Risk and Reward Theme Analysis

He told her about the shilling he had found, and the good-luck spell. “It’s the best good-luck spell in the world. But I’ll have to do it tonight, sure, while there’s still a new moon.”

“What if you can’t see the new moon through your window?”

Nat shook his head. “That’s bad luck. I’ll have to wait till Hab is asleep, and then get downstairs in the dark, without knocking over anything, and come out here in the yard.”

Lizza’s eyes got big. “By yourself? Won’t you be afraid?”

“Not very much,” Nat said. “Anyway, I got to do it. Our luck’s just got to change. I heard Granny talking to Mother. She’s worried. She said if things don’t go better now, she didn’t know what we’d do.” Lizza shivered. Nat added quickly, “They will go better, Lizza! Honest they will! Soon as I work my good-luck spell!”

“I’d invest in a privateer. I’d buy an expectation from a sailor.”

“How do you buy an expectation?”

“An expectation is the money a sailor expects to make on the voyage of a privateer. You see, when we capture a British ship, we sell it. The owner of the privateer gets part of the money. The rest goes to the captain and crew. If you want to buy an expectation, you talk to a sailor about it. He’ll take your money. Then he’ll give you a slip of paper that says you’ll get part of what he makes on the voyage.”

“And will that be more money than you gave him?”

“Lots more.”

“Why will the sailor sell his expectation, when he would have more money if he didn’t?”

Father chuckled. “Here comes a sailor now. You might ask him.”

The big man took off his flat black hat and fished a paper from the crown. “Just got one left. For ten per cent of my expectations. What’ll you give me for it?”

“All my money!” Nat laid his shilling in the big man’s hand.

The big man stared at the shilling. “Well, I’ll be a copper-bottomed, bevel-edged…Most money you ever had, eh?”

“Yes, sir!”

“And you come from a long line of sea captains? Who are you?”

“Nat Bowditch.”

“Captain Bowditch’s boy, eh? I remember when the Polly went aground. Same day the war started. April 19, 1775.”

“Granny said it ‘took the tuck’ out of Father.” Nat told the big man about his good-luck spell that he was going to work, only the nor’easter came, and hid the moon.

The big man rubbed his bristling chin. He looked at the shilling. “It’s a bargain, Mate. But keep it a secret!

Ben yawned, stretched, and led the way through the shop to where huge coils of rope were stashed. He leaned against a barrel. “Nat Bowditch, eh? I’ve heard of you. Master Watson’s brightest student you were.” He shook his head dolefully. “And now you’re becalmed. Just like I was at your age. Wouldn’t think to look at me I was bright as a dollar once, would you? But I was. Wanted to make something of myself. But I didn’t have a chance. Taken out of school, I was. Just like you. When I look at you, I can see myself as I was thirty—forty years agon. Becalmed I was. Just like you.”

Behind Nat a deep voice rumbled, “Avast there, Ben Meeker! Stow that gab about being becalmed! […] Only a weakling gives up when he’s becalmed. A strong man sails by ash breeze!”

There was another world, too—the world of Salem. Every time Nat went on an errand he realized how Salem was growing. The men of Salem were proud of their town. Their “city,” they called it now. Here it was—only 1790—not even ten years since we’d won our independence—and Salem had doubled in size! Eight thousand people now! The people bragged of the growth of Salem, and of the daring of her sailors. Elias Hasket Derby’s ships were going farther and farther from their home port. As Nat shouldered his way through the crowded wharves he heard talk of Russia and France and Spain, of Bombay and Calcutta.

“I wonder,” Nat said, “why they call it a venture?”

Gibaut was still chuckling. “Because it is a venture—a risk. Any cargo is a risk. When we get to Bourbon, we may find people begging for our cargo and we may sell everything for three times what we paid for it. Or maybe when we get there, they won’t want anything we have. Maybe we’ll find there have been eight or ten ships there just ahead of us. Then we’ll lose our shirts. We never know.”

“I wouldn’t want to lose my whole hundred and thirty-five dollars. I wonder if there’s anything I could be sure I’d sell?”

“You can’t be sure of anything,” Gibaut said. “But ask Monsieur Bonnefoy about it. He ought to know. He comes from Bourbon. Fact is, he’s going home on the Henry.”

“He speaks for a lot of men, Polly. I’m not saying that there are many as mean-spirited as he is—thank heaven. But there are hundreds—thousands—who don’t believe in ‘book sailing.’ You know, seafaring is a lot like medicine. On the one hand—superstition and old wives’ tales; on the other hand—the scientist, trying to solve puzzles and find the answers. And all through the ages men have believed the superstitions and doubted the scientist. Natural, I suppose. You believe what you grow up believing. It’s hard to change.”

“You can’t remember, Polly, when we first started inoculating for smallpox.” He shook his head. “Wonder to me I wasn’t lynched. Inoculation was risky—but not as bad as the epidemics of the smallpox. Then vaccination came along. It was safer, but people raised almost as much fuss.”

Lem growled. “When did you last shoot the sun?”

“About three days ago.”

Lem gulped. “Three days? Seventy-two hours? And since then?”

“It’s simple mathematics, Lem. At such a speed, in so many hours, you log so many miles in a given direction. It’s—”

“Yeah,” Lem growled. “Seventy-two hours through the Roaring Forties. Seventy-two hours by dead reckoning, and then you enter Salem Harbor. Why, you…[…]” He slumped in a chair and stared at Nat.

Nat winked at Polly. “Have you any idea what’s the matter with him?”

Polly’s eyes danced. “He just doesn’t understand about you and mathematics, dear. Two plus two is four. It comes out right, doesn’t it?”