, because, as you shall see, he
was destined to have much to do with my life, the fate of Dr. Karl
Augustus Schermerhorn, and the doom of the _Laughing Lass_.

He wore on his head a red bandana handkerchief. I never saw him with
other covering. From beneath It straggled oily and tangled locks of
glossy black. His face was long, narrow, hook-nosed and sinister; his
eyes, as I have described them, a steady and beady black. I could at
first glance ascribe great activity, but only moderate strength to his
slender, wiry figure. In this I was mistaken. His sheer physical power
was second only to that of Captain Selover. One of his forearms ended in
a steel hook. At the moment I could not understand this; could not see
how a man so maimed could be useful aboard a ship. Later I wished we had
more as handy. He knew a jam hitch which he caught over and under his
hook quicker than most men can grasp a line with the naked hand. It would
render one way, but held fast the other. He told me it was a cinch-hook
hitch employed by mule packers in the mountains, and that he had used it
on swamp-hooks in the lumber woods of Michigan. I shouldn't wonder. He
was a Wandering Jew.--His name was Anderson, but I never heard him called
that. It was always "Handy Solomon" with men and masters.

We stared at each other, I fascinated by something, some spell of the
ship, which I have never been able to explain to myself--nor even
describe. It was a mystery, a portent, a premonition such as overtakes a
man sometimes in the dark passageways of life. I cannot tell you of it,
nor make you believe--let it pass----

Then by a slow process of successive perceptions I became aware that I
was watched by other eyes, other wax figures, other human beings with
unwavering gaze. They seemed to the sense of mystic apprehension that for
the moment held possession of me, to be everywhere--in the bunks, on the
floor, back in the shadows, watching, watching, watching from the
advantage of another world.

[Illustration: Slowly the man defined himself as a shape takes form in a
fog.]

I don't know why I tell you this; why I lay so much stress on the first
weird impression I got of the forecastle. It means something to me
now--in view of all that happened subsequently. Almost can I look back
and see, in that moment of occultism, a warning, an enlightenment----But
the point is, it meant something to me then. I stood there fascinated,
unable to move, unable to speak.