Part 15 (1/2)
The captain listened attentively to the explanation, and altered his tone. ”Oh, that is a different matter,” said he. ”You need be under no alarm, sir; the thundering lubber knows what he is about, at that work.
Why, he has been a s.h.i.+p's carpenter all his life. Him a seaman! If anything ever happens to me, and Joe Wylie is set to navigate this s.h.i.+p, then you may say your prayers. He isn't fit to sail a wash-tub across a duck-pond. But I'll tell you what it is,” added this worthy, with more pomposity than neatness of articulation, ”here's a respeckable pa.s.senger brought me a report; do my duty to m' employers, and--take a look at the well.”
He accordingly chalked a plumb-line, and went and sounded the well.
There were eight inches of water. Hudson told him that was no more than all s.h.i.+ps contained from various causes: ”In fact,” said he, ”our pumps suck, and will not draw, at eight inches.” Then suddenly grasping Mr.
Hazel's hand, he said, in tearful accents, ”Don't you trouble your head about Joe Wylie, or any such sc.u.m. I'm skipper of the _Proserpine,_ and a man that does his duty to 'z employers. Mr. Hazel, sir, I'd come to my last anchor in that well this moment, if my duty to m' employers required it. D-- my eyes if I wouldn't lie down there this minute, and never move to all eternity and a day after, if it was my duty to m' employers!”
”No doubt,” said Hazel dryly. ”But I think you can serve your employers better in other parts of the s.h.i.+p.” He then left him, with a piece of advice; ”to keep his eye upon that Wylie.”
Mr. Hazel kept his own eye on Wylie so constantly, that at eleven o'clock P.M. he saw that worthy go into the captain's cabin with a quart bottle of rum.
The coast was clear; the temptation great. These men then were still deceiving him with a feigned antagonism. He listened at the keyhole, not without some compunction; which, however, became less and less as fragments of the dialogue reached his ear.
For a long time the only speaker was Hudson, and his discourse ran upon his own exploits at sea. But suddenly Wylie's voice broke in with an unmistakable tone of superiority. ”Belay all that chat, and listen to me.
It is time we settled something. I'll hear what you have got to say; and then you'll _do_ what _I_ say. Better keep your hands off the bottle a minute you have had enough for the present; this is business. I know you are good for jaw; but what are you game to do for the governor 's money?
Anything?”
”More than you have ever seen or heard tell of, ye lubber,” replied the irritated skipper. ”Who has ever served his employers like Hiram Hudson?”
”Keep that song for your quarter-deck,” retorted the mate, contemptuously. ”No; on second thoughts, just tell me how you have served your employers, you old humbug. Give me chapter and verse to choose from.
Come now, the _Neptune?”_
”Well, the _Neptune;_ she caught fire a hundred leagues from land.”
”How came she to do that?”
”That is my business. Well, I put her head before the wind, and ran for the Azores; and I stuck to her, sir, till she was as black as a coal, and we couldn't stand on deck, but kept hopping like parched peas; and fire belching out of her portholes forward. Then we took to the boats, and saved a few bales of silk by way of sample of her cargo, and got ash.o.r.e; and she'd have come ash.o.r.e too next tide and told tales, but somebody left a keg of gunpowder in the cabin, with a long fuse, and blew a hole in her old ribs, that the water came in, and down she went, hissing like ten thousand sarpints, and n.o.body the wiser.”
”Who lighted the fuse, I wonder?” said Wylie.
”Didn't I tell ye it was 'Somebody'?” said Hudson. ”Hand me the stiff.”
He replenished his gla.s.s, and, after taking a sip or two, asked Wylie if he had ever had the luck to be boarded by pirates.
”No,” said Wylie. ”Have you?”
”Ay; and they rescued me from a watery grave, as the lubbers call it. Ye see, I was employed by Downes & Co., down at the Havanna, and cleared for Vera Cruz with some boxes of old worn-out printer's type.”
”To print psalm-books for the darkies, no doubt,” suggested Wylie.
”Insured as specie,” continued Hudson, ignoring the interruption. ”Well, just at daybreak one morning, all of a sudden there was a rakish-looking craft on our weather-bow. Lets fly a nine-pounder across our forefoot, and was alongside before my men could tumble up from below. I got knocked into the sea by the boom and fell between the s.h.i.+ps; and the pirate he got hold of me and poured hot grog down my throat to bring me to my senses.”
”That is not what you use it for in general,” said Wylie. ”Civil sort of pirate, though.”
”Pirate be d--d. That was my consort rigged out with a black flag, and mounted with four nine-pounders on one side, and five dummies on the other. He bl.u.s.tered a bit, and swore, and took our type and our cabbages (I complained to Downes ash.o.r.e about the vagabond taking the vegetables), and ordered us to leeward under all canvas, and we never saw him again--not till he had shaved off his mustaches, and called on Downes to condole and say the varmint had chased his s.h.i.+p fifty leagues out of her course; but he had got clear of him. Downes complimented me publicly.
Says he, 'This skipper boarded the pirate single-handed; only he jumped short, and fell between the two s.h.i.+ps; and here he is by a miracle.' Then he takes out his handkerchief, and flops his head on my shoulder. 'His merciful preservation almost reconciles me to the loss of my gold,' says the thundering crocodile. Cleared seventy thousand dollars, he did, out of the Manhattan Marine, and gave the pirate and me but two hundred pounds between us both.”
”The _Rose?”_ said Wylie.