 18 The next day, while the storm was blowing itself out, Wolf-Larsen and I crammed anatomy and surgery and set my ridges ribs. Then, when the storm broke, Wolf-Larsen cruised back and forth over that portion of the ocean where we had encountered it, and somewhat more to the westward, while the boats were being repaired and new sails made and bent. Ceiling schooner after ceiling schooner we sighted and boarded, most of which were in search of lost boats, and most of which were carrying boats and crews they had picked up and which did not belong to them. For the thick of the fleet had been to the westward of us, and the boats scattered far and wide had headed in mad flight for the nearest refuge. Two of our boats, with men all safe, we took off the Cisco and to Wolf-Larsen's huge delight and my own grief, he called smoke, with nilson and leech from the San Diego. So that at the end of five days we found ourselves short but four men, Anderson, Holyoke, Williams, and Kelly, and were once more hunting on the flanks of the herd. As we followed at north we began to encounter the dreaded sea fogs. Day after day the boats lowered and were swallowed up almost ere they touched the water, while we on board pumped the horn at regular intervals, and every fifteen minutes fired the bomb gun. Boats were continually being lost and found at being the custom for a boat to hunt on lay, with whatever schooner picked it up until such time it was recovered by its own schooner. But Wolf-Larsen, as was to be expected, being a boat short, took possession of the first stray one and compelled its men to hunt with the ghost, not permitting them to return to their own schooner when we sighted it. I remember how we forced the hunter and his two men below a rifle at their breasts while their captain passed by at biscuit toss and hailed us for information. Thomas Mugridge, so strangely and perniciously clinging to life, was soon limping about again and performing as double duties as cook and cabin boy. Johnson and leech were bullied and beaten as much as ever, and they looked for their lives to end with the end of the hunting season, while the rest of the crew lived the lives of dogs and were worked like dogs by the pitiless master. As for Wolf-Larsen and myself, we got along fairly well, though I could not quite rid myself of the idea that right conduct, for me, lay in killing him. He fascinated me immeasurably and I feared him immeasurably, and yet I could not imagine him lying prone in death. There was an endurance as a perpetual youth about him which rose up and forbade the picture. I could see him only as living always and dominating always, fighting and destroying, himself surviving. One diversion it is when we were in the midst of the herd and the sea was too rough to lower the boats, was to lower with two boat-pollars and a steerer and go out himself. He was a good shot, too, and brought many a skin aboard under what the hunters termed impossible hunting conditions. It seemed the breath of his nostrils, this carrying his life in his hands and struggling for it against tremendous odds. I was learning more and more seamanship in one clear day, a thing we rarely encountered now. I had the satisfaction of running and handling the ghost and picking up the boats myself. Wolf-Larsen had been smitten with one of his headaches, and I stood at the wheel from morning until evening, sailing across the ocean after the last wee boat and heaving to and picking it and the other five up without command or suggestion from him. Gales we encountered now and again, for it was a raw and stormy region, and in the middle of June a typhoon most memorable to me and most important because of the changes wrought through it upon my future. We must have been caught nearly at the center of this circular storm, and Wolf-Larsen ran out of it and to the southward, first under a double reefed jib, and finally under bare poles. Never had I imagined so great a sea. The seas previously encountered were as ripples compared with these, which ran a half-mile from crest to crest, and which upreared, I am confident, above our mast head. So great was it that Wolf-Larsen himself did not dare heave to, though he was being driven far to the southward and out of the seal-herd. We must have been well in the path of the Trans-Pacific Steamships when the typhoon moderated, and here, to the surprise of the hunters, we found ourselves in the midst of seals. A second herd, or sort of rear-guard, they declared, and the most unusual thing. But it was boats over, the boom-boom of guns, and the pitiful slaughter through the long day. It was at this time that I was approached by leech. I had just finished tallying the skins of the last boat aboard when it came to my side in the darkness and sad in a low tone. Can you tell me, Mr. Van Wyden, how far we are off the coast and what the bearings of Yokohama are? My heart leaped with gladness for I knew what he had in mind, and I gave him the bearings, west, north-west, and five hundred miles away. Thank you, sir, was all that he said as he slipped back into the darkness. Next morning, number three boat in Johnson and Leech were missing. The water-breakers and grub-boxes from all the other boats were likewise missing, as were the beds and sea-bags of the two men. Wolf-Larsen was furious. He set sail and bore away into the west, north-west, two hunters constantly at the mast-heads and sweeping the sea with glasses, himself pacing the deck like an angry lion. He knew too well my sympathy for the runaways to send me aloft as a lookout. The wind was fair but fitful, and it was like looking for a needle in a haystack to raise that tiny boat out of the blue immensity. But he put the ghost through her best paces, so as to get between the deserters and the land. This accomplished he cruised back and forth across what he knew must be their course. On the morning of the third day, shortly after eight bells, a cry that a boat was sited came down from smoke at the mast-head. All hands lined the rail. A snappy breeze was blowing from the west with the promise of more wind behind it, and there to leeward, in the troubled silver of the rising sun, appeared and disappeared a black speck. We squared away and ran for it. My heart was as glad. I felt myself turning sick in anticipation, and as I looked at the gleam of triumph in Wolf-Larsen's eyes, his form swam before me, and I felt almost irresistibly impelled to fling myself upon him. So unnerved was I by the thought of impending violence to Leech and Johnson that my reason must have left me. I know that I slipped down into the steerage in a daze, and that I was just beginning the ascent to the deck, a loaded shotgun in my hands when I heard the startled cry. There were five men in that boat. I supported myself in the companion way, weak and trembling, while the observation was being verified by the remarks of the rest of the men. Then my knees gave from under me, and I sank down myself again, but overcome by shock at knowledge of what I had so nearly done. Also, I was very thankful as I put the gun away and slipped back on deck. No one had remarked my absence. The boat was near enough for us to make out that it was larger than any ceiling boat and built on different lines. As we drew closer, the sail was taken in and the mast unstepped. Ours were shipped, and its occupants waited for us to heave to and take them aboard. Smoke, who had descended to the deck and was now standing by my side, began to chuckle in a significant way. I looked at him inquiringly. Talk of a mess! he giggled. What's wrong? I demanded. Again he chuckled. Don't you see there in the sternsheets on the bottom? May I never shoot a seal again if that ain't a woman. I looked closely, but was not sure until exclamations broke out on all sides. The boat contained four men, and its fifth occupant was certainly a woman. We were agog with excitement, all except Wolf Larson, who was too evidently disappointed in that it was not his own boat with the two victims of his malice. We ran down the flying jeb, hauled the jeb sheets to windward, and the mainsheet flat, and came up into the wind. The oars struck the water, and with a few strokes the boat was alongside. I now caught my first fair glimpse of the woman. She was wrapped in a long ulster, for the morning was raw, and I could see nothing but her face in a mass of light brown hair escaping from under the seamen's cap on her head. The eyes were large and brown and lustrous, the mouth sweet and sensitive, and his face itself a delicate oval, though sun and exposure to briny wind had burnt the face scarlet. She seemed to me like a bean from another world. I was aware of the hungry outreaching for her as of a starving man for bread. But then I had not seen a woman for a very long time. I know that I was lost in a great wonder, almost a stupor. This, then, was a woman, so that I forgot myself and my mate's duties and took no part in helping the newcomers aboard. For when one of the sailors lifted her into Wolf Larson's downstretched arms, she looked up into her curious faces and smiled amusedly and sweetly, as only a woman can smile, and as I had seen no one smile for so long that I had forgotten such smiles existed. Mr. Van Wyden, Wolf Larson's voice brought me sharply back to myself. Will you take the lady below and see to her comfort? Make up that spare port cabin, put cookie to work on it, and see what you can do for that face. It's burned badly. He turned briskly away from us and began to question the new men. The boat was cast adrift, though one of them called it a bloody shame, with the Oklahoma so near. I found myself strangely afraid of this woman I was escorting aft. Also, I was awkward. It seemed to me that I was realizing for the first time what a delicate, fragile creature a woman is, and as I caught her arm to help her down the companion stairs, I was startled by its smallness and softness. Indeed, she was a slender, delicate woman, as women go, but to me she was so etharily slender and delicate that I was quite prepared for her arm to crumble in my grasp. All this, in frankness, to show my first impression, after a long denial of women in general, and of Maude Brewster in particular. No need to go to integrate trouble for me, she protested when I had seated her in Wolf Larson's armchair, which I had dragged hastily from his cabin. The men were looking for land at any moment this morning, and the vessel should be in by night. Don't you think so? Her simple faith in the immediate future took me back. How could I explain to her the situation? The strange man who stalked the sea like destiny. All that it had taken me months to learn. But I answered honestly. If it were any other captain except ours, I should say you would be ashore in Yokohama tomorrow. But our captain is a strange man, and I beg of you to be prepared for anything. Understand? For anything. I confess I hardly do understand, she hesitated, a perturbed but not frightened expression in her eyes. Or is it a misconception of mine that shipwrecked people are always shown every consideration? This is such a little thing, you know. We are so close to land. Candidly I do not know, I strove to reassure her. I wished merely to prepare you for the worst if the worst is to come. This man, this captain, is a brute, a demon, and one can never tell what will be his next fantastic act. I was growing excited, but she interrupted me with an, oh, I see. And her voice sounded weary. To think was patently an effort. She was clearly on the verge of physical collapse. She asked no further questions, and I vowed safe, no remark, devoted myself to Wolf Larson's command, which was to make her comfortable. I bustled about in quite house wifely fashion, procuring soothing lotions for her sunburn, raiding Wolf Larson's private stores for a bottle of port I knew to be there, and directing Thomas Mugridge into preparation of the spare stateroom. The wind was freshening rapidly, the ghost healing over more and more, and by the time the stateroom was ready, she was dashing through the water at a lively clip. I had quite forgotten the existence of Leech and Johnson when suddenly, like a thunder clap, Boat Ho came down the open companion way. It was Smoke's unmistakable voice crying from the masthead. I shot a glance at the woman, but she was leaning back in her arm chair. Her eyes closed, unutterably tired. I doubt that she had heard, and I resolved to prevent her seeing the brutality I knew would follow the capture of the deserters. She was tired. Very good. She should sleep. There were swift commands on deck, a stamping of feet and a slapping of reef points as the ghost shot into the wind and about on the other tack. As she filled away and healed, the armchair began to slide across the cabin floor, and I sprang for it just in time to prevent the rescued woman from being spilled out. Her eyes were too heavy to suggest more than a hint of the sleepy surprise that perplexed her as she looked up at me, and she half stumbled, half tottered as I led her to her cabin. Mugridge grinned insinuatingly in my face as I shoved him out and ordered him back to his galley work, and he won his revenge by spreading glowing reports among the hunters as to what an excellent idea is mine. I was proving myself to be. She leaned heavily against me, and I do believe that she had fallen asleep again between the armchair and the stateroom. This I discovered when she nearly fell into the bunk during the sudden lurch of the schooner. She aroused, smiled drowsily, and was off to sleep again. And asleep I left her under a heavy pair of sailor's blankets, her head resting on a pillow I had appropriated from Wolf-Larsen's bunk. End of Chapter 18 Chapter 19 of The Seawolf. This library of ox recording is in the public domain. The Seawolf by Jack London, Chapter 19. I came on deck to find the ghost heading up close on the portac and cutting into windward of a familiar spritz sail close-hauled on the same tack ahead of us. All hands were on deck, for they knew that something was to happen when Leach and Johnson were dragged aboard. It was four bells. Lewis came after relieved the wheel. There was a dampness in the air, and I noticed he had on his oil-skins. What are we going to have? I asked him. A healthy young slip of a gale from the breathy of it, sir, he answered, with a splatter of rain just to what our gills and no more. Too bad we sided them, I said, as the ghost bow was flowing off a point by a large sea, and the boat leaped for a moment past the jibs and into our line of vision. Lewis gave a spoke and temporized. They'd never have made the land, sir, I'm thinking. Think not, I queried. No, sir, did you feel that? A puff had got the schooner, and he was forced to put the wheel up rapidly to keep her out of the wind. Tis no eggshell will float on this sea an hour come, and its stroke of luck for them were here to pick them up. Wolf Larson strode aft from the midships, where he had been talking with the rescued men. The cat-like springiness in his tread was a little more pronounced than usual, and his eyes were bright and snappy. Three oilers and a fourth engineer was his greeting, but we'll make sailors out of them, or boat-pullers at any rate. Now, what of the lady? I knew not why, but I was aware of a twinge or pang like the cut of a knife when he mentioned her. I thought of the certain silly fastidiousness on my part, but it persisted in spite of me, and I merely shrugged my shoulders and answered. Wolf Larson pursed his lips in a long, quizzical whistle. What's her name, then? he demanded. I don't know, I replied. She is asleep. She was very tired. In fact, I am waiting to hear the news from you. What vessel was it? Male steamer, he answered shortly. The city of Tokyo from Frisco bound for Yokohama, disabled in that typhoon, old tub, opened up top and bottom like a sieve. They were adrift four days. And you don't know who or what she is, eh? Maid, wife, or widow? Well, well. He shook his head in a bannering way and regarded me with laughing eyes. Are you? I began. It was on the verge of my tongue to ask if he were going to take the castaways into Yokohama. Am I what? he asked. What do you intend doing with Lleach and Johnson? He shook his head. Really, hump, I don't know. You see, with these additions, I've about all the crew I want. And they've about all the escaping they want, I said. Why not give them a change of treatment? Take them aboard and deal gently with them. Whatever they have done they have been hounded into doing. By me? By you, I answered steadily. And I give you warning, Wolf Larson, that I may forget love of my own life and the desire to kill you if you go too far in maltreating those poor wretches. Bravo! he cried. You do me proud, hump. You found your legs with the vengeance. You're quite an individual. You were unfortunate in having your life cast in easy places, but you're developing, and I like you the better for it. His voice and expression changed. His face was serious. Do you believe in promises? he asked. Are they sacred things? Of course, I answered. Then here's a compact, he went on, consummate actor. If I promise not to lay my hands upon Lleach, will you promise, in turn, not to attempt to kill me? Oh, not that I'm afraid of you. Not that I'm afraid of you, he hastened to add. I could hardly believe my ears. What was coming over the man? Is it a go? he asked impatiently. A go, I answered. His hand went out to mine, and as I shook it hardly I could have sworn I saw the mocking-devil shine up for a moment in his eyes. We strolled across the poop to the lee side. The boat was close at hand now, and in desperate flight. Johnson was steering, Lleach bailing. We overhauled them about two feet to their one. Wolf Larson motioned Lewis to keep off slightly, and we dashed a breast to this boat, not a score of feet to windward. The ghost blanketed it. The spritz sail flapped emptily, and the boat rided to an even keel, causing the two men swiftly to change position. The boat lost headway, and as we lifted on a huge surge, toppled and fell into the trough. It was at this moment that Lleach and Johnson looked up into the faces of their shipmates who lined the rail amid ships. There was no greeting. They were as dead men in their comrades' eyes, and between them was the gulf that parts the living and the dead. The next instant they were opposite the poop, worsted Wolf Larson and I. We were falling in the trough, they were rising on the surge. Johnson looked at me, and I could see that his face was worn and haggard. I waved my hand to him, and he answered the greeting but with a wave that was hopeless and despairing. It was as if he were saying fair well. I did not see into the eyes of Lleach, for he was looking at Wolf Larson the old and implacable snarl of hatred, strong as ever on his face. Then they were gone astern. The spritz sail filled with the wind, suddenly careening the frail open-craft till it seemed it would surely capsize. A white cap foamed above it and broke across in snow-white smother. Then the boat emerged, half swamped, Lleach flinging the water out, and Johnson clinging to the steering-or, his face white and anxious. Wolf Larson barked a short laugh in my ear and strode away to the weather-side of the poop. I expected him to give orders for the ghost to heave to, but she kept on her course, and he made no sign. Lleach stood imperturbably at the wheel, but I noticed the group sailors forward, turning trouble-faces in our direction. Still the ghost tore along till the boat dwindled to a speck, when Wolf Larson's voice rang out in command, and he went about on the starboard tack. Back we held, two miles and more, to windward to the struggling cockle-shell, when the flying jib was run down in the schooner-hove, too. The sealing boat's not made for windward work. There hope lies in keeping the weather-position so that they may run before the wind for the schooner when it breezes up. But in all that wild waste there was no refuge for Lleach and Johnson save on the ghost, and they resolutely began the windward beat. It was slow work in the heavy sea that was running. At any moment they were liable to be overwhelmed by the hissing comers. Time and again, in countless times, we watched the boat luff into the big whitecaps, lose headway, and be flung back like a quirk. Johnson was a splendid seaman, and he knew as much about small boats as he did about ships. At the end of an hour and a half he was nearly alongside, standing past our stern on the last leg out, aiming to fetch us on the next leg back. So you've changed your mind. I heard Wolf-Larsen mutter half to himself, half to them as though they could hear. You want to come aboard, eh? Well then, just keep it coming. Hard up without helm, he commanded Ufti Ufti, the Kanaka, who had in the meantime relieved Lewis at the wheel. Command followed command. As the schooner paid off, the foreign mainsheets were slacked away for fair wind. And before the wind we were, and leaping, when Johnson, easing his sheet at intimate peril, cut across our wake a hundred feet away. Again Wolf-Larsen laughed, at the same time beckoning them with his arm to follow. It was evidently his intention to play with them. A lesson, I took it, in lieu of a beating, though a dangerous lesson, for the frail craft stood in momentary danger of being overwhelmed. Johnson squared away promptly and ran after us. There was nothing else for him to do. Death stalked everywhere, and it was only a matter of time when one of those many huge waves would fall upon the boat, roll it over, and pass on. Tis the fear of death at the hearts of them, Lewis muttered in my ear, as I passed forward to see taking in the flying-jib and stay-sale. Oh, he'll heave too in a little while, and pick them up, I answered cheerfully. He's bent on giving them a lesson. That's all. Lewis looked at me shrewdly. Think so? He asked. Surely, I answered. Don't you? I think nothing but if my own skin these days was the answer. And tis with wonder I'm filled as to the workens out, if things. A pretty mess that Frisco Whiskey got me into, and a prettier mess that women's got you into after. Ah, it's myself that knows ye for a blitherin' fool. What do you mean, I demanded, for having sped his shaft he was turning away? What do I mean, he cried, and it's you that asks me. Tis not what I mean, but what the wolf will mean. The wolf, I say, the wolf. If trouble comes, will you stand by? I asked impulsively, for he had voiced my own fear. Stand by? Tis Fatah Lewis, I stand by, and trouble enough it'll be. We're at the beginning of things, I'm telling ye, the bare beginning of things. I had not thought you so great a coward, I sneered. He favored me with a contemptuous stare. If I raised never a hand for that poor fool, pointing stern to the tiny sail. Do you think I'm hungering for a broken head for a woman I never laid me eyes on before this day? I turned scornfully away and went aft. Better get in those top sails, Mr. Van Wyden, Wolf Larson said, as I came on the poop. I felt relief, at least as far as the two men were concerned. It was clear he did not wish to run too far away from them. I picked up hope at the thought, and put the order swiftly into execution. I had scarcely opened in my mouth the issue the necessary commands, when eager men were springing to the hell-yards and down-halls, and others were racing aloft. This eagerness on their part was noted by Wolf Larson with a grim smile. Still we increased our lead, and when the boat had dropped a stern several miles we hoved to and waited. All eyes watched it coming, even Wolf Larson's. But he was the only unperturbed man aboard. Lewis, gazing fixedly, betrayed a trouble in his face he was not quite able to hide. The boat drew closer and closer, hurling along through the seething green like the thin alive, lifting and sending and uptossing across the huge back-breakers, or disappearing behind them only to rush in to sight again and shoot skyward. It seemed impossible that it could continue to live, yet with each dizzying sweep it did achieve the impossible. A rain-squall drove fast, and out of the flying wet the boat emerged almost upon us. Hard up there, Wolf Larson shouted, himself springing to the wheel and whirling it over. Again the ghosts sprang away and raced before the wind, and for two hours Johnson and the Leeds pursued us. We hoved to and ran away, hoved to and ran away, and ever a stern the struggling patch of sail tossed skyward and fell into the rushing valleys. It was a quarter of a mile away when a thick squall of rain veiled it from view. It never emerged. The wind blew the air clear again, but no patch of sail broke the troubled surface. I thought I saw, for an instant, the boat's bottom show black in a breaking crest. At the best that was all. For Johnson and Leeds the travail of existence had ceased. The men remained grouped amid ships. No one had gone below, and no one was speaking. Nor were any looks being exchanged. Each man seemed stunned, deeply common and plaitive, as it were, and not quite sure, trying to realize what had just taken place. Wolf Larson gave them little time for thought. He at lunch put the ghost upon her course, a course which meant the seal heard and not Yokohama harbor. But the men were no longer eager as they polled and hauled, and I heard curses amongst them, which left their lips smothered and as heavy and lifeless as were they. Not so was it with the hunters. Smoke the irrepressible related to story, and they descended into the steerage, balloing with laughter. As I passed to Lever to the galley on my way after I was approached by the engineer we had rescued. His face was white, his lips were trembling. Good God, sir, what kind of craft is this? he cried. You have eyes you have seen. I answered almost brutally. What of the pain and fear at my own heart? Your promise, I said to Wolf Larson. I was not thinking of taking them aboard when I made that promise, he answered. And anyway, you'll agree I've not laid my hands upon them. Far from it, far from it, he laughed a moment later. I made no reply. I was incapable of speaking. My mind was too confused. I must have time to think, I knew. This woman, sleeping even now in the spare cabin, was a responsibility which I must consider, and the only rational thought that flickered through my mind was that I must do nothing hastily if I were to be any help to her at all. CHAPTER 20 The remainder of the day passed uneventfully. The young slip of a gale, having wedded our gills, proceeded to moderate. The fourth engineer and three oilers, after a warm interview with Wolf Larson, were furnished with outfits from the slop chests, assigned places under the hunters in the various boats and watches on the vessel, and bundled forward into the forecastle. They went protestingly, but their voices were not loud. They were odd by what they had already seen of Wolf Larson's character. While the tale of woe they spedily heard in the forecastle took the last bit of rebellion out of them. Miss Brewster, we had learned her name from the engineer, slept on and on. At supper I requested the hunters to lower their voices, so she was not disturbed, and it was not till next morning that she made her appearance. It had been my intention to have her meals served apart, but Wolf Larson put down his foot. Who was she that she should be too good for cabin table and cabin society had been his demand. But her coming to the table had something amusing in it. The hunters fell silent as clams. Jacques Horner and Smoke alone were unabashed, stealing stealthy glances that are now and again, and even taking part in the conversation. The other four men glued their eyes on their plates and chewed steadily and with thoughtful precision, their ears moving and wobbling in time with their jaws like the ears of so many animals. Wolf Larson had little to say at first, doing no more than reply when he was addressed. Not that he was abashed, far from it. This woman was a new type to him, a different breed for many he had ever known, and he was curious. He studied her, his eyes rarely leaving her face unless to follow the movements of her hands or shoulders. I studied her myself, and though it was I who maintained the conversation, I know that I was a bit shy and not quite self-possessed. His was the perfect poise, the supreme confidence and self, which nothing could shake, and he was no more timid of a woman than he was of storm and battle. And when shall we arrive at Yokohama, she asked, turning to him and looking him squirrely in the eyes. There it was, the question flat. The jaws stopped working, the ears ceased wobbling, and though eyes remained glued on plates, each man listened greedily for the answer. In four months, possibly three, if the season closes early, Wolf Larson said. She caught her breath and stammered. I thought I was given to understand that Yokohama was only a day's sail away. Yet here she paused and looked about the table at the circle of unsympathetic faces staring hard at the plates. It is not right, she concluded. That is a question you must settle with Mr. Van Wyden there, he replied, nodding to me with a mischievous twinkle. Mr. Van Wyden is what you may call an authority on such things as rights. Now I, who am only a sailor, would look upon the situation somewhat differently. It may possibly be your misfortune that you have to remain with us, but it is certainly our good fortune. He regarded her smilingly. Her eyes fell before his gaze, but she lifted them again indefinitely to mine. I read the unspoken question there, was it right? But I had decided that the part I was to play must be a neutral one, so I did not answer. What do you think, she demanded, that it is unfortunate, especially if you have engagements falling due in the course of the next several months. But, since you say you were of origin to Japan for your health, I can assure you that it will improve no better anywhere than aboard the ghost. I saw her eyes flash with indignation, and this time it was I who dropped mine, while I felt my face flushing under her gaze. It was cowardly, but what else could I do? Mr. Van Wyden speaks with the voice of authority, Wolf Larson laughed. I nodded my head, and she, having recovered herself, waited expectantly. Not that he is much to speak of now, Wolf Larson went on, but he has improved wonderfully. You should have seen him when he came on board. A more scrawny, pitiful specimen of humanity one could hardly conceive. Isn't that so, carefoot? Carefoot, thus directly addressed, was startled into dropping his knife on the floor, though he managed to grunt affirmation. Developed himself by peeling potatoes and washing dishes. Yeah, carefoot? Again, that worthy grunted. Look at him now. True, he is not what you would term muscular, but still he has muscles, which is more than he had when he came aboard. Also, he has legs to stand on. You would not think so to look at him, but he was quite unable to stand alone at first. The hunters were snickering, but she looked at me with a sympathy in her eyes, which more than compensated for Wolf Larson's nastiness. And truth had been so long since I had received sympathy that I was softened, and I became then, and gladly, her willing slave. But I was angry with Wolf Larson. He was challenging my manhood with his slurs. Challenging the very legs, he claimed to be instrumental in getting for me. I may have learned to stand on my own legs, I retorted, but I have yet to stamp upon others with them. He looked at me insolently. Your education is only half completed then, he said, dryly, and turned to her. We are very hospitable upon the ghost. Mr. Van Wyden has discovered that. We do everything to make our guests feel at home. Yeah, Mr. Van Wyden? Even to the peeling of potatoes and the washing of dishes, I answered, to say nothing to wringing their necks out of a very fellow ship. I beg of you not to receive false impressions of us for Mr. Van Wyden, he interposed with mock anxiety. You will observe Mr. Brewster that he carries a dirk in his belt, a most unusual thing for a ship's officer to do. While really very estonable, Mr. Van Wyden is sometimes, how shall I say it, or quarrelsome and harsh measures are necessary. He is quite reasonable and fair in his calm moments. And as he is calm now, he will not deny that only yesterday he threatened my life. I was well-nigh choking and my eyes were certainly fiery. He drew attention to me. Look at him now. He can scarcely control himself in your presence. He is not accustomed to the presence of ladies, anyway. I shall have to arm myself before I dare go on deck with him. He shook his head sadly, murmuring, too bad, too bad, while the hunters burst in the guffaws of laughter. The deep sea voices of these men rumbling and bellowing in the confined space produced a wild effect. The whole setting was wild, and for the first time regarding this strange woman and realizing how incongruous she was in it, I was aware of how much of a part of it I was myself. I knew these men and their mental processes was one of them myself, living the seal-hunting life, eating the seal-hunting fair, thinking largely the seal-hunting thoughts. There was, for me, no strangeness to it, to the rough clothes, the coarse faces, the wild laughter, and the lurching cabin walls and swaying sea lamps. As I buttered a piece of bread, my eyes chanced to rest upon my hands. The knuckles were skinned and inflamed clear across. The fingers swollen, the nails rimmed with black. I felt a mattress-like growth of beard on my neck, knew that the sleeve of my coat was ripped, that a button was missing from the throat of the blue shirt I wore. The dark mention by Wolf-Warsson rested in its sheath on my hip. It was very natural that it should be there. How natural I had not imagined until now, when I looked upon it with her eyes and knew how strange it, and all that went with it, must appear to her. But she divined the mockery in Wolf-Warsson's word and again favored me with the sympathetic glance. But there was a look of bewilderment also in her eyes. That it was mockery made the situation more puzzling to her. I may be taken off by some passing vessel, perhaps, she suggested. There will be no passing vessels except other sealing-scuners, Wolf-Warsson made answer. I have no clothes, nothing, she objected. You hardly realize, sir, that I am not a man, or that I am accustomed to the vagrant, careless life that which you and your men seem to lead. The sooner you get accustomed to it, the better, he said. I'll furnish you with cloth, needles, and thread, he added. I hope it will not be too dreadful a hardship for you to make yourself a dresser, too. She made a ripe pucker with her mouth as though to advertise her ignorance of dressmaking. That she was frightened and bewildered, and that she was bravely striving to hide it was quite plain to me. I suppose you're like Mr. Van Wyden, there accustomed to having things done for you. Well, I think doing a few things for yourself will hardly dislocate any joints. By the way, what do you do for a living? She regarded him with amazement unconcealed. I mean no offense, believe me. People eat, therefore they must procure the wear with all. These men here shoot seals in order to live. For the same reason I sail this gooner, and Mr. Van Wyden, for the present at any rate, earns his salty grub by assisting me. Now, what do you do? She shrugged her shoulders. Do you feed yourself, or does someone else feed you? I'm afraid someone else has fed me most of my life, she laughed, trying bravely to enter into the spirit of his quizzing, though I could see a terror dawning and growing in her eyes as she watched Dolf Larson. And I suppose someone else makes your bed for you? I have made beds, she replied. Very often, she shook her head with mock rooffulness. Do you know what they do to poor men in the States who, like you, do not work for their living? I am very ignorant, she pleaded. What do they do to the poor men who are like me? They send them to jail. The crime of not earning a living, in their case, is called vagrancy. If I were Mr. Van Wyden, who harps eternally on the questions of right and wrong, I'd asked, by what right do you live when you do nothing to deserve living? But as you are not Mr. Van Wyden, I don't have to answer, do I? She beamed upon him through her terror-filled eyes, and the pathos of it got me to the heart. I must, in some way, break in and lead the conversation into other channels. Have you ever earned a dollar by your own labor? He demanded certain of her answer, a triumphant vindictiveness in his voice. Yes, I have, she answered slowly, and I could have laughed aloud at his crossfallen visage. I remember my father giving me a dollar once, when I was a little girl, for remaining absolutely quiet for five minutes. He smiled indulgingly. But that was long ago, she continued, and you would scarcely demand a little girl of nine to earn her own living. At present, however, she said, after another slight pause, I earn about $1,800 a year. With one accord, all eyes left the plates and settled on her. A woman who earned $1,800 a year was worth looking at. Wolf Larson was undisguised in his admiration. Salary or peacework, he asked. Peacework, she answered promptly. 1800, he calculated. That's $150 a month. Well, Miss Brewster, there is nothing small about the ghost. Consider yourself on salary during the time you remain with us. She made no acknowledgment. She was too unused as yet to the whims of the man to accept them with equanimity. I forgot to inquire, he went unswavly, as to the nature of your occupation. What commodities do you turn out? What tools and materials do you require? Paper and ink, she laughed, and oh, also a typewriter. You are Maude Brewster, I said slowly, and with certainty, almost as though I were charging her with a crime. Her eyes lifted curiously to mine. How do you know? Aren't you, I demanded. She acknowledged her identity with a nod. It was Wolf Larson's turn to be puzzled. The name and his magic signified nothing to him. I was proud that it did mean something to me. And for the first time in a weary while I was convincingly conscious of a superiority over him. I remember writing a review of a thin little volume. I had begun carelessly when she interrupted me. You, she cried, you are, she was now staring at me in wide-eyed wonder. I nodded my identity in turn. Humphrey Van Wyden, she concluded, and then added with a sigh of relief and unaware that she had glanced that relief at Wolf Larson. I am so glad. I remember the review she went on hastily, becoming aware of the awkwardness of her remark. That too-too flattering review. Not at all, I denied valiantly. You impeach my sober judgment and make my cannons of little worth. Besides, all my brother critics were with me. Didn't lying include your kiss endured among the four supreme sonnets by women in the English language? But you called me the American Mrs. Minell. Was it not true, I demanded? No, not that, she answered. I was hurt. We can measure the unknown only by the known, I replied, in my finest academic manner. As a critic, I was compelled to place you. You have now become a yardstick yourself. Seven of your thin little volumes are on my shelves, and there are two thicker volumes, the essays, which, you will pardon my saying, and I know not which is flattered more, fully equal your verse. The time is not far distant when some unknown will arise in England, and the critics will name her the English Mod Brewster. You are very kind, I am sure, she murmured, and the very conventionality of her tones and words with the host of associations that aroused of the old life on the other side of the world gave me a quick thrill. Rich with remembrance, but stinging sharp with homesickness. And you are Mod Brewster, I said solemnly, gazing across at her. And you are Humphrey Van Wyden, she said, gazing back at me with equal solemnity and awe. How unusual. I don't understand. We surely are not to expect some wildly romantic sea story from your sober pen. No, I am not gathering material, I assure you, is my answer. I have neither aptitude nor inclination for fiction. Tell me, why have you always buried yourself in California? She next asked. It has not been kind of you. We have the east have seen too very little of you. Too little indeed, of the Dean of American Letters II. I bowed to and disclaimed the compliment. I nearly met you once in Philadelphia, some Browning, a fair or other. You were to lecture, you know. My train was four hours late. And then we quite forgot where we were, leaving wolf horse and stranded in silence in the midst of our flood of gossip. The hunters left the table and went on deck and still we talked. Wolf Larson alone remained. Suddenly I became aware of him leaning back from the table, and listening curiously to our alien speech of a world he did not know. I broke off in the middle of a sentence. The present, with all its pearls and anxieties, rushed upon me with stunning force. It smote Miss Brewster, likewise, a vague and nameless terror rushing into her eyes as she regarded Wolf Larson. He rose to his feet and laughed awkwardly. The sound of it was metallic. Oh, don't mind me, he said, with its self-depreciatory wave of his hand. I don't count. Go on, go on, I pray you. But the gates of speech were closed, and we too rose from the table and laughed awkwardly. CHAPTER XXI The chagrin wolf Larson felt from being ignored by Mod Brewster and me in the conversation at table had to express itself in some fashion, and it felt to Thomas Mugridge to be the victim. He had not mended his ways nor his shirt, though the latter he contended he had changed. The garment itself did not bear out the assertion, nor did the accumulations of grease on stove and pot and pan attest to general cleanliness. I've given you warning, Cookie, Wolf Larson said, and now you've got to take your medicine. Mugridge's face turned white under a sooty veneer, and when Wolf Larson called for a rope and a couple of men, their miserable cockney fled wildly out of the galley and dodged and ducked about the deck with a grinning crew in pursuit. Few things could have been more to their liking than to give him a tow over the side, for to the forecastle he had sent messes and concoctions of the vilest order. Conditions favored the undertaking. The ghost was slipping through the water at no more than three miles an hour, and as he was fairly calm. But Mugridge had little stomach for a dip in it. Possibly he had seen men towed before. Besides, the water was frightfully cold, and his was anything but a rugged constitution. As usual, the watches blow, and the hunters turned out for what promised sport. Mugridge seemed to be in rabid fear of the water, and he exhibited the nimbleness and speed we did not dream he possessed. Cornered in the right angle of the poop and galley, he sprang like a cat to the top of the cabin and ran out. But his pursuers first stalling him. He doubled back across the cabin, passed over the galley, and gained the deck by means of the steered scuttle. Straightforward he raced, the bolt puller Harrison at his heels and gaining on him. But Mugridge, leaping suddenly, caught the jib-boom lift. It happened in an instant. Holding his weight by his arms and in mid-air doubling his body at the hips, he let fly with both feet. The uncoming Harrison caught the kick squarely in the pit of the stomach, groaned involuntarily and doubled up and sank backward to the deck. Hand clapping and roars of laughter from the hunters greeted the exploit, while Mugridge, eluding half of his pursuers at the foremast, ran aft and threw the remainder like a runner on the football field. Straight aft he held to the poop and along the poop to the stern. So great was the speed that as he curved past the corner of the cabin he slipped and fell. Nelson was standing at the wheel and the cockney's hurtling body struck his legs. Both went down together, but Mugridge alone arose. By some freak of pressures, his frail body had snapped the strong man's leg like a pipe stem. Parsons took the wheel and the pursuit continued. Round and round the decks they went. Mugridge, sick with fear, the sailors hollowing and shouting directions to one another and the hunters bellowing encouragement and laughter. Mugridge went down on the forehatch under three men, but he emerged from the mast like an eel, bleeding at the mouth, the offending shirt ripped into tatters and sprang for the main rigging. Up he went clear up beyond the route lines to the very mast head. Half a dozen sailors formed to the cross trees after him, where they clustered and waited while two of their number, Ufti Ufti and Black, who was Vladimir's boat steerer, continued up the thin steel stays, lifting their bodies higher and higher by means of their arms. It was a perilous undertaking for, at a height of over a hundred feet from the deck, holding on by their hands, they were not in the best of positions to protect themselves from Mugridge's feet. And Mugridge kicked savagely till the Kanaka, holding on with one hand, seized the cockney's foot with the other. Black duplicated the performance a moment later with the other foot. Then the three writhed together at a swaying tangle, struggling, sliding, and falling into the arms of their mates on the cross trees. The aerial battle was over at Thomas Mugridge, whining and gibbering. His mouth-flecked with bloody foam was brought down to deck. Wolf Larson rode a bowline and a piece of rope and slipped it under his shoulders. Then he was carried aft and flung into the sea. Forty, fifty, sixty feet of line ran out when Wolf Larson cried, Belay. Ufti took a turn on the bed, the rope tautened, and the ghost, lunging onward, jerked the cook to the surface. It was a pitiful spectacle. Though he could not drown, and was nine lived in addition, he was suffering all the agonies of half drowning. The ghost was going very slowly, and when her stern lifted on a wave and she slipped forward, she pulled the wretch to the surface and gave him a moment in which to breathe. But between each lift the stern fell, and while the bow lazily climbed the next wave, the line slackened and he sank beneath. I had forgotten the existence of Maude Brewster, and I remembered her with a start as she stepped lightly beside me. It was her first time on deck since she had come aboard. A dead silence greeted her appearance. What is the cause of the merriment? she asked. As Captain Larson, I answered composedly and coldly. Though inwardly my blood was boiling at the thought that she should be witness to such brutality. She took my advice and was turning to put it into execution when her eyes lighted on Ufti Ufti immediately before her. His body instinct with alertness and grace as he held the turn of the rope. Are you fishing? she asked him. He made no reply. His eyes fixed intently on the sea stern suddenly flashed. Sharko, sir, he cried. Even lively, all hands tailed on, Wolf Larson shouted, springing himself to the rope in advance of the quickest. Mugridge had heard the Canaka's warning cry and was screaming madly. I could see a black fin cutting the water and making for him with greater swiftness than he was being pulled aboard. It was an even toss, whether the shark or we would get him, and it was a matter of moments. When Mugridge was directly beneath us, the stern descended the slope of a passing wave, thus giving the advantage to the shark. The fin disappeared. The belly flashed white and swift upward the rush, almost equally swift but not quite, with Wolf Larson. He threw his strength into one tremendous jerk. The cockney's body left the water, so did part of the sharks. He drew up his legs and the man-eater seemed no more than barely to touch one foot, sinking back into the water with his splash. But at the moment of contact, Thomas Mugridge cried out. Then he came in like a fresh-cut fish on a line, clearing the rail generously and striking the deck in a heap, on hands and knees and rolling over. But a fountain of blood was gushing forth. The right foot was missing amputated neatly at the ankle. I looked instantly to mod Brewster. Her face was white, her eyes dilated with horror. She was gazing, not at Thomas Mugridge but at Wolf Larson. And he was aware of it, for he sat with one of his short laughs. Man play, Miss Brewster! Somewhat rougher I warrant than what you have been used to but still man play. The shark was not in the reckoning yet, but at this juncture, Mugridge, who had lifted his head and ascertained the extent of his loss, floundered over on deck and buried his teeth in Wolf Larson's leg. Wolf Larson stooped, coolly to the cockney, and pressed with thumb and finger at the rear of the jaws and below the ears. The jaws opened with reluctance, and Wolf Larson stepped free. As I was saying, he went on as though nothing unwanted had happened. The shark was not in the reckoning. It was, shall we say, Providence. She gave no sign that she had heard, though the expression of her eyes changed to one of inexpressible loathing as she started to turn away. She no more than started, for she swayed and tottered and reached her hand weakly out to mine. I caught her in time to save her from falling and helped her to a seat in the cabin. I thought she might faint outright, but she controlled herself. Well, you get a tourniquet. Mr. Van Wyden Wolf Larson called to me. I hesitated. Her lips moved, and though they form no words, she commanded me with her eyes, plainly a speech, to go to the help of the unfortunate man. Please, she managed to whisper, and I could but obey. By now I had developed such skill at surgery that Wolf Larson, with a few words of advice, left me to my task with a couple of sailors for assistance. For his task he elected a vengeance on the shark. A heavy swivel hook, baited with fat salt pork, was dropped over side, and by the time I had compressed the severed veins and arteries the sailors were singing and heaving in the offending monster. I did not see it myself, but my assistance, first one and then the other, deserted me for a few minutes to run amidships and look at what was going on. The shark, a sixteen-footer, was hoisted up against the main rigging. Its jaws were pried apart to their greatest extension, and its stout stake, sharpened at both ends, was so inserted that when the pries were removed the spread jaws were fixed upon it. This accomplished, the hook was cut out. The shark dropped back into the sea, helpless, yet with its full strength, doomed to lingering starvation, a living death less meat for it than for the man who devised the punishment. CHAPTER XXI I knew what it was as she came toward me. For ten minutes I had watched her talking earnestly with the engineer, and now, with the sign for silence, I drew her out of earshot of the helmsman. Her face was white and set, her large eyes larger than usual, what of the purpose in them looked penetratingly into mine. I felt rather timid and apprehensive for she had come to search Humphrey Van Wyden's soul, and Humphrey Van Wyden had nothing of which to be particularly proud since his advent on the ghost. We walked to the break of the poop where she turned and faced me. I glanced around to see that no one was within earring distance. What is it? I asked gently. But the expression of determination on her face did not relax. I can readily understand, she began, that this morning's affair was largely an accident, but I have been talking with Mr. Haskins. He tells me the day we were rescued, even while I was in the cabin, two men were drowned, deliberately drowned, murdered. There was a query in her voice, and she faced me accusingly, as though I were guilty of the deed, or at least a party to it. The information is quite correct, I answered. Two men were murdered. And you permitted it, she cried. I was unable to prevent it, is a better way of phrasing it, I replied, still gently. But you tried to prevent it. There was an emphasis on the tried in a fleeting little note in her voice. Oh, but you didn't, she hurried on, divining my answer. But why didn't you? I shrugged my shoulders. You must remember, Miss Brewster, that you are a new inhabitant of this mortal world, and that you do not yet understand the laws which operate within it. You bring with you certain fine conceptions of humanity, manhood, conduct, and such things. But here you will find them misconceptions. I have found it so, I added, with an involuntary sigh. She shook her head incredulously. What would you advise, then, I asked, that I should take a knife or a gun or an axe and kill this man? She half started back. No, not that. Then what should I do? Kill myself? You speak in purely materialistic terms, she objected. There is such a thing as moral courage, and moral courage is never without effect. Ah, I smiled. You advise me to kill neither him nor myself, but to let him kill me. I held up my hand as she was about to speak. For moral courage is a worthless asset on this little floating world. Leech, one of the men who were murdered, had moral courage to an unusual degree. So had the other man, Johnson. Not only did it not stand them in good stead, but it destroyed them. And so with me if I should exercise what little moral courage I may possess. You must understand, Miss Brewster, and understand clearly that this man is a monster. He is without conscience. Nothing is sacred to him. Nothing is too terrible for him to do. It was due to his whim that I was detained aboard in the first place. It is due to his whim that I am still alive. I do nothing, can do nothing, because I am a slave to this monster, as you are now a slave to him, because I desire to live, as you will desire to live, because I cannot fight and overcome him, just as you will not be able to fight and overcome him. She waited for me to go on. What remains? Mine is the role of the weak. I remain silent and suffer ignominy, as you will remain silent and suffer ignominy. And it is well. It is the best we can do if we wish to live. The battle is not always to the strong. We have not the strength with which to fight this man. We must dissimulate and win, if when we can, by craft. If you will be advised by me, this is what you will do. I know my position is perilous, and I may say frankly that yours is even more perilous. We must stand together without appearing to do so in secret alliance. I shall not be able to side with you openly, and no matter what indignities may be put upon me, you are to remain likewise silent. We must provoke no scenes with this man or cross as well. And we must keep smiling faces and be friendly with him no matter how repulsive it may be. She brushed her hand across her forehead in a puzzled way, saying, Still I do not understand. You must do as I say, I interrupted authoritatively, for I saw Wolfhorsen's gaze wandering toward us from where he paced up and down with a ladder mirror of midships. Do as I say, and ere long you will find I am right. What shall I do then? she asked, detecting the anxious glance I had shot at the object of our conversation, and impressed I flattered myself with the earnestness of my manner. Dispense with all the moral courage you can, I said briskly. Don't arouse this man's animosity. Be quite friendly with him, talk with him, discuss literature and art with him, his fond of such things. You will find him an interested listener and no fool. And for your own sake try to avoid witnessing, as much as you can, the brutalities of the ship. It will make it easier for you to act your part. I am to lie, she said, in steady rebellious tones. By speech and action to lie, Wolfhorsen had separated from the ladder mirror and was coming toward us. I was desperate. Please, please understand me, I said hurriedly, lowering my voice. All your experience of men and things is worthless here. You must begin over again. I know, I can see it, you have, among other ways, been used to managing people with your eyes, letting your moral courage speak out through them, as it were. You have already managed me with your eyes, commanded me with them. But don't try it on Wolfhorsen. You could as easily control a lion while he would make a mock of you. He would. I have always been proud of the fact that I discovered him, I said, turning the conversation as Wolfhorsen stepped on the poop and joined us. The editors were afraid of him and the publishers would have none of him. But I knew, and his genius and my judgment were vindicated when he made that magnificent hit with his forge. And it was a newspaper poem, she said, glibly. It did happen to see light in the newspaper, I replied. But not because the magazine editors had been denied the glimpse at it. We were talking of Harris, I said to Wolfhorsen. Oh yes, he acknowledged. I remember the forge. Filled with pretty sentiments and an almighty faith in human illusions. By the way, Mr. van Wyden, you'd better look in on Cookie. He's complaining and restless. Thus was I bluntly dismissed from the poop, only to find my grid, sweeping soundly from the morphine I had given him. I made no haste to return on deck, and when I did, I was gratified to see Miss Brewster in animated conversation with Wolfhorsen. As I say, the sight gratified me. She was following my advice. And yet I was conscious of a slight shock or hurt, and that she was able to do the thing I had begged her to do, and which she had notably disliked. CHAPTER XXIII Brave winds, blowing fair, swiftly drove the ghost northward into the sealherd. We encountered it well up to the forty-fourth parallel. In a raw and stormy sea across which the wind herried the fog banks in eternal flight. For days at a time we could never see the sun nor take an observation. Then the wind would sweep the face of the ocean clean, the waves would ripple and flash, and we would learn where we were. A day of clear weather might follow, or three days, or four, and then the fog would settle down upon us, seemingly thicker than ever. The hunting was perilous, yet the boats, day after day, were swallowed up in the gray obscurity, and were seen no more till nightfall, and often not till long after, when they would creep in like sea rays, one by one, out of the gray. Wainwright, the hunter whom Wolfhorsen had stolen with boat and men, took advantage of the veiled sea and escaped. He disappeared one morning in the encircling fog with his two men, and we never saw them again, though it was not many days when we learned that they had passed from schooner to schooner until they finally regained their own. This was the thing I had set my mind upon doing, but opportunity never offered. It was not in the Mainz Province to go out in the boats, and though I maneuvered cunningly for it, Wolfhorsen never granted me the privilege. Had he done so, I should have managed somehow to carry Miss Brewster away with me. As it was, the situation was approaching the stage which I was afraid to consider. I involuntarily shunned the thought of it, and yet the thought continually arose in my mind like a haunting specter. I had read sea romances in my time, wherein figured, as a matter of course, the lone woman in the midst of a shipload of men. But I learned, now, that I had never comprehended the deeper significance of such a situation, the thing the writers hyped upon and exploited so thoroughly. And here it was, now, and I was face to face with it, that it should be as vital as possible. It required no more than that the woman should be Maud Brewster, who now charmed me in person as she had long charmed me through her work. No one more out of environment could be imagined. She was a delicate, ethereal creature, swaying and willowy, light and graceful of movement. It never seemed to me that she walked or at least walked after the ordinary manner of mortals. Hers wasn't an extreme withsomeness, and she moved with a certain indefinable erroneous. Approaching one as down might float, or as a bird on noiseless wings. She was like a bit of Dresden China, and I was continually impressed with what I may call her fragility. As at the time I cut her arm on helping her below, so at any time I was quite prepared, should stress or rough handling befall her, to see her crumble away. I have never seen body and spirit in such perfect accord. Describe her verse, as the critics have described it, as sublimated and spiritual, and you have described your body. It seemed to partake of her soul, to have analogous attributes, and to link it to life with a slenderest of chains. Indeed, she trod the earth lightly, and in her constitution there was little of the robust clay. She was in striking contrast to Wolf Larson. Each was nothing that the other was, everything that the other was not. I noted them walking the deck together one morning, and I likened them to the extreme ends of the human ladder of evolution, the one, the culmination of all savagery, the other the finished product of the finest civilization. True, Wolf Larson possessed instinct to an unusual degree, but it was directed solely to the exercise of his savage instincts, and made him but the more formidable a savage. He was splendidly muscled, a heavy man, and though he strode with assertitude and directness of the physical man, there was nothing heavy about his stride. The jungle and the wildness lurked in the uplift and down-foot of his feet. He was gat-footed, and lithe, and strong, always strong. I likened him to some great tiger, a beast of prowess and prey. He looked at it, and the piercing glitter that arose at times in his eyes with the same piercing glitter I had observed in the eyes of caged leopards and other praying creatures of the wild. But this day, as I noted them pacing up and down, I saw that it was she who terminated the walk. They came up to where I was standing by the entrance of the companion-way. Though she betrayed it by no outward sign, I felt, somehow, that she was greatly perturbed. She made some idle remark, looking at me, and laughed lightly enough. But I saw her eyes return to his, and voluntarily, as though fascinated. Then they fell, but not swiftly enough to veil the rush of terror that filled them. It was in his eyes that I saw the cause of her perturbation. Ordinarily gray, and cold, and harsh, they were now warm and soft and golden. And all a dance with tiny lights that dimmed and faded, or welled up till the full orbs were flooded with a glowing radiance. Perhaps it was to this that the golden color was due, but golden his eyes were, enticing and masterful, at the same time glaring and compelling, and speaking the demand and clamor of blood which no woman, much less mobberster, could misunderstand. Her own terror rushed upon me, and in that moment of fear, the most terrible fear a man can experience, I knew that in inexpressible ways she was dear to me. The knowledge that I loved her rushed upon me with the terror, and with both emotions gripping at my heart, and causing my blood at the same time to chill, and to leap riotously. I felt myself drawn by a power without me, and beyond me, and found my eyes returning against my will to gaze into the eyes of Wolf Larson. But he had recovered himself. The golden color and the dancing lights were gone, gray and cold, and glittering they were as he bowed brusquely and turned away. I am afraid, she whispered with a shiver. I am so afraid. I too was afraid. And what of my discovery of how much she meant to me? My mind was in a turmoil, but I succeeded in answering quite calmly. All will come right, Miss Brewster. Trust me, it will come right. She answered with a grateful little smile that sent my heart pounding, and started to descend the companion stairs. For a long while I remained standing where she had left me. There was imperative need to adjust myself to consider the significance of the changed aspects of things. It had come, at last, love had come, when I least expected it and under the most forbidding conditions. Of course my philosophy had always recognized the inevitableness of the love call sooner or later, but long years of booky silence had made me inattentive and unprepared. And now it had come. Mod Brewster. My memory flashed back to that first thin little volume on my desk, and I saw before me, as though in the concrete, the row of thin little volumes on my library shelf, how I had welcomed each of them. Each year one had come from the press, and to me each was the advent of the year. They had voiced a kindred intellect and spirit, and as such I had received them into a camaraderie of the mind, but now their place was in my heart. My heart, a feeling of revulsion came over me. I seemed to stand outside myself and to look at myself incredulously. Mod Brewster. Humphrey Van Wyden, the cold-blooded fish, the emotionless monster, the analytical demon of Charlie Fureus, who is christening, in love. And then, without rhyme or reason, all skeptical, my mind flew back to the small biographical note in the red bound who's who, and I said to myself, she was born in Cambridge and she is 27 years old. And then I said, 27 years old and still free and fancy free? But how did I know she was fancy free? And the pang of newborn jealousy put all incredulity to flight. There was no doubt about it. I was jealous, therefore I loved. And the woman I loved was Mod Brewster. I, Humphrey Van Wyden, was in love. And again the doubt assailed me. Not that I was afraid of it, however, or reluctant to meet it. On the contrary, idealist that I was to the most pronounced degree, my philosophy had always recognized and girdened love as the greatest thing in the world, the aim and the summit of being, the most exquisite pitch of joy and happiness to which life could thrill, the thing of all things to be hailed and welcomed and taken into the heart. But now that it had come I could not believe. I could not be so fortunate. It was too good, too good to be true. Simmons' lines came into my head. I wandered all these years among a world of women seeking you. And then I had ceased seeking. It was not for me this greatest thing in the world I had decided. Furisouth was right. I was abnormal, an emotionless monster, a strange bookish creature, capable of clasuring in sensations only of the mind. And though I had been surrounded by women all my days, my appreciation of them had been aesthetic and nothing more. I had actually, at times, considered myself outside the pale. A monkish fellow denied the eternal or the passing passions. I saw and understood so well in others. And now it had come. Undreamed of and unheralded it had come. In what could have been no less than an ecstasy I left my post at the head of the companion way and started along the deck murmuring to myself these beautiful lines of Mrs. Browning. I lived with visions for my company instead of men and women years ago and found them gentlemates nor thought to know as sweeter music than they played to me. But the sweeter music was playing in my ears and I was blind and oblivious to all about me. The sharp voice of Wolf Larson aroused me. What the hell are you up to? He was demanding. I had strayed forward where the sailors were painting, and I came to myself to find my advancing foot on the verge of overturning the paint-pot. Sleepwalking? Sunstroke? What! he barked. Now, indigestion, I retorted, and continued my walk as though nothing untoward had occurred. Nor can I quite close my eyes to a small voice of pride, which tells me I did not do so badly, all things considered. To begin with, at the midday dinner Wolf Larson informed the hunters that they were to eat thenceforth in the steerage. It was an unprecedented thing on sealing schooners, where it is the custom for the hunters to rank unofficially as officers. He gave no reason, but his motive was obvious enough. Orner and Smoke had been displaying a gallantry towards Maude Brewster, ledicrous in itself and inoffensive to her, but to him evidently distasteful. The announcement was received with black silence, though the other four hunters glanced significantly at the two who had been the cause of their banishment. Jock Horner, quiet as was his way, gave no sign, but the blood surged darkly across Smoke's forehead, and he half opened his mouth to speak. Wolf Larson was watching him, waiting for him, the steely glitter in his eyes, but Smoke closed his mouth again without having said anything. Anything to say? The other demanded aggressively. It was a challenge, but Smoke refused to accept it. About what? he asked, so innocently that Wolf Larson was disconcerted, while the other smiled. Oh, nothing, Wolf Larson said lamely. I just thought you might want to register a kick. About what? asked the improbable Wolf Smoke. Smoke's mates were now smiling broadly. His captain could have killed him, and I doubt not that blood would have flowed had not Maude Brewster been present. For that matter it was her presence which enabled Smoke to act as he did. He was too discreet and cautious a man to incur Wolf Larson's anger at a time when that anger could be expressed in terms stronger than words. I was in fear that a struggle might take place, but a cry from the helmsman made it easy for the situation to save itself. Smoke ho! the cry came down the open companion way. How's it bear Wolf Larson called up? Dead a stern, sir. Maybe it's a Russian, suggested Latimer. His words brought anxiety into the faces of the other hunters. A Russian could mean but one thing, a cruiser. The hunters, never more than roughly aware of the position of the ship, nevertheless knew that we were close to the boundaries of the Forbidden Sea, while Wolf Larson's record as a poacher was notorious. All eyes centered upon him. We're dead safe, he assured them, with a laugh. No salt mines this time, Smoke. But I'll tell you what, all A odds of five to one is the Macedonia. No one accepted his offer, and he went on. In which event, all A ten to one, there's trouble breezing up. No thank you, Latimer spoke up. I don't object to losing my money, but I like to get a run for it anyway. There was never a time when there wasn't trouble when you and that brother of yours got together, and all A twenty to one on that. A general smile followed, in which Wolf Larson joined, and the dinner went on smoothly, thanks to me, for he treated me abominably for the rest of the meal, sneering at me and patronizing me until I was all a tremble with suppressed rage. Yet I knew I must control myself from mod bruster's sake, and I received my reward when her eyes got mine for a fleeting second, and they said, as distinctly as if she spoke, Be brave, be brave. We left the table to go on deck, for a steamer was a welcome break in the monotony of the sea on which we floated, while the conviction that it was death Larson and the Macedonia added to the excitement. The stiff breeze and heavy sea, which had sprung up the previous afternoon, had been moderating all morning so that it was now possible to lower the boats for an afternoon's hunt. The hunting promised to be profitable. We had sailed since daylight across a sea barren of seals, and were now running into the herd. The smoke was still miles of stern, but overhauling us rapidly when we lowered our boats. They spread out and struck a northerly course across the ocean. Now and again we saw a sail lower, heard the reports of the shotguns, and saw the sail go up again. The seals were thick, the wind was dying away, everything favored a big catch. As we ran off to get our leeward position of the last leeboat, we found the ocean fairly carpeted with sleeping seals. They were all about as thicker than I had ever seen them before, in twos and threes and bunches, stretched full length on the surface and sleeping for all the world like so many lazy young dogs. Under the approaching smoke, the whole and upper works of a steamer were growing larger. It was the Macedonia. I read her name through the glasses as she passed scarcely a mile to starboard. Wolf Larson looked savagely at the vessel while Mod Brewster was curious. Whereas the trouble you were so sure was breezing up, Captain Larson, she asked gaily. He glanced at her a moment's amusement, softening his features. What do you expect that they'd come aboard and cut our throats? Something like that, she confessed. You understand seal hunters are so new and strange to me that I am quite ready to expect anything. He nodded his head. Quite right, quite right. Your error is that you failed to expect the worst. Why, what could be worse than cutting our throats? She asked, with pretty naive surprise. Cutting our purses, he answered. Man is so made these days that his capacity for living is determined by the money he possesses. Who steals my purse steals trash, she quoted. Who steals my purse steals my right to live, was the reply. Old saws to the contrary. For he steals my bread and meat and bed, and in so doing imperils my life. There are not enough soup kitchens and bread lines to go around, you know, and when men have nothing in their purses they usually die, and die miserably, and lest they are able to fill their purses pretty speedily. But I fail to see that this steamer has any designs on your purse. Wait, and you will see, he answered grimly. We did not have long to wait. Having passed several miles beyond our line of boats, the Macedonia proceeded to lower her own. We knew she carried fourteen to our five. We were one short through the desertion of Wainwright. And she began dropping them far to leeward of our last boat, continued dropping them a thwart our course, and finished dropping them far to windward of our first weather boat. The hunting, for us, was spoiled. There were no seals behind us, and ahead of us the line of fourteen boats, like a huge broom, swept the herd before it. Our boats hunted across the two or three miles of water between them and the point where the Macedonias had been dropped, and then headed for home. The wind had fallen to a whisper. The ocean was growing calmer and calmer, and this, coupled with the presence of the great herd, made a perfect hunting day. One of the two or three days to be encountered in the whole of a lucky season. An angry lot of men, boat-pollers and stirrers, as well as hunters, swarmed over our side. Each man felt he had been robbed, and the boats were hoisted in the mid-curses, which, if curses, had power, would have settled death-clarcing for all eternity. Dead and damned for a dozen if eternities, commented Lewis, his eyes twinkling up at me as they rested from hauling taut the lashings of his boat. Listen to them, and find if it is hard to discover the most vital things in their souls, said Wolf Larson. Faith and love and high ideals, the good and the beautiful, the true? There an eight sense of right has been violated, Maude Brewster said, joining the conversation. She was standing a dozen feet away, one hand resting on the main shrouds, and her body swaying gently to the slight roll of the ship. She had not raised her voice, and yet I was struck by its clear and bell-like tone. Ah, it was sweet in my ears. I scarcely dared look at her just then, for the fear of betraying myself. A boy's cap was perched on her head, and her hair, light brown and arranged in a loose and fluffy order that caught the sun seemed an orial about the delicate oval of her face. She was positively bewitching, and with all sweetly spirits you all, if not saintly. All my old-time marvel at life returned to me at the sight of this splendid incarnation of it, and Wolf Larson's cold explanation of life and its meaning was truly ridiculous and laughable. A sentimentalist, he sneered like Mr. Van Wyden. These men are cursing because their desires have been outraged. That is all. What desires? The desires for the good grub and soft beds the shore at which a handsome payday brings them. The women and the drink, the gorging and the beastliness which so truly expresses them. The best that is in them. Their highest aspirations. Their ideals, if you please. The exhibition they make of their feelings is not a touching sight, yet it shows how deeply they have been touched, how deeply their purses have been touched, for to lay hands on their purses is to lay hands on their souls. You hardly behave as if your purse had been touched, she said smilingly. Then it so happens that I am behaving differently, for my purse and my soul have both been touched. At the current price of skins in the London market, and based on a fair estimate of what the afternoon's catch would have been, had not the Macedonia hugged it, the ghost has lost about fifteen hundred dollars' worth of skins. You speak so calmly, she began. But I do not feel calm. I could kill the man who robbed me, he interrupted. Yes, yes, I know. And that man, my brother, more sentiment. Bah! His face underwent a sudden change. His voice was less harsh and wholly sincere, as he said. You must be happy, you sentimentalists, really and truly happy at dreaming and finding things good, and because you find some of them good, feeling good yourself. Now tell me, you two, do you find me good? You are good to look upon, in a way, I qualified. There are in you all powers for good, was Maud Brewster's answer. There you are, he cried at her, half angrily. Your words are empty to me. There is nothing clear and sharp and definite about the thought you have expressed. You cannot pick it up in your two hands and look at it. In point of fact it is not a thought. It is a feeling, a sentiment, a something based upon illusion and not a product of the intellect at all. As he went on, his voice again grew soft, and a confiding note came into it. Do you know, I sometimes catch myself wishing that I, too, were blind to the facts of life, and only knew its fancies and illusions. They are wrong, all wrong, of course, and contrary to reason. But in the face of them my reason tells me, wrong and most wrong, that to dream and live illusions gives greater delight. And after all, delight is the wage for living. Without delight, living is a worthless act. To labor at living and be unpaid is worse than to be dead. He who delights the most lives the most, and your dreams and unrealities are less disturbing to you, and more gratifying than are my facts to me. He shook his head slowly, pondering. I often doubt, I often doubt, the worth whileness of reason. Dreams must be more substantial and satisfying. Emotional delight is more filling and lasting than intellectual delight. And besides, you pay for your moments of intellectual delight by having the blues. Emotional delight is followed by no more than jaded senses which speedily recuperate. I envy you, I envy you. He stopped abruptly, and then on his lips formed one of his strange quizzical smiles, as he added. It's from my brain I envy you, take notice, and not from my heart. My reason dictates it. The envy is an intellectual product. I am like a sober man looking upon drunken men, and greatly weary, wishing he too were drunk. Or like a wise man looking upon fools and wishing he too were a fool, I laughed. Quite so, he said, you were a blessed bankrupt pair of fools. You have no facts in your pocketbook. Yet we spend as freely as you, was Maud Brewster's contribution. More freely, because it costs you nothing. And because we draw up on eternity, she retorted. Whether you do or think you do is the same thing. You spend what you haven't got, and in return you get greater value from spending what you haven't got than I get from spending what I have got and what I have sweated to get. Why don't you change the basis of your carnage, then? She queried teasingly. He looked at her quickly, half hopefully, and then said, all regretfully, too late. I'd like to, perhaps, but I can't. My pocketbook is stuffed with the old carnage, and it's a stubborn thing. I can never bring myself to recognize anything else as valid. He ceased speaking, and his gaze wandered absentedly past her, and became lost in the placid sea. The old primal melancholy was strong upon him. He was quivering to it. He had reasoned himself in to a spell of the blues, and within few hours one could look for the devil within him to be up and stirring. I remembered Charlie Fureseth and knew this man's sadness as the penalty which the materialist ever pays for his materialism.