It was a little bit creepy all alone on the wharf that night. I don't
deny it. Twice I thought I 'eard something coming up on tip-toe behind
me. The second time I was so nervous that I began to sing to keep my
spirits up, and I went on singing till three of the hands of the Susan
Emily, wot was lying alongside, came up from the fo'c'sle and offered to
fight me. I was thankful when daylight came.

Five nights arterwards I 'ad the shock of my life. It was the fust night
for some time that there was no craft up. A dark night, and a nasty
moaning sort of a wind. I 'ad just lighted the lamp at the corner of the
warehouse, wot 'ad blown out, and was sitting down to rest afore putting
the ladder away, when I 'appened to look along the jetty and saw a head
coming up over the edge of it. In the light of the lamp I saw the dead
white face of Sam Bullet's ghost making faces at me.

[Illustration: IN THE LIGHT OF THE LAMP I SAW THE DEAD WHITE FACE]

I just caught my breath, sharp like, and then turned and ran for the
gate like a race-horse. I 'ad left the key in the padlock, in case of
anything happening, and I just gave it one turn, flung the wicket open
and slammed it in the ghost's face, and tumbled out into the road.

I ran slap into the arms of a young policeman wot was passing. Nasty,
short-tempered chap he was, but I don't think I was more glad to see
anybody in my life. I hugged 'im till 'e nearly lost 'is breath, and
then he sat me down on the kerb-stone and asked me wot I meant by it.

Wot with the excitement and the running I couldn't speak at fust, and
when I did he said I was trying to deceive 'im.