Part 5

“Dat’s enough! Dat settles it,” she exploded. “Now I know mighty well dey ain’ no sech pussun. Kinfolks to de whole worl’. Look heah, me an’ my Miss Edith has jes’ been deceptified long enough! I know wheah you gwine wid dis boat! You gwine to de Souf Pole—dat’s wheah you gwine! I done heah de Cap’n say so las’ night, an’ dat when he got dar he gwine to sail her off into space wid de whole kit an’ possum of us! I know mighty well somp’n gone wrong when I put Miss Edith to baid. She ain’ said two words, an’ befoah dat she been mighty chipper de whole trip. I didn’t know what it was, an’ I set an’ hol’ her han’ an’ sing to her, an’ it seem like she ain’ _nevah_ goin’ to sleep. But bimeby when I slip up on deck a li’l’, to look at de sky, I heah de Cap’n an’ Mistah Lahkins argifyin’ up on de bridge, an’ I heah de Cap’n say dat we goin’ to de Souf Pole an’, ’scusin’ de libe’ty, sah, dat you gone plum crazy on de subjec’, and dat you got de Admiral an’ Mistah Macarony an’ Mistah Sturritt all crazy, laikewise; an’ dat he gwine to sail you-all to de Souf Pole, case dat wheah you-all b’long, an’ dat you-all nevah get home, case when he get dere he gwine straight off into space wid de ship, an’ de whole caboodle in it. An’ den right away, I knowed what’s de mattah wid my Miss Edith. I knowed she been up dar a-hearin’ somp’n, too. An’ I make up my min’, right den an’ dar, dat me an’ my Miss Edith ain’ gwine. I like to see me an’ my Miss Edith flyin’ off into space, an’ us wid no wings yit, an’ fallin’ down to de bottomless pit an’ lake o’ fiah! Humph! We’s gwine de other way, we is!”

She hesitated a moment for breath, and I took advantage of the recess.

“What did Mr. Larkins say about it?” I asked.

“Mistah Lahkins! Humph, Mistah Lahkins! What he always say? He jes’ laugh an’ say dat de Souf Pole ’bout de onliest stick o’ timbah he ain’ tie up to yit, but he reckon dat it strong enough to hol’ us f’m gwine off into space. Anyway, he willin’ to take chances wid de res’. ‘An’ de Cap’n say, ‘Dat’s all right, same here,’ but dat de bosen, Frenchy, been talkin’ ’roun’ ’mong de sailors, an’ dat some get mighty oneasy an’ wan’ to be put ashoah. An’ dat’s what _I_ want. I wan’ me an’ my Miss Edith put ashoah. Den if you-all _mus’_ go on aftah de Souf Pole, why jes’ _go_, and leave me an’ my Miss Edith to go back home; an’ nex’ time tell folks wheah you gwine, an’ not make out like you takin’ all dis perwision down to some po’ kinfolks dat everybody related to, an’ nobody don’t know about.”

There was another brief intermission. The incident was entertaining enough, but there was a grave note in it as well. In the bosen, Frenchy, I recognized the sailor who on the first day had barred my entrance to the Billowcrest. I recalled my unfavorable impression of the man. He would be altogether the one, I thought, to stir up discontent among the sailors—an unpleasant prospect.

“Please, sah, won’t you put me an’ my Miss Edith ashoah, sah?” In my more serious consideration I had temporarily forgotten Zar’s presence. She had believed me hesitating, perhaps, and had adopted a persuasive tone in consequence. “Miss Edith mighty sad las’ night,” she added, “an’ I know you don’ want dat po’ gal to go spillin’ off into space like a lil’ robin when he nes’ break!”

“Not for the South Pole, Antarctics, and the whole world, Zar!” I said with a fervency that made the woman suddenly regard me with a new interest. There was a rustle behind her, and Edith Gale stepped out on deck. “Here is Miss Gale to speak for herself,” I added, with some confusion.

“What’s the matter, Zar? What do you want of Mr. Chase?”

“I want him to put we ’uns ashoah,” began the old woman. “I tol’ him we done foun’ out about gwine to de Souf Pole, an’ dat you an’ me wan’ to get off right heah, an’ go ashoah.”

“But I don’t want to get off, Zar. I’ve known all along where we are going. I _want_ to go to the South Pole with—with Papa, and we’re going to bring it back with us.”

Zar regarded her mistress a moment in silence. Then she said in a voice of grave wonderment:

“I wish you tell me what dat Paw of yours gwine to do wid dat Souf Pole when he gits it? Ain’ he got money ’nuff already? Anyhow, who gwine to buy dat pole? An’ how dey gwine know hit’s de sho nuff Souf Pole when dey sees hit? What’s to hender us gwine ’shoah right heah, an’ hackin’ down any ole pole, an’ gwine home again widout any moah foolishness? Ain’ none dem folks up in New York gwine know de diff’ence!”

“Why, Zar,” laughed Miss Gale, “and you such a good church member!”

“Well, den, if yo’ Paw boun’ to go aftah de sho’ nuff pole, let him go, but don’ _you_ go. You cain’t he’p him any!”

“But, Zar, you know I wouldn’t leave Papa. I never could.”

The old woman tossed her head.

“Humph! Bettah not be too suah!” She regarded me with a fierceness that somehow warmed me to the soul. “Dey ain’ no man livin’ I’d go to de Souf Pole foh,” she concluded, and with this final shot she disappeared, and went rumbling down the companion-way, “no, sah, not even if I could be wid him all de way an’ back again.”

“See, there’s a vessel,” said Edith Gale. “Bring the glass, please, and let’s try to make her out.”

I hastened to obey, though with no great interest in the result. The tropics and distant vessels had been wonderfully fascinating to me, but just at this moment I was dwelling fondly on Zar’s parting salute.

A little later she sought me again.

“Look heah,” she counselled solemnly, “you turn dis ship right ’round, now, an’ go back home. You go off down dar wid my Miss Edith, an’ bofe die an’ get all froze stiff, an’ den what good is you to each other, I like to know? What good is you?”

Zar had meant this for remonstrance and admonition, but I was her sworn friend and champion from that moment.

Chauncey Gale found me staring off at the horizon and building a fair castle in which the South Pole had no part.

“Chase,” he said, “don’t you make a mistake, too, and forget what I told you about Johnnie.”

The abruptness of it startled me a bit, but there was a quality in his voice that called for confidence and sincerity.

“Thank you, Mr. Gale, and—and I believe you spoke just in time.”

“I had my suspicions of it,” he admitted. “Tony got his medicine last night, I guess.”

“Oh!” I had started a bit, and Zar’s report of Miss Gale’s depression took on a new meaning.

“Yes, he’s no good this morning. He got all tangled up on his dynamo and we had an explosion that nearly set the ship afire. Then he went off half crying and I haven’t seen him since. I guess he wishes himself ashore, now, but wishin’ won’t do any good. He might get a message there all right, but he’s got to have something more than vibrations to get himself there. You see this ain’t any matrimonial excursion. We ain’t got any preacher along, and Biff’s license don’t cover that sort of a splice. Emory’s got a doctor’s diploma, but that wouldn’t fit the case, either.”

Mr. Emory was the Second Officer of the Billowcrest—a quiet, unobtrusive man whose love for the sea had led him back to it through devious ways. A runaway cabin boy, he had returned home in early manhood to become a country doctor, a naval hospital surgeon, a ship’s doctor and officer by turns, and was now serving us in the double capacity of the last two.

“Anyway,” concluded Gale, “we’ve got the South Pole on hand, and I’m in favor of taking things in their turn. You can’t afford to get in Macarony’s fix just now. We’ll need you when we get down there below the Horn. Besides we’re a long ways from shore, and the water here’s full of sharks.”

The last was certainly true. A black knife-like fin at that instant cut the water below us, and the swish of a steel-like tail as it disappeared made me shudder.

“That chap seems to be following us,” commented Gale, “they say it means a death aboard, but I think it’s more likely he’s after the garbage. ’Twouldn’t be a good time to swim, would it?”

He walked away and left me leaning over the rail. I thought his advice kindly, on the whole encouraging, and made up my mind to remember it. I wondered if Ferratoni had really spoken to Edith Gale. “Poor fellow,” I thought, “it must have been the glamour of the tropic night that made his ideal seem real to him for the moment.” And this I still believe to have been the case; but what it was he said that night to Edith Gale, or just what she replied, I shall never know.

X. CAPTAIN BIFFER IS ASSISTED BY THE PAMPEIRO.

Southward, and still southward.

We crossed the equator under light steam, for there was no wind and it was too warm to lie becalmed, even in that mystical, lotus-breathing sea.

Our world was turned around, now. We were going back to the year’s beginning, and springtime lay at the end of our bow-sprit. The Big Dipper and the North Star were ours no longer; the Southern Cross had become our beacon and our hope. The sun and moon were still with us, but even these had fallen behind and it was to the northward now that we turned for noonday.

Gradually the glorious sunsets of the lower tropics faded into a semblance of those we had known in our own land. It was no longer quite comfortable on deck without wraps. An April quality had come into the air, and we grew presently to realize that we were entering rapidly into what was, to us, the curious anomaly of an October spring.

To me it was all pure enjoyment. It seemed that I could never look at the sea enough, and often I got Edith Gale to help me. And Ferratoni too, sometimes, for with the cooler weather and more temperate skies he had become quite himself again.

The first frost in the air seemed a glacial feeling to us, and set us to talking with renewed interest of the Far South and the lands and peoples we had undertaken to discover. I felt sure we were extravagant in some of our expectations. The tales we had read led us to hope for marvels in the way of mechanical progress, and we treated ourselves to flying machines and heaven only knows what other luxuries. In the end, I discouraged flying machines. I said that if these were a fact with the Antarcticans, they would have come to us long since. I said also that we must not build our anticipations too big, but base everything on calm reason and sound logic. It was more than possible, I admitted, that the Antarcticans had made some advancements in mechanism that were unknown to us, but on the whole I thought we would hold our own at the next world’s exhibition.

It had been Chauncey Gale’s intention to touch at one of the large South American ports for a little holiday, and to procure a few articles needed in the construction department below stairs. This idea, however, was now discouraged by the officers, who believed that a number if not all of the crew would desert the ship at the first opportunity.

“Why not let them go?” I had asked, when we were talking the matter over, “and ship a new crew?”

Into the Captain’s off eye there came the twist of indifferent scorn usually accorded to my suggestions.

“Yes,” he growled, “and get a gang from some crimp who would load ’em onto us dead drunk, to cut our throats as soon as they got sober. I know South American crews—I’ve helped kill some of ’em—I don’t want any more.”

I was silent. I didn’t know what a crimp was, and I wouldn’t have asked for considerable. I have since learned that he is an unreliable person; a bad man, who sells worse whisky over a disreputable bar, from which he unloads on sea-captains anything human, and drunk enough to stand the operation. His place is a sort of clearing house, and the crimp has a syndicate or trust, as it were, with the captain at his mercy.

We altered our plans, therefore, and turned our course more directly southward, toward the Falkland Islands. We were off the River de la Plata at the time, sailing leisurely along under a blue sky, with the fair weather that had followed us most of the way from New York. The sailors had expected we would put into Rio Janeiro or one of the ports farther down, but now that we had passed below Montevideo and were standing out to sea, they knew we were not to touch land again.

I was leaning over the rail after the interview in the cabin, puzzling about crimps, and looking at the shark—or one just like him—who still followed us, when I heard Mr. Emory, who was on watch, order the men up into the shrouds to shorten sail. I did not see why this should be done, for the sky was blue, dotted here and there with small woolly clouds that showed only a tendency to skurry about a little, like frisking lambs. Perhaps the men didn’t understand, either, for the bosen, Frenchy, blew his whistle presently and they left their work about half finished, and came down. Then they gathered in a group at the bow and I saw Mr. Emory go forward and talk earnestly to Frenchy, who seemed excited and gesticulated at the men, the cabin, himself and the world in general. Mr. Emory left him after a few moments and disappeared into the cabin, where I knew the Captain and Edith Gale were matched in a rubber of whist against the Admiral and Ferratoni, who had been coerced into learning the game.

I left my place at the ship’s side. I did not believe in the old shark superstition, and I had little respect for a creature that would follow a ship thirty-five hundred miles for table-scraps when he could get a fish dinner any time for the trouble of catching it. I did want to know about the men, though—why they had been taking in sail, and why they had quit and gathered in a group over the forecastle. Mr. Emory was talking to Captain Biffer when I came in.

“They refuse to obey orders,” he was saying, “unless we turn around and put into Montevideo. They claim they need more clothing for the cold weather south. The sky looks rather queer, and I set them to reefing down so’s to be ready for one of those Pampeiros that Mr. Larkins says come up in a minute down here. When they got about half through, Frenchy stopped them. They’re out forward, now.”

“Did you tell them we had plenty of warm clothing aboard?” asked Gale.

“I told them. It isn’t the clothing. They simply want to desert the ship.”

“Is Mr. Larkins on the bridge?” asked Captain Biffer.

“He comes on at eight bells—in about five minutes, now.”

“Very well; go back to the bridge, Mr. Emory, I’ll deal with this situation.” Then to Edith Gale “Don’t be alarmed, ma’am.”

I risked a remark.

“Is this your first strike, Captain?” I ventured.

His eye fixed me grimly.

“We don’t call it that at sea,” he said, “we call it mutiny!”

The word rather startled me, but I followed him out on deck, as did the others. No one could remain in the cabin with a thing like that going on outside. The men were about as we had left them—the bosen, Frenchy, somewhat in front of the others. He was a villain and a traitor, but he was not without bravado.

“We haf not been well treat!” he began, “we haf been deceive. We——”

He paused. The Captain had drawn a bead on him with the eye he most frequently used on me. With the other he took aim at the group behind, and every man of them felt himself singled out, and quailed. I could see them beginning to shrink and wither even before he said a word. He began by gently reminding them of the usual lightness of their employment and the continued excellence of their bill-of-fare; then in good sooth he opened up.

It was like the breaking loose at Manila. I had known that Biffer had a way with his English, but I never realized until that moment what he could do when he tried. They didn’t need any warm clothes, now. Everything he called them was red-hot and fitted as if they had grown to it. Why, they fairly shrivelled, and whenever anything he said hit the deck it smoked.

A cloud of what appeared to be genuine smoke came drifting across our bows just then, and the air had grown strangely hot, but nobody seemed to notice it. I think we unconsciously attributed these things to the Captain’s artillery. The men were huddled and Frenchy alone was still defiant. His case was desperate and he was a desperate man. He made a step forward—perhaps he thought the men would follow him—a movement that a second later would have been a spring at the Captain’s throat. One hand he held close to his side and in it something gleamed.

There was an instant of dead silence, then—just above our heads—

“_All hands aloft to shorten sail! The Pampeiro!_”

Everybody looked up. Officer Larkins had come on the bridge and his rich voice rang out like a clarion peal. Frenchy stopped. The men sprang into life. They were ready enough to obey, now, but it was too late!

I had seen cyclones in the West, but the Pampeiro is different. From the smoke across our bow there came a lurid flash, and thunder that seemed to hit every part of the vessel at once. I heard the smashing of wood and ripping of canvas overhead, and just in front of me I saw a great wave come pouring over the ship’s side. Somebody seized my hand and there was a startled cry of my name. Then somebody was clinging to me—somebody that I was holding close and helping into the cabin. In the half blackness I saw that Chauncey Gale and Ferratoni were just behind. The cabin was dark and the ship pitching violently.

It was all over in ten minutes. The vessel still rolled, but the storm had passed. Zar, who had been napping when the Pampeiro struck, came running in to her mistress.

“You po’ li’l’ lam’, how wet you is!” she said, “an’ how yo’ heart beat—so frightened!”

She bore off her charge, and the rest of us took account of stock.

We found we had lost some sail—a top-mast—several steamer chairs, and one man—Frenchy—who had been directly in the path of the wave.

“That’s what that shark meant,” said Chauncey Gale solemnly, “he won’t follow us any more. And say, Biff, it was worth the price of admission to hear you comb those fellows down. By the great corner-stone, but you did it beautiful!”

On the whole there were compensations. We had seen a Pampeiro, for one thing, and we had got rid of a mutiny; a disturbing element had been removed and an old superstition had been confirmed. Altogether, everybody was satisfied, including the shark.

But to me had come an added joy. In the moment of danger it was to _me_ that Edith Gale had turned.

That night we walked the deck together. The sky was clear and black again, though the sea was still billowy, and there was a chill head-wind which, with our damaged rigging, necessitated the use of steam.

We walked back to the stern, and leaning over looked down at the surge boiling up from the screw beneath. Like a huge serpent it twisted away into the night, showing a white coil here and there as it vanished in the shoreless dark behind. A mighty awe came upon us. Face to face with the vastness of the universe, we were overpowered by that dread loneliness which lies between the stars.

By and by I told her of the man sailing around the world in a little boat, alone. She would not let me dwell upon it. Then I said I had thought of doing it myself.

“You must never do it,” she shuddered, “promise me that you never will.”

There had never been the slightest danger of my doing it, and never would be, but it did not seem strange that I should promise.

XI. IN GLOOMY SEAS.

In entering the waters below Cape Horn it had been my plan to continue southward not farther than the northern extremity of the South Shetland Islands, thence to bear off in a southwesterly course until the outer edge of the field—or pack-ice—had been reached. This ice fringe would, I believed, begin somewhat north of the Antarctic Circle, not lower than the sixty-fifth parallel—possibly much higher. It would recede before the warm sun of December—the month answering to our northern June. My continued purpose was to creep westward along the edge of the ice-pack, examining every foot of the way, in the hope of finding a warm northerly flowing current, of the sort that Borchgrevink had reported. Such a current would afford a possible entrance to the frozen expanses surrounding the Antarctic Continent—perhaps guide us to the very gateway of the continent itself. Failing to find a passage sooner, we would continue westward to the coast of Victoria Land, and endeavor to reach our destination by following the warm current already reported by Borchgrevink.

I was rather surprised at Captain Biffer’s hearty approval of this outline. I believe now he was of the opinion that a few weeks along the edge of the pack, with perhaps a little squeeze here and there, would satisfy Chauncey Gale’s ambition for Antarctic conquest, and that the Billowcrest would be ordered north for a cruise in the Pacific, in the direction of more friendly latitudes.

For the present, therefore, we continued directly southward—very slowly, for we were still full early—keeping well off the stormy coast of Patagonia, and to the eastward of the Falkland Islands. These we sighted one morning, and ran close in to get a glimpse of inhabited land once more before plunging into the vastness of unknown and unpeopled seas. It was a bleak shore, and perhaps reminded Mr. Larkins of his native Newfoundland, where the conditions were somewhat similar. He gazed solemnly at the forbidding coast along which there showed but meager signs of foliage.

“Thim’s nootmig threes,” he said, at last, waving at the stunted vegetation which we were inspecting through the glasses, and upon which we had been commenting.

Edith Gale protested.

“Oh, Mr. Larkins! Nutmeg trees don’t grow in this cold latitude!”

“Yis, ma’am,—wooden nootmigs. The people ship ’em to the shtates.”

“And that long, smooth rock running down; what’s that, Mr. Larkins?”

“That’s a seals’ shlidy-down. The seals, ma’am, get out there and shoot the shoots. Many’s the time I’ve watched them in Newfoundland. I shouldn’t wonder if the bake-apple grows over there, too,” he added, reflectively.

“Baked apple! Do apples grow already baked in Newfoundland, Mr. Larkins?”

“Not baked apple, but bake-apple, ma’am. A bit of a foine yellow berry that grows on the top of a shlip of a shtalk, so high”—(holding his hand down to within a foot of the deck)—“one berry to the shtalk, ma’am, and delishuous, my worrd! And the bake-apple jam!” Mr. Larkins closed his eyes and wagged his head in a manner to indicate that life without bake-apple jam was but a poor shift, at best. “The _bake_-apple, is it!” he continued. “Oh, but, Miss, you must never die without tasting the bake-apple!”

There was something about Mr. Larkins’s manner that compelled faith in this unknown fruit, which ordinarily we would have regarded as a pleasant myth of his own. We caught a measure of his enthusiasm. We wanted to see the mysterious golden berry that grew one on a stalk, and had we not been on our way to find the South Pole, I believe we might have gone in pursuit of the bake-apple.

And now we were indeed getting well to the southward. The sun though on its upward incline had fallen far behind. Our days became long spectral cycles broken only by brief periods of luminous twilight, and the glacial feeling in the air was no longer a quality of our imagination. Against the chill wind that came over our bow we tacked but leisurely. Gradually, as we should, we were acquiring the taste for Antarctic cold, and daily the fascination of it, and of the lonely seas around and about, grew upon us.

XII. WHERE CAPTAIN BIFFER REVISES SOME OPINIONS.

I went up on the bridge one morning to find Captain Biffer gazing intently through the glass at some distant object.

“There’s your South Shetlands,” he announced, as I approached, “Elephant Island, I should say. Looks pretty cold to me.”