CHAPTER IX—THE STORM
IN the morning, directly after breakfast, Hunch went to see the foreman of the elevator gang. “Where're you getting your timber, Murphy?” he asked.
“Getting most of it up at Manistee.”
“Got it in yet?”
“More'n half of it. The rest of it's a late order.”
“How much is there to come?”
“About fifty thousand.”
“How's it delivered?”
“F. O. B. on the dock here. Why, you looking for a job?”
“Yes, wouldn't mind. I could get it down here cheaper'n the railroad, and pretty near as quick.”
“Navigation's closed, though. I don't know as the Manistee folks 'd want to risk it.”
“Yes, but look at that.” Hunch motioned toward the lake, which lay blue and sparkling beyond the Buttersville sandspit. “Quiet as August and it's a short run. There ain't hardly any ice either.”
“Well, you might talk to 'em up at Manistee, Hunch. Of course, they can deliver anyhow they like, but I can't run chances of delay.”
So Hunch went over to the telegraph office in the railroad station, and after a great deal of writing and rewriting made up the following message:
To Wm. F. Jackson, Esq.,
Pres't Manistee Timber Co.:
Will deliver the Liddington elevator bill of fifty thousand feet by Lake, One Hundred Dollars. If terms satisfactory, wire reply, so I can deliver while weather holds fair.
J. Badeau.
When this message reached Jackson, he was sitting at his desk, with the railroad rate figured out on a sheet of paper before him. He promptly laid the two offers side by side and looked from one to the other. There was no doubt that the lake route would be cheaper. But, on the other hand, it was now after the first of December, and navigation was nominally closed on the great lakes. Insurance he could get, if at all, only at a prohibitive rate.
It was a question of judgment, and before deciding it, Mr. Jackson got up and walked over to the window. The busy little city of Manistee shut off his view of Lake Michigan, but he knew it was flat as a mirror. Not many hours earlier he had stood by another window, in his big house on the bluff, and as he shaved he had looked out over miles and miles of blue water, as calm as in June. It was warm enough for mid-autumn; the barometer promised continued dear weather. Altogether, Badeau's offer had decidedly the best of it. So he sent a message to “J. Badeau, Liddington,” asking him to bring up his schooner at once.
Hunch, on receiving the message, went up to Herve's saloon, and while standing at the bar, let his eyes rove about the room until they settled on a lank, middle-aged man in the corner.
“Hello, Herm Peabody.”
“Hello, Hunch.”
“What you doing in these parts?”
“Come up to see my niece—Joe Cartier's wife.”
“Busy nowadays?”
“No, ain't picked up anything for the winter yet.”
“What would you think of taking a trip with me?”
“The Dean?”
“Yes.”
“A little late for schooners, ain't it?”
“Not in this weather, no. It's only a little trip-up to Manistee.”
“Well, this ain't been a very flush season, Hunch, and I s'pose I ought to take it.”
“Can you come right along? I'd like to overhaul her a little and run up there this afternoon. If they're reasonable quick about loading, we can get right back.”
A few hours later Hunch ran her out between the piers, with Peabody up forward, and pointed north-east-by-north to clear Big Point Sable. The breeze was light, and it was not until six o'clock that evening that the Dean ran into the harbor at Manistee. Hunch promptly looked up the lumberman.
“How are you, Badeau. You came right up.”
“Yes, I did.”
“We'll put that timber aboard the first thing in the morning.”
“You can't do it to-night, then?”
“Oh, hardly.” Mr. Jackson glanced out at the starlit sky. “You don't think there's any doubt about the weather, do you?”
“Maybe not. But if I could get it aboard now, I'd start right back. We know we're all right to-night.”
The lumberman's supper awaited him; his men had scattered to their homes. He glanced again at the sky, then said, “The morning 'll do, I guess.”
“Well, it's just this way, Mr. Jackson. I made you the offer to take this load down, but I don't feel like running any more risk than I have to.”
“If you see anything to worry you in that sky, Badeau, you can just let us run the risk.”
The thermometer dropped twenty-five degrees during the night. A film of ice formed in the harbor. The wind swung around to the northeast, and brought a bank of innocent looking clouds that spread slowly over the sky. Out on the lake front the shore ice grew higher and whiter as the waves beat tirelessly over it, and formed blocks and cones and miniature mountain ranges.
When Jackson met Hunch on the wharf, he seemed to have forgotten what he had said the evening before. “Well, Badeau, what do you make of it?”
“Of what?”
“The weather. Think you can make it?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“You ought to have gone out last night.”
To this Hunch made no reply; he kept one eye on the work of the timber shovers.
“Still,” added Jackson, “you can run down in two or three hours with this wind.”
A little later Hunch joined Peabody by the wheel. “Do you know of a good man here, Herm?”
“For the schooner, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Why—I'll see if I can pick up Duke Buckingham.”
“Go ahead. Tell him we're short-handed.”
When the Dean finally fell away from the wharf, in tow of Jackson's tug, it was well on toward noon. And none of the three men on board was over-cheerful when he looked out at the lake and felt the keen wind of the open water. Even on shore it was a day for heavy jackets and gloves; out here it was bitter cold.
“Set the tops'ls, Herm,” said Badeau, from the wheel.
Peabody looked at Buckingham, and then, without a word, the two men set to work.
They ran nearly before the wind, that is, nearly southwest. Badeau kept her up a few points to the westward in order to avoid the surf-currents that bore down on Point Sable. The deck was piled so high with timber that the schooner was unwieldy; her scuppers were nearly awash, and the stem was down so low in the water that half the time the small boat, hanging from the after davits, was afloat. When all sail was spread, Hunch called his men aft and gave them a hand in hauling the boat aboard and forward.
Rapidly the piers and the bluffs of Manistee fell off astern. Steadily the sky thickened, and fine, hard flakes of snow began to blow about their ears. Badeau alone did not mind the cold; his coat was open, his hands bare.
“What do you think o' this business, Herm?” asked Buckingham.
“Oh—well, it ain't but three hours in this wind.”
“I don't like them tops'ls.”
Peabody had no reply to this.
“What the devil's he runnin' way out here for?”
Peabody turned toward Point Sable; and then they both looked in silence. They could see the white line of the surf, due south. On the bluff the trees were tossing and bending.
Buckingham was the first to turn away. “Look there!” he exclaimed, gripping Peabody's arm. “Hi there, Hunch!” A black squall was sweeping down from the north, as sharply defined on the water as if laid out with a rule. Before the line were the leaden billows, behind it a black, wrinkled surface, dotted with whitecaps. “Hi there, Hunch!”
But Hunch's eyes had been long trained to take in a full circle at a glance. “Ready about!” he was bellowing, “Ready about!”
The wheel spun around, the jibs flapped, the schooner reeled as she swung lazily up. The three men watched the squall. Slowly—slowly—creaking angrily—Will she make it?—No—Yes—No——
“Struck, by——! Hold fast, boys! Hold fast!”
Over she went, till the booms dipped and the waters of Lake Michigan ran from stem to stem along the rail. Hunch left the wheel and sprang forward for the main sheet. Before he had it in his hand he was drenched through. Cursing like a Northern Peninsula lumberman, he hauled away. Peabody and Buckingham were together at the foresheet, with white faces and blue lips. Over again! They got up to the weather-rail—it was like climbing a gable roof—and still hauled away. For thirty endless seconds they fought, then her bowsprit, scooping deep into every wave, swung around and pointed into the wind. Hunch, shaking the water from his eyes, looked up and about; both topsails were gone, and a thousand feet or so of timber.
They could breathe now. But only for a moment, for the storm was beating them back toward the point. Another battle, and mainsail and foresail were double reefed and the Dean was slowly working up into the wind. There was no thought now of rounding the point; it was a question of getting sea room. Once Badeau thought of anchoring, but his judgment warned him not to try. One fact was encouraging, they made a little headway. By three o'clock in the afternoon they were back off the Manistee piers, and three miles out.
“What's that comin' down the harbor,” shouted Buckingham, “a tug?”
“Looks like it. Yes, that's what it is.”
“See there, she's whistlin'.” They could see the steam, though no sound reached them.
“She can't make it—hold fast, there!” The Dean nosed deep into a curling wave, struggled to rise, plunged on through, and the wave rushed over them. When they could see again, a few more thousand feet of lumber had disappeared.
“That was a soaker. Hunch all right, Henn?”
“Sure. See, she's putting back. Looks like the Cecilia Smith.”
“That's what she is. I never did think much o' Bill Peters.”
“Maybe he's right. He couldn't ever tow us in through that surf—say, the boat's gone!”
“The——-it is!”
“Look for yourself.”
“Lord, you're right! Kind o' rough on Hunch. He'll be lucky to come through this without losin' a wad. There's sixty or eighty dollars worth o' timber gone a'ready.”
“Maybe he won't have to stand for that.”
“Somebody'll have to. You can't get insurance now, you know.”
“Look out, Duke—here comes another!”
When this wave had passed, Peabody missed his companion, and looked around for him. At length he saw him, wedged in between the foremast and the timbers, grinning sheepishly; and stepping back he hauled him out. “What's the matter with you, man? Didn't you see it.”
“Oh, I saw it all right.”
“You'd better get hold here. What's the matter with your hands?”
“I dunno, sort o' numb, I guess.”
“Makes me think o' the time Ryerson's house burned—just such a day as this. Three or four of us got there early and pitched in to help the firemen.” He had to shout to make himself heard. “I was up on the ladder, next under the nozzleman, holding up the slack of the hose. Well, sir, do you know the water kept dribbling down from the nozzle around my fingers until they were just about froze stiff. Finally, they let go—I couldn't help it, my fingers just straightened out. Then the slack of the hose fell and jerked the nozzle right out of the nozzleman's hands. Well, sir, I didn't hardly know what I was doing, it come so quick; but when that nozzle was tumbling down by me, and the stream swinging all around, I made a grab for it and caught it by the handles. And there I stood, holding on for all there was in me, and the crowd yelling. All to once it struck me the nozzleman was yelling too, and I looked up, and there I was squirting a four-inch stream up under his rubber coat, and he was hanging on to the ladder for life. Getting colder, ain't it?” Buckingham, with lips bluer than ever, made no reply; he looked down at his hands. Peabody's eyes roved shoreward. The lines in his face deepened as he looked; for he saw that the Dean was making no headway. Half an hour later Badeau beckoned him aft. When he returned he took Buckingham by the shoulder, and shook him a little. “Here, Duke, what you thinking of! Brace up! Hunch says we'll throw off the deck load. He can't manage her at all this way. Come along—it's just what you need.”
Through the afternoon, through the night, the storm sported with the Dean. It swept down from the north and forced her nearer and nearer to the breakers on Point Sable; it veered to the northeast, and blew her, with a scurry of black water, out past the point and on—on, as if to hurl her on the Wisconsin shore; it brought snow and sleet to blind the tireless wheelman, whose hands never left the spokes; it ripped the sails and set the shreds to flapping derisively; and still Badeau kept the wheel, and still his crew held their places forward. There was no talking now. There were no more yams of sea or shore; the two men up forward were holding grimly to life, with fingers too stiffened to grip firmly—with spirits that shivered and threatened to let go.
Toward dawn Peabody groped aft. “I dunno what to do about Duke, Hunch.”
“Hammer 'im.”
“That don't help much. See any signs of it's letting up?”
Badeau shook his head.
“Do you know where we are?”
“Must be pretty near the middle of the lake. I'm going to try to work back. Stand by to come about.”
For the twentieth time that night the Bean, under the jib and the ruins of a foresail, pointed northeast. At Hunch's command, Peabody climbed half-way up the shrouds and clung there. The dark began to fade, the snow-flurries ceased. “Ho there! Hunch!—Ho there!”
“Ho-o!”
“Bray-ay-kers! Duke—Tell Hunch!” Buckingham crawled aft. “Hunch! Bray-ay-kers!”
“Breakers be——!”
“Herm——” It was hard for Buckingham to hold his excitement, hard for him to hold to anything. “Herm, he says—-”
Badeau's eyes rested on the pitiable object before him, then peered into the dark ahead. A flash came into his drawn face. “Stand by to come about!” Buckingham gazed stupidly. Hunch plunged forward and gave him a kick that sent him stumbling forward. “Ready about!”-Peabody was sliding down a stay-“Ready about!—Hard a lee!”—The men up forward could not hear him, could hardly see him; but Buckingham was fumbling with the lee jib-sheet. She swung a little way, wavered, then, caught in the rush of the surf, missed stays and floundered broadside on a bar. And the waves came pounding in over the rail.
When the morning came they were lashed in the forerigging. The mainmast was gone, the after-cabin was razed off flush with the deck, and the seas flowed at will through the hold.
“Can you make out where we are, Hunch?”
“Off Clinton.”
“They'll see us here then?”
“The ——— they will. There ain't nobody lives there.”
“Not in Clinton?”
“Not a soul—. There's the Liddington piers, below.”
“But there ain't nobody on watch.”
“No—station's closed.”
“Hold on though—what's that?”
“Over the pier—little sails?”
“Yes.”
“That's the life-boat.”
“No.”
“Sure it is.”
“Well, I'll be———!” murmured Peabody fervently. “The fools—they'll never make it without a tug.”
“Couldn't never get a tug out there.”
“Here they come! Is it the surf-boat?”
“Not much. It's the big English boat. Surf-boat don't carry any sail.”
“They've cleared the piers! Must be a volunteer crew. What's the matter with 'em?”
“Too much sea—can't use the rudder. See there—rudder's up in the air.”
“Duke—Hi, wake up! They're coming, Duke!”
Buckingham groaned.
“See' em turning 'round—they can't manage her!”
Badeau shook his head. The life-boat, while they watched, was caught up on the foaming crest of a wave, whirled around and jammed against the end of the pier. She fell back with the wave, then, freed in some way from her short masts, she rolled completely over on her high round air-tanks, and righting, pitched about, buoyant as ever.
“See that? Did you see, Hunch? She went over!”
“Shut up, will you?”
“Look there—they're throwing ropes. My nephew—I've got a nephew on that crew, Hunch.”
“He'd better look out for his uncle, then.”
“See 'em bobbing around. Must be they've got cork jackets on.”
By some unseen agency the boat was got back between the piers, and the bobbing figures disappeared. The excitement passed; the beach, strewn with wreckage and driftwood, and backed by sand hills and stunted pines, looked bleaker than ever: the wind penetrated to their bones.
“What do you think o' that, Hunch? What do you think 'll become——”
“Oh, shut up!”
An hour—two hours—and nothing but the roar of the surf, the endless white beach, the low sky.
Then Badeau reached up and shook Peabody's leg. “Wake up there, Herm! Look down the beach.”
“Wha—what's that? I don't see anything.”
“What are your eyes for?”
“Oh—team o' horses, eh. What's the crowd doing?”
“Can't you see the beach cart?”
“No—is it? Coming right along, ain't they.”
The cart was hauled up at a spot opposite the Dean. Over the ice-cones Badeau and Peabody could see the crew bustling about, until suddenly the crowd fell back, and they caught the shine of a brass gun and saw a projectile leap into the air trailing a line behind it.
“Not by fifty yards! It'll take a bigger charge than that. There—they're getting out another.”
Another moment of preparation, and another projectile came spinning toward them, passing high over their heads and directly between the foremast and the stump of the mainmast.
“How're we going to get 'er, Hunch? The topmast stays are down; I couldn't ever get down to that deck. Couldn't trust my hands, you see—all right except for my hands.”
“You stay here, and keep still,” said Badeau. He drew out his knife and cut the rope that lashed him to the shrouds; then worked his way painfully down to the deck. Holding now to the rail, now to the loose end of a stay, he fought through the waves, picked up the line, mounted with it to the cross-trees, and unaided hauled the heavier line out through the surf, and made the tackle fast to the foremast. The men on shore fell to with a will and sent out the hawser; and in another moment it was fast and taut, and the breeches buoy was dancing out to the schooner.
“Easy now,” said Hunch, as they lowered Buckingham into the canvas breeches.
“Lash 'im in, Hunch; lash 'im in! I'd do it—but my hands——”
They watched him without a word as the buoy went shoreward. The line sagged so low under his weight that half a dozen waves passed over him.
“They'll drown 'im!” said Peabody. Badeau was silent.
Buckingham was lifted to the beach, and the empty buoy came back.
“You go next, Hunch.”
“Get in—don't stop to talk!”
“Well—you see how it is—I guess you're a little better off than I am. You stand it better.”
“For God's sake, get in!”
Peabody snivelled a little as he swung off and went swinging down the line, his legs dangling grotesquely. Hunch clung to the ratlines, looking after him with a wild gleam in his eyes. When the buoy came back for the last time he caught it with one hand, then hesitated. He glanced down at the schooner's hull. Why should he go ashore at all? What was the use now? He looked at the crowd. They were waving at him, probably they were shouting. Then he found himself getting in and sliding off toward the shore.