Frank Nelson in the Forecastle; Or, The Sportman's Club Among the Whalers

by Harry Castlemon

"I know what you mean," said Frank. "This man says we are bound for Japan, and that is nearly three thousand miles from here."

Dick was frightened almost out of his senses. His face grew as pale as death, great drops of perspiration stood on his forehead, and he tugged and pulled at his irons with the strength of desperation. But they had been put on him to stay, and all his efforts to free himself were unavailing. Frank knew what he stood in fear of, and he knew, too, that anything he could say would not set the poor fellow's mind at rest. The wrong ideas he had formed of things and the ridiculous stories he had heard in the forecastle of the Stranger, had made an impression on him so deep and lasting that even Frank, in whom the trapper had every confidence, could not remove it. The real dangers he was likely to encounter would be but small things comparatively; but the imaginary evils which he would look for every day, would cause him much suffering. Frank thought more of his friend than he did of himself. How would Dick behave when he found himself dancing over the waves of the Pacific in a small boat in pursuit of a whale? What would he think if he saw one of those monsters of the deep—as Lucas, the boatswain's mate, said he had often seen them—come up on a breach, shoot up forty or fifty feet into the air, and then fall down into the water with a noise like the roar of Niagara? No doubt he would refuse duty. No doubt, too, when the captain or his officers attempted to punish him for disobedience there would be a desperate fight—for Dick stood not in fear of anything that walked on two feet—which would not end until the trapper had been severely injured and perhaps permanently disabled.

"Human natur'! What'll I do?" cried Dick, after he had exhausted himself in his efforts to pull off his irons.

"Watch, me and do as I do, as nearly as you can," replied Frank. "We are completely in the power of these men, and there is no way to get out of it. While on our voyage from Bellville, I took particular pains to learn all I could of a seaman's duties, and perhaps I shall be able to be of some assistance to you. What we don't know Lucas and Barton will teach us. But, whatever you do, don't refuse duty or talk back, no matter what is said or done to you. It will only be worse for you if you do."

"And bear another thing in mind," said one of the sailors, who had been listening to this conversation, "and that is, you take rank next below the cap'n's dog, and hain't got no rights of your own!"

The trapper looked toward Frank, and while the latter was explaining that, according to a sailor's creed, those who follow the sea take rank in this way: first the captain, then the mates, then the captain's dog, and lowest of all, the foremast hands—while Frank was explaining this, there was the sound of a commotion on the deck over their heads, and after listening a moment the sailors declared that the vessel was about to be taken to sea. And so it proved. The anchor was hove up, the sails spread one after the other, and finally the prisoners below began to feel the increasing motion of the ship. Just then the hatch was thrown open and the first mate came down the ladder. He walked straight up to Dick, unlocked his irons and slapping him on the back ordered him to go on deck and lend a hand. Even this simple order was Greek to the honest trapper; but he understood the word "go," and he went, delighted to find himself in possession of his liberty once more. Frank would have been glad to go with him, for it was anything but agreeable to his feelings to be confined below like a felon; but the officers wanted to get a little farther away from shore before they allowed too many of their unwilling crew the free use of their hands and feet.

The first order Dick heard when he reached the deck was: "Let fall and sheet home;" and the mate giving him a push by the shoulder and a kick at the same time, commanded him to "Grab hold of that rope and pull as if the sweetheart he left in the backwoods was at the other end of it." Or, we ought rather say that that was the order the mate intended to give, but he never finished it, for he was knocked down so promptly that it seemed as if his foot and the trapper's right arm were both put in motion at the same instant. Dick's hot blood, which was already at fever heat, boiled over completely when he felt the weight of the mate's boot, and he wiped out the insult as soon as it was given.

Of course there was a tumult at once. The second mate caught up a handspike and the captain descended from his quarter-deck, flourishing a rope's end as he came. They advanced upon the trapper from opposite sides, but he was ready and waiting, and they must have been astonished at the rough reception they met at his hands. With one single twist, which was so sudden and powerful that it almost dislocated the second mate's shoulder, Dick wrenched the handspike out of his grasp and threw it to the deck. Then his long arms swung in the air like the shafts of a windmill, one huge clenched hand, as heavy as a sledgehammer, fell full in the captain's face, the other alighted on the top of the mate's head, and both these worthies sank to the deck on the instant.

The first mate by this time recovered his feet, and picking up a handspike looked all around for the trapper; but he was not to be seen anywhere on deck. Nor indeed was he to be found about the ship. He was gone.