CHAPTER III

CAPTAIN TOBY READY – DOCTOR-AT-LARGE

As Jack entered the cabin he was greeted by a succession of shrill shrieks and whoops.

“Ahoy, my hearty! Never say die! Don’t give up the ship! Kra-a-a-a!”

“That is good advice, Methusaleh,” laughed the boy, addressing himself to a disreputable-looking parrot that stood balancing itself on a perch in a cage that hung in one corner of this queer abode.

The ports which the cabin had originally boasted had been enlarged and formed into windows, through which the light streamed cheerfully. Red cotton curtains hung at these casements and gave a dash of color to the dark wooden walls of the place. In the center was a swinging table and some rickety chairs; at one end was a sea-stove, a relic of the schooner’s sea-going days, and at the opposite end of the cabin, at the stern portion of it, was a bulkhead and a door.

From beyond this door came the clinking of glasses and the sound of pounding. It was Captain Toby hard at work in his sanctum compounding his medicines. Jack turned into another door alongside the stove, on the other side of which there was a similar portal.

These doors led into the cabins respectively of Jack and his uncle. Jack’s cabin was a neat little combination workshop and sleeping place.

On a shelf opposite his bunk was his wireless set, with the wires leading down to it from the aerials above. Another shelf held his stock of books, mostly of a scientific character, dealing with his favorite pursuit. The rest of the space in the not very large cabin was occupied by a work bench, cluttered with tools and stray bits of apparatus.

Jack had no wish to worry his uncle with an account of the happenings of the afternoon, so, before seeking him, he slipped out of his wet clothes and donned the overalls in which he usually worked. There was another reason for this, too, for the suit in which he had dived to the rescue of little Marjorie Jukes was the only one he boasted.

Having hung up his garments carefully, so that they would dry as free from wrinkles as possible, Jack left the cabin and made for his uncle’s sanctum in the stern.

“Well, Jack, my hearty, what luck?” inquired the old man as the boy entered.

Jack shook his head.

“The same old story, Uncle Toby. What are you busy at?”

“An order for the ‘Golden Embrocation and Universal Remedy for Man and Beast’ for Cap’n Styles of the Sea Witch,” rejoined his uncle in his deep voice, hoarse from many years of shouting orders above gales and storms. “If you really want to go to sea, Jack, I’ll get you a berth with Cap’n Styles. The Sea Witch is a fine old Yankee ship; not one of your smoke-eating tea-kettles.”

“But she has no wireless?” questioned Jack, gazing about him at the compartment, which was stocked with the tools of the captain’s trade: herbs in bundles, bottles, pestles and mortars and so forth. A strong aromatic odor filled the air, and the captain hummed cheerily as he poured a yellow, evil-smelling liquid from a big retort into half a dozen bottles, destined to cure the ills of Captain Styles.

“Wireless! Of course not, my hearty. What does a fine sailing ship want with a wireless? Take my word for it, Jack, wireless is only a newfangled idee, and it won’t last. Give a sailor sea-room and a good ship and all that fol-de-rol is only in his way.”

“And yet I saw the news of another rescue at sea by means of the wireless when I was looking at a newspaper bulletin-board to-day,” rejoined the lad. “The crew of a burning tramp steamer was rescued by a liner that had been summoned to their aid by the apparatus. If it hadn’t been for wireless, that ship might have burned up with all hands, and no one ever have known her fate.”

His uncle grunted in the manner of one unconvinced.

“Well, I ain’t saying that wireless mayn’t be all right for one of them floating wash-boilers, but for Yankee sailors, good rigging and canvas and a stout, sweet hull is good enough to go to sea with.”

As he went on with his work, he began rumbling in a gruff, throaty bass:

 
“Come, all you young fellers what foller the sea!
Yo ho, blow the man down;
And pay good attention and listen to me,
Oh, give me some time to blow the man down.”
 

“That’s the music, Jack,” said he. “I wish you’d go inter sails instead of steam, and follow the examples of your dad and your uncle, yes, and of your granddaddy, Noah Ready, afore ’em.”

Jack made no rejoinder, but set about straightening up the litter in the place. The contention between them was an old one, and always ended in the same way. His uncle knew many seafaring men of the old school who would gladly have given Jack a berth on their craft. But they were all in command of “wind-jammers,” and the boy’s heart was set on the wireless room of a liner, or at any rate a job on some wireless-equipped vessel.

Meantime the captain went on compounding and mixing and pouring, rumbling away at his old sea songs. He was an odd-looking character, as odd in his way as his chosen place of residence.

Years of service on the salt-water had tanned his wrinkled skin almost to a mahogany color. Under his chin was a fringe of white whiskers, and his round head – covered with a bristly white thatch – was set low between a pair of gigantic shoulders. He was dressed in a fantastic miscellany of water-side slops which flapped where they should have been tight, and wrinkled where they should have been loose. Add to this an expression of whimsical kindness, a wooden leg and a wide, rough scar, – the memento of a battle with savages in the South Seas, – and you have a portrait of Captain Toby Ready.

Presently the captain drew out a huge silver watch.

“Two bells. Time to stand by for supper, lad,” he said. “That stuff’ll have to go to Cap’n Styles to-morrow. There’s plenty of time; he don’t sail for goin’ on a week yet. Slip your cable, like a good lad, and set a course for the bakery. We’re short of bread.”

“And I’m short of the money to get it,” said Jack.

The captain thrust a hairy paw into his pocket and drew out an immense purse. He extracted a coin from it and handed it to the boy.

“An’ how much, lad, is a penny saved?” he inquired, peering at Jack from under his bushy white brows.

“A penny earned,” laughed Jack.

“Co’-rect,” chuckled the captain, grinning at Jack’s quick reply to the almost invariable formula, “an’ if Captain Toby Ready had thought o’ that when he was young, he wouldn’t be here on the craft Wenus making medicines fer sea-cap’ns with a tummy ache.

“I’ve got an apple pie in the oven, Jack,” said he, as the boy left the “drug-store,” as he and his uncle called it, “so cut along and hurry back.”

“Aye, aye, sir!” cried the boy, bounding up the cabin stairs with alacrity.

Apple pies were not common on board the Venus, nor was Jack too old to appreciate his uncle’s announcement.

CHAPTER IV

THE REJECTED REWARD

When Jack returned, he was surprised to hear voices in the cabin. His uncle had a habit of talking to himself, but there was another voice mingling with the old sailor’s deep, rumbling tones.

Wondering greatly who the visitor could be, for somehow the voice sounded different from the bellowings of the old sea cronies who visited the Venus either on business or socially, Jack descended the cabin stairs.

The swinging lamp was lighted and shone down on his uncle and another man, seated on opposite sides of the table.

“By the great main boom, the lad never told me a word of it!” his uncle was saying. “Dived overboard an’ saved your little gal, eh? Well, sir, Jack’s a chip of the old block!”

The man who sat opposite the captain was a portly gentleman with a bald brow, gold-rimmed glasses and close-cropped gray mustache. He spoke with curt, sharp emphasis, as if his minutes were dollars.

“Lucky that a watchman saw and recognized the boy as he sneaked away,” this individual replied. “If it had not been for that, I might never have found him. But I must see him. Where is he?”

“Here he is, sir, to answer for himself,” said the captain, as he heard Jack’s step on the stair.

As the boy entered the cabin the ship-owner jumped to his feet. He crossed the place with a quick, rapid stride and grasped Jack’s free hand.

“I’m proud to shake hands with a youngster like you,” he said in his swift, incisive way, “yes, sir, proud. If it had not been for you, my daughter might have drowned with those dolts all standing round doing nothing. Jove – ”

He mopped his forehead in an agitated way at the very thought of what might have happened.

“That’s all right, sir,” said Jack, “I’m glad I was there when I happened to be. When I knew the little girl was all right, I came away.”

The boy had recognized the shipping magnate from pictures of him that he had seen in the papers. Had he not come around another way from the bakery, he would have been prepared for this august visitor by the sight of his limousine, lying at the head of the dock.

“’Sarn it all, why didn’t you spin me the yarn?” sputtered the captain in an aggrieved tone.

“Oh! there really wasn’t much to tell,” said Jack. “The little girl was clinging to a pile and I went down and got her up. That’s all there was to it. If I hadn’t done it, somebody else would.”

“That is just the point,” roared Mr. Jukes, “somebody else wouldn’t.”

He drew out a check-book and signed his name to a check. He shoved this across the table to Jack, who was standing by his uncle.

“Fill that in for any amount you like, lad,” he said in his dictatorial way. “Make it a good, round sum. Jacob Jukes’ account can stand it.”

Jack colored and hesitated.

“Well, what’s the matter, boy?” sputtered the ship-owner, noting the boy’s hesitation. “That check won’t bite you. I know a whole lot of lads who’d have grabbed at it before it was out of my hand.”

“I beg your pardon, sir,” rejoined Jack, “you’re very generous and – and all that. Maybe you’ll think me ungrateful, but I can’t take that check.”

“Wha – what! Can’t take my check! What’s the matter with the boy?”

“Hev you slipped the cable of your senses, Jack?” hoarsely exclaimed his uncle, in what was meant to be a whisper.

“I don’t want money for just doing a little thing like that,” said the boy stubbornly.

“You don’t mean it. Come, take that check at once. Don’t be a fool!” urged Mr. Jukes with a very red face. “Why can’t you do as I tell you!”

The magnate’s tone was almost angry. He was not used to having his commands disobeyed, and he was commanding Jack to take the check. But the boy resolutely shook his head.

“Why, confound it all, I can’t understand it. Make him take the check at once, captain.”

“Don’t see how I can, if he’s so sot and stubborn about it,” rejoined the captain. Then, turning to Jack, he made another appeal. “Why won’t you take it, Jack?” he growled. “Shiver my timbers, what ails you?”

“Nothing; but I can’t accept money from Mr. Jukes or anybody else, for doing what I did,” said the boy quietly.

Mr. Jukes, with a crimson face, gave up the battle. He reached across the table, took the check and slowly tore it into fragments.

“It is the first time in my experience that I ever encountered such a singular lad as this. Hang me if I don’t think there’s a screw loose somewhere. But after what you did for me this afternoon, never hesitate to call on me if you need anything at any time. Here’s my card.”

He rose, and with a comical mixture of astonishment and indignation on his face, regarded Jack somewhat as he might have looked at some strange freak in nature.

“Thank you, sir,” said the boy, taking the bit of pasteboard, “I didn’t mean to offend you; but – but, well, I couldn’t take that check, that’s all.”

“Well, well, we’ll say no more about it,” said the great man testily. “But remember, I’ll always stand your friend if I can.”

He started to leave the cabin, when he suddenly brought up “all standing,” as the captain would have said, with a sharp exclamation of pain.

“What is it, sir?” demanded that veteran with some concern. “Your figurehead looks like you had some sort of a pain.”

“It is nothing. Just a sharp twinge of my old trouble, rheumatism,” explained the great man. “The damp air of the Basin may have brought it on.”

“Anchor right where you are!” exclaimed the captain, and before Mr. Jukes could say another word, he had darted into the “drug-store” and was back with a bottle full of a villainous-looking black liquid.

“My rheumatiz’ and gout remedy,” he explained.

“Yes, but I am under medical treatment. I – ”

“Keel-haul all your doctors. Throw their medicine overboard,” burst out the captain. “Try a few applications of Cap’n Ready’s Rheumatiz and Gout Specific. Cap’n Joe Trotter of the Flying Scud cured himself with two bottles. Take it! Try it! Rub it in twice a day, night and morning, and in a week you’ll be as spry as a boy, as taut and sound as a cable.”

“Well, well, I’ll try it,” said the magnate good-naturedly in reply to Captain Toby’s outburst of eloquence; “how much is it?”

“One dollar, guaranteed to work if used as directed, or your money back,” rattled on the captain, pocketing a bill which Mr. Jukes peeled off a roll that made Captain Toby open his eyes.

And so, burdened with a bottle of the “Rheumatiz and Gout Specific,” and with the memory of the first person he had ever met who was not willing to accept his bounty, the shipping magnate stepped ashore from the Venus.

“He’ll be dancing a hornpipe in a week,” prophesied Captain Toby; “the Specific has never failed.”

But if he could have seen Mr. Jukes carefully drop the bottle overboard as soon as he reached the shore end of the dock, his opinion of him would have fallen considerably. As it was, the old seaman was loud in his praise.

“Think of him, the skipper of a big corporation and all that, wisiting us on the Wenus!” he exclaimed. “Why, Jack, that’ll be something to tell about. The great Mr. Jukes! Maybe this’ll all lead to something! If the Specific works like it did on Cap’n Joe Trotter, he may make me his physician in ordinary.”

“Let’s hope it won’t work the same way on him that it did on Captain Zeb Holliday,” said Jack with a smile.

“Huh! That deck-swabbing lubber!” cried the captain, with intense scorn. “He drank it instead of rubbing it in, although the directions was wrote on the bottle plain as print. But, Jack, lad, why didn’t you take that check? Consarn it all – ”

“It’s no good talking about it, uncle,” said the boy, cutting him short; “I couldn’t take it; that’s all there is to that.”

“Confound you for a young jackass! Douse my topsails, but I’m proud of you, lad!” roared the captain, bringing down a mighty hand on Jack’s shoulders. “And now let’s pipe all hands to supper.”

Two days later, Jack happened to pass the dock where the Titan liner lay. She was taking aboard her cargo from a pipe-line – crude, black oil destined for Antwerp. Because of the adventure in which he had participated alongside her, Jack felt an interest in the ugly, powerful tanker. As he was looking at her, he noticed some men busy at the tops of her squat steel masts.

All at once they began to haul something aloft. What it was, Jack recognized the next moment. It was the antennæ of a wireless plant. They were installing a station on the ship, which bore the name “Ajax” on her round, whaleback stern.

Jack’s heart gave a sudden leap. A great idea had come to him. Mr. Jukes owned the Titan Line. The ship-owner had said to him only two nights before: “Remember, I’ll always stand your friend if I can. Never hesitate to call on me if you need anything at any time.”

And right then Jack needed something mighty badly. He needed the job of wireless operator on board the Ajax.