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_ Next day, a large ship, the Rachel, was descried, bearing directly
down upon the Pequod, all her spars thickly clustering with men. At
the time the Pequod was making good speed through the water; but as
the broad-winged windward stranger shot nigh to her, the boastful
sails all fell together as blank bladders that are burst, and all
life fled from the smitten hull.
"Bad news; she brings bad news," muttered the old Manxman. But ere
her commander, who, with trumpet to mouth, stood up in his boat; ere
he could hopefully hail, Ahab's voice was heard.
"Hast seen the White Whale?"
"Aye, yesterday. Have ye seen a whale-boat adrift?"
Throttling his joy, Ahab negatively answered this unexpected
question; and would then have fain boarded the stranger, when the
stranger captain himself, having stopped his vessel's way, was seen
descending her side. A few keen pulls, and his boat-hook soon
clinched the Pequod's main-chains, and he sprang to the deck.
Immediately he was recognised by Ahab for a Nantucketer he knew. But
no formal salutation was exchanged.
"Where was he?--not killed!--not killed!" cried Ahab, closely
advancing. "How was it?"
It seemed that somewhat late on the afternoon of the day previous,
while three of the stranger's boats were engaged with a shoal of
whales, which had led them some four or five miles from the ship; and
while they were yet in swift chase to windward, the white hump and
head of Moby Dick had suddenly loomed up out of the water, not very
far to leeward; whereupon, the fourth rigged boat--a reserved
one--had been instantly lowered in chase. After a keen sail before
the wind, this fourth boat--the swiftest keeled of all--seemed to
have succeeded in fastening--at least, as well as the man at the
mast-head could tell anything about it. In the distance he saw the
diminished dotted boat; and then a swift gleam of bubbling white
water; and after that nothing more; whence it was concluded that the
stricken whale must have indefinitely run away with his pursuers, as
often happens. There was some apprehension, but no positive alarm,
as yet. The recall signals were placed in the rigging; darkness came
on; and forced to pick up her three far to windward boats--ere going
in quest of the fourth one in the precisely opposite direction--the
ship had not only been necessitated to leave that boat to its fate
till near midnight, but, for the time, to increase her distance from
it. But the rest of her crew being at last safe aboard, she crowded
all sail--stunsail on stunsail--after the missing boat; kindling a
fire in her try-pots for a beacon; and every other man aloft on the
look-out. But though when she had thus sailed a sufficient distance
to gain the presumed place of the absent ones when last seen; though
she then paused to lower her spare boats to pull all around her; and
not finding anything, had again dashed on; again paused, and lowered
her boats; and though she had thus continued doing till daylight;
yet not the least glimpse of the missing keel had been seen.
The story told, the stranger Captain immediately went on to reveal
his object in boarding the Pequod. He desired that ship to unite
with his own in the search; by sailing over the sea some four or five
miles apart, on parallel lines, and so sweeping a double horizon, as
it were.
"I will wager something now," whispered Stubb to Flask, "that some
one in that missing boat wore off that Captain's best coat; mayhap,
his watch--he's so cursed anxious to get it back. Who ever heard of
two pious whale-ships cruising after one missing whale-boat in the
height of the whaling season? See, Flask, only see how pale he
looks--pale in the very buttons of his eyes--look--it wasn't the
coat--it must have been the--"
"My boy, my own boy is among them. For God's sake--I beg, I
conjure"--here exclaimed the stranger Captain to Ahab, who thus far
had but icily received his petition. "For eight-and-forty hours let
me charter your ship--I will gladly pay for it, and roundly pay for
it--if there be no other way--for eight-and-forty hours only--only
that--you must, oh, you must, and you SHALL do this thing."
"His son!" cried Stubb, "oh, it's his son he's lost! I take back the
coat and watch--what says Ahab? We must save that boy."
"He's drowned with the rest on 'em, last night," said the old Manx
sailor standing behind them; "I heard; all of ye heard their
spirits."
Now, as it shortly turned out, what made this incident of the
Rachel's the more melancholy, was the circumstance, that not only was
one of the Captain's sons among the number of the missing boat's
crew; but among the number of the other boat's crews, at the same
time, but on the other hand, separated from the ship during the dark
vicissitudes of the chase, there had been still another son; as that
for a time, the wretched father was plunged to the bottom of the
cruellest perplexity; which was only solved for him by his chief
mate's instinctively adopting the ordinary procedure of a whale-ship
in such emergencies, that is, when placed between jeopardized but
divided boats, always to pick up the majority first. But the
captain, for some unknown constitutional reason, had refrained from
mentioning all this, and not till forced to it by Ahab's iciness did
he allude to his one yet missing boy; a little lad, but twelve years
old, whose father with the earnest but unmisgiving hardihood of a
Nantucketer's paternal love, had thus early sought to initiate him in
the perils and wonders of a vocation almost immemorially the destiny
of all his race. Nor does it unfrequently occur, that Nantucket
captains will send a son of such tender age away from them, for a
protracted three or four years' voyage in some other ship than their
own; so that their first knowledge of a whaleman's career shall be
unenervated by any chance display of a father's natural but untimely
partiality, or undue apprehensiveness and concern.
Meantime, now the stranger was still beseeching his poor boon of
Ahab; and Ahab still stood like an anvil, receiving every shock, but
without the least quivering of his own.
"I will not go," said the stranger, "till you say aye to me. Do to
me as you would have me do to you in the like case. For YOU too have
a boy, Captain Ahab--though but a child, and nestling safely at home
now--a child of your old age too--Yes, yes, you relent; I see
it--run, run, men, now, and stand by to square in the yards."
"Avast," cried Ahab--"touch not a rope-yarn"; then in a voice that
prolongingly moulded every word--"Captain Gardiner, I will not do it.
Even now I lose time. Good-bye, good-bye. God bless ye, man, and
may I forgive myself, but I must go. Mr. Starbuck, look at the
binnacle watch, and in three minutes from this present instant warn
off all strangers: then brace forward again, and let the ship sail
as before."
Hurriedly turning, with averted face, he descended into his cabin,
leaving the strange captain transfixed at this unconditional and
utter rejection of his so earnest suit. But starting from his
enchantment, Gardiner silently hurried to the side; more fell than
stepped into his boat, and returned to his ship.
Soon the two ships diverged their wakes; and long as the strange
vessel was in view, she was seen to yaw hither and thither at every
dark spot, however small, on the sea. This way and that her yards
were swung round; starboard and larboard, she continued to tack;
now she beat against a head sea; and again it pushed her before it;
while all the while, her masts and yards were thickly clustered with
men, as three tall cherry trees, when the boys are cherrying among
the boughs.
But by her still halting course and winding, woeful way, you plainly
saw that this ship that so wept with spray, still remained without
comfort. She was Rachel, weeping for her children, because they were
not. _
Read next: CHAPTER 129 The Cabin.
Read previous: CHAPTER 127 The Deck.
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