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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + + +THE SECRET SHARER + +by Joseph Conrad + + + +I + + +On my right hand there were lines of fishing stakes resembling +a mysterious system of half-submerged bamboo fences, +incomprehensible in its division of the domain of tropical fishes, +and crazy of aspect as if abandoned forever by some nomad +tribe of fishermen now gone to the other end of the ocean; +for there was no sign of human habitation as far as the eye +could reach. To the left a group of barren islets, +suggesting ruins of stone walls, towers, and blockhouses, +had its foundations set in a blue sea that itself looked solid, +so still and stable did it lie below my feet; even the track +of light from the westering sun shone smoothly, without that +animated glitter which tells of an imperceptible ripple. +And when I turned my head to take a parting glance at the tug +which had just left us anchored outside the bar, I saw the straight +line of the flat shore joined to the stable sea, edge to edge, +with a perfect and unmarked closeness, in one leveled floor +half brown, half blue under the enormous dome of the sky. +Corresponding in their insignificance to the islets of the sea, +two small clumps of trees, one on each side of the only fault +in the impeccable joint, marked the mouth of the river Meinam +we had just left on the first preparatory stage of our +homeward journey; and, far back on the inland level, a larger +and loftier mass, the grove surrounding the great Paknam pagoda, +was the only thing on which the eye could rest from the vain +task of exploring the monotonous sweep of the horizon. +Here and there gleams as of a few scattered pieces of silver marked +the windings of the great river; and on the nearest of them, +just within the bar, the tug steaming right into the land became +lost to my sight, hull and funnel and masts, as though the impassive +earth had swallowed her up without an effort, without a tremor. +My eye followed the light cloud of her smoke, now here, +now there, above the plain, according to the devious curves +of the stream, but always fainter and farther away, till I lost +it at last behind the miter-shaped hill of the great pagoda. +And then I was left alone with my ship, anchored at the head +of the Gulf of Siam. + +She floated at the starting point of a long journey, very still in an +immense stillness, the shadows of her spars flung far to the eastward +by the setting sun. At that moment I was alone on her decks. +There was not a sound in her--and around us nothing moved, nothing lived, +not a canoe on the water, not a bird in the air, not a cloud in the sky. +In this breathless pause at the threshold of a long passage we seemed +to be measuring our fitness for a long and arduous enterprise, the appointed +task of both our existences to be carried out, far from all human eyes, +with only sky and sea for spectators and for judges. + +There must have been some glare in the air to interfere with one's sight, +because it was only just before the sun left us that my roaming eyes +made out beyond the highest ridges of the principal islet of the group +something which did away with the solemnity of perfect solitude. +The tide of darkness flowed on swiftly; and with tropical suddenness +a swarm of stars came out above the shadowy earth, while I lingered yet, +my hand resting lightly on my ship's rail as if on the shoulder of a +trusted friend. But, with all that multitude of celestial bodies staring +down at one, the comfort of quiet communion with her was gone for good. +And there were also disturbing sounds by this time--voices, footsteps forward; +the steward flitted along the main-deck, a busily ministering spirit; +a hand bell tinkled urgently under the poop deck.... + +I found my two officers waiting for me near the supper table, +in the lighted cuddy. We sat down at once, and as I helped +the chief mate, I said: + +"Are you aware that there is a ship anchored inside the islands? +I saw her mastheads above the ridge as the sun went down." + +He raised sharply his simple face, overcharged by a terrible +growth of whisker, and emitted his usual ejaculations: +"Bless my soul, sir! You don't say so!" + +My second mate was a round-cheeked, silent young man, grave beyond +his years, I thought; but as our eyes happened to meet I +detected a slight quiver on his lips. I looked down at once. +It was not my part to encourage sneering on board my ship. +It must be said, too, that I knew very little of my officers. +In consequence of certain events of no particular significance, +except to myself, I had been appointed to the command only a +fortnight before. Neither did I know much of the hands forward. +All these people had been together for eighteen months or so, +and my position was that of the only stranger on board. +I mention this because it has some bearing on what is to follow. +But what I felt most was my being a stranger to the ship; +and if all the truth must be told, I was somewhat of a stranger +to myself. The youngest man on board (barring the second mate), +and untried as yet by a position of the fullest responsibility, +I was willing to take the adequacy of the others for granted. +They had simply to be equal to their tasks; but I wondered +how far I should turn out faithful to that ideal conception +of one's own personality every man sets up for himself secretly. + + +Meantime the chief mate, with an almost visible effect of collaboration +on the part of his round eyes and frightful whiskers, was trying to evolve +a theory of the anchored ship. His dominant trait was to take all things +into earnest consideration. He was of a painstaking turn of mind. +As he used to say, he "liked to account to himself" for practically +everything that came in his way, down to a miserable scorpion +he had found in his cabin a week before. The why and the wherefore +of that scorpion--how it got on board and came to select his room +rather than the pantry (which was a dark place and more what a scorpion +would be partial to), and how on earth it managed to drown itself +in the inkwell of his writing desk--had exercised him infinitely. +The ship within the islands was much more easily accounted for; +and just as we were about to rise from table he made his pronouncement. +She was, he doubted not, a ship from home lately arrived. Probably she +drew too much water to cross the bar except at the top of spring tides. +Therefore she went into that natural harbor to wait for a few days +in preference to remaining in an open roadstead. + +"That's so," confirmed the second mate, suddenly, in his +slightly hoarse voice. "She draws over twenty feet. +She's the Liverpool ship Sephora with a cargo of coal. +Hundred and twenty-three days from Cardiff." + +We looked at him in surprise. + +"The tugboat skipper told me when he came on board +for your letters, sir," explained the young man. +"He expects to take her up the river the day after tomorrow." + +After thus overwhelming us with the extent of his information +he slipped out of the cabin. The mate observed regretfully +that he "could not account for that young fellow's whims." +What prevented him telling us all about it at once, +he wanted to know. + +I detained him as he was making a move. For the last two days the crew had +had plenty of hard work, and the night before they had very little sleep. +I felt painfully that I--a stranger--was doing something unusual when I +directed him to let all hands turn in without setting an anchor watch. +I proposed to keep on deck myself till one o'clock or thereabouts. +I would get the second mate to relieve me at that hour. + +"He will turn out the cook and the steward at four," I concluded, +"and then give you a call. Of course at the slightest sign of any +sort of wind we'll have the hands up and make a start at once." + +He concealed his astonishment. "Very well, sir." Outside the cuddy +he put his head in the second mate's door to inform him of my +unheard-of caprice to take a five hours' anchor watch on myself. +I heard the other raise his voice incredulously--"What? The +Captain himself?" Then a few more murmurs, a door closed, then another. +A few moments later I went on deck. + +My strangeness, which had made me sleepless, had prompted that +unconventional arrangement, as if I had expected in those solitary +hours of the night to get on terms with the ship of which I +knew nothing, manned by men of whom I knew very little more. +Fast alongside a wharf, littered like any ship in port with a +tangle of unrelated things, invaded by unrelated shore people, +I had hardly seen her yet properly. Now, as she lay cleared for sea, +the stretch of her main-deck seemed to me very find under the stars. +Very fine, very roomy for her size, and very inviting. +I descended the poop and paced the waist, my mind picturing +to myself the coming passage through the Malay Archipelago, +down the Indian Ocean, and up the Atlantic. All its phases +were familiar enough to me, every characteristic, all the +alternatives which were likely to face me on the high seas-- +everything! . . . except the novel responsibility of command. +But I took heart from the reasonable thought that the ship +was like other ships, the men like other men, and that the sea +was not likely to keep any special surprises expressly +for my discomfiture. + +Arrived at that comforting conclusion, I bethought myself +of a cigar and went below to get it. All was still down there. +Everybody at the after end of the ship was sleeping profoundly. +I came out again on the quarter-deck, agreeably at ease in my sleeping +suit on that warm breathless night, barefooted, a glowing cigar +in my teeth, and, going forward, I was met by the profound silence of +the fore end of the ship. Only as I passed the door of the forecastle, +I heard a deep, quiet, trustful sigh of some sleeper inside. +And suddenly I rejoiced in the great security of the sea as compared +with the unrest of the land, in my choice of that untempted life +presenting no disquieting problems, invested with an elementary +moral beauty by the absolute straightforwardness of its appeal +and by the singleness of its purpose. + +The riding light in the forerigging burned with a clear, untroubled, +as if symbolic, flame, confident and bright in the mysterious +shades of the night. Passing on my way aft along the other side +of the ship, I observed that the rope side ladder, put over, no doubt, +for the master of the tug when he came to fetch away our letters, +had not been hauled in as it should have been. I became annoyed at this, +for exactitude in some small matters is the very soul of discipline. +Then I reflected that I had myself peremptorily dismissed my +officers from duty, and by my own act had prevented the anchor +watch being formally set and things properly attended to. +I asked myself whether it was wise ever to interfere with the +established routine of duties even from the kindest of motives. +My action might have made me appear eccentric. Goodness only knew +how that absurdly whiskered mate would "account" for my conduct, +and what the whole ship thought of that informality of their new captain. +I was vexed with myself. + +Not from compunction certainly, but, as it were mechanically, +I proceeded to get the ladder in myself. Now a side ladder +of that sort is a light affair and comes in easily, yet my +vigorous tug, which should have brought it flying on board, +merely recoiled upon my body in a totally unexpected jerk. +What the devil! . . . I was so astounded by the immovableness +of that ladder that I remained stockstill, trying to +account for it to myself like that imbecile mate of mine. +In the end, of course, I put my head over the rail. + +The side of the ship made an opaque belt of shadow on +the darkling glassy shimmer of the sea. But I saw at once +something elongated and pale floating very close to the ladder. +Before I could form a guess a faint flash of phosphorescent light, +which seemed to issue suddenly from the naked body of a man, +flickered in the sleeping water with the elusive, silent play +of summer lightning in a night sky. With a gasp I saw revealed +to my stare a pair of feet, the long legs, a broad livid back +immersed right up to the neck in a greenish cadaverous glow. +One hand, awash, clutched the bottom rung of the ladder. +He was complete but for the head. A headless corpse! The cigar +dropped out of my gaping mouth with a tiny plop and a short hiss +quite audible in the absolute stillness of all things under heaven. +At that I suppose he raised up his face, a dimly pale oval +in the shadow of the ship's side. But even then I could only +barely make out down there the shape of his black-haired head. +However, it was enough for the horrid, frost-bound sensation +which had gripped me about the chest to pass off. +The moment of vain exclamations was past, too. I only climbed +on the spare spar and leaned over the rail as far as I could, +to bring my eyes nearer to that mystery floating alongside. + +As he hung by the ladder, like a resting swimmer, the sea +lightning played about his limbs at every stir; and he appeared +in it ghastly, silvery, fishlike. He remained as mute as +a fish, too. He made no motion to get out of the water, either. +It was inconceivable that he should not attempt to come on board, +and strangely troubling to suspect that perhaps he did not want to. +And my first words were prompted by just that troubled incertitude. + +"What's the matter?" I asked in my ordinary tone, speaking down to the face +upturned exactly under mine. + +"Cramp," it answered, no louder. Then slightly anxious, "I say, +no need to call anyone." + +"I was not going to," I said. + +"Are you alone on deck?" + +"Yes." + +I had somehow the impression that he was on the point of letting go the ladder +to swim away beyond my ken--mysterious as he came. But, for the moment, +this being appearing as if he had risen from the bottom of the sea +(it was certainly the nearest land to the ship) wanted only to know the time. +I told him. And he, down there, tentatively: + +"I suppose your captain's turned in?" + +"I am sure he isn't," I said. + +He seemed to struggle with himself, for I heard something +like the low, bitter murmur of doubt. "What's the good?" +His next words came out with a hesitating effort. + +"Look here, my man. Could you call him out quietly?" + +I thought the time Had come to declare myself. + +"I am the captain." + +I heard a "By Jove!" whispered at the level of the water. +The phosphorescence flashed in the swirl of the water all +about his limbs, his other hand seized the ladder. + +"My name's Leggatt." + +The voice was calm and resolute. A good voice. The self-possession +of that man had somehow induced a corresponding state in myself. +It was very quietly that I remarked: + +"You must be a good swimmer." + +"Yes. I've been in the water practically since nine o'clock. +The question for me now is whether I am to let go this ladder +and go on swimming till I sink from exhaustion, or--to come +on board here." + +I felt this was no mere formula of desperate speech, +but a real alternative in the view of a strong soul. +I should have gathered from this that he was young; indeed, it is +only the young who are ever confronted by such clear issues. +But at the time it was pure intuition on my part. +A mysterious communication was established already between +us two--in the face of that silent, darkened tropical sea. +I was young, too; young enough to make no comment. +The man in the water began suddenly to climb up the ladder, +and I hastened away from the rail to fetch some clothes. + +Before entering the cabin I stood still, listening in the lobby at +the foot of the stairs. A faint snore came through the closed door +of the chief mate's room. The second mate's door was on the hook, +but the darkness in there was absolutely soundless. He, too, +was young and could sleep like a stone. Remained the steward, +but he was not likely to wake up before he was called. +I got a sleeping suit out of my room and, coming back on deck, +saw the naked man from the sea sitting on the main hatch, +glimmering white in the darkness, his elbows on his knees and his +head in his hands. In a moment he had concealed his damp body +in a sleeping suit of the same gray-stripe pattern as the one +I was wearing and followed me like my double on the poop. +Together we moved right aft, barefooted, silent. + +"What is it?" I asked in a deadened voice, taking the lighted lamp +out of the binnacle, and raising it to his face. + +"An ugly business." + +He had rather regular features; a good mouth; light eyes under +somewhat heavy, dark eyebrows; a smooth, square forehead; no growth +on his cheeks; a small, brown mustache, and a well-shaped, round chin. +His expression was concentrated, meditative, under the inspecting +light of the lamp I held up to his face; such as a man thinking +hard in solitude might wear. My sleeping suit was just right +for his size. A well-knit young fellow of twenty-five at most. +He caught his lower lip with the edge of white, even teeth. + +"Yes," I said, replacing the lamp in the binnacle. +The warm, heavy tropical night closed upon his head again. + +"There's a ship over there," he murmured. + +"Yes, I know. The Sephora. Did you know of us?" + +"Hadn't the slightest idea. I am the mate of her--" +He paused and corrected himself. "I should say I WAS." + +"Aha! Something wrong?" + +"Yes. Very wrong indeed. I've killed a man." + +"What do you mean? Just now?" + +"No, on the passage. Weeks ago. Thirty-nine south. +When I say a man--" + +"Fit of temper," I suggested, confidently. + +The shadowy, dark head, like mine, seemed to nod imperceptibly +above the ghostly gray of my sleeping suit. It was, in the night, +as though I had been faced by my own reflection in the depths +of a somber and immense mirror. + +"A pretty thing to have to own up to for a Conway boy," +murmured my double, distinctly. + +"You're a Conway boy?" + +"I am," he said, as if startled. Then, slowly . . . "Perhaps you too--" + +It was so; but being a couple of years older I had left before +he joined. After a quick interchange of dates a silence fell; +and I thought suddenly of my absurd mate with his terrific whiskers +and the "Bless my soul--you don't say so" type of intellect. +My double gave me an inkling of his thoughts by saying: +"My father's a parson in Norfolk. Do you see me before a judge +and jury on that charge? For myself I can't see the necessity. +There are fellows that an angel from heaven--And I am not that. +He was one of those creatures that are just simmering +all the time with a silly sort of wickedness. +Miserable devils that have no business to live at all. +He wouldn't do his duty and wouldn't let anybody else do theirs. +But what's the good of talking! You know well enough the sort +of ill-conditioned snarling cur--" + +He appealed to me as if our experiences had been as identical as our clothes. +And I knew well enough the pestiferous danger of such a character where there +are no means of legal repression. And I knew well enough also that my double +there was no homicidal ruffian. I did not think of asking him for details, +and he told me the story roughly in brusque, disconnected sentences. +I needed no more. I saw it all going on as though I were myself inside +that other sleeping suit. + +"It happened while we were setting a reefed foresail, at dusk. +Reefed foresail! You understand the sort of weather. The only sail we +had left to keep the ship running; so you may guess what it had been +like for days. Anxious sort of job, that. He gave me some of his cursed +insolence at the sheet. I tell you I was overdone with this terrific weather +that seemed to have no end to it. Terrific, I tell you--and a deep ship. +I believe the fellow himself was half crazed with funk. It was no time +for gentlemanly reproof, so I turned round and felled him like an ox. +He up and at me. We closed just as an awful sea made for the ship. +All hands saw it coming and took to the rigging, but I had him by +the throat, and went on shaking him like a rat, the men above us yelling, +`Look out! look out!' Then a crash as if the sky had fallen on my head. +They say that for over ten minutes hardly anything was to be seen +of the ship--just the three masts and a bit of the forecastle head +and of the poop all awash driving along in a smother of foam. +It was a miracle that they found us, jammed together behind the forebitts. +It's clear that I meant business, because I was holding him by the throat +still when they picked us up. He was black in the face. It was too much +for them. It seems they rushed us aft together, gripped as we were, +screaming `Murder!' like a lot of lunatics, and broke into the cuddy. +And the ship running for her life, touch and go all the time, any minute +her last in a sea fit to turn your hair gray only a-looking at it. +I understand that the skipper, too, started raving like the rest of them. +The man had been deprived of sleep for more than a week, and to have +this sprung on him at the height of a furious gale nearly drove him +out of his mind. I wonder they didn't fling me overboard after +getting the carcass of their precious shipmate out of my fingers. +They had rather a job to separate us, I've been told. A sufficiently +fierce story to make an old judge and a respectable jury sit up a bit. +The first thing I heard when I came to myself was the maddening +howling of that endless gale, and on that the voice of the old man. +He was hanging on to my bunk, staring into my face out of his sou'wester. + +"`Mr. Leggatt, you have killed a man. You can act no longer +as chief mate of this ship.'" + +His care to subdue his voice made it sound monotonous. +He rested a hand on the end of the skylight to steady himself with, +and all that time did not stir a limb, so far as I could see. +"Nice little tale for a quiet tea party," he concluded +in the same tone. + +One of my hands, too, rested on the end of the skylight; neither did I stir +a limb, so far as I knew. We stood less than a foot from each other. +It occurred to me that if old "Bless my soul--you don't say so" +were to put his head up the companion and catch sight of us, +he would think he was seeing double, or imagine himself come +upon a scene of weird witchcraft; the strange captain having +a quiet confabulation by the wheel with his own gray ghost. +I became very much concerned to prevent anything of the sort. +I heard the other's soothing undertone. + +"My father's a parson in Norfolk," it said. Evidently he had +forgotten he had told me this important fact before. +Truly a nice little tale. + +"You had better slip down into my stateroom now," I said, +moving off stealthily. My double followed my movements; +our bare feet made no sound; I let him in, closed the door +with care, and, after giving a call to the second mate, +returned on deck for my relief. + +"Not much sign of any wind yet," I remarked when he approached. + +"No, sir. Not much," he assented, sleepily, in his hoarse voice, +with just enough deference, no more, and barely suppressing a yawn. + +"Well, that's all you have to look out for. You have got your orders." + +"Yes, sir." + +I paced a turn or two on the poop and saw him take up his position face +forward with his elbow in the ratlines of the mizzen rigging before I +went below. The mate's faint snoring was still going on peacefully. +The cuddy lamp was burning over the table on which stood a vase +with flowers, a polite attention from the ship's provision merchant-- +the last flowers we should see for the next three months at the very least. +Two bunches of bananas hung from the beam symmetrically, one on each +side of the rudder casing. Everything was as before in the ship-- +except that two of her captain's sleeping suits were simultaneously +in use, one motionless in the cuddy, the other keeping very still +in the captain's stateroom. + +It must be explained here that my cabin had the form of the capital +letter L, the door being within the angle and opening into the short part +of the letter. A couch was to the left, the bed place to the right; +my writing desk and the chronometers' table faced the door. +But anyone opening it, unless he stepped right inside, had no +view of what I call the long (or vertical) part of the letter. +It contained some lockers surmounted by a bookcase; and a few clothes, +a thick jacket or two, caps, oilskin coat, and such like, hung on hooks. +There was at the bottom of that part a door opening into my bathroom, +which could be entered also directly from the saloon. +But that way was never used. + +The mysterious arrival had discovered the advantage of this particular shape. +Entering my room, lighted strongly by a big bulkhead lamp swung on gimbals +above my writing desk, I did not see him anywhere till he stepped out quietly +from behind the coats hung in the recessed part. + +"I heard somebody moving about, and went in there at once," he whispered. + +I, too, spoke under my breath. + +"Nobody is likely to come in here without knocking and getting permission." + +He nodded. His face was thin and the sunburn faded, as though +he had been ill. And no wonder. He had been, I heard presently, +kept under arrest in his cabin for nearly seven weeks. +But there was nothing sickly in his eyes or in his expression. +He was not a bit like me, really; yet, as we stood leaning +over my bed place, whispering side by side, with our dark heads +together and our backs to the door, anybody bold enough to open +it stealthily would have been treated to the uncanny sight +of a double captain busy talking in whispers with his other self. + +"But all this doesn't tell me how you came to hang on to our side ladder," +I inquired, in the hardly audible murmurs we used, after he had told +me something more of the proceedings on board the Sephora once the bad +weather was over. + +"When we sighted Java Head I had had time to think all those matters +out several times over. I had six weeks of doing nothing else, +and with only an hour or so every evening for a tramp on the quarter-deck." + +He whispered, his arms folded on the side of my bed place, staring through +the open port. And I could imagine perfectly the manner of this thinking out-- +a stubborn if not a steadfast operation; something of which I should have +been perfectly incapable. + +"I reckoned it would be dark before we closed with the land," +he continued, so low that I had to strain my hearing near +as we were to each other, shoulder touching shoulder almost. +"So I asked to speak to the old man. He always seemed +very sick when he came to see me--as if he could not look +me in the face. You know, that foresail saved the ship. +She was too deep to have run long under bare poles. +And it was I that managed to set it for him. Anyway, he came. +When I had him in my cabin--he stood by the door looking +at me as if I had the halter round my neck already-- +I asked him right away to leave my cabin door unlocked +at night while the ship was going through Sunda Straits. +There would be the Java coast within two or three miles, +off Angier Point. I wanted nothing more. I've had a prize +for swimming my second year in the Conway." + +"I can believe it," I breathed out. + +"God only knows why they locked me in every night. +To see some of their faces you'd have thought they +were afraid I'd go about at night strangling people. +Am I a murdering brute? Do I look it? By Jove! If I had been +he wouldn't have trusted himself like that into my room. +You'll say I might have chucked him aside and bolted out, +there and then--it was dark already. Well, no. And for +the same reason I wouldn't think of trying to smash the door. +There would have been a rush to stop me at the noise, +and I did not mean to get into a confounded scrimmage. +Somebody else might have got killed--for I would not have +broken out only to get chucked back, and I did not want any +more of that work. He refused, looking more sick than ever. +He was afraid of the men, and also of that old second mate of his +who had been sailing with him for years--a gray-headed old humbug; +and his steward, too, had been with him devil knows how long-- +seventeen years or more--a dogmatic sort of loafer who hated +me like poison, just because I was the chief mate. No chief +mate ever made more than one voyage in the Sephora, you know. +Those two old chaps ran the ship. Devil only knows what the skipper +wasn't afraid of (all his nerve went to pieces altogether +in that hellish spell of bad weather we had)--of what the law +would do to him--of his wife, perhaps. Oh, yes! she's on board. +Though I don't think she would have meddled. She would have +been only too glad to have me out of the ship in any way. +The `brand of Cain' business, don't you see. That's all right. +I was ready enough to go off wandering on the face of the earth-- +and that was price enough to pay for an Abel of that sort. +Anyhow, he wouldn't listen to me. 'This thing must take its course. +I represent the law here.' He was shaking like a leaf. +`So you won't?' `No!' 'Then I hope you will be able to sleep on that,' +I said, and turned my back on him. `I wonder that you can,' +cries he, and locks the door. + +"Well after that, I couldn't. Not very well. +That was three weeks ago. We have had a slow passage +through the Java Sea; drifted about Carimata for ten days. +When we anchored here they thought, I suppose, it was all right. +The nearest land (and that's five miles) is the ship's destination; +the consul would soon set about catching me; and there would +have been no object in bolding to these islets there. +I don't suppose there's a drop of water on them. I don't know +how it was, but tonight that steward, after bringing me my supper, +went out to let me eat it, and left the door unlocked. +And I ate it--all there was, too. After I had finished I strolled +out on the quarter-deck. I don't know that I meant to do anything. +A breath of fresh air was all I wanted, I believe. +Then a sudden temptation came over me. I kicked off my slippers +and was in the water before I had made up my mind fairly. +Somebody heard the splash and they raised an awful hullabaloo. +`He's gone! Lower the boats! He's committed suicide! +No, he's swimming.' Certainly I was swimming. It's not +so easy for a swimmer like me to commit suicide by drowning. +I landed on the nearest islet before the boat left the ship's side. +I heard them pulling about in the dark, hailing, and so on, but after +a bit they gave up. Everything quieted down and the anchorage +became still as death. I sat down on a stone and began to think. +I felt certain they would start searching for me at daylight. +There was no place to hide on those stony things-- +and if there had been, what would have been the good? +But now I was clear of that ship, I was not going back. +So after a while I took off all my clothes, tied them up in a +bundle with a stone inside, and dropped them in the deep water +on the outer side of that islet. That was suicide enough for me. +Let them think what they liked, but I didn't mean to drown myself. +I meant to swim till I sank--but that's not the same thing. +I struck out for another of these little islands, and it +was from that one that I first saw your riding light. +Something to swim for. I went on easily, and on the way I came +upon a flat rock a foot or two above water. In the daytime, +I dare say, you might make it out with a glass from your poop. +I scrambled up on it and rested myself for a bit. +Then I made another start. That last spell must have been +over a mile." + +His whisper was getting fainter and fainter, and all the time +he stared straight out through the porthole, in which there +was not even a star to be seen. I had not interrupted him. +There was something that made comment impossible in his narrative, +or perhaps in himself; a sort of feeling, a quality, which I can't find +a name for. And when he ceased, all I found was a futile whisper: +"So you swam for our light?" + +"Yes--straight for it. It was something to swim for. +I couldn't see any stars low down because the coast was in the way, +and I couldn't see the land, either. The water was like glass. +One might have been swimming in a confounded thousand-feet deep +cistern with no place for scrambling out anywhere; but what I didn't +like was the notion of swimming round and round like a crazed +bullock before I gave out; and as I didn't mean to go back. +. . No. Do you see me being hauled back, stark naked, +off one of these little islands by the scruff of the neck +and fighting like a wild beast? Somebody would have got killed +for certain, and I did not want any of that. So I went on. +Then your ladder--" + +"Why didn't you hail the ship?" I asked, a little louder. + +He touched my shoulder lightly. Lazy footsteps came right over our heads +and stopped. The second mate had crossed from the other side of the poop +and might have been hanging over the rail for all we knew. + +"He couldn't hear us talking--could he?" My double breathed +into my very ear, anxiously. + +His anxiety was in answer, a sufficient answer, to the question +I had put to him. An answer containing all the difficulty +of that situation. I closed the porthole quietly, to make sure. +A louder word might have been overheard. + +"Who's that?" he whispered then. + +"My second mate. But I don't know much more of the fellow than you do." + +And I told him a little about myself. I had been appointed to take +charge while I least expected anything of the sort, not quite +a fortnight ago. I didn't know either the ship or the people. +Hadn't had the time in port to look about me or size anybody up. +And as to the crew, all they knew was that I was appointed to take +the ship home. For the rest, I was almost as much of a stranger on +board as himself, I said. And at the moment I felt it most acutely. +I felt that it would take very little to make me a suspect person +in the eyes of the ship's company. + +He had turned about meantime; and we, the two strangers in the ship, +faced each other in identical attitudes. + +"Your ladder--" he murmured, after a silence. "Who'd have thought +of finding a ladder hanging over at night in a ship anchored out here! +I felt just then a very unpleasant faintness. After the life I've +been leading for nine weeks, anybody would have got out of condition. +I wasn't capable of swimming round as far as your rudder chains. +And, lo and behold! there was a ladder to get hold of. +After I gripped it I said to myself, `What's the good?' +When I saw a man's head looking over I thought I would swim away +presently and leave him shouting--in whatever language it was. +I didn't mind being looked at. I--I liked it. And then you speaking to me +so quietly--as if you had expected me--made me hold on a little longer. +It had been a confounded lonely time--I don't mean while swimming. +I was glad to talk a little to somebody that didn't belong to the Sephora. +As to asking for the captain, that was a mere impulse. It could +have been no use, with all the ship knowing about me and the other +people pretty certain to be round here in the morning. I don't know-- +I wanted to be seen, to talk with somebody, before I went on. +I don't know what I would have said. . . . `Fine night, isn't it?' +or something of the sort." + +"Do you think they will be round here presently?" +I asked with some incredulity. + +"Quite likely," he said, faintly. + +"He looked extremely haggard all of a sudden. His head rolled +on his shoulders. + +"H'm. We shall see then. Meantime get into that bed," I whispered. +"Want help? There." + +It was a rather high bed place with a set of drawers underneath. +This amazing swimmer really needed the lift I gave him by seizing his leg. +He tumbled in, rolled over on his back, and flung one arm across his eyes. +And then, with his face nearly hidden, he must have looked exactly as I used +to look in that bed. I gazed upon my other self for a while before drawing +across carefully the two green serge curtains which ran on a brass rod. +I thought for a moment of pinning them together for greater safety, +but I sat down on the couch, and once there I felt unwilling to rise +and hunt for a pin. I would do it in a moment. I was extremely tired, +in a peculiarly intimate way, by the strain of stealthiness, +by the effort of whispering and the general secrecy of this excitement. +It was three o'clock by now and I had been on my feet since nine, +but I was not sleepy; I could not have gone to sleep. I sat there, +fagged out, looking at the curtains, trying to clear my mind of the confused +sensation of being in two places at once, and greatly bothered by an +exasperating knocking in my head. It was a relief to discover suddenly +that it was not in my head at all, but on the outside of the door. +Before I could collect myself the words "Come in" were out of my mouth, +and the steward entered with a tray, bringing in my morning coffee. +I had slept, after all, and I was so frightened that I shouted, +"This way! I am here, steward," as though he had been miles away. +He put down the tray on the table next the couch and only then said, +very quietly, "I can see you are here, sir." I felt him give me a keen look, +but I dared not meet his eyes just then. He must have wondered why I +had drawn the curtains of my bed before going to sleep on the couch. +He went out, hooking the door open as usual. + +I heard the crew washing decks above me. I knew I would have +been told at once if there had been any wind. Calm, I thought, +and I was doubly vexed. Indeed, I felt dual more than ever. +The steward reappeared suddenly in the doorway. +I jumped up from the couch so quickly that he gave a start. + +"What do you want here?" + +"Close your port, sir--they are washing decks." + +"It is closed," I said, reddening. + +"Very well, sir." But he did not move from the doorway and returned +my stare in an extraordinary, equivocal manner for a time. +Then his eyes wavered, all his expression changed, and in a voice +unusually gentle, almost coaxingly: + +"May I come in to take the empty cup away, sir?" + +"Of course!" I turned my back on him while he popped in and out. +Then I unhooked and closed the door and even pushed the bolt. +This sort of thing could not go on very long. The cabin was as hot +as an oven, too. I took a peep at my double, and discovered +that he had not moved, his arm was still over his eyes; but his +chest heaved; his hair was wet; his chin glistened with perspiration. +I reached over him and opened the port. + +"I must show myself on deck," I reflected. + +Of course, theoretically, I could do what I liked, with no +one to say nay to me within the whole circle of the horizon; +but to lock my cabin door and take the key away I did not dare. +Directly I put my head out of the companion I saw the group +of my two officers, the second mate barefooted, the chief +mate in long India-rubber boots, near the break of the poop, +and the steward halfway down the poop ladder talking to them eagerly. +He happened to catch sight of me and dived, the second +ran down on the main-deck shouting some order or other, +and the chief mate came to meet me, touching his cap. + +There was a sort of curiosity in his eye that I did not like. +I don't know whether the steward had told them that I was "queer" only, +or downright drunk, but I know the man meant to have a good look at me. +I watched him coming with a smile which, as he got into point-blank range, +took effect and froze his very whiskers. I did not give him time +to open his lips. + +"Square the yards by lifts and braces before the hands go to breakfast." + +It was the first particular order I had given on board that ship; +and I stayed on deck to see it executed, too. I had felt the need +of asserting myself without loss of time. That sneering young cub +got taken down a peg or two on that occasion, and I also seized +the opportunity of having a good look at the face of every +foremast man as they filed past me to go to the after braces. +At breakfast time, eating nothing myself, I presided with such +frigid dignity that the two mates were only too glad to escape from +the cabin as soon as decency permitted; and all the time the dual +working of my mind distracted me almost to the point of insanity. +I was constantly watching myself, my secret self, as dependent +on my actions as my own personality, sleeping in that bed, +behind that door which faced me as I sat at the head of the table. +It was very much like being mad, only it was worse because one was +aware of it. + +I had to shake him for a solid minute, but when at last he opened his eyes +it was in the full possession of his senses, with an inquiring look. + +"All's well so far," I whispered. "Now you must vanish into the bathroom." + +He did so, as noiseless as a ghost, and then I rang for the steward, +and facing him boldly, directed him to tidy up my stateroom while I was +having my bath--"and be quick about it." As my tone admitted of no excuses, +he said, "Yes, sir," and ran off to fetch his dustpan and brushes. +I took a bath and did most of my dressing, splashing, and whistling +softly for the steward's edification, while the secret sharer of my life +stood drawn up bolt upright in that little space, his face looking +very sunken in daylight, his eyelids lowered under the stern, dark line +of his eyebrows drawn together by a slight frown. + +When I left him there to go back to my room the steward +was finishing dusting. I sent for the mate and engaged him +in some insignificant conversation. It was, as it were, +trifling with the terrific character of his whiskers; but my object +was to give him an opportunity for a good look at my cabin. +And then I could at last shut, with a clear conscience, the door +of my stateroom and get my double back into the recessed part. +There was nothing else for it. He had to sit still on a small +folding stool, half smothered by the heavy coats hanging there. +We listened to the steward going into the bathroom out of +the saloon, filling the water bottles there, scrubbing the bath, +setting things to rights, whisk, bang, clatter--out again +into the saloon--turn the key--click. Such was my scheme +for keeping my second self invisible. Nothing better could +be contrived under the circumstances. And there we sat; +I at my writing desk ready to appear busy with some papers, +he behind me out of sight of the door. It would not have +been prudent to talk in daytime; and I could not have stood +the excitement of that queer sense of whispering to myself. +Now and then, glancing over my shoulder, I saw him far back there, +sitting rigidly on the low stool, his bare feet close together, +his arms folded, his head hanging on his breast--and perfectly still. +Anybody would have taken him for me. + +I was fascinated by it myself. Every moment I had to glance +over my shoulder. I was looking at him when a voice outside +the door said: + +"Beg pardon, sir." + +"Well! . . . I kept my eyes on him, and so when the voice outside +the door announced, "There's a ship's boat coming our way, sir," +I saw him give a start--the first movement he had made for hours. +But he did not raise his bowed head. + +"All right. Get the ladder over." + +I hesitated. Should I whisper something to him? But what? +His immobility seemed to have been never disturbed. +What could I tell him he did not know already? . . . Finally +I went on deck. + + + +II + +The skipper of the Sephora had a thin red whisker all round his face, +and the sort of complexion that goes with hair of that color; +also the particular, rather smeary shade of blue in the eyes. +He was not exactly a showy figure; his shoulders were high, +his stature but middling--one leg slightly more bandy +than the other. He shook hands, looking vaguely around. +A spiritless tenacity was his main characteristic, I judged. +I behaved with a politeness which seemed to disconcert him. +Perhaps he was shy. He mumbled to me as if he were ashamed of +what he was saying; gave his name (it was something like Archbold-- +but at this distance of years I hardly am sure), his ship's name, +and a few other particulars of that sort, in the manner +of a criminal making a reluctant and doleful confession. +He had had terrible weather on the passage out--terrible--terrible-- +wife aboard, too. + +By this time we were seated in the cabin and the steward brought in a +tray with a bottle and glasses. "Thanks! No." Never took liquor. +Would have some water, though. He drank two tumblerfuls. +Terrible thirsty work. Ever since daylight had been exploring +the islands round his ship. + +"What was that for--fun?" I asked, with an appearance of polite interest. + +"No!" He sighed. "Painful duty." + +As he persisted in his mumbling and I wanted my double to hear every word, +I hit upon the notion of informing him that I regretted to say I was +hard of hearing. + +"Such a young man, too!" he nodded, keeping his smeary blue, +unintelligent eyes fastened upon me. "What was the cause of it-- +some disease?" he inquired, without the least sympathy and as +if he thought that, if so, I'd got no more than I deserved. + +"Yes; disease," I admitted in a cheerful tone which seemed to shock him. +But my point was gained, because he had to raise his voice to give +me his tale. It is not worth while to record his version. +It was just over two months since all this had happened, and he had thought +so much about it that he seemed completely muddled as to its bearings, +but still immensely impressed. + +"What would you think of such a thing happening on board your own ship? +I've had the Sephora for these fifteen years. I am a well-known shipmaster." + +He was densely distressed--and perhaps I should have sympathized +with him if I had been able to detach my mental vision +from the unsuspected sharer of my cabin as though he were my +second self. There he was on the other side of the bulkhead, +four or five feet from us, no more, as we sat in the saloon. +I looked politely at Captain Archbold (if that was his name), +but it was the other I saw, in a gray sleeping suit, seated on +a low stool, his bare feet close together, his arms folded, +and every word said between us falling into the ears of his +dark head bowed on his chest. + +"I have been at sea now, man and boy, for seven-and-thirty years, +and I've never heard of such a thing happening in an English ship. +And that it should be my ship. Wife on board, too." + +I was hardly listening to him. + +"Don't you think," I said, "that the heavy sea which, +you told me, came aboard just then might have killed the man? +I have seen the sheer weight of a sea kill a man very neatly, +by simply breaking his neck." + +"Good God!" he uttered, impressively, fixing his smeary blue eyes on me. +"The sea! No man killed by the sea ever looked like that." +He seemed positively scandalized at my suggestion. And as I gazed +at him certainly not prepared for anything original on his part, +he advanced his head close to mine and thrust his tongue out at me +so suddenly that I couldn't help starting back. + +After scoring over my calmness in this graphic way he nodded wisely. +If I had seen the sight, he assured me, I would never forget it as long +as I lived. The weather was too bad to give the corpse a proper sea burial. +So next day at dawn they took it up on the poop, covering its face +with a bit of bunting; he read a short prayer, and then, just as it was, +in its oilskins and long boots, they launched it amongst those mountainous +seas that seemed ready every moment to swallow up the ship herself +and the terrified lives on board of her. + +"That reefed foresail saved you," I threw in. + +"Under God--it did," he exclaimed fervently. "It was by a special mercy, +I firmly believe, that it stood some of those hurricane squalls." + +"It was the setting of that sail which--" I began. + +"God's own hand in it," he interrupted me. "Nothing less could have done it. +I don't mind telling you that I hardly dared give the order. +It seemed impossible that we could touch anything without losing it, +and then our last hope would have been gone." + +The terror of that gale was on him yet. I let him go on for a bit, +then said, casually--as if returning to a minor subject: + +"You were very anxious to give up your mate to the shore people, I believe?" + +He was. To the law. His obscure tenacity on that point had in it +something incomprehensible and a little awful; something, as it +were, mystical, quite apart from his anxiety that he should +not be suspected of "countenancing any doings of that sort." +Seven-and-thirty virtuous years at sea, of which over twenty +of immaculate command, and the last fifteen in the Sephora, +seemed to have laid him under some pitiless obligation. + +"And you know," he went on, groping shame-facedly amongst his feelings, +"I did not engage that young fellow. His people had some +interest with my owners. I was in a way forced to take him on. +He looked very smart, very gentlemanly, and all that. +But do you know--I never liked him, somehow. I am a plain man. +You see, he wasn't exactly the sort for the chief mate of a ship +like the Sephora." + +I had become so connected in thoughts and impressions with the secret +sharer of my cabin that I felt as if I, personally, were being +given to understand that I, too, was not the sort that would +have done for the chief mate of a ship like the Sephora. +I had no doubt of it in my mind. + +"Not at all the style of man. You understand," he insisted, +superfluously, looking hard at me. + +I smiled urbanely. He seemed at a loss for a while. + +"I suppose I must report a suicide." + +"Beg pardon?" + +"Suicide! That's what I'll have to write to my owners directly I get in." + +"Unless you manage to recover him before tomorrow," +I assented, dispassionately. . . . "I mean, alive." + +He mumbled something which I really did not catch, and I turned my ear +to him in a puzzled manner. He fairly bawled: + +"The land--I say, the mainland is at least seven miles off my anchorage." + +"About that." + +My lack of excitement, of curiosity, of surprise, of any +sort of pronounced interest, began to arouse his distrust. +But except for the felicitous pretense of deafness I had not tried +to pretend anything. I had felt utterly incapable of playing +the part of ignorance properly, and therefore was afraid to try. +It is also certain that he had brought some ready-made suspicions +with him, and that he viewed my politeness as a strange and +unnatural phenomenon. And yet how else could I have received him? +Not heartily! That was impossible for psychological reasons, +which I need not state here. My only object was to keep off +his inquiries. Surlily? Yes, but surliness might have provoked +a point-blank question. From its novelty to him and from its nature, +punctilious courtesy was the manner best calculated to restrain the man. +But there was the danger of his breaking through my defense bluntly. +I could not, I think, have met him by a direct lie, also for psychological +(not moral) reasons. If he had only known how afraid I was of +his putting my feeling of identity with the other to the test! +But, strangely enough--(I thought of it only afterwards)-- +I believe that he was not a little disconcerted by the reverse +side of that weird situation, by something in me that reminded +him of the man he was seeking--suggested a mysterious similitude +to the young fellow he had distrusted and disliked from the first. + +However that might have been, the silence was not very prolonged. +He took another oblique step. + +"I reckon I had no more than a two-mile pull to your ship. +Not a bit more." + +"And quite enough, too, in this awful heat," I said. + +Another pause full of mistrust followed. Necessity, they say, is mother +of invention, but fear, too, is not barren of ingenious suggestions. +And I was afraid he would ask me point-blank for news of my other self. + +"Nice little saloon, isn't it?" I remarked, as if noticing for the first +time the way his eyes roamed from one closed door to the other. +"And very well fitted out, too. Here, for instance," I continued, +reaching over the back of my seat negligently and flinging the door open, +"is my bathroom." + +He made an eager movement, but hardly gave it a glance. +I got up, shut the door of the bathroom, and invited him to have +a look round, as if I were very proud of my accomodation. +He had to rise and be shown round, but he went through the business +without any raptures whatever. + +"And now we'll have a look at my stateroom," I declared, +in a voice as loud as I dared to make it, crossing the cabin +to the starboard side with purposely heavy steps. + +He followed me in and gazed around. My intelligent double had vanished. +I played my part. + +"Very convenient--isn't it?" + +Very nice. Very comf . . ." He didn't finish and went out +brusquely as if to escape from some unrighteous wiles of mine. +But it was not to be. I had been too frightened not to feel vengeful; +I felt I had him on the run, and I meant to keep him on the run. +My polite insistence must have had something menacing in it, +because he gave in suddenly. And I did not let him off a single item; +mate's room, pantry, storerooms, the very sail locker which was +also under the poop--he had to look into them all. When at last I +showed him out on the quarter-deck he drew a long, spiritless sigh, +and mumbled dismally that he must really be going back to his ship now. +I desired my mate, who had joined us, to see to the captain's boat. + +The man of whiskers gave a blast on the whistle which he used +to wear hanging round his neck, and yelled, "Sephora's away!" +My double down there in my cabin must have heard, and certainly +could not feel more relieved than I. Four fellows came running +out from somewhere forward and went over the side, while my +own men, appearing on deck too, lined the rail. I escorted +my visitor to the gangway ceremoniously, and nearly overdid it. +He was a tenacious beast. On the very ladder he lingered, +and in that unique, guiltily conscientious manner of sticking +to the point: + +"I say . . . you . . . you don't think that--" + +I covered his voice loudly: + +"Certainly not. . . . I am delighted. Good-by." + +I had an idea of what he meant to say, and just saved myself +by the privilege of defective hearing. He was too shaken +generally to insist, but my mate, close witness of that parting, +looked mystified and his face took on a thoughtful cast. +As I did not want to appear as if I wished to avoid all +communication with my officers, he had the opportunity +to address me. + +"Seems a very nice man. His boat's crew told our chaps a very +extraordinary story, if what I am told by the steward is true. +I suppose you had it from the captain, sir?" + +"Yes. I had a story from the captain." + +"A very horrible affair--isn't it, sir?" + +"It is." + +"Beats all these tales we hear about murders in Yankee ships." + +"I don't think it beats them. I don't think it resembles them +in the least." + +"Bless my soul--you don't say so! But of course I've no +acquaintance whatever with American ships, not I so I couldn't +go against your knowledge. It's horrible enough for me. +. . . But the queerest part is that those fellows seemed to have +some idea the man was hidden aboard here. They had really. +Did you ever hear of such a thing?" + +"Preposterous--isn't it?" + +We were walking to and fro athwart the quarter-deck. No one of the crew +forward could be seen (the day was Sunday), and the mate pursued: + +"There was some little dispute about it. Our chaps took offense. +`As if we would harbor a thing like that,' they said. +`Wouldn't you like to look for him in our coal-hole?' Quite a tiff. +But they made it up in the end. I suppose he did drown himself. +Don't you, sir?" + +"I don't suppose anything." + +"You have no doubt in the matter, sir?" + +"None whatever." + +I left him suddenly. I felt I was producing a bad impression, +but with my double down there it was most trying to be on deck. And it +was almost as trying to be below. Altogether a nerve-trying situation. +But on the whole I felt less torn in two when I was with him. +There was no one in the whole ship whom I dared take into +my confidence. Since the hands had got to know his story, +it would have been impossible to pass him off for anyone else, +and an accidental discovery was to be dreaded now more than ever. +. . . + +The steward being engaged in laying the table for dinner, +we could talk only with our eyes when I first went down. +Later in the afternoon we had a cautious try at whispering. +The Sunday quietness of the ship was against us; the stillness +of air and water around her was against us; the elements, +the men were against us--everything was against us in our +secret partnership; time itself--for this could not go on forever. +The very trust in Providence was, I suppose, denied to his guilt. +Shall I confess that this thought cast me down very much? +And as to the chapter of accidents which counts for so much +in the book of success, I could only hope that it was closed. +For what favorable accident could be expected? + +"Did you hear everything?" were my first words as soon as we took +up our position side by side, leaning over my bed place. + +He had. And the proof of it was his earnest whisper, "The man told you +he hardly dared to give the order." + +I understood the reference to be to that saving foresail. + +"Yes. He was afraid of it being lost in the setting." + +"I assure you he never gave the order. He may think he did, +but he never gave it. He stood there with me on the break of the poop +after the main topsail blew away, and whimpered about our last hope-- +positively whimpered about it and nothing else--and the night coming on! +To hear one's skipper go on like that in such weather was enough +to drive any fellow out of his mind. It worked me up into a sort +of desperation. I just took it into my own hands and went +away from him, boiling, and--But what's the use telling you? +YOU know! . . . Do you think that if I had not been pretty fierce +with them I should have got the men to do anything? Not It! +The bo's'n perhaps? Perhaps! It wasn't a heavy sea--it was a sea +gone mad! I suppose the end of the world will be something like that; +and a man may have the heart to see it coming once and be done with it-- +but to have to face it day after day--I don't blame anybody. +I was precious little better than the rest. Only--I was an officer +of that old coal wagon, anyhow--" + +"I quite understand," I conveyed that sincere assurance into his ear. +He was out of breath with whispering; I could hear him pant slightly. +It was all very simple. The same strung-up force which had given twenty-four +men a chance, at least, for their lives, had, in a sort of recoil, +crushed an unworthy mutinous existence. + +But I had no leisure to weigh the merits of the matter-- +footsteps in the saloon, a heavy knock. "There's enough wind +to get under way with, sir." Here was the call of a new claim +upon my thoughts and even upon my feelings. + +"Turn the hands up," I cried through the door. "I'll be on deck directly." + +I was going out to make the acquaintance of my ship. +Before I left the cabin our eyes met--the eyes of the only +two strangers on board. I pointed to the recessed part where +the little campstool awaited him and laid my finger on my lips. +He made a gesture--somewhat vague--a little mysterious, +accompanied by a faint smile, as if of regret. + +This is not the place to enlarge upon the sensations of a man +who feels for the first time a ship move under his feet to his +own independent word. In my case they were not unalloyed. +I was not wholly alone with my command; for there was that stranger +in my cabin. Or rather, I was not completely and wholly with her. +Part of me was absent. That mental feeling of being in two +places at once affected me physically as if the mood of secrecy +had penetrated my very soul. Before an hour had elapsed since +the ship had begun to move, having occasion to ask the mate +(he stood by my side) to take a compass bearing of the pagoda, +I caught myself reaching up to his ear in whispers. +I say I caught myself, but enough had escaped to startle the man. +I can't describe it otherwise than by saying that he shied. +A grave, preoccupied manner, as though he were in possession +of some perplexing intelligence, did not leave him henceforth. +A little later I moved away from the rail to look at the compass +with such a stealthy gait that the helmsman noticed it-- +and I could not help noticing the unusual roundness of his eyes. +These are trifling instances, though it's to no commander's +advantage to be suspected of ludicrous eccentricities. +But I was also more seriously affected. There are to a seaman +certain words, gestures, that should in given conditions come +as naturally, as instinctively as the winking of a menaced eye. +A certain order should spring on to his lips without thinking; +a certain sign should get itself made, so to speak, +without reflection. But all unconscious alertness had abandoned me. +I had to make an effort of will to recall myself back +(from the cabin) to the conditions of the moment. +I felt that I was appearing an irresolute commander to those +people who were watching me more or less critically. + +And, besides, there were the scares. On the second day out, +for instance, coming off the deck in the afternoon (I had straw +slippers on my bare feet) I stopped at the open pantry door and spoke +to the steward. He was doing something there with his back to me. +At the sound of my voice he nearly jumped out of his skin, +as the saying is, and incidentally broke a cup. + +"What on earth's the matter with you?" I asked, astonished. + +He was extremely confused. "Beg your pardon, sir. I made sure +you were in your cabin." + +"You see I wasn't." + +"No, sir. I could have sworn I had heard you moving in there not +a moment ago. It's most extraordinary . . . very sorry, sir." + +I passed on with an inward shudder. I was so identified +with my secret double that I did not even mention +the fact in those scanty, fearful whispers we exchanged. +I suppose he had made some slight noise of some kind or other. +It would have been miraculous if he hadn't at one time or another. +And yet, haggard as he appeared, he looked always perfectly +self-controlled, more than calm--almost invulnerable. +On my suggestion he remained almost entirely in +the bathroom, which, upon the whole, was the safest place. +There could be really no shadow of an excuse for anyone ever +wanting to go in there, once the steward had done with it. +It was a very tiny place. Sometimes he reclined on +the floor, his legs bent, his head sustained on one elbow. +At others I would find him on the campstool, sitting in his gray +sleeping suit and with his cropped dark hair like a patient, +unmoved convict. At night I would smuggle him into my bed place, +and we would whisper together, with the regular footfalls of +the officer of the watch passing and repassing over our heads. +It was an infinitely miserable time. It was lucky that some +tins of fine preserves were stowed in a locker in my stateroom; +hard bread I could always get hold of; and so he lived on stewed +chicken, PATE DE FOIE GRAS, asparagus, cooked oysters, sardines-- +on all sorts of abominable sham delicacies out of tins. +My early-morning coffee he always drank; and it was all I +dared do for him in that respect. + +Every day there was the horrible maneuvering to go through so that my room +and then the bathroom should be done in the usual way. I came to hate +the sight of the steward, to abhor the voice of that harmless man. +I felt that it was he who would bring on the disaster of discovery. +It hung like a sword over our heads. + +The fourth day out, I think (we were then working down the east side +of the Gulf of Siam, tack for tack, in light winds and smooth water)-- +the fourth day, I say, of this miserable juggling with the unavoidable, +as we sat at our evening meal, that man, whose slightest movement +I dreaded, after putting down the dishes ran up on deck busily. +This could not be dangerous. Presently he came down again; +and then it appeared that he had remembered a coat of mine +which I had thrown over a rail to dry after having been wetted +in a shower which had passed over the ship in the afternoon. +Sitting stolidly at the head of the table I became terrified at +the sight of the garment on his arm. Of course he made for my door. +There was no time to lose. + +"Steward," I thundered. My nerves were so shaken that I +could not govern my voice and conceal my agitation. +This was the sort of thing that made my terrifically +whiskered mate tap his forehead with his forefinger. +I had detected him using that gesture while talking on deck +with a confidential air to the carpenter. It was too far +to hear a word, but I had no doubt that this pantomime could +only refer to the strange new captain. + +"Yes, sir," the pale-faced steward turned resignedly to me. +It was this maddening course of being shouted at, checked without +rhyme or reason, arbitrarily chased out of my cabin, suddenly called +into it, sent flying out of his pantry on incomprehensible errands, +that accounted for the growing wretchedness of his expression. + +"Where are you going with that coat?" + +"To your room, sir." + +"Is there another shower coming?" + +"I'm sure I don't know, sir. Shall I go up again and see, sir?" + +"No! never mind." + +My object was attained, as of course my other self in there would have heard +everything that passed. During this interlude my two officers never raised +their eyes off their respective plates; but the lip of that confounded cub, +the second mate, quivered visibly. + +I expected the steward to hook my coat on and come out at once. +He was very slow about it; but I dominated my nervousness +sufficiently not to shout after him. Suddenly I became aware +(it could be heard plainly enough) that the fellow for some reason +or other was opening the door of the bathroom. It was the end. +The place was literally not big enough to swing a cat in. +My voice died in my throat and I went stony all over. +I expected to hear a yell of surprise and terror, and made +a movement, but had not the strength to get on my legs. +Everything remained still. Had my second self taken the poor +wretch by the throat? I don't know what I could have done +next moment if I had not seen the steward come out of my room, +close the door, and then stand quietly by the sideboard. + +"Saved," I thought. "But, no! Lost! Gone! He was gone!" + +I laid my knife and fork down and leaned back in my chair. My head swam. +After a while, when sufficiently recovered to speak in a steady voice, +I instructed my mate to put the ship round at eight o'clock himself. + +"I won't come on deck," I went on. "I think I'll turn in, and unless +the wind shifts I don't want to be disturbed before midnight. +I feel a bit seedy." + +"You did look middling bad a little while ago," the chief mate remarked +without showing any great concern. + +They both went out, and I stared at the steward clearing the table. +There was nothing to be read on that wretched man's face. +But why did he avoid my eyes, I asked myself. Then I thought I +should like to hear the sound of his voice. + +"Steward!" + +"Sir!" Startled as usual. + +"Where did you hang up that coat?" + +"In the bathroom, sir." The usual anxious tone. +"It's not quite dry yet, sir." + +For some time longer I sat in the cuddy. Had my double vanished +as he had come? But of his coming there was an explanation, +whereas his disappearance would be inexplicable. . . . I went +slowly into my dark room, shut the door, lighted the lamp, +and for a time dared not turn round. When at last I did I +saw him standing bolt-upright in the narrow recessed part. +It would not be true to say I had a shock, but an irresistible +doubt of his bodily existence flitted through my mind. +Can it be, I asked myself, that he is not visible to other eyes +than mine? It was like being haunted. Motionless, with a +grave face, he raised his hands slightly at me in a gesture +which meant clearly, "Heavens! what a narrow escape!" +Narrow indeed. I think I had come creeping quietly as near +insanity as any man who has not actually gone over the border. +That gesture restrained me, so to speak. + +The mate with the terrific whiskers was now putting the ship +on the other tack. In the moment of profound silence +which follows upon the hands going to their stations I heard +on the poop his raised voice: "Hard alee!" and the distant +shout of the order repeated on the main-deck. The sails, +in that light breeze, made but a faint fluttering noise. +It ceased. The ship was coming round slowly: I held my breath +in the renewed stillness of expectation; one wouldn't have +thought that there was a single living soul on her decks. +A sudden brisk shout, "Mainsail haul!" broke the spell, +and in the noisy cries and rush overhead of the men running away +with the main brace we two, down in my cabin, came together +in our usual position by the bed place. + +He did not wait for my question. "I heard him fumbling here and just +managed to squat myself down in the bath," he whispered to me. +"The fellow only opened the door and put his arm in to hang the coat up. +All the same--" + +"I never thought of that," I whispered back, even more appalled +than before at the closeness of the shave, and marveling at +that something unyielding in his character which was carrying +him through so finely. There was no agitation in his whisper. +Whoever was being driven distracted, it was not he. He was sane. +And the proof of his sanity was continued when he took up +the whispering again. + +"It would never do for me to come to life again." + +It was something that a ghost might have said. But what he was alluding +to was his old captain's reluctant admission of the theory of suicide. +It would obviously serve his turn--if I had understood at all the view +which seemed to govern the unalterable purpose of his action. + +"You must maroon me as soon as ever you can get amongst these islands +off the Cambodge shore," he went on. + +"Maroon you! We are not living in a boy's adventure tale," I protested. +His scornful whispering took me up. + +"We aren't indeed! There's nothing of a boy's tale in this. +But there's nothing else for it. I want no more. +You don't suppose I am afraid of what can be done to me? +Prison or gallows or whatever they may please. +But you don't see me coming back to explain such things +to an old fellow in a wig and twelve respectable tradesmen, +do you? What can they know whether I am guilty or not-- +or of WHAT I am guilty, either? That's my affair. +What does the Bible say? `Driven off the face of the earth.' +Very well, I am off the face of the earth now. As I came +at night so I shall go." + +"Impossible!" I murmured. "You can't." + +"Can't? . . . Not naked like a soul on the Day of Judgment. +I shall freeze on to this sleeping suit. The Last Day is not yet-- +and . . . you have understood thoroughly. Didn't you?" + +I felt suddenly ashamed of myself. I may say truly that I understood-- +and my hesitation in letting that man swim away from my ship's side +had been a mere sham sentiment, a sort of cowardice. + +"It can't be done now till next night," I breathed out. +"The ship is on the off-shore tack and the wind may fail us." + +"As long as I know that you understand," he whispered. +"But of course you do. It's a great satisfaction to have got +somebody to understand. You seem to have been there on purpose." +And in the same whisper, as if we two whenever we talked had to say +things to each other which were not fit for the world to hear, +he added, "It's very wonderful." + +We remained side by side talking in our secret way-- +but sometimes silent or just exchanging a whispered word or two +at long intervals. And as usual he stared through the port. +A breath of wind came now and again into our faces. +The ship might have been moored in dock, so gently and on an +even keel she slipped through the water, that did not murmur +even at our passage, shadowy and silent like a phantom sea. + +At midnight I went on deck, and to my mate's great +surprise put the ship round on the other tack. +His terrible whiskers flitted round me in silent criticism. +I certainly should not have done it if it had been only a question +of getting out of that sleepy gulf as quickly as possible. +I believe he told the second mate, who relieved him, +that it was a great want of judgment. The other only yawned. +That intolerable cub shuffled about so sleepily and lolled +against the rails in such a slack, improper fashion that I +came down on him sharply. + +"Aren't you properly awake yet?" + +"Yes, sir! I am awake." + +"Well, then, be good enough to hold yourself as if you were. +And keep a lookout. If there's any current we'll be closing +with some islands before daylight." + +The east side of the gulf is fringed with islands, some solitary, +others in groups. One the blue background of the high coast they +seem to float on silvery patches of calm water, arid and gray, +or dark green and rounded like clumps of evergreen bushes, +with the larger ones, a mile or two long, showing the outlines +of ridges, ribs of gray rock under the dark mantle of matted leafage. +Unknown to trade, to travel, almost to geography, the manner +of life they harbor is an unsolved secret. There must be villages-- +settlements of fishermen at least--on the largest of them, and some +communication with the world is probably kept up by native craft. +But all that forenoon, as we headed for them, fanned along by +the faintest of breezes, I saw no sign of man or canoe in the field +of the telescope I kept on pointing at the scattered group. + +At noon I have no orders for a change of course, and the mate's +whiskers became much concerned and seemed to be offering themselves +unduly to my notice. At last I said: + +"I am going to stand right in. Quite in--as far as I can take her." + +The stare of extreme surprise imparted an air of ferocity also to his eyes, +and he looked truly terrific for a moment. + +"We're not doing well in the middle of the gulf," I continued, casually. +"I am going to look for the land breezes tonight." + +"Bless my soul! Do you mean, sir, in the dark amongst the lot of all them +islands and reefs and shoals?" + +"Well--if there are any regular land breezes at all on this coast +one must get close inshore to find them, mustn't one?" + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed again under his breath. +All that afternoon he wore a dreamy, contemplative appearance +which in him was a mark of perplexity. After dinner I +went into my stateroom as if I meant to take some rest. +There we two bent our dark heads over a half-unrolled chart +lying on my bed. + +"There," I said. "It's got to be Koh-ring. I've been looking +at it ever since sunrise. It has got two hills and a low point. +It must be inhabited. And on the coast opposite there is what looks +like the mouth of a biggish river--with some towns, no doubt, not far up. +It's the best chance for you that I can see." + +"Anything. Koh-ring let it be." + +He looked thoughtfully at the chart as if surveying chances and +distances from a lofty height--and following with his eyes his own +figure wandering on the blank land of Cochin-China, and then passing +off that piece of paper clean out of sight into uncharted regions. +And it was as if the ship had two captains to plan her course for her. +I had been so worried and restless running up and down that I +had not had the patience to dress that day. I had remained +in my sleeping suit, with straw slippers and a soft floppy hat. +The closeness of the heat in the gulf had been most oppressive, +and the crew were used to seeing me wandering in that airy attire. + +"She will clear the south point as she heads now," I whispered into his ear. +"Goodness only knows when, though, but certainly after dark. +I'll edge her in to half a mile, as far as I may be able to judge +in the dark--" + +"Be careful," he murmured, warningly--and I realized suddenly +that all my future, the only future for which I was fit, +would perhaps go irretrievably to pieces in any mishap +to my first command. + +I could not stop a moment longer in the room. I motioned him to get out +of sight and made my way on the poop. That unplayful cub had the watch. +I walked up and down for a while thinking things out, then beckoned him over. + +"Send a couple of hands to open the two quarter-deck ports," +I said, mildly. + +He actually had the impudence, or else so forgot himself in his wonder +at such an incomprehensible order, as to repeat: + +"Open the quarter-deck ports! What for, sir?" + +"The only reason you need concern yourself about is because I tell you +to do so. Have them open wide and fastened properly." + +He reddened and went off, but I believe made some jeering remark +to the carpenter as to the sensible practice of ventilating +a ship's quarter-deck. I know he popped into the mate's cabin +to impart the fact to him because the whiskers came on deck, +as it were by chance, and stole glances at me from below-- +for signs of lunacy or drunkenness, I suppose. + +A little before supper, feeling more restless than ever, I rejoined, +for a moment, my second self. And to find him sitting so quietly +was surprising, like something against nature, inhuman. + +I developed my plan in a hurried whisper. + +"I shall stand in as close as I dare and then put her round. +I will presently find means to smuggle you out of here +into the sail locker, which communicates with the lobby. +But there is an opening, a sort of square for hauling the sails out, +which gives straight on the quarter-deck and which is never +closed in fine weather, so as to give air to the sails. +When the ship's way is deadened in stays and all the hands +are aft at the main braces you will have a clear road to slip +out and get overboard through the open quarter-deck port. +I've had them both fastened up. Use a rope's end to lower +yourself into the water so as to avoid a splash--you know. +It could be heard and cause some beastly complication." + +He kept silent for a while, then whispered, "I understand." + +"I won't be there to see you go," I began with an effort. +"The rest . . . I only hope I have understood, too." + +"You have. From first to last"--and for the first time there +seemed to be a faltering, something strained in his whisper. +He caught hold of my arm, but the ringing of the supper bell +made me start. He didn't though; he only released his grip. + +After supper I didn't come below again till well past eight +o'clock. The faint, steady breeze was loaded with dew; and the wet, +darkened sails held all there was of propelling power in it. +The night, clear and starry, sparkled darkly, and the opaque, +lightless patches shifting slowly against the low stars +were the drifting islets. On the port bow there was a big +one more distant and shadowily imposing by the great space +of sky it eclipsed. + +On opening the door I had a back view of my very own self looking at a chart. +He had come out of the recess and was standing near the table. + +"Quite dark enough," I whispered. + +He stepped back and leaned against my bed with a level, quiet glance. +I sat on the couch. We had nothing to say to each other. +Over our heads the officer of the watch moved here and there. +Then I heard him move quickly. I knew what that meant. +He was making for the companion; and presently his voice was +outside my door. + +"We are drawing in pretty fast, sir. Land looks rather close." + +"Very well," I answered. "I am coming on deck directly." + +I waited till he was gone out of the cuddy, then rose. My double moved too. +The time had come to exchange our last whispers, for neither of us was ever +to hear each other's natural voice. + +"Look here!" I opened a drawer and took out three sovereigns. +"Take this anyhow. I've got six and I'd give you the lot, +only I must keep a little money to buy some fruit and vegetables +for the crew from native boats as we go through Sunda Straits." + +He shook his head. + +"Take it," I urged him, whispering desperately. +"No one can tell what--" + +He smiled and slapped meaningly the only pocket of the sleeping jacket. +It was not safe, certainly. But I produced a large old silk handkerchief +of mine, and tying the three pieces of gold in a corner, pressed it on him. +He was touched, I supposed, because he took it at last and tied it quickly +round his waist under the jacket, on his bare skin. + +Our eyes met; several seconds elapsed, till, our glances +still mingled, I extended my hand and turned the lamp out. +Then I passed through the cuddy, leaving the door of my room wide open. +. . . "Steward!" + +He was still lingering in the pantry in the greatness of his zeal, +giving a rub-up to a plated cruet stand the last thing before going to bed. +Being careful not to wake up the mate, whose room was opposite, I spoke +in an undertone. + +He looked round anxiously. "Sir!" + +"Can you get me a little hot water from the galley?" + +"I am afraid, sir, the galley fire's been out for some time now." + +"Go and see." + +He flew up the stairs. + +"Now," I whispered, loudly, into the saloon--too loudly, +perhaps, but I was afraid I couldn't make a sound. +He was by my side in an instant--the double captain slipped past +the stairs--through a tiny dark passage . . . a sliding door. +We were in the sail locker, scrambling on our knees over the sails. +A sudden thought struck me. I saw myself wandering +barefooted, bareheaded, the sun beating on my dark poll. +I snatched off my floppy hat and tried hurriedly in the dark +to ram it on my other self. He dodged and fended off silently. +I wonder what he thought had come to me before he understood +and suddenly desisted. Our hands met gropingly, +lingered united in a steady, motionless clasp for a second. +. . . No word was breathed by either of us when they separated. + +I was standing quietly by the pantry door when the steward returned. + +"Sorry, sir. Kettle barely warm. Shall I light the spirit lamp?" + +"Never mind." + +I came out on deck slowly. It was now a matter of conscience +to shave the land as close as possible--for now he must go overboard +whenever the ship was put in stays. Must! There could be no going +back for him. After a moment I walked over to leeward and my +heart flew into my mouth at the nearness of the land on the bow. +Under any other circumstances I would not have held on a minute longer. +The second mate had followed me anxiously. + +I looked on till I felt I could command my voice. + +"She will weather," I said then in a quiet tone. + +"Are you going to try that, sir?" he stammered out incredulously. + +I took no notice of him and raised my tone just enough to be heard +by the helmsman. + +"Keep her good full." + +"Good full, sir." + +The wind fanned my cheek, the sails slept, the world was silent. +The strain of watching the dark loom of the land grow bigger and denser +was too much for me. I had shut my eyes--because the ship must go closer. +She must! The stillness was intolerable. Were we standing still? + +When I opened my eyes the second view started my heart with a thump. +The black southern hill of Koh-ring seemed to hang right over +the ship like a towering fragment of everlasting night. +On that enormous mass of blackness there was not a gleam to +be seen, not a sound to be heard. It was gliding irresistibly +towards us and yet seemed already within reach of the hand. +I saw the vague figures of the watch grouped in the waist, +gazing in awed silence. + +"Are you going on, sir?" inquired an unsteady voice at my elbow. + +I ignored it. I had to go on. + +"Keep her full. Don't check her way. That won't do now," +I said warningly. + +"I can't see the sails very well," the helmsman answered me, +in strange, quavering tones. + +Was she close enough? Already she was, I won't say in the shadow of the land, +but in the very blackness of it, already swallowed up as it were, gone too +close to be recalled, gone from me altogether. + +"Give the mate a call," I said to the young man who stood at my elbow +as still as death. "And turn all hands up." + +My tone had a borrowed loudness reverberated from the height of the land. +Several voices cried out together: "We are all on deck, sir." + +Then stillness again, with the great shadow gliding closer, +towering higher, without a light, without a sound. +Such a hush had fallen on the ship that she might have been a bark +of the dead floating in slowly under the very gate of Erebus. + +"My God! Where are we?" + +It was the mate moaning at my elbow. He was thunderstruck, +and as it were deprived of the moral support of his whiskers. +He clapped his hands and absolutely cried out, "Lost!" + +"Be quiet," I said, sternly. + +He lowered his tone, but I saw the shadowy gesture of his despair. +"What are we doing here?" + +"Looking for the land wind." + +He made as if to tear his hair, and addressed me recklessly. + +"She will never get out. You have done it, sir. I knew it'd end in something +like this. She will never weather, and you are too close now to stay. +She'll drift ashore before she's round. O my God!" + +I caught his arm as he was raising it to batter his poor devoted head, +and shook it violently. + +"She's ashore already," he wailed, trying to tear himself away. + +"Is she? . . . Keep good full there!" + +"Good full, sir," cried the helmsman in a frightened, thin, childlike voice. + +I hadn't let go the mate's arm and went on shaking it. "Ready about, +do you hear? You go forward"--shake--"and stop there"--shake--"and hold +your noise"--shake--" and see these head-sheets properly overhauled"-- +shake, shake--shake. + +And all the time I dared not look towards the land lest my heart +should fail me. I released my grip at last and he ran forward +as if fleeing for dear life. + +I wondered what my double there in the sail locker thought of +this commotion. He was able to hear everything--and perhaps he was able +to understand why, on my conscience, it had to be thus close--no less. +My first order "Hard alee!" re-echoed ominously under the towering +shadow of Koh-ring as if I had shouted in a mountain gorge. +And then I watched the land intently. In that smooth water +and light wind it was impossible to feel the ship coming-to. No! +I could not feel her. And my second self was making now ready +to ship out and lower himself overboard. Perhaps he was gone +already . . . ? + +The great black mass brooding over our very mastheads began to pivot away +from the ship's side silently. And now I forgot the secret stranger ready +to depart, and remembered only that I was a total stranger to the ship. +I did not know her. Would she do it? How was she to be handled? + +I swung the mainyard and waited helplessly. She was perhaps stopped, +and her very fate hung in the balance, with the black mass +of Koh-ring like the gate of the everlasting night towering over +her taffrail. What would she do now? Had she way on her yet? +I stepped to the side swiftly, and on the shadowy water I could see +nothing except a faint phosphorescent flash revealing the glassy +smoothness of the sleeping surface. It was impossible to tell-- +and I had not learned yet the feel of my ship. Was she moving? +What I needed was something easily seen, a piece of paper, +which I could throw overboard and watch. I had nothing on me. +To run down for it I didn't dare. There was no time. +All at once my strained, yearning stare distinguished +a white object floating within a yard of the ship's side. +White on the black water. A phosphorescent flash passed under it. +What was that thing? . . . I recognized my own floppy hat. +It must have fallen off his head . . . and he didn't bother. +Now I had what I wanted--the saving mark for my eyes. +But I hardly thought of my other self, now gone from the ship, +to be hidden forever from all friendly faces, to be a fugitive +and a vagabond on the earth, with no brand of the curse on his +sane forehead to stay a slaying hand . . . too proud to explain. + +And I watched the hat--the expression of my sudden pity for his mere flesh. +It had been meant to save his homeless head from the dangers of the sun. +And now--behold--it was saving the ship, by serving me for a mark to help +out the ignorance of my strangeness. Ha! It was drifting forward, +warning me just in time that the ship had gathered sternaway. + +"Shift the helm," I said in a low voice to the seaman standing still +like a statue. + +The man's eyes glistened wildly in the binnacle light as he jumped +round to the other side and spun round the wheel. + +I walked to the break of the poop. On the over-shadowed deck +all hands stood by the forebraces waiting for my order. +The stars ahead seemed to be gliding from right to left. +And all was so still in the world that I heard the quiet remark, +"She's round," passed in a tone of intense relief between two seamen. + +"Let go and haul." + +The foreyards ran round with a great noise, amidst cheery cries. +And now the frightful whiskers made themselves heard giving various orders. +Already the ship was drawing ahead. And I was alone with her. +Nothing! no one in the world should stand now between us, throwing a shadow +on the way of silent knowledge and mute affection, the perfect communion +of a seaman with his first command. + +Walking to the taffrail, I was in time to make out, on the very edge +of a darkness thrown by a towering black mass like the very gateway +of Erebus--yes, I was in time to catch an evanescent glimpse of my +white hat left behind to mark the spot where the secret sharer +of my cabin and of my thoughts, as though he were my second self, +had lowered himself into the water to take his punishment: +a free man, a proud swimmer striking out for a new destiny. + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Secret Sharer + + |