During the night, the Faithful had jibed twice, accidently allowing the wind to send the enormous boom swinging at lightening speed, a full one hundred and eighty degrees, from one side of the vessel to the other, and threatening to tear out the mast.
Cockburn decided to take the last option open to him—to take down the spanker and run directly before the wind and the following seas, and hope the speed of the vessel was reduced enough to maintain control.
Clancy called up a dozen men from below. Before going outside the wheel-house and into the wind and rain, the men carefully tied themselves one to the other, so if one man slipped, his mates would save him from being washed or blown overboard.
Half a dozen sailors crawled out onto the heaving deck and prepared to lower the sail. When the halyards were released the men on the wheel strained to bring up the helm, in order to point the bow far enough into the wind to allow the sail to become slack. When at last it did, all hands scrambled onto the wheel-house roof to haul it down.
At that moment an enormous wave knocked the bow of the Faithful back off the wind, the spanker filled with air and the huge boom swung wildly across the wheel-house roof, breaking bones and cracking skulls as it mowed every last man, screaming and shrieking, into the sea. In seconds the string of broken bodies was swallowed up in the swirling grey water.
There was another sickening thud when the boom hit the supporting mizzen mast shrouds with such force that it wrenched the bolts of their anchoring chain-plates clear out of the ship's hull on the port side. Then there was a loud splintering crack when the unsupported mast snapped like a twig and carried its rigging over the side into the sea.
Cockburn stood in stunned silence. Clancy screamed at what was left of the crew to get axes to cut away any of the mast's rigging that was still attached to the ship. Already the mast was slewing around in the water with its end slamming into the hull like a giant battering ram. Everyone knew, unless the mast could be freed by cutting away the remaining shrouds on the starboard side of the ship, it was just a matter of time before the mast staved-in the hull, and sent the Faithful to the bottom.
With the mast still attached to the ship she became almost impossible to steer. She broached constantly, swinging side-on to the roaring seas, and huge walls of water roared over her decks, threatening to capsize her.
Cockburn and Bates took the wheel as Clancy led the remaining men on the ship, four crewmen and the vessel's government labor agent and interpreter, out into the maelstrom with axes to cut away the starboard shrouds.
It was the worst thing they could have done.
No sooner were the men on the deck, than the three chain-plates on the starboard side yielded to the strain and pulled themselves out of the hull. In an instant the wire rope shrouds attached to them flew through the air, then whipped across the deck on their way to join the mast in the water on the other side of the ship.
Cockburn watched in horror as the shrouds sliced through the men's bodies, and a wall of water sweeping over the deck turned crimson as it washed them over the side.
A few hours after the mast broke free from the ship, a combination of the heavy going, fatigue, and advancing years, caused Isaiah Cockburn to collapse. When he dropped, his head slammed heavily into the sharp brass corner of a timber seat-locker. Blood oozed from a deep gash just above his temple as he passed into unconsciousness on the wheel-house floor.
Bates left the captain where he fell. For the rest of the day, wide-eyed and afraid, he held the vessel stern- on to the storm as best as he could. But by nightfall his mind and body could take no more, and he too finally succumbed to exhaustion and collapsed.
From then on the brigantine was left to her own devices, completely at the mercy of the sea.
But miraculously the Faithful managed to stay afloat, and somehow avoided being sucked into the eye of the cyclone. By midnight the conditions began to ease, as the storm spun off to the west toward the Queensland coast.
Bates came-to once during the night. When he awoke, the wheel-house was pitch black, the lantern having long since burnt its wick as well as the oil. Outside the wind still screamed, and huge waves still crashed over the ship.
Bates tried to get up, but the motion of the vessel threw him back to the floor. He fell down hard on top of Cockburn's body. In the darkness his hands closed around the captain's head, and he felt his fingers become sticky with blood. He held his ear close to Cockburn's mouth. He couldn't hear the captain drawing breath.
Panic gripped Bates when he realized he was the last man alive on a doomed ship. He screamed out in anguish into the night. Then he crawled into a corner of the wheel-house and lay there whimpering like a whipped pup. He lay curled up, his knees tucked under his chin, and holding his head in his hands, until mercifully he passed out once more.
When Bates awoke again, it was daylight, and a beam of sunlight was shining directly onto his face. He opened his eyes slowly, thinking he was in another time and another place.
The sunlight moved off his face and danced around the wheel-house wall. He got to his feet quickly and squinted outside.The wind had gone, and the sun was poking its way through a small patch of blue, in an otherwise grey, cloudy sky.A glimmer of hope appeared in Bates' eyes. The storm had passed. The Faithful was still afloat, though listing heavily to one side, and she was just rolling gently on a sloppy swell.Bates rubbed his eyes and grinned wearily, suddenly glad to be alive.
He turned away from the porthole and looked around the wheel-house. The grin slowly left his face. Something was missing. At first he couldn't put his finger on it. Then he looked down at the large pool of blood on wheel-house floor, and realized Isaiah Cockburn's body was gone.
Bates lurched out of the wheel-house. The deck was a shambles, littered with splintered timbers, blocks, and tangled lines which had not been severed from the ship during the storm. He stood holding onto the rail on the high side of the listing ship and called out Cockburn's name over and over again. Each time he called out he waited for a reply. None came.
Eventually he stumbled below down the main companionway. At the foot of the steps there was salt water up to his knees. He called out Cockburn's name. Again there was no answer. He waded forward toward the main hold. He saw daylight between the planking of the hull where the mast had been pounding the side of the ship. It was clear the rupture was the source of the water which was slowly swamping the Faithful.
Bates turned and waded back past the companionway to Cockburn's cabin in the aft section of the vessel. He pushed open the door and saw the captain. Cockburn sat strapped into his swivel chair at the chart table. His face was ghostly white and covered in crusted blood. His mouth hung wide open and his blue eyes, now pale and glazed, stared back at Bates.
At first Bates thought the Cockburn was dead. But then he got a start when the glazed eyes blinked.
`God almighty Isaiah,' Bates gasped, `I thought you were dead up there in the wheelhouse.'
Cockburn eyed Bates with distain, then spoke in short gasping breaths. `And I may well be soon, you sniveling yellow bastard. When I heard you crying like a baby up there,I came down here to die like a man'.
Bates glowered. `And so you will be, you old fool, and sooner than you think. This ship's takin' on water faster than six men could pump it out.' He turned to leave, then added, `I've got no time to waste here. I'm goin' to jury rig a ship's boat with a sail, fill it with provisions, and get off the Faithful—alone.'
`Go ahead Bates, I'm done for. But what of the Kanakas?'
Bates scowled. `What of 'em'?You don't think I'd take 'em with me do you?Anyway, with any luck they're already dead. But I sure as hell ain't takin' the time to go see.' The scowl changed to a grin. `I was goin' to do 'em in at the start of this voyage you know Isaiah, but Clancy caught me in the act.'
`I know that Bates.' Cockburn was breathing heavily, his eyes half closed. `Clancy told me.I entered the incident into the ship's log like everything else. But for the storm, I'd have
had you answer to Silas Moser for it.'
Bates eyes widened in anger. He lunged at Cockburn and hit him hard across the face. Then he unbuckled the captain's seat strap and pushed his head under water. He held it there for a full minute after the old man's body gave its last feeble jerk.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Captain Christian Blue stood at the rail of the five masted schooner Mendocino Trader. The blond Californian's lanky frame was slightly crouched, as he cradled the ship's sextant in both hands and squinted into the lens. He took the last of his midday sun sights and called out the reading to a young crewman, who jotted it down on paper along with the precise Greenwich Mean Time.
Blue handed the instrument to the crewman, then paced down the deck. Soon he would go below to his cabin and use the readings of the day's sun sights to determine the exact position of his vessel. But for the moment he choose to stay on deck and look out over the gently heaving ocean.
Twelve days earlier the Mendocino Trader had left he hurricane-proof harbor of Pago Pago, in Samoa, after delivering a cargo of coal from the United States to the American Star Line's steamship coaling station on the island of Tutuila. It was the first time his vessel had carried such a dirty, dusty cargo, and Christian Blue vowed it would be the last.
As soon as the coal was unloaded, his crew set about meticulously cleaning the dust and grime from the huge schooner's holds, while the captain began to scout around for a return cargo to the United States.
Blue had hoped to lay at anchor in Pago Pago's beautiful harbor until the hurricane season was over in early April. He well remembered the two wild summer storms he had encountered in the South Pacific four years earlier.
It was then the Mendocino Trader had been forced to seek sanctuary in the Port of Brisbane in Queensland. And it was there that Christian Blue had been obliged to sacrifice the schooner's cargo of soft Oregon pine to Silas Moser, in exchange for ready cash with which to repair his storm damaged vessel.
But like all adventurers, Christian Blue's plans and dreams were subject to the harsh realities of economic survival. And when a German coconut plantation owner from one of the western Samoan islands offered him an immediate and well paying cargo, he accepted it without hesitation and left within days.
It was now the first week in February. Already the safe, picturesque harbor of Pago Pago, lay over a thousand miles astern, while the Mendocino Trader, her holds crammed full of copra, pushed her bow through the Coral Sea bound for Java in the Dutch East Indies.
Christian Blue's deep blue eyes assessed the wind and the waves. The wind which had been blowing strongly for days, was now just a gentle breeze, and the seas, which had been mountainous during the strong wind, were now slight, but there was still a large swell running from the north. From the signs, he knew well, a severe tropical storm had been raging somewhere to the northeast, and he was more than grateful the Mendocino Trader had been spared its fury.
As Christian Blue turned to go below, he thought he saw a white speck on the horizon, a few degrees to starboard of the schooner's bow. He turned back and looked again. Unlike a white horse on a distant wave, the white speck didn't vanish a few moments after it appeared. He drew a telescope from his belt and raised it to his eye. He adjusted the lens. The tiny white speck on the horizon looked like a sail.
It was nearly two hours before the schooner reached the small boat, which was just drifting under a totally ineffective make-shift sail. A crewman on the Mendocino Traderthrew a line to its grateful lone occupant. By now, the seriously listing hull of the Faithful was in plain view about four miles away.
When Bates was hauled over the rail onto the deck he grinned with appreciation, scarcely able to believe his luck. A crowd of sailors quickly gathered around him.
Christian Blue looked him over. `You look to be in fair shape sailor. What's your name?'
`Bates, sir'
Blue pointed toward the ship wallowing in the distance.
Is that your ship over there?'
`She was Captain.... she was. She's done for now though. We got caught in the storm. It was terrible. I'm the only one left alive. She's taking on water fast. I'm surprised she's still afloat.'
When did you take to the ship's boat?'
Just before dark last night, sir. I was sure she'd go down before mornin.'
`And you say no one is aboard?'
`No-one sir.All hands were lost in the storm when we lost the mizzen mast.All except me and the skipper that is. We ran before the wind until we both collapsed. When Captain Cockburn dropped, he injured himself. He died later in his cabin.'
Christian Blue looked long and hard in the direction of the Faithful. `What's her name?' he asked without taking his eyes off the vessel.
`The Faithful.'
`Home port?'
`Brisbane sir.' Bates looked at the Stars and Stripes flying atop the masthead of the Mendocino Trader and thought he'd better be more specific. `That's in Australia, sir.'
Christian Blue turned to look Bates square in the eye. `I know well where it is Mr Bates. Now tell me, who is the vessel's owner?'
`The Stonehouse Shipping Company, sir.'
The Californian's face hardened.
`And what is her cargo?'
`She's empty, sir. She's a labor recruiting vessel, ten days out of Bundaberg—bound for the Solomon Islands.'
Christian Blue glowered.
`Labor recruiter—my ass, sailor. You mean she's a God-damned slaver.'
Bates lowered his eyes.
Christian Blue looked around the deck. `Mr Jackson?'
A deep voice answered immediately. `Yes, sir.'
The crowd of sailors on the deck opened up, and the Mendocino Trader's mate, a tall, muscular negro about thirty years old, passed through and stood beside the captain.
`Mr Jackson.' Christian Blue's eyes were on the Faithful. `This man Bates says that brigantine is abandoned. On the high seas, according to law, that makes her the property of whoever claims her. She's still afloat, perhaps we can save her. Would you like to be the first black man ever to seize a slaver?'
Jackson's black face grinned a wide white grin. He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted his orders:
`Helmsman, steer a course for the brig. Second mate, take six men below and bring up all the pumps and bailing gear you can lay your hands on. Shipwright, get together whatever men and materials your likely to need to keep that tub afloat.' Jackson made a huge fist of his right hand and slammed it hard into the open palm of his left. `Yes, sir. Today we're gonna' take ourselves a slaver.'
*
Christian Blue and Jackson were the first to board the Faithful along with several volunteers. Now the sea was almost dead-calm, and the brigantine listing so badly, that they were able to row a ship's boat to her low side and scramble directly onto her deck. They quickly assessed the ship's situation as near hopeless, but decided to try and salvage it anyway. Jackson signaled for pumps to be ferried over from the schooner.
Darkness was only an hour away when the Mendocino Trader's four big pumps were finally aboard the Faithful and in full operation. Two teams manned each pump. Two men furiously worked the long pump handles in see-saw fashion for fifteen back-breaking minutes, before being relieved for fifteen minutes by the second team.
The pumping continued all through the night, by lantern-light, with no let-up. By midnight, the Faithful had righted herself just a few degrees. Soon after, the shipwright found the place where the sea was coming in between the seams of the split planking in the hull.
Even though the rupture was still several feet beneath the water line, the shipwright and his helpers were able to pack temporary hessian caulking tightly into the openings.From then on the rate of incoming water slowed greatly.By dawn it was clear that the battle to salvage the Faithful was all but won.
When the water level became manageable below decks, Christian Blue waded through to the master's cabin. He found Isaiah Cockburn's body floating face down in the water
. He ordered the body be transferred to the schooner, and gave instructions for it to be prepared for burial at sea.
When the body had been removed, Blue took the ship's log from the shelving above the chart table and emptied out the wet papers from drawers beneath it. He carefully put everything into a canvas sea-bag, then gave it to a sailor to take to his cabin aboard the Mendocino Trader.
The sun was high over the eastern horizon when Christian Blue came up from below. The Faithful's deck was now gradually becoming level. He walked along it towards the bow. As he walked he took careful note of the damage the ship had sustained during the storm. When he reached the bow, he sat down on a hatch cover and contemplated the cost of repairing the vessel, and pondered what he might do with her now that she was his property.
He heard a muffled sound. Then he heard it again. The first time he heard it, he thought it was the salvage crew working below. Now it sounded like a child crying. He knelt down on the deck and put his ear to the planking. The sound was directly below him. When he pulled open the hatch-cover, Christian Blue found Sky sobbing uncontrollably at Kiri's breast.
Crewmen took Kiri and Sky to Christian Blue's own quarters aboard the Mendocino Trader—a large bright cabin with sunlight streaming in through two large portholes. They were given orange juice, squeezed from fresh oranges taken aboard at Pago Pago harbor, followed by boiled salted pork and rice, served with a soft mash of white potatoes and yellow turnips, prepared by the ship's Chinese cook.
When they had finished eating, they were brought hot water and soap, and they bathed in a cedar tub. Later, they lay in Christian Blue's big comfortable bunk. They slept soundly, watched over by the captain's cabin boy, a small, freckle-faced lad of about fourteen.
When Kiri awoke, the ship was rocking gently on a near calm sea, still not yet under sail. She could see it was dark beyond the two large portholes, but the soft glow of a lantern lit the cabin. Sky was still fast asleep beside her. She sat up in the bunk slowly to avoid waking him. As she did the freckle-faced cabin boy, who had been sitting dozing by the cabin door, jumped to his feet.
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