Part 26 (2/2)
”What? Come in! Don't be standing there, Cap'n Henshaw. Come in and sit down!”
In spite of his bl.u.s.ter his red face was growing blotched with patches of gray. Harrigan, less moved than any of the others, calmly replaced the guitar in its green cloth case.
”I sent this fellow down to be put at hard work,” said Henshaw, and waited.
It was obvious to Harrigan that the chief engineer was in mortal fear.
He himself felt strangely ill at ease as he looked at White Henshaw with his skin yellow as Egyptian papyrus from a tomb.
”Just a minute, captain,” began the engineer. ”You sent Harrigan down to the hole because he's considered a hard man to handle, eh?”
Henshaw waited for a fuller explanation; he seemed to be enjoying the distress of Campbell.
”Just so,” went on the Scotchman, ”but there are two ways of handling a difficult sailor. One is by using the club and the other by using kindness. The club has been tried and hasn't worked very well with Harrigan. I decided to take a hand with kindness. The results have been excellent. I was just about--”
His voice died away, for McTee was chuckling in a deep ba.s.s rumble, and Henshaw was smiling in a way that boded no good.
The captain broke in coldly: ”I've heard enough of your explanation, Campbell. Send Harrigan down to the hole at once. We'll work him a double s.h.i.+ft today, for a starter.”
Campbell was trembling like a self-conscious girl, for he was drawn between shame and dread of the captain.
”Look!” he cried, and taking the hand of Harrigan, he turned it palm up. ”This chap has been brutally treated. He's been at work that fairly tore the skin from the palms of his hands. One hour's work with a shovel, captain, would make Harrigan useless at any sort of a job for a month.”
”Which goes to show,” said McTee, ”that you don't know Harrigan.”
”I've heard what you have to say,” said Henshaw. ”I sent him down to work in the hole; I come down and find him singing in your room. I expect you to have him pa.s.sing coal inside of fifteen minutes, Campbell.”
Harrigan started for the door, feeling that the game had been played out, and glad of even this small respite of a day or more from the labor of the shovel. Before he left the room, however, the voice of Campbell halted him.
”Wait! Stay here! You'll do what I tell you, Harrigan. I'm the boss belowdecks.”
It was a declaration of war, and what it cost Campbell no one could ever tell. He stood swaying slightly from side to side, while he glared at Henshaw.
”You're drunk,” remarked the captain coldly. ”I'll give you half an hour, Campbell, to come to your senses--but after that--”
”d.a.m.n you and your time! I want no tune! I say the lad has been put through h.e.l.l and shan't go back to it, do you hear me?”
Henshaw was controlling himself carefully, or else he wished to draw out the engineer.
He said: ”You know the record of Harrigan?”
”What record? The one McTee told you? Would you believe what Black McTee says of a man he tried to break and couldn't?”
”My friend McTee is out of the matter. All that you have to do with is my order. You've heard that order, Campbell!”
”I'll see you in h.e.l.l before I send him to the hole.”
Henshaw waited another moment, quietly enjoying the wild excitement of the engineer like the Spanish gentleman who sits in safety in the gallery and watches the baiting of the bull in the arena below.
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