Confusion of Captain Keen: Schooner Days DCXCIII (693)

by C. H. J. Snider

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QNCE in the Sea Bird's chequered career she was owned and sailed by a skipper who was Keen; too Keen.

It was late in the fall. Hepburns, in Picton, required four hundred tons more coal for Prince Edward County. The Sea Bird was in Belleville, ready to lay up, when Capt. Keen heard of the chance and clenched it. The Sea Bird, short, chubby bowed, almost flat bottomed, could float about two hundred tons, so he agreed to make two trips.

Capt. Keen took his crew into his confidence. They were the two Caton boys, Ed and Jack, and Nolton Sanford, of Belleville. The Bird was not so big that she required a certified mate, nor so small that the cooking did itself, so the three sailors were mate, cook and crew. Capt. Keen said, boys, here was the chance of a good freight, and he wasn't going to be mean about it, he'd give $25 for the trip, or $2 a day, only make up their minds quick.

They made up their minds for $25, for that was a month's wages in the summer, and the trip would have to be a quick one to dodge the freeze-up. The Bird dropped down the Bay of Quinte that evening as far as Deseronto. Here, to the crew's surprise, she put in, and they were put to loading lumber, Capt. Keen having smelt a two-way freight. The boys saw that their $25 wasn't likely to come as easily as expected, but turned to work with the help of a big shore gang and had her piled high with dealboards and walking down the Long Reach ere the short following day ended. There was a nice little breeze all night, and next morning they were across the lake and in Oswego, and unloading. Next day by good luck the wind came southeast, and the coal thundered into her from the trestle, and out she sailed with started sheets.

Four days and a half after the bargain was made in Belleville, the Sea Bird was in Picton and ready to unload the first half of her contract. And the boys each had $25 in their pockets.

Capt. Keen had pulled a long face and talked about their being no more in it for him, when all the bills were paid, than enough to buy a winter overcoat. Sailor-like, the crew didn't figure that they hadn't got any more than that themselves. They said they had had all they wanted of being paid by the trip, and were willing to make up for their stroke of luck by going for the next load at so much a day. Only, as the vessel was running at least one man short, they ought to have that one man's pay divided among them. That was the regular custom in lake vessels. And Nolton Sanford spoke up and said that he was willing to do the cooking, and stand on watch as well, only he ought to have $1 a day extra for that, as this trip so late in the year meant meals all the time.

Capt. Keen agreed, after some haggling, to pay $2.75 a day, which was really very good pay, even for the fall, and share the extra man's pay, and allow $1 a day extra for cooking. So he jacked up the price on Mr. Hepburn to $1.25 a ton, take it or leave the rest of the coal on the far side of the lake. The summer rate from Oswego to Picton was then 40 or 50 cents. Hepburns had paid more than that for the preceding load, but they had to have the coal, so they agreed, and out the Sea Bird fluttered. It was now December. In mid-lake it breezed up and the bluff schooner, smart in smooth water, but no great shakes in a seaway, kept jumping into the same hole again and again.

"Well, Jack, where are we going to take her?" asked the captain of his acting mate.

"You're captain," said Jack, "and you ought to know where you're going to take her. One thing sure, she'll take us to the bottom if we stay out here."

"All right," grumbled the captain. "More days, more dollars. We'll run her." They turned her around and scurried back into shelter at South Bay.

Here they tossed nine days at anchor amid snow and ice and wind-whipped water. Ran out of food, and had to buy provisions from the farmers on the shore. Got a mild spell and a slant and, to tell a long voyage shortly, got across the lake and arrived back from Oswego iced to the sheerpoles and very low in the water, but with a very full cargo—a very full cargo—16 days from the time of starting. The boys had bought some Christmas presents in Oswego. They must have been heavy ones to bring her down by the stern so much.

Came the Christmas pay-off, in a Belleville barroom.

Capt. Keen growled over $2.75 a day, just for lying around at anchor eating him out of his own ship, but finally agreed to that much for all hands. But he gagged at $2.75 a day for Nolton Sanford, plus one-third of $2.75 a day, plus $1 a day for cooking.

"All right," said Nolton. "You've got the money on you. Come outside and I'll take it from you, if I have to take it out of your hide."

"Just a minute," said Capt. Keen, "I've thought it over. Here's your money, Nolton. Sixteen days at $2.75, that makes forty-four. One third of 16 days at $2.75, that makes fourteen sixty-six and two-thirds. Call it sixty-six cents. And sixteen days at $1 a day makes sixteen more. Seventy-four dollars and sixty-seven cents. Here's seventy-five dollars."

"You're all witnesses I've paid this man," he called in a loud voice, laying the money on the bar top. Then quietly to Nolton, "Now, I'm going to my cousin at the customs to tell him about those cartons of cigarettes you brought aboard in Oswego." He looked with a gimlet eye at some packages behind the bar. The hotelkeeper's face turned a brick red, but Nolton unhesitatingly scooped up the cash.

"All right," said he, loudly. "Now you boys be witnesses to this, too. While you're there, captain, tell the customs officer and the harbormaster to search the vessel for your winter's coal that you've stowed away in the lazarette and under the cabin floor, out of Mr. Hepburn's cargo. Then see how much freight money you'll get. If he needs any help, I'll show him where you had me take up the floor to hide it. Everybody line up, and name his own. You, too, Cap. This is on me."

"Don't mind if I do," said Capt.Keen, hastily. "What a kidder you are, Nolton. You boys know, of course, all this is just in fun, don't you?" '

But Nolton just pushed one bill across the mahogany and buttoned the rest in his hip pocket, and walked out.

NOLTON SANFORD

As he was then.