Caleb West, Master Diver

by Francis Hopkinson Smith

Captain Joe watched the changing sky where hour by hour were placarded the bulletins of the impending outbreak, and redoubled his efforts on the lines of the watch-tackles at which the men were tugging, pulling the derricks to their places.

By ten o’clock on the 15th of August, three of the four derricks, their tops connected by heavy wire rope, had been stepped in their sockets and raised erect, and their seaward guys had been made fast, Caleb securing the ends himself. By noon, the last derrick—the fourth leg of the chair, as it were—was also nearly perpendicular, the men tugging ten deep on the line of the watch-tackles. This derrick, being the last of the whole system and the most difficult to handle, was under the immediate charge of Captain Joe. On account of its position, which necessitated the bearing of its own strain and that of the other three derricks as well, its outboard seaward guy was as heavy as that of a ship’s anchor-chain. The final drawing taut of this chain, some sixty feet in length, stretching, as did the smaller ones, from the top of the derrick-mast down to the enrockment block, and the fastening of its sea end in the block, would not only complete the system of the four erected derricks, but would make them permanent and strong enough to resist either sea action or any weight that they might be required to lift. The failure to secure this chain guy into the anchoring enrockment block, or any sudden break in the other guys, would result not only in instantly toppling over the fourth derrick itself, but in dragging the three erect derricks with it. This might mean, too, the crushing to death of some of the men; for the slimy, ooze-covered rocks and concrete disk on which they had to stand and work made hurried escape impossible.

To insure an easier connection between this last chain and the enrockment block, Caleb had fastened below water, into the Lewis hole of the block, a long iron hook. Captain Joe’s problem, which he was now about to solve, was to catch this hook into a steel ring which was attached to the end of the chain guy. The drawing together of this hook and ring was to be done by means of a watch-tackle, which tightened the chain guy inch by inch, the gang of men standing in line while Captain Joe, ring in hand, waited to slip it into the hook. A stage manager stretching a tight-rope supported on saw-horses, with a similar tackle, solves, on a smaller scale, just such a problem every night.

Carleton, who never ran any personal risks, sat on the platform, out of harm’s way, sneering at the men’s struggles, and protesting that it was impossible to put up the four derricks at once. Sanford was across the disk, some fifty feet from Captain Joe, studying the effect of the increased strain on the outboard guys of the three derricks already placed.

The steady rhythmic movement of the men, ankle-deep in the water, swaying in unison, close-stepped, tugging at the tackle-line, like a file of soldiers, keeping time to Lonny Bowles’s “Heave ho,” had brought the hook and ring within six feet of each other, when the foot of one of the men slipped on the slimy ooze and tripped up the man next him. In an instant the whole gang were floundering among the rocks and in the water, the big fourth derrick swaying uneasily, like a tree that was doomed.

“Every man o’ ye as ye were!” shouted Captain Joe, without even a look at the superintendent, who had laughed outright at their fall. While he was shouting he had twisted a safety-line around a projecting rock to hold the strain until the men could regain their feet. The great derrick tottered for a moment, steadied itself like a drunken man, and remained still. The other three quivered, their top connecting guys sagging loose.

“Now make fast, an’ two ’r three of ye come here!” cried the captain again. In the easing of the strain caused by the slipping of the men, the six feet of space between hook and ring had gone back to ten.

Two men scrambled like huge crabs over the slippery rocks, and relieved Captain Joe of the end of the safety-line. The others stood firm and held taut the tug-lines of the watch-tackle. The slow, rhythmic movement of the gang to the steady “Heave ho” began again. The slack of the tackle was taken up, and the ten feet between the hook and the ring were reduced to five. Half an hour more, and the four great derricks would be anchored safe against any contingency.

The strain on the whole system became once more intense. The seaward guy of the opposite derrick—the one across the concrete disk—shook ominously under the enormous tension. Loud creaks could be heard as the links of the chain untwisted and the derricks turned on their rusty pintles.

Then a sound like a pistol-shot rang out clear and sharp.