Chapter II · A CONSULTATION.

Jake was in the galley making preparations for dinner when Ben entered, and he was trying to do so many things at the same time that it surely seemed as if it would be out of the question for him to give proper attention to even the most simple proposition. Bread-making was apparently the important one of his varied duties, for he continued to knead the dough some time after one of the pots on the range had protested against his neglect by allowing a portion of its contents to boil over with an angry hiss and smother of steam.

Ben was too much excited by the brief story Gertrude had told to be willing to wait until a more convenient season before asking the cook’s advice. While Jake worked he repeated what he had heard, adding many comments of his own, until, before he concluded the brief recital, the bread-maker had paused with his arms in the flour to the elbows and an expression of mingled anger and pity on his face.

“I’ve heard of people trainin’ children to walk on a tight-rope an’ all them monkey shines, but I never more’n half-believed such yarns till now. There’s one blessed thing though, which is that Mr. Whiskers won’t rig anything here for that poor little girl to fall from, for Captain Jack Irwin ain’t the kind of a man to allow such capers.”

“But he can do whatever he pleases when we get to Mexico, Jake, and that’s what we ought to look out for.”

“I declare, I don’t see how it can be done, my boy,” and Jake leaned over the bread-pan, wholly oblivious of the many half-cooked articles of food which required his attention. The dough was allowed to mix itself with more flour than was consistent with lightness, the pots and pans seemed bent on a regular boycott of their contents, and the passengers and crew of the Sea Queen were in great danger of being deprived of their dinner owing to the very deep study into which the cook had so suddenly been plunged.

“Why not tell Captain Irwin all about it and get him to take the little girl away from that man?”

“It would be a ticklish kind of business, ’cause you see he’s her step-father, even if she don’t call him so, an’ could put the law right onto anybody who tried to take her away.”

“But you don’t mean to say that you sha’n’t do anything toward helping the poor little thing?” Ben cried excitedly.

“Of course not. We’ve got plenty of time to fix up some sort of a plan, an’ he won’t dare be very rough to her while he’s on board. Bless my eyes! Here’s this dinner pretty nigh spoiled on account of my yarnin’ with you. Get aft where you belong, an’ I’ll see you again to-night.”

From the conflict that was going on between the water which was boiling over from the kettles, and the fire, it was easy for Ben to understand that it would be to the advantage of all on board, so far as dinner was concerned, if the cook was left alone for a while, therefore he went aft as Jake had requested.

The Sea Queen was now well down in the lower bay, rising and falling on the gentle swell as if practising that she might be ready to dance on the boisterous waves of the ocean just beyond. The sailors were loosing, hoisting and sheeting home the canvas preparatory to dispensing with the services of the tug, and on both steamer and schooner Ben found quite as much confusion, although of a different kind, as he had left in the galley. No one paid any attention to him, and not until Jake called to remind him it was time to be laying the cabin-table for dinner, did he even so much as think of his work.

He had expected to see Gertrude on deck when her step-father came out of the cabin about ten minutes after the consultation with Jake was brought to a close; but she did not appear until he knocked on the door to announce that dinner was ready.

While Ben was waiting upon the table he had many opportunities of exchanging glances with the little girl who had succeeded so well in enlisting his sympathies, and it pleased him wonderfully, because she seemed to consider him her friend. He was decidedly puzzled before the meal was finished by hearing Captain Irwin address the man as “Dr. Harlan,” and he could not understand how it was that Gertrude did not bear the same name as her step-father.

By the time he had taken away the dishes and set the cabin to rights, he no longer cared to speculate upon any question, for the Sea Queen, having parted company with the tug, was climbing up one wave and sliding down another in a manner that made him feel very uncomfortable in the region of the stomach.

“I can’t stay in the cabin any longer,” he said in reply to a question of the cook’s, as he sat on the deck with his back against the galley, his white face telling quite as plainly as words could have done, of the very disagreeable sensations which were rapidly overpowering him. “I feel just the same as I did that first night Jim an’ me were on board the Clitie.”

“You’ll get over it quicker than you did then,” Jake said consolingly. “These short seas make the old hooker jump around pretty lively, an’ she has shaken you up a bit, that’s all. I’ll look out for things aft, an’ you do whatever you think will make you feel the most comfortable.”

Then Ben gave himself wholly up to the malady which was assailing him, paying no attention to anything save his own discomfort for nearly two hours, when Jake, who had not come out of the cabin, said:

“There’s one good thing about all this bobbery, which is that Dr. Harlan, as he calls hisself, is about as sick a man as I ever heard of. He’s goin’ on dreadful in his state-room, an’ I hope he’ll keep so till we bring up in the gulf. The little girl is as chipper as a sparrer; she’s alongside of Bill Barlow, who’s takin’ his trick at the wheel, her brown hair a-flyin’ an’ her eyes a-sparklin’ like a Mother Carey’s chicken enjoyin’ the tumble.”

Ben had been so deeply occupied with the disagreeable affair which had prevented him from performing his duties as cabin-boy, that he had given no heed to anything around him until Jake made this last remark, and then it was with a feeling very nearly like shame that he looked aft at Gertie, who was apparently extracting a great deal of enjoyment from that which so distressed him. He understood that his present appearance was hardly calculated to give the idea that he could aid her in escaping from the life which her step-father evidently intended she should lead, and as he had fully made up his mind he would be her protector, it was necessary to assume a more dignified air and position.

“If she ain’t sick I don’t see why I should be when I’ve been on vessels a good deal more’n she has,” he said, as he staggered to his feet, catching hold of the mainstay to prevent himself from falling.

“Well, you see, there’s a difference in people,” Jake said in a philosophic tone. “I reckon you’ll get your sea-legs on right quick if you move around a bit, an’ the best thing you can do is to go aft an’ talk with her. You’ll feel well enough if you keep your mind away from your stomach, for its only when the two get chumming together that folks are sick.”

Ben did not understand this line of argument; but he went aft, impelled to do so by pride rather than the cook’s advice.

“Look pleasant or she’ll think you’re dyin’,” Jake said in a hoarse whisper, when the cabin-boy crept slowly along, clinging to the rail, as if fearing he might be thrown overboard, and the latter did his best to act upon the suggestion by wrinkling his face into that which he hoped would resemble a smile.

“Why, what’s the matter?” Gertie asked solicitously, as she left the helmsman’s side to aid her disconsolate-looking friend.

“I—I—you see I’m not feeling very well,” Ben managed to say after many a gasp and inward shudder. “I don’t think it’s nice to have the vessel jump around so, do you?”

“It seems perfectly splendid. Does it make you sick?”

“Well—I—yes, just a little,” and Ben clutched the rail yet more frantically as the Sea Queen’s bow divided a huge wave which sent the spray in showers over the weather side.

“But I thought sailors never got that way,” Gertie said in surprise.

“I don’t ’spose they do, but you see I’m not a whole one yet. After we get back from Mexico I guess I won’t mind these kind of waves any more’n Jake does. Ain’t you feeling bad a little bit?”

“Not the same as you do. If it was Mrs. Martin I was going away with I’d be as happy as a bird; but when I think of what he will make me do after we leave this vessel, it seems as if I oughtn’t ever laugh.”

“Don’t you worry about that,” Ben said as he tried very hard to appear brave, but succeeded only in looking as if he was growing more ill. “Jake will help me, an’ we’ll find some way to keep him from makin’ you walk on a rope.”

“I’m afraid you can’t,” she replied with a sigh. “You don’t know how cruel and strong he is.”

“We’ll fix it somehow,” Ben said confidently; and then, in answer to her questions, he told of his life in Savannah, of little Jim, toward whom he had tried to act the part of sister, as well as of the plans he had formed for the future, until suddenly he became aware that the nausea had departed, leaving him in a condition to attend to his duties once more.

He was not one who would willingly neglect his work, and knowing he was surely needed in the galley if not in the cabin, went forward, after assuring Gertie that with Jake’s assistance he would devise some plan to prevent Dr. Harlan from forcing her to become a tight-rope performer.

Before the second meal had been eaten, the deck of the Sea Queen was neither a pleasant nor a comfortable place. The wind had increased in force until Jake gravely told Ben that “there was danger the captain’s whiskers would be carried away;” and every now and then the top of a green wave would come rolling in over the bow as if determined to bury the schooner.

As a matter of course, Gertie was obliged to remain below, and since it was difficult to sit on the lockers which served as chairs, she had gone directly to her state-room, thereby preventing Ben from holding any conversation with her while attending to his duties in the cabin. He could talk with Jake, however, and in a snug corner of the galley, after the labors of the day were ended, the would-be protectors of Dr. Harlan’s step-daughter tried to form some mutually agreeable plan of action.

“I’ve been turnin’ this matter over in my mind all the afternoon,” Jake said thoughtfully, when he had lighted his pipe and puffed vigorously until he was confident the tobacco was well on fire, “but I can’t seem to think of but one thing we could do, an’ even that depends on the way the captain takes it.”

“Tell me about it,” and Ben pushed himself more closely into the corner lest the violent tossing of the vessel should throw him forward onto the stove.

“I don’t know as it’ll amount to anything, but here it is. You see the schooner is to put into Key West, an’ we’ll likely be there two or three days. Now, if you an’ me could make that blessed doctor think as how as we was goin’ to stay a week or more, he might go pryin’ round the island till we gave him the slip, an’ then we would carry the little girl to the folks in New York.”

“If we only could do that!” Ben exclaimed, delighted with the originality as well as the simplicity of the plan.

“There’s but one thing as stands in the way,” Jake replied with the air of a man who feels that he could devise more brilliant schemes if the necessity should arise.

“What is it?”

“The captain mightn’t be willin’ to leave a passenger what has paid his fare.”

Ben’s face clouded as this flaw in the otherwise perfect plan was pointed out by the originator, and his spirits fell as rapidly as they had been raised. He felt quite positive that Captain Irwin would not sail without his passengers, and already did he begin to despair of being able to fulfil his promise.

“Howsomever,” Jake said, after a long and painful pause, “we don’t know that he won’t do what we want, an’ we’ve got plenty of time to think up some plan if this falls through, so the best thing we can do is to turn in before the old hooker tumbles around so lively that we can’t get over the side of our bunk.”

It was several days before Ben found an opportunity to have any further conversation on the subject which was ever present in his mind. The wind which the Sea Queen had met so soon after leaving port was decidedly heavier than a summer breeze, and the schooner was tossed about at such a violent rate on the angry waters, that the cabin-boy’s time was so fully occupied as to preclude the possibility of anything save the briefest interviews with Jake.

In the meantime Dr. Harlan had recovered sufficiently from his indisposition to be able to spend the greater portion of each day in the saloon, and to the surprise and disappointment of Ben, he insisted that Gertie should remain with him, singing such songs as appeared to strike his fancy.

“I can’t make it out at all,” Master Clark said on the afternoon of the fifth day, when the gale had so nearly abated that it was pleasant to be on deck. He was holding another consultation with Jake, and had given a detailed account of how the passengers were employed.

“I reckon the captain knows all about it. He was in the galley late last night while I was fixin’ up a lunch for him an’ the first mate, an’ here’s what he told me he’d got from the man himself. This ’ere doctor ain’t no doctor at all, but jest goes round selling quack medicines—he’s got a whole raft of ’em on board now. He’s found out that we’re likely to be in Key West some time, an’ he told Captain Irwin as how he was goin’ on shore to see what he could do in the way of business. Now, it’s my idea, an’ the mate thinks the same thing, that he’s goin’ to take the girl with him so’s she can sing on the street to attract a crowd—you can make up your mind that’s why he wants to start her rope-walkin’. I’ve seen them kind of dodges lots of times, an’ a pretty little thing like her would draw twice as many people as ever he could.”

“He wouldn’t dare try to make her do anything like that!” Ben cried indignantly; but even as he spoke it could easily be seen by the expression of his face that he feared the cook had told the truth.

“Why shouldn’t he dare? Ain’t he her nateral guardian now her mother’s dead, an’ can’t he make her do whatever he chooses?”

“But won’t Captain Irwin stop him?” Ben asked.

“How can he? He says he’d like to interfere, but it wouldn’t do any good. Even if he could get her out of the scrape by goin’ to the officers of the law, he can’t afford to keep the vessel layin’ idle.”

“Isn’t it possible for us to do something, Jake?”

“I’m afraid not, my boy. Even the chance of leavin’ the quack doctor behind will be knocked in the head if he takes her on shore with him.”

“She’ll cry her eyes out if that has to be done. She’s scared of him now, an’ what will she do if she’s got to sing on the street? It wouldn’t be so awfully jolly for a rough feller like me, an’ it’ll use her all up.”

“I s’pose it will, but I don’t see how we can help her,” and Jake returned to his work, while Ben, his heart full of grief because of the suffering in store for his little friend, stood by the cabin-door listening to the childish voice which even now sounded strained and weary as it repeated again and again an air which the doctor probably intended should be sung in public.