At the wheel there was nothing whatever to do.  I might just as well have been forrard, smoking in the fo’cas’le.  Down on the main-deck, I could see the loom of the lanterns that had been lashed up to the sherpoles in the fore and main rigging.  Yet they showed less than they might, owing to the fact that they had been shaded on their after sides, so as not to blind the officer of the watch more than need be.

The night had come down strangely dark, and yet of the dark and the stillness and the lanterns, I was only conscious in occasional flashes of comprehension.  For, now that my mind was working, I was thinking chiefly of that queer, vast phantom of mist, I had seen rise from the sea, and take shape.

I kept staring into the night, towards the West, and then all round me; for, naturally, the memory predominated that she had been coming towards us when the darkness came, and it was a pretty disquieting sort of thing to think about.  I had such a horrible feeling that something beastly was going to happen any minute.

Yet, two bells came and went, and still all was quiet—­strangely quiet, it seemed to me.  And, of course, besides the queer, misty vessel I had seen in the West I was all the time remembering the four shadowy craft lying down in the sea, under our port side.  Every time I remembered them, I felt thankful for the lanterns round the maindeck, and I wondered why none had been put in the mizzen rigging.  I wished to goodness that they had, and made up my mind I would speak to the Second Mate about it, next time he came aft.  At the time, he was leaning over the rail across the break of the poop.  He was not smoking, as I could tell; for had he been, I should have seen the glow of his pipe, now and then.  It was plain to me that he was uneasy.  Three times already he had been down on to the maindeck, prowling about.  I guessed that he had been to look down into the sea, for any signs of those four grim craft.  I wondered whether they would be visible at night.

Suddenly, the time-keeper struck three bells, and the deeper notes of the bell forrard, answered them.  I gave a start.  It seemed to me that they had been struck close to my elbow.  There was something unaccountably strange in the air that night.  Then, even as the Second Mate answered the look-out’s “All’s well,” there came the sharp whir and rattle of running gear, on the port side of the mainmast.  Simultaneously, there was the shrieking of a parrel, up the main; and I knew that someone, or something, had let go the main-topsail haul-yards.  From aloft there came the sound of something parting; then the crash of the yard as it ceased falling.

The Second Mate shouted out something unintelligible, and jumped for the ladder.  From the maindeck there came the sound of running feet, and the voices of the watch, shouting.  Then I caught the Skipper’s voice; he must have run out on deck, through the Saloon doorway.