A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

In the Sargasso Sea

T >> Thomas A. Janvier >> In the Sargasso Sea




It was as we were leaving the machine-shop to continue our round of
investigations that my cat suddenly took it into his head to jump down
from my shoulders and stretch his own legs a little; and away he
scampered--being much given to such frisking dashes, as I later
discovered, though for the next week or so after that one he went
limping on three legs mighty soberly--first down the deck aft, and
then past me and up a dark passage leading toward the bows; and I,
being pretty well accustomed to cat habits, stood waiting until he
should have his fun out and so come back again with a miau by way of
"if you please" to be taken up into my arms. But he did not come back
in any great hurry, and off in the darkness I could hear his paws
padding about briskly; and then there was silence for a moment; and
then he broke out into a loud miauling which showed that he was in
trouble of some sort and also in pain.

As there was no helping him until I could see what was the matter with
him, I hurried first into the machine-shop for a wrench, and then went
forward into that dark place cautiously--until by a glint of light on
the ship's side I made out where a port was, and so got loose the
deadlight and could look around. What I saw was my poor cat in such a
pickle that I did not in the least blame him for crying out about it;
he having, as it seemed, made an unlucky jump upon some small bars of
iron which were lying loose and disorderly, with the one on which he
landed balanced so nicely that it had turned suddenly and jammed fast
his paw. And so he was anchored there very painfully, and was telling
what he thought about it in the most piercing yowls.

Fortunately it was an easy matter to let him loose from the trap that
he had got into; but even while I was doing it--and before I picked
him up to look at his hurt and to comfort him--I gave a shout of
delight on my own account that was a good deal louder than any of my
poor cat's yells of pain. For there before me was a very stout-looking
and large steam-launch--thirty-two feet over all, as I found when I
came to measure her--stowed snugly in a cradle set athwart-ship and
looking all ready to be put overboard into the sea. And at finding in
this unexpected fashion what I had been so long looking for, and had
quite done with hoping for, it is no wonder that I shouted with joy.

My cat coming limping to me to be pitied and cared for, holding up his
pinched paw and with little miaus asking for my sympathy quite like a
Christian, I had first of all to give him my attention. But his hurt
was not a very serious one--the flesh not being cut, and no bones
broken--and when I had comforted him as well as I could, until I got
him soothed a little, I put him down out of my arms that I might
examine carefully my great prize; but first of all opening all the
ports so that I might have plenty of light for what I wanted to do.

Coming to this deliberate survey, I found that the launch truly enough
was complete, but that she was very far from being ready to take the
water; for while all her parts were there--and even duplicates of her
more important pieces, in readiness against a break-down--most of her
fittings and all of her machinery was lying inside of her boxed for
transportation; being arranged that way, I suppose, because she would
have been far too heavy to swing into the snug place where I found her
and out again with everything bolted fast. She was a very beautiful
little boat, evidently intended for a pleasure craft--but very strong
and seaworthy, too; and it no doubt was to keep her in good order for
delivery that she had been stowed between-decks for the long voyage.
Indeed, only with a steam-winch and a good many men to handle her,
could she have been got down there; and the first of my uncomfortable
thoughts about her, of the many that I had first and last, came while
I was taking stock of her equipment--as I fell to wondering how in the
world I should manage, with only a cat to help me, ever to get her
overboard into the sea.

As to assembling her parts, and so making her ready for cruising, I
had no doubts whatever. That piece of work was directly in the line
of my training and I felt entirely secure about it; but even on that
score I quaked a good deal at the size of the contract to be taken by
a single pair of hands, and at thought of the long, long while that
would be required to carry it through. Yet the hope that came with
finding this boat put such heart into me that my spirits did not go
down far. Working on her--aside from the pleasure that any man with a
natural love for mechanics finds in serious and difficult labor with
his hands--would be a constant delight to me because of what it would
be leading to; and in every moment of my work I would have to sustain
me the thought that each rivet set in place and each bolt fastened
brought me appreciably nearer to being set free.

Having cursorily finished with the boat, I continued my survey to her
surroundings; that I might plan roughly my scheme of work upon her,
and that I might plan also for getting her launched when my work upon
her should be done. She was stowed on the main-deck--in a place that
probably was intended for the use of third-class passengers, when such
were carried--and the machine-shop was so close to her that in the
matter of fetching tools and so on my steps would be well saved.
Directly over her was the forward hatch; through which she had been
lowered and set in place in the cradle previously made ready for her,
and there fixed firm and fast. For a moment I had the fancy that I
might get up steam to work the donkey-engine and so hoist her out
again by that same way, and overboard too. But a very little
reflection showed me that this airily formed plan must be abandoned,
as all my work on her then would have to be done far away from the
machine-shop and with the additional disadvantage that through the
long time that certainly must pass before I could get her finished she
would lie open to the daily heavy rains. And then I had the much more
reasonable notion--though the amount of extra labor that it involved
was not encouraging to contemplate--that I would do my work on her
where she lay; and when I had finished her that I would cut loose a
sufficient number of plates from the side of the steamer to make a
hole big enough to get her overboard that way.

But having the hatch directly over where she was lying, though I could
not get her up through it, made my undertaking a good deal easier and
more comfortable for me. Even with all the ports open I would have had
but little light to work by; and, what was of even more importance in
that hot misty region, I would have had little fresh air--and still
less when I had set a-going my forge. But with the hatch off I could
have all the light that I needed and as much fresh air as was to be
had--with the advantage that the hatch could be set in place every
night when I went off duty and not opened again in the morning until
the rain was at an end: so preserving my machinery against the rust
that pretty much would have ruined it--for all that it was well
tallowed--had my slow building gone on in the open air.

My preliminary investigations being thus well ended, and the morning
ended too, I piped all hands to dinner; that is to say, I whistled to
my cat--who had been sitting still and watching me pretty solemnly,
his friskiness being for the time taken out of him by the pain in his
paw--and when he perceived that I was paying some attention to him
again he came limping to me on his three good legs and said with a
miau that if I pleased he would prefer going to his dinner in my arms.
And when I picked him up--as, indeed, I had to, for he positively
insisted upon my carrying him--he forgot about his hurt and fell to
purring to me at a great rate and to making little gentle thrusts
against my arm with the fore paw that was sound. And so we went aft in
great friendship and contentment and had a gay dinner together: the
cat sitting on the table opposite to me with all possible decorum--but
manifesting his daintiness by refusing to eat anything but tinned
chicken, and only the white meat at that!





XXXIV

I END A GOOD JOB WELL, AND GET A SET-BACK


When my meal was finished I set myself first of all to getting off the
hatch beneath which my boat lay; and this proved to be a bigger job
than I had counted upon--each of its sections being so heavy that I
could not manage it without tackle, and even with tackle the work took
me a good hour. My plan of operations had included removing the hatch
every morning and setting it back again every night, but when I found
how much energy and time would be wasted in that way I changed my
front a little and got at the same result along another line. All that
I needed was a covering for the hatch that would keep the rain out;
and what I did, therefore, was to knock together a light grating of
wood to fit over it--sloping the grating downward on each side from a
sort of a ridge pole--on which a tarpaulin could be stretched; and in
that way I got shortly to a water-tight covering for my hatch that I
could shift back and forth quickly and without any trouble at all. But
the whole of what remained of the afternoon was spent in getting
that piece of preliminary work finished to my mind.

The next morning I set myself to the examination of the stuff stowed
in the boat--the several parts which I would have to put together in
order to make my craft ready for the sea--and for this job also a
great deal of preliminary arrangement was required. Many of the
pieces--as the boiler, the cylinder, the shaft, the screw, and the
sections of the cabin--were too heavy for me to lift without tackle;
and as they all had to be got out and arranged in order ready for use,
and then in due course put aboard the boat one at a time in their
proper places, I first of all had to set up some sort of lifting
apparatus to take the place of a crane.

In this matter the open hatch directly over the boat again was a help
to me. Across it, running fore and aft, I stretched a heavy wire rope
on which I had placed a big block for a traveller, and carrying the
end of the rope forward to the capstan I fell to work with the
hand-bars and got it strained so taut that it was like a bar of iron.
Then to the traveller block I made fast my hoisting tackle--and so was
able to swing up the heavy pieces from where they were stowed, and to
run them along the taut rope until they were clear of the boat on
either side, and then to let them down upon the deck: where they would
remain until a reversal of this process would lift them up again and
set them in place as they were required. But even with my tackle--and
double tackle in the case of the heavier pieces--this was a
back-breaking job that took up the whole of three days.

However, I finished it at last, and had the boat clear and all the
pieces so arranged that as I needed them they would be ready to my
hand; and the examination that I was able to make of them, and of the
boat too after I had her empty, gave very satisfactory results. All
the parts were there, and all numbered so carefully that they could
have been assembled by much less skilful hands than mine; while the
hull of the boat was completely finished, and the sockets and
rivet-holes for attaching her fittings were all as they should be in
her frame. Farther, I could see by the little scratches here and there
on her iron-work that she had been set up and then taken apart again;
and so was sure that all was smooth for her coming together in the
right way. But, for all that I had such plain sailing before me in the
actual work of refitting her, my courage went down a little as I
perceived what a big contract I had taken, and what a very long time
must pass before I could pull it through.

Moreover, I saw that while the boat was well built for pleasure
cruising in smooth water--and, indeed, was so stout in her frame that
she would stand a great deal of knocking about without being the
worse for it--she by no means was prepared for the chances of an ocean
voyage. Except where her little cabin and engine-room would be--the
two filling about half of her length amidships--she was entirely open;
and while the frame of her cabin was stoutly built, that part of it
intended to rise above the rail was arranged for sliding glass
windows--which would be smashed in a moment by a heavy dash of sea. It
was clear, therefore, that in addition to setting her up on the lines
planned for her--a big job and a long job to start with--there was a
lot more for me to do. To fit her for my purposes it would be
necessary to cover her cabin windows with planking; to deck her over
forward in order to have my stores under cover as well as to guard
against shipping enough water to swamp her in rough weather; and
finally to rig her with a mast and sail upon which to fall back for
motive-power in the event of my running out of coal. This additional
work would not, in one way, present any difficulties--it being in
itself simple and easy of accomplishment; but in another way it was
not pleasant to contemplate, since the doing of it all single-handed
would increase very greatly the time which must pass before I could
start upon my voyage. However, as consideration of that phase of the
matter only tended to discourage me, I put it out of sight as well as
I was able and set myself with a will to finishing my preliminary
work--of which there still was a good deal to do.

The steamer's machine-shop, as I have said, was unusually well fitted
and supplied; but even in the short time that the vessel had been
lying abandoned in that reeking atmosphere rust had so coated
everything not shut up in lockers that all the tools in the racks and
the fittings of the lathe--although the lathe had an oil-cloth hood
over it--had to be cleaned before they could be used: a job that kept
me busy with the grind-stone, and emery-cloth, and oiled cotton-waste,
for a good long while. And after that I had to get the forge in order,
and to bring up fuel for it from the coal bunkers. And in attending to
all these various matters the time slipped away so quickly that a
whole week had passed before I had done.

But I must say that as the cat and I labored together--though his
labors were confined to cheering me by following me about on three
legs wherever I went, and pretty much all the while talking to me in
his way so that I should not fail to take notice of him--I got more
and more light-hearted; which was natural enough, seeing that what I
was doing in itself interested me and so made the time pass quickly,
and that I had also a great swelling undercurrent of hope as I
thought of what my slow-going work would bring me to in the end.

When at last I fairly got started at my building I was in a still
more cheerful mood--there being such a sense of definite
accomplishment as I set each piece in its place, and such a comfort in
the tangible advance that I was making, that half the time I was
singing as I made my bolts and rivets fast. But for all my
cheerfulness I had a plenty of trouble over what I was doing; and I
was sorry enough that I had not somebody beside my cat to help me, or
that I myself had not another pair or two of hands.

Almost at the start, when I began to swing the pieces of machinery
inboard, I found that I had still another bit of preliminary work to
attend to before I could go on. My travelling tackle crossing the boat
amidships had worked well enough in getting the stuff out of her, but
when I came to hoisting the parts aboard and setting them exactly in
their places, and holding them steady while I made fast the rivets, it
would not in any way serve my turn. What I had to do was to stretch
another wire rope across the hatch--at right angles with and a couple
of feet above the first one, and parallel with the boat's keel--and to
rig on this two travellers, to one or the other of which I could
transfer each piece as I got it inboard and so run it along until I
had it exactly over the place where it was to be made fast. But I was
a whole day in attending to this matter--and it was only one of the
many makeshifts to which I had to resort to accomplish what was too
much for my unaided strength; and in meeting such like side
difficulties I lost in all a good many days.

But though my work went very slowly, and now and then was stopped
short for a while by some obstacle that had to be overcome in any
rough and ready way that I could think of, I did get on; and at last I
had my boat together on the lines that her builders had planned. Yet
while, in a way, she was finished, there still was a weary lot to do
to her to fit her for my purposes; and in decking her over, and in
making her cabin solid, and in fitting a mast and sail to her, I spent
almost two months more.

All this work went slowly because I had to spend nearly as much time
in making ready for what I wanted to do as in doing it. Before I began
my planking I had to rip up from the steamer's deck the material for
it; and this was a hard job in itself and did not give me what I
wanted when it was done--for while the stuff served well enough for my
beams and braces it was clumsily heavy for the decking of my little
launch. But it had to answer, and in the end I got it well in place
and the joints so tightly caulked that I was sure of having a dry
hold. And that my deck might the more easily turn the water in a sea
way I made it flush with the rail; and I had no hatch in
it--arranging to get to the hold by a scuttle that I set in the
forward end of the cabin--and that gave me a still better chance of
keeping dry below.

For my mast I got down one of the top-gallant masts--and I had a close
shave to coming down with it and so ending my adventures right there.
The best way that I could think of to manage this piece of work--and I
have not since thought of any way better--was to make fast a line to
the lower end of the top-gallant mast just above the cap of the
topmast and to carry this line through the top-block and so down to
the deck, and there to pass it through another block to the capstan
and haul it taut and stop it; and when all that was in order, and the
stays cut, to get up into the cross-trees and saw through the spar
just below where I had whipped it with my line. My expectation was
that as the spar parted and fell it would be held hanging by my tackle
until I could get down to the deck again and lower it away; and that
really was what did happen--only as it fell there was a bit of slack
line to take up, and this gave such a tremendous jerk to the
cross-trees that I was within an ace of being shaken out of them and
of going down to the deck with a bang. But I didn't--which is the main
thing--and I did get my mast. It was a good deal heavier than my boat
could stand, and I had to spend a couple of days in taking it down
with a broad-axe and in finishing it with a plane until I got it as it
should be; and from the flag-staff at the steamer's stern I got out
with very little trouble a good boom and gaff.

After that I had only my sail to fit; and as I did not trouble myself
to make a very neat job of it this did not take me long. Indeed, I
grudged the time that I spent on my mast and sail--close upon a
fortnight, altogether--more than any like amount of time that I gave
to my task; for my hope was strong that I would not need a sail at
all, but would be able to manage--by a way that I had thought of--to
carry enough coal with me to make my voyage under steam. But I was not
leaving anything to chance--so far as chances could be foreseen--in
the adventure that I was about to make, and so I got my sail-power all
ready to fall back upon in case my steam-power failed. And when that
bit of work was finished I was full of a joyful light-heartedness; for
my boat in every way was ready for the water, and I was come at last
to the good ending of my long job.

That night I made a feast in celebration of what I had accomplished,
and in hope of my greater good fortune that I believed was soon to
come--with a place duly set on the opposite side of the table for my
only guest, and with a champagne-glass beside his plate to hold his
unsweetened condensed milk (for which, when I found it among the
ship's stores, he manifested a strong partiality) that he might lap
properly his responses to the toasts which I pledged him in
champagne. And I don't suppose that a man and a cat ever had a merrier
meal anywhere than we had in that queer place for it that evening; nor
that any two friends ever were happier together than we were when, our
feast being ended, he went through his various tricks--of which he had
learned a great many, and with a wonderful quickness, after his paw
got well--and then settled himself for a snooze on my lap while I sat
smoking my cigar and thinking that at last I had sawn through
my prison bars.

And it was while I was sitting in that state of placid happiness that
suddenly I was brought up all standing by the reflection--and why it
had not come sooner to me is a mystery--that a dozen turns of the
screw of my launch in that weed-covered ocean would be enough to foul
it hopelessly, and so at the very start to cut short the voyage under
steam that I had planned.





XXXV

I AM READY FOR A FRESH HAZARD OF FORTUNE


For a while after this black thought came to me I was pretty much
beaten by it; but when I got steadier--and had finished kicking myself
for a fool because I had not foreseen it all along--I perceived that
the odds were not wholly against me, after all. I had, at least, a
sea-worthy boat in which to make my venture, and therefore was as well
off as I had hoped to be when I had set about looking for one; and if
the plan that I had formed worked out in practice--if I could manage
to force a passage through the tangle by alternately working over the
bow of my boat to break up the weed, and over the sides to pole my
boat forward--I was a great deal better off than I had hoped to be:
for should I win my way to open water I would have steam as well as
sail power at my command.

But while this more reasonable view of the situation comforted me, it
did not satisfy me. The difficulty of working myself along in that
slow fashion I foresaw would be so enormous that I very well might die
of sheer exhaustion before I got clear of the weed-tangle--which
must extend outward, as I knew from my guess at the time that I had
taken in drifting in through it, for a very long way. What I had been
counting upon ever since I had found the launch was in having part of
the work, and the heaviest part, done by her engine; my part to be the
breaking of a passage, while the motive power was to be supplied by
the screw. But of course if the screw fouled, as it certainly would
foul with the loose weed all around it, that would be the end of my
hopeful plan.

This consideration of the matter reduced it to a definite problem.
What was needed was some sort of protection for the screw that would
keep the weed away from it and yet would allow it to work freely: and,
having the case thus clearly stated, the thought presently occurred to
me that I could secure this protection by building out from the stern
of the boat, so that the screw would be enclosed in it, some sort of
an iron cage. That arrangement, I conceived, would meet the
requirements of the case fully; and being come to my conclusion I
resigned myself to still another long delay while I carried my plan
into execution, and so went to bed at last hopefully--but well knowing
that this fresh piece of work that I had cut out for myself would be
hard to do.

I certainly did not overestimate the amount of labor involved in my
cage-building. I was a good three weeks over it. But I was kept up to
the collar by my conviction that without the cage I had no chance of
succeeding in my project; and so I got it finished at last. And then I
considered that my boat really was ready to take the water; and the
cat and I had another banquet in celebration of the long step that we
had taken toward our deliverance--only this time I did not give an
altogether free rein to my rejoicing, being fearful that some other
difficulty might present itself suddenly and bring me up again with a
round turn.

The boat being ready--for I could think of nothing more to do to
her--I had still to launch her, and the first step toward that end was
breaking out a section in the steamer's side. Luckily the stock of
cold-chisels aboard the _Ville de Saint Remy_ was a good one; but I
dulled them all twice over--and weary work at the grindstone I had
sharpening them again--before I had chipped away the bindings of those
endless rivets and had the satisfaction of seeing the big section of
iron plate between two of her iron ribs pitch outboard and splash down
through the weed into the sea.

As I have said, the bow compartment of the steamer was full of water,
and this brought her main-deck so low down forward that the boat had
only to be slid out almost on a level through the hole that I had
made. But to slide her that way--which seems easy, because I have
happened to put it glibly--was quite a different thing. With steam
power to work the capstan I could have got the boat overboard in no
time; but without steam power the launching went desperately slowly,
and was altogether the hardest piece of work that I had to do in the
whole of my long hard job.

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