Robbie Taggart
Page 10
As greatly as Robbie despised any splitting of a crew into factions, knowing that such divisiveness could prove fatal on a deep-sea voyage, he could not seem to do anything to prevent it aboard the Tiger. Try as he might to gain the respect of the boatswain and those closest to him, it was not long before he accepted the inevitable—that for the present a reconciliation was next to impossible. And if Digger and the others were bent on resisting him, perhaps it was for the best that he possessed a loyal following of his own.
11
Harmony at Sea
Fair seas accompanied the Sea Tiger through the Channel. The wind held steady off their port quarter, the skies remained clear, and on the Saturday evening of their first week out, the dark evening canopy boasted stars as large as party lanterns. The moon would be rising in the east before long, and even now a strange, ghostly light on the horizon portended her golden coming. Below there was nothing but water. The phosphorescent whiteness from the caps of the waves and from the turbulence of the ship’s prow cutting through the blackness lent an eerie luminescence to the night; it seemed as if the stars and the glow from the water’s surface were somehow reflections of one another. If there were other vessels across the watery void, they could neither be seen nor heard, as the wind-borne ships cut silently through the water, each on her own individual course. The masts of the Tiger were at their full height, and though the mainsail was loose, the foresail and jib were both full, and she ran before the wind as if hungry for the unknown infinite spaces that lay ahead.
Two hours later, the moon had risen to reign glorious in the heavens. Her light dulled the stars, but cast an energizing glow on a wide swath cut across the waters between herself and the Tiger. And that mystery of mysteries of the moon and the sea, the reflection remained ever the same, yet was ever changing as the Tiger’s relentless motion coursed through the night.
As Robbie stood on the poop gazing out on the wondrous sight, breathing deeply of the salty, watery sea air which is life to the lungs of a sailor, he had to admit that he felt good. He had made the right decision. This was the life he was made for, not some Naval office!
There was, despite favorable winds and clear skies, always work to be done in plenty. Robbie took pride in the ship, even though it was not his own, especially in that Pike at times seemed woefully neglectful of maintenance. Robbie had set the crew to scrubbing, scraping, polishing, and mending, along with general ongoing repairs which were always part of any ship’s required health.
But tonight he had taken the helm, set a lookout on the forecastle, and sent Torger Overlie to fetch his harmonica. And it was clear the eight men of the watch appreciated this opportunity to sit back and relax.
The men of the evening watch reclined here and there on the poop deck at the Tiger’s stern, while Torger began the familiar strains of “The Bonny Sailor.” Robbie chuckled to himself at the fact that the old Norseman was so well versed in British tunes. After the Norwegian played it through once, the men joined with the words:
Fair Sally lov’d a bonny seaman,
With tears she sent him out to roam,
Young Thomas lov’d no other woman,
But left his heart with her at home.
She view’d the seas from off the hill,
And as she turned her spinning wheel,
Sung of her bonny seaman.
The winds grew high, and she grew pale,
To see the weather cock turn round,
When, lo! she spy’d her bonny seaman
Come singing o’er the fallow ground.
With nimble haste he leapt the stile,
And Sally met him with a smile,
And hugged her bonny seaman.
A few of the men tried to harmonize, others croaked out in their crusty monotones, and the breeze carried their strangely melancholy voices off through the night as if they might be meant to linger eternally in the air, perhaps to greet other sailors whose ships would one day pass through these same waters.
Nothing can compare to an evening like this! Robbie thought. Everything was in perfect accord. When the sea was friendly and the winds favorable, all was well. Robbie noted that even several of the bo’sun’s crowd, who happened to be in Robbie’s watch, had joined in with the others, not so inclined toward antagonism when they were out from under the influence of Digger or Turk.
This knife, the gift of lovely Sally,
I still have kept for her dear sake;
A thousand times, in amorous folly,
Your name I carv’d upon the deck;
Again the happy pledge returns
To tell how truly Thomas burns,
How truly burns for Sally.
This thimble thou didst give thy Sally,
When this I saw, I thought on you.
Then why does Tom stand and dilly dally.
When yonder steeple’s in our view?
Tom, never to occasion blind,
Straight took her in her yielding mind,
And went to church with Sally.
Robbie sang along, for he knew the old song well. It was hardly surprising, he thought, that while at sea—the place most of these men loved better than any other—they would sing lovingly of home and sweethearts. It was a lonely life. But each had—for his own reasons—pledged himself to the sea. Yet the memories came more readily on a night such as this, and cast their merriment into nostalgic and pensive tones. Neither was it strange that hard-bitten men whose solitary existence was often predicated on the supposed strength derived from keeping their feelings and emotions to themselves would, when led by such a simple device as a harmonica, break into song as if they were children.
Torger had just begun “Fan Left on Shore” when Robbie heard soft footsteps approach from behind. He turned and saw Elliot Drew.
“I heard you singing,” he said. “Why don’t I take the helm and you can go down and join them?”
“I’m enjoying it well enough from here. Thanks, Drew, but there’s no need to keep you from the festivities.”
“You’d not be keeping me, to be sure,” replied the Vicar, leaning back against the stern rail and folding his arms across his chest. If he meant to effect a swagger, it was quite lost on his slender and wholly unathletic frame. Only his eyes, full as they were of their customary sarcasm, came close to the image he may have wanted to convey. “I don’t quite fancy singing songs about women just as well left on shore. These blokes sound almost as if they wanted to settle down with the girl they left behind!”
“Perhaps it’s true,” said Robbie, staring ahead at the moonlit wake left by the running ship.
“Ach! They’d go crazy—the whole lot of them,” laughed Drew scornfully. “Besides, for all their songs and poems of love, they’d never find her waiting once they got there. Women!—they’re an unfaithful lot. And most of these men are just sea-bound drifters. What woman’d have a one of them?”
“Again it seems you think none too highly of your fellow comrades.”
“And what’s the use of it? But what about you, Mr. First Mate Taggart? Do you have a young woman waiting on shore?”
Drew’s voice carried almost the tone of a challenge to Robbie to dare answer.
“No,” replied Robbie, drawing the word out thoughtfully. “There is no one waiting for me.”
“But there is someone who fills your thoughts.” The Vicar’s words were a statement, not a question.
“I suppose you’re right,” said Robbie.
“Ah ha! Just as I said.”
“But she is married now—to another man. She fills my thoughts only as a pleasant memory. But not as you might think. I love her still, but I respect her new husband and bear them both but the best of wishes.”
“Ah, Taggart! Spoken like a true stoic gentleman! No tears of remorse for you, eh? Stiff upper lip and all that?”
Robbie said nothing. For once Drew’s cynicism fell on unwilling ears. He decided it was time to turn the tables. “And you?” he asked meaningfully.
“But you sound more like you despise the whole of the weaker sex, rather than objecting on any more utopian grounds related to bachelorhood.”
“I loathe them. Why else would I have condemned myself to this monastery upon the water?”
“Why indeed?” echoed Robbie, feeling only part of the story must have been revealed. “From your words it is apparent that you loathe women and men, and disdain your fellow seamen. Is there anything you do like?”
“Hmmm . . . how perceptive of you, Taggart. You find the old Vicar out, down to his vilest secrets!” He paused, rubbed his unshaven chin for a few moments, then quoted, “‘For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it . . . ’”
“So, you like yourself,” said Robbie. “That’s how you answer my question. I suppose that is something.”
“’Tis nothing at all!” countered Drew quickly. “What kind of moron would care what happened to a wretch such as this?” he held out his arms to indicate himself.
Robbie studied him a moment, the shabby clothing, the day’s growth of beard peppered with gray even at his young age, the bloodshot eyes, the tremulous hands. He had no doubt been drinking on the sly despite Robbie’s admonition the day of their departure. Beneath it all, however, seemed to reside a gentility that could not be disguised, though it appeared Drew’s objective was to obliterate it completely.
“I’m afraid,” Drew went on, “that the Apostle and I will have to part company there. It is possible to hate even oneself.”
Robbie had no reply to give. The words were spoken so lightly that they took a few moments to sink in. And as they did, Robbie could not help but feel a great pity for this unfortunate man.
“Don’t look so forlorn, my friend,” said Drew with an unsuccessful attempt at a comforting grin. “I’m not the first man to admit his displeasure with his own person, though perhaps the first to admit it in your hearing.”
“I don’t know whether to believe you or not,” Robbie said at last. “I wonder if you are merely trying to shock me.”
“You think I have sinned by making such a statement?”
“I’m hardly the one to ask. That’s the business you were in, Vicar.”
“Well, I doubt that God will lay it to my account.”
“Don’t be too certain,” said Robbie. “I have a friend, the young lady I mentioned, who would tell me that God loves you. By your reasoning that would make Him a moron.”
Drew laughed heartily. In the right mood, he did love a good debate.
“So, we’ve a closet theologian in our midst! But though you jab your dogmatical sword at what you perceive as my hypocrisy, you don’t accept the tenets you espouse yourself. You are undone, Taggart! A nice ploy, but one that holds no water! Ha, ha! ha!”
“I made no claim for myself. I was only saying that your reasoning was flawed.”
“Ha, ha!” laughed Drew. “Ah, Taggart, you have given me a good laugh. We should be calling you the Vicar! But don’t you see, you’re in no position to make such a statement because you have nothing to offer in its place. My statements of faithlessness are more consistent than yours.”
Robbie did not reply.
“But I can see you are confused by my arguments. To return to the original question at hand, the sin of blasphemy, as you so correctly uncovered, is one I will accept.” His words were almost merry, as if he were not speaking about his immortal soul. “But not the sin of self-hate. Whatever you say, I do not accept that as a sin, but only the inevitable result of a life of failure.”
Robbie peered earnestly at Drew. “Then you do not love God, is that it?”
“Ah, Taggart. Your youthful naivete is so refreshing! What is love . . . what is God?”
Though Robbie had never thought of the question of love for God in reference to himself, a fact all too painfully clear to Jamie, it was still incredulous to him to hear one talk thus who had once been a cleric, a so-called man of God. What could have happened to cause him to abandon the very rudiments of his faith? But Robbie was in the tenuous position, as the Vicar saw so clearly, of expecting another to cling to a theology that he did not accept for himself. If the God of Christianity was indeed a God of love, then that love was meant for all men, not just a drunken ex-Vicar and a Highland lass he had once loved, but even for Robbie Taggart himself. But Robbie’s time had not yet come.
“Listen!” said the Vicar, bringing them back to the reality of events before them. “They’ve finally come to their senses.”
Robbie had all but forgotten about the men singing, and now suddenly their voices woke again in his ears.
The Vicar had picked up their conversation as one of the seamen had called out to the coxswain, “Torger, div ye ken Ratcliffe Highway?”
“Ya,” drawled the Norseman in his thick accent, “been dere mony times.”
“Not the place, ye dimwit, the song!”
“Ya, I know dat too,” laughed the good-natured Overlie. He cleared his throat and set the mouth organ once more to his lips, while most of the others followed with the words.
You jolly sailors list to me
I’ve been a fortnight home from sea,
Which time I’ve rambled night and day,
To have a lark on the Highway.
Listen you jovial sailors gay,
To the rigs of Ratcliffe Highway.
Some lasses their heads will toss,
With bustles as big as a brewer’s horse,
Some wear a cabbage net, called veil,
And a boa just like a buffalo’s tail.
Listen you jovial sailors gay,
To the rigs of Ratcliffe Highway.
The men laughed as they struck up the next verse. Perhaps they were thinking of their own adventures on that disreputable street in London, or on similar avenues where sailors congregate while enjoying shore leave.
Robbie’s merry mood had left him; the Vicar’s comments had unconsciously disturbed him. His sympathetic nature was drawn to pity the man, but not a small part of him was vexed with the pleasure Drew seemed to take criticizing everything about him.
Why should he pity the man? Drew refused to acknowledge anything good about life, and thus brought his troubles upon himself. Why, Drew possessed enough self-pity for both of them! He didn’t need Robbie’s besides.
He was angry, too, that Drew had spoiled his jolly mood. The evening had started out so well. But he wasn’t going to let it slip away because of a broken down, doleful ex-preacher.
“On second thought, Drew,” he said, in a tone that would have belied his next words, “maybe I do feel like singing. At least I can give it a try. Take the wheel.”
He started to descend from his post, then stopped and turned around. “And try not to run us aground,” he added caustically. He turned again, and joined the rest of the watch at the other end of the poop.
But the evening had lost its allure. For Robbie the melodies were forced; even his usually light heart could not pick itself back up. And clouds began to tumble in upon the lovely moon-bathed and star-studded sky.
12
Accusations
By the following morning Robbie’s vexation had shifted onto himself for letting himself get frustrated with the Vicar. His naturally sanguine nature had returned; once again he was able to look optimistically at life. And almost without noticing it, he found himself seeking an opportunity to reconcile with the Vicar the tension with which the evening had ended.
It disturbed Robbie to see how most of the crew treated the Vicar, sending him to fetch a bit of gear or another cup of coffee or a bucket of water for them. Yet Drew obeyed like a whipped pup. Not with a willing exuberance as did Sammy the cabin boy, but rather with a heavy sigh, as if this were no more than he deserved, though he retained the right within the privacy of his own min
d to despise them all for it. But Robbie believed that if Drew were treated with something akin to respect, he might rise out of the hole of self-abuse in which he continually seemed to be wallowing.
Robbie found the Vicar sitting in the midst of a pile of canvas, mending an old sail, just as Jenkins, one of the able seamen, was calling to him from the forecastle. Robbie approached unnoticed.
“Hey, Vicar!” called Jenkins. “Me blade on this trowel broke. Why don’t you be a good chap an’ run below an’ get me a new one?”
Drew glanced up, opened his mouth momentarily as if to protest, then thought better of it, rose, and sauntered away toward the hatch, passing Robbie on the way.
Robbie fell into step beside him.
“Elliot,” he said, “if you want that treatment to stop, you have to stand up to them.”
“What in heaven’s name do you mean?” asked the Vicar, as if the thought had never occurred to him.
“I mean,” replied Robbie with forced patience, “that if you showed a little backbone, they might stop pushing you around. I’d step in myself if I didn’t think that would only make things worse for you in the long run.”
“The vertebral portion of the anatomy was never my strongest asset.”
“Drew!” exclaimed Robbie, frustrated with the ex-cleric’s sarcasm. “Why can’t you just once look a problem straight in the eye without turning it into a joke?”
“If you only knew what you asked, Robbie Taggart.”
By now they had reached the forehatch, and Drew yanked it open with a jerk. He turned back toward Robbie with a smile that looked almost sincere. “I appreciate your concern, my friend. But don’t waste your time trying to reform me. It’s not worth your trouble. After all, even God couldn’t succeed in that area. So it’s doubtful you will be able to either.”