The Death Ship: A Strange Story, Vol. 1 (of 3)

by William Clark Russell

Now you will have deemed by this time that I had supped full enough of surprises. But conceive of my astonishment on entering the cabin, that was less darksome than I should have conceived it, on seeing a girl of from eighteen to twenty years of age, seated at the table on the right hand of the captain's chair!

I came to a stand, struck motionless with astonishment; whilst she, uttering an exclamation of surprise, hastily rose and stood staring at me, leaning with her right hand on the table to steady herself. It was as certain that she had been as ignorant of my presence on board as I, to this instant, of her existence. The thought that instantly flashed upon me was that she was Vanderdecken's daughter, that the Curse that had fallen on the ship included her, as it had all others of the vessel's miserable company of men, and that in consonance with Captain Skevington's mad but astonishing theory, touching the people of this Death Ship, she discovered the appearance she would have presented at the hour of her death, though vitalised in that aspect by the sentence that kept the Braave afloat and her people quick and sentient. I was the more willing to suppose this by her apparel, which was of the kind I had seen in old Dutch paintings at Rotterdam, for it consisted of a black velvet jacket, very beautifully fitting her figure, trimmed with fur and enriched with many small golden buttons; a green silk gown, plain and very full, as though made for a bigger woman. There was a rope of pearls round her neck, and I spied a diamond of great splendour blazing on the forefinger of the hand on which she leaned. She wore small red shoes and her hair was undressed.

Observation and the power of comprehending what one sees are rapid, otherwise it would have been impossible for me to have mastered the details I have set before you in the short time that intervened between my entering the cabin and seating myself at the table. Yet, short as that time was, it enabled me to witness in this girl such sweetness, fairness and loveliness of face as I vow no man could conceive the truth of who had not beheld it with his own eyes. 'Tis an old poet who writes of "the still harmony, whose diapason lies within a brow," and of the "sweet silent rhetorick of persuading eyes," and another more delicately choice yet in fancy, of

"The daintie touch,
The tender flesh, the colour bright, and such
As Parians see in marble, skin more fair,
More glorious head and far more glorious hair;
Eyes full of grace and quickness, purer roses——"

but of this beauty, shining sun-like in that labouring ancient cabin, gazing at me half-wistful, half-amazed, with an inclined posture of her form as though she would on a sudden race to greet me, what could the noblest poet of them all sing, only to tell of the soft violet of her eyes, of her hair of dusky gold, self-luminous as though the gilding light of a ruddy beam of sunset lingered amid the thick abundant tresses heedlessly knotted with a riband a little lower than the line of the ears, thence falling in a bright loose shower down her back, whilst over her forehead, white as though wrought out of the sea foam, the gilded curls were gathered in a shadow only a little darker than amber.

All this I saw and more yet, for whilst I stood looking at her the mate of the ship, Van Vogelaar, arrived, and both he and the captain, and the man Prins, turning their faces towards me, the warmth, the life of her skin, the living reality of her surprise, the redness of her lips, the diamond glance of her eyes, were so defined by the paleness, the deathly hue, of the flesh of the men's skin, that the fear that she was of this doomed company fell from me, and I knew that I was face to face with one that was mortal like myself.

The captain pointed to the bench on his left hand. I approached the table, giving the girl a low bow before sitting. She curtsied and resumed her seat, but all the while looking at me with an astonishment that greatly heightened her beauty; nor could I fail to see by the slight, but visible changes in the expression of her mouth, that my presence was putting a pleasure in her that grew as perception of my actuality sharpened in her mind.

A coarse, but clean cloth, that was a kind of duck or drill, covered the table, and upon it were a couple of dishes of cold meat, a dish of dried fish, another of dried plantains, a jar of marmalade, and a plate of a singular sort of cakes—yellow and heavy—resembling the crumb of newly-baked bread. These things were kept in their places by a rude framework of wood set upon the table and lashed to it underneath. Before each person there stood a silver cup—one of one design and size, another of another; also an earthen plate, of a grey colour, of Chinese baking, and of the kind exported years since in great quantities from Batavia; and a knife and fork of a pattern I had never before seen. On our seating ourselves, Prins went round the table with two jars—one holding a spirit, which I afterwards found was a kind of gin, and the other cold water, with which he manufactured a bumper for us three men, but the girl drank the water plain.

Not a word was said whilst Prins was at this work. As he was filling my cup, the clock over the door struck eight, the skeleton appearing and flourishing his lance as before, and scarce was this ended when the parrot croaked out, "Wy zyn al Verdomd." I had forgotten this bird, and the harsh utterance and dreadful words coming upon me unawares so startled me that I half-sprang to my feet. The girl looked down on the table with a sad face, whilst Vanderdecken said, "'Tis the clock that excites that fowl; we shall have to hang her out of hearing of it."

He never offered to make me known to the fair creature opposite, but that did not signify, for, after stealing several peeps at me, she asked in Dutch, but with the artless manner of a child, and in a sweet voice, if I was a Hollander.