The Pilot and his Wife: Chapter 17

Chapter 17

They doubled Cape Horn, and came to Valparaiso. But, on the morning they
were to enter the harbour, Salv�, to his intense exasperation, was put
under arrest. The captain found him too useful in keeping the crew in
order forward, and therefore took the most effectual means of preventing
him from putting into execution his declared determination to leave the
ship on their arrival at that port.

After leaving Valparaiso they called at the Chincha Islands, took in a
cargo of guano for China, and shaped their course then eastward across
the calm southern ocean, whose lonely monotony was only broken by the
occasional appearance of one of the larger kind of sea-birds, or by the
distant spouting of a whale. On board, however, the same peace was far
from prevailing. That little nut-shell that crept like a dot across the
limitless expanse of waters was a little floating hell, where every evil
passion raged from morning until night; and it was only by secretly
fomenting discord and divisions among the crew that the officers could
sleep with any sense of security in their berths. As it was, a large
section of them, with the Irishman at their head, had a project on hand
for murdering their officers, and converting the ship into a whaling
vessel. And even Salv�, in moments of bitterness and indignation at the
tyranny to which he was subjected by these men, whose lives were at the
mercy of the crew, would sometimes entertain the thought of joining with
the mutineers, who were restrained from carrying out their designs
mainly by the fear which he had inspired, and by the refusal of his
sanction. Many a desperate struggle with himself he went through when
one of his tyrants passed him on deck in the dark, and the temptation to
stick a knife into his back would rise strong within him, and almost
master him. The other's life hung upon a hair, and Salv� knew it; but
that hair was stronger than he thought. Elizabeth's face, and the still
unexhausted might of early impressions, made him always shrink from the
thought of having a murder on his conscience, and to that depth he never
fell, deteriorated though his character gradually became, from daily
association with everything that was vile, to that degree that he lost
all power of believing in the existence of good amongst his
fellow-creatures, or in a higher Power.

We need follow no further this dark period of his life. After a year and
a half on board the Stars and Stripes, and many a wild scene of
turbulence and riot, he brought his connection with her to a close at
last at New Orleans, where the accumulation of his wages was handed over
to him.

The life on board the other vessels in which he afterwards served did
not differ greatly from that which he had left; but he had become
accustomed to it, and his sensibilities were blunted by long habit. It
was not until some four years had thus passed that he again began to
feel a longing for Europe--he would not acknowledge to himself that it
was Norway exactly that he wanted to see again;--and after looking out
then for some time for a suitable ship for the home voyage, he found
himself at last with his Brazilian friend on board a large barque that
was homeward bound from Cura�oa, with tobacco and rum, for Rotterdam and
Nieuwediep.

Federigo had been his inseparable companion through all the vicissitudes
of his southern life; the secret of his faithful attachment, as Salv�
suspected, being that the latter had saved money, which he had turned
into gold pieces and kept in a belt round his waist. He had never, like
Federigo, sought occasions to squander his pay on land in gambling or in
other diversions. He hated women; and in the taverns which were
frequented by sailors he was looked upon as a dangerous customer, to
whom it was prudent to give as wide a berth as possible. Federigo, he
fancied, looked upon him as his reserve cash-box; and when on one
occasion, after they came into port, the Brazilian proposed that they
should desert and put their money into some mines that were very
favourably reported of just then, and share the profits, Salv� remarked
with perfect composure that he thought it highly probable that if they
started upon any expedition of the kind, his friend, if he got him alone
some fine night in a lonely place, would quietly stick his knife into
him and make off with the whole. He therefore declined the proposition,
but their relations nevertheless continued as friendly as before. Money
was the only power, Salv� reflected with bitterness, and this
satisfaction at least he could now enjoy in life.

It had become so obvious to him that Federigo's attachment was more to
his money than to himself, that he determined to get rid of his irksome
attentions. Accordingly, when they arrived at Nieuwediep, he made all
his arrangements for leaving the vessel, legally this time, without
saying a word to him of his intention; and Federigo only heard of it at
the last moment when he met him coming up with his hammock clothes. He
turned pale, and tears came into his eyes,--whether from a feeling of
injured friendship, or from disappointment, Salv� could not quite make
out. The expression of his face, with his restless small black eyes,
resembled that of a disturbed rat. At last he fell on Salv�'s neck in
his impetuous way, and broke out--

"But at any rate we must have one parting glass together this evening. I
don't know how I shall ever do without you--it is so long now since we
two have chummed together."

Against his better reason Salv� allowed himself to feel a little
softened at the thought; and the remembrance of all the attachment this
scoundrel had shown for him aroused something that almost resembled
emotion.

"It is no use, my friend," he replied; "what is done can't be undone.
But I'll give you this evening, at all events. You'll find me waiting
for you in the Aurora."

As usual at this season of the year, there were a great many vessels in
the harbour, and the Aurora tavern was full that evening of seafaring
folk laughing and talking and singing, and renewing, or laying the
foundations of, acquaintanceships over brandy or gin; while in the
little room over the bar, dance music was going on uninterruptedly, and
the boards were creaking under alternate Dutch schottische and English
hornpipe.

To properly appreciate a genuine sailors' reel or hornpipe, one should
see it danced by men who for a whole year at a time have been battling
with the waves and storms in every corner of the world, and who during
all that time have hardly set eyes upon a female form. They come on
shore bursting with a full masculine longing for the society of the
other sex, with a year's stored-up feeling to let out; and there is a
positive intoxication to them in the mere dance--in the mere holding at
Nieuwediep Anniken or Bibecke, or at Portsmouth Mary Ann, by the waist;
and Mary Ann and Bibecke perfectly understand this, and for the moment
feel themselves persons of no small importance. There is no element of
coarseness in the feeling. The sailor is more given to sentiment proper
than perhaps any other class of men, and generally speaking a more
romantic feeling for woman is cherished on board ship than anywhere else
in the world. If we wish to find in these times quietly romantic
enthusiasm, we must be the companion of the sailor on his lonely watch,
or listen to him as he lies on the forecastle and talks with _na�ve_
simplicity about his wife or his sweetheart--how their attachment came
about, and what he means to buy for her when he gets into port. Love on
board ship is a more naturally rich and varying theme than it is in the
peasant's monotonous life; and being in love, by reason of separation
from the object of his love, is a different thing to the sailor, a
something more entirely of the heart and the imagination, which does not
lose its ideal hue in the wear and tear of everyday use. A married
sailor is always an object of quiet respect to his comrades who have not
had means to take the same step themselves; and without exaggeration it
may be said that woman is present in her truest sense in the midst of
the often outwardly rough life on board ship--warm, loving, and
venerated, and surrounded by all the enchantment which distance can
supply. If we are tempted to think otherwise, we have not penetrated to
the simple, childlike nature which underlies the sailor's rough
exterior.

The exteriors, indeed, in the dancing-room of the Aurora that evening
were rough enough. Through the cloud of steam and tobacco-smoke, men of
the most various physiognomies were to be seen, the majority tanned and
bearded, with their hats on the back of their heads, and short clay
pipes in their mouths, and all in the wildest state of enjoyment,
dripping with perspiration and dancing indefatigably. There were French
and Swedish sailors in their red woollen shirts, Norwegians and Danes in
blue, with white canvas trousers, Yankees and English all in blue; and
as they swung the gracefully dressed Dutch girls with their small white
caps and little capes, and petticoats fastened up to do justice to the
neat shoes and white stockings below, vying with each other who should
dance the best and longest, the foundation of many a friendship or
enmity was laid, to be prosecuted later on in the evening over a bottle
of brandy or in a stand-up fight.

Salv� and Federigo were sitting over their gin in a side-room which
opened into the dancing-room, and was filled with men talking and
drinking, or with couples who came in to rest for a moment. Neither took
part in the dancing. Salv� was gloomy and out of tune for pleasure,
although, for Federigo's sake, he made his humour as little apparent as
possible. Federigo looked very disconsolate, and during the early part
of the evening sat and sipped his glass abstractedly. But as the time
wore on he kept filling Salv�'s glass unconsciously as it were, and
getting apparently more and more drunk himself, until he several times
spilt the contents of his own glass on the floor. He became very
talkative, recalling incident after incident of their life together. "I
shall never forget you," he cried, with open-hearted impulsiveness,
"never!" And as he repeated the word, there was a gleam of suppressed
feeling of some kind or other in his eye.

Salv�'s attention was preoccupied at the moment. He had heard two voices
speaking Norwegian by the window at his back, and it made his heart
knock against his ribs--it was so long since he had heard his
mother-tongue. They were two men belonging to timber ships, and one of
them, very red and excited, was singing the praises of one of the girls
in the other room.

"Ah!" broke in the other, a Tonsberger, "you should have seen handsome
Elizabeth in 'The Star' at Amsterdam. But she wasn't for such as you to
dance with, my lad."

Salv�'s interest was awakened at once. He listened with strained
attention for what might come next.

"And why not?" asked the other, a little on his dignity.

"Well, in the first place, they don't dance there; and in the next, you
would want to be a skipper at least to pay court in that quarter, mind
you. I saw her in the spring of last year, when we were lying there with
the Galatea; she was talking to the captain, for she's Norwegian--and a
proud one she is, too; with hair like a crown of gold on her head, and
so straight rigged that it makes a man nervous to come alongside her."

Salv� sat rapt in thought, and more absent than was polite to his friend
for the rest of the evening. An idea that it might be Elizabeth had shot
through him, and he could not divest himself of it, although the more he
reflected the more certain he knew he ought to be that she had been
married long ago to young Beck. His mind was in a ferment, and a wild
longing now possessed him to get home to Arendal and find out for
certain how matters actually stood.

When the time came for breaking up, Federigo was drunk, and Salv� was
obliged to accompany his inconsolable friend in the darkness over the
long narrow dam down by the dock, where there was water on both sides,
Federigo clinging to his arm the whole way, and leaning heavily upon it.

When they had reached the middle of the dam, Salv� saw him make a sudden
movement, and almost at the same moment he received a thrust in the
region of the heart, of such force that he staggered two or three steps
backwards. At the same time he heard Federigo say, in a voice trembling
with vindictive passion--

"Take that for Paolina, you hound!"

The object of his cupidity, the belt of money, had saved Salv�, who now
felled him to the ground with a blow that sent him rolling over the
embankment into the sea.

"Help! help!" came up to him from the water.

"You shall have it," replied Salv�, derisively, "for our fine
friendship's sake. Throw up your knife, though, first;" and he made a
noose in his handkerchief then to reach down to him. "You and your owl
of a sister," he muttered as he did so, "have taught me a thing or two.
I should only have had exactly what I deserved if I had been both stuck
and plundered, after being fool enough to put faith for one moment in
you or any one else."

"Now, up with you!"

When he saw Federigo's form scrambling up over the edge, he said,
scornfully, "Now then, at last we part. Good-bye, my old and faithful
friend!"

With that he went his way, and heard the Brazilian screaming and
stamping with rage down on the dam behind him in the dark.

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