ed the ship. You know what sort of men we
were in that foc'sle; save Newman and the parson, we were ignorant men,
and superstitious. We all believed implicitly in ghosts, I, and the
squareheads, Nigger and Cockney, and even the stiffs who had not the
sea in their blood. Aye, even Blackie and Boston believed in haunts.
It seemed reasonable to us that Nils should come back to the scene of
his earthly misery. Reasonable, and fearsome.

Nils came at night, in the middle watch, always in the middle watch.
That circumstance might have aroused suspicion in sceptical minds. But
we were not sceptical.

Lynch had us busy forward this night. Aye, it had become a practice
with him to keep us busy in the fore part of the ship during the night
watches. One of his tradesmen, Connolly, kept the poop watch for him.
No, we did not think this arrangement odd; we worked too hard to think.

Newman had the first wheel. At four bells, a lad named Oscar went aft
to relieve the big fellow. A moment later he reappeared forward,
wild-eyed and spluttering his own lingo. Oh, he was a frightened
squarehead. All we could understand of his speech was the word "Nils."

The word was enough. We didn't need the commotion and consternation
among Oscar's countrymen to help us interpret. He had seen Nils.

"What's the matter with you?" demanded Lynch.

Lindquist answered for Oscar. Nils was at the wheel. Oscar had gone
aft to relieve Newman, and he had seen his dead shipmate at the wheel,
steering the ship. He was afraid to relieve a ghost.

"Oh, rot!" says Lynch. "Here, come along aft with me, the lot of you.
We'll lay this ghost."

Oscar did not want to go aft again, but he had to. It was better to
face a ghost than disobey Bucko Lynch. That is what the rest of us
thought, too. We were all afraid to go aft, but more afraid not to.
So we huddled close upon the second mate's heels, and clumped noisily
upon the deck, as though to rout the wraith with our racket.

Perhaps our racket did send Nils away. It certainly aroused the men
sleeping in the cabin, and the roundhouse. But we saw Newman at the
helm, not Nils.

"Well, m'son, where's your ghost?" demanded Mister Lynch.

Oscar was still too frightened to muster his scant English, but
Lindquist talked for him. "He say like dis, sir, Nils ban at da wheel
when he koom aft, oond den he yump vrom der wheel oond run for'ard yust
like da time da captain thoomp him."

"Rot!" says