What had happened was this: Six of the crew, those spirits who had succumbed to the secret domination of the man Flint—the drinkers—had decided to celebrate the last night on the Wanderer. Their argument was that old man Cleigh wouldn’t miss a few bottles, and that it would be a long time between drinks when they returned to the States; and never might they again have so easy a chance to taste the juice of the champagne grape. Where was the harm? Hadn’t they behaved like little Fauntleroys for weeks? They did not want any trouble—just half a dozen bottles, and back to the forepeak to empty them. That wouldn’t kill the old man. They wouldn’t even have to force the door of the dry-stores; they had already learned that they could tickle the lock out of commission by the use of a bent wire. Young, restless, and mischievous—none of them bad. A bit of laughter and a few bars of song—that was all they wanted. No doubt the affair would have blown itself out harmlessly but for the fact that Chance had other ideas. She has a way with her, this Pagan Madonna, of taking off the cheerful motley of a jest and substituting the Phrygian cap of terror, subitaneously. 250
Dennison had lain down on the lounge in the main salon. Restless, unhappy, bitter toward his father, he had lain there counting the throbs of the engine to that point where they mysteriously cease to register and one has to wait a minute or two to pick up the throb again.
For years he had lived more or less in the open, which attunes the human ear to sounds that generally pass unnoticed. All at once he was sure that he had heard the tinkle of glass, but he waited. The tinkle was repeated. Instinct led him at once to the forward passage, and one glance down this was sufficient. From the thought of a drunken orgy—the thing he had been fearing since the beginning of this mad voyage—his thought leaped to Jane. Thus his subsequent acts were indirectly in her defense.
“What the devil are you up to there?” he called.
The unexpectedness of the challenge disconcerted the men. They had enough loot. A quick retreat, and Dennison would have had nothing to do but close the dry-stores door. But middle twenties are belligerent rather than discreet.
“What you got to say about it?” jeered one of the men, shifting his brace of bottles to the arms of another and squaring off.
Dennison rushed them, and the mêlée began. 251 It was a strenuous affair while it lasted. When a strong man is full of anger and bitter disappointment, when six young fellows are bored to distraction, nothing is quite so satisfying as an exchange of fisticuffs. Dennison had the advantage of being able to hit right and left, at random, while his opponents were not always sure that a blow landed where it was directed.
Naturally the racket drew Cleigh to the scene, and he arrived in time to see a champagne bottle descend upon the head of his son. Dennison went down.
Cleigh, boiling with impotent fury, had gone to bed, not to sleep but to plan; some way round the rogue, to trip him and regain the treasures that meant so much to him. Like father, like son. When he saw what was going on in the passage he saw also that here was something that linked up with his mood. Of course it was to defend the son; but without the bitter rage and the need of physical expression he would have gone for the hidden revolver and settled the affair with that. Instead he flew at the men with the savageness of a gray wolf. He was a tower of a man, for all his sixty years; and he had mauled three of the crew severely before Cunningham arrived.
Why had the mutinous six offered battle? Why hadn’t they retreated with good sense at the 252 start? Originally all they had wanted was the wine. Why stop to fight when the wine was theirs? In the morning none of them could answer these questions. Was there ever a rough-and-tumble that anybody could explain lucidly the morning after? Perhaps it was the false pride of youth; the bitter distaste at the thought of six turning tail for one.