“He was a fine, brave, faithful fellow, Mr. Jeorling, and devoted, body and soul, to my brother.”
“As West is to you, captain.”
“Does Glass know where the shipwrecked men from the Jane are now?”
“I told him, captain, and also all that you have resolved to do to save them.”
I did not think proper to add that Glass had been much surprised at Captain Guy’s abstaining from visiting him, as, in his absurd vanity, he held the commander of the Halbrane bound to do, nor that he did not consider the Governor of Tristan d’Acunha bound to take the initiative.
“I wish to ask you, Mr. Jeorling, whether you think everything in Arthur Pym’s journal, which has been published by Edgar Poe, is exactly true?”
“I think there is some need for doubt,” I answered “the singular character of the hero of those adventures being taken into consideration—at least concerning the phenomena of the island of Tsalal. And we know that Arthur Pym was mistaken in asserting that Captain William Guy and several of his companions perished in the landslip of the hill at Klock-Klock.”
“Ah! but he does not assert this, Mr. Jeorling! He says only that, when he and Dirk Peters had reached the opening through which they could discern the surrounding country, the seat of the artificial earthquake was revealed to them. Now, as the whole face of the hill was rushing into the ravine, the fate of my brother and twenty-nine of his men could not be doubtful to his mind. He was, most naturally, led to believe that Dirk Peters and himself were the only white men remaining alive on the island. He said nothing but this—nothing more. These were only suppositions—very reasonable, are they not?”
“I admit that, fully, captain.”
“But now, thanks to Patterson’s note-book, we are certain that my brother and five of his companions escaped from the landslip contrived by the natives.”