The Flying Bo'sun Part 12

"I want each of you to take one hour watches in the Captain's room from twelve to four." This was too much for Riley.

"Be Hivins, sir, if ye offered me a year's leaf in a Turkish Harem to stay five minutes in the auld haunted room, I wouldn't take it, for as sure as me name is Michael Dennis Riley he is rummaging around there."

The news of the ghost soon spread over the ship, and formed the sole topic of conversation of the crew. Even the second mate, whom I thought immune, was going around the decks looking bewildered, as if antic.i.p.ating the immediate destruction of ship and crew.

The Socialist cook was much interested in our astral visitor, and I thought how happy it would make him to sail away on the wings of a new law that would revolutionize both physics and chemistry.

"Yes," he said, "you can trust me to keep watch from twelve to two tonight in the Captain's room. I am very much pleased indeed to have the opportunity. I have for years been fighting the mechanical and cheap manifestations of mediums and seers." He picked up his ap.r.o.n and wiped his mouth, to interrupt the line of march of tobacco juice which, having broken the barriers, was slowly wending its way down his chin.

"Let me tell you," he said. "A material law gives us life. The same law takes it away. All material life," stamping the deck, "ends here. From the clay there is no redemption."

At one o'clock in the morning the cook called me.

"What do you want, Steward?" said I.

"There is something in the Captain's room. Something I can't understand.

When I am in the room with the light out, I am conscious of some one with me. And yet when I turn on the light that feeling leaves me. Then when I turn out the light and lock the door and sit here by the dining-table I would swear I could hear the sound of footsteps walking around, and the moving of chairs. I tell you, sir, it is mighty strange."

"Are you sure that the sounds you heard were not made by the second mate walking on the deck above?"

"No, sir, not at all. He agreed to stay forward on the deck-load till four bells."

"How about the man at the wheel?" said I. "He could walk around on the steering platform and produce such sounds as you heard in the Captain's room."

"Again you are mistaken. The man at the wheel is too scared to make any move but a natural one, such as turning the wheel, and that movement produces no sound down here in fair weather like we are having."

The cook was truly mystified. He was anxious for me to realize the importance of his investigations in the Captain's room, yet with it all he held fast to his materialistic ideals.

"Cook," said I, "you are taking this thing too seriously. I am certain that I have solved this mystery. Riley is certain that it is not Toby, the cat. Now you come along and are ready to prove that the sounds or walking you have observed were not produced by a material power from the deck above."

"I mean," replied he, "that this walking in here was not produced by any action of the second mate or the man at the wheel."

I told him that nevertheless I had the mystery solved, and I would prove it to him. "We have in the lower hold one hundred thousand feet of kiln-dried spruce boards one-half inch thick, and twenty-six to thirty inches wide. They vary in length from eighteen to thirty-six feet. The after bulkhead does not run flush with the deck above, and there are ends of boards that project over and into the runway. With the easy movement of the ship, this will produce a metallic sound that will cause vibration at a distance, and more distinctly under the Captain's room."

At this the cook became very indignant, and told me that my theory was not correct at all.

"Haven't I spent a half hour in the lazarette looking and listening for just such sounds as you describe?"

"Are you sure that there are no rats in his room?"

"If there are, I fail to find them. I have placed cheese around the room to convince myself. On examination of the cheese I couldn't find a tooth mark."

"But why are there no sounds of walking in there now?"

"That is what baffles me," said the cook. "Since we have been talking there has not been a sound from that room."

I sent him to turn in, a.s.suring him that I would sit in the room for an hour or so to see what would happen, and to try to solve a mystery that was beginning to try even my seasoned nerves.

CHAPTER XIII

HIGHER INTELLIGENCE--A VISIT FROM OUT THE SHADOWS

When the steward had gone forward to his bunk, I got a lunch, and was about to sit down by the dining-table to eat it, when I saw the door of the Captain's room open wide.

Then, to my utter amazement, I saw the chair that the dead Captain had sat in for years swing around upon its pivot ready to receive a visitor.

I was so startled by the wonderful unseen force that I forgot my lunch and was starting to close the door in the hope of another uncanny experience, when I was halted by a cry from the deck above.

"Hard to starboard, you d.a.m.ned fool. Are you trying to cut her in two amidship?" shouted the second mate.

"Hard over she is," rang out from the man at the wheel.

Instantly I was on deck. The second mate was over in the lee mizzen-rigging. "What is it, Olsen?" I asked.

"A full-rigged ship away two points on the starboard bow."

To the man at the wheel I said: "Put your helm down and pa.s.s to windward of him before you jibe the spanker over, or you will knock h.e.l.l out of these old sails." Then to the second mate: "Why do you have to sail all over the ocean to get by that old pea-soup hulk? Don't you see that he has the wind free? Luff her up half a point," I ordered the wheel-man.

We pa.s.sed so close to windward that we took the wind out of his lower sails. The moon was in the last quarter, and we could see plainly the watch on her deck, and hear the officer swear at the helmsman, saying:

"Keep her off, you d.a.m.ned sheep-herder, or you will cut that mud-scow in two." Then he shouted over to me: "It is the captain of an Irish locomotive you ought to be, you thick-headed pirate, trying to run us down! What's the name of your ship, anyway?"

"Hardship loaded with Poverty," I replied with sarcasm.

As we pa.s.sed each other the voice of the angry officer grew fainter and fainter, then was lost in the stilly night under Southern skies.

I was amused at the expression of the officer on board of the Yankee clipper, when he spoke of me as the captain of an Irish locomotive.

There could be no greater insult to a self-respecting sailorman than this phrase. It means that you would do much better carrying a hod or wheeling a wheelbarrow than handling a ship. I had sailed in those down-east ships and knew their language. They never intend to give one inch on land or sea. Hard luck indeed for the sailor who does not know how to fight, or who shows a yellow streak!

While thus meditating on the cruelties of the old oak ships and thinking what wonderful tales they could tell, my thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a consciousness of fear. Something warm was moving about my feet. On looking down I beheld Toby rubbing his black fur against my feet and legs....

On getting my position of ship at noon today, I noticed the crew tiptoeing around as if they were afraid of disturbing some sleeping baby. I spoke to Riley, asking what all the hush was about.

"Oh, be the Lord, sir, it is getting turrible on this auld graveyard of a ship. Begorra, we are shure av it now. Auld Charlie seen him prancing up and down the p.o.o.p deck wid a poipe in his mouth. 'Tis turrible days we be having. The cook said that he proved it himself beyond a question of a doubt that the old bye himself is back on her."

"Well, Riley, I am going to make the Old Man show down tonight. It is put up or shut up for him." Laughing a little at my own fancies, I went aft to the Captain's room, and sat down to watch, to continue to investigate this mystery that was so upsetting the morals of the crew as to endanger their efficiency.

I left the door to the dining-room half open so that the light hung from the center of the ceiling threw its sickly rays into the room. I could hear the man at the wheel make an occasional move with his feet. Then all would be still again. One bell rang,--half-past twelve.

Suddenly the door slammed with a terrible bang. I knew that there was no draught in the Captain's room to close it in this manner, and I must confess that I was considerably startled. Then I was conscious of some one moving a small stool that stood across from me, over towards the safe at the foot of the bed. I put out my hands to catch the visitor, and not finding anything but air, I reached out and pulled the door open.

To my amazement, the stool had been moved to the safe. I was so unnerved by this that my one thought was to get away, and I went into the dining-room, and unconsciously lit my pipe. When my thoughts sorted themselves it became clear to me that I had been singled out by Destiny to have the privilege of meeting a great and new and unseen Force. If this were so great as to be able to move furniture at will, why, thought I, could it not be harnessed to our material uses? Why could it not be developed to get sails and discharge cargoes? Surely, it would revolutionize the forces of the air and earth, as we know them now.

While these thoughts were taking shape in my mind, I was brought up with a start by hearing three loud and distinct raps on the door of the Captain's room.

I shook the ashes out of the old corn cob pipe, and entered the room, closing the door behind me. This time I beheld still greater marvels. At the head of the Captain's bed appeared a small light, giving forth no rays, but moving around in the direction of the safe at the foot of the bunk. There it stopped about a minute, then moved over to the desk and gradually disappeared.