PART TWO, CHAPTER 3.
DEVOTED SERVANTS--AND THE LIGHT OF A FLARE.
Young Powell thought to himself: "The men, too, are noticing it."Indeed, the captain's behaviour to his wife and to his wife's father wasnoticeable enough. It was as if they had been a pair of not verycongenial passengers. But perhaps it was not always like that. Thecaptain might have been put out by something.
When the aggrieved Franklin came on deck Mr Powell made a remark tothat effect. For his curiosity was aroused.
The mate grumbled "Seems to you? ... Put out? ... eh?" He buttoned histhick jacket up to the throat, and only then added a gloomy "Ay, likelyenough," which discouraged further conversation. But no encouragementwould have induced the newly-joined second mate to enter the way ofconfidences. His was an instinctive prudence. Powell did not know whyit was he had resolved to keep his own counsel as to his colloquy withMr Smith. But his curiosity did not slumber. Some time afterwards,again at the relief of watches, in the course of a little talk, hementioned Mrs Anthony's father quite casually, and tried to find outfrom the mate who he was.
"It would take a clever man to find that out, as things are on boardnow," Mr Franklin said, unexpectedly communicative. "The first I sawof him was when she brought him alongside in a four-wheeler one morningabout half-past eleven. The captain had come on board early, and wasdown in the cabin that had been fitted out for him. Did I tell you thatif you want the captain for anything you must stamp on the port side ofthe deck? That's so. This ship is not only unlike what she used to be,but she is like no other ship, anyhow. Did you ever hear of thecaptain's room being on the port side? Both of them stern-cabins havebeen fitted up afresh like a blessed palace. A gang of people from sometip-top West-End house were fussing here on board with hangings andfurniture for a fortnight, as if the Queen were coming with us. Ofcourse the starboard cabin is the bedroom one, but the poor captainhangs out to port on a couch, so that in case we want him on deck atnight, Mrs Anthony should not be startled. Nervous! Phoo! A womanwho marries a sailor and makes up her mind to come to sea should have noblamed jumpiness about her, I say. But never mind. Directly the oldcab pointed round the corner of the warehouse I called out to thecaptain that his lady was coming aboard. He answered me, but as Ididn't see him coming, I went down the gangway myself to help heralight. She jumps out excitedly without touching my arm, or as much assaying `thank you' or `good morning' or anything, turns back to the cab,and then that old joker comes out slowly. I hadn't noticed him inside.I hadn't expected to see anybody. It gave me a start. She says: `Myfather--Mr Franklin.' He was staring at me like an owl. `How do youdo, sir?' says I. Both of them looked funny. It was as if somethinghad happened to them on the way. Neither of them moved, and I stood bywaiting. The captain showed himself on the poop; and I saw him at theside looking over, and then he disappeared; on the way to meet them onshore, I expected. But he just went down below again. So, not seeinghim, I said: `Let me help you on board, sir.'
"On board!" says he in a silly fashion.
"On board!"
"It's not a very good ladder, but it's quite firm," says I, as he seemedto be afraid of it. And he didn't look a broken-down old man, either.You can see yourself what he is. Straight as a poker, and life enoughin him yet. But he made no move, and I began to feel foolish. Then shecomes forward. "Oh! Thank you, Mr Franklin. I'll help my father up."Flabbergasted me--to be choked off like this. Pushed in between himand me without as much as a look my way. So of course I dropped it.What do you think? I fell back. I would have gone up on board at onceand left them on the quay to come up or stay there till next week, onlythey were blocking the way. I couldn't very well shove them on oneside. Devil only knows what was up between them. There she was, paleas death, talking to him very fast. He got as red as a turkey-cock--dash me if he didn't. A bad-tempered old bloke, I can tell you. And abad lot, too. Never mind. I couldn't hear what she was saying to him,but she put force enough into it to shake her. It seemed--it seemed,mind!--that he didn't want to go on board. Of course it couldn't havebeen that. I know better. Well, she took him by the arm, above theelbow, as if to lead him, or push him rather. I was standing not quiteten feet off. Why should I have gone away? I was anxious to get backon board as soon as they would let me. I didn't want to overhear herblamed whispering either. But I couldn't stay there for ever, so I madea move to get past them if I could. And that's how I heard a few words.It was the old chap--something nasty about being "under the heel" ofsomebody or other. Then he says, "I don't want this sacrifice." Whatit meant I can't tell. It was a quarrel--of that I am certain. Shelooks over her shoulder, and sees me pretty close to them. I don't knowwhat she found to say into his ear, but he gave way suddenly. He lookedround at me too, and they went up together so quickly then that when Igot on the quarter-deck I was only in time to see the inner door of thepassage close after them. Queer--eh? But if it were only queerness onewouldn't mind. Some luggage in new trunks came on board in theafternoon. We undocked at midnight. And may I be hanged if I know whoor what he was or is. I haven't been able to find out. No, I don'tknow. He may have been anything. All I know is that once, years agowhen I went to see the Derby with a friend, I saw a pea-and-thimble chapwho looked just like that old mystery father out of a cab.
All this the goggle-eyed mate had said in a resentful and melancholyvoice, with pauses, to the gentle murmur of the sea. It was for him abitter sort of pleasure to have a fresh pair of ears, a newcomer, towhom he could repeat all these matters of grief and suspicion talkedover endlessly by the band of Captain Anthony's faithful subordinates.It was evidently so refreshing to his worried spirit that it made himforget the advisability of a little caution with a complete stranger.But really with Mr Powell there was no danger. Amused, at first, atthese plaints, he provoked them for fun. Afterwards, turning them overin his mind, he became impressed; and as the impression grew strongerwith the days his resolution to keep it to himself grew stronger too.
What made it all the easier to keep--I mean the resolution--was thatPowell's sentiment of amused surprise at what struck him at first asmere absurdity was not unmingled with indignation. And his years weretoo few, his position too novel, his reliance on his own opinion not yetfirm enough to allow him to express it with any effect. And then--whatwould have been the use, anyhow--and where was the necessity?
But this thing, familiar and mysterious at the same time, occupied hisimagination. The solitude of the sea intensifies the thoughts and thefacts of one's experience which seems to lie at the very centre of theworld, as the ship which carries one always remains the centre figure ofthe round horizon. He viewed the apoplectic, goggle-eyed mate and thesaturnine, heavy-eyed steward as the victims of a peculiar and secretform of lunacy which poisoned their lives. But he did not give them hissympathy on that account. No. That strange affliction awakened in hima sort of suspicious wonder.
Once--and it was at night again; for the officers of the _Ferndale_keeping watch and watch as was customary in those days, had but fewoccasions for intercourse--once, I say, the thick Mr Franklin, aquaintly bulky figure under the stars, the usual witnesses of hisoutpourings, asked him with an abruptness which was not callous, but inhis simple way:
"I believe you have no parents living?" Mr Powell said that he hadlost his father and mother at a very early age.
"My mother is still alive," declared Mr Franklin in a tone whichsuggested that he was gratified by the fact. "The old lady is lastingwell. Of course she's got to be made comfortable. A woman must belooked after, and, if it comes to that, I say, give me a mother. I daresay if she had not lasted it out so well I might have gone and gotmarried. I don't know, though. We sailors haven't got much time tolook about us to any purpose. Anyhow, as the old lady was there Ihaven't, I may say, looked at a girl in all my life. Not that I wasn'tpartial to female society in my time," he added with a patheticintonation, while the whites of his goggle eyes gleamed a
morously underthe clear night sky. "Very partial, I may say."
Mr Powell was amused; and as these communications took place only whenthe mate was relieved off duty he had no serious objection to them. Themate's presence made the first half-hour and sometimes even more of hiswatch on deck pass away. If his senior did not mind losing some of hisrest it was not Mr Powell's affair. Franklin was a decent fellow. Hisintention was not to boast of his filial piety.
"Of course I mean respectable female society," he explained. "The othersort is neither here nor there. I blame no man's conduct, but awell-brought-up young fellow like you knows that there's precious littlefun to be got out of it." He fetched a deep sigh. "I wish CaptainAnthony's mother had been a lasting sort like my old lady. He wouldhave had to look after her and he would have done it well. CaptainAnthony is a proper man. And it would have saved him from the mostfoolish--"
He did not finish the phrase which certainly was turning bitter in hismouth. Mr Powell thought to himself: "There he goes again." Helaughed a little.
"I don't understand why you are so hard on the captain, Mr Franklin. Ithought you were a great friend of his."
"Mr Franklin exclaimed at this. He was not hard on the captain.Nothing was further from his thoughts. Friend! Of course he was a goodfriend and a faithful servant. He begged Powell to understand that ifCaptain Anthony chose to strike a bargain with Old Nick to-morrow, andOld Nick were good to the captain, he (Franklin) would find it in hisheart to love Old Nick for the captain's sake. That was so. On theother hand, if a saint, an angel with white wings came along and--"
He broke off short again as if his own vehemence had frightened him.Then in his strained pathetic voice (which he had never raised) heobserved that it was no use talking. Anybody could see that the man waschanged.
"As to that," said young Powell, "it is impossible for me to judge."
"Good Lord!" whispered the mate. "An educated, clever young fellow likeyou with a pair of eyes on him and some sense too! Is that how a happyman looks? Eh? Young you may be, but you aren't a kid; and I dare youto say `Yes!'"
Mr Powell did not take up the challenge. He did not know what to thinkof the mate's view. Still, it seemed as if it had opened hisunderstanding in a measure. He conceded that the captain did not lookvery well.
"Not very well," repeated the mate mournfully. "Do you think a man witha face like that can hope to live his life out? You haven't knockedabout long in this world yet, but you are a sailor, you have been inthree or four ships, you say. Well, have you ever seen a shipmasterwalking his own deck as if he did not know what he had underfoot? Haveyou? Dam' me if I don't think that he forgets where he is. Of coursehe can be no other than a prime seaman; but it's lucky, all the same, hehas me on board. I know by this time what he wants done without beingtold. Do you know that I have had no order given me since we left port?Do you know that he has never once opened his lips to me unless I spoketo him first? I? His chief officer; his shipmate for full six years,with whom he had no cross word--not once in all that time. Ay. Not across look even. True that when I do make him speak to me, there is hisdear old self, the quick eye, the kind voice. Could hardly be other tohis old Franklin. But what's the good? Eyes, voice, everything's milesaway. And for all that I take good care never to address him when thepoop isn't clear. Yes! Only we two and nothing but the sea with us.You think it would be all right; the only chief mate he ever had--MrFranklin here and Mr Franklin there--when anything went wrong the firstword you would hear about the decks was `Franklin!'--I am thirteen yearsolder than he is--you would think it would be all right, wouldn't you?Only we two on this poop on which we saw each other first--he a youngmaster--told me that he thought I would suit him very well--we two, andthirty-one days out at sea, and it's no good! It's like talking to aman standing on shore. I can't get him back. I can't get at him. Ifeel sometimes as if I must shake him by the arm: `Wake up! Wake up!You are wanted, sir!'"
Young Powell recognised the expression of a true sentiment, a thing sorare in this world where there are so many mutes and so many excellentreasons even at sea for an articulate man not to give himself away, thathe felt something like respect for this outburst. It was not loud. Thegrotesque squat shape, with the knob of the head as if rammed downbetween the square shoulders by a blow from a club, moved vaguely in acircumscribed space limited by the two harness-casks lashed to the frontrail of the poop, without gestures, hands in the pockets of the jacket,elbows pressed closely to its side; and the voice without resonance,passed from anger to dismay and back again without a single louder wordin the hurried delivery, interrupted only by slight gasps for air as ifthe speaker were being choked by the suppressed passion of his grief.
Mr Powell, though moved to a certain extent, was by no means carriedaway. And just as he thought that it was all over, the other, fidgetingin the darkness, was heard again explosive, bewildered but not very loudin the silence of the ship and the great empty peace of the sea.
"They have done something to him! What is it? What can it be? Can'tyou guess? Don't you know?"
"Good heavens!" Young Powell was astounded on discovering that this wasan appeal addressed to him. "How on earth can I know?"
"You do talk to that white-faced, black-eyed ... I've seen you talkingto her more than a dozen times."
Young Powell, his sympathy suddenly chilled, remarked in a disdainfultone that Mrs Anthony's eyes were not black.
"I wish to God she had never set them on the captain, whatever colourthey are," retorted Franklin. "She and that old chap with the scrapedjaws who sits over her and stares down at her dead-white face with hisyellow eyes--confound them! Perhaps you will tell us that his eyes arenot yellow?"
Powell, not interested in the colour of Mr Smith's eyes, made a vaguegesture. Yellow or not yellow, it was all one to him.
The mate murmured to himself. "No. He can't know. No! No more than ababy. It would take an older head."
"I don't even understand what you mean," observed Mr Powell coldly.
"And even the best head would be puzzled by such devil-work," the matecontinued, muttering. "Well, I have heard tell of women doing for a manin one way or another when they got him fairly ashore. But to bringtheir devilry to sea and fasten on such a man! ... It's something Ican't understand. But I can watch. Let them look out--I say!"
His short figure, unable to stoop, without flexibility, could notexpress dejection. He was very tired suddenly; he dragged his feetgoing off the poop. Before he left it with nearly an hour of his watchbelow sacrificed, he addressed himself once more to our young man whostood abreast of the mizzen rigging in an unreceptive mood expressed bysilence and immobility. He did not regret, he said, having spokenopenly on this very serious matter.
"I don't know about its seriousness, sir," was Mr Powell's frankanswer. "But if you think you have been telling me something very newyou are mistaken. You can't keep that matter out of your speeches.It's the sort of thing I've been hearing more or less ever since I cameon board."
Mr Powell, speaking truthfully, did not mean to speak offensively. Hehad instincts of wisdom; he felt that this was a serious affair, for ithad nothing to do with reason. He did not want to raise an enemy forhimself in the mate. And Mr Franklin did not take offence. To MrPowell's truthful statement he answered with equal truth and simplicitythat it was very likely, very likely. With a thing like that (next doorto witchcraft almost) weighing on his mind, the wonder was that he couldthink of anything else. The poor man must have found in therestlessness of his thoughts the illusion of being engaged in an activecontest with some power of evil; for his last words as he wentlingeringly down the poop ladder expressed the quaint hope that he wouldget him, Powell, "on our side yet."
Mr Powell--just imagine a straightforward youngster assailed in thisfashion on the high seas--answered merely by an embarrassed and uneasylaugh which reflected exactly the state of his innocent soul. Theapoplectic mate, already hal
f-way down, went up again three steps of thepoop ladder. Why, yes. A proper young fellow, the mate expected,wouldn't stand by and see a man, a good sailor and his own skipper, introuble without taking his part against a couple of shore people who--
Mr Powell interrupted him impatiently, asking what was the trouble?
"What is it you are hinting at?" he cried with an inexplicableirritation.
"I don't like to think of him all alone down there with these two,"Franklin whispered impressively. "Upon my word I don't. God only knowswhat may be going on there... Don't laugh.--It was bad enough lastvoyage when Mrs Brown had a cabin aft; but now it's worse. Itfrightens me. I can't sleep sometimes for thinking of him all alonethere, shut off from us all."
Mrs Brown was the steward's wife. You must understand that shortlyafter his visit to the Fyne cottage (with all its consequences), Anthonyhad got an offer to go to the Western Islands, and bring home the cargoof some ship which, damaged in a collision or a stranding, took refugein Saint Michael, and was condemned there. Roderick Anthony hadconnections which would put such paying jobs in his way. So Flora deBarral had but a five months' voyage, a mere excursion, for her firsttrial of sea-life. And Anthony, clearly trying to be most attentive,had induced this Mrs Brown, the wife of his faithful steward, to comealong as maid to his bride. But for some reason or other thisarrangement was not continued. And the mate, tormented by indefinitealarms and forebodings, regretted it. He regretted that Jane Brown wasno longer on board--as a sort of representative of Captain Anthony'sfaithful servants, to watch quietly what went on in that part of theship this fatal marriage had closed to their vigilance. That had beenexcellent. For she was a dependable woman.
Powell did not detect any particular excellence in what seemed a spyingemployment. But in his simplicity he said that he should have thoughtMrs Anthony would have been glad anyhow to have another woman on board.He was thinking of the white-faced girlish personality which it seemedto him ought to have been cared for. The innocent young man alwayslooked upon the girl as immature; something of a child yet.
"She! glad! Why it was she who had her fired out. She didn't wantanybody around the cabin. Mrs Brown is certain of it. She told herhusband so. You ask the steward and hear what he has to say about it.That's why I don't like it. A capable woman who knew her place. Butno. Out she must go. For no fault, mind you. The captain was ashamedto send her away. But that wife of his--ay the precious pair of themhave got hold of him. I can't speak to him for a minute on the poopwithout that thimble-rigging coon coming gliding up. I'll tell youwhat. I overheard once--God knows. I didn't try to, only he forgot Iwas on the other side of the skylight with my sextant--I overheard him--you know how he sits hanging over her chair and talking away withoutproperly opening his mouth--yes I caught the word right enough. He wasalluding to the captain as `the jailer.' The jail!"
Franklin broke off with a profane execration. A silence reigned for along time and the slight, very gentle rolling of the ship slippingbefore the N.E. trade-wind seemed to be a soothing device for lulling tosleep the suspicions of men who trust themselves to the sea.
A deep sigh was heard followed by the mate's voice asking dismally ifthat was the way one would speak of a man to whom one wished well? Nobetter proof of something wrong was needed. Therefore he hoped, as hevanished at last, that Mr Powell would be on their side. And this timeMr Powell did not answer this hope with an embarrassed laugh.
That young officer was more and more surprised at the nature of theincongruous revelations coming to him in the surroundings and in theatmosphere of the open sea. It is difficult for us to understand theextent, the completeness, the comprehensiveness of his inexperience, forus who didn't go to sea out of a small private school at the age offourteen years and nine months. Leaning on his elbow in the mizzenrigging and so still that the helmsman over there at the other end ofthe poop might have (and he probably did) suspect him of beingcriminally asleep on duty, he tried to "get hold of that thing" by someside which would fit in with his simple notions of psychology. "Whatthe deuce are they worrying about?" he asked himself in a dazed andcontemptuous impatience. But all the same "jailer" was a funny name togive a man; unkind, unfriendly, nasty. He was sorry that Mr Smith wasguilty in that matter because, the truth must be told, he had been to acertain extent sensible of having been noticed in a quiet manner by thefather of Mrs Anthony. Youth appreciates that sort of recognitionwhich is the subtlest form of flattery age can offer. Mr Smith seizedopportunities to approach him on deck. His remarks were sometimes weirdand enigmatical. He was doubtless an eccentric old gent. But from thatto calling his son-in-law (whom he never approached on deck) nasty namesbehind his back was a long step.
And Mr Powell marvelled...
"While he was telling me all this,"--Marlow changed his tone--"Imarvelled even more. It was as if misfortune marked its victims on theforehead for the dislike of the crowd. I am not thinking here ofnumbers. Two men may behave like a crowd, three certainly will whentheir emotions are engaged. It was as if the forehead of Flora deBarral were marked. Was the girl born to be a victim; to be alwaysdisliked and crushed as if she were too fine for this world? Or tooluckless--since that also is often counted as sin."
Yes, I marvelled more since I knew more of the girl than Mr Powell--ifonly her true name; and more of Captain Anthony--if only the fact thathe was the son of a delicate erotic poet of a markedly refined andautocratic temperament. Yes, I knew their joint stories which MrPowell did not know. The chapter in it he was opening to me, thesea-chapter, with such new personages as the sentimental and apoplecticchief mate and the morose steward, however astounding to him in itsdetached condition was much more so to me as a member of a series,following the chapter outside the Eastern Hotel in which I myself hadplayed my part. In view of her declarations and my sage remarks it wasvery unexpected. She had meant well, and I had certainly meant welltoo. Captain Anthony--as far as I could gather from little Fyne--hadmeant well. As far as such lofty words may be applied to the obscurepersonages of this story we were all filled with the noblest sentimentsand intentions. The sea was there to give them the shelter of itssolitude free from the earth's petty suggestions. I could well marvelin myself, as to what had happened.
I hope that if he saw it, Mr Powell forgave me the smile of which I wasguilty at that moment. The light in the cabin of his little cutter wasdim. And the smile was dim too. Dim and fleeting. The girl's life hadpresented itself to me as a tragi-comical adventure, the saddest thingon earth, slipping between frank laughter and unabashed tears. Yes, thesaddest facts and the most common, and, being common perhaps the mostworthy of our unreserved pity.
The purely human reality is capable of lyrism but not of abstraction.Nothing will serve for its understanding but the evidence of rationallinking up of characters and facts. And beginning with Flora de Barral,in the light of my memories I was certain that she at least must havebeen passive; for that is of necessity the part of women, this waitingon fate which some of them, and not the most intelligent, cover up bythe vain appearances of agitation. Flora de Barral was notexceptionally intelligent but she was thoroughly feminine. She would bepassive (and that does not mean inanimate) in the circumstances, wherethe mere fact of being a woman was enough to give her an occult andsupreme significance. And she would be enduring which is the essence ofwoman's visible, tangible power. Of that I was certain. Had she notendured already? Yet it is so true that the germ of destruction lies inwait for us mortals, even at the very source of our strength, that onemay die of too much endurance as well as of too little of it.
"Such was my train of thought. And I was mindful also of my first viewof her--toying or perhaps communing in earnest with the possibilities ofa precipice. But I did not ask Mr Powell anxiously what had happenedto Mrs Anthony in the end. I let him go on in his own way feeling thatno matter what strange facts he would have to disclose, I was certain toknow much more of them than he ever did know o
r could possibly guess..."
Marlow paused for quite a long time. He seemed uncertain as though hehad advanced something beyond my grasp. Purposely I made no sign. "Youunderstand?" he asked.
"Perfectly," I said. "You are the expert in the psychologicalwilderness. This is like one of those Redskin stories where the noblesavages carry off a girl and the honest backwoodsman with hisincomparable knowledge follows the track and reads the signs of her fatein a footprint here, a broken twig there, a trinket dropped by the way.I have always liked such stories. Go on."
Marlow smiled indulgently at my jesting. "It is not exactly a story forboys," he said. "I go on then. The sign, as you call it, was not veryplentiful but very much to the purpose, and when Mr Powell heard (at acertain moment I felt bound to tell him) when he heard that I had knownMrs Anthony before her marriage, that, to a certain extent, I was herconfidant ... For you can't deny that to a certain extent ... Well letus say that I had a look in.--A young girl, you know, is something likea temple. You pass by and wonder what mysterious rites are going on inthere, what prayers, what visions? The privileged men, the lover, thehusband, who are given the key of the sanctuary do not always know howto use it. For myself, without claim, without merit, simply by chance Ihad been allowed to look through the half-opened door and I had seen thesaddest possible desecration, the withered brightness of youth, a spiritneither made cringing nor yet dulled but as if bewildered in quiveringhopelessness by gratuitous cruelty; self-confidence destroyed and,instead, a resigned recklessness, a mournful callousness (and all thissimple, almost naive)--before the material and moral difficulties of thesituation. The passive anguish of the luckless!"
I asked myself: wasn't that ill-luck exhausted yet? Ill-luck which islike the hate of invisible powers interpreted, made sensible andinjurious by the actions of men?
Mr Powell as you may well imagine had opened his eyes at my statement.But he was full of his recalled experiences on board the _Ferndale_, andthe strangeness of being mixed up in what went on aboard, simply becausehis name was also the name of a Shipping Master, kept him in a state ofwonder which made other coincidences, however unlikely, not so verysurprising after all.
This astonishing occurrence was so present to his mind that he alwaysfelt as though he were there under false pretences. And this feelingwas so uncomfortable that it nerved him to break through theawe-inspiring aloofness of his captain. He wanted to make a cleanbreast of it. I imagine that his youth stood in good stead to MrPowell. Oh, yes. Youth is a power. Even Captain Anthony had to takesome notice of it, as if it refreshed him to see something untouched,unscarred, unhardened by suffering. Or perhaps the very novelty of thatface, on board a ship where he had seen the same faces for years,attracted his attention.
Whether one day he dropped a word to his new second officer or onlylooked at him I don't know; but Mr Powell seized the opportunitywhatever it was. The captain who had started and stopped in hiseverlasting rapid walk smoothed his brow very soon, heard him to the endand then laughed a little.
"Ah! That's the story. And you felt you must put me right as to this."
"Yes, sir."
"It doesn't matter how you came on board," said Anthony. And thenshowing that perhaps he was not so utterly absent from his ship asFranklin supposed: "That's all right. You seem to be getting on verywell with everybody," he said in his curt hurried tone, as if talkinghurt him, and his eyes already straying over the sea as usual.
"Yes, sir."
Powell tells me that looking then at the strong face to which thathaggard expression was returning, he had the impulse, from some confusedfriendly feeling, to add: "I am very happy on board here, sir."
The quickly returning glance, its steadiness, abashed Mr Powell andmade him even step back a little. The captain looked as though he hadforgotten the meaning of the word.
"You--what? Oh yes ... You--of course ... Happy. Why not?"
This was merely muttered; and next moment Anthony was off on hisheadlong tramp his eyes turned to the sea away from his ship.
A sailor indeed looks generally into the great distances, but in CaptainAnthony's case there was--as Powell expressed it--something particular,something purposeful like the avoidance of pain or temptation. It wasvery marked once one had become aware of it. Before, one felt only apronounced strangeness. Not that the captain--Powell was careful toexplain--didn't see things as a shipmaster should. The proof of it wasthat on that very occasion he desired him suddenly after a period ofsilent pacing, to have all the staysails sheets eased off, and he wasgoing on with some other remarks on the subject of these staysails whenMrs Anthony followed by her father emerged from the companion. Sheestablished herself in her chair to leeward of the skylight as usual.Thereupon the captain cut short whatever he was going to say, and in alittle while went down below.
I asked Mr Powell whether the captain and his wife never conversed ondeck. He said no--or at any rate they never exchanged more than acouple of words. There was some constraint between them. For instance,on that very occasion, when Mrs Anthony came out they did look at eachother; the captain's eyes indeed followed her till she sat down; but hedid not speak to her; he did not approach her; and afterwards left thedeck without turning his head her way after this first silent exchangeof glances.
I asked Mr Powell what did he do then, the captain being out of theway. "I went over and talked to Mrs Anthony. I was thinking that itmust be very dull for her. She seemed to be such a stranger to theship."
"The father was there of course?"
"Always," said Powell. "He was always there sitting on the skylight, asif he were keeping watch over her. And I think," he added, "that he wasworrying her. Not that she showed it in any way. Mrs Anthony wasalways very quiet and always ready to look one straight in the face."
"You talked together a lot?" I pursued my inquiries.
"She mostly let me talk to her," confessed Mr Powell. "I don't knowthat she was very much interested--but still she let me. She never cutme short."
All the sympathies of Mr Powell were for Flora Anthony nee de Barral.She was the only human being younger than himself on board that shipsince the _Ferndale_ carried no boys and was manned by a full crew ofable seamen. Yes! their youth had created a sort of bond between them.Mr Powell's open countenance must have appeared to her distinctlypleasing amongst the mature, rough, crabbed or even inimical faces shesaw around her. With the warm generosity of his age young Powell was onher side, as it were, even before he knew that there were sides to betaken on board that ship, and what this taking sides was about. Therewas a girl. A nice girl. He asked himself no questions. Flora deBarral was not so much younger in years than himself; but for somereason, perhaps by contrast with the accepted idea of a captain's wife,he could not regard her otherwise but as an extremely youthful creature.At the same time, apart from her exalted position, she exercised overhim the supremacy a woman's earlier maturity gives her over a young manof her own age. As a matter of fact we can see that, without everhaving more than a half an hour's consecutive conversation together, andthe distances duly preserved, these two were becoming friends--under theeye of the old man, I suppose.
How he first got in touch with his captain's wife Powell relates in thisway. It was long before his memorable conversation with the mate andshortly after getting clear of the channel. It was gloomy weather; deadhead wind, blowing quite half a gale; the _Ferndale_ under reduced sailwas stretching close-hauled across the track of the homeward boundships, just moving through the water and no more, since there was noobject in pressing her and the weather looked threatening. About teno'clock at night he was alone on the poop, in charge, keeping well aftby the weather rail and staring to windward, when amongst the white,breaking seas, under the black sky, he made out the lights of a ship.He watched them for some time. She was running dead before the wind ofcourse. She will pass jolly close--he said to himself; and thensuddenly he felt a great mistrust of that approaching ship. S
he'sheading straight for us--he thought. It was not his business to get outof the way. On the contrary. And his uneasiness grew by therecollection of the forty tons of dynamite in the body of the_Ferndale_; not the sort of cargo one thinks of with equanimity inconnection with a threatened collision. He gazed at the two smalllights in the dark immensity filled with the angry noise of the seas.They fascinated him till their plainness to his sight gave him aconviction that there was danger there. He knew in his mind what to doin the emergency, but very properly he felt that he must call thecaptain out at once.
He crossed the deck in one bound. By the immemorial custom and usage ofthe sea the captain's room is on the starboard side. You would just assoon expect your captain to have his nose at the back of his head as tohave his state-room on the port side of the ship. Powell forgot allabout the direction on that point given him by the chief. He flew overas I said, stamped with his foot and then putting his face to the cowlof the big ventilator shouted down there: "Please come on deck, sir," ina voice which was not trembling or scared but which we may call fairlyexpressive. There could not be a mistake as to the urgence of the call.But instead of the expected alert "All right!" and the sound of a rushdown there, he heard only a faint exclamation--then silence.
Think of his astonishment! He remained there, his ear in the cowl ofthe ventilator, his eyes fastened on those menacing sidelights dancingon the gusts of wind which swept the angry darkness of the sea. It wasas though he had waited an hour but it was something much less than aminute before he fairly bellowed into the wide tube "Captain Anthony!"An agitated "What is it?" was what he heard down there in Mrs Anthony'svoice, light rapid footsteps... Why didn't she try to wake him up! "Iwant the captain," he shouted, then gave it up, making a dash at thecompanion where a blue light was kept, resolved to act for himself.
On the way he glanced at the helmsman whose face lighted up by thebinnacle lamps was calm. He said rapidly to him: "Stand by to spin thathelm up at the first word." The answer "Ay, ay, sir," was delivered ina steady voice. Then Mr Powell after a shout for the watch on deck to"lay aft," ran to the ship's side and struck the blue light on the rail.
A sort of nasty little spitting of sparks was all that came. The light(perhaps affected by damp) had failed to ignite. The time of all thesevarious acts must be counted in seconds. Powell confessed to me that atthis failure he experienced a paralysis of thought, of voice, of limbs.The unexpectedness of this misfire positively overcame his faculties.It was the only thing for which his imagination was not prepared. Itwas knocked clean over. When it got up it was with the suggestion thathe must do something at once or there would be a broadside smashaccompanied by the explosion of dynamite, in which both ships would beblown up and every soul on board of them would vanish off the earth inan enormous flame and uproar.
He saw the catastrophe happening and at the same moment, before he couldopen his mouth or stir a limb to ward off the vision, a voice very nearhis ear, the measured voice of Captain Anthony said: "Wouldn't light--eh? Throw it down! Jump for the flare-up."
The spring of activity in Mr Powell was released with great force. Hejumped. The flare-up was kept inside the companion with a box ofmatches ready to hand. Almost before he knew he had moved he was divingunder the companion slide. He got hold of the can in the dark and triedto strike a light. But he had to press the flare-holder to his breastwith one arm, his fingers were damp and stiff, his hands trembled alittle. One match broke. Another went out. In its flame he saw thecolourless face of Mrs Anthony a little below him, standing on thecabin stairs. Her eyes which were very close to his (he was in acrouching posture on the top step) seemed to burn darkly in thevanishing light. On deck the captain's voice was heard sudden andunexpectedly sardonic: "You had better look sharp, if you want to be intime."
"Let me have the box," said Mrs Anthony in a hurried and familiarwhisper which sounded amused as if they had been a couple of children upto some lark behind a wall. He was glad of the offer which seemed tohim very natural, and without ceremony--
"Here you are. Catch hold."
Their hands touched in the dark and she took the box while he held theparaffin soaked torch in its iron holder. He thought of warning her:"Look out for yourself." But before he had the time to finish thesentence the flare blazed up violently between them and he saw her throwherself back with an arm across her face. "Hallo," he exclaimed; onlyhe could not stop a moment to ask if she was hurt. He bolted out of thecompanion straight into his captain who took the flare from him and heldit high above his head.
The fierce flame fluttered like a silk flag, throwing an angry swayingglare mingled with moving shadows over the poop, lighting up the concavesurfaces of the sails, gleaming on the wet paint of the white rails.And young Powell turned his eyes to windward with a catch in his breath.
The strange ship, a darker shape in the night, did not seem to be movingonwards but only to grow more distinct right abeam, staring at the_Ferndale_ with one green and one red eye which swayed and tossed as ifthey belonged to the restless head of some invisible monster ambushed inthe night amongst the waves. A moment, long like eternity, elapsed,and, suddenly, the monster which seemed to take to itself the shape of amountain shut its green eye without as much as a preparatory wink.
Mr Powell drew a free breath. "All right now," said Captain Anthony ina quiet undertone. He gave the blazing flare to Powell and walked aftto watch the passing of that menace of destruction coming blindly withits parti-coloured stare out of a blind night on the wings of a sweepingwind. Her very form could be distinguished now black and elongatedamongst the hissing patches of foam bursting along her path.
As is always the case with a ship running before wind and sea she didnot seem to an onlooker to move very fast; but to be progressingindolently in long leisurely bounds and pauses in the midst of theovertaking waves. It was only when actually passing the stern withineasy hail of the _Ferndale_ that her headlong speed became apparent tothe eye. With the red light shut off and soaring like an immense shadowon the crest of a wave she was lost to view in one great, forward swing,melting into the lightless space.
"Close shave," said Captain Anthony in an indifferent voice justraised-enough to be heard in the wind. "A blind lot on board that ship.Put out the flare now."
Silently Mr Powell inverted the holder, smothering the flame in thecan, bringing about by the mere turn of his wrist the fall of darknessupon the poop. And at the same time vanished out of his mind's eye thevision of another flame enormous and fierce shooting violently from awhite churned patch of the sea, lighting up the very clouds and carryingupwards in its volcanic rush flying spars, corpses, the fragments of twodestroyed ships. It vanished and there was an immense relief. He toldme he did not know how scared he had been, not generally but of thatvery thing his imagination had conjured, till it was all over. Hemeasured it (for fear is a great tension) by the feeling of slackweariness which came over him all at once.
He walked to the companion and stooping low to put the flare in itsusual place saw in the darkness the motionless pale oval of MrsAnthony's face. She whispered quietly:
"Is anything going to happen? What is it?"
"It's all over now," he whispered back.
He remained bent low, his head inside the cover staring at that whiteghostly oval. He wondered she had not rushed out on deck. She hadremained quietly there. This was pluck. Wonderful self-restraint. Andit was not stupidity on her part. She knew there was imminent dangerand probably had some notion of its nature.
"You stayed here waiting for what would come," he murmured admiringly.
"Wasn't that the best thing to do?" she asked.
He didn't know. Perhaps. He confessed he could not have done it. Nothe. His flesh and blood could not have stood it. He would have felt hemust see what was coming. Then he remembered that the flare might havescorched her face, and expressed his concern.
"A bit. Nothing to hurt. Smell the singed hair?"<
br />
There was a sort of gaiety in her tone. She might have been frightenedbut she certainly was not overcome and suffered from no reaction. Thisconfirmed and augmented if possible Mr Powell's good opinion of her asa "jolly girl," though it seemed to him positively monstrous to refer insuch terms to one's captain's wife. "But she doesn't look it," hethought in extenuation and was going to say something more to her aboutthe lighting of that flare when another voice was heard in thecompanion, saying some indistinct words. Its tone was contemptuous; itcame from below, from the bottom of the stairs. It was a voice in thecabin. And the only other voice which could be heard in the main cabinat this time of the evening was the voice of Mrs Anthony's father. Theindistinct white oval sank from Mr Powell's sight so swiftly as to takehim by surprise. For a moment he hung at the opening of the companionand now that her slight form was no longer obstructing the narrow andwinding staircase the voices came up louder but the words were stillindistinct. The old gentleman was excited about something and MrsAnthony was "managing him" as Powell expressed it. They moved away fromthe bottom of the stairs and Powell went away from the companion. Yethe fancied he had heard the words "Lost to me" before he withdrew hishead. They had been uttered by Mr Smith.
Captain Anthony had not moved away from the taffrail. He remained inthe very position he took up to watch the other ship go by rolling andswinging all shadowy in the uproar of the following seas. He stirrednot; and Powell keeping near by did not dare speak to him, soenigmatical in its contemplation of the night did his figure appear tohis young eyes: indistinct--and in its immobility staring into gloom,the prey of some incomprehensible grief, longing or regret.
Why is it that the stillness of a human being is often so impressive, sosuggestive of evil--as if our proper fate were a ceaseless agitation?The stillness of Captain Anthony became almost intolerable to his secondofficer. Mr Powell loitering about the skylight wanted his captain offthe deck now. "Why doesn't he go below?" he asked himself impatiently.He ventured a cough.
Whether the effect of the cough or not Captain Anthony spoke. He didnot move the least bit. With his back remaining turned to the wholelength of the ship he asked Mr Powell with some brusqueness if thechief mate had neglected to instruct him that the captain was to befound on the port side.
"Yes, sir," said Mr Powell approaching his back. "The mate told me tostamp on the port side when I wanted you; but I didn't remember at themoment."
"You should remember," the captain uttered with an effort. Then addedmumbling "I don't want Mrs Anthony frightened. Don't you see?"
"She wasn't this time," Powell said innocently: "She lighted theflare-up for me, sir."
"This time," Captain Anthony exclaimed and turned round. "Mrs Anthonylighted the flare? Mrs Anthony!..." Powell explained that she was inthe companion all the time.
"All the time," repeated the captain. It seemed queer to Powell thatinstead of going himself to see the captain should ask him:
"Is she there now?" Powell said, that she had gone below after the shiphad passed clear of the _Ferndale_. Captain Anthony made a movementtowards the companion himself, when Powell added the information. "MrSmith called to Mrs Anthony from the saloon, sir. I believe they aretalking there now."
He was surprised to see the captain give up the idea of going belowafter all.
He began to walk the poop instead regardless of the cold, of the dampwind and of the sprays. And yet he had nothing on but his sleeping suitand slippers. Powell placing himself on the break of the poop kept alook-out. When after some time he turned his head to steal a glance athis eccentric captain he could not see his active and shadowy figureswinging to and fro. The second mate of the _Ferndale_ walked aftpeering about and addressed the seaman who steered.
"Captain gone below?"
"Yes, sir," said the fellow who with a quid of tobacco bulging out hisleft cheek kept his eyes on the compass card. "This minute. Helaughed."
"Laughed," repeated Powell incredulously. "Do you mean the captain did?You must be mistaken. What would he want to laugh for?"
"Don't know, sir."
The elderly sailor displayed a profound indifference towards humanemotions. However, after a longish pause he conceded a few words moreto the second officer's weakness. "Yes. He was walking the deck asusual when suddenly he laughed a little and made for the companion.Thought of something funny all at once."
Something funny! That Mr Powell could not believe. He did not askhimself why, at the time. Funny thoughts come to men, though, in allsorts of situations; they come to all sorts of men. Nevertheless MrPowell was shocked to learn that Captain Anthony had laughed withoutvisible cause on a certain night. The impression for some reason wasdisagreeable. And it was then, while finishing his watch, with thechilly gusts of wind sweeping at him out of the darkness where the shortsea of the soundings growled spitefully all round the ship, that itoccurred to his unsophisticated mind that perhaps things are not whatthey are confidently expected to be; that it was possible that CaptainAnthony was not a happy man.--In so far you will perceive he was to acertain extent prepared for the apoplectic and sensitive Franklin'slamentations about his captain. And though he treated them with acontempt which was in a great measure sincere, yet he admitted to methat deep down within him an inexplicable and uneasy suspicion that allwas not well in that cabin, so unusually cut off from the rest of theship, came into being and grew against his will...
Chance: A Tale in Two Parts Page 10