The Death Ship (38 page)

A Spanish chaser, a gunboat, came up while the
Yorikke
was just bordering the five-mile limit. Suppose the skipper said that the
Yorikke
was outside the limit, and suppose the Spaniard said she was not; the Spaniard wins, because he represents the state. The state is always right, and the individual is always wrong.

Thus it happened. The Spanish gunner signaled with flags and whistles. The skipper did not heed. So the Spaniard got sore and he fired twice the stop-and-stand-by order. The shells filled about the mast-heads of the
Yorikke
so that the old maid started to dance, thinking it was still Abukir. The skipper was laughing. Anyway he could not make it and bring the
Yorikke
out of the limit. We were not prepared to choke down the crying throat of the old hussy. Well, the skipper gave the signal to the engine to stop and stand by. The
Yorikke
was within the five miles, no doubt. The skipper pretended to be out. They would have blown us straight to hell if the old man had not stopped.

Aboard they came. Much bowing and begging your pardon and excuses for troubling us.

“Yes, sir, excuse me, you are still within the limit. No, sir, we have just taken our position. If in doubt, may we take position together, sir, so as not to leave any question?”

“It’s all right,” said the skipper.

“May we, please, examine your papers? Thank you, sir. Are in order. Only a matter of routine, you know. Would you mind, sir, may we, please, make a slight inspection of the cargo, sir? Won’t take long, sir. Half an hour or even less, sir. Acting under orders, sir, excuse me, sir.”

Said the skipper: “No objection, gentlemen. Am at your service, gentlemen. But, please, make it snappy. Or I will have to make your government responsible for all and everything. I am short already, gentlemen. We have had dead wind all the time. Go ahead, gentlemen, the ship is all yours.” The skipper laughed. He went on laughing and laughing. How this man could laugh! It was a sight and at the same time a feast for the ear. He changed his laughter from the bright and jovial to the ironical, then to the vulgar haw-haw of a fishmarket woman; then he would chuckle and giggle like a high-school baby. He went through the whole scale and all the shades of laughter, while the officers were diving into the holds or ordering boxes heaved out of the holds to be opened on deck.

Every child on all the coasts of the Mediterranean knew the stories about corned beef from Chicago. Exactly as the husband whose wife is known by all the men in town is always the last person on earth to hear something, so it is with governments. Not before the dumbest village idiot has long forgotten it will the government obtain official knowledge that the whole village was swept away during the flood last year. So the Spanish government, in the grip of a stern dictator, finally had word from an office-boy about the lively trade in corned beef from Chicago.

The officers of the gunner, supported by an experienced customs officer, went about the holds of the
Yorikke
like ants about a dead mouse. They were actually looking for corned beef. And the skipper laughed and giggled so that one could hear it from bow to stern.

The officers became nervous, partly because they did not find what they were looking for, but mostly on account of the laughing and chuckling of the skipper, of which they could make neither head nor tail. They thought of going straight to the bottom of things, and they asked the skipper: “Pardon me, sir, have you any corned beef on board?”

The skipper narrowed his eyes and smiled at them as if he wanted to make love, and said: “Of course, gentlemen. Excuse me, please. Por’guese, show the gentlemen to the galley and tell the cook to let the gentlemen inspect the corned beef from Chicago.”

The officer in charge looked at the skipper for a while, half-dumb, half-surprised. Then he said, saluting: “Thank you, captain, this will do. I do not want to see it. I am not yet through here. It will take me only a few minutes more, if you don’t mind, sir.”

“Not at all, sir,” the skipper said. He bowed and laughed again.

The experienced customs officer and two men more were still in the holds below, rumbling about.

The officer in charge went to the hatchway and pointed out several boxes to be hoisted on deck. The skipper ordered two of our hands to assist the officers.

Up came the boxes. The officer tapped them all off, some with his hands, others with his shoes, and still others with his closed pocket-knife.

“Have this one opened, please, sir,” he asked the skipper.

The skipper giggled, now drawing up his lips in an ironical manner. He ordered the Portuguese, who was ready with tools, to open the box pointed out by the officer.

When the box was open, one could see a row of cans sparkling in the bright sun.

The officer took out one can, then another. So did the skipper; he picked out one and another one.

The officer looked at the label, and the skipper smiled. The officer read: “Van Houten’s Pure Hollandish Cocoa. Free of Oil.”

The skipper handed the officer one of the cans he held. He laughed right out and said: “Why don’t you open this can, sir, to make sure it is cocoa?” His smile became satanical now. I was watching him, and I thought if something should go wrong the old man might be capable of killing that officer like a rat, shut in the others still below in the holds, and try to make off, resting his luck upon the well-weighted safety-valves of the
Yorikke
. Later, knowing him better, I knew he was far too intelligent to do such a thing. He had brains enough to get himself out of any jam, regardless of how thick it might have come. Anyway, his smile stayed diabolical, but it changed again into a light chuckling.

When he offered the officer one of the cans he held in his hand, the officer looked him straight and searchingly in the face. He noted his ironical smile. The officer pressed his lips together and got pale. He seemed no longer able to control his nerves. His hands trembled. He knew something was queer about the ship. But he got angry with himself for finding himself outsmarted by the skipper.

He reached for the can the skipper handed him. Again he looked the skipper in the face like a professional poker-player. Then, with a resolute gesture, he gave the can to the Portuguese and said to the skipper: “Please, sir, order him to open it.”

“Go ahead, Por’guese,” the skipper said.

The officer thought of corned beef from Chicago and expected to find it in this can labeled Van Houten’s Cocoa. When opened, there was in it: cocoa. The officer looked rather disappointed, almost pitiful. But he came to and smiled at the skipper.

He knocked with his shoes against two more boxes and seemed to listen to the echo. He pointed out another box, had it opened, saw the cans with the same labels, pushed it aside, and ordered open the third box. When it was open the skipper looked at it, bent rapidly down, and picked out two cans, apparently at random. He held one of these two toward the officer and said, again using a nasty satirical smile: “Won’t you examine one of these, sir?”

The officer looked with a sort of consternation at the two cans in the hands of the skipper, and for two or three seconds he seemed to hesitate. Unexpectedly, however, and as rapidly as the skipper had done before him, he picked out two other cans from the box.

The officer weighed them in his hands. Just when he was about to give one of them to the Portuguese the skipper butted in and said: “Sir, why don’t you open this can from the bottom?”

The officer gazed at the skipper, saw his smile, got extremely nervous and said: “No, sir, I’ll have it opened from the top.” This time the officer had a smile which, no doubt, he thought ‘looked satanical. But the skipper was a far better actor. His smile could look really diabolical, while the best the officer could achieve was a rather silly-looking smile.

He opened the box from the top by having the lid cut off. There was only cocoa in it, Van Houten’s Pure Hollandish, Free of Oil.

The skipper laughed out loud. The officer, almost mad with fury, emptied the whole can. Nothing came out but cocoa, and the paper it was wrapped in to keep it dry.

The officer picked out four more cans, opened the lids, smelled at the contents, closed the cans, stood thinking awhile, and then gave orders to his companions below in the holds to come up, the inspection being over.

When all the men had come out and were standing at the rail to go down the gangway to their boat, the officer wrote out the receipts for the damage done, bowed to the skipper, and said: “I beg your pardon, sir, for the trouble I have caused you, but these were my orders. We are, as you know well, at war with the Riff colony, and so you will understand why we have to examine occasionally ships sailing within our waters. Thank you, good-by, and have a lucky voyage.”

“All right with me, sir,” the skipper answered, shaking hands with the officer, “come again any time you wish, I am always your most obedient servant. Good-by.”

Off went the shallop with the officers.

The skipper bellowed up to the bridge: “Get her going. Full steam to get her out of the five. Damn it. Close cut.”

He took a deep breath and forced it out with a whistling noise. His laughter was all gone. Now he got pale. After a while he wiped his forehead.

He stood still at the rail where he had said good-by to the officer. Now he crossed over and came near the galley.

“Cook,” he hollered, “full after-gale supper tonight, raisin cake and cocoa with plenty of milk, and for each man two cups of rum with extra tea at nine. Come here, get the cocoa.”

He took up the various cans the officer had opened, smelled at them, and threw them overboard, save one, which he gave the cook. Then he fingered about the open boxes, picked one out here, and another one there, rather confident in his picking. He handed them to the cook and said: “Of course, special supper for the mess.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” the grandfather said, and hurried off with the cans.

“Por’guese,” the skipper called the hand, “close the boxes and put them back where they came from.”

All this time I had been standing at the rail watching this elegant business. I hardly remember a picture which interested me so much as had this procedure. What wouldn’t I give to know what went on inside the brain of the skipper when he offered the officer the cans in his hands, and, more, when he suggested to the officer that he open the cans from the bottom! I had more admiration for that skipper than ever before. What a pity, I thought, that the times of piracy are all over and gone for ever. With this skipper I would have gone to rob the whole English merchant marine. It’s too late now, with wireless and all that.

Anyway, I thought, something must be done, when I saw those boxes full of cocoa put back in the holds again. One should never lose any opportunity when it knocks at your back door. A few boxes of this Hollandish cocoa mean real money in the next port. All people like to drink cocoa.

That same night, still well filled with the elegant supper, and feeling swell, I crawled into the hold and swiped five boxes.

When Stanislav came below to relieve me, I said to him: “Hey, you smarty, did it ever occur to you that we sail a living gold mine? I am talking of cocoa, you dumbhead. Honorable trade. We can make at least three pounds easy money.”

“No such thing as easy money on this trip,” he answered. “Still wrapped in diapers, kiddy? It would be a gold mine all right if there were cocoa in these cans. But there isn’t. That’s the only objection to the gold mine in this case. Are you still that dumb to believe in newspapers, advertisements, and labels? The labels are all right. Only they don’t belong to these cans. Haven’t you inspected them? Don’t dream into your pockets any money so long as you are not through with the inspection.

Haven’t I told you a hundred times not to trust in the
Yorikke
, whatever she may show you? If you look closer you will see in these cans only cocoa-beans — beans I mean. But you won’t find in any port any soul to buy these beans unless you can sell them at the same time the bean-mills to grind the beans with. If you have got the right mill and you try to grind the beans, they come out: pupp-pupp-pupp-pupp-pupp-pupp, like this, and whoever swallows them won’t need any cocoa any more, with milk or without. What an innocent lambkin you are! I don’t understand myself how I can get along with such an ass.”

I was sure Stanislav was lying to put one over on me. I had seen the cocoa with my own eyes. So had the Spanish naval officer. It couldn’t be all black magic.

I simply could not believe it.

Immediately I went up to the bunker and opened the boxes. Stanislav was right. There were cocoa-beans inside. Hard ones, with shiny brass shells. In all the five boxes there were the same kind of beans. I did not find one single can in which there was Van Houten’s Pure Hollandish Cocoa. It all was Chicago again. Behind the label Pork and Beans you sure find anything, even bent hoofnails, but no pork and beans.

I closed the boxes and took them back into the hold. I was certainly not interested in the kind of cocoa-beans the Arabians and the Moroccans cook.

The skipper alone, that great magician, knew the word that turned cocoa-beans into emma-gees shells when needed. He was a great master of black magic, the skipper was. Yes, sir.

43

We were half a day out of Tripoli and met with real nasty weather. In the stoke-hold we were so thrown about that most of the time we did not know if we were at starboard or at port side or in which of the four corners and which of the two gangways of the bunkers.

Thrown upon a pile of fuel, trying to collect my limbs, I accidentally looked at the crystal tube of the water-gauge, and I marveled how such a pretty-looking little thing could kill a grown-up sailor in the horrible way that it had done to Kurt from Memel. I questioned myself for a few seconds: would I jump at the broken tube and shut the cock and in doing so sacrifice my precious life?

I would not do it, I decided. Let anybody who wants to be brave do it. I don’t care a tinkling about being brave and being called a great and regular guy.