The Pirate Island: A Story of the South Pacific

by Harry Collingwood

  CHAPTER NINE.

  THE "ALBATROSS."

  All that day the launch continued to scud before the gale; gettingpooped so often that it was the work of two men to keep her free ofwater.

  Toward evening Mr Bowles came aft, reporting himself "all ataunto" oncemore, and ready to resume duty. He still looked pale and haggard, butwas as keen and determined as ever; and he demurred so vehemently toCaptain Staunton's suggestion that he would be all the better for awhole night between the blankets that the skipper was at last compelledto give in, which he did with--it must be confessed--a feeling of thegreatest relief that he now had so trusty a coadjutor to share thewatches with him; for since the springing up of the gale the poor fellowhad scarcely closed his eyes.

  The night shut down "as dark as a wolf's mouth,"--to use the skipper'sown metaphor; and the chief mate took the first watch, with Bob on thelook-out.

  It must have been somewhere about six bells, or 11 p.m., when the latterwas startled by seeing the crest of the sea ahead of him breaking in acloud of phosphoric foam over some object directly in line with thelaunch's bow.

  "Keep her away, sir!" he yelled. "Starboard, for your life, _starboard_hard!"

  Up went the boat's helm in an instant; and as she dragged heavily on thesteep incline of the wave which had just swept under her, Bob sawfloating close past a large mass of tangled wreckage, consisting of aship's lower-mast with the heel of the topmast still in its place, andyards, stays, shrouds, braces, etcetera, attached. Dark as was thenight there was no difficulty whatever in identifying the character ofthe wreckage, for it floated in a regular swirl of lambent greenishphosphorescent light.

  "Stand by with the boat-hook, there forward," shouted Mr Bowles, "andsee if you can get hold of a rope's-end. If you can, we will anchor tothe wreck; and we shall ride to leeward of it as snug as if we were inthe London Dock--almost."

  As he spoke, he skilfully luffed the boat up under the lee of the mass;and Bob, with a vigorous sweep or two of the boat-hook, managed to fishup the standing part of the main brace with the block still attached.Through this block he rove the end of the launch's painter, and belayedit on board, thus causing her to ride to the wreckage by a sort of slip-line. The other apprentices meanwhile lost no time in taking in andstowing the canvas; and in a few minutes the launch was riding at herfloating anchor in perfect safety and in comparative comfort; stilltossing wildly, it is true, but no longer shipping a drop of waterexcepting the spray which blew over her from the seas as they broke onthe wreckage.

  Toward noon on the following day the gale broke; and by sunset it hadmoderated to a strong breeze. On that evening they were blessed with aglimpse of the sun once more, for just before the moment of his settingthe canopy of cloud which had hung overhead for so long broke up,leaving great gaps through which the blue sky could be seen, andrevealing the glorious luminary upon the verge of the western horizon,surrounded by a magnificent framework of jagged and tattered clouds, thelarger masses of which were of a dull purplish hue, with blotches ofcrimson here and there, and with edges of the purest gold; while thesmaller fragments streamed athwart the sky, lavishly painted with therichest tints of the rainbow.

  They hung on to the wreckage all that night, the wind being stillagainst them; and the next morning Lance, suspecting that there might bea few fish congregated about the mass of broken spars, as is frequentlythe case, roused out the lines and managed to hook over a dozen gaudilymarked and curiously shaped fish of decent size, the whole of which weredevoured with the greatest gusto that day at dinner, notwithstanding therather repulsive aspect which some of them presented.

  That night the wind, which had dwindled away to a gentle breeze,changed, and blew once more from the westward; and the sea having alsogone down to a great extent, our adventurers cast off from the wreckagewhich had so opportunely provided them with a shelter from the fury ofthe gale, and with whole canvas and flowing sheets stood away once moreon a north-easterly course.

  In addition to the delay which the gale had occasioned them, CaptainStaunton estimated that they had been driven fully five hundred milesdirectly out of their course; after a very careful inspection thereforeof their stock of provisions the skipper was reluctantly compelled toorder a further reduction in the daily allowance of food and waterserved out.

  And now the sufferings of those on board the launch commenced in grimearnest. The women, especially, as might be expected, soon began tofeel their privations acutely. Buffeted as they had been by the gale,they were completely exhausted, and needed rest and an abundance ofnourishing food rather than to be placed on short commons. They boretheir privations, however, with a quiet fortitude which ought to havesilenced in shame the querulous complaints and murmurings of Mr Dale;though it did not. The most distressing part of it all was to hear poorlittle May Staunton piteously crying for water, "'cause I'm so _veddy_thirsty mama," as the dear child explained. She was not old enough tounderstand the possibility of a state of things wherein food and drinkwere scarcities; and her reproachful looks at her father when he wasobliged to refuse her request almost broke his heart. Not, it must beunderstood, that she was limited to the same quantity of water as theothers. The men--always excepting Mr Dale--preferred to suffer in aheightened degree the fiery torture of thirst themselves, rather than tosee the child suffer; and they quietly arranged among themselves tocontribute each as much as he felt he could possibly spare of the nowprecious liquid, as it was daily served out to them, and to store it upin a bottle which was to be May's exclusive property. And the same inthe matter of food. It was wholly in vain that the child's fatherprotested against this sacrifice; they were one and all firm as adamantupon this point; and he, poor man, notwithstanding his anxiety that allshould be treated with equal fairness, could not contest theirdetermination with any great strength of will. Was she not his own andonly child, for whom he would cheerfully have laid down his life; andhow could he urge with any strength a point which would have resulted ina dreadful deprivation and a terrible increase of suffering to thewinning and helpless little creature? Therefore he at last contentedhimself with pouring the whole of his daily allowance of water intoMay's bottle, and cheerfully submitted for her innocent sake to endurethe tortures of the damned.

  Reader, have _you_ ever experienced the torment of thirst while exposedin an open boat to the blazing rays of the pitiless sun? You have not?Then thank God for it, and earnestly pray that you never may; for nonecan realise or even faintly imagine the intensity of the suffering butthose who have borne it.

  The women, from whom it was of course impossible to conceal thecircumstance that May was receiving more than her own share of food andwater, were anxious to follow the example of their male companions byalso setting apart a portion of their own allowance for the use of thechild, but this was at once decidedly vetoed; yet they were not soeasily to be deterred from their generous disposition, and many a sipand many a morsel which could ill be spared did the poor little childreceive from their sympathetic and loving hands.

  "After the storm comes the calm," says the proverb, and its truth wasfully borne out in the present instance.

  On the fourth day after casting off from the wreckage the wind began todrop, and by sunset it had fallen so light that the launch had barelysteerage-way. This was still another misfortune, for if the calmcontinued it would seriously delay their progress and thereby protracttheir sufferings. Next to a gale of wind, indeed, a calm and itsconsequent delay was what they had most to dread, for they were in apart of the ocean little frequented by craft of any description, excepta stray whaler now and then, and their only reasonable hope of salvationrested upon the possibility of their being able to reach land beforestarvation and thirst overcame them.

  Mr Bowles had the first watch, and Bob was posted at the now all butuseless helm. The wind had subsided until it was faint as the breath ofa sleeping infant, and the boat's sails flapped gently against the mastsas she rode with a scarcely perceptible swinging motion over th
e longstately slow-moving swell which followed her. The vast blue-black domeof the heavens above was devoid of the faintest trace of cloud, and thecountless stars which spangled the immeasurable vault beamed down uponthe tiny waif with a soft and mellow splendour which was repeated in thedark bosom of the scarcely ruffled ocean, where the reflected starbeamsmingled, far down in its mysterious depths, with occasional faint gleamsand flashes of pale greenish phosphorescent light. The thin goldencrescent of the young moon hung low down in the velvety darkness of thewestern sky, and a long thin thread of amber radiance streamed from thehorizon beneath her toward the boat, becoming more and more wavering andbroken up as it neared her, until within some twenty fathoms of thelaunch it dwindled away to a mere occasional fluttering gleam. A greatand solemn silence prevailed, upon which such slight sounds as the flapof the sails, the pattering of the reef-points, the creak of the rudder,or the stir of some uneasy sleeper broke with almost painfuldistinctness.

  Mr Bowles drew out his watch, and holding it close to his face,discovered that it was a few minutes past midnight. For the previoushalf-hour he had been sitting on the deck near Bob, with his legsdangling into the little cockpit abaft the stern-sheets, and staring inan abstracted fashion astern. As he replaced the watch in his pocket heglanced once more in that direction, but now his look suddenly grewintense and eager. For a full minute he remained thus, then he withdrewfrom its beckets beneath the seat a long and powerful telescope, whichhe adjusted and levelled. For another full minute he gazed anxiouslythrough the tube, and then, handing it to Bob to hold, he crept silentlyforward, so as not to disturb the sleeping women, and quietly called therelief watch.

  "Well, Mr Bowles," said the captain, as he rose to his feet, "whatweather have you had? Is there any wind at all?"

  "Very little, sir," answered the chief mate, replying to the lastquestion first; "just a cat's-paw from the west'ard bow and then, butnothing worth speaking about; and it's been the same all through thewatch. I want you to take a squint through the glass before I turn-in,sir, and to tell me whether I've been dreaming with my eyes open or no."

  "Why, what is it, Bowles? Do you think you've seen anything?"

  "Well, yes, I do, sir," answered the mate, "but it's so very indistinctin this starlight that I don't care to trust to my own eyes alone."

  Without another word the pair moved aft, and when they were fairlysettled in the cockpit Mr Bowles took the glass from Bob and put itinto the skipper's hand. He then looked intently astern for perhapshalf a minute, when he laid his hand on the skipper's arm and said--

  "D'ye see them two stars, sir, about a couple of hand's breadths to thesouth'ard of the moon? They're about six degrees above the horizon, andthe lower one is the southernmost of the two; it has a reddish gleamalmost like a ship's port light."

  "Yes," replied the skipper, "I see them. You mean those, do you not?"pointing to them.

  "Ay, ay, sir; them's the two. Now look at the horizon, just half-waybetween 'em, and tell me if you can see anything."

  The skipper looked long and steadfastly in the desired direction, and atlength raised the telescope to his eye.

  "By Jove, Bowles, I believe you are right," he at length exclaimedeagerly. "There certainly is a something away there on the horizon, butit is so small and indistinct that I cannot clearly make it out. Do youthink it is either of the other boats?"

  "No, sir, I don't," answered Bowles. "If it's anything it's a ship'sroyals. If 'twas one of the boats, she'd be within some five miles ofus for us to be able to see her at all, and at that distance her sailwould show out sharp and distinct through the glass. _This_ shows, asyou say, so indistinctly that it must be much more than that distanceaway, and therefore I say that if it's anything it's a ship's royals."

  The skipper took another long steady look through the telescope, andthen closing it sharply, said--

  "There is undoubtedly _something_ astern of us, Bowles, and under thecircumstances I think we shall be fully justified in hauling our windfor an hour or two in order to satisfy ourselves as to what it reallyis."

  Mr Bowles fully concurred in this opinion, and the boat was accordinglyat once brought to the wind, what little there was of it, on thestarboard tack, which brought the object about two points on her weatherbow.

  "If it is indeed a ship, Bowles," observed Captain Staunton when theboat's course had been changed and the mate was preparing to "go below,"as he phrased it, "we have dropped in for a rare piece of luck, for, totell you the plain truth, I had no hope whatever of falling in with acraft of any description about here. She will be a whaler, of course,but she is a long way north of the usual fishing-grounds, isn't she?"

  "Well," returned Bowles meditatively, "you can never tell _where_ youmay fall in with one of them chaps. They follows the fish, you see;sometimes here, sometimes there; just where they think they'll have thebest chance. Then, I have heard say that sometimes, if they happen tohit upon a particularly likely spot, such as a small uninhabited island,where there's a chance of good sport, they'll put a boat's crew ashorethere with boat, harpoons, lines, a stock of provisions, and two orthree hundred empty barrels, just to try their luck, like, for a monthor so, and go away on a cruise, coming back for 'em in due time, andoften finding 'em with every barrel full. Perhaps yon craft is up tosomething of that sort."

  "It may be so," returned Captain Staunton. "Indeed in all probabilityit _is_ so if our eyes have not deceived us. At all events, whatevershe is, we are pretty sure of a hearty welcome, and even a not overclean whaler will be a welcome change for all hands, and especially forthe ladies, from this boat, particularly now that the provisions aregetting low. And I have no doubt I shall be able to make arrangementswith the captain to carry us to Valparaiso with as little delay aspossible."

  "Ay, ay," returned Bowles, "I don't expect there'll be much troubleabout that. I only hope we shall be able to get alongside her. Iwouldn't stand on too long on this tack if I was you, sir. My opinionis that she's coming this way, and if so we ought to tack in good timeso as not to let her slip past us to windward or across our bows. Good-night, sir!"

  The night being so fine, and with so little wind, Captain Staunton tookthe tiller himself, and ordered the rest of the watch to lie down again;there was nothing to do, he said, and if he required their assistance hewould call them. Accordingly, in a very short time, he was the onlywaking individual in the launch, the others were only too glad of theopportunity to forget, as far as possible, their miseries in sleep.

  It is, of course, scarcely necessary to say that the skipper, as he satthere keeping his lonely watch, fixed his gaze, with scarcely a moment'sintermission, on that part of the horizon where the mysterious objecthad been seen. He allowed a full hour to pass, and then drawing out theglass, applied it to his eye, sweeping the horizon carefully from deadahead round to windward. He had not to seek far, for when the tube ofthe telescope pointed to within about three points of the starboard bowa small dark blot swept into the field of view. Yes, there it was,quite unmistakably this time, and a single moment's observation of itsatisfied the anxious watcher that he saw before him the royals andtopgallant-sails of a vessel apparently of no very great size.

  The fact that the stranger's topgallant-sails had risen above thehorizon within the hour since he had last looked at her was conclusiveproof to his mind that the craft was standing toward them; that, infact, they were approaching each other, though at a very low rate ofspeed, in consequence of the exceedingly light air of wind that wasblowing. Fully satisfied upon this point he at once put the boat's helmdown, and she came slowly and heavily about, the captain easily workingthe sheets himself.

  By four bells Captain Staunton was able to discern with the naked eyethe shadowy patch of darkness which the stranger's canvas made on thedusky line of the horizon, and when he called Mr Bowles at eight bells,or four o'clock in the morning, the patch had become darker, larger, andmore clearly defined, and it lay about one point before the weather beamof t
he launch. The telescope was once more called into requisition, andit now showed not only the royals and topgallant-sails, but also thetopsails of the stranger fairly above the horizon.

  "Thank God for that welcome sight!" exclaimed the chief mate, layingdown the telescope and reverently lifting his hat from his head. Heremained silent a minute or two, and then raising his eyes, allowed hisglance to travel all round the horizon and overhead until he had sweptthe entire expanse of the star-spangled heavens. Then, with a sigh ofintense relief, he said--

  "We're all right, I do verily believe, sir. There's the craft, plain asmud in a wine-glass, bearing right down upon us, or very nearly so.We've only to stand on as we're going and we shall cross her track.There's very little wind, it's true, but the trifle that there is isdrawing us together; we're nearing each other every minute, and there'sno sign of any change of weather, unless it may happen to be that thepresent light air will die away altogether with sunrise. I fancy I knowwhat you're thinking of sir; you're half inclined to say, `Out oars, andlet's get alongside her as soon as possible.' And that's just what Ishould say if there was any sign of a breeze springing up, but thereain't; she _can't_ run away from us, and therefore what I say is this:the launch is a heavy boat, and we're all hands of us as weak as cats;she's about six miles off now, and it would knock us all up to pull eventhat short distance, whereas if we go on as we are we shall dropalongside without any trouble by eight bells, or maybe a trifle earlier;and if the wind _should_ die away altogether, it'll be time enough_then_ to see what we can do with the oars."

  "That's exactly the way I have been arguing with myself ever since youcalled me, Bowles," returned the skipper. "It is true that we are allsuffering horribly from thirst, and in that way every moment is of valueto us; but on the other hand, everybody except our two selves is nowasleep and oblivious, for the time being, of their sufferings: let themsleep on, say I; the toil of tugging at heavy oars, and the excitementof knowing that a sail is at hand would only increase tenfold theirsufferings, without helping us forward a very great deal; so I think,with you, that we had better let things remain as they are for anotherhour or two; we can rouse all hands at any moment, should it seemdesirable to do so. Now, if you will take the tiller, I will juststretch myself out on the planks here, close at hand; I could not sleepnow if the whole world were offered me to do so."

  Saying which, the skipper suited the action to the word; he and the matecontinuing their chat, but carefully pitching their voices in so low atone that the ladies, close at hand, should not be disturbed in theirslumbers.

  By and by the sky began to pale in the eastern quarter; the starsquietly twinkled out, one by one; a bright rosy flush appeared, and thenup rolled the glorious sun above the horizon.

  The wind, light all night, had been imperceptibly dying away; and whenthe sun rose his bright beams flashed upon a sea whose surface wassmooth as oil. The launch lost way altogether, and refused any longerto answer her helm.

  As for the stranger, there she was, just hull-down; her snowy canvasgleaming in the brilliant morning sunshine, and so clearly defined thatevery rippling fold in the sails was distinctly visible as they flappedagainst the mast to the lazy roll of the vessel over the long sleepyswell.

  "Now," said Captain Staunton, "we'll rouse the steward, make him prepareand serve out a first-rate breakfast to all hands; and then `Hey! for apull to the ship.'"

  This was accordingly done. The breakfast was prepared, no great matterof a meal was it after all, though the last scrap of provisions and thelast drop of water went in its composition; and when it was ready thecramped and hungry voyagers were roused with the good news that a sailwas in sight, and the meal placed before them.

  Frugal as it was, it was a sumptuous banquet compared with their latefare; and the poor famished creatures devoured it ravenously, feeling,when it was finished, that they could have disposed of thrice as much.Perhaps it was just as well that there was no more; in their condition amoderately full meal even would have proved injurious to them ifadministered without great caution; but while there was not sufficientto provoke hurtful results there was just enough to put new life intothem, and to temporarily endow them with vigour and strength enough foran hour or two's toil at the oars.

  The meal over, the oars were eagerly manned; and the men dividingthemselves into two gangs, and working in short spells of a quarter ofan hour each, the launch was headed straight for the stranger, whichhaving now lost steerage-way had swung broadside-on, and showed herselfto be a small brig.

  "I tell you what it is, Bowles," said the captain as he sat at thetiller steering during one of his spells of rest from the oars, "we area great deal further to the westward than I imagined we were. We mustbe not very far from the outlying islands of that vast archipelago whichspreads itself over so many hundreds of leagues of the South Pacific.That fellow is no whaler; look at his canvas, no smoke stains from thetry-works there: he is a sandal-wood trader, or is after _beche-de-mer_.I am very glad it is so; it will be much more pleasant for the ladies;and if she is a Yankee, as a good many of these little traders are, theskipper will probably be glad enough to earn a few dollars by running usall across to the mainland."

  "To my mind," remarked Bowles, "the craft looks rather too trim and neataloft for a trader. And look at the hoist of her topsails; don't youthink there is a man-o'-war-ish appearance about the cut and set of themsails, sir?"

  "She certainly _does_ look rather taunt in her spars for a merchantman,"returned Captain Staunton. "We shall soon see what she really is,however; for she will be hull-up in another five minutes; and in anotherhalf-hour we shall be on board her. Ah! they have made us out; there goher colours. Take the glass, and see what you can make of them,Bowles."

  The chief mate took the telescope and levelled it at the brig, taking along and steady look at her.

  "A ten-gun brig, by the look of her," he presently remarked, with thetelescope still at his eye. "Anyhow, her bulwarks are pierced; and Ican see the muzzles of five bull-dogs grinning through her starboardport-holes. That's the stars and stripes hanging at her peak, as far asI can make out; but it's drooping so dead that I can see nothing but amingling of red and white, with a small patch of blue next the halliard-block. She's a pretty-looking little thing enough, and her skipper's athorough seaman, whoever he is. Ay, she's a man-o'-war sure enough--Upgo the courses and down comes the jib, all at once, man-o'-war fashion.And there's clue up royals and t'gallan's'ls--to prevent 'em frombeating themselves to pieces against the spars and rigging, _that_ is,for all the canvas she could set wouldn't give her steerage-way, muchless cause her to run away from us. She hasn't a pennant aloft,though--wonder how that is? And the hands on board seem to be a rum-looking lot of chaps as ever I set eyes on; no more like man-o'-war'smen than we are--not a single jersey or man-o'-war collar among 'em; nornothing like a uniform aft there. I s'pose they're economical, and wantto save their regular rig for harbour service."

  "Well, thank God for His mercy in directing us to her," exclaimed theskipper fervently, as he lifted his cap from his head. "Our troublesare all over now, ladies," he continued, turning to the women, who werenow eagerly watching the brig. "The craft is small; but she is plentybig enough to carry us all to Valparaiso; and, once there, I think weshall have very little difficulty in getting a passage home."

  Half an hour more of toilsome tugging at the oars, and the heavy launchranged up alongside the brig.

  "Look out for a rope," shouted one of the crew, as he sprang upon therail with a coil of line in his hand.

  "Heave," shouted Bob.

  The rope was dexterously thrown and caught; the heavy oars were laid in;and as the boat touched the brig's side a man dressed in a suit of whitenankeen, his head sheltered by a broad-brimmed Panama hat, and hisrather handsome sun-browned face half hidden by a thick black beard andmoustache, sauntered to the gangway from the position he had occupiedabaft the main-rigging, and leaning over the bulwarks remarked--

 
"Morning, straangers. I guess you found it hot work pullin' down to usin that heavy boat. Looks to me as though you had had rayther bad timeslately."

  "Yes," answered the skipper. "We were burned out of our ship--the_Galatea_ of London. We have been in the boat a fortnight to-day; andfor the last five days--until this morning, when we consumed the last ofour provisions--some of us have never tasted water."

  "Waal, stranger, that's bad news to tell. But I calculate we can soonput you all right. Here," he continued, addressing himself to the menwho were peering curiously over the bulwarks at the occupants of theboat, "jump down, some of you, and help 'em up over the side."

  There was a hearty laugh at this order, to the intense surprise of ouradventurers; but the skipper of the brig was evidently a man who was notto be trifled with; with two strides he was among the jeering crowd ofmen with a revolver in each hand.

  "Now, git," he exclaimed, levelling the pistols; and the men waited forno second bidding. In an instant some half a dozen of them sprang intothe boat; the brig's gangway was opened, and the boat's crew weresomewhat sullenly assisted up the side of the brig and on to her deck.

  The black-bearded man met them as they came up the side, and held outhis hand to Captain Staunton.

  "Morning, straanger," he repeated. "I'm powerful glad to see you all."

  "Thank you," returned the skipper. "I can assure you we are all atleast equally glad to see you, and to find ourselves once more with adeck beneath our feet. What ship is this, may I ask, and by what nameshall we call the gentleman who has given us so kind a reception?"

  "The brig's called the _Albatross_; and my name is Johnson--at yourservice."

  "You are an American cruiser, I presume?" continued Captain Staunton,looking first at the beautifully kept decks, and then more doubtfully atthe gang of desperadoes who crowded round.

  "Sorter," briefly replied the man who had called himself Johnson; andthe reply seemed for some reason to mightily tickle his crew, most ofwhom burst into a hearty guffaw.

  Captain Staunton glanced round upon them with such stern surprise thatthe fellows fell back a pace or two; and the skipper of the brig, firstdarting a furious glance upon his followers, led the way aft to thecabin, saying--

  "I sorter waited breakfast when I made out through the glass that youwere a shipwrecked crew, calculatin' that prob'ly you'd be glad to findyourselves in front of a good square meal. Your crew will have to makethemselves at home in the fo'ks'le; and if my lads don't treat 'emproperly, why they must just knock 'em down. My people are a trifleorkard to deal with at first, but I guess they'll all pull togetherfirst-rate arter a while."