For the next three weeks we ran smoothly to the westward, with nothing occurring aboard The Gentle Hand to break the monotony of ship’s duty. The stiff breeze, the edge of the northeast trade-wind, bore us steadily on over warm seas bright with sunlight and under blue skies flecked with the lumpy trade clouds that hung apparently motionless in the void above.

During this weather I had little to do, and had a better chance of seeing something of the after-guard while looking to the gear of the two long twelves we carried upon the quarter-deck for stern-chasers. We carried no metal on the forecastle, and it appeared that these heavy guns aft were out of all proportion to the rest of the battery.

I spoke to Hawkson about it, but he explained that the natives of the Navigator, Society, and Fiji groups were somewhat dangerous, and that, as our 82mission was one of peaceful trading, we would always run when attacked rather than fight, and the heavy twelves were for keeping large canoes at a distance.

“It would be a rather large canoe,” I admitted, “that would face the fire of a long twelve-pounder as heavy as any used in vessels of the frigate class. The islands you speak of are not, however, in the South Atlantic.”

“You always were a clever lad, Heywood,” said he, with an ugly smile. “What a smart one you were to see the error of that! But we’ll have a try just to see what you can hit. Get a beef barrel and heave it overboard, an’ get the men of the gun-crew aft.”

After that we seldom let many days slip without practice. Tim begged me to take him in the gun-crew, and, as he was as active as a monkey, I always let him have a chance. He grew very quiet and sad as we drew near the Bahamas, and when we ran clear of the trade, within a hundred miles of the island, he seemed to be gazing over the sunlit ocean, watching for a coming breeze.

Sometimes I had him aft, polishing the brass of a gun-breech, and I noticed that he divided his attention mostly between the captain, Hicks, and Renshaw, and the southern horizon.

The great southern ocean is a lonely place, but 83its very loneliness and quietness on the edge of the great winds makes it appeal to a turbulent soul.

Tim and I sat a long time on the breech of the stern-chaser, rubbing the metal easily and gazing out over the calm ocean. It was quiet aboard, and the voices of the men on the main-deck sounded loud and discordant. The slatting of the canvas was the only sound aloft, the royals jerking at the clews first as the barque swung easily on the swell, and then the t’gallantsails followed by the topsails fore and aft, the taut canvas fanning the almost still air with the rolling swing, making the jerking of the tacks and clews sound rhythmically upon the ear. Below, the captain and his two passengers smoked and drank their ale under the cabin skylight, their jokes sounding particularly coarse in the sunlit quiet.

Tim suddenly stopped work and gazed to the southward. Far away, miles and miles to windward, the horizon darkened slightly where the deeper blue of the ocean stood out against the pale azure of the semitropical sky.

While he looked, there came a sound over the water. It was a long, plaintive cry of immense volume, but hardly distinct enough to be heard unless the listener gave his attention. It was like a wild minor chord of a harp, long continued and sustained, rising and falling over the dark blue 84heave of the swells where the light air darkened and streaked the ruffled surface. Farther away to windward, the ocean took on a deeper blue, and the air filled the sails more steadily for a few minutes.

Tim stood gazing into the distance, his eyes bright and his lips parted, but there was an expression of peace and tranquillity upon his freckled face that I had never noticed before.

“It’s the calling, Heywood, Heywood,” he whispered. “It’s the great calling of the millions who have gone before. Listen!”

I heard it. The sad, wailing notes coming from miles and miles away to windward over that smooth sea, with the freshening breeze, made an impression upon me I could not throw off. It vibrated through my whole being, and was like the voice of great loneliness calling from the vast world of sea and sky. It was not like the hum of the trade in the rigging or the snore of a gale under the foot of a topsail, nor like the thunderous roar of the hurricane through the rigging of a hove-to ship. The melancholy sadness of the long-sustained wail was musical to a degree. I sat there listening.

Of course, it must have been caused by the wind over the surface of the sea at a great distance, or by different currents of air in passing, but the effect upon the imagination was like that which might be caused by the prolonged cry of a distant host 85from the vastness of sunlit waste. It pervaded my whole being, and enforced listening to its call, seeming to draw my soul to it as if out in that sparkling world of rippling wavelets lay the end of all strife and the great eternal peace.

Tim stretched forth his arm. His eyes held a strange look in them, and he moved to the rail as though in a dream.

“I am coming, May, coming,” he whispered.

Before I realized what had happened, he had gone over the side. Then I jumped to my feet with a yell, and bawled out: “Man overboard!” at the same time heaving the end of a gun-tackle over the taffrail. The cry and noise of my rush brought the entire watch to the side, and the captain and Hawkson to the quarter-rail. The barque was barely moving, and Tim was alongside. But he refused to take the end of the line. There was an exclamation beside me at the taffrail, and Renshaw leaned his elbows upon the rail and looked over at the sinking sailor. Their eyes met for an instant, and Tim made a grab for the line. He was hauled up quickly, and went forward without a word of excuse to the captain and Hawkson’s inquiries as to how he happened overboard.

It was a strange occurrence, and I pondered over it that evening while the barque rolled slowly toward the islands under a bright moon, and our watch 86stretched themselves upon the main-hatch to smoke and spin yarns. Tim avoided me.

The next morning we found ourselves close to New Providence Harbour, the white water of the Great Bahama bank stretching away on all sides.

The skipper seemed to know the bank pretty well, for he sprung his luff ............