"Only in the most elementary way," I answered. "And something killed those men, you say—something you do not understand?"
"I can only surmise. Something struck them that froze them stiff, that turned moving salt water to ice in an instant, that killed the intelligence that directed it. It was a passenger, a young missionary going home—a young genius of a man with a bent toward material things, and a whole boatload of scientific paraphernalia that he was always experimenting with. He was on the poop-deck when this occurred, but went clean crazy when I fell to the deck. We put him in the Cape Town hospital, but up to the last he was demented. He alone could tell what he did to that bunch of mutineers, but he could not have lived much longer."
"Tell me the yarn," I suggested. "Perhaps I can make a further guess at it."
"The best way," he answered, "would be to hypnotize you and question your subconscious mind. It is done in the hospitals to learn of mysterious, baffling diseases, and why could not you tell how this happened? But I never hypnotized anyone, so I'll give you the yarn—tell you what I know, and perhaps you can get the rest."
He placed his picture, face downward, on my table, seated himself, and lighted his pipe as a preliminary to his story. But before he could begin there was a knock at the door, and I admitted Old Bill.
"Thought, sir," he said, "that you might want me to clean up when the job is done."
This was usual; when a piece of work was in the making I paid no attention to my place. Only when the last stroke was applied to a picture did I think of housecleaning, and send for Bill.
"All right," I answered. "But not right away. Come back in an hour, when we're through talking."
He had entered the room, and nodded at my answer, even though his eyes were fixed upon the painting on the easel.
"But ye haven't put my face in it, arter all, sir," he said.