The boy, me and the cat

by Henry Merrihew Plummer

May 2nd. Fair and deliciously warm. None of the Cape Cod dampness on any of this trip. Leather shoes tucked away forward for the whole cruise turned out today without any mould whatever. Always a little dust when sweeping the cabin floor.

H. left me this afternoon to visit coal mines in West Virginia. It was hard to see him go. When his steamer sailed I was out in the launch to wave him good-bye. I guess it was just as well the steamer’s swash came along and gave me all I wanted to do to keep putt-putt right side up. Feelings, like stomach aches, are queer things. Am afraid he won’t come back quite my boy again. Sort of making a start on life’s cruise I fancy, and somebody else is going to be captain. He’ll help sail me home, tie me up to dock and then spread canvas and away. Quite right. I wouldn’t wish it otherwise and the master that gets him will know he’s got a man when the time comes. For H., this cruise has not been all a pleasant summer’s outing. Once or twice he has seen the edge of the big shadow not so very far away and has neither batted an eye nor quivered a lip. He’ll do. Bene, it is well.

Back to the boat a little lonesey and found many things to do pronto.

This Mowbray Arch is very lovely just at the close of day. As you look eastward, on the left is the stone embankment, green grass and trees; a bridge lit with lights in cluster spans the foreground and beyond in soft mist the city and little church with square topped belfry. On the right, the city with its lights and in the dark shadow are wharves with barges, derricks, lighters and little tugs. Don’t you get it? It is the Seine, Tuilleries, Pont Neuf, Notre Dame and the Quartier, all in miniature. It was all very beautiful as I ate my Turtle soup and sipped my glass of iced, Clysmic water.

May 3rd. You hear me howl. Turtle soup, Madeira with iced Clysmic may be the proper food for a dry cruise, but for nightmares it makes beer and Swiss cheese look like “also rans.” I saw things last night that beat any contraptions this cruise has yet furnished. Got a bump like a pigeon’s egg over my right eye where I tried to break a deck frame and am expecting complaints from shore as a public nuisance. Bet a noggin of New England rum would have kept the critter quiet. That soup is sure awful good and filling and I’ve got some more brewing now. Don’t know whether I dare tackle it again or not. Wouldn’t like to see those things again for anything, although I disremember just what they looked like now.

I have been four days alone on the boat living very quietly and peacefully in the Arch of Mowbray Ghent. That name is good. I find myself repeating it often. The place is good and I like it much. First along I looked at the conglomerated architecture of the houses of “the best people” and watched the children of Mammon play at the game called “automobiling.” They seem to get lots of fun out of it, play it all day and sometimes late into the night. They scream and laugh more when they play it at night. Sometimes I wonder. I am a little tired of the houses which make me think of the stern of the launch, mostly paint, putty and copper tacks. Across the stream it is more interesting. Buckeyes with long raking masts, coal barges with slow-moving, lazy niggers unloading cargo, and sometimes letting go a wild bit of wailing song. The draw opens often to give a glimpse of the outer harbor with its crowd of shipping half-hidden in the haze of smoke from many stacks. I have rather dreaded these days with the expected calls from shore people, and the invitations to breakfasts, lunches and suppers to follow. “Nix on it Mutt.” I might as well be in Patagonia for all the visitors I have had. A man who lives fifty yards away stopped one evening to see if I would pump out his motorboat in case she wanted to make a sink of it. When I explained it wasn’t my pumping night he went away. I asked a very blonde young man with red cheeks, paddling a green canoe, “the color scheme not bad at all”; what was the meaning of the name of the place? He replied that the promoters named it, and he thought “Ghent” was English, but had never heard who Mowbray was. I asked him aboard, and was going to suggest a lighter green for the canoe in the way of complete harmony with pink cheeks, but he muttered some excuse and paddled off down stream like the white rabbit in “Alice through the Looking Glass.” The “Best People” of Boston who don’t live, but dwell at Beverly and Manchester, would at least have sent word by the head gardener that they wished I would go away. Yankee inquisitiveness would prompt investigation; southern courtesy would compel a call—but here it is neither one thing nor the other. A sort of neutral zone where nobody seems quite certain of his own individuality.

Today the wind is light, southerly, soft with misty air. I can’t just tell whether the mist is due to weather or to the sickening sweetish smell which comes from the rotting refuse of the crab and oyster houses. What people are these who can daily face a breakfast table with such a nuisance in their front yard? For last four nights I have dined superbly on dry toast and turtle soup. I found I was making my brew too strong and so by diluting with half water I toned things to a point where I could eat all I wanted and not see great, long things covered with eelgrass. A truly wonderful soup experience it has been. Were it not for my 25th anniversary in June, I would be tempted to spread canvas and “ketch” me another green one off Hatteras. As regards high cost of living, it interests me some to figure up the expense of all my food on board for past week, since leaving Manteo, at 10 cents per day.

A fruit peddler gave me a tip on some jet black bananas ripened in the sun, which, on account of color he was offering for five cents a dozen. He threw in three more for good measure. They fairly melted in my mouth, and such a flavor. Last night I sliced some in sugar with a spoonful of sherry and stood them on deck. This morning I crawled out just at sunup and ate them cool with the coolness of the night and not at all the same thing as the cold of an ice-chest. They were so good I sliced up and ate some more and so spoiled the whole thing. It can’t be did quick that a-way.

I am now going to write a lot about turtles. I know nothing about turtles, but want to remember this one and what I have thought about him, so skip it, skip it. When he came on board fresh from the sea he was the most delicate shade of milky, bluey green. Not a bit the green of clear, deep ocean water but more the wide shallows churned often by big waves. When the young green of silver-leafed poplars turns downsides upsides on a gray southerly morning you are hitting it mighty close. The shell, 19 × 18 inches, has now turned to a stunning mixture of grays, browns and purply reds. It will make a fine memento of the cruise. The head is the best. Have never had anything get me quite so strong. Was going to mount it all to the merry with pop eyes made with marbles, pipe in mouth, etc., etc., etc. For a week it has stood before me as it stands now on the centreboard box. Have watched the green go and the color of old ivory come. The solemn majesty of that face impresses me so that no indignity will come to it from me. The power and relentless strength of the ages past and yet to come is in the curve and hook of that half open, bony jaw. I will try to do some careful work on it, mount it with silver as a paperweight and give it to Henry as a keepsake. That head might lend courage to a man who found himself some night with head in arms at a table piled high with trouble. I like to wonder what yarns it could spin of its deep sea swimmings and warm floatings between the Tortugas and Cape Cod. That head has looked on strange sights, and that hook has maybe ripped its way into some pretty gruesome shadows. Mighty relentless is the face. If I thought he was on my trail at the dark of the moon I wouldn’t walk or I wouldn’t run, I’d fly, but he’d sure get me just the same. I’m mighty glad he didn’t die in vain for he made awful good soup and that is a pesky sight more than I will do.