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_ 'An outward-bound mail-boat had come in that afternoon, and
the big dining-room of the hotel was more than half full of people
with a-hundred-pounds-round-the-world tickets in their pockets.
There were married couples looking domesticated and bored with
each other in the midst of their travels; there were small parties
and large parties, and lone individuals dining solemnly or feasting
boisterously, but all thinking, conversing, joking, or scowling as
was their wont at home; and just as intelligently receptive of new
impressions as their trunks upstairs. Henceforth they would be
labelled as having passed through this and that place, and so would
be their luggage. They would cherish this distinction of their persons,
and preserve the gummed tickets on their portmanteaus as documentary
evidence, as the only permanent trace of their improving enterprise.
The dark-faced servants tripped without noise over the vast and
polished floor; now and then a girl's laugh would be heard, as
innocent and empty as her mind, or, in a sudden hush of crockery,
a few words in an affected drawl from some wit embroidering for
the benefit of a grinning tableful the last funny story of
shipboard scandal. Two nomadic old maids, dressed up to kill,
worked acrimoniously through the bill of fare, whispering to each
other with faded lips, wooden-faced and bizarre, like two sumptuous
scarecrows. A little wine opened Jim's heart and loosened his
tongue. His appetite was good, too, I noticed. He seemed to have
buried somewhere the opening episode of our acquaintance. It was
like a thing of which there would be no more question in this world.
And all the time I had before me these blue, boyish eyes looking
straight into mine, this young face, these capable shoulders, the
open bronzed forehead with a white line under the roots of clustering
fair hair, this appearance appealing at sight to all my sympathies:
this frank aspect, the artless smile, the youthful seriousness. He
was of the right sort; he was one of us. He talked soberly, with a
sort of composed unreserve, and with a quiet bearing that might
have been the outcome of manly self-control, of impudence, of
callousness, of a colossal unconsciousness, of a gigantic deception.
Who can tell! From our tone we might have been discussing a third
person, a football match, last year's weather. My mind floated in a
sea of conjectures till the turn of the conversation enabled me,
without being offensive, to remark that, upon the whole, this
inquiry must have been pretty trying to him. He darted his arm
across the tablecloth, and clutching my hand by the side of my
plate, glared fixedly. I was startled. "It must be awfully hard," I
stammered, confused by this display of speechless feeling. "It is--
hell," he burst out in a muffled voice.
'This movement and these words caused two well-groomed male
globe-trotters at a neighbouring table to look up in alarm from their
iced pudding. I rose, and we passed into the front gallery for coffee
and cigars.
'On little octagon tables candles burned in glass globes; clumps
of stiff-leaved plants separated sets of cosy wicker chairs; and
between the pairs of columns, whose reddish shafts caught in a
long row the sheen from the tall windows, the night, glittering and
sombre, seemed to hang like a splendid drapery. The riding lights
of ships winked afar like setting stars, and the hills across the
roadstead resembled rounded black masses of arrested thunder-clouds.
' "I couldn't clear out," Jim began. "The skipper did--that's all
very well for him. I couldn't, and I wouldn't. They all got out of it
in one way or another, but it wouldn't do for me."
'I listened with concentrated attention, not daring to stir in my
chair; I wanted to know--and to this day I don't know, I can only
guess. He would be confident and depressed all in the same breath,
as if some conviction of innate blamelessness had checked the truth
writhing within him at every turn. He began by saying, in the tone
in which a man would admit his inability to jump a twenty-foot
wall, that he could never go home now; and this declaration recalled
to my mind what Brierly had said, "that the old parson in Essex
seemed to fancy his sailor son not a little."
'I can't tell you whether Jim knew he was especially "fancied,"
but the tone of his references to "my Dad" was calculated to give
me a notion that the good old rural dean was about the finest man
that ever had been worried by the cares of a large family since the
beginning of the world. This, though never stated, was implied
with an anxiety that there should be no mistake about it, which was
really very true and charming, but added a poignant sense of lives
far off to the other elements of the story. "He has seen it all in the
home papers by this time," said Jim. "I can never face the poor old
chap." I did not dare to lift my eyes at this till I heard him add, "I
could never explain. He wouldn't understand." Then I looked up.
He was smoking reflectively, and after a moment, rousing himself,
began to talk again. He discovered at once a desire that I should not
confound him with his partners in--in crime, let us call it. He was
not one of them; he was altogether of another sort. I gave no sign
of dissent. I had no intention, for the sake of barren truth, to rob
him of the smallest particle of any saving grace that would come in
his way. I didn't know how much of it he believed himself. I didn't
know what he was playing up to--if he was playing up to anything
at all--and I suspect he did not know either; for it is my belief no
man ever understands quite his own artful dodges to escape from
the grim shadow of self-knowledge. I made no sound all the time
he was wondering what he had better do after "that stupid inquiry
was over."
'Apparently he shared Brierly's contemptuous opinion of these
proceedings ordained by law. He would not know where to turn,
he confessed, clearly thinking aloud rather than talking to me.
Certificate gone, career broken, no money to get away, no work that
he could obtain as far as he could see. At home he could perhaps
get something; but it meant going to his people for help, and that
he would not do. He saw nothing for it but ship before the mast--
could get perhaps a quartermaster's billet in some steamer. Would
do for a quartermaster. . . . "Do you think you would?" I asked
pitilessly. He jumped up, and going to the stone balustrade looked
out into the night. In a moment he was back, towering above my
chair with his youthful face clouded yet by the pain of a conquered
emotion. He had understood very well I did not doubt his ability
to steer a ship. In a voice that quavered a bit he asked me why did
I say that? I had been "no end kind" to him. I had not even laughed
at him when--here he began to mumble--"that mistake, you know--
made a confounded ass of myself." I broke in by saying rather
warmly that for me such a mistake was not a matter to laugh at. He
sat down and drank deliberately some coffee, emptying the small
cup to the last drop. "That does not mean I admit for a moment
the cap fitted," he declared distinctly. "No?" I said. "No," he
affirmed with quiet decision. "Do you know what _you_ would have
done? Do you? And you don't think yourself" . . . he gulped something
. . . "you don't think yourself a--a--cur?"
'And with this--upon my honour!--he looked up at me inquisitively.
It was a question it appears--a bona fide question! However, he
didn't wait for an answer. Before I could recover he went on,
with his eyes straight before him, as if reading off something written
on the body of the night. "It is all in being ready. I wasn't; not--
not then. I don't want to excuse myself; but I would like to explain--
I would like somebody to understand--somebody--one person at least!
You! Why not you?"
'It was solemn, and a little ridiculous too, as they always are,
those struggles of an individual trying to save from the fire his
idea of what his moral identity should be, this precious notion of
a convention, only one of the rules of the game, nothing more, but
all the same so terribly effective by its assumption of unlimited
power over natural instincts, by the awful penalties of its
failure. He began his story quietly enough. On board that Dale Line
steamer that had picked up these four floating in a boat upon the
discreet sunset glow of the sea, they had been after the first day
looked askance upon. The fat skipper told some story, the others
had been silent, and at first it had been accepted. You don't
cross-examine poor castaways you had the good luck to save, if not
from cruel death, then at least from cruel suffering. Afterwards,
with time to think it over, it might have struck the officers of
the Avondale that there was "something fishy" in the affair; but of
course they would keep their doubts to themselves. They had picked up
the captain, the mate, and two engineers of the steamer Patna sunk
at sea, and that, very properly, was enough for them. I did not ask
Jim about the nature of his feelings during the ten days he spent on
board. From the way he narrated that part I was at liberty to infer
he was partly stunned by the discovery he had made--the discovery
about himself--and no doubt was at work trying to explain it away
to the only man who was capable of appreciating all its tremendous
magnitude. You must understand he did not try to minimise its
importance. Of that I am sure; and therein lies his distinction.
As to what sensations he experienced when he got ashore and heard
the unforeseen conclusion of the tale in which he had taken such
a pitiful part, he told me nothing of them, and it is difficult
to imagine.
'I wonder whether he felt the ground cut from under his feet? I
wonder? But no doubt he managed to get a fresh foothold very
soon. He was ashore a whole fortnight waiting in the Sailors' Home,
and as there were six or seven men staying there at the time, I had
heard of him a little. Their languid opinion seemed to be that, in
addition to his other shortcomings, he was a sulky brute. He had
passed these days on the verandah, buried in a long chair, and
coming out of his place of sepulture only at meal-times or late at
night, when he wandered on the quays all by himself, detached
from his surroundings, irresolute and silent, like a ghost without a
home to haunt. "I don't think I've spoken three words to a living
soul in all that time," he said, making me very sorry for him; and
directly he added, "One of these fellows would have been sure to
blurt out something I had made up my mind not to put up with,
and I didn't want a row. No! Not then. I was too--too . . . I had
no heart for it." "So that bulkhead held out after all," I remarked
cheerfully. "Yes," he murmured, "it held. And yet I swear to you
I felt it bulge under my hand." "It's extraordinary what strains old
iron will stand sometimes," I said. Thrown back in his seat, his legs
stiffly out and arms hanging down, he nodded slightly several times.
You could not conceive a sadder spectacle. Suddenly he lifted his
head; he sat up; he slapped his thigh. "Ah! what a chance missed!
My God! what a chance missed!" he blazed out, but the ring of the
last "missed" resembled a cry wrung out by pain.
'He was silent again with a still, far-away look of fierce yearning
after that missed distinction, with his nostrils for an instant dilated,
sniffing the intoxicating breath of that wasted opportunity. If you
think I was either surprised or shocked you do me an injustice in
more ways than one! Ah, he was an imaginative beggar! He would
give himself away; he would give himself up. I could see in his
glance darted into the night all his inner being carried on, projected
headlong into the fanciful realm of recklessly heroic aspirations. He
had no leisure to regret what he had lost, he was so wholly and
naturally concerned for what he had failed to obtain. He was very
far away from me who watched him across three feet of space. With
every instant he was penetrating deeper into the impossible world
of romantic achievements. He got to the heart of it at last! A strange
look of beatitude overspread his features, his eyes sparkled in the
light of the candle burning between us; he positively smiled! He
had penetrated to the very heart--to the very heart. It was an
ecstatic smile that your faces--or mine either--will never wear, my
dear boys. I whisked him back by saying, "If you had stuck to the
ship, you mean!"
'He turned upon me, his eyes suddenly amazed and full of pain,
with a bewildered, startled, suffering face, as though he had tumbled
down from a star. Neither you nor I will ever look like this on
any man. He shuddered profoundly, as if a cold finger-tip had
touched his heart. Last of all he sighed.
'I was not in a merciful mood. He provoked one by his contradictory
indiscretions. "It is unfortunate you didn't know beforehand!"
I said with every unkind intention; but the perfidious shaft fell
harmless--dropped at his feet like a spent arrow, as it were, and he
did not think of picking it up. Perhaps he had not even seen it.
Presently, lolling at ease, he said, "Dash it all! I tell you it bulged.
I was holding up my lamp along the angle-iron in the lower deck
when a flake of rust as big as the palm of my hand fell off the plate,
all of itself." He passed his hand over his forehead. "The thing
stirred and jumped off like something alive while I was looking at
it." "That made you feel pretty bad," I observed casually. "Do you
suppose," he said, "that I was thinking of myself, with a hundred
and sixty people at my back, all fast asleep in that fore-'tween-deck
alone--and more of them aft; more on the deck--sleeping--knowing
nothing about it--three times as many as there were boats for,
even if there had been time? I expected to see the iron open out
as I stood there and the rush of water going over them as they
lay. . . . What could I do--what?"
'I can easily picture him to myself in the peopled gloom of the
cavernous place, with the light of the globe-lamp falling on a small
portion of the bulkhead that had the weight of the ocean on the
other side, and the breathing of unconscious sleepers in his ears.
I can see him glaring at the iron, startled by the falling rust,
overburdened by the knowledge of an imminent death. This, I gathered,
was the second time he had been sent forward by that skipper of
his, who, I rather think, wanted to keep him away from the bridge.
He told me that his first impulse was to shout and straightway
make all those people leap out of sleep into terror; but such an
overwhelming sense of his helplessness came over him that he was
not able to produce a sound. This is, I suppose, what people mean
by the tongue cleaving to the roof of the mouth. "Too dry," was
the concise expression he used in reference to this state. Without
a sound, then, he scrambled out on deck through the number one
hatch. A windsail rigged down there swung against him accidentally,
and he remembered that the light touch of the canvas on his
face nearly knocked him off the hatchway ladder.
'He confessed that his knees wobbled a good deal as he stood on
the foredeck looking at another sleeping crowd. The engines having
been stopped by that time, the steam was blowing off. Its deep
rumble made the whole night vibrate like a bass string. The ship
trembled to it.
'He saw here and there a head lifted off a mat, a vague form
uprise in sitting posture, listen sleepily for a moment, sink down
again into the billowy confusion of boxes, steam-winches, ventilators.
He was aware all these people did not know enough to take intelligent
notice of that strange noise. The ship of iron, the men with white
faces, all the sights, all the sounds, everything on board to that
ignorant and pious multitude was strange alike, and as trustworthy
as it would for ever remain incomprehensible. It occurred
to him that the fact was fortunate. The idea of it was simply terrible.
'You must remember he believed, as any other man would have
done in his place, that the ship would go down at any moment; the
bulging, rust-eaten plates that kept back the ocean, fatally must
give way, all at once like an undermined dam, and let in a sudden
and overwhelming flood. He stood still looking at these recumbent
bodies, a doomed man aware of his fate, surveying the silent company
of the dead. They _were_ dead! Nothing could save them! There
were boats enough for half of them perhaps, but there was no time.
No time! No time! It did not seem worth while to open his lips, to
stir hand or foot. Before he could shout three words, or make three
steps, he would be floundering in a sea whitened awfully by the
desperate struggles of human beings, clamorous with the distress
of cries for help. There was no help. He imagined what would
happen perfectly; he went through it all motionless by the hatchway
with the lamp in his hand--he went through it to the very last
harrowing detail. I think he went through it again while he was
telling me these things he could not tell the court.
' "I saw as clearly as I see you now that there was nothing I could
do. It seemed to take all life out of my limbs. I thought I might just
as well stand where I was and wait. I did not think I had many
seconds . . ." Suddenly the steam ceased blowing off. The noise,
he remarked, had been distracting, but the silence at once became
intolerably oppressive.
' "I thought I would choke before I got drowned," he said.
'He protested he did not think of saving himself. The only distinct
thought formed, vanishing, and re-forming in his brain, was:
eight hundred people and seven boats; eight hundred people and
seven boats.
' "Somebody was speaking aloud inside my head," he said a little
wildly. "Eight hundred people and seven boats--and no time! Just think
of it." He leaned towards me across the little table, and I tried to
avoid his stare. "Do you think I was afraid of death?" he asked in a
voice very fierce and low. He brought down his open hand with a bang
that made the coffee-cups dance. "I am ready to swear I was not--I
was not. . . . By God--no!" He hitched himself upright and crossed
his arms; his chin fell on his breast.
'The soft clashes of crockery reached us faintly through the high
windows. There was a burst of voices, and several men came out in
high good-humour into the gallery. They were exchanging jocular
reminiscences of the donkeys in Cairo. A pale anxious youth stepping
softly on long legs was being chaffed by a strutting and rubicund
globe-trotter about his purchases in the bazaar. "No, really--do you
think I've been done to that extent?" he inquired very earnest and
deliberate. The band moved away, dropping into chairs as they went;
matches flared, illuminating for a second faces without the ghost of
an expression and the flat glaze of white shirt-fronts; the hum of
many conversations animated with the ardour of feasting sounded to
me absurd and infinitely remote.
' "Some of the crew were sleeping on the number one hatch within
reach of my arm," began Jim again.
'You must know they kept Kalashee watch in that ship, all hands
sleeping through the night, and only the reliefs of quartermasters
and look-out men being called. He was tempted to grip and shake
the shoulder of the nearest lascar, but he didn't. Something held
his arms down along his sides. He was not afraid--oh no! only he
just couldn't--that's all. He was not afraid of death perhaps, but
I'll tell you what, he was afraid of the emergency. His confounded
imagination had evoked for him all the horrors of panic, the
trampling rush, the pitiful screams, boats swamped--all the appalling
incidents of a disaster at sea he had ever heard of. He might have
been resigned to die but I suspect he wanted to die without added
terrors, quietly, in a sort of peaceful trance. A certain readiness to
perish is not so very rare, but it is seldom that you meet men whose
souls, steeled in the impenetrable armour of resolution, are ready
to fight a losing battle to the last; the desire of peace waxes stronger
as hope declines, till at last it conquers the very desire of life. Which
of us here has not observed this, or maybe experienced something
of that feeling in his own person--this extreme weariness of
emotions, the vanity of effort, the yearning for rest? Those striving
with unreasonable forces know it well,--the shipwrecked castaways
in boats, wanderers lost in a desert, men battling against the
unthinking might of nature, or the stupid brutality of crowds.' _
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