Page:The Gates of Morning - Henry De Vere Stacpoole.pdf/155

 of hell in his heart, the golden eyes vanished. Rantan had put out the light.

With the rising moon he saw as in a glass, darkly, little by little and bit by bit, the tragedy we have seen in full. He saw the grouping of the foc’sle hands as they came up from below, he saw them disappear as they sat on deck. Then he saw the figure of Le Moan, her halt at the saloon hatch and the following of Kanoa, he heard the scream of the stricken Carlin.

Lastly he saw the crowding of the hands aft, Carlin’s body being dragged on deck and cast overboard into a lather of moonshine and phosphorus, and something white carried shoulder high to forward of the galley where it was laid on deck.

Then after a few moments lights began to break out, lanterns moved on the deck, the portholes broke alive again and again were blotted out as the cabin lamp lit and taken from its attachments was carried on deck and swung from the ratlins of the main for decorative purposes. The moon gave all the light that any man in his sober senses could want, but the crew of the schooner were not sober, they were drunk with the excitement of the business, and though nominally free men they felt as slaves feel when their bonds are removed. Besides, Rantan and Carlin had plotted to kill them as they had killed Sru and the others. On top of that there was a bottle of ginger wine. It had been stored in the medicine locker—Peterson, like many other seamen, had medical fancies of his own and he believed this stuff to be a specific for the colic.