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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:16:33 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:16:33 -0700 |
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diff --git a/1142-h/1142-h.htm b/1142-h/1142-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bd88995 --- /dev/null +++ b/1142-h/1142-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3918 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> + +<!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" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Typhoon, by Joseph Conrad + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1142 ***</div> + + <blockquote><p> + [PG NOTE: The other stories usually included in this volume (“Amy + Foster,” “Falk: A Reminiscence,” and “To-morrow”) being already + available in the PG catalog, are not entered them here.] + </p></blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h1> + TYPHOON + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Joseph Conrad + </h2> + <h4> + Far as the mariner on highest mast<br /> Can see all around + upon the calmed vast, <br /> So + wide was Neptune's hall . . . — KEATS<br /> <br /> + </h4> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + Contents + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> AUTHOR'S NOTE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> TYPHOON </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> I </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> II </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> III </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> IV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> V </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VI </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + AUTHOR'S NOTE + </h2> + <p> + The main characteristic of this volume consists in this, that all the + stories composing it belong not only to the same period but have been + written one after another in the order in which they appear in the book. + </p> + <p> + The period is that which follows on my connection with Blackwood's + Magazine. I had just finished writing “The End of the Tether” and was + casting about for some subject which could be developed in a shorter form + than the tales in the volume of “Youth” when the instance of a steamship + full of returning coolies from Singapore to some port in northern China + occurred to my recollection. Years before I had heard it being talked + about in the East as a recent occurrence. It was for us merely one subject + of conversation amongst many others of the kind. Men earning their bread + in any very specialized occupation will talk shop, not only because it is + the most vital interest of their lives but also because they have not much + knowledge of other subjects. They have never had the time to get + acquainted with them. Life, for most of us, is not so much a hard as an + exacting taskmaster. + </p> + <p> + I never met anybody personally concerned in this affair, the interest of + which for us was, of course, not the bad weather but the extraordinary + complication brought into the ship's life at a moment of exceptional + stress by the human element below her deck. Neither was the story itself + ever enlarged upon in my hearing. In that company each of us could imagine + easily what the whole thing was like. The financial difficulty of it, + presenting also a human problem, was solved by a mind much too simple to + be perplexed by anything in the world except men's idle talk for which it + was not adapted. + </p> + <p> + From the first the mere anecdote, the mere statement I might say, that + such a thing had happened on the high seas, appeared to me a sufficient + subject for meditation. Yet it was but a bit of a sea yarn after all. I + felt that to bring out its deeper significance which was quite apparent to + me, something other, something more was required; a leading motive that + would harmonize all these violent noises, and a point of view that would + put all that elemental fury into its proper place. + </p> + <p> + What was needed of course was Captain MacWhirr. Directly I perceived him I + could see that he was the man for the situation. I don't mean to say that + I ever saw Captain MacWhirr in the flesh, or had ever come in contact with + his literal mind and his dauntless temperament. MacWhirr is not an + acquaintance of a few hours, or a few weeks, or a few months. He is the + product of twenty years of life. My own life. Conscious invention had + little to do with him. If it is true that Captain MacWhirr never walked + and breathed on this earth (which I find for my part extremely difficult + to believe) I can also assure my readers that he is perfectly authentic. I + may venture to assert the same of every aspect of the story, while I + confess that the particular typhoon of the tale was not a typhoon of my + actual experience. + </p> + <p> + At its first appearance “Typhoon,” the story, was classed by some critics + as a deliberately intended storm-piece. Others picked out MacWhirr, in + whom they perceived a definite symbolic intention. Neither was exclusively + my intention. Both the typhoon and Captain MacWhirr presented themselves + to me as the necessities of the deep conviction with which I approached + the subject of the story. It was their opportunity. It was also my + opportunity; and it would be vain to discourse about what I made of it in + a handful of pages, since the pages themselves are here, between the + covers of this volume, to speak for themselves. + </p> + <p> + This is a belated reflection. If it had occurred to me before it would + have perhaps done away with the existence of this Author's Note; for, + indeed, the same remark applies to every story in this volume. None of + them are stories of experience in the absolute sense of the word. + Experience in them is but the canvas of the attempted picture. Each of + them has its more than one intention. With each the question is what the + writer has done with his opportunity; and each answers the question for + itself in words which, if I may say so without undue solemnity, were + written with a conscientious regard for the truth of my own sensations. + And each of those stories, to mean something, must justify itself in its + own way to the conscience of each successive reader. + </p> + <p> + “Falk”—the second story in the volume—offended the delicacy of + one critic at least by certain peculiarities of its subject. But what is + the subject of “Falk”? I personally do not feel so very certain about it. + He who reads must find out for himself. My intention in writing “Falk” was + not to shock anybody. As in most of my writings I insist not on the events + but on their effect upon the persons in the tale. But in everything I have + written there is always one invariable intention, and that is to capture + the reader's attention, by securing his interest and enlisting his + sympathies for the matter in hand, whatever it may be, within the limits + of the visible world and within the boundaries of human emotions. + </p> + <p> + I may safely say that Falk is absolutely true to my experience of certain + straightforward characters combining a perfectly natural ruthlessness with + a certain amount of moral delicacy. Falk obeys the law of + self-preservation without the slightest misgivings as to his right, but at + a crucial turn of that ruthlessly preserved life he will not condescend to + dodge the truth. As he is presented as sensitive enough to be affected + permanently by a certain unusual experience, that experience had to be set + by me before the reader vividly; but it is not the subject of the tale. If + we go by mere facts then the subject is Falk's attempt to get married; in + which the narrator of the tale finds himself unexpectedly involved both on + its ruthless and its delicate side. + </p> + <p> + “Falk” shares with one other of my stories (“The Return” in the “Tales of + Unrest” volume) the distinction of never having been serialized. I think + the copy was shown to the editor of some magazine who rejected it + indignantly on the sole ground that “the girl never says anything.” This + is perfectly true. From first to last Hermann's niece utters no word in + the tale—and it is not because she is dumb, but for the simple + reason that whenever she happens to come under the observation of the + narrator she has either no occasion or is too profoundly moved to speak. + The editor, who obviously had read the story, might have perceived that + for himself. Apparently he did not, and I refrained from pointing out the + impossibility to him because, since he did not venture to say that “the + girl” did not live, I felt no concern at his indignation. + </p> + <p> + All the other stories were serialized. The “Typhoon” appeared in the early + numbers of the Pall Mall Magazine, then under the direction of the late + Mr. Halkett. It was on that occasion, too, that I saw for the first time + my conceptions rendered by an artist in another medium. Mr. Maurice + Grieffenhagen knew how to combine in his illustrations the effect of his + own most distinguished personal vision with an absolute fidelity to the + inspiration of the writer. “Amy Foster” was published in The Illustrated + London News with a fine drawing of Amy on her day out giving tea to the + children at her home, in a hat with a big feather. “To-morrow” appeared + first in the Pall Mall Magazine. Of that story I will only say that it + struck many people by its adaptability to the stage and that I was induced + to dramatize it under the title of “One Day More”; up to the present my + only effort in that direction. I may also add that each of the four + stories on their appearance in book form was picked out on various grounds + as the “best of the lot” by different critics, who reviewed the volume + with a warmth of appreciation and understanding, a sympathetic insight and + a friendliness of expression for which I cannot be sufficiently grateful. + </p> + <p> + 1919. J. C. <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + TYPHOON + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I + </h2> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr, of the steamer Nan-Shan, had a physiognomy that, in the + order of material appearances, was the exact counterpart of his mind: it + presented no marked characteristics of firmness or stupidity; it had no + pronounced characteristics whatever; it was simply ordinary, irresponsive, + and unruffled. + </p> + <p> + The only thing his aspect might have been said to suggest, at times, was + bashfulness; because he would sit, in business offices ashore, sunburnt + and smiling faintly, with downcast eyes. When he raised them, they were + perceived to be direct in their glance and of blue colour. His hair was + fair and extremely fine, clasping from temple to temple the bald dome of + his skull in a clamp as of fluffy silk. The hair of his face, on the + contrary, carroty and flaming, resembled a growth of copper wire clipped + short to the line of the lip; while, no matter how close he shaved, fiery + metallic gleams passed, when he moved his head, over the surface of his + cheeks. He was rather below the medium height, a bit round-shouldered, and + so sturdy of limb that his clothes always looked a shade too tight for his + arms and legs. As if unable to grasp what is due to the difference of + latitudes, he wore a brown bowler hat, a complete suit of a brownish hue, + and clumsy black boots. These harbour togs gave to his thick figure an air + of stiff and uncouth smartness. A thin silver watch chain looped his + waistcoat, and he never left his ship for the shore without clutching in + his powerful, hairy fist an elegant umbrella of the very best quality, but + generally unrolled. Young Jukes, the chief mate, attending his commander + to the gangway, would sometimes venture to say, with the greatest + gentleness, “Allow me, sir”—and possessing himself of the umbrella + deferentially, would elevate the ferule, shake the folds, twirl a neat + furl in a jiffy, and hand it back; going through the performance with a + face of such portentous gravity, that Mr. Solomon Rout, the chief + engineer, smoking his morning cigar over the skylight, would turn away his + head in order to hide a smile. “Oh! aye! The blessed gamp. . . . Thank + 'ee, Jukes, thank 'ee,” would mutter Captain MacWhirr, heartily, without + looking up. + </p> + <p> + Having just enough imagination to carry him through each successive day, + and no more, he was tranquilly sure of himself; and from the very same + cause he was not in the least conceited. It is your imaginative superior + who is touchy, overbearing, and difficult to please; but every ship + Captain MacWhirr commanded was the floating abode of harmony and peace. It + was, in truth, as impossible for him to take a flight of fancy as it would + be for a watchmaker to put together a chronometer with nothing except a + two-pound hammer and a whip-saw in the way of tools. Yet the uninteresting + lives of men so entirely given to the actuality of the bare existence have + their mysterious side. It was impossible in Captain MacWhirr's case, for + instance, to understand what under heaven could have induced that + perfectly satisfactory son of a petty grocer in Belfast to run away to + sea. And yet he had done that very thing at the age of fifteen. It was + enough, when you thought it over, to give you the idea of an immense, + potent, and invisible hand thrust into the ant-heap of the earth, laying + hold of shoulders, knocking heads together, and setting the unconscious + faces of the multitude towards inconceivable goals and in undreamt-of + directions. + </p> + <p> + His father never really forgave him for this undutiful stupidity. “We + could have got on without him,” he used to say later on, “but there's the + business. And he an only son, too!” His mother wept very much after his + disappearance. As it had never occurred to him to leave word behind, he + was mourned over for dead till, after eight months, his first letter + arrived from Talcahuano. It was short, and contained the statement: “We + had very fine weather on our passage out.” But evidently, in the writer's + mind, the only important intelligence was to the effect that his captain + had, on the very day of writing, entered him regularly on the ship's + articles as Ordinary Seaman. “Because I can do the work,” he explained. + The mother again wept copiously, while the remark, “Tom's an ass,” + expressed the emotions of the father. He was a corpulent man, with a gift + for sly chaffing, which to the end of his life he exercised in his + intercourse with his son, a little pityingly, as if upon a half-witted + person. + </p> + <p> + MacWhirr's visits to his home were necessarily rare, and in the course of + years he despatched other letters to his parents, informing them of his + successive promotions and of his movements upon the vast earth. In these + missives could be found sentences like this: “The heat here is very + great.” Or: “On Christmas day at 4 P. M. we fell in with some icebergs.” + The old people ultimately became acquainted with a good many names of + ships, and with the names of the skippers who commanded them—with + the names of Scots and English shipowners—with the names of seas, + oceans, straits, promontories—with outlandish names of lumber-ports, + of rice-ports, of cotton-ports—with the names of islands—with + the name of their son's young woman. She was called Lucy. It did not + suggest itself to him to mention whether he thought the name pretty. And + then they died. + </p> + <p> + The great day of MacWhirr's marriage came in due course, following shortly + upon the great day when he got his first command. + </p> + <p> + All these events had taken place many years before the morning when, in + the chart-room of the steamer Nan-Shan, he stood confronted by the fall of + a barometer he had no reason to distrust. The fall—taking into + account the excellence of the instrument, the time of the year, and the + ship's position on the terrestrial globe—was of a nature ominously + prophetic; but the red face of the man betrayed no sort of inward + disturbance. Omens were as nothing to him, and he was unable to discover + the message of a prophecy till the fulfilment had brought it home to his + very door. “That's a fall, and no mistake,” he thought. “There must be + some uncommonly dirty weather knocking about.” + </p> + <p> + The Nan-Shan was on her way from the southward to the treaty port of + Fu-chau, with some cargo in her lower holds, and two hundred Chinese + coolies returning to their village homes in the province of Fo-kien, after + a few years of work in various tropical colonies. The morning was fine, + the oily sea heaved without a sparkle, and there was a queer white misty + patch in the sky like a halo of the sun. The fore-deck, packed with + Chinamen, was full of sombre clothing, yellow faces, and pigtails, + sprinkled over with a good many naked shoulders, for there was no wind, + and the heat was close. The coolies lounged, talked, smoked, or stared + over the rail; some, drawing water over the side, sluiced each other; a + few slept on hatches, while several small parties of six sat on their + heels surrounding iron trays with plates of rice and tiny teacups; and + every single Celestial of them was carrying with him all he had in the + world—a wooden chest with a ringing lock and brass on the corners, + containing the savings of his labours: some clothes of ceremony, sticks of + incense, a little opium maybe, bits of nameless rubbish of conventional + value, and a small hoard of silver dollars, toiled for in coal lighters, + won in gambling-houses or in petty trading, grubbed out of earth, sweated + out in mines, on railway lines, in deadly jungle, under heavy burdens—amassed + patiently, guarded with care, cherished fiercely. + </p> + <p> + A cross swell had set in from the direction of Formosa Channel about ten + o'clock, without disturbing these passengers much, because the Nan-Shan, + with her flat bottom, rolling chocks on bilges, and great breadth of beam, + had the reputation of an exceptionally steady ship in a sea-way. Mr. + Jukes, in moments of expansion on shore, would proclaim loudly that the + “old girl was as good as she was pretty.” It would never have occurred to + Captain MacWhirr to express his favourable opinion so loud or in terms so + fanciful. + </p> + <p> + She was a good ship, undoubtedly, and not old either. She had been built + in Dumbarton less than three years before, to the order of a firm of + merchants in Siam—Messrs. Sigg and Son. When she lay afloat, + finished in every detail and ready to take up the work of her life, the + builders contemplated her with pride. + </p> + <p> + “Sigg has asked us for a reliable skipper to take her out,” remarked one + of the partners; and the other, after reflecting for a while, said: “I + think MacWhirr is ashore just at present.” “Is he? Then wire him at once. + He's the very man,” declared the senior, without a moment's hesitation. + </p> + <p> + Next morning MacWhirr stood before them unperturbed, having travelled from + London by the midnight express after a sudden but undemonstrative parting + with his wife. She was the daughter of a superior couple who had seen + better days. + </p> + <p> + “We had better be going together over the ship, Captain,” said the senior + partner; and the three men started to view the perfections of the Nan-Shan + from stem to stern, and from her keelson to the trucks of her two stumpy + pole-masts. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr had begun by taking off his coat, which he hung on the + end of a steam windless embodying all the latest improvements. + </p> + <p> + “My uncle wrote of you favourably by yesterday's mail to our good friends—Messrs. + Sigg, you know—and doubtless they'll continue you out there in + command,” said the junior partner. “You'll be able to boast of being in + charge of the handiest boat of her size on the coast of China, Captain,” + he added. + </p> + <p> + “Have you? Thank 'ee,” mumbled vaguely MacWhirr, to whom the view of a + distant eventuality could appeal no more than the beauty of a wide + landscape to a purblind tourist; and his eyes happening at the moment to + be at rest upon the lock of the cabin door, he walked up to it, full of + purpose, and began to rattle the handle vigorously, while he observed, in + his low, earnest voice, “You can't trust the workmen nowadays. A brand-new + lock, and it won't act at all. Stuck fast. See? See?” + </p> + <p> + As soon as they found themselves alone in their office across the yard: + “You praised that fellow up to Sigg. What is it you see in him?” asked the + nephew, with faint contempt. + </p> + <p> + “I admit he has nothing of your fancy skipper about him, if that's what + you mean,” said the elder man, curtly. “Is the foreman of the joiners on + the Nan-Shan outside? . . . Come in, Bates. How is it that you let Tait's + people put us off with a defective lock on the cabin door? The Captain + could see directly he set eye on it. Have it replaced at once. The little + straws, Bates . . . the little straws. . . .” + </p> + <p> + The lock was replaced accordingly, and a few days afterwards the Nan-Shan + steamed out to the East, without MacWhirr having offered any further + remark as to her fittings, or having been heard to utter a single word + hinting at pride in his ship, gratitude for his appointment, or + satisfaction at his prospects. + </p> + <p> + With a temperament neither loquacious nor taciturn he found very little + occasion to talk. There were matters of duty, of course—directions, + orders, and so on; but the past being to his mind done with, and the + future not there yet, the more general actualities of the day required no + comment—because facts can speak for themselves with overwhelming + precision. + </p> + <p> + Old Mr. Sigg liked a man of few words, and one that “you could be sure + would not try to improve upon his instructions.” MacWhirr satisfying these + requirements, was continued in command of the Nan-Shan, and applied + himself to the careful navigation of his ship in the China seas. She had + come out on a British register, but after some time Messrs. Sigg judged it + expedient to transfer her to the Siamese flag. + </p> + <p> + At the news of the contemplated transfer Jukes grew restless, as if under + a sense of personal affront. He went about grumbling to himself, and + uttering short scornful laughs. “Fancy having a ridiculous Noah's Ark + elephant in the ensign of one's ship,” he said once at the engine-room + door. “Dash me if I can stand it: I'll throw up the billet. Don't it make + you sick, Mr. Rout?” The chief engineer only cleared his throat with the + air of a man who knows the value of a good billet. + </p> + <p> + The first morning the new flag floated over the stern of the Nan-Shan + Jukes stood looking at it bitterly from the bridge. He struggled with his + feelings for a while, and then remarked, “Queer flag for a man to sail + under, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter with the flag?” inquired Captain MacWhirr. “Seems all + right to me.” And he walked across to the end of the bridge to have a good + look. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it looks queer to me,” burst out Jukes, greatly exasperated, and + flung off the bridge. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr was amazed at these manners. After a while he stepped + quietly into the chart-room, and opened his International Signal Code-book + at the plate where the flags of all the nations are correctly figured in + gaudy rows. He ran his finger over them, and when he came to Siam he + contemplated with great attention the red field and the white elephant. + Nothing could be more simple; but to make sure he brought the book out on + the bridge for the purpose of comparing the coloured drawing with the real + thing at the flagstaff astern. When next Jukes, who was carrying on the + duty that day with a sort of suppressed fierceness, happened on the + bridge, his commander observed: + </p> + <p> + “There's nothing amiss with that flag.” + </p> + <p> + “Isn't there?” mumbled Jukes, falling on his knees before a deck-locker + and jerking therefrom viciously a spare lead-line. + </p> + <p> + “No. I looked up the book. Length twice the breadth and the elephant + exactly in the middle. I thought the people ashore would know how to make + the local flag. Stands to reason. You were wrong, Jukes. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “Well, sir,” began Jukes, getting up excitedly, “all I can say—” He + fumbled for the end of the coil of line with trembling hands. + </p> + <p> + “That's all right.” Captain MacWhirr soothed him, sitting heavily on a + little canvas folding-stool he greatly affected. “All you have to do is to + take care they don't hoist the elephant upside-down before they get quite + used to it.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes flung the new lead-line over on the fore-deck with a loud “Here you + are, bo'ss'en—don't forget to wet it thoroughly,” and turned with + immense resolution towards his commander; but Captain MacWhirr spread his + elbows on the bridge-rail comfortably. + </p> + <p> + “Because it would be, I suppose, understood as a signal of distress,” he + went on. “What do you think? That elephant there, I take it, stands for + something in the nature of the Union Jack in the flag. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “Does it!” yelled Jukes, so that every head on the Nan-Shan's decks looked + towards the bridge. Then he sighed, and with sudden resignation: “It would + certainly be a dam' distressful sight,” he said, meekly. + </p> + <p> + Later in the day he accosted the chief engineer with a confidential, + “Here, let me tell you the old man's latest.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Solomon Rout (frequently alluded to as Long Sol, Old Sol, or Father + Rout), from finding himself almost invariably the tallest man on board + every ship he joined, had acquired the habit of a stooping, leisurely + condescension. His hair was scant and sandy, his flat cheeks were pale, + his bony wrists and long scholarly hands were pale, too, as though he had + lived all his life in the shade. + </p> + <p> + He smiled from on high at Jukes, and went on smoking and glancing about + quietly, in the manner of a kind uncle lending an ear to the tale of an + excited schoolboy. Then, greatly amused but impassive, he asked: + </p> + <p> + “And did you throw up the billet?” + </p> + <p> + “No,” cried Jukes, raising a weary, discouraged voice above the harsh buzz + of the Nan-Shan's friction winches. All of them were hard at work, + snatching slings of cargo, high up, to the end of long derricks, only, as + it seemed, to let them rip down recklessly by the run. The cargo chains + groaned in the gins, clinked on coamings, rattled over the side; and the + whole ship quivered, with her long gray flanks smoking in wreaths of + steam. “No,” cried Jukes, “I didn't. What's the good? I might just as well + fling my resignation at this bulkhead. I don't believe you can make a man + like that understand anything. He simply knocks me over.” + </p> + <p> + At that moment Captain MacWhirr, back from the shore, crossed the deck, + umbrella in hand, escorted by a mournful, self-possessed Chinaman, walking + behind in paper-soled silk shoes, and who also carried an umbrella. + </p> + <p> + The master of the Nan-Shan, speaking just audibly and gazing at his boots + as his manner was, remarked that it would be necessary to call at Fu-chau + this trip, and desired Mr. Rout to have steam up to-morrow afternoon at + one o'clock sharp. He pushed back his hat to wipe his forehead, observing + at the same time that he hated going ashore anyhow; while overtopping him + Mr. Rout, without deigning a word, smoked austerely, nursing his right + elbow in the palm of his left hand. Then Jukes was directed in the same + subdued voice to keep the forward 'tween-deck clear of cargo. Two hundred + coolies were going to be put down there. The Bun Hin Company were sending + that lot home. Twenty-five bags of rice would be coming off in a sampan + directly, for stores. All seven-years'-men they were, said Captain + MacWhirr, with a camphor-wood chest to every man. The carpenter should be + set to work nailing three-inch battens along the deck below, fore and aft, + to keep these boxes from shifting in a sea-way. Jukes had better look to + it at once. “D'ye hear, Jukes?” This chinaman here was coming with the + ship as far as Fu-chau—a sort of interpreter he would be. Bun Hin's + clerk he was, and wanted to have a look at the space. Jukes had better + take him forward. “D'ye hear, Jukes?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes took care to punctuate these instructions in proper places with the + obligatory “Yes, sir,” ejaculated without enthusiasm. His brusque “Come + along, John; make look see” set the Chinaman in motion at his heels. + </p> + <p> + “Wanchee look see, all same look see can do,” said Jukes, who having no + talent for foreign languages mangled the very pidgin-English cruelly. He + pointed at the open hatch. “Catchee number one piecie place to sleep in. + Eh?” + </p> + <p> + He was gruff, as became his racial superiority, but not unfriendly. The + Chinaman, gazing sad and speechless into the darkness of the hatchway, + seemed to stand at the head of a yawning grave. + </p> + <p> + “No catchee rain down there—savee?” pointed out Jukes. “Suppose + all'ee same fine weather, one piecie coolie-man come topside,” he pursued, + warming up imaginatively. “Make so—Phooooo!” He expanded his chest + and blew out his cheeks. “Savee, John? Breathe—fresh air. Good. Eh? + Washee him piecie pants, chow-chow top-side—see, John?” + </p> + <p> + With his mouth and hands he made exuberant motions of eating rice and + washing clothes; and the Chinaman, who concealed his distrust of this + pantomime under a collected demeanour tinged by a gentle and refined + melancholy, glanced out of his almond eyes from Jukes to the hatch and + back again. “Velly good,” he murmured, in a disconsolate undertone, and + hastened smoothly along the decks, dodging obstacles in his course. He + disappeared, ducking low under a sling of ten dirty gunny-bags full of + some costly merchandise and exhaling a repulsive smell. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr meantime had gone on the bridge, and into the chart-room, + where a letter, commenced two days before, awaited termination. These long + letters began with the words, “My darling wife,” and the steward, between + the scrubbing of the floors and the dusting of chronometer-boxes, snatched + at every opportunity to read them. They interested him much more than they + possibly could the woman for whose eye they were intended; and this for + the reason that they related in minute detail each successive trip of the + Nan-Shan. + </p> + <p> + Her master, faithful to facts, which alone his consciousness reflected, + would set them down with painstaking care upon many pages. The house in a + northern suburb to which these pages were addressed had a bit of garden + before the bow-windows, a deep porch of good appearance, coloured glass + with imitation lead frame in the front door. He paid five-and-forty pounds + a year for it, and did not think the rent too high, because Mrs. MacWhirr + (a pretentious person with a scraggy neck and a disdainful manner) was + admittedly ladylike, and in the neighbourhood considered as “quite + superior.” The only secret of her life was her abject terror of the time + when her husband would come home to stay for good. Under the same roof + there dwelt also a daughter called Lydia and a son, Tom. These two were + but slightly acquainted with their father. Mainly, they knew him as a rare + but privileged visitor, who of an evening smoked his pipe in the + dining-room and slept in the house. The lanky girl, upon the whole, was + rather ashamed of him; the boy was frankly and utterly indifferent in a + straightforward, delightful, unaffected way manly boys have. + </p> + <p> + And Captain MacWhirr wrote home from the coast of China twelve times every + year, desiring quaintly to be “remembered to the children,” and + subscribing himself “your loving husband,” as calmly as if the words so + long used by so many men were, apart from their shape, worn-out things, + and of a faded meaning. + </p> + <p> + The China seas north and south are narrow seas. They are seas full of + every-day, eloquent facts, such as islands, sand-banks, reefs, swift and + changeable currents—tangled facts that nevertheless speak to a + seaman in clear and definite language. Their speech appealed to Captain + MacWhirr's sense of realities so forcibly that he had given up his + state-room below and practically lived all his days on the bridge of his + ship, often having his meals sent up, and sleeping at night in the + chart-room. And he indited there his home letters. Each of them, without + exception, contained the phrase, “The weather has been very fine this + trip,” or some other form of a statement to that effect. And this + statement, too, in its wonderful persistence, was of the same perfect + accuracy as all the others they contained. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout likewise wrote letters; only no one on board knew how chatty he + could be pen in hand, because the chief engineer had enough imagination to + keep his desk locked. His wife relished his style greatly. They were a + childless couple, and Mrs. Rout, a big, high-bosomed, jolly woman of + forty, shared with Mr. Rout's toothless and venerable mother a little + cottage near Teddington. She would run over her correspondence, at + breakfast, with lively eyes, and scream out interesting passages in a + joyous voice at the deaf old lady, prefacing each extract by the warning + shout, “Solomon says!” She had the trick of firing off Solomon's + utterances also upon strangers, astonishing them easily by the unfamiliar + text and the unexpectedly jocular vein of these quotations. On the day the + new curate called for the first time at the cottage, she found occasion to + remark, “As Solomon says: 'the engineers that go down to the sea in ships + behold the wonders of sailor nature';” when a change in the visitor's + countenance made her stop and stare. + </p> + <p> + “Solomon. . . . Oh! . . . Mrs. Rout,” stuttered the young man, very red in + the face, “I must say . . . I don't. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “He's my husband,” she announced in a great shout, throwing herself back + in the chair. Perceiving the joke, she laughed immoderately with a + handkerchief to her eyes, while he sat wearing a forced smile, and, from + his inexperience of jolly women, fully persuaded that she must be + deplorably insane. They were excellent friends afterwards; for, absolving + her from irreverent intention, he came to think she was a very worthy + person indeed; and he learned in time to receive without flinching other + scraps of Solomon's wisdom. + </p> + <p> + “For my part,” Solomon was reported by his wife to have said once, “give + me the dullest ass for a skipper before a rogue. There is a way to take a + fool; but a rogue is smart and slippery.” This was an airy generalization + drawn from the particular case of Captain MacWhirr's honesty, which, in + itself, had the heavy obviousness of a lump of clay. On the other hand, + Mr. Jukes, unable to generalize, unmarried, and unengaged, was in the + habit of opening his heart after another fashion to an old chum and former + shipmate, actually serving as second officer on board an Atlantic liner. + </p> + <p> + First of all he would insist upon the advantages of the Eastern trade, + hinting at its superiority to the Western ocean service. He extolled the + sky, the seas, the ships, and the easy life of the Far East. The Nan-Shan, + he affirmed, was second to none as a sea-boat. + </p> + <p> + “We have no brass-bound uniforms, but then we are like brothers here,” he + wrote. “We all mess together and live like fighting-cocks. . . . All the + chaps of the black-squad are as decent as they make that kind, and old + Sol, the Chief, is a dry stick. We are good friends. As to our old man, + you could not find a quieter skipper. Sometimes you would think he hadn't + sense enough to see anything wrong. And yet it isn't that. Can't be. He + has been in command for a good few years now. He doesn't do anything + actually foolish, and gets his ship along all right without worrying + anybody. I believe he hasn't brains enough to enjoy kicking up a row. I + don't take advantage of him. I would scorn it. Outside the routine of duty + he doesn't seem to understand more than half of what you tell him. We get + a laugh out of this at times; but it is dull, too, to be with a man like + this—in the long-run. Old Sol says he hasn't much conversation. + Conversation! O Lord! He never talks. The other day I had been yarning + under the bridge with one of the engineers, and he must have heard us. + When I came up to take my watch, he steps out of the chart-room and has a + good look all round, peeps over at the sidelights, glances at the compass, + squints upward at the stars. That's his regular performance. By-and-by he + says: 'Was that you talking just now in the port alleyway?' 'Yes, sir.' + 'With the third engineer?' 'Yes, sir.' He walks off to starboard, and sits + under the dodger on a little campstool of his, and for half an hour + perhaps he makes no sound, except that I heard him sneeze once. Then after + a while I hear him getting up over there, and he strolls across to port, + where I was. 'I can't understand what you can find to talk about,' says + he. 'Two solid hours. I am not blaming you. I see people ashore at it all + day long, and then in the evening they sit down and keep at it over the + drinks. Must be saying the same things over and over again. I can't + understand.' + </p> + <p> + “Did you ever hear anything like that? And he was so patient about it. It + made me quite sorry for him. But he is exasperating, too, sometimes. Of + course one would not do anything to vex him even if it were worth while. + But it isn't. He's so jolly innocent that if you were to put your thumb to + your nose and wave your fingers at him he would only wonder gravely to + himself what got into you. He told me once quite simply that he found it + very difficult to make out what made people always act so queerly. He's + too dense to trouble about, and that's the truth.” + </p> + <p> + Thus wrote Mr. Jukes to his chum in the Western ocean trade, out of the + fulness of his heart and the liveliness of his fancy. + </p> + <p> + He had expressed his honest opinion. It was not worthwhile trying to + impress a man of that sort. If the world had been full of such men, life + would have probably appeared to Jukes an unentertaining and unprofitable + business. He was not alone in his opinion. The sea itself, as if sharing + Mr. Jukes' good-natured forbearance, had never put itself out to startle + the silent man, who seldom looked up, and wandered innocently over the + waters with the only visible purpose of getting food, raiment, and + house-room for three people ashore. Dirty weather he had known, of course. + He had been made wet, uncomfortable, tired in the usual way, felt at the + time and presently forgotten. So that upon the whole he had been justified + in reporting fine weather at home. But he had never been given a glimpse + of immeasurable strength and of immoderate wrath, the wrath that passes + exhausted but never appeased—the wrath and fury of the passionate + sea. He knew it existed, as we know that crime and abominations exist; he + had heard of it as a peaceable citizen in a town hears of battles, + famines, and floods, and yet knows nothing of what these things mean—though, + indeed, he may have been mixed up in a street row, have gone without his + dinner once, or been soaked to the skin in a shower. Captain MacWhirr had + sailed over the surface of the oceans as some men go skimming over the + years of existence to sink gently into a placid grave, ignorant of life to + the last, without ever having been made to see all it may contain of + perfidy, of violence, and of terror. There are on sea and land such men + thus fortunate—or thus disdained by destiny or by the sea. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II + </h2> + <p> + Observing the steady fall of the barometer, Captain MacWhirr thought, + “There's some dirty weather knocking about.” This is precisely what he + thought. He had had an experience of moderately dirty weather—the + term dirty as applied to the weather implying only moderate discomfort to + the seaman. Had he been informed by an indisputable authority that the end + of the world was to be finally accomplished by a catastrophic disturbance + of the atmosphere, he would have assimilated the information under the + simple idea of dirty weather, and no other, because he had no experience + of cataclysms, and belief does not necessarily imply comprehension. The + wisdom of his country had pronounced by means of an Act of Parliament that + before he could be considered as fit to take charge of a ship he should be + able to answer certain simple questions on the subject of circular storms + such as hurricanes, cyclones, typhoons; and apparently he had answered + them, since he was now in command of the Nan-Shan in the China seas during + the season of typhoons. But if he had answered he remembered nothing of + it. He was, however, conscious of being made uncomfortable by the clammy + heat. He came out on the bridge, and found no relief to this oppression. + The air seemed thick. He gasped like a fish, and began to believe himself + greatly out of sorts. + </p> + <p> + The Nan-Shan was ploughing a vanishing furrow upon the circle of the sea + that had the surface and the shimmer of an undulating piece of gray silk. + The sun, pale and without rays, poured down leaden heat in a strangely + indecisive light, and the Chinamen were lying prostrate about the decks. + Their bloodless, pinched, yellow faces were like the faces of bilious + invalids. Captain MacWhirr noticed two of them especially, stretched out + on their backs below the bridge. As soon as they had closed their eyes + they seemed dead. Three others, however, were quarrelling barbarously away + forward; and one big fellow, half naked, with herculean shoulders, was + hanging limply over a winch; another, sitting on the deck, his knees up + and his head drooping sideways in a girlish attitude, was plaiting his + pigtail with infinite languor depicted in his whole person and in the very + movement of his fingers. The smoke struggled with difficulty out of the + funnel, and instead of streaming away spread itself out like an infernal + sort of cloud, smelling of sulphur and raining soot all over the decks. + </p> + <p> + “What the devil are you doing there, Mr. Jukes?” asked Captain MacWhirr. + </p> + <p> + This unusual form of address, though mumbled rather than spoken, caused + the body of Mr. Jukes to start as though it had been prodded under the + fifth rib. He had had a low bench brought on the bridge, and sitting on + it, with a length of rope curled about his feet and a piece of canvas + stretched over his knees, was pushing a sail-needle vigorously. He looked + up, and his surprise gave to his eyes an expression of innocence and + candour. + </p> + <p> + “I am only roping some of that new set of bags we made last trip for + whipping up coals,” he remonstrated, gently. “We shall want them for the + next coaling, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “What became of the others?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, worn out of course, sir.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr, after glaring down irresolutely at his chief mate, + disclosed the gloomy and cynical conviction that more than half of them + had been lost overboard, “if only the truth was known,” and retired to the + other end of the bridge. Jukes, exasperated by this unprovoked attack, + broke the needle at the second stitch, and dropping his work got up and + cursed the heat in a violent undertone. + </p> + <p> + The propeller thumped, the three Chinamen forward had given up squabbling + very suddenly, and the one who had been plaiting his tail clasped his legs + and stared dejectedly over his knees. The lurid sunshine cast faint and + sickly shadows. The swell ran higher and swifter every moment, and the + ship lurched heavily in the smooth, deep hollows of the sea. + </p> + <p> + “I wonder where that beastly swell comes from,” said Jukes aloud, + recovering himself after a stagger. + </p> + <p> + “North-east,” grunted the literal MacWhirr, from his side of the bridge. + “There's some dirty weather knocking about. Go and look at the glass.” + </p> + <p> + When Jukes came out of the chart-room, the cast of his countenance had + changed to thoughtfulness and concern. He caught hold of the bridge-rail + and stared ahead. + </p> + <p> + The temperature in the engine-room had gone up to a hundred and seventeen + degrees. Irritated voices were ascending through the skylight and through + the fiddle of the stokehold in a harsh and resonant uproar, mingled with + angry clangs and scrapes of metal, as if men with limbs of iron and + throats of bronze had been quarrelling down there. The second engineer was + falling foul of the stokers for letting the steam go down. He was a man + with arms like a blacksmith, and generally feared; but that afternoon the + stokers were answering him back recklessly, and slammed the furnace doors + with the fury of despair. Then the noise ceased suddenly, and the second + engineer appeared, emerging out of the stokehold streaked with grime and + soaking wet like a chimney-sweep coming out of a well. As soon as his head + was clear of the fiddle he began to scold Jukes for not trimming properly + the stokehold ventilators; and in answer Jukes made with his hands + deprecatory soothing signs meaning: “No wind—can't be helped—you + can see for yourself.” But the other wouldn't hear reason. His teeth + flashed angrily in his dirty face. He didn't mind, he said, the trouble of + punching their blanked heads down there, blank his soul, but did the + condemned sailors think you could keep steam up in the God-forsaken + boilers simply by knocking the blanked stokers about? No, by George! You + had to get some draught, too—may he be everlastingly blanked for a + swab-headed deck-hand if you didn't! And the chief, too, rampaging before + the steam-gauge and carrying on like a lunatic up and down the engine-room + ever since noon. What did Jukes think he was stuck up there for, if he + couldn't get one of his decayed, good-for-nothing deck-cripples to turn + the ventilators to the wind? + </p> + <p> + The relations of the “engine-room” and the “deck” of the Nan-Shan were, as + is known, of a brotherly nature; therefore Jukes leaned over and begged + the other in a restrained tone not to make a disgusting ass of himself; + the skipper was on the other side of the bridge. But the second declared + mutinously that he didn't care a rap who was on the other side of the + bridge, and Jukes, passing in a flash from lofty disapproval into a state + of exaltation, invited him in unflattering terms to come up and twist the + beastly things to please himself, and catch such wind as a donkey of his + sort could find. The second rushed up to the fray. He flung himself at the + port ventilator as though he meant to tear it out bodily and toss it + overboard. All he did was to move the cowl round a few inches, with an + enormous expenditure of force, and seemed spent in the effort. He leaned + against the back of the wheelhouse, and Jukes walked up to him. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Heavens!” ejaculated the engineer in a feeble voice. He lifted his + eyes to the sky, and then let his glassy stare descend to meet the horizon + that, tilting up to an angle of forty degrees, seemed to hang on a slant + for a while and settled down slowly. “Heavens! Phew! What's up, anyhow?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes, straddling his long legs like a pair of compasses, put on an air of + superiority. “We're going to catch it this time,” he said. “The barometer + is tumbling down like anything, Harry. And you trying to kick up that + silly row. . . .” + </p> + <p> + The word “barometer” seemed to revive the second engineer's mad animosity. + Collecting afresh all his energies, he directed Jukes in a low and brutal + tone to shove the unmentionable instrument down his gory throat. Who cared + for his crimson barometer? It was the steam—the steam—that was + going down; and what between the firemen going faint and the chief going + silly, it was worse than a dog's life for him; he didn't care a tinker's + curse how soon the whole show was blown out of the water. He seemed on the + point of having a cry, but after regaining his breath he muttered darkly, + “I'll faint them,” and dashed off. He stopped upon the fiddle long enough + to shake his fist at the unnatural daylight, and dropped into the dark + hole with a whoop. + </p> + <p> + When Jukes turned, his eyes fell upon the rounded back and the big red + ears of Captain MacWhirr, who had come across. He did not look at his + chief officer, but said at once, “That's a very violent man, that second + engineer.” + </p> + <p> + “Jolly good second, anyhow,” grunted Jukes. “They can't keep up steam,” he + added, rapidly, and made a grab at the rail against the coming lurch. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr, unprepared, took a run and brought himself up with a + jerk by an awning stanchion. + </p> + <p> + “A profane man,” he said, obstinately. “If this goes on, I'll have to get + rid of him the first chance.” + </p> + <p> + “It's the heat,” said Jukes. “The weather's awful. It would make a saint + swear. Even up here I feel exactly as if I had my head tied up in a + woollen blanket.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr looked up. “D'ye mean to say, Mr. Jukes, you ever had + your head tied up in a blanket? What was that for?” + </p> + <p> + “It's a manner of speaking, sir,” said Jukes, stolidly. + </p> + <p> + “Some of you fellows do go on! What's that about saints swearing? I wish + you wouldn't talk so wild. What sort of saint would that be that would + swear? No more saint than yourself, I expect. And what's a blanket got to + do with it—or the weather either. . . . The heat does not make me + swear—does it? It's filthy bad temper. That's what it is. And what's + the good of your talking like this?” + </p> + <p> + Thus Captain MacWhirr expostulated against the use of images in speech, + and at the end electrified Jukes by a contemptuous snort, followed by + words of passion and resentment: “Damme! I'll fire him out of the ship if + he don't look out.” + </p> + <p> + And Jukes, incorrigible, thought: “Goodness me! Somebody's put a new + inside to my old man. Here's temper, if you like. Of course it's the + weather; what else? It would make an angel quarrelsome—let alone a + saint.” + </p> + <p> + All the Chinamen on deck appeared at their last gasp. + </p> + <p> + At its setting the sun had a diminished diameter and an expiring brown, + rayless glow, as if millions of centuries elapsing since the morning had + brought it near its end. A dense bank of cloud became visible to the + northward; it had a sinister dark olive tint, and lay low and motionless + upon the sea, resembling a solid obstacle in the path of the ship. She + went floundering towards it like an exhausted creature driven to its + death. The coppery twilight retired slowly, and the darkness brought out + overhead a swarm of unsteady, big stars, that, as if blown upon, flickered + exceedingly and seemed to hang very near the earth. At eight o'clock Jukes + went into the chart-room to write up the ship's log. + </p> + <p> + He copies neatly out of the rough-book the number of miles, the course of + the ship, and in the column for “wind” scrawled the word “calm” from top + to bottom of the eight hours since noon. He was exasperated by the + continuous, monotonous rolling of the ship. The heavy inkstand would slide + away in a manner that suggested perverse intelligence in dodging the pen. + Having written in the large space under the head of “Remarks” “Heat very + oppressive,” he stuck the end of the penholder in his teeth, pipe fashion, + and mopped his face carefully. + </p> + <p> + “Ship rolling heavily in a high cross swell,” he began again, and + commented to himself, “Heavily is no word for it.” Then he wrote: “Sunset + threatening, with a low bank of clouds to N. and E. Sky clear overhead.” + </p> + <p> + Sprawling over the table with arrested pen, he glanced out of the door, + and in that frame of his vision he saw all the stars flying upwards + between the teakwood jambs on a black sky. The whole lot took flight + together and disappeared, leaving only a blackness flecked with white + flashes, for the sea was as black as the sky and speckled with foam afar. + The stars that had flown to the roll came back on the return swing of the + ship, rushing downwards in their glittering multitude, not of fiery + points, but enlarged to tiny discs brilliant with a clear wet sheen. + </p> + <p> + Jukes watched the flying big stars for a moment, and then wrote: “8 P.M. + Swell increasing. Ship labouring and taking water on her decks. Battened + down the coolies for the night. Barometer still falling.” He paused, and + thought to himself, “Perhaps nothing whatever'll come of it.” And then he + closed resolutely his entries: “Every appearance of a typhoon coming on.” + </p> + <p> + On going out he had to stand aside, and Captain MacWhirr strode over the + doorstep without saying a word or making a sign. + </p> + <p> + “Shut the door, Mr. Jukes, will you?” he cried from within. + </p> + <p> + Jukes turned back to do so, muttering ironically: “Afraid to catch cold, I + suppose.” It was his watch below, but he yearned for communion with his + kind; and he remarked cheerily to the second mate: “Doesn't look so bad, + after all—does it?” + </p> + <p> + The second mate was marching to and fro on the bridge, tripping down with + small steps one moment, and the next climbing with difficulty the shifting + slope of the deck. At the sound of Jukes' voice he stood still, facing + forward, but made no reply. + </p> + <p> + “Hallo! That's a heavy one,” said Jukes, swaying to meet the long roll + till his lowered hand touched the planks. This time the second mate made + in his throat a noise of an unfriendly nature. + </p> + <p> + He was an oldish, shabby little fellow, with bad teeth and no hair on his + face. He had been shipped in a hurry in Shanghai, that trip when the + second officer brought from home had delayed the ship three hours in port + by contriving (in some manner Captain MacWhirr could never understand) to + fall overboard into an empty coal-lighter lying alongside, and had to be + sent ashore to the hospital with concussion of the brain and a broken limb + or two. + </p> + <p> + Jukes was not discouraged by the unsympathetic sound. “The Chinamen must + be having a lovely time of it down there,” he said. “It's lucky for them + the old girl has the easiest roll of any ship I've ever been in. There + now! This one wasn't so bad.” + </p> + <p> + “You wait,” snarled the second mate. + </p> + <p> + With his sharp nose, red at the tip, and his thin pinched lips, he always + looked as though he were raging inwardly; and he was concise in his speech + to the point of rudeness. All his time off duty he spent in his cabin with + the door shut, keeping so still in there that he was supposed to fall + asleep as soon as he had disappeared; but the man who came in to wake him + for his watch on deck would invariably find him with his eyes wide open, + flat on his back in the bunk, and glaring irritably from a soiled pillow. + He never wrote any letters, did not seem to hope for news from anywhere; + and though he had been heard once to mention West Hartlepool, it was with + extreme bitterness, and only in connection with the extortionate charges + of a boarding-house. He was one of those men who are picked up at need in + the ports of the world. They are competent enough, appear hopelessly hard + up, show no evidence of any sort of vice, and carry about them all the + signs of manifest failure. They come aboard on an emergency, care for no + ship afloat, live in their own atmosphere of casual connection amongst + their shipmates who know nothing of them, and make up their minds to leave + at inconvenient times. They clear out with no words of leavetaking in some + God-forsaken port other men would fear to be stranded in, and go ashore in + company of a shabby sea-chest, corded like a treasure-box, and with an air + of shaking the ship's dust off their feet. + </p> + <p> + “You wait,” he repeated, balanced in great swings with his back to Jukes, + motionless and implacable. + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say we are going to catch it hot?” asked Jukes with boyish + interest. + </p> + <p> + “Say? . . . I say nothing. You don't catch me,” snapped the little second + mate, with a mixture of pride, scorn, and cunning, as if Jukes' question + had been a trap cleverly detected. “Oh, no! None of you here shall make a + fool of me if I know it,” he mumbled to himself. + </p> + <p> + Jukes reflected rapidly that this second mate was a mean little beast, and + in his heart he wished poor Jack Allen had never smashed himself up in the + coal-lighter. The far-off blackness ahead of the ship was like another + night seen through the starry night of the earth—the starless night + of the immensities beyond the created universe, revealed in its appalling + stillness through a low fissure in the glittering sphere of which the + earth is the kernel. + </p> + <p> + “Whatever there might be about,” said Jukes, “we are steaming straight + into it.” + </p> + <p> + “You've said it,” caught up the second mate, always with his back to + Jukes. “You've said it, mind—not I.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, go to Jericho!” said Jukes, frankly; and the other emitted a + triumphant little chuckle. + </p> + <p> + “You've said it,” he repeated. + </p> + <p> + “And what of that?” + </p> + <p> + “I've known some real good men get into trouble with their skippers for + saying a dam' sight less,” answered the second mate feverishly. “Oh, no! + You don't catch me.” + </p> + <p> + “You seem deucedly anxious not to give yourself away,” said Jukes, + completely soured by such absurdity. “I wouldn't be afraid to say what I + think.” + </p> + <p> + “Aye, to me! That's no great trick. I am nobody, and well I know it.” + </p> + <p> + The ship, after a pause of comparative steadiness, started upon a series + of rolls, one worse than the other, and for a time Jukes, preserving his + equilibrium, was too busy to open his mouth. As soon as the violent + swinging had quieted down somewhat, he said: “This is a bit too much of a + good thing. Whether anything is coming or not I think she ought to be put + head on to that swell. The old man is just gone in to lie down. Hang me if + I don't speak to him.” + </p> + <p> + But when he opened the door of the chart-room he saw his captain reading a + book. Captain MacWhirr was not lying down: he was standing up with one + hand grasping the edge of the bookshelf and the other holding open before + his face a thick volume. The lamp wriggled in the gimbals, the loosened + books toppled from side to side on the shelf, the long barometer swung in + jerky circles, the table altered its slant every moment. In the midst of + all this stir and movement Captain MacWhirr, holding on, showed his eyes + above the upper edge, and asked, “What's the matter?” + </p> + <p> + “Swell getting worse, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “Noticed that in here,” muttered Captain MacWhirr. “Anything wrong?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes, inwardly disconcerted by the seriousness of the eyes looking at him + over the top of the book, produced an embarrassed grin. + </p> + <p> + “Rolling like old boots,” he said, sheepishly. + </p> + <p> + “Aye! Very heavy—very heavy. What do you want?” + </p> + <p> + At this Jukes lost his footing and began to flounder. “I was thinking of + our passengers,” he said, in the manner of a man clutching at a straw. + </p> + <p> + “Passengers?” wondered the Captain, gravely. “What passengers?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, the Chinamen, sir,” explained Jukes, very sick of this conversation. + </p> + <p> + “The Chinamen! Why don't you speak plainly? Couldn't tell what you meant. + Never heard a lot of coolies spoken of as passengers before. Passengers, + indeed! What's come to you?” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr, closing the book on his forefinger, lowered his arm and + looked completely mystified. “Why are you thinking of the Chinamen, Mr. + Jukes?” he inquired. + </p> + <p> + Jukes took a plunge, like a man driven to it. “She's rolling her decks + full of water, sir. Thought you might put her head on perhaps—for a + while. Till this goes down a bit—very soon, I dare say. Head to the + eastward. I never knew a ship roll like this.” + </p> + <p> + He held on in the doorway, and Captain MacWhirr, feeling his grip on the + shelf inadequate, made up his mind to let go in a hurry, and fell heavily + on the couch. + </p> + <p> + “Head to the eastward?” he said, struggling to sit up. “That's more than + four points off her course.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir. Fifty degrees. . . . Would just bring her head far enough round + to meet this. . . .” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr was now sitting up. He had not dropped the book, and he + had not lost his place. + </p> + <p> + “To the eastward?” he repeated, with dawning astonishment. “To the . . . + Where do you think we are bound to? You want me to haul a full-powered + steamship four points off her course to make the Chinamen comfortable! + Now, I've heard more than enough of mad things done in the world—but + this. . . . If I didn't know you, Jukes, I would think you were in liquor. + Steer four points off. . . . And what afterwards? Steer four points over + the other way, I suppose, to make the course good. What put it into your + head that I would start to tack a steamer as if she were a sailing-ship?” + </p> + <p> + “Jolly good thing she isn't,” threw in Jukes, with bitter readiness. “She + would have rolled every blessed stick out of her this afternoon.” + </p> + <p> + “Aye! And you just would have had to stand and see them go,” said Captain + MacWhirr, showing a certain animation. “It's a dead calm, isn't it?” + </p> + <p> + “It is, sir. But there's something out of the common coming, for sure.” + </p> + <p> + “Maybe. I suppose you have a notion I should be getting out of the way of + that dirt,” said Captain MacWhirr, speaking with the utmost simplicity of + manner and tone, and fixing the oilcloth on the floor with a heavy stare. + Thus he noticed neither Jukes' discomfiture nor the mixture of vexation + and astonished respect on his face. + </p> + <p> + “Now, here's this book,” he continued with deliberation, slapping his + thigh with the closed volume. “I've been reading the chapter on the storms + there.” + </p> + <p> + This was true. He had been reading the chapter on the storms. When he had + entered the chart-room, it was with no intention of taking the book down. + Some influence in the air—the same influence, probably, that caused + the steward to bring without orders the Captain's sea-boots and oilskin + coat up to the chart-room—had as it were guided his hand to the + shelf; and without taking the time to sit down he had waded with a + conscious effort into the terminology of the subject. He lost himself + amongst advancing semi-circles, left- and right-hand quadrants, the curves + of the tracks, the probable bearing of the centre, the shifts of wind and + the readings of barometer. He tried to bring all these things into a + definite relation to himself, and ended by becoming contemptuously angry + with such a lot of words, and with so much advice, all head-work and + supposition, without a glimmer of certitude. + </p> + <p> + “It's the damnedest thing, Jukes,” he said. “If a fellow was to believe + all that's in there, he would be running most of his time all over the sea + trying to get behind the weather.” + </p> + <p> + Again he slapped his leg with the book; and Jukes opened his mouth, but + said nothing. + </p> + <p> + “Running to get behind the weather! Do you understand that, Mr. Jukes? + It's the maddest thing!” ejaculated Captain MacWhirr, with pauses, gazing + at the floor profoundly. “You would think an old woman had been writing + this. It passes me. If that thing means anything useful, then it means + that I should at once alter the course away, away to the devil somewhere, + and come booming down on Fu-chau from the northward at the tail of this + dirty weather that's supposed to be knocking about in our way. From the + north! Do you understand, Mr. Jukes? Three hundred extra miles to the + distance, and a pretty coal bill to show. I couldn't bring myself to do + that if every word in there was gospel truth, Mr. Jukes. Don't you expect + me. . . .” + </p> + <p> + And Jukes, silent, marvelled at this display of feeling and loquacity. + </p> + <p> + “But the truth is that you don't know if the fellow is right, anyhow. How + can you tell what a gale is made of till you get it? He isn't aboard here, + is he? Very well. Here he says that the centre of them things bears eight + points off the wind; but we haven't got any wind, for all the barometer + falling. Where's his centre now?” + </p> + <p> + “We will get the wind presently,” mumbled Jukes. + </p> + <p> + “Let it come, then,” said Captain MacWhirr, with dignified indignation. + “It's only to let you see, Mr. Jukes, that you don't find everything in + books. All these rules for dodging breezes and circumventing the winds of + heaven, Mr. Jukes, seem to me the maddest thing, when you come to look at + it sensibly.” + </p> + <p> + He raised his eyes, saw Jukes gazing at him dubiously, and tried to + illustrate his meaning. + </p> + <p> + “About as queer as your extraordinary notion of dodging the ship head to + sea, for I don't know how long, to make the Chinamen comfortable; whereas + all we've got to do is to take them to Fu-chau, being timed to get there + before noon on Friday. If the weather delays me—very well. There's + your log-book to talk straight about the weather. But suppose I went + swinging off my course and came in two days late, and they asked me: + 'Where have you been all that time, Captain?' What could I say to that? + 'Went around to dodge the bad weather,' I would say. 'It must've been dam' + bad,' they would say. 'Don't know,' I would have to say; 'I've dodged + clear of it.' See that, Jukes? I have been thinking it all out this + afternoon.” + </p> + <p> + He looked up again in his unseeing, unimaginative way. No one had ever + heard him say so much at one time. Jukes, with his arms open in the + doorway, was like a man invited to behold a miracle. Unbounded wonder was + the intellectual meaning of his eye, while incredulity was seated in his + whole countenance. + </p> + <p> + “A gale is a gale, Mr. Jukes,” resumed the Captain, “and a full-powered + steam-ship has got to face it. There's just so much dirty weather knocking + about the world, and the proper thing is to go through it with none of + what old Captain Wilson of the Melita calls 'storm strategy.' The other + day ashore I heard him hold forth about it to a lot of shipmasters who + came in and sat at a table next to mine. It seemed to me the greatest + nonsense. He was telling them how he outmanoeuvred, I think he said, a + terrific gale, so that it never came nearer than fifty miles to him. A + neat piece of head-work he called it. How he knew there was a terrific + gale fifty miles off beats me altogether. It was like listening to a crazy + man. I would have thought Captain Wilson was old enough to know better.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr ceased for a moment, then said, “It's your watch below, + Mr. Jukes?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes came to himself with a start. “Yes, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “Leave orders to call me at the slightest change,” said the Captain. He + reached up to put the book away, and tucked his legs upon the couch. “Shut + the door so that it don't fly open, will you? I can't stand a door + banging. They've put a lot of rubbishy locks into this ship, I must say.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr closed his eyes. + </p> + <p> + He did so to rest himself. He was tired, and he experienced that state of + mental vacuity which comes at the end of an exhaustive discussion that has + liberated some belief matured in the course of meditative years. He had + indeed been making his confession of faith, had he only known it; and its + effect was to make Jukes, on the other side of the door, stand scratching + his head for a good while. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr opened his eyes. + </p> + <p> + He thought he must have been asleep. What was that loud noise? Wind? Why + had he not been called? The lamp wriggled in its gimbals, the barometer + swung in circles, the table altered its slant every moment; a pair of limp + sea-boots with collapsed tops went sliding past the couch. He put out his + hand instantly, and captured one. + </p> + <p> + Jukes' face appeared in a crack of the door: only his face, very red, with + staring eyes. The flame of the lamp leaped, a piece of paper flew up, a + rush of air enveloped Captain MacWhirr. Beginning to draw on the boot, he + directed an expectant gaze at Jukes' swollen, excited features. + </p> + <p> + “Came on like this,” shouted Jukes, “five minutes ago . . . all of a + sudden.” + </p> + <p> + The head disappeared with a bang, and a heavy splash and patter of drops + swept past the closed door as if a pailful of melted lead had been flung + against the house. A whistling could be heard now upon the deep vibrating + noise outside. The stuffy chart-room seemed as full of draughts as a shed. + Captain MacWhirr collared the other sea-boot on its violent passage along + the floor. He was not flustered, but he could not find at once the opening + for inserting his foot. The shoes he had flung off were scurrying from end + to end of the cabin, gambolling playfully over each other like puppies. As + soon as he stood up he kicked at them viciously, but without effect. + </p> + <p> + He threw himself into the attitude of a lunging fencer, to reach after his + oilskin coat; and afterwards he staggered all over the confined space + while he jerked himself into it. Very grave, straddling his legs far + apart, and stretching his neck, he started to tie deliberately the strings + of his sou'-wester under his chin, with thick fingers that trembled + slightly. He went through all the movements of a woman putting on her + bonnet before a glass, with a strained, listening attention, as though he + had expected every moment to hear the shout of his name in the confused + clamour that had suddenly beset his ship. Its increase filled his ears + while he was getting ready to go out and confront whatever it might mean. + It was tumultuous and very loud—made up of the rush of the wind, the + crashes of the sea, with that prolonged deep vibration of the air, like + the roll of an immense and remote drum beating the charge of the gale. + </p> + <p> + He stood for a moment in the light of the lamp, thick, clumsy, shapeless + in his panoply of combat, vigilant and red-faced. + </p> + <p> + “There's a lot of weight in this,” he muttered. + </p> + <p> + As soon as he attempted to open the door the wind caught it. Clinging to + the handle, he was dragged out over the doorstep, and at once found + himself engaged with the wind in a sort of personal scuffle whose object + was the shutting of that door. At the last moment a tongue of air scurried + in and licked out the flame of the lamp. + </p> + <p> + Ahead of the ship he perceived a great darkness lying upon a multitude of + white flashes; on the starboard beam a few amazing stars drooped, dim and + fitful, above an immense waste of broken seas, as if seen through a mad + drift of smoke. + </p> + <p> + On the bridge a knot of men, indistinct and toiling, were making great + efforts in the light of the wheelhouse windows that shone mistily on their + heads and backs. Suddenly darkness closed upon one pane, then on another. + The voices of the lost group reached him after the manner of men's voices + in a gale, in shreds and fragments of forlorn shouting snatched past the + ear. All at once Jukes appeared at his side, yelling, with his head down. + </p> + <p> + “Watch—put in—wheelhouse shutters—glass—afraid—blow + in.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes heard his commander upbraiding. + </p> + <p> + “This—come—anything—warning—call me.” + </p> + <p> + He tried to explain, with the uproar pressing on his lips. + </p> + <p> + “Light air—remained—bridge—sudden—north-east—could + turn—thought—you—sure—hear.” + </p> + <p> + They had gained the shelter of the weather-cloth, and could converse with + raised voices, as people quarrel. + </p> + <p> + “I got the hands along to cover up all the ventilators. Good job I had + remained on deck. I didn't think you would be asleep, and so . . . What + did you say, sir? What?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing,” cried Captain MacWhirr. “I said—all right.” + </p> + <p> + “By all the powers! We've got it this time,” observed Jukes in a howl. + </p> + <p> + “You haven't altered her course?” inquired Captain MacWhirr, straining his + voice. + </p> + <p> + “No, sir. Certainly not. Wind came out right ahead. And here comes the + head sea.” + </p> + <p> + A plunge of the ship ended in a shock as if she had landed her forefoot + upon something solid. After a moment of stillness a lofty flight of sprays + drove hard with the wind upon their faces. + </p> + <p> + “Keep her at it as long as we can,” shouted Captain MacWhirr. + </p> + <p> + Before Jukes had squeezed the salt water out of his eyes all the stars had + disappeared. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III + </h2> + <p> + Jukes was as ready a man as any half-dozen young mates that may be caught + by casting a net upon the waters; and though he had been somewhat taken + aback by the startling viciousness of the first squall, he had pulled + himself together on the instant, had called out the hands and had rushed + them along to secure such openings about the deck as had not been already + battened down earlier in the evening. Shouting in his fresh, stentorian + voice, “Jump, boys, and bear a hand!” he led in the work, telling himself + the while that he had “just expected this.” + </p> + <p> + But at the same time he was growing aware that this was rather more than + he had expected. From the first stir of the air felt on his cheek the gale + seemed to take upon itself the accumulated impetus of an avalanche. Heavy + sprays enveloped the Nan-Shan from stem to stern, and instantly in the + midst of her regular rolling she began to jerk and plunge as though she + had gone mad with fright. + </p> + <p> + Jukes thought, “This is no joke.” While he was exchanging explanatory + yells with his captain, a sudden lowering of the darkness came upon the + night, falling before their vision like something palpable. It was as if + the masked lights of the world had been turned down. Jukes was + uncritically glad to have his captain at hand. It relieved him as though + that man had, by simply coming on deck, taken most of the gale's weight + upon his shoulders. Such is the prestige, the privilege, and the burden of + command. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr could expect no relief of that sort from any one on + earth. Such is the loneliness of command. He was trying to see, with that + watchful manner of a seaman who stares into the wind's eye as if into the + eye of an adversary, to penetrate the hidden intention and guess the aim + and force of the thrust. The strong wind swept at him out of a vast + obscurity; he felt under his feet the uneasiness of his ship, and he could + not even discern the shadow of her shape. He wished it were not so; and + very still he waited, feeling stricken by a blind man's helplessness. + </p> + <p> + To be silent was natural to him, dark or shine. Jukes, at his elbow, made + himself heard yelling cheerily in the gusts, “We must have got the worst + of it at once, sir.” A faint burst of lightning quivered all round, as if + flashed into a cavern—into a black and secret chamber of the sea, + with a floor of foaming crests. + </p> + <p> + It unveiled for a sinister, fluttering moment a ragged mass of clouds + hanging low, the lurch of the long outlines of the ship, the black figures + of men caught on the bridge, heads forward, as if petrified in the act of + butting. The darkness palpitated down upon all this, and then the real + thing came at last. + </p> + <p> + It was something formidable and swift, like the sudden smashing of a vial + of wrath. It seemed to explode all round the ship with an overpowering + concussion and a rush of great waters, as if an immense dam had been blown + up to windward. In an instant the men lost touch of each other. This is + the disintegrating power of a great wind: it isolates one from one's kind. + An earthquake, a landslip, an avalanche, overtake a man incidentally, as + it were—without passion. A furious gale attacks him like a personal + enemy, tries to grasp his limbs, fastens upon his mind, seeks to rout his + very spirit out of him. + </p> + <p> + Jukes was driven away from his commander. He fancied himself whirled a + great distance through the air. Everything disappeared—even, for a + moment, his power of thinking; but his hand had found one of the + rail-stanchions. His distress was by no means alleviated by an inclination + to disbelieve the reality of this experience. Though young, he had seen + some bad weather, and had never doubted his ability to imagine the worst; + but this was so much beyond his powers of fancy that it appeared + incompatible with the existence of any ship whatever. He would have been + incredulous about himself in the same way, perhaps, had he not been so + harassed by the necessity of exerting a wrestling effort against a force + trying to tear him away from his hold. Moreover, the conviction of not + being utterly destroyed returned to him through the sensations of being + half-drowned, bestially shaken, and partly choked. + </p> + <p> + It seemed to him he remained there precariously alone with the stanchion + for a long, long time. The rain poured on him, flowed, drove in sheets. He + breathed in gasps; and sometimes the water he swallowed was fresh and + sometimes it was salt. For the most part he kept his eyes shut tight, as + if suspecting his sight might be destroyed in the immense flurry of the + elements. When he ventured to blink hastily, he derived some moral support + from the green gleam of the starboard light shining feebly upon the flight + of rain and sprays. He was actually looking at it when its ray fell upon + the uprearing sea which put it out. He saw the head of the wave topple + over, adding the mite of its crash to the tremendous uproar raging around + him, and almost at the same instant the stanchion was wrenched away from + his embracing arms. After a crushing thump on his back he found himself + suddenly afloat and borne upwards. His first irresistible notion was that + the whole China Sea had climbed on the bridge. Then, more sanely, he + concluded himself gone overboard. All the time he was being tossed, flung, + and rolled in great volumes of water, he kept on repeating mentally, with + the utmost precipitation, the words: “My God! My God! My God! My God!” + </p> + <p> + All at once, in a revolt of misery and despair, he formed the crazy + resolution to get out of that. And he began to thresh about with his arms + and legs. But as soon as he commenced his wretched struggles he discovered + that he had become somehow mixed up with a face, an oilskin coat, + somebody's boots. He clawed ferociously all these things in turn, lost + them, found them again, lost them once more, and finally was himself + caught in the firm clasp of a pair of stout arms. He returned the embrace + closely round a thick solid body. He had found his captain. + </p> + <p> + They tumbled over and over, tightening their hug. Suddenly the water let + them down with a brutal bang; and, stranded against the side of the + wheelhouse, out of breath and bruised, they were left to stagger up in the + wind and hold on where they could. + </p> + <p> + Jukes came out of it rather horrified, as though he had escaped some + unparalleled outrage directed at his feelings. It weakened his faith in + himself. He started shouting aimlessly to the man he could feel near him + in that fiendish blackness, “Is it you, sir? Is it you, sir?” till his + temples seemed ready to burst. And he heard in answer a voice, as if + crying far away, as if screaming to him fretfully from a very great + distance, the one word “Yes!” Other seas swept again over the bridge. He + received them defencelessly right over his bare head, with both his hands + engaged in holding. + </p> + <p> + The motion of the ship was extravagant. Her lurches had an appalling + helplessness: she pitched as if taking a header into a void, and seemed to + find a wall to hit every time. When she rolled she fell on her side + headlong, and she would be righted back by such a demolishing blow that + Jukes felt her reeling as a clubbed man reels before he collapses. The + gale howled and scuffled about gigantically in the darkness, as though the + entire world were one black gully. At certain moments the air streamed + against the ship as if sucked through a tunnel with a concentrated solid + force of impact that seemed to lift her clean out of the water and keep + her up for an instant with only a quiver running through her from end to + end. And then she would begin her tumbling again as if dropped back into a + boiling cauldron. Jukes tried hard to compose his mind and judge things + coolly. + </p> + <p> + The sea, flattened down in the heavier gusts, would uprise and overwhelm + both ends of the Nan-Shan in snowy rushes of foam, expanding wide, beyond + both rails, into the night. And on this dazzling sheet, spread under the + blackness of the clouds and emitting a bluish glow, Captain MacWhirr could + catch a desolate glimpse of a few tiny specks black as ebony, the tops of + the hatches, the battened companions, the heads of the covered winches, + the foot of a mast. This was all he could see of his ship. Her middle + structure, covered by the bridge which bore him, his mate, the closed + wheelhouse where a man was steering shut up with the fear of being swept + overboard together with the whole thing in one great crash—her + middle structure was like a half-tide rock awash upon a coast. It was like + an outlying rock with the water boiling up, streaming over, pouring off, + beating round—like a rock in the surf to which shipwrecked people + cling before they let go—only it rose, it sank, it rolled + continuously, without respite and rest, like a rock that should have + miraculously struck adrift from a coast and gone wallowing upon the sea. + </p> + <p> + The Nan-Shan was being looted by the storm with a senseless, destructive + fury: trysails torn out of the extra gaskets, double-lashed awnings blown + away, bridge swept clean, weather-cloths burst, rails twisted, + light-screens smashed—and two of the boats had gone already. They + had gone unheard and unseen, melting, as it were, in the shock and smother + of the wave. It was only later, when upon the white flash of another high + sea hurling itself amidships, Jukes had a vision of two pairs of davits + leaping black and empty out of the solid blackness, with one overhauled + fall flying and an iron-bound block capering in the air, that he became + aware of what had happened within about three yards of his back. + </p> + <p> + He poked his head forward, groping for the ear of his commander. His lips + touched it—big, fleshy, very wet. He cried in an agitated tone, “Our + boats are going now, sir.” + </p> + <p> + And again he heard that voice, forced and ringing feebly, but with a + penetrating effect of quietness in the enormous discord of noises, as if + sent out from some remote spot of peace beyond the black wastes of the + gale; again he heard a man's voice—the frail and indomitable sound + that can be made to carry an infinity of thought, resolution and purpose, + that shall be pronouncing confident words on the last day, when heavens + fall, and justice is done—again he heard it, and it was crying to + him, as if from very, very far—“All right.” + </p> + <p> + He thought he had not managed to make himself understood. “Our boats—I + say boats—the boats, sir! Two gone!” + </p> + <p> + The same voice, within a foot of him and yet so remote, yelled sensibly, + “Can't be helped.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr had never turned his face, but Jukes caught some more + words on the wind. + </p> + <p> + “What can—expect—when hammering through—such—Bound + to leave—something behind—stands to reason.” + </p> + <p> + Watchfully Jukes listened for more. No more came. This was all Captain + MacWhirr had to say; and Jukes could picture to himself rather than see + the broad squat back before him. An impenetrable obscurity pressed down + upon the ghostly glimmers of the sea. A dull conviction seized upon Jukes + that there was nothing to be done. + </p> + <p> + If the steering-gear did not give way, if the immense volumes of water did + not burst the deck in or smash one of the hatches, if the engines did not + give up, if way could be kept on the ship against this terrific wind, and + she did not bury herself in one of these awful seas, of whose white crests + alone, topping high above her bows, he could now and then get a sickening + glimpse—then there was a chance of her coming out of it. Something + within him seemed to turn over, bringing uppermost the feeling that the + Nan-Shan was lost. + </p> + <p> + “She's done for,” he said to himself, with a surprising mental agitation, + as though he had discovered an unexpected meaning in this thought. One of + these things was bound to happen. Nothing could be prevented now, and + nothing could be remedied. The men on board did not count, and the ship + could not last. This weather was too impossible. + </p> + <p> + Jukes felt an arm thrown heavily over his shoulders; and to this overture + he responded with great intelligence by catching hold of his captain round + the waist. + </p> + <p> + They stood clasped thus in the blind night, bracing each other against the + wind, cheek to cheek and lip to ear, in the manner of two hulks lashed + stem to stern together. + </p> + <p> + And Jukes heard the voice of his commander hardly any louder than before, + but nearer, as though, starting to march athwart the prodigious rush of + the hurricane, it had approached him, bearing that strange effect of + quietness like the serene glow of a halo. + </p> + <p> + “D'ye know where the hands got to?” it asked, vigorous and evanescent at + the same time, overcoming the strength of the wind, and swept away from + Jukes instantly. + </p> + <p> + Jukes didn't know. They were all on the bridge when the real force of the + hurricane struck the ship. He had no idea where they had crawled to. Under + the circumstances they were nowhere, for all the use that could be made of + them. Somehow the Captain's wish to know distressed Jukes. + </p> + <p> + “Want the hands, sir?” he cried, apprehensively. + </p> + <p> + “Ought to know,” asserted Captain MacWhirr. “Hold hard.” + </p> + <p> + They held hard. An outburst of unchained fury, a vicious rush of the wind + absolutely steadied the ship; she rocked only, quick and light like a + child's cradle, for a terrific moment of suspense, while the whole + atmosphere, as it seemed, streamed furiously past her, roaring away from + the tenebrous earth. + </p> + <p> + It suffocated them, and with eyes shut they tightened their grasp. What + from the magnitude of the shock might have been a column of water running + upright in the dark, butted against the ship, broke short, and fell on her + bridge, crushingly, from on high, with a dead burying weight. + </p> + <p> + A flying fragment of that collapse, a mere splash, enveloped them in one + swirl from their feet over their heads, filling violently their ears, + mouths and nostrils with salt water. It knocked out their legs, wrenched + in haste at their arms, seethed away swiftly under their chins; and + opening their eyes, they saw the piled-up masses of foam dashing to and + fro amongst what looked like the fragments of a ship. She had given way as + if driven straight in. Their panting hearts yielded, too, before the + tremendous blow; and all at once she sprang up again to her desperate + plunging, as if trying to scramble out from under the ruins. + </p> + <p> + The seas in the dark seemed to rush from all sides to keep her back where + she might perish. There was hate in the way she was handled, and a + ferocity in the blows that fell. She was like a living creature thrown to + the rage of a mob: hustled terribly, struck at, borne up, flung down, + leaped upon. Captain MacWhirr and Jukes kept hold of each other, deafened + by the noise, gagged by the wind; and the great physical tumult beating + about their bodies, brought, like an unbridled display of passion, a + profound trouble to their souls. One of those wild and appalling shrieks + that are heard at times passing mysteriously overhead in the steady roar + of a hurricane, swooped, as if borne on wings, upon the ship, and Jukes + tried to outscream it. + </p> + <p> + “Will she live through this?” + </p> + <p> + The cry was wrenched out of his breast. It was as unintentional as the + birth of a thought in the head, and he heard nothing of it himself. It all + became extinct at once—thought, intention, effort—and of his + cry the inaudible vibration added to the tempest waves of the air. + </p> + <p> + He expected nothing from it. Nothing at all. For indeed what answer could + be made? But after a while he heard with amazement the frail and resisting + voice in his ear, the dwarf sound, unconquered in the giant tumult. + </p> + <p> + “She may!” + </p> + <p> + It was a dull yell, more difficult to seize than a whisper. And presently + the voice returned again, half submerged in the vast crashes, like a ship + battling against the waves of an ocean. + </p> + <p> + “Let's hope so!” it cried—small, lonely and unmoved, a stranger to + the visions of hope or fear; and it flickered into disconnected words: + “Ship. . . . . This. . . . Never—Anyhow . . . for the best.” Jukes + gave it up. + </p> + <p> + Then, as if it had come suddenly upon the one thing fit to withstand the + power of a storm, it seemed to gain force and firmness for the last broken + shouts: + </p> + <p> + “Keep on hammering . . . builders . . . good men. . . . . And chance it . + . . engines. . . . Rout . . . good man.” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr removed his arm from Jukes' shoulders, and thereby ceased + to exist for his mate, so dark it was; Jukes, after a tense stiffening of + every muscle, would let himself go limp all over. The gnawing of profound + discomfort existed side by side with an incredible disposition to + somnolence, as though he had been buffeted and worried into drowsiness. + The wind would get hold of his head and try to shake it off his shoulders; + his clothes, full of water, were as heavy as lead, cold and dripping like + an armour of melting ice: he shivered—it lasted a long time; and + with his hands closed hard on his hold, he was letting himself sink slowly + into the depths of bodily misery. His mind became concentrated upon + himself in an aimless, idle way, and when something pushed lightly at the + back of his knees he nearly, as the saying is, jumped out of his skin. + </p> + <p> + In the start forward he bumped the back of Captain MacWhirr, who didn't + move; and then a hand gripped his thigh. A lull had come, a menacing lull + of the wind, the holding of a stormy breath—and he felt himself + pawed all over. It was the boatswain. Jukes recognized these hands, so + thick and enormous that they seemed to belong to some new species of man. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain had arrived on the bridge, crawling on all fours against the + wind, and had found the chief mate's legs with the top of his head. + Immediately he crouched and began to explore Jukes' person upwards with + prudent, apologetic touches, as became an inferior. + </p> + <p> + He was an ill-favoured, undersized, gruff sailor of fifty, coarsely hairy, + short-legged, long-armed, resembling an elderly ape. His strength was + immense; and in his great lumpy paws, bulging like brown boxing-gloves on + the end of furry forearms, the heaviest objects were handled like + playthings. Apart from the grizzled pelt on his chest, the menacing + demeanour and the hoarse voice, he had none of the classical attributes of + his rating. His good nature almost amounted to imbecility: the men did + what they liked with him, and he had not an ounce of initiative in his + character, which was easy-going and talkative. For these reasons Jukes + disliked him; but Captain MacWhirr, to Jukes' scornful disgust, seemed to + regard him as a first-rate petty officer. + </p> + <p> + He pulled himself up by Jukes' coat, taking that liberty with the greatest + moderation, and only so far as it was forced upon him by the hurricane. + </p> + <p> + “What is it, boss'n, what is it?” yelled Jukes, impatiently. What could + that fraud of a boss'n want on the bridge? The typhoon had got on Jukes' + nerves. The husky bellowings of the other, though unintelligible, seemed + to suggest a state of lively satisfaction. + </p> + <p> + There could be no mistake. The old fool was pleased with something. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain's other hand had found some other body, for in a changed + tone he began to inquire: “Is it you, sir? Is it you, sir?” The wind + strangled his howls. + </p> + <p> + “Yes!” cried Captain MacWhirr. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV + </h2> + <p> + All that the boatswain, out of a superabundance of yells, could make clear + to Captain MacWhirr was the bizarre intelligence that “All them Chinamen + in the fore 'tween deck have fetched away, sir.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes to leeward could hear these two shouting within six inches of his + face, as you may hear on a still night half a mile away two men conversing + across a field. He heard Captain MacWhirr's exasperated “What? What?” and + the strained pitch of the other's hoarseness. “In a lump . . . seen them + myself. . . . Awful sight, sir . . . thought . . . tell you.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes remained indifferent, as if rendered irresponsible by the force of + the hurricane, which made the very thought of action utterly vain. + Besides, being very young, he had found the occupation of keeping his + heart completely steeled against the worst so engrossing that he had come + to feel an overpowering dislike towards any other form of activity + whatever. He was not scared; he knew this because, firmly believing he + would never see another sunrise, he remained calm in that belief. + </p> + <p> + These are the moments of do-nothing heroics to which even good men + surrender at times. Many officers of ships can no doubt recall a case in + their experience when just such a trance of confounded stoicism would come + all at once over a whole ship's company. Jukes, however, had no wide + experience of men or storms. He conceived himself to be calm—inexorably + calm; but as a matter of fact he was daunted; not abjectly, but only so + far as a decent man may, without becoming loathsome to himself. + </p> + <p> + It was rather like a forced-on numbness of spirit. The long, long stress + of a gale does it; the suspense of the interminably culminating + catastrophe; and there is a bodily fatigue in the mere holding on to + existence within the excessive tumult; a searching and insidious fatigue + that penetrates deep into a man's breast to cast down and sadden his + heart, which is incorrigible, and of all the gifts of the earth—even + before life itself—aspires to peace. + </p> + <p> + Jukes was benumbed much more than he supposed. He held on—very wet, + very cold, stiff in every limb; and in a momentary hallucination of swift + visions (it is said that a drowning man thus reviews all his life) he + beheld all sorts of memories altogether unconnected with his present + situation. He remembered his father, for instance: a worthy business man, + who at an unfortunate crisis in his affairs went quietly to bed and died + forthwith in a state of resignation. Jukes did not recall these + circumstances, of course, but remaining otherwise unconcerned he seemed to + see distinctly the poor man's face; a certain game of nap played when + quite a boy in Table Bay on board a ship, since lost with all hands; the + thick eyebrows of his first skipper; and without any emotion, as he might + years ago have walked listlessly into her room and found her sitting there + with a book, he remembered his mother—dead, too, now—the + resolute woman, left badly off, who had been very firm in his bringing up. + </p> + <p> + It could not have lasted more than a second, perhaps not so much. A heavy + arm had fallen about his shoulders; Captain MacWhirr's voice was speaking + his name into his ear. + </p> + <p> + “Jukes! Jukes!” + </p> + <p> + He detected the tone of deep concern. The wind had thrown its weight on + the ship, trying to pin her down amongst the seas. They made a clean + breach over her, as over a deep-swimming log; and the gathered weight of + crashes menaced monstrously from afar. The breakers flung out of the night + with a ghostly light on their crests—the light of sea-foam that in a + ferocious, boiling-up pale flash showed upon the slender body of the ship + the toppling rush, the downfall, and the seething mad scurry of each wave. + Never for a moment could she shake herself clear of the water; Jukes, + rigid, perceived in her motion the ominous sign of haphazard floundering. + She was no longer struggling intelligently. It was the beginning of the + end; and the note of busy concern in Captain MacWhirr's voice sickened him + like an exhibition of blind and pernicious folly. + </p> + <p> + The spell of the storm had fallen upon Jukes. He was penetrated by it, + absorbed by it; he was rooted in it with a rigour of dumb attention. + Captain MacWhirr persisted in his cries, but the wind got between them + like a solid wedge. He hung round Jukes' neck as heavy as a millstone, and + suddenly the sides of their heads knocked together. + </p> + <p> + “Jukes! Mr. Jukes, I say!” + </p> + <p> + He had to answer that voice that would not be silenced. He answered in the + customary manner: “. . . Yes, sir.” + </p> + <p> + And directly, his heart, corrupted by the storm that breeds a craving for + peace, rebelled against the tyranny of training and command. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr had his mate's head fixed firm in the crook of his elbow, + and pressed it to his yelling lips mysteriously. Sometimes Jukes would + break in, admonishing hastily: “Look out, sir!” or Captain MacWhirr would + bawl an earnest exhortation to “Hold hard, there!” and the whole black + universe seemed to reel together with the ship. They paused. She floated + yet. And Captain MacWhirr would resume, his shouts. “. . . . Says . . . + whole lot . . . fetched away. . . . Ought to see . . . what's the matter.” + </p> + <p> + Directly the full force of the hurricane had struck the ship, every part + of her deck became untenable; and the sailors, dazed and dismayed, took + shelter in the port alleyway under the bridge. It had a door aft, which + they shut; it was very black, cold, and dismal. At each heavy fling of the + ship they would groan all together in the dark, and tons of water could be + heard scuttling about as if trying to get at them from above. The + boatswain had been keeping up a gruff talk, but a more unreasonable lot of + men, he said afterwards, he had never been with. They were snug enough + there, out of harm's way, and not wanted to do anything, either; and yet + they did nothing but grumble and complain peevishly like so many sick + kids. Finally, one of them said that if there had been at least some light + to see each other's noses by, it wouldn't be so bad. It was making him + crazy, he declared, to lie there in the dark waiting for the blamed hooker + to sink. + </p> + <p> + “Why don't you step outside, then, and be done with it at once?” the + boatswain turned on him. + </p> + <p> + This called up a shout of execration. The boatswain found himself + overwhelmed with reproaches of all sorts. They seemed to take it ill that + a lamp was not instantly created for them out of nothing. They would whine + after a light to get drowned by—anyhow! And though the unreason of + their revilings was patent—since no one could hope to reach the + lamp-room, which was forward—he became greatly distressed. He did + not think it was decent of them to be nagging at him like this. He told + them so, and was met by general contumely. He sought refuge, therefore, in + an embittered silence. At the same time their grumbling and sighing and + muttering worried him greatly, but by-and-by it occurred to him that there + were six globe lamps hung in the 'tween-deck, and that there could be no + harm in depriving the coolies of one of them. + </p> + <p> + The Nan-Shan had an athwartship coal-bunker, which, being at times used as + cargo space, communicated by an iron door with the fore 'tween-deck. It + was empty then, and its manhole was the foremost one in the alleyway. The + boatswain could get in, therefore, without coming out on deck at all; but + to his great surprise he found he could induce no one to help him in + taking off the manhole cover. He groped for it all the same, but one of + the crew lying in his way refused to budge. + </p> + <p> + “Why, I only want to get you that blamed light you are crying for,” he + expostulated, almost pitifully. + </p> + <p> + Somebody told him to go and put his head in a bag. He regretted he could + not recognize the voice, and that it was too dark to see, otherwise, as he + said, he would have put a head on that son of a sea-cook, anyway, sink or + swim. Nevertheless, he had made up his mind to show them he could get a + light, if he were to die for it. + </p> + <p> + Through the violence of the ship's rolling, every movement was dangerous. + To be lying down seemed labour enough. He nearly broke his neck dropping + into the bunker. He fell on his back, and was sent shooting helplessly + from side to side in the dangerous company of a heavy iron bar—a + coal-trimmer's slice probably—left down there by somebody. This + thing made him as nervous as though it had been a wild beast. He could not + see it, the inside of the bunker coated with coal-dust being perfectly and + impenetrably black; but he heard it sliding and clattering, and striking + here and there, always in the neighbourhood of his head. It seemed to make + an extraordinary noise, too—to give heavy thumps as though it had + been as big as a bridge girder. This was remarkable enough for him to + notice while he was flung from port to starboard and back again, and + clawing desperately the smooth sides of the bunker in the endeavour to + stop himself. The door into the 'tween-deck not fitting quite true, he saw + a thread of dim light at the bottom. + </p> + <p> + Being a sailor, and a still active man, he did not want much of a chance + to regain his feet; and as luck would have it, in scrambling up he put his + hand on the iron slice, picking it up as he rose. Otherwise he would have + been afraid of the thing breaking his legs, or at least knocking him down + again. At first he stood still. He felt unsafe in this darkness that + seemed to make the ship's motion unfamiliar, unforeseen, and difficult to + counteract. He felt so much shaken for a moment that he dared not move for + fear of “taking charge again.” He had no mind to get battered to pieces in + that bunker. + </p> + <p> + He had struck his head twice; he was dazed a little. He seemed to hear yet + so plainly the clatter and bangs of the iron slice flying about his ears + that he tightened his grip to prove to himself he had it there safely in + his hand. He was vaguely amazed at the plainness with which down there he + could hear the gale raging. Its howls and shrieks seemed to take on, in + the emptiness of the bunker, something of the human character, of human + rage and pain—being not vast but infinitely poignant. And there + were, with every roll, thumps, too—profound, ponderous thumps, as if + a bulky object of five-ton weight or so had got play in the hold. But + there was no such thing in the cargo. Something on deck? Impossible. Or + alongside? Couldn't be. + </p> + <p> + He thought all this quickly, clearly, competently, like a seaman, and in + the end remained puzzled. This noise, though, came deadened from outside, + together with the washing and pouring of water on deck above his head. Was + it the wind? Must be. It made down there a row like the shouting of a big + lot of crazed men. And he discovered in himself a desire for a light, too—if + only to get drowned by—and a nervous anxiety to get out of that + bunker as quickly as possible. + </p> + <p> + He pulled back the bolt: the heavy iron plate turned on its hinges; and it + was as though he had opened the door to the sounds of the tempest. A gust + of hoarse yelling met him: the air was still; and the rushing of water + overhead was covered by a tumult of strangled, throaty shrieks that + produced an effect of desperate confusion. He straddled his legs the whole + width of the doorway and stretched his neck. And at first he perceived only + what he had come to seek: six small yellow flames swinging violently on + the great body of the dusk. + </p> + <p> + It was stayed like the gallery of a mine, with a row of stanchions in the + middle, and cross-beams overhead, penetrating into the gloom ahead—indefinitely. + And to port there loomed, like the caving in of one of the sides, a bulky + mass with a slanting outline. The whole place, with the shadows and the + shapes, moved all the time. The boatswain glared: the ship lurched to + starboard, and a great howl came from that mass that had the slant of + fallen earth. + </p> + <p> + Pieces of wood whizzed past. Planks, he thought, inexpressibly startled, + and flinging back his head. At his feet a man went sliding over, + open-eyed, on his back, straining with uplifted arms for nothing: and + another came bounding like a detached stone with his head between his legs + and his hands clenched. His pigtail whipped in the air; he made a grab at + the boatswain's legs, and from his opened hand a bright white disc rolled + against the boatswain's foot. He recognized a silver dollar, and yelled at + it with astonishment. With a precipitated sound of trampling and shuffling + of bare feet, and with guttural cries, the mound of writhing bodies piled + up to port detached itself from the ship's side and sliding, inert and + struggling, shifted to starboard, with a dull, brutal thump. The cries + ceased. The boatswain heard a long moan through the roar and whistling of + the wind; he saw an inextricable confusion of heads and shoulders, naked + soles kicking upwards, fists raised, tumbling backs, legs, pigtails, + faces. + </p> + <p> + “Good Lord!” he cried, horrified, and banged-to the iron door upon this + vision. + </p> + <p> + This was what he had come on the bridge to tell. He could not keep it to + himself; and on board ship there is only one man to whom it is worth while + to unburden yourself. On his passage back the hands in the alleyway swore + at him for a fool. Why didn't he bring that lamp? What the devil did the + coolies matter to anybody? And when he came out, the extremity of the ship + made what went on inside of her appear of little moment. + </p> + <p> + At first he thought he had left the alleyway in the very moment of her + sinking. The bridge ladders had been washed away, but an enormous sea + filling the after-deck floated him up. After that he had to lie on his + stomach for some time, holding to a ring-bolt, getting his breath now and + then, and swallowing salt water. He struggled farther on his hands and + knees, too frightened and distracted to turn back. In this way he reached + the after-part of the wheelhouse. In that comparatively sheltered spot he + found the second mate. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain was pleasantly surprised—his impression being that + everybody on deck must have been washed away a long time ago. He asked + eagerly where the Captain was. + </p> + <p> + The second mate was lying low, like a malignant little animal under a + hedge. + </p> + <p> + “Captain? Gone overboard, after getting us into this mess.” The mate, too, + for all he knew or cared. Another fool. Didn't matter. Everybody was going + by-and-by. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain crawled out again into the strength of the wind; not because + he much expected to find anybody, he said, but just to get away from “that + man.” He crawled out as outcasts go to face an inclement world. Hence his + great joy at finding Jukes and the Captain. But what was going on in the + 'tween-deck was to him a minor matter by that time. Besides, it was + difficult to make yourself heard. But he managed to convey the idea that + the Chinaman had broken adrift together with their boxes, and that he had + come up on purpose to report this. As to the hands, they were all right. + Then, appeased, he subsided on the deck in a sitting posture, hugging with + his arms and legs the stand of the engine-room telegraph—an iron + casting as thick as a post. When that went, why, he expected he would go, + too. He gave no more thought to the coolies. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr had made Jukes understand that he wanted him to go down + below—to see. + </p> + <p> + “What am I to do then, sir?” And the trembling of his whole wet body + caused Jukes' voice to sound like bleating. + </p> + <p> + “See first . . . Boss'n . . . says . . . adrift.” + </p> + <p> + “That boss'n is a confounded fool,” howled Jukes, shakily. + </p> + <p> + The absurdity of the demand made upon him revolted Jukes. He was as + unwilling to go as if the moment he had left the deck the ship were sure + to sink. + </p> + <p> + “I must know . . . can't leave. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “They'll settle, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “Fight . . . boss'n says they fight. . . . Why? Can't have . . . fighting + . . . board ship. . . . Much rather keep you here . . . case . . . I + should . . . washed overboard myself. . . . Stop it . . . some way. You + see and tell me . . . through engine-room tube. Don't want you . . . come + up here . . . too often. Dangerous . . . moving about . . . deck.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes, held with his head in chancery, had to listen to what seemed + horrible suggestions. + </p> + <p> + “Don't want . . . you get lost . . . so long . . . ship isn't. . . . . + Rout . . . Good man . . . Ship . . . may . . . through this . . . all + right yet.” + </p> + <p> + All at once Jukes understood he would have to go. + </p> + <p> + “Do you think she may?” he screamed. + </p> + <p> + But the wind devoured the reply, out of which Jukes heard only the one + word, pronounced with great energy “. . . . Always. . . .” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr released Jukes, and bending over the boatswain, yelled, + “Get back with the mate.” Jukes only knew that the arm was gone off his + shoulders. He was dismissed with his orders—to do what? He was + exasperated into letting go his hold carelessly, and on the instant was + blown away. It seemed to him that nothing could stop him from being blown + right over the stern. He flung himself down hastily, and the boatswain, + who was following, fell on him. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you get up yet, sir,” cried the boatswain. “No hurry!” + </p> + <p> + A sea swept over. Jukes understood the boatswain to splutter that the + bridge ladders were gone. “I'll lower you down, sir, by your hands,” he + screamed. He shouted also something about the smoke-stack being as likely + to go overboard as not. Jukes thought it very possible, and imagined the + fires out, the ship helpless. . . . The boatswain by his side kept on + yelling. “What? What is it?” Jukes cried distressfully; and the other + repeated, “What would my old woman say if she saw me now?” + </p> + <p> + In the alleyway, where a lot of water had got in and splashed in the dark, + the men were still as death, till Jukes stumbled against one of them and + cursed him savagely for being in the way. Two or three voices then asked, + eager and weak, “Any chance for us, sir?” + </p> + <p> + “What's the matter with you fools?” he said brutally. He felt as though he + could throw himself down amongst them and never move any more. But they + seemed cheered; and in the midst of obsequious warnings, “Look out! Mind + that manhole lid, sir,” they lowered him into the bunker. The boatswain + tumbled down after him, and as soon as he had picked himself up he + remarked, “She would say, 'Serve you right, you old fool, for going to + sea.'” + </p> + <p> + The boatswain had some means, and made a point of alluding to them + frequently. His wife—a fat woman—and two grown-up daughters + kept a greengrocer's shop in the East-end of London. + </p> + <p> + In the dark, Jukes, unsteady on his legs, listened to a faint thunderous + patter. A deadened screaming went on steadily at his elbow, as it were; + and from above the louder tumult of the storm descended upon these near + sounds. His head swam. To him, too, in that bunker, the motion of the ship + seemed novel and menacing, sapping his resolution as though he had never + been afloat before. + </p> + <p> + He had half a mind to scramble out again; but the remembrance of Captain + MacWhirr's voice made this impossible. His orders were to go and see. What + was the good of it, he wanted to know. Enraged, he told himself he would + see—of course. But the boatswain, staggering clumsily, warned him to + be careful how he opened that door; there was a blamed fight going on. And + Jukes, as if in great bodily pain, desired irritably to know what the + devil they were fighting for. + </p> + <p> + “Dollars! Dollars, sir. All their rotten chests got burst open. Blamed + money skipping all over the place, and they are tumbling after it head + over heels—tearing and biting like anything. A regular little hell + in there.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes convulsively opened the door. The short boatswain peered under his + arm. + </p> + <p> + One of the lamps had gone out, broken perhaps. Rancorous, guttural cries + burst out loudly on their ears, and a strange panting sound, the working + of all these straining breasts. A hard blow hit the side of the ship: + water fell above with a stunning shock, and in the forefront of the gloom, + where the air was reddish and thick, Jukes saw a head bang the deck + violently, two thick calves waving on high, muscular arms twined round a + naked body, a yellow-face, open-mouthed and with a set wild stare, look up + and slide away. An empty chest clattered turning over; a man fell head + first with a jump, as if lifted by a kick; and farther off, indistinct, + others streamed like a mass of rolling stones down a bank, thumping the + deck with their feet and flourishing their arms wildly. The hatchway + ladder was loaded with coolies swarming on it like bees on a branch. They + hung on the steps in a crawling, stirring cluster, beating madly with + their fists the underside of the battened hatch, and the headlong rush of + the water above was heard in the intervals of their yelling. The ship + heeled over more, and they began to drop off: first one, then two, then + all the rest went away together, falling straight off with a great cry. + </p> + <p> + Jukes was confounded. The boatswain, with gruff anxiety, begged him, + “Don't you go in there, sir.” + </p> + <p> + The whole place seemed to twist upon itself, jumping incessantly the + while; and when the ship rose to a sea Jukes fancied that all these men + would be shot upon him in a body. He backed out, swung the door to, and + with trembling hands pushed at the bolt. . . . + </p> + <p> + As soon as his mate had gone Captain MacWhirr, left alone on the bridge, + sidled and staggered as far as the wheelhouse. Its door being hinged + forward, he had to fight the gale for admittance, and when at last he + managed to enter, it was with an instantaneous clatter and a bang, as + though he had been fired through the wood. He stood within, holding on to + the handle. + </p> + <p> + The steering-gear leaked steam, and in the confined space the glass of the + binnacle made a shiny oval of light in a thin white fog. The wind howled, + hummed, whistled, with sudden booming gusts that rattled the doors and + shutters in the vicious patter of sprays. Two coils of lead-line and a + small canvas bag hung on a long lanyard, swung wide off, and came back + clinging to the bulkheads. The gratings underfoot were nearly afloat; with + every sweeping blow of a sea, water squirted violently through the cracks + all round the door, and the man at the helm had flung down his cap, his + coat, and stood propped against the gear-casing in a striped cotton shirt + open on his breast. The little brass wheel in his hands had the appearance + of a bright and fragile toy. The cords of his neck stood hard and lean, a + dark patch lay in the hollow of his throat, and his face was still and + sunken as in death. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr wiped his eyes. The sea that had nearly taken him + overboard had, to his great annoyance, washed his sou'-wester hat off his + bald head. The fluffy, fair hair, soaked and darkened, resembled a mean + skein of cotton threads festooned round his bare skull. His face, + glistening with sea-water, had been made crimson with the wind, with the + sting of sprays. He looked as though he had come off sweating from before + a furnace. + </p> + <p> + “You here?” he muttered, heavily. + </p> + <p> + The second mate had found his way into the wheelhouse some time before. He + had fixed himself in a corner with his knees up, a fist pressed against + each temple; and this attitude suggested rage, sorrow, resignation, + surrender, with a sort of concentrated unforgiveness. He said mournfully + and defiantly, “Well, it's my watch below now: ain't it?” + </p> + <p> + The steam gear clattered, stopped, clattered again; and the helmsman's + eyeballs seemed to project out of a hungry face as if the compass card + behind the binnacle glass had been meat. God knows how long he had been + left there to steer, as if forgotten by all his shipmates. The bells had + not been struck; there had been no reliefs; the ship's routine had gone + down wind; but he was trying to keep her head north-north-east. The rudder + might have been gone for all he knew, the fires out, the engines broken + down, the ship ready to roll over like a corpse. He was anxious not to get + muddled and lose control of her head, because the compass-card swung far + both ways, wriggling on the pivot, and sometimes seemed to whirl right + round. He suffered from mental stress. He was horribly afraid, also, of + the wheelhouse going. Mountains of water kept on tumbling against it. When + the ship took one of her desperate dives the corners of his lips twitched. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr looked up at the wheelhouse clock. Screwed to the + bulk-head, it had a white face on which the black hands appeared to stand + quite still. It was half-past one in the morning. + </p> + <p> + “Another day,” he muttered to himself. + </p> + <p> + The second mate heard him, and lifting his head as one grieving amongst + ruins, “You won't see it break,” he exclaimed. His wrists and his knees + could be seen to shake violently. “No, by God! You won't. . . .” + </p> + <p> + He took his face again between his fists. + </p> + <p> + The body of the helmsman had moved slightly, but his head didn't budge on + his neck,—like a stone head fixed to look one way from a column. + During a roll that all but took his booted legs from under him, and in the + very stagger to save himself, Captain MacWhirr said austerely, “Don't you + pay any attention to what that man says.” And then, with an indefinable + change of tone, very grave, he added, “He isn't on duty.” + </p> + <p> + The sailor said nothing. + </p> + <p> + The hurricane boomed, shaking the little place, which seemed air-tight; + and the light of the binnacle flickered all the time. + </p> + <p> + “You haven't been relieved,” Captain MacWhirr went on, looking down. “I + want you to stick to the helm, though, as long as you can. You've got the + hang of her. Another man coming here might make a mess of it. Wouldn't do. + No child's play. And the hands are probably busy with a job down below. . + . . Think you can?” + </p> + <p> + The steering-gear leaped into an abrupt short clatter, stopped smouldering + like an ember; and the still man, with a motionless gaze, burst out, as if + all the passion in him had gone into his lips: “By Heavens, sir! I can + steer for ever if nobody talks to me.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh! aye! All right. . . .” The Captain lifted his eyes for the first time + to the man, “. . . Hackett.” + </p> + <p> + And he seemed to dismiss this matter from his mind. He stooped to the + engine-room speaking-tube, blew in, and bent his head. Mr. Rout below + answered, and at once Captain MacWhirr put his lips to the mouthpiece. + </p> + <p> + With the uproar of the gale around him he applied alternately his lips and + his ear, and the engineer's voice mounted to him, harsh and as if out of + the heat of an engagement. One of the stokers was disabled, the others had + given in, the second engineer and the donkey-man were firing-up. The third + engineer was standing by the steam-valve. The engines were being tended by + hand. How was it above? + </p> + <p> + “Bad enough. It mostly rests with you,” said Captain MacWhirr. Was the + mate down there yet? No? Well, he would be presently. Would Mr. Rout let + him talk through the speaking-tube?—through the deck speaking-tube, + because he—the Captain—was going out again on the bridge + directly. There was some trouble amongst the Chinamen. They were fighting, + it seemed. Couldn't allow fighting anyhow. . . . + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout had gone away, and Captain MacWhirr could feel against his ear + the pulsation of the engines, like the beat of the ship's heart. Mr. + Rout's voice down there shouted something distantly. The ship pitched + headlong, the pulsation leaped with a hissing tumult, and stopped dead. + Captain MacWhirr's face was impassive, and his eyes were fixed aimlessly + on the crouching shape of the second mate. Again Mr. Rout's voice cried + out in the depths, and the pulsating beats recommenced, with slow strokes—growing + swifter. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout had returned to the tube. “It don't matter much what they do,” he + said, hastily; and then, with irritation, “She takes these dives as if she + never meant to come up again.” + </p> + <p> + “Awful sea,” said the Captain's voice from above. + </p> + <p> + “Don't let me drive her under,” barked Solomon Rout up the pipe. + </p> + <p> + “Dark and rain. Can't see what's coming,” uttered the voice. “Must—keep—her—moving—enough + to steer—and chance it,” it went on to state distinctly. + </p> + <p> + “I am doing as much as I dare.” + </p> + <p> + “We are—getting—smashed up—a good deal up here,” + proceeded the voice mildly. “Doing—fairly well—though. Of + course, if the wheelhouse should go. . . .” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout, bending an attentive ear, muttered peevishly something under his + breath. + </p> + <p> + But the deliberate voice up there became animated to ask: “Jukes turned up + yet?” Then, after a short wait, “I wish he would bear a hand. I want him + to be done and come up here in case of anything. To look after the ship. I + am all alone. The second mate's lost. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “What?” shouted Mr. Rout into the engine-room, taking his head away. Then + up the tube he cried, “Gone overboard?” and clapped his ear to. + </p> + <p> + “Lost his nerve,” the voice from above continued in a matter-of-fact tone. + “Damned awkward circumstance.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout, listening with bowed neck, opened his eyes wide at this. + However, he heard something like the sounds of a scuffle and broken + exclamations coming down to him. He strained his hearing; and all the time + Beale, the third engineer, with his arms uplifted, held between the palms + of his hands the rim of a little black wheel projecting at the side of a + big copper pipe. + </p> + <p> + He seemed to be poising it above his head, as though it were a correct + attitude in some sort of game. + </p> + <p> + To steady himself, he pressed his shoulder against the white bulkhead, one + knee bent, and a sweat-rag tucked in his belt hanging on his hip. His + smooth cheek was begrimed and flushed, and the coal dust on his eyelids, + like the black pencilling of a make-up, enhanced the liquid brilliance of + the whites, giving to his youthful face something of a feminine, exotic + and fascinating aspect. When the ship pitched he would with hasty + movements of his hands screw hard at the little wheel. + </p> + <p> + “Gone crazy,” began the Captain's voice suddenly in the tube. “Rushed at + me. . . . Just now. Had to knock him down. . . . This minute. You heard, + Mr. Rout?” + </p> + <p> + “The devil!” muttered Mr. Rout. “Look out, Beale!” + </p> + <p> + His shout rang out like the blast of a warning trumpet, between the iron + walls of the engine-room. Painted white, they rose high into the dusk of + the skylight, sloping like a roof; and the whole lofty space resembled the + interior of a monument, divided by floors of iron grating, with lights + flickering at different levels, and a mass of gloom lingering in the + middle, within the columnar stir of machinery under the motionless + swelling of the cylinders. A loud and wild resonance, made up of all the + noises of the hurricane, dwelt in the still warmth of the air. There was + in it the smell of hot metal, of oil, and a slight mist of steam. The + blows of the sea seemed to traverse it in an unringing, stunning shock, + from side to side. + </p> + <p> + Gleams, like pale long flames, trembled upon the polish of metal; from the + flooring below the enormous crank-heads emerged in their turns with a + flash of brass and steel—going over; while the connecting-rods, + big-jointed, like skeleton limbs, seemed to thrust them down and pull them + up again with an irresistible precision. And deep in the half-light other + rods dodged deliberately to and fro, crossheads nodded, discs of metal + rubbed smoothly against each other, slow and gentle, in a commingling of + shadows and gleams. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes all those powerful and unerring movements would slow down + simultaneously, as if they had been the functions of a living organism, + stricken suddenly by the blight of languor; and Mr. Rout's eyes would + blaze darker in his long sallow face. He was fighting this fight in a pair + of carpet slippers. A short shiny jacket barely covered his loins, and his + white wrists protruded far out of the tight sleeves, as though the + emergency had added to his stature, had lengthened his limbs, augmented + his pallor, hollowed his eyes. + </p> + <p> + He moved, climbing high up, disappearing low down, with a restless, + purposeful industry, and when he stood still, holding the guard-rail in + front of the starting-gear, he would keep glancing to the right at the + steam-gauge, at the water-gauge, fixed upon the white wall in the light of + a swaying lamp. The mouths of two speaking-tubes gaped stupidly at his + elbow, and the dial of the engine-room telegraph resembled a clock of + large diameter, bearing on its face curt words instead of figures. The + grouped letters stood out heavily black, around the pivot-head of the + indicator, emphatically symbolic of loud exclamations: AHEAD, ASTERN, + SLOW, Half, STAND BY; and the fat black hand pointed downwards to the word + FULL, which, thus singled out, captured the eye as a sharp cry secures + attention. + </p> + <p> + The wood-encased bulk of the low-pressure cylinder, frowning portly from + above, emitted a faint wheeze at every thrust, and except for that low + hiss the engines worked their steel limbs headlong or slow with a silent, + determined smoothness. And all this, the white walls, the moving steel, + the floor plates under Solomon Rout's feet, the floors of iron grating + above his head, the dusk and the gleams, uprose and sank continuously, + with one accord, upon the harsh wash of the waves against the ship's side. + The whole loftiness of the place, booming hollow to the great voice of the + wind, swayed at the top like a tree, would go over bodily, as if borne + down this way and that by the tremendous blasts. + </p> + <p> + “You've got to hurry up,” shouted Mr. Rout, as soon as he saw Jukes appear + in the stokehold doorway. + </p> + <p> + Jukes' glance was wandering and tipsy; his red face was puffy, as though + he had overslept himself. He had had an arduous road, and had travelled + over it with immense vivacity, the agitation of his mind corresponding to + the exertions of his body. He had rushed up out of the bunker, stumbling + in the dark alleyway amongst a lot of bewildered men who, trod upon, asked + “What's up, sir?” in awed mutters all round him;—down the stokehold + ladder, missing many iron rungs in his hurry, down into a place deep as a + well, black as Tophet, tipping over back and forth like a see-saw. The + water in the bilges thundered at each roll, and lumps of coal skipped to + and fro, from end to end, rattling like an avalanche of pebbles on a slope + of iron. + </p> + <p> + Somebody in there moaned with pain, and somebody else could be seen + crouching over what seemed the prone body of a dead man; a lusty voice + blasphemed; and the glow under each fire-door was like a pool of flaming + blood radiating quietly in a velvety blackness. + </p> + <p> + A gust of wind struck upon the nape of Jukes' neck and next moment he felt + it streaming about his wet ankles. The stokehold ventilators hummed: in + front of the six fire-doors two wild figures, stripped to the waist, + staggered and stooped, wrestling with two shovels. + </p> + <p> + “Hallo! Plenty of draught now,” yelled the second engineer at once, as + though he had been all the time looking out for Jukes. The donkeyman, a + dapper little chap with a dazzling fair skin and a tiny, gingery + moustache, worked in a sort of mute transport. They were keeping a full + head of steam, and a profound rumbling, as of an empty furniture van + trotting over a bridge, made a sustained bass to all the other noises of + the place. + </p> + <p> + “Blowing off all the time,” went on yelling the second. With a sound as of + a hundred scoured saucepans, the orifice of a ventilator spat upon his + shoulder a sudden gush of salt water, and he volleyed a stream of curses + upon all things on earth including his own soul, ripping and raving, and + all the time attending to his business. With a sharp clash of metal the + ardent pale glare of the fire opened upon his bullet head, showing his + spluttering lips, his insolent face, and with another clang closed like + the white-hot wink of an iron eye. + </p> + <p> + “Where's the blooming ship? Can you tell me? blast my eyes! Under water—or + what? It's coming down here in tons. Are the condemned cowls gone to + Hades? Hey? Don't you know anything—you jolly sailor-man you . . . + ?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes, after a bewildered moment, had been helped by a roll to dart + through; and as soon as his eyes took in the comparative vastness, peace + and brilliance of the engine-room, the ship, setting her stern heavily in + the water, sent him charging head down upon Mr. Rout. + </p> + <p> + The chief's arm, long like a tentacle, and straightening as if worked by a + spring, went out to meet him, and deflected his rush into a spin towards + the speaking-tubes. At the same time Mr. Rout repeated earnestly: + </p> + <p> + “You've got to hurry up, whatever it is.” + </p> + <p> + Jukes yelled “Are you there, sir?” and listened. Nothing. Suddenly the + roar of the wind fell straight into his ear, but presently a small voice + shoved aside the shouting hurricane quietly. + </p> + <p> + “You, Jukes?—Well?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes was ready to talk: it was only time that seemed to be wanting. It + was easy enough to account for everything. He could perfectly imagine the + coolies battened down in the reeking 'tween-deck, lying sick and scared + between the rows of chests. Then one of these chests—or perhaps + several at once—breaking loose in a roll, knocking out others, sides + splitting, lids flying open, and all these clumsy Chinamen rising up in a + body to save their property. Afterwards every fling of the ship would hurl + that tramping, yelling mob here and there, from side to side, in a whirl + of smashed wood, torn clothing, rolling dollars. A struggle once started, + they would be unable to stop themselves. Nothing could stop them now + except main force. It was a disaster. He had seen it, and that was all he + could say. Some of them must be dead, he believed. The rest would go on + fighting. . . . + </p> + <p> + He sent up his words, tripping over each other, crowding the narrow tube. + They mounted as if into a silence of an enlightened comprehension dwelling + alone up there with a storm. And Jukes wanted to be dismissed from the + face of that odious trouble intruding on the great need of the ship. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V + </h2> + <p> + He waited. Before his eyes the engines turned with slow labour, that in + the moment of going off into a mad fling would stop dead at Mr. Rout's + shout, “Look out, Beale!” They paused in an intelligent immobility, + stilled in mid-stroke, a heavy crank arrested on the cant, as if conscious + of danger and the passage of time. Then, with a “Now, then!” from the + chief, and the sound of a breath expelled through clenched teeth, they + would accomplish the interrupted revolution and begin another. + </p> + <p> + There was the prudent sagacity of wisdom and the deliberation of enormous + strength in their movements. This was their work—this patient + coaxing of a distracted ship over the fury of the waves and into the very + eye of the wind. At times Mr. Rout's chin would sink on his breast, and he + watched them with knitted eyebrows as if lost in thought. + </p> + <p> + The voice that kept the hurricane out of Jukes' ear began: “Take the hands + with you . . . ,” and left off unexpectedly. + </p> + <p> + “What could I do with them, sir?” + </p> + <p> + A harsh, abrupt, imperious clang exploded suddenly. The three pairs of + eyes flew up to the telegraph dial to see the hand jump from FULL to STOP, + as if snatched by a devil. And then these three men in the engineroom had + the intimate sensation of a check upon the ship, of a strange shrinking, + as if she had gathered herself for a desperate leap. + </p> + <p> + “Stop her!” bellowed Mr. Rout. + </p> + <p> + Nobody—not even Captain MacWhirr, who alone on deck had caught sight + of a white line of foam coming on at such a height that he couldn't + believe his eyes—nobody was to know the steepness of that sea and + the awful depth of the hollow the hurricane had scooped out behind the + running wall of water. + </p> + <p> + It raced to meet the ship, and, with a pause, as of girding the loins, the + Nan-Shan lifted her bows and leaped. The flames in all the lamps sank, + darkening the engine-room. One went out. With a tearing crash and a + swirling, raving tumult, tons of water fell upon the deck, as though the + ship had darted under the foot of a cataract. + </p> + <p> + Down there they looked at each other, stunned. + </p> + <p> + “Swept from end to end, by God!” bawled Jukes. + </p> + <p> + She dipped into the hollow straight down, as if going over the edge of the + world. The engine-room toppled forward menacingly, like the inside of a + tower nodding in an earthquake. An awful racket, of iron things falling, + came from the stokehold. She hung on this appalling slant long enough for + Beale to drop on his hands and knees and begin to crawl as if he meant to + fly on all fours out of the engine-room, and for Mr. Rout to turn his head + slowly, rigid, cavernous, with the lower jaw dropping. Jukes had shut his + eyes, and his face in a moment became hopelessly blank and gentle, like + the face of a blind man. + </p> + <p> + At last she rose slowly, staggering, as if she had to lift a mountain with + her bows. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Rout shut his mouth; Jukes blinked; and little Beale stood up hastily. + </p> + <p> + “Another one like this, and that's the last of her,” cried the chief. + </p> + <p> + He and Jukes looked at each other, and the same thought came into their + heads. The Captain! Everything must have been swept away. Steering-gear + gone—ship like a log. All over directly. + </p> + <p> + “Rush!” ejaculated Mr. Rout thickly, glaring with enlarged, doubtful eyes + at Jukes, who answered him by an irresolute glance. + </p> + <p> + The clang of the telegraph gong soothed them instantly. The black hand + dropped in a flash from STOP to FULL. + </p> + <p> + “Now then, Beale!” cried Mr. Rout. + </p> + <p> + The steam hissed low. The piston-rods slid in and out. Jukes put his ear + to the tube. The voice was ready for him. It said: “Pick up all the money. + Bear a hand now. I'll want you up here.” And that was all. + </p> + <p> + “Sir?” called up Jukes. There was no answer. + </p> + <p> + He staggered away like a defeated man from the field of battle. He had + got, in some way or other, a cut above his left eyebrow—a cut to the + bone. He was not aware of it in the least: quantities of the China Sea, + large enough to break his neck for him, had gone over his head, had + cleaned, washed, and salted that wound. It did not bleed, but only gaped + red; and this gash over the eye, his dishevelled hair, the disorder of his + clothes, gave him the aspect of a man worsted in a fight with fists. + </p> + <p> + “Got to pick up the dollars.” He appealed to Mr. Rout, smiling pitifully + at random. + </p> + <p> + “What's that?” asked Mr. Rout, wildly. “Pick up . . . ? I don't care. . . + .” Then, quivering in every muscle, but with an exaggeration of paternal + tone, “Go away now, for God's sake. You deck people'll drive me silly. + There's that second mate been going for the old man. Don't you know? You + fellows are going wrong for want of something to do. . . .” + </p> + <p> + At these words Jukes discovered in himself the beginnings of anger. Want + of something to do—indeed. . . . Full of hot scorn against the + chief, he turned to go the way he had come. In the stokehold the plump + donkeyman toiled with his shovel mutely, as if his tongue had been cut + out; but the second was carrying on like a noisy, undaunted maniac, who + had preserved his skill in the art of stoking under a marine boiler. + </p> + <p> + “Hallo, you wandering officer! Hey! Can't you get some of your + slush-slingers to wind up a few of them ashes? I am getting choked with + them here. Curse it! Hallo! Hey! Remember the articles: Sailors and + firemen to assist each other. Hey! D'ye hear?” + </p> + <p> + Jukes was climbing out frantically, and the other, lifting up his face + after him, howled, “Can't you speak? What are you poking about here for? + What's your game, anyhow?” + </p> + <p> + A frenzy possessed Jukes. By the time he was back amongst the men in the + darkness of the alleyway, he felt ready to wring all their necks at the + slightest sign of hanging back. The very thought of it exasperated him. He + couldn't hang back. They shouldn't. + </p> + <p> + The impetuosity with which he came amongst them carried them along. They + had already been excited and startled at all his comings and goings—by + the fierceness and rapidity of his movements; and more felt than seen in + his rushes, he appeared formidable—busied with matters of life and + death that brooked no delay. At his first word he heard them drop into the + bunker one after another obediently, with heavy thumps. + </p> + <p> + They were not clear as to what would have to be done. “What is it? What is + it?” they were asking each other. The boatswain tried to explain; the + sounds of a great scuffle surprised them: and the mighty shocks, + reverberating awfully in the black bunker, kept them in mind of their + danger. When the boatswain threw open the door it seemed that an eddy of + the hurricane, stealing through the iron sides of the ship, had set all + these bodies whirling like dust: there came to them a confused uproar, a + tempestuous tumult, a fierce mutter, gusts of screams dying away, and the + tramping of feet mingling with the blows of the sea. + </p> + <p> + For a moment they glared amazed, blocking the doorway. Jukes pushed + through them brutally. He said nothing, and simply darted in. Another lot + of coolies on the ladder, struggling suicidally to break through the + battened hatch to a swamped deck, fell off as before, and he disappeared + under them like a man overtaken by a landslide. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain yelled excitedly: “Come along. Get the mate out. He'll be + trampled to death. Come on.” + </p> + <p> + They charged in, stamping on breasts, on fingers, on faces, catching their + feet in heaps of clothing, kicking broken wood; but before they could get + hold of him Jukes emerged waist deep in a multitude of clawing hands. In + the instant he had been lost to view, all the buttons of his jacket had + gone, its back had got split up to the collar, his waistcoat had been torn + open. The central struggling mass of Chinamen went over to the roll, dark, + indistinct, helpless, with a wild gleam of many eyes in the dim light of + the lamps. + </p> + <p> + “Leave me alone—damn you. I am all right,” screeched Jukes. “Drive + them forward. Watch your chance when she pitches. Forward with 'em. Drive + them against the bulkhead. Jam 'em up.” + </p> + <p> + The rush of the sailors into the seething 'tween-deck was like a splash of + cold water into a boiling cauldron. The commotion sank for a moment. + </p> + <p> + The bulk of Chinamen were locked in such a compact scrimmage that, linking + their arms and aided by an appalling dive of the ship, the seamen sent it + forward in one great shove, like a solid block. Behind their backs small + clusters and loose bodies tumbled from side to side. + </p> + <p> + The boatswain performed prodigious feats of strength. With his long arms + open, and each great paw clutching at a stanchion, he stopped the rush of + seven entwined Chinamen rolling like a boulder. His joints cracked; he + said, “Ha!” and they flew apart. But the carpenter showed the greater + intelligence. Without saying a word to anybody he went back into the + alleyway, to fetch several coils of cargo gear he had seen there—chain + and rope. With these life-lines were rigged. + </p> + <p> + There was really no resistance. The struggle, however it began, had turned + into a scramble of blind panic. If the coolies had started up after their + scattered dollars they were by that time fighting only for their footing. + They took each other by the throat merely to save themselves from being + hurled about. Whoever got a hold anywhere would kick at the others who + caught at his legs and hung on, till a roll sent them flying together + across the deck. + </p> + <p> + The coming of the white devils was a terror. Had they come to kill? The + individuals torn out of the ruck became very limp in the seamen's hands: + some, dragged aside by the heels, were passive, like dead bodies, with + open, fixed eyes. Here and there a coolie would fall on his knees as if + begging for mercy; several, whom the excess of fear made unruly, were hit + with hard fists between the eyes, and cowered; while those who were hurt + submitted to rough handling, blinking rapidly without a plaint. Faces + streamed with blood; there were raw places on the shaven heads, scratches, + bruises, torn wounds, gashes. The broken porcelain out of the chests was + mostly responsible for the latter. Here and there a Chinaman, wild-eyed, + with his tail unplaited, nursed a bleeding sole. + </p> + <p> + They had been ranged closely, after having been shaken into submission, + cuffed a little to allay excitement, addressed in gruff words of + encouragement that sounded like promises of evil. They sat on the deck in + ghastly, drooping rows, and at the end the carpenter, with two hands to + help him, moved busily from place to place, setting taut and hitching the + life-lines. The boatswain, with one leg and one arm embracing a stanchion, + struggled with a lamp pressed to his breast, trying to get a light, and + growling all the time like an industrious gorilla. The figures of seamen + stooped repeatedly, with the movements of gleaners, and everything was + being flung into the bunker: clothing, smashed wood, broken china, and the + dollars, too, gathered up in men's jackets. Now and then a sailor would + stagger towards the doorway with his arms full of rubbish; and dolorous, + slanting eyes followed his movements. + </p> + <p> + With every roll of the ship the long rows of sitting Celestials would sway + forward brokenly, and her headlong dives knocked together the line of + shaven polls from end to end. When the wash of water rolling on the deck + died away for a moment, it seemed to Jukes, yet quivering from his + exertions, that in his mad struggle down there he had overcome the wind + somehow: that a silence had fallen upon the ship, a silence in which the + sea struck thunderously at her sides. + </p> + <p> + Everything had been cleared out of the 'tween-deck—all the wreckage, + as the men said. They stood erect and tottering above the level of heads + and drooping shoulders. Here and there a coolie sobbed for his breath. + Where the high light fell, Jukes could see the salient ribs of one, the + yellow, wistful face of another; bowed necks; or would meet a dull stare + directed at his face. He was amazed that there had been no corpses; but + the lot of them seemed at their last gasp, and they appeared to him more + pitiful than if they had been all dead. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly one of the coolies began to speak. The light came and went on his + lean, straining face; he threw his head up like a baying hound. From the + bunker came the sounds of knocking and the tinkle of some dollars rolling + loose; he stretched out his arm, his mouth yawned black, and the + incomprehensible guttural hooting sounds, that did not seem to belong to a + human language, penetrated Jukes with a strange emotion as if a brute had + tried to be eloquent. + </p> + <p> + Two more started mouthing what seemed to Jukes fierce denunciations; the + others stirred with grunts and growls. Jukes ordered the hands out of the + 'tweendecks hurriedly. He left last himself, backing through the door, + while the grunts rose to a loud murmur and hands were extended after him + as after a malefactor. The boatswain shot the bolt, and remarked uneasily, + “Seems as if the wind had dropped, sir.” + </p> + <p> + The seamen were glad to get back into the alleyway. Secretly each of them + thought that at the last moment he could rush out on deck—and that + was a comfort. There is something horribly repugnant in the idea of being + drowned under a deck. Now they had done with the Chinamen, they again + became conscious of the ship's position. + </p> + <p> + Jukes on coming out of the alleyway found himself up to the neck in the + noisy water. He gained the bridge, and discovered he could detect obscure + shapes as if his sight had become preternaturally acute. He saw faint + outlines. They recalled not the familiar aspect of the Nan-Shan, but + something remembered—an old dismantled steamer he had seen years ago + rotting on a mudbank. She recalled that wreck. + </p> + <p> + There was no wind, not a breath, except the faint currents created by the + lurches of the ship. The smoke tossed out of the funnel was settling down + upon her deck. He breathed it as he passed forward. He felt the deliberate + throb of the engines, and heard small sounds that seemed to have survived + the great uproar: the knocking of broken fittings, the rapid tumbling of + some piece of wreckage on the bridge. He perceived dimly the squat shape + of his captain holding on to a twisted bridge-rail, motionless and swaying + as if rooted to the planks. The unexpected stillness of the air oppressed + Jukes. + </p> + <p> + “We have done it, sir,” he gasped. + </p> + <p> + “Thought you would,” said Captain MacWhirr. + </p> + <p> + “Did you?” murmured Jukes to himself. + </p> + <p> + “Wind fell all at once,” went on the Captain. + </p> + <p> + Jukes burst out: “If you think it was an easy job—” + </p> + <p> + But his captain, clinging to the rail, paid no attention. “According to + the books the worst is not over yet.” + </p> + <p> + “If most of them hadn't been half dead with seasickness and fright, not + one of us would have come out of that 'tween-deck alive,” said Jukes. + </p> + <p> + “Had to do what's fair by them,” mumbled MacWhirr, stolidly. “You don't + find everything in books.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, I believe they would have risen on us if I hadn't ordered the hands + out of that pretty quick,” continued Jukes with warmth. + </p> + <p> + After the whisper of their shouts, their ordinary tones, so distinct, rang + out very loud to their ears in the amazing stillness of the air. It seemed + to them they were talking in a dark and echoing vault. + </p> + <p> + Through a jagged aperture in the dome of clouds the light of a few stars + fell upon the black sea, rising and falling confusedly. Sometimes the head + of a watery cone would topple on board and mingle with the rolling flurry + of foam on the swamped deck; and the Nan-Shan wallowed heavily at the + bottom of a circular cistern of clouds. This ring of dense vapours, + gyrating madly round the calm of the centre, encompassed the ship like a + motionless and unbroken wall of an aspect inconceivably sinister. Within, + the sea, as if agitated by an internal commotion, leaped in peaked mounds + that jostled each other, slapping heavily against her sides; and a low + moaning sound, the infinite plaint of the storm's fury, came from beyond + the limits of the menacing calm. Captain MacWhirr remained silent, and + Jukes' ready ear caught suddenly the faint, long-drawn roar of some + immense wave rushing unseen under that thick blackness, which made the + appalling boundary of his vision. + </p> + <p> + “Of course,” he started resentfully, “they thought we had caught at the + chance to plunder them. Of course! You said—pick up the money. + Easier said than done. They couldn't tell what was in our heads. We came + in, smash—right into the middle of them. Had to do it by a rush.” + </p> + <p> + “As long as it's done . . . ,” mumbled the Captain, without attempting to + look at Jukes. “Had to do what's fair.” + </p> + <p> + “We shall find yet there's the devil to pay when this is over,” said + Jukes, feeling very sore. “Let them only recover a bit, and you'll see. + They will fly at our throats, sir. Don't forget, sir, she isn't a British + ship now. These brutes know it well, too. The damned Siamese flag.” + </p> + <p> + “We are on board, all the same,” remarked Captain MacWhirr. + </p> + <p> + “The trouble's not over yet,” insisted Jukes, prophetically, reeling and + catching on. “She's a wreck,” he added, faintly. + </p> + <p> + “The trouble's not over yet,” assented Captain MacWhirr, half aloud . . . + . “Look out for her a minute.” + </p> + <p> + “Are you going off the deck, sir?” asked Jukes, hurriedly, as if the storm + were sure to pounce upon him as soon as he had been left alone with the + ship. + </p> + <p> + He watched her, battered and solitary, labouring heavily in a wild scene + of mountainous black waters lit by the gleams of distant worlds. She moved + slowly, breathing into the still core of the hurricane the excess of her + strength in a white cloud of steam—and the deep-toned vibration of + the escape was like the defiant trumpeting of a living creature of the sea + impatient for the renewal of the contest. It ceased suddenly. The still + air moaned. Above Jukes' head a few stars shone into a pit of black + vapours. The inky edge of the cloud-disc frowned upon the ship under the + patch of glittering sky. The stars, too, seemed to look at her intently, + as if for the last time, and the cluster of their splendour sat like a + diadem on a lowering brow. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr had gone into the chart-room. There was no light there; + but he could feel the disorder of that place where he used to live tidily. + His armchair was upset. The books had tumbled out on the floor: he + scrunched a piece of glass under his boot. He groped for the matches, and + found a box on a shelf with a deep ledge. He struck one, and puckering the + corners of his eyes, held out the little flame towards the barometer whose + glittering top of glass and metals nodded at him continuously. + </p> + <p> + It stood very low—incredibly low, so low that Captain MacWhirr + grunted. The match went out, and hurriedly he extracted another, with + thick, stiff fingers. + </p> + <p> + Again a little flame flared up before the nodding glass and metal of the + top. His eyes looked at it, narrowed with attention, as if expecting an + imperceptible sign. With his grave face he resembled a booted and + misshapen pagan burning incense before the oracle of a Joss. There was no + mistake. It was the lowest reading he had ever seen in his life. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr emitted a low whistle. He forgot himself till the flame + diminished to a blue spark, burnt his fingers and vanished. Perhaps + something had gone wrong with the thing! + </p> + <p> + There was an aneroid glass screwed above the couch. He turned that way, + struck another match, and discovered the white face of the other + instrument looking at him from the bulkhead, meaningly, not to be + gainsaid, as though the wisdom of men were made unerring by the + indifference of matter. There was no room for doubt now. Captain MacWhirr + pshawed at it, and threw the match down. + </p> + <p> + The worst was to come, then—and if the books were right this worst + would be very bad. The experience of the last six hours had enlarged his + conception of what heavy weather could be like. “It'll be terrific,” he + pronounced, mentally. He had not consciously looked at anything by the + light of the matches except at the barometer; and yet somehow he had seen + that his water-bottle and the two tumblers had been flung out of their + stand. It seemed to give him a more intimate knowledge of the tossing the + ship had gone through. “I wouldn't have believed it,” he thought. And his + table had been cleared, too; his rulers, his pencils, the inkstand—all + the things that had their safe appointed places—they were gone, as + if a mischievous hand had plucked them out one by one and flung them on + the wet floor. The hurricane had broken in upon the orderly arrangements + of his privacy. This had never happened before, and the feeling of dismay + reached the very seat of his composure. And the worst was to come yet! He + was glad the trouble in the 'tween-deck had been discovered in time. If + the ship had to go after all, then, at least, she wouldn't be going to the + bottom with a lot of people in her fighting teeth and claw. That would + have been odious. And in that feeling there was a humane intention and a + vague sense of the fitness of things. + </p> + <p> + These instantaneous thoughts were yet in their essence heavy and slow, + partaking of the nature of the man. He extended his hand to put back the + matchbox in its corner of the shelf. There were always matches there—by + his order. The steward had his instructions impressed upon him long + before. “A box . . . just there, see? Not so very full . . . where I can + put my hand on it, steward. Might want a light in a hurry. Can't tell on + board ship what you might want in a hurry. Mind, now.” + </p> + <p> + And of course on his side he would be careful to put it back in its place + scrupulously. He did so now, but before he removed his hand it occurred to + him that perhaps he would never have occasion to use that box any more. + The vividness of the thought checked him and for an infinitesimal fraction + of a second his fingers closed again on the small object as though it had + been the symbol of all these little habits that chain us to the weary + round of life. He released it at last, and letting himself fall on the + settee, listened for the first sounds of returning wind. + </p> + <p> + Not yet. He heard only the wash of water, the heavy splashes, the dull + shocks of the confused seas boarding his ship from all sides. She would + never have a chance to clear her decks. + </p> + <p> + But the quietude of the air was startlingly tense and unsafe, like a + slender hair holding a sword suspended over his head. By this awful pause + the storm penetrated the defences of the man and unsealed his lips. He + spoke out in the solitude and the pitch darkness of the cabin, as if + addressing another being awakened within his breast. + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn't like to lose her,” he said half aloud. + </p> + <p> + He sat unseen, apart from the sea, from his ship, isolated, as if + withdrawn from the very current of his own existence, where such freaks as + talking to himself surely had no place. His palms reposed on his knees, he + bowed his short neck and puffed heavily, surrendering to a strange + sensation of weariness he was not enlightened enough to recognize for the + fatigue of mental stress. + </p> + <p> + From where he sat he could reach the door of a washstand locker. There + should have been a towel there. There was. Good. . . . He took it out, + wiped his face, and afterwards went on rubbing his wet head. He towelled + himself with energy in the dark, and then remained motionless with the + towel on his knees. A moment passed, of a stillness so profound that no + one could have guessed there was a man sitting in that cabin. Then a + murmur arose. + </p> + <p> + “She may come out of it yet.” + </p> + <p> + When Captain MacWhirr came out on deck, which he did brusquely, as though + he had suddenly become conscious of having stayed away too long, the calm + had lasted already more than fifteen minutes—long enough to make + itself intolerable even to his imagination. Jukes, motionless on the + forepart of the bridge, began to speak at once. His voice, blank and + forced as though he were talking through hard-set teeth, seemed to flow + away on all sides into the darkness, deepening again upon the sea. + </p> + <p> + “I had the wheel relieved. Hackett began to sing out that he was done. + He's lying in there alongside the steering-gear with a face like death. At + first I couldn't get anybody to crawl out and relieve the poor devil. That + boss'n's worse than no good, I always said. Thought I would have had to go + myself and haul out one of them by the neck.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah, well,” muttered the Captain. He stood watchful by Jukes' side. + </p> + <p> + “The second mate's in there, too, holding his head. Is he hurt, sir?” + </p> + <p> + “No—crazy,” said Captain MacWhirr, curtly. + </p> + <p> + “Looks as if he had a tumble, though.” + </p> + <p> + “I had to give him a push,” explained the Captain. + </p> + <p> + Jukes gave an impatient sigh. + </p> + <p> + “It will come very sudden,” said Captain MacWhirr, “and from over there, I + fancy. God only knows though. These books are only good to muddle your + head and make you jumpy. It will be bad, and there's an end. If we only + can steam her round in time to meet it. . . .” + </p> + <p> + A minute passed. Some of the stars winked rapidly and vanished. + </p> + <p> + “You left them pretty safe?” began the Captain abruptly, as though the + silence were unbearable. + </p> + <p> + “Are you thinking of the coolies, sir? I rigged lifelines all ways across + that 'tween-deck.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you? Good idea, Mr. Jukes.” + </p> + <p> + “I didn't . . . think you cared to . . . know,” said Jukes—the + lurching of the ship cut his speech as though somebody had been jerking + him around while he talked—“how I got on with . . . that infernal + job. We did it. And it may not matter in the end.” + </p> + <p> + “Had to do what's fair, for all—they are only Chinamen. Give them + the same chance with ourselves—hang it all. She isn't lost yet. Bad + enough to be shut up below in a gale—” + </p> + <p> + “That's what I thought when you gave me the job, sir,” interjected Jukes, + moodily. + </p> + <p> + “—without being battered to pieces,” pursued Captain MacWhirr with + rising vehemence. “Couldn't let that go on in my ship, if I knew she + hadn't five minutes to live. Couldn't bear it, Mr. Jukes.” + </p> + <p> + A hollow echoing noise, like that of a shout rolling in a rocky chasm, + approached the ship and went away again. The last star, blurred, enlarged, + as if returning to the fiery mist of its beginning, struggled with the + colossal depth of blackness hanging over the ship—and went out. + </p> + <p> + “Now for it!” muttered Captain MacWhirr. “Mr. Jukes.” + </p> + <p> + “Here, sir.” + </p> + <p> + The two men were growing indistinct to each other. + </p> + <p> + “We must trust her to go through it and come out on the other side. That's + plain and straight. There's no room for Captain Wilson's storm-strategy + here.” + </p> + <p> + “No, sir.” + </p> + <p> + “She will be smothered and swept again for hours,” mumbled the Captain. + “There's not much left by this time above deck for the sea to take away—unless + you or me.” + </p> + <p> + “Both, sir,” whispered Jukes, breathlessly. + </p> + <p> + “You are always meeting trouble half way, Jukes,” Captain MacWhirr + remonstrated quaintly. “Though it's a fact that the second mate is no + good. D'ye hear, Mr. Jukes? You would be left alone if. . . .” + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr interrupted himself, and Jukes, glancing on all sides, + remained silent. + </p> + <p> + “Don't you be put out by anything,” the Captain continued, mumbling rather + fast. “Keep her facing it. They may say what they like, but the heaviest + seas run with the wind. Facing it—always facing it—that's the + way to get through. You are a young sailor. Face it. That's enough for any + man. Keep a cool head.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir,” said Jukes, with a flutter of the heart. + </p> + <p> + In the next few seconds the Captain spoke to the engine-room and got an + answer. + </p> + <p> + For some reason Jukes experienced an access of confidence, a sensation + that came from outside like a warm breath, and made him feel equal to + every demand. The distant muttering of the darkness stole into his ears. + He noted it unmoved, out of that sudden belief in himself, as a man safe + in a shirt of mail would watch a point. + </p> + <p> + The ship laboured without intermission amongst the black hills of water, + paying with this hard tumbling the price of her life. She rumbled in her + depths, shaking a white plummet of steam into the night, and Jukes' + thought skimmed like a bird through the engine-room, where Mr. Rout—good + man—was ready. When the rumbling ceased it seemed to him that there + was a pause of every sound, a dead pause in which Captain MacWhirr's voice + rang out startlingly. + </p> + <p> + “What's that? A puff of wind?”—it spoke much louder than Jukes had + ever heard it before—“On the bow. That's right. She may come out of + it yet.” + </p> + <p> + The mutter of the winds drew near apace. In the forefront could be + distinguished a drowsy waking plaint passing on, and far off the growth of + a multiple clamour, marching and expanding. There was the throb as of many + drums in it, a vicious rushing note, and like the chant of a tramping + multitude. + </p> + <p> + Jukes could no longer see his captain distinctly. The darkness was + absolutely piling itself upon the ship. At most he made out movements, a + hint of elbows spread out, of a head thrown up. + </p> + <p> + Captain MacWhirr was trying to do up the top button of his oilskin coat + with unwonted haste. The hurricane, with its power to madden the seas, to + sink ships, to uproot trees, to overturn strong walls and dash the very + birds of the air to the ground, had found this taciturn man in its path, + and, doing its utmost, had managed to wring out a few words. Before the + renewed wrath of winds swooped on his ship, Captain MacWhirr was moved to + declare, in a tone of vexation, as it were: “I wouldn't like to lose her.” + </p> + <p> + He was spared that annoyance. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI + </h2> + <p> + On A bright sunshiny day, with the breeze chasing her smoke far ahead, the + Nan-Shan came into Fu-chau. Her arrival was at once noticed on shore, and + the seamen in harbour said: “Look! Look at that steamer. What's that? + Siamese—isn't she? Just look at her!” + </p> + <p> + She seemed, indeed, to have been used as a running target for the + secondary batteries of a cruiser. A hail of minor shells could not have + given her upper works a more broken, torn, and devastated aspect: and she + had about her the worn, weary air of ships coming from the far ends of the + world—and indeed with truth, for in her short passage she had been + very far; sighting, verily, even the coast of the Great Beyond, whence no + ship ever returns to give up her crew to the dust of the earth. She was + incrusted and gray with salt to the trucks of her masts and to the top of + her funnel; as though (as some facetious seaman said) “the crowd on board + had fished her out somewhere from the bottom of the sea and brought her in + here for salvage.” And further, excited by the felicity of his own wit, he + offered to give five pounds for her—“as she stands.” + </p> + <p> + Before she had been quite an hour at rest, a meagre little man, with a + red-tipped nose and a face cast in an angry mould, landed from a sampan on + the quay of the Foreign Concession, and incontinently turned to shake his + fist at her. + </p> + <p> + A tall individual, with legs much too thin for a rotund stomach, and with + watery eyes, strolled up and remarked, “Just left her—eh? Quick + work.” + </p> + <p> + He wore a soiled suit of blue flannel with a pair of dirty cricketing + shoes; a dingy gray moustache drooped from his lip, and daylight could be + seen in two places between the rim and the crown of his hat. + </p> + <p> + “Hallo! what are you doing here?” asked the ex-second-mate of the + Nan-Shan, shaking hands hurriedly. + </p> + <p> + “Standing by for a job—chance worth taking—got a quiet hint,” + explained the man with the broken hat, in jerky, apathetic wheezes. + </p> + <p> + The second shook his fist again at the Nan-Shan. “There's a fellow there + that ain't fit to have the command of a scow,” he declared, quivering with + passion, while the other looked about listlessly. + </p> + <p> + “Is there?” + </p> + <p> + But he caught sight on the quay of a heavy seaman's chest, painted brown + under a fringed sailcloth cover, and lashed with new manila line. He eyed + it with awakened interest. + </p> + <p> + “I would talk and raise trouble if it wasn't for that damned Siamese flag. + Nobody to go to—or I would make it hot for him. The fraud! Told his + chief engineer—that's another fraud for you—I had lost my + nerve. The greatest lot of ignorant fools that ever sailed the seas. No! + You can't think . . .” + </p> + <p> + “Got your money all right?” inquired his seedy acquaintance suddenly. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Paid me off on board,” raged the second mate. “'Get your breakfast + on shore,' says he.” + </p> + <p> + “Mean skunk!” commented the tall man, vaguely, and passed his tongue on + his lips. “What about having a drink of some sort?” + </p> + <p> + “He struck me,” hissed the second mate. + </p> + <p> + “No! Struck! You don't say?” The man in blue began to bustle about + sympathetically. “Can't possibly talk here. I want to know all about it. + Struck—eh? Let's get a fellow to carry your chest. I know a quiet + place where they have some bottled beer. . . .” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Jukes, who had been scanning the shore through a pair of glasses, + informed the chief engineer afterwards that “our late second mate hasn't + been long in finding a friend. A chap looking uncommonly like a bummer. I + saw them walk away together from the quay.” + </p> + <p> + The hammering and banging of the needful repairs did not disturb Captain + MacWhirr. The steward found in the letter he wrote, in a tidy chart-room, + passages of such absorbing interest that twice he was nearly caught in the + act. But Mrs. MacWhirr, in the drawing-room of the forty-pound house, + stifled a yawn—perhaps out of self-respect—for she was alone. + </p> + <p> + She reclined in a plush-bottomed and gilt hammock-chair near a tiled + fireplace, with Japanese fans on the mantel and a glow of coals in the + grate. Lifting her hands, she glanced wearily here and there into the many + pages. It was not her fault they were so prosy, so completely + uninteresting—from “My darling wife” at the beginning, to “Your + loving husband” at the end. She couldn't be really expected to understand + all these ship affairs. She was glad, of course, to hear from him, but she + had never asked herself why, precisely. + </p> + <p> + “. . . They are called typhoons . . . The mate did not seem to like it . . + . Not in books . . . Couldn't think of letting it go on. . . .” + </p> + <p> + The paper rustled sharply. “. . . . A calm that lasted more than twenty + minutes,” she read perfunctorily; and the next words her thoughtless eyes + caught, on the top of another page, were: “see you and the children again. + . . .” She had a movement of impatience. He was always thinking of coming + home. He had never had such a good salary before. What was the matter now? + </p> + <p> + It did not occur to her to turn back overleaf to look. She would have + found it recorded there that between 4 and 6 A. M. on December 25th, + Captain MacWhirr did actually think that his ship could not possibly live + another hour in such a sea, and that he would never see his wife and + children again. Nobody was to know this (his letters got mislaid so + quickly)—nobody whatever but the steward, who had been greatly + impressed by that disclosure. So much so, that he tried to give the cook + some idea of the “narrow squeak we all had” by saying solemnly, “The old + man himself had a dam' poor opinion of our chance.” + </p> + <p> + “How do you know?” asked, contemptuously, the cook, an old soldier. “He + hasn't told you, maybe?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, he did give me a hint to that effect,” the steward brazened it out. + </p> + <p> + “Get along with you! He will be coming to tell me next,” jeered the old + cook, over his shoulder. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. MacWhirr glanced farther, on the alert. “. . . Do what's fair. . . + Miserable objects . . . . Only three, with a broken leg each, and one . . + . Thought had better keep the matter quiet . . . hope to have done the + fair thing. . . .” + </p> + <p> + She let fall her hands. No: there was nothing more about coming home. Must + have been merely expressing a pious wish. Mrs. MacWhirr's mind was set at + ease, and a black marble clock, priced by the local jeweller at 3L. 18s. + 6d., had a discreet stealthy tick. + </p> + <p> + The door flew open, and a girl in the long-legged, short-frocked period of + existence, flung into the room. + </p> + <p> + A lot of colourless, rather lanky hair was scattered over her shoulders. + Seeing her mother, she stood still, and directed her pale prying eyes upon + the letter. + </p> + <p> + “From father,” murmured Mrs. MacWhirr. “What have you done with your + ribbon?” + </p> + <p> + The girl put her hands up to her head and pouted. + </p> + <p> + “He's well,” continued Mrs. MacWhirr languidly. “At least I think so. He + never says.” She had a little laugh. The girl's face expressed a wandering + indifference, and Mrs. MacWhirr surveyed her with fond pride. + </p> + <p> + “Go and get your hat,” she said after a while. “I am going out to do some + shopping. There is a sale at Linom's.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, how jolly!” uttered the child, impressively, in unexpectedly grave + vibrating tones, and bounded out of the room. + </p> + <p> + It was a fine afternoon, with a gray sky and dry sidewalks. Outside the + draper's Mrs. MacWhirr smiled upon a woman in a black mantle of generous + proportions armoured in jet and crowned with flowers blooming falsely + above a bilious matronly countenance. They broke into a swift little + babble of greetings and exclamations both together, very hurried, as if + the street were ready to yawn open and swallow all that pleasure before it + could be expressed. + </p> + <p> + Behind them the high glass doors were kept on the swing. People couldn't + pass, men stood aside waiting patiently, and Lydia was absorbed in poking + the end of her parasol between the stone flags. Mrs. MacWhirr talked + rapidly. + </p> + <p> + “Thank you very much. He's not coming home yet. Of course it's very sad to + have him away, but it's such a comfort to know he keeps so well.” Mrs. + MacWhirr drew breath. “The climate there agrees with him,” she added, + beamingly, as if poor MacWhirr had been away touring in China for the sake + of his health. + </p> + <p> + Neither was the chief engineer coming home yet. Mr. Rout knew too well the + value of a good billet. + </p> + <p> + “Solomon says wonders will never cease,” cried Mrs. Rout joyously at the + old lady in her armchair by the fire. Mr. Rout's mother moved slightly, + her withered hands lying in black half-mittens on her lap. + </p> + <p> + The eyes of the engineer's wife fairly danced on the paper. “That captain + of the ship he is in—a rather simple man, you remember, mother?—has + done something rather clever, Solomon says.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, my dear,” said the old woman meekly, sitting with bowed silvery + head, and that air of inward stillness characteristic of very old people + who seem lost in watching the last flickers of life. “I think I remember.” + </p> + <p> + Solomon Rout, Old Sol, Father Sol, the Chief, “Rout, good man”—Mr. + Rout, the condescending and paternal friend of youth, had been the baby of + her many children—all dead by this time. And she remembered him best + as a boy of ten—long before he went away to serve his apprenticeship + in some great engineering works in the North. She had seen so little of + him since, she had gone through so many years, that she had now to retrace + her steps very far back to recognize him plainly in the mist of time. + Sometimes it seemed that her daughter-in-law was talking of some strange + man. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Rout junior was disappointed. “H'm. H'm.” She turned the page. “How + provoking! He doesn't say what it is. Says I couldn't understand how much + there was in it. Fancy! What could it be so very clever? What a wretched + man not to tell us!” + </p> + <p> + She read on without further remark soberly, and at last sat looking into + the fire. The chief wrote just a word or two of the typhoon; but something + had moved him to express an increased longing for the companionship of the + jolly woman. “If it hadn't been that mother must be looked after, I would + send you your passage-money to-day. You could set up a small house out + here. I would have a chance to see you sometimes then. We are not growing + younger. . . .” + </p> + <p> + “He's well, mother,” sighed Mrs. Rout, rousing herself. + </p> + <p> + “He always was a strong healthy boy,” said the old woman, placidly. + </p> + <p> + But Mr. Jukes' account was really animated and very full. His friend in + the Western Ocean trade imparted it freely to the other officers of his + liner. “A chap I know writes to me about an extraordinary affair that + happened on board his ship in that typhoon—you know—that we + read of in the papers two months ago. It's the funniest thing! Just see + for yourself what he says. I'll show you his letter.” + </p> + <p> + There were phrases in it calculated to give the impression of + light-hearted, indomitable resolution. Jukes had written them in good + faith, for he felt thus when he wrote. He described with lurid effect the + scenes in the 'tween-deck. “. . . It struck me in a flash that those + confounded Chinamen couldn't tell we weren't a desperate kind of robbers. + 'Tisn't good to part the Chinaman from his money if he is the stronger + party. We need have been desperate indeed to go thieving in such weather, + but what could these beggars know of us? So, without thinking of it twice, + I got the hands away in a jiffy. Our work was done—that the old man + had set his heart on. We cleared out without staying to inquire how they + felt. I am convinced that if they had not been so unmercifully shaken, and + afraid—each individual one of them —to stand up, we would have + been torn to pieces. Oh! It was pretty complete, I can tell you; and you + may run to and fro across the Pond to the end of time before you find + yourself with such a job on your hands.” + </p> + <p> + After this he alluded professionally to the damage done to the ship, and + went on thus: + </p> + <p> + “It was when the weather quieted down that the situation became + confoundedly delicate. It wasn't made any better by us having been lately + transferred to the Siamese flag; though the skipper can't see that it + makes any difference—'as long as we are on board'—he says. + There are feelings that this man simply hasn't got—and there's an + end of it. You might just as well try to make a bedpost understand. But + apart from this it is an infernally lonely state for a ship to be going + about the China seas with no proper consuls, not even a gunboat of her own + anywhere, nor a body to go to in case of some trouble. + </p> + <p> + “My notion was to keep these Johnnies under hatches for another fifteen + hours or so; as we weren't much farther than that from Fu-chau. We would + find there, most likely, some sort of a man-of-war, and once under her + guns we were safe enough; for surely any skipper of a man-of-war—English, + French or Dutch—would see white men through as far as row on board + goes. We could get rid of them and their money afterwards by delivering + them to their Mandarin or Taotai, or whatever they call these chaps in + goggles you see being carried about in sedan-chairs through their stinking + streets. + </p> + <p> + “The old man wouldn't see it somehow. He wanted to keep the matter quiet. + He got that notion into his head, and a steam windlass couldn't drag it + out of him. He wanted as little fuss made as possible, for the sake of the + ship's name and for the sake of the owners—'for the sake of all + concerned,' says he, looking at me very hard. + </p> + <p> + “It made me angry hot. Of course you couldn't keep a thing like that + quiet; but the chests had been secured in the usual manner and were safe + enough for any earthly gale, while this had been an altogether fiendish + business I couldn't give you even an idea of. + </p> + <p> + “Meantime, I could hardly keep on my feet. None of us had a spell of any + sort for nearly thirty hours, and there the old man sat rubbing his chin, + rubbing the top of his head, and so bothered he didn't even think of + pulling his long boots off. + </p> + <p> + “'I hope, sir,' says I, 'you won't be letting them out on deck before we + make ready for them in some shape or other.' Not, mind you, that I felt + very sanguine about controlling these beggars if they meant to take + charge. A trouble with a cargo of Chinamen is no child's play. I was dam' + tired, too. 'I wish,' said I, 'you would let us throw the whole lot of + these dollars down to them and leave them to fight it out amongst + themselves, while we get a rest.' + </p> + <p> + “'Now you talk wild, Jukes,' says he, looking up in his slow way that + makes you ache all over, somehow. 'We must plan out something that would + be fair to all parties.' + </p> + <p> + “I had no end of work on hand, as you may imagine, so I set the hands + going, and then I thought I would turn in a bit. I hadn't been asleep in + my bunk ten minutes when in rushes the steward and begins to pull at my + leg. + </p> + <p> + “'For God's sake, Mr. Jukes, come out! Come on deck quick, sir. Oh, do + come out!' + </p> + <p> + “The fellow scared all the sense out of me. I didn't know what had + happened: another hurricane—or what. Could hear no wind. + </p> + <p> + “'The Captain's letting them out. Oh, he is letting them out! Jump on + deck, sir, and save us. The chief engineer has just run below for his + revolver.' + </p> + <p> + “That's what I understood the fool to say. However, Father Rout swears he + went in there only to get a clean pocket-handkerchief. Anyhow, I made one + jump into my trousers and flew on deck aft. There was certainly a good + deal of noise going on forward of the bridge. Four of the hands with the + boss'n were at work abaft. I passed up to them some of the rifles all the + ships on the China coast carry in the cabin, and led them on the bridge. + On the way I ran against Old Sol, looking startled and sucking at an + unlighted cigar. + </p> + <p> + “'Come along,' I shouted to him. + </p> + <p> + “We charged, the seven of us, up to the chart-room. All was over. There + stood the old man with his sea-boots still drawn up to the hips and in + shirt-sleeves—got warm thinking it out, I suppose. Bun Hin's dandy + clerk at his elbow, as dirty as a sweep, was still green in the face. I + could see directly I was in for something. + </p> + <p> + “'What the devil are these monkey tricks, Mr. Jukes?' asks the old man, as + angry as ever he could be. I tell you frankly it made me lose my tongue. + 'For God's sake, Mr. Jukes,' says he, 'do take away these rifles from the + men. Somebody's sure to get hurt before long if you don't. Damme, if this + ship isn't worse than Bedlam! Look sharp now. I want you up here to help + me and Bun Hin's Chinaman to count that money. You wouldn't mind lending a + hand, too, Mr. Rout, now you are here. The more of us the better.' + </p> + <p> + “He had settled it all in his mind while I was having a snooze. Had we + been an English ship, or only going to land our cargo of coolies in an + English port, like Hong-Kong, for instance, there would have been no end + of inquiries and bother, claims for damages and so on. But these Chinamen + know their officials better than we do. + </p> + <p> + “The hatches had been taken off already, and they were all on deck after a + night and a day down below. It made you feel queer to see so many gaunt, + wild faces together. The beggars stared about at the sky, at the sea, at + the ship, as though they had expected the whole thing to have been blown + to pieces. And no wonder! They had had a doing that would have shaken the + soul out of a white man. But then they say a Chinaman has no soul. He has, + though, something about him that is deuced tough. There was a fellow + (amongst others of the badly hurt) who had had his eye all but knocked + out. It stood out of his head the size of half a hen's egg. This would + have laid out a white man on his back for a month: and yet there was that + chap elbowing here and there in the crowd and talking to the others as if + nothing had been the matter. They made a great hubbub amongst themselves, + and whenever the old man showed his bald head on the foreside of the + bridge, they would all leave off jawing and look at him from below. + </p> + <p> + “It seems that after he had done his thinking he made that Bun Hin's + fellow go down and explain to them the only way they could get their money + back. He told me afterwards that, all the coolies having worked in the + same place and for the same length of time, he reckoned he would be doing + the fair thing by them as near as possible if he shared all the cash we + had picked up equally among the lot. You couldn't tell one man's dollars + from another's, he said, and if you asked each man how much money he + brought on board he was afraid they would lie, and he would find himself a + long way short. I think he was right there. As to giving up the money to + any Chinese official he could scare up in Fu-chau, he said he might just + as well put the lot in his own pocket at once for all the good it would be + to them. I suppose they thought so, too. + </p> + <p> + “We finished the distribution before dark. It was rather a sight: the sea + running high, the ship a wreck to look at, these Chinamen staggering up on + the bridge one by one for their share, and the old man still booted, and + in his shirt-sleeves, busy paying out at the chartroom door, perspiring + like anything, and now and then coming down sharp on myself or Father Rout + about one thing or another not quite to his mind. He took the share of + those who were disabled himself to them on the No. 2 hatch. There were + three dollars left over, and these went to the three most damaged coolies, + one to each. We turned-to afterwards, and shovelled out on deck heaps of + wet rags, all sorts of fragments of things without shape, and that you + couldn't give a name to, and let them settle the ownership themselves. + </p> + <p> + “This certainly is coming as near as can be to keeping the thing quiet for + the benefit of all concerned. What's your opinion, you pampered mail-boat + swell? The old chief says that this was plainly the only thing that could + be done. The skipper remarked to me the other day, 'There are things you + find nothing about in books.' I think that he got out of it very well for + such a stupid man.” + </p> + <p> + [The other stories included in this volume (“Amy Foster,” “Falk: A + Reminiscence,” and “To-morrow”) being already available in another volume, + have not entered them here.] + </p> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1142 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |