“God in heaven!” exclaimed Mynheer Kloots.

Philip felt a hand upon his shoulder, and the cold darted through his whole frame.  He turned round and met the one eye of Schriften, who screamed in his ear—­“PHILIP VANDERDECKEN—­That’s the Flying Dutchman!”

Chapter X

The sudden gloom which had succeeded to the pale light had the effect of rendering every object still more indistinct to the astonished crew of the Ter Schilling.  For a moment or more not a word was uttered by a soul on board.  Some remained with their eyes still strained towards the point where the apparition had been seen, others turned away full of gloomy and foreboding thoughts.  Hillebrant was the first who spoke:  turning round to the eastern quarter, and observing a light on the horizon, he started, and seizing Philip by the arm, cried out, “What’s that?”

“That is only the moon rising from the bank of clouds,” replied Philip, mournfully.

“Well!” observed Mynheer Kloots, wiping his forehead, which was damp with perspiration, “I have been told of this before, but I have mocked at the narration.”

Philip made no reply.  Aware of the reality of the vision, and how deeply it interested him, he felt as if he were a guilty person.

The moon had now risen above the clouds, and was pouring her mild pale light over the slumbering ocean.  With a simultaneous impulse, everyone directed his eyes to the spot where the strange vision had last been seen; and all was a dead, dead calm.

Since the apparition, the pilot, Schriften, had remained on the poop; he now gradually approached Mynheer Kloots, and looking round, said—­

“Mynheer Kloots, as pilot of this vessel, I tell you that you must prepare for very bad weather.”

“Bad weather!” said Kloots, rousing himself from a deep reverie.

“Yes, bad weather, Mynheer Kloots.  There never was a vessel which fell in with—­what we have just seen, but met with disaster soon afterwards.  The very name of Vanderdecken is unlucky—­He! he!”

Philip would have replied to the sarcasm, but he could not, his tongue was tied.

“What has the name of Vanderdecken to do with it?” observed Kloots.

“Have you not heard, then?  The captain of that vessel we have just seen is a Mynheer Vanderdecken—­he is the Flying Dutchman!”

“How know you that, pilot?” inquired Hillebrant.

“I know that, and much more, if I chose to tell,” replied Schriften; “but never mind, I have warned you of bad weather, as is my duty;” and, with these words, Schriften went down the poop-ladder.

“God in heaven!  I never was so puzzled and so frightened in my life,” observed Kloots.  “I don’t know what to think or say.—­What think you, Philip? was it not supernatural?”

“Yes,” replied Philip, mournfully.  “I have no doubt of it.”