Adventure, July 1, 1928 — page 83: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE ROARING HORN v7 “Damn this calm!” he growled. “And this hell’s flames bunch o’ farmers, too! Of all the beachcombin’, lousy swabbies ever I commanded-—”’ His evil mood was heightened by memo- ries of how that morning, when he had seen Peter Mayes kick Dago Viterbo for working his broom athwartship instead of fore and aft while washing down the deck, of how Mayes had demanded— “Sure, is there anything under God’s blue sky you can do right, you burgoo swillin’ son of a whelp?” “I one good paper hanger on de land,” Viterbo had most surprisingly retorted. “You like, I do fine job, paperin’ your cabin!” Whereupon Mayes had fetched him a blow that had sent him skirling, for back- talk, and had earnestly assured the son of Italy that the only one proud of him was Satan’s own self. “Of all the bushborn muttonheads!”’ pondered Bohannon. “Damned _ hay- makin’ sons o’ sea cooks! Ain’t half a dozen A-1 sailors aboard us. All the rest o’ these here thick skinned clodhoppers is tarred up with the lazy stick. They’d oughta be kicked to death by cripples, that’s what. Quicker I get clear o’ this ship and leave ’em all go drownd off the Horn, the better, s’help my God!’ ITH jaundiced eye of spite and venom he surveyed the China Girl and the work now going on, for the most part with inept clumsiness. The watch on deck, indeed, was as far as it dared largely doing only ‘‘government stroke”, which is to say just putting in time; soldiering on the job. Bohannon glowered at Paavola the Finn, now at the wheel, to which from time to time he gave an easy spoke; a pale and sweating figure in the stifle of the wheelhouse. He regarded with misprisal some of the more expert who were making sennit; knotting rope yarn for spun yarn, making _sword mats for chafing gear. Not even the competence wherewith Saunier, the Miquelon Frenchman, and the big red bearded Dane, Tondern, were coach whipping a spare sheerpole, relieved his mood. Evil eyed, he watched them working with canvas, tar, spun yarn and serving board; and as he watched he smoked and chewed curses on all hands. “Keel hauled is what they’d ought to be!” he bitterly affirmed, his scar con- tracting as his gash of a mouth snarled up. “God stiffen ’em, the sons o’ scaldies!”’ No very pleasant ship to be aboard of was the China Girl, and that was living truth. From the seams of her holy- stoned decks stewed and bubbled pitch that smeared the soles, now mostly naked, of all who trod them. A sickly stench of bilges arose from the forepeak. Cock- roaches had begun to swarm; and even rats, driven up from below by the intense heat, had commenced venturing furtively on deck. This, despite the ravages of the slit eared and filthy cat which Humphrey Chubbock the Newfoundland cook had fetched aboard in New York, and which now snarled and spat at all with a veno- mous temper almost equal to the cap- tain’s Own. From the galley, while Bohannon watched and listened, a clink of tinware and coppers sounded as Chubbock messed with grub few wanted on the sweltering ship. Chubbock had to labor under diffi- culties, what of weevily biscuit, salt beef so hard that the foremast hands had nick- named it sole leather, tea flavored with roaches, rotting potatoes and other skulch. As Chubbock worked he was singing to himself. The irregular gusts of noise that served him as music suddenly fell silent as he stoked his range. Into that silence issued a sailorman, out of the forward deckhouse. His tough skin, powerful hands, manner of glancing aloft, all marked him as a seasoned lobscouser. The vigorous modeling of his head, his bitter and steady gazing dark eyes, strong beard and rich tanned sunburn made him an arresting figure as, open throated and with muscular bare arms he stood gazing over the tropic sea, searching for any sign of breeze. In “dog’s wool and oakum”’ singlet and dungaree trousers, with naked feet thrust comicloooks.com