Adventure Magazine Cover — page 143: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Micky’s Marquis only perhaps for a minute or two in days that the second mate dared pump water from the forepeak tank for fear of salt water getting in much more than had been, and ruining that part of the supply utterly. Then it was that the combination of adverse circumstances proved almost more than the Marquis could endure. He shivered even while furling a split topsail, which kept every other man sweat- ing. For the first time since Micky had cured his sore hands, the little Frenchman hung back from hauling his share on a rope. For the first time in the entire voyage he failed to respond with a smile, faint though it was at times, to Micky’s boisterous greeting. Straight to the Old Man went Micky. “Well?” snapped the sleep-hungry, har- assed skipper. “Plase sor, ’tis the Marquis Oi’m onaisy about. Th’ lad’s dyin’ on his feet, sir. He ought to lay up, sor.” “Lay up!” gasped the Old Man. “In this?” He swept a heavy arm around the gray sea wastes. His own fat, red face now sagged in gray folds of fleshless skin, his own bright eyes were red and heavy for lack of sleep. “Oi’ll do his worrk, sor,” Micky per- sisted, and the skipper’s haggard face lighted up with the tenderness that lurks within the hard case of most real sailor-men. “Go for’ard, Donlin,”’ he said, gently turning Micky about. ‘“You’re already doing more than any two men in the ship. I’m watching, my lad. The ship can spare nobody until a man drops. The weather’ll change in a little while, by the glass. Your Marquis will soon find his feet again.” Micky grinned at the unconscious humor, and saluted. He stopped in at the galley and found the Doctor out. He had wanted to bully the old cook into making some hot coffee; in his absence he rummag- ed for dry sticks, started a bit of fire, and hurriedly made it himself out of cabin stores. Taking it forward, he ran right in to old Doc himself, yarning in the forecastle. He put the steaming pot behind him, catching the cook’s eye; but there was something on Doc’s mind, too, for though he undoubtedly caught sight of the coffee- pot, he slipped his pipe in his pocket and made a hasty exit. “Now what the @ivil!’’ Micky grunted, looking around at the palpably uneasy ed 137 watch. He saw the black eyes of the Marquis glittering at him out of a face of ghastly hue. ‘Here, me boy,” he grinned, “‘giv’s yer pannikin. Hot coffee, me little man!’ Like a phantom the Marquis confronted him, spitting with anger. Micky stood like an efigy, dumb with amazement, for the excitement of the Marquis was cer- tainly not that of a tottering mind. “Ha!” screamed the Frenchman, snap- ping his fingers under Micky’s nose. .‘‘Ha! Fet is ze false friend, ha? I am ze seeck man, yes, bot I do ze work, no? An’ ze man vat ees my friend mos’ go to ze skip- paire an’ say zat I, I, I am not fit for ze work ze sheep! Parbleul Come on ze deck!”’ Before Micky could well fathom the mys- tery, understand that the cook must have been aft on some business with the steward and overheard his appeal to the captain, thereafter carrying the tale to the Marquis, the little Frenchman was dancing frantically in front of him, two small, pitiful fists balled up and jerking under his nose. The coffee-pot fell with a sizzling splash, and Micky glared down at his excited friend. Then, while he was yet debating whether to spank the little man and put him in his bunk, or go out and pound the cook, to say nothing of his feelings at the loss of the precious coffee, from on deck came a thunderous crash and roar, a sharper, more metallic crash, and a shout from the poop that penetrated even the hubbub of the elements. : “On deck! All hands! Aft with you, the for’ard tank’s adrift!” The forward tank was one of a pair, secured by a stout band of iron which was bolted through the bulwarks fore and aft of the tank, just abaft the break of the forecastle. It, and its mate opposite, was a cubical iron tank full of water, and weighed around two tons. It was the emergency supply in case the big forepeak tanks gave out before the voyage was up. And it was adrift; a careering, murderous lump of inanimate menace in the hands of such terrific seas as were combing the ship from either quarter. Merely to get out of the forecastle was a problem for the boldest and nimblest. As the men swarmed up the narrow ladder, the tank could be heard thundering across the deck to the roll of the ship and the COPMMICLOOOKS (E@)