The day was near dusk. Bill had spent all day learning the ropes of sailing. Working as a deck hand wasn’t his first choice but he wanted to get to that island and this was a way he could pay his fair.
Henry, also had places to go and he too took aboard the ship. He and Bill worked.
The third week out the winds began to blow. As the storm grew the boat shook and turned.
Suddenly a large crack rang through the air. The lightning had shot across the bow.
The passengers ran out to the deck and saw the captain rushing back and forth. Out of the the corner of the eye a wave crashed across the deck pushing the captain out to sea.
The next morning the passengers assembled together.
Milford spoke up, “With the captain gone the next in command is William.”
William looked surprised. As sure as his surprise faded a look of smugness crossed his face.
“Of course I should be captain.”, he thought.
After settling in to the captains quarters a knock came to the door.
“I need to speak to you.” Henry said.
“There’s a leak in the cargo hold.”
Bill didn’t like this.
“Well go fix it!” Bill bellowed.
“We need to use the clay.”
“You can’t use that. It’s going to be delivered and as the new captain I’ll get a commission.”
“If we don’t fill that leak we won’t make it.”
Bill got upset. He didn’t like hearing that anything would take his profits.
“Look, it won’t take much.”
Bills annoyance turned into hostility.
“I don’t want to hear it! Get out of here!”
“We’ll be flooded in a few days.”
“SHUT UP!” Bill said, knowing that he planned to take the emergency boat if anything happened.
“There’s no leak!”
Henry, left perplexed. A few hours later Milfred stood next Henry.
The sky was clear and the ocean was as far as the eye could see.
“What did cap’n say?”
“About?”
“You know what…”
“You saw it too?”
“It’s hard to miss. I’ve been on this ship 20 years. Sometimes there’s some water in cargo hold but not this much and it’s growing.”
Henry look over at Milfred.
“Captain won’t hear of it.”
“I’ll give it”, he said.
A few minutes later shouting could be heard,
“EVERYTHING IS FINE! THERE’S NO PROBLEM! GET OUT! GET OUT!”
A woman approached the two.
“I couldn’t help but overhearing. I do some work with primitive apes.”
“Oh?”
“Well, often they don’t know how to respond to bad news. They throw their temper and go ape shit. But we’ve made some break throughs. We’re teaching them to use their words.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, instead of saying, “SHUT UP!” or “STOP COMPLAINING” we’re teaching them to say what they feel and talk through the issues using the sign language they’ve learned.”
“Fascinating. Do you think it will work with Bill?”
