The Captain of the Polestar and Other Tales Story 1 - The Captain of the "Pole Star" - Part 3

Arthur Conan Doyle (0:01)

Section 3 of The Captain of the Polestar and Other Tales by Arthur Conan Doyle This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. THE CAPTAIN OF THE POLESTAR PART 3 September 17th The bogey again, thank heaven, that I have strong nerves. The superstition of these poor fellows, and the circumstantial accounts which they give, with the utmost earnestness and self-conviction, would horrify any man not accustomed to their ways. There are many versions of the matter, but the sum total of them all is that something uncanny has been flitting round the ship all night, and that Sandy MacDonald of Peterhead and Lang Peter Williamson of Shetland sought as also did Mr. Milne on the bridge. So, having three witnesses, they can make a better case of it than the second mate did. I spoke to Milne after breakfast and told him that he should be above such nonsense, and that as an officer he ought to set the men a better example. He shook his weather-beaten head ominously, but answered, with characteristic caution, Maybe I and maybe not, doctor, he said. I didn't call it a ghost. I can't say I preen my faith in sea-boggles and the like, though there's a many has claimed to have seen, and that an oir. I'm no easy feared. And maybe you ain't blind, but would run a bit cold, mom, if instead of spearing about in the daylight, he were with me last night, and seen an awful like shape, white and gruesome, while's here and while's there, and its greeting and calling in the darkness, like a bit lamby that has lost its mother. You would nay be say ready to put it down, to old wives' clavour, then I'm thinking. I saw it was hopeless to reason with him, so contented myself with baking him as a personal favor, to call me up the next time the spectre appeared, a request to which he exceeded with many ejaculations expressive of his hope that such an opportunity might never arise. As I hope, the white desert behind us has become broken by many thin streaks of water which intersect it in all directions. Our latitude today was eighty degrees fifty-two minutes north, which shows that there is a strong southerly drift upon the pack. Should the wind continue favorable, it will break up as rapidly as it formed. At present we can do nothing but smoke and wait and hope for the best. I am rapidly becoming a fatalist. When dealing with such uncertain factors as wind and ice, a man can be nothing else. Perhaps it was the wind and sand of the Arabian deserts which gave the minds of the original followers of Muhammad their tendency to bow to Kiznet. These spectral alarms have a very bad effect upon the Captain. I feared that it might excite his sensitive mind and endeavored to conceal the absurd story from him. But unfortunately he overheard one of the men making an allusion to it, and insisted upon being informed about it. As I had expected, it brought out all his latent lunacy in an exaggerated form. I can hardly believe that this is the same man who discoursed philosophy last night with the most critical acumen and coolest judgment. He is pacing backwards and forwards upon the quarter-deck like a caged tiger, stopping now again to throw out his hands with a yearning gesture and stare impatiently out over the ice. He keeps up a continual mutter to himself, and once he called out, But a little time, love, but a little time. Poor fellow! It is sad to see a gallant seaman, an accomplished gentleman, reduced to such a pass, and to think that imagination and delusion can cow a mind to which real danger was but the salt of life. Was ever a man in such a position as I, between a demented captain and a ghost-seeing mate, I sometimes think I am the only really sane man aboard the vessel, except perhaps the second engineer, who is a kind of ruminant and would care nothing for all the fiends in the Red Sea so long as they would leave him alone and not disarrange his tools.

The ice is still opening rapidly, and there is every probability of our being able to make a start tomorrow morning. They will think I am inventing, when I tell them at home, all the strange things that have befallen me. 12 PM I have been a good deal startled, though I feel steadier now, thanks to a stiff glass of brandy. I am hardly myself yet, however, as this handwriting will testify. The fact is that I have gone through a very strange experience, and am beginning to doubt whether I was justified in branding everyone on board as madmen, because they professed to have seen things which did not seem reasonable to my understanding. Shah, I am a fool to let such a trifle unnerve me, and yet, coming as it does, after all these alarms, it has an additional significance. For I cannot doubt either Mr. Manson's story, or that of the mate, now that I have experienced that, which I used formally to scoff at.