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I won't say that the rest of us damned Cockney. We were, after all, foc'sle savages, and our hatred of Fitzgibbon was very bitter. But it took the stiffs to honor Cockney for that knife-play. Well, Newman might dismiss this fellow with a contemptuous word, but I couldn't. Cockney had become a rival I must reckon with.
It means a sign o' mourning the yards bein' canted opposite ways, to look drunk an' disorderly. They do. "'An' what might our last giddy-go-round signify? I asks of 'Op. "'Good 'Evins! 'e says, 'Are you in that habit o' permittin' leathernecks to assassinate lootenants every morning at drill without immejitly 'avin' 'em shot on the foc'sle in the horrid crawly-crawly twilight?"
But it happened that Nigger, coming from the wheel, seized an opportunity to slip into the deserted room for a quiet smoke-O. It was a liberty he was safe in taking, now that the bucko mate had reformed. My bunk in the starboard foc'sle was handy to the door connecting the two rooms, and when he burst terror-stricken through that door my unconscious head was right in front of him.
But we obtained plain confirmation of the lady's word he was drinking, when, every morning the Chinese cabin boy brought empty bottles out on deck and heaved them overboard. Whereat, all the thirsty souls forward clicked their tongues and swore. But this interim, during which Yankee Swope stayed below, and moped and drank, was, you may be sure, no peaceful period for the foc'sle.
But it was not a peaceful calm. I found Newman in the port foc'sle, talking to Holy Joe. When I entered, I heard Newman say: "They are good, simple lads use your authority as a minister. Reason, command, do your best to convince them they must be obedient. Tell them they will be the ones to suffer in case of trouble." "I will do my best," the parson answered. With a nod to me, he went out on deck.
Well, I had the superstitions of a foc'sle Jack, but I knew well enough that a proper ghost would not walk abroad in the noon o' day. I stared fascinated at that moving piece of wood. It slowly lifted about an inch, and then, through the narrow slit; I saw an eye regarding me with a fixed glare.
There was I with a sprained wrist big as my blanked head, an' Lynch a-hazin' me to work and every morning she trips into the foc'sle with her bright cheer an' her linaments. A blanked, blessed angel, she is!" "He beats her," supplemented another man. "I got it from a mate what chummed with the bloke as was a Sails on her one voyage.
"It's bad for 'im too." "Don't you worry about me, my lads," said Henry with offensive patronage. "I can take care of myself all right. You ain't seen me come aboard so drunk that I've tried to get down the foc'sle without shoving the scuttle back. You never knew me to buy a bundle o' forged pawn-tickets. You never " "Listen to 'im," said Sam, growing purple; "I'll be 'ung for 'im yet."
The hour struck clear in the cabin; the nosing bows slapped and scuffed with the seas; the foc'sle stove-pipe hissed and sputtered as the spray caught it; and the boys slept on, while Disko, Long Jack, Tom Platt, and Uncle Salters, each in turn, stumped aft to look at the wheel, forward to see that the anchor held, or to veer out a little more cable against chafing, with a glance at the dim anchor-light between each round.
The skipper deigned no reply, and his message having been conveyed to the foc'sle, a scene of intense animation prevailed there. "I'm goin' to have a go now," said Dick emphatically. "Five pounds is worth picking up." "I only 'ope as you won't 'ave the treat I 'ad," said the cook feelingly.
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