The Sea-Wolf - Jack London (the read aloud family txt) 📗

of its hairy shield, and advertised instant relief when he glanced from Wolf Larsen to me, noted that there was only the pair of us, and then glanced over his own two men who had joined him. Surely he had little reason to be afraid. He towered like a Goliath above Wolf Larsen. He must have measured six feet eight or nine inches in stature, and I subsequently learned his weight⁠—240 pounds. And there was no fat about him. It was all bone and muscle.

A return of apprehension was apparent when, at the top of the companionway, Wolf Larsen invited him below. But he reassured himself with a glance down at his host⁠—a big man himself but dwarfed by the propinquity of the giant. So all hesitancy vanished, and the pair descended into the cabin. In the meantime, his two men, as was the wont of visiting sailors, had gone forward into the forecastle to do some visiting themselves.

Suddenly, from the cabin came a great, choking bellow, followed by all the sounds of a furious struggle. It was the leopard and the lion, and the lion made all the noise. Wolf Larsen was the leopard.

“You see the sacredness of our hospitality,” I said bitterly to Maud Brewster.

She nodded her head that she heard, and I noted in her face the signs of the same sickness at sight or sound of violent struggle from which I had suffered so severely during my first weeks on the Ghost.

“Wouldn’t it be better if you went forward, say by the steerage companionway, until it is over?” I suggested.

She shook her head and gazed at me pitifully. She was not frightened, but appalled, rather, at the human animality of it.

“You will understand,” I took advantage of the opportunity to say, “whatever part I take in what is going on and what is to come, that I am compelled to take it⁠—if you and I are ever to get out of this scrape with our lives.”

“It is not nice⁠—for me,” I added.

“I understand,” she said, in a weak, faraway voice, and her eyes showed me that she did understand.

The sounds from below soon died away. Then Wolf Larsen came alone on deck. There was a slight flush under his bronze, but otherwise he bore no signs of the battle.

“Send those two men aft, Mr. Van Weyden,” he said.

I obeyed, and a minute or two later they stood before him. “Hoist in your boat,” he said to them. “Your hunter’s decided to stay aboard awhile and doesn’t want it pounding alongside.”

“Hoist in your boat, I said,” he repeated, this time in sharper tones as they hesitated to do his bidding.

“Who knows? you may have to sail with me for a time,” he said, quite softly, with a silken threat that belied the softness, as they moved slowly to comply, “and we might as well start with a friendly understanding. Lively now! Death Larsen makes you jump better than that, and you know it!”

Their movements perceptibly quickened under his coaching, and as the boat swung inboard I was sent forward to let go the jibs. Wolf Larsen, at the wheel, directed the Ghost after the Macedonia’s second weather boat.

Under way, and with nothing for the time being to do, I turned my attention to the situation of the boats. The Macedonia’s third weather boat was being attacked by two of ours, the fourth by our remaining three; and the fifth, turn about, was taking a hand in the defence of its nearest mate. The fight had opened at long distance, and the rifles were cracking steadily. A quick, snappy sea was being kicked up by the wind, a condition which prevented fine shooting; and now and again, as we drew closer, we could see the bullets zip-zipping from wave to wave.

The boat we were pursuing had squared away and was running before the wind to escape us, and, in the course of its flight, to take part in repulsing our general boat attack.

Attending to sheets and tacks now left me little time to see what was taking place, but I happened to be on the poop when Wolf Larsen ordered the two strange sailors forward and into the forecastle. They went sullenly, but they went. He next ordered Miss Brewster below, and smiled at the instant horror that leapt into her eyes.

“You’ll find nothing gruesome down there,” he said, “only an unhurt man securely made fast to the ringbolts. Bullets are liable to come aboard, and I don’t want you killed, you know.”

Even as he spoke, a bullet was deflected by a brass-capped spoke of the wheel between his hands and screeched off through the air to windward.

“You see,” he said to her; and then to me, “Mr. Van Weyden, will you take the wheel?”

Maud Brewster had stepped inside the companionway so that only her head was exposed. Wolf Larsen had procured a rifle and was throwing a cartridge into the barrel. I begged her with my eyes to go below, but she smiled and said:

“We may be feeble land-creatures without legs, but we can show Captain Larsen that we are at least as brave as he.”

He gave her a quick look of admiration.

“I like you a hundred percent better for that,” he said. “Books, and brains, and bravery. You are well-rounded, a bluestocking fit to be the wife of a pirate chief. Ahem, we’ll discuss that later,” he smiled, as a bullet struck solidly into the cabin wall.

I saw his eyes flash golden as he spoke, and I saw the terror mount in her own.

“We are braver,” I hastened to say. “At least, speaking for myself, I know I am braver than Captain Larsen.”

It was I who was now favoured by a quick look. He was wondering if I were making fun of him. I put three or four spokes over to counteract a sheer toward the wind on the part of the Ghost, and then steadied her. Wolf Larsen was still waiting an