Читать книгу The Mutiny of the Flying Spray - Arthur Hunt Chute - Страница 9
ОглавлениеTHE “HARD CHANCE”
As we sailed seaward, my heart was beating in a hectic manner. There was an exultation of movement, together with an apprehensive facing of the unknown.
Tug left the tiller in my hands, probably to keep me occupied.
As we passed the Brooklyn shore, I recognized our home on the Heights, with its lofty situation, and its cupola, so popular with ship-owners of that time. Looking back at the familiar scenes, I was not without misgiving thinking of my dear mother and wondering if I should ever see her again.
Through the Narrows and down the Outer Bay we sped, the little catboat ramping along before a full breeze that forced us to single reef the mainsail, as soon as we came into the choppy waters of the lower bay.
The beautifully wooded landscape on either side, with its wild appearance, and the highlands of Navesink to the southwest, and the opening ocean out before filled me with a sense of awe. One must be outside in a little boat to get that feeling.
The dawn coming up across the sea floor flooded our pathway with molten silver and flowing gold.
There was a keen tang to the air that set one’s blood tingling, and did much to allay misgivings. As for Tug, misgivings he did not know. Incorrigibly gay, he kept on singing one after another of the popular songs of the gold rush, without which there would have been many a gay soul missing in the Forty-niners.
Halfway across the lower bay, Tug relieved me at the steering, setting his course for an estuary at the far end of Coney Island. Noting the purpose with which he steered, I inferred that he had a definite goal, and sure enough, there inside the shelter of the estuary we came across a type of craft used by the Gloucester fishermen of that period, known as a pinkie.
The pinkie was as unlovely as some slatternly old charwoman. But she appeared to be quite adequate for rough service.
As we ranged alongside, I noticed on her counter the name, Hard Chance of Marblehead. With her pitch bottom, stout timbers, and stubby mast, she certainly looked as though she were created to stand any amount of smashing about in tough weather, a veritable storm bird.
“What d’ye think o’ her, Laurie?” inquired Tug, as we made fast and clambered aboard.
“She’s no private yacht,” I replied with a touch of irony.
“No, thank God, she isn’t. She’s a deep-sea breadwinner, the kind that you can put your trust in when it’s lookin’ dirty.”
If we had discovered the finest cruiser in the New York Yacht Club, Tug could not have shown more delight. As I looked her over, I must confess that she began to command my respect also.
The Hard Chance was about fifteen tons. She had no rail nor bulwark above the deck, the only protection being a narrow waist, about eighteen inches in height.
The cuddy, a small apartment forward, contained two berths, and a fireplace built of brick just abaft the foremast. The chimney was made of wood and plastered on the inside to prevent its taking fire.
An old Andover jersey lying on the bunk and a couple of boxes of stores dumped down hastily led me to infer that Tug had been there before.
Bending over, I began to place the stores in a locker: four quarts of molasses, ten pounds of fat pork, twenty pounds of flour, twenty pounds of hard-tack, five pounds of coffee, and a bag of potatoes. A couple of barrels of water and a harness-cask of salt horse completed our stores. This did not represent the possibility, of a very elaborate bill-of-fare, but Tug went on to say that it would answer the purpose, and we also could buy fresh supplies along the coast, to say nothing of the fish that we might catch.
Coming out of the cuddy, we began to examine her gear. All the time Tug kept up a running fire of comment, praising everything like a person who was trying to make a sale.
“She carries only foresail and mainsail, but you can take it from me, Laurie, she’s a peach of a sailor in heavy weather.”
“You talk as if you had been out in her before.”
“You bet your sweet life I have. I ain’t putting all our future on any crazy sea-coffin. No, Sir, I know what I’m doing before I take a chance, and I tell you, I’m ready to trust this tough-looking little craft to get us there, and I’m doing it on something more than hearsay.”
Little by little I began to succumb to Tug’s eloquence, and as I felt the sturdy lurch of the incoming rollers, there was awakened within me the thrill of the wanderlust, but there was still something that held me back.
Noting the undecided look upon my face, Tug burst out:
“What the dickens is up with you, Laurie? Will nothing ever satisfy you?”
“She suits me to a T,” I answered.
“Well, what’s up?”
“I was just wondering where you got this craft. Was she loaned to you? Did you rent her? Or did you buy her?”
“Of course I didn’t.”
“All right, are you stealing another man’s boat?”
“I ain’t stealing,” answered Tug, hotly. “And what’s more you can take that back.”
“Aw, cut it out. If you are about to take this boat, I say, either you got it right, or you got it wrong. So speak up and tell us how you got it.”
Tug was hot-tempered in the extreme. My first insinuation inflamed him for the moment, but it was as quickly gone, and with his old twinkle, he inquired:
“Possession’s nine points of the law, ain’t it?”
“I s’pose so.”
“All right, that’s how I come by this pinkie. I put this jersey in her last fall to kind o’ stake out my claim, and as I’ve been tending for her the past six months, without a sign of anyone else near her, I say it begins to look as if she was mine.”
“But, where’s her rightful owner?”
“Search me. Maybe in the graveyard, maybe in the penitentiary. Wherever he is, he hasn’t got any use for the Hard Chance, that’s sure, and as we two are bound to get out to the gold fields, I say, we’ve got to take the first thing that comes along. By good luck, it happens to be this handy little craft, just pining to wash the barnacles off of herself.”
“But, you’ll never get around Cape Horn in her.”
“Who said we would?”
“How are you expecting to fetch California, then?”
“From Panama, of course.”
“But I won’t steal another man’s boat.”
“Aw, be sensible for once. Who’s stealing her? I’ve been using this hooker for six months. By the law of possession she’s mine. I’m going to use her a little longer, that’s all. After we arrive at Panama, we’ll leave a ticket on her, saying, ‘Returned with thanks.’ But, don’t you worry about the poor owner, he’s gone to the last port, that’s what’s happened, and Tug Wilson ain’t the kind to let his old pinkie rot for nothing.”
“And if he isn’t dead?”
“All right, if he ain’t when we come back with our pile we can do the handsome, and present him with a few thousand for the loan of his tub. That’s fair enough, ain’t it?”
There was no doubt about the pile that we would bring back and so I assented, and without further ado, Tug began to make sail.
As the Hard Chance plunged and pitched at the leash, I felt a strange yearning to fly away. Gazing out where the edge of the sky met the edge of the sea, I felt like a bird that had suddenly discovered wings. We had only our moorings to slip, and nothing could hold us.
And so when Tug sang out, “Let her go!” obedience was instinctive.
Making our cat fast to the mooring buoy, I cast off the splice of six-inch cable, and the Hard Chance darted out of the mouth of the estuary, and laid over gleefully to meet the first lift of the open sea.
We were off for California.
