Robert Michael Ballantyne - Chasing the Sun

Fred Temple was a tall, handsome young fellow of about five-and-twenty.

He had a romantic spirit, a quiet gentlemanly manner, a pleasant smile, and a passionate desire for violent exercise. To look at him you would have supposed that he was rather a lazy man, for all his motions were slow and deliberate. He was never in a hurry, and looked as if it would take a great deal to excite him. But those who knew Fred Temple well used to say that there was a great deal more in him than appeared at first sight. Sometimes a sudden flush of the brow, or a gleam of his eyes, told of hidden fires within.

Fred, when a small boy, was extremely fond of daring and dangerous expeditions. He had risked his life hundreds of times on tree-tops and precipices for birds’ nests, and had fought more hand-to-hand battles than any of the old Greek or Roman heroes. After he became a man, he risked his life more than once in saving the lives of others, and it was a notable fact that many of the antagonists of his boyhood became, at last, his most intimate friends.

Fred Temple was fair and ruddy. At about the age of nineteen certain parts of his good-looking face became covered with a substance resembling floss-silk. At twenty-five this substance had changed into a pair of light whiskers and a lighter moustache. By means of that barbarous custom called shaving he kept his chin smooth.

Fred’s father was a wealthy Liverpool merchant. At the period when our tale opens Fred himself had become chief manager of the business. People began, about this time, to say that the business could not get on without him. There were a great number of hands, both men and women, employed by Temple and Son, and there was not one on the establishment, male or female, who did not say and believe that Mr Frederick was the best master, not only in Liverpool, but in the whole world. He did not by any means overdose the people with attentions; but he had a hearty offhand way of addressing them that was very attractive. He was a firm ruler. No skulker had a chance of escape from his sharp eye, but, on the other hand, no hard-working servant was overlooked.

One day it was rumoured in the works that Mr Frederick was going to take a long holiday. Since his appointment to the chief charge, Fred had taken few holidays, and had worked so hard that he began to have a careworn aspect, so the people said they were “glad to hear it; no one in the works deserved a long holiday better than he.” But the people were not a little puzzled when Bob Bowie, the office porter, told them that their young master was going away for three months to chase the sun!

“Chase the sun, Bob! what d’ye mean?” said one. “I don’t know wot I mean; I can only tell ye wot I say,” answered Bowie bluntly.

Bob Bowie was an old salt—a retired seaman—who had sailed long as steward of one of the ships belonging to the House of Temple and Son, and, in consequence of gallantry in saving the life of a comrade, had been pensioned off, and placed in an easy post about the office, with good pay. He was called Old Bob because he looked old, and was weather-worn, but he was stout and hale, and still fit for active service.

“Come, Bowie,” cried another, “how d’ye know he’s goin’ to chase the sun?”

“Cause I heerd him say so,” replied Bob.

“Was he in earnest?” inquired a third.

“In coorse he wos,” said Bob.

“Then it’s my opinion,” replied the other, “that old Mr Temple’ll have to chase his son, and clap him in a strait-jacket w’en he catches him—if he talks such stuff.”

The porter could not understand a joke, and did not like one, so he turned on his heel, and, leaving his friends to laugh at their comrade’s jest, proceeded to the counting-room.

There were two counting-rooms—a small outer and a large inner one. In the outer room sat a tall middle-aged man, lanky and worn in appearance and with a red nose. Opposite to him, at the same desk, sat a small fat boy with a round red face, and no chin to speak of. The man was writing busily—the boy was drawing a caricature of the man, also busily.

Passing these, Bob Bowie entered the inner office, where a dozen clerks were all busily employed, or pretending to be so. Going straight onward like a homeward-bound ship, keeping his eyes right ahead, Bob was stranded at last in front of a green door, at which he knocked, and was answered with a hearty “Come in.”

The porter went in and found Fred Temple seated at a table which was covered with books and papers.

“Oh! I sent for you, Bowie, to say that I want you to go with me to Norway to-morrow morning.”

“To Norway, sir!” said Bowie in surprise.

“Ay, surely you’re not growing timid in your old age, Bob! It is but a short voyage of two or three days. My little schooner is a good sea-boat, and a first-rate sailor.”

“Why, as for bein’ timid ,” said the porter, rubbing the end of his nose, which was copper-coloured and knotty, “I don’t think I ever knowed that there feelin’, but it does take a feller aback to be told all of a suddent, after he’s reg’larly laid up in port, to get ready to trip anchor in twelve hours and bear away over the North Sea—not that I cares a brass fardin’ for that fish-pond, blow high, blow low, but it’s raither suddent, d’ye see, and my rig ain’t just seaworthy.”

Bowie glanced uneasily at his garments, which were a cross between those of a railway-guard and a policeman.

“Never mind the rig, Bob,” cried Fred, laughing. “Do you get ready to start, with all the underclothing you have, by six to-morrow morning. We shall go to Hull by rail, and I will see to it that your top-sails are made all right.”

“Wery good, sir.”

“You’ve not forgotten how to make lobscouse or plum-duff, I dare say?”

Bob’s eyes brightened as he replied stoutly, “By no manner o’ means.”

“Then be off, and, remember, sharp six.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” cried the old seaman in a nautical tone that he had not used for many years, and the very sound of which stirred his heart with old memories. He was about to retire, but paused at the threshold of the green door.

“Beg parding, sir, but if I might make so bold as to ax—”

“Go on, Bob,” said Fred encouragingly.

“I heerd ye say to our cashier, sir, that you wos goin’ for to chase the sun . Wot sort of a chase may that be, sir?”

“Ha! Bowie, that’s a curious chase, but not a wild goose one, as I hope to show you in a month or two. You know, of course, that in the regions of the earth north of the Arctic Circle the sun shines by night as well as by day for several weeks in summer?”

“In coorse I do,” answered Bob; “every seaman knows that or ought for to know it; and that it’s dark all day as well as all night in winter for some weeks, just to make up for it, so to speak.”

“Well, Bob, I am very desirous to see this wonderful sight with my own eyes, but I fear I am almost too late of setting out. The season is so far advanced that the sun is setting farther and farther north every night, and if the winds baffle us I won’t be able to catch him sitting up all night; but if the winds serve, and we have plenty of them we may yet be in time to see him draw an unbroken circle in the sky. You see it will be a regular chase, for the sun travels north at a rapid pace. D’you understand?”

Bob Bowie grinned, nodded his head significantly, retired, and shut the door.

Fred Temple, left alone, seized a quill and scribbled off two notes,—one to a friend in Scotland, the other to a friend in Wales. The note to Scotland ran as follows:—