Back Aa

Harbor of Doubt, The

Close

<h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2> <h3>A PRISONER</h3> When Code Schofield came to himself his first sensation was one of oppression, such as is felt after sleeping in an unventilated room. It seemed difficult for him to breathe, but his body was quite free and uninjured, as he found by moving himself carefully in all directions before he even opened his eyes. Presently the air became familiar. It was a perfect mixture of flavors; oilskins, stale tobacco-smoke, brine, burned grease, tar, and, as a background, fish. His ears almost immediately detected water noises running close by, and he could feel the pull of stout oak timber that formed the inner wall of where he lay. “Fo’c’stle of a fishing schooner!” he announced, and then opened his eyes to prove that he was correct. He looked out into a three-cornered room occupied by a three-cornered table, and that ran as far back as the foremast. Above, fastened to a huge square beam, hung a chain-lamp so swiveled that it 180 kept itself level however much the schooner kicked and wriggled. On the table, swinging his legs, sat a large, unpleasant-looking man. “Wal, how are ye?” asked this latter, seeing his charge had recovered consciousness. Never having seen the man before, Code did not consider it necessary to answer. So he wriggled to find out if any bones were broken, and, in the end, discovered a tender knob on the right side of his head. He soon recalled the visit to St. Pierre, the purchase of the bait, Pete Ellinwood’s fight, the general mix-up, and the blow on the head that had finished him. He sat up suddenly. “Look here! What ship is this?” he demanded. “You’ll find out soon enough when you go on deck. Hungry? I got orders to feed ye.” “You bet I’m hungry; didn’t have any dinner last night in St. Pierre.” “Two nights ago,” said the other, beginning to fry salt pork. “Nigh thirty-six hours you’ve laid here like a log.” Code doubted it, but did not argue. He was trying to puzzle out the situation. If this was a fishing schooner the men ought to be over the side fishing, and she would be at anchor. Instead, feeling the long, steady heel to leeward and half-recover to windward, he knew she was flying on a course. <div>181</div> Breakfast swallowed, he made his way on deck. As he came up the companionway a man stood leaning against the rail. With a feeling of violent revulsion, Code recognized Nat Burns. A glance at a near-by dory showed the lettering Nettie B., and Schofield at once recognized his position. He was Nat Burns’s prisoner. “Mornin’,” said Burns curtly. “Thought you were goin’ to sleep forever.” “It’s a hanging offense putting any one to sleep that long,” retorted Code cheerfully. “Luck was with you, and I woke up.” “You’re hardly in a position to joke about hanging offenses,” remarked Nat venomously. “Why not?” Code had gone a sickly pallor that looked hideous through his tan. “Because you’re goin’ home to St. Andrew’s to be tried for one.” Code glanced over his left shoulder. The sun was there. The schooner was headed almost directly southwest. Nat had spoken the truth. They were headed homeward. “Where’s your warrant?” Code could feel his teeth getting on edge with rage as he talked to this captor who bore himself with such insolence. “Don’t need a warrant for murder cases, and I’m a constable at Freekirk Head, so everything is being done according to law. The gunboat didn’t find 182 you, so I thought, as long as you were right to hand, I’d bring you along.” “Then you knew I was in St. Pierre?” “Yes; saw you come in. If it hadn’t been so dark you’d have recognized the Nettie not far away.” Code, remembering the time of night they arrived, knew this to be impossible, for it is dark at six in September. He had barely been able to make out the lines of the nearest schooners. A man was standing like a statue at the wheel, and, as he put the vessel over on the port tack, his face came brightly into the sun. It was ’Arry Duncan. Code had not been wrong, then, in thinking that he had seen the man’s face in St. Pierre. “Fine traitor you’ve got there at the wheel,” said Schofield. “He’ll do you brown some day.” “I don’t think so. Just because he did you, doesn’t prove anything. He was in my employ all the time, and getting real money for his work.” “So it was all a plot, eh?” said Code dejectedly. “I give you credit, Burns, for more brains than I ever supposed you had. What’s become of Pete Ellinwood and the Lass?” “Pete is back on the schooner and she’s gone out to fish. You needn’t worry about them. At the proper time they’ll be told you are safe and unhurt.” Code said nothing for a while. With hands 183 rammed into his pockets he stood watching the white and blue sea whirl by. In those few minutes he touched the last depth of failure and despair. For a brief space he was minded to leap overboard. He shivered as one with an ague and shook off the deadly influence of the idea. Had he no more grit? he asked himself. Had he come this far only to be beaten? Was this insolent young popinjay to win at last? No! Then he listened, for Nat was speaking. “If you give your word of honor not to try and escape you can have the run of the decks and go anywhere you like on the schooner. If not, you will be locked up and go home a prisoner.” It was the last straw, the final piece of humiliation. Code stiffened as a soldier might to rebuke. A deadly, dull anger surged within him and took possession of his whole being––such an anger as can only come to one who, amiable and upright by nature, is driven to inevitable revolt. “Look here, Burns,” he said, his voice low, but intense with the emotion that mastered him, “I’ll give no word of honor regarding anything. Between you and me there is a lot to be settled. You have almost ruined me, and, by Heaven, before I get through with you, you’ll rue it! “I shall make every attempt to escape from this schooner, and if I do escape, look out! If I do not 184 escape and you press these charges against me, I’ll hunt you down for the rest of my life; or if I go to prison I will have others do it for me. “Now you know what to expect, and you also know that when I say a thing I mean it. Now do what you like with me.” Burns looked at Schofield’s tense white face. His eyes encountered those flaming blue ones and dropped sullenly. Whether it was the tremendous force of the threat or whether it was a guilty conscience working, no one but himself knew, but his face grew gradually as pallid as that of his captive. Suddenly he turned away. “Boys,” he called to the crew who were working near, “put Schofield in the old storeroom. And one of you watch it all the time. He says he will escape if he can, so I hold you responsible.” Code followed the men to a little shanty seemingly erected against the foremast. It was of stout, heavy boards about long enough to allow a cot being set up in it. It had formerly been used for storing provisions and had never been taken down. When the padlock snapped behind him Code took in his surroundings. There were two windows in the little cubby, one looking forward and the other to starboard. Neither was large enough to provide a means of escape, he judged. At the foot of the cot was a plain wooden armchair, both pieces of furniture 185 being screwed to the floor. For exercise there was a strip of bare deck planking about six feet long beside the bed, where he might pace back and forth. Both the cot and chair appeared to be new. “Had the room all ready for me,” said Code to himself. The one remaining piece of furniture was a queer kind of book-shelf nailed against the wall. It was fully five feet long and protruded a foot out above his bed. In its thirty-odd pigeonholes was jammed a collection of stuff that was evidently the accumulation of years. There were scores of cheap paper-bound novels concerning either high society or great detectives, old tobacco-boxes, broken pipes, string, wrapping-paper, and all the what-not of a general depository. With hours on his hands and nothing whatever to occupy him, Code began to sort over the lurid literature with a view to his entertainment. He hauled a great dusty bundle out of one pigeonhole, and found among the novels some dusty exercise books. He inspected them curiously. On the stiff board cover of one was scrawled, “Log Schooner M. C. Burns; M. C. Burns, master.” The novels were forgotten with the appearance of this old relic. The M. C. Burns was the original 186 Burns schooner when Nat’s father was still in the fish business at Freekirk Head. It was the direct predecessor of the Nettie B., which was entirely Nat’s. On the death of the elder Burns when the May Schofield went down, the M. C. Burns had been sold to realize immediate cash. And here was her log! Code looked over pages that were redolent of the events in his boyhood, for Michael was a ready writer and made notes regularly even when the M. C. was not on a voyage. He had spent an hour in this way when he came to this entry on one of the very last pages: “June 30: This day clear with strong E. S.-E. wind. This day Nat, in the M. C. Burns, raced Code Schofield in the May Schofield from Quoddy Head to moorings in Freekirk Head harbor. My boy had the worst of it all the way. I never saw such luck as that young Schofield devil has. He won by half an hour. Poor Nat is heartbroken and swore something awful. He says he’ll win next time or know why!” “Just like old man Burns!” thought Code. “Pities and spoils his rascal of a son. But the boy loved him.” Code had not thought of that race in years. How well he remembered it now! There had been money up on both sides, and the rules were that no 187 one in either schooner should be over twenty except the skippers. What satisfaction it had been to give Nat a good trimming in the fifty-year-old May. He could still feel an echo of the old proud thrill. He turned back to the log. “July 1: Cloudy this day. Hot. Light S.-W. breeze. Nat tells me another race will be sailed in just a week. Swears he will win it. Poor boy, what with losing yesterday and Caroline Fuller’s leaving the Head to work in Lubec, he is hardly himself. I’m afraid the old M. C. won’t show much speed till she is thoroughly overhauled. Note––Stmr. May Schofield’s policy runs out July 20th. See about this, sure.” There was very little pertaining to the next race until the entry for June 6, two days before the event. Then he read: “Nat is quite happy; says he can’t lose day after to-morrow. I told him he must have fitted the M. C. with wings, but he only grinned. Take the stmr. to St. John to-morrow to look after policies, including May Schofield’s. She’s so old her rates will have to go up. Won’t be back till day after the race, but Nat says he’ll telegraph me. Wonder what business that boy’s got up his sleeve that makes him so sure he will win? Oh, he’s a clever one, that boy!” <div>188</div> Here the chronicle ended. Little did Michael Burns know he would never write in it again. He went to St. John’s, as he had said, and completed his business in time to return home the day of the race instead of the day after. The second race was never sailed, for Code Schofield received a telegram from St. John’s, offering him a big price for a quick lighterage trip to Grande Mignon, St. John being accidentally out of schooners and the trip urgent. Though loath to lose the race by default, the money offered was too good to pass by, and Code had made the trip and loaded up by nightfall. It was then that he had met Michael Burns, and Burns had expressed his desire to go home in the May so as to watch her actions in a moderate sea and gale. Neither he nor the May ever saw dry land again. Only Code of the whole ship’s company struggled ashore on the Wolves, bruised and half dead from exposure. The end of the old log before him was full of poignant tragedy to Code, the tragedy of his own life, for it was the unwritten pages from then on that should have told the story of a fiendishly planned revenge upon him who was totally innocent of any wrong-doing. The easy, weak, indulgence of the father had grown a crop of vicious and cruel deeds in the son. <hr class='toprule' /> 189 <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2