Page:The Pacific Monthly volumes 1-3.djvu/38

 master of the Mist was short of men and offered him a berth, which in itself was an inducement, for our funds were running low.

"A few nights before the vessel was to sail, as I lay wrapped in my blankets before my cabin fire, I had a disturbing dream. It made so strong an impression upon me that I urged Harold to give up his intended voyage. He only laughed at my fears, and, indeed, I had to confess them to myself foolish and ungrounded." Here the captain lapsed into silence, seeming to forget his audience in retrospection.

"Tell us the dream," ventured Neja, softly, and the captain, always responsive to her voice, whether grave or gay, continued:

"It was this: I dreamed that, standing upon the shore, I watched the Mist, with my two boys on board, sail out across the bar. As I looked, a great wave lifted her upon its mighty crest, held her suspended thus a single instant, then, as if she had been a painted toy, snapt her beams asunder, and her parted decks went down forever out of sight in the gulfs of the sea.

"Well, the cargo was all stowed, the water-casks filled and everything made ready for departure. The weather was fine, the bar as smooth as I have ever seen it. The Mist was to sail in the morning at floodtide, which would occur about 10 o'clock. Harold was on board, and late in the afternoon Fred took a small boat and pulled out to the ship where she lay anchored in the bend of the river just opposite the cannery. He meant to spend the night on board and take leave of his brother in the morning. "As I came down the coast and climbed the hills above the cannery in the red glow of the setting sun, I saw my brave boys leaning over the ship's rail, and waved my hand to them. They answered gaily, and Fred laughingly called out that he was going, too. Their words came to me clearly and distinctly in the stillness of the evening, and as I rode along the shore I heard the voices of the sailors and the shuffling of their feet as they passed to and fro about their work. "Late that night the people at the cannery saw the ship's lights shining

quietly, and thought as they retired to rest that all was well with her. At break of day, when they looked out, she was gone.

" 'Strange,' they said, 'that she should attempt the bar in the night, and at low tide, too,' and went about their work.

"A bank of fog lay close alongshore and hid the white surf line and the bar, not half a mile distant, whereat the men grumbled, for it was a rare sight to see a vessel sailing by, and they had looked forward for days to the mild excitement of watching the Mist cross the bar and fade away into the distance down the coast. They speculated variously about the absent boat and her unaccountable movements, commenting severely upon the rashness of the captain in braving the dangers of a practically unknown bar in the darkness of night and at a stage of tide considered unsafe even in broad day.

"Along toward noon the fog cleared away, and there, not more than a mile to the southward and just outside the breakers, lay the Mist, motionless, with her sails still furled, evidently riding at anchor.

"All day she lay there, and the men on shore cast many a wondering glance toward her, but she sent no signal or sign of distress, only at irregular intervals, in the breathless stillness, a long-drawn, wailing cry came up from the sea, the like of which they had never heard before. Whether it came from the ship, or from the sands or further out they could not tell. Sound carries strangely in the dead October calms that hold these lonely regions as in a spell.

Sealions, likely,' they said, and yet they were mysteriously moved by it.

"The sun went down and the stars came out, and the Mist faded to a dimly discernible shadow. She hung out no lights, which was in itself a thing to cause comment. Something must be wrong, and they resolved that if she still lay there when morning came they would try to discover what it was. Their vague uneasiness would not let them sleep very soundly that night. As soon as it was light some one brought a glass and they observed her long and carefully, only to