Hell's Hatches Page 7

  CHAPTER VII

  RONA COMES ABOARD

  Well, I still think I was right on the score of the futility of furtherwords. Nothing more that I could have _said_ would have changed thesituation; but was there nothing more that I could have _done_? Ronaanswered that question, so far as she herself was concerned, then andthere, though hardly in a way that I had the wit or the will to profitby.

  Bell's answer to the girl's anxious appeal that she be allowed to joinhim had been no less brusque and decided than that he had made to mine."Sorry, honey. No 'commodations fo' ladies this voyage. You wun'tintended to nu'se niggas, anyhow. Can't be done, honey." Then, to me:"Time to be shovin' off now, Whitney. Tide's already on the tu'n. Rightsorry to have to hurry you-all this way." Not a word of farewell....Navy training would not down.

  "Bel-la, leesten to me!" There was more threat than entreaty in Rona'svoice now. Beyond doubt, he had never crossed her before. That she washurt and angry showed in every line of her tense figure, as she balancedprecariously with her left foot on the outrigger and her right on theport weatherboard. "Bel-la, by crackee, I say I go with you! If you letme come on schoona, all good. If you say no, by crackee, I--I sweem! Isweem afta you. You know I good sweema, Bel-la."

  Swim! I knew the girl well enough to know it was not a bluff, and Bellmust have known even better. I had heard him speak many a time of herabsolute lack of fear. Also, although at that moment his imagination wasnot quickened (as mine was) by the drunken roll a black cadaver underthe counter gave as a questing nose pushed into it from below, he musthave known what shrift a swimmer would have in those shark-infestedwaters.

  Bell's mouth twitched at her words (I could just see his head andshoulders where he conned ship with a foot on the starboard rail and ahand in the shrouds of the mainmast), but he made no reply. Doubtless hecounted on my doing what I could to fish her out before anythinghappened. Sweeping his eye fore and aft, he noted how the turning tidehad swung the schooner so that she headed directly away from thepassage, with the fluky puffs of the freshening trade wind coming overher port quarter. Then, cautioning the men standing by at the fore andmain sheets to "take in sma't" as she gathered way, he bellowed theorder to "Heave away!"

  The ululant surge of the _beche-de-mer_ anchor chantey floated aft asthe blacks resumed their rhythmic tramp around the capstan.

  "_What name you b'longa? What name you b'longa? You Mary come catch'm ride. What name you b'longa? Come hear my songa-- I take you to Sydney-side._"

  I have often wondered if the frank invitation in the swinging linesmight not have been the inspiration of Rona's astonishing action.

  The obligato of the incoming chain grinding through the hawse-pipe hadaccompanied the chantey for only a stave or two, when Allen's clear,ringing voice (he had not needed to be told where a mate belonged when aship was getting under way) announced from the forecastle: "Anchorbroken out, sir!"

  "Walk lively! Get catted 'fore she hits the passage!" Bell roared back,anxious lest the great length of chain still out would make troublewhere the lagoon shoaled at its seaward entrance. A moment later he cameaft and relieved the man at the wheel, ordering the latter to stand byto keep the mainsheet from fouling the nigger wire. It was the giganticMalay, Ranga-Ro, bulking mightily against the purpling eastern twilightsky, who responded with a deep-rumbling "Ay, ay, su!" and sprang to thestarboard rail to clear the sagging lines running back from theunstable-minded main boom. Then the amazing thing befell.

  As the schooner gathered way and began gliding ahead under the impulseof the half-filled mainsail, Rona had crouched as though for a spring atthe towing whaleboat. The painter of the latter, however, made fast onthe port side of the taffrail, brought the yawning double-ender too faraway for anything but a creature with wings to bridge the gap. Seeing itwas impossible to jump to the whaleboat, she straightened up again,swaying undulantly as the dugout bobbed about in the gently heaving wakeof the schooner.

  "Bel-la, I come!" There was more of anger than despair in thatsteel-clear cry; more indignation than resignation in the hair-triggerpoise of the reed-slender figure. The instant that she hesitated on thechance that this final threat might soften Bell's resolve was all thatprevented what at best could not have been other than a nasty mess forthe both of us. There was no possible chance for me to intercept herbefore she jumped, and, once in the water, I knew she was quite equal toupsetting the canoe rather than be dragged back into it. As for helpfrom the schooner--Bell had determined upon his course, and his eyes,like his mind, were directed ahead, not astern.

  It was Ranga-Ro (deftly fending the slack of the mainsheet from thenigger wire), not Bell, who turned at the sound of Rona's cry. Whetheror not he had glimpsed her during the previous ten minutes, I am notsure; but for the girl (whose eyes had been on Bell from first to last),I was certain that the big Malay had not impinged upon her visionbefore. Recognition of his racial characteristics must have beeninstantaneous. They were written for even an ethnic novice to read inthe giant's straight black hair, high cheek bones, wide mouth, with itsbetel nut-stained teeth, and the light golden yellow skin clothing themonstrously muscled limbs. The peculiar twist of the loosely-looped_sarong_ and a wisp of rolled leaf behind an ear would have located himeven more definitely; but to Rona the fact that there was an indubitableMalay staring into her eyes from the nearest rail of the recedingschooner, made the incidental of his being a Moluccan--a Spice Islandman--of little moment. She was used to handling big golden-yellowmen.... They had proved a deal more manageable than a certain white manshe could mention.

  I heard, without understanding, the swift run of her tripplingly-tonguedMalay, and only the sibilant hiss of "_Lekas! Lekas!_" at the end toldme that what she had ordered done was to be done "quickly! quickly!" Hernext order--to me--was no less insistent. "Paddl' catch'n schoona,Whit-nee! Paddl' lak hell!"

  The girl's imperious mood brooked no delay. My work was cut out clearfor me, and, everything considered, I am not at all sure that the yellowman--on the score of zeal, at least--outdid the white man in carryingout the orders he had received. Slipping back to the stern to even upthe down-by-the-head trim Rona's presence in the bow gave the crankydugout, I plied the stubby paddle with all the strength and skill at mycommand. The crazy craft rode higher now with Allen out of it, but evenso the speed with which I drove it threw a wave inches above the hole inthe crumbling bow. The up-curling water poured through in a steadystream. My race, I saw, was against that rising flood in the bottom ofthe canoe quite as much as against the schooner.

  There were only eight or ten yards to make up on the still slowly moving_Cora_, and, barring swamping or a collision with a shark or a floatingnigger, I felt that I could do it easily. But what to do when we hadcaught her up? Ah, there was where the yellow man was to come in. Rangawas just as busily carrying out his orders as was I. "Clear away thenigger wire and stand by to pick me up," had plainly been the drift ofthat swift stream of Malay Rona had directed at him. Superbly disdainfulof the sharp barbs that were slashing his bare palms to ribbons, heforced the whole savage entanglement down to the deck with no moreapparent effort than a child would have used in collapsing astring-strung "cat's-cradle." Rove through steel stanchions set at closeintervals along the rail, the wire could not be torn entirely clear. Sothe direct and simple-minded Ranga did the next best thing--gave amighty heave and brought three or four of the nearest stanchions down tothe deck in the tangle of wire they had supported.

  An order from Bell at this juncture would probably have stopped thiswholesale destruction of his protective entanglement; or perhaps Ishould say _possibly_ rather than probably. One cannot be sure just howstrong a force Rona had lashed into action. It has since occurred to methat the man must have been gripped with something very closely akin tothe madness of _amok_ to handle that wire with his naked hands as hedid. It may be that the only one from whom he would have brookedinterference was the one who had fire
d that savage train ofenergy--Rona. These points were not to be put to the test, however. Fromfirst to last Bell--although, from the wrecking of the wire almost underhis very eyes, he must have known what was going on--never looked back.

  What with the settling of the half-swamped canoe and the acceleratingspeed of the schooner, it was touch-and-go at the end. I had gained byfeet at first; then by inches; and finally, with but a couple of yardsmore needed to bring the bow up even with the schooner's counter, Irealized that I was no better than holding my own. It was the last ounceof reserve in my aching frame that I called upon for that final spurt.Rona must have sensed that I was going my limit, for she said no word... only crouched, tense as a waiting wild-cat, for the moment of herspring.

  For the first few seconds the gap closed quickly as the canoe gatheredincreased headway from the impulse of my wildly driven paddle; then moreslowly and more slowly, until, again, I was no better than holding even.Another foot, and the jump would be safe. Bending low to make the mostof my expiring strength, my eyes wandered from the goal for an instant.It was a shuddering gasp of consternation from the bow that brought themback again. The swooning mainsail, filled by the freshening puffs, wasbeginning to make its pull felt in earnest. The gap had widened. Insteadof gaining a foot I had lost two. That dished me completely. "No good,Rona--I'm--all in," I groaned, and slid limply down into the bottom ofthe canoe, where the water now lapped level with the thwarts.

  Half fainting though I was, the picture of that super-simian spring ofRona's is indelibly etched upon my memory. Save for that one quick gasp,she made no sound. The jump was an impossible one ... sheerlyimpossible. And yet-- Only a swift gathering of muscles--very like thefinal quivering hunch of an ape that leaps from tree to tree--heraldedaction. Then, with a back-kick that forced the already half-submergedbow right under, she flashed up to her full height and launched her bodyinto the air.

  It was a good jump,--a wonderful one, indeed, considering the unstabletake-off--but of course she missed the rail--and by feet. That didn'tsurprise me.... I had seen it was inevitable. But what I had _not_reckoned upon was the astonishing length of Ranga's mighty left arm.Standing by with a bight of the mainsheet gripped in his right hand tokeep from overbalancing, he had sprung to the top of the rail as Ronajumped, leaning out at all of an angle of forty-five degrees, probablymore. It was into the solidly pliant muscles of his great corded leftwrist, extended to the full reach of the arm, that Rona clawed with thelast half inch of her out-stretched fingers--clawed and _held_. I say_clawed into_, not clutched or seized. The girl's hold on Ranga's wristwas not that of an acrobat grabbing over the bar for which he has jumped(her leap was short by an inch at least of giving her a chance to dothat), but rather that of a flung cat clawing into the limb or the trunkof a tree. With less strength of fingers or length of nails her handswould merely have brushed the outstretched arm and missed a hold.

  Under the impact of that flying hundred and twenty pounds (in spite ofher slenderness, Rona must have weighed quite that) of bone and muscle,striking, as it did, just where the greatest leverage would be exerted,Ranga was all but swung round and thrown from his footing. Thehastily-seized mainsheet was hardly a scientifically-run guy for theleaning tower of his stressed frame, nor did the wreck of the barbedwire entanglement writhing over the rail offer the solidest offoundations. Back and forth he swayed, like the half unstepped mast of agrounded sloop; then steadied, quiveringly, up to his original tenseslant.

  The acrobatic miracle wrought by Ranga in swinging Rona's precariouslyhanging form inboard was the most perfect feat of strength and balance Iever saw, or ever expect to see. It looked as sheerly impossible as thejump had looked--and was accomplished scarcely less quickly. The drawingup of the extended left arm (what a marvellous rippling and bunching ofgolden muscles that was!) brought the girl's pendant form close inagainst the corrugated bulge of the giant's chest, reducing the terrificleverage by a good half. A similar doubling up of the right, with asudden tug on the mainsheet at the end of it, did the rest. For aninstant the great rangy rack of corded muscles balanced erect in themidst of the wire-tangle festooned over the rail; then jumped lightlydown beyond and deposited its burden on the deck.

  Hardly ten seconds could have elapsed from the instant of Rona's jump tothe one in which Ranga plumped her down beside Bell at the wheel. Thegap between the canoe and the schooner had widened to hardly twentyyards. I could see both the Malay and the girl quite distinctly as, withthe latter still looped in the crook of his fingernail-torn left arm, hepoised for a moment on the rail. Neither appeared to have turned a hair.Neither seemed in the least flustered ... might have been in the habitof doing that sort of thing every day for all the excitement they showedabout it.

  The first thing Ranga did, as the dropped mainsheet gave him a freehand, was to reach to the knot of his _sarong_ and satisfy himself thatthe little bamboo flute tucked in there had ridden out the storm. AndRona--her first move was to gather up and stow an amber-streaming cornerof the peacock shawl, which was threatening to catch in an uprearingstrand of the nigger wire. Those two funny little incidentals completemy recollections of that breathless quarter-minute. Whether Rona, orBell, or anyone else on the schooner waved good-bye in my direction I donot recall. Ranga was taking in the slack of the mainsheet when I lookedagain, and Bell, peering up at the flapping headsails, was grinding awayat the wheel. Two or three shots rang out following a commotionforward--probably fired to check a fresh up-surge of the blacks frombelow.

  As Bell brought her round in a wide circle, the _Cora's_ sails wereflattened in and she began to beat up toward the entrance of the passagein a series of short tacks. As she headed in past the quay, I heard aburst of cheers roll up from a knot of humanity blurring the beach infront of Jackson's. It was just a big, full-throated general whoop, thatfirst one, but it was quickly followed by a number of other volleys of"huroars" that seemed to carry suggestions of control and leadership.The last of these was a hearty "three-times-three," topped off with a"tiger." "Cheering the parting heroes by name," I muttered to myself,and wondered who that last rousing "tiger" was meant to speed. I wasstill speculating when the sharp whish of a heeling dorsal, as asheering shark avoided the submerged outrigger by a hair, awakened me toa rude realization of the fact that the swift tropic night had all butfallen and that I was drifting out with the tide in a holed and barelyfloating dugout.

  Of all the ebbings of the tide of courage that my sorrily spent life hadknown, and had still to know, those next few minutes--with the _Cora_dissolving into the swimming dusk as she beat out through the passage,the weirdly green wakes of the sharks lacing the oily-black water withwelts of phosphorescence as they assembled for their ghastly banquet,and my swamped canoe teetering in balance between positive and negativebuoyancy--registered low-water mark. I have never heard of a despairingabsinthe slave trying to break his bonds at the end of the day. It isinvariably at the end of the night that he makes his break forliberty--at the beginning of the day he has not the courage to face. Butit was the shame of the yellow in me, rather than the green, that heldempire now. Rona had brooked no refusal of her demand to be taken on the_Cora_. Why had I? She had been ready to swim for it. Why should not I?Surely the sea, better than anything else, would wash that yellow stainfrom my honour and leave it white at the last. I didn't even have toscrew my nerve up to the point of jumping over. Listing heavily tostarboard as the half-capsized dugout was, one little inch edged to theright, and not even the leverage of the outrigger could keep it fromoverturning. Just the inclination of my shoulders would do the trick....I would not even have to take the initiative to the extent of edgingalong. Surely--

  With a quick gasp, I slid sharply to one side--but it was to theleft--the outrigger side. The great starshaped welter of greenluminescence, where a half-dozen wallowing man-eaters nuzzled into abobbing witch-fire-streaked shape of unreflecting opacity, proved toomuch for my last unbroken filament of nerve--all that I needed to makemy honour white. I had always dread
ed sharks, and it was my horror ofthem now that checked the worthiest impulse that had stirred me thatday. The momentarily eclipsed image of the cooling green bottle tookshape again before my eyes, and, after that, there was nothing to do butmake the best fight I could to reach it.

  Proceeding with infinite caution to avoid the upset which I now fearedabove everything in the world, I crawled forward along the outriggerside and stopped the hole in the bow with my folded drill jacket, as anecessary preliminary to beginning to bail out with my waterproofsun-helmet. But before I turned to on what could have hardly provedother than a hopeless task, the sound of oars and voices reached myears, and presently the bow of a hard-pulled whaleboat came pushing upout of the darkness. It was old Jackson whose strong arm reached out anddragged me in over the gunwale. When they got back their breaths lost incheering the departing schooner, he explained, after depositing my limpform in the stern sheets, Doc Wyndham bawled over to them from"Quarantine" that some cove had been left behind in a foundered canoe.Jackson himself reckoned that the Doc was beginning to go off his nutand see things; but as several of the others seemed to have hazyrecollections of something of the same kind, it was thought best to putoff and investigate.

  "'Ow'd you 'appen to miss c'nections?" Jackson asked sympathetically. "Ispotted you paddlin' the canoe off, an' we was so sure the Skipper 'adsigned you on that we give a speshul w'oop in your 'onour. 'W'at's thematter wiv W'itney?' I bellered ('member the night you learned us thatone?--time the looted fizz from the _Levuka_ was on tap); an' the boyscum back wiv: ''E's all right!--you bet!--Ev'ry time!'"

  "That wasn't the big 'three-times-three' at the end, was it, Jack?" Iasked, my face burning with shame at the thought.

  "Well, no; 'ardly that un," was the half-apologetic reply. "Thatripsnorter was in 'onour uv 'Slant' Allen. Long time pal uv all uv us,'e is. Slash-bangin' finisher, li'l ol' 'Slant.'... Trust 'im allus tobe on 'and w'en they're liftin' 'ell's 'atches."

  I knew then that I wasn't going to be tumbling over myself to tell"Slant's" friends on the beach that his volunteering to go with the_Cora_ had been just a shade less voluntary than they reckoned. _He_ hadnot pulled up dead at his first hurdle as I had, anyhow. No, until Iknew more of what had transpired earlier in the day, I was not going togive the man away; and not to his old friends in any case. I would do atleast that much homage to his nerve.

  Seeing how dead beat I was, Jackson waved back the crowd at the quay andheaded me straight for home. He knew what I needed, and I was asgrateful for the bluff old outlaw's unspoken sympathy as I was for thehelp of his sustaining arm. With rare delicacy, he avoided being awitness to my assault on the green bottle by leaving me at the door.Like all the rest of those rough, red-blooded roysterers of Kai, Jacksonfelt that habitual absinthe drinking was degenerate, almost immoral....All right for a "Froggy," of course, but not for a proper white man....A thing that a real self-respecting beach-comber would never allowhimself to be guilty of. The fact (which could not be concealed forlong) that I was known to be addicted to the habit had taken even moreliving down than my painting, especially when they learned I wasstraight Yankee and not a "_We-we_."

  I drank hungrily at first--gulping glass after glass of the cool greenliquid,--but stopped just as soon as I found my nerves were steadied andbefore the first stage of "elevation" was entered upon. (A seasoneddrinker takes some time to reach the latter.) Unspeakably tiredphysically, I dropped off to sleep almost as soon as the absintherelaxed the tension on my nerves. My rest was dreamless anduntroubled--or comparatively so.