They did not have to stay for the scattering of the fog. Long before
the sun had lifted that veil from off the face of the sea, the crew of
the _Catamaran_ had discovered the character of their neighbours. They
were not friends, but dire enemies,--the very enemies they so much
dreaded.
The discovery was not delayed. It was made soon after, and in the
following manner:--
The three--Snowball, the sailor, and little William--had kept their
place on the carcass of the _cachalot_, all three attentively
listening,--the two last standing up, and the former in a reclining
attitude, with his huge ear laid close to the skin of the whale,--as
though he believed that to be a conductor of sound. There was no need
for them to have been thus straining their ears: for when a sound
reached them at length, it was that of a voice,--so harsh and loud, that
a deaf man might almost have heard it.
"_Sacre_!" exclaimed the voice, apparently pronounced in an accent of
surprise, "look here, comrades! Here's a dead man among us!"
Had it been the demon of the mist that gave utterance to these speeches,
they could not have produced a more fearful effect upon those who heard
them from the back of the _cachalot_. The accent, along with that
profane shibboleth, might have proceeded from anyone who spoke the
language of France; but the tone of the voice could not be mistaken. It
had too often rung in their ears with a disagreeable emphasis. "Massa
Le Grow, dat am," muttered the negro. "Anybody tell dat."
Snowball's companions made no reply. None was required. Other voices
rose up out of the mist.
"A dead man!" shouted a second. "Sure enough. Who is it?"
"It's the Irishman!" proclaimed a third. "See! He's been killed!
There's a knife sticking between his ribs! He's been murdered!"
"That's his own knife," suggested some one. "I know it; because it once
belonged to me. If you look you'll find his name on the haft. He
graved it there the very day he bought it from me."
There was an interval of silence, as if they had paused to confirm the
suggestion of the last speaker.
"You're right," said one, resuming the informal inquest. "There's his
name, sure enough,--_Larry O'Gorman_."
"He's killed himself!" suggested a voice not hitherto heard. "He's
committed suicide!"
"I don't wonder at his doing so," said another, confirmingly. "He
expected to have to die anyhow; and I suppose he thought the sooner it
was off his mind the better it would be for him."
"How's that?" inquired a fresh speaker, who appeared to dissent from the
opinions of those that had preceded him. "Why should he expect to die
any more than the rest of us?"
"You forget, mate, that the fight was not finished between him and
Monsieur Le Gros?"
"No, I don't forget it. Well?"
"Well, yourself!"
"It don't follow he was to be the next to die,--not as I can see. Look
at this, comrades! There's been foul play here! The Irishman's been
stabbed with his own knife. That's plain enough; but it is not so sure
he did it himself, Why should he? I say again, there's been foul play?"
"And who do you accuse of foul play?"
"I don't accuse anyone. Let them bring the charge, as have seen
something. Somebody must know how this came about. There's been a
murder. Can anyone tell who did it?"
There was a pause of silence of more than a minute in duration. No one
made answer. If anyone knew who was the murderer, they failed to
proclaim it.
"Look here, mates!" put in one, whose sharp voice sounded like the cry
of a hyena, "I'm hungry as a starved shark. Suppose we suspend this
inquest, till we've had breakfast. After that we can settle who's done
the deed,--if there's been anyone, except the man himself. What say ye
all?"
The horrid proposal was not replied to by anyone. The loud shout that
succeeded it sprang from a different cause; and the words that were
afterwards uttered had no reference to the topic under consideration.
"A light! a light!" came the cry, vociferated by several voices.
"It's the light we saw last night. It's the galley-fire! There's a
ship within a hundred yards of us!"
"Ship ahoy! ship ahoy!"
"Ship ahoy! what ship's that?"
"Why the devil don't you answer our hail?"
"To the oars, men! to the oars. _Sacre-dieu_! The lubbers must be
asleep. Ship ahoy! ship ahoy!"
There was no mistaking the signification of these speeches. The sailor
and Snowball exchanged glances of despair. Both had already looked
behind them. There, blazing fiercely up, was the fire of spermaceti,
with the shark-steaks browning in its flame. In the excitement of the
moment they had forgotten all about it. Its light, gleaming through the
fog, had betrayed their presence to those upon the raft; and the order
issued to take to the oars, with the confused plashing that quickly
followed, told the Catamarans that the big raft was about to bear down
upon them!