Part 8 (1/2)
The only one who neither expected news, nor cared apparently whether he received a letter or not, was Salve Kristiansen. While the parcel was being distributed, he remained standing by the wheel, intent apparently upon watching the movements of the two men who were hoisting up and making fast the jolly-boat. His lips were compressed; and when he gave the men a hand now and then, it was not a very willing one, and was generally accompanied by some bitter or sarcastic remark. His nature since they last sailed from Arendal seemed to have turned to gall; and when the captain had casually mentioned in his letter home that he was not so well satisfied with him, he had had good reason for saying so.
There had been all sorts of unpleasantness between them; and if any discontent or difference between himself and the crew prevailed, Salve was sure to be at the bottom of it. He had found a rancid salt-herring, set up on four legs with a tail, as he was walking on the p.o.o.p one evening in the moonlight; and as complaints had been recently made about the food, a good deal of which had become worse than bad from the effects of the hot climate, he had at once attributed to Salve this pointed method of drawing his attention to the subject again. It seemed almost as if he had some cause for bitterness against himself personally; and as he had always treated him with marked favour, he was at a loss to comprehend the reason for it.
With the exception of the captain, who had retained his seat at the after-end of the p.o.o.p, Salve was soon the only human being to be seen on deck. The whole crew had disappeared, and might have been found poring over their letters two and two, or singly, in the most out-of-the-way places, from the main and fore top even to the bowsprit end, where one had erected a pavilion for himself out of a fold of the hauled-down jib.
Captain Beck's letter, to judge from his gestures and half-audible exclamations, was not giving him the pleasure which he had antic.i.p.ated.
His whole face, up to the top of his head, had become red as a lobster, and he sat now drumming with one hand on his knee, and casting an occasional fierce look over at Salve, in the att.i.tude of a man beside himself with anger. At last he brought the hand in which he held the letter down upon the table with a force that sent the decanter and gla.s.s flying, and thrusting the fragments aside with his foot, he strode up and down the deck for a couple of minutes and then came towards Salve as if he meant to say something; and as the latter could very well perceive that it was not going to be anything pleasant, his countenance a.s.sumed an expression of defiance accordingly. He changed his mind, though, before he reached him, and turning short round shouted instead--
”Where is the second mate? Where is the whole watch?” and he looked furiously about him, as if surprised, although he knew very well how they were occupied, and that it had been decided not to weigh anchor until later in the day, when they would have the evening breeze.
”Ay, ay, sir!” was heard from the mate in the long-boat; and he raised himself and came forward with the letter he had been reading in his hand.
”Stand by to man the windla.s.s! Pipe all hands!” ordered the captain, and roared the command again gratuitously through the trumpet.
The crew turned out from their several retreats with sour looks. They had expected to be left alone until after tea-time, when there would have been a general interchange of news on the forecastle; and now there came instead a hail of orders from the speaking-trumpet, as if the captain had all of a sudden become possessed.
There was already a good deal of discontent prevailing among the crew, both on account of the bad food which they had to put up with, and on account of their leave ash.o.r.e at Monte Video having been, as they thought, capriciously refused; and it was therefore something more nearly approaching to a howl than a song that was now heard from the capstan and from the party who were hoisting the heavy mainsail. The customary English chorus--
”Haul the bowline, The captain he is growling; Haul the bowline, The bowline haul”--
was sung with offensive significance; and though, at the last heavy heave with which the enormous anchor was catted up to the bows, the mate tried to create a diversion in the feeling by a cheery ”Saat 'kjelimen--hal' paa,” the concluding words of the song--
”Aa hal i--aa--iaa-- Cheerily, men!”--
were delivered in a scornful shout.
”You'll have a chance of cooling yourselves presently, my lads,” said Salve, coming up at the moment from his own heavy work with the cross-jack; ”when we weather the point, all the lee-sails have to be set”--and the remark had the effect which he desired of intensifying the prevailing irritation.
In spite of the vertical heat, the hail of orders from the captain's trumpet continued, accompanied by reprimands and fault-finding all round, until the crew were nearly in a state of mutiny, and it was not until late in the evening that he showed any signs of exhaustion.
His temper had not improved next day. He looked as if he had a determination of blood to the head; and every time he came near Salve, he glared at him as if it was all he could do to control himself from an outburst of some kind or another. He knew that Salve had made love to Elizabeth, and had wished to make her presents since she had come into his house; and that the same girl was now to be his son's wife--the idea was absolutely intolerable!
At last he could contain himself no longer. Salve had just deposited a coil of rope aft, and the captain, after watching his movements with evidently suppressed irritation, broke out suddenly, without preface of any kind--
”You, I believe, had some acquaintance with that--that Elizabeth Raklev I took into my house.”
Salve felt the blood rush to his heart. He seemed to know what was coming.
”The post,” the captain continued, in a bitterly contemptuous tone, ”has brought me the delightful intelligence that my son has engaged himself to her.”
”Congratulate you, captain,” said Salve. His voice almost failed him, and he was deadly pale, but his eyes flashed with a wild defiance.
He went forward, and the captain growled after him to himself, ”He can have that to fret over now instead of the food;” and as the mate was coming up the cabin stairs at the moment polis.h.i.+ng the s.e.xtant, he turned away with a look of grim satisfaction to take the alt.i.tude.
When the Juno last sailed from Arendal she had changed two of her crew.
One of the new hands was a square-built, coa.r.s.e-featured, uncouth-looking creature, from the fjord region north of Stavanger, who called himself Nils Buvaagen, but whose name had been changed by the others to Uvaagen (not-awake), on account of his evident predisposition to sleep. He was incredibly _nave_ and communicative, especially on the subject of his wife and children (of which latter he apparently had his nest full), and had soon become the b.u.t.t of the s.h.i.+p. Salve was the only one who ever took his part, and that only because he saw all the others against him; and having also been the means of saving his life when he had been washed overboard one dark night in the English Channel, he had inspired the simple fellow with a perfectly devoted attachment to him.
They were up on the mainyard together that evening, where they had been helping to carry out an order with the mainsail. The rest had gone down again, but Salve, who felt a longing to be alone, had remained aloft, and was standing on the foot-rope, with his elbows resting on the yard.