Harrigan

As Campbell was dragged away, the bos’n said to his companions:  “Now, lads, you see where Campbell stands!”

They growled for answer.

“But I’ll get him!” went on Hovey.  “I’m going to kill Van Roos and Borgson by inches before his eyes.  And when he sees ’em die—­they’ll have to die, anyway, before we reach shore—­Campbell will be water in our hands.  He’ll see ’em die, an’ them in the wireless house will see ’em die.  Their throats are thick with thirst by now.  We’ll show ’em water an’ food, an’ offer it to ’em if they’ll give up Henshaw.  If they won’t, we’ll show ’em how we’ll kill ’em when they’re too weak to resist.  They’ll see a sample in Van Roos and Borgson.  Every yell they let out’ll be an argument for us.  We’ll have Henshaw before the day’s done.”

Sam Hall pushed his thick fingers slowly through his hair, stupefied by this careful cruelty, and even the one eye of Jacob Flint grew dim, but Garry Cochrane slapped the bos’n on the shoulder heartily.

“Jerry,” he said, “you got the makin’s of a great man.  Let’s go start the fun.”

On the way aft they passed the firemen sprawling on the shady side of the deck.  They stumbled to their feet at sight of Hovey, and swore volubly that the hole of the ship was too hot for a man to live in it five minutes.  Hovey passed them without a word.  He had to tend to Campbell now, and without an engineer it was useless to work men in the fireroom.

First of all he had two buckets of water carried aft and placed just below the edge of the raised deck which supported the wireless house.  There were dippers floating invitingly on the surface of the water in each bucket.  Then from the galley of the ship Kamasura and Shida, the cabin boys, brought out steaming meats and cut loaves of bread and displayed the feast near the buckets of water.  Upon this outlay gazed the famine-stricken fugitives, Sloan, McTee and Harrigan; Kate did not see, for she was caring for the sick captain.  Hovey advanced and made a speech.

“We’re actin’ generous and open to you,” he began.  “We’re offerin’ you food an’ water—­all you want—­in exchange for White Henshaw.  He sold his soul to hell long ago, an’ we’ve come to claim payment.  It’s overdue, that’s what it is!”

“Aye, aye!” came a chorus of yells from the sailors.  “White Henshaw’s overdue.”

“Look at this here water,” went on Hovey, with a tempting wave of his hand.  “Why not take this up an’ help yourselves—­after you’ve given us Henshaw?”

Sloan crowded in between Harrigan and McTee; his voice was a slavering murmur:  “For pity’s sake, boys, what we going to do?”

Harrigan and the big Scot exchanged glances.  Faintly and slowly they smiled.  There was a profound mutual understanding in that smile.

“I’m dying,” went on Sloan eagerly and still in that slavering voice.  “I’m burnin’ up inside.  For God’s sake let ’em take him and finish him off!”

And always as he spoke his quick eyes went back and forth from face to face.  They had neither eye nor voice for him.  They turned their attention back to Hovey, who now spoke again hastily.

“But if you don’t give us Henshaw, we’ll take him, anyway.  In one more day—­or maybe two at the most—­we’ll come an’ get you—­understand?  An’ what we’ll do to you when we get you will be this!”

He gestured over his shoulder.  Eric Borgson was being led out on the deck by some of the crew.

“Look him over, Cap’n McTee.  He’s a big man, an’ we’re goin’ to kill him by inches.  So we’re goin’ to finish Van Roos—­the same way.  Speak out, lads; d’you want to die like these two are goin’ to die, or will you turn over Henshaw—­who needs killin’?”

McTee smiled benevolently down upon the upturned, furious faces of the mutineers, and muttered:  “Harrigan, I could drink blood.”

“An’ lick your lips afther it,” groaned the Irishman softly.  “An’ so could I, Angus!  They’re startin’ their devil work.  Let’s go inside.  I can’t be standing the sight of it, McTee.”

“Go inside an’ let ’em rush the wireless house?” said McTee incredulously.  “No, lad.  We got to stay an’ watch.  Besides, maybe this is the way we’ll all die—­after we’re too weak to fight ’em.  And I’m rather curious to learn just how I’ll die; I’ve always been!”

They were binding Borgson face down on the hatch.

“Look,” said Harrigan.  “Maybe it ain’t goin’ to be so bad as we thought.  They’re just goin’ to lick Borgson the way he licked the Jap.”

“They’ll do more,” replied McTee, shaking his head.  “Henshaw and Borgson and Van Roos have really put those wild men through hell, and now they’re going to get it back with interest.”

In the meantime little Kamasura stepped out from the crowd.  He was naked to the waist, for the raw incisions which the lash had left would not bear the weight of clothes.  He carried the blacksnake in his hands, drawing it caressingly through his hands as Borgson had done.  Now the tying of Borgson was completed, and the sailors spread back in a loose circle to watch their entertainment.

The Japanese took his distance carefully, shifting repeatedly a matter of inches to make sure that no stroke would be wasted.  Then he whirled the blacksnake over his head.  They could see Borgson wince as the lash sang above him, and the muscles of his bare back flexed and stood up in knots that glistened under the sunlight.  But the stroke did not fall.  Kamasura had learned the lesson of creating suspense from the very man he was now about to torture.  Harrigan bowed his head in his hands.

“I can’t look, McTee,” he muttered.  “I’m sick inside—­sick—­sick!”

The last words came in a growl from the hollow of his throat.  The blacksnake whirled through the air again and fell with a sharp slap like two broad hands clapped together, but Borgson did not cry out.  His body writhed mutely, and down his back appeared a red mark.  The whip whirled again and fell, this time bringing a stifled curse for a response.  Once more it whirled, and this time merely cracked in the air.  Again and again an idle snap in the air.  Broken by that grim suspense, Borgson yelled in terror.

Kamasura laughed and glanced at the circle of sailors like a ringmaster in a circus in search of applause.  The whip now whirled rapidly over his head and fell again and again, and every stroke brought a fresh and louder scream from the mate.  Another sound, rhythmic and barbarous, punctuated those shrieks of anguish.  It was the singing of Kamasura, who as he wielded the lash remembered a chant of his native land and shouted it now in time with the blows of the blacksnake.

On the upper deck Sloan lay prone on his face, sobbing with terror; Harrigan kept his face hid and clutched at his head with both hands; McTee stared straight down upon the scene of the torture with burning eyes.  Inside the wheelhouse Kate crouched beside the bunk on which Henshaw was stretched, staring straight above his head.  The fever had deprived him of the last of his senses.

“Your hands!” he muttered at length.

She placed them upon his forehead.  She had done that repeatedly during the past day, and each time the effect had been marvelously soothing to the old man.  Now at the touch he drew a deep breath of relief.

“Even in hell,” he whispered at length—­“even in hell you come to me, Beatrice!  I knew you would!”

He caught her hands at the wrists; his fingers, despite his fever, were deadly cold, and a chill ate into her blood.

“I hear them yelling—­the souls of the damned,” he said quietly.  “You can’t hear it?”

“No, no!” she said.  “I cannot hear!”

“Of course not,” he went on with the same lack of emotion; “for, you see, you’ve come from heaven, and the coolness of heaven is in your hands, Beatrice.  Put them against my temples, so!  For every bit of the love I have given you you are permitted to repay me with coolness—­ coolness and comfort in hell!”

Suddenly he broke into exultant laughter, a sound more terrible than the wild wails from the deck.

“See!” he said, and his eyes twinkled as he stretched out a gaunt arm toward a corner of the room.  “There’s Johnny Carson lying naked on a bed of blue fire.  Ha, ha, ha!  Have you been waiting long for me to come, lad?”

She shut out the hungry, hideous light of his eyes with the palms of her hands.  Now the screaming on the deck ceased abruptly.

“Beatrice!” he cried with a sudden terror.

“Yes,” answered Kate.

“Ah,” he said, and patted her hands endearingly.  “When the silence came, I feared maybe you were leaving me.  You won’t do that?”

“No.  I’ll stay.”

“So!  Then I’ll sleep.  But waken me when they begin yelling again.  They thought I’d come down to the same hell I sent them to, and that they’d watch me burn.  But I fooled ’em, Beatrice, by loving you.  You’re the chip of wood that keeps me afloat—­afloat—­afloat—­”

And he drifted into sleep, while she leaned against the bunk, almost unconscious from fear and exhaustion.