“Shall I ring, and get you some whiskey or brandy?”
Again he shook his head.
“Help me to get up,” he said feebly.
He was very much shaken, and I had some trouble in getting him on his
feet, and seating him on the one chair in the room.
“You had better come to my state-room,” I said; “it is nearer than
yours. What has happened to you?”
He replied, “I will go in a moment. Wait a minute.” And I waited.
“Now,” he continued, when he had apparently pulled himself together a
bit, “just turn on the electric light, will you?”
I reached up to the peg of the electric light and turned it on. A
shudder passed over Plodkins’ frame, but he said nothing. He seemed
puzzled, and once more I asked him to let me take him to my stateroom,
but he shook his head.
“Turn on the water.” I did so.
“Turn out the electric light.” I did that also.
“Now,” he added, “put your hand in the water and turn on the electric
light.”
I was convinced Plodkins had become insane, but I recollected I was
there alone with him, shaky as he was, in a room with a bolted door, so
I put my fingers in the water and attempted to turn on the electric
light. I got a shock that was very much greater than that which I
received when I saw Plodkins lying at the bottom of the bath-tub. I
gave a yell and a groan, and staggered backwards. Then Plodkins laughed
a feeble laugh.
“Now,” he said, “I will go with you to your state-room.”
The laugh seemed to have braced up Plodkins like a glass of liquor
would have done, and when we got to my state-room he was able to tell
me what had happened. As a sort of preface to his remarks, I would like
to say a word or two about that bath-tub. It was similar to bath-tubs
on board other steamers; a great and very deep receptacle of solid
marble. There were different nickel-plated taps for letting in hot or
cold water, or fresh water or salt water as was desired; and the
escape-pipe instead of being at the end, as it is in most bath-tubs,
was in the centre. It was the custom of the bath-room steward to fill
it about half full of water at whatever temperature you desired. Then,
placing a couple of towels on the rack, he would go and call the man
whose hour it was to bathe.
Plodkins said, “When I went in there everything appeared as usual,
except that the morning was very dark. I stood in the bath-tub, the
water coming nearly to my knees, and reached up to turn on the electric
light. The moment I touched the brass key I received a shock that
simply paralyzed me. I think liquor has something to do with the awful
effect the electricity had upon me, because I had taken too much the
night before, and was feeling very shaky indeed; but the result was
that I simply fell full length in the bath-tub just as you found me. I
was unable to move anything except my fingers and toes. I did not
appear to be hurt in the least, and my senses, instead of being dulled
by the shock, seemed to be preternaturally sharp, and I realized in a
moment that if this inability to move remained with me for five minutes
I was a dead man—dead, not from the shock, but by drowning. I gazed up
through that clear green water, and I could see the ripples on the
surface slowly subsiding after my plunge into the tub. It reminded me
of looking into an aquarium. You know how you see up through the water
to the surface with the bubbles rising to the top. I knew that nobody
would come in for at least half an hour, and even then I couldn’t
remember whether I had bolted the door or not. Sometimes I bolt it, and
sometimes I don’t. I didn’t this morning, as it happens. All the time I
felt that strength was slowly returning to me, for I continually worked
my fingers and toes, and now feeling seemed to be coming up to my
wrists and arms. Then I remembered that the vent was in the middle of
the bath-tub; so, wriggling my fingers around, I got hold of the ring,
and pulled up the plug. In the dense silence that was around me, I
could not tell whether the water was running out or not; but gazing up
towards the ceiling I thought I saw the surface gradually sinking down
and down and down. Of course it couldn’t have been more than a few
seconds, but it seemed to be years and years and years. I knew that if
once I let my breath go I would be drowned, merely by the spasmodic
action of my lungs trying to recover air. I felt as if I should burst.
It was a match against time, with life or death as the stake. At first,
as I said, my senses were abnormally sharp, but, by and by, I began to
notice that they were wavering. I thought the glassy surface of the
water, which I could see above me, was in reality a great sheet of
crystal that somebody was pressing down upon me, and I began to think
that the moment it reached my face I would smother. I tried to
struggle, but was held with a grip of steel. Finally, this slab of
crystal came down to my nose, and seemed to split apart. I could hold
on no longer, and with a mighty expiration blew the water up towards
the ceiling, and drew in a frightful smothering breath of salt water,
that I blew in turn upwards, and the next breath I took in had some air
with the water. I felt the water tickling the corners of my mouth, and
receding slower and slower down my face and neck. Then I think I must
have become insensible until just before you entered the room. Of
course there is something wrong with the electric fittings, and there
is a leak of electricity; but I think liquor is at the bottom of all
this. I don’t believe it would have affected me like this if I had not
been soaked in whiskey.”
“If I were you,” I said, “I would leave whiskey alone.”
“I intend to,” he answered solemnly, “and baths too.”