Blow The Man Down: A Romance Of The Coast
that. Somebody informed him that the magnate had gone back to New York.
It was manifest to Mayo that in his contempt Fogg had decided that the
salvaging of the _Conomo_ intact had been relegated to the storehouse of
dreams. His purpose would be suited if she were junked, so the young
man realized. Only the _Conomo_ afloat, a successful pioneer in new
transportation experiments alongcoast, would threaten his vested
interests.
There had been wintry winds and intervening calms in the days since
Mayo had been prosecuting his projects ashore. But by word of mouth from
straying fishermen and captains of packets he had been assured that the
steamer still stuck on Razee.
And when at last he was equipped he went forth from Limeport; he went
blithely, although he knew that a Titan's job faced him. He kept his own
counsel as to what he proposed to do with the steamer. He even allowed
the water-front gossips to guess, unchallenged, that he was going to
junk the wreck. He was not inviting more of that brazen hostility that
characterized the operations of Fogg and his hirelings.
He was at the wheel of a husky lighter which he had chartered; the rest
of the crew he supplied from his own men. The lighter was driven by its
own power, and carried a good pump and a sturdy crane; its decks were
loaded high with coal. The schooner was now merely convoy. It was an
all-day trip to Razee, for the lighter was a slow and clumsy craft, but
when Mayo at last made fast to the side of the _Conomo_ and squealed a
shrill salute with the whistle, the joy he found in Captain Candage's
rubicund countenance made amends for anxiety and delay.
“I knew you'd make a go of it, somehow,” vouchsafed the old skipper.
“But who did you have to knock down in a dark place so as to steal his
money off'n him?”
“That's private business till we get ready to pay it back, with six per
cent, interest,” stated the young man, bluntly.
“Oh, very well. So long as we've got it I don't care where you stole
it,” returned Candage, with great serenity. “I simply know that you
didn't get it from skinflint Rowley, and that's comfort enough for me.
Let me tell you that we haven't been loafing on board here. We rigged
that taakul you see aloft, and jettisoned all the cargo we could get
at. It was all spoiled by the water. There's pretty free space for
operations 'midships. I've got out all her spare cable, and it's ready.”
“And you've done a good job there, sir. We've got to make this lighter
fast alongside in such a way that a blow won't wreck her against us.
Spring cables--plenty of them--and we are sailors enough to know how to
moor. But when I think of what amateurs we are in the rest of this job,
cold shivers run over me.”
“That Limeport water-front crowd got at you, too, hey?”
“Captain Candage, I have watched men more or less in this life. It's
sometimes a mighty big handicap for a man to be too wise. While the
awfully wise man sits back and shakes his head and figures prospects and
says it can't be done, the fool rushes in, because he doesn't know any
better, and blunders the job through and wins out. Let's keep on being
fools, good and plenty, but keep busy just the same.”
And on that basis the rank amateurs of Razee proceeded with all the grit
that was in them.
The men of Hue and Cry had plenty of muscle and little wit. They asked
no questions, they did not look forward gioomily to doubtful prospects.
The same philosophy, or lack of it, that had always made life full of
merry hope when their stomachs were filled, taking no thought of the
morrow, animated them now. Fate had given Mayo and his associate an
ideal crew for that parlous job. It was not a question of union hours
and stated wages; they worked all night just as cheerily as they worked
all day.
An epic of the sea was lived there on Razee Reef during the weeks that
followed.
The task which was wrought out would make a story in itself, far beyond
the confines of such a narrative as this must be.
Bitter toil of many days often proved to be a sad mistake, for the men
who wrought there had more courage in endeavor than good understanding
of methods.
Then, after disappointment, hope revived, for further effort avoided the
mistakes that had been so costly.
The brunt of the toil, the duty of being pioneer, fell on Mayo.
He donned a diving-suit and descended into the riven bowels of the wreck
and cleared the way for the others.
On deck they built sections of bulkhead, and he went down and groped in
the murky water, and spiked the braces and set those sections and calked
the spaces between bulkhead and hull.
There were storms that menaced their lighter and drove the little
schooner to sea in a welter of tempest.
There were calms that cheered them with promise of spring.
The schooner was the errand-boy that brought supplies and coal from the
main. But the men who went ashore refused to gossip on the water-front,
and the occasional craft that hove to in the vicinity of Razee were not
allowed to land inquisitive persons on the wreck.
After many weeks the bulkheads were set and the pumps were started.
There were three crews for these pumps, and their clanking never ceased,
day or night. There was less water in the fore part; her bow was propped
high on the ledges. The progress here was encouraging.
Aft, there were disasters. Three times the bulkhead crumpled under the
tremendous pressure of the sea, as soon as the pumps had relieved the
opposing pressure within the hull. Mayo, haggard, unkempt, unshorn, thin
with his vigils, stayed underwater in his diving-dress until he became
the wreck of a man. But at last they built a transverse section that
promised to hold. The pumps began to make gains on the water. As
the flood within was lowered and they could get at the bulkhead more
effectively from the inside, they kept adding to it and strengthening
it.
And then came the need of more material and more equipment, for the
gigantic job of floating the steamer was still ahead of them.
Mayo felt that he had proved his theory and was now in a position to
enlist the capital that would see them through. He could show a hull
that was sound except for the rent amidships--a hull from both ends of
which the trespassing sea was being evicted. With the money that would
furnish buoying lighters and tugs and the massive equipment for floating
her, he felt that he would be able to convert that helpless mass of junk
into a steamer once more--change scrap-iron into an active value of at
least one hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
And when he and Captain Candage had arrived at that hopeful and earnest
belief, following days of tremulous watching of the work the pumps were
doing, the young man went again to the main on his momentous errand.
As they sailed into Limeport, Mayo was a bit astonished to see green on
the sloping hills. He had been living in a waking dream of mighty toil
on Razee; he had almost forgotten that so many weeks had gone past.
When he went ashore in his dory from the schooner, the balmy breath
of spring breathed out to him from budding gardens and the warm breeze
fanned his roughened cheeks.
As he had forgotten that spring had come, so had he forgotten about his
personal appearance. He had rushed ashore from a man's job that was now
waiting for him to rush back to it. He did not realize that he looked
like a cave-man--resembled some shaggy, prehistoric human; his mind was
too full of his affairs on Razee.
When Captain Mayo strode down the main street of Limeport, it troubled
him not a whit because folks gaped at him and turned to stare after him.
He had torn himself from his gigantic task for only one purpose, and
that idea filled his mind.
He was ragged, his hands were swollen, purple, cut, and raw from his
diver's labors, his hair hung upon his collar, and a beard masked his
face. They who thronged the streets were taking advantage of the first
warm days to show their spring finery. The contrast of this rude figure
from the open sea was made all the more striking as he brushed through
the crowds.
Here and there he bolted into offices where there were men he knew and
whom he hoped to interest. He had no fat wallet to exhibit to them this
time. He had only his empty, swollen hands and a wild, eager, stammering
story of what he expected to do. They stared at him, many of them
stupidly, some of them frankly incredulous, most of them without
particular interest. He looked like a man who had failed miserably;
there was nothing about him to suggest success.
One man put the matter succinctly: “Look here, Mayo, if you came in
here, looking the way you do, and asked me for a quarter to buy a
meal with, I'd think it was perfectly natural, and would slip you the
quarter. But not ten thousand--you don't look the part.”
“What have my clothes got to do with it? I haven't time to think about
clothes. I can't wear a plug hat in a diving-suit. I've been working.
And I'm still on the job. The way I look ought to show you that I mean
business.”
But they turned him down. In half a dozen offices they listened and
shook their heads or curtly refused to look into the thing. He had not
come ashore to beg for assistance as if it were a favor. He had come
feeling certain that this time he had a valuable thing to offer. His
labors had racked his body, his nerves were on edge, his temper was
short. When they refused to help he cursed them and tore out. That they
allowed his personal appearance to influence their judgment stirred his
fury--it was so unjust to his self-sacrificing devotion to his task.
He soon exhausted his circle of acquaintances, but the rebuffs made him
angry instead of despondent. Thrusting rudely past pedestrians who were
polite and sleek, he marched along the street, scowling.
And then his eyes fell on a face that gave a fresh stir to all the
bitterness that was in him.
He saw Fletcher Fogg standing outside the Nicholas Hotel. The day was
bland, the spring sun was warming, but it was evident that Mr. Fogg was
not basking contentedly; his countenance was fully as gloomy as that of
Captain Mayo, and he chewed on an unlighted cigar and spat snippets of
tobacco over the curb while he pondered.
Mayo was not in a mood to reason with his passion. He had just been
battering his pride and persistence up against men whose manner
of refusal showed that they remembered what Fletcher Fogg had said
regarding the prospects of successful floating of the _Conomo_. There
stood the ponderous pirate, blocking Mayo's way on the sidewalk, just
as he had blocked the young man's prospects in life in the _Montana_
affair--just as he had closed avenues of credit. Mayo bumped against him
and crowded him back across the sidewalk to the hotel's granite wall. He
put his two raw, swollen hands on Fogg's immaculate waistcoat and shoved
salt-stained, work-worn, and bearded face close.
Even then the promoter did not seem to recognize Mayo. He blinked
apprehensively. He looked about as if he intended to summon help.
“You don't seem to have your iron wishbone in your pocket this time,”
growled the assailant. He jabbed his thumbs cruelly into Fogg's ribs.
“Gad! You're--you're Captain Mayo! I'll be cursed if I knew you till you
spoke!”
“I managed to hold myself in the last time you saw me, Fogg. I was
waiting. Now, damn you, I've got you!”
He was making reference merely to the physical grip in which he held the
man. But Fogg seemed to find deeper significance in the words.
“I know it, Mayo,” he whined. “That's why I'm down here. I have been
wondering about the best way to get to you--to meet you right!”
“You got to me all right, you infernal renegade!”
“But, see here, Mayo, we can't talk this matter here on the street.”