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<html><h2>The “<i>Gloria Scott</i> ”</h2></html>
===Sir Arthur Conan Doyle===

“I have some papers here,” said my friend Sherlock Holmes, as we
sat one winter’s night on either side of the fire, “which I
really think, Watson, that it would be worth your while to glance
over. These are the documents in the extraordinary case of the
//Gloria Scott//, and this is the message which struck Justice of
the Peace Trevor dead with horror when he read it.”

He had picked from a drawer a little tarnished cylinder, and,
undoing the tape, he handed me a short note scrawled upon a
half-sheet of slate-grey paper.

“The supply of game for London is going steadily up,” it ran.
“Head-keeper Hudson, we believe, has been now told to receive all
orders for fly-paper and for preservation of your hen-pheasant’s
life.”

As I glanced up from reading this enigmatical message, I saw
Holmes chuckling at the expression upon my face.

“You look a little bewildered,” said he.

“I cannot see how such a message as this could inspire horror. It
seems to me to be rather grotesque than otherwise.”

“Very likely. Yet the fact remains that the reader, who was a
fine, robust old man, was knocked clean down by it as if it had
been the butt end of a pistol.”

“You arouse my curiosity,” said I. “But why did you say just now
that there were very particular reasons why I should study this
case?”

“Because it was the first in which I was ever engaged.”

I had often endeavoured to elicit from my companion what had
first turned his mind in the direction of criminal research, but
had never caught him before in a communicative humour. Now he sat
forward in this armchair and spread out the documents upon his
knees. Then he lit his pipe and sat for some time smoking and
turning them over.

“You never heard me talk of Victor Trevor?” he asked. “He was the
only friend I made during the two years I was at college. I was
never a very sociable fellow, Watson, always rather fond of
moping in my rooms and working out my own little methods of
thought, so that I never mixed much with the men of my year. Bar
fencing and boxing I had few athletic tastes, and then my line of
study was quite distinct from that of the other fellows, so that
we had no points of contact at all. Trevor was the only man I
knew, and that only through the accident of his bull terrier
freezing on to my ankle one morning as I went down to chapel.

“It was a prosaic way of forming a friendship, but it was
effective. I was laid by the heels for ten days, but Trevor used
to come in to inquire after me. At first it was only a minute’s
chat, but soon his visits lengthened, and before the end of the
term we were close friends. He was a hearty, full-blooded fellow,
full of spirits and energy, the very opposite to me in most
respects, but we had some subjects in common, and it was a bond
of union when I found that he was as friendless as I. Finally, he
invited me down to his father’s place at Donnithorpe, in Norfolk,
and I accepted his hospitality for a month of the long vacation.

“Old Trevor was evidently a man of some wealth and consideration,
a J.P. and a landed proprietor. Donnithorpe is a little hamlet
just to the north of Langmere, in the country of the Broads. The
house was an old-fashioned, wide-spread, oak-beamed brick
building, with a fine lime-lined avenue leading up to it. There
was excellent wild-duck shooting in the fens, remarkably good
fishing, a small but select library, taken over, as I understood,
from a former occupant, and a tolerable cook, so that he would be
a fastidious man who could not put in a pleasant month there.

“Trevor senior was a widower, and my friend his only son.

“There had been a daughter, I heard, but she had died of
diphtheria while on a visit to Birmingham. The father interested
me extremely. He was a man of little culture, but with a
considerable amount of rude strength, both physically and
mentally. He knew hardly any books, but he had travelled far, had
seen much of the world. And had remembered all that he had
learned. In person he was a thick-set, burly man with a shock of
grizzled hair, a brown, weather-beaten face, and blue eyes which
were keen to the verge of fierceness. Yet he had a reputation for
kindness and charity on the country-side, and was noted for the
leniency of his sentences from the bench.

“One evening, shortly after my arrival, we were sitting over a
glass of port after dinner, when young Trevor began to talk about
those habits of observation and inference which I had already
formed into a system, although I had not yet appreciated the part
which they were to play in my life. The old man evidently thought
that his son was exaggerating in his description of one or two
trivial feats which I had performed.

“‘Come, now, Mr. Holmes,’ said he, laughing good-humoredly. ‘I’m
an excellent subject, if you can deduce anything from me.’

“‘I fear there is not very much,’ I answered; ‘I might suggest
that you have gone about in fear of some personal attack within
the last twelve months.’

“The laugh faded from his lips, and he stared at me in great
surprise.

“‘Well, that’s true enough,’ said he. ‘You know, Victor,’ turning
to his son, ‘when we broke up that poaching gang, they swore to
knife us, and Sir Edward Holly has actually been attacked. I’ve
always been on my guard since then, though I have no idea how you
know it.’

“‘You have a very handsome stick,’ I answered. ‘By the
inscription I observed that you had not had it more than a year.
But you have taken some pains to bore the head of it and pour
melted lead into the hole so as to make it a formidable weapon. I
argued that you would not take such precautions unless you had
some danger to fear.’

“‘Anything else?’ he asked, smiling.

“‘You have boxed a good deal in your youth.’

“‘Right again. How did you know it? Is my nose knocked a little
out of the straight?’

“‘No,’ said I. ‘It is your ears. They have the peculiar
flattening and thickening which marks the boxing man.’

“‘Anything else?’

“‘You have done a good deal of digging by your callosities.’

“‘Made all my money at the gold fields.’

“‘You have been in New Zealand.’

“‘Right again.’

“‘You have visited Japan.’

“‘Quite true.’

“‘And you have been most intimately associated with some one
whose initials were J. A., and whom you afterwards were eager to
entirely forget.’

“Mr. Trevor stood slowly up, fixed his large blue eyes upon me
with a strange wild stare, and then pitched forward, with his
face among the nutshells which strewed the cloth, in a dead
faint.

“You can imagine, Watson, how shocked both his son and I were.
His attack did not last long, however, for when we undid his
collar, and sprinkled the water from one of the finger-glasses
over his face, he gave a gasp or two and sat up.

“‘Ah, boys,’ said he, forcing a smile, ‘I hope I haven’t
frightened you. Strong as I look, there is a weak place in my
heart, and it does not take much to knock me over. I don’t know
how you manage this, Mr. Holmes, but it seems to me that all the
detectives of fact and of fancy would be children in your hands.
That’s your line of life, sir, and you may take the word of a man
who has seen something of the world.’

“And that recommendation, with the exaggerated estimate of my
ability with which he prefaced it, was, if you will believe me,
Watson, the very first thing which ever made me feel that a
profession might be made out of what had up to that time been the
merest hobby. At the moment, however, I was too much concerned at
the sudden illness of my host to think of anything else.

“‘I hope that I have said nothing to pain you?’ said I.

“‘Well, you certainly touched upon rather a tender point. Might I
ask how you know, and how much you know?’ He spoke now in a
half-jesting fashion, but a look of terror still lurked at the
back of his eyes.

“‘It is simplicity itself,’ said I. ‘When you bared your arm to
draw that fish into the boat I saw that J. A. had been tattooed
in the bend of the elbow. The letters were still legible, but it
was perfectly clear from their blurred appearance, and from the
staining of the skin round them, that efforts had been made to
obliterate them. It was obvious, then, that those initials had
once been very familiar to you, and that you had afterwards
wished to forget them.’

“What an eye you have!” he cried, with a sigh of relief. ‘It is
just as you say. But we won’t talk of it. Of all ghosts the
ghosts of our old lovers are the worst. Come into the
billiard-room and have a quiet cigar.’

“From that day, amid all his cordiality, there was always a touch
of suspicion in Mr. Trevor’s manner towards me. Even his son
remarked it. ‘You’ve given the governor such a turn,’ said he,
‘that he’ll never be sure again of what you know and what you
don’t know.’ He did not mean to show it, I am sure, but it was so
strongly in his mind that it peeped out at every action. At last
I became so convinced that I was causing him uneasiness that I
drew my visit to a close. On the very day, however, before I
left, an incident occurred which proved in the sequel to be of
importance.

“We were sitting out upon the lawn on garden chairs, the three of
us, basking in the sun and admiring the view across the Broads,
when a maid came out to say that there was a man at the door who
wanted to see Mr. Trevor.

“‘What is his name?’ asked my host.

“‘He would not give any.’

“‘What does he want, then?’

“‘He says that you know him, and that he only wants a moment’s
conversation.’

“‘Show him round here.’ An instant afterwards there appeared a
little wizened fellow with a cringing manner and a shambling
style of walking. He wore an open jacket, with a splotch of tar
on the sleeve, a red-and-black check shirt, dungaree trousers,
and heavy boots badly worn. His face was thin and brown and
crafty, with a perpetual smile upon it, which showed an irregular
line of yellow teeth, and his crinkled hands were half closed in
a way that is distinctive of sailors. As he came slouching across
the lawn I heard Mr. Trevor make a sort of hiccoughing noise in
his throat, and jumping out of his chair, he ran into the house.
He was back in a moment, and I smelt a strong reek of brandy as
he passed me.

“‘Well, my man,’ said he, ‘what can I do for you?’

“The sailor stood looking at him with puckered eyes, and with the
same loose-lipped smile upon his face.

“‘You don’t know me?’ he asked.

“‘Why, dear me, it is surely Hudson,’ said Mr. Trevor in a tone
of surprise.

“‘Hudson it is, sir,’ said the seaman. ‘Why, it’s thirty year and
more since I saw you last. Here you are in your house, and me
still picking my salt meat out of the harness cask.’

“‘Tut, you will find that I have not forgotten old times,’ cried
Mr. Trevor, and, walking towards the sailor, he said something in
a low voice. ‘Go into the kitchen,’ he continued out loud, ‘and
you will get food and drink. I have no doubt that I shall find
you a situation.’

“‘Thank you, sir,’ said the seaman, touching his forelock. ‘I’m
just off a two-yearer in an eight-knot tramp, short-handed at
that, and I wants a rest. I thought I’d get it either with Mr.
Beddoes or with you.’

“‘Ah!’ cried Trevor. ‘You know where Mr. Beddoes is?’

“‘Bless you, sir, I know where all my old friends are,’ said the
fellow with a sinister smile, and he slouched off after the maid
to the kitchen. Mr. Trevor mumbled something to us about having
been shipmate with the man when he was going back to the
diggings, and then, leaving us on the lawn, he went indoors. An
hour later, when we entered the house, we found him stretched
dead drunk upon the dining-room sofa. The whole incident left a
most ugly impression upon my mind, and I was not sorry next day
to leave Donnithorpe behind me, for I felt that my presence must
be a source of embarrassment to my friend.

“All this occurred during the first month of the long vacation. I
went up to my London rooms, where I spent seven weeks working out
a few experiments in organic chemistry. One day, however, when
the autumn was far advanced and the vacation drawing to a close,
I received a telegram from my friend imploring me to return to
Donnithorpe, and saying that he was in great need of my advice
and assistance. Of course I dropped everything and set out for
the North once more.

“He met me with the dog-cart at the station, and I saw at a
glance that the last two months had been very trying ones for
him. He had grown thin and careworn, and had lost the loud,
cheery manner for which he had been remarkable.

“‘The governor is dying,’ were the first words he said.

“‘Impossible!’ I cried. ‘What is the matter?’

“‘Apoplexy. Nervous shock, He’s been on the verge all day. I
doubt if we shall find him alive.’

“I was, as you may think, Watson, horrified at this unexpected
news.

“‘What has caused it?’ I asked.

“‘Ah, that is the point. Jump in and we can talk it over while we
drive. You remember that fellow who came upon the evening before
you left us?’

“‘Perfectly.’

“‘Do you know who it was that we let into the house that day?’

“‘I have no idea.’

“‘It was the devil, Holmes,’ he cried.

“I stared at him in astonishment.

“‘Yes, it was the devil himself. We have not had a peaceful hour
since---not one. The governor has never held up his head from that
evening, and now the life has been crushed out of him and his
heart broken, all through this accursed Hudson.’

“‘What power had he, then?’

“‘Ah, that is what I would give so much to know. The kindly,
charitable, good old governor---how could he have fallen into the
clutches of such a ruffian! But I am so glad that you have come,
Holmes. I trust very much to your judgment and discretion, and I
know that you will advise me for the best.’

“We were dashing along the smooth white country road, with the
long stretch of the Broads in front of us glimmering in the red
light of the setting sun. From a grove upon our left I could
already see the high chimneys and the flag-staff which marked the
squire’s dwelling.

“‘My father made the fellow gardener,’ said my companion, ‘and
then, as that did not satisfy him, he was promoted to be butler.
The house seemed to be at his mercy, and he wandered about and
did what he chose in it. The maids complained of his drunken
habits and his vile language. The dad raised their wages all
round to recompense them for the annoyance. The fellow would take
the boat and my father’s best gun and treat himself to little
shooting trips. And all this with such a sneering, leering,
insolent face that I would have knocked him down twenty times
over if he had been a man of my own age. I tell you, Holmes, I
have had to keep a tight hold upon myself all this time; and now
I am asking myself whether, if I had let myself go a little more,
I might not have been a wiser man.

“‘Well, matters went from bad to worse with us, and this animal
Hudson became more and more intrusive, until at last, on making
some insolent reply to my father in my presence one day, I took
him by the shoulders and turned him out of the room. He slunk
away with a livid face and two venomous eyes which uttered more
threats than his tongue could do. I don’t know what passed
between the poor dad and him after that, but the dad came to me
next day and asked me whether I would mind apologising to Hudson.
I refused, as you can imagine, and asked my father how he could
allow such a wretch to take such liberties with himself and his
household.

“‘“Ah, my boy,” said he, “it is all very well to talk, but you
don’t know how I am placed. But you shall know, Victor. I’ll see
that you shall know, come what may. You wouldn’t believe harm of
your poor old father, would you, lad?” He was very much moved,
and shut himself up in the study all day, where I could see
through the window that he was writing busily.

“‘That evening there came what seemed to me to be a grand
release, for Hudson told us that he was going to leave us. He
walked into the dining-room as we sat after dinner, and announced
his intention in the thick voice of a half-drunken man.

“‘“I’ve had enough of Norfolk,” said he. “I’ll run down to Mr.
Beddoes in Hampshire. He’ll be as glad to see me as you were, I
daresay.”

“‘“You’re not going away in an unkind spirit, Hudson, I hope,”
said my father, with a tameness which made my blood boil.

“‘“I’ve not had my ’pology,” said he sulkily, glancing in my
direction.

“‘“Victor, you will acknowledge that you have used this worthy
fellow rather roughly,” said the dad, turning to me.

“‘“On the contrary, I think that we have both shown extraordinary
patience towards him,” I answered.

“‘“Oh, you do, do you?” he snarls. “Very good, mate. We’ll see
about that!” He slouched out of the room, and half an hour
afterwards left the house, leaving my father in a state of
pitiable nervousness. Night after night I heard him pacing his
room, and it was just as he was recovering his confidence that
the blow did at last fall.

“‘And how?’ I asked eagerly.

“‘In a most extraordinary fashion. A letter arrived for my father
yesterday evening, bearing the Fordingbridge postmark. My father
read it, clapped both his hands to his head, and began running
round the room in little circles like a man who has been driven
out of his senses. When I at last drew him down on to the sofa,
his mouth and eyelids were all puckered on one side, and I saw
that he had a stroke. Dr. Fordham came over at once. We put him
to bed; but the paralysis has spread, he has shown no sign of
returning consciousness, and I think that we shall hardly find
him alive.’

“‘You horrify me, Trevor!’ I cried. ‘What then could have been in
this letter to cause so dreadful a result?’

“‘Nothing. There lies the inexplicable part of it. The message
was absurd and trivial. Ah, my God, it is as I feared!’

“As he spoke we came round the curve of the avenue, and saw in
the fading light that every blind in the house had been drawn
down. As we dashed up to the door, my friend’s face convulsed
with grief, a gentleman in black emerged from it.

“‘When did it happen, doctor?’ asked Trevor.

“‘Almost immediately after you left.’

“‘Did he recover consciousness?’

“‘For an instant before the end.’

“‘Any message for me.’

“‘Only that the papers were in the back drawer of the Japanese
cabinet.’

“My friend ascended with the doctor to the chamber of death,
while I remained in the study, turning the whole matter over and
over in my head, and feeling as sombre as ever I had done in my
life. What was the past of this Trevor, pugilist, traveler, and
gold-digger, and how had he placed himself in the power of this
acid-faced seaman? Why, too, should he faint at an allusion to
the half-effaced initials upon his arm, and die of fright when he
had a letter from Fordingbridge? Then I remembered that
Fordingbridge was in Hampshire, and that this Mr. Beddoes, whom
the seaman had gone to visit and presumably to blackmail, had
also been mentioned as living in Hampshire. The letter, then,
might either come from Hudson, the seaman, saying that he had
betrayed the guilty secret which appeared to exist, or it might
come from Beddoes, warning an old confederate that such a
betrayal was imminent. So far it seemed clear enough. But then
how could this letter be trivial and grotesque, as described by
the son? He must have misread it. If so, it must have been one of
those ingenious secret codes which mean one thing while they seem
to mean another. I must see this letter. If there were a hidden
meaning in it, I was confident that I could pluck it forth. For
an hour I sat pondering over it in the gloom, until at last a
weeping maid brought in a lamp, and close at her heels came my
friend Trevor, pale but composed, with these very papers which
lie upon my knee held in his grasp. He sat down opposite to me,
drew the lamp to the edge of the table, and handed me a short
note scribbled, as you see, upon a single sheet of grey paper.
‘The supply of game for London is going steadily up,’ it ran.
‘Head-keeper Hudson, we believe, has been now told to receive all
orders for fly paper and for preservation of your hen pheasant’s
life.’

“I daresay my face looked as bewildered as yours did just now
when first I read this message. Then I reread it very carefully.
It was evidently as I had thought, and some secret meaning must
lie buried in this strange combination of words. Or could it be
that there was a prearranged significance to such phrases as ‘fly
paper’ and ‘hen pheasant’? Such a meaning would be arbitrary and
could not be deduced in any way. And yet I was loath to believe
that this was the case, and the presence of the word ‘Hudson’
seemed to show that the subject of the message was as I had
guessed, and that it was from Beddoes rather than the sailor. I
tried it backwards, but the combination ‘life pheasant’s hen’ was
not encouraging. Then I tried alternate words, but neither ‘The
of for’ nor ‘supply game London’ promised to throw any light upon
it. And then in an instant the key of the riddle was in my hands,
and I saw that every third word, beginning with the first, would
give a message which might well drive old Trevor to despair.

“It was short and terse, the warning, as I now read it to my
companion:

“‘The game is up. Hudson has told all. Fly for your life.’

“Victor Trevor sank his face into his shaking hands. ‘It must be
that, I suppose,’ said he. ‘This is worse than death, for it
means disgrace as well. But what is the meaning of these
“head-keepers” and “hen pheasants”?’

“‘It means nothing to the message, but it might mean a good deal
to us if we had no other means of discovering the sender. You see
that he has begun by writing “The . . . game . . . is,” and so on.
Afterwards he had, to fulfill the prearranged cipher, to fill in
any two words in each space. He would naturally use the first
words which came to his mind, and if there were so many which
referred to sport among them, you may be tolerably sure that he
is either an ardent shot or interested in breeding. Do you know
anything of this Beddoes?’

“‘Why, now that you mention it,’ said he, ‘I remember that my
poor father used to have an invitation from him to shoot over his
preserves every autumn.’

“‘Then it is undoubtedly from him that the note comes,’ said I.
‘It only remains for us to find out what this secret was which
the sailor Hudson seems to have held over the heads of these two
wealthy and respected men.’

“‘Alas, Holmes, I fear that it is one of sin and shame!’ cried my
friend. ‘But from you I shall have no secrets. Here is the
statement which was drawn up by my father when he knew that the
danger from Hudson had become imminent. I found it in the
Japanese cabinet, as he told the doctor. Take it and read it to
me, for I have neither the strength nor the courage to do it
myself.’

“These are the very papers, Watson, which he handed to me, and I
will read them to you, as I read them in the old study that night
to him. They are endorsed outside, as you see, ‘Some particulars
of the voyage of the bark //Gloria Scott//, from her leaving
Falmouth on the 8th October, 1855, to her destruction in N. lat.
15º 20’, W. long. 25º 14’ on Nov. 6th.’ It is in the form of a
letter, and runs in this way:

“‘My dear, dear son,---Now that approaching disgrace begins to
darken the closing years of my life, I can write with all truth
and honesty that it is not the terror of the law, it is not the
loss of my position in the county, nor is it my fall in the eyes
of all who have known me, which cuts me to the heart; but it is
the thought that you should come to blush for me---you who love me
and who have seldom, I hope, had reason to do other than respect
me. But if the blow falls which is forever hanging over me, then
I should wish you to read this, that you may know straight from
me how far I have been to blame. On the other hand, if all should
go well (which may kind God Almighty grant!), then if by any
chance this paper should be still undestroyed and should fall
into your hands, I conjure you, by all you hold sacred, by the
memory of your dear mother, and by the love which had been
between us, to hurl it into the fire and to never give one
thought to it again.

“‘If then your eye goes on to read this line, I know that I shall
already have been exposed and dragged from my home, or as is more
likely, for you know that my heart is weak, by lying with my
tongue sealed forever in death. In either case the time for
suppression is past, and every word which I tell you is the naked
truth, and this I swear as I hope for mercy.

“‘My name, dear lad, is not Trevor. I was James Armitage in my
younger days, and you can understand now the shock that it was to
me a few weeks ago when your college friend addressed me in words
which seemed to imply that he had surmised my secret. As Armitage
it was that I entered a London banking house, and as Armitage I
was convicted of breaking my country’s laws, and was sentenced to
transportation. Do not think very harshly of me, laddie. It was a
debt of honour, so called, which I had to pay, and I used money
which was not my own to do it, in the certainty that I could
replace it before there could be any possibility of its being
missed. But the most dreadful ill-luck pursued me. The money
which I had reckoned upon never came to hand, and a premature
examination of accounts exposed my deficit. The case might have
been dealt leniently with, but the laws were more harshly
administered thirty years ago than now, and on my twenty-third
birthday I found myself chained as a felon with thirty-seven
other convicts in ’tween-decks of the barque //Gloria Scott//,
bound for Australia.

“‘It was the year ’55 when the Crimean war was at its height, and
the old convict ships had been largely used as transports in the
Black Sea. The government was compelled, therefore, to use
smaller and less suitable vessels for sending out their
prisoners. The //Gloria Scott// had been in the Chinese tea trade,
but she was an old-fashioned, heavy-bowed, broad-beamed craft,
and the new clippers had cut her out. She was a five-hundred-ton
boat, and besides her thirty-eight gaol-birds, she carried
twenty-six of a crew, eighteen soldiers, a captain, three mates,
a doctor, a chaplain, and four warders. Nearly a hundred souls
were in her, all told, when we set sail from Falmouth.

“‘The partitions between the cells of the convicts, instead of
being of thick oak, as is usual in convict-ships, were quite thin
and frail. The man next to me, upon the aft side, was one whom I
had particularly noticed when we were led down the quay. He was a
young man with a clear, hairless face, a long, thin nose, and
rather nut-cracker jaws. He carried his head very jauntily in the
air, had a swaggering style of walking, and was, above all else,
remarkable for his extraordinary height. I don’t think any of our
heads would have come up to his shoulder, and I am sure that he
could not have measured less than six and a half feet. It was
strange among so many sad and weary faces to see one which was
full of energy and resolution. The sight of it was to me like a
fire in a snowstorm. I was glad, then, to find that he was my
neighbour, and gladder still when, in the dead of the night, I
heard a whisper close to my ear, and found that he had managed to
cut an opening in the board which separated us.

“‘“Hallao, chummy!” said he, “what’s your name, and what are you
here for?”

“‘I answered him, and asked in turn who I was talking with.

“‘“I’m Jack Prendergast,” said he, “and by God! You’ll learn to
bless my name before you’ve done with me.”

“‘I remembered hearing of his case, for it was one which had made
an immense sensation throughout the country some time before my
own arrest. He was a man of good family and of great ability, but
of incurably vicious habits, who had by an ingenious system of
fraud obtained huge sums of money from the leading London
merchants.

“‘“Ha, ha! You remember my case!” said he proudly.

“‘“Very well, indeed.”

“‘“Then maybe you remember something queer about it?”

“‘“What was that, then?”

“‘“I’d had nearly a quarter of a million, hadn’t I?”

“‘“So it was said.”

“‘“But none was recovered, eh?”

“‘“No.”

“‘“Well, where d’ye suppose the balance is?” he asked.

“‘“I have no idea,” said I.

“‘“Right between my finger and thumb,” he cried. “By God! I’ve
got more pounds to my name than you’ve hairs on your head. And if
you’ve money, my son, and know how to handle it and spread it,
you can do //anything!// Now, you don’t think it likely that a man
who could do anything is going to wear his breeches out sitting
in the stinking hold of a rat-gutted, beetle-ridden, mouldy old
coffin of a China coaster. No, sir, such a man will look after
himself and will look after his chums. You may lay to that! You
hold on to him, and you may kiss the book that he’ll haul you
through.”

“‘That was his style of talk, and at first I thought it meant
nothing; but after a while, when he had tested me and sworn me in
with all possible solemnity, he let me understand that there
really was a plot to gain command of the vessel. A dozen of the
prisoners had hatched it before they came aboard, Prendergast was
the leader, and his money was the motive power.

“‘“I’d a partner,” said he, “a rare good man, as true as a stock
to a barrel. He’s got the dibbs, he has, and where do you think
he is at this moment? Why, he’s the chaplain of this ship---the
chaplain, no less! He came aboard with a black coat, and his
papers right, and money enough in his box to buy the thing right
up from keel to main-truck. The crew are his, body and soul. He
could buy ’em at so much a gross with a cash discount, and he did
it before ever they signed on. He’s got two of the warders and
Mercer, the second mate, and he’d get the captain himself, if he
thought him worth it.”

“‘“What are we to do, then?” I asked.

“‘“What do you think?” said he. “We’ll make the coats of some of
these soldiers redder than ever the tailor did.”

“‘“But they are armed,” said I.

“‘“And so shall we be, my boy. There’s a brace of pistols for
every mother’s son of us, and if we can’t carry this ship, with
the crew at our back, it’s time we were all sent to a young
misses’ boarding-school. You speak to your mate upon the left
to-night, and see if he is to be trusted.”

“‘I did so, and found my other neighbour to be a young fellow in
much the same position as myself, whose crime had been forgery.
His name was Evans, but he afterwards changed it, like myself,
and he is now a rich and prosperous man in the south of England.
He was ready enough to join the conspiracy, as the only means of
saving ourselves, and before we had crossed the Bay there were
only two of the prisoners who were not in the secret. One of
these was of weak mind, and we did not dare to trust him, and the
other was suffering from jaundice, and could not be of any use to
us.

““From the beginning there was really nothing to prevent us from
taking possession of the ship. The crew were a set of ruffians,
specially picked for the job. The sham chaplain came into our
cells to exhort us, carrying a black bag, supposed to be full of
tracts, and so often did he come that by the third day we had
each stowed away at the foot of our beds a file, a brace of
pistols, a pound of powder, and twenty slugs. Two of the warders
were agents of Prendergast, and the second mate was his
right-hand man. The captain, the two mates, two warders,
Lieutenant Martin, his eighteen soldiers, and the doctor were all
that we had against us. Yet, safe as it was, we determined to
neglect no precaution, and to make our attack suddenly by night.
It came, however, more quickly than we expected, and in this way.

“‘One evening, about the third week after our start, the doctor
had come down to see one of the prisoners who was ill, and
putting his hand down on the bottom of his bunk he felt the
outline of the pistols. If he had been silent he might have blown
the whole thing, but he was a nervous little chap, so he gave a
cry of surprise and turned so pale that the man knew what was up
in an instant and seized him. He was gagged before he could give
the alarm, and tied down upon the bed. He had unlocked the door
that led to the deck, and we were through it in a rush. The two
sentries were shot down, and so was a corporal who came running
to see what was the matter. There were two more soldiers at the
door of the state-room, and their muskets seemed not to be
loaded, for they never fired upon us, and they were shot while
trying to fix their bayonets. Then we rushed on into the
captain’s cabin, but as we pushed open the door there was an
explosion from within, and there he lay with his brains smeared
over the chart of the Atlantic which was pinned upon the table,
while the chaplain stood with a smoking pistol in his hand at his
elbow. The two mates had both been seized by the crew, and the
whole business seemed to be settled.

“‘The state-room was next the cabin, and we flocked in there and
flopped down on the settees, all speaking together, for we were
just mad with the feeling that we were free once more. There were
lockers all round, and Wilson, the sham chaplain, knocked one of
them in, and pulled out a dozen of brown sherry. We cracked off
the necks of the bottles, poured the stuff out into tumblers, and
were just tossing them off, when in an instant without warning
there came the roar of muskets in our ears, and the saloon was so
full of smoke that we could not see across the table. When it
cleared again the place was a shambles. Wilson and eight others
were wriggling on the top of each other on the floor, and the
blood and the brown sherry on that table turn me sick now when I
think of it. We were so cowed by the sight that I think we should
have given the job up if it had not been for Prendergast. He
bellowed like a bull and rushed for the door with all that were
left alive at his heels. Out we ran, and there on the poop were
the lieutenant and ten of his men. The swing skylights above the
saloon table had been a bit open, and they had fired on us
through the slit. We got on them before they could load, and they
stood to it like men; but we had the upper hand of them, and in
five minutes it was all over. My God! Was there ever a
slaughter-house like that ship! Prendergast was like a raging
devil, and he picked the soldiers up as if they had been children
and threw them overboard alive or dead. There was one sergeant
that was horribly wounded and yet kept on swimming for a
surprising time, until some one in mercy blew out his brains.
When the fighting was over there was no one left of our enemies
except just the warders, the mates, and the doctor.

“‘It was over them that the great quarrel arose. There were many
of us who were glad enough to win back our freedom, and yet who
had no wish to have murder on our souls. It was one thing to
knock the soldiers over with their muskets in their hands, and it
was another to stand by while men were being killed in cold
blood. Eight of us, five convicts and three sailors, said that we
would not see it done. But there was no moving Prendergast and
those who were with him. Our only chance of safety lay in making
a clean job of it, said he, and he would not leave a tongue with
power to wag in a witness-box. It nearly came to our sharing the
fate of the prisoners, but at last he said that if we wished we
might take a boat and go. We jumped at the offer, for we were
already sick of these bloodthirsty doings, and we saw that there
would be worse before it was done. We were given a suit of
sailors’ togs each, a barrel of water, two casks, one of junk and
one of biscuits, and a compass. Prendergast threw us over a
chart, told us that we were shipwrecked mariners whose ship had
foundered in lat. 15º N. and long 25º W., and then cut the
painter and let us go.

“‘And now I come to the most surprising part of my story, my dear
son. The seamen had hauled the foreyard aback during the rising,
but now as we left them they brought it square again, and as
there was a light wind from the north and east the barque began
to draw slowly away from us. Our boat lay, rising and falling,
upon the long, smooth rollers, and Evans and I, who were the most
educated of the party, were sitting in the sheets working out our
position and planning what coast we should make for. It was a
nice question, for the Cape de Verds were about five hundred
miles to the north of us, and the African coast about seven
hundred to the east. On the whole, as the wind was coming round
to the north, we thought that Sierra Leone might be best, and
turned our head in that direction, the barque being at that time
nearly hull down on our starboard quarter. Suddenly as we looked
at her we saw a dense black cloud of smoke shoot up from her,
which hung like a monstrous tree upon the sky line. A few seconds
later a roar like thunder burst upon our ears, and as the smoke
thinned away there was no sign left of the //Gloria Scott//. In an
instant we swept the boat’s head round again and pulled with all
our strength for the place where the haze still trailing over the
water marked the scene of this catastrophe.

“‘It was a long hour before we reached it, and at first we feared
that we had come too late to save any one. A splintered boat and
a number of crates and fragments of spars rising and falling on
the waves showed us where the vessel had foundered; but there was
no sign of life, and we had turned away in despair when we heard
a cry for help, and saw at some distance a piece of wreckage with
a man lying stretched across it. When we pulled him aboard the
boat he proved to be a young seaman of the name of Hudson, who
was so burned and exhausted that he could give us no account of
what had happened until the following morning.

“‘It seemed that after we had left, Prendergast and his gang had
proceeded to put to death the five remaining prisoners. The two
warders had been shot and thrown overboard, and so also had the
third mate. Prendergast then descended into the ’tween-decks and
with his own hands cut the throat of the unfortunate surgeon.
There only remained the first mate, who was a bold and active
man. When he saw the convict approaching him with the bloody
knife in his hand he kicked off his bonds, which he had somehow
contrived to loosen, and rushing down the deck he plunged into
the after-hold.

“‘A dozen convicts, who descended with their pistols in search of
him, found him with a match-box in his hand seated beside an open
powder barrel, which was one of a hundred carried on board, and
swearing that he would blow all hands up if he were in any way
molested. An instant later the explosion occurred, though Hudson
thought it was caused by the misdirected bullet of one of the
convicts rather than the mate’s match. Be the cause what it may,
it was the end of the //Gloria Scott// and of the rabble who held
command of her.

“‘Such, in a few words, my dear boy, is the history of this
terrible business in which I was involved. Next day we were
picked up by the brig //Hotspur//, bound for Australia, whose
captain found no difficulty in believing that we were the
survivors of a passenger ship which had foundered. The transport
ship //Gloria Scott// was set down by the Admiralty as being lost
at sea, and no word has ever leaked out as to her true fate.
After an excellent voyage the //Hotspur// landed us at Sydney,
where Evans and I changed our names and made our way to the
diggings, where, among the crowds who were gathered from all
nations, we had no difficulty in losing our former identities.

“‘The rest I need not relate. We prospered, we travelled, we came
back as rich colonials to England, and we bought country estates.
For more than twenty years we have led peaceful and useful lives,
and we hoped that our past was forever buried. Imagine, then, my
feelings when in the seaman who came to us I recognised instantly
the man who had been picked off the wreck. He had tracked us down
somehow, and had set himself to live upon our fears. You will
understand now how it was that I strove to keep the peace with
him, and you will in some measure sympathise with me in the fears
which fill me, now that he has gone from me to his other victim
with threats upon his tongue.’

“Underneath is written in a hand so shaky as to be hardly
legible, ‘Beddoes writes in cipher to say H. has told all. Sweet
Lord, have mercy on our souls!’

“That was the narrative which I read that night to young Trevor,
and I think, Watson, that under the circumstances it was a
dramatic one. The good fellow was heartbroken at it, and went out
to the Terai tea planting, where I hear that he is doing well. As
to the sailor and Beddoes, neither of them was ever heard of
again after that day on which the letter of warning was written.
They both disappeared utterly and completely. No complaint had
been lodged with the police, so that Beddoes had mistaken a
threat for a deed. Hudson had been seen lurking about, and it was
believed by the police that he had done away with Beddoes and had
fled. For myself I believe that the truth was exactly the
opposite. I think that it is most probable that Beddoes, pushed
to desperation and believing himself to have been already
betrayed, had revenged himself upon Hudson, and had fled from the
country with as much money as he could lay his hands on. Those
are the facts of the case, Doctor, and if they are of any use to
your collection, I am sure that they are very heartily at your
service.”
Omaha Sherlockian Society

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