He's had command of a Liverpool ship, the _Samaria_, some years ago. He
lost her in the Indian Ocean, and had his certificate suspended for a
year. Ever since then he has not been able to get another command. He's
been knocking about in the Western Ocean trade lately."
"That accounts for him being a stranger to everybody about the Docks,"
Captain Ashton concluded as they rose from table.
Captain Johns walked down to the Dock after lunch. He was short
of stature and slightly bandy. His appearance did not inspire the
generality of mankind with esteem; but it must have been otherwise
with his employers. He had the reputation of being an uncomfortable
commander, meticulous in trifles, always nursing a grievance of some
sort and incessantly nagging. He was not a man to kick up a row with you
and be done with it, but to say nasty things in a whining voice; a man
capable of making one's life a perfect misery if he took a dislike to an
officer.
That very evening I went to see Bunter on board, and sympathized with
him on his prospects for the voyage. He was subdued. I suppose a man
with a secret locked up in his breast loses his buoyancy. And there was
another reason why I could not expect Bunter to show a great
elasticity of spirits. For one thing he had been very seedy lately, and
besides--but of that later.
Captain Johns had been on board that afternoon and had loitered and
dodged about his chief mate in a manner which had annoyed Bunter
exceedingly.
"What could he mean?" he asked with calm exasperation. "One would think
he suspected I had stolen something and tried to see in what pocket I
had stowed it away; or that somebody told him I had a tail and he wanted
to find out how I managed to conceal it. I don't like to be approached
from behind several times in one afternoon in that creepy way and then
to be looked up at suddenly in front from under my elbow. Is it a new
sort of peep-bo game? It doesn't amuse me. I am no longer a baby."
I assured him that if anyone were to tell Captain Johns that
he--Bunter--had a tail, Johns would manage to get himself to believe
the story in some mysterious manner. He would. He was suspicious and
credulous to an inconceivable degree. He would believe any silly tale,
suspect any man of anything, and crawl about with it and ruminate the
stuff, and turn it over and over in his mind in the most miserable,
inwardly whining perplexity. He would take the meanest possible view in
the end, and discover the meanest possible course of action by a sort of
natural genius for that sort of thing.
Bunter also told me that the mean creature had crept all over the ship
on his little, bandy legs, taking him along to grumble and whine
to about a lot of trifles. Crept about the decks like a wretched
insect--like a cockroach, only not so lively.
Thus did the self-possessed Bunter express himself with great disgust.
Then, going on with his usual stately deliberation, made sinister by the
frown of his jet-black eyebrows:
"And the fellow is mad, too. He tried to be sociable for a bit, and
could find nothing else but to make big eyes at me, and ask me if I
believed 'in communication beyond the grave.' Communication beyond--I
didn't know what he meant at first. I didn't know what to say. 'A very
solemn subject, Mr. Bunter,' says he. I've given a great deal of study
to it."
Had Johns lived on shore he would have been the predestined prey of
fraudulent mediums; or even if he had had any decent opportunities
between the voyages. Luckily for him, when in England, he lived
somewhere far away in Leytonstone, with a maiden sister ten years older
than himself, a fearsome virago twice his size, before whom he trembled.
It was said she bullied him terribly in general; and in the particular
instance of his spiritualistic leanings she had her own views.
These leanings were to her simply satanic. She was reported as having
declared that, "With God's help, she would prevent that fool from
giving himself up to the Devils." It was beyond doubt that Johns' secret
ambition was to get into personal communication with the spirits of the
dead--if only his sister would let him. But she was adamant. I was told
that while in London he had to account to her for every penny of the
money he took with him in the morning, and for every hour of his time.
And she kept the bankbook, too.
Bunter (he had been a wild youngster, but he was well connected;
had ancestors; there was a family tomb somewhere in the home
counties)--Bunter was indignant, perhaps on account of his own dead.
Those steely-blue eyes of his flashed with positive ferocity out of that
black-bearded face. He impressed me--there was so much dark passion in
his leisurely contempt.
"The cheek of the fellow! Enter into relations with... A mean little cad
like this! It would be an impudent intrusion. He wants to enter!... What
is it? A new sort of snobbishness or what?"
I laughed outright at this original view of spiritism--or whatever the
ghost craze is called. Even Bunter himself condescended to smile. But it
was an austere, quickly vanished smile. A man in his almost, I may say,
tragic position couldn't be expected--you understand. He was really
worried. He was ready eventually to put up with any dirty trick in the
course of the voyage. A man could not expect much consideration should
he find himself at the mercy of a fellow like Johns. A misfortune is
a misfortune, and there's an end of it. But to be bored by mean,
low-spirited, inane ghost stories in the Johns style, all the way out
to Calcutta and back again, was an intolerable apprehension to be under.
Spiritism was indeed a solemn subject to think about in that light.
Dreadful, even!
Poor fellow! Little we both thought that before very long he himself...
However, I could give him no comfort. I was rather appalled myself.
Bunter had also another annoyance that day. A confounded berthing master
came on board on some pretence or other, but in reality, Bunter thought,