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Elisha Cuthbert Photos Books: Martin Eden The Pickwick Papers The Sea Wolf |
alive and in your clutches! Come on,
you coward! Kill me! Kill me! Kill me!"
It was at this stage that Thomas Mugridges erratic soul brought
him into the scene. He had been listening at the galley door, but
he now came out, ostensibly to fling some scraps over the side, but
obviously to see the killing he was certain would take place. He
smirked greasily up into the face of Wolf Larsen, who seemed not to
see him. But the Cockney was unabashed, though mad, stark mad. He
turned to Leach, saying:
"Such langwidge! Shockin!"
Leachs rage was no longer impotent. Here at last was something
ready to hand. And for the first time since the stabbing the
Cockney had appeared outside the galley without his knife. The
words had barely left his mouth when he was knocked down by Leach.
Three times he struggled to his feet, striving to gain the galley,
and each time was knocked down.
"Oh, Lord!" he cried. "Elp! Elp! Tyke im awy, carnt yer?
Tyke im awy!"
The hunters laughed from sheer relief. Tragedy had dwindled, the
farce had begun. The sailors now crowded boldly aft, grinning and
shuffling, to watch the pummelling of the hated Cockney. And even
I felt a great joy surge up within me. I confess that I delighted
in this beating Leach was giving to Thomas Mugridge, though it was
as terrible, almost, as the one Mugridge had caused to be given to
Johnson. But the expression of Wolf Larsens face never changed.
He did not change his position either, but continued to gaze down
with a great curiosity. For all his pragmatic certitude, it seemed
as if he watched the play and movement of life in the hope of
discovering something more about it, of discerning in its maddest
writhings a something which had hitherto escaped him,--the key to
its mystery, as it were, which would make all clear and plain.
But the beating! It was quite similar to the one I had witnessed
in the cabin. The Cockney strove in vain to protect himself from
the infuriated boy. And in vain he strove to gain the shelter of
the cabin. He rolled toward it, grovelled toward it, fell toward
it when he was knocked down. But blow followed blow with
bewildering rapidity. He was knocked about like a shuttlecock,
until, finally, like Johnson, he was beaten and kicked as he lay
helpless on the deck. And no one interfered. Leach could have
killed him, but, having evidently filled the measure of his
vengeance, he drew away from his prostrate foe, who was whimpering
and wailing in a puppyish sort of way, and walked forward.
But these two affairs were only the opening events of the days
programme. In the afternoon Smoke and Henderson fell foul of each
other, and a fusillade of shots came up from the steerage, followed
by a stampede of the other four hunters for the deck. A column of
thick, acrid smoke--the kind always made by black powder--was
arising through the open companion-way, and down through it leaped
Wolf Larsen. The sound of blows and scuffling came to our ears.
Both men were wounded, and he was thrashing them both for having
disobeyed his orders and crippled themselves in advance of the
hunting season. In fact, they were badly wounded, and, having
thrashed them, he proceeded to operate upon them in a rough
surgical fashion and to dress their wounds. I served as assistant
while he probed and cleansed the passages made by the bullets, and
I saw the two men endure his crude surgery without anaesthetics and
with no more to uphold them than a stiff tumbler of whisky.
Then, in the first dog-watch, trouble came to a head in the
forecastle. It took its rise out of the tittle-tattle and tale-
bearing which had been the cause of Johnsons beating, and from the
noise we heard, and from the sight of the bruised men next day, it
was patent that half the forecastle had soundly drubbed the other
half.
The second dog-watch and the day were wound up by a fight between
Johansen and the lean, Yankee-looking hunter, Latimer. It was
caused by remarks of Latimers concerning the noises made by the
mate in his sleep, and though Johansen was whipped, he kept the
steerage awake for the rest of the The Sea Wolf page 47 The Sea Wolf page 49 |