No More Learning

"Better? Why it's true! How could he have known? "

I went back and repeated:

"'What was that? ' said Olaf, standing
On the quarter-deck,
'Something heard I like the stranding
Of a shattered wreck. '"

"How could he have known how the ships crash and the oars rip out and go
z-zzp all along the line? Why only the other night--But go back please
and read 'The Skerry of Shrieks' again. "

"No, I'm tired. Let's talk. What happened the other night? "

"I had an awful nightmare about that galley of ours. I dreamed I was
drowned in a fight. You see we ran alongside another ship in harbor. The
water was dead still except where our oars whipped it up. You know where
I always sit in the galley?
" He spoke haltingly at first, under a fine
English fear of being laughed at.

"No. That's news to me," I answered, meekly, my heart beginning to beat.

"On the fourth oar from the bow on the right side on the upper deck.
There were four of us at the oar, all chained. I remember watching the
water and trying to get my handcuffs off before the row began. Then we
closed up on the other ship, and all their fighting men jumped over our
bulwarks, and my bench broke and I was pinned down with the three other
fellows on top of me, and the big oar jammed across our backs. "

"Well? " Charlie's eyes were alive and alight. He was looking at the wall
behind my chair.

"I don't know how we fought. The men were trampling all over my back,
and I lay low. Then our rowers on the left side--tied to their oars, you
know--began to yell and back water. I could hear the water sizzle, and
we spun round like a cockchafer and I knew, lying where I was, that
there was a galley coming up bow-on, to ram us on the left side. I could
just lift up my head and see her sail over the bulwarks. We wanted to
meet her bow to bow, but it was too late.