The Argosy, Vol. 82, No. 3 — page 18: what you’re looking at

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

392 THE him. One o’ you lend him some dunga- rees. If he kicks, whale him!” In the foul-smelling fo’c’s’le again, Blake groped his way to a bunk and collapsed. His brain was in a chaotic state, and he could pay little heed to what passed around him. The watch had just come below and breakfast was in progress; the gloomy den was filled with the odors of humanity and bilgewater. One of the men slipped over to Blake and offered him a tin pannikin of steaming coffee. “Here, matey,” he said, not unkindly, “take a swig on this! It'll put some guts into ye, and nex’ time ye plaster that cow-son aft I hope ye crack his bloody sky- piece!” With a muttered word of thanks, Blake took the pannikin. He tasted the scalding stuff, and squirmed inwardly. Coffee! If this was coffee, he had fooled himself all his life! But it was hot, and reasonably sweetened with black molasses. After a sip or two his inner man responded to its warmth, and he found himself listening to the uncouth noises that passed for table-talk among the half-dozen men. His friend of the coffee, whom the others called Paddy Ryan, seemed to be watching him, and promptly came over again when Blake showed signs of interest in life. Ryan was a small man, very wrinkled, but with efficiency stamped in his whole bearing. Blake felt instinctively that here was a friend, and one who was able to help him find himself in this new environment. If Jack Blake had ever been tainted with snobbishness, it was clean wiped out of him by this time. He met Ryan’s cheery grin with a faint smile. “See here, matey,” began Paddy, “you ain’t one of us, that’s plain. But you’re here, an’ here you'll have to be stoppin’ till this ship gets some’eres. So you might as well eat some grub. You ain’t goin’ to lick Steelfist Charley half starved, me bully boy!” Once the coffee had put a warm glow beneath his belt, the same thought had come to Blake himself. He realized exactly how matters stood. He knew that if he did not at least make a show of accepting his lot, the entire afterguard of the ship would beat him mercilessly until he did. Having eaten nothing since the previous evening, he was hungry. Determined to _evening clothes, thought Blake. ARGOSY. conquer that skipper with the terrible right, he resolved to store away strength. And finally, being very much of a man, he re- solved that he would never sign articles or in any shape give up his rights under the law. He came to his feet with another faint smile. “Hold on,” exclaimed Ryan, reaching down a bundle from his own bunk, just op- posite. ‘“‘Peel them glad duds, matey! Put ‘em in yer bunk—’tis all the beddin’ ye get. And you can use these here slops 0’ mine till you sign on an’ do be gettin’ some more from the slop-chest.”’ The ‘“‘slops” were a pair of dungaree trousers and a jacket of the same stuff; not new, not too clean, but certainly more in keeping with the surroundings than his He put them on grimly, and took a place at the mess kids. Being too sore to converse, Blake silently gnawed a scrap of hardtack and endeavored to wash it down with drafts of coffee. Then he discovered that, when the coffee became cool enough to drink readily, it also de- veloped a taste which he could not stomach. Hard though he tried, he found it im- possible to down that coffee. He was not at all seasick. As a boy, Blake had made many cruises in his father’s yacht, and had be- come well acquainted with sea life—from the other end of the ship. This was some- thing new, however. Giving up the effort, he bethought him- self to search his pockets. When he left the club, he had had something over a hundred dollars in gold. Now he found himself stripped of money and valuables, save for one ten-dollar gold piece in a vest pocket. Searching his bunk, he found a cranny in the sheathing and slipped the gold piece into it. Later, he thought, it might come in useful, and it would certainly be confiscated by officers or stolen by his shipmates did it appear in his possession. From a scuttle-butt beneath the ladder, Blake now obtained a pannikin of water, which proved better than the coffee. While he munched his biscuit with its help, the little hatch was darkened by a descending figure; a square, muscular, bronzed seaman dropped down and took his seat on a vacant sea-chest. This proved to be the bo’sun, Fancy Harry Lovell, snatching a surreptitious smoke below. His pipe was soon going, and GEomichoo (S cS) (E@)