Black Pawl

Thus far fair weather had followed them from the island; the schooner laid the leagues of ocean behind her and plunged steadfastly along the homeward course. There was peace abo...

Spiess, a born lubber who would never learn the way of the sea, bungled his simple share of the task of getting the mate’s boat away. Black Pawl, master of the schooner, was nea...

Black Pawl had knocked at Ruth’s door while she was preparing to put up her hair. It was about her shoulders now. He thought, abruptly, that with her hair thus, she looked very...

When Black Pawl saw the locket, his hands fell and hung limply at his sides. He stared at the little golden thing; and his eyes blurred, and he brushed his knuckles across them,...

Black Pawl was right. There was wind coming, and plenty of it--too much of it. It began cheerfully enough--just a brisk breeze across a sunlit sea. But the clouds that poked up...

On the second day afterward, the Deborah ran into the fringes of bad weather. In mid-morning the wind began to rise unpleasantly; the glass was falling, and the skies were overc...

It was as though the blade of the knife touched a spring of life within Black Pawl. He came to his feet with a swift, fierce movement that flung Spiess off his back and sent the...

Ruth Lytton was sick with unhappiness for the sake of Black Pawl. She was sorry for him because his son was false; she was sorrier for him because Black Pawl was false to himsel...

They did not get away as soon as the Captain had expected. Before coming to this anchorage, the oil-casks had been securely stowed against the homeward voyage; the whaling gear...

When Black Pawl said, “Come below,” his voice was harsh and sick and broken. The girl looked up at him briefly, her eyes sober and wistful; and then she smiled and asked:

There developed in Black Pawl a devil of unrest. It is in all men; it was stronger in him, just as every function of the man was stronger than a like function in other men. Bene...

At dawn Black Pawl rose and dressed himself. Though he had not slept, he was not weary. Strength had flowed into him during the night, and happiness, and peace, and a great love...

Black Pawl said to him next day: “Well, Father, you were a true prophet. The thing came about as you said. But you see, it is finished, with no harm done after all.”

When Black Pawl boasted to the missionary that the men forward were so loyal they brought him word of Red Pawl’s talk to them, he spoke the truth. When he said there was not one...

The grim story which the missionary had heard from Black Pawl stayed in his mind; he could not put it aside. He thought upon it constantly, wondering, seeking, puzzling for the...

Red Pawl fell forward into Black Pawl’s lap. And the Captain’s arms went around his son and held him close; and the revolver fell upon the deck at one side. Close against his br...

The third day afterward the Deborah sailed away from her island anchorage. Her rigging was shipshape again; her sticks were spliced and splinted and strong for any gale. The wid...

Black Pawl and his daughter were together through that afternoon, below, in the cabin; and there they cast up the old accounts of the year. And there were times when they were u...