Phantom Lights
by August W. Derleth
Of the four men sitting in the captain's cabin on the S. S. Maine, three were listening to Captain Henderson, who was talking of storms in general, an apt topic, since the Maine had been driven head on into a raging tropical gale, and was at the moment making very little headway. The four of them, including the captain himself, were somewhat bored, though none of them showed it. Wembler, the business man, had begun to toy with his spectacles, taking them off, folding them, and putting them back on. Allison, the tall, dark man who was ostensibly a writer, occasionally whispered in an undertone to his companion, whose name had been given as Talbot.
It was Wembler who broke suddenly into the captain's monologue, "Have we stopped? Doesn't seem as if we were moving at all."
The captain shook his head. "No, we've been going very slowly on account of the gale." Then he stopped talking abruptly. "We have stopped," he said, and got up.
At the same moment, a sharp rap on the cabin door brought the other three men to attention. The Captain shouted "Come!"
A tousled head of red hair first appeared in the small opening, and after it a youngish face that seemed to emerge from the hair.
"What is it, Munro?" asked Captain Henderson.
"The anchor's gone out, sir—torn out of its holdings by the storm. We can't seem to be able to draw it back. Attached to something, most likely."
The captain pondered this a moment, then he made an abrupt gesture with his hand. "Well, leave it until this infernal storm has passed—we weren't making time, anyway. Give the order to shut down the engines. Then try to find out just about where we are, and report back to me."
"Very well, sir."
The captain sat down again. "Happens once in a lifetime," he explained. He shrugged his shoulders and tried to smile genially; his mood was not for it. "There's nothing to be done."
His listeners nodded sympathetically. Then the four of them sat in silence until another rap on the cabin door brought them again to alertness.
Again Munro appeared in response to the captain's call. "I've inquired of the first mate, sir," he said, "as to our bearings. He has no idea where we are. He's asked the radio operator to broadcast to see what he can get. We are somewhere about the Moluccas, he thinks, or more probably Java. Seems to be something wrong with our compasses, sir."
The captain nodded ponderously. "Most likely the storm, or some other magnetic influence. You may go, Munro, but if anything crops up, report to me immediately."
Munro vanished, drawing the cabin door shut behind him. The captain shook his head dolefully and waited to see whether one of the other men might say something. No one ventured; so he began once more. "I didn't think we had got as far as Java," he said. "But you can't ever tell—"
Wembler looked up suddenly and spoke. "Say, isn't this the twenty-seventh of February?"
"No, the twenty-sixth," said the captain evenly. He looked at his clock for verification, but found it not. "I'm sorry," he said at once, "it is the twenty-seventh. I had no idea it was after midnight."
Wembler nodded. "A year ago this morning the Cumberland went down off the coast of Java."
Captain Henderson snatched at the change of subject. "That was quite a mystery, as I remember it. There were only a few survivors, I think."
Wembler said, "only one—the first mate. They got some ugly rumours out about him shortly after he appeared. Said he'd blown up the ship during the storm."
"His wife went down, too, if I'm not mistaken," said the captain, as if questioning Wembler's suggestion.
Wembler nodded. "They said it was partly because of her that he did it. There was another man on board, and I understand there'd been bad blood between the mate and this man on account of his wife. Then, too, the first mate had had a terrible time with the captain, and wanted to get even with him. Did the thing in a moment of madness."
The captain looked at him for a moment without seeming to see him. Talbot spoke suddenly. "All of which goes to show how oddly unfounded rumours come up. We know that no one but that first mate survived the disaster—and yet someone got out those rumours about him."
The captain nodded. "You speak about it as if you had seen it all," he said, turning to Wembler.
Wembler laughed. "I knew the first mate pretty well, and I knew what he was capable of doing when he got jealous. His wife was a most attractive woman."
"You think he really sent the Cumberland down, then?" asked the captain.
"I know he did," said Wembler shortly.
"Nonsense!" snapped Talbot with unexpected sharpness. "Only the first mate would know that—and unless he's told you, you couldn't know."
Wembler looked at him curiously. "He didn't tell me—but his wife did."
Talbot looked as if he might explode; then abruptly he said, "Oh, I see—spiritualism." And thus he dismissed the subject.
The door of the cabin opened suddenly, and Munro looked in. "Something wrong, sir," he said.
"Eh? What is it?" asked Henderson.
"Lights on the water. Looks like a ship sinking, or else we're close to Java." Munro paused. "Will you come, sir?"
The captain nodded shortly and turned to his companions. "If you gentlemen would care to come along—? This promises to be interesting. There are greatcoats in the closet over there."
Munro led the way to the upper deck; the four men followed after him, bracing themselves against the gale. On the upper deck they were met by the first mate.
Captain Henderson raised his binoculars and stared vainly into the pall of darkness broken every few minutes by vivid, jagged flashes of lightning. Huge waves obstructed his vision at regular intervals. "Can't see a thing," he shouted. Then he swept the raging sea and sky once more. Abruptly, lights on the water came into view.
"There they are," shouted the first mate.
"Java lights," said the captain.
The first mate shouted again. "No, no, not Java, sir; they wouldn't bob about like that."
The lights were coming closer now. The first mate raised his binoculars and fixed them on the approaching lights. "That's a ship, sure," he said.
"Any distress signal?" asked the captain.
"No."
"Odd. Ship's in distress—plain as a pikestaff."
Munro had been peering through his glasses in silence; he lowered them suddenly and turned to the captain. "Some lettering just now, sir. I saw it quite clearly. An 'm' and the end of a word, which I took to be land."
"English ship, then," shouted the captain. "'M'—yes."
The first mate raised his glasses. "I can see lettering, but I'm damned if I can make it out."
A man came along the deck toward the little group, breasting the furious wind. It had stopped raining, now, and the lightning flashes were not as frequent as they had been. Even the wind had lessened considerably.
Munro saw the oncoming man and shouted to the captain, "here's our distress signal, sir."
The man came up to them, and handed a tightly folded slip of paper to the captain. Henderson opened the paper, and with the aid of the first mate's flash light, read:
"H. M. S. Cumberland calling. Send Harry to us."
"What's this?" shouted the captain.
"Mr. Rogers got only those words, sir; nothing more."
"Must be some mistake!"
"No mistake, sir. I heard that come in myself."
The first mate shouted suddenly. "The lights have vanished." Even as he spoke, there came a sudden brilliant flash in the sky, a flash that was not made by lightning, followed by a thunderous detonation.
Then came a sound that held them, fascinated them—a sound fraught with terror—a woman's voice, clear as a bell, calling from where the lights had been, the voice distinct above the roar of the wind.
"Harry ... Harry ... Harry...."
The wind brought the sound to them, magnifying it, subduing it. Immediately after, came a chorus of voices, calling as if from a great distance, "Harry ... Harry ... Come to us ... Come ..." the woman's voice yet strong above them all.
The captain muttered something incoherent. Then he turned to the three men who had followed him from the cabin and shouted, waving the message from the radio operator, "Cumberland calling! Something's wrong."
One of the three launched himself suddenly forward, striking Captain Henderson, and pushing him violently aside. He sprawled on the deck, but felt hands helping him to his feet almost immediately. At the same moment the voice of Munro came to him, shouting, "Man overboard—Man overboard!"
"Good God!" shouted the captain. "Shut up, Munro. We can't send any one out there to look for him." He swung about and looked at the men grouped about him; almost at once he saw that the man named Allison was missing.
Wembler pushed himself forward, his face white and drawn. "You wouldn't find him, Captain," he said, shaking his head. "You'd never find him. Harry Allison was first mate on the Cumberland a year ago—he wasn't 'Allison' then. And he was my brother-in-law!"
The captain waved his arm toward the place where the lights had been. "And that?" he shouted frenziedly. "What was all that?"
Wembler's hand closed over Henderson's arm. "You heard, Captain. It was the Cumberland sinking, just as she did a year ago when that blackguard blew her up. And I heard my sister's voice calling to Allison—and the others. The souls of those people he killed in his devilish jealousy came back for him!"