The Isle of Retribution/Chapter 9
IX
Ned's news was received with the keenest delight by Lenore and Mrs. Hardenworth. The latter regained her lost amiability with promptness. Lenore's reaction was not dissimilar from Ned's; in her native city she could come into her own again.
The bottles were greeted with shouts of delight. Ned went immediately to the sideboard and procured half a dozen glasses.
“All hands partake to-night,” he explained. “It's going to be a real party.”
He mixed whiskies-and-sodas for Lenore and Mrs. Hardenworth; then started to make the rounds of the crew with a bottle and glasses. He did not, however, waste time offering any to Bess. The latter had already evinced an innate fear of it, wholly apart from sentimentality and nonsense. She had lived in a circle and environment where strong drink had not been merely a thing to jest over and sing songs about, to drink lightly and receive therefrom pleasant exhilaration; but where it was a living demon, haunting and shadowing every hour. She had no false sophistication—her knowledge of life was all too real—and she had no desire to toy with poison and play with fire. Both were realities to her. She knew that they had blasted life on life, all as sturdy and seemingly as invincible as her own. Her abstinence was not a moral issue with her. It was simply that she knew here was a foe that met men in their pleasant hours, greeted them in friendly ways, and then, by insidious, slow attack, cast them down and left them miserably to die; and she was simply afraid for her life of it. Ned, on the other hand, would have laughed at the thought of its ever mastering him. He felt himself immune from the tragedies that had afflicted other men. It was part of the conceit of his generation.
But Ned found plenty of customers for his whisky. McNab, at the wheel, wished him happy days over two fingers of straight liquor in the glass, and Knutsen, his pale eyes gleaming, poured himself a staggering portion. “Go ahead,” Ned encouraged him when the seaman apologized for his greediness. “The sky's the limit to-night.” And Forest in the engine room, and Julius in the kitchen absorbed a man's-size drink with right good will.
Ned was able to make the rounds again before the call for dinner; and the attitude of his guests was changed in but one instance. McNab seemed to be measuring his liquor with exceeding care. He was a man who knew his own limits, and he apparently did not intend to overstep them. He took a small drink, but Knutsen, his superior, consumed as big a portion as before.
It was an elated, spirited trio that sat down at the little table in the saloon. Not one of them could ever remember a happier mood. Julius served the dinner with a flourish; and they had only laughter when a sudden lurch of the craft slid the sugar bowl off the table to the floor.
“Hello, the ship's drunk too,” Ned commented gaily.
They were really in too glad a mood to see anything but sport in the suddenly rocking table. The truth was that the wind had suddenly sprung into a brisk gale, rolling heavy seas and bobbing the little craft about like a cork. The three screamed with laughter, holding fast to their slipping chairs, and Lenore rescued the bottle that was tipping precariously on the buffet.
“We'd better have a little extra one,” she told them. “I'll be seasick if we don't.”
She had to speak rather loudly to make herself heard. The wind was no longer laughing lightly and happily at their port bows. It had suddenly burst into a frantic roar, swelling to the proportions of a thunder clap and dying away on a long, weird wail that filled the sky and the sea. Instantly it burst forth loudly again, and the snow whipped against the glass of the ports.
Ned stood up, braced himself, and immediately poured the drinks. But it was not only to save Lenore an attack of sea-sickness. He was also swayed by the fact that the heat of the room seemed to be swiftly escaping. Fortunately, there was still warmth in plenty in the bottle, so he need not be depressed by a mere fall of temperature. He glanced about the room, rather suspecting that one of the ports had been left open. The saloon, however, was as tightly closed as was possible for it to be.
He turned at once, made his way through the gale that swept the deck, and procured Lenore's and Mrs. Hardenworth's heaviest coats. He noticed as he passed that Bess had sought refuge in the engine room. Ned waved to her then returned to his guests.
The room was already noticeably colder, not so much from the drop in temperature—a thermometer would have still registered above freezing—as from the chilling, penetrating quality of the wind that forced an entrance as if through the ship's seams. There seemed no pause, now, between the mighty, roaring gusts. The long, weird wail they had heard at first was only an overtone, in some way oppressive to the imagination. The rattle at the window was loud for the soft sweep of snow. Ned saw why in a moment: the snow had changed to sleet.
There was no opportunity to make comment before Knutsen lurched into the room. “It's tough, isn't it?” he commented. “Mr. Cornet, I want another shot of dat stuff before I take de wheel.”
Ned, not uninfluenced by his cups, extended the bottle with a roar of laughter. “You know what's good for you,” he commented. “Where's McNab? Let him have one too.”
“He's still at de wheel, but I don't think he'd care for one. He's a funny old wolf, at times. Mrs. Hardenworth, how do you like dis weat'er?”
“I don't like it very well.” She held fast to the slipping table. “Of course, you'd tell us if there was any danger”
“Not a bit of danger. Yust a squall. Dis isn't rough—you ought to see what it would be outside dis chain of islands. But it's mighty chilly.” He poured the stiff drink down his great throat, then buttoned his coat tight.
Ned, for a moment secretly appalled by the storm, felt his old recklessness returning. The captain said it was only a squall,—and were they not soon to turn south? In fact, their direction now was no longer north, but rather in an easternly direction toward Tzar Island. He was warm now, glowing; the rocking of the boat only increased his exhilaration.
“There's only three or four shots left in this bottle,” he said, holding up the second of the two quarts he had taken from the case. “You'd better have one more with us before you go. A man burns up lots of whisky without hurting him any on a night like this. Then take the bottle in with you to keep you warm at the wheel.”
Knutsen needed no second urging. He was of a race that yields easily to drink, and he wanted to conquer the last, least little whisper of his fear of the night and the storm. He drank once more, pocketed the bottle, then made his way to the pilot house.
“You're not going to try to ride her through?” McNab asked, as he yielded the wheel.
“Of course. You're not afraid of a little flurry like dis.”
His voice gave no sign of the four powerful drinks he had consumed. A tough man physically, the truth was he was still a long way from actual drunkenness. But even a small amount of liquor had a distressing effect upon him,—a particularly unfortunate effect for one who habitually has the lives of other human beings in his charge. He always lost the fine edge of his caution. With drink upon him, he was willing to take a chance.
McNab stared into his glittering eyes, and for a moment his lips were tightly compressed. “This isn't a little flurry,” he answered at last coldly. “It's a young gale, and God knows what it will be by morning. You know and I know we shouldn't attempt things here that we can do with safety in waters we're familiar with. Right now we can run into the lea of Ivan Island and find a harbor. There's a good one just south of the point.”
“We're not going to run into Ivan Island. I want to feel dry land. We're going to head on toward Tzar Island.”
“You run a little more of that bottle down your neck and you'll be heading us into hell. Listen, Cap'n.” McNab paused, deeply troubled. “You let me take the wheel, and you go in and celebrate with the party. You won't do any damage then.”
“And you get back to your engine and mind your own business.” Little angry points of light shot into Knutsen's eyes. “And if you see Cornet, tell him to bring up anoder bottle. Dis one's almost empty.”
McNab turned to the door, where for a moment he stood listening to the wild raging of the wind. Then he climbed down into the engine room.
There was nothing in his face, as he entered, to reveal the paths of his thought. He was wholly casual, wholly commonplace, seemingly not in the least alarmed. He stepped to Bess's side, half smiling.
“I wonder if you can help me?” he asked.
The girl stood up, a straight, athletic figure at his side. “I'll try, of course.”
“It depends—have you any influence with young Cornet?”
Bess slowly shook her head. “I'm afraid I can't help you,” she told him, very gravely. “I have no influence with him at all. What is it you wanted me to do?”
“I wanted you to tell him to put up the booze. Particularly to keep the captain from getting any more. This is a bum night. It's against the rules of the sea to scare passengers, but somehow, I figure you're the stuff that can stand it and maybe hold out. This isn't a night to have a shipload of drunks. There may be some tight places before the morning”
“There's only one way.” The girl's lips were close to his ear, else he couldn't have heard in the roar of the storm and the flapping of the sails. “Listen, McNab. How much has he got in the dining saloon?”
“None, now, I don't think. He only brought up two bottles, and Ivnutsen's got one of 'em—not much in it, though. They must have emptied the other.”
“Then we're all clear.” She suddenly straightened, a look of unswervable intent in her face. “McNab, it's better to make some one—violently mad at you—isn't it, if maybe you can save him from trouble? If you want to see him get ahead and make a success of a big venture—it isn't wrong, is it, to do something against his will that you know is right?”
McNab looked at her as before now he had looked at strong men with whom he had stood the watch. “What are you gettin' at?”
His voice was gruff, but it didn't offend her. She felt that they were on common ground.
“If may be human lives are the stake, a person can't stand by for one man's anger,” she went on.
“Human lives are the first consideration,” the man answered. “That's the rule of the sea. Most sea rules are good rules—built on sense—all except the one that you can't take the wheel away from a drunken captain. What's your idea?”
“You know as well as I do. I promised his father before I left that I'd look after Ned. He was in earnest—and Ned needs looking after now if he ever did. Mr. Cornet won't blame me, either. Show me how to get down in the hold.”
McNab suddenly chuckled and patted her on the back with rough familiarity, yet with fervent companionship. “You've got the stuff,” he said. “But you can't lift them alone. I'm with you till the last dog is hung.”