Salvage—extra special

A ship’s captain who didn’t want to be rescued.

Off Cape Sable, the coast-guard cutter Arrowsic received orders to return to her regular strategic position in a port on the Maine coast. For six weeks the cutter had been offshore on iceberg patrol in the steamer lanes.

The radioman’s ears fairly wiggled with the impulse of an expansive grin. He carried that grin when he trotted aft along the main deck, the message fluttering in his hand. Men observed the radiant visage and guessed hopefully.

Captain Rawson Bent received the message in his quarters, a spacious room below the quarter-deck. He was pacing to and fro across the beam of the ship. He performed a queer little jig when he started for his desk. No expression of hilarity, this! His countenance between his frosted temple locks was as stonily stern as usual. His muscles were unruly ever since he had spent a half-hour in icy Alaskan water after wind-lashed boat tackle had knocked him off the cutter Bear.

He pushed buttons on his desk, summoned executive officer and ship’s writer, gave orders for change of course, dictated acknowledgment of the receipt of orders, and the Arrowsic swung in a foaming half-circle and rode a tail sea in a sou’easter, heading for port. The tumble of graybacks suggested menace for the coasters. Captain Bent, returning to station, was now thinking solely of coast affairs.

When, eventually, the Arrowsic plowed past shipping in the home harbor, she was greeted by whistle toots of steamers and was hailed heartily by men leaning over the rails of anchored schooners. Captain Bent paced the bridge and swung his arm in reply. He was accepting the acclaim in behalf of the cutter and her salvage record.

As soon as the Arrowsic, crawfishing with churning screw, had backed into her dock within jumping distance of the pier head, a sailor leaped, beating a heave line to the wharf. He swarmed up a telephone post and made connection with the cutter’s private wire from central.

When he had overseen the job of mooring, the captain went below where the ship’s writer was busy with the freshly connected telephone, ringing up various points of contact to report arrival. Captain Bent waited at the man’s elbow, listening, checking to make certain that the ship had been put in touch with all the offices which should be informed.

It was immediately apparent that the writer had started something special at headquarters of the life-saving service. He was silent, giving attention. After his brief pause he barked:

“Yes, sir! I’ll call Captain Bent.”

The latter reached for the receiver and announced himself. This is what he heard:

“Captain Bent, you’re in the nick o’ time, as usual. Popham Sands station reports a two-master kedged offshore and making a touch-and-go of it. Station has been trying to get their boat off through the rollers, but she has pitch-poled at every try. They’ve fired lines on the chance of working the breeches buoy, but the lines haven’t been handled aboard the schooner. Station phones that the crew acts queer. Glass shows a woman and children aboard. It seems to be a job cut out for you, eh, what?”

“That’s what!” snapped the captain. “Inform the station I’m on the way. Hold on a moment! Does the glass show her name?”

“Yes, sir. She’s the Harvest Home, hailing from Lumbo Island.”

Captain Bent hung up and for an instant bored vacancy with a straight-ahead stare.

“I’ll be damned!” he snorted, leaping up and starting away.

Crossing the ward room, he saw the executive officer dealing with a man delegated by suppliants for shore leave.

Not halting in his stride, the commander announced, “We’re casting off at once, Mr. Todd. Call o’ duty! Send all hands to stations.”

The chief engineer stepped into the starboard alley from his stateroom, his face lathered. “Did I hear you say we’re off again, sir?”

“At once! Give her all she’ll carry.”

By this precipitate change of plans the Arrowsic plowed in departure down the harbor, cutting the foam streaks which were still marking the trail of her arrival.

Stepping into the wheelhouse, the captain gave orders to the man on the grating. “East by half south after turning the whistler. And make course good in tide first hour’s ebb.”

The chart room was abaft the wheelhouse through a connecting archway.

Captain Bent launched himself into a swivel chair and swung up his feet to rest on a table. His smile always flickered when he took this attitude. The pose was a deep-water gesture, with its meaning for mariners. Twice around Cape Horn--he was entitled to put both feet on the table!

The executive officer, coming in to make due log entry, glanced at the posed feet and grinned understanding.

Said Captain Bent, unbending more than was his wont, “They’re up there as monuments of memory, Mr. Todd. My memory has just been jogged. Nudged by a name. Harvest Home! We’re headed to pull off a packet named the Harvest Home. A two-master lugger taking the name of the mighty in vain. ’Twas in a full-rigger named Harvest Home that I rounded the Horn. Articled apprentice! So, for once, we’ll put a bit of sentiment into the job we do to-day. But Captain York Coombs would bang his fists up against his coffin lid if he could know that a two-sticked old hooker was now parading his clipper’s name.”

Lieutenant Todd made suitable reply and entered time of departure, course and objective.

The chart-room clock ding-dinged four bells--ten o’clock of the forenoon, landsman’s time.

Making mental estimate, Todd figured that the cutter would be off Popham Sands at about two o’clock in the afternoon, arriving in the last run of the ebb tide.

His nose wrinkled when foresight pictured for him the conditions off Popham Sands when the ebb would be kicking up trouble in earnest. The mouth of a great river was at Popham. When the barrier was lowered by a receding sea, the river, which had been forced back by tide at flood, would renew its assault on its ancient enemy, tilting at the ocean with brackish torrent. Towering surges were piling in toward the coast this day, following the previous thrust by the sou’easter. Where river and surges would be coming to grips that afternoon, during the rush of the ebb tide, there was bound to be welter aplenty.

Captain Bent squinted at the preoccupied countenance of his officer. “I see that you and I have the same thoughts, Mr. Todd. So there’s no profit in swapping ’em. We can only hope that the packet is still hooked when we get there.”

Standing in from the open sea four hours later, Captain Bent perceived that the schooner was still hooked.

With his glasses he had mounted to the top of the wheelhouse. He could see the schooner silhouetted against the white spume rolling up behind her from the breakers. The craft was a shuttlecock for the tide rips and surges. He understood why she had been able to hang on so long in the riot. He was obliged to have full knowledge of bottoms at all points of hazard along the coast. Rocks, deeply submerged, bastioned the sands at Popham where the beach ended undersea. The anchor flukes manifestly were gripped on rocks in a death clutch.

It was also evident to Captain Bent’s sea-trained observation of gear at bow that the schooner had drifted in from the open sea to this perilous position where she was fighting for her life. Through his glasses he was able to make out against the white suds churned by her forefoot the taut, straddled streaking of her chains. So, while she had drifted, her Old Man had maneuvered skillfully enough to effect a bridle-anchoring! This adjustment was enabling the craft to ride without broaching.

Running the glass lenses against his sleeve, the cutter commander muttered, “A clipper name hasn’t been wholly wasted on the man who knows enough to carry good chain and brace his bowers.”

Further inspection through the glass revealed that the schooner’s foremast had partially parted stays and that her top hamper had been slatted into a tangle. It would be impossible to make sail on her; she could not ratch off that lee even if she were dealing with a smoother sea.

It was up to the Arrowsic to get a line across the schooner, give her cable, tow her to safety. Captain Bent stowed his binoculars, descended to the bridge. His three lieutenants were there, ready for his orders.

“Have the gunner clear equipment for shooting a line. Get cross-bearings from points ashore, so we can make sure of charted depths. Put a man forward with heave lead.”

He gave the engineer one bell.

While the cutter slowed to half speed the captain informed the executive officer, “We mustn’t take too many chances, Mr. Todd, but we’ve got to tackle shoal water to put a line aboard her.”