Billy Topsail & Company: A Story for Boys

A pale little clerk put his head in at the door in a very doubtful way.

“Skipper of the Black Eagle, sir,” said he. “Clerk, too,” he added.

“Show ’em in,” Sir Archibald growled.

What happened need not be described. It was both melancholy and stormy without; there was a roaring tempest within. Sir Archibald was not used to giving way to aggravation; but he was now presently embarked on a rough sea of it, from which, indeed, he had difficulty in reaching quiet harbour again. It was not the first interview he had had with the skipper and clerk of the Black Eagle since that trim craft had returned from the French Shore trade. But it turned out to be the final one. The books of the Black Eagle had been examined; her stores had been appraised, her stock taken, her fish weighed. And the result had been so amazing that Sir Archibald had not only been mystified but enraged. It was for this reason that when Skipper George Rumm, with Tommy Bull, the rat-eyed little clerk, left the presence of Sir Archibald Armstrong, the prediction of the clerk had come true: there were two able-bodied seamen looking for a berth on the streets of St. John’s. First of all, however, they set about finding Tom Tulk o’ Twillingate; but this, somehow or other, the discreet Tom Tulk never would permit them to do.

By Sir Archibald’s watch it was now exactly 2:47. Sir Archibald rose from the chair that was his throne.

“I’m sorry,” he sighed. “I had hoped–”

Again the pale little clerk put his head in at the door. This time he was grinning shamelessly.

“Well?” said Sir Archibald. “What is it?”

“Master Archie, sir.”

Archie shook hands with his father in a perfunctory way. Sir Archibald’s cheery greeting–and with what admiration and affection and happiness his heart was filled at that moment!–Sir Archibald’s cheery greeting failed in his throat. Archie was prodigiously scowling. This was no failure of affection; nor was it an evil regard towards his creditor, who would have for him, as the boy well knew, nothing but the warmest sympathy. It was shame and sheer despair. In every line of the boy’s drawn face–in his haggard eyes and trembling lips–in his dejected air–even in his dishevelled appearance (as Sir Archibald sadly thought)–failure was written. What the nature of that failure was Sir Archibald did not know. How it had come about he could not tell. But it was failure. It was failure–and there was no doubt about it. Sir Archibald’s great fatherly heart warmed towards the boy. He did not resent the brusque greeting; he understood. And Sir Archibald came at that moment nearer to putting his arms about his big son in the most sentimental fashion in the world than he had come in a good many years.

“Father,” said Archie, abruptly, “please sit down.”

Sir Archibald sat down.

“I owe you a thousand dollars, sir,” Archie went on, coming close to his father’s desk and looking Sir Archibald straight in the eye. “It is due to-day, and I can’t pay it–now.”

Sir Archibald would not further humiliate the boy by remitting the debt. There was no help for Archie in this crisis. Nobody knew it better than Sir Archibald.

“I have no excuse, sir,” said Archie, with his head half-defiantly thrown back, “but I should like to explain.”

Sir Archibald nodded.

“I meant to be back in time to realize on–well–on those things you have given me–on the yacht and the boat and the pony,” Archie went on, finding a little difficulty with a lump of shame in his throat; “but I missed the mail-boat at Ruddy Cove, and I–”

The pale little clerk once more put his sharp little face in at the door.

“Judd,” said Sir Archibald, sternly, “be good enough not to interrupt me.”

“But, sir–”

“Judd,” Sir Archibald roared, “shut that door!”

The pale little clerk took his life in his hands, and, turning infinitely paler, gasped:

“Skipper of the Spot Cash to see you, sir.”

“What!” shouted Archie.

Judd had fled.

“Skipper–of–the–Spot–Cash!” Archie muttered stupidly.

Indeed, yes. The hearty, grinning, triumphant skipper of the Spot Cash! And more, too, following sheepishly in his wake: no less than the full complement of other members of the trading firm of Topsail, Armstrong, Grimm & Company, even to Donald North, who was winking with surprise, and Bagg, the cook, ex-gutter-snipe from London, who could not wink at all from sheer amazement. And then–first thing of all–Archie Armstrong and his father shook hands in quite another way. Whereupon this same Archie Armstrong (while Sir Archibald fairly bellowed with delighted laughter) fell upon Bill o’ Burnt Bay, and upon the crew of the Spot Cash, right down to Bagg (who had least to lose), and beat the very breath out of their bodies in an hilarious expression of joy.

“Dickerin’,” Bill o’ Burnt Bay explained, by and by.

“Dickering?” ejaculated Archie.

“Jus’ simon-pure dickerin’,” Bill o’ Burnt Bay insisted, a bit indignantly.

And then it all came out–how that the Jolly Harbour wreckers had come aboard to reason; how that Bill o’ Burnt Bay, with a gun in one hand, was disposed to reason, and did reason, and continued to reason, until the Jolly Harbour folk began to laugh, and were in the end persuaded to take a reasonable amount of merchandise from the depleted shelves (the whole of it) in return for their help in floating the schooner. It came out, too, how Billy Topsail had held the candle over the powder-keg. It came out, moreover, how the crew of the Spot Cash had set sail from Jolly Harbour with a fair wind, how the wind had providentially continued to blow fair and strong, how the Spot Cash had made the land-fall of St. John’s before night of the day before, and how the crew had with their own arms towed her into harbour and had not fifteen minutes ago moored her at Sir Archibald’s wharf. And loaded, sir–loaded, sir, with as fine a lot o’ salt-cod as ever came out o’ White Bay an’ off the French Shore! To all of which both Sir Archibald and Archie listened with wide open eyes–the eyes of the boy (it may be whispered in strictest confidence) glistening with tears of proud delight in his friends.

There was a celebration. Of course, there was a celebration! To be sure! This occurred when the load of the Spot Cash had been weighed out, and a discharge of obligation duly handed to the firm of Topsail, Armstrong, Grimm & Company, and the balance paid over in hard cash. Skipper Bill was promptly made a member of the firm to his own great profit; and he was amazed and delighted beyond everything but a wild gasp–and so was Billy Topsail–and so was Jimmie Grimm–and so was Donald North–and so was Bagg–so were they all amazed, every one, when they were told that fish had gone to three-eighty, and each found himself the possessor, in his own right, free of all incumbrance, of one hundred and thirty-seven dollars and sixty-three cents. But this amazement was hardly equal to that which overcame them when they sat down to dinner with Archie and Sir Archibald and Lady Armstrong in the evening. Perhaps it was the shining plate–perhaps it was Lady Armstrong’s sweet beauty–perhaps it was Sir Archibald’s jokes–perhaps it was Archie Armstrong’s Eton jacket and perfectly immaculate appearance–perhaps it was the presence of his jolly tutor–perhaps it was the glitter and snowy whiteness and glorious bounty of the table spread before them–but there was nothing in the whole wide world to equal the astonishment of the crew of the Spot Cash– nothing to approach it, indeed–except their fine delight.

THE END

1

Donald North himself told me this–told me, too, what he had thought, and what he said to his mother–N. D.

2

The story of this voyage–the tale of the time when Archie Armstrong and Billy Topsail and Bill o’ Burnt Bay were lost in the snow on the ice-floe–with certain other happenings in which Billy Topsail was involved–is related in “The Adventures of Billy Topsail.”

3

Billy Topsail’s reasons were no doubt connected with an encounter with a gigantic devil-fish at Birds’ Nest Islands, as related in “The Adventures of Billy Topsail.”

4

A “tickle” is a narrow passage of water between two islands. It is also (as here used) a narrow passage leading into harbour.

5

As related in “The Adventures of Billy Topsail.”

6

As related in “The Adventures of Billy Topsail.”