Chapter VII
In every way dinner proved up beyond my expectations, and I registered a
note that the cook, whoever or whatever he might be, was a capable man at
his trade. Miss West served, and, though she and the steward were
strangers, they worked together splendidly. I should have thought, from
the smoothness of the service, that he was an old house servant who for
years had known her every way.
The pilot ate in the chart-house, so that at table were the four of us
that would always be at table together. Captain West and his daughter
faced each other, while I, on the captain’s right, faced Mr. Pike. This
put Miss West across the corner on my right.
Mr. Pike, his dark sack coat (put on for the meal) bulging and wrinkling
over the lumps of muscles that padded his stooped shoulders, had nothing
at all to say. But he had eaten too many years at captains’ tables not
to have proper table manners. At first I thought he was abashed by Miss
West’s presence. Later, I decided it was due to the presence of the
captain. For Captain West had a way with him that I was beginning to
learn. Far removed as Mr. Pike and Mr. Mellaire were from the sailors,
individuals as they were of an entirely different and superior breed, yet
equally as different and far removed from his officers was Captain West.
He was a serene and absolute aristocrat. He neither talked “ship” nor
anything else to Mr. Pike.
On the other hand, Captain West’s attitude toward me was that of a social
equal. But then, I was a passenger. Miss West treated me the same way,
but unbent more to Mr. Pike. And Mr. Pike, answering her with “Yes,
Miss,” and “No, Miss,” ate good-manneredly and with his shaggy-browed
gray eyes studied me across the table. I, too, studied him. Despite his
violent past, killer and driver that he was, I could not help liking the
man. He was honest, genuine. Almost more than for that, I liked him for
the spontaneous boyish laugh he gave on the occasions when I reached the
points of several funny stories. No man could laugh like that and be all
bad. I was glad that it was he, and not Mr. Mellaire, who was to sit
opposite throughout the voyage. And I was very glad that Mr. Mellaire
was not to eat with us at all.
I am afraid that Miss West and I did most of the talking. She was
breezy, vivacious, tonic, and I noted again that the delicate, almost
fragile oval of her face was given the lie by her body. She was a
robust, healthy young woman. That was undeniable. Not fat–heaven
forbid!–not even plump; yet her lines had that swelling roundness that
accompanies long, live muscles. She was full-bodied, vigorous; and yet
not so full-bodied as she seemed. I remember with what surprise, when we
arose from table, I noted her slender waist. At that moment I got the
impression that she was willowy. And willowy she was, with a normal
waist and with, in addition, always that informing bodily vigour that
made her appear rounder and robuster than she really was.
It was the health of her that interested me. When I studied her face
more closely I saw that only the lines of the oval of it were delicate.
Delicate it was not, nor fragile. The flesh was firm, and the texture of
the skin was firm and fine as it moved over the firm muscles of face and
neck. The neck was a beautiful and adequate pillar of white. Its flesh
was firm, its skin fine, and it was muscular. The hands, too, attracted
me–not small, but well-shaped, fine, white and strong, and well cared
for. I could only conclude that she was an unusual captain’s daughter,
just as her father was an unusual captain and man. And their noses were
alike, just the hint-touch of the beak of power and race.
While Miss West was telling of the unexpectedness of the voyage, of how
suddenly she had decided to come–she accounted for it as a whim–and
while she told of all the complications she had encountered in her haste
of preparation, I found myself casting up a tally of the efficient ones
on board the Elsinore. They were Captain West and his daughter, the
two mates, myself, of course, Wada and the steward, and, beyond the
shadow of a doubt, the cook. The dinner vouched for him. Thus I found
our total of efficients to be eight. But the cook, the steward, and Wada
were servants, not sailors, while Miss West and myself were
supernumeraries. Remained to work, direct, do, but three efficients out
of a total ship’s company of forty-five. I had no doubt that other
efficients there were; it seemed impossible that my first impression of
the crew should be correct. There was the carpenter. He might, at his
trade, be as good as the cook. Then the two sailmakers, whom I had not
yet seen, might prove up.
A little later during the meal I ventured to talk about what had
interested me and aroused my admiration, namely, the masterfulness with
which Mr. Pike and Mr. Mellaire had gripped hold of that woeful,
worthless crew. It was all new to me, I explained, but I appreciated the
need of it. As I led up to the occurrence on Number Two hatch, when Mr.
Pike had lifted up Larry and toppled him back with a mere slap from the
ends of his fingers, I saw in Mr. Pike’s eyes a warning, almost
threatening, expression. Nevertheless, I completed my description of the
episode.
When I had quite finished there was a silence. Miss West was busy
serving coffee from a copper percolator. Mr. Pike, profoundly occupied
with cracking walnuts, could not quite hide the wicked, little,
half-humorous, half-revengeful gleam in his eyes. But Captain West
looked straight at me, but from oh! such a distance–millions and
millions of miles away. His clear blue eyes were as serene as ever, his
tones as low and soft.
“It is the one rule I ask to be observed, Mr. Pathurst–we never discuss
the sailors.”
It was a facer to me, and with quite a pronounced fellow-feeling for
Larry I hurriedly added:
“It was not merely the discipline that interested me. It was the feat of
strength.”
“Sailors are trouble enough without our hearing about them, Mr.
Pathurst,” Captain West went on, as evenly and imperturbably as if I had
not spoken. “I leave the handling of the sailors to my officers. That’s
their business, and they are quite aware that I tolerate no undeserved
roughness or severity.”
Mr. Pike’s harsh face carried the faintest shadow of an amused grin as he
stolidly regarded the tablecloth. I glanced to Miss West for sympathy.
She laughed frankly, and said:
“You see, father never has any sailors. And it’s a good plan, too.”
“A very good plan,” Mr. Pike muttered.
Then Miss West kindly led the talk away from that subject, and soon had
us laughing with a spirited recital of a recent encounter of hers with a
Boston cab-driver.
Dinner over, I stepped to my room in quest of cigarettes, and
incidentally asked Wada about the cook. Wada was always a great gatherer
of information.
“His name Louis,” he said. “He Chinaman, too. No; only half Chinaman.
Other half Englishman. You know one island Napoleon he stop long time
and bime by die that island?”
“St. Helena,” I prompted.
“Yes, that place Louis he born. He talk very good English.”
At this moment, entering the hall from the deck, Mr. Mellaire, just
relieved by the mate, passed me on his way to the big room in the stern
where the second table was set. His “Good evening, sir,” was as stately
and courteous as any southern gentleman of the old days could have
uttered it. And yet I could not like the man. His outward seeming was
so at variance with the personality that resided within. Even as he
spoke and smiled I felt that from inside his skull he was watching me,
studying me. And somehow, in a flash of intuition, I knew not why, I was
reminded of the three strange young men, routed last from the forecastle,
to whom Mr. Pike had read the law. They, too, had given me a similar
impression.
Behind Mr. Mellaire slouched a self-conscious, embarrassed individual,
with the face of a stupid boy and the body of a giant. His feet were
even larger than Mr. Pike’s, but the hands–I shot a quick glance to
see–were not so large as Mr. Pike’s.
As they passed I looked inquiry to Wada.
“He carpenter. He sat second table. His name Sam Lavroff. He come from
New York on ship. Steward say he very young for carpenter, maybe twenty-
two, three years old.”
As I approached the open port over my desk I again heard the swish and
gurgle of water and again realized that we were under way. So steady and
noiseless was our progress, that, say seated at table, it never entered
one’s head that we were moving or were anywhere save on the solid land. I
had been used to steamers all my life, and it was difficult immediately
to adjust myself to the absence of the propeller-thrust vibration.
“Well, what do you think?” I asked Wada, who, like myself, had never made
a sailing-ship voyage.
He smiled politely.
“Very funny ship. Very funny sailors. I don’t know. Mebbe all right. We
see.”
“You think trouble?” I asked pointedly.
“I think sailors very funny,” he evaded.
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