"
"Do you think so?" Margaret queried.
"We all think so, Miss. We ain't spent our lives on the sea for
nothin'. There's no end of landsmen don't believe in the Flyin'
Dutchman. But what do they know? They're just landsmen, ain't they?
They ain't never had their leg grabbed by a ghost, such as I had, on
the Kathleen, thirty-five years ago, down in the hole 'tween the
water-casks. An' didn't that ghost rip the shoe right off of me?
An' didn't I fall through the hatch two days later an' break my
shoulder?"
"Now, Miss, I seen 'em makin' signs to Mr. Pike that we'd run into
their ship hove to on the other tack. Don't you believe it. There
wasn't no ship."
"But how do you explain the carrying away of our head-gear?" I
demanded.
"There's lots of things can't be explained, sir," was Tom Spink's
answer. "Who can explain the way the Finns plays tom-fool tricks
with the weather? Yet everybody knows it. Why are we havin' a hard
passage around the Horn, sir? I ask you that. Why, sir?"
I shook my head.
"Because of the carpenter, sir.
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