Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-03-29
CHAPTER XIV.

AN EXTRAORDINARY OCCURRENCE. l While sat smoking my pipe it entered my head to presently turn those two silent gentle. men in the cabin out of it. It was task from which I shrank, but it must be done. To be candid, I dreaded the effects of their dismal comparionship on my spirits. But how was to dispose of them? I meditated this matter while smoked. First thought would drag them to the Assure or rent in the ice just beyond the stern of the schooner and tumble them into it. But even then they would still be with me, so to speak, 1 mean they would be neighbors though out of sight; and my eagerness was to get them away from this island altogether, which was only to bo done by casting them into the sea. settled my scheme thus: First, was to haul the figures as best I could on to the deck: then, there being three, to get them over the side, and afterward, by degrees, to transport the four of them to some steep, whence they would slide of themselves into the ocean. Yet so much did I dread the l undertaking, and abhor the thought of the tedious time foresaw it would occupy me- that l cannot imagine any other sort of painful and distressing work that would not have seemed actually agreeable as compared with this
 My pipe being smoked out, stepped into the cabin, and ascending the ladder threw off the companion cover and opened the doors, and then went to the man that had hls back to the steps-but my courage failed me; ; he was so life like, there was SO wild and fierce an earnestness in the expression of his face, so inimitable picture of horror in his starting posture that my hands fell to my side and could not lay hold of him. will not stop to analyze my fear or ask why, since knew that this man was dead, he should have terrified me as surely TO living man could: l can only repeat that the pros pect of touching him, and laying him upon the deck and then dragging him up tho lad der, was indescribably fearful to me, and turned away shaking as if I had the ague.
 But it had to be done, nevertheless and after great deal of reasoning and self-re- proach 1 seized him on sudden, and kicking away the bench let him fall to the deck. He was frozen as hard as stone and fell like stone, and l looked to see him break, as statue might that falls lumpishly. His arms remaining raised put him into an attitude of entreaty to me to leave him in peace; but had somewhat mastered myself, and the hurry and tumult of my spirits were a kind of hot temper; SO catching him by the collal dragged him to the foot of the companion steps, and then, with infinite labor and a number of sickening pauses, hauled him up the ladder to the deck.
 1 let him lie, and returned weary and out of breath. He had been o very fine man ir life-of beauty, too, as was to be seen in the shape of his features and the particular ele- gance of his chin, despite the distortion of his last unspeakable dismay; and with his clothes l guessed his weight came hard upon POD pounds-no mean burden to haul up ladder went to the cook house for @ dram and tu rest myself, and then came back to the cabin and looked at the other man. His posture has been already described. He made very burly figure in his coat, and if his weight did not exceed the others it was not likely to be less. Nothing of his head was visible but the badness on the top and the growth of hair that ringed it, and the fluffing up of his beard about his arms, in which his face was sunk. I touched his beard with a shuddering finger, and noted that the frost had made every hair of it as stiff as wire. It would l not do to stand idly contemplating him, for already there was slowly creeping into me dread of seeing his face; so took hold of
 him and swayed him from the table, and he fell upon the deck sideways, preserving his posture, so that his face remained hidden. I | dragged him a little way, but he was so heavy 1 and his attitude rendered him as burden so
 surprisingly cumbrous, that was sure could
 never of my own strength haul him up the
 ladder. Yet neither was it tolerable that he
 should be there.
 Then, thought I, if I was to put him before
 the fire, he might presently thaw into some
 sort of suppleness, and so prove not harder l than the other to get on deck l liked the | idea, and without more ado dragged him la | boriousIy into the cook room and laid him close to the furnace, throwing in little pile I of coal to make the fire roar.