A dozen yacht tenders flocked in a flotilla near the stern of a rusty old schooner. All the tenders were burning Coston lights, and from several boats yachtsmen were sending off rockets which striped the pall of fog with bizarre colorings.
The stern of the schooner was well lighted up by the torches, and Mayo saw her name, though he did not need that name to a.s.sure him of her ident.i.ty; she was the venerable _Polly_.
The light which flamed about her, showing up her rig and lines, was weirdly unreal and more than ever did she seem like a ghost ship.
The thick curtain of the mist caught up the flare of the torches and reflected it upon her from the skies, and she was limned in fantastic fashion from truck to water-line. Shadows of men in the tenders were thrown against the fog-screen in grotesque outline, and a spirit crew appeared to be toiling in the top-hamper of the old schooner.
Captain Mayo ordered his men to hold water and the tender drifted close to the flotilla. He spied a yacht skipper whom he had known when both were in the coasting trade.
"What"s the idea, Duncan?"
His acquaintance grinned. "Serenade for old Epps Candage"s girl--handed to her over his head." He pointed upward.
Projecting over the schooner"s rail was the convulsed countenance of Captain Candage. Choler seemed to be consuming him. The freakish light painted everything with patterns in arabesque; the captain"s face looked like the countenance of a gargoyle.
Mayo, observing with the natural prejudice of a "native," detected mockery in the affair. He had just been present at one exhibition of the convivial humor of larking yachtsmen.
"What"s the special excuse for it?" he asked, sourly.
"According to the story, Epps has brought her with him on this trip to break up a courting match."
"Well, does that have anything to do with this performance?"
"Oh, it"s only a little spree," confessed the other. "It was planned out on our yacht. Old Epps made himself a mucker to-day by sa.s.sing some of the gents of the fleet, and the boys are handing him a little something.
That"s all! It"s only fun!"
"According to my notion it"s the kind of fun that hurts when a girl is concerned, Duncan."
"Just as serious as ever, eh? Well, my notion is that a little good-natured fun never hurts a pretty girl--and they say this one is some looker! Oh, hold on a minute, Boyd!" The master of the _Olenia_ had turned away and was about to give an order to his oarsmen. "You ought to stop long enough to hear that new song one of the gents on the _Sunbeam_ has composed for the occasion. It"s a corker. I heard "em rehearsing it on our yacht."
In spite of his impatient resentment on behalf of the daughter of Epps Candage, Captain Mayo remained. Just then the accredited minstrel of the yachtsmen stood up, balancing himself in a tender. He was clearly revealed by the lights, and was magnified by the aureole of tinted fog which surrounded him. He sang, in waltz time, in a fine tenor:
"Our Polly O, O"er the sea you go; Fairer than sunbeam, lovely as moon-gleam, All of us love thee so!
While the breezes blow To waft thee, Polly O, We will be true to thee, Crossing the blue to thee, Polly--Polly!
Dear little Polly, Polly--O-O-O!"
He finished the verse and then raised both arms with the gesture of a choral conductor.
"All together, now, boys!"
They sang with soul and vigor and excellent effect.
Ferocity nearly inarticulate, fury almost apoplectic, were expressed by the face above the weather-worn rail.
"They say that music soothes the savage breast, but it don"t look like it in this case," observed Captain Duncan with a chuckle.
"Clear off away from here, you drunken dudes! I"ll have the law on ye!
I"ll have ye arrested for--for breaking the peace."
That threat, considering the surroundings, provoked great hilarity.
"Give way all! Here comes a cop!" warned a jeering voice.
"He"s walking on the water," explained another.
"The man must be a fool," declared Captain Mayo. "If he"d go below and shut up, they"d get tired and leave in a few minutes."
However, Captain Candage seemed to believe that retreat would be greatly to his discredit. He continued to hang over the rail, discharging as complete a line of deep-water oaths as ever pa.s.sed the quivering lips of a mariner. Therefore the playful yachtsmen were highly entertained and stayed to bait him still further. Every little while they sang the Polly song with fresh gusto, while the enraged skipper fairly danced to it in his mad rage and flung his arms about like a crazy orchestra leader.
Mr. Speed came rowing in his dory, putting out all his strength, splashing his oars. "My Gawd! Cap"n Mayo," he gasped, "I heard "em hollering "Oh, Polly!" and I was "feard she was afire. What"s the trouble?"
"You"d better get on board, sir, and induce Captain Candage to go below and keep still. He is fast making a complete idiot of himself."
"I hain"t got no influence over him. I ask and implore you to step on board and soothe him down, sir. You can do it. He"ll listen to a Mayo."
"I"d better not try. It"s no job for a stranger, Mr. Speed."
"He"ll be heaving that whole deckload of shingles at "em next!"
"Get his daughter to coax him."
"He won"t listen to her when he"s that fussed up!"
"I"m sorry! Give way men!"
His rowers dropped their oars into the water and pulled away with evident reluctance.
"Better stay and see it out," advised Captain Duncan.
"I don"t care much for your show," stated Mayo, curtly.
The cabin curtains were drawn on the _Olenia_, and he felt especially shut away from human companionship. He went forward and paced up and down the deck, turning over his troubled affairs in his mind, but making poor shift in his efforts to set anything in its right place.
There were no indications that the serenading yachtsmen were becoming tired of their method of killing time during a fog-bound evening. They had secured banjos and mandolins, and were singing the Polly song with better effect and greater relish. And continually the hoa.r.s.e voice of the _Polly"s_ master roared forth malediction, twisted into new forms of profanity.
But Captain Mayo, pacing under the damp gleam of the riding-light, paid but little heed to the hullabaloo. He was too thoroughly absorbed in his own troubles to feel special interest in what his neighbors were doing. He did not even note that a fog-sodden breeze had begun to puff spasmodically from the east and that the mists were shredding overhead.
However, all of a sudden, a sound forced itself on his attention; he heard the chuckling of sheaves and knew that a sail was being hoisted.
The low-lying stratum of fog was still thick, and he could not perceive the ident.i.ty of the craft which proposed to take advantage of the sluggish breeze. The "ruckle-ruckle" of the blocks sounded at quick intervals and indicated haste; there was a suggestion of vicious determination on the part of the men who were tugging at the halyards.
Then Captain Mayo heard the steady clanking of capstan pawls. He knew the methods of the Apple-treers, their cautiousness, and their leisurely habits, and he could scarcely believe that a coasting skipper was intending to leave the harbor that night. But the capstan pawls began to click in staccato, showing that the anchor had been broken out.
Protesting shouts from all about in the gloom greeted that signal.
There was no mistaking the hoa.r.s.e voice of Captain Candage when it was raised in reply; his tones had become familiar after that evening of malediction.
"Dingdam ye, I know of a way of getting shet of the bunch of ye!"
"Don"t try to shift your anchorage!"
"Anchorage be hossified! I"m going to sea!" bellowed the master of the _Polly_.