. "No, dearie, it wasn't so bad as you
think. The poor are good to the poor. I was never insulted or
abused ... nor heard bad language, except when a man was drunk." She
paused, then continued her tale. "It was very hard work, early and
late, and I took sick. I was ill for six or eight weeks and had to
draw on the money you sent me. I was down to the last shilling when a
kind lady, who had been a patient at the Ross Hydro, met me and got me
the position of night matron in this home."

Donald listened quietly, but his knuckles showed white on the tan of
his clenched hands, and there was an ominous glint in his eyes. "I'd
like to tear the heart out of him!" he growled fiercely, but the
mother soothed him. "Let's forget it all, sonny-dear, and talk of
Canada. I have ten pounds saved up. Will I need to buy heavy clothes
for the cold winters there? They tell me it's all frozen up for half
the year in Canada."

The vindictive glint in the youth's eyes faded away and he laughed
heartily. "Why, Mater, where did you get that yarn? I'll bet you won't
feel the cold as much there in winter as you do here. It was warm
enough when I left, goodness knows! What's good for winter here is
good enough for Nova Scotia. Now, we'll book second cabin passages
out, and for once I'll go as a passenger and find out what it feels
like to loaf around at sea."

After a stay of just three days in Glasgow, during which time McKenzie
called on Mrs. McGlashan and gave her news of her son, the two sailed
for Halifax. After an uneventful voyage, they arrived in the old
Canadian city by the sea on a fine October day, and Donald telephoned
the Nickersons at Eastville Harbor. Judson answered the call. "I'll
meet you at the boat, Donald," he said over the long distance wire,
"and I'll have a load of wood up to your shack, the stove lit, the
kittle on and grub in the locker. I'm tickled to death you're back,
and I've got a fine little brig for you to second mate in a couple of
weeks. And, bye-the-bye, Donny-boy"--he chuckled into the
instrument--"Ira Burton's landed his fish an' we've skinned him hands
daown. He jest came short of aour trip by ten quintals. It's the talk
of the taown, boy, and he's riproarin' sore abaout it. He lost a lot
of time at the Madaleens and he struck a bad breeze on the Banks and
lost an anchor and hawser, some of his dories and a pile o' gear. It's
a rare joke, but I ain't agoin' to take his money. He struck hard luck
all through. An' say, Donald, you'll find Ruth daown home here, but
she's got that codfish aristocrat with her. I've a notion to shanghai
him to the West Indies--Oh, gorry! they're here. I must knock off. So
long, Donny-me-lad! See you in the morning!"

So Moodey was down at Eastville! Donald was not very pleased at the
news, but then, a girl might have men friends without anything serious
being the intention. He was jealous, he said to himself, and Ruth was
not tied to him. He had neither a proprietory interest nor a monopoly
of her company, and he could not expect her to avoid the society of
all men-folk but Donald McKenzie. Thus cogitating, he laughed the
matter away, and called up Helena Stuart. "My! Donald, but I'm glad
you're back," she said after the first greetings. "And your mother is
with you? Bring her up to the house this afternoon and stay until your
boat leaves for Eastville. Mother will be delighted. Do come now!
Don't forget! Au revoir!"

Before going to the Stuarts, Mrs. McKenzie looked her son over
critically. He was wearing the much-detested suit, but his mother had
overhauled it and shortened the hated sleeves. It did not look good on
him, however, and the mother knew he disliked it. "Don," she
suggested, "I think you could afford to buy another suit. I want to
see you looking nice. Don't you think you could get one ready made to
put on before going up to your friend's house?"

Donald, with true Scotch canniness, counted his money. "I think I can,
Mater. I've got twenty-five dollars I can spend--some for you and some
for me. Let's go shopping!"

When he stepped into the Stuart parlor that afternoon, he was attired
in a neat grey tweed which really fitted his slim, well set-up figure.
Fifteen dollars could accomplish wonders! When Helena saw him, she
stepped back in surprise. "I really didn't know you," she cried, with
a smile of admiration on her pretty face. "You don't look a bit
like--like--what will I say?"

"Like a fisherman," volunteered Donald, laughing at her evident
confusion. "That's what you wanted to say, but you didn't like to say
it for fear of offending." She came close to him and whispered softly,
"If Ruth were to see you now, she'd fall in love with you right off!"
And McKenzie blushed furiously.

When his mother was busily engaged in conversation with Mrs. Stuart,
Donald got Helena away to a corner. He wanted to find out something,
and he thought Helena might tell him. "Helena," he said quietly, "I
look upon you as one of my best friends, and I want you to tell me if
Ruth really cares for Mr. Moodey?"

The girl looked up at him quickly with a smile in her dark eyes, but
when she saw the earnest look on his face, she became serious. "I--I
really don't know, Donald," she answered. "He has been going around
with her a great deal and she appears to be fond of him. He belongs to
a good family here in Halifax and his people are well off. He is
studying law at the College and is very popular with a certain set
here--quite an athlete and a social star--and he simply dances
attendance on Ruth when she is here."

Donald nodded gloomily. "Does Ruth think anything of me, Helena?"

"She thinks a great deal of you," replied his companion, "and often
talks about you. She thinks you are very clever and very brave, but I
don't think she likes your profession. You see, Ruth is a girl who has
always had everything she wanted. Her parents and her brothers have
spoiled her. I think she is afraid you'd never earn enough to give her
what she has been used to, and she detests the idea of marrying a
seafaring man. She has often remarked that she would never be a
sailor's wife."

McKenzie smiled rather bitterly. "You know, Helena, I'm very much
struck with Ruth. It's awfully foolish of me to be talking like this
to you, I know, but ... I want to get my bearings. If Moodey is the
favored man ... why, I'll withdraw. But, you know, Helena, I'm Scotch,
and I wouldn't withdraw unless I had absolutely no chance with her.
You say she thinks something of me? If she does, I'll stick around and
give Moodey a run for it, even though I am but a fisherman. Within a
few years I hope to be the best fisherman out of Nova Scotia. I have
no money, but money isn't everything."

Helena slipped her hand into his and gave it a warm squeeze. "That's
the way I like to hear you talk," she said encouragingly. "You just
stick to it. You and Ruth are very young yet--I'm taking advantage of
my two or three years' seniority to speak thus--and I think you have
plenty of time ahead of you. Ruth is a very dear sweet girl and I
really think she is too good for Walter Moodey--not that he isn't a
nice sort of boy, but I think he's too conceited. You must work hard
to get ahead in your vocation, and keep paying attentions to Ruth,
even though Walter is around."

"You'll keep this all a secret?" asked Donald shyly. "It's awfully
silly of me to talk to you like this." Helena laughed. How seriously
this eighteen-year-old boy talked! She admired his unsophisticated
charm, and wondered how this young fellow who had travelled and seen
so much could be so serious in his love and withal so boyish in his
confidences and child-like in his fears. Eighteen is early to talk of
love, yet at seventeen and eighteen love is blossoming into flower and
the newly-opened buds are often more beautiful than the mature bloom.
Besides, this lad had outgrown youth. He was a man. When most lads of
his age were still callow youths, with youthful thoughts and actions,
he was doing a man's work, living with men and thinking with men and
earning a man's pay. His life for the past two years had been fraught
with experiences which men of maturer years in shore occupations would
consider as adventures sufficiently notable to be classed as
outstanding events in a lifetime. The sea may keep the heart young,
but it ages mind and body, and the sailor of eighteen is the equal in
confidence, initiative and ability of land-living males twice older in
years. The midshipman of sixteen is often in command of men in
hazardous expeditions, and many a sailor youth in his teens has sailed
and navigated ships to all parts of the globe. Thus Helena reasoned,
and she regarded Donald's confidences as being the heart secrets of a
clear-minded, upright man, and not as the love-sick fears and fancies
of a susceptible boy.

When mother and son left the Stuart home for the Eastville packet
steamer, Helena whispered to Don in parting, "We are charmed with your
mother. She is a most delightful lady and you must take good care of
her, and ... keep up your attentions to our mutual friend. 'Faint
heart' ... you know. Au revoir!"

Eastville greeted the McKenzies next morning in most auspicious
weather, with a blue sky, smooth sea, and clear autumn sunshine, and
as they passed inside the Capes, Donald pointed out the various
landmarks. "And there's the spot, Mater, where we'll build our house
later on ... in that hollow among the spruce trees just back of the
head-land. You get a magnificent view of the sea and harbor from
there, and the hollow faces the south and is sheltered from the cold
winds. The sun shines there all day long ... it's a lovely spot." And
he rambled on, until at last they were on the wharf and shaking hands
with Judson Nickerson.

"Come along up to the house, Mrs. McKenzie," he said cordially. "We'll
have breakfast there. Your trunks will be sent up to your own
place--don't worry about them. I'm glad to see you both safely landed
here." And he chattered away in an effort to make both feel that they
were at home and among friends.

Breakfast at the Nickerson home that morning was an event, and Janet
McKenzie was most cordially received. The old ship-builder's voice
boomed in welcome, and his keen eyes beamed hospitably through his
steel-rimmed glasses, and Mrs. Nickerson and Ruth charmed the mother
with their courtesy and kindness. They had been up to the cottage the
day before and had fixed it all ready for occupancy, and Jud had piled
the wood-shed with kindling and stove-wood. And the breakfast itself
was a thing to be remembered. Corn meal porridge and hot corn cake,
fried fresh mackerel and bacon strips and hash brown potatoes,
new-baked biscuits, honey, stewed blueberries and delicious coffee--a
typical Down-east matutinal meal! Mrs. McKenzie was delighted with
everything, and with a heart aglow with happiness, confided to her
son, "I'm sure I'll love this place. Your friends are so kind. What
lovely people they are. I'm very, very happy, Donald-laddie, now that
I have a home and you!"

And when he took his mother up to the cottage on the hill--Shelter
Harbor--that was a joyous occasion. "This is our little place, Mater,"
he said proudly as they walked, arm in arm, up the front path. "It's
small, but it's cosy." He opened the door and ushered her in, and when
she surveyed the clean and homey interior, he waited, almost
breathlessly for her comments. From room to room they went, and when
every part of the place had been examined, Mrs. McKenzie sat down in a
chair and with eyes glowing, said with excess of happiness in her
voice, "My! ... it's just lovely, Donny-dear! Just perfect!" And
Donald felt, with her pronouncement, that life was indeed sweet and
everything was worth while. "Of course, Mater, it isn't anything like
our old villa in Glasgow, but it's not too bad," he went on. "Here's
the stove for heating the place--you'll have to get used to these
Canadian heaters--and the pump is just at the kitchen door. It'll be a
little hard for you here while I'm at sea, as you'll have to get your
wood out of the shed and your water from the pump--"

The mother laughed. "And you think that is a hardship? Why, my dear
child, I was brought up on a farm and I had to do a great deal harder
work than that. I cleaned stables, planted and pulled potatoes in the
fields, milked cows, and gathered hay and oats and stacked them. I was
born a poor country girl and know what work is. Don't you worry about
me in this cosy little place. It's paradise compared with what I've
had to do." By these admissions, Janet McKenzie showed that she had
profited by misfortune and the old arrogance and "high-falutin'" ideas
of palmier days had passed away. She, too, had gone through the mill
and come out ground!

The Nickersons had invited them to stay with them for a day or two,
but Janet courteously declined. She was eager to get into her own
home, and within a half-hour of her entry, she had the kitchen stove
alight, the kettle on, and a dinner under way, and Donald busied
himself stacking up fire-wood in the wood-box behind the stove. "We
must have some chickens," observed the mother as she peeled potatoes,
"and next spring I'll plant a vegetable garden so that we can have our
own potatoes, onions, cabbages and such. Maybe, later on, we can buy a
cow, and I'll make butter and I'll be able to give you real cream, and
butter made with my own hands."

Donald made a negative gesture. "That's very nice, Mater, but a cow
means hard work for you. I don't want you to slave--"

His mother gave a sniff of pretended indignation. "What have I got to
do in this little place when you are away? Do you think I can't do the
work. I'm not going to act the lady and sit with my hands in my lap
all the time, Donny-dear! We'll get the chickens, the garden and the
cow, and I'll show you I know all about milking and butter-making. I
used to be a dairy-maid, and a good dairy-maid, too. My butter won a
prize at a fair one year." And she smiled happily, when Donald said,
"Alright, Mater, you'll have your chickens, your garden and your cow,
and I'll be able to judge if your butter is all that you say it'll
be."

Judson came up in the afternoon. He was in working clothes and sat
down in the kitchen. "I don't want to rush you, Don, but I guess you
want to git to work and earn some money. I'm going skipper of that
little brig down to the wharf there loading dried fish and lumber for
Havana, and I want to git her sails bent and her gear overhauled. I'm
holding the second mate's berth open for you. D'ye s'pose you can
start right in naow and bear a hand? You might as well be doing
something and earn a dollar. What d'ye say?"

"I'll be with you in ten minutes, Skipper," answered Don eagerly. "I'm
anxious to get to work. A brig you say? I'll have to remember my
square-rig sailorizing for her. Bye-the-bye, did you know the
_Kelvinhaugh_ is gone? Here's the newspaper report."

Judson read it and there was no surprise on his face. "I knew it," he
said. "She was too heavily sparred and unwieldy for such a small crew,
and I cal'late she got caught in a squall with her kites up and rolled
over. I guess old Muirhead was full, too.... Oh, well, I'm not sorry I
skipped aout of her. She was a barge if there ever was one, and I'm
sorry for the poor devils that shipped in her." And with that, he
dismissed the matter.

The brig was a Nova Scotia product of about three hundred and fifty
tons, and called the _Queen's County_. She was a smart little craft
and by the lines of her, promised to be a fast sailer. Her hull was
painted white, also the houses and the insides of the bulwarks. The
trunk cabin aft contained comfortable rooms for three officers and a
cook-steward, and for'ard, a house was built partly into a short
topgallant forecastle, and this contained accommodations for eight
hands. The second mate was supposed to act as boatswain also, and this
was to be Donald's job.

She had two masts, both square-rigged, and carried double-topsail
yards, single topgallants and royals. The masts and yards were of wood
and scraped and greased. The blocks, mast-heads, yard-arms and trucks
were painted white, and her cleanliness, bright wood, and white paint
proclaimed her a typical "Bluenose" packet--a lazy sailor's nightmare.

"I see where there's a lot of sand-and-canvas work aboard this little
craft," remarked Donald. "I hope we get a crew worth while."

"Oh, they'll all be home fellers," said the skipper. "You and I and
the mate and McGlashan will live aft, but the grub'll be the same for
all hands. There'll be ten of us to handle her, and that's a good
crowd for this hooker in any weather."

The _Queen's County_ was partly owned by an old Eastville captain who
only went to sea in the summer, and she plied almost exclusively in
the West Indian trade between Eastville and the Island ports. Dried
fish and lumber out, and molasses to Halifax, home, constituted her
cargoes. It was an ideal trade for winter, and Donald looked forward
to voyaging in the little brig with a great deal of pleasure.

While he was aloft on the main-royal yard tieing the rovings which
lash the head of the sail to the jack-stay, he saw Ruth and Walter
Moodey on the wharf below talking to the skipper. His heart gave a
queer little jump at the sight, and something of a depressed feeling
seized him when he saw Moodey helping her up the gang-plank, but he
went on with his work. He was on wages and had no right to knock-off
for social receptions unless his commander gave him permission. From
his perch, a hundred and forty feet aloft, he saw Judson pilot the two
about the brig's decks, and from the corner of his eye he could see
Ruth looking up at him, but he made no sign that he had seen her.
Finally, they went into the cabin.

From bending the sail, he commenced to overhaul the furling gear and
was reeving the bunt-lines through the leads when Judson's voice came
rolling up from below, "R'yal yard there! Lay down from aloft!" He was
standing on the poop with his sister and Moodey, and they were
chatting and joking. McKenzie took the short cut to the deck by
sliding down the royal backstay and when he stepped on the poop, he
whipped off his cap and bowed to Ruth and extended a tarry hand to
Walter with a "Hullo, Moodey, how are you?"

The other shook hands cordially and there was no resentment in his
expression at the dropping of the "Mister." If it had been anybody
else whose station in life was similar to McKenzie's, Moodey would
have had something to say on the omission. Ruth took Donald by the arm
and walked him over to the rail. "You wouldn't look at me when I came
down," she pouted prettily. "I've been getting a crick in my neck
looking up at you and trying to catch your eye, but you went on
playing with your strings and cords and refused to look at me."

Donald laughed. "Well, you know, Ruth, I'm on the ship's books now and
I can't do as I like. I thought you might not care to have a
dirty-looking sailor hailing you from the mast. I humbly apologize for
my neglect."

"My friends are all gentlemen no matter what their garb or their
work," answered the girl, "and you are a friend of mine." Mentally,
the youth wished he could be more than a friend, and with that wish in
his heart he could not frame a suitable answer. Instead he asked,
"What do you think of our little ship?"

They chatted for a while until Moodey, who was talking with the
skipper, cried out, "Will we go along now, Ruth?" There was a
proprietory tone in his voice which Donald was quick to note, and it
pleased him when Miss Nickerson replied, "I'll be with you in a
minute!" And to McKenzie she said, "Will you come over to-night? Bring
your mother with you. You know, I'm going to Halifax on Monday to
study music and painting, and I'll be staying with the Stuarts until
the spring. You'll come--won't you?"

Donald promised readily and when she went off with her escort he
watched her slim figure walking gracefully up the wharf with a feeling
of mixed admiration and regret in his breast. Moodey's presence
disturbed him and the thought of her being in Halifax all
winter--which meant being in the too-near proximity of Walter--did not
make him feel happy. It was very easy for a girl to forget the absent
one. He turned to make his way aloft again, when the skipper remarked,
"Y'know, Don, I can't cotton to that blighter somehow. He's
chock-full of bazoo about himself, and he's forever hitching at his
tie or scrapin' his nails or patting his hair. He's got a notion that
he's hell'n-all 'raound here and that he's patronizing us Nickersons
by paying attentions to my sister. I said so to her last night, but
she gave me an earfull and told me to mind my own business so I have
to be nice, for Ruth's sake, to that pink-faced, powdered, manicured,
scented pup!"

"You're too hard on him," grinned McKenzie. "That's only his manner.
I'll bet he's alright at heart, or Ruth wouldn't tolerate him. I was a
bit of a namby-pamby kid myself one time, until I went to sea and got
it all knocked out of me--and you did some of the knocking out
yourself, Judson."

The other growled, "Oh, shucks, Don, you were different. I hustled you
araound to make a sailor out of you, but you had the stuff in you even
though you were a mammy's boy. But that feller? I'll bet he's got a
yeller streak in him a yard wide. I can tell! I'm a judge of men, and
some day you'll see.... Naow, Don, we'll go through the bos'n's locker
and see what we need for the voyage."

For the next two days, Donald saw Ruth each evening. Of course Moodey
was there, but it seemed as if the girl favored McKenzie more than the
Halifax youth. Dressed in clothes which enabled him to feel at home in
her company, the young fisherman felt that only Moodey's presence
prevented him from cultivating the intimacy he yearned for. The Monday
morning came all too quick for Donald, though Moodey felt no regret.
McKenzie was bound "to the south'ard" and would not see her again for
possibly two or three months. Moodey, in Halifax, could visit her
whenever she permitted. McKenzie squirmed when he thought about it,
and pictured his rival wooing Ruth with a free rein and no opposition.
He would have to do something to keep his memory green, mused Donald,
and when she was about to drive away in the team to catch the Halifax
train at the station ten miles away, he managed to secure a few
minutes' talk with her _à la solitaire_ and screwed his courage up to
ask if he might write to her in Halifax.

With a sweet smile, she said, "Most certainly, Don. I shall be
delighted if you will. Write and let me know all about Havana and the
places you visit. We're pals, aren't we? Write me a nice chummy
letter, and if you come to Halifax during the winter telephone me
first thing, so's we can have an evening together." And with her merry
blue eyes and pretty face photographed on his mind and her farewell
greetings ringing in his ears, he turned from thoughts of love and
wooing to more mundane and sterner things.

On a cold November morning, the _Queen's County_, with a hold packed
with drums and casks of dried cod-fish and a deck-load of spruce
lumber filling the space between fo'c'sle head and poop-break, towed
out of Eastville Harbor and to sea. A couple of miles offshore, the
tug cast them off and the brig swung south for warmer climes, with her
crew crowding the canvas on her. It was a very happy Donald that paced
her weather alley that night, smoking and musing. As _Mister_
McKenzie, second mate of a beautiful little clipper brig, he was
standing his watch in charge of the ship, and he kept an eye on the
weather-leach of the straining t'gallan's'ls, and thought of his
mother, his home on the hill, and Ruth.

"Eighteen years of age and keeping a home of my own, and with the dear
old Mater comfortably settled in it, and me, second mate of this fine
little packet! Donald Percival McKenzie--you're a very lucky boy! And,
maybe, if you watch yourself, and play your cards right, you'll win
the dearest and loveliest.... Um-um!" He smiled happily to himself and
sensing a flap aloft of the t'gallan's'l leach, he turned to shout to
the wheelsman, "No higher, Jack! You're shaking her!"




CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN


Donald Mckenzie celebrated two noteworthy events in Havana, Cuba. One
was his twenty-first birthday, and the other was the successful
completion of his first voyage as master of a vessel. She wasn't a
very big vessel--being but a fishing schooner of 99 tons--but still
she was a vessel and required as much skill in sailing and navigating
as a craft ten times her size. Judson Nickerson, in the brig _Queen's
County_, had arrived in Matanzas a couple of days before McKenzie
attained his majority, and he journeyed the forty miles or so to
Havana to help his friend celebrate the occasion.

McKenzie, a man grown, tall, lithe and sinewy, sea-tanned and good
looking, and dressed in white ducks and a Panama hat, met his former
skipper in the rotunda of the Hotel Sevilla. "Waal, by Jupiter!" cried
Nickerson, wringing his hand. "You got daown here anyways, an' you
ain't pushed any of th' Bahamas off th' charts in gittin' here, have
you? And you're twenty-one, eh? Lord Harry, Donny-boy, you make me
feel old--"

"Yes, you look old, you ancient crock!" laughed the other, staring at
his friend critically. Judson had lost some of his ranginess, his
angularities had filled out, and his sharp face had smoothed and
rounded, until he looked younger than ever he did in _Kelvinhaugh_
days. "Why you're only a mere fifteen-year jump ahead of me, and
since you've been living a quiet, settled life for the past four
years, the lines of dissipation have faded--"

"The lines of starvation, you mean," cried the other. "Since I left
your hard-feeding Scotch ships an' got home into Bluenosers again,
I've gained weight, and so have you, let me tell you. Where do we
celebrate?"

"Right here, old timer," answered Donald. "I've got a meal ordered
that will make your mouth water, and with everything to drink from
_pina frias_ to planter's punch." And they entered the cool,
high-ceilinged dining room and sat down at a table by the _patio_.

"I suppose you'll try to go afishin' in that ol' hooker of yours this
spring," queried Judson. "You should do all right. You know the ropes
naow an' ye've done two seasons in the dory with me. Will Heneker give
you the _Alameda_ for a fishin' trip this spring, d'ye think?"

McKenzie pursed his lips. "I'm not sure, Jud. You see I offered to
take her down here with a load of salt fish when Tom Himmelman took
sick, as you know, and I didn't get a chance to broach the subject. I
was glad of the opportunity to skipper a vessel, and I didn't ask for
too much. But when I get home I'll ask Heneker to give me a chance as
skipper afishing, and if I take good care of the old _Alameda_ he
might give me charge of her or another of his hookers. Fishing is the
only game to make money in. There isn't much in this freighting work,
but it's a good way to pass the winter and earn a dollar or two. Do
you know, you old fox, I think you had a hand in getting me this
command?"

Captain Nickerson gave an enigmatical smile. "Skipper of a
double-trawl dory is better than being mate of the finest wind-jammer
afloat. You're boss anyway--no matter the size. You 'member the old
yarn 'bout the big P. and O. liner going out of London River? Her
mate, brass-bound to the eyes, was standing in the bows when an old
barge sculled across the river in front of the liner an' th' mate had
to signal to the bridge to slow the engines to prevent a collision.
Then he opens up on the bargee. 'You blankety-blank scowbanker!' he
bawls. 'What in Tophet d'ye mean by scullin' yer old punt 'crost th'
bows of a liner carryin' Her Majesty's mails an' a thousan'
passengers?' The bargee shoots a squirt of tobacco juice over th'
liner's stem as he sculls past, and he looks up at th' brass-bound
mate with all of a London bargee's contempt for a deep waterman. 'Oo
th' 'ell are you aboard that 'ooker?' he shouts. 'I'm the chief
officer of this packet!' answers the mate. Mister Bargee spits again
and retorts, 'Well, Mister Chief H'officer,' he says, 'I'm capting of
this 'ere barge, so you'd better go'n talk to yer equals, you
brass-bound bridge monkey!'"

The guffaws of the two sailors at this hoary old joke caused the
tourists at adjacent tables to look questioningly in their direction.

Working through the dinner from soup to fruit, the two skippers passed
a jovial couple of hours, and when the punch came along, Judson filled
his glass. "Here's to you, old son," he said. "Twenty-one years of age
an' master of a vessel. Not too bad, boy! Not too bad! Here's hoping
that the next time I drink your health it will be at your wedding.
Salut!" McKenzie acknowledged the toast with a smile. "And you, Jud?
Here's hoping I'll have a similar pleasure, and I hope it will be
soon. Bye-the-way, have you heard from Helena this time?"

The other reddened a little under his tan. "Yes, I got a note from her
at Matanzas," he said slowly, and then he added, "You know, we
seafarin' men are at a disadvantage. These pretty and popular girls
have a swarm of shore-hawks dancin' araound them all th' time, while
we poor devils only get an evening with them two or three times a
year. Helena has a bunch of admirers in Halifax--there was two fellers
visitin' her the last time I went to call on her--an' darned if I
could get a word in edgewise. They gushed about hockey matches,
dances, teas and theayters, an' I had to sit an' listen to their bunk
an' amuse myself tryin' to figure aout th' price of fish, until I sat
the blighters aout an' got a few minutes alone with her 'bout
midnight. Durned if I know whether she likes me or not."

Donald sighed sympathetically. His experiences were of a similar
nature. He, too, had dallied precious hours waiting rare minutes of
tête-à-tête with Ruth, but four years of persistent wooing seemed to
have been rather futile, and he was in a state of maddening
uncertainty as to his standing with the girl of his desire. He never
talked to Judson about his fondness for Ruth, and the latter never
mentioned the subject to him. Oftentimes he wished he could make a
confidant of the brother, but as the other had never broached the
subject, Donald hesitated to open it with him. From Jud, however, he
got scraps of news, but they were not calculated to make him happy.
"Th' nut was daown home, I h'ard," or "Ruth spent th' holiday with th'
Moodeys," was the general drift of his informative remarks and they
made McKenzie writhe inwardly.

Ruth wrote him often, but they were merely friendly letters,
commencing "Dear Donald," and ending with "yours sincerely." Donald
took his cue from these, and no matter how much he hungered to
subscribe himself as "yours affectionately," or "yours lovingly," he
had to wait for time and opportunity to earn the right, and time and
opportunity in a sailor's wooing, is long acoming. Evidently Judson
was in the same box, but Judson was in a better situation than
McKenzie. Nickerson had money saved and could afford to keep a wife
and a comfortable home; Donald had his mother to support and had
nothing but a couple of hundred dollars to windward of him. Give him
two years as skipper of a fishing vessel and he might, with luck,
scratch up enough to keep a home with a wife and his mother, but when
he thought of Ruth as the wife, the prospects looked black. Moodey
paid her a great deal of attention; Moodey's people had money, and he,
himself, had secured his LL.B., and was now a junior member of his
father's law firm. Walter was away with a flying start on the road to
success; McKenzie was but a common vessel fisherman, and skipper for a
West Indian voyage, of a small schooner carrying dried fish.

They finished dinner and strolled down through the palms of the Prado
to the Miramar on the Malecon or marine promenade. It was a glorious
evening, and the cool sea breeze was coming in from the Gulf of
Mexico with the setting of the sun, while a regimental band was
playing for the entertainment of the Cubans and Americans who lounged
around on the seats, or strolled leisurely along the sea-wall.

"Let's sit down here and watch the sun set," suggested Donald, leading
the way to a seat. "My artistic eye is taken by the view from here.
Isn't it glorious? I must invest in a pad of paper and a box of
water-colors and do some sketching. I've got a chance now."

The sea stretched like a huge mirror of ruddy gold before them, and
the sun was going down behind the placid Gulf a huge red ball already
eclipsed by the horizon. The windows of the residences on the Malecon
gleamed as though a furnace flamed within their walls, and the rocks
of old Morro's headland stood out like rough cast copper in the glow.
The light-house tower, the ponderous masonry of Morro Fort and of
Cabanas behind, stood placidly reflected in the fading light--calm and
hoary as with the dignity of age, and when one gazed upon their rugged
walls and heard the rag-time strains of the American band, a strange
sense of incongruity took possession of the soul. Here, embodied in
those massy bastions, was history--monumental testimony to the glory
of old Spain, of the Conquistadores, of buccaneers and sea-rovers, of
Columbus, Drake, Morgan and the hosts of reckless seafaring
adventurers who had made these waters their cruising ground. From
here, De Soto--the Bayard of Spanish chivalry--journeyed to Florida to
seek a new El Dorado greater than Mexico or Peru, and left his noble
wife, Isabella d'Avila, to hold La Fuerza as Regent of Cuba until his
return. For five years she waited for her husband's coming and kept
the prowling sea wolves away from the treasures collected yearly in
her stronghold for shipment to Spain. Then came the news of her
husband's death and burial in the turgid waters of the great river
which he discovered--the Mississippi--and she surrendered her post to
join him three days after the ill news was brought to her.

And in the brave days of old what sights old Morro saw! Slave-ships
gliding in from the Guinea Coast, with the sea breeze behind and their
ghastly freights below; privateers, adventurers, pirates and simple
merchantmen! Plate ships from Panama with the treasures of the Incas
in their holds, and galleons and carracks from Vera Cruz, with a
lading of the silver of Mexico, slipped in and out of this storied
harbor--_Llave del Nuevo Mundo_--as the Spaniards called it--"The Key
to the New World!"

As he mused on these things, McKenzie thought of the prosaic age he
lived in and the change wrought by the years. The dark and narrow
streets with their grilled windows through which dusky _senoritas_ in
days long gone, watched the passers-by or flirted with _caballero_ and
_hidalgo_ of Spain, were aglare with electric lights, and the
streetcars gonged their noisy way down the stone-paved _calles_; the
_avenidas_ were thronged, not with promenaders in _sombreros_, black
coats, and lace _mantillas_, but with smartly dressed men and women
who spoke Spanish with an American accent, or English with a Spanish
accent; with peddlers selling cheap cigars and cigarettes, and
newsboys yelling "_El Diario!_" ... "_El Mundo!_" ... "Havana Post!"
and "New York American!" and soliciting bilingually with easy
transition from Spanish to English, and above the hum of conversation
and street noises, blared the American band, playing, not the dreamy
airs of far-off Castille, which Old Havana knew in thrumming guitars,
but the latest Broadway "rag-time" or march of Sousa. And he,
McKenzie, how had he come to storied Havana? Not in galleon, carrack,
privateersman or slaver brig, but in a little Nova Scotia soft-wood
schooner, with a load of dry salted cod-fish!

He sighed and came to a mental conclusion. Romance was in the past. It
did not belong to the present; it was always in the past, and memory
was like unto a skilful painter who touched up the drab canvases of
reality with the colors of glamor long after the picture was made!

The sun had vanished behind the quiet sea and the stars had swarmed
into the velvety azure of the firmament upon the heels of the master
orb, whose after-glow still flamed above the western horizon. A
fishing vessel crept in from the Keys on the breath of the soft
north-east trade wind and her crew were chanteying an old Biscayan
chorus, while a big steamer ablaze with lights forged out with
passengers and cargo on schedule time, to connect with the trains at
Key West, ninety miles away. Donald drank in the beauties of the
night, and remarked to his companion, "This Cuba is a beautiful
country, Jud, and I could sit for hours just dreaming and looking on
this sort of thing. Look at those palms with their feathery fronds;
that sunset! Oh, to be a master painter or a poet that I might dilate
upon the things I see!"

"Yes, it's very fine," grudgingly admitted Judson, "but I don't know
as it can beat daown home for scenery. These tropical countries have
lots of color in them--the flowers are gaudy and the palms and herbage
are very green, but look how coarse they are. Then again, these places
are all hell-holes for heat. You sweat all the time, and you're
pestered with flies and bugs of every variety. No, siree, I prefer
Nova Scotia. I've bin all over th' world, and I think Eastville has
them all skinned for looks an' climate. When a mosquito bites you
Down-east you don't die of yellow jack like you used to in these
ports. This here Havana, until the Yankees cleaned it and drained it,
used to be a sailor's grave-yard." He paused and lit up a cigar. "Tell
me, now that you're twenty-one an' skipper of a hooker, tell me, what
you think of a seafaring life now? You came aboard that _Kelvinhaugh_
full up to the back teeth with the romance and adventure of it, but
have you found it? Do you really like the life?" And he looked
quizzically at McKenzie through the cigar smoke.

The other stared for a while at the ruddy glow of the sunset to the
westward, and answered slowly, "Have I found romance and adventure in
a sea life? I'll answer that in a peculiar way. On the _Kelvinhaugh_
my ideals were shattered and I hated it all, and I was glad to run
away from her in Vancouver. On the voyage to Halifax in the _Starbuck_
I was indifferent. It was intensely monotonous and the adventurous
spells were only occasional, like the time we ran the easting down
the Horn. But, now, when I look back on these voyages, it gives me a
thrill and I see the adventure and romance of them, but it is only by
recollection, and not in the actual experience, that I appreciate
these things. But in the fisheries, I have found the true and
ever-present fascination of seafaring. We're taking something out of
the ocean in that game; we're dodging the wind and weather with only
one objective--that of getting fish. We don't know what we're going to
get. It's a gamble, pure and simple, but there is a glamor and hazard
in wresting the spoils of the deep from the deep, which does not exist
in the other branches of seafaring, where one is paid a wage to sail a
vessel from one port to another and keep her in good condition while
on the journey. In fishing, we are in closer intimacy with the ocean
and all its moods. We brave it in small, but able vessels with men
whom we work with as partners, and we work _in_ it, rather than _on_
it. We know it as the merchant seaman cannot know it, for we know the
floor of the ocean, while the other seamen only see the surface. To
them, the sea is a waste of salt water. To us it is an element which
we regard as an opaque mass which hides that which we seek and we are
forever penetrating its secrets. We know the currents below; we know
the depth of water on our Banks; we know what the bottom is
like--rocks, gravel, mud or sand, and we try to figure out the
migrations of the fish which travel over these bottoms in the gloom of
the light-defying fathoms. We lay our lines over the sea floor always
hopefully and we're always looking forward to a catch. When the fish
are striking it is dollars in our pockets and we're robbing old
ocean's horde; when they're not striking, we look forward
optimistically to another day's looting. Monotony, the drawback in
seafaring, has thus no place in fishing. We are keener observers of
the weather and thus become closer students of natural phenomena; we
work hard, but we live well and sleep in comfortable quarters; we sail
in craft of yacht-like build, and we enjoy the sport of sailing as no
yachtsman can; and best of all, we are free and independent men banded
together for a common purpose and obeying our leader without force or
coercion. Seafaring under those conditions appeals to me. I am
content. I desire no other vocation for gaining a livelihood, for it
gives me money for my material needs, and enough of adventure, romance
and the element of chance to satisfy my mind and soul. So there you
have it."

Nickerson smiled. "You've expressed it pretty well," he remarked,
"and I cal'late you've recorded my ideas on the subject also. We
fishermen are the true Sea Kings. Your merchantman is only a ship
laborer--nothing more and nothing less. I learnt that, and I went back
to the fishing. The merchant seaman looks upon us with contempt; the
landsman, with pity for our hard lot, and we laugh at the both of
them. They are fools! They don't know--they can't know, for we are a
fraternity--a lodge intricate and hard for the stranger to enter, for
our initiation is difficult and not easily acquired. We are the finest
sailors afloat, and we harvest Neptune's pastures when his watch-dog,
Boreas, sleeps. When we want a change, we come droghing fish and deals
to the Indies or the Brazils and live in perpetual summer."

Donald laughed. "Judson, you are developing a wonderful faculty for
moralizing. I like your phrase 'we harvest Neptune's pastures when his
watch-dog Boreas sleeps!' That's a motto for a fisherman. It should be
painted on the wheel-box like the 'Don't give up the ship's' and
'England expects,' which they carve in the poop-breaks of British and
American men-o-war."

McKenzie accompanied his old ship-mate to the station, where he took
train for Matanzas again. "So long, Donny-boy," cried Judson as they
pulled out. "I'll see you in Eastville unless our courses cross. I'm
loading molasses an' I'll be getting away in a day or so. I'll tell
your mother I saw you here an' helped you to celebrate your
twenty-first birthday--"

"You'll tell my mother will you?" shouted the other with a grin. "Not
if the _Alameda_ has a rag of canvas on her. I'll be home a fortnight
before your old square-rig hooker sights Cape Sable."

Early next morning the _Alameda_ slipped out of Havana and ran
south-east down the Cuban coast to the Turks or Caicos Islands--there
to load a cargo of salt for fishery use. At Salt Cay, they came to an
anchor and filled up the schooner's hold with a cargo of the
evaporated sea-water salt, which is the principal manufacture of the
inhabitants of these easterly atolls of the Bahama group. When a full
lading of the saline crystals was secured, the crew of six hands
hoisted sails and anchor and with the steady trades filling their
canvas they bowled off for Eastville and home.

"I'd like to make a fast run up," said McKenzie to McGlashan. "It has
been done in seven days, but I don't think this old hooker can stand
the driving and travel like those new model Lunenburg vessels.
However, we'll try her."

With the Bahama current behind them and the steady north-east trade
blowing strong, the _Alameda_ showed her heels and ploughed through
the deep blue of the tropical sea at a ten-knot clip. McKenzie paced
the quarter, luxuriating in the bright sunshine and watching the
flying-fish, which every now and again skittered up from the sapphire
water as the on-rushing schooner drove upon them. Blue skies and bluer
seas; water that boiled and hissed like champagne in the furrows of
the vessel's passage, and foam that gleamed snow-white against the
deep colors of the Main; flashes of low sandy islets with graceful
tufted palms leaning to loo'ard as the constant trade wind rudely
swayed them.... Truly, these were enchanting seas! Little wonder, he
mused, that the old sea-dogs of northern climes sought these waters
and plied their nefarious occupations until Port Royal gallows and
cruising frigates made the "trade" no longer safe or profitable. Aye,
aye, no wonder the old buccaneer would lament the pleasant times in
pleasant weather in--

    "The pleasant Isle of Aves,
    Beside the Spanish Main."

For five days they ran thus and McKenzie lazied the hours
away--reading and basking in genial sunshine and taking three sextant
squints daily to fix the schooner's position. Then they crossed the
Gulf Stream and the chill breath of February struck them just as
suddenly as the sea changed from blue to green at the fringes of the
great current. Off came the light clothing of summer weather, and on
went the heavy underwear, sweaters, sea-boots, mittens and caps of
frigid seafaring, and a fire was kindled in the cabin stove to
unlimber stiffened fingers and toes.

On February 20th, they made to the eastward of Brown's Bank, and the
fair wind which had hurried them along, flickered away and left them
rolling, with slatting sails and banging booms, in a heavy swell from
the S.E. The sky was solid with stratas of leaden cloud, which ran in
layers from nadir to zenith, and the air was chill and cold. McKenzie
studied the barometer anxiously--tapping the glass every reading to
flog the forecasts of the instrument, which was steadily going down.
Archie Surrette--an old fisherman--read the signs. "We're agoin' to
git some dirt, Skipper," he remarked. "Awful pink sunrise this mornin'
and there ain't no gulls araound. This swell comin' up from th'
south-east ... a south-easter, sure."

McKenzie laughed. "That's a fair wind for home, Archie," he said.
"Better get her snugged down though. Call the boys and we'll get the
jib in the tricing jacket and the mains'l reefed before it hits us."

At noon, the glass had dropped to 29-5 and still going down. A misty
rain began to fall, and within half an hour of its coming, the wind
came in a squall from the southeast which drove the _Alameda_ down to
her rail with the violence of its initial onslaught. When it eased off
and the schooner was tearing along towards the Nova Scotia coast,
McKenzie ran below to squint at the barometer. "Dropped another
tenth," he muttered anxiously. He laid a chart out on the locker and
with the dividers commenced measuring the distance from the vessel's
present position to the nearest harbor. For a minute he sat thinking,
and then he rolled up the sea map and threw it into his bunk. "Can't
make it," he muttered. "This blow will be on us full force within an
hour, and we'd be safer offshore than running in on the land in a
gale of wind and snow."

Buttoning up his oilskins, he pulled on his mittens and went on deck.
Though it was shortly after noon, the sky was dark and the rain was
coming down in sheets, and the wind was blowing in gusts which
careened the vessel to her rails as they struck the canvas.

Taking the wheel, he spoke to the helmsman. "Go for'ard Jim, an' call
the boys. Tell the cook to oil up and come on deck. We'll get the
mains'l off her." And the man scrambled forward to do his bidding with
feelings of relief. When the big mainsail is down, fishermen feel that
they are in trim for anything.

Taking in the mainsail with a full gang of fishermen, and taking it
in, in squally winter weather, with only six men to subdue the
thrashing canvas, are two different propositions. When the men
mustered aft, McKenzie gave his orders. "Joak will lower away on the
peak, and Jim will lower away the throat when I sing out. You, Archie,
will ship the crotch and hook in the tackles when Wesley lowers away
on the topping lift. Ainslie will stand by the gaff down-haul, and
I'll look after the wheel. We'll get the mainsheet in first. Are you
ready?"

It was blowing harder every minute, and the schooner, by the wind, was
plunging and rearing in an ugly cross sea kicked up by the shifting of
the squalls to the eastward. The rain was turning into sleet, which
cut the skin and numbed the hands with its bitterness and velocity,
and which adhered to the gear and froze in the lowering temperature.
Donald watched his chance, and in the wake of a violent blast, he
rolled the wheel down easily and roared, "Helm's a lee! Mainsheet!"
For five minutes, the _Alameda's_ quarter was a scene of frenzied
action. As the vessel came up, the mainsheet was yanked in by all
hands, and then the men ran to the stations. As the schooner rounded
into the wind, sails slatting and sheet blocks banging and jangling,
McKenzie slipped the wheel in the becket, and held the crotch plank
while Surrette hooked the crotch tackle into the ring bolts and hove
it taut. The big sixty-foot boom was now amidships, and when it
steadied above the crotch, McKenzie roared, "Lower away y'r lift!" And
when Wesley Sanders slacked off on the tackle fall, the boom dropped
on to the crotch notch; port and starboard crotch tackles already
hooked in were hauled taut and belayed, and the order came, "Settle
away yer halliards!"

The schooner, plunging and rearing, bows-on to the seas, was
threatening to fall off with the wind in foresail and jumbo. "Let yer
halliards go by the run!" shouted the skipper, springing to assist the
two men tugging at the gaff-downhaul. "And bear a hand here you other
fellows!" Joak and Jim at the pin-rail let the halliards go
and scrambled aft to lend their strength and beef at the
downhaul--wrenching and jerking with the vicious slats of the bellying
mainsail, which, half way down the mast, was prevented from coming
down further by the wind which filled the canvas.

As all hands struggled with the hauling down rope, a big sea rose
above the quarter, roaring with a white-capped crest and curling ready
to break. McKenzie saw it. "Belay yer downhaul," he yelled, "and hang
on!" The words were hardly out of his mouth before it broke aboard.
The schooner rolled down to its impact, and the men hanging on to the
downhaul were enveloped in solid green and washed over the main-boom
and into the belly of the mainsail, which, with the force and weight
of the water in it, was driven over the low rail and into the sea.
Struggling for foot-hold on the slippery canvas and totally submerged
in water as the schooner rolled to leeward, McKenzie and the four men
with him would have been drowned had not Surrette, who had hung on to
the crotch-tackles when the sea struck, jumped up on the cabin house
and thrown a rope down to the yelling, oilskinned humans struggling
and clawing to get out of the deadly water-filled sail.

As soon as he recovered his breath, McKenzie, with no time to thank
Providence for his escape, or to contemplate the horrors of those
suffocating minutes over-side, sprung to the wheel and swung the
vessel off before the wind. "Get the fore-boom tackle hooked in," he
gasped. "I'll jibe her and get that mains'l inboard!" As he rolled the
wheel over, the _Alameda_ slowly payed off. "Watch yerselves when she
comes-to!" he cried in warning, and he stared anxiously at the little
knot of men standing amidships by the fore-sheet. The wind was blowing
with gale force by now and the sea was running in roaring combers, and
the air was white with spray and sleet. For a minute the schooner
raced over the waves with the wind aft, and on the declivity of a huge
crest, Donald rolled the helm up and the foresail came sweeping over
like the flick of a whip--fetching up on the jibing-tackle with such
force as to snap the strong iron shackle of the block and to bend the
stout boom like a bow. The fore-sheet held, however, and as the
schooner came to the wind on the other tack, the men leaped into the
main-rigging just as another sea boarded her amidships, and wrenching
the staysail-box from off the booby-hatch, carried it over the rail.

McKenzie gave a grim smile. "Heneker won't be pleased with this day's
work," he murmured. "And this is only the beginning." By this time,
the mainsail had collapsed and the men were down from the rigging and
tugging on the wet canvas. "Ef that there downhaul had parted while
you fellers were in the belly o' that mains'l overside, I cal'late
ye'd ha' bin in Heaven 'r Hell by this time!" observed Surrette. And
the others grinned and thought no more about it.

Hove-to under foresail and jumbo and with the wheel lashed, McKenzie
and his five men tugged and hauled the heavy wet mainsail aboard. Then
commenced the big job of furling it--a herculean task, at which every
man had to exert all the strength that was in him to roll the sodden,
frozen canvas up and on to the boom. As he pulled and jerked and
hefted the weighty roll of canvas on his back in order that the stops
could be passed, Donald thought of similar tasks "down under" off the
pitch of the Horn in the _Kelvinhaugh_. No need to go to fifty-five
south for strenuous seafaring, he thought. It could be experienced in
all its terrors right off the Nova Scotia coast in wintertime, and
this was a sample of it.

It took them an hour to get the mainsail stowed, and when it was done,
Joak staggered away to his galley--cursing the folly that made a cook
a sailor. "A cook aye gets the worst of it," he growled to himself.
"They never want ye on deck but when it's blawin' a ruddy gale, and
then ye get it butt-end first. I wisht I was back in a guid steamer's
galley whaur ye have nane o' this murderin' deck wurrk!" Joak was a
true sea-cook, however, and in spite of the awful rolling and tumbling
of the vessel, he had his oilskins off, his apron on, and good meal
under way--gale or no gale. And the chilled and hungry humans of the
_Alameda_ wolfed his hot concoctions and blessed him wholeheartedly.

Throughout the short winter afternoon, they rode the gale under
foresail and jumbo, with the wheel lashed and two men on deck to keep
a watch. The wind was steadily increasing, and blowing in such
terrific squalls from the N.N.E. that the schooner would be pressed
lee-rail under during their violence. At tea-time, they stowed the
jumbo to make the vessel lie easier, and McKenzie noted by the still
falling barometer that the worst was yet to come.

With the darkness came conditions bad enough to frighten capable
seamen. A terrible sea--stupendous in the height of the waves and the
whitewater which crowned them--raced roaring through the livid night
and tossed the schooner about like a cork. The wind, at times, blew in
such terrific squalls as to heel the vessel down until half her deck
was submerged and the watch had to hang, limpetlike, to the gear to
avoid being blown overboard. Nothing born of woman could look to
windward in those blasts, and the air was so full of spray as to fill
the mouth with salt saliva in the breathing of it. The side-lights
could not be kept alight, and a kerosene torch, which they had lit and
placed inside a dory to shine against the foresail, was repeatedly
doused by the sprays which drenched the schooner. "You'll just have to
keep torches handy inside the cabin gang-way to show a light in case
another vessel's bearing down," said Donald, after an attempt to keep
a riding-light lit on the peak halliards failed. Lightless, they
plunged and rolled and prayed that the _Alameda_ would cross no
liner's path that night.

At midnight the glass was down to 28.6 and pumping in rapid jerks, and
McKenzie called Surrette's attention to it. "Did you ever see that
before, Archie?" he asked, hanging on to a weather bunk partition to
save himself from sliding to leeward. The fisherman stared at the
barometer, bit off a chew, and grinned. "Look's if th' gaul-derned
thing was agoin' to jibe, Skipper!" he remarked, and Donald laughed at
the simile. The quivering of the needle suggested the premonitory
symptoms of a sail about to swing over. He sat down on the cabin
floor--it was impossible to stand or sit comfortably--and filled a
pipe of tobacco. He had just taken a couple of puffs when the cabin
slide was shoved back and Wesley shouted, "Gittin' worse, Skipper, and
snow's thicker'n ever. Thought I h'ard a steamer blowin'--"

McKenzie was on his feet and up the steps in a trice. Clutching the
spokes of the lashed wheel he listened with straining ears, and amidst
the howl of the wind and the thunder of the sea he heard a regular
note which betokened the blast of a steamer's whistle. "Call the
crowd, Wesley, and tell Jim to light the torches in the gangway--" He
had barely shouted the words when the faint mast-head light of a large
steamer blinked in the blackness to windward. A flicker of red and
green showed below and McKenzie knew that the vessel was heading right
square for them. Casting off the wheel lashing, he almost screamed,
"Stand by yer fore-sheet! We'll have to swing off!"

With fearful recollections of the _Livadia_ accident in his mind, he
watched the nearing lights and spoked the wheel over. Someone was
easing off the sheet of the foresail and the vessel was swinging off.
Then she gathered way and slipped out from under the roaring bows of
the monster driving through the night. It was a big ship--a liner of
ten or fifteen thousand tons--and she towered above them as she forged
past, bellowing stentorously and rolling ponderously. The black smoke
from her belching funnels whirled pungent and bituminous to McKenzie's
nostrils as she vanished into the blackness--a memory of rows of
blazing port-holes and swinging fabric.

The _Alameda_ tore through the dark with a huge wave chasing her
astern, and waiting but a faltering hand at the wheel to overwhelm and
destroy the gallant little craft. McKenzie was a master helmsman,
however, and when the steamer passed, he shouted to Surrette beside
him, "We'll come-to again. Go for'ad and tell the boys to sheet in the
fores'l when I put the wheel down!" Watching his chance in a smooth
between two seas, he gave a shout and eased the spokes over while the
crew amidships tugged the boom inboard and belayed. The steamer was
but an incident--a common hazard nevertheless on the Banks--and they
were hove-to once more.




CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT


It was two in the morning, and McKenzie, keeping a watch by standing
inside the cabin gang-way with his head and shoulders above the slide,
noticed that the foresail was too much for the vessel in the hurricane
squalls then blowing. To Wesley Sanders, standing on the cabin house
hanging on to the main-boom, he bawled, "Go'n call the boys. We'll
have to reef that fores'l!"

Sanders clawed his way forward in the darkness and Donald waited for
the men to muster aft. As they peered at the huge seas rushing to
loo'ard and felt the terrific force of the wind, they realized that it
was time to clip the _Alameda's_ wings, for if they didn't reef the
sail, either mast or sail would go and they would be in a nasty mess.
Never, in his years at sea, had he ever seen such a gale, nor had old
Archie or any of the others. It was an awe-inspiring sight--something
to put fear in the heart of the boldest, and McKenzie admitted to
himself that he was nervous, but not afraid. He was constrained to
marvel at the Providence which kept them comparatively safe up to the
present in this tremendous broil of wind-thrashed water--this war of
elemental Titans in the midst of whom the schooner was tossed like a
chip. As he waited for the men to report aft, he thought of some
verses about the Gloucester fishermen in the big gale of 1879.

    "Oh, the black, black night on Georges,
    When eight-score men were lost!
    Were you there, ye men of Gloucester?
    Aye, ye were there, and tossed
    Like chips upon the water
    Were your little craft that night,
    Driving, swearing, calling,
    But ne'er a call of fright."....

He thought it must have been a night just like this one, but the
vessels in those days were not the able, well-ballasted craft of his
time. It had been blowing like the devil for some hours now and a
hell's own sea was running, but so secure did the crowd feel that
those off duty could sleep peacefully in their rocking bunks with
implicit trust in the seaworthiness of the vessel and the skill of him
who commanded her.

Moving figures in the gloom for'ard showed that the four men from the
forecastle were coming aft with Sanders, and Donald scrambled out of
the cabin gang-way and hauled the slide shut. As he leaped out on top
of the cabin house, a violent blast of wind struck the schooner and he
grasped the gaff-bridles to save himself from being hurled overboard
as the vessel rolled down. The squall kept her pressed lee-rail under
for fully a minute, during which time McKenzie and the others could do
nothing but hang on to the main-boom and the gear around the mast
until its fury was expended.

Slowly, very slowly, the vessel came up as the sail eased off, and the
water poured over the lee rail. Then Saunders gave a frightened shout,
"Watch aout!" McKenzie peered quickly under his arm to windward in
time to see a huge wall of water piling up with a roaring crest, livid
in the blackness of the night. It was a "boarder"--he saw that--and he
swung himself on the lashed gaff and scrambled up the peak halliards
as fast as he could go. He was climbing when the sea struck, and the
shock of its onslaught hove the _Alameda_ down until her masts were
level with the water. McKenzie was almost hurled from the halliards he
was climbing, and when the schooner rolled down he found his feet
trailing in the sea and his body at right angles to the
masts--outlined in the gloom by the frozen sleet adhering to them.

Clutching desperately at the halliards, he waited for the vessel to
come up and wondering how the others fared, and if the hull was
damaged. She lifted a little, but would come up no further. This time
she was hove-down on her beam ends. "Cargo's shifted!" muttered
McKenzie, and he scrambled down to the gaff again with half his body
dragging through seething sea. Crawling over the boom with fingers
numb and frozen and the chill sleet melting and running down his neck,
he made the weather side of the house and clawed his way along to the
main-mast, where men were standing hanging on to the gear and working
at something. In the darkness it was impossible to discern anything
distinctly, save by the film of frozen sleet which outlined objects.
Also, nothing could be heard above the thunder of wind and sea. As
McKenzie slid down the slanting decks to the mast to see if all hands
were safe and the condition of the foresail, Surrette bawled in his
ear, "Main-boom's out of the saddle, Skipper, an' Wesley's jammed in
it--!"

With a grim foreboding in his heart, Donald felt and stared around the
after-side of the mast until he made out the oilskinned figure of
Sanders lying head down to leeward. He was writhing and twisting and
crying out, and his right leg was jammed against the mast by the jaws
of the unshipped main-boom. At every roll of the beam-ended schooner
in the sea-way, the man's head and shoulders were submerged and he was
screaming, "For th' love o' Christ set me free! Get my leg clear! Oh,
God! It's killin' me!" His cries could be heard above the noises of
the gale.

"Let's have a pump-handle!" bawled McKenzie quickly--horror-struck at
the man's plight. "Get a fluke-bar--anything.... God's sake don't let
him suffer like that! Get down and hold his head clear of the water,
you Archie!"

With four of them tugging and straining on a pump-brake, they failed
to lever the boom-jaws clear. When the vessel rolled, the great
sixty-five foot spar swayed and ground against the captive limb and
Wesley screamed with the frightful agony of it. "Oh, God!" he
shrieked, and his shouts would be stifled by the seas which washed
over them from time to time. "Cut my leg away! Cut it away! Holy
Mother! I can't stand it! I can't stand it!"

Surrette was hanging to loo'ard with one arm around the fife-rail and
the other supporting Sanders to keep his head clear of the water. He
was trying to soothe the agonized man. "Hold a minute, Wesley-boy,
we'll git ye adrift in a minute! Keep cool, my son, ye'll soon be
alright!" But, eventually, Nature did what Surrette couldn't do, and
Sanders mercifully fainted.

Every grind of the boom-jaws against the man's leg wrung Donald's
sensitive heart. He saw that all efforts to budge the heavy boom by
levering it away were of no avail. "Get me an ax!" he yelled, panting
and perspiring and with the blood running cold within him at the
terror of it all. When the axe was handed to him, Joak whimpered,
"Ye're no goin' tae cut his leg aff, are ye, Donal'?"

"Leg? Hell!" snapped the skipper. "Stand clear! I'm going to chop
through the boom!" And he swung the keen blade into the wood until he
had severed the jaws and Wesley was released.

"God's truth, that was awful!" he panted. "Get him down in the cabin
and place him in a lee bunk. His leg must be crushed to a pulp."
Staggering along the deck with the groaning man and deluged with spray
and solid water, they reached the gangway and managed to get Sanders
into the cabin. They placed him tenderly in a bunk in the darkness and
scrambled on deck again for still more strenuous work.

The _Alameda_ was lying on her beam-ends in the trough of the sea and
the waves were making a complete breach over her. "Slack away the
fore-sheet!" shouted McKenzie calmly. "And if that don't lift her,
we'll try and haul the sail off her!" A half an hour's desperate work
on the part of the five men failed to bring the schooner up, and
Donald realized there was only one other thing to do. "Get me your
axe again, Joak," he shouted, and when it was brought to him he slid
down into the water to leeward and hacked the lanyards of the
main-shrouds. Crawling up to windward, he bawled to Surrette, "Cast
off your main-sheet and crotch-tackles! I'm going to cut away the
main-mast!" And when this was done, he waited a moment when the vessel
rolled to leeward and swung his axe into the taut weather lanyards.
With a twang of the spring-stay as it parted, the big spar went by the
board and into the sea.

Relieved of the main-mast and with the foresail down, the schooner
slowly came up from her beam-end position, but wallowed in the trough
with her decks listed to port. The foremast, with nothing to stay it
aft, was reeling precariously in the step and threatened to topple
over the side until McKenzie and Surrette clawed their way aloft and
stayed it with two lengths of three-inch halliard which they carried
to the gypsy-winch and hove taut.

When this work was done, they double reefed the foresail and set it,
and Donald sent Ainslie Williams to the wheel. "We'll jibe her over on
the other tack and get to work on that salt which has shifted up
inside her port top-sides. It'll shift back some when we put her
over.... Lash yourself to the box, then let her run off for a spell
and watch for a lull and a smooth before you put the helm up on her!"
And he and the three others stood by a jibing tackle which they rigged
to ease the fore-boom over.

Under sail again, the schooner ran before the wind and sea, and then
Ainslie shouted and put the wheel over. Bang! The foreboom whipped
from port to starboard with a jarring shock which caused the stout
halliard backstays to stretch and McKenzie to glance anxiously at the
mast.

"She's alright," he ejaculated grimly, and he was about to make a leap
for the fore-rigging as the schooner came up, when another big sea
piled over the stern and, catching him in its terrific onrush, drove
him with sickening force into the fore pin-rail. For almost half a
minute he was under water, and when he emerged dazed, sputtering and
gasping, it was to find Surrette washing about in the water, which
seemed to fill her decks from stem to stern.

Hauling the old fisherman to his feet, McKenzie found him unconscious
from a blow on the head, but, sensing from the slatting of the
foresail, that the wheel was deserted, he propped the man against a
splintered dory and ran aft to find nobody at the spokes. Before he
could swing the wheel down, the foresail jibed, and the sail split
from head to foot and was soon a rectangle of slatting rags.

Joak and Jim from out of the darkness appeared aft. "Where's Ainslie?"
bawled Donald. "God Almighty, but this is one hell of a night! Go
for'ad, you fellows, and get Surrette into the cabin. He's lying
stunned against a dory!" And he slipped the wheel into the becket
lashed hard down, and searched the lee quarter for the missing Ainslie
with a chill dread gripping his heart. When the other two brought
Surrette aft, Donald met them. "Ainslie's gone!" he said huskily. "God
be good to him!"

With the schooner lying broad in the sea, they went below, and
McKenzie lit the lamps and went over to examine Wesley, who was lying
where they had left him. Cutting the clothing away from the injured
limb, Donald found the leg fearfully bruised and swollen. Fixing it up
as best he could, he made the injured man comfortable by shoring him
with pillows and blankets, and he turned to Surrette. The old man had
been hove against the bulwarks and had received a nasty cut on the
head, but when a spoonful of rum had been forced between his teeth, he
became conscious. After bathing and dressing the wound, Donald left
him in a bunk, and scanned the barometer.

"Rising!" he grunted wearily, and to the other two he said, "We'll get
a bite of something and cut our way into the hold and trim that salt.
Then when it eases off, we'll get some sail on her and get her in."
The others nodded gloomily, and they all went forward to the
forecastle and ate like starving men.

When Joak brought Donald a cup of coffee, he found him with his head
on the table, crying silently. "What's th' maitter, Donal'?" he asked,
patting his old chum on the shoulder. "Are ye thinkin' aboot Ainslie?"

The other nodded and looked up with the tears streaming from his tired
eyes. "I wonder--if I shouldn't have taken--the wheel--myself--that
time?" he said brokenly.

Jim answered, "No, no, Skipper! It wasn't any fault of yours. I h'ard
ye tell him to lash hisself an' he couldn't ha' done it. It was his
fate. Poor lad! I hope he died quick an' easy. That's th' best a
feller kin wish. God rest his soul, for he was a good lad!"

McKenzie was only a boy after all and he felt Ainslie's loss keenly.
It was awful to go like that--to be swept into eternity in the
twinkling of an eye--and it un-nerved him. He had put in a frightful
night and he was feeling the strain, and it wasn't over yet. The other
two--older men and unhampered with responsibility--cheered him up, and
when he went on deck again, he felt better and ready to tackle the
problems before him.

Breaking into the hold, they trimmed the cargo of salt, and came on
deck again when the grey dawn was breaking. The wind had eased off to
a moderate gale, but the sea was still running high and the schooner,
on an even keel once more, looked a sorry sight in the growing light.
Ice filmed rigging and the bulwarks, and everything moveable was gone
from the deck--dories, stays'l box and cable box, and the chain was
scattered around. The starboard anchor was hove off the rail and
inboard, and a splintered stump showed where the main-mast had been,
while a gap in the port bulwarks marked the place where it crashed
overboard. The foremast stood denuded of sail, with gaff and boom
swinging idly and festoons of canvas flapping from them. The halliards
were trailing overside, and gleaming ice covered everything.

"She's rim-racked for sure, Skipper," grinned Jim, "but she's still
tight. Ain't no more'n ordinary water when I tried th' pumps ... good
hull to stand th' bangin' she's had this time."

Donald surveyed the schooner and he said hoarsely, "We'll work her
in. We'll hoist the riding sail on the foremast, and with that and the
jumbo, we'll get her along. Let's get busy."

With the easing off of the gale, McKenzie got the schooner underway
again, and after figuring out his position by dead reckoning, he
shaped a course for Eastville, and found, even without after-canvas
that she would lay it. Eastville Harbor was their nearest port, and he
was anxious to get Sanders ashore and into a doctor's hands.

But progress under such scanty canvas was slow, and when a fishing
vessel hove in sight during the afternoon, McKenzie hoisted the
ensign, union down, and, when the other craft hove-to, he hailed her.
"Send a dory over. I have an injured man I want to send to hospital!"
They came and took Sanders away, and within a few minutes the other
vessel swung off hot-foot for Eastville.

"I'll work her in alright," Donald told her Skipper. "Tell them we're
coming, and that we lost a man--Ainslie Williams--overboard in that
blow."

Two days later, in fine smooth weather, they arrived off Eastville
Capes, and a tug plucked them through the headlands and into the
harbor. McKenzie steered--as he had steered for two nights and two
days--and he looked utterly played out. His face was unshaven and red
and swollen by continuous exposure to cold and wind; his shoulders
drooped through sheer bodily fatique, and his brown eyes peered,
blood-shot, through half-closed lids, heavy for lack of sleep. The
skipper of the tug-boat, making fast alongside to shove the schooner
into the wharf, stared at the smashed decks and at the weary McKenzie,
and he remarked to a deck-hand, "That lad has sure had one hell of a
time an' he's done well--mighty well--for a kid."

There was a crowd of people on the wharf when they came alongside,
and, thinking of Ainslie Williams, Donald avoided their eyes. They
looked down on the schooner's decks in silence, and the half-masted
flag told its own story of death ... outside. He got up on the wharf,
still in his sea-boots and oil-clothes, and staggered on the
stringpiece as though a deck were still heaving beneath his feet.
People spoke to him--kindly voices--but he was tired, too tired to
talk. When a man has been three days and three nights on his feet
under severe mental and physical strain, he craves but one thing--to
throw himself down and sleep, sleep, sleep.

Caleb Heneker, the _Alameda's_ owner, laid a kindly hand on his
shoulder. "You did well, son, to bring her through that breeze. It was
a terror--a real bad one, and an awful lot of vessels and lives lost.
Run along, Cap'en, and git a rest. Your mother's at the head of the
wharf, and I cal'late she'll be mighty glad to see ye." He seemed to
rouse at the mention of "mother," and with a vague recollection of
hearing Heneker say that "Sanders was alright, but they had to take
his leg off," he found himself with her arms around his neck and her
voice in his ears, sobbing, "Oh, Donald, I'm so glad you're back home
and safe!"

Arm in arm with her, he walked up to his house, and the people
strolling down to the wharf to view the schooner, stepped courteously
to one side to let them pass. "Young Skipper looks broken up," they
said, sympathetically. "Must have had an awful time." And they stared
after the stooping, oilskinned figure staggering up the road with the
mother leading him by the arm, and shook their heads understandingly.
It was not the first time they had seen such sights, and oftentimes it
would be a silent figure on a plank, and covered with a blanket, which
would be carried up from the wharf--a staved and broken
human--aftermath of gales.

At home he flopped down into a bedroom chair and the mother took his
boots and oilskins off--soothing him with cheerful "There now's" as
she removed his clothing. Leading him to bed, she helped him in,
arranged the pillow under his head and covered him with the blanket
and quilt just as she used to do when he was a bit of a little lad.
Then with a soft kiss, she pulled down the window blind and left him
to a slumber which lasted for a full twelve hours.

Youth does not take long to recuperate both mentally and physically,
and McKenzie was no exception. When he awoke, he sloughed off the
despondency and depression of spirits induced by fatigue and anxiety,
and went down to the vessel. They were unloading the salt out of her,
and carpenters were already at work on her decks repairing the
damages. Archie Surrette, tending a salt tub, hailed him cheerfully,
"How're ye feelin', Skipper? Catch up on sleep?" His head was
bandaged, but he looked none the worse.

"They're givin' ye a great name, Cap, for gettin' this hooker in," he
continued. "'Twas an awful breeze, they say. A power o' vessels lost
an' bust up. Th' whole o' Novy Scotia's beaches are piled wi'
lobster-traps, stove dories and fishin' boats, an' nary a fish house
has a roof on it 'twixt here and Cape Sable. It blowed vessels away
from the wharves--bust their moorin' lines, an' even blowed sails out
o' the stops and tore 'em to rags. It wuz th' big breeze all right."

McKenzie nodded. "What--what do they think of--of poor
Williams--going?" he ventured hesitatingly.

The old man bit off a chew. "It was too bad, Skip, that he went, but
it wuz his own fault. He niver lashed hisself to the wheel-box after
you warned him. He sh'd ha' known better--he's bin at sea a long while
and he knowed what was liable to happen. Ef he'd have taken a turn
with a bit o' line around his waist, he'd have bin here to-day 'stead
of over the side. Don't you worry, Skip," and he patted him on the
shoulder, "it ain't your fault, and nobody's sayin' it is. Good thing
he was a single man. Now, poor Sanders ... that's bad. They had to
take his leg off to save his life. He'll pull 'raound, but he's got
six of a family to keep, an' I cal'late he won't want to go to sea any
more after what he went through. And I don't blame him!"

Feeling himself again, Donald went into Heneker's office to discuss
the chance of getting command of the _Alameda_ for the spring fishery.

"I'd like to give her to ye, son," said the old man, "but Tommy
Himmelman'll be goin' back in her." He noticed the disappointment in
McKenzie's eyes, and he added encouragingly, "I'm plannin' to build
another vessel this summer which Himmelman'll take next year, an' by
that time, I can promise you first chance on the _Alameda_. Y'know,
son, you're young yet. Put in another season in the dory and learn all
ye can. It'll be good training." He turned and picked up a letter from
his desk. "Here's a letter from the insurance company what has the
policy on the _Alameda_. They're sending you a gold watch for bringin'
her in, and well they might, for it's saved them a good four thousand
dollars anyway."

When he left the office, Donald muttered grimly, "A gold watch? Very
nice, but a gold watch will not help poor Williams or Sanders. I'd
give a thousand gold watches to see them as they were!"

For a couple of days he remained at home helping his mother and
cutting wood for her summer firing, then Mr. Nickerson sent for him to
get Judson's schooner ready for the spring fishery. He spent a week
working on her when Judson himself arrived from Halifax.

"By gorry, Don," remarked the skipper after the greetings were over,
"but that was one devil of a session you had after you left me. A
dirty easterly! We get one every winter, but that one was a terror.
Awful sea, they tell me, running everyways and piling aboard. That's
what does the damage, and no vessel can avoid them. So Caleb Heneker
can't give you the _Alameda_ this season? Oh, well, you're young yet,
and another summer in the dory won't hurt you."

"I suppose you saw Helena in Halifax," observed Donald. "And Ruth? How
are they?"

The other made a gesture. "By Jingo, I nearly forgot my message. I've
to tell you they're both tickled to death to hear of your escape, but
Ruth wants to know why you did not write her since you came in. She
thinks you are most unfriendly."

McKenzie smiled. "I'll write to-night," he said simply; glad that she
resented his neglect. He had not felt like writing after his
disastrous trip, and the piece of convent-made lace which he had
purchased for her in Calle O'Reilly, Havana, had been ruined by salt
water and was no longer presentable.

When mid-March came around, the Spring fleet were swinging off for the
Banks again and Nickerson's schooner, the _Windrush_ was about ready
for sea, with an eight-dory gang. Donald was going dory-mates with old
Archie Surrette.

"Let's take a shoot up to Halifax for a day," suggested Judson, and
when McKenzie gave him a quizzical stare, he reddened under his tan.
"If I don't," he added in excuse, "Helena will be getting hitched to
one of those Willy-boys that's forever flappin' araound her. Get into
your glad rags and come along." And the two men ran for their
respective homes, changed, and caught the packet steamer a half-minute
before she pulled out.




CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE


Ruth Nickerson greeted Donald with unusual warmth. She was now a woman
beautiful of face and figure, and McKenzie had never seen her look so
entrancing and desirable, while the sincerity of her welcome caused
his heart to thump wildly. When she took his hand, she stepped close
to him and looked up into his face with wide open eyes--eyes as clear
and as blue as a Trade wind sky, and there was a hint of deep regard
in them which made him feel ridiculously happy. For a space he
retained her soft fingers in his and she made no attempt to withdraw
them.

"I am so glad to see you, Donald," she said softly, and there was a
depth of feeling in her voice that he had never heard before. "And I,
you," he murmured, and he gave her hand another press before releasing
it.

She stood back a space and scanned him from head to foot. He was
dressed neatly and becomingly in a grey tweed and with tan boots. His
collar and tie were in accordance with the latest fashion, and a
Halifax barber had spent an hour trimming his hair, shaving his
cheeks, and manicuring his sun-tanned strong fingers. This last was a
piece of the fussiness of early training, and when he departed, his
barber remarked to a workmate, "Them rich guys are great on havin'
their lunch hooks fussed up. By th' mitts on him, I reckon he's bin
spendin' th' winter sportin' 'round in Bermuja playin' goluff an'
paddlin' canoes."

Nothing of the desperate ordeal of three weeks before appeared in his
face or figure. His features glowed with a healthy tan and the white
skin of his forehead--hat-shaded from sun and sea wind--served to
contrast with his dark wavy hair. There was a snappy glint of vigorous
strength in his large dark eyes which matched the erectness of his
slim figure, and his present appearance caused Ruth to hark back in
memory of the day, four years previous, when she had first met him--a
rough looking, tousled-headed sea boy, garbed in clothes which were a
caricature.

After the survey, which Donald endured somewhat abashed, she remarked
laughingly, "My! Donald McKenzie, if I were to meet you on the street
I wouldn't know you--you're grown so----" She was going to say
"handsome," but hesitated and caught him by the arm. "Come into the
parlor and tell me all about your dreadful adventures. It must have
been awful." And she led him to a sofa and motioned him to a seat
beside her.

As he was reluctant to tell the story, she plied him with questions to
which he returned jocular answers. It is bad form for a sailor to
relate personal adventures in any other way. "Yes," he observed
humorously, "we cut away the mast because it made the vessel lop-sided
and very uncomfortable. When we cut it down and got it clear of the
ship, things were much nicer. The gale? Oh, it was quite a
breeze--quite a breeze! I should imagine you people ashore had an
awful time in the streets with the shingles flying and the signs and
telephone poles falling down. None of those dangers at sea--thank
goodness!" And he heaved a sigh of mock relief.

She asked about Williams and Sanders, but when she saw the fun die out
of his smiling eyes and a look as of pain light in their depths, she
cried hastily, "No, no, don't let's talk about _that_! Let's change
the subject. Are you going as captain of a vessel this summer?"

"No," he answered, almost pathetically. "It's me for the dory and
trawl-hauling again. I guess Old Heneker thought I used vessels too
roughly to risk giving me another command. But he's promised to give
me a chance of a vessel next spring, so that's encouraging."

"You intend remaining at sea then?" she ventured somewhat
apprehensively.

"Sure thing!" answered McKenzie. "There's nothing else I can do and
there's nothing else I care to do. Seafaring is my hobby and my
profession, and I do not wish anything better."

"Wouldn't you care to have a shore occupation? Something connected
with ships?"

"Some day, yes!" he replied, "but not yet. Some day when it does not
pay me to go to sea or when I've made enough to keep away from it. But
I have a home and a mother to keep and it is only by fishing and
navigating vessels that I can make the money. I couldn't make enough
at any other occupation. I wouldn't care to be an office clerk and I
don't want to be a shore laborer. What could I do ashore worth while?
Nothing!"

Her face fell a little at this, but Donald failed to notice it. He was
gratifying his artistic sense of proportion and his appreciation of
beauty in regarding the lovely roundness of her bare forearms and the
perfect sweep of shoulders and neck. What a glorious head of hair she
had!--he mused as he gazed thoughtfully on its wavy, coiled tresses
with a sheen on them where they caught the light like the sun on a
raven's wing. She was very, very pretty this Nova Scotia lassie, he
thought, but with his silent admiration came a recurrent pang of fear
that someone other than he would call her "wife." He talked away, and
while he talked he sub-consciously tried to imagine possessing this
charming girl for his own; to slip his arms around those perfectly
moulded shoulders, and, looking into those wide blue eyes, slowly
press her body and her lips to his. It was an enchanting thought--a
fancy to set his blood afire; to realize his heart's desire, to have
this wonderful, virile, glorious creature in his arms and to hear her
whisper, "I love you!"

They switched from the relation of storm happenings to a description
of Cuba. He seemed inspired by her company, and as he dilated on the
beauties of the sapphire seas, the palms, the dazzling sunlight, and
the ancient glories of Old Havana, she saw in him an artist, a
romanticist, and a nature-lover, drawing on a clear and retentive
memory for the painting of a word picture which his masterly telling
limned before her imaginative eyes. She lay back on the sofa cushions
and gazed at his features dreamily, and as he talked she felt a
strange thrill in her heart and he appeared then to her as her Knight
Splendid. She pictured him in shining armor--a Conquistadore in morion
and cuirass--a _caballero_ of Royal Spain--a cavalier as intrepid, as
brave, and as chivalrous as those of whom he was talking in his
relation of Cuba's history, and she could picture him in fancy leaving
her for the conquest of a new world with her glove in his helmet and
clear purpose and courage burning in his dark eyes.

"Those are glorious latitudes," he was saying. "Warm, yet cool with
the steady Trade wind forever blowing and ruffling the sea into little
waves which sparkle in the dazzling sunlight. As the ship rushes along
the schools of flying fish leap out almost from the curl of the bow
wave, and with their wings glistening like mother-of-pearl in the sun
they slip into the blue water again to be followed by another school.
And those palms! I think the palm is a most beautiful tree! There is
something graceful about them which delights the eye as they bend and
sway to the wind with their fronds rustling and sighing in
accompaniment to the murmur of the surf on the white sand beaches.
It's a rare tree, the palm, and the only trees which compare with them
for beauty, in my mind, are our own Canadian spruce and pine."

Ruth admitted to herself that she was in love with Donald then. But
when he ceased talking and she lost the spell of his eyes and voice,
cold reason would intervene and endeavour to stifle the feeling within
her. "Love him! Love him! Love him!" Desire and the woman's heart
urged, but Reason came with a repressive "No! No!" and as she wavered
between the two, Reason would conquer and Justice and Honor would
murmur, "Play the game fairly. Tell him it cannot be!"

Cultured, handsome, brave, generous and all as he was, yet he was but
a common fisherman, with but a bare and hazardous livelihood assured
him. Love him, she might, but she knew she would not marry him as a
fisherman, and he would not change his occupation. She admired the
fishermen; she had listened, with her imagination thrilled, to tales
of their adventurous existence, but ever since she was a little child
she had shuddered at the thought of ever having a near one and a dear
one following that hazardous vocation. She feared for her brother,
Judson, and she would fear ten times more for the man she loved. The
recent gale in which Donald had lost a man and seen another maimed for
life; in which he himself had escaped death but narrowly, served to
stiffen her determination. She could not marry him. She admitted she
was a coward, but she could not bear the strain and anxiety of the
days when her man was at sea. When she married, her husband would have
to be near and to home.

At last Judson and Helena came in and interrupted their delightful
_tête-à-tête_. They had been to a theatre and they burst into the
parlor full of the recollections of a pleasurable show, and with their
entry the conversation became general. Then they had some playing and
singing, and when McKenzie prepared to depart he felt that the time
was fast approaching when he would have to declare himself. Ruth's
attitude towards him gave him hope and he knew instinctively that he
stood well in her estimation. This evening she had been particularly
charming to him--not the charm of a hostess to a dear friend--but
rather the charm of a woman in whose heart love was budding; that
indefinable something, the touch of fingers, the fleeting glances and
soft-spoken phrases which only lovers can understand, and McKenzie was
quick to sense it.

In the darkened hallway she pressed close to him and her hair brushed
his face, leaving a faint and indescribably sweet perfume in his
nostrils. In the reflected light her rounded shoulders and head were
faintly illuminated, and she became, to his imagination, a Venus of
the shadows; a woman waiting to be caressed and loved unseen by prying
eyes and desirous of keeping her affections secret. While he stood
whispering to her the intoxication of her presence and the
circumstances were causing his blood to pound through his veins. She,
too, was fighting a tumult in her heart. "Love him!" urged Desire and
the woman in her, but Reason's icy hand repressed the inclination. She
would have to decide soon--aye, even now. If she gave way...?

Walter Moodey's face rose before her eyes. She'd have no reason to
fear sea terrors with him. He was handsome, manly, generous ... and
yet she had a deep feeling for this poor, brave, clean-hearted Scotch
fisher-boy. But the sea ... the lonely nights. The hazardous
livelihood ... the sweating toil of it. It was hard, terribly hard,
but it could not be otherwise. A tremendous wave of sympathy swept
over her and she found herself murmuring, "Don! Kiss me ... and go!"

She barely whispered the words, but the telepathy of love communicated
their import to his quickened sensibilities and he crushed her to his
breast. For a moment--a space of seconds charged with happiness
supreme--he could feel the throbbing of her heart and her warm, soft
body against his as their lips met in the age-old seal of love. Then,
drunk with the sense of possession, with the intoxicating sensation of
having held this glorious creature in his arms for a delicious and
memorable portion of time, of having kissed her on that desirable
mouth, he reeled away, feeling that he had reached the uttermost
heights of visioned and desired joy.

When McKenzie left, Ruth immediately felt ashamed of her weakness and
cringed mentally at the thought of her impulsive action. It was
sympathy and a feeling which she could not control that spurred her to
display her excess of emotion, and she knew that Donald had
misinterpreted her true feelings towards him. She admired and
respected him, but she did not love him enough to marry him. He had
neither money nor prospects sufficient to give her what she expected
and had been used to, and she was too much of a coward to become the
wife of a fisherman. With Walter Moodey as her husband she would move
in a sphere corresponding to her desires, tastes and ambition. With
Donald McKenzie she would live as a house-drudge, solitary for long
periods, uncertain as to the future for many years, and unable to
enjoy and fraternize with the things and people she admired.

In her bedroom she lay in the dark and analyzed the spirit which urged
her to the action which she was now repenting. It was purely
sympathy--sympathy for a manly, clean-hearted young fellow who loved
her and whom she would be putting on the rack within a short period
when she accepted Walter Moodey. Moodey was in her class. He was
handsome, clever, generous, courteous and a gentleman, and she
_thought_ she loved him. When he was with her she was sure of it, and
it was only when she was alone and thinking of McKenzie that the
little doubt came.

McKenzie's voyage in the _Alameda_ was the cause of his undoing. Ruth
had heard the story from Judson and the horror of it had stiffened her
determination to break off the dangerous intimacy with Donald. She
laid awake the best part of the night a prey to conflicting emotions,
and scheme after scheme ran through her mind like sheep racing through
a pen gate. She would have to let McKenzie know the real state of
affairs between them. To let him go away with the impression which he
undoubtedly had, would be a torture to her conscience and
self-respect. She would write him to Eastville the first thing in the
morning and explain--but ... if the letter should not reach him before
he sailed? Or again, if it did, how would he act? This caused her much
speculative pain, and for a space, her reason refused to suggest an
easier way. Harassed by her fears she ultimately decided to evade and
postpone the day of reckoning with McKenzie. Walter had already
proposed to her, but she had not given her answer. She would accept
him and have him hasten the marriage ere Donald returned from the
fishery in the fall, and by doing so she would be spared the necessity
of making painful explanations and of living in the same locality with
him.

Stampeded into this ruthless line of action, she tried to soothe her
conscience that it was for the best. Next day she accepted Walter
Moodey. The engagement was to be kept secret, and they were to marry
in August.

Meantime, McKenzie was living in the seventh heaven of delight. His
feet trod air and his head was in the clouds. In his mind, Ruth's
action gave her to him. They had sealed their pledge without words and
she would become his wife on the asking. In his exhilaration of spirit
he was not above feeling sorry for Moodey. "Poor chap," he murmured.
"I hope he don't take it too hard, and may he get a girl as good as
Ruth." Happy, with love in his heart and a song on his lips McKenzie
went to the Banks.

The _Windrush_ "wet her gear" on the Western grounds most of the time,
but the spring trip was a rough and windy one and fishing was below
the average. Donald was anxious to make money--it was now an obsession
with him--and Archie Surrette, his dory-mate, would curse his excess
of zeal when he rolled, bone-tired, into his bunk o' nights. "By Judas
Priest!" he'd growl, "McKenzie's killin' me! I'm rushed from mornin'
to night. He don't want to stop even to eat, an' to-day, after we'd
hauled an' baited six tubs o' gear agin' that tide an' wind an' my
back near busted an' dark acomin' and me wishin' I wuz aboard and in
me bunk, he says, 'By gorry, Archie, if I had another bucket o' bait
I'd haul an' spin 'em out again!' I ups an' says, says I, 'Donald
McKenzie! ef you have a mind to do that, ye kin put me aboard th'
vessel and ye kin take th' dory yerself and spin 'em out agin, for I
be damned ef I will!'"

And when the bait was finished and the schooner was heading for
Eastville to land her spring catch, it was McKenzie who went to her
wheel and swung her off as the skipper gave the course. "West Nor'West
and drive her, you!"

"West Nor'West, and I'll drive her! I'll tear the mains'l off this
peddler before she slacks her gait!" McKenzie grinned cheerfully. He
was directing her course for home and Ruth, and in a moderate gale,
with a tuck in the big mainsail, the _Windrush_ was storming through
the night with a bone in her teeth. Watch after watch came aft to
relieve him, but he waved them away with a laugh. "Leave her to me,
boys," he shouted. "I'm a steersman and I'll walk her along. If I
leave her to some of you Jonahs, the wind'll drop or come away a
nose-ender!"

The for'ard gang christened him "Stormalong McKenzie" that night. In
the weight of the breeze blowing the schooner commenced that peculiar
leaping and plunging which indicates a "driven" vessel, and whole seas
were coming over the bows and washing as far aft as the gurry-kid. In
the forecastle the men lay in their bunks and listened to the
continuous "barroombing" outside--the drumming of the bow-wave, the
crashes of the water falling on deck and the swash and trickle across
the planks overhead. Now and again she would swipe a big one and the
jar of its impact against the bowsprit and the windlass above would
douse the lamp screwed to the pawl-post; the anchor stock would thump
against the bows, and the vessel would creak and groan in every
straining timber.

Crash! A heavy thud and a rolling noise on deck as if huge boulders
were being thrown along the planks. "He's capsized th' chain-box this
time," growled a nautical Sherlock Holmes from the depths of his bunk.
Crash! Thud! Swish! Another comber aboard, and Sherlock remarked,
"That one fetched agin th' dories, I'll bet. McKenzie'll start
somethin' overboard afore long!" But the snores from the bunks proved
that most of the gang were not worrying.

A nervous look-out man scrambled aft in the dark and shouted to
Donald, "Th' starb'd nest o' dories is workin' aft, Mac!" And the
other, with a laugh, replied, "Don't let that scare you, John! Get a
gripe around their sterns and let me know when the windlass comes aft.
Time enough then to shout!" And thus he drove her storming--a slugging
twelve to fourteen knots throughout the night--and next morning,
before the dawn, the light on Eastville Cape blinked them a
homeward-bounder's welcome.

Aye! 'Tis not always Boreas that drives a vessel into port; oft-times
Cupid is more of a driver than the breezy god!

Donald surprised his mother just as she was bringing in a pail of milk
from the little barn, and he also whirled her off her feet with the
gladness of his welcome. Then he sat down to a breakfast such as
seamen dream about--not that they didn't fare well on the _Windrush_,
but much seafaring provender comes out of cans and salt brine, and
fresh milk, eggs and vegetables can be appreciated after weeks of
preserved food.

"Ruth Nickerson is home," observed the mother, well aware of the
importance of her announcement even though Donald had skilfully
concealed from her all ideas of serious intentions. Mother's instincts
are keen, however, especially where love and another woman is
concerned, and she smiled to herself at Don's look of false surprise
and his careless "Is that so? And how is she?" Just as if he wasn't
dying to know if she were home!

"I think Mr. Moodey and Helena Stuart are down here also," she went
on. Another time, this announcement of Moodey's presence in Eastville
would have given him a sinking feeling, but now he could afford to be
generous. He didn't mind poor Moodey. Jolly good of him to stick
around and keep Ruth company. Fine chap, Moodey! The mother continued,
"I heard something about them having a picnic down to Salvage Island
to-day. The young people of the church have chartered the packet
steamer for the trip. They're to start about eleven."

"A picnic?" ejaculated Donald. "Oho! I'd like to get in on that.
Wonder if Jud'll be going?" He had scarcely finished speaking before
Captain Nickerson appeared in the kitchen door. After greeting Mrs.
McKenzie he said to Donald, "The church folk are having a picnic
cruise to Salvage Island--clam bake and all that sort of thing--and I
reckon I'll go. Will you come along? The boys'll get the fish out and
the stores aboard, and we'll pull out day after to-morrow. You'll be
with us? Right! Meet me at our house. The packet'll pull out at
eleven."

He had departed but a few minutes when Caleb Heneker walked up. He
was evidently in a fix about something by the manner in which he
hustled up to the house. "Is yer son araound, Mrs. McKenzie?" he
enquired. "Want to see him particular. H'ard he got in this mornin'."
And when Donald appeared the old man got to business right away.

"I've got the schooner _Amy Anderson_ loaded with dry fish for San
Juan, Porty Reek, and th' skipper I had for her has gone raound to
Annapolis to take a three-master. Naow, I'm stuck. I can't git a man I
kin trust to take my vessel daown, and I've come to see ef you'd go in
her. I've got to git her away right naow--she's three weeks late
already--and I got a cable this mornin' sayin' ef th' cargo don't
leave within' twenty-four hours they'll refuse th' shipment. Kin you
go?"

Donald was rather taken back. "How about my fishing?" he enquired. "I
couldn't leave Captain Nickerson short a man, and, also, I doubt if it
would pay me to leave the _Windrush_ to go West India freighting."

Heneker waved his handkerchief to cool himself. "That's all right," he
answered quickly, "I saw Judson Nickerson just naow and he says he's
agreeable for you to go. It's easier to git fishermen than skippers
and in this case I'm willin' to pay you as much as what you'd make
afishin'. That's square, ain't it?"

McKenzie nodded. He was in a quandary and couldn't make up his mind
right away. They might make a big stock fishing and he knew that Caleb
couldn't pay on the basis of a high-line trip for a West Indian run.
Then after he came back he might have to kick around idle. He wanted
to think the matter over, but Caleb insisted on an answer one way or
the other. Mrs. McKenzie had been saying nothing, and to her the wily
Heneker turned, "Best for him to take my offer, ma'am," he observed.
"She's a fine big hundred an' twenty-five-ton schooner--a noo
vessel--and it's better to be a captain than a fisherman. Besides, I'm
agoin' to give him a vessel to skipper afishin' next season." The old
pride was working in Janet's mind and she thought of the "captain"
part of it. Donald was, in her opinion, more suited for master than
fisherman, and besides, hadn't Mr. Heneker offered to make his money
as much as if he were fishing?

"I think, Don, Mr. Heneker is right," she said, "Captain Nickerson is
willing for you to go and he can easily get another man to fill your
place."

Donald rose to his feet. "I'll go, Mr. Heneker," he said quickly.
"I'll get my gear aboard this morning--you'll loan me a sextant--and
I'll get out with the early tide after midnight----"

"Can't ye go out this afternoon?" queried the vessel owner.

"No!" said the other decisively, thinking of Ruth and the picnic. "I
must have a few hours ashore. I've been two months at sea and just got
in. I'll take her out at two in the morning if she's ready."

Caleb rose to go. "Right, son," he said. "And don't be scared to drive
her. That fish must be got down there quick. I want to hold the
business and avoid payin' another insurance on it. You'll either load
molasses or salt home. The agents'll give you instructions."

After he left Donald shed his sea clothes, bathed, shaved and dressed,
and glanced over a number of picture post cards from Joak McGlashan
who had gone home to Glasgow for a visit. McGlashan was having a six
months' holiday after six years absence from home, and by the
addresses from whence the cards came he was having a time and a half.
"I'll be back in time to go to the West Indies with you in the fall,"
he wrote. "Hope you have good fishing and high line stocks this
summer. Am enjoying myself, but I like the Canadian weather better
than this. It's aye raining here."

About half-past ten he took leave of his mother and went to the
Nickerson home. As he stepped up to the door his heart was pounding
like a sledge-hammer against his ribs, and he felt pleasurably excited
at the thought of seeing Ruth again after two months' absence. The
memory of that farewell in Halifax was still vivid, and he hoped, ere
he sailed for Porto Rico, that he would be fortunate enough to have
such another delightful valedictory moment with the girl of his heart.

She came to the door at his knock, and Donald noticed, with something
of a shock, the half-fearful look in her eyes when she greeted him.
She was pale and her hand was feverishly hot when she received his
cordial clasp. "You're a little pale," he remarked in anxious concern.
"Are you feeling all right, Ruth?" She led the way nervously into the
parlor. "Oh, I'm all right," she replied. "It's the warm weather, I
guess, and rushing around to get ready for the picnic. And how have
you been?"

They sat and talked for a while, but to Ruth the conversation was an
ordeal. She answered and remarked mechanically while her sub-conscious
mind was thinking of the cruel duplicity which she was practising on
the young fellow beside her. His eyes told her, too eloquently, of the
manner in which he regarded her. She could see that and she looked
forward to the day's excursion with dread. It was too late now to
withdraw from going, and she felt that the fateful hour was coming and
it might as well be elsewhere as in her own home. By nature,
open-hearted and free from deceit, it was terribly hard for her to
dissemble her feelings, and for the past two months her thoughts had
been whirling around like a chip in an eddy. In the quiet of the night
Donald's handsome tanned face, with its large dark eyes, would keep
constantly coming before her in spite of all her efforts to eradicate
all thoughts of him from mind and heart.

She was secretly engaged to Walter, and when he was with her she felt
composed and happy, though, strangely enough, in all her intimate
moments with him she had never been thrilled as she had been with
McKenzie the night he bade her good-bye in Halifax. Walter had kissed
her at the moment of their engagement, but there was something lacking
on her part. She could not respond to his warm embrace and caress, and
she thought it was because of her mind being troubled with the
deception she was forced to play on McKenzie. When she gazed at the
handsome, confident young sailor seated beside her, a strange
yearning filled her--a desire for something she did not know--but
when her feelings were becoming distraught, cold reason calmed them by
bringing up her self-imposed axiom that she would not, and could not,
marry a fisherman, nor exist as a fisherman's wife.

Moodey came in, and after a puzzled glance at Donald and Ruth--a
lightning glance with just a hint of jealousy in it--he thrust forth
his hand and greeted McKenzie cordially. "I'm glad to see you again,
Mac," he said warmly. "You're looking fine and dandy, by Jove, and as
hard as nails. Going to the picnic with us? Good! We'll have a jolly
good time." Donald returned the greeting with equal cordiality--the
more so as he felt some regret for Moodey. A fine chap, Moodey, he
thought. The affectation and swank of college days had been toned
down, but he was still a little "uppish" with others not in his exact
social scale.

With Helena Stuart and Judson making a party all to themselves, the
other three walked down to the steamer. Ruth walked between them,
outwardly care-free and as charming as ever, but torn in heart and
mind with a dread of the day's possible events.

Promptly at eleven the steamer, with a party of seventy-five young men
and women aboard, cast off and proceeded down the harbor. It was a
fine warm day and the sea was smooth, but in the pilot-house Captain
Eben Westhaver was worrying. To Judson he confided his fears. "It's a
nice day naow, cap'en, but look at th' glass and that brassy-lookin'
sky to th' south'ard. Not that we need worry 'bout a summer squall in
this able packet, but it ain't pleasant picnicking in wind an' rain,
an' we don't want t' have a crowd o' sea-sick wimmen aboard."

The other laughed scornfully. "Wall, naow, ef that ain't a coaster
talking my name ain't Nickerson! Judas Priest! There never was a
shore-ranger yet but what didn't go to sea with one eye on the
barometer and another off to wind'ard. Ye seem to hop 'tween harbor
and harbor dodgin' every little breeze and scared to death of a bit of
cloud. What if the barometer _is_ low? I've seen it fall often-times
and nawthing happen. Tcha! Go ahead and don't be such an old woman!"

They landed on the Island about one and had a most glorious dinner.
Then some of the young men remained to prepare for the clam-bake
supper, and others, boys and girls, broke off into groups and roamed
around in the woods or along the sandy beaches. Judson and Helena
vanished, leaving Ruth, Walter and Donald together.

"I'm going to have a swim," said Moodey. "I brought my suit along. How
about it, Mac?"

Donald made a negative gesture. "Have no swimming gear," he said.

"I can get you a suit from some of the others. Come on in."

Ruth, dreading to be left alone with Donald, added her plea to
Moodey's. "Yes, Donald, why don't you go? Let me see you and Walter
have a race."

McKenzie laughed. "I can't swim very much and besides I'm not stuck on
bathing in these waters. Too cold for me."

Moodey gave a half sneer as he remarked, "I should have thought you
sailors could stand anything in that line. I haven't pounded ice off a
ship's rigging or doubled Cape Horn, but I've gone in swimming at the
North West Arm in Halifax in winter. Well, since you're not coming,
take care of Ruth. I'm off."

When he went, McKenzie felt that his opportunity had come. With his
heart pounding rapidly, he said, "Ruth, let's walk up under the trees.
We can sit down and watch Walter swimming from there."

Dreading the coming minutes she was about to dissent, but something
beyond her control compelled her to follow him. Seated under the
trees, she sat dumbly waiting, and with her eyes looking far off to
sea. Gazing into her face, Donald took her hand and she made no
resistance.

"Ruth," he said very quietly, and in the tone of his voice there was a
nervous tremor. "You made me very happy that night I left you in
Halifax." He paused as if expecting a sympathetic response, but none
came. Ruth felt her heart pounding as if it would choke her. He
continued slowly and in the same nervous low tone. "You know,
girlie"--she winced at the term--"I loved you ever since we first met
four years ago, and--and since that night in Halifax I've been
thinking of you night and day." He wanted to say a great deal more but
words failed. He drew a deep breath, and gazing intently at her slowly
paling face, he said simply, "Ruth, darling, I love you. Will you
marry me?"

The moment had come! Ruth made an effort to regain her composure. Not
daring to look at his face, she slowly withdrew her hand from his and
replied in a faint whisper, which seemed, to her strained imagination,
to echo inside of her, "I--I can't!"

Donald gave a slight start. Her shoulder was against his and she felt
it. It seemed to have temporarily bereft him of speech. After a pause,
which to Ruth seemed an eternity, he asked quietly, "Why, Ruth?"

She lost her composure for a moment and felt like crying, but
regaining her self-control, answered in the same barely audible voice,
"I'm already engaged."

"Engaged? To whom?" The quiet question held a note of intense
surprise. Astounded, uncomprehending, McKenzie stared at her averted
face in a daze.

She almost choked as she replied, "To Walter!"

It seemed an age before he spoke again, but when he did the tremor was
more noticeable, though there was no anger in the tone, but instead, a
note of astonishment. "Why, Ruth, how can that be? Don't you love me?"

Still looking away from him; not daring to look at his face, she shook
her head and murmured, "No, Donald!"

"I don't believe it!" His words came quick and there was no tremor in
his voice. Catching her hand again, he gripped it in his strong
fingers, and repeated. "I don't believe it!" Then with appeal in his
tones, he added, "Look into my eyes, Ruth, and tell me that! I
don't--I can't--believe it ... after that night!"

Her resolution was wavering, but cold reason was saying insistently,
"If you give way now you'll surrender to him. You'll be a fisherman's
wife. You'll live in a cottage and keep a home for a man who'll be
with you but seldom. You'll lie awake nights worrying about him.
You'll not be able to enjoy the things you desire and admire. You may
love ... but love flies out of the window when poverty comes in at the
door. Your culture, your education will be thrown away, and some day,
maybe, you'll be standing in your cottage door with a child in your
arms and there'll be a vessel coming in with a half-masted flag ...
and some man will be saying to you, 'Aye, your husband was lost at
sea!'" She shuddered at the thought and steeled her heart. She would
not look into his eyes. If she did so, she would waver, she knew. She
cared for him more than she thought, and her heart was breaking.

"No, Donald, I--I like you very, very much, but I can't ... will
not ... marry you!"

Still grasping her hand, he asked huskily, "Do you mean that, Ruth?"
She answered with a nod, but wishing to hear it from her own lips he
repeated. "Do you mean that, Ruth?"

"Yes!"

He released her hand quickly and rose to his feet. Straightening
himself up to his full height he squared his shoulders, and with
moisture glistening on his forehead, turned and gazed at her. It was
his Gethsemane, this spot, and the pain in his heart showed in his
eyes. The girl sat on the grass with averted face, nervously tearing a
spring flower to shreds. "Ruth," he said at last in a voice charged
with emotion, "With the exception of my mother, you've shaken my faith
in women forever. Good-bye!" The farewell came from his lips like the
snap of a whip, and when she raised her tear-filled eyes, it was to
see him striding through the woods with his head high and his
shoulders square.

When he vanished in the greenery, she gave a queer little sob and
commenced to cry. For a minute she gave way to her pent-up emotions,
and only when she saw Walter coming out of the sea did she arise and
run back to a little stream in the woods. Bathing her eyes in the cool
water, she coaxed the evidences of tears from her face and tried to
console herself that the ordeal was over. But in her heart of hearts
she knew that it was just beginning.




CHAPTER THIRTY


The packet steamer was slugging hot-foot for Eastville as the sun went
down behind an ominous bank of clouds. Thunder was rumbling to the
south'ard and Captain Westhaver was glancing every now and again out
of the pilot-house window. "Only a thunder storm, I reckon," he
muttered. "But I don't like that cussed glass an' that blurry sky to
th' south'ard. Looks jest like a West Injy hurricane sky. But, we'll
git in afore it strikes." The sea was smooth save for a slight swell
rolling up from the south'ard, and there was but little wind. The
chatter and laughter of the picnickers sounded unusually loud on the
quiet air. Someone was playing a fiddle, and there was a dance going
on aft.

Down on the after freight deck away from the crowd, Donald McKenzie
sat on the bitts, sucking away at a dry pipe, and communing with his
thoughts. Outwardly calm, yet boiling inwardly, he reviewed his years
of acquaintanceship with Ruth Nickerson. Ever and anon, the memory of
the night in Halifax would rise to mind, and he would vision again her
upturned face with the dim light upon it, and feel the soft warmth of
her body as he held her in his arms when she had said, "Kiss me, Don,
and go!" Pah! He brushed his hands across his lips. It was a Judas
kiss, for but a scant two months afterwards she had become engaged to
another.

There was a patter of rain on the sea, a growl of thunder, and the
sky had suddenly become overcast with sullen clouds. The pattering
rain turned into a teeming downpour, but McKenzie took no notice of
it. Nature was only in keeping with his mood, and even when the rain
slashed in upon his body he made no note of the squall which caused
it. The sea was rising after the first ten minutes of the puff, and
the rolling of the steamer caused a cessation of the music, the
dancing, and the chatter on the deck above. "Goin' t' have a storm, I
reckon," remarked someone behind him. He turned. It was a fireman up
for a breath of fresh air. "Yes," returned McKenzie. "A summer
squall."

It was darkening fast. The sun had set and the heavy clouds curtained
the after-glow. Ever and anon, a vivid flash of lightning would
shatter the darkness and render the night blacker than before, and the
wind was rising. To port, Donald could see the land against the faint
light in the west, and he knew they were drawing in to the heads of
Eastville.

He suddenly realized that he was soaking wet and he shivered with the
chill of it. His collar was limp and the rain was running down his
neck and inside his clothing. The clammy discomfort cooled his burning
body and brought him back to a realization of things around him. It
was blowing a savage squall, and the packet steamer was rolling and
smashing the waves into spray. Up on deck he could hear the frightened
cries of sea-sick women.

The sailor instinct came to the fore, and, for the time being, he
forgot the, to him, tragic event of the afternoon. Glancing ahead, he
could see the white water on the Lower Eastville Ledges, hounded by
the gusts and squalls, boiling and quarrelling with the rocks. The
Outer Ledge sparbuoy slipped by, and he felt the steamer canting as
the wheel was put hard over to make the turn into the channel. Then,
all of a sudden, something snapped above his head, and he was struck a
heavy blow, as of a whip, across the back. He turned and saw a piece
of steel wire rope hanging from fair-leads in the deck beams above.
"What the--?" he ejaculated rubbing his smarting shoulders, and then
a realization of what had happened came to him in a flash. "Jupiter!
Wheel gear has parted!"

Two men--the mate and a deck hand--came running to where he stood.
"Where's th' spare tiller? God's truth! we'll be on th' ledges--" The
words were whipped from the officer's mouth as a piling sea came
aboard and hurled him, the deck hand and McKenzie to leeward. As they
lay in the scuppers, they felt the steamer ground--once, twice, three
times--and finally with a terrific crash. "She's ashore!" yelled the
mate jumping to his feet and scrambling up the ladder. A huge comber,
with a livid, curling crest which seethed and growled, piled up ready
to fall, and McKenzie and the deck hand leaped behind the casing as it
struck the helpless steamer. Through the spray, Donald saw
white-painted planks and pieces of the vessel tossing in the wake of
the breaker, and with the water up to his chest he struggled along the
narrow alleyway to a ladder leading to the deck above.

A mob of frightened, crying and screaming women and girls were
crowding in the lee of the upper deck cabins, and when a sea hit the
steamer and caused her to grind and twist, they shrieked in fear.
Looking at the starboard life-boat, McKenzie saw that it was already
stove, so he turned to the port boat which Captain Westhaver, Judson
and other men were trying to swing out.

"You here, Don?" cried Nickerson when McKenzie elbowed his way to him.
The skipper's face was strained with anxiety, and he seemed relieved
to see him. "Git these lubbers out o' th' way, Don," he roared, "so's
we kin git this boat out. Th' gaul-derned thing ain't wu'th a hoot in
hell anyways, but we might git th' wimmin in and away from th' ship.
She'll be in flinders in a damn short time!"

Pushing back the men and youths who were pressing around the boat,
most of whom were farmers and tradesmen, McKenzie shouted, "Don't
crowd now, boys. We'll get the boat out a sight quicker if you'll give
us a chance." He spoke kindly and confidently and they stood clear
while the davits were out-swung.

"D'ye reckon ye kin git away from th' side?" cried Captain Westhaver
to Judson. "Devil of a back-wash down thar' an' she'll be stove sure
as blazes----"

Crash! A double wave piled over the steamer's superstructure and
poured tons of chilly brine into the boat, and while the women
screamed, and the men hung on to anything available, the flimsy bolts
in the davit heads parted with the weight of the water-filled
life-boat and it up ended and fell into the sea.

"God save us!" cried Nickerson, aghast at this catastrophe. "That's
yer coaster gear for ye! By the old red-headed, creeping Judas, Cap'en
Westhaver, ye sh'd be tarred an' feathered for that piece o' botch
work! Hell's bells! We're jammed in a clinch for fair, naow."

Donald stood beside him. "What's best to do now, Jud?" he asked
calmly. "Durned ef I know," answered the other. "Cal'late we'd better
see th' women with life-belts on an' git to work on a raft."

A terrible sea was piling over the ledges by now, and revealed in the
flashes of lightning, it looked awe-inspiring and frightful. The
steamer had struck broadside on to one of the reefs, and had been
lifted almost over it. If she went much further there was the dire
possibility of her sliding into the deep water on the inside of it and
foundering. A sandy beach could be seen--a hundred yards away--a
trifle astern of the vessel, while ahead of her rose a small rocky
cliff upon which some stunted spruce trees grew.

While Donald and some others were working on a raft, Captain Nickerson
was tying life-belts on to Ruth and Helena. Both girls were dreadfully
frightened, but managed to keep calm. Moodey stood, white-faced and
silent, with an arm around Ruth to keep her from sliding overboard
when the vessel pounded. Helena was hanging to her friend's arm, and
secured around the waist by a line which Judson had rove through a
ring bolt, and the other girls--about forty of them--were similarly
protected. All stood huddled under the lee of the upper deck-cabin.

Torn with anxiety and fearful of Helena's and his sister's safety,
yet Judson appeared outwardly calm, and he soothed the girls with
cheerful words. When a sea would crash over the steamer his booming
laugh would be heard. "Don't let that scare you? That's nawthin'. Hang
on for a bit and there'll be a slew of dories alongside. The boys'll
be coming aout from Eastville." In his heart he knew he lied. No
dories could live in that broil of tide, wind and ledge-torn water,
and at Eastville there was neither a life-boat or a Lyle gun
breeches-buoy apparatus.

The captain of the steamer dragged himself along to where Nickerson
stood. "Ef someone c'd only swim ashore with a line," he shouted above
the tumult, "we might git a hawser fast to a tree on th' point yander
and rig up a breeches buoy. But it's takin' a big chanst whoever
tries. Liable to git mushed up in the surf."

Judson nodded. It was a chance--their only chance. The steamer would
go to pieces inside an hour ... when the tide rose. The storm might
abate in that time, but the sea would be there long after the wind had
subsided, and hanging on to the vessel would be fatal. The only
solution was to get the crowd clear of the ship before she went to
pieces. He turned it over in his sailorly mind. _He_ couldn't swim,
but he might be able to get ashore on a couple of planks. "By gorry!"
he muttered, "it might be done!" And aloud he bawled to Westhaver.
"Git a couple of stout planks 'n lash 'em together, 'n get me
something for a paddle. I'll ride th' blame thing in to the beach same
as the Kanakas in the South Seas ride the surf on a board. Sing aout
when you're ready!"

Helena overheard the bawled conversation and clutched him by the arm.
"What are you going to do, Jud?" she cried fearfully. Then with a
glance at the surf seething and roaring on the beach to leeward and
swirling in toppling combers around them, she added hysterically. "No,
no, no! Judson, you can't do it! You can't do it!"

He looked into her frightened face and laughed. There was no fear in
his keen dare-devil eyes when he replied tenderly. "Don't worry,
Helena. I'll get there ... somehow. Jest you hang on here ... an'
pray to God!" The last words were spoken reverently.

She suddenly threw her arms around his neck and her wet hair fluttered
around his face. "Judson," she pleaded. "You can't do it. You know it
can't be done. Stay with us and we'll die together!" Then she turned
towards Ruth who was hidden from her by Walter's body. "Ruthie!" she
cried. "Judson can't swim and he's going to try and reach the shore on
a plank with a line. He can't do it! He can't do it! Don't let him
go!"

Westhaver scrambled for'ard again. "I got a couple o' fine two-inch
plank all lashed up for ye, Jud. Well-seized an' spiked they are so's
they'll hang together," he was meticulously exact in his description
of the preparations for the desperate venture, "and I've got some
stout line and a good paddle fur ye. We're ready fur ye, Jud, old man,
an' by cripes, ef you make it...."

A sea burst over the house and caused the fabric to tremble ominously.
When the tide rose, the waves would hurl themselves on the light
superstructure and it wouldn't last long. Judson knew that and he
cried, "I'll be right with ye, Eben!"

Helena screamed and clutched him tight around the neck. "No, no, no!
It's certain death!" she wailed. "You can't swim and you'd never get
through ... that!" She gave a frightened glance at the sea. Ruth, who
had been standing apathetic hanging on to Moodey's arm and the
life-line, suddenly turned to her fiancee. He was shivering and silent
and had hardly spoken a word. "You're a good swimmer, Walter," she
cried. "Why don't _you_ try it? Don't let Judson go. He can't swim a
stroke!" And she looked up into his face imploringly.

Walter seemed to be galvanized to life. He gave an apprehensive look
at the sea roaring and crashing around them and at the white water
racing and bursting over the rocks ahead. In the darkness it looked
horrible. There were pieces of jagged timbers whirling and tossing
around in this hell's caldron and he thought of swimming among them.
The roar and thunder of the water; the livid tossings in the
blackness and the awfulness of demoniac power suggested in the
staggering impacts of the waves against the steamer's hull and the
rending and grinding of timbers un-nerved him. "God ... Ruth, I--I
couldn't do it!" he burst out at last. "Nobody could swim in that.
I'd--I'd be smashed to pieces in the breakers. Look at them! Look at
them!" And he pointed with shaking fingers at the raging water.

"But to the beach below there," cried Ruth appealingly. "You might
manage that, Walter. Think of the women aboard. You might be able to
reach the shore. I'll pray for you, Walter dear. Try, Walter, my brave
boy. You're a good swimmer----"

He shook his head vehemently, angrily. "No, no, no! Ruth, darling.
Don't ask me! I couldn't do it. Nobody could swim that. You're trying
to send me to certain death. No, no, no! We'll hang on here until the
men come from Eastville in the boats. They'll be here soon now. The
storm will soon be over. Just wait, dear. Just wait!" There was a
whimpering note of protest in his voice, and in the semi-darkness,
Ruth looked at him in amazement. She heard him mumbling again. "Why
should I go? ... certain death ... just wait. Just wait." She stared
up at his face; noted the fear and horror expressed in it, and her
lips curled contemptuously. "And you so often boasted of your
swimming!" The scorn in her voice made Moodey writhe, but he hung on
the life-line and mumbled. "I know. I know, Ruth ... but I couldn't
swim in that. You want to see me drowned ... just wait!" The girl
savagely disengaged his arm from around her waist, and to her brother
she said with a trembling in her words. "Go, dear Juddy, go! And God
go with you! There are no cowards in the Nickerson family--men or
women--and ... there never will be!" And she kissed him.

Nickerson swung around to Helena. "I'm agoin', Helena," he said
calmly. "So long, little girl!" He bent down and kissed her on the
spray-drenched lips. "Go, darling, and may God aid you!" she cried,
and when he dragged himself away the two women, clinging together,
watched him vanish in the darkness with pallid faces upon which spray
and tears mingled.

On the after-deck, McKenzie, who had been busy on a raft, saw Judson
whipping off his coat. "And what are _you_ going to do, Jud?" he
asked. "Try to git in with a line," answered the other grimly. "I
might manage to make the beach yonder, and if I can, I'll come up
araound to the point ahead there and git a hawser ashore.
Breeches-buoy, y'know."

"But--but you can't swim, Jud," exclaimed McKenzie protestingly,
"You'll _never_ make it!"

"I'll make a dam' good try anyways," growled the other determinedly.
Donald laughed and proceeded to divest himself of his coat, pants and
boots. There was a resolute look on his boyish features, but he still
laughed as he stripped. "And what th' devil are you laughing at? And
what are you cal'latin' you're agoin' to do?" cried Nickerson, staring
at the young man in amazement.

"Me?" McKenzie stopped laughing, stared to leeward, and carefully
scanned the sea--the racing, broiling run of it and the violent
confusion of water which separated the wreck from the shore. "Why,
Juddy, old timer, I'm laughing at the idea of you trying to scramble
ashore on two planks. You'd be choked or drove under ere you'd made
five fathom off the ship. Remember the _West Wind_ and the _Livadia_?
I've had some practice--you haven't. I'm going to let you tend the
line, old timer, and _I'll_ swim ashore!" He spoke the last sentence
without laughing and in a voice that brooked no denial.

Nickerson demurred. "You've got a mother and you're all she's got----"
The other nodded and said in the same grim tone, "If anything _should_
happen, Jud, I rely on you to look after her. Now, get your line
coiled and see that there is enough of it and no chafes or broken
strands."

Captain Westhaver broke in, "It's a kile o' trawl ground-line, bran'
noo stuff, an' stout an' strong. I got three hundred fathom here----"
"But, hell!" growled Judson obstinately, "I'm agoin', Don--not you!"
Donald pulled off his boots and tightened the waist-band of his
under-drawers. "No, no, Jud!" he said. "What's the use of you going?
It would only be wasted effort. You can't swim. I can. It's up to me.
You're needed aboard to rig up that breeches-buoy and get the people
off. If I shouldn't make it, you can try, but not before. Gimme that
line!" "Th' lad's right," concurred the steamer captain, and he handed
the end of the thin, light, trawl-line to McKenzie, who proceeded to
knot it around his shoulders. "Now, Jud," he said finally. "I'm going
to make for the beach yonder, and if I manage it, I'll carry my line
up to the point ahead. When I give a signal, you bend a stout halliard
and a block to it and I'll pull it ashore and rig my end of the gear
to one of those trees. You know how the business is worked. Now, Jud,
old man, so long! If anything _should_ happen ... look after my
mother!" And while Nickerson stood half-dazed with the suddenness of
this usurpation of _his_ voluntary forlorn hope, McKenzie was
scrambling along to the stern of the pounding steamer. For a full
minute he stood amidst the chill sprays awaiting a chance, and his
slim body would be outlined against the livid whiteness of the foaming
water. Several times when flying water from the waves slashed across
the deck, the anxious watchers thought he had gone. They waited with
their hearts in their mouths, and Nickerson nervously fingered the
line. A smooth after a big sea; a momentary cessation of the tumult; a
muffled shout from the slim figure at the rail--then into the back of
a racing comber he dived!

Nickerson tending the line felt it weaving through his hands, and he
leaned over the broken rail and stared into the spray and rain with
chill fear clawing at his heart. He was trembling with anxiety for his
friend--the lad he had trained in the ways of the sea and the man he
loved as a brother--and he peered into the tumult of surging combers,
into which Donald had gone, with nervous concern. Watching the sea and
the line slipping through his fingers in spasmodic jerks, he was
unaware of two female figures scrambling along the drenched deck
behind him. It was Helena and Ruth who, unable to remain lashed up
for'ard, had come aft to see if Judson had gone on his desperate
mission. Mistaking him for someone else, they cried fearfully, "Has he
gone?"

Captain Westhaver heard and answered shortly, "Yes!" And added. "Take
care an' hang on, girls!" Then Judson shouted out, "He's still going!
He's still going! I believe he'll make it!"

"Oh!" The two women cried out together at the sound of the voice, and
Helena asked quickly, "Who's that? Is that Juddy?"

"Aye! That's Cap'en Nickerson at th' rail," answered Westhaver.

"Then who's gone? Who's out there?" It was Ruth's question.

"Young Cap'en McKenzie! He's aswimmin' in to th' beach!"

Ruth gave a queer little cry. "Donald?" For a moment she stood as if
dazed. She had been thinking of him all along and wondering where he
was. And he was out in _that_! And he had not come to her! Everything
seemed to swim before her, and she would have fallen had not Captain
Westhaver grabbed her as she swayed. "Oh! oh!" she whimpered. "He's
gone and I didn't know it! Oh! oh! he's gone.... Oh, God help him!"
And with Helena and Westhaver holding her up, she stared into the
blackness alternately sobbing and calling on the Almighty to guard and
keep the man who was struggling through the breakers in an effort to
save them all.

And McKenzie was having a desperate struggle--the greatest fight of
his life! With his head down, and swimming a powerful overhand stroke,
he got clear of the ship and into a broiling welter of leaping combers
which toppled over on his body, forcing him under with the weight of
the falling water and tossing him on their frothing crests like a
shingle in an eddy. The tide, racing in with the sea and wind, was
driving him towards the rocks, and he realized that, once in its grip,
he would be done for--smashed to a pulp on the ledges which were
dashing the seas to spray and effervescing foam.

It was about a hundred yards to the sand beach, but it was a hundred
yards of raging water--a mill-race of shouting, roaring, fighting,
whirling combers whipped to fury by wind, back-wash, tide and the
inequalities of the bottom, and by the time he had three minutes in
among this inferno of water he felt his strength giving out. He was
choking for want of air; his mouth and nose were full of salt brine,
and the buffeting of the waves and the drag of the tide were fast
weakening him, and he hadn't made half the distance. Gasping for
breath, he struggled on until he felt that he had reached the limit of
his endurance. His muscles were lagging and refusing to respond. His
heart was pounding as if it would burst inside his chest, and he found
it increasingly hard to breathe. He thought of his mother and Ruth and
murmured a prayer as his strokes became feebler. He was going to
die--a modern Leander of Abydos--and he decided to throw up his hands
and drown rather than be shattered on the rocks with the spark of life
in his body. He had stopped swimming, when a kindly under-tow--an
inshore eddy--caught him and bore him away from the ledges.

He thought dazedly of the women aboard the wreck and it spurred him to
life again. Treading water in the momentary respite and gulping great
chestfuls of air, he prepared himself for the final effort--the battle
with the surf on the beach. He could discern the shore clearly now as
he rose on a wave, and when he made out the sloping sand of the beach
he took a last gulp of air and drove in on the back of a mighty
comber. Husbanding his strength, he held back when it broke until he
felt the sand under his feet. Digging his toes in, he tried to stem
the back-wash, but he was too weak. His legs collapsed under him and
he was caught in the following comber and rolled over and over in a
broil of water and sand. Clawing desperately at the unresisting
grains, he caught a projecting bolt from a buried wharf-timber, and
hanging on to it with all the strength he could muster until the wave
receded, he scrambled frantically on hands and knees up the beach ere
the next breaker came pounding in.

For a full five minutes he lay prone with half the senses and breath
knocked out of him, until the brain, recovering quicker than the
muscles, began to urge, "Get up! Think of the women! Judson, Helena,
Ruth!" Even _her_ name came to him sub-consciously just as it had come
when he was for giving up in the broil of it. He rolled painfully to
his feet and staggered like a drunken man along the beach. He glanced
at the loom of the steamer lying amidst the whitewater on the ledges,
then suddenly felt for the line. It was still around his body, and he
gave three strong jerks at it to see if it had parted. By the feel of
it, he knew it was all right and mumbled thanks to God. Then,
stumbling over the sand, boulders, and pieces of timber and trees, he
ran for the point.

Aboard the wreck, Nickerson was almost frantic with fear. The line had
not taken a fathom from him for about five minutes and he imagined the
worst. Then three distinct tugs came on the cord which he held. He
wheeled around with a triumphant bellow. "By the old red-headed Judas
Priest! He's done it! By Godfrey! He's done it ... th' bully boy!" And
he laughed like a drunken man.

Helena gave Ruth a violent shake and almost screamed, "Do you hear,
Ruth? He's done it! He's ashore! Oh, God, we're saved! We're saved!
Oh, Father, to thee our thanks ... for him ... and us!" Ruth nodded
dumbly. She couldn't speak, but mentally she was praying and thanking
the Almighty for His mercy.

Judson was bawling--calmly now. "He's getting araound to the Point.
Git that block an' tayckle ready, Cap'en. You got that strop araound
th' forem'st and a tail-block on? Good! And that ring-buoy and
whip-line--have ye got it slung and ready to reeve off? Fine! We'll
send that halliard rope ashore...." He and Westhaver walked forward
with the line, shouting encouragement to the drenched, shivering, and
now apathetic mob of people hanging in life-lines under the lee of the
deck-house. The rising tide was sending solid water over the packet's
upper decks now and pieces of the superstructure were sluicing over
the lee rail. The people in the shelter of the house were often up to
their knees in swirling water. McKenzie had just reached the shore in
time! "Don't git scared naow," consoled Westhaver. "We'll hev ye
ashore in a jiffy. Th' rope's gone in ... cheer up ... soon be aout o'
this!" And Judson was chattering away to him and the packet's crew as
they rigged the breeches gear. "Knew him since he made his first
voyage to sea ... a poor little whitefaced nipper of a 'prentice-boy
in a lousy four-mast barque out o' Glasgow. Game as they make 'em....
I made a sailor out o' him ... th' little skinny nipper ... and naow
he's a better man than me!"

"Aye!" said Eben solemnly, "and you're an able man yourself, Judson
Nickerson! An able man!"

Up on the Point, Donald, shivering in his wet underwear, hauled the
stout rope ashore and was lashing a block to a tree trunk when several
men with lanterns appeared. They stared at him in astonishment, and in
answer to their questions he pointed to seaward and replied huskily,
"There she is! Steerin' gear wheel rope parted and she grounded on the
ledge yonder. I'm rigging a breeches-buoy to bring the folks
ashore.... Here! Fix this. My hands are numb! Look sharp or the old
hooker will be falling to pieces in the pounding she's getting out
there now!" The men--Eastville folks who had come out to the Point to
see what had delayed the steamer--set to work and rigged the gear
under McKenzie's direction. Within ten minutes they were hauling the
first passengers ashore.

Donald stood huddled under a boulder and watched a number of the women
land. He saw Ruth and Helena among them. He did not wish to see either
of them--the events of the afternoon were too fresh in his mind. He
was still bitter. Then he remembered his contract with Cal Heneker,
and the memory spurred him to ask a man to loan him an overcoat and
get him over to the town. Seeing that he could do no more, and that
the packet's crowd would be rescued all right, he left for home in
company with a farmer who had a horse and buggy with him.

His mother was standing in the door of Shelter Harbor when he arrived,
and she almost went into hysterics when she saw him. "Don't be
frightened, Mother," he soothed. "I'm all right and so is everybody
else. The old steamer went aground in that storm, but everybody got
off safe. I had to swim ashore and I left my clothes. So now, Mother
dear, make me a good hot cup of tea while I change, for I must get
aboard my ship and away with the tide. The storm is breaking off now
and it's going to be a fine night."

Aching in every muscle, and with his shoulders, arms and legs skinned
and bruised by the pounding he had got on the sand, Donald rubbed
himself down with liniment and bandaged a few of the worst scrapes.
Then he climbed stiffly into his sea clothes and went down-stairs.

Over a cup of scalding tea, hot biscuits and cake, he smiled at his
mother and patted her cheek. "Dear old mother," he said with a tender
note in his voice. "Always worrying and fretting about me."

"But just think, Donny, if you'd been drowned?" she said plaintively.
He laughed happily. "I'm not born to be drowned, mammy-dear. Swimming
is the only athletic accomplishment I have, and I can swim easier than
I can walk. I did it easily. 'Twas only a hundred yards."

The mother shook her head as if doubting the light manner in which he
was relating the experience of the evening, and she thought of the
day, years ago, when M'Leish, mate of the _Sarmania_, had come to her
with evil news. She shuddered involuntarily and her hand gripped that
of her son's in a tense clasp. "Oh, Donny-laddie, if I were to lose
you...?" She bit her lips and her eyes filled with tears at the bare
thought.

He set down his cup and rose to his feet. Slipping his arms around her
neck, he kissed her, saying tenderly. "Mother mine, you're not going
to lose me. I'm yours always, and you're always mine!"

She smiled gravely and looked into his eyes. "Maybe ... someday,
Donny, my son, you'll be saying that to another woman."

He winced imperceptibly, and into his tired eyes there flashed a
sudden tense look--a shadow of painful memory reflected in the windows
of the soul--then it vanished, and he smoothed her hair lovingly.
"There is no other woman but you, Mother dear!"

And an hour later, and while the crew and passengers of the ill-fated
packet steamer were being warmed and re-clothed in the farm houses
near the scene of the wreck, Captain Donald McKenzie was stiffly and
painfully pacing the quarter of the _Amy Anderson_ standing out to
sea.

The wind had dropped to a light breeze when they passed out of the
channel. A heavy swell--aftermath of the gale--was running, and the
wreck of the steamer could be distinctly discerned in the moonlight
with the waves making a complete breach over it. The whole
superstructure was gone, and nothing but the hull remained, and as he
stared at it, McKenzie thought of the mental wreck he had experienced
but a few hours previous. "Mrs. Walter Moodey," he murmured, and he
smiled bitterly.




CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE


McKenzie drove the _Amy Anderson_ for Porto Rico in a manner that gave
his small crew some trepidation whenever there was more than ordinary
wind blowing. He felt that he had to give vent to his feelings--to
blow off steam as it were--and as he was too good-natured a man to
take it out of his crew, he took it out of the vessel, and kept sail
on her at times when prudence suggested otherwise.

On these occasions, he twirled the wheel himself and seemed to take a
savage pleasure in hounding the schooner along, and several times he
had her with half the deck under lee water and threatening to jump the
masts over the side. Try as he might, he could not erase Ruth
Nickerson from his mind, and with harassing persistence, the memory of
the night in Halifax and the afternoon at Salvage Island kept rising
before him--odious and inexplicable comparisons which tormented his
thoughts and wrung his heart. He couldn't fathom the complex feminine
nature which was capable of shifting around so quick. In his opinion,
Ruth had led him on; he had bared his soul to her, and she had spurned
him, cut him adrift, and given her heart and hand to another two
months after he concluded she was his, and his alone.

When he thought of this, and of the visions, dreams and ambitions in
which Ruth played so prominent a part, he endured mental agony which
demanded relief. As he had neither taste nor inclination for drink or
brutality, he found a counter distraction in driving the vessel. And
under such pressure, the _Amy Anderson_ arrived off San Juan nine days
after leaving Eastville, with her foretopmast gone and all her light
sails split through sail-dragging in one or two hard breezes.

In the Porto Rican city, he sought solace in riding into the
country--leaving the schooner early in the morning and returning late
at night. During these solitary excursions he debated his future
course of action, and finally concluded to carry on as though nothing
had interfered with his peace of mind. Ruth Nickerson would live in
Halifax after she was married and he would see but little of her in
Eastville. He loved that town; liked its people, and the Bank
fisheries gave him a vocation and a livelihood which he enjoyed and
which catered to his fascination for the sea and the myriad life which
dwelt within it. In future, he would live and act as though Ruth
Nickerson never existed. This was his resolution, but he found it
terribly hard to forget.

An hour before sailing for Halifax with a cargo of barrelled molasses,
the agent brought him three letters which came in the morning's
mail-boat from New York. One was from his mother, the other from
Judson Nickerson, but the hand-writing on the third--a small pink
envelope--made his heart leap. His first impulse was to tear it open,
but pride arrested him. "She's not worth it," he growled. "Mother
comes first." And he thrust Ruth's letter into his pocket, adding
under his breath, "Explanations, most likely ... or an announcement."

Mrs. McKenzie's letter was a long one and it bubbled over with news.
"You are a regular hero here," she wrote, "and I have a bone to pick
with you for not telling me about your swimming ashore through the
surf and saving all those people. I am both proud and vexed with you,
but I think my pride will overcome any vexation I may have at your
failure to tell me more about the wreck and what you did. Everybody is
talking about you, and, oh, sonny, but I'm proud. To-day, a cablegram
came addressed to you from your friend Mr. McGlashan in Glasgow. I
opened it and it runs: _Remain in Eastville. Will arrive Halifax July
fifteenth. Very important. McGlashan._ I suppose you know what it is
about. I saw Ruth Nickerson this morning. She was quite ill after the
wreck and doesn't look very well yet."

He folded the letter up and placed it in his pocket for a second
perusal later, but one item in it seemed to run in his mind. "Ruth ...
ill?" he murmured, and slowly and deliberately, he reached into his
pocket and took out her letter. For a space he gazed at the familiar
handwriting on the envelope, then he broke it open and took out a
sheet of pale pink paper folded in half, and with a firm-set mouth and
cold eyes, he straightened it out. For a moment, the writing danced
before his eyes, with the excited blood pounding from heart to brain,
then his self-possession returned and he read the two or three lines
which it contained.

     DONALD:--

     If you can forgive me, and trust me to renew your faith in
     women--ask me again.

     RUTH.

The grim look faded from his face and gave place to one of perplexed
astonishment. Scarcely believing he had read the note aright, he
perused it a second time--reading the words out aloud. "If you can
forgive me ... and trust me ... ask me again!" And he stared at the
little pink sheet--now trembling in his hand with the agitation of
conflicting feelings--and murmured, "Ask me again!"

With a joyful cry he jumped to his feet--his dark eyes sparkling with
a gladness which scarcely knew expression--and he stepped under the
sky-light and re-read the letter for the third time. "Whoop-ee!" he
cried in excess of new-found delight. "Will I forgive her? Why, she
never did anything wrong! It must have been a mistake--all a
mistake--for she's the dearest, sweetest, darlingest girl in the
world!"

A tousled, sun-burned face peered down the cabin companionway, and a
hoarse voice enquired, "Did I hear ye sing aout, Skipper?" Donald
wheeled and laughed confusedly. "No, Anson, I didn't sing out, but if
you're all ready to slip, get the stops off the sails and we'll slide
right away for home. Everybody aboard? Cook get his water tanks
filled? Good boy! Then we'll get under way!" And when Anson vanished,
he kissed the little pink note, folded it carefully, and slipped it
into the breast pocket of his shirt. Within thirty minutes the _Amy
Anderson_, with the Canadian ensign flying from the main-gaff, and the
four lowers on her, was slipping out of San Juan harbor to the urge of
the steady north-east trade.

Running out to the nor'ad, the green hills of the Island soon changed
into the blue of distance as they left it astern. McKenzie paced the
weather quarter with his brain in a whirl of exhilaration and the
tinkling bell of the patent log recording the knots sounded gloriously
in his ears as evidence of the ever-shortening distance between him
and the girl he loved. He trod the deck with a strange springiness,
and when he scanned the bubbling broil of the wake astern, he could
not restrain a joyous chuckle and an encouraging word to the man at
the wheel, "Sock it to her, Billy old son! She's travelling home and
the girls have got hold of the tow-rope! Give her a good full and let
'er slide!"

He paced the deck for an hour, then he had to go below and read those
magical words once more to make sure that his eyes were not deceiving
him.

No, by Jupiter! There it was--plain as a hand-spike in her own dear
hand-writing. "Ask me again." Would he ask her again? Why, the _Amy
Anderson_ couldn't travel fast enough to give him the opportunity! In
his excitement, he paced the narrow cabin, staggering and swaying with
the rolling of the vessel, and murmuring to himself, "Ask me again!"

He suddenly remembered Judson's letter and opened it quickly.
Stretching out on the locker, he composed himself to read it. Good old
Juddy! What did he have to say, the old bucko! "Dear Don," it ran.
"Congratulate me! I'm the happiest man in the world, old timer.
Helena has said the word and we're going to sail dory-mates just as
soon as the Devil-dodger makes a long splice of it. I'm waiting for
her to name the day, then, old son, you can polish up your
gaff-topsail hat and overhaul your square-mainsail coat and stand
beside your old skipper and see everything all clear for my getting
under way on a new voyage. If it wasn't for Eben Westhaver's old
packet bumping the ledges, I reckon I'd still be guessing, but I've no
hard feelings against that sorry old coaster now. And, bye the bye,
Don, you pulled out in a hell of a hurry that night. You seemed to
think it was of more importance to get Cal Heneker's old scow to Porto
Reek than it was to see all us shipwrecked folks ashore. However, the
town will have a band playing for you when you get home. The Ladies'
Aid of the Church and the Young People's Society are both squabbling
among themselves as to how they'll honor you, while Tom Daley, the
Mayor, is prating to the Council about recognizing Eastville's
esteemed citizen, Captain Donald McKenzie, with something worthy of
your plucky work that night. They've petitioned the Royal Humane, the
Government and Lloyd's to honor you, and I tell you, son, they had
scare-heads in the Halifax papers about 'the thrilling rescue.' But
enough of that. You are going to get no more soft-soap from me on that
subject. My sister Ruth was quite sick after the affair, but she's
chased that nut Moodey back to where he belongs. On the steamer that
night she asked him to swim ashore with a line--he's bragged a whale
of a lot about his swimming abilities to her--but he got a sudden
attack of Cape Horn fever and balked at the job. I always said that
joker had a yellow streak in him somewhere, and that was where he
showed it. If he wasn't such an able swimmer and such a mouth about
it, I wouldn't have felt so mad about the blighter. But, believe me,
Don, I gave him an earful when we got ashore that night. It took me a
while to square myself with the girls for the language which they said
I used towards him. Now, _you_ know, Donny-my-lad, that I'd only
express my feelings in good old sailor fashion, but shore-folks don't
understand our particular lingo, though I'll bet Moodey did. Now, old
shippy, I'm going out again in the morning, but I'll look for you in
September, and you can bet my bullies will hump some this time. We'll
spin 'em out when the gulls can't fly to wind'ard, and I plan to wet a
pile of salt and bait small and catch 'em large from now out." When he
finished reading, McKenzie chuckled happily.

On a windy July morning, the _Amy Anderson_ stormed up Halifax harbor
and came to an anchor in the stream. McKenzie went ashore and got
Caleb Heneker on the telephone and was over-joyed when that worthy
told him to deliver his cargo to a certain Agent and pay off. The
schooner would load dry fish in Halifax later in the month and sail
for Demerara, and if he cared to do so, he could take her down when
ready. Next day, late in the afternoon, Donald drove into Eastville,
and slipping along the hill road, he got home before any of the
town's-people were aware of his arrival.

"And Donny, my son," said his mother, after the welcoming and exchange
of news, "they're planning a public reception to you for that rescue.
It was a wonderfully brave thing you did that night, laddie--" And she
chatted joyfully in the same strain, but Donald wasn't listening. He
was thinking of just how soon he could call upon Ruth Nickerson.

"Have I any decent clothes, Mother?" he asked suddenly--interrupting
her in the middle of an announcement of what the Ladies' Aid were
proposing to do.

"Only an old suit, dear," she replied. "Your best suit you left on the
wreck--"

He rose and patted her on the shoulder. "Then, Mother dear, if you
will be sweet enough to give it a bit of a press while I'm cleaning
up, I'll wear it."

After supper, he kissed his mother. "I'm going down the road, Mater
dear--"

Mrs. McKenzie gave a knowing smile. "Oh, yes, laddie, and you might
give my regards to Ruth and tell her I hope she's feeling better."
Donald blushed under his tan. "Who said I was going to see Ruth?" he
asked confusedly. The mother turned him around and gently pushed him
through the door. "Run along, Donny," she said with a laugh. "You
can't hide anything from your mother. Give her my love!"

Ruth was not at home when he called, but Mrs. Nickerson thought she
had taken a walk in the direction of the Cape. For several precious
minutes the old lady detained him to talk about the wreck (Donald was
inwardly damning the wreck) but at last he managed to break away by
saying he would stroll along and meet Ruth and come home with her. As
soon as he was out of sight from the houses, he broke into a run.

He spied her at last, in the half-light of declining day, sitting on
the grass alone and watching the sea. It was in his favorite spot in
the little hollow behind the head-land, and he trotted up behind
her--his foot-falls making no sound on the green sod. A short space
away from where she sat with her face turned away from him, he stopped
and cried softly, "Ruth!"

She was on her feet in an instant and facing him--her cheeks flaming
rose and a wonderful light in her deep blue eyes. "Donald!" Sweet and
low the name sounded from her lips and his heart thrilled. He advanced
towards her and took her hand. "Will we sit down again?"

She nodded shyly and dropped to the grass and he still retained his
clasp of her hand. He scanned her face. How beautiful it seemed in the
rosy glow from the westering sun. "I got your letter," he said simply.
She made no reply, but sat nervously plucking at a wild flower, and
her eyes were lowered to the ground.

There came into Donald's soul at this moment the thrill of splendid
hours--vistas of momentous events in his young life; reefing down jobs
on the topsail yards of the _Kelvinhaugh_ in the wild squalls of the
Horn; the storming excitement of "running the easting" in the _Helen
Starbuck_; delirious drives for port on fishermen in pelting winds and
heavy seas, and all the exhilarating sensations which come to sailors
every now and again. He could remember his feelings at those
times--the quickening pulse, the rapid heart-beats, the alertness of
eye, mind and muscle and the expectancy of ultimate conquest. He was
feeling that way now. "And I've come to ask you again," he said at
last and with something of a tremor in his voice. Taking a full
breath, he asked boldly, "Ruth! will you be my wife?"

She looked up slowly--very slowly it seemed--and her eyes looked clear
and glowing into his. Then softly, very softly, she answered, "Yes!"
And Donald's arm was around her and he was pressing her to him and his
kisses were upon her lips.

"And you'll be content to marry me--a fisherman?" enquired he when the
first ecstacy of love had passed. "You know what I am and what I have.
Will you make the sacrifice?"

She smiled happily. "It's no sacrifice, dear," she replied. "I'm proud
and glad to be yours, no matter what you are. It's not the occupation
that counts ... it's the man!"

The rosy glow in the west faded and the azure of the summer night
claimed the sky from nadir to zenith, while the glorious host of
stellar worlds aloft spangled the heavens in myriad twinklings of
diamond lights. The earth exhaled the scent of wild flowers and the
warm wind wafted the odors of spruce and pine to where they sat. A
night bird warbled a happy song to its mate, and its paean of love
found a responsive chord in the hearts of the two who listened.

"Isn't this just lovely, Don?" ventured Ruth. "The night, the stars,
the flowers, the world, everything...!" Donald pressed her to him and
looked into her upturned face, his dark eyes radiant with the joy that
was his. "Not half so lovely as you, dear!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Donald got to bed very late that night and next morning he confided
his secret to his mother. "And I hope you won't be jealous, Mater
dear," he added, "for you are still my lovely sweet mother, and Ruth
will not usurp any of the love I bear for you. She'll share it with
you, and we should all be very happy."

She flashed him a look of infinite tenderness. It didn't seem so very
long ago when he was a pale, shrinking, sensitive lad whom she
comforted and petted and caressed. Here he was a lithe, strong,
sun-tanned, capable man starting out on the high-road of love's
adventure. "You'll both be my children, laddie. You've brought me
another one, and I'll love her for her own sake as well as yours.
She's a dear lassie, and I'm glad--oh, so glad!" Then a shade of worry
crossed her face and Donald noted it.

"What are you thinking about, Mater?" he asked.

She hesitated before replying, "Are you sure--do you think Ruth will
be content to live here, and--and get along on your earnings? It's
quite a drop from what she's been used to." Anxious concern was
reflected in her eyes.

He squared his shoulders. "Don't you worry about that, Mater dear," he
said confidently. "I'll be skipper of a fishing vessel next Spring and
I'll make enough to keep us comfortable. I know my work. I'm
ambitious. I'll invest in vessels and build up a competence just as
the others around here have done. Ruth knows our circumstances and
position, and she'll tuck in. She's cultured and well-educated, but
she can cook and sew and do housework as well as the best. That's the
sort of a girl I'm taking for a wife--a girl in a thousand!" And he
spoke the last words proudly. The mother watched him swing out into
the garden--strong, optimistic and full of the confidence of youth.
Aye, she mused, he had done well. Master of a vessel at twenty-two and
earning more than many a commander on a liner, and successful in love
and ambitious.... He would be alright ... if the sea and the Almighty
willed it so.

Two or three days later, and while Donald was chopping wood at the
back of the house, he heard a familiar voice in the kitchen talking to
his mother. It had a strong Scotch burr there was no mistaking, and
Don hove down the axe and strode hastily into the house to find Joak
McGlashan seated in the parlor. There was a stranger with him--a
dapper looking gentleman, middle-aged, clean-shaven, and wearing good
clothes of an unmistakable English cut. When McKenzie walked in, Joak
sprung to his feet, his face beaming. "Hulloh, there, Donal'!" he
shouted. "My! but I'm gled tae see ye! Ye got ma cable, eh?"

The important happenings of recent days had driven all thought of the
cable out of Donald's mind, and he stammered a wondering affirmative.
He had regarded the matter as being of no particular importance. Joak
wanted to secure a berth as cook with him, possibly, and he would
certainly get it if McKenzie had the ordaining of it. The other turned
and indicated the stranger who was standing gravely waiting. "This is
Mistur Montgomery o' Glesca'," he observed, "and he come oot here tae
Novy Scotia tae see you and yer mither here aboot verra important
business." And having made the introduction, Joak sat down and
nervously lit a clay pipe.

Mr. Montgomery extended a hand to mother and son, and he lifted a
despatch case on to the table and opened it. "I'm a solicitor," he
said briefly. And while the two McKenzies stared at him wonderingly,
he pulled a sheaf of documents out on the table and adjusted a pair of
_pince nez_ on his nose. Clearing his throat, he began, "Er--I have a
disagreeable task to perform, Captain"--he addressed Donald--"in
telling you that your respected uncle has passed away. Died very
suddenly--very tragic affair!" He looked over his glasses at mother
and son, and sighed. Mrs. McKenzie clasped and unclasped her fingers
nervously and her eyebrows went up in consternation at the
announcement, but Donald's tanned face was unmoved. "Too bad," he
remarked calmly. He took a packet of cigarettes from his pocket and
lit one.

The legal gentleman nodded. "Yes ... too bad." Then he enquired with a
corrugation of his forehead and in a mildly suggestive tone,
"You--er--haven't kept in touch with your relatives in Scotland, have
you?"

"No, sir," answered Donald coolly, and he blew a smoke ring, "nor they
with us."

The other gave a respectful cough and drew his chair closer to the
table. "Possibly, I'd better go into the matter and explain the object
of my visit to British North America." McKenzie smiled at the
appellation. With the tips of his fingers together, Mr. Montgomery
leaned with his elbows on the table and said, "Your husband, Mrs.
McKenzie, was a nephew of the late Sir Alastair McKenzie, Baronet, of
Dunsany Castle, Scotland. You, of course, were aware of that." Janet
nodded. "Now," he continued, "Sir Alastair had but one son--his wife
died many years ago--and when Sir Alastair passed away, the title and
estate naturally went to the son Roderick. This young man, I regret to
say, was in very poor health--in fact, he was a consumptive--and he
never married. He knew, that having no direct issue, the title and
estate would have to pass to another branch of the family; namely, his
father's nephew or his issue--"

"That would be David McKenzie," interrupted Janet interestedly.

The lawyer shook his head. "No, Madam! It would be your late
husband--Alexander McKenzie!"

A blank look came over the mother's face and for a moment she couldn't
speak. At last she stuttered, "How--how could--could--that be, sir?
David was the elder!"

"No, Madam! On the contrary, Alexander was the elder by an extremely
narrow margin. You knew, of course, that David and Alexander were
twins?"

Mrs. McKenzie gasped. "No, I didn't! This is the first time I ever
knew of it! Poor Alec never once told me that he and David were twin
brothers, and I always thought David was years older than my
husband--"

The other shook his head. "No, that is not so. David may have _looked_
older. Possibly his sedentary and rigorous manner of living made him
appear that way, but your husband was older than David by a few
minutes, and the birth, date and time is thus recorded in the
Edinburgh Registrar's records." And while Donald and his mother were
puzzling over what they had heard and wondering what was coming, Mr.
Montgomery continued.

"Your unfortunate husband having been drowned at sea, the heir to the
baronetcy was, of course, your son the Captain there. Under Sir
Roderick's instructions, an investigation was made for the next of kin
some years ago, and we found that your son Donald had gone to sea in a
Glasgow sailing ship and was supposed to have been drowned in
Vancouver. That being the case, David McKenzie would succeed on Sir
Roderick's demise, and then would come David's son Alastair the
second," Donald was blowing smoke-rings and smiling strangely. It was
as if he had guessed something.

"Now we come to the particularly tragic aspect of this affair." The
legal gentleman paused for a fresh start. "Some ten weeks ago, Mrs.
David McKenzie, the boy Alastair, Sir Roderick and a chauffeur were
motoring down from Dunsany to Glasgow when the steering apparatus of
the motor car broke or jammed and it plunged over the high bank into
Loch Velaig. I regret to say that both Mrs. McKenzie and the boy were
drowned. Sir Roderick was saved by the chauffeur, but died within a
few days from the exposure in the chilly water. The chauffeur went
direct to Glasgow to Mr. David's office and told him the sad news. The
shock was too much for him, evidently, for he was found dead in his
chair a half an hour afterwards."

Mrs. McKenzie was listening with horror-struck features and Donald was
visibly affected at the recital of the ghastly retribution which had
come to his uncle. Retribution it was ... and Donald shuddered at the
horror of it. Mr. Montgomery continued with legal deliberation and
calmness. "We could find no heirs, of course, and the matter was
advertised in the papers. The whole story was given, and it stated
that you, Captain, had been drowned in Vancouver harbor. A few days
after publication in the Glasgow press, Mr. McGlashan comes to us
stating that Donald McKenzie was alive and in Canada, and he told us
of your running away from the ship and making believe you were
drowned. He produced evidence so convincing that we got in touch with
two men who had been shipmates with you, Thompson and Jenkins, and, as
a result, I am here in the colonies to settle this business." The
quizzical expression came on Donald's face again and he calmly lit
another cigarette.

Turning to Mrs. McKenzie, the solicitor enquired, "You have your
marriage certificate and your son's birth certificate, I presume? Yes?
Very good!" The mother produced them and when Mr. Montgomery had
finished examining them, he rose to his feet and walked towards
Donald. "There are, of course, some legal details to be gone into, but
the case is pretty clear." He held out his hand and in his most
cordial professional manner exclaimed, "Allow me to congratulate you,
_Sir Donald_!"

The mother gasped audibly, but her son was calmer and in control of
his feelings. With a queer smile on his face, he asked: "The Dunsany
estate? It is mortgaged, is it not?"

"To the hilt, sir," answered the other. "There is no revenue from
it--"

Blowing a series of smoke rings, McKenzie laughed a little and said
very calmly, "I'm very much obliged to you, Mr. Montgomery. But I
don't know as I can thank you for coming out to Canada and handing me
a title. As a sailor, I don't know what to do with it. The estate, I
understand, brings no income. What's the use of a title to me? I'm a
skipper of a fishing vessel and I'm certainly not going to accept a
title and have my crew calling me 'Sir' or have people observing that
'Sir Donald struck a big jag of hake on Western this time,' or have my
gang joking about being skippered by a baronet. It would be the
biggest joke on the Banks. All the trawlers would be swinging off to
have a look at me to see if I wore a coronet!" He became serious
again. "No, sir, I think I'll let it drop. Pass it on to someone with
the money to keep up the style which should go with the thing. At the
present time, to me, it would be as useful as the Dutchman's anchor--"
He stopped at his mother's reproachful "Oh, Donald!" Poor woman! Her
pride was being sorely tried by her son's perversity. "Sir Donald!" It
had a rare impressive sound and she was just beginning to feel that
life was sweet, joyous and tremendously portentous. Her son a
baronet! And so he should be.

Montgomery smiled and raised his hand. "You should permit me to
finish," he said. "Your uncle, David McKenzie, has no heirs, and you
are the next of kin. He was a wealthy man--one of Glasgow's merchant
princes--and the value of his estate, including cash, bonds, stocks
and shares, his ships, and so on, which will come to you, is in the
neighborhood, I should judge, of eight hundred thousand pounds!"

Joak's clay pipe broke between his teeth, and as it clattered to the
floor, he ejaculated, "Ma guid gracious! Eight hunner thoosan'
pounds!" Mrs. McKenzie looked dazed, and Donald sat quietly plucking
at the fringes of the tablecloth.

       *       *       *       *       *

The solicitor departed for the hotel after examining certain papers
which Mrs. McKenzie produced for his inspection, and before he left he
said, "It will be necessary for you both to come to Scotland in order
that we might settle up the estate. I will leave you a draft to cover
the necessary expenses, and it would be well for you to leave as soon
as possible." He bowed gravely, "I am at your service, Sir Donald, and
I trust we may have the pleasure of handling your business in future.
I bid you a very good evening!" And he and McGlashan went out
together, but not before Donald had warned Joak. "See here, you old
Turk, not a word to anyone about this affair ... yet. And furthermore,
I don't want any of that damned _sir-ing_ from you. Cut it out in
future!" And he gave his old chum a slap on the back and had him
chuckling in unfeigned delight.

For an hour, mother and son discussed the matter--Janet excited and
exuberant; Donald, calm and thoughtful. "You know, Mater," he said at
last, "I've been putting two and two together and I've figured out
Uncle Davey's little plans. He knew that Roderick McKenzie was a
lunger and not likely to live long, and he knew that I stood in the
way of his succession to the Dunsany baronetcy. Knowing those things,
he worked those schemes to get rid of me aboard the _Kelvinhaugh_. The
idea just struck him when we went to his office that time. And, do you
know, I don't believe he was thinking of himself. It was all for his
son and his family pride that he toiled and scrimped and did shady
tricks so that when the time came he could restore the family fortunes
and uphold the dignity of the house. But, you see, after all, he lost
out in the end. Aye, the mills of the gods grind slowly, but they
grind exceedingly small!" He sighed and rose to his feet. "Mater dear,
if you'll rustle the grub on the table the baronet and his mamma will
have supper. I want to go over and see Ruth. I have a very interesting
evening ahead of me."

He dressed himself with particular care that night--particular in the
_selection_ of his clothes. With a blue flannel shirt, a cheap tie,
faded coat and pants, and a pair of heavy boots on his feet, he
surveyed himself in the glass and chuckled boisterously, "Now, Sir
Donald," he said to himself, "you look the part as right as rain. A
poor trawl-hauler dolled up to see his girl. If Ruth'll love me in
this rig, she'll love me in anything. I'll test her affections
to-night for sure!"

A few minutes later, he clumped upon the veranda of the Nickerson
home. Old Mr. Nickerson was reading a paper and looked up over his
glasses. "Waal, young feller," he boomed cordially, "an' haow does it
feel to be a hero? The old taown certainly gave ye a good reception
t'other night, eh? And I cal'late that young girl of aours is as proud
as a dog with two tails to hev a man all Eastville is makin' a fuss
of. Cal Heneker tells me he's agoin' to give ye his best vessel to
take afishin' next Spring.... Aye! aye! ye're a lucky young feller all
'raound. Ruth? She's inside washin' up the supper things." And he
resumed his reading again--thinking for a moment of the days when he,
too, was young.

McKenzie led Ruth off to his favorite spot behind the headland, and
they sat down on the grass. "Whatever's on your mind, Donald?" asked
the girl. "You've been looking so mysterious and acting as though you
were suppressing something that I'm sure you've got a surprise hidden.
Be kind, now, and let your poor curious little Ruthie in on the
secret."

He looked smiling into her eyes. "Yes, Ruthie, dear, I have
something--something to ask you. Will you marry me right away?"

She recoiled. "Right away? Good gracious, Don, how can I?"

"How can't you, sweetheart?" He asked the question with a laugh.

"Why--why, I--I have to get a hundred and one things ready, Don," she
answered. "You can't expect a girl to marry you the day after the
engagement. I've a host of things to get ready. I haven't got a full
Hope Chest. There's linen to make up and embroider; dresses to be
made, and--and--" She paused in confusion at the mental vista of
nuptial concomitants.

"And?"

"And--and lots of things you have no business to know anything about,"
she added hastily, while an embarrassed flush crept into her cheeks.

Donald pretended not to notice, and made a careless gesture. "Oh, you
could get all those things afterwards, dear. You know, the _Amy
Anderson_ sails for Demerara next week. Don't you think a trip down
there would make an ideal honeymoon? I may not get a chance to take
you on the trip _I'm thinking of_ unless you marry me right away." It
was a carefully worded series of sentences. There was no accommodation
for a woman on the _Amy Anderson_.

Ruth thought for a moment, then, with sparkling eyes, she cried, "That
would be lovely, Donald, I'm willing, but--but--let's go home and talk
it over with mother first."

For answer he caught her around the shoulders and turned her towards
him. Looking down into her eyes, he said earnestly, "Ruthie, darling,
are you _sure_ you love me? Will you be content to marry me--a
fisherman--and be a fisherman's wife? Would you, if your mother
consented, marry me in a few days, and sail with me adown the seas on
a sailor's honeymoon? Would you?" With heart thumping wildly, he
waited for her answer, and when it came--a soft-spoken "Yes!"--he saw
her face alight with the pure flame of love and her blue eyes smiling
with adoration of him. Then he kissed her fervidly and laughed with
the joy of realization and triumph.

"So we shall, sweetheart," he cried joyously. "We shall get married
and you'll sail with me--not to Demerara--but to auld, grey Scotland.
And you'll sail as a sailor's bride, for I am of the sailor breed, but
not as a fisherman's wife, for you'll be Lady Ruth McKenzie! Aye,
sweetheart, Lady Ruth McKenzie, wife of Sir Donald McKenzie of
Dunsany, and heir to eight hundred thousand pounds!"

The sun glow flared in the golden west and the whispering spruce and
pines stirred in the evening breeze as the night-bird gave tune to his
nocturnal serenade. On the bold head-land, facing the eternal sea, two
deliriously happy souls gazed out upon the waters, and the man
murmured, "I've seen it in murmuring calms and crooning under the
stars, and I've seen it when the hail and sleet and the big graybacks
went roaring down the wind. It has been cruel and kind; it has
scourged me and inspired me; it took my father ruthlessly from me, but
it made of me a man! It has taken much, but it has given much. It
brought me to you, and I love it, as I love you, for it has given me
the greatest blessing in all the wide, wide world ... you!"




EPILOGUE

(EXTRACT FROM AN ARTICLE IN THE "COMMUNITY MAGAZINE.")


A striking example of the benefits which can be conferred upon a small
town through the munificence of one of its citizens can be seen in the
little fishing port of Eastville, Nova Scotia. Eastville is probably
one of the most contented towns on the continent of America,
and it owes its many advantages as a community to a young
sailor-fisherman--Sir Donald Percival McKenzie, Bart.

Many years ago, Donald McKenzie came to Eastville as a poor sailor lad
in company with Captain Nickerson, who had befriended him at sea. He
afterwards sailed in Bank fishing schooners with Nickerson and learned
the business of a fisherman. In those days he had no knowledge of the
good fortune which was in store for him, but plied his hazardous
vocation until he commanded a vessel of his own at twenty-one. Through
a strange turn of fate, the Eastville fishing skipper fell heir to an
ancient Scottish baronetcy and a fortune estimated at four million
dollars.

Instead of returning to live on the ancestral estate in the Highlands
of Scotland, Sir Donald built a modern replica of Dunsany Castle on
Eastville Cape, and devoted his money and talents to the benefit of
his adopted town. As an experienced fisherman, he naturally turned his
attention to the fishing industry, and organized a company in which
practically all the citizens of Eastville are share-holders. This
thriving concern, known as the Eastville Community Fisheries, Ltd.,
own and operate a fine fleet of some fifty fishing schooners and West
India freighters, and the shore establishments consist of a cold
storage, fish cannery, sail lofts, blacksmith shop, shipyard, marine
railway, and large buildings and drying yards for the preparation of
dried salted fish.

Through his influence, Eastville was connected up with the main line
of railway with two trains daily, and he has endowed the town with a
cottage hospital, a public library, and a splendid building for
meetings and entertainments, known as the Alexander McKenzie Memorial
Hall--erected to the memory of Sir Donald's father, a sea-captain
drowned at sea. Many other instances could be cited of this young
man's regard for his adopted town, not the least of which is his
thoughtfulness in caring for former ship-mates. A sea cook, John
McGlashan--a boyhood chum--is in charge of a completely-stocked
grocery store and commissariat for outfitting the fleet; a fisherman,
Sanders, who lost a leg on a vessel Sir Donald commanded, is in charge
of the vessel gear stores, and the General Superintendent of the
fleets and plants and assistant manager, is the Captain Nickerson who
befriended him. The whole town is employed, directly or indirectly, in
the McKenzie enterprises, and there is ample evidence that all are
thriving and paying propositions.

It was the writer's privilege to visit Dunsany Castle and meet Sir
Donald and his charming wife. Built exactly to the dimensions and in
the style of the original Scottish castle, insofar as outside
appearance is concerned, the residence boasts a modern interior in
heating, lighting and other conveniences. The rooms are hung with
numerous tapestries and paintings--ancestral heirlooms removed from
Scotland, while many of the latter are the productions of Sir Donald
and his wife, both of whom are artists of no mean ability. From the
upper windows of the residence a magnificent view of the Atlantic is
obtained, and Sir Donald explained that as he could not remain
actively at sea, he had to have a place where he could at least look
upon it. The Laird of Dunsany, however, holds a master mariner's
certificate, and spends much time on the water in marine biological
work, and in winter months, he sails and navigates his own yacht on
southern cruises.

... In conversing with the townspeople, one is struck by the affection
and admiration which they all have for Sir Donald, Lady McKenzie and
Sir Donald's mother. All three have apparently bound themselves up in
the social life of the community and endeared themselves to all who
know them, and it is a distinct pleasure to meet fishermen who boast
of having either sailed under his command or as dory-mates or
ship-mates in fishing vessels. In this hectic age when most
capitalists are looked upon with dislike by the working people, it was
a treat to be able to visit a community where the head of it was held
in such genuine esteem.

For to see the successful operation of the community system to an
industry, at once romantic and hazardous, and for a living example of
a capitalist who knows the sea as only sailors know it, and whose life
is a record of adventure and daring deeds, I would have you journey to
the pleasant town of Eastville, Nova Scotia.




       *       *       *       *       *




Transcriber's note:

Archaic and inconsistent spelling and punctuation were retained.





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