nd blood, or whether they're what we should call ghosts or
spirits."

"They can't be flesh and blood," Tammy interrupted. "Where would they
live? Besides, that first one I saw, I thought I could see through it.
And this last one--the Second Mate would have seen it. And they would
drown--"

"Not necessarily," I said.

"Oh, but I'm sure they're not," he insisted. "It's impossible--"

"So are ghosts--when you're feeling sensible," I answered. "But I'm not
saying they _are_ flesh and blood; though, at the same time, I'm not
going to say straight out they're ghosts--not yet, at any rate."

"Where do they come from?" he asked, stupidly enough.

"Out of the sea," I told him. "You saw for yourself!"

"Then why don't other vessels have them coming aboard?" he said. "How do
you account for that?"

"In a way--though sometimes it seems cracky--I think I can, according to
my idea," I answered.

"How?" he inquired again.

"Why, I believe that this ship is open, as I've told you--exposed,
unprotected, or whatever you like to call it. I should say it's
reasonable to think that all the things of the material world are
barred, as it were, from the immaterial; but that in some cases the
barrier may be broken down. That's what may have happened to this ship.
And if it has, she may be naked to the attacks of beings belonging to
some other state of existence."

"What's made her like that?" he asked, in a really awed sort of tone.

"The Lord knows!" I answered. "Perhaps something to do with magnetic
stresses; but you'd not understand, and I don't, really. And, I suppose,
inside of me, I don't believe it's anything of the kind, for a minute.
I'm not built that way. And yet I don't know! Perhaps, there may have
been some rotten thing done aboard of her. Or, again, it's a heap more
likely to be something quite outside of anything I know."

"If they're immaterial then, they're spirits?" he questioned.

"I don't know," I said. "It's so hard to say what I really think, you
know. I've got a queer idea, that my head-piece likes to think good; but
I don't believe my tummy believes it."

"Go on!" he said.

"Well," I said. "Suppose the earth were inhabited by two kinds of life.
We're one, and _they're_ the other."

"Go on!" he said.

"Well," I said. "Don't you see, in a normal state we may not be capable
of appreciating the _realness_ of the other? But they may be just as
_real_ and material to _them_, as _we_ are to _us_. Do you