Chapter XII: 'stricken'

It was from this time that there began to creep over the ship a feeling shared by all, both fore and aft, that the voyage would not end without something untoward happening. What form, however, any misfortune which might come to them would be likely to take, none were bold enough to attempt to prophesy. Yet, all the same, the feeling was there, and, since every man on board the ship was a sailor, while, for the ladies, one was a sailor's wife and the other a sailor's future wife (each of whom was certain to be strongly receptive of the ideas and superstitions of her own particular sailor), it was not very strange that such should be the case. And, there was also in the thoughts of all that idea to which none of the men congregated outside the cabin, when the negro had been found dead, had ventured to give expression--the idea that the unknown, insidious disease--which had struck him and the negress, and also, possibly, the Arab _Negoda_ down--might eventually seize on them. There were, however, at present at least, no symptoms of anything of the kind happening. All on board continued well enough, and, up to the time that the man and woman had both been buried in the sea for more than twenty-four hours, no complaints were heard from any one of feeling at all unwell, while the three remaining blacks seemed no worse than before.

Yet, it was a pity, perhaps, that at this time the ship should still have been forced to remain becalmed and almost motionless; that neither from south nor west any breeze blew--from the north and cast there was scarcely a possibility of wind at this season--and that, except for the strong southern current which carried her along at a considerable though almost imperceptible rate, she hardly stirred at all. A pity, because it gave the sailors too many idle watches wherein to talk and chatter, to spin yarns of old-time horrors which had fallen upon vessels in different parts of the world, and to relate strange visitations which they had either personally suffered under or had 'heerd tell on,' and so forth.

Nor aft, in the saloon, did those who used it fail to discuss the strange circumstance of--not so much the death which had stricken the Africans--as the blindness that had fallen upon them. And here, Stephen Charke, better read perhaps than any of the others owing to his studious nature, was able to discuss the matter more freely than either the captain or those who sat at his table.

'I do distinctly recollect reading somewhere,' the mate said one evening, as all sat under the great after-deck awning, fanning themselves listlessly, while Fagg worked a kind of punkah which his ingenuity had devised, 'I do distinctly recollect reading somewhere of all those in a ship, on board of which was a large cargo of West African negroes bound for America, being stricken with blindness. I wish I could recall where I read it. In that way we might be able, also, to find out how to take some steps to avoid the same thing happening to us in the old _Emperor_.'

'A cheerful prospect, truly,' said the captain, 'if that is to occur'; and as he spoke he roamed his eye around the tranquil, glassy sea, on which there was not so much as a ripple. 'A pleasant thing, indeed, if one-half of us get blind and a rough time comes on. How, then, is the ship to be worked three thousand miles. How are the sails to be attended to?' and now he directed his eyes aloft to where all the canvas was neatly furled with the exception of the studding sails.

'We'll hope it won't be as bad as that, sir,' said Fagg. 'Only the black people, and those out of another ship than ours, seem to suffer. Until one of us,'--by which he meant the Europeans on board--'gets affected we haven't much to fear, I take it. While, you know, sir, we can find shelter before we reach Bombay. There are the Seychelles, for instance, from which we are not so very far off.'

'Such a delay as that would mean a very serious loss for me,' Pooley replied. 'As it is, I expect, one way or another, I shall miss one voyage out of two years.'

'I hope not,' said Gilbert Bampfyld, seriously, 'otherwise I shall begin to think it was a pity you ever came in contact with the dhow in which you found me.'

Yet, as he spoke, he saw Bella's beautiful eyes fixed on his face, and knew that no more crowning mercy had ever been vouchsafed to any two mortals than had been accorded to his sweetheart and himself by his rescue.

'Well,' said Pooley, 'we won't talk about that. I am devoutly thankful that we were enabled, by God's mercy, and also by the aid of something which is almost a miracle, to rescue you. For the rest a sailor must take all that comes in his way and never repine. The _Emperor_ has been a good old tank to me; pray Heaven she continues so to the end.' Then he suddenly stopped and peered forward under the awning towards the forecastle, where, beneath another awning, the sailors had been lying about, some sleeping, some chatting idly, and most of them--even to those who had dropped off--with a pipe between their lips.

'What's that commotion forward?' he asked, addressing himself to Charke, who, ever on the _qui vive_ as became a chief officer, had sprung to his feet and was gazing keenly towards the foredeck. 'What's the matter with the men, and why are those three holding Wilks up like that?'

'Forward there!' sang out Charke in a voice like a trumpet, as he, too, saw that which the master had described, namely, three of the hands standing up round the man named Wilks, and one grasping him on either side, while he himself pushed his arms out before him in a manner that implied a sort of doubting helplessness on his part. 'Forward there! What's the matter with that man?'

'He says he can't see, sir,' roared back another man on the forecastle deck, pulling his hair to Charke as he spoke. 'He was asleep just now; and then, when he woke up, he asked what time o'night it was because it was so dark.'

'My God!' exclaimed Pooley, while the faces of all around him took on a blanched, terrified look, and Bella, with the beautiful carnation of her lips almost white now, grasped her lover's arm. 'My God!' Then he turned to Fagg and muttered, repeating the other's words: '"Not much to fear until one of us gets affected." Heavens! we haven't had long to wait!'

While, following Charke who had already gone forward, and followed by Fagg, he went towards the forecastle.

His mates were bringing Wilks down the ladder now, since Charke sang out that he should be taken into the comparative darkness of their quarters at once, thereby to escape the glare of the sun; and not one of those who were eagerly watching his descent but observed how like his actions were to the actions of the blind negroes when they were brought off from the dhow, and the actions of the others to the behaviour of the men who had assisted them to come on board. For his companions directed his hands to the ladder's ropes even as the blacks, hands had been directed; while in each of his motions was the same hesitation, followed by the same careful grasping of the rail, as there had been in the motions of the slaves.

'Oh, Gilbert,' Bella exclaimed piteously, as she clung to him, 'what is going to happen? What is hanging over us? Supposing--supposing----'

'What, darling?'

'That--oh, I don't dare to say what I dread. But if this terrible thing should spread all through the ship. If uncle, if you, if all the sailors were attacked. And you--you--dearest; you, my darling.'

'Let us hope it will not come to that. Besides I, personally, matter the least of any----'

'Bertie!' she almost shrieked, alarmed, 'when you know that those others--some of them at least--that those poor black creatures have died after it. And you say that you matter the least of any; you, whom I love so.'

'I meant as regards the ship. I am not one of her officers, nor concerned in the working of her; and Bella, dearest Bella, don't get those dreadful ideas into your pretty head. Never give way to panic in an emergency. Doubtless some more will find their eyesight leave them--temporarily--but it can scarcely be that all will be attacked. And as regards death following, why, those other niggers are all right, and they are just as blind as those who have died!'

It happened--as so often such things happen in this world--that he spoke a little too soon. He hit upon the denial of the likelihood of a possibility occurring which, by a strange decree of fate or chance, was, at the very moment of that denial, to occur; since, just as the repudiation of such probability was uttered by him, and before the men helping Wilks had had time to get him comfortably into his berth in the forecastle, there arose once more that strange, weird, moaning kind of incantation from the deck-cabin in which the remaining negroes were, that had been heard before by all. And, added to it, was something more than any had heretofore heard, namely, a series of wild turbulent shouts in the unknown barbaric tongue used by the Africans--shouts that seemed to issue alone from one of their throats. A noise, a bellowing, in which, though on board the _Emperor of the Moon_ there was not one person who could understand the words that voice uttered, all recognised the tones that denote fear, terror, and misery extreme.

Instantly, so stridently horrible were those cries, every one of the Englishmen about rushed towards the cabin, Pooley and Charke being the first there, while Gilbert, running forward from the afterpart and along the waist, was soon by their sides.

And then, looking in, they saw that the poor blind, excited savage who was emitting those shouts had, in truth, sufficient reason for his frenzy. He seemed--he was, indeed--demented, as, with both his great hands, he felt all over the bodies of his comrades who were lying lifeless on the cabin deck, and presented an awful appearance to those who gazed on him as his great features worked in excitement, his vast mouth, with its adornment of huge white teeth, opened and shut like a wild beast's at bay, and his blind, but brilliant, eyes glared hideously. That he was nearly mad with fright and terror was easily apparent, since, while recognising without seeing that there were others near, he snarled and bit at the space in front of him, and struck out with his fists or clawed at the air with his enormous hands.

'He will spring out at us directly,' Charke said, drawing to one side of the cabin. 'The fellow is mad with fear or grief.' Then, ready in expedient as ever, he ran the cabin door out of its slide and shut in the negro with his dead companions. Nor did he do so too soon, since, a moment later, those without heard the huge form of the man leaping towards the door; once they heard him slip, as though he had trodden on the body or one of the limbs of those lying dead on the floor; and then there came a beating and hammering on that door which seemed to promise that, in a few seconds, the panels would be dashed out and the maddened black be among them.

'This is too awful,' muttered Pooley. 'Is he really gone mad, do you think?' he asked, appealing to Charke, Gilbert and Fagg at one and the same time.

'No doubt about it,' they answered together. 'No doubt. And if he once gets out to the deck, sir,' said Charke, 'a dozen of us will not be able to hold him.'

'We must capture him if he does. Better throw a rope round him somehow. If he were not blind, we should have to shoot him. Ha! see, he has smashed open the panel! Stand by there, some of you men, to catch him as he leaps out.'

While, even as he spoke, the gigantic madman, with another howl, broke down the door and sprang amongst them.