‘Ha!’ said I, turning upon Finn.
‘By all that is blue, then, Mr. Monson, sir,’ exclaimed the worthy fellow, ‘there is somewhat a-talking below.’
‘What does it say?’ asked Miss Jennings, showing herself all on a sudden thoroughly frightened.
‘What I heard,’ said Wilfrid in his most raven note, ‘was this, “The yacht is cursed. Sail her home! Sail her home!”’
‘’Twas as plain, Mr. Monson, as his honour’s own voice,’ said Finn, in a profoundly despondent way.
‘D’ye think, Finn,’ said I, ‘that it is a trick played off upon the crew by some skylarking son of a gun forward?’
His head wagged against the stars. ‘I wish I could believe it, sir. The woice was under foot. There’s nobody belonging to the ship there. There’s no man a-missing. ’Sides, ’tain’t a human woice. Never could ha’ believed it.’ He pulled out his pocket-handkerchief and polished his brow.
‘Well,’ I exclaimed, ‘so long as the thing, whatever it be, keeps forward—the deuce of it is, I’ve heard such sounds myself twice. It can’t be fancy, then. Yet, confound it all, Wilf, there can be nothing supernatural about it either. What is it? Shall I explore the yacht forward? Give me a lantern, and I’ll overhaul her to my own satisfaction anyway.’
‘You may set us on fire,’ said Wilfrid; ‘let the matter rest for to-night. To-morrow, Finn, you can rummage the yacht.’ He started violently: ‘What can it be, though? Are we veritably haunted by the ghost of the Portuguese?’ He tried to laugh, but the dryness of the utterance seemed to half choke him.
‘Well, let us wait for daylight, as you say,’ cried I.