The Belted Seas | Page 5

'em
either, I ain't so uppish as to differ."
Then Stevey Todd chimed in and made a tidy argument, quoting
Scripture to prove that "actions with intent to deceive, and deception
pursuant," weren't moral, and, moreover, he says: "Shall we lose our
souls because S. A. customs is ridiculous? Tell me that!"
"Shucks!" says the mate; "we're saved by grace!"
Then Captain Clyde took it up and his argument was beautiful. For he
said S. A. customs were oppressive to the poor of that country by
wrongfully preventing them from buying U. S. goods; so that, having
sworn to the U. S., we weren't bound by S. A. laws further than
humanity or the Dago was able to enforce; "which," he says, "I argue
ain't either of 'em the case."
"That's a tart argiment, Captain Clyde," says the bos'n. "I never heerd
you make a tarter."
They went on that way till it made my head ache, and before I knew it I
was arguing hard against the bos'n, the captain egging me on.
I sailed with that crew four years. They were smugglers. I'm free to say
I loved Clyde, and liked the crew. For, granting he was much of a miser
and maybe but a shrewd old man, to be corrupting folks with his
theories, though I'm not so sure about that, not knowing what he really
thought; yet, he was a bold man, and a kind man, and I never saw one
that was keener in judgment. You might say he had made that crew to
suit him, having picked out the material one by one, and they were
most of all like children of his bringing up. I judge he had a theory
about arguments, that so long as they talked up to him and freed their
opinions, there wouldn't be any secret trouble brewing below, or maybe
it was only his humour. It was surely a fact that they were steady in
business and a rare crew to his purpose, explain it as one may. He

taught me navigation, and treated me like a son, and it's not for me to
go back on him. I don't know why he took to me that way, and different
from the rest. He taught me his business and how he did it. I was the
only one who knew. He was absolute owner as well as captain, and his
own buyer and seller as well. He carried no cargoes but his own, which
he made up for the most part in New York or Philadelphia, and would
bill the Hebe Maitland maybe to Rio Janeiro. Then the Hawk would
maybe deliver the biggest part off the coast of Venezuela in the night,
and the Hebe Maitland would, like as not, sail into Rio by-and-by and
pay her duty on the rest, and take a cargo to New York as properly as a
lady going to church.
There were a good many countries in South America to choose from. It
wasn't wise to visit the same one right along, though there was apt to be
a new government when we came again. Clyde knew all about it. I'm
not saying but what an odd official of a government here and there was
acquainted with the merits of a percentage, being instructed in it by the
same. For all that there was excitement. It was a great life. Sometimes I
catch myself heaving a sigh for the old man that's dead, and saying to
myself, "That was a great life yonder."
My recollection is, it was a sub-agent in Cuba who turned evidence on
Clyde at last, for a gunboat missed us by only a few miles coming
down by St. Christopher, as I heard afterward. Then a Spanish cruiser
ran us down, at last, under a corner of a little island among the
Windwards, about thirty miles east of Tobago, where Clyde's
cleverness came to nothing.
It was growing twilight, we driving close off the low shores of the
island. The woods were dark above the shore, and half a mile out was
the black cruiser, with a pennon of smoke against the sky, and the black
water between. I went into Clyde's cabin and found him talking to
himself.
"We'll be scuttling her, Tom," he says.
With that he gave a jerk at the foot of his bunk, and the footboard came
off, and there underneath were four brown canvas bags tied up with

rope. Now, I never knew before that day that Clyde didn't keep his
money in a bank, same as any other civilised gentleman, and it shows
how little I knew about him, after all. He sat there holding up eagles
and double pesos to the lamplight, with his eyes shining and his
wrinkled old mouth