“The red-headed man, sir,” he stammered
breathlessly.
The chief engineer awoke with a snarl. He had
drunk much good Scotch whisky that evening, and the
smoke of it was still dry in his throat and cloudy
in his brain.
“And what the hell is wrong with the red-headed
man now?” he roared. “Ain’t
he doin’ two men’s work still?”
“Two? He’s doin’ ten men’s
work with his hands rolled in cloth and the blood
soakin’ through, an’ he sings like a devil
while he works. He’s gone crazy, sir.”
“Naw, he ain’t,” growled the chief;
“that’ll come later. Black McTee is
breakin’ him an’ he’ll be broke before
he goes off his nut. Now get to hell out of here.
I ain’t slept a wink for ten days.”
The fireman went back to his work muttering, and Harrigan
sang the rest of the night.
In the morning there was the usual task of scrubbing
down the bridge. The suds soaked through the
bandages at once and burned his hands like fire.
He tore away the cloths and kept at his task, for he
knew that if he refused to continue, he became by
that act of disobedience a mutineer.
The fourth day was a long nightmare, but at the end
of it Harrigan was still at his post. That night
the pain kept him awake. For forty-eight hours
he had not closed his eyes. The next morning,
as he prepared his bucket of suds and looked down
at his blood-caked hands, the thought of surrender
rose strongly for the first time. Two things fought
against it: his fierce pride and a certain awe
which he had noted as it grew from day to day in the
eyes of the rest of the crew. They were following
the silent battle between the great Irishman and the
captain with a profound, an almost uncanny interest.
As he scrubbed the bridge that morning, McTee, as
always, stood staring out across the bows, impassive,
self-contained as a general overlooking a field of
battle. And the temptation to surrender swelled
up in the throat of Harrigan like the desire for speech
in a child. He kept his teeth hard together and
prayed for endurance. Only five days, and it
might be weeks before they made a port. Even then
the captain might put him in irons rather than risk
his escape.
“Harrigan,” said McTee suddenly.
“Don’t keep it up. You’re bound
to break. Speak those words now that I told you
to say and you’re a free man.”
Harrigan looked up and the words formed at the base
of his tongue. Harrigan looked down and saw his
crimson hands. The words fell back like dust
on his heart.
“Take you for my master an’ swear to forget
what you’ve done?” he said, and his voice
was hardly more than a whisper. “McTee,
if I promised you that I’d perjure blacker ‘n
hell an’ kill you someday when your back was
turned. As it is, I’ll kill you while we’re
standin’ face to face.”
McTee laughed, low, deep, and his eyes were half closed
as if he heard pleasant music. Harrigan grinned
up at him.
