THE PASSAGE
It was the night of April 29, 1915, that Martin Blake, clerk, sat at the Cohasset's cabin table and heard the tale of Fire Mountain. It was on the morning of July 6, 1915, that Martin Blake, seaman, bent over the Cohasset's foreroyal yardarm and fisted the canvas, with the shrill whistle of the squall in his ears.
The interim had fashioned a new Martin Blake. In the bronzed and active figure, dungaree clad, sheath-knife on hip, who so casually balanced himself on the swaying foot-rope, there was little in common, so far as outward appearance went, with the dapper, white-faced clerk of yore.
He completed furling the sail. Then he straightened and swept the sea with keen, puckered eyes. It was a scrutiny that was rewarded. Ahead, across the horizon sky, floated a dark smudge, like the smoke-trail of a steamer, and beneath it was a black speck. It was no ship, but land, he knew. It was the expected landfall, the volcanic island, there ahead, and he, of all of the ship's company, first perceived it from his lofty perch.
He sent the welcome hail to the deck below——
"Land ho!"
He leaned over the lee yard-arm, grasped a back-stay, and commenced a rapid and precipitous descent to the deck. A few months before, he would have descended laboriously and fearfully by way of the shrouds; sliding down a backstay would then have rubbed his palms raw, and visited giddiness upon him. But now his hands were rope calloused, and his wits height proof. He was now the equal, for agility and daring, with any man on the ship. He had won, without much trouble, a seaman's niche on the ship.
In truth, Martin was to the life born, and he took to the sea like a duck to water. He won quickly through the inevitable series of mishaps that rubbed the greenhorn mark away; and he gleefully measured his progress by his ever-growing ability to outpull, outclimb, and outdare the polyglot denizens of the brigantine's forecastle.
He had expert coaching to urge his education on apace. He knew the many ropes and their various offices before he was two weeks on board; and he was able to move about aloft, by day or night, quite fearlessly. By the end of the first month he was standing his regular wheel trick. And, as the weeks passed, he gained more than a cursory knowledge of the leverages and wind surfaces that controlled and propelled his little floating world.
He applied himself earnestly to master his new craft. It was the life he had lusted for, and the mere physical spaciousness of his new outlook was a delight. He contrasted it with his former city-cramped, office-ridden existence.