The Ghost Pirates

by William Hope Hodgson

  VI

  _Another Man to the Wheel_

  The conversation had slacked off. We were all moody and shaken, and Iknow I, for one, was thinking some rather troublesome thoughts.

  Suddenly, I heard the sound of the Second's whistle. Then his voice camealong the deck:

  "Another man to the wheel!"

  "'e's singin' out for some one to go aft an' relieve ther wheel," saidQuoin, who had gone to the door to listen. "Yer'd better 'urry up,Plummer."

  "What's ther time?" asked Plummer, standing up and knocking out hispipe. "Must be close on ter four bells, 'oo's next wheel is it?"

  "It's all right, Plummer," I said, getting up from the chest on which Ihad been sitting. "I'll go along. It's my wheel, and it only wants acouple of minutes to four bells."

  Plummer sat down again, and I went out of the fo'cas'le. Reaching thepoop, I met Tammy on the lee side, pacing up and down.

  "Who's at the wheel?" I asked him, in astonishment.

  "The Second Mate," he said, in a shaky sort of voice. "He's waiting tobe relieved. I'll tell you all about it as soon as I get a chance."

  I went on aft to the wheel.

  "Who's that?" the Second inquired.

  "It's Jessop, Sir," I answered.

  He gave me the course, and then, without another word, went forrardalong the poop. On the break, I heard him call Tammy's name, and thenfor some minutes he was talking to him; though what he was saying, Icould not possibly hear. For my part, I was tremendously curious to knowwhy the Second Mate had taken the wheel. I knew that if it were just amatter of bad steering on Tammy's part, he would not have dreamt ofdoing such a thing. There had been something queer happening, aboutwhich I had yet to learn; of this, I felt sure.

  Presently, the Second Mate left Tammy, and commenced to walk the weatherside of the deck. Once he came right aft, and, stooping down, peeredunder the wheel-box; but never addressed a word to me. Sometime later,he went down the weather ladder on to the main-deck. Directlyafterwards, Tammy came running up to the lee side of the wheel-box.

  "I've seen it again!" he said, gasping with sheer nervousness.

  "What?" I said.

  "That _thing_," he answered. Then he leant across the wheel-box, andlowered his voice.

  "It came over the lee rail--_up out of the sea_," he added, with an airof telling something unbelievable.

  I turned more towards him; but it was too dark to see his face with anydistinctness. I felt suddenly husky. "My God!" I thought. And then Imade a silly effort to protest; but he cut me short with a certainimpatient hopelessness.

  "For God's sake, Jessop," he said, "do stow all that! It's no good. Imust have someone to talk to, or I shall go dotty."

  I saw how useless it was to pretend any sort of ignorance. Indeed,really, I had known it all along, and avoided the youngster on that veryaccount, as you know.

  "Go on," I said. "I'll listen; but you'd better keep an eye for theSecond Mate; he may pop up any minute."

  For a moment, he said nothing, and I saw him peering stealthily aboutthe poop.

  "Go on," I said. "You'd better make haste, or he'll be up before you'rehalf-way through. What was he doing at the wheel when I came up torelieve it? Why did he send you away from it?"

  "He didn't," Tammy replied, turning his face towards me. "I bunked awayfrom it."

  "What for?" I asked.

  "Wait a minute," he answered, "and I'll tell you the whole business. Youknow the Second Mate sent me to the wheel, after _that_--" He nodded hishead forrard.

  "Yes," I said.

  "Well, I'd been here about ten minutes, or a quarter of an hour, and Iwas feeling rotten about Williams, and trying to forget it all and keepthe ship on her course, and all that; when, all at once, I happened toglance to loo'ard, and there I saw it climbing over the rail. My God! Ididn't know what to do. The Second Mate was standing forrard on thebreak of the poop, and I was here all by myself. I felt as if I werefrozen stiff. When it came towards me, I let go of the wheel, and yelledand bunked forrard to the Second Mate. He caught hold of me and shookme; but I was so jolly frightened, I couldn't say a word. I could onlykeep on pointing. The Second kept asking me 'Where?' And then, all atonce, I found I couldn't see the thing. I don't know whether he saw it.I'm not at all certain he did. He just told me to damn well get back tothe wheel, and stop making a damned fool of myself. I said out straightI wouldn't go. So he blew his whistle, and sung out for someone to comeaft and take it. Then he ran and got hold of the wheel himself. You knowthe rest."

  "You're quite sure it wasn't thinking about Williams made you imagineyou saw something?" I said, more to gain a moment to think, than becauseI believed that it was the case.

  "I thought you were going to listen to me, seriously!" he said,bitterly. "If you won't believe me; what about the chap the Second Matesaw? What about Tom? What about Williams? For goodness sake! don't tryto put me off like you did last time. I nearly went cracked with wantingto tell someone who would listen to me, and wouldn't laugh. I couldstand anything, but this being alone. There's a good chap, don't pretendyou don't understand. Tell me what it all means. What is this horribleman that I've twice seen? You know you know something, and I believeyou're afraid to tell anyone, for fear of being laughed at. Why don'tyou tell me? You needn't be afraid of my laughing."

  He stopped, suddenly. For the moment, I said nothing in reply.

  "Don't treat me like a kid, Jessop!" he exclaimed, quite passionately.

  "I won't," I said, with a sudden resolve to tell him everything. "I needsomeone to talk to, just as badly as you do."

  "What does it all mean, then?" he burst out. "Are they real? I alwaysused to think it was all a yarn about such things."

  "I'm sure I don't know what it all means, Tammy," I answered. "I'm justas much in the dark, there, as you are. And I don't know whether they'rereal--that is, not as we consider things real. You don't know that I sawa queer figure down on the maindeck, several nights before you saw thatthing up here."

  "Didn't you see this one?" he cut in, quickly.

  "Yes," I answered.

  "Then, why did you pretend not to have?" he said, in a reproachfulvoice. "You don't know what a state you put me into, what with my beingcertain that I had seen it and then you being so jolly positive thatthere had been nothing. At one time I thought I was going clean off mydot--until the Second Mate saw that man go up the main. Then, I knewthat there must be something in the thing I was certain I'd seen."

  "I thought, perhaps, that if I told you I hadn't seen it, you wouldthink you'd been mistaken," I said. "I wanted you to think it wasimagination, or a dream, or something of that sort."

  "And all the time, you knew about that other thing you'd seen?" heasked.

  "Yes," I replied.

  "It was thundering decent of you," he said. "But it wasn't any good."

  He paused a moment. Then he went on:

  "It's terrible about Williams. Do you think he saw something, up aloft?"

  "I don't know, Tammy," I said. "It's impossible to say. It _may_ havebeen only an accident." I hesitated to tell him what I really thought.

  "What was he saying about his pay-day? Who was he saying it to?"

  "I don't know," I said, again. "He was always cracked about taking apay-day out of her. You know, he stayed in her, on purpose, when all theothers left. He told me that he wasn't going to be done out of it, foranyone."

  "What did the other lot leave for?" he asked. Then, as the idea seemedto strike him--"Jove! do you think they saw something, and got scared?It's quite possible. You know, we only joined her in 'Frisco. She had no'prentices on the passage out. Our ship was sold; so they sent us aboardhere to come home."

  "They may have," I said. "Indeed, from things I've heard Williams say,I'm pretty certain, he for one, guessed or knew a jolly sight more thanwe've any idea of."

  "And now he's dead!" said Tammy, solemnly. "We'll never be able to findout from him now."

  For a few moments, he was silent. Then he
went off on another track.

  "Doesn't anything ever happen in the Mate's watch?"

  "Yes," I answered. "There's several things happened lately, that seempretty queer. Some of his side have been talking about them. But he'stoo jolly pig-headed to see anything. He just curses his chaps, and putsit all down to them."

  "Still," he persisted, "things seem to happen more in our watch than inhis--I mean, bigger things. Look at tonight."

  "We've no proof, you know," I said.

  He shook his head, doubtfully.

  "I shall always funk going aloft, now."

  "Nonsense!" I told him. "It may only have been an accident."

  "Don't!" he said. "You know you don't think so, really."

  I answered nothing, just then; for I knew very well that he was right.We were silent for a couple of moments.

  Then he spoke again:

  "Is the ship haunted?"

  For an instant I hesitated.

  "No," I said, at length. "I don't think she is. I mean, not in thatway."

  "What way, then?"

  "Well, I've formed a bit of a theory, that seems wise one minute, andcracked the next. Of course, it's as likely to be all wrong; but it'sthe only thing that seems to me to fit in with all the beastly thingswe've had lately."

  "Go on!" he said, with an impatient, nervous movement.

  "Well, I've an idea that it's nothing _in_ the ship that's likely tohurt us. I scarcely know how to put it; but, if I'm right in what Ithink, it's the ship herself that's the cause of everything."

  "What do you mean?" he asked, in a puzzled voice. "Do you mean that theship _is_ haunted, after all?"

  "No!" I answered. "I've just told you I didn't. Wait until I've finishedwhat I was going to say."

  "All right!" he said.

  "About that thing you saw tonight," I went on. "You say it came over thelee rail, up on to the poop?"

  "Yes," he answered.

  "Well, the thing I saw, _came up out of the sea, and went back into thesea_."

  "Jove!" he said; and then: "Yes, go on!"

  "My idea is, that this ship is open to be boarded by those things," Iexplained. "What they are, of course I don't know. They look like men--in lots of ways. But--well, the Lord knows what's in the sea. Though wedon't want to go imagining silly things, of course. And then, again, youknow, it seems fat-headed, calling anything silly. That's how I keepgoing, in a sort of blessed circle. I don't know a bit whether they'reflesh and blood, or whether they're what we should call ghosts orspirits."

  "They can't be flesh and blood," Tammy interrupted. "Where would theylive? Besides, that first one I saw, I thought I could see through it.And this last one--the Second Mate would have seen it. And they woulddrown--"

  "Not necessarily," I said.

  "Oh, but I'm sure they're not," he insisted. "It's impossible--"

  "So are ghosts--when you're feeling sensible," I answered. "But I'm notsaying they _are_ flesh and blood; though, at the same time, I'm notgoing to say straight out they're ghosts--not yet, at any rate."

  "Where do they come from?" he asked, stupidly enough.

  "Out of the sea," I told him. "You saw for yourself!"

  "Then why don't other vessels have them coming aboard?" he said. "How doyou account for that?"

  "In a way--though sometimes it seems cracky--I think I can, according tomy idea," I answered.

  "How?" he inquired again.

  "Why, I believe that this ship is open, as I've told you--exposed,unprotected, or whatever you like to call it. I should say it'sreasonable to think that all the things of the material world arebarred, as it were, from the immaterial; but that in some cases thebarrier may be broken down. That's what may have happened to this ship.And if it has, she may be naked to the attacks of beings belonging tosome other state of existence."

  "What's made her like that?" he asked, in a really awed sort of tone.

  "The Lord knows!" I answered. "Perhaps something to do with magneticstresses; but you'd not understand, and I don't, really. And, I suppose,inside of me, I don't believe it's anything of the kind, for a minute.I'm not built that way. And yet I don't know! Perhaps, there may havebeen some rotten thing done aboard of her. Or, again, it's a heap morelikely to be something quite outside of anything I know."

  "If they're immaterial then, they're spirits?" he questioned.

  "I don't know," I said. "It's so hard to say what I really think, youknow. I've got a queer idea, that my head-piece likes to think good; butI don't believe my tummy believes it."

  "Go on!" he said.

  "Well," I said. "Suppose the earth were inhabited by two kinds of life.We're one, and _they're_ the other."

  "Go on!" he said.

  "Well," I said. "Don't you see, in a normal state we may not be capableof appreciating the _realness_ of the other? But they may be just as_real_ and material to _them_, as _we_ are to _us_. Do you see?"

  "Yes," he said. "Go on!"

  "Well," I said. "The earth may be just as _real_ to them, as to us. Imean that it may have qualities as material to them, as it has to us;but neither of us could appreciate the other's realness, or the qualityof realness in the earth, which was real to the other. It's so difficultto explain. Don't you understand?"

  "Yes," he said. "Go on!"

  "Well, if we were in what I might call a healthy atmosphere, they wouldbe quite beyond our power to see or feel, or anything. And the same withthem; but the more we're like _this_, the more _real_ and actual theycould grow _to us_. See? That is, the more we should become able toappreciate their form of materialness. That's all. I can't make it anyclearer."

  "Then, after all, you _really_ think they're ghosts, or something ofthat sort?" Tammy said.

  "I suppose it does come to that," I answered. "I mean that, anyway, Idon't think they're our ideas of flesh and blood. But, of course, it'ssilly to say much; and, after all, you must remember that I may be allwrong."

  "I think you ought to tell the Second Mate all this," he said. "If it'sreally as you say, the ship ought to be put into the nearest port, andjolly well burnt."

  "The Second Mate couldn't do anything," I replied. "Even if he believedit all; which we're not certain he would."

  "Perhaps not," Tammy answered. "But if you could get him to believe it,he might explain the whole business to the Skipper, and then somethingmight be done. It's not safe as it is."

  "He'd only get jeered at again," I said, rather hopelessly.

  "No," said Tammy. "Not after what's happened tonight."

  "Perhaps not," I replied, doubtfully. And just then the Second Mate cameback on to the poop, and Tammy cleared away from the wheel-box, leavingme with a worrying feeling that I ought to do something.