Chương Chương 16 · 第16章

After the mysterious interview in the fore-chains, the one so abruptly

ended there by Billy, nothing especially germane to the story occurred

until the events now about to be narrated.

Elsewhere it has been said that owing to the lack of frigates (of course

better sailers than line-of-battle ships) in the English squadron up the

Straits at that period, the _Indomitable_[2] seventy-four was

occasionally employed not only as an available substitute for a scout,

but at times on detached service of more important kind. This was not

alone because of her sailing qualities, not common in a ship of her

rate, but quite as much probably, that the character of her commander,

it was thought, specially adapted him for any duty where under

unforeseen difficulties a prompt initiative might have to be taken in

some matter demanding knowledge and ability in addition to those

qualities employed in good seamanship. It was on an expedition of the

latter sort, a somewhat distant one, and when the _Indomitable_[2] was

almost at her furthest remove from the fleet, that in the latter part of

an afternoon-watch she unexpectedly came in sight of a ship of the

enemy. It proved to be a frigate. The latter, perceiving through the

glass that the weight of men and metal would be heavily against her,

invoking her light heels, crowded sail to get away. After a chase urged

almost against hope, and lasting until about the middle of the first

dog-watch, she signally succeeded in effecting her escape.

Not long after the pursuit had been given up, and ere the excitement

incident thereto had altogether waned away, the master-at-arms,

ascending from his cavernous sphere, made his appearance cap in hand by

the mainmast, respectfully waiting the notice of Captain Vere, then

solitary walking the weather-side of the quarter-deck, doubtless

somewhat chafed at the failure of the pursuit. The spot where Claggart

stood was the place allotted to men of lesser grades seeking some more

particular interview either with the officer of the deck or the captain

himself. But from the latter it was not often that a sailor or petty

officer of those days would seek a hearing; only some exceptional cause

would, according to established custom, have warranted that.

Presently, just as the commander, absorbed in his reflections, was on

the point of turning aft in his promenade, he became sensible of

Claggart’s presence, and saw the doffed cap held in deferential

expectancy. Here be it said that Captain Vere’s personal knowledge of

this petty officer had only begun at the time of the ship’s last sailing

from home, Claggart then for the first, in transfer from a ship detained

for repairs, supplying on board the _Indomitable_[3] the place of a

previous master-at-arms disabled and ashore.

No sooner did the commander observe who it was that now so deferentially

stood awaiting his notice, than a peculiar expression came over his

face. It was not unlike that which uncontrollably will flit across the

countenance of one at unawares encountering a person who though known to

him indeed has hardly been long enough known for thorough knowledge, but

something in whose aspect nevertheless now for the first provokes a

vaguely repellent distaste. But coming to a stand, and resuming much of

his wonted official manner, save that a sort of impatience lurked in the

intonation of the opening word, he said, ‘Well, what is it,

master-at-arms?’

With the air of a subordinate grieved at the necessity of being a

messenger of ill-tidings, and while conscientiously determined to be

frank, yet equally resolved upon shunning overstatement, Claggart at

this invitation, or rather summons to disburthen, spoke up. What he

said, conveyed in the language of no uneducated man, was to the effect

following, if not altogether in these words, namely: That during the

chase and preparations for the possible encounter he had seen enough to

convince him that at least one sailor aboard was a dangerous character

in a ship mustering some who not only had taken a guilty part in the

late serious trouble, but others also who, like the man in question, had

entered His Majesty’s service under another form than enlistment.

At this point Captain Vere with some impatience interrupted him:

‘Be direct, man; say impressed men.’

Claggart made a gesture of subservience and proceeded. Quite lately he

(Claggart) had begun to suspect that some sort of movement prompted by

the sailor in question was covertly going on, but he had not thought

himself warranted in reporting the suspicion so long as it remained

indistinct. But from what he had that afternoon observed in the man

referred to, the suspicion of something clandestine going on had

advanced to a point less removed from certainty. He deeply felt, he

added, the serious responsibility assumed in making a report involving

such possible consequences to the individual mainly concerned, besides

tending to augment those natural anxieties which every naval commander

must feel in view of extraordinary outbreaks so recent as those which,

he sorrowfully said it, it needed not to name.

Now at the first broaching of the matter Captain Vere, taken by

surprise, could not wholly dissemble his disquietude, but as Claggart

went on, the former’s aspect changed into restiveness under something in

the testifier’s manner in giving his testimony. However, he refrained

from interrupting him. And Claggart, continuing, concluded with this:

‘God forbid, your honour, that the _Indomitable’s_[4] should be the

experience of the----’

‘Never mind that!’ here peremptorily broke in the superior, his face

altering with anger instantly, divining the ship that the other was

about to name, one in which the Nore Mutiny had assumed a singularly

tragical character that for a time jeopardised the life of its

commander. Under the circumstances he was indignant at the purposed

allusion. When the commissioned officers themselves were on all

occasions very heedful how they referred to the recent event, for a

petty officer unnecessarily to allude to it in the presence of his

captain, this struck him as a most immodest presumption. Besides, to his

quick sense of self-respect, it even looked under the circumstances

something like an attempt to alarm him. Nor at that was he without some

surprise that one who so far as he had hitherto come under his notice

had shown considerable tact in his function, should in this particular

evince such lack of it.

But these thoughts and kindred dubious ones flitting across his mind

were suddenly replaced by an intuitional surmise, which though as yet

obscure in form, served practically to affect his reception of the ill

tidings. Certain it is, that long versed in everything pertaining to the

complicated gun-deck life, which like every other form of life has its

secret mines and dubious side, the side popularly disclaimed, Captain

Vere did not permit himself to be unduly disturbed by the general tenor

of his subordinate’s report. Furthermore, if in view of recent events

prompt action should be taken at the first palpable sign of recurring

insubordination, for all that, not judicious would it be, he thought, to

keep the idea of lingering disaffection alive by undue forwardness in

crediting an informer, even if his own subordinate, and charged among

other honours with police surveillance of the crew. This feeling would

not perhaps have so prevailed with him were it not that upon a prior

occasion the patriotic zeal officially evinced by Claggart had somewhat

irritated him as appearing rather supersensitive and strained.

Furthermore, something even in the official’s self-possessed and

somewhat ostentatious manner in making his specifications strangely

reminded him of a bandsman, a perjured witness in a capital case before

a court-martial ashore of which when a lieutenant he, Captain Vere, had

been a member.

Now the peremptory check given to Claggart in the matter of the arrested

allusion was quickly followed up by this: ‘You say that there is at

least one dangerous man aboard. Name him.’

‘William Budd, a foretopman, your honour.’

‘William Budd!’ repeated Captain Vere with unfeigned astonishment; ‘and

mean you the man that Lieutenant Ratcliffe took from the merchantman not

very long ago--the young fellow who seems to be so popular with the

men--Billy, the Handsome Sailor, as they call him?’

‘The same, your honour; but for all his youth and good looks, a deep

one. Not for nothing does he insinuate himself into the good-will of his

shipmates, since at the least they will at a pinch say a good word for

him at all hazards. Did Lieutenant Ratcliffe happen to tell your honour

of that adroit fling of Budd’s jumping up in the cutter’s bow under the

merchantman’s stern when he was being taken off? That sort of

good-humoured air even masks that at heart he resents his impressment.

You have but noted his fair cheek. A man-trap may be under his

ruddy-tipped daisies.’

Now the _Handsome Sailor_ as a signal figure among the crew had

naturally enough attracted the captain’s attention from the first.

Though in general not very demonstrative to his officers, he had

congratulated Lieutenant Ratcliffe upon his good fortune in lighting on

such a fine specimen of the _genus homo_, who in the nude might have

passed for a statue of young Adam before the Fall.

As to Billy’s adieu to the ship _Rights-of-Man_, which the boarding

lieutenant, in a deferential way, had indeed reported to him, Captain

Vere, more as a good story than aught else (having mistakenly understood

it as a satiric sally), had but thought so much the better of the

impressed man for it; as a military sailor, admiring the spirit that

could take an arbitrary enlistment so merrily and sensibly. The

foretopman’s conduct, too, so far as it had fallen under the captain’s

notice, had confirmed the first happy augury, while the new recruit’s

qualities as a _sailor-man_ seemed to be such that he had thought of

recommending him to the executive officer for promotion to a place that

would more frequently bring him under his own observation, namely, the

captaincy of the mizen-top, replacing there in the starboard-watch a man

not so young whom partly for that reason he deemed less fitted for the

post. Be it parenthesised here that since the mizen-topmen have not to

handle such breadths of heavy canvas as the lower sails on the mainmast

and foremast, a young man if of the right stuff not only seems best

adapted to duty there, but, in fact, is generally selected for the

captaincy of that top, and the company under him are light hands, and

often but striplings. In sum, Captain Vere had from the beginning deemed

Billy Budd to be what in the naval parlance of the time was called a

‘_King’s bargain_,’ that is to say, for His Britannic Majesty’s Navy a

capital investment at small outlay or none at all.

After a brief pause, during which the reminiscences above mentioned

passed vividly through his mind, he weighed the import of Claggart’s

last suggestion conveyed in the phrase ‘a man-trap under his

ruddy-tipped daisies,’ and the more he weighed it the less reliance he

felt in the informer’s good faith. Suddenly he turned upon him: ‘Do you

come to me, master-at-arms, with so foggy a tale? As to Budd, cite me an

act or spoken word of his confirmatory of what you in general charge

against him. Stay,’ drawing nearer to him, ‘heed what you speak. Just

now and in a case like this, there is a yard-arm-end for the false

witness.’

‘Ah, your honour!’ sighed Claggart, mildly shaking his shapely head as

in sad deprecation of such unmerited severity of tone. Then

bridling--erecting himself as in virtuous self-assertion, he

circumstantially alleged certain words and acts which collectively, if

credited, led to presumptions mortally inculpating Budd, and for some of

these averments, he added, substantiating proof was not far.

With gray eyes impatient and distrustful, essaying to fathom to the

bottom Claggart’s calm violet ones, Captain Vere again heard him out;

then for the moment stood ruminating. The mood he evinced,

Claggart--himself for the time liberated from the other’s

scrutiny--steadily regarded with a look difficult to render--a look

curious of the operation of his tactics, a look such as might have been

that of the spokesman of the envious children of Jacob deceptively

imposing upon the troubled patriarch the blood-dyed coat of young

Joseph.

Though something exceptional in the moral quality of Captain Vere made

him, in earnest encounter with a fellow-man, a veritable touchstone of

that man’s essential nature, yet now as to Claggart and what was really

going on in him, his feeling partook less of intuitional conviction than

of strong suspicion clogged by strange dubieties. The perplexity he

evinced proceeded less from aught touching the man informed against--as

Claggart doubtless opined--than from considerations how best to act in

regard to the informer. At first, indeed, he was naturally for summoning

that substantiation of his allegations which Claggart said was at hand.

But such a proceeding would result in the matter at once getting abroad,

which in the present stage of it, he thought, might undesirably affect

the ship’s company. If Claggart was a false witness--that closed the

affair. And therefore, before trying the accusation, he would first

practically test the accuser; and he thought this could be done in a

quiet undemonstrative way.

The measure he determined upon involved a shifting of the scene, a

transfer to a place less exposed to observation than the broad

quarter-deck. For although the few gun-room officers there at the time

had, in due observance of naval etiquette, withdrawn to leeward the

moment Captain Vere had begun his promenade on the deck’s weather-side;

and though during the colloquy with Claggart they of course ventured not

to diminish the distance; and though throughout the interview Captain

Vere’s voice was far from high, and Claggart’s silvery and low; and the

wind in the cordage and the wash of the sea helped the more to put them

beyond ear-shot; nevertheless, the interview’s continuance already had

attracted observation from some topmen aloft, and other sailors in the

waist or farther forward.

Having determined upon his measures, Captain Vere forthwith took action.

Abruptly turning to Claggart he asked, ‘Master-at-arms, is it now Budd’s

watch aloft?’

‘No, your honour.’

Whereupon, ‘Mr. Wilkes,’ summoning the nearest midshipman, ‘tell Albert

to come to me.’ Albert was the captain’s hammock-boy, a sort of

sea-valet, in whose discretion and fidelity his master had much

confidence. The lad appeared. ‘You know Budd, the foretopman?’

‘I do, sir.’

‘Go find him. It is his watch off. Manage to tell him out of ear-shot

that he is wanted aft. Contrive it that he speaks to nobody. Keep him in

talk yourself. And not till you get well aft here, not till then, let

him know that the place where he is wanted is my cabin. You understand?

Go. Master-at-arms, show yourself on the decks below, and when you think

it time for Albert to be coming with his man, stand by quietly to follow

the sailor in.’

-----

Footnote 2:

In Melville’s MS. the vessel is on these occasions given the name

_Bellipotent_. See also pp. 64, 66, 109, 110.

Footnote 3:

Cf. p. 63 note.

Footnote 4:

Cf. p. 63 note.

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