Argosy, Vol. 120, No. 1 — page 83: what you’re looking at

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

THE BUTT OF NEPTUNE’S JEST. cheeks were aflame with the embarrass- ment of the situation. Her voice bespoke her loathing of the woman who had drawn back. “It’s—” Dan had started to call the wretched hag by the name he had learned from the drunken second mate of the ill- fated Castonia. He cut it short. The very vulgarity of such a name for a woman made it unfit for the ears of a good girl. Their spell of emotion was broken. They stared at each other a moment—both a little amazed at themselves, at the won- derful knowledge of, love, a little fearful lest they had been too forward. “TI must go and—” She could think of no excuse to offer. But she must go. She went toward the passage. When she was out of sight Dan stood a minute or two, his eyes turned toward the . shore, where stood the wretched shacks of the beach-combers, shorter by one than they had been but a little over twenty-four hours ago. He had gone through a lot for twenty- four hours. He was far from sure that he had got much nearer the goal of success and happiness than he had been the’ day before the eventful yesterday when first he had seen the girl with whose lot and life his own had become so quickly. bound up. -But he suddenly perceived one thing. Whether he succeeded or failed, whether he were ever happy again or not—he was a different and a bigger man than the poor wreck who had lived. in the shack now battered to the crude driftwood of which it had been made. Perhaps these new circumstances would defeat him. Perhaps they would defeat any man. They would not defeat the man these hours had made him without a fight the man he had been could not even have begun. He turned then and went through the after passage. The first bitter struggle must be that of making himself obey the unreasoning order of his superior. Half- way through he paused, struck with a fresh idea. According to the information Mr. Ed- ward had furnished him, the No. 4 hatch was already completely loaded.. It had been 73 that fact and the fact that the cargo aboard it ran light for its bulk which had gone into his calculations to cause him to put the heavier casks into the one next it. Though he had not measured himself, or got a look at the markings on the bow and stern of the ship, he had thought there was the barely perceptible forward tilt of the deck to confirm Edwards’s information. But it might be wrong. If the No. 4 compartment was not full, the putting of this cargo into No. 3 was error enough to make any skipper furious. Dan ground his teeth. He suspected Ed- wards the more since the man had come out of the captain’s room as Hope came to de- liver his tirade of abuse. If the second mate had fooled him—well, there are ways of passing abuse along down the line. Just now Dan was not preparing any speeches to compare with the one he had had to hear. He was clenching his fists. But Dan was not to gain immediate knowledge as to the exact extent of the second mate’s honesty or dishonesty for a while. He scented trouble the instant his eyes ran around the little knots of idle sea- men sitting or sprawling on the edge of the open hatch or the cover of the closed one behind it. They looked as if they were setting themselves for some preconcerted action at sight of him. . The big blond boatswain was facing him, sitting on the hatch that had to be opened for the transfer of the load into it. His eyes dropped before Dan uttered the com- mand: | | “Get that hatch open!” ‘The boatswain got to his feet, came slow- ly forward toward Dan. ‘“‘T said, get that hatch open.”’ Dan halted the man’s advance with the same quieter tone with which he had made stiffer every command he had had to repeat through. the day. But this time the trick of voice did not bring the result. “They ban tired,” stolidly asserted the nautical equivalent of a foreman. There was a brief silence. Dan and the big Scandinavian eyed each other without a blink in either pair of eyes. In a way Dan understood. The men had seen his authority overridden by the one CoOMmiiclooo @ S C@