Part 24 (2/2)

”The Yellow Viper?” queried Stuart.

”The same. An' the name's a good one. It's more viperous than any other snake of the viper bunch, an' its disposition is mean and yellow right through. Ever see one?”

”No,” said Stuart, ”I haven't. I heard there were some in Trinidad, and there have been a few reported in Cuba. But I guess they're rare there.

What do they look like?”

The mate spat freely over the side, while he gathered his powers for a description.

”If ye can think of a fish that's been a long time dead,” he suggested, ”an' has turned a sort of phosph.o.r.escent brown-yellow in decayin', ye'll have a general idea of the color. The head, like all the vipers, is low, flat an' triangle-shaped. The eye is a bright orange color, an' so s.h.i.+nin' that flashes from it look like sparks of red-yellow fire. I've never seen them at night, but folks who have, say that in the dark the eyes look like glowin' charcoal.

”If I had to take a walk through the St. Lucia woods, I'd put on armor, I would! Why, any minute, something you take for a branch, a knot of liana, a clump of fruit, a hangin' air-plant, may take life an' strike.

An' that's all ye'll ever know in this world.”

”There's no cure for it?”

”None. A little while after a fer-de-lance strikes, ye're as dead as if you'd been dropped in mid-Atlantic, with a shot tied to your feet.”

”Maybe I'm just as glad I'm not going to land there,” said Stuart, ”though I guess it's one of the most famous fighting spots of the world.

I read once that for a hundred and fifty years there was never a year without a battle on that island. Seven times it was held by the English and seven times by the French.”

”Like enough,” replied the mate. ”It's owned by the English now, but Castries is a French town, through and through. But Castries sticks in my memory for a reason which means more to a deep-water sailor than any land fightin'. We were lyin' in the harbor at Castries when the _Roddam_ came in, ay, more'n twenty years ago.”

”What was the _Roddam_?” queried Stuart, scenting a story.

”Have ye forgotten,” answered the mate in a return query, ”or didn't ye ever know? Let me tell ye what the _Roddam_ was!”

”We were lyin' right over there, in Castries Harbor, dischargin'

coal--which was carried down by negro women in baskets on their heads--when we saw creep round the headland of Vigie, where you can see the old barracks from here, the shape of a steamer. She came slowly, like some wounded an' crippled critter. Clear across the bay we could hear her screw creakin,' an' her engines clankin' like they were all poundin' to pieces. What a sight she was! We looked at her, struck still ourselves an' unable to speak. They talk of a Phantom s.h.i.+p, but if ever anything looked like a Phantom Steamer, the _Roddam_ was that one.

”From funnel-rim to water-line she was grey an' ghost-like, lookin' like a boat seen in an ugly dream. Every sc.r.a.p o' paint had been burned from her sides, or else was hangin' down from the bare iron like flaps o'

skin. She had been flayed alive, an' she showed it. Some of her derricks were gone, the ropes charred an' the wires endin' in blobs o' melted metal. The planks of her chart-house were blackened. Her ventilators had crumpled into ma.s.ses without any shape.

”Laborin' like a critter in pain, she managed to make shallow water, an'

a rattle o' chain told o' the droppin' o' the anchor. After that, nothin'! There wasn't a sign o' life aboard.

”The harbor folks pulled out to take a look at the craft. As they came near, the smell o' fire an' sulphur met them. A hush, like death, seemed to hang over her. The colored boatmen quit rowin', but the harbor-master forced them on. Her ladder was still down. The harbor-master climbed aboard.

”On deck, nothin' moved. The harbor-master stepped down into grey ashes, sinkin' above his knee. With a scream he drew back. The ashes were hot, almost white-hot, below. The light surface ash flew up about him and half-suffocated him. His boot half-burned from his foot and chokin', the harbor-master staggered back to the rail for air.

”No life was to be seen, nothin' but piles o' grey ash, heaped in mounds. Ash was everywhere. From it rose a quivering heat, smellin' o'

sulphur an' the Pit.

”Yet everyone couldn't be dead on this ghost-s.h.i.+p, for someone must ha'

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