The Mary Celeste
I wish to share with you an incident that
happened to me, and still haunts me to this day. As it still haunts me,
I can hardly tell this story. But here goes.
This story starts in New York, 1872.I was
walking around the harbour when I saw the captain of the Mary Celeste
– the Dei Gratia’s sister ship. I am the mate on board the Dei
Gratia. My nickname’s ‘Muggins,’ because I’m always doing jobs
for the captain. Captain Morehouse (my captain) calls me Muggins too.
Later on that day. The tramp Mary Celeste set sail for Genoa. A few days
later we had set sail too. Our journey had been largely uneventful.
About 28 days later, I wished I hadn’t
said that the journey had been uneventful. We had found the horror of
horrors-a ship lying adrift in the Atlantic Ocean.
"Muggins!" called Captain
Morehouse.
"Yes, sir? I replied.
"Go and see what’s wrong with that
ship", ordered the captain, "It shouldn’t be adrift like
that. Here’s the telescope!"
"Aye sir, " I looked through
the telescope and saw a ship-a sailing tramp, it was very familiar.
I knew that ship from somewhere. I turned
the ‘scope towards the bow. It read " Mary Celeste". There
was no sign of life on board.
I went over to the old, wooden rickety
lifeboat and pushed off from and started to row. In about 15 minutes I
had reached the lonely ship and climbed up the cargo net. As I reached
the deck I saw nothing wrong, except the sails were set but a little
torn, but what would you expect after a storm? The hatches were open and
everything inside was wet. The skylight was open and everything inside
the cabin was wet. I walked carefully over to the ship’s log. I turned
the sodden pages until I reached the most recent entry. It said that
nothing out-of-the-ordinary had happened. Maybe there’s something to
explain what’s happened here, I thought. I searched the ship’s log
but there were none. there were no navigation instruments either. Let’s
go check out the hold, I thought, anything to get away from this spooky
place!
The cargo seemed undamaged, and there was
plenty of food for everyone. There was no fire damage and there was not
enough water in the bilges to sink the ship. I ran right back up to
deck, scared. I wanted out. I walked very quickly towards the cargo net.
As I walked past the captain’s cabin
skylight I saw a bloodstained sword and a darkened bloodstain nearby on
deck. I kept walking. I bumped into the ship’s rail. I glimpsed two
long scratches in the bow planking. There was a deep cut in the rail.
There must have been pirates or a monster here, I thought. As I climbed
hurriedly down the cargo net I noticed that the lifeboat was missing!
"Well at least they got away. I
muttered to myself as I rowed quickly back to the Dei Gratia and
reported all to the the captain. Despite my pleading not to, in case the
thing that was on the Marie Celeste came up and attacked the
unsuspecting crew of the Dei Gratia, the captain said that we should
throw a line to the Marie Celeste and tow her home.
When we towed the Marie Celeste home, we
towed the empty ship to Gibraltar, not New York. No monster or pirate
from the Marie Celeste set foot on the on our ship, as we towed her to
Gibraltar. An enquiry followed, but no enquiry could explain this subtle
incident.
I still live in fear of the monster or
pirates that were on the Marie Celeste, fearing that they might come and
get us and we may suffer the fate of the ten people aboard the good
ship, the Marie Celeste.
