And romantic it certainly was -- the fog, like the gray shadow of infinite mystery, brooding over the whirling speck of earth; and men, mere motes of light and sparkle, cursed with an insane relish for work, riding their steeds of wood and steel through the heart of the mystery, groping their way blindly through the Unseen, and clamoring and clanging in confident speech the while their hearts are heavy with incertitude and fear.
The voice of my companion brought me back to myself with a laugh.Itoo had been groping and floundering, the while I thought rode clear-eyed through the mystery.
"Hello; somebody comin' our way," he was saying."And d'ye hear that?
He's comin' fast.Walking right along.Guess he don't hear us yet.Wind's in wrong direction."The fresh breeze was blowing right down upon us, and I could hear the whistle plainly, off to one side and a little ahead.
"Ferry-boat?" I asked.
He nodded, then added, "Or he wouldn't be keepin' up such a clip." He gave a short chuckle."They're gettin' anxious up there."I glanced up.The captain had thrust his head and shoulders out of the pilot-house, and was staring intently into the fog as though by sheer force of will he could penetrate it.His face was anxious, as was the face of my companion, who had stumped over to the rail and was gazing with a like intentness in the direction of the invisible danger.
Then everything happened, and with inconceivable rapidity.The fog seemed to break away as though split by a wedge, and the bow of a steamboat emerged, trailing fog-wreaths on either side like seaweed on the snout of Leviathan.
I could see the pilot-house and a white-bearded man leaning partly out of it, on his elbows.He was clad in a blue uniform, and I remember noting how trim and quiet he was.His quietness, under the circumstances, was terrible.He accepted Destiny, marched hand in hand with it, and coolly measured the stroke.As he leaned there, he ran a calm and speculative eye over us, as though to determine the precise point of the collision, and took no notice whatever when our pilot, white with rage, shouted, "Now you've done it!"On looking back, I realize that the remark was too obvious to make rejoinder necessary.
"Grab hold of something and hang on," the red-faced man said to me.
All his bluster had gone, and he seemed to have caught the contagion of preternatural calm."And listen to the women scream," he said grimly, almost bitterly, I thought, as though he had been through the experience before.
The vessels came together before I could follow his advice.We must have been struck squarely amidships, for I saw nothing, the strange steamboat having passed beyond my line of vision.The Martinez heeled over, sharply, and there was a crashing and rending of timber.I was thrown flat on the wet deck, and before I could scramble to my feet I heard the scream of the women.This it was, I am certain, -- the most indescribable of blood-curdling sounds, -- that threw me into a panic.I remembered the life-preservers stored in the cabin, but was met at the door and swept backward by a wild rush of men and women.What happened in the next few minutes I do not recollect, though I have a clear remembrance of pulling down life-preservers from the overhead racks, while the red-faced man fastened them about the bodies of an hysterical group of women.This memory is as distinct and sharp as that of any picture I have seen.It is a picture, and I can see it now, -- the jagged edges of the hole in the side of the cabin, through which the gray fog swirled and eddied; the empty upholstered seats, littered with all the evidences of sudden flight, such as packages, hand satchels, umbrellas, and wraps; the stout gentleman who had been reading my essay, encased in cork and canvas, the magazine still in his hand, and asking me with monotonous insistence if I thought there was any danger; the red-faced man, stumping gallantly around on his artificial legs and buckling life-preservers on all comers; and finally, the screaming bedlam of women.
This it was, the screaming of the women, that most tried my nerves.
It must have tried, too, the nerves of the red-faced man, for have another picture which will never fade from my mind.The stout gentleman is stuffing the magazine into his overcoat pocket and looking on curiously.A tangled mass of women, with drawn, white faces and open mouths, is shrieking like a chorus of lost souls; and the red-faced man, his face now purplish with wrath, and with arms extended overhead as in the act of hurling thunderbolts, is shouting, "Shut up! Oh, shut up!"I remember the scene impelled me to sudden laughter, and in the next instant I realized I was becoming hysterical myself; for these were women of my own kind, like my mother and sisters, with the fear of death upon them and unwilling to die.And I remember that the sounds they made reminded me of the squealing of pigs under the knife of the butcher, and I was struck with horror at the vividness of the analogy.These women, capable of the most sublime emotions, of the tenderest sympathies, were open-mouthed and screaming.They wanted to live, they were helpless, like rats in a trap, and they screamed.
