Not till two hours later did he awake and start to go on deck. Half-way up the companion, he deposited Jerry on deck and went back to the stateroom for a forgotten bottle of quinine. But he did not immediately return to Jerry. The long drawer under Borckman’s bunk8 caught his eye. The wooden button that held it shut was gone, and it was far out and hanging at an angle that jammed it and prevented it from falling to the floor. The matter was serious. There was little doubt in his mind, had the drawer, in the midst of the squall of the previous night, fallen to the floor, that no Arangi and no soul of the eighty souls on board would have been left. For the drawer was filled with a heterogeneous9 mess of dynamite10 sticks, boxes of fulminating caps, coils of fuses, lead sinkers, iron tools, and many boxes of rifle, revolver and pistol cartridges11. He sorted and arranged the varied12 contents, and with a screwdriver13 and a longer screw reattached the button.
In the meantime, Jerry was encountering new adventure not of the pleasantest. While waiting for Skipper to return, Jerry chanced to see the wild-dog brazenly14 lying on deck a dozen feet from his lair15 in the trade-boxes. Instantly stiffly crouching16, Jerry began to stalk. Success seemed assured, for the wild-dog, with closed eyes, was apparently17 asleep.
And at this moment the mate, two-legging it along the deck from for’ard in the direction of the bottle stored between the yam sacks, called, “Jerry,” in a remarkably18 husky voice. Jerry flattened19 his filbert-shaped ears and wagged his tail in acknowledgment, but advertised his intention of continuing to stalk his enemy. And at sound of the mate’s voice the wild-dog flung quick-opened eyes in Jerry’s direction and flashed into his burrow20, where he immediately turned around, thrust his head out with a show of teeth, and snarled21 triumphant22 defiance23.
Baulked of his quarry24 by the inconsiderateness of the mate, Jerry trotted25 back to the head of the companion to wait for Skipper. But Borckman, whose brain was well a-crawl by virtue26 of the many nips, clung to a petty idea after the fashion of drunken men. Twice again, imperatively27, he called Jerry to him, and twice again, with flattened ears of gentleness and wagging tail, Jerry good-naturedly expressed his disinclination. Next, he yearned28 his head over the coming and into the cabin after Skipper.
Borckman remembered his first idea and continued to the bottle, which he generously inverted29 skyward. But the second idea, petty as it was, persisted; and, after swaying and mumbling30 to himself for a time, after unseeingly making believe to study the crisp fresh breeze that filled the Arangi’s sails and slanted31 her deck, and, after sillily attempting on the helmsman to portray33 eagle-like vigilance in his drink-swimming eyes, he lurched amidships toward Jerry.
Jerry’s first intimation of Borckman’s arrival was a cruel and painful clutch on his flank and groin that made him cry out in pain and whirl around. Next, as the mate had seen Skipper do in play, Jerry had his jowls seized in a tooth-clattering shake that was absolutely different from the Skipper’s rough love-shake. His head and body were shaken, his teeth clattered34 painfully, and with the roughest of roughness he was flung part way down the slippery slope of deck.
Now Jerry was a gentleman. All the soul of courtesy was in him, for equals and superiors. After all, even in an inferior like the wild-dog, he did not consciously press an advantage very far—never extremely far. In his stalking and rushing of the wild-dog, he had been more sound and fury than an overbearing bully35. But with a superior, with a two-legged white-god like Borckman, there was more a demand upon his control, restraint, and inhibition of primitive36 promptings. He did not want to play with the mate a game that he ecstatically played with Skipper, because he had experienced no similar liking37 for the mate, two-legged white-god that he was.
And still Jerry was all gentleness. He came back in a feeble imitation rush of the whole-hearted rush that he had learned to make on Skipper. He was, in truth, acting38, play-acting, attempting to do what he had no heart-prompting to do. He made believe to play, and uttered simulated growls39 that failed of the verity40 of simulation.
He bobbed his tail good-naturedly and friendly, and growled41 ferociously42 and friendly; but the keenness of the drunkenness of the mate discerned the difference and aroused in him, vaguely43, the intuition of difference, of play-acting, of cheating. Jerry was cheating—out of his heart of consideration. Borckman drunkenly recognized the cheating without crediting the heart of good behind it. On the instant he was antagonistic44. Forgetting that he was only a brute45, he posited7 that this was no more than a brute with which he strove to play in the genial46 comradely way that the Skipper played.
Red war was inevitable—not first on Jerry’s part, but on Borckman’s part. Borckman felt the abysmal47 urgings of the beast, as a beast, to prove himself master of this four-legged beast. Jerry felt his jowl and jaw48 clutched still more harshly and hardly, and, with increase of harshness and hardness, he was flung farther down the deck, which, on account of its growing slant32 due to heavier gusts49 of wind, had become a steep and slippery hill.
He came back, clawing frantically50 up the slope that gave him little footing; and he came back, no longer with poorly attempted simulation of ferocity, but impelled51 by the first flickerings of real ferocity. He did not know this. If he thought at all, he was under the impression that he was playing the game as he had played it with Skipper. In short, he was taking an interest in the game, although a radically52 different interest from what he had taken with Skipper.
This time his teeth flashed quicker and with deeper intent at the jowl-clutching hand, and, missing, he was seized and flung down the smooth incline harder and farther than before. He was growing angry, as he clawed back, though he was not conscious of it. But the mate, being a man, albeit53 a drunken one, sensed the change in Jerry’s attack ere Jerry dreamed there was any change in it. And not only did Borckman sense it, but it served as a spur to drive him back into primitive beastliness, and to fight to master this puppy as a primitive man, under dissimilar provocation54, might have fought with the members of the first litter stolen from a wolf-den among the rocks.
True, Jerry could trace as far back. His ancient ancestors had been Irish wolf-hounds, and, long before that, the ancestors of the wolf-hounds had been wolves. The note in Jerry’s growls changed. The unforgotten and ineffaceable past strummed the fibres of his throat. His teeth flashed with fierce intent, in the desire of sinking as deep in the man’s hand as passion could drive. For Jerry by this time was all passion. He had leaped back into the dark stark55 rawness of the early world almost as swiftly as had Borckman. And this time his teeth scored, ripping the tender and sensitive and flesh of all the inside of the first and second joints56 of Borckman’s right hand. Jerry’s teeth were needles that stung, and Borckman, gaining the grasp on Jerry’s jaw, flung him away and down so that almost he hit the Arangi’s tiny-rail ere his clawing feet stopped him.
And Van Horn, having finished his rearrangement and repair of the explosive-filled drawer under the mate’s bunk, climbed up the companion steps, saw the battle, paused, and quietly looked on.
But he looked across a million years, at two mad creatures who had slipped the leach57 of the generations and who were back in the darkness of spawning58 life ere dawning intelligence had modified the chemistry of such life to softness of consideration. What stirred in the brain crypts of Borckman’s heredity, stirred in the brain-crypts of Jerry’s heredity. Time had gone backward for both. All the endeavour and achievement of the ten thousand generations was not, and, as wolf-dog and wild-man, the combat was between Jerry and the mate. Neither saw Van Horn, who was inside the companionway hatch, his eyes level with the combing.
To Jerry, Borckman was now no more a god than was he himself a mere59, smooth-coated Irish terrier. Both had forgotten the million years stamped into their heredity more feebly, less eraseably, than what had been stamped in prior to the million years. Jerry did not know drunkenness, but he did know unfairness; and it was with raging indignation that he knew it. Borckman fumbled60 his next counter to Jerry’s attack, missed, and had both hands slashed61 in quick succession ere he managed to send the puppy sliding.
And still Jerry came back. As any screaming creature of the jungle, he hysterically62 squalled his indignation. But he made no whimper. Nor did he wince63 or cringe to the blows. He bored straight in, striving, without avoiding a blow, to beat and meet the blow with his teeth. So hard was he flung down the last time that his side smashed painfully against the rail, and Van Horn cried out:
“Cut that out, Borckman! Leave the puppy alone!”
The mate turned in the startle of surprise at being observed. The sharp, authoritative64 words of Van Horn were a call across the million years. Borckman’s anger-convulsed face ludicrously attempted a sheepish, deprecating grin, and he was just mumbling, “We was only playing,” when Jerry arrived back, leaped in the air, and sank his teeth into the offending hand.
Borckman immediately and insanely went back across the million years. An attempted kick got his ankle scored for his pains. He gibbered his own rage and hurt, and, stooping, dealt Jerry a tremendous blow alongside the head and neck. Being in mid-leap when he received the blow Jerry was twistingly somersaulted sidewise before he struck the deck on his back. As swiftly as he could scramble65 to footing and charge, he returned to the attack, but was checked by Skipper’s:
“Jerry! Stop it! Come here!”
He obeyed, but only by prodigious66 effort, his neck bristling67 and his lips writhing68 clear of his teeth as he passed the mate. For the first time there was a whimper in his throat; but it was not the whimper of fear, nor of pain, but of outrage69, and of desire to continue the battle which he struggled to control at Skipper’s behest.
Stepping out on deck, Skipper picked him up and patted and soothed70 him the while he expressed his mind to the mate.
“Borckman, you ought to be ashamed. You ought to be shot or have your block knocked off for this. A puppy, a little puppy scarcely weaned. For two cents I’d give you what-for myself. The idea of it. A little puppy, a weanling little puppy. Glad your hands are ripped. You deserved it. Hope you get blood-poisoning in them. Besides, you’re drunk. Go below and turn in, and don’t you dare come on deck until you’re sober. Savve?”
And Jerry, far-journeyer across life and across the history of all life that goes to make the world, strugglingly mastering the abysmal slime of the prehistoric71 with the love that had come into existence and had become warp72 and woof of him in far later time, his wrath73 of ancientness still faintly reverberating74 in his throat like the rumblings of a passing thunder-storm, knew, in the wide warm ways of feeling, the augustness and righteousness of Skipper. Skipper was in truth a god who did right, who was fair, who protected, and who imperiously commanded this other and lesser75 god that slunk away before his anger.
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1
culminated
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| v.达到极点( culminate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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profusion
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| n.挥霍；丰富 | |
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malarial
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| 患疟疾的，毒气的 | |
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delirium
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| n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
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ebbed
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| （指潮水）退( ebb的过去式和过去分词 )； 落； 减少； 衰落 | |
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refreshing
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| adj.使精神振作的，使人清爽的，使人喜欢的 | |
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7
posited
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| v.假定，设想，假设( posit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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8
bunk
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| n.(车、船等倚壁而设的)铺位；废话 | |
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heterogeneous
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| adj.庞杂的；异类的 | |
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dynamite
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| n./vt.(用)炸药(爆破) | |
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11
cartridges
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| 子弹( cartridge的名词复数 )； （打印机的）墨盒； 录音带盒； （唱机的）唱头 | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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screwdriver
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| n.螺丝起子；伏特加橙汁鸡尾酒 | |
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14
brazenly
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| adv.厚颜无耻地；厚脸皮地肆无忌惮地 | |
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lair
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| n.野兽的巢穴；躲藏处 | |
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16
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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17
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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18
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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19
flattened
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| [医]（水）平扁的，弄平的 | |
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20
burrow
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| vt.挖掘(洞穴)；钻进；vi.挖洞；翻寻；n.地洞 | |
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21
snarled
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| v.（指狗）吠，嗥叫， （人）咆哮( snarl的过去式和过去分词 )；咆哮着说，厉声地说 | |
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22
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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23
defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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24
quarry
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| n.采石场；v.采石；费力地找 | |
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25
trotted
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| 小跑，急走( trot的过去分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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26
virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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imperatively
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| adv.命令式地 | |
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yearned
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| 渴望，切盼，向往( yearn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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inverted
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| adj.反向的，倒转的v.使倒置，使反转( invert的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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30
mumbling
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| 含糊地说某事，叽咕，咕哝( mumble的现在分词 ) | |
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31
slanted
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| 有偏见的； 倾斜的 | |
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slant
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| v.倾斜，倾向性地编写或报道；n.斜面，倾向 | |
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portray
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| v.描写，描述；画(人物、景象等) | |
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clattered
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| 发出咔哒声（clatter的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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35
bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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36
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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39
growls
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的第三人称单数 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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40
verity
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| n.真实性 | |
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41
growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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42
ferociously
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| 野蛮地，残忍地 | |
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43
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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44
antagonistic
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| adj.敌对的 | |
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45
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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46
genial
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| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
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47
abysmal
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| adj.无底的，深不可测的，极深的；糟透的，极坏的；完全的 | |
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48
jaw
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| n.颚，颌，说教，流言蜚语；v.喋喋不休，教训 | |
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49
gusts
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| 一阵强风( gust的名词复数 )； （怒、笑等的）爆发； （感情的）迸发； 发作 | |
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50
frantically
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| ad.发狂地, 发疯地 | |
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51
impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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52
radically
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| ad.根本地，本质地 | |
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53
albeit
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| conj.即使；纵使；虽然 | |
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54
provocation
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| n.激怒，刺激，挑拨，挑衅的事物，激怒的原因 | |
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55
stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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56
joints
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| 接头( joint的名词复数 )； 关节； 公共场所（尤指价格低廉的饮食和娱乐场所） （非正式）； 一块烤肉 （英式英语） | |
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57
leach
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| v.分离，过滤掉；n.过滤；过滤器 | |
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58
spawning
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| 产卵 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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60
fumbled
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| （笨拙地）摸索或处理（某事物）( fumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 乱摸，笨拙地弄； 使落下 | |
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61
slashed
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| v.挥砍( slash的过去式和过去分词 )；鞭打；割破；削减 | |
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62
hysterically
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| ad. 歇斯底里地 | |
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63
wince
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| n.畏缩，退避，（因痛苦，苦恼等)面部肌肉抽动；v.畏缩，退缩，退避 | |
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64
authoritative
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| adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的 | |
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65
scramble
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| v.爬行，攀爬，杂乱蔓延，碎片，片段，废料 | |
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66
prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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67
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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68
writhing
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| （因极度痛苦而）扭动或翻滚( writhe的现在分词 ) | |
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69
outrage
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| n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒 | |
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70
soothed
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| v.安慰( soothe的过去式和过去分词 )；抚慰；使舒服；减轻痛苦 | |
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71
prehistoric
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| adj.（有记载的）历史以前的，史前的，古老的 | |
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72
warp
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| vt.弄歪，使翘曲，使不正常，歪曲，使有偏见 | |
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73
wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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74
reverberating
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| 回响，回荡( reverberate的现在分词 )； 使反响，使回荡，使反射 | |
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75
lesser
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| adj.次要的，较小的；adv.较小地，较少地 | |
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