Chapter 12

"To git sailors to come to yer house on commission," retorted Hennesey, hotly; "an' fur fear I'd be makin' too much, ye sind me to a bloody coaster, whose min are in the union, while you go down to the _Albatross_, in from deep water."

"I got no wan from the _Albatross_."

"No fault o' yours or mine. I'd ha' got 'em."

"None o' yer shlack."

"To hill wi' ye."

"Ye're discharged. Come in an' I'll pay ye off."

"Right ye are. From this on I'll work fur mesilf and git your business, ye skin."

Hennesey's estimate of Murphy was not far wrong, though it might also apply to himself. The profits of a sailors' boarding-house depend not upon the cash paid in by men with money, who choose their own ship and come and go as they please, but upon the advance or allotment of pay which the law allows to deep-water seamen in order that they may purchase an outfit of clothing before sailing. To get this allotment, Murphy and others of his kind would take in and feed any penniless sailor long enough to run up an inflated bill for board, money lent, and clothing, then find him a ship and walk him to the shipping-office, more or less drugged or drunk. Here the penniless sailor dared not, even if suspicious, contest the claim, for, should he do so, he would find himself not only out of a ship, but out of a boarding-house; so he would sign away his allotment, and go aboard with what clothing his benefactor had allowed him. As deep-water men on shore are invariably drunk, drugged, or penniless, the boarding-masters, to whom the skippers must apply for men, easily control the situation. And, as machinery for such control, nearly all boarding-houses have the front ground floor divided into barroom and clothing-store, while in the rear is the dining-room and upstairs the bedrooms, each with as many beds as there is room for. Thus, a man may be housed, fed, clothed, drugged, and shipped from the same address. The remedy for this has no place in this story.

A boarding-master, or crimp, without the machinery, becomes a shipping-master, a go-between between the skipper and the boarding-master, whose income is the blood-money paid by skippers for men. Murphy, strolling along South Street a few days later, saw a new sign over a doorway--Timothy Hennesey, Shipping-Master. He ascended the wooden stairs, and in a dingy room with one desk and chair found his former aid.

"Well, what the hill is this, Hennesey--tryin' to take the brid out of honest min's mouths?"

"I've me livin' to make, Murphy, an' I'm a-doin' it. I got the crew of the _Albatross_."

"An' what did ye do wid 'em?"

"Put 'em wid Stillman, over beyant. Ye might ha' had 'em had ye played fair."

Stillman was Murphy's most important rival, and the news did not cheer him. He glared darkly at Hennesey.

"An' I've got the shippin' o' Williams's new crew whin he sails," continued Hennesey, "an' I'll not go to you for 'em, Murphy."

"Ye'll not?" responded Murphy, luridly. "After all the wark I've given ye."

"I'll not. I told ye I'd git yer business, an' I'll do it."

Murphy's fist shot out and Hennesey went down. Arising with bleeding nose, he shook his small fist at his chuckling assailant passing sidewise out of his door.

"I'll not forgit thot, John Murphy," he spluttered.

"I don't want ye to. Remember it while ye live; an' there's more where thot cum from, too, ye scab."

At a meeting of the brotherhood that evening, Murphy posted the name of Timothy Hennesey, scab, and Captain Williams, outlaw; then, somewhat easier in his mind, took account of the immediate business situation. It was bad; he had three cash boarders, of no use when their money was gone, as they signed in coasters, and there was but one ship in port, the _Albatross_, and none expected for a fortnight. So, leaving orders with his wife to watch the cash register in the bar, and to evict the boarders when they asked for trust, he took the train for Chicago, where lived a prosperous brother, for whom he had a sincere regard, and to whom he owed a long-promised visit. Brother Mike welcomed him, and under the softening influence of brotherly love he forgave Hennesey, but not Williams. It is so much easier to warm toward a fellow man you have punched than toward one who has punched you.

Mike took John down to his coal-docks, with which he was amassing a fortune, and explained their workings. A schooner lay at one, and his gang was unloading her. It was a cold day in November, and their warm overcoats felt none too warm; yet down in the hold of the schooner were men bare to the waist, black as negroes with coal dust, save where the perspiration cleared white channels as it ran down their backs and breasts--keeping themselves warm with the violence of their exertions. There were two to each of the three hatches; and there were six others on the dock runway, wheeling the coal away; they had nearly unloaded the schooner, having cleared away the coal directly under the hatch, and were now loading their buckets at the two piles farther back, between the hatches. These buckets stood as high as their waists, and held, according to Brother Mike, five hundred pounds when full. But a man, having filled it to the brim, would seize the bale and drag it along the flooring to the hatch, unhook a descending bucket, hook on the full one, sing out an inarticulate cry, and drag the empty back to the coal to be filled in its turn--all with a never-lessening display of extravagant muscular force.

"Heavens! what wark!" said John, as they peered down the hatch. "An' how long do they kape this up?"

"Tin hours a day, and not a minute longer," answered Mike; "that is, barrin' fifteen minutes at tin in the mornin' and three in the afternoon, whin they knock off for a bite and a drink up at me place on the corner. They go up and ate up me free lunch and soak in about a pint of whisky at one drink."

"The divil! and don't it kill thim?"

"Naw. They come back and sweat it out. They couldn't wurruk like this widout it."

"It's great work, Mike. Look at the devilopment. Did ye iver see a prize-fighter with such muscles?"

"A prize-fighter!" said Mike. "Jawn Murphy, luk at them. They're all sizes, big and little, in my two gangs; but give the littlest a month's trainin' in the science o' boxin' and he'd lick any heavyweight in the wurruld. Ye see, ye simply can't hurt 'em."

"Can't hurt 'em?"

"Ye can't hurt 'em. They're not human. They're wild beasts. They come from the hills and bogs of Limerick and Galway, and they can't speak the language, but call themselves Irishmin. Well, Jawn, they're Irish, mebbe, as the American Injun's an American; but they're not like you and me, dacent min from Dublin."

"But if they can't speak the language, how do ye git on wid 'em?"

"Once in a while, when they're cool and tranquil, I get on to a word or two, but usually I fall back on moral suasion and the sign language."

"Moral suasion?"

"I swear at 'em. And thin, whin that fails, I use the sign language. That's good in talkin' to any foreigner, Jawn."

"But what is it, the sign language?"

"A brick. See this, Jawn?" Mike held up one side of his coat, and John felt of an oblong protuberance in the right-hand pocket. "I carry a brick at all times, Jawn, for it's the only thing that appeals to their sinsibilities. I used to carry a club, but it didn't wurruk; they'd get back at me wid their shovels, and it's domned inconvanient, Jawn, to be sliced up wid a shovel. So, I carry a brick."

"Do they git that way often?"

"Yis; it's their natural condition. They'd rather fight than ate, and I don't dare hire a man from another county in one gang, for fear they'll kill him; so this is the Galway gang, and up the dock a bit is the Limerick gang, twilve min to each. They're all alike, but think they're different, so I have to be careful. But, while they'd rather fight than ate, they'd rather wurruk than fight, and that's where I come in. I kape 'em apart, and stir up their jealousy. Each gang 'll wurruk like hill to bate the other."

"And what do ye pay thim?"

"By the job. They stick to factory hours, and won't wurruk overtime, but at tin hours a day they make about eight dollars."

"The divil! But that's big pay."

"Yis; but I have to pay it, for no other class o' min can do the wurruk. Why, it 'ud kill an American or a Dootchman!"

"They must have money saved up."

"All that they don't spind at me bar up on the corner. They have to save some, for in the nature o' things I can't git it all back. And they're all goin' back to the old sod whin navigation closes--in about two weeks. This'll be about their last job."

"They'll come to New York and take passage, I suppose."

"Yis; and I'll have to buy their tickets and ship thim. They don't know much about American money, and wid a new man I have to pay him in English money at first, until he finds it's no good; thin I exchange at a discount."

"Fine, Mike; ye'll be rich before long."

"That I will, if the supply of bog-trottin' savages holds out."

At this juncture one of the men in the hold lifted his sooty countenance and, with the vehemence of a lunatic, delivered this:

"Whythilldonye'veaharseut'lldothwark?"

"Dry up," said Mike, pulling the brick from his pocket. "Dry up or I'll hurt yer feelin's."

The man shrank back out of sight, and Mike put the brick back in his pocket.

"What did he say?" queried John.

"He objicts to the speed o' the harse on the dock. He can fill buckets, ye see, faster than the harse can h'ist 'em. That's what ails him."

"And he's afraid o' the brick?"

"Yis; but o' nothin' else. Thim fellers don't fear a gun, so I don't carry one. Why, a while back, there was a bad time at the corner whin the two gangs got mixed up, and the police cum down. They used their guns, but--hill! the bullets just punctured their skins, and they picked thim out wid their fingers and wint for the coppers and done thim up. I tell ye, Jawn, that a wild Irishman, frish from the bogs and the hills, can outwork, outfight, and outeat any man alive."

"Outeat?"

"I give thim mate three times a day. If it wuzn't for the profits o' the bar, it wud brek me. And, say, Jawn, they can't say 'mate' whin they ask for more. They say 'mate.'"

"'Mate'? And can't they say 'mate,' whin they ate it so much?"

"No, Jawn, they sing out for mate. It's no use; they can't spake the language, and it's no use t'achin' thim. They're good min to wurruk--all bone and sole leather, but ye can't refine thim."

"You can't, Mike, but I kin."

"How, ye skeptic? Luk at 'em. Scratch 'em, and they won't bleed. Shoot 'em, and they'll pick out the bullets and paste ye wid 'em. Reason wid 'em, and they'll insult ye. Refine 'em, Jawn! Ye're crazy. Luk at thot felly down there under the hatch. He's here on his weddin' trip, but he lift his wife behind in the old country."

"That makes no difference," answered John, ruminatively; "I can refine 'em. Make sure, Mike, that whin they come to New York they come to my house in Front Street. I'll feed 'em mate three times a day again' the time they take the ship for the old sod. I'll be good to thim, Mike. Send thim to me."

"Ay, John, I will thot. But ye'll nade to square yerself wid yer butcher in advance if ye think to feed thim wolfs. They're hungry and they're thirsty be nature."

"Never mind. Send thim on, both factions. I'll take care o' thim. They're a fine lot o' min, and I'll be good to 'em."

John verified Mike's description of them when they met, both gangs, at their afternoon recess in Mike's barroom. They conversed in shouts and whoops, uttering words that, while they bore a slight resemblance to English, were in the main unintelligible. Murphy endeavored to find those whose sole-leather flesh had stopped a bullet, but could not. However, digging his fingers into the breasts and shoulders of a few of the quietest convinced him that the story could not be far wrong. The stiffened muscles felt like bones.

He treated them all, and was glad, when he saw them drink, that he had not promised them free whisky at his house; but he reiterated his promise of "mate" three times a day, and secured their promise to board at his house while waiting for sailing-day. This done, he finished his visit and returned to New York.

His first task was to estimate the business situation; it was the same, except that his boarders had gone at the request of Mrs. Murphy. This was good, almost as good as the news that Williams's old crew had scattered and that there was not a deep-water man in port to aid Hennesey in his first job in the shipping business. He cautiously hunted for Hennesey, meeting him by accident, as he said, in the street at daytime, safe from possible bricks or clubs coming out of the dark.

"And how are ye, Tim?" he said, exuberantly, as he extended his hand.

"So so," answered Hennesey, ignoring the greeting and eying his late employer suspiciously. "And how is it wid you?"

"Fine, Hennesey, fine. In a week I'll have as fine a crew of min in me house as iver ye laid eyes on. Lake sailors, every wan o' thim. And I'll be after havin' to find thim a ship."

"That's easier than to find the min," said Hennesey, still watching for a sudden demonstration of Murphy's fist. "I'll be goin' to Philadelphy, I think, or Boston."

"And it'll cost ye a hundred, Hennesey. I've done it. It takes a cool hundred to bring a crew on from either port. Don't be a fule, Hennesey. I'm domned sorry I slugged ye. I wuz put out, ye see, but I felt bad about it nixt day. I can't deal wid Williams, the dog, but I can wid you, and you can wid him."

"Speak up. What do ye want, John Murphy?"

"That we git together, Hennesey, for our mutual advantage. Give up this idee of gittin' me business away from me. Ye can't do it. I'm too well established, and the only skipper I've blacklisted is Williams, and he's all ye've got."

"What do I git out of it?"

"Ye git your blood-money from Williams, widout huntin' up yer min. I git the allotment agin' the expense I'm put to in feedin' thim. The regular thing, except thot ye make more than ye would as a runner--only ye've got to muster 'em into the shippin'-office and sign 'em. I can't appear. Williams might be there, and cold-deck the deal."

"Murphy, gimme me job back and I'm wid ye. But I want me priveleges--a drink whin I nade it, and access to the bar for me frinds."

"Right, Hennesey; let bygones be bygones. Put this job through as shippin'-master, and thin go on wid me as runner. Shake hands."

They shook, Murphy joyous and forgiving, Hennesey cold, suspicious, and unforgiving. A handshake is a poor auditing of a fist blow.

"Whin does Williams want his min?" asked Murphy.

"In two weeks, about. Twinty-four able seamen."

"Thot's good. I'll have to feed 'em a week, and thot's dead loss; but I'll be contint; yes, I'll be contint, Hennesey, if I can furnish Williams wid the right kind of a crew, God d--bliss him!"

"Ye're gittin' religion, are ye not?" asked Hennesey. "I heard he slugged ye around decks and bundled ye down into yer boat.'"

"Yes"--and Murphy's eyes shone--"but thot's all past, Hennesey. I'm not the man to hold a grudge. Ye know thot."

"But I am," muttered Hennesey, as they parted.

And thus did Murphy plan his dark vengeance upon Captain Williams. It went through without a hitch; the twenty-four wild men from Galway and Limerick, shipped on by Brother Mike, arrived at Murphy's house in a few days, and were housed and fed--"mate" with every meal--to the scandal of Mrs. Murphy, who averred that she "niver seed such min."

"Fur they have no table manners, John," she said. "What's the use givin' thim knives and forks, whin they don't know how to use thim? Foor o' thim cut their mouths."

"Niver mind, Norah," said Murphy, kindly. "Give thim spoons; for a spoon is like a shovel, ye know, and they're accustomed to shovels. And give 'em bafe stew and mashed praties."

"I'll give 'em rat pizen, if I have to sarve 'em much longer," responded the good lady. "I was a silf-respictin' woman before I married you, John Murphy, and didn't have to consort wid lunatics."

"Niver mind, Norah," answered Murphy, soothingly. "I'll be rid o' thim in a few days, and ye'll have a new driss out o' the proceeds."

The proceeds were secured. Murphy collected a week's board in advance from each, and induced them to deposit their money with him for safe-keeping. Then he got them drunk on his tried and true whisky, and kept them so; then he collected ten dollars from each for a ticket to Queenstown on the ship which would sail in a few days; and then he audited an account for each, charging them with money advanced as they asked for it. As he always trebled the amount that they asked for, and as they were too drunk and befuddled to contest the word of so good and kind a man, Murphy had a tidy sum due him when the allotments were signed.

This happened in due time and form. Captain. Williams, knowing by experience that no crew would sign with him if he showed himself, remained away from the shipping-office and took his ship down to the Horseshoe with the help of his two mates, cook, steward, and a tug, leaving his articles in the care of Hennesey, and trusting to him to sign the crew and bring them down in the tug that would tow him out past the light-ship.

Hennesey did his part. As the _Albatross_ was bound for Liverpool _via_ Queenstown in ballast, there was only part deception in walking the twenty-four to the shipping-office to sign their names (or marks) on the ship's articles, which they cheerfully did, under the impression that it was a necessary matter of form connected with their purchase of tickets; and while the Shipping Commissioner marveled somewhat at the hilarity and the ingenuous self-assertiveness of this crew of sailormen, he forebore to express himself, and left the matter to Captain Williams and Providence. So, with all their allotment or advance signed away to Murphy against the entertainment they had received, and with their pockets depleted from their sublime trust in Murphy's bookkeeping, they went back to the boarding-house, the signed slaves of Bucko Bill Williams, a man they had not met.

It was a wild night, that last night in the boarding-house. The Galways and the Limericks got to fighting, and only Murphy's "pull" with the police prevented a raid. Mrs. Murphy quit the scene early in the evening, going back to her mother with unkind comments on the company that Murphy kept, and Murphy, with a brick in his pocket, and sometimes in his hand, was busy each minute in settling a dispute between this man and that. At last he and Hennesey agreed that it was time to quiet them; so Hennesey, behind the bar, filled twenty-four pint flasks, each with a moderate addition of "knockout drops," and with much flourish of oratory brought the crowd up to the bar for a last drink and the presentation of the flasks. The drinks were also seasoned, and soon Murphy and Hennesey had a long hour's work in lifting the twenty-four able seamen up to the bedrooms, to sleep until the express wagons came to take them and their dunnage to the tug. They came at ten o'clock, and the unconscious men were carried down with their grips and boxes, and loaded in like so many bags of potatoes.

"It's done, Hennesey," said Murphy, as, perspiring and fatigued, he fetched back into the barroom. "Now, Hennesey, let's you and me have a drink, and we'll drink to the health and the happiness of Bucko Bill Williams, the dog."

"Right," said Hennesey, going behind the bar and bringing out the bottle and the glasses; "but we'll need to hurry, Murphy, for I've got to go down wid the tug, ye know." As he spoke he passed his hand over the glass he had placed for Murphy, and Murphy, glancing out through the door at the departing express wagons, did not see.

But Hennesey had another express wagon in reserve, and when Murphy sagged down and sought the nearest chair and table, too stupefied to even wonder at his sleepiness, Hennesey called this wagon from the corner and, with the help of the driver, bundled Murphy into it, climbed in himself, and rode down to the dock and the waiting tug.

* * * * *

It was broad daylight when Murphy woke, in a forecastle bunk, with a dull, dragging pain in his head which he knew from experience was the after effects of a drug. He rolled out, noticing that each bunk held a sleeping man, and, examining a few, recognized his boarders. The plan had succeeded, but why was he there? Then he remembered that last drink, and calling down silent curses upon Hennesey, went out on deck.

The big ship was plowing along before the wind with not a rag set except the foretopmast-staysail and jib. Amidships was a man coiling up ropes, at the wheel was another man, and pacing the top of the after-house was Captain Williams, red-bearded, red-eyed, and truculent of gesture and expression. These three bore marks of hard usage, bruises, black eyes, swollen noses, and contusions. Murphy climbed the forecastle deck and looked astern. The land was a thin line of blue on the horizon.

He descended and went aft. The man coiling ropes, whom Murphy learned later was the first mate, looked furtively at him as he passed, and turned in his tracks so as not to show him his back. Murphy judged that he was nervous over something that had happened--something connected with his injuries. Climbing the poop steps, he was stopped by Captain Williams, who descended from the house and faced him.

"Well, Murphy, what the hell are _you_ doing here? Are you in on this deal?"

"What deal, Captain?" asked Murphy, meekly, for it was no place for self-respect.

"This deal I got from your discharged runner, Hennesey. I only dealt with the fellow because he told me he had quit you. And look at what he gave me for a crew--twenty-four wild Micks that, let alone the ropes, can't speak English or understand it. Are you a party to this trick, Murphy?"

"I'm not," declared Murphy, stoutly. "The domned villain doped me last night, and must ha' put me aboard wid the crew he shipped for you. What for, I don't know. He had yer full count, as he told me."

"Guess you're the man he hoisted up himself, saying you were willing to work your passage without pay. So I let you come and sleep it off."

"He did!" stormed Murphy, "the dirty, ungrateful dog! I took him in and gave him wark, and I took him back after I'd discharged him. And now I git this! O' course, Captain, ye'll put me aboard the first ship me meet bound in."

"Not much, I won't. If you took Hennesey back you're in on this deal."

"I'm not in it. Where's Hennesey now, Captain Williams?"

"Went back in the tug, I suppose. He didn't stop to get his receipt signed for the men he delivered. So, he gets no money for this kind of a crew. They're not sailors, and he loses. Moreover, Murphy, you lose. Hennesey brought me the articles, and every man Jack o' them signed his allotment over to you as favored creditor. That means that Hennesey got this bunch out of your house. As they're not sailors, I mean to disrate them to boys at five dollars a month. That's the allotment you get, if you care to sue for it; but I told the tug captain to notify the owners to pay no allotment notes."

"Ye did?" spluttered Murphy. "Well, Williams, I'll sue, don't ye fear. I'll sue."

"That's as may be," said Williams, coldly. "Meanwhile, you'll sing small, do what you're told, and work your passage; and any time that you forget where you are, call on me and I'll tell you."

"Ye want me to wark me passage, do ye? And what'll I do? It's gone twinty years since I've been to sea. I can't go aloft, wi' the fat on me."

"I see," said the skipper, seriously, "that your displacement is more than your dimensions call for. Can you boss that bunch of Kollkenny cats?"