In absolute desperation Sailor began to climb. He knew that if he disobeyed he would be flung into the sea. Clinging, feet and claws, like a cat, for the sake of the life he hadn't the courage to lose, he fought his way up somehow through the icy wind and the icier spray that was ever leaping up and hitting him, no matter how high he went. He fought his way as far as the lower yardarm. Here he clung helpless, dazed with terror, faint with exhaustion. Commands were screamed from below, which he could not understand, which he could not have obeyed had he understood them, since he now lacked the power to stir from his perch. His hands were frozen stiff; there was neither use nor breath in his body; the motions of the ship were such that if he tried to shift a finger he would be flung to the deck he could no longer see, and be pulped like an apple. So he clung frantically to the shrouds, trying to keep his balance, although he had merely to let go an instant in order to end his troubles. But this he could not do; and in the meantime commands and threats were howled at him in vain.

"Come down, then," bawled the Old Man at last, beside himself with fury.

But the boy couldn't move one way or the other. At that moment it was no more possible to come down than it was to go up higher.

They had to roll up the sails without his aid. After that the fury of the wind and the sea seemed to abate a bit. Perhaps this was more Henry Harper's fancy than anything else; but at least it enabled him to gather the strength to move from his perch and slide down the futtock shrouds to the deck.

The Old Man was waiting for him at the foot of the mast. He took him by the throat.

"One o' you fetch me a bight o' cord," he roared quietly. He had to roar to make himself heard at all, but it was a quiet sort of roar that meant more than it could express.

He was promptly obeyed by two or three. There was going to be a bit of fun with Sailor.

Frank, an Arab and reckoned nothing as a seaman, was the first with the cord, but Louis, a Peruvian, was hard on his heels. The boy wondered dimly what was going to happen.

The Old Man took hold of his wrists and tied them so tightly behind him that the double twist of cord cut into his thin flesh. But he didn't feel it very much just then. The next thing the boy knew was that he was being dragged along the deck. Then he realized that he was being lashed to the mizzen fife-rail while several of the crew stood around grinning approvingly. And when this was done they left him there. They left him unable to sit or to lie down, or even to stand, because the seas continually washed his feet from under him. There was nothing to protect him from the pitiless wind of the Atlantic that cut through his wretched body like a knife, or the yet more pitiless waves that broke over it, soaking him to the skin and half dashing out his life. Mercifully the third sea that came, towering like a mountain and then seeming to burst right over him, although such was not the case, left him insensible.

He didn't know exactly how or when it was that he came to. He had a dim idea that he was very slowly dying a worse death than he had ever imagined it was possible for anything to die. It was a process that went on and on; and then there came a blank; and then it started again, and he remembered he was still alive and that he was still dying; and then another blank; and then there was something alive quite near him; and then he remembered Mother and tried to gasp her name.

When at last Henry Harper came to himself he found he was in the arms of Mr. Thompson. The Old Man with the devil in his eyes was standing by; all around the Horn he had been drinking heavily. Mr. MacFarlane, Mr. Petersen the third mate, and some of the others were also standing by.

The boy heard the Old Man threaten to put Mr. Thompson in irons, and heard him call him a mutinous dog. Mr. Thompson made no reply, but no dog could have looked more mutinous than he did as he held the boy in his arms. There was a terrible look on his face, and Mr. MacFarlane and the others held back a bit.

It chanced, however, that there was just one thought at the back of the Old Man's mind, and it was this that saved Mr. Thompson, also the boy and perhaps the ship. He feared no man, he had no God when he was in drink, and he didn't set much store by the devil as a working institution; but drunk or sober he was always a first-rate seaman and he cared a great deal about his ship. And he knew very well that except himself Mr. Thompson was the only first-rate seaman aboard the Margaret Carey, and that without his aid there was little chance of the vessel reaching Frisco. It was this thought at the back of the Old Man's mind that prevented his putting Mr. Thompson in irons.

The boy lay longer than he knew, hovering much nearer to death than he guessed, in Mr. Thompson's bunk, with Mr. Thompson's spare oilskins over him, his dry blankets under him, and Mr. Thompson moistening his lips with grog every few minutes for several hours. It was a pretty near go; had Henry Harper known how near it was he might have taken his chance. But he didn't know, and in the course of two or three days nature and Mr. Thompson and perhaps a change in the weather pulled him through.

All the way out from London until the third day past the Horn the weather had been as dirty as it knew how to be; and it knows how to be very dirty indeed aboard a windjammer on the fifty-sixth degree of latitude in the month of December, which is not the worst time of the year. But it suddenly took quite a miraculous turn for the better. The wind allowed Mr. Thompson to shift the course of the Margaret Carey a couple of points in two hours, so that before that day was out the old tub, which could not have been so crazy as she seemed to Henry Harper, was running before it in gala order with all her canvas spread.

During the following morning the sun was seen for the first time for some weeks, and the port watch gave it a cheer of encouragement. By nightfall the wind and the sea were behaving very well, all things considered, and they shared the credit with Mr. Thompson of having saved the life of Henry Harper.

The Old Man's temper began to mend with the weather. He was not all bad – very few men are – it was merely as Mr. Thompson had said, that when drink was in him he was a devil. The dirtier the weather the more drink there was in him, as a rule. When the sun shone again and things began to look more hopeful, the Old Man's temper improved out of all knowledge.

The Old Man set such store by seamanship that it was the one quality he respected in others. His world was divided into those who were good seamen and those who were not good seamen. If you were a good seaman he would never forget it in his dealings with you; if you were not a good seaman, whatever else you might be, you could go to hell for all that he cared. And of all the seamen he had shipped in the course of a pretty long experience as a master mariner, he had never, in his own judgment, come across the equal of Mr. Thompson. This was his fifth time round the Horn with that gentleman as mate, and each voyage increased the Old Man's respect for his remarkable ability. He had never seen anything better than the style in which the mate got the old ship before the wind; nothing could be more perfect than the way she was moving now under all her canvas; and that evening in the cabin, after supper, the Old Man broached a bottle of his "pertickler" and decided upon some little amende to the mate for having threatened to put him in irons.

"That bye is no use on deck," he said. "He had better come here and make himself useful until he gets stronger."

The Old Man meant this for a great concession, and Mr. Thompson accepted it in the spirit in which it was offered. The Old Man now regarded the boy as part and parcel of Mr. Thompson's property, and it was by no means certain, such is the subtle psychology of active benevolence, that Mr. Thompson did not regard the boy in that light also. At any rate the boy looked on the mate as his natural protector. Henry Harper craved for someone to whom he could render homage and obedience. He would have reverenced the Old Man had he been worthy of such an emotion; as it was he had to fall back on the mate, a rough man to look at, and a very bad one to cross, but one to whom he owed his life, and the only friend he had.

It took Henry Harper a fortnight to get fairly on his legs again. Then he was able to come on deck as far as the break of the poop. Much seemed to have happened to the world since he had been below. He found the sun shining gloriously; there was hardly a puff of wind; the crew in high good humor were cheerfully mending sails. It was not the same ship, it was not the same sea, it was not the same world he had left a long fortnight ago. He was amazed and thrilled. The slum-bred waif had no idea that any world could be like this. Moreover, the convalescent stage of a dangerous illness was cleansing and renewing him. For the first time since he had been born he forgot the burden of his inheritance. He was suddenly intoxicated by the extraordinary majesty and beauty of the universe.

The sea, what an indescribably glorious thing! The sky without a cloud in it! He had never seen any sky at Blackhampton to compare with this. The air, how clean and bright it was! The mollymawks with their beautiful white breasts were skimming the green water. It was a glorious world. He heard a dago singing at his work. He almost wanted to sing as well.

He got a needle and some packthread and sat down on the afterhatch and suddenly made up his mind to do his best. He could make nothing of his life, or of his circumstances. His wretched body was all sore and bruised and broken; his head was still going round and round; he didn't know what he was, or why he was, or where he was; but a very glorious earth had been made by Somebody, just as a very miserable thing had been made by Somebody. However, let him keep on keeping on.

He had gone too far, thus early in life, for self-pity. Besides there was too much happening around him, too much to look at, too much to do to think very deeply about himself. Yes, it was a very wonderful world. The sun began to warm his veins as he sat plying his needle, such a sun as he had never known. The colors all around were simply marvelous; blues and yellows, greens and purples! There was nothing at Blackhampton to compare with them. The dago seated near had set down his needle, had dabbled his hand in the water, had begun to sing louder than ever. Yes, Blackhampton was not to be compared with such a world as this.

For the next three weeks things began to go a bit kinder for Henry Harper. Each day grew warmer, more gorgeous; there was no wind to speak of; the sea became so smooth that it might have been the West Norton and Bagsworth canal. And as it was clearly realized by the rest of the crew that for some mysterious reason Sailor was now under the extremely powerful protection of Mr. Thompson, they were careful to keep their hands off him, and also their boots. This made life a little duller for them, but a bit easier for Henry Harper.