CHAPTER IX
Man Overboard!
Dusk had succeeded the glorious sun-set and touched it with the sombre hue of twilight. The day had been exceptionally hot, a day when one seems to find just sufficient energy to lounge in an easy chair under the pretense of reading a novel until a delightful drowsiness creeps over you and all pretense is at an end – you are sleeping the sleep of the just on a scorching summer day.
But now night had descended on the stately Northland, and with it had come a cool, refreshing breeze. All was quiet, serene, peaceful, and among the passengers, lounging in groups about the deck, conversation was carried on in undertones.
“Gee,” Tom was saying, softly. “This has been one great day, hasn’t it? Nothing to do but hang around on deck, alternately reading, sleeping and watching the wheels go ’round.”
“Yes, I guess this is about the first day since we have been on board that something exciting hasn’t happened and it seems mighty good for a change.”
“Look out,” Bert warned. “The day isn’t over yet and there is plenty of time for something exciting to happen between this and midnight. For my part, I wouldn’t much mind if it did, for after a day like this you feel as if you needed something to wake you up.”
“Do you?” Tom queried, sarcastically. “I feel just now as if I had more urgent need of something to put me to sleep,” and with a yawn he dropped into a convenient chair and settled himself comfortably with his feet against the rail. “Sing us that song you used to sing at college before we threatened to set the Black Hand on your trail, Dick,” he invited. “Perhaps that will help to woo sweet slumber.”
“It would be much more likely to woo sweet nightmare,” said Bert, which was true if not complimentary.
“That’s all right,” Dick retorted, good-naturedly. “Of course, I understand that this apparent reluctance on your part is due entirely to sour grapes since you doubtless are aware of the fact that I never would condescend – ”
“Oh can it,” Tom murmured, sleepily. “If you won’t sing, the least you can do is to keep still and let a fellow go to sleep.”
“Oh, certainly,” Dick said, obligingly, “anything you wish. As I was saying,” he went on with a wink at Bert, “you are doubtless aware that I would never condescend to render that immortal ballad before so – ”
“You have gone too far,” Tom cried in a terrible voice, as he sprang for Dick. “You have dared disobey my mandates and now you shall suffer the penalty – ”
But the mock tragedy was never enacted, for, even as Tom spoke, his attention was caught by the figure of a man covered from head to foot with soot and grime and running toward their end of the deck at full speed. At his heels was a crowd led by the steward who cried out frantically to the boys, “Stop him, stop him! He’s gone mad!”
So suddenly had come the thunder-bolt from a clear sky that for a few seconds the boys could do nothing but stare at the spectacle before them and wonder if they could be awake. In fact, Bert confessed later that he had had a faint impression that Dick’s nightmare must have come upon them ahead of time.
Bert was the first to take in the situation and with a cry of, “I guess it’s up to us, fellows,” he ran toward the wild figure now only a few feet in front of them. But even as the three comrades threw out their hands to halt the flying madman, he paused, glared around him for an instant with the look of a hunted animal brought to bay, and then, with a fierce, inhuman cry that echoed in Bert’s memory for many a long day after, he threw himself over the rail and into the glassy depths nearly forty feet below!
For a brief moment there was the silence of death on board the Northland, and then arose such an uproar that even the captain’s great voice, shouting orders to the crew, could scarcely be heard above the din.
“’Tis nought but a stoker gone crazy with the heat of the day,” Bert heard a man say.
“Ay,” growled a stoker who had also overheard. “’Tis a wonder that we are all not crazy or dead this day, but that poor devil is worse off than us for he can’t swim a stroke.”
“Did you say that that man can’t swim?” Bert demanded, while a look of horror crept over his face.
“That I did, young feller,” the stoker answered, as he eyed Bert insolently from head to foot, “though doubtless he can find something to hang on to until – ”
But Bert never heard the end of the sentence for he was busy untying his shoes and stripping off his coat.
“Bert, Bert, you are never going to risk your life needlessly for that madman,” Tom pleaded. “The boat is stopping, now, and it will pick him up in a few minutes. Anyway he’s crazy – ”
But Bert stopped him. “He’s a man,” he said simply, “and he can’t swim.” Then there was a flash of white in the air, a quick splash and Bert was on his way to save a life.
Down there in the eddy and swirl of the waves, Bert had but one thought, one hope – to reach that little speck that he had sighted from the deck of the steamer. Nor did it once occur to him that he could have acted otherwise. One of his fellow beings had need of his splendid strength and skill, and not until they failed him would he give up the fight.
So on and on he swam, taxing his great vitality and endurance to the utmost. But to his tortured fancy it seemed as though he were being dragged backward. Surely he could not be making any progress at all at this speed. Then a fierce feeling of anger swept over him, burning him like a flame – anger at this feeling of impotence that threatened to master him.
“One would think,” he raged, “that I had never been outside a country town in my life. I am making progress. I can save that fellow’s life, and what’s more, I’m going to.”
Ah, that was better! Now every long, powerful stroke did its work and soon he was within a few feet of the spot where the madman was holding on to a slippery piece of driftwood, that now and again slipped from his numbed fingers, only to be regained by a desperate effort.
As Bert neared him, the stoker cried out frantically, “Don’t come near me! Don’t touch me! I’ll kill you if you do!”
But as he spoke his fingers lost their grip and he would have sunk below the surface if it had not been for Bert’s cat-like quickness. In a flash, he had grasped the stoker around the waist and lifted his head above the water, but he was not quite prepared for what was to follow.
For a second the stoker lay passive in Bert’s grasp, gasping for breath. Then with the quick, sinuous motion of a reptile he twisted about and met his fingers around Bert’s throat in the vise-like grip that only a maniac can effect and began slowly to tighten his hold.
In desperation Bert tore at the relentless fingers, fighting with all the fierceness of a wild animal for his life. But the more he struggled the tighter grew that band of iron about his neck. They were under water now, but not even threatened suffocation could make the madman loose his grip. Tighter and tighter it grew, until Bert felt the blood go pounding up into his brain and his eyes seemed starting from his head.
Was this to be the end, then, of all his hopes, of all his dreams, of all his aspirations? His college, his friends, his two dear comrades, was he to lose all these now, when his future was filled with such bright promise? And that by the hands of a man he had risked his life to save!
Then once again came that rush of wild, hot anger, this time a thousandfold more fierce than before, and again it seemed to give him exhaustless strength. He drew his arm back slowly, and then with all the strength of his body behind it planted his fist squarely in the madman’s forehead.
Then, at last, that iron grip loosened and the fingers relaxed their hold. With great joy and exultation in his heart, Bert grasped the arm as it slipped past him and dragged him to the surface.
With a feeling of exquisite comfort and ease, he floated on his back, drawing in great breaths of the glorious air into his tortured lungs. Softly as in a dream he heard the faint dip of oars in the water and then came Dick’s voice calling his name.
“Stay where you are, Bert,” it was saying. “We’ll be with you in a jiffy, now.”
“You mean we will if this hanged boat ever stops going backward and makes up its mind to travel in the right direction,” Tom said impatiently. “We’ve been five minutes getting nowhere, already.”
“Stop your growling, Tom,” Dick commanded. “You ought to be so all-fired thankful to see Bert floating on the surface instead of being entertained in Davy Jones’ locker that you wouldn’t have time for anything but thanksgiving.”
“You don’t suppose that I’m not thankful, do you,” Tom demanded, huskily. “If he hadn’t come up again after we saw him go under I – well – I – Bert,” he called, lustily, to hide the break in his voice, “can you hear us now?”
“Sure thing,” came a weak voice that they nevertheless recognized as Bert’s.
Then the rowers redoubled their efforts and in a few strokes had reached the spot where Bert floated with his still-unconscious burden. In less time than it takes to tell, willing hands had lifted the stoker into the boat and Bert was half dragged, half pushed in after him. For the fierce, superhuman strength that had come to him in his extremity had passed as quickly as it had come, leaving him as weak as a rag. It had been through sheer grit and will power that he had been able to hold on to the stoker until the boat could relieve him.
As he was hauled into the boat, Dick and Tom fell upon him, half laughing, half crying and wholly joyful. They showered him with praises and called him every endearing name they could think of, such as – “dear old fellow, game old scout,” and a hundred others equally incoherent but eminently satisfactory.
After five minutes of hard pulling, the little boat reached the steamer’s side. Her rails were crowded with passengers, waiting to welcome in the first real drama that many of them had ever witnessed.
As Bert was helped on deck he was welcomed with a rousing cheer that might have been heard for a mile around the ship. Bert flushed with pleasure and acknowledged the salute as best he could in his dripping garments, while he whispered to his two companions:
“Get me into the cabin as soon as you can, will you, fellows? It’s fine of them to greet me so right royally, but I know I must look a wreck and it wouldn’t feel so very bad to get some dry clothes on.”
Meanwhile, the stoker, who had not regained consciousness, was taken below to receive medical attention. As the sailors laid him on his bunk they muttered discontentedly of the inadvisability of rescuing mad stokers, who were little better than land lubbers, anyway.
“Sure and now we’ll be having one more worthless shpalpeen on our hands,” O’Brien was saying. “Oi’m not sayin’ as it wasn’t a brave thing that that young feller has been afther doin’, but jist the same it would ’a been bether to have left him there and saved us the throuble of burying of him later.”
“Ay, ay, so say I,” growled another. “He’ll probably die before the week’s out, and ’tis my opinion that he’s better dead than alive, seein’ he’s crazy, poor devil.”
“Hush! he’s conscious,” warned the doctor, as he rose from his kneeling position beside the bunk. “He will do nicely, now, with good care. I’ll be back in an hour to see how he’s getting along.”
As the doctor left the room, the two sailors neared the stoker, who lay with his eyes closed, as if absolutely oblivious to their presence.
“Well, old b’y,” said O’Brien, “how be ye feelin’ afther your duckin’? Pretty spry?”
Slowly the man opened his eyes and let them rest for a long minute on the big Irishman’s ruddy face. When he spoke, the words came haltingly, as if he were groping in his memory for facts that persistently eluded him.
“I don’t seem to recollect,” he said, “just exactly what happened. Was I – did I” – and the fear and pleading in his voice went straight to O’Brien’s heart – “was I – mad?”
“Now don’t you worry about that, son,” O’Brien lied, kindly. “Ye wuzn’t mad, ye wuz jist a thrifle touched be the heat. Oi’ll bet anythin’ ye’ll be up ’n aroun’ as hale an’ hearty as the skipper himself in a day or two.” Then he added in an undertone to his companion, “Bedad, an’ if he ain’t as sane as any man jack of us, me name ain’t Pat O’Brien. Sure an’ Oi ain’t niver seen the loike of it before.”
“Me neither,” the other answered in awestruck tones. “He goes off the boat madder than a March hare and comes back after a dip in the briny and a knock-out punch over one eye seemin’ as right as a trivet. It beats all.”
Meanwhile the man on the bed had been watching the men wistfully, and as O’Brien turned to him again, he asked eagerly, “Please tell me everything. I know I was out of my head, so you needn’t be afraid to tell me the truth.”
“Sure and Oi will, then,” Pat said, heartily, and he did, from beginning to end, omitting nothing.
When the tale was finished the doctor came again to have another look at his patient and was surprised and delighted at his improvement. “Why, at this rate we’ll have you up and around by this time day after to-morrow,” he cried. “What’s that?” as the stoker whispered something in his ear. “Why, yes, I guess he will come. I’ll give him your message, anyway, and see what he says.”
Then with a cheerful nod he left his patient to the enjoyment of a well-cooked, appetizing meal.
Half an hour later Bert, clad once more in dry, snug clothes, made his way hurriedly below to the stokers’ cabin. He had declined his friends’ offer to accompany him, for his instinct told him that the stoker would prefer to see him alone.
As he turned the knob of the door the stoker looked around inquiringly. Bert went forward quickly.
“I am Bert Wilson,” he said. “The doctor gave me your message and I came as soon as I could get a bite to eat.”
“It was very good of you to come, sir,” the man replied, nervously fumbling with a glass on the table at his elbow. “You see, I wanted to thank you and tell you how sorry I am that I gave you – any – trouble in the water.” His voice was scarcely above a whisper. “I can jist recollect, now, that I tried to – kill – you. Can you ever – forgive – ”
“Forgive,” Bert interrupted. “Why, I have nothing to forgive, but if I had I would have forgiven and forgotten long ago.” Then he put out his hand impulsively and said in that frank, open way that was peculiarly his own, “You and I have gone through great danger together and have managed to pull through with nothing but a few scratches to tell the story. Shall we shake hands on it?”
“Well, you sure did get everything that was coming to you, Bert,” Tom said, as they were getting ready for bed that night. “You asked for excitement – ”
“And I got it,” Bert finished, as he slipped in between the cool, inviting sheets. “Good-night, fellows, I’m off.”
CHAPTER X
Crooked Work
“Yes, me byes, there’s nothin’ in this wide world much worse, to me manner o’ thinkin’, than a ‘ringer.’” It was Reddy who spoke, following up a conversation in which most of the athletes had joined. “Crookedness is a bad thing in any line of business or amusement, but it’s specially bad in anythin’ like sport, that in its very nature ought to be kept clean and wholesome. It’s a queer thing, though, but true none the less, that there’s nothin’ much worse than some branches o’ sport. Look at prize fightin’, fer instance. O’ course, I’m not sayin’ that some fights aren’t on the level, an’ all that, but take them as a rule and the scraps and scrappers are so crooked they could hide behind a corkscrew.”
“Yes, and there are lots of other things the same way,” observed Bert, who was one of the group. “I’ve been told that wrestling is as crooked, if not more so, than boxing. Do you think it is, Reddy?”
“Well, that’s a hard question, m’ son,” returned the veteran trainer, thoughtfully. “When you get right down to it, there’s not much to choose between them. I’ve seen many a boxin’ an’ wrestlin’ bout in my time, but there’s very few that I thought was straight from start to finish. It’s a wonder to me how the fight promoters manage to keep on fooling the public. It looks to me as though a babe in arms would get wise to their game. But nix! The poor ginks will file out of a hall after a rotten go, swearing they’ll never spend a cent to see another fight, and the next week they’re back again, same as ever.”
“I guess there’s not as much underhand work in other lines of sport as in that, though, is there, Reddy?” questioned Tom.
“No, I don’t think there is,” answered Reddy, speculatively. “Of course, among amateurs, there generally isn’t the money incentive that the professionals have, and that makes a big difference. The hard thing, when you’re dealing with amateur meets, is to keep professionals out. Some club will want specially to win a race, and like as not they’ll look around for some professional, who’s not too well known, to help them out. It’s a dirty, low-down trick, o’ course, but it’s tried many a time, just the same.”
“Huh,” said Tom, “why doesn’t the amateur up and beat the professional at his own game? There’s nothing very wonderful about a man, just because he runs for money, instead of the honor.”
“Thrue fer you, me bye,” returned Reddy, smiling, “but that’s sometimes easier said than done. A man who’s running to earn his bread is usually going to run faster than the man who’s simply out fer glory. That may not sound very noble, and all that, but it’s the truth, nine times out o’ ten.”
“Yes, but how about the tenth time?” asked Bert, who had been listening attentively to all the trainer said.
“Well, once in a great while the ‘ringer’ gets tripped up, o’ course. I remember one time, many a long year ago, when I saw jist the thing you mentioned happen,” and a reminiscent smile spread over the veteran’s face.
The listening group of young athletes sensed a story at once, and assailed Reddy with requests to “fire away, and tell them about it.”
The trainer seemed in a talkative mood, and without much urging, began.
“’Twas whin I was but a young lad,” he said, “but even thin I was always interested in sport of any kind, and used to attend ivery track event for miles around the little town where I lived. I used to help around the club houses, carryin’ water and such things, and got to know, by sight at any rate, a good many well-known runners and sich.
“Well, one day there was a big college meet not far from our town, and o’ course nothin’ would do me but what I must see it.
“Accordin’ly, I was hangin’ around the club house long before the time for the race, and had plenty o’ time to size up the contestants. They were as fine lookin’ a set o’ byes as you could wish to see, and they was all jokin’ and rough-housin’ as though they had never a care on their minds. I knew they’d be in dead enough earnest in a little while, though.
“Well, the time come for them to get dressed in their runnin’ togs, and suddenly I began to sit up an’ take notice, as you might say. As one big, sthrappin’ feller, that I hadn’t noticed much before, on account o’ his havin’ kept apart a little from the others, and havin’ been so quiet-like, stood up in his runnin’ suit, it flashed across me mind that I’d seen him run some place before. At first I couldn’t place him, think as hard as I might, but suddenly I remembered where I’d seen him. It was at a race held about a year ago, and then he had run in the hundred-yard dash with professionals and had come in third.
“‘Well, what do ye know about that,’ thinks I to myself, ‘the good fer nothin’ crook is goin’ to run against these young fellers, and it’s a cinch he’ll cop off the prize.’ And, believe me, I felt sorry for the other boys that was goin’ to race against him, fer I knew he was fast, although not among the first-raters, and I figured that none o’ the others would have a show in his company.
“However, there was nothin’ I could do, for nobody would have taken my word for it, an’ I’d a’ got laughed at fer my trouble. So I kept me own council, and sat tight, but all interest in the big race was lost fer me, for I hated crooked work about as much then as I do now, I guess.
“There was a young feller from C – that I’d picked to win the hundred-yard dash, before I recognized this ringer chap. (His name was Smith, by the way, but he was known now, I found out, as Castle.) Young Sidney was a game kid, all right, from his toes up. He wasn’t very tall, and at first glance you wouldn’t think he’d be any great shakes as a runner. But he could get away at the crack o’ the pistol about as fast as any man I ever saw, barrin’ none, and he could certainly burn up the track fer a short distance. He was never much on the long distances, but he was sure class on everythin’ up to three hundred yards.
“I’d seen him run several times, and once or twice when I’d brought him a drink o’ water, or somethin’ like that, he’d grin at me an’ give me a pleasant word or two. So I had a likin’ for him, and was minded to put him wise.
“So the first chance I got I sidled up to him and tipped him off that this Castle feller was a ‘profesh.’ He gives a long whistle, and looks pretty much surprised, naturally. But he was game, clear through, and he says to me, ‘Well, kid, I don’t care if he is a professional. I’m as good a man as he is, and I think I can beat him, anyway. It’s the only chance I have, because I’m not going to squeal to the officials.’
“Well, I liked him all the more for that, and o’ course wished him all kinds o’ luck. Me heart was heavy fer him, though, for I didn’t think he would get a look-in.
“By now the time had come fer the lads to line up, and they all filed out o’ the club house, as sober as so many deacons. The starter got them in position, and everythin’ was ready fer the event. There were five starters, and each one looked to have a chance to the finish.
“‘Get on your mark! Get set!’ yelled the starter, and pointed his little pistol up in the air. Crack! she went, and the lads were off in a bunch, runnin’ as though the old Nick were after thim.
“This ‘ringer’ chap was up to all the tricks of the trade, howiver, and had ‘beat this pistol’ by the shade of an eyelash. He had a five-foot lead on young Sidney before they’d gone eight yards, and that’s an awful lot in a hundred-yard sprint. ‘Good-night,’ thinks I to meself, ‘the ringer’s won the race already,’ and the thought made me far from happy, as ye may aisily imagine.
“But the old boy himself seemed to be in young Sidney, and before I knew it my heart was in me mouth and I was almost yelling me lungs out rootin’ for him.
“He raced along in great bounds, and it seemed to me as though each stride covered ten feet. By the time they’d made half the distance he was right up to the ‘ringer’s’ shoulder, and seemed to be goin’ faster each second.
“Smith (or Castle, whichever you choose to call him) gave a glance back, and let out every bit o’ speed in him. For a second he drew away from the kid, and I was almost ready to cry, I was so disappointed.
“But Sidney was not the bye to be left behind, and he put on full steam, so to speak. By now everybody that was watchin’ the race was standin’ on their ears with excitement, and when at the seventy-five-yard mark Sidney drew right abreast of this Smith chap I thought the whole field would go wild. Pretty women an’ girls waved their parasols and shrieked at the top o’ their lungs, and as fer the men – well, they just went plumb batty.
“The other entries were practically out of the race now, and were plugging along far in the rear. The two leaders hit it up faster an’ faster, till they were fairly flying. For all he was a ‘ringer,’ the Smith chap was game, and did his best, I’ll say that for him. But young Sidney was a regular cyclone that day, and on the last ten yards jumped ahead as though the other fellow were standing still. It seemed to me he cleared the last fifteen feet in one jump, and I’ll swear he was in the air when his breast broke the ribbon.
“He’d won the race, all right, but he didn’t hear the applause that pretty nearly split the sky in two. He just crumpled up like a wet rag, and it was pretty near ten minutes before we could bring him to.
“When he did finally open his eyes, he happened to look at me first, and he grinned weakly, ‘Well, Red, we trimmed the “ringer” good and plenty, you and I, didn’t we?’ and he actually shook hands with me.
“Believe me, boys, I was the happiest kid in the State that day, bar none.”
Here Reddy stopped speaking, and gazed ruminatively out over the ocean, with what looked like a mist in his blue eyes.
After the athletes had discussed this story in all its details, Bert asked, “But what became of the ‘ringer,’ Reddy? What did they do to him?”
“Oh, there was nothing much we could do,” replied the trainer, “but, believe me, it was an awful knock to the college that put him up to it, and I don’t think they tried that trick for many a long day afterward. Believe me, lads, crookedness doesn’t pay, in sport or in anything else.”