The Vanquished by Brian Garfield

The boat’s bottom struck a trough of water, jarring everyone loose, and Charley pitched down the steeply sloping floor until the bulkhead stopped him hard. When he looked back he saw an intertwined crawling mass that slowly took shape and became eyes and arms and legs. Out of that confusion stepped Norval Douglas. He braced himself against the wall by a porthole. The boat rolled over and the mass of bodies separated. Chuck Parker was still rooted by his hammock. His face was distorted with wrath; he bore down mightily upon the slight form of Samuel Kimmel, and then Kimmel pulled a pocket-pistol from somewhere and trained it uncertainly on Parker and shouted above the din of sea and storm: “You’ve got this coming to you, damn you!” Parker stopped in his tracks and Norval Douglas pushed forward, palming his own revolver. Once again the waves parted and the ship plunged downward, heeled over. Charley scratched for a grip. Dimly he heard the report of a gunshot, and when the boat slowly righted itself he saw Chuck Parker with one leg buckling under him, dropping to the deck. He lifted himself to one elbow and looked down and said, in a stupid voice, “You put a slug in my leg. What for?”
    Kimmel stumbled forward and knelt by him. His single fevered eye peeredat the injured leg. “Jesus. I didn’t really mean to pull the Goddamn trigger.”
    Parker’s sluggish features turned petulant. He glared at the black eyepatch. Kimmel said, “I’m sorry”—Charley saw his lips form the words. Norval Douglas was leaning down over Parker. Kimmel got up. “I’ll find Dr. Oxley. Stay put, Parker.”
    â€œI ain’t going anywhere,” Parker said. “You son of a bitch. I don’t even know you. What the hell did you do that for?”
    â€œYou cheated me in a card game,” Kimmel said, and the whole thing appeared silly to Charley.
    Men were getting sick all over the big cabin and the stench became bad. Kimmel disappeared, on the hunt for Oxley, the surgeon. Parker lay regarding his wounded leg with undiminished surprise. His lips worked together. Norval Douglas knelt to press a handkerchief against the wound and stem the bleeding. The smell of vomit in the room drove Charley to his feet. He put his coat on and went stumbling to the ladder, and climbed out of the cabin.
    Coming on deck, he stood aside to let the doctor rush past, and looked out upon a heavy ocean. The clumsy packet, bracing the wind, fell into a trough, and Charley fell across the deck against the railing. When he pulled himself up he saw a lantern break loose and fall flaming to the decks. The ship pitched over and the lamp rolled down the slanting deck to be lost in the sea. High spray extinguished the sparks left behind. A man, trying to tighten some ropes, rolled off balance and ran yelling down the ship. Doors slammed and cabins emptied their occupants into the night. The Sea Bird wheeled ponderously over onto a precarious keel, and a cargo hoist abruptly broke loose and dropped into the cabin wall. There was a high sound of crushing wood, and then while the captain and mates came out on deck to observe the damage, the ship went over once more and the hoist slid back, smashing through the starboard rail and rolling into the ocean, immediately disappearing in foam.
    The captain scaled the rigging and bawled, “Helmsman—helmsman—keep her into the wind, God damn it!” Figures came and went on the slippery deck. A freak turn of wind brought an unseen crewman’s voice to Charley’s ears: “Raise her up, now. Heave!” The ship bumped rock-hard water and the captain slipped from the rigging and landed hard on the tilted deck; he slid down the deck to the shattered cabin wall and pulled himself back from that and reeled toward the Texas ladder. When he came by, Charley heard him talking to himself in loud and angry terms: “I’ll keelhaul the man