Thrice Armed

Jimmy climbed on board the schooner, and, descending to the little cabin, found his father lying propped up in his bunk. His eyes were more watery than ever, and when he spoke his voice was a trifle thick. The light of the fish-oil lamp projected his worn face blackly in gaunt profile on the bulkhead.

"Been talking to Jordan? He's a man to make friends with," he said. "Guess he and the other young ones with blood and grit in them are going to set their mark on this country. It mayn't count against you if you leave the mail-boats, Jimmy. Manhood stands first here, though my day has gone. Perhaps I fooled my chances, or didn't see them when they came. But you're going to be smarter; you have red blood and brains."

Jimmy said nothing. He had noticed already that Tom Wheelock had fallen into a habit of inconsequent rambling, and there were times when it pained him to listen. The old man, who did not seem to notice his silence, went on:

"You got them from your mother, as Eleanor has done. She died – and I'm often thankful – before the bad days came. Guess it would break her heart if she could see her husband now, a played-out, broken man, with a bond on which he can't pay the interest on his last vessel. Maybe things would have been different if she had lived. I was never smart at business – I am a sailorman – and it was your mother who showed me how to build the fleet up and save the money to buy each new boat. When you went to sea we had four of them. Now they're all gone. The last was the Fish-hawk, and she lies in six fathoms where she drove across the Qualyclot reef with her starboard bilge ground in."

"Merril doesn't own the Tyee yet," said Jimmy.

"No," said Wheelock drowsily; "but unless you know enough to stop him he's going to. You'll have nothing, Jimmy, when I'm gone; but you'll remember it was that man squeezed the blood out of me. Anyway, it won't be long. I'm played out, and kind of tired of it all. Couldn't worry through without your mother. Never was smart at business – I am a sailorman. It was she who made me boss of the Wheelock fleet, and now I guess she's waiting for the old and broken man."

His elbow slipped from under him, and, falling back, he lay inert and silent, with eyes that slowly closed, and his face showing very gaunt and unhealthily pallid in patches under the fish-oil lamp. There was no longer any suggestion of strength in it, for dejection had slackened his mental grip as indulgence had sapped the vigor of his body. Jimmy Wheelock, who remembered what his father had been, felt a haze creep across his eyes as he gazed at him, and then a sudden thrill of anger seemed to fill his blood with fire. Merril, who held a bond on the Tyee, had, it seemed, a good deal to answer for.

CHAPTER IV

IN THE TOILS

It was a month later when Jimmy Wheelock stood leaning on the Tyee's rail one morning, while she lay alongside a sawmill wharf at Vancouver. The Siwash deck-hand had left them, and Jimmy, who had done his work, was very hot and grimy after trimming ballast in the hold. He and Prescott were waiting for another few loads of it, and expected that the Tyee would go to sea shortly after they got them. This, however, was by no means certain, since a surveyor had come on board a few days ago, and Tom Wheelock, who had been summoned to Merril's office, had not yet come back.

It was then about eleven o'clock, and the broad Inlet sparkled in a blaze of sunshine, with a fresh breeze that came off from the black pine forests crisping it into little splashing ripples. Jimmy was glad of the chill of it on his dripping face, and as grateful for the respite from toil with the shovel, as he gazed at the climbing city. It rose with the dark pines creeping close up to it, ridged with mazy wires and towering poles, roof above roof, up the low rise, and the air was filled with the sound of its activity. A train of ponderous freight-cars rolled clanging along the wharf; a great locomotive with tolling bell was backing more cars in; and the scream of saws rang stridently through the clatter of the winches as Empress liner and sound steamer hove their cargo in. Jimmy Wheelock had, of course, gazed upon a similar scene in other ports, but there was, he seemed to feel, a difference here.

In this new land the toiler was not bound by iron laws of caste and custom forever to his toil. The Mountain Province was awakening to a recognition of its wealth, and there was room in it and to spare for men with brains as well as men with muscle. There were forests to be cleared, roads to be built, and mine adits to be driven, and nobody troubled himself greatly about the antecedents of his hired hand. If the latter professed himself able to do what was required of him, he was, as they say in that country, given a show. Jimmy also knew that where all were ready to attempt the impossible, and toiled as, except in the New West, man has seldom toiled before, it was the English sailormen, runagates from their vessels, who had built the most perilous railroad trestles, and marched with the vanguard when the treasure-seekers pushed their way into the wilderness of rock and snow. He felt as he listened to the scream of the saws and the tolling of the locomotive bells that amid all that feverish activity there must be some scope for him, which was reassuring, since it was becoming clear that he would have to find some means of supporting himself and his father before very long.

Then he looked around as Prescott, who touched his arm, pointed to a trim white cutter which was sliding through the flashing water with an inclined spire of sail above her and a swath of foam at her lee bow.

"I guess that's Valentine's Sorata," he said. "Got the biggest topsail on her, and she has a deck-plank in. If she'd only her lower canvas, most men would find her quite a big handful to sail alone. It's when he rounds up to his mooring the circus will begin."

The Sorata came straight on toward them, close-hauled on the wind, until they could hear the hissing of the brine that swept a foot deep along her slanted deck; then there was a banging of canvas, and she swung as on a pivot, while a bent figure with its back against her tiller became furiously busy. Slanting sharply, she drove away on the other tack, and shot in with canvas shaking between a great four-masted ship and a steamer with white tiers of decks. Then her head-sails dropped, and she stopped with a big iron buoy which Valentine seized with his boat-hook close beneath her bowsprit. After that there was a rattle of chain, and Prescott made a gesture of approval.

"Smart," he said. "I guess there are not many men in this Province who could have brought her up in that berth without another hand on board."

Valentine appeared to see them, for he waved his hand; but the next minute Jimmy, who looked around, lost his interest in him, for Tom Wheelock was coming slowly across the wharf. He walked wearily, with head bent and dejection expressed in every languid movement. Prescott's face grew troubled as he glanced at him.

"I guess we're not going to sea to-day," he said. "Your father has more to carry than he can stand. That – Merril has been putting the screw on him."

Wheelock dropped somewhat heavily upon the Tyee's deck, and, though they looked at him questioningly, he said nothing to either of them as he made his way to the little after-cabin. When he reached it, he sat down and wiped his forehead before he poured himself out a stiff drink of whisky; then he made a little, hopeless gesture as he turned to Jimmy, who stood at the foot of the ladder with Prescott in the scuttle behind him.

"You'll stop loading that ballast," he said. "I'm fixed this time. I guess Merril has the ship. Carpenters to come on board to-morrow, and as far as I can figure, eight hundred dollars won't see them clear. Besides that, it's a sure thing we'll lose the coast mill contract."

Jimmy said nothing, but he set his lips tight, and Tom Wheelock had finished his whisky before he looked at him again. His eyes were half-closed, and he sat huddled and limp, with one hand trembling on his glass, a broken man.

"Carpenters will be here to-morrow. I guess there's no use stopping them – I've got to see the thing right out," he said. "Still, you can tell the boys we don't want that ballast. I feel kind of shaky, and I'm going to lie down. Not as strong as I used to be, Jimmy, and I haven't quite got over that thump I got against the rail."

Jimmy made a sign to Prescott and went up the ladder, and when he stood on deck the grizzled sailorman wondered at the change in him. There was no geniality in his blue eyes now, and his face was set and grim, for pity was struggling within him with a vindictive hatred of the man who had brought his father down. Tom Wheelock, it was evident, had been brought low in more ways than one.

"If you'll see about that ballast, I'll go straight to Merril's office. I want this thing made clear," he said.

"Well," advised Prescott, "I'd walk round a few blocks first; you want to simmer down before you talk to a man like that. Go slow, and get a round turn on your temper."

Jimmy, who made no answer, swung himself up on the wharf, and it was not until he had traversed part of the water-front that he remembered it might have been advisable to change his clothes. He was still clad in blue jean freely smeared with the red soil that he had been shoveling in the hold, and his face and hands were grimy and damp with perspiration. Still, that did not seem to matter greatly, since, after all, it was a costume quite in accordance with his station. The days when he had worn a naval uniform had passed.

Striding into an office in a great stone building, he accosted a clerk, who said that Mr. Merril was busy, and then appeared to grow a trifle disconcerted under Jimmy's gaze. The latter smiled at him grimly.

"Then it's probably fortunate that I'm not busy at all," he said. "In fact, I'm quite prepared to stay here until this evening; and since there seems to be only one door to the place it will perhaps save Mr. Merril inconvenience if he sees me now. You can explain that to him."

The clerk, who grinned at one of his companions, disappeared, and, coming back, ushered the insistent visitor into a sumptuously furnished office; and, when the door closed behind him, Jimmy was a little astonished to find himself as collected as he had ever been in his life. He was one of the men who do not quite realize their own capabilities until driven by necessity into strenuous action. An elderly gentleman with a pallid and somewhat expressionless face, dressed with a precision not altogether usual in that country, looked up at him.

"Well?" he said inquiringly.

Jimmy drew forward a chair, and sat down uninvited. "You know my name," he said. "I want to understand exactly why you are sending those carpenters on board the schooner?"

Merril looked at him gravely, but Jimmy did not appear to find his gaze in any way troublesome.

"I don't think you have anything to do with the matter," he said. "Still, out of courtesy – "

"No," interrupted Jimmy; "I'm not asking a favor, only anticipating things a little. It is, I am afraid, quite likely that I shall have to take over the schooner before very long."

"Then, in accordance with a clause in the agreement, the vessel must be kept in efficient repair to the satisfaction of a qualified surveyor. The man I sent down reports that she needs a new mast, decks relaid, and a good deal of new planking about her water-line. Your father has particulars."

"I suppose," said Jimmy very quietly, "there would be nothing gained by asking you to allow the repairs to stand over until we have brought down one or two more loads of lumber. I expect you know it will cost us the sawmill contract if we lay the schooner off now?"

Merril made a little gesture. "I'm afraid not. I can't afford to take the risk of having the schooner lost, to oblige you, and the fact that you may not carry out the sawmill contract naturally does not concern me."

"Has it occurred to you that we might question your surveyor's report? Half the repairs are quite unnecessary, as you no doubt know. Why the man recommended them is, of course, a question I'm not going into, though it wouldn't be very difficult to hit on the reason. There are, however, other men of his profession in this city."

Again Merril looked at him steadily, with a faint, sardonic gleam, which was more galling than anger, in his eyes. "You will, of course, do what you consider advisable, but if the repairs are not made I shall apply for an injunction to stop you from going to sea; and the law is somewhat costly. The redemption instalment and interest are overdue, and if your father has any money with him, one would fancy it would be more prudent for him to settle his obligations than to give it to the lawyers."

Jimmy realized that this was incontrovertible. Unless the arrears were paid within a fixed time, Merril could foreclose on the vessel and sell her to somebody acting in concert with him, which was, no doubt, what he wished to do. There was, it seemed, no wriggling out of his grip; and, though he felt it would be useless, Jimmy resolved to appeal to his sense of fairness.

"So far as I can figure, you have been paid in interest and charges about forty cents on every dollar you lent; and you still hold a bond for the original amount," he said. "That would be enough to satisfy most men; and all we ask is a little time and consideration. You could let those repairs stand over, and could wait a while for your interest. It will most certainly be paid if we can keep hold of the sawmill contract."

"I'm afraid you are wasting time;" and Merril glanced at the papers before him. "There are several reasons which make it necessary for me to insist on your father's carrying out the conditions of his bond. He owes me a good deal of money now."

A hard glint crept into Jimmy's blue eyes, and there was a trace of hoarseness in his voice. "I want you to understand that it will crush him," he said. "He is an old and broken man, and you would lose nothing by a little clemency. I will take every dollar of his debts upon myself."

"I'm sorry, but it can't be helped," said Merril, with a shrug of his shoulders which seemed to suggest that his patience was becoming exhausted. "The conditions laid down must be carried out."

Jimmy rose slowly. Every nerve in him tingled, though there was only the ominous scintillation in his eyes to indicate what he was feeling. Laying one hand on Merril's desk, he looked down at him, and they faced each other so for, perhaps, half a minute. The man who held in his grasp many a small industry in that Province shrank inwardly beneath the sailor's gaze.

"Then," said Jimmy, with a slow forcefulness that was the more impressive because of the restraint he put upon himself, "you shall have your money, and everything else that is due you. If I live long enough – all – my father's debt will certainly be paid."

He went out; and Merril, to whom an interview of this description was not exactly a novelty, was for once a little uneasy in his mind. There was a certain suggestion of steadfastness in the seafarer's manner that he did not like, and he felt that he could be relied on to keep his promise if the opportunity were afforded him. Still, the bondholder fancied it would not be insuperably difficult to contrive that the occasion did not arise.

Next day the carpenters duly arrived on board the Tyee, and when they took possession there was nothing for any one else to do, which was partly why it happened that Jimmy sat smoking on the skylights of the Sorata's saloon one hot afternoon. He had told Valentine, who lay near him on the warm deck, part of his troubles. There was scarcely a breath of air, and the smoke of the big mills hung in a long trail above the oily Inlet and floated in a filmy cloud athwart the towering pines. The tapping of the carpenters' mallets on board the Tyee came faintly across the water.

"It will be three weeks, anyway, before you get your new deck in, and it may be longer," said Valentine. "All the carpenters on this coast are going up to the new railroad trestles, where they're getting almost any price they ask. What are you going to do in the meanwhile?"

Jimmy said he did not know, and was sorry this was the case. He had discovered that board costs a good deal in that country, and while the Tyee was practically gutted it would be necessary to live ashore. Valentine appeared to ruminate, and then looked up at him.