Over the Plum Pudding Part 18

"Aha!" cried Hans, triumphantly, as I lifted the bottle into the boat, "it _was_ something, after all. I knew it could not be nothing. Is it empty of contents?"

I turned the vessel bottom side up, and nothing came out of it, but there was a distinct thud within which betrayed the presence of some solid substance.

"It is not empty of contents," said I, giving it another shake, "but it hasn't any table to show what those contents are."

"Oh, we don't need a table," said Hans, failing to appreciate the subtle humor of my remark. "Just shake it out."

With a sigh over my lost joke, I did as I was bidden, and soon, after a vigorous shaking and the removal of a cork which I had not previously noticed, the substance within issued forth through the bottle's neck.

"Dear me," said I. "It appears to be ma.n.u.script."

"Let me see," said Hans. "Ah," he observed, "it is writing. Why did you say it was ma.n.u.script?"

"That is writing," I explained.

"That may be," said he, "but why waste your tongue on three syllables when two will do?"

I ignored the question and put another.

"Can you read it?" I asked.

"With difficulty," he said, "by this light. Let us return to my rooms and see if we can decimate it."

"Decipher, decipher, Hans," said I.

"As you will," he retorted, with a sweep of the oars which brought us under the shadow of the wharf.

Tying our boat, we hastened back to Pumpernickel's rooms, and within a half-hour of our find we were busily engaged in translating the extraordinary narrative of Captain Hammerpestle, commander of the _Gretchen B._, a s.h.i.+p that, as we learned from the captain's story, was once of ill-repute, later of pleasant memory, and finally the central figure of an ocean mystery never as yet solved, though at least two hundred and fifty years had pa.s.sed since she was given up for lost.

The story was in substance as follows:

II

THE TALE OF CAPTAIN HAMMERPESTLE

The end is approaching, and I, Rudolf Hammerpestle, of Bingen, third owner and captain of the ill-starred _Gretchen B._, formerly known as the _Dutch Avenger_, will shortly find a watery grave in sixty-eight fathoms of the Atlantic, ninety miles west of the rock of Gibraltar.

The _Gretchen B._ is sinking, and the pirate ghost is at last a victor, though I have given him a pretty fight these many days. Had it not been for my own stupidity in employing a foreign crew, all might yet be well, and I am impelled in my last moments, for we are sure to go to the bottom within two hours, to write out this story merely in the hope that it may some day reach my fellow-men, tell them of my horrible fate, and possibly warn them against my errors. If I had stuck to my own countrymen, if I had employed Hans Stickenfurst and good old Diedrich Foutzenhickle and their like for my officers and crew, instead of the idiot Pat Sullivan and his twin, Barney O'Brien, and others of that ilk, I should now be nearing port that I shall never reach, instead of sinking, slowly sinking, into the mysterious depths of the great ocean.

I have locked myself within my cabin so as to be free from interruption, and it is highly probable that, having tightly closed my port and calked up the door-cracks and key-hole, I shall be able to gain an extra hour for the writing of this tale even after the _Gretchen B._ has disappeared beneath the waves, to be hid forevermore from the eyes of man. When the tale is finished I shall place it within my trusty water-bottle, open the port, thrust it forth into the sea, and trust to Heaven that it may rise to the surface and ultimately make some port where it may be read and published, I devoutly hope, by some house of standing.

And now, as every story should begin at the beginning, let me go back to the time when I first took charge of the _Gretchen B._ It was five years agone, on the 7th day of May, 1635, that the _Gretchen B._ was purchased by her present owners, and I, Rudolf Hammerpestle, of Bingen, appointed her commander. It was with a light heart, a full crew, and sixty barrels of Schnitzelhammerstein claret that I set out from Bingen on the 27th day of May, 1635, for London, where the claret was to be sold to the public as medicinal port--its nutty flavor, its bouquet, and other properties favoring the illusion. All went well with us until we reached the sea, when one night, after our second day on the ocean, feeling faint from the effects of the sun, for I had had a hard day of it, I tapped one of the barrels of my cargo for a taste of the claret.

Understand, I was not in any sense taking away from the full measure which was due to the purchaser in London, for I intended to replace what I had taken with water--so slight in quant.i.ty, too, as not to affect the flavor appreciably. Imagine my consternation to find the liquid turned sour and thin--so thin that under no circ.u.mstances could it ever pa.s.s muster as medicinal port. I was horrified. Ours had always been an honorable firm. What was to be done? My employers' reputation was at stake. If that claret had ever been delivered at London as port they were ruined. I determined to run the _Gretchen B._ to Naples, and there dispose of my cargo as Chianti, to which, with the infusion of a little whale-oil for appearance' sake, it could be made to bear a remarkable resemblance.

This done, I retired to my cabin to reflect. What could it have been that had wrought such a change, for on leaving Bingen the wine was sweet and good? I locked my door so as to be undisturbed, for I cannot think when there are others about; but hardly had I seated myself at my table when, upon the honor of a sea-captain, a ruffianly person, noiseless as a cat, _walked through the ma.s.sive oaken barrier I had but just fastened to_!

"Who--what are you?" I cried, aghast, the spectral quality of the apparition being at once manifest.

"Oh!" he retorted. "It seems to me it's more to the point for _me_ to ask that question. You are the interloper."

"It is my cabin," I said, indignantly.

"Oh, is it?" he sneered. "Since when?"

"Since the seventh day of May," I replied. "I am the commander of this craft."

"Pooh!" said he, harshly. "Do you know who I am?"

"I've asked you once," said I, trying hard to appear calm and sarcastic.

"Well, I almost hate to tell you," he said, throwing off his coat, whereon I was filled with consternation to observe that his belt held four wicked-looking blunderbusses and six cutla.s.ses of razor edge.

"You're not a bad fellow, and your hair will turn white when I tell you; but since you ask, so be it. Your hair be upon your own head. _I am the ghost of Wouter von Rotterdaam!_"

"You?" I cried, clutching wildly at my locks, not to keep them from turning white, of course, but to steady my nerves, for in the name I recognized that of one of the most successful pirates, and the bloodiest in his way.

"Ay, I!" he replied, impressively.

"But--who--what do you here on board the _Gretchen B._?" I cried.

"_Gretchen_ nothing," he said. "This is the _Dutch Avenger_, upon which, after her capture, six months ago, I was hanged, and which, my dear Hammerpestle, I shall haunt till she fills her destiny, which is _there_!"

The word "there" was p.r.o.nounced in sepulchral tones, and with Von Rotterdaam's forefinger pointed downward. I s.h.i.+vered from top to toe, but quickly recovered.

"If _I_ cannot have the _Dutch Avenger_, at least none other shall have her," he added.

"You are mistaken, Mr. von Rotterdaam," I said, politely. "You have taken the wrong boat, sir. This is not the _Dutch Avenger_, but the _Gretchen B._, of Bingen."

"She has not always been the _Gretchen B._, of Bingen," he replied.

"I know that, my dear sir," I observed, "but her previous name was the _Anneke van der Q_."

"_Anneke van der_ bos.h.!.+" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, with a laugh. "That is what they told you, and you swallowed the bait. They knew precious well your people wouldn't buy her if they had ever guessed she'd once been the terror of the seas as the _Dutch Avenger_ of everywhere, the ubiquitous ranger of the deep, Captain Wouter von Rotterdaam, better known as the Throat-Cutter of the Caribbees."

"Is that the truth?" I replied.

"As a pirate, I scorn lies," he answered. "We don't need 'em in our business. Get your carpenter to plane off the name on her stern and see!" and even as he spoke he disappeared, fading away through the closed door.

I was nearly prostrated by the revelation, but, hoping for disproof, I rushed up on deck, summoned the carpenter, and ordered the name _Gretchen B._ planed off the stern. Alas! there beneath the innocent letters lay the horrid proof of the truth of the spectre's story, the words _Dutch Avenger_, flanked on either side by skull and cross-bones.

Again I sought my room, to recover, and to my added distress Von Rotterdaam had returned, an ugly look on his face.

"You've changed your course!" he said, savagely.

"I know it," said I. "My cargo is spoiled for the original market. I am taking it where it is salable."

He was very wroth.