章节正文
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 any one 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
bath-room, which could be entered also directly from the saloon.
But that way was never used.
The mysteriousarrival 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
grey-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 bolting
to these islets there. I don't suppose there's a drop of water on
them. I don't know how it was, but to-night 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 quarterdeck. 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 as 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 port-hole, 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 futilewhisper: "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 an answer, a sufficient answer, to the question I
had put to him. An answer containing all the difficulty of that
situation. I closed the port-hole 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 ladderhanging 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
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 any one 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
bath-room, which could be entered also directly from the saloon.
But that way was never used.
The mysteriousarrival 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
grey-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 bolting
to these islets there. I don't suppose there's a drop of water on
them. I don't know how it was, but to-night 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 quarterdeck. 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 as 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 port-hole, 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 futilewhisper: "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 an answer, a sufficient answer, to the question I
had put to him. An answer containing all the difficulty of that
situation. I closed the port-hole 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 ladderhanging 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
- barely [´beəli]
ad.公开地；仅仅 (初中英语单词) - polite [pə´lait] a.有礼貌的；温和的 (初中英语单词)
- opening [´əupəniŋ] n.开放；开端 a.开始的 (初中英语单词)
- jacket [´dʒækit] n.茄克衫；外套 (初中英语单词)
- mysterious [mi´stiəriəs] a.神秘的；难以理解的 (初中英语单词)
- arrival [ə´raivəl] n.到达；到达的人(物) (初中英语单词)
- advantage [əd´vɑ:ntidʒ] n.优势；利益 (初中英语单词)
- strongly [´strɔŋli] ad.强烈地；强有力地 (初中英语单词)
- anywhere [´eniweə] ad.无论何处；任何地方 (初中英语单词)
- presently [´prezəntli] ad.不久；目前 (初中英语单词)
- arrest [ə´rest] vt.逮捕 n.逮捕；停止 (初中英语单词)
- poison [´pɔizən] n.毒物 v.毒害 a.有毒的 (初中英语单词)
- voyage [´vɔi-idʒ] n.&vi.航海；航程；旅行 (初中英语单词)
- breath [breθ] n.呼吸；气息 (初中英语单词)
- splash [splæʃ] v.&n.溅水声；涉水而进 (初中英语单词)
- swimmer [´swimə] n.游泳者 (初中英语单词)
- daylight [´deilait] n.日光；黎明 (初中英语单词)
- whisper [´wispə] v.耳语 n.低语；沙沙声 (初中英语单词)
- comment [´kɔment] n.&v.评论；评注；注意 (初中英语单词)
- lightly [´laitli] ad.轻微地，稍微 (初中英语单词)
- anxiety [æŋ´zaiəti] n.挂念；渴望；焦虑的事 (初中英语单词)
- meantime [´mi:ntaim] n.&ad.其间；同时 (初中英语单词)
- capable [´keipəbəl] a.有能力；能干的 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- perfectly [´pə:fiktli] ad.理想地；完美地 (高中英语单词)
- stubborn [´stʌbən] a.顽固的；坚持的 (高中英语单词)
- strain [strein] vt.拉紧 vi.拖 n.张力 (高中英语单词)
- hearing [´hiəriŋ] n.听力；听证会；审讯 (高中英语单词)
- steward [´stju:əd] n.管家；服务员 (高中英语单词)
- destination [,desti´neiʃən] n.目标地 (高中英语单词)
- consul [´kɔnsəl] n.领事；执政官 (高中英语单词)
- temptation [temp´teiʃən] n.引诱，诱惑(物) (高中英语单词)
- suicide [´su:isaid, ´sju:-] n.&a.自杀(者)(的) (高中英语单词)
- daytime [´deitaim] n.白天 (高中英语单词)
- narrative [´nærətiv] a.叙述的 n.记事 (高中英语单词)
- ladder [´lædə] n.梯子；阶梯 (高中英语单词)
- hanging [´hæŋiŋ] n.绞刑 a.悬挂着的 (高中英语单词)
- identical [ai´dentikəl] a.完全相同的 (高中英语单词)
- finding [´faindiŋ] n.发现物；判断；结果 (高中英语单词)
- unpleasant [ʌn´plezənt] a.不愉快的；不合意的 (高中英语单词)
- hoarse [hɔ:s] a.嘶哑的；嗓门粗哑的 (英语四级单词)
- simultaneously [,siməl´teinjəsli] ad.同时，一起 (英语四级单词)
- sickly [´sikli] a.多病的；病态的 (英语四级单词)
- audible [´ɔ:dibəl] a.听得见的 (英语四级单词)
- touching [´tʌtʃiŋ] a.动人的 prep.提到 (英语四级单词)
- trying [´traiiŋ] a.难堪的；费劲的 (英语四级单词)
- futile [´fju:tail] a.无用的，无益的 (英语四级单词)
- stealthily [´stelθili] ad.偷偷地，隐秘地 (英语六级单词)
- sleepily [´sli:pili] ad.瞌睡地；懒散地 (英语六级单词)
- bookcase [´buk-keis] n.书架(箱) (英语六级单词)
- uncanny [ʌn´kæni] a.神秘的；离奇的 (英语六级单词)
- steadfast [´stedfɑ:st, -fæst] a.坚定的，不动摇的 (英语六级单词)
- halter [´hɔ:ltə] n.缰绳，绞索 (英语六级单词)
- anchorage [´æŋkəridʒ] n.停泊地点；抛锚地点 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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