"Jerusalem, it is dark," he said again, and he recalled Wilson's reply, "Have the gas lit." Aye, that would be pleasant. For a moment he saw the streets of London town with a diminuendo in lamps, and then he pulled himself together. It breezed up a bit and was four bells. He hove the log, and went along the lee side to go below to enter it on the slate. She made a biggish weather roll, and the decks being slippery, he steadied himself and put his head outside the rail to take a look ahead. And at that moment, as he says, he saw the Simoom vigia. His heart stood still, and then thumped furiously. In spite of the hiss of the seas, and the windy roar of the rigging, the sound of his pulse in his ears was like the sound of a pump. He was paralysed, and yet he knew that the _Palembang_ was rushing on destruction. "Hard a starboard!" he said coolly, but in a choking voice. "Sir?" said the astounded man at the wheel. "Hard a starboard, damn you," said Green fiercely. And the helmsman ground the wheel hard down with the air of a surprised martyr. As the _Palembang_ bowed and came round almost at right angles to her former course, Green swears he saw broken water, though he lost the sharp pinnacle of rock he had seen at first. Old Spiller, who was not asleep, came up on deck in a hurry. "What's she off her course for?" Green told him, and Spiller swore. "You saw nothing, you damn fool." "I did." "You didn't, you imaginative ass." Green wanted to plant his fist between Spiller's eyes, but did not; for he was a married man and hated to lose a job. He ground his teeth and turned away. The _Palembang_ was put on her course again, and after interrogating the man on the look-out and the man at the wheel, who acknowledged they had seen nothing, the skipper swore promiscuously at everything, and went below to lay his soul in soak. "What one man sees another'll look for, and what a fool looks for a fool will see," he cried, without knowing what a neat addition he had made to the subject of suggestion. And by the time that Wilson relieved him at four o'clock Green was curiously uncertain as to whether he had seen straight or not. "Now, did you?" asked Wilson. "Two hours ago I'd have sworn to it," said the second mate, scratching his head. "Well, I've a notion you did," cried Wilson. "Between you and me and the mizzen-mast, I think Banks is a right smart man." "I believe I can swear I saw it," said young Green, much encouraged. "Yes, there were at least three rocks, one of them a pinnacle like an obelisk." And with Wilson secretly on his side, he was quite sure of it before they reached Bombay, though Spiller was for ever jeering at him, and making the ship as uncomfortable as he could. "Mebbe you can see ghosts, too," he was constantly suggesting. "I'll quit at Bombay if he'll give me my discharge," said Green.