The Ghost Pirates

  VII

  _The Coming of the Mist and That Which It Ushered_

  We buried Williams at midday. Poor beggar! It had been so sudden. Allday the men were awed and gloomy, and there was a lot of talk aboutthere being a Jonah aboard. If they'd only known what Tammy and I, andperhaps the Second Mate, knew!

  And then the next thing came--the mist. I cannot remember now, whetherit was on the day we buried Williams that we first saw it, or the dayafter.

  When first I noticed it, like everybody else aboard, I took it to besome form of haze, due to the heat of the sun; for it was broad daylightwhen the thing came.

  The wind had died away to a light breeze, and I was working at the mainrigging, along with Plummer, putting on seizings.

  "Looks as if 'twere middlin' 'ot," he remarked.

  "Yes," I said; and, for the time, took no further notice.

  Presently he spoke again:

  "It's gettin' quite 'azy!" and his tone showed he was surprised.

  I glanced up, quickly. At first, I could see nothing. Then, I saw whathe meant. The air had a wavy, strange, unnatural appearance; somethinglike the heated air over the top of an engine's funnel, that you canoften see when no smoke is coming out.

  "Must be the heat," I said. "Though I don't remember ever seeinganything just like it before."

  "Nor me," Plummer agreed.

  It could not have been a minute later when I looked up again, and wasastonished to find that the whole ship was surrounded by a thinnish hazethat quite hid the horizon.

  "By Jove! Plummer," I said. "How queer!"

  "Yes," he said, looking round. "I never seen anythin' like it before--not in these parts."

  "Heat wouldn't do that!" I said.

  "N--no," he said, doubtfully.

  We went on with our work again--occasionally exchanging an odd word ortwo. Presently, after a little time of silence, I bent forward and askedhim to pass me up the spike. He stooped and picked it up from the deck,where it had tumbled. As he held it out to me, I saw the stolidexpression on his face, change suddenly to a look of complete surprise.He opened his mouth.

  "By gum!" he said. "It's gone."

  I turned quickly, and looked. And so it had--the whole sea showing clearand bright, right away to the horizon.

  I stared at Plummer, and he stared at me.

  "Well, I'm blowed!" he exclaimed.

  I do not think I made any reply; for I had a sudden, queer feeling thatthe thing was not right. And then, in a minute, I called myself an ass;but I could not really shake off the feeling. I had another good look atthe sea. I had a vague idea that something was different. The sea lookedbrighter, somehow, and the air clearer, I thought, and I missedsomething; but not much, you know. And it was not until a couple of dayslater, that I knew that it was several vessels on the horizon, which hadbeen quite in sight before the mist, and now were gone.

  During the rest of the watch, and indeed all day, there was no furthersign of anything unusual. Only, when the evening came (in the seconddog-watch it was) I saw the mist rise faintly--the setting sun shiningthrough it, dim and unreal.

  I knew then, as a certainty, that it was not caused by heat.

  And that was the beginning of it.

  The next day, I kept a pretty close watch, during all my time on deck;but the atmosphere remained clear. Yet, I heard from one of the chaps inthe Mate's watch, that it had been hazy during part of the time he wasat the wheel.

  "Comin' an' goin', like," he described it to me, when I questioned himabout it. He thought it might be heat.

  But though I knew otherwise, I did not contradict him. At that time, noone, not even Plummer, seemed to think very much of the matter. And whenI mentioned it to Tammy, and asked him whether he'd noticed it, he onlyremarked that it must have been heat, or else the sun drawing up water.I let it stay at that; for there was nothing to be gained by suggestingthat the thing had more to it.

  Then, on the following day, something happened that set me wonderingmore than ever, and showed me how right I had been in feeling the mistto be something unnatural. It was in this way.

  Five bells, in the eight to twelve morning watch, had gone. I was at thewheel. The sky was perfectly clear--not a cloud to be seen, even on thehorizon. It was hot, standing at the wheel; for there was scarcely anywind, and I was feeling drowsy. The Second Mate was down on the maindeckwith the men, seeing about some job he wanted done; so that I was on thepoop alone.

  Presently, with the heat, and the sun beating right down on to me, Igrew thirsty; and, for want of something better, I pulled out a bit ofplug I had on me, and bit off a chew; though, as a rule, it is not ahabit of mine. After a little, naturally enough, I glanced round for thespittoon; but discovered that it was not there. Probably it had beentaken forrard when the decks were washed, to give it a scrub. So, asthere was no one on the poop, I left the wheel, and stepped aft to thetaffrail. It was thus that I came to see something altogether unthoughtof--a full-rigged ship, close-hauled on the port tack, a few hundredyards on our starboard quarter. Her sails were scarcely filled by thelight breeze, and flapped as she lifted to the swell of the sea. Sheappeared to have very little way through the water, certainly not morethan a knot an hour. Away aft, hanging from the gaff-end, was a stringof flags. Evidently, she was signalling to us. All this, I saw in aflash, and I just stood and stared, astonished. I was astonished becauseI had not seen her earlier. In that light breeze, I knew that she musthave been in sight for at least a couple of hours. Yet I could think ofnothing rational to satisfy my wonder. There she was--of that much, Iwas certain. And yet, how had she come there without my seeing her,before?

  All at once, as I stood, staring, I heard the wheel behind me, spinrapidly. Instinctively, I jumped to get hold of the spokes; for I didnot want the steering gear jammed. Then I turned again to have anotherlook at the other ship; but, to my utter bewilderment, _there was nosign of her_--nothing but the calm ocean, spreading away to the distanthorizon. I blinked my eyelids a bit, and pushed the hair off myforehead. Then, I stared again; but there was no vestige of her--nothing, you know; and absolutely nothing unusual, except a faint,tremulous quiver in the air. And the blank surface of the sea reachingeverywhere to the empty horizon.

  Had she foundered? I asked myself, naturally enough; and, for themoment, I really wondered. I searched round the sea for wreckage; butthere was nothing, not even an odd hen-coop, or a piece of deckfurniture; and so I threw away that idea, as impossible.

  Then, as I stood, I got another thought, or, perhaps, an intuition and Iasked myself seriously whether this disappearing ship might not be insome way connected with the other queer things. It occurred to me then,that the vessel I had seen was nothing real, and, perhaps, did not existoutside of my own brain. I considered the idea, gravely. It helped toexplain the thing, and I could think of nothing else that would. Had shebeen real, I felt sure that others aboard us would have been bound tohave seen her long before I had--I got a bit muddled there, with tryingto think it out; and then, abruptly, the reality of the other ship, cameback to me--every rope and sail and spar, you know. And I remembered howshe had lifted to the heave of the sea, and how the sails had flapped inthe light breeze. And the string of flags! She had been signalling. Atthat last, I found it just as impossible to believe that she had notbeen real.

  I had reached to this point of irresolution, and was standing with myback, partly turned to the wheel. I was holding it steady with my lefthand, while I looked over the sea, to try to find something to help meto understand.

  All at once, as I stared, I seemed to see the ship again.

  She was more on the beam now, than on the quarter; but I thought littleof that, in the astonishment of seeing her once more. It was only aglimpse, I caught of her--dim and wavering, as though I looked at herthrough the convolutions of heated air. Then she grew indistinct, andvanished again; but I was convinced now that she was real, and had beenin sight all the time, if I could have seen her. That curious, dim,wavering appearance
had suggested something to me. I remembered thestrange, wavy look of the air, a few days previously, just before themist had surrounded the ship. And in my mind, I connected the two. Itwas nothing about the other packet that was strange. The strangeness waswith us. It was something that was about (or invested) our ship thatprevented me--or indeed, any one else aboard from seeing that other. Itwas evident that she had been able to see us, as was proved by hersignalling. In an irrelevant sort of way, I wondered what the peopleaboard of her thought of our apparently intentional disregard of theirsignals.

  After that, I thought of the strangeness of it all. Even at that minute,they could see us, plainly; and yet, so far as we were concerned, thewhole ocean seemed empty. It appeared to me, at that time, to be theweirdest thing that could happen to us.

  And then a fresh thought came to me. How long had we been like that? Ipuzzled for a few moments. It was now that I recollected that we hadsighted several vessels on the morning of the day when the mistappeared; and since then, we had seen nothing. This, to say the least,should have struck me as queer; for some of the other packets werehomeward bound along with us, and steering the same course.Consequently, with the weather being fine, and the wind next to nothing,they should have been in sight all the time. This reasoning seemed to meto show, unmistakably, some connection between the coming of the mist,and our inability to _see_. So that it is possible we had been in thatextraordinary state of blindness for nearly three days.

  In my mind, the last glimpse of that ship on the quarter, came back tome. And, I remember, a curious thought got me, that I had looked at herfrom out of some other dimension. For a while, you know, I reallybelieved the mystery of the idea, and that it might be the actual truth,took me; instead of my realising just all that it might mean. It seemedso exactly to express all the half-defined thoughts that had come, sinceseeing that other packet on the quarter.

  Suddenly, behind me, there came a rustle and rattle of the sails; and,in the same instant, I heard the Skipper saying:

  "Where the devil have you got her to, Jessop?"

  I whirled round to the wheel.

  "I don't know--Sir," I faltered.

  I had forgotten even that I was at the wheel.

  "Don't know!" he shouted. "I should damned well think you don't.Starboard your helm, you fool. You'll have us all aback!"

  "i, i, Sir," I answered, and hove the wheel over. I did it almostmechanically; for I was still dazed, and had not yet had time to collectmy senses.

  During the following half-minute, I was only conscious, in a confusedsort of way, that the Old Man was ranting at me. This feeling ofbewilderment passed off, and I found that I was peering blankly into thebinnacle, at the compass-card; yet, until then, entirely without beingaware of the fact. Now, however, I saw that the ship was coming back onto her course. Goodness knows how much she had been off!

  With the realisation that I had let the ship get almost aback, therecame a sudden memory of the alteration in the position of the othervessel. She had appeared last on the beam, instead of on the quarter.Now, however, as my brain began to work, I saw the cause of thisapparent and, until then, inexplicable change. It was due, of course, toour having come up, until we had brought the other packet on to thebeam.

  It is curious how all this flashed through my mind, and held myattention--although only momentarily--in the face of the Skipper'sstorming. I think I had hardly realised he was still singing out at me.Anyhow, the next thing I remember, he was shaking my arm.

  "What's the matter with you, man?" he was shouting. And I just staredinto his face, like an ass, without saying a word. I seemed stillincapable, you know, of actual, reasoning speech.

  "Are you damned well off your head?" he went on shouting. "Are you alunatic? Have you had sunstroke? Speak, you gaping idiot!"

  I tried to say something; but the words would not come clearly.

  "I--I--I--" I said, and stopped, stupidly. I was all right, really; butI was so bewildered with the thing I had found out; and, in a way, Iseemed almost to have come back out of a distance, you know.

  "You're a lunatic!" he said, again. He repeated the statement severaltimes, as if it were the only thing that sufficiently expressed hisopinion of me. Then he let go of my arm, and stepped back a couple ofpaces.

  "I'm not a lunatic!" I said, with a sudden gasp. "I'm not a lunatic,Sir, any more than you are."

  "Why the devil don't you answer my questions then?" he shouted, angrily."What's the matter with you? What have you been doing with the ship?Answer me now!"

  "I was looking at that ship away on the starboard quarter, Sir," Iblurted out. "She's been signalling--"

  "What!" he cut me short with disbelief. "What ship?"

  He turned, quickly, and looked over the quarter. Then he wheeled roundto me again.

  "There's no ship! What do you mean by trying to spin up a cuffer likethat?"

  "There is, Sir," I answered. "It's out there--" I pointed.

  "Hold your tongue!" he said. "Don't talk rubbish to me. Do you think I'mblind?"

  "I saw it, Sir," I persisted.

  "Don't you talk back to me!" he snapped, with a quick burst of temper."I won't have it!"

  Then, just as suddenly, he was silent. He came a step towards me, andstared into my face. I believe the old ass thought I was a bit mad;anyway, without another word, he went to the break of the poop.

  "Mr. Tulipson," he sung out.

  "Yes, Sir," I heard the Second Mate reply.

  "Send another man to the wheel."

  "Very good, Sir," the Second answered.

  A couple of minutes later, old Jaskett came up to relieve me. I gave himthe course, and he repeated it.

  "What's up, mate?" he asked me, as I stepped off the grating.

  "Nothing much," I said, and went forrard to where the Skipper wasstanding on the break of the poop. I gave him the course; but the crabbyold devil took no notice of me, whatever. When I got down on to themaindeck, I went up to the Second, and gave it to him. He answered mecivilly enough, and then asked me what I had been doing to put the OldMan's back up.

  "I told him there's a ship on the starboard quarter, signalling us," Isaid.

  "There's no ship out there, Jessop," the Second Mate replied, looking atme with a queer, inscrutable expression.

  "There is, Sir," I began. "I--"

  "That will do, Jessop!" he said. "Go forrard and have a smoke. I shallwant you then to give a hand with these foot-ropes. You'd better bring aserving-mallet aft with you, when you come."

  I hesitated a moment, partly in anger; but more, I think, in doubt.

  "i, i, Sir," I muttered at length, and went forrard.