DEBITS AND CREDITS

Books by Rudyard Kipling

• Actions and Reactions
• Brushwood Boy, The
• Captains Courageous
• Collected Verse
• Day’s Work, The
• Debits and Credits
• Departmental Ditties and Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads
• Diversity of Creatures, A
• Eyes of Asia, The
• Feet of the Young Men, The
• Five Nations, The
• France at War
• Fringes of the Fleet
• From Sea to Sea
• History of England, A
• Independence
• Irish Guards in the Great War, The
• Jungle Book, The
• Jungle Book, Second
• Just So Song Book
• Just So Stories
• Kim
• Kipling Anthology, A Prose and Verse
• Kipling Calendar
• Kipling Stories and Poems Every Child Should Know
• Kipling Birthday Book, The
• Land and Sea Tales
• Letters of Travel
• Life’s Handicap: Being Stories of Mine Own People
• Light That Failed, The
• Many Inventions
• Naulahka, The (With Wolcott Balestier)
• Plain Tales From the Hills
• Puck of Pook’s Hill
• Rewards and Fairies
• Rudyard Kipling’s Verse: Inclusive Edition, 1885-1918
• Sea Warfare
• Seven Seas, The
• Soldier Stories
• Soldiers Three, The Story of the Gadsbys, and In Black and White
• Song of the English, A
• Songs for Youth
• Songs from Books
• Stalky & Co.
• The Two Jungle Books
• They
• Traffics and Discoveries
• Under the Deodars, The Phantom ’Rickshaw, and Wee Willie Winkie
• With the Night Mail
• Years Between, The

DEBITS AND CREDITS

By Rudyard Kipling

GARDEN CITY   NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1926

COPYRIGHT, 1919, 1924, 1926, BY RUDYARD KIPLING. COPYRIGHT, 1915, 1918, BY THE METROPOLITAN MAGAZINE COMPANY. COPYRIGHT, 1925, 1926, BY THE MCCALL COMPANY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES AT THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y.

CONTENTS

THE ENEMIES TO EACH OTHER

With Apologies to the Shade of Mirza Mirkhond

THE ENEMIES TO EACH OTHER

It is narrated (and God knows best the true state of the case) by Abu Ali Jafir Bin Yakub-ulisfahani that when, in His determinate Will, The Benefactor had decided to create the Greatest Substitute (Adam), He despatched, as is known, the faithful and the excellent Archangel Jibrail to gather from Earth clays, loams, and sands endowed with various colours and attributes, necessary for the substance of our pure Forefather’s body. Receiving the Command and reaching the place, Jibrail put forth his hand to take them, but Earth shook and lamented and supplicated him. Then said Jibrail: “Lie still and rejoice, for out of thee He will create that than which (there) is no handsomer thing—to wit a Successor and a Wearer of the Diadem over thee through the ages.” Earth said: “I adjure thee to abstain from thy purpose, lest evil and condemnation of that person who is created out of me should later overtake him, and the Abiding (sorrow) be loosed upon my head. I have no power to resist the Will of the Most High, but I take refuge with Allah from thee.” So Jibrail was moved by the lamentations and helplessness of Earth, and returned to the Vestibule of the Glory with an empty hand.

After this, by the Permission, the Just and Terrible Archangel Michael next descended, and he, likewise, hearing and seeing the abjection of Earth, returned with an empty hand. Then was sent the Archangel Azrael, and when Earth had once again implored God, and once again cried out, he closed his hand upon her bosom and tore out the clays and sands necessary.

Upon his return to the Vestibule it was asked if Earth had again taken refuge with Allah or not? Azrael said: “Yes.” It was answered: “If it took refuge with Me why didst thou not spare?” Azrael answered: “Obedience (to Thee) was more obligatory than Pity (for it).” It was answered: “Depart! I have made thee the Angel of Death to separate the souls from the bodies of men.” Azrael wept, saying: “Thus shall all men hate me.” It was answered: “Thou hast said that Obedience is more obligatory than Pity. Mix thou the clays and the sands and lay them to dry between Tayif and Mecca till the time appointed.” So, then, Azrael departed and did according to the Command. But in his haste he perceived not that he had torn out from Earth clays and minerals that had lain in her at war with each other since the first; nor did he withdraw them and set them aside. And in his grief that he should have been decreed the Separator of Companions, his tears mingled with them in the mixing so that the substance of Adam’s body was made unconformable and ill-assorted, pierced with burning drops, and at issue with itself before there was (cause of) strife.

This, then, lay out to dry for forty years between Tayif and Mecca and, through all that time, the Beneficence of the Almighty leavened it and rained upon it the Mercy and the Blessing, and the properties necessary to the adornment of the Successorship. In that period, too, it is narrated that the Angels passed to and fro above it, and among them Eblis the Accursed, who smote the predestined Creation while it was drying, and it rang hollow. Eblis then looked more closely and observing that of which it was composed to be diverse and ill-assorted and impregnated with bitter tears, he said: “Doubt not I shall soon attain authority over this; and his ruin shall be easy.” (This, too, lay in the foreknowledge of The Endless.)

When time was that the chain of cause and effect should be surrendered to Man’s will, and the vessels of desire and intention entrusted to his intelligence, and the tent of his body illuminated by the lamp of vitality, the Soul was despatched, by Command of the Almighty, with the Archangel Jibrail, towards that body. But the Soul being thin and subtle refused, at first, to enter the thick and diverse clays, saying: “I have fear of that (which is) to be.” This it cried twice, till it received the Word: “Enter unwillingly, and unwillingly depart.” Then only it entered. And when that agony was accomplished, the Word came: “My Compassion exceedeth My Wrath.” It is narrated that these were the first words of which our pure Forefather had cognisance.

Afterwards, by the operation of the determinate Will, there arose in Adam a desire for a companion, and an intimate and a friend in the Garden of the Tree. It is narrated that he first took counsel of Earth (which had furnished) his body. Earth said: “Forbear. Is it not enough that one should have dominion over me?” Adam answered: “There is but one who is One in Earth or Heaven. All paired things point to the Unity, and my soul, which came not from thee, desires unutterably.” Earth said: “Be content in innocence, and let thy body, which I gave unwillingly, return thus to (me) thy mother.” Adam said: “I am motherless. What should I know?”

At that time came Eblis the Accursed who had long prepared an evil stratagem and a hateful device against our pure Forefather, being desirous of his damnation, and anxious to multiply causes and occasions thereto. He addressed first his detestable words to the Peacock among the birds of the Garden, saying: “I have great amity towards thee because of thy beauty; but, through no fault of mine, I am forbidden the Garden. Hide me, then, among thy tail-feathers that I may enter it, and worship both thee and our Lord Adam, who is Master of thee.” The Peacock said: “Not by any contrivance of mine shalt thou enter, lest a judgment fall on my beauty and my excellence. But there is in the Garden a Serpent of loathsome aspect who shall make thy path easy.” He then despatched the Serpent to the Gate and after conversation and by contrivance and a malign artifice, Eblis hid himself under the tongue of the Serpent, and was thus conveyed past the barrier. He then worshipped Adam and ceased not to counsel him to demand a companion and an intimate that the delights might be increased, and the succession assured to the Regency of Earth. For he foresaw that, among multitudes, many should come to him. Adam therefore made daily supplication for that blessing. It was answered him: “How knowest thou if the gratification of thy desire be a blessing or a curse?” Adam said: “By no means; but I will abide the chance.”

Then the somnolence fell upon him, as is narrated; and upon waking he beheld our Lady Eve (upon whom be the Mercy and the Forgiveness). Adam said: “O my Lady and Light of my Universe, who art thou?” Eve said: “O my Lord and Summit of my Contentment, who art thou?” Adam said: “Of a surety I am thine.” Eve said: “Of a surety I am thine.” Thus they ceased to inquire further into the matter, but were united, and became one flesh and one soul, and their felicity was beyond comparison or belief or imagination or apprehension.

Thereafter, it is narrated, that Eblis the Stoned consorted with them secretly in the Garden, and the Peacock with him; and they jested and made mirth for our Lord Adam and his Lady Eve and propounded riddles and devised occasions for the stringing of the ornaments and the threading of subtleties. And upon a time when their felicity was at its height, and their happiness excessive, and their contentment expanded to the uttermost, Eblis said: “O my Master and my Mistress declare to us, if it pleases, some comparison or similitude that lies beyond the limits of possibility.” Adam said: “This is easy. That the Sun should cease in Heaven or that the Rivers should dry in the Garden is beyond the limits of possibility.” And they laughed and agreed, and the Peacock said: “O our Lady, tell us now something of a jest as unconceivable and as beyond belief as this saying of thy Lord.” Our Lady Eve then said: “That my Lord should look upon me otherwise than is his custom is beyond this saying.” And when they had laughed abundantly, she said: “O our Servitors, tell us now something that is further from possibility or belief than my saying.” Then the Peacock said: “O our Lady Eve, except that thou shouldst look upon thy Lord otherwise than is thy custom, there is nothing further than thy saying from possibility or belief or imagination.” Then said Eblis: “Except that the one of you should be made an enemy to the other, there is nothing, O my Lady, further than thy saying from possibility, or belief, or imagination, or apprehension.” And they laughed immoderately all four together in the Garden.

But when the Peacock had gone and Eblis had seemed to depart, our Lady Eve said to Adam: “My Lord and Disposer of my Soul, by what means did Eblis know our fear?” Adam said: “O my Lady, what fear?” Eve said: “The fear which was in our hearts from the first, that the one of us might be made an enemy to the other.” Then our pure Forefather bowed his head on her bosom and said: “O Companion of my Heart, this has been my fear also from the first, but how didst thou know?” Eve said: “Because I am thy flesh and thy soul. What shall we do?”

Thus, then, they came at moonrise to the Tree that had been forbidden to them, and Eblis lay asleep under it. But he waked merrily and said: “O my Master and my Mistress, this is the Tree of Eternity. By eating her fruit, felicity is established for ever among mankind; nor after eating it shall there be any change whatever in the disposition of the hearts of the eaters.”

Eve then put out her hand to the fruit, but Adam said: “It is forbidden. Let us go.” Eve said: “O my Lord and my Sustainer, upon my head be it, and upon the heads of my daughters after me. I will first taste of this Tree, and if misfortune fall on me, do thou intercede for me; or else eat likewise, so that eternal bliss may come to us together.”

Thus she ate, and he after her; and at once the ornaments of Paradise disappeared from round them, and they were delivered to shame and nudity and abjection. Then, as is narrated, Adam accused Eve in the Presence; but our Lady Eve (upon whom be the Pity and the Recompense) accepted (the blame of) all that had been done.

When the Serpent and the Peacock had each received their portion for their evil contrivances (for the punishment of Eblis was reserved) the Divine Decree of Expulsion was laid upon Adam and Eve in these words: “Get ye down, the one of you an enemy to the other.” Adam said: “But I have heard that Thy Compassion exceeds Thy Wrath.” It was answered: “I have spoken. The Decree shall stand in the place of all curses.” So they went down, and the barriers of the Garden of the Tree were made fast behind them.

It is further recorded by the stringers of the pearls of words and the narrators of old, that when our pure Forefather the Lord Adam and his adorable consort Eve (upon whom be the Glory and the Sacrifice) were thus expelled, there was lamentation among the beasts in the Garden whom Adam had cherished and whom our Lady Eve had comforted. Of those unaffected there remained only the Mole, whose custom it was to burrow in earth and to avoid the light of the Sun. His nature was malignant and his body inconspicuous but, by the Power of the Omnipotent, Whose Name be exalted, he was then adorned with eyes far-seeing both in the light and the darkness.

When the Mole heard the Divine Command of Expulsion, it entered his impure mind that he would extract profit and advancement from a secret observation and a hidden espial. So he followed our Forefather and his august consort, under the earth, and watched those two in their affliction and their abjection and their misery, and the Garden was without his presence for that time.

When his watch was complete and his observation certain, he turned him swiftly underneath the Earth and came back saying to the Guardians of the Gate: “Make room! I have a sure and a terrible report.” So his passage was permitted, and he lay till evening in the Garden. Then he said: “Can the Accursed by any means escape the Decree?” It was answered: “By no means can they escape or avoid.” Then the Mole said: “But I have seen that they have escaped.” It was answered: “Declare thy observation.” The Mole said: “The enemies to each other have altogether departed from Thy worship and Thy adoration. Nor are they in any sort enemies to each other, for they enjoy together the most perfect felicity, and moreover they have made them a new God.” It was answered: “Declare the shape of the God.” The Mole said: “Their God is of small stature, pinkish in colour, unclothed, fat and smiling. They lay it upon the grass and, filling its hands with flowers, worship it and desire no greater comfort.” It was answered: “Declare the name of the God.” The Mole said: “Its name is Quabil (Cain), and I testify upon a sure observation that it is their God and their Uniter and their Comforter.” It was answered: “Why hast thou come to Us?” The Mole said: “Through my zeal and my diligence; for honour and in hope of reward.” It was answered: “Is this, then, the best that thou canst do with the eyes which We gave thee?” The Mole said: “To the extreme of my ability!” It was answered: “There is no need. Thou hast not added to their burden, but to thine own. Be darkened henceforward, upon Earth and under Earth. It is not good to spy upon any creature of God to whom alleviation is permitted.” So, then, the Mole’s eyes were darkened and contracted, and his lot was made miserable upon and under the Earth to this day.

But to those two, Adam and Eve, the alleviation was permitted, till Habil and Quabil and their sisters Labuda and Aqlemia had attained the age of maturity. Then there came to the Greatest Substitute and his Consort, from out of Kabul the Stony, that Peacock, by whose contrivance Eblis the Accursed had first obtained admission into the Garden of the Tree. And they made him welcome in all their ways and into all their imaginings; and he sustained them with false words and flagitious counsels, so that they considered and remembered their forfeited delights in the Garden both arrogantly and impenitently.

Then came the Word to the Archangel Jibrail the Faithful, saying: “Follow those two with diligence, and interpose the shield of thy benevolence where it shall be necessary; for though We have surrendered them for awhile (to Eblis) they shall not achieve an irremediable destruction.” Jibrail therefore followed our First Substitute and the Lady Eve—upon whom is the Grace and a Forgetfulness—and kept watch upon them in all the lands appointed for their passage through the world. Nor did he hear any lamentations in their mouths for their sins. It is recorded that, for a hundred years they were continuously upheld by the Peacock under the detestable power of Eblis the Stoned, who by means of magic multiplied the similitudes of meat and drink and rich raiment about them for their pleasure, and came daily to worship them as Gods. (This also lay in the predestined Will of the Inscrutable). Further, in that age, their eyes were darkened and their minds were made turbid, and the faculty of laughter was removed from them. The Excellent Archangel Jibrail, when he perceived by observation that they had ceased to laugh, returned and bowed himself among the Servitors and cried: “The last evil has fallen upon Thy creatures whom I guard! They have ceased to laugh and are made even with the ox and the camel.” It was answered: “This also was foreseen. Keep watch.”

After yet another hundred years Eblis, whose doom is assured, came to worship Adam as was his custom and said: “O my Lord and my Advancer and my Preceptor in Good and Evil, whom hast thou ever beheld in all thy world, wiser and more excellent than thyself?” Adam said: “I have never seen such an one.” Eblis asked: “Hast thou ever conceived of such an one?” Adam answered: “Except in dreams I have never conceived of such an one.” Eblis then answered: “Disregard dreams. They proceed from superfluity of meat. Stretch out thy hand upon the world which thou hast made and take possession.” So Adam took possession of the mountains which he had levelled and of the rivers which he had diverted and of the upper and lower Fires which he had made to speak and to work for him, and he named them as possessions for himself and his children for ever. After this, Eblis asked: “O, my Upholder and Crown of my Belief, who has given thee these profitable things?” Adam said: “By my Hand and my Head, I alone have given myself these things.” Eblis said: “Praise we the Giver!” So, then, Adam praised himself in a loud voice, and built an Altar and a Mirror behind the Altar; and he ceased not to adore himself in the Mirror, and to extol himself daily before the Altar, by the name and under the attributes of the Almighty.

The historians assert that on such occasions it was the custom of the Peacock to expand his tail and stand beside our First Substitute and to minister to him with flatteries and adorations.

After yet another hundred years, the Omnipotent Whose Name be exalted, put a bitter remorse into the bosom of the Peacock, and that bird closed his tail and wept upon the mountains of Serendib. Then said the Excellent and Faithful Archangel Jibrail: “How has the Vengeance overtaken thee, O thou least desirable of fowl?” The Peacock said: “Though I myself would by no means consent to convey Eblis into the Garden of the Tree, yet as is known to thee and to the All Seeing, I referred him to the Serpent for a subtle device, by whose malice and beneath whose tongue did Eblis secretly enter that Garden. Wherefore did Allah change my attuned voice to a harsh cry and my beauteous legs to unseemly legs, and hurled me into the district of Kabul the Stony. Now I fear that He will also deprive me of my tail, which is the ornament of my days and the delight of my eye. For that cause and in that fear I am penitent, O Servant of God.” Jibrail then said: “Penitence lies not in confession, but in restitution and visible amendment.” The Peacock said: “Enlighten me in that path and prove my sincerity.” Jibrail said: “I am troubled on account of Adam who, through the impure magic of Eblis, has departed from humility, and worships himself daily at an Altar and before a Mirror, in such and such a manner.” The Peacock said: “O Courier of the Thrones, hast thou taken counsel of the Lady Eve?” Jibrail asked: “For what reason?” The Peacock said: “For the reason that when the Decree of Expulsion was issued against those two, it was said: ‘Get ye down, the one of you an enemy unto the other,’ and this is a sure word.” Jibrail answered: “What will that profit?” The Peacock said: “Let us exchange our shapes for a time and I will show thee that profit.”

Jibrail then exacted an oath from the Peacock that he would return him his shape at the expiration of a certain time without dishonour or fraud, and the exchange was effected, and Jibrail retired himself into the shape of the Peacock, and the Peacock lifted himself into the illustrious similitude of Jibrail and came to our Lady Eve and said: “Who is God?” The Lady Eve answered him: “His name is Adam.” The Peacock said: “How is he God?” The Lady Eve answered: “For that he knows both Good and Evil.” The Peacock asked: “By what means attained he to that knowledge?” The Lady Eve answered: “Of a truth it was I who brought it to him between my hands from off a Tree in the Garden.” The Peacock said: “The greater then thy modesty and thy meekness, O my Lady Eve,” and he removed himself from her presence, and came again to Jibrail a little before the time of the evening prayer. He said to that excellent and trusty one: “Continue, I pray, to serve in my shape at the time of the Worship at the Altar.” So Jibrail consented and preened himself and spread his tail and pecked between his claws, after the manner of created Peacocks, before the Altar until the entrance of our pure Forefather and his august consort. Then he perceived by observation that when Adam kneeled at the Mirror to adore himself the Lady Eve abode unwillingly, and in time she asked: “Have I then no part in this worship?” Adam answered: “A great and a redoubtable part hast thou, O my Lady, which is to praise and worship me constantly.” The Lady Eve said: “But I weary of this worship. Except thou build me an Altar and make a Mirror to me also I will in no wise be present at this worship, nor in thy bed.” And she withdrew her presence. Adam then said to Jibrail whom he esteemed to be the Peacock: “What shall we do? If I build not an Altar, the Woman who walks by my side will be a reproach to me by day and a penance by night, and peace will depart from the earth.” Jibrail answered, in the voice of the Peacock: “For the sake of Peace on earth build her also an Altar.” So they built an Altar with a Mirror in all respects conformable to the Altar which Adam had made, and Adam made proclamation from the ends of the earth to the ends of the earth that there were now two Gods upon earth—the one Man, and the other Woman.

Then came the Peacock in the likeness of Jibrail to the Lady Eve and said: “O Lady of Light, why is thy Altar upon the left hand and the Altar of my Lord upon the right?” The Lady Eve said: “It is a remediable error,” and she remedied it with her own hands, and our pure Forefather fell into a great anger. Then entered Jibrail in the likeness of the Peacock and said to Adam: “O my Lord and Very Interpreter, what has vexed thee?” Adam said: “What shall we do? The Woman who sleeps in my bosom has changed the honourable places of the Altars, and if I suffer not the change she will weary me by night and day, and there will be no refreshment upon earth.” Jibrail said, speaking in the voice of the Peacock: “For the sake of refreshment suffer the change.” So they worshipped at the changed Altars, the Altar to the Woman upon the right, and to the Man upon the left.

Then came the Peacock, in the similitude of Jibrail the Trusty One, to our Lady Eve and said: “O Incomparable and All-Creating, art thou by chance the mother of Quabil and Habil (Cain and Abel)?” The Lady Eve answered: “By no chance but by the immutable ordinance of Nature am I their Mother.” The Peacock said, in the voice of Jibrail: “Will they become such as Adam?” The Lady Eve answered: “Of a surety, and many more also.” The Peacock, as Jibrail, said: “O Lady of Abundance, enlighten me now which is the greater, the mother or the child?” The Lady Eve answered: “Of a surety, the mother.” The disguised Peacock then said: “O my Lady, seeing that from thee alone proceed all the generations of Man who calls himself God, what need of any Altar to Man?” The Lady Eve answered: “It is an error. Doubt not it shall be rectified,” and at the time of the Worship she smote down the left-hand Altar. Adam said: “Why is this, O my Lady and my Co-equal?” The Lady Eve answered: “Because it has been revealed that in Me is all excellence and increase, splendour, terror, and power. Bow down and worship.” Adam answered: “O my Lady, but thou art Eve my mate and no sort of goddess whatever. This have I known from the beginning. Only for Peace’ sake I suffered thee to build an Altar to thyself.” The Lady Eve answered: “O my Lord, but thou art Adam my mate, and by many universes removed from any sort of Godhead, and this have I known from the first. Nor for the sake of any peace whatever will I cease to proclaim it.” She then proclaimed it aloud, and they reproached each other and disputed and betrayed their thoughts and their inmost knowledges until the Peacock lifted himself in haste from their presence and came to Jibrail and said: “Let us return each to his own shape; for Enlightenment is at hand.”

So restitution was made without fraud or dishonour and they returned to the temple each in his proper shape with his attributes, and listened to the end of that conversation between the First Substitute and his august Consort who ceased not to reprehend each other upon all matters within their observation and their experience and their imagination.

When the steeds of recrimination had ceased to career across the plains of memory, and when the drum of evidence was no longer beaten by the drumstick of malevolence, and the bird of argument had taken refuge in the rocks of silence, the Excellent and Trustworthy Archangel Jibrail bowed himself before our pure Forefather and said: “O my Lord and Fount of all Power and Wisdom, is it permitted to worship the Visible God?”

Then by the operation of the Mercy of Allah, the string was loosed in the throat of our First Substitute and the oppression was lifted from his lungs and he laughed without cessation and said: “By Allah I am no God but the mate of this most detestable Woman whom I love, and who is necessary to me beyond all the necessities.” But he ceased not to entertain Jibrail with tales of the follies and the unreasonableness of our Lady Eve till the night time.

The Peacock also bowed before the Lady Eve and said: “Is it permitted to adore the Source and the Excellence?” and the string was loosened in the Lady Eve’s throat and she laughed aloud and merrily and said: “By Allah I am no goddess in any sort, but the mate of this mere Man whom, in spite of all, I love beyond and above my soul.” But she detained the Peacock with tales of the stupidity and the childishness of our pure Forefather till the Sun rose.

Then Adam entered, and the two looked upon each other laughing. Then said Adam: “O my Lady and Crown of my Torments, is it peace between us?” And our Lady Eve answered: “O my Lord and sole Cause of my Unreason, it is peace till the next time and the next occasion.” And Adam said: “I accept, and I abide the chance.” Our Lady Eve said: “O Man, wouldst thou have it otherwise upon any composition?” Adam said: “O Woman, upon no composition would I have it otherwise—not even for the return to the Garden of the Tree; and this I swear on thy head and the heads of all who shall proceed from thee.” And Eve said: “I also.” So they removed both Altars and laughed and built a new one between.

Then Jibrail and the Peacock departed and prostrated themselves before the Throne and told what had been said. It was answered: “How left ye them?” They said: “Before one Altar.” It was answered: “What was written upon the Altar?” They said: “The Decree of Expulsion as it was spoken—‘Get ye down, the one of you an enemy unto the other.’”

And it was answered: “Enough! It shall stand in the place of both Our Curse and Our Blessing.”

SEA CONSTABLES

A Tale of ’15

THE CHANGELINGS

Or ever the battered liners sank

With their passengers to the dark,

I was head of a Walworth Bank,

And you were a grocer’s clerk.

I was a dealer in stocks and shares,

And you in butters and teas,

And we both abandoned our own affairs

And took to the dreadful seas.

Wet and worry about our ways—

Panic, onset, and flight—

Had us in charge for a thousand days

And a thousand-year-long night.

We saw more than the nights could hide—

More than the waves could keep—

And—certain faces over the side

Which do not go from our sleep.

We were more tired than words can tell

While the pied craft fled by,

And the swinging mounds of the Western swell

Hoisted us Heavens-high....

Now there is nothing—not even our rank—

To witness what we have been;

And I am returned to my Walworth Bank,

And you to your margarine!

SEA CONSTABLES

A Tale of ’15

The head-waiter of the Carvoitz almost ran to meet Portson and his guests as they came up the steps from the palm-court where the string band plays.

“Not seen you since—oh, ever so long,” he began. “So glad to get your wire. Quite well—eh?”

“Fair to middling, Henri,” Portson shook hands with him. “You’re looking all right, too. Have you got us our table?”

Henri nodded towards a pink alcove, kept for mixed doubles, which discreetly commanded the main dining-room’s glitter and blaze.

“Good man!” said Portson. “Now, this is serious, Henri. We put ourselves unreservedly in your hands. We’re weather-beaten mariners—though we don’t look it, and we haven’t eaten a Christian meal in months. Have you thought of all that, Henri, mon ami?”

“The menu, I have compose it myself,” Henri answered with the gravity of a high priest.

It was more than a year since Portson—of Portson, Peake and Ensell, Stock and Share Brokers—had drawn Henri’s attention to an apparently extinct Oil Company which, a little later, erupted profitably; and it may be that Henri prided himself on paying all debts in full.

The most recent foreign millionaire and the even more recent foreign actress at a table near the entrance clamoured for his attention while he convoyed the party to the pink alcove. With his own hands he turned out some befrilled electrics and lit four pale-rose candles.

“Bridal!” some one murmured. “Quite bridal!”

“So glad you like. There is nothing too good.” Henri slid away, and the four men sat down. They had the coarse-grained complexions of men who habitually did themselves well, and an air, too, of recent, red-eyed dissipation. Maddingham, the eldest, was a thick-set middle-aged presence, with crisped grizzled hair, of the type that one associates with Board Meetings. He limped slightly. Tegg, who followed him, blinking, was neat, small, and sandy, of unmistakable Wavy cut, but sheepish aspect. Winchmore, the youngest, was more on the lines of the conventional pre-war “nut,” but his eyes were sunk in his head and his hands black-nailed and roughened. Portson, their host, with Vandyke beard and a comfortable little stomach, beamed upon them as they settled to their oysters.

“That’s what I mean,” said the carrying voice of the foreign actress, whom Henri had just disabused of the idea that she had been promised the pink alcove. “They ain’t alive to the war yet. Now, what’s the matter with those four dubs yonder joining the British Army or—or doing something?”

“Who’s your friend?” Maddingham asked.

“I’ve forgotten her name for the minute,” Portson replied, “but she’s the latest thing in imported patriotic piece-goods. She sings ‘Sons of the Empire, Go Forward!’ at the Palemseum. It makes the aunties weep.”

“That’s Sidney Latter. She’s not half bad,” Tegg reached for the vinegar. “We ought to see her some night.”

“Yes. We’ve a lot of time for that sort of thing,” Maddingham grunted. “I’ll take your oysters, Portson, if you don’t want ’em.”

“Cheer up, Papa Maddingham! ’Soon be dead!” Winchmore suggested.

Maddingham glared at him. “If I’d had you with me for one week, Master Winchmore——”

“Not the least use,” the boy retorted. “I’ve just been made a full-lootenant. I have indeed. I couldn’t reconcile it with my conscience to take Etheldreda out any more as a plain sub. She’s too flat in the floor.”

“Did you get those new washboards of yours fixed?” Tegg cut in.

“Don’t talk shop already,” Portson protested. “This is Vesiga soup. I don’t know what he’s arranged in the way of drinks.”

“Pol Roger ’04,” said the waiter.

“Sound man, Henri,” said Winchmore. “But,” he eyed the waiter doubtfully, “I don’t quite like.... What’s your alleged nationality?”

“’Henri’s nephew, monsieur,” the smiling waiter replied, and laid a gloved hand on the table. It creaked corkily at the wrist. “Bethisy-sur-Oise,” he explained. “My uncle he buy me all the hand for Christmas. It is good to hold plates only.”

“Oh! Sorry I spoke,” said Winchmore.

“Monsieur is right. But my uncle is very careful, even with neutrals.” He poured the champagne.

“Hold a minute,” Maddingham cried. “First toast of obligation: For what we are going to receive, thank God and the British Navy.”

“Amen!” said the others with a nod towards Lieutenant Tegg, of the Royal Navy afloat, and, occasionally, of the Admiralty ashore.

“Next! ‘Damnation to all neutrals!’” Maddingham went on.

“Amen! Amen!” they answered between gulps that heralded the sole à la Colbert. Maddingham picked up the menu. “Suprème of chicken,” he read loudly. “Filet béarnaise, Woodcock and Richebourg ’74, Pêches Melba, Croûtes Baron. I couldn’t have improved on it myself; though one might,” he went on—“one might have substituted quail en casserole for the woodcock.”

“Then there would have been no reason for the Burgundy,” said Tegg with equal gravity.

“You’re right,” Maddingham replied.

The foreign actress shrugged her shoulders. “What can you do with people like that?” she said to her companion. “And yet I’ve been singing to ’em for a fortnight.”

“I left it all to Henri,” said Portson.

“My Gord!” the eavesdropping woman whispered. “Get on to that! Ain’t it typical? They leave everything to Henri in this country.”

“By the way,” Tegg asked Winchmore after the fish, “where did you mount that one-pounder of yours after all?”

“Midships. Etheldreda won’t carry more weight forward. She’s wet enough as it is.”

“Why don’t you apply for another craft?” Portson put in. “There’s a chap at Southampton just now, down with pneumonia and——”

“No, thank you. I know Etheldreda. She’s nothing to write home about, but when she feels well she can shift a bit.”

Maddingham leaned across the table. “If she does more than eleven in a flat calm,” said he, “I’ll—I’ll give you Hilarity.”

“’Wouldn’t be found dead in Hilarity,” was Winchmore’s grateful reply. “You don’t mean to say you’ve taken her into real wet water, Papa? Where did it happen?”

The other laughed. Maddingham’s red face turned brick colour, and the veins on the cheekbones showed blue through a blurr of short bristles.

“He’s been convoying neutrals—in a tactful manner,” Tegg chuckled.

Maddingham filled his glass and scowled at Tegg. “Yes,” he said, “and here’s special damnation to me Lords of the Admiralty. A more muddle-headed set of brass-bound apes——”

“My! My! My!” Winchmore chirruped soothingly. “It don’t seem to have done you any good, Papa. Who were you conveyancing?”

Maddingham snapped out a ship’s name and some details of her build.

“Oh, but that chap’s a friend of mine!” cried Winchmore. “I ran across him—the—not so long ago, hugging the Scotch coast—out of his course, he said, owing to foul weather and a new type of engine—a Diesel. That’s him, ain’t it—the complete neutral?” He mentioned an outstanding peculiarity of the ship’s rig.

“Yes,” said Portson. “Did you board him, Winchmore?”

“No. There’d been a bit of a blow the day before and old Ethel’s only dinghy had dropped off the hooks. But he signalled me all his symptoms. He was as communicative as—as a lady in the Promenade. (Hold on, Nephew of my Uncle! I’m going to have some more of that Béarnaise fillet.) His smell attracted me. I chaperoned him for a couple of days.”

“Only two days. You hadn’t anything to complain of,” said Maddingham wrathfully.

“I didn’t complain. If he chose to hug things, ’twasn’t any of my business. I’m not a Purity League. ’Didn’t care what he hugged, so long as I could lie behind him and give him first chop at any mines that were going. I steered in his wake (I really can steer a bit now, Portson) and let him stink up the whole of the North Sea. I thought he might come in useful for bait. No Burgundy, thanks, Nephew of my Uncle. I’m sticking to the Jolly Roger.”

“Go on, then—before you’re speechless. Was he any use as bait?” Tegg demanded.

“We never got a fair chance. As I told you, he hugged the coast till dark, and then he scraped round Gilarra Head and went up the bay nearly to the beach.”

“’Lights out?” Maddingham asked.

Winchmore nodded. “But I didn’t worry about that. I was under his stern. As luck ’ud have it, there was a fishing-party in the bay, and we walked slam into the middle of ’em—a most ungodly collection of local talent. ’First thing I knew a steam-launch fell aboard us, and a boy—a nasty little Navy boy, Tegg—wanted to know what I was doing. I told him, and he cursed me for putting the fish down just as they were rising. Then the two of us (he was hanging on to my quarter with a boat-hook) drifted on to a steam trawler and our friend the Neutral and a ten-oared cutter full of the military, all mixed up. They were subs from the garrison out for a lark. Uncle Newt explained over the rail about the weather and his engine-troubles, but they were all so keen to carry on with their fishing, they didn’t fuss. They told him to clear off.”

“Was there anything on the move round Gilarra at that time?” Tegg inquired.

“Oh, they spun me the usual yarns about the water being thick with ’em, and asked me to help; but I couldn’t stop. The cutter’s stern-sheets were piled up with mines, like lobster-pots, and from the way the soldiers handled ’em I thought I’d better get out. So did Uncle Newt. He didn’t like it a bit. There were a couple of shots fired at something just as we cleared the Head, and one dropped rather close to him. (These duck-shoots in the dark are dam’ dangerous y’know.) He lit up at once—tail-light, head-light, and side-lights. I had no more trouble with him the rest of the night.”

“But what about the report that you sawed off the steam-launch’s boat-hook?” Tegg demanded suddenly.

“What! You don’t mean to say that little beast of a snotty reported it? He was scratchin’ poor old Ethel’s paint to pieces. I never reported what he said to me. And he called me a damned amateur, too. Well! Well! War’s war. I missed all that fishing-party that time. My orders were to follow Uncle Newt. So I followed—and poor Ethel without a dry rag on her.”

Winchmore refilled his glass.

“Well, don’t get poetical,” said Portson. “Let’s have the rest of your trip.”

“There wasn’t any rest,” Winchmore insisted pathetically. “There was just good old Ethel with her engines missing like sin, and Uncle Newt thumping and stinking half a mile ahead of us, and me eating bread and Worcester sauce. I do when I feel that way. Besides, I wanted to go back and join the fishing-party. Just before dark I made out Cordelia—that Southampton ketch that old Jarrott fitted with oil auxiliaries for a family cruiser last summer. She’s a beamy bus, but she can roll, and she was doing an honest thirty degrees each way when I overhauled her. I asked Jarrott if he was busy. He said he wasn’t. But he was. He’s like me and Nelson when there’s any sea on.”

“But Jarrott’s a Quaker. ’Has been for generations. Why does he go to war?” said Maddingham.

“If it comes to that,” Portson said, “why do any of us?”

“Jarrott’s a mine-sweeper,” Winchmore replied with deep feeling. “The Quaker religion (I’m not a Quaker, but I’m much more religious than any of you chaps give me credit for) has decided that mine-sweeping is lifesaving. Consequently”—he dwelt a little on the word—“the profession is crowded with Quakers—specially off Scarborough. ’See? Owin’ to the purity of their lives, they ‘all go to Heaven when they die—Roll, Jordan, Roll!’”

“Disgustin’,” said the actress audibly as she drew on her gloves. Winchmore looked at her with delight. “That’s a peach-Melba, too,” he said.

“And David Jarrott’s a mine-sweeper,” Maddingham mused aloud. “So you turned our Neutral over to him, Winchmore, did you?”

“Yes, I did. It was the end of my beat—I wish I didn’t feel so sleepy—and I explained the whole situation to Jarrott, over the rail. ’Gave him all my silly instructions—those latest ones, y’know. I told him to do nothing to imperil existing political relations. I told him to exercise tact. I—I told him that in my capac’ty as Actin’ Lootenant, you see. Jarrott’s only a Lootenant-Commander—at fifty-four, too! Yes, I handed my Uncle Newt over to Jarrott to chaperone, and I went back to my—I can say it perfectly—pis-ca-to-rial party in the bay. Now I’m going to have a nap. In ten minutes I shall be on deck again. This is my first civilised dinner in nine weeks, so I don’t apologise.”

He pushed his plate away, dropped his chin on his palm and closed his eyes.

“Lyndnoch and Jarrott’s Bank, established 1793,” said Maddingham half to himself. “I’ve seen old Jarrott in Cowes week bullied by his skipper and steward till he had to sneak ashore to sleep. And now he’s out mine-sweeping with Cordelia! What’s happened to his—I shall forget my own name next—Belfast-built two-hundred tonner?”

“Goneril,” said Portson. “He turned her over to the Service in October. She’s—she was Culana.”

“She was Culana, was she? My God! I never knew that. Where did it happen?”

“Off the same old Irish corner I was watching last month. My young cousin was in her; so was one of the Raikes boys. A whole nest of mines, laid between patrols.”

“I’ve heard there’s some dirty work going on there now,” Maddingham half whispered.

“You needn’t tell me that,” Portson returned. “But one gets a little back now and again.”

“What are you two talking about?” said Tegg, who seemed to be dozing, too.

“Culana,” Portson answered as he lit a cigarette.

“Yes, that was rather a pity. But.... What about this Newt of ours?”

“I took her over from Jarrott next day—off Margate,” said Portson. “Jarrott wanted to get back to his mine-sweeping.”

“Every man to his taste,” said Maddingham. “That never appealed to me. Had they detailed you specially to look after the Newt?”

“Me among others,” Portson admitted. “I was going down Channel when I got my orders, and so I went on with him. Jarrott had been tremendously interested in his course up to date—specially off the Wash. He’d charted it very carefully and he said he was going back to find out what some of the kinks and curves meant. Has he found out, Tegg?”

Tegg thought for a moment. “Cordelia was all right up to six o’clock yesterday evening,” he said.

“’Glad of that. Then I did what Winchmore did. I lay behind this stout fellow and saw him well into the open.”

“Did you say anything to him?” Tegg asked.

“Not a thing. He kept moving all the time.”

“’See anything?” Tegg continued.

“No. He didn’t seem to be in demand anywhere in the Channel, and, when I got him on the edge of soundings I dropped him—as per your esteemed orders.”

Tegg nodded again and murmured some apology.

“Where did you pick him up, Maddingham?” Portson went on.

Maddingham snorted.

“Well north and west of where you left him heading up the Irish Channel and stinking like a taxi. I hadn’t had my breakfast. My cook was seasick; so were four of my hands.”

“I can see that meeting. Did you give him a gun across the bows?” Tegg asked.

“No, no. Not that time. I signalled him to heave to. He had his papers ready before I came over the side. You see,” Maddingham said pleadingly, “I’m new to this business. Perhaps I wasn’t as polite to him as I should have been if I’d had my breakfast.”

“He deposed that Maddingham came alongside swearing like a bargee,” said Tegg.

“Not in the least. This is what happened.” Maddingham turned to Portson. “I asked him where he was bound for and he told me—Antigua.”

“Hi! Wake up, Winchmore. You’re missing something.” Portson nudged Winchmore, who was slanting sideways in his chair.

“Right! All right! I’m awake,” said Winchmore stickily. “I heard every word.”

Maddingham went on. “I told him that this wasn’t his way to Antigua——”

“Antigua. Antigua!” Winchmore finished rubbing his eyes. “‘There was a young bride of Antigua——’”

“Hsh! Hsh!” said Portson and Tegg warningly.

“Why? It’s the proper one. ‘Who said to her spouse, “What a pig you are!”’”

“Ass!” Maddingham growled and continued: “He told me that he’d been knocked out of his reckoning by foul weather and engine-trouble, owing to experimenting with a new type of Diesel engine. He was perfectly frank about it.”

“So he was with me,” said Winchmore. “Just like a real lady. I hope you were a real gentleman, Papa.”

“I asked him what he’d got. He didn’t object. He had some fifty thousand gallon of oil for his new Diesel engine, and the rest was coal. He said he needed the oil to get to Antigua with, he was taking the coal as ballast, and he was coming back, so he told me, with coconuts. When he’d quite finished, I said: ‘What sort of damned idiot do you take me for?’ He said: ‘I haven’t decided yet!’ Then I said he’d better come into port with me, and we’d arrive at a decision. He said that his papers were in perfect order and that my instructions—mine, please!—were not to imperil political relations. I hadn’t received these asinine instructions, so I took the liberty of contradicting him—perfectly politely, as I told them at the Inquiry afterward. He was a small-boned man with a grey beard, in a glengarry, and he picked his teeth a lot. He said: ‘The last time I met you, Mister Maddingham, you were going to Carlsbad, and you told me all about your blood-pressures in the wagon-lit before we tossed for upper berth. Don’t you think you are a little old to buccaneer about the sea this way?’ I couldn’t recall his face—he must have been some fellow that I’d travelled with some time or other. I told him I wasn’t doing this for amusement—it was business. Then I ordered him into port. He said: ‘S’pose I don’t go?’ I said: ‘Then I’ll sink you.’ Isn’t it extraordinary how natural it all seems after a few weeks? If any one had told me when I commissioned Hilarity last summer what I’d be doing this spring I’d—I’d ... God! It is mad, isn’t it?”

“Quite,” said Portson. “But not bad fun.”

“Not at all, but that’s what makes it all the madder. Well, he didn’t argue any more. He warned me I’d be hauled over the coals for what I’d done, and I warned him to keep two cables ahead of me and not to yaw.”

“Jaw?” said Winchmore, sleepily.

“No. Yaw,” Maddingham snarled. “Not to look as if he even wanted to yaw. I warned him that, if he did, I’d loose off into him, end-on. But I was absolutely polite about it. ’Give you my word, Tegg.”

“I believe you. Oh, I believe you,” Tegg replied.

“Well, so I took him into port—and that was where I first ran across our Master Tegg. He represented the Admiralty on that beach.”

The small blinking man nodded. “The Admiralty had that honour,” he said graciously.

Maddingham turned to the others angrily. “I’d been rather patting myself on the back for what I’d done, you know. Instead of which, they held a court-martial——”

“We called it an Inquiry,” Tegg interjected.

“You weren’t in the dock. They held a court-martial on me to find out how often I’d sworn at the poor injured Neutral, and whether I’d given him hot-water bottles and tucked him up at night. It’s all very fine to laugh, but they treated me like a pickpocket. There were two fat-headed civilian judges and that blackguard Tegg in the conspiracy. A cursed lawyer defended my Neutral and he made fun of me. He dragged in everything the Neutral had told him about my blood-pressures on the Carlsbad trip. And that’s what you get for trying to serve your country in your old age!” Maddingham emptied and refilled his glass.

“We did give you rather a grilling,” said Tegg placidly. “It’s the national sense of fair play.”

“I could have stood it all if it hadn’t been for the Neutral. We dined at the same hotel while this court-martial was going on, and he used to come over to my table and sympathise with me! He told me that I was fighting for his ideals and the uplift of democracy, but I must respect the Law of Nations!”

“And we respected ’em,” said Tegg. “His papers were perfectly correct; the Court discharged him. We had to consider existing political relations. I told Maddingham so at the hotel and he——”

Again Maddingham turned to the others. “I couldn’t make up my mind about Tegg at the Inquiry,” he explained. “He had the air of a decent sailor-man, but he talked like a poisonous politician.”

“I was,” Tegg returned. “I had been ordered to change into that rig. So I changed.”

Maddingham ran one fat square hand through his crisped hair and looked up under his eyebrows like a shy child, while the others lay back and laughed.

“I suppose I ought to have been on to the joke,” he stammered, “but I’d blacked myself all over for the part of Lootenant-Commander R.N.V.R. in time of war, and I’d given up thinking as a banker. If it had been put before me as a business proposition I might have done better.”

“I thought you were playing up to me and the judges all the time,” said Tegg. “I never dreamed you took it seriously.”

“Well, I’ve been trained to look on the law as serious. I’ve had to pay for some of it in my time, you know.”

“I’m sorry,” said Tegg. “We were obliged to let that oily beggar go—for reasons, but, as I told Maddingham, the night the award was given, his duty was to see that he was properly directed to Antigua.”

“Naturally,” Portson observed. “That being the Neutral’s declared destination. And what did Maddingham do? Shut up, Maddingham!”

Said Tegg, with downcast eyes: “Maddingham took my hand and squeezed it; he looked lovingly into my eyes (he did!); he turned plum-colour, and he said: ‘I will’—just like a bridegroom at the altar. It makes me feel shy to think of it even now. I didn’t see him after that till the evening when Hilarity was pulling out of the Basin, and Maddingham was cursing the tug-master.”

“I was in a hurry,” said Maddingham. “I wanted to get to the Narrows and wait for my Neutral there. I dropped down to Biller and Grove’s yard that tide (they’ve done all my work for years) and I jammed Hilarity into the creek behind their slip, so the Newt didn’t spot me when he came down the river. Then I pulled out and followed him over the Bar. He stood nor-west at once. I let him go till we were well out of sight of land. Then I overhauled him, gave him a gun across the bows and ran alongside. I’d just had my lunch, and I wasn’t going to lose my temper this time. I said: ‘Excuse me, but I understand you are bound for Antigua?’ He was, he said, and as he seemed a little nervous about my falling aboard him in that swell, I gave Hilarity another sheer in—she’s as handy as a launch—and I said: ‘May I suggest that this is not the course for Antigua?’ By that time he had his fenders overside, and all hands yelling at me to keep away. I snatched Hilarity out and began edging in again. He said: ‘I’m trying a sample of inferior oil that I have my doubts about. If it works all right I shall lay my course for Antigua, but it will take some time to test the stuff and adjust the engines to it.’ I said: ‘Very good, let me know if I can be of any service,’ and I offered him Hilarity again once or twice—he didn’t want her—and then I dropped behind and let him go on. Wasn’t that proper, Portson?”

Portson nodded. “I know that game of yours with Hilarity,” he said. “How the deuce do you do it? My nerve always goes at close quarters in any sea.”

“It’s only a little trick of steering,” Maddingham replied with a simper of vanity. “You can almost shave with her when she feels like it. I had to do it again that same evening, to establish a moral ascendancy. He wasn’t showing any lights, and I nearly tripped over him. He was a scared Neutral for three minutes, but I got a little of my own back for that damned court-martial. But I was perfectly polite. I apologised profusely. I didn’t even ask him to show his lights.”

“But did he?” said Winchmore.

“He did—every one; and a flare now and then,” Maddingham replied. “He held north all that night, with a falling barometer and a rising wind and all the other filthy things. Gad, how I hated him! Next morning we got it, good and tight from the nor-nor-west out of the Atlantic, off Carso Head. He dodged into a squall, and then he went about. We weren’t a mile behind, but it was as thick as a wall. When it cleared, and I couldn’t see him ahead of me, I went about too, and followed the rain. I picked him up five miles down wind, legging it for all he was worth to the south’ard—nine knots, I should think. Hilarity doesn’t like a following sea. We got pooped a bit, but by noon we’d struggled back to where we ought to have been—two cables astern of him. Then he began to signal, but his flags being end-on to us, of course, we had to creep up on his beam—well abeam—to read ’em. That didn’t restore his morale either. He made out he’d been compelled to put back by stress of weather before completing his oil tests. I made back I was sorry to hear it, but would be greatly interested in the results. Then I turned in (I’d been up all night) and my lootenant took on. He was a widower (by the way) of the name of Sherrin, aged forty-seven. He’d run a girls’ school at Weston-super-Mare after he’d left the Service in ’ninety-five, and he believed the English were the Lost Tribes.”

“What about the Germans?” said Portson.

“Oh, they’d been misled by Austria, who was the Beast with Horns in Revelations. Otherwise he was rather a dull dog. He set the tops’ls in his watch. Hilarity won’t steer under any canvas, so we rather sported round our friend that afternoon, I believe. When I came up after dinner, she was biting his behind, first one side, then the other. Let’s see—that would be about thirty miles east-sou-east of Harry Island. We were running as near as nothing south. The wind had dropped, and there was a useful cross-rip coming up from the south-east. I took the wheel and, the way I nursed him from starboard, he had to take the sea over his port bow. I had my sciatica on me—buccaneering’s no game for a middle-aged man—but I gave that fellow sprudel! By Jove; I washed him out! He stood it as long as he could, and then he made a bolt for Harry Island. I had to ride in his pocket most of the way there because I didn’t know that coast. We had charts, but Sherrin never understood ’em, and I couldn’t leave the wheel. So we rubbed along together, and about midnight this Newt dodged in over the tail of Harry Shoals and anchored, if you please, in the lee of the Double Ricks. It was dead calm there, except for the swell, but there wasn’t much room to manœuvre in, and I wasn’t going to anchor. It looked too like a submarine rendezvous. But first, I came alongside and asked him what his trouble was. He told me he had overheated his something-or-other bulb. I’ve never been shipmates with Diesel engines, but I took his word for it, and I said I ’ud stand by till it cooled. Then he told me to go to hell.”

“If you were inside the Double Ricks in the dark, you were practically there,” said Portson.

“That’s what I thought. I was on the bridge, rabid with sciatica, going round and round like a circus-horse in about three acres of water, and wondering when I’d hit something. Ridiculous position. Sherrin saw it. He saved me. He said it was an ideal place for submarine attacks, and we’d better begin to repel ’em at once. As I said, I couldn’t leave the wheel, so Sherrin fought the ship—both quick-firers and the maxims. He tipped ’em well down into the sea or well up at the Ricks as we went round and round. We made rather a row; and the row the gulls made when we woke ’em was absolutely terrifying. ’Give you my word!”

“And then?” said Winchmore.

“I kept on running in circles through this ghastly din. I took one sheer over towards his stern—I thought I’d cut it too fine, but we missed it by inches. Then I heard his capstan busy, and in another three minutes his anchor was up. He didn’t wait to stow. He hustled out as he was—bulb or no bulb. He passed within ten feet of us (I was waiting to fall in behind him) and he shouted over the rail: ‘You think you’ve got patriotism. All you’ve got is uric acid and rotten spite!’ I expect he was a little bored. I waited till we had cleared Harry Shoals before I went below, and then I slept till 9 A. M. He was heading north this time, and after I’d had breakfast and a smoke I ran alongside and asked him where he was bound for now. He was wrapped in a comforter, evidently suffering from a bad cold. I couldn’t quite catch what he said, but I let him croak for a few minutes and fell back. At 9 P. M. he turned round and headed south (I was getting to know the Irish Channel by then) and I followed. There was no particular sea on. It was a little chilly, but as he didn’t hug the coast I hadn’t to take the wheel. I stayed below most of the night and let Sherrin suffer. Well, Mr. Newt kept up this game all the next day, dodging up and down the Irish Channel. And it was infernally dull. He threw up the sponge off Cloone Harbour. That was on Friday morning. He signalled: ‘Developed defects in engine-room. Antigua trip abandoned.’ Then he ran into Cloone and tied up at Brady’s Wharf. You know you can’t repair a dinghy at Cloone! I followed, of course, and berthed behind him. After lunch I thought I’d pay him a call. I wanted to look at his engines. I don’t understand Diesels, but Hyslop, my engineer, said they must have gone round ’em with a hammer, for they were pretty badly smashed up. Besides that they had offered all their oil to the Admiralty agent there, and it was being shifted to a tug when I went aboard him. So I’d done my job. I was just going back to Hilarity when his steward said he’d like to see me. He was lying in his cabin breathing pretty loud—wrapped up in rugs and his eyes sticking out like a rabbit’s. He offered me drinks. I couldn’t accept ’em, of course. Then he said: ‘Well, Mr. Maddingham, I’m all in.’ I said I was glad to hear it. Then he told me he was seriously ill with a sudden attack of bronchial pneumonia, and he asked me to run him across to England to see his doctor in town. I said, of course, that was out of the question, Hilarity being a man-of-war in commission. He couldn’t see it. He asked what had that to do with it? He thought this war was some sort of joke, and I had to repeat it all over again. He seemed rather afraid of dying (it’s no game for a middle-aged man, of course) and he hoisted himself up on one elbow and began calling me a murderer. I explained to him—perfectly politely—that I wasn’t in this job for fun. It was business. My orders were to see that he went to Antigua, and now that he wasn’t going to Antigua, and had sold his oil to us, that finished it as far as I was concerned. (Wasn’t that perfectly correct?) He said: ‘But that finishes me, too. I can’t get any doctor in this God-forsaken hole. I made sure you’d treat me properly as soon as I surrendered.’ I said there wasn’t any question of surrender. If he’d been a wounded belligerent, I might have taken him aboard, though I certainly shouldn’t have gone a yard out of my course to land him anywhere; but as it was, he was a neutral—altogether outside the game. You see my point? I tried awfully hard to make him understand it. He went on about his affairs all being at loose ends. He was a rich man—a million and a quarter, he said—and he wanted to redraft his will before he died. I told him a good many people were in his position just now—only they weren’t rich. He changed his tack then and appealed to me on the grounds of our common humanity. ‘Why, if you leave me now, Mr. Maddingham,’ he said, ‘you condemn me to death, just as surely as if you hanged me.’”

“This is interesting,” Portson murmured. “I never imagined you in this light before, Maddingham.”

“I was surprised at myself—’give you my word. But I was perfectly polite. I said to him: ‘Try to be reasonable, sir. If you had got rid of your oil where it was wanted, you’d have condemned lots of people to death just as surely as if you’d drowned ’em.’ ‘Ah, but I didn’t,’ he said. ‘That ought to count in my favour.’ ‘That was no thanks to you,’ I said. ‘You weren’t given the chance. This is war, sir. If you make up your mind to that, you’ll see that the rest follows.’ ‘I didn’t imagine you’d take it as seriously as all that,’ he said—and he said it quite seriously, too. ‘Show a little consideration. Your side’s bound to win anyway.’ I said: ‘Look here! I’m a middle-aged man, and I don’t suppose my conscience is any clearer than yours in many respects, but this is business. I can do nothing for you.’”

“You got that a bit mixed, I think,” said Tegg critically.

“He saw what I was driving at,” Maddingham replied, “and he was the only one that mattered for the moment. ‘Then I’m a dead man, Mr. Maddingham,’ he said. ‘That’s your business,’ I said. ‘Good afternoon.’ And I went out.”

“And?” said Winchmore, after some silence.

“He died. I saw his flag half-masted next morning.”

There was another silence. Henri looked in at the alcove and smiled. Maddingham beckoned to him.

“But why didn’t you lend him a hand to settle his private affairs?” said Portson.

“Because I wasn’t acting in my private capacity. I’d been on the bridge for three nights and—” Maddingham pulled out his watch—“this time to-morrow I shall be there again—confound it! Has my car come, Henri?”

“Yes, Sare Francis. I am sorry.” They all complimented Henri on the dinner, and when the compliments were paid he expressed himself still their debtor. So did the nephew.

“Are you coming with me, Portson?” said Maddingham as he rose heavily.

“No. I’m for Southampton, worse luck! My car ought to be here, too.”

“I’m for Euston and the frigid calculating North,” said Winchmore with a shudder. “One common taxi, please, Henri.”

Tegg smiled. “I’m supposed to sleep in just now, but if you don’t mind, I’d like to come with you as far as Gravesend, Maddingham.”

“Delighted. There’s a glass all round left still,” said Maddingham. “Here’s luck! The usual, I suppose? ‘Damnation to all neutrals!’”

THE VINEYARD

At the eleventh hour he came,

But his wages were the same

As ours who all day long had trod

The wine-press of the Wrath of God.

When he shouldered through the lines

Of our cropped and mangled vines,

His unjaded eye could scan

How each hour had marked its man.

(Children of the morning-tide

With the hosts of noon had died;

And our noon contingents lay

Dead with twilight’s spent array.)

Since his back had felt no load,

Virtue still in him abode;

So he swiftly made his own

Those last spoils we had not won.

We went home, delivered thence,

Grudging him no recompense

Till he portioned praise or blame

To our works before he came.

Till he showed us for our good—

Deaf to mirth, and blind to scorn—

How we might have best withstood

Burdens that he had not borne!

“IN THE INTERESTS OF THE BRETHREN”

“BANQUET NIGHT”

“Once in so often,” King Solomon said,

Watching his quarrymen drill the stone,

“We will club our garlic and wine and bread

And banquet together beneath my Throne.

And all the Brethren shall come to that mess

As Fellow-Craftsmen—no more and no less.

“Send a swift shallop to Hiram of Tyre,

Felling and floating our beautiful trees,

Say that the Brethren and I desire

Talk with our Brethren who use the seas.

And we shall be happy to meet them at mess

As Fellow-Craftsmen—no more and no less.

“Carry this message to Hiram Abif—

Excellent Master of forge and mine:—

I and the Brethren would like it if

He and the Brethren will come to dine

(Garments from Bozrah or morning-dress)

As Fellow-Craftsmen—no more and no less.

“God gave the Hyssop and Cedar their place—

Also the Bramble, the Fig and the Thorn—

But that is no reason to black a man’s face

Because he is not what he hasn’t been born.

And, as touching the Temple, I hold and profess

We are Fellow-Craftsmen—no more and no less.”

So it was ordered and so it was done,

And the hewers of wood and the Masons of Mark,

With foc’sle hands of the Sidon run

And Navy Lords from the Royal Ark,

Came and sat down and were merry at mess

As Fellow-Craftsmen—no more and no less.

The Quarries are hotter than Hiram’s forge,

No one is safe from the dog-whips’ reach.

It’s mostly snowing up Lebanon gorge,

And it’s always blowing off Joppa beach;

But once in so often, the messenger brings

Solomon’s mandate: “Forget these things!

Brother to Beggars and Fellow to Kings,

Companion of Princes—forget these things!

Fellow-Craftsman, forget these things!”

“IN THE INTERESTS OF THE BRETHREN”

I was buying a canary in a birdshop when he first spoke to me and suggested that I should take a less highly coloured bird. “The colour is in the feeding,” said he. “Unless you know how to feed ’em, it goes. Canaries are one of our hobbies.”

He passed out before I could thank him. He was a middle-aged man with grey hair and a short, dark beard, rather like a Sealyham terrier in silver spectacles. For some reason his face and his voice stayed in my mind so distinctly that, months later, when I jostled against him on a platform crowded with an Angling Club going to the Thames, I recognised, turned, and nodded.

“I took your advice about the canary,” I said.

“Did you? Good!” he replied heartily over the rod-case on his shoulder, and was parted from me by the crowd.