Читать книгу The Death Ship (Musaicum Adventure Classics) - William Clark Russell - Страница 16

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I rose to the surface from a deep plunge, but being a very indifferent swimmer it was as much as I could do—clothed as I was—to keep myself afloat by battling with my hands. I heard the rippling of the water about my ears, and I felt a deep despair settle upon my spirits, for I knew that the air that blew would carry my ship away from me and that I must speedily drown.

Indeed, to the first impulse of wind the Saracen had moved and I could see her, a great shadow, drawing away with the corpus sant, that a minute before had sparkled on her mainmast, now shining on her fore-topsail yard-arm. I had not the least doubt that, in the noise of the shooting, and amid the general alarm excited by the approach of the boat, neither the splash I had made in striking the water nor my disappearance had been noticed, and I remember thinking with the swiftness peculiar to persons in my situation—for as Cowper says—

"He long survives who lives an hour

In ocean self-upheld——"

I say I remember thinking that even if I should be immediately missed it was most unlikely the crew would suffer Mr. Hall to stop the ship and seek for me, for they would be mad not to use the new wind and sweep away from waters accurst by the presence of what was undoubtedly the Death Ship, whilst if even Mr. Hall's persuasion should prevail, yet long before that time I should have sunk.

I struggled hard to keep myself afloat, freely breaking the water in the hope that the light and whiteness of it might be seen. Four or five minutes thus passed and I was feeling my legs growing weighty as lead, when I noticed a light approach me. My eyes being full of wet, I could see no more than the light, what held or bore it being eclipsed by the spikes or fibres that shot out of it; as you notice a candle flame when the sight is damp. I could also hear the dip and trickle of oars, and tried to shout; but my brain was giddy, my mind sinking into a babbling state, and in truth I was so exhausted, that but for the sudden life darted into me by the sight of the lamp, I am sure I should then and there have clenched my hands above my head and sunk.

The lantern was flashed full upon my face and I was grasped by my hair. He who seized me spoke, and I believed it was the voice of one of the men in my watch, though I did not catch a syllable of his speech. After which I felt myself grasped under each arm and lifted out of the water, whereupon I no doubt fainted, for there is a blank between this and what followed, though the interval must have been very short.

When I opened my eyes, or rather when my senses returned to me, I found myself lying on my back, and the first thing I noticed was the moon shining weakly amid thin bodies of vapour which the wind had set in motion and which sped under her in puffs like the smoke of gunpowder after the discharge of a cannon. I lay musing a little while, conscious of nothing but the moon and some dark stretches of sail hovering above me; but my mind gathering force, I saw by the cut of the canvas that I was on board a strange ship; and then did I observe three men standing near my feet watching me. A great terror seized my heart. I sprang erect with a loud cry of fear, and rushed to the rail to see if the Saracen was near that I might hail her, but was stayed in that by being seized by the arm.

He who clutched me exclaimed in Dutch, "What would you do? If you could swim for a week you would not catch her."

I perfectly understood him, but made no reply, did not even look at him, staring about the sea for the Saracen in an anguish of mind not to be expressed. Suddenly I caught sight of the smudge of her, and perceived she was heading away on her course; she was out on our starboard beam. I cast my eyes aloft, and found the yards of the ship I was in braced up to meet the wind on the larboard tack, whence I knew that every instant was widening the space between the two vessels. On mastering this I could have dashed myself down on the deck with grief and terror. One of the group observing me as if I should fall, extended his hand, but I shrunk back with horror, and covered my face, whilst deep hysteric sobs burst from my breast, for now, without heeding any further appearances, I knew that I was on board the Phantom Ship, the Sea Spectre, dreaded of marines, a fabric accurst by God, in the presence of men dead and yet alive, more terrible in their supernatural existence, in their clothing of flesh whose human mortality had been rendered undecaying by a fate that shrunk up the soul in one to think of, than had they been ghosts—essences through which you might pass your hand as through a moonbeam!

I stood awhile as though paralysed, but was presently rallied by the chill of the night wind striking through my streaming clothes. A lantern was near where the three men were grouped, no doubt the same that had been carried in the boat, but the dim illumination would have sufficed for no more than to throw out the proportion of things within its sphere, had it not been helped by the faint moonlight and a corpus sant that shone with the power of a planet close against the blocks of the jeers of the mainyard. 'Twas a ghostly radiance to behold the men in, but I found nerve now to survey them.

There were three, as I have said: one very tall, above six feet, with a grey—almost white—beard, that descended to his waist; the second was a broad, corpulent man, of the true Dutch build without hair on his face; in the third man I could see nothing striking, if it were not for a ruggedness of seafaring aspect. I could not distinguish their apparel beyond that the stout man wore boots to the height of his knees, whereas the tall personage was clad in black hose, shoes with large buckles, and breeches terminating at the knees; their head-dresses were alike, a sort of cap of skin, with flaps for the ears.

"Do you speak Dutch?" said the tallest of the three, after eyeing me in silence whilst a man could have counted a hundred. He it was who had responded to my hail from the Saracen, as my ear immediately detected—now that I had my faculties—by the deep, organ-like melodiousness and tremor of his voice.

I answered "Yes."

"Why were your people afraid of us? We intended no harm. We desired but a little favour—a small quantity of tobacco, of which we are short."

This speech I followed, though some of the words, or the pronunciation of them, were different from what I had been used to hear at Rotterdam. He spoke imperiously, with a hint even of passion, and, rearing himself to his full stature, clasped his hands behind him, and stared at me as some Indian King might at a slave.

"Sir," said I, speaking brokenly, for I was a slow hand at his tongue, and besides, the chill of my clothes was now become a pain, "first let me ask what ship is this, and who are you and your men who have rescued me from death?"

"The name of this ship is the Braave," he answered, in his deep, solemn voice. "I, who command the vessel, am known as Cornelius Vanderdecken; the three seamen, to whom you owe your life, are Frederick Houtman, John de Bremen, and this man," indicating the rough, uncouth person who stood on his left, "the mate, Herman Van Vogelaar."

I felt a sensation as of ice pressed to my chest when he pronounced his own name, yet, recollecting he had called his ship the Braave, I asked, though 'twas wonderful he could follow my utterance—

"What port do you belong to?"

"Amsterdam."

"Where are you from?"

"Batavia."

I said, "When did you sail?"

"On the twenty-second of July in last year! By the glory of the Holy Trinity, but it is dreary work; see how the wind heads us even yet!" He sighed deeply and glanced aloft in a manner that suggested grievous weariness.

"Last year!" I thought, a sudden elation expanding my soul and calming me as an opiate might, "if that be so why, then, though this ship had made a prodigiously long voyage of it from Java to these parallels, there is nothing wildly out of nature in such tardiness." Last year! Had I caught the true signification of the words he used?

"Pray, sir," said I, speaking in as firm a voice as the shivers which chased me permitted, "what might last year be?"

The mate, Van Vogelaar, growled out some exclamation I could not catch, the captain made a gesture with his hands, whilst their burly companion said in thick, Dutch accents, "It needs not salt water, but good, strong liquor to take away a Hollander's brain."

"Last year!" exclaimed Vanderdecken, unbending his haughty, imperious manner, "why, mynheer, what should be last year but 1653?"