Alfred Grace - The Tale of Timber Town

“Seems they’ve got a menag’ry aboard,” commented Sartoris.

Presently a white face appeared at the side.

“Where’s the captain?” asked the Health Officer.

“With the mate, who’s dying.”

“Then who are you?”

“Cap’n’s servant.”

“But where’s the other mate?”

“He died a week ago.”

“What’s wrong on board?”

“Don’t know, sir. Ten men are dead, and three are sick.”

“Where are you from?”

“Canton.”

“Canton? Have you got plague aboard?”

“Not bubonic. The men go off quiet and gradual, after being sick a long time. I guess you’d better come aboard, and see for yourself.”

The ladder was put over the side, and soon the doctor had clambered on board.

The men in the boat sat quiet and full of contemplation.

“This is a good time for a smoke,” said the Pilot, filling his pipe and passing his tobacco tin forrard. “And I think, Sartoris, all hands ’d be none the worse for another dose o’ my medicine.” Again his capacious hand went into his more capacious pocket, and the key of the locker was handed to Sartoris.

“Some foolish people are teetotal,” continued Summerhayes, “and would make a man believe as how every blessed drop o’ grog he drinks shortens his life by a day or a week, as the case may be. But give me a glass o’ liquor an’ rob me of a month, rather than the plagues o’ China strike me dead to-morrer. Some folks have no more sense than barn-door fowls.”

A yellow man, more loquacious than his fellows, had attracted the attention of Sartoris.

“Heh! John. What’s the name of your skipper?”

The Chinaman’s reply was unintelligible. “I can make nothing of him,” said Sartoris. But, just at that moment, the man who had described himself as the captain’s servant reappeared at the side of the ship.

“My man,” said Summerhayes, “who’s your captain?”

“Cap’n Starbruck.”

“Starbruck!” exclaimed Sartoris. “I know him.” In a moment he was half-way up the ladder.

“Hi! Sartoris,” roared the Pilot. “If you go aboard that vessel, you’ll stay there till she’s got a clean bill o’ health.”

“I’m going to help my old shipmate,” answered Sartoris from the top of the ladder. “Turn and turn about, I says. He stood by me in the West Indies, when I had Yellow Jack; and I stand by him now.” As he spoke his foot was on the main-rail. He jumped into the waist of the quarantined barque, and was lost to sight.

“Whew!” said the Pilot to the vessel’s side. “Here’s a man just saved from shipwreck, and he must plunge into a fever-den in order to be happy. I wash my hands of such foolishness. Let ’im go, let ’im go.”

The thin, neat doctor appeared, standing on the main-rail. He handed his bag to one of the boat’s crew, and slowly descended the ladder.

“An’ what have you done with Sartoris?” asked the Pilot.

“He’s aboard,” replied the doctor, “and there he stops. That’s all I can say.”

“And what’s the sickness?”

“Ten men are dead, five more are down – two women, Chinese, and three men. I should call it fever, a kind of barbiers or beri-beri. But in the meanwhile, I’ll take another drop of your excellent liquor.”

The doctor drank the Pilot’s medicine in complete silence.

“Let go that rope!” roared Summerhayes. “Shove her off. Up with your sail.” The trim boat shot towards the sunny port of Timber Town, and Sartoris was left aboard the fever-ship.

On the terrace of the Pilot’s house was a garden-seat, on which sat Rose Summerhayes and Scarlett.

Rose was looking at her dainty shoe, the point of which protruded from beneath her skirt; while Scarlett’s eyes were fixed on the magnificent panorama of mountains which stretched north and south as far as he could see.

Behind the grass-covered foot-hills, at whose base crouched the little town, there stood bolder and more rugged heights. In rear of these rose the twin forest-clad tops of an enormous mountain mass, on either side of which stretched pinnacled ranges covered with primeval “bush.”

Scarlett was counting hill and mountain summits. His enumeration had reached twenty distinct heights, when, losing count, he turned to his companion.

“It’s a lovely picture to have in front of your door,” he said, “a picture that never tires the eye.”

A break in the centre of the foot-hills suddenly attracted his attention. It was the gorge through which a rippling, sparkling river escaped from the mountain rampart and flowed through the town to the tidal waters of the harbour.

“That valley will take us into the heart of the hills,” he said. “We start to-morrow morning, soon after dawn – Moonlight and I. Do you know him?”

The girl looked up from her shoe, and smiled. “I can’t cultivate the acquaintance of every digger in the town,” she replied.

“Don’t speak disparagingly of diggers. I become one to-morrow.”

“Then, mind you bring me a big nugget when you come back,” said the girl.

“That’s asking me to command good luck. Give me that, and you shall have the nugget.”

“Does luck go by a girl’s favour? If it did, you would be sure to have it.”

“I never had it on the voyage out, did I?”

“Perhaps you never had the other either.”

“That’s true – I left England through lack of it.”

“I shouldn’t have guessed that. Perhaps you’ll gain it in this country.”

Scarlett looked at her, but her eyes were again fixed on the point of her shoe.

“Well, Rosebud – flirting as usual?” Captain Summerhayes, clad in blue serge, with his peaked cap on the back of his head, came labouring up the path, and sat heavily on the garden-seat. “I never see such a gal – always with the boys when she ought to be cooking the dinner.”

“Father!” exclaimed Rose, flushing red, though she well knew the form that the Pilot’s chaff usually took. “How can you tell such fibs? You forget that Mr. Scarlett is not one of the old cronies who understand your fun.”

“There, there, my gal.” The Pilot laid his great brown hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “Don’t be ruffled. Let an old sailor have his joke: it won’t hurt, God bless us; it won’t hurt more’n the buzzing of a blue-bottle fly. But you’re that prim and proper, that staid and straight-laced, you make me tease you, just to rouse you up. Oh! them calm ones, Mr. Scarlett, beware of ’em. It takes a lot to goad ’em to it, but once their hair’s on end, it’s time a sailor went to sea, and a landsman took to the bush. It’s simply terrible. Them mild ’uns, Mr. Scarlett, beware of ’em.”

“Father, do stop!” cried Rose, slapping the Pilot’s broad back with her soft, white hand.

“All right,” said her father, shrinking from her in mock dread; “stop that hammerin’.”

“Tell us about the fever-ship, and what they’re doing with Sartoris,” said Scarlett.

“Lor’, she’s knocked the breath out of a man’s body. I’m just in dread o’ me life. Sit t’other end o’ the seat, gal; and do you, Mr. Scarlett, sit in between us, and keep the peace. It’s fearful, this livin’ alone with a dar’ter that thumps me.” The old fellow chuckled internally, and threatened to explode with suppressed merriment. “Some day I shall die o’ laffing,” he said, as he pulled himself together. “But you was asking about Sartoris.” He had now got himself well in hand. “Sartoris is like a pet monkey in a cage, along o’ Chinamen, Malays, Seedee boys, and all them sort of animals. Laff? You should ha’ seen me standing up in the boat, hollerin’ at Sartoris, and laffin’ so as I couldn’t hardly keep me feet. ‘Sartoris,’ I says, ‘when do the animals feed?’ An’ he looks over the rail, just like a stuffed owl in a glass case, and says nothing. I took a bottle from the boat’s locker, and held it up. ‘What wouldn’t you give for a drop o’ that!’ I shouts. But he shook his fist, and said something disrespectful about port wine; but I was that roused up with the humour o’ the thing, I laffed so as I had to set down. A prisoner for full four weeks, or durin’ the pleasure o’ the Health Officer, that’s Sartoris. Lord! what a trap to be caught in.”