“Well, to tell the truth, sir,” said Ted, “I’m like the mate. I’m only a poor sailor-man, but I wouldn’t lend my clothes to the Queen of England.”
“You fetch up them clothes,” roared the skipper snatching off his bonnet and flinging it on the deck. “Fetch ’em up at once. D’ye think I’m going about in these petticuts?”
“They’re my clothes,” muttered Ted doggedly.
“Very well, then, I’ll have Bill’s,” said the skipper. “But mind you, my lad, I’ll make you pay for this afore I’ve done with you. Bill’s the only honest man aboard this ship. Gimme your hand, Bill, old man.”
“I’m with them two,” said Bill gruffly, as he turned away.
The skipper, biting his lips with fury, turned from one to the other, and then, with a big oath, walked forward. Before he could reach the fo’c’sle Bill and Ted dived down before him, and, by the time he had descended, sat on their chests side by side confronting him. To threats and appeals alike they turned a deaf ear, and the frantic skipper was compelled at last to go on deck again, still encumbered with the hated skirts.
“Why don’t you go an’ lay down,” said the mate, “an’ I’ll send you down a nice cup o’ hot tea. You’ll get histericks, if you go on like that.”
“I’ll knock your ‘ead off if you talk to me,” said the skipper.
“Not you,” said the mate cheerfully; “you ain’t big enough. Look at that pore fellow over there.”
The skipper looked in the direction indicated, and, swelling with impotent rage, shook his fist fiercely at a red-faced man with grey whiskers, who was wafting innumerable tender kisses from the bridge of a passing steamer.
“That’s right,” said the mate approvingly; “don’t give ‘im no encouragement. Love at first sight ain’t worth having.”
The skipper, suffering severely from suppressed emotion, went below, and the crew, after waiting a little while to make sure that he was not coming up again, made their way quietly to the mate.
“If we can only take him to Battlesea in this rig it’ll be all right,” said the latter. “You chaps stand by me. His slippers and sou’-wester is the only clothes he’s got aboard. Chuck every needle you can lay your hands on overboard, or else he’ll git trying to make a suit out of a piece of old sail or something. If we can only take him to Mr. Pearson like this, it won’t be so bad after all.”
While these arrangements were in hand above, the skipper and the boy were busy over others below. Various startling schemes propounded by the skipper for obtaining possession of his men’s attire were rejected by the youth as unlawful, and, what was worse, impracticable. For a couple of hours they discussed ways and means, but only ended in diatribes against the mean ways of the crew; and the skipper, whose head ached still from his excesses, fell into a state of sullen despair at length, and sat silent.
“By Jove, Tommy, I’ve got it,” he cried suddenly, starting up and hitting the table with his fist. “Where’s your other suit?”
“That ain’t no bigger that this one,” said Tommy.
“You git it out,” said the skipper, with a knowing toss of his head. “Ah, there we are. Now go in my state-room and take those off.”
The wondering Tommy, who thought that great grief had turned his kinsman’s brain, complied, and emerged shortly afterwards in a blanket, bringing his clothes under his arm.
“Now, do you know what I’m going to do?” inquired the skipper, with a big smile.
“No.”
“Fetch me the scissors, then. Now do you know what I’m going to do?”
“Cut up the two suits and make ’em into one,” hazarded the horror-stricken Tommy. “Here, stop it! Leave off!”
The skipper pushed him impatiently off, and, placing the clothes on the table, took up the scissors, and, with a few slashing strokes, cut them garments into their component parts.
“What am I to wear,” said Tommy, beginning to blubber. “You didn’t think of that?”
“What are you to wear, you selfish young pig?” said the skipper sternly. “Always thinking about yourself. Go and git some needles and thread, and if there’s any left over, and you’re a good boy, I’ll see whether I can’t make something for you out of the leavings.”
“There ain’t no needles here,” whined Tommy, after a lengthened search.
“Go down the fo’c’sle and git the case of sail-makers’ needles, then,” said the skipper, “Don’t let anyone see what you’re after, an’ some thread.”
“Well, why couldn’t you let me go in my clothes before you cut ’em up,” moaned Tommy. “I don’t like going up in this blanket. They’ll laugh at me.”
“You go at once!” thundered the skipper, and, turning his back on him, whistled softly, and began to arrange the pieces of cloth.
“Laugh away, my lads,” he said cheerfully, as an uproarious burst of laughter greeted the appearance of Tommy on deck. “Wait a bit.”
He waited himself for nearly twenty minutes, at the end of which time Tommy, treading on his blanket, came flying down the companion-ladder, and rolled into the cabin.
“There ain’t a needle aboard the ship,” he said solemnly, as he picked himself up and rubbed his head. “I’ve looked everywhere.”
“What?” roared the skipper, hastily concealing the pieces of cloth. “Here, Ted! Ted!”
“Ay, ay, sir!” said Ted, as he came below.
“I want a sail-maker’s needle,” said the skipper glibly. “I’ve got a rent in this skirt.”
“I broke the last one yesterday,” said Ted, with an evil grin.
“Any other needle then,” said the skipper, trying to conceal his emotion.
“I don’t believe there’s such a thing aboard the ship,” said Ted, who had obeyed the mate’s thoughtful injunction. “NOR thread. I was only saying so to the mate yesterday.”
The skipper sank again to the lowest depths, waved him away, and then, getting on a corner of the locker, fell into a gloomy reverie.
“It’s a pity you do things in such a hurry,” said Tommy, sniffing vindictively. “You might have made sure of the needle before you spoiled my clothes. There’s two of us going about ridiculous now.”
The master of the Sarah Jane allowed this insolence to pass unheeded. It is in moments of deep distress that the mind of man, naturally reverting to solemn things, seeks to improve the occasion by a lecture. The skipper, chastened by suffering and disappointment, stuck his right hand in his pocket, after a lengthened search for it, and gently bidding the blanketed urchin in front of him to sit down, began:
“You see what comes of drink and cards,” he said mournfully. “Instead of being at the helm of my ship, racing all the other craft down the river, I’m skulkin’ down below here like — like” —
“Like an actress,” suggested Tommy.
The skipper eyed him all over. Tommy, unconscious of offence, met his gaze serenely.
“If,” continued the skipper, “at any time you felt like taking too much, and you stopped with the beer-mug half-way to your lips, and thought of me sitting in this disgraceful state, what would you do?”
“I dunno,” replied Tommy, yawning.
“What would you do?” persisted the skipper, with great expression.
“Laugh, I s’pose,” said Tommy, after a moment’s thought.
The sound of a well-boxed ear rang through the cabin.
“You’re an unnatural, ungrateful little toad,” said the skipper fiercely. “You don’t deserve to have a good, kind uncle to look after you.”
“Anybody can have him for me,” sobbed the indignant Tommy, as he tenderly felt his ear. “You look a precious sight more like an aunt than an uncle.”
After firing this shot he vanished in a cloud of blanket, and the skipper, reluctantly abandoning a hastily-formed resolve of first flaying him alive and then flinging him overboard, sat down again and lit his pipe.
Once out of the river he came on deck again, and, ignoring by a great ef
fort the smiles of the crew and the jibes of the mate, took command. The only alteration he made in his dress was to substitute his sou’-wester for the bonnet, and in this guise he did his work, while the aggrieved Tommy hopped it in blankets. The three days at sea passed like a horrid dream. So covetous was his gaze, that the crew instinctively clutched their nether garments and looked to the buttoning of their coats as they passed him. He saw coats in the mainsail, and fashioned phantom trousers out of the flying jib, and towards the end began to babble of blue serges and mixed tweeds. Oblivious of fame, he had resolved to enter the harbour of Battlesea by night; but it was not to be. Near home the wind dropped, and the sun was well up before Battlesea came into view, a grey bank on the starboard bow.
Until within a mile of the harbour, the skipper held on, and then his grasp on the wheel relaxed somewhat, and he looked round anxiously for the mate.
“Where’s Bob?” he shouted.
“He’s very ill, sir,” said Ted, shaking his head.
“Ill?” gasped the startled skipper. “Here, take the wheel a minute.”
He handed it over, and grasping his skirts went hastily below. The mate was half lying, half sitting, in his bunk, groaning dismally.
“What’s the matter?” inquired the skipper.
“I’m dying,” said the mate. “I keep being tied up all in knots inside. I can’t hold myself straight.”
The other cleared his throat. “You’d better take off your clothes and lie down a bit,” he said kindly. “Let me help you off with them.”
“No — don’t — trouble,” panted the mate.
“It ain’t no trouble,” said the skipper, in a trembling voice.
“No, I’ll keep ’em on,” said the mate faintly. “I’ve always had an idea I’d like to die in my clothes. It may be foolish, but I can’t help it.”
“You’ll have your wish some day, never fear, you infernal rascal,” shouted the overwrought skipper. “You’re shamming sickness to make me take the ship into port.”
“Why shouldn’t you take her in,” asked the mate, with an air of innocent surprise. “It’s your duty as cap’n. You’d better get above now. The bar is always shifting.”
The skipper, restraining himself by a mighty effort, went on deck again, and, taking the wheel, addressed the crew. He spoke feelingly of the obedience men owed their superior officers, and the moral obligation they were under to lend them their trousers when they required them. He dwelt on the awful punishments awarded for mutiny, and proved clearly, that to allow the master of a ship to enter port in petticoats was mutiny of the worst type. He then sent them below for their clothing. They were gone such a long time that it was palpable to the meanest intellect that they did not intend to bring it. Meantime the harbour widened out before him.
There were two or three people on the quay as the Sarah Jane came within hailing distance. By the time she had passed the lantern at the end of it there were two or three dozen, and the numbers were steadily increasing at the rate of three persons for every five yards she made. Kind-hearted, humane men, anxious that their friends should not lose so great and cheap a treat, bribed small and reluctant boys with pennies to go in search of them, and by the time the schooner reached her berth, a large proportion of the population of the port was looking over each other’s shoulders and shouting foolish and hilarious inquiries to the skipper. The news reached the owner, and he came hurrying down to the ship, just as the skipper, regardless of the heated remonstrances of the sightseers, was preparing to go below.
Mr. Pearson was a stout man, and he came down exploding with wrath. Then he saw the apparition, and mirth overcame him. It became necessary for three stout fellows to act as buttresses, and the more indignant the skipper looked the harder their work became. Finally he was assisted, in a weak state, and laughing hysterically, to the deck of the schooner, where he followed the skipper below, and in a voice broken with emotion demanded an explanation.
“It’s the finest sight I ever saw in my life, Bross,” he said when the other had finished. “I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. I’ve been feeling very low this last week, and it’s done me good. Don’t talk nonsense about leaving the ship. I wouldn’t lose you for anything after this, but if you like to ship a fresh mate and crew you can please yourself. If you’ll only come up to the house and let Mrs. Pearson see you — she’s been ailing — I’ll give you a couple of pounds. Now, get your bonnet and come.”
THE BOATSWAIN’S WATCH
Captain Polson sat in his comfortable parlour smiling benignly upon his daughter and sister. His ship, after an absence of eighteen months, was once more berthed in the small harbour of Barborough, and the captain was sitting in that state of good-natured affability which invariably characterised his first appearance after a long absence.
“No news this end, I suppose,” he inquired, after a lengthy recital of most extraordinarily uninteresting adventures.
“Not much,” said his sister Jane, looking nervously at her niece. “Young Metcalfe has gone into partnership with his father.”
“I don’t want to hear about those sharks,” said the captain, waxing red. “Tell me about honest men.”
“Joe Lewis has had a month’s imprisonment for stealing fowls,” said Miss Polson meekly. “Mrs. Purton has had twins — dear little fellows they are, fat as butter! — she has named one of them Polson, after you. The greedy one.”
“Any deaths?” inquired the captain snappishly, as he eyed the innocent lady suspiciously.
“Poor old Jasper Wheeler has gone,” said his sister; “he was very resigned. He borrowed enough money to get a big doctor from London, and when he heard that there was no hope for him he said he was just longing to go, and he was sorry he couldn’t take all his dear ones with him. Mary Hewson is married to Jack Draper, and young Metcalfe’s banns go up for the third time next Sunday.”
“I hope he gets a Tartar,” said the vindictive captain. “Who’s the girl? Some silly little fool, I know. She ought to be warned!”
“I don’t believe in interfering in marriages,” said his daughter Chrissie, shaking her head sagely.
“Oh!” said the captain, staring, “YOU don’t! Now you’ve put your hair up and taken to wearing long frocks, I suppose you’re beginning to think of it.”
“Yes; auntie wants to tell you something!” said his daughter, rising and crossing the room.
“No, I don’t!” said Miss Polson hastily.
“You’d better do it,” said Chrissie, giving her a little push, “there’s a dear; I’ll go upstairs and lock myself in my room.”
The face of the captain, whilst this conversation was passing, was a study in suppressed emotions. He was a firm advocate for importing the manners of the quarter-deck into private life, the only drawback being that he had to leave behind him the language usual in that locality. To this omission he usually ascribed his failures.
“Sit down, Chrissie,” he commanded; “sit down, Jane. Now, miss, what’s all this about?”
“I don’t like to tell you,” said Chrissie, folding her hands in her lap. “I know you’ll be cross. You’re so unreasonable.”
The captain stared — frightfully.
“I’m going to be married,” said Chrissie suddenly,— “there! To Jack Metcalfe — there! So you’ll have to learn to love him. He’s going to try and love you for my sake.” To his sister’s dismay the captain got up, and brandishing his fists walked violently to and fro. By these simple but unusual means decorum was preserved.
“If you were only a boy,” said the captain, when he had regained his seat, “I should know what to do with you.”
“If I were a boy,” said Chrissie, who, having braced herself up for the fray, meant to go through with it, “I shouldn’t want to marry Jack. Don’t be silly, father!”
“Jane,” said the captain, in a voice which made the lady addressed start in her chair, “what do you mean by it?”
“It isn’t my fault,” said Miss Po
lson feebly. “I told her how it would be. And it was so gradual; he admired my geraniums at first, and, of course, I was deceived. There are so many people admire my geraniums; whether it is because the window has a south aspect” —
“Oh!” said the captain rudely, “that’ll do, Jane. If he wasn’t a lawyer, I’d go round and break his neck. Chrissie is only nineteen, and she’ll come for a year’s cruise with me. Perhaps the sea air’ll strengthen her head. We’ll see who’s master in this family.”
“I’m sure I don’t want to be master,” said his daughter, taking a weapon of fine cambric out of her pocket, and getting ready for action. “I can’t help liking people. Auntie likes him too, don’t you, auntie?”
“Yes,” said Miss Polson bravely.
“Very good,” said the autocrat promptly, “I’ll take you both for a cruise.”
“You’re making me very un — unhappy,” said Chrissie, burying her face in her handkerchief.
“You’ll be more unhappy before I’ve done with you,” said the captain grimly. “And while I think of it, I’ll step round and stop those banns.” His daughter caught him by the arm as he was passing, and laid her face on his sleeve. “You’ll make me look so foolish,” she wailed.
“That’ll make it easier for you to come to sea with me,” said her father. “Don’t cry all over my sleeve. I’m going to see a parson. Run upstairs and play with your dolls, and if you’re a good girl, I’ll bring you in some sweets.” He put on his hat, and closing the front door with a bang, went off to the new rector to knock two years off the age which his daughter kept for purposes of matrimony. The rector, grieved at such duplicity in one so young, met him more than half way, and he came out from him smiling placidly, until his attention was attracted by a young man on the other side of the road, who was regarding him with manifest awkwardness.
“Good evening, Captain Polson,” he said, crossing the road.
“Oh,” said the captain, stopping, “I wanted to speak to you. I suppose you wanted to marry my daughter while I was out of the way, to save trouble. Just the manly thing I should have expected of you. I’ve stopped the banns, and I’m going to take her for a voyage with me. You’ll have to look elsewhere, my lad.”
Works of W. W. Jacobs Page 119
