I cannot say that the position of mate carried with it anything morejoyful than that there were no more dishes to wash. I was ignorant ofthe simplest duties of mate, and would have fared badly indeed, had thesailors not sympathized with me. I knew nothing of the minutiæ of ropesand rigging, of the trimming and setting of sails; but the sailors tookpains to put me to rights,—Louis proving an especially good teacher,—andI had little trouble with those under me.

With the hunters it was otherwise. Familiar in varying degree with thesea, they took me as a sort of joke. In truth, it was a joke to me, thatI, the veriest landsman, should be filling the office of mate; but to betaken as a joke by others was a different matter. I made no complaint,but Wolf Larsen demanded the most punctilious sea etiquette in mycase,—far more than poor Johansen had ever received; and at the expenseof several rows, threats, and much grumbling, he brought the hunters totime. I was “Mr. Van Weyden” fore and aft, and it was only unofficiallythat Wolf Larsen himself ever addressed me as “Hump.”

It was amusing. Perhaps the wind would haul a few points while we wereat dinner, and as I left the table he would say, “Mr. Van Weyden, willyou kindly put about on the port tack.” And I would go on deck, beckonLouis to me, and learn from him what was to be done. Then, a few minuteslater, having digested his instructions and thoroughly mastered themanœuvre, I would proceed to issue my orders. I remember an earlyinstance of this kind, when Wolf Larsen appeared on the scene just as Ihad begun to give orders. He smoked his cigar and looked on quietly tillthe thing was accomplished, and then paced aft by my side along theweather poop.

“Hump,” he said, “I beg pardon, Mr. Van Weyden, I congratulate you. Ithink you can now fire your father’s legs back into the grave to him.You’ve discovered your own and learned to stand on them. A littlerope-work, sail-making, and experience with storms and such things, andby the end of the voyage you could ship on any coasting schooner.”

It was during this period, between the death of Johansen and the arrivalon the sealing grounds, that I passed my pleasantest hours on the_Ghost_. Wolf Larsen was quite considerate, the sailors helped me, and Iwas no longer in irritating contact with Thomas Mugridge. And I makefree to say, as the days went by, that I found I was taking a certainsecret pride in myself. Fantastic as the situation was,—a land-lubbersecond in command,—I was, nevertheless, carrying it off well; and duringthat brief time I was proud of myself, and I grew to love the heave androll of the _Ghost_ under my feet as she wallowed north and west throughthe tropic sea to the islet where we filled our water-casks.

But my happiness was not unalloyed. It was comparative, a period of lessmisery slipped in between a past of great miseries and a future of greatmiseries. For the _Ghost_, so far as the seamen were concerned, was ahell-ship of the worst description. They never had a moment’s rest orpeace. Wolf Larsen treasured against them the attempt on his life andthe drubbing he had received in the forecastle; and morning, noon, andnight, and all night as well, he devoted himself to making life unlivablefor them.

He knew well the psychology of the little thing, and it was the littlethings by which he kept the crew worked up to the verge of madness. Ihave seen Harrison called from his bunk to put properly away a misplacedpaintbrush, and the two watches below haled from their tired sleep toaccompany him and see him do it. A little thing, truly, but whenmultiplied by the thousand ingenious devices of such a mind, the mentalstate of the men in the forecastle may be slightly comprehended.

Of course much grumbling went on, and little outbursts were continuallyoccurring. Blows were struck, and there were always two or three mennursing injuries at the hands of the human beast who was their master.Concerted action was impossible in face of the heavy arsenal of weaponscarried in the steerage and cabin. Leach and Johnson were the twoparticular victims of Wolf Larsen’s diabolic temper, and the look ofprofound melancholy which had settled on Johnson’s face and in his eyesmade my heart bleed.

With Leach it was different. There was too much of the fighting beast inhim. He seemed possessed by an insatiable fury which gave no time forgrief. His lips had become distorted into a permanent snarl, which atmere sight of Wolf Larsen broke out in sound, horrible and menacing and,I do believe, unconsciously. I have seen him follow Wolf Larsen aboutwith his eyes, like an animal its keeper, the while the animal-like snarlsounded deep in his throat and vibrated forth between his teeth.

I remember once, on deck, in bright day, touching him on the shoulder aspreliminary to giving an order. His back was toward me, and at the firstfeel of my hand he leaped upright in the air and away from me, snarlingand turning his head as he leaped. He had for the moment mistaken me forthe man he hated.

Both he and Johnson would have killed Wolf Larsen at the slightestopportunity, but the opportunity never came. Wolf Larsen was too wisefor that, and, besides, they had no adequate weapons. With their fistsalone they had no chance whatever. Time and again he fought it out withLeach who fought back always, like a wildcat, tooth and nail and fist,until stretched, exhausted or unconscious, on the deck. And he was neveraverse to another encounter. All the devil that was in him challengedthe devil in Wolf Larsen. They had but to appear on deck at the sametime, when they would be at it, cursing, snarling, striking; and I haveseen Leach fling himself upon Wolf Larsen without warning or provocation.Once he threw his heavy sheath-knife, missing Wolf Larsen’s throat by aninch. Another time he dropped a steel marlinspike from the mizzencrosstree. It was a difficult cast to make on a rolling ship, but thesharp point of the spike, whistling seventy-five feet through the air,barely missed Wolf Larsen’s head as he emerged from the cabincompanion-way and drove its length two inches and over into the soliddeck-planking. Still another time, he stole into the steerage, possessedhimself of a loaded shot-gun, and was making a rush for the deck with itwhen caught by Kerfoot and disarmed.

I often wondered why Wolf Larsen did not kill him and make an end of it.But he only laughed and seemed to enjoy it. There seemed a certain spiceabout it, such as men must feel who take delight in making pets offerocious animals.

“It gives a thrill to life,” he explained to me, “when life is carried inone’s hand. Man is a natural gambler, and life is the biggest stake hecan lay. The greater the odds, the greater the thrill. Why should Ideny myself the joy of exciting Leach’s soul to fever-pitch? For thatmatter, I do him a kindness. The greatness of sensation is mutual. Heis living more royally than any man for’ard, though he does not know it.For he has what they have not—purpose, something to do and be done, anall-absorbing end to strive to attain, the desire to kill me, the hopethat he may kill me. Really, Hump, he is living deep and high. I doubtthat he has ever lived so swiftly and keenly before, and I honestly envyhim, sometimes, when I see him raging at the summit of passion andsensibility.”

“Ah, but it is cowardly, cowardly!” I cried. “You have all theadvantage.”

“Of the two of us, you and I, who is the greater coward?” he askedseriously. “If the situation is unpleasing, you compromise with yourconscience when you make yourself a party to it. If you were reallygreat, really true to yourself, you would join forces with Leach andJohnson. But you are afraid, you are afraid. You want to live. Thelife that is in you cries out that it must live, no matter what the cost;so you live ignominiously, untrue to the best you dream of, sinningagainst your whole pitiful little code, and, if there were a hell,heading your soul straight for it. Bah! I play the braver part. I dono sin, for I am true to the promptings of the life that is in me. I amsincere with my soul at least, and that is what you are not.”

There was a sting in what he said. Perhaps, after all, I was playing acowardly part. And the more I thought about it the more it appeared thatmy duty to myself lay in doing what he had advised, lay in joining forceswith Johnson and Leach and working for his death. Right here, I think,entered the austere conscience of my Puritan ancestry, impelling metoward lurid deeds and sanctioning even murder as right conduct. I dweltupon the idea. It would be a most moral act to rid the world of such amonster. Humanity would be better and happier for it, life fairer andsweeter.

I pondered it long, lying sleepless in my bunk and reviewing in endlessprocession the facts of the situation. I talked with Johnson and Leach,during the night watches when Wolf Larsen was below. Both men had losthope—Johnson, because of temperamental despondency; Leach, because he hadbeaten himself out in the vain struggle and was exhausted. But he caughtmy hand in a passionate grip one night, saying:

“I think yer square, Mr. Van Weyden. But stay where you are and keep yermouth shut. Say nothin’ but saw wood. We’re dead men, I know it; butall the same you might be able to do us a favour some time when we needit damn bad.”

It was only next day, when Wainwright Island loomed to windward, closeabeam, that Wolf Larsen opened his mouth in prophecy. He had attackedJohnson, been attacked by Leach, and had just finished whipping the pairof them.

“Leach,” he said, “you know I’m going to kill you some time or other,don’t you?”

A snarl was the answer.

“And as for you, Johnson, you’ll get so tired of life before I’m throughwith you that you’ll fling yourself over the side. See if you don’t.”

“That’s a suggestion,” he added, in an aside to me. “I’ll bet you amonth’s pay he acts upon it.”

I had cherished a hope that his victims would find an opportunity toescape while filling our water-barrels, but Wolf Larsen had selected hisspot well. The _Ghost_ lay half-a-mile beyond the surf-line of a lonelybeach. Here debauched a deep gorge, with precipitous, volcanic wallswhich no man could scale. And here, under his direct supervision—for hewent ashore himself—Leach and Johnson filled the small casks and rolledthem down to the beach. They had no chance to make a break for libertyin one of the boats.

Harrison and Kelly, however, made such an attempt. They composed one ofthe boats’ crews, and their task was to ply between the schooner and theshore, carrying a single cask each trip. Just before dinner, startingfor the beach with an empty barrel, they altered their course and boreaway to the left to round the promontory which jutted into the seabetween them and liberty. Beyond its foaming base lay the prettyvillages of the Japanese colonists and smiling valleys which penetrateddeep into the interior. Once in the fastnesses they promised, and thetwo men could defy Wolf Larsen.

I had observed Henderson and Smoke loitering about the deck all morning,and I now learned why they were there. Procuring their rifles, theyopened fire in a leisurely manner, upon the deserters. It was acold-blooded exhibition of marksmanship. At first their bullets zippedharmlessly along the surface of the water on either side the boat; but,as the men continued to pull lustily, they struck closer and closer.

“Now, watch me take Kelly’s right oar,” Smoke said, drawing a morecareful aim.

I was looking through the glasses, and I saw the oar-blade shatter as heshot. Henderson duplicated it, selecting Harrison’s right oar. The boatslewed around. The two remaining oars were quickly broken. The mentried to row with the splinters, and had them shot out of their hands.Kelly ripped up a bottom board and began paddling, but dropped it with acry of pain as its splinters drove into his hands. Then they gave up,letting the boat drift till a second boat, sent from the shore by WolfLarsen, took them in tow and brought them aboard.

Late that afternoon we hove up anchor and got away. Nothing was beforeus but the three or four months’ hunting on the sealing grounds. Theoutlook was black indeed, and I went about my work with a heavy heart.An almost funereal gloom seemed to have descended upon the _Ghost_. WolfLarsen had taken to his bunk with one of his strange, splittingheadaches. Harrison stood listlessly at the wheel, half supportinghimself by it, as though wearied by the weight of his flesh. The rest ofthe men were morose and silent. I came upon Kelly crouching to the leeof the forecastle scuttle, his head on his knees, his arms about hishead, in an attitude of unutterable despondency.

Johnson I found lying full length on the forecastle head, staring at thetroubled churn of the forefoot, and I remembered with horror thesuggestion Wolf Larsen had made. It seemed likely to bear fruit. Itried to break in on the man’s morbid thoughts by calling him away, buthe smiled sadly at me and refused to obey.

Leach approached me as I returned aft.

“I want to ask a favour, Mr. Van Weyden,” he said. “If it’s yer luck toever make ’Frisco once more, will you hunt up Matt McCarthy? He’s my oldman. He lives on the Hill, back of the Mayfair bakery, runnin’ acobbler’s shop that everybody knows, and you’ll have no trouble. Tellhim I lived to be sorry for the trouble I brought him and the things Idone, and—and just tell him ‘God bless him,’ for me.”

I nodded my head, but said, “We’ll all win back to San Francisco, Leach,and you’ll be with me when I go to see Matt McCarthy.”

“I’d like to believe you,” he answered, shaking my hand, “but I can’t.Wolf Larsen ’ll do for me, I know it; and all I can hope is, he’ll do itquick.”

And as he left me I was aware of the same desire at my heart. Since itwas to be done, let it be done with despatch. The general gloom hadgathered me into its folds. The worst appeared inevitable; and as Ipaced the deck, hour after hour, I found myself afflicted with WolfLarsen’s repulsive ideas. What was it all about? Where was the grandeurof life that it should permit such wanton destruction of human souls? Itwas a cheap and sordid thing after all, this life, and the sooner overthe better. Over and done with! I, too, leaned upon the rail and gazedlongingly into the sea, with the certainty that sooner or later I shouldbe sinking down, down, through the cool green depths of its oblivion.