CHAPTER VIII
"ON THE FOC'S'LE HEAD"
One Sunday afternoon in the south-east trades the foc's'le indulged itself in another of those excitable debates which sailors on deep-water ships love so much.
It was a superb South Pacific day, with a glinting sea and a sky full of those fluffy white billowy clouds which painters so delight to seat cherubs upon.
The upper strata of these sheep-backs moved faster than the lower, as if engaged in a heavenly steeplechase, signifying an increase of wind.
On the Higgins, for a wonder, peace reigned, for the old man and Black Davis were both below taking a "stretch off the land," whilst the bosun held the deck.
Forward both watches were assembled on the foc's'le head—some stretched on their backs with eyes shut, others propped up against the capstan or bitts pretending to sew or read.
Studpoker Bob, true to his bent in life, was rapidly appropriating Hank's payday by aid of a very dirty pack of cards and a game known as "Casino."
Close by sat Jack Derringer, patching a pair of oilskin pants, with the cowboy prone beside him, a paint-covered, disreputable slouch hat which had once been a "shore-enough Stetsin" hiding his face from the glare of the sun.
Leaning against the port lighthouse, old Ben Sluice, with the aid of a gigantic pair of spectacles perched on the tip of his nose, laboriously spelt out a yellow-backed English society novel.
The cockney, with his head buried in his arms, lay face down on the deck in the attitude beloved by the British Tommy Atkins, snoring like a tired cross-cut saw; whilst Paddy at his side bent a wrinkled brow upon a gigantic volume entitled, The Drainage of Europe.
Below on the maindeck Curly and the boy worked steadily upon a mass of singlets and shirts, with the aid of the wash-deck tub.
Suddenly old Ben Sluice dropped his book, gave a slow look round, and, catching Jack's eye, spoke:
"Jack, you've been learnt—eddicated as they say. What breed o' coyote air these here book-sharps? What does they allow is their long suit? Does this here benighted burro reckon he knows 'hoss'? He don't know 'hoss' from 'jackass,' nor 'mewel' from 'dogy'; he's green an' juicy a whole passel, like a fool-kid suckin' eggs an' actin' smart."
"What's the trouble, Ben?"
"Why, look-a-here; this buckaroo clean gets me, fur a fact. I cain't throw a squaw-hitch over his idees worth a cent. He has me driftin' like lost sheep——"
"What cuts you, old son?" broke in Broncho, from behind his sombrero.
"Wall, it's this way. Thar's a long-nose coon the book-sharp calls Lord Edward, who didn't oughter be allowed round. He's a big auger, too, way up on the trail.
"He goes buttin' round the landscape, a-hittin' it up high, a-discardin' his dinero like as if he's a mine-boss an' a-soakin' up tanglefoot to beat a sheepman; an' he's roped up a wife as pretty as a peach, whom he don' pay no more attention to than if she's an empty bottle.
"He jest neglec's her complete 'cept with his tongue, which is that mean an' ugly it gets her hot in the collar every time. Wall, she jest sets thar an' wilts, an' don' pay no heed to nothin', though thar's a whole mob o' softies floppin' round her like gapin' trout-fish, sayin' as how hers weren't no dago dream o' paradise, till they gets mushy an' maudlin' over her white face an' big eyes; an' thar ain't one of 'em, with their soft talk, who's got the sand to up an' shoot the white outer the high-falootin' eye of Lord Edward.
"Chucks! It makes me tired. Is they men or wax figgers? An' this here book-sharp allows they're first-class broncho-twisters. But if they is low-down skunks, the wimen bar this here put-upon Lady Beatrice is shore rattlesnakes from away back, they're that venomous; an' they fires out words at this here Lord Edward's wife as'd make a jack-rabbit curl his tail, which same words carves out wounds in the pore female like mushroom bullets. I'm a single-footer myself, an' ain't cut the tracks o' many wimen bar squaws; nor yet want to, onless this here book-sharp's brand o' female is a fake, which I shore reckon it is."
"Women is mighty various," drawled the cowpuncher meditatively. "Some is sweet as molasses, some's all venegar. One kind'll stampede at the drop of a hat, another'll get balky an' jest set thar. No, you can't play no system on women—the deal's a sight too blotched."
"Then you allows this here book-sharp shows savvy in his idees?"
"Has these here rattlesnake females you discourses on many rings on their horns?"
"Wall, I reckon their lustre is some faded, if that's a high kyard in the deal."
"Which it shore enough is, for it's this way. When we-alls starts along this mortal trail we're like colts friskin' about, allowin' it's a case o' jam an' doughnuts cl'ar through. We shore sooner or later butts into trouble, gets bogged, and is yanked out, an' goes on gettin' bogged an' bein' yanked out till it gets to be a habit. But wi' wimen it's different. Gettin' bogged that-a-way frets 'em, till they're feelin' as ugly an' mean as Government pack-mules, an' they jest hankers to shoot off their bazoo till they has some one howlin'; an' the more rings they has on their horns the more they frets an' sets in to pull the props out from under the fresher fillies an' side-track them into the bog of disrepute."
Jack listened to this speech with half-shut eyes, and then half muttered to himself:
"Men are a queer kind of beasts and women a queer kind of angels."
"I allow Broncho piles it on too thick," declared old Ben stubbornly, not noticing Jack's remark.
"Bedad!" chimed in Paddy, roused from his book by the miner's deep voice, "but my old woman's after bein' 'the pole o' me tent,' as they say in the Seharey. Her spuds'd make the mouth o' the divil wather sufeecient to put out old Mother Nick's galley-fire."
"Lawd, you surprise me, Pat!" exclaimed the cockney, rolling over on his back and rubbing his eyes. "A bloomin' Don Juan like you spliced? W'y, you're a disgryce."
"Be aisy, be aisy, an' don't call y'r brither names. What's a Don Juan, any way?"
"A Don Juan is er sort er——" and Hollins broke off and scratched his head for want of the proper word.
"I'll be after Don Juaning you with a black eye the minit before next," burst out Paddy fiercely, the suspicion breaking into his brain that he was being insulted.
"Oh, go slow an' don't be so bloomin' gay," drawled the cockney disdainfully. "You ain't the on'y lydy-killer on the beach, if you 'as got an old Dutch peelin' spuds on yer h'ancestral mud-bank."
"The hen-breed is smooth goods s'long as yew don't get married none; then they're sure p'ison," suddenly broke in Hank, with the sad but self-satisfied look of a man of big experience in such matters.
"Thar, you're shore way off the range," exclaimed Broncho emphatically. "A female which ain't hitched up in double harness is as wo'thless in the game o' life as an ace which ain't drawed nothin'. Her locoed parents is plumb chagrined to death, when, after chippin' in a blue stack or two for the draw, they can't rake out even a hen-ranche tough or a paper dude to yoke her up to. And, again, say you-alls is a-aimin' to throw your rope over some high-steppin', head-tossin' filly; what with you prancin' out in y'r store-clothes every time, an' the dinero you-alls has to paw down in your war-bags for to soothe her frettin's for doughnuts an' sech eadibles, it shore makes your wad o' notes look some flat an' shrunk up. An' all the time you-alls is a-frettin' an' a-frothin' an' feelin' chunked up, mebbe, one minit, an' flatter than a flapjack the next. No, you draws no dividend on women onless they're married. It's them yoked-up longhorns like Paddy who gets a rake off the pot in this earthly game."
"I'm puttin' up my payday agen that deck-swab that yew ain't married none, Broncho," returned Hank sourly.
"That's so, son, I ain't that lucky," drawled the cowpuncher. "I've taken tickets more'n once, but I never ain't drawed nothin' I'm near makin' a winnin' play with."
"I'd rather hev' had a blank than the winning number o' the lottery I raked in my old woman with," growled the disillusioned Hank.
"Mebbe she reckons she ain't owin' Providence nothin' fur bliss gratis when she gets down to the bedrock o' your vartues," remarked old Ben Sluice, with a slow grin.
"Is that meant?" snarled Hank, rising to his feet. He was not in the best of tempers—those who played cards long with Studpoker Bob seldom were. "I'll soon show yew my vartues, my all-fired smartie," he growled, advancing on Ben in a menacing attitude. "I guess them vartues'll raise some pretty considerable bumps on y'r ugly figger-head."
"It's a foight, bedad!" exclaimed Paddy, delightedly. "Go it, ye spalpeens! Git a move on your bump-raisin' operations, Hank, me broth of a boy."
"Jest you backwater some," said Ben coolly, pulling out a capstan-bar from the rack as Hank squared up to him.
Hank drew back uncertainly, for there was a nasty gleam in the old miner's eyes.
"Crikey! but 'e's got the bulge on you, Hank, proper," grinned the cockney appreciatively.
"I would shorely like to savvy what for you two lunattics is a-howlin' for blood?" drawled Broncho, as he slowly proceeded to fill his pipe.
"This half-baked sluice-robber has the hell-freezin' nerve to insinnivate that my old woman don't bank none on my vartues," explained the injured benedict ferociously.
Jack had been holding himself in up till now well enough, but this last was too much for him, and, doubling up, he burst into a roar of laughter, in which old Ben joined heartily, taking for granted that the laugh was on his side of the deck.
"I guess Ben wouldn't think it so durned funny, if he'd drop that handspike an' stand up like a man," snarled Hank.
"Book-sports allows as how it's women as causes mos' of the skin-ticklin' in this ornery globe, an' I reckon they shore hits the bull's-eye this time," remarked Broncho, sagely.
"What's the row?" broke in Curly excitedly, coming up the topgallant-ladder in two bounds.
"W'y, swipe me if ole Ben ain't been an' hurted Hank's delikit feelin's," explained the cockney.
"It's a cert, son, as how Hank ain't out to have his back scratched that away. A wounded grizzly is mild an' dreamlike compared to him," added Broncho, with a slow droop of his left eye.
"Vy don' you blunk 'im?" grunted the Dutchman's heavy voice, addressing itself to Hank.
"Hell!" burst out the exasperated man. "If thet Dutch son of a carrion-crow gives me any durned chin-chin, I'll ram his ugly pig's-eyes outer the back of his head"; and Dutchy withered into his shell again.
"Look-a-here, partner, ain't you had 'bout enuff o' this low-grade dust-raisin'," inquired Ben loftily; still, however, clinging to his trusty capstan-bar. "'Cos thar goes four bells an' it's my wheel."
"Air you goin' to take in the slack o' them insinnivations?" demanded Hank, with dignity.
"You jest step outer the trail an' let this outfit pass, or I reckon you'll be shy considerable epidermis in another minit," growled old Ben angrily, as Hank blocked his way down the topgallant-ladder.
"Wall! Dog my cats if I stand to that!" roared Hank, and he made a wild rush at the old miner.
Ben lunged out furiously with the handspike, but the long, wiry down-easter dodged the formidable weapon with catlike activity, and the next moment they were "in holds," in the parlance of the prize-ring.
Clutched in each other's arms, they reeled across the foc's'le head like hugging bears, and then down they came with a crash on the deck.
"I'll learn yew to miscall a free-born American citizen, yew long-ha'red dump-thief," screeched Hank, as they rolled over and he came on top.
But with a desperate effort Ben reversed the positions, and as his horny fingers gripped the other's hairy throat he growled like an angry grizzly.
"You reckon you's ugly, but this child's uglier."
Hank tried hard to gurgle out a suitable retort, but his effort sounded like the choke of a ship's pump. Wildly he clutched at the iron hands on his throat, but in vain; he could not budge them. His breath began to come in short gasps, his face to flush purple beneath the deep tan, and his strength to leave him.
Both watches were now gathered round the two combatants, a ring of excited faces.
The gambler was perched up on the capstan, and as he remarked afterwards in describing the fight to Red Bill, who was all this time waiting to be relieved at the wheel,
"I jest sits back in the peep-chair an' follows the run of the cards, like it were a faro game."
The cockney, his face working with excitement, hopped up and down like a cat on hot bricks, crying out,
"Sock it to 'im, Ben, sock it to 'im! Starboard watch fur ever!"
"Chucks! but Ben has him in one spin o' the wheel," remarked Broncho to the rover. "This here's a freeze-out for Hank; he's beginnin' to unwind melodies o' despair."
For Hank, in his effort to breathe, was groaning and grunting and choking.
"Go easy, Ben; I think Hank's had about enough," interposed Jack, leaning over and trying to drag him off the prostrate down-easter.
"Sticks to Hank closer'n bacon-rind," observed Broncho, watching Jack's unavailing efforts.
"Help me get him off," panted the rover. "He'll choke the man in a minute."
"That's some obvious—that 'possum ain't doin' no roll-over an' playin' dead," drawled the cowboy composedly, as he lent Jack his aid.
"A man's finish is his own," put in the gambler, objecting to the interference of the two friends.
"You jest hold your hand, my lively one-horse-saloon bottle-washer, or I suspicion I'll have to tame you some," said the cowpuncher contemptuously.
Then, with a terrific heave together, Jack and Broncho pulled old Ben off Hank on to his feet.
Ben just stood there and looked at his victim, gasping on the deck.
"Mebbe that'll learn you some, mister; Ben Sluice don't allow no Yankee wolf to come yowlin' blood round him without puttin' up a breeze o' some sort"; and he turned on his heel, clambered down the ladder, and went aft to relieve the wheel.
"Wake up, old son, an' take a new hold," said the cowpuncher kindly, as Hank gave no signs of life except to roll his eyes and breathe in harsh, jerky groans.
"Get us a bucket of water, Jim," called the rover.
The water had the desired effect. Hank's face assumed a more healthy colour; he drew a deep breath and sat up.
"I'm feelin' some considerable used up," he muttered slowly; and then he began to swear in that vivid, forcible way which obtains at sea. Presently he rose to his feet and stood staggering, then lurched forward like a drunken man and headed for the topgallant-ladder.
"He's shore as wobbly as a tenderfooted cow-hoss in a patch o' cactus," remarked Broncho, as he noted Hank's tottering steps.
"I was all choked up in a minit; that minin' tough's fingers are like iron clamps," threw back the other, as he carefully clawed his way down on to the maindeck.
"And that h'ain't no josh, neither," declared the cockney feelingly. "'E nearly 'as you garrotted inter dead meat, s'elp me bob."
"I allows Hank has all he wants," pronounced Broncho. "When women is the theme o'discourse, gents o' savvy cash in an' quit; thar's no knowin' which way the cat will hop. You're liable to get creased or reap a skinful o' lead whichever way you plays your hand."
And thus the argument finished.