Blow The Man Down: A Romance Of The Coast

by Holman Day

  XIX ~ THE PRIZE PACKAGE FROM MR. FOGG

  Our captain stood on his quarter-deck, And a fine little man was he! "Overhaul, overhaul, on your davit tackle fall, And launch your boats to the sea, Brave boys! And launch your boats to the sea." --The Whale.

  A slowing, tug, tooting fussy and staccato blasts which Captain Wasstranslated into commands to hold up, intercepted the _Nequasset_ inHampton Roads.

  Mr. Fletcher Fogg was a passenger on the tug. In a suit of natty gray,he loomed conspicuously in the alley outside the tug's pilot-house. Hecursed roundly when he toilsomely climbed the ladder to the freighter'sdeck, for the rusty sheathing smutched the knees of his trousers.

  "I'm doing a little better than I promised you, captain," he stated whenhe arrived finally in the presence of the master. "I said Philadelphia.But here I am. Do you know me now?"

  "Your name is Fogg," returned Captain Wass, exhibiting no specialdelight.

  "And I'm manager of this line. As it seems to be pretty hard for you toget anything through that thick nut of yours, I'll ask you to glance ata paper which will save argument."

  The paper was an attested notification, signed by the directors, statingin laconic legal phrase what Mr. Fogg had just declared.

  "You recognize my authority, do you?"

  "Your bill o' lading reads O. K.," assented the skipper.

  "Very well! Exactly! Then you take your orders. Proceed to an anchorageoff Lambert Point below Norfolk, pick a berth well off the channel, andput down both hooks. The boat is going out of commission. I find you'renot making any money for the owners."

  "It ain't my fault. With charters at--" began the master, indignantly.

  "I haven't any time for a joint debate. You are laid off. Bring youraccounts to the main office as soon as you have turned the steamer overto the caretaker--he'll come out from Norfolk." Manager Fogg turned onhis heel to meet Mate Mayo. "You will report at the main offices, too,Mr. Mayo. Have you master's papers?"

  "I have, sir--Atlantic waters, Jacksonville to East-port."

  "Very good--you're going to be promoted. I shall put you aboard thepassenger-steamer _Montana_ as captain." He looked about sharply. "Whereis my agent?"

  "There, in the quartermaster's cabin. We gave him that," replied CaptainWass, gruffly. "I'm glad I'm out of steamboating. I've learned how torun a boarding-house and make money out of it."

  Mr. Fogg did not understand that sneer, and he paid no attention to thecaptain's manner. He started for the cabin indicated.

  "Well, you can swell around in gold braid now and catch your heiress,"observed Captain Wass to his mate.

  "I'm sorry, skipper," said the young man, with real feeling. "You arethe man to be promoted, not I. It isn't right--it doesn't seem real."

  "There isn't any real steamboating on this coast any longer. It is--Idon't know what the devil it is," snarled the veteran. "I have beensniffing and scouting. I'd like to be a mouse in the wall of them NewYork offices and hear what it is they're trying to do to us poor cusses.Ordered one day to keep the law; ordered the next day to break the law;hounded by owners and threatened by the government! I'm glad I'm out ofit and glad you've got a good job. That last I'm specially glad about.But keep your eye peeled. There are queer doings round about you!"

  Fogg entered the cabin and shut the door behind him. He found Boynesitting on a stool and looking somewhat apprehensive. "Hiding?" inquiredFogg.

  "I thought I wouldn't show myself till I was sure about who was on thattug," said the young man.

  "That's the boy, David," complimented Fogg, with real heartiness."You're no fool. Nothing like being careful. Pack your bag and go aboardthe tug." He marched out.

  "Philadelphia charter has been canceled, eh?" asked Captain Wass. Thetone of his voice did not invite amity.

  "It has, sir."

  "Seems queer to turn down a cargo that's there waiting--and the old boatcan carry it cheaper than anybody else, the way I've got expenses fineddown."

  "Are you trying to tell me my business?"

  "I have beep steamboating forty years, and I know a little somethingabout it."

  Mr. Fogg looked at the old mariner, eyes narrowed. He wanted to informCaptain Wass that the latter knew altogether too much about steamboatingfor the kind of work that was planned out along the coast in thoseticklish times.

  "Then I ain't to expect anything special from now on?" asked theskipper. In spite of his determination to be crusty and keep his upperlip stiff, he could not repress a little wistfulness, and his eyes rovedover the old freighter with affection.

  "Not a thing, sir!" Mr. Fogg was blunt and cool. He started for theladder. He slapped the shoulder of Mayo as he passed the young man."Here's the kind of chap we're looking for nowadays. The sooner youreport, my boy, the better for you."

  With Boyne following him, he climbed down the swaying ladder, and waslifted from the lower rungs over the tug's rail to a secure footing.

  After the lines had been cast off and the tug went floundering away ata sharp angle, Captain Wass scuffed into his pilot-house and gave thebells.

  "She seems to feel it--honest she does!" he told Mate Mayo. "She goesoff logy. She doesn't pick up her heels. Nor could I do it when I walkedin here. Going to be scrapped--the two of us! Cuss their picking andstealing and fighting and financing. They ain't steam-boating anylonger. They're using good boats to play checkers in Wall Street with.Well, son," he mourned, hanging dispiritedly over the sill of the windowand staring up the wind-swept Chesapeake, "I ain't going to whine--butI shall miss the old packet and the rumble and racket of the old machinedown there in her belly. I'd even take the job of watchman aboard her ifhe would hire me."

  "He seems to fancy me a bit. I'll ask him to hire you," proffered themate, eagerly.

  "I reckon you didn't get the look in his eye when he fired me," saidCaptain Wass. "I won't allow you to say a word to him about me. You goahead, boy, and take the job he has offered. But always remember thathe's a slick operator. See what he has done to Uncle Vose; and wehaven't been able to worm it out of that passenger how it was done,either. Financing in these days comes pretty nigh to running withoutlights and under forced draught. It gets a man to Prosperity Landing ina hurry, providing he doesn't hit anything bigger than he is. They'regoing to haul up this freighter and blame it on to me because I ain'tmaking money for the owners. They'll have plenty of figgers to show it.Look out that they don't lay something worse and bigger to you. They'regoing to play a game with the Vose line, I tell you! In the game of bigfinance, 'tag-gool,' making 'it' out of the little chap who can't runvery fast, seems to be almighty popular."

  He slowed the freighter to a snail's pace when he approached the dredgedchannel, and at last the leadsman found suitable bottom. Both anchorswere let go.

  The old skipper sounded the jingle, telling the chief engineer that theengine-crew was released. In a speaking-tube the captain ordered bothboilers to be blown off.

  "And there's the end of me as master of my ship," he said.

  Mate Mayo's eyes were wet, but words of sympathy to fit the case did notcome to his sailor tongue, and he was silent.

  When the tug was near Newport News, Manager Fogg took David Boyne apartfrom all ears which might hear. He gave the young man another packet ofmoney.

  "The rest of your expenses for a good trip," he said. "You seem to bea chap who knows how to mind his own business--and able to get at theother fellow's business in pretty fair shape. You haven't told such anawful lot about young Mayo, but it's satisfactory to learn that he haslived such a simple and every-day life that there isn't much to tell."

  "I never saw a man so sort of guileless," affirmed Boyne. "Not that Ihave had a lot of experience, but in a lawyer's office you are bound tosee considerable of human nature."

  "He is no doubt a very deserving young man--and I'm glad I can use him,"said Fogg, not able to keep all the grimness out of his tones. "Now,son," he went on, after a momen
t of pondering, "you stay on board thistug till I have been gone five minutes. There are a lot of sharp eyesaround in these times, and some of Vose's friends would be glad to runto him with a story about me. After five minutes, you take your bag andwalk to Dock Seven and go aboard the freighter _Ariel_--go just as ifyou belonged there. Tell the captain that you are Daniel Boyle--get thename--Daniel Boyle. And never tell anybody until you hear from me thatyour name is David Boyne. That freighter leaves to-night for Barbadoswith sugar machinery. You'll have a nice trip."

  "I don't care how far away I get," declared Boyne, rather bitterly. "Ihave done a tough trick. I'm pretty much of a renegade. No, I don't carehow far I go."

  "Nor I, either," agreed Fogg, but a smile relieved the brutality of thespeech. "You see, son, both of us have special reasons why it's just aswell for you to be away from these diggings for a time. If some folksget hold of you they'll bother you with a lot of foolish questions. Whenyou get tired of Barbados go ahead and pick out another nice trip, andkeep going, and later on we'll find a good job for you up this way. Keepme posted. Good-by."

  The tug had docked and he hurried off and away.

  "It's quite a game," reflected Mr. Fogg. "I've bluffed a pot with onetwo-spot. Work was a little coarse because it had to be done on shortnotice. The work I do with my second two-spot is going to be smoother,and there won't be so much beefing after the pot is raked in. Too muchhollering, and your game gets raided! I can see what would happen tome--Julius Marston doing it--if I give the strong-arm squad an opening.But if they see the little Fogg boy slip a card in the next deal he'sgoing to make--well, I'll eat the _Montana_, if that's the only way toget rid of her."

  Boyd Mayo lost no time in obeying his orders to report in New York. Hegave his name to a clerk at the offices of the Vose line and asked tosee Mr. Fogg. He presented himself a bit timorously. He was not at allsure of his good fortune. It is rather bewildering for a young man tohave the captaincy of a twin-screw passenger racer popped at one ascarelessly as tossing a peanut to a child. He crushed his cap betweentrembling palms when he followed the clerk into the inner office.

  Mr. Fogg rose and greeted Mayo with great cordiality. "Good morning,captain," said the manager. "Allow me to hope that you're going to be aslively in keeping to schedule time as you have been in getting here fromNorfolk."

  "I didn't feel like wasting much time, considering what was promisedme," stammered Mayo, not yet sure of himself.

  "Afraid I might change my mind?"

  "It seemed too good to be true. I wanted to get here as soon as I couldand make sure that I had heard right, sir. Here are my papers."

  He laid them in the manager's hand. Fogg did not unfold them. He fannedthem, indicating a chair.

  "Sit down, Captain Mayo. You understand that new management has takenhold of the Vose line in order to get some life and snap into thebusiness. We have strong competition. A big syndicate is taking overthe other steamship properties, and we must hustle to keep up with theprocession. I'm laying off freighters that are not showing a properprofit--I'm weeding out the moss-covered captains who are not up withthe times. That's why I'm putting you on the _Montana_ in place ofJacobs."

  "He's a good man--one of the best," ventured Mayo, loyalty to his kindprompting him. "I'll be sorry to see him step aside, as glad as I am tobe promoted--and that's honest."

  "That's the way to talk; but we've got to have hustle and dash, andyoung men can give us what we're after. It doesn't mean that you've gotto take reckless chances."

  "I hope not, Mr. Fogg. My training with Captain Wass has been the otherway. And if you could only give him--"

  "Captain, you've got your own row to hoe. Keep your eye on it," advisedthe general manager, sharply. "I'm picking captains for the Vose boats,and I think I understand my business. Now what I want to know is, do youhave confidence in me? Are you going to be loyal to me?"

  "Yes, sir!" affirmed Mayo, impressed by his superior's brisk, brusquebusiness demeanor.

  "Exactly! And the only talk I want you to turn loose is to the effectthat you believe I'm doing my best to make this line worth something tothe stockholders. Where are you stopping?"

  Mayo named a little hotel around the corner.

  "I'll put you aboard the _Montana_ just as soon as I can arrange thedetails of transfer. I may let Jacobs make another trip or so. Reporthere each morning at nine. For the rest of the time keep within reach ofthe hotel telephone."

  Mayo saluted and went out.

  Fogg called the observer at the weather bureau on the telephone andasked some questions. He was informed that the wind had swung into thenorthwest and that the long-prevailing fog had been blown off the coast.

  Mr. Fogg appeared to feel somewhat peevish over this sudden departureof the weather phenomenon which bore his family name. He slammed thereceiver on to the hook and said a naughty word. A person overhearingmight have wondered a bit, for here was a steamboat manager cursing theabsence of the fog instead of preserving his profanity to expend on thepresence of the demoralizing mists. But the reign of the north wind inlate summer is never long; three days later the breeze shifted, and thegray banks of the fog marched in from the open sea.

  Mayo was awakened early by the clamor of the whistles of river craft,for the little hotel was near the water-front. He saw the fog driftingin shredded masses against the high buildings, shrouding the towers.He had been waiting his call to duty with much impatience, finding theconfinement of the hotel irksome in the crisp days of sunlight, eager tobe out and about this splendid new duty which promised so much.

  It was the _Montana's_ sailing-day from the New York end.

  He had gone to sleep thrilling with the earnest hope that he would becalled to take her out. But when he looked out into that morning, sawthe draping curtains of the stalking mists, heard the frantic squallingsof craft in the harbor, frenzied howls of alarm, hoarse hootings ofprotests and warnings, he was suddenly and pointedy anxious to havehis elevation to the pilot-house of the _Montana_ deferred. Better thesmoky, cramped office of the little hotel where he had been chafing indismal waiting. He was perfectly willing to sit there and studyover again the advertising chromos on the walls and gaze out on theeverlasting procession of rumbling drays. But at eight o'clock thetelephone summoned him.

  "This is General-Manager Fogg," the voice informed him, though he didnot require the information; he knew those crisp tones. "I am speakingfrom my apartments. Please proceed at once to the _Montana_. I'll comeaboard within an hour."

  "Do you expect me to take command--to--take her out to-day?" falteredMayo.

  "Certainly. Captain Jacobs will transfer command as soon as I get down."

  Mayo had just been rejoicing in his heart because Jacobs would beobliged to bear the responsibility of that day's sailing; he had beenperfectly sure that a new man would not be summoned under the conditionswhich prevailed. He wanted to suggest to Manager Fogg that makingthe change just then would be inadvisable. He cleared his throat andsearched his soul for words. But a sharp and decisive click told himthat Mr. Fogg considered the matter settled. He came away from thetelephone, dizzy and troubled, and he was not comforted when herecollected how Manager Fogg had received meek suggestions in the past.He paid his modest account, took his traveling-bag, and started for theVose line pier.

  When he saw her looming in the fog--his ship at last--he felt likerunning away from her incontinently, instead of running toward her.

  Mayo had all of a young man's zeal and ambition and courage--but he hadin full measure a sailor's caution and knowledge of conditions; he hadbeen trained by that master of caution, Captain Zoradus Wass. He wasreally frightened as he stared up at the towering bow, the mightyflanks, the graceful sweep of superstructure, and realized that he mustguide this giant and her freightage of human beings into the whitevoid of the fog. In his honesty he acknowledged to himself that he wasfrightened.

  The whole great fabric fairly shouted responsibility at him.

  He was confident of his ab
ility. As chief mate he had mastered theproblems of courses and manoeuvers in the fog along that same routewhich he must now take. But until then the supreme responsibility haddevolved upon another.

  Men were rushing freight aboard on rattling trucks--parallel lines ofstevedores were working. There were many trunks, avant couriers of thepassengers.

  He went aboard by the freight entrance and found his way to the row ofofficers' staterooms. He recognized the gray-bearded veteran who waspacing the alley outside the pilot-house, though the man was not inuniform; it was the deposed master.

  "Good morning, Captain Mayo," he said, without any resentment in histones. "I congratulate you on your promotion."

  "I hope you understand that I didn't go hunting for this job," blurtedMayo.

  "I believe it's merely a matter of new policy--so Manager Fogg tells me.Understand me, too, Captain Mayo! I harbor no resentment, especially notagainst you."

  He put out his hand in fine, manly fashion, and was so distinctlythe best type of the dignified, self-possessed sea-captain of the oldschool, that Mayo fairly flinched at thought of replacing this man.

  Captain Jacobs opened the door lettered "Captain." "All my truck is outand over the rail. I'll sit in with you, if you don't mind, until Mr.Fogg arrives. You're going to have a thick passage, Captain Mayo."

  "It doesn't seem right to me--putting a new man on here in this fog,"protested Mayo, warmly. "I ought to have her in clear weather till Iknow her tricks. In a pinch, when you've got to know how a boat behaves,and know it mighty sudden in order to avoid a smash, one false move putsyou into the hole."

  "They seem to be running steamboat lines from Wall Street nowadays,instead of from the water-front," said Captain Jacobs, dryly. "It's allin the game as they're playing it in these times. There's nothing to besaid by the men in the pilot-house."

  "I'm a sailor, and a simple one. I think I know my job, Captain Jacobs,or else I wouldn't accept this promotion. But I've got no swelled head.It's the proper and sensible thing for you to take the _Montana_ outtonight and let me hang around the pilot-house and watch you. If I canprevail upon Mr. Fogg to allow it, will you make another trip?"

  "I would do it to help you, but I'll be blasted if I'll help Fogg--notif he would get down now and beg me," declared Captain Jacobs, showingtemper for the first time. "And if you had been pitchforked out asI've been after all my years of honest service you'd feel just as I do,Captain Mayo. You don't blame me, do you?"

  "I can't blame you."

  "You know the courses, and you'll have the same staff as I've had.You'll find every notation in the log accurate to the yard or thesecond. She's a steady old girl and, knowing tide set and courses, asyou do, you can depend on her to the turn of a screw. You have my bestwishes--but I'm done."

  He put the fervor of final resolve into the declaration. But, withsailor's fraternal spirit of helpfulness he sat down and went intothe details of all the Montana's few whims. He called in the mates andintroduced them to the new master. They seemed to be quiet, sturdy menwho bore no malice because a new policy had put a new man over them.

  Then arrived General-Manager Fogg, and in this strictly businesspresence Mayo did not presume to voice any of his doubts or his opinionof his inefficiency.

  The rather stiff and decidedly painful ceremony of speeding the formercommander was soon over, and Captain Jacobs departed.

  "Why haven't you put on your uniform?" asked Fogg. "You have fixedyourself out with a new one, of course?"

  "Yes, sir." Mayo's cheeks flushed slightly when he recollected how hehad strutted before the mirror in his room at the hotel. But he had beenashamed to hurry into his gilt-incrusted coat in the presence of CaptainJacobs.

  "Get it on as soon as you can," ordered the general manager. "I want youto make a general inspection of the boat with me."

  They made the tour, and in spite of his misgivings, when he saw themists sweeping past the end of the pier Captain Mayo, receiving thesalutes of respectful subalterns, felt the proud joy of one who has atlast arrived at the goal of his ambition.

  Master of the crack _Montana_, queen of the Vose fleet, at the age oftwenty-six!

  He glanced into each of the splendid mirrors of the great saloon to makesure of the gold letters on his cap.

  The thick carpet seemed grateful to his step. The ship's orchestra wasrehearsing in its gallery.

  If only that devilish fog would lift! But still it surged in from thesea, and the glass, down to 29.40, promised no clearing weather.

  "Safety to the minutest detail--that's my motto," declared Manager Fogg."Order a fire drill."

  It was accomplished, and Mr. Fogg criticized the lack of snap. He wasrather severe after the life-boat drill, was over. He ordered a secondrehearsal. He commanded that the crew do it a third time. The warmthof his insistence on this feature of shipboard discipline was verynoticeable.

  "And when you put those boats back see to it that every line is free andcoiled and every cover loose. It costs a lot of good money if you killoff passengers in these days." Then he hurried away. "I'll see youbefore sailing-time," he informed Captain Mayo.

  The new skipper was glad to be alone and to have leisure for study ofthe steamer's log-books. He had been accustomed to a freighter'sslower time on the courses. He did a little figuring. He found that atseventy-five revolutions per minute the _Montana_ would log off aboutthe same speed that the freighter made when doing her best. He resolvedto make the fog an excuse and slow down to the _Nequasset's_ familiarrate of progress. He reflected that he would feel pretty much at homeunder those circumstances. He was heartened, and went about the shiplooking less like a malefactor doomed to execution.

  When General-Manager Fogg, bustled on board a few minutes prior to theadvertised sailing-time at five o'clock, he commented on Captain Mayo'simproved demeanor.

  "Getting one of the best jobs on this coast seemed to make considerableof a mourner out of you. Perhaps a mirror has shown you how well youlook in that new uniform. At any rate, I'm glad to see you have chirkedup. And now I'll give you a piece of news that ought to make you lookstill happier: I'm going along on this trip with you. If you show methat you can do a good job in this kind of weather you needn't worryabout your position."

  The expression on Captain Mayo's face did not indicate unalloyed delightwhen he heard this "good news." Unaccustomed as he was to the ship, hecould not hope to make a smooth showing.

  "And still you refuse to cheer up!" remonstrated the manager.

  "I am glad you are going along, sir. Don't misunderstand me. But asailor is a pretty serious chap when he feels responsibility. I'mundertaking a big stunt."

  "It's the best way to find out whether you're the man for thejob--whether you're the man I think you are. It's a test that beatssailing ships on a puddle."

  "I'm glad you're aboard," repeated the captain. "It's going to shadedown my responsibility just a little."

  "It is, is it?" cried Manager Fogg, his tones sharp. "Not by a blamedsight! You're the captain of this craft. I'm a passenger. Don't try toshirk. You aren't afraid, are you?"

  They were standing beside the dripping rail outside the pilot-house.Far below them, in the spacious depths of the steamer, a bugle soundedlong-drawn notes and the monotonous calls of stewards warned "Allashore!"

  The gangways were withdrawn with dull "clackle" of wet chains overpulleys, and Captain Mayo, after a swift glance at his watch, to makesure of the time, ordered a quartermaster to sound the signal for "Castoff!" The whistle yelped a gruff note, and, seeing that all was clear,the captain yanked the auxiliary bell-pulls at the rail. Two for theport engine, two for the starboard, and the _Montana_ began to back intothe gray pall which shrouded the river.

  Captain Mayo saw the lines of faces on the pier, husbands and wives,mothers and sweethearts, bidding good-by to those who waved farewellfrom the steamer's decks. He gathered himself with supreme grip ofresolve. It was up to him! He almost spoke it aloud.

  Tremors of doubt did not agitat
e him any longer. It was unthinkingfaith, nevertheless it was implicit confidence, that all those folksplaced in him. They were intrusting themselves to his vessel with theblind assurance of travelers who pursue a regular route, not caring howthe destination is reached as long as they come to their journey's end.

  The hoarse, long, warning blast which announced to all in the river thatthe steamer was leaving her dock drowned out the shouts of farewell andthe strains of the gay air the orchestra was playing.

  "See you later," said General-Manager Fogg. "I think I'll have an earlydinner."

  Captain Mayo climbed the short ladder and entered his pilot-house.

  It was up to him!