The drift of the current was so strong that before sunset Matadore had all but vanished, washed away in the blue that stretched from infinity to infinity, terrific in its calm.
The Pacific slept, and the slumber of this giant when sleep takes it in deadly earnest is more trying to the imagination than its fury and storm, an effect produced perhaps by the heave of the endless swell flooding up from nowhere passing to nowhere, through space and time.
But the crew of the Haliotis were not imaginative men, and they had other calls upon their consideration. It was at the first meal on board that the junk began to whisper of its presence. Harman had brewed some tea, and they were seated round the table in the saloon when Davis, looking up from his plate to the open skylight, sniffed the air.
“That junk whiffs,” said Davis.
It was enough. Harman for a moment turned his head as though he was straining to listen, and Keller glanced towards the door, then they went on with their food, but the mischief was done and from that on the junk was with them.
It was not so much the badness of the smell as the faintness and the Chinese nature of it that produced the psychological effect—it was a scent, a perfume of which shark liver oil was the vehicle and the occupants joss-sticks, opium and the musk of Chinks. It haunted their sleep that night and was only dispelled when next morning Keller, who had gone on deck, came shouting down the hatch that the wind was coming.
They had taken the sails off the junk the night before, finding a hatchet—it was stained with something that was not red paint—they hacked off the entangling spar, then, the wind coming, fortunately, on the junk’s side, the sails of the Haliotis trembled, the main boom lashed out to port and Davis springing to the wheel turned the spokes.
For a moment the Chinaman seemed to cling to its departing companion, wallowed, slobbered, groaned, and with a last roll dunched in ten feet of the starboard rail, then it drew away as the great sail pressure of the Haliotis heeled the schooner to port.
“We’re free,” shouted Harman.
“Hr—good riddance!” cried Keller, raising his fist as if to strike at the departing one, now well astern, and spitting into the water as if to get the taste of her from his mouth.