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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/30138-0.txt b/30138-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a14c180 --- /dev/null +++ b/30138-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7424 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30138 *** + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 30138-h.htm or 30138-h.zip: + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30138/30138-h/30138-h.htm) + or + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30138/30138-h.zip) + + + + + +THE SEINERS + +by + +JAMES B. CONNOLLY + +Author of "Out of Gloucester," "Jeb Hutton," Etc. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: IT WAS THE FINEST KIND OF EXCITEMENT, OUR RUNNING TO +HARBOR] + + + +Charles Scribner's Sons +New York 1910 + +Copyright, 1904, by +Charles Scribner's Sons + +Published, May, 1904 + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW'S 1 + II. A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS 8 + III. MINNIE ARKELL 16 + IV. LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION 27 + V. FROM OUT OF CROW'S NEST 35 + VI. MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL 43 + VII. CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL 51 + VIII. THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA 61 + IX. MACKEREL 70 + X. WE LOSE OUR SEINE 82 + XI. AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE 87 + XII. THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR 99 + XIII. WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE 119 + XIV. A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING 123 + XV. CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD 129 + XVI. WE GET A FINE SCHOOL 137 + XVII. A DRIVE FOR MARKET 144 + XVIII. A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET 153 + XIX. MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN 159 + XX. THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME 172 + XXI. SEINERS' WORK 175 + XXII. ON THE CAPE SHORE 184 + XXIII. DRESSING DOWN 193 + XXIV. THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN 202 + XXV. TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS 206 + XXVI. THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER 211 + XXVII. IN CLANCY'S BOARDING-HOUSE 217 + XXVIII. IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN 220 + XXIX. MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME 230 + XXX. THE MORNING OF THE RACE 235 + XXXI. THE START OF THE RACE 243 + XXXII. O'DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS 250 + XXXIII. THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN 257 + XXXIV. MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE 265 + XXXV. CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW 271 + XXXVI. MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED 281 + XXXVII. THE GIRL IN CANSO 289 + XXXVIII. THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST'ARD 297 + XXXIX. THE HEART OF CLANCY 309 + + + + +THE SEINERS + + + + +THE SEINERS + +I + +THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW'S + + +It was only a few days before this that the new vessel of Mr. +Withrow's, built by him, as everybody supposed, for Maurice Blake, had +been towed around from Essex, and I remember how Maurice stood on the +dock that afternoon and looked her over. + +There was not a bolt or a plank or a seam in her whole hull, not a +square inch inside or out, that he had not been over half a dozen +times while she was on the stocks; but now he had to look her over +again, and as he looked his eyes took on a shine. She had been +designed by a man famous the world over, and was intended to beat +anything that ever sailed past Eastern Point. + +She certainly was a great-looking model of a vessel, and "If she only +sails and handles half so well as she looks, she'll do for me," said +Maurice. "Yes, sir, and if she's up to what I think she ought to be, I +wouldn't be afraid to bet my share of what we make out South that +she'll hold her own with anything out of Gloucester--give her a few +weeks to loosen up, of course." + +That was a good deal to say, for it was a great fleet of vessels +sailing out of Gloucester; but even so, even allowing for a young +skipper's pride in his first crack vessel, it meant a whole lot coming +like that from Maurice Blake. + +And on top of all that Maurice and Withrow had to quarrel, though what +about I never found out. I only know that I was ready to believe that +Withrow was to blame, for I liked Maurice and did not like Withrow, +even though Withrow was the man from whom I drew my pay every week. +And yet I could not understand it, for Maurice Blake had been far and +away the most successful skipper sailing for Withrow, and Withrow +always had a good eye for the dollar. + +No more came of it until this particular morning, some days after +Maurice and Withrow had quarrelled. Wesley Marrs and Tommie Clancy, +two men that I never tired of listening to, were on the dock and +sizing up the new vessel. Wesley Marrs was himself a great fisherman, +and master at this time of the wonderful Lucy Foster. + + When she swings the main boom over + And she feels the wind abaft, + + The way she'll walk to Gloucester'll + Make a steamer look a raft. + + For she's the Lucy Foster, + She's a seiner out of Gloucester,-- + +was the way the fishermen of the port used to sing about the Lucy; +while Tommie Clancy was Maurice Blake's closest friend. + +With ballast stored, masts stepped, rigging set up, and sails bent, +setting as sweet as could be to her lines and the lumpers beginning to +get her ready for the mackerel season, the Fred Withrow was certainly +a picture. + +After a couple of extra long pulls, blowing the smoke into the air, +and another look above and below, "That one--she'll sail some or I +don't know," said Wesley. + +"She sure will," said Tommie; "and it's a jeesly shame Maurice isn't +to have her." Then turning to me, "What in the devil's name ails that +man you work for, Joey?" + +I said I didn't know. + +"No, nor nobody else knows. I'd like to work in that store for him for +about ten minutes. I think I'd make him say something in that ten +minutes that would give me a good excuse for heaving him out the +window. He had an argument with Maurice, Wesley, and Maurice don't +know what it was half about, but he knows he came near to punching +Withrow." + +And Wesley and Tommie had to talk that out; and between the pair of +them, thinking of what they said, I thought I ought to walk back to +the store with barely a civil look for my employer, who didn't like +that at all, for he generally wanted to hand out the black looks +himself. + +Then the girls--my cousin Nellie and her particular chum, Alice +Foster--came in to weigh themselves, and also to remind me, they said, +that I was to take them over to Essex the next day for the launching +of the new vessel for the Duncan firm, which had been designed by a +friend of Nell's, a young fellow named Will Somers, who was just +beginning to get a name in Gloucester for fast and able models of +vessels. Withrow, who was not over-liberal with his holidays, said I +might go--mostly, I suspect, because Alice Foster had said she would +not make the trip without Nell, and Nell would not go unless I went +too. + +Then Nell and Miss Foster went on with the business of weighing +themselves. That was in line with the latest fad. It was always +something or other, and physical culture was in the air at this time +with every other girl in Gloucester, so far as I could see--either +Indian-club swinging or dumb-bell drilling, long walks, and things of +that kind, and telling how much better they felt after it. My cousin +Nell, who went in for anything that anybody ever told her about, was +trying to reduce her weight. According to some perfect-form charts, or +something or other on printed sheets, she weighed seven pounds more +than she should for her height. I thought she was about the right +weight myself, and told her so, but she said no--she was positively +fat. "Look at Alice," she said, "she's just the thing." + +I looked at Alice--Miss Foster I always called her myself--and +certainly she was a lovely girl, though perhaps a little too conscious +of it. She was one of the few that weren't going in for anything that +I could see. She wasn't even weighing herself, or at least she didn't +until Mr. Withrow, with his company manners in fine working order, +asked her if she wouldn't allow him to weigh her. + +There were people in town who said it was not for nothing that +Alice Foster was so chummy with my cousin Nell. They meant, of +course, that being chummy with Nell, who came down regularly to see +me, gave herself a good excuse to come along and so have a word with +Withrow. Fred Withrow himself was a big, well-built, handsome +man--an unusually good-looking man, I'd call him--and a great +heart-breaker, according to report--some of it his own. And he was +wealthy, too. I did not know, but somehow or other I did not believe +it, or maybe it was that I hoped rather than believed that Miss +Foster did not care particularly for him; for I did not like him +myself, although I worked for him and was taking his money. Being day +in and day out with him in the store, you see I saw him pretty much +as he really was, and I hated to think of a fine girl--for with +all her cool ways I knew Miss Foster was that--marrying him. Just +how Withrow thought he stood with Miss Foster I did not know--he +was a pretty close-mouthed man when he wanted to be. Miss Foster +herself was that reserved kind of a girl that you cannot always +place. She struck me as being a girl that would die before she would +confess a weakness or a troublesome feeling. And yet, without +knowing how it came there, there was always a notion in the back of +my head that made me half-believe that she did not come to the +store with my cousin out of pure companionship. There was something +besides--and what could it be but Withrow? + +After the weighing was done Nell asked me all at once, "I hear, Joe, +that Captain Hollis is going to have your new vessel? How is that? +We--I thought that Captain Blake was going master of her--and such a +pretty vessel!" + +I answered that I didn't know how it was, and looked over at my +employer, as much as to say, "Maybe he can tell you." + +I think now that I must have been a pretty impudent lad, letting my +employer know what I thought of him as I did in those days. I think, +too, he had a pretty shrewd notion of what I thought of himself and +Maurice Blake. At any rate, after the girls had gone, he worked +himself into a fine bit of temper, and I talked back at him, and the +end of it was that he discharged me--or 1 quit--I'm not sure which. I +do know that it was rapid-fire talk while it lasted. + +It was some satisfaction to me to tell Withrow just about what I did +think of him before I went. He didn't quite throw me out of the door, +although he was big enough for that; but he looked as if he wanted to. +And maybe he would have, too, or tried it, only I said, "Mind I don't +give you what Tommie Clancy threatened to give you once," and his +nerve went flat. I couldn't have handled him as Clancy had any more +than I could have hove a barrel of salt mackerel over my head, which +was what the strong fishermen of the port were doing about that time +to prove their strength; but the bluff went, and I couldn't help +throwing out my chest as I went out the door and thinking that I was +getting to be a great judge of human nature. + + + + +II + +A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS + + +I was sorry to lose my job. I was twenty years old, without a trade or +special knowledge of any kind, and beyond the outfitting of fishing +vessels, knowing nothing of any business, and with no more than a high +school education--and that two years behind me--and I knew of no place +in Gloucester where I could begin all over and right away get as much +pay as I had left behind me. I might go to Boston, of course, and try +for something there--I was not ten minutes out of Withrow's before I +thought of doing that. But a little further thought and I knew there +were more capable men than I walking the streets of Boston looking for +work. However, a lot could happen before I would have to worry, and so +I decided to take the air and think it over. + +I might go fishing certainly--I had had a little experience in my +school vacations--if my mother would only stand for it. As to that I +did not know. If it came to fishing or starving--one or the +other--then of course she would have to let me go fishing. But my +father had been lost on the Grand Banks with his vessel and all +hands--and then one brother was already fishing. So I hardly thought +she would allow me, and anyway I knew she would never have a good +night's rest while I was out. + +However, I kept thinking it over. To get away by myself I took a ride +over to Essex. There I knew I would find half a dozen vessels on the +stocks, and there they were--the latest vessel for the Duncan firm and +three more for other firms. I knew one of the ship-carpenters in +Elwell's yard, Levi Woodbury, and he was telling me about some of the +vessels that had been launched lately. "Of course," he said, "you saw +the one launched a few days ago from here--that one built for Mr. +Withrow?" + +I said I had, and that she was a wonder to look at and that I wished +Maurice Blake, and not Sam Hollis, was to have her. + +"Yes," said Levi, "and a pity. Maurice Blake could have sailed her +right, though for that matter Sam Hollis is a clever hand to sail a +vessel, too. And she ought to sail some, that vessel. But look +here at this one for the Duncans and to be launched to-morrow. +Designed by Will Somers--know him? Yes? A nice young fellow. Ain't she +able-looking?" + +She certainly was, and handsome, and Levi went on to tell me about +her. He showed me where she was like and where she differed from the +Lucy Foster, the Fred Withrow, the Nannie O, the Colleen Bawn, and the +others which were then causing trouble in Gloucester with crews +fighting over their good qualities. I did not know a whole lot about +vessels, but having been born in Gloucester and having soaked in the +atmosphere all my life and loving vessels besides, I had a lot of +notions about them. And I liked this last Duncan vessel. By the wind +and in a sea-way, it struck me she would be a wonder. There was +something more than just the fine lines of her. There is that about +vessels. You can take two vessels, model them alike, rig them alike, +handle them alike, and still one will sail rings around the other. And +why is it? I've heard a hundred fishermen at different times say that +and then ask, Why is it? This one was awfully sharp forward, too sharp +some might have said, with little more forefoot than most of the +late-built flyers; but she was deep and had a quarter that I knew +would stand up under her sail. I liked the after-part of her. Racing +machines are all right for a few months or a year or two and in smooth +water, but give me a vessel that can stand up under sail. I thought I +could see where, if they gave her sail enough, especially aft, and a +skipper that would drive her, she might do great things. And +certainly she ought to be a comfort in a blow and bring a fellow +home--and there's a whole lot in that--being in a vessel that you feel +will bring you home again. + +I looked over the others, but none of them held me like the Duncan +vessel, and I soon came back to Gloucester and took a walk along the +waterfront. + +It was well into March at this time--the third week in March, I +remember--and there was a great business doing along the docks. The +salt bankers were almost ready to leave--twenty-eight or thirty sail +fitting out for the Grand Banks. And then there were the seiners--the +mackerel catchers--seventy or eighty sail of them making ready for the +Southern cruise. All that meant that things would be humming for a +while. So I took a walk along the docks to see it. + +Most of the vessels that had been fishing during the winter had been +stripped of their winter sails, and now aboard these they were bending +on the summer suits and slinging up what top spars had not already +been sent up. For the vessels that had been laid up all winter and +stripped of everything, they were getting out the gear from the lofts. +Everywhere it was topmasts being sent up, sails being dragged out, +stays swayed taut, halyards and sheets rove--an overhauling +generally. On the railways--Burnham's, Parkhurst's, and Tarr's--were +vessels having their bottoms scrubbed and painted and their topsides +lined out. And they all looked so handsome and smelt so fine with +their riggings being tarred, not with the smoky tar that people ashore +put on house-roofs, but the fine rich-smelling tar that goes into +vessels' rigging; and there was the black and dark sea-green paint for +the sides, with the gold or yellow or sometimes red stripe to mark the +run, and main and quarter rails being varnished. + +And the seine-boats! If there is anything afloat that sets more +easily on the water than a seine-boat I never saw it, unless it +might be a birch-bark canoe--and who'd want to be caught out in a +blow in a canoe? The seine-boats all looked as natural as so many +sea-gulls--thirty-six or thirty-eight feet long, green or blue +bottoms to just above the waterline so that it would show, and above +that all clear white except for the blue or red or yellow or green +decorations that some skippers liked. And the seines that went +with them were coming in wagons from the net and twine factory, +tanned brown or tarred black and all ready to be hauled on to the +vessels' decks or stowed in the holds below, until the fleet +should be in among the mackerel to the south'ard--off Hatteras or +Cape May or somewhere down that way. + +To feel all that and the rest of it--to walk to the tops of your shoes +in pine chips in the spar yards, to measure the lengths of booms and +gaffs for yourself if you weren't sure who were going to spread the +big mainsails, to go up in the sail-lofts and see the sailmakers, +bench after bench of them, making their needles and the long waxed +threads fly through the canvas that it seemed a pity wasn't to stay so +white forever--to see them spread the canvas out along the chalk lines +on the varnished floor, fixing leach and luff ropes to them and +putting the leather-bound cringles in, and putting them in too so +they'd stay, for by and by men's lives would depend on the way they +hung on--all that, railways, sail-lofts, vessels, boats, docks alive +with men jumping to their work--skippers, crews, carpenters, riggers, +lumpers, all thinking, talking, and, I suppose, dreaming of the +season's work ahead--m-m--there was life for a man! Who'd want to work +in a store after that? + +I stopped at Duncan's wharf and looked at Wesley Marrs's vessel, the +Lucy Foster, and then the Colleen Bawn. + + And O'Donnell drove the Colleen like a ghost through all that + gale, + And around 'twas roaring mountains and above 'twas blinding hail, + +and so on. And the Nannie O, another vessel that fishermen sang songs +about. + + Oh, the lovely Nannie O, + The able Nannie O, + The Nannie O a-drivin' through the gale. + +They were lying there, tied to the docks. They were all dreams, so +long and clean, with the beautiful sheer fore and aft, and the +overhang of the racers they were meant to be--the gold run, with the +grain of the varnished oak rails shining above the night-black of +their topsides, and varnished spars. They had the look of vessels that +could sail--and they could, and live out a gale--nothing like them +afloat I'd heard people say that ought to know. + +I walked along another stretch and at Withrow's dock I saw again the +new one that had been built for Maurice Blake but given to Sam Hollis, +who was a boon companion of Withrow's ashore, as I may have said +already. Hollis's gang were bragging even now that she'd trim anything +that ever sailed--the Lucy Foster, the Nannie O, the Colleen Bawn, and +all the rest of them. And there were some old sharks, too, upon the +docks who said they didn't know but she looked as if she could. But a +lot of other people didn't think it--she was all right as a vessel, +but Sam Hollis wasn't a Wesley Marrs, nor a Tom O'Donnell, nor a +Tommie Ohlsen, nor even a Maurice Blake, who was a much younger man +and a less experienced fisherman than any of the others. + +All that, with the vessels anchored in the stream and the little +dories running up and down and in and out--it all brought back again +the trips I'd made with my father, clear back to the time when I was a +little boy, so small that in heavy weather he wouldn't trust me to go +forward or aft myself, but would carry me in his arms himself--it all +made me so long for the sea that my head went round and I found myself +staggering like a drunken man as I tried to walk away from it. + + + + +III + +MINNIE ARKELL + + +There was nothing for it. For a thousand dollars a month I could not +stay ashore. Somebody or other would give me a chance to go seining, +some good skipper I knew; and if none of the killers would give me a +chance, then I'd try some old pod of a skipper. My mother would just +have to let me go. It was only summer fishing after all--seining +wasn't like winter trawling--and in the end she would see it as I +did. + +I walked along, and as the last man in my mind was Maurice Blake, of +course he was the first I had to run into. He was not looking well; I +mean he was not looking as he should have looked. There was a reckless +manner about him that no more belonged to him than a regularly quiet +manner belonged to his friend Tommie Clancy. And I guessed why--he had +been drinking. I had heard it already. Generally when a man starts to +drink for the first time everybody talks about it. I was surprised, +and I wished he hadn't. But we are always finding out new things about +men. In my heart I was not blaming Maurice so much maybe as I should. +I'd always been taught that drinking in excess was an awful habit, but +some otherwise fine men I knew drank at times, and I wasn't going to +blame Maurice till I knew more about it. + +And we can forgive a lot, too, in those we like. Maurice had no family +to think of, and it must have been a blow to him not to get so fine a +vessel as the Fred Withrow after he had been promised and had set his +heart on it. And then to see her go to a man like Sam Hollis! and with +the prospect of not getting another until a man like Withrow felt like +saying you could. Everybody in Gloucester seemed to know that Withrow +was doing all he could to keep Maurice from getting a vessel, and as +the owners had banded together just before this for protection, as +they called it, "against outside interference," and as Withrow was one +of the largest owners and a man of influence beyond his vessel +holdings, he was quite a power at this time. + +Maurice Blake was far from being drunk, however, when I met him this +day. Indeed, I do not believe that in his most reckless hour up to +this time he had ever lost control of himself so far as not to know +pretty nearly what he was doing all the time; but certainly he had +been drinking this day, and the drinking manner did not set well on +him. + +Maurice was standing on the front steps of Mrs. Arkell's boarding-house +when I saw him. It was Mrs. Arkell's granddaughter Minnie that married +the wealthy Mr. Miner--a rather loud sort of man, who had been reported +as saying that he would give her a good time and show her life. He may +have given her a good time--I don't know--but he was dead in two +years. He was supposed to be very rich--three or four millions--but on +settling up there was less than half a million. Of course that wasn't +bad--enough for Minnie to buy a big house next her grandmother's for +a summer home, and enough to go off travelling whenever she pleased. + +When she came back to Gloucester she was still a very handsome girl, +spoken of as the "Miner widow" among people who had known her only +since her marriage, but still called Minnie Arkell by most of those +who had known her when she was a child. In Gloucester she bought the +first house just around the corner from her grandmother's. A handy +passage between their two back yards allowed her to visit her +grandmother whenever she pleased. She wanted to be near her own +people, she said, and was more in her grandmother's house than her +own. + +Maurice came down the steps of Mrs. Arkell's boarding-house as I came +along, and joined me on the sidewalk. He asked me the first thing if +I wouldn't have a drink, and I said no. + +"Oh, I forgot," he said, "you don't drink. Have a cigar," and he +pulled one out of his pocket, and I took and lit it. Generally I +smoked a pipe, but I liked good cigars, though I couldn't afford them +myself. This was not a good one--more like the kind they hand out in +bar-rooms when men get tired of drinking and say they guess they'll +have a smoke. + +"How does it happen, Joe, you're not at the store? I always thought +Withrow held his men pretty close to hours." + +"Well, so he does, but I'm not working for him now." And then I told +him that I had had an argument with Withrow, been discharged, and was +thinking of going fishing. I didn't tell him at first how it all came +about, but I think he guessed it, for all at once, after a searching +look, he reached out and shook hands with me. + +"If ever I get a vessel again, Joe, and you still want to go fishing +and care for a chance with me, you can have it--if you can't go with a +better man, I mean. I'll take you and be glad to have you." + +That meant a good berth, of course, for Maurice was a killer. + +I looked at Maurice when he wasn't watching me, and felt sorry for +him. He was a man that anybody would like the looks of. It wasn't +that he was a handsome man--I never could get to like pretty men +myself--but there was something about him that made you feel you could +trust him. The heavy tan of his face and the grip of his jaw would +spoil almost anybody for a beauty man, I suppose, but he had fine eyes +and his mouth was all right, and he had a head that you'd like to +stand off one side and look at, with hair that seemed to lift and wave +with every breath of wind, and when he smiled you felt somehow that +he'd saved that particular smile for you. He was no better built than +a hundred other men I knew who were going fishing, and he was no +bigger than a thousand others sailing out of Gloucester, and not near +so big as a lot of others--five feet ten or eleven, maybe, he was, +with level shoulders, and very light on his feet--but looking at him +you knew he was all there. + +After smoking a while and watching him between puffs, it flashed on me +all at once that I was pretty thick. A word or two my cousin Nell had +let slip--not so much what she said as the way she said it--gave me a +hint of a whole lot of things. Looking at Maurice now I asked him if +he had seen my cousin or Miss Foster lately. + +He flushed up as he looked at me, and I saw that whatever he was +thinking of it had not been far away from what I had been thinking +of. "No, I haven't seen them"--slowly. "How is your cousin?" + +"Oh, she seems to be all right. They were both in to the store this +morning." + +"What doing?" I thought he was beginning to worry, but I tried not to +let on that I noticed it. I was beginning to feel like a sleuth, or a +detective, or a diplomat, or something. + +"Well, I don't know. Nell said they came in to see me, but all that +happened that I had any hand in was to weigh her. She gained another +pound last week, and it's worrying her. The more exercise she takes +the heavier she gets, she says. She's a hundred and thirty-one now. Of +course, while they're there Withrow had to help out and make himself +agreeable, especially to Miss Foster, but I can't see that she warms +up to him." + +"Ha? No? You don't think so?" + +"Not much, but maybe it's her way. She's pretty frosty generally +anyway, different from my cousin--she's something like." + +"Yes, your cousin is all right," said Maurice. + +"You bet," I said. "She don't stand around and chill the air." + +"Why--does Miss Foster always? Is that her way? I--don't--know--much +about her." + +"Well, I don't know so very much myself--mostly what my cousin tells +me. Still, I guess she's all right; but she strikes me as one of the +kind that might make an awful lot of a man and never let on until she +was dead sure of him." + +"H-m--That means she could think a whole lot of Withrow and not let +on, Joe?" + +I tried to look at Maurice like my oldest brother used to look at me +sometimes when he tried to make me feel that I was a very green kid +indeed, and said, "Well, if she's the kind to care for a man like +Withrow, all I've got to say is that she'll deserve all she'll get. +He's no good." + +"That may be, but how's she to know? I know, you know, and half the +men in Gloucester know that he's rotten; but take a woman who only +sees him at his best and when he's watching out--how's she to know?" + +"I don't know, but being a woman she ought to," was all I could say to +that. It came into my mind just then that when I next saw my cousin +Nell I'd tell her what I really knew, and more than that--what I +really thought of my old employer. Perhaps she'd carry it to Miss +Foster. If it was to be Maurice or Withrow, I knew on which side I was +going to be. + +Both of us were quiet then, neither of us quite knowing what to say +perhaps. Then together we started to walk to the corner of the side +street. We were past the side-door of the boarding-house when a voice +called out, "Oh, Maurice," and then, maybe noticing me, I suppose, +"Oh, Captain Blake," and Maurice turned. Minnie Arkell--Mrs. Miner +rather--was there at the kitchen window. I didn't know she was in town +at all--thought she hadn't got back from Florida, or North Carolina, +or wherever it was she had been for the winter. + +"Won't you come in a minute, Captain, and your friend? He doesn't +remember me--do you, Joe?--and yet we were playmates once," which was +true. I was often taken to Mrs. Arkell's when a little fellow by +skippers who were friends of my father's. They used to tell me about +him, and I liked to listen. + +"I thought I'd run over and see granny," she went on. "I'm back to the +old house for a while. Won't you come in?" + +My mind had long been set against Minnie Arkell. I knew about her +throwing over a fine young fellow, a promising skipper, to marry +Miner. I may have been too young at the time to judge anybody, but +after that I had small use for her. My ideas in the matter were of +course pretty much what older men had put into me. + +I had listened to them--skippers and others--and yet now, when she +held out her hand to me and smiled, I didn't feel nearly so set +against her. She certainly was a handsome girl, and yet I hoped that +Maurice wouldn't fall in love with her, as most everybody did that +came to the Arkell house. + +I said that I did not have time to come in, and started to make off. +Maurice asked me where I was bound. I told him that I thought of +taking a look in at Crow's Nest and getting the news. + +"Yes, you'll get it there, sure enough. When they can't tell you +anything else up there they can tell you what everybody's doing." He +smiled at that, turned slowly toward the side-door, as if he would +rather go with me to Crow's Nest, and I went off. + +Just outside the gate I saw Sam Hollis, a man I never did like. Tommie +Clancy, the man that could size up a person quicker than anybody I'd +ever met, used to say that deep down, if you could get at Hollis, +you'd find a quitter, but that nobody had ever got into him. I'd been +meeting Hollis after every trip in for two years in Withrow's store. +He was a successful fisherman, and a sharp, keen man ashore, but he +was a man I never quite took to. One of his ambitions, I felt +satisfied, was to be reckoned a devil of a fellow. He'd have given a +year's earnings, I knew, to have people point him out on the street +and say, "There's Sam Hollis--there's the boy to carry sail--nobody +ever made him take his mains'l in," the same as they used to say of a +half dozen or so that really would carry sail--that would drive a +vessel under before they would be the first to reef. But the people +didn't do that, although, let him tell it, he did wonderful things out +to sea, and he had such a way of telling it, too, that he'd almost +make you believe him. But as Clancy used to say, after he'd left you, +and you had time to think it over, you'd see where here and there his +story wasn't well-calked. My own idea was that he wanted a reputation +so that he could pose as a devil of a fellow with certain people +ashore. It is easy enough to see that even a more careful man than Sam +Hollis might take a chance for a smile from a woman like Minnie +Arkell. + +Anyhow, I never felt at home with Hollis, and so was willing to take +Clancy's judgment straight. Hollis was a man about forty, and had been +one of Minnie Arkell's admirers ever since I could remember--ever +since she was old enough to have any, I mean, and she wasn't any late +bloomer, as Clancy used to say. + +Hollis went into the Arkell house by the door that had only just +closed behind Maurice and Minnie Arkell. I didn't like that very much, +and was thinking of turning back and going in, too; but on second +thought it occurred to me that perhaps only Maurice would have a +welcome for me. So I didn't enter, but kept on to Crow's Nest +instead. + + + + +IV + +LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION + + +By this time I should have gone home, I suppose, and had something to +eat--it was getting on into the afternoon--but I didn't want to have a +talk with my mother yet awhile, and so kept on to Crow's Nest, where I +found half a dozen good-natured loafers. Not all were loafers +exactly--three or four were simply waiting around before shipping on +some seiner for the mackerel season. It promised to shower at the +time, too, and of course the gentlemen who formed old Peter's staff +could not think of venturing out in threatening weather. + +And there they were, with Peter Hines, the paid man in charge of +Crow's Nest, keeping a benevolent eye on them. Yarning, arguing, +skylarking, advising Peter, and having fun with little Johnnie Duncan +they were when I entered. Johnnie was the grandson of the head of the +Duncan firm, a fine, clear-eyed boy, that nobody could help liking. He +thought fishermen were the greatest people in the world. Whatever a +fisherman did was all right to Johnnie. + +I had got all the news at Crow's Nest and was just thinking of moving +along toward home when Tommie Clancy popped in. Of course that made a +difference. I wasn't going to move while Clancy was around. + +"My soul, but here's where the real gentlemen are," he had to say +first, and then, "Anybody seen Maurice to-day?" + +I told him I had, and where. + +"Anybody with him?" + +"Well, not with him exactly." I shook my head, and said nothing of +Minnie Arkell, nor of Sam Hollis, although Clancy, looking at me, I +could see, guessed that there was something else; and he might have +asked me something more only for the crowd and little Johnnie Duncan. + +Johnnie was trying to climb up onto Clancy, and so Clancy, turning +from me, took Johnnie up and gave him a toss that all but hit his head +against the roof. "And how's she heading, Johnnie-boy?" and taking a +seat stood Johnnie up beside him. + +"East-s'uth-east, and a fair, fair wind," answered Johnnie. + +"East-s'uth-east--my, but you said that fine. And a fair wind? Must be +bound Georges Bank way. And how long will you hold that course?" + +"From Eastern Point--a hundred and thirty-five mile." + +"Yes--and then?" + +"Then you throw her up and heave the lead." + +"And heave the lead--sure enough. And then?" + +"And then, if you find you're clear of the North Shoal, you put her to +the s'uth'ard and west'ard till you're in onto the Bank." + +"S'uth'ard and west'ard--that's the boy. Man, but I'll live to see you +going to the Custom House and taking out your master's papers yet." + +"And can I join the Master Mariners then?" + +"That's what you can, and walk down Main Street with a swing to your +shoulders, too. And now you're up on the Bank and twenty-five fathom +of water and the right bottom--and you're a hand-liner, say, after +cod--what then?" + +"Let go her chain and begin fishing." + +"And would you give her a short or a long string of cable?" + +"M-m--I'm not sure. A long string you'd hang on better, but a short +scope and you could get out faster in case you were dragging and going +onto the shoals. What would you do, Captain Clancy? You never told me +that, did you?" + +"Well, it would depend, too, though handliners generally calculate on +hanging on, blow how it will. But never mind that; suppose your +anchor dragged or parted and into the shoal water you went in a gale, +an easterly, say--and the bank right under your lee--wind sixty or +seventy or eighty mile an hour--what would you do?" + +"Anchor not hold? M-m--Then I'd--give her the second one." + +"And if that dragged, too--or parted?" + +"Both of 'em? M-m"--Johnnie was taking deep breaths now--"why, then +I'd have to put sail to her----" + +"What sail?" + +"Why, jib, jumbo, fore and main." + +"And the wind blowing eighty mile an hour?" + +"Why, yes, if she'd stand it." + +"My, but she'd have to be an able vessel that--all four lowers and the +wind blowing eighty mile an hour. Man, but you're a dog! Suppose she +couldn't stand it?" + +"Then I'd reef the mains'l." + +"And if that was too much--what then?" + +"Reef it again." + +"And too much yet?" + +"Balance-reef it--maybe take it in altogether--and the jib with it, +and get out the riding-sail." + +"And would you do nothing to the fores'l?" + +"M-m--I dunno--with some vessels maybe I'd reef that, too--maybe take +it in altogether." + +"My, but you're cert'nly a dog. And what then?" + +"Why, then I'd try to work her out." + +"And would you be doing anything with the lead?" + +"Oh, we'd be keeping the lead going all the time, for banging her +across and back like that you wouldn't know where you were just." + +"And would you come clear, d'y' think?" + +"Yes, sir--if the gear held and with an able vessel we ought to." + +"If the gear held--that's it. Be sure, Johnnie-boy, you see that the +gear is all right before ever you leave port. And with an able vessel, +you say? With that new one of your gran'pa's--would you come clear +with her?" + +"Oh, she'd come clear--built to go fresh halibuting next winter, that +one." + +"Yes--and seining this spring. But suppose now you were +haddocking--trawling--eight or ten dories, and you just arrived on the +grounds, picked out a good spot, and there you are--you're all baited +up and ready?" + +"Winter time?" + +"Winter time, yes." + +"First I'd single-reef the mains'l. Then I'd hold her up a little--not +too much--me being skipper would be to the wheel myself--and then I'd +give the order, 'Dories to the rail!' and then, when everything was +all right--when I'd be satisfied we wouldn't foul the next vessel's +trawls--I'd call out, 'Over with your wind'ard dory!'" + +"Loud and clear you'd holler, because the wind might be high." + +"Loud and clear, yes--'Let go your wind'ard dory!'--like that. And +'Set to the west'ard,' or the east'ard, whatever it was--according to +the tide, you know. I'd call that out to the dory as it went sliding +by the quarter--the vessel, of course, 'd be sailing all the time--and +next, 'Wind'ard dory to the rail!' And then, when we'd gone ahead +enough, again, 'Let go your looard dory!' and then, 'Looard dory to +the rail! Let go your wind'ard dory! Let go your looard dory!' and so +till they were all over the side." + +"And supposing, they being all out, it came on thick, or snowing, and +some of them went astray, and it was time to go home, having filled +her with eighty or ninety or a hundred thousand of fresh fish, a fair +wind, and every prospect of a good market--what then?" + +"Oh, I'd have to wait, of course--cruise around and stand by." + +"And suppose you couldn't find them again?" + +"Why, after waiting until I was sure they were gone, I'd come home." + +"And your flag?" + +"Half-mast." + +"Half-mast--that's it. I hope you'll never have to fly a half-masted +flag, Johnnie. But suppose you did see them, and they were in shoal +water, say--and the shoals to looard, of course, and it blowing----" + +"I'd stand in and get them." + +"And it blowing hard--blowing hard, Johnnie?--and shoal--shoal +water?" + +"Why"--Johnnie was looking troubled--"why, I'd have to stand in just +the same, wouldn't I?" + +"Your own men and you ask me, Johnnie-boy?" + +"Why, of course I'd have to stand in and get them." + +"And if you got in so far you couldn't get out--you got smothered, +say?" + +"Why, then--then we'd be lost--all hands would be lost." + +Poor Johnnie! he was all but crying. + +"That's it. And that's where some would say you showed yourself a man, +and some a fool, Johnnie-boy. Some would say, 'Use judgment--think of +the other eighteen or twenty men safe aboard the vessel.' Would you +use judgment, or what, Johnnie?" + +"M-m--I don't know. What would you do, Captain Clancy?" + +"What d'y' think I'd do, Johnnie?" Clancy drew the boy up and tucked +the little face to his own broad breast. The rest of us knew well +enough what Clancy would do. "Judgment hell!" Clancy would say, and go +in and get lost--or maybe get away with it where a more careful man +would be lost--but we waited to hear what Johnnie--such a little +boy--would say. He said it at last, after looking long into Clancy's +face. + +"I think you'd go in, Captain Clancy." + +Clancy laughed at that. "Lord, Johnnie-boy, no wonder everybody loves +you. No matter what a man does, all you see is the best that's in +him." + +It was time to clean up then, and Johnnie of course was bound to +help. + + + + +V + +FROM OUT OF CROW'S NEST + + +"What'll I do with this?" asked Johnnie, in the middle of the cleaning +up, holding up a pan of sweepings. + +"Oh, that"--Clancy naturally took charge--"heave it overboard. Ebb +tide'll carry it away. Heave it into the slip. Wait--maybe you'll have +to hoist the hatches. 'Tisn't raining much now, anyway, and it will +soon stop altogether. Might as well go aloft and make a good job of +the hatches, hadn't he, Peter?" + +"Wait a minute." Peter was squinting through the porthole. "I +shouldn't wonder but this is one of our fellows coming in. I know +she's a banker. The Enchantress, I think. Look, Tommie, and see what +you make of her." + +Clancy looked. "That's who it is, Peter. Hi, Johnnie, here'll be a +chance for you to hoist the flag. Hurry aloft and tend to the hatches, +as Peter says, and you can hoist the flag for the Enchantress home +from the Banks." + +In bad weather, like it was that day, the little balcony of Crow's +Nest was shut in by little hatches, arranged so that they could be run +up and down, the same as hatches are slid over the companionway of a +fisherman's cabin or forec's'le. Johnnie was a pretty active boy, and +he was up the rope ladder and onto the roof in a few seconds. We could +hear him walking above, and soon the hatches slid away and we all +could look freely out to sea again. + +"All right below?" called out Johnnie. + +"Not yet," answered Peter. He was standing by the rail of the balcony +and untwisting the halyards that served to hoist the signal-flags to +the mast-head. Peter seemed slow at it, and Clancy called out again, +"Wait a bit, and we'll overhaul the halyards." Then, looking up and +noticing that Johnnie was standing on the edge of the roof, he added, +"And be careful and not slip on those wet planks." + +"Aye, aye!" Johnnie was in high glee. "And then I can run up the flag +for the Enchantress?" + +"Sure, you've been such a good boy to-day." + +"M-m--but that'll be fine. I can catch the halyards from here if +you'll swing them in a little." + +"All right--be careful. Here you go now." + +"Let 'em come--I got----" + +The first thing we knew of what had happened was when we saw Johnnie's +body come pitching down. He struck old Peter first, staggering him, +and from there he shot down out of sight. + +Clancy jumped to the rail in time to save Peter from toppling over it +and just in time, as he said afterward, to see the boy splash in the +slip below. He yanked Peter to his feet, and then, without turning +around, he called out, "A couple of you run to the head of the +dock--there'll be a dory there somewhere--row 'round to the slip with +it. He'll be carried under the south side--look for him there if I'm +not there before you. Drive her now!" + +"Here, Joe, wake up!" Clancy had untied the ends of the halyards after +whirling them through the block above, and now had the whole line +piled up on the balcony. He took a couple of turns around his waist, +took another turn around a cleat under the balcony rail, passed the +bight of the line to me, and said, "Here, Joe, lower me. Take hold +you, too, Peter. Pay out and not too careful. Oh, faster, man! If he +ain't dead he'll drown, maybe--if he gets sucked in and caught under +those piles it's all off." + +He was sliding over the rail, the line tautening to his weight in no +time, and he talking all the time. "Lower away--lower, lower! +Faster--faster than that--he's rising again--second time--and drifting +under the wharf, sure's fate! Faster--faster--what's wrong?--what's +caught there?--let her run!" + +The halyards had become fouled, and Peter was trying to clear them, +calling to Clancy to wait. + +"Fouled?" roared Clancy. "Cast it off altogether. Let go altogether +and let me drop." + +"We can't--the bight of it's caught around Peter's legs!" I called to +him. + +"Oh, hell! take a couple of half-hitches around the cleat then--look +out now!" He gripped the halyards high above his head with both hands, +gave a jumping pull, and let himself drop. The line parted and down he +shot. + +He must have been shaken by the shock of his fall, but I guess he had +his senses with him when he came up again, for in no time he was +striking toward where Johnnie had come up last. Then I ran downstairs, +down to the dock, and was just in time to see Parsons and Moore rowing +a dory desperately up the slip, and Clancy with Johnnie chest-up, and +a hand under his neck, kicking from under the stringers, and calling +out, "This way with the dory--drive her, fellows, drive her!" + +I did not wait for any more--I knew Johnnie was safe with Clancy--but +ran to the office of the Duncans and told them that Johnnie had fallen +into the dock and got wet, and that it might be well to telephone for +a doctor. His grandfather knew it was serious without my saying any +more, and rang up at once. + +That had hardly been done when Clancy came in the door with Johnnie in +his arms. The boy was limp and unconscious and water was dripping from +him. Old Mr. Duncan was worried enough, but composed in his manner for +all that. He met Clancy at the door. "This way, Captain; lay him on +this couch. The doctor will be here in a very few minutes now. Perhaps +we can do something while he is on the way. Just how did it happen? +and we'll know better what to do, perhaps." + +Clancy told his story in forty words. "He's probably shook up and his +lungs must be full of water. But he may come out all right--his +eyelids quivered coming up the dock. Better strip his shirt and waist +off. He's got a lot of water in him--roll him over and we'll get some +of it out." + +He worked away on Johnnie, and had the water pretty well out of him by +the time the uncle and the doctor came. It was hard work for a time, +but it came at last to when the doctor stood up, rested his arms for a +breath, said, "Ah--he's all right now," and went on again. It was not +so very long after that that Johnnie opened his eyes--for about a +second. But pretty soon he opened them to stay. His first look was for +his grandfather, but his first word was for Clancy. "I could see you +when you jumped, Captain Clancy--it was great." + +Then they bundled Johnnie into a carriage and his uncle took him +home. + +"Lord, but I thought he was gone, Joe. But let's get out of this," +said Clancy, and we were making for the door, with Clancy's clothes +still wringing wet, when we were stopped by the elder Mr. Duncan, who +shook hands with both of us and then went on to speak to Clancy. + +"Captain Clancy----" + +"Captain once, but----" + +"I know, I know, but not from lack of ability, at any rate. Let me +thank you. His mother will thank you herself later, and make you feel, +I know, her sense of what she owes to you. And his cousin Alice--she +thinks the world of him. There, I know you don't want to hear any +more, but you shall--maybe later--though it may come up in another +way. But tell me--wait, come inside a minute. Come in you, too, Joe," +he said, turning to me, but I said I'd rather wait outside. I wanted +to have a smoke to get my nerves steady again, I guess. + +So Clancy and Mr. Duncan went inside, and through the window, whenever +I looked up, I could see them. As their talk went on I could see that +they were getting very much interested about something or other. +Clancy particularly was laying down the law with a clenched fist and +an arm that swung through the air like a jibing boom. Somebody, I +knew, was getting it. + +When they came out Mr. Duncan stopped at the door, and said, as if by +way of a parting word, "And so you think that's the cause of Withrow's +picking a quarrel with Maurice? Well, I never thought of that before, +but maybe you're right. And now, what do you say to a vessel for +yourself?" + +"Me take a vessel? No, sir--not for me. But when you've got vessels to +hand around, Mr. Duncan, bear Maurice in mind--he's a fisherman." + +We left Mr. Duncan then, he making ready to telephone to learn how +Johnnie was getting along. Clancy said his clothes were beginning to +feel so dry that he did not know as he would go to his boarding-house. +"I think we'd better go up to the Anchorage and have a little touch. +But I forgot--you don't drink, Joe? No? So I thought, but don't you +care--you're young yet. Come along, anyway, and have a smoke." + +And so we went along to the Anchorage, and while we were there, I +smoking one of those barroom cigars and Clancy nursing the after-taste +of his drink and declaring that a touch of good liquor was equal to a +warm stove for drying wet clothes, I told him what I would have told +him in Crow's Nest if there had not been so many around--about Minnie +Arkell calling Maurice back into her grandmother's house, and then Sam +Hollis coming along and going in after him. + +"What!" and stopped dead. Suddenly he brought his fist through the +air. "I'll"--and as suddenly stopped it midway. "No, I won't, either. +But I'll put Maurice wise to them. What should he know at his age and +with his up-bringing of what's in the heads of people like them. And +if I don't have something further to say to old Mr. Duncan! But now +let's go back to Arkell's--come on, Joe." + +But I didn't go back with him. I didn't think that I could do Maurice +any good then, and I might be in the way if Clancy wanted to speak his +mind out to anybody. I went home instead, where I expected to have +troubles of my own, for I knew that my mother wouldn't like the idea +of my going seining. + + + + +VI + +MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL + + +Three days after Johnnie Duncan fell out of Crow's Nest the new +Duncan vessel designed by Will Somers was towed around from Essex. +She had been named the Johnnie Duncan. I spent the best part of the +next three days watching the sparmakers and riggers at work on her. +And when they had done with her and she fit to go to sea, she did look +handsome. She had not quite the length of the new vessel of Sam +Hollis's, which lay at Withrow's dock just below her, and that +probably helped to give her a more powerful look to people that +compared them. Too able-looking altogether to be real fast, some +thought, to hold the Withrow vessel in anything short of a gale, but +I didn't feel so sure she wouldn't sail in a moderate breeze, too. +I had seen her on the stocks, and knew the beautiful lines below the +water-mark. And she was going to carry the sail to drive her. I took +particular pains to get the measurements of her mainmast while it +lay on the dock under the shears. It was eighty-seven feet--and +she only a hundred and ten feet over all--and it stepped plumb in +the middle of her, further forward than a mainmast was generally put +in a fisherman. To that was shackled a seventy-five foot boom, and +eighty-odd tons of pig-iron were cemented close down to her keel, and +that floored over and stanchioned snug. For the rest, she was very +narrow forward, as I think I said--everybody said she'd never stand +the strain of her fore-rigging when they got to driving her on a +long passage. And she carried an ungodly bowsprit--thirty-seven feet +outboard--easily the longest bowsprit out of Gloucester. Topmasts to +match, and there was some sail to drive a vessel. But she had the +hull for it, full and yet easy, with the greatest beam pretty well +aft of the mainmast, and she drew fifteen and a half feet of water. + +I was still looking her over, her third day in the riggers' and +sailmakers' hands, when Clancy came along. + +"Handsome, ain't she, and only needing a skipper and crew to be off on +the Southern cruise, eh, Joe?" + +"That's all. And according to the talk, you're to be the skipper." + +"Well, talk has another according coming to it." + +"I'm sorry to hear that. But what happened at Mrs. Arkell's the other +day?" + +"What happened? Joe, but I was glad you didn't come with me. You'd +have felt as I did about it, I know. There they were--the two of +them--Hollis and Withrow--yes, Withrow there--when I broke in on them, +and Maurice between them--drunk. Yes, sir, drunk and helpless. They +called it a wine-party, as though a man couldn't get as good and drunk +on wine in a private residence as ever he could on whiskey or rum in +the back room of a saloon. Well, sir, I asked a question or two, and +they tried to face me out, but out they went--first Hollis, and then +Withrow, one after the other, and both good and lively. And then +Minnie Arkell popped in from her own house by way of the backyard. She +didn't expect to see me--I know she didn't. Had gone over to her house +when the men began to drink, she said, and had just come over to see +granny. + +"Well, I told her what I thought. 'It means nothing to you,' I +said, 'to see a man make a fool of himself--that's been a good +part of your business in life for some time, now--to see men make +fools of themselves for you. Withrow had reasons for wanting him +disgraced--never mind why. Sam Hollis, maybe, has his reasons too. And +the two of them are being helped along by you. You could have stopped +this thing here to-day, but you didn't.' 'No, no, Tommie,' she says. +'Yes, yes,' I went on, 'and don't try to tell me different. If I +didn't know you since you were a little girl you might be able to +convince me, but I know you. Maurice, when he was himself, passed +you by. You were bound to have him. You know a real man, more's the +pity, when you see one, and you know that Maurice, young and green +and soft as he is, has more life and dash than a dozen of the kind +you've been mixing with lately.' + +"Oh, but I laid it on, Joe. Yes. A shame to have to talk like that to +a woman, but I just had to. I didn't stop there. 'You're handsome, and +you're rich, Minnie Arkell; got a lot of life left in you yet, and go +off travelling with people who get their names regularly in the Boston +papers; but just the same, Minnie Arkell, there are women in jail not +half so bad as you--women doing time who've done less mischief in the +world than you have.'" + +"Wasn't that pretty rough, Tommie?" + +"Rough? Lord, yes--but true, Joe, true. And if you'd only see poor +Maurice lying there! Cried? I could've cried, Joe--not since my mother +died did I come so near to it. But it was done. + +"Well, I made Minnie go and get her grandmother. And, Joe, if you'd +seen that fine old lady--oh, but she's got a heart in her--stoop and +put Maurice's head on her bosom as if he was a little child. 'The +poor, poor boy. No mother here,' she said, 'and the best man on earth +might come to it. Leave him to me, Tommie.' Lord, I could have knelt +down at her feet--the heart in her, Joe." + +"And how has Maurice been since?" + +"All right. That was the first time in his life that he was drunk. I +think it will be his last. But let's go aboard the Johnnie." + +After looking over the Johnnie Duncan and admiring her to our hearts' +content, we sat down in her cabin and began to talk of the seining +season to come. Others came down and joined in--George Moore, Eddie +Parsons among others--and they asked Clancy what he was going to do. +Was he going to see about a chance to go seining, or what? Moore said +he's been waiting to see what Maurice Blake was going to do; but as it +was beginning to look as though Maurice was done for, he guessed he'd +take a look around. He asked Clancy what he thought, and Clancy said +he didn't know--time enough yet. + +Maurice Blake himself dropped down then. He was looking better, and +everybody was glad to see it. He'd quit drinking--that was certain; +and now he was a picture of a man--not pretty, but strong-looking, +with his eyes glowing and his skin flushing with the good blood inside +him. He took a seat on the lockers and began to whittle a block of +soft pine into a model of a hull, and after a while, with a squint +along the sheer of his little model, he asked if anybody had seen Tom +O'Donnell or Wesley Marrs. Several said yes, they had, and he asked +where, and when they told him he got up and said he guessed he'd go +along--as he couldn't get a vessel himself, he might as well see about +a chance to go hand. "And as we've been together so much in times gone +by, Tommie, and you, Eddie and George, what do you say if we go +together now?" + +"All right," said Clancy, "but wait a minute--who's that in the +gangway?" + +It turned out to be Johnnie Duncan. He had a fat bundle under his arm, +and bundle and all Clancy took him up, tossed him into the air, said +"All right again, Johnnie-boy?" and kissed him when he caught him +down. + +Johnnie started to undo his bundle. "I tell you it's great to be out +again--the way they kept me cooped up the last few days," and then, +cutting the string to hurry matters, opened the bundle and spread a +handsome set of colors on the lockers. "The Johnnie Duncan's," said +he. "I picked out the kind they were to be, but mummer worked the +monograms herself. See, red and blue. And see that for an ensign! and +the firm's flag--and the highs--look!--the J. A. D. twisted up the +same as on the handkerchiefs we strained the coffee through last week. +And the burgee--the letters on the burgee--my cousin Alice worked +them. And these stars--see, on the ensign--mummer and my cousin both +worked them. Gran'pa said the vessel ought to be sure a lucky one, and +all she needs is an able master, he says, and if Captain Blake will +take her he'll be proud to have him sail the Johnnie Duncan----" + +Maurice Blake stood up. "Me?" + +"Yes," said Johnnie. "Gran'pa says that you can have her just as soon +as you go to the Custom House and get your papers. There, I think I +remembered it all, except of course that the colors are from me and +mummer and my cousin Alice, and will you fly them for us?" + +Maurice laid down his model and picked up the colors. Then he looked +at Johnnie and said, "Thank you, Johnnie; and tell your mother, +Johnnie, and your cousin, that I'll fly the Johnnie Duncan's +colors--and stand by them--if ever it comes to standing by--till she +goes under. Tell your grandfather that I'll be proud to be master of +his vessel and I'll sail her the best I know how." + +"That's you, Maurice," said Clancy. + +Maurice drew his hand across his eyes and sat down again. And as soon +as they decently could, Clancy, George Moore, and Eddie Parsons asked +him if they might ship with him for the Southern cruise. Maurice said +they very well knew that he'd be glad to have them. He asked me, too, +he felt so good, and of course I jumped at the chance. + + + + +VII + +CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL + + +The Johnnie Duncan only needed to have her stores taken aboard to go +to sea. And that was attended to next morning, and she was out for her +trial trip the same afternoon. Everybody said she looked as handsome +as a photograph going out, though all the old sharks, when they saw +her mainsail hoisted for the first time, said she'd certainly have +need of her quarter and draught to stand up under it. + +It was a great day for sailing, though--the finest kind of a breeze, +and smooth water. We early carried away our foretopmast, which had a +flaw in it. It was just as well to discover it then. Without topsail +and balloon we had it out with the Eastern Point on her way back from +Boston. She was not much of a steamer for speed, but her schedule +called for twelve knots and she generally made pretty near it--eleven +or eleven and a half, according to how her stokers felt, I guess. We +headed her off after a while, and that was doing pretty well for that +breeze, with a new vessel not yet loosened up. + +"But the balloon was too much for her," said Mr. Duncan, as we shot +into the dock after beating the Eastern Point. + +"No, the balloon was all right--'twas the topm'st was a bit light," +answered Maurice. + +Old Mr. Duncan smiled at that. "But what do you think of her, Captain +Blake?" + +"Oh, she's like all the rest of them when she's alone--sails like the +devil," the skipper answered to that, but he smiled with it and we all +knew he was satisfied with her. + +That night was the Master Mariners' Ball, and I waited up till late to +talk with my cousin Nell, who had gone there with Will Somers. Finally +they came along past my house and I hailed them. + +Nell broke right in as usual with what was uppermost in her mind. "I +don't suppose you saw me and Alice, but we were in Mr. Duncan's office +when you and Mr. Clancy and Captain Blake were coming up the dock +to-day after the trial trip. Mr. Duncan told us what Captain Blake +said of the Johnnie Duncan, but now tell me, what did the rest of you +think of her? What does your friend Clancy say? He knows a vessel." + +"Clancy," I answered, "thought what we all thought, I guess--that +she's a fast vessel any way you take her, but he won't say she's the +fastest vessel out of Gloucester, even after she's put in trim and +loosened up. But in a sea-going way and with wind enough--with wind +enough, mind--he thinks she'll do pretty well." + +"With wind enough and in a sea-way?" repeated Nell. "Then I hope that +when the fishermen's race is sailed next fall it's a howling gale and +seas clear to your mast-head. Yes, and you needn't laugh--don't you +know what it means to Will?" + +And I did realize. Somers, a fine fellow, was just then beginning to +get a chance at designing fishermen. So far he had done pretty well, +but it was on the Johnnie Duncan, I knew, he had pinned his faith. For +his own sake, I hoped that the Johnnie would do great things, but for +Nell's sake I prayed she would. Nell thought a lot of Will and wasn't +ashamed to show her liking, and thinking of that set me to thinking of +other things. + +"Was Miss Foster to the ball?" I asked her. + +"She was," said Nell. + +"And with whom?" + +"Mr. Withrow." + +"Oh-h, Lord!" + +"Oh-h!--and why Oh-h-h?" + +"I wish she'd gone with Maurice." + +"H-m--that was drunk the other day?" + +"Yes, I suppose that queers him forever. And the other fellow does +ten times as bad, only under cover. Who told you?" + +"Never mind. Wasn't he?" + +"Was Maurice to the ball?" + +"He was." + +"And who with?" + +"With nobody." + +"Good. Was Mrs. Miner there?" + +"Mrs. Miner?"--and such a sniff!--"yes, she was there." + +"With Sam Hollis?" + +"Yes, and flirted with half the men in the hall and with your Maurice +Blake outrageously." + +"That so? Could Maurice help that much? But I wish, just the same, +that Miss Foster had gone with Maurice." + +"Well, there was one very good reason." + +"What?" + +"He didn't ask her. And Mr. Withrow made a handsome cavalier anyway." + +"A handsome"--I was going to say lobster, but I didn't. Instead I told +her why Maurice didn't ask Miss Foster--that he didn't think enough of +himself, probably. And that led up to a talk about Maurice Blake and +Clancy. Before I got through I had Nell won over. Indeed, I think she +was won over before I began at all. + +"There's a whole lot you don't know yet," she said at last. "Get +Captain Blake to make a name for himself seining, and for sailing his +vessel as she ought to be sailed, and I'll get down on my knees to +Alice for him--sail her as she ought to be sailed, remember. And make +a good stock with her, and you'll see." + +So, as I walked down the street with Nell and Will Somers a part of +the way, the talk was in that strain, and when I left them, after +passing Sam Hollis bound home, it was with the hope of things coming +out all right. I was feeling happy until I got near Minnie Arkell's +door, where my worrying began again, for there on the steps and in the +glare of the electric light was Minnie Arkell herself, as though she +were waiting for somebody. And not wanting to have her know that I saw +her waiting at her door steps at that time of night, I stepped in the +shadows until she should go in. It was then that Maurice came along, +and she called him up. And he went up and stood on the step below her +and she bent over him as if she wanted to lift him up. And it was less +than five minutes since Sam Hollis left her. + +"Come around by way of the side door of grandma's house, Maurice, and +through her yard and into my house, and nobody will see you. And then +no old grannies will talk and we'll have a little supper all to +ourselves. Hurry now." She was talking as if she owned him. I did not +hear what Maurice said, nor I did not want to hear; but making for the +corner, he went by me like a shot, and "O Lord!" I heard him groan as +he passed me, not recognizing me--not even seeing me, I believe. + +I did not know what to make of it and let him go by. But after he had +turned the corner and Minnie Arkell had shut her door--and she watched +him till he disappeared around the corner--I ran after him. In my +hurrying after him I heard the voice of Clancy coming down the street. +He was singing. I had heard from Nell of Clancy being at the ball, +where he was as usual in charge of the commissary. I could imagine how +they must have drove things around the punch-bowl with Clancy to the +wheel. He was coming along now and for blocks anybody that was not +dead could hear him. And getting nearer I had to admire him. He was +magnificent, even with a list to port. Not often, I imagined, did men +of Clancy's lace and figure get into evening dress. The height and +breadth of him!--and spreading enough linen on his shirt front to make +a sail for quite a little vessel. He was almost on top of me, with + + "Oh, hove flat down on th' Western Banks + Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks-- + And----" + +when I hailed him. + +"Hulloh, if it ain't Joe Buckley. Why, Joey, but aren't you out pretty +late to-night? But maybe you're only standing watch for somebody? +Three o'clock, Joey, and no excuse for you, for you didn't have to +stand by the supplies--" But then I rushed him around the corner, and +down the street to the side door of Mrs. Arkell's and just in time to +head off Maurice, bound as I knew for Minnie Arkell's house across the +yard. I didn't have a chance to say a word to Tommie, but he didn't +have to be told. If I'd been explaining for a week he couldn't have +picked things up any better than he did. + +"Maurice--hi, Maurice! Oh, 'tis you, isn't it. Well, Maurice-boy, all +the night I waited for a chance to have a word with you, but ne'er a +chance could I get. Early in the evening--when I was fit for ladies' +company--Miss Foster said how proud she was to know me--me, who had +saved her cousin Johnnie's life. And then she asked me about the +vessel, and I told her, Maurice, that nothing like the Duncan ever +pushed salt water from out of her way before. 'Nothing with two sticks +in her,' says I, and I laid it on thick; 'and Maurice Blake,' says +I--and there, Maurice, I only spoke true catechism. 'Maurice Blake,' +says I, 'is the man to sail her.' She was glad, she said, to know +that, because her chum, Miss Buckley--Joe's cousin there--wanted that +particular vessel to be a success. And she herself was interested in +it. Never mind the reasons, she said. And she always did believe--and, +Maurice, listen now--she knew that Captain Blake would do the Johnnie +Duncan justice. And I said to her--well, Maurice, what I said you can +guess well enough. No, come to think, you can't guess, but I won't +tell you to your face. But thinking of it now, I mind, Maurice, the +time when we were dory-mates--you and me, Maurice--and the cold +winter's day our dory was capsized. And dark coming on and nothing in +sight, and I could see you beginning to get tired. But tired as you +were, Maurice, tired as you were and the gray look beginning to creep +over you, you says, 'Tommie, take the plug strap for a while, you.'" + +"But you didn't take it, Tommie." + +"No, I didn't take it--and why? I didn't take it--and why? Because, +though the mothers that bore us both were great women--all fire and +iron--'twas in me to last longer--you a boy and your first winter +fishing, and me a tough, hard old trawler. And you had all of life +before you, and I'd run through some hard years of mine. If I'd gone +'twould have been no great loss, but you, Maurice, innocent as a +child--how could I? I'd known men and women, good and bad--I'd lived +life and I'd had my chance and thrown it away--but at your age the +things you had to learn! Maybe I didn't think it all out like that, +but that was why I didn't take the plug strap. But, Maurice-boy, I +never forgot it. 'Take the plug strap, you, Tommie,' you says. We were +dory-mates, of course, but, Maurice-boy, I'll never forget it." + +Clancy took off his hat and drew his hand across his forehead. "And +where were you bound when we stopped you, Maurice?" + +"Oh, I don't know. To take a walk maybe." + +"Sure, and why not? Let's all take a walk. Let's take a walk down to +the dock and have a look at the vessel. Too dark? So it is, but we can +see the shadow of her masts rising up to the clouds and we can open up +the cabin and go below and have a smoke. Come, Maurice. Come on, +Joe." + +And down to the cabin of the Johnnie Duncan we went, and Clancy never +in such humor. For three hours--from a little after three o'clock +until after six--we sat on the lockers, Clancy talking and we smoking +and roaring at him. Only the sun coming up over Eastern Point, +lighting up the harbor and striking into the cabin of the Johnnie +Duncan, brought Clancy to a halt. + +He moved then and we with him. We left Maurice at the door of old Mrs. +Arkell's, the old lady herself in the doorway and asking us if we had +a good time at the ball. Standing on the steps, before he went in, +Maurice said to me: "Tell your cousin, Joe, that when I do race the +Johnnie, I'll take the spars out of her before anything gets by--take +the spars out or send her under. I can't do any more than that." + +The Johnnie Duncan was to leave at ten o'clock and so I left Clancy at +his boarding-house. He looked tired when I left him. But he was +chuckling, too. I asked him what it was that made him smile so. + +"I'll give you three guesses," he said, but I didn't guess. + + + + +VIII + +THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA + + +The rest of that morning, between leaving Clancy and getting back to +the dock again, I spent in cleaning up and overhauling my home outfit. +My mother couldn't be made to believe that store bedding was of much +use--and she was right, I guess--and so a warranted mattress and +blankets and comforters and a pillow were made into a bundle and +thrown onto a waiting wagon. Then it was good-by to all--good-by to my +cousin Nell, who had come over from her house, good-by and a kiss for +her little sister--late for school she was, but didn't care she +said--and then good-by to my mother. That took longer. Then it was +into the wagon with my bedding and off to the dock. + +At Duncan's store I had charged up to me such other stuff as I needed: +Two suits of oilskins, yellow and black, two sou'westers, heavy and +light, two blue-gray flannel shirts, a black sweater, a pair of rubber +boots, two pairs of woollen mitts and four pairs of cotton mitts, +five pounds of smoking tobacco, a new pipe, and so on. When I had all +my stuff tied up, I swung up abreast of Clancy and together we headed +for the end of Duncan's dock, where the Johnnie Duncan lay. + +Quite a fleet went out ahead of us that morning. Being a new vessel, +there was a lot of things that were not ready until the last minute. +And then there was the new foretopmast--promised at nine o'clock it +was--not slung and stayed up until after ten. And then our second +seine, which finally we had to leave for Wesley Marrs to take next +morning. And there were the usual two or three men late. Clancy and +Andie Howe went up to have a farewell drink and were gone so long that +the skipper sent me after them. I found them both in the Anchorage, +where Clancy had met a man he hadn't seen for ten years--an old +dory-mate--thought he was lost five years before in the West Indies. +"But here he is, fine and handsome. Another little touch all around +and a cigar for Joe, and we're off for the Southern cruise." + +We left then and started for the dock, with Clancy full of poetry. +There happened to be a young woman looking out of a window on the way +down. Clancy did not know her, nor she him, so far as I knew, but +something about him seemed to take her eye. She leaned far out and +waved her handkerchief at him. That was enough. Clancy broke out-- + + "The wind blows warm and the wind blows fair, + Oh, the wind blows westerly-- + Our jibs are up and our anchor's in, + For the Duncan's going to sea. + And will you wait for me, sweetheart? + Oh, will you wait for me? + And will you be my love again + When I come back from sea? + + "Oh, sway away and start her sheets + And point her easterly-- + It's tackle-pennant, boom her out + And turn the Duncan free. + You'll see some sailing now, my boys, + We're off for the Southern cruise-- + They'll try to hold the Johnnie D, + But they'll find it of no use." + +I didn't wait any longer than that for Clancy, but ran ahead to the +Duncan. I found her with jibs up and paying off. I was in time to get +aboard without trouble, but Clancy and Howe coming later had to make a +pier-head jump of it. Clancy, who could leap like a hound--drunk or +sober--made it all right with his feet on the end of the bowsprit and +his fingers on the balloon stay when he landed, but Howe fell short, +and we had the liveliest kind of a time gaffing him in over the bow, +he not being able to swim. They must have heard us yelling clear to +Eastern Point, I guess. Andie didn't mind. "I must be with a lot of +dogs--have to jump overboard to get aboard." He spat out what water he +had to, and started right in to winch up the mainsail with the gang. +He had on a brand-new suit, good cloth and a fine fit. + +"You'll soon dry out in the sun, Andie-boy," they all said to him. + +"I s'pose so. But will my clothes ever fit me again like they +did?--and my fine new patent-leather shoes!" + +Drifting down by the dock next to Duncan's our long bowsprit almost +swept off a row of old fellows from the cap-log. They had to scramble, +but didn't mind. "Good luck, and I hope you fill her up," they called +out. + +"Oh, we'll try and get our share of 'em," our fellows called back. + +There was a young woman on the next dock--one of the kind that quite +often come down to take snap-shots. A stranger to Gloucester she must +have been, for not only that Gloucester girls don't generally come +down to the docks to see the fishermen off, but she said good-by to +us. She meant all right, but she should never have said good-by to a +fisherman. It's unlucky. Too many of them don't come back, and then +the good-by comes true. + +Andie Howe looked a funny sight when we were making sail. Clancy, who, +once he got started, took a lot of stopping, was still going: + + "Oh, the Johnnie Duncan, fast and able-- + Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel-- + And will you save a kiss for me + When I come back from sea?" + +"Yes," roared Andie, + + "And don't forget I love you, dear, + And save a kiss for me," + +with the salt water dripping from his fine new suit of clothes and the +patent-leather shoes he was so fond of. + +And Clancy again: + + "Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me," + +and Howe, + + "Oh, too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree + And a hi-did-dy ho-did-dy ho-dee-dee," + +and Clancy, + + "Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree, + The Johnnie Duncan's going to sea," + +and Howe--a little shy on the words-- + + "Tum-did-dy dum-did-dy dum-did-dy-dum, + Hoo-roo-roo and a dum by gum." + +And by that time the gang were joining in and sheeting flat the +topsails with a great swing. + +I don't suppose that Gloucester Harbor will ever again look as +beautiful to me as it did that morning when we sailed out. Forty sail +of seiners leaving within two hours, and to see them going--to see +them one after another loose sails and up with them, break out +anchors, pay off, and away! It was the first day of April and the +first fine day in a week, and those handsome vessels going out one +after the other in their fresh paint and new sails--it was a sight to +make a man's heart thump. + +"The Johnnie Duncan, seiner of Gloucester--watch her walk across the +Bay to-day," was George Moore's little speech when he came on deck to +heave his first bucket of scraps over the rail. George was cook. + +And she did walk. We squared away with half a dozen others abreast of +us and Eastern Point astern of us all. Among the forty sail of +fishermen that were standing across the Bay that morning we knew we'd +find some that could sail. There was the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley's +vessel. He worked her clear of the bunch that came out of the harbor +and came after us, and we had it with him across to Cape Cod. Forty +miles before we beat him; but Pitt Ripley had a great sailer in the +Ruth, and we would have been satisfied to hold her even. "Only wait +till by and by, when we get her in trim," we kept saying. + +"This one'll smother some of them yet," said Eddie Parsons, looking +back at the Ruth. He felt pretty good, because he had the wheel when +we finally crossed the Ruth's bow. + +"With good steering--yes," said Clancy. + +"Of course," exclaimed Eddie to that, and filled his chest full, and +then, looking around and catching everybody laughing, let his chest +flatten again. + +The skipper didn't have much to say right away about her sailing. He +was watching her, though. He'd look at her sails, have an eye on how +they set and drew, take a look over her quarter, another look aloft, +and then back at the Ruth, then a look for the vessels still ahead. +"We'll know more about it after we've tried her out with the Lucy +Foster or the Colleen Bawn or Hollis's new vessel," he said, after a +while. + +One thing we soon found out, and that was that she was a stiff vessel. +That was after a squall hit us off Cape Cod. We watched the rest of +them then. Some luffed and others took in sail, and about them we +could not tell. But those that took it full gave us an idea of how we +were behaving. "Let her have it and see how she'll do," said the +skipper, and Howe, who was at the wheel--with his clothes good and dry +again--let her have it full. With everything on and tearing through +the water like a torpedo-boat, one puff rolled her down till she +filled herself chock up between the house and rail, but she kept right +on going. Some vessels can't sail at all with decks under, but the +Johnnie never stopped. "She's all right, this one," said everybody +then. A second later she took a slap of it over her bow, nearly +smothering the cook, who had just come up to dump some potato parings +over the rail. The way he came up coughing and spitting and then his +dive for the companionway--everybody had to roar. + +"Did y'see the cook hop?--did y'see him hop?" called Andie, who was +afraid somebody had missed it. + +We passed the Marauder, Soudan McLeod, soon after. His mainmast had +broken off eight or ten feet below the head. They were clearing away +the wreckage. "I s'pose I oughter had more sense," he called out as we +went by. + +"Oh, I don't know--maybe the spar was rotten," said Maurice, and that +was a nice way to put it, too. + +That night it came a flat calm, and with barely steerage way for us. +There was a big four-masted coaster bound south, too, and light, and +for the best part of the night we had a drifting match with her. +Coasters as a rule are not great all-round sailers, but some of them, +with their flat bottoms and shoal draft, in a fair wind and going +light, can run like ghosts, and this was one of that kind. We had our +work cut out to hold this one while the wind was light and astern, but +in the morning, when it hauled and came fresher, we went flying over +the shoals. So far as the looks of it went the big coaster might as +well have been anchored then. + +All that day we held on. And it was a lesson in sailing to see the way +some of those seiners were handled. Our skipper spent most of that day +finding out how she sailed best and putting marks on her sheets for +quick trimming by and by. + +Trying each other out, measuring one vessel against another, the fleet +went down the coast. We passed a few and were passed by none, and that +was something. Ahead of us somewhere were a half-dozen flyers. If we +could have beaten some of them we should have had something to brag +about; but no telling, we might get our chance yet. + + + + +IX + +MACKEREL + + +Throughout all that night the lights of the fleet were all about us, +ahead and behind. At breakfast next morning--four o'clock--we were off +Delaware Breakwater, and that afternoon at two we began the mast-head +watch for fish. And on that fine April day it was a handsome +sight--forty sail of seiners in sight, spread out and cruising +lazily. + +The skipper was the first to get into his oilskins and heavy sweater, +for with a vessel hopping along at even no more than six or seven +knots by the wind it is pretty chilly aloft, nice and comfortable +though it may be on deck in the sun. + +There was a game of seven-up going on in the cabin, and the sun +striking down the companionway was bothering Andie Howe. He began to +complain. "Hi, up there to the wheel! Hi, Eddie--can't you put her on +the other tack?--the sun's in my eyes. How can a man see the cards +with the sun in his eyes?" + +Parsons didn't have the chance to talk back when the word came from +aloft to put the seine-boat over the side, and after that to overhaul +the seine and pile it in the boat. Vessels ahead had seen mackerel, +the skipper called out. We got into oilskins and boots and made ready. +Those who were going into the seine-boat had already picked out in +what positions they were going to row, and now there was an +overhauling of oars and putting marks on them so that they could be +picked out in a hurry. Clancy and I were to be dorymen. We made ready +the dory, and then Clancy went to the mast-head with the skipper and +Long Steve, whose watch it was aloft. + +Things began to look like business soon. Even from the deck we could +see that one or two vessels ahead had boats out. We began to picture +ourselves setting around a big school and landing the first mackerel +of the year into New York. I think everybody aboard was having that +dream, though everybody pretended not to be in earnest. You could hear +them: "A nice school now--three hundred barrels." "Or two hundred +would be doing pretty well." "Or even a hundred barrels wouldn't be +bad." There were two or three young fellows among the crew, fellows +like myself, who had never seen much seining, and they couldn't keep +still for excitement when from the mast-head came the word that a boat +ahead was out and making a set. + +We were going along all the time and when we could see from the deck +for ourselves the boats that were setting, Billie Hurd couldn't stand +it any longer, but had to go aloft, too. The four of them made a fine +picture--the skipper and Steve standing easily on the spreaders, one +leaning against the mast and the other against the back-stay, with +Hurd perched on the jib halyards block and Clancy on the spring-stay, +and all looking as comfortable as if they were in rockers at home. I'd +have given a hundred dollars then to be able to stand up there on one +foot and lean as easily as the skipper against the stay with the +vessel going along as she was. I made up my mind to practise it when +next I went aloft. + +I went to the mast-head myself by and by, and, seeing half a dozen +schools almost at once, I became so excited that I could hardly speak. +The skipper was excited, too, but he didn't show it, only by his eyes +and talking more jerkily than usual. He paid no attention to two or +three schools that made me just crazy just to look at, but at last, +when he thought it was time, he began to move. Ten or a dozen +Gloucester vessels were bunched together, and one porgy steamer--that +is, built for porgy or menhaden fishing, but just now trying for +mackerel like the rest of us. + +"There'll be plenty of them up soon, don't you think, Tommie?" the +skipper asked. + +"Plenty," answered Tommie, "plenty," with his eyes ever on the fish. +"I think Sam Hollis has got his all right, but Pitt Ripley--I don't +know." + +It was getting well along toward sunset then, with everybody worried, +the skipper still aloft, and one boat making ready to set about a mile +inside of us. "They'll dive," said our skipper, and they did. "There's +Pitt Ripley's school now," and he pointed to where a raft of mackerel +were rising and rippling the water black, and heading for the north. +"There's another gone down, too--they'll dive that fellow. Who is +it--Al McNeill?--yes. But they'll come up again, and when it does, +it's ours." And they did come up, and when they did the skipper made a +jump and roared, "Into the boat!" There was a scramble. "Stay up here, +you Billie, and watch the school," he said to Hurd, and "Go down, +you," to me. I slid down by the jib halyards. The skipper and Clancy +came down by the back-stay and beat me to the deck. They must have +tumbled down, they were down so quick. + +"Hurry--the Aurora's going after it, too." The Aurora was one of +Withrow's fleet and we were bound to beat her. I had hardly time to +leap into the dory after Clancy, and we were off, with nobody left +aboard but Hurd to the mast-head and the cook, who was to stay on deck +and sail the vessel. + +In the seine-boat it was double-banked oars, nine long blades and a +monstrous big one steering--good as another oar that--and all driving +for dear life, with Long Steve and a cork-passer standing by the seine +and the skipper on top of it, with his eyes fixed on the school +ahead--his only motions to open his mouth and to wave with his hands +to the steersman behind him. "Drive her--drive her," he called to the +crew. "More yet--more yet," to the steering oar. "There's the porgy +steamer's boat, too, after the same school. Drive her now, fellows!" + +The mackerel were wild as could be, great rafts of them, and +travelling faster than the old seiners in the gang said they had ever +seen them travel before, and what was worse, not staying up long. +There were boats out from three or four vessels before we pushed off +with ours. I remember the porgy steamer had cut in ahead and given +their boat a long start for a school. However, that school did not +stay up long enough and they had their row for nothing. But then their +steamer picked them up again and dropped them on the way to the same +school that we were trying for. How some of our gang did swear at +them! And all because they were steam power. + +It promised to be a pretty little race, but that school, too, went +down before either of us could head it, and so it was another row for +nothing. We lay on our oars then, both boats ready for another row, +with the skipper and seine-heaver in each standing on top of the seine +and watching for the fish to show again. Of course both gangs were +sizing each other up, too. I think myself that the Duncan's crowd were +a huskier lot of men than the steamer's. Our fellows looked more like +fishermen, as was to be expected, because in Gloucester good fishermen +are so common that naturally, a man hailing from there gets so that he +wants to be a good fisherman, too, and of course the men coming there +are all pretty good to begin with, leaving out the fellows who are +born and brought up around Gloucester and who have it in their blood. +A man doesn't leave Newfoundland or Cape Breton or even Nova Scotia or +Maine and the islands along the coast, or give up any safe, steady +work he may have, to come to Gloucester to fish unless he feels that +he can come pretty near to holding his end up. That's not saying that +a whole lot of fine fishermen do not stay at home, with never any +desire to fish out of Gloucester, in spite of the good money that a +fisherman with a good skipper can make from there, but just the same +they're a pretty smart and able lot that do come. And so, while our +gang was half made up of men that were born far away from Gloucester, +yet they had the Gloucester spirit, which is everything in deep-sea +fishing, when nerve and strength and skill count for so much. And this +other crowd--the porgy steamer's--did not have that look. + +"Look at what we're coming to," somebody called. "All steam boys soon, +and on wages--wages!" he repeated, "and going around the deck, with a +blue guernsey with letters on the chest of it--A.D.Q.--or some other +damn company." + +"Well, that would not be bad either, with your grub bill sure and your +money counted out at the end of every month," answered somebody else. + +I was sizing up the two gangs myself, I being in the dory with Clancy, +and I guess that nearly everyone of us was doing the same thing and +keeping an eye out for fish at the same time, when all at once a +school popped up the other side of the porgyman's boat. Perhaps, half +a mile it was and, for a wonder, not going like a streak. + +We saw it first and got to going first, but the Aurora's boat and the +steamer's boat were nearer, and so when we were all under good headway +there were two lengths or so that we had to make up on each. Well, +that was all right. Two lengths weren't so many, and we drove her. It +was something to see the fellows lay out to it then--doubled-banked, +two men to each wide seat and each man with a long oar, which he had +picked out and trimmed to suit himself, and every man in his own +particular place as if in a racing crew. + +And now every man was bending to it. A big fellow, named Rory +McKinnon, was setting the stroke. There was a kick and a heave to +every stroke, and the men encouraging each other. "Now--now--give it +to her," was all that I could hear coming out of him. All this time we +in the dory were coming on behind, Clancy and I having to beat their +dory just as our boat had to beat their boat. And we were driving, +too, you may be sure. Clancy was making his oars bend like whips. +"Blast 'em! There's no stiffness to 'em," he was complaining. And +then, "Sock it to her," he would call out to our fellows in the +seine-boat. "We've got the porgy crew licked--that's the stuff," came +from the skipper. From on top of the seine he was watching the fish, +watching the gang, watching the other boats, watching us in the +dory--watching everything. Whoever made a slip then would hear from it +afterwards, we knew. And clip, clip, clip it was, with the swash just +curling nicely under the bow of the other boat, and I suppose our own, +too, if we could have seen. + +Our boat was gaining on the Aurora's and the skipper was warming up. +The fish was going the same way we were, still a quarter of a mile +ahead. + +"Drive her," said the skipper. "Drive her--drive her--another length +and you got 'em. And, Kenney, it's the best of ash you've got. Don't +be afraid of breaking it. And, Dan Burns, didn't y'ever learn to keep +stroke in the Bay of Islands with nine more men beside you rowing? And +drive her--hit her up now--here's where we got 'em--they can't hold it +on their lives. Now then, another dozen strokes and it's over. One, +two, three--quicker, Lord, quicker--six, seven--oh, now she's fair +flying--look at her leap. You blessed lobster, keep rowing and not +looking over your shoulder. We got to get the fish first." + +A quarter mile of that with the foam ripping by us, and every man with +his blood like fire jumping to his oar, when the skipper leaped back +to the steering oar. "Stand by," he called, and then, "Now--over with +the buoy," and over it went, with the dory at hand and Tommie Clancy +right there to pick it up and hold it to windward. And then went the +seine over in huge armfuls. Just to see Long Steve throw that seine +was worth a trip South. And he was vain as a child of his strength +and endurance. "My, but look at him!" Clancy called out--"look at the +back of him!" "He's a horse," somebody else would have to say, and +"H-g-gh," Steve would grunt, and "H-g-gh" he would fill the air full +of tarred netting, "H-g-gh--pass them corks," and over it would go, +"H-g-gh," and the skipper would say, "That's the boy, Steve," and +Steve would heave to break his back right then and there. All the time +they were driving the seine-boat to its limit, and the skipper was +laying to the big steering oar, the longest of them all and taking a +strong man to handle it properly--laying to it, swinging from the +waist like a hammer-thrower, and the boat jumping to it. She came +jumping right for us in the dory in a little while. It doesn't take a +good gang long to put a quarter mile of netting around a school of +mackerel. + +It was a pretty set he made. "Pretty, pretty," you could almost hear +the old seiners saying between their teeth, even as they were all +rowing with jaws set and never a let-up until the circle was +completed, when it was oars into the air and Clancy leaping from the +dory into the seine-boat to help purse up. "It's a raft if ever we get +'em," were his first words, and everybody that wasn't too breathless +said yes, it was a jeesly raft of fish. + +"Purse in," it was then, and lively. And so we pursed in, hauling on +the running line in the lower edge of the seine, something as the +string around the neck of a tobacco bag is drawn tight. It was heavy +work of course, but everybody made light of it. We could not tell if +the fish were in it or not. The leaders might have dove when they felt +the twine against their noses and so escaped with the whole school +following after, or they might have taken no alarm and stayed in. + +So we pursed in, not knowing whether we were to have a good haul with +a hundred or a hundred and fifty dollars apiece at the end of it, or +whether we would have our work for nothing. All hands kept up the +pretence of joking, of course, but everybody was anxious enough. It +was more than the money--it was fisherman's pride. Were we to get into +New York and have it telegraphed on to Gloucester for everybody that +knew us to read and talk about--landing the first mackerel of the +year? We watched while the circle narrowed and the pool inside grew +shallower. Somebody said, "There's one," and we could see the shine of +it, and another--and another--and then the whole mass of them rose +flipping. They lashed the water into foam, rushed around the edges, +nosed the corks of the seine. I don't think myself that mackerel are +particularly intelligent, take them generally; but at times they seem +to know--these fellows, at least, seemed to know they were gone and +they thrashed about in fury. A mackerel is a handsome fish any time, +but to see him right you want to see him fresh-seined. They whipped +the water white now--tens of thousands of them. I don't believe that +the oldest seiner there didn't feel his heart beat faster--the first +mackerel of the year. "And Lord knows, maybe a couple of hundred +barrels," and the skipper's eyes shone--it meant a lot to him. And +some of the men began to talk like children, they were so pleased. + + + + +X + +WE LOSE OUR SEINE + + +Two hundred barrels the skipper had said, but long before we were all +pursed up we knew that five hundred barrels would never hold the fish +in that seine. The size of that school filled us with joy and yet it +was the very size of it that caused us our trouble. It was too big for +the seine, and when they began to settle down and take the twine with +them the trouble began for us. No bit of twine ever made to be handled +from a seine-boat was big enough to hold that school of fish when they +began to go down. + +The skipper was awake to it early and signalled for the vessel to come +alongside. So the Johnnie stood over to us, and Hurd, pushing the +spare dory over with Moore's help, came jumping with it to the side of +the seine where I was alone in the first dory. He hadn't even stopped +to get into his oilskins, he was in such a hurry. By the skipper's +orders I had made fast some of the corks to the thwarts in the dory +and Billie took some into the spare dory. The whole length of the +seine-boat they were making fast the seine too. In that way the +skipper hoped to buoy up the fish and hold them until we could lighten +the seine up by bailing some of the fish onto the deck of the vessel. +But it was of no use. There must have been a thousand barrels of them, +and dories and seine-boat began to go under. It was over the rail of +my dory and spare dory both, and both Billie and myself to our waists, +when the skipper sung out for us to jump and save ourselves. We hung +on a little longer, but it got to be too much for us and overboard we +went. We were not in danger then. It is true that the sea was making +and we were weighted down with oilskins and rubber boots, but we had +for support the corks that had not yet gone under. And along the corks +we hauled ourselves toward the seine-boat. I was praying that the +sharks that sometimes follow up mackerel would not bother us. It is +probable that they would not even if there were any around, as +mackerel are better eating. And such a fuss as we made hauling +ourselves through the water! We'd have scared away a whole school of +sharks. Before we could get to the seine-boat that, too, was under. +"Jump!" called the skipper, and "Jump everybody!" called Clancy, and +themselves both hanging on to a last handful of twine. The men in the +seine-boat jumped and struck out for the vessel, which was now quite +close, with the cook, the only man left aboard, throwing over +keelers, draw-buckets, the main sheet--anything within his reach that +was loose and would support a man. + +The skipper and Clancy hung on to the last. "Jump you, Tommie!" called +the skipper. "Not me till you go," answered Clancy. They couldn't do a +bit of good, but they hung on, each grabbing handfuls of twine in a +last effort to hold up the seine. The seine-boat went under--and they +up to their necks--and then it turned over and in toward the seine. +Some of us hollered--we were afraid that it was all up with both of +them--that they would be thrown toward the inside and tangled up in +the seine. But both of them bobbed up, the skipper saying nothing, but +Clancy sputtering like a crazy man. The dories coming loose gave a few +of us a chance to climb up on the bottom of them, and when the +seine-boat came bobbing up most of the others climbed up on the bottom +of that. And there was some swearing done then, you may be sure! The +gang would have been all right then, waiting to be picked up by the +cook from the vessel, which was then pretty handy; but the seine-boat +started to go under again and then came the slap of a little sea, and +overboard went seven or eight of us. Clancy was one of those thrown +into the water. We all remembered it afterwards because he called out +for Andie Howe. + +"Where's Andie?" + +"Here," said Andie. + +"Where?" + +"Hanging onto the bow of the seine-boat." + +"Well, hang on a while longer," said Clancy and struck out for the +vessel, and made it too, oilskins, big boots and all. He threw two or +three lines out at once--one especially to Thad Simpson, the other man +of the crew besides Andie Howe who it was known couldn't swim. So +Clancy hauled him in. The third man he hauled in was Billie Hurd. + +"Good Lord, Tommie," said Billie, "you hove a line over my head to +Andie Howe." + +"You pop-eyed Spanish mackerel!" roared Clancy at him, "you ought to +know by this time that Andie can't swim." + +"I know, but he was all oiled up, and look at me----" + +"Go to hell," said Clancy. + +We all got aboard after a while, but our fine new seine was gone, and +the big school of fish too. After a hard grapple we got the dories and +a little later the seine-boat, and after a lot more work we got them +right side up. The dories we pulled the plugs out of to let them drain +and then took them on deck, but the seine-boat we had to pump out. By +then it was pretty well on in the night and I remember how the moon +rose just as we had it fairly well dried out and dropped astern--rose +as big as a barrel-head and threw a yellow light over it, and then +went out of sight, for a breeze was on us. + +And "Oh, Lord! that thousand-barrel school!" groaned everybody. + + + + +XI + +AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE + + +It wasn't bad enough that we came near losing a few men and our boat, +and our seine altogether, but it must come on to breeze up on top of +that and drive us off the grounds. After putting everything to rights, +we were having a mug-up forward and wondering if the skipper would +take sail off her or what, when we heard the call that settled it. + +"On deck everybody!" we heard. And when we got there, came from the +skipper, "Take in the balloon, tie it up and put it below. Haul down +your stays'l too--and go aloft a couple of you, fore and aft, and put +the tops'ls in gaskets." + +We attended to that--a gang out on the bowsprit, half a dozen aloft +and so on--with the skipper to the wheel while it was being done. When +we had finished it was, "Haul the seine-boat alongside--pump out what +water's left." Then, "Shift that painter and hook on the big painter. +Drop her astern and give her plenty of line. Where's the dorymen? +Where's Tommie and Joe? Haul the dories into the hatch, Tommie, and +make 'em fast. Gripe 'em good while you're at it. Clear the deck of +all loose gear--put it below, all of it--keelers, everything. Maybe +'twon't be much of a blow, but there's no telling--it may. She mayn't +be the kind that washes everything over, but put it all safe anyway." + +The skipper watched all this until he had seen everything cleared up +and heard "All fast the dory," from the waist. Then he looked up and +took note of sky and wind. "Don't feel any too good. Maybe 'twill blow +off, but we might's well run in. We'll have to wait for our other +seine anyway and Wesley will be sure to put into the Breakwater for +news on his way down, especially if it comes to blow." + +He dropped below then to light his pipe. Seeing me and Parsons, with +me trying to fix up Parsons's leg where it had been gashed--Eddie +never knew how--in the mix-up of the evening, the skipper said, +"There's some liniment in the chest and some linen in one of the +drawers under my bunk. Get it. And some of you might's well turn in +and have a nap. She'll be all right--the watch and myself can look +after her now," and he went on deck again, puffing like an engine to +keep his pipe going. + +Most of them did turn in and were soon asleep. Some of the older men +had a smoke and an overhauling of their wet clothes, while a few +joined in a little game of draw before turning in. One or two were +deploring the loss of the seine. The nearness to losing lives didn't +seem to be worrying anybody. For myself, I was somewhat worked up. +There was one time in the water when I thought I was gone. So I went +on deck after the skipper. It was a black night and breezing all the +time and I wanted to see how the vessel behaved. The Johnnie was +close-hauled at this time and swashing under, and I knew without +asking further that the skipper intended to make Delaware Breakwater. + +While hurrying forward, after lending a hand to batten down the main +hatch--the Johnnie plunging along all the time--and my head perhaps a +little too high in the air, I stumbled off the break and plump over a +man under the windward rail. I thought I was going to leeward and +maybe overboard, but somebody hooked onto the full in the back of my +oil-jacket, hauled me up the inclined deck again, and in a roaring +whisper said, "Get a hold here, Joey--here's a ring-bolt for you. +Don't let go on your life! Isn't it fine?" It was Clancy. He had +nights, I know, when he couldn't sleep, and like me, I suppose, he +wanted to watch the sea, which just then was firing grandly. Into this +sea the vessel was diving--nose first--bringing her bowsprit down, +down, down, and then up, up, up, until her thirty-seven-foot bowsprit +would be pointing to where the North star should be. Whenever she +heaved like that I could feel her deck swelling under me. I remember +when I used to play foot-ball at the high school at home and it was +getting handy to a touch-down, with perhaps only a few yards to gain +and the other side braced to stop it, that a fellow playing back had +to buck like that from under a line when he had to scatter tons, or +what he thought was tons, of people on top of him. The vessel was that +way now, only with every dive she had hundreds of tons to lift from +under. At a time like that you can feel the ribs of a vessel brace +within her just as if she was human. Now I could almost feel her heart +pumping and her lungs pounding somewhere inside. I could feel her +brace to meet it, feel her shiver, as if she was scared half to death, +and almost hear her screech like a winner every time she cleared it +and threw it over her head. + +Now down she went--the Johnnie Duncan--down and forward, for she +wouldn't be held back--shoulders and breast slap into it. Clear to her +waist she went, fighting the sea from her. To either side were +tumbling the broken waves, curling away like beach combers. The hollow +of each was a curved sheet of electric white, and the top--the +crest--was a heavier, hotter white. The crests would rise above our +rail and break, and back into the hollows would fall a shower of +shooting stars that almost sizzled. There wasn't a star above, but +millions on the water! + +"Ever see anything like that ashore, Joey-boy?" said Clancy, and I had +to roar a whisper that I never had. + +Through this play of fire the Johnnie leaped with great bounds. She +boiled her way, and astern she left a wake in which the seine-boat was +rearing and diving with a fine little independent trail of its own. + +Two men forward--the watch--were leaning over the windlass and peering +into the night. They were there for whatever they might see, but +particularly were they looking for the double white light of Five +Fathom Bank lightship. The skipper was at the wheel. When he got in +the way of the cabin light, we could catch the shine from his dripping +oil-clothes, and the spark from his pipe--which he kept going through +it all--marked his position when he stepped back into the darkness. + +Clancy noticed him. "There's a man for you, Joey. Think what it meant +to a young skipper with a new vessel--the loss of that school and the +seine on top of it the very first day he struck fish. If we'd got +that, he might have been the first vessel of the year into the New +York market. And think of the price the first fish fetch!--and the +honor of it--and he breaking his heart to make a reputation this year. +And yet not a yip out of him--not a cranky word to one of the gang all +night. A great man I call him--and a fisherman." I thought so, too. + +Sometimes I imagined I could see the wink of red and green lights +abreast and astern, which I probably did, for there should have been +fifty sail or so of seiners inside and outside of us--there were sixty +sail of the fleet in sight that afternoon--and I knew that, barring a +possible few that had got fish and were driving for the New York +market, all the others were like ourselves, under lower sails and +boring into it, with extra lookout forward, the skipper at the wheel +or on the quarter and all ears and eyes for the surf and lights +inshore when we should get there. + +"Something ahead! dead ahead! sa-ail!" came suddenly from forward. +There was a scraping of boot-heels at the wheel. "What d'y'make of +it?--all right, I see her!" In the shadow we saw the skipper pulling +the wheel down. Ahead I imagined I saw a dark patch, but to make sure +I squirmed up to the fore-rigging. Whoever she was, the light from her +cabin skylight was right there and I realized that we were pretty +close, but not really how close until a boat bobbed up under my jaws +almost. Right from under our bow it heaved. It was a seiner and that +was her seine-boat towing astern, and I could easily have heaved a +line to her helmsman as we swept by her. There was an awfully tall +shadow of sails--half up to the clouds I thought--and the black of the +hull looked as long as a dock. A voice was hurled to us, but we +couldn't quite make it out--but it was the watch, probably, saying a +word or two by way of easing his feelings. + +We worked up to the windward of that one and slowly crowded past her +tumbling green light. Then the skipper let the wheel fly up and we +shot ahead and soon we had her directly astern, with her one green and +one red eye looking after us. "That's one fellow we outsail," thought +I to myself, and I knew I was beginning to love the Johnnie Duncan. + +All through that night it went on like that. + +At four o'clock or so in the morning the cook stuck his head out of +the slit in the forec's'le companionway and spoke his welcome little +piece. "Can't have any reg'lar sit-down this morning, boys. Have to +leave the china in the becket for a while yet, but all that wants can +make a mug-up, and when we get inside--if we do in anything like a +decent hour--we'll have breakfast." + +At five o'clock the sky began to brighten to the eastward, but there +was no let-up to the wind or sea. If anything it was breezing up. At +six o'clock, when the short blasts of the lightship split the air +abreast of us, things were good and lively, but there was no daylight +to go by then. The wash that in the night only buried her bow good was +then coming over her to the foremast and filling the gangway between +the house and rail as it raced aft. The beauty of double-lashing the +dories began to appear, and all hands might have been towing astern +all night by the look of them. But the Johnnie Duncan was doing well +and the opinion of the crew generally was that the skipper could slap +every rag to her and she'd carry it--that is, if she had to. The +skipper put her more westerly after we had passed the lightship and on +we went. + +We had the company of a couple of coasters in this part of the drive; +and by that, if nothing else, a man might know we were inshore. Some +Gloucester men were in sight, too, though most of the fleet, we +guessed, were still outside of us. The coasters were colliers, +three-masters both, and reefed down, wallowing in the sea. One had her +foretopmast snapped short off, and such patched sails as she had on +looked lonesome. The gang, of course, had to make fun of her. + +"There's one way to house a topm'st!" + +"Broke your clothes-pole, old girl!" + +"Better take in your washing there--looks like rain!" + +"Go it, you beauty! I only wish I had my cameraw. If y'only suspected +how lovely you look!" + +Two big ocean tugs, one clear white and one all black, offered a +change in looks, though in nothing else, for each one, with two barges +of coal, was making desperate hauling of it, and the Breakwater yet a +good bit away. + +"Hustle 'em, you husky coal-jammers!" roared Parsons at them, as if he +could be heard beyond the rail. "I wouldn't be aboard of you for my +share of the Southern trip--and mackerel away up in G, too. Would you, +Billie?" + +"Then? Naw!" said Hurd, with a wrinkling of his little nose. + +"No, nor me neither," said Long Steve. "Hi--ever hear the cook--ever +hear George Moore's song:-- + + 'If ever you go to sea, my boy, + Don't ever you ship on a steamer; + There's stacks to scrape and rails to paint-- + It's always work to clean her. + When the wind is wrong and the shore is by, + They'll keep you clear of leeway, + But they roll and they jolt and they're never dry-- + They're the devil's own in a sea-way!'" + +Steve, trying to sing that, had one hand hooked into a ring-bolt under +the rail and he was slowly pickling--we were all pickling--like a +salted mackerel in a barrel. + +An hour past Five Fathom and the tall white tower of Cape Henlopen +could be made out ahead, as well as the gray tower of Cape May through +the mists to the northward. The wind was coming faster and it felt +heavier. We could judge best of how we were looking ourselves by +watching all our fellows near by. We could see to the bottom planks of +two to leeward of us, while on the sloping deck of one to windward it +was plain that only what was lashed or bolted was still there. When +they reared they almost stood up straight, and when they scooped into +it the wonder was that all the water taken aboard didn't hold her +until the next comber could have a fair whack at her. + +The men--that is, a few of them--might joke, but were all glad to be +getting in. There's no fun staying wet and getting wetter all night +long. If it wasn't for the wetness of a fellow it would have been +great, for it was the finest kind of excitement, our running to +harbor--that night--especially in the morning when we were passing +three or four and nobody passing us. We went by one fellow--the +Martinet she was--a fair enough sailer--passed her to windward of +course, our gang looking across at their gang and nobody saying a +word, but everybody thinking a lot, you may be sure. It was worth a +square meal that. + +With the Martinet astern, the skipper let her pay off and run for the +end of the Breakwater. For a while he let the wind take her fair +abeam, with sheets in, and the way she sizzled through the water was a +caution. There was a moment that an extra good blast hit her that my +heart sank, but I reflected that the skipper knew his business, and so +tried to take it unconcernedly. Everybody around me was joking and +laughing--to think, I suppose, that we would soon be in. + +A moment after that I went down to leeward. The sea was bubbling in +over her rail at the fore-rigging and I wanted to get the feel of it. +I got it. It is pretty shoal water on the bar at the mouth of the +Delaware River and quite a little sea on when it blows. One sea came +aboard. Somebody yelled and I saw it--but too late--and slap! over I +went--over the rail--big boots and oilskins I went down into the +roaring. For a second my head came up and I saw the vessel. Everybody +aboard was standing by. The skipper was whirling the spokes and the +vessel was coming around like a top. I never saw a vessel roll down so +far in all my life. I went under again and coming up heard a dull +shout. There was a line beside me. "Grab hold!" yelled somebody. No +need to tell me--I grabbed hold. It was the seine-boat's painter. The +Johnnie was still shooting and when the line tautened it came as near +to pulling my arms out of my shoulders as ever I want to have them +again. But I hung on. Then she came up, and they hauled the painter in +and gaffed me over the rail. + +"You blankety blank fool!" roared Clancy, as soon as I stood +up--"don't you know any better? A fine thing we'd have to be +telegraphing home, wouldn't it? Are you all right now?" + +"All right," I said, and felt pretty cheap. + +While being hauled in, knowing that I was safe, I had been thinking +what a fine little adventure I'd have to tell when we got back to +Gloucester, but after Clancy got through with me I saw that there were +two ways to look at it. So I took my old place under the windward rail +and didn't move from there again till it was time to take sail off +her. + + + + +XII + +THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR + + +Nearing the Breakwater we had more company. Other seiners, with boats +astern and dories on deck, were coming in; jumbo, jib, fore and reefed +mainsail generally, and all plunging gloriously with a harbor near at +hand. + +For the next few hours of that morning any watcher in the lighthouse +on the Breakwater could have seen plenty of samples of clever +seamanship. At our time we were only one of a half-dozen at the +business of working around the jetty, some making for one end and some +for the other. There was a great trying of tacks and some plain +criticism of tactics and weatherly qualities. There was one who tried +to cut in before he could quite make it. When he had to put back or +run ashore and lose her, a great laugh went up, though there was +nothing the matter with the try. He had only tried too much. + +Eddie Parsons was the sharp critic. "Trying to beat out the fleet, +hey? And with that old hooker? Nothing wrong with your nerve, old man, +but some fine day, when there's a little wind stirring, you'll roll +that tub over a little too far. That's right--jam her up now! Think +you got a steamboat? Wonder nobody ever told you about sailing a +vessel. Come out of it, old man, and let her swing off." + +We had yet to get in ourselves, and that we had the Johnnie Duncan to +eat into the wind we were thankful. At last we were by and reaching +down to the end of the jetty. We all began to feel good once we were +sure of it. It was fine, too, to listen to Clancy as we got near. He +was standing on the break, leaning against the weather rigging and +looking forward. + +"You'd think she'd been coming here for a hundred years, wouldn't you? +Look at her point her nose now at that beacon--don't have to give this +one the wheel at all. She's the girl. See her bow off now. Man, but +she knows as well as you and me she'll be inside and snug's a kenched +mackerel before long. Watch her kick into the wind now. Oh, she's the +lady, this one. I've sailed many of them, but she's the queen of them +all, this one." + +A half dozen of lucky fellows were in before us. We drove in among +them, under the bow of one and past the stern of another. They were +all watching us, after the custom of the fleet in harbor. We knew this +and behaved as smartly as we could without slopping over. + +By and by our skipper picked out a place to his fancy. "Stand by +halyards and down-hauls," was his warning. + +"Ready--all ready." + +"Ready with the anchor!" + +"All ready the anchor, sir!" + +"Down with your jib! Down with jumbo! Let go your fore halyards! Watch +out now--ready--let go your anchor!" + +Rattle--whizz--whir-r-r--splash! clink--and the Johnnie Duncan of +Gloucester was safe to her mooring. + +And not till then did our skipper, ten hours to the wheel, unclinch +his grip, hook the becket to a spoke, slat his sou'wester on the +wheel-box and ease his mind. + +"Thank the Lord, there's a jeesly blow behind us. There's some +outside'll wish they had a shore job before they get in. Hi, boys, +when you get her tied up for'ard, better all go below and have a bite +to eat. Let the mains'l stand and give it a chance to dry." Then he +looked about him. "And I didn't notice that anybody passed us on the +way." There was a whole lot in that last. + +After eating a bite, I went over in the dory to the lighthouse on the +jetty, where seamen's mail was taken care of. After leaving my letters +I stopped to watch some of the fleet coming. It was easy enough to +pick them. The long, slick-looking, lively seine-boat in tow and the +black pile of netting on deck told what they were, and they came +jumping out of the mists in a way to make a man's heart beat. + +There was a man standing on the jetty. He was master of a three-masted +coaster, he told me. "You come off one of them Gloucester +mackerel-catchers?" he asked me. I said yes. "That new-looking one +that came in a while ago?" I said yes again. + +"I was watching her--she's a dream--a dream. I never see anything like +them--the whole bunch of 'em. Look at this one--ain't she got on about +all she can stand up under though? My soul, ain't she staggering! I +expect her skipper knows his business--don't expect he'd be skipper of +a fine vessel like that if he didn't. But if 'twas me I'd just about +take a wide tuck or two in that ever-lastin' mains'l he's got there. +My conscience, but ain't he a-sockin' it to her! I s'pose that's the +way some of your vessels are sailed out and never heard from +again--that was never run into, nor rolled over, nor sunk in a reg'lar +way, but just drove right into it head-first trying to make a passage +and drowned before ever they could rise again. Well, good-luck to you, +old girl, and your skipper, whoever he is, and I guess if your canvas +stays on you'll be to anchor before a great while, for you're making +steamboat time. Go it, old girl, and your little baby on behind, go +it! There ain't nothing short of an ocean liner could get you now. Go +it! a sail or two don't matter--if it's a good mackerel season I +s'pose the owners don't mind if you blow away a few sails. Go it, God +bless you! Go it! you're the lads can sail a vessel, you fishermen of +Gloucester. Lord, if I dared to try a thing like that with my vessel +and my crew and the old gear I got, I rather expect I'd have a +rigger's bill by the time I got home--if ever I got home carryin' on +like that in my old hooker." + +I watched her, too. She was the Tarantula, Jim Porter, another +sail-carrier. Around the point and across she tore and over toward the +sands beyond, swung off on her heel to her skipper's heave, came down +by the wreck of a big three-master on the inner beach, and around and +up opposite what looked like a building on the hill. Then it was down +with the wheel, down with headsails, let go fore-halyards, over with +the anchor, and there she was, another fisherman of Gloucester, at +rest in harbor after an all-night fight with a lively breeze. + +And I left the master of the coaster there and went back to the +Duncan, where the crew were standing along the rail or leaning over +the house and having a lot of fun sizing up those who were coming in. +It is one of the enjoyments of the seining fleet--this racing to +harbor when it blows and then watching the others work in. I've heard +it said that no place in the world can show a fleet like them--all +fine vessels, from one hundred to one hundred and twenty feet over +all, deep draught, heavily sparred, and provided with all kinds of +sail. They were ably managed, of course,--and a dash to port makes the +finest kind of a regatta. No better chances are offered to try vessels +and seamanship--no drifting or flukes but wind enough for all hands +and on all points of sailing generally. + +They came swooping in one after the other--like huge sea-gulls, only +with wings held close. Now, with plenty of light, those already in +could easily see the others coming long before they rounded the jetty. +Even if we couldn't see the hulls of them, there were fellows who +could name them--one vessel after the other--just by the spars and +upper rigging. The cut of a topsail, the look of a mast-head, the set +of a gaff--the smallest little thing was enough to place them, so well +were they acquainted with one another. And the distance at which some +of them could pick out a vessel was amazing. + +George Moore, coming up out of the forec's'le to dump over some +scraps, spied one. "The Mary Grace Adams," he sang out,--"the +shortest forem'st out of Gloucester. She must've been well inside when +she started--to get in at this time. Slow--man, but she is slow, that +one." + +"Yes, that's the old girl, and behind her is the Dreamer--Charlie +Green--black mast-heads and two patches on her jumbo. She'll be in and +all fast before the Mary Grace's straightened out." + +And so it was--almost. The Mary Adams was one of the older fleet and +never much of a sailer. The Dreamer was one of the newer vessels, +able, and a big sailer. They were well raked by the critics, as under +their four lowers they whipped in and around and passed on by. + +After the Dreamer came the Madeline, with "Black Jack" Hogan, a fleshy +man for a fisherman, who minded his way and remained unmoved at the +compliments paid his vessel, one of the prize beauties of the fleet. +The Marguerite, Charley Falvey, a dog at seining, always among the +high-liners, who got more fun out of a summer's seining than most men +ever got out of yachting, who bought all the latest inventions in gear +as fast as they came out and who had a dainty way of getting fish. The +Marguerite dipped her bow as she passed, while her clever skipper +nodded along the line. + +The King Philip, another fast beauty, made her bow and dipped her +jibs to her mates in harbor. At sight of her master, Al McNeill, a +great shout goes up. "Ho, ho! boys, here's Lucky Al! Whose seine was +it couldn't hold a jeesly big school one day off here last spring but +Billie Simms'? Yes, sir, Billie Simms. Billie fills up and was just +about thinking he'd have to let the rest go when who heaves in sight +and rounds to and says, 'Can I help y'out, William?' Who but Lucky Al +McNeill, of course. Bales out two hundred barrels as nice fat mackerel +as anybody'd want to see. 'Just fills me up,' says Al, and scoots to +market. Just been to New York, mind you, that same week with two +hundred and fifty barrels he got twelve cents apiece for. 'Just fills +me up,' says Al, and scoots. No, he ain't a bit lucky, Captain Al +ain't--married a young wife only last fall." + +Then followed the Albatross, with Mark Powers giving the orders. Then +the Privateer, another fast one, but going sluggishly now because of a +stove-in seine-boat wallowing astern. Then the North Wind, with her +decks swept clear of everything but her house and hatches. Seine-boat, +seine and dory were gone. + +After her was a big, powerful vessel, the Ave Maria, with the most +erratic skipper of all. This man never appeared but the gossip broke +out. Andie Howe had his record. "Here comes George Ross. What's this +they say now?--that he don't come down from the mast-head now like he +used to, when he strikes a school. When I was with him he was a pretty +lively man comin' from aloft--used to sort of fall down, you know. But +now he comes down gentle-like--slides down the back-stay. Only trouble +now he's got to get new rubber boots every other trip, 'count of the +creases he wears in the legs of them sliding down the wire. I tell you +they all lose their nerve as they get older. There's Billie Simms +coming behind him. He's given up tryin' to sail his vessel on the side +and tryin' to see how long he c'n carry all he c'n pile on. Billie +says 't'ain't like when a fellow's young and ain't got any family. I +expect it's about the same with George since he got married." The +master of the Ave Maria didn't even glance over as he piloted his +vessel along. He very well knew that we were talking about him. + +Pretty soon came one that everybody looked at doubtfully. She sported +a new mainmast and a new fore-gaff. "Who's this old hooker with her +new spars? Looks like a vessel just home from salt fishing, don't she? +Lord, but she needs painting." Nobody seemed to know who she was, and +as she got nearer there was a straining of eyes for her name forward. +"The H-A-R-B-I--oh, the Harbinger. Must be old Marks and the old craft +he bought down East last fall. This the old man, of course--the +Harbinger. How long's she been down here? Came down ahead of the +fleet? Well, she ought to--by the looks of her she needs a good early +start to get anywhere. They ought to be glad to get in. I mind that +September breeze twenty year ago that the old man said blew all the +water off Quero and drove him ashore on Sable Island. He says he ain't +taking any more line storms in his. No, nor anybody else in the old +square-enders he gen'rally sails in. I'll bet he's glad to change +winter trawling for summer seining. I'll bet he put in a few wakeful +nights on the Banks in his time--mind the time he parted his cable and +came bumping over Sable Island No'the-east Bar? Found the only channel +there was, I callate. 'Special little angels was looking out for me,' +he says, when he got home. 'Yes,' says Wesley Marrs--he was telling it +to Wesley--'yes,' says Wesley, 'but I'll bet keepin' the lead goin' +had a hell of a lot to do with it, too.'" + +So they came rolling in by the end of the jetty until they could make +one last tack of it. Like tumbling dolphins they were--seiners all, +with a single boat towing astern and a single dory, or sometimes two +dories, lashed in the waist, all gear stowed away, under four lower +sails mostly--jumbo, jib, fore and main, though now and then was one +with a mainsail in stops and a trysail laced to the gaff, and all +laying down to it until their rails were washing under and the sea +hissed over the bows. + +Anybody would have to admire them as they came scooting past. When +they thought they were close enough to the Breakwater--and some went +pretty close--up or down would go the wheel, according to which end of +the jetty they came in by, around they would go, and across the flats +and down on the fleet they would come shooting. They breasted into the +hollows like any sea-bird and lifted with every heave to shake the +water from bilge to quarter. They came across with never a let-up, +shaving everything along the way until a good berth was picked out. +Then they let go sails, dropped anchor and were ready for a rest. + +Nobody got by our fellows without a word. And we weren't the only crew +of critics. Bungling seamanship would get a slashing here, but there +was none of that. It was all good, but there are degrees of goodness, +of course. First-class seamanship being a matter of course, only a +wonderful exhibition won approval from everybody. And crews coming in, +knowing what was ahead of them, made no mistakes in that harbor. + +A dozen ordinary skippers sailed past before a famous fisherman at +length came in. Everybody knew him--a dog, a high-liner, truly a +master mariner. A murmur went up. "There's the boy," said Tommie +Clancy. "I mind last summer when he came into Souris just such a day +as this, but with more wind stirring. 'Twas Fourth of July and we had +all our flags to the peak--and some fine patriotic fights going on +ashore that day--our flag and the English. The harbor was jammed with +seiners and fresh-fishers. You couldn't see room for a dory, looking +at 'em end on. But that don't jar Tom O'Donnell. What does he do? He +just comes in and sails around the fleet like a cup-defender on +parade--and every bit of canvas he had aboard flying--only his crew +had to hang onto the ring-bolts under the wind'ard rail. Well, he +comes piling in, looks the fleet over, sizes up everything, picks out +a nice spot as he shoots around, sails out the harbor again--clean +out, yes sir, clean out--comes about--and it blowing a living gale all +the time--shoots her in again, dives across a line of us, and fetches +her up standing. We could've jumped from our rail to his in +jack-boots, he was that close to us and another fellow the other side. +Slid her in like you slide the cover into a diddy box. Yes, sir, and +that's the same lad you see coming along now--Tom O'Donnell and his +Colleen Bawn." + +He certainly was coming on now, and a fine working vessel he had. She +showed it in every move. She came around like a twin-screw launch, +picked out her berth like she had intelligence in her eyes, made for +it, swirled, fluttered like a bird, felt with her claws for the ground +underneath, found it, gripped it, swayed, hung on, and at last settled +gently in her place. There was no more jar to the whole thing than if +she had been a cat-boat in a summer breeze. "Pretty, pretty, pretty," +you could hear the gang along our rail. + +"They talk about knockabout racing craft," said Clancy, "but did +y'ever see anything drop to a berth slicker than that? And that's a +vessel you c'n go to sea in, and in the hardest winter gale that ever +blew you c'n turn in when your watch is done and have a feeling of +comfort." + +"Where's the steam trawler, the porgy boat, we saw yesterday?" + +"Put into Chincoteague most likely--nearer than here." + +"That's what we'll have to come to yet--steamers, and go on wages like +a waiter in a hotel." + +"Yes," said Clancy, "I s'pose so, but with vessels like we got and the +seamen sailing out of Gloucester we'll stave 'em off a long time yet, +and even as it is, give me a breeze and a vessel like this one under +us and we'll beat out all the steam fishermen that ever turned a +screw." + +One of the latest experiments in a fishermen's model reached in then +and her coming started a chorus. They were always trying new models in +Gloucester, everybody was so anxious to have a winner. This one's +sails were still white and pretty and her hull still shiny in fresh +black paint. The red stripe along her rail and the gold stripe along +her run set off her lines; her gear didn't have a speck on it, her +spars were yellow as could be and to leeward we thought we could still +smell the patent varnish. For that matter there were several there as +new-looking as she was, our own vessel for one; but there had been a +lot of talk about this one. She was going to clean out the fleet. She +had been pretending to a lot, and as she hadn't yet made good, of +course she got a great raking. + +"She's here at last, boys--the yacht, the wonderful, marvellous +Victory! Ain't she a bird? Built to beat the fleet! Look at the +knockabout bow of her!" + +"Knockabout googleums--h-yah! Scoop shovel snout and a stern ugly as a +battle-ship's, and the Lord knows there was overhang and to spare to +tail her out decent. Cut out the yellow and the red and the whole lot +of gold decorations and she's as homely as a Newf'undland jack." + +"Just the same, she c'n sail," said somebody who wanted to start an +argument. + +"Sail! Yah! might beat a Rockport granite sloop. Ever hear of the +Henry Clay Parker, Mister Billie Simms, and the little licking she +gave this winner of yours? No? Well, you want to go around and have a +drink or two with the boys next time you're ashore and get the news. +It was like a dogfish and a mackerel--the Henry just eat her up. And +there's the others. Why, this one underneath us'd make a holy show of +her, I'll bet. And there's half a dozen others. There's the--oh, +what's the use?" + +"Oh, Eddie Parsons, a perfect lady and coming in like a high-stepper +and yet you must malign her beauty and make light of her virtue," and +Clancy jammed Parsons's sou'wester down over his eyes--"hush up, +Eddie." + +Into the harbor and after the Victory heaved another one. And she was +the real thing--handsome, fast and able. And she had a record for +bringing the fish home--an able vessel and well-known for it. She +could carry whole sails when some of the others were double-reefed and +thinking of dragging trysails out of the hold. And her skipper was a +wonder. + +"You c'n cut all the others out--here comes the real thing. Here's the +old dog himself. Did he ever miss a blow? And look at him. Every man +comes in here to-day under four lowers, no more, and some under +reefed mains'l, or trys'l, but four whole lowers ain't enough for this +gentleman--not for Wesley. He must carry that gaff-tops'l if he pulls +the planks out of her. He always brings her home, but if some of the +underwriters'd see him out here they'd soon blacklist him till he +mended his ways. It's a blessed wonder he ain't found bottom before +this. Look at her now skating on her ear. There she goes--if they'd +just lower a man over the weather rail with a line on him he could +write his name on her keel!" + +And she certainly was something to make a man's eyes stick out. There +had been a vessel or two that staggered before, but the Lucy fairly +rolled down into it, and there was no earthly reason why she should do +it except that it pleased her skipper to sport that extra kite. + +She boiled up from the end of the jetty, and her wake was the wake of +a screw steamer. She had come from home, we knew, and so it happened +she was one of the last to get in. The harbor was crowded as she +straightened out. We knew she would not have too much leeway coming +on, and what berth she was after kept everybody guessing. + +"If she goes where's she pointing--and most vessels do--she'll find a +berth down on the beach on that course, down about where the wreck is. +It'll be dry enough walking when she gets there. If she keeps on the +gait she's going now, she ought to be able to fetch good and high and +dry up on the mud. They'd cert'nly be able to step ashore--when they +get there. Ah-h-h, but that's more like it." + +She was taking it over the quarter then. She cleared the stern of the +most leeward of the fleet and then kicked off, heading over to where +the Johnnie Duncan and the Victory lay. The betting was that she would +round to and drop in between us two. There was room there, but only +just room. It would be a close fit, but there was room. + +But she didn't round to. She held straight on without the sign of a +swerve. On the Johnnie, the gang being almost in her path picked out a +course for her. Between the outer end of our seine-boat and the end of +the bowsprit of the Mary Grace Adams was a passage that may have been +the width of a vessel. But the space seemed too narrow. Our crew were +wondering if he would try it. Even the skipper, standing in the +companionway, stepped up on deck to have a better look. + +"He's got to take it quarterin', and it ain't wide enough," said Eddie +Parsons. + +"Quartering--yes, but with everything hauled inboard," said the +skipper. "He'll try it, I guess. I was with him for two years, and if +he feels like trying it he'll try it." + +"And s'pose he does try it, Skipper?" + +"Oh, he'll come pretty near making it, though he stands a good chance +to scrape the paint off our seine-boat going by. No, don't touch the +seine-boat--let her be as she is. We'll fool 'em if they think they +c'n jar anybody here coming on like that. There's room enough if +nothing slips, and if they hit it's their lookout." + +It looked like a narrow space for a vessel of her beam to go through, +but she hopped along, and the eyes of all the harbor followed her to +the point where she must turn tail or make the passage. + +She held on--her chance to go back was gone. + +"Watch her, boys. Now she's whooping--look at her come!" + +And she was coming. Her windward side was lifted so high that her +bottom planks could be seen. Her oil-skinned crew were crowded +forward. There were men at the fore-halyards, at jib-halyards, at the +down-hauls, and a group were standing by the anchor. Two men were at +the wheel. + +She bit into it. There was froth at her mouth. She was so near now +that we could read the faces of her crew; and wide awake to this fine +seamanship we all leaned over the rail, the better to see how she'd +make out. The crews of half the vessels inside the Breakwater were +watching her. + +She was a length away and jumping to it. It was yet in doubt, but she +was certainly rushing to some sort of a finish. She rushed on, and +w-r-r-rp! her weather bow came down on the Johnnie's seine-boat. But +it didn't quite hit it. Her quarter to leeward just cut under the +Adams' bowsprit and the leech of her mainsail seemed to flatten past. +For a moment we were not certain, but no jolt or lurch came and our +seine-boat seemed all right. Another jump and she was clear by. And +then we felt like cheering her, and her skipper Wesley Marrs, too, as +he stood to the wheel and sung out, "Couldn't scare you, could I, +Maurice. I thought you'd haul your seine-boat in. I've got your extra +seine," and swept by. + +From our deck and from the deck of the Adams, and from the decks of +half a dozen others, could be heard murmurs, and there was a general +pointing out of the redoubtable skipper himself to the green hands +that knew him only by reputation. "That's him, Wesley himself--the +stocky little man of the two at the wheel." + +If the stocky little man heard the hails that were sent after him, he +made no sign, unless a faint dipping of his sou'wester back over his +windward shoulder was his way of showing it. + +He had business yet, had Wesley Marrs. There was a tug and a barge and +another big seiner in his course. He clipped the tug, scraped the +barge, and set the seiner's boat a-dancing, and two lengths more he +put down the wheel and threw her gracefully into the wind. Down came +jib, down came jumbo, over splashed the anchor. She ran forward a +little, rattled back a link or two, steadied herself, and there she +was. Her big mainsail was yet shaking in the wind, her gaff-topsail +yet fluttering aloft, but she herself, the Lucy Foster of Gloucester, +was at your service. "And what do you think of her, people?" might +just as well have been shot off her deck through a megaphone, for that +was what her bearing and the unnatural smartness of her crew plainly +were saying. + +We all drew breath again. Clancy unbent from the rail and shook his +head in high approval. He took off his sou'wester, slatted it over the +after-bitt to clear the brim of water, and spoke his mind. "You'll see +nothing cleaner than that in this harbor to-day, fellows, and you'll +see some pretty fair work at that. That fellow--he's an able seaman." + +"Yes, sir--an able seaman," said the skipper also. + +And Clancy and the skipper were something in the line of able seamen +themselves. + + + + +XIII + +WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE + + +Generally a day in harbor is a day of loafing for the crew of a +seiner; but it was not so altogether with us that day. Within two +hours of the time that Wesley Marrs came in to the Breakwater in such +slashing style the skipper had us into the seine-boat and on the way +to the Lucy Foster. By his orders we took along ten empty mackerel +barrels. "We'll go over to the beach first and fill these barrels up +with sand." We all knew what the sand was for--the Johnnie Duncan was +going to be put in trim to do her best sailing. Coming down the coast +the skipper and Clancy decided that she was down by the stern a +trifle. + +So we attended to the sand, and on the way back hauled our second +seine out of the hold of the Lucy Foster, and piled it into the +seine-boat. With the last of the twine into the seine-boat and just as +we were about to push off from the Lucy, Wesley Marrs put a foot on +the rail of his vessel and spoke to Maurice. + +"And when I was taking the last of that aboard in the dock in +Gloucester, you wouldn't believe who it was stepped onto the cap-log +and looking down on the deck of the Lucy says, 'And you'll take good +care of that seine for Captain Blake, won't you, Captain Marrs?' Could +you guess now, Maurice?" + +"No," said Maurice. + +"No, I'll bet you can't. It isn't often she comes down the dock. Miss +Foster no less. 'And what makes you think I won't?' I asks her. 'Oh, +of course I know you will,' she says, 'and deliver it to him in good +order, too.' 'I'll try,' I says, as though it was a desp'rate job I +had on hand--to put a seine in the hold and turn it over to another +vessel when I met her. 'But what makes you worry about this partic'lar +seine, Miss Foster?' I asks." + +"Which Miss Foster was it, Wesley--the one your vessel is named +after?" broke in our skipper. + +"No--no--but the younger one--Alice. 'But what makes you worry?' I +asks her, and she didn't say anything, but that one that's with her +all the time--the one that goes with the lad that designed the Johnnie +Duncan----" + +"Joe's cousin here----" + +"That's it--the fat little Buckley girl--a fine girl too. And if I was +a younger man and looking for a wife, there's the kind for me--but +anyway she up and says, 'Alice is worried, Captain Marrs, because she +owns a third of Captain Blake's vessel--a good part of her little +fortune's in the Duncan--and if anything happens to the seine +one-third of it, of course, comes out of her. And it cost a good many +hundred dollars. So you must be careful.' 'Oh, that's it?' says I. +'Then it'll be shortened sail and extra careful watches on the Lucy +till I meet Maurice, for I mustn't lose any property of Miss +Foster's.'" + +We rowed away from the Lucy Foster, and I supposed that was the end of +it. But that night going on deck to take a last look at the stars +before turning in, there was the skipper and Clancy walking the break +and talking. + +"And did you know, Tommie, that Miss Foster owned any of this one?" +the skipper was saying. + +"No," said Tommie, "I didn't know, but----" + +"But you suspected. Well, I didn't even suspect. And there's that +seine we lost last night--cost all of eight hundred dollars." + +"That's what it did--a fine seine." + +A few minutes later the skipper went below, and Clancy, seeing me, +said, "Hold on, Joey. Did you hear what the skipper said?" + +"About Miss Foster owning a share of the vessel?" + +"Well, not that so much, but about the loss of the seine?" + +"Yes--why?" + +"Why? Joe, but sometimes a man would think you were about ten year +old. I tell you, Joe, I'm not too sure it's going to be Withrow. And +if you don't see some driving on this one when next we get among the +fish, then--" But he didn't finish it, only clucked his tongue and +went below. + +Clancy was right again. During the night the weather moderated, and in +the morning the first of the fleet to go out past the Breakwater was +the Johnnie Duncan. It looked to us as if the skipper thought the +mackerel would be all gone out of the sea before we got back to the +spot where we had struck them two days before. + + + + +XIV + +A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING + + +We might have stayed in harbor another twenty-four hours and lost +nothing by it. It was dawn when we put out from the Delaware +Breakwater, and by dark of the same day we were back to where we had +met the big school and lost the seine two days before. And there we +hung about for another night and day waiting for the sea to flatten +out. Mackerel rarely show in rough weather, even if you could put out +a seine-boat and go after them. But I suppose that it did us no harm +to be on the ground and ready. + +On the evening of the next day there was something doing. There was +still some sea on, but not enough to hurt. Along about eight o'clock, +I remember, I came off watch and dropped into the forec's'le to fix up +my arm, which was still badly strained from hanging onto the +seine-boat's painter when I was washed overboard. The skipper, taking +a look, told me not to go into the dory that night, but to let Billie +Hurd, who was spare hand, take my place, and for me to stay aboard. I +would rather have gone into the dory, of course, but was not able to +pull an oar--that is, pull it as I'd have to pull when driving for a +school--and knowing I would be no more than so much freight in the +dory there was nothing else to do. "And if we see fish, Clancy'll stay +to the mast-head to-night--as good a seine-master as sails out of +Gloucester is Tommie--better than me," he said. "I'm going in the +seine-boat, and Eddie Parsons, you'll take Clancy's place in the +dory." And buttoning his oil-jacket up tight, he put on his mitts and +went on deck. + +That evening the forward gang were doing about as much work as seiners +at leisure usually do. It was in the air that we would strike fish, +but the men had not yet been told to get ready. So four of them were +playing whist at the table under the lamp and two were lying half in +and half out of opposite upper bunks, trying to get more of the light +on the pages of the books they were reading. Long Steve, in a lower +port bunk nearer the gangway, was humming something sentimental, and +two were in a knot on the lockers, arguing fiercely over nothing in +particular. There was a fellow in the peak roaring out, "Scots wha hae +wi' Wallace bled." Only the cook, just done with mixing bread, seemed +to have ever done a lick of work in his life, and he was now standing +by the galley fire rolling the dough off his fingers. The cook on a +fisherman is always a busy man. + +Down the companionway and into the thick of this dropped Clancy, oiled +up and all ready to go aloft. To the mast-head of a vessel, even on an +April night in southern waters, it is cold enough, especially when, +like a seiner, she is nearly always by the wind; and Clancy was +wrapped up. "I think," said Clancy, as his boot-heels hit the floor, +"I'll have a mug-up." From the boiler on the galley-stove he poured +out a mug of coffee and from the grub-locker he took a slice of bread +and two thick slices of cold beef. He buried the bread among the beef +and leaned against the foremast while he ate. + +Once when Clancy was a skipper he did a fine bit of rescuing out to +sea, and after he got home a newspaper man saw him and wrote him up. I +had the clipping stuck on the wall of Withrow's store for months and +had read it so often that I knew it by heart. "In heavy jack-boots and +summer sou'wester, with a black jersey of fine quality sticking up +above the neck of his oil-jacket, with a face that won you at sight; +cheeks a nice even pink; damp, storm-beaten, and healthful; with +mouth, eyes, and jaw bespeaking humor, sympathy, and courage; +shoulders that seemed made for butting to windward--an attractive, +inspiring, magnetic man altogether--that is Captain Tommie Clancy of +the Gloucester fisherman, the Mary Andrews." That, was how it read, +and certainly it fitted him now, as he stood there in the middle of +the thick curling smoke of the pipes, holding the mug of coffee in one +hand and the sandwich of bread and meat in the other, leaning easily +against the butt of the foremast, and between gulps and bites taking +notice of the crew. + +"Give me," he said to the cook as the proper man for an audience, "a +seiner's crew when they're not on fish for real gentlemen of leisure. +Look at 'em now--you'd think they were all near-sighted, with their +cards up to their chins. And above them look--Kipling to starb'd and +the Duchess to port. Mulvaney, I'll bet, filled full of whiskey and +keeping the heathen on the jump, and Airy Fairy Lillian, or some other +daisy with winning ways, disturbing the peace of mind of half a dozen +dukes. Mulvaney's all right, but the Duchess! They'll be taking books +of that kind to the mast-head next. What d'y' s'pose I found aft the +other day? Now what d'y' s'pose? I'll bet you'd never guess. No, no. +Well, 'He Loved, but Was Lured Away.' Yes. Isn't that fine stuff for a +fisherman to be feeding on? But whoever was reading it, he was ashamed +of it. 'Well, who owns this thing?' says I, picking up the lured-away +lad. 'Nobody,' speaks up Sam there. Of course he didn't own it--O +no! + +"Violet Vance," went on Clancy, and took another bite of his sandwich. +"Violet Vance and Wilful Winnie and a whole holdful of airy creatures +couldn't help a fisherman when there's anything stirring. I waded +through a whole bunch of 'em once,"--he reached over and took a wedge +of pie from the grub-locker. "Yes, I went through a whole bunch of 'em +once--pretty good pie this, cook, though gen'rally those artificial +apples that swings on strings ain't in it with the natural tree apples +for pie--once when we were laying somewhere to the east'ard of Sable +Island, in a blow and a thick fog--fresh halibuting--and right in the +way of the liners. And I expect I was going around like a man asleep, +because the skipper comes up and begins to talk to me. It was my first +trip with him and I was a young lad. 'Young fellow,' says the skipper, +Matt Dawson--this was in the Lorelei--'young fellow,' says Matt, 'you +look tired. Let me call up the crew and swing a hammock for you from +the fore-rigging to the jumbo boom. How'll that do for you? When the +jumbo slats it'll keep the hammock rocking. Let me,' he says. +'P'raps,' he goes on, 'you wouldn't mind waking up long enough to give +this music box a turn or two every now and then while the fog lasts.' +We had a patent fog-horn aboard, the first I ever saw, and I'd clear +forgot it--warn't used to patent horns. But just another little wedge +of pie, George. + +"However, I suppose when there's nothing doing there's no very great +harm. But we'll try to keep some of you busy to-night. Praise the +Lord, the moon's out of the way and it's looking black already and the +sea ought to fire up fine later on. And there's a nice little breeze +to overhaul a good school when we see one. If any of you are beginning +to think of getting in a wink of sleep then you'd better turn in now, +for you're sure to be out before long. I'm going aloft." + +Clancy climbed up the companionway. Then followed the scraping of his +boot-heels across the deck. Half a minute later, had anybody cared to +go up and have a look, I suppose he would have been discovered +astraddle of the highest block above the forethroat--he and the +skipper--watching out sharply for the lights of the many other vessels +about them, but more particularly straining their eyes for the +phosphorescent trails of mackerel. + + + + +XV + +CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD + + +The men below knew their skipper and Clancy too well to imagine that +they were to be too long left in peace. And then, too, the next man +off watch reported a proper night for mackerel. "Not a blessed star +out--and black! It's like digging a hole in the ground and looking +into it. And the skipper's getting nervous, I know. I could hear him +stirrin' 'round up there when I was for'ard just now, and he hollered +to the wheel that up to the no'the'ard it looked like planty of fish. +'And I callate we ain't the only vessel got eyes for it,' he said." + +"Yes," said his watch-mate, who had just dropped down, "it's nothing +but side-lights all 'round and----" + +Just then came the skipper's voice from aloft. "Tell the boys they +might's well oil up and be ready." The watch did not have to repeat +it--we all heard it below, and fore and aft, in cabin and forec's'le, +the gang made ready. Cards, novels, and all the hot arguments went +by the board, and then after a mug-up for nearly all we slid into +oil-clothes, boots and sou'westers, and puffing at what was probably +to be the last pipeful of the evening, we lay around on lockers and +on the floor, backs to the butt of the mast and backs to the +stove--wherever there was space for a broad back and a pair of stout +legs our fellows dropped themselves, discussing all the while the +things that interested them--fish, fishing, fast vessels, big +shares, politics, Bob Fitzsimmons, John L. Sullivan, good stories, +and just then particularly, because two of the crew were thinking of +marrying, the awful price of real estate in Gloucester. + +By and by, ringing as clear as if he himself stood at the companionway, +came the skipper's voice from the mast-head: "On deck everybody!" No +more discussion, no more loafing--pipes were smothered into bosoms, +and up the companionway crowded oilskins and jack-boots. + +Then came: "It looks like fish ahead of us. Haul the boat alongside +and drop the dory over." + +We jumped. Four laid hands on the dory in the waist and ten or a dozen +heaved away on the stiff painter of the seine-boat that was towing +astern. Into the air and over the starboard rail went the dory, while +ploughing up to the vessel's boom at the port fore-rigging came the +bow of the seine-boat. + +Then followed: "Put the tops'ls to her--sharp now." + +The halyards could be heard whirring up toward the sky, while two +bunches of us sagged and lifted on the deck below. Among us it was, +"Now then--o-ho--sway away--good," until topsails were flat as boards, +and the schooner, hauled up, had heeled to her scuppers. + +"Slap the stays'l to her and up with the balloon. Half the fleet's +driving to the no'the'ard. Lively." + +The Johnnie liked that rarely. With the seventy-five foot main-boom +sheeted in to her rail, with the thirty-seven-foot spike bowsprit +poking a lane in the sea when she dove and a path among the clouds +when she lifted, with her midship rail all but flush with the sea and +the night breeze to sing to her--of course she liked it, and she +showed her liking. She'd tear herself apart now before she'd let +anything in the fleet go by her. And red and green lights were racing +to both quarters of her. + +"Into the boat!" It was the skipper's voice again, and fifteen men +leaped over the rail at the word. Two dropped into the dory and +thirteen jumped from the vessel's rail onto thwarts or netting or into +the bottom of the seine-boat--anywhere at all so that they get in +quickly. As extra hand on deck I had to stand by and pay out the +painter. + +In the middle of it came the skipper sliding down from the mast-head. +"Drop astern, boat and dory," he called out, and himself leaped over +the quarter and onto the pile of netting as into the Johnnie's boiling +wake they went. The thirty-eight-foot seine-boat was checked up a +dozen fathoms astern, and the dory just astern of that. The two men in +the dory had to fend off desperately as they slid by the seine-boat. + +On the deck of the Johnnie were the cook, who had the wheel, and +myself, who had to stand by the sheets. There would be stirring times +soon, for even from the deck occasional flashes of light, marking +small pods of mackerel, could be made out on the surface of the sea. +Clancy, now at the mast-head alone, was noting these signs, we felt +sure, and with them a whole lot of other things. To the mast-heads of +other vessels out in the night were other skippers, or seine-masters, +and all with skill and nerve and a great will to get fish. + +The Johnnie was making perhaps ten knots good now, and with every jerk +the painter of the seine-boat chafed and groaned in the taffrail +chock. The skipper from the boat called for more line. "Slack away a +bit, slack away. We're not porpoises." + +I jumped to attend to the painter just as Clancy's voice broke in from +above: "Swing her off about two points, ease your main sheet and keep +an eye on that light to looard. Off, off--that's good--hold her--and +Joe, slack stays'l and then foretops'l halyards. Be ready to let go +balloon halyards and stand by down-haul. Look alive." + +I paid out some sheet from the bitt by the wheel-box, unbuttoned the +after stays'l tack, jumped forward and loosed up halyards till her +kites dropped limp. + +"Down with your balloon there--and at the wheel there, jibe her over. +Watch out for that fellow astern--he's pretty handy to our boat. Watch +out in boat and dory!" The last warning was a roar. + +The big balloon gossamer came rattling down the long stay and the jaws +of the booms ratched, fore and main, as they swung over. From astern +came the voices of the men in boat and dory, warning each other to +hang on when they felt her jibing. Some of them must have come near to +being jerked overboard. "Why in God's name don't you slack that +painter?" came the voice of the skipper from the boat. + +I leaped to give them more painter, and "Draw away your jib--draw away +your jumbo," came from aloft. Sheets were barely fast when it was: +"Steady at the wheel, George--steady her--ste-a-dy--Great God! man, if +you can't see can't you feel that fellow just ahead? And, skipper, +tell them to close their jaws astern there--water won't hurt 'em. +Ready all now?" + +"Ready!" roared back the skipper. + +"All right. Down with your wheel a bit now, George. Down--more yet. +Hold her there." + +The vessels that we had dodged by this bit of luffing were now +dropping by us; one red light was slowly sliding past our quarter to +port, and one green shooting by our bow to starboard. Evidently Clancy +had only been waiting to steer clear of these two neighbors, for there +was plenty of fish in sight now. The sea was flashing with trails of +them. Clancy now began to bite out commands. + +"Stand ready everybody. In the boat and dory there--is everything +ready, skipper?" + +"All ready, boat and dory." + +Out came Clancy's orders then--rapid fire--and as he ripped them out, +no whistling wind could smother his voice, no swash of the sea could +drown it. In boat, dory and on deck, every brain glowed to understand +and every heart pumped to obey. + +"Up with your wheel, George, and let her swing by. Stea-dy. Ready in +the boat. Steady your wheel. Are you ready in the boat? Let her swing +off a little more, George. Steady--hold her there. Stand by in the +boat. Now then--now! Cast off your painter, cast off and pull to the +west'ard. And drive her! Up with the wheel. More yet--that's good. +Drive her, I say, skipper. Where's that dory?--I don't see the dory. +The dory, the dory--where in hell's the dory?--show that lantern in +the dory. All right, the dory. Hold her up, George. Don't let her +swing off another inch now. Drive her, boys, drive her! Look out now! +Stand by the seine! Stand by--the twine--do you hear, Steve! The +twine! Drive her--drive her--blessed Lord! drive her. That's the +stuff, skipper, drive her! Let her come up, George. Down with your +wheel--down with you wheel--ste-a-dy. Drive her, skipper, drive her! +Turn in now--in--shorter yet. Drive her now--where's that dory!--hold +her up!--not you, George! you're all right--ste-a-dy. Hold that dory +up to the wind!--that's it, boys--you're all right--straight ahead +now! That's the stuff. Turn her in now again, skipper. In the dory +there--show your lantern in the dory and be ready for the seine-boat. +Good enough. Now cover your lantern in the dory and haul away when +you're ready." + +To have experienced the strain and drive of that rush, to have held an +oar in the boat during that and to have shared with the men in the +confidence they gathered--ours was a skipper to steer a boat around a +school--and the soul that rang in Clancy's voice!--why, just to stand +on deck, as I did, and listen to it--it was like living. + +During this dash we could make out neither boat nor dory from deck, +but the flashes of light raised by the oars at every stroke were +plainly to be seen in that phosphorescent sea. Certainly they were +making that boat hop along! Ten good men, with every man a long, broad +blade, and double banked, so that every man might encourage his mate +and be himself spurred on by desperate effort. Legs, arms, shoulders, +back, all went into it and their wake alive with smoke and fire to +tell them they were moving! To be in that?--The middle of a black +night on the Atlantic was this, and the big seine-heaver was throwing +the seine in great armfuls. And Hurd and Parsons in the little dory +tossing behind and gamely trying to keep up! They were glad enough to +be in the dory, I know, to get hold of the buoy, and you can be sure +there was some lively action aboard of her when Clancy called so +fiercely to them to hold the buoy up to the wind, so that the efforts +of the crew of the seine-boat, racing to get their two hundred odd +fathoms of twine fence around the flying school, might not go for +naught. + + + + +XVI + +WE GET A FINE SCHOOL + + +With his "Haul away now when you're ready," Clancy came down from +aloft. He was sliding down evidently by way of the jib halyards, for +there was the sound of a chafing whiz that could be nothing else than +the friction of oilskins against taut manila rope, a sudden check, as +of a block met on the way, an impatient, soft, little forgivable oath, +and then a plump! that meant that he must have dropped the last twelve +or fifteen feet to the deck. Immediately came the scurry of his +boot-heels as he hurried aft. In another moment he stood in the glow +of the binnacle light, and reaching back toward the shadow of the +cook, but never turning his head from that spot out in the dark where +he had last seen the boat, he took the wheel. + +"All right, George, I've got you. A good-sized school, by the looks, +if they got them, and I think they have. Did you see that boat ahead +we near ran into?--the last time we put the wheel down? Man, but for a +second I thought they were gone. I hope no blessed vessel comes as +near to our fellows. And they were so busy rowing and heaving twine +they never saw us, and myself nearly cross-eyed trying to watch them +and our own boat and the fish all the time. Go below, George, she's +all right now, and tell Joe--where is he?--to go below, too, and have +a mug-up for himself. He must be soaked through taking the swash that +must've come over her bow for the last hour. But tell him to come +right up so's to keep watch out ahead." + +I didn't go below, however, but standing by the fore-rigging kept an +eye out ahead. Clancy himself stood to the wheel with his head ever +turned over one shoulder, until he saw the flare of a torch from the +seine-boat. "Good!" he exclaimed. "What there is is safe now, +anyway." + +After that his work was easy. He had only to dodge the lights of other +vessels now, the old red and green lights that had been our neighbors +all that evening, and a few new yellow flares that came from other +seine-boats. So his eyes ranged the blackness and in rings about his +own seine-boat he sailed the Johnnie Duncan. That the crew were quite +a little while pursing up only gave him satisfaction. "A nice school, +Joe, if they got it all," he said, "a nice school of 'em." And after a +pause, "I think I'll stand down and have a look." + +He ran down, luffed, and hailed, "Hi--skipper, what's it like?" + +From the row of figures that were seen to be crowding gunnel and +thwarts and hauling on the seine, one shadow straightened up beside +the smoky torch and spoke. "Can't be sure yet, Tommie, but things look +all right so far. A fair-sized school if we don't lose 'em." + +"Lord, don't lose 'em, skipper, though I think you've got 'em fast +enough now. Sounds natural to hear 'em flipping inside the corks, +don't it? Ought to be hurrying 'em up, skipper--it's getting along in +the night." + +Clancy, very well satisfied, stood away again and continued to sail +triangles around boat and dory. Being now clear of the greater part of +the mental strain his spirits began to lighten. Merely by way of being +sociable with himself he hummed some old ditties. There was that about +the old coaster, the Eliza Jane. I liked to hear him sing that, as, +dancing a one-footed jig-step by the wheel-box, he bumped it out: + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane with a blue foremast + And a load of hay came drifting past. + Her skipper stood aft and he said, 'How do? + We're the 'Liza Jane and who be you?' + + He stood by the wheel and he says, 'How do? + We're from Bangor, Maine--from where be you?' + + "The 'Liza Jane got a new main truck-- + A darn fine thing but wouldn't stay stuck. + Came a breeze one day from the no'-no'-west + And the gosh-darned thing came down with the rest. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di--a breeze from the west-- + Who'd 'a' thunk the truck wouldn't stuck with the rest? + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane left the wharf one day, + A fine flood tide and the day Friday, + But the darned old tide sent her bow askew + And the 'Liza Jane began for to slew. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di--she'd 'a' fairly flew, + If she only could sail the other end to. + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane left port one day, + With her hold full of squash and her deck all hay. + Two years back with her sails all set + She put from Bath--she's sailing yet. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di for a good old craft + She'd 've sailed very well with her bow on aft." + +There was a long story to the Eliza Jane, but Clancy did not finish +it. Maybe he felt that it was not in harmony with that lowering sky or +that flashing sea. Maybe, too, in the waters that rolled and the wake +that smoked was the inspiration for something more stirring. At any +rate he began, in a voice that carried far, an old ballad of the war +of 1812. + +Two or three more stanzas to warm up, and the fight was on. And you +would think Clancy was in it. He laid every mast and yard of the +enemy over the side of her, he made her decks run with blood, and at +the last, in a noble effort, he caused her to strike her flag. + +By the time he had finished that, it happened that we were running +before the wind, and, going so, it was very quiet aboard the vessel. +There was none of the close-hauled wash through her scuppers, nor was +there much play of wind through stays and halyards. It was in fact +unusually quiet, and it needed only that to set Clancy off on a more +melancholy tack. So in a subdued voice he began the recitation of one +of the incidents that have helped to make orphans of Gloucester +children: + + "Twelve good vessels fighting through the night + Fighting, fighting, that no'the-east gale; + Every man, be sure, did his might, + But never a sign of a single sail + Was there in the morning when the sun shone red, + But a hundred and seventy fine men--dead-- + Were settling somewhere into the sand + On Georges shoals, which is Drowned Men's Land. + + "Seventy widows kneeling----" + +A long hail came over the water and a torch was raised and lowered. +"Hi-i--" hallooed the voice. + +"Hi-i-i--" hallooed back Clancy as he pulled down his wheel. You might +have thought he intended to run over them. But no, for at the very +last second he threw her up cleverly and let her settle beside the +boat, from which most of the men came tumbling immediately over the +side of the vessel. Of those who stayed, one shackled the boat's bow +onto the iron that hung from the boom at the fore-rigging, and having +done that, braced an oar between himself and the vessel's run to hold +the boat away and steady while another in the stern of the boat did +the same thing with his oar. In the boat's waist two men hung onto the +seine. + +A section of the cork edge of the seine was then gathered inboard and +clamped down over the vessel's rail, with the mackerel crowded into +the middle part, and the bunt of the seine thus held safely between +boat and vessel. Into this space the sea swashed and slapped after a +manner that kept all in the boat completely drenched and made it +pretty hard for the men in bow and stern to fend off and retain their +balance at the same time. + +And then began the bailing in. Guided by the skipper, who stood on the +break, our big dip-net, which could hold a barrel easily, was dropped +over the rail and in among the kicking fish. A twist and a turn and +"He-yew!" the skipper yelled. "Oy-hoo!" grunted the two gangs of us at +the halyards, and into the air and over the rail swung the dip-net, +swimming full. "Down!" We let it sag quickly to Clancy and Parsons, +who were at the rail. "Hi-o!" they called cheerfully, and turned the +dip-net inside out. Out and down it went again, "He-yew!" and up and +in it came again. "Oy-hoo!" "Hi-o!" and flop! it was turned upside +down and another barrel of fat, lusty fish flipped their length +against the hard deck. Head and tail they flipped, each head and tail +ten times a second seemingly, until it sounded--they beat the deck so +frantically--as if a regiment of gentle little drummer boys were +tapping a low but wonderfully quick-sounding roll. Scales flew. We +found some next morning glued to the mast-head. I never can get some +people to believe that it is so--mackerel scales to the mast-head. + +"He-yew!" called the skipper, "Oy-hoo!" hollered the halyards gang, +"Hi-o!" sung out Clancy and Parsons cheerily at the rail. "Fine fat +fish," commented the men in the seine-boat, the only men who had time +to draw an extra breath. + +Blazing torches were all around us. Arms worked up and down, big boots +stamped, while inboard and out swung the dip-net, and onto the deck +flopped the mackerel. "Drive her!" called the skipper, and "He-yew!" +"Oy-hoo!" and "Hi-o!" it went. Drenched oilskins steamed, wet faces +glowed, glad eyes shone through the smoke flare, and the pitching +vessel, left to herself, plunged up and down to the lift and fall of +every sea. + + + + +XVII + +A DRIVE FOR MARKET + + +Her deck was pretty well filled with mackerel when "All dry," said +Long Steve, and drew the last of the seine into the boat. + +"Then hurry aboard and drop that seine-boat astern. And--whose watch? +Take the wheel--wait till I give you the course--there. But don't +drive her awhile yet. Some of those fish might be washed over. But it +won't be for long." + +"Ready with the ice?" he asked next. + +"All ready," and the men who had been chopping ice and making ready +the pens in the hold stood by to take the mackerel as we passed them +down. + +As soon as we had enough of them off the vessel's deck to make it safe +to drive her, the skipper gave her a little more sheet and let her go +for New York. We hustled the seine-boat aboard too. Some other vessels +must have got fish, too, and there was no time to waste. + +It was a good-sized school and when we had them all iced and +below--more than thirty thousand count--it was time for all hands to +turn in--all but the two men on watch of course. I didn't turn in +myself, but after a mug-up and pipeful below came on deck again. It +was a pretty good sort of a night for a dark night, with a moderate +breeze that sang in your ears when you leaned against the halyards and +a sea that lapped bucketfuls of spray over her rail forward and that +tumbled away in a wide flat hump as our quarter slipped on and left it +behind. + +I found the skipper leaning against the weather rigging and watching a +red light coming up on us. Noticing me he said, "There's that porgy +steamer that we beat out for that school the other day overhauling us +now. There's the beauty of steam. The crew of this one knows more in a +minute than they know in a week about fishing in that steamer, and +we'd be carrying our summer kites when that gang, if they were in a +sailing vessel, would be laying to an anchor; and with our boat out +and their boat out and a school in sight they'd have to take our +leavings. But here's one of the times when they have the best of it." + +There wasn't much wind stirring then, but it promised to breeze up, or +so the skipper thought, and I'm sure I was glad to hear him say it, +for the harder it blew the sooner we would get to New York and the +better our chance to beat the porgyman. First in to market got the +cream. + +It was pretty well on to daybreak when the porgy steamer got up +abreast of us and after a while worked by. One of them took the +trouble to sing out to us when they went by, "Well, you got a school +before us, but we'll be tied up and into the dock and spending our +money ashore whilst you're still along the Jersey coast somewhere." + +And we supposed they would, but Hurd, who was then to our wheel, had +to call back to them, "Oh, I dunno. I dunno about that--it's a good +run to Fulton Market dock yet." And, turning to us, "I hope the bloody +old boiler explodes so nobody'll be able to find a mackerel of 'em +this side the Bay of Fundy. Of course I wouldn't want to see the men +come to any harm, but wouldn't it jar you--them scrubs?" + +The skipper wasn't saying anything. And it meant a lot to him, too. He +was looking after the steamer and, I know, praying for wind. We could +see it in his eyes. + +And sometimes things come as we like to have them. At full dawn it was +a nice breeze with the Johnnie Duncan washing her face in plenty of +good spray and the fine sun shining warm on a fresh sea-way. Another +hour, the wind hauling and still making, the Johnnie was down to her +rail, and awhile after that she was getting all the wind she needed. + +"We may have a chance to try her out on this run, who knows?" said the +skipper. We were coming up on the porgy steamer then and you should +have seen his eyes when they looked from the rail to the deck of his +vessel and from the deck again to aloft. On the steamer the gang were +in the waist watching us coming and they must have been piling the +coal into her below and giving her the jet steadily, for out of her +funnel was coming the smoke in clouds mixed with steam. + +"But their firemen can stoke till they're black in the face and they +won't get more than eleven or eleven and a half knots out of her," +said Clancy. "I know her--the Nautilus--and if this one under us ain't +logging her fourteen good then I don't know. And she'll be doing +better yet before we see New York." + +They were driving the porgyman then, but she was fated. Once we began +to get her she came back to us fast enough, and once she was astern +she troubled us no more. After the porgyman we passed a big white +yacht, evidently just up from the West Indies after a winter's cruise. +She looked a model for a good sailer, but there was no chance to try +her out, for they had her under shortened sail when we went by. + +There was a New York blue-fisherman on our weather bow bound for New +York, too, and the way we went by her was a scandal. And farther on +we drove by a big bark--big enough, almost, to take us aboard. They +were plainly trying to make a passage on her, but we left her too. +Then we passed another yacht, but she wasn't carrying half our sail. +Her hull was as long as ours, but she didn't begin to be sparred as we +were. We must have had ten feet on her main-boom and ten feet more +bowsprit outboard, and yet under her four lower sails she seemed to be +making heavy going of it. It's a good yacht that can hold a fisherman +in a breeze and a sea-way. We beat this one about as bad as we beat +the blue-fisherman. As we went by we tried to look as though we had +beaten so many vessels that we'd lost all interest in racing, and at +the same time we were all dancing on our toes to think what a vessel +we had under us. It was that passage we held the north-bound Savannah +steamer for seven hours. Her passengers stood by the rail and watched +us, and when at last we crowded our bowsprit past her nose, they waved +their handkerchiefs and cheered us like mad. + +"When we get this one loosened up a bit and down to her trim, she'll +sail some or I don't know," said our skipper. He stood in the cabin +gangway then and filled his boots with water, but he wouldn't take in +sail. Back behind us was another seiner. We could just make out that +they were soaking it to her too. The skipper nodded his head back at +her. Then, with one hand on the house and the other on the rail, he +looked out from under our main-boom and across at the steamer. "Not a +rag--let the spars come out of her." + +One thing was sure--the Johnnie was a vessel that could stand driving. +She didn't crowd herself as she got going. No, sir! The harder we +drove her the faster she went. Laying down on her side made no +difference to her. In fact we were not sure that she wouldn't do her +best sailing on her side. But it hadn't come to that yet. She was +standing up under sail fine. Most of them, we knew, would have washed +everything off their deck before that. And certainly there would have +been no standing down by the lee rail on too many of them with that +breeze abeam. + +Going up New York harbor, where we had to tack, the Savannah steamer +could have gone by if she had to, but big steamers slow down some +going into a harbor, and we holding on to everything made up for the +extra distance sailed. The wind, of course, was nothing to what it was +outside, and that made some difference. Anyway, we kept the Johnnie +going and held the steamer up to the Battery, where, as she had to go +up North River, she gave us three toots. The people on the Battery +must have had a good look at us. I guess it was not every day they saw +a schooner of the Johnnie's size carrying on like that. Billie Hurd +had to pay his respects to them. "Look, you loafers, look, and see a +real vessel sailing in." + +There was a sassy little East River towboat that wanted to give us a +tow, but our skipper said it would be losing time to take sail off and +wait for a line then. The tug captain said, "Oh, no; and you can't +dock her anyway in this harbor without a tug." + +"Oh, I can dock her all right, I guess," said our skipper. + +"Maybe you think you can, but wait till you try it, and have a nice +little bill for damages besides." + +"Well, the vessel's good for the damages, too." + +That towboat tailed us just the same, but we had the satisfaction of +fooling him. The skipper kept the Johnnie going till the right time +and then, when the tugboat people thought it was too late, he shot her +about on her heel and into the dock with her mainsail coming down on +the run and jibs dead. + +A couple of East Side loafers standing on the wharf cap-log were +nearly swept away by the end of our bowsprit, we came on so fast. Four +or five of us leaped ashore, and with lines out and made fast in no +time, we had her docked without so much as cracking a single shingle +of the house across the head of the dock. + +We sold our mackerel for nineteen cents apiece. Fifty-seven hundred +and odd dollars was our stock, and about a hundred and forty dollars +each man's share. We felt a little bit chesty after that. We were not +the first to market that year, but we were the first since the early +flurry, and the biggest stock so far that spring was to our credit. + +We stood on the deck and watched the porgy steamer come in and tie up, +too late for that day's market. Some of our fellows had to ask them +where they got their fish--to the s'uth'ard or where?--and two or +three fights came out of it, but no harm done. Then nearly everybody +drew some money off the skipper, and we smoked fifteen-cent cigars and +threw our chests out. We all went uptown, too, and took in the +theatres that night, and afterwards treated each other and pretty +nearly everybody else that we met along the East Side on the way back, +until the policemen began to notice us and ask if we didn't think we'd +better be getting back to our ships. One or two of the crew had to get +into fights with the toughs along the water front, but we were all +safely aboard by three o'clock in the morning. + +All but Clancy. Some of us were trying to get some sleep along towards +morning when Clancy came aboard with a fine shore list. The cook, who +was up and stirring about for breakfast, noticed him first. "It's a +fine list you've got, Tommie." + +"And why not?--and a fine beam wind coming down the street. I'm like a +lot of other deep-draught craft of good model, George--I sail best +with the wind abeam. A bit of a list gets you down to your lines." And +until we turned out for breakfast, after which it was time to be off +and away to the fleet again, he kept us all in a roar with the story +of his adventures. + + + + +XVIII + +A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET + + +Through all of that month and through most of the month of May we +chased the mackerel up the coast. By the middle of May we were well up +front with the killers, and our skipper's reputation was gaining. The +vessel, too, was getting quite a name as a sailer. Along the Maryland, +Delaware, and Jersey coasts we chased them--on up to off Sandy Hook +and then along the Long Island shore, running them fresh into New +York. There were nights and days that spring when we saw some driving +on the Johnnie Duncan. + +Toward the end of May, with the fish schooling easterly to off No +Man's Land and reported as being seen on Georges and in the Bay of +Fundy--working to the eastward all the time--we thought the skipper +would put for home, take in salt, fill the hold with barrels and refit +for a Cape Shore trip--that is, head the fish off along the Nova +Scotia shore, from Cape Sable and on to anywhere around the Gulf of +St. Lawrence, and stay there until we had filled her up with salt +mackerel. We thought so, because most of the fleet had decided on +that plan and because we had been away from home since the first of +April. But no--he stayed cruising off Block Island and running them +fresh into Newport with the last half-dozen of the fleet. + +Our idea of it was that the skipper wanted to go home badly enough, +but he was set on getting a big stock and didn't care what it cost +himself or us to get it. Some of us would have given a lot to be +home. + + "Oh, fine blue sky and a fine blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me," + +was how Clancy put it as he came down from aloft one afternoon and +took the wheel from me. "By the wind is it, Joe?" + +"By the wind," I said--the usual word when seiners are cruising for +mackerel, and I went aloft to take his place at the mast-head. It was +a lazy watch, as the mackerel generally were not showing at this time +in the middle of the day. They seemed to prefer the early morning or +the late afternoon, or above all a dark night. + +Long Steve, who came up this day to pass the time with me aloft, had +been telling me about his old home, when we both noticed the topsails +of what we knew must be the first of a fleet of big schooner yachts +racing to Newport--from New York, no doubt, on one of their ocean +races. Steve, of course, had to try to name the leader, while she was +yet miles away--seiners have wonderful eyes for vessels--and was still +at it, naming the others behind, when the next on watch relieved me +and I went below. + +The first of the yachts was almost on us when I came down, and Clancy +was watching her like a hawk when he turned the wheel over to the next +man. She was as about as big as we were. We knew her well. She had +been a cup defender and afterwards changed to a schooner rig. Our +skipper was taking a nap below at this time, or we supposed he was. He +had been up nearly a week, with no more than a two-hours' sleep each +day, and so was pretty well tired. That was what made Clancy stand by +the wheel and ask if the skipper was still asleep. + +"No," said the skipper himself. He had just turned out, and in his +stocking feet he came to the companionway and looked up. "What is +it?" + +"Here's this big yacht crawling by on our quarter--she'll be by us +soon. I thought you wouldn't like it." + +"I'll be right up. Tell the gang to sway up." + +He drew on his slip-shods and came on deck. He took a look over at the +yacht while we were swaying up. When we had everything good and flat +and trimmed sheets a bit, the skipper called out to take in the +fore-topsail. "She hasn't got hers set," he explained. + +Now, a fore-topsail does not help much--hauled up, as were the Johnnie +Duncan and the yacht, it would be a hindrance to most vessels, and, +perhaps, because it did not help her was why the yacht had not hers +set. But it showed the skipper's fairness. Ours had been left set, +because we might need it in a hurry, and also because with the skipper +below nobody could order it down. Now we clewed it up. + +Clancy, standing aft, threw a look at our seine-boat, which of course +we had in tow. "She's quite a drag," he suggested, "for a vessel +that's racing." + +"Yes," said the skipper, "but wait a while. We won't cast it off +unless we have to." + +We did not have to. We soon had her in trim. For weeks the skipper and +Clancy had been marking the Johnnie's sheets so that in an emergency +they could whip her into her best sailing in no time. With that, and +with the shifting of some barrels of salt that we had on deck, we soon +had her going. It is surprising what a lot of difference the shifting +of a few barrels of salt will make in the trim of a vessel. We had not +had a try with anything for two weeks or so and had become careless. +The last thing we did was to take some barrels of fresh water that +happened to be standing forward of the windlass and shift them aft, +and then the Johnnie began to go along for fair. + +Coming up to Block Island Light things were pretty even. Then it came +a question of who was to go to windward. The yacht hauled her +mainsheet in to two blocks. So did we, and, further, ran a line from +the cringle in her foresail to the weather rigging. She could not make +it--we had her. + +"Mind the time," said the skipper, when at last we had her under our +quarter--"mind the time, Tommie, when we used to do so much racing +down on the Cape shore? There's where we had plenty of time for racing +and all sorts of foolishness. I was pretty young then, but I mind it +well. A string of men on the rigging from the shear poles clear up to +the mast-head--yes, and a man astraddle the main gaff once or twice, +passing buckets of water to wet down the mains'l." + +"Yes, and barrels of water out toward the end of the main-boom keep +the sail stretched. Man, but those were the days we paid attention to +racing." + +"Those were the days," asserted the skipper. "But we can do a little +of it now, too." + +By that you will understand we were walking away from our yacht. We +were to anchor in the harbor while she was still coming, and we had +towed our seine-boat all the way. + +"Lord," said Clancy, as we were tying up our foresail, "but I'd like +to see this one in an ocean race with plenty of wind stirring--not a +flat breeze and a short drag like we had to-day." + + + + +XIX + +MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN + + +Coming on to dark that night a gig put off from the schooner-yacht and +rowed over to us. On the way she was hailed and passed a few words +with a steam-yacht anchored in between. The man in the stern of the +gig was not satisfied until he had been rowed three times around the +Johnnie. When he had looked his fill he came alongside. + +He mistook Clancy for the skipper. I suppose he couldn't imagine a man +of Clancy's figure and bearing to be an ordinary hand on a fisherman. +So to Clancy he said, "Captain, you've got a wonderful vessel here. +Put a single stick in her and she'll beat the world." + +"Yes," said Clancy, "and she'd be a hell of a fine fisherman then, +wouldn't she?" + +The rest of us had to roar at that. We at once pictured the Johnnie +rigged up as a sloop out on the Grand Banks, trawling or hand-lining, +with the crew trying to handle her in some of the winter gales that +struck in there. And a great chance she would have rigged as a sloop +and her one big sail, making a winter passage home eight or nine or +ten hundred miles, when as it was, with the sail split up to schooner +rig, men found it bad enough. + +The master of the yacht had a message for our captain, he said, and +Clancy told him the skipper was below. There they talked for a while +and after the yachtsman had gone Maurice, inviting four or five of us +along, dressed up, called for the seine-boat, got in and was rowed +over to a steam-yacht that we now remembered had hailed the +schooner-yacht's gig. All brass and varnish and white paint and gold +she would be in the daytime, but now she was all lit up with electric +lights below and Japanese lanterns on deck. + +When we came alongside, who should come to the gangway of the yacht +and welcome Maurice but Minnie Arkell--Mrs. Miner. She greeted all of +us for that matter--she never pretended not to see people--and invited +us all below for refreshments. There was a good lay-out there and we +pitched into it. Seiners are great people at table or in a bunk. They +can turn to and eat, or turn in and sleep any minute, day or night. So +now we turned to. Clancy did great things to the wine. Generally he +took whiskey, but he did not object to good wine now and then. He and +one fellow in a blue coat, white duck trousers, and a blue cap that +never left his head, had a great chat. + +"I callate that if he didn't have that cap with the button on front +nobody'd know he was a real yachtsman, would they?" Eddie Parsons +whispered in my ear. + +The owner of the steam-yacht was trying to convince Tommie that +yachting would be more in his line than fishing, but Tommie couldn't +see it. + +"But why not?" he asked at last. "Why not, Mr. Clancy? Is it a matter +of money? If it is, I'll make that right. I pay ordinary hands +twenty-five and thirty dollars a month and found, but I'll pay you +fifty--sixty--seventy dollars a month to go with me. I'm going to race +this steamer this summer and I want a quartermaster--a man like you +that can steer to a hair-line. Seventy dollars a month now--what do +you say?" + +"Come now, my good man, what do you say?" Clancy got that off without +so much as a smile. "But you couldn't make it seventy-five now, could +you? No, I didn't mean that quite, though I've been out the dock in +Gloucester of a Saturday noon and back again to the dock of a Tuesday +noon--three days--and shared two hundred dollars--not as skipper, mind +you, but just as hand. There now, I hope you're not going to get +angry. Hadn't we better have another little touch? But I can see +myself in a suit of white duck, touching my cap, and saying, 'Aye, +aye, sir,' to some slob--no reference to you, mind you--but some slob +in a uniform that's got a yacht, not because he loves the sea, but +because he wants to butt in somewhere--who lives aboard his yacht just +the same as he does in his house ashore--electric bells, baths, +servants, barber and all--and hugs the shore so close that he gets the +morning paper as regularly as when he's at home. When that kind go +yachting all they miss are the tables on the lawn and the automobiles +going by the door. They even have canary-birds--some of them--in +cages. Yes, and wouldn't be caught twenty miles off shore--no, not +even in a summer's breeze for--And where would he be in a winter's +gale? I can see myself rowing a gig with somebody like that in the +stern giving orders and fooling--well, some simple-minded women folks, +maybe, who know as much of the sea as they do of the next world--most +of them--fooling them into believing that he's a devil--yes, a clean +devil on the water. Seventy a month for that?--couldn't you make it +seventy-five?" + +"You don't mean to say that----" + +"Yes," said Clancy, "I do. I'd rather stick to fishing than--but +here's a shoot and let's call the quartermaster's job off." + +Minnie Arkell chimed in here. "A real fisherman, you must remember, +Mr. Keith, doesn't care much for yachting because--leaving out the +question of wages, for he does make more at fishing--he can remain a +fisherman and yet be independent." + +"You mean they don't have to take orders as if they were on a yacht, +Mrs. Miner?" + +"No, no--don't make any mistake there. The discipline of a yacht, so +far as I know it, is baby play to what they have on a good fisherman. +The discipline aboard a warship is nothing to that aboard a fisherman, +like Captain Blake's vessel say, when there is anything to be done. +Fishermen, it's true, don't have to touch their caps and say, 'Very +good, sir,' to a man who may be no more of a real man than themselves. +On your yacht I suppose you'd discharge a man who didn't do what he +was told, and on a warship he would be sent to the brig, I suppose. On +a fisherman he'd be put ashore. On a fisherman they not only obey +orders, but they carry them out on the jump. And why? Because they've +always done it. Why, deep-sea fishermen are always getting into places +where only the best of seamanship can save them, and they very early +get in the way of doing things up quick and right. When a Gloucester +skipper orders in the sail, say in a gale of wind, and more than apt +to be in the middle of the night--you don't see men trying to see how +long it will take them to get into oilskins--or filling another pipe +before they climb on deck. No, sir--the first man out on the bowsprit, +if it's the jib to come in--or out on the foot-ropes, if it's the +mainsail to be tied up--he's the man that will have a right to hold +his head high next day aboard that vessel. And so the crew of a +fisherman jump to their work--if they didn't there'd be a lot more of +them lost than there are." + +"Dear me," said Mr. Keith, "that never occurred to me before. But how +is it, Mrs. Miner, that you have it down so fine?" + +"My father was a Gloucester skipper, and since I was that high"--she +put her hand on a level with her knee--"I've been listening to +fishermen. And yachting life does tend to spoil a fisherman," she went +on to explain. "After a summer of yachting a fisherman will begin to +think that a winter of fishing is going to be a serious thing." She +was warmed up then and went on talking at a great rate. And listening +to her I could understand better why men took to her. She had warm +blood in her. If it were not for her weakness to be admired by men, +she would have been a great woman. "And they get so, that what seems +extraordinary work to you is only an every-day matter to them. Do you +remember that last schooner-yacht race across the Atlantic?--when two +or three reporters went along, and after they got back wrote all kinds +of stories of what a desperate trip it was--how rough it was and +dangerous! Well, that time there were three or four Gloucestermen +making the run to Iceland. Now, they were not as big as the racing +yachts and they were loaded down with all the stores for a long salt +trip--their holds full of salt, for one thing--and yet they made about +as good time to Iceland as that yachtsman made to Queenstown. And they +weren't driving their vessels either--they don't drive on the way out. +It's only coming home that they try to make passages. Now, they must +have got the same weather and yet nobody ever heard them in their +letters home report a word of bad weather, or ever afterward, either. +And yet--but were you to Iceland that time, Maurice?" + +"No," said the skipper, "but you were, Tommie?" + +"Yes," answered Clancy, "in the Lucy Foster. We made Rik-ie-vik inside +of fourteen days, carrying both tops'ls all the way. Wesley--Wesley +Marrs--wasn't hurrying her, of course. As Mrs. Miner says, the vessels +going to the east'ard don't hurry, except now and then when two of +them with records get together. And the Lucy was logy, of course, with +the three hundred and odd hogsheads of salt and other stuff in her. +If we'd been driving her going to Iceland that time we'd have had the +stays'l and balloon to her--and she'd have gone right along with them, +too." + +Mrs. Miner looked around at her yachting friends to see if they were +getting all that. + +"There was one day that passage it blew a bit," exclaimed Clancy. "And +that was the day we thought we saw a fellow to the east'ard. We had +men by the halyards all that day with splitting knives." + +"Why?" asked Keith. + +"Why, to cut before she could capsize." + +"Oh!" said Keith and said it with a little click. + +"But that's nothing. I've seen the gang with Tom O'Donnell standing +watch by the halyards for days with axes when he was making a +passage." + +Minnie Arkell filled another glass of champagne for Clancy, and Clancy +didn't give the fizz too much time to melt away either. + +"These men are the real things," she said, but Clancy, for fear we +were getting too much credit, broke in, "Not us seiners. It's the +winter fishermen--trawlers and hand-liners--that are the real things. +Of course, we lose men now and then seining, but it's in winter up on +the shoal water on the Banks that--there's where you have some seas +to buck against," and he went on to tell of a battle with a gale on a +winter's night on the Grand Banks. Clancy could tell a story as well +as anybody I ever met. He could make the blood jump to your heart, or +the tears to your eyes--or he could chill you till the blood froze. +When he got through you could hear them all breathing--men and women +both, like people who had just run a race. "Two hundred and odd men +sailing out of Gloucester," he said, "went down that night. There +weren't too many came safe out of that blow. The father of this boy +here was lost--the Mary Buckley warn't it, Joe?--named for your +mother?" + +"And my father, too, was lost soon after," said Minnie Arkell, and the +glance she gave me melted a lot of prejudice I had felt for her. That +was the good human side to her. + +"No better man ever sailed out of Gloucester, Mrs. Miner," said +Clancy. + +She flushed up. "Thank you, Tommie, for that, though I know he was a +reckless man." And, she might have added, he left some of his +recklessness in the blood of the Arkells. + +The skipper told them a lot about sea life that night. Some of the +stories he told, though long known in Gloucester, they took to be +yarns at first. They could not believe that men went through such +things and lived. And then the skipper had such an easy way of telling +them. After a man has been through a lot of unusual things--had them +years behind him and almost forgotten them--I suppose they don't +surprise him any more. + +The skipper looked well that night. When he warmed up and his eyes +took on a fresh shine and his mouth softened like a woman's, I tell +you he was a winner. I could not help comparing him with the +steam-yacht owner, who was a good-looking man, too, but in a different +way. Both of them, to look at, were of the same size. Both had their +clothes made by tailors who knew their business and took pains with +the fitting, though it was easy to fit men like Clancy and the +skipper, such fine level shoulders and flat broad backs they had. Now +the skipper, as I say, when he warmed up began to look something like +what he ought--like he did when walking the quarter and the vessel +going out to sea. Only then it would be in a blue flannel shirt open +at the throat and in jack-boots. But now, in the cabin of that yacht, +dressed as he was in black clothes like anybody else and in +good-fitting shoes, you had to take a second look at him to get his +measure. The yachtsman thought that he and the skipper were of about +the same size, and barring that the skipper's shoulders were a shade +wider there wasn't so much difference to look at. But there was a +difference, just the same. The yachtsman weighed a hundred and +seventy-five pounds. He asked what Maurice weighed. "Oh, about the +same," said Maurice. But I and Clancy knew that he weighed a hundred +and ninety-five, and Minnie Arkell, who knew too, finally had to tell +it, and then they all took another look at the two men and could see +where the difference lay. There was no padding to Maurice, and when +you put your hand where his shoulders and back muscles ought to be you +found something there. + +When we were leaving that night, Mrs. Miner stopped Maurice on the +gangway to say, "And when they have the fishermen's race this fall, +you must sail the Johnnie Duncan, Maurice, as you've never sailed a +vessel yet. With you on the quarter and Clancy to the wheel she ought +to do great things." + +"Oh, we'll race her as well as we know how if we're around, but Tom +O'Donnell and Wesley Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen and Sam Hollis and the +rest--they'll have something to say about it, I'm afraid." + +"What of it? You've got the vessel and you must win--I'll bet all the +loose money I have in the world on her. Remember I own a third of +her. Mr. Duncan sold me a third just before I left Gloucester." + +That was a surprise to us--that Mrs. Miner owned a part of the Johnnie +Duncan. It set Clancy to figuring, and turning in that night, he +said--he was full of fizzy wine, but clear-headed enough--"Well, what +do you make of that? The Foster girl a third and Minnie Arkell a third +of this one. I'm just wise to it that it wasn't old Duncan alone that +wanted Maurice for skipper. Lord, Lord, down at the Delaware +Breakwater do you remember that when we heard that the Foster girl +owned a part of this one, I said, like the wise guy I thought I was, +'Ha, ha,' I said, 'so Miss Foster owns a third? That's it, eh?' And +now it's Minnie Arkell a third. Where does Withrow come in? And did +you hear her when she invited Maurice to the time they're going to +have on that same steam-yacht to-morrow night?--that was when she +whispered to him at the gangway, when we were leaving. She tried to +get him to promise to come, and at last he said he would if he was in +the harbor. 'Then be sure to be in the harbor--you're skipper and can +do as you please. Do come,' she said at the last, good and loud, 'and +tell them how to sail a vessel in heavy weather. They only play at it, +so do come and tell them.' And then in a low voice--'But I want you to +come for yourself.' That's what she says--'For yourself,' she +says--in a whisper almost. 'Take a run into the harbor to-morrow night +if you can, Maurice,' she says. O Lord, women--women--they don't know +a thing--no," and Clancy turned in. + + + + +XX + +THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME + + +We were out of Newport Harbor before daybreak of next morning, and +cruised inside Block Island all that day. We all thought the skipper +would be in to Newport that night--it was no more than a two hours' +run the way the wind was--and we waited. + +The test came after supper. We had supper as usual, at three o'clock. +Breakfast at four, dinner at ten, supper at three--mug-ups before and +after and in between. Along about four o'clock the skipper, standing +on the break, stood looking back toward where Newport lay. Had we +turned then we'd have been in nicely by dark. It was a fine +afternoon--the finest kind of an afternoon--a clear blue sky, and a +smooth blue sea with the surface just rippling beautifully. All fire +was the sun and the sails of every vessel in sight looked white as +could be. Several yachts passed us--steam and sail--all bright and +handsome and all bound into Newport, and the skipper's eyes rested +long on them--on one of them particularly with music aboard. + +The skipper looked back a long time--looked back, and looked back. He +began walking the quarter--back and forth, back and forth, back and +forth. The sun got lower and lower, the sea lost some of its blue, and +the air grew fresher, and still he kept looking back. + +"It'll be a grand sunset to-night, Tommie." + +"The finest kind. But one thing wrong with it." + +"What's that?" + +"We're not seeing it astern of us." + +The skipper stopped. "Astern? That's so, too--it _is_ a fine westerly, +isn't it?" + +Clancy said nothing, only leaned against the rigging, not a move out +of him--puffing his pipe and looking away. + +Nobody spoke till the skipper spoke again. + +"Who's to the wheel--you, Steve? How's she heading now?" + +"No'the by west." + +"No'the by west? Put her east by no'the--ease off your mainsheet. Let +it go to the knot. Call the gang and make sail--stays'l and +balloon--everything--we'll go home, I guess." + +Clancy snapped the pipe out of his mouth and hove it over the rail. +Then he went for the forec's'le gangway. In two jumps he was there. + +"Up, you loafers--on deck and make sail. 'To the east'ard,' says the +skipper, and over the shoals we'll put her to-night." + +"Home! Home--good enough--and hurroo!" we could hear from below. + +The skipper said nothing more--only all night long he walked the +quarter. + +Next day when we were almost abreast of Cape Cod Clancy began to +instruct me. "Here's a tip for any girl friends you got, Joe. See the +skipper last night? Tell them if they're after a man--a real man--even +if he's a bit shy--tell them--" Oh, the advice that Clancy could +give! + +About the time that we left Cape Cod light astern and squared away for +Thatcher's--with Gloucester Harbor almost in sight--with the rocks of +Eastern Point dead ahead--Clancy began to sing again: + + "Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me-- + Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree-- + Who wouldn't a Gloucester seiner be? + +Ha, Joey-boy?" and gave me a slap on the shoulder that sent me +half-way to the break. + +That was all right, but I went aloft so I could see the rocks of Cape +Ann a mite sooner. I was just beginning to discover that I had been +almost homesick. + + + + +XXI + +SEINERS' WORK + + +We were high line of the seining fleet when we got home from the +Southern cruise and we felt pretty proud of ourselves. It was +something to stand on the corner on one of the days when the Johnnie +was fitting out again, and have other fellows come up to you and say, +"What's that they say you fellows shared on the Southern trip?" And +when we'd tell them, and we trying not to throw out our chests too +much, it was fine to hear them say, "That so? Lord, but that's great. +Well, if Maurice only holds out he'll make a great season of it, won't +he?" + +"Oh, he'll hold out," we'd say, and lead the way down to the Anchorage +or some other place for a drink or a cigar, for of course, with the +money we'd made, we naturally felt like spending some of it on those +who were not doing so well. And of course, too, no seiner could ever +resist anybody who talks to him in a nice friendly way like that. + +The skipper's doings ashore interested all of his crew, of course, +although me, perhaps, more than anybody else, unless it was Clancy. I +got pretty regular bulletins from my cousin Nell. She was for the +skipper, first, last and all the time. + +"I like him," she said to me more than a dozen times. "I do like him, +but I never imagined that a man who does so well at sea could shrink +into himself as he does. Why, you almost have to haul him out by the +ears ashore. If it weren't for me I really believe--" and she +stopped. + +But I thought I understood what she meant. "Meaning your chum, Alice +Foster?" I said. + +"Yes, meaning my chum, Alice Foster. Why?" + +"Oh, I don't know. Sometimes I think she's a kind of a frost." + +"No, she isn't a frost, and don't you come around here again and tell +me so." + +Nor did I, for I would not have an argument with Nell for all the +Alice Fosters in the world, for if Nell were anybody else but my first +cousin, I think I would have fallen in love with her myself. + +And then we put out to sea and again we were living the life of +seiners, having it hard and easy in streaks. There were the times when +we went along for a week and did not do a tap but eat, sleep, stand a +trick at the wheel, a watch to the mast-head, and skylark around the +deck, and read, or have a quiet game of draw or whist or seven-up +below. But again there were times when we were on fish, and our +skipper being a driver, it was jump, jump, jump for a week on end. +There was that time in August when the fish were so plentiful on +Georges Bank, when, standing to the mast-head, you could see nothing +but mackerel schooling for fifteen or twenty miles either side of the +vessel. But, oh, they were wild! A dozen times we'd heave the +seine--put off from the vessel, put out that two hundred and odd +fathom of twine, drive seine-boat and dory to the limit, purse in--and +not so much as a single mackerel caught by the gills. That happened +fifteen or twenty times some days, maybe. We got our fill of sets that +month. But then again there was a week off Cape Cod and in the Bay of +Fundy and off the Maine coast when we ran them fresh to Boston market, +when we landed more mackerel it was said in a single week than was +ever landed before by one vessel. We were five days and five nights +that time without seeing our bunks. It was forever out and after them, +heave the seine, purse up and bail in, ice some, and dress the rest +along the way, and the vessel with everything on driving for Boston. + +We stood to it that week, you may be sure, until coming on the fifth +day some of us fell asleep over the keelers as the Johnnie was coming +into T Wharf. I remember that I could just barely see in a kind of a +hazy way the row of people along the cap-log when we made fast. And +yet after that we had to hoist them out of the hold and onto the dock. +That day, going out again, the skipper made all but the watch and +himself turn in. That afternoon, when everybody had had a little kink, +the skipper himself, who had been under a heavier strain than any of +us, suddenly fell backward over the house and sound asleep. And there +he lay all the rest of that day and that night. + +After ten or twelve hours of it we tried to wake him, but not a budge. +We tried again, but no use. At last he came to and without any help at +all. Sitting up, he asked where we were, and being told, he said +nothing for a moment or so, and then suddenly--"That so? How long was +I asleep?" We told him--seventeen hours. "Good Lord!" he groaned, and +after a mug-up scooted for the mast-head like a factory hand with the +seven o'clock whistle blowing. "He's a fisherman, the skipper," said +the gang as they watched him climb the rigging. + +And he was a fisherman. All that summer he drove things with but +little time for us ashore. Twice he put into Gloucester with a day to +ourselves and another time we had a chance to run down after we had +put into Boston for market, and that we suspected was because the +skipper found he could not keep away himself any longer. Things, we +judged, were going pretty well with him in Gloucester. He did not +pretend any longer now that he was not interested in Miss Foster, and +from my cousin Nell I got occasional hints, most of which I confided +to Clancy, who explained them as if they were so many parables. + +"It'll be all right," said Clancy, "if only Minnie Arkell stands +clear. I'm glad she's away for the summer, but she'll turn up in the +fall. You'll see her just before the race large as life, and some of +her swell-dressed friends, and a yacht, I'll bet." + +Considering how deeply the skipper was interested in Miss Foster, some +of us thought he ought to be putting in a little time ashore between +trips. After a run into the Boston fresh fish market, say, we would +have liked mighty well to take in the theatre, or a trip to the beach, +or some other little entertainment of a night. But no, it was in and +out--drive, drive, drive. + +He was all ambition, the skipper. He was going to be up front or break +something. Miss Foster was one of the ambitious kind, too. If she was +going to have a fisherman, he would have to be a killer or she would +know why. And so I suppose that had a lot to do with the way the +skipper drove things. + +We had our loafing spells, as I say, but mostly it was plenty of work. +That time when we stayed awake for five days and nights was not the +only one. Another time our legs swelled up and the blood came out of +the ends of our fingers with standing up to the keelers and dressing +fish without rest. But, Lord, nobody minded that. After we'd got +rested up we felt better than ever. + +We had good luck generally. We lost neither men nor gear to amount to +anything that summer. That seine we lost trying for our first school +to the s'uth'ard in the spring was the only bit of misfortune that +came, and we had long ago made up for that. But others were not so +lucky. There was the loss of the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley's vessel. I +think I have said that she was a fast vessel. She was fast--fast, but +of the cranky type. We were jogging along a little to windward of her +one fine afternoon--it had been a fine September day and now it was +coming on to evening. To the westward of Cape Sable, in the Bay of +Fundy, it was, and no hint of a blow up to within a few minutes of the +time when the squall struck the Ruth. I suppose it would have been +more prudent on Pitt's part if he had had less sail on, but like most +of the skippers in the fleet I guess he was not looking for any record +for prudence. Any minute he might have to be up and driving her, and +keeping sail on was the quickest way to have it when you needed it in +a hurry. The squall hit her--it hit us, too, but we saw it coming and +met it and beyond washing a few keelers overboard, when she rolled +down, no harm was done to the Johnnie. On the Ripley, I suppose, they +saw it too, but the Ripley and the Duncan were not the same class of +vessel by any means. She went over--hove down, with her foremast under +water to the cross-trees almost. + +Most of her crew were below at the time, some in their bunks. Four or +five of those below never reached the deck at all--the water rushing +down the companionways cut them off. Some rushed aft where the stern +was high out of water and some piled into the rigging. Some were +calling out and giving advice to others. We could hear them plainly. +Two jumped to the wheel and threw it up, but she would not right. + +We had the Johnnie to keep right side up, but we saw the whole thing. +It could not have been more than two or three minutes from the time +the squall struck her when she was going down head-first. Those of her +crew who had gone to the stern were going with her, but those who had +taken to the rigging, by leaping wide came clear. Their seine-boat, +which had been towing astern, might have been of use to them, but +being fast to the vessel by the painter it was pretty well filled with +water before anybody had a chance to cut the painter. The man that +cut it went down with the vessel. He was all right, whoever he was. +Those in the water were looking about for the dory, and found that +half full of water, too. They were trying to bail the water out of the +dory, after hauling it across the bow of the submerged seine-boat, +when we got them in our seine-boat and picked up what was left of +them. + +Nine of them were lost, her skipper among them. One of the men +saved--the cook--said that when the squall struck the vessel, Captain +Ripley had been seen to jump for the boom tackle, which he unhitched, +and then to spring for the lashings of the dory, which he cut with his +knife. The cook also said that he thought the skipper lost his life +because of the half-stunning blow that he must have received from the +fore-boom while he was on the rail trying to free the dory. The vessel +was sinking all the time and it being dark--or near it in the +squall--I suppose Captain Ripley could not watch everything. No doubt, +it was the fore-boom hit him and knocked him overboard. Certainly he +was knocked overboard, and the last seen of him he was swimming and +pushing an empty barrel before him to one of the crew. "Keep your +nerve up," he called to the cook, and after that he suddenly +disappeared. He got a man's death, anyway. + +We rowed back to the Duncan with the survivors. Nine men gone--it was +a hard story to take home with us, but we had it to do. It was all a +part of fishing life, and so we put back for Gloucester. + + + + +XXII + +ON THE CAPE SHORE + + +While we were into Gloucester, after taking home the crew of the Ruth +Ripley, our vessel was put on the ways. That was after a talk between +the skipper and Mr. Duncan. There is always something that needs +attending to on a fisherman, and this time it was our water-tanks. And +while they were being looked after, the Johnnie was overhauled, her +bottom scrubbed and topsides painted. Old Mr. Duncan, we found, was +beginning to take a lot of pride in our vessel and balked at no +expense to have her in trim. And now that the Ripley was lost, he +would have only two vessels to represent him in the big fishermen's +race, which was then only four weeks away. + +"Hurry up home now," he said to Maurice as we left the dock that time. +"Hurry up, and give yourself plenty of time to tune her up and get her +in trim for the race. I've set my heart on it. You or the Lucy Foster +must win that race, and whatever else we do we've got to beat +Withrow's vessel, anyway." + +And Miss Foster said that one of her guardian's vessels would have to +win the race, and my cousin Nell said that the Johnnie Duncan would +have to win. There was a lot depending on it, she said. It meant a lot +to Will Somers, I suppose Nell meant. + +We figured that we had time to make a Cape shore trip, and, with fair +luck, to fill the Johnnie with salt mackerel and be back in time to +get her in good condition for the race, which this year, because it +was anniversary year in Gloucester, promised to be the greatest ever +sailed. + +Our plans were somewhat interfered with by a rescue we made. We found +a Glasgow bark, New York bound, in the Bay of Fundy, and her crew in +hard straits. We stood down and after a lot of trouble took them +off--Clancy and Long Steve in the dory. Billie Hurd came near being +the second man in the dory, but Clancy, grabbing him as he had one +foot over the rail, hauled him back with, "Way for your elders, little +man," and jumped in beside Long Steve. + +"Elders, but not betters," said Hurd. + +"Have it your own way," answered Clancy, "but I go in the dory." + +The rescue was really a fine thing, but the important thing was that +some of the rescued men had been exposed to the battering of the sea +so long that they needed medical attention, and so we drove for +home--and cracked our foremast-head doing it. That delayed us almost a +week, for the skipper had to have that spar just so. A lot might +depend on it, same as the rest of the gear. And it was a spar--as fine +a bit of timber, Oregon pine of course, as was ever set up in a +fisherman. And maybe that too was just as well, with the race coming +on. + +By the time we were down the Cape shore--down Canso way--and among the +fleet again, we had lost a week. Our hold was still to fill up, and +only two weeks and a day to the race. Wesley Marrs, Tom O'Donnell, Sam +Hollis, and the rest were then talking of going home and making ready +for the race. Bottoms would have to be scrubbed, extra gear put +ashore--a whole lot of things done--and a few try-outs in the Bay by +way of tuning up. + +The race was the talk of all the fleet. Half the crews on the Cape +shore wanted to be in Gloucester when the race came off, and some of +the skippers of the slower vessels, which would not enter because they +had no show to win, were already scheming to be home just before the +race so that they could be on hand to follow it. + +The morning after we were back among the fleet we got a small school +right from under the eyes of the Lynx, one of the English cutters +which were patrolling the coast to see that we didn't get any fish +within the three-mile limit. I remember that while we were satisfied +at the time that we were outside the line, we did not know what the +revenue-cutter might say, and particularly the Lynx, whose captain had +a hard name among our fleet for his readiness to suspect law-breaking +when there wasn't any. The cutter people generally seemed to want to +be fair toward us, but this Lynx's captain was certainly a vindictive +cuss. Anything hailing from Gloucester was an abomination in his eyes. +And so this morning, when, after we had decided that we were outside +the limit, and made ready to set, it was hard to have to take the +order of the Lynx and sheer off. Our judgment of distance ought to +have been as good as his--better, really, we thought it, because we +were always judging distances at sea, and more at home upon the sea, +too. But that made no difference--what the cutter people said had to +be law for us. + +So this time he ordered us not to set where we were or he'd seize our +vessel. Several Gloucester vessels had been confiscated just before +this and the owners had to pay the fine to recover them. One owner +disputed the judgment and his case was then waiting settlement. +Another who refused to pay saw his vessel turned into a lightship and +placed down Miramichi way in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where it is +yet. This day the commander of the Lynx might have some reason to +think that his order ended that for us--and we could almost see him +chuckling--but it didn't. A fog was creeping up at the time and in ten +minutes it was on us, and under cover of the fog we got a little +school--the same school we thought and on the exact spot where the +cutter was lying when she ordered us off. Didn't we cackle though when +we bailed it in? Oh, no! It was not much of a school--only twenty +barrels--but it made us all feel fine. Not alone did we feel that we +had got the better of the English cutter, but also that luck was +coming to us again. We justified ourselves by saying that we honestly +believed we were outside the three-mile limit, and that our judgment +was as good as theirs. + +That night the forec's'le of the Johnnie Duncan presented one of the +most beatific scenes I ever saw. Everybody was in the temper of an +angel. There was nothing doing--no whist at the table, no reading out +of upper bunks, no love song from the peak, and no fierce argument on +the lockers. We were discussing the cutters and the talk was very +soothing. The cook, as usual, was finishing up a batch of dough. You +might have thought he was the only man who had been working in a week, +were it not for the wet oil-clothes hanging up to dry, and the +overhauling of second suits of oil-clothes by some of the gang. Every +man, except the cook, who never smoked while at work, was puffing away +as if he misdoubted he would ever get another chance for a pipeful in +his life. "Harmony most ex-quis-ite," said somebody, and that's what +must have been that hung over the forec's'le, and it seemed to be +merely in keeping with the heavenly order of things that the +atmosphere showed pale blue wherever the rays of the lamp could get a +chance to strike through. + +When Clancy dropped down for his usual mug-up before going to the +mast-head for the night of course, he wasn't going to let that get by +without having a word to say about it. He leaned against the foremast +and took a look around. "My soul, but it's as if the blessed angels +were fanning their wings over this forehold. There's Brian Boru and +Lord Salisbury there double-banked on the same locker, and nothing +doing on any Irish question. There's the lad that sleeps in the peak +and not a single hallelujah of praise for his darling Lucille. The +other one--the wild man that sings the Bobbie Burns songs--not a +shriek out of him. And Bill and John no longer spoiling their eyesight +on bad print. I expect it's that little school of fish--the first in +two weeks or more. The prospect must be making you all pleased. Well, +it ought. A few hundred barrels of that kind of mackerel--as fine +fish as ever I see bailed over the rail. And some of you ready +reck'ners ought to easily figure up what'll be coming to us if we ever +fill her up--say five hundred barrels. A good thing--a few hundred +barrels of mackerel. A few too many of 'em for good trim, but it's +comforting to know they're there. She seemed to be in pretty nice trim +when we tried out one or two of the fleet this morning, didn't she? +And to-night, if it breezes up--and it looks now as if it will--we'll +get some more--if it's a night like last night. One time there last +night--did you notice her, cook?--that time that crazy lad started to +cross our bow and we luffed her. Why, man, she shot over like I don't +know what--just shot like one of those torpedo boats we see around +when the Navy goes evoluting. I was near shook overboard from aloft. +They tell me they're going crazy over the race in Gloucester. Well, +here's one that'll bet his summer's earnings----" + +"What's left of it, you mean, Tommie," said George Moore from his pan +of dough. + +"Well, yes, what's left of it--and what I c'n borrow. Old man +Duncan'll stake me, and there's others. I hope, though, it blows a +jeesly gale. For this one, God bless her, she c'n sail, and some of +them'll find it out--when it's too late, maybe. Sam Hollis for one. +There's a man I'd give my eye almost, to beat. And maybe the +skipper hasn't got it in for him! He doesn't say much, Maurice +don't, but a while ago, after coming down from aloft, Billie Simms +hails him and tells him that the cutter people know all about that +little school to-day--and who told him, who told him? Well, the +skipper'll drive this one to the bottom before he ever lets Sam +Hollis or any of Withrow's vessels get by him when we race. Yes, sir. +But, Georgie-boy"--Clancy shouldered away from the foremast--"how +is it for a wedge or two of one of those blueberry pies you got +cooling there? Just a little wedge, now. But you don't need to be +too close-hauled with your knife--no. Sailing by the wind is all +right when you're jogging in and out among the fleet, and nothing +partic'lar doing except an eye out for mackerel, but you want to +give her a full always--always, Georgie--when you're cutting pie. +There's the lad--straight across the beam. And now at right angles +again. And now lay one atop of the other, and you have it--an +invention of my own--a blueberry sandwich. M-m--but look at the +juice squish through her scuppers!" He held it up for all of us to +have a look. "Now another little wash of coffee in the wake of that +and I'll be all right for a fine little watch aloft." + +He jammed his sou'wester hard down, and heroically waved away the +remainder of the pie. "No, no. First thing I know I'll be having +dyspepsia. I never had it yet, but I might," and then heaved himself +up the companionway, humming, as he went, one of his old favorites: + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane and the Maria Louise + Sailed a race one day for a peck of peas. + You'd hardly believe the way them two + Carried sail that day--they fairly flew. + + People ashore they said, 'Gee whiz! + The 'Liza Jane the fastest is.'" + +We could hear him scrambling, still humming, over the barrels on deck. +He halted long enough by the rail to say, "How is it, boys?" to the +watch on deck, and then swung himself up the rigging. Once aloft he +had his work cut out, with hours of strain on brain and nerve. But +Clancy never minded--he never minded anything so far as we could make +out. + + + + +XXIII + +DRESSING DOWN + + +That night was the worst I ever put in towing astern of a vessel. +"Owling" is the seiners' word for that kind of work. It was "owling" +sure enough, with the seine-boat on a short painter and the dory on a +shorter painter still and astern of the seine-boat again. We came near +to being lost in the dory. Mel Adams, who was in the dory with me, +thinking she was surely going to capsize one time she rode up over the +stern of the seine-boat, took a flying leap into the seine-boat. He +had a hard time getting back, for there was quite a little sea on. +Even in the seine-boat they were all glad enough to hear Clancy give +the word to cast off and pull after the school. + +It was a big school, and hard work in that sea, but we had them safe +at last. The vessel then came alongside and the bailing in began. +Having had a good long lay-off we bailed them in with plenty of +good-will. It was "He-yew!" "Oy-hoo!" "Hi-o!" and "Drive her!" all +along the line until we had on deck what the skipper thought was a +hundred barrels. Then the bag was put around the seine to protect the +rest of the mackerel from dogfish and sharks, and we were ready to +dress. + +Barrels were tossed out of the hold, keelers set up, sharp-edged +knives drawn from diddy-boxes below, and a chance had to see a smart +crew dressing a haul of mackerel that were to be salted. It was too +long a run, four hundred miles or so, to take a chance of getting them +fresh to market. It needed a fair and fresh breeze to be sure of it, +and besides with the market for salt mackerel getting stronger all the +time it was good judgment to salt down and fill her up before going +home. + +We had been through the same thing before, even with as good a +deckload, but now we were getting near the end of the season. This +trip, then the race, and maybe one more trip after the race, and we +would be done seining. And so we drove things. + +Four gangs of four men each took corners in the waist. Each gang had +two keelers--yard square boxes, eight inches or so in depth, and set +up on two or three barrels. Into the keelers the mackerel on deck were +bailed and around them the men gathered, with long-handled torches set +up all about. + +All hands came into the dressing--skipper and cook too--and the work +went on. It was one gang against the other, each jealously counting +barrels when they were filled, that full credit might be given for +speed. Sixteen men were accounted for in this way. The seventeenth and +eighteenth were to keep the keelers filled, draw water for pickle from +over the side, roll the filled barrels out of the way--in short, to +help out generally. + +It was fine to watch the splitters. One left-handed grab and the +mackerel was in place; flat and smooth, one right-handed slit and he +was laid open the length of his back. Forty-five mackerel a minute +either the skipper, Clancy or Moore could split--that is, pick them +up, place in position, split from nose to tail along the back, and +slide out of the way again. Sixty a minute they could do in spurts, if +somebody would place the mackerel in rows for them. + +The busiest man of all was the skipper. He had to keep an eye out for +the course of the Johnnie. Vessels that are dressing fish, vessels on +which the entire crew are soaked in blood, gills, intestines, and +swashing brine, might be allowed privileges, one might think; but no, +they must keep a lookout just the same. On this dark night, the +Johnnie Duncan, though making a great effort--considering that she had +jibs down and wheel in the becket--to stay as she was put, yet would +fall away or come-to, especially when the wind shifted two or three +points at a jump. And just as soon as she did the skipper would +notice it instantly, jump aft and set her right. Generally, to shift +the wheel a few spokes would be enough, but now and then he would have +to give the wheel a good round whirl. At such a time he would sing out +a warning, the torches would be lowered, we would duck our heads, the +boom would go swinging by in the smoky yellow glare, and the Johnnie +Duncan would be off on another tack. We would brace our legs to a new +angle, the skipper would hop back to his knife, and again the dressing +would go humming along. + +When we had the first hundred barrels of mackerel swashing in brine, +the rest of them, perhaps another hundred barrels, were bailed in. And +all night long like that we stood to it driving. Under the yellow and +smoky light of the torches I could see nothing but mackerel or the +insides of mackerel in the air. Keelers, deck, rail, our hands, faces, +boots and oilskins were sticky with the blood and gurry. At top speed +we raced like that through the night. Once in a while a man would drop +his knife or snap off his gibbing mitt, rinse his hand in the brine +barrel by his side, slap his hand across the hoops, and condemn the +luck of a split finger or a thumb with a fish-bone in it. Another +might pull up for a moment, glance up at the stars or down at the +white froth under the rail, draw his hand across his forehead, +mutter, "My soul, but I'm dry," take a full dipper from the +water-pail, drink it dry, pass dipper and pail along to the next and +back to his work. + +When the cook called out for breakfast we were still at it, with the +deck of the vessel covered with barrels of pickling mackerel. It was +beginning to get light then. "Oh, the blessed day's coming on. Smother +the torches, boys," said the skipper, and led the way below for the +first table to have a bite. + +Before the sun came up we were beginning to make out the rest of the +fleet. One after another they were coming into view, their long hulls +and high spars reaching across the wind. Between the gray sky and the +slaty sea their white sails looked whiter than chalk. + +We had to name the different vessels then. "There's Tom O'Donnell--and +Wesley Marrs--and Sam Hollis--and--" sung out Andie Howe. + +"Sam Hollis--where's Sam Hollis?" broke in Mel Adams. + +"Away to the east'ard, ain't it, Andie?--the fellow with jibs down?" +spoke up Billie Hurd, who was a bit proud that he too could pick her +out at such a distance. + +"So it is, ain't it?" said Mel, and he began to tell our troubles in +the dory. "'Twas him near ran over us last night--remember, Joe? +Leastways, it looked like Hollis's new one's quarter goin' by. He was +pointin' 'bout no'the-east then, but he couldn't 've held on that +tack long or he'd be somewhere up by Miquelon and not here this +mornin'--the gait he was goin'. Man, but there was smoke coming out +of his scuppers when he went by. 'Why don't y' come aboard whilst +you're about it--come aboard and be sociable,' I hollers. 'Oh, don't +cry, y' ain't hurted,' says whoever's to the wheel of her. Least it +sounded like that, 'Y' ain't hurted,' he says." + +"Must have been pretty close, Mel?" said Clancy, never stopping, but +keeping a string of split mackerel rolling into his keeler. Mel and I +were gibbing for Clancy. + +"Close? I could've touched his chain-plates like that," and Mel, +getting excited, reached his mittened hand across the keeler and +touched Clancy on the arm. Clancy's knife took a jump and cut a +finger. For a few seconds Clancy laid down the law of a splitting +knife to Mel, but Mel didn't mind. + +"That's just about the way I swore at the man to the wheel of the +Withrow. Didn't I, Joe? Yes, sir, I cert'nly swore at him good, but it +no more jarred him than--but when their seine-boat came by, half of +'em smokin', some half-breed among 'em has to sing out, 'Y'ought to +hang up a riding light if your vessel's hove-to,' he says. What do you +think of that, Tommie--'if your vessel's hove-to!'--and if the Johnnie +was going one she was going ten knots an hour." + +"That's right, Mel--I heard you to the mast-head," said Clancy. Clancy +heard it about as much as old Mr. Duncan back in Gloucester did, but +he was always ready to help a man out. + +"Did you? Well, I hove-to him. I hove the bailer at him, that's what I +did, and he ducked. But he ducked too late, I callate, for 'Bam!' it +caught him--or somebody in the seine-boat with him. He swore some, or +somebody swore, you c'n bet. 'I don't know who y'are,' he hollers, +'but if ever I meet you ashore,' and he was so far away then I +couldn't ketch no more of it. 'Don't know who y'are, but if I ketch +you ashore'--Lord----" + +"So, if a lad with a bump on the side of his head waltzes up to you on +Main Street and whangs you, Mel, next time you're ashore in +Gloucester, what'll you do?" asked Clancy. + +"I'll say, 'Where's that bailer, you loafer?' but first I'll whang him +back. I had to finish the bailing out with my sou'wester. I sings out +to Andie Howe in the boat here to hand me one of the bailers in the +boat. 'I'm usin' my hat,' I hollers, 'and Joe's using his sou'wester,' +thinkin' that would fetch him all right. 'Well, we're usin' ten +sou'westers here,' says Andie, 'and one or two of 'em leaks,' and that +was all the satisfaction I got." + +"Yes," said Eddie Parsons, "the seine-boat was sure wallerin' then. +The skipper had only just told Jimmie Gunn to quit his growling. +'You'll be wanting hot-water bags to your feet next, I suppose,' says +the skipper." + +"I was thinking of the boat--afraid she'd be so logy with the water in +her that we couldn't drive her when the time came," bristled up Jimmie +Gunn to that. + +"Y-yah!" snorted Eddie, "if you weren't scared, then I never saw a man +scared. Logy? I notice we made her hop along all right after we cast +off from the vessel. Man, but she fair hurdled some of them seas--some +of the little ones, I mean. Didn't she, Steve? We thought we'd lost +Joe and you, Mel, in the dory, didn't we, fellows?" + +"You did, hey? Well, you didn't, nor nowheres near it," broke in Mel. +"We were right there with the goods when they hove the seine, warn't +we, Joey?" + +And so it went on through all that day, while the men worked, +dressing, salting, and putting all in pickle. It was a drive all +through without any quitting by anybody, except when it was time to +relieve lookouts at the mast-head. In the middle of it all, had the +call of "School-O!" been heard from aloft, we would have been only too +glad to drop everything, jump into the boat and dory, get after the +mackerel, and do the same thing over--split, gibb and pack away--for +all of the next night, and the night after that--for a week if +necessary. + +Not until well into the afternoon, when the last mackerel was +flattened out in its barrel, did any of us feel that we could step +back in our own time, straighten ourselves out, and take a look over +our work. Then we counted the oozing barrels with great satisfaction, +you may be sure, even while we were massaging our swollen wrists with +our aching fingers. It was a good bit of work that, well and quickly +done, and it was fine to get a rest after it, although it might be +only for a little while. Even though we had to do it all over +again--to stay half-drowned and chilled through in the seine-boat or +dory for half the night and then dress down for eighteen or twenty +hours on top of it--what did a little hard work matter? "Think of the +hundred-dollar bill, maybe, to be carried home and laid in the wife's +lap," said Long Steve. + +"Or the roaring night ashore when a fellow's not a family man--m-m--!" +said Eddie Parsons. Eddie was not a family man. + + + + +XXIV + +THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN + + +We certainly were feeling pretty good along about that time, and we +felt better when next day, cruising in and out among the fleet, other +crews began to take notice of our catch. By that time the word had +gone around. One after another they came sailing up--as if to size us +up was the last thing that could enter their heads--rounding to, and +then a hail. Something like this it went: + +"Hulloh, Maurice." + +"Hulloh, Wesley," or George Drake, or Al McNeill, or whoever it might +be. + +"That's a mighty pretty deckload of fish. When'd y'get 'em?" + +"Oh, twenty barrels yesterday morning and the rest last night." + +"That so? How many d'y'call 'em, Maurice?" + +"How many? Oh, two hundred and eighty or ninety wash barrels. Ought to +head up about two sixty." + +"That so? Fine, Maurice, fine. As handsome a deckload as I've seen +this year." + +And he would bear off, and another vessel would come and go through +the same ceremony. It was very satisfying to us and the skipper must +have felt proud. Not that a lot bigger hauls had not been made by +other men before--indeed, yes, and by the very men perhaps who were +complimenting him. But three hundred barrels, or near it, in pickle at +one time does look fine on a vessel's deck, and they looked especially +fine at this time because there was not another vessel in the fleet +that had half as many, so far as we knew. + +Not another but Sam Hollis--or so he claimed. He came ranging up that +same day and began asking how the Duncan was sailing lately, and +followed that up by saying he himself had two hundred odd barrels in +the hold. He showed about sixty wash barrels on deck. We did not +believe he had twenty below. She looked cork light. "If she sets as +high out of water with two hundred and forty barrels, then you ought +to put two hundred and forty more in her and she'd fly," called out +Clancy to Hollis, and that was pretty much what we all thought. + +And 'twas Sam Hollis made trouble for the Duncan that day. He bore off +then but came back in the afternoon. More talk there was, and it wound +up by our racing with him. We did not start out to race, but +gradually, as we found ourselves jogging along side by side, jibs +were drawn away and sheets began to be trimmed. The first thing we +knew we found ourselves swaying up sails, and then before we really +woke up to it we were both off and away before a little breeze. + +Hollis had all the best of it. He was bound to, with the Duncan +carrying most of her mackerel aft and away down by the stern. Even had +we had time to--we did shift some of it forward--we were too deep for +any kind of racing in that moderate breeze. We said that to ourselves, +anyway, and yet we held on. But it was no use--it wound up by Hollis +giving us a scandalous beating. And after running away from us he kept +straight on to the westward, and by that we knew that he was bound for +Gloucester to get ready for the big race. + +The skipper felt it. He was one that took things to heart. + +"I've been bragging about this one--what she could do. I told the old +man only the last time we were in that he could go broke that I'd beat +Sam Hollis, and here the first time we come together he makes her look +like a wood-carrier. The best thing I can do, I guess, is to keep out +of the race; maybe it will save the old man some money. I expected +he'd beat us, the trim we were in--but to beat us the way he did!" + +Nothing the crew could say seemed to make him think otherwise, and +that night it was not nearly so joyful below in the Johnnie Duncan. +The talk was that she would not go home for the race. Only Clancy +seemed to be as cheerful as ever. "Don't any of you get to worrying," +he said. "I know the skipper--the Johnnie Duncan'll be there when the +time comes." + +Yet next morning when Wesley Marrs went by us with the Lucy Foster +bound for home and sang out, "Come along, Maurice, and get ready for +the race--we'll have a brush on the way," our skipper only waved his +hand and said, "No--this old plug can't sail." Wesley looked mighty +puzzled at that, but kept on his way. + + + + +XXV + +TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS + + +Next day after, in a calm, Clancy and I had to take the dory and row +out among the fleet for some salt. The skipper thought it likely that +some of the vessels that were going home might have salt to spare. He +doubted if he himself would have enough in case we struck another good +school. So we rowed out. We went from one vessel to another without +any luck, until we found ourselves aboard Tom O'Donnell--the Colleen +Bawn. And just as we got aboard a school showed near by her, and they +made a dash for it. The Colleen was pretty well inshore then, and yet +safe outside the three-mile limit in our judgment. Even in the +judgment of one of the Canadian revenue cutters, the Mink, she was +outside the limit. "You're all right, go ahead," her commander sang +out from the bridge. + +Yet trouble came of it. The Colleen's gang were making a set when +along came the Lynx, the same cutter that had ordered our own skipper +not to set two or three days back in the fog, and we had set in spite +of him. I think I said that he had a bad reputation among our fleet. +In this case some said afterwards that he had been watching the Duncan +since that time, and having seen a dory put out from her and go aboard +Tom O'Donnell, that he then had a special watch for O'Donnell. Anyway, +we know that as the Colleen Bawn's crew were pursing in the seine he +came along and ordered them to cast loose the fish. "You're inside the +limit," said this fellow now. + +"I may be, but I don't think so," said O'Donnell to that. + +"You're inside and you know it." + +"You're a liar if you say I know it." + +O'Donnell had had trouble with the Lynx before, and had small patience +with her captain. More words came out of it, and while they were +talking back and forth another of the fleet a mile to the east'ard put +out a boat. + +The cutter went after him, her captain singing out as he went, "You +wait here till I come back." "Wait like hell!" said O'Donnell, "and +this breeze making," and continued to purse up. Pursed up, the fish +aboard--there were forty or fifty barrels--he started off. One of +those sudden breezes were springing up and it promised to be wind +enough to suit anybody. We made out the Johnnie Duncan bearing down, +intending no doubt to take off Clancy and me. But the cutter was +coming toward us then, and O'Donnell said we had better stay aboard +or we would be picked up on the way by the cutter's people and maybe +get the Duncan and our skipper into trouble. That last--the thought +that our skipper or the vessel might get mixed up in it--kept us +aboard the Colleen Bawn. + +The Lynx could steam as fast as any cutter they had on the Cape shore +at that time, but the Colleen was a witch and O'Donnell a wonder at +sailing her. So we stayed with O'Donnell and watched him and the +cutter have it out. They had it, the cutter letting drive a shot every +once in a while. The first shot, I remember, went whistling by the ear +of one of O'Donnell's crew who was standing back-to in the waist, and +so astonished him, he not expecting it, that he fell into the +forehold. He raised a great racket among a lot of empty barrels. The +fall never hurt him, but the things he said when he came on deck +again! O'Donnell made him lie flat--and then all of us but Clancy, who +refused to lie down but compromised by leaning over the house and +watching the cutter and making comments on her actions for the benefit +of the rest of us. Through it all O'Donnell stood to the wheel and the +nearest he came to honoring the cutter by a compliment was when he'd +half turn his head, spit over the rail and swear at her. The wind and +sea-way together were too much for the cutter. The Colleen left her +behind, and she at last drew off after bunching a few farewell shots. + +O'Donnell then hove-to and took his seine-boat on deck. He had been +towing it the wrong end foremost for the whole forty miles, and he was +worried over it. "It's strained her maybe--and she almost a new boat," +he lamented. "For the rest I don't care. That lad had it in for me all +along. The other one though, he's decent--never bothers a man without +a little reason. I was going home anyway for the race, and so it don't +matter. I suppose Maurice will be along soon, Tommie? Did you see him +coming after the cutter--he held her fine and he in no trim. What's it +they say about Hollis beating the Johnnie yesterday? If he did, be +sure he was specially prepared, and the Johnnie had an off-day. But I +suppose he'll be holding on now for Gloucester?" + +Clancy said maybe, but no telling, and explained how it had been--the +skipper's discouragement after Hollis had beaten him. + +O'Donnell said he was foolish to worry over a thing like that. "I know +Sam Hollis," he said--"'twas a trap he laid for Maurice. He's got a +smart vessel in the Withrow, but he can't run away from Maurice. No, +nor beat him I doubt--with both in trim. But wait a while--let the day +of the race get near and Maurice to thinking it over, and you'll see +him flyin' home." + +We hoped so. For ourselves we went home on the Colleen. There was +nothing else for us to do. We had quite a time of it that trip with +O'Donnell. He sailed about five hundred miles out of his way--away to +the eastward and s'uth'ard. There might be cruisers and cutters galore +after him, he said--they might put out from Halifax, or telegraph +ahead--you couldn't tell what they might do, he said, and so he sailed +the Colleen out to sea. But we came across the Bay one dark night +without side-lights, and reached Boston all right. O'Donnell had a +suit of sails stowed away in an East Boston wharf that he wanted to +get out for the race. And also he didn't like his new foremast and was +going to have a new one put in if there was time. + + + + +XXVI + +THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER + + +Clancy and I went home by train, reaching Gloucester as the first of +an easterly gale set in. There we found it was nothing but talk of the +race. We had not reached Main Street at all before Clancy was held up. +Clancy, of course, would know. Where was Maurice Blake? What were we +doing in Gloucester and the Johnnie not in? The Duncans--especially +the elder Mr. Duncan--Miss Foster, my cousin Nell, and Will Somers +were boiling over. Where was Maurice Blake? Where was the Johnnie +Duncan? Everybody in town seemed to know that Sam Hollis had given us +a bad beating down Cape shore way, and the news had a mighty +discouraging effect on all Maurice's friends, even on those of them +who knew enough of Sam Hollis not to take his talk just as he wanted +them to take it. Withrow's vessel had beaten the Johnnie Duncan with +Maurice Blake sailing her--they had to believe that part of it, and +that in itself was bad enough. Sam Hollis's stock was booming, you may +be sure--and the race right close to hand, too. + +"That little beating the Johnnie got didn't lose any in the telling by +Sam Hollis and his gang, did it, Joe?" said Clancy to me, and then he +went around borrowing all the money he could to bet the Johnnie Duncan +would beat the Withrow in the race. But would Maurice now enter at +all? I asked Clancy about that part--if there was not a chance that +Maurice might not stay down the Cape shore way and let the race go. +But he only laughed and said, "Lord--Joey-boy, you've a lot to learn +yet about Maurice in spite of your season's seining along with him." + +It was a Monday morning when Clancy and I reached Gloucester. The race +was to be sailed on Friday of that same week. For several days before +this, we were told, Wesley Marrs, Sam Hollis, Tommie Ohlsen, and the +rest of them had been out in the Bay tuning up their vessels like a +lot of cup defenders. Never before had fishermen given so much +attention to the little details before a race. The same day that we +got home they were up on the ways for a final polishing and primping +up. They were smooth as porcelain when they came off. And coming off +their skippers thought they had better take some of the ballast out of +them. "'Tisn't as if it was winter weather"--it was the middle of +September then--"with big seas and driving gales," was the way Wesley +Marrs put it, and they all agreed that the chances were ten to one +that the wind would not be strong enough to call for the heavy ballast +they carried. Fishermen, of course, are built to be at their best when +wind and sea are doing their worst, and so the taking out of ballast +for a September race looked like good judgment. So about forty tons of +ballast were taken out of most of them--the Lucy Foster, the Withrow, +the Nannie O, and half a dozen others. + +That looked all right, but on Tuesday night an easterly gale set in, +the wind blowing forty-odd miles an hour. All day Wednesday it blew, +and all day Thursday even harder, with a promise of blowing harder +still on Friday, which was to be the day of the race. The people of +Gloucester who had been praying for wind, "Wind for a fisherman's +race--wind--wind," seemed likely to get what they wanted. + +On Thursday I saw Tommie Ohlsen and Wesley Marrs in conference on the +street. Wesley had his nose up in the air, sniffing the breeze. He +shook his head with, "Tommie, I ought to've let the ballast stay in +the Lucy. It looks like it's going to be the devil's own breeze for +vessels that ain't prepared for it." + +"Yes," said Ohlsen, "wind fifty-two mile an hour the weather man says, +and still making. That's bad for light ballast and whole sail. If we +could only put the ballast back----" + +"Yes--if we could. But we can't put it back now--there ain't time to +do it right and everybody would laugh at us too. And besides, if we +did, all the others would put it back, and where's the difference?" + +"Of course," said Tommie, "but if all of us would put it back it would +make a better race." + +In view of the reputation of Wesley Marrs and Ohlsen and O'Donnell and +their vessels, we could not understand the confidence of Withrow and +his people in Sam Hollis. He had a great vessel--nobody doubted it. +But it was doubted by many if she was the equal of some of the others, +and few believed she was better. And Sam Hollis was not the man to +carry the sail, or at least the fishermen of Gloucester generally did +not think so. But Withrow and Hollis's gang kept on bragging and they +backed their bragging up, too. I drew what money I had saved that +summer out of my seining share--two hundred and twenty-five +dollars--and bet it myself with one of the Withrow's crew that the +Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow, whether the Johnnie was home to +race or not. It was really betting against Withrow himself, who, it +was said, was taking up every bet made by any of the Withrow's crew. +That was Thursday afternoon, and still no word of the Duncan. + +"Good for you, Joey," said Clancy when he heard of that. "Even if +Maurice don't come it's better to lose your money and shut them up. +But don't worry--he'll come. Do you think he's been standing and +looking at this easterly--it's all along the coast to Newf'undland I +see by the papers--and not swing her off? He's on his way now, and +swinging all he's got to her, I'll bet. Wait and see." + +"My," said my cousin Nell, "and so you bet your pile on the Johnnie +Duncan whether she's in or not?--and if she don't reach here in time +you lose it all?" and told it all over to her Will Somers, to whom I +learned she was now engaged. And from that time on I noticed that +Alice Foster beamed on me like an angel. + +Minnie Arkell was home for the race just as Clancy had prophesied. She +had come with some of her friends down from Boston three or four days +before this, in the same steam-yacht she had been aboard of at Newport +in June. Meeting me she asked me about our passage home on the Colleen +Bawn, and I told her of it. She listened with great interest. + +"Is Tom O'Donnell as fine-looking as he used to be--with his grand +figure and head and great beard? I remember some years ago I used to +think him the finest-looking man I ever saw." + +I told her that I guessed she'd think him fine-looking yet if she'd +seen him to the wheel of the Colleen Bawn with the six-pound shot +whistling by him, and he never so much as letting on he knew they were +there. Her eyes shone at that. Then she offered to take any bets I +made off my hands. "You can't afford to take your little savings out +of the bank and bet it on a vessel that may not be here in time. I'll +take it off your hands--come!" + +That was an attractive side to her--caring but little for money--but I +wasn't letting anybody take my bets off my hands. I still believed +that Maurice would be home, though that was seven o'clock Thursday +evening. I knew he would be home if he only guessed that his friends +were betting on his vessel--and they not even knowing whether she was +to be home in time for the race. And if he weren't home, I was ready +to lose my little roll. + + + + +XXVII + +IN CLANCY'S BOARDING-HOUSE + + +From Minnie Arkell, whom I met at the door of her own house, I went to +Clancy's boarding house. I did not find Clancy then and I went off, +but coming back again I found him, and a very busy man he was, with an +immense crock of punch between his knees. He was explaining down in +the kitchen to the other boarders--fifteen or twenty of the +thirstiest-looking fishermen I ever laid eyes on--just how it was he +made the punch. The bowl was about the size of a little beer keg. + +"On the night of last Fourth of July," he was saying--"and I mind we +came in that morning with a hundred and seventy-five barrels we got +off Mount Desert--that night I warn't very busy. I gets this +crock--four gallons--let you all have a look--a nice cold stony crock +you see it is, and that they'd been using then in the house here for +piccalilli--and a fine flavor still hanging to it. Wait a minute now +till I tell you. It'll taste better, too, after you hear. And into the +crock I puts two gallons of rum--fine rum it was--for a bottom. Every +good punch has to have a bottom. It's like the big blocks they put +under a house by way of a foundation, or the ballast down near the +keel of a vessel--there'd be no stiffening without it, and the first +good breeze she'd capsize, and then where'd you be? Now, on top of +those two gallons--it was two o'clock in the morning, I mind, when I +started to mix it--whiskey, brandy, and sherry--no, I can't tell what +parts of each--for that's the secret of it. A fellow was dory-mate +with me once--a Frenchman from Bordeaux--told me and said never to +tell, and I gave my oath--down in St. Peer harbor in Miquelon it +was--and afterwards he was lost on the Heptagon--and of course, never +being released from the oath, I can't tell. Well, there was the rum, +the whiskey, the brandy, and the sherry--and on top o' that went one +can of canned pine-apple--canned pine is better than the pine-apple +right out of its jacket. Why? Well, that's part of the secret. Then a +dozen squeezed lemons and oranges. Then some maraschino. I'd got it +off an Italian salt bark skipper in the harbor once. On top o' that I +put one quart of green tea--boiled it myself--it was three in the +morning then, I mind--and I sampled a cup of it. Wait now--wait. Just +ease your sheets and let me tell it. Here's the best part of it. I +takes that crock with the fourteen quarts of good stuff in it and +lowers it to the bottom of the old well out in the yard with a lot of +cold round little stones above and below and more little stones packed +all around and then I lowers down two good-sized rocks on top o' +that--and nails boards over the well--that's why nobody could get into +that well all this summer. Well, that was the morning after the last +Fourth of July--I mind the sun was coming up over the rocks of Cape +Ann when I was done. And that was July, and now the last of +September--three months ago. A while ago in the dark and a howling +gale--you all see me come in with it, didn't you? Yes, if you go out +quick, you c'n see the well just where I left it--I goes out and digs +it up--and here it is--and now it's here, we'll all have a little +touch in honor of to-morrow, for it's a great day when the wind blows +fifty or sixty miles an hour so that fishermen can have good weather +for a race." + +And they all had a little touch. Clancy sat on the table with the +crock between his feet and bailed it out while they all agreed it was +the smoothest stuff that ever slid down their throats. There was not a +man in the gang who was not sure he could put away a barrel of it. + +"Put away a barrel of it?" whispered Clancy--"yes. Let's get out +of here, Joe. In an hour they'll be going into the air like +firecrackers." + + + + +XXVIII + +IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN + + +We left Clancy's boarding house and went over to old Mrs. Arkell's +place, where most of the skippers who were going to race next day had +gathered. Clancy at once started in to mix milk-punches. And he sang +his latest favorite, with the gang supping his mixture between the +stanzas: + + "Oh, hove flat down on Quero Banks + Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks, + And the way she was a-settlin' was an awful sight to see"-- + +Then Wesley Marrs sang a song and after him Patsie Oddie followed with +a roarer. + +The punch-mixing, singing and story-telling went on and in the middle +of it Tom O'Donnell came driving in. He was like a whiff of a +no'the-easter out to sea. "Whoo!" he said. "Hulloh, Wesley-boy--and +Patsie Oddie--and Tommie Ohlsen--and, by my soul, Tommie Clancy again. +Lord, what a night to come beating down from Boston! What's that, +Wesley?--did the Colleen outfoot the cutter down the Cape shore way? +Indeed and she did, and could do it over again in the same breeze to +half their logy old battleships. Into Boston I was Monday morning, and +the fish out of her the same morning. Tuesday I took her across to +Cape Cod, tuning her up, and into Provincetown that night. Next day it +was blowing pretty hard. A fine day for a run across the Bay, I +thinks, and waits for maybe a Boston vessel, one of the T Wharf fleet. +For I'll go to Boston, I thinks, to put the Colleen on the railway +to-day, because maybe in Gloucester I may have to wait--or may get no +chance at all--with half a dozen or more that will be waiting to be +scrubbed for the race. And who comes along then but Tom Lowrie. +'Waiting for me?' he asks, and I tells him I was hoping it would be +the new Whalen vessel. 'Here's one that's as good as any Whalen +vessel,' he says--'as good as anything out of Boston--or Gloucester,' +he says. So across the Bay we had it out. And, gentlemen, I'm telling +you the Colleen sailed--all the wind she wanted. She came along, and +Lowrie--by the looks of things then--he's sailing yet. Well, I never +did like that forem'st that was in the Colleen, and so, thinks I, +here's a chance to test it--and why not, with the race coming on? So I +jibed her over off Minot's just--and sure enough it cracked about ten +feet below the mast-head." + +"You were satisfied then, Tom?" + +"Sure and I was. And better before the race than in the race. And next +day--that's to-day--we spent putting in a new stick. I had to take +what I could get to save time, and I don't think it's what it ought to +be and maybe it won't last through to-morrow. But, anyway, you want to +have an eye out for the Colleen to-morrow, for I'm telling you I never +see her sail like she did yesterday coming across the Bay. Ask Tom +Lowrie next time you see him. Well, to-night I had to beat down here +to be sure and be here in time, and so out we put--and here I am. +Blowing? Indeed and it is. And thick, is it? Standing on her +knight-heads and looking aft you c'd no more than make out her +side-lights. We came along, and Boston inner and outer harbor crowded +with vessels, steamers and sail, waiting for it to moderate so they +c'd put out. A blessed wonder it was we didn't sink somebody--or +ourselves. Outside we went along by smell, I think, for only every +once in awhile could we see a light. One time we almost ran into +something--a fisherman it must have been, for I s'pose only a +fisherman would be going in on a night like this--out of a squall of +snow and blackness she came--man alive! but, whoever she was, she was +coming a great clip. Winged out and we didn't see her till the end of +her bowsprit caught the end of our main-boom--hauled in we were to two +blocks--and over we went on the other tack--yes, sir, over on the +other tack. Thinks I, ''Tis a new way to jibe a vessel over.' And the +end of her fore-boom all but swept me from beside the wheel and over +the rail as she went by--she was that close. And I sings out to her, +'Won't you leave us your name so I can thank you next time we meet?' +but Lord, not a word out of him. He kept on to Boston, I suppose, and +we kept on to Gloucester, and here I am." + +"And the Colleen, Tom--she's all right?" + +"Right, man? Watch her to-morrow. Barring that forem'st being too +light--but whoever looked for a breeze like this?--two days and three +nights now and blowing harder all the time. But never mind, she'll +make great going of it to-morrow. Divil take it, but we'll all make +great going of it. Tommie, dear, what's in the bowl? Milk? Man, but +don't be telling me things like that--and the one thing the doctors +warn me against is heart-trouble. Ah, milk-punch--that's better, man. +A wee droppeen. Look at it--the color of the tip of a comber in twelve +fathom of water and a cross-tide. Well, here's to every mother's son +of us that's going to race to-morrow. May ye all win if the Colleen +don't--all but you, Sam Hollis. But where's he gone--into the other +room? Well, if he was here 'twould be the same. He's got a vessel +that can sail. Let him sail her to-morrow and win, if it's in her--or +in him. But a thousand dollars--and outside my house and vessel, Lord +knows, it's all the money I've got in the world--beyond my house and +vessel--a thousand dollars the Colleen beats the Withrow. Hello, +there--what d'y'say, Sam Hollis--the Colleen and the Withrow--a +thousand dollars, boat for boat. But where the divil is he? Gone? Are +you sure? Gone! But a queer time to leave a party--just when it's +getting to be real sociable." + +"Never mind the betting now, Tom," spoke up Wesley Marrs. "Let the +owners have that to themselves. And according to accounts some of them +are having it. Fred Withrow and old Duncan are ready to go broke over +the race to-morrow. Whichever loses, he'll remember this race, I'm +thinking. Here's hoping it won't be Duncan. So to the devil with the +betting, Tom. Some of us have bet all we could afford--some of us more +than we could afford, I callate. Let's have a song instead, Tom." + +"Anything to please you, Wesley," and O'Donnell began to sing. He +started off first with his + + "Oh, seiners all and trawlers all," + +but Alec McNeill and Patsie Oddie interrupted. "Oh, give us the other +one, Tom--the Newf'undland and Cape Shore Men." + +"Ha!" laughed O'Donnell, "it's the mention of your own you want--you +and Patsie there. Well, it's all one to me. Any man from any place, so +long as he's a fair man and a brave man, and Lord knows ye're both +that. Well, here's to you both--a wee drop just, Tommie--easy--easy," +and he began: + + "Oh, Newf'undland and Cape Shore men, and men of Gloucester town, + With ye I've trawled o'er many banks and sailed the compass + roun'; + I've ate with ye, and bunked with ye, and watched with ye all + three, + And better shipmates than ye were I never hope to see. + I've seen ye in the wild typhoon beneath a Southern sky, + I've seen ye when the Northern gales drove seas to mast-head + high, + But summer breeze or winter blow, from Hatt'ras to Cape Race, + I've yet to see ye with the sign of fear upon your face. + + Oh, swingin' cross the Bay + Go eighty sail of seiners, + And every blessed one of them a-driving to her rail! + + There's a gale upon the waters and there's foam upon the sea, + And looking out the window is a dark-eyed girl for me, + And driving her for Gloucester, maybe we don't know + What the little ones are thinking when the mother looks out so. + Oh, the children in the cradle and the wife's eyes out to sea, + The husband at the helm and looking westerly-- + When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's + blood foam? + Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home. + + West half no'the and drive her, we're abreast now of Cape Sable, + It's an everlasting hurricane, but here's the craft that's able-- + When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's + blood foam? + Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home. + + Oh, the roar of shoaling waters and the awful, awful sea, + Busted shrouds and parting cables, and the white death on our + lee; + Oh, the black, black night on Georges when eight score men were + lost-- + Were ye there, ye men of Gloucester? Aye, ye were--and tossed + Like chips upon the water were your little craft that night, + Driving, swearing, calling out, but ne'er a call of fright. + So knowing ye for what ye are, ye masters of the sea, + Here's to ye, Gloucester fishermen, a health to ye from me. + + And here's to it that once again + We'll trawl and seine and race again; + Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; + And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!' + We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,' + And all together let us go beneath the ocean's roar." + +I never again expect to hear a sea song sung as Tom O'Donnell sang it +then, his beard still wet with the spray and his eyes glowing like +coal-fire. And the voice of him! He must have been heard in half of +Gloucester that night. He made the table quiver. And when they all +rose with glasses raised and sang the last lines again: + + "And here's to it that once again + We'll trawl and seine and race again; + Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; + And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!' + We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,' + And all together we shall go beneath the ocean's roar----" + +any stranger hearing and seeing might have understood why it was that +their crews were ready to follow these men to death. + +"The like of you, Tom O'Donnell, never sailed the sea," said Patsie +Oddie when they had got the last ro-o-ar--"even the young ladies come +in off the street to hear you better." + +He meant Minnie Arkell, who was standing in the doorway with her eyes +fixed on O'Donnell, who had got up to go home, but with Wesley trying +to hold him back. He was to the door when Minnie Arkell stopped him. +She said she had heard him singing over to her house and couldn't keep +away, and then, with a smile and a look into his eyes, she asked +O'Donnell what was his hurry--and didn't he remember her? + +In her suit of yachting blue, with glowing face and tumbled hair, she +was a picture. "Look at her," nudged Clancy--"isn't she a corker? But +she's wasting time on Tom O'Donnell." + +"What's your hurry, Tom?" called Wesley. "Another song." + +"No, no, it's the little woman on the hill. She knew I was to come +down to-night and not a wink of sleep will she get till I'm home. And +she knows there'll be bad work to-morrow maybe and she'd like to see +me a little before I go, and I'd like to see her, too." + +"She's a lucky woman, Captain O'Donnell, and you must think a lot of +her?" Minnie Arkell had caught his eye once more. + +"I don't know that she's so awfully lucky with me on her hands," +laughed O'Donnell, "but I do think a lot of her, child." + +"Child? to me? But you don't remember me, Captain?" + +"Indeed, and I do, and well remember you. And it's the beautiful woman +you've grown to be. But you always were a lovely child. It's often my +wife spoke of you and wondered how you were. She's heard me speak of +your father a hundred times, I know. A brave man your father, girl. +And she'll be glad to see you any time, little girl--or the daughter +of any fisherman lost at sea. If ever you have a blue day, go to her, +for 'tis she has the heart--and, God bless her, an extra weakness for +orphans. Her own children some day--there's no telling. But good-night +to you, dear"--he patted her head--"good-night all. Wesley, Tommie, +Patsie--all of ye, good-night. In the morning we'll have it out." Out +the door he went, and I fancied there was almost a blush on Minnie +Arkell's face. + +Tom O'Donnell was the kind of a man a fellow would like to have for a +father. + + + + +XXIX + +MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME + + +From Mrs. Arkell's we walked back to Clancy's boarding house. Clancy +wanted to see how they made out with the punch. We found several of +them up in the wind, and so no great danger of them. But two or three +of them, Dave Campbell particularly, were running wild. "Boomed out +and driving," said Clancy, and began to remonstrate with Dave on the +evils of intemperance. He went on quite awhile, but Dave showed no +signs of remorse. "Wait and I'll fix him," said Clancy, and obeying a +motioning with his head two or three of the sober ones followed him +out. + +He led the way to the wood-shed next door where there was a goat, and +the goat we carried up three flights of stairs to Campbell's room. He +was a big, able goat, and we had quite a time to get him up stairs. At +last we got him tied to the post of Campbell's bed. Then we went down +stairs to the kitchen and Clancy persuaded Campbell to go up stairs to +bed, which after awhile he did. It was not yet morning and there was +no light in the bedroom. We took our position on the landing outside +where we could hear everything that went on in Campbell's room, which +was just at the head of the stairs. + +Dave went in and we could hear him falling over something in the dark. +"What's it?" we could hear him, and acting as if he was feeling +around. Taking off our shoes we crawled nearer. We could barely make +out his shadow in the dark, but we could easily hear him talking to +himself. "What's it? Eh, what?" He must have been feeling the horns +then, and the goat must have butted him. Again, and once more, for out +the door and down the stairs went Dave. We ran in and cut the goat +loose and down he went after Dave. The whole three flights they +raced. + +"He's got me at last," hollered Dave, bolting into the kitchen, +slamming the door behind him and bracing himself against it. + +We took the goat and put him back in the wood-shed and came back to +the kitchen by way of the window. Dave, who was still braced against +the door, did not know but what we had been in the kitchen all the +time, and that gave Clancy a fine chance to take up his lecture on +intemperance just where he had left it off,--at the very beginning. +"Intemperance, Dave, is an awful thing. You'll have to be doing +something for it soon, I think. Yes, when the devil himself gives you +a call it's time to do something. You'd better come with me and take +the pledge. Come up now to Father Haley." + +"I'm a Pres--a Pres--a Pres--by--ter--ian, Tommie." + +"Well, come with me to your church then--any church at all. What's the +odds, so long's you reform. Here, we'll do it right here now. Come, +hold up your hand," and then and there Clancy was about to get Dave to +promise not to look a glass of liquor or punch in the face for a year +again, when who comes bouncing in but Eddie Parsons. + +"Hurroo!" said Clancy, forgetting Dave and grabbing Eddie by the +shoulder, "and the Duncan's home?" + +"She is," said Eddie, "and four hundred and fifty barrels of mackerel +coming out of her hold. A dozen lumpers getting 'em out from both +holds and two at a lick they're coming onto Duncan's Dock. And what +d'y'think, Tommie----" + +"But what kept you so long, man? We've all been getting heart disease +waiting for you." + +"I know. We ought to've been in yesterday mornin', or in the +afternoon at the latest, for we swung her off Tuesday night +midnight--plenty of time with a fair wind. But on Wednesday afternoon, +coming like a race-horse--wung out--we sighted a dory and two men in +it signalizing. Astray they were, and we took 'em aboard, and all +that night we stood by. And warn't it chafing? Oh, no! Daylight came +thick and we waited for it to clear, keeping the horn goin'. It +lifted and we got another dory, but it was late afternoon then. +Then their vessel came along with all the others accounted for, and we +turned over our two and went on our way. And maybe she didn't come! +Oh, no! Blowing? A living gale all the time, but the skipper kept her +going. You'd hardly b'lieve if I told you where we was yesterday +afternoon and we here now. A no'the-easter and a howler all the way. +At four o'clock we passed in by the bell-buoy. Man, such a blow! +Are we in the race, you say? Are we! And oh, the skipper says for you +and Joe to be down after breakfast. We all knew you'd get home and be +all right with Tom O'Donnell. So be down after breakfast--the skipper +will be looking for you both. But say, let me tell you. What +d'y'think? Coming into the harbor a while ago who d'y' s'pose was +out in the stream with a lighter alongside his vessel? Who but Sam +Hollis and the Withrow. Yes, and the gang putting ballast back in +her." + +"No?" + +"Yes. And some one of them sees us going by in the dark. And we did go +by, too! 'Lord!' says somebody--'twas Withrow himself--'but if that +don't look like the ghost of Maurice Blake's vessel!' 'Yes,' hollers +back the skipper--and they must've been some surprised to hear +him--'and the ghost'll be with you to-morrow in the race. Yes,' the +skipper says, 'and we're all ready for it. Four weeks since we've been +on the ways and maybe a scrubbing wouldn't hurt her, but if it keeps +a-blowin' who'll mind that? Not the Johnnie.' Oh, Tommie, if you'd +seen her comin' across the Bay of Fundy yesterday afternoon and last +night. Did she come?--did she come? Lord--O Lord----" + +"And so that's Withrow--got his vessel tuned up like a fiddle and +now he's putting extra ballast in her. Blast him and Hollis for +schemers!" said Clancy. "And that's how it comes they're so ready +to bet--stiffenin' her so stiff for to-morrow that they know +something'll happen to the others first. But the Johnnie's a bit +stiff, too--and there's no ballast out of her. And, as the skipper +says, maybe we ain't been on the ways for a few weeks now, but Lord, +the Johnnie ought to be able to drag a few little blades of sea-grass +on her hull in this breeze. And so we're in the race, heh? Dave, I +can't stop to give you the pledge now-- + + Oh, the Johnnie Duncan fast and able, + Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel." + +And Clancy was the joyful man as he awoke the echoes in the gray of +that stormy morning. + + + + +XXX + +THE MORNING OF THE RACE + + +I don't think that the people of Gloucester will ever forget the +morning of that race, which, they will still tell you, was the only +race ever sailed. Wind was what the fishermen wanted, and they got +it--wind, and sea with it. The admiral of the White Squadron, then at +anchor at Rockport Harbor, just around the Cape, stood on the bridge +of his flagship that morning and looked out to sea. Somebody told him +that the fishermen were going to race that day. He took another look. +"Race to-day? Pooh! they'll do well to stay hove-to to-day." Of +course, that ought to have settled it, the admiral having said it. + +It blew that day. Leaving home I had time for a bite to eat and a +wash-up. I turned the corner and picked up Clancy, with Maurice Blake, +Tom O'Donnell and Wesley Marrs just ahead. We ran into Mr. Edkins, a +nice old gentleman, who had been made secretary of the race committee. +What he didn't know about fishing would be the making of a "killer," +but, of course, he wasn't picked out for that--he'd never fished a +day in his life--but because of his knowledge of the rules of yacht +racing. Having had long experience in managing yachting regattas, he +knew all about time allowances and sail measurements--though there +were to be no allowances of any kind here. It was to be boat for boat +in this race; every vessel for herself. So he was thought to be a good +man to have to look after the stake and judges' boats. It was +Gloucester's Anniversary celebration, with a lot of strangers in +town--the Governor and a whole holdful of national characters--and in +deference to them the race was to be managed so that spectators might +have a chance to see it. + +Mr. Edkins came along in his official regalia--tall hat, frock coat, +umbrella, gloves, and a pink in his button-hole. + +"Is it true, Captain O'Donnell, that the race is going to be held +to-day?" + +O'Donnell looked at him as though he didn't understand. "To-day? +to-day?--Good Lord, are we all on the wrong tack? And sure isn't this +the day?" + +"Oh, yes--oh, yes, Captain O'Donnell, this is the day appointed. And +that is the trouble. Surely you are not going to race to-day?" + +"We're not going to--" broke in Wesley Marrs, "and why aren't we going +to race to-day? What in the name of all that's good have we been +doing with our vessels up on the railway the last week or two? What +d'y'think we took the ballast out of our vessels for? What d'y'think I +had that everlasting new balloon made for last trip in, what for that +big mains'l that Tom here had bent on the Colleen yesterday, and for +what did Maurice drive the Johnnie Duncan home only last night? What +in----" + +"Wait, Captain, wait. What I mean is, do you know how it is outside? +They've telegraphed me that up in Boston Harbor there won't be a +steamer leave the harbor to-day--it's as stormy as that. There are two +big ocean liners--and we've got word that they won't leave--won't dare +to leave--not a steamer of any kind will leave Boston Harbor to-day. +And outside a heavy sea running--with the wind fifty-four miles an +hour, the weather bureau says. Fifty-four miles an hour. That's not +street corner talk--it's official. And----" + +"Divil take it, does being official make it blow any harder?" asked +O'Donnell. + +"And I know the way you fishermen will try to carry on. I know, I +know--don't tell me you're careful. I tell you, Captain O'Donnell, and +you, Captain Marrs, I tell you all--that if you persist in racing +to-day I wash my hands of the whole affair--completely wash my----" + +"Well, 'tis a fine wash day, too. Come, Wesley--come, Maurice, we'll +have to be getting on." + +They left Mr. Edkins standing there. A little farther on they overtook +the manager of the insurance company, which had policies on most of +the fishing vessels. He was just about to enter his office when +O'Donnell spied him. "Hullo, there's the man I want to see--" and +hailed, "Just heave to a minute, Mr. Brooks, if you please. Now look +here, you know we've took a few pigs of iron out our vessels, and you +know it looks like a bit of weather outside. Now, what I want to know +is if I capsize the Colleen Bawn to-day--if I don't come home with +her--does my wife get the insurance? That's what I want to know--does +my wife get the insurance?" + +Mr. Brooks looked at O'Donnell, rubbed his chin and scratched his +head, then looked at O'Donnell again. "Why, I suppose it all comes +under the usual risk of fishing vessels. I suppose so--but--h-m--it +will be pretty risky, won't it? But let me see--wait a moment +now--there's the President inside, and Mr. Emerson, too--he's a +director." + +He went inside, and we could see that they were talking it over. +Pretty soon they all came out with the President of the company in +front. "Good-morning, Captain O'Donnell--Captain Marrs, good-morning. +How do you do, Maurice? Captain O'Donnell, take it from me as +official, your insurance on the Colleen Bawn is safe. For the honor +and glory of old Gloucester go ahead and sink her." + +"And the Lucy Foster?" asked Wesley. + +"And the Lucy Foster, Captain Marrs." + +"Of course the Johnnie Duncan, speaking for the owners?" asked +Maurice. + +"For every vessel that we insure that leaves the harbor to race +to-day." + +"Hurroo!" said O'Donnell. "Don't tell me, Wesley, I'm no--what's +it?--dip-lo-mat. Yes, dip-lo-mat, by the Lord!" + +But it certainly was a desperate morning for a race. The streets +seemed to be full of men ready to go out. There were to be only nine +vessels in the race, but another half dozen vessels were going over to +see it, and that meant more than three or four hundred able fishermen +going out. The men that were going to stay ashore would go up to those +that were going out and say, "Well, good-by, old man. If you don't +come back, why, you know your grave'll be kept green." And the men +going out would grin and say, "That's all right, boy, but if she goes, +she'll go with every rag on her," in a half-joking way, too, but it +was the belief that morning that there might be a whole lot of truth +in that kind of joking. + +Before we reached the dock we knew that the whole town had learned +pretty much that half a dozen of the skippers had promised each other +in Mrs. Arkell's kitchen the night before, "No sail comes off except +what's blown off," and there promised to be some blown off. Men who +had only just heard their skippers speak of that were bragging of it +in the streets. "Why," said one of O'Donnell's crew as we were coming +down the dock, "if any crawly-spined crawfish loses his nerve and +jumps to our halyards, thinkin' the Colleen's going to capsize--why, +he'll get fooled--and why? Because our halyards are all housed +aloft--by the skipper's orders." + +That sounded strong, but it was true. When we reached the end of our +dock we looked for ourselves, and there it was. The Colleen's crew had +hoisted their mains'l already and there she lay swayed up and all +ready, and men aloft were even then putting the seizing on. Tom +O'Donnell himself was pointing it out to Sam Hollis with a good deal +of glee, thinking, I suppose, to worry Hollis, who, to uphold his +reputation, would have to do the same and take the chances that went +with it. By this time everybody knew that Hollis had put his ballast +back during the night. One of Wesley Marrs's men jumped onto the +Withrow and below and had a look for himself. He couldn't get down by +way of the hatches--they were battened down--but he dropped into the +forec's'le and, before anybody knew what he was up to, he had slipped +through the forehold and into the mainhold and there he saw where they +had hurriedly put back the flooring, and he also saw extra barrels of +sand tiered low for further stiffening of the Withrow. He was +discovered before he got on deck and nearly beaten to a jelly before +he got up on the wharf again. It ended in a fine little riot with some +of our gang and O'Donnell's mixing in. Clancy came down the back-stay +like a man falling from the mast-head, so as to be into it before it +was over. He was almost too late--but not quite. Only old Mr. Duncan +coming along with half a dozen other dignified owners stopped it. But +there was time for Clancy to speak his mind out to Sam Hollis. And +that gave Hollis a chance to say, "Well, talk away, Tommie Clancy, but +this is the day I make the Johnnie Duncan take in sail." And Clancy +answered him, "That so! Well, no matter what happens, put this down, +Maurice Blake hangs to his canvas longer than Sam Hollis to-day--hangs +to it or goes over with it or the spars come out of the Johnnie +Duncan." + +After the talking was over we thought Hollis would be shamed into +sending a man aloft to mouse his halyards too. But not for Hollis. +That was a little too much for him. Clancy and three or four others +finished attending to our own halyards and overhauling the gear aloft. +Our mains'l was already hoisted and the other three lowers with stops +loosed were all ready to hoist too. The mains'l had been left standing +just as it was when the Johnnie Duncan came in that morning. It was +flat as a board, and I remember how grieved we were when we had to +lower it again because the tug that came to give us a kick out from +the dock could not turn us around with it up--it was blowing so. The +tug captain said he might manage to turn it against the sun, but that +would be bad luck of course, and he knew the crew wouldn't stand for +it, especially with a race like this on hand. It had to be with the +sun; and so we had to lower it again, and when the vessel was turned +around, hoist it again, not forgetting to lash the halyards aloft +again too. But after we'd got it swayed up it didn't set near so well +as before--too baggy to our way of thinking. + + + + +XXXI + +THE START OF THE RACE + + +We got away at last and beat out the harbor with the Lucy Foster, the +Colleen Bawn, the Withrow, the Nannie O, and four others. For other +company going out there was a big steam-yacht with Minnie Arkell and +her friends aboard, which did not get out of the harbor. Out by the +Point they shipped a sea and put back, with Minnie Arkell waving her +handkerchief and singing out--"Don't take in any sail, Maurice," as +they turned back. There was also the Eastern Point, a high-sided +stubby steamer, at that time running regularly to Boston; and there +was the New Rochelle, a weak-looking excursioner that might have done +for Long Island Sound, where somebody said she'd just come from, but +which didn't seem to fit in here. Her passengers were mostly +fishermen--crews of vessels not in the race. There was also a big +powerful iron sea-tug, the Tocsin, that promised to make better +weather of it than any of the others. + +Billie Simms was one of the men who were not going in the race but +intended to see some of it. He was in the Henry Clay Parker, a +fine-looking vessel that was not so very fast, but had the reputation +of being wonderfully stiff. Coming out past Eastern Point lighthouse, +where he could begin to get a look at things, Billie hollered out that +he was sorry he hadn't entered. "Looks to me like the vessel that'll +stay right side up the longest ought to win this race, and that's the +Henry C." He hauled her across our stern while he was yelling and I +remember she took one roll down to her sheer poles when passing on, +and Maurice sang out, "Look out, Billie, or you'll capsize her." + +"Capsize this one? Lord, Maurice, I've tried it a dozen times and I'm +damned if I could," and he went rolling on like nothing I ever saw, +unless it was the rest of us who were then manoeuvring for the start. +We passed the Parker again before we got to the line, and old Peter +Hines, who was hanging to her main-rigging, had to yell us his good +wishes. "Drive her, Maurice-boy, and whatever you do don't let the man +that took your vessel from you beat you home," meaning Sam Hollis of +course. Maurice waved his hand, but said nothing. He was looking +serious enough, however. + +Tommie Clancy was the boy who wasn't worrying particularly. He saluted +Peter as if he were going out on a holiday excursion. "Ain't she a +dog, Peter? Watch her." + +"That's what she is--and drive her, Tommie--drive her." + +"Oh, we'll drive her, Peter," called back Tommie, and began: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + I love old Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +"Let you alone, Tommie, and you'll get your prayer some day," was +Peter's last hail as we straightened out for the swoop across the +line. + +Clancy was to the wheel then with the skipper. Both were lashed and we +had life-lines around deck. To the wheel of every vessel in the fleet +were two men lashed, and they all had life-lines around deck. + +In crossing the line there was no attempt at jockeying such as one +often sees in yacht racing. There was no disposition on the part of +any skipper to do anything that would set anybody else back. Of +course, everybody wanted to be in a good berth and to cross between +the guns; but the idea was to give the vessels such a try out as they +would get out to sea--as if they were making a passage in a breeze. +The course--forty-two miles or so--was very short for a fisherman, +for one great thing in a fisherman is her power to stand a long drag. +Day and night in and day and night out and driving all the time is the +way a fisherman wants it. Any sort of racing machine could be built to +stand a little hard going for a while. But that wouldn't be living +through a long hard winter's gale on the Banks--one of those blows +where wind and sea--and in shoal water at that--have a chance to do +their worst. Fishermen are built for that sort of work and on their +sea-worthiness depends not only the fortunes of owners but the lives +of men--of real men--and the happiness and comfort of wives and +children ashore. And so the idea in everybody's mind that day was to +make this test as nearly fair as could be and see who had the fastest +and most weatherly boat in the fleet. There were men to the wheel that +day who could handle big fishermen as if they were cat-boats, who +would have dared and did, later, dare to sail their vessels as close +to a mark in this sea as men sail a twenty-foot knockabout in the +smoothest of waters inshore--only with the fishermen a slip-up meant +the loss of a vessel, maybe other vessels too, and twenty-five or +fifty lives perhaps. + +And so the skill of these men was not used to give anybody the worst +of it. A fair start and give everybody his chance was the idea. Thus +Tommie Ohlsen could have forced the Withrow outside the starting boat +and compelled her to come about and maybe lose a few minutes, but he +did not. He held up and let her squeeze through. O'Donnell in his turn +could have crowded Ohlsen when he let up on the Withrow, but he did +not. He, too, held up in turn and let Ohlsen have his swing going +across. + +Across we went, one after the other. West-sou'west was the course to a +stake-boat, which we were told would be found off Egg Rock, fourteen +miles away. We had only the compass to go by, for at the start it was +rain and drizzle, as well as wind and a big sea, and you couldn't see +a mile ahead. On the way we shot by the New Rochelle, which had +started ahead with the intention of waiting for the fleet at the first +stake-boat. Now she was headed back, wabbing awfully. From Billie +Simms, who went over part of the course in the Henry Clay Parker ahead +of the fleet, we got word of the trouble as we went by. The New +Rochelle was beginning to leak. "You c'n spit between her deck-planks +and into her hold--she's that loose," hollered Billie. I don't think +the fishermen aboard of her minded much so long as she stayed afloat, +but her captain, a properly licensed man, did, I expect, and so she +put back with some of them growling, I heard afterward, "and after +paying their little old three dollars to see only the start of the +race." Her captain reported, when he got in, that he didn't see +anything outside but a lot of foolish fishermen trying to drown +themselves. + +The first leg was before the wind and the Lucy Foster and the Colleen +Bawn went it like bullets. I don't expect ever again to see vessels +run faster than they did that morning. On some of those tough passages +from the Banks fishing vessels may at times have gone faster than +either of these did that morning. It is likely, for where a lot of +able vessels are all the time trying to make fast passages--skippers +who are not afraid to carry sail and vessels that can stand the +dragging--and in all kinds of chances--there must in the course of +years of trying be some hours when they do get over an everlasting lot +of water. But there are no means of checking up. Half the time the men +do not haul the log for half a day or more. Some of the reports of +speed of fishermen at odd times have been beyond all records, and so +people who do not know said they must be impossible. But here was a +measured course and properly anchored stake-boats--and the Lucy and +the Colleen did that first leg of almost fourteen sea-miles in fifty +minutes, which is better than a 16-1/2 knot clip, and that means over +nineteen land miles an hour. I think anybody would call that pretty +fast going. And, as some of them said afterward, "Lord in Heaven! +suppose we'd had smooth water!" But I don't think that the sea checked +them so very much--not as much as one might think, for they were +driving these vessels. + + + + +XXXII + +O'DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS + + +We were next to the last vessel across the starting line. The Nannie +O--we couldn't see them all--about held the Lucy Foster and the +Colleen Bawn level. The Withrow showed herself to be a wonderful +vessel off the wind, too. Wesley Marrs was around the stake-boat +first. In the fog and drizzle the leaders did not find the stake-boat +at once. Wesley happening to be nearest to it when they did see it, +got the benefit and was first around. We were close up, almost near +enough to board the Withrow's quarter rounding. I am not sure that the +skipper and Clancy, who were to the wheel, did not try to give Hollis +a poke with the end of our long bowsprit; but if they did, the Johnnie +was not quite fast enough for that. The Withrow beat us around. +Looking back we could see the others coming like wild horses. Every +one of them, except one that carried away something and hauled up and +out of it, was diving into it to the foremast with every leap the same +as we had been. On that first leg nobody could stand anywhere for'ard +of the fore-hatch or he would have been swept overboard. + +Leaving Egg Rock and going for Minot's Ledge, the skipper left the +wheel and George Nelson took his place beside Clancy. It was drizzling +then, every now and then that settling down so that we couldn't see +three lengths ahead. At such times we simply hoped that nobody ahead +would carry away anything or in any way become disabled in the road. + +Well clear of the stake-boat, however, it lifted and we could see what +we were doing. The Lucy Foster was still ahead with O'Donnell and +Ohlsen and Hollis almost abreast--no more than a few lengths between. +Practically they were all about just as they started. We were next. It +was a broad reach to Minot's Ledge and hard going for all hands. It +must be remembered that we all had everything on, even to balloon and +staysails, and our halyards were lashed aloft. The men to the +mast-head, who were up there to shift tacks, were having a sweet time +of it hanging on, even lashed though they were. + +Everybody was pretty well strung up at this time. The skipper, a line +about his elbow, was hooked up to the main-rigging--the weather side, +of course--and it was up to a man's waist and boiling white on the lee +side. The crew were snug up under the weather rail and hanging on--no +mistake either about the way they were hanging on. Every once in +awhile one of us would poke his head up to see what they were doing to +windward of us. Mr. Duncan, who had come aboard just before we left +the dock, was trying to sit on the weather bitt near the wheel-box. He +had a line around his waist, too. He had bet a lot of money with +Withrow on the race, but I don't think that his money was worrying him +half so much as some other things then. + +So far as we could see at this time we were making as good weather as +any of them. And our best chance--the beat home--was yet to come. The +Johnnie had the stiffness for that. Had the Johnnie reached Gloucester +from the Cape Shore earlier she, too, would have been lightened up and +made less stiff. To be sure she would have had her bottom scrubbed and +we would have had her up to racing pitch, with every bit of sail just +so and her trim gauged to a hair's depth, but that did not matter so +very much now. The Johnnie was in shape for a hard drag like this, and +for that we had to thank the tricky Sam Hollis. We began to see that +after all it was a bit of good luck our vessel not being home in time +to tune up the same as the rest of the fleet. + +It was along about here--half-way on the reach to Minot's--that +Tommie Ohlsen broke his main-gaff. It was the fault of the Eastern +Point, the Boston steamer. She had gone ahead of the fleet, taking +almost a straight course for Minot's Ledge. Reaching across from +Half-Way Rock to Minot's the fleet began to overhaul her. She, making +bad weather of it along here, started to turn around. But, rolling to +her top-rail, it was too much for them, and her captain kept her +straight on for Boston. That was all right, but her action threw +Ohlsen off. She was right in the Nannie O's way, and to save the +steamer and themselves from a collision and certain loss of life, +Ohlsen had to jibe the Nannie O, and so suddenly that the Nannie O's +gaff broke under the strain. And that lost Ohlsen his chance for the +race. It was too bad, for with Ohlsen, Marrs, and O'Donnell, each in +his own vessel in a breeze, you could put the names in a hat and shake +them up. When we went by the Nannie O her crew were getting the +trysail out of the hold, and they finished the race with that, and +made good going of it, as we saw afterward. Indeed, a trysail that day +would have been sail enough for almost any men but these. + +Before we reached Minot's there was some sail went into the air. One +after the other went the balloons--on the Foster, the Colleen, the +Withrow and at last on us. I don't know whether they had any trouble +on the others--being too busy with our own to watch--but we came near +to losing men with ours. It got caught under our keel, and we started +to try to haul it in--the skipper having an economical notion of +saving the owner the expense of a new sail, I suppose. But Mr. Duncan, +seeing what he was at, sang out: "Let the sail go to the devil, +Captain--I'll pay for the new one myself." Even at that we had to +crawl out on the bowsprit--six or eight of us--with sharp knives, and +cut it away, and we were glad to get back again. The Johnnie never +slackened. It was desperate work. + +Rounding Minot's, Tom O'Donnell gave an exhibition of desperate +seamanship. He had made up his mind, it seems, that he was due to pass +Wesley Marrs along here. But first he had to get by the Withrow. Off +Minot's was the turning buoy, with just room, as it was considered, +for one vessel at a time to pass safely in that sea. + +O'Donnell figured that the tide being high there was easily room for +two, and then breasted up to the Withrow, outside of her and with the +rocks just under his quarter. Hollis, seeing him come, made a motion +as if to force him on the rocks, but O'Donnell, standing to his own +wheel, called out--"You do, Sam Hollis, and we'll both go." There +certainly would have been a collision, with both vessels and both +crews--fifty men--very likely lost, but Hollis weakened and kept off. +That kind of work was too strong for him. He had so little room that +his main-boom hit the can-buoy as he swept by. + +Once well around O'Donnell, in great humor, and courting death, worked +by Hollis and then, making ready to tack and pass Wesley's bow, let +the Colleen have her swing, but with all that sail on and in that +breeze, there could be only one outcome. And yet he might have got +away with it but for his new foremast, which, as he had feared, had +not the strength it should have had. He let her go, never stopped to +haul in his sheets--he had not time to if he was to cross Wesley's +bow. So he swung her and the full force of the wind getting her laid +both spars over the side--first one and then the other clean as could +be. + +Hollis never stopped or made a motion to help, but kept on after the +Lucy Foster. We almost ran over O'Donnell, but luffed in time, and the +skipper called out to O'Donnell that we'd stand by and take his men +off. + +O'Donnell was swearing everything blue. "Go on--go on--don't mind me. +Go on, I tell you. We're all right. I'll have her under jury rig and +be home for supper. Go on, Maurice--go on and beat that divil +Hollis!" + +Half way to Eastern Point on the way back saw us in the wake of the +Withrow, which was then almost up with the Lucy Foster. It was the +beat home now, with all of us looking to see the Withrow do great +things, for just off the ways and with all her ballast in she was in +great trim for it. Going to windward, too, was generally held to be +her best point of sailing. All that Hollis had to do was to keep his +nerve and drive her. + + + + +XXXIII + +THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN + + +Hollis was certainly driving her now. He ought to have felt safe in +doing so with the Lucy Foster to go by, for the Lucy, by reason of the +ballast taken out of her, should, everything else being equal, capsize +before the Withrow. + +Hollis must have had that in mind, for he followed Wesley Marrs's +every move. Wesley was sailing her wide. And our skipper approved of +that, too. To attempt a too close course in the sea that was out in +the Bay that day, with the blasts of wind that were sweeping down, +would have deadened her way altogether too much--maybe hung her up. +And so it was "Keep her a full whatever you do," and that, with coming +about when the others did--we being afraid to split tacks--made plenty +of work for us. + +"Hard-a-lee" it was one after the other, and for every "Hard-a-lee" +twenty of us went down into the roaring sea fore and aft and hauled in +and slackened away sheets, while aloft, the fellows lashed to the +foremast head shifted top and staysail tacks. They were wise to lash +themselves up aloft, for with every tack, she rolled down into it as +if she were never coming up, and when she did come up shook herself as +if she would snap her topmasts off. + +Half way to Eastern Point on the beat home it seemed to occur to the +skipper and to Clancy that the Johnnie Duncan stood a chance to win +the race. It was Clancy, still lashed to the wheel, now with Long +Steve, turned his head for just a second to Mr. Duncan and spoke the +first word of it. + +"Mr. Duncan, do you know, but the Johnnie's got a chance to win this +race?" + +"D'y'think so, Tommie--d'y'think so?" + +Some of us in the crew had been thinking of that same thing some time, +and we watched Mr. Duncan, who, with a life line about him, was +clinging to a bitt aft, and watching things with tight lips, a drawn +face and shiny eyes. We listened to hear what else he might have to +say. But he didn't realize at once what it meant. His eyes and his +mind were on the Lucy Foster. + +"What d'y'think of the Lucy and the Withrow, Tommie?" Mr. Duncan said +next. + +Tommie took a fresh look at the Lucy Foster, which was certainly doing +stunts. It was along this time that big Jim Murch--a tall man, but +even so, he was no more than six feet four, and the Lucy twenty-four +feet beam--was swinging from the ring-bolts under the windward rail +and throwing his feet out trying to touch with his heels the sea that +was swashing up on the Lucy's deck. And every once in a while he did +touch, for the Lucy, feeling the need of her ballast, was making +pretty heavy weather of it. Every time she rolled and her sheer poles +went under, Jim would holler out that he'd touched again. + +We could hear him over on the Johnnie at times. Mr. Duncan, who +believed that nothing ever built could beat the Lucy Foster, began to +worry at that, and again he spoke to Clancy. He had to holler to make +himself heard. + +"But what do you think of the Lucy's chances, Tommie?" + +Clancy shook his head. + +And getting nothing out of Clancy, Mr. Duncan called out then: "What +do you think of the Lucy, you, Captain Blake?" + +The skipper shook his head, too. "I'm afraid it's too much for her." + +And then--one elbow was hitched in the weather rigging and a half +hitch around his waist--the skipper swung around, and looking over to +the Withrow, he went on: + +"I don't see, Mr. Duncan, why we don't stand a pretty good chance to +win out on Hollis." + +"Why not--why not--if anything happens to the Lucy." + +It jarred us some to think that even there, in spite of the great race +the Johnnie was making of it, she was still, in the old man's eyes, +only a second string to the Lucy Foster. + +About then the wind seemed to come harder than ever, but Clancy at the +wheel never let up on the Johnnie. He socked it to her--wide and free +he sailed her. Kept her going--oh, but he kept her going. "If this one +only had a clean bottom and a chance to tune her up before going out," +said somebody, and we all said, "Oh, if she only had--just half a day +on the railway before this race." + +We were fairly buried at times on the Johnnie--on the Lucy Foster it +must have been tough. And along here the staysail came off the Withrow +and eased her a lot. We would all have been better off with less sail +along about that time. In proof of that we could see back behind us +where the Nannie O, under her trysail, was almost holding her own. But +it wouldn't do to take it off. Had they not all said before putting +off that morning that what sail came off that day would be blown +off?--yes, sir--let it blow a hundred miles an hour. And fishermen's +pride was keeping sail on us and the Foster. Hollis tried to make it +look that his staysail blew off, but we knew better--a knife to the +halyards did the work. + +It was after her big staysail was off and she making easier weather of +it that the Withrow crossed the Lucy's bow for the first time in the +race and took the lead. + +We all felt for Mr. Duncan, who couldn't seem to believe his eyes. We +all felt for Wesley, too, who was desperately trying to hold the wind +of the Withrow--he had even rigged blocks to his jib sheets and led +them to cleats clear aft to flatten his headsails yet more. And +Wesley's crew hauled like demons on those jib sheets--hauled and +hauled with the vessel under way all the time--hauled so hard, in +fact, that with the extra purchase given them by the blocks they +pulled the cleats clean out, and away went the Lucy's jib and +jumbo--and there was Wesley hung up. And out of the race, for we were +all too near the finish for her to win out then unless the Johnnie and +the Withrow capsized entirely. + +Mr. Duncan, when he saw the Lucy's crew trying to save the headsails, +couldn't contain himself. + +"Cut 'em away--cut 'em to hell!" he sang out, and we all had to smile, +he spoke so excitedly. But it was no use. The Lucy was out of the +race, and going by her, we didn't look at Mr. Duncan nor Wesley +Marrs--we knew they were both taking it hard--but watched the +Withrow. + +Over on the other tack we went, first the Withrow, then the Johnnie. +We were nearing the finish line, and we were pretty well worked +up--the awful squalls were swooping down and burying us. We could hear +Hollis's voice and see his crew go up when he warned his men at the +wheel to ease up on her when the squalls hit. On our vessel the +skipper never waved an arm nor opened his mouth to Clancy at the +wheel. And of his own accord you may be sure that Clancy wasn't easing +up. Not Tommie Clancy--no, sir--he just drove her--let her have it +full--lashed her like, with his teeth and eyes flashing through the +sea that was swashing over him. And the Johnnie fairly sizzled through +the water. + +There were several times in the race when we thought the going was as +bad as could be, but now we were all sure that this was the worst of +all. There was some excuse for Mr. Duncan when he called out: + +"My God, Tommie, but if she makes one of those low dives again, will +she ever come up?" + +"I dunno," said Clancy to that. "But don't you worry, Mr. Duncan, if +any vessel out of Gloucester'll come up, this one'll come up." + +He was standing with the water, the clear water, not the swash, well +up to his waist then, and we could hear him: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + I love old Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +That was too much for Mr. Duncan, and, watching his chance, he dove +between the house and rail, to the weather rigging, where the skipper +grabbed him and made him fast beside himself. The old man took a look +down the slant of the deck and took a fresh hold of the rigging. + +"Captain Blake, isn't she down pretty low?" + +"Maybe--maybe--Mr. Duncan, but she'll go lower yet before the sail +comes off her. This is the day Sam Hollis was going to make me take in +sail." + +Less than a minute after that we made our rush for the line. Hollis +tried to crowd us outside the stake-boat, which was rolling head to +wind and sea, worse than a lightship in a surf gale--tried to crowd us +out just as an awful squall swooped down. It was the Johnnie or the +Withrow then. We took it full and they didn't, and there is all there +was to it. But for a minute it was either vessel's race. At the +critical time Sam Hollis didn't have the nerve, and the skipper and +Clancy did. + +They looked at each other--the skipper and Clancy--and Clancy soaked +her. Held to it cruelly--recklessly. It was too much to ask of a +vessel. Down she went--buried. It was heaven or hell, as they say, for +a while. I know I climbed on to her weather run, and it was from there +I saw Withrow ducking her head to it--hove to, in fact, for the blast +to pass. + +The Johnnie weathered it. Able--able. Up she rose, a horse, and across +the line we shot like a bullet, and so close to the judge's boat that +we could have jumped aboard. + +We all but hit the Henry Clay Parker, Billie Simms's vessel, on the +other side of the line, and it was on her that old Peter of Crow's +Nest, leaping into the air and cracking his heels together, called out +as we drove by: + +"The Johnnie Duncan wins--the able Johnnie Duncan--sailin' across the +line on her side and her crew sittin' out on the keel." + + + + +XXXIV + +MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE + + +We were hardly across the line when there was a broom at our truck--a +new broom that I know I, for one, never saw before. And yet I suppose +every vessel that sailed in the race that day had a new broom hid away +somewhere below--to be handy if needed. + +But it was the Johnnie Duncan, sailing up the harbor, that carried +hers to the truck. And it was Mr. Duncan who stood aft of her and took +most of the cheers, and it was Clancy and Long Steve who waved their +hands from the wheel-box, and it was the skipper who leaned against +the weather rigging, and the rest of us who lined the weather rail and +answered the foolish questions of people along the road. + +Every vessel we met seemed to think we had done something great; and I +suppose we had in a way--that is, skipper, crew and vessel. We had +out-carried and out-sailed the best out of Gloucester in a breeze that +was a breeze. We had taken the chance of being capsized or hove-down +and losing the vessel and ourselves. Mr. Duncan, I think, realized +more than anybody else at the time what we had been through. "I didn't +know what it really was to be," he said, "before I started. If I had, +I doubt very much if I'd have started." We all said--"No, no, you'd +have gone just the same, Mr. Duncan;" and we believed he would, too. + +Going up the harbor somebody hinted to Clancy that he ought to go and +have a mug-up for himself after his hard work--and it had been hard +work. "And I'll take your place at the wheel," said that somebody, +"for you must be tired, Tommie." + +"And maybe I am tired, too," answered Clancy, "but if I am, I'm just +thick enough not to know it. But don't fool yourself that if I stood +lashed to this wheel since she crossed the starting line this morning +I'm going to quit it now and let you take her up the harbor and get +all the bouquets. I'll have a mug-up by and by, and it'll be a mug-up, +don't you worry." + +And it was a mug-up. He took the gold and silver cup given to Maurice +as a skipper of the winning vessel, and with the crew in his wake +headed a course for the Anchorage, where he filled it till it +flowed--and didn't have to pay for filling it, either. + +"It's the swellest growler that I ever expect to empty. Gold and +silver--and holds six quarts level. Just a little touch all round, +and we'll fill her up again. 'Carte blanche, and charge it to me,' +says Mr. Duncan." + +"What kind is carte blanche, Tommie?" asked Andie Howe. + +"They'll tell you behind the bar," said Clancy. + +"Billie," ordered Andie, "just a little touch of carte blanche, will +you, while Clancy's talking. He's the slowest man to begin that ever I +see. Speeches--speeches--speeches, when your throat's full of +gurry--dry, salty gurry. A little touch of that carte blanche that Mr. +Duncan ordered for the crew of the Johnnie Duncan, Billie, will you?" + +"Carte blanche--yes," went on Clancy, "and I callate the old fizzy +stuff's the thing to do justice to this fe-lic-i-tous oc-ca-sion. Do I +hear the voice of my shipmates? Aye, aye, I hear them--and in accents +unmistakable. Well, here's a shoot--six quarts level--and a few pieces +of ice floating around on top. My soul, but don't it look fine and +rich? Have a look, everybody." + +"Let's have a drink instead," hollered Parsons. + +Clancy paid no attention to that. "Who was the lad in that Greek bunch +in the old days that they sank up to his neck in the lake--cold +sparkling water--and peaches and oranges and grapes floating on a +little raft close by--but him fixed so he couldn't bend his head down +to get a drink nor lift his head to take a bite of fruit--and hot +weather all the time, mind you. Lord, the thirst he raised after a +while! What was his--oh, yes, Tantalus--that's the lad, Tantalus--the +cold sparkling water. Man, the thirst he----" + +"The thirst of Tantalus ain't a patch on the thirst I got. And this is +something better than cold sparkling water. That's you all over, +Tommie--joking at serious times," wailed Parsons. + +"Is it as bad as that with you, Eddie? Well, let's forget Tantalus and +drink instead to the able-est, handsom-est, fast-est vessel that ever +weathered Eastern Point--to the Johnnie Duncan--and her skipper." + +"And Mr. Duncan, Tommie--he's all right, too." + +"Yes, of course, Mr. Duncan. And while we're at it, here's to the +whole blessed gang of us--skipper, owner and crew--we're all +corkers." + +"Drive her, Tommie!" roared a dozen voices, and Tommie drove her for a +good pint before he set the cup down again. + +It was a great celebration altogether. Wherever one of our gang was +there was an admiring crowd. Nobody but us was listened to. And the +questions we had to answer! And of course we were all willing enough +to talk. We must have told the story of the race over about twenty +times each. After a while, of course, some of our fellows, with all +the entertaining and admiration that was handed out to them, had to +put a touch or two to it. It was strong enough to tell the bare facts +of that race, I thought, but one or two had to give their imaginations +a chance. One man, a fisherman, one of those who had been on one of +the excursion boats, and so didn't see the race at all, came along +about two hours after the Duncan crew struck the Anchorage and +listened to Andie Howe for a while. And going away it was he who said, +"It must have been a race that. As near as I c'n make it out the +Johnnie sailed most of that race keel up." + +"Oh, don't go away mad," Andie called after him. "Come back and have a +little touch of carte blanche--it's on the old man." + +"I'll take it for him," came a voice. It was old Peter of Crow's Nest, +who took his drink and asked for Clancy. Clancy was in the back part +of the room, and I ran and got him. Peter led the way to the +sidewalk. + +"Tommie, go and get Maurice, if it ain't too late." + +"What is it?" + +"It's Minnie Arkell. Coming up the dock after the race she ran up and +grabbed him and threw her arms about his neck. 'You're the man to sail +a race in heavy weather,' she hollers, and a hundred people looking +on. And there's half a dozen of those friends of hers and they're up +to her house and now making ready for a wine celebration. Go and get +him before it is too late." + + + + +XXXV + +CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW + + +Clancy started on the run and I after him. "We'll go to his +boarding-house first, Joe, and if he's not there, to Minnie +Arkell's." + +He wasn't in his boarding-house, and we hurried out. On the sidewalk +we almost ran into little Johnnie Duncan. + +"Oh, Captain Clancy--or you, Joe Buckley--won't you tell me about the +race? Grandpa was too busy to tell me, but went down the wharf with a +lot of people to show them the Johnnie Duncan. They all left the +office and told me to mind it. And my cousin Alice came in with Joe's +cousin Nell. And I saw Captain Blake with some people and ran after +him and I just caught up with him and they went off and left me. And +then a little while ago he came back by himself and ran toward the +dock and didn't even see me. And Captain Blake used to be so good to +me!" Poor Johnnie was all but crying. + +"Toward the dock? That's good," breathed Clancy. "Stay here, Johnnie, +and we'll tell you about the race when we get back," and led the way +to Mr. Duncan's office. + +We found the skipper in the outer office, standing beside the +bookkeeper's desk and looking out of the window next the slip. Hearing +us coming he turned and then we saw that he held in his hands an open +box with a string of beautiful pearls. Noticing us gaze at the pearls +in surprise, he said, "Mr. Duncan gave me these for winning the race. +And I took them, thinking that somebody or other might like them." + +"And don't she?" asked Clancy--it seemed to slip out of Tommie without +his knowing it. + +"I guess not," said Maurice. Only then did it flash on me what it all +might mean. + +"Did you try?" asked Clancy. + +"Try! Yes, and was made a fool of. Oh, what's the use--what in +hell's the use?" He stood silent a moment. "I guess not," he said +then--looked out the window again, and hove the whole string out +of the open window and into the slip. + +Clancy and myself both jumped to stop him, but we weren't quick +enough. They were gone--the whole beautiful necklace. The skipper +fixed his eyes on where they had struck the water. Then he turned and +left the office. At the door he stopped and said: "I don't know--maybe +I won't take the Johnnie next trip, and if I don't, Tommie, I hope +you'll take her--Mr. Duncan will let you have her if you want. I hope +you'll take her anyway, for you know what a vessel she is. You'll take +care of her--" and went and left us. + +Clancy swore to himself for a while. He hadn't quite done when the +door of the rear office opened and Miss Foster herself came out. She +greeted me sweetly--she always did--but was going out without paying +any attention to Clancy. She looked pale--although perhaps I would not +have noticed her paleness particularly only for what had just +happened. + +I was surprised to see then what Clancy did. Before she had got to the +door he was beside her. + +"Miss Foster, Miss Foster," he said, and his tone was so different +from what I had ever heard from him before that I could hardly believe +it. He was a big man, it must be remembered, and still on him were the +double-banked oilskins and heavy jack-boots he wore through the race. +Also his face was flushed from the excitement of the day--the salt +water was not yet dry on him and his eyes were shining, shining not +alone with the glow of a man who had been lashed to a wheel steering a +vessel in a gale--and, too, to victory--for hours, and not alone with +the light that comes from two or three quarts of champagne--it was +something more than that. Whatever it was it surprised me and held +Alice Foster's attention. + +"Mister Clancy," she said, and turned to him. + +"Yes, Mister Clancy--or Tommie Clancy--or Captain Clancy, as +it is at times--master of an odd vessel now and again--but +Clancy all the time--just Clancy, good-for-nothing Clancy--hard +drinker--reveller--night-owl--disturber of the peace--at best +only a fisherman who'll by and by go out and get lost like +thousands of the other fishermen before him--as a hundred every +year do now and have three lines in the paper--name, age, +birthplace, street and number of his boarding-house, and that +will be the end of it. But that don't matter--Tommie Clancy, +whatever he is, is a friend of Maurice Blake's. And he means +to speak a word for Maurice. + +"For a long time now, Miss Foster, Maurice has thought the world of +you. He never told me--he never told anybody. But I know him. He +waited a long time, I'm sure, before he even told himself--maybe even +before he knew it himself. But I knew it--bunk-mates, watch-mates, +dory-mates we've been. He's master of a fine vessel now and I'm one of +his crew. He's gone ahead and I've stayed behind. Why? Because he's +carried in his heart the picture of a girl he thought could be all a +woman ought to be to a man. And that was well A man like Maurice +needs that, and maybe--maybe--you're all that he thought and more +maybe, Miss Foster. Wait--he had that picture before his eyes all the +time. I hadn't any picture. Years ago, when I was Maurice's age, I +might have had something like it, and now look at me. And why? Why, +Miss Foster, you're a woman--could you guess? No? Think. What's +running in a man's head, do you think, in the long winter nights when +he's walking the deck, with the high heavens above and the great, +black rolling sea around him? What's in his head when, trawls hauled +and his fish aboard, when the danger and the hard work are mostly by, +his vessel's going to the west'ard? What when he's an hour to rest and +he's lying, smoking and thinking, in his bunk? What's been in +Maurice's head and in his heart all the years he's loafed with the +likes of me and yet never fell to my level? Anything he ever read +anywhere, do you think, or was it a warm image that every time he came +ashore and was lucky enough to get a look at you he could see was true +to the woman it stood for? When you had no more idea of it than what +was going on at the North Pole he was watching you--and thinking of +you. Always thinking of you, Miss Foster. He never thought he had a +chance. I know him. Who asks a woman like you to share a fisherman's +life? Is it a man like Maurice? Sometimes--maybe with the blood +racing through him after a great race he might. A while ago he did, +Miss Foster. And what gave him the courage? + +"Listen to me now, Miss Foster, and say what you please afterward. +Maurice and I are friends. Friends. I've been with him on the bottom +of a capsized dory when we both expected we'd hauled our last +trawl--with the seas washing over us and we both getting weak and him +getting black in the face--and maybe I was, too. I told you this once +before, but let me tell it again. 'Come and take the plug strap, +Tommie,' he says to me. 'Come and take the plug strap.' Do you know +what that means, Miss Foster?--and the seas sweeping over you and your +whole body getting numb? And I've been with him four days and four +nights--astray in the fog of the Western Banks in winter, and, for all +we knew and believed, we were gone. In times like those men get to +know each other, and I tell you, Miss Foster--" Clancy choked and +stopped. "To-day he sailed a race the like of which was never sailed +before. A dozen times he took the chance of himself going over the +rail. And why? The better to keep an eye on things and help his vessel +along? Yes. But why that? For that cup we've drowned a dozen times in +wine to-day? He never looked twice at it when he got ashore. He +hasn't seen it since he handed it to me on the dock. The boys might +like to look at it, he said. He's forgot he ever won it by now. He let +us take it up to a rum-shop and drink out of it the same as if it was +a tin-pail--the beautiful gold and silver cup--engraved. We used it +for a growler for all Maurice cared for the value of it, and there's +forty men walking the streets now that's got a list they got out of +that cup. We might have lost it, battered each other's drunken heads +in with it, and he wouldn't have said a dozen words about it. But +there was a necklace of pearls, and he thought you'd like them. 'To +you, Maurice, for winning the race,' says Mr. Duncan, 'for winning the +race,' and hands Maurice the pearls--your own guardian, Miss Foster, +and most crazy, he was that pleased. And that's what Maurice ran up to +get when the race was over--there was something a girl might like, or +thought so. And then what? On the way down a woman that I know--that +you know--tried to hold him up. Kissed him before a hundred +people--she knew you were waiting--she knew, trust a woman--and walked +down part way with him, because you were looking. And he being a man, +and weak, and only twenty-six--and the racing blood still running +through him--maybe forgot himself for five minutes--not knowing you +were within a mile. That doesn't excuse him? No, you're right, it +don't. But he, poor boy, knowing nothing--what does a boy of +twenty-six know?--knowing nothing--suspecting nothing--and yet, if he +forgot himself, he never really forgot you. He hurries on to you and +offers you the necklace that he risked his life to get. And you--what +did you say?" + +"What did I say? I told him that perhaps he knew somebody that he'd +rather give it to before me----" + +"Before you? There's a woman. You're not satisfied when a man fights +all the devil in himself for you, but you must rub it into him while +he's doing it. Maurice--or maybe you don't understand. You could say +things like that to a dog--if a dog could understand--and he'd come +back and lick your hand. Maurice has blood and fire in him. And here's +a woman--whatever else she is--is warm-blooded too. She wants Maurice, +and, by God, she'll get him if you keep on. Do you remember the night +of the Master Mariners' ball--the night before we sailed on the +Southern cruise? Well, that night this woman, she waits for Maurice +and stops him on his way home. But she didn't get him. He was up in +the wind for a minute or two, but one spoke of the wheel and he found +his head again. Again last June in Newport on a warm summer's +night--flowers, music, wine--the cabin of a beautiful yacht--she asks +him to wait over a day or two in Newport harbor. Does he? Does he? Not +Maurice. With never a touch of the wheel, off he swings and drives for +home. And why didn't he stay? Why, do you suppose? Didn't he tell you +a while ago? Good God! Look here--you're no fool. Look at me--ten +years ago I was another Maurice. And this woman--I tell you she knows +men. She don't care whether a man is rich or poor, tall or short, thin +or fat, so long as she likes him. And I tell you she loves Maurice--as +well as she can love--and she's not a good enough woman--there it is. +And they're all saying you're likely to marry Withrow. Wait now. +Withrow, I'm telling you, isn't fit to wash the gurry off Maurice's +jack-boots. I'm a careless man, Miss Foster, and in my life I've done +things I wish now I hadn't, but I draw the line above the head of a +man like Withrow. Whatever I am, I'm too good to be company for Fred +Withrow. And on top of all that he's so carried away with this other +woman--this same woman--and she caring more for Maurice's eyelash than +Withrow's whole two hundred and ten pounds--Withrow is so carried away +with her that he is ready to elope with her--elope with her! I know +that--never mind how. Bring Withrow and me together, and I'll tell +him--tell him, yes, and throw him through the door afterward if he +denies it. This woman is enough of a woman to want Maurice--Maurice +with nothing at all--before Withrow with all he's got and all he can +get her or give her--and she's clever enough to come pretty near +getting what she wants. And now, Miss Foster, suppose you think it +over. I'm going to hunt up Maurice, though I'm not too sure we'll find +him in a hurry. Good-by." + +He swept his sou'wester wide to her and went out the door. I said +good-by without looking at her. I was too ashamed--and went after +Clancy. But I think she was crying to herself as I went out. + + + + +XXXVI + +MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED + + +The morning after the race I was eating breakfast at home and I could +not remember when I enjoyed a meal like that one. I had had a fine +long sleep and the sleep that comes to a man after he's been through a +long and exciting experience does make him feel like a world-beater. I +felt that I could go out and about leap the length of a seine-boat or +rip up a plank sidewalk. It was worth while to be alive, and +everything tasted so good. + +I had put away six fried eggs and about fourteen of those little +slices of bacon before I even thought of slacking up (with my mother +piling them up as fast as I lifted them off)--and maybe I wouldn't +have slacked then only my cousin Nell came skipping in. + +She kissed my mother half a dozen times, and danced around the room. +"Four vessels off the Johnnie Duncan's model have already been +ordered. Four, auntie--four. There will be a fleet of them yet, you'll +see. And how are you, Joe?" + +"Fine," I said, and kept on eating. + +Nell didn't like my not noticing how glad she was feeling, I suppose, +for all at once, as I was about to sugar another cup of coffee, she +ran her hands through my hair and yanked till I couldn't pretend any +longer. + +"There, now, with your mind off your stomach, perhaps you'll look up +and converse when a lady deigns to notice you. How much money did Mr. +Withrow lose on the race?" + +"I don't know, but it was a good pile; I know that." + +"And how much did Mr. Duncan win?" + +"I don't know that, either; but I hope it was a good roll, for he won +about all Withrow lost." + +"M-m--but aren't you in love with your old employer? But let's not +mind common money matters. What do you think of the Johnnie Duncan for +a vessel?" + +"She's a dog--a dog." + +"Isn't she! And the fastest, able-est and the handsomest vessel that +ever sailed past Eastern Point, isn't she?" + +"That's what she is." + +"And who designed her?" + +"Who? Let me see. Oh, yes, some local man." + +"You don't know! Look up here. Who designed her!" + +"Oh, yes. 'Twas a Gloucester man." + +"A Gloucester man? Look up again. +Now--who--de--signed--the--John--nie--Dun--can!" + +"Ouch, yes. A ver-y fine and a-ble--and handsome gen-tle-man--a +wonderful man." + +"That's a little better. And his name?" + +"William Somers--William the Illustrious--William the First--'First in +war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of Gloucestermen'--and if +you let me stand up, I'll do a break-down to show you how glad I am." + +"Now you're showing something like appreciation. And now where do you +suppose your friend Clancy is and your skipper?" + +"Clancy? Lord knows. Maybe in a circle of admiring friends, singing +whatever is his latest. 'Hove flat down' was the last I heard. If it +was earlier in the day--about three in the morning--it would be pretty +sure to be that." + +"What a pity, and he such a fine man otherwise!" + +"What's a pity?" + +"Why, his getting drunk, as I hear he does very often." + +"Gets drunk? Who gets drunk? Clancy? That's news to me. As long as +I've known him I never saw him drunk yet. He gets mellow and +loose--but drunk! Clancy drunk? Why, Nell!" + +"Oh, well, all right, he's an apostle of temperance then. But Captain +Blake--where is he?" + +"I couldn't say--why?" + +"I have a message for him." + +"Did you try his boarding-house?" + +"Yes. That is, Will did, and he wasn't there, hadn't been there at +all, they said, since the afternoon before." + +"That so? Where else did you try? Duncan's office?" + +"We did, and no word of him there." + +"Try Clancy's boarding-house?" + +"Yes, and no word." + +"Try--h-m--the Anchorage?" + +"Oh, Joe, you don't think he's been loafing there since?" + +"No, I don't. And yet after the way he got turned down yesterday, you +know--there's no telling what a man might do." + +"Well, Will looked in there, too." + +"You fat little fox! Why didn't you say that at first? And no word?" + +"No." + +"Well, I don't know where he'd be then." + +"Nor I, except--did you notice the wind has hauled to the northwest?" + +"I did." + +"Well. Do you know that old vessel that Mr. Withrow's been trying to +get a crew for--the Flamingo?" + +"M-h-h." + +"Well, this morning early she went out--on a hand-lining trip to the +east'ard, it is said. And Will says that he thinks--he doesn't know, +mind you, because they won't tell him anything down to Withrow's--but +he thinks that Maurice Blake's shipped in her." + +"Wow! She won't last out one good breeze on the Banks." + +"That is just what Will said. And it's too bad, for I had a message +for him--a message that would make everything all right. I suppose you +can guess?" + +"Guess? H-m-m--I don't know as I want to." + +"Well, don't get mad about it, anyway. How would you feel if you saw +that horrid Minnie Arkell rush up and--Oh, you know what I mean. +However, I've been pleading with Alice since yesterday afternoon. For +two hours I was up in her room last evening, and poor Will walking the +veranda down below. I put Captain Blake's case as I thought a friend +of his would put it--as you would put it, say--perhaps better in some +ways--for I could not forget that he sailed the Johnnie Duncan +yesterday, and her winning meant so much to Will. Yes, and I'm not +forgetting Clancy and the rest of her crew--indeed, I'm not--I felt as +though I could kiss every one of them." + +"Well, here's one of them." + +"Don't get saucy because your mother is standing by. Go and find +Maurice Blake. Go ahead, won't you, Joe? Tell him that everything is +all right. She is proud." + +"That's a nice sounding word for it--pride. Stuck on herself is what +I'd say." + +"No, she isn't. You must allow a woman self-respect, you know." + +"I guess so. And it must be her long suit, seeing she's always leading +from it." + +"Oh, keep your fishermen's jokes for the mugging-up times on your +vessel. You go and get Maurice Blake--or find Mr. Clancy and have him +get him--if he hasn't gone on the Flamingo." + +So I went out. On a cruise along the water front I found a whole +lot of people. I saw Wesley Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen--sorrowful and +neither saying much--looking after their vessels--Ohlsen seeing to a +new gaff. "I ought to've lost," said Ohlsen. "Look at that for a +rotten piece of wood." Sam Hollis was around, too, trying to explain +how it was he didn't win the race. But he couldn't explain to +anybody's satisfaction how his stays'l went nor why he hove-to when +that squall struck him--the same squall that shot the Johnnie +Duncan across the line. Tom O'Donnell was there, looking down on the +deck of the vessel in which he took so much pride. "Two holes in +her deck where her spars ought to be," he was saying when I came +along. I asked him if he had seen Maurice that morning, and it was +from him I learned for certain that Maurice had shipped on the +Flamingo. "I didn't see her leaving, boy, but Withrow himself told +me this morning. 'And I hope he'll never come back,' he said at the +same time. ''Tis you that takes a licking hard. But maybe 'tis the +insurance,' I says. 'If that's what you're thinking,' says he, 'she +isn't insured.' 'Then it must be the divil's own repair she's in +when no company at all will insure her,' I says. Sure, we had hard +words over it, but that won't bring back Maurice--he's gone in the +Flamingo, Joe." + +I went after Clancy then, and after a long chase, that took me to +Boston and back, I caught up with him. He was full of repentance and +was gloomy. It was up in his boarding-house--in his room. He, looking +tired, was thinking of taking a kink of sleep. + +"Hulloh, Joe! And I don't wonder you look surprised, Joe. I must be +getting old. Thursday morning I got up after as fine a night's sleep +as a man'd want. That was Thursday. Then Thursday night, Friday, +Friday night, Saturday--two nights and three days, and I'm sleepy +already. Sleepy, Joe, and I remember the time I could go a whole week, +and then, after a good night's sleep, wake up fine and daisy and be +ready for another week. Joe, there's a moral in that if you can only +work it out." + +Clancy stayed silent after that, not inclined to talk, I could see, +until I told him about Maurice having shipped in the Flamingo and the +hard crew that had gone in her. + +That stirred him. "Great Lord, gone in that shoe-box! Why, Joe, I'd as +soon put to sea in a market basket calked with butter. And the man +that's got her--Dave Warner! He's crazy, Joe, if ever a man was crazy. +Clean out of his head over a girl that he met in Gloucester once, but +now living in Halifax, and she won't have anything to do with him. +He's daffy over her. If she was drowning alongside you'd curse your +luck because you had to gaff her in. That is, you would only she's a +woman, of course. Wants to get lost, Joe, I believe--wants to! If this +was Boston or New York and in older days, I'd say that Dave and +Withrow must have shanghaied a crew to man the Flamingo's kind. But +you c'n get men here to go in anything sometimes. Wait a bit and I'll +be along with you. We'll see old Duncan and maybe we c'n head the +Flamingo off." + + + + +XXXVII + +THE GIRL IN CANSO + + +That was Saturday evening. The crew of the Johnnie had been told just +after the race by the skipper that he would not need them again until +Monday. Scattering on that, some going to Boston, they could not be +got together again until Monday morning, and it was not until Monday +noon that we got away. + +We fitted out as though for a Cape Shore seining trip, and that's what +we were to do in case we missed the Flamingo or could not persuade her +skipper or Maurice himself that he ought to leave her and come back on +the Johnnie Duncan. It was Clancy who had the matter in charge. +Indeed, it was only Clancy who knew what it was really all about. + +We had a good run-off before a stiff westerly that gradually hauled to +the north, and Tuesday night late saw us in Halifax Harbor. It was too +late to do anything that night, but Clancy went ashore to find out +what he could. Before sunrise he was back with word to break out the +anchor and put to sea. He had word of the Flamingo. + +"That girl of Dave's--it seems she's moved to Canso with her folks, +and Dave's gone there. He's probably there before this--maybe left +again. She's an old plug, the Flamingo, but she ought've made Canso +before this. He only stayed a few hours here and left Monday." + +It was bang, bang, bang all the way to Canso, with Clancy swearing at +Withrow and the Flamingo and Dave Warner and the girl in the case--one +after the other and sometimes all together. "Blast Withrow and that +crazy fool Dave Warner, too. And why in the devil couldn't her folks +stayed in Gloucester--or in Halifax, at least. They ought've put a few +sticks of dynamite in her and blown her to pieces ages ago. She's +forty years old if she's a day--her old planks rotten. They won't keep +her afloat over-night if they're out in this. Why d'y's'pose people +leave a good lively little city like Halifax to go to a place like +Canso? Why?" + +Andie Howe happened to be within hearing, and "Maybe the rent's +cheaper," suggested Andie. + +"Maybe it is--and maybe if you don't talk sense I'll heave you over +the rail some fine day. Better give her a grain more fore-sheet. Man, +but it's a wicked night." + +We made Canso after the worst day and night we had had in the Johnnie +Duncan since she was launched. Outside Canso Harbor it looked bad. We +didn't think the skipper would try to enter the harbor that black +night, but he did. "Got to go in and get news," said Clancy, and in we +went. It was as black as could be--squalls sweeping down--and Canso is +not the easiest harbor in the world to make at night. + +I went ashore with Clancy to hear what the young woman might have to +say. We found her in a place run by her father, a sort of lodging +house and "pub," with herself serving behind the bar--a bold-looking +young woman, not over-neat--and yet attractive in her way--good +figure, regular features, and good color. "There, Joe, if you brought +a girl like that home your mother would probably die of a broken +heart, but there's the kind that a foolish man like Dave Warner would +sell his soul for." Then Clancy explained while we were waiting for +her to see us privately, "I don't know if she'll remember me, but I +met her two or three times in Gloucester." + +When she came in she recognized Clancy right away. "How do you do, +Captain Clancy?" + +"How do you do, Miss Luce? My friend, Mr. Buckley. Now what we've come +for--but first, suppose we have a little something by way of +sociability. A little fizzy stuff, say, and some good cigars, Miss +Luce." + +She brought the wine and the cigars. Clancy pulled the cork, filled +both glasses, pushed one glass toward the young woman and drew one to +himself. + +"But, Captain, your friend hasn't any." + +"My friend," said Clancy, "doesn't drink. The last thing the doctor +said to him before we came away was, 'Don't touch a drop of liquor or +your life will pay the forfeit.' You see, Miss Luce, he's been a +dissipated youth--drink--and having been dissipated and coming of +delicate people, it's affected his health." + +"You don't tell me? I'm sure he doesn't look it." + +"No, he don't--that's a fact. But so it is." + +"Stomach?" she asked me. + +"No--heart," answered Clancy for me. "What they call an aneurism. You +know what an aneurism is, of course?" + +"Yes-yes--oh, yes----" + +"Of course. Well, he's got one of them." + +"That's too bad. So he only smokes instead?" + +"That's all. Here, Joe, smoke up." + +"My, I always thought smoking was bad for the heart." + +"It is--for everything except aneurisms. Smoking's the death of +aneurisms. Have another cigar, Joe. And Miss Luce, shall we exchange a +health?" + +"But I never drank anything in all my life." + +"Of course not. But you will now, won't you? Consider the occasion and +I'm sure you won't let me drink alone. And I've come so far to see +you, too--only of course not--Well, here's to your good health, and +may you live long and----" + +The rest of it was smothered in the gurgle. And nobody would ever +think to see the way she put down hers that Miss Luce had never had a +drink of wine before. + +"And now, Miss Luce, may I ask how long it has been since your friend +Dave Warner left----" + +"Oh-h--Dave Warner? He's no friend of mine." + +"Isn't he? Well, he's no particular friend of mine, either. But a +friend of mine--of both of us, Joe here, too--is with Dave--Maurice +Blake. Any word of him?" + +"Oh, yes. A good-looking fellow, nice eyes and hair and nice manners. +I do like to see refined manners in people. Now if it was him----" + +"If it was him, you wouldn't have told him to go to sea and the devil +take him----" + +"I'd have you know, Captain Clancy, I don't swear." + +"Swear? You, Miss Luce? Dear me, whatever made you think I thought +that? But let's have another taste of wine. But of course you didn't +encourage Dave to stay ashore here?" + +"Him?--I guess not. When he said he didn't care if he never came back, +I told him I was sure I didn't--and out he went." + +"O woman, gentle woman," murmured Clancy in his glass, "especially +real ladies. But Dave never did know how to talk to a lady." + +"I should say he didn't." + +"No, not Dave. And so his money gone he's----" + +"Money? Why, he never had any money." + +"Well, that's bad. Not even enough to open a bottle of wine to drink a +lady's health?" + +"Bottle of wine? No, nor a thimbleful of tuppenny ale." + +"That was bad, Miss Luce. Dave ought've come better heeled---- + + 'And so his money gone he puts out to sea-- + It may happen to you or happen to me.' + +And which way did he say he was going?" + +"He didn't say and I didn't ask, though one of the men with him said +something about going to the Grand Banks." + +"Grand Banks, eh? That's comforting--it isn't more than a couple of +days' sail from here to the nearest edge of it, and twenty-odd +thousand or more square miles of shoal water to hunt over after you +get there. Had they taken their bait aboard, did you hear, Miss +Luce?" + +"Yes, they had. That was yesterday afternoon late. His vessel was +leaking then, I heard him say to that nice-looking man--Maurice Blake +his name, did you say? A nice name Maurice, isn't it? Well, he said to +Maurice going out the door, 'Well, we'll put out and I callate--I +don't know how she'll get out but out we'll go to-night.' 'The sooner +you go the better it will suit me,' Blake said, and they went off +together." + +"And how was Mr. Blake?" + +"How do you mean? How did he act? My, I never saw such a man. Wouldn't +open his head all night--wouldn't drink, but just sat and smoked like +your friend there. Anything the matter with him?" + +"With Maurice? Oh, in the way of aneurisms? Not that I know of. Oh, +yes, he has heart-trouble too, come to think. But I must be getting +back to the vessel." + +"So soon?" + +"Yes, we've got to go to sea. I'm like Dave Warner in that I'm going +to sea too." + +"But nobody's driving you away." She had her eyes on Clancy's face +then. + +He didn't look up--only stared into his glass. + +She was silent for a full minute. Clancy said nothing. "Nobody's +driving you away," she said again. + +At that Clancy looked at her. "There's no telling," he said at first, +and then hastily, "Oh, no--of course nobody's driving me to sea." + +"Then what's your hurry?" + +I got up and went to the door then. I heard the sound of a scraping +chair and then of Clancy standing up. A moment's quiet and then it +was: "No, dear, I can't stay--nobody's driving me away, I know that. +I'm sure you wouldn't--not with your heart. And you've a good heart if +you'd only give it a chance. But I can't stay." + +"And why not? You won't, you mean. Well, I never thought you were +_that_ kind of a man." + +"No? Well, don't go to giving me any moral rating. Don't go to +over-rating me--or maybe you'd call it under-rating. But you see, it's +my friend that's calling." + +"And you're going out in this gale?" + +"Gale. I'd go if it was a hundred gales. Good-by--and take care of +yourself, dear." + +"And will you come back if you don't find him?" + +"Lord, Lord, how can I say? Can anybody say who's coming back and who +isn't?" + +He went by me and out the door. She looked after him, but he never +turned--only plunged out of the house and into the street and I right +after him. + + + + +XXXVIII + +THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST'ARD + + +Getting back to the vessel Clancy was pretty gloomy. "That's +settled. We can't chase them as far to the east'ard as the big +banks--a three hundred mile run to the nearest edge of it and tens of +thousands of square miles to hunt over after we'd got there. And it +would be child's work anyway to ask Maurice to leave her on the bank. +Who'd take his place even if Dave would stand for it? 'Twould mean +laying up a dory or taking his dory-mate too. Maurice wouldn't leave +her anyway, even if he believed he'd never get home--no real fisherman +would. And yet there it is--Dave in a devil of a mood, and a vessel +according to all reports that won't live out one good easterly. +And there's a crazy crew aboard her that won't make for the most +careful handling of a vessel. Oh, Lord, I don't see anything for +it, but, thank the Lord, Maurice has been behaving himself--and that +in spite of how blue he must have been feeling. By this time he's +cert'nly made up his mind he's with a pretty bad crowd, but maybe +he's glad of a little excitement. What I don't understand is how +Dave ever left old man Luce's place without breaking up the +furniture before going away. Gen'rally that's his style. Maybe +Maurice being along had something to do with it--a pretty able man in +close quarters is Maurice. Yes, he must be glad of the excitement, +but Lord, that won't save him from being lost. Oh, oh, and now +what'll we do? Let's see, the Flamingo's on the way to the Banks, +and that's the end of that chase. We've got to wait now and see that +she comes home--or don't come home--one or the other. I told that +girl that I was going to put out--put out if it blew a hundred gales. +And so I would if any good would come of it, but putting out to sea a +day like this because you bragged you would--risking your vessel and +crew, or making hard work for them if nothing else--that ain't good +sense, is it? Besides, I had to tell her something to get away +without setting up to be a model of virtue. What else could I do? +Women are the devil--sometimes--aren't they, Joe? There's some are. I +suppose it wouldn't do any great harm to head her for home. I don't +believe there's going to be much more fish going to be seined this +fall--and wouldn't she make a passage of it in this easterly? Oh, +Lord, it would be the race all over again, only ten times as long a +drag." + +While he sat there in the cabin, smoking and meditating, letting us +into his thoughts every now and then, the voices of some of our crew +were heard on deck. + +We all went up and got the word that was being passed around. A coast +steamer had just come to anchor in the harbor with the report that +just outside--about ten miles to the west'ard--was a vessel, dismasted +and clean-swept, and dragging toward the rocks. They could not help +her themselves--too rough--a hurricane outside--to launch a boat was +out of the question. They didn't mind taking a chance, they said, but +to attempt her rescue would be suicide. + +It looked like a pretty hard chance going out in that gale, but Clancy +didn't wait. "Nobody else seems to be hurrying to get out, and we +being the able-est looking craft in the harbor, I callate it's up to +us to go." He got the exact location of the distressed vessel from the +coaster, and then it was up anchor, make sail, and out we went. + +There were people who called Clancy a fool for ordering out his vessel +and risking his crew that day--men in that very harbor--and maybe he +was. But for myself, I want that kind of a fool for my skipper. The +man that will take a chance for a stranger will take a bigger chance +for his own by and by. + +We saw her while we were yet miles away, down to the west'ard--near +Whitehead and with the cruel stretch of rocks under her lee quarter. +Even with plenty of sea-room she could not have lasted long, and here +with these ledges to catch her she looked to be in for a short shrift. +We had a good chance to get a look at her as we bore down. Everything +was gone from her deck, even the house and rail. There was not as much +loose wood on deck as would make a tooth-pick. Afterwards we learned +that two seas hove her down so that they had to cut the spars away to +right her, and then just as she was coming up another monster had +caught her and swept her clean--not only swept clean, but stove in her +planks and started some of her beams so that she began to leak in a +fashion that four men to the pumps could just manage to keep up with. + +We could just see them--the men to the pumps working desperately--with +the others lashed to the stumps of the masts and the stanchions which +were left when the rail went. Her big hawser had parted and her chain +was only serving to slightly check her way toward the rocks. + +With spars and deck gear gone and her hull deep in the water, a vessel +is not so easily distinguished. But there was something familiar in +this one. We had seen her before. All at once it flashed on half a +dozen of us--"the Flamingo!" we said. "God! that's luck!" said +Clancy. + +She lay in a sort of inlet that was wide open to the gale, rocks on +the better part of three sides of her, north, south and west. She was +then within all but striking distance of the rocks, and the seas, high +and wicked, were sweeping over her. It looked like a bad place to work +out of if we should get close in, but Clancy held on. + +"Not much lee-room, but plenty of water under her keel anyway," and +himself to the wheel, sailed the Johnnie around the Flamingo. He +hailed Maurice as he went by, waved his hand to the others, and hove a +line aboard. They took the line, hauled in the hawser at the end of +it, made that fast to the windlass, and then we started off with her +in tow. + +We were doing pretty well, what with plenty of wind and the Johnnie +buckling down to her work like she was a steamer, till the hawser +parted and back toward the rocks went the Flamingo again. + +"No use," said Clancy, "sea's too much for any line we got. We'll try +it with the seine-boat. Who'll go in the seine-boat and try to take +them off? Think quick, but mind what it means." + +Every man of the crew of the Johnnie Duncan said, "Here!" The cook +even came out of the forec's'le and put in his "And me, too, +skipper." + +"You're good men," said Clancy,--"damn good men," and looked us up and +down. We felt proud, he said it in such a way. "But you're taking your +lives in your hands and some of you got wives and children--mothers or +something. Who hasn't anybody depending on him? Which of you hasn't +any woman somewhere, or little brothers or sisters?" + +About twelve of the sixteen men standing on the deck of the Johnnie +Duncan said "Me!" + +"Three-quarters of you, at least," said Clancy, "are damn liars. Over +with the seine-boat and be careful nobody gets hurt." + +Somebody did get hurt, though. Andie Howe got his foot smashed and was +helped below. Clancy gave the rest of us a scolding in advance. +"You're not hurt yet, but some of you will be--like Andie--if you +don't watch out. You'd think that some of you were out on some little +pond up in the country somewhere launching a canoe off one of those +club-house floats. Keep an eye out for those seas when they board. And +watch out for that deckload or some of you'll have a head cut off. A +man killed or a man washed over the rail--what's the difference--it's +a man lost. Look out now--watch, you Steve--damn you, watch out! Over +with it!" + +And over it went and with it leaped two men before it could sag away, +while the rest of us stood by the rail watching our chance. + +"Nelson," called Clancy, "come away from that rail! Steve, come +away!--come away, I say, and no back talk. Pat, you can go--jump +in--watch your chance or it's the last of you. Eddie, you can go, and +you Bill, and you Frenchy. Joe! stand away from that rail or I'll put +you in the hold and batten the hatches on you. Now, that's better. And +that's enough--six men to the oars and one to steer." + +"And who'll steer?" asked somebody. + +"You'll know in a minute," said Clancy, and he leaped for the +seine-boat and made it, and grabbed the steering oar. "Stand by--push +off! Fend off in the vessel there! Steve, if anything happens--you +know--you're to take the Johnnie home. Give way, fellows. Now! Watch +out!--now--now then, around with her--end on, and there she is like a +bird! And now drive her!" + +"A bird!" said Clancy--but a wild-looking bird--fifty feet she looked +to be going into the air one moment and down out of sight the next, +and water slamming aboard her so that we thought she was swamped half +a dozen times. Two had to leave the oars and go to bailing, while +Clancy with an arm and shoulders and back and swinging waist +like--well, like nothing a man ever had before--kept her end to it. + +"Good luck!" we called. + +"Never fear--we'll bring 'em back!" said Clancy. + +"Or stay with them," we thought. + +But he didn't stay with them. It was a ticklish job, but Clancy got +away with it. He didn't dare to go too near the Flamingo, for that +meant that the seas would pitch the seine-boat up and dash it to +kindling wood against her hull. What he did do was to go as near the +Flamingo as he could and keep her clear, then heave a line aboard and +call to her crew one after the other to make it fast around themselves +and jump overboard. It took some nerve to make that jump--from the +rigging of the Duncan we watched them--saw them shiver and draw +up--these were men accustomed to face danger--reckless men--but the +shiver was over in a breath, and then over the rail and into that +sea--a game fight--and they were hauled into the seine-boat. Some of +them we thought would never make it, for it was an awful sea. + +As fast as one of the Flamingo's men made the seine-boat he was set to +work bailing out or taking a haul at the oars, for it was a difficult +matter in that sea to keep the seine-boat at the right distance from +the Flamingo. But they got them all--ten of them. Two were hauled in +unconscious, but came to after awhile. + +To get aboard the Johnnie again was almost as bad as to get into the +seine-boat from the Flamingo. But we managed it. Long Steve was swept +over while we were at it, but we got him back with the help of Maurice +Blake and another of the Flamingo's crowd. By smart clever work they +grabbed Steve before he could go down and hauled him into the +seine-boat. + +When they were all safe aboard the Duncan Clancy shook hands with +Maurice. "I call that luck, Maurice--to come out to save a stranger +and find you've saved your own. And now whose trick to the wheel--you, +Joe? Put her on the off-shore tack till we're well clear of that +headland--maybe we c'n make it in one leg. No? Then a short tack and +have an eye out for the ledges--not too close. And Maurice, go +below--you and Dave and all hands of you, and we'll get out dry +clothes for you. Man, but you must be cold and hungry, but the cook's +getting coffee and grub ready. And for the Duncan's crew--on deck all +hands and put the tops'ls to her. For, Maurice-boy, we're going +home--going home, Maurice--where there's people waiting for you. Hang +on a while longer, Joe, and I'll take her myself." + +No need to tell me to hang on. If I hadn't hung on or been lashed to +the wheel I could never have kept my feet, for at this time it was so +bad that they had passed a line from my waist to the windward bitt and +I was up to my waist with every dive of her. + +"Lord, she's a dog, ain't she! If old man Duncan could see her now! +Remember Tom O'Donnell singing that song the other night: + + 'West half-no'the and drive her--we're abreast now of Cape + Sable-- + 'Tis an everlasting hurricane, but here's the craft that's + able.' + +We're not abreast of Cape Sable yet, but it won't take us too many +hours at this clip. And here's the craft that's able. Man, wouldn't it +be fine if Tom O'Donnell himself was with us and the pair of us racing +home? Let me take the wheel, Joe. And go for'ard and have a mug-up for +yourself--and have a care going, Joe, for it's leaping she is now and +seas that'd lift you a cable's length to looard if ever they caught +you fair. That's it--oh, but if your mother could see you now, Joe, +it's never to sea you'd come again." + +I made my way for'ard. A dash between the house and windward rail, a +shoot for the mainmast and holding on there for awhile. Another dive +for the gripes on the dories, another shoot between rail and dories, a +grip of the bow gripes, a swing around and I was at the forec's'le +hatch. Here I thought I heard him call and looked aft. + +He had a leg either side of the wheel, standing full height and sawing +the spokes a bit up and down to get the feel of her. The life line was +trailing from his waist to the bitt--the clear white sea was up to his +middle and racing over the taffrail. He had cast away his mitts the +better to grip the spokes, and even as I looked he took off his +sou'wester and sent it scaling. The wind taking hold of it must have +carried it a quarter a mile to leeward. Watching it go, himself +looking out under the boom, he laughed--laughed--such a roar of a +laugh--stamped his feet and began to sing: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + My love's for Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +The devil was in him then. "Did you call me, skipper?" I sang out. + +"Did I? Did I? Lord, Joe, I don't know. Maybe I did. I feel like +calling from here to Gloucester, and if I did I bet they'd hear me. +God, Joe, but it's good to be alive, isn't it?--just to be alive. +Whew! but I wish I had a few more sou'westers--just to see 'em scale. +But what was it I wanted--but is the cook there?" + +"He is--I c'n hear him talking." + +"Then go below and tell him, Joe--tell him to mouse his pots and +kettles, for with sail alow and sail aloft, with her helmsman lashed +and her house awash, in a living gale and the devil's own sea, the +Johnnie Duncan's going to the west'ard." + +And she certainly went. + + + + +XXXIX + +THE HEART OF CLANCY + + +That trip ended seining for the Duncan that year. Everything went well +with our friends, after we got home. It was late in the season, and +Maurice Blake was to stay ashore to get married, for one thing. He had +made a great season of it and could afford to. So the Johnnie Duncan +was fitted out for fresh halibuting and Clancy took her. + +I went with him. I remember very well that I had no idea of going +winter fishing when the seining season ended, but, somehow or other +when Clancy came to get a crew together I was looking for a chance. + +So we put out, and on the rocks of Cape Ann, near Eastern Point +lighthouse, on the day we sailed on our first halibuting trip, were +Maurice Blake and Alice Foster, my cousin Nell and Will Somers, to +wave us good luck. Clancy hauled the vessel close in to get a better +look and they waved us until I suppose they could see us no longer. Of +course they should have been able to make us out long after we had +lost sight of them, we being a tall-sparred, white-sailed vessel; and +Clancy must have had that in mind, for long after all signs of them +had been lost to us he kept the glasses pointed to the rocks. He +turned at last with a "Well, I suppose they're all happy now, Joe?" + +"They ought to be," I said. + +"Yes, they ought to be," he repeated, and then again, "they ought to +be," and went for'ard. + +He stayed for'ard a long time, saying no word, but leaning over the +windlass and looking out ahead. Nobody disturbed him. Once or twice +when the sheets needed trimming--and in a deep sleep I think Clancy +would know that--he turned and gave the word, but the bare word and no +more. He had his spells we all knew, when he didn't want anybody near +him, and so he wanted to be alone, I suppose. And there he stayed, +with what spray came over the bow splashing him, but he paying no +attention. + +At supper call he moved, but not to go below and eat--only to shift to +walking the quarter, and walking the quarter he stayed until near +midnight. He went below then after giving a few words of instruction +to the watch--went below and got out his pipe. From my bunk, the +middle port bunk in the cabin, I watched him rummaging for tobacco in +his stateroom and then his coming out with his pipe and his filling +and lighting it slowly and thoughtfully, and then his sitting and +smoking under the cabin lamp. + +Looking over when he had finished that pipeful--I had not drawn my +curtain--he caught my eyes on him. He smiled, but said nothing--only +lit another pipeful, and kept on smoking. + +I fell asleep watching him--fell asleep and woke again. He must have +been watching me, for his eyes were on mine when I looked for him +again. He smiled and shook his pipe out, and made as though to turn +in. + +But he didn't turn in. He took off his jersey, loosened the collar of +his flannel shirt, cast off his slip-shods--stopped--looked into his +bunk, came back, filled and lit another pipeful and began to talk to +me. I thought I was sleepy, but in five minutes I didn't think so. +Joking, laughing, telling stories--in ten minutes he had me roaring. +Before long he had everybody in the cabin awake and roaring, too. Men, +coming off watch and into the cabin to warm up, or for one thing or +another, listened and stayed. He kept that up all the rest of the +night--until after six o'clock in the morning, and only the cook +called to breakfast there's no telling when he would have stopped. And +not until he was going for'ard to eat did I get a glimpse of what it +was he had been thinking of during all those earlier hours of the +night. The sun, I remember, was streaking the sky ahead of us--he +stopped just as he was about to drop into the forec's'le and pointed +it out. + +"A sunrise, Joe, on a fine October morning out to +sea--beautiful--beautiful--but just one thing wrong about it. And what +is it?--you don't see? Well, Joe, it's over the bow. A sunrise, Joe, +is most beautiful when it's over the stern--and why? 'Cause then +you're going home--of course. Going home, Joe--if you've got a home to +go to. Look to it, Joe, that you've got a home of your own to go to +before you're much older. Somebody to work for--somebody waiting for +you--a wife, Joe--wife and children--or you're in for some awful +lonesome times." + +That was Clancy--watch-mate, bunk-mate, dory-mate once, and now my +skipper--Clancy, who could be any man's friend, the man that everybody +jumped to shake hands with, and yet never a bit of use to himself. And +I couldn't but half wonder at that, and kept my eyes on him when, with +one foot on the top step of the companionway, he turned and looked +around again. + +"And if you can't get anybody, skipper?" + +"Then it's hard--though most likely you've deserved it." + +"But you haven't deserved it?" + +"Deserved it? Yes, and ten times over." + +"That's pretty rough." + +"Rough? No, it's right. When you do wrong you've got to make up for +it. It's all in the big scheme of the universe. You've got to strike a +balance some time--somewhere. And the sooner the better. Be thankful +if you have to settle it right away, Joe. If you don't and it drags +along--then it's worse again, and the Lord help those that come after +you--those that have to take up life where you've left it off. The +Lord have mercy on the heirs of your brain and heart and soul, boy. +What you hand them they've got to take. Yes, sir, you'll pay for it +somewhere--you yourself, or, what's worse, those you care for will +have to pay--in this world or another--whatever it is we're coming to, +a better or a worse world, it's there and waiting us. Be thankful, as +I said, Joe, if you have to settle for it here--settle for it yourself +alone." + +All around, above and below, ahead and astern, he looked, a long, long +look astern--his foot on the step, and singing softly, almost to +himself: + + "And if I come to you, my love, + And my heart free from guile, + Will you have a glance for me-- + Will you on me smile? + +Oh, Lord! pipe-dreams--pipe-dreams. Let's go below, Joe, and have a +bite to eat." + +So below we went; and her sails lit up by the morning sun, her decks +wet by the slapping sea, sheets off and sailing free, the Johnnie +Duncan clipped her way to the east'ard. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30138 *** diff --git a/30138-h/30138-h.htm b/30138-h/30138-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..726d0ea --- /dev/null +++ b/30138-h/30138-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,8976 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Seiners, by James B. (James Brendan) Connolly</title> +<style type="text/css"> + @media screen { + hr.pb {margin:30px 0; width:100%; border:none;border-top:thin dashed silver;} + .pagenum {display: inline; font-size: x-small; text-align: right; text-indent: 0; position: absolute; right: 2%; padding: 1px 3px; font-style: normal; font-variant:normal; font-weight:normal; text-decoration: none; background-color: inherit; border:1px solid #eee;} + .pncolor {color: silver;} + } + @media print { + hr.pb {border:none;page-break-after: always;} + .pagenum { display:none; } + } + body {margin-left: 11%; margin-right: 10%;} + p {margin-top: 0.5em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: 0.5em;} + + h1 {font-size:1.4em;} + h1,h2,h3 {text-align:center; font-weight:normal;} + h1.pg {text-align:center; font-weight:bold; font-size: 190%; } + h2 {font-size:1.2em;} + h3 {font-size:1.0em;} + h3.pg {text-align:center; font-weight:bold; font-size: 110%; } + hr.p5 {border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; width: 5%;} + p.tp {font-size:1em; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; text-align:center;} + + .caption {font-size: 90%; text-align:center;} + .chsp {margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em;} + .figcenter {margin: 2em auto 2em auto; text-align: center; width: auto;} + .figtag {height: 1px;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + a {text-decoration: none;} + div.poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; margin-bottom: 1em; text-align: left;} + div.poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em;} + div.poem p {margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + hr.toprule {width: 65%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; border:none; border-bottom:1px solid silver; clear:both;} + span.indent1 {text-indent:0; width: 0.4em; display: block; float: left;} + span.indent2 {text-indent:0; width: 0.8em; display: block; float: left;} + span.indent3 {text-indent:0; width: 1.2em; display: block; float: left;} + span.indent6 {text-indent:0; width: 2.4em; display: block; float: left;} + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; clear: both;} + td.chalgn {text-align:right; margin-top:0; padding-right:1em;} + + hr.full { width: 100%; + margin-top: 3em; + margin-bottom: 0em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + height: 4px; + border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ + border-style: solid; + border-color: #000000; + clear: both; } + pre {font-size: 85%;} +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30138 ***</div> +<h1 class="pg">The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Seiners, by James B. (James Brendan) +Connolly</h1> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> + +<div class='figtag'> +<a name='linki_1' id='linki_1'></a> +</div> +<div class='figcenter'> +<img src='images/illus-fpc.jpg' alt='' title='' width='582' height='369' /><br /> +<p class='caption'> +IT WAS THE FINEST KIND OF EXCITEMENT, OUR RUNNING TO HARBOR<br /> +</p> +</div> +<hr class='pb' /> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:2.2em;margin-top:40px;margin-bottom:40px;'>THE<br />SEINERS</p> +<p class='tp' style='margin-bottom:20px;'>BY</p> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:1.4em;margin-bottom:20px;'>JAMES B. CONNOLLY</p> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;margin-bottom:80px;'>AUTHOR OF “OUT OF GLOUCESTER,”<br />“JEB HUTTON,” ETC.</p> +<p class='tp' >CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS</p> +<p class='tp' >NEW YORK : : : : : : : : : 1910</p> +<hr class='pb' /> +<p class='tp' ><span class='smcap'>Copyright, 1904, by</span></p> +<p class='tp' >CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS</p> +<hr class='p5' /> +<p class='tp' >Published, May, 1904</p> +<hr class='pb' /> +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> +<table border='0' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Contents' style='margin:1em auto;'> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>I.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The New Vessel of Withrow’s</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS'>1</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>II.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Little Jog Along the Docks</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS'>8</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>III.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#III_MINNIE_ARKELL'>16</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>IV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Little Johnnie Duncan Stands Examination</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION'>27</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>V.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>From out of Crow’s Nest</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST'>35</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Gets a Vessel</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL'>43</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy Crosses Minnie Arkell</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL'>51</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Seining Fleet Puts out to Sea</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA'>61</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>IX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Mackerel</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IX_MACKEREL'>70</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>X.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>We Lose Our Seine</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE'>82</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>An Over-Night Breeze</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE'>87</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Fleet Runs to Harbor</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR'>99</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Wesley Marrs Brings a Message</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE'>119</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Prospect of Night-Seining</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING'>123</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy to the Mast-Head</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD'>129</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>We Get a Fine School</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL'>137</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Drive for Market</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET'>144</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Brush With the Yachting Fleet</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET'>153</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell Again</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN'>159</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Skipper Puts for Home</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME'>172</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Seiners’ Work</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXI_SEINERS_WORK'>175</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>On the Cape Shore</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE'>184</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Dressing Down</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN'>193</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Withrow Outsails the Duncan</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN'>202</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Trouble With the Dominion Cutters</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS'>206</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Gossip in Gloucester</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER'>211</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>In Clancy’s Boarding-House</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE'>217</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>In the Arkell Kitchen</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN'>220</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Comes Home</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME'>230</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Morning of the Race</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE'>235</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Start of the Race</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE'>243</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>O’donnell Carries Away Both Masts</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS'>250</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Able Johnnie Duncan</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN'>257</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell Once More</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE'>265</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy Lays Down the Law</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW'>271</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Is Recalled</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED'>281</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Girl in Canso</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO'>289</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Duncan Goes to the West’ard</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD'>297</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Heart of Clancy</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY'>309</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +<hr class='pb' /> +<h1>THE SEINERS</h1> +<hr class='pb' /> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_1' name='page_1'></a>1</span></div> +<h1>The Seiners</h1> +<div class='chsp' style='padding-top:0'> +<a name='I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS' id='I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS'></a> +<h2>I</h2> +<h3>THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW’S</h3> +</div> +<p>It was only a few days before this that the +new vessel of Mr. Withrow’s, built by him, +as everybody supposed, for Maurice Blake, had +been towed around from Essex, and I remember +how Maurice stood on the dock that afternoon +and looked her over.</p> +<p>There was not a bolt or a plank or a seam in +her whole hull, not a square inch inside or out, that +he had not been over half a dozen times while +she was on the stocks; but now he had to look her +over again, and as he looked his eyes took on a +shine. She had been designed by a man famous +the world over, and was intended to beat anything +that ever sailed past Eastern Point.</p> +<p>She certainly was a great-looking model of a +vessel, and “If she only sails and handles half so +well as she looks, she’ll do for me,” said Maurice. +“Yes, sir, and if she’s up to what I think she ought +to be, I wouldn’t be afraid to bet my share of what +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_2' name='page_2'></a>2</span> +we make out South that she’ll hold her own with +anything out of Gloucester––give her a few weeks +to loosen up, of course.”</p> +<p>That was a good deal to say, for it was a great +fleet of vessels sailing out of Gloucester; but even +so, even allowing for a young skipper’s pride in +his first crack vessel, it meant a whole lot coming +like that from Maurice Blake.</p> +<p>And on top of all that Maurice and Withrow +had to quarrel, though what about I never found +out. I only know that I was ready to believe that +Withrow was to blame, for I liked Maurice and +did not like Withrow, even though Withrow was +the man from whom I drew my pay every week. +And yet I could not understand it, for Maurice +Blake had been far and away the most successful +skipper sailing for Withrow, and Withrow always +had a good eye for the dollar.</p> +<p>No more came of it until this particular morning, +some days after Maurice and Withrow had +quarrelled. Wesley Marrs and Tommie Clancy, +two men that I never tired of listening to, were on +the dock and sizing up the new vessel. Wesley +Marrs was himself a great fisherman, and master +at this time of the wonderful Lucy Foster.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>When she swings the main boom over</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And she feels the wind abaft,</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_3' name='page_3'></a>3</span></p> +<p>The way she’ll walk to Gloucester’ll</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Make a steamer look a raft.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>For she’s the Lucy Foster,</p> +<p>She’s a seiner out of Gloucester,––</p> +</div></div> +<p>was the way the fishermen of the port used to sing +about the Lucy; while Tommie Clancy was Maurice +Blake’s closest friend.</p> +<p>With ballast stored, masts stepped, rigging set +up, and sails bent, setting as sweet as could be to +her lines and the lumpers beginning to get her +ready for the mackerel season, the Fred Withrow +was certainly a picture.</p> +<p>After a couple of extra long pulls, blowing the +smoke into the air, and another look above and +below, “That one––she’ll sail some or I don’t +know,” said Wesley.</p> +<p>“She sure will,” said Tommie; “and it’s a +jeesly shame Maurice isn’t to have her.” Then +turning to me, “What in the devil’s name ails that +man you work for, Joey?”</p> +<p>I said I didn’t know.</p> +<p>“No, nor nobody else knows. I’d like to work +in that store for him for about ten minutes. I +think I’d make him say something in that ten +minutes that would give me a good excuse for +heaving him out the window. He had an argument +with Maurice, Wesley, and Maurice don’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_4' name='page_4'></a>4</span> +know what it was half about, but he knows he +came near to punching Withrow.”</p> +<p>And Wesley and Tommie had to talk that out; +and between the pair of them, thinking of what +they said, I thought I ought to walk back to the +store with barely a civil look for my employer, +who didn’t like that at all, for he generally wanted +to hand out the black looks himself.</p> +<p>Then the girls––my cousin Nellie and her particular +chum, Alice Foster––came in to weigh +themselves, and also to remind me, they said, that +I was to take them over to Essex the next day for +the launching of the new vessel for the Duncan +firm, which had been designed by a friend of +Nell’s, a young fellow named Will Somers, who +was just beginning to get a name in Gloucester for +fast and able models of vessels. Withrow, who +was not over-liberal with his holidays, said I might +go––mostly, I suspect, because Alice Foster had +said she would not make the trip without Nell, +and Nell would not go unless I went too.</p> +<p>Then Nell and Miss Foster went on with the +business of weighing themselves. That was in +line with the latest fad. It was always something +or other, and physical culture was in the air at +this time with every other girl in Gloucester, so +far as I could see––either Indian-club swinging +or dumb-bell drilling, long walks, and things of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_5' name='page_5'></a>5</span> +that kind, and telling how much better they felt +after it. My cousin Nell, who went in for anything +that anybody ever told her about, was trying +to reduce her weight. According to some +perfect-form charts, or something or other on +printed sheets, she weighed seven pounds more +than she should for her height. I thought she was +about the right weight myself, and told her so, +but she said no––she was positively fat. “Look +at Alice,” she said, “she’s just the thing.”</p> +<p>I looked at Alice––Miss Foster I always called +her myself––and certainly she was a lovely girl, +though perhaps a little too conscious of it. She +was one of the few that weren’t going in for anything +that I could see. She wasn’t even weighing +herself, or at least she didn’t until Mr. Withrow, +with his company manners in fine working order, +asked her if she wouldn’t allow him to weigh her.</p> +<p>There were people in town who said it was +not for nothing that Alice Foster was so chummy +with my cousin Nell. They meant, of course, that +being chummy with Nell, who came down regularly +to see me, gave herself a good excuse to come +along and so have a word with Withrow. Fred +Withrow himself was a big, well-built, handsome +man––an unusually good-looking man, I’d call +him––and a great heart-breaker, according to report––some +of it his own. And he was wealthy, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_6' name='page_6'></a>6</span> +too. I did not know, but somehow or other I did +not believe it, or maybe it was that I hoped rather +than believed that Miss Foster did not care particularly +for him; for I did not like him myself, +although I worked for him and was taking his +money. Being day in and day out with him in +the store, you see I saw him pretty much as he +really was, and I hated to think of a fine girl––for +with all her cool ways I knew Miss Foster was +that––marrying him. Just how Withrow thought +he stood with Miss Foster I did not know––he +was a pretty close-mouthed man when he wanted +to be. Miss Foster herself was that reserved kind +of a girl that you cannot always place. She struck +me as being a girl that would die before she would +confess a weakness or a troublesome feeling. And +yet, without knowing how it came there, there was +always a notion in the back of my head that made +me half-believe that she did not come to the store +with my cousin out of pure companionship. There +was something besides––and what could it be but +Withrow?</p> +<p>After the weighing was done Nell asked me all +at once, “I hear, Joe, that Captain Hollis is going +to have your new vessel? How is that? We––I +thought that Captain Blake was going master +of her––and such a pretty vessel!”</p> +<p>I answered that I didn’t know how it was, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_7' name='page_7'></a>7</span> +looked over at my employer, as much as to say, +“Maybe he can tell you.”</p> +<p>I think now that I must have been a pretty +impudent lad, letting my employer know what I +thought of him as I did in those days. I think, +too, he had a pretty shrewd notion of what I +thought of himself and Maurice Blake. At any +rate, after the girls had gone, he worked himself +into a fine bit of temper, and I talked back at him, +and the end of it was that he discharged me––or +1 quit––I’m not sure which. I do know that it +was rapid-fire talk while it lasted.</p> +<p>It was some satisfaction to me to tell Withrow +just about what I did think of him before I went. +He didn’t quite throw me out of the door, although +he was big enough for that; but he looked +as if he wanted to. And maybe he would have, +too, or tried it, only I said, “Mind I don’t give +you what Tommie Clancy threatened to give you +once,” and his nerve went flat. I couldn’t have +handled him as Clancy had any more than I could +have hove a barrel of salt mackerel over my head, +which was what the strong fishermen of the port +were doing about that time to prove their strength; +but the bluff went, and I couldn’t help throwing out +my chest as I went out the door and thinking that +I was getting to be a great judge of human nature.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_8' name='page_8'></a>8</span> +<a name='II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS' id='II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS'></a> +<h2>II</h2> +<h3>A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS</h3> +</div> +<p>I was sorry to lose my job. I was twenty years +old, without a trade or special knowledge of +any kind, and beyond the outfitting of fishing vessels, +knowing nothing of any business, and with +no more than a high school education––and that +two years behind me––and I knew of no place in +Gloucester where I could begin all over and right +away get as much pay as I had left behind me. I +might go to Boston, of course, and try for something +there––I was not ten minutes out of Withrow’s +before I thought of doing that. But a little +further thought and I knew there were more capable +men than I walking the streets of Boston looking +for work. However, a lot could happen +before I would have to worry, and so I decided +to take the air and think it over.</p> +<p>I might go fishing certainly––I had had a little +experience in my school vacations––if my mother +would only stand for it. As to that I did not +know. If it came to fishing or starving––one or +the other––then of course she would have to let +me go fishing. But my father had been lost on the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_9' name='page_9'></a>9</span> +Grand Banks with his vessel and all hands––and +then one brother was already fishing. So I hardly +thought she would allow me, and anyway I knew +she would never have a good night’s rest while I +was out.</p> +<p>However, I kept thinking it over. To get away +by myself I took a ride over to Essex. There I +knew I would find half a dozen vessels on the +stocks, and there they were––the latest vessel for +the Duncan firm and three more for other firms. I +knew one of the ship-carpenters in Elwell’s yard, +Levi Woodbury, and he was telling me about some +of the vessels that had been launched lately. “Of +course,” he said, “you saw the one launched a few +days ago from here––that one built for Mr. Withrow?”</p> +<p>I said I had, and that she was a wonder to look +at and that I wished Maurice Blake, and not Sam +Hollis, was to have her.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Levi, “and a pity. Maurice Blake +could have sailed her right, though for that matter +Sam Hollis is a clever hand to sail a vessel, too. +And she ought to sail some, that vessel. But look +here at this one for the Duncans and to be launched +to-morrow. Designed by Will Somers––know +him? Yes? A nice young fellow. Ain’t she +able-looking?”</p> +<p>She certainly was, and handsome, and Levi went +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_10' name='page_10'></a>10</span> +on to tell me about her. He showed me where she +was like and where she differed from the Lucy Foster, +the Fred Withrow, the Nannie O, the Colleen +Bawn, and the others which were then causing trouble +in Gloucester with crews fighting over their good +qualities. I did not know a whole lot about vessels, +but having been born in Gloucester and having +soaked in the atmosphere all my life and loving +vessels besides, I had a lot of notions about them. +And I liked this last Duncan vessel. By the wind +and in a sea-way, it struck me she would be a wonder. +There was something more than just the fine +lines of her. There is that about vessels. You +can take two vessels, model them alike, rig them +alike, handle them alike, and still one will sail +rings around the other. And why is it? I’ve +heard a hundred fishermen at different times say +that and then ask, Why is it? This one was awfully +sharp forward, too sharp some might have +said, with little more forefoot than most of the +late-built flyers; but she was deep and had a quarter +that I knew would stand up under her sail. I +liked the after-part of her. Racing machines are +all right for a few months or a year or two and +in smooth water, but give me a vessel that can +stand up under sail. I thought I could see where, +if they gave her sail enough, especially aft, and a +skipper that would drive her, she might do great +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_11' name='page_11'></a>11</span> +things. And certainly she ought to be a comfort +in a blow and bring a fellow home––and there’s +a whole lot in that––being in a vessel that you +feel will bring you home again.</p> +<p>I looked over the others, but none of them held +me like the Duncan vessel, and I soon came back +to Gloucester and took a walk along the waterfront.</p> +<p>It was well into March at this time––the third +week in March, I remember––and there was a +great business doing along the docks. The salt +bankers were almost ready to leave––twenty-eight +or thirty sail fitting out for the Grand Banks. And +then there were the seiners––the mackerel catchers––seventy +or eighty sail of them making ready for +the Southern cruise. All that meant that things +would be humming for a while. So I took a walk +along the docks to see it.</p> +<p>Most of the vessels that had been fishing during +the winter had been stripped of their winter sails, +and now aboard these they were bending on the +summer suits and slinging up what top spars had +not already been sent up. For the vessels that +had been laid up all winter and stripped of everything, +they were getting out the gear from the +lofts. Everywhere it was topmasts being sent up, +sails being dragged out, stays swayed taut, halyards +and sheets rove––an overhauling generally. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_12' name='page_12'></a>12</span> +On the railways––Burnham’s, Parkhurst’s, and +Tarr’s––were vessels having their bottoms +scrubbed and painted and their topsides lined out. +And they all looked so handsome and smelt so fine +with their riggings being tarred, not with the +smoky tar that people ashore put on house-roofs, +but the fine rich-smelling tar that goes into vessels’ +rigging; and there was the black and dark sea-green +paint for the sides, with the gold or yellow +or sometimes red stripe to mark the run, and main +and quarter rails being varnished.</p> +<p>And the seine-boats! If there is anything afloat +that sets more easily on the water than a seine-boat +I never saw it, unless it might be a birch-bark +canoe––and who’d want to be caught out in a blow +in a canoe? The seine-boats all looked as natural +as so many sea-gulls––thirty-six or thirty-eight feet +long, green or blue bottoms to just above the waterline +so that it would show, and above that all clear +white except for the blue or red or yellow or green +decorations that some skippers liked. And the +seines that went with them were coming in wagons +from the net and twine factory, tanned brown or +tarred black and all ready to be hauled on to the +vessels’ decks or stowed in the holds below, until +the fleet should be in among the mackerel to the +south’ard––off Hatteras or Cape May or somewhere +down that way.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_13' name='page_13'></a>13</span></div> +<p>To feel all that and the rest of it––to walk to +the tops of your shoes in pine chips in the spar +yards, to measure the lengths of booms and gaffs +for yourself if you weren’t sure who were going to +spread the big mainsails, to go up in the sail-lofts +and see the sailmakers, bench after bench of them, +making their needles and the long waxed threads +fly through the canvas that it seemed a pity wasn’t +to stay so white forever––to see them spread the +canvas out along the chalk lines on the varnished +floor, fixing leach and luff ropes to them and putting +the leather-bound cringles in, and putting +them in too so they’d stay, for by and by men’s +lives would depend on the way they hung on––all +that, railways, sail-lofts, vessels, boats, docks alive +with men jumping to their work––skippers, crews, +carpenters, riggers, lumpers, all thinking, talking, +and, I suppose, dreaming of the season’s work +ahead––m-m––there was life for a man! Who’d +want to work in a store after that?</p> +<p>I stopped at Duncan’s wharf and looked at +Wesley Marrs’s vessel, the Lucy Foster, and then +the Colleen Bawn.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>And O’Donnell drove the Colleen like a ghost through all that gale,</p> +<p>And around ’twas roaring mountains and above ’twas blinding hail,</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_14' name='page_14'></a>14</span></div> +<p>and so on. And the Nannie O, another vessel that +fishermen sang songs about.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the lovely Nannie O,</p> +<p>The able Nannie O,</p> +<p>The Nannie O a-drivin’ through the gale.</p> +</div></div> +<p>They were lying there, tied to the docks. They +were all dreams, so long and clean, with the beautiful +sheer fore and aft, and the overhang of the +racers they were meant to be––the gold run, with +the grain of the varnished oak rails shining above +the night-black of their topsides, and varnished +spars. They had the look of vessels that could +sail––and they could, and live out a gale––nothing +like them afloat I’d heard people say that ought +to know.</p> +<p>I walked along another stretch and at Withrow’s +dock I saw again the new one that had been +built for Maurice Blake but given to Sam Hollis, +who was a boon companion of Withrow’s ashore, +as I may have said already. Hollis’s gang were +bragging even now that she’d trim anything that +ever sailed––the Lucy Foster, the Nannie O, the +Colleen Bawn, and all the rest of them. And +there were some old sharks, too, upon the docks +who said they didn’t know but she looked as if she +could. But a lot of other people didn’t think it––she +was all right as a vessel, but Sam Hollis wasn’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_15' name='page_15'></a>15</span> +a Wesley Marrs, nor a Tom O’Donnell, nor a +Tommie Ohlsen, nor even a Maurice Blake, who +was a much younger man and a less experienced +fisherman than any of the others.</p> +<p>All that, with the vessels anchored in the stream +and the little dories running up and down and in and +out––it all brought back again the trips I’d made +with my father, clear back to the time when I was +a little boy, so small that in heavy weather he +wouldn’t trust me to go forward or aft myself, but +would carry me in his arms himself––it all made +me so long for the sea that my head went round +and I found myself staggering like a drunken man +as I tried to walk away from it.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_16' name='page_16'></a>16</span> +<a name='III_MINNIE_ARKELL' id='III_MINNIE_ARKELL'></a> +<h2>III</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL</h3> +</div> +<p>There was nothing for it. For a thousand +dollars a month I could not stay ashore. +Somebody or other would give me a chance to go +seining, some good skipper I knew; and if none of +the killers would give me a chance, then I’d try +some old pod of a skipper. My mother would just +have to let me go. It was only summer fishing +after all––seining wasn’t like winter trawling––and +in the end she would see it as I did.</p> +<p>I walked along, and as the last man in my mind +was Maurice Blake, of course he was the first I +had to run into. He was not looking well; I mean +he was not looking as he should have looked. +There was a reckless manner about him that no +more belonged to him than a regularly quiet manner +belonged to his friend Tommie Clancy. And +I guessed why––he had been drinking. I had +heard it already. Generally when a man starts to +drink for the first time everybody talks about it. +I was surprised, and I wished he hadn’t. But we +are always finding out new things about men. In +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_17' name='page_17'></a>17</span> +my heart I was not blaming Maurice so much maybe +as I should. I’d always been taught that drinking +in excess was an awful habit, but some otherwise +fine men I knew drank at times, and I wasn’t +going to blame Maurice till I knew more about it.</p> +<p>And we can forgive a lot, too, in those we like. +Maurice had no family to think of, and it must +have been a blow to him not to get so fine a vessel +as the Fred Withrow after he had been promised +and had set his heart on it. And then to see her +go to a man like Sam Hollis! and with the prospect +of not getting another until a man like Withrow +felt like saying you could. Everybody in Gloucester +seemed to know that Withrow was doing all he +could to keep Maurice from getting a vessel, and +as the owners had banded together just before this +for protection, as they called it, “against outside +interference,” and as Withrow was one of the +largest owners and a man of influence beyond his +vessel holdings, he was quite a power at this time.</p> +<p>Maurice Blake was far from being drunk, however, +when I met him this day. Indeed, I do not +believe that in his most reckless hour up to this +time he had ever lost control of himself so far as +not to know pretty nearly what he was doing all +the time; but certainly he had been drinking this +day, and the drinking manner did not set well on +him.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_18' name='page_18'></a>18</span></div> +<p>Maurice was standing on the front steps of +Mrs. Arkell’s boarding-house when I saw him. It +was Mrs. Arkell’s granddaughter Minnie that +married the wealthy Mr. Miner––a rather loud +sort of man, who had been reported as saying that +he would give her a good time and show her life. +He may have given her a good time––I don’t +know––but he was dead in two years. He was +supposed to be very rich––three or four millions––but +on settling up there was less than half a million. +Of course that wasn’t bad––enough for +Minnie to buy a big house next her grandmother’s +for a summer home, and enough to go off travelling +whenever she pleased.</p> +<p>When she came back to Gloucester she was still +a very handsome girl, spoken of as the “Miner +widow” among people who had known her only +since her marriage, but still called Minnie Arkell +by most of those who had known her when she +was a child. In Gloucester she bought the first +house just around the corner from her grandmother’s. +A handy passage between their two +back yards allowed her to visit her grandmother +whenever she pleased. She wanted to be near her +own people, she said, and was more in her grandmother’s +house than her own.</p> +<p>Maurice came down the steps of Mrs. Arkell’s +boarding-house as I came along, and joined me on +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_19' name='page_19'></a>19</span> +the sidewalk. He asked me the first thing if I +wouldn’t have a drink, and I said no.</p> +<p>“Oh, I forgot,” he said, “you don’t drink. +Have a cigar,” and he pulled one out of his pocket, +and I took and lit it. Generally I smoked a pipe, +but I liked good cigars, though I couldn’t afford +them myself. This was not a good one––more +like the kind they hand out in bar-rooms when +men get tired of drinking and say they guess they’ll +have a smoke.</p> +<p>“How does it happen, Joe, you’re not at the +store? I always thought Withrow held his men +pretty close to hours.”</p> +<p>“Well, so he does, but I’m not working for him +now.” And then I told him that I had had an +argument with Withrow, been discharged, and +was thinking of going fishing. I didn’t tell him at +first how it all came about, but I think he guessed +it, for all at once, after a searching look, he +reached out and shook hands with me.</p> +<p>“If ever I get a vessel again, Joe, and you still +want to go fishing and care for a chance with me, +you can have it––if you can’t go with a better man, +I mean. I’ll take you and be glad to have you.”</p> +<p>That meant a good berth, of course, for Maurice +was a killer.</p> +<p>I looked at Maurice when he wasn’t watching +me, and felt sorry for him. He was a man that +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_20' name='page_20'></a>20</span> +anybody would like the looks of. It wasn’t that +he was a handsome man––I never could get to like +pretty men myself––but there was something about +him that made you feel you could trust him. The +heavy tan of his face and the grip of his jaw +would spoil almost anybody for a beauty man, I +suppose, but he had fine eyes and his mouth was +all right, and he had a head that you’d like to +stand off one side and look at, with hair that +seemed to lift and wave with every breath of +wind, and when he smiled you felt somehow that +he’d saved that particular smile for you. He was +no better built than a hundred other men I knew +who were going fishing, and he was no bigger than +a thousand others sailing out of Gloucester, and +not near so big as a lot of others––five feet ten +or eleven, maybe, he was, with level shoulders, and +very light on his feet––but looking at him you +knew he was all there.</p> +<p>After smoking a while and watching him between +puffs, it flashed on me all at once that I was +pretty thick. A word or two my cousin Nell had +let slip––not so much what she said as the way she +said it––gave me a hint of a whole lot of things. +Looking at Maurice now I asked him if he had +seen my cousin or Miss Foster lately.</p> +<p>He flushed up as he looked at me, and I saw +that whatever he was thinking of it had not been +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_21' name='page_21'></a>21</span> +far away from what I had been thinking of. “No, +I haven’t seen them”––slowly. “How is your +cousin?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she seems to be all right. They were both +in to the store this morning.”</p> +<p>“What doing?” I thought he was beginning to +worry, but I tried not to let on that I noticed it. +I was beginning to feel like a sleuth, or a detective, +or a diplomat, or something.</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t know. Nell said they came in +to see me, but all that happened that I had any +hand in was to weigh her. She gained another +pound last week, and it’s worrying her. The +more exercise she takes the heavier she gets, she +says. She’s a hundred and thirty-one now. Of +course, while they’re there Withrow had to help +out and make himself agreeable, especially to +Miss Foster, but I can’t see that she warms up to +him.”</p> +<p>“Ha? No? You don’t think so?”</p> +<p>“Not much, but maybe it’s her way. She’s +pretty frosty generally anyway, different from my +cousin––she’s something like.”</p> +<p>“Yes, your cousin is all right,” said Maurice.</p> +<p>“You bet,” I said. “She don’t stand around +and chill the air.”</p> +<p>“Why––does Miss Foster always? Is that her +way? I––don’t––know––much about her.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_22' name='page_22'></a>22</span></div> +<p>“Well, I don’t know so very much myself––mostly +what my cousin tells me. Still, I guess +she’s all right; but she strikes me as one of the +kind that might make an awful lot of a man and +never let on until she was dead sure of him.”</p> +<p>“H-m––That means she could think a whole +lot of Withrow and not let on, Joe?”</p> +<p>I tried to look at Maurice like my oldest +brother used to look at me sometimes when he +tried to make me feel that I was a very green kid +indeed, and said, “Well, if she’s the kind to care +for a man like Withrow, all I’ve got to say is that +she’ll deserve all she’ll get. He’s no good.”</p> +<p>“That may be, but how’s she to know? I +know, you know, and half the men in Gloucester +know that he’s rotten; but take a woman who only +sees him at his best and when he’s watching out––how’s +she to know?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, but being a woman she ought +to,” was all I could say to that. It came into my +mind just then that when I next saw my cousin +Nell I’d tell her what I really knew, and more +than that––what I really thought of my old employer. +Perhaps she’d carry it to Miss Foster. +If it was to be Maurice or Withrow, I knew on +which side I was going to be.</p> +<p>Both of us were quiet then, neither of us quite +knowing what to say perhaps. Then together we +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_23' name='page_23'></a>23</span> +started to walk to the corner of the side street. +We were past the side-door of the boarding-house +when a voice called out, “Oh, Maurice,” and +then, maybe noticing me, I suppose, “Oh, Captain +Blake,” and Maurice turned. Minnie Arkell––Mrs. +Miner rather––was there at the kitchen +window. I didn’t know she was in town at all––thought +she hadn’t got back from Florida, or +North Carolina, or wherever it was she had been +for the winter.</p> +<p>“Won’t you come in a minute, Captain, and +your friend? He doesn’t remember me––do you, +Joe?––and yet we were playmates once,” which +was true. I was often taken to Mrs. Arkell’s +when a little fellow by skippers who were friends +of my father’s. They used to tell me about him, +and I liked to listen.</p> +<p>“I thought I’d run over and see granny,” she +went on. “I’m back to the old house for a while. +Won’t you come in?”</p> +<p>My mind had long been set against Minnie +Arkell. I knew about her throwing over a fine +young fellow, a promising skipper, to marry +Miner. I may have been too young at the time +to judge anybody, but after that I had small +use for her. My ideas in the matter were of +course pretty much what older men had put into +me.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_24' name='page_24'></a>24</span></div> +<p>I had listened to them––skippers and others––and +yet now, when she held out her hand to me +and smiled, I didn’t feel nearly so set against her. +She certainly was a handsome girl, and yet I hoped +that Maurice wouldn’t fall in love with her, as +most everybody did that came to the Arkell house.</p> +<p>I said that I did not have time to come in, and +started to make off. Maurice asked me where I +was bound. I told him that I thought of taking +a look in at Crow’s Nest and getting the news.</p> +<p>“Yes, you’ll get it there, sure enough. When +they can’t tell you anything else up there they can +tell you what everybody’s doing.” He smiled at +that, turned slowly toward the side-door, as if he +would rather go with me to Crow’s Nest, and I +went off.</p> +<p>Just outside the gate I saw Sam Hollis, a man +I never did like. Tommie Clancy, the man that +could size up a person quicker than anybody I’d +ever met, used to say that deep down, if you could +get at Hollis, you’d find a quitter, but that nobody +had ever got into him. I’d been meeting Hollis +after every trip in for two years in Withrow’s +store. He was a successful fisherman, and a +sharp, keen man ashore, but he was a man I never +quite took to. One of his ambitions, I felt satisfied, +was to be reckoned a devil of a fellow. He’d +have given a year’s earnings, I knew, to have people +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_25' name='page_25'></a>25</span> +point him out on the street and say, “There’s +Sam Hollis––there’s the boy to carry sail––nobody +ever made him take his mains’l in,” the same as +they used to say of a half dozen or so that really +would carry sail––that would drive a vessel under +before they would be the first to reef. But the +people didn’t do that, although, let him tell it, he +did wonderful things out to sea, and he had such +a way of telling it, too, that he’d almost make you +believe him. But as Clancy used to say, after he’d +left you, and you had time to think it over, you’d +see where here and there his story wasn’t well-calked. +My own idea was that he wanted a reputation +so that he could pose as a devil of a fellow +with certain people ashore. It is easy enough to +see that even a more careful man than Sam Hollis +might take a chance for a smile from a woman +like Minnie Arkell.</p> +<p>Anyhow, I never felt at home with Hollis, and +so was willing to take Clancy’s judgment straight. +Hollis was a man about forty, and had been one +of Minnie Arkell’s admirers ever since I could remember––ever +since she was old enough to have +any, I mean, and she wasn’t any late bloomer, as +Clancy used to say.</p> +<p>Hollis went into the Arkell house by the door +that had only just closed behind Maurice and Minnie +Arkell. I didn’t like that very much, and was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_26' name='page_26'></a>26</span> +thinking of turning back and going in, too; but +on second thought it occurred to me that perhaps +only Maurice would have a welcome for me. So I +didn’t enter, but kept on to Crow’s Nest instead.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_27' name='page_27'></a>27</span> +<a name='IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION' id='IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION'></a> +<h2>IV</h2> +<h3>LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION</h3> +</div> +<p>By this time I should have gone home, I suppose, +and had something to eat––it was +getting on into the afternoon––but I didn’t want +to have a talk with my mother yet awhile, and so +kept on to Crow’s Nest, where I found half a +dozen good-natured loafers. Not all were loafers +exactly––three or four were simply waiting around +before shipping on some seiner for the mackerel +season. It promised to shower at the time, too, +and of course the gentlemen who formed old +Peter’s staff could not think of venturing out in +threatening weather.</p> +<p>And there they were, with Peter Hines, the paid +man in charge of Crow’s Nest, keeping a benevolent +eye on them. Yarning, arguing, skylarking, +advising Peter, and having fun with little Johnnie +Duncan they were when I entered. Johnnie was +the grandson of the head of the Duncan firm, a +fine, clear-eyed boy, that nobody could help liking. +He thought fishermen were the greatest people +in the world. Whatever a fisherman did was +all right to Johnnie.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_28' name='page_28'></a>28</span></div> +<p>I had got all the news at Crow’s Nest and was +just thinking of moving along toward home when +Tommie Clancy popped in. Of course that made +a difference. I wasn’t going to move while Clancy +was around.</p> +<p>“My soul, but here’s where the real gentlemen +are,” he had to say first, and then, “Anybody seen +Maurice to-day?”</p> +<p>I told him I had, and where.</p> +<p>“Anybody with him?”</p> +<p>“Well, not with him exactly.” I shook my head, +and said nothing of Minnie Arkell, nor of Sam +Hollis, although Clancy, looking at me, I could +see, guessed that there was something else; and he +might have asked me something more only for the +crowd and little Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>Johnnie was trying to climb up onto Clancy, +and so Clancy, turning from me, took Johnnie up +and gave him a toss that all but hit his head against +the roof. “And how’s she heading, Johnnie-boy?” +and taking a seat stood Johnnie up beside +him.</p> +<p>“East-s’uth-east, and a fair, fair wind,” answered +Johnnie.</p> +<p>“East-s’uth-east––my, but you said that fine. +And a fair wind? Must be bound Georges +Bank way. And how long will you hold that +course?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_29' name='page_29'></a>29</span></div> +<p>“From Eastern Point––a hundred and thirty-five +mile.”</p> +<p>“Yes––and then?”</p> +<p>“Then you throw her up and heave the lead.”</p> +<p>“And heave the lead––sure enough. And +then?”</p> +<p>“And then, if you find you’re clear of the North +Shoal, you put her to the s’uth’ard and west’ard +till you’re in onto the Bank.”</p> +<p>“S’uth’ard and west’ard––that’s the boy. Man, +but I’ll live to see you going to the Custom House +and taking out your master’s papers yet.”</p> +<p>“And can I join the Master Mariners then?”</p> +<p>“That’s what you can, and walk down Main +Street with a swing to your shoulders, too. And +now you’re up on the Bank and twenty-five fathom +of water and the right bottom––and you’re a hand-liner, +say, after cod––what then?”</p> +<p>“Let go her chain and begin fishing.”</p> +<p>“And would you give her a short or a long +string of cable?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I’m not sure. A long string you’d +hang on better, but a short scope and you could +get out faster in case you were dragging and going +onto the shoals. What would you do, Captain +Clancy? You never told me that, did you?”</p> +<p>“Well, it would depend, too, though handliners +generally calculate on hanging on, blow how it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_30' name='page_30'></a>30</span> +will. But never mind that; suppose your anchor +dragged or parted and into the shoal water you +went in a gale, an easterly, say––and the bank +right under your lee––wind sixty or seventy or +eighty mile an hour––what would you do?”</p> +<p>“Anchor not hold? M-m––Then I’d––give +her the second one.”</p> +<p>“And if that dragged, too––or parted?”</p> +<p>“Both of ’em? M-m”––Johnnie was taking +deep breaths now––“why, then I’d have to put +sail to her–––”</p> +<p>“What sail?”</p> +<p>“Why, jib, jumbo, fore and main.”</p> +<p>“And the wind blowing eighty mile an hour?”</p> +<p>“Why, yes, if she’d stand it.”</p> +<p>“My, but she’d have to be an able vessel that––all +four lowers and the wind blowing eighty mile +an hour. Man, but you’re a dog! Suppose she +couldn’t stand it?”</p> +<p>“Then I’d reef the mains’l.”</p> +<p>“And if that was too much––what then?”</p> +<p>“Reef it again.”</p> +<p>“And too much yet?”</p> +<p>“Balance-reef it––maybe take it in altogether––and +the jib with it, and get out the riding-sail.”</p> +<p>“And would you do nothing to the fores’l?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I dunno––with some vessels maybe +I’d reef that, too––maybe take it in altogether.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_31' name='page_31'></a>31</span></div> +<p>“My, but you’re cert’nly a dog. And what +then?”</p> +<p>“Why, then I’d try to work her out.”</p> +<p>“And would you be doing anything with the +lead?”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’d be keeping the lead going all the +time, for banging her across and back like that +you wouldn’t know where you were just.”</p> +<p>“And would you come clear, d’y’ think?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir––if the gear held and with an able +vessel we ought to.”</p> +<p>“If the gear held––that’s it. Be sure, Johnnie-boy, +you see that the gear is all right before ever +you leave port. And with an able vessel, you say? +With that new one of your gran’pa’s––would you +come clear with her?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she’d come clear––built to go fresh halibuting +next winter, that one.”</p> +<p>“Yes––and seining this spring. But suppose +now you were haddocking––trawling––eight or +ten dories, and you just arrived on the grounds, +picked out a good spot, and there you are––you’re +all baited up and ready?”</p> +<p>“Winter time?”</p> +<p>“Winter time, yes.”</p> +<p>“First I’d single-reef the mains’l. Then I’d +hold her up a little––not too much––me being +skipper would be to the wheel myself––and then +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_32' name='page_32'></a>32</span> +I’d give the order, ‘Dories to the rail!’ and then, +when everything was all right––when I’d be satisfied +we wouldn’t foul the next vessel’s trawls––I’d +call out, ‘Over with your wind’ard dory!’”</p> +<p>“Loud and clear you’d holler, because the wind +might be high.”</p> +<p>“Loud and clear, yes––‘Let go your wind’ard +dory!’––like that. And ‘Set to the west’ard,’ or +the east’ard, whatever it was––according to the +tide, you know. I’d call that out to the dory as +it went sliding by the quarter––the vessel, of +course, ’d be sailing all the time––and next, +‘Wind’ard dory to the rail!’ And then, when +we’d gone ahead enough, again, ‘Let go your +looard dory!’ and then, ‘Looard dory to the rail! +Let go your wind’ard dory! Let go your looard +dory!’ and so till they were all over the side.”</p> +<p>“And supposing, they being all out, it came on +thick, or snowing, and some of them went astray, +and it was time to go home, having filled her with +eighty or ninety or a hundred thousand of fresh +fish, a fair wind, and every prospect of a good +market––what then?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I’d have to wait, of course––cruise around +and stand by.”</p> +<p>“And suppose you couldn’t find them again?”</p> +<p>“Why, after waiting until I was sure they were +gone, I’d come home.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_33' name='page_33'></a>33</span></div> +<p>“And your flag?”</p> +<p>“Half-mast.”</p> +<p>“Half-mast––that’s it. I hope you’ll never +have to fly a half-masted flag, Johnnie. But suppose +you did see them, and they were in shoal +water, say––and the shoals to looard, of course, +and it blowing–––”</p> +<p>“I’d stand in and get them.”</p> +<p>“And it blowing hard––blowing hard, Johnnie?––and +shoal––shoal water?”</p> +<p>“Why”––Johnnie was looking troubled––“why, +I’d have to stand in just the same, wouldn’t I?”</p> +<p>“Your own men and you ask me, Johnnie-boy?”</p> +<p>“Why, of course I’d have to stand in and get +them.”</p> +<p>“And if you got in so far you couldn’t get out––you +got smothered, say?”</p> +<p>“Why, then––then we’d be lost––all hands +would be lost.”</p> +<p>Poor Johnnie! he was all but crying.</p> +<p>“That’s it. And that’s where some would say +you showed yourself a man, and some a fool, +Johnnie-boy. Some would say, ‘Use judgment––think +of the other eighteen or twenty men safe +aboard the vessel.’ Would you use judgment, or +what, Johnnie?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I don’t know. What would you do, +Captain Clancy?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_34' name='page_34'></a>34</span></div> +<p>“What d’y’ think I’d do, Johnnie?” Clancy +drew the boy up and tucked the little face to his +own broad breast. The rest of us knew well +enough what Clancy would do. “Judgment hell!” +Clancy would say, and go in and get lost––or +maybe get away with it where a more careful man +would be lost––but we waited to hear what Johnnie––such +a little boy––would say. He said it at last, +after looking long into Clancy’s face.</p> +<p>“I think you’d go in, Captain Clancy.”</p> +<p>Clancy laughed at that. “Lord, Johnnie-boy, +no wonder everybody loves you. No matter what +a man does, all you see is the best that’s in him.”</p> +<p>It was time to clean up then, and Johnnie of +course was bound to help.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_35' name='page_35'></a>35</span> +<a name='V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST' id='V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST'></a> +<h2>V</h2> +<h3>FROM OUT OF CROW’S NEST</h3> +</div> +<p>“What’ll I do with this?” asked Johnnie, +in the middle of the cleaning up, holding +up a pan of sweepings.</p> +<p>“Oh, that”––Clancy naturally took charge––“heave +it overboard. Ebb tide’ll carry it away. +Heave it into the slip. Wait––maybe you’ll have +to hoist the hatches. ’Tisn’t raining much now, +anyway, and it will soon stop altogether. Might +as well go aloft and make a good job of the +hatches, hadn’t he, Peter?”</p> +<p>“Wait a minute.” Peter was squinting through +the porthole. “I shouldn’t wonder but this is one +of our fellows coming in. I know she’s a banker. +The Enchantress, I think. Look, Tommie, and +see what you make of her.”</p> +<p>Clancy looked. “That’s who it is, Peter. Hi, +Johnnie, here’ll be a chance for you to hoist the +flag. Hurry aloft and tend to the hatches, as +Peter says, and you can hoist the flag for the Enchantress +home from the Banks.”</p> +<p>In bad weather, like it was that day, the little +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_36' name='page_36'></a>36</span> +balcony of Crow’s Nest was shut in by little +hatches, arranged so that they could be run up +and down, the same as hatches are slid over the +companionway of a fisherman’s cabin or forec’s’le. +Johnnie was a pretty active boy, and he was up the +rope ladder and onto the roof in a few seconds. +We could hear him walking above, and soon the +hatches slid away and we all could look freely out +to sea again.</p> +<p>“All right below?” called out Johnnie.</p> +<p>“Not yet,” answered Peter. He was standing +by the rail of the balcony and untwisting the halyards +that served to hoist the signal-flags to the +mast-head. Peter seemed slow at it, and Clancy +called out again, “Wait a bit, and we’ll overhaul +the halyards.” Then, looking up and noticing that +Johnnie was standing on the edge of the roof, he +added, “And be careful and not slip on those wet +planks.”</p> +<p>“Aye, aye!” Johnnie was in high glee. “And +then I can run up the flag for the Enchantress?”</p> +<p>“Sure, you’ve been such a good boy to-day.”</p> +<p>“M-m––but that’ll be fine. I can catch the halyards +from here if you’ll swing them in a little.”</p> +<p>“All right––be careful. Here you go now.”</p> +<p>“Let ’em come––I got–––”</p> +<p>The first thing we knew of what had happened +was when we saw Johnnie’s body come pitching +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_37' name='page_37'></a>37</span> +down. He struck old Peter first, staggering him, +and from there he shot down out of sight.</p> +<p>Clancy jumped to the rail in time to save Peter +from toppling over it and just in time, as he said +afterward, to see the boy splash in the slip below. +He yanked Peter to his feet, and then, without +turning around, he called out, “A couple of you +run to the head of the dock––there’ll be a dory +there somewhere––row ’round to the slip with it. +He’ll be carried under the south side––look for +him there if I’m not there before you. Drive her +now!”</p> +<p>“Here, Joe, wake up!” Clancy had untied the +ends of the halyards after whirling them through +the block above, and now had the whole line piled +up on the balcony. He took a couple of turns +around his waist, took another turn around a cleat +under the balcony rail, passed the bight of the line +to me, and said, “Here, Joe, lower me. Take hold +you, too, Peter. Pay out and not too careful. Oh, +faster, man! If he ain’t dead he’ll drown, maybe––if +he gets sucked in and caught under those piles +it’s all off.”</p> +<p>He was sliding over the rail, the line tautening +to his weight in no time, and he talking all the +time. “Lower away––lower, lower! Faster––faster +than that––he’s rising again––second time––and +drifting under the wharf, sure’s fate! +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_38' name='page_38'></a>38</span> +Faster––faster––what’s wrong?––what’s caught +there?––let her run!”</p> +<p>The halyards had become fouled, and Peter was +trying to clear them, calling to Clancy to wait.</p> +<p>“Fouled?” roared Clancy. “Cast it off altogether. +Let go altogether and let me drop.”</p> +<p>“We can’t––the bight of it’s caught around +Peter’s legs!” I called to him.</p> +<p>“Oh, hell! take a couple of half-hitches around +the cleat then––look out now!” He gripped the +halyards high above his head with both hands, +gave a jumping pull, and let himself drop. The +line parted and down he shot.</p> +<p>He must have been shaken by the shock of his +fall, but I guess he had his senses with him when +he came up again, for in no time he was striking +toward where Johnnie had come up last. Then I +ran downstairs, down to the dock, and was just +in time to see Parsons and Moore rowing a dory +desperately up the slip, and Clancy with Johnnie +chest-up, and a hand under his neck, kicking from +under the stringers, and calling out, “This way +with the dory––drive her, fellows, drive her!”</p> +<p>I did not wait for any more––I knew Johnnie +was safe with Clancy––but ran to the office of the +Duncans and told them that Johnnie had fallen +into the dock and got wet, and that it might be +well to telephone for a doctor. His grandfather +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_39' name='page_39'></a>39</span> +knew it was serious without my saying any more, +and rang up at once.</p> +<p>That had hardly been done when Clancy came +in the door with Johnnie in his arms. The boy +was limp and unconscious and water was dripping +from him. Old Mr. Duncan was worried +enough, but composed in his manner for all that. +He met Clancy at the door. “This way, Captain; +lay him on this couch. The doctor will be here +in a very few minutes now. Perhaps we can do +something while he is on the way. Just how did +it happen? and we’ll know better what to do, perhaps.”</p> +<p>Clancy told his story in forty words. “He’s +probably shook up and his lungs must be full of +water. But he may come out all right––his eyelids +quivered coming up the dock. Better strip +his shirt and waist off. He’s got a lot of water in +him––roll him over and we’ll get some of it out.”</p> +<p>He worked away on Johnnie, and had the water +pretty well out of him by the time the uncle and +the doctor came. It was hard work for a time, +but it came at last to when the doctor stood up, +rested his arms for a breath, said, “Ah––he’s all +right now,” and went on again. It was not so +very long after that that Johnnie opened his eyes––for +about a second. But pretty soon he opened +them to stay. His first look was for his grandfather, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_40' name='page_40'></a>40</span> +but his first word was for Clancy. “I +could see you when you jumped, Captain Clancy––it +was great.”</p> +<p>Then they bundled Johnnie into a carriage and +his uncle took him home.</p> +<p>“Lord, but I thought he was gone, Joe. But +let’s get out of this,” said Clancy, and we were +making for the door, with Clancy’s clothes still +wringing wet, when we were stopped by the elder +Mr. Duncan, who shook hands with both of us +and then went on to speak to Clancy.</p> +<p>“Captain Clancy–––”</p> +<p>“Captain once, but–––”</p> +<p>“I know, I know, but not from lack of ability, +at any rate. Let me thank you. His mother will +thank you herself later, and make you feel, I +know, her sense of what she owes to you. And +his cousin Alice––she thinks the world of him. +There, I know you don’t want to hear any more, +but you shall––maybe later––though it may come +up in another way. But tell me––wait, come inside +a minute. Come in you, too, Joe,” he said, +turning to me, but I said I’d rather wait outside. +I wanted to have a smoke to get my nerves steady +again, I guess.</p> +<p>So Clancy and Mr. Duncan went inside, and +through the window, whenever I looked up, I +could see them. As their talk went on I could see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_41' name='page_41'></a>41</span> +that they were getting very much interested about +something or other. Clancy particularly was laying +down the law with a clenched fist and an arm +that swung through the air like a jibing boom. +Somebody, I knew, was getting it.</p> +<p>When they came out Mr. Duncan stopped at +the door, and said, as if by way of a parting word, +“And so you think that’s the cause of Withrow’s +picking a quarrel with Maurice? Well, I never +thought of that before, but maybe you’re right. +And now, what do you say to a vessel for yourself?”</p> +<p>“Me take a vessel? No, sir––not for me. But +when you’ve got vessels to hand around, Mr. Duncan, +bear Maurice in mind––he’s a fisherman.”</p> +<p>We left Mr. Duncan then, he making ready to +telephone to learn how Johnnie was getting along. +Clancy said his clothes were beginning to feel so +dry that he did not know as he would go to his +boarding-house. “I think we’d better go up to +the Anchorage and have a little touch. But I forgot––you +don’t drink, Joe? No? So I thought, +but don’t you care––you’re young yet. Come +along, anyway, and have a smoke.”</p> +<p>And so we went along to the Anchorage, and +while we were there, I smoking one of those barroom +cigars and Clancy nursing the after-taste of +his drink and declaring that a touch of good liquor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_42' name='page_42'></a>42</span> +was equal to a warm stove for drying wet clothes, +I told him what I would have told him in Crow’s +Nest if there had not been so many around––about +Minnie Arkell calling Maurice back into her +grandmother’s house, and then Sam Hollis coming +along and going in after him.</p> +<p>“What!” and stopped dead. Suddenly he +brought his fist through the air. “I’ll”––and as +suddenly stopped it midway. “No, I won’t, either. +But I’ll put Maurice wise to them. What should +he know at his age and with his up-bringing of +what’s in the heads of people like them. And if +I don’t have something further to say to old Mr. +Duncan! But now let’s go back to Arkell’s––come +on, Joe.”</p> +<p>But I didn’t go back with him. I didn’t think +that I could do Maurice any good then, and I +might be in the way if Clancy wanted to speak his +mind out to anybody. I went home instead, where +I expected to have troubles of my own, for I knew +that my mother wouldn’t like the idea of my going +seining.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_43' name='page_43'></a>43</span> +<a name='VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL' id='VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL'></a> +<h2>VI</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL</h3> +</div> +<p>Three days after Johnnie Duncan fell out +of Crow’s Nest the new Duncan vessel designed +by Will Somers was towed around from +Essex. She had been named the Johnnie Duncan. +I spent the best part of the next three days watching +the sparmakers and riggers at work on her. +And when they had done with her and she fit to +go to sea, she did look handsome. She had not +quite the length of the new vessel of Sam Hollis’s, +which lay at Withrow’s dock just below her, and +that probably helped to give her a more powerful +look to people that compared them. Too able-looking +altogether to be real fast, some thought, +to hold the Withrow vessel in anything short of a +gale, but I didn’t feel so sure she wouldn’t sail +in a moderate breeze, too. I had seen her on the +stocks, and knew the beautiful lines below the +water-mark. And she was going to carry the sail +to drive her. I took particular pains to get the +measurements of her mainmast while it lay on the +dock under the shears. It was eighty-seven feet––and +she only a hundred and ten feet over all––and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_44' name='page_44'></a>44</span> +it stepped plumb in the middle of her, further forward +than a mainmast was generally put in a fisherman. +To that was shackled a seventy-five foot +boom, and eighty-odd tons of pig-iron were cemented +close down to her keel, and that floored +over and stanchioned snug. For the rest, she was +very narrow forward, as I think I said––everybody +said she’d never stand the strain of her fore-rigging +when they got to driving her on a long +passage. And she carried an ungodly bowsprit––thirty-seven +feet outboard––easily the longest +bowsprit out of Gloucester. Topmasts to match, +and there was some sail to drive a vessel. But +she had the hull for it, full and yet easy, with the +greatest beam pretty well aft of the mainmast, +and she drew fifteen and a half feet of water.</p> +<p>I was still looking her over, her third day in +the riggers’ and sailmakers’ hands, when Clancy +came along.</p> +<p>“Handsome, ain’t she, and only needing a skipper +and crew to be off on the Southern cruise, eh, +Joe?”</p> +<p>“That’s all. And according to the talk, you’re +to be the skipper.”</p> +<p>“Well, talk has another according coming to it.”</p> +<p>“I’m sorry to hear that. But what happened at +Mrs. Arkell’s the other day?”</p> +<p>“What happened? Joe, but I was glad you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_45' name='page_45'></a>45</span> +didn’t come with me. You’d have felt as I did about +it, I know. There they were––the two of them––Hollis +and Withrow––yes, Withrow there––when +I broke in on them, and Maurice between them––drunk. +Yes, sir, drunk and helpless. They called +it a wine-party, as though a man couldn’t get as +good and drunk on wine in a private residence as +ever he could on whiskey or rum in the back room +of a saloon. Well, sir, I asked a question or two, +and they tried to face me out, but out they went––first +Hollis, and then Withrow, one after the other, +and both good and lively. And then Minnie +Arkell popped in from her own house by way of +the backyard. She didn’t expect to see me––I +know she didn’t. Had gone over to her house +when the men began to drink, she said, and had +just come over to see granny.</p> +<p>“Well, I told her what I thought. ‘It means +nothing to you,’ I said, ‘to see a man make a fool +of himself––that’s been a good part of your business +in life for some time, now––to see men make +fools of themselves for you. Withrow had reasons +for wanting him disgraced––never mind why. +Sam Hollis, maybe, has his reasons too. And the +two of them are being helped along by you. You +could have stopped this thing here to-day, but +you didn’t.’ ‘No, no, Tommie,’ she says. ‘Yes, +yes,’ I went on, ‘and don’t try to tell me different. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_46' name='page_46'></a>46</span> +If I didn’t know you since you were a little girl +you might be able to convince me, but I know you. +Maurice, when he was himself, passed you by. +You were bound to have him. You know a real +man, more’s the pity, when you see one, and you +know that Maurice, young and green and soft as +he is, has more life and dash than a dozen of the +kind you’ve been mixing with lately.’</p> +<p>“Oh, but I laid it on, Joe. Yes. A shame to +have to talk like that to a woman, but I just had +to. I didn’t stop there. ‘You’re handsome, and +you’re rich, Minnie Arkell; got a lot of life left +in you yet, and go off travelling with people who +get their names regularly in the Boston papers; +but just the same, Minnie Arkell, there are women +in jail not half so bad as you––women doing time +who’ve done less mischief in the world than you +have.’”</p> +<p>“Wasn’t that pretty rough, Tommie?”</p> +<p>“Rough? Lord, yes––but true, Joe, true. And +if you’d only see poor Maurice lying there! +Cried? I could’ve cried, Joe––not since my +mother died did I come so near to it. But it was +done.</p> +<p>“Well, I made Minnie go and get her +grandmother. And, Joe, if you’d seen that fine +old lady––oh, but she’s got a heart in her––stoop +and put Maurice’s head on her bosom as if he +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_47' name='page_47'></a>47</span> +was a little child. ‘The poor, poor boy. No mother +here,’ she said, ‘and the best man on earth might +come to it. Leave him to me, Tommie.’ Lord, I +could have knelt down at her feet––the heart in +her, Joe.”</p> +<p>“And how has Maurice been since?”</p> +<p>“All right. That was the first time in his life +that he was drunk. I think it will be his last. +But let’s go aboard the Johnnie.”</p> +<p>After looking over the Johnnie Duncan and +admiring her to our hearts’ content, we sat down +in her cabin and began to talk of the seining season +to come. Others came down and joined in––George +Moore, Eddie Parsons among others––and +they asked Clancy what he was going to do. +Was he going to see about a chance to go seining, +or what? Moore said he’s been waiting to see +what Maurice Blake was going to do; but as it +was beginning to look as though Maurice was +done for, he guessed he’d take a look around. He +asked Clancy what he thought, and Clancy said he +didn’t know––time enough yet.</p> +<p>Maurice Blake himself dropped down then. He +was looking better, and everybody was glad to see +it. He’d quit drinking––that was certain; and +now he was a picture of a man––not pretty, but +strong-looking, with his eyes glowing and his skin +flushing with the good blood inside him. He took +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_48' name='page_48'></a>48</span> +a seat on the lockers and began to whittle a block +of soft pine into a model of a hull, and after a +while, with a squint along the sheer of his little +model, he asked if anybody had seen Tom O’Donnell +or Wesley Marrs. Several said yes, they had, +and he asked where, and when they told him he +got up and said he guessed he’d go along––as he +couldn’t get a vessel himself, he might as well see +about a chance to go hand. “And as we’ve been +together so much in times gone by, Tommie, and +you, Eddie and George, what do you say if we go +together now?”</p> +<p>“All right,” said Clancy, “but wait a minute––who’s +that in the gangway?”</p> +<p>It turned out to be Johnnie Duncan. He had +a fat bundle under his arm, and bundle and all +Clancy took him up, tossed him into the air, said +“All right again, Johnnie-boy?” and kissed him +when he caught him down.</p> +<p>Johnnie started to undo his bundle. “I tell you +it’s great to be out again––the way they kept me +cooped up the last few days,” and then, cutting the +string to hurry matters, opened the bundle and +spread a handsome set of colors on the lockers. +“The Johnnie Duncan’s,” said he. “I picked out +the kind they were to be, but mummer worked +the monograms herself. See, red and blue. And +see that for an ensign! and the firm’s flag––and the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_49' name='page_49'></a>49</span> +highs––look!––the J. A. D. twisted up the same +as on the handkerchiefs we strained the coffee +through last week. And the burgee––the letters on +the burgee––my cousin Alice worked them. And +these stars––see, on the ensign––mummer and my +cousin both worked them. Gran’pa said the vessel +ought to be sure a lucky one, and all she needs +is an able master, he says, and if Captain Blake +will take her he’ll be proud to have him sail the +Johnnie Duncan–––”</p> +<p>Maurice Blake stood up. “Me?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Johnnie. “Gran’pa says that you +can have her just as soon as you go to the Custom +House and get your papers. There, I think I remembered +it all, except of course that the colors +are from me and mummer and my cousin Alice, +and will you fly them for us?”</p> +<p>Maurice laid down his model and picked up the +colors. Then he looked at Johnnie and said, +“Thank you, Johnnie; and tell your mother, Johnnie, +and your cousin, that I’ll fly the Johnnie Duncan’s +colors––and stand by them––if ever it comes +to standing by––till she goes under. Tell your +grandfather that I’ll be proud to be master of his +vessel and I’ll sail her the best I know how.”</p> +<p>“That’s you, Maurice,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>Maurice drew his hand across his eyes and sat +down again. And as soon as they decently could, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_50' name='page_50'></a>50</span> +Clancy, George Moore, and Eddie Parsons asked +him if they might ship with him for the Southern +cruise. Maurice said they very well knew that +he’d be glad to have them. He asked me, too, he +felt so good, and of course I jumped at the chance.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_51' name='page_51'></a>51</span> +<a name='VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL' id='VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL'></a> +<h2>VII</h2> +<h3>CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL</h3> +</div> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan only needed to have her +stores taken aboard to go to sea. And that +was attended to next morning, and she was out for +her trial trip the same afternoon. Everybody +said she looked as handsome as a photograph going +out, though all the old sharks, when they saw her +mainsail hoisted for the first time, said she’d certainly +have need of her quarter and draught to +stand up under it.</p> +<p>It was a great day for sailing, though––the finest +kind of a breeze, and smooth water. We early +carried away our foretopmast, which had a flaw in +it. It was just as well to discover it then. Without +topsail and balloon we had it out with the Eastern +Point on her way back from Boston. She was not +much of a steamer for speed, but her schedule +called for twelve knots and she generally made +pretty near it––eleven or eleven and a half, according +to how her stokers felt, I guess. We headed +her off after a while, and that was doing pretty well +for that breeze, with a new vessel not yet loosened +up.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_52' name='page_52'></a>52</span></div> +<p>“But the balloon was too much for her,” said +Mr. Duncan, as we shot into the dock after beating +the Eastern Point.</p> +<p>“No, the balloon was all right––’twas the +topm’st was a bit light,” answered Maurice.</p> +<p>Old Mr. Duncan smiled at that. “But what do +you think of her, Captain Blake?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she’s like all the rest of them when she’s +alone––sails like the devil,” the skipper answered +to that, but he smiled with it and we all knew he +was satisfied with her.</p> +<p>That night was the Master Mariners’ Ball, and +I waited up till late to talk with my cousin Nell, +who had gone there with Will Somers. Finally +they came along past my house and I hailed them.</p> +<p>Nell broke right in as usual with what was uppermost +in her mind. “I don’t suppose you saw me +and Alice, but we were in Mr. Duncan’s office when +you and Mr. Clancy and Captain Blake were coming +up the dock to-day after the trial trip. Mr. +Duncan told us what Captain Blake said of the +Johnnie Duncan, but now tell me, what did the +rest of you think of her? What does your friend +Clancy say? He knows a vessel.”</p> +<p>“Clancy,” I answered, “thought what we all +thought, I guess––that she’s a fast vessel any way +you take her, but he won’t say she’s the fastest +vessel out of Gloucester, even after she’s put in trim +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_53' name='page_53'></a>53</span> +and loosened up. But in a sea-going way and with +wind enough––with wind enough, mind––he thinks +she’ll do pretty well.”</p> +<p>“With wind enough and in a sea-way?” repeated +Nell. “Then I hope that when the fishermen’s +race is sailed next fall it’s a howling gale +and seas clear to your mast-head. Yes, and you +needn’t laugh––don’t you know what it means to +Will?”</p> +<p>And I did realize. Somers, a fine fellow, was +just then beginning to get a chance at designing +fishermen. So far he had done pretty well, but +it was on the Johnnie Duncan, I knew, he had +pinned his faith. For his own sake, I hoped +that the Johnnie would do great things, but for +Nell’s sake I prayed she would. Nell thought a +lot of Will and wasn’t ashamed to show her liking, +and thinking of that set me to thinking of other +things.</p> +<p>“Was Miss Foster to the ball?” I asked her.</p> +<p>“She was,” said Nell.</p> +<p>“And with whom?”</p> +<p>“Mr. Withrow.”</p> +<p>“Oh-h, Lord!”</p> +<p>“Oh-h!––and why Oh-h-h?”</p> +<p>“I wish she’d gone with Maurice.”</p> +<p>“H-m––that was drunk the other day?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I suppose that queers him forever. And +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_54' name='page_54'></a>54</span> +the other fellow does ten times as bad, only under +cover. Who told you?”</p> +<p>“Never mind. Wasn’t he?”</p> +<p>“Was Maurice to the ball?”</p> +<p>“He was.”</p> +<p>“And who with?”</p> +<p>“With nobody.”</p> +<p>“Good. Was Mrs. Miner there?”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Miner?”––and such a sniff!––“yes, she +was there.”</p> +<p>“With Sam Hollis?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and flirted with half the men in the hall +and with your Maurice Blake outrageously.”</p> +<p>“That so? Could Maurice help that much? +But I wish, just the same, that Miss Foster had +gone with Maurice.”</p> +<p>“Well, there was one very good reason.”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“He didn’t ask her. And Mr. Withrow made a +handsome cavalier anyway.”</p> +<p>“A handsome”––I was going to say lobster, +but I didn’t. Instead I told her why Maurice +didn’t ask Miss Foster––that he didn’t think +enough of himself, probably. And that led up to a +talk about Maurice Blake and Clancy. Before I +got through I had Nell won over. Indeed, I think +she was won over before I began at all.</p> +<p>“There’s a whole lot you don’t know yet,” she +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_55' name='page_55'></a>55</span> +said at last. “Get Captain Blake to make a name +for himself seining, and for sailing his vessel as +she ought to be sailed, and I’ll get down on my +knees to Alice for him––sail her as she ought to be +sailed, remember. And make a good stock with +her, and you’ll see.”</p> +<p>So, as I walked down the street with Nell and +Will Somers a part of the way, the talk was in +that strain, and when I left them, after passing +Sam Hollis bound home, it was with the hope of +things coming out all right. I was feeling happy +until I got near Minnie Arkell’s door, where my +worrying began again, for there on the steps and +in the glare of the electric light was Minnie Arkell +herself, as though she were waiting for somebody. +And not wanting to have her know that I +saw her waiting at her door steps at that time of +night, I stepped in the shadows until she should +go in. It was then that Maurice came along, and +she called him up. And he went up and stood on +the step below her and she bent over him as if she +wanted to lift him up. And it was less than five +minutes since Sam Hollis left her.</p> +<p>“Come around by way of the side door of +grandma’s house, Maurice, and through her yard +and into my house, and nobody will see you. And +then no old grannies will talk and we’ll have a little +supper all to ourselves. Hurry now.” She was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_56' name='page_56'></a>56</span> +talking as if she owned him. I did not hear +what Maurice said, nor I did not want to hear; +but making for the corner, he went by me like a +shot, and “O Lord!” I heard him groan as he +passed me, not recognizing me––not even seeing +me, I believe.</p> +<p>I did not know what to make of it and let him +go by. But after he had turned the corner and +Minnie Arkell had shut her door––and she watched +him till he disappeared around the corner––I ran +after him. In my hurrying after him I heard the +voice of Clancy coming down the street. He was +singing. I had heard from Nell of Clancy being +at the ball, where he was as usual in charge of the +commissary. I could imagine how they must have +drove things around the punch-bowl with Clancy +to the wheel. He was coming along now and for +blocks anybody that was not dead could hear him. +And getting nearer I had to admire him. He was +magnificent, even with a list to port. Not often, I +imagined, did men of Clancy’s lace and figure get +into evening dress. The height and breadth of +him!––and spreading enough linen on his shirt +front to make a sail for quite a little vessel. He +was almost on top of me, with</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, hove flat down on th’ Western Banks</p> +<p>Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks––</p> +<p>And–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>when I hailed him.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_57' name='page_57'></a>57</span></div> +<p>“Hulloh, if it ain’t Joe Buckley. Why, Joey, +but aren’t you out pretty late to-night? But maybe +you’re only standing watch for somebody? Three +o’clock, Joey, and no excuse for you, for you didn’t +have to stand by the supplies––” But then I +rushed him around the corner, and down the street +to the side door of Mrs. Arkell’s and just in time +to head off Maurice, bound as I knew for Minnie +Arkell’s house across the yard. I didn’t have +a chance to say a word to Tommie, but he didn’t +have to be told. If I’d been explaining for a +week he couldn’t have picked things up any better +than he did.</p> +<p>“Maurice––hi, Maurice! Oh, ’tis you, isn’t it. +Well, Maurice-boy, all the night I waited for a +chance to have a word with you, but ne’er a chance +could I get. Early in the evening––when I was +fit for ladies’ company––Miss Foster said how +proud she was to know me––me, who had saved +her cousin Johnnie’s life. And then she asked me +about the vessel, and I told her, Maurice, that +nothing like the Duncan ever pushed salt water +from out of her way before. ‘Nothing with two +sticks in her,’ says I, and I laid it on thick; ‘and +Maurice Blake,’ says I––and there, Maurice, I +only spoke true catechism. ‘Maurice Blake,’ says +I, ‘is the man to sail her.’ She was glad, she +said, to know that, because her chum, Miss Buckley––Joe’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_58' name='page_58'></a>58</span> +cousin there––wanted that particular +vessel to be a success. And she herself was interested +in it. Never mind the reasons, she said. +And she always did believe––and, Maurice, listen +now––she knew that Captain Blake would do the +Johnnie Duncan justice. And I said to her––well, +Maurice, what I said you can guess well +enough. No, come to think, you can’t guess, but I +won’t tell you to your face. But thinking of it now, +I mind, Maurice, the time when we were dory-mates––you +and me, Maurice––and the cold winter’s +day our dory was capsized. And dark coming +on and nothing in sight, and I could see you +beginning to get tired. But tired as you were, +Maurice, tired as you were and the gray look +beginning to creep over you, you says, ‘Tommie, +take the plug strap for a while, you.’”</p> +<p>“But you didn’t take it, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“No, I didn’t take it––and why? I didn’t take +it––and why? Because, though the mothers that +bore us both were great women––all fire and iron––’twas +in me to last longer––you a boy and your +first winter fishing, and me a tough, hard old trawler. +And you had all of life before you, and I’d run +through some hard years of mine. If I’d gone +’twould have been no great loss, but you, Maurice, +innocent as a child––how could I? I’d known men +and women, good and bad––I’d lived life and I’d +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_59' name='page_59'></a>59</span> +had my chance and thrown it away––but at your +age the things you had to learn! Maybe I didn’t +think it all out like that, but that was why I didn’t +take the plug strap. But, Maurice-boy, I never +forgot it. ‘Take the plug strap, you, Tommie,’ +you says. We were dory-mates, of course, but, +Maurice-boy, I’ll never forget it.”</p> +<p>Clancy took off his hat and drew his hand across +his forehead. “And where were you bound when +we stopped you, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know. To take a walk maybe.”</p> +<p>“Sure, and why not? Let’s all take a walk. +Let’s take a walk down to the dock and have a +look at the vessel. Too dark? So it is, but we +can see the shadow of her masts rising up to the +clouds and we can open up the cabin and go below +and have a smoke. Come, Maurice. Come +on, Joe.”</p> +<p>And down to the cabin of the Johnnie Duncan +we went, and Clancy never in such humor. For +three hours––from a little after three o’clock until +after six––we sat on the lockers, Clancy talking +and we smoking and roaring at him. Only the +sun coming up over Eastern Point, lighting up the +harbor and striking into the cabin of the Johnnie +Duncan, brought Clancy to a halt.</p> +<p>He moved then and we with him. We left +Maurice at the door of old Mrs. Arkell’s, the old +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_60' name='page_60'></a>60</span> +lady herself in the doorway and asking us if we +had a good time at the ball. Standing on the +steps, before he went in, Maurice said to me: +“Tell your cousin, Joe, that when I do race the +Johnnie, I’ll take the spars out of her before anything +gets by––take the spars out or send her +under. I can’t do any more than that.”</p> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan was to leave at ten o’clock +and so I left Clancy at his boarding-house. He +looked tired when I left him. But he was chuckling, +too. I asked him what it was that made him +smile so.</p> +<p>“I’ll give you three guesses,” he said, but I +didn’t guess.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_61' name='page_61'></a>61</span> +<a name='VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA' id='VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA'></a> +<h2>VIII</h2> +<h3>THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA</h3> +</div> +<p>The rest of that morning, between leaving +Clancy and getting back to the dock again, +I spent in cleaning up and overhauling my home +outfit. My mother couldn’t be made to believe +that store bedding was of much use––and she was +right, I guess––and so a warranted mattress and +blankets and comforters and a pillow were made +into a bundle and thrown onto a waiting wagon. +Then it was good-by to all––good-by to my cousin +Nell, who had come over from her house, good-by +and a kiss for her little sister––late for school +she was, but didn’t care she said––and then good-by +to my mother. That took longer. Then it was +into the wagon with my bedding and off to the +dock.</p> +<p>At Duncan’s store I had charged up to me such +other stuff as I needed: Two suits of oilskins, +yellow and black, two sou’westers, heavy and light, +two blue-gray flannel shirts, a black sweater, a pair +of rubber boots, two pairs of woollen mitts and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_62' name='page_62'></a>62</span> +four pairs of cotton mitts, five pounds of smoking +tobacco, a new pipe, and so on. When I had all +my stuff tied up, I swung up abreast of Clancy +and together we headed for the end of Duncan’s +dock, where the Johnnie Duncan lay.</p> +<p>Quite a fleet went out ahead of us that morning. +Being a new vessel, there was a lot of things that +were not ready until the last minute. And then +there was the new foretopmast––promised at nine +o’clock it was––not slung and stayed up until after +ten. And then our second seine, which finally we +had to leave for Wesley Marrs to take next morning. +And there were the usual two or three men +late. Clancy and Andie Howe went up to have a +farewell drink and were gone so long that the +skipper sent me after them. I found them both in +the Anchorage, where Clancy had met a man he +hadn’t seen for ten years––an old dory-mate––thought +he was lost five years before in the West +Indies. “But here he is, fine and handsome. Another +little touch all around and a cigar for Joe, +and we’re off for the Southern cruise.”</p> +<p>We left then and started for the dock, with +Clancy full of poetry. There happened to be a +young woman looking out of a window on the +way down. Clancy did not know her, nor she him, +so far as I knew, but something about him seemed +to take her eye. She leaned far out and waved +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_63' name='page_63'></a>63</span> +her handkerchief at him. That was enough. +Clancy broke out––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“The wind blows warm and the wind blows fair,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, the wind blows westerly––</p> +<p>Our jibs are up and our anchor’s in,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>For the Duncan’s going to sea.</p> +<p>And will you wait for me, sweetheart?</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, will you wait for me?</p> +<p>And will you be my love again</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>When I come back from sea?</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, sway away and start her sheets</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And point her easterly––</p> +<p>It’s tackle-pennant, boom her out</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And turn the Duncan free.</p> +<p>You’ll see some sailing now, my boys,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>We’re off for the Southern cruise––</p> +<p>They’ll try to hold the Johnnie D,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>But they’ll find it of no use.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>I didn’t wait any longer than that for Clancy, +but ran ahead to the Duncan. I found her with +jibs up and paying off. I was in time to get +aboard without trouble, but Clancy and Howe +coming later had to make a pier-head jump of it. +Clancy, who could leap like a hound––drunk or +sober––made it all right with his feet on the +end of the bowsprit and his fingers on the +balloon stay when he landed, but Howe fell +short, and we had the liveliest kind of a time +gaffing him in over the bow, he not being able +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_64' name='page_64'></a>64</span> +to swim. They must have heard us yelling clear +to Eastern Point, I guess. Andie didn’t mind. +“I must be with a lot of dogs––have to jump +overboard to get aboard.” He spat out what +water he had to, and started right in to winch +up the mainsail with the gang. He had on a +brand-new suit, good cloth and a fine fit.</p> +<p>“You’ll soon dry out in the sun, Andie-boy,” +they all said to him.</p> +<p>“I s’pose so. But will my clothes ever fit me +again like they did?––and my fine new patent-leather +shoes!”</p> +<p>Drifting down by the dock next to Duncan’s +our long bowsprit almost swept off a row of old +fellows from the cap-log. They had to scramble, +but didn’t mind. “Good luck, and I hope you fill +her up,” they called out.</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll try and get our share of ’em,” our +fellows called back.</p> +<p>There was a young woman on the next dock––one +of the kind that quite often come down to take +snap-shots. A stranger to Gloucester she must +have been, for not only that Gloucester girls don’t +generally come down to the docks to see the fishermen +off, but she said good-by to us. She meant +all right, but she should never have said good-by +to a fisherman. It’s unlucky. Too many of them +don’t come back, and then the good-by comes true.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_65' name='page_65'></a>65</span></div> +<p>Andie Howe looked a funny sight when we +were making sail. Clancy, who, once he got +started, took a lot of stopping, was still going:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the Johnnie Duncan, fast and able––</p> +<p>Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel––</p> +<p>And will you save a kiss for me</p> +<p>When I come back from sea?”</p> +</div></div> +<p>“Yes,” roared Andie,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And don’t forget I love you, dear,</p> +<p>And save a kiss for me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>with the salt water dripping from his fine new suit +of clothes and the patent-leather shoes he was so +fond of.</p> +<p>And Clancy again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea</p> +<p>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Howe,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree</p> +<p>And a hi-did-dy ho-did-dy ho-dee-dee,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Clancy,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree,</p> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan’s going to sea,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Howe––a little shy on the words––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Tum-did-dy dum-did-dy dum-did-dy-dum,</p> +<p>Hoo-roo-roo and a dum by gum.”</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_66' name='page_66'></a>66</span></div> +<p>And by that time the gang were joining in and +sheeting flat the topsails with a great swing.</p> +<p>I don’t suppose that Gloucester Harbor will +ever again look as beautiful to me as it did that +morning when we sailed out. Forty sail of seiners +leaving within two hours, and to see them going––to +see them one after another loose sails and up +with them, break out anchors, pay off, and away! +It was the first day of April and the first fine day +in a week, and those handsome vessels going out +one after the other in their fresh paint and new +sails––it was a sight to make a man’s heart thump.</p> +<p>“The Johnnie Duncan, seiner of Gloucester––watch +her walk across the Bay to-day,” was +George Moore’s little speech when he came on +deck to heave his first bucket of scraps over the +rail. George was cook.</p> +<p>And she did walk. We squared away with half +a dozen others abreast of us and Eastern Point +astern of us all. Among the forty sail of fishermen +that were standing across the Bay that morning +we knew we’d find some that could sail. There +was the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley’s vessel. He +worked her clear of the bunch that came out of +the harbor and came after us, and we had it with +him across to Cape Cod. Forty miles before we +beat him; but Pitt Ripley had a great sailer in the +Ruth, and we would have been satisfied to hold +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_67' name='page_67'></a>67</span> +her even. “Only wait till by and by, when we +get her in trim,” we kept saying.</p> +<p>“This one’ll smother some of them yet,” said +Eddie Parsons, looking back at the Ruth. He +felt pretty good, because he had the wheel when +we finally crossed the Ruth’s bow.</p> +<p>“With good steering––yes,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>“Of course,” exclaimed Eddie to that, and filled +his chest full, and then, looking around and catching +everybody laughing, let his chest flatten again.</p> +<p>The skipper didn’t have much to say right away +about her sailing. He was watching her, though. +He’d look at her sails, have an eye on how they +set and drew, take a look over her quarter, another +look aloft, and then back at the Ruth, then +a look for the vessels still ahead. “We’ll know +more about it after we’ve tried her out with the +Lucy Foster or the Colleen Bawn or Hollis’s new +vessel,” he said, after a while.</p> +<p>One thing we soon found out, and that was that +she was a stiff vessel. That was after a squall hit +us off Cape Cod. We watched the rest of them +then. Some luffed and others took in sail, and +about them we could not tell. But those that took +it full gave us an idea of how we were behaving. +“Let her have it and see how she’ll do,” said the +skipper, and Howe, who was at the wheel––with +his clothes good and dry again––let her have it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_68' name='page_68'></a>68</span> +full. With everything on and tearing through +the water like a torpedo-boat, one puff rolled her +down till she filled herself chock up between the +house and rail, but she kept right on going. Some +vessels can’t sail at all with decks under, but the +Johnnie never stopped. “She’s all right, this one,” +said everybody then. A second later she took a +slap of it over her bow, nearly smothering the +cook, who had just come up to dump some potato +parings over the rail. The way he came up coughing +and spitting and then his dive for the companionway––everybody +had to roar.</p> +<p>“Did y’see the cook hop?––did y’see him hop?” +called Andie, who was afraid somebody had +missed it.</p> +<p>We passed the Marauder, Soudan McLeod, +soon after. His mainmast had broken off eight +or ten feet below the head. They were clearing +away the wreckage. “I s’pose I oughter had more +sense,” he called out as we went by.</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know––maybe the spar was rotten,” +said Maurice, and that was a nice way to +put it, too.</p> +<p>That night it came a flat calm, and with barely +steerage way for us. There was a big four-masted +coaster bound south, too, and light, and for the +best part of the night we had a drifting match +with her. Coasters as a rule are not great all-round +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_69' name='page_69'></a>69</span> +sailers, but some of them, with their flat +bottoms and shoal draft, in a fair wind and going +light, can run like ghosts, and this was one of +that kind. We had our work cut out to hold this +one while the wind was light and astern, but in +the morning, when it hauled and came fresher, we +went flying over the shoals. So far as the looks +of it went the big coaster might as well have been +anchored then.</p> +<p>All that day we held on. And it was a lesson +in sailing to see the way some of those seiners +were handled. Our skipper spent most of that +day finding out how she sailed best and putting +marks on her sheets for quick trimming by and by.</p> +<p>Trying each other out, measuring one vessel +against another, the fleet went down the coast. +We passed a few and were passed by none, and +that was something. Ahead of us somewhere +were a half-dozen flyers. If we could have beaten +some of them we should have had something to +brag about; but no telling, we might get our +chance yet.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_70' name='page_70'></a>70</span> +<a name='IX_MACKEREL' id='IX_MACKEREL'></a> +<h2>IX</h2> +<h3>MACKEREL</h3> +</div> +<p>Throughout all that night the lights of +the fleet were all about us, ahead and behind. +At breakfast next morning––four o’clock––we +were off Delaware Breakwater, and that +afternoon at two we began the mast-head watch +for fish. And on that fine April day it was a +handsome sight––forty sail of seiners in sight, +spread out and cruising lazily.</p> +<p>The skipper was the first to get into his oilskins +and heavy sweater, for with a vessel hopping along +at even no more than six or seven knots by the +wind it is pretty chilly aloft, nice and comfortable +though it may be on deck in the sun.</p> +<p>There was a game of seven-up going on in the +cabin, and the sun striking down the companionway +was bothering Andie Howe. He began to +complain. “Hi, up there to the wheel! Hi, +Eddie––can’t you put her on the other tack?––the +sun’s in my eyes. How can a man see the +cards with the sun in his eyes?”</p> +<p>Parsons didn’t have the chance to talk back +when the word came from aloft to put the seine-boat +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_71' name='page_71'></a>71</span> +over the side, and after that to overhaul the +seine and pile it in the boat. Vessels ahead had +seen mackerel, the skipper called out. We got +into oilskins and boots and made ready. Those +who were going into the seine-boat had already +picked out in what positions they were going to +row, and now there was an overhauling of oars +and putting marks on them so that they could be +picked out in a hurry. Clancy and I were to be +dorymen. We made ready the dory, and then +Clancy went to the mast-head with the skipper and +Long Steve, whose watch it was aloft.</p> +<p>Things began to look like business soon. Even +from the deck we could see that one or two vessels +ahead had boats out. We began to picture +ourselves setting around a big school and landing +the first mackerel of the year into New York. I +think everybody aboard was having that dream, +though everybody pretended not to be in earnest. +You could hear them: “A nice school now––three +hundred barrels.” “Or two hundred would be +doing pretty well.” “Or even a hundred barrels +wouldn’t be bad.” There were two or three young +fellows among the crew, fellows like myself, who +had never seen much seining, and they couldn’t +keep still for excitement when from the mast-head +came the word that a boat ahead was out and +making a set.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_72' name='page_72'></a>72</span></div> +<p>We were going along all the time and when +we could see from the deck for ourselves the boats +that were setting, Billie Hurd couldn’t stand it +any longer, but had to go aloft, too. The four +of them made a fine picture––the skipper and Steve +standing easily on the spreaders, one leaning +against the mast and the other against the back-stay, +with Hurd perched on the jib halyards block +and Clancy on the spring-stay, and all looking as +comfortable as if they were in rockers at home. +I’d have given a hundred dollars then to be able +to stand up there on one foot and lean as easily as +the skipper against the stay with the vessel going +along as she was. I made up my mind to practise +it when next I went aloft.</p> +<p>I went to the mast-head myself by and by, and, +seeing half a dozen schools almost at once, I became +so excited that I could hardly speak. The +skipper was excited, too, but he didn’t show it, +only by his eyes and talking more jerkily than +usual. He paid no attention to two or three +schools that made me just crazy just to look at, +but at last, when he thought it was time, he began +to move. Ten or a dozen Gloucester vessels +were bunched together, and one porgy steamer––that +is, built for porgy or menhaden fishing, +but just now trying for mackerel like the rest of +us.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_73' name='page_73'></a>73</span></div> +<p>“There’ll be plenty of them up soon, don’t you +think, Tommie?” the skipper asked.</p> +<p>“Plenty,” answered Tommie, “plenty,” with +his eyes ever on the fish. “I think Sam Hollis +has got his all right, but Pitt Ripley––I don’t +know.”</p> +<p>It was getting well along toward sunset then, +with everybody worried, the skipper still aloft, and +one boat making ready to set about a mile inside +of us. “They’ll dive,” said our skipper, and +they did. “There’s Pitt Ripley’s school now,” and +he pointed to where a raft of mackerel were rising +and rippling the water black, and heading for the +north. “There’s another gone down, too––they’ll +dive that fellow. Who is it––Al McNeill?––yes. +But they’ll come up again, and when it +does, it’s ours.” And they did come up, and when +they did the skipper made a jump and roared, +“Into the boat!” There was a scramble. “Stay +up here, you Billie, and watch the school,” he said +to Hurd, and “Go down, you,” to me. I slid +down by the jib halyards. The skipper and +Clancy came down by the back-stay and beat me +to the deck. They must have tumbled down, they +were down so quick.</p> +<p>“Hurry––the Aurora’s going after it, too.” +The Aurora was one of Withrow’s fleet and we +were bound to beat her. I had hardly time to +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_74' name='page_74'></a>74</span> +leap into the dory after Clancy, and we were off, +with nobody left aboard but Hurd to the mast-head +and the cook, who was to stay on deck and +sail the vessel.</p> +<p>In the seine-boat it was double-banked oars, +nine long blades and a monstrous big one steering––good +as another oar that––and all driving for +dear life, with Long Steve and a cork-passer +standing by the seine and the skipper on top of +it, with his eyes fixed on the school ahead––his +only motions to open his mouth and to wave with +his hands to the steersman behind him. “Drive +her––drive her,” he called to the crew. “More +yet––more yet,” to the steering oar. “There’s the +porgy steamer’s boat, too, after the same school. +Drive her now, fellows!”</p> +<p>The mackerel were wild as could be, great rafts +of them, and travelling faster than the old seiners +in the gang said they had ever seen them travel +before, and what was worse, not staying up long. +There were boats out from three or four vessels +before we pushed off with ours. I remember the +porgy steamer had cut in ahead and given their +boat a long start for a school. However, that +school did not stay up long enough and they had +their row for nothing. But then their steamer +picked them up again and dropped them on the +way to the same school that we were trying for. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_75' name='page_75'></a>75</span> +How some of our gang did swear at them! And +all because they were steam power.</p> +<p>It promised to be a pretty little race, but that +school, too, went down before either of us could +head it, and so it was another row for nothing. +We lay on our oars then, both boats ready for +another row, with the skipper and seine-heaver in +each standing on top of the seine and watching +for the fish to show again. Of course both +gangs were sizing each other up, too. I think +myself that the Duncan’s crowd were a huskier +lot of men than the steamer’s. Our fellows looked +more like fishermen, as was to be expected, because +in Gloucester good fishermen are so common that +naturally, a man hailing from there gets so that +he wants to be a good fisherman, too, and of course +the men coming there are all pretty good to begin +with, leaving out the fellows who are born and +brought up around Gloucester and who have it in +their blood. A man doesn’t leave Newfoundland +or Cape Breton or even Nova Scotia or Maine +and the islands along the coast, or give up any +safe, steady work he may have, to come to +Gloucester to fish unless he feels that he can come +pretty near to holding his end up. That’s not +saying that a whole lot of fine fishermen do not +stay at home, with never any desire to fish out of +Gloucester, in spite of the good money that a fisherman +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_76' name='page_76'></a>76</span> +with a good skipper can make from there, +but just the same they’re a pretty smart and able +lot that do come. And so, while our gang was +half made up of men that were born far away +from Gloucester, yet they had the Gloucester +spirit, which is everything in deep-sea fishing, +when nerve and strength and skill count for so +much. And this other crowd––the porgy steamer’s––did +not have that look.</p> +<p>“Look at what we’re coming to,” somebody +called. “All steam boys soon, and on wages––wages!” +he repeated, “and going around the +deck, with a blue guernsey with letters on the chest +of it––A.D.Q.––or some other damn company.”</p> +<p>“Well, that would not be bad either, with your +grub bill sure and your money counted out at the +end of every month,” answered somebody else.</p> +<p>I was sizing up the two gangs myself, I being +in the dory with Clancy, and I guess that nearly +everyone of us was doing the same thing and +keeping an eye out for fish at the same time, when +all at once a school popped up the other side of +the porgyman’s boat. Perhaps, half a mile it was +and, for a wonder, not going like a streak.</p> +<p>We saw it first and got to going first, but the +Aurora’s boat and the steamer’s boat were nearer, +and so when we were all under good headway +there were two lengths or so that we had to make +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_77' name='page_77'></a>77</span> +up on each. Well, that was all right. Two +lengths weren’t so many, and we drove her. It +was something to see the fellows lay out to it +then––doubled-banked, two men to each wide seat +and each man with a long oar, which he had +picked out and trimmed to suit himself, and every +man in his own particular place as if in a racing +crew.</p> +<p>And now every man was bending to it. A big +fellow, named Rory McKinnon, was setting the +stroke. There was a kick and a heave to every +stroke, and the men encouraging each other. +“Now––now––give it to her,” was all that I could +hear coming out of him. All this time we in the +dory were coming on behind, Clancy and I having +to beat their dory just as our boat had to +beat their boat. And we were driving, too, you +may be sure. Clancy was making his oars bend +like whips. “Blast ’em! There’s no stiffness to +’em,” he was complaining. And then, “Sock it to +her,” he would call out to our fellows in the seine-boat. +“We’ve got the porgy crew licked––that’s +the stuff,” came from the skipper. From on top of +the seine he was watching the fish, watching the +gang, watching the other boats, watching us in +the dory––watching everything. Whoever made +a slip then would hear from it afterwards, we +knew. And clip, clip, clip it was, with the swash +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_78' name='page_78'></a>78</span> +just curling nicely under the bow of the other +boat, and I suppose our own, too, if we could +have seen.</p> +<p>Our boat was gaining on the Aurora’s and the +skipper was warming up. The fish was going the +same way we were, still a quarter of a mile ahead.</p> +<p>“Drive her,” said the skipper. “Drive her––drive +her––another length and you got ’em. And, +Kenney, it’s the best of ash you’ve got. Don’t be +afraid of breaking it. And, Dan Burns, didn’t +y’ever learn to keep stroke in the Bay of Islands +with nine more men beside you rowing? And +drive her––hit her up now––here’s where we got +’em––they can’t hold it on their lives. Now then, +another dozen strokes and it’s over. One, two, +three––quicker, Lord, quicker––six, seven––oh, +now she’s fair flying––look at her leap. You +blessed lobster, keep rowing and not looking over +your shoulder. We got to get the fish first.”</p> +<p>A quarter mile of that with the foam ripping +by us, and every man with his blood like fire +jumping to his oar, when the skipper leaped back +to the steering oar. “Stand by,” he called, and +then, “Now––over with the buoy,” and over it +went, with the dory at hand and Tommie Clancy +right there to pick it up and hold it to windward. +And then went the seine over in huge armfuls. +Just to see Long Steve throw that seine was worth +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_79' name='page_79'></a>79</span> +a trip South. And he was vain as a child of his +strength and endurance. “My, but look at him!” +Clancy called out––“look at the back of him!” +“He’s a horse,” somebody else would have to +say, and “H-g-gh,” Steve would grunt, and +“H-g-gh” he would fill the air full of tarred netting, +“H-g-gh––pass them corks,” and over it +would go, “H-g-gh,” and the skipper would say, +“That’s the boy, Steve,” and Steve would heave +to break his back right then and there. All the +time they were driving the seine-boat to its limit, +and the skipper was laying to the big steering oar, +the longest of them all and taking a strong man +to handle it properly––laying to it, swinging from +the waist like a hammer-thrower, and the boat +jumping to it. She came jumping right for us in +the dory in a little while. It doesn’t take a good +gang long to put a quarter mile of netting around +a school of mackerel.</p> +<p>It was a pretty set he made. “Pretty, pretty,” +you could almost hear the old seiners saying between +their teeth, even as they were all rowing +with jaws set and never a let-up until the circle +was completed, when it was oars into the air and +Clancy leaping from the dory into the seine-boat +to help purse up. “It’s a raft if ever we get ’em,” +were his first words, and everybody that wasn’t +too breathless said yes, it was a jeesly raft of fish.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_80' name='page_80'></a>80</span></div> +<p>“Purse in,” it was then, and lively. And so we +pursed in, hauling on the running line in the lower +edge of the seine, something as the string around +the neck of a tobacco bag is drawn tight. It was +heavy work of course, but everybody made light +of it. We could not tell if the fish were in it or +not. The leaders might have dove when they felt +the twine against their noses and so escaped with +the whole school following after, or they might +have taken no alarm and stayed in.</p> +<p>So we pursed in, not knowing whether we were +to have a good haul with a hundred or a hundred +and fifty dollars apiece at the end of it, or whether +we would have our work for nothing. All hands +kept up the pretence of joking, of course, but everybody +was anxious enough. It was more than the +money––it was fisherman’s pride. Were we to get +into New York and have it telegraphed on to +Gloucester for everybody that knew us to read and +talk about––landing the first mackerel of the +year? We watched while the circle narrowed and +the pool inside grew shallower. Somebody said, +“There’s one,” and we could see the shine of it, +and another––and another––and then the whole +mass of them rose flipping. They lashed the water +into foam, rushed around the edges, nosed the +corks of the seine. I don’t think myself that +mackerel are particularly intelligent, take them +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_81' name='page_81'></a>81</span> +generally; but at times they seem to know––these +fellows, at least, seemed to know they were gone +and they thrashed about in fury. A mackerel is a +handsome fish any time, but to see him right you +want to see him fresh-seined. They whipped the +water white now––tens of thousands of them. I +don’t believe that the oldest seiner there didn’t feel +his heart beat faster––the first mackerel of the +year. “And Lord knows, maybe a couple of hundred +barrels,” and the skipper’s eyes shone––it +meant a lot to him. And some of the men began +to talk like children, they were so pleased.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_82' name='page_82'></a>82</span> +<a name='X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE' id='X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE'></a> +<h2>X</h2> +<h3>WE LOSE OUR SEINE</h3> +</div> +<p>Two hundred barrels the skipper had said, +but long before we were all pursed up we +knew that five hundred barrels would never hold +the fish in that seine. The size of that school filled +us with joy and yet it was the very size of it that +caused us our trouble. It was too big for the seine, +and when they began to settle down and take the +twine with them the trouble began for us. No bit +of twine ever made to be handled from a seine-boat +was big enough to hold that school of fish when +they began to go down.</p> +<p>The skipper was awake to it early and signalled +for the vessel to come alongside. So the Johnnie +stood over to us, and Hurd, pushing the spare dory +over with Moore’s help, came jumping with it to +the side of the seine where I was alone in the first +dory. He hadn’t even stopped to get into his oilskins, +he was in such a hurry. By the skipper’s +orders I had made fast some of the corks to the +thwarts in the dory and Billie took some into the +spare dory. The whole length of the seine-boat +they were making fast the seine too. In that way +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_83' name='page_83'></a>83</span> +the skipper hoped to buoy up the fish and hold +them until we could lighten the seine up by bailing +some of the fish onto the deck of the vessel. But +it was of no use. There must have been a thousand +barrels of them, and dories and seine-boat began +to go under. It was over the rail of my dory +and spare dory both, and both Billie and myself +to our waists, when the skipper sung out for us to +jump and save ourselves. We hung on a little +longer, but it got to be too much for us and overboard +we went. We were not in danger then. It +is true that the sea was making and we were +weighted down with oilskins and rubber boots, but +we had for support the corks that had not yet +gone under. And along the corks we hauled ourselves +toward the seine-boat. I was praying that +the sharks that sometimes follow up mackerel +would not bother us. It is probable that they +would not even if there were any around, as mackerel +are better eating. And such a fuss as we made +hauling ourselves through the water! We’d have +scared away a whole school of sharks. Before we +could get to the seine-boat that, too, was under. +“Jump!” called the skipper, and “Jump everybody!” +called Clancy, and themselves both hanging +on to a last handful of twine. The men in the +seine-boat jumped and struck out for the vessel, +which was now quite close, with the cook, the only +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_84' name='page_84'></a>84</span> +man left aboard, throwing over keelers, draw-buckets, +the main sheet––anything within his reach +that was loose and would support a man.</p> +<p>The skipper and Clancy hung on to the last. +“Jump you, Tommie!” called the skipper. “Not +me till you go,” answered Clancy. They couldn’t +do a bit of good, but they hung on, each grabbing +handfuls of twine in a last effort to hold up the +seine. The seine-boat went under––and they up +to their necks––and then it turned over and in +toward the seine. Some of us hollered––we were +afraid that it was all up with both of them––that +they would be thrown toward the inside and tangled +up in the seine. But both of them bobbed up, +the skipper saying nothing, but Clancy sputtering +like a crazy man. The dories coming loose gave a +few of us a chance to climb up on the bottom of +them, and when the seine-boat came bobbing up +most of the others climbed up on the bottom of +that. And there was some swearing done then, +you may be sure! The gang would have been all +right then, waiting to be picked up by the cook +from the vessel, which was then pretty handy; but +the seine-boat started to go under again and then +came the slap of a little sea, and overboard went +seven or eight of us. Clancy was one of those +thrown into the water. We all remembered it +afterwards because he called out for Andie Howe.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_85' name='page_85'></a>85</span></div> +<p>“Where’s Andie?”</p> +<p>“Here,” said Andie.</p> +<p>“Where?”</p> +<p>“Hanging onto the bow of the seine-boat.”</p> +<p>“Well, hang on a while longer,” said Clancy and +struck out for the vessel, and made it too, oilskins, +big boots and all. He threw two or three lines +out at once––one especially to Thad Simpson, the +other man of the crew besides Andie Howe who it +was known couldn’t swim. So Clancy hauled him +in. The third man he hauled in was Billie Hurd.</p> +<p>“Good Lord, Tommie,” said Billie, “you hove +a line over my head to Andie Howe.”</p> +<p>“You pop-eyed Spanish mackerel!” roared +Clancy at him, “you ought to know by this time +that Andie can’t swim.”</p> +<p>“I know, but he was all oiled up, and look +at me–––”</p> +<p>“Go to hell,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>We all got aboard after a while, but our fine +new seine was gone, and the big school of fish too. +After a hard grapple we got the dories and a little +later the seine-boat, and after a lot more work we +got them right side up. The dories we pulled the +plugs out of to let them drain and then took +them on deck, but the seine-boat we had to pump +out. By then it was pretty well on in the night +and I remember how the moon rose just as we had +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_86' name='page_86'></a>86</span> +it fairly well dried out and dropped astern––rose +as big as a barrel-head and threw a yellow light +over it, and then went out of sight, for a breeze +was on us.</p> +<p>And “Oh, Lord! that thousand-barrel school!” +groaned everybody.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_87' name='page_87'></a>87</span> +<a name='XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE' id='XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE'></a> +<h2>XI</h2> +<h3>AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE</h3> +</div> +<p>It wasn’t bad enough that we came near losing +a few men and our boat, and our seine altogether, +but it must come on to breeze up on top of +that and drive us off the grounds. After putting +everything to rights, we were having a mug-up forward +and wondering if the skipper would take sail +off her or what, when we heard the call that +settled it.</p> +<p>“On deck everybody!” we heard. And when +we got there, came from the skipper, “Take in the +balloon, tie it up and put it below. Haul down +your stays’l too––and go aloft a couple of you, +fore and aft, and put the tops’ls in gaskets.”</p> +<p>We attended to that––a gang out on the bowsprit, +half a dozen aloft and so on––with the skipper +to the wheel while it was being done. When +we had finished it was, “Haul the seine-boat alongside––pump +out what water’s left.” Then, “Shift +that painter and hook on the big painter. Drop +her astern and give her plenty of line. Where’s +the dorymen? Where’s Tommie and Joe? Haul +the dories into the hatch, Tommie, and make ’em +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_88' name='page_88'></a>88</span> +fast. Gripe ’em good while you’re at it. Clear +the deck of all loose gear––put it below, all of it––keelers, +everything. Maybe ’twon’t be much of a +blow, but there’s no telling––it may. She mayn’t +be the kind that washes everything over, but put +it all safe anyway.”</p> +<p>The skipper watched all this until he had seen +everything cleared up and heard “All fast the +dory,” from the waist. Then he looked up and +took note of sky and wind. “Don’t feel any too +good. Maybe ’twill blow off, but we might’s well +run in. We’ll have to wait for our other seine +anyway and Wesley will be sure to put into the +Breakwater for news on his way down, especially +if it comes to blow.”</p> +<p>He dropped below then to light his pipe. Seeing +me and Parsons, with me trying to fix up Parsons’s +leg where it had been gashed––Eddie never +knew how––in the mix-up of the evening, the +skipper said, “There’s some liniment in the chest +and some linen in one of the drawers under my +bunk. Get it. And some of you might’s well turn +in and have a nap. She’ll be all right––the watch +and myself can look after her now,” and he went +on deck again, puffing like an engine to keep his +pipe going.</p> +<p>Most of them did turn in and were soon asleep. +Some of the older men had a smoke and an overhauling +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_89' name='page_89'></a>89</span> +of their wet clothes, while a few joined in a +little game of draw before turning in. One or two +were deploring the loss of the seine. The nearness +to losing lives didn’t seem to be worrying +anybody. For myself, I was somewhat worked +up. There was one time in the water when I +thought I was gone. So I went on deck after the +skipper. It was a black night and breezing all +the time and I wanted to see how the vessel behaved. +The Johnnie was close-hauled at this +time and swashing under, and I knew without asking +further that the skipper intended to make +Delaware Breakwater.</p> +<p>While hurrying forward, after lending a hand +to batten down the main hatch––the Johnnie +plunging along all the time––and my head perhaps +a little too high in the air, I stumbled off the +break and plump over a man under the windward +rail. I thought I was going to leeward and maybe +overboard, but somebody hooked onto the full in +the back of my oil-jacket, hauled me up the inclined +deck again, and in a roaring whisper said, “Get a +hold here, Joey––here’s a ring-bolt for you. +Don’t let go on your life! Isn’t it fine?” It was +Clancy. He had nights, I know, when he couldn’t +sleep, and like me, I suppose, he wanted to watch +the sea, which just then was firing grandly. Into +this sea the vessel was diving––nose first––bringing +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_90' name='page_90'></a>90</span> +her bowsprit down, down, down, and then up, +up, up, until her thirty-seven-foot bowsprit would +be pointing to where the North star should be. +Whenever she heaved like that I could feel her +deck swelling under me. I remember when I used +to play foot-ball at the high school at home and it +was getting handy to a touch-down, with perhaps +only a few yards to gain and the other side braced +to stop it, that a fellow playing back had to buck +like that from under a line when he had to scatter +tons, or what he thought was tons, of people on +top of him. The vessel was that way now, only +with every dive she had hundreds of tons to lift +from under. At a time like that you can feel the +ribs of a vessel brace within her just as if she was +human. Now I could almost feel her heart +pumping and her lungs pounding somewhere inside. +I could feel her brace to meet it, feel her +shiver, as if she was scared half to death, and almost +hear her screech like a winner every time she +cleared it and threw it over her head.</p> +<p>Now down she went––the Johnnie Duncan––down +and forward, for she wouldn’t be held back––shoulders +and breast slap into it. Clear to her +waist she went, fighting the sea from her. To +either side were tumbling the broken waves, curling +away like beach combers. The hollow of each was +a curved sheet of electric white, and the top––the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_91' name='page_91'></a>91</span> +crest––was a heavier, hotter white. The crests +would rise above our rail and break, and back into +the hollows would fall a shower of shooting stars +that almost sizzled. There wasn’t a star above, +but millions on the water!</p> +<p>“Ever see anything like that ashore, Joey-boy?” +said Clancy, and I had to roar a whisper that I +never had.</p> +<p>Through this play of fire the Johnnie leaped +with great bounds. She boiled her way, and astern +she left a wake in which the seine-boat was rearing +and diving with a fine little independent trail +of its own.</p> +<p>Two men forward––the watch––were leaning +over the windlass and peering into the night. +They were there for whatever they might see, but +particularly were they looking for the double white +light of Five Fathom Bank lightship. The skipper +was at the wheel. When he got in the way of +the cabin light, we could catch the shine from his +dripping oil-clothes, and the spark from his pipe––which +he kept going through it all––marked his +position when he stepped back into the darkness.</p> +<p>Clancy noticed him. “There’s a man for you, +Joey. Think what it meant to a young skipper +with a new vessel––the loss of that school and the +seine on top of it the very first day he struck fish. +If we’d got that, he might have been the first vessel +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_92' name='page_92'></a>92</span> +of the year into the New York market. And think +of the price the first fish fetch!––and the honor of +it––and he breaking his heart to make a reputation +this year. And yet not a yip out of him––not a +cranky word to one of the gang all night. A +great man I call him––and a fisherman.” I +thought so, too.</p> +<p>Sometimes I imagined I could see the wink of +red and green lights abreast and astern, which I +probably did, for there should have been fifty sail +or so of seiners inside and outside of us––there +were sixty sail of the fleet in sight that afternoon––and +I knew that, barring a possible few that had +got fish and were driving for the New York market, +all the others were like ourselves, under lower +sails and boring into it, with extra lookout forward, +the skipper at the wheel or on the quarter and all +ears and eyes for the surf and lights inshore when +we should get there.</p> +<p>“Something ahead! dead ahead! sa-ail!” came +suddenly from forward. There was a scraping +of boot-heels at the wheel. “What d’y’make of +it?––all right, I see her!” In the shadow we saw +the skipper pulling the wheel down. Ahead I +imagined I saw a dark patch, but to make sure I +squirmed up to the fore-rigging. Whoever she +was, the light from her cabin skylight was right +there and I realized that we were pretty close, but +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_93' name='page_93'></a>93</span> +not really how close until a boat bobbed up under +my jaws almost. Right from under our bow it +heaved. It was a seiner and that was her seine-boat +towing astern, and I could easily have heaved +a line to her helmsman as we swept by her. There +was an awfully tall shadow of sails––half up to +the clouds I thought––and the black of the hull +looked as long as a dock. A voice was hurled to +us, but we couldn’t quite make it out––but it was +the watch, probably, saying a word or two by way +of easing his feelings.</p> +<p>We worked up to the windward of that one and +slowly crowded past her tumbling green light. +Then the skipper let the wheel fly up and we shot +ahead and soon we had her directly astern, with +her one green and one red eye looking after us. +“That’s one fellow we outsail,” thought I to myself, +and I knew I was beginning to love the +Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>All through that night it went on like that.</p> +<p>At four o’clock or so in the morning the cook +stuck his head out of the slit in the forec’s’le companionway +and spoke his welcome little piece. +“Can’t have any reg’lar sit-down this morning, +boys. Have to leave the china in the becket for +a while yet, but all that wants can make a mug-up, +and when we get inside––if we do in anything like +a decent hour––we’ll have breakfast.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_94' name='page_94'></a>94</span></div> +<p>At five o’clock the sky began to brighten to the +eastward, but there was no let-up to the wind or +sea. If anything it was breezing up. At six +o’clock, when the short blasts of the lightship split +the air abreast of us, things were good and lively, +but there was no daylight to go by then. The wash +that in the night only buried her bow good was +then coming over her to the foremast and filling +the gangway between the house and rail as it raced +aft. The beauty of double-lashing the dories began +to appear, and all hands might have been +towing astern all night by the look of them. But +the Johnnie Duncan was doing well and the opinion +of the crew generally was that the skipper +could slap every rag to her and she’d carry it––that +is, if she had to. The skipper put her more +westerly after we had passed the lightship and +on we went.</p> +<p>We had the company of a couple of coasters in +this part of the drive; and by that, if nothing else, +a man might know we were inshore. Some +Gloucester men were in sight, too, though most of +the fleet, we guessed, were still outside of us. The +coasters were colliers, three-masters both, and +reefed down, wallowing in the sea. One had her +foretopmast snapped short off, and such patched +sails as she had on looked lonesome. The gang, of +course, had to make fun of her.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_95' name='page_95'></a>95</span></div> +<p>“There’s one way to house a topm’st!”</p> +<p>“Broke your clothes-pole, old girl!”</p> +<p>“Better take in your washing there––looks like +rain!”</p> +<p>“Go it, you beauty! I only wish I had my cameraw. +If y’only suspected how lovely you look!”</p> +<p>Two big ocean tugs, one clear white and one all +black, offered a change in looks, though in nothing +else, for each one, with two barges of coal, was +making desperate hauling of it, and the Breakwater +yet a good bit away.</p> +<p>“Hustle ’em, you husky coal-jammers!” roared +Parsons at them, as if he could be heard beyond +the rail. “I wouldn’t be aboard of you for my +share of the Southern trip––and mackerel away up +in G, too. Would you, Billie?”</p> +<p>“Then? Naw!” said Hurd, with a wrinkling +of his little nose.</p> +<p>“No, nor me neither,” said Long Steve. “Hi––ever +hear the cook––ever hear George Moore’s +song:––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘If ever you go to sea, my boy,</p> +<p>Don’t ever you ship on a steamer;</p> +<p>There’s stacks to scrape and rails to paint––</p> +<p>It’s always work to clean her.</p> +<p>When the wind is wrong and the shore is by,</p> +<p>They’ll keep you clear of leeway,</p> +<p>But they roll and they jolt and they’re never dry––</p> +<p>They’re the devil’s own in a sea-way!’“</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_96' name='page_96'></a>96</span></div> +<p>Steve, trying to sing that, had one hand hooked +into a ring-bolt under the rail and he was slowly +pickling––we were all pickling––like a salted +mackerel in a barrel.</p> +<p>An hour past Five Fathom and the tall white +tower of Cape Henlopen could be made out ahead, +as well as the gray tower of Cape May through the +mists to the northward. The wind was coming +faster and it felt heavier. We could judge best of +how we were looking ourselves by watching all our +fellows near by. We could see to the bottom +planks of two to leeward of us, while on the sloping +deck of one to windward it was plain that only +what was lashed or bolted was still there. When +they reared they almost stood up straight, and +when they scooped into it the wonder was that all +the water taken aboard didn’t hold her until the +next comber could have a fair whack at her.</p> +<p>The men––that is, a few of them––might joke, +but were all glad to be getting in. There’s no fun +staying wet and getting wetter all night long. If +it wasn’t for the wetness of a fellow it would have +been great, for it was the finest kind of excitement, +our running to harbor––that night––especially +in the morning when we were passing +three or four and nobody passing us. We went +by one fellow––the Martinet she was––a fair +enough sailer––passed her to windward of course, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_97' name='page_97'></a>97</span> +our gang looking across at their gang and nobody +saying a word, but everybody thinking a lot, you +may be sure. It was worth a square meal that.</p> +<p>With the Martinet astern, the skipper let her +pay off and run for the end of the Breakwater. +For a while he let the wind take her fair abeam, +with sheets in, and the way she sizzled through the +water was a caution. There was a moment that +an extra good blast hit her that my heart sank, +but I reflected that the skipper knew his business, +and so tried to take it unconcernedly. Everybody +around me was joking and laughing––to think, I +suppose, that we would soon be in.</p> +<p>A moment after that I went down to leeward. +The sea was bubbling in over her rail at the fore-rigging +and I wanted to get the feel of it. I got +it. It is pretty shoal water on the bar at the mouth +of the Delaware River and quite a little sea on +when it blows. One sea came aboard. Somebody +yelled and I saw it––but too late––and slap! over +I went––over the rail––big boots and oilskins I +went down into the roaring. For a second my +head came up and I saw the vessel. Everybody +aboard was standing by. The skipper was whirling +the spokes and the vessel was coming around +like a top. I never saw a vessel roll down so +far in all my life. I went under again and coming +up heard a dull shout. There was a line beside +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_98' name='page_98'></a>98</span> +me. “Grab hold!” yelled somebody. No need +to tell me––I grabbed hold. It was the seine-boat’s +painter. The Johnnie was still shooting and +when the line tautened it came as near to pulling +my arms out of my shoulders as ever I want to +have them again. But I hung on. Then she came +up, and they hauled the painter in and gaffed me +over the rail.</p> +<p>“You blankety blank fool!” roared Clancy, as +soon as I stood up––“don’t you know any better? +A fine thing we’d have to be telegraphing home, +wouldn’t it? Are you all right now?”</p> +<p>“All right,” I said, and felt pretty cheap.</p> +<p>While being hauled in, knowing that I was +safe, I had been thinking what a fine little adventure +I’d have to tell when we got back to +Gloucester, but after Clancy got through with me +I saw that there were two ways to look at it. So +I took my old place under the windward rail and +didn’t move from there again till it was time to +take sail off her.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_99' name='page_99'></a>99</span> +<a name='XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR' id='XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR'></a> +<h2>XII</h2> +<h3>THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR</h3> +</div> +<p>Nearing the Breakwater we had more company. +Other seiners, with boats astern and +dories on deck, were coming in; jumbo, jib, fore +and reefed mainsail generally, and all plunging +gloriously with a harbor near at hand.</p> +<p>For the next few hours of that morning any +watcher in the lighthouse on the Breakwater could +have seen plenty of samples of clever seamanship. +At our time we were only one of a half-dozen at +the business of working around the jetty, some +making for one end and some for the other. +There was a great trying of tacks and some plain +criticism of tactics and weatherly qualities. There +was one who tried to cut in before he could quite +make it. When he had to put back or run ashore +and lose her, a great laugh went up, though there +was nothing the matter with the try. He had only +tried too much.</p> +<p>Eddie Parsons was the sharp critic. “Trying to +beat out the fleet, hey? And with that old hooker? +Nothing wrong with your nerve, old man, but +some fine day, when there’s a little wind stirring, +you’ll roll that tub over a little too far. That’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_100' name='page_100'></a>100</span> +right––jam her up now! Think you got a steamboat? +Wonder nobody ever told you about sailing +a vessel. Come out of it, old man, and let her +swing off.”</p> +<p>We had yet to get in ourselves, and that we had +the Johnnie Duncan to eat into the wind we were +thankful. At last we were by and reaching down +to the end of the jetty. We all began to feel good +once we were sure of it. It was fine, too, to listen +to Clancy as we got near. He was standing on +the break, leaning against the weather rigging and +looking forward.</p> +<p>“You’d think she’d been coming here for a +hundred years, wouldn’t you? Look at her point +her nose now at that beacon––don’t have to give +this one the wheel at all. She’s the girl. See her +bow off now. Man, but she knows as well as you +and me she’ll be inside and snug’s a kenched +mackerel before long. Watch her kick into the +wind now. Oh, she’s the lady, this one. I’ve +sailed many of them, but she’s the queen of them +all, this one.”</p> +<p>A half dozen of lucky fellows were in before us. +We drove in among them, under the bow of one +and past the stern of another. They were all +watching us, after the custom of the fleet in harbor. +We knew this and behaved as smartly as we could +without slopping over.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_101' name='page_101'></a>101</span></div> +<p>By and by our skipper picked out a place to his +fancy. “Stand by halyards and down-hauls,” was +his warning.</p> +<p>“Ready––all ready.”</p> +<p>“Ready with the anchor!”</p> +<p>“All ready the anchor, sir!”</p> +<p>“Down with your jib! Down with jumbo! Let +go your fore halyards! Watch out now––ready––let +go your anchor!”</p> +<p>Rattle––whizz––whir-r-r––splash! clink––and +the Johnnie Duncan of Gloucester was safe to her +mooring.</p> +<p>And not till then did our skipper, ten hours to +the wheel, unclinch his grip, hook the becket to a +spoke, slat his sou’wester on the wheel-box and +ease his mind.</p> +<p>“Thank the Lord, there’s a jeesly blow behind +us. There’s some outside’ll wish they had a shore +job before they get in. Hi, boys, when you get +her tied up for’ard, better all go below and have a +bite to eat. Let the mains’l stand and give it a +chance to dry.” Then he looked about him. +“And I didn’t notice that anybody passed us on +the way.” There was a whole lot in that last.</p> +<p>After eating a bite, I went over in the dory to +the lighthouse on the jetty, where seamen’s mail +was taken care of. After leaving my letters I +stopped to watch some of the fleet coming. It was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_102' name='page_102'></a>102</span> +easy enough to pick them. The long, slick-looking, +lively seine-boat in tow and the black pile of +netting on deck told what they were, and they came +jumping out of the mists in a way to make a man’s +heart beat.</p> +<p>There was a man standing on the jetty. He was +master of a three-masted coaster, he told me. +“You come off one of them Gloucester mackerel-catchers?” +he asked me. I said yes. “That new-looking +one that came in a while ago?” I said yes +again.</p> +<p>“I was watching her––she’s a dream––a dream. +I never see anything like them––the whole bunch +of ’em. Look at this one––ain’t she got on about +all she can stand up under though? My soul, +ain’t she staggering! I expect her skipper knows +his business––don’t expect he’d be skipper of a +fine vessel like that if he didn’t. But if ’twas me +I’d just about take a wide tuck or two in that ever-lastin’ +mains’l he’s got there. My conscience, but +ain’t he a-sockin’ it to her! I s’pose that’s the way +some of your vessels are sailed out and never +heard from again––that was never run into, nor +rolled over, nor sunk in a reg’lar way, but just +drove right into it head-first trying to make a passage +and drowned before ever they could rise +again. Well, good-luck to you, old girl, and your +skipper, whoever he is, and I guess if your canvas +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_103' name='page_103'></a>103</span> +stays on you’ll be to anchor before a great while, +for you’re making steamboat time. Go it, old +girl, and your little baby on behind, go it! There +ain’t nothing short of an ocean liner could get you +now. Go it! a sail or two don’t matter––if it’s a +good mackerel season I s’pose the owners don’t +mind if you blow away a few sails. Go it, God +bless you! Go it! you’re the lads can sail a vessel, +you fishermen of Gloucester. Lord, if I dared to +try a thing like that with my vessel and my crew +and the old gear I got, I rather expect I’d have a +rigger’s bill by the time I got home––if ever I got +home carryin’ on like that in my old hooker.”</p> +<p>I watched her, too. She was the Tarantula, Jim +Porter, another sail-carrier. Around the point and +across she tore and over toward the sands beyond, +swung off on her heel to her skipper’s heave, came +down by the wreck of a big three-master on the +inner beach, and around and up opposite what +looked like a building on the hill. Then it was +down with the wheel, down with headsails, let go +fore-halyards, over with the anchor, and there she +was, another fisherman of Gloucester, at rest in +harbor after an all-night fight with a lively breeze.</p> +<p>And I left the master of the coaster there and +went back to the Duncan, where the crew were +standing along the rail or leaning over the house +and having a lot of fun sizing up those who were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_104' name='page_104'></a>104</span> +coming in. It is one of the enjoyments of the +seining fleet––this racing to harbor when it blows +and then watching the others work in. I’ve heard +it said that no place in the world can show a fleet +like them––all fine vessels, from one hundred to +one hundred and twenty feet over all, deep +draught, heavily sparred, and provided with all +kinds of sail. They were ably managed, of course,––and +a dash to port makes the finest kind of a +regatta. No better chances are offered to try vessels +and seamanship––no drifting or flukes but +wind enough for all hands and on all points of +sailing generally.</p> +<p>They came swooping in one after the other––like +huge sea-gulls, only with wings held close. +Now, with plenty of light, those already in could +easily see the others coming long before they +rounded the jetty. Even if we couldn’t see the +hulls of them, there were fellows who could name +them––one vessel after the other––just by the spars +and upper rigging. The cut of a topsail, the look +of a mast-head, the set of a gaff––the smallest +little thing was enough to place them, so well were +they acquainted with one another. And the distance +at which some of them could pick out a +vessel was amazing.</p> +<p>George Moore, coming up out of the forec’s’le +to dump over some scraps, spied one. “The Mary +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_105' name='page_105'></a>105</span> +Grace Adams,” he sang out,––“the shortest +forem’st out of Gloucester. She must’ve been well +inside when she started––to get in at this time. +Slow––man, but she is slow, that one.”</p> +<p>“Yes, that’s the old girl, and behind her is the +Dreamer––Charlie Green––black mast-heads and +two patches on her jumbo. She’ll be in and all fast +before the Mary Grace’s straightened out.”</p> +<p>And so it was––almost. The Mary Adams was +one of the older fleet and never much of a sailer. +The Dreamer was one of the newer vessels, able, +and a big sailer. They were well raked by the +critics, as under their four lowers they whipped in +and around and passed on by.</p> +<p>After the Dreamer came the Madeline, with +“Black Jack” Hogan, a fleshy man for a fisherman, +who minded his way and remained unmoved +at the compliments paid his vessel, one of the prize +beauties of the fleet. The Marguerite, Charley +Falvey, a dog at seining, always among the +high-liners, who got more fun out of a summer’s +seining than most men ever got out of yachting, +who bought all the latest inventions in gear as fast +as they came out and who had a dainty way of +getting fish. The Marguerite dipped her bow as +she passed, while her clever skipper nodded along +the line.</p> +<p>The King Philip, another fast beauty, made her +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_106' name='page_106'></a>106</span> +bow and dipped her jibs to her mates in harbor. +At sight of her master, Al McNeill, a great shout +goes up. “Ho, ho! boys, here’s Lucky Al! Whose +seine was it couldn’t hold a jeesly big school one +day off here last spring but Billie Simms’? Yes, +sir, Billie Simms. Billie fills up and was just about +thinking he’d have to let the rest go when who +heaves in sight and rounds to and says, ‘Can I help +y’out, William?’ Who but Lucky Al McNeill, +of course. Bales out two hundred barrels as nice +fat mackerel as anybody’d want to see. ‘Just fills +me up,’ says Al, and scoots to market. Just been +to New York, mind you, that same week with two +hundred and fifty barrels he got twelve cents +apiece for. ‘Just fills me up,’ says Al, and scoots. +No, he ain’t a bit lucky, Captain Al ain’t––married +a young wife only last fall.”</p> +<p>Then followed the Albatross, with Mark +Powers giving the orders. Then the Privateer, another +fast one, but going sluggishly now because of +a stove-in seine-boat wallowing astern. Then the +North Wind, with her decks swept clear of everything +but her house and hatches. Seine-boat, seine +and dory were gone.</p> +<p>After her was a big, powerful vessel, the Ave +Maria, with the most erratic skipper of all. This +man never appeared but the gossip broke out. +Andie Howe had his record. “Here comes George +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_107' name='page_107'></a>107</span> +Ross. What’s this they say now?––that he don’t +come down from the mast-head now like he used +to, when he strikes a school. When I was with him +he was a pretty lively man comin’ from aloft––used +to sort of fall down, you know. But now he +comes down gentle-like––slides down the back-stay. +Only trouble now he’s got to get new rubber +boots every other trip, ’count of the creases he +wears in the legs of them sliding down the wire. +I tell you they all lose their nerve as they get +older. There’s Billie Simms coming behind him. +He’s given up tryin’ to sail his vessel on the side +and tryin’ to see how long he c’n carry all he c’n +pile on. Billie says ’t’ain’t like when a fellow’s +young and ain’t got any family. I expect it’s about +the same with George since he got married.” The +master of the Ave Maria didn’t even glance over +as he piloted his vessel along. He very well knew +that we were talking about him.</p> +<p>Pretty soon came one that everybody looked at +doubtfully. She sported a new mainmast and a +new fore-gaff. “Who’s this old hooker with her +new spars? Looks like a vessel just home from salt +fishing, don’t she? Lord, but she needs painting.” +Nobody seemed to know who she was, and as she +got nearer there was a straining of eyes for her +name forward. “The H-A-R-B-I––oh, the Harbinger. +Must be old Marks and the old craft he +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_108' name='page_108'></a>108</span> +bought down East last fall. This the old man, +of course––the Harbinger. How long’s she been +down here? Came down ahead of the fleet? +Well, she ought to––by the looks of her she needs +a good early start to get anywhere. They ought +to be glad to get in. I mind that September breeze +twenty year ago that the old man said blew all the +water off Quero and drove him ashore on Sable +Island. He says he ain’t taking any more line +storms in his. No, nor anybody else in the old +square-enders he gen’rally sails in. I’ll bet he’s +glad to change winter trawling for summer seining. +I’ll bet he put in a few wakeful nights on +the Banks in his time––mind the time he parted +his cable and came bumping over Sable Island +No’the-east Bar? Found the only channel there +was, I callate. ‘Special little angels was looking +out for me,’ he says, when he got home. ‘Yes,’ +says Wesley Marrs––he was telling it to Wesley––‘yes,’ +says Wesley, ‘but I’ll bet keepin’ the lead +goin’ had a hell of a lot to do with it, too.’”</p> +<p>So they came rolling in by the end of the jetty +until they could make one last tack of it. Like +tumbling dolphins they were––seiners all, with a +single boat towing astern and a single dory, or +sometimes two dories, lashed in the waist, all gear +stowed away, under four lower sails mostly––jumbo, +jib, fore and main, though now and then +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_109' name='page_109'></a>109</span> +was one with a mainsail in stops and a trysail laced +to the gaff, and all laying down to it until their +rails were washing under and the sea hissed over +the bows.</p> +<p>Anybody would have to admire them as they +came scooting past. When they thought they were +close enough to the Breakwater––and some went +pretty close––up or down would go the wheel, +according to which end of the jetty they came in +by, around they would go, and across the flats and +down on the fleet they would come shooting. They +breasted into the hollows like any sea-bird and +lifted with every heave to shake the water from +bilge to quarter. They came across with never a +let-up, shaving everything along the way until a +good berth was picked out. Then they let go sails, +dropped anchor and were ready for a rest.</p> +<p>Nobody got by our fellows without a word. +And we weren’t the only crew of critics. Bungling +seamanship would get a slashing here, but there +was none of that. It was all good, but there are +degrees of goodness, of course. First-class seamanship +being a matter of course, only a wonderful +exhibition won approval from everybody. And +crews coming in, knowing what was ahead of +them, made no mistakes in that harbor.</p> +<p>A dozen ordinary skippers sailed past before a +famous fisherman at length came in. Everybody +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_110' name='page_110'></a>110</span> +knew him––a dog, a high-liner, truly a master +mariner. A murmur went up. “There’s the boy,” +said Tommie Clancy. “I mind last summer when +he came into Souris just such a day as this, but +with more wind stirring. ’Twas Fourth of July +and we had all our flags to the peak––and some +fine patriotic fights going on ashore that day––our +flag and the English. The harbor was jammed +with seiners and fresh-fishers. You couldn’t see +room for a dory, looking at ’em end on. But that +don’t jar Tom O’Donnell. What does he do? He +just comes in and sails around the fleet like a cup-defender +on parade––and every bit of canvas he +had aboard flying––only his crew had to hang +onto the ring-bolts under the wind’ard rail. Well, +he comes piling in, looks the fleet over, sizes up +everything, picks out a nice spot as he shoots +around, sails out the harbor again––clean out, yes +sir, clean out––comes about––and it blowing a living +gale all the time––shoots her in again, dives +across a line of us, and fetches her up standing. +We could’ve jumped from our rail to his in jack-boots, +he was that close to us and another fellow +the other side. Slid her in like you slide the cover +into a diddy box. Yes, sir, and that’s the same +lad you see coming along now––Tom O’Donnell +and his Colleen Bawn.”</p> +<p>He certainly was coming on now, and a fine +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_111' name='page_111'></a>111</span> +working vessel he had. She showed it in every +move. She came around like a twin-screw launch, +picked out her berth like she had intelligence in her +eyes, made for it, swirled, fluttered like a bird, felt +with her claws for the ground underneath, found +it, gripped it, swayed, hung on, and at last settled +gently in her place. There was no more jar to the +whole thing than if she had been a cat-boat in a +summer breeze. “Pretty, pretty, pretty,” you +could hear the gang along our rail.</p> +<p>“They talk about knockabout racing craft,” said +Clancy, “but did y’ever see anything drop to a +berth slicker than that? And that’s a vessel you c’n +go to sea in, and in the hardest winter gale that +ever blew you c’n turn in when your watch is done +and have a feeling of comfort.”</p> +<p>“Where’s the steam trawler, the porgy boat, we +saw yesterday?”</p> +<p>“Put into Chincoteague most likely––nearer +than here.”</p> +<p>“That’s what we’ll have to come to yet––steamers, +and go on wages like a waiter in a hotel.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “I s’pose so, but with vessels +like we got and the seamen sailing out of +Gloucester we’ll stave ’em off a long time yet, and +even as it is, give me a breeze and a vessel like this +one under us and we’ll beat out all the steam fishermen +that ever turned a screw.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_112' name='page_112'></a>112</span></div> +<p>One of the latest experiments in a fishermen’s +model reached in then and her coming started a +chorus. They were always trying new models in +Gloucester, everybody was so anxious to have a +winner. This one’s sails were still white and +pretty and her hull still shiny in fresh black paint. +The red stripe along her rail and the gold stripe +along her run set off her lines; her gear didn’t have +a speck on it, her spars were yellow as could be +and to leeward we thought we could still smell the +patent varnish. For that matter there were several +there as new-looking as she was, our own vessel +for one; but there had been a lot of talk about +this one. She was going to clean out the fleet. She +had been pretending to a lot, and as she hadn’t yet +made good, of course she got a great raking.</p> +<p>“She’s here at last, boys––the yacht, the wonderful, +marvellous Victory! Ain’t she a bird? Built +to beat the fleet! Look at the knockabout bow of +her!”</p> +<p>“Knockabout googleums––h-yah! Scoop shovel +snout and a stern ugly as a battle-ship’s, and the +Lord knows there was overhang and to spare +to tail her out decent. Cut out the yellow and the +red and the whole lot of gold decorations and +she’s as homely as a Newf’undland jack.”</p> +<p>“Just the same, she c’n sail,” said somebody +who wanted to start an argument.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_113' name='page_113'></a>113</span></div> +<p>“Sail! Yah! might beat a Rockport granite +sloop. Ever hear of the Henry Clay Parker, +Mister Billie Simms, and the little licking she +gave this winner of yours? No? Well, you want +to go around and have a drink or two with the boys +next time you’re ashore and get the news. It was +like a dogfish and a mackerel––the Henry just eat +her up. And there’s the others. Why, this one +underneath us’d make a holy show of her, I’ll bet. +And there’s half a dozen others. There’s the––oh, +what’s the use?”</p> +<p>“Oh, Eddie Parsons, a perfect lady and coming +in like a high-stepper and yet you must malign her +beauty and make light of her virtue,” and Clancy +jammed Parsons’s sou’wester down over his eyes––“hush +up, Eddie.”</p> +<p>Into the harbor and after the Victory heaved +another one. And she was the real thing––handsome, +fast and able. And she had a record for +bringing the fish home––an able vessel and well-known +for it. She could carry whole sails when +some of the others were double-reefed and thinking +of dragging trysails out of the hold. And her +skipper was a wonder.</p> +<p>“You c’n cut all the others out––here comes the +real thing. Here’s the old dog himself. Did he +ever miss a blow? And look at him. Every man +comes in here to-day under four lowers, no more, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_114' name='page_114'></a>114</span> +and some under reefed mains’l, or trys’l, but four +whole lowers ain’t enough for this gentleman––not +for Wesley. He must carry that gaff-tops’l if he +pulls the planks out of her. He always brings +her home, but if some of the underwriters’d see +him out here they’d soon blacklist him till he +mended his ways. It’s a blessed wonder he ain’t +found bottom before this. Look at her now skating +on her ear. There she goes––if they’d just +lower a man over the weather rail with a line on +him he could write his name on her keel!”</p> +<p>And she certainly was something to make a +man’s eyes stick out. There had been a vessel or +two that staggered before, but the Lucy fairly +rolled down into it, and there was no earthly reason +why she should do it except that it pleased her +skipper to sport that extra kite.</p> +<p>She boiled up from the end of the jetty, and her +wake was the wake of a screw steamer. She had +come from home, we knew, and so it happened +she was one of the last to get in. The harbor was +crowded as she straightened out. We knew she +would not have too much leeway coming on, and +what berth she was after kept everybody guessing.</p> +<p>“If she goes where’s she pointing––and most +vessels do––she’ll find a berth down on the beach +on that course, down about where the wreck is. +It’ll be dry enough walking when she gets there. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_115' name='page_115'></a>115</span> +If she keeps on the gait she’s going now, she ought +to be able to fetch good and high and dry up on +the mud. They’d cert’nly be able to step ashore––when +they get there. Ah-h-h, but that’s more +like it.”</p> +<p>She was taking it over the quarter then. She +cleared the stern of the most leeward of the fleet +and then kicked off, heading over to where the +Johnnie Duncan and the Victory lay. The betting +was that she would round to and drop in between +us two. There was room there, but only just room. +It would be a close fit, but there was room.</p> +<p>But she didn’t round to. She held straight on +without the sign of a swerve. On the Johnnie, the +gang being almost in her path picked out a course +for her. Between the outer end of our seine-boat +and the end of the bowsprit of the Mary Grace +Adams was a passage that may have been the +width of a vessel. But the space seemed too narrow. +Our crew were wondering if he would try +it. Even the skipper, standing in the companionway, +stepped up on deck to have a better look.</p> +<p>“He’s got to take it quarterin’, and it ain’t wide +enough,” said Eddie Parsons.</p> +<p>“Quartering––yes, but with everything hauled +inboard,” said the skipper. “He’ll try it, I guess. +I was with him for two years, and if he feels like +trying it he’ll try it.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_116' name='page_116'></a>116</span></div> +<p>“And s’pose he does try it, Skipper?”</p> +<p>“Oh, he’ll come pretty near making it, though +he stands a good chance to scrape the paint off our +seine-boat going by. No, don’t touch the seine-boat––let +her be as she is. We’ll fool ’em if they +think they c’n jar anybody here coming on like +that. There’s room enough if nothing slips, and +if they hit it’s their lookout.”</p> +<p>It looked like a narrow space for a vessel of her +beam to go through, but she hopped along, and +the eyes of all the harbor followed her to the +point where she must turn tail or make the passage.</p> +<p>She held on––her chance to go back was gone.</p> +<p>“Watch her, boys. Now she’s whooping––look +at her come!”</p> +<p>And she was coming. Her windward side was +lifted so high that her bottom planks could be +seen. Her oil-skinned crew were crowded forward. +There were men at the fore-halyards, at +jib-halyards, at the down-hauls, and a group were +standing by the anchor. Two men were at the +wheel.</p> +<p>She bit into it. There was froth at her mouth. +She was so near now that we could read the faces +of her crew; and wide awake to this fine seamanship +we all leaned over the rail, the better to see +how she’d make out. The crews of half the vessels +inside the Breakwater were watching her.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_117' name='page_117'></a>117</span></div> +<p>She was a length away and jumping to it. It +was yet in doubt, but she was certainly rushing to +some sort of a finish. She rushed on, and w-r-r-rp! +her weather bow came down on the Johnnie’s +seine-boat. But it didn’t quite hit it. Her quarter +to leeward just cut under the Adams’ bowsprit and +the leech of her mainsail seemed to flatten past. +For a moment we were not certain, but no jolt or +lurch came and our seine-boat seemed all right. +Another jump and she was clear by. And then we +felt like cheering her, and her skipper Wesley +Marrs, too, as he stood to the wheel and sung out, +“Couldn’t scare you, could I, Maurice. I thought +you’d haul your seine-boat in. I’ve got your extra +seine,” and swept by.</p> +<p>From our deck and from the deck of the Adams, +and from the decks of half a dozen others, could +be heard murmurs, and there was a general pointing +out of the redoubtable skipper himself to the +green hands that knew him only by reputation. +“That’s him, Wesley himself––the stocky little +man of the two at the wheel.”</p> +<p>If the stocky little man heard the hails that +were sent after him, he made no sign, unless a +faint dipping of his sou’wester back over his windward +shoulder was his way of showing it.</p> +<p>He had business yet, had Wesley Marrs. There +was a tug and a barge and another big seiner in +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_118' name='page_118'></a>118</span> +his course. He clipped the tug, scraped the barge, +and set the seiner’s boat a-dancing, and two lengths +more he put down the wheel and threw her gracefully +into the wind. Down came jib, down came +jumbo, over splashed the anchor. She ran forward +a little, rattled back a link or two, steadied +herself, and there she was. Her big mainsail was +yet shaking in the wind, her gaff-topsail yet fluttering +aloft, but she herself, the Lucy Foster of +Gloucester, was at your service. “And what do +you think of her, people?” might just as well have +been shot off her deck through a megaphone, for +that was what her bearing and the unnatural +smartness of her crew plainly were saying.</p> +<p>We all drew breath again. Clancy unbent from +the rail and shook his head in high approval. He +took off his sou’wester, slatted it over the after-bitt +to clear the brim of water, and spoke his mind. +“You’ll see nothing cleaner than that in this harbor +to-day, fellows, and you’ll see some pretty fair +work at that. That fellow––he’s an able seaman.”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir––an able seaman,” said the skipper +also.</p> +<p>And Clancy and the skipper were something in +the line of able seamen themselves.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_119' name='page_119'></a>119</span> +<a name='XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE' id='XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE'></a> +<h2>XIII</h2> +<h3>WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE</h3> +</div> +<p>Generally a day in harbor is a day of +loafing for the crew of a seiner; but it was +not so altogether with us that day. Within two +hours of the time that Wesley Marrs came in to +the Breakwater in such slashing style the skipper +had us into the seine-boat and on the way to the +Lucy Foster. By his orders we took along ten +empty mackerel barrels. “We’ll go over to the +beach first and fill these barrels up with sand.” +We all knew what the sand was for––the Johnnie +Duncan was going to be put in trim to do her best +sailing. Coming down the coast the skipper and +Clancy decided that she was down by the stern +a trifle.</p> +<p>So we attended to the sand, and on the way back +hauled our second seine out of the hold of the Lucy +Foster, and piled it into the seine-boat. With the +last of the twine into the seine-boat and just as we +were about to push off from the Lucy, Wesley +Marrs put a foot on the rail of his vessel and +spoke to Maurice.</p> +<p>“And when I was taking the last of that aboard +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_120' name='page_120'></a>120</span> +in the dock in Gloucester, you wouldn’t believe +who it was stepped onto the cap-log and looking +down on the deck of the Lucy says, ‘And you’ll +take good care of that seine for Captain Blake, +won’t you, Captain Marrs?’ Could you guess +now, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Maurice.</p> +<p>“No, I’ll bet you can’t. It isn’t often she comes +down the dock. Miss Foster no less. ‘And what +makes you think I won’t?’ I asks her. ‘Oh, of +course I know you will,’ she says, ‘and deliver it +to him in good order, too.’ ‘I’ll try,’ I says, as +though it was a desp’rate job I had on hand––to +put a seine in the hold and turn it over to another +vessel when I met her. ‘But what makes you worry +about this partic’lar seine, Miss Foster?’ I asks.”</p> +<p>“Which Miss Foster was it, Wesley––the one +your vessel is named after?” broke in our skipper.</p> +<p>“No––no––but the younger one––Alice. ‘But +what makes you worry?’ I asks her, and she didn’t +say anything, but that one that’s with her all the +time––the one that goes with the lad that designed +the Johnnie Duncan–––”</p> +<p>“Joe’s cousin here–––”</p> +<p>“That’s it––the fat little Buckley girl––a fine +girl too. And if I was a younger man and looking +for a wife, there’s the kind for me––but anyway +she up and says, ‘Alice is worried, Captain Marrs, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_121' name='page_121'></a>121</span> +because she owns a third of Captain Blake’s vessel––a +good part of her little fortune’s in the Duncan––and +if anything happens to the seine one-third +of it, of course, comes out of her. And it cost a +good many hundred dollars. So you must be careful.’ +‘Oh, that’s it?’ says I. ‘Then it’ll be shortened +sail and extra careful watches on the Lucy +till I meet Maurice, for I mustn’t lose any property +of Miss Foster’s.’”</p> +<p>We rowed away from the Lucy Foster, and I +supposed that was the end of it. But that night +going on deck to take a last look at the stars before +turning in, there was the skipper and Clancy walking +the break and talking.</p> +<p>“And did you know, Tommie, that Miss Foster +owned any of this one?” the skipper was saying.</p> +<p>“No,” said Tommie, “I didn’t know, but–––”</p> +<p>“But you suspected. Well, I didn’t even suspect. +And there’s that seine we lost last night––cost all +of eight hundred dollars.”</p> +<p>“That’s what it did––a fine seine.”</p> +<p>A few minutes later the skipper went below, +and Clancy, seeing me, said, “Hold on, Joey. Did +you hear what the skipper said?”</p> +<p>“About Miss Foster owning a share of the +vessel?”</p> +<p>“Well, not that so much, but about the loss of +the seine?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_122' name='page_122'></a>122</span></div> +<p>“Yes––why?”</p> +<p>“Why? Joe, but sometimes a man would think +you were about ten year old. I tell you, Joe, I’m +not too sure it’s going to be Withrow. And if you +don’t see some driving on this one when next we +get among the fish, then––” But he didn’t finish +it, only clucked his tongue and went below.</p> +<p>Clancy was right again. During the night the +weather moderated, and in the morning the first +of the fleet to go out past the Breakwater was the +Johnnie Duncan. It looked to us as if the skipper +thought the mackerel would be all gone out of the +sea before we got back to the spot where we had +struck them two days before.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_123' name='page_123'></a>123</span> +<a name='XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING' id='XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING'></a> +<h2>XIV</h2> +<h3>A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING</h3> +</div> +<p>We might have stayed in harbor another +twenty-four hours and lost nothing by it. +It was dawn when we put out from the Delaware +Breakwater, and by dark of the same day we were +back to where we had met the big school and lost +the seine two days before. And there we hung +about for another night and day waiting for the sea +to flatten out. Mackerel rarely show in rough +weather, even if you could put out a seine-boat and +go after them. But I suppose that it did us no +harm to be on the ground and ready.</p> +<p>On the evening of the next day there was something +doing. There was still some sea on, but not +enough to hurt. Along about eight o’clock, I remember, +I came off watch and dropped into the +forec’s’le to fix up my arm, which was still badly +strained from hanging onto the seine-boat’s painter +when I was washed overboard. The skipper, taking +a look, told me not to go into the dory that +night, but to let Billie Hurd, who was spare hand, +take my place, and for me to stay aboard. I would +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_124' name='page_124'></a>124</span> +rather have gone into the dory, of course, but was +not able to pull an oar––that is, pull it as I’d have +to pull when driving for a school––and knowing I +would be no more than so much freight in the +dory there was nothing else to do. “And if we see +fish, Clancy’ll stay to the mast-head to-night––as +good a seine-master as sails out of Gloucester is +Tommie––better than me,” he said. “I’m going +in the seine-boat, and Eddie Parsons, you’ll take +Clancy’s place in the dory.” And buttoning his +oil-jacket up tight, he put on his mitts and went +on deck.</p> +<p>That evening the forward gang were doing +about as much work as seiners at leisure usually do. +It was in the air that we would strike fish, but the +men had not yet been told to get ready. So four of +them were playing whist at the table under the +lamp and two were lying half in and half out of +opposite upper bunks, trying to get more of the +light on the pages of the books they were reading. +Long Steve, in a lower port bunk nearer the +gangway, was humming something sentimental, +and two were in a knot on the lockers, arguing +fiercely over nothing in particular. There was a +fellow in the peak roaring out, “Scots wha hae wi’ +Wallace bled.” Only the cook, just done with +mixing bread, seemed to have ever done a lick of +work in his life, and he was now standing by the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_125' name='page_125'></a>125</span> +galley fire rolling the dough off his fingers. The +cook on a fisherman is always a busy man.</p> +<p>Down the companionway and into the thick of +this dropped Clancy, oiled up and all ready to go +aloft. To the mast-head of a vessel, even on an +April night in southern waters, it is cold enough, +especially when, like a seiner, she is nearly always +by the wind; and Clancy was wrapped up. “I +think,” said Clancy, as his boot-heels hit the floor, +“I’ll have a mug-up.” From the boiler on the galley-stove +he poured out a mug of coffee and from +the grub-locker he took a slice of bread and two +thick slices of cold beef. He buried the bread +among the beef and leaned against the foremast +while he ate.</p> +<p>Once when Clancy was a skipper he did a fine +bit of rescuing out to sea, and after he got home a +newspaper man saw him and wrote him up. I had +the clipping stuck on the wall of Withrow’s store +for months and had read it so often that I knew it +by heart. “In heavy jack-boots and summer sou’wester, +with a black jersey of fine quality sticking +up above the neck of his oil-jacket, with a face that +won you at sight; cheeks a nice even pink; damp, +storm-beaten, and healthful; with mouth, eyes, and +jaw bespeaking humor, sympathy, and courage; +shoulders that seemed made for butting to windward––an +attractive, inspiring, magnetic man altogether––that +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_126' name='page_126'></a>126</span> +is Captain Tommie Clancy of the +Gloucester fisherman, the Mary Andrews.” That, +was how it read, and certainly it fitted him now, as +he stood there in the middle of the thick curling +smoke of the pipes, holding the mug of coffee in +one hand and the sandwich of bread and meat in +the other, leaning easily against the butt of the +foremast, and between gulps and bites taking notice +of the crew.</p> +<p>“Give me,” he said to the cook as the proper +man for an audience, “a seiner’s crew when they’re +not on fish for real gentlemen of leisure. Look at +’em now––you’d think they were all near-sighted, +with their cards up to their chins. And above them +look––Kipling to starb’d and the Duchess to port. +Mulvaney, I’ll bet, filled full of whiskey and keeping +the heathen on the jump, and Airy Fairy Lillian, +or some other daisy with winning ways, disturbing +the peace of mind of half a dozen dukes. +Mulvaney’s all right, but the Duchess! They’ll +be taking books of that kind to the mast-head next. +What d’y’ s’pose I found aft the other day? Now +what d’y’ s’pose? I’ll bet you’d never guess. No, +no. Well, ‘He Loved, but Was Lured Away.’ +Yes. Isn’t that fine stuff for a fisherman to be +feeding on? But whoever was reading it, he was +ashamed of it. ‘Well, who owns this thing?’ says +I, picking up the lured-away lad. ‘Nobody,’ speaks +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_127' name='page_127'></a>127</span> +up Sam there. Of course he didn’t own it––O no!</p> +<p>“Violet Vance,” went on Clancy, and took another +bite of his sandwich. “Violet Vance and +Wilful Winnie and a whole holdful of airy creatures +couldn’t help a fisherman when there’s anything +stirring. I waded through a whole bunch of +’em once,”––he reached over and took a wedge +of pie from the grub-locker. “Yes, I went through +a whole bunch of ’em once––pretty good pie this, +cook, though gen’rally those artificial apples that +swings on strings ain’t in it with the natural tree +apples for pie––once when we were laying somewhere +to the east’ard of Sable Island, in a blow +and a thick fog––fresh halibuting––and right in +the way of the liners. And I expect I was going +around like a man asleep, because the skipper +comes up and begins to talk to me. It was my +first trip with him and I was a young lad. ‘Young +fellow,’ says the skipper, Matt Dawson––this was +in the Lorelei––‘young fellow,’ says Matt, ‘you +look tired. Let me call up the crew and swing a +hammock for you from the fore-rigging to the +jumbo boom. How’ll that do for you? When the +jumbo slats it’ll keep the hammock rocking. Let +me,’ he says. ‘P’raps,’ he goes on, ‘you wouldn’t +mind waking up long enough to give this music +box a turn or two every now and then while the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_128' name='page_128'></a>128</span> +fog lasts.’ We had a patent fog-horn aboard, the +first I ever saw, and I’d clear forgot it––warn’t +used to patent horns. But just another little +wedge of pie, George.</p> +<p>“However, I suppose when there’s nothing doing +there’s no very great harm. But we’ll try to +keep some of you busy to-night. Praise the Lord, +the moon’s out of the way and it’s looking black +already and the sea ought to fire up fine later on. +And there’s a nice little breeze to overhaul a good +school when we see one. If any of you are beginning +to think of getting in a wink of sleep then +you’d better turn in now, for you’re sure to be out +before long. I’m going aloft.”</p> +<p>Clancy climbed up the companionway. Then +followed the scraping of his boot-heels across the +deck. Half a minute later, had anybody cared to +go up and have a look, I suppose he would have +been discovered astraddle of the highest block +above the forethroat––he and the skipper––watching +out sharply for the lights of the many other +vessels about them, but more particularly straining +their eyes for the phosphorescent trails of mackerel.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_129' name='page_129'></a>129</span> +<a name='XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD' id='XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD'></a> +<h2>XV</h2> +<h3>CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD</h3> +</div> +<p>The men below knew their skipper and +Clancy too well to imagine that they were +to be too long left in peace. And then, too, the +next man off watch reported a proper night for +mackerel. “Not a blessed star out––and black! +It’s like digging a hole in the ground and looking +into it. And the skipper’s getting nervous, I know. +I could hear him stirrin’ ’round up there when I +was for’ard just now, and he hollered to the wheel +that up to the no’the’ard it looked like planty of +fish. ‘And I callate we ain’t the only vessel got +eyes for it,’ he said.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said his watch-mate, who had just +dropped down, “it’s nothing but side-lights all +’round and–––”</p> +<p>Just then came the skipper’s voice from aloft. +“Tell the boys they might’s well oil up and be +ready.” The watch did not have to repeat it––we +all heard it below, and fore and aft, in cabin +and forec’s’le, the gang made ready. Cards, novels, +and all the hot arguments went by the board, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_130' name='page_130'></a>130</span> +and then after a mug-up for nearly all we slid into +oil-clothes, boots and sou’westers, and puffing at +what was probably to be the last pipeful of the +evening, we lay around on lockers and on the floor, +backs to the butt of the mast and backs to the +stove––wherever there was space for a broad back +and a pair of stout legs our fellows dropped +themselves, discussing all the while the things that +interested them––fish, fishing, fast vessels, big +shares, politics, Bob Fitzsimmons, John L. Sullivan, +good stories, and just then particularly, because +two of the crew were thinking of marrying, +the awful price of real estate in Gloucester.</p> +<p>By and by, ringing as clear as if he himself +stood at the companionway, came the skipper’s +voice from the mast-head: “On deck everybody!” +No more discussion, no more loafing––pipes were +smothered into bosoms, and up the companionway +crowded oilskins and jack-boots.</p> +<p>Then came: “It looks like fish ahead of us. +Haul the boat alongside and drop the dory over.”</p> +<p>We jumped. Four laid hands on the dory in +the waist and ten or a dozen heaved away on the +stiff painter of the seine-boat that was towing +astern. Into the air and over the starboard rail +went the dory, while ploughing up to the vessel’s +boom at the port fore-rigging came the bow of the +seine-boat.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_131' name='page_131'></a>131</span></div> +<p>Then followed: “Put the tops’ls to her––sharp +now.”</p> +<p>The halyards could be heard whirring up toward +the sky, while two bunches of us sagged and +lifted on the deck below. Among us it was, “Now +then––o-ho––sway away––good,” until topsails +were flat as boards, and the schooner, hauled up, +had heeled to her scuppers.</p> +<p>“Slap the stays’l to her and up with the balloon. +Half the fleet’s driving to the no’the’ard. Lively.”</p> +<p>The Johnnie liked that rarely. With the seventy-five +foot main-boom sheeted in to her rail, with +the thirty-seven-foot spike bowsprit poking a lane +in the sea when she dove and a path among the +clouds when she lifted, with her midship rail all but +flush with the sea and the night breeze to sing to +her––of course she liked it, and she showed her +liking. She’d tear herself apart now before she’d +let anything in the fleet go by her. And red and +green lights were racing to both quarters of her.</p> +<p>“Into the boat!” It was the skipper’s voice +again, and fifteen men leaped over the rail at the +word. Two dropped into the dory and thirteen +jumped from the vessel’s rail onto thwarts or netting +or into the bottom of the seine-boat––anywhere +at all so that they get in quickly. As extra +hand on deck I had to stand by and pay out the +painter.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_132' name='page_132'></a>132</span></div> +<p>In the middle of it came the skipper sliding +down from the mast-head. “Drop astern, boat and +dory,” he called out, and himself leaped over the +quarter and onto the pile of netting as into the +Johnnie’s boiling wake they went. The thirty-eight-foot +seine-boat was checked up a dozen +fathoms astern, and the dory just astern of that. +The two men in the dory had to fend off desperately +as they slid by the seine-boat.</p> +<p>On the deck of the Johnnie were the cook, who +had the wheel, and myself, who had to stand by +the sheets. There would be stirring times soon, +for even from the deck occasional flashes of light, +marking small pods of mackerel, could be made +out on the surface of the sea. Clancy, now at the +mast-head alone, was noting these signs, we felt +sure, and with them a whole lot of other things. +To the mast-heads of other vessels out in the night +were other skippers, or seine-masters, and all with +skill and nerve and a great will to get fish.</p> +<p>The Johnnie was making perhaps ten knots good +now, and with every jerk the painter of the seine-boat +chafed and groaned in the taffrail chock. +The skipper from the boat called for more line. +“Slack away a bit, slack away. We’re not +porpoises.”</p> +<p>I jumped to attend to the painter just as Clancy’s +voice broke in from above: “Swing her off about +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_133' name='page_133'></a>133</span> +two points, ease your main sheet and keep an eye +on that light to looard. Off, off––that’s good––hold +her––and Joe, slack stays’l and then foretops’l +halyards. Be ready to let go balloon halyards and +stand by down-haul. Look alive.”</p> +<p>I paid out some sheet from the bitt by the wheel-box, +unbuttoned the after stays’l tack, jumped forward +and loosed up halyards till her kites dropped +limp.</p> +<p>“Down with your balloon there––and at the +wheel there, jibe her over. Watch out for that +fellow astern––he’s pretty handy to our boat. +Watch out in boat and dory!” The last warning +was a roar.</p> +<p>The big balloon gossamer came rattling down +the long stay and the jaws of the booms ratched, +fore and main, as they swung over. From astern +came the voices of the men in boat and dory, warning +each other to hang on when they felt her jibing. +Some of them must have come near to being +jerked overboard. “Why in God’s name don’t you +slack that painter?” came the voice of the skipper +from the boat.</p> +<p>I leaped to give them more painter, and “Draw +away your jib––draw away your jumbo,” came +from aloft. Sheets were barely fast when it was: +“Steady at the wheel, George––steady her––ste-a-dy––Great +God! man, if you can’t see can’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_134' name='page_134'></a>134</span> +you feel that fellow just ahead? And, skipper, tell +them to close their jaws astern there––water won’t +hurt ’em. Ready all now?”</p> +<p>“Ready!” roared back the skipper.</p> +<p>“All right. Down with your wheel a bit now, +George. Down––more yet. Hold her there.”</p> +<p>The vessels that we had dodged by this bit of +luffing were now dropping by us; one red light was +slowly sliding past our quarter to port, and one +green shooting by our bow to starboard. Evidently +Clancy had only been waiting to steer clear of +these two neighbors, for there was plenty of fish in +sight now. The sea was flashing with trails of +them. Clancy now began to bite out commands.</p> +<p>“Stand ready everybody. In the boat and dory +there––is everything ready, skipper?”</p> +<p>“All ready, boat and dory.”</p> +<p>Out came Clancy’s orders then––rapid fire––and +as he ripped them out, no whistling wind +could smother his voice, no swash of the sea could +drown it. In boat, dory and on deck, every brain +glowed to understand and every heart pumped to +obey.</p> +<p>“Up with your wheel, George, and let her swing +by. Stea-dy. Ready in the boat. Steady your +wheel. Are you ready in the boat? Let her swing +off a little more, George. Steady––hold her there. +Stand by in the boat. Now then––now! Cast off +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_135' name='page_135'></a>135</span> +your painter, cast off and pull to the west’ard. +And drive her! Up with the wheel. More yet––that’s +good. Drive her, I say, skipper. Where’s +that dory?––I don’t see the dory. The dory, the +dory––where in hell’s the dory?––show that lantern +in the dory. All right, the dory. Hold her +up, George. Don’t let her swing off another inch +now. Drive her, boys, drive her! Look out now! +Stand by the seine! Stand by––the twine––do you +hear, Steve! The twine! Drive her––drive her––blessed +Lord! drive her. That’s the stuff, skipper, +drive her! Let her come up, George. Down +with your wheel––down with you wheel––ste-a-dy. +Drive her, skipper, drive her! Turn in now––in––shorter +yet. Drive her now––where’s that +dory!––hold her up!––not you, George! you’re all +right––ste-a-dy. Hold that dory up to the wind!––that’s +it, boys––you’re all right––straight ahead +now! That’s the stuff. Turn her in now again, +skipper. In the dory there––show your lantern in +the dory and be ready for the seine-boat. Good +enough. Now cover your lantern in the dory and +haul away when you’re ready.”</p> +<p>To have experienced the strain and drive of that +rush, to have held an oar in the boat during that +and to have shared with the men in the confidence +they gathered––ours was a skipper to steer a boat +around a school––and the soul that rang in Clancy’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_136' name='page_136'></a>136</span> +voice!––why, just to stand on deck, as I did, +and listen to it––it was like living.</p> +<p>During this dash we could make out neither boat +nor dory from deck, but the flashes of light raised +by the oars at every stroke were plainly to be seen +in that phosphorescent sea. Certainly they were +making that boat hop along! Ten good men, +with every man a long, broad blade, and double +banked, so that every man might encourage his +mate and be himself spurred on by desperate effort. +Legs, arms, shoulders, back, all went into it and +their wake alive with smoke and fire to tell them +they were moving! To be in that?––The middle +of a black night on the Atlantic was this, and the +big seine-heaver was throwing the seine in great +armfuls. And Hurd and Parsons in the little dory +tossing behind and gamely trying to keep up! +They were glad enough to be in the dory, I know, +to get hold of the buoy, and you can be sure there +was some lively action aboard of her when Clancy +called so fiercely to them to hold the buoy up to +the wind, so that the efforts of the crew of the +seine-boat, racing to get their two hundred odd +fathoms of twine fence around the flying school, +might not go for naught.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_137' name='page_137'></a>137</span> +<a name='XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL' id='XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL'></a> +<h2>XVI</h2> +<h3>WE GET A FINE SCHOOL</h3> +</div> +<p>With his “Haul away now when you’re +ready,” Clancy came down from aloft. +He was sliding down evidently by way of the jib +halyards, for there was the sound of a chafing +whiz that could be nothing else than the friction +of oilskins against taut manila rope, a sudden +check, as of a block met on the way, an impatient, +soft, little forgivable oath, and then a plump! +that meant that he must have dropped the last +twelve or fifteen feet to the deck. Immediately +came the scurry of his boot-heels as he hurried aft. +In another moment he stood in the glow of the +binnacle light, and reaching back toward the +shadow of the cook, but never turning his head +from that spot out in the dark where he had last +seen the boat, he took the wheel.</p> +<p>“All right, George, I’ve got you. A good-sized +school, by the looks, if they got them, and I think +they have. Did you see that boat ahead we near +ran into?––the last time we put the wheel down? +Man, but for a second I thought they were gone. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_138' name='page_138'></a>138</span> +I hope no blessed vessel comes as near to our fellows. +And they were so busy rowing and heaving +twine they never saw us, and myself nearly +cross-eyed trying to watch them and our own boat +and the fish all the time. Go below, George, she’s +all right now, and tell Joe––where is he?––to go +below, too, and have a mug-up for himself. He +must be soaked through taking the swash that +must’ve come over her bow for the last hour. But +tell him to come right up so’s to keep watch out +ahead.”</p> +<p>I didn’t go below, however, but standing by the +fore-rigging kept an eye out ahead. Clancy himself +stood to the wheel with his head ever turned +over one shoulder, until he saw the flare of a torch +from the seine-boat. “Good!” he exclaimed. +“What there is is safe now, anyway.”</p> +<p>After that his work was easy. He had only to +dodge the lights of other vessels now, the old red +and green lights that had been our neighbors all +that evening, and a few new yellow flares that came +from other seine-boats. So his eyes ranged the +blackness and in rings about his own seine-boat he +sailed the Johnnie Duncan. That the crew were +quite a little while pursing up only gave him satisfaction. +“A nice school, Joe, if they got it all,” +he said, “a nice school of ’em.” And after a pause, +“I think I’ll stand down and have a look.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_139' name='page_139'></a>139</span></div> +<p>He ran down, luffed, and hailed, “Hi––skipper, +what’s it like?”</p> +<p>From the row of figures that were seen to be +crowding gunnel and thwarts and hauling on the +seine, one shadow straightened up beside the smoky +torch and spoke. “Can’t be sure yet, Tommie, but +things look all right so far. A fair-sized school if +we don’t lose ’em.”</p> +<p>“Lord, don’t lose ’em, skipper, though I think +you’ve got ’em fast enough now. Sounds natural +to hear ’em flipping inside the corks, don’t it? +Ought to be hurrying ’em up, skipper––it’s getting +along in the night.”</p> +<p>Clancy, very well satisfied, stood away again and +continued to sail triangles around boat and dory. +Being now clear of the greater part of the mental +strain his spirits began to lighten. Merely by way +of being sociable with himself he hummed some +old ditties. There was that about the old coaster, +the Eliza Jane. I liked to hear him sing that, as, +dancing a one-footed jig-step by the wheel-box, he +bumped it out:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane with a blue foremast</p> +<p>And a load of hay came drifting past.</p> +<p>Her skipper stood aft and he said, ‘How do?</p> +<p>We’re the ’Liza Jane and who be you?’</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>He stood by the wheel and he says, ‘How do?</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>We’re from Bangor, Maine––from where be you?’</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_140' name='page_140'></a>140</span></p> +<p>“The ’Liza Jane got a new main truck––</p> +<p>A darn fine thing but wouldn’t stay stuck.</p> +<p>Came a breeze one day from the no’-no’-west</p> +<p>And the gosh-darned thing came down with the rest.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di––a breeze from the west––</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Who’d ’a’ thunk the truck wouldn’t stuck with the rest?</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane left the wharf one day,</p> +<p>A fine flood tide and the day Friday,</p> +<p>But the darned old tide sent her bow askew</p> +<p>And the ’Liza Jane began for to slew.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di––she’d ’a’ fairly flew,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>If she only could sail the other end to.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane left port one day,</p> +<p>With her hold full of squash and her deck all hay.</p> +<p>Two years back with her sails all set</p> +<p>She put from Bath––she’s sailing yet.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di for a good old craft</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>She’d ’ve sailed very well with her bow on aft.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>There was a long story to the Eliza Jane, but +Clancy did not finish it. Maybe he felt that it was +not in harmony with that lowering sky or that +flashing sea. Maybe, too, in the waters that rolled +and the wake that smoked was the inspiration for +something more stirring. At any rate he began, in +a voice that carried far, an old ballad of the war +of 1812.</p> +<p>Two or three more stanzas to warm up, and +the fight was on. And you would think Clancy +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_141' name='page_141'></a>141</span> +was in it. He laid every mast and yard of the +enemy over the side of her, he made her decks run +with blood, and at the last, in a noble effort, he +caused her to strike her flag.</p> +<p>By the time he had finished that, it happened +that we were running before the wind, and, going +so, it was very quiet aboard the vessel. There was +none of the close-hauled wash through her scuppers, +nor was there much play of wind through +stays and halyards. It was in fact unusually quiet, +and it needed only that to set Clancy off on a more +melancholy tack. So in a subdued voice he began +the recitation of one of the incidents that have +helped to make orphans of Gloucester children:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Twelve good vessels fighting through the night</p> +<p>Fighting, fighting, that no’the-east gale;</p> +<p>Every man, be sure, did his might,</p> +<p>But never a sign of a single sail</p> +<p>Was there in the morning when the sun shone red,</p> +<p>But a hundred and seventy fine men––dead––</p> +<p>Were settling somewhere into the sand</p> +<p>On Georges shoals, which is Drowned Men’s Land.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Seventy widows kneeling–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>A long hail came over the water and a torch was +raised and lowered. “Hi-i––” hallooed the voice.</p> +<p>“Hi-i-i––” hallooed back Clancy as he pulled +down his wheel. You might have thought he intended +to run over them. But no, for at the very +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_142' name='page_142'></a>142</span> +last second he threw her up cleverly and let her +settle beside the boat, from which most of the men +came tumbling immediately over the side of the +vessel. Of those who stayed, one shackled the +boat’s bow onto the iron that hung from the boom +at the fore-rigging, and having done that, braced +an oar between himself and the vessel’s run to hold +the boat away and steady while another in the +stern of the boat did the same thing with his oar. +In the boat’s waist two men hung onto the seine.</p> +<p>A section of the cork edge of the seine was then +gathered inboard and clamped down over the vessel’s +rail, with the mackerel crowded into the +middle part, and the bunt of the seine thus held +safely between boat and vessel. Into this space +the sea swashed and slapped after a manner that +kept all in the boat completely drenched and made +it pretty hard for the men in bow and stern to fend +off and retain their balance at the same time.</p> +<p>And then began the bailing in. Guided by the +skipper, who stood on the break, our big dip-net, +which could hold a barrel easily, was dropped over +the rail and in among the kicking fish. A twist +and a turn and “He-yew!” the skipper yelled. +“Oy-hoo!” grunted the two gangs of us at the halyards, +and into the air and over the rail swung the +dip-net, swimming full. “Down!” We let it sag +quickly to Clancy and Parsons, who were at the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_143' name='page_143'></a>143</span> +rail. “Hi-o!” they called cheerfully, and turned +the dip-net inside out. Out and down it went +again, “He-yew!” and up and in it came again. +“Oy-hoo!” “Hi-o!” and flop! it was turned upside +down and another barrel of fat, lusty fish +flipped their length against the hard deck. Head +and tail they flipped, each head and tail ten +times a second seemingly, until it sounded––they +beat the deck so frantically––as if a regiment of +gentle little drummer boys were tapping a low but +wonderfully quick-sounding roll. Scales flew. We +found some next morning glued to the mast-head. +I never can get some people to believe that it is so––mackerel +scales to the mast-head.</p> +<p>“He-yew!” called the skipper, “Oy-hoo!” hollered +the halyards gang, “Hi-o!” sung out Clancy +and Parsons cheerily at the rail. “Fine fat fish,” +commented the men in the seine-boat, the only men +who had time to draw an extra breath.</p> +<p>Blazing torches were all around us. Arms +worked up and down, big boots stamped, while inboard +and out swung the dip-net, and onto the deck +flopped the mackerel. “Drive her!” called the +skipper, and “He-yew!” “Oy-hoo!” and “Hi-o!” +it went. Drenched oilskins steamed, wet faces +glowed, glad eyes shone through the smoke flare, +and the pitching vessel, left to herself, plunged up +and down to the lift and fall of every sea.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_144' name='page_144'></a>144</span> +<a name='XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET' id='XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET'></a> +<h2>XVII</h2> +<h3>A DRIVE FOR MARKET</h3> +</div> +<p>Her deck was pretty well filled with mackerel +when “All dry,” said Long Steve, and drew +the last of the seine into the boat.</p> +<p>“Then hurry aboard and drop that seine-boat +astern. And––whose watch? Take the wheel––wait +till I give you the course––there. But don’t +drive her awhile yet. Some of those fish might be +washed over. But it won’t be for long.”</p> +<p>“Ready with the ice?” he asked next.</p> +<p>“All ready,” and the men who had been chopping +ice and making ready the pens in the hold +stood by to take the mackerel as we passed them +down.</p> +<p>As soon as we had enough of them off the +vessel’s deck to make it safe to drive her, the skipper +gave her a little more sheet and let her go for +New York. We hustled the seine-boat aboard too. +Some other vessels must have got fish, too, and +there was no time to waste.</p> +<p>It was a good-sized school and when we had +them all iced and below––more than thirty thousand +count––it was time for all hands to turn in––all +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_145' name='page_145'></a>145</span> +but the two men on watch of course. I didn’t +turn in myself, but after a mug-up and pipeful below +came on deck again. It was a pretty good sort +of a night for a dark night, with a moderate breeze +that sang in your ears when you leaned against the +halyards and a sea that lapped bucketfuls of spray +over her rail forward and that tumbled away in a +wide flat hump as our quarter slipped on and left +it behind.</p> +<p>I found the skipper leaning against the weather +rigging and watching a red light coming up on us. +Noticing me he said, “There’s that porgy steamer +that we beat out for that school the other day +overhauling us now. There’s the beauty of steam. +The crew of this one knows more in a minute than +they know in a week about fishing in that steamer, +and we’d be carrying our summer kites when that +gang, if they were in a sailing vessel, would be +laying to an anchor; and with our boat out and +their boat out and a school in sight they’d have +to take our leavings. But here’s one of the times +when they have the best of it.”</p> +<p>There wasn’t much wind stirring then, but it +promised to breeze up, or so the skipper thought, +and I’m sure I was glad to hear him say it, for +the harder it blew the sooner we would get to New +York and the better our chance to beat the porgyman. +First in to market got the cream.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_146' name='page_146'></a>146</span></div> +<p>It was pretty well on to daybreak when the +porgy steamer got up abreast of us and after +a while worked by. One of them took the trouble +to sing out to us when they went by, “Well, you got +a school before us, but we’ll be tied up and into +the dock and spending our money ashore whilst +you’re still along the Jersey coast somewhere.”</p> +<p>And we supposed they would, but Hurd, who +was then to our wheel, had to call back to them, +“Oh, I dunno. I dunno about that––it’s a good +run to Fulton Market dock yet.” And, turning to +us, “I hope the bloody old boiler explodes so nobody’ll +be able to find a mackerel of ’em this side +the Bay of Fundy. Of course I wouldn’t want to +see the men come to any harm, but wouldn’t it jar +you––them scrubs?”</p> +<p>The skipper wasn’t saying anything. And it +meant a lot to him, too. He was looking after the +steamer and, I know, praying for wind. We could +see it in his eyes.</p> +<p>And sometimes things come as we like to have +them. At full dawn it was a nice breeze with the +Johnnie Duncan washing her face in plenty of good +spray and the fine sun shining warm on a fresh +sea-way. Another hour, the wind hauling and still +making, the Johnnie was down to her rail, and +awhile after that she was getting all the wind she +needed.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_147' name='page_147'></a>147</span></div> +<p>“We may have a chance to try her out on this +run, who knows?” said the skipper. We were +coming up on the porgy steamer then and you +should have seen his eyes when they looked from +the rail to the deck of his vessel and from the +deck again to aloft. On the steamer the gang were +in the waist watching us coming and they must +have been piling the coal into her below and giving +her the jet steadily, for out of her funnel was +coming the smoke in clouds mixed with steam.</p> +<p>“But their firemen can stoke till they’re black in +the face and they won’t get more than eleven or +eleven and a half knots out of her,” said Clancy. +“I know her––the Nautilus––and if this one under +us ain’t logging her fourteen good then I don’t +know. And she’ll be doing better yet before we +see New York.”</p> +<p>They were driving the porgyman then, but she +was fated. Once we began to get her she came +back to us fast enough, and once she was astern +she troubled us no more. After the porgyman we +passed a big white yacht, evidently just up from +the West Indies after a winter’s cruise. She looked +a model for a good sailer, but there was no chance +to try her out, for they had her under shortened +sail when we went by.</p> +<p>There was a New York blue-fisherman on our +weather bow bound for New York, too, and the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_148' name='page_148'></a>148</span> +way we went by her was a scandal. And farther +on we drove by a big bark––big enough, almost, +to take us aboard. They were plainly trying to +make a passage on her, but we left her too. Then +we passed another yacht, but she wasn’t carrying +half our sail. Her hull was as long as ours, but +she didn’t begin to be sparred as we were. We +must have had ten feet on her main-boom and ten +feet more bowsprit outboard, and yet under her +four lower sails she seemed to be making heavy +going of it. It’s a good yacht that can hold a fisherman +in a breeze and a sea-way. We beat this +one about as bad as we beat the blue-fisherman. +As we went by we tried to look as though we had +beaten so many vessels that we’d lost all interest in +racing, and at the same time we were all dancing +on our toes to think what a vessel we had under +us. It was that passage we held the north-bound +Savannah steamer for seven hours. Her passengers +stood by the rail and watched us, and when +at last we crowded our bowsprit past her nose, they +waved their handkerchiefs and cheered us like +mad.</p> +<p>“When we get this one loosened up a bit and +down to her trim, she’ll sail some or I don’t know,” +said our skipper. He stood in the cabin gangway +then and filled his boots with water, but he wouldn’t +take in sail. Back behind us was another seiner. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_149' name='page_149'></a>149</span> +We could just make out that they were soaking it +to her too. The skipper nodded his head back +at her. Then, with one hand on the house and the +other on the rail, he looked out from under our +main-boom and across at the steamer. “Not a rag––let +the spars come out of her.”</p> +<p>One thing was sure––the Johnnie was a vessel +that could stand driving. She didn’t crowd herself +as she got going. No, sir! The harder we +drove her the faster she went. Laying down on +her side made no difference to her. In fact we were +not sure that she wouldn’t do her best sailing on +her side. But it hadn’t come to that yet. She was +standing up under sail fine. Most of them, we +knew, would have washed everything off their deck +before that. And certainly there would have been +no standing down by the lee rail on too many of +them with that breeze abeam.</p> +<p>Going up New York harbor, where we had to +tack, the Savannah steamer could have gone by if +she had to, but big steamers slow down some going +into a harbor, and we holding on to everything +made up for the extra distance sailed. The wind, +of course, was nothing to what it was outside, and +that made some difference. Anyway, we kept the +Johnnie going and held the steamer up to the Battery, +where, as she had to go up North River, she +gave us three toots. The people on the Battery +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_150' name='page_150'></a>150</span> +must have had a good look at us. I guess it was +not every day they saw a schooner of the Johnnie’s +size carrying on like that. Billie Hurd had to pay +his respects to them. “Look, you loafers, look, +and see a real vessel sailing in.”</p> +<p>There was a sassy little East River towboat that +wanted to give us a tow, but our skipper said it +would be losing time to take sail off and wait for a +line then. The tug captain said, “Oh, no; and +you can’t dock her anyway in this harbor without +a tug.”</p> +<p>“Oh, I can dock her all right, I guess,” said our +skipper.</p> +<p>“Maybe you think you can, but wait till you try +it, and have a nice little bill for damages besides.”</p> +<p>“Well, the vessel’s good for the damages, too.”</p> +<p>That towboat tailed us just the same, but we +had the satisfaction of fooling him. The skipper +kept the Johnnie going till the right time and then, +when the tugboat people thought it was too late, +he shot her about on her heel and into the dock +with her mainsail coming down on the run and +jibs dead.</p> +<p>A couple of East Side loafers standing on the +wharf cap-log were nearly swept away by the end +of our bowsprit, we came on so fast. Four or five +of us leaped ashore, and with lines out and made +fast in no time, we had her docked without so much +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_151' name='page_151'></a>151</span> +as cracking a single shingle of the house across the +head of the dock.</p> +<p>We sold our mackerel for nineteen cents apiece. +Fifty-seven hundred and odd dollars was our stock, +and about a hundred and forty dollars each man’s +share. We felt a little bit chesty after that. We +were not the first to market that year, but we were +the first since the early flurry, and the biggest stock +so far that spring was to our credit.</p> +<p>We stood on the deck and watched the porgy +steamer come in and tie up, too late for that day’s +market. Some of our fellows had to ask them +where they got their fish––to the s’uth’ard or +where?––and two or three fights came out of it, +but no harm done. Then nearly everybody drew +some money off the skipper, and we smoked fifteen-cent +cigars and threw our chests out. We all went +uptown, too, and took in the theatres that night, +and afterwards treated each other and pretty +nearly everybody else that we met along the East +Side on the way back, until the policemen began to +notice us and ask if we didn’t think we’d better +be getting back to our ships. One or two of the +crew had to get into fights with the toughs along +the water front, but we were all safely aboard by +three o’clock in the morning.</p> +<p>All but Clancy. Some of us were trying to get +some sleep along towards morning when Clancy +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_152' name='page_152'></a>152</span> +came aboard with a fine shore list. The cook, who +was up and stirring about for breakfast, noticed +him first. “It’s a fine list you’ve got, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“And why not?––and a fine beam wind coming +down the street. I’m like a lot of other deep-draught +craft of good model, George––I sail best +with the wind abeam. A bit of a list gets you +down to your lines.” And until we turned out for +breakfast, after which it was time to be off and +away to the fleet again, he kept us all in a roar with +the story of his adventures.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_153' name='page_153'></a>153</span> +<a name='XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET' id='XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET'></a> +<h2>XVIII</h2> +<h3>A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET</h3> +</div> +<p>Through all of that month and through +most of the month of May we chased the +mackerel up the coast. By the middle of May +we were well up front with the killers, and our +skipper’s reputation was gaining. The vessel, too, +was getting quite a name as a sailer. Along the +Maryland, Delaware, and Jersey coasts we chased +them––on up to off Sandy Hook and then along +the Long Island shore, running them fresh into +New York. There were nights and days that +spring when we saw some driving on the Johnnie +Duncan.</p> +<p>Toward the end of May, with the fish schooling +easterly to off No Man’s Land and reported as +being seen on Georges and in the Bay of Fundy––working +to the eastward all the time––we thought +the skipper would put for home, take in salt, fill +the hold with barrels and refit for a Cape Shore +trip––that is, head the fish off along the Nova +Scotia shore, from Cape Sable and on to anywhere +around the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and stay there +until we had filled her up with salt mackerel. We +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_154' name='page_154'></a>154</span> +thought so, because most of the fleet had decided +on that plan and because we had been away from +home since the first of April. But no––he stayed +cruising off Block Island and running them fresh +into Newport with the last half-dozen of the fleet.</p> +<p>Our idea of it was that the skipper wanted to go +home badly enough, but he was set on getting a +big stock and didn’t care what it cost himself or us +to get it. Some of us would have given a lot to +be home.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, fine blue sky and a fine blue sea</p> +<p>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>was how Clancy put it as he came down from aloft +one afternoon and took the wheel from me. “By +the wind is it, Joe?”</p> +<p>“By the wind,” I said––the usual word when +seiners are cruising for mackerel, and I went aloft +to take his place at the mast-head. It was a lazy +watch, as the mackerel generally were not showing +at this time in the middle of the day. They seemed +to prefer the early morning or the late afternoon, +or above all a dark night.</p> +<p>Long Steve, who came up this day to pass the +time with me aloft, had been telling me about his +old home, when we both noticed the topsails of +what we knew must be the first of a fleet of big +schooner yachts racing to Newport––from New +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_155' name='page_155'></a>155</span> +York, no doubt, on one of their ocean races. Steve, +of course, had to try to name the leader, while +she was yet miles away––seiners have wonderful +eyes for vessels––and was still at it, naming the +others behind, when the next on watch relieved +me and I went below.</p> +<p>The first of the yachts was almost on us when +I came down, and Clancy was watching her like +a hawk when he turned the wheel over to the next +man. She was as about as big as we were. We +knew her well. She had been a cup defender and +afterwards changed to a schooner rig. Our skipper +was taking a nap below at this time, or we supposed +he was. He had been up nearly a week, +with no more than a two-hours’ sleep each day, and +so was pretty well tired. That was what made +Clancy stand by the wheel and ask if the skipper +was still asleep.</p> +<p>“No,” said the skipper himself. He had just +turned out, and in his stocking feet he came to the +companionway and looked up. “What is it?”</p> +<p>“Here’s this big yacht crawling by on our quarter––she’ll +be by us soon. I thought you wouldn’t +like it.”</p> +<p>“I’ll be right up. Tell the gang to sway up.”</p> +<p>He drew on his slip-shods and came on deck. +He took a look over at the yacht while we were +swaying up. When we had everything good and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_156' name='page_156'></a>156</span> +flat and trimmed sheets a bit, the skipper called +out to take in the fore-topsail. “She hasn’t got hers +set,” he explained.</p> +<p>Now, a fore-topsail does not help much––hauled +up, as were the Johnnie Duncan and the yacht, it +would be a hindrance to most vessels, and, perhaps, +because it did not help her was why the yacht had +not hers set. But it showed the skipper’s fairness. +Ours had been left set, because we might need it +in a hurry, and also because with the skipper below +nobody could order it down. Now we clewed +it up.</p> +<p>Clancy, standing aft, threw a look at our seine-boat, +which of course we had in tow. “She’s quite +a drag,” he suggested, “for a vessel that’s racing.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said the skipper, “but wait a while. We +won’t cast it off unless we have to.”</p> +<p>We did not have to. We soon had her in trim. +For weeks the skipper and Clancy had been marking +the Johnnie’s sheets so that in an emergency +they could whip her into her best sailing in no time. +With that, and with the shifting of some barrels +of salt that we had on deck, we soon had her going. +It is surprising what a lot of difference the shifting +of a few barrels of salt will make in the trim of a +vessel. We had not had a try with anything for +two weeks or so and had become careless. The +last thing we did was to take some barrels of fresh +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_157' name='page_157'></a>157</span> +water that happened to be standing forward of the +windlass and shift them aft, and then the Johnnie +began to go along for fair.</p> +<p>Coming up to Block Island Light things were +pretty even. Then it came a question of who was +to go to windward. The yacht hauled her mainsheet +in to two blocks. So did we, and, further, ran +a line from the cringle in her foresail to the +weather rigging. She could not make it––we had +her.</p> +<p>“Mind the time,” said the skipper, when at +last we had her under our quarter––“mind the +time, Tommie, when we used to do so much racing +down on the Cape shore? There’s where we had +plenty of time for racing and all sorts of foolishness. +I was pretty young then, but I mind it well. +A string of men on the rigging from the shear +poles clear up to the mast-head––yes, and a man +astraddle the main gaff once or twice, passing +buckets of water to wet down the mains’l.”</p> +<p>“Yes, and barrels of water out toward the +end of the main-boom keep the sail stretched. +Man, but those were the days we paid attention +to racing.”</p> +<p>“Those were the days,” asserted the skipper. +“But we can do a little of it now, too.”</p> +<p>By that you will understand we were walking +away from our yacht. We were to anchor in the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_158' name='page_158'></a>158</span> +harbor while she was still coming, and we had +towed our seine-boat all the way.</p> +<p>“Lord,” said Clancy, as we were tying up our +foresail, “but I’d like to see this one in an ocean +race with plenty of wind stirring––not a flat +breeze and a short drag like we had to-day.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_159' name='page_159'></a>159</span> +<a name='XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN' id='XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN'></a> +<h2>XIX</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN</h3> +</div> +<p>Coming on to dark that night a gig put off +from the schooner-yacht and rowed over +to us. On the way she was hailed and passed a +few words with a steam-yacht anchored in between. +The man in the stern of the gig was not satisfied +until he had been rowed three times around the +Johnnie. When he had looked his fill he came +alongside.</p> +<p>He mistook Clancy for the skipper. I suppose +he couldn’t imagine a man of Clancy’s figure and +bearing to be an ordinary hand on a fisherman. So +to Clancy he said, “Captain, you’ve got a wonderful +vessel here. Put a single stick in her and she’ll +beat the world.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “and she’d be a hell of a +fine fisherman then, wouldn’t she?”</p> +<p>The rest of us had to roar at that. We at once +pictured the Johnnie rigged up as a sloop out on +the Grand Banks, trawling or hand-lining, with +the crew trying to handle her in some of the winter +gales that struck in there. And a great chance +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_160' name='page_160'></a>160</span> +she would have rigged as a sloop and her one +big sail, making a winter passage home eight or +nine or ten hundred miles, when as it was, with +the sail split up to schooner rig, men found it bad +enough.</p> +<p>The master of the yacht had a message for our +captain, he said, and Clancy told him the skipper +was below. There they talked for a while and +after the yachtsman had gone Maurice, inviting +four or five of us along, dressed up, called for the +seine-boat, got in and was rowed over to a steam-yacht +that we now remembered had hailed the +schooner-yacht’s gig. All brass and varnish and +white paint and gold she would be in the daytime, +but now she was all lit up with electric lights below +and Japanese lanterns on deck.</p> +<p>When we came alongside, who should come to +the gangway of the yacht and welcome Maurice +but Minnie Arkell––Mrs. Miner. She greeted all +of us for that matter––she never pretended not to +see people––and invited us all below for refreshments. +There was a good lay-out there and we +pitched into it. Seiners are great people at table +or in a bunk. They can turn to and eat, or turn +in and sleep any minute, day or night. So now we +turned to. Clancy did great things to the wine. +Generally he took whiskey, but he did not object +to good wine now and then. He and one fellow +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_161' name='page_161'></a>161</span> +in a blue coat, white duck trousers, and a blue cap +that never left his head, had a great chat.</p> +<p>“I callate that if he didn’t have that cap with +the button on front nobody’d know he was a real +yachtsman, would they?” Eddie Parsons whispered +in my ear.</p> +<p>The owner of the steam-yacht was trying to convince +Tommie that yachting would be more in his +line than fishing, but Tommie couldn’t see it.</p> +<p>“But why not?” he asked at last. “Why not, +Mr. Clancy? Is it a matter of money? If it is, +I’ll make that right. I pay ordinary hands twenty-five +and thirty dollars a month and found, but I’ll +pay you fifty––sixty––seventy dollars a month to +go with me. I’m going to race this steamer this +summer and I want a quartermaster––a man like +you that can steer to a hair-line. Seventy dollars +a month now––what do you say?”</p> +<p>“Come now, my good man, what do you say?” +Clancy got that off without so much as a smile. +“But you couldn’t make it seventy-five now, could +you? No, I didn’t mean that quite, though I’ve +been out the dock in Gloucester of a Saturday noon +and back again to the dock of a Tuesday noon––three +days––and shared two hundred dollars––not +as skipper, mind you, but just as hand. There +now, I hope you’re not going to get angry. Hadn’t +we better have another little touch? But I can see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_162' name='page_162'></a>162</span> +myself in a suit of white duck, touching my cap, +and saying, ‘Aye, aye, sir,’ to some slob––no reference +to you, mind you––but some slob in a uniform +that’s got a yacht, not because he loves the sea, +but because he wants to butt in somewhere––who +lives aboard his yacht just the same as he does in +his house ashore––electric bells, baths, servants, +barber and all––and hugs the shore so close that he +gets the morning paper as regularly as when he’s +at home. When that kind go yachting all they +miss are the tables on the lawn and the automobiles +going by the door. They even have canary-birds––some +of them––in cages. Yes, and wouldn’t +be caught twenty miles off shore––no, not even in +a summer’s breeze for––And where would he be +in a winter’s gale? I can see myself rowing a gig +with somebody like that in the stern giving orders +and fooling––well, some simple-minded women +folks, maybe, who know as much of the sea as +they do of the next world––most of them––fooling +them into believing that he’s a devil––yes, a clean +devil on the water. Seventy a month for that?––couldn’t +you make it seventy-five?”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean to say that–––”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “I do. I’d rather stick to +fishing than––but here’s a shoot and let’s call the +quartermaster’s job off.”</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell chimed in here. “A real fisherman, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_163' name='page_163'></a>163</span> +you must remember, Mr. Keith, doesn’t care +much for yachting because––leaving out the question +of wages, for he does make more at fishing––he +can remain a fisherman and yet be independent.”</p> +<p>“You mean they don’t have to take orders as +if they were on a yacht, Mrs. Miner?”</p> +<p>“No, no––don’t make any mistake there. The +discipline of a yacht, so far as I know it, is baby +play to what they have on a good fisherman. The +discipline aboard a warship is nothing to that +aboard a fisherman, like Captain Blake’s vessel +say, when there is anything to be done. Fishermen, +it’s true, don’t have to touch their caps and +say, ‘Very good, sir,’ to a man who may be no more +of a real man than themselves. On your yacht I +suppose you’d discharge a man who didn’t do what +he was told, and on a warship he would be sent +to the brig, I suppose. On a fisherman he’d be put +ashore. On a fisherman they not only obey orders, +but they carry them out on the jump. And why? +Because they’ve always done it. Why, deep-sea +fishermen are always getting into places where only +the best of seamanship can save them, and they +very early get in the way of doing things up quick +and right. When a Gloucester skipper orders in +the sail, say in a gale of wind, and more than apt +to be in the middle of the night––you don’t see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_164' name='page_164'></a>164</span> +men trying to see how long it will take them to +get into oilskins––or filling another pipe before +they climb on deck. No, sir––the first man out on +the bowsprit, if it’s the jib to come in––or out on +the foot-ropes, if it’s the mainsail to be tied up––he’s +the man that will have a right to hold his head +high next day aboard that vessel. And so the +crew of a fisherman jump to their work––if they +didn’t there’d be a lot more of them lost than +there are.”</p> +<p>“Dear me,” said Mr. Keith, “that never occurred +to me before. But how is it, Mrs. Miner, +that you have it down so fine?”</p> +<p>“My father was a Gloucester skipper, and since +I was that high”––she put her hand on a level +with her knee––“I’ve been listening to fishermen. +And yachting life does tend to spoil a fisherman,” +she went on to explain. “After a summer of yachting +a fisherman will begin to think that a winter +of fishing is going to be a serious thing.” She was +warmed up then and went on talking at a great +rate. And listening to her I could understand better +why men took to her. She had warm blood in +her. If it were not for her weakness to be admired +by men, she would have been a great woman. +“And they get so, that what seems extraordinary +work to you is only an every-day matter to them. +Do you remember that last schooner-yacht race +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_165' name='page_165'></a>165</span> +across the Atlantic?––when two or three reporters +went along, and after they got back wrote all kinds +of stories of what a desperate trip it was––how +rough it was and dangerous! Well, that time there +were three or four Gloucestermen making the run +to Iceland. Now, they were not as big as the +racing yachts and they were loaded down with all +the stores for a long salt trip––their holds full of +salt, for one thing––and yet they made about as +good time to Iceland as that yachtsman made to +Queenstown. And they weren’t driving their vessels +either––they don’t drive on the way out. It’s +only coming home that they try to make passages. +Now, they must have got the same weather and +yet nobody ever heard them in their letters home +report a word of bad weather, or ever afterward, +either. And yet––but were you to Iceland that +time, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“No,” said the skipper, “but you were, +Tommie?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” answered Clancy, “in the Lucy Foster. +We made Rik-ie-vik inside of fourteen days, carrying +both tops’ls all the way. Wesley––Wesley +Marrs––wasn’t hurrying her, of course. As Mrs. +Miner says, the vessels going to the east’ard don’t +hurry, except now and then when two of them +with records get together. And the Lucy was logy, +of course, with the three hundred and odd hogsheads +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_166' name='page_166'></a>166</span> +of salt and other stuff in her. If we’d been +driving her going to Iceland that time we’d have +had the stays’l and balloon to her––and she’d have +gone right along with them, too.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Miner looked around at her yachting +friends to see if they were getting all that.</p> +<p>“There was one day that passage it blew a +bit,” exclaimed Clancy. “And that was the day we +thought we saw a fellow to the east’ard. We had +men by the halyards all that day with splitting +knives.”</p> +<p>“Why?” asked Keith.</p> +<p>“Why, to cut before she could capsize.”</p> +<p>“Oh!” said Keith and said it with a little +click.</p> +<p>“But that’s nothing. I’ve seen the gang with +Tom O’Donnell standing watch by the halyards +for days with axes when he was making a passage.”</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell filled another glass of champagne +for Clancy, and Clancy didn’t give the fizz too +much time to melt away either.</p> +<p>“These men are the real things,” she said, but +Clancy, for fear we were getting too much credit, +broke in, “Not us seiners. It’s the winter fishermen––trawlers +and hand-liners––that are the real +things. Of course, we lose men now and then +seining, but it’s in winter up on the shoal water +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_167' name='page_167'></a>167</span> +on the Banks that––there’s where you have some +seas to buck against,” and he went on to tell of a +battle with a gale on a winter’s night on the Grand +Banks. Clancy could tell a story as well as anybody +I ever met. He could make the blood jump +to your heart, or the tears to your eyes––or he could +chill you till the blood froze. When he got +through you could hear them all breathing––men +and women both, like people who had just run a +race. “Two hundred and odd men sailing out of +Gloucester,” he said, “went down that night. +There weren’t too many came safe out of that +blow. The father of this boy here was lost––the +Mary Buckley warn’t it, Joe?––named for your +mother?”</p> +<p>“And my father, too, was lost soon after,” said +Minnie Arkell, and the glance she gave me melted +a lot of prejudice I had felt for her. That was the +good human side to her.</p> +<p>“No better man ever sailed out of Gloucester, +Mrs. Miner,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>She flushed up. “Thank you, Tommie, for that, +though I know he was a reckless man.” And, she +might have added, he left some of his recklessness +in the blood of the Arkells.</p> +<p>The skipper told them a lot about sea life that +night. Some of the stories he told, though long +known in Gloucester, they took to be yarns at first. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_168' name='page_168'></a>168</span> +They could not believe that men went through such +things and lived. And then the skipper had such +an easy way of telling them. After a man has +been through a lot of unusual things––had them +years behind him and almost forgotten them––I +suppose they don’t surprise him any more.</p> +<p>The skipper looked well that night. When he +warmed up and his eyes took on a fresh shine and +his mouth softened like a woman’s, I tell you he +was a winner. I could not help comparing him +with the steam-yacht owner, who was a good-looking +man, too, but in a different way. Both of them, +to look at, were of the same size. Both had their +clothes made by tailors who knew their business +and took pains with the fitting, though it was +easy to fit men like Clancy and the skipper, such +fine level shoulders and flat broad backs they had. +Now the skipper, as I say, when he warmed up +began to look something like what he ought––like +he did when walking the quarter and the vessel +going out to sea. Only then it would be in a blue +flannel shirt open at the throat and in jack-boots. +But now, in the cabin of that yacht, dressed as he +was in black clothes like anybody else and in good-fitting +shoes, you had to take a second look at him +to get his measure. The yachtsman thought that +he and the skipper were of about the same size, and +barring that the skipper’s shoulders were a shade +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_169' name='page_169'></a>169</span> +wider there wasn’t so much difference to look at. +But there was a difference, just the same. The +yachtsman weighed a hundred and seventy-five +pounds. He asked what Maurice weighed. “Oh, +about the same,” said Maurice. But I and Clancy +knew that he weighed a hundred and ninety-five, +and Minnie Arkell, who knew too, finally had to +tell it, and then they all took another look at the +two men and could see where the difference lay. +There was no padding to Maurice, and when +you put your hand where his shoulders and +back muscles ought to be you found something +there.</p> +<p>When we were leaving that night, Mrs. Miner +stopped Maurice on the gangway to say, “And +when they have the fishermen’s race this fall, you +must sail the Johnnie Duncan, Maurice, as you’ve +never sailed a vessel yet. With you on the quarter +and Clancy to the wheel she ought to do great +things.”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll race her as well as we know how if +we’re around, but Tom O’Donnell and Wesley +Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen and Sam Hollis and +the rest––they’ll have something to say about it, +I’m afraid.”</p> +<p>“What of it? You’ve got the vessel and you +must win––I’ll bet all the loose money I have in +the world on her. Remember I own a third of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_170' name='page_170'></a>170</span> +her. Mr. Duncan sold me a third just before I +left Gloucester.”</p> +<p>That was a surprise to us––that Mrs. Miner +owned a part of the Johnnie Duncan. It set Clancy +to figuring, and turning in that night, he said––he +was full of fizzy wine, but clear-headed enough––“Well, +what do you make of that? The Foster +girl a third and Minnie Arkell a third of this one. +I’m just wise to it that it wasn’t old Duncan alone +that wanted Maurice for skipper. Lord, Lord, +down at the Delaware Breakwater do you remember +that when we heard that the Foster girl owned +a part of this one, I said, like the wise guy I thought +I was, ‘Ha, ha,’ I said, ‘so Miss Foster owns a +third? That’s it, eh?’ And now it’s Minnie +Arkell a third. Where does Withrow come in? +And did you hear her when she invited Maurice to +the time they’re going to have on that same steam-yacht +to-morrow night?––that was when she whispered +to him at the gangway, when we were leaving. +She tried to get him to promise to come, and +at last he said he would if he was in the harbor. +‘Then be sure to be in the harbor––you’re skipper +and can do as you please. Do come,’ she said at +the last, good and loud, ‘and tell them how to sail a +vessel in heavy weather. They only play at it, so +do come and tell them.’ And then in a low +voice––‘But I want you to come for yourself.’ +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_171' name='page_171'></a>171</span> +That’s what she says––‘For yourself,’ she says––in +a whisper almost. ‘Take a run into the harbor to-morrow +night if you can, Maurice,’ she says. O +Lord, women––women––they don’t know a thing––no,” +and Clancy turned in.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_172' name='page_172'></a>172</span> +<a name='XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME' id='XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME'></a> +<h2>XX</h2> +<h3>THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME</h3> +</div> +<p>We were out of Newport Harbor before daybreak +of next morning, and cruised inside +Block Island all that day. We all thought the +skipper would be in to Newport that night––it +was no more than a two hours’ run the way the +wind was––and we waited.</p> +<p>The test came after supper. We had supper as +usual, at three o’clock. Breakfast at four, dinner +at ten, supper at three––mug-ups before and after +and in between. Along about four o’clock the +skipper, standing on the break, stood looking back +toward where Newport lay. Had we turned then +we’d have been in nicely by dark. It was a fine +afternoon––the finest kind of an afternoon––a clear +blue sky, and a smooth blue sea with the surface +just rippling beautifully. All fire was the sun and +the sails of every vessel in sight looked white as +could be. Several yachts passed us––steam and sail––all +bright and handsome and all bound into Newport, +and the skipper’s eyes rested long on them––on +one of them particularly with music aboard.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_173' name='page_173'></a>173</span></div> +<p>The skipper looked back a long time––looked +back, and looked back. He began walking the +quarter––back and forth, back and forth, back and +forth. The sun got lower and lower, the sea lost +some of its blue, and the air grew fresher, and still +he kept looking back.</p> +<p>“It’ll be a grand sunset to-night, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“The finest kind. But one thing wrong with +it.”</p> +<p>“What’s that?”</p> +<p>“We’re not seeing it astern of us.”</p> +<p>The skipper stopped. “Astern? That’s so, too––it +<i>is</i> a fine westerly, isn’t it?”</p> +<p>Clancy said nothing, only leaned against the rigging, +not a move out of him––puffing his pipe and +looking away.</p> +<p>Nobody spoke till the skipper spoke again.</p> +<p>“Who’s to the wheel––you, Steve? How’s she +heading now?”</p> +<p>“No’the by west.”</p> +<p>“No’the by west? Put her east by no’the––ease +off your mainsheet. Let it go to the knot. Call +the gang and make sail––stays’l and balloon––everything––we’ll +go home, I guess.”</p> +<p>Clancy snapped the pipe out of his mouth and +hove it over the rail. Then he went for the forec’s’le +gangway. In two jumps he was there.</p> +<p>“Up, you loafers––on deck and make sail. ‘To +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_174' name='page_174'></a>174</span> +the east’ard,’ says the skipper, and over the shoals +we’ll put her to-night.”</p> +<p>“Home! Home––good enough––and hurroo!” +we could hear from below.</p> +<p>The skipper said nothing more––only all night +long he walked the quarter.</p> +<p>Next day when we were almost abreast of Cape +Cod Clancy began to instruct me. “Here’s a tip +for any girl friends you got, Joe. See the skipper +last night? Tell them if they’re after a man––a +real man––even if he’s a bit shy––tell them––” +Oh, the advice that Clancy could give!</p> +<p>About the time that we left Cape Cod light +astern and squared away for Thatcher’s––with +Gloucester Harbor almost in sight––with the rocks +of Eastern Point dead ahead––Clancy began to +sing again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Who wouldn’t a Gloucester seiner be?</p> +</div></div> +<p>Ha, Joey-boy?” and gave me a slap on the shoulder +that sent me half-way to the break.</p> +<p>That was all right, but I went aloft so I could +see the rocks of Cape Ann a mite sooner. I was +just beginning to discover that I had been almost +homesick.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_175' name='page_175'></a>175</span> +<a name='XXI_SEINERS_WORK' id='XXI_SEINERS_WORK'></a> +<h2>XXI</h2> +<h3>SEINERS’ WORK</h3> +</div> +<p>We were high line of the seining fleet when +we got home from the Southern cruise and +we felt pretty proud of ourselves. It was something +to stand on the corner on one of the days +when the Johnnie was fitting out again, and have +other fellows come up to you and say, “What’s +that they say you fellows shared on the Southern +trip?” And when we’d tell them, and we trying +not to throw out our chests too much, it was fine +to hear them say, “That so? Lord, but that’s +great. Well, if Maurice only holds out he’ll make +a great season of it, won’t he?”</p> +<p>“Oh, he’ll hold out,” we’d say, and lead the way +down to the Anchorage or some other place for a +drink or a cigar, for of course, with the money +we’d made, we naturally felt like spending some +of it on those who were not doing so well. And of +course, too, no seiner could ever resist anybody who +talks to him in a nice friendly way like that.</p> +<p>The skipper’s doings ashore interested all of his +crew, of course, although me, perhaps, more than +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_176' name='page_176'></a>176</span> +anybody else, unless it was Clancy. I got pretty +regular bulletins from my cousin Nell. She was +for the skipper, first, last and all the time.</p> +<p>“I like him,” she said to me more than a dozen +times. “I do like him, but I never imagined that +a man who does so well at sea could shrink into +himself as he does. Why, you almost have to haul +him out by the ears ashore. If it weren’t for me I +really believe––” and she stopped.</p> +<p>But I thought I understood what she meant. +“Meaning your chum, Alice Foster?” I said.</p> +<p>“Yes, meaning my chum, Alice Foster. Why?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know. Sometimes I think she’s a +kind of a frost.”</p> +<p>“No, she isn’t a frost, and don’t you come +around here again and tell me so.”</p> +<p>Nor did I, for I would not have an argument +with Nell for all the Alice Fosters in the world, +for if Nell were anybody else but my first cousin, +I think I would have fallen in love with her myself.</p> +<p>And then we put out to sea and again we were +living the life of seiners, having it hard and easy in +streaks. There were the times when we went along +for a week and did not do a tap but eat, sleep, +stand a trick at the wheel, a watch to the mast-head, +and skylark around the deck, and read, or +have a quiet game of draw or whist or seven-up +below. But again there were times when we were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_177' name='page_177'></a>177</span> +on fish, and our skipper being a driver, it was +jump, jump, jump for a week on end. There was +that time in August when the fish were so plentiful +on Georges Bank, when, standing to the mast-head, +you could see nothing but mackerel schooling +for fifteen or twenty miles either side of the vessel. +But, oh, they were wild! A dozen times we’d +heave the seine––put off from the vessel, put out +that two hundred and odd fathom of twine, drive +seine-boat and dory to the limit, purse in––and +not so much as a single mackerel caught by the +gills. That happened fifteen or twenty times some +days, maybe. We got our fill of sets that month. +But then again there was a week off Cape Cod and +in the Bay of Fundy and off the Maine coast when +we ran them fresh to Boston market, when we +landed more mackerel it was said in a single week +than was ever landed before by one vessel. We +were five days and five nights that time without seeing +our bunks. It was forever out and after them, +heave the seine, purse up and bail in, ice some, and +dress the rest along the way, and the vessel with +everything on driving for Boston.</p> +<p>We stood to it that week, you may be sure, until +coming on the fifth day some of us fell asleep over +the keelers as the Johnnie was coming into T +Wharf. I remember that I could just barely see +in a kind of a hazy way the row of people along the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_178' name='page_178'></a>178</span> +cap-log when we made fast. And yet after that +we had to hoist them out of the hold and onto the +dock. That day, going out again, the skipper +made all but the watch and himself turn in. That +afternoon, when everybody had had a little kink, +the skipper himself, who had been under a heavier +strain than any of us, suddenly fell backward over +the house and sound asleep. And there he lay all +the rest of that day and that night.</p> +<p>After ten or twelve hours of it we tried to wake +him, but not a budge. We tried again, but no use. +At last he came to and without any help at all. +Sitting up, he asked where we were, and being told, +he said nothing for a moment or so, and then suddenly––“That +so? How long was I asleep?” We +told him––seventeen hours. “Good Lord!” he +groaned, and after a mug-up scooted for the mast-head +like a factory hand with the seven o’clock +whistle blowing. “He’s a fisherman, the skipper,” +said the gang as they watched him climb the +rigging.</p> +<p>And he was a fisherman. All that summer he +drove things with but little time for us ashore. +Twice he put into Gloucester with a day to ourselves +and another time we had a chance to run +down after we had put into Boston for market, +and that we suspected was because the skipper +found he could not keep away himself any longer. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_179' name='page_179'></a>179</span> +Things, we judged, were going pretty well with +him in Gloucester. He did not pretend any longer +now that he was not interested in Miss Foster, and +from my cousin Nell I got occasional hints, most +of which I confided to Clancy, who explained them +as if they were so many parables.</p> +<p>“It’ll be all right,” said Clancy, “if only Minnie +Arkell stands clear. I’m glad she’s away for the +summer, but she’ll turn up in the fall. You’ll see +her just before the race large as life, and some of +her swell-dressed friends, and a yacht, I’ll bet.”</p> +<p>Considering how deeply the skipper was interested +in Miss Foster, some of us thought he ought +to be putting in a little time ashore between trips. +After a run into the Boston fresh fish market, say, +we would have liked mighty well to take in the +theatre, or a trip to the beach, or some other little +entertainment of a night. But no, it was in and +out––drive, drive, drive.</p> +<p>He was all ambition, the skipper. He was going +to be up front or break something. Miss Foster +was one of the ambitious kind, too. If she was +going to have a fisherman, he would have to be a +killer or she would know why. And so I suppose +that had a lot to do with the way the skipper drove +things.</p> +<p>We had our loafing spells, as I say, but mostly +it was plenty of work. That time when we stayed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_180' name='page_180'></a>180</span> +awake for five days and nights was not the only +one. Another time our legs swelled up and the +blood came out of the ends of our fingers with +standing up to the keelers and dressing fish without +rest. But, Lord, nobody minded that. After we’d +got rested up we felt better than ever.</p> +<p>We had good luck generally. We lost neither +men nor gear to amount to anything that summer. +That seine we lost trying for our first school to the +s’uth’ard in the spring was the only bit of misfortune +that came, and we had long ago made up for +that. But others were not so lucky. There was +the loss of the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley’s vessel. I +think I have said that she was a fast vessel. She +was fast––fast, but of the cranky type. We were +jogging along a little to windward of her one fine +afternoon––it had been a fine September day and +now it was coming on to evening. To the westward +of Cape Sable, in the Bay of Fundy, it was, and no +hint of a blow up to within a few minutes of the +time when the squall struck the Ruth. I suppose +it would have been more prudent on Pitt’s part if +he had had less sail on, but like most of the skippers +in the fleet I guess he was not looking for +any record for prudence. Any minute he might +have to be up and driving her, and keeping sail on +was the quickest way to have it when you needed it +in a hurry. The squall hit her––it hit us, too, but +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_181' name='page_181'></a>181</span> +we saw it coming and met it and beyond washing +a few keelers overboard, when she rolled down, no +harm was done to the Johnnie. On the Ripley, I +suppose, they saw it too, but the Ripley and +the Duncan were not the same class of vessel +by any means. She went over––hove down, +with her foremast under water to the cross-trees +almost.</p> +<p>Most of her crew were below at the time, some +in their bunks. Four or five of those below never +reached the deck at all––the water rushing down +the companionways cut them off. Some rushed +aft where the stern was high out of water and some +piled into the rigging. Some were calling out and +giving advice to others. We could hear them +plainly. Two jumped to the wheel and threw it up, +but she would not right.</p> +<p>We had the Johnnie to keep right side up, but +we saw the whole thing. It could not have been +more than two or three minutes from the time the +squall struck her when she was going down head-first. +Those of her crew who had gone to the +stern were going with her, but those who had taken +to the rigging, by leaping wide came clear. Their +seine-boat, which had been towing astern, might +have been of use to them, but being fast to the vessel +by the painter it was pretty well filled with water +before anybody had a chance to cut the painter. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_182' name='page_182'></a>182</span> +The man that cut it went down with the vessel. He +was all right, whoever he was. Those in the water +were looking about for the dory, and found that +half full of water, too. They were trying to bail +the water out of the dory, after hauling it across +the bow of the submerged seine-boat, when we got +them in our seine-boat and picked up what was left +of them.</p> +<p>Nine of them were lost, her skipper among +them. One of the men saved––the cook––said that +when the squall struck the vessel, Captain Ripley +had been seen to jump for the boom tackle, which +he unhitched, and then to spring for the lashings +of the dory, which he cut with his knife. The +cook also said that he thought the skipper lost his +life because of the half-stunning blow that he must +have received from the fore-boom while he was on +the rail trying to free the dory. The vessel was +sinking all the time and it being dark––or near it +in the squall––I suppose Captain Ripley could not +watch everything. No doubt, it was the fore-boom +hit him and knocked him overboard. Certainly +he was knocked overboard, and the last seen +of him he was swimming and pushing an empty +barrel before him to one of the crew. “Keep +your nerve up,” he called to the cook, and after +that he suddenly disappeared. He got a man’s +death, anyway.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_183' name='page_183'></a>183</span></div> +<p>We rowed back to the Duncan with the survivors. +Nine men gone––it was a hard story to +take home with us, but we had it to do. It was all +a part of fishing life, and so we put back for +Gloucester.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_184' name='page_184'></a>184</span> +<a name='XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE' id='XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE'></a> +<h2>XXII</h2> +<h3>ON THE CAPE SHORE</h3> +</div> +<p>While we were into Gloucester, after taking +home the crew of the Ruth Ripley, +our vessel was put on the ways. That was after +a talk between the skipper and Mr. Duncan. +There is always something that needs attending +to on a fisherman, and this time it was our +water-tanks. And while they were being looked +after, the Johnnie was overhauled, her bottom +scrubbed and topsides painted. Old Mr. Duncan, +we found, was beginning to take a lot of pride in +our vessel and balked at no expense to have her in +trim. And now that the Ripley was lost, he would +have only two vessels to represent him in the big +fishermen’s race, which was then only four weeks +away.</p> +<p>“Hurry up home now,” he said to Maurice as +we left the dock that time. “Hurry up, and give +yourself plenty of time to tune her up and get her +in trim for the race. I’ve set my heart on it. You +or the Lucy Foster must win that race, and whatever +else we do we’ve got to beat Withrow’s vessel, +anyway.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_185' name='page_185'></a>185</span></div> +<p>And Miss Foster said that one of her guardian’s +vessels would have to win the race, and my cousin +Nell said that the Johnnie Duncan would have to +win. There was a lot depending on it, she said. +It meant a lot to Will Somers, I suppose Nell +meant.</p> +<p>We figured that we had time to make a Cape +shore trip, and, with fair luck, to fill the Johnnie +with salt mackerel and be back in time to get her +in good condition for the race, which this year, because +it was anniversary year in Gloucester, promised +to be the greatest ever sailed.</p> +<p>Our plans were somewhat interfered with by a +rescue we made. We found a Glasgow bark, New +York bound, in the Bay of Fundy, and her crew in +hard straits. We stood down and after a lot of +trouble took them off––Clancy and Long Steve in +the dory. Billie Hurd came near being the second +man in the dory, but Clancy, grabbing him as he +had one foot over the rail, hauled him back with, +“Way for your elders, little man,” and jumped in +beside Long Steve.</p> +<p>“Elders, but not betters,” said Hurd.</p> +<p>“Have it your own way,” answered Clancy, +“but I go in the dory.”</p> +<p>The rescue was really a fine thing, but the important +thing was that some of the rescued men +had been exposed to the battering of the sea so +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_186' name='page_186'></a>186</span> +long that they needed medical attention, and so +we drove for home––and cracked our foremast-head +doing it. That delayed us almost a week, for +the skipper had to have that spar just so. A lot +might depend on it, same as the rest of the gear. +And it was a spar––as fine a bit of timber, Oregon +pine of course, as was ever set up in a fisherman. +And maybe that too was just as well, with the race +coming on.</p> +<p>By the time we were down the Cape shore––down +Canso way––and among the fleet again, we +had lost a week. Our hold was still to fill up, and +only two weeks and a day to the race. Wesley +Marrs, Tom O’Donnell, Sam Hollis, and the rest +were then talking of going home and making +ready for the race. Bottoms would have to be +scrubbed, extra gear put ashore––a whole lot of +things done––and a few try-outs in the Bay by way +of tuning up.</p> +<p>The race was the talk of all the fleet. Half the +crews on the Cape shore wanted to be in Gloucester +when the race came off, and some of the skippers +of the slower vessels, which would not enter +because they had no show to win, were already +scheming to be home just before the race so that +they could be on hand to follow it.</p> +<p>The morning after we were back among the +fleet we got a small school right from under the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_187' name='page_187'></a>187</span> +eyes of the Lynx, one of the English cutters which +were patrolling the coast to see that we didn’t get +any fish within the three-mile limit. I remember +that while we were satisfied at the time that we +were outside the line, we did not know what the +revenue-cutter might say, and particularly the +Lynx, whose captain had a hard name among our +fleet for his readiness to suspect law-breaking when +there wasn’t any. The cutter people generally +seemed to want to be fair toward us, but this +Lynx’s captain was certainly a vindictive cuss. +Anything hailing from Gloucester was an abomination +in his eyes. And so this morning, when, after +we had decided that we were outside the limit, +and made ready to set, it was hard to have to take +the order of the Lynx and sheer off. Our judgment +of distance ought to have been as good as his––better, +really, we thought it, because we were +always judging distances at sea, and more at home +upon the sea, too. But that made no difference––what +the cutter people said had to be law for us.</p> +<p>So this time he ordered us not to set where we +were or he’d seize our vessel. Several Gloucester +vessels had been confiscated just before this and the +owners had to pay the fine to recover them. One +owner disputed the judgment and his case was then +waiting settlement. Another who refused to pay +saw his vessel turned into a lightship and placed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_188' name='page_188'></a>188</span> +down Miramichi way in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, +where it is yet. This day the commander of the +Lynx might have some reason to think that his +order ended that for us––and we could almost see +him chuckling––but it didn’t. A fog was creeping +up at the time and in ten minutes it was on us, and +under cover of the fog we got a little school––the +same school we thought and on the exact spot +where the cutter was lying when she ordered us off. +Didn’t we cackle though when we bailed it in? Oh, +no! It was not much of a school––only twenty +barrels––but it made us all feel fine. Not alone did +we feel that we had got the better of the English +cutter, but also that luck was coming to us again. +We justified ourselves by saying that we honestly +believed we were outside the three-mile limit, and +that our judgment was as good as theirs.</p> +<p>That night the forec’s’le of the Johnnie Duncan +presented one of the most beatific scenes I ever saw. +Everybody was in the temper of an angel. There +was nothing doing––no whist at the table, no reading +out of upper bunks, no love song from the +peak, and no fierce argument on the lockers. We +were discussing the cutters and the talk was very +soothing. The cook, as usual, was finishing up a +batch of dough. You might have thought he was +the only man who had been working in a week, +were it not for the wet oil-clothes hanging up to +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_189' name='page_189'></a>189</span> +dry, and the overhauling of second suits of oil-clothes +by some of the gang. Every man, except +the cook, who never smoked while at work, was +puffing away as if he misdoubted he would ever +get another chance for a pipeful in his life. “Harmony +most ex-quis-ite,” said somebody, and that’s +what must have been that hung over the forec’s’le, +and it seemed to be merely in keeping with the +heavenly order of things that the atmosphere +showed pale blue wherever the rays of the lamp +could get a chance to strike through.</p> +<p>When Clancy dropped down for his usual mug-up +before going to the mast-head for the night of +course, he wasn’t going to let that get by without +having a word to say about it. He leaned against +the foremast and took a look around. “My soul, +but it’s as if the blessed angels were fanning their +wings over this forehold. There’s Brian Boru +and Lord Salisbury there double-banked on the +same locker, and nothing doing on any Irish question. +There’s the lad that sleeps in the peak and +not a single hallelujah of praise for his darling +Lucille. The other one––the wild man that sings +the Bobbie Burns songs––not a shriek out of him. +And Bill and John no longer spoiling their eyesight +on bad print. I expect it’s that little school +of fish––the first in two weeks or more. The prospect +must be making you all pleased. Well, it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_190' name='page_190'></a>190</span> +ought. A few hundred barrels of that kind of +mackerel––as fine fish as ever I see bailed over the +rail. And some of you ready reck’ners ought to +easily figure up what’ll be coming to us if we ever +fill her up––say five hundred barrels. A good +thing––a few hundred barrels of mackerel. A few +too many of ’em for good trim, but it’s comforting +to know they’re there. She seemed to be in +pretty nice trim when we tried out one or two of +the fleet this morning, didn’t she? And to-night, if +it breezes up––and it looks now as if it will––we’ll +get some more––if it’s a night like last night. One +time there last night––did you notice her, cook?––that +time that crazy lad started to cross our bow +and we luffed her. Why, man, she shot over like +I don’t know what––just shot like one of those +torpedo boats we see around when the Navy goes +evoluting. I was near shook overboard from aloft. +They tell me they’re going crazy over the race in +Gloucester. Well, here’s one that’ll bet his summer’s +earnings–––”</p> +<p>“What’s left of it, you mean, Tommie,” said +George Moore from his pan of dough.</p> +<p>“Well, yes, what’s left of it––and what I c’n +borrow. Old man Duncan’ll stake me, and there’s +others. I hope, though, it blows a jeesly gale. For +this one, God bless her, she c’n sail, and some of +them’ll find it out––when it’s too late, maybe. Sam +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_191' name='page_191'></a>191</span> +Hollis for one. There’s a man I’d give my eye +almost, to beat. And maybe the skipper hasn’t +got it in for him! He doesn’t say much, Maurice +don’t, but a while ago, after coming down +from aloft, Billie Simms hails him and tells him +that the cutter people know all about that little +school to-day––and who told him, who told him? +Well, the skipper’ll drive this one to the bottom +before he ever lets Sam Hollis or any of +Withrow’s vessels get by him when we race. Yes, +sir. But, Georgie-boy”––Clancy shouldered away +from the foremast––“how is it for a wedge or two +of one of those blueberry pies you got cooling +there? Just a little wedge, now. But you don’t +need to be too close-hauled with your knife––no. +Sailing by the wind is all right when you’re +jogging in and out among the fleet, and nothing +partic’lar doing except an eye out for mackerel, +but you want to give her a full always––always, +Georgie––when you’re cutting pie. There’s the +lad––straight across the beam. And now at right +angles again. And now lay one atop of the other, +and you have it––an invention of my own––a +blueberry sandwich. M-m––but look at the juice +squish through her scuppers!” He held it up +for all of us to have a look. “Now another little +wash of coffee in the wake of that and I’ll be all +right for a fine little watch aloft.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_192' name='page_192'></a>192</span></div> +<p>He jammed his sou’wester hard down, and +heroically waved away the remainder of the pie. +“No, no. First thing I know I’ll be having dyspepsia. +I never had it yet, but I might,” and then +heaved himself up the companionway, humming, +as he went, one of his old favorites:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane and the Maria Louise</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Sailed a race one day for a peck of peas.</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>You’d hardly believe the way them two</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Carried sail that day––they fairly flew.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent6'> </span>People ashore they said, ‘Gee whiz!</p> +<p><span class='indent6'> </span>The ’Liza Jane the fastest is.’“</p> +</div></div> +<p>We could hear him scrambling, still humming, +over the barrels on deck. He halted long enough +by the rail to say, “How is it, boys?” to the watch +on deck, and then swung himself up the rigging. +Once aloft he had his work cut out, with hours of +strain on brain and nerve. But Clancy never +minded––he never minded anything so far as we +could make out.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_193' name='page_193'></a>193</span> +<a name='XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN' id='XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN'></a> +<h2>XXIII</h2> +<h3>DRESSING DOWN</h3> +</div> +<p>That night was the worst I ever put in towing +astern of a vessel. “Owling” is the seiners’ +word for that kind of work. It was “owling” +sure enough, with the seine-boat on a short painter +and the dory on a shorter painter still and astern +of the seine-boat again. We came near to being +lost in the dory. Mel Adams, who was in the dory +with me, thinking she was surely going to capsize +one time she rode up over the stern of the seine-boat, +took a flying leap into the seine-boat. He +had a hard time getting back, for there was quite +a little sea on. Even in the seine-boat they were +all glad enough to hear Clancy give the word to +cast off and pull after the school.</p> +<p>It was a big school, and hard work in that sea, +but we had them safe at last. The vessel then came +alongside and the bailing in began. Having had +a good long lay-off we bailed them in with plenty +of good-will. It was “He-yew!” “Oy-hoo!” +“Hi-o!” and “Drive her!” all along the line until +we had on deck what the skipper thought was a +hundred barrels. Then the bag was put around +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_194' name='page_194'></a>194</span> +the seine to protect the rest of the mackerel from +dogfish and sharks, and we were ready to dress.</p> +<p>Barrels were tossed out of the hold, keelers set +up, sharp-edged knives drawn from diddy-boxes +below, and a chance had to see a smart crew dressing +a haul of mackerel that were to be salted. It +was too long a run, four hundred miles or so, to +take a chance of getting them fresh to market. It +needed a fair and fresh breeze to be sure of it, and +besides with the market for salt mackerel getting +stronger all the time it was good judgment to salt +down and fill her up before going home.</p> +<p>We had been through the same thing before, +even with as good a deckload, but now we were +getting near the end of the season. This trip, then +the race, and maybe one more trip after the race, +and we would be done seining. And so we drove +things.</p> +<p>Four gangs of four men each took corners in the +waist. Each gang had two keelers––yard square +boxes, eight inches or so in depth, and set up on +two or three barrels. Into the keelers the mackerel +on deck were bailed and around them the +men gathered, with long-handled torches set up all +about.</p> +<p>All hands came into the dressing––skipper and +cook too––and the work went on. It was one +gang against the other, each jealously counting +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_195' name='page_195'></a>195</span> +barrels when they were filled, that full credit might +be given for speed. Sixteen men were accounted +for in this way. The seventeenth and eighteenth +were to keep the keelers filled, draw water for +pickle from over the side, roll the filled barrels out +of the way––in short, to help out generally.</p> +<p>It was fine to watch the splitters. One left-handed +grab and the mackerel was in place; flat +and smooth, one right-handed slit and he was laid +open the length of his back. Forty-five mackerel +a minute either the skipper, Clancy or Moore could +split––that is, pick them up, place in position, split +from nose to tail along the back, and slide out of +the way again. Sixty a minute they could do in +spurts, if somebody would place the mackerel in +rows for them.</p> +<p>The busiest man of all was the skipper. He had +to keep an eye out for the course of the Johnnie. +Vessels that are dressing fish, vessels on which the +entire crew are soaked in blood, gills, intestines, and +swashing brine, might be allowed privileges, one +might think; but no, they must keep a lookout +just the same. On this dark night, the Johnnie +Duncan, though making a great effort––considering +that she had jibs down and wheel in the becket––to +stay as she was put, yet would fall away or +come-to, especially when the wind shifted two or +three points at a jump. And just as soon as she +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_196' name='page_196'></a>196</span> +did the skipper would notice it instantly, jump aft +and set her right. Generally, to shift the wheel a +few spokes would be enough, but now and then he +would have to give the wheel a good round whirl. +At such a time he would sing out a warning, the +torches would be lowered, we would duck our +heads, the boom would go swinging by in the +smoky yellow glare, and the Johnnie Duncan would +be off on another tack. We would brace our legs +to a new angle, the skipper would hop back to his +knife, and again the dressing would go humming +along.</p> +<p>When we had the first hundred barrels of +mackerel swashing in brine, the rest of them, perhaps +another hundred barrels, were bailed in. And +all night long like that we stood to it driving. +Under the yellow and smoky light of the torches +I could see nothing but mackerel or the insides of +mackerel in the air. Keelers, deck, rail, our hands, +faces, boots and oilskins were sticky with the blood +and gurry. At top speed we raced like that +through the night. Once in a while a man would +drop his knife or snap off his gibbing mitt, rinse +his hand in the brine barrel by his side, slap his +hand across the hoops, and condemn the luck of a +split finger or a thumb with a fish-bone in it. Another +might pull up for a moment, glance up at +the stars or down at the white froth under the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_197' name='page_197'></a>197</span> +rail, draw his hand across his forehead, mutter, +“My soul, but I’m dry,” take a full dipper from +the water-pail, drink it dry, pass dipper and pail +along to the next and back to his work.</p> +<p>When the cook called out for breakfast we were +still at it, with the deck of the vessel covered with +barrels of pickling mackerel. It was beginning to +get light then. “Oh, the blessed day’s coming on. +Smother the torches, boys,” said the skipper, and +led the way below for the first table to have a +bite.</p> +<p>Before the sun came up we were beginning to +make out the rest of the fleet. One after another +they were coming into view, their long hulls and +high spars reaching across the wind. Between the +gray sky and the slaty sea their white sails looked +whiter than chalk.</p> +<p>We had to name the different vessels then. +“There’s Tom O’Donnell––and Wesley Marrs––and +Sam Hollis––and––” sung out Andie Howe.</p> +<p>“Sam Hollis––where’s Sam Hollis?” broke in +Mel Adams.</p> +<p>“Away to the east’ard, ain’t it, Andie?––the +fellow with jibs down?” spoke up Billie Hurd, who +was a bit proud that he too could pick her out at +such a distance.</p> +<p>“So it is, ain’t it?” said Mel, and he began to +tell our troubles in the dory. “’Twas him near ran +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_198' name='page_198'></a>198</span> +over us last night––remember, Joe? Leastways, it +looked like Hollis’s new one’s quarter goin’ by. +He was pointin’ ’bout no’the-east then, but he +couldn’t ’ve held on that tack long or he’d be somewhere +up by Miquelon and not here this mornin’––the +gait he was goin’. Man, but there was smoke +coming out of his scuppers when he went by. +‘Why don’t y’ come aboard whilst you’re about it––come +aboard and be sociable,’ I hollers. ‘Oh, don’t +cry, y’ ain’t hurted,’ says whoever’s to the wheel +of her. Least it sounded like that, ‘Y’ ain’t +hurted,’ he says.”</p> +<p>“Must have been pretty close, Mel?” said +Clancy, never stopping, but keeping a string of split +mackerel rolling into his keeler. Mel and I were +gibbing for Clancy.</p> +<p>“Close? I could’ve touched his chain-plates like +that,” and Mel, getting excited, reached his mittened +hand across the keeler and touched Clancy +on the arm. Clancy’s knife took a jump and cut a +finger. For a few seconds Clancy laid down the +law of a splitting knife to Mel, but Mel didn’t +mind.</p> +<p>“That’s just about the way I swore at the man +to the wheel of the Withrow. Didn’t I, Joe? +Yes, sir, I cert’nly swore at him good, but it no +more jarred him than––but when their seine-boat +came by, half of ’em smokin’, some half-breed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_199' name='page_199'></a>199</span> +among ’em has to sing out, ‘Y’ought to hang up a +riding light if your vessel’s hove-to,’ he says. +What do you think of that, Tommie––‘if your vessel’s +hove-to!’––and if the Johnnie was going one +she was going ten knots an hour.”</p> +<p>“That’s right, Mel––I heard you to the mast-head,” +said Clancy. Clancy heard it about as +much as old Mr. Duncan back in Gloucester did, +but he was always ready to help a man out.</p> +<p>“Did you? Well, I hove-to him. I hove the +bailer at him, that’s what I did, and he ducked. +But he ducked too late, I callate, for ‘Bam!’ it +caught him––or somebody in the seine-boat with +him. He swore some, or somebody swore, you c’n +bet. ‘I don’t know who y’are,’ he hollers, ‘but if +ever I meet you ashore,’ and he was so far away +then I couldn’t ketch no more of it. ‘Don’t know +who y’are, but if I ketch you ashore’––Lord–––”</p> +<p>“So, if a lad with a bump on the side of his head +waltzes up to you on Main Street and whangs you, +Mel, next time you’re ashore in Gloucester, what’ll +you do?” asked Clancy.</p> +<p>“I’ll say, ‘Where’s that bailer, you loafer?’ but +first I’ll whang him back. I had to finish the bailing +out with my sou’wester. I sings out to Andie +Howe in the boat here to hand me one of the +bailers in the boat. ‘I’m usin’ my hat,’ I hollers, +‘and Joe’s using his sou’wester,’ thinkin’ that would +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_200' name='page_200'></a>200</span> +fetch him all right. ‘Well, we’re usin’ ten sou’westers +here,’ says Andie, ‘and one or two of ’em +leaks,’ and that was all the satisfaction I got.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Eddie Parsons, “the seine-boat was +sure wallerin’ then. The skipper had only just +told Jimmie Gunn to quit his growling. ‘You’ll +be wanting hot-water bags to your feet next, I +suppose,’ says the skipper.”</p> +<p>“I was thinking of the boat––afraid she’d be +so logy with the water in her that we couldn’t drive +her when the time came,” bristled up Jimmie Gunn +to that.</p> +<p>“Y-yah!” snorted Eddie, “if you weren’t scared, +then I never saw a man scared. Logy? I notice +we made her hop along all right after we cast off +from the vessel. Man, but she fair hurdled some +of them seas––some of the little ones, I mean. +Didn’t she, Steve? We thought we’d lost Joe and +you, Mel, in the dory, didn’t we, fellows?”</p> +<p>“You did, hey? Well, you didn’t, nor nowheres +near it,” broke in Mel. “We were right there with +the goods when they hove the seine, warn’t we, +Joey?”</p> +<p>And so it went on through all that day, while +the men worked, dressing, salting, and putting all +in pickle. It was a drive all through without any +quitting by anybody, except when it was time to +relieve lookouts at the mast-head. In the middle +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_201' name='page_201'></a>201</span> +of it all, had the call of “School-O!” been heard +from aloft, we would have been only too glad to +drop everything, jump into the boat and dory, get +after the mackerel, and do the same thing over––split, +gibb and pack away––for all of the next +night, and the night after that––for a week if +necessary.</p> +<p>Not until well into the afternoon, when the last +mackerel was flattened out in its barrel, did any of +us feel that we could step back in our own time, +straighten ourselves out, and take a look over our +work. Then we counted the oozing barrels with +great satisfaction, you may be sure, even while we +were massaging our swollen wrists with our aching +fingers. It was a good bit of work that, well and +quickly done, and it was fine to get a rest after it, +although it might be only for a little while. Even +though we had to do it all over again––to stay +half-drowned and chilled through in the seine-boat +or dory for half the night and then dress down for +eighteen or twenty hours on top of it––what did +a little hard work matter? “Think of the hundred-dollar +bill, maybe, to be carried home and laid in +the wife’s lap,” said Long Steve.</p> +<p>“Or the roaring night ashore when a fellow’s +not a family man––m-m––!” said Eddie Parsons. +Eddie was not a family man.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_202' name='page_202'></a>202</span> +<a name='XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN' id='XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN'></a> +<h2>XXIV</h2> +<h3>THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN</h3> +</div> +<p>We certainly were feeling pretty good along +about that time, and we felt better when +next day, cruising in and out among the fleet, +other crews began to take notice of our catch. By +that time the word had gone around. One after +another they came sailing up––as if to size us up +was the last thing that could enter their heads––rounding +to, and then a hail. Something like this +it went:</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Maurice.”</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Wesley,” or George Drake, or Al +McNeill, or whoever it might be.</p> +<p>“That’s a mighty pretty deckload of fish. +When’d y’get ’em?”</p> +<p>“Oh, twenty barrels yesterday morning and the +rest last night.”</p> +<p>“That so? How many d’y’call ’em, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“How many? Oh, two hundred and eighty or +ninety wash barrels. Ought to head up about two +sixty.”</p> +<p>“That so? Fine, Maurice, fine. As handsome +a deckload as I’ve seen this year.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_203' name='page_203'></a>203</span></div> +<p>And he would bear off, and another vessel would +come and go through the same ceremony. It was +very satisfying to us and the skipper must have +felt proud. Not that a lot bigger hauls had not +been made by other men before––indeed, yes, and +by the very men perhaps who were complimenting +him. But three hundred barrels, or near it, in +pickle at one time does look fine on a vessel’s deck, +and they looked especially fine at this time because +there was not another vessel in the fleet that had +half as many, so far as we knew.</p> +<p>Not another but Sam Hollis––or so he claimed. +He came ranging up that same day and began asking +how the Duncan was sailing lately, and followed +that up by saying he himself had two hundred +odd barrels in the hold. He showed about +sixty wash barrels on deck. We did not believe +he had twenty below. She looked cork light. +“If she sets as high out of water with two hundred +and forty barrels, then you ought to put two +hundred and forty more in her and she’d fly,” +called out Clancy to Hollis, and that was pretty +much what we all thought.</p> +<p>And ’twas Sam Hollis made trouble for the +Duncan that day. He bore off then but came back +in the afternoon. More talk there was, and it +wound up by our racing with him. We did not +start out to race, but gradually, as we found ourselves +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_204' name='page_204'></a>204</span> +jogging along side by side, jibs were drawn +away and sheets began to be trimmed. The first +thing we knew we found ourselves swaying up sails, +and then before we really woke up to it we were +both off and away before a little breeze.</p> +<p>Hollis had all the best of it. He was bound to, +with the Duncan carrying most of her mackerel +aft and away down by the stern. Even had we had +time to––we did shift some of it forward––we +were too deep for any kind of racing in that moderate +breeze. We said that to ourselves, anyway, +and yet we held on. But it was no use––it wound +up by Hollis giving us a scandalous beating. And +after running away from us he kept straight on +to the westward, and by that we knew that he was +bound for Gloucester to get ready for the big +race.</p> +<p>The skipper felt it. He was one that took things +to heart.</p> +<p>“I’ve been bragging about this one––what she +could do. I told the old man only the last time we +were in that he could go broke that I’d beat Sam +Hollis, and here the first time we come together +he makes her look like a wood-carrier. The best +thing I can do, I guess, is to keep out of the race; +maybe it will save the old man some money. I expected +he’d beat us, the trim we were in––but to +beat us the way he did!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_205' name='page_205'></a>205</span></div> +<p>Nothing the crew could say seemed to make him +think otherwise, and that night it was not nearly +so joyful below in the Johnnie Duncan. The talk +was that she would not go home for the race. Only +Clancy seemed to be as cheerful as ever. “Don’t +any of you get to worrying,” he said. “I know the +skipper––the Johnnie Duncan’ll be there when the +time comes.”</p> +<p>Yet next morning when Wesley Marrs went by +us with the Lucy Foster bound for home and sang +out, “Come along, Maurice, and get ready for the +race––we’ll have a brush on the way,” our skipper +only waved his hand and said, “No––this old plug +can’t sail.” Wesley looked mighty puzzled at +that, but kept on his way.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_206' name='page_206'></a>206</span> +<a name='XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS' id='XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS'></a> +<h2>XXV</h2> +<h3>TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS</h3> +</div> +<p>Next day after, in a calm, Clancy and I had +to take the dory and row out among the +fleet for some salt. The skipper thought it likely +that some of the vessels that were going home +might have salt to spare. He doubted if he himself +would have enough in case we struck another +good school. So we rowed out. We went from +one vessel to another without any luck, until we +found ourselves aboard Tom O’Donnell––the +Colleen Bawn. And just as we got aboard a school +showed near by her, and they made a dash for it. +The Colleen was pretty well inshore then, and yet +safe outside the three-mile limit in our judgment. +Even in the judgment of one of the Canadian +revenue cutters, the Mink, she was outside the +limit. “You’re all right, go ahead,” her commander +sang out from the bridge.</p> +<p>Yet trouble came of it. The Colleen’s gang +were making a set when along came the Lynx, the +same cutter that had ordered our own skipper not +to set two or three days back in the fog, and we had +set in spite of him. I think I said that he had a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_207' name='page_207'></a>207</span> +bad reputation among our fleet. In this case some +said afterwards that he had been watching the +Duncan since that time, and having seen a dory put +out from her and go aboard Tom O’Donnell, that +he then had a special watch for O’Donnell. Anyway, +we know that as the Colleen Bawn’s crew +were pursing in the seine he came along and ordered +them to cast loose the fish. “You’re inside +the limit,” said this fellow now.</p> +<p>“I may be, but I don’t think so,” said O’Donnell +to that.</p> +<p>“You’re inside and you know it.”</p> +<p>“You’re a liar if you say I know it.”</p> +<p>O’Donnell had had trouble with the Lynx before, +and had small patience with her captain. +More words came out of it, and while they were +talking back and forth another of the fleet a mile +to the east’ard put out a boat.</p> +<p>The cutter went after him, her captain singing +out as he went, “You wait here till I come back.” +“Wait like hell!” said O’Donnell, “and this breeze +making,” and continued to purse up. Pursed up, +the fish aboard––there were forty or fifty barrels––he +started off. One of those sudden breezes were +springing up and it promised to be wind enough +to suit anybody. We made out the Johnnie Duncan +bearing down, intending no doubt to take off +Clancy and me. But the cutter was coming toward +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_208' name='page_208'></a>208</span> +us then, and O’Donnell said we had better stay +aboard or we would be picked up on the way by +the cutter’s people and maybe get the Duncan and +our skipper into trouble. That last––the thought +that our skipper or the vessel might get mixed up +in it––kept us aboard the Colleen Bawn.</p> +<p>The Lynx could steam as fast as any cutter they +had on the Cape shore at that time, but the Colleen +was a witch and O’Donnell a wonder at sailing +her. So we stayed with O’Donnell and +watched him and the cutter have it out. They had +it, the cutter letting drive a shot every once in a +while. The first shot, I remember, went whistling +by the ear of one of O’Donnell’s crew who was +standing back-to in the waist, and so astonished +him, he not expecting it, that he fell into the forehold. +He raised a great racket among a lot of +empty barrels. The fall never hurt him, but +the things he said when he came on deck +again! O’Donnell made him lie flat––and then all +of us but Clancy, who refused to lie down but compromised +by leaning over the house and watching +the cutter and making comments on her actions for +the benefit of the rest of us. Through it all O’Donnell +stood to the wheel and the nearest he came to +honoring the cutter by a compliment was when he’d +half turn his head, spit over the rail and swear at +her. The wind and sea-way together were too +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_209' name='page_209'></a>209</span> +much for the cutter. The Colleen left her behind, +and she at last drew off after bunching a few farewell +shots.</p> +<p>O’Donnell then hove-to and took his seine-boat +on deck. He had been towing it the wrong end +foremost for the whole forty miles, and he was +worried over it. “It’s strained her maybe––and +she almost a new boat,” he lamented. “For the +rest I don’t care. That lad had it in for me all +along. The other one though, he’s decent––never +bothers a man without a little reason. I was going +home anyway for the race, and so it don’t matter. +I suppose Maurice will be along soon, Tommie? +Did you see him coming after the cutter––he held +her fine and he in no trim. What’s it they say +about Hollis beating the Johnnie yesterday? If he +did, be sure he was specially prepared, and the +Johnnie had an off-day. But I suppose he’ll be +holding on now for Gloucester?”</p> +<p>Clancy said maybe, but no telling, and explained +how it had been––the skipper’s discouragement +after Hollis had beaten him.</p> +<p>O’Donnell said he was foolish to worry over a +thing like that. “I know Sam Hollis,” he said––“’twas +a trap he laid for Maurice. He’s got a +smart vessel in the Withrow, but he can’t run away +from Maurice. No, nor beat him I doubt––with +both in trim. But wait a while––let the day of the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_210' name='page_210'></a>210</span> +race get near and Maurice to thinking it over, and +you’ll see him flyin’ home.”</p> +<p>We hoped so. For ourselves we went home on +the Colleen. There was nothing else for us to do. +We had quite a time of it that trip with O’Donnell. +He sailed about five hundred miles out of +his way––away to the eastward and s’uth’ard. +There might be cruisers and cutters galore after +him, he said––they might put out from Halifax, +or telegraph ahead––you couldn’t tell what they +might do, he said, and so he sailed the Colleen out +to sea. But we came across the Bay one dark night +without side-lights, and reached Boston all right. +O’Donnell had a suit of sails stowed away in an +East Boston wharf that he wanted to get out for +the race. And also he didn’t like his new foremast +and was going to have a new one put in if +there was time.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_211' name='page_211'></a>211</span> +<a name='XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER' id='XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER'></a> +<h2>XXVI</h2> +<h3>THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER</h3> +</div> +<p>Clancy and I went home by train, reaching +Gloucester as the first of an easterly gale +set in. There we found it was nothing but talk of +the race. We had not reached Main Street at all +before Clancy was held up. Clancy, of course, +would know. Where was Maurice Blake? What +were we doing in Gloucester and the Johnnie not +in? The Duncans––especially the elder Mr. Duncan––Miss +Foster, my cousin Nell, and Will +Somers were boiling over. Where was Maurice +Blake? Where was the Johnnie Duncan? Everybody +in town seemed to know that Sam Hollis had +given us a bad beating down Cape shore way, and +the news had a mighty discouraging effect on all +Maurice’s friends, even on those of them who +knew enough of Sam Hollis not to take his talk +just as he wanted them to take it. Withrow’s vessel +had beaten the Johnnie Duncan with Maurice +Blake sailing her––they had to believe that part of +it, and that in itself was bad enough. Sam Hollis’s +stock was booming, you may be sure––and the +race right close to hand, too.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_212' name='page_212'></a>212</span></div> +<p>“That little beating the Johnnie got didn’t lose +any in the telling by Sam Hollis and his gang, did +it, Joe?” said Clancy to me, and then he went +around borrowing all the money he could to bet +the Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow in +the race. But would Maurice now enter at all? I +asked Clancy about that part––if there was not a +chance that Maurice might not stay down the Cape +shore way and let the race go. But he only +laughed and said, “Lord––Joey-boy, you’ve a lot +to learn yet about Maurice in spite of your season’s +seining along with him.”</p> +<p>It was a Monday morning when Clancy and I +reached Gloucester. The race was to be sailed +on Friday of that same week. For several days +before this, we were told, Wesley Marrs, Sam +Hollis, Tommie Ohlsen, and the rest of them had +been out in the Bay tuning up their vessels like a +lot of cup defenders. Never before had fishermen +given so much attention to the little details before +a race. The same day that we got home they were +up on the ways for a final polishing and primping +up. They were smooth as porcelain when they +came off. And coming off their skippers thought +they had better take some of the ballast out of +them. “’Tisn’t as if it was winter weather”––it +was the middle of September then––“with big seas +and driving gales,” was the way Wesley Marrs put +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_213' name='page_213'></a>213</span> +it, and they all agreed that the chances were ten +to one that the wind would not be strong enough +to call for the heavy ballast they carried. Fishermen, +of course, are built to be at their best when +wind and sea are doing their worst, and so the +taking out of ballast for a September race looked +like good judgment. So about forty tons of ballast +were taken out of most of them––the Lucy +Foster, the Withrow, the Nannie O, and half a +dozen others.</p> +<p>That looked all right, but on Tuesday night an +easterly gale set in, the wind blowing forty-odd +miles an hour. All day Wednesday it blew, and all +day Thursday even harder, with a promise of blowing +harder still on Friday, which was to be the day +of the race. The people of Gloucester who had +been praying for wind, “Wind for a fisherman’s +race––wind––wind,” seemed likely to get what +they wanted.</p> +<p>On Thursday I saw Tommie Ohlsen and Wesley +Marrs in conference on the street. Wesley had +his nose up in the air, sniffing the breeze. He +shook his head with, “Tommie, I ought to’ve let +the ballast stay in the Lucy. It looks like it’s going +to be the devil’s own breeze for vessels that ain’t +prepared for it.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Ohlsen, “wind fifty-two mile an +hour the weather man says, and still making. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_214' name='page_214'></a>214</span> +That’s bad for light ballast and whole sail. If we +could only put the ballast back–––”</p> +<p>“Yes––if we could. But we can’t put it back +now––there ain’t time to do it right and everybody +would laugh at us too. And besides, if we did, all +the others would put it back, and where’s the difference?”</p> +<p>“Of course,” said Tommie, “but if all of us +would put it back it would make a better race.”</p> +<p>In view of the reputation of Wesley Marrs and +Ohlsen and O’Donnell and their vessels, we could +not understand the confidence of Withrow and his +people in Sam Hollis. He had a great vessel––nobody +doubted it. But it was doubted by many +if she was the equal of some of the others, and +few believed she was better. And Sam Hollis was +not the man to carry the sail, or at least the fishermen +of Gloucester generally did not think so. But +Withrow and Hollis’s gang kept on bragging and +they backed their bragging up, too. I drew what +money I had saved that summer out of my seining +share––two hundred and twenty-five dollars––and +bet it myself with one of the Withrow’s crew that +the Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow, +whether the Johnnie was home to race or +not. It was really betting against Withrow himself, +who, it was said, was taking up every bet +made by any of the Withrow’s crew. That was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_215' name='page_215'></a>215</span> +Thursday afternoon, and still no word of the +Duncan.</p> +<p>“Good for you, Joey,” said Clancy when he +heard of that. “Even if Maurice don’t come it’s +better to lose your money and shut them up. But +don’t worry––he’ll come. Do you think he’s been +standing and looking at this easterly––it’s all along +the coast to Newf’undland I see by the papers––and +not swing her off? He’s on his way now, and +swinging all he’s got to her, I’ll bet. Wait and +see.”</p> +<p>“My,” said my cousin Nell, “and so you bet +your pile on the Johnnie Duncan whether she’s in +or not?––and if she don’t reach here in time you +lose it all?” and told it all over to her Will +Somers, to whom I learned she was now engaged. +And from that time on I noticed that Alice Foster +beamed on me like an angel.</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell was home for the race just as +Clancy had prophesied. She had come with some +of her friends down from Boston three or four +days before this, in the same steam-yacht she had +been aboard of at Newport in June. Meeting me +she asked me about our passage home on the Colleen +Bawn, and I told her of it. She listened with +great interest.</p> +<p>“Is Tom O’Donnell as fine-looking as he used +to be––with his grand figure and head and great +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_216' name='page_216'></a>216</span> +beard? I remember some years ago I used to +think him the finest-looking man I ever saw.”</p> +<p>I told her that I guessed she’d think him fine-looking +yet if she’d seen him to the wheel of the +Colleen Bawn with the six-pound shot whistling +by him, and he never so much as letting on he knew +they were there. Her eyes shone at that. Then +she offered to take any bets I made off my hands. +“You can’t afford to take your little savings out of +the bank and bet it on a vessel that may not be +here in time. I’ll take it off your hands––come!”</p> +<p>That was an attractive side to her––caring but +little for money––but I wasn’t letting anybody +take my bets off my hands. I still believed that +Maurice would be home, though that was seven +o’clock Thursday evening. I knew he would be +home if he only guessed that his friends were betting +on his vessel––and they not even knowing +whether she was to be home in time for the race. +And if he weren’t home, I was ready to lose my +little roll.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_217' name='page_217'></a>217</span> +<a name='XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE' id='XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE'></a> +<h2>XXVII</h2> +<h3>IN CLANCY’S BOARDING-HOUSE</h3> +</div> +<p>From Minnie Arkell, whom I met at the +door of her own house, I went to Clancy’s +boarding house. I did not find Clancy then and I +went off, but coming back again I found him, and +a very busy man he was, with an immense crock +of punch between his knees. He was explaining +down in the kitchen to the other boarders––fifteen +or twenty of the thirstiest-looking fishermen I ever +laid eyes on––just how it was he made the punch. +The bowl was about the size of a little beer keg.</p> +<p>“On the night of last Fourth of July,” he was +saying––“and I mind we came in that morning +with a hundred and seventy-five barrels we got off +Mount Desert––that night I warn’t very busy. I +gets this crock––four gallons––let you all have a +look––a nice cold stony crock you see it is, and +that they’d been using then in the house here for +piccalilli––and a fine flavor still hanging to it. +Wait a minute now till I tell you. It’ll taste better, +too, after you hear. And into the crock I puts +two gallons of rum––fine rum it was––for a bottom. +Every good punch has to have a bottom. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_218' name='page_218'></a>218</span> +It’s like the big blocks they put under a house by +way of a foundation, or the ballast down near the +keel of a vessel––there’d be no stiffening without +it, and the first good breeze she’d capsize, and then +where’d you be? Now, on top of those two gallons––it +was two o’clock in the morning, I mind, +when I started to mix it––whiskey, brandy, and +sherry––no, I can’t tell what parts of each––for +that’s the secret of it. A fellow was dory-mate +with me once––a Frenchman from Bordeaux––told +me and said never to tell, and I gave my oath––down +in St. Peer harbor in Miquelon it was––and +afterwards he was lost on the Heptagon––and of +course, never being released from the oath, I can’t +tell. Well, there was the rum, the whiskey, the +brandy, and the sherry––and on top o’ that went +one can of canned pine-apple––canned pine is better +than the pine-apple right out of its jacket. +Why? Well, that’s part of the secret. Then a +dozen squeezed lemons and oranges. Then some +maraschino. I’d got it off an Italian salt bark skipper +in the harbor once. On top o’ that I put one +quart of green tea––boiled it myself––it was three +in the morning then, I mind––and I sampled a cup +of it. Wait now––wait. Just ease your sheets and +let me tell it. Here’s the best part of it. I takes +that crock with the fourteen quarts of good stuff +in it and lowers it to the bottom of the old well +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_219' name='page_219'></a>219</span> +out in the yard with a lot of cold round little +stones above and below and more little stones +packed all around and then I lowers down two +good-sized rocks on top o’ that––and nails boards +over the well––that’s why nobody could get into +that well all this summer. Well, that was the +morning after the last Fourth of July––I mind the +sun was coming up over the rocks of Cape Ann +when I was done. And that was July, and now the +last of September––three months ago. A while ago +in the dark and a howling gale––you all see me +come in with it, didn’t you? Yes, if you go out +quick, you c’n see the well just where I left it––I +goes out and digs it up––and here it is––and +now it’s here, we’ll all have a little touch in +honor of to-morrow, for it’s a great day when the +wind blows fifty or sixty miles an hour so that +fishermen can have good weather for a race.”</p> +<p>And they all had a little touch. Clancy sat on +the table with the crock between his feet and bailed +it out while they all agreed it was the smoothest +stuff that ever slid down their throats. There was +not a man in the gang who was not sure he could +put away a barrel of it.</p> +<p>“Put away a barrel of it?” whispered Clancy––“yes. +Let’s get out of here, Joe. In an hour they’ll +be going into the air like firecrackers.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_220' name='page_220'></a>220</span> +<a name='XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN' id='XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN'></a> +<h2>XXVIII</h2> +<h3>IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN</h3> +</div> +<p>We left Clancy’s boarding house and went +over to old Mrs. Arkell’s place, where +most of the skippers who were going to race next +day had gathered. Clancy at once started in to +mix milk-punches. And he sang his latest favorite, +with the gang supping his mixture between the +stanzas:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, hove flat down on Quero Banks</p> +<p>Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks,</p> +<p>And the way she was a-settlin’ was an awful sight to see”––</p> +</div></div> +<p>Then Wesley Marrs sang a song and after him +Patsie Oddie followed with a roarer.</p> +<p>The punch-mixing, singing and story-telling +went on and in the middle of it Tom O’Donnell +came driving in. He was like a whiff of a no’the-easter +out to sea. “Whoo!” he said. “Hulloh, +Wesley-boy––and Patsie Oddie––and Tommie +Ohlsen––and, by my soul, Tommie Clancy again. +Lord, what a night to come beating down from +Boston! What’s that, Wesley?––did the Colleen +outfoot the cutter down the Cape shore way? Indeed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_221' name='page_221'></a>221</span> +and she did, and could do it over again in the +same breeze to half their logy old battleships. +Into Boston I was Monday morning, and the fish +out of her the same morning. Tuesday I took her +across to Cape Cod, tuning her up, and into Provincetown +that night. Next day it was blowing +pretty hard. A fine day for a run across the Bay, +I thinks, and waits for maybe a Boston vessel, one +of the T Wharf fleet. For I’ll go to Boston, I +thinks, to put the Colleen on the railway to-day, +because maybe in Gloucester I may have to wait––or +may get no chance at all––with half a dozen +or more that will be waiting to be scrubbed for the +race. And who comes along then but Tom Lowrie. +‘Waiting for me?’ he asks, and I tells him I was +hoping it would be the new Whalen vessel. +‘Here’s one that’s as good as any Whalen vessel,’ +he says––‘as good as anything out of Boston––or +Gloucester,’ he says. So across the Bay we had +it out. And, gentlemen, I’m telling you the Colleen +sailed––all the wind she wanted. She came +along, and Lowrie––by the looks of things then––he’s +sailing yet. Well, I never did like that +forem’st that was in the Colleen, and so, thinks I, +here’s a chance to test it––and why not, with the +race coming on? So I jibed her over off Minot’s +just––and sure enough it cracked about ten feet +below the mast-head.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_222' name='page_222'></a>222</span></div> +<p>“You were satisfied then, Tom?”</p> +<p>“Sure and I was. And better before the race +than in the race. And next day––that’s to-day––we +spent putting in a new stick. I had to take +what I could get to save time, and I don’t think +it’s what it ought to be and maybe it won’t last +through to-morrow. But, anyway, you want to +have an eye out for the Colleen to-morrow, for I’m +telling you I never see her sail like she did yesterday +coming across the Bay. Ask Tom Lowrie +next time you see him. Well, to-night I had to +beat down here to be sure and be here in time, and +so out we put––and here I am. Blowing? Indeed +and it is. And thick, is it? Standing on her +knight-heads and looking aft you c’d no more +than make out her side-lights. We came along, +and Boston inner and outer harbor crowded with +vessels, steamers and sail, waiting for it to moderate +so they c’d put out. A blessed wonder it was +we didn’t sink somebody––or ourselves. Outside +we went along by smell, I think, for only every +once in awhile could we see a light. One time we +almost ran into something––a fisherman it must +have been, for I s’pose only a fisherman would be +going in on a night like this––out of a squall of +snow and blackness she came––man alive! but, +whoever she was, she was coming a great clip. +Winged out and we didn’t see her till the end of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_223' name='page_223'></a>223</span> +her bowsprit caught the end of our main-boom––hauled +in we were to two blocks––and over we +went on the other tack––yes, sir, over on the other +tack. Thinks I, ‘’Tis a new way to jibe a vessel +over.’ And the end of her fore-boom all but swept +me from beside the wheel and over the rail as she +went by––she was that close. And I sings out to +her, ‘Won’t you leave us your name so I can thank +you next time we meet?’ but Lord, not a word out +of him. He kept on to Boston, I suppose, and we +kept on to Gloucester, and here I am.”</p> +<p>“And the Colleen, Tom––she’s all right?”</p> +<p>“Right, man? Watch her to-morrow. Barring +that forem’st being too light––but whoever looked +for a breeze like this?––two days and three nights +now and blowing harder all the time. But never +mind, she’ll make great going of it to-morrow. +Divil take it, but we’ll all make great going of it. +Tommie, dear, what’s in the bowl? Milk? Man, +but don’t be telling me things like that––and the +one thing the doctors warn me against is heart-trouble. +Ah, milk-punch––that’s better, man. A +wee droppeen. Look at it––the color of the tip of +a comber in twelve fathom of water and a cross-tide. +Well, here’s to every mother’s son of us +that’s going to race to-morrow. May ye all win +if the Colleen don’t––all but you, Sam Hollis. But +where’s he gone––into the other room? Well, if +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_224' name='page_224'></a>224</span> +he was here ’twould be the same. He’s got a vessel +that can sail. Let him sail her to-morrow and win, +if it’s in her––or in him. But a thousand dollars––and +outside my house and vessel, Lord knows, it’s +all the money I’ve got in the world––beyond my +house and vessel––a thousand dollars the Colleen +beats the Withrow. Hello, there––what d’y’say, +Sam Hollis––the Colleen and the Withrow––a +thousand dollars, boat for boat. But where the +divil is he? Gone? Are you sure? Gone! But +a queer time to leave a party––just when it’s getting +to be real sociable.”</p> +<p>“Never mind the betting now, Tom,” spoke up +Wesley Marrs. “Let the owners have that to +themselves. And according to accounts some of +them are having it. Fred Withrow and old Duncan +are ready to go broke over the race to-morrow. +Whichever loses, he’ll remember this race, I’m +thinking. Here’s hoping it won’t be Duncan. So +to the devil with the betting, Tom. Some of us +have bet all we could afford––some of us more +than we could afford, I callate. Let’s have a song +instead, Tom.”</p> +<p>“Anything to please you, Wesley,” and O’Donnell +began to sing. He started off first with his</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, seiners all and trawlers all,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>but Alec McNeill and Patsie Oddie interrupted. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_225' name='page_225'></a>225</span> +“Oh, give us the other one, Tom––the Newf’undland +and Cape Shore Men.”</p> +<p>“Ha!” laughed O’Donnell, “it’s the mention of +your own you want––you and Patsie there. Well, +it’s all one to me. Any man from any place, so +long as he’s a fair man and a brave man, and Lord +knows ye’re both that. Well, here’s to you both––a +wee drop just, Tommie––easy––easy,” and he +began:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, Newf’undland and Cape Shore men, and men of Gloucester town,</p> +<p>With ye I’ve trawled o’er many banks and sailed the compass roun’;</p> +<p>I’ve ate with ye, and bunked with ye, and watched with ye all three,</p> +<p>And better shipmates than ye were I never hope to see.</p> +<p>I’ve seen ye in the wild typhoon beneath a Southern sky,</p> +<p>I’ve seen ye when the Northern gales drove seas to mast-head high,</p> +<p>But summer breeze or winter blow, from Hatt’ras to Cape Race,</p> +<p>I’ve yet to see ye with the sign of fear upon your face.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, swingin’ cross the Bay</p> +<p>Go eighty sail of seiners,</p> +<p>And every blessed one of them a-driving to her rail!</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>There’s a gale upon the waters and there’s foam upon the sea,</p> +<p>And looking out the window is a dark-eyed girl for me,</p> +<p>And driving her for Gloucester, maybe we don’t know</p> +<p>What the little ones are thinking when the mother looks out so.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_226' name='page_226'></a>226</span></p> +<p>Oh, the children in the cradle and the wife’s eyes out to sea,</p> +<p>The husband at the helm and looking westerly––</p> +<p>When you get to thinking that way, don’t it make your heart’s blood foam?</p> +<p>Be sure it does––so here’s a health to those we love at home.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>West half no’the and drive her, we’re abreast now of Cape Sable,</p> +<p>It’s an everlasting hurricane, but here’s the craft that’s able––</p> +<p>When you get to thinking that way, don’t it make your heart’s blood foam?</p> +<p>Be sure it does––so here’s a health to those we love at home.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the roar of shoaling waters and the awful, awful sea,</p> +<p>Busted shrouds and parting cables, and the white death on our lee;</p> +<p>Oh, the black, black night on Georges when eight score men were lost––</p> +<p>Were ye there, ye men of Gloucester? Aye, ye were––and tossed</p> +<p>Like chips upon the water were your little craft that night,</p> +<p>Driving, swearing, calling out, but ne’er a call of fright.</p> +<p>So knowing ye for what ye are, ye masters of the sea,</p> +<p>Here’s to ye, Gloucester fishermen, a health to ye from me.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>And here’s to it that once again</p> +<p>We’ll trawl and seine and race again;</p> +<p>Here’s to us that’s living and to them that’s gone before;</p> +<p>And when to us the Lord says, ‘Come!’</p> +<p>We’ll bow our heads, ‘His will be done,’</p> +<p>And all together let us go beneath the ocean’s roar.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>I never again expect to hear a sea song sung as +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_227' name='page_227'></a>227</span> +Tom O’Donnell sang it then, his beard still wet +with the spray and his eyes glowing like coal-fire. +And the voice of him! He must have been heard +in half of Gloucester that night. He made the +table quiver. And when they all rose with glasses +raised and sang the last lines again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And here’s to it that once again</p> +<p>We’ll trawl and seine and race again;</p> +<p>Here’s to us that’s living and to them that’s gone before;</p> +<p>And when to us the Lord says, ‘Come!’</p> +<p>We’ll bow our heads, ‘His will be done,’</p> +<p>And all together we shall go beneath the ocean’s roar–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>any stranger hearing and seeing might have understood +why it was that their crews were ready +to follow these men to death.</p> +<p>“The like of you, Tom O’Donnell, never sailed +the sea,” said Patsie Oddie when they had got the +last ro-o-ar––“even the young ladies come in off +the street to hear you better.”</p> +<p>He meant Minnie Arkell, who was standing in +the doorway with her eyes fixed on O’Donnell, +who had got up to go home, but with Wesley trying +to hold him back. He was to the door when +Minnie Arkell stopped him. She said she had +heard him singing over to her house and couldn’t +keep away, and then, with a smile and a look into +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_228' name='page_228'></a>228</span> +his eyes, she asked O’Donnell what was his hurry––and +didn’t he remember her?</p> +<p>In her suit of yachting blue, with glowing face +and tumbled hair, she was a picture. “Look at +her,” nudged Clancy––“isn’t she a corker? But +she’s wasting time on Tom O’Donnell.”</p> +<p>“What’s your hurry, Tom?” called Wesley. +“Another song.”</p> +<p>“No, no, it’s the little woman on the hill. She +knew I was to come down to-night and not a wink +of sleep will she get till I’m home. And she knows +there’ll be bad work to-morrow maybe and she’d +like to see me a little before I go, and I’d like to +see her, too.”</p> +<p>“She’s a lucky woman, Captain O’Donnell, and +you must think a lot of her?” Minnie Arkell had +caught his eye once more.</p> +<p>“I don’t know that she’s so awfully lucky with +me on her hands,” laughed O’Donnell, “but I do +think a lot of her, child.”</p> +<p>“Child? to me? But you don’t remember me, +Captain?”</p> +<p>“Indeed, and I do, and well remember you. +And it’s the beautiful woman you’ve grown to be. +But you always were a lovely child. It’s often my +wife spoke of you and wondered how you were. +She’s heard me speak of your father a hundred +times, I know. A brave man your father, girl. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_229' name='page_229'></a>229</span> +And she’ll be glad to see you any time, little girl––or +the daughter of any fisherman lost at sea. If +ever you have a blue day, go to her, for ’tis she has +the heart––and, God bless her, an extra weakness +for orphans. Her own children some day––there’s +no telling. But good-night to you, dear”––he +patted her head––“good-night all. Wesley, Tommie, +Patsie––all of ye, good-night. In the morning +we’ll have it out.” Out the door he went, and +I fancied there was almost a blush on Minnie +Arkell’s face.</p> +<p>Tom O’Donnell was the kind of a man a fellow +would like to have for a father.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_230' name='page_230'></a>230</span> +<a name='XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME' id='XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME'></a> +<h2>XXIX</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME</h3> +</div> +<p>From Mrs. Arkell’s we walked back to +Clancy’s boarding house. Clancy wanted to +see how they made out with the punch. We found +several of them up in the wind, and so no great +danger of them. But two or three of them, +Dave Campbell particularly, were running wild. +“Boomed out and driving,” said Clancy, and began +to remonstrate with Dave on the evils of intemperance. +He went on quite awhile, but Dave +showed no signs of remorse. “Wait and I’ll fix +him,” said Clancy, and obeying a motioning with +his head two or three of the sober ones followed +him out.</p> +<p>He led the way to the wood-shed next door +where there was a goat, and the goat we carried +up three flights of stairs to Campbell’s room. He +was a big, able goat, and we had quite a time to get +him up stairs. At last we got him tied to the post +of Campbell’s bed. Then we went down stairs to +the kitchen and Clancy persuaded Campbell to go +up stairs to bed, which after awhile he did. It was +not yet morning and there was no light in the bedroom. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_231' name='page_231'></a>231</span> +We took our position on the landing outside +where we could hear everything that went on +in Campbell’s room, which was just at the head of +the stairs.</p> +<p>Dave went in and we could hear him falling over +something in the dark. “What’s it?” we could +hear him, and acting as if he was feeling around. +Taking off our shoes we crawled nearer. We could +barely make out his shadow in the dark, but we +could easily hear him talking to himself. “What’s +it? Eh, what?” He must have been feeling the +horns then, and the goat must have butted him. +Again, and once more, for out the door and down +the stairs went Dave. We ran in and cut the goat +loose and down he went after Dave. The whole +three flights they raced.</p> +<p>“He’s got me at last,” hollered Dave, bolting +into the kitchen, slamming the door behind him and +bracing himself against it.</p> +<p>We took the goat and put him back in the wood-shed +and came back to the kitchen by way of the +window. Dave, who was still braced against the +door, did not know but what we had been in the +kitchen all the time, and that gave Clancy a fine +chance to take up his lecture on intemperance just +where he had left it off,––at the very beginning. +“Intemperance, Dave, is an awful thing. You’ll +have to be doing something for it soon, I think. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_232' name='page_232'></a>232</span> +Yes, when the devil himself gives you a call it’s +time to do something. You’d better come with me +and take the pledge. Come up now to Father +Haley.”</p> +<p>“I’m a Pres––a Pres––a Pres––by––ter––ian, +Tommie.”</p> +<p>“Well, come with me to your church then––any +church at all. What’s the odds, so long’s you reform. +Here, we’ll do it right here now. Come, +hold up your hand,” and then and there Clancy was +about to get Dave to promise not to look a glass +of liquor or punch in the face for a year again, +when who comes bouncing in but Eddie Parsons.</p> +<p>“Hurroo!” said Clancy, forgetting Dave and +grabbing Eddie by the shoulder, “and the Duncan’s +home?”</p> +<p>“She is,” said Eddie, “and four hundred and +fifty barrels of mackerel coming out of her hold. +A dozen lumpers getting ’em out from both holds +and two at a lick they’re coming onto Duncan’s +Dock. And what d’y’think, Tommie–––”</p> +<p>“But what kept you so long, man? We’ve all +been getting heart disease waiting for you.”</p> +<p>“I know. We ought to’ve been in yesterday +mornin’, or in the afternoon at the latest, for we +swung her off Tuesday night midnight––plenty of +time with a fair wind. But on Wednesday afternoon, +coming like a race-horse––wung out––we +sighted a dory and two men in it signalizing. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_233' name='page_233'></a>233</span> +Astray they were, and we took ’em aboard, and all +that night we stood by. And warn’t it chafing? +Oh, no! Daylight came thick and we waited for +it to clear, keeping the horn goin’. It lifted and we +got another dory, but it was late afternoon then. +Then their vessel came along with all the others +accounted for, and we turned over our two and +went on our way. And maybe she didn’t come! +Oh, no! Blowing? A living gale all the time, but +the skipper kept her going. You’d hardly b’lieve +if I told you where we was yesterday afternoon and +we here now. A no’the-easter and a howler all the +way. At four o’clock we passed in by the bell-buoy. +Man, such a blow! Are we in the race, you +say? Are we! And oh, the skipper says for you +and Joe to be down after breakfast. We all knew +you’d get home and be all right with Tom O’Donnell. +So be down after breakfast––the skipper will +be looking for you both. But say, let me tell you. +What d’y’think? Coming into the harbor a while +ago who d’y’ s’pose was out in the stream with a +lighter alongside his vessel? Who but Sam Hollis +and the Withrow. Yes, and the gang putting +ballast back in her.”</p> +<p>“No?”</p> +<p>“Yes. And some one of them sees us going by +in the dark. And we did go by, too! ‘Lord!’ says +somebody––’twas Withrow himself––‘but if that +don’t look like the ghost of Maurice Blake’s vessel!’ +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_234' name='page_234'></a>234</span> +‘Yes,’ hollers back the skipper––and they +must’ve been some surprised to hear him––‘and +the ghost’ll be with you to-morrow in the race. +Yes,’ the skipper says, ‘and we’re all ready for it. +Four weeks since we’ve been on the ways and maybe +a scrubbing wouldn’t hurt her, but if it keeps +a-blowin’ who’ll mind that? Not the Johnnie.’ +Oh, Tommie, if you’d seen her comin’ across the +Bay of Fundy yesterday afternoon and last night. +Did she come?––did she come? Lord––O +Lord–––”</p> +<p>“And so that’s Withrow––got his vessel tuned +up like a fiddle and now he’s putting extra ballast +in her. Blast him and Hollis for schemers!” said +Clancy. “And that’s how it comes they’re so ready +to bet––stiffenin’ her so stiff for to-morrow that +they know something’ll happen to the others first. +But the Johnnie’s a bit stiff, too––and there’s no +ballast out of her. And, as the skipper says, +maybe we ain’t been on the ways for a few weeks +now, but Lord, the Johnnie ought to be able to +drag a few little blades of sea-grass on her hull in +this breeze. And so we’re in the race, heh? Dave, +I can’t stop to give you the pledge now––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the Johnnie Duncan fast and able,</p> +<p>Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>And Clancy was the joyful man as he awoke the +echoes in the gray of that stormy morning.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_235' name='page_235'></a>235</span> +<a name='XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE' id='XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE'></a> +<h2>XXX</h2> +<h3>THE MORNING OF THE RACE</h3> +</div> +<p>I don’t think that the people of Gloucester +will ever forget the morning of that race, +which, they will still tell you, was the only race +ever sailed. Wind was what the fishermen wanted, +and they got it––wind, and sea with it. The admiral +of the White Squadron, then at anchor at +Rockport Harbor, just around the Cape, stood on +the bridge of his flagship that morning and looked +out to sea. Somebody told him that the fishermen +were going to race that day. He took another +look. “Race to-day? Pooh! they’ll do well to +stay hove-to to-day.” Of course, that ought to +have settled it, the admiral having said it.</p> +<p>It blew that day. Leaving home I had time for +a bite to eat and a wash-up. I turned the corner +and picked up Clancy, with Maurice Blake, Tom +O’Donnell and Wesley Marrs just ahead. We ran +into Mr. Edkins, a nice old gentleman, who had +been made secretary of the race committee. What +he didn’t know about fishing would be the making +of a “killer,” but, of course, he wasn’t picked out +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_236' name='page_236'></a>236</span> +for that––he’d never fished a day in his life––but +because of his knowledge of the rules of yacht +racing. Having had long experience in managing +yachting regattas, he knew all about time allowances +and sail measurements––though there were +to be no allowances of any kind here. It was to be +boat for boat in this race; every vessel for herself. +So he was thought to be a good man to have to +look after the stake and judges’ boats. It was +Gloucester’s Anniversary celebration, with a lot of +strangers in town––the Governor and a whole +holdful of national characters––and in deference +to them the race was to be managed so that spectators +might have a chance to see it.</p> +<p>Mr. Edkins came along in his official regalia––tall +hat, frock coat, umbrella, gloves, and a pink +in his button-hole.</p> +<p>“Is it true, Captain O’Donnell, that the race is +going to be held to-day?”</p> +<p>O’Donnell looked at him as though he didn’t +understand. “To-day? to-day?––Good Lord, are +we all on the wrong tack? And sure isn’t this the +day?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes––oh, yes, Captain O’Donnell, this is +the day appointed. And that is the trouble. +Surely you are not going to race to-day?”</p> +<p>“We’re not going to––” broke in Wesley Marrs, +“and why aren’t we going to race to-day? What +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_237' name='page_237'></a>237</span> +in the name of all that’s good have we been doing +with our vessels up on the railway the last week or +two? What d’y’think we took the ballast out of +our vessels for? What d’y’think I had that everlasting +new balloon made for last trip in, what for +that big mains’l that Tom here had bent on the +Colleen yesterday, and for what did Maurice drive +the Johnnie Duncan home only last night? What +in–––”</p> +<p>“Wait, Captain, wait. What I mean is, do you +know how it is outside? They’ve telegraphed me +that up in Boston Harbor there won’t be a steamer +leave the harbor to-day––it’s as stormy as that. +There are two big ocean liners––and we’ve got +word that they won’t leave––won’t dare to leave––not +a steamer of any kind will leave Boston Harbor +to-day. And outside a heavy sea running––with +the wind fifty-four miles an hour, the weather +bureau says. Fifty-four miles an hour. That’s not +street corner talk––it’s official. And–––”</p> +<p>“Divil take it, does being official make it blow +any harder?” asked O’Donnell.</p> +<p>“And I know the way you fishermen will try +to carry on. I know, I know––don’t tell me you’re +careful. I tell you, Captain O’Donnell, and you, +Captain Marrs, I tell you all––that if you persist +in racing to-day I wash my hands of the whole +affair––completely wash my–––”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_238' name='page_238'></a>238</span></div> +<p>“Well, ’tis a fine wash day, too. Come, Wesley––come, +Maurice, we’ll have to be getting on.”</p> +<p>They left Mr. Edkins standing there. A little +farther on they overtook the manager of the insurance +company, which had policies on most of +the fishing vessels. He was just about to enter his +office when O’Donnell spied him. “Hullo, there’s +the man I want to see––” and hailed, “Just heave +to a minute, Mr. Brooks, if you please. Now look +here, you know we’ve took a few pigs of iron out +our vessels, and you know it looks like a bit of +weather outside. Now, what I want to know is +if I capsize the Colleen Bawn to-day––if I don’t +come home with her––does my wife get the insurance? +That’s what I want to know––does my +wife get the insurance?”</p> +<p>Mr. Brooks looked at O’Donnell, rubbed his +chin and scratched his head, then looked at O’Donnell +again. “Why, I suppose it all comes under the +usual risk of fishing vessels. I suppose so––but––h-m––it +will be pretty risky, won’t it? But let me +see––wait a moment now––there’s the President inside, +and Mr. Emerson, too––he’s a director.”</p> +<p>He went inside, and we could see that they were +talking it over. Pretty soon they all came out +with the President of the company in front. +“Good-morning, Captain O’Donnell––Captain +Marrs, good-morning. How do you do, Maurice? +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_239' name='page_239'></a>239</span> +Captain O’Donnell, take it from me as +official, your insurance on the Colleen Bawn is +safe. For the honor and glory of old Gloucester +go ahead and sink her.”</p> +<p>“And the Lucy Foster?” asked Wesley.</p> +<p>“And the Lucy Foster, Captain Marrs.”</p> +<p>“Of course the Johnnie Duncan, speaking for +the owners?” asked Maurice.</p> +<p>“For every vessel that we insure that leaves the +harbor to race to-day.”</p> +<p>“Hurroo!” said O’Donnell. “Don’t tell me, +Wesley, I’m no––what’s it?––dip-lo-mat. Yes, +dip-lo-mat, by the Lord!”</p> +<p>But it certainly was a desperate morning for a +race. The streets seemed to be full of men ready +to go out. There were to be only nine vessels +in the race, but another half dozen vessels were +going over to see it, and that meant more than +three or four hundred able fishermen going out. +The men that were going to stay ashore would +go up to those that were going out and say, +“Well, good-by, old man. If you don’t come +back, why, you know your grave’ll be kept green.” +And the men going out would grin and say, +“That’s all right, boy, but if she goes, she’ll go +with every rag on her,” in a half-joking way, too, +but it was the belief that morning that there might +be a whole lot of truth in that kind of joking.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_240' name='page_240'></a>240</span></div> +<p>Before we reached the dock we knew that the +whole town had learned pretty much that half a +dozen of the skippers had promised each other in +Mrs. Arkell’s kitchen the night before, “No sail +comes off except what’s blown off,” and there +promised to be some blown off. Men who had +only just heard their skippers speak of that were +bragging of it in the streets. “Why,” said one of +O’Donnell’s crew as we were coming down the +dock, “if any crawly-spined crawfish loses his nerve +and jumps to our halyards, thinkin’ the Colleen’s +going to capsize––why, he’ll get fooled––and +why? Because our halyards are all housed aloft––by +the skipper’s orders.”</p> +<p>That sounded strong, but it was true. When +we reached the end of our dock we looked for +ourselves, and there it was. The Colleen’s crew +had hoisted their mains’l already and there she lay +swayed up and all ready, and men aloft were even +then putting the seizing on. Tom O’Donnell himself +was pointing it out to Sam Hollis with a good +deal of glee, thinking, I suppose, to worry Hollis, +who, to uphold his reputation, would have to do +the same and take the chances that went with it. +By this time everybody knew that Hollis had put +his ballast back during the night. One of Wesley +Marrs’s men jumped onto the Withrow and below +and had a look for himself. He couldn’t get down +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_241' name='page_241'></a>241</span> +by way of the hatches––they were battened down––but +he dropped into the forec’s’le and, before +anybody knew what he was up to, he had slipped +through the forehold and into the mainhold and +there he saw where they had hurriedly put back +the flooring, and he also saw extra barrels of sand +tiered low for further stiffening of the Withrow. +He was discovered before he got on deck and +nearly beaten to a jelly before he got up on the +wharf again. It ended in a fine little riot with +some of our gang and O’Donnell’s mixing in. +Clancy came down the back-stay like a man falling +from the mast-head, so as to be into it before it was +over. He was almost too late––but not quite. +Only old Mr. Duncan coming along with half a +dozen other dignified owners stopped it. But there +was time for Clancy to speak his mind out to Sam +Hollis. And that gave Hollis a chance to say, +“Well, talk away, Tommie Clancy, but this is the +day I make the Johnnie Duncan take in sail.” And +Clancy answered him, “That so! Well, no matter +what happens, put this down, Maurice Blake hangs +to his canvas longer than Sam Hollis to-day––hangs +to it or goes over with it or the spars come +out of the Johnnie Duncan.”</p> +<p>After the talking was over we thought Hollis +would be shamed into sending a man aloft to mouse +his halyards too. But not for Hollis. That was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_242' name='page_242'></a>242</span> +a little too much for him. Clancy and three or +four others finished attending to our own halyards +and overhauling the gear aloft. Our mains’l was +already hoisted and the other three lowers with +stops loosed were all ready to hoist too. The +mains’l had been left standing just as it was when +the Johnnie Duncan came in that morning. It was +flat as a board, and I remember how grieved we +were when we had to lower it again because the tug +that came to give us a kick out from the dock could +not turn us around with it up––it was blowing so. +The tug captain said he might manage to turn it +against the sun, but that would be bad luck of +course, and he knew the crew wouldn’t stand for it, +especially with a race like this on hand. It had to +be with the sun; and so we had to lower it again, +and when the vessel was turned around, hoist it +again, not forgetting to lash the halyards aloft +again too. But after we’d got it swayed up it +didn’t set near so well as before––too baggy to our +way of thinking.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_243' name='page_243'></a>243</span> +<a name='XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE' id='XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE'></a> +<h2>XXXI</h2> +<h3>THE START OF THE RACE</h3> +</div> +<p>We got away at last and beat out the harbor +with the Lucy Foster, the Colleen Bawn, +the Withrow, the Nannie O, and four others. For +other company going out there was a big steam-yacht +with Minnie Arkell and her friends aboard, +which did not get out of the harbor. Out by the +Point they shipped a sea and put back, with Minnie +Arkell waving her handkerchief and singing out––“Don’t +take in any sail, Maurice,” as they turned +back. There was also the Eastern Point, a high-sided +stubby steamer, at that time running regularly +to Boston; and there was the New Rochelle, a +weak-looking excursioner that might have done for +Long Island Sound, where somebody said she’d +just come from, but which didn’t seem to fit in +here. Her passengers were mostly fishermen––crews +of vessels not in the race. There was also a +big powerful iron sea-tug, the Tocsin, that promised +to make better weather of it than any of the +others.</p> +<p>Billie Simms was one of the men who were not +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_244' name='page_244'></a>244</span> +going in the race but intended to see some of it. +He was in the Henry Clay Parker, a fine-looking +vessel that was not so very fast, but had the reputation +of being wonderfully stiff. Coming out past +Eastern Point lighthouse, where he could begin +to get a look at things, Billie hollered out that he +was sorry he hadn’t entered. “Looks to me like the +vessel that’ll stay right side up the longest ought +to win this race, and that’s the Henry C.” He +hauled her across our stern while he was yelling and +I remember she took one roll down to her sheer +poles when passing on, and Maurice sang out, +“Look out, Billie, or you’ll capsize her.”</p> +<p>“Capsize this one? Lord, Maurice, I’ve tried +it a dozen times and I’m damned if I could,” and +he went rolling on like nothing I ever saw, unless +it was the rest of us who were then manœuvring for +the start. We passed the Parker again before we +got to the line, and old Peter Hines, who was +hanging to her main-rigging, had to yell us his +good wishes. “Drive her, Maurice-boy, and whatever +you do don’t let the man that took your +vessel from you beat you home,” meaning Sam +Hollis of course. Maurice waved his hand, but +said nothing. He was looking serious enough, +however.</p> +<p>Tommie Clancy was the boy who wasn’t worrying +particularly. He saluted Peter as if he were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_245' name='page_245'></a>245</span> +going out on a holiday excursion. “Ain’t she a +dog, Peter? Watch her.”</p> +<p>“That’s what she is––and drive her, Tommie––drive +her.”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll drive her, Peter,” called back Tommie, +and began:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p>I love old Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>“Let you alone, Tommie, and you’ll get your +prayer some day,” was Peter’s last hail as we +straightened out for the swoop across the line.</p> +<p>Clancy was to the wheel then with the skipper. +Both were lashed and we had life-lines around +deck. To the wheel of every vessel in the fleet +were two men lashed, and they all had life-lines +around deck.</p> +<p>In crossing the line there was no attempt at jockeying +such as one often sees in yacht racing. There +was no disposition on the part of any skipper to do +anything that would set anybody else back. Of +course, everybody wanted to be in a good berth and +to cross between the guns; but the idea was to give +the vessels such a try out as they would get out to +sea––as if they were making a passage in a breeze. +The course––forty-two miles or so––was very short +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_246' name='page_246'></a>246</span> +for a fisherman, for one great thing in a fisherman +is her power to stand a long drag. Day and night +in and day and night out and driving all the time +is the way a fisherman wants it. Any sort of racing +machine could be built to stand a little hard +going for a while. But that wouldn’t be living +through a long hard winter’s gale on the Banks––one +of those blows where wind and sea––and in +shoal water at that––have a chance to do their +worst. Fishermen are built for that sort of work +and on their sea-worthiness depends not only the +fortunes of owners but the lives of men––of real +men––and the happiness and comfort of wives and +children ashore. And so the idea in everybody’s +mind that day was to make this test as nearly fair +as could be and see who had the fastest and most +weatherly boat in the fleet. There were men to +the wheel that day who could handle big fishermen +as if they were cat-boats, who would have +dared and did, later, dare to sail their vessels as +close to a mark in this sea as men sail a twenty-foot +knockabout in the smoothest of waters inshore––only +with the fishermen a slip-up meant the loss of +a vessel, maybe other vessels too, and twenty-five +or fifty lives perhaps.</p> +<p>And so the skill of these men was not used to +give anybody the worst of it. A fair start and +give everybody his chance was the idea. Thus +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_247' name='page_247'></a>247</span> +Tommie Ohlsen could have forced the Withrow +outside the starting boat and compelled her to come +about and maybe lose a few minutes, but he did +not. He held up and let her squeeze through. +O’Donnell in his turn could have crowded Ohlsen +when he let up on the Withrow, but he did not. +He, too, held up in turn and let Ohlsen have his +swing going across.</p> +<p>Across we went, one after the other. West-sou’west +was the course to a stake-boat, which we +were told would be found off Egg Rock, fourteen +miles away. We had only the compass to go by, +for at the start it was rain and drizzle, as well as +wind and a big sea, and you couldn’t see a mile +ahead. On the way we shot by the New Rochelle, +which had started ahead with the intention of waiting +for the fleet at the first stake-boat. Now she +was headed back, wabbing awfully. From Billie +Simms, who went over part of the course in the +Henry Clay Parker ahead of the fleet, we got +word of the trouble as we went by. The New +Rochelle was beginning to leak. “You c’n spit +between her deck-planks and into her hold––she’s +that loose,” hollered Billie. I don’t think the fishermen +aboard of her minded much so long as she +stayed afloat, but her captain, a properly licensed +man, did, I expect, and so she put back with some +of them growling, I heard afterward, “and after +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_248' name='page_248'></a>248</span> +paying their little old three dollars to see only the +start of the race.” Her captain reported, when he +got in, that he didn’t see anything outside but a +lot of foolish fishermen trying to drown themselves.</p> +<p>The first leg was before the wind and the Lucy +Foster and the Colleen Bawn went it like bullets. +I don’t expect ever again to see vessels run faster +than they did that morning. On some of those +tough passages from the Banks fishing vessels may +at times have gone faster than either of these did +that morning. It is likely, for where a lot of able +vessels are all the time trying to make fast passages––skippers +who are not afraid to carry sail +and vessels that can stand the dragging––and in +all kinds of chances––there must in the course of +years of trying be some hours when they do get +over an everlasting lot of water. But there are +no means of checking up. Half the time the men +do not haul the log for half a day or more. Some +of the reports of speed of fishermen at odd times +have been beyond all records, and so people who +do not know said they must be impossible. But +here was a measured course and properly anchored +stake-boats––and the Lucy and the Colleen did that +first leg of almost fourteen sea-miles in fifty minutes, +which is better than a 16-1/2 knot clip, and +that means over nineteen land miles an hour. I +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_249' name='page_249'></a>249</span> +think anybody would call that pretty fast going. +And, as some of them said afterward, “Lord in +Heaven! suppose we’d had smooth water!” But +I don’t think that the sea checked them so very +much––not as much as one might think, for they +were driving these vessels.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_250' name='page_250'></a>250</span> +<a name='XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS' id='XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS'></a> +<h2>XXXII</h2> +<h3>O’DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS</h3> +</div> +<p>We were next to the last vessel across the +starting line. The Nannie O––we +couldn’t see them all––about held the Lucy Foster +and the Colleen Bawn level. The Withrow +showed herself to be a wonderful vessel off the +wind, too. Wesley Marrs was around the stake-boat +first. In the fog and drizzle the leaders +did not find the stake-boat at once. Wesley happening +to be nearest to it when they did see it, +got the benefit and was first around. We were +close up, almost near enough to board the Withrow’s +quarter rounding. I am not sure that the +skipper and Clancy, who were to the wheel, did +not try to give Hollis a poke with the end of our +long bowsprit; but if they did, the Johnnie was +not quite fast enough for that. The Withrow +beat us around. Looking back we could see the +others coming like wild horses. Every one of +them, except one that carried away something and +hauled up and out of it, was diving into it to the +foremast with every leap the same as we had been. +On that first leg nobody could stand anywhere +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_251' name='page_251'></a>251</span> +for’ard of the fore-hatch or he would have been +swept overboard.</p> +<p>Leaving Egg Rock and going for Minot’s +Ledge, the skipper left the wheel and George Nelson +took his place beside Clancy. It was drizzling +then, every now and then that settling down so +that we couldn’t see three lengths ahead. At such +times we simply hoped that nobody ahead would +carry away anything or in any way become disabled +in the road.</p> +<p>Well clear of the stake-boat, however, it lifted +and we could see what we were doing. The Lucy +Foster was still ahead with O’Donnell and Ohlsen +and Hollis almost abreast––no more than a few +lengths between. Practically they were all about +just as they started. We were next. It was a +broad reach to Minot’s Ledge and hard going for +all hands. It must be remembered that we all had +everything on, even to balloon and staysails, and +our halyards were lashed aloft. The men to the +mast-head, who were up there to shift tacks, were +having a sweet time of it hanging on, even lashed +though they were.</p> +<p>Everybody was pretty well strung up at this +time. The skipper, a line about his elbow, was +hooked up to the main-rigging––the weather side, +of course––and it was up to a man’s waist and +boiling white on the lee side. The crew were snug +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_252' name='page_252'></a>252</span> +up under the weather rail and hanging on––no +mistake either about the way they were hanging +on. Every once in awhile one of us would poke +his head up to see what they were doing to +windward of us. Mr. Duncan, who had come +aboard just before we left the dock, was trying to +sit on the weather bitt near the wheel-box. He +had a line around his waist, too. He had bet a +lot of money with Withrow on the race, but I don’t +think that his money was worrying him half so +much as some other things then.</p> +<p>So far as we could see at this time we were +making as good weather as any of them. And our +best chance––the beat home––was yet to come. +The Johnnie had the stiffness for that. Had the +Johnnie reached Gloucester from the Cape Shore +earlier she, too, would have been lightened up and +made less stiff. To be sure she would have had +her bottom scrubbed and we would have had her +up to racing pitch, with every bit of sail just so and +her trim gauged to a hair’s depth, but that did not +matter so very much now. The Johnnie was in +shape for a hard drag like this, and for that we +had to thank the tricky Sam Hollis. We began to +see that after all it was a bit of good luck our +vessel not being home in time to tune up the same +as the rest of the fleet.</p> +<p>It was along about here––half-way on the reach +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_253' name='page_253'></a>253</span> +to Minot’s––that Tommie Ohlsen broke his main-gaff. +It was the fault of the Eastern Point, the +Boston steamer. She had gone ahead of the fleet, +taking almost a straight course for Minot’s Ledge. +Reaching across from Half-Way Rock to Minot’s +the fleet began to overhaul her. She, making bad +weather of it along here, started to turn around. +But, rolling to her top-rail, it was too much for +them, and her captain kept her straight on for Boston. +That was all right, but her action threw Ohlsen +off. She was right in the Nannie O’s way, and +to save the steamer and themselves from a collision +and certain loss of life, Ohlsen had to jibe the +Nannie O, and so suddenly that the Nannie O’s +gaff broke under the strain. And that lost Ohlsen +his chance for the race. It was too bad, for with +Ohlsen, Marrs, and O’Donnell, each in his own +vessel in a breeze, you could put the names in a +hat and shake them up. When we went by the +Nannie O her crew were getting the trysail out +of the hold, and they finished the race with that, +and made good going of it, as we saw afterward. +Indeed, a trysail that day would have been sail +enough for almost any men but these.</p> +<p>Before we reached Minot’s there was some sail +went into the air. One after the other went the +balloons––on the Foster, the Colleen, the +Withrow and at last on us. I don’t know whether +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_254' name='page_254'></a>254</span> +they had any trouble on the others––being too busy +with our own to watch––but we came near to losing +men with ours. It got caught under our keel, +and we started to try to haul it in––the skipper +having an economical notion of saving the owner +the expense of a new sail, I suppose. But Mr. +Duncan, seeing what he was at, sang out: “Let the +sail go to the devil, Captain––I’ll pay for the new +one myself.” Even at that we had to crawl out on +the bowsprit––six or eight of us––with sharp +knives, and cut it away, and we were glad to get +back again. The Johnnie never slackened. It +was desperate work.</p> +<p>Rounding Minot’s, Tom O’Donnell gave an exhibition +of desperate seamanship. He had made +up his mind, it seems, that he was due to pass +Wesley Marrs along here. But first he had to get +by the Withrow. Off Minot’s was the turning +buoy, with just room, as it was considered, for one +vessel at a time to pass safely in that sea.</p> +<p>O’Donnell figured that the tide being high there +was easily room for two, and then breasted up to +the Withrow, outside of her and with the rocks +just under his quarter. Hollis, seeing him come, +made a motion as if to force him on the rocks, but +O’Donnell, standing to his own wheel, called out––“You +do, Sam Hollis, and we’ll both go.” There +certainly would have been a collision, with both +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_255' name='page_255'></a>255</span> +vessels and both crews––fifty men––very likely lost, +but Hollis weakened and kept off. That kind of +work was too strong for him. He had so little +room that his main-boom hit the can-buoy as he +swept by.</p> +<p>Once well around O’Donnell, in great humor, +and courting death, worked by Hollis and then, +making ready to tack and pass Wesley’s bow, let +the Colleen have her swing, but with all that sail on +and in that breeze, there could be only one outcome. +And yet he might have got away with it +but for his new foremast, which, as he had feared, +had not the strength it should have had. He let +her go, never stopped to haul in his sheets––he had +not time to if he was to cross Wesley’s bow. So he +swung her and the full force of the wind getting +her laid both spars over the side––first one and +then the other clean as could be.</p> +<p>Hollis never stopped or made a motion to help, +but kept on after the Lucy Foster. We almost ran +over O’Donnell, but luffed in time, and the skipper +called out to O’Donnell that we’d stand by and +take his men off.</p> +<p>O’Donnell was swearing everything blue. “Go +on––go on––don’t mind me. Go on, I tell you. +We’re all right. I’ll have her under jury rig and +be home for supper. Go on, Maurice––go on and +beat that divil Hollis!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_256' name='page_256'></a>256</span></div> +<p>Half way to Eastern Point on the way back +saw us in the wake of the Withrow, which was +then almost up with the Lucy Foster. It was the +beat home now, with all of us looking to see the +Withrow do great things, for just off the ways +and with all her ballast in she was in great trim +for it. Going to windward, too, was generally +held to be her best point of sailing. All that Hollis +had to do was to keep his nerve and drive her.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_257' name='page_257'></a>257</span> +<a name='XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN' id='XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN'></a> +<h2>XXXIII</h2> +<h3>THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN</h3> +</div> +<p>Hollis was certainly driving her now. He +ought to have felt safe in doing so with +the Lucy Foster to go by, for the Lucy, by reason +of the ballast taken out of her, should, everything +else being equal, capsize before the Withrow.</p> +<p>Hollis must have had that in mind, for he followed +Wesley Marrs’s every move. Wesley was +sailing her wide. And our skipper approved of +that, too. To attempt a too close course in the +sea that was out in the Bay that day, with the +blasts of wind that were sweeping down, would +have deadened her way altogether too much––maybe +hung her up. And so it was “Keep her a +full whatever you do,” and that, with coming +about when the others did––we being afraid to +split tacks––made plenty of work for us.</p> +<p>“Hard-a-lee” it was one after the other, and for +every “Hard-a-lee” twenty of us went down into +the roaring sea fore and aft and hauled in and +slackened away sheets, while aloft, the fellows +lashed to the foremast head shifted top and staysail +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_258' name='page_258'></a>258</span> +tacks. They were wise to lash themselves +up aloft, for with every tack, she rolled down into +it as if she were never coming up, and when she +did come up shook herself as if she would snap +her topmasts off.</p> +<p>Half way to Eastern Point on the beat home it +seemed to occur to the skipper and to Clancy that +the Johnnie Duncan stood a chance to win the race. +It was Clancy, still lashed to the wheel, now with +Long Steve, turned his head for just a second to +Mr. Duncan and spoke the first word of it.</p> +<p>“Mr. Duncan, do you know, but the Johnnie’s +got a chance to win this race?”</p> +<p>“D’y’think so, Tommie––d’y’think so?”</p> +<p>Some of us in the crew had been thinking of +that same thing some time, and we watched Mr. +Duncan, who, with a life line about him, was +clinging to a bitt aft, and watching things with +tight lips, a drawn face and shiny eyes. We listened +to hear what else he might have to say. But +he didn’t realize at once what it meant. His eyes +and his mind were on the Lucy Foster.</p> +<p>“What d’y’think of the Lucy and the Withrow, +Tommie?” Mr. Duncan said next.</p> +<p>Tommie took a fresh look at the Lucy Foster, +which was certainly doing stunts. It was along +this time that big Jim Murch––a tall man, but +even so, he was no more than six feet four, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_259' name='page_259'></a>259</span> +the Lucy twenty-four feet beam––was swinging +from the ring-bolts under the windward rail and +throwing his feet out trying to touch with his heels +the sea that was swashing up on the Lucy’s deck. +And every once in a while he did touch, for the +Lucy, feeling the need of her ballast, was making +pretty heavy weather of it. Every time she rolled +and her sheer poles went under, Jim would holler +out that he’d touched again.</p> +<p>We could hear him over on the Johnnie at times. +Mr. Duncan, who believed that nothing ever built +could beat the Lucy Foster, began to worry at +that, and again he spoke to Clancy. He had to +holler to make himself heard.</p> +<p>“But what do you think of the Lucy’s chances, +Tommie?”</p> +<p>Clancy shook his head.</p> +<p>And getting nothing out of Clancy, Mr. Duncan +called out then: “What do you think of the Lucy, +you, Captain Blake?”</p> +<p>The skipper shook his head, too. “I’m afraid +it’s too much for her.”</p> +<p>And then––one elbow was hitched in the weather +rigging and a half hitch around his waist––the +skipper swung around, and looking over to the +Withrow, he went on:</p> +<p>“I don’t see, Mr. Duncan, why we don’t stand +a pretty good chance to win out on Hollis.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_260' name='page_260'></a>260</span></div> +<p>“Why not––why not––if anything happens to +the Lucy.”</p> +<p>It jarred us some to think that even there, in +spite of the great race the Johnnie was making of +it, she was still, in the old man’s eyes, only a second +string to the Lucy Foster.</p> +<p>About then the wind seemed to come harder +than ever, but Clancy at the wheel never let up +on the Johnnie. He socked it to her––wide and +free he sailed her. Kept her going––oh, but he +kept her going. “If this one only had a clean +bottom and a chance to tune her up before going +out,” said somebody, and we all said, “Oh, if she +only had––just half a day on the railway before +this race.”</p> +<p>We were fairly buried at times on the Johnnie––on +the Lucy Foster it must have been tough. +And along here the staysail came off the Withrow +and eased her a lot. We would all have been better +off with less sail along about that time. In +proof of that we could see back behind us where +the Nannie O, under her trysail, was almost holding +her own. But it wouldn’t do to take it off. +Had they not all said before putting off that morning +that what sail came off that day would be +blown off?––yes, sir––let it blow a hundred miles +an hour. And fishermen’s pride was keeping sail +on us and the Foster. Hollis tried to make it look +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_261' name='page_261'></a>261</span> +that his staysail blew off, but we knew better––a +knife to the halyards did the work.</p> +<p>It was after her big staysail was off and she making +easier weather of it that the Withrow crossed +the Lucy’s bow for the first time in the race and +took the lead.</p> +<p>We all felt for Mr. Duncan, who couldn’t seem +to believe his eyes. We all felt for Wesley, too, +who was desperately trying to hold the wind of the +Withrow––he had even rigged blocks to his jib +sheets and led them to cleats clear aft to flatten his +headsails yet more. And Wesley’s crew hauled +like demons on those jib sheets––hauled and hauled +with the vessel under way all the time––hauled so +hard, in fact, that with the extra purchase given +them by the blocks they pulled the cleats clean out, +and away went the Lucy’s jib and jumbo––and +there was Wesley hung up. And out of the race, +for we were all too near the finish for her to win +out then unless the Johnnie and the Withrow capsized +entirely.</p> +<p>Mr. Duncan, when he saw the Lucy’s crew +trying to save the headsails, couldn’t contain +himself.</p> +<p>“Cut ’em away––cut ’em to hell!” he sang out, +and we all had to smile, he spoke so excitedly. But +it was no use. The Lucy was out of the race, and +going by her, we didn’t look at Mr. Duncan nor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_262' name='page_262'></a>262</span> +Wesley Marrs––we knew they were both taking +it hard––but watched the Withrow.</p> +<p>Over on the other tack we went, first the +Withrow, then the Johnnie. We were nearing the +finish line, and we were pretty well worked up––the +awful squalls were swooping down and burying +us. We could hear Hollis’s voice and see his crew +go up when he warned his men at the wheel to +ease up on her when the squalls hit. On our vessel +the skipper never waved an arm nor opened his +mouth to Clancy at the wheel. And of his own +accord you may be sure that Clancy wasn’t easing +up. Not Tommie Clancy––no, sir––he just drove +her––let her have it full––lashed her like, with his +teeth and eyes flashing through the sea that was +swashing over him. And the Johnnie fairly +sizzled through the water.</p> +<p>There were several times in the race when we +thought the going was as bad as could be, but now +we were all sure that this was the worst of all. +There was some excuse for Mr. Duncan when he +called out:</p> +<p>“My God, Tommie, but if she makes one of +those low dives again, will she ever come up?”</p> +<p>“I dunno,” said Clancy to that. “But don’t you +worry, Mr. Duncan, if any vessel out of Gloucester’ll +come up, this one’ll come up.”</p> +<p>He was standing with the water, the clear water, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_263' name='page_263'></a>263</span> +not the swash, well up to his waist then, and we +could hear him:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>I love old Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>That was too much for Mr. Duncan, and, +watching his chance, he dove between the house +and rail, to the weather rigging, where the skipper +grabbed him and made him fast beside himself. +The old man took a look down the slant of the +deck and took a fresh hold of the rigging.</p> +<p>“Captain Blake, isn’t she down pretty low?”</p> +<p>“Maybe––maybe––Mr. Duncan, but she’ll go +lower yet before the sail comes off her. This is +the day Sam Hollis was going to make me take in +sail.”</p> +<p>Less than a minute after that we made our rush +for the line. Hollis tried to crowd us outside the +stake-boat, which was rolling head to wind and +sea, worse than a lightship in a surf gale––tried to +crowd us out just as an awful squall swooped down. +It was the Johnnie or the Withrow then. We took +it full and they didn’t, and there is all there was +to it. But for a minute it was either vessel’s race. +At the critical time Sam Hollis didn’t have the +nerve, and the skipper and Clancy did.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_264' name='page_264'></a>264</span></div> +<p>They looked at each other––the skipper and +Clancy––and Clancy soaked her. Held to it +cruelly––recklessly. It was too much to ask of a +vessel. Down she went––buried. It was heaven +or hell, as they say, for a while. I know I climbed +on to her weather run, and it was from there I +saw Withrow ducking her head to it––hove to, +in fact, for the blast to pass.</p> +<p>The Johnnie weathered it. Able––able. Up +she rose, a horse, and across the line we shot like +a bullet, and so close to the judge’s boat that we +could have jumped aboard.</p> +<p>We all but hit the Henry Clay Parker, Billie +Simms’s vessel, on the other side of the line, and +it was on her that old Peter of Crow’s Nest, leaping +into the air and cracking his heels together, +called out as we drove by:</p> +<p>“The Johnnie Duncan wins––the able Johnnie +Duncan––sailin’ across the line on her side and +her crew sittin’ out on the keel.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_265' name='page_265'></a>265</span> +<a name='XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE' id='XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE'></a> +<h2>XXXIV</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE</h3> +</div> +<p>We were hardly across the line when there +was a broom at our truck––a new broom +that I know I, for one, never saw before. And yet +I suppose every vessel that sailed in the race that +day had a new broom hid away somewhere below––to +be handy if needed.</p> +<p>But it was the Johnnie Duncan, sailing up the +harbor, that carried hers to the truck. And it was +Mr. Duncan who stood aft of her and took most +of the cheers, and it was Clancy and Long Steve +who waved their hands from the wheel-box, and +it was the skipper who leaned against the weather +rigging, and the rest of us who lined the weather +rail and answered the foolish questions of people +along the road.</p> +<p>Every vessel we met seemed to think we had +done something great; and I suppose we had in a +way––that is, skipper, crew and vessel. We had +out-carried and out-sailed the best out of Gloucester +in a breeze that was a breeze. We had taken +the chance of being capsized or hove-down and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_266' name='page_266'></a>266</span> +losing the vessel and ourselves. Mr. Duncan, I +think, realized more than anybody else at the time +what we had been through. “I didn’t know what +it really was to be,” he said, “before I started. If +I had, I doubt very much if I’d have started.” We +all said––“No, no, you’d have gone just the same, +Mr. Duncan;” and we believed he would, too.</p> +<p>Going up the harbor somebody hinted to Clancy +that he ought to go and have a mug-up for himself +after his hard work––and it had been hard work. +“And I’ll take your place at the wheel,” said that +somebody, “for you must be tired, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“And maybe I am tired, too,” answered Clancy, +“but if I am, I’m just thick enough not to know +it. But don’t fool yourself that if I stood lashed +to this wheel since she crossed the starting line this +morning I’m going to quit it now and let you take +her up the harbor and get all the bouquets. I’ll +have a mug-up by and by, and it’ll be a mug-up, +don’t you worry.”</p> +<p>And it was a mug-up. He took the gold and +silver cup given to Maurice as a skipper of the +winning vessel, and with the crew in his wake +headed a course for the Anchorage, where he filled +it till it flowed––and didn’t have to pay for filling +it, either.</p> +<p>“It’s the swellest growler that I ever expect to +empty. Gold and silver––and holds six quarts +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_267' name='page_267'></a>267</span> +level. Just a little touch all round, and we’ll fill +her up again. ‘Carte blanche, and charge it to +me,’ says Mr. Duncan.”</p> +<p>“What kind is carte blanche, Tommie?” asked +Andie Howe.</p> +<p>“They’ll tell you behind the bar,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>“Billie,” ordered Andie, “just a little touch of +carte blanche, will you, while Clancy’s talking. +He’s the slowest man to begin that ever I see. +Speeches––speeches––speeches, when your throat’s +full of gurry––dry, salty gurry. A little touch of +that carte blanche that Mr. Duncan ordered for +the crew of the Johnnie Duncan, Billie, will you?”</p> +<p>“Carte blanche––yes,” went on Clancy, “and I +callate the old fizzy stuff’s the thing to do justice +to this fe-lic-i-tous oc-ca-sion. Do I hear the voice +of my shipmates? Aye, aye, I hear them––and in +accents unmistakable. Well, here’s a shoot––six +quarts level––and a few pieces of ice floating +around on top. My soul, but don’t it look fine and +rich? Have a look, everybody.”</p> +<p>“Let’s have a drink instead,” hollered Parsons.</p> +<p>Clancy paid no attention to that. “Who was +the lad in that Greek bunch in the old days that +they sank up to his neck in the lake––cold sparkling +water––and peaches and oranges and grapes +floating on a little raft close by––but him fixed so +he couldn’t bend his head down to get a drink nor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_268' name='page_268'></a>268</span> +lift his head to take a bite of fruit––and hot +weather all the time, mind you. Lord, the thirst +he raised after a while! What was his––oh, yes, +Tantalus––that’s the lad, Tantalus––the cold +sparkling water. Man, the thirst he–––”</p> +<p>“The thirst of Tantalus ain’t a patch on the +thirst I got. And this is something better than +cold sparkling water. That’s you all over, Tommie––joking +at serious times,” wailed Parsons.</p> +<p>“Is it as bad as that with you, Eddie? Well, +let’s forget Tantalus and drink instead to the +able-est, handsom-est, fast-est vessel that ever +weathered Eastern Point––to the Johnnie Duncan––and +her skipper.”</p> +<p>“And Mr. Duncan, Tommie––he’s all right, +too.”</p> +<p>“Yes, of course, Mr. Duncan. And while we’re +at it, here’s to the whole blessed gang of us––skipper, +owner and crew––we’re all corkers.”</p> +<p>“Drive her, Tommie!” roared a dozen voices, +and Tommie drove her for a good pint before he +set the cup down again.</p> +<p>It was a great celebration altogether. Wherever +one of our gang was there was an admiring +crowd. Nobody but us was listened to. And the +questions we had to answer! And of course we +were all willing enough to talk. We must have +told the story of the race over about twenty times +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_269' name='page_269'></a>269</span> +each. After a while, of course, some of our fellows, +with all the entertaining and admiration that +was handed out to them, had to put a touch or two +to it. It was strong enough to tell the bare facts +of that race, I thought, but one or two had to give +their imaginations a chance. One man, a fisherman, +one of those who had been on one of the excursion +boats, and so didn’t see the race at all, +came along about two hours after the Duncan +crew struck the Anchorage and listened to Andie +Howe for a while. And going away it was he who +said, “It must have been a race that. As near as +I c’n make it out the Johnnie sailed most of that +race keel up.”</p> +<p>“Oh, don’t go away mad,” Andie called after +him. “Come back and have a little touch of carte +blanche––it’s on the old man.”</p> +<p>“I’ll take it for him,” came a voice. It was old +Peter of Crow’s Nest, who took his drink and +asked for Clancy. Clancy was in the back part of +the room, and I ran and got him. Peter led the +way to the sidewalk.</p> +<p>“Tommie, go and get Maurice, if it ain’t too +late.”</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“It’s Minnie Arkell. Coming up the dock after +the race she ran up and grabbed him and threw her +arms about his neck. ‘You’re the man to sail a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_270' name='page_270'></a>270</span> +race in heavy weather,’ she hollers, and a hundred +people looking on. And there’s half a dozen of +those friends of hers and they’re up to her house +and now making ready for a wine celebration. Go +and get him before it is too late.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_271' name='page_271'></a>271</span> +<a name='XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW' id='XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW'></a> +<h2>XXXV</h2> +<h3>CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW</h3> +</div> +<p>Clancy started on the run and I after him. +“We’ll go to his boarding-house first, Joe, +and if he’s not there, to Minnie Arkell’s.”</p> +<p>He wasn’t in his boarding-house, and we hurried +out. On the sidewalk we almost ran into +little Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>“Oh, Captain Clancy––or you, Joe Buckley––won’t +you tell me about the race? Grandpa was +too busy to tell me, but went down the wharf with +a lot of people to show them the Johnnie Duncan. +They all left the office and told me to mind it. +And my cousin Alice came in with Joe’s cousin +Nell. And I saw Captain Blake with some people +and ran after him and I just caught up with him +and they went off and left me. And then a little +while ago he came back by himself and ran toward +the dock and didn’t even see me. And Captain +Blake used to be so good to me!” Poor Johnnie +was all but crying.</p> +<p>“Toward the dock? That’s good,” breathed +Clancy. “Stay here, Johnnie, and we’ll tell you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_272' name='page_272'></a>272</span> +about the race when we get back,” and led the +way to Mr. Duncan’s office.</p> +<p>We found the skipper in the outer office, standing +beside the bookkeeper’s desk and looking out +of the window next the slip. Hearing us coming +he turned and then we saw that he held in his +hands an open box with a string of beautiful pearls. +Noticing us gaze at the pearls in surprise, he said, +“Mr. Duncan gave me these for winning the race. +And I took them, thinking that somebody or other +might like them.”</p> +<p>“And don’t she?” asked Clancy––it seemed to +slip out of Tommie without his knowing it.</p> +<p>“I guess not,” said Maurice. Only then did it +flash on me what it all might mean.</p> +<p>“Did you try?” asked Clancy.</p> +<p>“Try! Yes, and was made a fool of. Oh, +what’s the use––what in hell’s the use?” He stood +silent a moment. “I guess not,” he said then––looked +out the window again, and hove the whole +string out of the open window and into the slip.</p> +<p>Clancy and myself both jumped to stop him, but +we weren’t quick enough. They were gone––the +whole beautiful necklace. The skipper fixed his +eyes on where they had struck the water. Then +he turned and left the office. At the door he +stopped and said: “I don’t know––maybe I won’t +take the Johnnie next trip, and if I don’t, Tommie, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_273' name='page_273'></a>273</span> +I hope you’ll take her––Mr. Duncan will let you +have her if you want. I hope you’ll take her anyway, +for you know what a vessel she is. You’ll +take care of her––” and went and left us.</p> +<p>Clancy swore to himself for a while. He hadn’t +quite done when the door of the rear office opened +and Miss Foster herself came out. She greeted +me sweetly––she always did––but was going out +without paying any attention to Clancy. She +looked pale––although perhaps I would not have +noticed her paleness particularly only for what had +just happened.</p> +<p>I was surprised to see then what Clancy did. +Before she had got to the door he was beside +her.</p> +<p>“Miss Foster, Miss Foster,” he said, and his +tone was so different from what I had ever heard +from him before that I could hardly believe it. He +was a big man, it must be remembered, and still +on him were the double-banked oilskins and heavy +jack-boots he wore through the race. Also his +face was flushed from the excitement of the day––the +salt water was not yet dry on him and his +eyes were shining, shining not alone with the glow +of a man who had been lashed to a wheel steering +a vessel in a gale––and, too, to victory––for hours, +and not alone with the light that comes from two +or three quarts of champagne––it was something +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_274' name='page_274'></a>274</span> +more than that. Whatever it was it surprised me +and held Alice Foster’s attention.</p> +<p>“Mister Clancy,” she said, and turned to him.</p> +<p>“Yes, Mister Clancy––or Tommie Clancy––or +Captain Clancy, as it is at times––master of an odd +vessel now and again––but Clancy all the time––just +Clancy, good-for-nothing Clancy––hard drinker––reveller––night-owl––disturber +of the peace––at +best only a fisherman who’ll by and by go out +and get lost like thousands of the other fishermen +before him––as a hundred every year do now and +have three lines in the paper––name, age, birthplace, +street and number of his boarding-house, +and that will be the end of it. But that don’t +matter––Tommie Clancy, whatever he is, is a +friend of Maurice Blake’s. And he means to +speak a word for Maurice.</p> +<p>“For a long time now, Miss Foster, Maurice has +thought the world of you. He never told me––he +never told anybody. But I know him. He waited +a long time, I’m sure, before he even told himself––maybe +even before he knew it himself. But I +knew it––bunk-mates, watch-mates, dory-mates +we’ve been. He’s master of a fine vessel now and +I’m one of his crew. He’s gone ahead and I’ve +stayed behind. Why? Because he’s carried in his +heart the picture of a girl he thought could be all a +woman ought to be to a man. And that was well +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_275' name='page_275'></a>275</span> +A man like Maurice needs that, and maybe––maybe––you’re +all that he thought and more maybe, Miss +Foster. Wait––he had that picture before his eyes +all the time. I hadn’t any picture. Years ago, +when I was Maurice’s age, I might have had something +like it, and now look at me. And why? +Why, Miss Foster, you’re a woman––could you +guess? No? Think. What’s running in a man’s +head, do you think, in the long winter nights when +he’s walking the deck, with the high heavens above +and the great, black rolling sea around him? +What’s in his head when, trawls hauled and his +fish aboard, when the danger and the hard work +are mostly by, his vessel’s going to the west’ard? +What when he’s an hour to rest and he’s lying, +smoking and thinking, in his bunk? What’s been +in Maurice’s head and in his heart all the years he’s +loafed with the likes of me and yet never fell to +my level? Anything he ever read anywhere, do +you think, or was it a warm image that every time +he came ashore and was lucky enough to get a +look at you he could see was true to the woman +it stood for? When you had no more idea of it +than what was going on at the North Pole he was +watching you––and thinking of you. Always +thinking of you, Miss Foster. He never thought +he had a chance. I know him. Who asks a +woman like you to share a fisherman’s life? Is it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_276' name='page_276'></a>276</span> +a man like Maurice? Sometimes––maybe with +the blood racing through him after a great race he +might. A while ago he did, Miss Foster. And +what gave him the courage?</p> +<p>“Listen to me now, Miss Foster, and say what +you please afterward. Maurice and I are friends. +Friends. I’ve been with him on the bottom of a +capsized dory when we both expected we’d hauled +our last trawl––with the seas washing over us and +we both getting weak and him getting black in +the face––and maybe I was, too. I told you this +once before, but let me tell it again. ‘Come and +take the plug strap, Tommie,’ he says to me. +‘Come and take the plug strap.’ Do you know +what that means, Miss Foster?––and the seas +sweeping over you and your whole body getting +numb? And I’ve been with him four days and +four nights––astray in the fog of the Western +Banks in winter, and, for all we knew and believed, +we were gone. In times like those men get +to know each other, and I tell you, Miss Foster––” +Clancy choked and stopped. “To-day +he sailed a race the like of which was never sailed +before. A dozen times he took the chance of himself +going over the rail. And why? The better +to keep an eye on things and help his vessel along? +Yes. But why that? For that cup we’ve drowned +a dozen times in wine to-day? He never looked +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_277' name='page_277'></a>277</span> +twice at it when he got ashore. He hasn’t seen it +since he handed it to me on the dock. The boys +might like to look at it, he said. He’s forgot he +ever won it by now. He let us take it up to a +rum-shop and drink out of it the same as if it was +a tin-pail––the beautiful gold and silver cup––engraved. +We used it for a growler for all Maurice +cared for the value of it, and there’s forty men +walking the streets now that’s got a list they got +out of that cup. We might have lost it, battered +each other’s drunken heads in with it, and he +wouldn’t have said a dozen words about it. But +there was a necklace of pearls, and he thought you’d +like them. ‘To you, Maurice, for winning the +race,’ says Mr. Duncan, ‘for winning the race,’ +and hands Maurice the pearls––your own guardian, +Miss Foster, and most crazy, he was that +pleased. And that’s what Maurice ran up to get +when the race was over––there was something a +girl might like, or thought so. And then what? +On the way down a woman that I know––that you +know––tried to hold him up. Kissed him before a +hundred people––she knew you were waiting––she +knew, trust a woman––and walked down part way +with him, because you were looking. And he being +a man, and weak, and only twenty-six––and the +racing blood still running through him––maybe +forgot himself for five minutes––not knowing you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_278' name='page_278'></a>278</span> +were within a mile. That doesn’t excuse him? No, +you’re right, it don’t. But he, poor boy, knowing +nothing––what does a boy of twenty-six know?––knowing +nothing––suspecting nothing––and yet, if +he forgot himself, he never really forgot you. He +hurries on to you and offers you the necklace that +he risked his life to get. And you––what did you +say?”</p> +<p>“What did I say? I told him that perhaps he +knew somebody that he’d rather give it to before +me–––”</p> +<p>“Before you? There’s a woman. You’re not +satisfied when a man fights all the devil in himself +for you, but you must rub it into him while +he’s doing it. Maurice––or maybe you don’t understand. +You could say things like that to a dog––if +a dog could understand––and he’d come back +and lick your hand. Maurice has blood and fire in +him. And here’s a woman––whatever else she is––is +warm-blooded too. She wants Maurice, and, +by God, she’ll get him if you keep on. Do you remember +the night of the Master Mariners’ ball––the +night before we sailed on the Southern cruise? +Well, that night this woman, she waits for Maurice +and stops him on his way home. But she didn’t +get him. He was up in the wind for a minute or +two, but one spoke of the wheel and he found his +head again. Again last June in Newport on a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_279' name='page_279'></a>279</span> +warm summer’s night––flowers, music, wine––the +cabin of a beautiful yacht––she asks him to wait +over a day or two in Newport harbor. Does he? +Does he? Not Maurice. With never a touch of +the wheel, off he swings and drives for home. And +why didn’t he stay? Why, do you suppose? +Didn’t he tell you a while ago? Good God! Look +here––you’re no fool. Look at me––ten years ago +I was another Maurice. And this woman––I tell +you she knows men. She don’t care whether a +man is rich or poor, tall or short, thin or fat, so +long as she likes him. And I tell you she loves +Maurice––as well as she can love––and she’s not +a good enough woman––there it is. And they’re +all saying you’re likely to marry Withrow. Wait +now. Withrow, I’m telling you, isn’t fit to wash +the gurry off Maurice’s jack-boots. I’m a careless +man, Miss Foster, and in my life I’ve done things +I wish now I hadn’t, but I draw the line above the +head of a man like Withrow. Whatever I am, +I’m too good to be company for Fred Withrow. +And on top of all that he’s so carried away with +this other woman––this same woman––and she +caring more for Maurice’s eyelash than Withrow’s +whole two hundred and ten pounds––Withrow is +so carried away with her that he is ready to elope +with her––elope with her! I know that––never +mind how. Bring Withrow and me together, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_280' name='page_280'></a>280</span> +I’ll tell him––tell him, yes, and throw him through +the door afterward if he denies it. This woman +is enough of a woman to want Maurice––Maurice +with nothing at all––before Withrow with all he’s +got and all he can get her or give her––and she’s +clever enough to come pretty near getting what +she wants. And now, Miss Foster, suppose you +think it over. I’m going to hunt up Maurice, +though I’m not too sure we’ll find him in a hurry. +Good-by.”</p> +<p>He swept his sou’wester wide to her and went +out the door. I said good-by without looking at +her. I was too ashamed––and went after Clancy. +But I think she was crying to herself as I went +out.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_281' name='page_281'></a>281</span> +<a name='XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED' id='XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED'></a> +<h2>XXXVI</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED</h3> +</div> +<p>The morning after the race I was eating +breakfast at home and I could not remember +when I enjoyed a meal like that one. I +had had a fine long sleep and the sleep that comes +to a man after he’s been through a long and exciting +experience does make him feel like a world-beater. +I felt that I could go out and about leap +the length of a seine-boat or rip up a plank sidewalk. +It was worth while to be alive, and everything +tasted so good.</p> +<p>I had put away six fried eggs and about fourteen +of those little slices of bacon before I even +thought of slacking up (with my mother piling +them up as fast as I lifted them off)––and maybe +I wouldn’t have slacked then only my cousin Nell +came skipping in.</p> +<p>She kissed my mother half a dozen times, and +danced around the room. “Four vessels off the +Johnnie Duncan’s model have already been ordered. +Four, auntie––four. There will be a fleet +of them yet, you’ll see. And how are you, Joe?”</p> +<p>“Fine,” I said, and kept on eating.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_282' name='page_282'></a>282</span></div> +<p>Nell didn’t like my not noticing how glad she +was feeling, I suppose, for all at once, as I was +about to sugar another cup of coffee, she ran her +hands through my hair and yanked till I couldn’t +pretend any longer.</p> +<p>“There, now, with your mind off your stomach, +perhaps you’ll look up and converse when a lady +deigns to notice you. How much money did Mr. +Withrow lose on the race?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, but it was a good pile; I know +that.”</p> +<p>“And how much did Mr. Duncan win?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know that, either; but I hope it was a +good roll, for he won about all Withrow lost.”</p> +<p>“M-m––but aren’t you in love with your old +employer? But let’s not mind common money +matters. What do you think of the Johnnie Duncan +for a vessel?”</p> +<p>“She’s a dog––a dog.”</p> +<p>“Isn’t she! And the fastest, able-est and the +handsomest vessel that ever sailed past Eastern +Point, isn’t she?”</p> +<p>“That’s what she is.”</p> +<p>“And who designed her?”</p> +<p>“Who? Let me see. Oh, yes, some local man.”</p> +<p>“You don’t know! Look up here. Who designed +her!”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes. ’Twas a Gloucester man.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_283' name='page_283'></a>283</span></div> +<p>“A Gloucester man? Look up again. Now––who––de––signed––the––John––nie––Dun––can!”</p> +<p>“Ouch, yes. A ver-y fine and a-ble––and handsome +gen-tle-man––a wonderful man.”</p> +<p>“That’s a little better. And his name?”</p> +<p>“William Somers––William the Illustrious––William +the First––‘First in war, first in peace, +and first in the hearts of Gloucestermen’––and if +you let me stand up, I’ll do a break-down to show +you how glad I am.”</p> +<p>“Now you’re showing something like appreciation. +And now where do you suppose your friend +Clancy is and your skipper?”</p> +<p>“Clancy? Lord knows. Maybe in a circle of +admiring friends, singing whatever is his latest. +‘Hove flat down’ was the last I heard. If it was +earlier in the day––about three in the morning––it +would be pretty sure to be that.”</p> +<p>“What a pity, and he such a fine man otherwise!”</p> +<p>“What’s a pity?”</p> +<p>“Why, his getting drunk, as I hear he does very +often.”</p> +<p>“Gets drunk? Who gets drunk? Clancy? +That’s news to me. As long as I’ve known him I +never saw him drunk yet. He gets mellow and +loose––but drunk! Clancy drunk? Why, Nell!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_284' name='page_284'></a>284</span></div> +<p>“Oh, well, all right, he’s an apostle of temperance +then. But Captain Blake––where is he?”</p> +<p>“I couldn’t say––why?”</p> +<p>“I have a message for him.”</p> +<p>“Did you try his boarding-house?”</p> +<p>“Yes. That is, Will did, and he wasn’t there, +hadn’t been there at all, they said, since the afternoon +before.”</p> +<p>“That so? Where else did you try? Duncan’s +office?”</p> +<p>“We did, and no word of him there.”</p> +<p>“Try Clancy’s boarding-house?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and no word.”</p> +<p>“Try––h-m––the Anchorage?”</p> +<p>“Oh, Joe, you don’t think he’s been loafing there +since?”</p> +<p>“No, I don’t. And yet after the way he got +turned down yesterday, you know––there’s no +telling what a man might do.”</p> +<p>“Well, Will looked in there, too.”</p> +<p>“You fat little fox! Why didn’t you say that at +first? And no word?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t know where he’d be then.”</p> +<p>“Nor I, except––did you notice the wind has +hauled to the northwest?”</p> +<p>“I did.”</p> +<p>“Well. Do you know that old vessel that Mr. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_285' name='page_285'></a>285</span> +Withrow’s been trying to get a crew for––the +Flamingo?”</p> +<p>“M-h-h.”</p> +<p>“Well, this morning early she went out––on a +hand-lining trip to the east’ard, it is said. And +Will says that he thinks––he doesn’t know, mind +you, because they won’t tell him anything down to +Withrow’s––but he thinks that Maurice Blake’s +shipped in her.”</p> +<p>“Wow! She won’t last out one good breeze +on the Banks.”</p> +<p>“That is just what Will said. And it’s too bad, +for I had a message for him––a message that +would make everything all right. I suppose you +can guess?”</p> +<p>“Guess? H-m-m––I don’t know as I want +to.”</p> +<p>“Well, don’t get mad about it, anyway. How +would you feel if you saw that horrid Minnie +Arkell rush up and––Oh, you know what I mean. +However, I’ve been pleading with Alice since yesterday +afternoon. For two hours I was up in her +room last evening, and poor Will walking the +veranda down below. I put Captain Blake’s case +as I thought a friend of his would put it––as you +would put it, say––perhaps better in some ways––for +I could not forget that he sailed the Johnnie +Duncan yesterday, and her winning meant so much +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_286' name='page_286'></a>286</span> +to Will. Yes, and I’m not forgetting Clancy and +the rest of her crew––indeed, I’m not––I felt as +though I could kiss every one of them.”</p> +<p>“Well, here’s one of them.”</p> +<p>“Don’t get saucy because your mother is standing +by. Go and find Maurice Blake. Go ahead, +won’t you, Joe? Tell him that everything is all +right. She is proud.”</p> +<p>“That’s a nice sounding word for it––pride. +Stuck on herself is what I’d say.”</p> +<p>“No, she isn’t. You must allow a woman self-respect, +you know.”</p> +<p>“I guess so. And it must be her long suit, seeing +she’s always leading from it.”</p> +<p>“Oh, keep your fishermen’s jokes for the mugging-up +times on your vessel. You go and get +Maurice Blake––or find Mr. Clancy and have him +get him––if he hasn’t gone on the Flamingo.”</p> +<p>So I went out. On a cruise along the water +front I found a whole lot of people. I saw Wesley +Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen––sorrowful and neither +saying much––looking after their vessels––Ohlsen +seeing to a new gaff. “I ought to’ve lost,” said +Ohlsen. “Look at that for a rotten piece of wood.” +Sam Hollis was around, too, trying to explain how +it was he didn’t win the race. But he couldn’t explain +to anybody’s satisfaction how his stays’l went +nor why he hove-to when that squall struck him––the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_287' name='page_287'></a>287</span> +same squall that shot the Johnnie Duncan +across the line. Tom O’Donnell was there, looking +down on the deck of the vessel in which he took so +much pride. “Two holes in her deck where her +spars ought to be,” he was saying when I came +along. I asked him if he had seen Maurice that +morning, and it was from him I learned for certain +that Maurice had shipped on the Flamingo. “I +didn’t see her leaving, boy, but Withrow himself +told me this morning. ‘And I hope he’ll never +come back,’ he said at the same time. ‘’Tis you +that takes a licking hard. But maybe ’tis the insurance,’ +I says. ‘If that’s what you’re thinking,’ +says he, ‘she isn’t insured.’ ‘Then it must be the +divil’s own repair she’s in when no company at all +will insure her,’ I says. Sure, we had hard words +over it, but that won’t bring back Maurice––he’s +gone in the Flamingo, Joe.”</p> +<p>I went after Clancy then, and after a long chase, +that took me to Boston and back, I caught up with +him. He was full of repentance and was gloomy. +It was up in his boarding-house––in his room. +He, looking tired, was thinking of taking a kink +of sleep.</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Joe! And I don’t wonder you look +surprised, Joe. I must be getting old. Thursday +morning I got up after as fine a night’s sleep as a +man’d want. That was Thursday. Then Thursday +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_288' name='page_288'></a>288</span> +night, Friday, Friday night, Saturday––two +nights and three days, and I’m sleepy already. +Sleepy, Joe, and I remember the time I could go +a whole week, and then, after a good night’s sleep, +wake up fine and daisy and be ready for another +week. Joe, there’s a moral in that if you can only +work it out.”</p> +<p>Clancy stayed silent after that, not inclined to +talk, I could see, until I told him about Maurice +having shipped in the Flamingo and the hard crew +that had gone in her.</p> +<p>That stirred him. “Great Lord, gone in that +shoe-box! Why, Joe, I’d as soon put to sea in a +market basket calked with butter. And the man +that’s got her––Dave Warner! He’s crazy, Joe, +if ever a man was crazy. Clean out of his head +over a girl that he met in Gloucester once, but now +living in Halifax, and she won’t have anything to +do with him. He’s daffy over her. If she was +drowning alongside you’d curse your luck because +you had to gaff her in. That is, you would only +she’s a woman, of course. Wants to get lost, Joe, +I believe––wants to! If this was Boston or New +York and in older days, I’d say that Dave and +Withrow must have shanghaied a crew to man the +Flamingo’s kind. But you c’n get men here to +go in anything sometimes. Wait a bit and I’ll be +along with you. We’ll see old Duncan and maybe +we c’n head the Flamingo off.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_289' name='page_289'></a>289</span> +<a name='XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO' id='XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO'></a> +<h2>XXXVII</h2> +<h3>THE GIRL IN CANSO</h3> +</div> +<p>That was Saturday evening. The crew of +the Johnnie had been told just after the race +by the skipper that he would not need them again +until Monday. Scattering on that, some going to +Boston, they could not be got together again until +Monday morning, and it was not until Monday +noon that we got away.</p> +<p>We fitted out as though for a Cape Shore seining +trip, and that’s what we were to do in case we +missed the Flamingo or could not persuade her +skipper or Maurice himself that he ought to leave +her and come back on the Johnnie Duncan. It +was Clancy who had the matter in charge. Indeed, +it was only Clancy who knew what it was really +all about.</p> +<p>We had a good run-off before a stiff westerly +that gradually hauled to the north, and Tuesday +night late saw us in Halifax Harbor. It was too +late to do anything that night, but Clancy went +ashore to find out what he could. Before sunrise +he was back with word to break out the anchor +and put to sea. He had word of the Flamingo.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_290' name='page_290'></a>290</span></div> +<p>“That girl of Dave’s––it seems she’s moved to +Canso with her folks, and Dave’s gone there. He’s +probably there before this––maybe left again. +She’s an old plug, the Flamingo, but she ought’ve +made Canso before this. He only stayed a few +hours here and left Monday.”</p> +<p>It was bang, bang, bang all the way to Canso, +with Clancy swearing at Withrow and the Flamingo +and Dave Warner and the girl in the case––one +after the other and sometimes all together. +“Blast Withrow and that crazy fool Dave Warner, +too. And why in the devil couldn’t her folks +stayed in Gloucester––or in Halifax, at least. +They ought’ve put a few sticks of dynamite in her +and blown her to pieces ages ago. She’s forty +years old if she’s a day––her old planks rotten. +They won’t keep her afloat over-night if they’re +out in this. Why d’y’s’pose people leave a good +lively little city like Halifax to go to a place like +Canso? Why?”</p> +<p>Andie Howe happened to be within hearing, +and “Maybe the rent’s cheaper,” suggested Andie.</p> +<p>“Maybe it is––and maybe if you don’t talk sense +I’ll heave you over the rail some fine day. Better +give her a grain more fore-sheet. Man, but it’s a +wicked night.”</p> +<p>We made Canso after the worst day and night +we had had in the Johnnie Duncan since she was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_291' name='page_291'></a>291</span> +launched. Outside Canso Harbor it looked bad. +We didn’t think the skipper would try to enter the +harbor that black night, but he did. “Got to go +in and get news,” said Clancy, and in we went. It +was as black as could be––squalls sweeping down––and +Canso is not the easiest harbor in the world +to make at night.</p> +<p>I went ashore with Clancy to hear what the +young woman might have to say. We found her +in a place run by her father, a sort of lodging house +and “pub,” with herself serving behind the bar––a +bold-looking young woman, not over-neat––and +yet attractive in her way––good figure, regular +features, and good color. “There, Joe, if you +brought a girl like that home your mother would +probably die of a broken heart, but there’s the kind +that a foolish man like Dave Warner would sell his +soul for.” Then Clancy explained while we were +waiting for her to see us privately, “I don’t know +if she’ll remember me, but I met her two or three +times in Gloucester.”</p> +<p>When she came in she recognized Clancy right +away. “How do you do, Captain Clancy?”</p> +<p>“How do you do, Miss Luce? My friend, Mr. +Buckley. Now what we’ve come for––but first, +suppose we have a little something by way of sociability. +A little fizzy stuff, say, and some good +cigars, Miss Luce.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_292' name='page_292'></a>292</span></div> +<p>She brought the wine and the cigars. Clancy +pulled the cork, filled both glasses, pushed one +glass toward the young woman and drew one to +himself.</p> +<p>“But, Captain, your friend hasn’t any.”</p> +<p>“My friend,” said Clancy, “doesn’t drink. The +last thing the doctor said to him before we came +away was, ‘Don’t touch a drop of liquor or your +life will pay the forfeit.’ You see, Miss Luce, he’s +been a dissipated youth––drink––and having been +dissipated and coming of delicate people, it’s affected +his health.”</p> +<p>“You don’t tell me? I’m sure he doesn’t look +it.”</p> +<p>“No, he don’t––that’s a fact. But so it is.”</p> +<p>“Stomach?” she asked me.</p> +<p>“No––heart,” answered Clancy for me. “What +they call an aneurism. You know what an aneurism +is, of course?”</p> +<p>“Yes-yes––oh, yes–––”</p> +<p>“Of course. Well, he’s got one of them.”</p> +<p>“That’s too bad. So he only smokes instead?”</p> +<p>“That’s all. Here, Joe, smoke up.”</p> +<p>“My, I always thought smoking was bad for the +heart.”</p> +<p>“It is––for everything except aneurisms. Smoking’s +the death of aneurisms. Have another cigar, +Joe. And Miss Luce, shall we exchange a health?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_293' name='page_293'></a>293</span></div> +<p>“But I never drank anything in all my life.”</p> +<p>“Of course not. But you will now, won’t you? +Consider the occasion and I’m sure you won’t +let me drink alone. And I’ve come so far to +see you, too––only of course not––Well, here’s +to your good health, and may you live long +and–––”</p> +<p>The rest of it was smothered in the gurgle. And +nobody would ever think to see the way she put +down hers that Miss Luce had never had a drink +of wine before.</p> +<p>“And now, Miss Luce, may I ask how long it +has been since your friend Dave Warner left–––”</p> +<p>“Oh-h––Dave Warner? He’s no friend of +mine.”</p> +<p>“Isn’t he? Well, he’s no particular friend of +mine, either. But a friend of mine––of both of us, +Joe here, too––is with Dave––Maurice Blake. +Any word of him?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes. A good-looking fellow, nice eyes and +hair and nice manners. I do like to see refined +manners in people. Now if it was him–––”</p> +<p>“If it was him, you wouldn’t have told him to +go to sea and the devil take him–––”</p> +<p>“I’d have you know, Captain Clancy, I don’t +swear.”</p> +<p>“Swear? You, Miss Luce? Dear me, whatever +made you think I thought that? But let’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_294' name='page_294'></a>294</span> +have another taste of wine. But of course you +didn’t encourage Dave to stay ashore here?”</p> +<p>“Him?––I guess not. When he said he didn’t +care if he never came back, I told him I was sure +I didn’t––and out he went.”</p> +<p>“O woman, gentle woman,” murmured Clancy +in his glass, “especially real ladies. But Dave +never did know how to talk to a lady.”</p> +<p>“I should say he didn’t.”</p> +<p>“No, not Dave. And so his money gone +he’s–––”</p> +<p>“Money? Why, he never had any money.”</p> +<p>“Well, that’s bad. Not even enough to open a +bottle of wine to drink a lady’s health?”</p> +<p>“Bottle of wine? No, nor a thimbleful of tuppenny +ale.”</p> +<p>“That was bad, Miss Luce. Dave ought’ve +come better heeled–––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘And so his money gone he puts out to sea––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>It may happen to you or happen to me.’</p> +</div></div> +<p>And which way did he say he was going?”</p> +<p>“He didn’t say and I didn’t ask, though one of +the men with him said something about going to +the Grand Banks.”</p> +<p>“Grand Banks, eh? That’s comforting––it +isn’t more than a couple of days’ sail from here +to the nearest edge of it, and twenty-odd thousand +or more square miles of shoal water to hunt over +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_295' name='page_295'></a>295</span> +after you get there. Had they taken their bait +aboard, did you hear, Miss Luce?”</p> +<p>“Yes, they had. That was yesterday afternoon +late. His vessel was leaking then, I heard him say +to that nice-looking man––Maurice Blake his +name, did you say? A nice name Maurice, isn’t +it? Well, he said to Maurice going out the door, +‘Well, we’ll put out and I callate––I don’t know +how she’ll get out but out we’ll go to-night.’ ‘The +sooner you go the better it will suit me,’ Blake +said, and they went off together.”</p> +<p>“And how was Mr. Blake?”</p> +<p>“How do you mean? How did he act? My, I +never saw such a man. Wouldn’t open his head +all night––wouldn’t drink, but just sat and smoked +like your friend there. Anything the matter with +him?”</p> +<p>“With Maurice? Oh, in the way of aneurisms? +Not that I know of. Oh, yes, he has +heart-trouble too, come to think. But I must be +getting back to the vessel.”</p> +<p>“So soon?”</p> +<p>“Yes, we’ve got to go to sea. I’m like Dave +Warner in that I’m going to sea too.”</p> +<p>“But nobody’s driving you away.” She had her +eyes on Clancy’s face then.</p> +<p>He didn’t look up––only stared into his glass.</p> +<p>She was silent for a full minute. Clancy said +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_296' name='page_296'></a>296</span> +nothing. “Nobody’s driving you away,” she said +again.</p> +<p>At that Clancy looked at her. “There’s no telling,” +he said at first, and then hastily, “Oh, no––of +course nobody’s driving me to sea.”</p> +<p>“Then what’s your hurry?”</p> +<p>I got up and went to the door then. I heard +the sound of a scraping chair and then of Clancy +standing up. A moment’s quiet and then it was: +“No, dear, I can’t stay––nobody’s driving me +away, I know that. I’m sure you wouldn’t––not +with your heart. And you’ve a good heart if you’d +only give it a chance. But I can’t stay.”</p> +<p>“And why not? You won’t, you mean. Well, +I never thought you were <i>that</i> kind of a man.”</p> +<p>“No? Well, don’t go to giving me any moral +rating. Don’t go to over-rating me––or maybe +you’d call it under-rating. But you see, it’s my +friend that’s calling.”</p> +<p>“And you’re going out in this gale?”</p> +<p>“Gale. I’d go if it was a hundred gales. Good-by––and +take care of yourself, dear.”</p> +<p>“And will you come back if you don’t find him?”</p> +<p>“Lord, Lord, how can I say? Can anybody +say who’s coming back and who isn’t?”</p> +<p>He went by me and out the door. She looked +after him, but he never turned––only plunged out +of the house and into the street and I right after +him.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_297' name='page_297'></a>297</span> +<a name='XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD' id='XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD'></a> +<h2>XXXVIII</h2> +<h3>THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST’ARD</h3> +</div> +<p>Getting back to the vessel Clancy was +pretty gloomy. “That’s settled. We can’t +chase them as far to the east’ard as the big banks––a +three hundred mile run to the nearest edge of it +and tens of thousands of square miles to hunt over +after we’d got there. And it would be child’s work +anyway to ask Maurice to leave her on the bank. +Who’d take his place even if Dave would stand for +it? ’Twould mean laying up a dory or taking his +dory-mate too. Maurice wouldn’t leave her anyway, +even if he believed he’d never get home––no +real fisherman would. And yet there it is––Dave +in a devil of a mood, and a vessel according to all +reports that won’t live out one good easterly. And +there’s a crazy crew aboard her that won’t make +for the most careful handling of a vessel. Oh, +Lord, I don’t see anything for it, but, thank the +Lord, Maurice has been behaving himself––and +that in spite of how blue he must have been feeling. +By this time he’s cert’nly made up his mind he’s +with a pretty bad crowd, but maybe he’s glad of a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_298' name='page_298'></a>298</span> +little excitement. What I don’t understand is how +Dave ever left old man Luce’s place without breaking +up the furniture before going away. Gen’rally +that’s his style. Maybe Maurice being along had +something to do with it––a pretty able man in close +quarters is Maurice. Yes, he must be glad of the +excitement, but Lord, that won’t save him from +being lost. Oh, oh, and now what’ll we do? Let’s +see, the Flamingo’s on the way to the Banks, and +that’s the end of that chase. We’ve got to wait +now and see that she comes home––or don’t come +home––one or the other. I told that girl that I +was going to put out––put out if it blew a hundred +gales. And so I would if any good would come of +it, but putting out to sea a day like this because +you bragged you would––risking your vessel and +crew, or making hard work for them if nothing +else––that ain’t good sense, is it? Besides, I had +to tell her something to get away without setting up +to be a model of virtue. What else could I do? +Women are the devil––sometimes––aren’t they, +Joe? There’s some are. I suppose it wouldn’t do +any great harm to head her for home. I don’t +believe there’s going to be much more fish going +to be seined this fall––and wouldn’t she make a +passage of it in this easterly? Oh, Lord, it would +be the race all over again, only ten times as long +a drag.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_299' name='page_299'></a>299</span></div> +<p>While he sat there in the cabin, smoking and +meditating, letting us into his thoughts every now +and then, the voices of some of our crew were +heard on deck.</p> +<p>We all went up and got the word that was being +passed around. A coast steamer had just come +to anchor in the harbor with the report that just +outside––about ten miles to the west’ard––was a +vessel, dismasted and clean-swept, and dragging +toward the rocks. They could not help her themselves––too +rough––a hurricane outside––to launch +a boat was out of the question. They didn’t mind +taking a chance, they said, but to attempt her rescue +would be suicide.</p> +<p>It looked like a pretty hard chance going out in +that gale, but Clancy didn’t wait. “Nobody else +seems to be hurrying to get out, and we being the +able-est looking craft in the harbor, I callate it’s +up to us to go.” He got the exact location of the +distressed vessel from the coaster, and then it was +up anchor, make sail, and out we went.</p> +<p>There were people who called Clancy a fool for +ordering out his vessel and risking his crew that +day––men in that very harbor––and maybe he was. +But for myself, I want that kind of a fool for my +skipper. The man that will take a chance for a +stranger will take a bigger chance for his own by +and by.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_300' name='page_300'></a>300</span></div> +<p>We saw her while we were yet miles away, +down to the west’ard––near Whitehead and with +the cruel stretch of rocks under her lee quarter. +Even with plenty of sea-room she could not have +lasted long, and here with these ledges to catch +her she looked to be in for a short shrift. We had +a good chance to get a look at her as we bore +down. Everything was gone from her deck, even +the house and rail. There was not as much loose +wood on deck as would make a tooth-pick. Afterwards +we learned that two seas hove her down so +that they had to cut the spars away to right her, +and then just as she was coming up another monster +had caught her and swept her clean––not only +swept clean, but stove in her planks and started +some of her beams so that she began to leak in a +fashion that four men to the pumps could just +manage to keep up with.</p> +<p>We could just see them––the men to the pumps +working desperately––with the others lashed to the +stumps of the masts and the stanchions which were +left when the rail went. Her big hawser had +parted and her chain was only serving to slightly +check her way toward the rocks.</p> +<p>With spars and deck gear gone and her hull +deep in the water, a vessel is not so easily distinguished. +But there was something familiar in this +one. We had seen her before. All at once it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_301' name='page_301'></a>301</span> +flashed on half a dozen of us––“the Flamingo!” +we said. “God! that’s luck!” said Clancy.</p> +<p>She lay in a sort of inlet that was wide open to +the gale, rocks on the better part of three sides +of her, north, south and west. She was then within +all but striking distance of the rocks, and the seas, +high and wicked, were sweeping over her. It +looked like a bad place to work out of if we should +get close in, but Clancy held on.</p> +<p>“Not much lee-room, but plenty of water under +her keel anyway,” and himself to the wheel, sailed +the Johnnie around the Flamingo. He hailed +Maurice as he went by, waved his hand to the +others, and hove a line aboard. They took the +line, hauled in the hawser at the end of it, made +that fast to the windlass, and then we started off +with her in tow.</p> +<p>We were doing pretty well, what with plenty of +wind and the Johnnie buckling down to her work +like she was a steamer, till the hawser parted and +back toward the rocks went the Flamingo again.</p> +<p>“No use,” said Clancy, “sea’s too much for any +line we got. We’ll try it with the seine-boat. +Who’ll go in the seine-boat and try to take them +off? Think quick, but mind what it means.”</p> +<p>Every man of the crew of the Johnnie Duncan +said, “Here!” The cook even came out of the +forec’s’le and put in his “And me, too, skipper.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_302' name='page_302'></a>302</span></div> +<p>“You’re good men,” said Clancy,––“damn good +men,” and looked us up and down. We felt proud, +he said it in such a way. “But you’re taking your +lives in your hands and some of you got wives and +children––mothers or something. Who hasn’t +anybody depending on him? Which of you hasn’t +any woman somewhere, or little brothers or +sisters?”</p> +<p>About twelve of the sixteen men standing on the +deck of the Johnnie Duncan said “Me!”</p> +<p>“Three-quarters of you, at least,” said Clancy, +“are damn liars. Over with the seine-boat and be +careful nobody gets hurt.”</p> +<p>Somebody did get hurt, though. Andie Howe +got his foot smashed and was helped below. +Clancy gave the rest of us a scolding in advance. +“You’re not hurt yet, but some of you will be––like +Andie––if you don’t watch out. You’d think +that some of you were out on some little pond up +in the country somewhere launching a canoe off +one of those club-house floats. Keep an eye out +for those seas when they board. And watch out +for that deckload or some of you’ll have a head +cut off. A man killed or a man washed over the +rail––what’s the difference––it’s a man lost. Look +out now––watch, you Steve––damn you, watch +out! Over with it!”</p> +<p>And over it went and with it leaped two men +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_303' name='page_303'></a>303</span> +before it could sag away, while the rest of us stood +by the rail watching our chance.</p> +<p>“Nelson,” called Clancy, “come away from that +rail! Steve, come away!––come away, I say, and +no back talk. Pat, you can go––jump in––watch +your chance or it’s the last of you. Eddie, you can +go, and you Bill, and you Frenchy. Joe! stand +away from that rail or I’ll put you in the hold and +batten the hatches on you. Now, that’s better. +And that’s enough––six men to the oars and one +to steer.”</p> +<p>“And who’ll steer?” asked somebody.</p> +<p>“You’ll know in a minute,” said Clancy, and +he leaped for the seine-boat and made it, and +grabbed the steering oar. “Stand by––push off! +Fend off in the vessel there! Steve, if anything +happens––you know––you’re to take the Johnnie +home. Give way, fellows. Now! Watch out!––now––now +then, around with her––end on, +and there she is like a bird! And now drive +her!”</p> +<p>“A bird!” said Clancy––but a wild-looking +bird––fifty feet she looked to be going into the +air one moment and down out of sight the next, +and water slamming aboard her so that we thought +she was swamped half a dozen times. Two had +to leave the oars and go to bailing, while Clancy +with an arm and shoulders and back and swinging +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_304' name='page_304'></a>304</span> +waist like––well, like nothing a man ever had before––kept +her end to it.</p> +<p>“Good luck!” we called.</p> +<p>“Never fear––we’ll bring ’em back!” said +Clancy.</p> +<p>“Or stay with them,” we thought.</p> +<p>But he didn’t stay with them. It was a ticklish +job, but Clancy got away with it. He didn’t dare +to go too near the Flamingo, for that meant that +the seas would pitch the seine-boat up and dash it +to kindling wood against her hull. What he did +do was to go as near the Flamingo as he could and +keep her clear, then heave a line aboard and call to +her crew one after the other to make it fast around +themselves and jump overboard. It took some +nerve to make that jump––from the rigging of +the Duncan we watched them––saw them shiver +and draw up––these were men accustomed to face +danger––reckless men––but the shiver was over +in a breath, and then over the rail and into that +sea––a game fight––and they were hauled into the +seine-boat. Some of them we thought would never +make it, for it was an awful sea.</p> +<p>As fast as one of the Flamingo’s men made the +seine-boat he was set to work bailing out or taking +a haul at the oars, for it was a difficult matter in +that sea to keep the seine-boat at the right distance +from the Flamingo. But they got them all––ten +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_305' name='page_305'></a>305</span> +of them. Two were hauled in unconscious, but +came to after awhile.</p> +<p>To get aboard the Johnnie again was almost as +bad as to get into the seine-boat from the Flamingo. +But we managed it. Long Steve was swept over +while we were at it, but we got him back with the +help of Maurice Blake and another of the Flamingo’s +crowd. By smart clever work they +grabbed Steve before he could go down and +hauled him into the seine-boat.</p> +<p>When they were all safe aboard the Duncan +Clancy shook hands with Maurice. “I call that +luck, Maurice––to come out to save a stranger and +find you’ve saved your own. And now whose trick +to the wheel––you, Joe? Put her on the off-shore +tack till we’re well clear of that headland––maybe +we c’n make it in one leg. No? Then a short +tack and have an eye out for the ledges––not too +close. And Maurice, go below––you and Dave +and all hands of you, and we’ll get out dry clothes +for you. Man, but you must be cold and hungry, +but the cook’s getting coffee and grub ready. And +for the Duncan’s crew––on deck all hands and put +the tops’ls to her. For, Maurice-boy, we’re going +home––going home, Maurice––where there’s people +waiting for you. Hang on a while longer, +Joe, and I’ll take her myself.”</p> +<p>No need to tell me to hang on. If I hadn’t hung +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_306' name='page_306'></a>306</span> +on or been lashed to the wheel I could never have +kept my feet, for at this time it was so bad that +they had passed a line from my waist to the +windward bitt and I was up to my waist with every +dive of her.</p> +<p>“Lord, she’s a dog, ain’t she! If old man Duncan +could see her now! Remember Tom O’Donnell +singing that song the other night:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘West half-no’the and drive her––we’re abreast now of Cape Sable––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>’Tis an everlasting hurricane, but here’s the craft that’s able.’</p> +</div></div> +<p>We’re not abreast of Cape Sable yet, but it won’t +take us too many hours at this clip. And here’s the +craft that’s able. Man, wouldn’t it be fine if Tom +O’Donnell himself was with us and the pair of us +racing home? Let me take the wheel, Joe. And +go for’ard and have a mug-up for yourself––and +have a care going, Joe, for it’s leaping she is now +and seas that’d lift you a cable’s length to looard +if ever they caught you fair. That’s it––oh, but +if your mother could see you now, Joe, it’s never +to sea you’d come again.”</p> +<p>I made my way for’ard. A dash between the +house and windward rail, a shoot for the mainmast +and holding on there for awhile. Another dive +for the gripes on the dories, another shoot between +rail and dories, a grip of the bow gripes, a swing +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_307' name='page_307'></a>307</span> +around and I was at the forec’s’le hatch. Here I +thought I heard him call and looked aft.</p> +<p>He had a leg either side of the wheel, standing +full height and sawing the spokes a bit up and +down to get the feel of her. The life line was +trailing from his waist to the bitt––the clear white +sea was up to his middle and racing over the taffrail. +He had cast away his mitts the better to grip +the spokes, and even as I looked he took off his +sou’wester and sent it scaling. The wind taking +hold of it must have carried it a quarter a mile to +leeward. Watching it go, himself looking out +under the boom, he laughed––laughed––such a +roar of a laugh––stamped his feet and began to +sing:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>My love’s for Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>The devil was in him then. “Did you call me, +skipper?” I sang out.</p> +<p>“Did I? Did I? Lord, Joe, I don’t know. +Maybe I did. I feel like calling from here to +Gloucester, and if I did I bet they’d hear me. +God, Joe, but it’s good to be alive, isn’t it?––just +to be alive. Whew! but I wish I had a few more +sou’westers––just to see ’em scale. But what was +it I wanted––but is the cook there?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_308' name='page_308'></a>308</span></div> +<p>“He is––I c’n hear him talking.”</p> +<p>“Then go below and tell him, Joe––tell him to +mouse his pots and kettles, for with sail alow and +sail aloft, with her helmsman lashed and her house +awash, in a living gale and the devil’s own sea, +the Johnnie Duncan’s going to the west’ard.”</p> +<p>And she certainly went.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_309' name='page_309'></a>309</span> +<a name='XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY' id='XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY'></a> +<h2>XXXIX</h2> +<h3>THE HEART OF CLANCY</h3> +</div> +<p>That trip ended seining for the Duncan that +year. Everything went well with our +friends, after we got home. It was late in the +season, and Maurice Blake was to stay ashore to +get married, for one thing. He had made a great +season of it and could afford to. So the Johnnie +Duncan was fitted out for fresh halibuting and +Clancy took her.</p> +<p>I went with him. I remember very well that I +had no idea of going winter fishing when the +seining season ended, but, somehow or other when +Clancy came to get a crew together I was looking +for a chance.</p> +<p>So we put out, and on the rocks of Cape Ann, +near Eastern Point lighthouse, on the day we sailed +on our first halibuting trip, were Maurice Blake +and Alice Foster, my cousin Nell and Will Somers, +to wave us good luck. Clancy hauled the vessel +close in to get a better look and they waved us until +I suppose they could see us no longer. Of course +they should have been able to make us out long +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_310' name='page_310'></a>310</span> +after we had lost sight of them, we being a tall-sparred, +white-sailed vessel; and Clancy must have +had that in mind, for long after all signs of them +had been lost to us he kept the glasses pointed to +the rocks. He turned at last with a “Well, I suppose +they’re all happy now, Joe?”</p> +<p>“They ought to be,” I said.</p> +<p>“Yes, they ought to be,” he repeated, and then +again, “they ought to be,” and went for’ard.</p> +<p>He stayed for’ard a long time, saying no word, +but leaning over the windlass and looking out +ahead. Nobody disturbed him. Once or twice +when the sheets needed trimming––and in a deep +sleep I think Clancy would know that––he turned +and gave the word, but the bare word and no more. +He had his spells we all knew, when he didn’t want +anybody near him, and so he wanted to be alone, +I suppose. And there he stayed, with what spray +came over the bow splashing him, but he paying +no attention.</p> +<p>At supper call he moved, but not to go below and +eat––only to shift to walking the quarter, and +walking the quarter he stayed until near midnight. +He went below then after giving a few words of +instruction to the watch––went below and got out +his pipe. From my bunk, the middle port bunk in +the cabin, I watched him rummaging for tobacco +in his stateroom and then his coming out with his +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_311' name='page_311'></a>311</span> +pipe and his filling and lighting it slowly and +thoughtfully, and then his sitting and smoking under +the cabin lamp.</p> +<p>Looking over when he had finished that pipeful––I +had not drawn my curtain––he caught my +eyes on him. He smiled, but said nothing––only +lit another pipeful, and kept on smoking.</p> +<p>I fell asleep watching him––fell asleep and woke +again. He must have been watching me, for his +eyes were on mine when I looked for him again. +He smiled and shook his pipe out, and made as +though to turn in.</p> +<p>But he didn’t turn in. He took off his jersey, +loosened the collar of his flannel shirt, cast off his +slip-shods––stopped––looked into his bunk, came +back, filled and lit another pipeful and began to +talk to me. I thought I was sleepy, but in five +minutes I didn’t think so. Joking, laughing, telling +stories––in ten minutes he had me roaring. Before +long he had everybody in the cabin awake and +roaring, too. Men, coming off watch and into the +cabin to warm up, or for one thing or another, listened +and stayed. He kept that up all the rest of +the night––until after six o’clock in the morning, +and only the cook called to breakfast there’s no +telling when he would have stopped. And not +until he was going for’ard to eat did I get a glimpse +of what it was he had been thinking of during all +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_312' name='page_312'></a>312</span> +those earlier hours of the night. The sun, I remember, +was streaking the sky ahead of us––he +stopped just as he was about to drop into the +forec’s’le and pointed it out.</p> +<p>“A sunrise, Joe, on a fine October morning out +to sea––beautiful––beautiful––but just one thing +wrong about it. And what is it?––you don’t see? +Well, Joe, it’s over the bow. A sunrise, Joe, is +most beautiful when it’s over the stern––and why? +’Cause then you’re going home––of course. Going +home, Joe––if you’ve got a home to go to. Look +to it, Joe, that you’ve got a home of your own to +go to before you’re much older. Somebody to +work for––somebody waiting for you––a wife, +Joe––wife and children––or you’re in for some +awful lonesome times.”</p> +<p>That was Clancy––watch-mate, bunk-mate, +dory-mate once, and now my skipper––Clancy, +who could be any man’s friend, the man that everybody +jumped to shake hands with, and yet never a +bit of use to himself. And I couldn’t but half +wonder at that, and kept my eyes on him when, +with one foot on the top step of the companionway, +he turned and looked around again.</p> +<p>“And if you can’t get anybody, skipper?”</p> +<p>“Then it’s hard––though most likely you’ve deserved +it.”</p> +<p>“But you haven’t deserved it?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_313' name='page_313'></a>313</span></div> +<p>“Deserved it? Yes, and ten times over.”</p> +<p>“That’s pretty rough.”</p> +<p>“Rough? No, it’s right. When you do wrong +you’ve got to make up for it. It’s all in the big +scheme of the universe. You’ve got to strike a +balance some time––somewhere. And the sooner +the better. Be thankful if you have to settle it +right away, Joe. If you don’t and it drags along––then +it’s worse again, and the Lord help those +that come after you––those that have to take up +life where you’ve left it off. The Lord have +mercy on the heirs of your brain and heart and +soul, boy. What you hand them they’ve got to +take. Yes, sir, you’ll pay for it somewhere––you +yourself, or, what’s worse, those you care for will +have to pay––in this world or another––whatever +it is we’re coming to, a better or a worse world, +it’s there and waiting us. Be thankful, as I said, +Joe, if you have to settle for it here––settle for it +yourself alone.”</p> +<p>All around, above and below, ahead and astern, +he looked, a long, long look astern––his foot on +the step, and singing softly, almost to himself:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And if I come to you, my love,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>And my heart free from guile,</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Will you have a glance for me––</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>Will you on me smile?</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_314' name='page_314'></a>314</span></div> +<p>Oh, Lord! pipe-dreams––pipe-dreams. Let’s go +below, Joe, and have a bite to eat.”</p> +<p>So below we went; and her sails lit up by the +morning sun, her decks wet by the slapping sea, +sheets off and sailing free, the Johnnie Duncan +clipped her way to the east’ard.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30138 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg b/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..3370341 --- /dev/null +++ b/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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(James Brendan) +Connolly</h1> +<pre> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: The Seiners</p> +<p>Author: James B. (James Brendan) Connolly</p> +<p>Release Date: September 30, 2009 [eBook #30138]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEINERS***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3 class="pg">E-text prepared by Roger Frank<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (http://www.pgdp.net)</h3> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> + +<div class='figtag'> +<a name='linki_1' id='linki_1'></a> +</div> +<div class='figcenter'> +<img src='images/illus-fpc.jpg' alt='' title='' width='582' height='369' /><br /> +<p class='caption'> +IT WAS THE FINEST KIND OF EXCITEMENT, OUR RUNNING TO HARBOR<br /> +</p> +</div> +<hr class='pb' /> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:2.2em;margin-top:40px;margin-bottom:40px;'>THE<br />SEINERS</p> +<p class='tp' style='margin-bottom:20px;'>BY</p> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:1.4em;margin-bottom:20px;'>JAMES B. CONNOLLY</p> +<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;margin-bottom:80px;'>AUTHOR OF “OUT OF GLOUCESTER,”<br />“JEB HUTTON,” ETC.</p> +<p class='tp' >CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS</p> +<p class='tp' >NEW YORK : : : : : : : : : 1910</p> +<hr class='pb' /> +<p class='tp' ><span class='smcap'>Copyright, 1904, by</span></p> +<p class='tp' >CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS</p> +<hr class='p5' /> +<p class='tp' >Published, May, 1904</p> +<hr class='pb' /> +<h3>CONTENTS</h3> +<table border='0' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Contents' style='margin:1em auto;'> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>I.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The New Vessel of Withrow’s</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS'>1</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>II.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Little Jog Along the Docks</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS'>8</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>III.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#III_MINNIE_ARKELL'>16</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>IV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Little Johnnie Duncan Stands Examination</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION'>27</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>V.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>From out of Crow’s Nest</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST'>35</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Gets a Vessel</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL'>43</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy Crosses Minnie Arkell</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL'>51</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>VIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Seining Fleet Puts out to Sea</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA'>61</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>IX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Mackerel</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IX_MACKEREL'>70</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>X.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>We Lose Our Seine</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE'>82</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>An Over-Night Breeze</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE'>87</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Fleet Runs to Harbor</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR'>99</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Wesley Marrs Brings a Message</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE'>119</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Prospect of Night-Seining</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING'>123</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy to the Mast-Head</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD'>129</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>We Get a Fine School</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL'>137</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Drive for Market</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET'>144</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Brush With the Yachting Fleet</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET'>153</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell Again</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN'>159</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Skipper Puts for Home</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME'>172</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Seiners’ Work</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXI_SEINERS_WORK'>175</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>On the Cape Shore</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE'>184</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Dressing Down</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN'>193</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Withrow Outsails the Duncan</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN'>202</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Trouble With the Dominion Cutters</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS'>206</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Gossip in Gloucester</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER'>211</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>In Clancy’s Boarding-House</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE'>217</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>In the Arkell Kitchen</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN'>220</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Comes Home</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME'>230</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Morning of the Race</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE'>235</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Start of the Race</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE'>243</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>O’donnell Carries Away Both Masts</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS'>250</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Able Johnnie Duncan</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN'>257</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Minnie Arkell Once More</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE'>265</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXV.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Clancy Lays Down the Law</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW'>271</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVI.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Maurice Blake Is Recalled</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED'>281</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Girl in Canso</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO'>289</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXVIII.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Duncan Goes to the West’ard</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD'>297</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td valign='top' class='chalgn'>XXXIX.</td> + <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Heart of Clancy</span></td> + <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY'>309</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +<hr class='pb' /> +<h1>THE SEINERS</h1> +<hr class='pb' /> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_1' name='page_1'></a>1</span></div> +<h1>The Seiners</h1> +<div class='chsp' style='padding-top:0'> +<a name='I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS' id='I_THE_NEW_VESSEL_OF_WITHROWS'></a> +<h2>I</h2> +<h3>THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW’S</h3> +</div> +<p>It was only a few days before this that the +new vessel of Mr. Withrow’s, built by him, +as everybody supposed, for Maurice Blake, had +been towed around from Essex, and I remember +how Maurice stood on the dock that afternoon +and looked her over.</p> +<p>There was not a bolt or a plank or a seam in +her whole hull, not a square inch inside or out, that +he had not been over half a dozen times while +she was on the stocks; but now he had to look her +over again, and as he looked his eyes took on a +shine. She had been designed by a man famous +the world over, and was intended to beat anything +that ever sailed past Eastern Point.</p> +<p>She certainly was a great-looking model of a +vessel, and “If she only sails and handles half so +well as she looks, she’ll do for me,” said Maurice. +“Yes, sir, and if she’s up to what I think she ought +to be, I wouldn’t be afraid to bet my share of what +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_2' name='page_2'></a>2</span> +we make out South that she’ll hold her own with +anything out of Gloucester––give her a few weeks +to loosen up, of course.”</p> +<p>That was a good deal to say, for it was a great +fleet of vessels sailing out of Gloucester; but even +so, even allowing for a young skipper’s pride in +his first crack vessel, it meant a whole lot coming +like that from Maurice Blake.</p> +<p>And on top of all that Maurice and Withrow +had to quarrel, though what about I never found +out. I only know that I was ready to believe that +Withrow was to blame, for I liked Maurice and +did not like Withrow, even though Withrow was +the man from whom I drew my pay every week. +And yet I could not understand it, for Maurice +Blake had been far and away the most successful +skipper sailing for Withrow, and Withrow always +had a good eye for the dollar.</p> +<p>No more came of it until this particular morning, +some days after Maurice and Withrow had +quarrelled. Wesley Marrs and Tommie Clancy, +two men that I never tired of listening to, were on +the dock and sizing up the new vessel. Wesley +Marrs was himself a great fisherman, and master +at this time of the wonderful Lucy Foster.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>When she swings the main boom over</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And she feels the wind abaft,</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_3' name='page_3'></a>3</span></p> +<p>The way she’ll walk to Gloucester’ll</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Make a steamer look a raft.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>For she’s the Lucy Foster,</p> +<p>She’s a seiner out of Gloucester,––</p> +</div></div> +<p>was the way the fishermen of the port used to sing +about the Lucy; while Tommie Clancy was Maurice +Blake’s closest friend.</p> +<p>With ballast stored, masts stepped, rigging set +up, and sails bent, setting as sweet as could be to +her lines and the lumpers beginning to get her +ready for the mackerel season, the Fred Withrow +was certainly a picture.</p> +<p>After a couple of extra long pulls, blowing the +smoke into the air, and another look above and +below, “That one––she’ll sail some or I don’t +know,” said Wesley.</p> +<p>“She sure will,” said Tommie; “and it’s a +jeesly shame Maurice isn’t to have her.” Then +turning to me, “What in the devil’s name ails that +man you work for, Joey?”</p> +<p>I said I didn’t know.</p> +<p>“No, nor nobody else knows. I’d like to work +in that store for him for about ten minutes. I +think I’d make him say something in that ten +minutes that would give me a good excuse for +heaving him out the window. He had an argument +with Maurice, Wesley, and Maurice don’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_4' name='page_4'></a>4</span> +know what it was half about, but he knows he +came near to punching Withrow.”</p> +<p>And Wesley and Tommie had to talk that out; +and between the pair of them, thinking of what +they said, I thought I ought to walk back to the +store with barely a civil look for my employer, +who didn’t like that at all, for he generally wanted +to hand out the black looks himself.</p> +<p>Then the girls––my cousin Nellie and her particular +chum, Alice Foster––came in to weigh +themselves, and also to remind me, they said, that +I was to take them over to Essex the next day for +the launching of the new vessel for the Duncan +firm, which had been designed by a friend of +Nell’s, a young fellow named Will Somers, who +was just beginning to get a name in Gloucester for +fast and able models of vessels. Withrow, who +was not over-liberal with his holidays, said I might +go––mostly, I suspect, because Alice Foster had +said she would not make the trip without Nell, +and Nell would not go unless I went too.</p> +<p>Then Nell and Miss Foster went on with the +business of weighing themselves. That was in +line with the latest fad. It was always something +or other, and physical culture was in the air at +this time with every other girl in Gloucester, so +far as I could see––either Indian-club swinging +or dumb-bell drilling, long walks, and things of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_5' name='page_5'></a>5</span> +that kind, and telling how much better they felt +after it. My cousin Nell, who went in for anything +that anybody ever told her about, was trying +to reduce her weight. According to some +perfect-form charts, or something or other on +printed sheets, she weighed seven pounds more +than she should for her height. I thought she was +about the right weight myself, and told her so, +but she said no––she was positively fat. “Look +at Alice,” she said, “she’s just the thing.”</p> +<p>I looked at Alice––Miss Foster I always called +her myself––and certainly she was a lovely girl, +though perhaps a little too conscious of it. She +was one of the few that weren’t going in for anything +that I could see. She wasn’t even weighing +herself, or at least she didn’t until Mr. Withrow, +with his company manners in fine working order, +asked her if she wouldn’t allow him to weigh her.</p> +<p>There were people in town who said it was +not for nothing that Alice Foster was so chummy +with my cousin Nell. They meant, of course, that +being chummy with Nell, who came down regularly +to see me, gave herself a good excuse to come +along and so have a word with Withrow. Fred +Withrow himself was a big, well-built, handsome +man––an unusually good-looking man, I’d call +him––and a great heart-breaker, according to report––some +of it his own. And he was wealthy, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_6' name='page_6'></a>6</span> +too. I did not know, but somehow or other I did +not believe it, or maybe it was that I hoped rather +than believed that Miss Foster did not care particularly +for him; for I did not like him myself, +although I worked for him and was taking his +money. Being day in and day out with him in +the store, you see I saw him pretty much as he +really was, and I hated to think of a fine girl––for +with all her cool ways I knew Miss Foster was +that––marrying him. Just how Withrow thought +he stood with Miss Foster I did not know––he +was a pretty close-mouthed man when he wanted +to be. Miss Foster herself was that reserved kind +of a girl that you cannot always place. She struck +me as being a girl that would die before she would +confess a weakness or a troublesome feeling. And +yet, without knowing how it came there, there was +always a notion in the back of my head that made +me half-believe that she did not come to the store +with my cousin out of pure companionship. There +was something besides––and what could it be but +Withrow?</p> +<p>After the weighing was done Nell asked me all +at once, “I hear, Joe, that Captain Hollis is going +to have your new vessel? How is that? We––I +thought that Captain Blake was going master +of her––and such a pretty vessel!”</p> +<p>I answered that I didn’t know how it was, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_7' name='page_7'></a>7</span> +looked over at my employer, as much as to say, +“Maybe he can tell you.”</p> +<p>I think now that I must have been a pretty +impudent lad, letting my employer know what I +thought of him as I did in those days. I think, +too, he had a pretty shrewd notion of what I +thought of himself and Maurice Blake. At any +rate, after the girls had gone, he worked himself +into a fine bit of temper, and I talked back at him, +and the end of it was that he discharged me––or +1 quit––I’m not sure which. I do know that it +was rapid-fire talk while it lasted.</p> +<p>It was some satisfaction to me to tell Withrow +just about what I did think of him before I went. +He didn’t quite throw me out of the door, although +he was big enough for that; but he looked +as if he wanted to. And maybe he would have, +too, or tried it, only I said, “Mind I don’t give +you what Tommie Clancy threatened to give you +once,” and his nerve went flat. I couldn’t have +handled him as Clancy had any more than I could +have hove a barrel of salt mackerel over my head, +which was what the strong fishermen of the port +were doing about that time to prove their strength; +but the bluff went, and I couldn’t help throwing out +my chest as I went out the door and thinking that +I was getting to be a great judge of human nature.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_8' name='page_8'></a>8</span> +<a name='II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS' id='II_A_LITTLE_JOG_ALONG_THE_DOCKS'></a> +<h2>II</h2> +<h3>A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS</h3> +</div> +<p>I was sorry to lose my job. I was twenty years +old, without a trade or special knowledge of +any kind, and beyond the outfitting of fishing vessels, +knowing nothing of any business, and with +no more than a high school education––and that +two years behind me––and I knew of no place in +Gloucester where I could begin all over and right +away get as much pay as I had left behind me. I +might go to Boston, of course, and try for something +there––I was not ten minutes out of Withrow’s +before I thought of doing that. But a little +further thought and I knew there were more capable +men than I walking the streets of Boston looking +for work. However, a lot could happen +before I would have to worry, and so I decided +to take the air and think it over.</p> +<p>I might go fishing certainly––I had had a little +experience in my school vacations––if my mother +would only stand for it. As to that I did not +know. If it came to fishing or starving––one or +the other––then of course she would have to let +me go fishing. But my father had been lost on the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_9' name='page_9'></a>9</span> +Grand Banks with his vessel and all hands––and +then one brother was already fishing. So I hardly +thought she would allow me, and anyway I knew +she would never have a good night’s rest while I +was out.</p> +<p>However, I kept thinking it over. To get away +by myself I took a ride over to Essex. There I +knew I would find half a dozen vessels on the +stocks, and there they were––the latest vessel for +the Duncan firm and three more for other firms. I +knew one of the ship-carpenters in Elwell’s yard, +Levi Woodbury, and he was telling me about some +of the vessels that had been launched lately. “Of +course,” he said, “you saw the one launched a few +days ago from here––that one built for Mr. Withrow?”</p> +<p>I said I had, and that she was a wonder to look +at and that I wished Maurice Blake, and not Sam +Hollis, was to have her.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Levi, “and a pity. Maurice Blake +could have sailed her right, though for that matter +Sam Hollis is a clever hand to sail a vessel, too. +And she ought to sail some, that vessel. But look +here at this one for the Duncans and to be launched +to-morrow. Designed by Will Somers––know +him? Yes? A nice young fellow. Ain’t she +able-looking?”</p> +<p>She certainly was, and handsome, and Levi went +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_10' name='page_10'></a>10</span> +on to tell me about her. He showed me where she +was like and where she differed from the Lucy Foster, +the Fred Withrow, the Nannie O, the Colleen +Bawn, and the others which were then causing trouble +in Gloucester with crews fighting over their good +qualities. I did not know a whole lot about vessels, +but having been born in Gloucester and having +soaked in the atmosphere all my life and loving +vessels besides, I had a lot of notions about them. +And I liked this last Duncan vessel. By the wind +and in a sea-way, it struck me she would be a wonder. +There was something more than just the fine +lines of her. There is that about vessels. You +can take two vessels, model them alike, rig them +alike, handle them alike, and still one will sail +rings around the other. And why is it? I’ve +heard a hundred fishermen at different times say +that and then ask, Why is it? This one was awfully +sharp forward, too sharp some might have +said, with little more forefoot than most of the +late-built flyers; but she was deep and had a quarter +that I knew would stand up under her sail. I +liked the after-part of her. Racing machines are +all right for a few months or a year or two and +in smooth water, but give me a vessel that can +stand up under sail. I thought I could see where, +if they gave her sail enough, especially aft, and a +skipper that would drive her, she might do great +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_11' name='page_11'></a>11</span> +things. And certainly she ought to be a comfort +in a blow and bring a fellow home––and there’s +a whole lot in that––being in a vessel that you +feel will bring you home again.</p> +<p>I looked over the others, but none of them held +me like the Duncan vessel, and I soon came back +to Gloucester and took a walk along the waterfront.</p> +<p>It was well into March at this time––the third +week in March, I remember––and there was a +great business doing along the docks. The salt +bankers were almost ready to leave––twenty-eight +or thirty sail fitting out for the Grand Banks. And +then there were the seiners––the mackerel catchers––seventy +or eighty sail of them making ready for +the Southern cruise. All that meant that things +would be humming for a while. So I took a walk +along the docks to see it.</p> +<p>Most of the vessels that had been fishing during +the winter had been stripped of their winter sails, +and now aboard these they were bending on the +summer suits and slinging up what top spars had +not already been sent up. For the vessels that +had been laid up all winter and stripped of everything, +they were getting out the gear from the +lofts. Everywhere it was topmasts being sent up, +sails being dragged out, stays swayed taut, halyards +and sheets rove––an overhauling generally. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_12' name='page_12'></a>12</span> +On the railways––Burnham’s, Parkhurst’s, and +Tarr’s––were vessels having their bottoms +scrubbed and painted and their topsides lined out. +And they all looked so handsome and smelt so fine +with their riggings being tarred, not with the +smoky tar that people ashore put on house-roofs, +but the fine rich-smelling tar that goes into vessels’ +rigging; and there was the black and dark sea-green +paint for the sides, with the gold or yellow +or sometimes red stripe to mark the run, and main +and quarter rails being varnished.</p> +<p>And the seine-boats! If there is anything afloat +that sets more easily on the water than a seine-boat +I never saw it, unless it might be a birch-bark +canoe––and who’d want to be caught out in a blow +in a canoe? The seine-boats all looked as natural +as so many sea-gulls––thirty-six or thirty-eight feet +long, green or blue bottoms to just above the waterline +so that it would show, and above that all clear +white except for the blue or red or yellow or green +decorations that some skippers liked. And the +seines that went with them were coming in wagons +from the net and twine factory, tanned brown or +tarred black and all ready to be hauled on to the +vessels’ decks or stowed in the holds below, until +the fleet should be in among the mackerel to the +south’ard––off Hatteras or Cape May or somewhere +down that way.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_13' name='page_13'></a>13</span></div> +<p>To feel all that and the rest of it––to walk to +the tops of your shoes in pine chips in the spar +yards, to measure the lengths of booms and gaffs +for yourself if you weren’t sure who were going to +spread the big mainsails, to go up in the sail-lofts +and see the sailmakers, bench after bench of them, +making their needles and the long waxed threads +fly through the canvas that it seemed a pity wasn’t +to stay so white forever––to see them spread the +canvas out along the chalk lines on the varnished +floor, fixing leach and luff ropes to them and putting +the leather-bound cringles in, and putting +them in too so they’d stay, for by and by men’s +lives would depend on the way they hung on––all +that, railways, sail-lofts, vessels, boats, docks alive +with men jumping to their work––skippers, crews, +carpenters, riggers, lumpers, all thinking, talking, +and, I suppose, dreaming of the season’s work +ahead––m-m––there was life for a man! Who’d +want to work in a store after that?</p> +<p>I stopped at Duncan’s wharf and looked at +Wesley Marrs’s vessel, the Lucy Foster, and then +the Colleen Bawn.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>And O’Donnell drove the Colleen like a ghost through all that gale,</p> +<p>And around ’twas roaring mountains and above ’twas blinding hail,</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_14' name='page_14'></a>14</span></div> +<p>and so on. And the Nannie O, another vessel that +fishermen sang songs about.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the lovely Nannie O,</p> +<p>The able Nannie O,</p> +<p>The Nannie O a-drivin’ through the gale.</p> +</div></div> +<p>They were lying there, tied to the docks. They +were all dreams, so long and clean, with the beautiful +sheer fore and aft, and the overhang of the +racers they were meant to be––the gold run, with +the grain of the varnished oak rails shining above +the night-black of their topsides, and varnished +spars. They had the look of vessels that could +sail––and they could, and live out a gale––nothing +like them afloat I’d heard people say that ought +to know.</p> +<p>I walked along another stretch and at Withrow’s +dock I saw again the new one that had been +built for Maurice Blake but given to Sam Hollis, +who was a boon companion of Withrow’s ashore, +as I may have said already. Hollis’s gang were +bragging even now that she’d trim anything that +ever sailed––the Lucy Foster, the Nannie O, the +Colleen Bawn, and all the rest of them. And +there were some old sharks, too, upon the docks +who said they didn’t know but she looked as if she +could. But a lot of other people didn’t think it––she +was all right as a vessel, but Sam Hollis wasn’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_15' name='page_15'></a>15</span> +a Wesley Marrs, nor a Tom O’Donnell, nor a +Tommie Ohlsen, nor even a Maurice Blake, who +was a much younger man and a less experienced +fisherman than any of the others.</p> +<p>All that, with the vessels anchored in the stream +and the little dories running up and down and in and +out––it all brought back again the trips I’d made +with my father, clear back to the time when I was +a little boy, so small that in heavy weather he +wouldn’t trust me to go forward or aft myself, but +would carry me in his arms himself––it all made +me so long for the sea that my head went round +and I found myself staggering like a drunken man +as I tried to walk away from it.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_16' name='page_16'></a>16</span> +<a name='III_MINNIE_ARKELL' id='III_MINNIE_ARKELL'></a> +<h2>III</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL</h3> +</div> +<p>There was nothing for it. For a thousand +dollars a month I could not stay ashore. +Somebody or other would give me a chance to go +seining, some good skipper I knew; and if none of +the killers would give me a chance, then I’d try +some old pod of a skipper. My mother would just +have to let me go. It was only summer fishing +after all––seining wasn’t like winter trawling––and +in the end she would see it as I did.</p> +<p>I walked along, and as the last man in my mind +was Maurice Blake, of course he was the first I +had to run into. He was not looking well; I mean +he was not looking as he should have looked. +There was a reckless manner about him that no +more belonged to him than a regularly quiet manner +belonged to his friend Tommie Clancy. And +I guessed why––he had been drinking. I had +heard it already. Generally when a man starts to +drink for the first time everybody talks about it. +I was surprised, and I wished he hadn’t. But we +are always finding out new things about men. In +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_17' name='page_17'></a>17</span> +my heart I was not blaming Maurice so much maybe +as I should. I’d always been taught that drinking +in excess was an awful habit, but some otherwise +fine men I knew drank at times, and I wasn’t +going to blame Maurice till I knew more about it.</p> +<p>And we can forgive a lot, too, in those we like. +Maurice had no family to think of, and it must +have been a blow to him not to get so fine a vessel +as the Fred Withrow after he had been promised +and had set his heart on it. And then to see her +go to a man like Sam Hollis! and with the prospect +of not getting another until a man like Withrow +felt like saying you could. Everybody in Gloucester +seemed to know that Withrow was doing all he +could to keep Maurice from getting a vessel, and +as the owners had banded together just before this +for protection, as they called it, “against outside +interference,” and as Withrow was one of the +largest owners and a man of influence beyond his +vessel holdings, he was quite a power at this time.</p> +<p>Maurice Blake was far from being drunk, however, +when I met him this day. Indeed, I do not +believe that in his most reckless hour up to this +time he had ever lost control of himself so far as +not to know pretty nearly what he was doing all +the time; but certainly he had been drinking this +day, and the drinking manner did not set well on +him.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_18' name='page_18'></a>18</span></div> +<p>Maurice was standing on the front steps of +Mrs. Arkell’s boarding-house when I saw him. It +was Mrs. Arkell’s granddaughter Minnie that +married the wealthy Mr. Miner––a rather loud +sort of man, who had been reported as saying that +he would give her a good time and show her life. +He may have given her a good time––I don’t +know––but he was dead in two years. He was +supposed to be very rich––three or four millions––but +on settling up there was less than half a million. +Of course that wasn’t bad––enough for +Minnie to buy a big house next her grandmother’s +for a summer home, and enough to go off travelling +whenever she pleased.</p> +<p>When she came back to Gloucester she was still +a very handsome girl, spoken of as the “Miner +widow” among people who had known her only +since her marriage, but still called Minnie Arkell +by most of those who had known her when she +was a child. In Gloucester she bought the first +house just around the corner from her grandmother’s. +A handy passage between their two +back yards allowed her to visit her grandmother +whenever she pleased. She wanted to be near her +own people, she said, and was more in her grandmother’s +house than her own.</p> +<p>Maurice came down the steps of Mrs. Arkell’s +boarding-house as I came along, and joined me on +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_19' name='page_19'></a>19</span> +the sidewalk. He asked me the first thing if I +wouldn’t have a drink, and I said no.</p> +<p>“Oh, I forgot,” he said, “you don’t drink. +Have a cigar,” and he pulled one out of his pocket, +and I took and lit it. Generally I smoked a pipe, +but I liked good cigars, though I couldn’t afford +them myself. This was not a good one––more +like the kind they hand out in bar-rooms when +men get tired of drinking and say they guess they’ll +have a smoke.</p> +<p>“How does it happen, Joe, you’re not at the +store? I always thought Withrow held his men +pretty close to hours.”</p> +<p>“Well, so he does, but I’m not working for him +now.” And then I told him that I had had an +argument with Withrow, been discharged, and +was thinking of going fishing. I didn’t tell him at +first how it all came about, but I think he guessed +it, for all at once, after a searching look, he +reached out and shook hands with me.</p> +<p>“If ever I get a vessel again, Joe, and you still +want to go fishing and care for a chance with me, +you can have it––if you can’t go with a better man, +I mean. I’ll take you and be glad to have you.”</p> +<p>That meant a good berth, of course, for Maurice +was a killer.</p> +<p>I looked at Maurice when he wasn’t watching +me, and felt sorry for him. He was a man that +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_20' name='page_20'></a>20</span> +anybody would like the looks of. It wasn’t that +he was a handsome man––I never could get to like +pretty men myself––but there was something about +him that made you feel you could trust him. The +heavy tan of his face and the grip of his jaw +would spoil almost anybody for a beauty man, I +suppose, but he had fine eyes and his mouth was +all right, and he had a head that you’d like to +stand off one side and look at, with hair that +seemed to lift and wave with every breath of +wind, and when he smiled you felt somehow that +he’d saved that particular smile for you. He was +no better built than a hundred other men I knew +who were going fishing, and he was no bigger than +a thousand others sailing out of Gloucester, and +not near so big as a lot of others––five feet ten +or eleven, maybe, he was, with level shoulders, and +very light on his feet––but looking at him you +knew he was all there.</p> +<p>After smoking a while and watching him between +puffs, it flashed on me all at once that I was +pretty thick. A word or two my cousin Nell had +let slip––not so much what she said as the way she +said it––gave me a hint of a whole lot of things. +Looking at Maurice now I asked him if he had +seen my cousin or Miss Foster lately.</p> +<p>He flushed up as he looked at me, and I saw +that whatever he was thinking of it had not been +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_21' name='page_21'></a>21</span> +far away from what I had been thinking of. “No, +I haven’t seen them”––slowly. “How is your +cousin?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she seems to be all right. They were both +in to the store this morning.”</p> +<p>“What doing?” I thought he was beginning to +worry, but I tried not to let on that I noticed it. +I was beginning to feel like a sleuth, or a detective, +or a diplomat, or something.</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t know. Nell said they came in +to see me, but all that happened that I had any +hand in was to weigh her. She gained another +pound last week, and it’s worrying her. The +more exercise she takes the heavier she gets, she +says. She’s a hundred and thirty-one now. Of +course, while they’re there Withrow had to help +out and make himself agreeable, especially to +Miss Foster, but I can’t see that she warms up to +him.”</p> +<p>“Ha? No? You don’t think so?”</p> +<p>“Not much, but maybe it’s her way. She’s +pretty frosty generally anyway, different from my +cousin––she’s something like.”</p> +<p>“Yes, your cousin is all right,” said Maurice.</p> +<p>“You bet,” I said. “She don’t stand around +and chill the air.”</p> +<p>“Why––does Miss Foster always? Is that her +way? I––don’t––know––much about her.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_22' name='page_22'></a>22</span></div> +<p>“Well, I don’t know so very much myself––mostly +what my cousin tells me. Still, I guess +she’s all right; but she strikes me as one of the +kind that might make an awful lot of a man and +never let on until she was dead sure of him.”</p> +<p>“H-m––That means she could think a whole +lot of Withrow and not let on, Joe?”</p> +<p>I tried to look at Maurice like my oldest +brother used to look at me sometimes when he +tried to make me feel that I was a very green kid +indeed, and said, “Well, if she’s the kind to care +for a man like Withrow, all I’ve got to say is that +she’ll deserve all she’ll get. He’s no good.”</p> +<p>“That may be, but how’s she to know? I +know, you know, and half the men in Gloucester +know that he’s rotten; but take a woman who only +sees him at his best and when he’s watching out––how’s +she to know?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, but being a woman she ought +to,” was all I could say to that. It came into my +mind just then that when I next saw my cousin +Nell I’d tell her what I really knew, and more +than that––what I really thought of my old employer. +Perhaps she’d carry it to Miss Foster. +If it was to be Maurice or Withrow, I knew on +which side I was going to be.</p> +<p>Both of us were quiet then, neither of us quite +knowing what to say perhaps. Then together we +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_23' name='page_23'></a>23</span> +started to walk to the corner of the side street. +We were past the side-door of the boarding-house +when a voice called out, “Oh, Maurice,” and +then, maybe noticing me, I suppose, “Oh, Captain +Blake,” and Maurice turned. Minnie Arkell––Mrs. +Miner rather––was there at the kitchen +window. I didn’t know she was in town at all––thought +she hadn’t got back from Florida, or +North Carolina, or wherever it was she had been +for the winter.</p> +<p>“Won’t you come in a minute, Captain, and +your friend? He doesn’t remember me––do you, +Joe?––and yet we were playmates once,” which +was true. I was often taken to Mrs. Arkell’s +when a little fellow by skippers who were friends +of my father’s. They used to tell me about him, +and I liked to listen.</p> +<p>“I thought I’d run over and see granny,” she +went on. “I’m back to the old house for a while. +Won’t you come in?”</p> +<p>My mind had long been set against Minnie +Arkell. I knew about her throwing over a fine +young fellow, a promising skipper, to marry +Miner. I may have been too young at the time +to judge anybody, but after that I had small +use for her. My ideas in the matter were of +course pretty much what older men had put into +me.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_24' name='page_24'></a>24</span></div> +<p>I had listened to them––skippers and others––and +yet now, when she held out her hand to me +and smiled, I didn’t feel nearly so set against her. +She certainly was a handsome girl, and yet I hoped +that Maurice wouldn’t fall in love with her, as +most everybody did that came to the Arkell house.</p> +<p>I said that I did not have time to come in, and +started to make off. Maurice asked me where I +was bound. I told him that I thought of taking +a look in at Crow’s Nest and getting the news.</p> +<p>“Yes, you’ll get it there, sure enough. When +they can’t tell you anything else up there they can +tell you what everybody’s doing.” He smiled at +that, turned slowly toward the side-door, as if he +would rather go with me to Crow’s Nest, and I +went off.</p> +<p>Just outside the gate I saw Sam Hollis, a man +I never did like. Tommie Clancy, the man that +could size up a person quicker than anybody I’d +ever met, used to say that deep down, if you could +get at Hollis, you’d find a quitter, but that nobody +had ever got into him. I’d been meeting Hollis +after every trip in for two years in Withrow’s +store. He was a successful fisherman, and a +sharp, keen man ashore, but he was a man I never +quite took to. One of his ambitions, I felt satisfied, +was to be reckoned a devil of a fellow. He’d +have given a year’s earnings, I knew, to have people +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_25' name='page_25'></a>25</span> +point him out on the street and say, “There’s +Sam Hollis––there’s the boy to carry sail––nobody +ever made him take his mains’l in,” the same as +they used to say of a half dozen or so that really +would carry sail––that would drive a vessel under +before they would be the first to reef. But the +people didn’t do that, although, let him tell it, he +did wonderful things out to sea, and he had such +a way of telling it, too, that he’d almost make you +believe him. But as Clancy used to say, after he’d +left you, and you had time to think it over, you’d +see where here and there his story wasn’t well-calked. +My own idea was that he wanted a reputation +so that he could pose as a devil of a fellow +with certain people ashore. It is easy enough to +see that even a more careful man than Sam Hollis +might take a chance for a smile from a woman +like Minnie Arkell.</p> +<p>Anyhow, I never felt at home with Hollis, and +so was willing to take Clancy’s judgment straight. +Hollis was a man about forty, and had been one +of Minnie Arkell’s admirers ever since I could remember––ever +since she was old enough to have +any, I mean, and she wasn’t any late bloomer, as +Clancy used to say.</p> +<p>Hollis went into the Arkell house by the door +that had only just closed behind Maurice and Minnie +Arkell. I didn’t like that very much, and was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_26' name='page_26'></a>26</span> +thinking of turning back and going in, too; but +on second thought it occurred to me that perhaps +only Maurice would have a welcome for me. So I +didn’t enter, but kept on to Crow’s Nest instead.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_27' name='page_27'></a>27</span> +<a name='IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION' id='IV_LITTLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN_STANDS_EXAMINATION'></a> +<h2>IV</h2> +<h3>LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION</h3> +</div> +<p>By this time I should have gone home, I suppose, +and had something to eat––it was +getting on into the afternoon––but I didn’t want +to have a talk with my mother yet awhile, and so +kept on to Crow’s Nest, where I found half a +dozen good-natured loafers. Not all were loafers +exactly––three or four were simply waiting around +before shipping on some seiner for the mackerel +season. It promised to shower at the time, too, +and of course the gentlemen who formed old +Peter’s staff could not think of venturing out in +threatening weather.</p> +<p>And there they were, with Peter Hines, the paid +man in charge of Crow’s Nest, keeping a benevolent +eye on them. Yarning, arguing, skylarking, +advising Peter, and having fun with little Johnnie +Duncan they were when I entered. Johnnie was +the grandson of the head of the Duncan firm, a +fine, clear-eyed boy, that nobody could help liking. +He thought fishermen were the greatest people +in the world. Whatever a fisherman did was +all right to Johnnie.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_28' name='page_28'></a>28</span></div> +<p>I had got all the news at Crow’s Nest and was +just thinking of moving along toward home when +Tommie Clancy popped in. Of course that made +a difference. I wasn’t going to move while Clancy +was around.</p> +<p>“My soul, but here’s where the real gentlemen +are,” he had to say first, and then, “Anybody seen +Maurice to-day?”</p> +<p>I told him I had, and where.</p> +<p>“Anybody with him?”</p> +<p>“Well, not with him exactly.” I shook my head, +and said nothing of Minnie Arkell, nor of Sam +Hollis, although Clancy, looking at me, I could +see, guessed that there was something else; and he +might have asked me something more only for the +crowd and little Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>Johnnie was trying to climb up onto Clancy, +and so Clancy, turning from me, took Johnnie up +and gave him a toss that all but hit his head against +the roof. “And how’s she heading, Johnnie-boy?” +and taking a seat stood Johnnie up beside +him.</p> +<p>“East-s’uth-east, and a fair, fair wind,” answered +Johnnie.</p> +<p>“East-s’uth-east––my, but you said that fine. +And a fair wind? Must be bound Georges +Bank way. And how long will you hold that +course?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_29' name='page_29'></a>29</span></div> +<p>“From Eastern Point––a hundred and thirty-five +mile.”</p> +<p>“Yes––and then?”</p> +<p>“Then you throw her up and heave the lead.”</p> +<p>“And heave the lead––sure enough. And +then?”</p> +<p>“And then, if you find you’re clear of the North +Shoal, you put her to the s’uth’ard and west’ard +till you’re in onto the Bank.”</p> +<p>“S’uth’ard and west’ard––that’s the boy. Man, +but I’ll live to see you going to the Custom House +and taking out your master’s papers yet.”</p> +<p>“And can I join the Master Mariners then?”</p> +<p>“That’s what you can, and walk down Main +Street with a swing to your shoulders, too. And +now you’re up on the Bank and twenty-five fathom +of water and the right bottom––and you’re a hand-liner, +say, after cod––what then?”</p> +<p>“Let go her chain and begin fishing.”</p> +<p>“And would you give her a short or a long +string of cable?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I’m not sure. A long string you’d +hang on better, but a short scope and you could +get out faster in case you were dragging and going +onto the shoals. What would you do, Captain +Clancy? You never told me that, did you?”</p> +<p>“Well, it would depend, too, though handliners +generally calculate on hanging on, blow how it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_30' name='page_30'></a>30</span> +will. But never mind that; suppose your anchor +dragged or parted and into the shoal water you +went in a gale, an easterly, say––and the bank +right under your lee––wind sixty or seventy or +eighty mile an hour––what would you do?”</p> +<p>“Anchor not hold? M-m––Then I’d––give +her the second one.”</p> +<p>“And if that dragged, too––or parted?”</p> +<p>“Both of ’em? M-m”––Johnnie was taking +deep breaths now––“why, then I’d have to put +sail to her–––”</p> +<p>“What sail?”</p> +<p>“Why, jib, jumbo, fore and main.”</p> +<p>“And the wind blowing eighty mile an hour?”</p> +<p>“Why, yes, if she’d stand it.”</p> +<p>“My, but she’d have to be an able vessel that––all +four lowers and the wind blowing eighty mile +an hour. Man, but you’re a dog! Suppose she +couldn’t stand it?”</p> +<p>“Then I’d reef the mains’l.”</p> +<p>“And if that was too much––what then?”</p> +<p>“Reef it again.”</p> +<p>“And too much yet?”</p> +<p>“Balance-reef it––maybe take it in altogether––and +the jib with it, and get out the riding-sail.”</p> +<p>“And would you do nothing to the fores’l?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I dunno––with some vessels maybe +I’d reef that, too––maybe take it in altogether.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_31' name='page_31'></a>31</span></div> +<p>“My, but you’re cert’nly a dog. And what +then?”</p> +<p>“Why, then I’d try to work her out.”</p> +<p>“And would you be doing anything with the +lead?”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’d be keeping the lead going all the +time, for banging her across and back like that +you wouldn’t know where you were just.”</p> +<p>“And would you come clear, d’y’ think?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir––if the gear held and with an able +vessel we ought to.”</p> +<p>“If the gear held––that’s it. Be sure, Johnnie-boy, +you see that the gear is all right before ever +you leave port. And with an able vessel, you say? +With that new one of your gran’pa’s––would you +come clear with her?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she’d come clear––built to go fresh halibuting +next winter, that one.”</p> +<p>“Yes––and seining this spring. But suppose +now you were haddocking––trawling––eight or +ten dories, and you just arrived on the grounds, +picked out a good spot, and there you are––you’re +all baited up and ready?”</p> +<p>“Winter time?”</p> +<p>“Winter time, yes.”</p> +<p>“First I’d single-reef the mains’l. Then I’d +hold her up a little––not too much––me being +skipper would be to the wheel myself––and then +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_32' name='page_32'></a>32</span> +I’d give the order, ‘Dories to the rail!’ and then, +when everything was all right––when I’d be satisfied +we wouldn’t foul the next vessel’s trawls––I’d +call out, ‘Over with your wind’ard dory!’”</p> +<p>“Loud and clear you’d holler, because the wind +might be high.”</p> +<p>“Loud and clear, yes––‘Let go your wind’ard +dory!’––like that. And ‘Set to the west’ard,’ or +the east’ard, whatever it was––according to the +tide, you know. I’d call that out to the dory as +it went sliding by the quarter––the vessel, of +course, ’d be sailing all the time––and next, +‘Wind’ard dory to the rail!’ And then, when +we’d gone ahead enough, again, ‘Let go your +looard dory!’ and then, ‘Looard dory to the rail! +Let go your wind’ard dory! Let go your looard +dory!’ and so till they were all over the side.”</p> +<p>“And supposing, they being all out, it came on +thick, or snowing, and some of them went astray, +and it was time to go home, having filled her with +eighty or ninety or a hundred thousand of fresh +fish, a fair wind, and every prospect of a good +market––what then?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I’d have to wait, of course––cruise around +and stand by.”</p> +<p>“And suppose you couldn’t find them again?”</p> +<p>“Why, after waiting until I was sure they were +gone, I’d come home.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_33' name='page_33'></a>33</span></div> +<p>“And your flag?”</p> +<p>“Half-mast.”</p> +<p>“Half-mast––that’s it. I hope you’ll never +have to fly a half-masted flag, Johnnie. But suppose +you did see them, and they were in shoal +water, say––and the shoals to looard, of course, +and it blowing–––”</p> +<p>“I’d stand in and get them.”</p> +<p>“And it blowing hard––blowing hard, Johnnie?––and +shoal––shoal water?”</p> +<p>“Why”––Johnnie was looking troubled––“why, +I’d have to stand in just the same, wouldn’t I?”</p> +<p>“Your own men and you ask me, Johnnie-boy?”</p> +<p>“Why, of course I’d have to stand in and get +them.”</p> +<p>“And if you got in so far you couldn’t get out––you +got smothered, say?”</p> +<p>“Why, then––then we’d be lost––all hands +would be lost.”</p> +<p>Poor Johnnie! he was all but crying.</p> +<p>“That’s it. And that’s where some would say +you showed yourself a man, and some a fool, +Johnnie-boy. Some would say, ‘Use judgment––think +of the other eighteen or twenty men safe +aboard the vessel.’ Would you use judgment, or +what, Johnnie?”</p> +<p>“M-m––I don’t know. What would you do, +Captain Clancy?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_34' name='page_34'></a>34</span></div> +<p>“What d’y’ think I’d do, Johnnie?” Clancy +drew the boy up and tucked the little face to his +own broad breast. The rest of us knew well +enough what Clancy would do. “Judgment hell!” +Clancy would say, and go in and get lost––or +maybe get away with it where a more careful man +would be lost––but we waited to hear what Johnnie––such +a little boy––would say. He said it at last, +after looking long into Clancy’s face.</p> +<p>“I think you’d go in, Captain Clancy.”</p> +<p>Clancy laughed at that. “Lord, Johnnie-boy, +no wonder everybody loves you. No matter what +a man does, all you see is the best that’s in him.”</p> +<p>It was time to clean up then, and Johnnie of +course was bound to help.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_35' name='page_35'></a>35</span> +<a name='V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST' id='V_FROM_OUT_OF_CROWS_NEST'></a> +<h2>V</h2> +<h3>FROM OUT OF CROW’S NEST</h3> +</div> +<p>“What’ll I do with this?” asked Johnnie, +in the middle of the cleaning up, holding +up a pan of sweepings.</p> +<p>“Oh, that”––Clancy naturally took charge––“heave +it overboard. Ebb tide’ll carry it away. +Heave it into the slip. Wait––maybe you’ll have +to hoist the hatches. ’Tisn’t raining much now, +anyway, and it will soon stop altogether. Might +as well go aloft and make a good job of the +hatches, hadn’t he, Peter?”</p> +<p>“Wait a minute.” Peter was squinting through +the porthole. “I shouldn’t wonder but this is one +of our fellows coming in. I know she’s a banker. +The Enchantress, I think. Look, Tommie, and +see what you make of her.”</p> +<p>Clancy looked. “That’s who it is, Peter. Hi, +Johnnie, here’ll be a chance for you to hoist the +flag. Hurry aloft and tend to the hatches, as +Peter says, and you can hoist the flag for the Enchantress +home from the Banks.”</p> +<p>In bad weather, like it was that day, the little +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_36' name='page_36'></a>36</span> +balcony of Crow’s Nest was shut in by little +hatches, arranged so that they could be run up +and down, the same as hatches are slid over the +companionway of a fisherman’s cabin or forec’s’le. +Johnnie was a pretty active boy, and he was up the +rope ladder and onto the roof in a few seconds. +We could hear him walking above, and soon the +hatches slid away and we all could look freely out +to sea again.</p> +<p>“All right below?” called out Johnnie.</p> +<p>“Not yet,” answered Peter. He was standing +by the rail of the balcony and untwisting the halyards +that served to hoist the signal-flags to the +mast-head. Peter seemed slow at it, and Clancy +called out again, “Wait a bit, and we’ll overhaul +the halyards.” Then, looking up and noticing that +Johnnie was standing on the edge of the roof, he +added, “And be careful and not slip on those wet +planks.”</p> +<p>“Aye, aye!” Johnnie was in high glee. “And +then I can run up the flag for the Enchantress?”</p> +<p>“Sure, you’ve been such a good boy to-day.”</p> +<p>“M-m––but that’ll be fine. I can catch the halyards +from here if you’ll swing them in a little.”</p> +<p>“All right––be careful. Here you go now.”</p> +<p>“Let ’em come––I got–––”</p> +<p>The first thing we knew of what had happened +was when we saw Johnnie’s body come pitching +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_37' name='page_37'></a>37</span> +down. He struck old Peter first, staggering him, +and from there he shot down out of sight.</p> +<p>Clancy jumped to the rail in time to save Peter +from toppling over it and just in time, as he said +afterward, to see the boy splash in the slip below. +He yanked Peter to his feet, and then, without +turning around, he called out, “A couple of you +run to the head of the dock––there’ll be a dory +there somewhere––row ’round to the slip with it. +He’ll be carried under the south side––look for +him there if I’m not there before you. Drive her +now!”</p> +<p>“Here, Joe, wake up!” Clancy had untied the +ends of the halyards after whirling them through +the block above, and now had the whole line piled +up on the balcony. He took a couple of turns +around his waist, took another turn around a cleat +under the balcony rail, passed the bight of the line +to me, and said, “Here, Joe, lower me. Take hold +you, too, Peter. Pay out and not too careful. Oh, +faster, man! If he ain’t dead he’ll drown, maybe––if +he gets sucked in and caught under those piles +it’s all off.”</p> +<p>He was sliding over the rail, the line tautening +to his weight in no time, and he talking all the +time. “Lower away––lower, lower! Faster––faster +than that––he’s rising again––second time––and +drifting under the wharf, sure’s fate! +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_38' name='page_38'></a>38</span> +Faster––faster––what’s wrong?––what’s caught +there?––let her run!”</p> +<p>The halyards had become fouled, and Peter was +trying to clear them, calling to Clancy to wait.</p> +<p>“Fouled?” roared Clancy. “Cast it off altogether. +Let go altogether and let me drop.”</p> +<p>“We can’t––the bight of it’s caught around +Peter’s legs!” I called to him.</p> +<p>“Oh, hell! take a couple of half-hitches around +the cleat then––look out now!” He gripped the +halyards high above his head with both hands, +gave a jumping pull, and let himself drop. The +line parted and down he shot.</p> +<p>He must have been shaken by the shock of his +fall, but I guess he had his senses with him when +he came up again, for in no time he was striking +toward where Johnnie had come up last. Then I +ran downstairs, down to the dock, and was just +in time to see Parsons and Moore rowing a dory +desperately up the slip, and Clancy with Johnnie +chest-up, and a hand under his neck, kicking from +under the stringers, and calling out, “This way +with the dory––drive her, fellows, drive her!”</p> +<p>I did not wait for any more––I knew Johnnie +was safe with Clancy––but ran to the office of the +Duncans and told them that Johnnie had fallen +into the dock and got wet, and that it might be +well to telephone for a doctor. His grandfather +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_39' name='page_39'></a>39</span> +knew it was serious without my saying any more, +and rang up at once.</p> +<p>That had hardly been done when Clancy came +in the door with Johnnie in his arms. The boy +was limp and unconscious and water was dripping +from him. Old Mr. Duncan was worried +enough, but composed in his manner for all that. +He met Clancy at the door. “This way, Captain; +lay him on this couch. The doctor will be here +in a very few minutes now. Perhaps we can do +something while he is on the way. Just how did +it happen? and we’ll know better what to do, perhaps.”</p> +<p>Clancy told his story in forty words. “He’s +probably shook up and his lungs must be full of +water. But he may come out all right––his eyelids +quivered coming up the dock. Better strip +his shirt and waist off. He’s got a lot of water in +him––roll him over and we’ll get some of it out.”</p> +<p>He worked away on Johnnie, and had the water +pretty well out of him by the time the uncle and +the doctor came. It was hard work for a time, +but it came at last to when the doctor stood up, +rested his arms for a breath, said, “Ah––he’s all +right now,” and went on again. It was not so +very long after that that Johnnie opened his eyes––for +about a second. But pretty soon he opened +them to stay. His first look was for his grandfather, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_40' name='page_40'></a>40</span> +but his first word was for Clancy. “I +could see you when you jumped, Captain Clancy––it +was great.”</p> +<p>Then they bundled Johnnie into a carriage and +his uncle took him home.</p> +<p>“Lord, but I thought he was gone, Joe. But +let’s get out of this,” said Clancy, and we were +making for the door, with Clancy’s clothes still +wringing wet, when we were stopped by the elder +Mr. Duncan, who shook hands with both of us +and then went on to speak to Clancy.</p> +<p>“Captain Clancy–––”</p> +<p>“Captain once, but–––”</p> +<p>“I know, I know, but not from lack of ability, +at any rate. Let me thank you. His mother will +thank you herself later, and make you feel, I +know, her sense of what she owes to you. And +his cousin Alice––she thinks the world of him. +There, I know you don’t want to hear any more, +but you shall––maybe later––though it may come +up in another way. But tell me––wait, come inside +a minute. Come in you, too, Joe,” he said, +turning to me, but I said I’d rather wait outside. +I wanted to have a smoke to get my nerves steady +again, I guess.</p> +<p>So Clancy and Mr. Duncan went inside, and +through the window, whenever I looked up, I +could see them. As their talk went on I could see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_41' name='page_41'></a>41</span> +that they were getting very much interested about +something or other. Clancy particularly was laying +down the law with a clenched fist and an arm +that swung through the air like a jibing boom. +Somebody, I knew, was getting it.</p> +<p>When they came out Mr. Duncan stopped at +the door, and said, as if by way of a parting word, +“And so you think that’s the cause of Withrow’s +picking a quarrel with Maurice? Well, I never +thought of that before, but maybe you’re right. +And now, what do you say to a vessel for yourself?”</p> +<p>“Me take a vessel? No, sir––not for me. But +when you’ve got vessels to hand around, Mr. Duncan, +bear Maurice in mind––he’s a fisherman.”</p> +<p>We left Mr. Duncan then, he making ready to +telephone to learn how Johnnie was getting along. +Clancy said his clothes were beginning to feel so +dry that he did not know as he would go to his +boarding-house. “I think we’d better go up to +the Anchorage and have a little touch. But I forgot––you +don’t drink, Joe? No? So I thought, +but don’t you care––you’re young yet. Come +along, anyway, and have a smoke.”</p> +<p>And so we went along to the Anchorage, and +while we were there, I smoking one of those barroom +cigars and Clancy nursing the after-taste of +his drink and declaring that a touch of good liquor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_42' name='page_42'></a>42</span> +was equal to a warm stove for drying wet clothes, +I told him what I would have told him in Crow’s +Nest if there had not been so many around––about +Minnie Arkell calling Maurice back into her +grandmother’s house, and then Sam Hollis coming +along and going in after him.</p> +<p>“What!” and stopped dead. Suddenly he +brought his fist through the air. “I’ll”––and as +suddenly stopped it midway. “No, I won’t, either. +But I’ll put Maurice wise to them. What should +he know at his age and with his up-bringing of +what’s in the heads of people like them. And if +I don’t have something further to say to old Mr. +Duncan! But now let’s go back to Arkell’s––come +on, Joe.”</p> +<p>But I didn’t go back with him. I didn’t think +that I could do Maurice any good then, and I +might be in the way if Clancy wanted to speak his +mind out to anybody. I went home instead, where +I expected to have troubles of my own, for I knew +that my mother wouldn’t like the idea of my going +seining.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_43' name='page_43'></a>43</span> +<a name='VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL' id='VI_MAURICE_BLAKE_GETS_A_VESSEL'></a> +<h2>VI</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL</h3> +</div> +<p>Three days after Johnnie Duncan fell out +of Crow’s Nest the new Duncan vessel designed +by Will Somers was towed around from +Essex. She had been named the Johnnie Duncan. +I spent the best part of the next three days watching +the sparmakers and riggers at work on her. +And when they had done with her and she fit to +go to sea, she did look handsome. She had not +quite the length of the new vessel of Sam Hollis’s, +which lay at Withrow’s dock just below her, and +that probably helped to give her a more powerful +look to people that compared them. Too able-looking +altogether to be real fast, some thought, +to hold the Withrow vessel in anything short of a +gale, but I didn’t feel so sure she wouldn’t sail +in a moderate breeze, too. I had seen her on the +stocks, and knew the beautiful lines below the +water-mark. And she was going to carry the sail +to drive her. I took particular pains to get the +measurements of her mainmast while it lay on the +dock under the shears. It was eighty-seven feet––and +she only a hundred and ten feet over all––and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_44' name='page_44'></a>44</span> +it stepped plumb in the middle of her, further forward +than a mainmast was generally put in a fisherman. +To that was shackled a seventy-five foot +boom, and eighty-odd tons of pig-iron were cemented +close down to her keel, and that floored +over and stanchioned snug. For the rest, she was +very narrow forward, as I think I said––everybody +said she’d never stand the strain of her fore-rigging +when they got to driving her on a long +passage. And she carried an ungodly bowsprit––thirty-seven +feet outboard––easily the longest +bowsprit out of Gloucester. Topmasts to match, +and there was some sail to drive a vessel. But +she had the hull for it, full and yet easy, with the +greatest beam pretty well aft of the mainmast, +and she drew fifteen and a half feet of water.</p> +<p>I was still looking her over, her third day in +the riggers’ and sailmakers’ hands, when Clancy +came along.</p> +<p>“Handsome, ain’t she, and only needing a skipper +and crew to be off on the Southern cruise, eh, +Joe?”</p> +<p>“That’s all. And according to the talk, you’re +to be the skipper.”</p> +<p>“Well, talk has another according coming to it.”</p> +<p>“I’m sorry to hear that. But what happened at +Mrs. Arkell’s the other day?”</p> +<p>“What happened? Joe, but I was glad you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_45' name='page_45'></a>45</span> +didn’t come with me. You’d have felt as I did about +it, I know. There they were––the two of them––Hollis +and Withrow––yes, Withrow there––when +I broke in on them, and Maurice between them––drunk. +Yes, sir, drunk and helpless. They called +it a wine-party, as though a man couldn’t get as +good and drunk on wine in a private residence as +ever he could on whiskey or rum in the back room +of a saloon. Well, sir, I asked a question or two, +and they tried to face me out, but out they went––first +Hollis, and then Withrow, one after the other, +and both good and lively. And then Minnie +Arkell popped in from her own house by way of +the backyard. She didn’t expect to see me––I +know she didn’t. Had gone over to her house +when the men began to drink, she said, and had +just come over to see granny.</p> +<p>“Well, I told her what I thought. ‘It means +nothing to you,’ I said, ‘to see a man make a fool +of himself––that’s been a good part of your business +in life for some time, now––to see men make +fools of themselves for you. Withrow had reasons +for wanting him disgraced––never mind why. +Sam Hollis, maybe, has his reasons too. And the +two of them are being helped along by you. You +could have stopped this thing here to-day, but +you didn’t.’ ‘No, no, Tommie,’ she says. ‘Yes, +yes,’ I went on, ‘and don’t try to tell me different. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_46' name='page_46'></a>46</span> +If I didn’t know you since you were a little girl +you might be able to convince me, but I know you. +Maurice, when he was himself, passed you by. +You were bound to have him. You know a real +man, more’s the pity, when you see one, and you +know that Maurice, young and green and soft as +he is, has more life and dash than a dozen of the +kind you’ve been mixing with lately.’</p> +<p>“Oh, but I laid it on, Joe. Yes. A shame to +have to talk like that to a woman, but I just had +to. I didn’t stop there. ‘You’re handsome, and +you’re rich, Minnie Arkell; got a lot of life left +in you yet, and go off travelling with people who +get their names regularly in the Boston papers; +but just the same, Minnie Arkell, there are women +in jail not half so bad as you––women doing time +who’ve done less mischief in the world than you +have.’”</p> +<p>“Wasn’t that pretty rough, Tommie?”</p> +<p>“Rough? Lord, yes––but true, Joe, true. And +if you’d only see poor Maurice lying there! +Cried? I could’ve cried, Joe––not since my +mother died did I come so near to it. But it was +done.</p> +<p>“Well, I made Minnie go and get her +grandmother. And, Joe, if you’d seen that fine +old lady––oh, but she’s got a heart in her––stoop +and put Maurice’s head on her bosom as if he +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_47' name='page_47'></a>47</span> +was a little child. ‘The poor, poor boy. No mother +here,’ she said, ‘and the best man on earth might +come to it. Leave him to me, Tommie.’ Lord, I +could have knelt down at her feet––the heart in +her, Joe.”</p> +<p>“And how has Maurice been since?”</p> +<p>“All right. That was the first time in his life +that he was drunk. I think it will be his last. +But let’s go aboard the Johnnie.”</p> +<p>After looking over the Johnnie Duncan and +admiring her to our hearts’ content, we sat down +in her cabin and began to talk of the seining season +to come. Others came down and joined in––George +Moore, Eddie Parsons among others––and +they asked Clancy what he was going to do. +Was he going to see about a chance to go seining, +or what? Moore said he’s been waiting to see +what Maurice Blake was going to do; but as it +was beginning to look as though Maurice was +done for, he guessed he’d take a look around. He +asked Clancy what he thought, and Clancy said he +didn’t know––time enough yet.</p> +<p>Maurice Blake himself dropped down then. He +was looking better, and everybody was glad to see +it. He’d quit drinking––that was certain; and +now he was a picture of a man––not pretty, but +strong-looking, with his eyes glowing and his skin +flushing with the good blood inside him. He took +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_48' name='page_48'></a>48</span> +a seat on the lockers and began to whittle a block +of soft pine into a model of a hull, and after a +while, with a squint along the sheer of his little +model, he asked if anybody had seen Tom O’Donnell +or Wesley Marrs. Several said yes, they had, +and he asked where, and when they told him he +got up and said he guessed he’d go along––as he +couldn’t get a vessel himself, he might as well see +about a chance to go hand. “And as we’ve been +together so much in times gone by, Tommie, and +you, Eddie and George, what do you say if we go +together now?”</p> +<p>“All right,” said Clancy, “but wait a minute––who’s +that in the gangway?”</p> +<p>It turned out to be Johnnie Duncan. He had +a fat bundle under his arm, and bundle and all +Clancy took him up, tossed him into the air, said +“All right again, Johnnie-boy?” and kissed him +when he caught him down.</p> +<p>Johnnie started to undo his bundle. “I tell you +it’s great to be out again––the way they kept me +cooped up the last few days,” and then, cutting the +string to hurry matters, opened the bundle and +spread a handsome set of colors on the lockers. +“The Johnnie Duncan’s,” said he. “I picked out +the kind they were to be, but mummer worked +the monograms herself. See, red and blue. And +see that for an ensign! and the firm’s flag––and the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_49' name='page_49'></a>49</span> +highs––look!––the J. A. D. twisted up the same +as on the handkerchiefs we strained the coffee +through last week. And the burgee––the letters on +the burgee––my cousin Alice worked them. And +these stars––see, on the ensign––mummer and my +cousin both worked them. Gran’pa said the vessel +ought to be sure a lucky one, and all she needs +is an able master, he says, and if Captain Blake +will take her he’ll be proud to have him sail the +Johnnie Duncan–––”</p> +<p>Maurice Blake stood up. “Me?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Johnnie. “Gran’pa says that you +can have her just as soon as you go to the Custom +House and get your papers. There, I think I remembered +it all, except of course that the colors +are from me and mummer and my cousin Alice, +and will you fly them for us?”</p> +<p>Maurice laid down his model and picked up the +colors. Then he looked at Johnnie and said, +“Thank you, Johnnie; and tell your mother, Johnnie, +and your cousin, that I’ll fly the Johnnie Duncan’s +colors––and stand by them––if ever it comes +to standing by––till she goes under. Tell your +grandfather that I’ll be proud to be master of his +vessel and I’ll sail her the best I know how.”</p> +<p>“That’s you, Maurice,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>Maurice drew his hand across his eyes and sat +down again. And as soon as they decently could, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_50' name='page_50'></a>50</span> +Clancy, George Moore, and Eddie Parsons asked +him if they might ship with him for the Southern +cruise. Maurice said they very well knew that +he’d be glad to have them. He asked me, too, he +felt so good, and of course I jumped at the chance.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_51' name='page_51'></a>51</span> +<a name='VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL' id='VII_CLANCY_CROSSES_MINNIE_ARKELL'></a> +<h2>VII</h2> +<h3>CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL</h3> +</div> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan only needed to have her +stores taken aboard to go to sea. And that +was attended to next morning, and she was out for +her trial trip the same afternoon. Everybody +said she looked as handsome as a photograph going +out, though all the old sharks, when they saw her +mainsail hoisted for the first time, said she’d certainly +have need of her quarter and draught to +stand up under it.</p> +<p>It was a great day for sailing, though––the finest +kind of a breeze, and smooth water. We early +carried away our foretopmast, which had a flaw in +it. It was just as well to discover it then. Without +topsail and balloon we had it out with the Eastern +Point on her way back from Boston. She was not +much of a steamer for speed, but her schedule +called for twelve knots and she generally made +pretty near it––eleven or eleven and a half, according +to how her stokers felt, I guess. We headed +her off after a while, and that was doing pretty well +for that breeze, with a new vessel not yet loosened +up.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_52' name='page_52'></a>52</span></div> +<p>“But the balloon was too much for her,” said +Mr. Duncan, as we shot into the dock after beating +the Eastern Point.</p> +<p>“No, the balloon was all right––’twas the +topm’st was a bit light,” answered Maurice.</p> +<p>Old Mr. Duncan smiled at that. “But what do +you think of her, Captain Blake?”</p> +<p>“Oh, she’s like all the rest of them when she’s +alone––sails like the devil,” the skipper answered +to that, but he smiled with it and we all knew he +was satisfied with her.</p> +<p>That night was the Master Mariners’ Ball, and +I waited up till late to talk with my cousin Nell, +who had gone there with Will Somers. Finally +they came along past my house and I hailed them.</p> +<p>Nell broke right in as usual with what was uppermost +in her mind. “I don’t suppose you saw me +and Alice, but we were in Mr. Duncan’s office when +you and Mr. Clancy and Captain Blake were coming +up the dock to-day after the trial trip. Mr. +Duncan told us what Captain Blake said of the +Johnnie Duncan, but now tell me, what did the +rest of you think of her? What does your friend +Clancy say? He knows a vessel.”</p> +<p>“Clancy,” I answered, “thought what we all +thought, I guess––that she’s a fast vessel any way +you take her, but he won’t say she’s the fastest +vessel out of Gloucester, even after she’s put in trim +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_53' name='page_53'></a>53</span> +and loosened up. But in a sea-going way and with +wind enough––with wind enough, mind––he thinks +she’ll do pretty well.”</p> +<p>“With wind enough and in a sea-way?” repeated +Nell. “Then I hope that when the fishermen’s +race is sailed next fall it’s a howling gale +and seas clear to your mast-head. Yes, and you +needn’t laugh––don’t you know what it means to +Will?”</p> +<p>And I did realize. Somers, a fine fellow, was +just then beginning to get a chance at designing +fishermen. So far he had done pretty well, but +it was on the Johnnie Duncan, I knew, he had +pinned his faith. For his own sake, I hoped +that the Johnnie would do great things, but for +Nell’s sake I prayed she would. Nell thought a +lot of Will and wasn’t ashamed to show her liking, +and thinking of that set me to thinking of other +things.</p> +<p>“Was Miss Foster to the ball?” I asked her.</p> +<p>“She was,” said Nell.</p> +<p>“And with whom?”</p> +<p>“Mr. Withrow.”</p> +<p>“Oh-h, Lord!”</p> +<p>“Oh-h!––and why Oh-h-h?”</p> +<p>“I wish she’d gone with Maurice.”</p> +<p>“H-m––that was drunk the other day?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I suppose that queers him forever. And +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_54' name='page_54'></a>54</span> +the other fellow does ten times as bad, only under +cover. Who told you?”</p> +<p>“Never mind. Wasn’t he?”</p> +<p>“Was Maurice to the ball?”</p> +<p>“He was.”</p> +<p>“And who with?”</p> +<p>“With nobody.”</p> +<p>“Good. Was Mrs. Miner there?”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Miner?”––and such a sniff!––“yes, she +was there.”</p> +<p>“With Sam Hollis?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and flirted with half the men in the hall +and with your Maurice Blake outrageously.”</p> +<p>“That so? Could Maurice help that much? +But I wish, just the same, that Miss Foster had +gone with Maurice.”</p> +<p>“Well, there was one very good reason.”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>“He didn’t ask her. And Mr. Withrow made a +handsome cavalier anyway.”</p> +<p>“A handsome”––I was going to say lobster, +but I didn’t. Instead I told her why Maurice +didn’t ask Miss Foster––that he didn’t think +enough of himself, probably. And that led up to a +talk about Maurice Blake and Clancy. Before I +got through I had Nell won over. Indeed, I think +she was won over before I began at all.</p> +<p>“There’s a whole lot you don’t know yet,” she +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_55' name='page_55'></a>55</span> +said at last. “Get Captain Blake to make a name +for himself seining, and for sailing his vessel as +she ought to be sailed, and I’ll get down on my +knees to Alice for him––sail her as she ought to be +sailed, remember. And make a good stock with +her, and you’ll see.”</p> +<p>So, as I walked down the street with Nell and +Will Somers a part of the way, the talk was in +that strain, and when I left them, after passing +Sam Hollis bound home, it was with the hope of +things coming out all right. I was feeling happy +until I got near Minnie Arkell’s door, where my +worrying began again, for there on the steps and +in the glare of the electric light was Minnie Arkell +herself, as though she were waiting for somebody. +And not wanting to have her know that I +saw her waiting at her door steps at that time of +night, I stepped in the shadows until she should +go in. It was then that Maurice came along, and +she called him up. And he went up and stood on +the step below her and she bent over him as if she +wanted to lift him up. And it was less than five +minutes since Sam Hollis left her.</p> +<p>“Come around by way of the side door of +grandma’s house, Maurice, and through her yard +and into my house, and nobody will see you. And +then no old grannies will talk and we’ll have a little +supper all to ourselves. Hurry now.” She was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_56' name='page_56'></a>56</span> +talking as if she owned him. I did not hear +what Maurice said, nor I did not want to hear; +but making for the corner, he went by me like a +shot, and “O Lord!” I heard him groan as he +passed me, not recognizing me––not even seeing +me, I believe.</p> +<p>I did not know what to make of it and let him +go by. But after he had turned the corner and +Minnie Arkell had shut her door––and she watched +him till he disappeared around the corner––I ran +after him. In my hurrying after him I heard the +voice of Clancy coming down the street. He was +singing. I had heard from Nell of Clancy being +at the ball, where he was as usual in charge of the +commissary. I could imagine how they must have +drove things around the punch-bowl with Clancy +to the wheel. He was coming along now and for +blocks anybody that was not dead could hear him. +And getting nearer I had to admire him. He was +magnificent, even with a list to port. Not often, I +imagined, did men of Clancy’s lace and figure get +into evening dress. The height and breadth of +him!––and spreading enough linen on his shirt +front to make a sail for quite a little vessel. He +was almost on top of me, with</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, hove flat down on th’ Western Banks</p> +<p>Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks––</p> +<p>And–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>when I hailed him.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_57' name='page_57'></a>57</span></div> +<p>“Hulloh, if it ain’t Joe Buckley. Why, Joey, +but aren’t you out pretty late to-night? But maybe +you’re only standing watch for somebody? Three +o’clock, Joey, and no excuse for you, for you didn’t +have to stand by the supplies––” But then I +rushed him around the corner, and down the street +to the side door of Mrs. Arkell’s and just in time +to head off Maurice, bound as I knew for Minnie +Arkell’s house across the yard. I didn’t have +a chance to say a word to Tommie, but he didn’t +have to be told. If I’d been explaining for a +week he couldn’t have picked things up any better +than he did.</p> +<p>“Maurice––hi, Maurice! Oh, ’tis you, isn’t it. +Well, Maurice-boy, all the night I waited for a +chance to have a word with you, but ne’er a chance +could I get. Early in the evening––when I was +fit for ladies’ company––Miss Foster said how +proud she was to know me––me, who had saved +her cousin Johnnie’s life. And then she asked me +about the vessel, and I told her, Maurice, that +nothing like the Duncan ever pushed salt water +from out of her way before. ‘Nothing with two +sticks in her,’ says I, and I laid it on thick; ‘and +Maurice Blake,’ says I––and there, Maurice, I +only spoke true catechism. ‘Maurice Blake,’ says +I, ‘is the man to sail her.’ She was glad, she +said, to know that, because her chum, Miss Buckley––Joe’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_58' name='page_58'></a>58</span> +cousin there––wanted that particular +vessel to be a success. And she herself was interested +in it. Never mind the reasons, she said. +And she always did believe––and, Maurice, listen +now––she knew that Captain Blake would do the +Johnnie Duncan justice. And I said to her––well, +Maurice, what I said you can guess well +enough. No, come to think, you can’t guess, but I +won’t tell you to your face. But thinking of it now, +I mind, Maurice, the time when we were dory-mates––you +and me, Maurice––and the cold winter’s +day our dory was capsized. And dark coming +on and nothing in sight, and I could see you +beginning to get tired. But tired as you were, +Maurice, tired as you were and the gray look +beginning to creep over you, you says, ‘Tommie, +take the plug strap for a while, you.’”</p> +<p>“But you didn’t take it, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“No, I didn’t take it––and why? I didn’t take +it––and why? Because, though the mothers that +bore us both were great women––all fire and iron––’twas +in me to last longer––you a boy and your +first winter fishing, and me a tough, hard old trawler. +And you had all of life before you, and I’d run +through some hard years of mine. If I’d gone +’twould have been no great loss, but you, Maurice, +innocent as a child––how could I? I’d known men +and women, good and bad––I’d lived life and I’d +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_59' name='page_59'></a>59</span> +had my chance and thrown it away––but at your +age the things you had to learn! Maybe I didn’t +think it all out like that, but that was why I didn’t +take the plug strap. But, Maurice-boy, I never +forgot it. ‘Take the plug strap, you, Tommie,’ +you says. We were dory-mates, of course, but, +Maurice-boy, I’ll never forget it.”</p> +<p>Clancy took off his hat and drew his hand across +his forehead. “And where were you bound when +we stopped you, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know. To take a walk maybe.”</p> +<p>“Sure, and why not? Let’s all take a walk. +Let’s take a walk down to the dock and have a +look at the vessel. Too dark? So it is, but we +can see the shadow of her masts rising up to the +clouds and we can open up the cabin and go below +and have a smoke. Come, Maurice. Come +on, Joe.”</p> +<p>And down to the cabin of the Johnnie Duncan +we went, and Clancy never in such humor. For +three hours––from a little after three o’clock until +after six––we sat on the lockers, Clancy talking +and we smoking and roaring at him. Only the +sun coming up over Eastern Point, lighting up the +harbor and striking into the cabin of the Johnnie +Duncan, brought Clancy to a halt.</p> +<p>He moved then and we with him. We left +Maurice at the door of old Mrs. Arkell’s, the old +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_60' name='page_60'></a>60</span> +lady herself in the doorway and asking us if we +had a good time at the ball. Standing on the +steps, before he went in, Maurice said to me: +“Tell your cousin, Joe, that when I do race the +Johnnie, I’ll take the spars out of her before anything +gets by––take the spars out or send her +under. I can’t do any more than that.”</p> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan was to leave at ten o’clock +and so I left Clancy at his boarding-house. He +looked tired when I left him. But he was chuckling, +too. I asked him what it was that made him +smile so.</p> +<p>“I’ll give you three guesses,” he said, but I +didn’t guess.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_61' name='page_61'></a>61</span> +<a name='VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA' id='VIII_THE_SEINING_FLEET_PUTS_OUT_TO_SEA'></a> +<h2>VIII</h2> +<h3>THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA</h3> +</div> +<p>The rest of that morning, between leaving +Clancy and getting back to the dock again, +I spent in cleaning up and overhauling my home +outfit. My mother couldn’t be made to believe +that store bedding was of much use––and she was +right, I guess––and so a warranted mattress and +blankets and comforters and a pillow were made +into a bundle and thrown onto a waiting wagon. +Then it was good-by to all––good-by to my cousin +Nell, who had come over from her house, good-by +and a kiss for her little sister––late for school +she was, but didn’t care she said––and then good-by +to my mother. That took longer. Then it was +into the wagon with my bedding and off to the +dock.</p> +<p>At Duncan’s store I had charged up to me such +other stuff as I needed: Two suits of oilskins, +yellow and black, two sou’westers, heavy and light, +two blue-gray flannel shirts, a black sweater, a pair +of rubber boots, two pairs of woollen mitts and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_62' name='page_62'></a>62</span> +four pairs of cotton mitts, five pounds of smoking +tobacco, a new pipe, and so on. When I had all +my stuff tied up, I swung up abreast of Clancy +and together we headed for the end of Duncan’s +dock, where the Johnnie Duncan lay.</p> +<p>Quite a fleet went out ahead of us that morning. +Being a new vessel, there was a lot of things that +were not ready until the last minute. And then +there was the new foretopmast––promised at nine +o’clock it was––not slung and stayed up until after +ten. And then our second seine, which finally we +had to leave for Wesley Marrs to take next morning. +And there were the usual two or three men +late. Clancy and Andie Howe went up to have a +farewell drink and were gone so long that the +skipper sent me after them. I found them both in +the Anchorage, where Clancy had met a man he +hadn’t seen for ten years––an old dory-mate––thought +he was lost five years before in the West +Indies. “But here he is, fine and handsome. Another +little touch all around and a cigar for Joe, +and we’re off for the Southern cruise.”</p> +<p>We left then and started for the dock, with +Clancy full of poetry. There happened to be a +young woman looking out of a window on the +way down. Clancy did not know her, nor she him, +so far as I knew, but something about him seemed +to take her eye. She leaned far out and waved +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_63' name='page_63'></a>63</span> +her handkerchief at him. That was enough. +Clancy broke out––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“The wind blows warm and the wind blows fair,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, the wind blows westerly––</p> +<p>Our jibs are up and our anchor’s in,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>For the Duncan’s going to sea.</p> +<p>And will you wait for me, sweetheart?</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, will you wait for me?</p> +<p>And will you be my love again</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>When I come back from sea?</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, sway away and start her sheets</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And point her easterly––</p> +<p>It’s tackle-pennant, boom her out</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>And turn the Duncan free.</p> +<p>You’ll see some sailing now, my boys,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>We’re off for the Southern cruise––</p> +<p>They’ll try to hold the Johnnie D,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>But they’ll find it of no use.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>I didn’t wait any longer than that for Clancy, +but ran ahead to the Duncan. I found her with +jibs up and paying off. I was in time to get +aboard without trouble, but Clancy and Howe +coming later had to make a pier-head jump of it. +Clancy, who could leap like a hound––drunk or +sober––made it all right with his feet on the +end of the bowsprit and his fingers on the +balloon stay when he landed, but Howe fell +short, and we had the liveliest kind of a time +gaffing him in over the bow, he not being able +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_64' name='page_64'></a>64</span> +to swim. They must have heard us yelling clear +to Eastern Point, I guess. Andie didn’t mind. +“I must be with a lot of dogs––have to jump +overboard to get aboard.” He spat out what +water he had to, and started right in to winch +up the mainsail with the gang. He had on a +brand-new suit, good cloth and a fine fit.</p> +<p>“You’ll soon dry out in the sun, Andie-boy,” +they all said to him.</p> +<p>“I s’pose so. But will my clothes ever fit me +again like they did?––and my fine new patent-leather +shoes!”</p> +<p>Drifting down by the dock next to Duncan’s +our long bowsprit almost swept off a row of old +fellows from the cap-log. They had to scramble, +but didn’t mind. “Good luck, and I hope you fill +her up,” they called out.</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll try and get our share of ’em,” our +fellows called back.</p> +<p>There was a young woman on the next dock––one +of the kind that quite often come down to take +snap-shots. A stranger to Gloucester she must +have been, for not only that Gloucester girls don’t +generally come down to the docks to see the fishermen +off, but she said good-by to us. She meant +all right, but she should never have said good-by +to a fisherman. It’s unlucky. Too many of them +don’t come back, and then the good-by comes true.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_65' name='page_65'></a>65</span></div> +<p>Andie Howe looked a funny sight when we +were making sail. Clancy, who, once he got +started, took a lot of stopping, was still going:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the Johnnie Duncan, fast and able––</p> +<p>Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel––</p> +<p>And will you save a kiss for me</p> +<p>When I come back from sea?”</p> +</div></div> +<p>“Yes,” roared Andie,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And don’t forget I love you, dear,</p> +<p>And save a kiss for me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>with the salt water dripping from his fine new suit +of clothes and the patent-leather shoes he was so +fond of.</p> +<p>And Clancy again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea</p> +<p>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Howe,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree</p> +<p>And a hi-did-dy ho-did-dy ho-dee-dee,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Clancy,</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree,</p> +<p>The Johnnie Duncan’s going to sea,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>and Howe––a little shy on the words––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Tum-did-dy dum-did-dy dum-did-dy-dum,</p> +<p>Hoo-roo-roo and a dum by gum.”</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_66' name='page_66'></a>66</span></div> +<p>And by that time the gang were joining in and +sheeting flat the topsails with a great swing.</p> +<p>I don’t suppose that Gloucester Harbor will +ever again look as beautiful to me as it did that +morning when we sailed out. Forty sail of seiners +leaving within two hours, and to see them going––to +see them one after another loose sails and up +with them, break out anchors, pay off, and away! +It was the first day of April and the first fine day +in a week, and those handsome vessels going out +one after the other in their fresh paint and new +sails––it was a sight to make a man’s heart thump.</p> +<p>“The Johnnie Duncan, seiner of Gloucester––watch +her walk across the Bay to-day,” was +George Moore’s little speech when he came on +deck to heave his first bucket of scraps over the +rail. George was cook.</p> +<p>And she did walk. We squared away with half +a dozen others abreast of us and Eastern Point +astern of us all. Among the forty sail of fishermen +that were standing across the Bay that morning +we knew we’d find some that could sail. There +was the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley’s vessel. He +worked her clear of the bunch that came out of +the harbor and came after us, and we had it with +him across to Cape Cod. Forty miles before we +beat him; but Pitt Ripley had a great sailer in the +Ruth, and we would have been satisfied to hold +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_67' name='page_67'></a>67</span> +her even. “Only wait till by and by, when we +get her in trim,” we kept saying.</p> +<p>“This one’ll smother some of them yet,” said +Eddie Parsons, looking back at the Ruth. He +felt pretty good, because he had the wheel when +we finally crossed the Ruth’s bow.</p> +<p>“With good steering––yes,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>“Of course,” exclaimed Eddie to that, and filled +his chest full, and then, looking around and catching +everybody laughing, let his chest flatten again.</p> +<p>The skipper didn’t have much to say right away +about her sailing. He was watching her, though. +He’d look at her sails, have an eye on how they +set and drew, take a look over her quarter, another +look aloft, and then back at the Ruth, then +a look for the vessels still ahead. “We’ll know +more about it after we’ve tried her out with the +Lucy Foster or the Colleen Bawn or Hollis’s new +vessel,” he said, after a while.</p> +<p>One thing we soon found out, and that was that +she was a stiff vessel. That was after a squall hit +us off Cape Cod. We watched the rest of them +then. Some luffed and others took in sail, and +about them we could not tell. But those that took +it full gave us an idea of how we were behaving. +“Let her have it and see how she’ll do,” said the +skipper, and Howe, who was at the wheel––with +his clothes good and dry again––let her have it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_68' name='page_68'></a>68</span> +full. With everything on and tearing through +the water like a torpedo-boat, one puff rolled her +down till she filled herself chock up between the +house and rail, but she kept right on going. Some +vessels can’t sail at all with decks under, but the +Johnnie never stopped. “She’s all right, this one,” +said everybody then. A second later she took a +slap of it over her bow, nearly smothering the +cook, who had just come up to dump some potato +parings over the rail. The way he came up coughing +and spitting and then his dive for the companionway––everybody +had to roar.</p> +<p>“Did y’see the cook hop?––did y’see him hop?” +called Andie, who was afraid somebody had +missed it.</p> +<p>We passed the Marauder, Soudan McLeod, +soon after. His mainmast had broken off eight +or ten feet below the head. They were clearing +away the wreckage. “I s’pose I oughter had more +sense,” he called out as we went by.</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know––maybe the spar was rotten,” +said Maurice, and that was a nice way to +put it, too.</p> +<p>That night it came a flat calm, and with barely +steerage way for us. There was a big four-masted +coaster bound south, too, and light, and for the +best part of the night we had a drifting match +with her. Coasters as a rule are not great all-round +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_69' name='page_69'></a>69</span> +sailers, but some of them, with their flat +bottoms and shoal draft, in a fair wind and going +light, can run like ghosts, and this was one of +that kind. We had our work cut out to hold this +one while the wind was light and astern, but in +the morning, when it hauled and came fresher, we +went flying over the shoals. So far as the looks +of it went the big coaster might as well have been +anchored then.</p> +<p>All that day we held on. And it was a lesson +in sailing to see the way some of those seiners +were handled. Our skipper spent most of that +day finding out how she sailed best and putting +marks on her sheets for quick trimming by and by.</p> +<p>Trying each other out, measuring one vessel +against another, the fleet went down the coast. +We passed a few and were passed by none, and +that was something. Ahead of us somewhere +were a half-dozen flyers. If we could have beaten +some of them we should have had something to +brag about; but no telling, we might get our +chance yet.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_70' name='page_70'></a>70</span> +<a name='IX_MACKEREL' id='IX_MACKEREL'></a> +<h2>IX</h2> +<h3>MACKEREL</h3> +</div> +<p>Throughout all that night the lights of +the fleet were all about us, ahead and behind. +At breakfast next morning––four o’clock––we +were off Delaware Breakwater, and that +afternoon at two we began the mast-head watch +for fish. And on that fine April day it was a +handsome sight––forty sail of seiners in sight, +spread out and cruising lazily.</p> +<p>The skipper was the first to get into his oilskins +and heavy sweater, for with a vessel hopping along +at even no more than six or seven knots by the +wind it is pretty chilly aloft, nice and comfortable +though it may be on deck in the sun.</p> +<p>There was a game of seven-up going on in the +cabin, and the sun striking down the companionway +was bothering Andie Howe. He began to +complain. “Hi, up there to the wheel! Hi, +Eddie––can’t you put her on the other tack?––the +sun’s in my eyes. How can a man see the +cards with the sun in his eyes?”</p> +<p>Parsons didn’t have the chance to talk back +when the word came from aloft to put the seine-boat +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_71' name='page_71'></a>71</span> +over the side, and after that to overhaul the +seine and pile it in the boat. Vessels ahead had +seen mackerel, the skipper called out. We got +into oilskins and boots and made ready. Those +who were going into the seine-boat had already +picked out in what positions they were going to +row, and now there was an overhauling of oars +and putting marks on them so that they could be +picked out in a hurry. Clancy and I were to be +dorymen. We made ready the dory, and then +Clancy went to the mast-head with the skipper and +Long Steve, whose watch it was aloft.</p> +<p>Things began to look like business soon. Even +from the deck we could see that one or two vessels +ahead had boats out. We began to picture +ourselves setting around a big school and landing +the first mackerel of the year into New York. I +think everybody aboard was having that dream, +though everybody pretended not to be in earnest. +You could hear them: “A nice school now––three +hundred barrels.” “Or two hundred would be +doing pretty well.” “Or even a hundred barrels +wouldn’t be bad.” There were two or three young +fellows among the crew, fellows like myself, who +had never seen much seining, and they couldn’t +keep still for excitement when from the mast-head +came the word that a boat ahead was out and +making a set.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_72' name='page_72'></a>72</span></div> +<p>We were going along all the time and when +we could see from the deck for ourselves the boats +that were setting, Billie Hurd couldn’t stand it +any longer, but had to go aloft, too. The four +of them made a fine picture––the skipper and Steve +standing easily on the spreaders, one leaning +against the mast and the other against the back-stay, +with Hurd perched on the jib halyards block +and Clancy on the spring-stay, and all looking as +comfortable as if they were in rockers at home. +I’d have given a hundred dollars then to be able +to stand up there on one foot and lean as easily as +the skipper against the stay with the vessel going +along as she was. I made up my mind to practise +it when next I went aloft.</p> +<p>I went to the mast-head myself by and by, and, +seeing half a dozen schools almost at once, I became +so excited that I could hardly speak. The +skipper was excited, too, but he didn’t show it, +only by his eyes and talking more jerkily than +usual. He paid no attention to two or three +schools that made me just crazy just to look at, +but at last, when he thought it was time, he began +to move. Ten or a dozen Gloucester vessels +were bunched together, and one porgy steamer––that +is, built for porgy or menhaden fishing, +but just now trying for mackerel like the rest of +us.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_73' name='page_73'></a>73</span></div> +<p>“There’ll be plenty of them up soon, don’t you +think, Tommie?” the skipper asked.</p> +<p>“Plenty,” answered Tommie, “plenty,” with +his eyes ever on the fish. “I think Sam Hollis +has got his all right, but Pitt Ripley––I don’t +know.”</p> +<p>It was getting well along toward sunset then, +with everybody worried, the skipper still aloft, and +one boat making ready to set about a mile inside +of us. “They’ll dive,” said our skipper, and +they did. “There’s Pitt Ripley’s school now,” and +he pointed to where a raft of mackerel were rising +and rippling the water black, and heading for the +north. “There’s another gone down, too––they’ll +dive that fellow. Who is it––Al McNeill?––yes. +But they’ll come up again, and when it +does, it’s ours.” And they did come up, and when +they did the skipper made a jump and roared, +“Into the boat!” There was a scramble. “Stay +up here, you Billie, and watch the school,” he said +to Hurd, and “Go down, you,” to me. I slid +down by the jib halyards. The skipper and +Clancy came down by the back-stay and beat me +to the deck. They must have tumbled down, they +were down so quick.</p> +<p>“Hurry––the Aurora’s going after it, too.” +The Aurora was one of Withrow’s fleet and we +were bound to beat her. I had hardly time to +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_74' name='page_74'></a>74</span> +leap into the dory after Clancy, and we were off, +with nobody left aboard but Hurd to the mast-head +and the cook, who was to stay on deck and +sail the vessel.</p> +<p>In the seine-boat it was double-banked oars, +nine long blades and a monstrous big one steering––good +as another oar that––and all driving for +dear life, with Long Steve and a cork-passer +standing by the seine and the skipper on top of +it, with his eyes fixed on the school ahead––his +only motions to open his mouth and to wave with +his hands to the steersman behind him. “Drive +her––drive her,” he called to the crew. “More +yet––more yet,” to the steering oar. “There’s the +porgy steamer’s boat, too, after the same school. +Drive her now, fellows!”</p> +<p>The mackerel were wild as could be, great rafts +of them, and travelling faster than the old seiners +in the gang said they had ever seen them travel +before, and what was worse, not staying up long. +There were boats out from three or four vessels +before we pushed off with ours. I remember the +porgy steamer had cut in ahead and given their +boat a long start for a school. However, that +school did not stay up long enough and they had +their row for nothing. But then their steamer +picked them up again and dropped them on the +way to the same school that we were trying for. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_75' name='page_75'></a>75</span> +How some of our gang did swear at them! And +all because they were steam power.</p> +<p>It promised to be a pretty little race, but that +school, too, went down before either of us could +head it, and so it was another row for nothing. +We lay on our oars then, both boats ready for +another row, with the skipper and seine-heaver in +each standing on top of the seine and watching +for the fish to show again. Of course both +gangs were sizing each other up, too. I think +myself that the Duncan’s crowd were a huskier +lot of men than the steamer’s. Our fellows looked +more like fishermen, as was to be expected, because +in Gloucester good fishermen are so common that +naturally, a man hailing from there gets so that +he wants to be a good fisherman, too, and of course +the men coming there are all pretty good to begin +with, leaving out the fellows who are born and +brought up around Gloucester and who have it in +their blood. A man doesn’t leave Newfoundland +or Cape Breton or even Nova Scotia or Maine +and the islands along the coast, or give up any +safe, steady work he may have, to come to +Gloucester to fish unless he feels that he can come +pretty near to holding his end up. That’s not +saying that a whole lot of fine fishermen do not +stay at home, with never any desire to fish out of +Gloucester, in spite of the good money that a fisherman +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_76' name='page_76'></a>76</span> +with a good skipper can make from there, +but just the same they’re a pretty smart and able +lot that do come. And so, while our gang was +half made up of men that were born far away +from Gloucester, yet they had the Gloucester +spirit, which is everything in deep-sea fishing, +when nerve and strength and skill count for so +much. And this other crowd––the porgy steamer’s––did +not have that look.</p> +<p>“Look at what we’re coming to,” somebody +called. “All steam boys soon, and on wages––wages!” +he repeated, “and going around the +deck, with a blue guernsey with letters on the chest +of it––A.D.Q.––or some other damn company.”</p> +<p>“Well, that would not be bad either, with your +grub bill sure and your money counted out at the +end of every month,” answered somebody else.</p> +<p>I was sizing up the two gangs myself, I being +in the dory with Clancy, and I guess that nearly +everyone of us was doing the same thing and +keeping an eye out for fish at the same time, when +all at once a school popped up the other side of +the porgyman’s boat. Perhaps, half a mile it was +and, for a wonder, not going like a streak.</p> +<p>We saw it first and got to going first, but the +Aurora’s boat and the steamer’s boat were nearer, +and so when we were all under good headway +there were two lengths or so that we had to make +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_77' name='page_77'></a>77</span> +up on each. Well, that was all right. Two +lengths weren’t so many, and we drove her. It +was something to see the fellows lay out to it +then––doubled-banked, two men to each wide seat +and each man with a long oar, which he had +picked out and trimmed to suit himself, and every +man in his own particular place as if in a racing +crew.</p> +<p>And now every man was bending to it. A big +fellow, named Rory McKinnon, was setting the +stroke. There was a kick and a heave to every +stroke, and the men encouraging each other. +“Now––now––give it to her,” was all that I could +hear coming out of him. All this time we in the +dory were coming on behind, Clancy and I having +to beat their dory just as our boat had to +beat their boat. And we were driving, too, you +may be sure. Clancy was making his oars bend +like whips. “Blast ’em! There’s no stiffness to +’em,” he was complaining. And then, “Sock it to +her,” he would call out to our fellows in the seine-boat. +“We’ve got the porgy crew licked––that’s +the stuff,” came from the skipper. From on top of +the seine he was watching the fish, watching the +gang, watching the other boats, watching us in +the dory––watching everything. Whoever made +a slip then would hear from it afterwards, we +knew. And clip, clip, clip it was, with the swash +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_78' name='page_78'></a>78</span> +just curling nicely under the bow of the other +boat, and I suppose our own, too, if we could +have seen.</p> +<p>Our boat was gaining on the Aurora’s and the +skipper was warming up. The fish was going the +same way we were, still a quarter of a mile ahead.</p> +<p>“Drive her,” said the skipper. “Drive her––drive +her––another length and you got ’em. And, +Kenney, it’s the best of ash you’ve got. Don’t be +afraid of breaking it. And, Dan Burns, didn’t +y’ever learn to keep stroke in the Bay of Islands +with nine more men beside you rowing? And +drive her––hit her up now––here’s where we got +’em––they can’t hold it on their lives. Now then, +another dozen strokes and it’s over. One, two, +three––quicker, Lord, quicker––six, seven––oh, +now she’s fair flying––look at her leap. You +blessed lobster, keep rowing and not looking over +your shoulder. We got to get the fish first.”</p> +<p>A quarter mile of that with the foam ripping +by us, and every man with his blood like fire +jumping to his oar, when the skipper leaped back +to the steering oar. “Stand by,” he called, and +then, “Now––over with the buoy,” and over it +went, with the dory at hand and Tommie Clancy +right there to pick it up and hold it to windward. +And then went the seine over in huge armfuls. +Just to see Long Steve throw that seine was worth +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_79' name='page_79'></a>79</span> +a trip South. And he was vain as a child of his +strength and endurance. “My, but look at him!” +Clancy called out––“look at the back of him!” +“He’s a horse,” somebody else would have to +say, and “H-g-gh,” Steve would grunt, and +“H-g-gh” he would fill the air full of tarred netting, +“H-g-gh––pass them corks,” and over it +would go, “H-g-gh,” and the skipper would say, +“That’s the boy, Steve,” and Steve would heave +to break his back right then and there. All the +time they were driving the seine-boat to its limit, +and the skipper was laying to the big steering oar, +the longest of them all and taking a strong man +to handle it properly––laying to it, swinging from +the waist like a hammer-thrower, and the boat +jumping to it. She came jumping right for us in +the dory in a little while. It doesn’t take a good +gang long to put a quarter mile of netting around +a school of mackerel.</p> +<p>It was a pretty set he made. “Pretty, pretty,” +you could almost hear the old seiners saying between +their teeth, even as they were all rowing +with jaws set and never a let-up until the circle +was completed, when it was oars into the air and +Clancy leaping from the dory into the seine-boat +to help purse up. “It’s a raft if ever we get ’em,” +were his first words, and everybody that wasn’t +too breathless said yes, it was a jeesly raft of fish.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_80' name='page_80'></a>80</span></div> +<p>“Purse in,” it was then, and lively. And so we +pursed in, hauling on the running line in the lower +edge of the seine, something as the string around +the neck of a tobacco bag is drawn tight. It was +heavy work of course, but everybody made light +of it. We could not tell if the fish were in it or +not. The leaders might have dove when they felt +the twine against their noses and so escaped with +the whole school following after, or they might +have taken no alarm and stayed in.</p> +<p>So we pursed in, not knowing whether we were +to have a good haul with a hundred or a hundred +and fifty dollars apiece at the end of it, or whether +we would have our work for nothing. All hands +kept up the pretence of joking, of course, but everybody +was anxious enough. It was more than the +money––it was fisherman’s pride. Were we to get +into New York and have it telegraphed on to +Gloucester for everybody that knew us to read and +talk about––landing the first mackerel of the +year? We watched while the circle narrowed and +the pool inside grew shallower. Somebody said, +“There’s one,” and we could see the shine of it, +and another––and another––and then the whole +mass of them rose flipping. They lashed the water +into foam, rushed around the edges, nosed the +corks of the seine. I don’t think myself that +mackerel are particularly intelligent, take them +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_81' name='page_81'></a>81</span> +generally; but at times they seem to know––these +fellows, at least, seemed to know they were gone +and they thrashed about in fury. A mackerel is a +handsome fish any time, but to see him right you +want to see him fresh-seined. They whipped the +water white now––tens of thousands of them. I +don’t believe that the oldest seiner there didn’t feel +his heart beat faster––the first mackerel of the +year. “And Lord knows, maybe a couple of hundred +barrels,” and the skipper’s eyes shone––it +meant a lot to him. And some of the men began +to talk like children, they were so pleased.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_82' name='page_82'></a>82</span> +<a name='X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE' id='X_WE_LOSE_OUR_SEINE'></a> +<h2>X</h2> +<h3>WE LOSE OUR SEINE</h3> +</div> +<p>Two hundred barrels the skipper had said, +but long before we were all pursed up we +knew that five hundred barrels would never hold +the fish in that seine. The size of that school filled +us with joy and yet it was the very size of it that +caused us our trouble. It was too big for the seine, +and when they began to settle down and take the +twine with them the trouble began for us. No bit +of twine ever made to be handled from a seine-boat +was big enough to hold that school of fish when +they began to go down.</p> +<p>The skipper was awake to it early and signalled +for the vessel to come alongside. So the Johnnie +stood over to us, and Hurd, pushing the spare dory +over with Moore’s help, came jumping with it to +the side of the seine where I was alone in the first +dory. He hadn’t even stopped to get into his oilskins, +he was in such a hurry. By the skipper’s +orders I had made fast some of the corks to the +thwarts in the dory and Billie took some into the +spare dory. The whole length of the seine-boat +they were making fast the seine too. In that way +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_83' name='page_83'></a>83</span> +the skipper hoped to buoy up the fish and hold +them until we could lighten the seine up by bailing +some of the fish onto the deck of the vessel. But +it was of no use. There must have been a thousand +barrels of them, and dories and seine-boat began +to go under. It was over the rail of my dory +and spare dory both, and both Billie and myself +to our waists, when the skipper sung out for us to +jump and save ourselves. We hung on a little +longer, but it got to be too much for us and overboard +we went. We were not in danger then. It +is true that the sea was making and we were +weighted down with oilskins and rubber boots, but +we had for support the corks that had not yet +gone under. And along the corks we hauled ourselves +toward the seine-boat. I was praying that +the sharks that sometimes follow up mackerel +would not bother us. It is probable that they +would not even if there were any around, as mackerel +are better eating. And such a fuss as we made +hauling ourselves through the water! We’d have +scared away a whole school of sharks. Before we +could get to the seine-boat that, too, was under. +“Jump!” called the skipper, and “Jump everybody!” +called Clancy, and themselves both hanging +on to a last handful of twine. The men in the +seine-boat jumped and struck out for the vessel, +which was now quite close, with the cook, the only +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_84' name='page_84'></a>84</span> +man left aboard, throwing over keelers, draw-buckets, +the main sheet––anything within his reach +that was loose and would support a man.</p> +<p>The skipper and Clancy hung on to the last. +“Jump you, Tommie!” called the skipper. “Not +me till you go,” answered Clancy. They couldn’t +do a bit of good, but they hung on, each grabbing +handfuls of twine in a last effort to hold up the +seine. The seine-boat went under––and they up +to their necks––and then it turned over and in +toward the seine. Some of us hollered––we were +afraid that it was all up with both of them––that +they would be thrown toward the inside and tangled +up in the seine. But both of them bobbed up, +the skipper saying nothing, but Clancy sputtering +like a crazy man. The dories coming loose gave a +few of us a chance to climb up on the bottom of +them, and when the seine-boat came bobbing up +most of the others climbed up on the bottom of +that. And there was some swearing done then, +you may be sure! The gang would have been all +right then, waiting to be picked up by the cook +from the vessel, which was then pretty handy; but +the seine-boat started to go under again and then +came the slap of a little sea, and overboard went +seven or eight of us. Clancy was one of those +thrown into the water. We all remembered it +afterwards because he called out for Andie Howe.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_85' name='page_85'></a>85</span></div> +<p>“Where’s Andie?”</p> +<p>“Here,” said Andie.</p> +<p>“Where?”</p> +<p>“Hanging onto the bow of the seine-boat.”</p> +<p>“Well, hang on a while longer,” said Clancy and +struck out for the vessel, and made it too, oilskins, +big boots and all. He threw two or three lines +out at once––one especially to Thad Simpson, the +other man of the crew besides Andie Howe who it +was known couldn’t swim. So Clancy hauled him +in. The third man he hauled in was Billie Hurd.</p> +<p>“Good Lord, Tommie,” said Billie, “you hove +a line over my head to Andie Howe.”</p> +<p>“You pop-eyed Spanish mackerel!” roared +Clancy at him, “you ought to know by this time +that Andie can’t swim.”</p> +<p>“I know, but he was all oiled up, and look +at me–––”</p> +<p>“Go to hell,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>We all got aboard after a while, but our fine +new seine was gone, and the big school of fish too. +After a hard grapple we got the dories and a little +later the seine-boat, and after a lot more work we +got them right side up. The dories we pulled the +plugs out of to let them drain and then took +them on deck, but the seine-boat we had to pump +out. By then it was pretty well on in the night +and I remember how the moon rose just as we had +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_86' name='page_86'></a>86</span> +it fairly well dried out and dropped astern––rose +as big as a barrel-head and threw a yellow light +over it, and then went out of sight, for a breeze +was on us.</p> +<p>And “Oh, Lord! that thousand-barrel school!” +groaned everybody.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_87' name='page_87'></a>87</span> +<a name='XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE' id='XI_AN_OVERNIGHT_BREEZE'></a> +<h2>XI</h2> +<h3>AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE</h3> +</div> +<p>It wasn’t bad enough that we came near losing +a few men and our boat, and our seine altogether, +but it must come on to breeze up on top of +that and drive us off the grounds. After putting +everything to rights, we were having a mug-up forward +and wondering if the skipper would take sail +off her or what, when we heard the call that +settled it.</p> +<p>“On deck everybody!” we heard. And when +we got there, came from the skipper, “Take in the +balloon, tie it up and put it below. Haul down +your stays’l too––and go aloft a couple of you, +fore and aft, and put the tops’ls in gaskets.”</p> +<p>We attended to that––a gang out on the bowsprit, +half a dozen aloft and so on––with the skipper +to the wheel while it was being done. When +we had finished it was, “Haul the seine-boat alongside––pump +out what water’s left.” Then, “Shift +that painter and hook on the big painter. Drop +her astern and give her plenty of line. Where’s +the dorymen? Where’s Tommie and Joe? Haul +the dories into the hatch, Tommie, and make ’em +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_88' name='page_88'></a>88</span> +fast. Gripe ’em good while you’re at it. Clear +the deck of all loose gear––put it below, all of it––keelers, +everything. Maybe ’twon’t be much of a +blow, but there’s no telling––it may. She mayn’t +be the kind that washes everything over, but put +it all safe anyway.”</p> +<p>The skipper watched all this until he had seen +everything cleared up and heard “All fast the +dory,” from the waist. Then he looked up and +took note of sky and wind. “Don’t feel any too +good. Maybe ’twill blow off, but we might’s well +run in. We’ll have to wait for our other seine +anyway and Wesley will be sure to put into the +Breakwater for news on his way down, especially +if it comes to blow.”</p> +<p>He dropped below then to light his pipe. Seeing +me and Parsons, with me trying to fix up Parsons’s +leg where it had been gashed––Eddie never +knew how––in the mix-up of the evening, the +skipper said, “There’s some liniment in the chest +and some linen in one of the drawers under my +bunk. Get it. And some of you might’s well turn +in and have a nap. She’ll be all right––the watch +and myself can look after her now,” and he went +on deck again, puffing like an engine to keep his +pipe going.</p> +<p>Most of them did turn in and were soon asleep. +Some of the older men had a smoke and an overhauling +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_89' name='page_89'></a>89</span> +of their wet clothes, while a few joined in a +little game of draw before turning in. One or two +were deploring the loss of the seine. The nearness +to losing lives didn’t seem to be worrying +anybody. For myself, I was somewhat worked +up. There was one time in the water when I +thought I was gone. So I went on deck after the +skipper. It was a black night and breezing all +the time and I wanted to see how the vessel behaved. +The Johnnie was close-hauled at this +time and swashing under, and I knew without asking +further that the skipper intended to make +Delaware Breakwater.</p> +<p>While hurrying forward, after lending a hand +to batten down the main hatch––the Johnnie +plunging along all the time––and my head perhaps +a little too high in the air, I stumbled off the +break and plump over a man under the windward +rail. I thought I was going to leeward and maybe +overboard, but somebody hooked onto the full in +the back of my oil-jacket, hauled me up the inclined +deck again, and in a roaring whisper said, “Get a +hold here, Joey––here’s a ring-bolt for you. +Don’t let go on your life! Isn’t it fine?” It was +Clancy. He had nights, I know, when he couldn’t +sleep, and like me, I suppose, he wanted to watch +the sea, which just then was firing grandly. Into +this sea the vessel was diving––nose first––bringing +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_90' name='page_90'></a>90</span> +her bowsprit down, down, down, and then up, +up, up, until her thirty-seven-foot bowsprit would +be pointing to where the North star should be. +Whenever she heaved like that I could feel her +deck swelling under me. I remember when I used +to play foot-ball at the high school at home and it +was getting handy to a touch-down, with perhaps +only a few yards to gain and the other side braced +to stop it, that a fellow playing back had to buck +like that from under a line when he had to scatter +tons, or what he thought was tons, of people on +top of him. The vessel was that way now, only +with every dive she had hundreds of tons to lift +from under. At a time like that you can feel the +ribs of a vessel brace within her just as if she was +human. Now I could almost feel her heart +pumping and her lungs pounding somewhere inside. +I could feel her brace to meet it, feel her +shiver, as if she was scared half to death, and almost +hear her screech like a winner every time she +cleared it and threw it over her head.</p> +<p>Now down she went––the Johnnie Duncan––down +and forward, for she wouldn’t be held back––shoulders +and breast slap into it. Clear to her +waist she went, fighting the sea from her. To +either side were tumbling the broken waves, curling +away like beach combers. The hollow of each was +a curved sheet of electric white, and the top––the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_91' name='page_91'></a>91</span> +crest––was a heavier, hotter white. The crests +would rise above our rail and break, and back into +the hollows would fall a shower of shooting stars +that almost sizzled. There wasn’t a star above, +but millions on the water!</p> +<p>“Ever see anything like that ashore, Joey-boy?” +said Clancy, and I had to roar a whisper that I +never had.</p> +<p>Through this play of fire the Johnnie leaped +with great bounds. She boiled her way, and astern +she left a wake in which the seine-boat was rearing +and diving with a fine little independent trail +of its own.</p> +<p>Two men forward––the watch––were leaning +over the windlass and peering into the night. +They were there for whatever they might see, but +particularly were they looking for the double white +light of Five Fathom Bank lightship. The skipper +was at the wheel. When he got in the way of +the cabin light, we could catch the shine from his +dripping oil-clothes, and the spark from his pipe––which +he kept going through it all––marked his +position when he stepped back into the darkness.</p> +<p>Clancy noticed him. “There’s a man for you, +Joey. Think what it meant to a young skipper +with a new vessel––the loss of that school and the +seine on top of it the very first day he struck fish. +If we’d got that, he might have been the first vessel +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_92' name='page_92'></a>92</span> +of the year into the New York market. And think +of the price the first fish fetch!––and the honor of +it––and he breaking his heart to make a reputation +this year. And yet not a yip out of him––not a +cranky word to one of the gang all night. A +great man I call him––and a fisherman.” I +thought so, too.</p> +<p>Sometimes I imagined I could see the wink of +red and green lights abreast and astern, which I +probably did, for there should have been fifty sail +or so of seiners inside and outside of us––there +were sixty sail of the fleet in sight that afternoon––and +I knew that, barring a possible few that had +got fish and were driving for the New York market, +all the others were like ourselves, under lower +sails and boring into it, with extra lookout forward, +the skipper at the wheel or on the quarter and all +ears and eyes for the surf and lights inshore when +we should get there.</p> +<p>“Something ahead! dead ahead! sa-ail!” came +suddenly from forward. There was a scraping +of boot-heels at the wheel. “What d’y’make of +it?––all right, I see her!” In the shadow we saw +the skipper pulling the wheel down. Ahead I +imagined I saw a dark patch, but to make sure I +squirmed up to the fore-rigging. Whoever she +was, the light from her cabin skylight was right +there and I realized that we were pretty close, but +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_93' name='page_93'></a>93</span> +not really how close until a boat bobbed up under +my jaws almost. Right from under our bow it +heaved. It was a seiner and that was her seine-boat +towing astern, and I could easily have heaved +a line to her helmsman as we swept by her. There +was an awfully tall shadow of sails––half up to +the clouds I thought––and the black of the hull +looked as long as a dock. A voice was hurled to +us, but we couldn’t quite make it out––but it was +the watch, probably, saying a word or two by way +of easing his feelings.</p> +<p>We worked up to the windward of that one and +slowly crowded past her tumbling green light. +Then the skipper let the wheel fly up and we shot +ahead and soon we had her directly astern, with +her one green and one red eye looking after us. +“That’s one fellow we outsail,” thought I to myself, +and I knew I was beginning to love the +Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>All through that night it went on like that.</p> +<p>At four o’clock or so in the morning the cook +stuck his head out of the slit in the forec’s’le companionway +and spoke his welcome little piece. +“Can’t have any reg’lar sit-down this morning, +boys. Have to leave the china in the becket for +a while yet, but all that wants can make a mug-up, +and when we get inside––if we do in anything like +a decent hour––we’ll have breakfast.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_94' name='page_94'></a>94</span></div> +<p>At five o’clock the sky began to brighten to the +eastward, but there was no let-up to the wind or +sea. If anything it was breezing up. At six +o’clock, when the short blasts of the lightship split +the air abreast of us, things were good and lively, +but there was no daylight to go by then. The wash +that in the night only buried her bow good was +then coming over her to the foremast and filling +the gangway between the house and rail as it raced +aft. The beauty of double-lashing the dories began +to appear, and all hands might have been +towing astern all night by the look of them. But +the Johnnie Duncan was doing well and the opinion +of the crew generally was that the skipper +could slap every rag to her and she’d carry it––that +is, if she had to. The skipper put her more +westerly after we had passed the lightship and +on we went.</p> +<p>We had the company of a couple of coasters in +this part of the drive; and by that, if nothing else, +a man might know we were inshore. Some +Gloucester men were in sight, too, though most of +the fleet, we guessed, were still outside of us. The +coasters were colliers, three-masters both, and +reefed down, wallowing in the sea. One had her +foretopmast snapped short off, and such patched +sails as she had on looked lonesome. The gang, of +course, had to make fun of her.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_95' name='page_95'></a>95</span></div> +<p>“There’s one way to house a topm’st!”</p> +<p>“Broke your clothes-pole, old girl!”</p> +<p>“Better take in your washing there––looks like +rain!”</p> +<p>“Go it, you beauty! I only wish I had my cameraw. +If y’only suspected how lovely you look!”</p> +<p>Two big ocean tugs, one clear white and one all +black, offered a change in looks, though in nothing +else, for each one, with two barges of coal, was +making desperate hauling of it, and the Breakwater +yet a good bit away.</p> +<p>“Hustle ’em, you husky coal-jammers!” roared +Parsons at them, as if he could be heard beyond +the rail. “I wouldn’t be aboard of you for my +share of the Southern trip––and mackerel away up +in G, too. Would you, Billie?”</p> +<p>“Then? Naw!” said Hurd, with a wrinkling +of his little nose.</p> +<p>“No, nor me neither,” said Long Steve. “Hi––ever +hear the cook––ever hear George Moore’s +song:––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘If ever you go to sea, my boy,</p> +<p>Don’t ever you ship on a steamer;</p> +<p>There’s stacks to scrape and rails to paint––</p> +<p>It’s always work to clean her.</p> +<p>When the wind is wrong and the shore is by,</p> +<p>They’ll keep you clear of leeway,</p> +<p>But they roll and they jolt and they’re never dry––</p> +<p>They’re the devil’s own in a sea-way!’“</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_96' name='page_96'></a>96</span></div> +<p>Steve, trying to sing that, had one hand hooked +into a ring-bolt under the rail and he was slowly +pickling––we were all pickling––like a salted +mackerel in a barrel.</p> +<p>An hour past Five Fathom and the tall white +tower of Cape Henlopen could be made out ahead, +as well as the gray tower of Cape May through the +mists to the northward. The wind was coming +faster and it felt heavier. We could judge best of +how we were looking ourselves by watching all our +fellows near by. We could see to the bottom +planks of two to leeward of us, while on the sloping +deck of one to windward it was plain that only +what was lashed or bolted was still there. When +they reared they almost stood up straight, and +when they scooped into it the wonder was that all +the water taken aboard didn’t hold her until the +next comber could have a fair whack at her.</p> +<p>The men––that is, a few of them––might joke, +but were all glad to be getting in. There’s no fun +staying wet and getting wetter all night long. If +it wasn’t for the wetness of a fellow it would have +been great, for it was the finest kind of excitement, +our running to harbor––that night––especially +in the morning when we were passing +three or four and nobody passing us. We went +by one fellow––the Martinet she was––a fair +enough sailer––passed her to windward of course, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_97' name='page_97'></a>97</span> +our gang looking across at their gang and nobody +saying a word, but everybody thinking a lot, you +may be sure. It was worth a square meal that.</p> +<p>With the Martinet astern, the skipper let her +pay off and run for the end of the Breakwater. +For a while he let the wind take her fair abeam, +with sheets in, and the way she sizzled through the +water was a caution. There was a moment that +an extra good blast hit her that my heart sank, +but I reflected that the skipper knew his business, +and so tried to take it unconcernedly. Everybody +around me was joking and laughing––to think, I +suppose, that we would soon be in.</p> +<p>A moment after that I went down to leeward. +The sea was bubbling in over her rail at the fore-rigging +and I wanted to get the feel of it. I got +it. It is pretty shoal water on the bar at the mouth +of the Delaware River and quite a little sea on +when it blows. One sea came aboard. Somebody +yelled and I saw it––but too late––and slap! over +I went––over the rail––big boots and oilskins I +went down into the roaring. For a second my +head came up and I saw the vessel. Everybody +aboard was standing by. The skipper was whirling +the spokes and the vessel was coming around +like a top. I never saw a vessel roll down so +far in all my life. I went under again and coming +up heard a dull shout. There was a line beside +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_98' name='page_98'></a>98</span> +me. “Grab hold!” yelled somebody. No need +to tell me––I grabbed hold. It was the seine-boat’s +painter. The Johnnie was still shooting and +when the line tautened it came as near to pulling +my arms out of my shoulders as ever I want to +have them again. But I hung on. Then she came +up, and they hauled the painter in and gaffed me +over the rail.</p> +<p>“You blankety blank fool!” roared Clancy, as +soon as I stood up––“don’t you know any better? +A fine thing we’d have to be telegraphing home, +wouldn’t it? Are you all right now?”</p> +<p>“All right,” I said, and felt pretty cheap.</p> +<p>While being hauled in, knowing that I was +safe, I had been thinking what a fine little adventure +I’d have to tell when we got back to +Gloucester, but after Clancy got through with me +I saw that there were two ways to look at it. So +I took my old place under the windward rail and +didn’t move from there again till it was time to +take sail off her.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_99' name='page_99'></a>99</span> +<a name='XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR' id='XII_THE_FLEET_RUNS_TO_HARBOR'></a> +<h2>XII</h2> +<h3>THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR</h3> +</div> +<p>Nearing the Breakwater we had more company. +Other seiners, with boats astern and +dories on deck, were coming in; jumbo, jib, fore +and reefed mainsail generally, and all plunging +gloriously with a harbor near at hand.</p> +<p>For the next few hours of that morning any +watcher in the lighthouse on the Breakwater could +have seen plenty of samples of clever seamanship. +At our time we were only one of a half-dozen at +the business of working around the jetty, some +making for one end and some for the other. +There was a great trying of tacks and some plain +criticism of tactics and weatherly qualities. There +was one who tried to cut in before he could quite +make it. When he had to put back or run ashore +and lose her, a great laugh went up, though there +was nothing the matter with the try. He had only +tried too much.</p> +<p>Eddie Parsons was the sharp critic. “Trying to +beat out the fleet, hey? And with that old hooker? +Nothing wrong with your nerve, old man, but +some fine day, when there’s a little wind stirring, +you’ll roll that tub over a little too far. That’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_100' name='page_100'></a>100</span> +right––jam her up now! Think you got a steamboat? +Wonder nobody ever told you about sailing +a vessel. Come out of it, old man, and let her +swing off.”</p> +<p>We had yet to get in ourselves, and that we had +the Johnnie Duncan to eat into the wind we were +thankful. At last we were by and reaching down +to the end of the jetty. We all began to feel good +once we were sure of it. It was fine, too, to listen +to Clancy as we got near. He was standing on +the break, leaning against the weather rigging and +looking forward.</p> +<p>“You’d think she’d been coming here for a +hundred years, wouldn’t you? Look at her point +her nose now at that beacon––don’t have to give +this one the wheel at all. She’s the girl. See her +bow off now. Man, but she knows as well as you +and me she’ll be inside and snug’s a kenched +mackerel before long. Watch her kick into the +wind now. Oh, she’s the lady, this one. I’ve +sailed many of them, but she’s the queen of them +all, this one.”</p> +<p>A half dozen of lucky fellows were in before us. +We drove in among them, under the bow of one +and past the stern of another. They were all +watching us, after the custom of the fleet in harbor. +We knew this and behaved as smartly as we could +without slopping over.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_101' name='page_101'></a>101</span></div> +<p>By and by our skipper picked out a place to his +fancy. “Stand by halyards and down-hauls,” was +his warning.</p> +<p>“Ready––all ready.”</p> +<p>“Ready with the anchor!”</p> +<p>“All ready the anchor, sir!”</p> +<p>“Down with your jib! Down with jumbo! Let +go your fore halyards! Watch out now––ready––let +go your anchor!”</p> +<p>Rattle––whizz––whir-r-r––splash! clink––and +the Johnnie Duncan of Gloucester was safe to her +mooring.</p> +<p>And not till then did our skipper, ten hours to +the wheel, unclinch his grip, hook the becket to a +spoke, slat his sou’wester on the wheel-box and +ease his mind.</p> +<p>“Thank the Lord, there’s a jeesly blow behind +us. There’s some outside’ll wish they had a shore +job before they get in. Hi, boys, when you get +her tied up for’ard, better all go below and have a +bite to eat. Let the mains’l stand and give it a +chance to dry.” Then he looked about him. +“And I didn’t notice that anybody passed us on +the way.” There was a whole lot in that last.</p> +<p>After eating a bite, I went over in the dory to +the lighthouse on the jetty, where seamen’s mail +was taken care of. After leaving my letters I +stopped to watch some of the fleet coming. It was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_102' name='page_102'></a>102</span> +easy enough to pick them. The long, slick-looking, +lively seine-boat in tow and the black pile of +netting on deck told what they were, and they came +jumping out of the mists in a way to make a man’s +heart beat.</p> +<p>There was a man standing on the jetty. He was +master of a three-masted coaster, he told me. +“You come off one of them Gloucester mackerel-catchers?” +he asked me. I said yes. “That new-looking +one that came in a while ago?” I said yes +again.</p> +<p>“I was watching her––she’s a dream––a dream. +I never see anything like them––the whole bunch +of ’em. Look at this one––ain’t she got on about +all she can stand up under though? My soul, +ain’t she staggering! I expect her skipper knows +his business––don’t expect he’d be skipper of a +fine vessel like that if he didn’t. But if ’twas me +I’d just about take a wide tuck or two in that ever-lastin’ +mains’l he’s got there. My conscience, but +ain’t he a-sockin’ it to her! I s’pose that’s the way +some of your vessels are sailed out and never +heard from again––that was never run into, nor +rolled over, nor sunk in a reg’lar way, but just +drove right into it head-first trying to make a passage +and drowned before ever they could rise +again. Well, good-luck to you, old girl, and your +skipper, whoever he is, and I guess if your canvas +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_103' name='page_103'></a>103</span> +stays on you’ll be to anchor before a great while, +for you’re making steamboat time. Go it, old +girl, and your little baby on behind, go it! There +ain’t nothing short of an ocean liner could get you +now. Go it! a sail or two don’t matter––if it’s a +good mackerel season I s’pose the owners don’t +mind if you blow away a few sails. Go it, God +bless you! Go it! you’re the lads can sail a vessel, +you fishermen of Gloucester. Lord, if I dared to +try a thing like that with my vessel and my crew +and the old gear I got, I rather expect I’d have a +rigger’s bill by the time I got home––if ever I got +home carryin’ on like that in my old hooker.”</p> +<p>I watched her, too. She was the Tarantula, Jim +Porter, another sail-carrier. Around the point and +across she tore and over toward the sands beyond, +swung off on her heel to her skipper’s heave, came +down by the wreck of a big three-master on the +inner beach, and around and up opposite what +looked like a building on the hill. Then it was +down with the wheel, down with headsails, let go +fore-halyards, over with the anchor, and there she +was, another fisherman of Gloucester, at rest in +harbor after an all-night fight with a lively breeze.</p> +<p>And I left the master of the coaster there and +went back to the Duncan, where the crew were +standing along the rail or leaning over the house +and having a lot of fun sizing up those who were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_104' name='page_104'></a>104</span> +coming in. It is one of the enjoyments of the +seining fleet––this racing to harbor when it blows +and then watching the others work in. I’ve heard +it said that no place in the world can show a fleet +like them––all fine vessels, from one hundred to +one hundred and twenty feet over all, deep +draught, heavily sparred, and provided with all +kinds of sail. They were ably managed, of course,––and +a dash to port makes the finest kind of a +regatta. No better chances are offered to try vessels +and seamanship––no drifting or flukes but +wind enough for all hands and on all points of +sailing generally.</p> +<p>They came swooping in one after the other––like +huge sea-gulls, only with wings held close. +Now, with plenty of light, those already in could +easily see the others coming long before they +rounded the jetty. Even if we couldn’t see the +hulls of them, there were fellows who could name +them––one vessel after the other––just by the spars +and upper rigging. The cut of a topsail, the look +of a mast-head, the set of a gaff––the smallest +little thing was enough to place them, so well were +they acquainted with one another. And the distance +at which some of them could pick out a +vessel was amazing.</p> +<p>George Moore, coming up out of the forec’s’le +to dump over some scraps, spied one. “The Mary +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_105' name='page_105'></a>105</span> +Grace Adams,” he sang out,––“the shortest +forem’st out of Gloucester. She must’ve been well +inside when she started––to get in at this time. +Slow––man, but she is slow, that one.”</p> +<p>“Yes, that’s the old girl, and behind her is the +Dreamer––Charlie Green––black mast-heads and +two patches on her jumbo. She’ll be in and all fast +before the Mary Grace’s straightened out.”</p> +<p>And so it was––almost. The Mary Adams was +one of the older fleet and never much of a sailer. +The Dreamer was one of the newer vessels, able, +and a big sailer. They were well raked by the +critics, as under their four lowers they whipped in +and around and passed on by.</p> +<p>After the Dreamer came the Madeline, with +“Black Jack” Hogan, a fleshy man for a fisherman, +who minded his way and remained unmoved +at the compliments paid his vessel, one of the prize +beauties of the fleet. The Marguerite, Charley +Falvey, a dog at seining, always among the +high-liners, who got more fun out of a summer’s +seining than most men ever got out of yachting, +who bought all the latest inventions in gear as fast +as they came out and who had a dainty way of +getting fish. The Marguerite dipped her bow as +she passed, while her clever skipper nodded along +the line.</p> +<p>The King Philip, another fast beauty, made her +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_106' name='page_106'></a>106</span> +bow and dipped her jibs to her mates in harbor. +At sight of her master, Al McNeill, a great shout +goes up. “Ho, ho! boys, here’s Lucky Al! Whose +seine was it couldn’t hold a jeesly big school one +day off here last spring but Billie Simms’? Yes, +sir, Billie Simms. Billie fills up and was just about +thinking he’d have to let the rest go when who +heaves in sight and rounds to and says, ‘Can I help +y’out, William?’ Who but Lucky Al McNeill, +of course. Bales out two hundred barrels as nice +fat mackerel as anybody’d want to see. ‘Just fills +me up,’ says Al, and scoots to market. Just been +to New York, mind you, that same week with two +hundred and fifty barrels he got twelve cents +apiece for. ‘Just fills me up,’ says Al, and scoots. +No, he ain’t a bit lucky, Captain Al ain’t––married +a young wife only last fall.”</p> +<p>Then followed the Albatross, with Mark +Powers giving the orders. Then the Privateer, another +fast one, but going sluggishly now because of +a stove-in seine-boat wallowing astern. Then the +North Wind, with her decks swept clear of everything +but her house and hatches. Seine-boat, seine +and dory were gone.</p> +<p>After her was a big, powerful vessel, the Ave +Maria, with the most erratic skipper of all. This +man never appeared but the gossip broke out. +Andie Howe had his record. “Here comes George +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_107' name='page_107'></a>107</span> +Ross. What’s this they say now?––that he don’t +come down from the mast-head now like he used +to, when he strikes a school. When I was with him +he was a pretty lively man comin’ from aloft––used +to sort of fall down, you know. But now he +comes down gentle-like––slides down the back-stay. +Only trouble now he’s got to get new rubber +boots every other trip, ’count of the creases he +wears in the legs of them sliding down the wire. +I tell you they all lose their nerve as they get +older. There’s Billie Simms coming behind him. +He’s given up tryin’ to sail his vessel on the side +and tryin’ to see how long he c’n carry all he c’n +pile on. Billie says ’t’ain’t like when a fellow’s +young and ain’t got any family. I expect it’s about +the same with George since he got married.” The +master of the Ave Maria didn’t even glance over +as he piloted his vessel along. He very well knew +that we were talking about him.</p> +<p>Pretty soon came one that everybody looked at +doubtfully. She sported a new mainmast and a +new fore-gaff. “Who’s this old hooker with her +new spars? Looks like a vessel just home from salt +fishing, don’t she? Lord, but she needs painting.” +Nobody seemed to know who she was, and as she +got nearer there was a straining of eyes for her +name forward. “The H-A-R-B-I––oh, the Harbinger. +Must be old Marks and the old craft he +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_108' name='page_108'></a>108</span> +bought down East last fall. This the old man, +of course––the Harbinger. How long’s she been +down here? Came down ahead of the fleet? +Well, she ought to––by the looks of her she needs +a good early start to get anywhere. They ought +to be glad to get in. I mind that September breeze +twenty year ago that the old man said blew all the +water off Quero and drove him ashore on Sable +Island. He says he ain’t taking any more line +storms in his. No, nor anybody else in the old +square-enders he gen’rally sails in. I’ll bet he’s +glad to change winter trawling for summer seining. +I’ll bet he put in a few wakeful nights on +the Banks in his time––mind the time he parted +his cable and came bumping over Sable Island +No’the-east Bar? Found the only channel there +was, I callate. ‘Special little angels was looking +out for me,’ he says, when he got home. ‘Yes,’ +says Wesley Marrs––he was telling it to Wesley––‘yes,’ +says Wesley, ‘but I’ll bet keepin’ the lead +goin’ had a hell of a lot to do with it, too.’”</p> +<p>So they came rolling in by the end of the jetty +until they could make one last tack of it. Like +tumbling dolphins they were––seiners all, with a +single boat towing astern and a single dory, or +sometimes two dories, lashed in the waist, all gear +stowed away, under four lower sails mostly––jumbo, +jib, fore and main, though now and then +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_109' name='page_109'></a>109</span> +was one with a mainsail in stops and a trysail laced +to the gaff, and all laying down to it until their +rails were washing under and the sea hissed over +the bows.</p> +<p>Anybody would have to admire them as they +came scooting past. When they thought they were +close enough to the Breakwater––and some went +pretty close––up or down would go the wheel, +according to which end of the jetty they came in +by, around they would go, and across the flats and +down on the fleet they would come shooting. They +breasted into the hollows like any sea-bird and +lifted with every heave to shake the water from +bilge to quarter. They came across with never a +let-up, shaving everything along the way until a +good berth was picked out. Then they let go sails, +dropped anchor and were ready for a rest.</p> +<p>Nobody got by our fellows without a word. +And we weren’t the only crew of critics. Bungling +seamanship would get a slashing here, but there +was none of that. It was all good, but there are +degrees of goodness, of course. First-class seamanship +being a matter of course, only a wonderful +exhibition won approval from everybody. And +crews coming in, knowing what was ahead of +them, made no mistakes in that harbor.</p> +<p>A dozen ordinary skippers sailed past before a +famous fisherman at length came in. Everybody +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_110' name='page_110'></a>110</span> +knew him––a dog, a high-liner, truly a master +mariner. A murmur went up. “There’s the boy,” +said Tommie Clancy. “I mind last summer when +he came into Souris just such a day as this, but +with more wind stirring. ’Twas Fourth of July +and we had all our flags to the peak––and some +fine patriotic fights going on ashore that day––our +flag and the English. The harbor was jammed +with seiners and fresh-fishers. You couldn’t see +room for a dory, looking at ’em end on. But that +don’t jar Tom O’Donnell. What does he do? He +just comes in and sails around the fleet like a cup-defender +on parade––and every bit of canvas he +had aboard flying––only his crew had to hang +onto the ring-bolts under the wind’ard rail. Well, +he comes piling in, looks the fleet over, sizes up +everything, picks out a nice spot as he shoots +around, sails out the harbor again––clean out, yes +sir, clean out––comes about––and it blowing a living +gale all the time––shoots her in again, dives +across a line of us, and fetches her up standing. +We could’ve jumped from our rail to his in jack-boots, +he was that close to us and another fellow +the other side. Slid her in like you slide the cover +into a diddy box. Yes, sir, and that’s the same +lad you see coming along now––Tom O’Donnell +and his Colleen Bawn.”</p> +<p>He certainly was coming on now, and a fine +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_111' name='page_111'></a>111</span> +working vessel he had. She showed it in every +move. She came around like a twin-screw launch, +picked out her berth like she had intelligence in her +eyes, made for it, swirled, fluttered like a bird, felt +with her claws for the ground underneath, found +it, gripped it, swayed, hung on, and at last settled +gently in her place. There was no more jar to the +whole thing than if she had been a cat-boat in a +summer breeze. “Pretty, pretty, pretty,” you +could hear the gang along our rail.</p> +<p>“They talk about knockabout racing craft,” said +Clancy, “but did y’ever see anything drop to a +berth slicker than that? And that’s a vessel you c’n +go to sea in, and in the hardest winter gale that +ever blew you c’n turn in when your watch is done +and have a feeling of comfort.”</p> +<p>“Where’s the steam trawler, the porgy boat, we +saw yesterday?”</p> +<p>“Put into Chincoteague most likely––nearer +than here.”</p> +<p>“That’s what we’ll have to come to yet––steamers, +and go on wages like a waiter in a hotel.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “I s’pose so, but with vessels +like we got and the seamen sailing out of +Gloucester we’ll stave ’em off a long time yet, and +even as it is, give me a breeze and a vessel like this +one under us and we’ll beat out all the steam fishermen +that ever turned a screw.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_112' name='page_112'></a>112</span></div> +<p>One of the latest experiments in a fishermen’s +model reached in then and her coming started a +chorus. They were always trying new models in +Gloucester, everybody was so anxious to have a +winner. This one’s sails were still white and +pretty and her hull still shiny in fresh black paint. +The red stripe along her rail and the gold stripe +along her run set off her lines; her gear didn’t have +a speck on it, her spars were yellow as could be +and to leeward we thought we could still smell the +patent varnish. For that matter there were several +there as new-looking as she was, our own vessel +for one; but there had been a lot of talk about +this one. She was going to clean out the fleet. She +had been pretending to a lot, and as she hadn’t yet +made good, of course she got a great raking.</p> +<p>“She’s here at last, boys––the yacht, the wonderful, +marvellous Victory! Ain’t she a bird? Built +to beat the fleet! Look at the knockabout bow of +her!”</p> +<p>“Knockabout googleums––h-yah! Scoop shovel +snout and a stern ugly as a battle-ship’s, and the +Lord knows there was overhang and to spare +to tail her out decent. Cut out the yellow and the +red and the whole lot of gold decorations and +she’s as homely as a Newf’undland jack.”</p> +<p>“Just the same, she c’n sail,” said somebody +who wanted to start an argument.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_113' name='page_113'></a>113</span></div> +<p>“Sail! Yah! might beat a Rockport granite +sloop. Ever hear of the Henry Clay Parker, +Mister Billie Simms, and the little licking she +gave this winner of yours? No? Well, you want +to go around and have a drink or two with the boys +next time you’re ashore and get the news. It was +like a dogfish and a mackerel––the Henry just eat +her up. And there’s the others. Why, this one +underneath us’d make a holy show of her, I’ll bet. +And there’s half a dozen others. There’s the––oh, +what’s the use?”</p> +<p>“Oh, Eddie Parsons, a perfect lady and coming +in like a high-stepper and yet you must malign her +beauty and make light of her virtue,” and Clancy +jammed Parsons’s sou’wester down over his eyes––“hush +up, Eddie.”</p> +<p>Into the harbor and after the Victory heaved +another one. And she was the real thing––handsome, +fast and able. And she had a record for +bringing the fish home––an able vessel and well-known +for it. She could carry whole sails when +some of the others were double-reefed and thinking +of dragging trysails out of the hold. And her +skipper was a wonder.</p> +<p>“You c’n cut all the others out––here comes the +real thing. Here’s the old dog himself. Did he +ever miss a blow? And look at him. Every man +comes in here to-day under four lowers, no more, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_114' name='page_114'></a>114</span> +and some under reefed mains’l, or trys’l, but four +whole lowers ain’t enough for this gentleman––not +for Wesley. He must carry that gaff-tops’l if he +pulls the planks out of her. He always brings +her home, but if some of the underwriters’d see +him out here they’d soon blacklist him till he +mended his ways. It’s a blessed wonder he ain’t +found bottom before this. Look at her now skating +on her ear. There she goes––if they’d just +lower a man over the weather rail with a line on +him he could write his name on her keel!”</p> +<p>And she certainly was something to make a +man’s eyes stick out. There had been a vessel or +two that staggered before, but the Lucy fairly +rolled down into it, and there was no earthly reason +why she should do it except that it pleased her +skipper to sport that extra kite.</p> +<p>She boiled up from the end of the jetty, and her +wake was the wake of a screw steamer. She had +come from home, we knew, and so it happened +she was one of the last to get in. The harbor was +crowded as she straightened out. We knew she +would not have too much leeway coming on, and +what berth she was after kept everybody guessing.</p> +<p>“If she goes where’s she pointing––and most +vessels do––she’ll find a berth down on the beach +on that course, down about where the wreck is. +It’ll be dry enough walking when she gets there. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_115' name='page_115'></a>115</span> +If she keeps on the gait she’s going now, she ought +to be able to fetch good and high and dry up on +the mud. They’d cert’nly be able to step ashore––when +they get there. Ah-h-h, but that’s more +like it.”</p> +<p>She was taking it over the quarter then. She +cleared the stern of the most leeward of the fleet +and then kicked off, heading over to where the +Johnnie Duncan and the Victory lay. The betting +was that she would round to and drop in between +us two. There was room there, but only just room. +It would be a close fit, but there was room.</p> +<p>But she didn’t round to. She held straight on +without the sign of a swerve. On the Johnnie, the +gang being almost in her path picked out a course +for her. Between the outer end of our seine-boat +and the end of the bowsprit of the Mary Grace +Adams was a passage that may have been the +width of a vessel. But the space seemed too narrow. +Our crew were wondering if he would try +it. Even the skipper, standing in the companionway, +stepped up on deck to have a better look.</p> +<p>“He’s got to take it quarterin’, and it ain’t wide +enough,” said Eddie Parsons.</p> +<p>“Quartering––yes, but with everything hauled +inboard,” said the skipper. “He’ll try it, I guess. +I was with him for two years, and if he feels like +trying it he’ll try it.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_116' name='page_116'></a>116</span></div> +<p>“And s’pose he does try it, Skipper?”</p> +<p>“Oh, he’ll come pretty near making it, though +he stands a good chance to scrape the paint off our +seine-boat going by. No, don’t touch the seine-boat––let +her be as she is. We’ll fool ’em if they +think they c’n jar anybody here coming on like +that. There’s room enough if nothing slips, and +if they hit it’s their lookout.”</p> +<p>It looked like a narrow space for a vessel of her +beam to go through, but she hopped along, and +the eyes of all the harbor followed her to the +point where she must turn tail or make the passage.</p> +<p>She held on––her chance to go back was gone.</p> +<p>“Watch her, boys. Now she’s whooping––look +at her come!”</p> +<p>And she was coming. Her windward side was +lifted so high that her bottom planks could be +seen. Her oil-skinned crew were crowded forward. +There were men at the fore-halyards, at +jib-halyards, at the down-hauls, and a group were +standing by the anchor. Two men were at the +wheel.</p> +<p>She bit into it. There was froth at her mouth. +She was so near now that we could read the faces +of her crew; and wide awake to this fine seamanship +we all leaned over the rail, the better to see +how she’d make out. The crews of half the vessels +inside the Breakwater were watching her.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_117' name='page_117'></a>117</span></div> +<p>She was a length away and jumping to it. It +was yet in doubt, but she was certainly rushing to +some sort of a finish. She rushed on, and w-r-r-rp! +her weather bow came down on the Johnnie’s +seine-boat. But it didn’t quite hit it. Her quarter +to leeward just cut under the Adams’ bowsprit and +the leech of her mainsail seemed to flatten past. +For a moment we were not certain, but no jolt or +lurch came and our seine-boat seemed all right. +Another jump and she was clear by. And then we +felt like cheering her, and her skipper Wesley +Marrs, too, as he stood to the wheel and sung out, +“Couldn’t scare you, could I, Maurice. I thought +you’d haul your seine-boat in. I’ve got your extra +seine,” and swept by.</p> +<p>From our deck and from the deck of the Adams, +and from the decks of half a dozen others, could +be heard murmurs, and there was a general pointing +out of the redoubtable skipper himself to the +green hands that knew him only by reputation. +“That’s him, Wesley himself––the stocky little +man of the two at the wheel.”</p> +<p>If the stocky little man heard the hails that +were sent after him, he made no sign, unless a +faint dipping of his sou’wester back over his windward +shoulder was his way of showing it.</p> +<p>He had business yet, had Wesley Marrs. There +was a tug and a barge and another big seiner in +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_118' name='page_118'></a>118</span> +his course. He clipped the tug, scraped the barge, +and set the seiner’s boat a-dancing, and two lengths +more he put down the wheel and threw her gracefully +into the wind. Down came jib, down came +jumbo, over splashed the anchor. She ran forward +a little, rattled back a link or two, steadied +herself, and there she was. Her big mainsail was +yet shaking in the wind, her gaff-topsail yet fluttering +aloft, but she herself, the Lucy Foster of +Gloucester, was at your service. “And what do +you think of her, people?” might just as well have +been shot off her deck through a megaphone, for +that was what her bearing and the unnatural +smartness of her crew plainly were saying.</p> +<p>We all drew breath again. Clancy unbent from +the rail and shook his head in high approval. He +took off his sou’wester, slatted it over the after-bitt +to clear the brim of water, and spoke his mind. +“You’ll see nothing cleaner than that in this harbor +to-day, fellows, and you’ll see some pretty fair +work at that. That fellow––he’s an able seaman.”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir––an able seaman,” said the skipper +also.</p> +<p>And Clancy and the skipper were something in +the line of able seamen themselves.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_119' name='page_119'></a>119</span> +<a name='XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE' id='XIII_WESLEY_MARRS_BRINGS_A_MESSAGE'></a> +<h2>XIII</h2> +<h3>WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE</h3> +</div> +<p>Generally a day in harbor is a day of +loafing for the crew of a seiner; but it was +not so altogether with us that day. Within two +hours of the time that Wesley Marrs came in to +the Breakwater in such slashing style the skipper +had us into the seine-boat and on the way to the +Lucy Foster. By his orders we took along ten +empty mackerel barrels. “We’ll go over to the +beach first and fill these barrels up with sand.” +We all knew what the sand was for––the Johnnie +Duncan was going to be put in trim to do her best +sailing. Coming down the coast the skipper and +Clancy decided that she was down by the stern +a trifle.</p> +<p>So we attended to the sand, and on the way back +hauled our second seine out of the hold of the Lucy +Foster, and piled it into the seine-boat. With the +last of the twine into the seine-boat and just as we +were about to push off from the Lucy, Wesley +Marrs put a foot on the rail of his vessel and +spoke to Maurice.</p> +<p>“And when I was taking the last of that aboard +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_120' name='page_120'></a>120</span> +in the dock in Gloucester, you wouldn’t believe +who it was stepped onto the cap-log and looking +down on the deck of the Lucy says, ‘And you’ll +take good care of that seine for Captain Blake, +won’t you, Captain Marrs?’ Could you guess +now, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Maurice.</p> +<p>“No, I’ll bet you can’t. It isn’t often she comes +down the dock. Miss Foster no less. ‘And what +makes you think I won’t?’ I asks her. ‘Oh, of +course I know you will,’ she says, ‘and deliver it +to him in good order, too.’ ‘I’ll try,’ I says, as +though it was a desp’rate job I had on hand––to +put a seine in the hold and turn it over to another +vessel when I met her. ‘But what makes you worry +about this partic’lar seine, Miss Foster?’ I asks.”</p> +<p>“Which Miss Foster was it, Wesley––the one +your vessel is named after?” broke in our skipper.</p> +<p>“No––no––but the younger one––Alice. ‘But +what makes you worry?’ I asks her, and she didn’t +say anything, but that one that’s with her all the +time––the one that goes with the lad that designed +the Johnnie Duncan–––”</p> +<p>“Joe’s cousin here–––”</p> +<p>“That’s it––the fat little Buckley girl––a fine +girl too. And if I was a younger man and looking +for a wife, there’s the kind for me––but anyway +she up and says, ‘Alice is worried, Captain Marrs, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_121' name='page_121'></a>121</span> +because she owns a third of Captain Blake’s vessel––a +good part of her little fortune’s in the Duncan––and +if anything happens to the seine one-third +of it, of course, comes out of her. And it cost a +good many hundred dollars. So you must be careful.’ +‘Oh, that’s it?’ says I. ‘Then it’ll be shortened +sail and extra careful watches on the Lucy +till I meet Maurice, for I mustn’t lose any property +of Miss Foster’s.’”</p> +<p>We rowed away from the Lucy Foster, and I +supposed that was the end of it. But that night +going on deck to take a last look at the stars before +turning in, there was the skipper and Clancy walking +the break and talking.</p> +<p>“And did you know, Tommie, that Miss Foster +owned any of this one?” the skipper was saying.</p> +<p>“No,” said Tommie, “I didn’t know, but–––”</p> +<p>“But you suspected. Well, I didn’t even suspect. +And there’s that seine we lost last night––cost all +of eight hundred dollars.”</p> +<p>“That’s what it did––a fine seine.”</p> +<p>A few minutes later the skipper went below, +and Clancy, seeing me, said, “Hold on, Joey. Did +you hear what the skipper said?”</p> +<p>“About Miss Foster owning a share of the +vessel?”</p> +<p>“Well, not that so much, but about the loss of +the seine?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_122' name='page_122'></a>122</span></div> +<p>“Yes––why?”</p> +<p>“Why? Joe, but sometimes a man would think +you were about ten year old. I tell you, Joe, I’m +not too sure it’s going to be Withrow. And if you +don’t see some driving on this one when next we +get among the fish, then––” But he didn’t finish +it, only clucked his tongue and went below.</p> +<p>Clancy was right again. During the night the +weather moderated, and in the morning the first +of the fleet to go out past the Breakwater was the +Johnnie Duncan. It looked to us as if the skipper +thought the mackerel would be all gone out of the +sea before we got back to the spot where we had +struck them two days before.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_123' name='page_123'></a>123</span> +<a name='XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING' id='XIV_A_PROSPECT_OF_NIGHTSEINING'></a> +<h2>XIV</h2> +<h3>A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING</h3> +</div> +<p>We might have stayed in harbor another +twenty-four hours and lost nothing by it. +It was dawn when we put out from the Delaware +Breakwater, and by dark of the same day we were +back to where we had met the big school and lost +the seine two days before. And there we hung +about for another night and day waiting for the sea +to flatten out. Mackerel rarely show in rough +weather, even if you could put out a seine-boat and +go after them. But I suppose that it did us no +harm to be on the ground and ready.</p> +<p>On the evening of the next day there was something +doing. There was still some sea on, but not +enough to hurt. Along about eight o’clock, I remember, +I came off watch and dropped into the +forec’s’le to fix up my arm, which was still badly +strained from hanging onto the seine-boat’s painter +when I was washed overboard. The skipper, taking +a look, told me not to go into the dory that +night, but to let Billie Hurd, who was spare hand, +take my place, and for me to stay aboard. I would +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_124' name='page_124'></a>124</span> +rather have gone into the dory, of course, but was +not able to pull an oar––that is, pull it as I’d have +to pull when driving for a school––and knowing I +would be no more than so much freight in the +dory there was nothing else to do. “And if we see +fish, Clancy’ll stay to the mast-head to-night––as +good a seine-master as sails out of Gloucester is +Tommie––better than me,” he said. “I’m going +in the seine-boat, and Eddie Parsons, you’ll take +Clancy’s place in the dory.” And buttoning his +oil-jacket up tight, he put on his mitts and went +on deck.</p> +<p>That evening the forward gang were doing +about as much work as seiners at leisure usually do. +It was in the air that we would strike fish, but the +men had not yet been told to get ready. So four of +them were playing whist at the table under the +lamp and two were lying half in and half out of +opposite upper bunks, trying to get more of the +light on the pages of the books they were reading. +Long Steve, in a lower port bunk nearer the +gangway, was humming something sentimental, +and two were in a knot on the lockers, arguing +fiercely over nothing in particular. There was a +fellow in the peak roaring out, “Scots wha hae wi’ +Wallace bled.” Only the cook, just done with +mixing bread, seemed to have ever done a lick of +work in his life, and he was now standing by the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_125' name='page_125'></a>125</span> +galley fire rolling the dough off his fingers. The +cook on a fisherman is always a busy man.</p> +<p>Down the companionway and into the thick of +this dropped Clancy, oiled up and all ready to go +aloft. To the mast-head of a vessel, even on an +April night in southern waters, it is cold enough, +especially when, like a seiner, she is nearly always +by the wind; and Clancy was wrapped up. “I +think,” said Clancy, as his boot-heels hit the floor, +“I’ll have a mug-up.” From the boiler on the galley-stove +he poured out a mug of coffee and from +the grub-locker he took a slice of bread and two +thick slices of cold beef. He buried the bread +among the beef and leaned against the foremast +while he ate.</p> +<p>Once when Clancy was a skipper he did a fine +bit of rescuing out to sea, and after he got home a +newspaper man saw him and wrote him up. I had +the clipping stuck on the wall of Withrow’s store +for months and had read it so often that I knew it +by heart. “In heavy jack-boots and summer sou’wester, +with a black jersey of fine quality sticking +up above the neck of his oil-jacket, with a face that +won you at sight; cheeks a nice even pink; damp, +storm-beaten, and healthful; with mouth, eyes, and +jaw bespeaking humor, sympathy, and courage; +shoulders that seemed made for butting to windward––an +attractive, inspiring, magnetic man altogether––that +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_126' name='page_126'></a>126</span> +is Captain Tommie Clancy of the +Gloucester fisherman, the Mary Andrews.” That, +was how it read, and certainly it fitted him now, as +he stood there in the middle of the thick curling +smoke of the pipes, holding the mug of coffee in +one hand and the sandwich of bread and meat in +the other, leaning easily against the butt of the +foremast, and between gulps and bites taking notice +of the crew.</p> +<p>“Give me,” he said to the cook as the proper +man for an audience, “a seiner’s crew when they’re +not on fish for real gentlemen of leisure. Look at +’em now––you’d think they were all near-sighted, +with their cards up to their chins. And above them +look––Kipling to starb’d and the Duchess to port. +Mulvaney, I’ll bet, filled full of whiskey and keeping +the heathen on the jump, and Airy Fairy Lillian, +or some other daisy with winning ways, disturbing +the peace of mind of half a dozen dukes. +Mulvaney’s all right, but the Duchess! They’ll +be taking books of that kind to the mast-head next. +What d’y’ s’pose I found aft the other day? Now +what d’y’ s’pose? I’ll bet you’d never guess. No, +no. Well, ‘He Loved, but Was Lured Away.’ +Yes. Isn’t that fine stuff for a fisherman to be +feeding on? But whoever was reading it, he was +ashamed of it. ‘Well, who owns this thing?’ says +I, picking up the lured-away lad. ‘Nobody,’ speaks +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_127' name='page_127'></a>127</span> +up Sam there. Of course he didn’t own it––O no!</p> +<p>“Violet Vance,” went on Clancy, and took another +bite of his sandwich. “Violet Vance and +Wilful Winnie and a whole holdful of airy creatures +couldn’t help a fisherman when there’s anything +stirring. I waded through a whole bunch of +’em once,”––he reached over and took a wedge +of pie from the grub-locker. “Yes, I went through +a whole bunch of ’em once––pretty good pie this, +cook, though gen’rally those artificial apples that +swings on strings ain’t in it with the natural tree +apples for pie––once when we were laying somewhere +to the east’ard of Sable Island, in a blow +and a thick fog––fresh halibuting––and right in +the way of the liners. And I expect I was going +around like a man asleep, because the skipper +comes up and begins to talk to me. It was my +first trip with him and I was a young lad. ‘Young +fellow,’ says the skipper, Matt Dawson––this was +in the Lorelei––‘young fellow,’ says Matt, ‘you +look tired. Let me call up the crew and swing a +hammock for you from the fore-rigging to the +jumbo boom. How’ll that do for you? When the +jumbo slats it’ll keep the hammock rocking. Let +me,’ he says. ‘P’raps,’ he goes on, ‘you wouldn’t +mind waking up long enough to give this music +box a turn or two every now and then while the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_128' name='page_128'></a>128</span> +fog lasts.’ We had a patent fog-horn aboard, the +first I ever saw, and I’d clear forgot it––warn’t +used to patent horns. But just another little +wedge of pie, George.</p> +<p>“However, I suppose when there’s nothing doing +there’s no very great harm. But we’ll try to +keep some of you busy to-night. Praise the Lord, +the moon’s out of the way and it’s looking black +already and the sea ought to fire up fine later on. +And there’s a nice little breeze to overhaul a good +school when we see one. If any of you are beginning +to think of getting in a wink of sleep then +you’d better turn in now, for you’re sure to be out +before long. I’m going aloft.”</p> +<p>Clancy climbed up the companionway. Then +followed the scraping of his boot-heels across the +deck. Half a minute later, had anybody cared to +go up and have a look, I suppose he would have +been discovered astraddle of the highest block +above the forethroat––he and the skipper––watching +out sharply for the lights of the many other +vessels about them, but more particularly straining +their eyes for the phosphorescent trails of mackerel.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_129' name='page_129'></a>129</span> +<a name='XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD' id='XV_CLANCY_TO_THE_MASTHEAD'></a> +<h2>XV</h2> +<h3>CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD</h3> +</div> +<p>The men below knew their skipper and +Clancy too well to imagine that they were +to be too long left in peace. And then, too, the +next man off watch reported a proper night for +mackerel. “Not a blessed star out––and black! +It’s like digging a hole in the ground and looking +into it. And the skipper’s getting nervous, I know. +I could hear him stirrin’ ’round up there when I +was for’ard just now, and he hollered to the wheel +that up to the no’the’ard it looked like planty of +fish. ‘And I callate we ain’t the only vessel got +eyes for it,’ he said.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said his watch-mate, who had just +dropped down, “it’s nothing but side-lights all +’round and–––”</p> +<p>Just then came the skipper’s voice from aloft. +“Tell the boys they might’s well oil up and be +ready.” The watch did not have to repeat it––we +all heard it below, and fore and aft, in cabin +and forec’s’le, the gang made ready. Cards, novels, +and all the hot arguments went by the board, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_130' name='page_130'></a>130</span> +and then after a mug-up for nearly all we slid into +oil-clothes, boots and sou’westers, and puffing at +what was probably to be the last pipeful of the +evening, we lay around on lockers and on the floor, +backs to the butt of the mast and backs to the +stove––wherever there was space for a broad back +and a pair of stout legs our fellows dropped +themselves, discussing all the while the things that +interested them––fish, fishing, fast vessels, big +shares, politics, Bob Fitzsimmons, John L. Sullivan, +good stories, and just then particularly, because +two of the crew were thinking of marrying, +the awful price of real estate in Gloucester.</p> +<p>By and by, ringing as clear as if he himself +stood at the companionway, came the skipper’s +voice from the mast-head: “On deck everybody!” +No more discussion, no more loafing––pipes were +smothered into bosoms, and up the companionway +crowded oilskins and jack-boots.</p> +<p>Then came: “It looks like fish ahead of us. +Haul the boat alongside and drop the dory over.”</p> +<p>We jumped. Four laid hands on the dory in +the waist and ten or a dozen heaved away on the +stiff painter of the seine-boat that was towing +astern. Into the air and over the starboard rail +went the dory, while ploughing up to the vessel’s +boom at the port fore-rigging came the bow of the +seine-boat.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_131' name='page_131'></a>131</span></div> +<p>Then followed: “Put the tops’ls to her––sharp +now.”</p> +<p>The halyards could be heard whirring up toward +the sky, while two bunches of us sagged and +lifted on the deck below. Among us it was, “Now +then––o-ho––sway away––good,” until topsails +were flat as boards, and the schooner, hauled up, +had heeled to her scuppers.</p> +<p>“Slap the stays’l to her and up with the balloon. +Half the fleet’s driving to the no’the’ard. Lively.”</p> +<p>The Johnnie liked that rarely. With the seventy-five +foot main-boom sheeted in to her rail, with +the thirty-seven-foot spike bowsprit poking a lane +in the sea when she dove and a path among the +clouds when she lifted, with her midship rail all but +flush with the sea and the night breeze to sing to +her––of course she liked it, and she showed her +liking. She’d tear herself apart now before she’d +let anything in the fleet go by her. And red and +green lights were racing to both quarters of her.</p> +<p>“Into the boat!” It was the skipper’s voice +again, and fifteen men leaped over the rail at the +word. Two dropped into the dory and thirteen +jumped from the vessel’s rail onto thwarts or netting +or into the bottom of the seine-boat––anywhere +at all so that they get in quickly. As extra +hand on deck I had to stand by and pay out the +painter.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_132' name='page_132'></a>132</span></div> +<p>In the middle of it came the skipper sliding +down from the mast-head. “Drop astern, boat and +dory,” he called out, and himself leaped over the +quarter and onto the pile of netting as into the +Johnnie’s boiling wake they went. The thirty-eight-foot +seine-boat was checked up a dozen +fathoms astern, and the dory just astern of that. +The two men in the dory had to fend off desperately +as they slid by the seine-boat.</p> +<p>On the deck of the Johnnie were the cook, who +had the wheel, and myself, who had to stand by +the sheets. There would be stirring times soon, +for even from the deck occasional flashes of light, +marking small pods of mackerel, could be made +out on the surface of the sea. Clancy, now at the +mast-head alone, was noting these signs, we felt +sure, and with them a whole lot of other things. +To the mast-heads of other vessels out in the night +were other skippers, or seine-masters, and all with +skill and nerve and a great will to get fish.</p> +<p>The Johnnie was making perhaps ten knots good +now, and with every jerk the painter of the seine-boat +chafed and groaned in the taffrail chock. +The skipper from the boat called for more line. +“Slack away a bit, slack away. We’re not +porpoises.”</p> +<p>I jumped to attend to the painter just as Clancy’s +voice broke in from above: “Swing her off about +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_133' name='page_133'></a>133</span> +two points, ease your main sheet and keep an eye +on that light to looard. Off, off––that’s good––hold +her––and Joe, slack stays’l and then foretops’l +halyards. Be ready to let go balloon halyards and +stand by down-haul. Look alive.”</p> +<p>I paid out some sheet from the bitt by the wheel-box, +unbuttoned the after stays’l tack, jumped forward +and loosed up halyards till her kites dropped +limp.</p> +<p>“Down with your balloon there––and at the +wheel there, jibe her over. Watch out for that +fellow astern––he’s pretty handy to our boat. +Watch out in boat and dory!” The last warning +was a roar.</p> +<p>The big balloon gossamer came rattling down +the long stay and the jaws of the booms ratched, +fore and main, as they swung over. From astern +came the voices of the men in boat and dory, warning +each other to hang on when they felt her jibing. +Some of them must have come near to being +jerked overboard. “Why in God’s name don’t you +slack that painter?” came the voice of the skipper +from the boat.</p> +<p>I leaped to give them more painter, and “Draw +away your jib––draw away your jumbo,” came +from aloft. Sheets were barely fast when it was: +“Steady at the wheel, George––steady her––ste-a-dy––Great +God! man, if you can’t see can’t +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_134' name='page_134'></a>134</span> +you feel that fellow just ahead? And, skipper, tell +them to close their jaws astern there––water won’t +hurt ’em. Ready all now?”</p> +<p>“Ready!” roared back the skipper.</p> +<p>“All right. Down with your wheel a bit now, +George. Down––more yet. Hold her there.”</p> +<p>The vessels that we had dodged by this bit of +luffing were now dropping by us; one red light was +slowly sliding past our quarter to port, and one +green shooting by our bow to starboard. Evidently +Clancy had only been waiting to steer clear of +these two neighbors, for there was plenty of fish in +sight now. The sea was flashing with trails of +them. Clancy now began to bite out commands.</p> +<p>“Stand ready everybody. In the boat and dory +there––is everything ready, skipper?”</p> +<p>“All ready, boat and dory.”</p> +<p>Out came Clancy’s orders then––rapid fire––and +as he ripped them out, no whistling wind +could smother his voice, no swash of the sea could +drown it. In boat, dory and on deck, every brain +glowed to understand and every heart pumped to +obey.</p> +<p>“Up with your wheel, George, and let her swing +by. Stea-dy. Ready in the boat. Steady your +wheel. Are you ready in the boat? Let her swing +off a little more, George. Steady––hold her there. +Stand by in the boat. Now then––now! Cast off +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_135' name='page_135'></a>135</span> +your painter, cast off and pull to the west’ard. +And drive her! Up with the wheel. More yet––that’s +good. Drive her, I say, skipper. Where’s +that dory?––I don’t see the dory. The dory, the +dory––where in hell’s the dory?––show that lantern +in the dory. All right, the dory. Hold her +up, George. Don’t let her swing off another inch +now. Drive her, boys, drive her! Look out now! +Stand by the seine! Stand by––the twine––do you +hear, Steve! The twine! Drive her––drive her––blessed +Lord! drive her. That’s the stuff, skipper, +drive her! Let her come up, George. Down +with your wheel––down with you wheel––ste-a-dy. +Drive her, skipper, drive her! Turn in now––in––shorter +yet. Drive her now––where’s that +dory!––hold her up!––not you, George! you’re all +right––ste-a-dy. Hold that dory up to the wind!––that’s +it, boys––you’re all right––straight ahead +now! That’s the stuff. Turn her in now again, +skipper. In the dory there––show your lantern in +the dory and be ready for the seine-boat. Good +enough. Now cover your lantern in the dory and +haul away when you’re ready.”</p> +<p>To have experienced the strain and drive of that +rush, to have held an oar in the boat during that +and to have shared with the men in the confidence +they gathered––ours was a skipper to steer a boat +around a school––and the soul that rang in Clancy’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_136' name='page_136'></a>136</span> +voice!––why, just to stand on deck, as I did, +and listen to it––it was like living.</p> +<p>During this dash we could make out neither boat +nor dory from deck, but the flashes of light raised +by the oars at every stroke were plainly to be seen +in that phosphorescent sea. Certainly they were +making that boat hop along! Ten good men, +with every man a long, broad blade, and double +banked, so that every man might encourage his +mate and be himself spurred on by desperate effort. +Legs, arms, shoulders, back, all went into it and +their wake alive with smoke and fire to tell them +they were moving! To be in that?––The middle +of a black night on the Atlantic was this, and the +big seine-heaver was throwing the seine in great +armfuls. And Hurd and Parsons in the little dory +tossing behind and gamely trying to keep up! +They were glad enough to be in the dory, I know, +to get hold of the buoy, and you can be sure there +was some lively action aboard of her when Clancy +called so fiercely to them to hold the buoy up to +the wind, so that the efforts of the crew of the +seine-boat, racing to get their two hundred odd +fathoms of twine fence around the flying school, +might not go for naught.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_137' name='page_137'></a>137</span> +<a name='XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL' id='XVI_WE_GET_A_FINE_SCHOOL'></a> +<h2>XVI</h2> +<h3>WE GET A FINE SCHOOL</h3> +</div> +<p>With his “Haul away now when you’re +ready,” Clancy came down from aloft. +He was sliding down evidently by way of the jib +halyards, for there was the sound of a chafing +whiz that could be nothing else than the friction +of oilskins against taut manila rope, a sudden +check, as of a block met on the way, an impatient, +soft, little forgivable oath, and then a plump! +that meant that he must have dropped the last +twelve or fifteen feet to the deck. Immediately +came the scurry of his boot-heels as he hurried aft. +In another moment he stood in the glow of the +binnacle light, and reaching back toward the +shadow of the cook, but never turning his head +from that spot out in the dark where he had last +seen the boat, he took the wheel.</p> +<p>“All right, George, I’ve got you. A good-sized +school, by the looks, if they got them, and I think +they have. Did you see that boat ahead we near +ran into?––the last time we put the wheel down? +Man, but for a second I thought they were gone. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_138' name='page_138'></a>138</span> +I hope no blessed vessel comes as near to our fellows. +And they were so busy rowing and heaving +twine they never saw us, and myself nearly +cross-eyed trying to watch them and our own boat +and the fish all the time. Go below, George, she’s +all right now, and tell Joe––where is he?––to go +below, too, and have a mug-up for himself. He +must be soaked through taking the swash that +must’ve come over her bow for the last hour. But +tell him to come right up so’s to keep watch out +ahead.”</p> +<p>I didn’t go below, however, but standing by the +fore-rigging kept an eye out ahead. Clancy himself +stood to the wheel with his head ever turned +over one shoulder, until he saw the flare of a torch +from the seine-boat. “Good!” he exclaimed. +“What there is is safe now, anyway.”</p> +<p>After that his work was easy. He had only to +dodge the lights of other vessels now, the old red +and green lights that had been our neighbors all +that evening, and a few new yellow flares that came +from other seine-boats. So his eyes ranged the +blackness and in rings about his own seine-boat he +sailed the Johnnie Duncan. That the crew were +quite a little while pursing up only gave him satisfaction. +“A nice school, Joe, if they got it all,” +he said, “a nice school of ’em.” And after a pause, +“I think I’ll stand down and have a look.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_139' name='page_139'></a>139</span></div> +<p>He ran down, luffed, and hailed, “Hi––skipper, +what’s it like?”</p> +<p>From the row of figures that were seen to be +crowding gunnel and thwarts and hauling on the +seine, one shadow straightened up beside the smoky +torch and spoke. “Can’t be sure yet, Tommie, but +things look all right so far. A fair-sized school if +we don’t lose ’em.”</p> +<p>“Lord, don’t lose ’em, skipper, though I think +you’ve got ’em fast enough now. Sounds natural +to hear ’em flipping inside the corks, don’t it? +Ought to be hurrying ’em up, skipper––it’s getting +along in the night.”</p> +<p>Clancy, very well satisfied, stood away again and +continued to sail triangles around boat and dory. +Being now clear of the greater part of the mental +strain his spirits began to lighten. Merely by way +of being sociable with himself he hummed some +old ditties. There was that about the old coaster, +the Eliza Jane. I liked to hear him sing that, as, +dancing a one-footed jig-step by the wheel-box, he +bumped it out:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane with a blue foremast</p> +<p>And a load of hay came drifting past.</p> +<p>Her skipper stood aft and he said, ‘How do?</p> +<p>We’re the ’Liza Jane and who be you?’</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>He stood by the wheel and he says, ‘How do?</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>We’re from Bangor, Maine––from where be you?’</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_140' name='page_140'></a>140</span></p> +<p>“The ’Liza Jane got a new main truck––</p> +<p>A darn fine thing but wouldn’t stay stuck.</p> +<p>Came a breeze one day from the no’-no’-west</p> +<p>And the gosh-darned thing came down with the rest.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di––a breeze from the west––</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Who’d ’a’ thunk the truck wouldn’t stuck with the rest?</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane left the wharf one day,</p> +<p>A fine flood tide and the day Friday,</p> +<p>But the darned old tide sent her bow askew</p> +<p>And the ’Liza Jane began for to slew.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di––she’d ’a’ fairly flew,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>If she only could sail the other end to.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane left port one day,</p> +<p>With her hold full of squash and her deck all hay.</p> +<p>Two years back with her sails all set</p> +<p>She put from Bath––she’s sailing yet.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>Oh, hi-diddle-di for a good old craft</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>She’d ’ve sailed very well with her bow on aft.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>There was a long story to the Eliza Jane, but +Clancy did not finish it. Maybe he felt that it was +not in harmony with that lowering sky or that +flashing sea. Maybe, too, in the waters that rolled +and the wake that smoked was the inspiration for +something more stirring. At any rate he began, in +a voice that carried far, an old ballad of the war +of 1812.</p> +<p>Two or three more stanzas to warm up, and +the fight was on. And you would think Clancy +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_141' name='page_141'></a>141</span> +was in it. He laid every mast and yard of the +enemy over the side of her, he made her decks run +with blood, and at the last, in a noble effort, he +caused her to strike her flag.</p> +<p>By the time he had finished that, it happened +that we were running before the wind, and, going +so, it was very quiet aboard the vessel. There was +none of the close-hauled wash through her scuppers, +nor was there much play of wind through +stays and halyards. It was in fact unusually quiet, +and it needed only that to set Clancy off on a more +melancholy tack. So in a subdued voice he began +the recitation of one of the incidents that have +helped to make orphans of Gloucester children:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Twelve good vessels fighting through the night</p> +<p>Fighting, fighting, that no’the-east gale;</p> +<p>Every man, be sure, did his might,</p> +<p>But never a sign of a single sail</p> +<p>Was there in the morning when the sun shone red,</p> +<p>But a hundred and seventy fine men––dead––</p> +<p>Were settling somewhere into the sand</p> +<p>On Georges shoals, which is Drowned Men’s Land.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Seventy widows kneeling–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>A long hail came over the water and a torch was +raised and lowered. “Hi-i––” hallooed the voice.</p> +<p>“Hi-i-i––” hallooed back Clancy as he pulled +down his wheel. You might have thought he intended +to run over them. But no, for at the very +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_142' name='page_142'></a>142</span> +last second he threw her up cleverly and let her +settle beside the boat, from which most of the men +came tumbling immediately over the side of the +vessel. Of those who stayed, one shackled the +boat’s bow onto the iron that hung from the boom +at the fore-rigging, and having done that, braced +an oar between himself and the vessel’s run to hold +the boat away and steady while another in the +stern of the boat did the same thing with his oar. +In the boat’s waist two men hung onto the seine.</p> +<p>A section of the cork edge of the seine was then +gathered inboard and clamped down over the vessel’s +rail, with the mackerel crowded into the +middle part, and the bunt of the seine thus held +safely between boat and vessel. Into this space +the sea swashed and slapped after a manner that +kept all in the boat completely drenched and made +it pretty hard for the men in bow and stern to fend +off and retain their balance at the same time.</p> +<p>And then began the bailing in. Guided by the +skipper, who stood on the break, our big dip-net, +which could hold a barrel easily, was dropped over +the rail and in among the kicking fish. A twist +and a turn and “He-yew!” the skipper yelled. +“Oy-hoo!” grunted the two gangs of us at the halyards, +and into the air and over the rail swung the +dip-net, swimming full. “Down!” We let it sag +quickly to Clancy and Parsons, who were at the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_143' name='page_143'></a>143</span> +rail. “Hi-o!” they called cheerfully, and turned +the dip-net inside out. Out and down it went +again, “He-yew!” and up and in it came again. +“Oy-hoo!” “Hi-o!” and flop! it was turned upside +down and another barrel of fat, lusty fish +flipped their length against the hard deck. Head +and tail they flipped, each head and tail ten +times a second seemingly, until it sounded––they +beat the deck so frantically––as if a regiment of +gentle little drummer boys were tapping a low but +wonderfully quick-sounding roll. Scales flew. We +found some next morning glued to the mast-head. +I never can get some people to believe that it is so––mackerel +scales to the mast-head.</p> +<p>“He-yew!” called the skipper, “Oy-hoo!” hollered +the halyards gang, “Hi-o!” sung out Clancy +and Parsons cheerily at the rail. “Fine fat fish,” +commented the men in the seine-boat, the only men +who had time to draw an extra breath.</p> +<p>Blazing torches were all around us. Arms +worked up and down, big boots stamped, while inboard +and out swung the dip-net, and onto the deck +flopped the mackerel. “Drive her!” called the +skipper, and “He-yew!” “Oy-hoo!” and “Hi-o!” +it went. Drenched oilskins steamed, wet faces +glowed, glad eyes shone through the smoke flare, +and the pitching vessel, left to herself, plunged up +and down to the lift and fall of every sea.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_144' name='page_144'></a>144</span> +<a name='XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET' id='XVII_A_DRIVE_FOR_MARKET'></a> +<h2>XVII</h2> +<h3>A DRIVE FOR MARKET</h3> +</div> +<p>Her deck was pretty well filled with mackerel +when “All dry,” said Long Steve, and drew +the last of the seine into the boat.</p> +<p>“Then hurry aboard and drop that seine-boat +astern. And––whose watch? Take the wheel––wait +till I give you the course––there. But don’t +drive her awhile yet. Some of those fish might be +washed over. But it won’t be for long.”</p> +<p>“Ready with the ice?” he asked next.</p> +<p>“All ready,” and the men who had been chopping +ice and making ready the pens in the hold +stood by to take the mackerel as we passed them +down.</p> +<p>As soon as we had enough of them off the +vessel’s deck to make it safe to drive her, the skipper +gave her a little more sheet and let her go for +New York. We hustled the seine-boat aboard too. +Some other vessels must have got fish, too, and +there was no time to waste.</p> +<p>It was a good-sized school and when we had +them all iced and below––more than thirty thousand +count––it was time for all hands to turn in––all +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_145' name='page_145'></a>145</span> +but the two men on watch of course. I didn’t +turn in myself, but after a mug-up and pipeful below +came on deck again. It was a pretty good sort +of a night for a dark night, with a moderate breeze +that sang in your ears when you leaned against the +halyards and a sea that lapped bucketfuls of spray +over her rail forward and that tumbled away in a +wide flat hump as our quarter slipped on and left +it behind.</p> +<p>I found the skipper leaning against the weather +rigging and watching a red light coming up on us. +Noticing me he said, “There’s that porgy steamer +that we beat out for that school the other day +overhauling us now. There’s the beauty of steam. +The crew of this one knows more in a minute than +they know in a week about fishing in that steamer, +and we’d be carrying our summer kites when that +gang, if they were in a sailing vessel, would be +laying to an anchor; and with our boat out and +their boat out and a school in sight they’d have +to take our leavings. But here’s one of the times +when they have the best of it.”</p> +<p>There wasn’t much wind stirring then, but it +promised to breeze up, or so the skipper thought, +and I’m sure I was glad to hear him say it, for +the harder it blew the sooner we would get to New +York and the better our chance to beat the porgyman. +First in to market got the cream.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_146' name='page_146'></a>146</span></div> +<p>It was pretty well on to daybreak when the +porgy steamer got up abreast of us and after +a while worked by. One of them took the trouble +to sing out to us when they went by, “Well, you got +a school before us, but we’ll be tied up and into +the dock and spending our money ashore whilst +you’re still along the Jersey coast somewhere.”</p> +<p>And we supposed they would, but Hurd, who +was then to our wheel, had to call back to them, +“Oh, I dunno. I dunno about that––it’s a good +run to Fulton Market dock yet.” And, turning to +us, “I hope the bloody old boiler explodes so nobody’ll +be able to find a mackerel of ’em this side +the Bay of Fundy. Of course I wouldn’t want to +see the men come to any harm, but wouldn’t it jar +you––them scrubs?”</p> +<p>The skipper wasn’t saying anything. And it +meant a lot to him, too. He was looking after the +steamer and, I know, praying for wind. We could +see it in his eyes.</p> +<p>And sometimes things come as we like to have +them. At full dawn it was a nice breeze with the +Johnnie Duncan washing her face in plenty of good +spray and the fine sun shining warm on a fresh +sea-way. Another hour, the wind hauling and still +making, the Johnnie was down to her rail, and +awhile after that she was getting all the wind she +needed.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_147' name='page_147'></a>147</span></div> +<p>“We may have a chance to try her out on this +run, who knows?” said the skipper. We were +coming up on the porgy steamer then and you +should have seen his eyes when they looked from +the rail to the deck of his vessel and from the +deck again to aloft. On the steamer the gang were +in the waist watching us coming and they must +have been piling the coal into her below and giving +her the jet steadily, for out of her funnel was +coming the smoke in clouds mixed with steam.</p> +<p>“But their firemen can stoke till they’re black in +the face and they won’t get more than eleven or +eleven and a half knots out of her,” said Clancy. +“I know her––the Nautilus––and if this one under +us ain’t logging her fourteen good then I don’t +know. And she’ll be doing better yet before we +see New York.”</p> +<p>They were driving the porgyman then, but she +was fated. Once we began to get her she came +back to us fast enough, and once she was astern +she troubled us no more. After the porgyman we +passed a big white yacht, evidently just up from +the West Indies after a winter’s cruise. She looked +a model for a good sailer, but there was no chance +to try her out, for they had her under shortened +sail when we went by.</p> +<p>There was a New York blue-fisherman on our +weather bow bound for New York, too, and the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_148' name='page_148'></a>148</span> +way we went by her was a scandal. And farther +on we drove by a big bark––big enough, almost, +to take us aboard. They were plainly trying to +make a passage on her, but we left her too. Then +we passed another yacht, but she wasn’t carrying +half our sail. Her hull was as long as ours, but +she didn’t begin to be sparred as we were. We +must have had ten feet on her main-boom and ten +feet more bowsprit outboard, and yet under her +four lower sails she seemed to be making heavy +going of it. It’s a good yacht that can hold a fisherman +in a breeze and a sea-way. We beat this +one about as bad as we beat the blue-fisherman. +As we went by we tried to look as though we had +beaten so many vessels that we’d lost all interest in +racing, and at the same time we were all dancing +on our toes to think what a vessel we had under +us. It was that passage we held the north-bound +Savannah steamer for seven hours. Her passengers +stood by the rail and watched us, and when +at last we crowded our bowsprit past her nose, they +waved their handkerchiefs and cheered us like +mad.</p> +<p>“When we get this one loosened up a bit and +down to her trim, she’ll sail some or I don’t know,” +said our skipper. He stood in the cabin gangway +then and filled his boots with water, but he wouldn’t +take in sail. Back behind us was another seiner. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_149' name='page_149'></a>149</span> +We could just make out that they were soaking it +to her too. The skipper nodded his head back +at her. Then, with one hand on the house and the +other on the rail, he looked out from under our +main-boom and across at the steamer. “Not a rag––let +the spars come out of her.”</p> +<p>One thing was sure––the Johnnie was a vessel +that could stand driving. She didn’t crowd herself +as she got going. No, sir! The harder we +drove her the faster she went. Laying down on +her side made no difference to her. In fact we were +not sure that she wouldn’t do her best sailing on +her side. But it hadn’t come to that yet. She was +standing up under sail fine. Most of them, we +knew, would have washed everything off their deck +before that. And certainly there would have been +no standing down by the lee rail on too many of +them with that breeze abeam.</p> +<p>Going up New York harbor, where we had to +tack, the Savannah steamer could have gone by if +she had to, but big steamers slow down some going +into a harbor, and we holding on to everything +made up for the extra distance sailed. The wind, +of course, was nothing to what it was outside, and +that made some difference. Anyway, we kept the +Johnnie going and held the steamer up to the Battery, +where, as she had to go up North River, she +gave us three toots. The people on the Battery +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_150' name='page_150'></a>150</span> +must have had a good look at us. I guess it was +not every day they saw a schooner of the Johnnie’s +size carrying on like that. Billie Hurd had to pay +his respects to them. “Look, you loafers, look, +and see a real vessel sailing in.”</p> +<p>There was a sassy little East River towboat that +wanted to give us a tow, but our skipper said it +would be losing time to take sail off and wait for a +line then. The tug captain said, “Oh, no; and +you can’t dock her anyway in this harbor without +a tug.”</p> +<p>“Oh, I can dock her all right, I guess,” said our +skipper.</p> +<p>“Maybe you think you can, but wait till you try +it, and have a nice little bill for damages besides.”</p> +<p>“Well, the vessel’s good for the damages, too.”</p> +<p>That towboat tailed us just the same, but we +had the satisfaction of fooling him. The skipper +kept the Johnnie going till the right time and then, +when the tugboat people thought it was too late, +he shot her about on her heel and into the dock +with her mainsail coming down on the run and +jibs dead.</p> +<p>A couple of East Side loafers standing on the +wharf cap-log were nearly swept away by the end +of our bowsprit, we came on so fast. Four or five +of us leaped ashore, and with lines out and made +fast in no time, we had her docked without so much +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_151' name='page_151'></a>151</span> +as cracking a single shingle of the house across the +head of the dock.</p> +<p>We sold our mackerel for nineteen cents apiece. +Fifty-seven hundred and odd dollars was our stock, +and about a hundred and forty dollars each man’s +share. We felt a little bit chesty after that. We +were not the first to market that year, but we were +the first since the early flurry, and the biggest stock +so far that spring was to our credit.</p> +<p>We stood on the deck and watched the porgy +steamer come in and tie up, too late for that day’s +market. Some of our fellows had to ask them +where they got their fish––to the s’uth’ard or +where?––and two or three fights came out of it, +but no harm done. Then nearly everybody drew +some money off the skipper, and we smoked fifteen-cent +cigars and threw our chests out. We all went +uptown, too, and took in the theatres that night, +and afterwards treated each other and pretty +nearly everybody else that we met along the East +Side on the way back, until the policemen began to +notice us and ask if we didn’t think we’d better +be getting back to our ships. One or two of the +crew had to get into fights with the toughs along +the water front, but we were all safely aboard by +three o’clock in the morning.</p> +<p>All but Clancy. Some of us were trying to get +some sleep along towards morning when Clancy +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_152' name='page_152'></a>152</span> +came aboard with a fine shore list. The cook, who +was up and stirring about for breakfast, noticed +him first. “It’s a fine list you’ve got, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“And why not?––and a fine beam wind coming +down the street. I’m like a lot of other deep-draught +craft of good model, George––I sail best +with the wind abeam. A bit of a list gets you +down to your lines.” And until we turned out for +breakfast, after which it was time to be off and +away to the fleet again, he kept us all in a roar with +the story of his adventures.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_153' name='page_153'></a>153</span> +<a name='XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET' id='XVIII_A_BRUSH_WITH_THE_YACHTING_FLEET'></a> +<h2>XVIII</h2> +<h3>A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET</h3> +</div> +<p>Through all of that month and through +most of the month of May we chased the +mackerel up the coast. By the middle of May +we were well up front with the killers, and our +skipper’s reputation was gaining. The vessel, too, +was getting quite a name as a sailer. Along the +Maryland, Delaware, and Jersey coasts we chased +them––on up to off Sandy Hook and then along +the Long Island shore, running them fresh into +New York. There were nights and days that +spring when we saw some driving on the Johnnie +Duncan.</p> +<p>Toward the end of May, with the fish schooling +easterly to off No Man’s Land and reported as +being seen on Georges and in the Bay of Fundy––working +to the eastward all the time––we thought +the skipper would put for home, take in salt, fill +the hold with barrels and refit for a Cape Shore +trip––that is, head the fish off along the Nova +Scotia shore, from Cape Sable and on to anywhere +around the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and stay there +until we had filled her up with salt mackerel. We +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_154' name='page_154'></a>154</span> +thought so, because most of the fleet had decided +on that plan and because we had been away from +home since the first of April. But no––he stayed +cruising off Block Island and running them fresh +into Newport with the last half-dozen of the fleet.</p> +<p>Our idea of it was that the skipper wanted to go +home badly enough, but he was set on getting a +big stock and didn’t care what it cost himself or us +to get it. Some of us would have given a lot to +be home.</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, fine blue sky and a fine blue sea</p> +<p>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>was how Clancy put it as he came down from aloft +one afternoon and took the wheel from me. “By +the wind is it, Joe?”</p> +<p>“By the wind,” I said––the usual word when +seiners are cruising for mackerel, and I went aloft +to take his place at the mast-head. It was a lazy +watch, as the mackerel generally were not showing +at this time in the middle of the day. They seemed +to prefer the early morning or the late afternoon, +or above all a dark night.</p> +<p>Long Steve, who came up this day to pass the +time with me aloft, had been telling me about his +old home, when we both noticed the topsails of +what we knew must be the first of a fleet of big +schooner yachts racing to Newport––from New +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_155' name='page_155'></a>155</span> +York, no doubt, on one of their ocean races. Steve, +of course, had to try to name the leader, while +she was yet miles away––seiners have wonderful +eyes for vessels––and was still at it, naming the +others behind, when the next on watch relieved +me and I went below.</p> +<p>The first of the yachts was almost on us when +I came down, and Clancy was watching her like +a hawk when he turned the wheel over to the next +man. She was as about as big as we were. We +knew her well. She had been a cup defender and +afterwards changed to a schooner rig. Our skipper +was taking a nap below at this time, or we supposed +he was. He had been up nearly a week, +with no more than a two-hours’ sleep each day, and +so was pretty well tired. That was what made +Clancy stand by the wheel and ask if the skipper +was still asleep.</p> +<p>“No,” said the skipper himself. He had just +turned out, and in his stocking feet he came to the +companionway and looked up. “What is it?”</p> +<p>“Here’s this big yacht crawling by on our quarter––she’ll +be by us soon. I thought you wouldn’t +like it.”</p> +<p>“I’ll be right up. Tell the gang to sway up.”</p> +<p>He drew on his slip-shods and came on deck. +He took a look over at the yacht while we were +swaying up. When we had everything good and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_156' name='page_156'></a>156</span> +flat and trimmed sheets a bit, the skipper called +out to take in the fore-topsail. “She hasn’t got hers +set,” he explained.</p> +<p>Now, a fore-topsail does not help much––hauled +up, as were the Johnnie Duncan and the yacht, it +would be a hindrance to most vessels, and, perhaps, +because it did not help her was why the yacht had +not hers set. But it showed the skipper’s fairness. +Ours had been left set, because we might need it +in a hurry, and also because with the skipper below +nobody could order it down. Now we clewed +it up.</p> +<p>Clancy, standing aft, threw a look at our seine-boat, +which of course we had in tow. “She’s quite +a drag,” he suggested, “for a vessel that’s racing.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said the skipper, “but wait a while. We +won’t cast it off unless we have to.”</p> +<p>We did not have to. We soon had her in trim. +For weeks the skipper and Clancy had been marking +the Johnnie’s sheets so that in an emergency +they could whip her into her best sailing in no time. +With that, and with the shifting of some barrels +of salt that we had on deck, we soon had her going. +It is surprising what a lot of difference the shifting +of a few barrels of salt will make in the trim of a +vessel. We had not had a try with anything for +two weeks or so and had become careless. The +last thing we did was to take some barrels of fresh +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_157' name='page_157'></a>157</span> +water that happened to be standing forward of the +windlass and shift them aft, and then the Johnnie +began to go along for fair.</p> +<p>Coming up to Block Island Light things were +pretty even. Then it came a question of who was +to go to windward. The yacht hauled her mainsheet +in to two blocks. So did we, and, further, ran +a line from the cringle in her foresail to the +weather rigging. She could not make it––we had +her.</p> +<p>“Mind the time,” said the skipper, when at +last we had her under our quarter––“mind the +time, Tommie, when we used to do so much racing +down on the Cape shore? There’s where we had +plenty of time for racing and all sorts of foolishness. +I was pretty young then, but I mind it well. +A string of men on the rigging from the shear +poles clear up to the mast-head––yes, and a man +astraddle the main gaff once or twice, passing +buckets of water to wet down the mains’l.”</p> +<p>“Yes, and barrels of water out toward the +end of the main-boom keep the sail stretched. +Man, but those were the days we paid attention +to racing.”</p> +<p>“Those were the days,” asserted the skipper. +“But we can do a little of it now, too.”</p> +<p>By that you will understand we were walking +away from our yacht. We were to anchor in the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_158' name='page_158'></a>158</span> +harbor while she was still coming, and we had +towed our seine-boat all the way.</p> +<p>“Lord,” said Clancy, as we were tying up our +foresail, “but I’d like to see this one in an ocean +race with plenty of wind stirring––not a flat +breeze and a short drag like we had to-day.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_159' name='page_159'></a>159</span> +<a name='XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN' id='XIX_MINNIE_ARKELL_AGAIN'></a> +<h2>XIX</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN</h3> +</div> +<p>Coming on to dark that night a gig put off +from the schooner-yacht and rowed over +to us. On the way she was hailed and passed a +few words with a steam-yacht anchored in between. +The man in the stern of the gig was not satisfied +until he had been rowed three times around the +Johnnie. When he had looked his fill he came +alongside.</p> +<p>He mistook Clancy for the skipper. I suppose +he couldn’t imagine a man of Clancy’s figure and +bearing to be an ordinary hand on a fisherman. So +to Clancy he said, “Captain, you’ve got a wonderful +vessel here. Put a single stick in her and she’ll +beat the world.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “and she’d be a hell of a +fine fisherman then, wouldn’t she?”</p> +<p>The rest of us had to roar at that. We at once +pictured the Johnnie rigged up as a sloop out on +the Grand Banks, trawling or hand-lining, with +the crew trying to handle her in some of the winter +gales that struck in there. And a great chance +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_160' name='page_160'></a>160</span> +she would have rigged as a sloop and her one +big sail, making a winter passage home eight or +nine or ten hundred miles, when as it was, with +the sail split up to schooner rig, men found it bad +enough.</p> +<p>The master of the yacht had a message for our +captain, he said, and Clancy told him the skipper +was below. There they talked for a while and +after the yachtsman had gone Maurice, inviting +four or five of us along, dressed up, called for the +seine-boat, got in and was rowed over to a steam-yacht +that we now remembered had hailed the +schooner-yacht’s gig. All brass and varnish and +white paint and gold she would be in the daytime, +but now she was all lit up with electric lights below +and Japanese lanterns on deck.</p> +<p>When we came alongside, who should come to +the gangway of the yacht and welcome Maurice +but Minnie Arkell––Mrs. Miner. She greeted all +of us for that matter––she never pretended not to +see people––and invited us all below for refreshments. +There was a good lay-out there and we +pitched into it. Seiners are great people at table +or in a bunk. They can turn to and eat, or turn +in and sleep any minute, day or night. So now we +turned to. Clancy did great things to the wine. +Generally he took whiskey, but he did not object +to good wine now and then. He and one fellow +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_161' name='page_161'></a>161</span> +in a blue coat, white duck trousers, and a blue cap +that never left his head, had a great chat.</p> +<p>“I callate that if he didn’t have that cap with +the button on front nobody’d know he was a real +yachtsman, would they?” Eddie Parsons whispered +in my ear.</p> +<p>The owner of the steam-yacht was trying to convince +Tommie that yachting would be more in his +line than fishing, but Tommie couldn’t see it.</p> +<p>“But why not?” he asked at last. “Why not, +Mr. Clancy? Is it a matter of money? If it is, +I’ll make that right. I pay ordinary hands twenty-five +and thirty dollars a month and found, but I’ll +pay you fifty––sixty––seventy dollars a month to +go with me. I’m going to race this steamer this +summer and I want a quartermaster––a man like +you that can steer to a hair-line. Seventy dollars +a month now––what do you say?”</p> +<p>“Come now, my good man, what do you say?” +Clancy got that off without so much as a smile. +“But you couldn’t make it seventy-five now, could +you? No, I didn’t mean that quite, though I’ve +been out the dock in Gloucester of a Saturday noon +and back again to the dock of a Tuesday noon––three +days––and shared two hundred dollars––not +as skipper, mind you, but just as hand. There +now, I hope you’re not going to get angry. Hadn’t +we better have another little touch? But I can see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_162' name='page_162'></a>162</span> +myself in a suit of white duck, touching my cap, +and saying, ‘Aye, aye, sir,’ to some slob––no reference +to you, mind you––but some slob in a uniform +that’s got a yacht, not because he loves the sea, +but because he wants to butt in somewhere––who +lives aboard his yacht just the same as he does in +his house ashore––electric bells, baths, servants, +barber and all––and hugs the shore so close that he +gets the morning paper as regularly as when he’s +at home. When that kind go yachting all they +miss are the tables on the lawn and the automobiles +going by the door. They even have canary-birds––some +of them––in cages. Yes, and wouldn’t +be caught twenty miles off shore––no, not even in +a summer’s breeze for––And where would he be +in a winter’s gale? I can see myself rowing a gig +with somebody like that in the stern giving orders +and fooling––well, some simple-minded women +folks, maybe, who know as much of the sea as +they do of the next world––most of them––fooling +them into believing that he’s a devil––yes, a clean +devil on the water. Seventy a month for that?––couldn’t +you make it seventy-five?”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean to say that–––”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Clancy, “I do. I’d rather stick to +fishing than––but here’s a shoot and let’s call the +quartermaster’s job off.”</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell chimed in here. “A real fisherman, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_163' name='page_163'></a>163</span> +you must remember, Mr. Keith, doesn’t care +much for yachting because––leaving out the question +of wages, for he does make more at fishing––he +can remain a fisherman and yet be independent.”</p> +<p>“You mean they don’t have to take orders as +if they were on a yacht, Mrs. Miner?”</p> +<p>“No, no––don’t make any mistake there. The +discipline of a yacht, so far as I know it, is baby +play to what they have on a good fisherman. The +discipline aboard a warship is nothing to that +aboard a fisherman, like Captain Blake’s vessel +say, when there is anything to be done. Fishermen, +it’s true, don’t have to touch their caps and +say, ‘Very good, sir,’ to a man who may be no more +of a real man than themselves. On your yacht I +suppose you’d discharge a man who didn’t do what +he was told, and on a warship he would be sent +to the brig, I suppose. On a fisherman he’d be put +ashore. On a fisherman they not only obey orders, +but they carry them out on the jump. And why? +Because they’ve always done it. Why, deep-sea +fishermen are always getting into places where only +the best of seamanship can save them, and they +very early get in the way of doing things up quick +and right. When a Gloucester skipper orders in +the sail, say in a gale of wind, and more than apt +to be in the middle of the night––you don’t see +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_164' name='page_164'></a>164</span> +men trying to see how long it will take them to +get into oilskins––or filling another pipe before +they climb on deck. No, sir––the first man out on +the bowsprit, if it’s the jib to come in––or out on +the foot-ropes, if it’s the mainsail to be tied up––he’s +the man that will have a right to hold his head +high next day aboard that vessel. And so the +crew of a fisherman jump to their work––if they +didn’t there’d be a lot more of them lost than +there are.”</p> +<p>“Dear me,” said Mr. Keith, “that never occurred +to me before. But how is it, Mrs. Miner, +that you have it down so fine?”</p> +<p>“My father was a Gloucester skipper, and since +I was that high”––she put her hand on a level +with her knee––“I’ve been listening to fishermen. +And yachting life does tend to spoil a fisherman,” +she went on to explain. “After a summer of yachting +a fisherman will begin to think that a winter +of fishing is going to be a serious thing.” She was +warmed up then and went on talking at a great +rate. And listening to her I could understand better +why men took to her. She had warm blood in +her. If it were not for her weakness to be admired +by men, she would have been a great woman. +“And they get so, that what seems extraordinary +work to you is only an every-day matter to them. +Do you remember that last schooner-yacht race +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_165' name='page_165'></a>165</span> +across the Atlantic?––when two or three reporters +went along, and after they got back wrote all kinds +of stories of what a desperate trip it was––how +rough it was and dangerous! Well, that time there +were three or four Gloucestermen making the run +to Iceland. Now, they were not as big as the +racing yachts and they were loaded down with all +the stores for a long salt trip––their holds full of +salt, for one thing––and yet they made about as +good time to Iceland as that yachtsman made to +Queenstown. And they weren’t driving their vessels +either––they don’t drive on the way out. It’s +only coming home that they try to make passages. +Now, they must have got the same weather and +yet nobody ever heard them in their letters home +report a word of bad weather, or ever afterward, +either. And yet––but were you to Iceland that +time, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“No,” said the skipper, “but you were, +Tommie?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” answered Clancy, “in the Lucy Foster. +We made Rik-ie-vik inside of fourteen days, carrying +both tops’ls all the way. Wesley––Wesley +Marrs––wasn’t hurrying her, of course. As Mrs. +Miner says, the vessels going to the east’ard don’t +hurry, except now and then when two of them +with records get together. And the Lucy was logy, +of course, with the three hundred and odd hogsheads +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_166' name='page_166'></a>166</span> +of salt and other stuff in her. If we’d been +driving her going to Iceland that time we’d have +had the stays’l and balloon to her––and she’d have +gone right along with them, too.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Miner looked around at her yachting +friends to see if they were getting all that.</p> +<p>“There was one day that passage it blew a +bit,” exclaimed Clancy. “And that was the day we +thought we saw a fellow to the east’ard. We had +men by the halyards all that day with splitting +knives.”</p> +<p>“Why?” asked Keith.</p> +<p>“Why, to cut before she could capsize.”</p> +<p>“Oh!” said Keith and said it with a little +click.</p> +<p>“But that’s nothing. I’ve seen the gang with +Tom O’Donnell standing watch by the halyards +for days with axes when he was making a passage.”</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell filled another glass of champagne +for Clancy, and Clancy didn’t give the fizz too +much time to melt away either.</p> +<p>“These men are the real things,” she said, but +Clancy, for fear we were getting too much credit, +broke in, “Not us seiners. It’s the winter fishermen––trawlers +and hand-liners––that are the real +things. Of course, we lose men now and then +seining, but it’s in winter up on the shoal water +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_167' name='page_167'></a>167</span> +on the Banks that––there’s where you have some +seas to buck against,” and he went on to tell of a +battle with a gale on a winter’s night on the Grand +Banks. Clancy could tell a story as well as anybody +I ever met. He could make the blood jump +to your heart, or the tears to your eyes––or he could +chill you till the blood froze. When he got +through you could hear them all breathing––men +and women both, like people who had just run a +race. “Two hundred and odd men sailing out of +Gloucester,” he said, “went down that night. +There weren’t too many came safe out of that +blow. The father of this boy here was lost––the +Mary Buckley warn’t it, Joe?––named for your +mother?”</p> +<p>“And my father, too, was lost soon after,” said +Minnie Arkell, and the glance she gave me melted +a lot of prejudice I had felt for her. That was the +good human side to her.</p> +<p>“No better man ever sailed out of Gloucester, +Mrs. Miner,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>She flushed up. “Thank you, Tommie, for that, +though I know he was a reckless man.” And, she +might have added, he left some of his recklessness +in the blood of the Arkells.</p> +<p>The skipper told them a lot about sea life that +night. Some of the stories he told, though long +known in Gloucester, they took to be yarns at first. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_168' name='page_168'></a>168</span> +They could not believe that men went through such +things and lived. And then the skipper had such +an easy way of telling them. After a man has +been through a lot of unusual things––had them +years behind him and almost forgotten them––I +suppose they don’t surprise him any more.</p> +<p>The skipper looked well that night. When he +warmed up and his eyes took on a fresh shine and +his mouth softened like a woman’s, I tell you he +was a winner. I could not help comparing him +with the steam-yacht owner, who was a good-looking +man, too, but in a different way. Both of them, +to look at, were of the same size. Both had their +clothes made by tailors who knew their business +and took pains with the fitting, though it was +easy to fit men like Clancy and the skipper, such +fine level shoulders and flat broad backs they had. +Now the skipper, as I say, when he warmed up +began to look something like what he ought––like +he did when walking the quarter and the vessel +going out to sea. Only then it would be in a blue +flannel shirt open at the throat and in jack-boots. +But now, in the cabin of that yacht, dressed as he +was in black clothes like anybody else and in good-fitting +shoes, you had to take a second look at him +to get his measure. The yachtsman thought that +he and the skipper were of about the same size, and +barring that the skipper’s shoulders were a shade +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_169' name='page_169'></a>169</span> +wider there wasn’t so much difference to look at. +But there was a difference, just the same. The +yachtsman weighed a hundred and seventy-five +pounds. He asked what Maurice weighed. “Oh, +about the same,” said Maurice. But I and Clancy +knew that he weighed a hundred and ninety-five, +and Minnie Arkell, who knew too, finally had to +tell it, and then they all took another look at the +two men and could see where the difference lay. +There was no padding to Maurice, and when +you put your hand where his shoulders and +back muscles ought to be you found something +there.</p> +<p>When we were leaving that night, Mrs. Miner +stopped Maurice on the gangway to say, “And +when they have the fishermen’s race this fall, you +must sail the Johnnie Duncan, Maurice, as you’ve +never sailed a vessel yet. With you on the quarter +and Clancy to the wheel she ought to do great +things.”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll race her as well as we know how if +we’re around, but Tom O’Donnell and Wesley +Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen and Sam Hollis and +the rest––they’ll have something to say about it, +I’m afraid.”</p> +<p>“What of it? You’ve got the vessel and you +must win––I’ll bet all the loose money I have in +the world on her. Remember I own a third of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_170' name='page_170'></a>170</span> +her. Mr. Duncan sold me a third just before I +left Gloucester.”</p> +<p>That was a surprise to us––that Mrs. Miner +owned a part of the Johnnie Duncan. It set Clancy +to figuring, and turning in that night, he said––he +was full of fizzy wine, but clear-headed enough––“Well, +what do you make of that? The Foster +girl a third and Minnie Arkell a third of this one. +I’m just wise to it that it wasn’t old Duncan alone +that wanted Maurice for skipper. Lord, Lord, +down at the Delaware Breakwater do you remember +that when we heard that the Foster girl owned +a part of this one, I said, like the wise guy I thought +I was, ‘Ha, ha,’ I said, ‘so Miss Foster owns a +third? That’s it, eh?’ And now it’s Minnie +Arkell a third. Where does Withrow come in? +And did you hear her when she invited Maurice to +the time they’re going to have on that same steam-yacht +to-morrow night?––that was when she whispered +to him at the gangway, when we were leaving. +She tried to get him to promise to come, and +at last he said he would if he was in the harbor. +‘Then be sure to be in the harbor––you’re skipper +and can do as you please. Do come,’ she said at +the last, good and loud, ‘and tell them how to sail a +vessel in heavy weather. They only play at it, so +do come and tell them.’ And then in a low +voice––‘But I want you to come for yourself.’ +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_171' name='page_171'></a>171</span> +That’s what she says––‘For yourself,’ she says––in +a whisper almost. ‘Take a run into the harbor to-morrow +night if you can, Maurice,’ she says. O +Lord, women––women––they don’t know a thing––no,” +and Clancy turned in.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_172' name='page_172'></a>172</span> +<a name='XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME' id='XX_THE_SKIPPER_PUTS_FOR_HOME'></a> +<h2>XX</h2> +<h3>THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME</h3> +</div> +<p>We were out of Newport Harbor before daybreak +of next morning, and cruised inside +Block Island all that day. We all thought the +skipper would be in to Newport that night––it +was no more than a two hours’ run the way the +wind was––and we waited.</p> +<p>The test came after supper. We had supper as +usual, at three o’clock. Breakfast at four, dinner +at ten, supper at three––mug-ups before and after +and in between. Along about four o’clock the +skipper, standing on the break, stood looking back +toward where Newport lay. Had we turned then +we’d have been in nicely by dark. It was a fine +afternoon––the finest kind of an afternoon––a clear +blue sky, and a smooth blue sea with the surface +just rippling beautifully. All fire was the sun and +the sails of every vessel in sight looked white as +could be. Several yachts passed us––steam and sail––all +bright and handsome and all bound into Newport, +and the skipper’s eyes rested long on them––on +one of them particularly with music aboard.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_173' name='page_173'></a>173</span></div> +<p>The skipper looked back a long time––looked +back, and looked back. He began walking the +quarter––back and forth, back and forth, back and +forth. The sun got lower and lower, the sea lost +some of its blue, and the air grew fresher, and still +he kept looking back.</p> +<p>“It’ll be a grand sunset to-night, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“The finest kind. But one thing wrong with +it.”</p> +<p>“What’s that?”</p> +<p>“We’re not seeing it astern of us.”</p> +<p>The skipper stopped. “Astern? That’s so, too––it +<i>is</i> a fine westerly, isn’t it?”</p> +<p>Clancy said nothing, only leaned against the rigging, +not a move out of him––puffing his pipe and +looking away.</p> +<p>Nobody spoke till the skipper spoke again.</p> +<p>“Who’s to the wheel––you, Steve? How’s she +heading now?”</p> +<p>“No’the by west.”</p> +<p>“No’the by west? Put her east by no’the––ease +off your mainsheet. Let it go to the knot. Call +the gang and make sail––stays’l and balloon––everything––we’ll +go home, I guess.”</p> +<p>Clancy snapped the pipe out of his mouth and +hove it over the rail. Then he went for the forec’s’le +gangway. In two jumps he was there.</p> +<p>“Up, you loafers––on deck and make sail. ‘To +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_174' name='page_174'></a>174</span> +the east’ard,’ says the skipper, and over the shoals +we’ll put her to-night.”</p> +<p>“Home! Home––good enough––and hurroo!” +we could hear from below.</p> +<p>The skipper said nothing more––only all night +long he walked the quarter.</p> +<p>Next day when we were almost abreast of Cape +Cod Clancy began to instruct me. “Here’s a tip +for any girl friends you got, Joe. See the skipper +last night? Tell them if they’re after a man––a +real man––even if he’s a bit shy––tell them––” +Oh, the advice that Clancy could give!</p> +<p>About the time that we left Cape Cod light +astern and squared away for Thatcher’s––with +Gloucester Harbor almost in sight––with the rocks +of Eastern Point dead ahead––Clancy began to +sing again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Who wouldn’t a Gloucester seiner be?</p> +</div></div> +<p>Ha, Joey-boy?” and gave me a slap on the shoulder +that sent me half-way to the break.</p> +<p>That was all right, but I went aloft so I could +see the rocks of Cape Ann a mite sooner. I was +just beginning to discover that I had been almost +homesick.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_175' name='page_175'></a>175</span> +<a name='XXI_SEINERS_WORK' id='XXI_SEINERS_WORK'></a> +<h2>XXI</h2> +<h3>SEINERS’ WORK</h3> +</div> +<p>We were high line of the seining fleet when +we got home from the Southern cruise and +we felt pretty proud of ourselves. It was something +to stand on the corner on one of the days +when the Johnnie was fitting out again, and have +other fellows come up to you and say, “What’s +that they say you fellows shared on the Southern +trip?” And when we’d tell them, and we trying +not to throw out our chests too much, it was fine +to hear them say, “That so? Lord, but that’s +great. Well, if Maurice only holds out he’ll make +a great season of it, won’t he?”</p> +<p>“Oh, he’ll hold out,” we’d say, and lead the way +down to the Anchorage or some other place for a +drink or a cigar, for of course, with the money +we’d made, we naturally felt like spending some +of it on those who were not doing so well. And of +course, too, no seiner could ever resist anybody who +talks to him in a nice friendly way like that.</p> +<p>The skipper’s doings ashore interested all of his +crew, of course, although me, perhaps, more than +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_176' name='page_176'></a>176</span> +anybody else, unless it was Clancy. I got pretty +regular bulletins from my cousin Nell. She was +for the skipper, first, last and all the time.</p> +<p>“I like him,” she said to me more than a dozen +times. “I do like him, but I never imagined that +a man who does so well at sea could shrink into +himself as he does. Why, you almost have to haul +him out by the ears ashore. If it weren’t for me I +really believe––” and she stopped.</p> +<p>But I thought I understood what she meant. +“Meaning your chum, Alice Foster?” I said.</p> +<p>“Yes, meaning my chum, Alice Foster. Why?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I don’t know. Sometimes I think she’s a +kind of a frost.”</p> +<p>“No, she isn’t a frost, and don’t you come +around here again and tell me so.”</p> +<p>Nor did I, for I would not have an argument +with Nell for all the Alice Fosters in the world, +for if Nell were anybody else but my first cousin, +I think I would have fallen in love with her myself.</p> +<p>And then we put out to sea and again we were +living the life of seiners, having it hard and easy in +streaks. There were the times when we went along +for a week and did not do a tap but eat, sleep, +stand a trick at the wheel, a watch to the mast-head, +and skylark around the deck, and read, or +have a quiet game of draw or whist or seven-up +below. But again there were times when we were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_177' name='page_177'></a>177</span> +on fish, and our skipper being a driver, it was +jump, jump, jump for a week on end. There was +that time in August when the fish were so plentiful +on Georges Bank, when, standing to the mast-head, +you could see nothing but mackerel schooling +for fifteen or twenty miles either side of the vessel. +But, oh, they were wild! A dozen times we’d +heave the seine––put off from the vessel, put out +that two hundred and odd fathom of twine, drive +seine-boat and dory to the limit, purse in––and +not so much as a single mackerel caught by the +gills. That happened fifteen or twenty times some +days, maybe. We got our fill of sets that month. +But then again there was a week off Cape Cod and +in the Bay of Fundy and off the Maine coast when +we ran them fresh to Boston market, when we +landed more mackerel it was said in a single week +than was ever landed before by one vessel. We +were five days and five nights that time without seeing +our bunks. It was forever out and after them, +heave the seine, purse up and bail in, ice some, and +dress the rest along the way, and the vessel with +everything on driving for Boston.</p> +<p>We stood to it that week, you may be sure, until +coming on the fifth day some of us fell asleep over +the keelers as the Johnnie was coming into T +Wharf. I remember that I could just barely see +in a kind of a hazy way the row of people along the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_178' name='page_178'></a>178</span> +cap-log when we made fast. And yet after that +we had to hoist them out of the hold and onto the +dock. That day, going out again, the skipper +made all but the watch and himself turn in. That +afternoon, when everybody had had a little kink, +the skipper himself, who had been under a heavier +strain than any of us, suddenly fell backward over +the house and sound asleep. And there he lay all +the rest of that day and that night.</p> +<p>After ten or twelve hours of it we tried to wake +him, but not a budge. We tried again, but no use. +At last he came to and without any help at all. +Sitting up, he asked where we were, and being told, +he said nothing for a moment or so, and then suddenly––“That +so? How long was I asleep?” We +told him––seventeen hours. “Good Lord!” he +groaned, and after a mug-up scooted for the mast-head +like a factory hand with the seven o’clock +whistle blowing. “He’s a fisherman, the skipper,” +said the gang as they watched him climb the +rigging.</p> +<p>And he was a fisherman. All that summer he +drove things with but little time for us ashore. +Twice he put into Gloucester with a day to ourselves +and another time we had a chance to run +down after we had put into Boston for market, +and that we suspected was because the skipper +found he could not keep away himself any longer. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_179' name='page_179'></a>179</span> +Things, we judged, were going pretty well with +him in Gloucester. He did not pretend any longer +now that he was not interested in Miss Foster, and +from my cousin Nell I got occasional hints, most +of which I confided to Clancy, who explained them +as if they were so many parables.</p> +<p>“It’ll be all right,” said Clancy, “if only Minnie +Arkell stands clear. I’m glad she’s away for the +summer, but she’ll turn up in the fall. You’ll see +her just before the race large as life, and some of +her swell-dressed friends, and a yacht, I’ll bet.”</p> +<p>Considering how deeply the skipper was interested +in Miss Foster, some of us thought he ought +to be putting in a little time ashore between trips. +After a run into the Boston fresh fish market, say, +we would have liked mighty well to take in the +theatre, or a trip to the beach, or some other little +entertainment of a night. But no, it was in and +out––drive, drive, drive.</p> +<p>He was all ambition, the skipper. He was going +to be up front or break something. Miss Foster +was one of the ambitious kind, too. If she was +going to have a fisherman, he would have to be a +killer or she would know why. And so I suppose +that had a lot to do with the way the skipper drove +things.</p> +<p>We had our loafing spells, as I say, but mostly +it was plenty of work. That time when we stayed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_180' name='page_180'></a>180</span> +awake for five days and nights was not the only +one. Another time our legs swelled up and the +blood came out of the ends of our fingers with +standing up to the keelers and dressing fish without +rest. But, Lord, nobody minded that. After we’d +got rested up we felt better than ever.</p> +<p>We had good luck generally. We lost neither +men nor gear to amount to anything that summer. +That seine we lost trying for our first school to the +s’uth’ard in the spring was the only bit of misfortune +that came, and we had long ago made up for +that. But others were not so lucky. There was +the loss of the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley’s vessel. I +think I have said that she was a fast vessel. She +was fast––fast, but of the cranky type. We were +jogging along a little to windward of her one fine +afternoon––it had been a fine September day and +now it was coming on to evening. To the westward +of Cape Sable, in the Bay of Fundy, it was, and no +hint of a blow up to within a few minutes of the +time when the squall struck the Ruth. I suppose +it would have been more prudent on Pitt’s part if +he had had less sail on, but like most of the skippers +in the fleet I guess he was not looking for +any record for prudence. Any minute he might +have to be up and driving her, and keeping sail on +was the quickest way to have it when you needed it +in a hurry. The squall hit her––it hit us, too, but +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_181' name='page_181'></a>181</span> +we saw it coming and met it and beyond washing +a few keelers overboard, when she rolled down, no +harm was done to the Johnnie. On the Ripley, I +suppose, they saw it too, but the Ripley and +the Duncan were not the same class of vessel +by any means. She went over––hove down, +with her foremast under water to the cross-trees +almost.</p> +<p>Most of her crew were below at the time, some +in their bunks. Four or five of those below never +reached the deck at all––the water rushing down +the companionways cut them off. Some rushed +aft where the stern was high out of water and some +piled into the rigging. Some were calling out and +giving advice to others. We could hear them +plainly. Two jumped to the wheel and threw it up, +but she would not right.</p> +<p>We had the Johnnie to keep right side up, but +we saw the whole thing. It could not have been +more than two or three minutes from the time the +squall struck her when she was going down head-first. +Those of her crew who had gone to the +stern were going with her, but those who had taken +to the rigging, by leaping wide came clear. Their +seine-boat, which had been towing astern, might +have been of use to them, but being fast to the vessel +by the painter it was pretty well filled with water +before anybody had a chance to cut the painter. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_182' name='page_182'></a>182</span> +The man that cut it went down with the vessel. He +was all right, whoever he was. Those in the water +were looking about for the dory, and found that +half full of water, too. They were trying to bail +the water out of the dory, after hauling it across +the bow of the submerged seine-boat, when we got +them in our seine-boat and picked up what was left +of them.</p> +<p>Nine of them were lost, her skipper among +them. One of the men saved––the cook––said that +when the squall struck the vessel, Captain Ripley +had been seen to jump for the boom tackle, which +he unhitched, and then to spring for the lashings +of the dory, which he cut with his knife. The +cook also said that he thought the skipper lost his +life because of the half-stunning blow that he must +have received from the fore-boom while he was on +the rail trying to free the dory. The vessel was +sinking all the time and it being dark––or near it +in the squall––I suppose Captain Ripley could not +watch everything. No doubt, it was the fore-boom +hit him and knocked him overboard. Certainly +he was knocked overboard, and the last seen +of him he was swimming and pushing an empty +barrel before him to one of the crew. “Keep +your nerve up,” he called to the cook, and after +that he suddenly disappeared. He got a man’s +death, anyway.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_183' name='page_183'></a>183</span></div> +<p>We rowed back to the Duncan with the survivors. +Nine men gone––it was a hard story to +take home with us, but we had it to do. It was all +a part of fishing life, and so we put back for +Gloucester.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_184' name='page_184'></a>184</span> +<a name='XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE' id='XXII_ON_THE_CAPE_SHORE'></a> +<h2>XXII</h2> +<h3>ON THE CAPE SHORE</h3> +</div> +<p>While we were into Gloucester, after taking +home the crew of the Ruth Ripley, +our vessel was put on the ways. That was after +a talk between the skipper and Mr. Duncan. +There is always something that needs attending +to on a fisherman, and this time it was our +water-tanks. And while they were being looked +after, the Johnnie was overhauled, her bottom +scrubbed and topsides painted. Old Mr. Duncan, +we found, was beginning to take a lot of pride in +our vessel and balked at no expense to have her in +trim. And now that the Ripley was lost, he would +have only two vessels to represent him in the big +fishermen’s race, which was then only four weeks +away.</p> +<p>“Hurry up home now,” he said to Maurice as +we left the dock that time. “Hurry up, and give +yourself plenty of time to tune her up and get her +in trim for the race. I’ve set my heart on it. You +or the Lucy Foster must win that race, and whatever +else we do we’ve got to beat Withrow’s vessel, +anyway.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_185' name='page_185'></a>185</span></div> +<p>And Miss Foster said that one of her guardian’s +vessels would have to win the race, and my cousin +Nell said that the Johnnie Duncan would have to +win. There was a lot depending on it, she said. +It meant a lot to Will Somers, I suppose Nell +meant.</p> +<p>We figured that we had time to make a Cape +shore trip, and, with fair luck, to fill the Johnnie +with salt mackerel and be back in time to get her +in good condition for the race, which this year, because +it was anniversary year in Gloucester, promised +to be the greatest ever sailed.</p> +<p>Our plans were somewhat interfered with by a +rescue we made. We found a Glasgow bark, New +York bound, in the Bay of Fundy, and her crew in +hard straits. We stood down and after a lot of +trouble took them off––Clancy and Long Steve in +the dory. Billie Hurd came near being the second +man in the dory, but Clancy, grabbing him as he +had one foot over the rail, hauled him back with, +“Way for your elders, little man,” and jumped in +beside Long Steve.</p> +<p>“Elders, but not betters,” said Hurd.</p> +<p>“Have it your own way,” answered Clancy, +“but I go in the dory.”</p> +<p>The rescue was really a fine thing, but the important +thing was that some of the rescued men +had been exposed to the battering of the sea so +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_186' name='page_186'></a>186</span> +long that they needed medical attention, and so +we drove for home––and cracked our foremast-head +doing it. That delayed us almost a week, for +the skipper had to have that spar just so. A lot +might depend on it, same as the rest of the gear. +And it was a spar––as fine a bit of timber, Oregon +pine of course, as was ever set up in a fisherman. +And maybe that too was just as well, with the race +coming on.</p> +<p>By the time we were down the Cape shore––down +Canso way––and among the fleet again, we +had lost a week. Our hold was still to fill up, and +only two weeks and a day to the race. Wesley +Marrs, Tom O’Donnell, Sam Hollis, and the rest +were then talking of going home and making +ready for the race. Bottoms would have to be +scrubbed, extra gear put ashore––a whole lot of +things done––and a few try-outs in the Bay by way +of tuning up.</p> +<p>The race was the talk of all the fleet. Half the +crews on the Cape shore wanted to be in Gloucester +when the race came off, and some of the skippers +of the slower vessels, which would not enter +because they had no show to win, were already +scheming to be home just before the race so that +they could be on hand to follow it.</p> +<p>The morning after we were back among the +fleet we got a small school right from under the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_187' name='page_187'></a>187</span> +eyes of the Lynx, one of the English cutters which +were patrolling the coast to see that we didn’t get +any fish within the three-mile limit. I remember +that while we were satisfied at the time that we +were outside the line, we did not know what the +revenue-cutter might say, and particularly the +Lynx, whose captain had a hard name among our +fleet for his readiness to suspect law-breaking when +there wasn’t any. The cutter people generally +seemed to want to be fair toward us, but this +Lynx’s captain was certainly a vindictive cuss. +Anything hailing from Gloucester was an abomination +in his eyes. And so this morning, when, after +we had decided that we were outside the limit, +and made ready to set, it was hard to have to take +the order of the Lynx and sheer off. Our judgment +of distance ought to have been as good as his––better, +really, we thought it, because we were +always judging distances at sea, and more at home +upon the sea, too. But that made no difference––what +the cutter people said had to be law for us.</p> +<p>So this time he ordered us not to set where we +were or he’d seize our vessel. Several Gloucester +vessels had been confiscated just before this and the +owners had to pay the fine to recover them. One +owner disputed the judgment and his case was then +waiting settlement. Another who refused to pay +saw his vessel turned into a lightship and placed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_188' name='page_188'></a>188</span> +down Miramichi way in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, +where it is yet. This day the commander of the +Lynx might have some reason to think that his +order ended that for us––and we could almost see +him chuckling––but it didn’t. A fog was creeping +up at the time and in ten minutes it was on us, and +under cover of the fog we got a little school––the +same school we thought and on the exact spot +where the cutter was lying when she ordered us off. +Didn’t we cackle though when we bailed it in? Oh, +no! It was not much of a school––only twenty +barrels––but it made us all feel fine. Not alone did +we feel that we had got the better of the English +cutter, but also that luck was coming to us again. +We justified ourselves by saying that we honestly +believed we were outside the three-mile limit, and +that our judgment was as good as theirs.</p> +<p>That night the forec’s’le of the Johnnie Duncan +presented one of the most beatific scenes I ever saw. +Everybody was in the temper of an angel. There +was nothing doing––no whist at the table, no reading +out of upper bunks, no love song from the +peak, and no fierce argument on the lockers. We +were discussing the cutters and the talk was very +soothing. The cook, as usual, was finishing up a +batch of dough. You might have thought he was +the only man who had been working in a week, +were it not for the wet oil-clothes hanging up to +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_189' name='page_189'></a>189</span> +dry, and the overhauling of second suits of oil-clothes +by some of the gang. Every man, except +the cook, who never smoked while at work, was +puffing away as if he misdoubted he would ever +get another chance for a pipeful in his life. “Harmony +most ex-quis-ite,” said somebody, and that’s +what must have been that hung over the forec’s’le, +and it seemed to be merely in keeping with the +heavenly order of things that the atmosphere +showed pale blue wherever the rays of the lamp +could get a chance to strike through.</p> +<p>When Clancy dropped down for his usual mug-up +before going to the mast-head for the night of +course, he wasn’t going to let that get by without +having a word to say about it. He leaned against +the foremast and took a look around. “My soul, +but it’s as if the blessed angels were fanning their +wings over this forehold. There’s Brian Boru +and Lord Salisbury there double-banked on the +same locker, and nothing doing on any Irish question. +There’s the lad that sleeps in the peak and +not a single hallelujah of praise for his darling +Lucille. The other one––the wild man that sings +the Bobbie Burns songs––not a shriek out of him. +And Bill and John no longer spoiling their eyesight +on bad print. I expect it’s that little school +of fish––the first in two weeks or more. The prospect +must be making you all pleased. Well, it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_190' name='page_190'></a>190</span> +ought. A few hundred barrels of that kind of +mackerel––as fine fish as ever I see bailed over the +rail. And some of you ready reck’ners ought to +easily figure up what’ll be coming to us if we ever +fill her up––say five hundred barrels. A good +thing––a few hundred barrels of mackerel. A few +too many of ’em for good trim, but it’s comforting +to know they’re there. She seemed to be in +pretty nice trim when we tried out one or two of +the fleet this morning, didn’t she? And to-night, if +it breezes up––and it looks now as if it will––we’ll +get some more––if it’s a night like last night. One +time there last night––did you notice her, cook?––that +time that crazy lad started to cross our bow +and we luffed her. Why, man, she shot over like +I don’t know what––just shot like one of those +torpedo boats we see around when the Navy goes +evoluting. I was near shook overboard from aloft. +They tell me they’re going crazy over the race in +Gloucester. Well, here’s one that’ll bet his summer’s +earnings–––”</p> +<p>“What’s left of it, you mean, Tommie,” said +George Moore from his pan of dough.</p> +<p>“Well, yes, what’s left of it––and what I c’n +borrow. Old man Duncan’ll stake me, and there’s +others. I hope, though, it blows a jeesly gale. For +this one, God bless her, she c’n sail, and some of +them’ll find it out––when it’s too late, maybe. Sam +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_191' name='page_191'></a>191</span> +Hollis for one. There’s a man I’d give my eye +almost, to beat. And maybe the skipper hasn’t +got it in for him! He doesn’t say much, Maurice +don’t, but a while ago, after coming down +from aloft, Billie Simms hails him and tells him +that the cutter people know all about that little +school to-day––and who told him, who told him? +Well, the skipper’ll drive this one to the bottom +before he ever lets Sam Hollis or any of +Withrow’s vessels get by him when we race. Yes, +sir. But, Georgie-boy”––Clancy shouldered away +from the foremast––“how is it for a wedge or two +of one of those blueberry pies you got cooling +there? Just a little wedge, now. But you don’t +need to be too close-hauled with your knife––no. +Sailing by the wind is all right when you’re +jogging in and out among the fleet, and nothing +partic’lar doing except an eye out for mackerel, +but you want to give her a full always––always, +Georgie––when you’re cutting pie. There’s the +lad––straight across the beam. And now at right +angles again. And now lay one atop of the other, +and you have it––an invention of my own––a +blueberry sandwich. M-m––but look at the juice +squish through her scuppers!” He held it up +for all of us to have a look. “Now another little +wash of coffee in the wake of that and I’ll be all +right for a fine little watch aloft.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_192' name='page_192'></a>192</span></div> +<p>He jammed his sou’wester hard down, and +heroically waved away the remainder of the pie. +“No, no. First thing I know I’ll be having dyspepsia. +I never had it yet, but I might,” and then +heaved himself up the companionway, humming, +as he went, one of his old favorites:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, the ’Liza Jane and the Maria Louise</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Sailed a race one day for a peck of peas.</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>You’d hardly believe the way them two</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Carried sail that day––they fairly flew.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p><span class='indent6'> </span>People ashore they said, ‘Gee whiz!</p> +<p><span class='indent6'> </span>The ’Liza Jane the fastest is.’“</p> +</div></div> +<p>We could hear him scrambling, still humming, +over the barrels on deck. He halted long enough +by the rail to say, “How is it, boys?” to the watch +on deck, and then swung himself up the rigging. +Once aloft he had his work cut out, with hours of +strain on brain and nerve. But Clancy never +minded––he never minded anything so far as we +could make out.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_193' name='page_193'></a>193</span> +<a name='XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN' id='XXIII_DRESSING_DOWN'></a> +<h2>XXIII</h2> +<h3>DRESSING DOWN</h3> +</div> +<p>That night was the worst I ever put in towing +astern of a vessel. “Owling” is the seiners’ +word for that kind of work. It was “owling” +sure enough, with the seine-boat on a short painter +and the dory on a shorter painter still and astern +of the seine-boat again. We came near to being +lost in the dory. Mel Adams, who was in the dory +with me, thinking she was surely going to capsize +one time she rode up over the stern of the seine-boat, +took a flying leap into the seine-boat. He +had a hard time getting back, for there was quite +a little sea on. Even in the seine-boat they were +all glad enough to hear Clancy give the word to +cast off and pull after the school.</p> +<p>It was a big school, and hard work in that sea, +but we had them safe at last. The vessel then came +alongside and the bailing in began. Having had +a good long lay-off we bailed them in with plenty +of good-will. It was “He-yew!” “Oy-hoo!” +“Hi-o!” and “Drive her!” all along the line until +we had on deck what the skipper thought was a +hundred barrels. Then the bag was put around +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_194' name='page_194'></a>194</span> +the seine to protect the rest of the mackerel from +dogfish and sharks, and we were ready to dress.</p> +<p>Barrels were tossed out of the hold, keelers set +up, sharp-edged knives drawn from diddy-boxes +below, and a chance had to see a smart crew dressing +a haul of mackerel that were to be salted. It +was too long a run, four hundred miles or so, to +take a chance of getting them fresh to market. It +needed a fair and fresh breeze to be sure of it, and +besides with the market for salt mackerel getting +stronger all the time it was good judgment to salt +down and fill her up before going home.</p> +<p>We had been through the same thing before, +even with as good a deckload, but now we were +getting near the end of the season. This trip, then +the race, and maybe one more trip after the race, +and we would be done seining. And so we drove +things.</p> +<p>Four gangs of four men each took corners in the +waist. Each gang had two keelers––yard square +boxes, eight inches or so in depth, and set up on +two or three barrels. Into the keelers the mackerel +on deck were bailed and around them the +men gathered, with long-handled torches set up all +about.</p> +<p>All hands came into the dressing––skipper and +cook too––and the work went on. It was one +gang against the other, each jealously counting +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_195' name='page_195'></a>195</span> +barrels when they were filled, that full credit might +be given for speed. Sixteen men were accounted +for in this way. The seventeenth and eighteenth +were to keep the keelers filled, draw water for +pickle from over the side, roll the filled barrels out +of the way––in short, to help out generally.</p> +<p>It was fine to watch the splitters. One left-handed +grab and the mackerel was in place; flat +and smooth, one right-handed slit and he was laid +open the length of his back. Forty-five mackerel +a minute either the skipper, Clancy or Moore could +split––that is, pick them up, place in position, split +from nose to tail along the back, and slide out of +the way again. Sixty a minute they could do in +spurts, if somebody would place the mackerel in +rows for them.</p> +<p>The busiest man of all was the skipper. He had +to keep an eye out for the course of the Johnnie. +Vessels that are dressing fish, vessels on which the +entire crew are soaked in blood, gills, intestines, and +swashing brine, might be allowed privileges, one +might think; but no, they must keep a lookout +just the same. On this dark night, the Johnnie +Duncan, though making a great effort––considering +that she had jibs down and wheel in the becket––to +stay as she was put, yet would fall away or +come-to, especially when the wind shifted two or +three points at a jump. And just as soon as she +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_196' name='page_196'></a>196</span> +did the skipper would notice it instantly, jump aft +and set her right. Generally, to shift the wheel a +few spokes would be enough, but now and then he +would have to give the wheel a good round whirl. +At such a time he would sing out a warning, the +torches would be lowered, we would duck our +heads, the boom would go swinging by in the +smoky yellow glare, and the Johnnie Duncan would +be off on another tack. We would brace our legs +to a new angle, the skipper would hop back to his +knife, and again the dressing would go humming +along.</p> +<p>When we had the first hundred barrels of +mackerel swashing in brine, the rest of them, perhaps +another hundred barrels, were bailed in. And +all night long like that we stood to it driving. +Under the yellow and smoky light of the torches +I could see nothing but mackerel or the insides of +mackerel in the air. Keelers, deck, rail, our hands, +faces, boots and oilskins were sticky with the blood +and gurry. At top speed we raced like that +through the night. Once in a while a man would +drop his knife or snap off his gibbing mitt, rinse +his hand in the brine barrel by his side, slap his +hand across the hoops, and condemn the luck of a +split finger or a thumb with a fish-bone in it. Another +might pull up for a moment, glance up at +the stars or down at the white froth under the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_197' name='page_197'></a>197</span> +rail, draw his hand across his forehead, mutter, +“My soul, but I’m dry,” take a full dipper from +the water-pail, drink it dry, pass dipper and pail +along to the next and back to his work.</p> +<p>When the cook called out for breakfast we were +still at it, with the deck of the vessel covered with +barrels of pickling mackerel. It was beginning to +get light then. “Oh, the blessed day’s coming on. +Smother the torches, boys,” said the skipper, and +led the way below for the first table to have a +bite.</p> +<p>Before the sun came up we were beginning to +make out the rest of the fleet. One after another +they were coming into view, their long hulls and +high spars reaching across the wind. Between the +gray sky and the slaty sea their white sails looked +whiter than chalk.</p> +<p>We had to name the different vessels then. +“There’s Tom O’Donnell––and Wesley Marrs––and +Sam Hollis––and––” sung out Andie Howe.</p> +<p>“Sam Hollis––where’s Sam Hollis?” broke in +Mel Adams.</p> +<p>“Away to the east’ard, ain’t it, Andie?––the +fellow with jibs down?” spoke up Billie Hurd, who +was a bit proud that he too could pick her out at +such a distance.</p> +<p>“So it is, ain’t it?” said Mel, and he began to +tell our troubles in the dory. “’Twas him near ran +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_198' name='page_198'></a>198</span> +over us last night––remember, Joe? Leastways, it +looked like Hollis’s new one’s quarter goin’ by. +He was pointin’ ’bout no’the-east then, but he +couldn’t ’ve held on that tack long or he’d be somewhere +up by Miquelon and not here this mornin’––the +gait he was goin’. Man, but there was smoke +coming out of his scuppers when he went by. +‘Why don’t y’ come aboard whilst you’re about it––come +aboard and be sociable,’ I hollers. ‘Oh, don’t +cry, y’ ain’t hurted,’ says whoever’s to the wheel +of her. Least it sounded like that, ‘Y’ ain’t +hurted,’ he says.”</p> +<p>“Must have been pretty close, Mel?” said +Clancy, never stopping, but keeping a string of split +mackerel rolling into his keeler. Mel and I were +gibbing for Clancy.</p> +<p>“Close? I could’ve touched his chain-plates like +that,” and Mel, getting excited, reached his mittened +hand across the keeler and touched Clancy +on the arm. Clancy’s knife took a jump and cut a +finger. For a few seconds Clancy laid down the +law of a splitting knife to Mel, but Mel didn’t +mind.</p> +<p>“That’s just about the way I swore at the man +to the wheel of the Withrow. Didn’t I, Joe? +Yes, sir, I cert’nly swore at him good, but it no +more jarred him than––but when their seine-boat +came by, half of ’em smokin’, some half-breed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_199' name='page_199'></a>199</span> +among ’em has to sing out, ‘Y’ought to hang up a +riding light if your vessel’s hove-to,’ he says. +What do you think of that, Tommie––‘if your vessel’s +hove-to!’––and if the Johnnie was going one +she was going ten knots an hour.”</p> +<p>“That’s right, Mel––I heard you to the mast-head,” +said Clancy. Clancy heard it about as +much as old Mr. Duncan back in Gloucester did, +but he was always ready to help a man out.</p> +<p>“Did you? Well, I hove-to him. I hove the +bailer at him, that’s what I did, and he ducked. +But he ducked too late, I callate, for ‘Bam!’ it +caught him––or somebody in the seine-boat with +him. He swore some, or somebody swore, you c’n +bet. ‘I don’t know who y’are,’ he hollers, ‘but if +ever I meet you ashore,’ and he was so far away +then I couldn’t ketch no more of it. ‘Don’t know +who y’are, but if I ketch you ashore’––Lord–––”</p> +<p>“So, if a lad with a bump on the side of his head +waltzes up to you on Main Street and whangs you, +Mel, next time you’re ashore in Gloucester, what’ll +you do?” asked Clancy.</p> +<p>“I’ll say, ‘Where’s that bailer, you loafer?’ but +first I’ll whang him back. I had to finish the bailing +out with my sou’wester. I sings out to Andie +Howe in the boat here to hand me one of the +bailers in the boat. ‘I’m usin’ my hat,’ I hollers, +‘and Joe’s using his sou’wester,’ thinkin’ that would +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_200' name='page_200'></a>200</span> +fetch him all right. ‘Well, we’re usin’ ten sou’westers +here,’ says Andie, ‘and one or two of ’em +leaks,’ and that was all the satisfaction I got.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Eddie Parsons, “the seine-boat was +sure wallerin’ then. The skipper had only just +told Jimmie Gunn to quit his growling. ‘You’ll +be wanting hot-water bags to your feet next, I +suppose,’ says the skipper.”</p> +<p>“I was thinking of the boat––afraid she’d be +so logy with the water in her that we couldn’t drive +her when the time came,” bristled up Jimmie Gunn +to that.</p> +<p>“Y-yah!” snorted Eddie, “if you weren’t scared, +then I never saw a man scared. Logy? I notice +we made her hop along all right after we cast off +from the vessel. Man, but she fair hurdled some +of them seas––some of the little ones, I mean. +Didn’t she, Steve? We thought we’d lost Joe and +you, Mel, in the dory, didn’t we, fellows?”</p> +<p>“You did, hey? Well, you didn’t, nor nowheres +near it,” broke in Mel. “We were right there with +the goods when they hove the seine, warn’t we, +Joey?”</p> +<p>And so it went on through all that day, while +the men worked, dressing, salting, and putting all +in pickle. It was a drive all through without any +quitting by anybody, except when it was time to +relieve lookouts at the mast-head. In the middle +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_201' name='page_201'></a>201</span> +of it all, had the call of “School-O!” been heard +from aloft, we would have been only too glad to +drop everything, jump into the boat and dory, get +after the mackerel, and do the same thing over––split, +gibb and pack away––for all of the next +night, and the night after that––for a week if +necessary.</p> +<p>Not until well into the afternoon, when the last +mackerel was flattened out in its barrel, did any of +us feel that we could step back in our own time, +straighten ourselves out, and take a look over our +work. Then we counted the oozing barrels with +great satisfaction, you may be sure, even while we +were massaging our swollen wrists with our aching +fingers. It was a good bit of work that, well and +quickly done, and it was fine to get a rest after it, +although it might be only for a little while. Even +though we had to do it all over again––to stay +half-drowned and chilled through in the seine-boat +or dory for half the night and then dress down for +eighteen or twenty hours on top of it––what did +a little hard work matter? “Think of the hundred-dollar +bill, maybe, to be carried home and laid in +the wife’s lap,” said Long Steve.</p> +<p>“Or the roaring night ashore when a fellow’s +not a family man––m-m––!” said Eddie Parsons. +Eddie was not a family man.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_202' name='page_202'></a>202</span> +<a name='XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN' id='XXIV_THE_WITHROW_OUTSAILS_THE_DUNCAN'></a> +<h2>XXIV</h2> +<h3>THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN</h3> +</div> +<p>We certainly were feeling pretty good along +about that time, and we felt better when +next day, cruising in and out among the fleet, +other crews began to take notice of our catch. By +that time the word had gone around. One after +another they came sailing up––as if to size us up +was the last thing that could enter their heads––rounding +to, and then a hail. Something like this +it went:</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Maurice.”</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Wesley,” or George Drake, or Al +McNeill, or whoever it might be.</p> +<p>“That’s a mighty pretty deckload of fish. +When’d y’get ’em?”</p> +<p>“Oh, twenty barrels yesterday morning and the +rest last night.”</p> +<p>“That so? How many d’y’call ’em, Maurice?”</p> +<p>“How many? Oh, two hundred and eighty or +ninety wash barrels. Ought to head up about two +sixty.”</p> +<p>“That so? Fine, Maurice, fine. As handsome +a deckload as I’ve seen this year.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_203' name='page_203'></a>203</span></div> +<p>And he would bear off, and another vessel would +come and go through the same ceremony. It was +very satisfying to us and the skipper must have +felt proud. Not that a lot bigger hauls had not +been made by other men before––indeed, yes, and +by the very men perhaps who were complimenting +him. But three hundred barrels, or near it, in +pickle at one time does look fine on a vessel’s deck, +and they looked especially fine at this time because +there was not another vessel in the fleet that had +half as many, so far as we knew.</p> +<p>Not another but Sam Hollis––or so he claimed. +He came ranging up that same day and began asking +how the Duncan was sailing lately, and followed +that up by saying he himself had two hundred +odd barrels in the hold. He showed about +sixty wash barrels on deck. We did not believe +he had twenty below. She looked cork light. +“If she sets as high out of water with two hundred +and forty barrels, then you ought to put two +hundred and forty more in her and she’d fly,” +called out Clancy to Hollis, and that was pretty +much what we all thought.</p> +<p>And ’twas Sam Hollis made trouble for the +Duncan that day. He bore off then but came back +in the afternoon. More talk there was, and it +wound up by our racing with him. We did not +start out to race, but gradually, as we found ourselves +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_204' name='page_204'></a>204</span> +jogging along side by side, jibs were drawn +away and sheets began to be trimmed. The first +thing we knew we found ourselves swaying up sails, +and then before we really woke up to it we were +both off and away before a little breeze.</p> +<p>Hollis had all the best of it. He was bound to, +with the Duncan carrying most of her mackerel +aft and away down by the stern. Even had we had +time to––we did shift some of it forward––we +were too deep for any kind of racing in that moderate +breeze. We said that to ourselves, anyway, +and yet we held on. But it was no use––it wound +up by Hollis giving us a scandalous beating. And +after running away from us he kept straight on +to the westward, and by that we knew that he was +bound for Gloucester to get ready for the big +race.</p> +<p>The skipper felt it. He was one that took things +to heart.</p> +<p>“I’ve been bragging about this one––what she +could do. I told the old man only the last time we +were in that he could go broke that I’d beat Sam +Hollis, and here the first time we come together +he makes her look like a wood-carrier. The best +thing I can do, I guess, is to keep out of the race; +maybe it will save the old man some money. I expected +he’d beat us, the trim we were in––but to +beat us the way he did!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_205' name='page_205'></a>205</span></div> +<p>Nothing the crew could say seemed to make him +think otherwise, and that night it was not nearly +so joyful below in the Johnnie Duncan. The talk +was that she would not go home for the race. Only +Clancy seemed to be as cheerful as ever. “Don’t +any of you get to worrying,” he said. “I know the +skipper––the Johnnie Duncan’ll be there when the +time comes.”</p> +<p>Yet next morning when Wesley Marrs went by +us with the Lucy Foster bound for home and sang +out, “Come along, Maurice, and get ready for the +race––we’ll have a brush on the way,” our skipper +only waved his hand and said, “No––this old plug +can’t sail.” Wesley looked mighty puzzled at +that, but kept on his way.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_206' name='page_206'></a>206</span> +<a name='XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS' id='XXV_TROUBLE_WITH_THE_DOMINION_CUTTERS'></a> +<h2>XXV</h2> +<h3>TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS</h3> +</div> +<p>Next day after, in a calm, Clancy and I had +to take the dory and row out among the +fleet for some salt. The skipper thought it likely +that some of the vessels that were going home +might have salt to spare. He doubted if he himself +would have enough in case we struck another +good school. So we rowed out. We went from +one vessel to another without any luck, until we +found ourselves aboard Tom O’Donnell––the +Colleen Bawn. And just as we got aboard a school +showed near by her, and they made a dash for it. +The Colleen was pretty well inshore then, and yet +safe outside the three-mile limit in our judgment. +Even in the judgment of one of the Canadian +revenue cutters, the Mink, she was outside the +limit. “You’re all right, go ahead,” her commander +sang out from the bridge.</p> +<p>Yet trouble came of it. The Colleen’s gang +were making a set when along came the Lynx, the +same cutter that had ordered our own skipper not +to set two or three days back in the fog, and we had +set in spite of him. I think I said that he had a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_207' name='page_207'></a>207</span> +bad reputation among our fleet. In this case some +said afterwards that he had been watching the +Duncan since that time, and having seen a dory put +out from her and go aboard Tom O’Donnell, that +he then had a special watch for O’Donnell. Anyway, +we know that as the Colleen Bawn’s crew +were pursing in the seine he came along and ordered +them to cast loose the fish. “You’re inside +the limit,” said this fellow now.</p> +<p>“I may be, but I don’t think so,” said O’Donnell +to that.</p> +<p>“You’re inside and you know it.”</p> +<p>“You’re a liar if you say I know it.”</p> +<p>O’Donnell had had trouble with the Lynx before, +and had small patience with her captain. +More words came out of it, and while they were +talking back and forth another of the fleet a mile +to the east’ard put out a boat.</p> +<p>The cutter went after him, her captain singing +out as he went, “You wait here till I come back.” +“Wait like hell!” said O’Donnell, “and this breeze +making,” and continued to purse up. Pursed up, +the fish aboard––there were forty or fifty barrels––he +started off. One of those sudden breezes were +springing up and it promised to be wind enough +to suit anybody. We made out the Johnnie Duncan +bearing down, intending no doubt to take off +Clancy and me. But the cutter was coming toward +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_208' name='page_208'></a>208</span> +us then, and O’Donnell said we had better stay +aboard or we would be picked up on the way by +the cutter’s people and maybe get the Duncan and +our skipper into trouble. That last––the thought +that our skipper or the vessel might get mixed up +in it––kept us aboard the Colleen Bawn.</p> +<p>The Lynx could steam as fast as any cutter they +had on the Cape shore at that time, but the Colleen +was a witch and O’Donnell a wonder at sailing +her. So we stayed with O’Donnell and +watched him and the cutter have it out. They had +it, the cutter letting drive a shot every once in a +while. The first shot, I remember, went whistling +by the ear of one of O’Donnell’s crew who was +standing back-to in the waist, and so astonished +him, he not expecting it, that he fell into the forehold. +He raised a great racket among a lot of +empty barrels. The fall never hurt him, but +the things he said when he came on deck +again! O’Donnell made him lie flat––and then all +of us but Clancy, who refused to lie down but compromised +by leaning over the house and watching +the cutter and making comments on her actions for +the benefit of the rest of us. Through it all O’Donnell +stood to the wheel and the nearest he came to +honoring the cutter by a compliment was when he’d +half turn his head, spit over the rail and swear at +her. The wind and sea-way together were too +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_209' name='page_209'></a>209</span> +much for the cutter. The Colleen left her behind, +and she at last drew off after bunching a few farewell +shots.</p> +<p>O’Donnell then hove-to and took his seine-boat +on deck. He had been towing it the wrong end +foremost for the whole forty miles, and he was +worried over it. “It’s strained her maybe––and +she almost a new boat,” he lamented. “For the +rest I don’t care. That lad had it in for me all +along. The other one though, he’s decent––never +bothers a man without a little reason. I was going +home anyway for the race, and so it don’t matter. +I suppose Maurice will be along soon, Tommie? +Did you see him coming after the cutter––he held +her fine and he in no trim. What’s it they say +about Hollis beating the Johnnie yesterday? If he +did, be sure he was specially prepared, and the +Johnnie had an off-day. But I suppose he’ll be +holding on now for Gloucester?”</p> +<p>Clancy said maybe, but no telling, and explained +how it had been––the skipper’s discouragement +after Hollis had beaten him.</p> +<p>O’Donnell said he was foolish to worry over a +thing like that. “I know Sam Hollis,” he said––“’twas +a trap he laid for Maurice. He’s got a +smart vessel in the Withrow, but he can’t run away +from Maurice. No, nor beat him I doubt––with +both in trim. But wait a while––let the day of the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_210' name='page_210'></a>210</span> +race get near and Maurice to thinking it over, and +you’ll see him flyin’ home.”</p> +<p>We hoped so. For ourselves we went home on +the Colleen. There was nothing else for us to do. +We had quite a time of it that trip with O’Donnell. +He sailed about five hundred miles out of +his way––away to the eastward and s’uth’ard. +There might be cruisers and cutters galore after +him, he said––they might put out from Halifax, +or telegraph ahead––you couldn’t tell what they +might do, he said, and so he sailed the Colleen out +to sea. But we came across the Bay one dark night +without side-lights, and reached Boston all right. +O’Donnell had a suit of sails stowed away in an +East Boston wharf that he wanted to get out for +the race. And also he didn’t like his new foremast +and was going to have a new one put in if +there was time.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_211' name='page_211'></a>211</span> +<a name='XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER' id='XXVI_THE_GOSSIP_IN_GLOUCESTER'></a> +<h2>XXVI</h2> +<h3>THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER</h3> +</div> +<p>Clancy and I went home by train, reaching +Gloucester as the first of an easterly gale +set in. There we found it was nothing but talk of +the race. We had not reached Main Street at all +before Clancy was held up. Clancy, of course, +would know. Where was Maurice Blake? What +were we doing in Gloucester and the Johnnie not +in? The Duncans––especially the elder Mr. Duncan––Miss +Foster, my cousin Nell, and Will +Somers were boiling over. Where was Maurice +Blake? Where was the Johnnie Duncan? Everybody +in town seemed to know that Sam Hollis had +given us a bad beating down Cape shore way, and +the news had a mighty discouraging effect on all +Maurice’s friends, even on those of them who +knew enough of Sam Hollis not to take his talk +just as he wanted them to take it. Withrow’s vessel +had beaten the Johnnie Duncan with Maurice +Blake sailing her––they had to believe that part of +it, and that in itself was bad enough. Sam Hollis’s +stock was booming, you may be sure––and the +race right close to hand, too.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_212' name='page_212'></a>212</span></div> +<p>“That little beating the Johnnie got didn’t lose +any in the telling by Sam Hollis and his gang, did +it, Joe?” said Clancy to me, and then he went +around borrowing all the money he could to bet +the Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow in +the race. But would Maurice now enter at all? I +asked Clancy about that part––if there was not a +chance that Maurice might not stay down the Cape +shore way and let the race go. But he only +laughed and said, “Lord––Joey-boy, you’ve a lot +to learn yet about Maurice in spite of your season’s +seining along with him.”</p> +<p>It was a Monday morning when Clancy and I +reached Gloucester. The race was to be sailed +on Friday of that same week. For several days +before this, we were told, Wesley Marrs, Sam +Hollis, Tommie Ohlsen, and the rest of them had +been out in the Bay tuning up their vessels like a +lot of cup defenders. Never before had fishermen +given so much attention to the little details before +a race. The same day that we got home they were +up on the ways for a final polishing and primping +up. They were smooth as porcelain when they +came off. And coming off their skippers thought +they had better take some of the ballast out of +them. “’Tisn’t as if it was winter weather”––it +was the middle of September then––“with big seas +and driving gales,” was the way Wesley Marrs put +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_213' name='page_213'></a>213</span> +it, and they all agreed that the chances were ten +to one that the wind would not be strong enough +to call for the heavy ballast they carried. Fishermen, +of course, are built to be at their best when +wind and sea are doing their worst, and so the +taking out of ballast for a September race looked +like good judgment. So about forty tons of ballast +were taken out of most of them––the Lucy +Foster, the Withrow, the Nannie O, and half a +dozen others.</p> +<p>That looked all right, but on Tuesday night an +easterly gale set in, the wind blowing forty-odd +miles an hour. All day Wednesday it blew, and all +day Thursday even harder, with a promise of blowing +harder still on Friday, which was to be the day +of the race. The people of Gloucester who had +been praying for wind, “Wind for a fisherman’s +race––wind––wind,” seemed likely to get what +they wanted.</p> +<p>On Thursday I saw Tommie Ohlsen and Wesley +Marrs in conference on the street. Wesley had +his nose up in the air, sniffing the breeze. He +shook his head with, “Tommie, I ought to’ve let +the ballast stay in the Lucy. It looks like it’s going +to be the devil’s own breeze for vessels that ain’t +prepared for it.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Ohlsen, “wind fifty-two mile an +hour the weather man says, and still making. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_214' name='page_214'></a>214</span> +That’s bad for light ballast and whole sail. If we +could only put the ballast back–––”</p> +<p>“Yes––if we could. But we can’t put it back +now––there ain’t time to do it right and everybody +would laugh at us too. And besides, if we did, all +the others would put it back, and where’s the difference?”</p> +<p>“Of course,” said Tommie, “but if all of us +would put it back it would make a better race.”</p> +<p>In view of the reputation of Wesley Marrs and +Ohlsen and O’Donnell and their vessels, we could +not understand the confidence of Withrow and his +people in Sam Hollis. He had a great vessel––nobody +doubted it. But it was doubted by many +if she was the equal of some of the others, and +few believed she was better. And Sam Hollis was +not the man to carry the sail, or at least the fishermen +of Gloucester generally did not think so. But +Withrow and Hollis’s gang kept on bragging and +they backed their bragging up, too. I drew what +money I had saved that summer out of my seining +share––two hundred and twenty-five dollars––and +bet it myself with one of the Withrow’s crew that +the Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow, +whether the Johnnie was home to race or +not. It was really betting against Withrow himself, +who, it was said, was taking up every bet +made by any of the Withrow’s crew. That was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_215' name='page_215'></a>215</span> +Thursday afternoon, and still no word of the +Duncan.</p> +<p>“Good for you, Joey,” said Clancy when he +heard of that. “Even if Maurice don’t come it’s +better to lose your money and shut them up. But +don’t worry––he’ll come. Do you think he’s been +standing and looking at this easterly––it’s all along +the coast to Newf’undland I see by the papers––and +not swing her off? He’s on his way now, and +swinging all he’s got to her, I’ll bet. Wait and +see.”</p> +<p>“My,” said my cousin Nell, “and so you bet +your pile on the Johnnie Duncan whether she’s in +or not?––and if she don’t reach here in time you +lose it all?” and told it all over to her Will +Somers, to whom I learned she was now engaged. +And from that time on I noticed that Alice Foster +beamed on me like an angel.</p> +<p>Minnie Arkell was home for the race just as +Clancy had prophesied. She had come with some +of her friends down from Boston three or four +days before this, in the same steam-yacht she had +been aboard of at Newport in June. Meeting me +she asked me about our passage home on the Colleen +Bawn, and I told her of it. She listened with +great interest.</p> +<p>“Is Tom O’Donnell as fine-looking as he used +to be––with his grand figure and head and great +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_216' name='page_216'></a>216</span> +beard? I remember some years ago I used to +think him the finest-looking man I ever saw.”</p> +<p>I told her that I guessed she’d think him fine-looking +yet if she’d seen him to the wheel of the +Colleen Bawn with the six-pound shot whistling +by him, and he never so much as letting on he knew +they were there. Her eyes shone at that. Then +she offered to take any bets I made off my hands. +“You can’t afford to take your little savings out of +the bank and bet it on a vessel that may not be +here in time. I’ll take it off your hands––come!”</p> +<p>That was an attractive side to her––caring but +little for money––but I wasn’t letting anybody +take my bets off my hands. I still believed that +Maurice would be home, though that was seven +o’clock Thursday evening. I knew he would be +home if he only guessed that his friends were betting +on his vessel––and they not even knowing +whether she was to be home in time for the race. +And if he weren’t home, I was ready to lose my +little roll.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_217' name='page_217'></a>217</span> +<a name='XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE' id='XXVII_IN_CLANCYS_BOARDINGHOUSE'></a> +<h2>XXVII</h2> +<h3>IN CLANCY’S BOARDING-HOUSE</h3> +</div> +<p>From Minnie Arkell, whom I met at the +door of her own house, I went to Clancy’s +boarding house. I did not find Clancy then and I +went off, but coming back again I found him, and +a very busy man he was, with an immense crock +of punch between his knees. He was explaining +down in the kitchen to the other boarders––fifteen +or twenty of the thirstiest-looking fishermen I ever +laid eyes on––just how it was he made the punch. +The bowl was about the size of a little beer keg.</p> +<p>“On the night of last Fourth of July,” he was +saying––“and I mind we came in that morning +with a hundred and seventy-five barrels we got off +Mount Desert––that night I warn’t very busy. I +gets this crock––four gallons––let you all have a +look––a nice cold stony crock you see it is, and +that they’d been using then in the house here for +piccalilli––and a fine flavor still hanging to it. +Wait a minute now till I tell you. It’ll taste better, +too, after you hear. And into the crock I puts +two gallons of rum––fine rum it was––for a bottom. +Every good punch has to have a bottom. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_218' name='page_218'></a>218</span> +It’s like the big blocks they put under a house by +way of a foundation, or the ballast down near the +keel of a vessel––there’d be no stiffening without +it, and the first good breeze she’d capsize, and then +where’d you be? Now, on top of those two gallons––it +was two o’clock in the morning, I mind, +when I started to mix it––whiskey, brandy, and +sherry––no, I can’t tell what parts of each––for +that’s the secret of it. A fellow was dory-mate +with me once––a Frenchman from Bordeaux––told +me and said never to tell, and I gave my oath––down +in St. Peer harbor in Miquelon it was––and +afterwards he was lost on the Heptagon––and of +course, never being released from the oath, I can’t +tell. Well, there was the rum, the whiskey, the +brandy, and the sherry––and on top o’ that went +one can of canned pine-apple––canned pine is better +than the pine-apple right out of its jacket. +Why? Well, that’s part of the secret. Then a +dozen squeezed lemons and oranges. Then some +maraschino. I’d got it off an Italian salt bark skipper +in the harbor once. On top o’ that I put one +quart of green tea––boiled it myself––it was three +in the morning then, I mind––and I sampled a cup +of it. Wait now––wait. Just ease your sheets and +let me tell it. Here’s the best part of it. I takes +that crock with the fourteen quarts of good stuff +in it and lowers it to the bottom of the old well +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_219' name='page_219'></a>219</span> +out in the yard with a lot of cold round little +stones above and below and more little stones +packed all around and then I lowers down two +good-sized rocks on top o’ that––and nails boards +over the well––that’s why nobody could get into +that well all this summer. Well, that was the +morning after the last Fourth of July––I mind the +sun was coming up over the rocks of Cape Ann +when I was done. And that was July, and now the +last of September––three months ago. A while ago +in the dark and a howling gale––you all see me +come in with it, didn’t you? Yes, if you go out +quick, you c’n see the well just where I left it––I +goes out and digs it up––and here it is––and +now it’s here, we’ll all have a little touch in +honor of to-morrow, for it’s a great day when the +wind blows fifty or sixty miles an hour so that +fishermen can have good weather for a race.”</p> +<p>And they all had a little touch. Clancy sat on +the table with the crock between his feet and bailed +it out while they all agreed it was the smoothest +stuff that ever slid down their throats. There was +not a man in the gang who was not sure he could +put away a barrel of it.</p> +<p>“Put away a barrel of it?” whispered Clancy––“yes. +Let’s get out of here, Joe. In an hour they’ll +be going into the air like firecrackers.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_220' name='page_220'></a>220</span> +<a name='XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN' id='XXVIII_IN_THE_ARKELL_KITCHEN'></a> +<h2>XXVIII</h2> +<h3>IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN</h3> +</div> +<p>We left Clancy’s boarding house and went +over to old Mrs. Arkell’s place, where +most of the skippers who were going to race next +day had gathered. Clancy at once started in to +mix milk-punches. And he sang his latest favorite, +with the gang supping his mixture between the +stanzas:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, hove flat down on Quero Banks</p> +<p>Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks,</p> +<p>And the way she was a-settlin’ was an awful sight to see”––</p> +</div></div> +<p>Then Wesley Marrs sang a song and after him +Patsie Oddie followed with a roarer.</p> +<p>The punch-mixing, singing and story-telling +went on and in the middle of it Tom O’Donnell +came driving in. He was like a whiff of a no’the-easter +out to sea. “Whoo!” he said. “Hulloh, +Wesley-boy––and Patsie Oddie––and Tommie +Ohlsen––and, by my soul, Tommie Clancy again. +Lord, what a night to come beating down from +Boston! What’s that, Wesley?––did the Colleen +outfoot the cutter down the Cape shore way? Indeed +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_221' name='page_221'></a>221</span> +and she did, and could do it over again in the +same breeze to half their logy old battleships. +Into Boston I was Monday morning, and the fish +out of her the same morning. Tuesday I took her +across to Cape Cod, tuning her up, and into Provincetown +that night. Next day it was blowing +pretty hard. A fine day for a run across the Bay, +I thinks, and waits for maybe a Boston vessel, one +of the T Wharf fleet. For I’ll go to Boston, I +thinks, to put the Colleen on the railway to-day, +because maybe in Gloucester I may have to wait––or +may get no chance at all––with half a dozen +or more that will be waiting to be scrubbed for the +race. And who comes along then but Tom Lowrie. +‘Waiting for me?’ he asks, and I tells him I was +hoping it would be the new Whalen vessel. +‘Here’s one that’s as good as any Whalen vessel,’ +he says––‘as good as anything out of Boston––or +Gloucester,’ he says. So across the Bay we had +it out. And, gentlemen, I’m telling you the Colleen +sailed––all the wind she wanted. She came +along, and Lowrie––by the looks of things then––he’s +sailing yet. Well, I never did like that +forem’st that was in the Colleen, and so, thinks I, +here’s a chance to test it––and why not, with the +race coming on? So I jibed her over off Minot’s +just––and sure enough it cracked about ten feet +below the mast-head.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_222' name='page_222'></a>222</span></div> +<p>“You were satisfied then, Tom?”</p> +<p>“Sure and I was. And better before the race +than in the race. And next day––that’s to-day––we +spent putting in a new stick. I had to take +what I could get to save time, and I don’t think +it’s what it ought to be and maybe it won’t last +through to-morrow. But, anyway, you want to +have an eye out for the Colleen to-morrow, for I’m +telling you I never see her sail like she did yesterday +coming across the Bay. Ask Tom Lowrie +next time you see him. Well, to-night I had to +beat down here to be sure and be here in time, and +so out we put––and here I am. Blowing? Indeed +and it is. And thick, is it? Standing on her +knight-heads and looking aft you c’d no more +than make out her side-lights. We came along, +and Boston inner and outer harbor crowded with +vessels, steamers and sail, waiting for it to moderate +so they c’d put out. A blessed wonder it was +we didn’t sink somebody––or ourselves. Outside +we went along by smell, I think, for only every +once in awhile could we see a light. One time we +almost ran into something––a fisherman it must +have been, for I s’pose only a fisherman would be +going in on a night like this––out of a squall of +snow and blackness she came––man alive! but, +whoever she was, she was coming a great clip. +Winged out and we didn’t see her till the end of +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_223' name='page_223'></a>223</span> +her bowsprit caught the end of our main-boom––hauled +in we were to two blocks––and over we +went on the other tack––yes, sir, over on the other +tack. Thinks I, ‘’Tis a new way to jibe a vessel +over.’ And the end of her fore-boom all but swept +me from beside the wheel and over the rail as she +went by––she was that close. And I sings out to +her, ‘Won’t you leave us your name so I can thank +you next time we meet?’ but Lord, not a word out +of him. He kept on to Boston, I suppose, and we +kept on to Gloucester, and here I am.”</p> +<p>“And the Colleen, Tom––she’s all right?”</p> +<p>“Right, man? Watch her to-morrow. Barring +that forem’st being too light––but whoever looked +for a breeze like this?––two days and three nights +now and blowing harder all the time. But never +mind, she’ll make great going of it to-morrow. +Divil take it, but we’ll all make great going of it. +Tommie, dear, what’s in the bowl? Milk? Man, +but don’t be telling me things like that––and the +one thing the doctors warn me against is heart-trouble. +Ah, milk-punch––that’s better, man. A +wee droppeen. Look at it––the color of the tip of +a comber in twelve fathom of water and a cross-tide. +Well, here’s to every mother’s son of us +that’s going to race to-morrow. May ye all win +if the Colleen don’t––all but you, Sam Hollis. But +where’s he gone––into the other room? Well, if +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_224' name='page_224'></a>224</span> +he was here ’twould be the same. He’s got a vessel +that can sail. Let him sail her to-morrow and win, +if it’s in her––or in him. But a thousand dollars––and +outside my house and vessel, Lord knows, it’s +all the money I’ve got in the world––beyond my +house and vessel––a thousand dollars the Colleen +beats the Withrow. Hello, there––what d’y’say, +Sam Hollis––the Colleen and the Withrow––a +thousand dollars, boat for boat. But where the +divil is he? Gone? Are you sure? Gone! But +a queer time to leave a party––just when it’s getting +to be real sociable.”</p> +<p>“Never mind the betting now, Tom,” spoke up +Wesley Marrs. “Let the owners have that to +themselves. And according to accounts some of +them are having it. Fred Withrow and old Duncan +are ready to go broke over the race to-morrow. +Whichever loses, he’ll remember this race, I’m +thinking. Here’s hoping it won’t be Duncan. So +to the devil with the betting, Tom. Some of us +have bet all we could afford––some of us more +than we could afford, I callate. Let’s have a song +instead, Tom.”</p> +<p>“Anything to please you, Wesley,” and O’Donnell +began to sing. He started off first with his</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, seiners all and trawlers all,”</p> +</div></div> +<p>but Alec McNeill and Patsie Oddie interrupted. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_225' name='page_225'></a>225</span> +“Oh, give us the other one, Tom––the Newf’undland +and Cape Shore Men.”</p> +<p>“Ha!” laughed O’Donnell, “it’s the mention of +your own you want––you and Patsie there. Well, +it’s all one to me. Any man from any place, so +long as he’s a fair man and a brave man, and Lord +knows ye’re both that. Well, here’s to you both––a +wee drop just, Tommie––easy––easy,” and he +began:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, Newf’undland and Cape Shore men, and men of Gloucester town,</p> +<p>With ye I’ve trawled o’er many banks and sailed the compass roun’;</p> +<p>I’ve ate with ye, and bunked with ye, and watched with ye all three,</p> +<p>And better shipmates than ye were I never hope to see.</p> +<p>I’ve seen ye in the wild typhoon beneath a Southern sky,</p> +<p>I’ve seen ye when the Northern gales drove seas to mast-head high,</p> +<p>But summer breeze or winter blow, from Hatt’ras to Cape Race,</p> +<p>I’ve yet to see ye with the sign of fear upon your face.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, swingin’ cross the Bay</p> +<p>Go eighty sail of seiners,</p> +<p>And every blessed one of them a-driving to her rail!</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>There’s a gale upon the waters and there’s foam upon the sea,</p> +<p>And looking out the window is a dark-eyed girl for me,</p> +<p>And driving her for Gloucester, maybe we don’t know</p> +<p>What the little ones are thinking when the mother looks out so.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_226' name='page_226'></a>226</span></p> +<p>Oh, the children in the cradle and the wife’s eyes out to sea,</p> +<p>The husband at the helm and looking westerly––</p> +<p>When you get to thinking that way, don’t it make your heart’s blood foam?</p> +<p>Be sure it does––so here’s a health to those we love at home.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>West half no’the and drive her, we’re abreast now of Cape Sable,</p> +<p>It’s an everlasting hurricane, but here’s the craft that’s able––</p> +<p>When you get to thinking that way, don’t it make your heart’s blood foam?</p> +<p>Be sure it does––so here’s a health to those we love at home.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the roar of shoaling waters and the awful, awful sea,</p> +<p>Busted shrouds and parting cables, and the white death on our lee;</p> +<p>Oh, the black, black night on Georges when eight score men were lost––</p> +<p>Were ye there, ye men of Gloucester? Aye, ye were––and tossed</p> +<p>Like chips upon the water were your little craft that night,</p> +<p>Driving, swearing, calling out, but ne’er a call of fright.</p> +<p>So knowing ye for what ye are, ye masters of the sea,</p> +<p>Here’s to ye, Gloucester fishermen, a health to ye from me.</p> +</div><div class='stanza'> +<p>And here’s to it that once again</p> +<p>We’ll trawl and seine and race again;</p> +<p>Here’s to us that’s living and to them that’s gone before;</p> +<p>And when to us the Lord says, ‘Come!’</p> +<p>We’ll bow our heads, ‘His will be done,’</p> +<p>And all together let us go beneath the ocean’s roar.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>I never again expect to hear a sea song sung as +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_227' name='page_227'></a>227</span> +Tom O’Donnell sang it then, his beard still wet +with the spray and his eyes glowing like coal-fire. +And the voice of him! He must have been heard +in half of Gloucester that night. He made the +table quiver. And when they all rose with glasses +raised and sang the last lines again:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And here’s to it that once again</p> +<p>We’ll trawl and seine and race again;</p> +<p>Here’s to us that’s living and to them that’s gone before;</p> +<p>And when to us the Lord says, ‘Come!’</p> +<p>We’ll bow our heads, ‘His will be done,’</p> +<p>And all together we shall go beneath the ocean’s roar–––”</p> +</div></div> +<p>any stranger hearing and seeing might have understood +why it was that their crews were ready +to follow these men to death.</p> +<p>“The like of you, Tom O’Donnell, never sailed +the sea,” said Patsie Oddie when they had got the +last ro-o-ar––“even the young ladies come in off +the street to hear you better.”</p> +<p>He meant Minnie Arkell, who was standing in +the doorway with her eyes fixed on O’Donnell, +who had got up to go home, but with Wesley trying +to hold him back. He was to the door when +Minnie Arkell stopped him. She said she had +heard him singing over to her house and couldn’t +keep away, and then, with a smile and a look into +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_228' name='page_228'></a>228</span> +his eyes, she asked O’Donnell what was his hurry––and +didn’t he remember her?</p> +<p>In her suit of yachting blue, with glowing face +and tumbled hair, she was a picture. “Look at +her,” nudged Clancy––“isn’t she a corker? But +she’s wasting time on Tom O’Donnell.”</p> +<p>“What’s your hurry, Tom?” called Wesley. +“Another song.”</p> +<p>“No, no, it’s the little woman on the hill. She +knew I was to come down to-night and not a wink +of sleep will she get till I’m home. And she knows +there’ll be bad work to-morrow maybe and she’d +like to see me a little before I go, and I’d like to +see her, too.”</p> +<p>“She’s a lucky woman, Captain O’Donnell, and +you must think a lot of her?” Minnie Arkell had +caught his eye once more.</p> +<p>“I don’t know that she’s so awfully lucky with +me on her hands,” laughed O’Donnell, “but I do +think a lot of her, child.”</p> +<p>“Child? to me? But you don’t remember me, +Captain?”</p> +<p>“Indeed, and I do, and well remember you. +And it’s the beautiful woman you’ve grown to be. +But you always were a lovely child. It’s often my +wife spoke of you and wondered how you were. +She’s heard me speak of your father a hundred +times, I know. A brave man your father, girl. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_229' name='page_229'></a>229</span> +And she’ll be glad to see you any time, little girl––or +the daughter of any fisherman lost at sea. If +ever you have a blue day, go to her, for ’tis she has +the heart––and, God bless her, an extra weakness +for orphans. Her own children some day––there’s +no telling. But good-night to you, dear”––he +patted her head––“good-night all. Wesley, Tommie, +Patsie––all of ye, good-night. In the morning +we’ll have it out.” Out the door he went, and +I fancied there was almost a blush on Minnie +Arkell’s face.</p> +<p>Tom O’Donnell was the kind of a man a fellow +would like to have for a father.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_230' name='page_230'></a>230</span> +<a name='XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME' id='XXIX_MAURICE_BLAKE_COMES_HOME'></a> +<h2>XXIX</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME</h3> +</div> +<p>From Mrs. Arkell’s we walked back to +Clancy’s boarding house. Clancy wanted to +see how they made out with the punch. We found +several of them up in the wind, and so no great +danger of them. But two or three of them, +Dave Campbell particularly, were running wild. +“Boomed out and driving,” said Clancy, and began +to remonstrate with Dave on the evils of intemperance. +He went on quite awhile, but Dave +showed no signs of remorse. “Wait and I’ll fix +him,” said Clancy, and obeying a motioning with +his head two or three of the sober ones followed +him out.</p> +<p>He led the way to the wood-shed next door +where there was a goat, and the goat we carried +up three flights of stairs to Campbell’s room. He +was a big, able goat, and we had quite a time to get +him up stairs. At last we got him tied to the post +of Campbell’s bed. Then we went down stairs to +the kitchen and Clancy persuaded Campbell to go +up stairs to bed, which after awhile he did. It was +not yet morning and there was no light in the bedroom. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_231' name='page_231'></a>231</span> +We took our position on the landing outside +where we could hear everything that went on +in Campbell’s room, which was just at the head of +the stairs.</p> +<p>Dave went in and we could hear him falling over +something in the dark. “What’s it?” we could +hear him, and acting as if he was feeling around. +Taking off our shoes we crawled nearer. We could +barely make out his shadow in the dark, but we +could easily hear him talking to himself. “What’s +it? Eh, what?” He must have been feeling the +horns then, and the goat must have butted him. +Again, and once more, for out the door and down +the stairs went Dave. We ran in and cut the goat +loose and down he went after Dave. The whole +three flights they raced.</p> +<p>“He’s got me at last,” hollered Dave, bolting +into the kitchen, slamming the door behind him and +bracing himself against it.</p> +<p>We took the goat and put him back in the wood-shed +and came back to the kitchen by way of the +window. Dave, who was still braced against the +door, did not know but what we had been in the +kitchen all the time, and that gave Clancy a fine +chance to take up his lecture on intemperance just +where he had left it off,––at the very beginning. +“Intemperance, Dave, is an awful thing. You’ll +have to be doing something for it soon, I think. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_232' name='page_232'></a>232</span> +Yes, when the devil himself gives you a call it’s +time to do something. You’d better come with me +and take the pledge. Come up now to Father +Haley.”</p> +<p>“I’m a Pres––a Pres––a Pres––by––ter––ian, +Tommie.”</p> +<p>“Well, come with me to your church then––any +church at all. What’s the odds, so long’s you reform. +Here, we’ll do it right here now. Come, +hold up your hand,” and then and there Clancy was +about to get Dave to promise not to look a glass +of liquor or punch in the face for a year again, +when who comes bouncing in but Eddie Parsons.</p> +<p>“Hurroo!” said Clancy, forgetting Dave and +grabbing Eddie by the shoulder, “and the Duncan’s +home?”</p> +<p>“She is,” said Eddie, “and four hundred and +fifty barrels of mackerel coming out of her hold. +A dozen lumpers getting ’em out from both holds +and two at a lick they’re coming onto Duncan’s +Dock. And what d’y’think, Tommie–––”</p> +<p>“But what kept you so long, man? We’ve all +been getting heart disease waiting for you.”</p> +<p>“I know. We ought to’ve been in yesterday +mornin’, or in the afternoon at the latest, for we +swung her off Tuesday night midnight––plenty of +time with a fair wind. But on Wednesday afternoon, +coming like a race-horse––wung out––we +sighted a dory and two men in it signalizing. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_233' name='page_233'></a>233</span> +Astray they were, and we took ’em aboard, and all +that night we stood by. And warn’t it chafing? +Oh, no! Daylight came thick and we waited for +it to clear, keeping the horn goin’. It lifted and we +got another dory, but it was late afternoon then. +Then their vessel came along with all the others +accounted for, and we turned over our two and +went on our way. And maybe she didn’t come! +Oh, no! Blowing? A living gale all the time, but +the skipper kept her going. You’d hardly b’lieve +if I told you where we was yesterday afternoon and +we here now. A no’the-easter and a howler all the +way. At four o’clock we passed in by the bell-buoy. +Man, such a blow! Are we in the race, you +say? Are we! And oh, the skipper says for you +and Joe to be down after breakfast. We all knew +you’d get home and be all right with Tom O’Donnell. +So be down after breakfast––the skipper will +be looking for you both. But say, let me tell you. +What d’y’think? Coming into the harbor a while +ago who d’y’ s’pose was out in the stream with a +lighter alongside his vessel? Who but Sam Hollis +and the Withrow. Yes, and the gang putting +ballast back in her.”</p> +<p>“No?”</p> +<p>“Yes. And some one of them sees us going by +in the dark. And we did go by, too! ‘Lord!’ says +somebody––’twas Withrow himself––‘but if that +don’t look like the ghost of Maurice Blake’s vessel!’ +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_234' name='page_234'></a>234</span> +‘Yes,’ hollers back the skipper––and they +must’ve been some surprised to hear him––‘and +the ghost’ll be with you to-morrow in the race. +Yes,’ the skipper says, ‘and we’re all ready for it. +Four weeks since we’ve been on the ways and maybe +a scrubbing wouldn’t hurt her, but if it keeps +a-blowin’ who’ll mind that? Not the Johnnie.’ +Oh, Tommie, if you’d seen her comin’ across the +Bay of Fundy yesterday afternoon and last night. +Did she come?––did she come? Lord––O +Lord–––”</p> +<p>“And so that’s Withrow––got his vessel tuned +up like a fiddle and now he’s putting extra ballast +in her. Blast him and Hollis for schemers!” said +Clancy. “And that’s how it comes they’re so ready +to bet––stiffenin’ her so stiff for to-morrow that +they know something’ll happen to the others first. +But the Johnnie’s a bit stiff, too––and there’s no +ballast out of her. And, as the skipper says, +maybe we ain’t been on the ways for a few weeks +now, but Lord, the Johnnie ought to be able to +drag a few little blades of sea-grass on her hull in +this breeze. And so we’re in the race, heh? Dave, +I can’t stop to give you the pledge now––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, the Johnnie Duncan fast and able,</p> +<p>Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel.“</p> +</div></div> +<p>And Clancy was the joyful man as he awoke the +echoes in the gray of that stormy morning.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_235' name='page_235'></a>235</span> +<a name='XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE' id='XXX_THE_MORNING_OF_THE_RACE'></a> +<h2>XXX</h2> +<h3>THE MORNING OF THE RACE</h3> +</div> +<p>I don’t think that the people of Gloucester +will ever forget the morning of that race, +which, they will still tell you, was the only race +ever sailed. Wind was what the fishermen wanted, +and they got it––wind, and sea with it. The admiral +of the White Squadron, then at anchor at +Rockport Harbor, just around the Cape, stood on +the bridge of his flagship that morning and looked +out to sea. Somebody told him that the fishermen +were going to race that day. He took another +look. “Race to-day? Pooh! they’ll do well to +stay hove-to to-day.” Of course, that ought to +have settled it, the admiral having said it.</p> +<p>It blew that day. Leaving home I had time for +a bite to eat and a wash-up. I turned the corner +and picked up Clancy, with Maurice Blake, Tom +O’Donnell and Wesley Marrs just ahead. We ran +into Mr. Edkins, a nice old gentleman, who had +been made secretary of the race committee. What +he didn’t know about fishing would be the making +of a “killer,” but, of course, he wasn’t picked out +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_236' name='page_236'></a>236</span> +for that––he’d never fished a day in his life––but +because of his knowledge of the rules of yacht +racing. Having had long experience in managing +yachting regattas, he knew all about time allowances +and sail measurements––though there were +to be no allowances of any kind here. It was to be +boat for boat in this race; every vessel for herself. +So he was thought to be a good man to have to +look after the stake and judges’ boats. It was +Gloucester’s Anniversary celebration, with a lot of +strangers in town––the Governor and a whole +holdful of national characters––and in deference +to them the race was to be managed so that spectators +might have a chance to see it.</p> +<p>Mr. Edkins came along in his official regalia––tall +hat, frock coat, umbrella, gloves, and a pink +in his button-hole.</p> +<p>“Is it true, Captain O’Donnell, that the race is +going to be held to-day?”</p> +<p>O’Donnell looked at him as though he didn’t +understand. “To-day? to-day?––Good Lord, are +we all on the wrong tack? And sure isn’t this the +day?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes––oh, yes, Captain O’Donnell, this is +the day appointed. And that is the trouble. +Surely you are not going to race to-day?”</p> +<p>“We’re not going to––” broke in Wesley Marrs, +“and why aren’t we going to race to-day? What +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_237' name='page_237'></a>237</span> +in the name of all that’s good have we been doing +with our vessels up on the railway the last week or +two? What d’y’think we took the ballast out of +our vessels for? What d’y’think I had that everlasting +new balloon made for last trip in, what for +that big mains’l that Tom here had bent on the +Colleen yesterday, and for what did Maurice drive +the Johnnie Duncan home only last night? What +in–––”</p> +<p>“Wait, Captain, wait. What I mean is, do you +know how it is outside? They’ve telegraphed me +that up in Boston Harbor there won’t be a steamer +leave the harbor to-day––it’s as stormy as that. +There are two big ocean liners––and we’ve got +word that they won’t leave––won’t dare to leave––not +a steamer of any kind will leave Boston Harbor +to-day. And outside a heavy sea running––with +the wind fifty-four miles an hour, the weather +bureau says. Fifty-four miles an hour. That’s not +street corner talk––it’s official. And–––”</p> +<p>“Divil take it, does being official make it blow +any harder?” asked O’Donnell.</p> +<p>“And I know the way you fishermen will try +to carry on. I know, I know––don’t tell me you’re +careful. I tell you, Captain O’Donnell, and you, +Captain Marrs, I tell you all––that if you persist +in racing to-day I wash my hands of the whole +affair––completely wash my–––”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_238' name='page_238'></a>238</span></div> +<p>“Well, ’tis a fine wash day, too. Come, Wesley––come, +Maurice, we’ll have to be getting on.”</p> +<p>They left Mr. Edkins standing there. A little +farther on they overtook the manager of the insurance +company, which had policies on most of +the fishing vessels. He was just about to enter his +office when O’Donnell spied him. “Hullo, there’s +the man I want to see––” and hailed, “Just heave +to a minute, Mr. Brooks, if you please. Now look +here, you know we’ve took a few pigs of iron out +our vessels, and you know it looks like a bit of +weather outside. Now, what I want to know is +if I capsize the Colleen Bawn to-day––if I don’t +come home with her––does my wife get the insurance? +That’s what I want to know––does my +wife get the insurance?”</p> +<p>Mr. Brooks looked at O’Donnell, rubbed his +chin and scratched his head, then looked at O’Donnell +again. “Why, I suppose it all comes under the +usual risk of fishing vessels. I suppose so––but––h-m––it +will be pretty risky, won’t it? But let me +see––wait a moment now––there’s the President inside, +and Mr. Emerson, too––he’s a director.”</p> +<p>He went inside, and we could see that they were +talking it over. Pretty soon they all came out +with the President of the company in front. +“Good-morning, Captain O’Donnell––Captain +Marrs, good-morning. How do you do, Maurice? +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_239' name='page_239'></a>239</span> +Captain O’Donnell, take it from me as +official, your insurance on the Colleen Bawn is +safe. For the honor and glory of old Gloucester +go ahead and sink her.”</p> +<p>“And the Lucy Foster?” asked Wesley.</p> +<p>“And the Lucy Foster, Captain Marrs.”</p> +<p>“Of course the Johnnie Duncan, speaking for +the owners?” asked Maurice.</p> +<p>“For every vessel that we insure that leaves the +harbor to race to-day.”</p> +<p>“Hurroo!” said O’Donnell. “Don’t tell me, +Wesley, I’m no––what’s it?––dip-lo-mat. Yes, +dip-lo-mat, by the Lord!”</p> +<p>But it certainly was a desperate morning for a +race. The streets seemed to be full of men ready +to go out. There were to be only nine vessels +in the race, but another half dozen vessels were +going over to see it, and that meant more than +three or four hundred able fishermen going out. +The men that were going to stay ashore would +go up to those that were going out and say, +“Well, good-by, old man. If you don’t come +back, why, you know your grave’ll be kept green.” +And the men going out would grin and say, +“That’s all right, boy, but if she goes, she’ll go +with every rag on her,” in a half-joking way, too, +but it was the belief that morning that there might +be a whole lot of truth in that kind of joking.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_240' name='page_240'></a>240</span></div> +<p>Before we reached the dock we knew that the +whole town had learned pretty much that half a +dozen of the skippers had promised each other in +Mrs. Arkell’s kitchen the night before, “No sail +comes off except what’s blown off,” and there +promised to be some blown off. Men who had +only just heard their skippers speak of that were +bragging of it in the streets. “Why,” said one of +O’Donnell’s crew as we were coming down the +dock, “if any crawly-spined crawfish loses his nerve +and jumps to our halyards, thinkin’ the Colleen’s +going to capsize––why, he’ll get fooled––and +why? Because our halyards are all housed aloft––by +the skipper’s orders.”</p> +<p>That sounded strong, but it was true. When +we reached the end of our dock we looked for +ourselves, and there it was. The Colleen’s crew +had hoisted their mains’l already and there she lay +swayed up and all ready, and men aloft were even +then putting the seizing on. Tom O’Donnell himself +was pointing it out to Sam Hollis with a good +deal of glee, thinking, I suppose, to worry Hollis, +who, to uphold his reputation, would have to do +the same and take the chances that went with it. +By this time everybody knew that Hollis had put +his ballast back during the night. One of Wesley +Marrs’s men jumped onto the Withrow and below +and had a look for himself. He couldn’t get down +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_241' name='page_241'></a>241</span> +by way of the hatches––they were battened down––but +he dropped into the forec’s’le and, before +anybody knew what he was up to, he had slipped +through the forehold and into the mainhold and +there he saw where they had hurriedly put back +the flooring, and he also saw extra barrels of sand +tiered low for further stiffening of the Withrow. +He was discovered before he got on deck and +nearly beaten to a jelly before he got up on the +wharf again. It ended in a fine little riot with +some of our gang and O’Donnell’s mixing in. +Clancy came down the back-stay like a man falling +from the mast-head, so as to be into it before it was +over. He was almost too late––but not quite. +Only old Mr. Duncan coming along with half a +dozen other dignified owners stopped it. But there +was time for Clancy to speak his mind out to Sam +Hollis. And that gave Hollis a chance to say, +“Well, talk away, Tommie Clancy, but this is the +day I make the Johnnie Duncan take in sail.” And +Clancy answered him, “That so! Well, no matter +what happens, put this down, Maurice Blake hangs +to his canvas longer than Sam Hollis to-day––hangs +to it or goes over with it or the spars come +out of the Johnnie Duncan.”</p> +<p>After the talking was over we thought Hollis +would be shamed into sending a man aloft to mouse +his halyards too. But not for Hollis. That was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_242' name='page_242'></a>242</span> +a little too much for him. Clancy and three or +four others finished attending to our own halyards +and overhauling the gear aloft. Our mains’l was +already hoisted and the other three lowers with +stops loosed were all ready to hoist too. The +mains’l had been left standing just as it was when +the Johnnie Duncan came in that morning. It was +flat as a board, and I remember how grieved we +were when we had to lower it again because the tug +that came to give us a kick out from the dock could +not turn us around with it up––it was blowing so. +The tug captain said he might manage to turn it +against the sun, but that would be bad luck of +course, and he knew the crew wouldn’t stand for it, +especially with a race like this on hand. It had to +be with the sun; and so we had to lower it again, +and when the vessel was turned around, hoist it +again, not forgetting to lash the halyards aloft +again too. But after we’d got it swayed up it +didn’t set near so well as before––too baggy to our +way of thinking.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_243' name='page_243'></a>243</span> +<a name='XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE' id='XXXI_THE_START_OF_THE_RACE'></a> +<h2>XXXI</h2> +<h3>THE START OF THE RACE</h3> +</div> +<p>We got away at last and beat out the harbor +with the Lucy Foster, the Colleen Bawn, +the Withrow, the Nannie O, and four others. For +other company going out there was a big steam-yacht +with Minnie Arkell and her friends aboard, +which did not get out of the harbor. Out by the +Point they shipped a sea and put back, with Minnie +Arkell waving her handkerchief and singing out––“Don’t +take in any sail, Maurice,” as they turned +back. There was also the Eastern Point, a high-sided +stubby steamer, at that time running regularly +to Boston; and there was the New Rochelle, a +weak-looking excursioner that might have done for +Long Island Sound, where somebody said she’d +just come from, but which didn’t seem to fit in +here. Her passengers were mostly fishermen––crews +of vessels not in the race. There was also a +big powerful iron sea-tug, the Tocsin, that promised +to make better weather of it than any of the +others.</p> +<p>Billie Simms was one of the men who were not +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_244' name='page_244'></a>244</span> +going in the race but intended to see some of it. +He was in the Henry Clay Parker, a fine-looking +vessel that was not so very fast, but had the reputation +of being wonderfully stiff. Coming out past +Eastern Point lighthouse, where he could begin +to get a look at things, Billie hollered out that he +was sorry he hadn’t entered. “Looks to me like the +vessel that’ll stay right side up the longest ought +to win this race, and that’s the Henry C.” He +hauled her across our stern while he was yelling and +I remember she took one roll down to her sheer +poles when passing on, and Maurice sang out, +“Look out, Billie, or you’ll capsize her.”</p> +<p>“Capsize this one? Lord, Maurice, I’ve tried +it a dozen times and I’m damned if I could,” and +he went rolling on like nothing I ever saw, unless +it was the rest of us who were then manœuvring for +the start. We passed the Parker again before we +got to the line, and old Peter Hines, who was +hanging to her main-rigging, had to yell us his +good wishes. “Drive her, Maurice-boy, and whatever +you do don’t let the man that took your +vessel from you beat you home,” meaning Sam +Hollis of course. Maurice waved his hand, but +said nothing. He was looking serious enough, +however.</p> +<p>Tommie Clancy was the boy who wasn’t worrying +particularly. He saluted Peter as if he were +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_245' name='page_245'></a>245</span> +going out on a holiday excursion. “Ain’t she a +dog, Peter? Watch her.”</p> +<p>“That’s what she is––and drive her, Tommie––drive +her.”</p> +<p>“Oh, we’ll drive her, Peter,” called back Tommie, +and began:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p>I love old Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>“Let you alone, Tommie, and you’ll get your +prayer some day,” was Peter’s last hail as we +straightened out for the swoop across the line.</p> +<p>Clancy was to the wheel then with the skipper. +Both were lashed and we had life-lines around +deck. To the wheel of every vessel in the fleet +were two men lashed, and they all had life-lines +around deck.</p> +<p>In crossing the line there was no attempt at jockeying +such as one often sees in yacht racing. There +was no disposition on the part of any skipper to do +anything that would set anybody else back. Of +course, everybody wanted to be in a good berth and +to cross between the guns; but the idea was to give +the vessels such a try out as they would get out to +sea––as if they were making a passage in a breeze. +The course––forty-two miles or so––was very short +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_246' name='page_246'></a>246</span> +for a fisherman, for one great thing in a fisherman +is her power to stand a long drag. Day and night +in and day and night out and driving all the time +is the way a fisherman wants it. Any sort of racing +machine could be built to stand a little hard +going for a while. But that wouldn’t be living +through a long hard winter’s gale on the Banks––one +of those blows where wind and sea––and in +shoal water at that––have a chance to do their +worst. Fishermen are built for that sort of work +and on their sea-worthiness depends not only the +fortunes of owners but the lives of men––of real +men––and the happiness and comfort of wives and +children ashore. And so the idea in everybody’s +mind that day was to make this test as nearly fair +as could be and see who had the fastest and most +weatherly boat in the fleet. There were men to +the wheel that day who could handle big fishermen +as if they were cat-boats, who would have +dared and did, later, dare to sail their vessels as +close to a mark in this sea as men sail a twenty-foot +knockabout in the smoothest of waters inshore––only +with the fishermen a slip-up meant the loss of +a vessel, maybe other vessels too, and twenty-five +or fifty lives perhaps.</p> +<p>And so the skill of these men was not used to +give anybody the worst of it. A fair start and +give everybody his chance was the idea. Thus +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_247' name='page_247'></a>247</span> +Tommie Ohlsen could have forced the Withrow +outside the starting boat and compelled her to come +about and maybe lose a few minutes, but he did +not. He held up and let her squeeze through. +O’Donnell in his turn could have crowded Ohlsen +when he let up on the Withrow, but he did not. +He, too, held up in turn and let Ohlsen have his +swing going across.</p> +<p>Across we went, one after the other. West-sou’west +was the course to a stake-boat, which we +were told would be found off Egg Rock, fourteen +miles away. We had only the compass to go by, +for at the start it was rain and drizzle, as well as +wind and a big sea, and you couldn’t see a mile +ahead. On the way we shot by the New Rochelle, +which had started ahead with the intention of waiting +for the fleet at the first stake-boat. Now she +was headed back, wabbing awfully. From Billie +Simms, who went over part of the course in the +Henry Clay Parker ahead of the fleet, we got +word of the trouble as we went by. The New +Rochelle was beginning to leak. “You c’n spit +between her deck-planks and into her hold––she’s +that loose,” hollered Billie. I don’t think the fishermen +aboard of her minded much so long as she +stayed afloat, but her captain, a properly licensed +man, did, I expect, and so she put back with some +of them growling, I heard afterward, “and after +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_248' name='page_248'></a>248</span> +paying their little old three dollars to see only the +start of the race.” Her captain reported, when he +got in, that he didn’t see anything outside but a +lot of foolish fishermen trying to drown themselves.</p> +<p>The first leg was before the wind and the Lucy +Foster and the Colleen Bawn went it like bullets. +I don’t expect ever again to see vessels run faster +than they did that morning. On some of those +tough passages from the Banks fishing vessels may +at times have gone faster than either of these did +that morning. It is likely, for where a lot of able +vessels are all the time trying to make fast passages––skippers +who are not afraid to carry sail +and vessels that can stand the dragging––and in +all kinds of chances––there must in the course of +years of trying be some hours when they do get +over an everlasting lot of water. But there are +no means of checking up. Half the time the men +do not haul the log for half a day or more. Some +of the reports of speed of fishermen at odd times +have been beyond all records, and so people who +do not know said they must be impossible. But +here was a measured course and properly anchored +stake-boats––and the Lucy and the Colleen did that +first leg of almost fourteen sea-miles in fifty minutes, +which is better than a 16-1/2 knot clip, and +that means over nineteen land miles an hour. I +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_249' name='page_249'></a>249</span> +think anybody would call that pretty fast going. +And, as some of them said afterward, “Lord in +Heaven! suppose we’d had smooth water!” But +I don’t think that the sea checked them so very +much––not as much as one might think, for they +were driving these vessels.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_250' name='page_250'></a>250</span> +<a name='XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS' id='XXXII_ODONNELL_CARRIES_AWAY_BOTH_MASTS'></a> +<h2>XXXII</h2> +<h3>O’DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS</h3> +</div> +<p>We were next to the last vessel across the +starting line. The Nannie O––we +couldn’t see them all––about held the Lucy Foster +and the Colleen Bawn level. The Withrow +showed herself to be a wonderful vessel off the +wind, too. Wesley Marrs was around the stake-boat +first. In the fog and drizzle the leaders +did not find the stake-boat at once. Wesley happening +to be nearest to it when they did see it, +got the benefit and was first around. We were +close up, almost near enough to board the Withrow’s +quarter rounding. I am not sure that the +skipper and Clancy, who were to the wheel, did +not try to give Hollis a poke with the end of our +long bowsprit; but if they did, the Johnnie was +not quite fast enough for that. The Withrow +beat us around. Looking back we could see the +others coming like wild horses. Every one of +them, except one that carried away something and +hauled up and out of it, was diving into it to the +foremast with every leap the same as we had been. +On that first leg nobody could stand anywhere +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_251' name='page_251'></a>251</span> +for’ard of the fore-hatch or he would have been +swept overboard.</p> +<p>Leaving Egg Rock and going for Minot’s +Ledge, the skipper left the wheel and George Nelson +took his place beside Clancy. It was drizzling +then, every now and then that settling down so +that we couldn’t see three lengths ahead. At such +times we simply hoped that nobody ahead would +carry away anything or in any way become disabled +in the road.</p> +<p>Well clear of the stake-boat, however, it lifted +and we could see what we were doing. The Lucy +Foster was still ahead with O’Donnell and Ohlsen +and Hollis almost abreast––no more than a few +lengths between. Practically they were all about +just as they started. We were next. It was a +broad reach to Minot’s Ledge and hard going for +all hands. It must be remembered that we all had +everything on, even to balloon and staysails, and +our halyards were lashed aloft. The men to the +mast-head, who were up there to shift tacks, were +having a sweet time of it hanging on, even lashed +though they were.</p> +<p>Everybody was pretty well strung up at this +time. The skipper, a line about his elbow, was +hooked up to the main-rigging––the weather side, +of course––and it was up to a man’s waist and +boiling white on the lee side. The crew were snug +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_252' name='page_252'></a>252</span> +up under the weather rail and hanging on––no +mistake either about the way they were hanging +on. Every once in awhile one of us would poke +his head up to see what they were doing to +windward of us. Mr. Duncan, who had come +aboard just before we left the dock, was trying to +sit on the weather bitt near the wheel-box. He +had a line around his waist, too. He had bet a +lot of money with Withrow on the race, but I don’t +think that his money was worrying him half so +much as some other things then.</p> +<p>So far as we could see at this time we were +making as good weather as any of them. And our +best chance––the beat home––was yet to come. +The Johnnie had the stiffness for that. Had the +Johnnie reached Gloucester from the Cape Shore +earlier she, too, would have been lightened up and +made less stiff. To be sure she would have had +her bottom scrubbed and we would have had her +up to racing pitch, with every bit of sail just so and +her trim gauged to a hair’s depth, but that did not +matter so very much now. The Johnnie was in +shape for a hard drag like this, and for that we +had to thank the tricky Sam Hollis. We began to +see that after all it was a bit of good luck our +vessel not being home in time to tune up the same +as the rest of the fleet.</p> +<p>It was along about here––half-way on the reach +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_253' name='page_253'></a>253</span> +to Minot’s––that Tommie Ohlsen broke his main-gaff. +It was the fault of the Eastern Point, the +Boston steamer. She had gone ahead of the fleet, +taking almost a straight course for Minot’s Ledge. +Reaching across from Half-Way Rock to Minot’s +the fleet began to overhaul her. She, making bad +weather of it along here, started to turn around. +But, rolling to her top-rail, it was too much for +them, and her captain kept her straight on for Boston. +That was all right, but her action threw Ohlsen +off. She was right in the Nannie O’s way, and +to save the steamer and themselves from a collision +and certain loss of life, Ohlsen had to jibe the +Nannie O, and so suddenly that the Nannie O’s +gaff broke under the strain. And that lost Ohlsen +his chance for the race. It was too bad, for with +Ohlsen, Marrs, and O’Donnell, each in his own +vessel in a breeze, you could put the names in a +hat and shake them up. When we went by the +Nannie O her crew were getting the trysail out +of the hold, and they finished the race with that, +and made good going of it, as we saw afterward. +Indeed, a trysail that day would have been sail +enough for almost any men but these.</p> +<p>Before we reached Minot’s there was some sail +went into the air. One after the other went the +balloons––on the Foster, the Colleen, the +Withrow and at last on us. I don’t know whether +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_254' name='page_254'></a>254</span> +they had any trouble on the others––being too busy +with our own to watch––but we came near to losing +men with ours. It got caught under our keel, +and we started to try to haul it in––the skipper +having an economical notion of saving the owner +the expense of a new sail, I suppose. But Mr. +Duncan, seeing what he was at, sang out: “Let the +sail go to the devil, Captain––I’ll pay for the new +one myself.” Even at that we had to crawl out on +the bowsprit––six or eight of us––with sharp +knives, and cut it away, and we were glad to get +back again. The Johnnie never slackened. It +was desperate work.</p> +<p>Rounding Minot’s, Tom O’Donnell gave an exhibition +of desperate seamanship. He had made +up his mind, it seems, that he was due to pass +Wesley Marrs along here. But first he had to get +by the Withrow. Off Minot’s was the turning +buoy, with just room, as it was considered, for one +vessel at a time to pass safely in that sea.</p> +<p>O’Donnell figured that the tide being high there +was easily room for two, and then breasted up to +the Withrow, outside of her and with the rocks +just under his quarter. Hollis, seeing him come, +made a motion as if to force him on the rocks, but +O’Donnell, standing to his own wheel, called out––“You +do, Sam Hollis, and we’ll both go.” There +certainly would have been a collision, with both +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_255' name='page_255'></a>255</span> +vessels and both crews––fifty men––very likely lost, +but Hollis weakened and kept off. That kind of +work was too strong for him. He had so little +room that his main-boom hit the can-buoy as he +swept by.</p> +<p>Once well around O’Donnell, in great humor, +and courting death, worked by Hollis and then, +making ready to tack and pass Wesley’s bow, let +the Colleen have her swing, but with all that sail on +and in that breeze, there could be only one outcome. +And yet he might have got away with it +but for his new foremast, which, as he had feared, +had not the strength it should have had. He let +her go, never stopped to haul in his sheets––he had +not time to if he was to cross Wesley’s bow. So he +swung her and the full force of the wind getting +her laid both spars over the side––first one and +then the other clean as could be.</p> +<p>Hollis never stopped or made a motion to help, +but kept on after the Lucy Foster. We almost ran +over O’Donnell, but luffed in time, and the skipper +called out to O’Donnell that we’d stand by and +take his men off.</p> +<p>O’Donnell was swearing everything blue. “Go +on––go on––don’t mind me. Go on, I tell you. +We’re all right. I’ll have her under jury rig and +be home for supper. Go on, Maurice––go on and +beat that divil Hollis!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_256' name='page_256'></a>256</span></div> +<p>Half way to Eastern Point on the way back +saw us in the wake of the Withrow, which was +then almost up with the Lucy Foster. It was the +beat home now, with all of us looking to see the +Withrow do great things, for just off the ways +and with all her ballast in she was in great trim +for it. Going to windward, too, was generally +held to be her best point of sailing. All that Hollis +had to do was to keep his nerve and drive her.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_257' name='page_257'></a>257</span> +<a name='XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN' id='XXXIII_THE_ABLE_JOHNNIE_DUNCAN'></a> +<h2>XXXIII</h2> +<h3>THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN</h3> +</div> +<p>Hollis was certainly driving her now. He +ought to have felt safe in doing so with +the Lucy Foster to go by, for the Lucy, by reason +of the ballast taken out of her, should, everything +else being equal, capsize before the Withrow.</p> +<p>Hollis must have had that in mind, for he followed +Wesley Marrs’s every move. Wesley was +sailing her wide. And our skipper approved of +that, too. To attempt a too close course in the +sea that was out in the Bay that day, with the +blasts of wind that were sweeping down, would +have deadened her way altogether too much––maybe +hung her up. And so it was “Keep her a +full whatever you do,” and that, with coming +about when the others did––we being afraid to +split tacks––made plenty of work for us.</p> +<p>“Hard-a-lee” it was one after the other, and for +every “Hard-a-lee” twenty of us went down into +the roaring sea fore and aft and hauled in and +slackened away sheets, while aloft, the fellows +lashed to the foremast head shifted top and staysail +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_258' name='page_258'></a>258</span> +tacks. They were wise to lash themselves +up aloft, for with every tack, she rolled down into +it as if she were never coming up, and when she +did come up shook herself as if she would snap +her topmasts off.</p> +<p>Half way to Eastern Point on the beat home it +seemed to occur to the skipper and to Clancy that +the Johnnie Duncan stood a chance to win the race. +It was Clancy, still lashed to the wheel, now with +Long Steve, turned his head for just a second to +Mr. Duncan and spoke the first word of it.</p> +<p>“Mr. Duncan, do you know, but the Johnnie’s +got a chance to win this race?”</p> +<p>“D’y’think so, Tommie––d’y’think so?”</p> +<p>Some of us in the crew had been thinking of +that same thing some time, and we watched Mr. +Duncan, who, with a life line about him, was +clinging to a bitt aft, and watching things with +tight lips, a drawn face and shiny eyes. We listened +to hear what else he might have to say. But +he didn’t realize at once what it meant. His eyes +and his mind were on the Lucy Foster.</p> +<p>“What d’y’think of the Lucy and the Withrow, +Tommie?” Mr. Duncan said next.</p> +<p>Tommie took a fresh look at the Lucy Foster, +which was certainly doing stunts. It was along +this time that big Jim Murch––a tall man, but +even so, he was no more than six feet four, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_259' name='page_259'></a>259</span> +the Lucy twenty-four feet beam––was swinging +from the ring-bolts under the windward rail and +throwing his feet out trying to touch with his heels +the sea that was swashing up on the Lucy’s deck. +And every once in a while he did touch, for the +Lucy, feeling the need of her ballast, was making +pretty heavy weather of it. Every time she rolled +and her sheer poles went under, Jim would holler +out that he’d touched again.</p> +<p>We could hear him over on the Johnnie at times. +Mr. Duncan, who believed that nothing ever built +could beat the Lucy Foster, began to worry at +that, and again he spoke to Clancy. He had to +holler to make himself heard.</p> +<p>“But what do you think of the Lucy’s chances, +Tommie?”</p> +<p>Clancy shook his head.</p> +<p>And getting nothing out of Clancy, Mr. Duncan +called out then: “What do you think of the Lucy, +you, Captain Blake?”</p> +<p>The skipper shook his head, too. “I’m afraid +it’s too much for her.”</p> +<p>And then––one elbow was hitched in the weather +rigging and a half hitch around his waist––the +skipper swung around, and looking over to the +Withrow, he went on:</p> +<p>“I don’t see, Mr. Duncan, why we don’t stand +a pretty good chance to win out on Hollis.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_260' name='page_260'></a>260</span></div> +<p>“Why not––why not––if anything happens to +the Lucy.”</p> +<p>It jarred us some to think that even there, in +spite of the great race the Johnnie was making of +it, she was still, in the old man’s eyes, only a second +string to the Lucy Foster.</p> +<p>About then the wind seemed to come harder +than ever, but Clancy at the wheel never let up +on the Johnnie. He socked it to her––wide and +free he sailed her. Kept her going––oh, but he +kept her going. “If this one only had a clean +bottom and a chance to tune her up before going +out,” said somebody, and we all said, “Oh, if she +only had––just half a day on the railway before +this race.”</p> +<p>We were fairly buried at times on the Johnnie––on +the Lucy Foster it must have been tough. +And along here the staysail came off the Withrow +and eased her a lot. We would all have been better +off with less sail along about that time. In +proof of that we could see back behind us where +the Nannie O, under her trysail, was almost holding +her own. But it wouldn’t do to take it off. +Had they not all said before putting off that morning +that what sail came off that day would be +blown off?––yes, sir––let it blow a hundred miles +an hour. And fishermen’s pride was keeping sail +on us and the Foster. Hollis tried to make it look +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_261' name='page_261'></a>261</span> +that his staysail blew off, but we knew better––a +knife to the halyards did the work.</p> +<p>It was after her big staysail was off and she making +easier weather of it that the Withrow crossed +the Lucy’s bow for the first time in the race and +took the lead.</p> +<p>We all felt for Mr. Duncan, who couldn’t seem +to believe his eyes. We all felt for Wesley, too, +who was desperately trying to hold the wind of the +Withrow––he had even rigged blocks to his jib +sheets and led them to cleats clear aft to flatten his +headsails yet more. And Wesley’s crew hauled +like demons on those jib sheets––hauled and hauled +with the vessel under way all the time––hauled so +hard, in fact, that with the extra purchase given +them by the blocks they pulled the cleats clean out, +and away went the Lucy’s jib and jumbo––and +there was Wesley hung up. And out of the race, +for we were all too near the finish for her to win +out then unless the Johnnie and the Withrow capsized +entirely.</p> +<p>Mr. Duncan, when he saw the Lucy’s crew +trying to save the headsails, couldn’t contain +himself.</p> +<p>“Cut ’em away––cut ’em to hell!” he sang out, +and we all had to smile, he spoke so excitedly. But +it was no use. The Lucy was out of the race, and +going by her, we didn’t look at Mr. Duncan nor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_262' name='page_262'></a>262</span> +Wesley Marrs––we knew they were both taking +it hard––but watched the Withrow.</p> +<p>Over on the other tack we went, first the +Withrow, then the Johnnie. We were nearing the +finish line, and we were pretty well worked up––the +awful squalls were swooping down and burying +us. We could hear Hollis’s voice and see his crew +go up when he warned his men at the wheel to +ease up on her when the squalls hit. On our vessel +the skipper never waved an arm nor opened his +mouth to Clancy at the wheel. And of his own +accord you may be sure that Clancy wasn’t easing +up. Not Tommie Clancy––no, sir––he just drove +her––let her have it full––lashed her like, with his +teeth and eyes flashing through the sea that was +swashing over him. And the Johnnie fairly +sizzled through the water.</p> +<p>There were several times in the race when we +thought the going was as bad as could be, but now +we were all sure that this was the worst of all. +There was some excuse for Mr. Duncan when he +called out:</p> +<p>“My God, Tommie, but if she makes one of +those low dives again, will she ever come up?”</p> +<p>“I dunno,” said Clancy to that. “But don’t you +worry, Mr. Duncan, if any vessel out of Gloucester’ll +come up, this one’ll come up.”</p> +<p>He was standing with the water, the clear water, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_263' name='page_263'></a>263</span> +not the swash, well up to his waist then, and we +could hear him:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>I love old Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>That was too much for Mr. Duncan, and, +watching his chance, he dove between the house +and rail, to the weather rigging, where the skipper +grabbed him and made him fast beside himself. +The old man took a look down the slant of the +deck and took a fresh hold of the rigging.</p> +<p>“Captain Blake, isn’t she down pretty low?”</p> +<p>“Maybe––maybe––Mr. Duncan, but she’ll go +lower yet before the sail comes off her. This is +the day Sam Hollis was going to make me take in +sail.”</p> +<p>Less than a minute after that we made our rush +for the line. Hollis tried to crowd us outside the +stake-boat, which was rolling head to wind and +sea, worse than a lightship in a surf gale––tried to +crowd us out just as an awful squall swooped down. +It was the Johnnie or the Withrow then. We took +it full and they didn’t, and there is all there was +to it. But for a minute it was either vessel’s race. +At the critical time Sam Hollis didn’t have the +nerve, and the skipper and Clancy did.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_264' name='page_264'></a>264</span></div> +<p>They looked at each other––the skipper and +Clancy––and Clancy soaked her. Held to it +cruelly––recklessly. It was too much to ask of a +vessel. Down she went––buried. It was heaven +or hell, as they say, for a while. I know I climbed +on to her weather run, and it was from there I +saw Withrow ducking her head to it––hove to, +in fact, for the blast to pass.</p> +<p>The Johnnie weathered it. Able––able. Up +she rose, a horse, and across the line we shot like +a bullet, and so close to the judge’s boat that we +could have jumped aboard.</p> +<p>We all but hit the Henry Clay Parker, Billie +Simms’s vessel, on the other side of the line, and +it was on her that old Peter of Crow’s Nest, leaping +into the air and cracking his heels together, +called out as we drove by:</p> +<p>“The Johnnie Duncan wins––the able Johnnie +Duncan––sailin’ across the line on her side and +her crew sittin’ out on the keel.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_265' name='page_265'></a>265</span> +<a name='XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE' id='XXXIV_MINNIE_ARKELL_ONCE_MORE'></a> +<h2>XXXIV</h2> +<h3>MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE</h3> +</div> +<p>We were hardly across the line when there +was a broom at our truck––a new broom +that I know I, for one, never saw before. And yet +I suppose every vessel that sailed in the race that +day had a new broom hid away somewhere below––to +be handy if needed.</p> +<p>But it was the Johnnie Duncan, sailing up the +harbor, that carried hers to the truck. And it was +Mr. Duncan who stood aft of her and took most +of the cheers, and it was Clancy and Long Steve +who waved their hands from the wheel-box, and +it was the skipper who leaned against the weather +rigging, and the rest of us who lined the weather +rail and answered the foolish questions of people +along the road.</p> +<p>Every vessel we met seemed to think we had +done something great; and I suppose we had in a +way––that is, skipper, crew and vessel. We had +out-carried and out-sailed the best out of Gloucester +in a breeze that was a breeze. We had taken +the chance of being capsized or hove-down and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_266' name='page_266'></a>266</span> +losing the vessel and ourselves. Mr. Duncan, I +think, realized more than anybody else at the time +what we had been through. “I didn’t know what +it really was to be,” he said, “before I started. If +I had, I doubt very much if I’d have started.” We +all said––“No, no, you’d have gone just the same, +Mr. Duncan;” and we believed he would, too.</p> +<p>Going up the harbor somebody hinted to Clancy +that he ought to go and have a mug-up for himself +after his hard work––and it had been hard work. +“And I’ll take your place at the wheel,” said that +somebody, “for you must be tired, Tommie.”</p> +<p>“And maybe I am tired, too,” answered Clancy, +“but if I am, I’m just thick enough not to know +it. But don’t fool yourself that if I stood lashed +to this wheel since she crossed the starting line this +morning I’m going to quit it now and let you take +her up the harbor and get all the bouquets. I’ll +have a mug-up by and by, and it’ll be a mug-up, +don’t you worry.”</p> +<p>And it was a mug-up. He took the gold and +silver cup given to Maurice as a skipper of the +winning vessel, and with the crew in his wake +headed a course for the Anchorage, where he filled +it till it flowed––and didn’t have to pay for filling +it, either.</p> +<p>“It’s the swellest growler that I ever expect to +empty. Gold and silver––and holds six quarts +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_267' name='page_267'></a>267</span> +level. Just a little touch all round, and we’ll fill +her up again. ‘Carte blanche, and charge it to +me,’ says Mr. Duncan.”</p> +<p>“What kind is carte blanche, Tommie?” asked +Andie Howe.</p> +<p>“They’ll tell you behind the bar,” said Clancy.</p> +<p>“Billie,” ordered Andie, “just a little touch of +carte blanche, will you, while Clancy’s talking. +He’s the slowest man to begin that ever I see. +Speeches––speeches––speeches, when your throat’s +full of gurry––dry, salty gurry. A little touch of +that carte blanche that Mr. Duncan ordered for +the crew of the Johnnie Duncan, Billie, will you?”</p> +<p>“Carte blanche––yes,” went on Clancy, “and I +callate the old fizzy stuff’s the thing to do justice +to this fe-lic-i-tous oc-ca-sion. Do I hear the voice +of my shipmates? Aye, aye, I hear them––and in +accents unmistakable. Well, here’s a shoot––six +quarts level––and a few pieces of ice floating +around on top. My soul, but don’t it look fine and +rich? Have a look, everybody.”</p> +<p>“Let’s have a drink instead,” hollered Parsons.</p> +<p>Clancy paid no attention to that. “Who was +the lad in that Greek bunch in the old days that +they sank up to his neck in the lake––cold sparkling +water––and peaches and oranges and grapes +floating on a little raft close by––but him fixed so +he couldn’t bend his head down to get a drink nor +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_268' name='page_268'></a>268</span> +lift his head to take a bite of fruit––and hot +weather all the time, mind you. Lord, the thirst +he raised after a while! What was his––oh, yes, +Tantalus––that’s the lad, Tantalus––the cold +sparkling water. Man, the thirst he–––”</p> +<p>“The thirst of Tantalus ain’t a patch on the +thirst I got. And this is something better than +cold sparkling water. That’s you all over, Tommie––joking +at serious times,” wailed Parsons.</p> +<p>“Is it as bad as that with you, Eddie? Well, +let’s forget Tantalus and drink instead to the +able-est, handsom-est, fast-est vessel that ever +weathered Eastern Point––to the Johnnie Duncan––and +her skipper.”</p> +<p>“And Mr. Duncan, Tommie––he’s all right, +too.”</p> +<p>“Yes, of course, Mr. Duncan. And while we’re +at it, here’s to the whole blessed gang of us––skipper, +owner and crew––we’re all corkers.”</p> +<p>“Drive her, Tommie!” roared a dozen voices, +and Tommie drove her for a good pint before he +set the cup down again.</p> +<p>It was a great celebration altogether. Wherever +one of our gang was there was an admiring +crowd. Nobody but us was listened to. And the +questions we had to answer! And of course we +were all willing enough to talk. We must have +told the story of the race over about twenty times +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_269' name='page_269'></a>269</span> +each. After a while, of course, some of our fellows, +with all the entertaining and admiration that +was handed out to them, had to put a touch or two +to it. It was strong enough to tell the bare facts +of that race, I thought, but one or two had to give +their imaginations a chance. One man, a fisherman, +one of those who had been on one of the excursion +boats, and so didn’t see the race at all, +came along about two hours after the Duncan +crew struck the Anchorage and listened to Andie +Howe for a while. And going away it was he who +said, “It must have been a race that. As near as +I c’n make it out the Johnnie sailed most of that +race keel up.”</p> +<p>“Oh, don’t go away mad,” Andie called after +him. “Come back and have a little touch of carte +blanche––it’s on the old man.”</p> +<p>“I’ll take it for him,” came a voice. It was old +Peter of Crow’s Nest, who took his drink and +asked for Clancy. Clancy was in the back part of +the room, and I ran and got him. Peter led the +way to the sidewalk.</p> +<p>“Tommie, go and get Maurice, if it ain’t too +late.”</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“It’s Minnie Arkell. Coming up the dock after +the race she ran up and grabbed him and threw her +arms about his neck. ‘You’re the man to sail a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_270' name='page_270'></a>270</span> +race in heavy weather,’ she hollers, and a hundred +people looking on. And there’s half a dozen of +those friends of hers and they’re up to her house +and now making ready for a wine celebration. Go +and get him before it is too late.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_271' name='page_271'></a>271</span> +<a name='XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW' id='XXXV_CLANCY_LAYS_DOWN_THE_LAW'></a> +<h2>XXXV</h2> +<h3>CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW</h3> +</div> +<p>Clancy started on the run and I after him. +“We’ll go to his boarding-house first, Joe, +and if he’s not there, to Minnie Arkell’s.”</p> +<p>He wasn’t in his boarding-house, and we hurried +out. On the sidewalk we almost ran into +little Johnnie Duncan.</p> +<p>“Oh, Captain Clancy––or you, Joe Buckley––won’t +you tell me about the race? Grandpa was +too busy to tell me, but went down the wharf with +a lot of people to show them the Johnnie Duncan. +They all left the office and told me to mind it. +And my cousin Alice came in with Joe’s cousin +Nell. And I saw Captain Blake with some people +and ran after him and I just caught up with him +and they went off and left me. And then a little +while ago he came back by himself and ran toward +the dock and didn’t even see me. And Captain +Blake used to be so good to me!” Poor Johnnie +was all but crying.</p> +<p>“Toward the dock? That’s good,” breathed +Clancy. “Stay here, Johnnie, and we’ll tell you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_272' name='page_272'></a>272</span> +about the race when we get back,” and led the +way to Mr. Duncan’s office.</p> +<p>We found the skipper in the outer office, standing +beside the bookkeeper’s desk and looking out +of the window next the slip. Hearing us coming +he turned and then we saw that he held in his +hands an open box with a string of beautiful pearls. +Noticing us gaze at the pearls in surprise, he said, +“Mr. Duncan gave me these for winning the race. +And I took them, thinking that somebody or other +might like them.”</p> +<p>“And don’t she?” asked Clancy––it seemed to +slip out of Tommie without his knowing it.</p> +<p>“I guess not,” said Maurice. Only then did it +flash on me what it all might mean.</p> +<p>“Did you try?” asked Clancy.</p> +<p>“Try! Yes, and was made a fool of. Oh, +what’s the use––what in hell’s the use?” He stood +silent a moment. “I guess not,” he said then––looked +out the window again, and hove the whole +string out of the open window and into the slip.</p> +<p>Clancy and myself both jumped to stop him, but +we weren’t quick enough. They were gone––the +whole beautiful necklace. The skipper fixed his +eyes on where they had struck the water. Then +he turned and left the office. At the door he +stopped and said: “I don’t know––maybe I won’t +take the Johnnie next trip, and if I don’t, Tommie, +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_273' name='page_273'></a>273</span> +I hope you’ll take her––Mr. Duncan will let you +have her if you want. I hope you’ll take her anyway, +for you know what a vessel she is. You’ll +take care of her––” and went and left us.</p> +<p>Clancy swore to himself for a while. He hadn’t +quite done when the door of the rear office opened +and Miss Foster herself came out. She greeted +me sweetly––she always did––but was going out +without paying any attention to Clancy. She +looked pale––although perhaps I would not have +noticed her paleness particularly only for what had +just happened.</p> +<p>I was surprised to see then what Clancy did. +Before she had got to the door he was beside +her.</p> +<p>“Miss Foster, Miss Foster,” he said, and his +tone was so different from what I had ever heard +from him before that I could hardly believe it. He +was a big man, it must be remembered, and still +on him were the double-banked oilskins and heavy +jack-boots he wore through the race. Also his +face was flushed from the excitement of the day––the +salt water was not yet dry on him and his +eyes were shining, shining not alone with the glow +of a man who had been lashed to a wheel steering +a vessel in a gale––and, too, to victory––for hours, +and not alone with the light that comes from two +or three quarts of champagne––it was something +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_274' name='page_274'></a>274</span> +more than that. Whatever it was it surprised me +and held Alice Foster’s attention.</p> +<p>“Mister Clancy,” she said, and turned to him.</p> +<p>“Yes, Mister Clancy––or Tommie Clancy––or +Captain Clancy, as it is at times––master of an odd +vessel now and again––but Clancy all the time––just +Clancy, good-for-nothing Clancy––hard drinker––reveller––night-owl––disturber +of the peace––at +best only a fisherman who’ll by and by go out +and get lost like thousands of the other fishermen +before him––as a hundred every year do now and +have three lines in the paper––name, age, birthplace, +street and number of his boarding-house, +and that will be the end of it. But that don’t +matter––Tommie Clancy, whatever he is, is a +friend of Maurice Blake’s. And he means to +speak a word for Maurice.</p> +<p>“For a long time now, Miss Foster, Maurice has +thought the world of you. He never told me––he +never told anybody. But I know him. He waited +a long time, I’m sure, before he even told himself––maybe +even before he knew it himself. But I +knew it––bunk-mates, watch-mates, dory-mates +we’ve been. He’s master of a fine vessel now and +I’m one of his crew. He’s gone ahead and I’ve +stayed behind. Why? Because he’s carried in his +heart the picture of a girl he thought could be all a +woman ought to be to a man. And that was well +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_275' name='page_275'></a>275</span> +A man like Maurice needs that, and maybe––maybe––you’re +all that he thought and more maybe, Miss +Foster. Wait––he had that picture before his eyes +all the time. I hadn’t any picture. Years ago, +when I was Maurice’s age, I might have had something +like it, and now look at me. And why? +Why, Miss Foster, you’re a woman––could you +guess? No? Think. What’s running in a man’s +head, do you think, in the long winter nights when +he’s walking the deck, with the high heavens above +and the great, black rolling sea around him? +What’s in his head when, trawls hauled and his +fish aboard, when the danger and the hard work +are mostly by, his vessel’s going to the west’ard? +What when he’s an hour to rest and he’s lying, +smoking and thinking, in his bunk? What’s been +in Maurice’s head and in his heart all the years he’s +loafed with the likes of me and yet never fell to +my level? Anything he ever read anywhere, do +you think, or was it a warm image that every time +he came ashore and was lucky enough to get a +look at you he could see was true to the woman +it stood for? When you had no more idea of it +than what was going on at the North Pole he was +watching you––and thinking of you. Always +thinking of you, Miss Foster. He never thought +he had a chance. I know him. Who asks a +woman like you to share a fisherman’s life? Is it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_276' name='page_276'></a>276</span> +a man like Maurice? Sometimes––maybe with +the blood racing through him after a great race he +might. A while ago he did, Miss Foster. And +what gave him the courage?</p> +<p>“Listen to me now, Miss Foster, and say what +you please afterward. Maurice and I are friends. +Friends. I’ve been with him on the bottom of a +capsized dory when we both expected we’d hauled +our last trawl––with the seas washing over us and +we both getting weak and him getting black in +the face––and maybe I was, too. I told you this +once before, but let me tell it again. ‘Come and +take the plug strap, Tommie,’ he says to me. +‘Come and take the plug strap.’ Do you know +what that means, Miss Foster?––and the seas +sweeping over you and your whole body getting +numb? And I’ve been with him four days and +four nights––astray in the fog of the Western +Banks in winter, and, for all we knew and believed, +we were gone. In times like those men get +to know each other, and I tell you, Miss Foster––” +Clancy choked and stopped. “To-day +he sailed a race the like of which was never sailed +before. A dozen times he took the chance of himself +going over the rail. And why? The better +to keep an eye on things and help his vessel along? +Yes. But why that? For that cup we’ve drowned +a dozen times in wine to-day? He never looked +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_277' name='page_277'></a>277</span> +twice at it when he got ashore. He hasn’t seen it +since he handed it to me on the dock. The boys +might like to look at it, he said. He’s forgot he +ever won it by now. He let us take it up to a +rum-shop and drink out of it the same as if it was +a tin-pail––the beautiful gold and silver cup––engraved. +We used it for a growler for all Maurice +cared for the value of it, and there’s forty men +walking the streets now that’s got a list they got +out of that cup. We might have lost it, battered +each other’s drunken heads in with it, and he +wouldn’t have said a dozen words about it. But +there was a necklace of pearls, and he thought you’d +like them. ‘To you, Maurice, for winning the +race,’ says Mr. Duncan, ‘for winning the race,’ +and hands Maurice the pearls––your own guardian, +Miss Foster, and most crazy, he was that +pleased. And that’s what Maurice ran up to get +when the race was over––there was something a +girl might like, or thought so. And then what? +On the way down a woman that I know––that you +know––tried to hold him up. Kissed him before a +hundred people––she knew you were waiting––she +knew, trust a woman––and walked down part way +with him, because you were looking. And he being +a man, and weak, and only twenty-six––and the +racing blood still running through him––maybe +forgot himself for five minutes––not knowing you +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_278' name='page_278'></a>278</span> +were within a mile. That doesn’t excuse him? No, +you’re right, it don’t. But he, poor boy, knowing +nothing––what does a boy of twenty-six know?––knowing +nothing––suspecting nothing––and yet, if +he forgot himself, he never really forgot you. He +hurries on to you and offers you the necklace that +he risked his life to get. And you––what did you +say?”</p> +<p>“What did I say? I told him that perhaps he +knew somebody that he’d rather give it to before +me–––”</p> +<p>“Before you? There’s a woman. You’re not +satisfied when a man fights all the devil in himself +for you, but you must rub it into him while +he’s doing it. Maurice––or maybe you don’t understand. +You could say things like that to a dog––if +a dog could understand––and he’d come back +and lick your hand. Maurice has blood and fire in +him. And here’s a woman––whatever else she is––is +warm-blooded too. She wants Maurice, and, +by God, she’ll get him if you keep on. Do you remember +the night of the Master Mariners’ ball––the +night before we sailed on the Southern cruise? +Well, that night this woman, she waits for Maurice +and stops him on his way home. But she didn’t +get him. He was up in the wind for a minute or +two, but one spoke of the wheel and he found his +head again. Again last June in Newport on a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_279' name='page_279'></a>279</span> +warm summer’s night––flowers, music, wine––the +cabin of a beautiful yacht––she asks him to wait +over a day or two in Newport harbor. Does he? +Does he? Not Maurice. With never a touch of +the wheel, off he swings and drives for home. And +why didn’t he stay? Why, do you suppose? +Didn’t he tell you a while ago? Good God! Look +here––you’re no fool. Look at me––ten years ago +I was another Maurice. And this woman––I tell +you she knows men. She don’t care whether a +man is rich or poor, tall or short, thin or fat, so +long as she likes him. And I tell you she loves +Maurice––as well as she can love––and she’s not +a good enough woman––there it is. And they’re +all saying you’re likely to marry Withrow. Wait +now. Withrow, I’m telling you, isn’t fit to wash +the gurry off Maurice’s jack-boots. I’m a careless +man, Miss Foster, and in my life I’ve done things +I wish now I hadn’t, but I draw the line above the +head of a man like Withrow. Whatever I am, +I’m too good to be company for Fred Withrow. +And on top of all that he’s so carried away with +this other woman––this same woman––and she +caring more for Maurice’s eyelash than Withrow’s +whole two hundred and ten pounds––Withrow is +so carried away with her that he is ready to elope +with her––elope with her! I know that––never +mind how. Bring Withrow and me together, and +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_280' name='page_280'></a>280</span> +I’ll tell him––tell him, yes, and throw him through +the door afterward if he denies it. This woman +is enough of a woman to want Maurice––Maurice +with nothing at all––before Withrow with all he’s +got and all he can get her or give her––and she’s +clever enough to come pretty near getting what +she wants. And now, Miss Foster, suppose you +think it over. I’m going to hunt up Maurice, +though I’m not too sure we’ll find him in a hurry. +Good-by.”</p> +<p>He swept his sou’wester wide to her and went +out the door. I said good-by without looking at +her. I was too ashamed––and went after Clancy. +But I think she was crying to herself as I went +out.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_281' name='page_281'></a>281</span> +<a name='XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED' id='XXXVI_MAURICE_BLAKE_IS_RECALLED'></a> +<h2>XXXVI</h2> +<h3>MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED</h3> +</div> +<p>The morning after the race I was eating +breakfast at home and I could not remember +when I enjoyed a meal like that one. I +had had a fine long sleep and the sleep that comes +to a man after he’s been through a long and exciting +experience does make him feel like a world-beater. +I felt that I could go out and about leap +the length of a seine-boat or rip up a plank sidewalk. +It was worth while to be alive, and everything +tasted so good.</p> +<p>I had put away six fried eggs and about fourteen +of those little slices of bacon before I even +thought of slacking up (with my mother piling +them up as fast as I lifted them off)––and maybe +I wouldn’t have slacked then only my cousin Nell +came skipping in.</p> +<p>She kissed my mother half a dozen times, and +danced around the room. “Four vessels off the +Johnnie Duncan’s model have already been ordered. +Four, auntie––four. There will be a fleet +of them yet, you’ll see. And how are you, Joe?”</p> +<p>“Fine,” I said, and kept on eating.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_282' name='page_282'></a>282</span></div> +<p>Nell didn’t like my not noticing how glad she +was feeling, I suppose, for all at once, as I was +about to sugar another cup of coffee, she ran her +hands through my hair and yanked till I couldn’t +pretend any longer.</p> +<p>“There, now, with your mind off your stomach, +perhaps you’ll look up and converse when a lady +deigns to notice you. How much money did Mr. +Withrow lose on the race?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, but it was a good pile; I know +that.”</p> +<p>“And how much did Mr. Duncan win?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know that, either; but I hope it was a +good roll, for he won about all Withrow lost.”</p> +<p>“M-m––but aren’t you in love with your old +employer? But let’s not mind common money +matters. What do you think of the Johnnie Duncan +for a vessel?”</p> +<p>“She’s a dog––a dog.”</p> +<p>“Isn’t she! And the fastest, able-est and the +handsomest vessel that ever sailed past Eastern +Point, isn’t she?”</p> +<p>“That’s what she is.”</p> +<p>“And who designed her?”</p> +<p>“Who? Let me see. Oh, yes, some local man.”</p> +<p>“You don’t know! Look up here. Who designed +her!”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes. ’Twas a Gloucester man.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_283' name='page_283'></a>283</span></div> +<p>“A Gloucester man? Look up again. Now––who––de––signed––the––John––nie––Dun––can!”</p> +<p>“Ouch, yes. A ver-y fine and a-ble––and handsome +gen-tle-man––a wonderful man.”</p> +<p>“That’s a little better. And his name?”</p> +<p>“William Somers––William the Illustrious––William +the First––‘First in war, first in peace, +and first in the hearts of Gloucestermen’––and if +you let me stand up, I’ll do a break-down to show +you how glad I am.”</p> +<p>“Now you’re showing something like appreciation. +And now where do you suppose your friend +Clancy is and your skipper?”</p> +<p>“Clancy? Lord knows. Maybe in a circle of +admiring friends, singing whatever is his latest. +‘Hove flat down’ was the last I heard. If it was +earlier in the day––about three in the morning––it +would be pretty sure to be that.”</p> +<p>“What a pity, and he such a fine man otherwise!”</p> +<p>“What’s a pity?”</p> +<p>“Why, his getting drunk, as I hear he does very +often.”</p> +<p>“Gets drunk? Who gets drunk? Clancy? +That’s news to me. As long as I’ve known him I +never saw him drunk yet. He gets mellow and +loose––but drunk! Clancy drunk? Why, Nell!”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_284' name='page_284'></a>284</span></div> +<p>“Oh, well, all right, he’s an apostle of temperance +then. But Captain Blake––where is he?”</p> +<p>“I couldn’t say––why?”</p> +<p>“I have a message for him.”</p> +<p>“Did you try his boarding-house?”</p> +<p>“Yes. That is, Will did, and he wasn’t there, +hadn’t been there at all, they said, since the afternoon +before.”</p> +<p>“That so? Where else did you try? Duncan’s +office?”</p> +<p>“We did, and no word of him there.”</p> +<p>“Try Clancy’s boarding-house?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and no word.”</p> +<p>“Try––h-m––the Anchorage?”</p> +<p>“Oh, Joe, you don’t think he’s been loafing there +since?”</p> +<p>“No, I don’t. And yet after the way he got +turned down yesterday, you know––there’s no +telling what a man might do.”</p> +<p>“Well, Will looked in there, too.”</p> +<p>“You fat little fox! Why didn’t you say that at +first? And no word?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t know where he’d be then.”</p> +<p>“Nor I, except––did you notice the wind has +hauled to the northwest?”</p> +<p>“I did.”</p> +<p>“Well. Do you know that old vessel that Mr. +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_285' name='page_285'></a>285</span> +Withrow’s been trying to get a crew for––the +Flamingo?”</p> +<p>“M-h-h.”</p> +<p>“Well, this morning early she went out––on a +hand-lining trip to the east’ard, it is said. And +Will says that he thinks––he doesn’t know, mind +you, because they won’t tell him anything down to +Withrow’s––but he thinks that Maurice Blake’s +shipped in her.”</p> +<p>“Wow! She won’t last out one good breeze +on the Banks.”</p> +<p>“That is just what Will said. And it’s too bad, +for I had a message for him––a message that +would make everything all right. I suppose you +can guess?”</p> +<p>“Guess? H-m-m––I don’t know as I want +to.”</p> +<p>“Well, don’t get mad about it, anyway. How +would you feel if you saw that horrid Minnie +Arkell rush up and––Oh, you know what I mean. +However, I’ve been pleading with Alice since yesterday +afternoon. For two hours I was up in her +room last evening, and poor Will walking the +veranda down below. I put Captain Blake’s case +as I thought a friend of his would put it––as you +would put it, say––perhaps better in some ways––for +I could not forget that he sailed the Johnnie +Duncan yesterday, and her winning meant so much +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_286' name='page_286'></a>286</span> +to Will. Yes, and I’m not forgetting Clancy and +the rest of her crew––indeed, I’m not––I felt as +though I could kiss every one of them.”</p> +<p>“Well, here’s one of them.”</p> +<p>“Don’t get saucy because your mother is standing +by. Go and find Maurice Blake. Go ahead, +won’t you, Joe? Tell him that everything is all +right. She is proud.”</p> +<p>“That’s a nice sounding word for it––pride. +Stuck on herself is what I’d say.”</p> +<p>“No, she isn’t. You must allow a woman self-respect, +you know.”</p> +<p>“I guess so. And it must be her long suit, seeing +she’s always leading from it.”</p> +<p>“Oh, keep your fishermen’s jokes for the mugging-up +times on your vessel. You go and get +Maurice Blake––or find Mr. Clancy and have him +get him––if he hasn’t gone on the Flamingo.”</p> +<p>So I went out. On a cruise along the water +front I found a whole lot of people. I saw Wesley +Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen––sorrowful and neither +saying much––looking after their vessels––Ohlsen +seeing to a new gaff. “I ought to’ve lost,” said +Ohlsen. “Look at that for a rotten piece of wood.” +Sam Hollis was around, too, trying to explain how +it was he didn’t win the race. But he couldn’t explain +to anybody’s satisfaction how his stays’l went +nor why he hove-to when that squall struck him––the +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_287' name='page_287'></a>287</span> +same squall that shot the Johnnie Duncan +across the line. Tom O’Donnell was there, looking +down on the deck of the vessel in which he took so +much pride. “Two holes in her deck where her +spars ought to be,” he was saying when I came +along. I asked him if he had seen Maurice that +morning, and it was from him I learned for certain +that Maurice had shipped on the Flamingo. “I +didn’t see her leaving, boy, but Withrow himself +told me this morning. ‘And I hope he’ll never +come back,’ he said at the same time. ‘’Tis you +that takes a licking hard. But maybe ’tis the insurance,’ +I says. ‘If that’s what you’re thinking,’ +says he, ‘she isn’t insured.’ ‘Then it must be the +divil’s own repair she’s in when no company at all +will insure her,’ I says. Sure, we had hard words +over it, but that won’t bring back Maurice––he’s +gone in the Flamingo, Joe.”</p> +<p>I went after Clancy then, and after a long chase, +that took me to Boston and back, I caught up with +him. He was full of repentance and was gloomy. +It was up in his boarding-house––in his room. +He, looking tired, was thinking of taking a kink +of sleep.</p> +<p>“Hulloh, Joe! And I don’t wonder you look +surprised, Joe. I must be getting old. Thursday +morning I got up after as fine a night’s sleep as a +man’d want. That was Thursday. Then Thursday +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_288' name='page_288'></a>288</span> +night, Friday, Friday night, Saturday––two +nights and three days, and I’m sleepy already. +Sleepy, Joe, and I remember the time I could go +a whole week, and then, after a good night’s sleep, +wake up fine and daisy and be ready for another +week. Joe, there’s a moral in that if you can only +work it out.”</p> +<p>Clancy stayed silent after that, not inclined to +talk, I could see, until I told him about Maurice +having shipped in the Flamingo and the hard crew +that had gone in her.</p> +<p>That stirred him. “Great Lord, gone in that +shoe-box! Why, Joe, I’d as soon put to sea in a +market basket calked with butter. And the man +that’s got her––Dave Warner! He’s crazy, Joe, +if ever a man was crazy. Clean out of his head +over a girl that he met in Gloucester once, but now +living in Halifax, and she won’t have anything to +do with him. He’s daffy over her. If she was +drowning alongside you’d curse your luck because +you had to gaff her in. That is, you would only +she’s a woman, of course. Wants to get lost, Joe, +I believe––wants to! If this was Boston or New +York and in older days, I’d say that Dave and +Withrow must have shanghaied a crew to man the +Flamingo’s kind. But you c’n get men here to +go in anything sometimes. Wait a bit and I’ll be +along with you. We’ll see old Duncan and maybe +we c’n head the Flamingo off.”</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_289' name='page_289'></a>289</span> +<a name='XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO' id='XXXVII_THE_GIRL_IN_CANSO'></a> +<h2>XXXVII</h2> +<h3>THE GIRL IN CANSO</h3> +</div> +<p>That was Saturday evening. The crew of +the Johnnie had been told just after the race +by the skipper that he would not need them again +until Monday. Scattering on that, some going to +Boston, they could not be got together again until +Monday morning, and it was not until Monday +noon that we got away.</p> +<p>We fitted out as though for a Cape Shore seining +trip, and that’s what we were to do in case we +missed the Flamingo or could not persuade her +skipper or Maurice himself that he ought to leave +her and come back on the Johnnie Duncan. It +was Clancy who had the matter in charge. Indeed, +it was only Clancy who knew what it was really +all about.</p> +<p>We had a good run-off before a stiff westerly +that gradually hauled to the north, and Tuesday +night late saw us in Halifax Harbor. It was too +late to do anything that night, but Clancy went +ashore to find out what he could. Before sunrise +he was back with word to break out the anchor +and put to sea. He had word of the Flamingo.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_290' name='page_290'></a>290</span></div> +<p>“That girl of Dave’s––it seems she’s moved to +Canso with her folks, and Dave’s gone there. He’s +probably there before this––maybe left again. +She’s an old plug, the Flamingo, but she ought’ve +made Canso before this. He only stayed a few +hours here and left Monday.”</p> +<p>It was bang, bang, bang all the way to Canso, +with Clancy swearing at Withrow and the Flamingo +and Dave Warner and the girl in the case––one +after the other and sometimes all together. +“Blast Withrow and that crazy fool Dave Warner, +too. And why in the devil couldn’t her folks +stayed in Gloucester––or in Halifax, at least. +They ought’ve put a few sticks of dynamite in her +and blown her to pieces ages ago. She’s forty +years old if she’s a day––her old planks rotten. +They won’t keep her afloat over-night if they’re +out in this. Why d’y’s’pose people leave a good +lively little city like Halifax to go to a place like +Canso? Why?”</p> +<p>Andie Howe happened to be within hearing, +and “Maybe the rent’s cheaper,” suggested Andie.</p> +<p>“Maybe it is––and maybe if you don’t talk sense +I’ll heave you over the rail some fine day. Better +give her a grain more fore-sheet. Man, but it’s a +wicked night.”</p> +<p>We made Canso after the worst day and night +we had had in the Johnnie Duncan since she was +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_291' name='page_291'></a>291</span> +launched. Outside Canso Harbor it looked bad. +We didn’t think the skipper would try to enter the +harbor that black night, but he did. “Got to go +in and get news,” said Clancy, and in we went. It +was as black as could be––squalls sweeping down––and +Canso is not the easiest harbor in the world +to make at night.</p> +<p>I went ashore with Clancy to hear what the +young woman might have to say. We found her +in a place run by her father, a sort of lodging house +and “pub,” with herself serving behind the bar––a +bold-looking young woman, not over-neat––and +yet attractive in her way––good figure, regular +features, and good color. “There, Joe, if you +brought a girl like that home your mother would +probably die of a broken heart, but there’s the kind +that a foolish man like Dave Warner would sell his +soul for.” Then Clancy explained while we were +waiting for her to see us privately, “I don’t know +if she’ll remember me, but I met her two or three +times in Gloucester.”</p> +<p>When she came in she recognized Clancy right +away. “How do you do, Captain Clancy?”</p> +<p>“How do you do, Miss Luce? My friend, Mr. +Buckley. Now what we’ve come for––but first, +suppose we have a little something by way of sociability. +A little fizzy stuff, say, and some good +cigars, Miss Luce.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_292' name='page_292'></a>292</span></div> +<p>She brought the wine and the cigars. Clancy +pulled the cork, filled both glasses, pushed one +glass toward the young woman and drew one to +himself.</p> +<p>“But, Captain, your friend hasn’t any.”</p> +<p>“My friend,” said Clancy, “doesn’t drink. The +last thing the doctor said to him before we came +away was, ‘Don’t touch a drop of liquor or your +life will pay the forfeit.’ You see, Miss Luce, he’s +been a dissipated youth––drink––and having been +dissipated and coming of delicate people, it’s affected +his health.”</p> +<p>“You don’t tell me? I’m sure he doesn’t look +it.”</p> +<p>“No, he don’t––that’s a fact. But so it is.”</p> +<p>“Stomach?” she asked me.</p> +<p>“No––heart,” answered Clancy for me. “What +they call an aneurism. You know what an aneurism +is, of course?”</p> +<p>“Yes-yes––oh, yes–––”</p> +<p>“Of course. Well, he’s got one of them.”</p> +<p>“That’s too bad. So he only smokes instead?”</p> +<p>“That’s all. Here, Joe, smoke up.”</p> +<p>“My, I always thought smoking was bad for the +heart.”</p> +<p>“It is––for everything except aneurisms. Smoking’s +the death of aneurisms. Have another cigar, +Joe. And Miss Luce, shall we exchange a health?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_293' name='page_293'></a>293</span></div> +<p>“But I never drank anything in all my life.”</p> +<p>“Of course not. But you will now, won’t you? +Consider the occasion and I’m sure you won’t +let me drink alone. And I’ve come so far to +see you, too––only of course not––Well, here’s +to your good health, and may you live long +and–––”</p> +<p>The rest of it was smothered in the gurgle. And +nobody would ever think to see the way she put +down hers that Miss Luce had never had a drink +of wine before.</p> +<p>“And now, Miss Luce, may I ask how long it +has been since your friend Dave Warner left–––”</p> +<p>“Oh-h––Dave Warner? He’s no friend of +mine.”</p> +<p>“Isn’t he? Well, he’s no particular friend of +mine, either. But a friend of mine––of both of us, +Joe here, too––is with Dave––Maurice Blake. +Any word of him?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes. A good-looking fellow, nice eyes and +hair and nice manners. I do like to see refined +manners in people. Now if it was him–––”</p> +<p>“If it was him, you wouldn’t have told him to +go to sea and the devil take him–––”</p> +<p>“I’d have you know, Captain Clancy, I don’t +swear.”</p> +<p>“Swear? You, Miss Luce? Dear me, whatever +made you think I thought that? But let’s +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_294' name='page_294'></a>294</span> +have another taste of wine. But of course you +didn’t encourage Dave to stay ashore here?”</p> +<p>“Him?––I guess not. When he said he didn’t +care if he never came back, I told him I was sure +I didn’t––and out he went.”</p> +<p>“O woman, gentle woman,” murmured Clancy +in his glass, “especially real ladies. But Dave +never did know how to talk to a lady.”</p> +<p>“I should say he didn’t.”</p> +<p>“No, not Dave. And so his money gone +he’s–––”</p> +<p>“Money? Why, he never had any money.”</p> +<p>“Well, that’s bad. Not even enough to open a +bottle of wine to drink a lady’s health?”</p> +<p>“Bottle of wine? No, nor a thimbleful of tuppenny +ale.”</p> +<p>“That was bad, Miss Luce. Dave ought’ve +come better heeled–––</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘And so his money gone he puts out to sea––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>It may happen to you or happen to me.’</p> +</div></div> +<p>And which way did he say he was going?”</p> +<p>“He didn’t say and I didn’t ask, though one of +the men with him said something about going to +the Grand Banks.”</p> +<p>“Grand Banks, eh? That’s comforting––it +isn’t more than a couple of days’ sail from here +to the nearest edge of it, and twenty-odd thousand +or more square miles of shoal water to hunt over +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_295' name='page_295'></a>295</span> +after you get there. Had they taken their bait +aboard, did you hear, Miss Luce?”</p> +<p>“Yes, they had. That was yesterday afternoon +late. His vessel was leaking then, I heard him say +to that nice-looking man––Maurice Blake his +name, did you say? A nice name Maurice, isn’t +it? Well, he said to Maurice going out the door, +‘Well, we’ll put out and I callate––I don’t know +how she’ll get out but out we’ll go to-night.’ ‘The +sooner you go the better it will suit me,’ Blake +said, and they went off together.”</p> +<p>“And how was Mr. Blake?”</p> +<p>“How do you mean? How did he act? My, I +never saw such a man. Wouldn’t open his head +all night––wouldn’t drink, but just sat and smoked +like your friend there. Anything the matter with +him?”</p> +<p>“With Maurice? Oh, in the way of aneurisms? +Not that I know of. Oh, yes, he has +heart-trouble too, come to think. But I must be +getting back to the vessel.”</p> +<p>“So soon?”</p> +<p>“Yes, we’ve got to go to sea. I’m like Dave +Warner in that I’m going to sea too.”</p> +<p>“But nobody’s driving you away.” She had her +eyes on Clancy’s face then.</p> +<p>He didn’t look up––only stared into his glass.</p> +<p>She was silent for a full minute. Clancy said +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_296' name='page_296'></a>296</span> +nothing. “Nobody’s driving you away,” she said +again.</p> +<p>At that Clancy looked at her. “There’s no telling,” +he said at first, and then hastily, “Oh, no––of +course nobody’s driving me to sea.”</p> +<p>“Then what’s your hurry?”</p> +<p>I got up and went to the door then. I heard +the sound of a scraping chair and then of Clancy +standing up. A moment’s quiet and then it was: +“No, dear, I can’t stay––nobody’s driving me +away, I know that. I’m sure you wouldn’t––not +with your heart. And you’ve a good heart if you’d +only give it a chance. But I can’t stay.”</p> +<p>“And why not? You won’t, you mean. Well, +I never thought you were <i>that</i> kind of a man.”</p> +<p>“No? Well, don’t go to giving me any moral +rating. Don’t go to over-rating me––or maybe +you’d call it under-rating. But you see, it’s my +friend that’s calling.”</p> +<p>“And you’re going out in this gale?”</p> +<p>“Gale. I’d go if it was a hundred gales. Good-by––and +take care of yourself, dear.”</p> +<p>“And will you come back if you don’t find him?”</p> +<p>“Lord, Lord, how can I say? Can anybody +say who’s coming back and who isn’t?”</p> +<p>He went by me and out the door. She looked +after him, but he never turned––only plunged out +of the house and into the street and I right after +him.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_297' name='page_297'></a>297</span> +<a name='XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD' id='XXXVIII_THE_DUNCAN_GOES_TO_THE_WESTARD'></a> +<h2>XXXVIII</h2> +<h3>THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST’ARD</h3> +</div> +<p>Getting back to the vessel Clancy was +pretty gloomy. “That’s settled. We can’t +chase them as far to the east’ard as the big banks––a +three hundred mile run to the nearest edge of it +and tens of thousands of square miles to hunt over +after we’d got there. And it would be child’s work +anyway to ask Maurice to leave her on the bank. +Who’d take his place even if Dave would stand for +it? ’Twould mean laying up a dory or taking his +dory-mate too. Maurice wouldn’t leave her anyway, +even if he believed he’d never get home––no +real fisherman would. And yet there it is––Dave +in a devil of a mood, and a vessel according to all +reports that won’t live out one good easterly. And +there’s a crazy crew aboard her that won’t make +for the most careful handling of a vessel. Oh, +Lord, I don’t see anything for it, but, thank the +Lord, Maurice has been behaving himself––and +that in spite of how blue he must have been feeling. +By this time he’s cert’nly made up his mind he’s +with a pretty bad crowd, but maybe he’s glad of a +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_298' name='page_298'></a>298</span> +little excitement. What I don’t understand is how +Dave ever left old man Luce’s place without breaking +up the furniture before going away. Gen’rally +that’s his style. Maybe Maurice being along had +something to do with it––a pretty able man in close +quarters is Maurice. Yes, he must be glad of the +excitement, but Lord, that won’t save him from +being lost. Oh, oh, and now what’ll we do? Let’s +see, the Flamingo’s on the way to the Banks, and +that’s the end of that chase. We’ve got to wait +now and see that she comes home––or don’t come +home––one or the other. I told that girl that I +was going to put out––put out if it blew a hundred +gales. And so I would if any good would come of +it, but putting out to sea a day like this because +you bragged you would––risking your vessel and +crew, or making hard work for them if nothing +else––that ain’t good sense, is it? Besides, I had +to tell her something to get away without setting up +to be a model of virtue. What else could I do? +Women are the devil––sometimes––aren’t they, +Joe? There’s some are. I suppose it wouldn’t do +any great harm to head her for home. I don’t +believe there’s going to be much more fish going +to be seined this fall––and wouldn’t she make a +passage of it in this easterly? Oh, Lord, it would +be the race all over again, only ten times as long +a drag.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_299' name='page_299'></a>299</span></div> +<p>While he sat there in the cabin, smoking and +meditating, letting us into his thoughts every now +and then, the voices of some of our crew were +heard on deck.</p> +<p>We all went up and got the word that was being +passed around. A coast steamer had just come +to anchor in the harbor with the report that just +outside––about ten miles to the west’ard––was a +vessel, dismasted and clean-swept, and dragging +toward the rocks. They could not help her themselves––too +rough––a hurricane outside––to launch +a boat was out of the question. They didn’t mind +taking a chance, they said, but to attempt her rescue +would be suicide.</p> +<p>It looked like a pretty hard chance going out in +that gale, but Clancy didn’t wait. “Nobody else +seems to be hurrying to get out, and we being the +able-est looking craft in the harbor, I callate it’s +up to us to go.” He got the exact location of the +distressed vessel from the coaster, and then it was +up anchor, make sail, and out we went.</p> +<p>There were people who called Clancy a fool for +ordering out his vessel and risking his crew that +day––men in that very harbor––and maybe he was. +But for myself, I want that kind of a fool for my +skipper. The man that will take a chance for a +stranger will take a bigger chance for his own by +and by.</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_300' name='page_300'></a>300</span></div> +<p>We saw her while we were yet miles away, +down to the west’ard––near Whitehead and with +the cruel stretch of rocks under her lee quarter. +Even with plenty of sea-room she could not have +lasted long, and here with these ledges to catch +her she looked to be in for a short shrift. We had +a good chance to get a look at her as we bore +down. Everything was gone from her deck, even +the house and rail. There was not as much loose +wood on deck as would make a tooth-pick. Afterwards +we learned that two seas hove her down so +that they had to cut the spars away to right her, +and then just as she was coming up another monster +had caught her and swept her clean––not only +swept clean, but stove in her planks and started +some of her beams so that she began to leak in a +fashion that four men to the pumps could just +manage to keep up with.</p> +<p>We could just see them––the men to the pumps +working desperately––with the others lashed to the +stumps of the masts and the stanchions which were +left when the rail went. Her big hawser had +parted and her chain was only serving to slightly +check her way toward the rocks.</p> +<p>With spars and deck gear gone and her hull +deep in the water, a vessel is not so easily distinguished. +But there was something familiar in this +one. We had seen her before. All at once it +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_301' name='page_301'></a>301</span> +flashed on half a dozen of us––“the Flamingo!” +we said. “God! that’s luck!” said Clancy.</p> +<p>She lay in a sort of inlet that was wide open to +the gale, rocks on the better part of three sides +of her, north, south and west. She was then within +all but striking distance of the rocks, and the seas, +high and wicked, were sweeping over her. It +looked like a bad place to work out of if we should +get close in, but Clancy held on.</p> +<p>“Not much lee-room, but plenty of water under +her keel anyway,” and himself to the wheel, sailed +the Johnnie around the Flamingo. He hailed +Maurice as he went by, waved his hand to the +others, and hove a line aboard. They took the +line, hauled in the hawser at the end of it, made +that fast to the windlass, and then we started off +with her in tow.</p> +<p>We were doing pretty well, what with plenty of +wind and the Johnnie buckling down to her work +like she was a steamer, till the hawser parted and +back toward the rocks went the Flamingo again.</p> +<p>“No use,” said Clancy, “sea’s too much for any +line we got. We’ll try it with the seine-boat. +Who’ll go in the seine-boat and try to take them +off? Think quick, but mind what it means.”</p> +<p>Every man of the crew of the Johnnie Duncan +said, “Here!” The cook even came out of the +forec’s’le and put in his “And me, too, skipper.”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_302' name='page_302'></a>302</span></div> +<p>“You’re good men,” said Clancy,––“damn good +men,” and looked us up and down. We felt proud, +he said it in such a way. “But you’re taking your +lives in your hands and some of you got wives and +children––mothers or something. Who hasn’t +anybody depending on him? Which of you hasn’t +any woman somewhere, or little brothers or +sisters?”</p> +<p>About twelve of the sixteen men standing on the +deck of the Johnnie Duncan said “Me!”</p> +<p>“Three-quarters of you, at least,” said Clancy, +“are damn liars. Over with the seine-boat and be +careful nobody gets hurt.”</p> +<p>Somebody did get hurt, though. Andie Howe +got his foot smashed and was helped below. +Clancy gave the rest of us a scolding in advance. +“You’re not hurt yet, but some of you will be––like +Andie––if you don’t watch out. You’d think +that some of you were out on some little pond up +in the country somewhere launching a canoe off +one of those club-house floats. Keep an eye out +for those seas when they board. And watch out +for that deckload or some of you’ll have a head +cut off. A man killed or a man washed over the +rail––what’s the difference––it’s a man lost. Look +out now––watch, you Steve––damn you, watch +out! Over with it!”</p> +<p>And over it went and with it leaped two men +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_303' name='page_303'></a>303</span> +before it could sag away, while the rest of us stood +by the rail watching our chance.</p> +<p>“Nelson,” called Clancy, “come away from that +rail! Steve, come away!––come away, I say, and +no back talk. Pat, you can go––jump in––watch +your chance or it’s the last of you. Eddie, you can +go, and you Bill, and you Frenchy. Joe! stand +away from that rail or I’ll put you in the hold and +batten the hatches on you. Now, that’s better. +And that’s enough––six men to the oars and one +to steer.”</p> +<p>“And who’ll steer?” asked somebody.</p> +<p>“You’ll know in a minute,” said Clancy, and +he leaped for the seine-boat and made it, and +grabbed the steering oar. “Stand by––push off! +Fend off in the vessel there! Steve, if anything +happens––you know––you’re to take the Johnnie +home. Give way, fellows. Now! Watch out!––now––now +then, around with her––end on, +and there she is like a bird! And now drive +her!”</p> +<p>“A bird!” said Clancy––but a wild-looking +bird––fifty feet she looked to be going into the +air one moment and down out of sight the next, +and water slamming aboard her so that we thought +she was swamped half a dozen times. Two had +to leave the oars and go to bailing, while Clancy +with an arm and shoulders and back and swinging +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_304' name='page_304'></a>304</span> +waist like––well, like nothing a man ever had before––kept +her end to it.</p> +<p>“Good luck!” we called.</p> +<p>“Never fear––we’ll bring ’em back!” said +Clancy.</p> +<p>“Or stay with them,” we thought.</p> +<p>But he didn’t stay with them. It was a ticklish +job, but Clancy got away with it. He didn’t dare +to go too near the Flamingo, for that meant that +the seas would pitch the seine-boat up and dash it +to kindling wood against her hull. What he did +do was to go as near the Flamingo as he could and +keep her clear, then heave a line aboard and call to +her crew one after the other to make it fast around +themselves and jump overboard. It took some +nerve to make that jump––from the rigging of +the Duncan we watched them––saw them shiver +and draw up––these were men accustomed to face +danger––reckless men––but the shiver was over +in a breath, and then over the rail and into that +sea––a game fight––and they were hauled into the +seine-boat. Some of them we thought would never +make it, for it was an awful sea.</p> +<p>As fast as one of the Flamingo’s men made the +seine-boat he was set to work bailing out or taking +a haul at the oars, for it was a difficult matter in +that sea to keep the seine-boat at the right distance +from the Flamingo. But they got them all––ten +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_305' name='page_305'></a>305</span> +of them. Two were hauled in unconscious, but +came to after awhile.</p> +<p>To get aboard the Johnnie again was almost as +bad as to get into the seine-boat from the Flamingo. +But we managed it. Long Steve was swept over +while we were at it, but we got him back with the +help of Maurice Blake and another of the Flamingo’s +crowd. By smart clever work they +grabbed Steve before he could go down and +hauled him into the seine-boat.</p> +<p>When they were all safe aboard the Duncan +Clancy shook hands with Maurice. “I call that +luck, Maurice––to come out to save a stranger and +find you’ve saved your own. And now whose trick +to the wheel––you, Joe? Put her on the off-shore +tack till we’re well clear of that headland––maybe +we c’n make it in one leg. No? Then a short +tack and have an eye out for the ledges––not too +close. And Maurice, go below––you and Dave +and all hands of you, and we’ll get out dry clothes +for you. Man, but you must be cold and hungry, +but the cook’s getting coffee and grub ready. And +for the Duncan’s crew––on deck all hands and put +the tops’ls to her. For, Maurice-boy, we’re going +home––going home, Maurice––where there’s people +waiting for you. Hang on a while longer, +Joe, and I’ll take her myself.”</p> +<p>No need to tell me to hang on. If I hadn’t hung +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_306' name='page_306'></a>306</span> +on or been lashed to the wheel I could never have +kept my feet, for at this time it was so bad that +they had passed a line from my waist to the +windward bitt and I was up to my waist with every +dive of her.</p> +<p>“Lord, she’s a dog, ain’t she! If old man Duncan +could see her now! Remember Tom O’Donnell +singing that song the other night:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>‘West half-no’the and drive her––we’re abreast now of Cape Sable––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>’Tis an everlasting hurricane, but here’s the craft that’s able.’</p> +</div></div> +<p>We’re not abreast of Cape Sable yet, but it won’t +take us too many hours at this clip. And here’s the +craft that’s able. Man, wouldn’t it be fine if Tom +O’Donnell himself was with us and the pair of us +racing home? Let me take the wheel, Joe. And +go for’ard and have a mug-up for yourself––and +have a care going, Joe, for it’s leaping she is now +and seas that’d lift you a cable’s length to looard +if ever they caught you fair. That’s it––oh, but +if your mother could see you now, Joe, it’s never +to sea you’d come again.”</p> +<p>I made my way for’ard. A dash between the +house and windward rail, a shoot for the mainmast +and holding on there for awhile. Another dive +for the gripes on the dories, another shoot between +rail and dories, a grip of the bow gripes, a swing +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_307' name='page_307'></a>307</span> +around and I was at the forec’s’le hatch. Here I +thought I heard him call and looked aft.</p> +<p>He had a leg either side of the wheel, standing +full height and sawing the spokes a bit up and +down to get the feel of her. The life line was +trailing from his waist to the bitt––the clear white +sea was up to his middle and racing over the taffrail. +He had cast away his mitts the better to grip +the spokes, and even as I looked he took off his +sou’wester and sent it scaling. The wind taking +hold of it must have carried it a quarter a mile to +leeward. Watching it go, himself looking out +under the boom, he laughed––laughed––such a +roar of a laugh––stamped his feet and began to +sing:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“Oh, I love old Ocean’s smile,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>I love old Ocean’s frowning––</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>My love’s for Ocean all the while,</p> +<p><span class='indent2'> </span>My prayer’s for death by drowning.”</p> +</div></div> +<p>The devil was in him then. “Did you call me, +skipper?” I sang out.</p> +<p>“Did I? Did I? Lord, Joe, I don’t know. +Maybe I did. I feel like calling from here to +Gloucester, and if I did I bet they’d hear me. +God, Joe, but it’s good to be alive, isn’t it?––just +to be alive. Whew! but I wish I had a few more +sou’westers––just to see ’em scale. But what was +it I wanted––but is the cook there?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_308' name='page_308'></a>308</span></div> +<p>“He is––I c’n hear him talking.”</p> +<p>“Then go below and tell him, Joe––tell him to +mouse his pots and kettles, for with sail alow and +sail aloft, with her helmsman lashed and her house +awash, in a living gale and the devil’s own sea, +the Johnnie Duncan’s going to the west’ard.”</p> +<p>And she certainly went.</p> +<hr class='toprule' /> +<div class='chsp'> +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_309' name='page_309'></a>309</span> +<a name='XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY' id='XXXIX_THE_HEART_OF_CLANCY'></a> +<h2>XXXIX</h2> +<h3>THE HEART OF CLANCY</h3> +</div> +<p>That trip ended seining for the Duncan that +year. Everything went well with our +friends, after we got home. It was late in the +season, and Maurice Blake was to stay ashore to +get married, for one thing. He had made a great +season of it and could afford to. So the Johnnie +Duncan was fitted out for fresh halibuting and +Clancy took her.</p> +<p>I went with him. I remember very well that I +had no idea of going winter fishing when the +seining season ended, but, somehow or other when +Clancy came to get a crew together I was looking +for a chance.</p> +<p>So we put out, and on the rocks of Cape Ann, +near Eastern Point lighthouse, on the day we sailed +on our first halibuting trip, were Maurice Blake +and Alice Foster, my cousin Nell and Will Somers, +to wave us good luck. Clancy hauled the vessel +close in to get a better look and they waved us until +I suppose they could see us no longer. Of course +they should have been able to make us out long +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_310' name='page_310'></a>310</span> +after we had lost sight of them, we being a tall-sparred, +white-sailed vessel; and Clancy must have +had that in mind, for long after all signs of them +had been lost to us he kept the glasses pointed to +the rocks. He turned at last with a “Well, I suppose +they’re all happy now, Joe?”</p> +<p>“They ought to be,” I said.</p> +<p>“Yes, they ought to be,” he repeated, and then +again, “they ought to be,” and went for’ard.</p> +<p>He stayed for’ard a long time, saying no word, +but leaning over the windlass and looking out +ahead. Nobody disturbed him. Once or twice +when the sheets needed trimming––and in a deep +sleep I think Clancy would know that––he turned +and gave the word, but the bare word and no more. +He had his spells we all knew, when he didn’t want +anybody near him, and so he wanted to be alone, +I suppose. And there he stayed, with what spray +came over the bow splashing him, but he paying +no attention.</p> +<p>At supper call he moved, but not to go below and +eat––only to shift to walking the quarter, and +walking the quarter he stayed until near midnight. +He went below then after giving a few words of +instruction to the watch––went below and got out +his pipe. From my bunk, the middle port bunk in +the cabin, I watched him rummaging for tobacco +in his stateroom and then his coming out with his +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_311' name='page_311'></a>311</span> +pipe and his filling and lighting it slowly and +thoughtfully, and then his sitting and smoking under +the cabin lamp.</p> +<p>Looking over when he had finished that pipeful––I +had not drawn my curtain––he caught my +eyes on him. He smiled, but said nothing––only +lit another pipeful, and kept on smoking.</p> +<p>I fell asleep watching him––fell asleep and woke +again. He must have been watching me, for his +eyes were on mine when I looked for him again. +He smiled and shook his pipe out, and made as +though to turn in.</p> +<p>But he didn’t turn in. He took off his jersey, +loosened the collar of his flannel shirt, cast off his +slip-shods––stopped––looked into his bunk, came +back, filled and lit another pipeful and began to +talk to me. I thought I was sleepy, but in five +minutes I didn’t think so. Joking, laughing, telling +stories––in ten minutes he had me roaring. Before +long he had everybody in the cabin awake and +roaring, too. Men, coming off watch and into the +cabin to warm up, or for one thing or another, listened +and stayed. He kept that up all the rest of +the night––until after six o’clock in the morning, +and only the cook called to breakfast there’s no +telling when he would have stopped. And not +until he was going for’ard to eat did I get a glimpse +of what it was he had been thinking of during all +<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_312' name='page_312'></a>312</span> +those earlier hours of the night. The sun, I remember, +was streaking the sky ahead of us––he +stopped just as he was about to drop into the +forec’s’le and pointed it out.</p> +<p>“A sunrise, Joe, on a fine October morning out +to sea––beautiful––beautiful––but just one thing +wrong about it. And what is it?––you don’t see? +Well, Joe, it’s over the bow. A sunrise, Joe, is +most beautiful when it’s over the stern––and why? +’Cause then you’re going home––of course. Going +home, Joe––if you’ve got a home to go to. Look +to it, Joe, that you’ve got a home of your own to +go to before you’re much older. Somebody to +work for––somebody waiting for you––a wife, +Joe––wife and children––or you’re in for some +awful lonesome times.”</p> +<p>That was Clancy––watch-mate, bunk-mate, +dory-mate once, and now my skipper––Clancy, +who could be any man’s friend, the man that everybody +jumped to shake hands with, and yet never a +bit of use to himself. And I couldn’t but half +wonder at that, and kept my eyes on him when, +with one foot on the top step of the companionway, +he turned and looked around again.</p> +<p>“And if you can’t get anybody, skipper?”</p> +<p>“Then it’s hard––though most likely you’ve deserved +it.”</p> +<p>“But you haven’t deserved it?”</p> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_313' name='page_313'></a>313</span></div> +<p>“Deserved it? Yes, and ten times over.”</p> +<p>“That’s pretty rough.”</p> +<p>“Rough? No, it’s right. When you do wrong +you’ve got to make up for it. It’s all in the big +scheme of the universe. You’ve got to strike a +balance some time––somewhere. And the sooner +the better. Be thankful if you have to settle it +right away, Joe. If you don’t and it drags along––then +it’s worse again, and the Lord help those +that come after you––those that have to take up +life where you’ve left it off. The Lord have +mercy on the heirs of your brain and heart and +soul, boy. What you hand them they’ve got to +take. Yes, sir, you’ll pay for it somewhere––you +yourself, or, what’s worse, those you care for will +have to pay––in this world or another––whatever +it is we’re coming to, a better or a worse world, +it’s there and waiting us. Be thankful, as I said, +Joe, if you have to settle for it here––settle for it +yourself alone.”</p> +<p>All around, above and below, ahead and astern, +he looked, a long, long look astern––his foot on +the step, and singing softly, almost to himself:</p> +<div class='poem'><div class='stanza'> +<p>“And if I come to you, my love,</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>And my heart free from guile,</p> +<p><span class='indent1'> </span>Will you have a glance for me––</p> +<p><span class='indent3'> </span>Will you on me smile?</p> +</div></div> +<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_314' name='page_314'></a>314</span></div> +<p>Oh, Lord! pipe-dreams––pipe-dreams. Let’s go +below, Joe, and have a bite to eat.”</p> +<p>So below we went; and her sails lit up by the +morning sun, her decks wet by the slapping sea, +sheets off and sailing free, the Johnnie Duncan +clipped her way to the east’ard.</p> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEINERS***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 30138-h.txt or 30138-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/0/1/3/30138">http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/1/3/30138</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/old/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg b/old/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..3370341 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/30138-h/images/illus-fpc.jpg diff --git a/old/30138.txt b/old/30138.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..849335c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/30138.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7818 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Seiners, by James B. (James Brendan) +Connolly + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Seiners + + +Author: James B. (James Brendan) Connolly + + + +Release Date: September 30, 2009 [eBook #30138] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEINERS*** + + +E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 30138-h.htm or 30138-h.zip: + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30138/30138-h/30138-h.htm) + or + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30138/30138-h.zip) + + + + + +THE SEINERS + +by + +JAMES B. CONNOLLY + +Author of "Out of Gloucester," "Jeb Hutton," Etc. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: IT WAS THE FINEST KIND OF EXCITEMENT, OUR RUNNING TO +HARBOR] + + + +Charles Scribner's Sons +New York 1910 + +Copyright, 1904, by +Charles Scribner's Sons + +Published, May, 1904 + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW'S 1 + II. A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS 8 + III. MINNIE ARKELL 16 + IV. LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION 27 + V. FROM OUT OF CROW'S NEST 35 + VI. MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL 43 + VII. CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL 51 + VIII. THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA 61 + IX. MACKEREL 70 + X. WE LOSE OUR SEINE 82 + XI. AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE 87 + XII. THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR 99 + XIII. WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE 119 + XIV. A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING 123 + XV. CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD 129 + XVI. WE GET A FINE SCHOOL 137 + XVII. A DRIVE FOR MARKET 144 + XVIII. A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET 153 + XIX. MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN 159 + XX. THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME 172 + XXI. SEINERS' WORK 175 + XXII. ON THE CAPE SHORE 184 + XXIII. DRESSING DOWN 193 + XXIV. THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN 202 + XXV. TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS 206 + XXVI. THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER 211 + XXVII. IN CLANCY'S BOARDING-HOUSE 217 + XXVIII. IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN 220 + XXIX. MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME 230 + XXX. THE MORNING OF THE RACE 235 + XXXI. THE START OF THE RACE 243 + XXXII. O'DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS 250 + XXXIII. THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN 257 + XXXIV. MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE 265 + XXXV. CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW 271 + XXXVI. MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED 281 + XXXVII. THE GIRL IN CANSO 289 + XXXVIII. THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST'ARD 297 + XXXIX. THE HEART OF CLANCY 309 + + + + +THE SEINERS + + + + +THE SEINERS + +I + +THE NEW VESSEL OF WITHROW'S + + +It was only a few days before this that the new vessel of Mr. +Withrow's, built by him, as everybody supposed, for Maurice Blake, had +been towed around from Essex, and I remember how Maurice stood on the +dock that afternoon and looked her over. + +There was not a bolt or a plank or a seam in her whole hull, not a +square inch inside or out, that he had not been over half a dozen +times while she was on the stocks; but now he had to look her over +again, and as he looked his eyes took on a shine. She had been +designed by a man famous the world over, and was intended to beat +anything that ever sailed past Eastern Point. + +She certainly was a great-looking model of a vessel, and "If she only +sails and handles half so well as she looks, she'll do for me," said +Maurice. "Yes, sir, and if she's up to what I think she ought to be, I +wouldn't be afraid to bet my share of what we make out South that +she'll hold her own with anything out of Gloucester--give her a few +weeks to loosen up, of course." + +That was a good deal to say, for it was a great fleet of vessels +sailing out of Gloucester; but even so, even allowing for a young +skipper's pride in his first crack vessel, it meant a whole lot coming +like that from Maurice Blake. + +And on top of all that Maurice and Withrow had to quarrel, though what +about I never found out. I only know that I was ready to believe that +Withrow was to blame, for I liked Maurice and did not like Withrow, +even though Withrow was the man from whom I drew my pay every week. +And yet I could not understand it, for Maurice Blake had been far and +away the most successful skipper sailing for Withrow, and Withrow +always had a good eye for the dollar. + +No more came of it until this particular morning, some days after +Maurice and Withrow had quarrelled. Wesley Marrs and Tommie Clancy, +two men that I never tired of listening to, were on the dock and +sizing up the new vessel. Wesley Marrs was himself a great fisherman, +and master at this time of the wonderful Lucy Foster. + + When she swings the main boom over + And she feels the wind abaft, + + The way she'll walk to Gloucester'll + Make a steamer look a raft. + + For she's the Lucy Foster, + She's a seiner out of Gloucester,-- + +was the way the fishermen of the port used to sing about the Lucy; +while Tommie Clancy was Maurice Blake's closest friend. + +With ballast stored, masts stepped, rigging set up, and sails bent, +setting as sweet as could be to her lines and the lumpers beginning to +get her ready for the mackerel season, the Fred Withrow was certainly +a picture. + +After a couple of extra long pulls, blowing the smoke into the air, +and another look above and below, "That one--she'll sail some or I +don't know," said Wesley. + +"She sure will," said Tommie; "and it's a jeesly shame Maurice isn't +to have her." Then turning to me, "What in the devil's name ails that +man you work for, Joey?" + +I said I didn't know. + +"No, nor nobody else knows. I'd like to work in that store for him for +about ten minutes. I think I'd make him say something in that ten +minutes that would give me a good excuse for heaving him out the +window. He had an argument with Maurice, Wesley, and Maurice don't +know what it was half about, but he knows he came near to punching +Withrow." + +And Wesley and Tommie had to talk that out; and between the pair of +them, thinking of what they said, I thought I ought to walk back to +the store with barely a civil look for my employer, who didn't like +that at all, for he generally wanted to hand out the black looks +himself. + +Then the girls--my cousin Nellie and her particular chum, Alice +Foster--came in to weigh themselves, and also to remind me, they said, +that I was to take them over to Essex the next day for the launching +of the new vessel for the Duncan firm, which had been designed by a +friend of Nell's, a young fellow named Will Somers, who was just +beginning to get a name in Gloucester for fast and able models of +vessels. Withrow, who was not over-liberal with his holidays, said I +might go--mostly, I suspect, because Alice Foster had said she would +not make the trip without Nell, and Nell would not go unless I went +too. + +Then Nell and Miss Foster went on with the business of weighing +themselves. That was in line with the latest fad. It was always +something or other, and physical culture was in the air at this time +with every other girl in Gloucester, so far as I could see--either +Indian-club swinging or dumb-bell drilling, long walks, and things of +that kind, and telling how much better they felt after it. My cousin +Nell, who went in for anything that anybody ever told her about, was +trying to reduce her weight. According to some perfect-form charts, or +something or other on printed sheets, she weighed seven pounds more +than she should for her height. I thought she was about the right +weight myself, and told her so, but she said no--she was positively +fat. "Look at Alice," she said, "she's just the thing." + +I looked at Alice--Miss Foster I always called her myself--and +certainly she was a lovely girl, though perhaps a little too conscious +of it. She was one of the few that weren't going in for anything that +I could see. She wasn't even weighing herself, or at least she didn't +until Mr. Withrow, with his company manners in fine working order, +asked her if she wouldn't allow him to weigh her. + +There were people in town who said it was not for nothing that +Alice Foster was so chummy with my cousin Nell. They meant, of +course, that being chummy with Nell, who came down regularly to see +me, gave herself a good excuse to come along and so have a word with +Withrow. Fred Withrow himself was a big, well-built, handsome +man--an unusually good-looking man, I'd call him--and a great +heart-breaker, according to report--some of it his own. And he was +wealthy, too. I did not know, but somehow or other I did not believe +it, or maybe it was that I hoped rather than believed that Miss +Foster did not care particularly for him; for I did not like him +myself, although I worked for him and was taking his money. Being day +in and day out with him in the store, you see I saw him pretty much +as he really was, and I hated to think of a fine girl--for with +all her cool ways I knew Miss Foster was that--marrying him. Just +how Withrow thought he stood with Miss Foster I did not know--he +was a pretty close-mouthed man when he wanted to be. Miss Foster +herself was that reserved kind of a girl that you cannot always +place. She struck me as being a girl that would die before she would +confess a weakness or a troublesome feeling. And yet, without +knowing how it came there, there was always a notion in the back of +my head that made me half-believe that she did not come to the +store with my cousin out of pure companionship. There was something +besides--and what could it be but Withrow? + +After the weighing was done Nell asked me all at once, "I hear, Joe, +that Captain Hollis is going to have your new vessel? How is that? +We--I thought that Captain Blake was going master of her--and such a +pretty vessel!" + +I answered that I didn't know how it was, and looked over at my +employer, as much as to say, "Maybe he can tell you." + +I think now that I must have been a pretty impudent lad, letting my +employer know what I thought of him as I did in those days. I think, +too, he had a pretty shrewd notion of what I thought of himself and +Maurice Blake. At any rate, after the girls had gone, he worked +himself into a fine bit of temper, and I talked back at him, and the +end of it was that he discharged me--or 1 quit--I'm not sure which. I +do know that it was rapid-fire talk while it lasted. + +It was some satisfaction to me to tell Withrow just about what I did +think of him before I went. He didn't quite throw me out of the door, +although he was big enough for that; but he looked as if he wanted to. +And maybe he would have, too, or tried it, only I said, "Mind I don't +give you what Tommie Clancy threatened to give you once," and his +nerve went flat. I couldn't have handled him as Clancy had any more +than I could have hove a barrel of salt mackerel over my head, which +was what the strong fishermen of the port were doing about that time +to prove their strength; but the bluff went, and I couldn't help +throwing out my chest as I went out the door and thinking that I was +getting to be a great judge of human nature. + + + + +II + +A LITTLE JOG ALONG THE DOCKS + + +I was sorry to lose my job. I was twenty years old, without a trade or +special knowledge of any kind, and beyond the outfitting of fishing +vessels, knowing nothing of any business, and with no more than a high +school education--and that two years behind me--and I knew of no place +in Gloucester where I could begin all over and right away get as much +pay as I had left behind me. I might go to Boston, of course, and try +for something there--I was not ten minutes out of Withrow's before I +thought of doing that. But a little further thought and I knew there +were more capable men than I walking the streets of Boston looking for +work. However, a lot could happen before I would have to worry, and so +I decided to take the air and think it over. + +I might go fishing certainly--I had had a little experience in my +school vacations--if my mother would only stand for it. As to that I +did not know. If it came to fishing or starving--one or the +other--then of course she would have to let me go fishing. But my +father had been lost on the Grand Banks with his vessel and all +hands--and then one brother was already fishing. So I hardly thought +she would allow me, and anyway I knew she would never have a good +night's rest while I was out. + +However, I kept thinking it over. To get away by myself I took a ride +over to Essex. There I knew I would find half a dozen vessels on the +stocks, and there they were--the latest vessel for the Duncan firm and +three more for other firms. I knew one of the ship-carpenters in +Elwell's yard, Levi Woodbury, and he was telling me about some of the +vessels that had been launched lately. "Of course," he said, "you saw +the one launched a few days ago from here--that one built for Mr. +Withrow?" + +I said I had, and that she was a wonder to look at and that I wished +Maurice Blake, and not Sam Hollis, was to have her. + +"Yes," said Levi, "and a pity. Maurice Blake could have sailed her +right, though for that matter Sam Hollis is a clever hand to sail a +vessel, too. And she ought to sail some, that vessel. But look +here at this one for the Duncans and to be launched to-morrow. +Designed by Will Somers--know him? Yes? A nice young fellow. Ain't she +able-looking?" + +She certainly was, and handsome, and Levi went on to tell me about +her. He showed me where she was like and where she differed from the +Lucy Foster, the Fred Withrow, the Nannie O, the Colleen Bawn, and the +others which were then causing trouble in Gloucester with crews +fighting over their good qualities. I did not know a whole lot about +vessels, but having been born in Gloucester and having soaked in the +atmosphere all my life and loving vessels besides, I had a lot of +notions about them. And I liked this last Duncan vessel. By the wind +and in a sea-way, it struck me she would be a wonder. There was +something more than just the fine lines of her. There is that about +vessels. You can take two vessels, model them alike, rig them alike, +handle them alike, and still one will sail rings around the other. And +why is it? I've heard a hundred fishermen at different times say that +and then ask, Why is it? This one was awfully sharp forward, too sharp +some might have said, with little more forefoot than most of the +late-built flyers; but she was deep and had a quarter that I knew +would stand up under her sail. I liked the after-part of her. Racing +machines are all right for a few months or a year or two and in smooth +water, but give me a vessel that can stand up under sail. I thought I +could see where, if they gave her sail enough, especially aft, and a +skipper that would drive her, she might do great things. And +certainly she ought to be a comfort in a blow and bring a fellow +home--and there's a whole lot in that--being in a vessel that you feel +will bring you home again. + +I looked over the others, but none of them held me like the Duncan +vessel, and I soon came back to Gloucester and took a walk along the +waterfront. + +It was well into March at this time--the third week in March, I +remember--and there was a great business doing along the docks. The +salt bankers were almost ready to leave--twenty-eight or thirty sail +fitting out for the Grand Banks. And then there were the seiners--the +mackerel catchers--seventy or eighty sail of them making ready for the +Southern cruise. All that meant that things would be humming for a +while. So I took a walk along the docks to see it. + +Most of the vessels that had been fishing during the winter had been +stripped of their winter sails, and now aboard these they were bending +on the summer suits and slinging up what top spars had not already +been sent up. For the vessels that had been laid up all winter and +stripped of everything, they were getting out the gear from the lofts. +Everywhere it was topmasts being sent up, sails being dragged out, +stays swayed taut, halyards and sheets rove--an overhauling +generally. On the railways--Burnham's, Parkhurst's, and Tarr's--were +vessels having their bottoms scrubbed and painted and their topsides +lined out. And they all looked so handsome and smelt so fine with +their riggings being tarred, not with the smoky tar that people ashore +put on house-roofs, but the fine rich-smelling tar that goes into +vessels' rigging; and there was the black and dark sea-green paint for +the sides, with the gold or yellow or sometimes red stripe to mark the +run, and main and quarter rails being varnished. + +And the seine-boats! If there is anything afloat that sets more +easily on the water than a seine-boat I never saw it, unless it +might be a birch-bark canoe--and who'd want to be caught out in a +blow in a canoe? The seine-boats all looked as natural as so many +sea-gulls--thirty-six or thirty-eight feet long, green or blue +bottoms to just above the waterline so that it would show, and above +that all clear white except for the blue or red or yellow or green +decorations that some skippers liked. And the seines that went +with them were coming in wagons from the net and twine factory, +tanned brown or tarred black and all ready to be hauled on to the +vessels' decks or stowed in the holds below, until the fleet +should be in among the mackerel to the south'ard--off Hatteras or +Cape May or somewhere down that way. + +To feel all that and the rest of it--to walk to the tops of your shoes +in pine chips in the spar yards, to measure the lengths of booms and +gaffs for yourself if you weren't sure who were going to spread the +big mainsails, to go up in the sail-lofts and see the sailmakers, +bench after bench of them, making their needles and the long waxed +threads fly through the canvas that it seemed a pity wasn't to stay so +white forever--to see them spread the canvas out along the chalk lines +on the varnished floor, fixing leach and luff ropes to them and +putting the leather-bound cringles in, and putting them in too so +they'd stay, for by and by men's lives would depend on the way they +hung on--all that, railways, sail-lofts, vessels, boats, docks alive +with men jumping to their work--skippers, crews, carpenters, riggers, +lumpers, all thinking, talking, and, I suppose, dreaming of the +season's work ahead--m-m--there was life for a man! Who'd want to work +in a store after that? + +I stopped at Duncan's wharf and looked at Wesley Marrs's vessel, the +Lucy Foster, and then the Colleen Bawn. + + And O'Donnell drove the Colleen like a ghost through all that + gale, + And around 'twas roaring mountains and above 'twas blinding hail, + +and so on. And the Nannie O, another vessel that fishermen sang songs +about. + + Oh, the lovely Nannie O, + The able Nannie O, + The Nannie O a-drivin' through the gale. + +They were lying there, tied to the docks. They were all dreams, so +long and clean, with the beautiful sheer fore and aft, and the +overhang of the racers they were meant to be--the gold run, with the +grain of the varnished oak rails shining above the night-black of +their topsides, and varnished spars. They had the look of vessels that +could sail--and they could, and live out a gale--nothing like them +afloat I'd heard people say that ought to know. + +I walked along another stretch and at Withrow's dock I saw again the +new one that had been built for Maurice Blake but given to Sam Hollis, +who was a boon companion of Withrow's ashore, as I may have said +already. Hollis's gang were bragging even now that she'd trim anything +that ever sailed--the Lucy Foster, the Nannie O, the Colleen Bawn, and +all the rest of them. And there were some old sharks, too, upon the +docks who said they didn't know but she looked as if she could. But a +lot of other people didn't think it--she was all right as a vessel, +but Sam Hollis wasn't a Wesley Marrs, nor a Tom O'Donnell, nor a +Tommie Ohlsen, nor even a Maurice Blake, who was a much younger man +and a less experienced fisherman than any of the others. + +All that, with the vessels anchored in the stream and the little +dories running up and down and in and out--it all brought back again +the trips I'd made with my father, clear back to the time when I was a +little boy, so small that in heavy weather he wouldn't trust me to go +forward or aft myself, but would carry me in his arms himself--it all +made me so long for the sea that my head went round and I found myself +staggering like a drunken man as I tried to walk away from it. + + + + +III + +MINNIE ARKELL + + +There was nothing for it. For a thousand dollars a month I could not +stay ashore. Somebody or other would give me a chance to go seining, +some good skipper I knew; and if none of the killers would give me a +chance, then I'd try some old pod of a skipper. My mother would just +have to let me go. It was only summer fishing after all--seining +wasn't like winter trawling--and in the end she would see it as I +did. + +I walked along, and as the last man in my mind was Maurice Blake, of +course he was the first I had to run into. He was not looking well; I +mean he was not looking as he should have looked. There was a reckless +manner about him that no more belonged to him than a regularly quiet +manner belonged to his friend Tommie Clancy. And I guessed why--he had +been drinking. I had heard it already. Generally when a man starts to +drink for the first time everybody talks about it. I was surprised, +and I wished he hadn't. But we are always finding out new things about +men. In my heart I was not blaming Maurice so much maybe as I should. +I'd always been taught that drinking in excess was an awful habit, but +some otherwise fine men I knew drank at times, and I wasn't going to +blame Maurice till I knew more about it. + +And we can forgive a lot, too, in those we like. Maurice had no family +to think of, and it must have been a blow to him not to get so fine a +vessel as the Fred Withrow after he had been promised and had set his +heart on it. And then to see her go to a man like Sam Hollis! and with +the prospect of not getting another until a man like Withrow felt like +saying you could. Everybody in Gloucester seemed to know that Withrow +was doing all he could to keep Maurice from getting a vessel, and as +the owners had banded together just before this for protection, as +they called it, "against outside interference," and as Withrow was one +of the largest owners and a man of influence beyond his vessel +holdings, he was quite a power at this time. + +Maurice Blake was far from being drunk, however, when I met him this +day. Indeed, I do not believe that in his most reckless hour up to +this time he had ever lost control of himself so far as not to know +pretty nearly what he was doing all the time; but certainly he had +been drinking this day, and the drinking manner did not set well on +him. + +Maurice was standing on the front steps of Mrs. Arkell's boarding-house +when I saw him. It was Mrs. Arkell's granddaughter Minnie that married +the wealthy Mr. Miner--a rather loud sort of man, who had been reported +as saying that he would give her a good time and show her life. He may +have given her a good time--I don't know--but he was dead in two +years. He was supposed to be very rich--three or four millions--but on +settling up there was less than half a million. Of course that wasn't +bad--enough for Minnie to buy a big house next her grandmother's for +a summer home, and enough to go off travelling whenever she pleased. + +When she came back to Gloucester she was still a very handsome girl, +spoken of as the "Miner widow" among people who had known her only +since her marriage, but still called Minnie Arkell by most of those +who had known her when she was a child. In Gloucester she bought the +first house just around the corner from her grandmother's. A handy +passage between their two back yards allowed her to visit her +grandmother whenever she pleased. She wanted to be near her own +people, she said, and was more in her grandmother's house than her +own. + +Maurice came down the steps of Mrs. Arkell's boarding-house as I came +along, and joined me on the sidewalk. He asked me the first thing if +I wouldn't have a drink, and I said no. + +"Oh, I forgot," he said, "you don't drink. Have a cigar," and he +pulled one out of his pocket, and I took and lit it. Generally I +smoked a pipe, but I liked good cigars, though I couldn't afford them +myself. This was not a good one--more like the kind they hand out in +bar-rooms when men get tired of drinking and say they guess they'll +have a smoke. + +"How does it happen, Joe, you're not at the store? I always thought +Withrow held his men pretty close to hours." + +"Well, so he does, but I'm not working for him now." And then I told +him that I had had an argument with Withrow, been discharged, and was +thinking of going fishing. I didn't tell him at first how it all came +about, but I think he guessed it, for all at once, after a searching +look, he reached out and shook hands with me. + +"If ever I get a vessel again, Joe, and you still want to go fishing +and care for a chance with me, you can have it--if you can't go with a +better man, I mean. I'll take you and be glad to have you." + +That meant a good berth, of course, for Maurice was a killer. + +I looked at Maurice when he wasn't watching me, and felt sorry for +him. He was a man that anybody would like the looks of. It wasn't +that he was a handsome man--I never could get to like pretty men +myself--but there was something about him that made you feel you could +trust him. The heavy tan of his face and the grip of his jaw would +spoil almost anybody for a beauty man, I suppose, but he had fine eyes +and his mouth was all right, and he had a head that you'd like to +stand off one side and look at, with hair that seemed to lift and wave +with every breath of wind, and when he smiled you felt somehow that +he'd saved that particular smile for you. He was no better built than +a hundred other men I knew who were going fishing, and he was no +bigger than a thousand others sailing out of Gloucester, and not near +so big as a lot of others--five feet ten or eleven, maybe, he was, +with level shoulders, and very light on his feet--but looking at him +you knew he was all there. + +After smoking a while and watching him between puffs, it flashed on me +all at once that I was pretty thick. A word or two my cousin Nell had +let slip--not so much what she said as the way she said it--gave me a +hint of a whole lot of things. Looking at Maurice now I asked him if +he had seen my cousin or Miss Foster lately. + +He flushed up as he looked at me, and I saw that whatever he was +thinking of it had not been far away from what I had been thinking +of. "No, I haven't seen them"--slowly. "How is your cousin?" + +"Oh, she seems to be all right. They were both in to the store this +morning." + +"What doing?" I thought he was beginning to worry, but I tried not to +let on that I noticed it. I was beginning to feel like a sleuth, or a +detective, or a diplomat, or something. + +"Well, I don't know. Nell said they came in to see me, but all that +happened that I had any hand in was to weigh her. She gained another +pound last week, and it's worrying her. The more exercise she takes +the heavier she gets, she says. She's a hundred and thirty-one now. Of +course, while they're there Withrow had to help out and make himself +agreeable, especially to Miss Foster, but I can't see that she warms +up to him." + +"Ha? No? You don't think so?" + +"Not much, but maybe it's her way. She's pretty frosty generally +anyway, different from my cousin--she's something like." + +"Yes, your cousin is all right," said Maurice. + +"You bet," I said. "She don't stand around and chill the air." + +"Why--does Miss Foster always? Is that her way? I--don't--know--much +about her." + +"Well, I don't know so very much myself--mostly what my cousin tells +me. Still, I guess she's all right; but she strikes me as one of the +kind that might make an awful lot of a man and never let on until she +was dead sure of him." + +"H-m--That means she could think a whole lot of Withrow and not let +on, Joe?" + +I tried to look at Maurice like my oldest brother used to look at me +sometimes when he tried to make me feel that I was a very green kid +indeed, and said, "Well, if she's the kind to care for a man like +Withrow, all I've got to say is that she'll deserve all she'll get. +He's no good." + +"That may be, but how's she to know? I know, you know, and half the +men in Gloucester know that he's rotten; but take a woman who only +sees him at his best and when he's watching out--how's she to know?" + +"I don't know, but being a woman she ought to," was all I could say to +that. It came into my mind just then that when I next saw my cousin +Nell I'd tell her what I really knew, and more than that--what I +really thought of my old employer. Perhaps she'd carry it to Miss +Foster. If it was to be Maurice or Withrow, I knew on which side I was +going to be. + +Both of us were quiet then, neither of us quite knowing what to say +perhaps. Then together we started to walk to the corner of the side +street. We were past the side-door of the boarding-house when a voice +called out, "Oh, Maurice," and then, maybe noticing me, I suppose, +"Oh, Captain Blake," and Maurice turned. Minnie Arkell--Mrs. Miner +rather--was there at the kitchen window. I didn't know she was in town +at all--thought she hadn't got back from Florida, or North Carolina, +or wherever it was she had been for the winter. + +"Won't you come in a minute, Captain, and your friend? He doesn't +remember me--do you, Joe?--and yet we were playmates once," which was +true. I was often taken to Mrs. Arkell's when a little fellow by +skippers who were friends of my father's. They used to tell me about +him, and I liked to listen. + +"I thought I'd run over and see granny," she went on. "I'm back to the +old house for a while. Won't you come in?" + +My mind had long been set against Minnie Arkell. I knew about her +throwing over a fine young fellow, a promising skipper, to marry +Miner. I may have been too young at the time to judge anybody, but +after that I had small use for her. My ideas in the matter were of +course pretty much what older men had put into me. + +I had listened to them--skippers and others--and yet now, when she +held out her hand to me and smiled, I didn't feel nearly so set +against her. She certainly was a handsome girl, and yet I hoped that +Maurice wouldn't fall in love with her, as most everybody did that +came to the Arkell house. + +I said that I did not have time to come in, and started to make off. +Maurice asked me where I was bound. I told him that I thought of +taking a look in at Crow's Nest and getting the news. + +"Yes, you'll get it there, sure enough. When they can't tell you +anything else up there they can tell you what everybody's doing." He +smiled at that, turned slowly toward the side-door, as if he would +rather go with me to Crow's Nest, and I went off. + +Just outside the gate I saw Sam Hollis, a man I never did like. Tommie +Clancy, the man that could size up a person quicker than anybody I'd +ever met, used to say that deep down, if you could get at Hollis, +you'd find a quitter, but that nobody had ever got into him. I'd been +meeting Hollis after every trip in for two years in Withrow's store. +He was a successful fisherman, and a sharp, keen man ashore, but he +was a man I never quite took to. One of his ambitions, I felt +satisfied, was to be reckoned a devil of a fellow. He'd have given a +year's earnings, I knew, to have people point him out on the street +and say, "There's Sam Hollis--there's the boy to carry sail--nobody +ever made him take his mains'l in," the same as they used to say of a +half dozen or so that really would carry sail--that would drive a +vessel under before they would be the first to reef. But the people +didn't do that, although, let him tell it, he did wonderful things out +to sea, and he had such a way of telling it, too, that he'd almost +make you believe him. But as Clancy used to say, after he'd left you, +and you had time to think it over, you'd see where here and there his +story wasn't well-calked. My own idea was that he wanted a reputation +so that he could pose as a devil of a fellow with certain people +ashore. It is easy enough to see that even a more careful man than Sam +Hollis might take a chance for a smile from a woman like Minnie +Arkell. + +Anyhow, I never felt at home with Hollis, and so was willing to take +Clancy's judgment straight. Hollis was a man about forty, and had been +one of Minnie Arkell's admirers ever since I could remember--ever +since she was old enough to have any, I mean, and she wasn't any late +bloomer, as Clancy used to say. + +Hollis went into the Arkell house by the door that had only just +closed behind Maurice and Minnie Arkell. I didn't like that very much, +and was thinking of turning back and going in, too; but on second +thought it occurred to me that perhaps only Maurice would have a +welcome for me. So I didn't enter, but kept on to Crow's Nest +instead. + + + + +IV + +LITTLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN STANDS EXAMINATION + + +By this time I should have gone home, I suppose, and had something to +eat--it was getting on into the afternoon--but I didn't want to have a +talk with my mother yet awhile, and so kept on to Crow's Nest, where I +found half a dozen good-natured loafers. Not all were loafers +exactly--three or four were simply waiting around before shipping on +some seiner for the mackerel season. It promised to shower at the +time, too, and of course the gentlemen who formed old Peter's staff +could not think of venturing out in threatening weather. + +And there they were, with Peter Hines, the paid man in charge of +Crow's Nest, keeping a benevolent eye on them. Yarning, arguing, +skylarking, advising Peter, and having fun with little Johnnie Duncan +they were when I entered. Johnnie was the grandson of the head of the +Duncan firm, a fine, clear-eyed boy, that nobody could help liking. He +thought fishermen were the greatest people in the world. Whatever a +fisherman did was all right to Johnnie. + +I had got all the news at Crow's Nest and was just thinking of moving +along toward home when Tommie Clancy popped in. Of course that made a +difference. I wasn't going to move while Clancy was around. + +"My soul, but here's where the real gentlemen are," he had to say +first, and then, "Anybody seen Maurice to-day?" + +I told him I had, and where. + +"Anybody with him?" + +"Well, not with him exactly." I shook my head, and said nothing of +Minnie Arkell, nor of Sam Hollis, although Clancy, looking at me, I +could see, guessed that there was something else; and he might have +asked me something more only for the crowd and little Johnnie Duncan. + +Johnnie was trying to climb up onto Clancy, and so Clancy, turning +from me, took Johnnie up and gave him a toss that all but hit his head +against the roof. "And how's she heading, Johnnie-boy?" and taking a +seat stood Johnnie up beside him. + +"East-s'uth-east, and a fair, fair wind," answered Johnnie. + +"East-s'uth-east--my, but you said that fine. And a fair wind? Must be +bound Georges Bank way. And how long will you hold that course?" + +"From Eastern Point--a hundred and thirty-five mile." + +"Yes--and then?" + +"Then you throw her up and heave the lead." + +"And heave the lead--sure enough. And then?" + +"And then, if you find you're clear of the North Shoal, you put her to +the s'uth'ard and west'ard till you're in onto the Bank." + +"S'uth'ard and west'ard--that's the boy. Man, but I'll live to see you +going to the Custom House and taking out your master's papers yet." + +"And can I join the Master Mariners then?" + +"That's what you can, and walk down Main Street with a swing to your +shoulders, too. And now you're up on the Bank and twenty-five fathom +of water and the right bottom--and you're a hand-liner, say, after +cod--what then?" + +"Let go her chain and begin fishing." + +"And would you give her a short or a long string of cable?" + +"M-m--I'm not sure. A long string you'd hang on better, but a short +scope and you could get out faster in case you were dragging and going +onto the shoals. What would you do, Captain Clancy? You never told me +that, did you?" + +"Well, it would depend, too, though handliners generally calculate on +hanging on, blow how it will. But never mind that; suppose your +anchor dragged or parted and into the shoal water you went in a gale, +an easterly, say--and the bank right under your lee--wind sixty or +seventy or eighty mile an hour--what would you do?" + +"Anchor not hold? M-m--Then I'd--give her the second one." + +"And if that dragged, too--or parted?" + +"Both of 'em? M-m"--Johnnie was taking deep breaths now--"why, then +I'd have to put sail to her----" + +"What sail?" + +"Why, jib, jumbo, fore and main." + +"And the wind blowing eighty mile an hour?" + +"Why, yes, if she'd stand it." + +"My, but she'd have to be an able vessel that--all four lowers and the +wind blowing eighty mile an hour. Man, but you're a dog! Suppose she +couldn't stand it?" + +"Then I'd reef the mains'l." + +"And if that was too much--what then?" + +"Reef it again." + +"And too much yet?" + +"Balance-reef it--maybe take it in altogether--and the jib with it, +and get out the riding-sail." + +"And would you do nothing to the fores'l?" + +"M-m--I dunno--with some vessels maybe I'd reef that, too--maybe take +it in altogether." + +"My, but you're cert'nly a dog. And what then?" + +"Why, then I'd try to work her out." + +"And would you be doing anything with the lead?" + +"Oh, we'd be keeping the lead going all the time, for banging her +across and back like that you wouldn't know where you were just." + +"And would you come clear, d'y' think?" + +"Yes, sir--if the gear held and with an able vessel we ought to." + +"If the gear held--that's it. Be sure, Johnnie-boy, you see that the +gear is all right before ever you leave port. And with an able vessel, +you say? With that new one of your gran'pa's--would you come clear +with her?" + +"Oh, she'd come clear--built to go fresh halibuting next winter, that +one." + +"Yes--and seining this spring. But suppose now you were +haddocking--trawling--eight or ten dories, and you just arrived on the +grounds, picked out a good spot, and there you are--you're all baited +up and ready?" + +"Winter time?" + +"Winter time, yes." + +"First I'd single-reef the mains'l. Then I'd hold her up a little--not +too much--me being skipper would be to the wheel myself--and then I'd +give the order, 'Dories to the rail!' and then, when everything was +all right--when I'd be satisfied we wouldn't foul the next vessel's +trawls--I'd call out, 'Over with your wind'ard dory!'" + +"Loud and clear you'd holler, because the wind might be high." + +"Loud and clear, yes--'Let go your wind'ard dory!'--like that. And +'Set to the west'ard,' or the east'ard, whatever it was--according to +the tide, you know. I'd call that out to the dory as it went sliding +by the quarter--the vessel, of course, 'd be sailing all the time--and +next, 'Wind'ard dory to the rail!' And then, when we'd gone ahead +enough, again, 'Let go your looard dory!' and then, 'Looard dory to +the rail! Let go your wind'ard dory! Let go your looard dory!' and so +till they were all over the side." + +"And supposing, they being all out, it came on thick, or snowing, and +some of them went astray, and it was time to go home, having filled +her with eighty or ninety or a hundred thousand of fresh fish, a fair +wind, and every prospect of a good market--what then?" + +"Oh, I'd have to wait, of course--cruise around and stand by." + +"And suppose you couldn't find them again?" + +"Why, after waiting until I was sure they were gone, I'd come home." + +"And your flag?" + +"Half-mast." + +"Half-mast--that's it. I hope you'll never have to fly a half-masted +flag, Johnnie. But suppose you did see them, and they were in shoal +water, say--and the shoals to looard, of course, and it blowing----" + +"I'd stand in and get them." + +"And it blowing hard--blowing hard, Johnnie?--and shoal--shoal +water?" + +"Why"--Johnnie was looking troubled--"why, I'd have to stand in just +the same, wouldn't I?" + +"Your own men and you ask me, Johnnie-boy?" + +"Why, of course I'd have to stand in and get them." + +"And if you got in so far you couldn't get out--you got smothered, +say?" + +"Why, then--then we'd be lost--all hands would be lost." + +Poor Johnnie! he was all but crying. + +"That's it. And that's where some would say you showed yourself a man, +and some a fool, Johnnie-boy. Some would say, 'Use judgment--think of +the other eighteen or twenty men safe aboard the vessel.' Would you +use judgment, or what, Johnnie?" + +"M-m--I don't know. What would you do, Captain Clancy?" + +"What d'y' think I'd do, Johnnie?" Clancy drew the boy up and tucked +the little face to his own broad breast. The rest of us knew well +enough what Clancy would do. "Judgment hell!" Clancy would say, and go +in and get lost--or maybe get away with it where a more careful man +would be lost--but we waited to hear what Johnnie--such a little +boy--would say. He said it at last, after looking long into Clancy's +face. + +"I think you'd go in, Captain Clancy." + +Clancy laughed at that. "Lord, Johnnie-boy, no wonder everybody loves +you. No matter what a man does, all you see is the best that's in +him." + +It was time to clean up then, and Johnnie of course was bound to +help. + + + + +V + +FROM OUT OF CROW'S NEST + + +"What'll I do with this?" asked Johnnie, in the middle of the cleaning +up, holding up a pan of sweepings. + +"Oh, that"--Clancy naturally took charge--"heave it overboard. Ebb +tide'll carry it away. Heave it into the slip. Wait--maybe you'll have +to hoist the hatches. 'Tisn't raining much now, anyway, and it will +soon stop altogether. Might as well go aloft and make a good job of +the hatches, hadn't he, Peter?" + +"Wait a minute." Peter was squinting through the porthole. "I +shouldn't wonder but this is one of our fellows coming in. I know +she's a banker. The Enchantress, I think. Look, Tommie, and see what +you make of her." + +Clancy looked. "That's who it is, Peter. Hi, Johnnie, here'll be a +chance for you to hoist the flag. Hurry aloft and tend to the hatches, +as Peter says, and you can hoist the flag for the Enchantress home +from the Banks." + +In bad weather, like it was that day, the little balcony of Crow's +Nest was shut in by little hatches, arranged so that they could be run +up and down, the same as hatches are slid over the companionway of a +fisherman's cabin or forec's'le. Johnnie was a pretty active boy, and +he was up the rope ladder and onto the roof in a few seconds. We could +hear him walking above, and soon the hatches slid away and we all +could look freely out to sea again. + +"All right below?" called out Johnnie. + +"Not yet," answered Peter. He was standing by the rail of the balcony +and untwisting the halyards that served to hoist the signal-flags to +the mast-head. Peter seemed slow at it, and Clancy called out again, +"Wait a bit, and we'll overhaul the halyards." Then, looking up and +noticing that Johnnie was standing on the edge of the roof, he added, +"And be careful and not slip on those wet planks." + +"Aye, aye!" Johnnie was in high glee. "And then I can run up the flag +for the Enchantress?" + +"Sure, you've been such a good boy to-day." + +"M-m--but that'll be fine. I can catch the halyards from here if +you'll swing them in a little." + +"All right--be careful. Here you go now." + +"Let 'em come--I got----" + +The first thing we knew of what had happened was when we saw Johnnie's +body come pitching down. He struck old Peter first, staggering him, +and from there he shot down out of sight. + +Clancy jumped to the rail in time to save Peter from toppling over it +and just in time, as he said afterward, to see the boy splash in the +slip below. He yanked Peter to his feet, and then, without turning +around, he called out, "A couple of you run to the head of the +dock--there'll be a dory there somewhere--row 'round to the slip with +it. He'll be carried under the south side--look for him there if I'm +not there before you. Drive her now!" + +"Here, Joe, wake up!" Clancy had untied the ends of the halyards after +whirling them through the block above, and now had the whole line +piled up on the balcony. He took a couple of turns around his waist, +took another turn around a cleat under the balcony rail, passed the +bight of the line to me, and said, "Here, Joe, lower me. Take hold +you, too, Peter. Pay out and not too careful. Oh, faster, man! If he +ain't dead he'll drown, maybe--if he gets sucked in and caught under +those piles it's all off." + +He was sliding over the rail, the line tautening to his weight in no +time, and he talking all the time. "Lower away--lower, lower! +Faster--faster than that--he's rising again--second time--and drifting +under the wharf, sure's fate! Faster--faster--what's wrong?--what's +caught there?--let her run!" + +The halyards had become fouled, and Peter was trying to clear them, +calling to Clancy to wait. + +"Fouled?" roared Clancy. "Cast it off altogether. Let go altogether +and let me drop." + +"We can't--the bight of it's caught around Peter's legs!" I called to +him. + +"Oh, hell! take a couple of half-hitches around the cleat then--look +out now!" He gripped the halyards high above his head with both hands, +gave a jumping pull, and let himself drop. The line parted and down he +shot. + +He must have been shaken by the shock of his fall, but I guess he had +his senses with him when he came up again, for in no time he was +striking toward where Johnnie had come up last. Then I ran downstairs, +down to the dock, and was just in time to see Parsons and Moore rowing +a dory desperately up the slip, and Clancy with Johnnie chest-up, and +a hand under his neck, kicking from under the stringers, and calling +out, "This way with the dory--drive her, fellows, drive her!" + +I did not wait for any more--I knew Johnnie was safe with Clancy--but +ran to the office of the Duncans and told them that Johnnie had fallen +into the dock and got wet, and that it might be well to telephone for +a doctor. His grandfather knew it was serious without my saying any +more, and rang up at once. + +That had hardly been done when Clancy came in the door with Johnnie in +his arms. The boy was limp and unconscious and water was dripping from +him. Old Mr. Duncan was worried enough, but composed in his manner for +all that. He met Clancy at the door. "This way, Captain; lay him on +this couch. The doctor will be here in a very few minutes now. Perhaps +we can do something while he is on the way. Just how did it happen? +and we'll know better what to do, perhaps." + +Clancy told his story in forty words. "He's probably shook up and his +lungs must be full of water. But he may come out all right--his +eyelids quivered coming up the dock. Better strip his shirt and waist +off. He's got a lot of water in him--roll him over and we'll get some +of it out." + +He worked away on Johnnie, and had the water pretty well out of him by +the time the uncle and the doctor came. It was hard work for a time, +but it came at last to when the doctor stood up, rested his arms for a +breath, said, "Ah--he's all right now," and went on again. It was not +so very long after that that Johnnie opened his eyes--for about a +second. But pretty soon he opened them to stay. His first look was for +his grandfather, but his first word was for Clancy. "I could see you +when you jumped, Captain Clancy--it was great." + +Then they bundled Johnnie into a carriage and his uncle took him +home. + +"Lord, but I thought he was gone, Joe. But let's get out of this," +said Clancy, and we were making for the door, with Clancy's clothes +still wringing wet, when we were stopped by the elder Mr. Duncan, who +shook hands with both of us and then went on to speak to Clancy. + +"Captain Clancy----" + +"Captain once, but----" + +"I know, I know, but not from lack of ability, at any rate. Let me +thank you. His mother will thank you herself later, and make you feel, +I know, her sense of what she owes to you. And his cousin Alice--she +thinks the world of him. There, I know you don't want to hear any +more, but you shall--maybe later--though it may come up in another +way. But tell me--wait, come inside a minute. Come in you, too, Joe," +he said, turning to me, but I said I'd rather wait outside. I wanted +to have a smoke to get my nerves steady again, I guess. + +So Clancy and Mr. Duncan went inside, and through the window, whenever +I looked up, I could see them. As their talk went on I could see that +they were getting very much interested about something or other. +Clancy particularly was laying down the law with a clenched fist and +an arm that swung through the air like a jibing boom. Somebody, I +knew, was getting it. + +When they came out Mr. Duncan stopped at the door, and said, as if by +way of a parting word, "And so you think that's the cause of Withrow's +picking a quarrel with Maurice? Well, I never thought of that before, +but maybe you're right. And now, what do you say to a vessel for +yourself?" + +"Me take a vessel? No, sir--not for me. But when you've got vessels to +hand around, Mr. Duncan, bear Maurice in mind--he's a fisherman." + +We left Mr. Duncan then, he making ready to telephone to learn how +Johnnie was getting along. Clancy said his clothes were beginning to +feel so dry that he did not know as he would go to his boarding-house. +"I think we'd better go up to the Anchorage and have a little touch. +But I forgot--you don't drink, Joe? No? So I thought, but don't you +care--you're young yet. Come along, anyway, and have a smoke." + +And so we went along to the Anchorage, and while we were there, I +smoking one of those barroom cigars and Clancy nursing the after-taste +of his drink and declaring that a touch of good liquor was equal to a +warm stove for drying wet clothes, I told him what I would have told +him in Crow's Nest if there had not been so many around--about Minnie +Arkell calling Maurice back into her grandmother's house, and then Sam +Hollis coming along and going in after him. + +"What!" and stopped dead. Suddenly he brought his fist through the +air. "I'll"--and as suddenly stopped it midway. "No, I won't, either. +But I'll put Maurice wise to them. What should he know at his age and +with his up-bringing of what's in the heads of people like them. And +if I don't have something further to say to old Mr. Duncan! But now +let's go back to Arkell's--come on, Joe." + +But I didn't go back with him. I didn't think that I could do Maurice +any good then, and I might be in the way if Clancy wanted to speak his +mind out to anybody. I went home instead, where I expected to have +troubles of my own, for I knew that my mother wouldn't like the idea +of my going seining. + + + + +VI + +MAURICE BLAKE GETS A VESSEL + + +Three days after Johnnie Duncan fell out of Crow's Nest the new +Duncan vessel designed by Will Somers was towed around from Essex. +She had been named the Johnnie Duncan. I spent the best part of the +next three days watching the sparmakers and riggers at work on her. +And when they had done with her and she fit to go to sea, she did look +handsome. She had not quite the length of the new vessel of Sam +Hollis's, which lay at Withrow's dock just below her, and that +probably helped to give her a more powerful look to people that +compared them. Too able-looking altogether to be real fast, some +thought, to hold the Withrow vessel in anything short of a gale, but +I didn't feel so sure she wouldn't sail in a moderate breeze, too. +I had seen her on the stocks, and knew the beautiful lines below the +water-mark. And she was going to carry the sail to drive her. I took +particular pains to get the measurements of her mainmast while it +lay on the dock under the shears. It was eighty-seven feet--and +she only a hundred and ten feet over all--and it stepped plumb in +the middle of her, further forward than a mainmast was generally put +in a fisherman. To that was shackled a seventy-five foot boom, and +eighty-odd tons of pig-iron were cemented close down to her keel, and +that floored over and stanchioned snug. For the rest, she was very +narrow forward, as I think I said--everybody said she'd never stand +the strain of her fore-rigging when they got to driving her on a +long passage. And she carried an ungodly bowsprit--thirty-seven feet +outboard--easily the longest bowsprit out of Gloucester. Topmasts to +match, and there was some sail to drive a vessel. But she had the +hull for it, full and yet easy, with the greatest beam pretty well +aft of the mainmast, and she drew fifteen and a half feet of water. + +I was still looking her over, her third day in the riggers' and +sailmakers' hands, when Clancy came along. + +"Handsome, ain't she, and only needing a skipper and crew to be off on +the Southern cruise, eh, Joe?" + +"That's all. And according to the talk, you're to be the skipper." + +"Well, talk has another according coming to it." + +"I'm sorry to hear that. But what happened at Mrs. Arkell's the other +day?" + +"What happened? Joe, but I was glad you didn't come with me. You'd +have felt as I did about it, I know. There they were--the two of +them--Hollis and Withrow--yes, Withrow there--when I broke in on them, +and Maurice between them--drunk. Yes, sir, drunk and helpless. They +called it a wine-party, as though a man couldn't get as good and drunk +on wine in a private residence as ever he could on whiskey or rum in +the back room of a saloon. Well, sir, I asked a question or two, and +they tried to face me out, but out they went--first Hollis, and then +Withrow, one after the other, and both good and lively. And then +Minnie Arkell popped in from her own house by way of the backyard. She +didn't expect to see me--I know she didn't. Had gone over to her house +when the men began to drink, she said, and had just come over to see +granny. + +"Well, I told her what I thought. 'It means nothing to you,' I +said, 'to see a man make a fool of himself--that's been a good +part of your business in life for some time, now--to see men make +fools of themselves for you. Withrow had reasons for wanting him +disgraced--never mind why. Sam Hollis, maybe, has his reasons too. And +the two of them are being helped along by you. You could have stopped +this thing here to-day, but you didn't.' 'No, no, Tommie,' she says. +'Yes, yes,' I went on, 'and don't try to tell me different. If I +didn't know you since you were a little girl you might be able to +convince me, but I know you. Maurice, when he was himself, passed +you by. You were bound to have him. You know a real man, more's the +pity, when you see one, and you know that Maurice, young and green +and soft as he is, has more life and dash than a dozen of the kind +you've been mixing with lately.' + +"Oh, but I laid it on, Joe. Yes. A shame to have to talk like that to +a woman, but I just had to. I didn't stop there. 'You're handsome, and +you're rich, Minnie Arkell; got a lot of life left in you yet, and go +off travelling with people who get their names regularly in the Boston +papers; but just the same, Minnie Arkell, there are women in jail not +half so bad as you--women doing time who've done less mischief in the +world than you have.'" + +"Wasn't that pretty rough, Tommie?" + +"Rough? Lord, yes--but true, Joe, true. And if you'd only see poor +Maurice lying there! Cried? I could've cried, Joe--not since my mother +died did I come so near to it. But it was done. + +"Well, I made Minnie go and get her grandmother. And, Joe, if you'd +seen that fine old lady--oh, but she's got a heart in her--stoop and +put Maurice's head on her bosom as if he was a little child. 'The +poor, poor boy. No mother here,' she said, 'and the best man on earth +might come to it. Leave him to me, Tommie.' Lord, I could have knelt +down at her feet--the heart in her, Joe." + +"And how has Maurice been since?" + +"All right. That was the first time in his life that he was drunk. I +think it will be his last. But let's go aboard the Johnnie." + +After looking over the Johnnie Duncan and admiring her to our hearts' +content, we sat down in her cabin and began to talk of the seining +season to come. Others came down and joined in--George Moore, Eddie +Parsons among others--and they asked Clancy what he was going to do. +Was he going to see about a chance to go seining, or what? Moore said +he's been waiting to see what Maurice Blake was going to do; but as it +was beginning to look as though Maurice was done for, he guessed he'd +take a look around. He asked Clancy what he thought, and Clancy said +he didn't know--time enough yet. + +Maurice Blake himself dropped down then. He was looking better, and +everybody was glad to see it. He'd quit drinking--that was certain; +and now he was a picture of a man--not pretty, but strong-looking, +with his eyes glowing and his skin flushing with the good blood inside +him. He took a seat on the lockers and began to whittle a block of +soft pine into a model of a hull, and after a while, with a squint +along the sheer of his little model, he asked if anybody had seen Tom +O'Donnell or Wesley Marrs. Several said yes, they had, and he asked +where, and when they told him he got up and said he guessed he'd go +along--as he couldn't get a vessel himself, he might as well see about +a chance to go hand. "And as we've been together so much in times gone +by, Tommie, and you, Eddie and George, what do you say if we go +together now?" + +"All right," said Clancy, "but wait a minute--who's that in the +gangway?" + +It turned out to be Johnnie Duncan. He had a fat bundle under his arm, +and bundle and all Clancy took him up, tossed him into the air, said +"All right again, Johnnie-boy?" and kissed him when he caught him +down. + +Johnnie started to undo his bundle. "I tell you it's great to be out +again--the way they kept me cooped up the last few days," and then, +cutting the string to hurry matters, opened the bundle and spread a +handsome set of colors on the lockers. "The Johnnie Duncan's," said +he. "I picked out the kind they were to be, but mummer worked the +monograms herself. See, red and blue. And see that for an ensign! and +the firm's flag--and the highs--look!--the J. A. D. twisted up the +same as on the handkerchiefs we strained the coffee through last week. +And the burgee--the letters on the burgee--my cousin Alice worked +them. And these stars--see, on the ensign--mummer and my cousin both +worked them. Gran'pa said the vessel ought to be sure a lucky one, and +all she needs is an able master, he says, and if Captain Blake will +take her he'll be proud to have him sail the Johnnie Duncan----" + +Maurice Blake stood up. "Me?" + +"Yes," said Johnnie. "Gran'pa says that you can have her just as soon +as you go to the Custom House and get your papers. There, I think I +remembered it all, except of course that the colors are from me and +mummer and my cousin Alice, and will you fly them for us?" + +Maurice laid down his model and picked up the colors. Then he looked +at Johnnie and said, "Thank you, Johnnie; and tell your mother, +Johnnie, and your cousin, that I'll fly the Johnnie Duncan's +colors--and stand by them--if ever it comes to standing by--till she +goes under. Tell your grandfather that I'll be proud to be master of +his vessel and I'll sail her the best I know how." + +"That's you, Maurice," said Clancy. + +Maurice drew his hand across his eyes and sat down again. And as soon +as they decently could, Clancy, George Moore, and Eddie Parsons asked +him if they might ship with him for the Southern cruise. Maurice said +they very well knew that he'd be glad to have them. He asked me, too, +he felt so good, and of course I jumped at the chance. + + + + +VII + +CLANCY CROSSES MINNIE ARKELL + + +The Johnnie Duncan only needed to have her stores taken aboard to go +to sea. And that was attended to next morning, and she was out for her +trial trip the same afternoon. Everybody said she looked as handsome +as a photograph going out, though all the old sharks, when they saw +her mainsail hoisted for the first time, said she'd certainly have +need of her quarter and draught to stand up under it. + +It was a great day for sailing, though--the finest kind of a breeze, +and smooth water. We early carried away our foretopmast, which had a +flaw in it. It was just as well to discover it then. Without topsail +and balloon we had it out with the Eastern Point on her way back from +Boston. She was not much of a steamer for speed, but her schedule +called for twelve knots and she generally made pretty near it--eleven +or eleven and a half, according to how her stokers felt, I guess. We +headed her off after a while, and that was doing pretty well for that +breeze, with a new vessel not yet loosened up. + +"But the balloon was too much for her," said Mr. Duncan, as we shot +into the dock after beating the Eastern Point. + +"No, the balloon was all right--'twas the topm'st was a bit light," +answered Maurice. + +Old Mr. Duncan smiled at that. "But what do you think of her, Captain +Blake?" + +"Oh, she's like all the rest of them when she's alone--sails like the +devil," the skipper answered to that, but he smiled with it and we all +knew he was satisfied with her. + +That night was the Master Mariners' Ball, and I waited up till late to +talk with my cousin Nell, who had gone there with Will Somers. Finally +they came along past my house and I hailed them. + +Nell broke right in as usual with what was uppermost in her mind. "I +don't suppose you saw me and Alice, but we were in Mr. Duncan's office +when you and Mr. Clancy and Captain Blake were coming up the dock +to-day after the trial trip. Mr. Duncan told us what Captain Blake +said of the Johnnie Duncan, but now tell me, what did the rest of you +think of her? What does your friend Clancy say? He knows a vessel." + +"Clancy," I answered, "thought what we all thought, I guess--that +she's a fast vessel any way you take her, but he won't say she's the +fastest vessel out of Gloucester, even after she's put in trim and +loosened up. But in a sea-going way and with wind enough--with wind +enough, mind--he thinks she'll do pretty well." + +"With wind enough and in a sea-way?" repeated Nell. "Then I hope that +when the fishermen's race is sailed next fall it's a howling gale and +seas clear to your mast-head. Yes, and you needn't laugh--don't you +know what it means to Will?" + +And I did realize. Somers, a fine fellow, was just then beginning to +get a chance at designing fishermen. So far he had done pretty well, +but it was on the Johnnie Duncan, I knew, he had pinned his faith. For +his own sake, I hoped that the Johnnie would do great things, but for +Nell's sake I prayed she would. Nell thought a lot of Will and wasn't +ashamed to show her liking, and thinking of that set me to thinking of +other things. + +"Was Miss Foster to the ball?" I asked her. + +"She was," said Nell. + +"And with whom?" + +"Mr. Withrow." + +"Oh-h, Lord!" + +"Oh-h!--and why Oh-h-h?" + +"I wish she'd gone with Maurice." + +"H-m--that was drunk the other day?" + +"Yes, I suppose that queers him forever. And the other fellow does +ten times as bad, only under cover. Who told you?" + +"Never mind. Wasn't he?" + +"Was Maurice to the ball?" + +"He was." + +"And who with?" + +"With nobody." + +"Good. Was Mrs. Miner there?" + +"Mrs. Miner?"--and such a sniff!--"yes, she was there." + +"With Sam Hollis?" + +"Yes, and flirted with half the men in the hall and with your Maurice +Blake outrageously." + +"That so? Could Maurice help that much? But I wish, just the same, +that Miss Foster had gone with Maurice." + +"Well, there was one very good reason." + +"What?" + +"He didn't ask her. And Mr. Withrow made a handsome cavalier anyway." + +"A handsome"--I was going to say lobster, but I didn't. Instead I told +her why Maurice didn't ask Miss Foster--that he didn't think enough of +himself, probably. And that led up to a talk about Maurice Blake and +Clancy. Before I got through I had Nell won over. Indeed, I think she +was won over before I began at all. + +"There's a whole lot you don't know yet," she said at last. "Get +Captain Blake to make a name for himself seining, and for sailing his +vessel as she ought to be sailed, and I'll get down on my knees to +Alice for him--sail her as she ought to be sailed, remember. And make +a good stock with her, and you'll see." + +So, as I walked down the street with Nell and Will Somers a part of +the way, the talk was in that strain, and when I left them, after +passing Sam Hollis bound home, it was with the hope of things coming +out all right. I was feeling happy until I got near Minnie Arkell's +door, where my worrying began again, for there on the steps and in the +glare of the electric light was Minnie Arkell herself, as though she +were waiting for somebody. And not wanting to have her know that I saw +her waiting at her door steps at that time of night, I stepped in the +shadows until she should go in. It was then that Maurice came along, +and she called him up. And he went up and stood on the step below her +and she bent over him as if she wanted to lift him up. And it was less +than five minutes since Sam Hollis left her. + +"Come around by way of the side door of grandma's house, Maurice, and +through her yard and into my house, and nobody will see you. And then +no old grannies will talk and we'll have a little supper all to +ourselves. Hurry now." She was talking as if she owned him. I did not +hear what Maurice said, nor I did not want to hear; but making for the +corner, he went by me like a shot, and "O Lord!" I heard him groan as +he passed me, not recognizing me--not even seeing me, I believe. + +I did not know what to make of it and let him go by. But after he had +turned the corner and Minnie Arkell had shut her door--and she watched +him till he disappeared around the corner--I ran after him. In my +hurrying after him I heard the voice of Clancy coming down the street. +He was singing. I had heard from Nell of Clancy being at the ball, +where he was as usual in charge of the commissary. I could imagine how +they must have drove things around the punch-bowl with Clancy to the +wheel. He was coming along now and for blocks anybody that was not +dead could hear him. And getting nearer I had to admire him. He was +magnificent, even with a list to port. Not often, I imagined, did men +of Clancy's lace and figure get into evening dress. The height and +breadth of him!--and spreading enough linen on his shirt front to make +a sail for quite a little vessel. He was almost on top of me, with + + "Oh, hove flat down on th' Western Banks + Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks-- + And----" + +when I hailed him. + +"Hulloh, if it ain't Joe Buckley. Why, Joey, but aren't you out pretty +late to-night? But maybe you're only standing watch for somebody? +Three o'clock, Joey, and no excuse for you, for you didn't have to +stand by the supplies--" But then I rushed him around the corner, and +down the street to the side door of Mrs. Arkell's and just in time to +head off Maurice, bound as I knew for Minnie Arkell's house across the +yard. I didn't have a chance to say a word to Tommie, but he didn't +have to be told. If I'd been explaining for a week he couldn't have +picked things up any better than he did. + +"Maurice--hi, Maurice! Oh, 'tis you, isn't it. Well, Maurice-boy, all +the night I waited for a chance to have a word with you, but ne'er a +chance could I get. Early in the evening--when I was fit for ladies' +company--Miss Foster said how proud she was to know me--me, who had +saved her cousin Johnnie's life. And then she asked me about the +vessel, and I told her, Maurice, that nothing like the Duncan ever +pushed salt water from out of her way before. 'Nothing with two sticks +in her,' says I, and I laid it on thick; 'and Maurice Blake,' says +I--and there, Maurice, I only spoke true catechism. 'Maurice Blake,' +says I, 'is the man to sail her.' She was glad, she said, to know +that, because her chum, Miss Buckley--Joe's cousin there--wanted that +particular vessel to be a success. And she herself was interested in +it. Never mind the reasons, she said. And she always did believe--and, +Maurice, listen now--she knew that Captain Blake would do the Johnnie +Duncan justice. And I said to her--well, Maurice, what I said you can +guess well enough. No, come to think, you can't guess, but I won't +tell you to your face. But thinking of it now, I mind, Maurice, the +time when we were dory-mates--you and me, Maurice--and the cold +winter's day our dory was capsized. And dark coming on and nothing in +sight, and I could see you beginning to get tired. But tired as you +were, Maurice, tired as you were and the gray look beginning to creep +over you, you says, 'Tommie, take the plug strap for a while, you.'" + +"But you didn't take it, Tommie." + +"No, I didn't take it--and why? I didn't take it--and why? Because, +though the mothers that bore us both were great women--all fire and +iron--'twas in me to last longer--you a boy and your first winter +fishing, and me a tough, hard old trawler. And you had all of life +before you, and I'd run through some hard years of mine. If I'd gone +'twould have been no great loss, but you, Maurice, innocent as a +child--how could I? I'd known men and women, good and bad--I'd lived +life and I'd had my chance and thrown it away--but at your age the +things you had to learn! Maybe I didn't think it all out like that, +but that was why I didn't take the plug strap. But, Maurice-boy, I +never forgot it. 'Take the plug strap, you, Tommie,' you says. We were +dory-mates, of course, but, Maurice-boy, I'll never forget it." + +Clancy took off his hat and drew his hand across his forehead. "And +where were you bound when we stopped you, Maurice?" + +"Oh, I don't know. To take a walk maybe." + +"Sure, and why not? Let's all take a walk. Let's take a walk down to +the dock and have a look at the vessel. Too dark? So it is, but we can +see the shadow of her masts rising up to the clouds and we can open up +the cabin and go below and have a smoke. Come, Maurice. Come on, +Joe." + +And down to the cabin of the Johnnie Duncan we went, and Clancy never +in such humor. For three hours--from a little after three o'clock +until after six--we sat on the lockers, Clancy talking and we smoking +and roaring at him. Only the sun coming up over Eastern Point, +lighting up the harbor and striking into the cabin of the Johnnie +Duncan, brought Clancy to a halt. + +He moved then and we with him. We left Maurice at the door of old Mrs. +Arkell's, the old lady herself in the doorway and asking us if we had +a good time at the ball. Standing on the steps, before he went in, +Maurice said to me: "Tell your cousin, Joe, that when I do race the +Johnnie, I'll take the spars out of her before anything gets by--take +the spars out or send her under. I can't do any more than that." + +The Johnnie Duncan was to leave at ten o'clock and so I left Clancy at +his boarding-house. He looked tired when I left him. But he was +chuckling, too. I asked him what it was that made him smile so. + +"I'll give you three guesses," he said, but I didn't guess. + + + + +VIII + +THE SEINING FLEET PUTS OUT TO SEA + + +The rest of that morning, between leaving Clancy and getting back to +the dock again, I spent in cleaning up and overhauling my home outfit. +My mother couldn't be made to believe that store bedding was of much +use--and she was right, I guess--and so a warranted mattress and +blankets and comforters and a pillow were made into a bundle and +thrown onto a waiting wagon. Then it was good-by to all--good-by to my +cousin Nell, who had come over from her house, good-by and a kiss for +her little sister--late for school she was, but didn't care she +said--and then good-by to my mother. That took longer. Then it was +into the wagon with my bedding and off to the dock. + +At Duncan's store I had charged up to me such other stuff as I needed: +Two suits of oilskins, yellow and black, two sou'westers, heavy and +light, two blue-gray flannel shirts, a black sweater, a pair of rubber +boots, two pairs of woollen mitts and four pairs of cotton mitts, +five pounds of smoking tobacco, a new pipe, and so on. When I had all +my stuff tied up, I swung up abreast of Clancy and together we headed +for the end of Duncan's dock, where the Johnnie Duncan lay. + +Quite a fleet went out ahead of us that morning. Being a new vessel, +there was a lot of things that were not ready until the last minute. +And then there was the new foretopmast--promised at nine o'clock it +was--not slung and stayed up until after ten. And then our second +seine, which finally we had to leave for Wesley Marrs to take next +morning. And there were the usual two or three men late. Clancy and +Andie Howe went up to have a farewell drink and were gone so long that +the skipper sent me after them. I found them both in the Anchorage, +where Clancy had met a man he hadn't seen for ten years--an old +dory-mate--thought he was lost five years before in the West Indies. +"But here he is, fine and handsome. Another little touch all around +and a cigar for Joe, and we're off for the Southern cruise." + +We left then and started for the dock, with Clancy full of poetry. +There happened to be a young woman looking out of a window on the way +down. Clancy did not know her, nor she him, so far as I knew, but +something about him seemed to take her eye. She leaned far out and +waved her handkerchief at him. That was enough. Clancy broke out-- + + "The wind blows warm and the wind blows fair, + Oh, the wind blows westerly-- + Our jibs are up and our anchor's in, + For the Duncan's going to sea. + And will you wait for me, sweetheart? + Oh, will you wait for me? + And will you be my love again + When I come back from sea? + + "Oh, sway away and start her sheets + And point her easterly-- + It's tackle-pennant, boom her out + And turn the Duncan free. + You'll see some sailing now, my boys, + We're off for the Southern cruise-- + They'll try to hold the Johnnie D, + But they'll find it of no use." + +I didn't wait any longer than that for Clancy, but ran ahead to the +Duncan. I found her with jibs up and paying off. I was in time to get +aboard without trouble, but Clancy and Howe coming later had to make a +pier-head jump of it. Clancy, who could leap like a hound--drunk or +sober--made it all right with his feet on the end of the bowsprit and +his fingers on the balloon stay when he landed, but Howe fell short, +and we had the liveliest kind of a time gaffing him in over the bow, +he not being able to swim. They must have heard us yelling clear to +Eastern Point, I guess. Andie didn't mind. "I must be with a lot of +dogs--have to jump overboard to get aboard." He spat out what water he +had to, and started right in to winch up the mainsail with the gang. +He had on a brand-new suit, good cloth and a fine fit. + +"You'll soon dry out in the sun, Andie-boy," they all said to him. + +"I s'pose so. But will my clothes ever fit me again like they +did?--and my fine new patent-leather shoes!" + +Drifting down by the dock next to Duncan's our long bowsprit almost +swept off a row of old fellows from the cap-log. They had to scramble, +but didn't mind. "Good luck, and I hope you fill her up," they called +out. + +"Oh, we'll try and get our share of 'em," our fellows called back. + +There was a young woman on the next dock--one of the kind that quite +often come down to take snap-shots. A stranger to Gloucester she must +have been, for not only that Gloucester girls don't generally come +down to the docks to see the fishermen off, but she said good-by to +us. She meant all right, but she should never have said good-by to a +fisherman. It's unlucky. Too many of them don't come back, and then +the good-by comes true. + +Andie Howe looked a funny sight when we were making sail. Clancy, who, +once he got started, took a lot of stopping, was still going: + + "Oh, the Johnnie Duncan, fast and able-- + Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel-- + And will you save a kiss for me + When I come back from sea?" + +"Yes," roared Andie, + + "And don't forget I love you, dear, + And save a kiss for me," + +with the salt water dripping from his fine new suit of clothes and the +patent-leather shoes he was so fond of. + +And Clancy again: + + "Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me," + +and Howe, + + "Oh, too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree + And a hi-did-dy ho-did-dy ho-dee-dee," + +and Clancy, + + "Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree, + The Johnnie Duncan's going to sea," + +and Howe--a little shy on the words-- + + "Tum-did-dy dum-did-dy dum-did-dy-dum, + Hoo-roo-roo and a dum by gum." + +And by that time the gang were joining in and sheeting flat the +topsails with a great swing. + +I don't suppose that Gloucester Harbor will ever again look as +beautiful to me as it did that morning when we sailed out. Forty sail +of seiners leaving within two hours, and to see them going--to see +them one after another loose sails and up with them, break out +anchors, pay off, and away! It was the first day of April and the +first fine day in a week, and those handsome vessels going out one +after the other in their fresh paint and new sails--it was a sight to +make a man's heart thump. + +"The Johnnie Duncan, seiner of Gloucester--watch her walk across the +Bay to-day," was George Moore's little speech when he came on deck to +heave his first bucket of scraps over the rail. George was cook. + +And she did walk. We squared away with half a dozen others abreast of +us and Eastern Point astern of us all. Among the forty sail of +fishermen that were standing across the Bay that morning we knew we'd +find some that could sail. There was the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley's +vessel. He worked her clear of the bunch that came out of the harbor +and came after us, and we had it with him across to Cape Cod. Forty +miles before we beat him; but Pitt Ripley had a great sailer in the +Ruth, and we would have been satisfied to hold her even. "Only wait +till by and by, when we get her in trim," we kept saying. + +"This one'll smother some of them yet," said Eddie Parsons, looking +back at the Ruth. He felt pretty good, because he had the wheel when +we finally crossed the Ruth's bow. + +"With good steering--yes," said Clancy. + +"Of course," exclaimed Eddie to that, and filled his chest full, and +then, looking around and catching everybody laughing, let his chest +flatten again. + +The skipper didn't have much to say right away about her sailing. He +was watching her, though. He'd look at her sails, have an eye on how +they set and drew, take a look over her quarter, another look aloft, +and then back at the Ruth, then a look for the vessels still ahead. +"We'll know more about it after we've tried her out with the Lucy +Foster or the Colleen Bawn or Hollis's new vessel," he said, after a +while. + +One thing we soon found out, and that was that she was a stiff vessel. +That was after a squall hit us off Cape Cod. We watched the rest of +them then. Some luffed and others took in sail, and about them we +could not tell. But those that took it full gave us an idea of how we +were behaving. "Let her have it and see how she'll do," said the +skipper, and Howe, who was at the wheel--with his clothes good and dry +again--let her have it full. With everything on and tearing through +the water like a torpedo-boat, one puff rolled her down till she +filled herself chock up between the house and rail, but she kept right +on going. Some vessels can't sail at all with decks under, but the +Johnnie never stopped. "She's all right, this one," said everybody +then. A second later she took a slap of it over her bow, nearly +smothering the cook, who had just come up to dump some potato parings +over the rail. The way he came up coughing and spitting and then his +dive for the companionway--everybody had to roar. + +"Did y'see the cook hop?--did y'see him hop?" called Andie, who was +afraid somebody had missed it. + +We passed the Marauder, Soudan McLeod, soon after. His mainmast had +broken off eight or ten feet below the head. They were clearing away +the wreckage. "I s'pose I oughter had more sense," he called out as we +went by. + +"Oh, I don't know--maybe the spar was rotten," said Maurice, and that +was a nice way to put it, too. + +That night it came a flat calm, and with barely steerage way for us. +There was a big four-masted coaster bound south, too, and light, and +for the best part of the night we had a drifting match with her. +Coasters as a rule are not great all-round sailers, but some of them, +with their flat bottoms and shoal draft, in a fair wind and going +light, can run like ghosts, and this was one of that kind. We had our +work cut out to hold this one while the wind was light and astern, but +in the morning, when it hauled and came fresher, we went flying over +the shoals. So far as the looks of it went the big coaster might as +well have been anchored then. + +All that day we held on. And it was a lesson in sailing to see the way +some of those seiners were handled. Our skipper spent most of that day +finding out how she sailed best and putting marks on her sheets for +quick trimming by and by. + +Trying each other out, measuring one vessel against another, the fleet +went down the coast. We passed a few and were passed by none, and that +was something. Ahead of us somewhere were a half-dozen flyers. If we +could have beaten some of them we should have had something to brag +about; but no telling, we might get our chance yet. + + + + +IX + +MACKEREL + + +Throughout all that night the lights of the fleet were all about us, +ahead and behind. At breakfast next morning--four o'clock--we were off +Delaware Breakwater, and that afternoon at two we began the mast-head +watch for fish. And on that fine April day it was a handsome +sight--forty sail of seiners in sight, spread out and cruising +lazily. + +The skipper was the first to get into his oilskins and heavy sweater, +for with a vessel hopping along at even no more than six or seven +knots by the wind it is pretty chilly aloft, nice and comfortable +though it may be on deck in the sun. + +There was a game of seven-up going on in the cabin, and the sun +striking down the companionway was bothering Andie Howe. He began to +complain. "Hi, up there to the wheel! Hi, Eddie--can't you put her on +the other tack?--the sun's in my eyes. How can a man see the cards +with the sun in his eyes?" + +Parsons didn't have the chance to talk back when the word came from +aloft to put the seine-boat over the side, and after that to overhaul +the seine and pile it in the boat. Vessels ahead had seen mackerel, +the skipper called out. We got into oilskins and boots and made ready. +Those who were going into the seine-boat had already picked out in +what positions they were going to row, and now there was an +overhauling of oars and putting marks on them so that they could be +picked out in a hurry. Clancy and I were to be dorymen. We made ready +the dory, and then Clancy went to the mast-head with the skipper and +Long Steve, whose watch it was aloft. + +Things began to look like business soon. Even from the deck we could +see that one or two vessels ahead had boats out. We began to picture +ourselves setting around a big school and landing the first mackerel +of the year into New York. I think everybody aboard was having that +dream, though everybody pretended not to be in earnest. You could hear +them: "A nice school now--three hundred barrels." "Or two hundred +would be doing pretty well." "Or even a hundred barrels wouldn't be +bad." There were two or three young fellows among the crew, fellows +like myself, who had never seen much seining, and they couldn't keep +still for excitement when from the mast-head came the word that a boat +ahead was out and making a set. + +We were going along all the time and when we could see from the deck +for ourselves the boats that were setting, Billie Hurd couldn't stand +it any longer, but had to go aloft, too. The four of them made a fine +picture--the skipper and Steve standing easily on the spreaders, one +leaning against the mast and the other against the back-stay, with +Hurd perched on the jib halyards block and Clancy on the spring-stay, +and all looking as comfortable as if they were in rockers at home. I'd +have given a hundred dollars then to be able to stand up there on one +foot and lean as easily as the skipper against the stay with the +vessel going along as she was. I made up my mind to practise it when +next I went aloft. + +I went to the mast-head myself by and by, and, seeing half a dozen +schools almost at once, I became so excited that I could hardly speak. +The skipper was excited, too, but he didn't show it, only by his eyes +and talking more jerkily than usual. He paid no attention to two or +three schools that made me just crazy just to look at, but at last, +when he thought it was time, he began to move. Ten or a dozen +Gloucester vessels were bunched together, and one porgy steamer--that +is, built for porgy or menhaden fishing, but just now trying for +mackerel like the rest of us. + +"There'll be plenty of them up soon, don't you think, Tommie?" the +skipper asked. + +"Plenty," answered Tommie, "plenty," with his eyes ever on the fish. +"I think Sam Hollis has got his all right, but Pitt Ripley--I don't +know." + +It was getting well along toward sunset then, with everybody worried, +the skipper still aloft, and one boat making ready to set about a mile +inside of us. "They'll dive," said our skipper, and they did. "There's +Pitt Ripley's school now," and he pointed to where a raft of mackerel +were rising and rippling the water black, and heading for the north. +"There's another gone down, too--they'll dive that fellow. Who is +it--Al McNeill?--yes. But they'll come up again, and when it does, +it's ours." And they did come up, and when they did the skipper made a +jump and roared, "Into the boat!" There was a scramble. "Stay up here, +you Billie, and watch the school," he said to Hurd, and "Go down, +you," to me. I slid down by the jib halyards. The skipper and Clancy +came down by the back-stay and beat me to the deck. They must have +tumbled down, they were down so quick. + +"Hurry--the Aurora's going after it, too." The Aurora was one of +Withrow's fleet and we were bound to beat her. I had hardly time to +leap into the dory after Clancy, and we were off, with nobody left +aboard but Hurd to the mast-head and the cook, who was to stay on deck +and sail the vessel. + +In the seine-boat it was double-banked oars, nine long blades and a +monstrous big one steering--good as another oar that--and all driving +for dear life, with Long Steve and a cork-passer standing by the seine +and the skipper on top of it, with his eyes fixed on the school +ahead--his only motions to open his mouth and to wave with his hands +to the steersman behind him. "Drive her--drive her," he called to the +crew. "More yet--more yet," to the steering oar. "There's the porgy +steamer's boat, too, after the same school. Drive her now, fellows!" + +The mackerel were wild as could be, great rafts of them, and +travelling faster than the old seiners in the gang said they had ever +seen them travel before, and what was worse, not staying up long. +There were boats out from three or four vessels before we pushed off +with ours. I remember the porgy steamer had cut in ahead and given +their boat a long start for a school. However, that school did not +stay up long enough and they had their row for nothing. But then their +steamer picked them up again and dropped them on the way to the same +school that we were trying for. How some of our gang did swear at +them! And all because they were steam power. + +It promised to be a pretty little race, but that school, too, went +down before either of us could head it, and so it was another row for +nothing. We lay on our oars then, both boats ready for another row, +with the skipper and seine-heaver in each standing on top of the seine +and watching for the fish to show again. Of course both gangs were +sizing each other up, too. I think myself that the Duncan's crowd were +a huskier lot of men than the steamer's. Our fellows looked more like +fishermen, as was to be expected, because in Gloucester good fishermen +are so common that naturally, a man hailing from there gets so that he +wants to be a good fisherman, too, and of course the men coming there +are all pretty good to begin with, leaving out the fellows who are +born and brought up around Gloucester and who have it in their blood. +A man doesn't leave Newfoundland or Cape Breton or even Nova Scotia or +Maine and the islands along the coast, or give up any safe, steady +work he may have, to come to Gloucester to fish unless he feels that +he can come pretty near to holding his end up. That's not saying that +a whole lot of fine fishermen do not stay at home, with never any +desire to fish out of Gloucester, in spite of the good money that a +fisherman with a good skipper can make from there, but just the same +they're a pretty smart and able lot that do come. And so, while our +gang was half made up of men that were born far away from Gloucester, +yet they had the Gloucester spirit, which is everything in deep-sea +fishing, when nerve and strength and skill count for so much. And this +other crowd--the porgy steamer's--did not have that look. + +"Look at what we're coming to," somebody called. "All steam boys soon, +and on wages--wages!" he repeated, "and going around the deck, with a +blue guernsey with letters on the chest of it--A.D.Q.--or some other +damn company." + +"Well, that would not be bad either, with your grub bill sure and your +money counted out at the end of every month," answered somebody else. + +I was sizing up the two gangs myself, I being in the dory with Clancy, +and I guess that nearly everyone of us was doing the same thing and +keeping an eye out for fish at the same time, when all at once a +school popped up the other side of the porgyman's boat. Perhaps, half +a mile it was and, for a wonder, not going like a streak. + +We saw it first and got to going first, but the Aurora's boat and the +steamer's boat were nearer, and so when we were all under good headway +there were two lengths or so that we had to make up on each. Well, +that was all right. Two lengths weren't so many, and we drove her. It +was something to see the fellows lay out to it then--doubled-banked, +two men to each wide seat and each man with a long oar, which he had +picked out and trimmed to suit himself, and every man in his own +particular place as if in a racing crew. + +And now every man was bending to it. A big fellow, named Rory +McKinnon, was setting the stroke. There was a kick and a heave to +every stroke, and the men encouraging each other. "Now--now--give it +to her," was all that I could hear coming out of him. All this time we +in the dory were coming on behind, Clancy and I having to beat their +dory just as our boat had to beat their boat. And we were driving, +too, you may be sure. Clancy was making his oars bend like whips. +"Blast 'em! There's no stiffness to 'em," he was complaining. And +then, "Sock it to her," he would call out to our fellows in the +seine-boat. "We've got the porgy crew licked--that's the stuff," came +from the skipper. From on top of the seine he was watching the fish, +watching the gang, watching the other boats, watching us in the +dory--watching everything. Whoever made a slip then would hear from it +afterwards, we knew. And clip, clip, clip it was, with the swash just +curling nicely under the bow of the other boat, and I suppose our own, +too, if we could have seen. + +Our boat was gaining on the Aurora's and the skipper was warming up. +The fish was going the same way we were, still a quarter of a mile +ahead. + +"Drive her," said the skipper. "Drive her--drive her--another length +and you got 'em. And, Kenney, it's the best of ash you've got. Don't +be afraid of breaking it. And, Dan Burns, didn't y'ever learn to keep +stroke in the Bay of Islands with nine more men beside you rowing? And +drive her--hit her up now--here's where we got 'em--they can't hold it +on their lives. Now then, another dozen strokes and it's over. One, +two, three--quicker, Lord, quicker--six, seven--oh, now she's fair +flying--look at her leap. You blessed lobster, keep rowing and not +looking over your shoulder. We got to get the fish first." + +A quarter mile of that with the foam ripping by us, and every man with +his blood like fire jumping to his oar, when the skipper leaped back +to the steering oar. "Stand by," he called, and then, "Now--over with +the buoy," and over it went, with the dory at hand and Tommie Clancy +right there to pick it up and hold it to windward. And then went the +seine over in huge armfuls. Just to see Long Steve throw that seine +was worth a trip South. And he was vain as a child of his strength +and endurance. "My, but look at him!" Clancy called out--"look at the +back of him!" "He's a horse," somebody else would have to say, and +"H-g-gh," Steve would grunt, and "H-g-gh" he would fill the air full +of tarred netting, "H-g-gh--pass them corks," and over it would go, +"H-g-gh," and the skipper would say, "That's the boy, Steve," and +Steve would heave to break his back right then and there. All the time +they were driving the seine-boat to its limit, and the skipper was +laying to the big steering oar, the longest of them all and taking a +strong man to handle it properly--laying to it, swinging from the +waist like a hammer-thrower, and the boat jumping to it. She came +jumping right for us in the dory in a little while. It doesn't take a +good gang long to put a quarter mile of netting around a school of +mackerel. + +It was a pretty set he made. "Pretty, pretty," you could almost hear +the old seiners saying between their teeth, even as they were all +rowing with jaws set and never a let-up until the circle was +completed, when it was oars into the air and Clancy leaping from the +dory into the seine-boat to help purse up. "It's a raft if ever we get +'em," were his first words, and everybody that wasn't too breathless +said yes, it was a jeesly raft of fish. + +"Purse in," it was then, and lively. And so we pursed in, hauling on +the running line in the lower edge of the seine, something as the +string around the neck of a tobacco bag is drawn tight. It was heavy +work of course, but everybody made light of it. We could not tell if +the fish were in it or not. The leaders might have dove when they felt +the twine against their noses and so escaped with the whole school +following after, or they might have taken no alarm and stayed in. + +So we pursed in, not knowing whether we were to have a good haul with +a hundred or a hundred and fifty dollars apiece at the end of it, or +whether we would have our work for nothing. All hands kept up the +pretence of joking, of course, but everybody was anxious enough. It +was more than the money--it was fisherman's pride. Were we to get into +New York and have it telegraphed on to Gloucester for everybody that +knew us to read and talk about--landing the first mackerel of the +year? We watched while the circle narrowed and the pool inside grew +shallower. Somebody said, "There's one," and we could see the shine of +it, and another--and another--and then the whole mass of them rose +flipping. They lashed the water into foam, rushed around the edges, +nosed the corks of the seine. I don't think myself that mackerel are +particularly intelligent, take them generally; but at times they seem +to know--these fellows, at least, seemed to know they were gone and +they thrashed about in fury. A mackerel is a handsome fish any time, +but to see him right you want to see him fresh-seined. They whipped +the water white now--tens of thousands of them. I don't believe that +the oldest seiner there didn't feel his heart beat faster--the first +mackerel of the year. "And Lord knows, maybe a couple of hundred +barrels," and the skipper's eyes shone--it meant a lot to him. And +some of the men began to talk like children, they were so pleased. + + + + +X + +WE LOSE OUR SEINE + + +Two hundred barrels the skipper had said, but long before we were all +pursed up we knew that five hundred barrels would never hold the fish +in that seine. The size of that school filled us with joy and yet it +was the very size of it that caused us our trouble. It was too big for +the seine, and when they began to settle down and take the twine with +them the trouble began for us. No bit of twine ever made to be handled +from a seine-boat was big enough to hold that school of fish when they +began to go down. + +The skipper was awake to it early and signalled for the vessel to come +alongside. So the Johnnie stood over to us, and Hurd, pushing the +spare dory over with Moore's help, came jumping with it to the side of +the seine where I was alone in the first dory. He hadn't even stopped +to get into his oilskins, he was in such a hurry. By the skipper's +orders I had made fast some of the corks to the thwarts in the dory +and Billie took some into the spare dory. The whole length of the +seine-boat they were making fast the seine too. In that way the +skipper hoped to buoy up the fish and hold them until we could lighten +the seine up by bailing some of the fish onto the deck of the vessel. +But it was of no use. There must have been a thousand barrels of them, +and dories and seine-boat began to go under. It was over the rail of +my dory and spare dory both, and both Billie and myself to our waists, +when the skipper sung out for us to jump and save ourselves. We hung +on a little longer, but it got to be too much for us and overboard we +went. We were not in danger then. It is true that the sea was making +and we were weighted down with oilskins and rubber boots, but we had +for support the corks that had not yet gone under. And along the corks +we hauled ourselves toward the seine-boat. I was praying that the +sharks that sometimes follow up mackerel would not bother us. It is +probable that they would not even if there were any around, as +mackerel are better eating. And such a fuss as we made hauling +ourselves through the water! We'd have scared away a whole school of +sharks. Before we could get to the seine-boat that, too, was under. +"Jump!" called the skipper, and "Jump everybody!" called Clancy, and +themselves both hanging on to a last handful of twine. The men in the +seine-boat jumped and struck out for the vessel, which was now quite +close, with the cook, the only man left aboard, throwing over +keelers, draw-buckets, the main sheet--anything within his reach that +was loose and would support a man. + +The skipper and Clancy hung on to the last. "Jump you, Tommie!" called +the skipper. "Not me till you go," answered Clancy. They couldn't do a +bit of good, but they hung on, each grabbing handfuls of twine in a +last effort to hold up the seine. The seine-boat went under--and they +up to their necks--and then it turned over and in toward the seine. +Some of us hollered--we were afraid that it was all up with both of +them--that they would be thrown toward the inside and tangled up in +the seine. But both of them bobbed up, the skipper saying nothing, but +Clancy sputtering like a crazy man. The dories coming loose gave a few +of us a chance to climb up on the bottom of them, and when the +seine-boat came bobbing up most of the others climbed up on the bottom +of that. And there was some swearing done then, you may be sure! The +gang would have been all right then, waiting to be picked up by the +cook from the vessel, which was then pretty handy; but the seine-boat +started to go under again and then came the slap of a little sea, and +overboard went seven or eight of us. Clancy was one of those thrown +into the water. We all remembered it afterwards because he called out +for Andie Howe. + +"Where's Andie?" + +"Here," said Andie. + +"Where?" + +"Hanging onto the bow of the seine-boat." + +"Well, hang on a while longer," said Clancy and struck out for the +vessel, and made it too, oilskins, big boots and all. He threw two or +three lines out at once--one especially to Thad Simpson, the other man +of the crew besides Andie Howe who it was known couldn't swim. So +Clancy hauled him in. The third man he hauled in was Billie Hurd. + +"Good Lord, Tommie," said Billie, "you hove a line over my head to +Andie Howe." + +"You pop-eyed Spanish mackerel!" roared Clancy at him, "you ought to +know by this time that Andie can't swim." + +"I know, but he was all oiled up, and look at me----" + +"Go to hell," said Clancy. + +We all got aboard after a while, but our fine new seine was gone, and +the big school of fish too. After a hard grapple we got the dories and +a little later the seine-boat, and after a lot more work we got them +right side up. The dories we pulled the plugs out of to let them drain +and then took them on deck, but the seine-boat we had to pump out. By +then it was pretty well on in the night and I remember how the moon +rose just as we had it fairly well dried out and dropped astern--rose +as big as a barrel-head and threw a yellow light over it, and then +went out of sight, for a breeze was on us. + +And "Oh, Lord! that thousand-barrel school!" groaned everybody. + + + + +XI + +AN OVER-NIGHT BREEZE + + +It wasn't bad enough that we came near losing a few men and our boat, +and our seine altogether, but it must come on to breeze up on top of +that and drive us off the grounds. After putting everything to rights, +we were having a mug-up forward and wondering if the skipper would +take sail off her or what, when we heard the call that settled it. + +"On deck everybody!" we heard. And when we got there, came from the +skipper, "Take in the balloon, tie it up and put it below. Haul down +your stays'l too--and go aloft a couple of you, fore and aft, and put +the tops'ls in gaskets." + +We attended to that--a gang out on the bowsprit, half a dozen aloft +and so on--with the skipper to the wheel while it was being done. When +we had finished it was, "Haul the seine-boat alongside--pump out what +water's left." Then, "Shift that painter and hook on the big painter. +Drop her astern and give her plenty of line. Where's the dorymen? +Where's Tommie and Joe? Haul the dories into the hatch, Tommie, and +make 'em fast. Gripe 'em good while you're at it. Clear the deck of +all loose gear--put it below, all of it--keelers, everything. Maybe +'twon't be much of a blow, but there's no telling--it may. She mayn't +be the kind that washes everything over, but put it all safe anyway." + +The skipper watched all this until he had seen everything cleared up +and heard "All fast the dory," from the waist. Then he looked up and +took note of sky and wind. "Don't feel any too good. Maybe 'twill blow +off, but we might's well run in. We'll have to wait for our other +seine anyway and Wesley will be sure to put into the Breakwater for +news on his way down, especially if it comes to blow." + +He dropped below then to light his pipe. Seeing me and Parsons, with +me trying to fix up Parsons's leg where it had been gashed--Eddie +never knew how--in the mix-up of the evening, the skipper said, +"There's some liniment in the chest and some linen in one of the +drawers under my bunk. Get it. And some of you might's well turn in +and have a nap. She'll be all right--the watch and myself can look +after her now," and he went on deck again, puffing like an engine to +keep his pipe going. + +Most of them did turn in and were soon asleep. Some of the older men +had a smoke and an overhauling of their wet clothes, while a few +joined in a little game of draw before turning in. One or two were +deploring the loss of the seine. The nearness to losing lives didn't +seem to be worrying anybody. For myself, I was somewhat worked up. +There was one time in the water when I thought I was gone. So I went +on deck after the skipper. It was a black night and breezing all the +time and I wanted to see how the vessel behaved. The Johnnie was +close-hauled at this time and swashing under, and I knew without +asking further that the skipper intended to make Delaware Breakwater. + +While hurrying forward, after lending a hand to batten down the main +hatch--the Johnnie plunging along all the time--and my head perhaps a +little too high in the air, I stumbled off the break and plump over a +man under the windward rail. I thought I was going to leeward and +maybe overboard, but somebody hooked onto the full in the back of my +oil-jacket, hauled me up the inclined deck again, and in a roaring +whisper said, "Get a hold here, Joey--here's a ring-bolt for you. +Don't let go on your life! Isn't it fine?" It was Clancy. He had +nights, I know, when he couldn't sleep, and like me, I suppose, he +wanted to watch the sea, which just then was firing grandly. Into this +sea the vessel was diving--nose first--bringing her bowsprit down, +down, down, and then up, up, up, until her thirty-seven-foot bowsprit +would be pointing to where the North star should be. Whenever she +heaved like that I could feel her deck swelling under me. I remember +when I used to play foot-ball at the high school at home and it was +getting handy to a touch-down, with perhaps only a few yards to gain +and the other side braced to stop it, that a fellow playing back had +to buck like that from under a line when he had to scatter tons, or +what he thought was tons, of people on top of him. The vessel was that +way now, only with every dive she had hundreds of tons to lift from +under. At a time like that you can feel the ribs of a vessel brace +within her just as if she was human. Now I could almost feel her heart +pumping and her lungs pounding somewhere inside. I could feel her +brace to meet it, feel her shiver, as if she was scared half to death, +and almost hear her screech like a winner every time she cleared it +and threw it over her head. + +Now down she went--the Johnnie Duncan--down and forward, for she +wouldn't be held back--shoulders and breast slap into it. Clear to her +waist she went, fighting the sea from her. To either side were +tumbling the broken waves, curling away like beach combers. The hollow +of each was a curved sheet of electric white, and the top--the +crest--was a heavier, hotter white. The crests would rise above our +rail and break, and back into the hollows would fall a shower of +shooting stars that almost sizzled. There wasn't a star above, but +millions on the water! + +"Ever see anything like that ashore, Joey-boy?" said Clancy, and I had +to roar a whisper that I never had. + +Through this play of fire the Johnnie leaped with great bounds. She +boiled her way, and astern she left a wake in which the seine-boat was +rearing and diving with a fine little independent trail of its own. + +Two men forward--the watch--were leaning over the windlass and peering +into the night. They were there for whatever they might see, but +particularly were they looking for the double white light of Five +Fathom Bank lightship. The skipper was at the wheel. When he got in +the way of the cabin light, we could catch the shine from his dripping +oil-clothes, and the spark from his pipe--which he kept going through +it all--marked his position when he stepped back into the darkness. + +Clancy noticed him. "There's a man for you, Joey. Think what it meant +to a young skipper with a new vessel--the loss of that school and the +seine on top of it the very first day he struck fish. If we'd got +that, he might have been the first vessel of the year into the New +York market. And think of the price the first fish fetch!--and the +honor of it--and he breaking his heart to make a reputation this year. +And yet not a yip out of him--not a cranky word to one of the gang all +night. A great man I call him--and a fisherman." I thought so, too. + +Sometimes I imagined I could see the wink of red and green lights +abreast and astern, which I probably did, for there should have been +fifty sail or so of seiners inside and outside of us--there were sixty +sail of the fleet in sight that afternoon--and I knew that, barring a +possible few that had got fish and were driving for the New York +market, all the others were like ourselves, under lower sails and +boring into it, with extra lookout forward, the skipper at the wheel +or on the quarter and all ears and eyes for the surf and lights +inshore when we should get there. + +"Something ahead! dead ahead! sa-ail!" came suddenly from forward. +There was a scraping of boot-heels at the wheel. "What d'y'make of +it?--all right, I see her!" In the shadow we saw the skipper pulling +the wheel down. Ahead I imagined I saw a dark patch, but to make sure +I squirmed up to the fore-rigging. Whoever she was, the light from her +cabin skylight was right there and I realized that we were pretty +close, but not really how close until a boat bobbed up under my jaws +almost. Right from under our bow it heaved. It was a seiner and that +was her seine-boat towing astern, and I could easily have heaved a +line to her helmsman as we swept by her. There was an awfully tall +shadow of sails--half up to the clouds I thought--and the black of the +hull looked as long as a dock. A voice was hurled to us, but we +couldn't quite make it out--but it was the watch, probably, saying a +word or two by way of easing his feelings. + +We worked up to the windward of that one and slowly crowded past her +tumbling green light. Then the skipper let the wheel fly up and we +shot ahead and soon we had her directly astern, with her one green and +one red eye looking after us. "That's one fellow we outsail," thought +I to myself, and I knew I was beginning to love the Johnnie Duncan. + +All through that night it went on like that. + +At four o'clock or so in the morning the cook stuck his head out of +the slit in the forec's'le companionway and spoke his welcome little +piece. "Can't have any reg'lar sit-down this morning, boys. Have to +leave the china in the becket for a while yet, but all that wants can +make a mug-up, and when we get inside--if we do in anything like a +decent hour--we'll have breakfast." + +At five o'clock the sky began to brighten to the eastward, but there +was no let-up to the wind or sea. If anything it was breezing up. At +six o'clock, when the short blasts of the lightship split the air +abreast of us, things were good and lively, but there was no daylight +to go by then. The wash that in the night only buried her bow good was +then coming over her to the foremast and filling the gangway between +the house and rail as it raced aft. The beauty of double-lashing the +dories began to appear, and all hands might have been towing astern +all night by the look of them. But the Johnnie Duncan was doing well +and the opinion of the crew generally was that the skipper could slap +every rag to her and she'd carry it--that is, if she had to. The +skipper put her more westerly after we had passed the lightship and on +we went. + +We had the company of a couple of coasters in this part of the drive; +and by that, if nothing else, a man might know we were inshore. Some +Gloucester men were in sight, too, though most of the fleet, we +guessed, were still outside of us. The coasters were colliers, +three-masters both, and reefed down, wallowing in the sea. One had her +foretopmast snapped short off, and such patched sails as she had on +looked lonesome. The gang, of course, had to make fun of her. + +"There's one way to house a topm'st!" + +"Broke your clothes-pole, old girl!" + +"Better take in your washing there--looks like rain!" + +"Go it, you beauty! I only wish I had my cameraw. If y'only suspected +how lovely you look!" + +Two big ocean tugs, one clear white and one all black, offered a +change in looks, though in nothing else, for each one, with two barges +of coal, was making desperate hauling of it, and the Breakwater yet a +good bit away. + +"Hustle 'em, you husky coal-jammers!" roared Parsons at them, as if he +could be heard beyond the rail. "I wouldn't be aboard of you for my +share of the Southern trip--and mackerel away up in G, too. Would you, +Billie?" + +"Then? Naw!" said Hurd, with a wrinkling of his little nose. + +"No, nor me neither," said Long Steve. "Hi--ever hear the cook--ever +hear George Moore's song:-- + + 'If ever you go to sea, my boy, + Don't ever you ship on a steamer; + There's stacks to scrape and rails to paint-- + It's always work to clean her. + When the wind is wrong and the shore is by, + They'll keep you clear of leeway, + But they roll and they jolt and they're never dry-- + They're the devil's own in a sea-way!'" + +Steve, trying to sing that, had one hand hooked into a ring-bolt under +the rail and he was slowly pickling--we were all pickling--like a +salted mackerel in a barrel. + +An hour past Five Fathom and the tall white tower of Cape Henlopen +could be made out ahead, as well as the gray tower of Cape May through +the mists to the northward. The wind was coming faster and it felt +heavier. We could judge best of how we were looking ourselves by +watching all our fellows near by. We could see to the bottom planks of +two to leeward of us, while on the sloping deck of one to windward it +was plain that only what was lashed or bolted was still there. When +they reared they almost stood up straight, and when they scooped into +it the wonder was that all the water taken aboard didn't hold her +until the next comber could have a fair whack at her. + +The men--that is, a few of them--might joke, but were all glad to be +getting in. There's no fun staying wet and getting wetter all night +long. If it wasn't for the wetness of a fellow it would have been +great, for it was the finest kind of excitement, our running to +harbor--that night--especially in the morning when we were passing +three or four and nobody passing us. We went by one fellow--the +Martinet she was--a fair enough sailer--passed her to windward of +course, our gang looking across at their gang and nobody saying a +word, but everybody thinking a lot, you may be sure. It was worth a +square meal that. + +With the Martinet astern, the skipper let her pay off and run for the +end of the Breakwater. For a while he let the wind take her fair +abeam, with sheets in, and the way she sizzled through the water was a +caution. There was a moment that an extra good blast hit her that my +heart sank, but I reflected that the skipper knew his business, and so +tried to take it unconcernedly. Everybody around me was joking and +laughing--to think, I suppose, that we would soon be in. + +A moment after that I went down to leeward. The sea was bubbling in +over her rail at the fore-rigging and I wanted to get the feel of it. +I got it. It is pretty shoal water on the bar at the mouth of the +Delaware River and quite a little sea on when it blows. One sea came +aboard. Somebody yelled and I saw it--but too late--and slap! over I +went--over the rail--big boots and oilskins I went down into the +roaring. For a second my head came up and I saw the vessel. Everybody +aboard was standing by. The skipper was whirling the spokes and the +vessel was coming around like a top. I never saw a vessel roll down so +far in all my life. I went under again and coming up heard a dull +shout. There was a line beside me. "Grab hold!" yelled somebody. No +need to tell me--I grabbed hold. It was the seine-boat's painter. The +Johnnie was still shooting and when the line tautened it came as near +to pulling my arms out of my shoulders as ever I want to have them +again. But I hung on. Then she came up, and they hauled the painter in +and gaffed me over the rail. + +"You blankety blank fool!" roared Clancy, as soon as I stood +up--"don't you know any better? A fine thing we'd have to be +telegraphing home, wouldn't it? Are you all right now?" + +"All right," I said, and felt pretty cheap. + +While being hauled in, knowing that I was safe, I had been thinking +what a fine little adventure I'd have to tell when we got back to +Gloucester, but after Clancy got through with me I saw that there were +two ways to look at it. So I took my old place under the windward rail +and didn't move from there again till it was time to take sail off +her. + + + + +XII + +THE FLEET RUNS TO HARBOR + + +Nearing the Breakwater we had more company. Other seiners, with boats +astern and dories on deck, were coming in; jumbo, jib, fore and reefed +mainsail generally, and all plunging gloriously with a harbor near at +hand. + +For the next few hours of that morning any watcher in the lighthouse +on the Breakwater could have seen plenty of samples of clever +seamanship. At our time we were only one of a half-dozen at the +business of working around the jetty, some making for one end and some +for the other. There was a great trying of tacks and some plain +criticism of tactics and weatherly qualities. There was one who tried +to cut in before he could quite make it. When he had to put back or +run ashore and lose her, a great laugh went up, though there was +nothing the matter with the try. He had only tried too much. + +Eddie Parsons was the sharp critic. "Trying to beat out the fleet, +hey? And with that old hooker? Nothing wrong with your nerve, old man, +but some fine day, when there's a little wind stirring, you'll roll +that tub over a little too far. That's right--jam her up now! Think +you got a steamboat? Wonder nobody ever told you about sailing a +vessel. Come out of it, old man, and let her swing off." + +We had yet to get in ourselves, and that we had the Johnnie Duncan to +eat into the wind we were thankful. At last we were by and reaching +down to the end of the jetty. We all began to feel good once we were +sure of it. It was fine, too, to listen to Clancy as we got near. He +was standing on the break, leaning against the weather rigging and +looking forward. + +"You'd think she'd been coming here for a hundred years, wouldn't you? +Look at her point her nose now at that beacon--don't have to give this +one the wheel at all. She's the girl. See her bow off now. Man, but +she knows as well as you and me she'll be inside and snug's a kenched +mackerel before long. Watch her kick into the wind now. Oh, she's the +lady, this one. I've sailed many of them, but she's the queen of them +all, this one." + +A half dozen of lucky fellows were in before us. We drove in among +them, under the bow of one and past the stern of another. They were +all watching us, after the custom of the fleet in harbor. We knew this +and behaved as smartly as we could without slopping over. + +By and by our skipper picked out a place to his fancy. "Stand by +halyards and down-hauls," was his warning. + +"Ready--all ready." + +"Ready with the anchor!" + +"All ready the anchor, sir!" + +"Down with your jib! Down with jumbo! Let go your fore halyards! Watch +out now--ready--let go your anchor!" + +Rattle--whizz--whir-r-r--splash! clink--and the Johnnie Duncan of +Gloucester was safe to her mooring. + +And not till then did our skipper, ten hours to the wheel, unclinch +his grip, hook the becket to a spoke, slat his sou'wester on the +wheel-box and ease his mind. + +"Thank the Lord, there's a jeesly blow behind us. There's some +outside'll wish they had a shore job before they get in. Hi, boys, +when you get her tied up for'ard, better all go below and have a bite +to eat. Let the mains'l stand and give it a chance to dry." Then he +looked about him. "And I didn't notice that anybody passed us on the +way." There was a whole lot in that last. + +After eating a bite, I went over in the dory to the lighthouse on the +jetty, where seamen's mail was taken care of. After leaving my letters +I stopped to watch some of the fleet coming. It was easy enough to +pick them. The long, slick-looking, lively seine-boat in tow and the +black pile of netting on deck told what they were, and they came +jumping out of the mists in a way to make a man's heart beat. + +There was a man standing on the jetty. He was master of a three-masted +coaster, he told me. "You come off one of them Gloucester +mackerel-catchers?" he asked me. I said yes. "That new-looking one +that came in a while ago?" I said yes again. + +"I was watching her--she's a dream--a dream. I never see anything like +them--the whole bunch of 'em. Look at this one--ain't she got on about +all she can stand up under though? My soul, ain't she staggering! I +expect her skipper knows his business--don't expect he'd be skipper of +a fine vessel like that if he didn't. But if 'twas me I'd just about +take a wide tuck or two in that ever-lastin' mains'l he's got there. +My conscience, but ain't he a-sockin' it to her! I s'pose that's the +way some of your vessels are sailed out and never heard from +again--that was never run into, nor rolled over, nor sunk in a reg'lar +way, but just drove right into it head-first trying to make a passage +and drowned before ever they could rise again. Well, good-luck to you, +old girl, and your skipper, whoever he is, and I guess if your canvas +stays on you'll be to anchor before a great while, for you're making +steamboat time. Go it, old girl, and your little baby on behind, go +it! There ain't nothing short of an ocean liner could get you now. Go +it! a sail or two don't matter--if it's a good mackerel season I +s'pose the owners don't mind if you blow away a few sails. Go it, God +bless you! Go it! you're the lads can sail a vessel, you fishermen of +Gloucester. Lord, if I dared to try a thing like that with my vessel +and my crew and the old gear I got, I rather expect I'd have a +rigger's bill by the time I got home--if ever I got home carryin' on +like that in my old hooker." + +I watched her, too. She was the Tarantula, Jim Porter, another +sail-carrier. Around the point and across she tore and over toward the +sands beyond, swung off on her heel to her skipper's heave, came down +by the wreck of a big three-master on the inner beach, and around and +up opposite what looked like a building on the hill. Then it was down +with the wheel, down with headsails, let go fore-halyards, over with +the anchor, and there she was, another fisherman of Gloucester, at +rest in harbor after an all-night fight with a lively breeze. + +And I left the master of the coaster there and went back to the +Duncan, where the crew were standing along the rail or leaning over +the house and having a lot of fun sizing up those who were coming in. +It is one of the enjoyments of the seining fleet--this racing to +harbor when it blows and then watching the others work in. I've heard +it said that no place in the world can show a fleet like them--all +fine vessels, from one hundred to one hundred and twenty feet over +all, deep draught, heavily sparred, and provided with all kinds of +sail. They were ably managed, of course,--and a dash to port makes the +finest kind of a regatta. No better chances are offered to try vessels +and seamanship--no drifting or flukes but wind enough for all hands +and on all points of sailing generally. + +They came swooping in one after the other--like huge sea-gulls, only +with wings held close. Now, with plenty of light, those already in +could easily see the others coming long before they rounded the jetty. +Even if we couldn't see the hulls of them, there were fellows who +could name them--one vessel after the other--just by the spars and +upper rigging. The cut of a topsail, the look of a mast-head, the set +of a gaff--the smallest little thing was enough to place them, so well +were they acquainted with one another. And the distance at which some +of them could pick out a vessel was amazing. + +George Moore, coming up out of the forec's'le to dump over some +scraps, spied one. "The Mary Grace Adams," he sang out,--"the +shortest forem'st out of Gloucester. She must've been well inside when +she started--to get in at this time. Slow--man, but she is slow, that +one." + +"Yes, that's the old girl, and behind her is the Dreamer--Charlie +Green--black mast-heads and two patches on her jumbo. She'll be in and +all fast before the Mary Grace's straightened out." + +And so it was--almost. The Mary Adams was one of the older fleet and +never much of a sailer. The Dreamer was one of the newer vessels, +able, and a big sailer. They were well raked by the critics, as under +their four lowers they whipped in and around and passed on by. + +After the Dreamer came the Madeline, with "Black Jack" Hogan, a fleshy +man for a fisherman, who minded his way and remained unmoved at the +compliments paid his vessel, one of the prize beauties of the fleet. +The Marguerite, Charley Falvey, a dog at seining, always among the +high-liners, who got more fun out of a summer's seining than most men +ever got out of yachting, who bought all the latest inventions in gear +as fast as they came out and who had a dainty way of getting fish. The +Marguerite dipped her bow as she passed, while her clever skipper +nodded along the line. + +The King Philip, another fast beauty, made her bow and dipped her +jibs to her mates in harbor. At sight of her master, Al McNeill, a +great shout goes up. "Ho, ho! boys, here's Lucky Al! Whose seine was +it couldn't hold a jeesly big school one day off here last spring but +Billie Simms'? Yes, sir, Billie Simms. Billie fills up and was just +about thinking he'd have to let the rest go when who heaves in sight +and rounds to and says, 'Can I help y'out, William?' Who but Lucky Al +McNeill, of course. Bales out two hundred barrels as nice fat mackerel +as anybody'd want to see. 'Just fills me up,' says Al, and scoots to +market. Just been to New York, mind you, that same week with two +hundred and fifty barrels he got twelve cents apiece for. 'Just fills +me up,' says Al, and scoots. No, he ain't a bit lucky, Captain Al +ain't--married a young wife only last fall." + +Then followed the Albatross, with Mark Powers giving the orders. Then +the Privateer, another fast one, but going sluggishly now because of a +stove-in seine-boat wallowing astern. Then the North Wind, with her +decks swept clear of everything but her house and hatches. Seine-boat, +seine and dory were gone. + +After her was a big, powerful vessel, the Ave Maria, with the most +erratic skipper of all. This man never appeared but the gossip broke +out. Andie Howe had his record. "Here comes George Ross. What's this +they say now?--that he don't come down from the mast-head now like he +used to, when he strikes a school. When I was with him he was a pretty +lively man comin' from aloft--used to sort of fall down, you know. But +now he comes down gentle-like--slides down the back-stay. Only trouble +now he's got to get new rubber boots every other trip, 'count of the +creases he wears in the legs of them sliding down the wire. I tell you +they all lose their nerve as they get older. There's Billie Simms +coming behind him. He's given up tryin' to sail his vessel on the side +and tryin' to see how long he c'n carry all he c'n pile on. Billie +says 't'ain't like when a fellow's young and ain't got any family. I +expect it's about the same with George since he got married." The +master of the Ave Maria didn't even glance over as he piloted his +vessel along. He very well knew that we were talking about him. + +Pretty soon came one that everybody looked at doubtfully. She sported +a new mainmast and a new fore-gaff. "Who's this old hooker with her +new spars? Looks like a vessel just home from salt fishing, don't she? +Lord, but she needs painting." Nobody seemed to know who she was, and +as she got nearer there was a straining of eyes for her name forward. +"The H-A-R-B-I--oh, the Harbinger. Must be old Marks and the old craft +he bought down East last fall. This the old man, of course--the +Harbinger. How long's she been down here? Came down ahead of the +fleet? Well, she ought to--by the looks of her she needs a good early +start to get anywhere. They ought to be glad to get in. I mind that +September breeze twenty year ago that the old man said blew all the +water off Quero and drove him ashore on Sable Island. He says he ain't +taking any more line storms in his. No, nor anybody else in the old +square-enders he gen'rally sails in. I'll bet he's glad to change +winter trawling for summer seining. I'll bet he put in a few wakeful +nights on the Banks in his time--mind the time he parted his cable and +came bumping over Sable Island No'the-east Bar? Found the only channel +there was, I callate. 'Special little angels was looking out for me,' +he says, when he got home. 'Yes,' says Wesley Marrs--he was telling it +to Wesley--'yes,' says Wesley, 'but I'll bet keepin' the lead goin' +had a hell of a lot to do with it, too.'" + +So they came rolling in by the end of the jetty until they could make +one last tack of it. Like tumbling dolphins they were--seiners all, +with a single boat towing astern and a single dory, or sometimes two +dories, lashed in the waist, all gear stowed away, under four lower +sails mostly--jumbo, jib, fore and main, though now and then was one +with a mainsail in stops and a trysail laced to the gaff, and all +laying down to it until their rails were washing under and the sea +hissed over the bows. + +Anybody would have to admire them as they came scooting past. When +they thought they were close enough to the Breakwater--and some went +pretty close--up or down would go the wheel, according to which end of +the jetty they came in by, around they would go, and across the flats +and down on the fleet they would come shooting. They breasted into the +hollows like any sea-bird and lifted with every heave to shake the +water from bilge to quarter. They came across with never a let-up, +shaving everything along the way until a good berth was picked out. +Then they let go sails, dropped anchor and were ready for a rest. + +Nobody got by our fellows without a word. And we weren't the only crew +of critics. Bungling seamanship would get a slashing here, but there +was none of that. It was all good, but there are degrees of goodness, +of course. First-class seamanship being a matter of course, only a +wonderful exhibition won approval from everybody. And crews coming in, +knowing what was ahead of them, made no mistakes in that harbor. + +A dozen ordinary skippers sailed past before a famous fisherman at +length came in. Everybody knew him--a dog, a high-liner, truly a +master mariner. A murmur went up. "There's the boy," said Tommie +Clancy. "I mind last summer when he came into Souris just such a day +as this, but with more wind stirring. 'Twas Fourth of July and we had +all our flags to the peak--and some fine patriotic fights going on +ashore that day--our flag and the English. The harbor was jammed with +seiners and fresh-fishers. You couldn't see room for a dory, looking +at 'em end on. But that don't jar Tom O'Donnell. What does he do? He +just comes in and sails around the fleet like a cup-defender on +parade--and every bit of canvas he had aboard flying--only his crew +had to hang onto the ring-bolts under the wind'ard rail. Well, he +comes piling in, looks the fleet over, sizes up everything, picks out +a nice spot as he shoots around, sails out the harbor again--clean +out, yes sir, clean out--comes about--and it blowing a living gale all +the time--shoots her in again, dives across a line of us, and fetches +her up standing. We could've jumped from our rail to his in +jack-boots, he was that close to us and another fellow the other side. +Slid her in like you slide the cover into a diddy box. Yes, sir, and +that's the same lad you see coming along now--Tom O'Donnell and his +Colleen Bawn." + +He certainly was coming on now, and a fine working vessel he had. She +showed it in every move. She came around like a twin-screw launch, +picked out her berth like she had intelligence in her eyes, made for +it, swirled, fluttered like a bird, felt with her claws for the ground +underneath, found it, gripped it, swayed, hung on, and at last settled +gently in her place. There was no more jar to the whole thing than if +she had been a cat-boat in a summer breeze. "Pretty, pretty, pretty," +you could hear the gang along our rail. + +"They talk about knockabout racing craft," said Clancy, "but did +y'ever see anything drop to a berth slicker than that? And that's a +vessel you c'n go to sea in, and in the hardest winter gale that ever +blew you c'n turn in when your watch is done and have a feeling of +comfort." + +"Where's the steam trawler, the porgy boat, we saw yesterday?" + +"Put into Chincoteague most likely--nearer than here." + +"That's what we'll have to come to yet--steamers, and go on wages like +a waiter in a hotel." + +"Yes," said Clancy, "I s'pose so, but with vessels like we got and the +seamen sailing out of Gloucester we'll stave 'em off a long time yet, +and even as it is, give me a breeze and a vessel like this one under +us and we'll beat out all the steam fishermen that ever turned a +screw." + +One of the latest experiments in a fishermen's model reached in then +and her coming started a chorus. They were always trying new models in +Gloucester, everybody was so anxious to have a winner. This one's +sails were still white and pretty and her hull still shiny in fresh +black paint. The red stripe along her rail and the gold stripe along +her run set off her lines; her gear didn't have a speck on it, her +spars were yellow as could be and to leeward we thought we could still +smell the patent varnish. For that matter there were several there as +new-looking as she was, our own vessel for one; but there had been a +lot of talk about this one. She was going to clean out the fleet. She +had been pretending to a lot, and as she hadn't yet made good, of +course she got a great raking. + +"She's here at last, boys--the yacht, the wonderful, marvellous +Victory! Ain't she a bird? Built to beat the fleet! Look at the +knockabout bow of her!" + +"Knockabout googleums--h-yah! Scoop shovel snout and a stern ugly as a +battle-ship's, and the Lord knows there was overhang and to spare to +tail her out decent. Cut out the yellow and the red and the whole lot +of gold decorations and she's as homely as a Newf'undland jack." + +"Just the same, she c'n sail," said somebody who wanted to start an +argument. + +"Sail! Yah! might beat a Rockport granite sloop. Ever hear of the +Henry Clay Parker, Mister Billie Simms, and the little licking she +gave this winner of yours? No? Well, you want to go around and have a +drink or two with the boys next time you're ashore and get the news. +It was like a dogfish and a mackerel--the Henry just eat her up. And +there's the others. Why, this one underneath us'd make a holy show of +her, I'll bet. And there's half a dozen others. There's the--oh, +what's the use?" + +"Oh, Eddie Parsons, a perfect lady and coming in like a high-stepper +and yet you must malign her beauty and make light of her virtue," and +Clancy jammed Parsons's sou'wester down over his eyes--"hush up, +Eddie." + +Into the harbor and after the Victory heaved another one. And she was +the real thing--handsome, fast and able. And she had a record for +bringing the fish home--an able vessel and well-known for it. She +could carry whole sails when some of the others were double-reefed and +thinking of dragging trysails out of the hold. And her skipper was a +wonder. + +"You c'n cut all the others out--here comes the real thing. Here's the +old dog himself. Did he ever miss a blow? And look at him. Every man +comes in here to-day under four lowers, no more, and some under +reefed mains'l, or trys'l, but four whole lowers ain't enough for this +gentleman--not for Wesley. He must carry that gaff-tops'l if he pulls +the planks out of her. He always brings her home, but if some of the +underwriters'd see him out here they'd soon blacklist him till he +mended his ways. It's a blessed wonder he ain't found bottom before +this. Look at her now skating on her ear. There she goes--if they'd +just lower a man over the weather rail with a line on him he could +write his name on her keel!" + +And she certainly was something to make a man's eyes stick out. There +had been a vessel or two that staggered before, but the Lucy fairly +rolled down into it, and there was no earthly reason why she should do +it except that it pleased her skipper to sport that extra kite. + +She boiled up from the end of the jetty, and her wake was the wake of +a screw steamer. She had come from home, we knew, and so it happened +she was one of the last to get in. The harbor was crowded as she +straightened out. We knew she would not have too much leeway coming +on, and what berth she was after kept everybody guessing. + +"If she goes where's she pointing--and most vessels do--she'll find a +berth down on the beach on that course, down about where the wreck is. +It'll be dry enough walking when she gets there. If she keeps on the +gait she's going now, she ought to be able to fetch good and high and +dry up on the mud. They'd cert'nly be able to step ashore--when they +get there. Ah-h-h, but that's more like it." + +She was taking it over the quarter then. She cleared the stern of the +most leeward of the fleet and then kicked off, heading over to where +the Johnnie Duncan and the Victory lay. The betting was that she would +round to and drop in between us two. There was room there, but only +just room. It would be a close fit, but there was room. + +But she didn't round to. She held straight on without the sign of a +swerve. On the Johnnie, the gang being almost in her path picked out a +course for her. Between the outer end of our seine-boat and the end of +the bowsprit of the Mary Grace Adams was a passage that may have been +the width of a vessel. But the space seemed too narrow. Our crew were +wondering if he would try it. Even the skipper, standing in the +companionway, stepped up on deck to have a better look. + +"He's got to take it quarterin', and it ain't wide enough," said Eddie +Parsons. + +"Quartering--yes, but with everything hauled inboard," said the +skipper. "He'll try it, I guess. I was with him for two years, and if +he feels like trying it he'll try it." + +"And s'pose he does try it, Skipper?" + +"Oh, he'll come pretty near making it, though he stands a good chance +to scrape the paint off our seine-boat going by. No, don't touch the +seine-boat--let her be as she is. We'll fool 'em if they think they +c'n jar anybody here coming on like that. There's room enough if +nothing slips, and if they hit it's their lookout." + +It looked like a narrow space for a vessel of her beam to go through, +but she hopped along, and the eyes of all the harbor followed her to +the point where she must turn tail or make the passage. + +She held on--her chance to go back was gone. + +"Watch her, boys. Now she's whooping--look at her come!" + +And she was coming. Her windward side was lifted so high that her +bottom planks could be seen. Her oil-skinned crew were crowded +forward. There were men at the fore-halyards, at jib-halyards, at the +down-hauls, and a group were standing by the anchor. Two men were at +the wheel. + +She bit into it. There was froth at her mouth. She was so near now +that we could read the faces of her crew; and wide awake to this fine +seamanship we all leaned over the rail, the better to see how she'd +make out. The crews of half the vessels inside the Breakwater were +watching her. + +She was a length away and jumping to it. It was yet in doubt, but she +was certainly rushing to some sort of a finish. She rushed on, and +w-r-r-rp! her weather bow came down on the Johnnie's seine-boat. But +it didn't quite hit it. Her quarter to leeward just cut under the +Adams' bowsprit and the leech of her mainsail seemed to flatten past. +For a moment we were not certain, but no jolt or lurch came and our +seine-boat seemed all right. Another jump and she was clear by. And +then we felt like cheering her, and her skipper Wesley Marrs, too, as +he stood to the wheel and sung out, "Couldn't scare you, could I, +Maurice. I thought you'd haul your seine-boat in. I've got your extra +seine," and swept by. + +From our deck and from the deck of the Adams, and from the decks of +half a dozen others, could be heard murmurs, and there was a general +pointing out of the redoubtable skipper himself to the green hands +that knew him only by reputation. "That's him, Wesley himself--the +stocky little man of the two at the wheel." + +If the stocky little man heard the hails that were sent after him, he +made no sign, unless a faint dipping of his sou'wester back over his +windward shoulder was his way of showing it. + +He had business yet, had Wesley Marrs. There was a tug and a barge and +another big seiner in his course. He clipped the tug, scraped the +barge, and set the seiner's boat a-dancing, and two lengths more he +put down the wheel and threw her gracefully into the wind. Down came +jib, down came jumbo, over splashed the anchor. She ran forward a +little, rattled back a link or two, steadied herself, and there she +was. Her big mainsail was yet shaking in the wind, her gaff-topsail +yet fluttering aloft, but she herself, the Lucy Foster of Gloucester, +was at your service. "And what do you think of her, people?" might +just as well have been shot off her deck through a megaphone, for that +was what her bearing and the unnatural smartness of her crew plainly +were saying. + +We all drew breath again. Clancy unbent from the rail and shook his +head in high approval. He took off his sou'wester, slatted it over the +after-bitt to clear the brim of water, and spoke his mind. "You'll see +nothing cleaner than that in this harbor to-day, fellows, and you'll +see some pretty fair work at that. That fellow--he's an able seaman." + +"Yes, sir--an able seaman," said the skipper also. + +And Clancy and the skipper were something in the line of able seamen +themselves. + + + + +XIII + +WESLEY MARRS BRINGS A MESSAGE + + +Generally a day in harbor is a day of loafing for the crew of a +seiner; but it was not so altogether with us that day. Within two +hours of the time that Wesley Marrs came in to the Breakwater in such +slashing style the skipper had us into the seine-boat and on the way +to the Lucy Foster. By his orders we took along ten empty mackerel +barrels. "We'll go over to the beach first and fill these barrels up +with sand." We all knew what the sand was for--the Johnnie Duncan was +going to be put in trim to do her best sailing. Coming down the coast +the skipper and Clancy decided that she was down by the stern a +trifle. + +So we attended to the sand, and on the way back hauled our second +seine out of the hold of the Lucy Foster, and piled it into the +seine-boat. With the last of the twine into the seine-boat and just as +we were about to push off from the Lucy, Wesley Marrs put a foot on +the rail of his vessel and spoke to Maurice. + +"And when I was taking the last of that aboard in the dock in +Gloucester, you wouldn't believe who it was stepped onto the cap-log +and looking down on the deck of the Lucy says, 'And you'll take good +care of that seine for Captain Blake, won't you, Captain Marrs?' Could +you guess now, Maurice?" + +"No," said Maurice. + +"No, I'll bet you can't. It isn't often she comes down the dock. Miss +Foster no less. 'And what makes you think I won't?' I asks her. 'Oh, +of course I know you will,' she says, 'and deliver it to him in good +order, too.' 'I'll try,' I says, as though it was a desp'rate job I +had on hand--to put a seine in the hold and turn it over to another +vessel when I met her. 'But what makes you worry about this partic'lar +seine, Miss Foster?' I asks." + +"Which Miss Foster was it, Wesley--the one your vessel is named +after?" broke in our skipper. + +"No--no--but the younger one--Alice. 'But what makes you worry?' I +asks her, and she didn't say anything, but that one that's with her +all the time--the one that goes with the lad that designed the Johnnie +Duncan----" + +"Joe's cousin here----" + +"That's it--the fat little Buckley girl--a fine girl too. And if I was +a younger man and looking for a wife, there's the kind for me--but +anyway she up and says, 'Alice is worried, Captain Marrs, because she +owns a third of Captain Blake's vessel--a good part of her little +fortune's in the Duncan--and if anything happens to the seine +one-third of it, of course, comes out of her. And it cost a good many +hundred dollars. So you must be careful.' 'Oh, that's it?' says I. +'Then it'll be shortened sail and extra careful watches on the Lucy +till I meet Maurice, for I mustn't lose any property of Miss +Foster's.'" + +We rowed away from the Lucy Foster, and I supposed that was the end of +it. But that night going on deck to take a last look at the stars +before turning in, there was the skipper and Clancy walking the break +and talking. + +"And did you know, Tommie, that Miss Foster owned any of this one?" +the skipper was saying. + +"No," said Tommie, "I didn't know, but----" + +"But you suspected. Well, I didn't even suspect. And there's that +seine we lost last night--cost all of eight hundred dollars." + +"That's what it did--a fine seine." + +A few minutes later the skipper went below, and Clancy, seeing me, +said, "Hold on, Joey. Did you hear what the skipper said?" + +"About Miss Foster owning a share of the vessel?" + +"Well, not that so much, but about the loss of the seine?" + +"Yes--why?" + +"Why? Joe, but sometimes a man would think you were about ten year +old. I tell you, Joe, I'm not too sure it's going to be Withrow. And +if you don't see some driving on this one when next we get among the +fish, then--" But he didn't finish it, only clucked his tongue and +went below. + +Clancy was right again. During the night the weather moderated, and in +the morning the first of the fleet to go out past the Breakwater was +the Johnnie Duncan. It looked to us as if the skipper thought the +mackerel would be all gone out of the sea before we got back to the +spot where we had struck them two days before. + + + + +XIV + +A PROSPECT OF NIGHT-SEINING + + +We might have stayed in harbor another twenty-four hours and lost +nothing by it. It was dawn when we put out from the Delaware +Breakwater, and by dark of the same day we were back to where we had +met the big school and lost the seine two days before. And there we +hung about for another night and day waiting for the sea to flatten +out. Mackerel rarely show in rough weather, even if you could put out +a seine-boat and go after them. But I suppose that it did us no harm +to be on the ground and ready. + +On the evening of the next day there was something doing. There was +still some sea on, but not enough to hurt. Along about eight o'clock, +I remember, I came off watch and dropped into the forec's'le to fix up +my arm, which was still badly strained from hanging onto the +seine-boat's painter when I was washed overboard. The skipper, taking +a look, told me not to go into the dory that night, but to let Billie +Hurd, who was spare hand, take my place, and for me to stay aboard. I +would rather have gone into the dory, of course, but was not able to +pull an oar--that is, pull it as I'd have to pull when driving for a +school--and knowing I would be no more than so much freight in the +dory there was nothing else to do. "And if we see fish, Clancy'll stay +to the mast-head to-night--as good a seine-master as sails out of +Gloucester is Tommie--better than me," he said. "I'm going in the +seine-boat, and Eddie Parsons, you'll take Clancy's place in the +dory." And buttoning his oil-jacket up tight, he put on his mitts and +went on deck. + +That evening the forward gang were doing about as much work as seiners +at leisure usually do. It was in the air that we would strike fish, +but the men had not yet been told to get ready. So four of them were +playing whist at the table under the lamp and two were lying half in +and half out of opposite upper bunks, trying to get more of the light +on the pages of the books they were reading. Long Steve, in a lower +port bunk nearer the gangway, was humming something sentimental, and +two were in a knot on the lockers, arguing fiercely over nothing in +particular. There was a fellow in the peak roaring out, "Scots wha hae +wi' Wallace bled." Only the cook, just done with mixing bread, seemed +to have ever done a lick of work in his life, and he was now standing +by the galley fire rolling the dough off his fingers. The cook on a +fisherman is always a busy man. + +Down the companionway and into the thick of this dropped Clancy, oiled +up and all ready to go aloft. To the mast-head of a vessel, even on an +April night in southern waters, it is cold enough, especially when, +like a seiner, she is nearly always by the wind; and Clancy was +wrapped up. "I think," said Clancy, as his boot-heels hit the floor, +"I'll have a mug-up." From the boiler on the galley-stove he poured +out a mug of coffee and from the grub-locker he took a slice of bread +and two thick slices of cold beef. He buried the bread among the beef +and leaned against the foremast while he ate. + +Once when Clancy was a skipper he did a fine bit of rescuing out to +sea, and after he got home a newspaper man saw him and wrote him up. I +had the clipping stuck on the wall of Withrow's store for months and +had read it so often that I knew it by heart. "In heavy jack-boots and +summer sou'wester, with a black jersey of fine quality sticking up +above the neck of his oil-jacket, with a face that won you at sight; +cheeks a nice even pink; damp, storm-beaten, and healthful; with +mouth, eyes, and jaw bespeaking humor, sympathy, and courage; +shoulders that seemed made for butting to windward--an attractive, +inspiring, magnetic man altogether--that is Captain Tommie Clancy of +the Gloucester fisherman, the Mary Andrews." That, was how it read, +and certainly it fitted him now, as he stood there in the middle of +the thick curling smoke of the pipes, holding the mug of coffee in one +hand and the sandwich of bread and meat in the other, leaning easily +against the butt of the foremast, and between gulps and bites taking +notice of the crew. + +"Give me," he said to the cook as the proper man for an audience, "a +seiner's crew when they're not on fish for real gentlemen of leisure. +Look at 'em now--you'd think they were all near-sighted, with their +cards up to their chins. And above them look--Kipling to starb'd and +the Duchess to port. Mulvaney, I'll bet, filled full of whiskey and +keeping the heathen on the jump, and Airy Fairy Lillian, or some other +daisy with winning ways, disturbing the peace of mind of half a dozen +dukes. Mulvaney's all right, but the Duchess! They'll be taking books +of that kind to the mast-head next. What d'y' s'pose I found aft the +other day? Now what d'y' s'pose? I'll bet you'd never guess. No, no. +Well, 'He Loved, but Was Lured Away.' Yes. Isn't that fine stuff for a +fisherman to be feeding on? But whoever was reading it, he was ashamed +of it. 'Well, who owns this thing?' says I, picking up the lured-away +lad. 'Nobody,' speaks up Sam there. Of course he didn't own it--O +no! + +"Violet Vance," went on Clancy, and took another bite of his sandwich. +"Violet Vance and Wilful Winnie and a whole holdful of airy creatures +couldn't help a fisherman when there's anything stirring. I waded +through a whole bunch of 'em once,"--he reached over and took a wedge +of pie from the grub-locker. "Yes, I went through a whole bunch of 'em +once--pretty good pie this, cook, though gen'rally those artificial +apples that swings on strings ain't in it with the natural tree apples +for pie--once when we were laying somewhere to the east'ard of Sable +Island, in a blow and a thick fog--fresh halibuting--and right in the +way of the liners. And I expect I was going around like a man asleep, +because the skipper comes up and begins to talk to me. It was my first +trip with him and I was a young lad. 'Young fellow,' says the skipper, +Matt Dawson--this was in the Lorelei--'young fellow,' says Matt, 'you +look tired. Let me call up the crew and swing a hammock for you from +the fore-rigging to the jumbo boom. How'll that do for you? When the +jumbo slats it'll keep the hammock rocking. Let me,' he says. +'P'raps,' he goes on, 'you wouldn't mind waking up long enough to give +this music box a turn or two every now and then while the fog lasts.' +We had a patent fog-horn aboard, the first I ever saw, and I'd clear +forgot it--warn't used to patent horns. But just another little wedge +of pie, George. + +"However, I suppose when there's nothing doing there's no very great +harm. But we'll try to keep some of you busy to-night. Praise the +Lord, the moon's out of the way and it's looking black already and the +sea ought to fire up fine later on. And there's a nice little breeze +to overhaul a good school when we see one. If any of you are beginning +to think of getting in a wink of sleep then you'd better turn in now, +for you're sure to be out before long. I'm going aloft." + +Clancy climbed up the companionway. Then followed the scraping of his +boot-heels across the deck. Half a minute later, had anybody cared to +go up and have a look, I suppose he would have been discovered +astraddle of the highest block above the forethroat--he and the +skipper--watching out sharply for the lights of the many other vessels +about them, but more particularly straining their eyes for the +phosphorescent trails of mackerel. + + + + +XV + +CLANCY TO THE MAST-HEAD + + +The men below knew their skipper and Clancy too well to imagine that +they were to be too long left in peace. And then, too, the next man +off watch reported a proper night for mackerel. "Not a blessed star +out--and black! It's like digging a hole in the ground and looking +into it. And the skipper's getting nervous, I know. I could hear him +stirrin' 'round up there when I was for'ard just now, and he hollered +to the wheel that up to the no'the'ard it looked like planty of fish. +'And I callate we ain't the only vessel got eyes for it,' he said." + +"Yes," said his watch-mate, who had just dropped down, "it's nothing +but side-lights all 'round and----" + +Just then came the skipper's voice from aloft. "Tell the boys they +might's well oil up and be ready." The watch did not have to repeat +it--we all heard it below, and fore and aft, in cabin and forec's'le, +the gang made ready. Cards, novels, and all the hot arguments went +by the board, and then after a mug-up for nearly all we slid into +oil-clothes, boots and sou'westers, and puffing at what was probably +to be the last pipeful of the evening, we lay around on lockers and +on the floor, backs to the butt of the mast and backs to the +stove--wherever there was space for a broad back and a pair of stout +legs our fellows dropped themselves, discussing all the while the +things that interested them--fish, fishing, fast vessels, big +shares, politics, Bob Fitzsimmons, John L. Sullivan, good stories, +and just then particularly, because two of the crew were thinking of +marrying, the awful price of real estate in Gloucester. + +By and by, ringing as clear as if he himself stood at the companionway, +came the skipper's voice from the mast-head: "On deck everybody!" No +more discussion, no more loafing--pipes were smothered into bosoms, +and up the companionway crowded oilskins and jack-boots. + +Then came: "It looks like fish ahead of us. Haul the boat alongside +and drop the dory over." + +We jumped. Four laid hands on the dory in the waist and ten or a dozen +heaved away on the stiff painter of the seine-boat that was towing +astern. Into the air and over the starboard rail went the dory, while +ploughing up to the vessel's boom at the port fore-rigging came the +bow of the seine-boat. + +Then followed: "Put the tops'ls to her--sharp now." + +The halyards could be heard whirring up toward the sky, while two +bunches of us sagged and lifted on the deck below. Among us it was, +"Now then--o-ho--sway away--good," until topsails were flat as boards, +and the schooner, hauled up, had heeled to her scuppers. + +"Slap the stays'l to her and up with the balloon. Half the fleet's +driving to the no'the'ard. Lively." + +The Johnnie liked that rarely. With the seventy-five foot main-boom +sheeted in to her rail, with the thirty-seven-foot spike bowsprit +poking a lane in the sea when she dove and a path among the clouds +when she lifted, with her midship rail all but flush with the sea and +the night breeze to sing to her--of course she liked it, and she +showed her liking. She'd tear herself apart now before she'd let +anything in the fleet go by her. And red and green lights were racing +to both quarters of her. + +"Into the boat!" It was the skipper's voice again, and fifteen men +leaped over the rail at the word. Two dropped into the dory and +thirteen jumped from the vessel's rail onto thwarts or netting or into +the bottom of the seine-boat--anywhere at all so that they get in +quickly. As extra hand on deck I had to stand by and pay out the +painter. + +In the middle of it came the skipper sliding down from the mast-head. +"Drop astern, boat and dory," he called out, and himself leaped over +the quarter and onto the pile of netting as into the Johnnie's boiling +wake they went. The thirty-eight-foot seine-boat was checked up a +dozen fathoms astern, and the dory just astern of that. The two men in +the dory had to fend off desperately as they slid by the seine-boat. + +On the deck of the Johnnie were the cook, who had the wheel, and +myself, who had to stand by the sheets. There would be stirring times +soon, for even from the deck occasional flashes of light, marking +small pods of mackerel, could be made out on the surface of the sea. +Clancy, now at the mast-head alone, was noting these signs, we felt +sure, and with them a whole lot of other things. To the mast-heads of +other vessels out in the night were other skippers, or seine-masters, +and all with skill and nerve and a great will to get fish. + +The Johnnie was making perhaps ten knots good now, and with every jerk +the painter of the seine-boat chafed and groaned in the taffrail +chock. The skipper from the boat called for more line. "Slack away a +bit, slack away. We're not porpoises." + +I jumped to attend to the painter just as Clancy's voice broke in from +above: "Swing her off about two points, ease your main sheet and keep +an eye on that light to looard. Off, off--that's good--hold her--and +Joe, slack stays'l and then foretops'l halyards. Be ready to let go +balloon halyards and stand by down-haul. Look alive." + +I paid out some sheet from the bitt by the wheel-box, unbuttoned the +after stays'l tack, jumped forward and loosed up halyards till her +kites dropped limp. + +"Down with your balloon there--and at the wheel there, jibe her over. +Watch out for that fellow astern--he's pretty handy to our boat. Watch +out in boat and dory!" The last warning was a roar. + +The big balloon gossamer came rattling down the long stay and the jaws +of the booms ratched, fore and main, as they swung over. From astern +came the voices of the men in boat and dory, warning each other to +hang on when they felt her jibing. Some of them must have come near to +being jerked overboard. "Why in God's name don't you slack that +painter?" came the voice of the skipper from the boat. + +I leaped to give them more painter, and "Draw away your jib--draw away +your jumbo," came from aloft. Sheets were barely fast when it was: +"Steady at the wheel, George--steady her--ste-a-dy--Great God! man, if +you can't see can't you feel that fellow just ahead? And, skipper, +tell them to close their jaws astern there--water won't hurt 'em. +Ready all now?" + +"Ready!" roared back the skipper. + +"All right. Down with your wheel a bit now, George. Down--more yet. +Hold her there." + +The vessels that we had dodged by this bit of luffing were now +dropping by us; one red light was slowly sliding past our quarter to +port, and one green shooting by our bow to starboard. Evidently Clancy +had only been waiting to steer clear of these two neighbors, for there +was plenty of fish in sight now. The sea was flashing with trails of +them. Clancy now began to bite out commands. + +"Stand ready everybody. In the boat and dory there--is everything +ready, skipper?" + +"All ready, boat and dory." + +Out came Clancy's orders then--rapid fire--and as he ripped them out, +no whistling wind could smother his voice, no swash of the sea could +drown it. In boat, dory and on deck, every brain glowed to understand +and every heart pumped to obey. + +"Up with your wheel, George, and let her swing by. Stea-dy. Ready in +the boat. Steady your wheel. Are you ready in the boat? Let her swing +off a little more, George. Steady--hold her there. Stand by in the +boat. Now then--now! Cast off your painter, cast off and pull to the +west'ard. And drive her! Up with the wheel. More yet--that's good. +Drive her, I say, skipper. Where's that dory?--I don't see the dory. +The dory, the dory--where in hell's the dory?--show that lantern in +the dory. All right, the dory. Hold her up, George. Don't let her +swing off another inch now. Drive her, boys, drive her! Look out now! +Stand by the seine! Stand by--the twine--do you hear, Steve! The +twine! Drive her--drive her--blessed Lord! drive her. That's the +stuff, skipper, drive her! Let her come up, George. Down with your +wheel--down with you wheel--ste-a-dy. Drive her, skipper, drive her! +Turn in now--in--shorter yet. Drive her now--where's that dory!--hold +her up!--not you, George! you're all right--ste-a-dy. Hold that dory +up to the wind!--that's it, boys--you're all right--straight ahead +now! That's the stuff. Turn her in now again, skipper. In the dory +there--show your lantern in the dory and be ready for the seine-boat. +Good enough. Now cover your lantern in the dory and haul away when +you're ready." + +To have experienced the strain and drive of that rush, to have held an +oar in the boat during that and to have shared with the men in the +confidence they gathered--ours was a skipper to steer a boat around a +school--and the soul that rang in Clancy's voice!--why, just to stand +on deck, as I did, and listen to it--it was like living. + +During this dash we could make out neither boat nor dory from deck, +but the flashes of light raised by the oars at every stroke were +plainly to be seen in that phosphorescent sea. Certainly they were +making that boat hop along! Ten good men, with every man a long, broad +blade, and double banked, so that every man might encourage his mate +and be himself spurred on by desperate effort. Legs, arms, shoulders, +back, all went into it and their wake alive with smoke and fire to +tell them they were moving! To be in that?--The middle of a black +night on the Atlantic was this, and the big seine-heaver was throwing +the seine in great armfuls. And Hurd and Parsons in the little dory +tossing behind and gamely trying to keep up! They were glad enough to +be in the dory, I know, to get hold of the buoy, and you can be sure +there was some lively action aboard of her when Clancy called so +fiercely to them to hold the buoy up to the wind, so that the efforts +of the crew of the seine-boat, racing to get their two hundred odd +fathoms of twine fence around the flying school, might not go for +naught. + + + + +XVI + +WE GET A FINE SCHOOL + + +With his "Haul away now when you're ready," Clancy came down from +aloft. He was sliding down evidently by way of the jib halyards, for +there was the sound of a chafing whiz that could be nothing else than +the friction of oilskins against taut manila rope, a sudden check, as +of a block met on the way, an impatient, soft, little forgivable oath, +and then a plump! that meant that he must have dropped the last twelve +or fifteen feet to the deck. Immediately came the scurry of his +boot-heels as he hurried aft. In another moment he stood in the glow +of the binnacle light, and reaching back toward the shadow of the +cook, but never turning his head from that spot out in the dark where +he had last seen the boat, he took the wheel. + +"All right, George, I've got you. A good-sized school, by the looks, +if they got them, and I think they have. Did you see that boat ahead +we near ran into?--the last time we put the wheel down? Man, but for a +second I thought they were gone. I hope no blessed vessel comes as +near to our fellows. And they were so busy rowing and heaving twine +they never saw us, and myself nearly cross-eyed trying to watch them +and our own boat and the fish all the time. Go below, George, she's +all right now, and tell Joe--where is he?--to go below, too, and have +a mug-up for himself. He must be soaked through taking the swash that +must've come over her bow for the last hour. But tell him to come +right up so's to keep watch out ahead." + +I didn't go below, however, but standing by the fore-rigging kept an +eye out ahead. Clancy himself stood to the wheel with his head ever +turned over one shoulder, until he saw the flare of a torch from the +seine-boat. "Good!" he exclaimed. "What there is is safe now, +anyway." + +After that his work was easy. He had only to dodge the lights of other +vessels now, the old red and green lights that had been our neighbors +all that evening, and a few new yellow flares that came from other +seine-boats. So his eyes ranged the blackness and in rings about his +own seine-boat he sailed the Johnnie Duncan. That the crew were quite +a little while pursing up only gave him satisfaction. "A nice school, +Joe, if they got it all," he said, "a nice school of 'em." And after a +pause, "I think I'll stand down and have a look." + +He ran down, luffed, and hailed, "Hi--skipper, what's it like?" + +From the row of figures that were seen to be crowding gunnel and +thwarts and hauling on the seine, one shadow straightened up beside +the smoky torch and spoke. "Can't be sure yet, Tommie, but things look +all right so far. A fair-sized school if we don't lose 'em." + +"Lord, don't lose 'em, skipper, though I think you've got 'em fast +enough now. Sounds natural to hear 'em flipping inside the corks, +don't it? Ought to be hurrying 'em up, skipper--it's getting along in +the night." + +Clancy, very well satisfied, stood away again and continued to sail +triangles around boat and dory. Being now clear of the greater part of +the mental strain his spirits began to lighten. Merely by way of being +sociable with himself he hummed some old ditties. There was that about +the old coaster, the Eliza Jane. I liked to hear him sing that, as, +dancing a one-footed jig-step by the wheel-box, he bumped it out: + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane with a blue foremast + And a load of hay came drifting past. + Her skipper stood aft and he said, 'How do? + We're the 'Liza Jane and who be you?' + + He stood by the wheel and he says, 'How do? + We're from Bangor, Maine--from where be you?' + + "The 'Liza Jane got a new main truck-- + A darn fine thing but wouldn't stay stuck. + Came a breeze one day from the no'-no'-west + And the gosh-darned thing came down with the rest. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di--a breeze from the west-- + Who'd 'a' thunk the truck wouldn't stuck with the rest? + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane left the wharf one day, + A fine flood tide and the day Friday, + But the darned old tide sent her bow askew + And the 'Liza Jane began for to slew. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di--she'd 'a' fairly flew, + If she only could sail the other end to. + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane left port one day, + With her hold full of squash and her deck all hay. + Two years back with her sails all set + She put from Bath--she's sailing yet. + + Oh, hi-diddle-di for a good old craft + She'd 've sailed very well with her bow on aft." + +There was a long story to the Eliza Jane, but Clancy did not finish +it. Maybe he felt that it was not in harmony with that lowering sky or +that flashing sea. Maybe, too, in the waters that rolled and the wake +that smoked was the inspiration for something more stirring. At any +rate he began, in a voice that carried far, an old ballad of the war +of 1812. + +Two or three more stanzas to warm up, and the fight was on. And you +would think Clancy was in it. He laid every mast and yard of the +enemy over the side of her, he made her decks run with blood, and at +the last, in a noble effort, he caused her to strike her flag. + +By the time he had finished that, it happened that we were running +before the wind, and, going so, it was very quiet aboard the vessel. +There was none of the close-hauled wash through her scuppers, nor was +there much play of wind through stays and halyards. It was in fact +unusually quiet, and it needed only that to set Clancy off on a more +melancholy tack. So in a subdued voice he began the recitation of one +of the incidents that have helped to make orphans of Gloucester +children: + + "Twelve good vessels fighting through the night + Fighting, fighting, that no'the-east gale; + Every man, be sure, did his might, + But never a sign of a single sail + Was there in the morning when the sun shone red, + But a hundred and seventy fine men--dead-- + Were settling somewhere into the sand + On Georges shoals, which is Drowned Men's Land. + + "Seventy widows kneeling----" + +A long hail came over the water and a torch was raised and lowered. +"Hi-i--" hallooed the voice. + +"Hi-i-i--" hallooed back Clancy as he pulled down his wheel. You might +have thought he intended to run over them. But no, for at the very +last second he threw her up cleverly and let her settle beside the +boat, from which most of the men came tumbling immediately over the +side of the vessel. Of those who stayed, one shackled the boat's bow +onto the iron that hung from the boom at the fore-rigging, and having +done that, braced an oar between himself and the vessel's run to hold +the boat away and steady while another in the stern of the boat did +the same thing with his oar. In the boat's waist two men hung onto the +seine. + +A section of the cork edge of the seine was then gathered inboard and +clamped down over the vessel's rail, with the mackerel crowded into +the middle part, and the bunt of the seine thus held safely between +boat and vessel. Into this space the sea swashed and slapped after a +manner that kept all in the boat completely drenched and made it +pretty hard for the men in bow and stern to fend off and retain their +balance at the same time. + +And then began the bailing in. Guided by the skipper, who stood on the +break, our big dip-net, which could hold a barrel easily, was dropped +over the rail and in among the kicking fish. A twist and a turn and +"He-yew!" the skipper yelled. "Oy-hoo!" grunted the two gangs of us at +the halyards, and into the air and over the rail swung the dip-net, +swimming full. "Down!" We let it sag quickly to Clancy and Parsons, +who were at the rail. "Hi-o!" they called cheerfully, and turned the +dip-net inside out. Out and down it went again, "He-yew!" and up and +in it came again. "Oy-hoo!" "Hi-o!" and flop! it was turned upside +down and another barrel of fat, lusty fish flipped their length +against the hard deck. Head and tail they flipped, each head and tail +ten times a second seemingly, until it sounded--they beat the deck so +frantically--as if a regiment of gentle little drummer boys were +tapping a low but wonderfully quick-sounding roll. Scales flew. We +found some next morning glued to the mast-head. I never can get some +people to believe that it is so--mackerel scales to the mast-head. + +"He-yew!" called the skipper, "Oy-hoo!" hollered the halyards gang, +"Hi-o!" sung out Clancy and Parsons cheerily at the rail. "Fine fat +fish," commented the men in the seine-boat, the only men who had time +to draw an extra breath. + +Blazing torches were all around us. Arms worked up and down, big boots +stamped, while inboard and out swung the dip-net, and onto the deck +flopped the mackerel. "Drive her!" called the skipper, and "He-yew!" +"Oy-hoo!" and "Hi-o!" it went. Drenched oilskins steamed, wet faces +glowed, glad eyes shone through the smoke flare, and the pitching +vessel, left to herself, plunged up and down to the lift and fall of +every sea. + + + + +XVII + +A DRIVE FOR MARKET + + +Her deck was pretty well filled with mackerel when "All dry," said +Long Steve, and drew the last of the seine into the boat. + +"Then hurry aboard and drop that seine-boat astern. And--whose watch? +Take the wheel--wait till I give you the course--there. But don't +drive her awhile yet. Some of those fish might be washed over. But it +won't be for long." + +"Ready with the ice?" he asked next. + +"All ready," and the men who had been chopping ice and making ready +the pens in the hold stood by to take the mackerel as we passed them +down. + +As soon as we had enough of them off the vessel's deck to make it safe +to drive her, the skipper gave her a little more sheet and let her go +for New York. We hustled the seine-boat aboard too. Some other vessels +must have got fish, too, and there was no time to waste. + +It was a good-sized school and when we had them all iced and +below--more than thirty thousand count--it was time for all hands to +turn in--all but the two men on watch of course. I didn't turn in +myself, but after a mug-up and pipeful below came on deck again. It +was a pretty good sort of a night for a dark night, with a moderate +breeze that sang in your ears when you leaned against the halyards and +a sea that lapped bucketfuls of spray over her rail forward and that +tumbled away in a wide flat hump as our quarter slipped on and left it +behind. + +I found the skipper leaning against the weather rigging and watching a +red light coming up on us. Noticing me he said, "There's that porgy +steamer that we beat out for that school the other day overhauling us +now. There's the beauty of steam. The crew of this one knows more in a +minute than they know in a week about fishing in that steamer, and +we'd be carrying our summer kites when that gang, if they were in a +sailing vessel, would be laying to an anchor; and with our boat out +and their boat out and a school in sight they'd have to take our +leavings. But here's one of the times when they have the best of it." + +There wasn't much wind stirring then, but it promised to breeze up, or +so the skipper thought, and I'm sure I was glad to hear him say it, +for the harder it blew the sooner we would get to New York and the +better our chance to beat the porgyman. First in to market got the +cream. + +It was pretty well on to daybreak when the porgy steamer got up +abreast of us and after a while worked by. One of them took the +trouble to sing out to us when they went by, "Well, you got a school +before us, but we'll be tied up and into the dock and spending our +money ashore whilst you're still along the Jersey coast somewhere." + +And we supposed they would, but Hurd, who was then to our wheel, had +to call back to them, "Oh, I dunno. I dunno about that--it's a good +run to Fulton Market dock yet." And, turning to us, "I hope the bloody +old boiler explodes so nobody'll be able to find a mackerel of 'em +this side the Bay of Fundy. Of course I wouldn't want to see the men +come to any harm, but wouldn't it jar you--them scrubs?" + +The skipper wasn't saying anything. And it meant a lot to him, too. He +was looking after the steamer and, I know, praying for wind. We could +see it in his eyes. + +And sometimes things come as we like to have them. At full dawn it was +a nice breeze with the Johnnie Duncan washing her face in plenty of +good spray and the fine sun shining warm on a fresh sea-way. Another +hour, the wind hauling and still making, the Johnnie was down to her +rail, and awhile after that she was getting all the wind she needed. + +"We may have a chance to try her out on this run, who knows?" said the +skipper. We were coming up on the porgy steamer then and you should +have seen his eyes when they looked from the rail to the deck of his +vessel and from the deck again to aloft. On the steamer the gang were +in the waist watching us coming and they must have been piling the +coal into her below and giving her the jet steadily, for out of her +funnel was coming the smoke in clouds mixed with steam. + +"But their firemen can stoke till they're black in the face and they +won't get more than eleven or eleven and a half knots out of her," +said Clancy. "I know her--the Nautilus--and if this one under us ain't +logging her fourteen good then I don't know. And she'll be doing +better yet before we see New York." + +They were driving the porgyman then, but she was fated. Once we began +to get her she came back to us fast enough, and once she was astern +she troubled us no more. After the porgyman we passed a big white +yacht, evidently just up from the West Indies after a winter's cruise. +She looked a model for a good sailer, but there was no chance to try +her out, for they had her under shortened sail when we went by. + +There was a New York blue-fisherman on our weather bow bound for New +York, too, and the way we went by her was a scandal. And farther on +we drove by a big bark--big enough, almost, to take us aboard. They +were plainly trying to make a passage on her, but we left her too. +Then we passed another yacht, but she wasn't carrying half our sail. +Her hull was as long as ours, but she didn't begin to be sparred as we +were. We must have had ten feet on her main-boom and ten feet more +bowsprit outboard, and yet under her four lower sails she seemed to be +making heavy going of it. It's a good yacht that can hold a fisherman +in a breeze and a sea-way. We beat this one about as bad as we beat +the blue-fisherman. As we went by we tried to look as though we had +beaten so many vessels that we'd lost all interest in racing, and at +the same time we were all dancing on our toes to think what a vessel +we had under us. It was that passage we held the north-bound Savannah +steamer for seven hours. Her passengers stood by the rail and watched +us, and when at last we crowded our bowsprit past her nose, they waved +their handkerchiefs and cheered us like mad. + +"When we get this one loosened up a bit and down to her trim, she'll +sail some or I don't know," said our skipper. He stood in the cabin +gangway then and filled his boots with water, but he wouldn't take in +sail. Back behind us was another seiner. We could just make out that +they were soaking it to her too. The skipper nodded his head back at +her. Then, with one hand on the house and the other on the rail, he +looked out from under our main-boom and across at the steamer. "Not a +rag--let the spars come out of her." + +One thing was sure--the Johnnie was a vessel that could stand driving. +She didn't crowd herself as she got going. No, sir! The harder we +drove her the faster she went. Laying down on her side made no +difference to her. In fact we were not sure that she wouldn't do her +best sailing on her side. But it hadn't come to that yet. She was +standing up under sail fine. Most of them, we knew, would have washed +everything off their deck before that. And certainly there would have +been no standing down by the lee rail on too many of them with that +breeze abeam. + +Going up New York harbor, where we had to tack, the Savannah steamer +could have gone by if she had to, but big steamers slow down some +going into a harbor, and we holding on to everything made up for the +extra distance sailed. The wind, of course, was nothing to what it was +outside, and that made some difference. Anyway, we kept the Johnnie +going and held the steamer up to the Battery, where, as she had to go +up North River, she gave us three toots. The people on the Battery +must have had a good look at us. I guess it was not every day they saw +a schooner of the Johnnie's size carrying on like that. Billie Hurd +had to pay his respects to them. "Look, you loafers, look, and see a +real vessel sailing in." + +There was a sassy little East River towboat that wanted to give us a +tow, but our skipper said it would be losing time to take sail off and +wait for a line then. The tug captain said, "Oh, no; and you can't +dock her anyway in this harbor without a tug." + +"Oh, I can dock her all right, I guess," said our skipper. + +"Maybe you think you can, but wait till you try it, and have a nice +little bill for damages besides." + +"Well, the vessel's good for the damages, too." + +That towboat tailed us just the same, but we had the satisfaction of +fooling him. The skipper kept the Johnnie going till the right time +and then, when the tugboat people thought it was too late, he shot her +about on her heel and into the dock with her mainsail coming down on +the run and jibs dead. + +A couple of East Side loafers standing on the wharf cap-log were +nearly swept away by the end of our bowsprit, we came on so fast. Four +or five of us leaped ashore, and with lines out and made fast in no +time, we had her docked without so much as cracking a single shingle +of the house across the head of the dock. + +We sold our mackerel for nineteen cents apiece. Fifty-seven hundred +and odd dollars was our stock, and about a hundred and forty dollars +each man's share. We felt a little bit chesty after that. We were not +the first to market that year, but we were the first since the early +flurry, and the biggest stock so far that spring was to our credit. + +We stood on the deck and watched the porgy steamer come in and tie up, +too late for that day's market. Some of our fellows had to ask them +where they got their fish--to the s'uth'ard or where?--and two or +three fights came out of it, but no harm done. Then nearly everybody +drew some money off the skipper, and we smoked fifteen-cent cigars and +threw our chests out. We all went uptown, too, and took in the +theatres that night, and afterwards treated each other and pretty +nearly everybody else that we met along the East Side on the way back, +until the policemen began to notice us and ask if we didn't think we'd +better be getting back to our ships. One or two of the crew had to get +into fights with the toughs along the water front, but we were all +safely aboard by three o'clock in the morning. + +All but Clancy. Some of us were trying to get some sleep along towards +morning when Clancy came aboard with a fine shore list. The cook, who +was up and stirring about for breakfast, noticed him first. "It's a +fine list you've got, Tommie." + +"And why not?--and a fine beam wind coming down the street. I'm like a +lot of other deep-draught craft of good model, George--I sail best +with the wind abeam. A bit of a list gets you down to your lines." And +until we turned out for breakfast, after which it was time to be off +and away to the fleet again, he kept us all in a roar with the story +of his adventures. + + + + +XVIII + +A BRUSH WITH THE YACHTING FLEET + + +Through all of that month and through most of the month of May we +chased the mackerel up the coast. By the middle of May we were well up +front with the killers, and our skipper's reputation was gaining. The +vessel, too, was getting quite a name as a sailer. Along the Maryland, +Delaware, and Jersey coasts we chased them--on up to off Sandy Hook +and then along the Long Island shore, running them fresh into New +York. There were nights and days that spring when we saw some driving +on the Johnnie Duncan. + +Toward the end of May, with the fish schooling easterly to off No +Man's Land and reported as being seen on Georges and in the Bay of +Fundy--working to the eastward all the time--we thought the skipper +would put for home, take in salt, fill the hold with barrels and refit +for a Cape Shore trip--that is, head the fish off along the Nova +Scotia shore, from Cape Sable and on to anywhere around the Gulf of +St. Lawrence, and stay there until we had filled her up with salt +mackerel. We thought so, because most of the fleet had decided on +that plan and because we had been away from home since the first of +April. But no--he stayed cruising off Block Island and running them +fresh into Newport with the last half-dozen of the fleet. + +Our idea of it was that the skipper wanted to go home badly enough, +but he was set on getting a big stock and didn't care what it cost +himself or us to get it. Some of us would have given a lot to be +home. + + "Oh, fine blue sky and a fine blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me," + +was how Clancy put it as he came down from aloft one afternoon and +took the wheel from me. "By the wind is it, Joe?" + +"By the wind," I said--the usual word when seiners are cruising for +mackerel, and I went aloft to take his place at the mast-head. It was +a lazy watch, as the mackerel generally were not showing at this time +in the middle of the day. They seemed to prefer the early morning or +the late afternoon, or above all a dark night. + +Long Steve, who came up this day to pass the time with me aloft, had +been telling me about his old home, when we both noticed the topsails +of what we knew must be the first of a fleet of big schooner yachts +racing to Newport--from New York, no doubt, on one of their ocean +races. Steve, of course, had to try to name the leader, while she was +yet miles away--seiners have wonderful eyes for vessels--and was still +at it, naming the others behind, when the next on watch relieved me +and I went below. + +The first of the yachts was almost on us when I came down, and Clancy +was watching her like a hawk when he turned the wheel over to the next +man. She was as about as big as we were. We knew her well. She had +been a cup defender and afterwards changed to a schooner rig. Our +skipper was taking a nap below at this time, or we supposed he was. He +had been up nearly a week, with no more than a two-hours' sleep each +day, and so was pretty well tired. That was what made Clancy stand by +the wheel and ask if the skipper was still asleep. + +"No," said the skipper himself. He had just turned out, and in his +stocking feet he came to the companionway and looked up. "What is +it?" + +"Here's this big yacht crawling by on our quarter--she'll be by us +soon. I thought you wouldn't like it." + +"I'll be right up. Tell the gang to sway up." + +He drew on his slip-shods and came on deck. He took a look over at the +yacht while we were swaying up. When we had everything good and flat +and trimmed sheets a bit, the skipper called out to take in the +fore-topsail. "She hasn't got hers set," he explained. + +Now, a fore-topsail does not help much--hauled up, as were the Johnnie +Duncan and the yacht, it would be a hindrance to most vessels, and, +perhaps, because it did not help her was why the yacht had not hers +set. But it showed the skipper's fairness. Ours had been left set, +because we might need it in a hurry, and also because with the skipper +below nobody could order it down. Now we clewed it up. + +Clancy, standing aft, threw a look at our seine-boat, which of course +we had in tow. "She's quite a drag," he suggested, "for a vessel +that's racing." + +"Yes," said the skipper, "but wait a while. We won't cast it off +unless we have to." + +We did not have to. We soon had her in trim. For weeks the skipper and +Clancy had been marking the Johnnie's sheets so that in an emergency +they could whip her into her best sailing in no time. With that, and +with the shifting of some barrels of salt that we had on deck, we soon +had her going. It is surprising what a lot of difference the shifting +of a few barrels of salt will make in the trim of a vessel. We had not +had a try with anything for two weeks or so and had become careless. +The last thing we did was to take some barrels of fresh water that +happened to be standing forward of the windlass and shift them aft, +and then the Johnnie began to go along for fair. + +Coming up to Block Island Light things were pretty even. Then it came +a question of who was to go to windward. The yacht hauled her +mainsheet in to two blocks. So did we, and, further, ran a line from +the cringle in her foresail to the weather rigging. She could not make +it--we had her. + +"Mind the time," said the skipper, when at last we had her under our +quarter--"mind the time, Tommie, when we used to do so much racing +down on the Cape shore? There's where we had plenty of time for racing +and all sorts of foolishness. I was pretty young then, but I mind it +well. A string of men on the rigging from the shear poles clear up to +the mast-head--yes, and a man astraddle the main gaff once or twice, +passing buckets of water to wet down the mains'l." + +"Yes, and barrels of water out toward the end of the main-boom keep +the sail stretched. Man, but those were the days we paid attention to +racing." + +"Those were the days," asserted the skipper. "But we can do a little +of it now, too." + +By that you will understand we were walking away from our yacht. We +were to anchor in the harbor while she was still coming, and we had +towed our seine-boat all the way. + +"Lord," said Clancy, as we were tying up our foresail, "but I'd like +to see this one in an ocean race with plenty of wind stirring--not a +flat breeze and a short drag like we had to-day." + + + + +XIX + +MINNIE ARKELL AGAIN + + +Coming on to dark that night a gig put off from the schooner-yacht and +rowed over to us. On the way she was hailed and passed a few words +with a steam-yacht anchored in between. The man in the stern of the +gig was not satisfied until he had been rowed three times around the +Johnnie. When he had looked his fill he came alongside. + +He mistook Clancy for the skipper. I suppose he couldn't imagine a man +of Clancy's figure and bearing to be an ordinary hand on a fisherman. +So to Clancy he said, "Captain, you've got a wonderful vessel here. +Put a single stick in her and she'll beat the world." + +"Yes," said Clancy, "and she'd be a hell of a fine fisherman then, +wouldn't she?" + +The rest of us had to roar at that. We at once pictured the Johnnie +rigged up as a sloop out on the Grand Banks, trawling or hand-lining, +with the crew trying to handle her in some of the winter gales that +struck in there. And a great chance she would have rigged as a sloop +and her one big sail, making a winter passage home eight or nine or +ten hundred miles, when as it was, with the sail split up to schooner +rig, men found it bad enough. + +The master of the yacht had a message for our captain, he said, and +Clancy told him the skipper was below. There they talked for a while +and after the yachtsman had gone Maurice, inviting four or five of us +along, dressed up, called for the seine-boat, got in and was rowed +over to a steam-yacht that we now remembered had hailed the +schooner-yacht's gig. All brass and varnish and white paint and gold +she would be in the daytime, but now she was all lit up with electric +lights below and Japanese lanterns on deck. + +When we came alongside, who should come to the gangway of the yacht +and welcome Maurice but Minnie Arkell--Mrs. Miner. She greeted all of +us for that matter--she never pretended not to see people--and invited +us all below for refreshments. There was a good lay-out there and we +pitched into it. Seiners are great people at table or in a bunk. They +can turn to and eat, or turn in and sleep any minute, day or night. So +now we turned to. Clancy did great things to the wine. Generally he +took whiskey, but he did not object to good wine now and then. He and +one fellow in a blue coat, white duck trousers, and a blue cap that +never left his head, had a great chat. + +"I callate that if he didn't have that cap with the button on front +nobody'd know he was a real yachtsman, would they?" Eddie Parsons +whispered in my ear. + +The owner of the steam-yacht was trying to convince Tommie that +yachting would be more in his line than fishing, but Tommie couldn't +see it. + +"But why not?" he asked at last. "Why not, Mr. Clancy? Is it a matter +of money? If it is, I'll make that right. I pay ordinary hands +twenty-five and thirty dollars a month and found, but I'll pay you +fifty--sixty--seventy dollars a month to go with me. I'm going to race +this steamer this summer and I want a quartermaster--a man like you +that can steer to a hair-line. Seventy dollars a month now--what do +you say?" + +"Come now, my good man, what do you say?" Clancy got that off without +so much as a smile. "But you couldn't make it seventy-five now, could +you? No, I didn't mean that quite, though I've been out the dock in +Gloucester of a Saturday noon and back again to the dock of a Tuesday +noon--three days--and shared two hundred dollars--not as skipper, mind +you, but just as hand. There now, I hope you're not going to get +angry. Hadn't we better have another little touch? But I can see +myself in a suit of white duck, touching my cap, and saying, 'Aye, +aye, sir,' to some slob--no reference to you, mind you--but some slob +in a uniform that's got a yacht, not because he loves the sea, but +because he wants to butt in somewhere--who lives aboard his yacht just +the same as he does in his house ashore--electric bells, baths, +servants, barber and all--and hugs the shore so close that he gets the +morning paper as regularly as when he's at home. When that kind go +yachting all they miss are the tables on the lawn and the automobiles +going by the door. They even have canary-birds--some of them--in +cages. Yes, and wouldn't be caught twenty miles off shore--no, not +even in a summer's breeze for--And where would he be in a winter's +gale? I can see myself rowing a gig with somebody like that in the +stern giving orders and fooling--well, some simple-minded women folks, +maybe, who know as much of the sea as they do of the next world--most +of them--fooling them into believing that he's a devil--yes, a clean +devil on the water. Seventy a month for that?--couldn't you make it +seventy-five?" + +"You don't mean to say that----" + +"Yes," said Clancy, "I do. I'd rather stick to fishing than--but +here's a shoot and let's call the quartermaster's job off." + +Minnie Arkell chimed in here. "A real fisherman, you must remember, +Mr. Keith, doesn't care much for yachting because--leaving out the +question of wages, for he does make more at fishing--he can remain a +fisherman and yet be independent." + +"You mean they don't have to take orders as if they were on a yacht, +Mrs. Miner?" + +"No, no--don't make any mistake there. The discipline of a yacht, so +far as I know it, is baby play to what they have on a good fisherman. +The discipline aboard a warship is nothing to that aboard a fisherman, +like Captain Blake's vessel say, when there is anything to be done. +Fishermen, it's true, don't have to touch their caps and say, 'Very +good, sir,' to a man who may be no more of a real man than themselves. +On your yacht I suppose you'd discharge a man who didn't do what he +was told, and on a warship he would be sent to the brig, I suppose. On +a fisherman he'd be put ashore. On a fisherman they not only obey +orders, but they carry them out on the jump. And why? Because they've +always done it. Why, deep-sea fishermen are always getting into places +where only the best of seamanship can save them, and they very early +get in the way of doing things up quick and right. When a Gloucester +skipper orders in the sail, say in a gale of wind, and more than apt +to be in the middle of the night--you don't see men trying to see how +long it will take them to get into oilskins--or filling another pipe +before they climb on deck. No, sir--the first man out on the bowsprit, +if it's the jib to come in--or out on the foot-ropes, if it's the +mainsail to be tied up--he's the man that will have a right to hold +his head high next day aboard that vessel. And so the crew of a +fisherman jump to their work--if they didn't there'd be a lot more of +them lost than there are." + +"Dear me," said Mr. Keith, "that never occurred to me before. But how +is it, Mrs. Miner, that you have it down so fine?" + +"My father was a Gloucester skipper, and since I was that high"--she +put her hand on a level with her knee--"I've been listening to +fishermen. And yachting life does tend to spoil a fisherman," she went +on to explain. "After a summer of yachting a fisherman will begin to +think that a winter of fishing is going to be a serious thing." She +was warmed up then and went on talking at a great rate. And listening +to her I could understand better why men took to her. She had warm +blood in her. If it were not for her weakness to be admired by men, +she would have been a great woman. "And they get so, that what seems +extraordinary work to you is only an every-day matter to them. Do you +remember that last schooner-yacht race across the Atlantic?--when two +or three reporters went along, and after they got back wrote all kinds +of stories of what a desperate trip it was--how rough it was and +dangerous! Well, that time there were three or four Gloucestermen +making the run to Iceland. Now, they were not as big as the racing +yachts and they were loaded down with all the stores for a long salt +trip--their holds full of salt, for one thing--and yet they made about +as good time to Iceland as that yachtsman made to Queenstown. And they +weren't driving their vessels either--they don't drive on the way out. +It's only coming home that they try to make passages. Now, they must +have got the same weather and yet nobody ever heard them in their +letters home report a word of bad weather, or ever afterward, either. +And yet--but were you to Iceland that time, Maurice?" + +"No," said the skipper, "but you were, Tommie?" + +"Yes," answered Clancy, "in the Lucy Foster. We made Rik-ie-vik inside +of fourteen days, carrying both tops'ls all the way. Wesley--Wesley +Marrs--wasn't hurrying her, of course. As Mrs. Miner says, the vessels +going to the east'ard don't hurry, except now and then when two of +them with records get together. And the Lucy was logy, of course, with +the three hundred and odd hogsheads of salt and other stuff in her. +If we'd been driving her going to Iceland that time we'd have had the +stays'l and balloon to her--and she'd have gone right along with them, +too." + +Mrs. Miner looked around at her yachting friends to see if they were +getting all that. + +"There was one day that passage it blew a bit," exclaimed Clancy. "And +that was the day we thought we saw a fellow to the east'ard. We had +men by the halyards all that day with splitting knives." + +"Why?" asked Keith. + +"Why, to cut before she could capsize." + +"Oh!" said Keith and said it with a little click. + +"But that's nothing. I've seen the gang with Tom O'Donnell standing +watch by the halyards for days with axes when he was making a +passage." + +Minnie Arkell filled another glass of champagne for Clancy, and Clancy +didn't give the fizz too much time to melt away either. + +"These men are the real things," she said, but Clancy, for fear we +were getting too much credit, broke in, "Not us seiners. It's the +winter fishermen--trawlers and hand-liners--that are the real things. +Of course, we lose men now and then seining, but it's in winter up on +the shoal water on the Banks that--there's where you have some seas +to buck against," and he went on to tell of a battle with a gale on a +winter's night on the Grand Banks. Clancy could tell a story as well +as anybody I ever met. He could make the blood jump to your heart, or +the tears to your eyes--or he could chill you till the blood froze. +When he got through you could hear them all breathing--men and women +both, like people who had just run a race. "Two hundred and odd men +sailing out of Gloucester," he said, "went down that night. There +weren't too many came safe out of that blow. The father of this boy +here was lost--the Mary Buckley warn't it, Joe?--named for your +mother?" + +"And my father, too, was lost soon after," said Minnie Arkell, and the +glance she gave me melted a lot of prejudice I had felt for her. That +was the good human side to her. + +"No better man ever sailed out of Gloucester, Mrs. Miner," said +Clancy. + +She flushed up. "Thank you, Tommie, for that, though I know he was a +reckless man." And, she might have added, he left some of his +recklessness in the blood of the Arkells. + +The skipper told them a lot about sea life that night. Some of the +stories he told, though long known in Gloucester, they took to be +yarns at first. They could not believe that men went through such +things and lived. And then the skipper had such an easy way of telling +them. After a man has been through a lot of unusual things--had them +years behind him and almost forgotten them--I suppose they don't +surprise him any more. + +The skipper looked well that night. When he warmed up and his eyes +took on a fresh shine and his mouth softened like a woman's, I tell +you he was a winner. I could not help comparing him with the +steam-yacht owner, who was a good-looking man, too, but in a different +way. Both of them, to look at, were of the same size. Both had their +clothes made by tailors who knew their business and took pains with +the fitting, though it was easy to fit men like Clancy and the +skipper, such fine level shoulders and flat broad backs they had. Now +the skipper, as I say, when he warmed up began to look something like +what he ought--like he did when walking the quarter and the vessel +going out to sea. Only then it would be in a blue flannel shirt open +at the throat and in jack-boots. But now, in the cabin of that yacht, +dressed as he was in black clothes like anybody else and in +good-fitting shoes, you had to take a second look at him to get his +measure. The yachtsman thought that he and the skipper were of about +the same size, and barring that the skipper's shoulders were a shade +wider there wasn't so much difference to look at. But there was a +difference, just the same. The yachtsman weighed a hundred and +seventy-five pounds. He asked what Maurice weighed. "Oh, about the +same," said Maurice. But I and Clancy knew that he weighed a hundred +and ninety-five, and Minnie Arkell, who knew too, finally had to tell +it, and then they all took another look at the two men and could see +where the difference lay. There was no padding to Maurice, and when +you put your hand where his shoulders and back muscles ought to be you +found something there. + +When we were leaving that night, Mrs. Miner stopped Maurice on the +gangway to say, "And when they have the fishermen's race this fall, +you must sail the Johnnie Duncan, Maurice, as you've never sailed a +vessel yet. With you on the quarter and Clancy to the wheel she ought +to do great things." + +"Oh, we'll race her as well as we know how if we're around, but Tom +O'Donnell and Wesley Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen and Sam Hollis and the +rest--they'll have something to say about it, I'm afraid." + +"What of it? You've got the vessel and you must win--I'll bet all the +loose money I have in the world on her. Remember I own a third of +her. Mr. Duncan sold me a third just before I left Gloucester." + +That was a surprise to us--that Mrs. Miner owned a part of the Johnnie +Duncan. It set Clancy to figuring, and turning in that night, he +said--he was full of fizzy wine, but clear-headed enough--"Well, what +do you make of that? The Foster girl a third and Minnie Arkell a third +of this one. I'm just wise to it that it wasn't old Duncan alone that +wanted Maurice for skipper. Lord, Lord, down at the Delaware +Breakwater do you remember that when we heard that the Foster girl +owned a part of this one, I said, like the wise guy I thought I was, +'Ha, ha,' I said, 'so Miss Foster owns a third? That's it, eh?' And +now it's Minnie Arkell a third. Where does Withrow come in? And did +you hear her when she invited Maurice to the time they're going to +have on that same steam-yacht to-morrow night?--that was when she +whispered to him at the gangway, when we were leaving. She tried to +get him to promise to come, and at last he said he would if he was in +the harbor. 'Then be sure to be in the harbor--you're skipper and can +do as you please. Do come,' she said at the last, good and loud, 'and +tell them how to sail a vessel in heavy weather. They only play at it, +so do come and tell them.' And then in a low voice--'But I want you to +come for yourself.' That's what she says--'For yourself,' she +says--in a whisper almost. 'Take a run into the harbor to-morrow night +if you can, Maurice,' she says. O Lord, women--women--they don't know +a thing--no," and Clancy turned in. + + + + +XX + +THE SKIPPER PUTS FOR HOME + + +We were out of Newport Harbor before daybreak of next morning, and +cruised inside Block Island all that day. We all thought the skipper +would be in to Newport that night--it was no more than a two hours' +run the way the wind was--and we waited. + +The test came after supper. We had supper as usual, at three o'clock. +Breakfast at four, dinner at ten, supper at three--mug-ups before and +after and in between. Along about four o'clock the skipper, standing +on the break, stood looking back toward where Newport lay. Had we +turned then we'd have been in nicely by dark. It was a fine +afternoon--the finest kind of an afternoon--a clear blue sky, and a +smooth blue sea with the surface just rippling beautifully. All fire +was the sun and the sails of every vessel in sight looked white as +could be. Several yachts passed us--steam and sail--all bright and +handsome and all bound into Newport, and the skipper's eyes rested +long on them--on one of them particularly with music aboard. + +The skipper looked back a long time--looked back, and looked back. He +began walking the quarter--back and forth, back and forth, back and +forth. The sun got lower and lower, the sea lost some of its blue, and +the air grew fresher, and still he kept looking back. + +"It'll be a grand sunset to-night, Tommie." + +"The finest kind. But one thing wrong with it." + +"What's that?" + +"We're not seeing it astern of us." + +The skipper stopped. "Astern? That's so, too--it _is_ a fine westerly, +isn't it?" + +Clancy said nothing, only leaned against the rigging, not a move out +of him--puffing his pipe and looking away. + +Nobody spoke till the skipper spoke again. + +"Who's to the wheel--you, Steve? How's she heading now?" + +"No'the by west." + +"No'the by west? Put her east by no'the--ease off your mainsheet. Let +it go to the knot. Call the gang and make sail--stays'l and +balloon--everything--we'll go home, I guess." + +Clancy snapped the pipe out of his mouth and hove it over the rail. +Then he went for the forec's'le gangway. In two jumps he was there. + +"Up, you loafers--on deck and make sail. 'To the east'ard,' says the +skipper, and over the shoals we'll put her to-night." + +"Home! Home--good enough--and hurroo!" we could hear from below. + +The skipper said nothing more--only all night long he walked the +quarter. + +Next day when we were almost abreast of Cape Cod Clancy began to +instruct me. "Here's a tip for any girl friends you got, Joe. See the +skipper last night? Tell them if they're after a man--a real man--even +if he's a bit shy--tell them--" Oh, the advice that Clancy could +give! + +About the time that we left Cape Cod light astern and squared away for +Thatcher's--with Gloucester Harbor almost in sight--with the rocks of +Eastern Point dead ahead--Clancy began to sing again: + + "Oh, a deep blue sky and a deep blue sea + And a blue-eyed girl awaiting me-- + Too-roo-roo and a too-roo-ree-- + Who wouldn't a Gloucester seiner be? + +Ha, Joey-boy?" and gave me a slap on the shoulder that sent me +half-way to the break. + +That was all right, but I went aloft so I could see the rocks of Cape +Ann a mite sooner. I was just beginning to discover that I had been +almost homesick. + + + + +XXI + +SEINERS' WORK + + +We were high line of the seining fleet when we got home from the +Southern cruise and we felt pretty proud of ourselves. It was +something to stand on the corner on one of the days when the Johnnie +was fitting out again, and have other fellows come up to you and say, +"What's that they say you fellows shared on the Southern trip?" And +when we'd tell them, and we trying not to throw out our chests too +much, it was fine to hear them say, "That so? Lord, but that's great. +Well, if Maurice only holds out he'll make a great season of it, won't +he?" + +"Oh, he'll hold out," we'd say, and lead the way down to the Anchorage +or some other place for a drink or a cigar, for of course, with the +money we'd made, we naturally felt like spending some of it on those +who were not doing so well. And of course, too, no seiner could ever +resist anybody who talks to him in a nice friendly way like that. + +The skipper's doings ashore interested all of his crew, of course, +although me, perhaps, more than anybody else, unless it was Clancy. I +got pretty regular bulletins from my cousin Nell. She was for the +skipper, first, last and all the time. + +"I like him," she said to me more than a dozen times. "I do like him, +but I never imagined that a man who does so well at sea could shrink +into himself as he does. Why, you almost have to haul him out by the +ears ashore. If it weren't for me I really believe--" and she +stopped. + +But I thought I understood what she meant. "Meaning your chum, Alice +Foster?" I said. + +"Yes, meaning my chum, Alice Foster. Why?" + +"Oh, I don't know. Sometimes I think she's a kind of a frost." + +"No, she isn't a frost, and don't you come around here again and tell +me so." + +Nor did I, for I would not have an argument with Nell for all the +Alice Fosters in the world, for if Nell were anybody else but my first +cousin, I think I would have fallen in love with her myself. + +And then we put out to sea and again we were living the life of +seiners, having it hard and easy in streaks. There were the times when +we went along for a week and did not do a tap but eat, sleep, stand a +trick at the wheel, a watch to the mast-head, and skylark around the +deck, and read, or have a quiet game of draw or whist or seven-up +below. But again there were times when we were on fish, and our +skipper being a driver, it was jump, jump, jump for a week on end. +There was that time in August when the fish were so plentiful on +Georges Bank, when, standing to the mast-head, you could see nothing +but mackerel schooling for fifteen or twenty miles either side of the +vessel. But, oh, they were wild! A dozen times we'd heave the +seine--put off from the vessel, put out that two hundred and odd +fathom of twine, drive seine-boat and dory to the limit, purse in--and +not so much as a single mackerel caught by the gills. That happened +fifteen or twenty times some days, maybe. We got our fill of sets that +month. But then again there was a week off Cape Cod and in the Bay of +Fundy and off the Maine coast when we ran them fresh to Boston market, +when we landed more mackerel it was said in a single week than was +ever landed before by one vessel. We were five days and five nights +that time without seeing our bunks. It was forever out and after them, +heave the seine, purse up and bail in, ice some, and dress the rest +along the way, and the vessel with everything on driving for Boston. + +We stood to it that week, you may be sure, until coming on the fifth +day some of us fell asleep over the keelers as the Johnnie was coming +into T Wharf. I remember that I could just barely see in a kind of a +hazy way the row of people along the cap-log when we made fast. And +yet after that we had to hoist them out of the hold and onto the dock. +That day, going out again, the skipper made all but the watch and +himself turn in. That afternoon, when everybody had had a little kink, +the skipper himself, who had been under a heavier strain than any of +us, suddenly fell backward over the house and sound asleep. And there +he lay all the rest of that day and that night. + +After ten or twelve hours of it we tried to wake him, but not a budge. +We tried again, but no use. At last he came to and without any help at +all. Sitting up, he asked where we were, and being told, he said +nothing for a moment or so, and then suddenly--"That so? How long was +I asleep?" We told him--seventeen hours. "Good Lord!" he groaned, and +after a mug-up scooted for the mast-head like a factory hand with the +seven o'clock whistle blowing. "He's a fisherman, the skipper," said +the gang as they watched him climb the rigging. + +And he was a fisherman. All that summer he drove things with but +little time for us ashore. Twice he put into Gloucester with a day to +ourselves and another time we had a chance to run down after we had +put into Boston for market, and that we suspected was because the +skipper found he could not keep away himself any longer. Things, we +judged, were going pretty well with him in Gloucester. He did not +pretend any longer now that he was not interested in Miss Foster, and +from my cousin Nell I got occasional hints, most of which I confided +to Clancy, who explained them as if they were so many parables. + +"It'll be all right," said Clancy, "if only Minnie Arkell stands +clear. I'm glad she's away for the summer, but she'll turn up in the +fall. You'll see her just before the race large as life, and some of +her swell-dressed friends, and a yacht, I'll bet." + +Considering how deeply the skipper was interested in Miss Foster, some +of us thought he ought to be putting in a little time ashore between +trips. After a run into the Boston fresh fish market, say, we would +have liked mighty well to take in the theatre, or a trip to the beach, +or some other little entertainment of a night. But no, it was in and +out--drive, drive, drive. + +He was all ambition, the skipper. He was going to be up front or break +something. Miss Foster was one of the ambitious kind, too. If she was +going to have a fisherman, he would have to be a killer or she would +know why. And so I suppose that had a lot to do with the way the +skipper drove things. + +We had our loafing spells, as I say, but mostly it was plenty of work. +That time when we stayed awake for five days and nights was not the +only one. Another time our legs swelled up and the blood came out of +the ends of our fingers with standing up to the keelers and dressing +fish without rest. But, Lord, nobody minded that. After we'd got +rested up we felt better than ever. + +We had good luck generally. We lost neither men nor gear to amount to +anything that summer. That seine we lost trying for our first school +to the s'uth'ard in the spring was the only bit of misfortune that +came, and we had long ago made up for that. But others were not so +lucky. There was the loss of the Ruth Ripley, Pitt Ripley's vessel. I +think I have said that she was a fast vessel. She was fast--fast, but +of the cranky type. We were jogging along a little to windward of her +one fine afternoon--it had been a fine September day and now it was +coming on to evening. To the westward of Cape Sable, in the Bay of +Fundy, it was, and no hint of a blow up to within a few minutes of the +time when the squall struck the Ruth. I suppose it would have been +more prudent on Pitt's part if he had had less sail on, but like most +of the skippers in the fleet I guess he was not looking for any record +for prudence. Any minute he might have to be up and driving her, and +keeping sail on was the quickest way to have it when you needed it in +a hurry. The squall hit her--it hit us, too, but we saw it coming and +met it and beyond washing a few keelers overboard, when she rolled +down, no harm was done to the Johnnie. On the Ripley, I suppose, they +saw it too, but the Ripley and the Duncan were not the same class of +vessel by any means. She went over--hove down, with her foremast under +water to the cross-trees almost. + +Most of her crew were below at the time, some in their bunks. Four or +five of those below never reached the deck at all--the water rushing +down the companionways cut them off. Some rushed aft where the stern +was high out of water and some piled into the rigging. Some were +calling out and giving advice to others. We could hear them plainly. +Two jumped to the wheel and threw it up, but she would not right. + +We had the Johnnie to keep right side up, but we saw the whole thing. +It could not have been more than two or three minutes from the time +the squall struck her when she was going down head-first. Those of her +crew who had gone to the stern were going with her, but those who had +taken to the rigging, by leaping wide came clear. Their seine-boat, +which had been towing astern, might have been of use to them, but +being fast to the vessel by the painter it was pretty well filled with +water before anybody had a chance to cut the painter. The man that +cut it went down with the vessel. He was all right, whoever he was. +Those in the water were looking about for the dory, and found that +half full of water, too. They were trying to bail the water out of the +dory, after hauling it across the bow of the submerged seine-boat, +when we got them in our seine-boat and picked up what was left of +them. + +Nine of them were lost, her skipper among them. One of the men +saved--the cook--said that when the squall struck the vessel, Captain +Ripley had been seen to jump for the boom tackle, which he unhitched, +and then to spring for the lashings of the dory, which he cut with his +knife. The cook also said that he thought the skipper lost his life +because of the half-stunning blow that he must have received from the +fore-boom while he was on the rail trying to free the dory. The vessel +was sinking all the time and it being dark--or near it in the +squall--I suppose Captain Ripley could not watch everything. No doubt, +it was the fore-boom hit him and knocked him overboard. Certainly he +was knocked overboard, and the last seen of him he was swimming and +pushing an empty barrel before him to one of the crew. "Keep your +nerve up," he called to the cook, and after that he suddenly +disappeared. He got a man's death, anyway. + +We rowed back to the Duncan with the survivors. Nine men gone--it was +a hard story to take home with us, but we had it to do. It was all a +part of fishing life, and so we put back for Gloucester. + + + + +XXII + +ON THE CAPE SHORE + + +While we were into Gloucester, after taking home the crew of the Ruth +Ripley, our vessel was put on the ways. That was after a talk between +the skipper and Mr. Duncan. There is always something that needs +attending to on a fisherman, and this time it was our water-tanks. And +while they were being looked after, the Johnnie was overhauled, her +bottom scrubbed and topsides painted. Old Mr. Duncan, we found, was +beginning to take a lot of pride in our vessel and balked at no +expense to have her in trim. And now that the Ripley was lost, he +would have only two vessels to represent him in the big fishermen's +race, which was then only four weeks away. + +"Hurry up home now," he said to Maurice as we left the dock that time. +"Hurry up, and give yourself plenty of time to tune her up and get her +in trim for the race. I've set my heart on it. You or the Lucy Foster +must win that race, and whatever else we do we've got to beat +Withrow's vessel, anyway." + +And Miss Foster said that one of her guardian's vessels would have to +win the race, and my cousin Nell said that the Johnnie Duncan would +have to win. There was a lot depending on it, she said. It meant a lot +to Will Somers, I suppose Nell meant. + +We figured that we had time to make a Cape shore trip, and, with fair +luck, to fill the Johnnie with salt mackerel and be back in time to +get her in good condition for the race, which this year, because it +was anniversary year in Gloucester, promised to be the greatest ever +sailed. + +Our plans were somewhat interfered with by a rescue we made. We found +a Glasgow bark, New York bound, in the Bay of Fundy, and her crew in +hard straits. We stood down and after a lot of trouble took them +off--Clancy and Long Steve in the dory. Billie Hurd came near being +the second man in the dory, but Clancy, grabbing him as he had one +foot over the rail, hauled him back with, "Way for your elders, little +man," and jumped in beside Long Steve. + +"Elders, but not betters," said Hurd. + +"Have it your own way," answered Clancy, "but I go in the dory." + +The rescue was really a fine thing, but the important thing was that +some of the rescued men had been exposed to the battering of the sea +so long that they needed medical attention, and so we drove for +home--and cracked our foremast-head doing it. That delayed us almost a +week, for the skipper had to have that spar just so. A lot might +depend on it, same as the rest of the gear. And it was a spar--as fine +a bit of timber, Oregon pine of course, as was ever set up in a +fisherman. And maybe that too was just as well, with the race coming +on. + +By the time we were down the Cape shore--down Canso way--and among the +fleet again, we had lost a week. Our hold was still to fill up, and +only two weeks and a day to the race. Wesley Marrs, Tom O'Donnell, Sam +Hollis, and the rest were then talking of going home and making ready +for the race. Bottoms would have to be scrubbed, extra gear put +ashore--a whole lot of things done--and a few try-outs in the Bay by +way of tuning up. + +The race was the talk of all the fleet. Half the crews on the Cape +shore wanted to be in Gloucester when the race came off, and some of +the skippers of the slower vessels, which would not enter because they +had no show to win, were already scheming to be home just before the +race so that they could be on hand to follow it. + +The morning after we were back among the fleet we got a small school +right from under the eyes of the Lynx, one of the English cutters +which were patrolling the coast to see that we didn't get any fish +within the three-mile limit. I remember that while we were satisfied +at the time that we were outside the line, we did not know what the +revenue-cutter might say, and particularly the Lynx, whose captain had +a hard name among our fleet for his readiness to suspect law-breaking +when there wasn't any. The cutter people generally seemed to want to +be fair toward us, but this Lynx's captain was certainly a vindictive +cuss. Anything hailing from Gloucester was an abomination in his eyes. +And so this morning, when, after we had decided that we were outside +the limit, and made ready to set, it was hard to have to take the +order of the Lynx and sheer off. Our judgment of distance ought to +have been as good as his--better, really, we thought it, because we +were always judging distances at sea, and more at home upon the sea, +too. But that made no difference--what the cutter people said had to +be law for us. + +So this time he ordered us not to set where we were or he'd seize our +vessel. Several Gloucester vessels had been confiscated just before +this and the owners had to pay the fine to recover them. One owner +disputed the judgment and his case was then waiting settlement. +Another who refused to pay saw his vessel turned into a lightship and +placed down Miramichi way in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where it is +yet. This day the commander of the Lynx might have some reason to +think that his order ended that for us--and we could almost see him +chuckling--but it didn't. A fog was creeping up at the time and in ten +minutes it was on us, and under cover of the fog we got a little +school--the same school we thought and on the exact spot where the +cutter was lying when she ordered us off. Didn't we cackle though when +we bailed it in? Oh, no! It was not much of a school--only twenty +barrels--but it made us all feel fine. Not alone did we feel that we +had got the better of the English cutter, but also that luck was +coming to us again. We justified ourselves by saying that we honestly +believed we were outside the three-mile limit, and that our judgment +was as good as theirs. + +That night the forec's'le of the Johnnie Duncan presented one of the +most beatific scenes I ever saw. Everybody was in the temper of an +angel. There was nothing doing--no whist at the table, no reading out +of upper bunks, no love song from the peak, and no fierce argument on +the lockers. We were discussing the cutters and the talk was very +soothing. The cook, as usual, was finishing up a batch of dough. You +might have thought he was the only man who had been working in a week, +were it not for the wet oil-clothes hanging up to dry, and the +overhauling of second suits of oil-clothes by some of the gang. Every +man, except the cook, who never smoked while at work, was puffing away +as if he misdoubted he would ever get another chance for a pipeful in +his life. "Harmony most ex-quis-ite," said somebody, and that's what +must have been that hung over the forec's'le, and it seemed to be +merely in keeping with the heavenly order of things that the +atmosphere showed pale blue wherever the rays of the lamp could get a +chance to strike through. + +When Clancy dropped down for his usual mug-up before going to the +mast-head for the night of course, he wasn't going to let that get by +without having a word to say about it. He leaned against the foremast +and took a look around. "My soul, but it's as if the blessed angels +were fanning their wings over this forehold. There's Brian Boru and +Lord Salisbury there double-banked on the same locker, and nothing +doing on any Irish question. There's the lad that sleeps in the peak +and not a single hallelujah of praise for his darling Lucille. The +other one--the wild man that sings the Bobbie Burns songs--not a +shriek out of him. And Bill and John no longer spoiling their eyesight +on bad print. I expect it's that little school of fish--the first in +two weeks or more. The prospect must be making you all pleased. Well, +it ought. A few hundred barrels of that kind of mackerel--as fine +fish as ever I see bailed over the rail. And some of you ready +reck'ners ought to easily figure up what'll be coming to us if we ever +fill her up--say five hundred barrels. A good thing--a few hundred +barrels of mackerel. A few too many of 'em for good trim, but it's +comforting to know they're there. She seemed to be in pretty nice trim +when we tried out one or two of the fleet this morning, didn't she? +And to-night, if it breezes up--and it looks now as if it will--we'll +get some more--if it's a night like last night. One time there last +night--did you notice her, cook?--that time that crazy lad started to +cross our bow and we luffed her. Why, man, she shot over like I don't +know what--just shot like one of those torpedo boats we see around +when the Navy goes evoluting. I was near shook overboard from aloft. +They tell me they're going crazy over the race in Gloucester. Well, +here's one that'll bet his summer's earnings----" + +"What's left of it, you mean, Tommie," said George Moore from his pan +of dough. + +"Well, yes, what's left of it--and what I c'n borrow. Old man +Duncan'll stake me, and there's others. I hope, though, it blows a +jeesly gale. For this one, God bless her, she c'n sail, and some of +them'll find it out--when it's too late, maybe. Sam Hollis for one. +There's a man I'd give my eye almost, to beat. And maybe the +skipper hasn't got it in for him! He doesn't say much, Maurice +don't, but a while ago, after coming down from aloft, Billie Simms +hails him and tells him that the cutter people know all about that +little school to-day--and who told him, who told him? Well, the +skipper'll drive this one to the bottom before he ever lets Sam +Hollis or any of Withrow's vessels get by him when we race. Yes, sir. +But, Georgie-boy"--Clancy shouldered away from the foremast--"how +is it for a wedge or two of one of those blueberry pies you got +cooling there? Just a little wedge, now. But you don't need to be +too close-hauled with your knife--no. Sailing by the wind is all +right when you're jogging in and out among the fleet, and nothing +partic'lar doing except an eye out for mackerel, but you want to +give her a full always--always, Georgie--when you're cutting pie. +There's the lad--straight across the beam. And now at right angles +again. And now lay one atop of the other, and you have it--an +invention of my own--a blueberry sandwich. M-m--but look at the +juice squish through her scuppers!" He held it up for all of us to +have a look. "Now another little wash of coffee in the wake of that +and I'll be all right for a fine little watch aloft." + +He jammed his sou'wester hard down, and heroically waved away the +remainder of the pie. "No, no. First thing I know I'll be having +dyspepsia. I never had it yet, but I might," and then heaved himself +up the companionway, humming, as he went, one of his old favorites: + + "Oh, the 'Liza Jane and the Maria Louise + Sailed a race one day for a peck of peas. + You'd hardly believe the way them two + Carried sail that day--they fairly flew. + + People ashore they said, 'Gee whiz! + The 'Liza Jane the fastest is.'" + +We could hear him scrambling, still humming, over the barrels on deck. +He halted long enough by the rail to say, "How is it, boys?" to the +watch on deck, and then swung himself up the rigging. Once aloft he +had his work cut out, with hours of strain on brain and nerve. But +Clancy never minded--he never minded anything so far as we could make +out. + + + + +XXIII + +DRESSING DOWN + + +That night was the worst I ever put in towing astern of a vessel. +"Owling" is the seiners' word for that kind of work. It was "owling" +sure enough, with the seine-boat on a short painter and the dory on a +shorter painter still and astern of the seine-boat again. We came near +to being lost in the dory. Mel Adams, who was in the dory with me, +thinking she was surely going to capsize one time she rode up over the +stern of the seine-boat, took a flying leap into the seine-boat. He +had a hard time getting back, for there was quite a little sea on. +Even in the seine-boat they were all glad enough to hear Clancy give +the word to cast off and pull after the school. + +It was a big school, and hard work in that sea, but we had them safe +at last. The vessel then came alongside and the bailing in began. +Having had a good long lay-off we bailed them in with plenty of +good-will. It was "He-yew!" "Oy-hoo!" "Hi-o!" and "Drive her!" all +along the line until we had on deck what the skipper thought was a +hundred barrels. Then the bag was put around the seine to protect the +rest of the mackerel from dogfish and sharks, and we were ready to +dress. + +Barrels were tossed out of the hold, keelers set up, sharp-edged +knives drawn from diddy-boxes below, and a chance had to see a smart +crew dressing a haul of mackerel that were to be salted. It was too +long a run, four hundred miles or so, to take a chance of getting them +fresh to market. It needed a fair and fresh breeze to be sure of it, +and besides with the market for salt mackerel getting stronger all the +time it was good judgment to salt down and fill her up before going +home. + +We had been through the same thing before, even with as good a +deckload, but now we were getting near the end of the season. This +trip, then the race, and maybe one more trip after the race, and we +would be done seining. And so we drove things. + +Four gangs of four men each took corners in the waist. Each gang had +two keelers--yard square boxes, eight inches or so in depth, and set +up on two or three barrels. Into the keelers the mackerel on deck were +bailed and around them the men gathered, with long-handled torches set +up all about. + +All hands came into the dressing--skipper and cook too--and the work +went on. It was one gang against the other, each jealously counting +barrels when they were filled, that full credit might be given for +speed. Sixteen men were accounted for in this way. The seventeenth and +eighteenth were to keep the keelers filled, draw water for pickle from +over the side, roll the filled barrels out of the way--in short, to +help out generally. + +It was fine to watch the splitters. One left-handed grab and the +mackerel was in place; flat and smooth, one right-handed slit and he +was laid open the length of his back. Forty-five mackerel a minute +either the skipper, Clancy or Moore could split--that is, pick them +up, place in position, split from nose to tail along the back, and +slide out of the way again. Sixty a minute they could do in spurts, if +somebody would place the mackerel in rows for them. + +The busiest man of all was the skipper. He had to keep an eye out for +the course of the Johnnie. Vessels that are dressing fish, vessels on +which the entire crew are soaked in blood, gills, intestines, and +swashing brine, might be allowed privileges, one might think; but no, +they must keep a lookout just the same. On this dark night, the +Johnnie Duncan, though making a great effort--considering that she had +jibs down and wheel in the becket--to stay as she was put, yet would +fall away or come-to, especially when the wind shifted two or three +points at a jump. And just as soon as she did the skipper would +notice it instantly, jump aft and set her right. Generally, to shift +the wheel a few spokes would be enough, but now and then he would have +to give the wheel a good round whirl. At such a time he would sing out +a warning, the torches would be lowered, we would duck our heads, the +boom would go swinging by in the smoky yellow glare, and the Johnnie +Duncan would be off on another tack. We would brace our legs to a new +angle, the skipper would hop back to his knife, and again the dressing +would go humming along. + +When we had the first hundred barrels of mackerel swashing in brine, +the rest of them, perhaps another hundred barrels, were bailed in. And +all night long like that we stood to it driving. Under the yellow and +smoky light of the torches I could see nothing but mackerel or the +insides of mackerel in the air. Keelers, deck, rail, our hands, faces, +boots and oilskins were sticky with the blood and gurry. At top speed +we raced like that through the night. Once in a while a man would drop +his knife or snap off his gibbing mitt, rinse his hand in the brine +barrel by his side, slap his hand across the hoops, and condemn the +luck of a split finger or a thumb with a fish-bone in it. Another +might pull up for a moment, glance up at the stars or down at the +white froth under the rail, draw his hand across his forehead, +mutter, "My soul, but I'm dry," take a full dipper from the +water-pail, drink it dry, pass dipper and pail along to the next and +back to his work. + +When the cook called out for breakfast we were still at it, with the +deck of the vessel covered with barrels of pickling mackerel. It was +beginning to get light then. "Oh, the blessed day's coming on. Smother +the torches, boys," said the skipper, and led the way below for the +first table to have a bite. + +Before the sun came up we were beginning to make out the rest of the +fleet. One after another they were coming into view, their long hulls +and high spars reaching across the wind. Between the gray sky and the +slaty sea their white sails looked whiter than chalk. + +We had to name the different vessels then. "There's Tom O'Donnell--and +Wesley Marrs--and Sam Hollis--and--" sung out Andie Howe. + +"Sam Hollis--where's Sam Hollis?" broke in Mel Adams. + +"Away to the east'ard, ain't it, Andie?--the fellow with jibs down?" +spoke up Billie Hurd, who was a bit proud that he too could pick her +out at such a distance. + +"So it is, ain't it?" said Mel, and he began to tell our troubles in +the dory. "'Twas him near ran over us last night--remember, Joe? +Leastways, it looked like Hollis's new one's quarter goin' by. He was +pointin' 'bout no'the-east then, but he couldn't 've held on that +tack long or he'd be somewhere up by Miquelon and not here this +mornin'--the gait he was goin'. Man, but there was smoke coming out +of his scuppers when he went by. 'Why don't y' come aboard whilst +you're about it--come aboard and be sociable,' I hollers. 'Oh, don't +cry, y' ain't hurted,' says whoever's to the wheel of her. Least it +sounded like that, 'Y' ain't hurted,' he says." + +"Must have been pretty close, Mel?" said Clancy, never stopping, but +keeping a string of split mackerel rolling into his keeler. Mel and I +were gibbing for Clancy. + +"Close? I could've touched his chain-plates like that," and Mel, +getting excited, reached his mittened hand across the keeler and +touched Clancy on the arm. Clancy's knife took a jump and cut a +finger. For a few seconds Clancy laid down the law of a splitting +knife to Mel, but Mel didn't mind. + +"That's just about the way I swore at the man to the wheel of the +Withrow. Didn't I, Joe? Yes, sir, I cert'nly swore at him good, but it +no more jarred him than--but when their seine-boat came by, half of +'em smokin', some half-breed among 'em has to sing out, 'Y'ought to +hang up a riding light if your vessel's hove-to,' he says. What do you +think of that, Tommie--'if your vessel's hove-to!'--and if the Johnnie +was going one she was going ten knots an hour." + +"That's right, Mel--I heard you to the mast-head," said Clancy. Clancy +heard it about as much as old Mr. Duncan back in Gloucester did, but +he was always ready to help a man out. + +"Did you? Well, I hove-to him. I hove the bailer at him, that's what I +did, and he ducked. But he ducked too late, I callate, for 'Bam!' it +caught him--or somebody in the seine-boat with him. He swore some, or +somebody swore, you c'n bet. 'I don't know who y'are,' he hollers, +'but if ever I meet you ashore,' and he was so far away then I +couldn't ketch no more of it. 'Don't know who y'are, but if I ketch +you ashore'--Lord----" + +"So, if a lad with a bump on the side of his head waltzes up to you on +Main Street and whangs you, Mel, next time you're ashore in +Gloucester, what'll you do?" asked Clancy. + +"I'll say, 'Where's that bailer, you loafer?' but first I'll whang him +back. I had to finish the bailing out with my sou'wester. I sings out +to Andie Howe in the boat here to hand me one of the bailers in the +boat. 'I'm usin' my hat,' I hollers, 'and Joe's using his sou'wester,' +thinkin' that would fetch him all right. 'Well, we're usin' ten +sou'westers here,' says Andie, 'and one or two of 'em leaks,' and that +was all the satisfaction I got." + +"Yes," said Eddie Parsons, "the seine-boat was sure wallerin' then. +The skipper had only just told Jimmie Gunn to quit his growling. +'You'll be wanting hot-water bags to your feet next, I suppose,' says +the skipper." + +"I was thinking of the boat--afraid she'd be so logy with the water in +her that we couldn't drive her when the time came," bristled up Jimmie +Gunn to that. + +"Y-yah!" snorted Eddie, "if you weren't scared, then I never saw a man +scared. Logy? I notice we made her hop along all right after we cast +off from the vessel. Man, but she fair hurdled some of them seas--some +of the little ones, I mean. Didn't she, Steve? We thought we'd lost +Joe and you, Mel, in the dory, didn't we, fellows?" + +"You did, hey? Well, you didn't, nor nowheres near it," broke in Mel. +"We were right there with the goods when they hove the seine, warn't +we, Joey?" + +And so it went on through all that day, while the men worked, +dressing, salting, and putting all in pickle. It was a drive all +through without any quitting by anybody, except when it was time to +relieve lookouts at the mast-head. In the middle of it all, had the +call of "School-O!" been heard from aloft, we would have been only too +glad to drop everything, jump into the boat and dory, get after the +mackerel, and do the same thing over--split, gibb and pack away--for +all of the next night, and the night after that--for a week if +necessary. + +Not until well into the afternoon, when the last mackerel was +flattened out in its barrel, did any of us feel that we could step +back in our own time, straighten ourselves out, and take a look over +our work. Then we counted the oozing barrels with great satisfaction, +you may be sure, even while we were massaging our swollen wrists with +our aching fingers. It was a good bit of work that, well and quickly +done, and it was fine to get a rest after it, although it might be +only for a little while. Even though we had to do it all over +again--to stay half-drowned and chilled through in the seine-boat or +dory for half the night and then dress down for eighteen or twenty +hours on top of it--what did a little hard work matter? "Think of the +hundred-dollar bill, maybe, to be carried home and laid in the wife's +lap," said Long Steve. + +"Or the roaring night ashore when a fellow's not a family man--m-m--!" +said Eddie Parsons. Eddie was not a family man. + + + + +XXIV + +THE WITHROW OUTSAILS THE DUNCAN + + +We certainly were feeling pretty good along about that time, and we +felt better when next day, cruising in and out among the fleet, other +crews began to take notice of our catch. By that time the word had +gone around. One after another they came sailing up--as if to size us +up was the last thing that could enter their heads--rounding to, and +then a hail. Something like this it went: + +"Hulloh, Maurice." + +"Hulloh, Wesley," or George Drake, or Al McNeill, or whoever it might +be. + +"That's a mighty pretty deckload of fish. When'd y'get 'em?" + +"Oh, twenty barrels yesterday morning and the rest last night." + +"That so? How many d'y'call 'em, Maurice?" + +"How many? Oh, two hundred and eighty or ninety wash barrels. Ought to +head up about two sixty." + +"That so? Fine, Maurice, fine. As handsome a deckload as I've seen +this year." + +And he would bear off, and another vessel would come and go through +the same ceremony. It was very satisfying to us and the skipper must +have felt proud. Not that a lot bigger hauls had not been made by +other men before--indeed, yes, and by the very men perhaps who were +complimenting him. But three hundred barrels, or near it, in pickle at +one time does look fine on a vessel's deck, and they looked especially +fine at this time because there was not another vessel in the fleet +that had half as many, so far as we knew. + +Not another but Sam Hollis--or so he claimed. He came ranging up that +same day and began asking how the Duncan was sailing lately, and +followed that up by saying he himself had two hundred odd barrels in +the hold. He showed about sixty wash barrels on deck. We did not +believe he had twenty below. She looked cork light. "If she sets as +high out of water with two hundred and forty barrels, then you ought +to put two hundred and forty more in her and she'd fly," called out +Clancy to Hollis, and that was pretty much what we all thought. + +And 'twas Sam Hollis made trouble for the Duncan that day. He bore off +then but came back in the afternoon. More talk there was, and it wound +up by our racing with him. We did not start out to race, but +gradually, as we found ourselves jogging along side by side, jibs +were drawn away and sheets began to be trimmed. The first thing we +knew we found ourselves swaying up sails, and then before we really +woke up to it we were both off and away before a little breeze. + +Hollis had all the best of it. He was bound to, with the Duncan +carrying most of her mackerel aft and away down by the stern. Even had +we had time to--we did shift some of it forward--we were too deep for +any kind of racing in that moderate breeze. We said that to ourselves, +anyway, and yet we held on. But it was no use--it wound up by Hollis +giving us a scandalous beating. And after running away from us he kept +straight on to the westward, and by that we knew that he was bound for +Gloucester to get ready for the big race. + +The skipper felt it. He was one that took things to heart. + +"I've been bragging about this one--what she could do. I told the old +man only the last time we were in that he could go broke that I'd beat +Sam Hollis, and here the first time we come together he makes her look +like a wood-carrier. The best thing I can do, I guess, is to keep out +of the race; maybe it will save the old man some money. I expected +he'd beat us, the trim we were in--but to beat us the way he did!" + +Nothing the crew could say seemed to make him think otherwise, and +that night it was not nearly so joyful below in the Johnnie Duncan. +The talk was that she would not go home for the race. Only Clancy +seemed to be as cheerful as ever. "Don't any of you get to worrying," +he said. "I know the skipper--the Johnnie Duncan'll be there when the +time comes." + +Yet next morning when Wesley Marrs went by us with the Lucy Foster +bound for home and sang out, "Come along, Maurice, and get ready for +the race--we'll have a brush on the way," our skipper only waved his +hand and said, "No--this old plug can't sail." Wesley looked mighty +puzzled at that, but kept on his way. + + + + +XXV + +TROUBLE WITH THE DOMINION CUTTERS + + +Next day after, in a calm, Clancy and I had to take the dory and row +out among the fleet for some salt. The skipper thought it likely that +some of the vessels that were going home might have salt to spare. He +doubted if he himself would have enough in case we struck another good +school. So we rowed out. We went from one vessel to another without +any luck, until we found ourselves aboard Tom O'Donnell--the Colleen +Bawn. And just as we got aboard a school showed near by her, and they +made a dash for it. The Colleen was pretty well inshore then, and yet +safe outside the three-mile limit in our judgment. Even in the +judgment of one of the Canadian revenue cutters, the Mink, she was +outside the limit. "You're all right, go ahead," her commander sang +out from the bridge. + +Yet trouble came of it. The Colleen's gang were making a set when +along came the Lynx, the same cutter that had ordered our own skipper +not to set two or three days back in the fog, and we had set in spite +of him. I think I said that he had a bad reputation among our fleet. +In this case some said afterwards that he had been watching the Duncan +since that time, and having seen a dory put out from her and go aboard +Tom O'Donnell, that he then had a special watch for O'Donnell. Anyway, +we know that as the Colleen Bawn's crew were pursing in the seine he +came along and ordered them to cast loose the fish. "You're inside the +limit," said this fellow now. + +"I may be, but I don't think so," said O'Donnell to that. + +"You're inside and you know it." + +"You're a liar if you say I know it." + +O'Donnell had had trouble with the Lynx before, and had small patience +with her captain. More words came out of it, and while they were +talking back and forth another of the fleet a mile to the east'ard put +out a boat. + +The cutter went after him, her captain singing out as he went, "You +wait here till I come back." "Wait like hell!" said O'Donnell, "and +this breeze making," and continued to purse up. Pursed up, the fish +aboard--there were forty or fifty barrels--he started off. One of +those sudden breezes were springing up and it promised to be wind +enough to suit anybody. We made out the Johnnie Duncan bearing down, +intending no doubt to take off Clancy and me. But the cutter was +coming toward us then, and O'Donnell said we had better stay aboard +or we would be picked up on the way by the cutter's people and maybe +get the Duncan and our skipper into trouble. That last--the thought +that our skipper or the vessel might get mixed up in it--kept us +aboard the Colleen Bawn. + +The Lynx could steam as fast as any cutter they had on the Cape shore +at that time, but the Colleen was a witch and O'Donnell a wonder at +sailing her. So we stayed with O'Donnell and watched him and the +cutter have it out. They had it, the cutter letting drive a shot every +once in a while. The first shot, I remember, went whistling by the ear +of one of O'Donnell's crew who was standing back-to in the waist, and +so astonished him, he not expecting it, that he fell into the +forehold. He raised a great racket among a lot of empty barrels. The +fall never hurt him, but the things he said when he came on deck +again! O'Donnell made him lie flat--and then all of us but Clancy, who +refused to lie down but compromised by leaning over the house and +watching the cutter and making comments on her actions for the benefit +of the rest of us. Through it all O'Donnell stood to the wheel and the +nearest he came to honoring the cutter by a compliment was when he'd +half turn his head, spit over the rail and swear at her. The wind and +sea-way together were too much for the cutter. The Colleen left her +behind, and she at last drew off after bunching a few farewell shots. + +O'Donnell then hove-to and took his seine-boat on deck. He had been +towing it the wrong end foremost for the whole forty miles, and he was +worried over it. "It's strained her maybe--and she almost a new boat," +he lamented. "For the rest I don't care. That lad had it in for me all +along. The other one though, he's decent--never bothers a man without +a little reason. I was going home anyway for the race, and so it don't +matter. I suppose Maurice will be along soon, Tommie? Did you see him +coming after the cutter--he held her fine and he in no trim. What's it +they say about Hollis beating the Johnnie yesterday? If he did, be +sure he was specially prepared, and the Johnnie had an off-day. But I +suppose he'll be holding on now for Gloucester?" + +Clancy said maybe, but no telling, and explained how it had been--the +skipper's discouragement after Hollis had beaten him. + +O'Donnell said he was foolish to worry over a thing like that. "I know +Sam Hollis," he said--"'twas a trap he laid for Maurice. He's got a +smart vessel in the Withrow, but he can't run away from Maurice. No, +nor beat him I doubt--with both in trim. But wait a while--let the day +of the race get near and Maurice to thinking it over, and you'll see +him flyin' home." + +We hoped so. For ourselves we went home on the Colleen. There was +nothing else for us to do. We had quite a time of it that trip with +O'Donnell. He sailed about five hundred miles out of his way--away to +the eastward and s'uth'ard. There might be cruisers and cutters galore +after him, he said--they might put out from Halifax, or telegraph +ahead--you couldn't tell what they might do, he said, and so he sailed +the Colleen out to sea. But we came across the Bay one dark night +without side-lights, and reached Boston all right. O'Donnell had a +suit of sails stowed away in an East Boston wharf that he wanted to +get out for the race. And also he didn't like his new foremast and was +going to have a new one put in if there was time. + + + + +XXVI + +THE GOSSIP IN GLOUCESTER + + +Clancy and I went home by train, reaching Gloucester as the first of +an easterly gale set in. There we found it was nothing but talk of the +race. We had not reached Main Street at all before Clancy was held up. +Clancy, of course, would know. Where was Maurice Blake? What were we +doing in Gloucester and the Johnnie not in? The Duncans--especially +the elder Mr. Duncan--Miss Foster, my cousin Nell, and Will Somers +were boiling over. Where was Maurice Blake? Where was the Johnnie +Duncan? Everybody in town seemed to know that Sam Hollis had given us +a bad beating down Cape shore way, and the news had a mighty +discouraging effect on all Maurice's friends, even on those of them +who knew enough of Sam Hollis not to take his talk just as he wanted +them to take it. Withrow's vessel had beaten the Johnnie Duncan with +Maurice Blake sailing her--they had to believe that part of it, and +that in itself was bad enough. Sam Hollis's stock was booming, you may +be sure--and the race right close to hand, too. + +"That little beating the Johnnie got didn't lose any in the telling by +Sam Hollis and his gang, did it, Joe?" said Clancy to me, and then he +went around borrowing all the money he could to bet the Johnnie Duncan +would beat the Withrow in the race. But would Maurice now enter at +all? I asked Clancy about that part--if there was not a chance that +Maurice might not stay down the Cape shore way and let the race go. +But he only laughed and said, "Lord--Joey-boy, you've a lot to learn +yet about Maurice in spite of your season's seining along with him." + +It was a Monday morning when Clancy and I reached Gloucester. The race +was to be sailed on Friday of that same week. For several days before +this, we were told, Wesley Marrs, Sam Hollis, Tommie Ohlsen, and the +rest of them had been out in the Bay tuning up their vessels like a +lot of cup defenders. Never before had fishermen given so much +attention to the little details before a race. The same day that we +got home they were up on the ways for a final polishing and primping +up. They were smooth as porcelain when they came off. And coming off +their skippers thought they had better take some of the ballast out of +them. "'Tisn't as if it was winter weather"--it was the middle of +September then--"with big seas and driving gales," was the way Wesley +Marrs put it, and they all agreed that the chances were ten to one +that the wind would not be strong enough to call for the heavy ballast +they carried. Fishermen, of course, are built to be at their best when +wind and sea are doing their worst, and so the taking out of ballast +for a September race looked like good judgment. So about forty tons of +ballast were taken out of most of them--the Lucy Foster, the Withrow, +the Nannie O, and half a dozen others. + +That looked all right, but on Tuesday night an easterly gale set in, +the wind blowing forty-odd miles an hour. All day Wednesday it blew, +and all day Thursday even harder, with a promise of blowing harder +still on Friday, which was to be the day of the race. The people of +Gloucester who had been praying for wind, "Wind for a fisherman's +race--wind--wind," seemed likely to get what they wanted. + +On Thursday I saw Tommie Ohlsen and Wesley Marrs in conference on the +street. Wesley had his nose up in the air, sniffing the breeze. He +shook his head with, "Tommie, I ought to've let the ballast stay in +the Lucy. It looks like it's going to be the devil's own breeze for +vessels that ain't prepared for it." + +"Yes," said Ohlsen, "wind fifty-two mile an hour the weather man says, +and still making. That's bad for light ballast and whole sail. If we +could only put the ballast back----" + +"Yes--if we could. But we can't put it back now--there ain't time to +do it right and everybody would laugh at us too. And besides, if we +did, all the others would put it back, and where's the difference?" + +"Of course," said Tommie, "but if all of us would put it back it would +make a better race." + +In view of the reputation of Wesley Marrs and Ohlsen and O'Donnell and +their vessels, we could not understand the confidence of Withrow and +his people in Sam Hollis. He had a great vessel--nobody doubted it. +But it was doubted by many if she was the equal of some of the others, +and few believed she was better. And Sam Hollis was not the man to +carry the sail, or at least the fishermen of Gloucester generally did +not think so. But Withrow and Hollis's gang kept on bragging and they +backed their bragging up, too. I drew what money I had saved that +summer out of my seining share--two hundred and twenty-five +dollars--and bet it myself with one of the Withrow's crew that the +Johnnie Duncan would beat the Withrow, whether the Johnnie was home to +race or not. It was really betting against Withrow himself, who, it +was said, was taking up every bet made by any of the Withrow's crew. +That was Thursday afternoon, and still no word of the Duncan. + +"Good for you, Joey," said Clancy when he heard of that. "Even if +Maurice don't come it's better to lose your money and shut them up. +But don't worry--he'll come. Do you think he's been standing and +looking at this easterly--it's all along the coast to Newf'undland I +see by the papers--and not swing her off? He's on his way now, and +swinging all he's got to her, I'll bet. Wait and see." + +"My," said my cousin Nell, "and so you bet your pile on the Johnnie +Duncan whether she's in or not?--and if she don't reach here in time +you lose it all?" and told it all over to her Will Somers, to whom I +learned she was now engaged. And from that time on I noticed that +Alice Foster beamed on me like an angel. + +Minnie Arkell was home for the race just as Clancy had prophesied. She +had come with some of her friends down from Boston three or four days +before this, in the same steam-yacht she had been aboard of at Newport +in June. Meeting me she asked me about our passage home on the Colleen +Bawn, and I told her of it. She listened with great interest. + +"Is Tom O'Donnell as fine-looking as he used to be--with his grand +figure and head and great beard? I remember some years ago I used to +think him the finest-looking man I ever saw." + +I told her that I guessed she'd think him fine-looking yet if she'd +seen him to the wheel of the Colleen Bawn with the six-pound shot +whistling by him, and he never so much as letting on he knew they were +there. Her eyes shone at that. Then she offered to take any bets I +made off my hands. "You can't afford to take your little savings out +of the bank and bet it on a vessel that may not be here in time. I'll +take it off your hands--come!" + +That was an attractive side to her--caring but little for money--but I +wasn't letting anybody take my bets off my hands. I still believed +that Maurice would be home, though that was seven o'clock Thursday +evening. I knew he would be home if he only guessed that his friends +were betting on his vessel--and they not even knowing whether she was +to be home in time for the race. And if he weren't home, I was ready +to lose my little roll. + + + + +XXVII + +IN CLANCY'S BOARDING-HOUSE + + +From Minnie Arkell, whom I met at the door of her own house, I went to +Clancy's boarding house. I did not find Clancy then and I went off, +but coming back again I found him, and a very busy man he was, with an +immense crock of punch between his knees. He was explaining down in +the kitchen to the other boarders--fifteen or twenty of the +thirstiest-looking fishermen I ever laid eyes on--just how it was he +made the punch. The bowl was about the size of a little beer keg. + +"On the night of last Fourth of July," he was saying--"and I mind we +came in that morning with a hundred and seventy-five barrels we got +off Mount Desert--that night I warn't very busy. I gets this +crock--four gallons--let you all have a look--a nice cold stony crock +you see it is, and that they'd been using then in the house here for +piccalilli--and a fine flavor still hanging to it. Wait a minute now +till I tell you. It'll taste better, too, after you hear. And into the +crock I puts two gallons of rum--fine rum it was--for a bottom. Every +good punch has to have a bottom. It's like the big blocks they put +under a house by way of a foundation, or the ballast down near the +keel of a vessel--there'd be no stiffening without it, and the first +good breeze she'd capsize, and then where'd you be? Now, on top of +those two gallons--it was two o'clock in the morning, I mind, when I +started to mix it--whiskey, brandy, and sherry--no, I can't tell what +parts of each--for that's the secret of it. A fellow was dory-mate +with me once--a Frenchman from Bordeaux--told me and said never to +tell, and I gave my oath--down in St. Peer harbor in Miquelon it +was--and afterwards he was lost on the Heptagon--and of course, never +being released from the oath, I can't tell. Well, there was the rum, +the whiskey, the brandy, and the sherry--and on top o' that went one +can of canned pine-apple--canned pine is better than the pine-apple +right out of its jacket. Why? Well, that's part of the secret. Then a +dozen squeezed lemons and oranges. Then some maraschino. I'd got it +off an Italian salt bark skipper in the harbor once. On top o' that I +put one quart of green tea--boiled it myself--it was three in the +morning then, I mind--and I sampled a cup of it. Wait now--wait. Just +ease your sheets and let me tell it. Here's the best part of it. I +takes that crock with the fourteen quarts of good stuff in it and +lowers it to the bottom of the old well out in the yard with a lot of +cold round little stones above and below and more little stones packed +all around and then I lowers down two good-sized rocks on top o' +that--and nails boards over the well--that's why nobody could get into +that well all this summer. Well, that was the morning after the last +Fourth of July--I mind the sun was coming up over the rocks of Cape +Ann when I was done. And that was July, and now the last of +September--three months ago. A while ago in the dark and a howling +gale--you all see me come in with it, didn't you? Yes, if you go out +quick, you c'n see the well just where I left it--I goes out and digs +it up--and here it is--and now it's here, we'll all have a little +touch in honor of to-morrow, for it's a great day when the wind blows +fifty or sixty miles an hour so that fishermen can have good weather +for a race." + +And they all had a little touch. Clancy sat on the table with the +crock between his feet and bailed it out while they all agreed it was +the smoothest stuff that ever slid down their throats. There was not a +man in the gang who was not sure he could put away a barrel of it. + +"Put away a barrel of it?" whispered Clancy--"yes. Let's get out +of here, Joe. In an hour they'll be going into the air like +firecrackers." + + + + +XXVIII + +IN THE ARKELL KITCHEN + + +We left Clancy's boarding house and went over to old Mrs. Arkell's +place, where most of the skippers who were going to race next day had +gathered. Clancy at once started in to mix milk-punches. And he sang +his latest favorite, with the gang supping his mixture between the +stanzas: + + "Oh, hove flat down on Quero Banks + Was the Bounding Billow, Captain Hanks, + And the way she was a-settlin' was an awful sight to see"-- + +Then Wesley Marrs sang a song and after him Patsie Oddie followed with +a roarer. + +The punch-mixing, singing and story-telling went on and in the middle +of it Tom O'Donnell came driving in. He was like a whiff of a +no'the-easter out to sea. "Whoo!" he said. "Hulloh, Wesley-boy--and +Patsie Oddie--and Tommie Ohlsen--and, by my soul, Tommie Clancy again. +Lord, what a night to come beating down from Boston! What's that, +Wesley?--did the Colleen outfoot the cutter down the Cape shore way? +Indeed and she did, and could do it over again in the same breeze to +half their logy old battleships. Into Boston I was Monday morning, and +the fish out of her the same morning. Tuesday I took her across to +Cape Cod, tuning her up, and into Provincetown that night. Next day it +was blowing pretty hard. A fine day for a run across the Bay, I +thinks, and waits for maybe a Boston vessel, one of the T Wharf fleet. +For I'll go to Boston, I thinks, to put the Colleen on the railway +to-day, because maybe in Gloucester I may have to wait--or may get no +chance at all--with half a dozen or more that will be waiting to be +scrubbed for the race. And who comes along then but Tom Lowrie. +'Waiting for me?' he asks, and I tells him I was hoping it would be +the new Whalen vessel. 'Here's one that's as good as any Whalen +vessel,' he says--'as good as anything out of Boston--or Gloucester,' +he says. So across the Bay we had it out. And, gentlemen, I'm telling +you the Colleen sailed--all the wind she wanted. She came along, and +Lowrie--by the looks of things then--he's sailing yet. Well, I never +did like that forem'st that was in the Colleen, and so, thinks I, +here's a chance to test it--and why not, with the race coming on? So I +jibed her over off Minot's just--and sure enough it cracked about ten +feet below the mast-head." + +"You were satisfied then, Tom?" + +"Sure and I was. And better before the race than in the race. And next +day--that's to-day--we spent putting in a new stick. I had to take +what I could get to save time, and I don't think it's what it ought to +be and maybe it won't last through to-morrow. But, anyway, you want to +have an eye out for the Colleen to-morrow, for I'm telling you I never +see her sail like she did yesterday coming across the Bay. Ask Tom +Lowrie next time you see him. Well, to-night I had to beat down here +to be sure and be here in time, and so out we put--and here I am. +Blowing? Indeed and it is. And thick, is it? Standing on her +knight-heads and looking aft you c'd no more than make out her +side-lights. We came along, and Boston inner and outer harbor crowded +with vessels, steamers and sail, waiting for it to moderate so they +c'd put out. A blessed wonder it was we didn't sink somebody--or +ourselves. Outside we went along by smell, I think, for only every +once in awhile could we see a light. One time we almost ran into +something--a fisherman it must have been, for I s'pose only a +fisherman would be going in on a night like this--out of a squall of +snow and blackness she came--man alive! but, whoever she was, she was +coming a great clip. Winged out and we didn't see her till the end of +her bowsprit caught the end of our main-boom--hauled in we were to two +blocks--and over we went on the other tack--yes, sir, over on the +other tack. Thinks I, ''Tis a new way to jibe a vessel over.' And the +end of her fore-boom all but swept me from beside the wheel and over +the rail as she went by--she was that close. And I sings out to her, +'Won't you leave us your name so I can thank you next time we meet?' +but Lord, not a word out of him. He kept on to Boston, I suppose, and +we kept on to Gloucester, and here I am." + +"And the Colleen, Tom--she's all right?" + +"Right, man? Watch her to-morrow. Barring that forem'st being too +light--but whoever looked for a breeze like this?--two days and three +nights now and blowing harder all the time. But never mind, she'll +make great going of it to-morrow. Divil take it, but we'll all make +great going of it. Tommie, dear, what's in the bowl? Milk? Man, but +don't be telling me things like that--and the one thing the doctors +warn me against is heart-trouble. Ah, milk-punch--that's better, man. +A wee droppeen. Look at it--the color of the tip of a comber in twelve +fathom of water and a cross-tide. Well, here's to every mother's son +of us that's going to race to-morrow. May ye all win if the Colleen +don't--all but you, Sam Hollis. But where's he gone--into the other +room? Well, if he was here 'twould be the same. He's got a vessel +that can sail. Let him sail her to-morrow and win, if it's in her--or +in him. But a thousand dollars--and outside my house and vessel, Lord +knows, it's all the money I've got in the world--beyond my house and +vessel--a thousand dollars the Colleen beats the Withrow. Hello, +there--what d'y'say, Sam Hollis--the Colleen and the Withrow--a +thousand dollars, boat for boat. But where the divil is he? Gone? Are +you sure? Gone! But a queer time to leave a party--just when it's +getting to be real sociable." + +"Never mind the betting now, Tom," spoke up Wesley Marrs. "Let the +owners have that to themselves. And according to accounts some of them +are having it. Fred Withrow and old Duncan are ready to go broke over +the race to-morrow. Whichever loses, he'll remember this race, I'm +thinking. Here's hoping it won't be Duncan. So to the devil with the +betting, Tom. Some of us have bet all we could afford--some of us more +than we could afford, I callate. Let's have a song instead, Tom." + +"Anything to please you, Wesley," and O'Donnell began to sing. He +started off first with his + + "Oh, seiners all and trawlers all," + +but Alec McNeill and Patsie Oddie interrupted. "Oh, give us the other +one, Tom--the Newf'undland and Cape Shore Men." + +"Ha!" laughed O'Donnell, "it's the mention of your own you want--you +and Patsie there. Well, it's all one to me. Any man from any place, so +long as he's a fair man and a brave man, and Lord knows ye're both +that. Well, here's to you both--a wee drop just, Tommie--easy--easy," +and he began: + + "Oh, Newf'undland and Cape Shore men, and men of Gloucester town, + With ye I've trawled o'er many banks and sailed the compass + roun'; + I've ate with ye, and bunked with ye, and watched with ye all + three, + And better shipmates than ye were I never hope to see. + I've seen ye in the wild typhoon beneath a Southern sky, + I've seen ye when the Northern gales drove seas to mast-head + high, + But summer breeze or winter blow, from Hatt'ras to Cape Race, + I've yet to see ye with the sign of fear upon your face. + + Oh, swingin' cross the Bay + Go eighty sail of seiners, + And every blessed one of them a-driving to her rail! + + There's a gale upon the waters and there's foam upon the sea, + And looking out the window is a dark-eyed girl for me, + And driving her for Gloucester, maybe we don't know + What the little ones are thinking when the mother looks out so. + Oh, the children in the cradle and the wife's eyes out to sea, + The husband at the helm and looking westerly-- + When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's + blood foam? + Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home. + + West half no'the and drive her, we're abreast now of Cape Sable, + It's an everlasting hurricane, but here's the craft that's able-- + When you get to thinking that way, don't it make your heart's + blood foam? + Be sure it does--so here's a health to those we love at home. + + Oh, the roar of shoaling waters and the awful, awful sea, + Busted shrouds and parting cables, and the white death on our + lee; + Oh, the black, black night on Georges when eight score men were + lost-- + Were ye there, ye men of Gloucester? Aye, ye were--and tossed + Like chips upon the water were your little craft that night, + Driving, swearing, calling out, but ne'er a call of fright. + So knowing ye for what ye are, ye masters of the sea, + Here's to ye, Gloucester fishermen, a health to ye from me. + + And here's to it that once again + We'll trawl and seine and race again; + Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; + And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!' + We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,' + And all together let us go beneath the ocean's roar." + +I never again expect to hear a sea song sung as Tom O'Donnell sang it +then, his beard still wet with the spray and his eyes glowing like +coal-fire. And the voice of him! He must have been heard in half of +Gloucester that night. He made the table quiver. And when they all +rose with glasses raised and sang the last lines again: + + "And here's to it that once again + We'll trawl and seine and race again; + Here's to us that's living and to them that's gone before; + And when to us the Lord says, 'Come!' + We'll bow our heads, 'His will be done,' + And all together we shall go beneath the ocean's roar----" + +any stranger hearing and seeing might have understood why it was that +their crews were ready to follow these men to death. + +"The like of you, Tom O'Donnell, never sailed the sea," said Patsie +Oddie when they had got the last ro-o-ar--"even the young ladies come +in off the street to hear you better." + +He meant Minnie Arkell, who was standing in the doorway with her eyes +fixed on O'Donnell, who had got up to go home, but with Wesley trying +to hold him back. He was to the door when Minnie Arkell stopped him. +She said she had heard him singing over to her house and couldn't keep +away, and then, with a smile and a look into his eyes, she asked +O'Donnell what was his hurry--and didn't he remember her? + +In her suit of yachting blue, with glowing face and tumbled hair, she +was a picture. "Look at her," nudged Clancy--"isn't she a corker? But +she's wasting time on Tom O'Donnell." + +"What's your hurry, Tom?" called Wesley. "Another song." + +"No, no, it's the little woman on the hill. She knew I was to come +down to-night and not a wink of sleep will she get till I'm home. And +she knows there'll be bad work to-morrow maybe and she'd like to see +me a little before I go, and I'd like to see her, too." + +"She's a lucky woman, Captain O'Donnell, and you must think a lot of +her?" Minnie Arkell had caught his eye once more. + +"I don't know that she's so awfully lucky with me on her hands," +laughed O'Donnell, "but I do think a lot of her, child." + +"Child? to me? But you don't remember me, Captain?" + +"Indeed, and I do, and well remember you. And it's the beautiful woman +you've grown to be. But you always were a lovely child. It's often my +wife spoke of you and wondered how you were. She's heard me speak of +your father a hundred times, I know. A brave man your father, girl. +And she'll be glad to see you any time, little girl--or the daughter +of any fisherman lost at sea. If ever you have a blue day, go to her, +for 'tis she has the heart--and, God bless her, an extra weakness for +orphans. Her own children some day--there's no telling. But good-night +to you, dear"--he patted her head--"good-night all. Wesley, Tommie, +Patsie--all of ye, good-night. In the morning we'll have it out." Out +the door he went, and I fancied there was almost a blush on Minnie +Arkell's face. + +Tom O'Donnell was the kind of a man a fellow would like to have for a +father. + + + + +XXIX + +MAURICE BLAKE COMES HOME + + +From Mrs. Arkell's we walked back to Clancy's boarding house. Clancy +wanted to see how they made out with the punch. We found several of +them up in the wind, and so no great danger of them. But two or three +of them, Dave Campbell particularly, were running wild. "Boomed out +and driving," said Clancy, and began to remonstrate with Dave on the +evils of intemperance. He went on quite awhile, but Dave showed no +signs of remorse. "Wait and I'll fix him," said Clancy, and obeying a +motioning with his head two or three of the sober ones followed him +out. + +He led the way to the wood-shed next door where there was a goat, and +the goat we carried up three flights of stairs to Campbell's room. He +was a big, able goat, and we had quite a time to get him up stairs. At +last we got him tied to the post of Campbell's bed. Then we went down +stairs to the kitchen and Clancy persuaded Campbell to go up stairs to +bed, which after awhile he did. It was not yet morning and there was +no light in the bedroom. We took our position on the landing outside +where we could hear everything that went on in Campbell's room, which +was just at the head of the stairs. + +Dave went in and we could hear him falling over something in the dark. +"What's it?" we could hear him, and acting as if he was feeling +around. Taking off our shoes we crawled nearer. We could barely make +out his shadow in the dark, but we could easily hear him talking to +himself. "What's it? Eh, what?" He must have been feeling the horns +then, and the goat must have butted him. Again, and once more, for out +the door and down the stairs went Dave. We ran in and cut the goat +loose and down he went after Dave. The whole three flights they +raced. + +"He's got me at last," hollered Dave, bolting into the kitchen, +slamming the door behind him and bracing himself against it. + +We took the goat and put him back in the wood-shed and came back to +the kitchen by way of the window. Dave, who was still braced against +the door, did not know but what we had been in the kitchen all the +time, and that gave Clancy a fine chance to take up his lecture on +intemperance just where he had left it off,--at the very beginning. +"Intemperance, Dave, is an awful thing. You'll have to be doing +something for it soon, I think. Yes, when the devil himself gives you +a call it's time to do something. You'd better come with me and take +the pledge. Come up now to Father Haley." + +"I'm a Pres--a Pres--a Pres--by--ter--ian, Tommie." + +"Well, come with me to your church then--any church at all. What's the +odds, so long's you reform. Here, we'll do it right here now. Come, +hold up your hand," and then and there Clancy was about to get Dave to +promise not to look a glass of liquor or punch in the face for a year +again, when who comes bouncing in but Eddie Parsons. + +"Hurroo!" said Clancy, forgetting Dave and grabbing Eddie by the +shoulder, "and the Duncan's home?" + +"She is," said Eddie, "and four hundred and fifty barrels of mackerel +coming out of her hold. A dozen lumpers getting 'em out from both +holds and two at a lick they're coming onto Duncan's Dock. And what +d'y'think, Tommie----" + +"But what kept you so long, man? We've all been getting heart disease +waiting for you." + +"I know. We ought to've been in yesterday mornin', or in the +afternoon at the latest, for we swung her off Tuesday night +midnight--plenty of time with a fair wind. But on Wednesday afternoon, +coming like a race-horse--wung out--we sighted a dory and two men in +it signalizing. Astray they were, and we took 'em aboard, and all +that night we stood by. And warn't it chafing? Oh, no! Daylight came +thick and we waited for it to clear, keeping the horn goin'. It +lifted and we got another dory, but it was late afternoon then. +Then their vessel came along with all the others accounted for, and we +turned over our two and went on our way. And maybe she didn't come! +Oh, no! Blowing? A living gale all the time, but the skipper kept her +going. You'd hardly b'lieve if I told you where we was yesterday +afternoon and we here now. A no'the-easter and a howler all the way. +At four o'clock we passed in by the bell-buoy. Man, such a blow! +Are we in the race, you say? Are we! And oh, the skipper says for you +and Joe to be down after breakfast. We all knew you'd get home and be +all right with Tom O'Donnell. So be down after breakfast--the skipper +will be looking for you both. But say, let me tell you. What +d'y'think? Coming into the harbor a while ago who d'y' s'pose was +out in the stream with a lighter alongside his vessel? Who but Sam +Hollis and the Withrow. Yes, and the gang putting ballast back in +her." + +"No?" + +"Yes. And some one of them sees us going by in the dark. And we did go +by, too! 'Lord!' says somebody--'twas Withrow himself--'but if that +don't look like the ghost of Maurice Blake's vessel!' 'Yes,' hollers +back the skipper--and they must've been some surprised to hear +him--'and the ghost'll be with you to-morrow in the race. Yes,' the +skipper says, 'and we're all ready for it. Four weeks since we've been +on the ways and maybe a scrubbing wouldn't hurt her, but if it keeps +a-blowin' who'll mind that? Not the Johnnie.' Oh, Tommie, if you'd +seen her comin' across the Bay of Fundy yesterday afternoon and last +night. Did she come?--did she come? Lord--O Lord----" + +"And so that's Withrow--got his vessel tuned up like a fiddle and +now he's putting extra ballast in her. Blast him and Hollis for +schemers!" said Clancy. "And that's how it comes they're so ready +to bet--stiffenin' her so stiff for to-morrow that they know +something'll happen to the others first. But the Johnnie's a bit +stiff, too--and there's no ballast out of her. And, as the skipper +says, maybe we ain't been on the ways for a few weeks now, but Lord, +the Johnnie ought to be able to drag a few little blades of sea-grass +on her hull in this breeze. And so we're in the race, heh? Dave, I +can't stop to give you the pledge now-- + + Oh, the Johnnie Duncan fast and able, + Good-by, dear, good-by, my Mabel." + +And Clancy was the joyful man as he awoke the echoes in the gray of +that stormy morning. + + + + +XXX + +THE MORNING OF THE RACE + + +I don't think that the people of Gloucester will ever forget the +morning of that race, which, they will still tell you, was the only +race ever sailed. Wind was what the fishermen wanted, and they got +it--wind, and sea with it. The admiral of the White Squadron, then at +anchor at Rockport Harbor, just around the Cape, stood on the bridge +of his flagship that morning and looked out to sea. Somebody told him +that the fishermen were going to race that day. He took another look. +"Race to-day? Pooh! they'll do well to stay hove-to to-day." Of +course, that ought to have settled it, the admiral having said it. + +It blew that day. Leaving home I had time for a bite to eat and a +wash-up. I turned the corner and picked up Clancy, with Maurice Blake, +Tom O'Donnell and Wesley Marrs just ahead. We ran into Mr. Edkins, a +nice old gentleman, who had been made secretary of the race committee. +What he didn't know about fishing would be the making of a "killer," +but, of course, he wasn't picked out for that--he'd never fished a +day in his life--but because of his knowledge of the rules of yacht +racing. Having had long experience in managing yachting regattas, he +knew all about time allowances and sail measurements--though there +were to be no allowances of any kind here. It was to be boat for boat +in this race; every vessel for herself. So he was thought to be a good +man to have to look after the stake and judges' boats. It was +Gloucester's Anniversary celebration, with a lot of strangers in +town--the Governor and a whole holdful of national characters--and in +deference to them the race was to be managed so that spectators might +have a chance to see it. + +Mr. Edkins came along in his official regalia--tall hat, frock coat, +umbrella, gloves, and a pink in his button-hole. + +"Is it true, Captain O'Donnell, that the race is going to be held +to-day?" + +O'Donnell looked at him as though he didn't understand. "To-day? +to-day?--Good Lord, are we all on the wrong tack? And sure isn't this +the day?" + +"Oh, yes--oh, yes, Captain O'Donnell, this is the day appointed. And +that is the trouble. Surely you are not going to race to-day?" + +"We're not going to--" broke in Wesley Marrs, "and why aren't we going +to race to-day? What in the name of all that's good have we been +doing with our vessels up on the railway the last week or two? What +d'y'think we took the ballast out of our vessels for? What d'y'think I +had that everlasting new balloon made for last trip in, what for that +big mains'l that Tom here had bent on the Colleen yesterday, and for +what did Maurice drive the Johnnie Duncan home only last night? What +in----" + +"Wait, Captain, wait. What I mean is, do you know how it is outside? +They've telegraphed me that up in Boston Harbor there won't be a +steamer leave the harbor to-day--it's as stormy as that. There are two +big ocean liners--and we've got word that they won't leave--won't dare +to leave--not a steamer of any kind will leave Boston Harbor to-day. +And outside a heavy sea running--with the wind fifty-four miles an +hour, the weather bureau says. Fifty-four miles an hour. That's not +street corner talk--it's official. And----" + +"Divil take it, does being official make it blow any harder?" asked +O'Donnell. + +"And I know the way you fishermen will try to carry on. I know, I +know--don't tell me you're careful. I tell you, Captain O'Donnell, and +you, Captain Marrs, I tell you all--that if you persist in racing +to-day I wash my hands of the whole affair--completely wash my----" + +"Well, 'tis a fine wash day, too. Come, Wesley--come, Maurice, we'll +have to be getting on." + +They left Mr. Edkins standing there. A little farther on they overtook +the manager of the insurance company, which had policies on most of +the fishing vessels. He was just about to enter his office when +O'Donnell spied him. "Hullo, there's the man I want to see--" and +hailed, "Just heave to a minute, Mr. Brooks, if you please. Now look +here, you know we've took a few pigs of iron out our vessels, and you +know it looks like a bit of weather outside. Now, what I want to know +is if I capsize the Colleen Bawn to-day--if I don't come home with +her--does my wife get the insurance? That's what I want to know--does +my wife get the insurance?" + +Mr. Brooks looked at O'Donnell, rubbed his chin and scratched his +head, then looked at O'Donnell again. "Why, I suppose it all comes +under the usual risk of fishing vessels. I suppose so--but--h-m--it +will be pretty risky, won't it? But let me see--wait a moment +now--there's the President inside, and Mr. Emerson, too--he's a +director." + +He went inside, and we could see that they were talking it over. +Pretty soon they all came out with the President of the company in +front. "Good-morning, Captain O'Donnell--Captain Marrs, good-morning. +How do you do, Maurice? Captain O'Donnell, take it from me as +official, your insurance on the Colleen Bawn is safe. For the honor +and glory of old Gloucester go ahead and sink her." + +"And the Lucy Foster?" asked Wesley. + +"And the Lucy Foster, Captain Marrs." + +"Of course the Johnnie Duncan, speaking for the owners?" asked +Maurice. + +"For every vessel that we insure that leaves the harbor to race +to-day." + +"Hurroo!" said O'Donnell. "Don't tell me, Wesley, I'm no--what's +it?--dip-lo-mat. Yes, dip-lo-mat, by the Lord!" + +But it certainly was a desperate morning for a race. The streets +seemed to be full of men ready to go out. There were to be only nine +vessels in the race, but another half dozen vessels were going over to +see it, and that meant more than three or four hundred able fishermen +going out. The men that were going to stay ashore would go up to those +that were going out and say, "Well, good-by, old man. If you don't +come back, why, you know your grave'll be kept green." And the men +going out would grin and say, "That's all right, boy, but if she goes, +she'll go with every rag on her," in a half-joking way, too, but it +was the belief that morning that there might be a whole lot of truth +in that kind of joking. + +Before we reached the dock we knew that the whole town had learned +pretty much that half a dozen of the skippers had promised each other +in Mrs. Arkell's kitchen the night before, "No sail comes off except +what's blown off," and there promised to be some blown off. Men who +had only just heard their skippers speak of that were bragging of it +in the streets. "Why," said one of O'Donnell's crew as we were coming +down the dock, "if any crawly-spined crawfish loses his nerve and +jumps to our halyards, thinkin' the Colleen's going to capsize--why, +he'll get fooled--and why? Because our halyards are all housed +aloft--by the skipper's orders." + +That sounded strong, but it was true. When we reached the end of our +dock we looked for ourselves, and there it was. The Colleen's crew had +hoisted their mains'l already and there she lay swayed up and all +ready, and men aloft were even then putting the seizing on. Tom +O'Donnell himself was pointing it out to Sam Hollis with a good deal +of glee, thinking, I suppose, to worry Hollis, who, to uphold his +reputation, would have to do the same and take the chances that went +with it. By this time everybody knew that Hollis had put his ballast +back during the night. One of Wesley Marrs's men jumped onto the +Withrow and below and had a look for himself. He couldn't get down by +way of the hatches--they were battened down--but he dropped into the +forec's'le and, before anybody knew what he was up to, he had slipped +through the forehold and into the mainhold and there he saw where they +had hurriedly put back the flooring, and he also saw extra barrels of +sand tiered low for further stiffening of the Withrow. He was +discovered before he got on deck and nearly beaten to a jelly before +he got up on the wharf again. It ended in a fine little riot with some +of our gang and O'Donnell's mixing in. Clancy came down the back-stay +like a man falling from the mast-head, so as to be into it before it +was over. He was almost too late--but not quite. Only old Mr. Duncan +coming along with half a dozen other dignified owners stopped it. But +there was time for Clancy to speak his mind out to Sam Hollis. And +that gave Hollis a chance to say, "Well, talk away, Tommie Clancy, but +this is the day I make the Johnnie Duncan take in sail." And Clancy +answered him, "That so! Well, no matter what happens, put this down, +Maurice Blake hangs to his canvas longer than Sam Hollis to-day--hangs +to it or goes over with it or the spars come out of the Johnnie +Duncan." + +After the talking was over we thought Hollis would be shamed into +sending a man aloft to mouse his halyards too. But not for Hollis. +That was a little too much for him. Clancy and three or four others +finished attending to our own halyards and overhauling the gear aloft. +Our mains'l was already hoisted and the other three lowers with stops +loosed were all ready to hoist too. The mains'l had been left standing +just as it was when the Johnnie Duncan came in that morning. It was +flat as a board, and I remember how grieved we were when we had to +lower it again because the tug that came to give us a kick out from +the dock could not turn us around with it up--it was blowing so. The +tug captain said he might manage to turn it against the sun, but that +would be bad luck of course, and he knew the crew wouldn't stand for +it, especially with a race like this on hand. It had to be with the +sun; and so we had to lower it again, and when the vessel was turned +around, hoist it again, not forgetting to lash the halyards aloft +again too. But after we'd got it swayed up it didn't set near so well +as before--too baggy to our way of thinking. + + + + +XXXI + +THE START OF THE RACE + + +We got away at last and beat out the harbor with the Lucy Foster, the +Colleen Bawn, the Withrow, the Nannie O, and four others. For other +company going out there was a big steam-yacht with Minnie Arkell and +her friends aboard, which did not get out of the harbor. Out by the +Point they shipped a sea and put back, with Minnie Arkell waving her +handkerchief and singing out--"Don't take in any sail, Maurice," as +they turned back. There was also the Eastern Point, a high-sided +stubby steamer, at that time running regularly to Boston; and there +was the New Rochelle, a weak-looking excursioner that might have done +for Long Island Sound, where somebody said she'd just come from, but +which didn't seem to fit in here. Her passengers were mostly +fishermen--crews of vessels not in the race. There was also a big +powerful iron sea-tug, the Tocsin, that promised to make better +weather of it than any of the others. + +Billie Simms was one of the men who were not going in the race but +intended to see some of it. He was in the Henry Clay Parker, a +fine-looking vessel that was not so very fast, but had the reputation +of being wonderfully stiff. Coming out past Eastern Point lighthouse, +where he could begin to get a look at things, Billie hollered out that +he was sorry he hadn't entered. "Looks to me like the vessel that'll +stay right side up the longest ought to win this race, and that's the +Henry C." He hauled her across our stern while he was yelling and I +remember she took one roll down to her sheer poles when passing on, +and Maurice sang out, "Look out, Billie, or you'll capsize her." + +"Capsize this one? Lord, Maurice, I've tried it a dozen times and I'm +damned if I could," and he went rolling on like nothing I ever saw, +unless it was the rest of us who were then manoeuvring for the start. +We passed the Parker again before we got to the line, and old Peter +Hines, who was hanging to her main-rigging, had to yell us his good +wishes. "Drive her, Maurice-boy, and whatever you do don't let the man +that took your vessel from you beat you home," meaning Sam Hollis of +course. Maurice waved his hand, but said nothing. He was looking +serious enough, however. + +Tommie Clancy was the boy who wasn't worrying particularly. He saluted +Peter as if he were going out on a holiday excursion. "Ain't she a +dog, Peter? Watch her." + +"That's what she is--and drive her, Tommie--drive her." + +"Oh, we'll drive her, Peter," called back Tommie, and began: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + I love old Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +"Let you alone, Tommie, and you'll get your prayer some day," was +Peter's last hail as we straightened out for the swoop across the +line. + +Clancy was to the wheel then with the skipper. Both were lashed and we +had life-lines around deck. To the wheel of every vessel in the fleet +were two men lashed, and they all had life-lines around deck. + +In crossing the line there was no attempt at jockeying such as one +often sees in yacht racing. There was no disposition on the part of +any skipper to do anything that would set anybody else back. Of +course, everybody wanted to be in a good berth and to cross between +the guns; but the idea was to give the vessels such a try out as they +would get out to sea--as if they were making a passage in a breeze. +The course--forty-two miles or so--was very short for a fisherman, +for one great thing in a fisherman is her power to stand a long drag. +Day and night in and day and night out and driving all the time is the +way a fisherman wants it. Any sort of racing machine could be built to +stand a little hard going for a while. But that wouldn't be living +through a long hard winter's gale on the Banks--one of those blows +where wind and sea--and in shoal water at that--have a chance to do +their worst. Fishermen are built for that sort of work and on their +sea-worthiness depends not only the fortunes of owners but the lives +of men--of real men--and the happiness and comfort of wives and +children ashore. And so the idea in everybody's mind that day was to +make this test as nearly fair as could be and see who had the fastest +and most weatherly boat in the fleet. There were men to the wheel that +day who could handle big fishermen as if they were cat-boats, who +would have dared and did, later, dare to sail their vessels as close +to a mark in this sea as men sail a twenty-foot knockabout in the +smoothest of waters inshore--only with the fishermen a slip-up meant +the loss of a vessel, maybe other vessels too, and twenty-five or +fifty lives perhaps. + +And so the skill of these men was not used to give anybody the worst +of it. A fair start and give everybody his chance was the idea. Thus +Tommie Ohlsen could have forced the Withrow outside the starting boat +and compelled her to come about and maybe lose a few minutes, but he +did not. He held up and let her squeeze through. O'Donnell in his turn +could have crowded Ohlsen when he let up on the Withrow, but he did +not. He, too, held up in turn and let Ohlsen have his swing going +across. + +Across we went, one after the other. West-sou'west was the course to a +stake-boat, which we were told would be found off Egg Rock, fourteen +miles away. We had only the compass to go by, for at the start it was +rain and drizzle, as well as wind and a big sea, and you couldn't see +a mile ahead. On the way we shot by the New Rochelle, which had +started ahead with the intention of waiting for the fleet at the first +stake-boat. Now she was headed back, wabbing awfully. From Billie +Simms, who went over part of the course in the Henry Clay Parker ahead +of the fleet, we got word of the trouble as we went by. The New +Rochelle was beginning to leak. "You c'n spit between her deck-planks +and into her hold--she's that loose," hollered Billie. I don't think +the fishermen aboard of her minded much so long as she stayed afloat, +but her captain, a properly licensed man, did, I expect, and so she +put back with some of them growling, I heard afterward, "and after +paying their little old three dollars to see only the start of the +race." Her captain reported, when he got in, that he didn't see +anything outside but a lot of foolish fishermen trying to drown +themselves. + +The first leg was before the wind and the Lucy Foster and the Colleen +Bawn went it like bullets. I don't expect ever again to see vessels +run faster than they did that morning. On some of those tough passages +from the Banks fishing vessels may at times have gone faster than +either of these did that morning. It is likely, for where a lot of +able vessels are all the time trying to make fast passages--skippers +who are not afraid to carry sail and vessels that can stand the +dragging--and in all kinds of chances--there must in the course of +years of trying be some hours when they do get over an everlasting lot +of water. But there are no means of checking up. Half the time the men +do not haul the log for half a day or more. Some of the reports of +speed of fishermen at odd times have been beyond all records, and so +people who do not know said they must be impossible. But here was a +measured course and properly anchored stake-boats--and the Lucy and +the Colleen did that first leg of almost fourteen sea-miles in fifty +minutes, which is better than a 16-1/2 knot clip, and that means over +nineteen land miles an hour. I think anybody would call that pretty +fast going. And, as some of them said afterward, "Lord in Heaven! +suppose we'd had smooth water!" But I don't think that the sea checked +them so very much--not as much as one might think, for they were +driving these vessels. + + + + +XXXII + +O'DONNELL CARRIES AWAY BOTH MASTS + + +We were next to the last vessel across the starting line. The Nannie +O--we couldn't see them all--about held the Lucy Foster and the +Colleen Bawn level. The Withrow showed herself to be a wonderful +vessel off the wind, too. Wesley Marrs was around the stake-boat +first. In the fog and drizzle the leaders did not find the stake-boat +at once. Wesley happening to be nearest to it when they did see it, +got the benefit and was first around. We were close up, almost near +enough to board the Withrow's quarter rounding. I am not sure that the +skipper and Clancy, who were to the wheel, did not try to give Hollis +a poke with the end of our long bowsprit; but if they did, the Johnnie +was not quite fast enough for that. The Withrow beat us around. +Looking back we could see the others coming like wild horses. Every +one of them, except one that carried away something and hauled up and +out of it, was diving into it to the foremast with every leap the same +as we had been. On that first leg nobody could stand anywhere for'ard +of the fore-hatch or he would have been swept overboard. + +Leaving Egg Rock and going for Minot's Ledge, the skipper left the +wheel and George Nelson took his place beside Clancy. It was drizzling +then, every now and then that settling down so that we couldn't see +three lengths ahead. At such times we simply hoped that nobody ahead +would carry away anything or in any way become disabled in the road. + +Well clear of the stake-boat, however, it lifted and we could see what +we were doing. The Lucy Foster was still ahead with O'Donnell and +Ohlsen and Hollis almost abreast--no more than a few lengths between. +Practically they were all about just as they started. We were next. It +was a broad reach to Minot's Ledge and hard going for all hands. It +must be remembered that we all had everything on, even to balloon and +staysails, and our halyards were lashed aloft. The men to the +mast-head, who were up there to shift tacks, were having a sweet time +of it hanging on, even lashed though they were. + +Everybody was pretty well strung up at this time. The skipper, a line +about his elbow, was hooked up to the main-rigging--the weather side, +of course--and it was up to a man's waist and boiling white on the lee +side. The crew were snug up under the weather rail and hanging on--no +mistake either about the way they were hanging on. Every once in +awhile one of us would poke his head up to see what they were doing to +windward of us. Mr. Duncan, who had come aboard just before we left +the dock, was trying to sit on the weather bitt near the wheel-box. He +had a line around his waist, too. He had bet a lot of money with +Withrow on the race, but I don't think that his money was worrying him +half so much as some other things then. + +So far as we could see at this time we were making as good weather as +any of them. And our best chance--the beat home--was yet to come. The +Johnnie had the stiffness for that. Had the Johnnie reached Gloucester +from the Cape Shore earlier she, too, would have been lightened up and +made less stiff. To be sure she would have had her bottom scrubbed and +we would have had her up to racing pitch, with every bit of sail just +so and her trim gauged to a hair's depth, but that did not matter so +very much now. The Johnnie was in shape for a hard drag like this, and +for that we had to thank the tricky Sam Hollis. We began to see that +after all it was a bit of good luck our vessel not being home in time +to tune up the same as the rest of the fleet. + +It was along about here--half-way on the reach to Minot's--that +Tommie Ohlsen broke his main-gaff. It was the fault of the Eastern +Point, the Boston steamer. She had gone ahead of the fleet, taking +almost a straight course for Minot's Ledge. Reaching across from +Half-Way Rock to Minot's the fleet began to overhaul her. She, making +bad weather of it along here, started to turn around. But, rolling to +her top-rail, it was too much for them, and her captain kept her +straight on for Boston. That was all right, but her action threw +Ohlsen off. She was right in the Nannie O's way, and to save the +steamer and themselves from a collision and certain loss of life, +Ohlsen had to jibe the Nannie O, and so suddenly that the Nannie O's +gaff broke under the strain. And that lost Ohlsen his chance for the +race. It was too bad, for with Ohlsen, Marrs, and O'Donnell, each in +his own vessel in a breeze, you could put the names in a hat and shake +them up. When we went by the Nannie O her crew were getting the +trysail out of the hold, and they finished the race with that, and +made good going of it, as we saw afterward. Indeed, a trysail that day +would have been sail enough for almost any men but these. + +Before we reached Minot's there was some sail went into the air. One +after the other went the balloons--on the Foster, the Colleen, the +Withrow and at last on us. I don't know whether they had any trouble +on the others--being too busy with our own to watch--but we came near +to losing men with ours. It got caught under our keel, and we started +to try to haul it in--the skipper having an economical notion of +saving the owner the expense of a new sail, I suppose. But Mr. Duncan, +seeing what he was at, sang out: "Let the sail go to the devil, +Captain--I'll pay for the new one myself." Even at that we had to +crawl out on the bowsprit--six or eight of us--with sharp knives, and +cut it away, and we were glad to get back again. The Johnnie never +slackened. It was desperate work. + +Rounding Minot's, Tom O'Donnell gave an exhibition of desperate +seamanship. He had made up his mind, it seems, that he was due to pass +Wesley Marrs along here. But first he had to get by the Withrow. Off +Minot's was the turning buoy, with just room, as it was considered, +for one vessel at a time to pass safely in that sea. + +O'Donnell figured that the tide being high there was easily room for +two, and then breasted up to the Withrow, outside of her and with the +rocks just under his quarter. Hollis, seeing him come, made a motion +as if to force him on the rocks, but O'Donnell, standing to his own +wheel, called out--"You do, Sam Hollis, and we'll both go." There +certainly would have been a collision, with both vessels and both +crews--fifty men--very likely lost, but Hollis weakened and kept off. +That kind of work was too strong for him. He had so little room that +his main-boom hit the can-buoy as he swept by. + +Once well around O'Donnell, in great humor, and courting death, worked +by Hollis and then, making ready to tack and pass Wesley's bow, let +the Colleen have her swing, but with all that sail on and in that +breeze, there could be only one outcome. And yet he might have got +away with it but for his new foremast, which, as he had feared, had +not the strength it should have had. He let her go, never stopped to +haul in his sheets--he had not time to if he was to cross Wesley's +bow. So he swung her and the full force of the wind getting her laid +both spars over the side--first one and then the other clean as could +be. + +Hollis never stopped or made a motion to help, but kept on after the +Lucy Foster. We almost ran over O'Donnell, but luffed in time, and the +skipper called out to O'Donnell that we'd stand by and take his men +off. + +O'Donnell was swearing everything blue. "Go on--go on--don't mind me. +Go on, I tell you. We're all right. I'll have her under jury rig and +be home for supper. Go on, Maurice--go on and beat that divil +Hollis!" + +Half way to Eastern Point on the way back saw us in the wake of the +Withrow, which was then almost up with the Lucy Foster. It was the +beat home now, with all of us looking to see the Withrow do great +things, for just off the ways and with all her ballast in she was in +great trim for it. Going to windward, too, was generally held to be +her best point of sailing. All that Hollis had to do was to keep his +nerve and drive her. + + + + +XXXIII + +THE ABLE JOHNNIE DUNCAN + + +Hollis was certainly driving her now. He ought to have felt safe in +doing so with the Lucy Foster to go by, for the Lucy, by reason of the +ballast taken out of her, should, everything else being equal, capsize +before the Withrow. + +Hollis must have had that in mind, for he followed Wesley Marrs's +every move. Wesley was sailing her wide. And our skipper approved of +that, too. To attempt a too close course in the sea that was out in +the Bay that day, with the blasts of wind that were sweeping down, +would have deadened her way altogether too much--maybe hung her up. +And so it was "Keep her a full whatever you do," and that, with coming +about when the others did--we being afraid to split tacks--made plenty +of work for us. + +"Hard-a-lee" it was one after the other, and for every "Hard-a-lee" +twenty of us went down into the roaring sea fore and aft and hauled in +and slackened away sheets, while aloft, the fellows lashed to the +foremast head shifted top and staysail tacks. They were wise to lash +themselves up aloft, for with every tack, she rolled down into it as +if she were never coming up, and when she did come up shook herself as +if she would snap her topmasts off. + +Half way to Eastern Point on the beat home it seemed to occur to the +skipper and to Clancy that the Johnnie Duncan stood a chance to win +the race. It was Clancy, still lashed to the wheel, now with Long +Steve, turned his head for just a second to Mr. Duncan and spoke the +first word of it. + +"Mr. Duncan, do you know, but the Johnnie's got a chance to win this +race?" + +"D'y'think so, Tommie--d'y'think so?" + +Some of us in the crew had been thinking of that same thing some time, +and we watched Mr. Duncan, who, with a life line about him, was +clinging to a bitt aft, and watching things with tight lips, a drawn +face and shiny eyes. We listened to hear what else he might have to +say. But he didn't realize at once what it meant. His eyes and his +mind were on the Lucy Foster. + +"What d'y'think of the Lucy and the Withrow, Tommie?" Mr. Duncan said +next. + +Tommie took a fresh look at the Lucy Foster, which was certainly doing +stunts. It was along this time that big Jim Murch--a tall man, but +even so, he was no more than six feet four, and the Lucy twenty-four +feet beam--was swinging from the ring-bolts under the windward rail +and throwing his feet out trying to touch with his heels the sea that +was swashing up on the Lucy's deck. And every once in a while he did +touch, for the Lucy, feeling the need of her ballast, was making +pretty heavy weather of it. Every time she rolled and her sheer poles +went under, Jim would holler out that he'd touched again. + +We could hear him over on the Johnnie at times. Mr. Duncan, who +believed that nothing ever built could beat the Lucy Foster, began to +worry at that, and again he spoke to Clancy. He had to holler to make +himself heard. + +"But what do you think of the Lucy's chances, Tommie?" + +Clancy shook his head. + +And getting nothing out of Clancy, Mr. Duncan called out then: "What +do you think of the Lucy, you, Captain Blake?" + +The skipper shook his head, too. "I'm afraid it's too much for her." + +And then--one elbow was hitched in the weather rigging and a half +hitch around his waist--the skipper swung around, and looking over to +the Withrow, he went on: + +"I don't see, Mr. Duncan, why we don't stand a pretty good chance to +win out on Hollis." + +"Why not--why not--if anything happens to the Lucy." + +It jarred us some to think that even there, in spite of the great race +the Johnnie was making of it, she was still, in the old man's eyes, +only a second string to the Lucy Foster. + +About then the wind seemed to come harder than ever, but Clancy at the +wheel never let up on the Johnnie. He socked it to her--wide and free +he sailed her. Kept her going--oh, but he kept her going. "If this one +only had a clean bottom and a chance to tune her up before going out," +said somebody, and we all said, "Oh, if she only had--just half a day +on the railway before this race." + +We were fairly buried at times on the Johnnie--on the Lucy Foster it +must have been tough. And along here the staysail came off the Withrow +and eased her a lot. We would all have been better off with less sail +along about that time. In proof of that we could see back behind us +where the Nannie O, under her trysail, was almost holding her own. But +it wouldn't do to take it off. Had they not all said before putting +off that morning that what sail came off that day would be blown +off?--yes, sir--let it blow a hundred miles an hour. And fishermen's +pride was keeping sail on us and the Foster. Hollis tried to make it +look that his staysail blew off, but we knew better--a knife to the +halyards did the work. + +It was after her big staysail was off and she making easier weather of +it that the Withrow crossed the Lucy's bow for the first time in the +race and took the lead. + +We all felt for Mr. Duncan, who couldn't seem to believe his eyes. We +all felt for Wesley, too, who was desperately trying to hold the wind +of the Withrow--he had even rigged blocks to his jib sheets and led +them to cleats clear aft to flatten his headsails yet more. And +Wesley's crew hauled like demons on those jib sheets--hauled and +hauled with the vessel under way all the time--hauled so hard, in +fact, that with the extra purchase given them by the blocks they +pulled the cleats clean out, and away went the Lucy's jib and +jumbo--and there was Wesley hung up. And out of the race, for we were +all too near the finish for her to win out then unless the Johnnie and +the Withrow capsized entirely. + +Mr. Duncan, when he saw the Lucy's crew trying to save the headsails, +couldn't contain himself. + +"Cut 'em away--cut 'em to hell!" he sang out, and we all had to smile, +he spoke so excitedly. But it was no use. The Lucy was out of the +race, and going by her, we didn't look at Mr. Duncan nor Wesley +Marrs--we knew they were both taking it hard--but watched the +Withrow. + +Over on the other tack we went, first the Withrow, then the Johnnie. +We were nearing the finish line, and we were pretty well worked +up--the awful squalls were swooping down and burying us. We could hear +Hollis's voice and see his crew go up when he warned his men at the +wheel to ease up on her when the squalls hit. On our vessel the +skipper never waved an arm nor opened his mouth to Clancy at the +wheel. And of his own accord you may be sure that Clancy wasn't easing +up. Not Tommie Clancy--no, sir--he just drove her--let her have it +full--lashed her like, with his teeth and eyes flashing through the +sea that was swashing over him. And the Johnnie fairly sizzled through +the water. + +There were several times in the race when we thought the going was as +bad as could be, but now we were all sure that this was the worst of +all. There was some excuse for Mr. Duncan when he called out: + +"My God, Tommie, but if she makes one of those low dives again, will +she ever come up?" + +"I dunno," said Clancy to that. "But don't you worry, Mr. Duncan, if +any vessel out of Gloucester'll come up, this one'll come up." + +He was standing with the water, the clear water, not the swash, well +up to his waist then, and we could hear him: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + I love old Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +That was too much for Mr. Duncan, and, watching his chance, he dove +between the house and rail, to the weather rigging, where the skipper +grabbed him and made him fast beside himself. The old man took a look +down the slant of the deck and took a fresh hold of the rigging. + +"Captain Blake, isn't she down pretty low?" + +"Maybe--maybe--Mr. Duncan, but she'll go lower yet before the sail +comes off her. This is the day Sam Hollis was going to make me take in +sail." + +Less than a minute after that we made our rush for the line. Hollis +tried to crowd us outside the stake-boat, which was rolling head to +wind and sea, worse than a lightship in a surf gale--tried to crowd us +out just as an awful squall swooped down. It was the Johnnie or the +Withrow then. We took it full and they didn't, and there is all there +was to it. But for a minute it was either vessel's race. At the +critical time Sam Hollis didn't have the nerve, and the skipper and +Clancy did. + +They looked at each other--the skipper and Clancy--and Clancy soaked +her. Held to it cruelly--recklessly. It was too much to ask of a +vessel. Down she went--buried. It was heaven or hell, as they say, for +a while. I know I climbed on to her weather run, and it was from there +I saw Withrow ducking her head to it--hove to, in fact, for the blast +to pass. + +The Johnnie weathered it. Able--able. Up she rose, a horse, and across +the line we shot like a bullet, and so close to the judge's boat that +we could have jumped aboard. + +We all but hit the Henry Clay Parker, Billie Simms's vessel, on the +other side of the line, and it was on her that old Peter of Crow's +Nest, leaping into the air and cracking his heels together, called out +as we drove by: + +"The Johnnie Duncan wins--the able Johnnie Duncan--sailin' across the +line on her side and her crew sittin' out on the keel." + + + + +XXXIV + +MINNIE ARKELL ONCE MORE + + +We were hardly across the line when there was a broom at our truck--a +new broom that I know I, for one, never saw before. And yet I suppose +every vessel that sailed in the race that day had a new broom hid away +somewhere below--to be handy if needed. + +But it was the Johnnie Duncan, sailing up the harbor, that carried +hers to the truck. And it was Mr. Duncan who stood aft of her and took +most of the cheers, and it was Clancy and Long Steve who waved their +hands from the wheel-box, and it was the skipper who leaned against +the weather rigging, and the rest of us who lined the weather rail and +answered the foolish questions of people along the road. + +Every vessel we met seemed to think we had done something great; and I +suppose we had in a way--that is, skipper, crew and vessel. We had +out-carried and out-sailed the best out of Gloucester in a breeze that +was a breeze. We had taken the chance of being capsized or hove-down +and losing the vessel and ourselves. Mr. Duncan, I think, realized +more than anybody else at the time what we had been through. "I didn't +know what it really was to be," he said, "before I started. If I had, +I doubt very much if I'd have started." We all said--"No, no, you'd +have gone just the same, Mr. Duncan;" and we believed he would, too. + +Going up the harbor somebody hinted to Clancy that he ought to go and +have a mug-up for himself after his hard work--and it had been hard +work. "And I'll take your place at the wheel," said that somebody, +"for you must be tired, Tommie." + +"And maybe I am tired, too," answered Clancy, "but if I am, I'm just +thick enough not to know it. But don't fool yourself that if I stood +lashed to this wheel since she crossed the starting line this morning +I'm going to quit it now and let you take her up the harbor and get +all the bouquets. I'll have a mug-up by and by, and it'll be a mug-up, +don't you worry." + +And it was a mug-up. He took the gold and silver cup given to Maurice +as a skipper of the winning vessel, and with the crew in his wake +headed a course for the Anchorage, where he filled it till it +flowed--and didn't have to pay for filling it, either. + +"It's the swellest growler that I ever expect to empty. Gold and +silver--and holds six quarts level. Just a little touch all round, +and we'll fill her up again. 'Carte blanche, and charge it to me,' +says Mr. Duncan." + +"What kind is carte blanche, Tommie?" asked Andie Howe. + +"They'll tell you behind the bar," said Clancy. + +"Billie," ordered Andie, "just a little touch of carte blanche, will +you, while Clancy's talking. He's the slowest man to begin that ever I +see. Speeches--speeches--speeches, when your throat's full of +gurry--dry, salty gurry. A little touch of that carte blanche that Mr. +Duncan ordered for the crew of the Johnnie Duncan, Billie, will you?" + +"Carte blanche--yes," went on Clancy, "and I callate the old fizzy +stuff's the thing to do justice to this fe-lic-i-tous oc-ca-sion. Do I +hear the voice of my shipmates? Aye, aye, I hear them--and in accents +unmistakable. Well, here's a shoot--six quarts level--and a few pieces +of ice floating around on top. My soul, but don't it look fine and +rich? Have a look, everybody." + +"Let's have a drink instead," hollered Parsons. + +Clancy paid no attention to that. "Who was the lad in that Greek bunch +in the old days that they sank up to his neck in the lake--cold +sparkling water--and peaches and oranges and grapes floating on a +little raft close by--but him fixed so he couldn't bend his head down +to get a drink nor lift his head to take a bite of fruit--and hot +weather all the time, mind you. Lord, the thirst he raised after a +while! What was his--oh, yes, Tantalus--that's the lad, Tantalus--the +cold sparkling water. Man, the thirst he----" + +"The thirst of Tantalus ain't a patch on the thirst I got. And this is +something better than cold sparkling water. That's you all over, +Tommie--joking at serious times," wailed Parsons. + +"Is it as bad as that with you, Eddie? Well, let's forget Tantalus and +drink instead to the able-est, handsom-est, fast-est vessel that ever +weathered Eastern Point--to the Johnnie Duncan--and her skipper." + +"And Mr. Duncan, Tommie--he's all right, too." + +"Yes, of course, Mr. Duncan. And while we're at it, here's to the +whole blessed gang of us--skipper, owner and crew--we're all +corkers." + +"Drive her, Tommie!" roared a dozen voices, and Tommie drove her for a +good pint before he set the cup down again. + +It was a great celebration altogether. Wherever one of our gang was +there was an admiring crowd. Nobody but us was listened to. And the +questions we had to answer! And of course we were all willing enough +to talk. We must have told the story of the race over about twenty +times each. After a while, of course, some of our fellows, with all +the entertaining and admiration that was handed out to them, had to +put a touch or two to it. It was strong enough to tell the bare facts +of that race, I thought, but one or two had to give their imaginations +a chance. One man, a fisherman, one of those who had been on one of +the excursion boats, and so didn't see the race at all, came along +about two hours after the Duncan crew struck the Anchorage and +listened to Andie Howe for a while. And going away it was he who said, +"It must have been a race that. As near as I c'n make it out the +Johnnie sailed most of that race keel up." + +"Oh, don't go away mad," Andie called after him. "Come back and have a +little touch of carte blanche--it's on the old man." + +"I'll take it for him," came a voice. It was old Peter of Crow's Nest, +who took his drink and asked for Clancy. Clancy was in the back part +of the room, and I ran and got him. Peter led the way to the +sidewalk. + +"Tommie, go and get Maurice, if it ain't too late." + +"What is it?" + +"It's Minnie Arkell. Coming up the dock after the race she ran up and +grabbed him and threw her arms about his neck. 'You're the man to sail +a race in heavy weather,' she hollers, and a hundred people looking +on. And there's half a dozen of those friends of hers and they're up +to her house and now making ready for a wine celebration. Go and get +him before it is too late." + + + + +XXXV + +CLANCY LAYS DOWN THE LAW + + +Clancy started on the run and I after him. "We'll go to his +boarding-house first, Joe, and if he's not there, to Minnie +Arkell's." + +He wasn't in his boarding-house, and we hurried out. On the sidewalk +we almost ran into little Johnnie Duncan. + +"Oh, Captain Clancy--or you, Joe Buckley--won't you tell me about the +race? Grandpa was too busy to tell me, but went down the wharf with a +lot of people to show them the Johnnie Duncan. They all left the +office and told me to mind it. And my cousin Alice came in with Joe's +cousin Nell. And I saw Captain Blake with some people and ran after +him and I just caught up with him and they went off and left me. And +then a little while ago he came back by himself and ran toward the +dock and didn't even see me. And Captain Blake used to be so good to +me!" Poor Johnnie was all but crying. + +"Toward the dock? That's good," breathed Clancy. "Stay here, Johnnie, +and we'll tell you about the race when we get back," and led the way +to Mr. Duncan's office. + +We found the skipper in the outer office, standing beside the +bookkeeper's desk and looking out of the window next the slip. Hearing +us coming he turned and then we saw that he held in his hands an open +box with a string of beautiful pearls. Noticing us gaze at the pearls +in surprise, he said, "Mr. Duncan gave me these for winning the race. +And I took them, thinking that somebody or other might like them." + +"And don't she?" asked Clancy--it seemed to slip out of Tommie without +his knowing it. + +"I guess not," said Maurice. Only then did it flash on me what it all +might mean. + +"Did you try?" asked Clancy. + +"Try! Yes, and was made a fool of. Oh, what's the use--what in +hell's the use?" He stood silent a moment. "I guess not," he said +then--looked out the window again, and hove the whole string out +of the open window and into the slip. + +Clancy and myself both jumped to stop him, but we weren't quick +enough. They were gone--the whole beautiful necklace. The skipper +fixed his eyes on where they had struck the water. Then he turned and +left the office. At the door he stopped and said: "I don't know--maybe +I won't take the Johnnie next trip, and if I don't, Tommie, I hope +you'll take her--Mr. Duncan will let you have her if you want. I hope +you'll take her anyway, for you know what a vessel she is. You'll take +care of her--" and went and left us. + +Clancy swore to himself for a while. He hadn't quite done when the +door of the rear office opened and Miss Foster herself came out. She +greeted me sweetly--she always did--but was going out without paying +any attention to Clancy. She looked pale--although perhaps I would not +have noticed her paleness particularly only for what had just +happened. + +I was surprised to see then what Clancy did. Before she had got to the +door he was beside her. + +"Miss Foster, Miss Foster," he said, and his tone was so different +from what I had ever heard from him before that I could hardly believe +it. He was a big man, it must be remembered, and still on him were the +double-banked oilskins and heavy jack-boots he wore through the race. +Also his face was flushed from the excitement of the day--the salt +water was not yet dry on him and his eyes were shining, shining not +alone with the glow of a man who had been lashed to a wheel steering a +vessel in a gale--and, too, to victory--for hours, and not alone with +the light that comes from two or three quarts of champagne--it was +something more than that. Whatever it was it surprised me and held +Alice Foster's attention. + +"Mister Clancy," she said, and turned to him. + +"Yes, Mister Clancy--or Tommie Clancy--or Captain Clancy, as +it is at times--master of an odd vessel now and again--but +Clancy all the time--just Clancy, good-for-nothing Clancy--hard +drinker--reveller--night-owl--disturber of the peace--at best +only a fisherman who'll by and by go out and get lost like +thousands of the other fishermen before him--as a hundred every +year do now and have three lines in the paper--name, age, +birthplace, street and number of his boarding-house, and that +will be the end of it. But that don't matter--Tommie Clancy, +whatever he is, is a friend of Maurice Blake's. And he means +to speak a word for Maurice. + +"For a long time now, Miss Foster, Maurice has thought the world of +you. He never told me--he never told anybody. But I know him. He +waited a long time, I'm sure, before he even told himself--maybe even +before he knew it himself. But I knew it--bunk-mates, watch-mates, +dory-mates we've been. He's master of a fine vessel now and I'm one of +his crew. He's gone ahead and I've stayed behind. Why? Because he's +carried in his heart the picture of a girl he thought could be all a +woman ought to be to a man. And that was well A man like Maurice +needs that, and maybe--maybe--you're all that he thought and more +maybe, Miss Foster. Wait--he had that picture before his eyes all the +time. I hadn't any picture. Years ago, when I was Maurice's age, I +might have had something like it, and now look at me. And why? Why, +Miss Foster, you're a woman--could you guess? No? Think. What's +running in a man's head, do you think, in the long winter nights when +he's walking the deck, with the high heavens above and the great, +black rolling sea around him? What's in his head when, trawls hauled +and his fish aboard, when the danger and the hard work are mostly by, +his vessel's going to the west'ard? What when he's an hour to rest and +he's lying, smoking and thinking, in his bunk? What's been in +Maurice's head and in his heart all the years he's loafed with the +likes of me and yet never fell to my level? Anything he ever read +anywhere, do you think, or was it a warm image that every time he came +ashore and was lucky enough to get a look at you he could see was true +to the woman it stood for? When you had no more idea of it than what +was going on at the North Pole he was watching you--and thinking of +you. Always thinking of you, Miss Foster. He never thought he had a +chance. I know him. Who asks a woman like you to share a fisherman's +life? Is it a man like Maurice? Sometimes--maybe with the blood +racing through him after a great race he might. A while ago he did, +Miss Foster. And what gave him the courage? + +"Listen to me now, Miss Foster, and say what you please afterward. +Maurice and I are friends. Friends. I've been with him on the bottom +of a capsized dory when we both expected we'd hauled our last +trawl--with the seas washing over us and we both getting weak and him +getting black in the face--and maybe I was, too. I told you this once +before, but let me tell it again. 'Come and take the plug strap, +Tommie,' he says to me. 'Come and take the plug strap.' Do you know +what that means, Miss Foster?--and the seas sweeping over you and your +whole body getting numb? And I've been with him four days and four +nights--astray in the fog of the Western Banks in winter, and, for all +we knew and believed, we were gone. In times like those men get to +know each other, and I tell you, Miss Foster--" Clancy choked and +stopped. "To-day he sailed a race the like of which was never sailed +before. A dozen times he took the chance of himself going over the +rail. And why? The better to keep an eye on things and help his vessel +along? Yes. But why that? For that cup we've drowned a dozen times in +wine to-day? He never looked twice at it when he got ashore. He +hasn't seen it since he handed it to me on the dock. The boys might +like to look at it, he said. He's forgot he ever won it by now. He let +us take it up to a rum-shop and drink out of it the same as if it was +a tin-pail--the beautiful gold and silver cup--engraved. We used it +for a growler for all Maurice cared for the value of it, and there's +forty men walking the streets now that's got a list they got out of +that cup. We might have lost it, battered each other's drunken heads +in with it, and he wouldn't have said a dozen words about it. But +there was a necklace of pearls, and he thought you'd like them. 'To +you, Maurice, for winning the race,' says Mr. Duncan, 'for winning the +race,' and hands Maurice the pearls--your own guardian, Miss Foster, +and most crazy, he was that pleased. And that's what Maurice ran up to +get when the race was over--there was something a girl might like, or +thought so. And then what? On the way down a woman that I know--that +you know--tried to hold him up. Kissed him before a hundred +people--she knew you were waiting--she knew, trust a woman--and walked +down part way with him, because you were looking. And he being a man, +and weak, and only twenty-six--and the racing blood still running +through him--maybe forgot himself for five minutes--not knowing you +were within a mile. That doesn't excuse him? No, you're right, it +don't. But he, poor boy, knowing nothing--what does a boy of +twenty-six know?--knowing nothing--suspecting nothing--and yet, if he +forgot himself, he never really forgot you. He hurries on to you and +offers you the necklace that he risked his life to get. And you--what +did you say?" + +"What did I say? I told him that perhaps he knew somebody that he'd +rather give it to before me----" + +"Before you? There's a woman. You're not satisfied when a man fights +all the devil in himself for you, but you must rub it into him while +he's doing it. Maurice--or maybe you don't understand. You could say +things like that to a dog--if a dog could understand--and he'd come +back and lick your hand. Maurice has blood and fire in him. And here's +a woman--whatever else she is--is warm-blooded too. She wants Maurice, +and, by God, she'll get him if you keep on. Do you remember the night +of the Master Mariners' ball--the night before we sailed on the +Southern cruise? Well, that night this woman, she waits for Maurice +and stops him on his way home. But she didn't get him. He was up in +the wind for a minute or two, but one spoke of the wheel and he found +his head again. Again last June in Newport on a warm summer's +night--flowers, music, wine--the cabin of a beautiful yacht--she asks +him to wait over a day or two in Newport harbor. Does he? Does he? Not +Maurice. With never a touch of the wheel, off he swings and drives for +home. And why didn't he stay? Why, do you suppose? Didn't he tell you +a while ago? Good God! Look here--you're no fool. Look at me--ten +years ago I was another Maurice. And this woman--I tell you she knows +men. She don't care whether a man is rich or poor, tall or short, thin +or fat, so long as she likes him. And I tell you she loves Maurice--as +well as she can love--and she's not a good enough woman--there it is. +And they're all saying you're likely to marry Withrow. Wait now. +Withrow, I'm telling you, isn't fit to wash the gurry off Maurice's +jack-boots. I'm a careless man, Miss Foster, and in my life I've done +things I wish now I hadn't, but I draw the line above the head of a +man like Withrow. Whatever I am, I'm too good to be company for Fred +Withrow. And on top of all that he's so carried away with this other +woman--this same woman--and she caring more for Maurice's eyelash than +Withrow's whole two hundred and ten pounds--Withrow is so carried away +with her that he is ready to elope with her--elope with her! I know +that--never mind how. Bring Withrow and me together, and I'll tell +him--tell him, yes, and throw him through the door afterward if he +denies it. This woman is enough of a woman to want Maurice--Maurice +with nothing at all--before Withrow with all he's got and all he can +get her or give her--and she's clever enough to come pretty near +getting what she wants. And now, Miss Foster, suppose you think it +over. I'm going to hunt up Maurice, though I'm not too sure we'll find +him in a hurry. Good-by." + +He swept his sou'wester wide to her and went out the door. I said +good-by without looking at her. I was too ashamed--and went after +Clancy. But I think she was crying to herself as I went out. + + + + +XXXVI + +MAURICE BLAKE IS RECALLED + + +The morning after the race I was eating breakfast at home and I could +not remember when I enjoyed a meal like that one. I had had a fine +long sleep and the sleep that comes to a man after he's been through a +long and exciting experience does make him feel like a world-beater. I +felt that I could go out and about leap the length of a seine-boat or +rip up a plank sidewalk. It was worth while to be alive, and +everything tasted so good. + +I had put away six fried eggs and about fourteen of those little +slices of bacon before I even thought of slacking up (with my mother +piling them up as fast as I lifted them off)--and maybe I wouldn't +have slacked then only my cousin Nell came skipping in. + +She kissed my mother half a dozen times, and danced around the room. +"Four vessels off the Johnnie Duncan's model have already been +ordered. Four, auntie--four. There will be a fleet of them yet, you'll +see. And how are you, Joe?" + +"Fine," I said, and kept on eating. + +Nell didn't like my not noticing how glad she was feeling, I suppose, +for all at once, as I was about to sugar another cup of coffee, she +ran her hands through my hair and yanked till I couldn't pretend any +longer. + +"There, now, with your mind off your stomach, perhaps you'll look up +and converse when a lady deigns to notice you. How much money did Mr. +Withrow lose on the race?" + +"I don't know, but it was a good pile; I know that." + +"And how much did Mr. Duncan win?" + +"I don't know that, either; but I hope it was a good roll, for he won +about all Withrow lost." + +"M-m--but aren't you in love with your old employer? But let's not +mind common money matters. What do you think of the Johnnie Duncan for +a vessel?" + +"She's a dog--a dog." + +"Isn't she! And the fastest, able-est and the handsomest vessel that +ever sailed past Eastern Point, isn't she?" + +"That's what she is." + +"And who designed her?" + +"Who? Let me see. Oh, yes, some local man." + +"You don't know! Look up here. Who designed her!" + +"Oh, yes. 'Twas a Gloucester man." + +"A Gloucester man? Look up again. +Now--who--de--signed--the--John--nie--Dun--can!" + +"Ouch, yes. A ver-y fine and a-ble--and handsome gen-tle-man--a +wonderful man." + +"That's a little better. And his name?" + +"William Somers--William the Illustrious--William the First--'First in +war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of Gloucestermen'--and if +you let me stand up, I'll do a break-down to show you how glad I am." + +"Now you're showing something like appreciation. And now where do you +suppose your friend Clancy is and your skipper?" + +"Clancy? Lord knows. Maybe in a circle of admiring friends, singing +whatever is his latest. 'Hove flat down' was the last I heard. If it +was earlier in the day--about three in the morning--it would be pretty +sure to be that." + +"What a pity, and he such a fine man otherwise!" + +"What's a pity?" + +"Why, his getting drunk, as I hear he does very often." + +"Gets drunk? Who gets drunk? Clancy? That's news to me. As long as +I've known him I never saw him drunk yet. He gets mellow and +loose--but drunk! Clancy drunk? Why, Nell!" + +"Oh, well, all right, he's an apostle of temperance then. But Captain +Blake--where is he?" + +"I couldn't say--why?" + +"I have a message for him." + +"Did you try his boarding-house?" + +"Yes. That is, Will did, and he wasn't there, hadn't been there at +all, they said, since the afternoon before." + +"That so? Where else did you try? Duncan's office?" + +"We did, and no word of him there." + +"Try Clancy's boarding-house?" + +"Yes, and no word." + +"Try--h-m--the Anchorage?" + +"Oh, Joe, you don't think he's been loafing there since?" + +"No, I don't. And yet after the way he got turned down yesterday, you +know--there's no telling what a man might do." + +"Well, Will looked in there, too." + +"You fat little fox! Why didn't you say that at first? And no word?" + +"No." + +"Well, I don't know where he'd be then." + +"Nor I, except--did you notice the wind has hauled to the northwest?" + +"I did." + +"Well. Do you know that old vessel that Mr. Withrow's been trying to +get a crew for--the Flamingo?" + +"M-h-h." + +"Well, this morning early she went out--on a hand-lining trip to the +east'ard, it is said. And Will says that he thinks--he doesn't know, +mind you, because they won't tell him anything down to Withrow's--but +he thinks that Maurice Blake's shipped in her." + +"Wow! She won't last out one good breeze on the Banks." + +"That is just what Will said. And it's too bad, for I had a message +for him--a message that would make everything all right. I suppose you +can guess?" + +"Guess? H-m-m--I don't know as I want to." + +"Well, don't get mad about it, anyway. How would you feel if you saw +that horrid Minnie Arkell rush up and--Oh, you know what I mean. +However, I've been pleading with Alice since yesterday afternoon. For +two hours I was up in her room last evening, and poor Will walking the +veranda down below. I put Captain Blake's case as I thought a friend +of his would put it--as you would put it, say--perhaps better in some +ways--for I could not forget that he sailed the Johnnie Duncan +yesterday, and her winning meant so much to Will. Yes, and I'm not +forgetting Clancy and the rest of her crew--indeed, I'm not--I felt as +though I could kiss every one of them." + +"Well, here's one of them." + +"Don't get saucy because your mother is standing by. Go and find +Maurice Blake. Go ahead, won't you, Joe? Tell him that everything is +all right. She is proud." + +"That's a nice sounding word for it--pride. Stuck on herself is what +I'd say." + +"No, she isn't. You must allow a woman self-respect, you know." + +"I guess so. And it must be her long suit, seeing she's always leading +from it." + +"Oh, keep your fishermen's jokes for the mugging-up times on your +vessel. You go and get Maurice Blake--or find Mr. Clancy and have him +get him--if he hasn't gone on the Flamingo." + +So I went out. On a cruise along the water front I found a whole +lot of people. I saw Wesley Marrs and Tommie Ohlsen--sorrowful and +neither saying much--looking after their vessels--Ohlsen seeing to a +new gaff. "I ought to've lost," said Ohlsen. "Look at that for a +rotten piece of wood." Sam Hollis was around, too, trying to explain +how it was he didn't win the race. But he couldn't explain to +anybody's satisfaction how his stays'l went nor why he hove-to when +that squall struck him--the same squall that shot the Johnnie +Duncan across the line. Tom O'Donnell was there, looking down on the +deck of the vessel in which he took so much pride. "Two holes in +her deck where her spars ought to be," he was saying when I came +along. I asked him if he had seen Maurice that morning, and it was +from him I learned for certain that Maurice had shipped on the +Flamingo. "I didn't see her leaving, boy, but Withrow himself told +me this morning. 'And I hope he'll never come back,' he said at the +same time. ''Tis you that takes a licking hard. But maybe 'tis the +insurance,' I says. 'If that's what you're thinking,' says he, 'she +isn't insured.' 'Then it must be the divil's own repair she's in +when no company at all will insure her,' I says. Sure, we had hard +words over it, but that won't bring back Maurice--he's gone in the +Flamingo, Joe." + +I went after Clancy then, and after a long chase, that took me to +Boston and back, I caught up with him. He was full of repentance and +was gloomy. It was up in his boarding-house--in his room. He, looking +tired, was thinking of taking a kink of sleep. + +"Hulloh, Joe! And I don't wonder you look surprised, Joe. I must be +getting old. Thursday morning I got up after as fine a night's sleep +as a man'd want. That was Thursday. Then Thursday night, Friday, +Friday night, Saturday--two nights and three days, and I'm sleepy +already. Sleepy, Joe, and I remember the time I could go a whole week, +and then, after a good night's sleep, wake up fine and daisy and be +ready for another week. Joe, there's a moral in that if you can only +work it out." + +Clancy stayed silent after that, not inclined to talk, I could see, +until I told him about Maurice having shipped in the Flamingo and the +hard crew that had gone in her. + +That stirred him. "Great Lord, gone in that shoe-box! Why, Joe, I'd as +soon put to sea in a market basket calked with butter. And the man +that's got her--Dave Warner! He's crazy, Joe, if ever a man was crazy. +Clean out of his head over a girl that he met in Gloucester once, but +now living in Halifax, and she won't have anything to do with him. +He's daffy over her. If she was drowning alongside you'd curse your +luck because you had to gaff her in. That is, you would only she's a +woman, of course. Wants to get lost, Joe, I believe--wants to! If this +was Boston or New York and in older days, I'd say that Dave and +Withrow must have shanghaied a crew to man the Flamingo's kind. But +you c'n get men here to go in anything sometimes. Wait a bit and I'll +be along with you. We'll see old Duncan and maybe we c'n head the +Flamingo off." + + + + +XXXVII + +THE GIRL IN CANSO + + +That was Saturday evening. The crew of the Johnnie had been told just +after the race by the skipper that he would not need them again until +Monday. Scattering on that, some going to Boston, they could not be +got together again until Monday morning, and it was not until Monday +noon that we got away. + +We fitted out as though for a Cape Shore seining trip, and that's what +we were to do in case we missed the Flamingo or could not persuade her +skipper or Maurice himself that he ought to leave her and come back on +the Johnnie Duncan. It was Clancy who had the matter in charge. +Indeed, it was only Clancy who knew what it was really all about. + +We had a good run-off before a stiff westerly that gradually hauled to +the north, and Tuesday night late saw us in Halifax Harbor. It was too +late to do anything that night, but Clancy went ashore to find out +what he could. Before sunrise he was back with word to break out the +anchor and put to sea. He had word of the Flamingo. + +"That girl of Dave's--it seems she's moved to Canso with her folks, +and Dave's gone there. He's probably there before this--maybe left +again. She's an old plug, the Flamingo, but she ought've made Canso +before this. He only stayed a few hours here and left Monday." + +It was bang, bang, bang all the way to Canso, with Clancy swearing at +Withrow and the Flamingo and Dave Warner and the girl in the case--one +after the other and sometimes all together. "Blast Withrow and that +crazy fool Dave Warner, too. And why in the devil couldn't her folks +stayed in Gloucester--or in Halifax, at least. They ought've put a few +sticks of dynamite in her and blown her to pieces ages ago. She's +forty years old if she's a day--her old planks rotten. They won't keep +her afloat over-night if they're out in this. Why d'y's'pose people +leave a good lively little city like Halifax to go to a place like +Canso? Why?" + +Andie Howe happened to be within hearing, and "Maybe the rent's +cheaper," suggested Andie. + +"Maybe it is--and maybe if you don't talk sense I'll heave you over +the rail some fine day. Better give her a grain more fore-sheet. Man, +but it's a wicked night." + +We made Canso after the worst day and night we had had in the Johnnie +Duncan since she was launched. Outside Canso Harbor it looked bad. We +didn't think the skipper would try to enter the harbor that black +night, but he did. "Got to go in and get news," said Clancy, and in we +went. It was as black as could be--squalls sweeping down--and Canso is +not the easiest harbor in the world to make at night. + +I went ashore with Clancy to hear what the young woman might have to +say. We found her in a place run by her father, a sort of lodging +house and "pub," with herself serving behind the bar--a bold-looking +young woman, not over-neat--and yet attractive in her way--good +figure, regular features, and good color. "There, Joe, if you brought +a girl like that home your mother would probably die of a broken +heart, but there's the kind that a foolish man like Dave Warner would +sell his soul for." Then Clancy explained while we were waiting for +her to see us privately, "I don't know if she'll remember me, but I +met her two or three times in Gloucester." + +When she came in she recognized Clancy right away. "How do you do, +Captain Clancy?" + +"How do you do, Miss Luce? My friend, Mr. Buckley. Now what we've come +for--but first, suppose we have a little something by way of +sociability. A little fizzy stuff, say, and some good cigars, Miss +Luce." + +She brought the wine and the cigars. Clancy pulled the cork, filled +both glasses, pushed one glass toward the young woman and drew one to +himself. + +"But, Captain, your friend hasn't any." + +"My friend," said Clancy, "doesn't drink. The last thing the doctor +said to him before we came away was, 'Don't touch a drop of liquor or +your life will pay the forfeit.' You see, Miss Luce, he's been a +dissipated youth--drink--and having been dissipated and coming of +delicate people, it's affected his health." + +"You don't tell me? I'm sure he doesn't look it." + +"No, he don't--that's a fact. But so it is." + +"Stomach?" she asked me. + +"No--heart," answered Clancy for me. "What they call an aneurism. You +know what an aneurism is, of course?" + +"Yes-yes--oh, yes----" + +"Of course. Well, he's got one of them." + +"That's too bad. So he only smokes instead?" + +"That's all. Here, Joe, smoke up." + +"My, I always thought smoking was bad for the heart." + +"It is--for everything except aneurisms. Smoking's the death of +aneurisms. Have another cigar, Joe. And Miss Luce, shall we exchange a +health?" + +"But I never drank anything in all my life." + +"Of course not. But you will now, won't you? Consider the occasion and +I'm sure you won't let me drink alone. And I've come so far to see +you, too--only of course not--Well, here's to your good health, and +may you live long and----" + +The rest of it was smothered in the gurgle. And nobody would ever +think to see the way she put down hers that Miss Luce had never had a +drink of wine before. + +"And now, Miss Luce, may I ask how long it has been since your friend +Dave Warner left----" + +"Oh-h--Dave Warner? He's no friend of mine." + +"Isn't he? Well, he's no particular friend of mine, either. But a +friend of mine--of both of us, Joe here, too--is with Dave--Maurice +Blake. Any word of him?" + +"Oh, yes. A good-looking fellow, nice eyes and hair and nice manners. +I do like to see refined manners in people. Now if it was him----" + +"If it was him, you wouldn't have told him to go to sea and the devil +take him----" + +"I'd have you know, Captain Clancy, I don't swear." + +"Swear? You, Miss Luce? Dear me, whatever made you think I thought +that? But let's have another taste of wine. But of course you didn't +encourage Dave to stay ashore here?" + +"Him?--I guess not. When he said he didn't care if he never came back, +I told him I was sure I didn't--and out he went." + +"O woman, gentle woman," murmured Clancy in his glass, "especially +real ladies. But Dave never did know how to talk to a lady." + +"I should say he didn't." + +"No, not Dave. And so his money gone he's----" + +"Money? Why, he never had any money." + +"Well, that's bad. Not even enough to open a bottle of wine to drink a +lady's health?" + +"Bottle of wine? No, nor a thimbleful of tuppenny ale." + +"That was bad, Miss Luce. Dave ought've come better heeled---- + + 'And so his money gone he puts out to sea-- + It may happen to you or happen to me.' + +And which way did he say he was going?" + +"He didn't say and I didn't ask, though one of the men with him said +something about going to the Grand Banks." + +"Grand Banks, eh? That's comforting--it isn't more than a couple of +days' sail from here to the nearest edge of it, and twenty-odd +thousand or more square miles of shoal water to hunt over after you +get there. Had they taken their bait aboard, did you hear, Miss +Luce?" + +"Yes, they had. That was yesterday afternoon late. His vessel was +leaking then, I heard him say to that nice-looking man--Maurice Blake +his name, did you say? A nice name Maurice, isn't it? Well, he said to +Maurice going out the door, 'Well, we'll put out and I callate--I +don't know how she'll get out but out we'll go to-night.' 'The sooner +you go the better it will suit me,' Blake said, and they went off +together." + +"And how was Mr. Blake?" + +"How do you mean? How did he act? My, I never saw such a man. Wouldn't +open his head all night--wouldn't drink, but just sat and smoked like +your friend there. Anything the matter with him?" + +"With Maurice? Oh, in the way of aneurisms? Not that I know of. Oh, +yes, he has heart-trouble too, come to think. But I must be getting +back to the vessel." + +"So soon?" + +"Yes, we've got to go to sea. I'm like Dave Warner in that I'm going +to sea too." + +"But nobody's driving you away." She had her eyes on Clancy's face +then. + +He didn't look up--only stared into his glass. + +She was silent for a full minute. Clancy said nothing. "Nobody's +driving you away," she said again. + +At that Clancy looked at her. "There's no telling," he said at first, +and then hastily, "Oh, no--of course nobody's driving me to sea." + +"Then what's your hurry?" + +I got up and went to the door then. I heard the sound of a scraping +chair and then of Clancy standing up. A moment's quiet and then it +was: "No, dear, I can't stay--nobody's driving me away, I know that. +I'm sure you wouldn't--not with your heart. And you've a good heart if +you'd only give it a chance. But I can't stay." + +"And why not? You won't, you mean. Well, I never thought you were +_that_ kind of a man." + +"No? Well, don't go to giving me any moral rating. Don't go to +over-rating me--or maybe you'd call it under-rating. But you see, it's +my friend that's calling." + +"And you're going out in this gale?" + +"Gale. I'd go if it was a hundred gales. Good-by--and take care of +yourself, dear." + +"And will you come back if you don't find him?" + +"Lord, Lord, how can I say? Can anybody say who's coming back and who +isn't?" + +He went by me and out the door. She looked after him, but he never +turned--only plunged out of the house and into the street and I right +after him. + + + + +XXXVIII + +THE DUNCAN GOES TO THE WEST'ARD + + +Getting back to the vessel Clancy was pretty gloomy. "That's +settled. We can't chase them as far to the east'ard as the big +banks--a three hundred mile run to the nearest edge of it and tens of +thousands of square miles to hunt over after we'd got there. And it +would be child's work anyway to ask Maurice to leave her on the bank. +Who'd take his place even if Dave would stand for it? 'Twould mean +laying up a dory or taking his dory-mate too. Maurice wouldn't leave +her anyway, even if he believed he'd never get home--no real fisherman +would. And yet there it is--Dave in a devil of a mood, and a vessel +according to all reports that won't live out one good easterly. +And there's a crazy crew aboard her that won't make for the most +careful handling of a vessel. Oh, Lord, I don't see anything for +it, but, thank the Lord, Maurice has been behaving himself--and that +in spite of how blue he must have been feeling. By this time he's +cert'nly made up his mind he's with a pretty bad crowd, but maybe +he's glad of a little excitement. What I don't understand is how +Dave ever left old man Luce's place without breaking up the +furniture before going away. Gen'rally that's his style. Maybe +Maurice being along had something to do with it--a pretty able man in +close quarters is Maurice. Yes, he must be glad of the excitement, +but Lord, that won't save him from being lost. Oh, oh, and now +what'll we do? Let's see, the Flamingo's on the way to the Banks, +and that's the end of that chase. We've got to wait now and see that +she comes home--or don't come home--one or the other. I told that +girl that I was going to put out--put out if it blew a hundred gales. +And so I would if any good would come of it, but putting out to sea a +day like this because you bragged you would--risking your vessel and +crew, or making hard work for them if nothing else--that ain't good +sense, is it? Besides, I had to tell her something to get away +without setting up to be a model of virtue. What else could I do? +Women are the devil--sometimes--aren't they, Joe? There's some are. I +suppose it wouldn't do any great harm to head her for home. I don't +believe there's going to be much more fish going to be seined this +fall--and wouldn't she make a passage of it in this easterly? Oh, +Lord, it would be the race all over again, only ten times as long a +drag." + +While he sat there in the cabin, smoking and meditating, letting us +into his thoughts every now and then, the voices of some of our crew +were heard on deck. + +We all went up and got the word that was being passed around. A coast +steamer had just come to anchor in the harbor with the report that +just outside--about ten miles to the west'ard--was a vessel, dismasted +and clean-swept, and dragging toward the rocks. They could not help +her themselves--too rough--a hurricane outside--to launch a boat was +out of the question. They didn't mind taking a chance, they said, but +to attempt her rescue would be suicide. + +It looked like a pretty hard chance going out in that gale, but Clancy +didn't wait. "Nobody else seems to be hurrying to get out, and we +being the able-est looking craft in the harbor, I callate it's up to +us to go." He got the exact location of the distressed vessel from the +coaster, and then it was up anchor, make sail, and out we went. + +There were people who called Clancy a fool for ordering out his vessel +and risking his crew that day--men in that very harbor--and maybe he +was. But for myself, I want that kind of a fool for my skipper. The +man that will take a chance for a stranger will take a bigger chance +for his own by and by. + +We saw her while we were yet miles away, down to the west'ard--near +Whitehead and with the cruel stretch of rocks under her lee quarter. +Even with plenty of sea-room she could not have lasted long, and here +with these ledges to catch her she looked to be in for a short shrift. +We had a good chance to get a look at her as we bore down. Everything +was gone from her deck, even the house and rail. There was not as much +loose wood on deck as would make a tooth-pick. Afterwards we learned +that two seas hove her down so that they had to cut the spars away to +right her, and then just as she was coming up another monster had +caught her and swept her clean--not only swept clean, but stove in her +planks and started some of her beams so that she began to leak in a +fashion that four men to the pumps could just manage to keep up with. + +We could just see them--the men to the pumps working desperately--with +the others lashed to the stumps of the masts and the stanchions which +were left when the rail went. Her big hawser had parted and her chain +was only serving to slightly check her way toward the rocks. + +With spars and deck gear gone and her hull deep in the water, a vessel +is not so easily distinguished. But there was something familiar in +this one. We had seen her before. All at once it flashed on half a +dozen of us--"the Flamingo!" we said. "God! that's luck!" said +Clancy. + +She lay in a sort of inlet that was wide open to the gale, rocks on +the better part of three sides of her, north, south and west. She was +then within all but striking distance of the rocks, and the seas, high +and wicked, were sweeping over her. It looked like a bad place to work +out of if we should get close in, but Clancy held on. + +"Not much lee-room, but plenty of water under her keel anyway," and +himself to the wheel, sailed the Johnnie around the Flamingo. He +hailed Maurice as he went by, waved his hand to the others, and hove a +line aboard. They took the line, hauled in the hawser at the end of +it, made that fast to the windlass, and then we started off with her +in tow. + +We were doing pretty well, what with plenty of wind and the Johnnie +buckling down to her work like she was a steamer, till the hawser +parted and back toward the rocks went the Flamingo again. + +"No use," said Clancy, "sea's too much for any line we got. We'll try +it with the seine-boat. Who'll go in the seine-boat and try to take +them off? Think quick, but mind what it means." + +Every man of the crew of the Johnnie Duncan said, "Here!" The cook +even came out of the forec's'le and put in his "And me, too, +skipper." + +"You're good men," said Clancy,--"damn good men," and looked us up and +down. We felt proud, he said it in such a way. "But you're taking your +lives in your hands and some of you got wives and children--mothers or +something. Who hasn't anybody depending on him? Which of you hasn't +any woman somewhere, or little brothers or sisters?" + +About twelve of the sixteen men standing on the deck of the Johnnie +Duncan said "Me!" + +"Three-quarters of you, at least," said Clancy, "are damn liars. Over +with the seine-boat and be careful nobody gets hurt." + +Somebody did get hurt, though. Andie Howe got his foot smashed and was +helped below. Clancy gave the rest of us a scolding in advance. +"You're not hurt yet, but some of you will be--like Andie--if you +don't watch out. You'd think that some of you were out on some little +pond up in the country somewhere launching a canoe off one of those +club-house floats. Keep an eye out for those seas when they board. And +watch out for that deckload or some of you'll have a head cut off. A +man killed or a man washed over the rail--what's the difference--it's +a man lost. Look out now--watch, you Steve--damn you, watch out! Over +with it!" + +And over it went and with it leaped two men before it could sag away, +while the rest of us stood by the rail watching our chance. + +"Nelson," called Clancy, "come away from that rail! Steve, come +away!--come away, I say, and no back talk. Pat, you can go--jump +in--watch your chance or it's the last of you. Eddie, you can go, and +you Bill, and you Frenchy. Joe! stand away from that rail or I'll put +you in the hold and batten the hatches on you. Now, that's better. And +that's enough--six men to the oars and one to steer." + +"And who'll steer?" asked somebody. + +"You'll know in a minute," said Clancy, and he leaped for the +seine-boat and made it, and grabbed the steering oar. "Stand by--push +off! Fend off in the vessel there! Steve, if anything happens--you +know--you're to take the Johnnie home. Give way, fellows. Now! Watch +out!--now--now then, around with her--end on, and there she is like a +bird! And now drive her!" + +"A bird!" said Clancy--but a wild-looking bird--fifty feet she looked +to be going into the air one moment and down out of sight the next, +and water slamming aboard her so that we thought she was swamped half +a dozen times. Two had to leave the oars and go to bailing, while +Clancy with an arm and shoulders and back and swinging waist +like--well, like nothing a man ever had before--kept her end to it. + +"Good luck!" we called. + +"Never fear--we'll bring 'em back!" said Clancy. + +"Or stay with them," we thought. + +But he didn't stay with them. It was a ticklish job, but Clancy got +away with it. He didn't dare to go too near the Flamingo, for that +meant that the seas would pitch the seine-boat up and dash it to +kindling wood against her hull. What he did do was to go as near the +Flamingo as he could and keep her clear, then heave a line aboard and +call to her crew one after the other to make it fast around themselves +and jump overboard. It took some nerve to make that jump--from the +rigging of the Duncan we watched them--saw them shiver and draw +up--these were men accustomed to face danger--reckless men--but the +shiver was over in a breath, and then over the rail and into that +sea--a game fight--and they were hauled into the seine-boat. Some of +them we thought would never make it, for it was an awful sea. + +As fast as one of the Flamingo's men made the seine-boat he was set to +work bailing out or taking a haul at the oars, for it was a difficult +matter in that sea to keep the seine-boat at the right distance from +the Flamingo. But they got them all--ten of them. Two were hauled in +unconscious, but came to after awhile. + +To get aboard the Johnnie again was almost as bad as to get into the +seine-boat from the Flamingo. But we managed it. Long Steve was swept +over while we were at it, but we got him back with the help of Maurice +Blake and another of the Flamingo's crowd. By smart clever work they +grabbed Steve before he could go down and hauled him into the +seine-boat. + +When they were all safe aboard the Duncan Clancy shook hands with +Maurice. "I call that luck, Maurice--to come out to save a stranger +and find you've saved your own. And now whose trick to the wheel--you, +Joe? Put her on the off-shore tack till we're well clear of that +headland--maybe we c'n make it in one leg. No? Then a short tack and +have an eye out for the ledges--not too close. And Maurice, go +below--you and Dave and all hands of you, and we'll get out dry +clothes for you. Man, but you must be cold and hungry, but the cook's +getting coffee and grub ready. And for the Duncan's crew--on deck all +hands and put the tops'ls to her. For, Maurice-boy, we're going +home--going home, Maurice--where there's people waiting for you. Hang +on a while longer, Joe, and I'll take her myself." + +No need to tell me to hang on. If I hadn't hung on or been lashed to +the wheel I could never have kept my feet, for at this time it was so +bad that they had passed a line from my waist to the windward bitt and +I was up to my waist with every dive of her. + +"Lord, she's a dog, ain't she! If old man Duncan could see her now! +Remember Tom O'Donnell singing that song the other night: + + 'West half-no'the and drive her--we're abreast now of Cape + Sable-- + 'Tis an everlasting hurricane, but here's the craft that's + able.' + +We're not abreast of Cape Sable yet, but it won't take us too many +hours at this clip. And here's the craft that's able. Man, wouldn't it +be fine if Tom O'Donnell himself was with us and the pair of us racing +home? Let me take the wheel, Joe. And go for'ard and have a mug-up for +yourself--and have a care going, Joe, for it's leaping she is now and +seas that'd lift you a cable's length to looard if ever they caught +you fair. That's it--oh, but if your mother could see you now, Joe, +it's never to sea you'd come again." + +I made my way for'ard. A dash between the house and windward rail, a +shoot for the mainmast and holding on there for awhile. Another dive +for the gripes on the dories, another shoot between rail and dories, a +grip of the bow gripes, a swing around and I was at the forec's'le +hatch. Here I thought I heard him call and looked aft. + +He had a leg either side of the wheel, standing full height and sawing +the spokes a bit up and down to get the feel of her. The life line was +trailing from his waist to the bitt--the clear white sea was up to his +middle and racing over the taffrail. He had cast away his mitts the +better to grip the spokes, and even as I looked he took off his +sou'wester and sent it scaling. The wind taking hold of it must have +carried it a quarter a mile to leeward. Watching it go, himself +looking out under the boom, he laughed--laughed--such a roar of a +laugh--stamped his feet and began to sing: + + "Oh, I love old Ocean's smile, + I love old Ocean's frowning-- + My love's for Ocean all the while, + My prayer's for death by drowning." + +The devil was in him then. "Did you call me, skipper?" I sang out. + +"Did I? Did I? Lord, Joe, I don't know. Maybe I did. I feel like +calling from here to Gloucester, and if I did I bet they'd hear me. +God, Joe, but it's good to be alive, isn't it?--just to be alive. +Whew! but I wish I had a few more sou'westers--just to see 'em scale. +But what was it I wanted--but is the cook there?" + +"He is--I c'n hear him talking." + +"Then go below and tell him, Joe--tell him to mouse his pots and +kettles, for with sail alow and sail aloft, with her helmsman lashed +and her house awash, in a living gale and the devil's own sea, the +Johnnie Duncan's going to the west'ard." + +And she certainly went. + + + + +XXXIX + +THE HEART OF CLANCY + + +That trip ended seining for the Duncan that year. Everything went well +with our friends, after we got home. It was late in the season, and +Maurice Blake was to stay ashore to get married, for one thing. He had +made a great season of it and could afford to. So the Johnnie Duncan +was fitted out for fresh halibuting and Clancy took her. + +I went with him. I remember very well that I had no idea of going +winter fishing when the seining season ended, but, somehow or other +when Clancy came to get a crew together I was looking for a chance. + +So we put out, and on the rocks of Cape Ann, near Eastern Point +lighthouse, on the day we sailed on our first halibuting trip, were +Maurice Blake and Alice Foster, my cousin Nell and Will Somers, to +wave us good luck. Clancy hauled the vessel close in to get a better +look and they waved us until I suppose they could see us no longer. Of +course they should have been able to make us out long after we had +lost sight of them, we being a tall-sparred, white-sailed vessel; and +Clancy must have had that in mind, for long after all signs of them +had been lost to us he kept the glasses pointed to the rocks. He +turned at last with a "Well, I suppose they're all happy now, Joe?" + +"They ought to be," I said. + +"Yes, they ought to be," he repeated, and then again, "they ought to +be," and went for'ard. + +He stayed for'ard a long time, saying no word, but leaning over the +windlass and looking out ahead. Nobody disturbed him. Once or twice +when the sheets needed trimming--and in a deep sleep I think Clancy +would know that--he turned and gave the word, but the bare word and no +more. He had his spells we all knew, when he didn't want anybody near +him, and so he wanted to be alone, I suppose. And there he stayed, +with what spray came over the bow splashing him, but he paying no +attention. + +At supper call he moved, but not to go below and eat--only to shift to +walking the quarter, and walking the quarter he stayed until near +midnight. He went below then after giving a few words of instruction +to the watch--went below and got out his pipe. From my bunk, the +middle port bunk in the cabin, I watched him rummaging for tobacco in +his stateroom and then his coming out with his pipe and his filling +and lighting it slowly and thoughtfully, and then his sitting and +smoking under the cabin lamp. + +Looking over when he had finished that pipeful--I had not drawn my +curtain--he caught my eyes on him. He smiled, but said nothing--only +lit another pipeful, and kept on smoking. + +I fell asleep watching him--fell asleep and woke again. He must have +been watching me, for his eyes were on mine when I looked for him +again. He smiled and shook his pipe out, and made as though to turn +in. + +But he didn't turn in. He took off his jersey, loosened the collar of +his flannel shirt, cast off his slip-shods--stopped--looked into his +bunk, came back, filled and lit another pipeful and began to talk to +me. I thought I was sleepy, but in five minutes I didn't think so. +Joking, laughing, telling stories--in ten minutes he had me roaring. +Before long he had everybody in the cabin awake and roaring, too. Men, +coming off watch and into the cabin to warm up, or for one thing or +another, listened and stayed. He kept that up all the rest of the +night--until after six o'clock in the morning, and only the cook +called to breakfast there's no telling when he would have stopped. And +not until he was going for'ard to eat did I get a glimpse of what it +was he had been thinking of during all those earlier hours of the +night. The sun, I remember, was streaking the sky ahead of us--he +stopped just as he was about to drop into the forec's'le and pointed +it out. + +"A sunrise, Joe, on a fine October morning out to +sea--beautiful--beautiful--but just one thing wrong about it. And what +is it?--you don't see? Well, Joe, it's over the bow. A sunrise, Joe, +is most beautiful when it's over the stern--and why? 'Cause then +you're going home--of course. Going home, Joe--if you've got a home to +go to. Look to it, Joe, that you've got a home of your own to go to +before you're much older. Somebody to work for--somebody waiting for +you--a wife, Joe--wife and children--or you're in for some awful +lonesome times." + +That was Clancy--watch-mate, bunk-mate, dory-mate once, and now my +skipper--Clancy, who could be any man's friend, the man that everybody +jumped to shake hands with, and yet never a bit of use to himself. And +I couldn't but half wonder at that, and kept my eyes on him when, with +one foot on the top step of the companionway, he turned and looked +around again. + +"And if you can't get anybody, skipper?" + +"Then it's hard--though most likely you've deserved it." + +"But you haven't deserved it?" + +"Deserved it? Yes, and ten times over." + +"That's pretty rough." + +"Rough? No, it's right. When you do wrong you've got to make up for +it. It's all in the big scheme of the universe. You've got to strike a +balance some time--somewhere. And the sooner the better. Be thankful +if you have to settle it right away, Joe. If you don't and it drags +along--then it's worse again, and the Lord help those that come after +you--those that have to take up life where you've left it off. The +Lord have mercy on the heirs of your brain and heart and soul, boy. +What you hand them they've got to take. Yes, sir, you'll pay for it +somewhere--you yourself, or, what's worse, those you care for will +have to pay--in this world or another--whatever it is we're coming to, +a better or a worse world, it's there and waiting us. Be thankful, as +I said, Joe, if you have to settle for it here--settle for it yourself +alone." + +All around, above and below, ahead and astern, he looked, a long, long +look astern--his foot on the step, and singing softly, almost to +himself: + + "And if I come to you, my love, + And my heart free from guile, + Will you have a glance for me-- + Will you on me smile? + +Oh, Lord! pipe-dreams--pipe-dreams. Let's go below, Joe, and have a +bite to eat." + +So below we went; and her sails lit up by the morning sun, her decks +wet by the slapping sea, sheets off and sailing free, the Johnnie +Duncan clipped her way to the east'ard. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SEINERS*** + + +******* This file should be named 30138.txt or 30138.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/0/1/3/30138 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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