The Castaways Page 6
CHAPTER SIX.
THE DERELICT.
The mere possibility that rescue might actually be at hand acted as atonic upon me, imparting renewed life and hope, and clearing away themore than half-delirious fancies that had clouded and bemuddled mybrain; thus enabling me once more to think and act rationally. I pulledmyself resolutely together, collected my wandering wits, and peered longand anxiously at the shadowy shape that had, as it were, crystallisedout of the surrounding darkness; then I looked away from it toward otherpoints of the horizon to see whether it repeated itself elsewhere. No;it was peculiar to one definite spot; and I no longer had any doubt butthat there was a certain tangible something, which could only be a ship,and that I must quickly determine upon the steps necessary to intercepther.
The first thing was to ascertain in what direction she was steering.When I first discovered her she was dead to windward, and since then shehad drawn aft a trifle, being now about two points before my weatherbeam. She could not have overtaken me, because in that case she wouldhave passed so close as to have all but run over the boat, and I couldnot have failed to see her; and the fact that she had slowly andimperceptibly grown up out of the darkness argued that she was notsailing away from me. Nor could she be sailing toward me, because inthat case she would have grown in size and distinctness much morerapidly than she had done. Nor, strangely enough, did she seem to becrossing my course in either direction, the slight change in herbearings being accounted for by the progress of the boat. Possibly shemight be hove-to; although it was difficult to imagine why she should beso, unless she had lost a man overboard. But if that were the case shewould be showing lights as a guide to her boat, which ought not to bevery far away. And why so deadly silent? I could not understand it.But as these ideas flitted through my mind I came to the conclusion thatthe correct thing to do was to close with her as quickly as possible bymaking short tacks toward her. So I put down my helm and hove the boatround upon the starboard tack, bringing the vague, black shadow abouttwo points on the weather bow. The flapping of the sails while the boatwas in stays awoke my companion, who sat up and, in a weak and huskyvoice, asked me what was the matter.
"Nothing," I answered; "at least nothing of an alarming nature. Thefact is that I fancy I can see something, away out there on the weatherbow, and I have tacked the boat for the purpose of investigating theobject more closely."
"Whereabout is this object of which you speak?" she asked.
I pointed it out to her, and she almost immediately saw it. "Do youimagine it to be a ship, Mr Conyers?" she inquired.
"I know not what else it can be," said I. "But," I added, "we must notbe too sanguine of help or rescue just yet. There are one or two pointsin connection with that object that make me doubtful as to its being aship."
"What are they?" she quickly demanded.
I told her that one was the apparent immobility of the object; the otherbeing the fact that no lights were being displayed. And I explainedthat the two together seemed incompatible with the supposition that theobject ahead was a ship, repeating to her, indeed, the arguments thathad flitted through my own mind only a few minutes before.
Yet with every fathom that the boat advanced, the shadow grew morepalpable, expanded, and approximated more closely to the appearance of avessel hove-to under bare poles. And at length, after several anxiousminutes of alternating hope and doubt, there arrived a moment when doubtbecame no longer possible, for the shadow had finally resolved itselfinto the silhouette of a brig under bare poles; even the thin lines ofthe masts--which, by the way, looked stumpy, as though hertopgallant-masts were gone--were perceptible to my practised eye.
Without pausing to puzzle out a possible reason for the singularcondition of the vessel, I hastily resigned the yoke-lines to MissOnslow and, springing upon the mast thwart, proceeded to hail the brigat the full power of my lungs, my delight at once more seeing a vesselso close at hand being coupled with a deadly anxiety lest she shouldsuddenly make sail and get away from me. But to all my hailing therecame no reply, nor was a light shown, or any other indication vouchsafedthat my cries had been heard, even though I continued them until theboat was actually crossing the stern of the stranger at a distance ofbarely fifty fathoms. There was only one inference to be drawn fromthis strange silence, namely, that the brig was derelict, a surmise thatwas borne out by the fact that her boats appeared to be gone. Yet Icould not detect any sign that anything was wrong with her; she was notsitting particularly deep in the water--so far as I could judge in thedarkness--nor did her spars appear to be damaged, except that, as I havealready mentioned, her topgallant-masts seemed to have been carriedaway; there appeared, therefore, to be no reason why we should notventure alongside; and accordingly, as soon as we had stood on farenough to fetch her on the next tack, I hove the boat round and--thebrig happening to lie broadside-on to the sea--ran her alongside toleeward, dousing my sails as we came up abreast the stranger's leequarter. As we shot up alongside I found that the vessel was certainlydeeper in the water than I had at first imagined her to be, yet notdeeper than might be accounted for by her carrying a heavy cargo; hercovering-board seemed to be about eighteen inches above the water, and Itherefore had no difficulty in clambering in over her bulwarks from thegunwale of the boat, of course taking care to carry the end of theboat's painter on board with me. Making this securely fast to a cleatin the bulwarks, I glanced fore and aft to see whether I could discoverany indication of the presence of human beings on board; but the deckappeared to be deserted; no gleam of light showed either forward or aft;and no sound broke the silence save the wash of the water along thebends, the choking gurgle of the scuppers, and the monotonous jerk-jerkof the spanker-boom at its sheet with the roll of the ship. Under thesecircumstances I considered that my companion might safely ventureaboard, and I accordingly assisted her up the side and in on deck,afterwards dropping the boat astern and carefully securing her by herpainter. This done, I conducted Miss Onslow aft to the cabincompanion--which was fitted with seat-lockers on each side--begged herto be seated for a short time while I investigated further; andforthwith plunged below.
Arrived at the foot of the companion ladder, I found myself confrontedby a bulkhead running athwart the ship, and in this I presently foundthe handle of a door. Turning this, I found myself--as I had expected--in the cabin, which was of course pitch dark, the panes of the skylightjust dimly showing, overhead, with the merest suggestion of a certainfaintly--gleaming something hanging from the beams, and swinging withthe roll of the ship, which I presently identified as the extinguishedcabin lamp. Groping cautiously with my hands, I presently encountered atable, uncovered, working round which I next came to some lockersupholstered in horsehair--as I gathered from the touch; and while I wasgroping about on these lockers my hands suddenly encountered what seemedto be a tablecloth, with a few knives and forks, some broken crockery,and a few other matters entangled in its folds, the whole suggesting theidea that the cabin had been the scene of a furious struggle, duringwhich the table, laid for a meal, had been swept of everything upon it.Leaving all this quite undisturbed--in the belief that when I could seejust how it all lay I might obtain a clue to the mystery at presentconnected with the ship--I continued my researches, with the result thatI made out the cabin to occupy the extreme after-end of the vessel, withpossibly a small sail-room, or something of that kind, abaft it, andthat it took up the whole width of that part of the hull; that is tosay, there were no staterooms between it and the ship's side, as issometimes the case. Continuing to grope my way round the cabin, Ipresently arrived once more at the bulkhead, wherein, on the starboardside, I found another door, giving access to a stateroom, as I soondiscovered by finding the bunk, with the bedding still in it, andapparently quite ready for an occupant. It did not take me long toarrive at the conclusion that I was in the skipper's stateroom; for Ifound that underneath the bunk was a chest of drawers; while in onecorner was a wash-basin, etcetera, and in the other what seemed to be
asmall bookcase. Having progressed thus far, I had hopes of soon findingthat of which I was in search, namely, a box of matches. Being asailor, and well acquainted with sailors' ways, I knew exactly wherewould be the most likely place to find what I wanted, and, clambering upon the bunk, I felt for the shelf that I knew ought to be at the head ofit. Yes, there it was; but as I felt along it I was disappointed tofind that there was nothing on it. But was there not? I had notexamined the entire length of it when I too hastily jumped to theconclusion that it was empty; as my hand travelled over into the farcorner it suddenly encountered quite a little store of things, allheaped together--a clasp knife, a pipe, a piece of stick tobacco, and afew other odd articles, among which was a box about half full ofmatches!
They proved to be rather damp, and I had to strike a full half-dozen ormore before I succeeded in persuading one to ignite, and while thusemployed I was struck for the first time by the coincidence between thecondition of affairs on the skipper's shelf and that in the cabin--everyloose article had in each case found its way right over to starboard, asfar as it could go! What did that point to? Why, obviously, that atsome time or another the brig had heeled so heavily to starboard thatevery movable thing had fetched away by the run and gone over to thatside, _and had never been replaced_! I gathered from this that the brighad been suddenly hove over upon her beam-ends, and that her crew,seized with panic, and no doubt under the impression that she wascapsizing, had made a rush for the boats and abandoned her, being, aslikely as not, blown so far to leeward by the squall that hove the brigover, that they lost sight of her altogether, and imagined that she hadfoundered. And by and by, when the squall had blown itself out, thebrig, with perhaps her canvas blown away, had simply righted again, andhad been drifting about ever since. How long ago that might havehappened, I could not at the moment guess, but I thought that possiblywith the return of daylight I might be able to discover indicationsenough to furnish me with a clue.
While thinking thus I had succeeded in finding and lighting a smalllamp, hung in gimbals from the fore bulkhead, and by its illumination Isaw that the stateroom was a nice, clean, cosy little apartment, such asMiss Onslow might occupy without discomfort; and, waiting only to lightthe cabin lamp--the globe of which was smashed in on its starboard side,as though it had been dashed violently against the deck above--I hurriedup the ladder, and invited the young lady to descend. I led herstraight to the skipper's stateroom, and urged her to lie down while Iproceeded to search for some food, but she declined to take any restuntil we had both partaken of a good meal; so I established hercomfortably on the sofa-lockers, and proceeded forthwith in search ofthe pantry.
I found this, as I had expected, in a corresponding position, on theopposite side of the ship to the cabin which I already designated in myown mind as Miss Onslow's; and in it were several tins of preservedmeats and soups, a bottle of pickles, some vinegar, a jar of salt, abottle of pepper, a cask about three-quarters full of potatoes, part ofa string of onions, a barrel nearly full of fine cabin biscuit, or"bread," as it is called at sea, a small canister of tea, another ofcoffee, a jar of brown sugar, and, in fact, a very fair assortment ofsuch commodities as are usually to be found in an ordinary ship'spantry. I observed, by the way, that such articles as were labelledbore the names of American manufacturers, and I deduced from that factthe impression that the brig was Yankee, an impression that wassubsequently confirmed.
I took a biscuit out of the barrel, broke it in two, and handed onepiece to Miss Onslow, nibbling at the other myself while I furtherprosecuted my researches. I did this because the biscuit was hard anddry, and, starving as we were, there was not much likelihood of oureating so much of it as to prove injurious; moreover it would have theeffect of taking the sharp edge off our hunger, and enabling us to eatcautiously and in moderation of the more appetising food that I intendedto place upon the table as quickly as possible.
My next task was to explore the galley, which I found to be very nicelyfitted up with what appeared to be an excellent cooking-stove and agenerous supply of implements, the whole of which had, like the articlesin the cabin, found their way right over to the starboard side; moreoverthe top of the stove was rusted in such a way as to suggest that thewater from the coppers had been capsized over it--everything, in short,tending to confirm my original impression that the brig had been on herbeam-ends. I looked into the coppers, and found them empty. Then Iwent to the scuttle-butt, but it also was so nearly empty that I did notcare to use the small remainder of water in it. There were no morecasks on deck, so I concluded that the ship's stock of water was keptbelow, most probably in tanks. And the thought of the latter remindedme that I had seen a small copper pump in the steward's pantry, so Ireturned there to get it. Then, with it in one hand, and a lantern inthe other, I searched about on deck until I had found the small screwplug that fitted into the tank pipe; and presently I had at my disposala bucket of sweet fresh water, which I poured into the coppers. I thenlighted the galley fire--finding plenty of coal for my immediate wantsin the locker--and proceeded to prepare a couple of tins of thepreserved soup that I had found in the pantry. Then, while this wascooking, I returned to the cabin to lay the table, but found that MissOnslow had forestalled me, having cleared away the wreck off thestarboard locker, restored the tablecloth to its proper position, andrearranged such portions of the table equipage as had not been smashedin the capsizal. The poor girl looked dreadfully white and thin andweary, but I noticed that during my absence she had found time to takeoff her hat and to roughly rearrange her hair! Her eyes looked red, asthough she had been crying; so, with the view of toning her up a little,I went to work rummaging in the sofa-lockers, and presently found a fewbottles of port wine, the neck of one of which I promptly knocked off,and insisted upon her taking a glass there and then. She obeyed me witha sweet submissiveness that was in extraordinary contrast with herdemeanour aboard the _City of Cawnpore_; but a flash of her old spiritreturned when she had swallowed the wine, as, handing me the glass, shesaid:
"There! I have done as you bade me. And now I _insist_ upon yourtaking some also; for you look positively ghastly, and so ill that,unless you take great care of yourself, you will break down altogether!"
I took the wine, and then hurried away back to the galley, where Iremained until the soup was ready. Of this we made a moderate meal, andthen, without attempting to clear the table, I gently conducted mycompanion to the skipper's stateroom, closed the door upon her, andflung myself, just as I was, upon the sofa-lockers of the main cabin,where I instantly fell into a sleep that was absolute oblivion.
I was awakened next morning by a beam of brilliant sunshine flashingintermittently athwart my closed eyelids to the lazy roll of the ship,and, springing to my feet and peering out through the nearest port, Isaw that the wind had died away to a flat calm, and that the water wasoil-smooth, with very little swell running. I felt greatly refreshed bymy sleep--brief though it had been--for it was the first spell of reallysound slumber that our precarious situation, and the anxiety attendantupon it, had permitted me to take since the loss of the _City ofCawnpore_; and, prompted thereto by the hilarity resulting from rest andthe cessation of anxiety, I started whistling softly as I gazed outthrough the port. A moment later Miss Onslow's cabin-door opened forthe space of half an inch, and the young lady thus addressed me throughthe chink:
"Good-morning, Mr Conyers; I am glad to hear you whistling; it showsthat your rest has done you good."
"Thank you, yes," I answered; "I am feeling quite my old self again thismorning. Were you able to get any rest?"
"Yes indeed," was the reply. "I was so tired that I scarcely rememberlying down; and I have not been awake more than five minutes. What alovely morning it is! I wonder whether I might venture to trouble youto get me a little water to wash in; there is none in here."
"Certainly," I said. "I will fetch you a bucketful at once, and placeit at your door, after which I intend to have a bath myself on deck."
"I think it exceedingly probable, and therefore I shall not risk goingoverboard," I answered. "No; my bath will be taken on the fore deck, ina wash-deck tub, if I can find one."
"Thank you," she returned. "And while you are so engaged I will lay thetable for breakfast; I still feel most atrociously hungry!"
I answered that I was glad to hear it, now that we were once more inpossession of provisions; and then hurried off up on deck to procure thewater asked for; after which I went forward, found a wash-deck tub,filled it from over the side, and treated myself to a salt-water bath,the refreshment of which was like a renewal of life to me.
Then, having dressed, I lighted the galley fire, filled and put on akettle, had a wash in fresh water, and made my way aft to the cabin,where I found Miss Onslow, looking wonderfully fresh and bright afterher night's rest, busily engaged in arranging the cabin table forbreakfast. Then came the question: What were we to have? I had astrong fancy for a rasher of bacon, which delicacy seemed also tocommend itself to my companion. I therefore looked about for thelazarette hatch, which I discovered underneath a mat at the foot of thecompanion ladder, and was soon overhauling the contents of thestorehouse. The craft proved to be abundantly stocked with excellentprovisions, among which I discovered an open cask nearly full of smokedhams, one of which I at once appropriated; and half an hour later foundthe Indian judge's daughter and myself seated before a most appetisingbreakfast.
And, as we ate, we talked--talked of what we were now to do. Mycompanion seemed to be under the impression that the discovery of thisderelict brig would in some way alter all our arrangements; but I had nodifficulty in demonstrating to her that our object--the making of ourway to some civilised port from which we could make a fresh start forCalcutta--still remained the same, the only difference being thatwhereas on the previous day we had possessed only an open boat, and werestarving, we now had a vessel under our feet that, if staunch, wouldprove far safer and more comfortable than the boat, while we alsopossessed food in abundance. But, as I pointed out to her, there was acertain price to pay for these advantages, namely, the greatly-increasedlabour of handling the brig, as compared with the boat; and I thought itadvisable to make the young lady understand at once that I should fromtime to time require her assistance. But I presently discovered thatthere was no need for me to dwell upon this point; she quickly informedme that she had already planned for herself the performance of whatmight be called the "domestic" part of the work, such as the preparationof meals, and so on; while she also expressed her perfect readiness tosteer, when required, or in any other way assist me, so far as shecould. And here I could not avoid being impressed afresh with theextraordinary change that misfortune had wrought in this girl; forwhereas while on board the _City of Cawnpore_ she had maintained ademeanour of haughty and repellent reserve that was almost insolent, shenow exhibited a gentle submissiveness and amiability of manner, with aquiet, steadfast courage under circumstances, of peculiar and terriblehardship and privation for a gently-nurtured woman, that, conjoined withher exceptional beauty of face and form, exercised a fascination upon meso potent that I frequently found it exceedingly difficult to maintainthat equable coolness and strict friendliness of behaviour demanded bythe exigencies of our peculiar situation. All of which, however, ismerely parenthetical.
Breakfast over, a busy day awaited me. I had used my eyes to goodpurpose, even while taking my morning tub; and had observed, among otherthings, that the brig's canvas was not furled; it had simply been blownclear and clean out of the boltropes. When the accident befell her shehad been under courses and single-reefed topsails, spanker, fore-topmaststaysail, and jib, for there the boltropes still were, with smallfluttering rags of canvas still adhering to them, here and there. Therewas no difficulty whatever in arriving at a correct conclusion as towhat had happened,--the aspect of the ship told the story as plainly asher own crew could have related it. The thing had happened afternightfall--that part of the story was made clear by the litter that hadbeen shot off the cabin table, and which showed that the skipper and oneof the mates had been at supper at the time. The single-reefed topsailsindicated that it had previously been blowing strong, and I took it thatthe night had settled down so dark and cloudy that the officer of thewatch had failed to note the approach of the squall until too late. Thetopsail halliards had been let go fore and aft when the squall swoopeddown upon them, but before it was possible to do anything further thebrig had been hove down upon her beam-ends, a panic had seized the crew,they had made a mad rush for the boats, under the conviction that thevessel was capsizing, and they had either been swamped, or had beendriven out of sight to leeward, before the brig had righted again.There was no doubt that the squall had been of exceptional violence, fornot only were all the sails blown away, but both topgallant-masts weregone at the caps--not only broken off but actually torn away, therigging that held them having parted.
It would be strange indeed if a vessel, having passed through such anordeal as this, should not show signs of having been more or lessstrained, and I was quite prepared to find that she had a considerableamount of water in her. And this anticipation was so far confirmedthat, upon sounding the well, I found close upon three and a half feetof water in the hold. This was bad enough, still it was hardly as badas I had expected; and now, the next thing to find out was whether shewas still leaking, or whether what she contained had all drained intoher during the time when she lay hove down on her beam-ends. This couldbe done by patiently waiting some few hours, and then sounding the wellagain. Or it could be done equally effectively by pumping the hookerdry, and then seeing whether any more water drained into her. It wasvitally necessary to restore her to her normal condition of buoyancy asspeedily as might be, in view of a possible recurrence of bad weather.But the same contingency rendered it almost, if not quite, as necessaryto bend and set a sufficient amount of canvas to put the ship undercontrol; and the first question to be settled was: Which should I firstundertake? I considered the matter for a minute or two, and came to theconclusion that the pumping out of that three and a half feet of waterwould leave my hands in such a blistered and raw condition that theywould be practically useless for such work as bending sails; so Idetermined to undertake the latter job first, especially as there was ofcourse the chance that the weather might continue fine after thespringing up of a breeze, in which event, if the brig were under canvas,she would be making headway during the operation of pumping her out.
I was under the impression that on the preceding night I had detectedthe presence of what might prove to be a sail-locker abaft the afterbulkhead of the cabin, so I now descended with the object of furtherinvestigating. My surmise proved well founded, for when I opened thedoor in the bulkhead there lay a whole pile of sails before me, eachsail neatly stopped, and many of them apparently quite new. I had cometo the conclusion that I would bend the fore-topmast staysail first, andafter a great deal of laborious work in turning over the various bundlesof canvas I came to what I was searching for, but not until I hadpreviously encountered new fore and main-topsails, which I managed, withconsiderable difficulty, to drag on deck.
The bending of the staysail was no very serious matter; it simply meantletting go the halliards, dragging upon the downhaul, cutting theboltrope away from the hanks, passing the new seizings, hoisting thesail foot by foot until I had got all the seizings finished, bending thesheets afresh, and there we were.
But to bend a topsail, single-handed, was a much more difficult job. Idecided to bend the main-topsail first; and by the time that I hadcompleted my task the day was done and it was growing so dark that Icould scarcely see to finish off properly. Nevertheless I was very wellcontent with my day's work, for I now had canvas enough on the brig toplace her under comma
nd whenever the breeze might choose to come.
Meanwhile Miss Onslow had been no less busy than myself, in another way.She had started by making herself complete mistress of the brig'sresources, looked at from a housekeeper's point of view; and in courseof the process had discovered--what I had already suspected, but had notfound time to verify--that outside the cabin, and alongside thecompanion ladder, was another stateroom, that, judging from itsappearance and contents, had belonged to the mate. This cabin she hadoverhauled, making an inventory of its contents--which she handed tome--and had then tidied it up and made it ready for my occupation.Moreover, she had taken possession of the galley, and had prepared agood, substantial, and appetising dinner in a style that, if not quiteequal to that of a professional cook, betrayed at least an aptitude thatwas as creditable as it was opportune. She had also found time to dosomething--I had not the remotest idea what--to her dress that had gonea considerable way toward renovating its appearance and obliterating thedisfigurement caused by the action of the sea water upon it; while inother ways she had spruced-up her appearance to an extent that excitedmy fervent but carefully-concealed admiration.
At sunset that night it was still stark calm, and the sky had a fine,clear, settled aspect that, combined with a slight disposition to riseon the part of the brig's barometer, led me to anticipate that the calmwas destined to endure for a few hours longer. For this I was devoutlythankful, for I had been toiling like a slave all day, fully exposed tothe scorching rays of a cloudless sun, and I was fatigued to the vergeof exhaustion; it was a great comfort, therefore, to feel that I shouldnot be called upon to look after the ship all night, but might safelyindulge in a few hours' sleep. That I might do so with the greaterconfidence, I routed out a tarpaulin from below, and with it rigged up atent on the wheel grating, as a shelter from the heavy dew; bringing upthe bed from the mate's bunk, and turning in on deck. This arrangementensured that in the event of a breeze springing up during the night Ishould instantly become aware of it, and be ready to promptly take suchmeasures as might appear necessary.