{"id":32,"date":"2021-04-06T15:46:29","date_gmt":"2021-04-06T19:46:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.ryerson.ca\/doctormoreau\/?post_type=chapter&p=32"},"modified":"2022-02-02T09:28:42","modified_gmt":"2022-02-02T14:28:42","slug":"chapter-3-the-strange-face","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/chapter\/chapter-3-the-strange-face\/","title":{"raw":"Chapter 3: The Strange Face","rendered":"Chapter 3: The Strange Face"},"content":{"raw":"We left the cabin and found a man at the companion obstructing our way. He was standing on the ladder with his back to us, peering over the combing of the hatchway. He was, I could see, a misshapen man, short, broad, and clumsy, with a crooked back, a hairy neck, and a head sunk between his shoulders. He was dressed in dark-blue serge, and had peculiarly thick, coarse, black hair. I heard the unseen dogs growl furiously, and forthwith he ducked back,\u2014coming into contact with the hand I put out to fend him off from myself. He turned with animal swiftness.\r\n\r\nIn some indefinable way the black face thus flashed upon me shocked me profoundly. It was a singularly deformed one. The facial part projected, forming something dimly suggestive of a muzzle, and the huge half-open mouth showed as big white teeth as I had ever seen in a human mouth. His eyes were blood-shot at the edges, with scarcely a rim of white round the hazel pupils. There was a curious glow of excitement in his face.\r\n\r\n\u201cConfound you!\u201d said Montgomery. \u201cWhy the devil don\u2019t you get out of the way?\u201d\r\n\r\nThe black-faced man started aside without a word. I went on up the companion, staring at him instinctively as I did so. Montgomery stayed at the foot for a moment. \u201cYou have no business here, you know,\u201d he said in a deliberate tone. \u201cYour place is forward.\u201d\r\n\r\nThe black-faced man cowered. \u201cThey\u2014won\u2019t have me forward.\u201d He spoke slowly, with a queer, hoarse quality in his voice.\r\n\r\n\u201cWon\u2019t have you forward!\u201d said Montgomery, in a menacing voice. \u201cBut I tell you to go!\u201d He was on the brink of saying something further, then looked up at me suddenly and followed me up the ladder.\r\n\r\nI had paused half way through the hatchway, looking back, still astonished beyond measure at the grotesque ugliness of this black-faced creature. I had never beheld such a repulsive and extraordinary face before, and yet\u2014if the contradiction is credible\u2014I experienced at the same time an odd feeling that in some way I had<\/i>already encountered exactly the features and gestures that now amazed me. Afterwards it occurred to me that probably I had seen him as I was lifted aboard; and yet that scarcely satisfied my suspicion of a previous acquaintance. Yet how one could have set eyes on so singular a face and yet have forgotten the precise occasion, passed my imagination.\r\n\r\nMontgomery\u2019s movement to follow me released my attention, and I turned and looked about me at the flush deck of the little schooner. I was already half prepared by the sounds I had heard for what I saw. Certainly I never beheld a deck so dirty. It was littered with scraps of carrot, shreds of green stuff, and indescribable filth. Fastened by chains to the mainmast were a number of grisly staghounds, who now began leaping and barking at me, and by the mizzen a huge puma was cramped in a little iron cage far too small even to give it turning room. Farther under the starboard bulwark were some big hutches containing a number of rabbits, and a solitary llama was squeezed in a mere box of a cage forward. The dogs were muzzled by leather straps. The only human being on deck was a gaunt and silent sailor at the wheel.\r\n\r\nThe patched and dirty spankers were tense before the wind, and up aloft the little ship seemed carrying every sail she had. The sky was clear, the sun midway down the western sky; long waves, capped by the breeze with froth, were running with us. We went past the steersman to the taffrail, and saw the water come foaming under the stern and the bubbles go dancing and vanishing in her wake. I turned and surveyed the unsavoury length of the ship.\r\n\r\n\u201cIs this an ocean menagerie?\u201d said I.\r\n\r\n\u201cLooks like it,\u201d said Montgomery.\r\n\r\n\u201cWhat are these beasts for? Merchandise, curios? Does the captain think he is going to sell them somewhere in the South Seas?\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cIt looks like it, doesn\u2019t it?\u201d said Montgomery, and turned towards the wake again.\r\n\r\nSuddenly we heard a yelp and a volley of furious blasphemy from the companion hatchway, and the deformed man with the black face came up hurriedly. He was immediately followed by a heavy red-haired man in a white cap. At the sight of the former the staghounds, who had all tired of barking at me by this time, became furiously excited, howling and leaping against their chains. The black hesitated before them, and this gave the red-haired man time to come up with him and deliver a tremendous blow between the shoulder-blades. The poor devil went down like a felled ox, and rolled in the dirt among the furiously excited dogs. It was lucky for him that they were muzzled. The red-haired man gave a yawp of exultation and stood staggering, and as it seemed to me in serious danger of either going backwards down the companion hatchway or forwards upon his victim.\r\n\r\nSo soon as the second man had appeared, Montgomery had started forward. \u201cSteady on there!\u201d he cried, in a tone of remonstrance. A couple of sailors appeared on the forecastle. The black-faced man, howling in a singular voice rolled about under the feet of the dogs. No one attempted to help him. The brutes did their best to worry him, butting their muzzles at him. There was a quick dance of their lithe grey-figured bodies over the clumsy, prostrate figure. The sailors forward shouted, as though it was admirable sport. Montgomery gave an angry exclamation, and went striding down the deck, and I followed him. The black-faced man scrambled up and staggered forward, going and leaning over the bulwark by the main shrouds, where he remained, panting and glaring over his shoulder at the dogs. The red-haired man laughed a satisfied laugh.\r\n\r\n\u201cLook here, Captain,\u201d said Montgomery, with his lisp a little accentuated, gripping the elbows of the red-haired man, \u201cthis won\u2019t do!\u201d\r\n\r\nI stood behind Montgomery. The captain came half round, and regarded him with the dull and solemn eyes of a drunken man. \u201cWha\u2019 won\u2019t do?\u201d he said, and added, after looking sleepily into Montgomery\u2019s face for a minute, \u201cBlasted Sawbones!\u201d\r\n\r\nWith a sudden movement he shook his arms free, and after two ineffectual attempts stuck his freckled fists into his side pockets.\r\n\r\n\u201cThat man\u2019s a passenger,\u201d said Montgomery. \u201cI\u2019d advise you to keep your hands off him.\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cGo to hell!\u201d said the captain, loudly. He suddenly turned and staggered towards the side. \u201cDo what I like on my own ship,\u201d he said.\r\n\r\nI think Montgomery might have left him then, seeing the brute was drunk; but he only turned a shade paler, and followed the captain to the bulwarks.\r\n\r\n\u201cLook you here, Captain,\u201d he said; \u201cthat man of mine is not to be ill-treated. He has been hazed ever since he came aboard.\u201d\r\n\r\nFor a minute, alcoholic fumes kept the captain speechless. \u201cBlasted Sawbones!\u201d was all he considered necessary.\r\n\r\nI could see that Montgomery had one of those slow, pertinacious tempers that will warm day after day to a white heat, and never again cool to forgiveness; and I saw too that this quarrel had been some time growing. \u201cThe man\u2019s drunk,\u201d said I, perhaps officiously; \u201cyou\u2019ll do no good.\u201d\r\n\r\nMontgomery gave an ugly twist to his dropping lip. \u201cHe\u2019s always drunk. Do you think that excuses his assaulting his passengers?\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cMy ship,\u201d began the captain, waving his hand unsteadily towards the cages, \u201cwas a clean ship. Look at it now!\u201d It was certainly anything but clean. \u201cCrew,\u201d continued the captain, \u201cclean, respectable crew.\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cYou agreed to take the beasts.\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cI wish I\u2019d never set eyes on your infernal island. What the devil\u2014want beasts for on an island like that? Then, that man of yours\u2014understood he was a man. He\u2019s a lunatic; and he hadn\u2019t no business aft. Do you think the whole damned ship belongs to you?\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cYour sailors began to haze the poor devil as soon as he came aboard.\u201d\r\n\r\n\u201cThat\u2019s just what he is\u2014he\u2019s a devil! an ugly devil! My men can\u2019t stand him. I<\/i> can\u2019t stand him. None of us can\u2019t stand him. Nor you<\/i> either!\u201d\r\n\r\nMontgomery turned away. \u201cYou<\/i> leave that man alone, anyhow,\u201d he said, nodding his head as he spoke.\r\n\r\nBut the captain meant to quarrel now. He raised his voice. \u201cIf he comes this end of the ship again I\u2019ll cut his insides out, I tell you. Cut out his blasted insides! Who are you, to tell me what I\u2019m to do? I tell you I\u2019m captain of this ship,\u2014captain and owner. I\u2019m the law here, I tell you,\u2014the law and the prophets. I bargained to take a man and his attendant to and from Arica, and bring back some animals. I never bargained to carry a mad devil and a silly Sawbones, a\u2014\u201d\r\n\r\nWell, never mind what he called Montgomery. I saw the latter take a step forward, and interposed. \u201cHe\u2019s drunk,\u201d said I. The captain began some abuse even fouler than the last. \u201cShut up!\u201d I said, turning on him sharply, for I had seen danger in Montgomery\u2019s white face. With that I brought the downpour on myself.\r\n\r\nHowever, I was glad to avert what was uncommonly near a scuffle, even at the price of the captain\u2019s drunken ill-will. I do not think I have ever heard quite so much vile language come in a continuous stream from any man\u2019s lips before, though I have frequented eccentric company enough. I found some of it hard to endure, though I am a mild-tempered man; but, certainly, when I told the captain to \u201cshut up\u201d I had forgotten that I was merely a bit of human flotsam, cut off from my resources and with my fare unpaid; a mere casual dependant on the bounty, or speculative enterprise, of the ship. He reminded me of it with considerable vigour; but at any rate I prevented a fight.","rendered":"

We left the cabin and found a man at the companion obstructing our way. He was standing on the ladder with his back to us, peering over the combing of the hatchway. He was, I could see, a misshapen man, short, broad, and clumsy, with a crooked back, a hairy neck, and a head sunk between his shoulders. He was dressed in dark-blue serge, and had peculiarly thick, coarse, black hair. I heard the unseen dogs growl furiously, and forthwith he ducked back,\u2014coming into contact with the hand I put out to fend him off from myself. He turned with animal swiftness.<\/p>\n

In some indefinable way the black face thus flashed upon me shocked me profoundly. It was a singularly deformed one. The facial part projected, forming something dimly suggestive of a muzzle, and the huge half-open mouth showed as big white teeth as I had ever seen in a human mouth. His eyes were blood-shot at the edges, with scarcely a rim of white round the hazel pupils. There was a curious glow of excitement in his face.<\/p>\n

\u201cConfound you!\u201d said Montgomery. \u201cWhy the devil don\u2019t you get out of the way?\u201d<\/p>\n

The black-faced man started aside without a word. I went on up the companion, staring at him instinctively as I did so. Montgomery stayed at the foot for a moment. \u201cYou have no business here, you know,\u201d he said in a deliberate tone. \u201cYour place is forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

The black-faced man cowered. \u201cThey\u2014won\u2019t have me forward.\u201d He spoke slowly, with a queer, hoarse quality in his voice.<\/p>\n

\u201cWon\u2019t have you forward!\u201d said Montgomery, in a menacing voice. \u201cBut I tell you to go!\u201d He was on the brink of saying something further, then looked up at me suddenly and followed me up the ladder.<\/p>\n

I had paused half way through the hatchway, looking back, still astonished beyond measure at the grotesque ugliness of this black-faced creature. I had never beheld such a repulsive and extraordinary face before, and yet\u2014if the contradiction is credible\u2014I experienced at the same time an odd feeling that in some way I had<\/i>already encountered exactly the features and gestures that now amazed me. Afterwards it occurred to me that probably I had seen him as I was lifted aboard; and yet that scarcely satisfied my suspicion of a previous acquaintance. Yet how one could have set eyes on so singular a face and yet have forgotten the precise occasion, passed my imagination.<\/p>\n

Montgomery\u2019s movement to follow me released my attention, and I turned and looked about me at the flush deck of the little schooner. I was already half prepared by the sounds I had heard for what I saw. Certainly I never beheld a deck so dirty. It was littered with scraps of carrot, shreds of green stuff, and indescribable filth. Fastened by chains to the mainmast were a number of grisly staghounds, who now began leaping and barking at me, and by the mizzen a huge puma was cramped in a little iron cage far too small even to give it turning room. Farther under the starboard bulwark were some big hutches containing a number of rabbits, and a solitary llama was squeezed in a mere box of a cage forward. The dogs were muzzled by leather straps. The only human being on deck was a gaunt and silent sailor at the wheel.<\/p>\n

The patched and dirty spankers were tense before the wind, and up aloft the little ship seemed carrying every sail she had. The sky was clear, the sun midway down the western sky; long waves, capped by the breeze with froth, were running with us. We went past the steersman to the taffrail, and saw the water come foaming under the stern and the bubbles go dancing and vanishing in her wake. I turned and surveyed the unsavoury length of the ship.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs this an ocean menagerie?\u201d said I.<\/p>\n

\u201cLooks like it,\u201d said Montgomery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat are these beasts for? Merchandise, curios? Does the captain think he is going to sell them somewhere in the South Seas?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt looks like it, doesn\u2019t it?\u201d said Montgomery, and turned towards the wake again.<\/p>\n

Suddenly we heard a yelp and a volley of furious blasphemy from the companion hatchway, and the deformed man with the black face came up hurriedly. He was immediately followed by a heavy red-haired man in a white cap. At the sight of the former the staghounds, who had all tired of barking at me by this time, became furiously excited, howling and leaping against their chains. The black hesitated before them, and this gave the red-haired man time to come up with him and deliver a tremendous blow between the shoulder-blades. The poor devil went down like a felled ox, and rolled in the dirt among the furiously excited dogs. It was lucky for him that they were muzzled. The red-haired man gave a yawp of exultation and stood staggering, and as it seemed to me in serious danger of either going backwards down the companion hatchway or forwards upon his victim.<\/p>\n

So soon as the second man had appeared, Montgomery had started forward. \u201cSteady on there!\u201d he cried, in a tone of remonstrance. A couple of sailors appeared on the forecastle. The black-faced man, howling in a singular voice rolled about under the feet of the dogs. No one attempted to help him. The brutes did their best to worry him, butting their muzzles at him. There was a quick dance of their lithe grey-figured bodies over the clumsy, prostrate figure. The sailors forward shouted, as though it was admirable sport. Montgomery gave an angry exclamation, and went striding down the deck, and I followed him. The black-faced man scrambled up and staggered forward, going and leaning over the bulwark by the main shrouds, where he remained, panting and glaring over his shoulder at the dogs. The red-haired man laughed a satisfied laugh.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook here, Captain,\u201d said Montgomery, with his lisp a little accentuated, gripping the elbows of the red-haired man, \u201cthis won\u2019t do!\u201d<\/p>\n

I stood behind Montgomery. The captain came half round, and regarded him with the dull and solemn eyes of a drunken man. \u201cWha\u2019 won\u2019t do?\u201d he said, and added, after looking sleepily into Montgomery\u2019s face for a minute, \u201cBlasted Sawbones!\u201d<\/p>\n

With a sudden movement he shook his arms free, and after two ineffectual attempts stuck his freckled fists into his side pockets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat man\u2019s a passenger,\u201d said Montgomery. \u201cI\u2019d advise you to keep your hands off him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGo to hell!\u201d said the captain, loudly. He suddenly turned and staggered towards the side. \u201cDo what I like on my own ship,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

I think Montgomery might have left him then, seeing the brute was drunk; but he only turned a shade paler, and followed the captain to the bulwarks.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook you here, Captain,\u201d he said; \u201cthat man of mine is not to be ill-treated. He has been hazed ever since he came aboard.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a minute, alcoholic fumes kept the captain speechless. \u201cBlasted Sawbones!\u201d was all he considered necessary.<\/p>\n

I could see that Montgomery had one of those slow, pertinacious tempers that will warm day after day to a white heat, and never again cool to forgiveness; and I saw too that this quarrel had been some time growing. \u201cThe man\u2019s drunk,\u201d said I, perhaps officiously; \u201cyou\u2019ll do no good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Montgomery gave an ugly twist to his dropping lip. \u201cHe\u2019s always drunk. Do you think that excuses his assaulting his passengers?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy ship,\u201d began the captain, waving his hand unsteadily towards the cages, \u201cwas a clean ship. Look at it now!\u201d It was certainly anything but clean. \u201cCrew,\u201d continued the captain, \u201cclean, respectable crew.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou agreed to take the beasts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish I\u2019d never set eyes on your infernal island. What the devil\u2014want beasts for on an island like that? Then, that man of yours\u2014understood he was a man. He\u2019s a lunatic; and he hadn\u2019t no business aft. Do you think the whole damned ship belongs to you?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYour sailors began to haze the poor devil as soon as he came aboard.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s just what he is\u2014he\u2019s a devil! an ugly devil! My men can\u2019t stand him. I<\/i> can\u2019t stand him. None of us can\u2019t stand him. Nor you<\/i> either!\u201d<\/p>\n

Montgomery turned away. \u201cYou<\/i> leave that man alone, anyhow,\u201d he said, nodding his head as he spoke.<\/p>\n

But the captain meant to quarrel now. He raised his voice. \u201cIf he comes this end of the ship again I\u2019ll cut his insides out, I tell you. Cut out his blasted insides! Who are you, to tell me what I\u2019m to do? I tell you I\u2019m captain of this ship,\u2014captain and owner. I\u2019m the law here, I tell you,\u2014the law and the prophets. I bargained to take a man and his attendant to and from Arica, and bring back some animals. I never bargained to carry a mad devil and a silly Sawbones, a\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

Well, never mind what he called Montgomery. I saw the latter take a step forward, and interposed. \u201cHe\u2019s drunk,\u201d said I. The captain began some abuse even fouler than the last. \u201cShut up!\u201d I said, turning on him sharply, for I had seen danger in Montgomery\u2019s white face. With that I brought the downpour on myself.<\/p>\n

However, I was glad to avert what was uncommonly near a scuffle, even at the price of the captain\u2019s drunken ill-will. I do not think I have ever heard quite so much vile language come in a continuous stream from any man\u2019s lips before, though I have frequented eccentric company enough. I found some of it hard to endure, though I am a mild-tempered man; but, certainly, when I told the captain to \u201cshut up\u201d I had forgotten that I was merely a bit of human flotsam, cut off from my resources and with my fare unpaid; a mere casual dependant on the bounty, or speculative enterprise, of the ship. He reminded me of it with considerable vigour; but at any rate I prevented a fight.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":251,"menu_order":4,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[48],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-32","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry","chapter-type-numberless"],"part":3,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/32","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/251"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/32\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/32\/revisions\/33"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/3"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/32\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/doctormoreau\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}