But to return. Mr. Pike had just relieved me yesterday afternoon, when the second mate climbed the forecastle-head and sauntered to the very eyes of the Elsinore , where he stood gazing overside.
“Take a crack at ’m,” Mr. Pike said.
It was a long shot, and I was taking slow and careful aim, when he touched my arm.
“No; don’t,” he said.
I lowered the little rifle and looked at him inquiringly.
“You might hit him,” he explained. “And I want him for myself.”
Life is never what we expect it to be. All our voyage from Baltimore south to the Horn and around the Horn has been marked by violence and death. And now that it has culminated in open mutiny there is no more violence, much less death. We keep to ourselves aft, and the mutineers keep to themselves for’ard. There is no more harshness, no more snarling and bellowing of commands; and in this fine weather a general festival obtains.
Aft, Mr. Pike and Margaret alternate with phonograph and piano; and for’ard, although we cannot see them, a full-fledged “foo-foo” band makes most of the day and night hideous. A squealing accordion that Tom Spink says was the property of Mike Cipriani is played by Guido Bombini, who sets the pace and seems the leader of the foo-foo. There are two broken-reeded harmonicas. Someone plays a jew’s-harp. Then there are home-made fifes and whistles and drums, combs covered with paper, extemporized triangles, and bones made from ribs of salt horse such as negro minstrels use.
The whole crew seems to compose the band, and, like a lot of monkey-folk rejoicing in rude rhythm, emphasizes the beat by hammering kerosene cans, frying-pans, and all sorts of things metallic or reverberant. Some genius has rigged a line to the clapper of the ship’s bell on the forecastle-head and clangs it horribly in the big foo-foo crises, though Bombini can be heard censuring him severely on occasion. And to cap it all, the fog-horn machine pumps in at the oddest moments in imitation of a big bass viol.
And this is mutiny on the high seas! Almost every hour of my deck-watches I listen to this infernal din, and am maddened into desire to join with Mr. Pike in a night attack and put these rebellious and inharmonious slaves to work.
Yet they are not entirely inharmonious. Guido Bombini has a respectable though untrained tenor voice, and has surprised me by a variety of selections, not only from Verdi, but from Wagner and Massenet. Bert Rhine and his crowd are full of rag-time junk, and one phrase that has caught the fancy of all hands, and which they roar out at all times, is: “It’s a bear ! It’s a bear ! It’s a bear !” This morning Nancy , evidently very strongly urged, gave a doleful rendering of Flying Cloud . Yes, and in the second dog-watch last evening our three topaz-eyed dreamers sang some folk-song strangely sweet and sad.
And this is mutiny! As I write I can scarcely believe it. Yet I know Mr. Pike keeps the watch over my head. I hear the shrill laughter of the steward and Louis over some ancient Chinese joke. Wada and the sail-makers, in the pantry, are, I know, talking Japanese politics. And from across the cabin, along the narrow halls, I can hear Margaret softly humming as she goes to bed.
But all doubts vanish at the stroke of eight bells, when I go on deck to relieve Mr. Pike, who lingers a moment for a “gain,” as he calls it.
“Say,” he said confidentially, “you and I can clean out the whole gang. All we got to do is sneak for’ard and turn loose. As soon as we begin to shoot up, half of ’em’ll bolt aft—lobsters like Nancy, an’ Sundry Buyers, an’ Jacobsen, an’ Bob, an’ Shorty, an’ them three castaways, for instance. An’ while they’re doin’ that, an’ our bunch on the poop is takin’ ’em in, you an’ me can make a pretty big hole in them that’s left. What d’ye say?”
I hesitated, thinking of Margaret.
“Why, say,” he urged, “once I jumped into that fo’c’s’le, at close range, I’d start right in, blim-blam-blim, fast as you could wink, nailing them gangsters, an’ Bombini, an’ the Sheeny, an’ Deacon, an’ the Cockney, an’ Mulligan Jacobs, an’ . . . an’ . . . Waltham.”
“That would be mine,” I smiled. “You’ve only eight shots in your Colt.”
Mr. Pike considered a moment, and revised his list. “All right,” he agreed, “I guess I’ll have to let Jacobs go. What d’ye say? Are you game?”
Still I hesitated, but before I could speak he anticipated me and returned to his fidelity.
“No, you can’t do it, Mr. Pathurst. If by any luck they got the both of us . . . No; we’ll just stay aft and sit tight until they’re starved to it . . . But where they get their tucker gets me. For’ard she’s as bare as a bone, as any decent ship ought to be, and yet look at ’em, rolling hog fat. And by rights they ought to a-quit eatin’ a week ago.”
CHAPTER XLIV
Yes, it is certainly mutiny. Collecting water from the leaders of the chart-house in a shower of rain this morning, Buckwheat exposed himself, and a long, lucky revolver-shot from for’ard caught him in the shoulder. The bullet was small-calibre and spent ere it reached him, so that he received no more than a flesh-wound, though he carried on as if he were dying until Mr. Pike hushed his noise by cuffing his ears.
I should not like to have Mr. Pike for my surgeon. He probed for the bullet with his little finger, which was far too big for the aperture; and with his little finger, while with his other hand he threatened another ear-clout, he gouged out the leaden pellet. Then he sent the boy below, where Margaret took him in charge with antiseptics and dressings.
I see her so rarely that a half-hour alone with her these days is an adventure. She is busy morning to night in keeping her house in order. As I write this, through my open door I can hear her laying the law down to the men in the after-room. She has issued underclothes all around from the slop-chest, and is ordering them to take a bath in the rain-water just caught. And to make sure of their thoroughness in the matter, she has told off Louis and the steward to supervise the operation. Also, she has forbidden them smoking their pipes in the after-room. And, to cap everything, they are to scrub walls, ceiling, everything, and then start to-morrow morning at painting. All of which serves to convince me almost that mutiny does not obtain and that I have imagined it.
But no. I hear Buckwheat blubbering and demanding how he can take a bath in his wounded condition. I wait and listen for Margaret’s judgment. Nor am I disappointed. Tom Spink and Henry are told off to the task, and the thorough scrubbing of Buckwheat is assured.
The mutineers are not starving. To-day they have been fishing for albatrosses. A few minutes after they caught the first one its carcase was flung overboard. Mr. Pike studied it through his sea-glasses, and I heard him grit his teeth when he made certain that it was not the mere feathers and skin but the entire carcass. They had taken only its wing-bones to make into pipe-stems. The inference was obvious: starving men would not throw meat away in such fashion .
But where do they get their food? It is a sea-mystery in itself, although I might not so deem it were it not for Mr. Pike.
“I think, and think, till my brain is all frazzled out,” he tells me; “and yet I can’t get a line on it. I know every inch of space on the Elsinore , and know there isn’t an ounce of grub anywhere for’ard, and yet they eat! I’ve overhauled the lazarette. As near as I can make it out, nothing is missing. Then where do they get it? That’s what I want to know. Where do they get it?”