CHAPTER XV.
THE PIRATE'S STORY.
It was now time to think of myself. The watch showed the hour to beafter six. Whilst my supper was preparing I went on deck to close thehatches to keep the cold out of the ship, and found the weather changed,the wind having shifted directly into the west, whence it was blowingwith a good deal of violence upon the ice, ringing over the peaks andamong the rocks with a singular clanking noise in its crying, as thoughit brought with it the echo of thousands of bells pealing in some greatcity behind the sea. It also swept up the gorge that went from ourhollow to the edge of the cliff in a noisy fierce hooting, and thisblast was very freely charged with the spray of the breakers whichboiled along the island. The sky was overcast with flying clouds of thetrue Cape Horn colour and appearance.
I closed the fore-scuttle, but on stepping aft came to the two bodies,the sight of which brought me to a stand. Since there was life in one,thought I, life may be in these, and I felt as if it would be likemurdering them to leave them here for the night. But, said I to myself,after all, these men are certainly insensible if they be not dead; thecold that freezes on deck cannot be different from the cold that frozethem below; they'll not be better off in the cabin than here. It will beall the same to them, and to-morrow I shall perhaps have the Frenchman'shelp to carry them to the furnace and discover if the vital spark isstill in them.
To be candid, I was the more easily persuaded to leave them to theirdeck lodging by the very grim, malignant, and savage appearance of thegreat figure that had leaned against the rail. Indeed, I did not at alllike the notion of such company in the cabin through the long night.Added to this, his bulk was such that, without assistance, I could onlyhave moved him as you move a cask, by rolling it; and though this mighthave answered to convey him to the hatch, I stood to break his arms andlegs off, and perhaps his head, so brittle was he with frost, by lettinghis own weight trundle him down the ladder.
So I left them to lie and came away, flinging a last look round, andthen closing the companion-door upon me. The Frenchman, as I may callhim, was sleeping very heavily and snoring loudly.
I got my supper, and whilst I ate surveyed the mound of clothes he madeon the deck--a motley heap indeed, with the colours and the finery ofthe lace and buttons of the coats I had piled upon him--and fell intosome startling considerations of him. Was it possible, I asked myself,that he could have lain in his frozen stupor for fifty years? But whynot? for suppose he had been on this ice but a year only, nay, sixmonths--an absurdity in the face of the manifest age of the ship and herfurniture--would not six months of lifelessness followed by aresurrection be as marvellous as fifty years? Had he the same aspectwhen the swoon of the ice seized him as he has now? I answered yes, forthe current of life having been frozen, his appearance would remain asit was.
I lighted my pipe and sat smoking, thinking he would presently awake;but his slumber was as deep as the stillness I had thawed him out of hadbeen, and he lay so motionless that, but for his snoring and harshbreathing, I should have believed him lapsed into his former state.
At eight o'clock the fire was very low. Nature was working out her ownway with this Frenchman, and I determined to let him sleep where he was,and take my chance of the night. At all events he could not alarm me bystirring, for if I heard a movement I should know what it was. So,loitering to see the last gleam of the fire extinguished, I took mylanthorn and went to bed, but not to sleep.
The full meaning of the man awakening into life out of a condition intowhich he had been plunged, for all I knew, before I was born, came uponme very violently in the darkness. There being nothing to divert mythoughts, I gave my mind wholly to it, and I tell you I found it anamazing terrifying thing to happen. Indeed, I do not know that the likeof such an adventure was ever before heard of, and I well recollectthinking to myself, "I would give my left hand to know of other cases ofthe kind--to be assured that this recovery was strictly within thebounds of nature," that I might feel I was not alone, so strongly didthe thoughts of a satanic influence operating in this business crowdupon me--that is to say, as if I was involuntarily working out some planof the devil.
The gale made a great roaring. The ship's stern lay open to the gorge,and but for her steadiness I might have supposed myself at sea. Therewas indeed an incessant thunder about my ears often accompanied by theshock of a mass of spray flung thirty feet high, and falling likesacks of stones upon the deck. Once I felt the vessel rock; I cannottell the hour, but it was long past midnight, and by the noise ofthe wind I guessed it was blowing a whole gale. The movement wasextraordinary--whether sideways or downwards I could not distinguish;but, seasoned as my stomach was to the motion of ships, this movementset up a nausea that lasted some while, acting upon me as I have sincelearned the convulsion of an earthquake does upon people. It took off mymind from the Frenchman, and filled me with a different sort of alarmaltogether, for it was very evident the gale was making the ice break;and, thought I to myself, if we do not mind our eye we shall be crushedand buried. But what was to be done? To quit the ship for that piercingflying gale, charged with sleet and hail and foam, was merely tolanguish for a little and then miserably expire of frost. No, thought I,if the end is to come let it find me here; and with that I snugged medown amid the coats and cloaks in my cot, and, obstinately holding myeyes closed, ultimately fell asleep.
It was late when I awoke. I lighted the lanthorn, but upon entering thepassage that led to the cabin I observed by my own posture that theschooner had not only heeled more to larboard, but was further "down bythe stern" to the extent of several feet. Indeed, the angle ofinclination was now considerable enough to bring my shoulder (in thepassage) close against the starboard side when I stood erect. The noiseof the gale was still in the air, and the booming and boiling of the seawas uncommonly loud. I walked straight to the cook-room, and, puttingthe lanthorn to the Frenchman, perceived that he was still in a heavysleep, and that he had lain through the night precisely in the attitudein which I had left him. His face was so muffled that little more thanhis long hawk's-bill nose was discernible. It was freezingly cold, and Imade haste to light the fire. There was still coal enough in the cornerto last for the day, and before long the furnace was blazing cheerfully.I went to work to make some broth and fry some ham, and melt a littleblock of the ruby-coloured wine; and whilst thus occupied, turning myhead a moment to look at the Frenchman, I found him half started up,staring intently at me.
This sudden confrontment threw me into such confusion that I could notspeak. He moved his head from side to side, taking a view of the scene,with an expression of the most inimitable astonishment painted upon hiscountenance. He then brought the flat of his hand with a dramatic blowto his forehead, the scar on which showed black as ink to the fire-glow,and sat erect.
"Where have I been?" he exclaimed in French.
"Sir," said I, speaking with the utmost difficulty, "I do not understandyour language. I am English. You speak my tongue. Will you address me init?"
"English!" he exclaimed in English, dropping his head on one side, andpeering at me with an incredible air of amazement. "How came you here?You are not of our company? Let me see..." Here he struggled withrecollection, continuing to stare at me from under his shaggy eyebrowsas if I was some frightful vision.
"I am a shipwrecked British mariner," said I, "and have been cast awayupon this ice, where I found your schooner."
"Ha!" he interrupted with prodigious vehemence, "certainly; we arefrozen up--I remember. That sleep should serve my memory so!" He made asif to rise, but sat again. "The cold is numbing; it would weaken alion. Give me a hot drink, sir."
I filled a pannikin with the melted wine, which he swallowed thirstily.
"More!" cried he. "I seem to want life."
Again I filled the pannikin.
"Good!" said he, fetching a sigh as he returned the vessel; "you arevery obliging, sir. If you have food there, we will eat together."
I give the substance of his speech, but n
ot his delivery of it, nor isit necessary that I should interpolate my rendering with the Frenchwords he used.
The broth being boiled, I gave him a good bowl of it along with a plateof bacon and tongue, some biscuit and a pannikin of hot brandy andwater, all which things I put upon his knees as he sat up on themattress, and to it he fell, making a rare meal. Yet all the while heate he acted like a man bewitched, as well he might, staring at me andlooking round and round him, and then dropping his knife to strike hisbrow, as if by that kind of blow he would quicken the activity of memorythere.
"There is something wrong," said he presently. "What is it, sir? This isthe cook-room. How does it happen that I am lying here?"
I told him exactly how it was, adding that if it had not been for hisposture, which obliged me to thaw in order to carry him, he would now beon deck with the others, awaiting the best funeral I could give him.
"Who are the others?" asked he.
"I know not," said I. "There were four in all, counting yourself; onesits frozen to death on the rocks. I met him first, and took this watchfrom his pocket that I might tell the time."
He took the watch in his hands, and asked me to bring the lanthornclose.
"Ha!" cried he, "this was Mendoza's--the captain's. I remember; he tookit for the sake of this letter upon it. He lies dead on the rocks? Wemissed him, but did not know where he had gone."
Then, raising his hand and impulsively starting upon the mattress, hecried, whilst he tapped his forehead, "It has come back! I have it!Guiseppe Trentanove and I were in the cabin; he had fallen blind withthe glare of the ice--if that was it. We confronted each other. On asudden he screamed out. I had put my face into my arms, and felt myselfdying. His cry aroused me. I looked up, and saw him leaning back fromthe table with his eyes fixed and horror in his countenance. I was toofeeble to speak--too languid to rise. I watched him awhile, and then thedrowsiness stole over me again, and my head sank, and I remember nomore."
He shuddered, and extended the pannikin for more liquor. I filled itwith two-thirds of brandy and the rest water, and he supped it down asif it had been a thimbleful of wine.
"By the holy cross," cried he, "but this is very wonderful, though. Howlong have you been here, sir?"
"Three days."
"Three days! and I have been in a stupor all that time--never moving,never breathing?"
"You will have been in a stupor longer than that, I expect," said I.
"What is this month?" he cried.
"July," I replied.
"July--July!" he muttered. "Impossible! Let me see"--he began to counton his fingers--"we fell in with the ice and got locked in November. Wehad six months of it, I recollect no more. Six months of it, sir; andsuppose the stupor came upon me then, the month at which my memory stopswould be April. Yet you call this July; that is to say, _four months ofoblivion_; impossible!"
"What was the year in which you fell in with the ice?" said I.
"The year?" he exclaimed in a voice deep with the wonder this questionraised in him; "the year? Why, man, what year but _seventeen hundred andfifty-three_!"
"Good God!" cried I, jumping to my feet with terror at a statement I hadanticipated, though it shocked me as a new and frightful revelation.
"Do you know what year this is?"
He looked at me without answering.
"It is eighteen hundred and one," I cried, and as I said this I recoileda step, fully expecting him to leap up and exhibit a hundreddemonstrations of horror and consternation; for this I am persuadedwould have been my posture had any man roused me from a slumber and toldme I had been in that condition for eight-and-forty years.
He continued to view me with a very strange and cunning expression inhis eyes, the coolness of which was inexpressibly surprising andbewildering and even mortifying; then presently grasping his beard,looked at it; then put his hands to his face and looked at them; thendrew out his feet and looked at _them_; then very slowly, but withoutvisible effort, stood up, swaying a little with an air of weakness, andproceeded to feel and strike himself all over, swinging his arms andusing his legs; after which he sat down and pulled the clothes over hisnaked feet, and fixing his eyes on me afresh, said, "What do you saythis year is, sir?"
"Eighteen hundred and one," I replied.
"Bah!" said he, and shook his head very knowingly. "No matter; you havebeen shipwrecked too! Sir, shipwreck shuffles dates as a player doescards, and the best of us will go wrong in famine, loneliness, cold, andperil. Be of good cheer, my friend; all will return to you. Sit, sir,that I may hear your adventures, and I will relate mine."
I saw how it was--he supposed me deranged, a mortifying construction toplace upon the language of a man who had restored him to life; yet a fewmoments' reflection taught me to see the reasonableness of it, forunless he thought me crazy he must conclude I spoke the truth, and itwas inconceivable he should believe that he had lain in a frozencondition for eight-and-forty years.
I stirred the fire to make more light and sat down near the furnace. Hisappearance was very striking. The scar upon his forehead gave a verydark sullen look to his brows; his eyes were small and were half lost inthe dusky hollows in which they were set, and I observed anindescribably leering, cunning expression in them, something of which Iattributed to the large quantity of liquor he had swallowed. Thiscontrasted oddly with the respectable aspect he took from hisbaldness--that is, from the nakedness of his poll, for, as I have beforesaid, his hair fell long and plentifully, in a ring a little above theears, so that you would have supposed at some late period of his life hehad been scalped.
I know not how it was, but I felt no joy in this man's company. For somecompanion, for some one to speak with, I had yearned again and againwith heart-breaking passion; and now a living man sat before me, yet Iwas sensible of no gladness. In truth, I was overawed by him; hefrightened me as one risen from the dead. Here was a creature that hadentered, as it seemed to me, those black portals from which no man everreturns, and had come back, through my instrumentality, after hard uponfifty years of the grave. Reason as I might that it was all perfectly innature, that there was nothing necromantic or diabolic in it, that itcould not have happened had it not been natural, my spirits were as muchoppressed and confounded by his sitting there alive, talking, andwatching me, as if, being truly dead, life had entered him on a sudden,and he had risen and walked.
I have no doubt the disorder my mind was in helped to persuade him thatI had not the full possession of my senses. He ran his eye over myfigure and then round the cook-room, and said, "I am impatient to learnyour story, sir."
"Why, sir," said I, "my story is summed up in what I have already toldyou." But that he might not be at a loss--for to be sure he had onlyvery newly collected his intellects--I related my adventures at large.He drew nearer to the furnace whilst I talked, bringing his covering ofclothes along with him, and held out his great hands to toast at thefire, all the time observing me with scarce a wink of the eye. Arrivedat the end of my tale, I told him how only last night I had dragged hiscompanion on deck, and how he was to have followed but for his posture.
"Ha!" cried he, "you might have caused my flesh to mortify by laying meclose to the fire. It would have been better to rub me with snow."
He poked up one foot after the other to count his toes, fearing some hadcome away with his stockings, and then said, "Well, and how long shouldI have slept had you not come? Another week! By St. Paul, I might havedied. Have you my stockings, sir?"
I gave them to him, and he pulled them over his legs and then drew onhis boots and stood up, the coats and wraps tumbling off him as he rose.
"I can stand," says he. "That is good."
But in attempting to take a step he reeled and would have fallen had Inot grasped his arm.
"Patience, my friend, patience!" he muttered as if to himself. "I mustlie a little longer," and with that he kneeled and then lay along themattress. He breathed heavily and pointed to the pannikin. I asked himwhether he would have win
e or brandy; he answered, "Wine," so I melted adraught, which dose, I thought, on top of what he had already taken,would send him to sleep; but instead it quickened his spirits, and withno lack of life in his voice he said, "What is the condition of thevessel?"
I told him that she was still high and dry, adding that during the nightsome sort of change had happened which I should presently go on deck toremark.
"Think you," says he, "that there is any chance of her ever beingliberated?"
I answered, "Yes, but not yet; that is, if the ice in breaking doesn'tdestroy her. The summer season has yet to come, and we are progressingnorth; but now that you are with me it will be a question for us tosettle, whether we are to wait for the ice to release the schooner orendeavour to effect our escape by other means."
A curious gleam of cunning satisfaction shone in his eyes as he lookedat me; he then kept silence for some moments, lost in thought.
"Pray," said I, breaking in upon him, "what ship is this?"
He started, deliberated an instant, and answered, "The _Boca delDragon_."[2]
[Footnote 2: So in Mr. Rodney's MS.]
"A Spaniard?"
He nodded.
"She was a pirate?" said I.
"How do you know that?" he cried with a sudden fierceness.
"Sir," said I, "I am a British sailor who has used the sea for someyears, and know the difference between a handspike and a poop-lanthorn.But what matters? She is a pirate no longer."
He let his eyes fall from my face and gazed round him with the air ofone who cannot yet persuade his understanding of the realities of thescene he moves in.
"Tut!" cried he presently, addressing himself, "what matters the truth,as you say? Yes, the _Boca del Dragon_ is a pirate. You have of courserummaged her, and guessed her character by what you found?"
"I met with enough to excite my suspicion," said I. "The ship's companyof such a craft as this do not usually go clothed in lace and richcloaks, and carry watches of this kind," tapping my breast, "in theirfobs and handfuls of gold in their pockets."
"Unless----" said he.
"Unless," I answered, "their flag is as black as our prospects."
"You think them black?" cried he, the look of resentment that wasdarkening his face dying out of it. "The vessel is sound, is not she?"
I replied that she appeared so, but it would be impossible to be sureuntil she floated.
"The stores?"
"They are plentiful."
"They should be!" he cried; "we have the liquor and stores of a galleonand two carracks in our hold, apart from what we originally laid in forthe cruise. Everything will have been kept sweet by the cold."
"All the stores seem sound," said I; "we shall not starve--no, not if wewere to be imprisoned here for three years. But all the same ourprospects are black, for here is the ship high and fixed; the ice inparting may crush her, and we have no boat."
"May, may!" he cried with a Frenchman's vehemence. "You have _may_ andyou also have _may not_ in your language. Let me feel my strengthimproving; we shall then find means of throwing a light upon these blackprospects of yours."
He smiled, or rather grinned, his fangs making the latter term fitterfor the mirthless grimace he made.
"May I ask your name?" said I.
"Jules Tassard, at your service," said he, "third in command of the_Boca del Dragon_, but good as Mate Trentanove, and good as CaptainMendoza, and good as the cabin boy Fernando Prado; for we pirates arerepublicans, sir, we know no social distinctions save those we order forthe convenience of working ship. Now let me tell you the story of ourdisaster. We had come out of the Spanish Main into the South Seas,partly to escape some British and French cruisers which were after usand others of our kind, and partly because ill-luck was against us, andwe could not find our account in those waters. We sailed in December twoyears ago----"
"Making the year----?" I interrupted.
He started, and then grinned again.
"Ah, to be sure!" cried he, "this is eighteen hundred and one; but tokeep my tale in countenance," he went on in a satirical apologetic way,"let me call the year in which we sailed for the South Sea seventeenhundred and fifty-one. What matters forty or fifty years to theshipwrecked? Is not one day of an open boat, with no society but thedevils of memory and no hope but the silence at the bottom of the sea,an eternity? Fill me that pannikin, my friend. I thank you. To proceed:we cruised some months in the South Sea and took a number of ships. Onewas a privateer that had plundered a British Indiaman in the SouthernOcean, and had entered the South Sea by New Holland. This fellow wasfull of fine clothes and had some silver in her. We took what we wanted,and let her go with her people under hatches, her yards square, her helmamidships, and her cabin on fire. Our maxim is, 'No witnesses!' That isthe pirate's philosophy. Who gives us quarter unless it be to hang us?But to continue: we did handsomely, but were a long time about it, andafter careening and filling up with water 'twixt San Carlos and Chiloewe set sail for the Antilles. Like your brig, we were blown south. Theweather was ferocious. Gale after gale thundered down upon us, forcingus to fly before it. We lost all reckoning of our position; for days,for weeks, sea and sky were enveloped in clouds of snow, in the heart ofwhich drove our frozen schooner. We were none of us of a nationality fitto encounter these regions; we carried most of us the curly hair of thesun, the chocolate cheek of the burning zone, and the ice chained thecrew, crouching like Lascars, below. We swept past many vast icebergs,which would leap on a sudden out of the white whirl of thickness, oftenso close aboard that the recoil of the surge striking against the masswould flood our decks. At all moments of the day and night we wereprepared to feel the shock of the vessel crushing her bows against oneof these stupendous hills. The cabin resounded with Salves and Aves,with invocations to the saints, promises, curses, and litanies. The colddoes not make men of the Spaniards, who are but indifferent seamen intemperate climes, and we were chiefly Spanish with consciences as red asyour English flag."
He grinned, emptied the pannikin, and stretched his hands to the fire towarm them.
"One morning, the weather having cleared somewhat, we found ourselvessurrounded by ice. A great chain floated ahead of us, extending far intothe south. The gale blew dead on to this coast; we durst not haul theschooner to the wind, and our only chance lay in discovering some baywhere we might find shelter. Such a bay it was my good luck to spy,lying directly in a line with the ship's head. It was formed of a greatsteep of ice jutting a long way slantingly into the sea, the widthbetween the point and the main being about a third of a mile. I seizedthe helm, and shouted to the men to hoist the head of the mainsail thatshe might round to when I put the helm down. But the fellows were in apanic terror and stood gaping at what they regarded as their doom,calling upon the Virgin and all the saints for help and mercy. Into thisbay did we rush on top of a huge sea, Trentanove and the captain and Iswinging with set teeth at the tiller, that was hard a-lee; she cameround, but with such way upon her that she took a long shelving beach ofice and ran up it to the distance of half her own length, and there shelay, with her rudder within touch of the wash of the water. The men,regarding the schooner as lost, and and concluding that if she went topieces her boats would be destroyed, and with them their only chance toescape from the ice, fell frantic and lost their wits altogether. Theyroared, 'To the boats! to the boats!' The captain endeavoured to bringthem to their senses; he and I and the mate, and Joam Barros, theboatswain--a Portuguese--went among them pistols in hand, entreating,cursing, threatening. 'Think of the plunder in this hold! Will youabandon it without an effort to save it? What think you are your chancesfor life in open boats in this sea? The schooner lies protected here;the weather will moderate presently, and we may then be able to slideher off.' But reason as we would the cowardly dogs refused to listen.They had broached a spirit-cask aft, and passed the liquor along thedecks whilst they hoisted the pinnace out of the hold and got the otherboats over. The drink maddened, yet left them wild with fear too. Theywould
not wait to come at the treasure in the run--the fools believedthe ship would tumble to pieces as she stood--but entered the forecastleand the officers' cabins, and routed about for whatever money andtrinkets they might stuff into their pockets without loss of time; andthen provisioning the boats, they called to us to join them, but wesaid, No, on which they ran the boats down to the water, tumbled intothem, and pulled away round the point of ice. We lost sight of themthen, and I have little doubt that they all perished shortlyafterwards."
He ceased. I was anxious to hear more.
"You had been six months on the ice when the stupor fell upon you?"
"Ay, about six months. The ice gathered about us and built us in. Irecollect it was three days after we stranded that, going on deck, I sawthe bay (as I term it) filled with ice. We drew up several plans toescape, but none satisfied us. Besides, sir, we had a treasure on boardwhich we had risked our necks to get, and we were prepared to go onimperilling our lives to save it. 'Twas natural. We had a great store ofcoal forwards and amidships, for we had faced the Horn in coming andknew what we had to expect in returning. We were also richly stockedwith provisions and drink of all sorts. There were but four of us, andwe dealt with what we had as if we designed it should last us fiftyyears. But the cold was frightful; it was not in flesh and blood tostand it. One day--we had been locked up about five months--Mendoza saidhe would get upon the rocks and take a view of the sea. He did notreturn. The others were too weak to seek him, and they were half blindbesides; I went, but the ice was full of caves and hollows, and thelike, and I could not find him, nor could I look for him long, the coldbeing the hand of death itself up there. The time went by; Trentanovewent stone-blind, and I had to put food and drink into his hands that hemight live. A week before the stupor came upon me I went on deck and sawJoam Barros leaning at the rail. I called to him, but he made no reply.I approached and looked at him, and found him frozen. Then happened whatI have told you. We were in the cabin, the mate seated at the table,waiting for me to lead and support him to the cook-room, for he was soweak he could scarce carry his weight. A sudden faintness seized me, andI sank down upon the bench opposite him, letting my head fall upon myarms. His cry startled me--I looked up--saw him as I have said; but thecabin then turned black, my head sank again, and I remember no more."
He paused and then cried in French, "That is all! They are dead--JulesTassard lives! The devil is loyal to his own!" and with that he lay backand burst into laughter.
"And this," said I, "was in seventeen hundred and fifty-three?"
"Yes," he answered; "and this is eighteen hundred andone--eight-and-forty years afterwards, hey?" and he laughed out again."I've talked so much," said he, "that, d'ye know, I think another napwill do me good. What coals have you found in the ship?"
I told him.
"Good," he cried; "we can keep ourselves warm for some time to come,anyhow."
And so saying, he pulled a rug up to his nose and shut his eyes.