XX

The captain invited Frederick to his cabin and asked him to write a few words in his album.  On the way, he showed him the chart-room and the wheel-house, where a sailor was turning the great wheel at the directions of the first mate, whose voice came from the bridge through a speaking-tube.  Frederick read the compass in front of the wheel and saw that the Roland lay west-southwest.  The captain was in hopes of striking better weather by taking a more southerly route.  The helmsman did not allow his attention to be diverted for the fraction of a second.  He kept his bronzed, weather-beaten face with its corn-coloured beard turned unwaveringly toward the compass, and his sea-blue eyes fastened upon the west-southwest line.  And the face of the compass, in its round copper case, notwithstanding the vessel’s elephantine leaps and bounds, never deviated from the horizontal.

When they reached his cabin, the handsome blond German, whose eyes came of the same stock as the mariner’s at the wheel, became more expansive.  He insisted on Frederick’s taking a comfortable seat and offered him a cigar.  He spoke of his own life.  Frederick learned that he was unmarried, had two unmarried sisters and a brother with a wife and children.  The pictures of his sisters, his brother, his brother’s wife, his brother’s children, and his parents were hung symmetrically on the wall over a red plush sofa.  They were sacred objects.

Frederick did not fail to ask his stereotyped question: 

“Do you follow your calling because you have a decided preference for it?”

“Tell me of a position on land where I could command the same salary, and I’d exchange without an instant’s hesitation.  Seafaring begins to lose its charms when a man gets on in years.”

The captain’s guttural voice was extremely agreeable.  It suggested to Frederick the sound of colliding billiard balls.  His enunciation was perfect, absolutely free of a dialectic tinge.

“My brother has a wife and children,” he said.  Though there was, of course, not the slightest trace of sentimentality in his tone, it was evident from the gleam in his eyes how he idolised his nieces and nephews.  He pointed out each one’s picture and at the end said frankly, “My brother is an enviable man.”  Then he asked Frederick whether he was the son of General von Kammacher.  He had taken part in the campaign of 1870 and 1871 as lieutenant of the regiment of artillery of which Frederick’s father had been chief.  He spoke of him with great admiration and reverence.