“Then he vanished from the deck for a while, but presently he came out of the cabin with Maggie, and these two went over the gangway publicly, before all hands, going for a walk together on that awful, blazing hot day, with clouds of dust flying about. They came back after a few hours looking very staid, but didn’t seem to have the slightest idea where they had been. Anyway, that’s the answer they both made to Mrs. Colchester’s question at tea-time.
“And didn’t she turn on Charley, with her voice like an old night cabman’s! ‘Rubbish. Don’t know where you’ve been! Stuff and nonsense. You’ve walked the girl off her legs. Don’t do it again.’
“It’s surprising how meek Charley could be with that old woman. Only on one occasion he whispered to me, ‘I’m jolly glad she isn’t Maggie’s aunt, except by marriage. That’s no sort of relationship.’ But I think he let Maggie have too much of her own way. She was hopping all over that ship in her yachting skirt and a red tam o’ shanter like a bright bird on a dead black tree. The old salts used to grin to themselves when they saw her coming along, and offered to teach her knots or splices. I believe she liked the men, for Charley’s sake, I suppose.
“As you may imagine, the fiendish propensities of that cursed ship were never spoken of on board. Not in the cabin, at any rate. Only once on the home-ward passage Charley said, incautiously, something about bringing all her crew home this time. Captain Colchester began to look uncomfortable at once, and that silly, hard-bitten old woman flew out at Charley as though he had said something indecent. I was quite confounded myself; as to Maggie, she sat completely mystified, opening her blue eyes very wide. Of course, before she was a day older she wormed it all out of me. She was a very difficult person to lie to.
“‘How awful,’ she said, quite solemn. ‘So many poor fellows. I am glad the voyage is nearly over. I won’t have a moment’s peace about Charley now.’
“I assured her Charley was all right. It took more than that ship knew to get over a seaman like Charley. And she agreed with me.
“Next day we got the tug off Dungeness; and when the tow-rope was fast Charley rubbed his hands and said to me in an undertone —
“‘We’ve baffled her, Ned.’
‘“Looks like it,’ I said, with a grin at him. It was beautiful weather, and the sea as smooth as a millpond. We went up the river without a shadow of trouble except once, when off Hole Haven, the brute took a sudden sheer and nearly had a barge anchored just clear of the fairway. But I was aft, looking after the steering, and she did not catch me napping that time. Charley came up on the poop, looking very concerned. ‘Close shave,’ says he.
“‘Never mind, Charley,’ I answered, cheerily. ‘You’ve tamed her.’
“We were to tow right up to the dock. The river pilot boarded us below Gravesend, and the first words I heard him say were: ‘You may just as well take your port anchor inboard at once, Mr. Mate.’
“This had been done when I went forward. I saw Maggie on the forecastle head enjoying the bustle and I begged her to go aft, but she took no notice of me, of course. Then Charley, who was very busy with the head gear, caught sight of her and shouted in his biggest voice: ‘Get off the forecastle head, Maggie. You’re in the way here.’ For all answer she made a funny face at him, and I saw poor Charley turn away, hiding a smile. She was flushed with the excitement of getting home again, and her blue eyes seemed to snap electric sparks as she looked at the river. A collier brig had gone round just ahead of us, and our tug had to stop her engines in a hurry to avoid running into her.
“In a moment, as is usually the case, all the shipping in the reach seemed to get into a hopeless tangle. A schooner and a ketch got up a small collision all to themselves right in the middle of the river. It was exciting to watch, and, meantime, our tug remained stopped. Any other ship than that brute could have been coaxed to keep straight for a couple of minutes — but not she! Her head fell off at once, and she began to drift down, taking her tug along with her. I noticed a cluster of coasters at anchor within a quarter of a mile of us, and I thought I had better speak to the pilot. ‘If you let her get amongst that lot,’ I said, quietly, ‘she will grind some of them to bits before we get her out again.’
“‘Don’t I know her!’ cries he, stamping his foot in a perfect fury. And he out with his whistle to make that bothered tug get the ship’s head up again as quick as possible. He blew like mad, waving his arm to port, and presently we could see that the tug’s engines had been set going ahead. Her paddles churned the water, but it was as if she had been trying to tow a rock — she couldn’t get an inch out of that ship. Again the pilot blew his whistle, and waved his arm to port. We could see the tug’s paddles turning faster and faster away, broad on our bow.
“For a moment tug and ship hung motionless in a crowd of moving shipping, and then the terrific strain that evil, stony-hearted brute would always put on everything, tore the towing-chock clean out. The tow-rope surged over, snapping the iron stanchions of the head-rail one after another as if they had been sticks of sealing-wax. It was only then I noticed that in order to have a better view over our heads, Maggie had stepped upon the port anchor as it lay flat on the forecastle deck.
“It had been lowered properly into its hardwood beds, but there had been no time to take a turn with it. Anyway, it was quite secure as it was, for going into dock; but I could see directly that the tow-rope would sweep under the fluke in another second. My heart flew up right into my throat, but not before I had time to yell out: ‘Jump clear of that anchor!’
“But I hadn’t time to shriek out her name. I don’t suppose she heard me at all. The first touch of the hawser against the fluke threw her down; she was up on her feet again quick as lightning, but she was up on the wrong side. I heard a horrid, scraping sound, and then that anchor, tipping over, rose up like something alive; its great, rough iron arm caught Maggie round the waist, seemed to clasp her close with a dreadful hug, and flung itself with her over and down in a terrific clang of iron, followed by heavy ringing blows that shook the ship from stem to stern — because the ring stopper held!”
“How horrible!” I exclaimed.
“I used to dream for years afterwards of anchors catching hold of girls,” said the man in tweeds, a little wildly. He shuddered. “With a most pitiful howl Charley was over after her almost on the instant. But, Lord! he didn’t see as much as a gleam of her red tam o’ shanter in the water. Nothing! nothing whatever! In a moment there were half-a-dozen boats around us, and he got pulled into one. I, with the boatswain and the carpenter, let go the other anchor in a hurry and brought the ship up somehow. The pilot had gone silly. He walked up and down the forecastle head wringing his hands and muttering to himself: ‘Killing women, now! Killing women, now!’ Not another word could you get out of him.
“Dusk fell, then a night black as pitch; and peering upon the river I heard a low, mournful hail, ‘Ship, ahoy!’ Two Gravesend watermen came alongside. They had a lantern in their wherry, and looked up the ship’s side, holding on to the ladder without a word. I saw in the patch of light a lot of loose, fair hair down there.”
He shuddered again.
