together in the dark, and tons of water could be heard scuttling
about as if
trying to get at them from above. The boatswain had
been keeping up a gruff talk, but a more
unreasonable lot of men,
he said afterwards, he had never been with. They were snug
enough there, out of harm's way, and not wanted to do anything,
either; and yet they did nothing but
grumble and complain
peevishly like so many sick kids. Finally, one of them said that
if there had been at least some light to see each other's noses
by, it wouldn't be so bad. It was making him crazy, he declared,
to lie there in the dark
waiting for the blamed hooker to sink.
"Why don't you step outside, then, and be done with it at once?"
the boatswain turned on him.
This called up a shout of execration. The boatswain found
himself overwhelmed with reproaches of all sorts. They seemed to
take it ill that a lamp was not
instantly" target="_blank" title="ad.立即,立刻">
instantly created for them out of
nothing. They would whine after a light to get drowned by --
anyhow! And though the unreason of their revilings was
patent --
since no one could hope to reach the lamp-room, which was forward
-- he became greatly distressed. He did not think it was decent
of them to be nagging at him like this. He told them so, and was
met by general contumely. He sought
refuge,
therefore, in an
embittered silence. At the same time their grumbling and sighing
and muttering worried him greatly, but by-and-by it occurred to
him that there were six globe lamps hung in the 'tween-deck, and
that there could be no harm in depriving the coolies of one of
them.
The Nan-Shan had an athwartship coal-bunker, which, being at
times used as cargo space, communicated by an iron door with the
fore 'tween-deck. It was empty then, and its manhole was the
foremost one in the alleyway. The boatswain could get in,
therefore, without coming out on deck at all; but to his great
surprise he found he could induce no one to help him in taking
off the manhole cover. He groped for it all the same, but one of
the crew lying in his way refused to budge.
"Why, I only want to get you that blamed light you are crying
for," he expostulated, almost pitifully.
Somebody told him to go and put his head in a bag. He regretted
he could not recognize the voice, and that it was too dark to
see,
otherwise, as he said, he would have put a head on that son
of a sea-cook, anyway, sink or swim. Nevertheless, he had made
up his mind to show them he could get a light, if he were to die
for it.
Through the
violence of the ship's rolling, every
movement was
dangerous. To be lying down seemed labour enough. He nearly
broke his neck dropping into the bunker. He fell on his back,
and was sent shooting
helplessly from side to side in the
dangerous company of a heavy iron bar -- a coal-trimmer's slice
probably -- left down there by somebody. This thing made him as
nervous as though it had been a wild beast. He could not see it,
the inside of the bunker coated with coal-dust being perfectly
and impenetrably black; but he heard it sliding and
clattering,
and
striking here and there, always in the neighbourhood of his
head. It seemed to make an
extraordinary noise, too -- to give
heavy thumps as though it had been as big as a
bridge girder.
This was
remarkable enough for him to notice while he was flung
from port to starboard and back again, and clawing desperately
the smooth sides of the bunker in the
endeavour to stop himself.
The door into the 'tween-deck not
fitting quite true, he saw a
thread of dim light at the bottom.
Being a sailor, and a still active man, he did not want much of a
chance to
regain his feet; and as luck would have it, in
scrambling up he put his hand on the iron slice, picking it up as
he rose. Otherwise he would have been afraid of the thing
breaking his legs, or at least knocking him down again. At first
he stood still. He felt unsafe in this darkness that seemed to
make the ship's
motionunfamiliar, unforeseen, and difficult to
counteract. He felt so much
shaken for a moment that he dared
not move for fear of "taking
charge again." He had no mind to get
battered to pieces in that bunker.
He had struck his head twice; he was dazed a little. He seemed to
hear yet so
plainly the
clatter and bangs of the iron slice
flying about his ears that he tightened his grip to prove to
himself he had it there
safely in his hand. He was vaguely
amazed at the plainness with which down there he could hear the
gale raging. Its howls and shrieks seemed to take on, in the
emptiness of the bunker, something of the human
character, of
human rage and pain -- being not vast but
infinitely poignant.
And there were, with every roll, thumps, too -- profound,
ponderous thumps, as if a bulky object of five-ton weight or so
had got play in the hold. But there was no such thing in the
cargo. Something on deck? Impossible. Or
alongside? Couldn't
be.
He thought all this quickly, clearly, competently, like a seaman,
and in the end remained puzzled. This noise, though, came
deadened from outside, together with the washing and pouring of
water on deck above his head. Was it the wind? Must be. It
made down there a row like the shouting of a big lot of crazed
men. And he discovered in himself a desire for a light, too -if
only to get drowned by -- and a
nervousanxiety to get out of
that bunker as quickly as possible.
He pulled back the bolt: the heavy iron plate turned on its
hinges; and it was as though he had opened the door to the sounds
of the
tempest. A gust of
hoarse yelling met him: the air was
still; and the rushing of water
overhead was covered by a tumult
of strangled, throaty shrieks that produced an effect of
desperate
confusion. He straddled his legs the whole width of
the
doorway and stretched his neck. And at first he perceived
only what he had come to seek: six small yellow flames swinging
violently on the great body of the dusk.
It was stayed like the
gallery of a mine, with a row of
stanchions in the middle, and cross-beams
overhead, penetrating
into the gloom ahead --
indefinitely. And to port there loomed,
like the caving in of one of the sides, a bulky mass with a
slanting
outline. The whole place, with the shadows and the
shapes, moved all the time. The boatswain glared: the ship
lurched to starboard, and a great howl came from that mass that
had the slant of fallen earth.
Pieces of wood whizzed past. Planks, he thought, inexpressibly
startled, and flinging back his head. At his feet a man went
sliding over, open-eyed, on his back, straining with uplifted
arms for nothing: and another came bounding like a detached stone
with his head between his legs and his hands clenched. His
58
pigtail whipped in the air; he made a grab at the boatswain's
legs, and from his opened hand a bright white disc rolled against
the boatswain's foot. He recognized a silver dollar, and yelled
at it with
astonishment. With a precipitated sound of trampling
and shuffling of bare feet, and with guttural cries, the mound of
writhing bodies piled up to port detached itself from the ship's
side and sliding, inert and struggling, shifted to starboard,
with a dull,
brutal thump. The cries ceased. The boatswain heard
a long moan through the roar and whistling of the wind; he saw an
inextricable
confusion of heads and shoulders, naked soles
kicking
upwards, fists raised, tumbling backs, legs, pigtails,
faces.
"Good Lord!" he cried, horrified, and banged-to the iron door
upon this vision.
This was what he had come on the
bridge to tell. He could not
keep it to himself; and on board ship there is only one man to
whom it is worth while to unburden yourself. On his passage back
the hands in the alleyway swore at him for a fool. Why didn't he
bring that lamp? What the devil did the coolies matter to
anybody? And when he came out, the
extremity of the ship made
what went on inside of her appear of little moment.
At first he thought he had left the alleyway in the very moment
of her sinking. The
bridge ladders had been washed away, but an
enormous sea filling the after-deck floated him up. After that
he had to lie on his
stomach for some time,
holding to a
ring-bolt, getting his
breath now and then, and swallowing salt
water. He struggled farther on his hands and knees, too
frightened and distracted to turn back. In this way he reached
the after-part of the wheelhouse. In that comparatively
sheltered spot he found the second mate.
The boatswain was
pleasantly surprised -- his
impression being
that everybody on deck must have been washed away a long time
ago. He asked
eagerly where the Captain was.
The second mate was lying low, like a
malignant little animal
under a hedge.
"Captain? Gone
overboard, after getting us into this mess." The
mate, too, for all he knew or cared. Another fool. Didn't
matter. Everybody was going by-and-by.
The boatswain crawled out again into the strength of the wind;
not because he much expected to find anybody, he said, but just
to get away from "that man." He crawled out as outcasts go to
face an
inclement world. Hence his great joy at
finding Jukes
and the Captain. But what was going on in the 'tween-deck was to
him a minor matter by that time. Besides, it was difficult to
make yourself heard. But he managed to
convey the idea that the
Chinaman had broken adrift together with their boxes, and that he
had come up on purpose to report this. As to the hands, they
were all right. Then, appeased, he subsided on the deck in a
sitting
posture, hugging with his arms and legs the stand of the
engine-room
telegraph -- an iron casting as thick as a post.
When that went, why, he expected he would go, too. He gave no
more thought to the coolies.
Captain MacWhirr had made Jukes understand that he wanted him to
go down below -- to see.
"What am I to do then, sir?" And the trembling of his whole wet
body caused Jukes' voice to sound like bleating.
"See first . . . Boss'n . . . says . . . adrift."
"That boss'n is a confounded fool," howled Jukes, shakily.
The
absurdity of the demand made upon him revolted Jukes. He was
as
unwilling to go as if the moment he had left the deck the ship
were sure to sink.
"I must know . . . can't leave. . . ."
"They'll settle, sir."
"Fight . . . boss'n says they fight. . . . Why? Can't have . . .
fighting . . . board ship. . . . Much rather keep you here . . .
case . . . . I should . . . washed
overboard myself. . . . Stop
it . . . some way. You see and tell me . . . through engine-room
tube. Don't want you . . . come up here . . . too often.
Dangerous . . . moving about . . . deck."
Jukes, held with his head in chancery, had to listen to what
seemed
horrible suggestions.
"Don't want . . . you get lost . . . so long . . . ship isn't. .
. . . Rout . . . Good man . . . Ship . . . may . . . through
this . . . all right yet."
All at once Jukes understood he would have to go.
"Do you think she may?" he screamed.
But the wind devoured the reply, out of which Jukes heard only
the one word,
pronounced with great
energy ". . . . Always. . .
."
Captain MacWhirr released Jukes, and bending over the boatswain,
yelled, "Get back with the mate." Jukes only knew that the arm
was gone off his shoulders. He was dismissed with his orders --
to do what? He was exasperated into letting go his hold
carelessly, and on the
instant was blown away. It seemed to him
that nothing could stop him from being blown right over the
stern. He flung himself down
hastily, and the boatswain, who was
following, fell on him.
"Don't you get up yet, sir," cried the boatswain. "No hurry!"