SOME years back I served as a policeman on a small island that shall remain nameless. I do that to protect the innocent, and to protect myself, innocent or not.
I recollect a time when I was engaged in a strategy of defeating the sun’s oppressive heat by defending myself in a beach bar with cold beer and an ancient electric fan. In walked a drunken ship captain, we could smell him long before we could see him, who was so soaked with water he could scarcely be wetter if he stood at the bottom of the sea.
“Why, it’s outrageous!” the old man shouted as if to warn everyone on the island of his predicament. “No one treats a captain like that! I demand justice!”
Curiosity got the better of me, and in spite of it being off duty, I invited the drunken sailor to sit down and explain his troubles in a volume such that I could enjoy but the rest of humanity would remain ignorant of his story. The only way to persuade him to speak at a sociable volume was to buy him a beer and gesture downward with a flat hand.
The captain went on to tell me how he was physically thrown overboard from his own ship by one of the engineers, William Clarence, a giant of a man with a furious temper to match. Yes, in gross disrespect to all the age-old manners and traditions of the sea, a common sailor had done violence to the captain and pitched him over. He demanded that I go the ship and arrest him.
Clearly, an offense had occurred. We could not leave a violent man free for fear he would hurt others, either on the vessel or, God forbid, on shore. It made no difference how large or how easily provoked he was, he must feel the firm hand of justice. I made plans to visit the ship in the morning with a fellow officer, and perhaps we would find safety in numbers, and if the angry giant did not respect his captain, he might respect the law, although I was skeptical.
Morning came, and we found the captain drunk and passed out behind the beach bar. Apparently, he had spent the night there among the trash cans and carried the smell to prove it. My colleague and I proceeded to the marina where we climbed into the police dinghy and paddled out to the ship.
When we arrived, who should be looking over the rail at us but William Clarence. He was every bit as large as the captain proposed. In my mind I figured the captain had exaggerated, but in fact, he did not do Clarence justice. Where the captain said he must be three hundred pounds, I suspected he was in the low two hundreds. Now that I saw him, he clearly threatened any scale that read up to five hundred pounds.
I steadied myself and tried to appear as policeman-like as I could and read the warrant for arrest.
“What, me? Under arrest for criminal assault?” He gave forth with a mighty laugh that would have burst the seams if it were a wooden boat. Luckily, we stood on steel. “Well, I don’t deny what I did to the captain, but you see, I had good reason to throw him overboard like I did.”
“And what reason was that?” I asked.
“Well,” and he looked around somewhat embarrassed as he explained, “well, he kicked my cat. He kicked him hard, nearly knocked the stuffing out of him, and there just isn’t any excuse to treat a small animal like that. So, it was either punch his lights out or throw him overboard. I chose the lesser of the two.”
I told him that he should explain it to the judge and perhaps he will be lenient.
“All right,” he said, “but how are you getting me to the courthouse? That puny boat of yours isn’t up to the challenge, not for all three of us.”
There was no doubt he was correct, but we set out anyway. About halfway to the shore, with nearly a thousand pounds in her, the little boat took on so much water that she sank right out from under us. Clarence grabbed both of us by our collars and swam for shore, and after we collected ourselves, he accompanied me to the courthouse.
There, before the judge, still soaking wet, Clarence pleaded his case. The captain had kicked hell out of the cat, so he threw him overboard. He was ready to take his punishment.
The judge asked if there were any witnesses willing to testify. Well, the captain was still passed out behind the beach bar and no other crew member was willing to testify against him, either for love of the cat or fear for their lives. Having saved me from drowning, I certainly was not going to testify against him. In the end, the judge dismissed the case for lack of evidence.
I wonder what happened to that old drunken captain.
BC Cook, PhD lived on Saipan and has taught history for 20 years. He currently resides on the mainland U.S.
BC Cook
