Grimes chewed the end of his clay pipe right off; it fell at his feet as he lifted his eyes to the sky and murmured: “My gawd! ain’t she bewtifool! Fancy the loikes of ’er a-wandering about wifout frens!”
That same night Waylao sat hidden in the old hulk by the promontory, the crowd of beachcombers around her. That hulk in the moonlight, with its rotting figurehead appealing to the sky-line, might have appeared to a stranger the most isolated spot in the South Seas. But a pathetic human drama was being enacted in the bowels of that derelict.
I wish I had had a camera in those days. A photograph of those shellbacks sitting on their barrels round that forlorn girl would have been worth its weight in gold.
She looked like some trapped faery creature as she sat there dimly outlined in the gloom, with glimpses of moonlight, through the broken deck roof, flitting about the folds of her mass of glorious hair. One would hardly believe the way those rough men looked after that girl, or the tenderness of their private comments. One went off to the stores of the township and purchased, on tick, the most delicate articles of food. Uncle Sam made her swallow a tiny drop of whisky. “It won’t ’urt yer, gal—that’s it, that’s it,” he said when Waylao at last sipped it. The spirit pulled her together; she even smiled when the old shellback made his antiquated jokes for her special benefit.
That night the crew prepared a bed for her at the far end of the derelict’s hold. Each hand was eager to add to her comfort. They piled up the tubs and rubbish till a wall divided her chamber from the rest of them.
“Here’s my coat,” said one. Another lent a faithful ragged overcoat of many years, so green that it looked as though it were growing moss; some even gave their clean shirts. Bill Grimes rushed ashore and gathered a heap of soft, sweet-scented seaweed. This made an excellent mattress.
When at length the bed was ready, it was quite a sumptuous pile; not a man but eyed it with approval, and felt that he had done his bit, and when eventually she lay down, one by one leaned over the improvised bed and tucked her in. They looked so proud and pleased that one would have thought each man was her father. The night was terrifically hot, so their efforts to add to her comfort only succeeded in making Waylao perspire. But nevertheless such was her gratitude that she smiled through her misery when the jovial, generous Irishman placed two more overcoats on her and, still half worried, said: “There you are, missy; begorra, you won’t be cold now, will you?”
They all crept away to the far end of the hold, and instead of sitting and yarning and using their wonderful oaths as usual, they sat smoking, deep in thought. I say wonderful oaths, because they were connoisseurs in such matters. As a dog’s wagging tail expresses more truth and gratitude than all human language, so those oaths expressed the true depth of their feelings.
Next morning Ranjo missed his rough customers: they were hidden from the blazing sun, all down in the hulk’s gloomy depth. There they sat on their old barrels, holding a solemn council as to what was best to be done about the girl who had sought their protection.
Uncle Sam pulled his whiskers. The rays of sunlight streaming through the port-hole just above his head revealed his worried face and the grizzled physiognomies of the sunburnt men grouped about him.