“But he almost wrecked us!” exclaimed Tom. “If he’d come up a second sooner, he would have capsized the boat and we’d all have been drowned or smashed by his flukes.”
The old whaleman chuckled. “Waall, I reckon we mought ha’ been,” he admitted. “But we wasn’t. ’Sides, no whaleman never thinks o’ sech things. We wuz out fer to git this here whale, and it’s git him or git stove.”
“But why didn’t you use the bomb lance?” asked Jim. “You had a good chance.”
“Look here, son,” said the old man petulantly. “I was brung up along with a reg’lar iron an’ a reg’lar lance. These here new-fangled contraptions may be all right fer them as likes ’em, but give me the old fashion’ weepons every time. By gum, I want ter see whar I’m a-drivin’ o’ the lance at. ’Sides, any dumb-foozled lan’lubber could git whales by a settin’ off an’ a-shootin’ of ’em. They ain’t no sport in it.”
By now the Narwhal was within a quarter of a mile of the boat. As her yards were swung and she was hove to, the men picked up their oars and headed for the schooner. As they drew alongside, Cap’n Pem shouted up to Captain Edwards and asked if they had seen the second officer’s boat.
“No, he was towed hull down,” replied the skipper. “But we can fetch him all right. Just stick a waif in that whale, get your boat aboard and we’ll run down to him.”
One of the men scrambled on to the whale’s body, and drove a sharp pointed iron bar bearing a flag at the end into the carcass. Then, casting loose the line to the fluke chain, the crew clambered on to the schooner and hoisted the boat to its davits.
“Well, boys, how did you like it?” asked Captain Edwards as Tom and Jim reached the deck. “Had a right pretty tussle—I was watchin’ you from aloft.”
“Fine!” declared Tom. “But we were scared some of the time, and oh, we had a great joke on Cap’n Pem! The cat was in the boat and she had four kittens.”
The skipper roared. “Well, that must have broken the spell!” he exclaimed. “What did Pem say?”