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Title: Hurricane Jack of The Vital SparkAuthor: Hugh Foulis (pseudonym of Neil Munro)* A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook *eBook No.: 0700751h.htmlLanguage: EnglishDate first posted: May 2007Date most recently updated: May 2007This eBook was produced by: Jon JermeyProject Gutenberg of Australia eBooks are created from printed editionswhich are in the public domain in Australia, unless a copyright noticeis included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in compliance with a particularpaper edition.Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check thecopyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing thisfile.This eBook is made available at no cost and with almost no restrictionswhatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the termsof the Project Gutenberg of Australia License which may be viewed online athttp://gutenberg.net.au/licence.html
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CONTENTS:
I. HURRICANE JACK
II. THE MYSTERY SHIP
III. UNDER SEALED ORDERS
IV. A SEARCH FOR SALVAGE
V. THE WONDERFUL CHEESE
VI. THE PHANTOM HORSE AND CART
VII. HURRICANE JACK'S LUCK-BIRD
VIII. A ROWDY VISITOR
IX. THE FENIAN GOAT
X. LAND GIRLS
XI. LEAP YEAR ON THE VITAL SPARK
XII. BONNIE ANN
XIII. THE LEAP-YEAR BALL
XIV. THE BOTTLE KING
XV. "MUDGES"
XVI. AN OCEAN TRAGEDY
XVII. FREIGHTS OF FANCY
XVIII. SUMMER-TIME ON THE VITAL SPARK
XIX. EGGS UNCONTROLLED
XX. COMMANDEERED
XXI. SUNNY JIM REJECTED
XXII. HOW JIM JOINED THE ARMY
XXIII. THE FUSILIER
XXIV. PARA HANDY, M.D.
XXV. A DOUBLE LIFE
XXVI. THE WET MAN OF MUSCADALE
XXVII. INITIATION
XXVIII. THE END OF THE WORLD
XXIX. THE CAPTURED CANNON
XXX. AN IDEAL JOB
"STOP you!" said Para Handy, looking at his watch, "and I will giveyou a trate; I will introduce you to the finest sailor ever sailed theseas. He's comin' aboard the vessel in a little to say good-bye to usbefore he joins a kind o' a boat that's bound for Valapariza. And I rightor am I wrong, Dougie?"
"That's what he said himsel', at any rate," said Dougie dubiously."But ye canna put your trust in Jeck. He meant it right enough at thetime, but that wass yesterday, and Jeck hass wan o' them memories formindin' things that's no' to be depended on--ass short and foggy ass awinter day!"
"You'll see he'll come!" said Para Handy confidently. "Jeck's a man o'his word, a perfect chentleman! Forbye, I have the lend o' histopcoat."
"Who is the consummate and accomplished mariner?" I asked, delaying mydeparture from the Vital Spark.
"There's only wan in all the cope and canopy o' British shippin'" saidthe Captain. "'John Maclachlan'in the books, but 'Hurricane Jeck' inevery port from here to Callao. You have heard me speak of him? An armlike a spar and the he'rt of a child!"
"I'll assure you there iss nothing wrong wi' his arm whatever," saidthe mate; "it's like a davit." But he offered no comment on the heart ofthe illustrious seaman.
"He'll be here in a chiffy," Para Handy assured me eagerly. "It'sworth your while waitin' to meet him when you have the chance. You'llfind him most agreeable; no pride nor palavers about him; chust like anycommon sailor. A full-rigged ship tattooed on his chest, and his hat wi'a list to starboard. A night wi' Jeck iss ass good ass a collegeeducation. You never saw such nerve!"
"I'll wait a little," I said; "life offers so few opportunities forseeing the really great."
Five minutes later, and a lanky weather-beaten person with a tightlybuttoned blue serge suit, a brown-paper parcel in his hand, and a verylow-crowned bowler hat at an angle of forty-five, dropped on to the deckof the Vital Spark.
"Peter," he said to the Captain anxiously, without preamble, "what didye do wi' my portmanta?"
"I never saw it, Jeck," said Para Handy. "Iss it runnin' in your mindye lost it?"
"Not exactly lost," said Hurricane Jack, "but it's been adrift in thisold town since Friday, and I'm tackin' round my friends to see if any ofthem's wearin' a good Crimea shirt I had in it. No reflections uponanybody, mind--that was an A1 shirt," and he looked with some suspicionat the turned-up collar of my coat.
"Nobody here hass your shirt, Jeck, I'll assure you," protested theCaptain. "What kind of a portmanta wass it?"
"It was a small tin canister," said Hurricane Jack quite frankly, and,having said so, cheered up magically, unburdened his mind of his loss,and was quite affable when I was formally presented to his distinguishednotice by the Captain. He had a hybrid accent, half Scotch and halfAmerican, and I flatter myself he seemed to take to me from the veryfirst.
"Put it there!" he exclaimed fervently, thrusting out a hand in which,on my response to the invitation, he almost crushed my fingers into pulp."I'm nothin' but an old sailor-man, but if I can do anything for anybodyat any time between now and my ship sailin', say the word, sunnyboys!"
I assured him there was nothing pressing that I wanted done at themoment.
"I told ye!" exclaimed the Captain triumphantly. "Always the perfectchentleman! He thinks of everything!" He beamed upon the visitor with apride and gratification it was delightful to witness.
"We havena anything on the boat," remarked Dougie, with what, tostupid people, might seem irrelevance. Hurricane Jack, however, withmarvellous intuition, knew exactly what was indicated, looked at me withsome expectancy, and I had not the slightest difficulty in inducing themall to join me in a visit to the Ferry Inn.
The bright particular star of the British mercantile marine havinggiven the toast, "A fair slant!" three minutes later, addressed himselfto the disposal of the largest quantity of malt liquor I have ever seenconsumed at one breath, put down the empty vessel with unnecessaryostentation, and informed all whom it might concern that it was the firstto-day.
"The chentleman," said Para Handy, alluding to me, "would take it assa special trate, Jeck, to hear some specimens of your agility."
I did my best to assume an aspect of the most eager curiosity.
"In the old clipper tred," Para Handy informed me in a stage whisper."Wan of the very best! Namely in all the shuppin' offices! Took a barquethey called the Port Jackson from Sydney to San Francisco innine-and-thirty days. Look at the shouthers o' him!"
"If a bit of a song, now--an old come-all-ye, or a short-pull shantylike 'Missouri River,'--would be any good to the gentleman," saidHurricane Jack agreeably, "I'll do my best endeavours as soon as I'vescoffed this off. Here's salute!"
Para Handy looked a little apprehensive. "What wass runnin' in mymind," said he, "wass no' so mich a song, though there's none can touchyou at the singin', Jeck, but some of your diversions in foreign parts.Take your time, Jeck; whatever you like yoursel'!" He turned again to mewith a glance that challenged my closest and most admiring attention forthe performance about to take place, and whispered, "Stop you, and you'llhear Mr Maclachlan!"
The gifted tar was apparently reluctant to abandon the idea of a song,and rather at a loss which of the stirring incidents of his life to beginwith.
"Vino," he remarked, and then, lest there should be any mistake aboutthe word, he spelled it. "V-i-n-o, that's wine in the Dago lingo.Wherever there's land there's liquor, and down away in the Dago countriesyou take a wide sheer in, see, to a place like Montevidio. Montevidio'slike here, see--" and he drew some lines on the counter with spilt ale;"and down about here's Bahia, and round the Horn, say just right here,there's Valaparisa. Well, as I say, you tack in to any o' them oddplaces, it might be for a cargo o' beef, and you're right up against thevino. That's Dago for wine, sunny boys! V-i-n-o."
"Didn't I tell ye!" exclaimed Para Handy ecstatically, looking at me."Jeck hass been everywhere. Speaks aal their languages like a native.Yes, Jeck; go on, Jeck; you're doin' capital, Jeck!"
"Extremely interesting!" I said to the fascinating child of the sea."Valparaiso now; it's pretty liable to earthquake, isn't it?"
"Take your time, Jeck; don't be in a hurry," said Para Handyanxiously, as if I had been a K.C. trying to trap a witness.
"Never saw the bloomin' place but it was pitchin' like a Cardifftramp," said Hurricane Jack. "It's the vino. V-i-n-o. Silly thing, theDago lingo; I know it fine, all the knots and splices of it, but it's thesilliest lingo between Hell and Honolulu. Good enough, I guess, for themJohnny Dagoes. What this country wants is genuine British sailormen, tosail genuine British ships, and where are they? A lot o' ruddy Dutchmen!None o' the old stuff that was in the Black Ball Line wi' me; it wasn'tblood we had in our veins in them days, sunny boys, but Riga balsam andgood Stockholm tar."
He suddenly put his hand into a pocket, dragged out a leather bag, andpoured a considerable quantity of silver coinage on the counter.
"Set her up again, sunny boy!" he said to the barman; "and don't vast'heavin' till this little pot o' money's earned."
"Always the perfect chentleman!" said Para Handy with emotion. "Moneyis nothing to Jeck; he will spend it like the wave of the sea." But hegathered it up and returned it, all but a shilling or two, to the leatherbag, which was by force restored to its owner's pocket.
"What," I asked, "is the strangest port you have seen?"
Hurricane Jack reflected. "You wouldn't believe me, sunny boys," saidhe, "if I told you."
"Yes, yes, Jeck; the chentleman'll believe anything," said ParaHandy.
"The rummiest port I've struck," said Hurricane Jack, "is Glasgow. Thehooker I was on came into the dock last week, the first time I've beenhome for three years, and I goes up the quay for a tot o' rum wi' ashipmate. Jerry Sloan, that comes out o' Sligo. It wasn't twelveo'clock--"
"At night?" asked Dougie.
"Certainly! Who wants rum in the middle o' the day? I'd been so longaway, perusin' up and down the South America coasts and over toAustralia, I'd clean forgot the Glasgow habits, and I tell you I got astart when I found the rum-shops battened down. There wasn't even ashebeen! They tell me shebeenin's against the law in Glasgow now. They'llsoon be shuttin' up the churches!
"'This is the worst place ever I scoffed!' says Jerry, and he's a ladthat's been a bit about the world. Next day Jerry and me takes a slantup-town to buy a knife, and blamed if there was a cutlery shop or anironmonger's open in the whole village!
"'The man that makes the knives in Sheffield's dead, and they'recelebratin' his funeral, or this is the slowest town on the WesternHemisphere,' says Jerry.
"Next day we took another slant to buy boiled ham, and went into ashop that was full of ham, but the son-of-a-gun who kept it said hedaren't sell us anything but oranges! So the both of us went back likebilly-oh to the waterside and signed for Valaparisa. That's where thevino is, sunny boys, and don't you forget it! V-i-n-o."
"Capital!" said Para Handy, and, turning again to me, remarked: "It'swonderful the things you see in traivellin'. If you'll come over to thevessel now, we'll maybe get Jeck to give a stave o' 'Paddy cameround.'"
But I tore myself away on the plea of urgent business.
UP at the bar of the inn the crew of the Vital Spark mildly regaledthemselves with munition ale which the Captain audibly surmised had beenmade on the premises after the last washing-day.
It seemed good enough, however, for a gang of young Glasgow Fair ladswho were also in the bar, and made as much noise as if the liquorlegislation of the past five years had been abandoned.
"They're only lettin' on," said Para Handy sadly. "Just play-actin'!It's no' on ale o' this dimensions that they're keepin' up the frolic. Abarrel o' that wouldna rouse a song in a Templar lodge."
He cut himself a plug of thick black twist, and chewed it to remove asspeedily as possible the flavour of Macalister's still undemobilisedbeer.
"I say, old chap," said the cheekiest of the Glasgow youths, "what doye chew tobacco for?"
"Just to get oot the juice," said Para Handy. "Iss everybody weelaboot Barlinnie?"
The trippers came surging boisterously up to his end of the counter;there was about them an infectious jollity that slightly thawed even thesaturnine Macphail.
"Is that your vessel at the quay?" said one of the strangers after awhile. "She looks a bit battered. Needin' paintin' an' that--"
Para Handy sighed.
"Ye may weel say it!" he responded. "It would be droll if she wassnalookin' battered. Ye would read in the papers aboot the 'MysteryShip'?"
"Often," said the Glasgow man.
"That's her," whispered Para Handy. "Q Boat 21--the chenuine article!The cammyflage iss off her, and her cannons iss back at Beardmore's, butif ye had seen her a year ago ye would call her the gem o' the sea. Am Iright or am I wrong, Dougie?"
"Ye chust took the word oot o' my mooth," responded the mate withimpressive alacrity. "The gem o' the ocean."
Macphail merely snorted.
"What was she for?" asked one of the trippers, quite impressed.
"That's just the very words I asked the Admirality when they took herover," said Para Handy, "and they wouldna tell me. 'Ye'll fin' oot soonenough," says they; 'she's the very packet we're lookin' for to play aprank on Jerry. She looks like a boat that would have agility.'
"They painted her streakum-strokum like the batters o' a book I haveat home called John Bunyan's 'Holy War,' so that ye couldna make her oota hundred yerds off if ye shut your eyes; they put a wireless instrumentdoon her funnel, and a couple o' nice wee guns at her stern, wi' a crateon the top o' them the same ass they were chickens, and put on board heran old frien' o' my own by the name o' Hurricane Jeck that's weel acquentwi' the ocean tred, and another chap for a gunner. The hold was packedwi' ammunition."
"Where did ye a' sleep?" asked one of the Glasgow company.
"It wassna a place to sleep in that wass botherin' us," explained theCaptain; "the trouble wass to find a place to put doon the pail in whenDougie and me and Macphail and Jeck was takin' oor baths in themorning."
"Oh, Jerusalem!" exclaimed Macphail to himself, with his face inanother mug of munition ale. "Baths!"
"Had ye navy uniforms?" asked one of the intensely interestedstrangers.
"The very latest!" Para Handy assured him. "I'll assure you they didit handsome."
"'Q 21' on the guernsey in red, red letters," added Dougie."Tasty!"
"Every man a telescope and a heavily mounted blue pea-jacket," addedMacphail, with an ironic humour that went over the heads of theaudience.
"But whit was the mystery bit?" inquired an impatient listener. "Didye sink onything?"
"Did we sink onything?" repeated Para Handy in an impressive whisper,after looking round the bar, to assure himself no person of Germansympathies might be present. "When I tell you, chentlemen, that HurricaneJeck wass the Admirality's man on board my boat, there iss no need to gointo the question aboot sinkin'."
"Perhaps the gentleman never heard o' Hurricane Jeck," suggested theengineer maliciously.
"Perhaps not by that name," said Para Handy briskly, "but they wouldhear o' John Maclachlan, V.C., and that's the same chentleman."
"I mind o' readin' the name o' a V.C. like that in the papers," saidan intelligent Glasgow man.
"There iss no more namely sailor in the Western Ocean tred," said ParaHandy, "and no man livin' that did more to win the war than my old friendJeck. Yon old fellow Tirpitz had a great respect for Jeck; he gave ordersto aal the German submarines to beware of Jeck in parteecular. But, mindye--Jeck Maclachlan iss aalways the perfect chentleman! He would sinkyour boat on ye the way ye would think it wass a favour."
"What sort o' lookin' chap is he?" asked a Glasgow man.
"A great big copious kind o' fellow wi' fur in his ears and the he'rtof a child," said Para Handy with fervour. "He wass on the China clippersin his time; there's not a quirk of navigation that Jeck iss not acquentwi', nor a British sailor that hass seen more life. Am I no' right,Dougie?"
"Chust exactly what I would say myself," responded the mate. "Jeck's aclinker! I never met a more soothin' man--very soothin'!"
"Puts ye in mind o' Steedman's Powders," interpolated Macphail in aconfidential whisper to Macalister, the publican. "Whit is it ye put inthat beer? It has a queer effect."
"Where did ye sail to?" asked one of the strangers, eager to get onwith what gave promise of being a most thrilling narrative.
Para Handy shook his head, and had another glass under pressure. "If Ihad a bit o' a map and two or three days wi' ye," he said, "I could showye where we sailed. But it wouldna be fair to Jeck. Ye'll mind this wasthe Mystery Ship, and though I wass in command of her, Jeck wass for theAdmirality. Would I dare put it any clearer, Dougie?"
"Ye'll have to be caautious, Captain," said the mate anxiously. "Keepmind o' the regulations!"
"Don't get into trouble, whitever you do!" advised the engineer with asardonic air.
Para Handy paid no heed to the engineer. He had sized up the Glasgowvisitors as a most agreeable and vivacious party of fine young gentlemenwhose acquaintance was well worth cultivating in the absence of moreexhilarating elements in John Macalister's bar.
"Where are ye bidin'?" he asked them abruptly, and was informed thatthe bell-tent round the point, on the shore, was to be their residencefor another week.
"Capital!" said Para Handy. "A tent's the very place for speakin' yourmind; ye never ken who's aboot ye in a bar. Dougie and me'll go roond tothe tent at supper-time and tell ye things aboot the Mystery Ship that'llmake your blood run cold."
"Right-ho!" said the Glasgow gentlemen with one accord.
"Mind ye!" warned the Captain, "strictly between oorsel's! If theAdmirality thocht that we wass blabbin' the way we won the war, therewould be trouble. We're no' a bit feared for oorsel's--Dougie and me--butwe must consuder Jeck. It wass me that wass in command o' Q Boat 21, butit wass Jeck that had the agility. Just to let ye ken--we would besailin' oot each trip wi' oor life in oor hands, and comin' backwi'--"
"Caautious, Captain! Caautious!" implored Dougie, with his eye on theclock.
"Half-past two; bar's closed, gentlemen!" announced Macalister, andhis guests streamed out.
"Be round at the tent at six," said one of the Glasgow fellows.
"Ye can depend on it!" the Captain assured him. "And just to show yethe kind o' man he wass, I'll bring Hurricane Jeck's photygraf."
"THE first time the Vital Spark and us took up the line o' mysteryshippin'," said Para Handy, settling down to his yarn, "she wasnacammyflaged at aal, but in her naitural colour. I wass thinkin' to spruceher up a bit for the occasion wi' a yellow bead aboot her, and the leastwee touch o' red aboot her funnel, but Hurricane Jeck, wi' theAdmirality's orders, made us sail the way we were.
"'This boat, my sunny boys,' says he, "iss to look like any ordinar'packet that would be carryin' coals, or wud, or gravel,' and he wouldnalet Dougie even wash his face for fear the enemy would have suspeecionsshe wass some vessel oot o' the usual. Indeed, I wass black affronted theway she took to sea--aal rust and tar, the deck reel-rail wi' buckets andboxes, a washin' o' clothes on the riggin', and everywhere Irishpennants. Am I right or am I wrong, Dougie?"
"Ye have it exact, Captain," promptly agreed the mate; "I have seen abonnier boat on a valentine."
"'The thing is to look naitural,' says Jeck, and his notion abootlookin' naitural wass to have us like a boat in a pantomime, and a crewlike a wheen o' showmen. He wouldna even let me put on my jecket! And,oh, but Macphail wass the angry man! Jeck's orders wass that we were tokeep her at four or five knots, but make her funnel smoke like bleezes.Macphail had to burn up all his novelettes; if he wass here himsel' hewould tell ye."
"Where did ye start frae?" asked one of the Glasgow men.
"I'll tell ye that withoot wan word o' devagation," said Para Handy."We started from Bowling, under sealed orders that Jeck had at hisfinger-ends, and a lot o' impudent brats o' boys on the quay cryin''Three cheers for the Aquitania!'"
"Oor lives in oor hands!" remarked Dougie solemnly. "We didna know butevery minute would be oor next."
"There wass a lot o' talk at the time aboot submarines roond Arran,and we made oor course first for Loch Ranza," continued the Captain. "Wenever came on nothing--not a thing! Jeck and me and Dougie put oot thepunt at Loch Ranza, and went ashore to see the polisman. We took Jenkinswi' us--he wass the English chentleman in cherge of the guns, and hewould aye be scoorin' them wi' soft soap--fair made pets o' them! Thepolisman assured us Kilbrannan Sound wass hotchin' wi' submarines theweek before, and he wass of opeenion they were shifted up Loch Fyne, fora whale wass seen at Tarbert on the Friday.
"We carried on to Tarbert, and by good luck it wass Tarbert Fair. Jeckthrew open the boat for visitors, considerin' the occasion. They came onboard in droves to see a mystery ship, and Jeck put roond a hat in theaid of Brutain's hardy sons. He gaithered seventeen shillin's, and westayed three days."
"Seventeen and ninepence ha'penny," said Dougie, apparently determinedon absolute accuracy.
"I stand corrected, Dougald; it wass seventeen and ninepenceha'penny," admitted the Captain, on reflection.
"It wass a chentleman's life under Jeck; ye never saw a better handfor navigaation! Duvvle the place did we go into but there was sport--adisplenishin' sale at Skipness that lasted a couple o' days; a marriageat Carradale wi' fifteen hens on the table, and everybody hearty--"
"Kind, kind people in Carradale!" enthusiastically testified the mate."That homely! Ye had just to stretch your hand, and somebody would putsomething in it. It wass wi' us bein' in the Navy."
"But did ye no' see ony submarines?" impatiently inquired one of theGlasgow men.
The narrator refused to be hurried. "Jeck jaloosed," he proceeded,"that the Blackwaterfoot wass the kind of a place where the Chermansmight be lurkin'; we went ashore and scoured aal roond the inn, ootsideand in, and up as far as Shisken, lookin' at night for signals. Wefollowed a light for an oor, and tracked it to Shisken Inn; it wass onlya man wi' a lantern."
"My goodness! aren't they cunnin'?" said Jeck at the end of the week,when there wassna ony sign o' the Chermans. "We'll have to go roond theMull and see if they're no' in Islay.' Ye'll mind o' him lookin' thebook, Dougie?"
"Fine!" said the mate, without a moment's hesitation, but with aquestioning look in his eye for Para Handy.
"It wass an almanac, and Jeck wass studyin' it like a book o' Gaelicsongs.
"'What are ye studyin', Jeck?' I asked him. 'Iss it the tides ye'relookin'?"
"'The tides iss aal right,' says Jeck; 'I'm lookin' to see what daythe wool market's on in Port Ellen.' Man! ye couldna keep step to Jeck;he wass chokeful o' naitural agility. We got into Port Ellen chust whenthe market started, and they couldna trate us better than they did. TheEnglish chentleman in charge o' oor guns said he had traivelled theworld, and never seen the like o't. For a couple o' days his cannons gotlittle scourin', I'll assure you!
"Jeck looked the map on Monday, and gave a start. 'Holy sailors!' sayshe, 'we forgot to caal on Campbeltown, and I have fifteen cousinsthere!'
"We were chust goin' roond by Sanda, and it wass desperate dark, whena boat pops up and hails us. We couldna mak' oot wan word they weresayin'!"
"'Now we're into the midst of it!' said Jeck, quite cool, puttin' ootthe light and takin' off his slippers. 'Heave oot the punt and start thepanic party!'"
"Whit was the panic party?" asked one of the Glasgow men.
"Chust me and Dougie and Macphail. I assure you we were well putthrough oor drills at Bowling! Whenever a U-boat hailed ye, yeunderstand, we were to get in the punt in a desperate confusion, andleave the English chentleman and Jeck on the vessel, below the cratewhere the guns wass.
"Macphail wass first in the punt, wi' his clock and a canister he kepthis clothes in; Dougie fell into the water, and wass nearly drooned, andI wass chust goin' to jump in when I minded and went back to get mypapers--"
"'John Bull' and the 'Oban Times,' "explained the mate withunnecessary and misunderstanding minuteness.
"When we put off in the punt, the gallant Jeck, wi' his gunner belowthe crate, was usin' terrible language, bawlin' oot to the Chermans toegg them to come on. A stiff bit breeze wass blowin' from the south'ard.We waited to hear the battle and pick up Jeck and the English chentlemanwhen it wass feenished--"
"Ye mind we were driftin', Captain," remarked the mate.
"As dark ass the inside o' a coo," pursued Para Handy, "and, as Dougietells ye, we were driftin'. Believe it or no', but in oor hurry wi' thepanic, we clean forgot the oars!"
"Oor lives in oor hands!" said Dougie lugubriously. "And me at thebailin' dish. The chentlemen's gettin' tired listenin', Peter."
"Aal night we drifted in the punt, and it wass desperate dark, but atrawler towed us in to Campbeltown in the mornin'. There wass ademonstration when we landed, us bein' in the Navy, but it wass kind o'spoiled at first for me and Dougie, wonderin' aboot the vessel. And thereshe wass, lyin' at the quay!"
"Criftens!" said a Glasgow man, with an air of frank disappointment;"I thocht she would be sunk by that time!"
"Not under Hurricane Jeck!" said Para Handy. "Ye'll mind o' Jeck'sagility. He had sunk the other fellow, him and Jenkins, and that's theway he got the Victoria Cross. And it wassna fifteen cousins he had inCampbeltown, when the story went aboot; the half o' aal the folk inKintyre wass cousins to him."
"I have a bit here o' the Cherman boat," said Dougie, taking afragment of a herring-box from below his guernsey. "Jeck picked it up fora sample. Any of you chentlemen that would like a souveneer--"
"HURRICANE JECK got a great, great name wi' the Admirality for hischeneral agility, efter we sunk the Cherman submarine off Sanda," saidPara Handy, "and they would be sendin' him letters every other day, butnot an article in the way o' money, and Jeck got vexed. Ye never, neverin your life saw a man in such a bad trum; I declare the sparks would flyfrom him if ye rubbed his whiskers. He wass chust wicked! Am I right oram I wrong, Dougie?"
"Ye have it chust exact, Captain," chimed in the mate promptly. "Hislanguage wass deplorable for a Christian vessel."
"And, indeed, I wassna in tremendous good trum mysel' efter afortnight or two o' danderin' roond the islands in the search o' MrTirptiz, wi' my boat pented in aal the colours o' a sixpenny kahouchyball--"
"Chust makin' a bauchle o' the boat!" said Dougie, with feeling.
"I had no money neither, and if it wass not that Jeck had a finebrass-braided deep-sea kep in the bottom o' his kist, we would bestervin'. Every noo and then he would go ashore wi' a Western Ocean chartrolled up under his oxter and the kep weel cocked, and come back wi' adozen o' eggs, a pound or two o' poothered butter, and a hen. They'resilly folk aboot them islands--chust ass Hielan' ass Mull!--and when Jeckwould cock his deep-sea kep at them, and wave the chart, and say he wassoffeecial forger for the Navy, they would give him the very blankets!
"We went one day for water to a creek o' a place that was calledBaghmohr, and spent the efternoon in pausin' and consuderin'. There iss atrig wee cotter hoose at Baghmohr, and a lot o' ducks aboot it; Jeck wentin to caal wi' his kep on, efter studying the ducks to see which wass thefattest, and all that wass at home wass a woman and a cat.
"Jeck is aye the chentleman; he took off his kep and asked the womanin Gaelic where wass her husband.
"'I don't ken where in the world he iss,' said the wife, 'but he leftthis mornin' wi' an empty keg on his shouther, and him singin'.'
"'Chust that!' said Jeck. 'It's a bonny place ye have here; iss therechust the two o' ye?'
"'Bonny enough,' said the wife. 'There's only me and my man and thecat and the ducks, but it iss a terrible place for scandal!'
"When Jeck came back withoot a duck I was dumfoondered. 'Surely yehadna the right cock on your bonnet?' I says to him. 'I'm sure ye neversaw finer ducks.'
"It wass then he told me aboot the keg. 'When a man goes away in themparts wi' an empty keg on his shouther, and him singin',' says Jeck,'it's no' for holy water. We'll chust wait, Peter, till he comes back!'Oh, man! Ye couldna be up to Jeck! He iss chust a perfect duvvle forcontrivance! Am I right or am I wrong, Dougie?"
"Oh, he's smert enough wi' his heid," frankly admitted the mate.
"We watched for the man comin' back wi' the keg till it was nearlydark," continued Para Handy, "and when he came, he hadna a keg at aal wi'him, but wass singin' that lood it put the fear o' daith on the veryducks.
"'Whatever he went away for, it wassna in the keg he put it,' saysHurricane Jeck, 'but I'll bate ye anything he'll go back in the mornin',and Jenkins and me'll follow him up for fear that anything happens.'
"It wass hardly daylight when the man of Baghmohr wass out wi' a bowlat the well, and cold spring water didna please him, for beforebreakfast-time he wass leapin' like a hare across the island.
"'Put by your polishin' paste and put on your Sunday garments," saidJeck to Jenkins, 'and the two o' us'll find oot where that fellow goesfor the hair o' the dog that bit him.'
"Jenkins stopped scourin' his cannon, and they started off in chase o'the Baghmohr man, for Jenkins had the greatest respect for Jeck and hisagility.
"Ye'll maybe no' believe me, but they tramped six miles till they cameto a clachan where everybody wass singin' like a Sunday School choir, andit a Tuesday mornin'! Every man in the place that had his wits aboot himwass doon on the shore aboot a cave wi' a great big puncheon o' rum init. It had drifted ashore on the Sunday, but nobody put a hand on it tillthe Monday mornin'.
"They were singin' like hey-my-nanny when Jeck and Jenkins came in themidst o' them--Jeck wi' a terrible cock on his kep, and the North Seachart as weel as the Western Ocean wan in his oxter, Jenkins wi'bell-moothed troosers and a white string wi' a whustle on't.
"'Biri your whustle!' commanded Jeck, and him throng buttonin' up hisjecket.
"Jenkins birled his whustle the same's it wass for a British battle;Jeck cocked his kep on three hairs, turned up wan side o' his moustache,and steps in front o' the biggest man in the company. What wass it hesaid, Dougald?"
"Whatever ye say yoursel'. Captain," replied the mate withdeference.
"I canna mind the words exactly, but Jeck assured them it wass thejyle for them. 'You are fair pollutin' the island wi' the King's rum,'said Jeck, and him sniffin'. 'Ye ken ass weel ass I do that every articlethat drifts ashore belongs to the Admirality. Gie me a tinny, and I'llsee what will require for to be done.'
"They passed him a tinny--Jeck filled it at the spigot-hole that theyhad made in the puncheon, took a good sup, and said, 'Chust what I wassjalousin'--Jamaica rum. Iss that not desperate, Jenkins? Chust you tasteit, to make sure.'
"Jenkins tasted near a pint, shut his eyes wan efter the other, andsaid it wass rum, withoot a question.
"'What ye'll do iss this,' says Jeck to the crofters, 'ye'll drivethat spigot in again, put the puncheon on a cairt, and hurl it over toBaghmohr, where ye'll find oor gunboat lyin', and if ye're slippy abootit I'll maybe let the thing blow by.'
"Jeck and Jenkins wass back at the boat by dinner-time, lookin' fine,and full o' capers, but the cairt wi' the puncheon in it didn't come tilllate in the efternoon. They said they had to travel seven miles to get ahorse and cairt.
"We slung the goods aboard wi' the winch, and the men wass wantin'something for the salvage.
"'I dauma do it,' said Jeck,' it's against the regulations; forbye, yedidna bring your tinnies,' and in a few meenutes we had up the anchor,and were off to sea again.
"It would be near ten o'clock at night when Macphail the engineer tookill of a sudden, and nothin' would do him but a drop o' spurits. Jecktook a gimlet and bored a couple o' holes in the puncheon. He filled acup for Macphail, and the silly fool had it swallowed before he found itwass nothing but a sample o' the Sound o' Sleat. Weren't they theblackguards! They had emptied the cask in their kegs and filled it upagain wi' plain sea water! Oh, my! but Jeck wass angry!"
"WE were, wan time yonder, perusin' up and doon the Long Isle lookingfor mines," said Para Handy. "We looked high, and we looked low, on seaand land; many a droll thing we found drifting, but never came on nothingmore infernal than oorsel's. Hurricane Jeck had a terrible skill formines. At night he would take the punt, wi' a bit o' a net in her, andsplash the mooths o' the burns for oors on end in search o' them. Not waniota! The only thing he would get in the net would be a grilse or two, ora string o' troot; Uist is fair infested wi' them.
"But wan night yonder he came back wi' a whupper o' a cheese; he gotit on the high-water mark.
"'Capital!' I says to him; 'that's something wise-like!' for I wasschust fair sick o' salmon--salmon--salmon, even-on.'
"Jeck rolled the cheese on board; sixty pounds wass in it if therewass an ounce! I never saw a cheese that better pleased the eye. Wi' acheese like yon and a poke o' meal, ye could trevel the world.
"But Jeck wass dubious. 'She looks aal right,' he says, 'but ye cannabe up to them Cherman blackguards. We'll be better to trate that cheesewi' caaution. I didna put a hand on her mysel' till I walked three timesroond her lookin' for horns, and when I lifted her it wass wi' my he'rtin my mooth and a word o' prayer.'
"'Hoots, man, but ye're tumid, tumid!' I says to him. 'What harm's ina Cheddar cheese? Take her aft and put your knife in her.'
"He took oot his knife at that, and made to hand me't. 'Open her upyoursel', Peter,' says he, 'but first let me and the rest o' the crew getoff a bit in the punt. I would be black affronted to be blown up wi' aCherman cheese wi' a bomb inside o't.'
"I looked at the cheese, and, my goodness, it wass a whupper! Ye couldfeed an airmy on't! And I never wass as hungry in my life! There isssomething aboot a cheese on board a ship that grows on ye! But I didnalike the look o' Jeck, at aal, at aal, for he aye took care that thecheese wass on wan side o' the funnel, and he had a startled eye.
"'I don't care a docken for cheese,' I says to him at last, 'butDougie's fond o't. Gie the knife to Dougie.' By this time Dougie wass inthe hold wi' a tarp'lain over his heid, but he heard me fine.
"'Take it away and sink it,' he bawls; 'cheese never agreed wi' me; Ipromised my wife I would never taste it.'
"Jeck looked roond for Macphail, but he was off like a moose among hisengines, and meh'in' like a sheep.
"The only man on the ship that wass quite cool and composed wassJenkins, and he wass under the crate where his gun wass, and him soundsleepin'.
"'Mind ye, I'm no' sayin' there is anything wrong wi' the cheese,'says Jeck. 'She may be a topper o' a cheese for aal I ken, but chust youput your ear doon close to her, Peter, and tell me if you don't hearsomething tickin'.'
"I made wan jump for the punt, and rowed away like fury!
"'Heave that cursed cheese o' Satan over the side this instant, orthere'll be the duvvle's own devastation!' I roared to Hurricane Jeck.'Ye were surely oot o' yer mind to meddle w'it.'
"I came back in twenty meenutes, and found Jeck and the gunner Jenkinshad the cheese below a barrel.
"'It's all right,' said Jeck; 'it wass my mistake aboot the tickin';Jenkins couldna hear it. But aal the same, we'll better keep her at adistance till we come to some place where there's folk that is keener oncheese than we are.'
"For near a month--ay, more than a month--we pursued oor devagationsroond the islands seekin' mines, and aye the cheese was in below thebarrel. Nobody would touch it. Dougie had his Book oot every night, andindeed I wasna in the best o' trum mysel', wi' my ear aye cocked forclockwork and the boots never on my feet.
"Every other day Jeck would tilt the barrel up, and we could see thatcursed cheese ass like a cheese ass anything, but lookin' duvelish glum.I couldna have worse nightmares if I ate it. We gave it, between us, thename o' Jerry.
"It wass the time o' the plewin' matches. The night before a plewin'match we came into Portree, and a wheen o' chentlemen were gatherin'prizes. Ye ken yoursel' the kind o' prizes they have at a plewin'match--a smoked ham for the best start-and-finish; a trooser-length o'tweed cloth from J. & A. Mackay, the merchants, for the bestoots-and-ins; a gigot o' black-faced mutton for the best-groomed horse; asilver chain and pendulum for the largest faimily plew-man; and a pair o'gallowses for the best-dressed senior plewman at his own expense.
"The chentleman at the store had a fine collection o' prizes when Jeckand me went in to look at them, and Jeck's eye lighted up when he saw thegallowses. For months his breeks wass hingin' on him wi' a lump o'string.
"'What ye're needin' to complete them prizes,' says he, 'iss a finebig sonsy Cheddar cheese. I'll make a bargain wi' ye. If ye'll let meinto the plewin' competition, I'll gie ye a prize o' the bonniest biggestkeppuck between Barra Heid and the Butt o' Lewis.'
"The man in charge o' the prizes looked hard at Jeck, who had a glessin him, but not wan drop more than he could cairry like a chentleman, andhe says quite sharp, 'What's wrong wi' the cheese?'
"'There's nothing wrong wi' the cheese,' says Jeck; 'she's a chenuineThomas Lipton, but my mates and me iss desperate keen on theagricultooral tred, and we'll gie the cheese to promote the cheneralhilarity.'
"'Are ye sure ye can plew?' asks the other one, dubious.
"'I've been plewin' all my days,' says Jeck, quite smert; 'chust lookat the boots o' me!'
"They agreed that Jeck would get into the competition, and sent doonto the vessel to fetch the cheese, and all the time they were away for'tI wass in the nerves, for fear they might jolt it. 'God help the harbouro' Portree this night,' says I to Jeck, 'if they start to sampleJerry!'
"The plewin' match wass a great success. Jeck dressed himsel' in hisSunday clothes, and his Navy kep, and his hair was oiled magnificent. Yenever saw a more becomin' man between the stilts. He had got the lend o'a horse and plew from a cousin o' his on the ootskirts o' Portree.
"His plewin' wass lamentable, but he got the gallowses for bein' thebest-dressed senior plewman at his own expense.
"A young man by the name o' Patrick Sinclair won the cheese, and Jeckand me helped him to hurl it in a barrow to his hoose. The whole time wewere helpin' him home wi't my he'rt wass in my mooth for fear it would gooff, and we laid it on the kitchen bed the same's it wass a baby!
"We got two good drams apiece from Sinclair's wife, and were no sooneroot o' the hoose than Jeck began to run for the ship ass fast as he couldshift his legs, me efter him.
"'It's time we were oot o' Portree,' says he, when we got on board;'there's likely to be trouble.'
"'Do ye think that cheese'll burst before we're started?' I asked him,busy lowsing the ropes.
"'It's no' the cheese I'm frightened for,' says Jeck, 'but it'sPatrick Sinclair. I'm no' a bit vexed for him: a fine strong young manlike that should be in the Navy when the land's at war, and no' idlin'his time away at plewin'. But when he opens up that cheese there'll be adesperate explosion.'
"'What do ye think'll be in it, Jeck? Will it be dunnymite?'
"'Duvvle the dunnymite!' says Jeck; 'chust chucky-stones! Jenkins an'me scooped oot the inside o' the cheese between us in the last fourweeks. We sliced the top off first, and used it for a lid. Three daysago, when you and the rest wass sleepin', we filled her up to the properweight wi' stones and tacked the top on.'"
THE Vital Spark, with the labours of the day completed, dozed in herberth inside the harbour, enveloped in an atmosphere of peace and fryingmackerel. From the stove-pipe rose the pale blue smoke of pine-wood: shehad been loading timber. A couple of shirts were drying on a string; theCaptain felt them. "Duvvle a drop o' drouth iss in it, Dougie," heremarked to the mate impatiently; "they'll no' be dry till Monday!"
"My goodness!" said the mate. "I wish I wass a shirt! I'm that dry youcould use me for a blot-sheet! And there iss Jum again wi' his mackerelfor the tea; the fellow has no contrivance at the cookin'--mackereleven-on since we came roond Ardlamont! Ye would think he was stockin' anaquarium. Fried mackerel iss the thirstiest fish that ever swam thesea!"
"All right, chaps!" Sunny Jim cried from the stove; "to-morrow ye'llget boiled yins!"
Dougie cast a pathetic look at the engineer.
"Issn't that the ruffian?" said he. "Many a man that caals himself acook would put his mind into the business noo and then and think o'something else than mackerel. It iss my opinion Jum goes doon to theslips wi' a pail at night and picks them up where the fishermen threwthem over the quay in the mornin'. Man, I never, never, never wass sothirsty!"
^Macphail, the engineer, who was rather bored with mackerel himself,was in a nasty humour. "It's my opeenion," he remarked, "that that's no'a mackerel thirst at a', but the thirst ye started wi' last Setturdaywhen ye got yer pay. There's naething 'll cure it for ye, Dougie; itwould tak' far mair money than ye earn, and it's worse noo that tratin'sno permitted on the Clyde."
The mate was so indignant at the suggestion that trouble seemedimpending, when Para Handy hurried to the restoration of a more peacefulhumour with a defence of Dougie which, to subtler instincts, would haverather appeared an added insult.
"Never you mind him, Dougie!" said he; "Macphail iss aalways jibing.And he's aal wrong aalthegither; the worst man in the world can be turnedfrom drink if his friends go aboot the thing wi' kindness. It's aal inthe kindly word! That puts me in mind o' wan time yonder my old frien'.Hurricane Jeck, made a Rechabite for life o' a man in Campbeltown that uptill then wass keepin' the distilleries goin' till his wife, poor body,wass near demented. It wass aal in the kindly word, and Jeck'sagility.
"It wass long afore Jeck sailed on the clippers and made hisreputation. Me and him and a bit o' a boy wass on the Margaret Ann, agaabert that made money for a man in Tarbert. At that time, even, Jeckwass a perfect chentleman; his manners wass complete. To see him stavin'up the quay ye would think he wass off a steamboat, and 'twas him, I'llassure you, had the gallant eye! 'Peter,' he would say to me, and hisbonnet cocked, 'I'm goin' for a perusal up the village, chust to showthem the kind o' men we breed in Kinlochaline.' My Chove! he had thestep!
"There wass wan time yonder, we were puttin' oot coals in Campbeltown,and a cairter wi' the bye-name o' the Twister wass a perfect he'rtbreakto us wi' drink. He couped ower the side o' the cairt the best part o'the coals we slung to him, and came back from every rake wi' another gillin him. The cargo was nearly oot, and him no' over the side o' the quayyet wi' his horse and cairt, when his wife came doon and yoked on us forleadin' her man astray.
"'Mrs MacCallum,' Jeck said to her, calm and gentle,' there iss not aman on board this boat the day hass drunk ass much ass would wet theinside o' a flute; when wass the good-man sober last?'
"'The year they took the lifeboat over the Machrihanish; he was at thecairtin' o't,' says she, and her near greetin'.
"'It iss high time he wass comin' to a conclusion wi't!' saidHurricane Jeck. 'Away you home, and I'll send your husband back to ye adufferent character. For the next three months have in a good supply ofbuttermilk!'
"The woman went away. Her man came back to the boat ten meenutesefter, worse than ever. 'No more the night,' said Hurricane Jeck; 'we'llput the rest oot in the mornin',' and the Twister made a course at wancewi' his horse and cairt for the nearest public-hoose.
"Jeck and me and the boy went efter him, and found the horse tied to aring at the mooth o' a close. The Twister wass in the next door in thepublic-hoose, and so wass the rest o' Campbeltown, perhaps, for thestreet was like a Sunday mornin'.
"'There's goin' to be a cairt amissin' here,' said Jeck, quite blithewi' us, and made a proposeetion. We took the horse oot o' the trams andled it through the close to a washin'-green that wass at the back. Wethen took off the wheels o' the cairt and rolled them in beside thehorse. Between us we lifted the body o' the cairt on its side and throughthe close wi't, too, like hey-ma-nanny, and back on the green we put onthe wheels again and yoked the horse.
"'There you are!' said Jeck. 'The first time ever a cairt wass heresince they built the tenement! Stop ye till ye hear what the Twister sayswhen he finds it!'
"Oh, man! man! I tell you it wass Jeck had the agility! He wass chustsublime!
"It took nearly half an oor for the Twister to find where his cairtwass, and we gave him twenty meenutes to himsel' before we went up to theclose to see what he wass doin'.
"He had a bit o' string. First he would measure the width o' the closeand then the cairt, and he was greetin' sore, sore!
"'What iss't?' says Hurricane Jeck, quite kindly.
"'Issn't this the fearful calamity that's happened?' said the cairter.'I canna get my cairt oot.'
"'What cairt?' said Hurricane Jeck, quite cool--oh, man, he was agenius!
"'What cairt but this wan,' said the Twister. 'The horse in some waythat I canna fathom broucht it in, and noo I canna get it oot!'
"'Willyum,' said Jeck, and clapped his shouther, 'that's no' a horseand cairt at all; it's just imaginaation! Hoo on earth could a cairt getin here? Chust you go home like a decent lad, and stop the drinkin' orye'll see far worse than cairts!'
"We got him home. 'Mind what I said aboot the buttermilk!' said Jeckto the Twister's wife; 'he's fairly in the horrors!' And then we wentback, took doon the cairt again and through the close, and to the yairdwhere it belonged, and stabled the horse as nate as ninepence.
"From that day on the Twister never tasted drink. I can tell you hegot the start! It wass ten years efter that before he found oot it wassrailly his cairt wass up the close, and no' a hallucinaation. And by thattime it wass hardly worth while to start drinkin' again."
PARA HANDY, with his arms plunged elbow-deep inside the waist-band ofhis trousers, and his back against a stanchion, conveniently forscratching, touched the animal misgivingly with the toe of his boot, andexpressed an opinion that any kind of pet was unnecessary on the VitalSpark so long as they had Macphail. "Forbye," said he, "you would have topay a licence for the beast, and the thing's no' worth it."
"Your aunty!" retorted Sunny Jim, lifting the hedgehog in his cap;"it's no' a dug. Ye divna need a licence for a hedgehog ony mair nor fora mangle. There's no' a better thing for killin' clocks; a' theforeign-goin' boats hae hedgehogs. Forbye, they're lucky."
But the Captain still looked with disapproval on the animal whichSunny Jim had picked up in a ditch along the shore that morning andbrought aboard in a handkerchief.
"There wass never a beast on board this boat," said he, "but broughtbad luck. I once had desperate trouble with a cockatoo; Dougie himsel'lltell you; and you mind yoursel' yon dog caaled Biler that you brought,that kept me ashore till the break o' day because it didna know me in mySunday clothes? You never can tell the meenute you would get an aawfulstart from a hedgehog; you don't know when you might be sittin' doon on'tsuddenly. It might be worse than Col Macdougall's tortoise."
"What happened wi' it?" asked Sunny Jim.
"It wass the time o' the big Tarbert fishin's," said Para Handy, "andHurricane Jeck wass home from sea and workin' a net wi' cousins that hada skiff caaled the Welcome Back. There never wass another boat thatseason had the luck o' the Welcome Back--she wass coinin' fortunes. Shehad only to dander over in the cool o' the evening to the Skate or EalanBuie, and pick up an eye o' fish that would load her to the gunnel, andthe others would be slashin' at it on the other side o' Otter and not abloomin' tail.
"The other Tarbert boats wass desperate. They were sure there wasssomething in't, and one Sunday night they asked at Hurricane Jeck for anexplanation. Jeck was a man that never took a mean advantage; he wass assopen ass the day.
"'I'll not deceive you, sunny boys,' says he. 'If the Welcome Back issgettin' fishin's, it's because she carries a luck-bird,' and he took atortoise oot o' his top-coat pocket.
"'She's no' a bird at aal!' said one o' the MacCallums.
"'Perhaps you'll tell me what she iss, then,' said Hurricane Jeck,quite patient, and withoot a word o' divagaation. 'You can see foryoursel' she's no' an animal.'
"'I would say she was an insect,' says MacCallum, and Jeck put thetortoise back in his top-coat pocket.
"'If it wassna the Sabbath evenin',' says he, 'and me wi' myreputation to consider, I would give you a lesson in naitural historythat would keep you studyin' in your bed for a day or two.'
"There wass no doubt efter that in Tarbert that the Welcome Back gother luck from Jeck's tortoise, and many a crew in Tarbert tried to buyher. But Jeck was terribly attached to her, and money wouldna tempt him.The beast had wonderful agility--not nimble, if you understand, butterrible sagacity. When Jeck would whustle to her she would come and puther heid oot to be scratched, and she knew his very step when he wasscomin' doon the quay. My own he'rt never warmed to them tortoises; foraal the sport that's in them you would be better wi' a partan, but Jeckaye said she grew on you. There's beasts in nature I never could see theuse o'--lollipin' about wi' neither meat nor music in them, chust likepolismen; and of aal the pets a man could make a hobby of, I think thetortoise iss the most rideeculus. You might ass well be friendly wi' afloo'er-pot.
"Jeck caaled her Sarah efter an aunt he had in Stirling. He wass neververy sure aboot her sect, but he said he had a feelin' in his mind thatthe name o' Sarah suited. When he would be chirpin' to her and caalin'her Sarah, it made my blood run cold; he couldna be more respectful ifshe had a sowl, and still-and-on he only bought her off a barrow inStockwell. I think mysel' it wass the great big he'rt o' him; Jeck mustaye have something to be kindly to. Isn't that so, Dougie?"
"The very man," said Dougie. "If he wassna puttin' the fear o' daithon his fellow-bein's, he wass lookin' aboot for people to give moneyto."
"He wass ass chentle ass a child. He would be clappin' Sarah on theback, and her wi' no more sense o' kindness than a blecknin' bottle. Hecould feed her from the hand. They said she would trot roond the deckbehind him, cheepin' like an English curate, and when he went ashore heaalways had her in his pocket, feared the Tarbert men would stealher.
"Many a time I heard him comin' doon the quay at night, and him throngtaalkin' away to Sarah in his pocket. If she had lived I don't believe heever would have mairried. 'The best o' a tortoise,' he would say, 'issthat she never gives you any back chat.'
"There wass never a man more downed than Jeck when Sarah went and diedon him. It wass the start o' the winter-time, and he said she took achill. The Welcome Back wass at the long-line fishin', and from the daythat Sarah slipped away the luck wass clean against them.
"Col Macdougall, a fisherman in Kilfinnan, wass a gentleman thatoffered a bonny penny for the luck-bird when she wass in life, and hereye was hardly closed in daith when Jeck wass over at Macdougall's boatwi' her remains in a pocket-naipkin.
"'If ye're on,' says he, 'for Sarah noo, you can have her at abargain,' says Jeck, and he clapped her doon on a thwart.
"'She doesna seem to have much vivacity. What's wrong wi' her?' saidCol, and he wass a man that played the bagpipes.
"'Not one article iss the matter wi' the poor wee cratur, except thatshe's kind o' deid,' said Hurricane Jeck. He wass, in all respects, theperfect chentleman and would never take advantage.
"'Dear me,' said Col, 'isn't that a peety! She wass worth her weightin gold when she wass livin'.'
"'And she's worth her weight in silver noo she's deid,' said Jeck. Heproved to Col that the luck-bird wass ass good ass ever, and went awaywi' seven-and-sixpence in his pocket, leavin' Sarah's mortal elementsbehind him.
"'I wouldna part wi' her,' said he, 'unless to a comfortable home.'There wass nothing wrong wi' Jeck; he had the finest feelin's.
"Col put the late lamented in behind the stove o' his skiff, andstarted out for splendid fishin's. They werna in't. There didna seem tobe a single cod or whitin' left in aal Loch Fyne. He would go doon to theden o' his skiff and turn poor Sarah over on her back, and give her theworst abuse because she didna came to his assistance, but Sarah was nomore concerned than a smoothin'-iron.
"He used her for breakin' coal, and he used her for a toaster, and thewinter slipped away. It wass a period namely still in Tarbert ass the BigNew Year, money bein' rife, and Col wass oot wi' his bagpipes everyevening till the month o' March. He wass over wi' his boat one night atTarbert at a horo-yally, and came back on board, himsel', wi' hisbagpipes aal reel-rail below his oxter, greatly put aboot because o' thebarren fishin's.
"Doon to the den o' the boat he went, and struck a match, and turnedup Sarah, who wass lyin' on her back.
"'You're there,' said he, 'and the name to you of bein' lucky, butduvvle the tail iss Col Macdougall in your reverence. Paid good money foryou, and there you are like a lump of stick, and the white fish laughin'at you!'
"The next meenute and Sarah put oot her heid and started walkin'!
"He wass the valiant laad, wass Col, like aal the folk he came off,but at that he started squealin', for to see a deid tortoise wi' suchagility, and took his feet from the skiff the same ass if the duvvle wassefter him. He fell and staved his arm on the quay, but still had thesense to throw his bagpipes into the middle o' Loch Tarbert.
"The parish munister, Macrae, wass gettin' ready for his bed wi' adrop o' toddy, when a ring came to the door, and a meenute efter ColMacdougall grabbed him by the elbow in the lobby.
"'Oh, Mr Macrae,' said he, 'isn't this the visitaation? Yonder's Sarahskippin' aboot the boat, and her a corpse since Martinmas. I'll assureyou this'll be the bonny lesson for me!'
"'Whatna Sarah?' said the munister.
"'Hurricane Jeck's tortoise,' said Col Macdougall, trumblin' aal over.'Her ghost iss crawlin' through my boat, so I want to lead a better life,and I've drooned my bagpipes.'
"A tortoise,' said the munister, lookin' droll at Col Macdougall, whowass lamentably known to him for a musician. 'Are you sure it wass anactual tortoise?'
"'If you heard her bark!' said Col. 'She wass bitin' at the heels o'me, and her, as you might say, poor Jeck's relict since last Martinmas.I'll never touch the pipes again. Excuse me caalin', but I came to give apound for the Foreign Missions.'
"'What you want,' said the munister, 'iss to take the temperancepledge. You have been keepin' the New Year too long.'
"'It's no' so bad as that,' said Col. 'I only saw but one o'them.'
"But Macrae took him into his study-room, and told him there wassnothing that would keep away tortoises but the temperance pledge. Colmust keep teetotal for a twelvemonth, and put his promise doon in blackand white.
"'And what aboot yoursel'?' said Col Macdougall, wi' his eye on thegless o' toddy.
"'I'll sign it too if you want,' said the munister with muchacceptance; and Col agreed. The munister wrote out a line and said, 'I,Col Macdougall, promise to abstain from all intoxicatin' liquors for atwelvemonth,' and Col put his name to it.
"'That's aal richt,' said the munister. 'Now for me,' and he signed atthe bottom, 'George Macrae, M.A., witness.'
"'That shows you,' said Para Handy, 'that it's no' aalways lucky tohave any kind of beast aboot the boat. Col staved his arm, and lost hispipes, and a pound for the Foreign Missions, and his liberty for atwelvemonth.'"
"He must have been an awful idiot that didna ken a tortoise sleeps a'winter," said Macphail, the engineer.
THE only man of the crew who dared to go ashore at Bunessan wasHurricane Jack. He had joined the Vital Spark again for a season, fed upwith "going foreign." It was subsequent to the deplorable incident of theminister's hens, when Para Handy and his men had to fight their way totheir vessel through an infuriated populace, and the Vital Spark, for theRoss of Mull, got the unpleasant reputation of being nothing better thana buccaneer.
It was nightfall when she came grunting into Loch Lathaich, andlay-to, while Jack went ashore in the punt on an urgent search for milkand butter.
The Captain gave him money to pay for these provisions. "Take a goodbig can wi' ye, and don't bring less than two or three prints o' butter,"he instructed Jack. "Don't let on what boat ye're on, or they'll twistthe neck off ye. And for God's sake, never let your eye light on ahen!"
"Anything at aal but hens!" implored Dougie. "They watch their henslike hawks. A body might lift a horse in Bunessan, and no' much saidaboot it, but the loss o' a hen makes them fair demented."
"Right-oh! sunny boys," said Hurricane Jack, and rowed off into thedarkness.
He was gone for hours, and in the absence of the punt nobody could getashore to look for him.
"I doot Jeck's in trouble," said Para Handy about midnight. "He hastoo flippant a style wi' him aal-together! After yon calamity we had wi'the Bunessan folk last Candlemas they're no' to be trifled wi'. We'llchust need to go roond to Tobermory and look for him in the polis-office.Wassn't I stupid to gie him the half-croon?"
It was the early hours of the morning, and the crew were sound asleepon the Vital Spark when Jack came aboard again with a clatter to wake thedead, and apparently with some companion who required assistance.
"Bless my sowl!" said the Captain, sitting up on the edge of his bunk."Who on aal the earth hass he wi' him here? He's far too flippant, Jeck,for a coastin' sailor!"
"No consideration! Not the least!" said Macphail, the engineer,bitterly. "There's my sleep sp'iled for the night!"
"Perhaps it's a chentlcman he hass wi' him," said Dougie hopefully,listening to some terrific banging up on deck. "It sounds like achentleman from the hotel, that would have a gless or two in him. Jeckwouldna bring him unless he had something wi' him in his pocket. Lightyou the lamp, Peter."
The Captain was fumbling at the lamp when a shout of "Stand fromunder!" came from Hurricane Jack on deck, and some frantic object,kicking wildly, landed between the bunks.
"Holy smoke!" exclaimed Para Handy, and the next moment he was doubledup on the floor from a violent impact in the pit of the stomach.
For ten minutes pandemonium reigned in the sailors' narrow quarters,without its occupants being able to form any idea of the nature of thisalarming visitation. The wooden sides of the bunks resounded with blows;a galvanised pail and a box of potatoes were flung back and forward withthe wildest racketing; sea-boots were flying; it looked as if the visitormeant to batter the Vital Spark to pieces.
Para Handy had gathered himself together and gone under the blanketsagain. "I'm done for!" he proclaimed, gasping. "Whoever Jeck's friendiss, he iss no chentleman."
"It's an Englishman," said Dougie, sniffing, his nose the only part ofhim uncovered as he cowered in his bunk. "Ye can feel the smell o' him,he's in the horrors. Light you the lamp, Peter. Man! don't be tumid!"
There was an interval of silence, broken only by the Captain's groansand the visitor's noisy breathing. Macphail cautiously put out a leg,with the idea of rising to light the lamp himself, slipped on thepotatoes with which the floor was strewn, and fell on the top of theCaptain, who, putting up his hands to clear himself, seized anunmistakable frantic pair of horns!
"It's no' an Englishman at aal!" he yelled in terror; "it's theduvvle! He has on a wincey shirt, and I have him by the horns!"
Dougie's instant and vociferous praying was interrupted by the descentof Hurricane Jack with a lantern he had lit on deck, which revealed themysterious and turbulent visitor as a shaggy yellow goat.
"What iss all the commotion?" angrily demanded the Captain, skippingbriskly out of his bunk. "Ye're far too flippant, Jeck! Did ye get mybutter and my milk?"
"I had the milk, right enough," said Hurricane Jack, "but I put thecan down at my feet till I would talk wi' the fellow that had the goats,and this one emptied it before I noticed. It was milk I went for, andmilk I was bound to bring, and the only way I could do it was to bringher ladyship here, the goat. Isn't she a topper?"
The goat, as if calmed by the presence of light on the subject, waslying down, peaceably chewing the top of a sea-boot with the utmostgusto.
"But did ye bring the butter?" pursued the Captain.
"There's no' an ounce of butter in Bunessan," said Hurricane Jack."That's another reason for me bringin' ye the goat. If we're wantin'butter we must make it oorsel's. A coo's oot o' the question on the VitalSpark, for we havena the accommodation, but a goat can pick up its livin'anywhere, and it's far more hyginkic than a coo."
"I'm warnin' ye it's no' me that'll milk it, I wou'dna lower mysel'!"loudly declared Dougie. "I'll leave the vessel first!"
"Where's my half-croon?" inquired the Captain, having rescued half aboot from the still unsatiated visitor.
"It's cost me more than half-a-croon to get that valuable goat," saidHurricane Jack. "There's a swab o' an Irishman yonder on the roadside wi'a herd o' thirty goats he's takin' aboot the country, but I couldna goaway wi' wan as long as he could coont them. It took me more thanhalf-a-croon, but I left him yonder thinkin' he had a herd o' fifty."
"It's no' me that'll milk that brute!" again protested Dougie. "Iwadna be in the same boat wi't. Look at its eye! Fierce! Fair wicked!Forbye, ye canna make butter wi' a goat's milk."
"Ye can!" said the Captain; "it's ass easy ass anything. The best o'butter!" He was looking now with more friendly eyes on the visitor, whowas finishing off supper with a sock of the engineer's. The odd thing wasthat the engineer seemed in no way worried about his sock; he was in ahelpless paroxysm of laughter, lying in his bunk.
A violent altercation rose between the Captain, Jack, andDougie--first, as to whether goat's milk would make butter, and second,as to which of the crew should be what the Captain called the"dairymaid." It came to wrestling. Pandemonium prevailed again, and thegoat, apparently much refreshed by its meal, leapt into the fray withstrict impartiality, butting at anything soft or hard that lay in the wayof its lowered horns. Though seriously handicapped by the narrowness ofthe fo'c'sle limits, it had all the honours of the battle, and the threemen ignominiously rushed on deck.
Macphail was still convulsed in his bunk, safe out of the conflict,and the goat turned joyfully to a change of diet in the form of rawpotatoes.
Para Handy's head appeared in the companion.
"Macphail," he said coaxingly, "we forgot to bring her ladyship up wi'us. Slip you that piece o' marlin' roond her neck, and take her up ondeck till we'll consuder who iss to be the master of this vessel."
"Come doon and get the beast yoursel'," retorted the engineer. "Thedairy's no' in my department."
"At least ye'll put up oor clothes," implored the Captain; "Dougie andme'll get oor daith o' cold."
And now the mate's head appeared at the top of the companion. "Don'tbe stickin', Macphail," he pleaded piteously. "It's a cold east wind, andI want my garments. The Captain and me hass compromised the situation.I'm willing to do the milkin' and Jeck'll churn."
"Good luck to the churnin' then!" shouted the engineer. "The whole loto' ye's a lot o' Hielan' stots. Your goat's a billy!"
A WHITE elephant would have been no more awkward a gift to the VitalSpark than the yellow goat which Hurricane Jack purloined from the Irishgoat-herd in Bunessan. It had apparently been nurtured in the principlesof Sinn Fein, and was utterly unamenable to restraint, law, order, or thechastening influence of a stiff rope's end. From dawn to dark it was upto mischief, and gave as much trouble as a cargo of rattlesnakes.
On account of its incorrigible bad character and its presumableorigin, they called it Michael, and Hurricane Jack professed to havegreat expectations of the luck that would go with it as a mascot. Butthis consideration weighed less with the rest of the crew than thepossibility of selling it at a pleasing price at some port of call remotefrom Mull.
"A capital goat!" said Para Handy. "Everything's complete! There'smoney in him! A fine big strappin' goat like that would be worth apound."
"Ay, and more nor a pound!" calculated Dougie. "We would get far morethan that even if we were selling his remains for venison."
"Naebody in their senses wants a billy-goat," said Macphail, theengineer, unfeelingly. "But perhaps ye could pass him off for a she if yeshaved him."
Michael really might have been shaved on the strength of the ironicalsuggestion; but already it was manifest that he was a goat to take noliberties with. He had broken away through the night from the stanchionto which they had tethered him, and roamed about the vessel, haughty andtruculent, his eye for ever cocked for anything to butt at, and hisappetite unappeasable.
The Captain had put his trousers over the stove to dry the nightbefore; in the morning all that was left of them was the blade of apocket-knife, and Michael chewed his cud with an air of magnificentdetachment.
Dougie was sent ashore on Oronsay for a bag of grass, and came backwith withered bog hay, which Michael refused to put a tooth to, andstrewed about the deck until it looked like the Moor of Rannoch in adroughty spring.
Two or three turnips that were in the bag seemed more to thepassenger's fancy: they quickly disappeared, with the most stimulatingeffect on the consumer, who caught the Captain bending twice to tap hispipe on his boot, and on each occasion butted him clean across thehatches.
"I'll have his he'rt's blood!" roared Para Handy, dancing with rage."It iss not a Fenian goat will be the master of my boat, and affront mebehind my back! Get me a coal-slice or a shovel, Macphail, and I'll givehim a bit o' Boyne Water!"
But Macphail, discretion itself, refused to involve himself in any wayin a vulgar brawl, and retired among his engines.
For the rest of the day Michael was content to keep the ship's companyinterned abaft the funnel. Even Hurricane Jack, with a wonderfulreputation for encounters with all sorts of wild forest animals in hisvoyages with the China clippers and the Black Ball Line, showed theutmost respect for Michael's lowered horns.
They threw lumps of coal at him till Macphail rebelled, findinghimself in danger of being left with insufficient fuel to keep up a headof steam: the goat was no more affected than if it had beenhailstones.
It was Dougie who had at last discovered that even an Irish goat hassome human susceptibilities.
"There's no use o' batterin' away at that duvvle o' a beast," he said,"we should try kindness. I wonder would he take a lozenger?" Since he hadstopped smoking a month before, the mate incessantly devoured pan dropsof a highly peppermint nature; he never sailed from the Clyde without ahalf-stone of them. Pan drops appeared to be a passion with Michael; hedevoured them readily from Dougie's hand, and became the most friendlygoat in Britain, following the mate about the ship continually with hisnose in the pocket where the sweets were.
In the Sound of Islay, Dougie's store of imperial pan drops went done,and Michael became more wicked than ever. He would tolerate no sound ormovement of any kind on board his vessel. If timbers creaked--andcreaking was a feature of the Vital Spark--he laid out with horns andhoofs at the nearest part of the bulkwark; if the man at the helm alteredthe course, the goat swept down on him at fifty knots.
The Captain positively wept! "I don't believe that's a human goat ataal!" he declared. "It's something super-canny. Iss it the will o'Providence that we're to be gybin' and yawin' aboot the Atlantic Oceanaal the rest o' oor days because a brute like that'll no' let us steerfor harbour?"
"We could trap him," suggested Hurricane Jack. "I've seen themtrappin' the elephants in India."
"What way would ye trap him?" inquired the Captain eagerly.
"We would need a pit, but the hold would do if we could get thehatches off--and then--and then we would need some cable, and a lot o'trees," explained Jack weakly.
"And whar the bleezes are ye gaun to get the trees?" asked theengineer indignantly. "Are ye gaun to grow them? I'll be clean oot o'coal to-morrow mornin', and ye daurna touch the sails."
"There iss nothing for it but abandon the ship and take to the punt,"said Dougie lugubriously. "We're no far from Port Askaig."
"We'll do better than that!" said the Captain, with an inspiration;"ye'll row ashore yoursel' and bring back a poke o' sweeties. That'llmaybe keep that cratur in trim till we reach Port Ellen."
Dougie succeeded in getting into the punt with difficulty, for Michaelobjected to having the only source of pan drops desert him. Half an hourlater, a further supply of his favourite provender quite restored him toamiability, and they were able, at Port Ellen, to lead him ashore on astring.
"If we'll no' sell him we can wander him," was the Captain's idea."Many a wan would be gled to have him."
"He would look fine in a great big park," remarked Hurricane Jack."I've seen goats just like that one on the River Plate. They makewineskins o' them. Exactly the same in Bilbao."
"Watch you his eye. I don't like the look o't," said Macphail, as theywent up the quay.
At that very moment Dougie's second supply of sweets was finished, andMichael, with the old Fenian ferocity aroused again, escaped from hishalter, and proceeded to give animation to the scenery and populace ofPort Ellen.
The first thing he altered was the structure of a shipping-box, whosevivid red colour apparently displeased him. A man who emerged from it wasinstantly butted back among its debris. The goat put its head through alarge framed map of the Royal Route, and, thus embellished, swept up thetown with the proud and lofty gait of a stag.
"I'm gaun to clear oot o' this for wan thing!" cried Macphail, andbolted back to the vessel.
The others would have liked to follow him, but were irresistiblycompelled to follow their property as he strewed terror and havoc in histrack. Port Ellen shops hastily put up their shutters, unable to rescuebarrels and boxes of goods displayed at their doors; into the only onetoo late of closing its door the goat went bounding furiously, but calmeddown instantly at the odour of peppermint.
Dougie went immediately after him.
"A pound of imperial pan drops!" he gasped to the shopkeeper, whoproceeded to weigh them out, all unsuspicious of the commotion in thestreet.
There was a woman customer at the counter.
"Do ye care for lozengers?" Dougie asked her, calmly pattingMichael.
"I whiles take them," she admitted.
"Then here's a present for ye," said Dougie, hurriedly thrusting thesweets in her hand. "Give wan or two to the goat; he's desperate fond o'them."
"Come away oot o' this!" he commanded his shipmates, as he hurriedlyquitted the shop. "I have Michael planted on a wife, and he'll bide wi'her ass lang ass her poke holds oot."
"Whatna cairry on! It iss chust lamentable!" panted Para Handy, asthey sped for their vessel.
The Vital Spark was leaving the quay when an infuriated carter ran upand bawled, "Stop you a meenute till I talk to ye!"
"What are ye wantin'?" asked the Captain. "I'm wantin' a word wi' abowly-legged man ye have there wi' whiskers on him, that tried to comeroond my wife wi' a poke o' lozengers," roared the jealous carter.
"No offence at aal, at aal!" cried Dougie, answering for himself. "Iwassna flirtin' wi' her; tell her to keep the sweeties for the goat. He'squite a good goat, and answers to the name of Michael."
"Take oot the chart and score oot Port Ellen," said the Captain alittle later; "that's another place we daurna enter in the WesternIsles!"
ON the morning of Hallowe'en the Vital Spark puffed into the littlecreek where the cargo of timber was already waiting for her. The LandGirls who had felled, and snedded, and sawn the trees in the forest twomiles off, and driven the logs down to the water's edge, completed theirjob by waiding knee-deep in Loch Fyne, leading the horses that draggedthe logs from the beach right out to the vessel's quarter, where thesteam-winch picked them up and lowered them into the hold.
Amazing young women! It was the first time Para Handy and his crew hadseen their kind. Those girls, in their corduroy breeches, leggings,strong boots and smocks, with their bobbed hair, and Englified accent,made as much sensation as if they had been pantomime princesses.
They were not unconscious of the impression they created. They put,accordingly, a lot of sheer swank into their handling and hauling of thetimber; one or two boldly smoked cigarettes; a little plump one,apparently known as Podger, who had come from a Midlothian Manse,actually stammered out a timid "d-d-damn!" in the hearing of the crew,and blushed furiously as she did so.
"My goodness! chust look at them! Aren't they smert?" said Para Handy."If they were in Gleska they would make money at the dancin'."
Dougie could not keep his gaze off them.
"I wish my wife could see them!" he remarked regretfully. "She nevergets over the door to see anything. I'll wudger ye it would open hereyes. Chust fancy them wi' troosers!"
"That's the latest style, sunny boys," intimated Hurricane Jack, withall the assurance of a man of the world, up to date in all new movements."First the vote and then the breeches. Ye can see them's no commoncarteresses--born ladies!"
Jack's natural gallantry, even at the age of fifty-five, had made himoil his hair, put on his best peajacket, and borrow a pair of misfitboots which Dougie had bought a week or two before in Greenock, found fartoo small for him, and intended to take back to the vendor. They fittedHurricane Jack like a glove.
"If my wife wass to go aboot in troosers wi' her hair cowed, I wouldbring her before the Session," said the Captain. "It's not naiture! Thereis not wan word aboot women wearin' breeches between the two boards o'the Bible."
"You look the Book o' Hezekiah!" said Hurricane Jack. "In thefifteenth chapter ye'll see there that a time would come, accordin' tothe prophets, when women would arise in Babylon and put their husband'sgarments on, and the men go forth in frocks."
The Captain was plainly staggered. He had overlooked that bit. "Go youdoon, Dougie," he said, "and look your Bible to see if Jeck iss right. Ithocht I knew every word o' Hezekiah by he'rt."
Twenty minutes later the mate came back with the Bible and his specson. "I canna put my hand on Hezekiah at aal, at aal," he admitted. "Whatway do ye spell it?"
Hurricane Jack took the Bible from him and hurriedly flicked throughits pages; then he turned to the dedication to "The Most High and MightyPrince James by the Grace of God, King of Britain, France, Ireland,Defender of the Faith."
"Tach!" he said; "no wonder ye canna find it! You might as well look alast year's almanac for the Battle o' Waterloo, as look in a Bible that'soot o' date completely for the Prophet Hezekiah."
"Anyway," said Dougie fervently, "ye'll never in aal your life see mein a frock. I never thocht much o' Hezekiah. He wass a waverer."
"I'll bate ye a pound to your pair o' boots ye'll wear a frock thiswinter," challenged Hurricane Jack.
"Done wi' ye!" said Dougie. "Ye may as weel hand over the money."
By the time the vessel was loaded, her crew and the surprising ladieswere on terms of the utmost cordiality. Old Macphail stood off--reservedand cynical. He knew about women, all they were up to, all they werecapable of: for twenty years he had been studying them in novelettes. Theprofound impression created on his shipmates by these bob-haired,be-breeched huzzies merely amused him.
That was why he was not invited to the Hallowe'en party.
It was to take place that night at the forest huts, two miles off,where the girls lived and worked. The Captain and Hurricane Jack were tocome in their Sunday clothes; Dougie's despair was that his Sundayclothes were in Glasgow.
"That's all right!" said the girls, languishing round him till hisshyness made his very whiskers tickle him. "The wood manager is fromhome; he's just your build of a man--with a suit in his wardrobe to fityou like a halo. We'll parcel it up and send it down to you in anhour."
"Nothing fancy, I hope?" said Dougie nervously. "I canna standknickerbockers. I never had them on my person."
"It's quite all right!" Podger assured him. "Mr Taylor's taste ischaste. You can turn up the foot of the legs a little--that will be moreconvenient for the dancing."
"But I'm no' goin' to dance!" protested Dougie in alarm. "The onlydance I ken iss Paddy O'Rafferty."
"Then we'll have it every now and then," said Podger, beaming on him."But you needn't join in anything else. You can sit out on the doorstepand hold our hands."
"My gracious!" said the mate to himself, "we're seem' life!"
In Mr Taylor's morning coat and a pair of shepherd-tartan trousers,Dougie was unmistakably the most conspicuous guest at the Land Girls'party. The garments were obviously made for an ampler person, but by thetime the borrower had worked his way through several plates of mashedpotatoes, which, he was assured, were full of threepenny-bits, but foundloaded with nothing but buttons, and had consumed apples, nuts, cold ham,and tea till he perspired, there was not a single crease in thewaistcoat.
"Mind, I'm no' goin' to dance wan step!" he confided to Hurricane Jackand the Captain. "It iss twenty years since I shook a foot at a pairty,and the only dance I ken iss Paddy O'Rafferty."
"I doot it's oot o' date; I'm no' goin' to dance mysel'," said ParaHandy.
"Wi' a splendid pair o' shepherd-tartan troosers like that," saidHurricane Jack, "the thing for you to do, Dougie, is to drape yoursel'over the stern o' the piano and turn the music. Be up an' doin', man!Cairry yoursel' like a sailor!"
To Dougie's horror Podger came up at this stage with a partner forhim.
"Here's a lady who is dying to dance with you," she announced. "HerSunday name is Miss Mathilde Vavasour MacKinlay, but you can call her'Tilda. In the Greek that means 'very choice.'"
"I can see that," said Dougie gallantly, "but if it's dancin' shewants, she'll better take the Captain. Wi' aal them buttons I swallowed,I'm no' in trum at aal, and the Captain's a fine strong dancer."
"Me!" cried Para Handy, horrified. "I daurna dance a step forpalpitation! Jeck's the chentleman for 'Tulda! He hass great experiencein Australia, and the boots for't. There's no a man on the roarin' deepmore flippant on his feet."
Hurricane Jack's performance for the rest of the evening justifiedthis testimony; he went through the country dances like a full-riggedship among the lug-sail young lads who were in the party, and refrainedfrom the waltzes and fox-trots only on the grounds of moraldisapproval.
It was shortly after midnight when Podger, all in a tremble, pale withapparent alarm, though really from more application of powder than usual,came in to intimate that Mr Taylor had unexpectedly returned, and was tojoin the party as soon as he had had supper.
"And he'll want to wear these very clothes!" she said to Dougie; "whaton earth are we to do?"
"I'll go back to the boat and shift," said Dougie agreeably; he haddiscovered a very obvious defect in the trousers. The pockets had beensewn up by Podger, and he had nowhere to put his hands.
"There's no time for that. He'll want them in fifteen minutes," saidPodger. "We could loan you quite a good waterproof. He'd bring down thehouse if he found we had meddled with his wardrobe."
"'Dalmighty! What am I to do?" bleated Dougie. "This iss a bonnybabble! And there iss not a pair of breeches in the company will fitme."
"Ye'll no' get mine, whatever!" firmly declared Para Handy.
"Ye havena, by any chance, a kind o' kilt?" inquired Hurricane Jack,who took contretemps of this sort with amazing calmness and resource.
"The very thing!" cried Podger. "There's 'Tilda's tartan skirt! It'sgood enough for a kilt. Go out to the hut at the back and we'll throw itin to you."
Twenty minutes later, attired, with the aid of Jack and the Captain,in a tartan skirt and a knitted jumper of a vivid yellow, Dougie wascoaxed back to the ballroom.
A roar of uncontrollable laughter greeted his appearance. He stood fora moment, blinking and confused, in the middle of the room, in a nethergarment much too short for a skirt and yet too long for a kilt, to whichin other respects it bore no earthly resemblance.
"Dougie will now oblige wi' the Reel o' Hullichan for the sake of thecheneral hilarity," announced the Captain.
"I'll see you aal to the duvvle first!" cried the mate; "I didna comehere for guisin'."
He bolted from the company, and an hour or two later, when Para Handyand Jack got back to their ship, they found him in bed still painfullyconscious that he had been made to look ridiculous.
"Hoots, man!" said Hurricane Jack, "what for did ye run away? It wasschenerally admitted that ye were the belle o' the ball. Didn't I tell yefrocks wass goin' to be aal the go for men this winter, accordin' to theProphet Hezekiah? I never, never, in aal my life got a better bargain ina pair o' boots'"
THE last cart of coals was no sooner out of the Vital Spark than thecrew were up at the Ferry Inn with a bright new tin can Para Handy hadbought three days before from a tinker in Ardrishaig. It would hold agallon. To carry a gallon of ale from the Ferry Inn to the quay obviouslydid not require two sturdy sailormen and an engineer, but it was thoughtbest that all of them should accompany the can to obviate any chance ofaccident.
"I have seen a can couped before noo," the Captain had remarked, withhis eye on the engineer, who had offered to go alone; "it takes a steadyhand and a good conscience to cairry a gallon o' ale withootspillin'."
"Wha are ye yappin' at noo?" asked the engineer truculently.
"I am not yappin' at nobody," replied the Captain calmly. "I wasschust mindin' some droll things that happened in the way o' short measurewi' the last can that we had. Keep you calm, Macphail, and don't put on abonnet that your heid doesna fit!"
They went into the back room of the public-house, and, sitting down,carefully sampled a schooner each before presenting the wholesale orderfor a canful.
"What way did Jeck no' come?" inquired Dougie. "I thocht he wass atoor back."
"Ye'll no' see Jeck for an oor or two," replied Para Handy. "He's awaygallivantin'. I'm sure ye saw him washin' his face? If ye were to go overtwenty minutes efter this to Mary Maclachlan's delf and sweetie-shop,I'll wudger ye'll get Hurricane Jeck languishin' on the lady wi' hisbench on the coonter, and smellin' like a valenteen wi' hair-oil. Thelast time we were here she made a great impression on Jeck wi' herconversation lozenges. He's no much o' a hand at flirtin' by word o'mooth, but he's desperate darin' when it comes to swappin' sweeties."
"I havena seen a conversation lozenger since the war," said Dougie."They'll no' be printin' them."
"If they're no'," said Para Handy, "it's a blue look-oot the night forJeck! There wass never a gallanter man in oilskins, but he's tumid, tumidamong women. It's my belief that Jeck would make a match of it wi' hisnamesake Mary Maclachlan if only he could summons up his nerve to askher."
Macphail gave a sardonic laugh. "If bounce would dae, Jeck would bethe champion lady-killer," he remarked unkindly. "The man's no' thinkin'o' merrage, in my belief; he has nerve enough to sample, every noo andthen, the sweetie boxes on the coonter."
There was genuine indignation in the Captain's reception of a remarkso unflattering to the absent shipmate. He had to call in anotherschooner for himself and Dougie; Macphail this time he overlooked.
"Amn't I the forlorn poor skipper o' a boat to have an enchineer likeyou, Macphail, that's aalways makin' light o' other people!" he retorted."Ye have chust been sailin' dubs aal your days, when Jeck wass makin' hisname in the Black Ball Line and the China clippers. He wass sailin' roondthe Horn before ye learned your tred in the gasfitter's shop inPaisley--that's where ye came from, and all ye ever learned abootengines, or I'm mistaken!"
"I'm no' sayin' onything against the chap," said the engineer, "exceptthat I don't think ony wise-like woman would ever mairry him. The man'sfifty if he's a day!"
"He iss not a brat o' a boy, I admit," said the Captain, "but he's inthe prime o' life and cheneral agility."
"It's time he wass married, anyway," chimed in Dougie. "It's a poorlife, ludgin's. Are ye sure, Peter, he has a chenuine fancy for MissMaclachlan?"
"She has him that tame he would eat oot o' her hand and jump throughgirrs," said the Captain. "Did he no' tell me himsel'? It's costin' himhalf his wages for hair-oil, pan drops, and 'Present-for-a-good-Boy' mugsevery time he's in Lochfyne and goes to see her, but he canna, for hislife, screw up his nerve to ask her."
"It's Leap Year; maybe she'll ask hersel'," suggested theengineer.
Para Handy's visage glowed at the suggestion. He banged the table.
"For a low-country man," he exclaimed, "ye have sometimes a wonderfulsagacity, Macphail. If Mary Maclachlan would only put the word to Jeckand save him from confusion, it would be capital!"
"We could give her a bit o' a hint," proposed Dougie. "Break it to hergently that Jeck is bashful."
"I have a wonderful lot o' nerve mysel'," said the Captain, "but I'mno' wan' o' them gladiators to risk my life in a delf shop. PerhapsMacphail would venture to put the position to Miss Maclachlan."
"Seein' it wass his idea--" said Dougie.
"I'll dae better than that," said the engineer; "if ye ring the bellfor ink and a pen and paper, I'll write a nice wee letter for Jeck fraeMiss Maclachlan that'll bring things to a heid and show if he's inearnest."
Macphail's forged Leap Year letter was a masterpiece of tact. Itindicated that the ostensible writer was fully aware of the difficulty asensitive gentleman might have in expressing his feelings to a young ladyas sensitive as himself, and pointed out that as this was Leap Year, shewas justified in making the first overtures. She remarked that Jack wasno longer a youth, and was arriving at that period of life when herequired some one to look after him. It was a position she feltthoroughly qualified to occupy. Though he might be of the impression thatshe was happy in her present position, it was far from being the case,and she was willing to change her condition on the slightestencouragement from him.
"Capital!" exclaimed the Captain when the note was finished. "Chustthe way a girl like Miss Maclachlan would put it. If I wass not a merriedman and got a letter like that I would merry the girl, even if she was ableck from South Australia."
"It should save a desperate lot o' hair-oil, that!" was Dougie's view."I wonder where they'll get a hoose?"
A discreet boy, with instructions to say the letter was given him by agirl, was sent with it to the vessel, and the can and its convoy an houror two later got on board.
Hurricane Jack was invisible. More remarkable was the fact that hisdunnage bag and all his belongings were gone too. Inquiries on the quaybrought out the information that he had left with the Minard Castle anhour ago, having got, as he explained to one informant, an unexpectedletter which made his instant departure imperative.
"Holy sailors!" exclaimed Para Handy, "isn't this the bonny caper? Doye think we scared him?"
Para Handy and Macphail went down to the delf and sweetie-shop to makeinquiries, and found it in charge of Miss Maclachlan's sister.
"Did ye see any word o' Hurricane Jeck the night?" he inquired.
"He was here two hours or more ago, and only stopped a minute," saidthe girl.
"Did he see your sister Mary?" asked the Captain.
"Hoo could he see Mary?" replied the girl. "She was merried a week agoto Peter Campbell, and she's left the shop."
IT was Macphail the engineer who first discovered the fame of BonnieAnn, and the little shop, half dairy, half greengrocery, where thatgifted lady had far more young customers for her occult powers than forher excellent potted-head and home-made soda scones. The occultdepartment of her thriving business was carried on behind the shop, in aroom where she read tea-cups, disclosed the future vicissitudes of anylove affair with the aid of a pack of cards, or--for a somewhat largerfee--took cataleptic fits, in the course of which she held communicationwith the dead.
Nor even then was Bonnie Ann's versatility exhausted; she called thischamber of hers a "Beauty Parlour and Seance Saloon," and could guaranteethe most ravishing complexions, busts of an agreeable contour, lustrouslong hair, fascinating eyelashes, finger-nails to do credit to any lady,and an infallible cure for chilblains, corns, and cuticular blotches.
The notorious Madame Blavatsky was a bungling amateur in the magicarts compared with the shy, almost morbidly unostentatious Ann, who neveradvertised.
Macphail, having gone to Bonnie Ann for treatment of an ingrowingtoe-nail, had been privileged to witness a trance performance, in whichshe conversed fluently with Mary Queen of Scots, and he returned to theVital Spark immensely impressed.
"I'm tellin' ye, there's something in't!" he declared to hisshipmates. "She had Bloody Mary to the life, and I ken, for I've readhistory. Ye can get it a' in 'The Scottish Chiefs.'"
"Did she read the palm o' your hand?" inquired Para Handy, hisinterest wakened.
"There's nane o' that hanky-panky about Bonnie Ann," replied theengineer. "Pure science! She throws hersel' into a trance till ye onlysee the whites o' her eyes, and then ye hear the depairted jist thesame's they were in the room. She's weel in wi' the Duke o' Wellington;he tell't her three years ago we would win the war."
Dougie, the mate, was not surprised to hear of these wonderfulmanifestations. "The papers iss full o' them," he said. "It's aal the gowi' the titled gentry and Epuscopalian munisters. I heard mysel', wannight, a noise I couldna understand inside a kitchen dresser."
"I'm no' sayin' whether I believe in the spirits or no'," remarkedPara Handy cautiously. "There iss spirits in the Scruptures, though theywere different in the Holy Land, and no' up to capers--shiftin'sideboards, spillin' oil on the ceilin', rappin' in coal scattles. But ifBonnie Ann hass the gift, we should give her a trial to see what she canmake o' Hurricane Jeck."
Three weeks before, Hurricane Jack, alarmed at the apparent intentionsof a lady who wished to take advantage of her Leap Year privilege andpropose to him, had disappeared. He had left the Vital Spark withoutwarning, and never been heard of since. Convinced--or almostconvinced--that Jack had drowned himself--for they knew the lady--histhree shipmates proceeded to Bonnie Ann's shop at night, and begannegotiations diplomatically with an order for turnips and cabbages.
"Could we hae a word wi' ye at the back?" inquired Macphail in a huskywhisper over the counter. "I wass tellin' my mates aboot BloodyMary."
Bonnie Ann, who apparently had got the adjective to her name from anironic customer, looked at her watch, and intimated that it wasshutting-up time.
"Forbye," she added, "if it's Mary Queen o' Scots ye're wantin', it'sno her nicht oot; I couldna get her. A lot o' you sailor chaps thinks abeauty parlour and seance saloon is jist like a shebeen that ye can comeintae ony oor o' the day or nicht and ring for the depairted the same'sit was a schooner o' beer."
"It's no' Bloody Mary we're wantin'," explained Para Handy soothingly."We'll no' put ye to the slightest bother. To let ye ken--a shipmate o'oors, Jack Maclachlan, went missin' three weeks ago. He's no' in thepolls-office, he's no' in his uncle's hoose in Polmadic, and he must bedeid, fair play or foul. Could ye help us, Ann, to find oot somethingaboot Jeck?" He bent upon Bonnie Ann a gaze of compellinglanguishment.
"Awa' into the back," she said, "and I'll put up the shutters and jineye in a meenute."
They were seated in the beauty parlour and seance saloon when shejoined them.
She lit the gas and turned it down to a peep, after first havinglowered the blind. Picking up, and gazing intently at, a crystal ball,the size of a satisfactory Seville orange, she muttered, "There's a manmissin'. He has a tattoo mark on his airm--it's blue. He's been missin'three weeks; his friends is anxious to hear aboot him."
"And that's the God's truth," exclaimed Dougie, awestruck by thisswift, unerring comprehension of the situation. "He had a lend o' mypocket-naipkin."
"He's a sailor," continued Bonnie Ann. "The initials o' his name is J.M'L., and he's a Scotchman. He traivelled a lot on boats. He wasna ateetotaller and whiles his language was coorse--"
"Holy Frost! Jeck to the life!" exclaimed Para Handy. "I doot he issdone for; he never even came for his pay. Iss he on deck or underhatches, Annie?"
"Did I no' tell ye!" cried Macphail triumphantly. "Never mind theglessy, Annie; throw us a trance, and get in touch wi' somebody that wasin the sea tred when he was in the body. There's nae use botherin' BonnieMary o' Argyll to ask for Jeck: if he's in the Better Land, he'll be doonaboot the quay, or in a beershop whaur she wouldna care to venture."
"I could try the Duke o' Wellington," suggested Bonnie Ann. "Mind, I'mno' guaranteein' ony communication; the Duke, whiles, tak's a loto'humourin'."
Para Handy looked dubious. "Is there no' a wee chape skipper chapcould do thejob? His Grace would be an expensive pairty. If Jeck issthere at aal, I'll wudger he's weel kent."
"In life he wass a toppin' singer, and he could play the trump,"remarked Dougie helpfully.
Bonnie Ann put the crystal ball back on the chimney-piece, and pulledout a little table to the middle of the room.
"Ye'll hae to help yoursel's," she intimated, having placed chairs forthem round the table. "Draw in."
"Don't put yoursel' to any bother, Annie," huskily implored theCaptain, under a misapprehension. "We're chust efter a splendid tea."
"I wasna gaun to offer ye onything," said Bonnie Ann. "Ye needna besae smert! A' put your baith hands flet on the table wi' me andconcentrate your minds on--what did ye say the chap's namewas--Maclachlan?"
"Better kent as Hurricane Jeck," explained Macphail, who entered intothe ceremony with absolute enthusiasm. "If ye put some tumblers on thetable he'll be wi' us in a jiffy."
This suggestion that the spirit of their departed shipmate was to jointhe company alarmed Para Handy, who hastily withdrew his hands.
"Bless my sowl!" he exclaimed, "are ye thinkin' to bring Jeck here inthe spirit?"
"I thocht that was whit ye wanted," answered Bonnie Ann peevishly."It's shairly no' to play catch-the-ten we're gaithered here!"
"And it's no' to see the ghost o' Jeck Maclachlan, I'll assure ye!"exclaimed Para Handy. "Take my advice, and don't you bother him, Annie.He wass a tricky lad in life, and dear knows what he would be up to inthe spirit! Am I no' right, Dougie?"
"Ye're quite right, Captain," agreed the mate emphatically. "We're no'wantin' to see himsel' at aal, but chust to get the news o' him. Let himkeep his distance! Could ye no' get him, Annie, to do something in theair wi' a tambourine?"
"As shair's daith I canna come the tambourine the nicht," pleadedBonnie Ann; "I'm deid tired--bakin' a' the aiftemoon. There's naethingfor't but to ask the Duke o' Wellington for your frien'."
"I don't believe the Duke's a bit o' good; he'll go on haverin' abootthe battle o' Waterloo, and that's the wan battle Jeck wass never in,"declared the Captain.
Macphail looked at the skipper with disgust. "Ye're makin' a fair codo' the thing," he exclaimed. "Gie the woman a chance! Fling us a trance,Annie, and see whit the Duke says."
Bonnie Ann sat back in her chair, shut her eyes, and in a minute ortwo was in wireless communication with the Iron Duke, who, in a falsettobaritone through her lips, conveyed the information that he had seen JohnMaclachlan in the last two days.
"What happened to Jeck?" inquired Para Handy, in an awestruckwhisper.
The unfortunate seaman, it appeared, had fallen over the side of aship in a storm, swam three days, and perished within sight of land.
"That's Jeck, sure enough!" exclaimed Dougie. "He was a capitalsweemer!"
"Iss he happy, Annie?" whispered Para Handy. "Ask His Grace what sorto' trum he's in."
"The life and soul o' the place!" replied the Duke of Wellington. "Ashappy's the day's long. He sends his best respects to all concerned."
Having recovered from her trance, Bonnie Ann briskly collected a feeof five shillings which the crew of the Vital Spark made up withdifficulty between them; saw her clients off the premises as quickly aspossible, shut up her shop, and retired to the beauty parlour to makeherself some supper.
The crew made for the quay in a state of considerable mentalexcitement, solemnised by the knowledge of their shipmate's fate, andwere staggered to find Hurricane Jack himself on board the Vital Spark!He had arrived by the Minard Castle.
"'Dalmighty! where were ye, Jeck?" inquired Para Handy, who was firstto recover himself.
"Oh, jist perusin' about the docks o' Gleska," said Jack airily. "Ifell in wi' a lot o' fellows."
"Of aal the liars ever I heard," said the Captain viciously, "theworst iss the Duke o' Wellington!"
SUNNY JIM, back again on one of his periodical short spells oflong-shore sailoring, went ashore on Friday morning with a can for milk,and an old potato-sack for bread, and, such is the morning charm ofAppin, that he made no attempt to get either of them filled until hereached the inn at Duror. He wasn't a fellow who drank at any timeexcessively, but, Glasgow-born, he felt always homesick in foreign partsunless he could be, as Para Handy said, "convenient and adjaacent to alicensed premise." In a shop beside the inn he got his bread, and hemight have got the milk a mile or two nearer Kintallen quay, from whichhe had come, but a sailor never goes to a farm for milk so long as he canget it at an inn.
"A quart," he said to the girl at the bar, and pushed the can acrossthe counter. As she measured out and filled his can with ale, he sternlykept an averted eye on a bill on the wall which spoke in the highestterms of Robertson's Sheep Dips.
"What in the world do ye ca' this?" he exclaimed, regarding the can'scontents with what to an unsophisticated child would look like genuinesurprise. "Michty! what thick cream! If the Gleska coos gave milk likethat, the dairies would mak' their fortunes."
"Was it not beer you wanted?" asked the girl, with sleeves rolled upon a pair of arms worth all the rest of the Venus de Medici, and aroguish eye.
"Nut at all!" said he emphatically. "Milk. What ye sometimes put intea."
"Then it's the back of the house you should go to," said the girl."This is not the milk department," and she was about to empty the canagain, but not with unreasonable celerity, lest the customer should maybechange his mind.
"Hold on!" said Sunny Jim, with a grasp at it. "Seein' it's there,I'll maybe can make use o't. See's a tumbler, Flora."
For twenty minutes he leaned upon the counter and fleeted the timedelightfully as in the golden world. He said he was off a yacht, and, ifnot officially, in every other sense the skipper. True, it was notexactly what might be called the yachting season, but the owners of theyacht were whimsical. Incidentally, he referred to his melodeon, and atthat the girl declared he was the very man she had been looking for.
"Oh, come aff it, come aff it!" said Sunny Jim, with proper modesty,but yet with an approving glance at his reflection which was in themirror behind her. "I'm naething patent, but I'll admit there's no' acheerier wee chap from here to Ballachulish."
"Ye would be an awful handy man at a ball," said the girl, "with yourmelodeon. We're having a leap-year dance tonight, and only a pair ofpipers. What's a pair of pipers?"
"Two," said Sunny Jim promptly.
"You're quite mistaken," replied the girl with equal promptness; "it'sonly two till the first reel's by, and then it's a pair o' bauchles no'able to keep their feet. You come with your melodeon, and I'll be yourpartner."
He went back to the Vital Spark delighted, looked out his Sundayclothes and his melodeon, and chagrined his shipmates hugely by thenarrative of his good fortune.
"What's a leap-year baal?" asked Para Handy. "Iss there a night or twoextra in it? No Chrustian baal should last over the week-end."
"It's a baal where the women hae a' the say," explained Macphail, theengineer, whose knowledge was encyclopaedic.
"Iss that it?" said Para Handy. "It's chust like bein' at home! It'sme that's gled I'm not invited. Take you something wise-like wi' ye inyour pocket, Jum; I wouldna be in their reverence."
"I would like to see it," said Dougic. "Does the lady come in a kindof a cab for you?"
"It's only young chaps that's invited," explained Sunny Jim, withbrutal candour.
The Captain looked at him reproachfully. "You shouldna say the like o'that to Dougie," he remonstrated. "Dougie's no' that terrible old."
"I was sayin' it to baith o' you," said Sunny Jim. "It's no' amothers' meetin' this, it's dancin'."
"There's no man in the shippin' tred wi' more agility than mysel',"declared the indignant skipper. "I can stot through the middle o' a dancelike a tuppenny kahoochy ball. Dougie himsel'll tell you!"
"Yes, I've often seen you stottin'," agreed the mate, with greatsolemnity. Para Handy looked at him with some suspicion, but he presentedevery appearance of a man with no intention to say anythingoffensive.
"You havena an extra collar and a bit o' a stud on you?" was theastonishing inquiry made by Dougie less than twenty minutes after SunnyJim had departed for the Duror ball. "I wass thinkin' to mysel' we mighttake a turn along the road to look at the life and gaiety."
"Dougie, you're beyond redemption!" said Para Handy. "A married manand nine or ten o' a family, and there you're up to all diversions like ayoung one!"
"I wassna going by the door o' the ball," the mate exclaimedindignantly. "You aye take me up wrong."
"Oh, ye should baith gang," suggested the engineer, with maliciousirony. "A couple o' fine young chaps! Gie the girls o' Appin a treat.Never let on you're mairried. They'll never suspect as lang's ye keep onyour bonnets."
"I think mysel' we should go, Dougie, and we might be able to buy apenny novelle for Macphail to read on Sunday," said the Captain."Anything fresh about Lady Audley, Macphail?"
Macphail ignored the innuendo. "Noo's your chance," he proceeded."Everything's done for ye by the fair sect: a lady M.C. to find yepairtners; the women themsel's comin' up to see if your programme's full,and askin' every noo and then if ye care for a gless o' clairet-cup ondraught. I wouldna say but ye would be better to hae a fan and a Shetlandshawl to put ower your heids when you're comin' hame; everything'sreversed at a leap-year ball."
He would simply have goaded the Captain into going if the Captain hadnot made up his mind as soon as Dougie himself that he was going in anycase.
"Two-and-six apiece for the tickets," said the man at the door whenPara Handy and his mate came drifting out of the bar and made a tentativeattempt at slipping in unostentatiously.
"Not for a leap-year dance, Johnny," said the Captain mildly."Everything is left to the ladies."
"Except the payin'; that's ass usual," said the doorkeeper, and theCaptain and his mate regretfully paid for entrance. The room was crowded,and the masculine predominated to the extent that it looked as if everylady had provided herself with half-a-dozen partners that she might beassured of sufficient dancing. One of the pipers had already lapsed intothe state so picturesquely anticipated by the girl whom Sunny Jim calledFlora; the other leant on a window-sill, and looked with Celtic ferocityand disdain upon Sunny Jim, who was playing his melodeon for the Flowersof Edinburgh.
"You're playin' tip-top, Jum. I never heard you better," said theCaptain to him at the first interval; and the musician was so pleasedthat he introduced his shipmates to Flora.
"We're no' here for the baal at aal, at aal, but chust to put bye thetime," the Captain explained to her. "I see you're no' slack forpairtners."
"Not at present," she replied; "but just you wait till the supper'sbye and you'll see a bonny difference."
She was right, too. The masculine did certainly not predominate aftermidnight, being otherwise engaged. The fact that Flora was a wallflowerseemed to distress Sunny Jim, who would gladly now relinquish his officeof musician to the piper.
"That's a charmin' gyurl, and a desperate sober piper," said theCaptain to his mate, who spent most of the time looking for what hecalled the "commytee," and had finally discovered, if not the thingitself, at all events what was as good. "Jum's doin' capital at themelodeon, and it would be a peety if the piper took his job."
They took out the piper, and by half an hour's intelligentadministration of the committee's refreshments rendered him quiteincapable of contributing any further music to the dancers.
"Now that's aal right," said the Captain cheerfully, returning to thehall. "A piper's aal right if ye take him the proper way, but I never sawone wi' a more durable heid than yon fellow. Man, Jum's doin capital!Hasn't he got the touch! It's a peety he's such a strong musician, for,noo that the pipers hass lost their reeds, he's likely to be kept at ittill the feenish."
"Lost their reeds!" said Dougie.
"Chust that!" replied the Captain calmly. "I took them oot o' theirdrones, and I have them in my pocket. It's every man for himsel' in Durorof Appin. You and me'll dance with Flora."
Nothing could exceed the obvious annoyance of Sunny Jim when he sawhis shipmates dance with Flora to the music of his own providing. Againand again he glanced with impatient expectancy towards the door for therelieving piper.
"The piper'll be back in a jiffy, Jum," said Para Handy to him,sweeping past with Flora in a polka or a schottische. "He's chust oot atthe back takin' a drop of lemonade, and said he would be inimmediately."
"You're doing magnificent," he said, coming round to the musicianagain as Dougie took the floor with Flora for the Haymakers. "Ye put meawful in mind of yon chap, Paddy Roosky, him that's namely for thefiddle. Man, if ye chust had a velvet jecket! Flora says she never dancedto more becomin' music."
"That's a' richt," said the disgusted musician; "but I'm gettin' fedup wi' playin' awa' here. I cam' here for dancin', and I wish the piperwould look slippy."
"He'll be in in wan meenute," said Para Handy, with the utmostconfidence, turning over the pipe reeds in his trousers pocket. "It's areel next time, Jum; you might have given us 'Monymusk' and 'Alisterwears a cock't bonnet'; I'm engaged for it to Flora."
Dance after dance went on, and, of course, there was no relievingpiper. The melodeonist was sustained by the flattering comments of hisshipmates on his playing and an occasional smile from Flora, who was thatkind of girl who didn't care whom she danced with so long as she gotdancing.
"Special request from Flora--would ye give us The Full-Rigged Ship'the next one? That's a topper," said the Captain to him. Or, "Complimentsof Flora, and would you mind the Garaka Waltz and Circassian Circle forthe next, Jum? She says she likes my style o' dancin'."
"I wish to goodness I'd never learned to play a bloomin' note," saidSunny Jim.
But he played without cessation till the ball was ended, the fickleFlora dancing more often with his shipmates than with anybody else.
As they took the road to Kintallen quay at six o'clock in the morning.Para Handy took some chanter reeds from his pocket and handed them toSunny Jim.
"You should learn the pipes, Jum," he remarked. "They're no' so soreon you ass a melodeon. Man, but she wass a lovely dancer, Flora! Chustsublime! Am I no' right, Dougie?"
"A fair gazelle! The steps o' her!" said the mate poetically.
"And we were pretty smert on oor feet oorsel's," said Para Handy. "Itdoesna do to have aal your agility in your fingers."
THE Vital Spark at nightfall put into the little bay where her cargoof timber was assembled. On an ingenuous excuse of "takin' the air,"Hurricane Jack, who had not been there before, went ashore at theearliest possible moment in the dark, and, trusting to an instinctusually unerring, searched for some place of cheer.
He came on the inn through a back yard, where were several vans anddogcarts, and a curious sort of chariot, highly ornamental to the feel,that puzzled him considerably, till he struck a match, and found it was ahearse.
The hearse, however, engaged his attention less intently than theenormous array of empty bottles which were piled up all round the yard.Crates were full of them, barrels were brimming over with them; they werein layers ten deep under the stable eaves, and tinkling with the waterthat fell through them from a broken rhone.
"Whatever they are in this place," said Jack to himself, "they're no'nerrow-mindcd. They must have a fine cheery winter of it! If they drankall that, there must have been great tred wi' the hearse."
He opened that solemn vehicle, looked inside, and found it too wasfilled with the relics of conviviality, mostly wine-bottles.
"English gentlemen. Towerists. Shooters. The money them folkwaste!"
He shook some of the bottles, to make certain they were empty. "Nofears o' them!" he reflected cynically. "It makes me sad. Puttin' bottlesin a hearse--it's no respectable; I wonder what the ministers wouldsay!"
There was no access to the inn from the yard that he could find, so tosave time he climbed a wall, and found himself on the other side of it,by that marvellous intuition of his, exactly at the door of the bar whereall the winter business of the inn was done.
Nobody was inside but the innkeeper, who was washing tumblers in thelight of a hanging paraffin-lamp, and was suspiciously flushed.
"A wet night," said Hurricane Jack, taking off his soaking cap andslapping it against the skirt of his oilskin coat to get rid of part ofits moisture. "I'll take a small sensation."
The landlord looked surprised. "I thought you were fromBalliemeanach," said he, "to order the hearse. Where in the world did yecome from?"
"From the boundin' deep," said Hurricane Jack. "My ship's outsidethere, as ye might say, on the doorstep."
The landlord looked immensely relieved. "As sure as death," said he,"I thought ye were from Balliemeanach. Maclean the wudman had a couple o'glesses o' Cream de Mong here yesterday, and I havena slept a wink since,wonderin' would he get over it."
"Cream de Mong," said Hurricane Jack, with genuine interest; "if it'sanything like that, I'll try it."
The landlord produced a bottle of green liqueur from below thecounter. "Mind ye," he said, "it's at your own risk. I don't fancy thelook o't mysel'. It was in the cellar when I came here three years ago,and I hadna the nerve to offer it to any one till Maclean was here indesperation yesterday, and me withoot a drop o' spirits in thehoose."
Hurricane Jack picked up the bottle, looked at it, and put it downagain, "Starboard Light," he remarked. "I've seen it. They take it incabins. I wouldn't use it to oil my hair. What I'm wantin's something todrink."
A bottle of beer was promptly uncorked and put before him."Ninepence," said the landlord.
"Holy sailors!" exclaimed Hurricane Jack. "I could buy wine for thaton the Rio Grande."
"There's a penny for the bottle," said the landlord. "Eightpence if yebring back the bottle."
Jack, two seconds after, handed him back the empty bottle andeightpence.
"Ye're surely keen on empty bottles," he remarked.
"A penny apiece, and glad to get as many as I can; they call me theBottle King," said the landlord. "But someway, this while back, my mind'sa' reel-rall."
Para Handy and Dougie were going to bed, and Macphail was therealready, when Hurricane Jack got back to the ship and excitedly demandeda large spale basket.
"What on earth are ye goin' to do wi' a spale basket, Jeck?" inquiredthe Captain. "Were ye fishin'?"
"No, nor fishin'!" retorted Jack; "but there's a man up yonder at theinn that calls himsel' the Bottle King, and payin' a penny apiece forthem. I think I can put a lot o' tred in his way." He had already found abasket.
Para Handy looked at him uneasily. "Iss it Peter Grant?" he asked."Ye'll no' get roond Peter wi' aal your agility. If it's buyin' bottleshe is, ye'll no' put him off wi' jeely jars. Where in the name o' fortuneare ye goin' to get the bottles? There iss not wan bottle in this boat,unless it's under Macphail's pillow."
"Hoots, man!" said Dougie, remonatrative; "give Jeck a chance! Jecknever yet put oot his hand farther than he could streetch his arm."
"Come on the pair o' ye, and see a pant!" said Hurricane Jack. "We'llhave to look slippy afore Grant shuts his shop."
"I hope it's nothing that'll be found oot," said Para Handy, stilluneasy. "Ye're a duvvle for quirks, Jeck, and I wouldna like the ship toget into trouble."
Ten minutes later they all trailed up to the inn with the emptybasket.
The innkeeper was still washing tumblers when the Captain and Dougie,carrying a spale basket of empty bottles between them, came into his bar,and Hurricane Jack behind them.
"Three pints o' ale," said Jack, with the utmost confidence, "andhere's two dozen bottles. We're glad to get rid o' them." The Bottle Kingwas frankly surprised at such a consignment from such a quarter.
"Wherever ye got them bottles, it wasna here," he said. "At least, asfar as I can mind. My heid's a' reel-rail, but it doesna maitter. I'mwillin' to tak' them," and, having emptied the basket, he produced thebeer for his customers.
"Are ye sure they're no' worth more than a penny the piece?" inquiredPara Handy. "We were gettin' tuppence for them in Port Askaig. Am Iright, Dougie, or am I wrong?"
"It wass tuppence in Port Askaig, and tuppence ha'penny in PortEllen," replied the mate, with unhesitating assurance. "Bottles isscarce. They're no' makin' them. And ye never in your life saw bonnierbottles than them; they're the chenuine gloss."
"Pure plate-gless," said Hurricane Jack. "Look at the labels--' SherryWine'--I'll wager there's a lot o' money in them."
"We have a ship-load yonder o' them," said tho Captain. "Could ye bedoin' wi' a gross or two? Chust for the turnover. We must aal put oorhand to the plew to help the government, Mr Grant."
The Bottle King for a moment suspended his washing of tumblers, withtremulous hands put on a pair of spectacles, and looked more closely athis purchase.
"God bless me!" he exclaimed; "them's my own wine bottles! Where didye get them?"
"We got them in a hearse behind the hoose here," frankly admittedHurricane Jack. "There's a thoosand deid men yonder, if there's wan."
"My Chove! aren't you the ruffians?" cried Peter Grant. "Sellin' me myown bottles! I never could mind where I put them, and me lookin' for themhigh and low since the Old New Year. Buttach! It doesna maitter; theycaal me the Bottle King."
"BY Chove! but they're bad the night!" said Dougie, running a grimypaw across his forehead.
"Perfectly ferocious!" said Para Handy, slapping his neck. "This fairbeats Bowmore, and Bowmore iss namely for its mudges. I never saw thebrutes more desperate! You would actually think they were whustlin' onwan another, cryin', 'Here's a clean sailor, and he hasna a collar on;gather about, boys!"
"Oh, criftens!" whimpered Sunny Jim, in agony, dabbing his faceincessantly with what looked suspiciously like a dish-cloth; "I've see'dmudges afore this, but they never had spurs on their feet afore. Yah-h-h!I wish I was back in Gleska! They can say what they like aboot the Clyde,but anywhere above Bowlin' I'll guarantee ye'll no' be eaten alive. Ifthey found a midge in Gleska, they would put it in the KelvingroveMuseum."
Macphail, his face well lubricated, came up from among the engines,and jeered. "Midges never bothered me," said he contemptuously. "If yehad been wi' me on the West Coast o' Africa, and felt the mosquitoes, itwouldna be aboot a wheen o' gnats ye would mak' a sang. It's a' ahallucination aboot midges; I can only speak aboot them the way I findthem, and they never did me ony harm. Perhaps it's no midges that'sbotherin' ye efter a'."
"Perhaps no'," said Para Handy, with great acidity. "Perhaps it'shummin'-birds, but the effect iss chust the same. Ye'll read in theScruptures yonder aboot the ant goin' for the sluggard, but the ant iss aperfect chentleman compared wi' the mudge. And from aal I ever heard o'the mosquito, it'll no' stab ye behind your back withoot a word o'warnin'. Look at them on Dougie's face--quite black! Ye would never thinkit wass the Sunday."
It was certainly pretty bad at the quay of Arrochar. With the eveningair had come out, as it seemed, the midges of all the Highlands. Theyhung in clouds above the Vital Spark, and battened gluttonously on herdistracted crew.
"When I was at the mooth o' the Congo River--" began the engineer; butPara Handy throttled the reminiscence.
"The Congo's no' to be compared wi' the West o' Scotland when ye cometo insects," said Para Handy. "There's places here that's chustdeplorable whenever the weather's the least bit warm. Look atTighnabruaich!--they're that bad there, they'll bite their way throughcorrugated iron roofs to get at ye! Take Clynder, again, or any otherplace in the Gareloch, and ye'll see the old ones leadin' roond the youngones, learnin' them the proper grips. There iss a spachial kind of mudgein Dervaig, in the Isle of Mull, that hass aal the points o' a Poltallochterrier, even to the black nose and the cocked lugs, and sits up andbarks at you. I wass once gatherin' cockles in Colonsay--"
"I could be daein' wi' some cockles," said Sunny Jim. "I aye feel likea cockle when it comes near the Gleska Fair."
"The best cockles in the country iss in Colonsay," said the Captain."But the people in Colonsay iss that slow they canna catch them. I wasswance gatherin' cockles there, and the mudges were that large and bold, Ihad to throw stones at them."
"It was a pity ye hadna a gun," remarked Macphail, with sarcasm.
"A gun would be no' much use wi' the mudges of Colonsay," replied theCaptain; "nothing would discourage yon fellows but a blast o' dynamite.What wass there on the island at the time but a chenuine Englishtowerist, wi' a capital red kilt, and, man! But he wass green! He wasthat green, the coos of Colonsay would go mooin' along the road efterhim, thinkin' he wass gress. He wass wan of them English chentlementhat'll be drinkin' chinger-beer on aal occasions, even when they're dry,and him bein' English, he had seen next to nothing aal his days till hetook the boat from West Loch Tarbert. The fast night on the island hewent oot in his kilt, and came back in half an oor to the inns wi' hislegs fair peetiful! There iss nothing that the mudges likes to see amongthem better than an English towerist with a kilt: the very tops wasseaten off his stockin's."
"That's a fair streetcher, Peter!" exclaimed the incredulousengineer.
"It's ass true ass I'm tellin' you," said Para Handy. "Any one inColonsay will tell you. He had wan of them names shed in the middle likeFitz-Gerald or Seton-Kerr; that'll prove it to ye. When he came in to theinns wi' his legs chust fair beyond redemption, he didna even know thecause of it.
"'It's the chinger-beer that's comin' oot on you,' says JohnMacdennott, that had the inns at the time. 'There iss not a thing you candrink that iss more deliteerious in Colonsay. Nobody takes it here.'
"'And what in all the world do they take?' said the Englishchentleman.
"'The water o' the mountain well,' said John,' and whiles a drop ofwholesome Brutish spirits. There's some that doesna care for water.'
"But the English chentleman was eccentric, and nothing would do forhim to drink but chinger, an' they took him doon to a shed where thefishermen were barkin' nets, and they got him to bark his legs wi'catechu. If it's green he wass before, he wass now ass brown's a trammelnet. But it never made a bit o' odds to the mudges oot in Colonsay! Itell you they're no' slack!"
"They're no' slack here neithers!" wailed Sunny Jim, whose face wasfairly wealed by the assailants. "Oh, michty! I think we would be faurbetter ashore."
"Not a bit!" said Dougie, furiously puffing a pipe of the strongesttobacco, in whose fumes the midges appeared to take the most exquisitepleasure. "There's no' a place ashore where ye could take shelter fromthem--it being Sunday," he significantly added.
"I'm gaun ashore anyway," said Macphail, removing all superfluouslubricant from his countenance with a piece of waste. "It wouldna bemidges that would keep me lollin' aboot this auld hooker on a fine nicht.If ye had some experience o' mosquitoes! Them's the chaps for ye. It'smosquitoes that spreads the malaria fever."
They watched him go jauntily up the quay, accompanied by a cloud ofinsects which seemed to be of the impression that he was leading them toan even better feeding-ground than the Vital Spark. He had hardly gone ahundred yards when he turned and came hurriedly back, beating theair.
"Holy frost!" he exclaimed, jumping on deck, "I never felt midges likethat in a' my days afore; they're in billions o' billions!"
"Tut, tut!" said Para Handy. "Ye're surely getting awfu' tumid,Macphail. You that's so weel acquent wi' them mosquitoes! If I wass atrevelled man like you, I wouldna be bate wi' a wheen o' Hielan' mudges.They're no' in't anyway. Chust imagination! Chust a hallucination! Yemind ye told us?"
"There's no hallucination aboot them chaps," said Macphail, smackinghimself viciously.
"Nut at all!" said Sunny Jim. "Nut at all! If there's onyhallucination aboot them, they have it sherpened. Gr-r-r! It's cruel;that's whit it is; fair cruel!"
"I promised I would go and see Macrae the nicht," said the engineer."But it's no' safe to gang up that quay. This is yin o' the times I wishI was a smoker; that tobacco o' yours, Dougie, would shairly fricht awa'the midges."
"Not wan bit of it!" said Dougie peevishly, rubbing the back of hisneck, on which his tormentors were thickly clustered. "I'm beginning tothink mysel' they're partial to tobacco; it maybe stimulates theappetite. My! aren't they the brutes! Look at them on Jim!"
With a howl of anguish Sunny Jim dashed down the fo'c'sle hatch, theback of his coat pulled over his ears.
"Is there naething at a' a chap could dae to his face to keep themaff?" asked the engineer, still solicitous about his promised visit toMacrae.
"Some people'll be sayin' parafiine-oil iss a good thing," suggestedthe Captain. "But that's only for Ro'sa' mudges; I'm thinkin' theArrochar mudges would maybe consuder paraffine a trate. And I've heard o'others tryin' whusky--I mean rubbed on ootside. I never had enough toexperiment wi't mysel'. Forbye, there's none."
"I wadna care to gang up to Macrae's on a Sunday smellin' o' eitherparaffine-oil or whisky," said Macphail.
"Of course not!" said Para Handy. "What was I thinkin' of? Macrae'ssister wouldna like it," and he winked broadly at Dougie. "Ye'll betakin' a bit of a daunder wi' her efter the church goes in. Give her mybest respects, will ye? A fine, big, bouncin' gyurl! A splendidform!"
"You shut up!" said Macphail to his commander, blushing. "I think I'llgie my face anither syne wi' plenty o' saft soap for it, and mak' abreenge across to Macrae's afore the effect wears aff."
He dragged a pail over to the water-beaker, half filled it with water,added a generous proportion of soft soap from a tin can, and proceeded towash himself without taking off his coat.
"Ye needna mind to keep on your kep," said the Captain, grimacing toDougie. "Mima'll no' see ye. He's been callin' on Macrae a score o'times, Dougie, and the sister hasna found oot yet he's bald. Mercy on us!Did ye ever in your life see such mudges!"
"I'm past speakin' aboot them!" said the mate, with hopelessresignation. "What iss he keepin' on his bonnet for?"
"He's that bald that unless he keeps it on when he's washin' his facehe doesna know where to stop," said Para Handy. "The want o' the hair'san aawful depredaation!"
But even these drastic measures failed to render Macphail inviolatefrom the attack of the insects, whose prowess he had underestimated. Forthe second time he came running back from the head of the quay pursued bythem, to be greeted afresh by the irony of his Captain.
"There's a solid wall o' them up there," he declared, rubbing hiseyes.
"Isn't it annoyin'?" said the Captain, with fallacious sympathy. "Mimawill be weary waitin' on ye. If there wass a druggist's open, ye mightget something in a bottle to rub on. Or if it wassna the Sabbath, yemight get a can o' syrup in the grocer's."
"Syrup?" said the engineer inquiringly, and Para Handy slyly kickedDougie on the shin.
"There's nothin' better for keepin' awa' the mudges," he explained."Ye rub it on your face and leave it on. It's a peety we havena any syrupon the boat."
"Sunny Jim had a tin o' syrup last night at his tea," said theengineer hopefully.
"But it must be the chenuine golden syrup," said Para Handy. "No otherkind'll do."
Sunny Jim was routed out from under the blankets in his bunk toproduce syrup, which proved to be of the requisite golden character, asPara Handy knew very well it was, and five minutes later Macphail, with ashining countenance, went up the quay a third time attended by midges ingreater myriads than ever. This time he beat no retreat.
"Stop you!" said Para Handy. "When Mima Macrae comes to the door,she'll think it's no' an enchineer she has to caal on her, but a flycemetery."
GEORGE IV., being a sovereign of imagination, was so much impressed bystories of Waterloo that he began to say he had been there himself, andhad taken part in it. He brought so much imagination to the narrativethat he ended by believing it--an interesting example of the strangepsychology of the liar. Quite as remarkable is the case of Para Handy,whose singular delusion of Sunday fortnight last is the subject of muchhilarity now among seamen of the minor coasting-trade.
The first of the storm on Saturday night found the Vital Spark offToward on her way up-channel, timber-laden, and without a single light,for Sunny Jim, who had been sent ashore for oil at Tarbert, had broughtback a jar of beer instead by an error that might naturally occur withany honest seaman.
When the lights of other ships were showing dangerously close the matestood at the bow and lit matches, which, of course, were blown outinstantly.
"It's not what might be called a cheneral illumination," he remarked,"but it's an imitataation of the Gantock Light, and it no' workin'proper, and you'll see them big fellows will give us plenty o'elbow-room."
Thanks to the matches and a bar of iron which Macphail had hung on thelever of the steam-whistle, so that it lamented ceaselessly through thetempest like a soul in pain, the Vital Spark escaped collision, and sometime after midnight got into Cardwell Bay with nothing lost except thejar, a bucket, and the mate's sou'-wester.
"A dirty night! It's us that iss weel out of it," said Para Handygratefully, when he had got his anchor down.
The storm was at its worst when the Captain went ashore on Sunday toget the train for Glasgow on a visit to his wife, the farther progress ofhis vessel up the river for another day at least being obviouslyimpossible. It was only then he realised that he had weathered one of thegreat gales that make history. At Gourock pierhead shellbacks ofexperience swore they had never seen the like of it; there were solemnbodings about the fate of vessels that had to face it. Para Handy, as aship's commander who had struggled through it, found himself regarded asa hero, and was plied with the most flattering inquiries. On any otherday the homage of the shellbacks might have aroused suspicion, but itsdisinterested nature could not be called in question, seeing all thepublic-houses were shut.
"Never saw anything like it in aal my born days," he said. "I wass thelength wan time of puttin' off my shippers and windin' up my watch forthe Day of Chudgment. Wan moment the boat wass up in the air like aflyin'-machine, and the next she wass scrapin' the cockles off the bottomo' the deep. Mountains high--chust mountains high! And no' wee mountainsneither, but the very bens of Skye! The seas was wearin' through us foreand aft like yon mysterious river rides that used to be at the ScenicExhibeetion, and the noise o' the cups and saucers clatterin' doon belowwass terrible, terrible! If Dougie wass here he could tell you."
"A dog's life, boys!" said the shellbacks. "He would be ill-advisedthat would sell a farm and go to sea. Anything carried away,Captain?"
A jar, a bucket, and a sou'-wester seemed too trivial a loss for sucha great occasion. Para Handy hurriedly sketched a vision of burstinghatches, shattered bulwarks, a mate with a broken leg, and himself forhours lashed to the wheel.
It was annoying to find that these experiences were not regarded bythe shellbacks as impressive. They seemed to think that nothing short oftragedy would do justice to a storm of such unusual magnitude.
Para Handy got into the train, and found himself in the company ofsome Paisley people, who seemed as proud of the superior nature of thestorm as if they had themselves arranged it.
"Nothing like it in history, chentlemen," said Para Handy, afterborrowing a match. "It's me that should ken, for I wass in it, ten mortalhours, battlin' wi' the tempest. A small boat carried away and a cargo o'feather bonnets on the deck we were carryin' for the Territorials. Myboat was shaved clean doon to the water-line till she looked like wan o'them timber-ponds at the Port--not an article left standin'! Acrank-shaft smashed on us, and the helm wass jammed. The enchineer--a manMacphail belongin' to Mother-well--had a couple of ribs stove in, and themate got a pair o' broken legs; at least there's wan o' them broken andthe other's a nesty stave. I kept her on her ooorse mysel' for fivehours, and the waiter up to my very muddle. Every sea was smashin' on me,but I never mudged. My George, no! Macfarlane never mudged!"
The Paisley passengers were intensly moved, and produced a consolingbottle.
"Best respects, chentlemen!" said Para Handy. "It's me that would givea lot for the like o' that at three o'clock this mornin'. I'm sittin'here withoot a rag but what I have on me. A fine sea-kist, split new, wi'fancy grommets, all my clothes, my whole month's wages, and presents forthe wife in't--it's lyin' yonder somewhere off Innellan.... It's aterrible thing the sea."
At Greenock two other passengers came into the compartment, brimful ofadmiration for a storm they seemed to think peculiarly British in itsdevastating character--a kind of vindication of the island's imperialpride.
"They've naething like it on the Continent," said one of them."They're a' richt there wi' their volcanic eruptions and earthquakes andthe like, but when it comes to the naitural elements--" He was incapableof expressing exactly what he thought of British dominance in respect ofthe natural elements.
"Here's a poor chap that was oot in his ship in the worst o't," saidthe Paisley passengers. Para Handy ducked his head in politeacknowledgment of the newcomers' flattering scrutiny, and was induced torepeat his story, to which he added some fresh sensational details.
He gave a vivid picture of the Vital Spark wallowing helplessly on thevery edge of the Gantock rocks; of the fallen mast beating against thevessel's side and driving holes in her; of the funnel flying through theair, with cases of feather bonnets ("cost ten pounds apiece, chentlemen,to the War Office"); of Sunny Jim incessantly toiling at the pump; theengineer unconscious and delirious; himself, tenacious and unconquered,at the wheel, lashed to it with innumerable strands of the best Manilacordage.
"I have seen storms in every part of the world," he said; "I have evenseen yon terrible monsoons that's namely oot about Australia, but neverin my born life did I come through what I came through last night."
Another application of the consolatory bottle seemed to brighten hisrecollection of details.
"I had a lot o' sky-rockets," he explained. "We always have them onthe best ships, and I fired them off wi' the wan hand, holdin' the wheelwi' the other. Signals o' distress, chentlemen. Some use cannons, but Iaye believe in the sky-rockets: you can both hear and see them. It makesa dufference."
"I kent a chap that did that for a day and a nicht aff the Mull o'Kintyre, and it never brung oot a single lifeboat," said one of thePaisley men.
It was obvious to Para Handy that his tragedy of the sea was pitchedon too low a key to stir some people; he breathed deeply and shook amelancholy head.
"You'll never get lifeboats when you want them, chentlemen," heremarked. "They keep them aal laid up in Gleska for them LifeboatSetturday processions. But it was too late for the lifeboat anyway forthe Vital Spark. The smertest boat in the tred, too."
"Good Lord! She didna sink?" said the Paisley men, unprepared for sucha denouement.
"Nothing above the water at three o'clock this mornin' but the winch,"said the Captain. "We managed to make our way ashore on a couple o'herrin'-boxes.... Poor Macphail! A great man for perusin' them novelles,but still-and-on a fellow of much agility. The very last words he saidwhen he heaved his breath--and him, poor sowl, withoot a word o' Gaelicin his heid--wass, 'There's nobody can say but what you did your duty,Peter.' That wass me."
"Do ye mean to say he was drooned?" asked the Paisley men with genuineemotion.
"Not drooned," said Para Handy; "he simply passed away."
"Isn't that deplorable! And whit came over the mate?"
"His name wass Dougald," said the Captain sadly, "a native ofLochaline, and ass cheery a man ass ever you met across a dram. Chustthat very mornin' he said to me, 'The 5th of November, Peter; this hassbeen a terrible New Year, and the next wan will be on us in achiffy.'"
By the time the consolatory bottle was finished the loss of the VitalSpark had assumed the importance of the loss of the Royal George, and thePaisley men suggested that the obvious thing to do was to start a smallsubscription for the sole survivor.
For a moment the conscience-stricken Captain hesitated. He hadscarcely thought his story quite so moving, but a moment of reflectionfound him quite incapable of recalling what was true and what imaginaryof the tale he told them. With seven-and-sixpence in his pocket, wrung bythe charm of pure imagination from his fellow-passengers, he arrived inGlasgow and went home.
He went in with a haggard countenance.
"What's the matter wi' ye, Peter?" asked his wife.
"Desperate news for you, Mery. Desperate news! The Vital Spark issunk."
"As long's the crew o' her are right that doesna matter," said theplucky little woman.
"Every mortal man o' them drooned except mysel'," said Para Handy, andthe tears streaming down his cheeks. "Nothing but her winch above thewater. They died like Brutain's hardy sons."
"And what are you doing here?" said his indignant wife. "As lang asthe winch is standin' there ye should be on her. Call yoursel' a sailorand a Hielan'man!"
For a moment he was staggered.
"Perhaps there's no' a word o' truth in it," he suggested. "Maybe thething's exaggerated. Anything could happen in such a desperatestorm."
"Whether it's exaggerated or no' ye'll go back the night and stickbeside the boat. I'll make a cup o' tea and boil an egg for ye. Abonny-like thing for me to go up and tell Dougie's wife her husband'sdeid and my man snug at home at a tousy tea!... Forbye, they'll maybesalve the boat, and she'll be needin' a captain."
With a train that left the Central some hours later Para Handyreturned in great anxiety to Gourock. The tragedy of his imagination wasnow exceedingly real to him. He took a boat and rowed out to the VitalSpark, which he was astonished to see intact at anchor, not a feature ofher changed.
Dougie was on deck to receive him.
"Holy smoke, Dougie, iss that yoursel'?" the Captain askedincredulously. "What way are you keepin'?"
"Fine," said Dougie. "What way's the mistress?"
The Captain seized him by the arm and felt it carefully.
"Chust yoursel', Dougie, and nobody else. It's me that's prood to seeyou. I hope there's nothing wrong wi' your legs?"
"Not a drop," said Dougie.
"And what way's Macphail?" inquired the Captain anxiously.
"He's in his bed wi' 'Lady Audley,'" said the mate.
"Still deleerious?" said the Captain with apprehension.
"The duvvle was never anything else," said Dougie.
"Did we lose anything in the storm last night?" asked Para Handy.
"A jar, and a bucket, and your own sou'-wester," answered Dougie.
"My Chove!" said Para Handy, much relieved. "Things iss terriblyexaggerated up in Gleska."
DURING several days on which the Vital Spark lay idle at Lochgoilhead,the crew spring-cleaned her. "My goodness! ye wouldna think she wouldtake such a desperate lot o' tar!" said Para Handy, watching the finalstrokes of Dougie's brush on the vessel's quarter.
There seemed, however, to be as much of the tar on the person andclothing of himself and his shipmates as on the boat.
"Ye're a bonny-lookin' lot!" said Macphail, the engineer, who nevertook any part in the painting operations. "If ye just had a tambourineapiece, and could sing 'The Swanee River,' ye would do for ChristyMinstrels."
But all the same, in spite of such tar as missed her when they slungit on, the Vital Spark looked beautiful and shiny, and the air for half amile round had the odour of Archangel, where the Russians come from.
With his own good hand, and at his own expense, her proud commanderhad freshened up her yellow bead and given her funnel a coat of red asgorgeous as a Gourock sunset. He stood on one leg, in a favouriteattitude of his when anything appealed to his emotions, and scratched hisshin with the heel of his other boot.
"Man! it's chust a trate to see her lookin' so smert!" he said withadmiration. "The sauciest boat in the coastin' tred! If ye shut wan eyeand glance end-on, ye would think she wass the Grenadier. Chust you lookat the lines of her--that sweet! I'm tellin' you he wassna slack the manthat made her."
Sunny Jim wiped his brow with the cuff of his jacket, and made a newsmear on his countenance which left him with a striking resemblance tothe White-Eyed Kaffir. His comparatively clean eye twinkled mischievouslyat Macphail.
"What I say is this," said he; "there's no' much sense in bein' sofancy wi' a boat that's only gaun to cairry coals and timber inside theCumbraes. Noo that we're blockaded, do ye no'think, Macphail, she shouldbe cairryin' passengers?"
"Holy smoke!" ejaculated Dougie, with genuine surprise. "Ye mightchust ass well say that the Admirality should put some guns on her andsend her to the Dardanelles."
Sunny Jim, with his back to the Captain, winked. "There's maybesomething in't," added Dougie hurriedly. "There's boats no' bettercarryin' passengers aal winter, and I'll warrant ye there's moneyin't."
"It's the chance o' a lifetime!" broke in the engineer, wanning up tothe play. "Half the regular steamers will be aft the Clyde for monthstakin' Gleska breid and the sodgers' washin's to the Bosphorus andthereabouts; if you have ony say at a' wi' the owners, Peter, you advisethem to let oot the Vital Spark for trips."
"Trups!" said Para Handy, beaming. "Man, Jum, ye hit the very thing!It wass aalways my ambeetion to get oot o' the common cairryin' tred andbe a chcntleman. I aalways said a boat like this wass thrown away oncoal, and wud, and herrin'; if she had chust a caibin and a place forsellin' tickets, I wouldna feel ashamed to sail her on the RoyalRowt."
Again his eye swept fondly over her bulging hull, with the tar stillwet and glistening on it; the bright new yellow stripe which made her socoquettish; the crimson funnel. "Of course, ye would need a band if yewent in for trips," suggested Macphail in a ruminating way. "Yin o' thaebands that can feenish a' thegither even if they're playin' differenttunes, or drap the piccolo oot every noo and then to go roond and liftthe pennies."
"Ach! I wouldna bother wi' a band," said Para Handy. "A band's no useunless ye want to chase the passengers below to take refreshments, and wehavena the accommodation. We maybe might get baud o' a kind o' fiddler. Imind when the tippiest boats on the Clyde had chust wan decent fiddler ora poor man wantin' the eysight, wi' a concerteena. Tiptop!"
He took a piece of twine from his trousers pocket and measured thestanding room between the wheel and the engines; Sunny Jim was in atransport of delight at a joke which went so smoothly.
"Two and a half," said Para Handy firmly, like a land surveyor. "Ithink there would be room for a no' too broad-built fiddler, if he didnabate the time wi' his feet. Stop you till we make a calculaation for thepassenger accommodation. We'll need to make it cubic."
"There's only forty cubic feet allo'ed for every lodger in theGarscube Road," said Sunny Jim. "That's the Act o' Parliament. Ye caneasy get the cubic space if ye coont it longways up in the air, andthere's naething to prevent it."
Para Handy stood on one leg again and scratched a shin, with a look ofthe profoundest calculation.
"Ye couldna have cabin passengers," suggested Dougie, snatching up anoil-can of Macphail's and pouring some of its contents into his hands toclean the tar off.
"There's no' goin' to be no caibin in this boat," said the Captainquickly. "Short runs and ready money! Gourock and Dunoon, maybe, andperhaps a Setturday to Ardentinny. I could get a dozen or two o' nice weeherrin' firkins doon at Tarbert for passengers to sit on roond thehatch."
"Do ye no' think it would look droll?" asked Dougie, a littleremorseful to have awakened such ecstatic visions.
"What way would it be droll?" retorted his Captain sharply. "I'mthinkin' ye havena much o' a heid for business, Dougie. If you would justconsider--a shillin' a heid to Hunter's Quay--"
"Ye would need a purser," suggested Sunny Jim.
"Allooin' I did!" replied the Captain. "Aal a purser needs is apocket-naipkin, a fancy tie, a flooer in his jaicket, and a pleasantsmile. There iss not a man on the Clyde would make a better purser thanyoursel' if ye showed the right agility. I'm tellin' you there's moneyin't! The people'll chust come in and pay their tickets. Look at the waythey crood doon at the Gleska Fair! We could put their wee tin boxes inthe howld."
"Of course, we would have moonlight cruises," said Macphail. "It'sjust found money--no extra cost for the engineer and crew."
On the prospect of moonlight cruises the Captain pondered for amoment. "No," he said. "I'm aal for daylight sailin'; they slip in pastye in the dark withoot a ticket, or give ye a Golden Text from the SundaySchool that looks like the chenuine article, and then where are ye?Forbye, it's no' that easy to watch a purser on the moonlight cruises; hewould make his fortune." He looked at his bright new funnel;imaginatively peopled the narrow deck with summer trippers; smelled thepervading odour of paint and tar, and glowed all over at the thocht ofhis beloved vessel taking the quay at Dunoon on a Saturday afternoon witha crowd of the genteelest passengers seated on herring firkins, and afiddle aft.
"I'll speak my mind aboot it to the owners whenever I get to Gleska!"he declared emphatically. "It's no' a chance they should let slip. Theymight could put up a bit o' a deck-house where a body could get a cup o'tea and a penny thing at tuppence."
"And wha would serve the tea, like?" asked Sunny Jim.
"There's nobody could do it cluverer than yoursel', Jum," said ParaHandy. "You would wash your hands and put on a brattie, and every noo andthen a chentleman would ship a penny in below his plate for atestimonial."
"That puts the feenish on it then!" said Sunny Jim, with emphasis. "Ijined this ship for a sailorman, and no' to hand roond cookies and liftthe tickets."
"And the mate would need to wear a collar," said Dougie. "It's no' athing I fancy at aal, at aal."
"A bonny-like skipper ye would look withoot a bridge to stand on,"wound up the engineer. "Besides, ye would need a Board o' Tredcertificate."
The Captain's visage fell. His dream dispelled. "Perhaps ye're right,"said he. "It would look a little droll. But, man, I aalways had thenotion that the Vita! Spark wass meant for something better than forcairryin' coals."
PARA HANDY, on Saturday night, wound up the ship's Kew-tested 2s. 11d.tin alarm chronometer with more than usual solemnity. It stopped as usualin the process, and he had to restore it to animation, after thecustomary fashion, by tapping it vigorously on the toe of his boot.
"If it wassna the law o' the land," he remarked, "I would see them atthe muschief afore I would be tamperin' wi' the time o' day the way Godmade it. We'll have to come up the quay to our beds next Setturday inbroad daylight; there's no consuderation for the sailor'sreputaation."
"Science!" said the mate, with bitterness. "Goodness knows what prankthem fellows'll be up to next! There wass nothing wrong wi' the time theway it wass, except that it wass aalways slippin' past when ye werenathinkin'."
"There's the nock for ye, Jim," said Para Handy. "Ye'll stay up tilltwo o'clock, and do the needful."
"What'll I stay up for?" asked Sunny Jim indignantly. "Ye can shiftthe handles noo; it's a' the same."
"But it's no' aal the same! If you would read the papers instead o'wastin' your time gallivanting, ye would see the Daylight Ack says twoo'clock's the oor for shifting nocks. Ye daurna do it a meenutesooner."
Sunny Jim laughed. "Right-oh, Captain!" he agreed. "I'll sit up anddae the shiftin' for ye. You and Dougie better leave me your watches,too; it'll be a' the yin operation."
"Can ye see the nock, Dougie? What time iss't by the Daylight Ack?"the Captain sleepily asked next morning without turning out of hisbunk.
The mate unhooked the clock, and incredulously surveyed its face."Stop you till I get my watch," he said, crawling out of his bunk. "ThemGerman nocks iss not dependable; ye couldna boil an egg wi' them."
A rich resonant snore came from the bunk of Sunny Jim.
"Holy sailor!" exclaimed Dougie, having consulted his watch; "it'shalf-past ten o'clock! No wonder I wass hungry! That's your science foryou!"
"Half-past ten o'clock!" said the Captain. "And chust you listen atthe way that fellow iss snorin'! Up this meenute, Jum, and make thebreakfast!"
It was with difficulty Sunny Jim was wakened, and then he proved ofthe most mutinous temper. "Ye can mak' your breakfast for yoursel's!" heprotested. "If I'm to sit up till twa o'clock in the mornin' to shift thetime, I'm no' gaun to rise till my sleep's made up."
Two seconds later he was snoring more resonantly than ever, insyncopated time with MacPhail, the engineer, who had volunteered to situp till two o'clock with him, and who had a snore of an intermittentgurgling character like one of his own steam pipes.
Between them the Captain and the mate made breakfast.
A blissful Sabbath calm was on loch and land when Para Handy put hishead up through the hatch. The Vital Spark was bumping softly against herfenders at a deserted quay; the smoke of morning fires was rising in thevillage. The tide was ebbing, but not yet far from full.
"I didna think they could do't," said the Captain.
"Do what?" asked Dougie, finishing off the last of the marmalade.
"The tide," said Para Handy; "it's no' near where it wass at this timeyesterday. It's shifted too."
"Chust what I told ye--science! The ruffians'll do anything! Do youno' think, Peter, we'll get punished some day for all this schemin' andcontrivance? Chust the work of unfidels! What way iss a man to ken noowhether it's Setturday night or Sunday morning? Many a wan'll go wrong attwelve o'clock on the Setturday night and start whistling. Noo thatthey're startin' takin' liberties wi' clocks and tides, ye'll see they'llcairry it further and play havoc wi' the almanacs. If they can rob us o'an oor they can steal a fortnight."
"Chust that!" agreed the Captain. "I could spare them a day or two atthe Whitsunday term; that's the sort o' thing they should abolish." Hesighed. "Indeed, it's a solemn thing, Dougie, to see the way they'reflyin' aal round to new human devices; do ye no' think me and you shouldgo to the church this mornin'?"
"Whatever you say yoursel'," said Dougie.
The bell was ringing as they went up the street, and had ceased whenthey reached the church. No other worshippers were visible.
"This place needs a great upliftin'," said Para Handy piously. "On aday like this, with the things of time upset and shifted, ye would thinkthey would be croodin' in to hear Mr M'Queen. Have ye any losengers?"
"Not wan!" said Dougie, "but maybe he'll no' be long."
The beadle was shutting the door of the church as they approached toenter. "Where are ye goin'?" he asked, with a curious look at them.
"Where would we be goin' but to hear my good frien', John M'Queen,"said the Captain fervently.
"Then ye'll better come back at half-past eleven," said the beadledryly. "This is no' the place for you at all; it's the SundaySchool."
"Holy sailors!" exclaimed the Captain; "what o'clock iss't?"
"Exactly half-past nine by the summer time," said the beadle, "butit's only half-past eight by naiture."
The Captain looked at Dougie. "Aren't we," said he, "the fools to beleavin' nocks and watches to fellows like Sunny Jim and Macphail! Thetricky duvvles! There's no' an inch o' a chentleman between them. It'sno' wan oor but three they put us forrit, and they're still snore-snorin'yonder!"
SUNNY JIM, with his sleeves rolled up, a sweat-rag stuck in thewaistband of his trousers, and his face much streaked with soot, clappeddown a bowl of eggs before the Captain, rinsed his hands in a pail ofwater, dried them on his waistcoat, and sat down on the edge of his bunkto enjoy his breakfast.
A gloomy silence fell upon the crew when they saw the eggs. They werejust plain ordinary eggs of oval shape, and no more soiled on the shellsthan usual, but their presence seemed momentous. Para Handy looked atthem like one entranced; Dougie put a finger out and touched themgingerly; Macphail withdrew his incredulous gaze from them with amuttered exclamation, and starting furiously spreading bread withmarmalade.
"Iss that eggs?" said the Captain, like one who was uncertain whetherthey were eggs or curling-stones.
"Oh no! Not at all!" cried Macphail, with bitter irony; "it's the bestDevonshire bacon, fried kidneys, kippered herring, finnan baddies,omelets, pork sausages. Jim would never shove us off wi' eggs!"
"They're duvvelish like eggs!" said Dougie lugubriously. "I never sawa better imitation. The look o' them fairly makes me grue."
"What way's the wind, Jum?" said Para Handy mildly. "I don't feel thesmell o' ham. Hurry you up, like a good laad, and bring us doon awise-like breakfast."
"That's a' the breakfast that's gaun," said Sunny Jim. "There's no abit o' ham in Tarbert."
"But, bless my he'rt! there's many another thing than ham a body couldenjoy!" said Para Handy. "There's things like--fush, and--sausages,and--fush, that a man could eat wi' some diversion. You're awfu' nerrow,Jum! You havena no variety. Even-on it's eggs wi' you; you havena had athing but eggs since we left Bowling."
"Tak' them or leave them!" said the cook; "the day'll come ye'll begled to get them. I'm no' a Grand Hotel nor an Italian Warehouse; I canonly gie ye what I can get, and there's dashed all left to eat in Tarbertsince the Fair, unless it's rhubarb."
The Captain chipped an egg with no enthusiasm. "Goodness knows," saidhe, "what this country would come to withoot the hens! Everybody in theland is eatin' eggs--eggs--eggs! Half the year there's nothing in themorning for ye but an egg. What, in aal the world, iss in an egg?"
"That's what I'm aye wonderin' when I start yin," said theengineer.
"There's nothing patent in an egg; it's chust a thing ye would expectfrom hens. If it wassna for the salt, ye might ass weel be eatin'blot-sheet. Did ye ever see any dufierence between wan egg andanother?"
"Some o' them's bigger," suggested Dougie, scooping out his own,apparently without much interest in the contents.
"That's the thing that angers me aboot an egg!" continued the Captain."It never makes ye gled to see it on the table; ye know at wance thething's a mere put-by because your wife or Jum could not be botheredmakin' something tasty."
"We'll hae to get the hens to put their heids thegither, and invent anew kind o' fancy egg for sailors," said Sunny Jim, consuming his withostentatious relish. "Yc can say whit ye like--there's naething bates acountry egg; and I can tell ye this, the lot o' ye, it's eggs ye're gaunto get for dinner tae; there's no' a bit o' butcher meat in Tarbert!"
"Holy smoke!" exclaimed the Captain. "Eggs for dinner! Not a morselmore will I be eating; you have spoiled my breakfast on me!"
The Vital Spark had her coals discharged by noon, and the Captain wentashore to a public-house for a change of diet. The very idea of eggsagain for dinner was repugnant to him, and several schooners of beerintensified his inward feelings of revolt against monotony of cuisine.There came into the bar a man he thought he knew; he said, "Hallo,Macdougall!" to him; "hoo's the fishin'?" and they had a glasstogether.
"What way's hersel'--the mustress keepin'?" Para Handy asked. "I hopeshe's splendid?"
"She's no bad at aal," said the other, with a little hesitation.
"Tell her I was askin' kindly for her health. I'm fine mysel'. Yon's anice bit hoose ye have, Johnny; it's very creditable to aalconcerned."
"It's no' that bad at aal!" replied the other, thinking for a moment."What way do ye no' come up some night and see us?"
"Nobody would be better pleased!" said Para Handy. "Iss yourmother-in-law still wi' ye?"
"Aye, she's yonder yet, but ach! ye needna mind for her; come up somenight, and have your supper.... Bring the boys!" Macdougall added witheffusive hospitality. So far, he had not suggested another drink.
"If I go up, I'll better go mysel'; there's four of us on board," saidPara Handy.
"Bring them all! This very night at seven o'clock, and, I assure you,you'll have supper."
"Hoots! That would be puttin' the wife to bother," said the Captain,with polite solicitude. "We would chust be goin' to have a crack."
"Ye'll have a crack, and ye'll have your supper too!" said Macdougallfirmly. "Mind and bring the boys! Sharp at seven, mind, and take yourmusic."
The Captain hurried on board his vessel, watched his crew disgustedlyeat eggs, which he professed disdain for, and when they had finished,told them of his invitation.
"Ye micht hae tell't us sooner!" said Macphail, with genuine vexation."There's a supper spoiled!"
"A capital cook, Mrs Macdougall!--namely, in the place for cooking,"callously said Para Handy. "I'm chust in trum mysel' for something elsethan eggs."
They dressed in their Sunday clothes, and went up at night to thehouse of John Macdougall.
"He's not at home, he's at the fishin'!" said a lady whom the Captainshook warmly by the hand, and addressed as Katrin.
"I met him in the toon at twelve the day, and he asked us to be sureand come to supper," said the Captain, much surprised.
"What was he like?" said she, with some amusement.
"A burly wise-like man, wi' a tartan kep; I ken him fine!"
She laughed; she was a cheerful body. "That's no' my man at all.Captain," said she; "but I'll tell ye who it was--his brother Peter;they're as like as peas!"
"Isn't this the bonny caper!" said Dougie, with distress. They stoodlike sheep.
"It's no' the first tune Peter played that trick," said the woman;"he's a rascal! If he had a house and a wife of his own, I would justadvise ye to go up, and take him at his word, but seein' ye're here,ye'll just come in and have your supper."
They went in, with mingled hope and diffidence, and she boiled themeggs!
"STOP you! We'll have a fine pant oot of Dougie; he's ass timid ass amountain hare," said Para Handy in the absence of his mate, who wasashore on one of the missions the crew of the Vital Spark entirelydisapproved of--to buy some special and exclusive "kitchen" for his tea.He had an unpleasantly ostentatious way of eating ham or kipperedherrings when the rest had nothing more piquant or interesting thanjam.
As a consequence of some deliberation and rehearsal, when Dougie cameback to the boat with his parcel he found an unusual bustle at an hourwhen, waiting for the tide to get her off at flood, the crew of the VitalSpark were apt to be yawning their heads off. The Captain was peeling hisguernsey off, preparatory to washing himself--a proceeding in itselfunusual enough to be surprising. Macphail, the engineer, was studying amap of the North Sea cut from some recent newspaper, and flourishing aone-legged compass. Sunny Jim was oiling the parts of a telescope he hadwon once in a raffle.
Such signs of unaccustomed activity could not but impress Dougie."What's wrong wi' ye?" he asked; "ye're duvvelish busy!"
"We'll be busier yet before we're done!" said the Captain, gravely andmysteriously, and turned his back to look over the shoulder of Macphailat the North Sea map. "Did ye find the place, Macphail?" he askedanxiously.
"Ay!" said the engineer. "It's just aboot whaur I said it was--adangerous place, fair hotchin' full o' mines."
"Chust that!" said Para Handy. "It's chust what I wass thinkin' tomyself. Well, well; we canna help it when the King and country caals. I'monly vexed aboot the boat." He stifled a sigh, bent over the enamelledbasin, and hurriedly damped himself: it must be admitted the afternoonwas cold.
"There's no' even the chance o' a medal on the job," said Sunny Jim."That's what gives me the needle!"
They behaved as if Dougie with his irritating groceries had noexistence. He determined to show no curiosity.
"It might be sweepin' mines they mean," said Para Handy in a little,drying his face. "Whatever it iss, it iss goin' to be a time oftrial."
"It's me that's gled I can swim," said Sunny Jim. "The very firstbang, and aff goes my galoshes! It's no' sae bad for me, as if I had awife and family."
Dougie pricked his ears.
"It's no' sweepin' mines," said the engineer emphatically. "If it wasto sweep mines they wanted us they would put steel plates roond the bowsand leave her light; there, wouldna be any sense in stuffin' her hold wi'cement and stones. Tak' you my word for it--she's gaun to jam the KielCanal. It's a risky job we're on, I'll warrant ye!"
"I wouldna care so much if it wasna for my aunty," said Sunny Jim in adoleful accent, with a wink to the engineer. "I aye made up her rent.Perhaps it's to cairry troops we're needed."
"Not at aal!" said Para Handy. "Where would ye put troops on the VitalSpark, and her hold filled up wi' causey and cement?"
Dougie's curiosity could no further be restrained. "What in aal theearth are ye palaverin' at?" he asked impatiently, and with someforebodings.
"I'm sorry to tell ye that, Dougald," said the Captain feelingly, "forit's a serious, serious business for us aal; the boat is commandeered. Ihave a kind o' letter here from the Admirality"--he produced it with aflourish from his trousers pocket. "Chust a line in their usual way:--'Report at Renfrew; get an extra dummy funnel and some wuden guns; fill upwi' causey and cement, and take the North Sea for it. To Captain Peter C.Macfarlane.'"
"'Peter C. Macfarlane,'" Dougie said, surprised. "I never heard o' the'C' before; where did ye get the title?"
"They must have kent my mother was a Cameron," said Para Handy; "andthey're always for the stylish thing in the Admirality. Never you mindaboot the title, Dougald; have ye an extra shirt or two and a pair o'mittens? Ye'll need them yonder."
"Where?" asked the mate, alarmed.
"In the North Sea. Amn't I tellin' ye we're commandeered!"
"I'll sec them to the muschief first!" said Dougie warmly. "If I'm todo the British Navy's work, it's no' in a cockle-shell!" But his heartwas in his boots.
For once his meal had no attractions for him, and the others, for thefirst time, shared his private ham with surprising appetite and relish,considering the tragic possibilities they discussed. So perfectly didthey sustain their parts as previously arranged among them that it neveroccurred to him to doubt the story.
"Of course, ye'll break the news to your mustress the best way that yecan," said the Captain, spreading jam on the bread with a soup spoon; "yeneedna put the worst face on the job; chust say it's an East Coast cargo,and ye'll send a postcaird home. I hope and trust ye kept up yourinsurance!"
"Of course, there's aye a chance they micht take us prisoners," saidSunny Jim. "That wouldna be sae bad."
"I ken a man that's no' goin'," said Dougie with profoundconviction.
"There's nane o' us can get oot o't," said the engineer, finishing thelast of the ham in an absent-minded way. "I think your letter makes thatquite plain, Peter?"
"It does that," said Para Handy, having scrutinised the documentagain, and shoved it under his plate for further reference if necessary.Dougie eyed it slyly, unobserved.
"The dashed thing is there's no' a uniform," said Sunny Jim. "Iwouldna mind sae much if we wore a blue pca-jacket wi' brass buttons, andthe name o' the boat on oor keps; if I'm to be drooned for my country Iwould like to be a wee bit tasty."
"There's a man I ken, and he's no' goin', whatever o't!" again saidDougie firmly,
The Captain had another inspiration. "Of course," said he, "they'regoin' to change the name o' the boat. There's a cruiser caaled the VitalSpark, and if we were sunk it would make confusion. The Chermans would besayin' we were the big one."
"There's one thing I can tell ye, and it's this--the man that iss notgoin' on this ploy iss me!" said Dougie, and slapped his knee.
"Toots, man! ye shouldna be so tumid!" said Para Handy; "Brutain'shardy sons!"
The rule of the vessel was that a man who indulged in extras to histea had to wash the dishes, and Dougie was left behind when the otherswent on deck. He lost no time in reading the document the Captain hadforgetfully left below his plate, and a great illumination came to himwhen he found it was nothing more than a second and final noticedemanding the Captain's poor-rates. "My goodness! wass there ever such alot o' liars?" said their victim. "Spoiled my tea on me! Stop you!"
By and by he went up on deck, and found his shipmates solemnlydiscussing the purpose of the dummy funnel and the wooden guns.
"It's to draw their torpedo fire," the engineer suggested. "Whenthey're bangin' awa' at us the cruiser'll slip by."
"And then it's domino wi' us!" said Sunny Jim lugubriously.
"There's wan thing I can say," said Para Handy unctuously, "and it'sthis--that my affairs is aal in the best condeetion; quite complete.There's no' a penny that I'm owin'."
"Except your poor-rates," broke in Dougie witheringly. "There's yourletter from the Admirality. It's in Berlin the whole o' ye should be, andwritin' Cherman telegrams."
WHEN tea was finished, Sunny Jim put on his Sunday clothes, turned upthe foot of his trousers, oiled his boots, put his cap on carefully, witha saucy tilt to it, and then spent several minutes violently brushingwhat was left below it of his hair. Thus only could his curl be coaxedinto that tasty wave above the forehead, and complete his fatal beautyfor the girls.
"Capital!" said Para Handy. "Never saw ye nicer, Jum; chust a regularNapoleon! Don't you shift another hair, or ye'll spoil yersel'!"
"The only other thing I could recommend," said Macphail, "is to putsome soap and water on a brush and gie a flourish aboot the ears."
Sunny Jim paid no attention. From the small tin box that held hisdunnage he produced his mouth harmonium and a tin of Glasgow toffee,which he stowed in his jacket pockets.
"My goodness!" said Dougie, the mate, "it's a desperate thing thislove; there's such expense in it! There's a sixpence away on sweeties foranother fellow's dochter!"
"Of course, we'll have a bite o' something ready for ye, Jum, when yecome back," remarked the Captain with magnificent sarcasm. "Dougie'll situp. Will a bit of cold roast chucken do, or would ye like an omelet?"
"Best respects to Liza," said the engineer rudely. "I think it's specsshe's needin' if you're her fancy."
Sunny Jim calmly lighted a cigarette and buttoned up his jacket. "Solong, chaps!" he said. "It's a pity ye're a' that old! Just a lot o'bloomin' fossils from the Fossil Grove, Whiteinch. Mak' yoursel's somegruel in a while, and awa' to your beds."
He was back to the Vital Spark in less than an hour in an obviouslyagitated state of mind.
"Bless me!" said Para Handy, starting up; "iss it that time o' night?The way time has o' slippin' past when ye're a fossil! Set you the table,Dougie, and put oot a chucken for his lordship. Maybe ye would like adrop o' something, Jum? To start wi', like. What way iss Liza keepin' inher health! My Chove! But yon's the beautious gyurl!"
"Shut up!" said Sunny Jim disgustedly. "I'm done wi' her, onywey! Iwouldna trust a woman like yon the length that I could throw her!"
"That's no far," said Macphail reflectively. "Sixteen stone, if she'san ounce. Tell me this--is she wearin' specs at last?"
"It would need to be some sort o' specs she was wearin' to seeonything in yon chap o' Mackay's she's awa' for a walk wi'," said SunnyJim with feeling. "Naething at a' to recommend him but a kilt and a hackon his heel!" Dougie, who never lost his head even in the most excitingcircumstances, asked the despondent lover abruptly if he had brought thetin of toffee back. In a moment of aberration Sunny Jim produced it, andput it down on the top of a barrel, and it sped so quickly round themseveral times that when his turn came there were only two sticky bitsleft in the bottom. He sucked them like one for whom toffee had nogreater taste than gas-work cinders. Such is the effect of unrequitedlove.
He was too profoundly grieved to be reticent. "I had a tryst wi' her,right enough, chaps. Eight o'clock, she said, at the factor's corner, andjust at that very meenute she went sailin' past wi' Dan Mackay, that'shame frae the Territorials at Dunoon, lettin' on he's wounded, and a' thetime, I'll bate ye, it's only a hack on his heel.
"'It's eight o'clock, Liza,' says I, and gied her the wink.
"'Fancy that!' says she, as nippy's onything. 'But ye've loads o'time; they're signin' on recruits in the armoury up till ten. Did ye hearaboot the war?' says she afore I could get my breath. 'It's fairlyragin'! Corporal Mackay's gaun oot to the front as soon as his feet getbetter.'
"And aff she went wi' Mackay, and left me standin' like a dummy! Yon'sno gentleman! He hadna a word to say for himsel'. Naething to tak' theeye aboot him but a kilt and a hack on his heel!"
"Holy smoke!" said Para Handy sympathetically. "Isn't that thedesperate pity? There's nothing noo in the heids o' the gyurls butsodgers. But ye canna blame the craturs! There's something smert abootthe kilt and the cockit bonnet."
"If I wassna one o' them old fossils from Whiteinch," remarked Dougie,with rancorous deliberation, "it wouldna be the like o' Liza Cameron, thetyler's dochter, could cast up to me a war wass ragin' and go off wi'another man--aye, even if he had a hack on every heel inside hisboots."
Sunny Jim was distressed almost to the verge of tears. "I'm fair sicko' this!" said he. "I'm gaun to 'list! Every quay this boat comes in tosomebody's shair to chip in something aboot my age and me no' bein'married, and whitna regiment I'm gaun to. The last trip we cam' up LochFyne I got as mony feathers as would stuff a bolster."
"I wass aye wonderin' what for so many feathers got into theporridge," said Dougie. "Did I no' say to the Captain yesterday, 'I'mfond o' porridge and I'm fond o' chicken, but I never cared to get themboth mixed'?"
"Mind ye, it's no' that I'm feared to 'list," said Sunny Jim. "I neverseen a German yet I oouldna knock the napper aff, and it couldna be worsein the trenches than in the howld o' this old vessel shovellin' coal. ButI'm feared they wouldna tak' me for a recruit----"
"If it's the bowly legs ye're thinkin' o'," said Macphail, "that's noony obstacle; ye're just the very make o' a horse marine."
Para Handy measured the disconsolate lover with a calculating eye. "Idoot," says he, "Jum hassna got the length for a horse marine unless theyput him through a mangle first. The regiment for you, Jum, is theBantams."
"I doot they wouldna pass me," said Sunny Jim. "But to show that womanI'm game enough, although I'm no' bloodthirsty, I'll go up this verymeenute and put in my name."
"You be fly and stand on your tiptoes!" Macphail cried after him as heclimbed up on the quay from the vessel's rail.
He came back in half an hour a little more disconsolate than ever. "Itell't ye!" said he, "they wouldna sign me on," and stood with his backclose to a glowing stove.
"No wonder," said the engineer. "Warpin' your legs still worse wi'standin' against the fire! Did I no' tell ye to get on'the tips o' yourtaes?"
"You're a disgrace to the boat," said Para Handy, with genuinevexation. "I'm black affronted! If Dougald and me wass a trifle younger,it's no' wi' troosers on we would be puttin' past the time. Just bringin'a bad name on the boat--that's what ye are! What way would they no' takeye?"
"Just look at the legs o' him!" said the engineer, as if they made thequestion quite ridiculous.
"It would likely be his character," suggested Dougie sadly. "They'reduvvelish parteecular noo aboot the character; it's no like the oldMilishia."
"It's no' my legs at a'; there's naething wrang wi' my legs," said thedisappointed candidate. "And they never asked aboot my character. But Ikent fine a' alang they wouldna tak' me."
"What for?" asked Para Handy. "Ye have all your faculties aboot ye,and ye're in your prime."
"It was this e'e o' mine," explained Sunny Jim, and indicated hisdexter optic, which had always a singularly stern expression even in hisamorous hours.
"That wan?" exclaimed the Captain. "That's the best o' the pair, to myopeenion, it's aye that steady. What's wrong wi't?"
"It's gless," said Sunny Jim, blushing; "they found it oot at thefirst go-aff."
"Holy frost!" said Para Handy. "Five years in this boat wi' us, and wenever kent it. Did I no' think ye were chust plain skeely!"
"JUMPIN' Jehosophat!" said Para Handy. "Here's Macphail. I doot theyhavena lifted him."
Dougie's visage fell. He had been confident that the want of anengineer would keep them idle in Tarbert for at least a week. "Isn't thatthe trash!" he said lugubriously. "Ye never could put dependence on him.Look you, has he any badge in his coat lapel? He iss chust the man wouldlet on a enchineer on the Vital Spark was a special tred. Ye canna be upto the quirks o' him."
"There is nothing on his coat lapel that I can see but a patch o'egg," said Para Handy, "and he had that when he started to go toStirling. Ye'll see we'll no' get rid o' Macphail so easy; they'regettin' gey parteecular in the airmy, and he never could keep thestep."
"Oh, man! if I had jist the ither eye!" said Sunny Jim in a passionateoutburst of yearning.
Macphail came down to the quay with the biscuit tin which fulfilledthe function of a suitcase when he travelled. His gait was most dejected,and his general air of infestivity was accentuated by the fact that hewore his Sunday clothes and a hat that, having been picked up casuallysome years before at the close of a ball in Crarae, had never fitted.
"See's your canister in case ye break the bottle," suggested theCaptain politely as his engineer stood on the edge of the quay andpiepared to jump on board.
"We werena expectin' to see ye again withoot your kilt," said Dougiemaliciously. Macphail's anatomical defects had been considered to renderkilts so absurdly out of the question that his shipmates always insistedGeneral Haig would instantly pick him for the Gordons.
Without a word the engineer sat down on his biscuit tin and burst intotears.
"Man, Macphail, I'm wonderin' at ye!" exclaimed the Captain. "Yoursystem's chust run doon wi' travellin'; a little drop o' Brutishspurrits--have ye much left in the canister?"
"Stand back and gie the chap breath!" implored Sunny Jim. "I'll bate apound they found there was something wrang wi' him internal. I wouldnabother, Mac, if it's checked in time ye'll maybe linger on foryears."
"Tach!" said Para Handy sympathetically. "I wouldna heed them doctors,Mac; it's only guess-work wi' them. But to tell ye the truth I didna likeyon chrechlin' cough ye had since ye went afore the Tribunal. The onlyhope I had wass ye were puttin' 't on. If I had chust a wee small drop ofspurrits wi'some sugar in't--will ye no' sit on this bucket?--a canisteriss cold."
"Ye may be glad they wouldna take ye!" said Dougie consolingly. "Evenif it wass only for the sake o' yer wife and pickle children."
"That's the dashed thing!" sobbed Macphail shamelessly; "they'retakin' me richt enough. I've passed the doctors at Stirling, and I have aticket here to jine a regiment to-morrow at Fort Matilda."
"Oh, michty!" exclaimed Sunny Jim with envy. "Whit regiment?"
"I canna mind its name," said the engineer, drying his eyes with apiece of waste; "but it starts wi' an F, and I'm to be a private. Andme!--I don't ken the least wee thing aboot the way to be a private! I wasbred an engineer."
In proof of these lamentable tidings he produced an official documentwhich declared he was physically fit in every respect, and a card withwhich to present himself to the office for recruits.
"Man alive! Did ye no' cough at them?" asked Para Handy. "Yonchrechlin' cough wass chust a masterpiece."
"Cough!" exclaimed Macphail. "I coughed till ye would think it was theCloch on a foggy night, but yon chaps never heeded. They put a tape abootmy chest, and chapped me between the shoulders, and listened could theyhear my circulation. I was stripped stark naked--"
"My Chove! issn't that chust desperate!" said the Captain,horrified.
"I don't care!" cried Macphail in an excess of indignation. "I'm no'gaun to go, and that's a' aboot it!" He incautiously rose from his seatand stamped the deck.
"Wi' a little wee drop sugar in't, there's nothing better for acough," said the Captain, hurriedly opening the biscuit tin. He lookeddisappointed. "Tach!" he said. "There's only an empty gill bottle and wanother garment. That iss not the way a chentleman would be travellin' fromStirling."
"See here!" said Sunny Jim with some eagerness. "Did they tak' yourphotograph?"
"No," said the melancholy engineer.
"Then gie me your tickets and I'll go to Fort Matilda in the name o'Dan Macphail. They'll never ken the difference. If it wasna this e'e o'mine was gless, I would hae 'listed a year ago. I've tried, and I'vebetter tried to jine, but they'll no' let ye jine wi' a glessy yin unlessye have lots o' influence."
"Ye canna hide that eye on them; it looks that flippant!" said theCaptain incredulously.
Macphail hurriedly handed over his documents lest any debate shoulddiminish the young man's ardour.
"They canna go back on the doctor's line!" said Sunny Jim. "It sayshere Dan Macphail is medically fit--that's me, and I'm faur better valuefor the British Airmy wi' my glessy than Macphail would be wi' a full seto' een and his Sunday specs and his he'rt no' in it. It's the chance o'my life!"
"I wash my hands of it!" said Dougie, who had not yet recovered fromhis disappointment at the engineer's return. "It is against the Defenceo' the Realm to pass gless eyes on the British Airmy, and ye'll get thisboat in trouble."
"I jist have time to catch the boat for Greenock," said Sunny Jim. Heput the documents in his pocket, buttoned his jacket, and climbedashore.
THREE weeks after Sunny Jim stole into the Scottish Fusiliers underfalse pretences with the name and papers of Macphail, the engineer, and aglass eye he had previously made a dozen vain attempts to foist onrecruiting officers as the natural article, he turned up in his uniformon the Vital Spark. He carried himself so erect that he had a rake aftlike a steamer's funnel, his chest preceding him by about nine inches,and his glengarry bonnet cocked on three hairs. Every button glinted.
"Jumpin' Jehosophat!" exclaimed the Captain. "It's on you they've madethe dufference! Wi' a step like that ye would make a toppin' piper. Ye'refar more copious aboot the body than ye were."
"Broader in every direction!" said Dougie, with genuine admiration."By the time they're done wi' ye, ye'll be a fair Goliath."
Macphail looked sourly on his substitute, but even he could notrestrain surprise. "I take the credit," said he, "for the makin' o' ye;if it wasna for my testimonials ye wouldna be in the airmy yet."
Sunny Jim saluted his old shipmates with a rapid movement that threwhis bonnet on to two hairs and an eyebrow, then cut away the right handsmartly.
"Cheer up, chaps!" he said; "the war's near by; I'm gaun oot wi' thevery next draft to put the feenisher on it."
"Did they no' say nothin' aboot your eye?" asked Para Handy, intentlyregarding that notorious organ.
"Oh, they just passed the remark that it was a fair bummer for theshootin'-ranges, seein' I wouldna need to shut it," said Sunny Jim. "Butwe had a kind o' a pant wi't the first day I was on parade. I was daein'the Swedish exercise, and sweatin' that much the glessy yin near slippedoot. I put up my hand to kep it, and the sergeant-major says, 'Whit'swrang wi' your eye, Macphail?'
"'There's something in it,' says I.
"'Then fall to the rear three paces and tak' it oot,' says he, 'andno' mak' a bloomin' demonstration o' the squad; the folk that's lookin'on'll think ye're greetin'.'
"I took it oot and slips it into my pocket, and when I steps into theranks again the sergeant-major nearly fainted.
"'Gless!' said he, when I explained it was a fancy yin. 'Man, it's no'a sodger you should be, but a war correspondent; ye have half the fullequipment for the job!'"
"And whit kind o' a situation hae ye?" asked Macphail.
"Oh, I'm a cook," said Sunny Jim. "It's really a chef's job, for yehae to be parteecular."
"Oh, my goodness!" cried Macphail. "The Scottish Fusiliers is gaun tosuffer."
"No fears!" said Sunny Jim; "cookin' in a camp is no' like cookin' ina coal-boat; it's no' a pound o'boiled beef ham and a quarter loaf that'syonder; the place is fair infested wi' the best o' butcher meat."
"Still-and-on it must be a hard life, James," suggested Para Handy."Everything by word o' command, and no time for to pause and toconsuder."
"It's a gentleman's life," declared the young recruit. "Naething hardaboot it, except that ye have to keep your teeth brushed. I don't think Icould think o' goin' back to follow the sea when the war's past;sodgerin' puts ye aff the notion o' a sedimentary life. I'm thinkin' o'gaun in for bein' a major; the best yins does it, and ye get ahorse."
They gave the ambitious son of Mars a cup of tea, and two boiled eggsto it; he politely disposed of them, though it was evident such fare wasrather homely for a chef. His new fastidiousness only came out when heasked for a saucer; he forgot that the only one on board was used for theengineer's black soap.
"The only thing that's wrang wi' the Fusiliers is that they spoil ye,"he explained apologetically. "Every other day there's a duff."
"Whit like iss the other chentlemen in the business wi' ye?" inquiredDougie.
"The very best!" said Sunny Jim, with enthusiasm. "It's yonder ye meetwi' genteel society; regular gentlemen, tip-top toffs right enough. Thechap that's lyin' next to me in the hut's in a capital business o' hisain aboot Dairy; I think it's linen drapery, for every sleeve he has isfilled to the brim wi' hankies."
"Jehosophat!" said Para Handy. "Dougie will boil another egg for yethis meenute."
"I hope," said Macphail, "that ye'll no' mak' a Ned o' yoursel' in onyway in the airmy, seein' ye're there in the name o' Dan Macphail. TheMacphails was aye respectable, and I wouldna care to have my reputationspoiled."
Dougie laughed derisively. "The Macphails!" he exclaimed. "Everybodykens they came from Ireland--Fenians and Sinn Feiners."
"Your reputation," said Sunny Jim indignantly. "Ye're aye takin' ootyour reputation and polishin' it up the same's it was a trombone or acomet; no' much o' a reputation, and ye needna bother. To tell ye thetruth, I found your reputation was the worst thing I could tak' wi' me tothe Fusiliers. By George, they had your history in their books!"
"It's a lie!" shouted the engineer, reddening.
"It's as true as I'm tellin' ye! I wasna jined a week when I went tomy officer and telit him straight I wasna Macphail at a'; and wasna gaunto stand the brunt o' bein' Dan Macphail. For the recruitin' officer hadDan Macphail doon in his books for a married man wi' five o' a family,and they were gaun to tak' so much aff my pay every week for your wife'sallooance!"
THE rain came down on Tarbert in a torrent. Dougie, while the cardswere being shuffled and dealt again, put his head out by the scuttle, andlooked up the deserted quay at the blurred lights of the village.
"What in the wide world are ye doin' there?" querulously demanded ParaHandy. "If ye keep that scuttle open any longer we'll be swamped! Come inand take your hand; it's no' ke-hoi we're playin'."
"It's a desperate night," said Dougie, shivering in an atmospherethat, now the hatch was closed, was stuffier than that of an oven. "Raineven-on; ass black ass the Earl o' Mansfield's waistcoat, and nothin'stirrin' in the place but the smell o' frying herrin'."
"Herrin'!" exclaimed the Captain, starting to his feet, and slammingdown his cards. "That puts me in mind I wass to caal the night on EddieMacvean, the carter. I clean forgot! I'm sorry to leave ye, laads, butye'll get your revenge to-morrow, maybe."
A minute later, and he was off the Vital Spark, with two-and-ninepencein his pocket, the total amount of gambling currency on the boat, notcounting Dougie's lucky sixpence.
It was discovered by his shipmates, left behind, that the cards he hadabandoned were "rags" without exception.
Macvean was apparently alone in his house when the Captain entered,sitting quite disconsolately by his fire, smoking.
"I wass up the toon for a message, Eddie," explained the visitor, "andI thocht I would gie ye a roar in the passin'. What way are ye keepin',this weather?"
"I canna compleen," replied the carter in a doleful tone, as if hebitterly regretted his obviously robust condition of health. "Are ye fineyoursel'?"
"What way iss the mustress?" politely continued the Captain. "I hopeshe's keepin' muddlin' weel."
Eddie Macvean sighed profoundly. "That's the trouble in this hoose,"he remarked; "there's no come and go in her. She's that dour! I got thefinest offer o' a wee coal business in Lochgilphead, but she's that takenup wi' Tarbert for gaiety and the like, she'll no' hear tell o'flittin'."
"Chust that!" commented Para Handy sympathetically. "Did ye no' trycoaxin' her?"
"It's no' the poker I would try wi' Liza Walker, you may be sure,Peter! I have been throng coaxin' her aal this week wi' that muchpatience ye would think I wass coortin', but she'll no budge! She says ifI'm goin' to take her to Lochgilphead, it'll be in her coffin. Nothin'for her but gaiety! It's them Young Women's Guilds that's leadin' themoff their feet!"
"Iss she oot at the Guild the night?" inquired the Captain, with awell-simulated air of regret at the lady's absence.
"No," said the husband sadly, "she's away to her bed wi' a tirravee ofa temper."
There was a loud banging on the wall which divided the room ofMacvean's house from the kitchen; he darted next door with significantalacrity, and was gone ten minutes.
"I canna make her oot at aal, at aal!" he remarked on returning."She's tellin' me where I'll get clean stockin's for mysel', and to sendoot a pair o' sheets she has in the bottom of the kist for manglin'."
"Iss she angry?" inquired Para Handy.
"That's the duvvelish thing aboot her noo," replied the distractedhusband. "She's quite composed, and caalin' me Edward. She says I wass agood man to her nearly aal the time we were togither."
"God bless me!" exclaimed Para Handy, staggered. "Ye should get thedoctor. Never let the like o' that go too far! It might be somethinginward!"
There was another banging on the wall; Macvean went out again, andcame back more confounded than ever.
"I never saw Liza in my life like that before!" he said. "She saysshe's quite resigned, and the only account against her iss a gallon ofparaffin oil she got last Tuesday in the merchant's. I think she's kindo' dazed. She's wantin' a drink o' water."
"If I was you, Eddie, I would get the doctor," advised the Captainfirmly. "Ye would be vexed if anything happened to her, and she died onye in weather like this."
The carter returned from his wife's bedside with the empty cup and alook of greater anxiety.
"She says there's nothing wrong wi' her; no pain nor nothing, exceptthat when she dovers over she dreams she's in Lochgilphead poorhouse, andwakens wi' a start. Her voice is aal away to a whisper. When I spokeaboot the doctor she said I wassna to let him in the door ass long assshe had aal her faculties. I'm to gie ye her best respects, and tell yeher faith wass aye in the Protestant releegion. 'Tell CaptainMacfarlane,' she says,' to be a sober man, and be good to hisfamily.'"
"It's the munister she's needin', Eddie, or a drop o' spirits," saidthe Captain gravely, though a little annoyed at the imputation. "Slip youoot and rouse the munister; he'll be in his bed. Or, do ye think yoursel'ye would try the spirits first?"
But another knocking summoned the carter, who returned to the kitchen,weeping. "There's something desperate wrong wi' Liza!" he blubbered; "shewants me to go round to the baker's shop and order a seed-cake."
"What for?" asked Para Handy, astonished.
"Goodness knows!" said Macvean; "the only seed-cake ever I saw wass atNew Year or a funeral. I'm vexed I ever spoke about Lochgilphead! Do yethink yoursel' there is any danger, Peter?"
The Captain had no time to answer, for another knocking had calledaway his host, who returned in a little wringing his hands.
"There iss nothing for it but to go for the doctor," he said. "She'sramblin'; she says I'm to try and keep the hoose together, and no' pairtwi' her mother's sofa."
"I'll go ben and see her," said Para Handy.
An oil-lamp on the chimney-piece lit up the room where Mrs Macvean waslying. The Captain was surprised to find her looking remarkably well,with the hue of health on her face, though a little embarrassed by hisunexpected appearance. She whipped off her nightcap.
"What way are ye keepin', Mrs Macvean?" he asked, in sympathetictones.
The patient paid no heed to him, beyond putting up her hands to feelif her hair was tidy. In a feeble voice she remarked to her husband,"Edward, ye'll give my Sunday frock to Aunty Jennet, and my rings to MaryMacMillan; she wass kind, kind to me!"
"'Dalmighty!" said the Captain, scratching his ear. "Do ye no' thinkthe least wee drop o' spirits would lift ye, Liza?"
"Nothing'll lift me noo but John Mackay, the joiner," sobbed thepatient. "Tell him to keep my held away from them M'Callums when he'scarryin' me doon the stairs.... And oh, Edward!" she continued, "I hopeye'll be happy in Lochgilphead, though it's a place I never caredfor."
Her husband by now was prostrate with emotion, incapable ofspeech.
"Did ye order the seed-cake?" she asked.
"It's aal right aboot the seed-cake," broke in Para Handy. "MrsCleghom, the baker's widow, iss takin' it in hand. I wudger ye she'llmake a topper! She's terrible vexed to hear ye're poorly, and says ye'reno' to bother. She's comin' in in the mornin' to make Eddie'sbreakfast."
Mrs Macvean at this sat up in bed with an amazing recovery of strengthand speech, her visage purple with indignation.
"Comin' here!" she cried. "She'll no' put a leg inside this door if Ican help it! I can see, noo, Edward, what ye're plottin'--to get me ooto' the road and mairry the bakehoose, but I'm no deid yet! It's only youand your Lochgilphead--"
"It's aal right aboot Lochgilphead, Liza," said the Captainsoothingly. "Edward's changed his mind; he's goin' to cairry on inTarbert."
"Cairry on!" exclaimed the wife. "He'll no' cairry on wi' SusanCleghorn anyway, and I'm goin' wi' him to Lochgilphead. If he had chustasked me the right way, I would be quite agreeable from the start. Awayoot o' this, the pair o' ye, till I get on my garments!"
"PHILANDERIN'; what in the world's philanderin'?" inquired Dougie,honestly eager for the definition of a word which Macphail the engineerhad recently learned from a Blue Bell novelette, and was apt to drag intoevery conversation about the female sex.
"It's the same as flirtin', but fancier, if ye follow me," repliedMacphail. "Many a chap starts flirtin' jist to pass the time and get thename o' being a regular teaser, and finds himsel' merried withoot knowin'hoo the devil it happened to him. A philanderer's different. He has a'his wits aboot him and doesna mak' a pet o' any woman in particular.He'll have half a dozen o' them knittin' socks for him at the same timein different localities, but the last thing he would think o' wastin'money on would be a bride's-cake. There's no philanderers in lodgin's;they're all supportin' poor old mothers."
"The best philanderer I ever kent," said Para Handy, "wass HurricaneJeck. He wass a don at it when he wass younger. He would cairry on wi' awhole Dorcas meetin' if they didna crood roond him aal at wance. Ye neversaw a more nimble fellow, and there he iss--no' merried yet, nor showin'any signs o't."
"Hurricane Jeck's no' my notion o' a proper philanderer," commentedthe engineer with some acidity. "He hasna the knowledge for't--a chapthat never opens a book!"
"There's no books needed," retorted the Captain. "Jeck had the gift bynature. I'm speakin' o' the time before he went sailin' foreign, when hehad his whuskers. We were on the Mary Jane thegither, and faith I wasnaslack mysel', though I never had his agility. He wass ass smert ass salton a sore finger. There wassna a port inside o' Paddy's Milestone whereJeck wass not ass welcome wi' the girls ass Royal Cherlie! But I can tellye it took some management!
"I mind that wan time Jeck got into a nesty babble wi' a couple o'girls in Gleska.
"He wass very chief at the time wi' a young weedow wife in Oban thathad a pickle money o' her own. If Jeck wass not a rover he would havemerried her, for she was a fine big bouncin' woman quite suitable for asailor, but he couldna make up his mind between her and a girl calledLucy Cameron he wass walkin' oot wi' any time the vessel wass inGleska.
"Wan time yonder when the Mary Jane wass in Oban the weedow trystedJeck to take her to the Mull and Iona Soiree, Concert, and Ball in theWaterloo Rooms in Gleska. Jeck wass always the perfect chentleman; hewould promise anything if it wassna that week.
"The night o' the Mull and Iona Gaitherin' came on, and Jeck cleanforgot his engagement wi' Mrs Maclachlan. That very night he was bookedfor Hengler's Circus wi' Lucy Cameron. It wassna till the weedow came tohis lodgin's in a cab, wi' a fine new pair o' white kid gloves for himand a flooer for his button-hole, that the poor chap minded o' hispromise.
"A lad less nimble in his wits would have thocht the poseetionhopeless, but Jeck wassna so easy daunted. Though he wass dressed aalready for the Circus, he went to the Mull and lona, clapped MrsMaclachlan doon among a wheen o' freen's o' hers from Tobermory chustbefore the soiree started; took a bloodin' nose, by his way of it, andwass oot in the street again in ajeffy, skelpin' it for LucyCameron's."
"Wasn't that the rogue?" exclaimed Dougie admiringly.
"When the Mull and Iona wass singin' the chorus o' Farewell toFuinary, or maybe aboot the time the orangers wass passin' roond in theWaterloo Rooms, Jeck wass sittin' across the street in Hengler's wi' LucyCameron, clappin' his hands at my namesake, Handy Andy the clown.
"Every noo and then he would take oot his watch when Lucy wassnalookin', and calculate hoo far the Mull and Iona folk would be in theirprogramme, and in twenty meenutes his nose began to blood again.
"'Beg pardon!' says Jeck--for he was aalways the perfect chentleman--'but I'll have to go oot a meenute for a key to put doon my back.' Andaway he went like the wind across the street to the Waterloo Rooms.
"He was chust in time for the start o' the Grand March.
"'Are ye better?' asked the weedow, quite anxious, never jalousin'Jeck wass a fair deceiver.
"'Tip-top!' says Jeck, and into the Grand March wi' her like atrumpeter. It wass chenerally allooed there wassna a handsomer couple onthe floor. He feenished Triumph wi' the weedow, saw her settled wi'another pairtner for Petronella, and then skipped like a goat across toHengler's. Little did Lucy Cameron ken her lad wass at the dancin'!
"Every twenty meenutes Jeck wass oot o' the circus on some excuse orother, and puttin' in a dance wi' the Oban weedow, then back again toLucy. He wass so busy between the two o' them he couldna even get adrink, and at the Mull and Iona his condeetion was noticed. At the circusLucy wass wonderin' too, for he aye came back wi' an oranger, or a pokeo' sweeties from the baal, and a smell o' lavender, but as right as aRechabite.
"For four mortal oors Jeck ran the ferry this way; when the circuswass feenished he took Miss Cameron home, and then back to the WaterlooRooms, where he made a night o't.
"He told me aal aboot it himsel' next day. 'If I hadna my health,Peter,' he said, 'I couldna do it. And the dash thing iss they're bothfine girls! I wass nearly poppin' the question to Lucy, and MrsMaclachlan wass most attractive.'
"The thing would have passed aal right if it wassna that the 'ObanTimes' next week gave an account o' the Mull and Iona, wi' Jeck's nameamong the chentlemen that wass present, and Lucy saw it. She wassdesperate angry!
"Jeck denied it; said it wass aalthegither a mistake; that somebodymust have been tradin' on his reputation; but Lucy's mother had a lodgerin the polls force that made an investigation, and it wass all up wi'poor Jeck and the Cameron family.
"And it didna stop there neither, for the polisman informed the Obanweedow the way Jeck had been cairryin' on, and the next time Jeck made acaal on her in Oban to clinch things for a merrage, Mrs Maclachlanwouldna speak to him."
"That shows ye," said the engineer, "that he wasna a rale philanderer;a philanderer's never found oot."
"TALKIN' aboot the health," said Para Handy, "the drollest man I eversaw that made a hobby o' his health wass a pairty in Muscadale caaled theWet Man."
"What in the name o' goodness did they caal him that for?" asked themate.
"Chust because he wass never dry," replied the Captain. "He went abootdamp for forty years, and would be livin' yet if it wassna for thedoctors. They took him to a cottage hospital in Campbeltoon, dried hisclo'es on him, and packed him in a bed wi' hot-water bottles. He drankevery drop that wass in the bottles before the mornin', and efter thatthey wouldna gie him any more, so he withered like the rose o' Sharon inthe Scruptures. Died o' drooth, like a geranium in a flooer-pot! He wassover ninety years o' age, wi' aal his faculties aboot him till the end,and never used a towel."
"My goodness!" exclaimed the mate.
"Many a time I'll be thinkin'," said Para Handy, "that the man inMuscadale wass born a bit before his time. If he wass spared anotherfifty years the world would see there iss a lot o' nonsense aboot scienceand the droggists' shops, and that long life iss aal a maitter o'moisture."
"If bein' wet would keep us healthy," interjected Macphail theengineer, "we would never dee at a' in the West Coast shippin' tred."
"There iss a lot o' rubbidge talked regairdin' damp," continued theCaptain. "Colin MacClure in Muscadale proved it. He wass fifty years o'age when he took a desperate cold that he couldna get rid o' till he fellwan day in the watter in the Sound o' Jura, and when they fished him oothe hadna a vestige. A chrechlin' cough he had wass gone completely.
"From that day he wass a changed man, and pinned his faith in watter,ootside and in. He couldna pass a pump-well withoot a swig at it, andwhen any other fisherman would be takin' a Chrustian dram in moderationwi' his frien's, nothin' but a barrel and a bailin'-dish would serve theWet Man o' Muscadale."
"Issn't that chust duwelish!" exclaimed Dougie. "I would say there issnothing worse for a man's inside than watter; look at the way it rotsyour boots!"
"He got heavy, heavy on the watter; aye nip-nippin' at it when hethocht that nobody wass lookin'. Many a time his wife--poor body!--had togo and look for him at the river-side and bring him home."
"I can take a little watter in moderation," said the mate; "a drop o'tin your tea does herm to nobody, but it's ruinaation to be alwaystipplin' at it."
"It would be diabetes," suggested the engineer.
"There wassna a diabete in Colin's composeetion," said the Captain."His constitution wass grand. He could eat tackets and sleep like a babeon a slab o' granite. A big bold healthy fisherman wi' a noble whusker onhim!--wan o' the chenuine old MacClures that's in the 'History o' theClans.' If there wass any germs o' any kind in the Wet Man o' Muscadalethey would need to wear life-belts. The only time that Colin wass indanger for his health was in frosty weather; he would get ass hard thenass a curlin'-stone, and the least bit jar against the corner o' a hoosewould knock a chip off him.
"'Be wet and ye'll be weel!' wass Colin's motto; he could prove it wi'the Bible. 'Noah,' he would say, 'made a fair hash o' the business inlandin' on Ben Ararat; if it wassna for that, we would be sweemin' abootthe deep the day like fishes, in the best o' health and trum, and no needfor your panel doctors. Ye never heard o' a herrin' yet that hadlumbago.'
"From the day that he wass picked oot o' the Sound o' Jura, he neverlet his clo'es dry on his back for fear o' trouble, and the very sight o'a dry shirt on a washin'-green would make him shiver. He wass the wan manin Scotland ye would find lamentin' if it wassna rainin'. Colin's notiono' comfort wass a good big hole in the roof o' the hoose, a dub on thehearth, a thin alpaca jecket stickin' to his ribs, all plashin', and hissea-boots full o' waiter."
"Did he no' get rheumatism?" inquired the mate, astounded.
"Not him! He wass ass flippant on his feet ass an Irish ragman, andnever spent a penny on his health till the day they buried him. Hecairried his notion to a redeeculous degree, for he was staunchteetotal."
"If he was livin' the day he would get a' the watter he needed in halfa mutchkin," suggested the engineer cynically.
"That wouldna do for the Wet Man o' Muscadale," said the Captain. "Yesee, he had to be wet ootside ass well ass in. Many a sore trauchle hiswife had wettin' him wi' a watterin'-can in the summer, the same's hewass a bed o' syboes. She wass a poor wee cricket o' a low-country woman,and darena even dry the blankets efter washin' them for fear that Colinwould get a cold. On their golden weddin' day she said to a neebour,'Bonny on the golden weddin'! My man's yonder sittin' on the ebb andsteepin' like a lump o' dulse.'
"The Wet Man thrived so weel on the watter treatment that a lot o' thefolk in the countryside aboot began to follow his example, and thennothin' would do for Colin but to start a new releegion. At first hethocht, himsel', o' joinin' the Baptists, thinkin' that the Baptistchurches had a pond in them the same ass the Greenheid Baths in Gleska,but when he heard that the Baptists only got a splash in a kind o' boyneand then came oot and dried themsel's, he wass fair disgusted.
"'They're chust a lot o' back-sliders,' he says; 'they havena thefundamentals o' releegion in them!' So he started a body o' his own theycaaled the MacClurites. The other denominations gave them the by-name o'the Muscadale Dookers, and they suffered a lot o' persecution, them bein'so close on Campbeltoon. The MacClurites never used oilskins norumberellas; they're tellin' me the second cheneration o' them had webfeet and feathers on them chust like jucks.
"The MacClurites quarrelled among themsel's aboot the doctrine; somesayin' salt watter wasna the naitural element o' salvaation, and othersthat ye werena proper wet unless ye fell in the Sound o' Jura. It cleanbroke up the MacClurites, and they aal went back to the Wee Free Churchass dry ass anything, and died in the prime o' life at seventy oreighty.
"But Colin MacClure never flinched nor bowed the knee toRamoth-Gilead. When the laird put rhones and a galvanised roof on hisdwellin', he took his abode below high-water mark in a skiff turnedupside doon that wass aalways flooded at every tide."
"He would be a' mildew," said the engineer.
"Fair blue-moulded!" said the Captain. "For fifty years the clo'eswass never dry on him; ye would think it wass gress wass growin' in hisback, but he went aboot to the very last wi' wonderful agility. It isfrom scenes like them that Scotia's grandeur springs."
THERE was absolutely nothing to do to pass the time till six o'clock,and Hurricane Jack, whose capacity for sleep under any circumstances andat any hour of the day or night was the envy of his shipmates, stretchedhimself out on the hatches with a fragment of tarpaulin over him. Inabout two seconds he was apparently dreaming of old days in the Chinaclipper trade, and giving a most realistic imitation of a regular snorterof a gale off the Ramariz.
"There's some people iss born lucky," remarked the Captainpathetically. "Jeck could go to sleep inside a pair o' bagpipes and a manplayin' on them. It's the innocent mind o' him."
"It's no' the innocent mind o' him, whatever it iss," retorted Dougiewith some acidity. "It's chust fair laziness; he canna be botheredstandin' up and keepin' his eyes open. Ye're chust spoilin' him. That'swhat I'm tellin' ye!"
Para Handy flushed with annoyance. "Ye think I'm slack," he remarked;"but I'm firm enough wi' Jeck when there's any occasion. I sent himpretty smert for the milk this mornin', and him wantin' me to go mysel'.I let him see who wass skipper on this boat. A body would think you wassbrocht up on a man-o'-war; ye would like to see me aye bullyin' thefellow. There's no herm in Jeck Maclachlan, and there iss not a nimblersailor under the cope and canopy, in any shape or form!"
Dougie made no reply. He sat on an upturned bucket sewing a patch onthe salient part of a pair of trousers with a sail-maker's needle.
"There ye are!" resumed the Captain. "Darnin' away at your clothes andthem beyond redemption! Ye're losin' aal taste o' yoursel'; what ye'reneedin's new garments aalthegither. Could ye no', for goodness sake, buya web o' homespun somewhere in the islands and make a bargain wi' atyler?"
"Tylers!" exclaimed Dougie. "I might as weel put mysel' in the handso' Rob Roy Macgregor! They're askin' £6, 10s. the suit, and it'sextra for the trooser linin'."
Para Handy was staggered. He had bought no clothes himself since hismarriage, and had failed to observe the extraordinary elevation in thecost of men's apparel.
"Holy Frost!" he cried. "That's a rent in itsel'! If that's the wayo't, keep you on plyin' the needle, Dougie. It's terrible the price o'everything nooadays. I think, mysel', it's a sign o' something goin' tohappen. It runs in my mind there wass something aboot that in the Book o'Revelations. I only paid £2, 10s. for a capital pilot suit the yearI joined the Rechabites."
The mate suspended his sewing, and looked up suspiciously at theskipper.
"It's the first time ever I heard ye were in the Rechabites," heremarked significantly. "Hoo long were ye in them?"
"Nearly a week," replied Para Handy, "and I came oot o' them wi'flyin' colours at the start o' the Tarbert Fair. It wass aal a mistake,Dougie; the tyler at the time in Tarbert took advantage o' me. Afisherman by the name o' Colin Macleod from Minard and me wass very chiefat that time, and he wass a Freemason. He would aye be givin' grips andmakin' signs to ye. By his way o't a sailor that had the grip couldtrevel the world and find good company wherever he went, even if he didnaken the language.
"Colin wass high up in the Freemasons; when he had all his medals andbrooches on he looked like a champion Hielan' dancer.
"He wass keen, keen for me to join the craft and be a reg'larchentleman, and at last I thocht to mysel' it would be a greatadvantage.
"'Where will I join?' I asked him.
"'Ye'll join in Tarbert; there's no' a Lodge in the realm o' Scotlandmore complete,' says Colin. 'And the first thing ye'll do, ye'll go upand see my cousin the tyler; he'll gie ye a lot o' preluminaryinstruction.'
"The very next time I wass in Tarbert I went to the tyler right enoughfor the preluminaries.
"'I wass thinkin' o' joinin' the Lodge,' I says to him, 'and ColinMacleod iss tellin' me ye're in a poseetion to gie me a lot o' tips tostart wi'. What clothes will I need the night o' the meetin'?'
"He was a big soft-lookin' lump o' a man, the tyler, wi' a smell o'singed cloth aboot him, and the front o' his jecket aal stuck over wi'pins; and I'll assure ye he gave me the he'rty welcome.
"'Ye couldna come to a better quarter!' he says to me, 'and it'll no'take me long to put ye through your faoin's. There's a Lodge on Friday,and by that time ye'll be perfect. Of course, ye'll have the propergarments?'
"'What kind o' garments?' says I. 'I have nothing at aal but what I'mwearin'; my Sabbath clothes iss all in Gleska.'
"'Tut! tut!' says he, quite vexed. 'Ye couldna get into a Lodge wi'clothes like that; ye'll need a wise-like suit if ye're to join thebrethren in Tarbert. But I can put ye right in half a jiffy.'
"He jumped the counter like a hare, made a grab at a pile o' cloththat wass behind me, hauled oot a web o' blue-pilot stuff, and slapped iton a chair.
"'There's the very ticket for ye!' he says, triumphant. 'Wi' a suit o'that ye'll be the perfect chentleman!'
"I wassna needin' clothes at aal, but before I could open my mouth tosay Jeck Robe'son he had the tape on me. Noo there's something aboot atyler's tape that aye puts me in a commotion, and I lose my wits.
"He had the measure o' my chest in the time ye wud gut a herrin', andwass roond at my back before I could turn mysel' to see what he wass upto. 'Forty-two; twenty-three,' he bawls, and puts it in a ledger.
"He wass on to me again wi' his tape, like a flash o' lightnin';pulled the jecket nearly off my back and took the length o' my waistcoat,and oh! my goodness, but he smelt o' Harris tweed, and it damp,singein'!
"'Hold up your arm!' says he, and he took the sleeve-length wi' aflourish, and aal the time he wass tellin' me what a capital Lodge wasthe Tarbert one, and aboot the staunchness o' the brethren.
"'Ye'll find us a lot o' cheery chaps,' he says; 'there's oftensingin'. But ye'll have to come at first deid sober, for they'reduvvelish particular.'
"By this time he wass doon aboot my legs, and the tape wass whippin'aal aboot me like an Irish halyard. I wass that vexed I had entered hisshop withoot a dram, for if I had a dram it wasna a tyler's tape thatPeter Macfarlane would flinch for.
"By the time he had aal my dimensions, fore and aft, in his wee bitledger, I wass in a perspiration, and I didna care if he measured me fora lady's dolman.
"'Do ye need to do this every time?' I asked him, put aboottremendous.
"'Do what?' says the tyler.
"'Go over me wi' a tape,' says I.
"'Not at aal,' he says, quite he'rty, laughin'. 'It's only for thefirst initiation that ye need consider your appearance. Later on, nodoot, ye'll need regalia, and I can put ye richt there too.'
"'It's only the first degree I'm wantin' to start wi',' I says to him;'I want to see if my health'll stand it.'
"'Tach!' says the tyler; 'ye'll get aal that's goin' at the wango-off. There's no shilly-shallyin' about oor Lodge in Tarbert. Come upto the shop to-morrow, and I'll gie the first fit on.'
"I went to him next day in the afternoon, and ye never in aal yourlife saw such a performance! The tape wass nothin' to't! He put on mebits o' jeckets and weskits tacked thegither, withoot any sign o' sleevesor buttons on them; filled his mooth to the brim wi' pins, and startedjaggin' them into me.
"'Mind it's only the first degree!' I cries to him. 'Ye maybe thinkI'm strong, but I'm no' that strong!'
"Him bein' full o' pins, I couldna make oot wan word he wass mumblin',but I gaithered he wass tellin' me something aboot the grips andpassword. And then he fair lost his heid! He took a lump of chalk andbegan to make a regular cod o' my jecket and weskit.
"' Stop! Stop!' I cries to him. 'I wass aye kind o' dubious abootFreemasons, and if I'm to wear a parapharnalia o' this kind, all made upo' patches pinned thegither, and chalked aal o'er like the start o' agame o' peever, I'm no' goin' to join!'
"The tyler gave a start. 'My goodness!' he says, 'it's no' theFreemasons ye were wantin' to join?'
"'That wass my intention,' I told him. 'And Colin said his cousin thetyler in Tarbert wass the very man to help me. That's the way I'mhere.'
"'Isn't that chust deplorable!' says the tyler, scratchin' his heid.'Ye're in the wrong shop aalthegither! The tyler o' the Mason's Lodge inTarbert's another man aalthegither, that stands at the door o' his Lodgeto get the password. I'm no' a Mason at aal; I'm the treasurer o' theRechabites.'
"'The Rechabites!' says I, horror-struck. 'Aren't they teetotal?'
"'Strict!' he says. 'Ye canna get over that--to start wi'. And ye'rechust ass good ass a full-blown Rechabite noo, for I've given yc aal Iken in the way o' secrets.'
"So that's the way I wass a Rechabite, Dougie. I wass staunch to thebrethren for seven days, and then I fair put an end to't. I never wentnear their Lodge, but the suit o' clothes came doon to the vessel for me,wi' a wee boy for the money. It wass £2, 10s., and I have theweskit yet."
"£2, 10s. and aal that sport!" said Dougie ruefully. "Them wassthe happy days!"
"WHEN men gets up in years--say aboot eighty or ninety--there shouldbe something done wi' them," said Para Handy.
"What in the world would ye do wi' them?" asked Dougie. "Ye darenawander them."
"Ye canna wander them nooadays; the Government iss watchin' them likehawks, and, anyway, they'll never venture half a mile from the PostOffice where they get their Old Age Pensions. I would put them aal oot onthe island o' St Kilda, wi' a man in cherge. Any old man of ninety thatwass dour and dismal I would ship him yonder wi' aal his parapharnalia.I'm no sayin' but here and there ye'll find an old chap worth hiskeep--chust as jolly and full o' mischief as if he wass a young man, butmost o' them's a tribulation to their frien's, and always interferin'.Hurricane Jeck could tell ye."
The Captain's startling scheme for dealing with nonagenariansoriginated in a conversation on longevity among the people of Arran.
"Jeck," he continued, "had his life fair spoiled on him wi' an unclehe had in Govan. He wass ninety-two if he wass a day, but wasna pleasedwi' that; he would aye be braggin' that he wass a hundred. He lived byhimsel' in a but-and-ben, and he made poor Hurricane's life atorment.
"Jeck at the time wass in his prime, and sailin' back and forrit,skipper o' a nice wee boat they caaled the Jenet. It wass years before hestarted goin' foreign. A more becomin' man on a quay ye never clapped aneye on--ass trig's a shippin'-box, and always wi' a nate wee roond broonhat.
"His Uncle Wilyum wass a tyrant. In his time he wass a landscapegairdner--"
"What iss a landscape gairdner?" asked Dougie.
"A landscape gairnder iss a man that scapes gairdens.... But fortwenty years old Wilyum lived on his money and spent his time contrivin'what way he would make his nephew Jeck a credit to the Second Comin' andthe family o' Maclachlan.
"He had every failin' that a man could have, Uncle Wilyum--he wasslame wi' rheumatism, as deaf's a post, teetotal to the worst degree, andnever went to church but made a patent kind o' releegion o' his own ooto' the 'Christian Herald' and the 'Gospel Trumpet.' Chust an old pagan!Ye would be sick listenin' to him on the prophet Jeremiah and the SecondComin' and the opening o' Baxter's Seven Phials."
"Whatna man was Baxter?" inquired the mate.
"Chust Baxter!" replied Para Handy petulantly. "The man that wass aprophet and wrote the 'Christian Herald.'
"Nobody could be nicer to an uncle up in years than Jeck. Many afirkin o' herrin' and scores o' eggs he brocht from the Hielan's for theold chap. He wass his only livin' relative except a sister o' his thatlived in Colonsay, and any money that the old man left wass likely to beJeck's.
"Money wass the last thing Jeck at the time had his mind on; he wass aborn rover that asked for nothing better than to dodge aboot the WesternHielan's in his own dacent boat, or go percolatin' roond the Broomie-lawwi' a cheery frien' or two when his vessel wass in Clyde.
"There wass no more harm in Jeck than in a goldfish, but the silly oldbody thocht he was a limb o' Satan, and never missed a chance to boardhim wi' a bundle o' tracts. Jeck had no sooner his foot on shore inGleska than Uncle Wilyum, wi' his sticks, would hirple up and follow himevery place he went to keep him oot o' temptation.
"He put the peter on't at last wan time he went efter Jeck to the Obanand Lorn Soiree and Ball in the Waterloo Rooms, and found him wi' a clovehitch round the waist o' a bouncin' girl and them throng waltzin'.
"I can tell you Jeck got Jeremiah from his Uncle Wilyum thatnight!
"'The like o' you dancin' there wi' a wanton woman, and us on theverge!' says the old chap, groanin'.
"'What verge?' says Jeck.
"'Did ye no' hear? 'says his uncle, lookin' fearfulunsatisfactory.
"'No,' says Jeck.
"'That's what I wass thinkin',' says his uncle, whippin' oot a'Christian Herald,' and showin' him a bit o' Baxter that said the end o'the world wass fixed for that day fortnight.
"'Chust that!' says Jeck. 'I heard a kind o' rumour aboot it doon atGreenock; but I'm no' botherin', for I'm goin' to take the boat for'twhen the time comes.'
"My goodness, but the old man wass staggered! It had never entered hishead to take to the sea for't when the end o' the world came, and hecocked his ears when he heard that Jeck wass goin' to get the better o'the Prophet Baxter wi' the Jenet.
"'Will ye take me wi' ye?' he says to his nephew.
"'Wi' aal the pleesure in the world,' says Jeck, who wass aye theperfect chentleman. 'Get you your bits o' sticks collected; we'll putthem in the hold for broken stowage, and ye'll come wi' me on Wednesday.We'll be roond the Mull before the trouble breaks oot.'
"Jeck wass only in fun, and you can imagine his consternation when alorry came doon to his boat next day wi' aal Uncle Wilyum's plenishin',and the old man on the top o' a chest o' drawers wi' a bundle o' Baxter'sprophecies!
"There's one thing aboot Jeck--he's never bate!
"He took the old man on board wi' all his dunnage, and started oot forColonsay, where he wass takin' coals.
"It was the dreariest trip he ever made in aal his life; for when theold man wassna takin' his meat or sleepin', he wass greetin' aboot theend o' aal things and swabbin' his heid-lights even-on wi' a red bandanahanky, or groanin' over the 'Christian Herald.'
"'Tach! I wouldna bother aboot the Prophet Baxter,' says Jeck to himat last. 'Perhaps he wass workin' wi' a last year's almanack, and fairlyoot o't wi' his calculations.'
"But Uncle Wilyum said that wass blasphemy, and kept on reelin' ootfathoms o' Jeremiah, till poor Jeck wass near demented.
"'What place iss this?' says Uncle Wilyum when they came to Colonsay,and Jeck began dischairgin' coal.
"'It's the end o' the world,' says Jeck, quite blithe. 'Away youashore and see your sister Mary, and I'll send up your furniture ass soonass the coals iss done.'
"'For aal the time we have thegither,' wailed his Uncle Wilyum, 'is itworth my while?'
"'Worth your while!" cried Jeck. 'Of course it's worth your while!I'll bate ye Baxter never heard o' the Isle o' Colonsay. It's forty yearssince ye saw your sister. Away and spend your money on her like achentleman.'
"Uncle Wilyum went ashore wi' his bundle o' the prophets, and settleddown wi' his sister, waitin' for the day o' tribulation. He lingeredseven years, and shaved himsel' every mornin', so as to be ready; butBaxter failed him at the last, and he died o' influenza, leavin' hispickle money to his sister."
"That wass a pity for Jeck," said Dougie.
"Tach! Jeck didna care a docken! He wass enjoyin' life."
As soon as it grew dark, when the quay was quite deserted and thevillage seemed wholly asleep, the crew of the Vital Spark set brisklyabout getting the gun ashore.
They passed two unrailed gang-planks between the vessel and the slip,took the tarpaulins off the mysterious mass of inert material at the bowand revealed a German 18-pounder, without its breech-block, exceedinglybattered and rusty. Hurricane Jack fastened a stout rope to the gunitself, and going behind lifted up the trail of the carriage with aneffort.
"Tail you on to the rope and pull like bleezes," he cried to Dougie;"Macphail and Peter'll shove roond the wheels o' her, and I'll hold upthis cursed contrivance.... Aalthegither, boys; heave!"
Para Handy took up the task allotted to him, almost weeping. "HolyFrost!" he wailed; "isn't this the bonny babble we're in? I wish we hadnever seen the blasted thing; it's aal your fault, Jeck."
"There'll be trouble aboot this, you'll see!" said Macphail, puttingall his propulsive vigour into a wheel spoke. "I knew from the beginnin'.But ye wouldna listen to me!"
"Shut up, and haul like Horse Artillery!" growled Hurricane Jack."Ye're no' in the Milishy."
By almost superhuman efforts they got the gun on to the slip, and upto the level of the wharf.
"What are we to do noo?" panted the Captain. "We canna leave it here;mind you, it's no' Crarae; there's a polisman in the place."
"We'll hurl it doon the quay and oot on the ebb," said Hurricane Jackwith confidence and alacrity. "Ye can put anything ye like underhigh-water-mark, there's no law against it. If we get it oot on the ebbnoo it'll be covered wi' the tide afore the mornin'," and he picked upthe trail again.
They trundled the piece noisily over the granite pier, perspiring atthe task; the weapon had never heard such lurid language in the processsince it left the Hindenburg Line.
"If anybody catches us at this!" moaned Dougie apprehensively, blowinglike a whale.
They were just on the verge of the sand when Macnaughton appeared inhis official glazed tippet, but without his helmet. He had just beenmaking his last round for the night.
"What in the name o' goodness are ye doin' here?" he inquired sternly."Whose cairt have ye there?"
"It's no' a cairt," said Hurricane Jack, letting down the trail. "It'sa quite good cannon the War Office sent for a War Memorial for the place.We're jist dischargin' it."
"Dischargin' it!" exclaimed the constable, horrified; "ye'll waken thewhole community!" He came closer, peered in the dark at the weapon, andhad a sudden inspiration.
"I know your capers fine!" he exclaimed, throwing back his tippet toshow his metal buttons. "We're no' that far behind in this place but weken aboot that gun; it's the hue and cry o' the county."
"What did ye hear aboot it?" asked Hurricane Jack, coolly taking aseat on the carriage.
"I have it aal here in my book," said the constable, slapping histail-pocket. "I might have ken't when I saw your boat come in thiseftemoon wi' a tarp'lin over the bows o' her, that you were up to some o'your dydoes. Ye got the gun from a hawker in Lochgilphead."
"Right enough!" acknowledged the Captain soothingly. "But it wass hisown gun; the burgh that got it from the War Office for a souvineer gotsick o't, and gave him't for old metal."
"We took it for a speculation," added Hurricane Jack. "Ye would thinkthere's many a place in Loch Fyne would like a chenuine Germancannon."
"We were goin' to make oor fortune wi't," said Macphail, with bittersarcasm. "Jeck assured us there was money in't."
"I ken aal aboot it," said the constable, with an air of profoundomniscience. "Ye've been cairryin' that lumber up and doon the loch forthe last three weeks tryin' to palm it off on His Majesty's lieges. It'saal in my book! Ye offered it for a pound in Caimdow; the price wass downto ten shillin's at Strachur; ye couldna sell't for a shillin' in Crarae,and ye left it on the quay there, but they made ye shift it."
"It's the God's truth--every word o't," confessed Hurricane Jack. "AGerman cannon's worse than a drunken reputation; ye canna get rido't."
The crew of the Vital Spark stood in the rain and dark round thedegraded and rejected relic of Imperial power, and violently abused Jack."A bloomin' eediot! I told him it would be left on oor hands!" criedMacphail. "Whit could ony-body dae wi' a cannon?"
"There might be another war at any time," suggested Hurricane Jackdefensively.
"I never wass ass black affronted in my life," bleated Para Handy."The whole loch-side iss laughin' at us. The very turbine steamers blowstheir whistles when they pass and cry 'Hood, ahoy!' It's no' like a thingye could break in bits and burn in Macphail's furnace; it's solid iron inevery pairt. Nobody hass a kind word for it; we tried to get a ministerto put it in his glebe, or foment the door o' his manse, and he put hisdog on us."
"Ye'll take it oot o' here anyway," said the constable firmly. "Wehave plenty o' trash o' oor own. It's a mercy I came on ye tryin' toleave it here and spoil the navigation!"
"I never dreamt that a gun wass so ill to manoeuvre," remarked theimperturbable Jack. "Do ye no' think, sergeant, there's anybody in theplace would care for it for an orniment? Anybody wi' a bit o' a gairden:they could cover it wi' fuchsias."
"No expense at aal!" added Para Handy eagerly. "We would put it inposeetion. Many a wan would be gled to have it if it wass in London or inGleska. It's a splendid cannon! Captured by the Australian Airmy. Costthe British Government £50 to take to Loch Fyne."
"I don't care if it cost £100," said the constable fiercely;"it's no' goin' to be panned off on this community that suffered plentywi' the war. Get it back on board your ship at wance, like dacent lads,and don't make any trouble."
"'Dalmighty!" cried the Captain, wringing his hands, "are we goin' tohave this Cherman abomination on oor decks the rest o' oor naiturallifes?... It's all your fault, Jeck, ye said there wass a fortune init."
"My mistake!" admitted Hurricane Jack, most handsomely. "I wash myhands noo o' the whole concern."
"I would wash my hands too, if they werena aal blistered," said Dougiepiteously. "What are we to do wi' the cursed thing? There iss no place wedare leave it."
"Could ye no' put it over the side o' the boat somewhere doon aboutKilbrannan?" suggested the constable.
They stared at one another, utterly astounded.
"My Chove!" said Para Handy. "We never thocht o' that! Aren't you theborn eediot, Jeck, that would have us cairtin' it up and doon the oceanfor the last three weeks!"
"I didna want to see a good gun wasted," explained Hurricane Jack,rather lamely, and he picked up the trail again. "But maybe that's thebest way oot o' the difficulty; get a ha'd o' the rope again, and pull,Dougie."
As the Vital Spark, outrageously belching sparks and cinders from fueleked out by wood purloined some days before from a cargo of pit-props,swept round the point of Row, Para Handy gazed with wonder and admirationat the Gareloch, full of idle ships.
"My word!" he exclaimed, "isn't that the splendid sight! Puts ye inmind o' a Royal Review!"
"I don't see onything Royal aboot it," growled the misanthropicengineer, Macphail. "It's a sign o' the terrible times we're livin' in.If there was freights for them boats, they wouldna be there, but dashin'roond the Horn and makin' work for people."
"Of course! Of course! You must aye be contrairy," said the Captainpeevishly. "Nothing on earth'll please you; ye're that parteecular. It'sthe way they chenerally make work for people that spoils ships for me. Ilike them best when they're at their moorin's. What more could ye want inthe way o' a bonny spectacle than the sight o' aal them gallant vesselsand them no' sailin'?"
Macphail snorted as he ducked his head and withdrew among his engines."There's enough bonny spectacles on board this boat to do me for mylifetime," he said in a parting shot before he disappeared.
Para Handy turned sadly to the mate. "Macphail must aye have the lastword," he said. "The man's no' worth payin' heed to. Greasin' bits o'enchines every day o' your life makes ye awfu' coorse. I'm sure that's afine sight, them ships, Dougie? There must be nearly half a hundredthere, and no' a lum reekin'."
"They're no bad," answered Dougie cautiously. "But some o' them'sterrible in need o' a stroke o' paint. Will there be anybody stayin' onthem?"
"Ye may depend on that!" the Captain assured him. "There iss a man ortwo in cherge o' every vessel, and maybe a wife and femily. The BritishMercantile Marine iss no' leavin' ocean liners lyin' aboot Garelochheidwi' nobody watchin' them. A chentleman's life! It would suit me fine,instead o' plowterin' up and doon Loch Fyne wi' coals and timber. Did Ino' tell ye the way Hurricane Jeck spent a twelvemonth on a boat laid upin the Gareloch when tred was dull aboot twenty years ago?"
"Ye did not!" said Dougie.
"She wass a great big whupper o' a barquenteen caaled the Jean andMary, wi' a caibin the size o' a Wee Free Church, and fitted up like apleesure yacht. She had even a pianna."
"God bless me!" gasped the mate, half incredulous.
"Jeck had the influence in them days, and he got the job to look efterher in the Gareloch till the times got better. The times wass good enoughthe way they were for Jeck, wance he had his dunnage on board. 'Never hada job to bate it!' he says; 'I wouldna swap wi' the polisman in theKelvingrove Museum.'"
"I would think he would be lonely," said Dougie dubiously. "A greatbig boat wi' nobody but yersel' in it at night would be awfu' eerie."
The Captain laughed uproariously. "Eerie!" he repeated. "There issnothin' eerie any place where Hurricane Jeck iss; he had the time o' hislife in the Jean and Mary.
"Wance they got their boat clapped doon in the Gareloch and Jeck incharge o' her, the chentlemen in Cardiff she belonged to forgot aal aboother. At least they never bothered Jeck except wi' a postal-order everynow and then for wages.
"The wages wassna desperate big, and Jeck put his brains in steep tothink oot some contrivance for makin' a wee bit extra money.
"It came near the Gleska Fair, and there wassna a but-and-ben inGarelochheid that wassna packed wi' ludgers like a herrin'-firkin. WhenJeck would be ashore for paraffin-oil or anything, he would aye be comin'on poor craturs wantin' ludgin's, so he filled the Jean and Mary wi' afine selection. For three or four weeks the barquenteen wass like anhotel, or wan o' them hydropathics. Jeck swithered aboot puttin' up asign to save him from goin' ashore to look for customers.
"Ye never saw a ship like it in aal your life! It wass hung from endto end wi' washin's aal July, and Jeck gave ludgin's free to a man wi' acomacopia that he played on the deck from mornin' till night."
"Wass it no' a terrible risk?" asked Dougie.
"No risk o' any kind, at aal, at aal. The owners wass in Cardiffspendin' their money, and they never saw the Gareloch in their lifes butin the map. Jeck kent he wass doin' a noble work for the health o' thecommunity--far better than the Fresh Air Fortnight!
"When the Fair wass feenished, and his ludgers went away, I'll assureye they left a bonny penny wi' the landlord o' the Jean and Mary. Hethocht the season wass done, but it wasna a week till he wass throngagain wi' a lot o' genteel young divinity students that came fromEdinburgh wi' a banjo.
"'Gie me a bottle o' beer and a banjo playin', and it's wonderful theway the time slips by,' says Jeck. He learned them a lot o' sailor songslike 'Ranza, Boys!' and 'Rollin' doon to Rio,' and the folk inGarelochheid that couldna get their night's sleep came oot at last in afury to the ship and asked him who she belonged to.
"'Ye can look Lloyd's List,' says Jeck to them, quite the chentleman,'and ye'll see the name o' the owners. But she's under charter wi' a manthat's aal for high jinks and the cheneral hilarity--and his name issJohn Maclachlan. If there iss any o' ye needin' ludgin's, say the wordand I'll put past a fine wee caibin for ye, wi' a southern exposure.'
"They went away wi' their heids in the air. 'I ken what's wrong wi'them,' says Jeck. 'Oh, man! if I chust had the spirit licence!'
"That wass his only tribulation: he had ass good an hotel below hisfeet as any in the country, but he dauma open a bar.
"The summer slipped by like a night at a weddin'; the comacopia manwent back to his work, but Jeck fell in wi' an old pianna-tuner thatcould play the pianna like a minister's wife, and aal the autumn Jeckgave smokin' concerts on the Jean and Mary, where all the folk in chergeo' the other vessels paid sixpence apiece and got a lot o' pleesure.
"'If I had chust a brass band!' says Jeck, 'and a wise-like man Icould trust for a purser, I would run moonlight trips. But it would be anawful bother liftin' the anchor; perhaps I'm better the way I am; there'sno' the responsibility wi' a boat at moorin's.'
"But the time he showed the best agility wass when he had a weddin' onthe ship. The mate o' another vessel was gettin' spliced in hisgood-mother's hoose in Clynder, where there wasna room for dancin'.
"Jeck hired the Jean and Mary to them; the company came oot in boatsfrom aal ends o' the Gareloch, wi' a couple o' pipers and that manyroasted hens ye couldna get eggs in the shire for months efter it. Theykept it up till the followm' efternoon, wi' the anchor lamp still burnin'and aal the buntin' in the vessel flyin'.
"A well-put-on young Englishman from Cardiff came alongside in amotor-lench in an awfu' fury, and bawled at Jeck what aal this carry-onmeant. There wass sixty people on board if there wass a dozen.
"'Some frien's o' my own,' says Jeck, quite nimble, and aye thechentleman. 'I have chust come into a lot o' money, and I'm givin' them atrate.'
"But that was the last o' Jeck's command in the Jean and Mary; thepoor duvvle had to go back and work at sailorin'."
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