Part 26 (1/2)

You can see the false difficulties of my position. I do not defend my att.i.tude. Undoubtedly a born leader of men, like Captain Selover at his best, would have known how to act with the proper decision both now and in the inception of the first mutiny. At heart I never doubted the reality of the crisis.

Even Percy Darrow saw the surliness of the men's att.i.tudes, and with his usual good sense divined the cause.

”You chaps are getting lazy,” said he, ”why don't you do something?

Where's the captain?”

They growled something about there being nothing to do, and explained that the captain preferred to live aboard.

”Don't blame him,” said Darrow, ”but he might give us a little of his squeaky company occasionally. Boys, I'll tell you something about seals. The old bull seals have long, stiff whiskers--a foot long. Do you know there's a market for those whiskers? Well, there is. The Chinese mount them in gold and use them for cleaners for their long pipes. Each whisker is worth from six bits to a dollar and a quarter.

Why don't you kill a few bull seal for the 'tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs'?”

”Nothin' to do with a voodoo?” grunted Handy Solomon.

Darrow laughed amusedly. ”No, this is the truth,” he a.s.sured. ”I'll tell you what: I'll give you boys six bits apiece for the whisker hairs, and four bits for the galls. I expect to sell them at a profit.”

Next morning they shook off their lethargy and went seal-hunting.

I was practically commanded to attend. This att.i.tude had been growing of late: now it began to take a definite form.

”Mr. Eagan, don't you want to go hunting?” or ”Mr. Eagen, I guess I'll just go along with you to stretch my legs,” had given way to, ”We're going fis.h.i.+ng: you'd better come along.”

I had known for a long time that I had lost any real control of them; and that perhaps humiliated me a little. However, my inexperience at handling such men, and the anomalous character of my position to some extent consoled me. In the filaments brushed across the face of my understanding I could discover none so strong as to support an overt act on my part. I cannot doubt, that had the affair come to a focus, I should have warned the scientists even at the risk of my life. In fact, as I shall have occasion to show you, I did my best. But at the moment, in all policy I could see my way to little besides acquiescence.

We killed seals by sequestrating the bulls, surrounding them, and clubbing them at a certain point of the forehead. It was surprising to see how hard they fought, and how quickly they succ.u.mbed to a blow properly directed. Then we stripped the mask with its bristle of long whiskers, took the gall, and dragged the carca.s.s into the surf where it was devoured by fish. At first the men, pleased by the novelty, stripped the skins. The blubber, often two or three inches in thickness, had then to be cut away from the pelt, cube by cube. It was a long, an oily, and odoriferous job. We stunk mightily of seal oil; our garments were s.h.i.+ny with it, the very pores of our skins seemed to ooze it. And even after the pelt was fairly well cleared, it had still to be tanned. Percy Darrow suggested the method, but the process was long, and generally unsatisfactory. With the acquisition of the fifth greasy, heavy, and ill-smelling piece of fur the men's interest in peltries waned. They confined themselves in all strictness to the ”tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs.”

Percy Darrow showed us how to clean the whiskers. The process was evil. The masks were, quite simply, to be advanced so far in the way of putrefaction that the bristles would part readily from their sockets. The first batch the men hung out on a line. A few moments later we heard a mighty squawking, and rushed out to find the island ravens making off with the entire catch. Protection of netting had to be rigged. We caught seals for a month or so. There was novelty in it, and it satisfied the l.u.s.t for killing. As time went on, the bulls grew warier. Then we made expeditions to outlying rocks.

Later Handy Solomon approached me on another diplomatic errand.

”The seals is getting shy, sir,” said he.

”They are,” said I.

”The only way to do is to shoot them,” said he.

”Quite like,” I agreed.

A pause ensued.

”We've got no cartridges,” he insinuated.

”And you've taken charge of my rifle,” I pointed out.

”Oh, not a bit, sir,” he cried. ”Thrackles, he just took it to clean it--you can have it whenever you want it, sir.”

”I have no cartridges--as you have observed,” said I.

”There's plenty aboard,” he suggested.

”And they're in very good hands there,” said I.