Bartleby the Scrivener: A Tale of Wall Street

98 THE PIAZZA TALES
opposed to it. Clearly any suspicion, combining such
contradictions, must needs be delusive. Besides, was it
not absurd to think of a vessel in distress—a vessel by
sickness almost dismanned of her crew— a vessel whose
inmates were parched for water—was it not a thousand
times absurd that such a craft should, at present, be of
a piratical character ; or her commander, either for
himself or those under him, cherish any desire but for
speedy relief and refreshment ! But then, might not
general distress, and thirst in particular, be affected ?
And might not that same undiminished Spanish crew,
alleged to have perished off to a remnant, be at that
very moment lurking in the hold ? On heart-broken
pretence of entreating a cup of cold water, fiends in
human form had got into lonely dwellings, nor retired
until a dark deed had been done. And among the
Malay pirates, it was no unusual thing to lure ships after
them into their treacherous harbours, or entice boarders
from a declared enemy at sea, by the spectacle of thinly
manned or vacant decks, beneath which prowled a
hundred spears with yellow arms ready to upthrust them
through the mats. Not that Captain Delano had entirely
credited such things. He had heard of them— and now,
destination of
as stories, they recurred. The present
the ship was the anchorage. There she would be near
his own vessel. Upon gaining that vicinity, might not
the San Dominick, like a slumbering volcano, suddenly
let loose energies now hid ?
He recalled the Spaniard's manner while telling his
story. There was a gloomy hesitancy and subterfuge
about it. It was just the manner of one making up his
tale for evil purposes as he goes. But if that story was
not^ true, what was the truth ? That the ship~ had
? But
unlawfully come into the Spaniard's possession
in many of its details, especially in reference to the