XXXII
I FALL IN WITH A FELLOW-PRISONER
When I had finished my breakfast the next morning I faced the worstthing which I had been forced to face since I had been cast prisonerinto the Sargasso Sea: a whole day of idleness without hope. Untilthen there had not been an hour--save when I was asleep--that I hadnot been doing something which in some way I had hoped would better mycondition temporarily, or would tend toward my deliverance. But thatmorning I was without such spurs to effort and there was absolutelynothing for me to do. My condition could not be improved by making myhome on another vessel; it was doubtful, indeed, if in all thewreck-pack I could find a home so comfortable and so abundantlystocked with the best provisions as I had found aboard of the _Villede Saint Remy_. As for working farther for my deliverance, I had setthat behind me after my experience during the two preceding days. Andso I brought a steamer-chair out on the deck and sat in it smoking,idle and hopeless, gazing straight out before me with a dullsteadfastness over the very gently undulating surface of theweed-covered sea.
After a while, tiring of sitting still, I began to pace the deckslowly; and I was so heavy with my sorrow that I could not thinkclearly, but had only in my mind a confused feeling that I was takingthe first of a series of walks such as wild animals imprisoned takeendlessly back and forth behind the bars that shut them in. And fromthis I went on to thinking, still in the same confused way, that thewild animals at least were not outcast in their captivity--havingliving people and living beasts around them, and the pleasure ofhearing living sounds--while one of the worst things about my prisonwas the absolute dead silence that hung over it like a dismal cloud.And perhaps it was because my thoughts happened at that moment to beset to take notice of such matters that I fancied I heard a very faintsound of scratching and an instant later a still fainter little cry.
I was standing just then close to the water-line on the deck forward,beside a covered hatch that seemed to lead to what had been thequarters of the crew; and it was from beneath this hatch, I wascertain, that the sounds came. Slight though the noise was, it greatlystartled me; and at the same time it aroused in me thestrangely-thrilling hope that there possibly might be a living manstill aboard of the steamer and that I would be no longer horriblyalone. Yet I would not suffer myself too much to give room to thishappy hope, for the little faint scratching--which I heard againpresently--was not the sort of noise that a man shut in would belikely to make; nor did the little plaintive sound seem like a humancry. But the matter was one to be investigated in a hurry, and with anenergy quite astonishing, in comparison with my lassitude of a momentbefore, I got the hatch open and leaned down it, listening; and then Iheard the scratching so plainly that I hurried down the stair.
The between-decks was well enough lighted by a good-sized skylight,and the place that I had got into had fixed tables set in it andseemed to be the mess-room of the crew. Doors opened out from it bothfore and aft; and from behind the after door--so plainly that I had nodifficulty in placing it--came the scratching sound that I waspursuing: and with it came the cries again, and this time sodistinctly as to shatter my hope of finding a human being there, butat the same time to make me, for all my sorrow, almost smile. For thecry was a very long and plaintive m-i-i-a-a-u! And the next moment,when I had the door open, a great black cat came out upon me--soovercome with delight at meeting a human being again that he wasalmost choking with his gurgling purr. Indeed the extravagant joy ofthe poor lonely creature was as great as mine would have been had Ifound a man there--and he manifested it by lunging sidewise against mylegs, and by standing up on his hind paws and reaching his fore pawsup to my knees and clutching them, and then with a spring he climbedright up me--all the while choking with his great gurglingpurring--and was not satisfied until he found himself bundled closeagainst my breast as I held him tight in my arms. And on myside--after I had gulped down my first disappointment because it wasonly a cat who was my fellow-prisoner--I was as glad to meet him as hewas to meet me; and I am not ashamed to say that I fairly cried overhim--as a warm rush of joy went over me at finding myself at last,after being for so long a time surrounded only by the dead, in thecompany of a living creature; and a creature which showed toward me byevery means that a brute beast could compass its gratitude andits love.
And I must add without delay that my cat's affection for me was whollydisinterested; at least, I am sure that he loved me--from the firstmoment of our encounter--not because he wanted me to do something forhim, but because he longed, as I did, for human companionship and wasfilled up with happiness because he had found again a human friend. AsI discovered upon investigation, his prison had been the galley inwhich food for the crew had been cooked; and upon the odds and endsleft there he had fared very well indeed--not overeating himself bygobbling down all his food in a hurry, and then dying of starvation,as a dog would have done, but temperately eating for his daily rationsonly what his sustenance required; and for drink he had had a potpartly full of what had been hot water that stood upon the galleystove. But I also must add that this coarse fare was not at all to hisliking; and that thereafter he ordered me around pretty sharply, inhis own way, and insisted always upon my providing him withdainty food.
It was a good thing for the cat, certainly, that I had found him; forhis stock of provisions was pretty nearly exhausted, and in a littlewhile longer he would have come to a dismal end. But my finding himwas a still better thing for me. When I first heard his faint littlescratching, and his still fainter plaintive little call for help, Iwas so deep in my despairing melancholy that my reason was in a fairway to go, and with it all farther effort on my part to set myselffree. From that desperate state my small adventure with him roused me,which was a good deal to thank him for; but I had more to thank himfor still.
In the little time that I had been aboard of the _Ville de SaintRemy_--my days having been passed away from her--I had made noexploration of her interior beyond her cabin and the region in whichwere carried her cabin stores; which latter were so abundant as to setme at my ease for an indefinite period in regard to food. But thismeeting with my fellow-prisoner so stirred me up, and put such freshspirit into me, that I began to think of having a general look allover her: that I might in a way take stock of my belongings and at thesame time have something to occupy my mind--for I knew that to sitdown idly again would be only again to fall back into despair. And so,my cat going with me--and, indeed, making a good deal of a convenienceof me, for he by no means would walk on his own legs but insisted uponjumping up on my shoulder and going that way as a passenger--I set offon my round.
As well as I could make out from what I found on board of her--for herpapers either had been carried away or were stowed in some place whichI did not discover--the _Ville de Saint Remy_ had been bound outwardto some colonial port and carried a cargo of general stores. When Igot her hatches off--though that came later--I saw in one place a lotof wheelbarrows, and some heavy wagons stowed with their wheels insideof them, and some machinery for threshing along with a portablesteam-engine; and in another place were boxes which seemed to havedry-goods in them, and a great many cases of wines, and some very bigcases that evidently contained pianos--and so on with a great lot ofstuff such as the people of a flourishing colony would be likelyto need.
But in my round that morning with the cat on my shoulders--for he wasnot content to remain perched on one of them quietly, but kept passingfrom one to the other with affectionate rubs against the back of myhead, and all the while purring as hard as he could purr--I did notget below the main-deck except into the engine-room, my attentionbeing given to finding out fully what the steamer had on board of herin the way of work-shops and tools: for already, with my renewedcheerfulness, the notion was beginning to take hold of me that I mightset to work and build a boat for myself--and so make what I could notfind. And, indeed, I don't doubt that I should have set myself to thisbig undertaking--for the appointments of the vessel were admirablycomplete and everything that I wanted for my work was
there--had not abigger, but a more promising, undertaking presented itself to me andso turned my efforts into another way.
In the Sargasso Sea Page 32
