WE SIGHT A SHIP.
It was like coming out of a sepulchre to step from that forecastle on
deck where the glorious sun was and the swaying shadows, and where
the blue wind gushed in a soft breathing over the bulwark-rails, with
weight enough in it to hold the canvas stirless, and to raise a gentle
hissing alongside like the seething of champagne. I spied Vanderdecken
on the poop and near him Imogene, so I hastened aft to greet the girl
and salute the great bearded figure that nobly towered beside her.
She looked fragrant and sweet as a white rose in the dewy morn, wore
a straw hat turned up on one side and looped to stay there with a
parti-coloured rosette, and though this riband was faded with age and
the straw yellow and dull through keeping, the gear did suit her beauty
most divinely, and I could have knelt and kissed her hand, so complete
a Princess did she appear in the royal perfections of her countenance
and shape.
To turn from the sparkle of her violet eye, the rosiness of her lip,
the life that teemed in the expression of her face, like a blushing
light shining through fragile porcelain, to turn from her to the great
silent figure near her, with piercing gaze directed over the taffrail,
his beard trembling to the down-rush of air from the mizzen, was to
obtain a proper contrast to enable you to realise in the aspect of
that amazing person the terrible conditions of his existence and the
enormous significance of his sentence.
With a smile of pleasure at the sight of me, Imogene bade me
good-morning, saying, "I am before you for the first time since you
have been in the ship."
"I was out of my cabin half-an-hour ago, perhaps longer," said I.
"What, think you, I have been doing? Exploring the sailors' quarters
and inspecting the kitchen." And I tossed up my hands and turned up
my eyes that she might guess what I thought of those places. Then
meeting Vanderdecken's gaze, which he had brought to bear upon me with
a frowning roll of the eyes, I took off my hat, giving him a bow. He
greeted me in his imperious stormy way, and asked me what I thought of
his ship.
I replied, "She is a very fine vessel, sir."
"Did they lift the hatches to show the cargo to you?" he exclaimed.
I answered smartly, "No," perceiving that he was aware I had been below
in the fore-part.
"How does my forecastle show to your English prejudice?" he said.
"Oh, mynheer!" said I, smiling, with a look at Imogene, whose eyes
were fixed in the quarter over the stern into which Vanderdecken had
been staring, "so far from Englishmen being prejudiced, at all events,
in naval matters, we are continually taking ideas from other nations,
particularly from the French, whose ships of war we imitate and admire.
Perhaps," said I, "that is one of the reasons why we are incessantly
capturing the vessels of that nation."
But the conceit was lost, because this man had flourished before we had
become the terror of the French that our admirals have since made the
English flag to be.
Imogene cried out in Dutch, "Do you know, Mr. Fenton, that there is a
sail in sight?"
My heart gave a bound, and following the indication of her ivory-white
forefinger, which pointed directly astern, I saw the tiny gleam of
what was unquestionably a ship's canvas, resembling the curved tip of
a gull's wing.
"Ay, to be sure, yonder's a sail!" I exclaimed, after keeping my eyes
fixed upon it a while to make sure, and I added in Dutch, "Which way,
madam, does the captain say she is steering?"
"Directly after us," she replied.
"Judge for yourself, sir," said Vanderdecken, motioning with his hand
toward a telescope that stood against the deck-house.
It was the ancient, heavy tube I had observed in his cabin. I picked it
up, rested it upon the rail--it was too weighty for the support of my
left hand--and worked away with it at the sail astern. It was a feeble
old glass, magnifying, I should suppose, to the proportion of a crown
to a groat. In fact I could see as well with the naked eye. It was
Vanderdecken's telescope, however, and a curiosity, and still feigning
to view the sail, I secretly ran my eye over the tubes, noticing, in
very faint letters, the words, "Cornelius Van der Decken, Amsterdam,
1650," graved in flowing characters upon the large tube.
"She is heading after us, you think, mynheer?" said Vanderdecken as I
rose.
"I could not say, sir. Has she grown since you first observed her?"
"Yes."
He took the glass and levelled it very easily, and I met Imogene's gaze
as she glanced from him to me, as though she was sure I could not but
admire the massive, manly figure of that man, drawn to his full height,
and in such a posture as one would love to see him painted in.
"She is certainly steering our course," said he, speaking with his eye
at the tube, "I hope she may not prove an English man-of-war. Who can
tell? If a merchantman, be her nationality what it may, we'll speak her
for tobacco, for that's a commodity we must have."
I looked earnestly and with a face flushed with hope at Imogene; but
she glanced away from me to the sail, signalling to me by this action
in a manner unmistakable, to be wary.
Vanderdecken put down the glass, cast a look aloft at the set of his
canvas and the trim of his yards, and then called to Arents to heave
the log. Some seamen came aft, in response to the second mate's call,
and, bringing out a reel and sand-glass from the deck-house, measured
the speed of the ship through the water, precisely as we at this day
do, so ancient is this simple device of telling a ship's speed of
passage through the water by paying out a line marked with knots to the
running of sand! I heard Arents say that the vessel was going three
knots and a half.
"At that rate," said I to Imogene, whilst Vanderdecken remained aft,
watching in a soulless manner the automaton-like motions of the men
engaged in hauling the line in and reeling it up, "that vessel yonder,
if she be actually heading our way, will soon overhaul us."
"Mr. Fenton," said she, with subdued energy in her soft voice, "I
earnestly pray you, neither by word, look or sign to give Captain
Vanderdecken the least reason to suspect that you mean to escape from
his ship and rescue me whenever the chance shall offer. I will tell
you why I say this: just now he spoke of you to me, and said if an
opportunity offered he should put you on board any vessel that would
receive you, no matter where she was bound to, and then he asked what
you and I chiefly talked about. There was more sternness in his manner
than ever I recollect in him when addressing me."
"If I thought him capable of human emotions," said I, "I should reckon
him jealous."
"But he _has_ human emotions--he loves his wife and children," she
replied.
"Ay, but who is to know that that love is not left to linger in him as
a part of his curse?" said I. "By which I mean, if he was not suffered
to remember his wife and children and love them, he might not show
himself very eager to get round the Cape. Possibly he wants to get rid
of me, not because he is jealous, not because he dislikes me as a man,
but because that malignant baboon, Van Vogelaar, may have been speaking
against me, putting fears into his head touching his treasure, and
working upon his duty as a Hollander--a compatriot of De Ruyter, God
help him--to hate me as an Englishman."
"But he loves me too, Mr. Fenton," said she.
"As a father might," said I, not liking this, yet amused by her sweet
tenaciousness.
"Yes, as a father; but it shows he has capacity for other emotions
outside those which you deem necessary for the duration of the
Sentence."
"I ought to believe so if he hates me," said I, looking his way and
observing that he had turned his back upon us and was watching the
sail astern. "But be all this as it will, you shall find me as careful
as you can desire."
"If," said she, plaintively, "he should become even faintly suspicious
of your intentions, he might set you ashore, should we not meet with a
ship to receive you, and then what would become of you and what would
become of me, Mr. Fenton?"
"Have no fear," said I; "he shall discover nothing in me to make him
suspicious. As to his setting me ashore, that he could do, and whether
I should be able to outwit him in such a manoeuvre, I cannot tell;
but in no other way could he get rid of me, unless by throwing me
overboard."
"He would not do that," she exclaimed, shaking her head; "nor do I
think he would force you from this ship if he could find no ground
for distrust. But something affecting you has worried his mind, I am
certain, or he would not have declared his intention to send you to
another vessel. He believes he is going straight home. Why, then,
should he not be willing to carry you? Maybe he heard from Arents that
you were below exploring the ship. Oh, Mr. Fenton, be cautious! If not
for your own sake, then for mine!"
She involuntarily brought her little hands together into a posture of
prayer with the earnestness of her entreaty, and her warmth flowed
rosily to her cheeks, so that, though she spoke low, her manner was
impassioned, and I saw how her dear heart was set upon my delivering
her, and how great was her terror lest my thoughtlessness should end in
procuring our separation. However, I had no time to then reassure her,
though I resolved henceforth to walk with extraordinary circumspection,
seeing that the people I had fallen amongst were utterly unintelligible
to me, being so composite in their dead-aliveness that it was
impossible to come at their motives and feelings, if they possessed
any resembling ours. I say I had not time to reassure her, for Prins
arrived to report breakfast, which brought Vanderdecken to us.
Little was said at table, but that little was quite enough to make me
understand the wisdom of Imogene's fears, and to perceive that if I did
not check my curiosity to inspect the ship so as to be able to deliver
a true account of this strange and fearful fabric, I stood to lose
Imogene the chance of escape which my presence in the vessel provided
her with. No matter which of the two mates had the watch on deck, Van
Vogelaar always sat down to meals first, Arents following. He was
beside me this morning as usual, coming fresh from his cabin; and when
we were seated, Vanderdecken told him there was a ship astern.
"How heading, skipper?"
"As we go, without doubt. She hath grown swiftly since first sighted,
yet hangs steady in the same quarter."
"Let her hoist any colours but those of this gentleman's country!" said
Van Vogelaar, with an ugly sneer.
"Should that happen, captain, will you fight her?" I asked, quietly.
"If she be a ship of war--no; for what are our defences against the
culverins and demi-culverins of your ships, and how shall we match
perhaps four hundred sailors with our slender company?" replied
Vanderdecken, with an evil glitter in his eyes, and grasping his beard
as his custom was when wrathful thoughts surged in him.
"She may prove a harmless merchantman--perhaps a sturdy Hollander--that
will give you plenty of tobacco for a little of your silver," said
Imogene, striking in with her sweet smile, and melodious voice, like a
sunbeam upon turbulent waters.
"If you are in doubt why not shift your helm, gentlemen?" said I.
"Ah, skipper!" cried Van Vogelaar, sardonically, "we have an adviser
here. It is fit that a Dutch ship should be served by an English pilot!"
I held my peace. At this moment the clock struck, and the parrot, as
though some fiend was inside her green bosom prompting her to breed
trouble, cried out "Wyn Zyn al Verdomd!" with fierce energy, severely
clawing her wires, and exhibiting more agitation than seems possible in
a fowl of naturally dull and leaden motions.
"I believe she speaks the truth," exclaimed Van Vogelaar, turning
his face towards the cage. "The parrot hath been known to possess a
witch-like capacity of forecasting and divining."
"Oh, but you know, Heer, that she had that sentence by heart when the
captain bought her," said Imogene, with a mixed air of distress and
petulance in her face.
"I know, madam," he replied, "that yonder bird never spoke those words
with such energy as she now puts into them before this gentleman
arrived."
Vanderdecken looked at him and then at me, but did not speak.
"What do you suspect from the increased energy of the bird's language?"
said I, fixing my eyes upon the mate.
He would not meet my gaze, but answered with his eyes upon his plate,
"What is your motive in examining this ship, sir?"
"The harmless curiosity of a sailor," I replied.
He was about to speak, but I lifted my hand, meaning to entreat silence
whilst I continued, but he, mistaking the gesture for a threat, shrank
very abjectly from his seat, proving himself a timorous, cowardly
fellow, and the more to be feared, perhaps, for being so. "Captain
Vanderdecken," said I, keeping my hand lifted, that he and his mate
might understand I intended no menace, "I know not what base and
degrading charges Herr Van Vogelaar would insinuate. I am an honest
man and mean well, and, sir, add to that the gratitude of one whose
life you have preserved. You were pleased, on one occasion, to speak
kindly of my countrymen, and regret that feud should ever exist between
two nations whose genius seems to have a common root. I trust that
your sympathy with Britain will cause you to turn a deaf ear to the
unwarrantable hints against my honour as an English seaman, dropped by
your first mate."
To this speech Vanderdecken made no reply; indeed, I would not like
to swear that he had heeded so much as a syllable of it. Van Vogelaar
resumed the posture on his seat from which he had started on my raising
my hand and went on with his meal. Shortly after this Imogene left
the table and entered her cabin, on which, weary of the sullen and
malignant company of the mate, and the ghostly silence and fiery eyes
of Captain Vanderdecken, I rose, bowed to the skipper, and went on deck.
I walked right aft, past the helmsman, and stood gazing with a most
passionate yearning and wistfulness at the sail astern. The stranger
had not greatly grown during the time we had passed below, but her
enlargement was marked enough to make me guess that she was overhauling
us hand over fist, as sailors say, and I reckoned that if the wind
held she would be within gunshot by three or four of the clock this
afternoon. I went for Vanderdecken's glass and examined her again;
the lenses imparted an atmospheric sharpness and pellucidity of
outline which showed plainly enough the royals and topgallant-sails of
apparently a large ship slightly leaning from the wind. I could not
persuade myself that she was "reaching," for though our yards were
as sharply braced as they would lie, the stranger, if she were close
hauled, could have luffed up three or four more points, but as she held
her place it was certain she was making a free wind and coming along
with her yards braced-in somewhat. Therefore she was not bound to the
westwards, and if for the Indian Ocean, what need had she to be heading
due north?
I put down the glass, but the yearning that rose within me at the sight
of the vessel ceased when I thought of Imogene. Suppose that ship
should prove the instrument of separating me from her! I had talked big
for the sake of comforting her, of fearing nothing from Vanderdecken
save being set ashore or tossed overboard, for I counted upon any and
all ships we met refusing to receive me if they found out that this
ancient fabric was the Flying Dutchman. But suppose Vanderdecken should
heave me overboard on nearing a vessel, leaving it to her people to
succour me if they chose?
These were the fancies which subdued in me the eager wistfulness raised
by yonder gleaming wing of canvas, whitening like a mounting star upon
the blue edge of the ocean in the south.
Lost in thought, I continued gazing until presently I grew sensible of
the presence of someone standing close beside me. It was Imogene. On
the weather quarter was Van Vogelaar surveying the sail with folded
arms and stooped head. His face wore a malignant expression, and in his
stirlessness he resembled an effigy, wrought with exquisite skill to a
marvellous imitation of apparel and shape.
"Where is the captain?" I asked.
"He is smoking in the cabin," Imogene answered.
"Yonder rascal is evidently my enemy," said I.
"All will be well if you show no curiosity," she replied, softly. "Do
you not remember that I cautioned you at the very beginning? My belief
is that the mate is mad you should know of the treasure in this ship,
and will be eager to get rid of you lest you should contrive to possess
it."
"But how?"
"By acquainting the master of the ship you are transferred to with the
wealth in this vessel. Add to this fear--for he has a share in all they
recover from wrecks, and in a portion of the cargo--his hatred of you
for your men firing at him."
"I begin to see," said I, "that there are several strokes of human
nature still to be witnessed among these unhappy wretches, spite of
their monstrous age, the frightfulness of the Curse they are under, and
their being men who are alive in death--corpses reflecting vitality
just as the dead moon shines. But needs must where the Devil drives;
speculating will not serve; we must wait."
I watched her whilst she looked at the sail in our wake; emotion
darkened and lightened in the violet of her eyes as the blue folds of
Heaven seem to deepen and brighten with the breathings of the wind;
through her delicate lips her rose-sweet breath came and went swiftly.
She started, looked at Van Vogelaar, aloft at the canvas, round the
deck, with a sharp tremble running through her light form, and cried
out with an hysteric swiftness, and in a voice full of tears, "You will
not leave me to this wretched fate, Mr. Fenton! You will not leave me
in this dreadful ship!"
I grasped her hand. "I swear before the Majesty of that offended God
whose eye is on this ship as we thus stand, that if I am forced to
leave you it will be at the cost of my life!"