William Hope Hodgson - The Finding of the Graiken.pdf

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THE FINDING OF
THE GRAIKEN
William Hope Hodgson
I
When a year had passed, and still there was no news of the
full-rigged ship Graiken, even the most sanguine of my old chum’s
friends had ceased to hope perchance, somewhere, she might be
above water.
Yet Ned Barlow, in his inmost thoughts, I knew, still hugged
to himself the hope that she would win home. Poor, dear old
fellow, how my heart did go out towards him in his sorrow!
For it was in the Graiken that his sweetheart had sailed on
 
that dull January day some twelve months previously.
The voyage had been taken for the sake of her health; yet
since then—save for a distant signal recorded at the Azores—there
had been from all the mystery of ocean no voice; the ship and they
within her had vanished utterly.
And still Barlow hoped. He said nothing actually, but at times
his deeper thoughts would float up and show through the sea of his
usual talk, and thus I would know in an indirect way of the thing
that his heart was thinking.
Nor was time a healer.
It was later that my present good fortune came to me. My
uncle died, and I—hitherto poor—was now a rich man. In a
breath, it seemed, I had become possessor of houses, lands, and
money;
also—in
my
eyes
almost
more
important—a
fine
fore-and-aft-rigged yacht of some two hundred tons register.
It seemed scarcely believable that the thing was mine, and I
was all in a scutter to run away down to Falmouth and get to sea.
In old times, when my uncle had been more than usually
gracious, he had invited me to accompany him for a trip round the
coast or elsewhere, as the fit might take him; yet never, even in my
most hopeful moments, had it occurred to me that ever she might
be mine.
And now I was hurrying my preparations for a good long sea
trip—for to me the sea is, and always has been, a comrade.
Still, with all the prospects before me, I was by no means
completely satisfied, for I wanted Ned Barlow with me, and yet
was afraid to ask him.
I had the feeling that, in view of his overwhelming loss, he
must positively hate the sea; and yet I could not be happy at the
thought of leaving him, and going alone.
He had not been well lately, and a sea voyage would be the
 
very thing for him, if only it were not going to freshen painful
memories.
Eventually I decided to suggest it, and this I did a couple of
days before the date I had fixed for sailing.
“Ned,” I said, “you need a change.”
“Yes,” he assented wearily.
“Come with me, old chap,” I went on, growing bolder. “I’m
taking a trip in the yacht. It would be splendid to have—”
To my dismay, he jumped to his feet and came towards me
excitedly.
“I’ve upset him now,” was my thought. “I am a fool!”
“Go to sea!” he said. “My God! I’d give—” He broke off
short, and stood suppressed opposite to me, his face all of a quiver
with suppressed emotion. He was silent a few seconds, getting
himself in hand; then he proceeded more quietly: “Where to?”
“Anywhere,” I replied, watching him keenly, for I was greatly
puzzled by his manner. “I’m not quite clear yet. Somewhere south
of here—the West Indies, I have thought. It’s all so new, you
know—just fancy being able to go just where we like. I can hardly
realise it yet.”
I stopped; for he had turned from me and was staring out of
the window.
“You’ll come, Ned?” I cried, fearful that he was going to
refuse me.
He took a pace away, and came back.
“I’ll come,” he said, and there was a look of strange
excitement in his eyes that set me off on a tack of vague wonder;
but I said nothing, just told him how he had pleased me.
 
II
We had been at sea a couple of weeks, and were alone upon
the Atlantic—at least, so much of it as presented itself to our view.
I was leaning over the taffrail, staring down into the boil of
the wake; yet I noticed nothing, for I was wrapped in a tissue of
somewhat uncomfortable thought. It was about Ned Barlow.
He had been queer, decidedly queer, since leaving port. His
whole attitude mentally had been that of a man under the influence
of an all-pervading excitement. I had said that he was in need of
change, and had trusted that the splendid tonic of the sea breeze
would serve to put him soon to rights mentally and physically; yet
here was the poor old chap acting in a manner calculated to cause
me anxiety as to his balance.
Scarcely a word had been spoken since leaving the Channel.
When I ventured to speak to him, often he would take not the least
notice, other times he would answer only by a brief word; but
talk—never.
In addition, his whole time was spent on deck among the
men, and with some of them he seemed to converse both long and
earnestly; yet to me, his chum and true friend, not a word.
Another thing came to me as a surprise—Barlow betrayed the
greatest interest in the position of the vessel, and the courses set, all
in such a manner as left me no room for doubt but that his
knowledge of navigation was considerable.
Once I ventured to express my astonishment at this
knowledge, and ask a question or two as to the way in which he had
gathered it, but had been treated with such an absurdly stony
 
silence that since then I had not spoken to him.
With all this it may be easily conceived that my thoughts, as I
stared down into the wake, were troublesome.
Suddenly I heard a voice at my elbow:
“I should like to have a word with you, sir.” I turned sharply.
It was my skipper, and something in his face told me that all was
not as it should be.
“Well, Jenkins, fire away.”
He looked round, as if afraid of being overheard; then came
closer to me.
“Someone’s been messing with the compasses, sir,” he said in
a low voice.
“What?” I asked sharply.
“They’ve been meddled with, sir. The magnets have been
shifted, and by someone who’s a good idea of what he’s doing.”
“What on earth do you mean?” I inquired. “Why should
anyone mess about with them? What good would it do them? You
must be mistaken.”
“No, sir, I’m not. They’ve been touched within the last
forty-eight hours, and by someone that understands what he’s
doing.”
I stared at him. The man was so certain. I felt bewildered.
“But why should they?”
“That’s more than I can say, sir; but it’s a serious matter, and
I want to know what I’m to do. It looks to me as though there were
something funny going on. I’d give a month’s pay to know just who
it was, for certain.”
“Well,” I said, “if they have been touched, it can only be by
one of the officers. You say the chap who has done it must
 

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