Part 7

Alf Jukes looked down. Nostrils quivering, fingers twitching, he uncertainly approached the broken bottle. He stooped, lifted the bottle, and stretched out a hand; as if to hurl it to the water. He hesitated; drew in his hand, and sniffed. Another moment and he flung the emptied fragment over the forecastle rail.

“Hey, Jukey! Come on down, ol’ son!” called one of his comrades, looking up from the forecastle.

Jukes descended and entered the forecastle. His fellows slapped him on the back. The boarding master thrust a bottle in his hand. As Jukes took it, one of his comrades tried to snatch it from him, and a bellow of laughter rose as the sailor went sprawling on the deck.

The bottles passed around.

“No more ships for me,” said one.

“Nor me, boys,” said another.

Jukes drank silently.

By and by the sailors shouldered their sea bags and followed the boarding master and his crimp from the forecastle. Jukes towering heedless among them, they shoved and elbowed one another aside, making for the boat. Pointing to other ships near by, they cursed them. They cursed the ship they left. They chattered confidingly to the boarding master, who promised them one and all an easy job on the land. As Jukes grasped the stroke oar and set the pace ashore they shouted their approval.

“Ol’ Jukey!” they cried, and “Good ol’ Jukey!”

They laughed to see the way the boat drove through the water, with Jukes’s great muscles surging her along. They jumped ashore and turned their backs forever on the sea. Without a glance behind, they followed Jukes across the street; Jukes at the boarding master’s heels, the crimp behind them all.

Hours passed. Besotted sailors lolled on dirty cots about a dirty room. They quarrelled, forgot their quarrels, and embraced each other. They smoked, and spat, and sang. The leering crimp came in, and went, and came, and went again, and called them each by name--quick-fitted names.

“’Ere, old Cork-fender, lap it up now! It’s good for sailor’s gizzards.”

“Gimme yer empty glass ’ere, Queer-fellow!”

“Young Bandy-shanks, you’ve ’ad enough! You’re young.--Another? All right, then. Wot’d yer mommer say?”

“Aw, haw! haw! haw!”

“Drink hearty, Jimmie Bilge! There’s plenty more.”

Ignoring their quarrels and embraces, taking no part in their noisy songs, Alf Jukes held out his glass for filling and refilling. The crimp winked at him deferentially.

Evening came. Save for loud snores, heavy breathing, and now and then a mumbled, sleepy oath, the room was quiet. Steady-handed still, Jukes stood erect amidst the wreckage of his fellows and emptied his glass.

In the barroom adjoining, the boarding master reached a black bottle from beneath the bar. Alf Jukes came from the back room as he replaced it. Resolve in his face, he stepped toward the street.

Three brimming glasses stood upon the bar. Lifting one to his own lips, the boarding master pushed another out toward Jukes.

“Here, big boy! Don’t run off so soon!” he quickly called.

Jukes stopped and hesitatingly looked toward the bar. The crimp and boarding master raised their glasses.

Jukes took the proffered glass, lifted, and drained it in one long straight swallow; then turned and strode toward the street door again. Midway, he staggered.

The boarding master and the crimp came from behind the bar. They lifted Jukes, carried him to the dusky street, and dumped him in their boat.

“That fills _her_ crew,” growled the boarding master with a nod to the riding light of a ship at anchor close inshore.

* * * * *

Dawn was breaking. Stars were fading. Mastheads of anchored ships swayed easily against the opening sky. A ship’s mate banged upon the forecastle door, rousing his crew. A drowsy sailor lurched off to the galley, fetching the morning coffee.

“How long was you ashore?” asked one sailor of another.

“Wot day is it?” came the reply. The questioner chuckled.

Some surly, some indifferent, they sipped their coffee.

The mate looked in.

“Rouse out here, now! Get up and man that windlass!”

They straggled to the deck. But Jukes lay sleeping still, his face to the bulkhead. The mate stepped in and shook him. He wakened slowly.

“Tumble out, here, you!”

Jukes climbed from the bunk and looked about him.

“Come on, now! You’re at sea, my man. Get out of here!”

With a long staggering stride, Jukes passed out to the new ship’s deck. The wind blew in his hair. The tide sang by.

Jukes turned, wild-eyed, and faced the mate. Men on the forecastle head looked down and laughed to hear him curse. He gazed up at them, vacant eyed. He looked toward the shore, saw his old ship, and shuddered.

“Come on, my man!” the mate said. “You’re at sea.”

Alf Jukes ascended to the forecastle head.

“Sing, someone!” said the mate, “sing and let’s get her away.”

A sailor leaning on a windlass bar began to sing a forecastle song, a chantey, a ballad with a wailing chorus. The tugboat’s smoke whirled by. The chorus rose and fell. The cable clanked.

“W’y don’t ye sing, shipmate?” a sailor asked of Jukes.

Alf Jukes let go his windlass bar. Fists clenched and arms upraised, his curses ringing loud above his comrades’ song, he looked upon the shore.

“Come on, my man,” the mate said. “You’re at sea.”

* * * * *

Weeks were gone by. It was black midnight. No star shone. Sails hung invisible. Long swells rolled sluggishly beneath the keel. The ship’s bow rose, dipped to deep hollows, and arose again.

Half naked in the hot night, Alf Jukes lay slumbering. The watch below slept soundly all about him. The watch on deck sat talking on the hatch without.

Sails flapped to the long roll of the ship. Chains clinked upon the lower masts. Blocks chattered squeakily. Now and again a heavy rope, a sheet or lazy tack, thud-thudded against the ship’s side. The wheel cluck-clucked. The sailors’ voices rose and fell, a mumble from the hatch.

Poring above a chart, the skipper sat in his chart room. Presently he rose, looked out to the dark night, listened awhile, and went below.

An hour passed.

High and sudden, the mate’s voice rang above the noises of the night, and, answering quick commands, gloom-hidden sailors leaped up and rushed to the braces.

The skipper ran, pajama-clad and shouting, to the deck. The watch on deck were shouting at the ropes. A deep, long, grumbling roar was all about--the growl of rollers bursting on a reef.

A sailor yelled at the forecastle door, wakening the sleepers of the watch below. Blackness was like a wall. The skipper was shouting orders. The mate was shouting; the grumbling rumble coming closer, louder.

The ship quivered. A rending sound rose sharp above the roar, died, and arose again. A topmast splintered and went overboard. Torn canvas snarled. Blocks skirled. The ship slid on, settling beyond the reef.

Last from his bunk came Jukes. Striking a match, he held it high, and by its feeble flare saw the crazed struggle of his comrades all yelling at the door. Fallen men clutched madly at the feet that trampled them. Water lapped into the forecastle. The match went out. The ship lurched heavily.

Jukes stepped from the emptied forecastle into water knee deep. As he slid barefooted to the rigging, the water rose to his waist. He gripped the shrouds and swung himself aloft. The water followed. He climbed, cat-nimble. The water followed close. He heard a last useless order from the skipper. Someone screamed, “The boat!” A shriek ended in a groan close to him. A hand clutched his bare foot. He bent to grasp the hand; but it slipped, and he touched only water.

Save for the growl and long wash of the sea there was no sound.

Alf Jukes was swimming.

Dawn came, and, treading water, Jukes gazed round the sea. He struck out, swam with strong steady strokes, and presently swung himself upon a piece of drifting wreckage.

The horizon was empty, the sky without a cloud. The sea was flat.

The sun rose. It beat on the bare white skin of Alf Jukes.

Jukes took a little oilskin package from his pocket and wedged it in the centre of the raft. He slipped off his dungaree trousers and dipped them in the sea. The dripping dungarees in his hand, he stood stark naked and once more gazed around. The sea was empty. His head by the raft’s edge, he lay down and covered himself as well as he could with the wet dungaree. The sun climbed higher.

Now and again Jukes splashed his great hands in the water, wetting his head and upper limbs afresh. Except upon the raft there was no motion anywhere in sky or sea.

By and by Jukes rose. His eyes searched the horizon. It was empty. He dropped the dungarees and dived deep. He swam down and down, seeking the cooler depths. He glimmered white, far under the unrippled blue water. When he rose to the surface again he held to the edge of the raft. The raft gave no shade. He reached for, and covered his head with, the dungarees. The sun was overhead when he drew himself up, and, holding to the edge of the raft, looked all about again.

Suddenly Jukes hurled himself upon the raft. His body, glistening in the sun, he watched a long green shape dart under him.

For the rest of the day Jukes dipped his dungarees in the sea and covered himself as best he could. All day a sharp green fin cruised slowly round. When the sun dipped there were red fiery patches on the marble-white skin of his back, on his thighs and shoulders.

Stars wakened. Long after day was gone Jukes curled himself in the middle of the raft and went to sleep. Thirst wakened him. He dipped the dungarees in the sea and wrapped them round his neck.

Night passed. At dawn the horizon was empty. Fins cruised to and fro on all sides. Snouts broke the still blue water. The sky was cloudless.

When Jukes dipped his dungarees, jaws snapped on them. He wrenched, and a leg of the dungarees remained in his hands. He wrapped it about his neck, and crouched down. The sun climbed higher.

Jukes rocked a little to and fro. Now and again a low coughing grunt escaped him.

Day passed. Night came, starry and still. Snouts nosed around the raft’s edge. Fins darted to and fro, rippling the windless water. Jukes slept fitfully, dreamed, wakened, dozed, and dreamed again. Night passed.

At dawn Jukes climbed unsteadily to his feet. His lips were black, his skin scarlet. He moaned. His tongue was swollen.

A quarter of a mile from the raft a dense black cloud was slowly crossing the equatorial sky. A sheer wall of water fell from the cloud to the sea. Flying fish leaped at the rain’s foot. White birds preyed on them from above, silver-bellied fish from below. The snouts were gone, to join in the preying.

Staring at the rain wall, Jukes listened to the just-audible _s-s-s-s_ of the doldrum squall.

The squall passed by, came within an eighth of a mile of the raft, dipped under the sea rim, and was gone. The sun rode high in a blue cloudless sky. The snouts were back. Fins rippled the water all about. Jukes crouched, with the wet scrap of dungaree about his neck. Day passed. Night came.

Jukes lay prostrate, face downward. Hours passed. Long after midnight he lifted his head and tried to climb to his knees. A dim green light winked on the sea far off. He toppled over and was still. Wind ruffled his hair and blew cool upon his brow.

Alf Jukes saw houses with smoking chimneys, windows aglint. Saw masts and spars along a waterfront. Heard singing, far away. A wind blew through green treetops.

* * * * *

When Jukes came to himself he lay in a lamplit forecastle. From near by came the voices of sailors. “I seen a boat wi’ two dead men in her one time. None ever knowed wot ship they was from.”

“If you follers deep water long enough, it’ll git ye.”

“Aye. ’Ow many _old_ sailors ’ave you ever seed?”

Jukes raised his head painfully and listened. From neck to ankles his body was a fiery blister.

“I been eleven blasted year at sea. I got nuthin’.”

“You never will ’ave.”

“W’oo cares?”

“There don’t no one care. You an’ me is dogs.”

“This here’ll be my last v’yage.”

“Aye.--That’s wot you says.--Wait.”

“Wait yerself. I’m done.”

“Haw, haw, haw!”

“There’s one as had ought to be cured leastways,” and a nod toward the forecastle.

Jukes climbed from the bunk and tottered out into the starlight.

“’Ow are ye, matey?”

“Bring ’im some water.”

Jukes gulped cold water down.

“’Ere, mate--you ’ad it in yer ’and.”

Jukes took the little oilskin package. They led him back and laid him in the bunk again. They smeared more grease on his burned limbs. They gave him more water.

“Look at ’im!--I’m done.”

“Me, too.”

As Jukes with fumbling fingers untied the package, they gathered round. He nodded his head. His lips moved. A sailor bent above him, listening.

“’E’s done. No more o’ships fer ’im.”

Jukes dozed away. They passed the picture from hand to hand. They read the dog-eared letter over.

“Look at ’ere,” said one, and pointed to the date.

“Three year ago! ’Ee’s been a long time----”

“Shanghaied, maybe.”

“Them crimps.”

“I’m done.”

“Haw, haw, haw! Maybe!”

* * * * *

It was the dog-watch time. The sun was setting. Warm, pearly little clouds passed overhead. A low wind murmured.

The sailor on lookout leaned on the forecastle rail, watching his comrades on the deck below. Skipper and mate looked forward from the poop. The cook and carpenter lolled in the galley doorway.

A dozen sailors gambolled by the hatch, trying themselves, pitting their strength and skill against each other’s. Alf Jukes was there, with head and shoulders higher than the rest.

“Here, Jukes!” called one, a lad with an unshaven downy face. “I’ll race you to the masthead!--Up and back. A pound of baccy to the winner. You take the main, and I’ll go up the fore.”

“’Ere, Chips! Come on an’ start ’em,” called an eager sailor; and Chips, the carpenter, stepped up.

“One--two----”

“I’ll bet a pound o’ baccy on young Limbertoes!”

“Me, too.”

Turning to the mate, the skipper said:

“The young fellow’ll win.”

“Aye,” said the mate, “he’s young. It’s in his favour.”

Jukes at the main, the other at the fore shrouds, stood waiting “three.”

“_Three!_” snapped the carpenter.

“Go!--go!--go!”

“Go, Limbertoes! My baccy’s on you!”

“Go, Jukes!--Go, Jukes!”

“Show ’im a sailor! Show ’im, Limber, now!”

Over the futtock shrouds, together, neck and neck, went Jukes and Limber.

“Two pound o’ baccy--’oo takes me on?--two pound on Limber!”

“Done--an’ my Sunday whack o’ duff thrown in!”

“Lord!--look at that there Jukes! ’Ee’s like a monkey.”

“Some sailor, that,” the skipper said. “Look at him go!”

“But the young man wins,” the mate replied.

“Bully for Limber!”

The youngster touched a hand upon the fore royal truck a touch ahead of Jukes upon the main.

“Down!--down!--down!” roared all the sailors.

Alf Jukes came sliding down the main royal stay. Down the fore royal stay came Limbertoes.

“Come on, Limber!”

“Limber wins!”

“A tie! They’re neck and neck.”

“No.--Limber wins!”

A bellow rose from every sailor. Full forty feet above the deck, Alf Jukes let go and dropped. Hands up and arms above his head, he fell straight as a plummet and landed on his feet.

“That fellow’s like a bear,” the skipper said.

“There was a feller on my last ship as’d beat both of ’em,” said a sailor.

“Oh, aye! There’s always fellers on a man’s last ship,” answered another.

“To-morrer we’ll be in, an’ you’ll ’ave one more last ship,” another laughed.

“Jukes, was you ever beat at anything?”

Without an answer Jukes walked slowly off and sat alone upon the bulwarks. His face was grim.

The bell struck eight. The crew strolled aft to answer to the muster roll. Last came Jukes. He looked like a bear that, peering from sheltering wilds, wonders what lies in the valleys beyond its great freedom.

* * * * *

Sails were furled, ropes coiled; the ship at anchor. A chill wind thrummed in her rigging. Cold rain beat down.

The sailors sat in the forecastle, amidst them a boarding master. While they drank from his bottles, Alf Jukes paced up and down the deck outside, alone. Now and again a sailor looked from the forecastle and called to him. He paid no heed.

The boarding master’s crimp came out, bottle in hand.

“The boys sent it ye, matey,” said he, and held the bottle temptingly toward Jukes. Jukes answered with a growl. His great right fist shot out, and, as the bruised crimp climbed to his feet, the sailors looked, laughing, from the forecastle ports.

The crimp reëntered the forecastle. The boarding master passed the bottles round. The sailors cursed the ship, all ships, and damned the sea. Soon, crowding at his heels, they all swarmed out, and clambered down into the boat ahead of him. Paying no heed to their loud farewells, Jukes walked up and down in the wind and the rain. Last, loitering from the forecastle, came the crimp.

The shouts of the sailors faded away. The ship was silent. The wind and the rain beat on her.

Jukes entered the deserted forecastle. It was gloomy and chill. Water dripped from him. He sat down, shivering a little. He drew out his oilskin package and untied it. Dark fell.

Presently, lighting the lamp, Jukes saw a bottle on the table. He scowled. He picked it up, and stepped to the door. The wind soughed drearily. The rain whipped by. He hesitated in the doorway, the bottle in his outstretched hand.

A boat drew noiselessly alongside the ship. The boarding master and his crimp climbed back aboard and peered unseen through one of the forward forecastle ports.

Bottle in hand, Jukes leaned in the doorway and looked out into the night. To-morrow he would be forever done with the sea.

Shore lights glimmered, winking through the rain. The sound of music reached him, faint upon the wind. Singing came indistinctly from the waterfront. It was very solitary, very cold in the forecastle.

Jukes moved closer to the lamp and held the bottle up. The crimp nudged the boarding master.

Alf Jukes put the bottle to his nose. Something to warm him a little; then toss it over the side.

Jukes tipped the bottle. His Adam’s apple rose and fell. He took the bottle from his lips, and listened. He looked about him, making sure that he was all alone.

Jukes sat down, bottle in hand. Outside the wind wailed drearily. The cold rain hissed. His Adam’s apple rose and fell again.

The boarding master entered the forecastle, the crimp at his heels. Jukes turned and leaped to his feet. Lifting the bottle to hurl it, he swayed uncertainly.

The crimp was laughing.

Jukes clutched at the bulkhead. The lamp was grown suddenly dim. The boarding master and the crimp had disappeared.

Someone struck Alf Jukes just behind the ear. Someone laughed near by.

Stars whirled in a pitch-black sky. The boarding master knelt over Jukes.

Everything was dark.

FEAR

BY JAMES WARNER BELLAH

From _Saturday Evening Post_

It was a little spot, that fear, but it had ached in his heart for months--ever since his first solo flight at Upavon Airdrome. It had come suddenly one morning like the clean pink hole of a steel-jacketed bullet--a wound to be ashamed of--a wound to fight against--a wound that never quite healed. Always it was there to throb and to pinch like the first faint gnawing of cancer. It came with him to the theatre and rankled his mind: “Enjoy this--it may be your last play.” It crept into his throat at meals, sometimes, and took away the poor savour that was left to the foods of wartime.

The fear of the men who fly. Sometimes he pictured it as an imp--an imp that sat eternally on his top plane and questioned him on the strength of rudder wires, pointed to imaginary flaws in struts, suggested that the petrol was low in the tank, that the engine would die on the next climbing turn.

It was with him now as the tender that was to take him up to his squadron jolted and bounced its way across the _pavé_ on the outskirts of Amiens. The squadron was the last place he had to go to. All the months that were gone had led up to this. These were the wars at last. This was the place he would cop it, if he was to cop it at all.

He shrugged. Anyway, he had had his four days in London and his ten days idling at Pilot’s Pool before the squadron sent for him. He braced one shoulder against the rattling seat and reached in his tunic pocket for a cigarette. Mechanically he offered one to the driver. The man took it with a grubby finger.

“Thankee, sor-r.”

He nodded and lighted both cigarettes with the smudge of his pocket lighter. Anyway, he was not flying up to 44. That was one flight saved. Funny, that fear--how it came and went like the throb of a nerve in an open tooth. Sometimes the spot was large, and filled his whole being; then again it would shrink to a dull ache, just enough to take the edge from the beauty of the sunrise and the sparkle from the wine of the moon.

There had been a time when it had jumped in every fibre of his soul. He had been a cadet officer then, with only twelve solo hours in the air, under the old rough-and-tumble system of learning to fly. Spinning at that time was an unsolved mystery to him, a ghastly mystery that had meant quick death in a welter of blood, flecked with splinters. Fred McCloud had gone that way, and Johnny Archamboult. For weeks afterward, Johnny’s screams had rung in his ears like a stab of pain, until the mere smell of petrol and fabric dope made the fear crawl into his throat and strangle him. Somehow he had kept on with the rest, under the merciless scourge that lashed one on to fly--and the worse fear of seeing cold scorn in the eyes of the men who taught the lore of thin cloud miles.

The tender twisted and dodged along the hard mud ribbon that ran like a badly healed cicatrix across the pock-scarred face of the fields. Gnarled and bleak, they were fields that had held the weight of blood-crazed men--still held them in unmarked graves, where they had fallen the year before under the steel flail. He had heard stories from his older brother about those fields--the laughing brother who had gone away one day and returned months later without his laugh, only to go away again, not to come back. He had seen pictures in the magazines----But somehow no one had caught their utter bleakness as he saw it now.