“Well, a few minutes ago—it may be five, or it may be ten—I’d just swung round to walk aft from the main riggin’ when, as my eyes travelled away out here over the port quarter, I got the notion into my head that there was somethin’ goin’ on down there, for it seemed to me that I’d got a glimpse—out of the corner of my eye, as it might be—of a small sparkin’, like—like—well, hang me if I know what it was like, unless it might be twenty or thirty pistols or muskets all being fired close after one another.”
“Ah!” I ejaculated. “And did you hear any sound, Henderson—anything like that of distant firing, for instance?”
“No, Mr Delamere; not a sound, sir,” answered the gunner. “But then,” he continued, “that ain’t very surprisin’ when you comes to think of it, for just listen to what’s goin’ on aboard here—the old hooker ain’t so very noisy, I’ll allow; still, what with the rustlin’ of the canvas overhead, the patter of the reef-points, the creakin’ of the jaws o’ the mainboom, the clank o’ the wheel-chains, and the wash and gurgle of the water alongside with the roll of her, there’s not much chance of pickin’ up sounds comin’ from a distance, is there, sir?”
“No, that is true, there is not,” I admitted. “Did you see, or hear, anything else, Henderson?” I asked.
“No, sir; never another thing,” answered the gunner. “And I’d like ye to understand, Mr Delamere, that I wouldn’t care actually to stand up in court and swear that I really saw what I told ye; for, as I explained, I only caught the thing out o’ the tail-end of my eye, as it might be, and then ’twas gone again, and I saw nothin’ more. But the impression that I really had seen something was so strong that I felt it was my duty to report it.”
“Of course; you did perfectly right,” I agreed; “particularly in view of the task that has been given us to do. Did the lookout see anything of this appearance of flashes?”
“No, sir,” answered Henderson; “he didn’t. Nat’rally he wouldn’t, for he was keepin’ a lookout ahead and on either bow, while this here flashin’ showed—if it really did show at all, and wasn’t my imagination—out there over the port quarter.”
“Quite so,” I concurred. “Under those circumstances he would not be in the least likely to see the appearance. Did it occur to you to take the bearing of the spot where you thought you saw those flashes?”
“Yes, sir, it did,” answered Henderson. “I stood, just for a second or two, to see if there was any more comin’: and then, not seein’ anything, I went straight to the binnacle and took the bearin’, which I found to be nor’-west and by west, half west.”
With one consent we both walked aft to the binnacle and peered into it. The schooner had swung several points while the gunner had been spinning his somewhat long-winded yarn, for the bearing which he gave now lay about a point over the starboard quarter. I stared into the blackness in that direction, but could see nothing. Then I got the night glass and, setting it to my focus, raised it to my eye, pointing it out over the starboard quarter and sweeping it slowly and carefully to right and left. For a minute or two I saw nothing; then, as I swept the tube along what I judged to be the line of the horizon, a tiny smudge of radiance—so dim as to be scarcely more than a suggestion—seemed to float athwart the lenses and was gone again. There is probably nothing in ordinary life much more difficult than to pick up and retain in the lenses of a telescope, levelled by hand, a spark of light so minute and faint as to be invisible to the unaided eye in the midst of the surrounding darkness, and the difficulty is enhanced when the attempt is made from the deck of a small vessel oscillating though ever so gently on the ridges of a long, low-running swell, and for the life of me I could not again find the feeble glimmer that had seemed to swim athwart the instrument, try as I would.