Though the shellbacks and derelicts of those days congregated eagerly in that little parlour of his snug homestead, they trembled in their sea-boots when he roared at one hint of contradiction. Yet a kind word at the critical moment made those blue, steely eyes of his soften. He was the biggest bluffer I’ve ever met.
Benbow gave me twenty dollars to go to his place and play the fiddle, so I know all about his idiosyncrasies. I think I would have accepted the job if only for the fun of the entertainment. That old cottage fairly shook on those spree nights. Should one rash member of that convivial, unshaved troop express doubt of his host’s word, the great Tai-o-hae gathering became plunged into the deepest gloom.
It is recorded in the Tai-o-hae annals of beachcomberism how the great meeting of shellbacks at a certain date of the year had been suddenly dispersed in the very midst of a glorious beano. Like the voice of Doom, Benbow had yelled forth his fierce invectives. Men still live in those parts who can recall how the echoes of the night hills recorded, like some mighty gramophone, the voice of their exasperated host.
“Shiver me timbers! You doubt me? By God! Eh? You doubt me? You dare, you son of a b—— nigger!” Then would come the final crash, as, lifting old Lydia’s family heirloom—a war-club—he would strike the rim of the mighty keg of rum, the bung of the barrel of fiery liquor that had been specially broached to celebrate his return home. One more crash and the bung was driven into the head. Ere the awestruck, broken-hearted shellbacks rose and filed out into the homeless night, they would gaze pathetically in silent appeals. Benbow was relentless. Out into the night they would go, muttering deadly imprecations on the one who had doubted Benbow and so brought unutterable sorrow on their heads.
But often the winds of Fate blew fair, and the cottage in the hills trembled with ribald song, as, with his red, bushy beard shaking, Benbow sat enthroned in his old arm-chair. Behind him the old grandfather clock merrily ticked, as he yelled forth some chantey:
“Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest, Yo! ho! ho! for a bottle of rum!”
Then would come the chorus from a choir of wrinkled, pulsing, groggy throats as those ragged, sunburnt shellbacks clinked their rum mugs. Those derelicts would roar forth glorious toasts to the glory of the most highest—Benbow—as eyes looked into “eyes that spake again, and all went merry” in Tai-o-hae. Old Lydia steamed from head to feet as she shot to and fro replenishing the rum mugs. Father O’Leary would hear “the sounds of revelry by night” in the distance, lift his arms to the sky and say: “Oh, those white men!”