The Bottineau courant. (Bottineau, Bottineau County, N.D.) 1895-1929, 1915-10-28
led; and In q moment he was read
ing aloud.
CHAPTER II.
Out Of the Silence.

CHAPTER II.
Out Of the Silence.
Mansfield was right. The pages Of
his diary struck the essentially hui
nan note of frank self-avowal. They
we're as fragrant as May orchards;
their sweetness of personality made
one think Of brave young dreams
among dewy blossoms. But I con
fessed to him the feeling that we
were trespassers into these secrets.
and, after that, he either laid the book
by altogether or read it only when
alone.
The Wastrel vas cruising at her
cripple's pace southwest by east,
through those hot waters which lie
directly above the equator. After
some days we sloped across the line,
but still chung to the hideous swelter
of the next meridian. Our course lay
among groups of lush islands, which
simmered in steam and fever, and the
merciless, overhead Jul beat upon us,
and soured. us, until faces that had
been sullen at Sandakan, grew malev-
Olent and menacing at one hundred
and fifty degrees, east, where, if / re-
member rightly, we crossed the eQua-
tor.
The brows of the men always gath
cred into a sweating scowl when they
gazed at Captain Coulter pacing tho
bridge. From scraps of information
picked up here and there, in fo'c's'le
disparagement, l pieced together a
lurid abstract of his story.
I knew how wild and were
the regulations of many of the men
of the eastern beaches. 1 had lis
tened to tales of lanai and bund, but
even in such company brutalities and
SO strong it's note of implacable reso-
luteness.
Over a high and rather prominent
forehead, long hair of iron gray was
always swept back. Under bushy and
aggressive brows his eyes were sim
gularly piercing and of the same deep
blue GOODNESS as polar ice. His nose
was large and straight, and his lips
set tight and unyielding like the jaws
of a steel trap. The chin was almost,
but not quite, pr%otrusive. He was a
silent man, yet in his own fashion he
was bitterly passionate.
Hefferman, the first mate, was a
tawdry courtier, who studiously con-
sidered his chief in every matter, and
maintained his position of concord by
ludicrous care to risk no disagree
ment. In the stuffy cabin where, three
times a day, we sweltered over bad
food, Mansfield and I studied the atti-
tudes of the officers.
Coulter grimly amused himself over
his eating by making absurd state
ments for the sheer pleasure of see-
ing his next in command fall abjectly
into agreement.
The second mate, however, was i'm
penetrably silent. He was without
fear, but a life which had evidently
brought him down a steep declivity
from a lost responsibility had taught
him consideration for odds. If he did
not contradict the dogmatic utteran-
ces of his chief in table conversation,
he at least refused to agree.
Mansfield and I were convinced that
If this prematurely gray fellow with
the dissipated face, cut in a patrician
mold, could v be brought to the
point of personal narrative, he would
have a stirring story to tell. We also
knew that he would never tell it.
Once, before the feud between af-
terwatch and fo'c'sle drove the Off.
into a necessary alliance, l
that there would be a brave
clash between the captain and the
mate.
It was a night of intolerable heat,
and a sky spangled with stars hung
us low and smothering. Law.
renee, the second mate, was of watch
and Joined US carrying a violin. Then
under the weird depression and mel
ancholy lassitude which burdened US
Ill, he began to improvise.
Mansfield and I listened, spellbound.
Under his touch the instrument gave
of such strains as could come only
the sheer genius of a gifted mu-
sician who had suffered miserably.
It was almost as IL he were giving
without words the story which his
lips would never tell, and into the i'm
provised music crept infinite ,pathos
and somber tragedy.
In a few minutes the captain came
over, and his advent was like that Of
! maniac. The lame foot was pound.
ing the deck with the %stressful stamp
hat vas always an indication of rage.
He halted before us with fists clench-
ID and his eyes glittering. Upon
he vented an outpouring of
wrath which is unquot-
lble.
"Throw that damned fiddle over.
he ordered at the end Of q
ierce TRADE. Don't let me hear its
scratching again on my