wind rises, see that everyone is accounted for and is indoors. Be sure to leave one door open on the side away from the wind …” Make you feel good, Jones? Well, that’s good enough for landlubbers. But you don’t frighten me. Groundswell’s a little heavier …
You’re getting a kick out of the crew, aren’t you? That Oklahoma bosun, for instance. He’s sitting on the bitts by the galley. He’s in a cold sweat. I’m wise to you, Davy; the kid on the 4 to 8 is wise; and the skipper is wise; but that bosun is fretting like an old maid with the shingles. Just because he had the roof blown away from over his head in the ’34 blow. We are passing plenty of ships; it’s the first time I’ve ever seen loaded tankers headed south. Every time one goes by the bosun starts moaning again, “Why doethn’t the thkipper turn around? Don’t he know there’th a hurricane coming?” and the kid and I sit and laugh at him. It’s the kid’s first trip; he’s out to see the sights. Kick up a show for him, Jones. You don’t want him to go back home and tell the truth about you, do you? Look at him. He’s got his sea-legs now; he’ll be a seaman before he gets his A.B. ticket. Look at him bracing easily against the roll of the ship, with the wind tearing at his hair. Seventeen years old, Davy, and you’re as old as the earth, but that kid has you whipped.
Sept. 22, 1938
Well, small stuff, you’ve succeeded in getting in people’s hair. Landlubber stuff again. Special broadcasts all night; all the crew off-watch spent the night in the messroom listening to them. “… after the wind subsides special squads of police and deputies will cover the streets. If you need assistance wait at your home until one of the squads passes.” Panic seed. You’ve got the bosun so worried that he knocks a man off when we are working on deck, to go back and get the hourly reports. We’re carrying thirty-foot seas now, but we’ve got you fooled. I told you the skipper was wise to you. By the time the blow hits the coast we’ll be a hundred miles north of it.
I can’t figure O’Rourke. He was going to sea before my parentswere born. He’s been through three hurricanes on the coast here, and everything else, running foreign, from a typhoon to a williwaw. Yet when the kid said, “I hope it hits us.
Then
we’ll see some fun!” O’Rourke clipped him. “Wait till ye know what ye’re talking about,” he growled, “before ye open yer young yap again.” The kid stood there rubbing his cheek, pain and shock in his eyes. Then he turned and ran below. I can’t figure it. O’Rourke knows what it’s all about; if you could kill a big-ship sailor, which I doubt, as long as the ship is in good condition, O’Rourke’s typhoons would have got him long ago. And he’s alive, isn’t he? So why should he clip the kid just because the kid has figured out in one trip what it took O’Rourke forty years to learn; that no hurricane is as strong as clean steel?
Sails Carmody is another one. He’s a Boston Irishman, the kid’s watchmate on the 4 to 8. Sails is at the radio for every report, but he never says anything. Each time he hears of another fifty miles less between us and the storm center he frowns more deeply. Yet I saw Sails take on two big Swedes at Evelyn Hardtime’s and whip them both. I saw Sails run up the mast in oilskins in a heavy swell, to clear the signal halliard. He has no nerves. And yet this business has him worried. How can you buffalo a man like that, Jones?
So you decided to take me up on it, did you? That Miami station: “The storm center is reported 180 miles due east of Miami, moving approximately north-northwest. It will therefore not reach the Florida coast.” Shifted north, hey? And will we meet? Let me figure this. If we hold course and speed, my ship and your little hurricane, we should meet a little to the north of Charleston, about 45 miles offshore. Hurry it up, old-timer, or we’ll be there
You’re getting a kick out of the crew, aren’t you? That Oklahoma bosun, for instance. He’s sitting on the bitts by the galley. He’s in a cold sweat. I’m wise to you, Davy; the kid on the 4 to 8 is wise; and the skipper is wise; but that bosun is fretting like an old maid with the shingles. Just because he had the roof blown away from over his head in the ’34 blow. We are passing plenty of ships; it’s the first time I’ve ever seen loaded tankers headed south. Every time one goes by the bosun starts moaning again, “Why doethn’t the thkipper turn around? Don’t he know there’th a hurricane coming?” and the kid and I sit and laugh at him. It’s the kid’s first trip; he’s out to see the sights. Kick up a show for him, Jones. You don’t want him to go back home and tell the truth about you, do you? Look at him. He’s got his sea-legs now; he’ll be a seaman before he gets his A.B. ticket. Look at him bracing easily against the roll of the ship, with the wind tearing at his hair. Seventeen years old, Davy, and you’re as old as the earth, but that kid has you whipped.
Sept. 22, 1938
Well, small stuff, you’ve succeeded in getting in people’s hair. Landlubber stuff again. Special broadcasts all night; all the crew off-watch spent the night in the messroom listening to them. “… after the wind subsides special squads of police and deputies will cover the streets. If you need assistance wait at your home until one of the squads passes.” Panic seed. You’ve got the bosun so worried that he knocks a man off when we are working on deck, to go back and get the hourly reports. We’re carrying thirty-foot seas now, but we’ve got you fooled. I told you the skipper was wise to you. By the time the blow hits the coast we’ll be a hundred miles north of it.
I can’t figure O’Rourke. He was going to sea before my parentswere born. He’s been through three hurricanes on the coast here, and everything else, running foreign, from a typhoon to a williwaw. Yet when the kid said, “I hope it hits us.
Then
we’ll see some fun!” O’Rourke clipped him. “Wait till ye know what ye’re talking about,” he growled, “before ye open yer young yap again.” The kid stood there rubbing his cheek, pain and shock in his eyes. Then he turned and ran below. I can’t figure it. O’Rourke knows what it’s all about; if you could kill a big-ship sailor, which I doubt, as long as the ship is in good condition, O’Rourke’s typhoons would have got him long ago. And he’s alive, isn’t he? So why should he clip the kid just because the kid has figured out in one trip what it took O’Rourke forty years to learn; that no hurricane is as strong as clean steel?
Sails Carmody is another one. He’s a Boston Irishman, the kid’s watchmate on the 4 to 8. Sails is at the radio for every report, but he never says anything. Each time he hears of another fifty miles less between us and the storm center he frowns more deeply. Yet I saw Sails take on two big Swedes at Evelyn Hardtime’s and whip them both. I saw Sails run up the mast in oilskins in a heavy swell, to clear the signal halliard. He has no nerves. And yet this business has him worried. How can you buffalo a man like that, Jones?
So you decided to take me up on it, did you? That Miami station: “The storm center is reported 180 miles due east of Miami, moving approximately north-northwest. It will therefore not reach the Florida coast.” Shifted north, hey? And will we meet? Let me figure this. If we hold course and speed, my ship and your little hurricane, we should meet a little to the north of Charleston, about 45 miles offshore. Hurry it up, old-timer, or we’ll be there
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