Men of the Deep Waters by William Hope Hodgson (best book club books of all time TXT) 📖

bows and stern,’ said the Second Mate; ‘just look at the growth on her.’

“There were, as he said, great clumpings of strange looking sea-fungi under the bows and the short counter astern. From the stump of her jibboom and her cutwater, great beards of rime and marine-growths hung downward into the scum that held her in. Her blank starboard side was presented to us, all a dead, dirtyish white, streaked and mottled vaguely with dull masses of heavier colour.

“‘There’s a steam or haze rising off her,’ said the Second Mate, speaking again; ‘you can see it against the light. It keeps coming and going. Look!’

“I saw then what he meant—a faint haze or steam, either suspended above the old vessel, or rising from her; and Captain Gannington saw it also:—

“‘Spontaneous combustion!’ he exclaimed. ‘We’ll ‘ave to watch w’en we lift the ‘atches; ‘nless it’s some poor devil that’s got aboard of ‘er; but that ain’t likely.’

“We were now within a couple of hundred yards of the old derelict, and had entered into the brown scum. As it poured off the lifted oars, I heard one of the men mutter to himself:—‘dam treacle!’ and, indeed, it was something like it. As the boat continued to forge nearer and nearer to the old ship, the scum grew thicker and thicker; so that, at last, it perceptibly slowed us.

“‘Give way, lads! Put some beef to it!’ sung out Captain Gannington; and thereafter there was no sound, except the panting of the men, and the faint, reiterated suck, suck, of the sullen brown scum upon the oars, as the boat was forced ahead. As we went, I was conscious of a peculiar smell in the evening air, and whilst I had no doubt that the puddling of the scum, by the oars, made it rise, I felt that in some way, it was vaguely familiar; yet I could give it no name.

“We were now very close to the old vessel, and presently she was high above us, against the dying light. The Captain called out then to:—‘in with the bow oars, and stand-by with the boathook,’ which was done.

“‘Aboard there! Ahoy! Aboard there! Ahoy!’ shouted Captain Gannington; but there came no answer, only the flat sound of his voice going lost into the open sea, each time he sung out.

“‘Ahoy! Aboard there! Ahoy!’ he shouted, time after time; but there was only the weary silence of the old hulk that answered us; and, somehow as he shouted, the while that I stared up half expectantly at her, a queer little sense of oppression, that amounted almost to nervousness, came upon me. It passed; but I remember how I was suddenly aware that it was growing dark. Darkness comes fairly rapidly in the tropics; though not so quickly as many fiction-writers seem to think; but it was not that the coming dusk had perceptibly deepened in that brief time, of only a few moments, but rather that my nerves had made me suddenly a little hyper-sensitive. I mention my state particularly; for I am not a nervy man, normally; and my abrupt touch of nerves is significant, in the light of what happened.

“‘There’s no one aboard there!’ said Captain Gannington. ‘Give way, men!’ For the boat’s crew had instinctively rested on their oars, as the Captain hailed the old craft. The men gave way again; and then the Second Mate called out excitedly:—‘Why, look there, there’s our pigsty! See, it’s got Bheotpte painted on the end. It’s drifted down here, and the scum’s caught it. What a blessed wonder!’

“It was, as he had said, our pigsty that had been washed overboard in the storm; and most extraordinary to come across it there.

“‘We’ll tow it off with us, when we go,’ remarked the Captain, and shouted to the crew to get-down to their oars; for they were hardly moving the boat, because the scum was so thick, close in around the old ship, that it literally clogged the boat from going ahead. I remember that it struck me, in a half-conscious sort of way, as curious that the pigsty, containing our three dead pigs, had managed to drift in so far, unaided, whilst we could scarcely manage to force the boat in, now that we had come right into the scum. But the thought passed from my mind; for so many things happened within the next few minutes.

“The men managed to bring the boat in alongside, within a couple of feet of the derelict, and the man with the boathook, hooked on.

“”Ave ye got ‘old there, forrard?’ asked Captain Gannington.

“‘Yessir!’ said the bow-man; and as he spoke, there came a queer noise of tearing.

“‘What’s that?’ asked the Captain.

“‘It’s tore, Sir. Tore clean away!’ said the man; and his tone showed that he had received something of a shock.

“‘Get a hold again then!’ said Captain Gannington, irritably. ‘You don’t s’pose this packet was built yesterday! Shove the hook into the main chains.’ The man did so, gingerly, as you might say; for it seemed to me, in the growing dusk, that he put no strain on to the hook; though, of course, there was no need; you see, the boat could not go very far, of herself, in the stuff in which she was embedded. I remember thinking this, also, as I looked up at the bulging side of the old vessel. Then I heard Captain Gannington’s voice:—

“‘Lord! but she’s old! An’ what a colour, Doctor! She don’t half want paint, do she! … Now then, somebody, one of them oars.’

“An oar was passed to him, and he leant it up against the ancient, bulging side; then he paused, and called to the Second Mate to light a couple of the lamps, and stand-by to pass them up; for darkness had settled down now upon the sea.

“The Second Mate lit two of the lamps, and told one of the men to light a third, and keep it handy in the boat; then he stepped across, with a lamp in each hand, to where Captain Gannington stood by the oar against the side of the ship.

“‘Now, my lad,’ said the Captain, to the man who had pulled stroke, ‘up with you, an’ we’ll pass ye up the lamps.’

“The man jumped to obey; caught the oar, and put his weight upon it, and as he did so, something seemed to give a little.

“‘Look!’ cried out the Second Mate, and pointed, lamp in hand … ‘It’s sunk in!’

“This was true. The oar had made quite an indentation into the bulging, somewhat slimy side of the old vessel.

“‘Mould, I reckon,’ said Captain Gannington, bending towards the derelict, to look. Then, to the man:—

“‘Up you go, my lad, and be smart… . Don’t stand there waitin’!’

“At that, the man, who had paused a moment as he felt the oar give beneath his weight, began to shin up, and in a few seconds he was aboard, and leant out over the rail for the lamps. These were passed up to him, and the Captain called to him to steady the oar. Then Captain Gannington went, calling to me to follow, and after me the Second Mate.

“As the Captain put his face over the rail, he gave a cry of astonishment:—

“‘Mould, by gum! Mould… . Tons of it! … Good Lord!’

“As I heard him shout that, I scrambled the more eagerly after him, and in a moment or two, I was able to see what he meant–- Everywhere that the light from the two lamps struck, there was nothing but smooth great masses and surfaces of a dirty white mould.

“I climbed over the rail, with the Second Mate close behind, and stood upon the mould-covered decks. There might have been no planking beneath the mould, for all that our feet could feel. It gave under our tread, with a spongy, puddingy feel. It covered the deck-furniture of the old ship, so that the shape of each article and fitment was often no more than suggested through it.

“Captain Gannington snatched a lamp from the man, and the Second Mate reached for the other. They held the lamps high, and we all stared. It was most extraordinary, and, somehow, most abominable. I can think of no other word, gentlemen, that so much describes the predominant feeling that affected me at the moment.

“‘Good Lord!’ said Captain Gannington, several times. ‘Good Lord!’ But neither the Second Mate nor the man said anything, and for my part I just stared, and at the same time began to smell a little at the air; for there was again a vague odour of something half familiar, that somehow brought to me a sense of half-known fright.

“I turned this way and that, staring, as I have said. Here and there, the mould was so heavy as to entirely disguise what lay beneath; converting the deck-fittings into indistinguishable mounds of mould, all dirty-white, and blotched and veined with irregular, dull purplish markings.

“There was a strange thing about the mould, which Captain Gannington drew attention to—it was that our feet did not crush into it and break the surface, as might have been expected; but merely indented it.

“‘Never seen nothin’ like it before! … Never!’ said the Captain, after having stooped with his lamp to examine the mould under our feet. He stamped with his heel, and the stuff gave out a dull, puddingy sound. He stooped again, with a quick movement, and stared, holding the lamp close to the deck. ‘Blest, if it ain’t a reg’lar skin to it!’ he said.

“The Second Mate and the man and I all stooped, and looked at it. The Second Mate progged it with his forefinger, and I remember I rapped it several times with my knuckles, listening to the dead sound it gave out, and noticing the close, firm texture of the mould.

“‘Dough!’ said the Second Mate. ‘It’s just like blessed dough! … Pouf!’ He stood up with a quick movement. ‘I could fancy it stinks a bit,’ he said.

“As he said this, I knew suddenly what the familiar thing was, in the vague odour that hung about us—It was that the smell had something animal-like in it; something of the same smell, only heavier, that you will smell in any place that is infested with mice. I began to look about with a sudden very real uneasiness…. There might be vast numbers of hungry rats aboard…. They might prove exceedingly dangerous, if in a starving condition; yet, as you will understand, somehow I hesitated to put forward my idea as a reason for caution; it was too fanciful.

“Captain Gannington had begun to go aft, along the mould-covered maindeck, with the Second Mate; each of them holding his lamp high up, so as to cast a good light about the vessel. I turned quickly and followed them, the man with me keeping close to my heels, and plainly uneasy. As we went, I became aware that there was a feeling of moisture in the air, and I remembered the slight mist, or smoke, above the hulk, which had made Captain Gannington suggest spontaneous combustion, in explanation.

“And always, as we went, there was that vague, animal smell; and, suddenly, I found myself wishing we were well away from the old vessel.

“Abruptly, after a few paces, the Captain stopped and pointed at a row of mould-hidden shapes on either side of the maindeck … ‘Guns,’ he said. ‘Been a privateer in the old days, I guess; maybe worse! We’ll ‘ave a look below, Doctor; there may be something worth touchin’. She’s older than I thought. Mr. Selvern thinks she’s about three hundred year old; but I scarce think it.’

“We continued our way aft, and I remember that I found myself walking