The seven missionaries

The S. S. Andaman was a vessel of some three thousand tons. She was in reality a cargo boat carrying passengers, in that passengers were the secondary consideration. There was only one class, and the accommodation was sufficient for about thirty people. Twelve knots was her maximum speed, and she quivered like jelly if you tried to get more out of her. And last, but not least, Captain James Kelly had been her skipper for ten years, and loved her with the love only given to men who go down to the sea in ships.

When Jim and I went on board she was taking in cargo, and Kelly was busy. He was apparently having words with the harbor master over something, and the argument had reached the dangerous stage of politeness. But Jim had sailed in her before, and a minute or two later a delighted chief steward was shaking hands with him warmly.

“This is great, sir!” he cried. “We got a wireless about the berths, but we had no idea it was from you.”

“You can fix us up, Bury?” asked Jim.

“Sure thing, Mr. Maitland,” answered the other. “We’ve only got twelve on board: two Yanks, a colored gentleman, two ladies and a missionary bunch.” We had followed him below and he was showing us our cabins. “Seven of ’em, sir,” he went on, “with two crates of Bibles and prayer books, all complete. Maybe you saw them sitting around on deck as you came on board.”

“Can’t say I did, Bury,” said Jim indifferently.

They never go ashore, sir,” continued the steward. “We’ve been making all the usual calls, and you’d have thought they’d have liked to go ashore and stretch their legs--but they didn’t. There they sit from morning till night reading and praying, till they fairly give you the hump.”

“It doesn’t sound like one long scream of excitement,” said Jim. “But if they’re happy, that’s all that matters. Come on, Dick. Let’s go up and see if old man Kelly is still being polite.”

We went on deck to find that the argument was finished, and with a shout of delight the skipper recognized Jim. Jim went forward to meet him, and for a moment or two I stood where I was, idly watching the scene on the quay. And then quite distinctly I heard a voice from behind me say, “By God! It’s Jim Maitland.” Now as a remark it was so ordinary when Jim was about that I never gave it a thought. In that part of the world one heard it, or its equivalent, whenever one entered a hotel or even a railway carriage.

And so, as I say, I didn’t give it a thought for a moment or two, until Jim’s voice hailed me, and I turned around to be introduced to the skipper. It was then that I noticed two benevolent-looking clergymen seated close to me in two deck chairs. Their eyes were fixed on the skipper and on Jim, while two open Bibles adorned their knees. Not another soul was in sight; there was not the slightest doubt in my mind that it was one of them who had spoken. And as I stood talking with the skipper and Jim my mind was subconsciously working.

There was no reason, of course, why a missionary should not recognize Jim, but somehow or other one does not expect a devout man with a Bible lying open on his knee to invoke the name of the Almighty quite so glibly. If he had said “Dear me!” or “Good gracious!” it would have been different. But the other came as almost a shock. However, the matter was a small one, and probably I should have dismissed it from my mind, but for the sequel a minute or two later. The skipper was called away on some matter, and Jim and I strolled back past the two parsons. They both looked up at us with mild interest as we passed, but neither of them gave the faintest sign of recognition.

Now that did strike me as strange. A Clergyman may swear if he likes, but why in the name of fortune he should utterly ignore a man whom he evidently knew was beyond me.

“Come and lean over the side, Jim,” I said, when we were out of earshot. “I want to tell you something funny. Only don’t look around.”

He listened in silence, and when I ended he said:

“More people know Tom Fool, old boy, than Tom Fool knows. I certainly don’t know either of those two sportsmen, but it’s more than likely they know me, at any rate by sight. And wouldn’t you swear if you had to wear a dog collar in this heat?”

Evidently Jim was inclined to dismiss the episode as trifling, and after a time I came around to the same view. Even at lunch that day, when the skipper was formally introducing us and the clergyman still gave no sign of claiming any previous acquaintance with Jim, I thought no more about it. Possibly to substantiate that claim he might have had to admit his presence in some place which would take a bit of explaining away to his little flock. For the man whose voice I had heard was evidently the shining light of the bunch.

He turned out to be the Reverend Samuel Longfellow, and his destination, as that of all the others, was Colombo. They were going to open a missionary house somewhere in the interior of Ceylon, and run it on novel lines of their own. But at that point Jim and I got out of our depths and the conversation languished. However, they seemed very decent fellows, even if they did fail somewhat signally to add to the general gaiety.

The voyage pursued its quiet, normal course for the first four or five days. The two Americans and the skipper made up the necessary numbers for a game of poker; the two ladies--mother and daughter they were by the name of Armstrong--knitted; the seven parsons prayed, and the colored gentleman effaced himself. The weather was perfect; the sea like a mill pond with every prospect of continuing so for some time. And so we lazed along at our twelve knots, making a couple of final calls before starting on the two-thousand-mile run to Colombo.

It was the first night out on the last stage that Jim and I were sitting talking with the skipper on the bridge. Occasionally the sharp, hissing crackle of the wireless installation broke the silence, and through the open door of the cabin we could see the operator working away in his shirt sleeves.

“I guess it’s hard to begin to estimate what we sailors owe to Marconi for that invention,” said Kelly thoughtfully. “Now that we’ve got it, it seems almost incredible to think how we got along without it. And what can I do for you, sir?”

An abrupt change in his tone made me look around to see the Reverend Samuel Longfellow standing diffidently behind us. He evidently felt that he was trespassing, for his voice was almost apologetic.

“Is it possible, captain, to send a message from your wireless?” he asked.

“Of course it is,” answered Kelly. “You can hand in any message you like to the operator, and he’ll send it for you.”

“You see, I’ve never sent a message by wireless before,” said the parson mildly, “and I wasn’t quite sure what to do. Can you get an answer quickly?”

“Depends on whom you are sending it to and where he is.”

“He’s on a yacht somewhere in this neighborhood,” answered the clergyman. “He is a missionary, like myself, whose health has broken down, and a kind philanthropist is taking him for a cruise to help him recover. I felt it would be so nice if I could speak to him, so to say--and hear from him, perhaps, how he is getting on.”

“Quite,” agreed the skipper gravely. “Well, Mr. Longfellow, there is nothing to prevent your speaking to him as much as you like. You just hand in your message to the operator whenever you want to, and he’ll send down the answer to you as soon as he receives it.”

“Oh, thank you, Captain Kelly,” said the parson gratefully. “I suppose there’s no way of saying where I am,” he continued hesitatingly. “I mean on shore when one sends a wire the person who gets it can look up where you are on a map, and it makes it so much more interesting for him.”

“I’m afraid, Mr. Longfellow,” he remarked at length, in a stifled voice, “that you can’t quite do that at sea. Of course, the position of the ship will be given on the message in terms of latitude and longitude. So if your friend goes to the navigating officer of this yacht, he’ll be able to show him with a pin exactly where you were in the Indian Ocean when the message was sent.”

“I see,” said the clergyman. “How interesting! And then, if I tell him that we are moving straight toward Colombo at twelve knots an hour, my dear friend will be able to follow me in spirit all the way on the map.”

The skipper choked slightly.

“Precisely, Mr. Longfellow. But I wouldn’t call it twelve knots an hour if I were you. Just say--twelve knots.”

The Reverend Samuel looked a little bewildered.