The Crater; Or, Vulcan's Peak: A Tale of the Pacific. Джеймс Фенимор Купер

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СКАЧАТЬ He went up the fore-rigging like a squirrel, and was soon at the captain's side, both looking anxiously to leeward. A few minutes after the ship had hauled by the wind, both came down, stopping in the top, however, to take one more look to leeward.

      The second-mate stood waiting the further descent of the captain, with a soft of leering look of contempt on his hard, well-dyed features, which seemed to anticipate that it would soon be known that Mark's white water had lost its colour, and become blue water once more. But Captain Crutchely did not go as far as this, when he got down. He admitted that he had seen nothing that he could very decidedly say was breakers, but that, once or twice, when it lighted up a little, there had been a gleaming along the western horizon which a good deal puzzled him. It might be white water, or it might be only the last rays of the setting sun tipping the combs of the regular seas. Bob Betts, too, was as much at fault as his captain, and a sarcastic remark or two of Hillson, the second-mate, were fast bringing Mark's breakers into discredit.

      "Jest look at the chart, Captain Crutchely," put in Hillson—"a regular Tower Hill chart as ever was made, and you'll see there can be no white water hereabouts. If a man is to shorten sail and haul his wind, at every dead whale he falls in with, in these seas, his owners will have the balance on the wrong side of the book at the end of the v'y'ge!"

      This told hard against Mark, and considerably in Hillson's favour.

      "And could you see nothing of breakers ahead, Bob?" demanded Mark, with an emphasis on the 'you' which pretty plainly implied that the young man was not so much surprised that the captain had not seen them.

      "Not a bit of it, Mr. Woolston," answered Bob, hitching up his trowsers, "and I'd a pretty good look ahead, too."

      This made still more against Mark, and Captain Crutchely sent for the chart. Over this map he and the second-mate pondered with a sort of muzzy sagacity, when they came to the conclusion that a clear sea must prevail around them, in all directions, for a distance exceeding a thousand miles. A great deal is determined in any case of a dilemma, when it is decided that this or that fact must be so. Captain Crutchely would not have arrived at this positive conclusion so easily, had not his reasoning powers been so much stimulated by his repeated draughts of rum and water, that afternoon; all taken, as he said and believed, not so much out of love for the beverage itself, as out of love for Mrs. John Crutchely. Nevertheless, our captain was accustomed to take care of a ship, and he was not yet in a condition to forget all his duties, in circumstances so critical. As Mark solemnly and steadily repeated his own belief that there were breakers ahead, he so far yielded to the opinions of his youthful chief-mate as to order the deep-sea up, and to prepare to sound.

      This operation of casting the deep-sea lead is not done in a moment, but, on board a merchant vessel, usually occupies from a quarter of an hour to twenty minutes. The ship must first be hove-to, and her way ought to be as near lost as possible before the cast is made. Then the getting along of the line, the stationing of the men, and the sounding and hauling in again, occupy a good many minutes. By the time it was all over, on this occasion, it was getting to be night. The misty, drizzling weather threatened to make the darkness intense, and Mark felt more and more impressed with the danger in which the ship was placed.

      The cast of the lead produced no other result than the certainty that bottom was not to be found with four hundred fathoms of line out. No one, however, not even the muzzy Hillson, attached much importance to this fact, inasmuch as it was known that the coral reefs often rise like perpendicular walls, in the ocean, having no bottom to be found within a cable's-length of them. Then Mark did not believe the ship to be within three leagues of the breakers he had seen, for they had seemed, both to him and to the seaman who had first reported them, to be several leagues distant. One on an elevation like that of the top-gallant cross-trees, could see a long way, and the white water had appeared to Mark to be on the very verge of the western horizon, even as seen from his lofty look-out.

      After a further consultation with his officers, during which Hillson had not spared his hits at his less experienced superior, Captain Crutchely came to a decision, which might be termed semi-prudent. There is nothing that a seaman more dislikes than to be suspected of extra-nervousness on the subject of doubtful dangers of this sort. Seen and acknowledged, he has no scruples about doing his best to avoid them; but so long as there is an uncertainty connected with their existence at all, that miserable feeling of vanity which renders us all so desirous to be more than nature ever intended us for, inclines most men to appear indifferent even while they dread. The wisest thing Captain Crutchely could have done, placed in the circumstances in which he now found himself, would have been to stand off and on, under easy canvas, until the return of light, when he might have gone ahead on his course with some confidence, and a great deal more of safety. But there would have been an air of concession to the power of an unknown danger that conflicted with his pride, in such a course, and the old and well-tried ship-master did not like to give the 'uncertain' this advantage over him. He decided therefore to stand on, with his topsails reefed, keeping bright look-outs ahead, and having his courses in the brails, ready for getting the tacks down to claw off to windward, should it prove to be necessary. With this plan Mark was compelled to comply, there being no appeal from the decrees of the autocrat of the quarter deck.

      As soon as the decision of Captain Crutchely was made, the helm was put up, and the ship kept off to her course. It was true, that under double-reefed topsails, and jib, which was all the canvas set, there was not half the danger there would have been under their former sail; and, when Mark took charge of the watch, as he did soon after, or eight o'clock, he was in hopes, by means of vigilance, still to escape the danger. The darkness, which was getting to be very intense, was now the greatest and most immediate source of his apprehensions. Could he only get a glimpse of the sea a cable's-length ahead, he would have felt vast relief; but even that small favour was denied him. By the time the captain and second-mate had turned in, which each did after going below and taking a stiff glass of rum and water in his turn, it was so dark our young mate could not discern the combing of the waves a hundred yards from the ship, in any direction. This obscurity was owing to the drizzle that filled the atmosphere, as well as to the clouds that covered the canopy above that lone and wandering ship.

      As for Mark, he took his station between the knight-heads, where he remained most of the watch, nearly straining the eyes out of his head, in the effort to penetrate the gloom, and listening acutely to ascertain if he might not catch some warning roar of the breakers, that he felt so intimately persuaded must be getting nearer and nearer at each instant. As midnight approached, came the thought of Hillson's taking his place, drowsy and thick-headed as he knew he must be at that hour. At length Mark actually fancied he heard the dreaded sounds; the warning, however, was not ahead, but well on his starboard beam. This he thought an ample justification for departing from his instructions, and he instantly issued an order to put the helm hard a-starboard, so as to bring the vessel up to the wind, on the contrary tack. Unfortunately, as the result proved, it now became his imperative duty to report to Captain Crutchely what he had done. For a minute or two the young man thought of keeping silence, to stand on his present course, to omit calling the second-mate, and to say nothing about what he had done, keeping the deck himself until light should return. But reflection induced him to shrink from the execution of this plan, which would have involved him in a serious misunderstanding with both his brother officers, who could not fail to hear all that had occurred in the night, and who must certainly know, each in his respective sphere, that they themselves had been slighted. With a slow step, therefore, and a heavy heart, Mark went into the cabin to make his report, and to give the second-mate the customary call.

      It was not an easy matter to awaken either of those, who slept under the influence of potations as deep as the night-caps taken by Captain Crutchely and Mr. Hillson. The latter, in particular, was like a man in a state of lethargy, and Mark had half a mind to leave him, and make his condition an excuse for not having persisted in the call. But he succeeded in arousing the captain, who soon found the means to bring the second-mate to a state of semi-consciousness.

      "Well, СКАЧАТЬ