By and by says Bob, “Look over there!” and there was Kent, sitting curled away in a heap under the stern of the long-boat. He had a book. Bob crawls behind and snatches it up, unbeknown, out of his hands; then he falls to laughing as if he would strangle, and gives the book a toss to me. It was a bit of Testament, black and old. There was writing on the yellow leaf which ran:
“Kentucky Hodge,
“from his Affecshunate mother
“who prays, For you evry day, Amen.”
The boy turned red, then white, and straightened up quite sudden, but he never said a word, only sat down again, and let us laugh it out. I’ve lost my reckoning if he ever heard the last of it. He told me one day how he came by the name, but I forget exactly. Something about an old uncle died in Kentucky, and the name was moniment-like, you see. He used to seem cut up a bit about it at first, for the lads took to it famously; but he got used to it in a week or two, and seeing as they meant him no unkindness, took it quite cheery.
One other thing I noticed was that he never had the book about after that. He fell into our ways next Sunday more easy.
They don’t take the Bible as a general thing, sailors don’t; though I will say that I never saw the man at sea who didn’t give it the credit of being an uncommon good yarn.
But I tell you, Tom Brown, I felt sorry for that boy. It’s punishment enough for a little scamp like him leaving the honest shore, and folks at home that were a bit tender of him maybe, to rough it on a trader, learning how to slush down a back-stay, or tie knots with frozen fingers in a snow-squall.
But that’s not the worst of it, by no means. If ever there was a cold-blooded, cruel man, with a wicked eye and a fist like a mallet, it was Job Whitmarsh. And I believe, of all the trips I’ve taken, him being mate of the Madonna, Kentucky found him at his worst. Bradley the second mate was none too gentle in his ways, but he never held a candle to Mr. Whitmarsh. He took a spite to the boy from the first, and he kept it up to the last.
I’ve seen him beat that boy till the blood run down in little pools on deck; then send him up, all wet and red, to clear the to’sail halliards; and when, what with the pain and faintness, he dizzied a little, and clung to the ratlines, half blind, he would have him down and flog him till the cap’n interfered—which would happen occasionally on a fair day when he had taken just enough to be good-natured. He used to rack his brains for the words he slung at the boy working quiet enough beside him. If curses had been a marketable article, Whitmarsh would have made his fortune. Then he used to kick the lad down the fo’castle ladder; he used to work him, sick or well, as he wouldn’t have worked a dray-horse; he used to chase him all about the deck at the rope’s end; he used to mast-head him for hours on the stretch; he used to starve him out in the hold. It didn’t come in my line to be over-tender, but I turned sick at heart, Tom, more than once, looking on helpless, and me a great stout fellow.
I remember a thing McCallum said one night; McCallum was a Scot—an old fellow with grey hair; told the best yarns on the fo’castle.
“Mark my words, shipmates,” says he. “When Job Whitmarsh’s time comes to go as straight to hell as Judas, that boy will bring his summons. Dead or alive, that boy will bring his summons.”
One day I recollect that the lad was sick with fever, and took to his hammock. Whitmarsh drove him on deck, and ordered him aloft. I was standing near by, trimming the spanker. Kentucky staggered for’ard a little and sat down. There was a rope’s-end there, knotted three times. The mate struck him.
“I’m very weak, sir,” says he.
He struck him again. He struck him twice more. The boy fell over a little, and lay where he fell.
I don’t know what ailed me, but all of a sudden I seemed to be lying off Long Wharf, with Molly in a white apron with her shining needles, and the baby a-play in his red stockings about the deck.
“Think if it was him!” says she, or she seems to say—“think if it was him!”
And the next I knew I’d let slip my tongue in a jiffy, and given it to the mate in a way I’ll bet Whitmarsh never got before. And the next I knew after that they had the irons on me.
“Sorry about that, eh?” said he, the day before they took ’em off.
“No, sir,” says I. And I never was. Kentucky never forgot that. I had helped him occasional in the beginning—learned him how to veer and haul a brace, let go or belay a sheet—but let him alone generally speaking, and went about my own business. That week in irons I really believe the lad never forgot.
One Saturday night, when the mate had been uncommon furious that week—Kentucky turned on him, very pale and slow (I was up in the mizzen-top, and heard him quite distinct).
“Mr. Whitmarsh,” says he—“Mr. Whitmarsh,”—he draws his breath in—“Mr. Whitmarsh,”—three times—“you’ve got the power and you know it, and so do the gentlemen who put you here; and I’m only a stow-away boy, and things are all in a tangle, but you’ll be sorry yet for every time you’ve laid your hands on me!”
He hadn’t a pleasant look about the eyes either, when he said it.
Fact was, that first month on the Madonna had done the lad no good. He had a surly, sullen way with him, some’at like what I’ve seen about a chained dog. At the first, his talk had been clean as my baby’s, and he would blush like any girl at Bob Smart’s stories; but he got used to Bob, and pretty good, in time, at small swearing.
I don’t think I should have noticed it so much if it had not been for seeming to see Molly and the knitting-needles, and the child upon the deck, and hearing her say, “Think if it was him!”
Well, things went along just about so with us till we neared the Cape. It’s not a pretty place, the Cape, on a winter’s voyage. I can’t say as I ever was what you may call scared after the first time rounding it, but it’s not a pretty place.
I don’t seem to remember much about Kent till there come a Friday at the first of December. It was a still day, with a little haze, like white sand sifted across a sunbeam on a kitchen table. The lad was quiet-like all day, chasing me about with his eyes.
“Sick?” says I.
“No,” says he.
“Whitmarsh drunk?” says I.
“No,” says he.
A little after dark I was lying on a coil of ropes, napping it. The boys were having the Bay of Biscay quite lively, and I waked up on the jump in the choruses. Kent came up. He was not singing. He sat down beside me, and first I thought I wouldn’t trouble myself about him, and then I thought I would.
So I opens one eye at him encouraging. He crawls up a little closer to me. It was rather dark where we sat, with a great greenish shadow dropping from the mainsail. The wind was up a little, and the light at helm looked flickery and red.
“Jake,” says he all at once, “where’s your mother?”
“In—heaven!” says I, all taken aback.
“Oh!” says he. “Got any women-folks at home that miss you?” asks he, by and by.
Said I, “Shouldn’t wonder.”
After that he sits still a little with his elbows on his knees; then he peers at me sidewise a while; then said he, “I s’pose I’ve got a mother to home. I ran away from her.”
That was the first time he had ever spoke about his folks since he came aboard.
“She was asleep down in the south chamber,” says he. “I got out the window. There was one white shirt she’d made for meetin’ and such. I’ve never worn it out here. I hadn’t the heart. It has a collar and some cuffs, you know. She had a headache making of it. She’s been follering me round all day, sewing that shirt. When I come in she would look up bright-like and smiling. Father’s dead. There ain’t anybody but me. All day long she’s been follering of me round.”
So then he gets up, and joins the lads, and tries to sing a little; but he comes back very
still and sits down. We could see the flickery light upon the boys’ faces, and on the rigging, and on the cap’n, who was damning the bosun a little aft.
“Jake,” says he, quite low, “look here. I’ve been thinking. Do you reckon there’s a chap here—just one, perhaps—who’s said his prayers since he came aboard?”
“No!” said I, quite short: for I’d have bet my head on it.
I can remember, as if it was this morning, just how the question sounded, and the answer. I can’t seem to put it into words how it came all over me. The wind was turning brisk, and we’d just eased her with a few reefs; Bob Smart, out furling the flying jib, got soaked; me and the boy sitting silent, were spattered. I remember watching the curve of the great swells, mahogany colour, with the tip of white, and thinking how like it was to a big creature hissing and foaming at the mouth, and thinking all at once something about Him holding of the sea in a balance, and not a word bespoke to beg His favour respectful since we weighed our anchor, and the cap’n yonder calling on Him just that minute to send the Madonna to the bottom, if the bosun hadn’t disobeyed his orders about the squaring of the after-yards.
“From his Affecshunate mother who prays. For you evry day. Amen,” whispers Kentucky, presently, very soft, “The book’s tore up. Mr. Whitmarsh wadded his old gun with it. But I remember.”
Then said he; “It’s almost bedtime at home. She’s setting in a little rocking-chair—green one. There’s a fire, and the dog. She sets all by herself.”
Then he begins again: “She has to bring in her own wood now. There’s a grey ribbon on her cap. When she goes to meetin’ she wears a grey bonnet. She’s drawed the curtains and the door is locked. But she thinks I’ll be coming home sorry some day—I’m sure she thinks I’ll be coming home sorry.”
Just then there comes the order, “Port watch ahoy! Tumble up there lively!” so I turns out, and the lad turns in, and the night settles down a little black, and my hands and head are full. Next day, it blows a clean, all but a bank of grey, very thin and still which lay just abeam of us.
The sea looked like a great purple pincushion, with a mast or two stuck in on the horizon for the pins. “Jake’s poetry”, the boys said that was.
By noon that little grey bank had grown up thick, like a wall. By sundown the cap’n let his liquor alone, and kept the deck. By night we were in chop-seas, with a very ugly wind.
“Steer small, there!” cries Whitmarsh, growing hot about the face—for we made a terribly crooked wake, with a broad sheer, and the old hull strained heavily—“steer small there, I tell you! Mind your eye now, McCallum, with your fore-sail! Furl the royals! Send down the royals! Cheerily, men! Where’s that lubber Kent? Up with you, lively now!”
Kentucky sprang for’ard at the order, then stopped short. Anybody as knows a royal from an anchor wouldn’t have blamed the lad. It’s no play for an old tar, stout and full in size, sending down the royals in a gale like that; let alone a boy of fifteen years on his first voyage.
But the mate takes to swearing and Kent shoots away up—the great mast swinging like a pendulum to and fro, and the reef-points snapping, and the blocks creaking, and the sails flapping to that extent as you wouldn’t consider possible unless you’d been before the mast yourself. It reminded me of evil birds I’ve read of, that stun a man with their wings.
Kent stuck bravely as far as the cross-trees. There he slipped and struggled and clung in the dark and noise a while, then comes sliding down the back-stay.
“I’m not afraid, sir,” says he; “but I cannot do it.”
For answer Whitmarsh takes to the rope’s-end. So Kentucky is up again, and slips and struggles and clings again, and then lays down again.
At this the men begin to grumble a little.
“Will you kill the lad?” said I. I get a blow for my pains, that sends me off my feet none too easy; and when I rub the stars out of my eyes the boy is up again, and the mate behind him with the rope. Whitmarsh stopped when he’d gone far enough. The lad climbed on. Once he looked back. He never opened his lips; he just looked back. If I’ve seen him once since—in my thinking, I’ve seen him twenty times—up in the shadow of the great grey wings, looking back.
After that there was only a cry, and a splash, and the Madonna racing along with the gale at twelve knots. If it had been the whole crew overboard, she could never have stopped for them that night.
“Well,” said the cap’n, “you’ve done it now.”
Whitmarsh turned his back.
By and by, when the wind fell, and the hurry was over, and I had the time to think a steady thought, being in the morning watch, I seemed to see the old lady in the grey bonnet setting by the fire. And the dog. And the green rocking-chair. And the front door, with the boy walking in on a sunny afternoon to take her by surprise.
Then I remember leaning over to look down, and wondering if the lad were thinking of it too, and what had happened to him now, these two hours back, and just about where he was, and how he liked his new quarters, and many other strange and curious things.
And while I sat there thinking, the Sunday-morning stars cut through the clouds, and the solemn Sunday-morning light began to break upon the sea.
* * * *
We had a quiet run of it, after that, into port, where we lay about a couple of months or so, trading off for a fair stock of palm-oil, ivory, and hides. The days were hot and purple and still. We hadn’t what you might call a blow till we rounded the Cape again, heading for home.
It was just about the spot that we lost the boy that we fell upon the worst gale of the trip. It struck us quite sudden. Whitmarsh was a little high. He wasn’t apt to be drunk in a gale, if it gave him warning sufficient.
Well, somebody had to furl the main-royal again, and he pitched on to McCallum. McCallum hadn’t his beat for fighting out the royal in a blow.
So he piled away lively, up to the to’-sail yard. There, all of a sudden, he stopped. Next we knew he was down like lightning.
His face had gone very white.
“What’s up with you?” roared Whitmarsh.
Said McCallum, “There’s somebody up there, sir.”
Screamed Whitmarsh, “You’re an idiot!”
Said McCallum, very quiet and distinct: “There’s somebody up there, sir. I saw him quite plain. He saw me. I called up. He called down. Says he, ‘Don’t you come up!’ and hang me if I’ll stir a step for you or any other man tonight!”
I never saw the face of any man alive go the turn that mate’s face went. If he wouldn’t have relished knocking the Scotchman dead before his eyes, I’ve lost my guess. Can’t say what he would have done to the old fellow, if there’d been any time to lose.
He’d the sense left to see there wasn’t overmuch, so he orders out Bob Smart direct.
Bob goes up steady, with a quid in his cheek and a cool eye. Half-way amid to’-sail and to’gallant he stops, and down he comes, spinning.
“Be drowned if there ain’t!” said he. “He’s sitting square upon the yard. I never see the boy Kentucky, if he isn’t sitting on that yard. ‘Don’t you come up!’ he cries out—‘don’t you come up!’”
“Bob’s drunk, and McCallum’s a fool!” said Jim Welch, standing by. So Welch volunteers up, and takes Jaloffe with him. They were a couple of the coolest hands aboard—Welch and Jaloffe. So up they goes, and down they comes like the rest, by the run.
“He beckoned of me back!” says Welch. “He hollered not to come up! not to come up!”
After that there wasn’t a man of us would stir aloft, not for love nor money.
Well, Whitmarsh he stamped, and he swore, and he knocked us about furious; but we sat and looked at one another’s eyes, and never stirred. Something cold, like a frost-bite, seemed to crawl along from man to man, looking into one another’s eyes.
“I’ll shame ye all, then, for a set of cowardly lubbers!” cries the mate; and what with the anger and the drink he was as good as his word, and up the ratlines in a twinkle.
In a flash we were after him—he was our officer, you see, and we felt ashamed—me at the head, and the lads following after.
I got to the futtock shrouds, and there I stopped, for I saw him myself—a palish boy, with a jerk of thin hair on his forehead; I’d have known him anywhere in this world or t’other. I saw him just as distinct as I see you, Tom Brown, sitting on that yard quite steady with the royal flapping like to flap him off.
I reckon I’ve had as much experience fore and aft, in the course of fifteen years at sea, as any man that ever tied a reef-point in a nor’easter; but I never saw a sight like that, not before nor since.
I won’t say that I didn’t wish myself on deck; but I stuck to the shrouds, and looked on steady.
Whitmarsh, swearing that that royal should be furled, went on and went up.
It was after that I hear the voice. It came from the figure of the boy upon the upper yard.
But this time it says, “Come up! Come up!” And then, a little louder, “Come up! Come up! Come up!” So he goes up, and next I knew there was a cry—and next a splash—and then I saw the royal flapping from the empty yard, and the mate was gone, and the boy.
Job Whitmarsh was never seen again.
THE SHIP THAT SAW A GHOST, by Frank Norris
Very much of this story must remain untold, for the reason that if it were definitely known what business I had aboard the tramp steam-freighter Glarus, three hundred miles off the South American coast on a certain summer’s day, some few years ago, I would very likely be obliged to answer a great many personal and direct questions put by fussy and impertinent experts in maritime law—who are paid to be inquisitive. Also, I would get “Ally Bazan,” Strokher and Hardenberg into trouble.
The Fifth Ghost Story Megapack 25 Classic Haunts Page 12
