This was too much for Ole Ericsen. At sight of his beloved
paintwork thus defaced, he jumped up and shook his fist at the
fishermen; but a second bullet smashed into the cabin not six
inches from his head, and he dropped down to the deck under cover
of the rail.
All the fishermen had rifles, and they now opened a general
fusillade. We were all driven to cover – even Charley, who was
compelled to desert the wheel. Had it not been for the heavy drag
of the nets, we would inevitably have broached to at the mercy of
TALES OF THE FISH PATROL
50
the enraged fishermen. But the nets, fastened to the bottom of the
Mary Rebecca well aft, held her stern into the wind, and she
continued to plough on, though somewhat erratically.
Charley, lying on the deck, could just manage to reach the lower
spokes of the wheel; but while he could steer after a fashion, it
was very awkward. Ole Ericsen bethought himself of a large piece
of sheet steel in the empty hold.
It was in fact a plate from the side of the New Jersey, a steamer
which had recently been wrecked outside the Golden Gate, and in the
salving of which the Mary Rebecca had taken part.
Crawling carefully along the deck, the two sailors, Ole, and myself
got the heavy plate on deck and aft, where we reared it as a shield
between the wheel and the fishermen. The bullets whanged and
banged against it till it rang like a bull’s-eye, but Charley
grinned in its shelter, and coolly went on steering.
So we raced along, behind us a howling, screaming bedlam of
wrathful Greeks, Collinsville ahead, and bullets spat-spatting all
around us.
“Ole,” Charley said in a faint voice, “I don’t know what we’re
going to do.”
Ole Ericsen, lying on his back close to the rail and grinning
upward at the sky, turned over on his side and looked at him. “Ay
tank we go into Collinsville yust der same,” he said.
“But we can’t stop,” Charley groaned. “I never thought of it, but
we can’t stop.”
A look of consternation slowly overspread Ole Ericsen’s broad face.
It was only too true. We had a hornet’s nest on our hands, and to
stop at Collinsville would be to have it about our ears.
“Every man Jack of them has a gun,” one of the sailors remarked
cheerfully.
“Yes, and a knife, too,” the other sailor added.
It was Ole Ericsen’s turn to groan. “What for a Svaidish faller
like me monkey with none of my biziness, I don’t know,” he
soliloquized.
TALES OF THE FISH PATROL
51
A bullet glanced on the stern and sang off to starboard like a
spiteful bee. “There’s nothing to do but plump the Mary Rebecca
ashore and run for it,” was the verdict of the first cheerful
sailor.
“And leaf der Mary Rebecca?” Ole demanded, with unspeakable horror
in his voice.
“Not unless you want to,” was the response. “But I don’t want to
be within a thousand miles of her when those fellers come aboard” –
indicating the bedlam of excited Greeks towing behind.
We were right in at Collinsville then, and went foaming by within
biscuit-toss of the wharf.
“I only hope the wind holds out,” Charley said, stealing a glance
at our prisoners.
“What of der wind?” Ole demanded disconsolately. “Der river will
not hold out, and then . . . and then . . .”
“It’s head for tall timber, and the Greeks take the hindermost,”
adjudged the cheerful sailor, while Ole was stuttering over what
would happen when we came to the end of the river.
We had now reached a dividing of the ways. To the left was the
mouth of the Sacramento River, to the right the mouth of the San
Joaquin. The cheerful sailor crept forward and jibed over the
foresail as Charley put the helm to starboard and we swerved to the
right into the San Joaquin. The wind, from which we had been
running away on an even keel, now caught us on our beam, and the
Mary Rebecca was pressed down on her port side as if she were about
to capsize.
Still we dashed on, and still the fishermen dashed on behind. The
value of their nets was greater than the fines they would have to
pay for violating the fish laws; so to cast off from their nets and
escape, which they could easily do, would profit them nothing.
Further, they remained by their nets instinctively, as a sailor
remains by his ship. And still further, the desire for vengeance
was roused, and we could depend upon it that they would follow us
to the ends of the earth, if we undertook to tow them that far.
The rifle-firing had ceased, and we looked astern to see what our
prisoners were doing. The boats were strung along at unequal
distances apart, and we saw the four nearest ones bunching
TALES OF THE FISH PATROL
52
together. This was done by the boat ahead trailing a small rope
astern to the one behind. When this was caught, they would cast
off from their net and heave in on the line till they were brought
up to the boat in front. So great was the speed at which we were
travelling, however, that this was very slow work. Sometimes the
men would strain to their utmost and fail to get in an inch of the
rope; at other times they came ahead more rapidly.
When the four boats were near enough together for a man to pass
from one to another, one Greek from each of three got into the
nearest boat to us, taking his rifle with him. This made five in
the foremost boat, and it was plain that their intention was to
board us. This they undertook to do, by main strength and sweat,
running hand over hand the float-line of a net. And though it was
slow, and they stopped frequently to rest, they gradually drew
nearer.
Charley smiled at their efforts, and said, “Give her the topsail,
Ole.”
The cap at the mainmast head was broken out, and sheet and downhaul
pulled flat, amid a scattering rifle fire from the boats; and the
Mary Rebecca lay over and sprang ahead faster than ever.
But the Greeks were undaunted. Unable, at the increased speed, to
draw themselves nearer by means of their hands, they rigged from
the blocks of their boat sail what sailors call a “watch-tackle.”
One of them, held by the legs by his mates, would lean far over the
bow and make the tackle fast to the float-line. Then they would
heave in on the tackle till the blocks were together, when the
manoeuvre would be repeated.
“Have to give her the staysail,” Charley said.
Ole Ericsen looked at the straining Mary Rebecca and shook his
head. “It will take der masts out of her,” he said.
“And we’ll be taken out of her if you don’t,” Charley replied.
Ole shot an anxious glance at his masts, another at the boat load
of armed Greeks, and consented.
The five men were in the bow of the boat – a bad place when a craft
is towing. I was watching the behavior of their boat as the great
fisherman’s staysail, far, far larger than the top-sail and used
only in light breezes, was broken out. As the Mary Rebecca lurched
TALES OF THE FISH PATROL
53
forward with a tremendous jerk, the nose of the boat ducked down
into the water, and the men tumbled over one another in a wild rush
into the stern to save the boat from being dragged sheer under
water.
“That settles them!” Charley remarked, though he was anxiously
studying the behavior of the Mary Rebecca, which was being driven
under far more canvas than she was rightly able to carry.
“Next stop is Antioch!” announced the cheerful sailor, after the
manner of a railway conductor. “And next comes Merryweather!”
“Come here, quick,” Charley said to me.
I crawled across the deck and stood upright beside him in the
shelter of the sheet steel.
“Feel in my inside pocket,” he commanded, “and get my notebook.
That’s right. Tear out a blank page and write what I tell you.”
And this is what I wrote:
Telephone to Merryweather, to the sheriff, the constable, or the
judge. Tell them we are coming and to turn out the town. Arm
everybody. Have them down on the wharf to meet us or we are gone
gooses.
Now make it good and fast to that marlin-spike, and stand by to
toss it ashore.”
I did as he directed. By then we were close to Antioch. The wind
was shouting through our rigging, the Mary Rebecca was half over on
her side and rushing ahead like an ocean greyhound. The seafaring
folk of Antioch had seen us breaking out topsail and staysail, a