"How are you for a climb?" Margaret asked me, shortly after we had left the table.
She stood challengingly at my open door, in oilskins, sou'wester, and sea-boots.
"I've never seen you with a foot above the deck since we sailed," she went on. "Have you a good head?"I marked my book, rolled out of my bunk in which I had been wedged, and clapped my hands for Wada.
"Will you?" she cried eagerly.
"If you let me lead," I answered airily, "and if you will promise to hold on tight. Whither away?""Into the top of the jigger. It's the easiest. As for holding on, please remember that I have often done it. It is with you the doubt rests.""Very well," I retorted; "do you lead then. I shall hold on tight.""I have seen many a landsman funk it," she teased. "There are no lubber-holes in our tops.""And most likely I shall," I agreed. "I've never been aloft in my life, and since there is no hole for a lubber."She looked at me, half believing my confession of weakness, while Iextended my arms for the oilskin which Wada struggled on to me.
On the poop it was magnificent, and terrible, and sombre. The universe was very immediately about us. It blanketed us in storming wind and flying spray and grayness. Our main deck was impassable, and the relief of the wheel came aft along the bridge. It was two o'clock, and for over two hours the frozen wretches had laid out upon the fore-yard. They were still there, weak, feeble, hopeless.
Captain West, stepping out in the lee of the chart-house, gazed at them for several minutes.
"We'll have to give up that reef," he said to Mr. Pike. "Just make the sail fast. Better put on double gaskets."And with lagging feet, from time to time pausing and holding on as spray and the tops of waves swept over him, the mate went for'ard along the bridge to vent his scorn on the two watches of a four-masted ship that could not reef a foresail.
It is true. They could not do it, despite their willingness, for this I have learned: THE MEN DO THEIR WEAK BEST WHENEVER THE ORDERIS GIVEN TO SHORTEN SAIL. It must be that they are afraid. They lack the iron of Mr. Pike, the wisdom and the iron of Captain West.
Always, have I noticed, with all the alacrity of which they are capable, do they respond to any order to shorten down. That is why they are for'ard, in that pigsty of a forecastle, because they lack the iron. Well, I can say only this: If nothing else could have prevented the funk hinted at by Margaret, the sorry spectacle of these ironless, spineless creatures was sufficient safeguard. How could I funk in the face of their weakness--I, who lived aft in the high place?
Margaret did not disdain the aid of my hand as she climbed upon the pin-rail at the foot of the weather jigger-rigging. But it was merely the recognition of a courtesy on her part, for the next moment she released her mittened hand from mine, swung boldly outboard into the face of the gale, and around against the ratlines. Then she began to climb. I followed, almost unaware of the ticklishness of the exploit to a tyro, so buoyed up was I by her example and by my scorn of the weaklings for'ard. Where men could go, I could go.
What men could do, I could do. And no daughter of the Samurai could out-game me.
Yet it was slow work. In the windward rolls against the storm-gusts one was pinned helplessly, like a butterfly, against the rigging. At such times, so great was the pressure one could not lift hand nor foot. Also, there was no need for holding on. As I have said, one was pinned against the rigging by the wind.
Through the snow beginning to drive the deck grew small beneath me, until a fall meant a broken back or death, unless one landed in the sea, in which case the result would be frigid drowning. And still Margaret climbed. Without pause she went out under the overhanging platform of the top, shifted her holds to the rigging that went aloft from it, and swung around this rigging, easily, carelessly, timing the action to the roll, and stood safely upon the top.
I followed. I breathed no prayers, knew no qualms, as I presented my back to the deck and climbed out under the overhang, feeling with my hands for holds I could not see. I was in an ecstasy. I could dare anything. Had she sprung into the air, stretched out her arms, and soared away on the breast of the gale, I should have unhesitatingly followed her.
As my head outpassed the edge of the top so that she came into view, I could see she was looking at me with storm-bright eyes. And as Iswung around the rigging lightly and joined her, I saw approval in her eyes that was quickly routed by petulance.
