“No! no!” impatiently answered the ex-whalesman, “nothing o’ the sort. It’s a whaler ‘tryin’-out’ her oil. Don’t you see the men yonder, standin’ by the try-works, are throwin’ in the ‘scraps’? Lord o’ mercy! if they should pass us without hearing our hail! Ship ahoy! whaler ahoy!” And the sailor once more put forth his cries with all the power that lay in his lungs.
To this was added the stentorian voice of the Coromantee, who, quickly catching the explanation given by the ex-whalesman, saw the necessity of making himself heard.
For some moments the deck of the Catamaran rang with the shouts, “Ship ahoy!”
“Whaler ahoy!” that might have been heard far over the ocean,—much farther than the distance at which the strange vessel appeared to be; but, to the consternation of those who gave utterance to those cries, no answer was returned.
They could now distinctly see the ship, and almost everything aboard of her; for the two columns of flame rising high in forward of her foremast, out of the huge double furnace of the “try-works,” illuminated not only the decks of the vessel, but the surface of the sea for miles around her.
They could see rolling sternward immense volumes of thick smoke, gleaming yellow under the light of the blazing fires; and the figures of men looming like giants in the glare of the garish flames,—some standing in front of the furnace, others moving about, and actively engaged in some species of industry, that to the eye of any other than a whalesman might have appeared supernatural.
Notwithstanding the distinctness with which they saw all these things, and the evident proximity of the ship, those on the raft could not make themselves heard, shout as loudly as they would.
This might have appeared strange to the Catamarans, and led them to believe that it was, in reality, a phantom ship they were hailing, and the gigantic figures they saw were those of spectres instead of men.
But the experience of the ex-whalesman forbade any such belief. He knew the ship to be a whaler, the moving forms to be men,—her crew,—and he knew, moreover, the reason why these had not answered his hail. They had not heard it. The roaring of the great furnace fires either drowned or deadened every other sound; even the voices of the whalesmen themselves, as they stood close to each other.
Ben Brace remembered all this; and the thought that the ship might pass them, unheard and unheeded, filled his mind with dread apprehension.