In the Sargasso Sea, Thomas A. Janvier [ebook reader for pc .txt] 📗
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hunger required. When I had finished I sat on there for a good while
longer, being very loath to go into the cabin; but at last, by finding
myself nodding with weary drowsiness, I knew that sleep would come
quickly, and so went inside and laid myself down upon the floor. There
still was a faint glimmer of dying daylight outside, and this little
glow somehow comforted me as I lay there facing the doorway and
blinking now and then before my eyes were tight closed; but I did not
lie long that way half-waking, being so utterly fagged in both mind
and body that I dropped off into deep slumber before the
darkness fell.
I suppose that even in my sleep I had an uneasy sense of my bleak
surroundings; and that this, in the course of three or four hours—by
which time I was a good deal rested and so slept less soundly—got the
better of my weariness and roused me awake again. But when I first
woke I was sure that I had slept the night through and that early
morning was come—for there was so much light in the cabin that I
never thought to account for it save by the return of day. Yet the
light was not like daylight, as I realized when I had a little more
shaken off my sleepiness, being curiously white and soft.
I turned over—for I had rolled in my uneasy sleep and got my back
toward the doorway—and raised myself a little on my elbow so that I
might see out clearly; and what I saw was so unearthly strange, and in
a way so awe-compelling, that in another moment I was on my feet and
staring with all my eyes. Over the whole deck of the galleon a soft
lambent light was playing, and this went along her bulwarks and up
over her high forecastle so that all the lines of her structure were
defined sharply by it; and pale through the mist against the
blackness, out over her low waist, I could catch glimpses of the other
tall old ships lying near her all likewise shining everywhere with the
same soft flames—which yet were not flames exactly, but rather a
flickering glow.
In a moment or so I realized that this luminous wonder, which at the
first look had so strong a touch of the supernatural in it, was no
more than the manifestation of a natural phenomenon: being the shimmer
of phosphorescent light upon the soaking rotten woodwork of the
galleon and of the ships about her, as rotten and as old. But making
this explanation to myself did not lessen the frightening strangeness
of the spectacle, nor do much to stop the cold creeps which ran over
me as I looked at it: I being there solitary in that marvellous
brightness—that I knew was in a way a death-glow—the one
thing alive.
But presently my unreasoning shivering dread began to yield a little,
as my curiosity bred in me an eager desire to see the whole of this
wondrous soft splendor; for I made sure from my glimpses over the
galleon’s bulwarks that it was about me on every side. And so I
stepped out from the cabin upon the deck, where my feet sank into the
short mossy growth that coated the rotten planks and I was fairly
walking in what seemed like a lake of wavering pale flame; and from
there, that I might see the better, I climbed cautiously up the rotten
stair leading to the roof of the cabin, and thence to the little
over-topping gallery where the stern-lantern was. And from that height
I could gaze about me as far as ever the mist would let me see.
Everywhere within the circle that my eyes covered—which was not a
very big one, for in the night the mist was thick and lowlying—the
old wrecks wedged together there were lighted with the same lambent
flames: which came and went over their dead carcasses as though they
all suddenly were lighted and then as suddenly were put out again; and
farther away the glow of them in the mist was like a silvery
shimmering haze. By this ebbing and flowing light—which seemed to
me, for all that I knew the natural cause of it, so outside of nature
that I thrilled with a creeping fear as I looked at it—I could see
clearly the shapes of the strange ancient ships around me: their great
poops and forecastles rising high above their shallow waists, and
here and there among them the remnant of a mast making a line of light
rising higher still—like a huge corpse-candle shining against the
blackness beyond. And the ruin of them—the breaks in their lines, and
the black gaps where bits of their frames had rotted away
completely—gave to them all a ghastly death-like look; while their
wild tangling together made strange ragged lines of brightness
wavering under the veil of mist, as though a desolate sea-city were
lying there dead before me lit up with lanterns of despair.
Yet that which most keenly thrilled me with a cold dread was my strong
conviction that I could see living men moving hither and thither over
those pale-lit decks, where my reason told me that only ancient death
could be; for the play of the flickering light made such a commotion
of fleeting flames and dancing shadows, going and coming in all manner
of fantastic shapes, that every shattered hulk around me seemed to
have her old crew alive and on board of her again—all hurrying in
bustling crowds fore and aft, and up and down the heights of her, as
though under orderly command. And at times these shapes were so real
and so distinct to me that I was for crying out to them—and would
check myself suddenly, shivering with a fright which I knew was out of
all reason but which for the life of me I could not keep down.
And so the night wore away: while I stood there on the galleon’s poop
with the soft pale flames flickering around me in the mist, and my
fears rising and falling as I lost and regained control of myself; and
I think that it is a wonder that I did not go mad.
XXVIII SET MYSELF TO A HEAVY TASK
At last, after what seemed to me an age of waiting for it, a little
pinkish tone began to glow in the mist to the eastward; and as that
honest light got stronger the death-fires on the old galleon and on
the wrecks around her paled quickly until they were snuffed out
altogether—and then came the customary morning downpour of rain.
With the return of the blessed daylight, and with the enlivening douse
of cool fresh water upon me, I got to be myself again: my fanciful
fears of the night-time leaving me, and my mind coming back soberly to
a consideration of my actual needs. Of these the most pressing, as my
stomach told me, was to get my breakfast; and when that matter, in a
very poor way, had been attended to, and I had drunk what water I
needed—without much relishing it—from a pool that had formed on the
deck where the timbers sagged down a little, I was in better heart to
lay out for myself a plan of campaign.
In one way planning was not necessary. By holding to a northerly
course I believed that I had got at least half way across my
continent, and my determination was fixed to keep on by the
north—rather than risk a fresh departure that might only carry me by
a fresh way again into the depths of the tangle—until I should come
once more to the open sea: if I may call open sea that far outlying
expanse of ocean covered with thick-grown weed. But it was needful
that I should plan for my supply of food as I went onward, that was to
be got only by returning to the far-away barque; and also I felt an
itching desire—as strong as at first blush it was unreasonable—to
carry away with me some part of the treasure that I had found. That I
ever should get out into the world again, and so have the good of my
riches, seemed likely to me only in my most sanguine moments; but even
on the slimmest chance of accomplishing my own deliverance I had a
very natural human objection to leaving behind me the wealth that I
had found through such peril—only to lie there for a while longer
idly, and then to be lost forever when the galleon sank to the bottom
of the sea.
As to the gold, it was plain that I could carry off so little of it
that I might as well resign myself—having that which was better worth
working for—to losing it all. But my treasure of jewels was another
matter. This was so very much more valuable than the gold—for the
stones for the most part were of a prodigious size and a rare
fineness—that between the two there really was no comparison; and at
the same time it was so compact in bulk and so petty in weight that I
might easily carry the whole of it with me and a good store of food
too. And so, to make a beginning, I picked the stones out of the slimy
and stinking ooze in which they were lying and washed them clean in
the pool of water on the deck; and then I packed them snugly into the
shirt-sleeve in which my beans had been stored—and tickled myself the
while with the fancy that most men would be willing for the sake of
stuffing a shirt-sleeve that way to cut off the arm to which
it belonged.
My packing being finished, and my precious bag laid away in a corner
of the cabin until I should come to fetch it again, I was in a better
mood for facing my long march back to the barque: for I had come to
have fortune as well as life to work for, and those two strong
stimulants to endeavor working together gave my spirits a great upward
pull. And, fortunately, my cheerfulness staid by me through my long
scrambling struggle backward along my blazed path; nor was it, in
reality, as hard a journey as I had expected it to be—for I had but a
light load of food to carry, barely enough to last me through, and the
marks which I had left upon the wrecks in passing made my way plain.
And so, at last, I got back to the barque one evening about sunset,
and had almost a feeling of homecoming in boarding her again; and I
was thankful enough to be able to eat all the supper I wanted, and
then to lie down comfortably in her clean cabin and to rest myself in
sound slumber after my many restless nights on rotten old ships
reeking with a chill dampness that struck into my very bones.
I slept soundly and woke refreshed; and for that I was thankful, since
the work cut out for me—to get back to the galleon with enough
provisions to last me until I could cross the rest of the
wreck-pack—was about as much as a strong man in good condition could
do. However, I had thought of something that would make this hard job
less difficult; for the ease with which I had carried a part of my
food in long narrow bags, sausage-fashion—thereby getting rid of
both the weight and the awkwardness of the tins—had put into my head
the notion of carrying in that way the whole of my fresh supply, and
so carrying at least twice as much
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