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I CANNOT SAY THAT THE POSITION Of mate carried with it anything
more joyful than that there were no more dishes to wash. I was
ignorant of the simplest duties of mate, and would have fared
badly indeed had not the sailors sympathized with me. I knew nothing
of the minutiae of ropes and rigging, of the trimming and setting
of sails; but the sailors took pains to put me to rights, Louis
proving a specially good teacher, and I had little trouble with
those under me.
With the hunters it was otherwise. Familiar in varying degree
with the sea, they took me as a sort of joke. In truth, it was
a joke to me that I, the veriest landsman, should be filling the
office of mate; but to be taken as a joke by others was a different
matter. I made no complaint, but Wolf Larsen demanded the must
punctilious sea-etiquette in my case,- far more than poor Johansen
had ever received,- and at the expense of several rows, threats,
and much grumbling, he brought the hunters to time. I was 'Mr.
Van Weyden' fore and aft, and only Wolf Larsen himself ever addressed
me as 'Hump.'
It was amusing. Perhaps the wind would haul a few points while
we were at dinner, and as I left the table he would say, 'Mr.
Van Weyden, will you kindly put about on the port tack?' And I
would go on deck, beckon Louis to me, and learn from him what
was to be done. Then, a few minutes later, having digested his
instructions and thoroughly mastered the maneuver, I would proceed
to issue my orders. I remember an early instance of this kind,
when Wolf Larsen appeared on the scene just as I had begun to
give orders. He smoked his cigar and looked on quietly till the
thing was done, and then paced aft by my side along the weather
poop.
'Hump,' he said,- 'I beg pardon, Mr. Van Weyden,- I congratulate
you. I think you can now fire your father's legs back into the
grave to him. You've discovered your own, and learned to stand
on them. A little rope-work, sail-making, and experience with
storms and such things, and by the end of the voyage you could
ship on any coasting schooner.'
It was during this period, between the death of Johansen and
the arrival on the sealing-grounds, that I passed my pleasantest
hours on the Ghost. Wolf Larsen was considerate, the sailors helped
me, and I was no longer in irritating contact with Thomas Mugridge.
And I make free to say, as the days went by, that I found I was
taking a certain secret pride in myself. Fantastic as the situation
was,- a landlubber second in command,- I was nevertheless carrying
it off well; and during that brief time I was proud of myself,
and I grew to love the heave and roll of the Ghost under my feet
as she wallowed north and west through the tropic sea to the islet
where we filled our water-casks.
But my happiness was not unalloyed. It was comparative, a period
of less misery slipped in between a past of great miseries and
a future of great miseries. For the Ghost, so far as the seamen
were concerned, was a hell-ship of the worst description. They
never had a moment's rest or peace. Wolf Larsen treasured against
them the attempt on his life and the drubbing he had received
in the forecastle, and morning, noon, and night, and all night
as well, he devoted himself to making life unlivable for them.
He knew well the psychology of the little thing, and it was
the little things by which he kept the crew worked up to the verge
of madness. I have seen Harrison called from his bunk to put properly
away a misplaced paint-brush, and the two watches below haled
from their tired sleep to accompany him and see him do it. A little
thing, truly, but when multiplied by the thousand ingenious devices
of such a mind, the mental state of the men in the forecastle
may be slightly comprehended.
Of course much grumbling went on, and little outbursts were
continually occurring. Blows were struck, and there were always
two or three men nursing injuries at the hands of the human beast
who was their master. Concerted action was impossible in face
of the heavy arsenal of weapons carried in the steerage and cabin.
Leach and Johnson were the two particular victims of Wolf Larsen's
diabolic temper, and the look of profound melancholy which had
settled on Johnson's face and in his eyes made my heart bleed.
With Leach it was different. There was too much of the fighting
beast in him. He seemed possessed by an insatiable fury which
gave no time for grief. His lips had become distorted into a permanent
snarl, which, at mere sight of Wolf Larsen, broke out in sound,
horrible and menacing, and, I do believe, unconsciously. I have
seen him follow Wolf Larsen about with his eyes, like an animal
its keeper, the while the animal-like snarl sounded deep in his
throat and vibrated forth between his teeth.
I remember once, on deck, in bright day, touching him on the
shoulder as preliminary to giving an order. His back was toward
me, and at the first feel of my hand he leaped upright in the
air and away from me, snarling and turning his head as he leaped.
He had for the moment mistaken me for the man he hated.
Both he and Johnson would have killed Wolf Larsen at the slightest
opportunity, but the opportunity never came. Wolf Larsen was too
wise for that, and, besides, they had no adequate weapons. With
their fists alone they had no chance whatever. Time and again
he fought it out with Leach, who fought back always, like a wildcat,
tooth and nail and fist, until stretched exhausted or unconscious
on the deck. And he was never averse to another encounter. All
the devil that was in him challenged the devil in Wolf Larsen.
They had but to appear on deck at the same time, when they would
be at it, cursing, snarling, striking; and I have seen Leach fling
himself upon Wolf Larsen without warning or provocation. Once
he threw his heavy sheath-knife, missing Wolf Larsen's throat
by an inch. Another time he dropped a steel marlinespike from
the main-crosstree. It was a difficult cast to make on a rolling
ship, but the sharp point of the spike, whistling seventy-five
feet through the air, barely missed Wolf Larsen's head as he emerged
from the cabin companionway, and drove its length two inches and
over into the solid deck-planking. Still another time he stole
into the steerage, possessed himself of a loaded shotgun, and
was making a rush for the deck with it when caught by Kerfoot
and disarmed.
I often wondered why Wolf Larsen did not kill him and make
an end of it. But he only laughed and seemed to enjoy it. There
seemed a certain spice about it, such as men must feel who take
delight in making pets of ferocious animals.
'It gives a thrill to life,' he explained to me, 'when life
is carried in one's hand. Man is a natural gambler, and life is
the biggest stake he can lay. The greater the odds, the greater
the thrill. Why should I deny myself the joy of exciting Leach's
soul to fever-pitch? For that matter, I do him a kindness. The
greatness of sensation is mutual. He is living more royally than
any man for'ard, though he does not know it. For he has what they
have not- purpose, something to do and be done, an all-absorbing
end to strive to attain, the desire to kill me, the hope that
he may kill me. Really, Hump, he is living deep and high. I doubt
that he has ever lived so swiftly and keenly before, and I honestly
envy him, sometimes, when I see him raging at the summit of passion
and sensibility.'
'Ah, but it is cowardly, cowardly,' I cried. 'You have all
the advantage.'
'Of the two of us, you and I, who is the greater coward?' he
asked seriously. 'If the situation is unpleasing, you compromise
with your conscience when you make yourself a party to it. If
you were really great, really true to yourself, you would join
forces with Leach and Johnson. But you are afraid, you are afraid.
You want to live. The life that is in you cries out that it must
live, no matter what the cost; so you live ignominiously, untrue
to the best you dream of, sinning against your whole pitiful little
code, and, if there were a hell, heading your soul straight for
it. Bah! I play the braver part. I do no sin, for I am true to
the promptings of the life that is in me. I am sincere with my
soul at least, and that is what you are not.'
There was a sting in what he said. Perhaps, after all, I was
playing a cowardly part. And the more I thought about it the more
it appeared that my duty to myself lay in doing what he had advised,
lay in joining forces with Johnson and Leach and working for his
death. Right here, I think, entered the austere conscience of
my Puritan ancestry, impelling me toward lurid deeds and sanctioning
even murder as right conduct. I dwelt upon the idea. It would
be a most moral act to rid the world of such a monster. Humanity
would be better and happier for it, life fairer and sweeter.
I pondered it long, lying sleepless in my bunk and reviewing
in endless procession the facts of the situation. I talked with
Johnson and Leach during the night watches when Wolf Larsen was
below. But both men had lost hope, Johnson because of temperamental
despondency, Leach because he had beaten himself out in the vain
struggle and was exhausted. But he caught my hand in a passionate
grip one night, saying:
'I think ye're square, Mr. Van Weyden. But stay where you are
an' keep yer mouth shut. Say nothin', but saw wood. We're dead
men, I know it; but, all the same, you might be able to do us
a favor sometime when we need it damn bad.'
It was only next day, when Wainwright Island loomed to windward,
close abeam, that Wolf Larsen opened his mouth in prophecy. He
had attacked Johnson, been attacked by Leach, and had just finished
whipping the pair of them.
'Leach,' he said, 'you know I'm going to kill you sometime
or other, don't you?'
A snarl was the answer.
'And as for you, Johnson, you'll get so tired of life before
I'm through with you that you'll fling yourself over the side.
See if you don't.'
'That's suggestion,' he added, in an aside to me. 'I'll bet
you a month's pay he acts upon it.'
I had cherished a hope that his victims would find an opportunity
to escape while filling our water-barrels, but Wolf Larsen had
selected his spot well. The Ghost lay half a mile beyond the surf-line
of a lonely beach. Here debouched a deep gorge, with precipitous,
volcanic walls which no man could scale. And here, under his direct
supervision,- for he went ashore himself,- Leach and Johnson filled
the small casks and rolled them down to the beach. They had no
chance to make a break for liberty in one of the boats.
Harrison and Kelly, however, made such an attempt. They composed
the crew of one of the boats, and their task was to play between
the schooner and the shore, carrying a single cask each trip.
Just before dinner, starting for the beach with an empty barrel,
they altered their course and bore away to the left to round the
promontory which jutted into the sea between them and liberty.
Beyond its foaming base lay the pretty villages of the Japanese
colonists and smiling valleys which penetrated deep into the interior.
Once in the fastnesses they promised, and the two men could defy
Wolf Larsen.
I had observed Henderson and Smoke loitering about the deck
all morning, and I now learned why they were there. Procuring
their rifles, they opened fire in a leisurely manner upon the
deserters. It was a most cold-blooded exhibition of marksmanship.
At first their bullets zipped harmlessly along the surface of
the water on each side the boat; but, as the men continued to
pull lustily, they struck closer and closer.
'Now watch me take Kelly's right oar,' Smoke said, drawing
a more careful aim.
I was looking through the glasses, and I saw the oar-blade
shattered as he shot. Henderson duplicated his feat, selecting
Harrison's right oar. The boat slued around. The two remaining
oars were quickly broken. The men tried to row with the spinters,
and had them shot out of their hands. Kelly ripped up a bottom-board
and began paddling, but dropped it with a cry of pain as its splinters
drove into his hands. Then they gave up, letting the boat drift
till a second boat, sent from the shore by Wolf Larsen, took them
in tow and brought them aboard.
Late that afternoon we hove up anchor and got away. Nothing
was before us but the three or four months' hunting on the sealing-grounds.
The outlook was black indeed, and I went about my work with a
heavy heart. An almost funereal gloom seemed to have descended
upon the Ghost. Wolf Larsen had taken to his bunk with one of
his strange splitting headaches. Harrison stood listlessly at
the wheel, half supporting himself by it, as though wearied by
the weight of his flesh. The rest of the men were morose and silent.
I came upon Kelly crouching in the lee of the forecastle scuttle,
his head on his knees, his arms about his head, in an attitude
of unutterable despondency.
Johnson I found lying full-length on the forecastle head, staring
at the troubled churn of the forefoot, and I remembered with horror
the suggestion Wolf Larsen had made. It seemed likely to bear
fruit. I tried to break in on the man's morbid thoughts by calling
him away; but he smiled sadly at me, and refused to obey.
Leach approached me as I returned aft.
'I want to ask a favor, Mr. Van Weyden,' he said. 'If it's
yer luck to ever make 'Frisco once more, will you hunt up Matt
McCarthy? He's my old man. He lives on the Hill, back of the Mayfair
bakery, runnin' a cobbler's shop that everybody knows, an' you'll
have no trouble. Tell him I lived to be sorry for the trouble
I brought him an' the things I done, an'- an' just tell him "God
bless him," for me.'
I nodded my head, but said:
'We'll all win back to San Francisco, Leach, and you'll be
with me when I go to see Matt McCarthy.'
'I'd like to believe you,' he answered, shaking my hand, 'but
I can't. Wolf Larsen'll do for me, I know it, and all I can hope
is he'll do it quick.'
And as he left me I was aware of the same desire at my heart.
Since it was to be done, let it be done with despatch. The general
gloom had gathered me into its folds. The worst appeared inevitable;
and as I paced the deck hour after hour, I found myself afflicted
with Wolf Larsen's repulsive ideas. What was it all about? Where
was the grandeur of life that it should permit such wanton destruction
of human souls? It was a cheap and sordid thing, after all, this
life, and the sooner over the better. Over and done with! Over
and done with! I, too, leaned upon the rail and gazed longingly
into the sea, with the certitude that sooner or later I should
be sinking down, down, through the cool green depths of its oblivion.
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