The Ghost Pirates

e Mist and That

en were awed and gloomy, and there was a lot of talk about there being a Jonah

remember now, whether it was on the day we burie

took it to be some form of haze, due to the heat of t

, and I was working at the main rigging,

were middlin' '

for the time, took

y he spo

azy!" and his tone sh

e air had a wavy, strange, unnatural appearance; something like the heated air over

ough I don't remember ever seei

" Plumme

gain, and was astonished to find that the whole ship was

mmer," I said

"I never seen anythin' like i

dn't do th

e said, d

t forward and asked him to pass me up the spike. He stooped and picked it up from the deck, where it had tumbled. As he hel

he said. "

it had-the whole sea showing clear

lummer, and h

blowed!" he

ing. I had another good look at the sea. I had a vague idea that something was different. The sea looked brighter, somehow, and the air clearer, I thought, and I missed something; but n

anything unusual. Only, when the evening came (in the second dog-watch it was)

rtainty, that it was

s the begin

he atmosphere remained clear. Yet, I heard from one of the chaps in the Mate

ed it to me, when I questioned him a

tter. And when I mentioned it to Tammy, and asked him whether he'd noticed it, he only remarked that it must have been heat, or el

dering more than ever, and showed me how right I had been in f

e seen, even on the horizon. It was hot, standing at the wheel; for there was scarcely any wind, and I was feeling drowsy. T

op, I left the wheel, and stepped aft to the taffrail. It was thus that I came to see something altogether unthought of-a full-rigged ship, close-hauled on the port tack, a few hundred yards on our starboard quarter. Her sails were scarcely filled by the light breeze, and flapped as she lifted to the swell of the sea. She appeared to have very little way through the water, certainly not more than a knot an hour. Away aft, hanging from the gaf

t the other ship; but, to my utter bewilderment, there was no sign of her-nothing but the calm ocean, spreading away to the distant horizon. I blinked my eyelids a bit, and pushed the hair off my forehead. Then, I s

ndered. I searched round the sea for wreckage; but there was nothing, not even an odd

I considered the idea, gravely. It helped to explain the thing, and I could think of nothing else that would. Had she been real, I felt sure that others aboard us would have been bound to have seen her long before I had-I got a bit muddled there, with trying to think it out; and then, abruptly, the reality of th

partly turned to the wheel. I was holding it steady with my left hand, whi

tared, I seemed to

in sight all the time, if I could have seen her. That curious, dim, wavering appearance had suggested something to me. I remembered the strange, wavy look of the air, a few days previously, just before the mist had surrounded the ship. And in my mind, I connected the two. It was nothing about the other packet that was strange. The strangeness was wi

see us, plainly; and yet, so far as we were concerned, the whole ocean seemed empt

ng. This, to say the least, should have struck me as queer; for some of the other packets were homeward bound along with us, and steering the same course. Consequently, with the weather being fine, and the wind next to nothing, they should have be

some other dimension. For a while, you know, I really believed the mystery of the idea, and that it might be the actual truth, took me; instead of my reali

e and rattle of the sails; and, in the

l have you got

round to

now-Sir,"

even that I wa

ted. "I should damned

, you fool. You'll

I did it almost mechanically; for I was still da

bewilderment passed off, and I found that I was peering blankly into the binnacle, at the compass-card; yet, until then, entirely witho

ssel. She had appeared last on the beam, instead of on the quarter. Now, however, as my brain began to work, I saw the cause of this appare

y momentarily-in the face of the Skipper's storming. I think I had hardly realised he

t stared into his face, like an ass, without saying a word. I

nt on shouting. "Are you a lunatic? Have y

ing; but the words wo

ut I was so bewildered with the thing I had found out; and, in a w

imes, as if it were the only thing that sufficiently expressed his opin

said, with a sudden g

more than

answer my questions the

h you? What have you b

r me

n the starboard quarter, Sir," I b

short with disbe

ked over the quarter. Then

you mean by trying to sp

answered. "It's out

d. "Don't talk rubbish to

, Sir," I

me!" he snapped, with

't hav

nd stared into my face. I believe the old ass thought I was a bit m

pson," he

heard the Seco

her man to

Sir," the Se

kett came up to relieve me. I gave

e asked me, as I ste

se; but the crabby old devil took no notice of me, whatever. When I got down on to the maindeck, I went up to the Second

p on the starboard quarte

the Second Mate replied, looking at m

Sir," I b

I shall want you then to give a hand with these foot-ropes. Y

partly in anger; but m

ttered at length,