An Antarctic Mystery (6 page)

The master and the dog were desperately thirsty, and when Arthur
stretched out his hand, he found Tiger lying on his back, with his
paws up and his hair on end. He then felt Tiger all over, and his
hand encountered a string passed round the dog's body. A strip of
paper was fastened to the string under his left shoulder.

Arthur Pym had reached the last stage of weakness. Intelligence was
almost extinct. However, after several fruitless attempts to procure
a light, he succeeded in rubbing the paper with a little
phosphorus—(the details given in Edgar Poe's narrative are
curiously minute at this point)—and then by the glimmer that
lasted less than a second he discerned just seven words at the end
of a sentence. Terrifying words these were:
blood—remain
hidden—life depends on it
.

What did these words mean? Let us consider the situation of Arthur
Pym, at the bottom of the ship's hold, between the boards of a
chest, without light, without water, with only ardent liquor to
quench his thirst! And this warning to remain hidden, preceded by
the word "blood "—that supreme word, king of words, so full of
mystery, of suffering, of terror! Had there been strife on board the
Grampus
? Had the brig been attacked by pirates? Had the crew
mutinied? How long had this state of things lasted?

It might be thought that the marvellous poet had exhausted the
resources of his imagination in the terror of such a situation; but
it was not so. There is more to come!

Arthur Pym lay stretched upon his mattress, incapable of thought, in
a sort of lethargy; suddenly he became aware of a singular sound, a
kind of continuous whistling breathing. It was Tiger, panting, Tiger
with eyes that glared in the midst of the darkness, Tiger with
gnashing teeth—Tiger gone mad. Another moment and the dog had
sprung upon Arthur Pym, who, wound up to the highest pitch of
horror, recovered sufficient strength to ward off his fangs, and
wrapping around him a blanket which Tiger had torn with his white
teeth, he slipped out of the chest, and shut the sliding side upon
the snapping and struggling brute.

Arthur Pym contrived to slip through the stowage of the hold, but
his head swam, and, falling against a bale, he let his knife drop
from his hand.

Just as he felt himself breathing his last sigh he heard his name
pronounced, and a bottle of water was held to his lips. He swallowed
the whole of its contents, and experienced the most exquisite of
pleasures.

A few minutes later, Augustus Barnard, seated with his comrade in a
corner of the hold, told him all that had occurred on board the brig.

Up to this point, I repeat, the story is admissible, but we have not
yet come to the events which "surpass all probability by their
marvellousness."

The crew of the
Grampus
numbered thirty-six men, including the
Barnards, father and son. After the brig had put to sea on the 20th
of June, Augustus Barnard had made several attempts to rejoin Arthur
Pym in his hiding place, but in vain. On the third day a mutiny
broke out on board, headed by the ship's cook, a negro like our
Endicott; but he, let me say at once, would never have thought of
heading a mutiny.

Numerous incidents are related in the romance—the massacre of most
of the sailors who remained faithful to Captain Barnard, then the
turning adrift of the captain and four of those men in a small
whaler's boat when the ship was abreast of the Bermudas. These
unfortunate persons were never heard of again.

Augustus Barnard would not have been spared, but for the
intervention of the sailing-master of the
Grampus
. This
sailing-master was a half-breed named Dirk Peters, and was the
person whom Captain Len Guy had gone to look for in Illinois!

The
Grampus
then took a south-east course under the command of the
mate, who intended to pursue the occupation of piracy in the
southern seas.

These events having taken place, Augustus Barnard would again have
joined Arthur Pym, but he had been shut up in the forecastle in
irons, and told by the ship's cook that he would not be allowed to
come out until "the brig should be no longer a brig."
Nevertheless, a few days afterwards, Augustus contrived to get rid
of his fetters, to cut through the thin partition between him and
the hold, and, followed by Tiger, he tried to reach his friend's
hiding place. He could not succeed, but the dog had scented Arthur
Pym, and this suggested to Augustus the idea of fastening a note to
Tiger's neck bearing the words:

"I scrawl this with blood—remain hidden—your life depends on
it—"

This note, as we have already learned, Arthur Pym had received. Just
as he had arrived at the last extremity of distress his friend
reached him.

Augustus added that discord reigned among the mutineers. Some wanted
to take the
Grampus
towards the Cape Verde Islands; others, and Dirk
Peters was of this number, were bent on sailing to the Pacific Isles.

Tiger was not mad. He was only suffering from terrible thirst, and
soon recovered when it was relieved.

The cargo of the
Grampus
was so badly stowed away that Arthur Pym
was in constant danger from the shifting of the bales, and Augustus,
at all risks, helped him to remove to a corner of the 'tween decks.

The half-breed continued to be very friendly with the son of Captain
Barnard, so that the latter began to consider whether the
sailing-master might not be counted on in an attempt to regain
possession of the ship.

They were just thirty days out from Nantucket when, on the 4th of
July, an angry dispute arose among the mutineers about a little brig
signalled in the offing, which some of them wanted to take and
others would have allowed to escape. In this quarrel a sailor
belonging to the cook's party, to which Dirk Peters had attached
himself, was mortally injured. There were now only thirteen men on
board, counting Arthur Pym.

Under these circumstances a terrible storm arose, and the
Grampus
was mercilessly knocked about. This storm raged until the 9th of
July, and on that day, Dirk Peters having manifested an intention of
getting rid of the mate, Augustus Barnard readily assured him of his
assistance, without, however, revealing the fact of Arthur Pym's
presence on board. Next day, one of the cook's adherents, a man
named Rogers, died in convulsions, and, beyond all doubt, of poison.
Only four of the cook's party then remained, of these Dirk Peters
was one. The mate had five, and would probably end by carrying the
day over the cook's party.

There was not an hour to lose. The half-breed having informed
Augustus Barnard that the moment for action had arrived, the latter
told him the truth about Arthur Pym.

While the two were in consultation upon the means to be employed for
regaining possession of the ship, a tempest was raging, and
presently a gust of irresistible force struck the
Grampus
and flung
her upon her side, so that on righting herself she shipped a
tremendous sea, and there was considerable confusion on board. This
offered a favourable opportunity for beginning the struggle,
although the mutineers had made peace among themselves. The latter
numbered nine men, while the half-breed's party consisted only of
himself, Augustus Barnard and Arthur Pym. The ship's master
possessed only two pistols and a hanger. It was therefore necessary
to act with prudence.

Then did Arthur Pym (whose presence on board the mutineers could not
suspect) conceive the idea of a trick which had some chance of
succeeding. The body of the poisoned sailor was still lying on the
deck; he thought it likely, if he were to put on the dead man's
clothes and appear suddenly in the midst of those superstitious
sailors, that their terror would place them at the mercy of Dirk
Peters. It was still dark when the half-breed went softly towards
the ship's stern, and, exerting his prodigious strength to the
utmost, threw himself upon the man at the wheel and flung him over
the poop.

Augustus Barnard and Arthur Pym joined him instantly, each armed
with a belaying-pin. Leaving Dirk Peters in the place of the
steersman, Arthur Pym, so disguised as to present the appearance of
the dead man, and his comrade, posted themselves close to the head
of the forecastle gangway. The mate, the ship's cook, all the
others were there, some sleeping, the others drinking or talking;
guns and pistols were within reach of their hands.

The tempest raged furiously; it was impossible to stand on the deck.

At that moment the mate gave the order for Augustus Barnard and Dirk
Peters to be brought to the forecastle. This order was transmitted
to the man at the helm, no other than Dirk Peters, who went down,
accompanied by Augustus Barnard, and almost simultaneously Arthur
Pym made his appearance.

The effect of the apparition was prodigious. The mate, terrified on
beholding the resuscitated sailor, sprang up, beat the air with his
hands, and fell down dead. Then Dirk Peters rushed upon the others,
seconded by Augustus Barnard, Arthur Pym, and the dog Tiger. In a
few moments all were strangled or knocked on the head save Richard
Parker, the sailor, whose life was spared.

And now, while the tempest was in full force, only four men were
left to work the brig, which was labouring terribly with seven feet
of water in her hold. They had to cut down the mainmast, and, when
morning came, the mizen. That day was truly awful, the night was
more awful still! If Dirk Peters and his companions had not lashed
themselves securely to the remains of the rigging, they must have
been carried away by a tremendous sea, which drove in the hatches of
the
Grampus
.

Then follows in the romance a minute record of the series of
incidents ensuing upon this situation, from the 14th of July to the
7th of August; the fishing for victuals in the submerged hold, the
coming of a mysterious brig laden with corpses, which poisoned the
atmosphere and passed on like a huge coffin, the sport of a wind of
death; the torments of hunger and thirst; the impossibility of
reaching the provision store; the drawing of lots by straws—the
shortest gave Richard Parker to be sacrificed for the life of the
other three—the death of that unhappy man, who was killed by Dirk
Peters and devoured; lastly, the finding in the hold of a jar of
olives and a small turtle.

Owing to the displacement of her cargo the
Grampus
rolled and
pitched more and more. The frightful heat caused the torture of
thirst to reach the extreme limit of human endurance, and on the 1st
of August, Augustus Barnard died. On the 3rd, the brig foundered in
the night, and Arthur Pym and the half-breed, crouching upon the
upturned keel, were reduced to feed upon the barnacles with which
the bottom was covered, in the midst of a crowd of waiting, watching
sharks. Finally, after the shipwrecked mariners of the
Grampus
had
drifted no less than twenty-five degrees towards the south, they
were picked up by the schooner
Jane
, of Liverpool, Captain William
Guy.

Evidently, reason is not outraged by an admission of the reality of
these facts, although the situations are strained to the utmost
limits of possibility; but that does not surprise us, for the writer
is the American magician-poet, Edgar Poe. But from this moment
onwards we shall see that no semblance of reality exists in the
succession of incidents.

Arthur Pym and Dirk Peters were well treated on board the English
schooner
Jane
. In a fortnight, having recovered from the effects of
their sufferings, they remembered them no more. With alternations of
fine and bad weather the
Jane
sighted Prince Edward's Island on
the 13th of October, then the Crozet Islands, and afterwards the
Kerguelens, which I had left eleven days ago.

Three weeks were employed in chasing sea-calves; these furnished the
Jane
with a goodly cargo. It was during this time that the captain
of the
Jane
buried the bottle in which his namesake of the
Halbrane
claimed to have found a letter containing William Guy's
announcement of his intention to visit the austral seas.

On the 12th of November, the schooner left the Kerguelens, and after
a brief stay at Tristan d'Acunha she sailed to reconnoitre the
Auroras in 35° 15' of south latitude, and 37° 38' of west
longitude. But these islands were not to be found, and she did not
find them.

On the 12th of December the
Jane
headed towards the Antarctic pole.
On the 26th, the first icebergs came in sight beyond the
seventy-third degree.

From the 1st to the 14th of January, 1828, the movements were
difficult, the polar circle was passed in the midst of ice-floes,
the icebergs' point was doubled and the ship sailed on the surface
of an open sea—the famous open sea where the temperature is 47°
Fahrenheit, and the water is 34°.

Edgar Poe, every one will allow, gives free rein to his fancy at
this point. No navigator had ever reached latitudes so high—not
even James Weddell of the British Navy, who did not get beyond the
seventy-fourth parallel in 1822. But the achievement of the
Jane
,
although difficult of belief, is trifling in comparison with the
succeeding incidents which Arthur Pym, or rather Edgar Poe, relates
with simple earnestness. In fact he entertained no doubt of reaching
the pole itself.

In the first place, not a single iceberg is to be seen on this
fantastic sea. Innumerable flocks of birds skim its surface, among
them is a pelican which is shot. On a floating piece of ice is a
bear of the Arctic species and of gigantic size. At last land is
signalled. It is an island of a league in circumference, to which
the name of Bennet Islet was given, in honour of the captain's
partner in the ownership of the
Jane
.