Chapter 35 - The Boy Tar by Mayne Reid
Mysterious Disappearance
As I had eaten so many biscuits for breakfast, I intended to make breakfast serve me for that day; but, hungering as I was, I could not carry out my good intent. About mid-day, I found myself groping at the box, and the result was, that I abstracted another biscuit. I resolved, however, to eat only half of it for dinner, and keep the other half for supper. Following out this resolution, I broke the biscuit across the middle, and laid one half aside. The other I ate, washing it down with a little more water.
You may think it strange that I did not fancy a little brandy along with it, which I might have had without any trouble, since there were at least a hundred gallons of it within reach. The brandy, however, was nothing to me; and the great cask might as well have contained vitriol, for aught I cared for it. There were several reasons why I did not meddle with it. First, because I did not relish it; second, because it made me feel sick, and nauseated both my palate and stomach. I suppose it had been of an inferior kind, intended, not as an article of commerce, but for the use of the sailors, as casks of very bad brandy and rum are carried in most ships for the use of the crew. A third reason why I kept clear of the brandy was, that I had already drunk of it—only about one wine-glassful—and it had the effect of making me so thirsty that I drank nearly half a gallon of water before I succeeded in fully quenching my thirst again. I reasoned, therefore, that if I touched the brandy, it would cause me, either great suffering from thirst, or that I should have to use more water than I could spare. Therefore it was, that I determined to abstain altogether from this alcoholic spirit.
When my watch warned me that it was my usual hour to go to sleep, I resolved to eat the odd half biscuit, which I had reserved for supper; and then “retire for the night.”
This operation consisted simply in stretching myself in a new position, and drawing a fold or two of the broadcloth over me, to keep me from getting chilled while asleep.
For the first week after leaving port, I had found it very cold, for it was the winter season when we left home. The cloth, however, after it was discovered, enabled me to wrap up snugly enough, and I no longer cared for the cold. After a time, however, I began to perceive that the cold had quite taken its departure, and each day and night the atmosphere in the hold of the ship appeared to be growing warmer. On the night after the storm had passed, it did not feel at all cold, and the slightest covering sufficed.
At first, I was surprised by this sudden change in the state of the atmosphere; but when I reflected a little, I was able to explain it to my satisfaction. “Beyond a doubt,” thought I, “we have been all the while sailing southward, and we are getting into the hot latitudes of the torrid zone.”
I knew but little of what that meant, but I had heard that the torrid zone—or the tropics, as it was also called—lay to the south of England; and that there the climate was hotter than the hottest summer day at home. I had also heard that Peru was a southern country, and therefore we must be going in a southerly direction to reach it.
This was a very good explanation of the warm weather that had set in. The ship had now been sailing for nearly two weeks; and allowing her to have made two hundred miles a day (and ships, I knew, often go faster than that), she would at this time be a long way from England, and in a different climate altogether.
Thus reasoning with myself, I contrived to pass that afternoon and evening, and as I felt the hands of my watch indicating the hour of ten, I resolved, as already stated, to eat the half biscuit, and then go to sleep.
I first drew a cup of water, so that the biscuit might not be eaten dry; and, this done, I stretched forth my hand for the bread. I knew the exact spot where it lay, for I had a little corner, just alongside the great beam, where I kept my knife and cup, and wooden almanack—a sort of little shelf, raised by a roll of the cloth above the common level of my cell. There I had placed the half biscuit, and there, of course, I could lay my hand upon it as well without a light as with one. So perfectly had I become acquainted with every corner of my apartment, and every crevice leading from it, that I could place my finger on any given spot of the size of a crown-piece, without the slightest deviation.
I reached forth my hand, then, to clutch the precious morsel. Judge my astonishment when I touched the spot where I supposed it to be lying, and found it was not there!
At first, I fancied I might be mistaken—that perhaps I had not left it in the usual place on my shelf. There it certainly was not.
I felt the cloth cup, for that was in my hand full of water. The knife was in its place—so, too, the little notched stick, and the pieces of the string which I had used in measuring the butt—but no half biscuit!
Could I have put it anywhere else? I thought not; and yet, to make sure, I felt all over the bottom of my cell, and among the folds and wrinkles of the cloth, and even in the pockets both of my jacket and trousers. I felt in my buskins too, for these were not upon my feet, as I no longer needed them, but lying idle in a corner. I left not an inch of the place that I did not examine—and minutely too—yet still no half biscuit could be found!
I looked carefully for it, not so much on account of its value; but that its disappearance from the shelf was something rather strange—stranger still that I could nowhere lay my hand upon it.
Had I eaten it?
I began to fancy that I had done so. Perhaps, during a period of absent-mindedness, I might have swallowed it up, without ever thinking of what I was doing. Certainly, I had no remembrance of having tasted food since I ate its counterpart—the other half; and if I had eaten it also, it must have done me very little good. I had neither enjoyed the meal, nor yet did my stomach appear to have received much benefit from it, since I was just as hungry as if I had not tasted food that day.
I recollected perfectly having placed it alongside the knife and cup; and how could it part from the place, unless it had been taken away by my own hand? I could not have thrown it accidentally from the little shelf, for I did not remember making a movement in that direction. But even so, it would still have been somewhere about me? It could not get underneath the butt, for the crevice there was closed up, regularly caulked with pieces of the cloth. I had done this for the purpose of making a level surface to rest upon.
Certainly the half biscuit was not to be found. It was gone—whether down my throat or in some other way, I could not decide—but if the former, I thought to myself, what a pity I had eaten it without knowing what I was about, for certainly my absence of mind had deprived me of all enjoyment of the meal.
I wavered for a long while, as to whether I should take another biscuit out of the box, or go to bed supperless. But the dread of the future decided me to abstain; and, summoning all my resolution, I drank off the cold water, placed my cup upon the shelf, and laid myself down for the night.