He was, in fact, a marked man when he reached the forecastle. Rumor travels through a ship’s crew and it was already known that Black McTee hated the Irishman and that White Henshaw had commenced to persecute him in a new and terrible manner.
This would have been sufficient tragedy to burden the shoulders of any one man, however strong, and when to this was added the fact that he had been kept by the grim chief engineer for several hours in the chief’s own room, and finally considering that this man had passed through a shipwreck, one of three lone survivors, it is easy to understand why the sailors gave him ample elbow room.
It was evidently expected that he would break out into a torrent of abuse, and when he, perceiving this, remained silent, their awe increased. All through supper he was aware of their wondering glances; above all he felt the gray, steady eyes of Jerry Hovey, the bos’n, yet he ate without speaking, replying to their tentative questions with grunts. Before the meal was finished and the pipes and cigarettes lighted, he was a made man. Persevering in his role, as soon as he had eaten he went out on deck and sat down in the corner between the rail and the forecastle upon a coil of rope.
As deep as the blue sea in the evening light was the peace which lay on the soul of Harrigan, for the day had brought two great victories, one over McTee and the other over the chief engineer. It was not a stolid content, for he knew the danger of the implacable hate of McTee, but with the aid of Campbell he felt that he would have a fighting chance at least to survive, and that was all he asked.
So he sat on the coil of rope leaning against the rail, and looked ahead. It was almost completely dark when a hand fell on his shoulder and he looked up into the steady, gray-blue eyes of the bos’n.
“I promised to talk to you tonight,” said that worthy, and sat down uninvited on a neighboring coil of rope.
He waited for a response. As a rule, sailors are glad to curry favor with the bos’n. Harrigan, however, sat without speaking, staring through the gloom.
“Well?” said Hovey at length. “You’re a silent man, Harrigan.”
There was no response.
“All right; I like a silent man. In a way of speakin’, I need ’em like you! If you say little to me, you’re likely to say little to others.
“I don’t talk much myself,” went on Hovey, “until I know my man. I ain’t seen much of you, but I guess I figure you straight.”
He grew suddenly cautious, cunning, and the steady, gray-blue eyes reminded Harrigan of a cat when she crouches for hours watching the rathole.
“You ain’t got much reason for standing in with White Henshaw?” he purred.
“H’m,” grunted the Irishman, and waited.
“Sure, you ain’t,” went on Hovey soothingly, “because McTee has raised hell between you. They say McTee tried his damnedest to break you?”
The last question was put in a different manner; it came suddenly like a surprise blow in the dark.
“Well?” queried Harrigan. “What of it?”
“He tried all the way from Honolulu?”
“He did.”
“Did he try his fists?”
“He did.”
Jerry Hovey cursed with excitement.
“And?”
“I carried him to his cabin afterward,” said Harrigan truthfully.
“Would you take on McTee again? Black McTee?”
“If I had to. Why?”
“Oh, nothin’. But McTee has started White Henshaw on your trail. Maybe you know what Henshaw is? The whole South Seas know him!”
“Well?”
“You’ll have a sweet hell of a time before this boat touches port, Harrigan.”
“I’ll weather it.”
“Yes, this trip, but what about the next? If Henshaw is breakin’ a man, he keeps him on the ship till the man gives in or dies. I know! Henshaw’ll get so much against you that he could soak you for ten years in the courts by the time we touch port. Then he’ll offer to let you off from the courts if you’ll ship with him again, and then the old game will start all over again. You may last one trip—other men have—one or two—but no one has ever lasted out three or four shippings under White Henshaw. It can’t be done!”
He paused to let this vital point sink home. Only the same dull silence came in reply, and this continued taciturnity seemed to irritate Hovey. When he spoke again, his voice was cold and sharp.
“He’s got you trapped, Harrigan. You’re a strong man, but you’ll never get his rope off your neck. He’ll either hang you with it or else tie you hand and foot an’ make you his slave. I know!”
There was a bitter emphasis on the last word that left no doubt as to his meaning, and Harrigan understood now the light of that steady, gray-blue eye which made the habitual smile of good nature meaningless.
“Ten years ago I shipped with White Henshaw. Ten years ago I didn’t have a crooked thought or a mean one in my brain. Today there’s hell inside me, understand? Hell!” He paused, breathing hard.
“There’s others on this ship that have been through the same grind, some of them longer than me. There’s others that ain’t here, but that ain’t forgotten, because me an’ some of the rest, we seen them dyin’ on their feet. Maybe they ain’t dropped into the sea, but they’re just the same, or worse. You’ll find ’em loafin’ along the beaches. They take water from the natives, they do.”
He went on in a hoarse whisper: “On this ship I’ve seen ’em busted. An’ Henshaw has done the bustin’. This is a coffin ship, Harrigan, an’ Henshaw he’s the undertaker. He don’t bring ’em to Davy Jones’s locker—he does worse—he brings ’em to hell on earth, a hell so bad that when they go below, they don’t notice no difference. Harrigan, me an’ a few of the rest, we know what’s been done, an’ some of us have thought wouldn’t it be a sort of joke, maybe, if sometime what Henshaw has done to others was done to himself, what?”
The sweat was standing out on Harrigan’s face wet and cold. It seemed to him that through the darkness he could make out whole troops of those broken men littering the decks. He peered through the dark at the bos’n, and made out the hint of the gray-blue eyes watching him again as the cat watches the mousehole, and the heart of Harrigan ached.
“Hovey, are you bound for the loincloth an’ the beaches, like the rest?”
“No, because I’ve sold my soul to White Henshaw; but you’re bound there, Harrigan, because you can never sell your soul. I looked in your eyes and seen it written there like it was in a book.”
He gripped the Irishman by the shoulder.
“There’s some say this is the last voyage of White Henshaw, but me an’ some of the rest, we know different. He can’t leave the sea, which means that he won’t take us out of hell. Now, talk straight. You stood up to McTee; would you stand up to Henshaw?”
Harrigan muttered after a moment of thought: “I suppose this is mutiny, bos’n?”
“Aye, but I’m safe in talkin’ it. White Henshaw trusts me, he does, because I’ve sold my soul to him. If you was to go an’ tell him what I’ve said, he’d laugh at you an’ say you was tryin’ to incite discontent. What’s it goin’ to be, Harrigan? Will you join me an’ the rest who can set you free an’ make a man of you, or will you stay by McTee and White Henshaw and that devil Campbell?”
“How could you set me free?”
“One move—altogether—in the