My Danish Sweetheart: A Novel. Volume 2 of 3

by William Clark Russell

I shuffled down, keeping a tight hold on the edge of the hatch, and felt my feet before there was occasion to let go with my hands. There was very little to be seen of this interior by the lantern light. It was the forepart of the steerage, so far as I could gather, with two rows of bulkheads forming a little corridor, at the extremity of which, aft, I could faintly distinguish the glimmering outlines of cases of light cargo. Forward of the hatch, through which we had descended, there stood a solid bulkhead, so there was nothing to be seen that way. The doors of the cabins opened out of the little corridor; they were mere pigeon-holes; but then these 'tweendecks were very low, and while I stood erect I felt the crown of the wideawake I wore brushing the planks.

Never could I have imagined so much noise in a ship as was here—the squeaking, the grinding, the groaning; the jar and shock of the rudder upon its post; the thump of the seas outside, and the responsive throbbing within; the sullen, muffled roar of the Atlantic surge washing past; all these notes were blended into such a confusion of sounds as is not to be expressed. The lantern swayed in the Captain's hand, and the shadows at our feet sprang from side to side. There were shadows, too, all round about, wildly playing upon the walls and bulkheads of the vessel with a mopping and mowing of them that might have filled a lonely and unaccustomed soul down here with horrible imaginations of sea monsters and ocean spectres.

'I heartily wish, Miss Nielsen,' cried the Captain—and, in truth, he had need to exert his voice to be audible amid that bewildering clamour—'that you had suffered me to provide you with better accommodation than this. Jones could have done very well down here. However, for to-night this will be your cabin. To-morrow I hope you will change your mind, and consent to sleep above.'

So saying, he opened the foremost of the little doors on the port side. It was a mere hole indeed, yet it somehow took the civilized look of an ordinary ship's berth from the round scuttle or thickly-glazed porthole which lay in an embrasure deep enough to comfortably warrant the thickness of the vessel's side. Under this porthole was a narrow bunk, and in it a bolster, and, as I might suppose, blankets, over which was spread a very handsome rug. I swiftly took note of one or two conveniences—a looking-glass, a washstand secured to the bulkhead (this piece of furniture, I made no doubt, had come direct from the Captain's cabin); there was also a little table, and upon it a comb and brush, and on the cabin deck was a square of carpet.

'Very poor quarters for you, Miss Nielsen,' said the Captain, looking round, his nose and whiskers appearing twice as long in the fluctuations of the lantern light and his fixed smile odd beyond words, with the tumbling of the shadows over his face.

'The cabin is very comfortable, and you are very kind!' exclaimed Helga.

'You are good to say so. I wish you a good night and pleasant dreams.'

He extended his hand, and held hers, I thought, rather longer than mere courtesy demanded.

'That will be your cabin, Mr. Tregarthen,' said he, going to the door.

I bade Helga good-night. It was hard to interpret her looks by that light, yet I fancied she had something to say, and bent my ear to her mouth; but instead of speaking, she hurriedly passed her right hand down my sleeve, by no means caressingly, but as though she desired to cleanse or dry her fingers. I looked at her, and she turned away.