Salt Water Part 17

"Does anybody hear him?"

There was an ominous silence. A pin might have been heard to drop on deck. The life-buoy had been let go at the first by the officer of the watch. Its signal fire now burned bright astern, but no one was seen clinging to it. There could be little doubt that the poor fellow, whoever he was, had sunk at once. The ship had been running at the time a few points off the wind. She was now brought close on a wind, and then the helm was put down, and she was hove about with her head towards the life-buoy. While she was in stays, the two quarter-boats were manned and lowered. Mr Vernon jumped into one of them, and the master into another; and as the frigate lost her way, they shoved off and pulled in the direction of the spot where the man was supposed to have fallen.

"Who can it be? Who is missing?" was asked by all hands, while we were anxiously looking out towards the boats, to see if they were picking up anybody.

When the ship reached the same locality, she was hove-to, and there we remained till the boats, having picked up the life-buoy, returned on board. They brought, however, too probable a sign of some one having been lost--a boy's hat. It had been picked up exactly at the spot where the ship was supposed to have been when the alarm was first given. The ship's muster-roll was now called over, to ascertain who of the ship's company was missing. One after the other had answered to their names, and it had so nearly reached the end, that we began to hope there might be some mistake after all, when that of Bobby Smudge was called. There was no answer. Poor Bobby! There could be but little doubt that the unfortunate wretch had put his threat of making away with himself into execution, rather than longer endure the tyranny of Mr Chissel. I hoped that the carpenter's accusing conscience would make him repent of his cruelty. This surmise as to the poor boy's fate was confirmed the next morning, when some of his clothes were discovered under the forechains. The next day the chief conversation among the men was about Bobby Smudge's suicide, and of the threats he had uttered of haunting the ship. This led to the recounting of similar circ.u.mstances; and many a forecastle yarn was spun that evening, abounding in horrors sufficient to make the hairs of a less stout-hearted auditory stand on end. From the extraordinary remarks I heard as I pa.s.sed about the decks, I declared, when I went to the berth, that I believed that some of the men fully expected to see poor Bobby Smudge come in at one of the ports and drive all hands out of the ship. A seaman will encounter anything living and tangible with a hearty good-will; but he has a mortal antipathy to meet any spirit, black, blue, white, or green, from the nether world.

"I say, D'Arcy, it would be great fun if we could just manage to give some of these fellows a fright," whispered d.i.c.ky Sharpe. "A white sheet and a howl would do it. I could manage to imitate Bobby Smudge's voice, and I should just like to look in on old Chissel when he is taking his first snooze. I'd just mutter, 'Bobby Smudge's ghost come to fetch you away, you old sinner,' and his villainous conscience would do the rest."

"Don't play any such foolish trick, d.i.c.ky," said I. "You would certainly be found out in the first place, and get severely punished into the bargain. Besides, the matter is too serious to be turned into a joke. Think of that poor unfortunate wretch, driven to despair, and plunged suddenly into another world, through the cruelty and tyranny of one who ought to have protected him, and tried to make him better!"

"But he was plunged into the sea," said d.i.c.ky, interrupting me; "and as for the cruelty he received, I don't think he was so very much worse off than numbers of other fellows in his position."

"I tell you, it is not a subject for joking on. Perhaps poor Bobby Smudge had a mother and sisters who will mourn bitterly when the ship returns home, and they find he is not in her."

"Dirty drabs, in all probability, who won't care a rap what has become of him," persisted the incorrigible d.i.c.ky.

"For shame, Sharpe--for shame," said I; thinking how my cousins would grieve for me if I were to be lost overboard. I began to feel a strange sort of satisfaction at the idea. Sentiment, or whatever it might be called, was very quickly put to flight by the shrill sound of the boatswain's whistle, and the hoa.r.s.e cry of "All hands--shorten sail!"

We were hurrying to our stations aloft as fast as our legs could carry us--for the tones in which the order was issued showed us that there was not a moment to be lost,--when, just as we were springing into the rigging, a squall, which had but the moment before been perceived by the officers of the watch, struck the ship. As ill-luck would have it, it was the third lieutenant who had the first watch, and he happened to be in a poetical mood, and deeply absorbed in composing an ode to Queen Dido, or the Dodo--I don't remember which it was reported was the case-- one or the other, I know. The squall was a very heavy one: if not a white squall, not inferior to it in strength and suddenness. The ship rushed through the water, which was lashed in an instant into a sheet of foam; the masts bent like wands, and looked as if they would instantly go by the board. The helm was ordered to be put up; but before she could answer it--stiff as she generally was--over she went, as if she had been a mere skiff, till her yard-arms almost touched the water. It appeared as if she would never right herself again. Then many a stout heart quailed, and many a brave man gave himself up for lost; but, dreadful as was the scene, discipline triumphed speedily over all unworthy fears. Some of the ports were open, and the water rushed through them in torrents. Such was the case with the one in our berth.

Poor Signor Mezzi, our Italian master, was sitting there. Never was a poor wretch more completely horrified. He gave up all for lost, and fancied that every moment the ship, and all in her, were going to the bottom. The a.s.sistant-surgeon and captain's clerk, who were at the time in the berth, each seized a pillow from the hammocks, which had just before been piped down, and cramming them into the port with tolerable effect, stopped the gush of water; but terror had too completely mastered the poor dominie to allow him to observe what was going forward. He shrieked out for mercy from every saint in the calendar, and entreated one or all of them to carry him on sh.o.r.e, even if it was but to the sandy coast of Africa. "_Ah! misericordia, misericordia, misericordia_!" was the burden of his plaint.

"_E impossible_, signor. If you do go to the bottom, heretics though we are, you will be in very goodly company," exclaimed Tourniquet. "And then think of the magnificent feast we shall make for the fishes. Let that be your consolation."

But poor Signor Mezzi refused to be comforted even by such a prospect; and even our medico himself, when he found the ship still remaining in her unusual position, and heard the uproar going on overhead, began to entertain some very disagreeable doubts as to the possibility of the event to which he was alluding actually occurring, and looked very blue about the gills; whereat little Scribble, the clerk, laughed heartily at him, and seated himself on the table, with his feet on the side of the ship, affirming that he was not afraid, and was as contented and happy as ever--the truth being, not that the young donkey was a bit more brave than the other two, but that he had not the sense to know the danger he was in, and that not a seaman on board but saw that the next moment might be his last. Tourniquet had not the heart to move and give Scribble a thrashing, or he would have done so. But to return on deck.

The instant the squall struck the ship, Captain Poynder hastened from his cabin, and, seizing his speaking-trumpet, in a calm tone issued the necessary orders.

"Down, every youngster, from the rigging. Clue up--haul down--let fly of all!"

It was too late. Before the words were out of his mouth, the ship was over on her beam-ends, and lay like a log, neither sails nor rudder having longer power over her. To describe the wild horror of the scene would be almost impossible. The rent sails flashing and flapping in the gale; the ropes lashing furiously, as if in an attempt to seize some one within their deadly coils; every timber quivering and groaning; the wind roaring; and the foam in thick sheets flying over us. Though the helm, as I have said, was hard up, still she lay in the trough of the sea, without a hope of once more rising.

"Send the carpenter and his crew aft, with their axes," shouted the captain.

Chissel and his mates quickly obeyed the summons, for he had seen from the first that his services would too probably be required.

"Stand by, to cut away the masts," added Captain Poynder.

It was a melancholy alternative, but the only one to save the ship from foundering. Afterwards we must trust to our anchors; and if they failed to hold with the wind as it then was, we could not fail of being driven on the inhospitable coast of Africa. And who could tell how many might reach the sh.o.r.e alive!--perhaps none. The uplifted axes gleamed in the hands of Chissel and his mates, as they stood round the mizen-mast; others were sent to cut away the shrouds, and clear the wreck of the mast as it fell. Once more Captain Poynder raised his trumpet to his lips. It was to give the dire orders to cut, when, at that moment, the ship with a violent jerk righted herself, and, speedily answering to the helm, away she flew before the wind. As such a course would very quickly have brought us up, sail was taken off her; and then, merely under her spanker and fore-staysail, she was brought to the wind, for it was discovered that the bowsprit was badly sprung, and that the topsail sheets were carried away. Happily the squall, having vented its fury on our heads, quickly pa.s.sed over, and we were left with much less wind than before.

"This is all that young beggar Bobby Smudge's doing, I'll warrant," I heard Ned Grummit, a topman, exclaim, as he came down from aloft. "I never knowed a chap of that sort who went for to go for to drown hisself, if he threatened to do mischief, but found means to do it. I knowed it would be so from the first, and we shall be lucky if worse doesn't come of it."

I tried to expostulate with the man, for whom I had a liking, for he was an honest fellow; but to no purpose. He still persisted in the belief that poor Bobby, who, while alive, had never done anybody harm, was destined to work us all sorts of mischief.

Everything had been made as snug as circ.u.mstances would allow. The watch below had been piped down, and had turned in; and silence reigned on board, and on the face of the ocean around us. It had been my watch on deck, and I was just about being relieved, when the silence was broken by a loud, unearthly cry; and the carpenter rushed on deck in his shirt, his hair standing on end, and his eyeb.a.l.l.s starting from their sockets. Had not several men laid hold of him, I believe he would have thrown himself overboard. He was carried back to his cabin, and the doctor was summoned. All Chissel could say was, "Bobby Smudge! Bobby Smudge! you young villain, be off with you!" The doctor gave him some stuff or other, and the carpenter went off into a sound sleep; but a man was ordered to sit up by his side, and watch him.

"Now," thought I, "this has been one of d.i.c.ky Sharpe's tricks, and all my good advice has been thrown away." But when I looked into d.i.c.ky's hammock, he was sleeping away with such unfeigned soundness that I could scarcely fancy that he had played any trick; and the next morning he a.s.sured me, on his word of honour, that he knew nothing whatever about the matter. I had never known d.i.c.ky to tell an untruth, and I felt very sure that he would not conceal anything he had done from me; indeed, the great pleasure he had in playing any mischievous prank was, to tell me of it afterwards, if I happened not to be a partaker of it,--a very rare occurrence, by-the-bye.

"Suppose you had played your trick on old Chissel, and what he has seen was really an evil spirit, how very dreadful it would have been for you to have met the unnameable thing at his bedside!" said I.

"Oh! don't talk of such a thing," exclaimed d.i.c.ky, shuddering. "I am sure I will never again think of carrying out such a joke as I contemplated. The idea is too frightful."

I advised him not; and, after talking the subject over, and turning it in every way, we came to the conclusion that, as no one else was likely to have tried to frighten old Chissel, if he had not really seen a ghost, his terror had been the result of his own evil conscience.

"Yes, it is a dreadful thing to have a bad conscience," said d.i.c.ky, with a sigh. "Do you know, D'Arcy, I sometimes wish that I had not played so many wild pranks in my life. I know that they will some time or other bring me into trouble; and yet, when the fit seizes me, I cannot help it. I wish that you would remind me of my good resolutions when I next propose anything of the sort."

I promised that I would, but suggested that unless he had some higher motive than the fear of being brought into trouble, he would in all probability continue as great a pickle as ever, if he did not go on from bad to worse. Indeed I read my chum a very severe lecture, which he took with perfect composure, feeling at the time that he fully deserved it; though I fear that he was not in the end very much the better for my sage advice.

We were busy all day repairing damages as well as we could at sea; but it was found that they were so considerable that the captain resolved to return to Malta, instead of pursuing our course to Tunis. While the work was going forward, a man in the forechains discovered a jacket and waistcoat, which were known to have belonged to Bobby Smudge. This was considered still stronger proof that the poor lad had destroyed himself, as no doubt he had hung them there before jumping into the sea. Seamen are certainly the most superst.i.tious beings alive, for this trifling matter made them talk the whole evening after they had knocked off work about Bobby and his ways; and scarcely one but believed that his spirit would haunt the ship as long as she remained in commission. The crippled state of the ship prevented our making much sail on her, and as we had frequently baffling winds, our voyage to Malta was considerably prolonged.

Dirty Bob, as poor Bobby Smudge was generally called, excited far more interest after his death than he had done during his lifetime, as is not unfrequently the case with much greater men. The night succeeding the squall pa.s.sed off, as far as I know, quietly enough; but the next morning I saw several groups of men talking together, as if something mysterious had occurred.

"I knowed it would be so," said Ned Trunnion, as I pa.s.sed by. "He was as bold a topman as ever stepped. I knowed the little chap wouldn't let us alone, after he'd given Mr Chissel a taste of his quality. No, no; depend on't he'll haunt the ship for many a long day, if he don't manage to run her ash.o.r.e, or to send her to Davy Jones' locker outright."

"What's that about?" I asked, for I suspected the observation was intended for my ears.

"Why, sir," said Tom Barlow, another topman, "Dirty Bob (saving your presence) has been aboard again, a playing off his pranks, and many of us see'd him as clear as we see you."

"Nonsense, man," said I. "If you mean Bobby Smudge, he's snug enough at the bottom of the sea, fifty miles astern of us, by this time; besides, if any of you saw him, why did you not catch him?"

"It wasn't 'xactly him we saw, sir," blurted out Ned. "It was his spirit or ghost like; and a chap might just as well try to catch one of them things as to grip an eel with greased fingers."

"How do you know it was his spirit, though?" I asked; for I suspected that the men had been working on each other's imagination till all fancied they had seen what perhaps only one had dreamed of.

"Why, sir," replied Tom Barlow, with a hitch to his waistband, "we knowed it was him, because it was as like him as he could stare, only a good deal blacker and dirtier even than he was in his lifetime. It had just gone two bells in the middle watch, when three or four of us who was awake saw him as plainly as we do you, sir, now--creeping about for all the world like a serpent, in and out among the hammocks. It was more, just then, than any one of us wished to do, to speak to him; but, thinks I, there can't be any harm telling him to cut his stick, just civilly like; so I lifts up my head, and sings out, 'Be off, you dirty son of a sea cook!' But scarcely was the words out of my mouth, than he was away like a shot up the main-hatchway, and through one of the ports, or right through the bottom of the ship, for what I knowed; for I couldn't see, you may suppose. All the others who saw him said, too, there was a strong smell of sulphur, wherever he'd been, and that he vanished away in a flame of fire; but I can't 'xactly swear to that myself."

I laughed outright at the absurdity of the story, and was more convinced than ever that the men had allowed their imaginations to be worked up to a pitch which would make them believe anything.

d.i.c.ky Sharpe and I talked the matter over, and agreed not to say anything about it, as were the circ.u.mstances to get to the ears of the captain, it would certainly make him very angry.

I thought we should hear no more about the matter; but two days after this I found the people more busy than ever talking about Bobby Smudge's ghost. Numbers declared they had seen it. Some described it as having one shape, some another. Not a few gave it a tail, and horns, and fiery eyes. All described it as black; and several were ready to affirm on oath that it smelt strongly of sulphur and other horrible odours. At length many of the men showed a great unwillingness to go below, and to turn into their hammocks.

Old Chissel had become a completely altered character. His conscience told him that he was the cause of poor Bobby's death. He grew thin and pale; his voice was no longer heard in loud dispute with his brother officer, the boatswain; and even his manner was softened towards his inferiors. The men remarked the change; and all argued that the ghost had done him some good at all events, though it certainly confirmed them in their belief of its existence. Night after night, no sooner was it dark, and the watch below turned in, than Dirty Bob's ghost was sure to appear to some one or other; till at length the gun-room officers heard of the matter, and ultimately the captain himself was informed of it.

At the same time a curious circ.u.mstance occurred. Every morning one or other of the messes had to complain that their bread-bags had been rifled, and different sorts of eatables had disappeared in a most unaccountable manner. None of the men suggested for a moment that the ghost had anything to do with the matter--for what could a ghost want with biscuit, bacon, or cheese; but Captain Poynder, who at length heard of this also, had, it appeared, formed a different notion on the subject.

Two of the marines--steady old hands--who were ready to believe or disbelieve in ghosts or spirits, and to fight carnal or spiritual enemies in any shape or of any colour, as their superior officers might command them, were sent for into the cabin. What their orders were I do not know; but one of them, Jabez Cartridge, was placed that night as sentry on the lower deck.

The first watch had nearly run out, and Jabez, who had his eyes about him in every direction, had seen nothing of the ghost, when, as it had just gone seven bells, he fancied that he observed a dark object gliding about under the hammocks. He stood as upright and stiff as his own ramrod. So immovable was he, that any one might have supposed him asleep on his post; but his little black eyes were not the less vigilant. The dark object moved slowly and cautiously on till it reached the lockers, where the men's mess things were kept.

Jabez saw that it had hands, and, by the peculiar movement of those hands, he came to the conclusion that it had pockets. Still a ghost might have hands, and trousers too, for what he knew to the contrary.

To convince himself, he sprang forward, and the ghost, with an unearthly shriek, took to flight; but Jabez was too quick for the phantom, and grasping him tight, he sung out, "I don't care if you be a ghost or not, but I've got you, at all events."

"Oh, let me go, let me go! and I'll lie snug and quiet till we get into harbour, and then I'll leave the ship and never come back--that I won't," answered the ghost, in piteous accents.

But Jabez was inexorable, and dragging him to the sentry's lantern, by its sickly light discovered features which belonged to no other than Bobby Smudge.

"Why, where have you been, you young scoundrel, all the time?" asked Jabez.