For a long time after the course of the steamer Sofala had been + altered for the land, the low swampy coast had retained its appearance + of a mere smudge of darkness beyond a belt of glitter. The sunrays + seemed to fall violently upon the calm sea--seemed to shatter themselves + upon an adamantine surface into sparkling dust, into a dazzling vapor + of light that blinded the eye and wearied the brain with its unsteady + brightness.
+ +Captain Whalley did not look at it. When his Serang, approaching the + roomy cane arm-chair which he filled capably, had informed him in a low + voice that the course was to be altered, he had risen at once and had + remained on his feet, face forward, while the head of his ship swung + through a quarter of a circle. He had not uttered a single word, not + even the word to steady the helm. It was the Serang, an elderly, alert, + little Malay, with a very dark skin, who murmured the order to the + helmsman. And then slowly Captain Whalley sat down again in the + arm-chair on the bridge and fixed his eyes on the deck between his feet.
+ +He could not hope to see anything new upon this lane of the sea. He had + been on these coasts for the last three years. From Low Cape to Malantan + the distance was fifty miles, six hours' steaming for the old ship with + the tide, or seven against. Then you steered straight for the land, and + by-and-by three palms would appear on the sky, tall and slim, and with + their disheveled heads in a bunch, as if in confidential criticism of + the dark mangroves. The Sofala would be headed towards the somber + strip of the coast, which at a given moment, as the ship closed with + it obliquely, would show several clean shining fractures--the brimful + estuary of a river. Then on through a brown liquid, three parts water + and one part black earth, on and on between the low shores, three parts + black earth and one part brackish water, the Sofala would plow her way + up-stream, as she had done once every month for these seven years or + more, long before he was aware of her existence, long before he had ever + thought of having anything to do with her and her invariable voyages. + The old ship ought to have known the road better than her men, who had + not been kept so long at it without a change; better than the faithful + Serang, whom he had brought over from his last ship to keep the + captain's watch; better than he himself, who had been her captain for + the last three years only. She could always be depended upon to make her + courses. Her compasses were never out. She was no trouble at all to + take about, as if her great age had given her knowledge, wisdom, and + steadiness. She made her landfalls to a degree of the bearing, and + almost to a minute of her allowed time. At any moment, as he sat on + the bridge without looking up, or lay sleepless in his bed, simply by + reckoning the days and the hours he could tell where he was--the precise + spot of the beat. He knew it well too, this monotonous huckster's + round, up and down the Straits; he knew its order and its sights and its + people. Malacca to begin with, in at daylight and out at dusk, to cross + over with a rigid phosphorescent wake this highway of the Far East. + Darkness and gleams on the water, clear stars on a black sky, perhaps + the lights of a home steamer keeping her unswerving course in the + middle, or maybe the elusive shadow of a native craft with her mat sails + flitting by silently--and the low land on the other side in sight + at daylight. At noon the three palms of the next place of call, up a + sluggish river. The only white man residing there was a retired young + sailor, with whom he had become friendly in the course of many voyages. + Sixty miles farther on there was another place of call, a deep bay with + only a couple of houses on the beach. And so on, in and out, picking + up coastwise cargo here and there, and finishing with a hundred miles' + steady steaming through the maze of an archipelago of small islands up + to a large native town at the end of the beat. There was a three days' + rest for the old ship before he started her again in inverse order, + seeing the same shores from another bearing, hearing the same voices + in the same places, back again to the Sofala's port of registry on + the great highway to the East, where he would take up a berth nearly + opposite the big stone pile of the harbor office till it was time to + start again on the old round of 1600 miles and thirty days. Not a very + enterprising life, this, for Captain Whalley, Henry Whalley, otherwise + Dare-devil Harry--Whalley of the Condor, a famous clipper in her day. + No. Not a very enterprising life for a man who had served famous firms, + who had sailed famous ships (more than one or two of them his own); who + had made famous passages, had been the pioneer of new routes and new + trades; who had steered across the unsurveyed tracts of the South Seas, + and had seen the sun rise on uncharted islands. Fifty years at sea, and + forty out in the East ("a pretty thorough apprenticeship," he used + to remark smilingly), had made him honorably known to a generation of + shipowners and merchants in all the ports from Bombay clear over to + where the East merges into the West upon the coast of the two Americas. + His fame remained writ, not very large but plain enough, on the + Admiralty charts. Was there not somewhere between Australia and China a + Whalley Island and a Condor Reef? On that dangerous coral formation the + celebrated clipper had hung stranded for three days, her captain and + crew throwing her cargo overboard with one hand and with the other, as + it were, keeping off her a flotilla of savage war-canoes. At that time + neither the island nor the reef had any official existence. Later the + officers of her Majesty's steam vessel Fusilier, dispatched to make a + survey of the route, recognized in the adoption of these two names the + enterprise of the man and the solidity of the ship. Besides, as anyone + who cares may see, the "General Directory," vol. ii. p. 410, begins the + description of the "Malotu or Whalley Passage" with the words: "This + advantageous route, first discovered in 1850 by Captain Whalley in the + ship Condor," &c., and ends by recommending it warmly to sailing vessels + leaving the China ports for the south in the months from December to + April inclusive.
+ +This was the clearest gain he had out of life. Nothing could rob him + of this kind of fame. The piercing of the Isthmus of Suez, like the + breaking of a dam, had let in upon the East a flood of new ships, new + men, new methods of trade. It had changed the face of the Eastern seas + and the very spirit of their life; so that his early experiences meant + nothing whatever to the new generation of seamen.
+ +In those bygone days he had handled many thousands of pounds of his + employers' money and of his own; he had attended faithfully, as by law + a shipmaster is expected to do, to the conflicting interests of owners, + charterers, and underwriters. He had never lost a ship or consented to + a shady transaction; and he had lasted well, outlasting in the end the + conditions that had gone to the making of his name. He had buried his + wife (in the Gulf of Petchili), had married off his daughter to the man + of her unlucky choice, and had lost more than an ample competence in the + crash of the notorious Travancore and Deccan Banking Corporation, whose + downfall had shaken the East like an earthquake. And he was sixty-five + years old.
+ +His age sat lightly enough on him; and of his ruin he was not ashamed. + He had not been alone to believe in the stability of the Banking + Corporation. Men whose judgment in matters of finance was as expert as + his seamanship had commended the prudence of his investments, and had + themselves lost much money in the great failure. The only difference + between him and them was that he had lost his all. And yet not his all. + There had remained to him from his lost fortune a very pretty little + bark, Fair Maid, which he had bought to occupy his leisure of a retired + sailor--"to play with," as he expressed it himself.
+ +He had formally declared himself tired of the sea the year preceding his + daughter's marriage. But after the young couple had gone to settle in + Melbourne he found out that he could not make himself happy on shore. He + was too much of a merchant sea-captain for mere yachting to satisfy him. + He wanted the illusion of affairs; and his acquisition of the Fair + Maid preserved the continuity of his life. He introduced her to his + acquaintances in various ports as "my last command." When he grew too + old to be trusted with a ship, he would lay her up and go ashore to be + buried, leaving directions in his will to have the bark towed out and + scuttled decently in deep water on the day of the funeral. His daughter + would not grudge him the satisfaction of knowing that no stranger would + handle his last command after him. With the fortune he was able to leave + her, the value of a 500-ton bark was neither here nor there. All this + would be said with a jocular twinkle in his eye: the vigorous old man + had too much vitality for the sentimentalism of regret; and a little + wistfully withal, because he was at home in life, taking a genuine + pleasure in its feelings and its possessions; in the dignity of his + reputation and his wealth, in his love for his daughter, and in his + satisfaction with the ship--the plaything of his lonely leisure.
+ +He had the cabin arranged in accordance with his simple ideal of comfort + at sea. A big bookcase (he was a great reader) occupied one side of his + stateroom; the portrait of his late wife, a flat bituminous oil-painting + representing the profile and one long black ringlet of a young woman, + faced his bed-place. Three chronometers ticked him to sleep and greeted + him on waking with the tiny competition of their beats. He rose at five + every day. The officer of the morning watch, drinking his early cup + of coffee aft by the wheel, would hear through the wide orifice of the + copper ventilators all the splashings, blowings, and splutterings of + his captain's toilet. These noises would be followed by a sustained + deep murmur of the Lord's Prayer recited in a loud earnest voice. Five + minutes afterwards the head and shoulders of Captain Whalley emerged + out of the companion-hatchway. Invariably he paused for a while on the + stairs, looking all round at the horizon; upwards at the trim of the + sails; inhaling deep draughts of the fresh air. Only then he would step + out on the poop, acknowledging the hand raised to the peak of the cap + with a majestic and benign "Good morning to you." He walked the deck + till eight scrupulously. Sometimes, not above twice a year, he had to + use a thick cudgel-like stick on account of a stiffness in the hip--a + slight touch of rheumatism, he supposed. Otherwise he knew nothing of + the ills of the flesh. At the ringing of the breakfast bell he went + below to feed his canaries, wind up the chronometers, and take the + head of the table. From there he had before his eyes the big carbon + photographs of his daughter, her husband, and two fat-legged babies + --his grandchildren--set in black frames into the maplewood bulkheads + of the cuddy. After breakfast he dusted the glass over these portraits + himself with a cloth, and brushed the oil painting of his wife with a + plumate kept suspended from a small brass hook by the side of the heavy + gold frame. Then with the door of his stateroom shut, he would sit down + on the couch under the portrait to read a chapter out of a thick pocket + Bible--her Bible. But on some days he only sat there for half an hour + with his finger between the leaves and the closed book resting on his + knees. Perhaps he had remembered suddenly how fond of boat-sailing she + used to be.
+ +She had been a real shipmate and a true woman too. It was like an + article of faith with him that there never had been, and never could be, + a brighter, cheerier home anywhere afloat or ashore than his home under + the poop-deck of the Condor, with the big main cabin all white and gold, + garlanded as if for a perpetual festival with an unfading wreath. She + had decorated the center of every panel with a cluster of home flowers. + It took her a twelvemonth to go round the cuddy with this labor of love. + To him it had remained a marvel of painting, the highest achievement of + taste and skill; and as to old Swinburne, his mate, every time he + came down to his meals he stood transfixed with admiration before the + progress of the work. You could almost smell these roses, he declared, + sniffing the faint flavor of turpentine which at that time pervaded the + saloon, and (as he confessed afterwards) made him somewhat less hearty + than usual in tackling his food. But there was nothing of the sort to + interfere with his enjoyment of her singing. "Mrs. Whalley is a regular + out-and-out nightingale, sir," he would pronounce with a judicial air + after listening profoundly over the skylight to the very end of the + piece. In fine weather, in the second dog-watch, the two men could hear + her trills and roulades going on to the accompaniment of the piano in + the cabin. On the very day they got engaged he had written to London + for the instrument; but they had been married for over a year before it + reached them, coming out round the Cape. The big case made part of the + first direct general cargo landed in Hong-kong harbor--an event that to + the men who walked the busy quays of to-day seemed as hazily remote as + the dark ages of history. But Captain Whalley could in a half hour of + solitude live again all his life, with its romance, its idyl, and its + sorrow. He had to close her eyes himself. She went away from under the + ensign like a sailor's wife, a sailor herself at heart. He had read + the service over her, out of her own prayer-book, without a break in his + voice. When he raised his eyes he could see old Swinburne facing him + with his cap pressed to his breast, and his rugged, weather-beaten, + impassive face streaming with drops of water like a lump of chipped red + granite in a shower. It was all very well for that old sea-dog to cry. + He had to read on to the end; but after the splash he did not remember + much of what happened for the next few days. An elderly sailor of the + crew, deft at needlework, put together a mourning frock for the child + out of one of her black skirts.
+ +He was not likely to forget; but you cannot dam up life like a sluggish + stream. It will break out and flow over a man's troubles, it will close + upon a sorrow like the sea upon a dead body, no matter how much love has + gone to the bottom. And the world is not bad. People had been very + kind to him; especially Mrs. Gardner, the wife of the senior partner + in Gardner, Patteson, & Co., the owners of the Condor. It was she who + volunteered to look after the little one, and in due course took her to + England (something of a journey in those days, even by the overland + mail route) with her own girls to finish her education. It was ten years + before he saw her again.
+ +As a little child she had never been frightened of bad weather; she + would beg to be taken up on deck in the bosom of his oilskin coat to + watch the big seas hurling themselves upon the Condor. The swirl and + crash of the waves seemed to fill her small soul with a breathless + delight. "A good boy spoiled," he used to say of her in joke. He had + named her Ivy because of the sound of the word, and obscurely fascinated + by a vague association of ideas. She had twined herself tightly round + his heart, and he intended her to cling close to her father as to a + tower of strength; forgetting, while she was little, that in the nature + of things she would probably elect to cling to someone else. But + he loved life well enough for even that event to give him a certain + satisfaction, apart from his more intimate feeling of loss.
+ +After he had purchased the Fair Maid to occupy his loneliness, he + hastened to accept a rather unprofitable freight to Australia simply for + the opportunity of seeing his daughter in her own home. What made him + dissatisfied there was not to see that she clung now to somebody else, + but that the prop she had selected seemed on closer examination "a + rather poor stick"--even in the matter of health. He disliked his + son-in-law's studied civility perhaps more than his method of + handling the sum of money he had given Ivy at her marriage. But of his + apprehensions he said nothing. Only on the day of his departure, with + the hall-door open already, holding her hands and looking steadily into + her eyes, he had said, "You know, my dear, all I have is for you and the + chicks. Mind you write to me openly." She had answered him by an almost + imperceptible movement of her head. She resembled her mother in + the color of her eyes, and in character--and also in this, that she + understood him without many words.
+ +Sure enough she had to write; and some of these letters made Captain + Whalley lift his white eye-brows. For the rest he considered he was + reaping the true reward of his life by being thus able to produce on + demand whatever was needed. He had not enjoyed himself so much in a + way since his wife had died. Characteristically enough his son-in-law's + punctuality in failure caused him at a distance to feel a sort of + kindness towards the man. The fellow was so perpetually being jammed on + a lee shore that to charge it all to his reckless navigation would be + manifestly unfair. No, no! He knew well what that meant. It was bad + luck. His own had been simply marvelous, but he had seen in his life too + many good men--seamen and others--go under with the sheer weight of bad + luck not to recognize the fatal signs. For all that, he was cogitating + on the best way of tying up very strictly every penny he had to leave, + when, with a preliminary rumble of rumors (whose first sound reached + him in Shanghai as it happened), the shock of the big failure came; + and, after passing through the phases of stupor, of incredulity, of + indignation, he had to accept the fact that he had nothing to speak of + to leave.
+ +Upon that, as if he had only waited for this catastrophe, the unlucky + man, away there in Melbourne, gave up his unprofitable game, and sat + down--in an invalid's bath-chair at that too. "He will never walk + again," wrote the wife. For the first time in his life Captain Whalley + was a bit staggered.
+ +The Fair Maid had to go to work in bitter earnest now. It was no longer + a matter of preserving alive the memory of Dare-devil Harry Whalley in + the Eastern Seas, or of keeping an old man in pocket-money and clothes, + with, perhaps, a bill for a few hundred first-class cigars thrown in at + the end of the year. He would have to buckle-to, and keep her going hard + on a scant allowance of gilt for the ginger-bread scrolls at her stem + and stern.
+ +This necessity opened his eyes to the fundamental changes of the world. + Of his past only the familiar names remained, here and there, but + the things and the men, as he had known them, were gone. The name of + Gardner, Patteson, & Co. was still displayed on the walls of warehouses + by the waterside, on the brass plates and window-panes in the business + quarters of more than one Eastern port, but there was no longer a + Gardner or a Patteson in the firm. There was no longer for Captain + Whalley an arm-chair and a welcome in the private office, with a bit of + business ready to be put in the way of an old friend, for the sake of + bygone services. The husbands of the Gardner girls sat behind the desks + in that room where, long after he had left the employ, he had kept his + right of entrance in the old man's time. Their ships now had yellow + funnels with black tops, and a time-table of appointed routes like a + confounded service of tramways. The winds of December and June were all + one to them; their captains (excellent young men he doubted not) were, + to be sure, familiar with Whalley Island, because of late years the + Government had established a white fixed light on the north end (with + a red danger sector over the Condor Reef), but most of them would have + been extremely surprised to hear that a flesh-and-blood Whalley still + existed--an old man going about the world trying to pick up a cargo here + and there for his little bark.
+ +And everywhere it was the same. Departed the men who would have nodded + appreciatively at the mention of his name, and would have thought + themselves bound in honor to do something for Dare-devil Harry Whalley. + Departed the opportunities which he would have known how to seize; and + gone with them the white-winged flock of clippers that lived in the + boisterous uncertain life of the winds, skimming big fortunes out of + the foam of the sea. In a world that pared down the profits to an + irreducible minimum, in a world that was able to count its disengaged + tonnage twice over every day, and in which lean charters were snapped up + by cable three months in advance, there were no chances of fortune for + an individual wandering haphazard with a little bark--hardly indeed any + room to exist.
+ +He found it more difficult from year to year. He suffered greatly from + the smallness of remittances he was able to send his daughter. Meantime + he had given up good cigars, and even in the matter of inferior cheroots + limited himself to six a day. He never told her of his difficulties, and + she never enlarged upon her struggle to live. Their confidence in each + other needed no explanations, and their perfect understanding endured + without protestations of gratitude or regret. He would have been shocked + if she had taken it into her head to thank him in so many words, but + he found it perfectly natural that she should tell him she needed two + hundred pounds.
+ +He had come in with the Fair Maid in ballast to look for a freight in + the Sofala's port of registry, and her letter met him there. Its tenor + was that it was no use mincing matters. Her only resource was in opening + a boarding-house, for which the prospects, she judged, were good. Good + enough, at any rate, to make her tell him frankly that with two hundred + pounds she could make a start. He had torn the envelope open, hastily, + on deck, where it was handed to him by the ship-chandler's runner, who + had brought his mail at the moment of anchoring. For the second time + in his life he was appalled, and remained stock-still at the cabin door + with the paper trembling between his fingers. Open a boarding-house! Two + hundred pounds for a start! The only resource! And he did not know where + to lay his hands on two hundred pence.
+ +All that night Captain Whalley walked the poop of his anchored ship, as + though he had been about to close with the land in thick weather, and + uncertain of his position after a run of many gray days without a sight + of sun, moon, or stars. The black night twinkled with the guiding lights + of seamen and the steady straight lines of lights on shore; and all + around the Fair Maid the riding lights of ships cast trembling trails + upon the water of the roadstead. Captain Whalley saw not a gleam + anywhere till the dawn broke and he found out that his clothing was + soaked through with the heavy dew.
+ +His ship was awake. He stopped short, stroked his wet beard, and + descended the poop ladder backwards, with tired feet. At the sight + of him the chief officer, lounging about sleepily on the quarterdeck, + remained open-mouthed in the middle of a great early-morning yawn.
+ +"Good morning to you," pronounced Captain Whalley solemnly, passing into + the cabin. But he checked himself in the doorway, and without looking + back, "By the bye," he said, "there should be an empty wooden case put + away in the lazarette. It has not been broken up--has it?"
+ +The mate shut his mouth, and then asked as if dazed, "What empty case, + sir?"
+ +"A big flat packing-case belonging to that painting in my room. Let it + be taken up on deck and tell the carpenter to look it over. I may want + to use it before long."
+ +The chief officer did not stir a limb till he had heard the door of the + captain's state-room slam within the cuddy. Then he beckoned aft the + second mate with his forefinger to tell him that there was something "in + the wind."
+ +When the bell rang Captain Whalley's authoritative voice boomed out + through a closed door, "Sit down and don't wait for me." And his + impressed officers took their places, exchanging looks and whispers + across the table. What! No breakfast? And after apparently knocking + about all night on deck, too! Clearly, there was something in the wind. + In the skylight above their heads, bowed earnestly over the plates, + three wire cages rocked and rattled to the restless jumping of the + hungry canaries; and they could detect the sounds of their "old + man's" deliberate movements within his state-room. Captain Whalley was + methodically winding up the chronometers, dusting the portrait of + his late wife, getting a clean white shirt out of the drawers, making + himself ready in his punctilious unhurried manner to go ashore. He could + not have swallowed a single mouthful of food that morning. He had made + up his mind to sell the Fair Maid.
+