“Then let me earnestly beg you not to use it any more, just for the present at least,” entreated the engineer.
“Just as you say,” answered the skipper cheerfully. “We’ve got our old canvas hose stowed away somewhere. I’ll have it routed out.”
“Right,” agreed Cunningham. “And while I’m keeping my watch on deck I’ll think over this scheme of mine. I should rather like you to get the better of that man—what is his name?—oh yes, Slocum!”
“Yes, that’s all right,” assented the skipper. “But—look here, if that there scheme of yourn has to do with divin’, Mister, who’s goin’ to do the divin’? I don’t know nothin’ about it.”
“But I do,” remarked Cunningham cheerfully. “I’ll do the diving if I can only work out this idea that has come to me. And I believe I can.”
From this point the conversation drifted away into generalities, and finally the skipper went below, leaving me in charge of the deck and of the forenoon watch. Later on Brown informed me that the late mate’s cabin was entirely at my service, while Cunningham was inducted into a small spare stateroom which was in use as a sort of extra sail-room, but which the skipper ordered to be cleared out for the engineer’s accommodation. Also, it appeared that when the late mate went overboard he left behind him a very fine sextant, which the skipper had purchased at the auction of the effects of the deceased, and this instrument he allowed me to use.
We, the new arrivals aboard the Martha Brown, shook down into our positions with a degree of promptitude that excited the liveliest admiration of the skipper. He was a shrewd old fellow, however, and for the first two days after our arrival he remained on deck all day, and was frequently up and down during the night, frankly confessing that he was anxious to observe the manner in which his new officers performed their duties; but after that he announced his intention to sleep in all night, laughingly declaring that as he was now employing two mates he saw no reason why he should not leave them to do the work and take his ease like a gentleman. He was good enough to express his complete satisfaction with my abilities as a navigator, and opened his eyes in astonishment when he saw that I was not content with a mere daily observation of the meridian altitude of the sun, but used as well such comparatively intricate problems as those of the double altitudes, lunars, altitudes of the stars, and Great Circle sailing. But what gratified him most of all, I think, was the fact that before we had been aboard two days I had got Simpson, the sailmaker, at work upon an enormous jack-yard gaff-topsail for use in light winds, the only gaff-topsail that the schooner had hitherto possessed being a trumpery little jib-headed affair which she could carry in quite a strong breeze. I also caused a set of preventer backstays to be fitted, which enabled us to carry an amount of canvas in a breeze that would otherwise have been impossible.
We certainly did carry on in a manner that sometimes made the old man gasp with astonishment, for hitherto he had been in the habit of sailing his schooner in a very jog-trot fashion; but now we handled her as we would have done a racer, and it was surprising to see how, day after day, her mileage increased, and how rapidly her track on the chart stretched southward. The skipper, in his groping, cautious way, had fully intended to make sure of his position by heading for and sighting the Falklands before attempting to make the Straits, but I told him I regarded that as an utterly useless waste of time, and worked out a Great Circle track direct for Cape Virgins, at the entrance to the Straits, to his mingled consternation and delight. “If you don’t cast the schooner away between you,” he said, “I guess we’ll get to that there oyster bank early enough to clean it out before the Kingfisher arrives; for, smart seaman as Slocum thinks hisself, I reckon he ain’t a patch on you for carryin’ on.”
For the first three or four days after our arrival on board the Martha Brown, Cunningham devoted his energies entirely to the task of qualifying himself to take charge of a watch, looking after the ship, and generally polishing up his somewhat rusty seamanship; but he very quickly settled into his place, and then, whenever he had a spare moment, he got to work with a pencil and paper, making sketches and calculations. Then, one evening in the second dog-watch, he brought to me a sheet of paper on which he had sketched the outline of a human figure; he first showed me this, and then, producing a tape measure, he desired me to measure him very accurately, jotting down upon the diagram the several measurements as I called them out.
Then, a day or two afterwards, I found him busily at work with a quantity of light, thin, iron rod, which he had routed out from among the ship’s stores. This rod he cut up into carefully measured lengths, and he welded and riveted these together, with the aid of a portable forge which he had rigged up on the lee side of the fore deck, until, in the course of a week, he had constructed some half a dozen light but strong skeleton frames. Having tried and proved these to his satisfaction, he procured an empty oak barrel, and, taking it carefully to pieces, set the carpenter to work to saw, cut out, and carefully plane up a number of thin strips from the staves. Then, when he had got as many of these strips as he required, he had small holes bored in them in certain positions, and, by means of a quantity of fine wire, proceeded to bind them carefully and strongly to the skeleton frames which he had previously made. And when he had done that, to my amazement he calmly proceeded to induct himself into them, with my assistance, and I then saw that the whole affair constituted a complete body armour of a kind, helmet and all. But, even then, I had no idea of what he was driving at until he condescended to explain.