Red
The skipper thrust his hand into one of his trouser pockets and with difficulty, for they were not at the sides but in front and he was a portly man, pulled out a large silver watch.
He looked at it and then looked again at the declining sun.
The Kanaka at the wheel gave him a glance, but did not speak.
The skipper’s eyes rested on the island they were approaching.
A white line of foam marked the reef.
He knew there was an opening large enough to get his ship through, and when they came a little nearer he counted on seeing it.
They had nearly an hour of daylight still before them.
In the lagoon the water was deep and they could anchor comfortably.
The chief of the village, which he could already see among the coconut trees was a friend of the mate’s, and it would be pleasant to go ashore for the night.
The mate came forward at that minute and the skipper turned to him.
“We’ll take a bottle of booze along with us and get some girls in to dance,” he said.
“I don’t see the opening,” said the mate.
He was a Kanaka, a handsome, swarthy fellow, with somewhat the look of a later Roman emperor, inclined to stoutness; but his face was fine and clean-cut.
“I’m dead sure there’s one right here,” said the captain, looking through his glasses.
“I can’t understand why I can’t pick it up.
Send one of the boys up the mast to have a look.”
The mate called one of the crew and gave him the order.
The captain watched the Kanaka climb and waited for him to speak.
But the Kanaka shouted down that he could see nothing but the unbroken line of foam.
The captain spoke Samoan like a native, and he cursed him freely.
“Shall he stay up there?” asked the mate.
“What the hell good does that do.” answered the captain.
“The blame fool can’t see worth a cent.
You bet your sweet life I’d find the opening if I was up there.”
He looked at the slender mast with anger.
It was all very well for a native who had been used to climbing up coconut trees all his life.
He was fat and heavy.
“Come down,” he shouted.
“You’re no more use than a dead dog.
We’ll just have to go along the reef till we find the opening.”
It was a seventy-ton schooner with paraffin auxiliary, and it ran, when there was no head wind, between four and five knots an hour.
It was a bedraggled object; it had been painted white a very long time ago, but it was now dirty, dingy, and mottled.
It smelt strongly of paraffin, and of the copra which was its usual cargo.
They were within a hundred feet of the reef now and the captain told the steersman to run along it till they came to the opening.
But when they had gone a couple of miles he realised that they had missed it.
He went about and slowly worked back again.
The white foam of the reef continued without interruption and now the sun was setting.
With a curse at the stupidity of the crew the skipper resigned himself to waiting till next morning.
“Put her about,” he said.
“I can’t anchor here.”
They went out to sea a little and presently it was quite dark.
They anchored.
When the sail was furled the ship began to roll a good deal.
They said at Apia that one day she would roll right over; and the owner, a German-American who managed one of the largest stores, said that no money was big enough to induce him to go out in her.
The cook, a Chinese in while trousers, very dirty and ragged, and a thin white tunic, came to say that supper was ready, and when the skipper went into the cabin he found the engineer already seated at table.
The engineer was a long, lean man with a scraggy neck. He was dressed in blue overalls and a sleeveless jersey which showed his thin arms tattooed from elbow to wrist.
“Hell, having to spend the night outside,” said the skipper.
The engineer did not answer, and they ate their supper in silence.
The cabin was lit by a dim oil-lamp.