his neck."

"Good God!" he uttered, impressively, fixing his smeary blue eyes
on me. "The sea! No man killed by the sea ever looked like that."

He seemed positively scandalised at my suggestion. And as I gazed
at him, certainly not prepared for anything original on his part,

he advanced his head close to mine and thrust his tongue out at me
so suddenly that I couldn't help starting back.

After scoring over my calmness in this graphic way he nodded
wisely. If I had seen the sight, he assured me, I would never

forget it as long as I lived. The weather was too bad to give the
corpse a proper sea burial. So next day at dawn they took it up on

the poop, covering its face with a bit of bunting; he read a short
prayer, and then, just as it was, in its oilskins and long boots,

they launched it amongst those mountainous seas that seemed ready
every moment to swallow up the ship herself and the terrified lives

on board of her.
"That reefed foresail saved you," I threw in.

"Under God - it did," he exclaimed fervently. "It was by a special
mercy, I firmly believe, that it stood some of those hurricane

squalls."
"It was the setting of that sail which - " I began.

"God's own hand in it," he interrupted me. "Nothing less could
have done it. I don't mind telling you that I hardly dared give

the order. It seemed impossible that we could touch anything
without losing it, and then our last hope would have been gone."

The terror of that gale was on him yet. I let him go on for a bit,
then said, casually - as if returning to a minor subject:

"You were very anxious to give up your mate to the shore people, I
believe?"

He was. To the law. His obscure tenacity on that point had in it
something incomprehensible and a little awful; something, as it

were, mystical, quite apart from his anxiety that he should not be
suspected of "countenancing any doings of that sort." Seven-and-

thirty virtuous years at sea, of which over twenty of immaculate
command, and the last fifteen in the Sephora, seemed to have laid

him under some pitiless obligation.
"And you know," he went on, groping shamefacedly amongst his

feelings, "I did not engage that young fellow. His people had some
interest with my owners. I was in a way forced to take him on. He

looked very smart, very gentlemanly, and all that. But do you know
- I never liked him, somehow. I am a plain man. You see, he

wasn't exactly the sort for the chief mate of a ship like the
Sephora."

I had become so connected in thoughts and impressions with the
secret sharer of my cabin that I felt as if I, personally, were

being given to understand that I, too, was not the sort that would
have done for the chief mate of a ship like the Sephora. I had no

doubt of it in my mind.
"Not at all the style of man. You understand," he insisted,

superfluously, looking hard at me.
I smiled urbanely. He seemed at a loss for a while.

"I suppose I must report a suicide."
"Beg pardon?"

"Suicide! That's what I'll have to write to my owners directly I
get in."

"Unless you manage to recover him before to-morrow," I assented,
dispassionately. . . "I mean, alive."

He mumbled something which I really did not catch, and I turned my
ear to him in a puzzled manner. He fairly bawled:

"The land - I say, the mainland is at least seven miles off my
anchorage."

"About that."
My lack of excitement, of curiosity, of surprise, of any sort of

pronounced interest, began to arouse his distrust. But except for
the felicitous pretence of deafness I had not tried to pretend

anything. I had felt utterly incapable of playing the part of
ignorance properly, and therefore was afraid to try. It is also

certain that he had brought some ready-made suspicions with him,
and that he viewed my politeness" target="_blank" title="n.礼貌；文雅；温和">politeness as a strange and unnatural

phenomenon. And yet how else could I have received him? Not
heartily! That was impossible for psychological reasons, which I

need not state here. My only object was to keep off his inquiries.
Surlily? Yes, but surliness might have provoked a point-blank

question. From its novelty to him and from its nature, punctilious
courtesy was the manner best calculated to restrain the man. But

there was the danger of his breaking through my defence bluntly. I
could not, I think, have met him by a direct lie, also for

psychological (not moral) reasons. If he had only known how afraid
I was of his putting my feeling of identity with the other to the

test! But, strangely enough - (I thought of it only afterward) - I
believe that he was not a little disconcerted by the reverse side

of that weird situation, by something in me that reminded him of
the man he was seeking - suggested a mysterious similitude to the

young fellow he had distrusted and disliked from the first.
However that might have been, the silence was not very prolonged.

He took another oblique step.
"I reckon I had no more than a two-mile pull to your ship. Not a

bit more."
"And quite enough, too, in this awful heat," I said.

Another pause full of mistrust followed. Necessity, they say, is
mother of invention, but fear, too, is not barren of ingenious

suggestions. And I was afraid he would ask me point-blank for news
of my other self.

"Nice little saloon, isn't it?" I remarked, as if noticing for the
first time the way his eyes roamed from one closed door to the

other. "And very well fitted out too. Here, for instance," I
continued, reaching over the back of my seat negligently and

flinging the door open, "is my bath-room."
He made an eager movement, but hardly gave it a glance. I got up,

shut the door of the bath-room, and invited him to have a look
round, as if I were very proud of my accommodation. He had to rise

and be shown round, but he went through the business without any
raptures whatever.

"And now we'll have a look at my stateroom," I declared, in a voice
as loud as I dared to make it, crossing the cabin to the starboard

side with purposely heavy steps.
He followed me in and gazed around. My intelligent double had

vanished. I played my part.
"Very convenient - isn't it?"

"Very nice. Very comf. . . " He didn't finish, and went out
brusquely as if to escape from some unrighteous wiles of mine. But

it was not to be. I had been too frightened not to feel vengeful;
I felt I had him on the run, and I meant to keep him on the run.

My politeinsistence must have had something menacing in it,
because he gave in suddenly. And I did not let him off a single

item; mate's room, pantry, storerooms, the very sail-locker which
was also under the poop - he had to look into them all. When at

last I showed him out on the quarter-deck he drew a long,
spiritless sigh, and mumbled dismally that he must really be going

back to his ship now. I desired my mate, who had joined us, to see
to the captain's boat.

The man of whiskers gave a blast on the whistle which he used to
wear hanging round his neck, and yelled, "Sephoras away!" My

double down there in my cabin must have heard, and certainly could
not feel more relieved than I. Four fellows came running out from

somewhere forward and went over the side, while my own men,
appearing on deck too, lined the rail. I escorted my visitor to

the gangway ceremoniously, and nearly overdid it. He was a
tenacious beast. On the very ladder he lingered, and in that

unique, guiltily conscientious manner of sticking to the point:
"I say . . . you . . . you don't think that - "