This made me rather curious.  I began to wonder whether there was, after all, some truth underlying the vague stories I had heard; and I took the first opportunity to ask him whether he had any reasons for believing that there was anything in the yarns about the ship.

At first he was inclined to be a bit offish; but, presently, he came round, and told me that he did not know of any particular incident which could be called unusual in the sense in which I meant.  Yet that, at the same time, there were lots of little things which, if you put them together, made you think a bit.  For instance, she always made such long passages and had so much dirty weather—­nothing but that and calms and head winds.  Then, other things happened; sails that he knew, himself, had been properly stowed, were always blowing adrift at night.  And then he said a thing that surprised me.

“There’s too many bloomin’ shadders about this ’ere packet; they gets onter yer nerves like nothin’ as ever I seen before in me nat’ral.”

He blurted it all out in a heap, and I turned round and looked at him.

“Too many shadows!” I said.  “What on earth do you mean?” But he refused to explain himself or tell me anything further—­just shook his head, stupidly, when I questioned him.  He seemed to have taken a sudden, sulky fit.  I felt certain that he was acting dense, purposely.  I believe the truth of the matter is that he was, in a way, ashamed of having let himself go like he had, in speaking out his thoughts about “shadders.”  That type of man may think things at times; but he doesn’t often put them into words.  Anyhow, I saw it was no use asking any further questions; so I let the matter drop there.  Yet, for several days afterwards, I caught myself wondering, at times, what the fellow had meant by “shadders.”

We left ’Frisco next day, with a fine, fair wind, that seemed a bit like putting the stopper on the yarns I had heard about the ship’s ill luck.  And yet—­

He hesitated a moment, and then went on again.

For the first couple of weeks out, nothing unusual happened, and the wind still held fair.  I began to feel that I had been rather lucky, after all, in the packet into which I had been shunted.  Most of the other fellows gave her a good name, and there was a pretty general opinion growing among the crowd, that it was all a silly yarn about her being haunted.  And then, just when I was settling down to things, something happened that opened my eyes no end.

It was in the eight to twelve watch, and I was sitting on the steps, on the starboard side, leading up to the fo’cas’le head.  The night was fine and there was a splendid moon.  Away aft, I heard the timekeeper strike four bells, and the look-out, an old fellow named Jaskett, answered him.  As he let go the bell lanyard, he caught sight of me, where I sat quietly, smoking.  He leant over the rail, and looked down at me.