CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN – MORE BAD OMENS

That evening, Osbourn Stanley finishes work at the Thompson Lumber Company and walks along the dock towards the ship. The air now is dead calm, so calm in fact, that there's not a ripple in the water in the harbor; a strange contrast to what it has been just a few hours or so earlier. As he approaches the dock, he meets Hogie Hoganson coming down the gangplank for another tree to carry on board.
   "Well, if it isn't the old pirate slayer himself," jokes Osbourn. "It sure calmed down quick out here, eh?"
   "Yeah, too calm."
   Osbourn looks at him in surprise.
   "Too calm, too quick. It's a bad sign," Hogie replies." I don't like it." Hogie grabs another tree and throws it over his shoulder. "Captain Schuenemann and Captain Nelson are on board. They've decided to set sail in the morning."
   "Oh?" says Osbourn, with a bit of surprise. "I thought he was going to wait for that load of trees from the Sault that Peter Anderson's bringing down." Osbourn joins Hogie and grabs a tree, throwing it over his shoulder.
   "I think the captain's worried about weight. The freezing rain the last couple of days has added a lot more weight to our deck load, so we're already overweight, and unless we get some real warm weather in the next day or so, we'll already be sailing overweight."
   "Yeah, I suppose he would know," says Osbourn, following Hogie up the gangplank of the ship. The calm is so still now that it seems almost eerie as the two men climb the gangplank.
   Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, Osbourn looks up and points toward the back of the ship. "Look, rats!" he yells, pointing with his left hand. "Rats, climbing down that dock line." He points them out to Hogie.
   Sure enough, two rats climb along together down the dock line from the ship to the dock. Reaching the dock, the rats quickly scamper off into some nearby stacks of lumber.
   "Rats leave a sinking ship."
   "What's that you say?" asks Osbourn.
   Hogie looks back at Osbourn then repeats it with a hysterical look. "Rats leave a sinking ship. All the sailors will tell you that. It's a sign not to take this voyage! Mark my words, if she sets sail tomorrow, it will be her last."
   The other sailors gather around as they raise their voices.
   "What's the matter?" they ask.
   "We just saw rats leaving the ship. It's a bad omen, I tell you," Hogie shouts.
   "You don't really believe all that, do you?" says Osbourn, trying to make light of the incident. "I've heard that before, too, but how's a rat going to know if a ship is going to sink? They probably get on and off of ships all of the time."
   "Maybe so," Hogie replies, "But somehow they know. I don't like it, I tell ya," he says emphatically. "I don't like it at all!"
   A couple of the other men on deck stop what they're doing and listen to Osbourn and the others. Osbourn tries to downplay the incident, in order to calm Hogie's fears. But Hogie continues more vehemently.
   "You saw it with your own eyes, and ye can't deny it," he says, looking at Osbourn.
   "That's true, but the more you believe in that superstition, the more it comes true. I suppose every time you see a black cat cross your path, you get all worried about that, too!"
   "No, but I don't like it. Rats leave a sinking ship," he says again.
   "Ah, it's just one of your sailors' superstitions," the others mock. "Don't let it spoil your trip."
   "We've got two of the best captains on the lake on his boat. They're not going to let us down," says Andrew.
   "There's a lot of good captains that put business ahead of right and wrong, and we all know it. The captain has gotten himself out on a limb. He's spent so much money in these trees that he'll be in debt up to his eyeballs the rest of his life if he doesn't get them to Chicago in time."
   "He's got all this money invested in trees, and has hardly spent a dime on this ship! He hasn't had her caulked in ages, and her canvas looks like an old patchwork quilt! One good blow and who knows what could happen. You can say what you want about rats and superstition, but I say the rats have more common sense than we do! Yer the ones believing superstition and fairy tales, I tell you. Just because we're carrying a load of Christmas trees for the good girls and boys in Chicago, we all think the story is supposed to have a happy ending. You're all living in a fantasyland, but the reality is there's not always a happy ending. Just ask the captain's brother, August. He'll tell ya. This ain't no fairy tale, and Captain Schuenemann ain't no Santa Claus." With that, Hogie throws down his Christmas tree onto the deck of the ship and walks off the ship. Two other sailors follow him off the ship down onto the dock. Captain Schuenemann and the others stand there staring at one another in silent disbelief.