When the Cock Crows

by Waldron Baily

This information astonished both Ichabod and those to whom he had told his story, for he had had no least suspicion that there was a third person on the yacht at the time of the wreck. In answer to eager questions, the man with the tackle declared that the body seemed to be chained fast to the engine of the sunken boat.

At this news, the Captain became greatly excited.

"Men!" he exclaimed in accents of dismay. "Hain't it been enough for this old, weather-beaten, storm-tossed hulk of an Ichabod to have gone through more'n most young fellers could stand without now havin' a murder to be investigated at his very door? Didn't ye hear them words o' Sumner Jenkins? He says as how the body is chained to the ingine. It's fitten, boys, as we should go right plumb up thar, an' have a look fer ourselves."

A few minutes later, Ichabod and his companions were lying alongside the wreck, and were leaning over gunwales, looking intently down into the transparent depths of the sea. And there, sure enough, lay the form of a man, with distorted features and wide-open dead eyes gazing back up at them. Around the waist of the corpse there was to be seen distinctly the chain that tightly encircled the body and thence ran to the engine frame, around which it was twisted, and held immovable by a huge padlock. Thus fettered, the unfortunate wretch had been carried down to his doom in the sea.

The gruesome discovery had been made that morning by pure chance on the part of a fisherman who, out of curiosity to view the wreck, had brought his boat up into the wind there. A careless glance over the side had shown him the ghastly face of the corpse beneath the waves. At the sight, the fisherman had let his craft slip off before the wind. He sailed straight to Beaufort, and told the town his news. It was the tidings carried by him that brought the morbid crowd of sightseers.

The combined efforts of those present had been insufficient to raise the engine and the body of the dead man to the surface. Now they were arranging a windlass, with block and fall, to bring the victim up to where the Coroner was impatiently waiting to perform his duty. Presently, then, the energetic workers secured a firm hold with the tackle on the engine frame. It was hauled to the surface, bringing with it the attached body. The padlock was smashed, and the stiffened form released from its iron bonds. Forthwith, the body was removed in one of the small boats to the sandy beach of Captain Ichabod's Island. The Coroner would have preferred that it should be taken into the shack for the holding of the inquest. But when the official made his request to the fisherman, the reply was by no means favorable.

"It seems as how I might be just a leetle accomidatin', but I dunno, Mr. Coroner, I've already got that place to fumigate out on account o' thar havin' been sickness an' a woman present thar. An' now should ye see fitten to carry that poor murdered feller in thar, Uncle Icky would sure have to quit. It 'ould be just a leetle more'n he could stand. Don't think I'm feared o' hants an' sich fer I hain't. It's just this: The thoughts o' the poor devil, how he just lay thar on the bottom with his eyes wide-open, an' him murdered—them thoughts would keep a-comin' back. No, Mr. Coroner, you'd better not take him into the hut—not unless you aim to buy Ichabod's Island."

The Coroner yielded to the old man's whim. He ordered the sodden and twisted form laid out decently on the white smoothness of the beach. Then, with the other men grouped about him, the Coroner selected a jury, and a minute later the investigation was under way according to due form of law. The only witnesses who were examined were the man who had discovered the corpse, and Ichabod. There was small need of more. For while the account of the finding of the body was completed within a few minutes, Captain Ichabod's narrative continued for a full hour, during which he told everything he knew concerning the wreck of The Isabel and the subsequent events, including the kidnapping of Shrimp.

Most of the hearers, if not all, had heard previously broken bits of the narrative. But now as they received the account in detail from beginning to end they hung on the old fisherman's words, held by the weird spell of this mystery of the sea.

At the conclusion of the testimony, the Coroner charged the jury briefly, and sent them into the shack to agree upon a verdict. The decision was not long delayed. Within ten minutes, the jury returned to the beach and the foreman announced that they had agreed upon a verdict. This was to the effect that the man had come to his death at the hands of parties unknown, while confined against his will aboard the gasoline yacht Isabel.