Among other devices to kill time, during the frequent calms, Long Ghost hit upon the game of chess.
With a jackknife, we carved the pieces quite tastefully out of bits of wood, and our board was the
middle of a chestlid, chalked into squares, which, in playing, we straddled at either end. Having no
other suitable way of distinguishing the sets, I marked mine by tying round them little scarfs of black
silk, torn from an old neckhandkerchief. Putting them in mourning this way, the doctor said, was quite
appropriate, seeing that they had reason to feel sad three games out of four. Of chess, the men never
could make head nor tail; indeed, their wonder rose to such a pitch that they at last regarded the mysterious
movements of the game with something more than perplexity; and after puzzling over them through several
long engagements, they came to the conclusion that we must be a couple of necromancers.