CHAPTER ONE

A Strange Bedmate

Call me Ishmael. I worked as a schoolmaster, but sometimes I would feel that I needed a bit of change. So, whenever I felt a little down from life, I would stop my work and head for the sea. There was something about the sea that brought back and restored my spirit, my drive in life. For this I could always count on the sea.

Don't think that I'd go aboard a ship, traveling as a passenger. No, my way of escaping the reality of my hometown of Manhattan, New York, was going to sea as a plain, ordinary seaman. In this way I didn't have to pay to be aboard a ship. In fact, whomever I worked for would pay me. Also, I liked the exercise of being a seaman. Most importantly, I was able to travel to faraway places and experience things that I would never experience if I stayed in my hometown.

Most of the time, I would sign up on a merchant ship, traveling from port to port. However, this time I decided to go aboard a whaling ship. These ships always interested me because working on one was often dangerous work, and the seamen on whaling ships were always an interesting and varied lot of men. I decided to go aboard a ship that would sail from the original home of whaling in America, Nantucket. It is an island off the coast of Massachusetts. In order to reach there from Manhattan, I had to first go to New Bedford and then take a small boat to Nantucket.

It was a terribly cold Saturday night in December when I arrived in New Bedford. Also, I received some bad news. I had just missed the last boat for Nantucket and the next one wasn't leaving until Monday morning. I did not have a lot of money, for I always traveled with little money, so I hadn't counted on the extra cost of staying two nights in New Bedford. Still I didn't have any other choice. I began to look around the town for a cheap hotel.

Most of the ones that I passed seemed too happy and nice for the money I had. So I kept on walking, even though there was an icy wind blowing hard on my face. Finally, near the dock, I saw an old, unfixed hotel with many windows. There was a light coming from inside. The sign of the hotel made a creaking noise as it moved in the wind. On the sign was a picture of a water spray with the words "The Spouter Inn—Peter Coffin" under the picture. The front door of the hotel was so old it was falling apart. The door was shaking in the strong wind. "Not what I had in mind," I thought, "but it's far better than being outside on this freezing and windy night."

When I entered the hotel, the first thing I saw was a dark and discouraging picture of a sinking ship and a whale. There were all kinds of frightening weapons—clubs, spears, whaling lances, and harpoons covered in rust—that hung on one wall. Most interesting, and quite imaginative as well, I thought, was the entrance to the bar. It was formed by the top skeleton of a whale's mouth. This made it look like the bartender, whose old dark face was covered in lines, was working and mixing drinks from inside a whale's fierce jaws.

The landlord told me that he didn't have any more rooms to use, but when I told him I had no other place to go before Monday morning, he told me I could share a bed with a harpooner, that is, a man who harpooned whales. I didn't like the idea of sharing a bed, especially with a harpooner. Harpooners are known for being fierce and wild men. Still, I knew that sharing rooms was quite common in hotels in small towns and that I would probably be quite safe. Seeing that I had no other choice, I told the landlord I would be happy with half of a good man's blanket.

I ate a simple dinner that night. I was waiting for the harpooner to arrive during my dinner, but he did not appear. I was really hoping to meet him before going to bed, for I did not look forward to sleeping in a strange bed in a strange town with a total stranger. This was especially true because I knew from experience that harpooners were usually rough in nature. As I sat at the bar, I kept a worried eye on the door. Yet, even after midnight there was still no sign of him.

Finally I got up and asked the landlord where my bed partner was. "Where is he?" I asked, but the landlord only shook his head in reply. "What sort of man is he, to be staying out so late?"

"Usually he's the man who leaves the earliest. You know, the kind of man who believes, 'the early bird catches the worm,'" explained the landlord. "But I guess tonight he must be out trying to sell his goods. He must be having some trouble selling his head."

"His what?" I shouted.

"Be easy there," said the landlord. "This harpoon-er is from the South Seas. While there he collected a lot of treated and fixed shrunken heads from New Zealand. These are great things of curiosity, you know. He's managed to sell all of them but one, and I told him it wouldn't be a good thing to be selling shrunken human heads about the streets tomorrow. Tomorrow is Sunday, and a good many folk will be going to church. They'll get mighty angry if they see him trying to sell one of those."

"Well, it sounds like he could be a dangerous man," I cried.

"He always pays," said the landlord, lighting a candle. "And that's the only business I care about. Now come along and I'll take you to your room."

There was an odd-looking old chest, like the ones that can be found on ships, standing in the middle of my small cold room. In the middle was a bed that was big enough for four harpooners. There wasn't any other furniture but a rough shelf and an old wooden chair underneath it. A seaman's bag was on the floor, and a tall, dangerous-looking harpoon stood beside the bed.

I couldn't sleep for a while after the landlord left. At last, I fell into a light sleep.

Suddenly, heavy footsteps in the hallway woke me up, and I saw a thin ray of light come into the room from the opened door.

"Lord protect me!" I thought. "It must be the head seller."

I lay perfectly still, not wanting to be seen by the head seller. I watched a dark figure stuff the horrible New Zealand head back into the sea-bag. He placed his heavy sea-coat on a chair. Then he reached into the sea-bag, and took out what looked like to me to be an Indian axe. I wasn't able to see the man's face in the dark, but after a while I was able to make out his features. When I did, I froze.

His face was dark purple in color, and all over it were large blackish-looking squares. When he took off his hat, I almost cried out in surprise. There was no hair on his head—no hair except a small twisted scalp knot, which is a piece of long hair left in the center when the rest was shaved off. To me his bald purple head looked like an old skull that had been buried for years.

The stranger was standing between me and the door. If he hadn't been, I would have run out of the room, frightened out of my mind. But fear had made me unable to move. So I just lay there waiting, silently looking at the rest of him.

The top half of his body—his chest, arms, and back—was covered in the same dark spots like his face. On his legs were tattoos, or ink drawings on the skin. In the darkness they looked like a row of dark green frogs running up young palm trees.

The stranger then reached over to his heavy sea-coat on the chair, and from the pocket he took out a little statue that was bent over at the back. It was a worshipping statue. Then he took out a handful of small pieces of wood, a candle, and a bit of ship's cake. These he placed on the shelf above the fireplace. He lit a small fire. I guessed it was a sacrificial, or holy, flame for his religion. Then he burned the cake and made a polite offering of it to the little statue. Then he began to pray. His eyes moved nervously in an unnatural manner, and he made strange noises in his throat. He was worshipping this figure in some kind of religious ceremony. I could only lay there, watching in amazement.

(end of section)