My Danish Sweetheart: A Novel. Volume 1 of 3

by William Clark Russell

  CHAPTER VIII.

  ADRIFT.

  It was necessary that we should have everything in readiness before wecarried poor Captain Nielsen out of his cabin. I unshipped the gangway,and watching an opportunity as the swell lifted the raft against theside of the barque stooping to it, I sprang; but I could not haveimagined the weight and volume of the swell until I had gained the frailplatform. Indeed, one could feel that the wrath kindled by the tempeststill lived in the deep bosom of the ocean. It was like a stern,revengeful breathing; but the wind was light, and the water butdelicately brushed, and it was easy to foresee that if no more wind blewthe swell would have greatly flattened down by sunset. Yet the manner inwhich the hull and the raft came together terrified me with a notion ofour contrivance going to pieces. I called to Helga, as she threw to meor handed the several parcels and articles we had collected upon thedeck, that there was not a moment of time to waste--that we must get herfather on to the raft without delay; and then, when I had hastily stowedthe last of the things, I sprang aboard again, and was going straight tothe Captain's berth, when I suddenly stopped, and exclaimed: 'First, howis he to be removed?'

  She eyed me piteously. Perhaps her seamanship did not reach to _that_height; or maybe her fear that we should cause her father pain impairedher perception of what was to be done.

  'Let me think, now,' said I. 'It is certain that he must be lowered tothe deck as he lies in his cot. Does he swing by hooks? I did notobserve.'

  'Yes,' she answered, 'what you would call the clews come together to apoint as in a hammock, and spread at the foot and head.'

  'Then there must be iron eyes in the upper deck,' cried I, 'to receivethe hooks. Now, see here! we shall have to get a sling at each end ofthe cot, attach a line to it, the ends of which we will pass throughthe eyes, and when this is done we will cut away the clews, and so lowerhim. Yes, that will do,' said I. 'I have it,' and, looking about me forsuch a thickness of rope as I needed, I overhauled some fathoms, passedmy knife through the length, and together we hastened to the Captain'sberth.

  'What is it now?' he asked, in a feeble voice, as we entered.

  'Everything is ready, Captain Nielsen,' said I, 'there is no time tolose. The cargo is washing about in the hold, and the ship has notanother hour of life left in her.'

  'What is it that you want?' said he, looking dully at the coil of rope Iheld in my hand.

  'Father, we are here to carry you to the raft.'

  'To the raft!' he exclaimed, with an air of bewilderment, and then headded, while I noticed a little colour of temper enter his cheeks. 'Ihave nothing to do with your raft. It was in your power to save the poor_Anine_. If she is to founder, I will go down with her.'

  So saying, he folded his arms upon his bosom in a posture of resolution,viewing me with all the severity his sickness would suffer his eyes toexpress. Nevertheless, there was a sort of silliness in the whole mannerof him which might have persuaded the most heedless observer that thepoor fellow was rapidly growing less and less responsible for hisbehaviour. Had he been a powerful man, or, indeed, possessed the use ofhis extremities, I should have dreaded what is termed a 'scene.' As itwas, nothing remained but to treat him as a child, to tackle him withall tenderness, but as swiftly as possible, and to get him over theside.

  There was a dreadful expression of distress in Helga's face when shelooked at him; but her glances at me were very full of assurance thatshe was of my mind, and that she would approve and be with me insympathy in whatever I resolved to do. Whipping out my knife, I cutlengths off the rope I held to make slings of. I carried one of theseslings to the cot and passed it over the end. The Captain extended hishand, and attempted to thrust me aside. The childlike weakness of thattrembling push would, in a time of less wretchedness and peril thanthis, have unnerved me with pity.

  'Bear with me! Be yourself, Captain! Show yourself the true Danishsailor that you are at heart--for Helga's sake!' I exclaimed.

  He covered his eyes and sobbed.

  I secured the slings to the cot, and, until we lowered him to the deck,he held his face hidden in his hands. I rove two lengths of line throughthe iron eyes at which the cot slung, in the manner I had described toHelga, and when the weight of the cot was on these lines, we belayed oneend, holding by the other. I then passed my knife through the clews, asit would be called, or thin lines which supported the cot, and, going tothe rope I had belayed, bade Helga lower her end as I lowered mine, andthe cot descended safely to the deck. The girl then came round to thehead of the cot, and together we dragged it out of the house on to thedeck.

  Saving a little wrench when we hauled the cot over the coaming of thedeck-house door, the poor man was put to no pain. It was merciful indeedthat he should have lain ill in the deck-house, for had he occupied acabin below I cannot imagine how we should have got him out on to thedeck without killing him with the anguish which we should have beenforced by our efforts to cause him.

  When we had got him to the gangway I sprang on to the raft and caughthold of the block that dangled at the extremity of the yardarm tackle.With this I returned to the barque, and, just as we had got the raftover, so did we sway the poor Captain on to her. I got on to the raft toreceive him as Helga lowered the cot. He descended gently, and on mycrying, 'Let go!' she swiftly released the line, and the tackleoverhauled itself to the roll of the vessel.

  I remember exclaiming 'Thank God!' when this job was ended, and I hadunhooked the block, as though the worst was over; and indeed, in themere business of abandoning the barque, the worst had ended with thebestowal of the sick and helpless Captain on the raft. But what was nowto begin? My 'Thank God!' seemed to sound like a piece of irony in myheart when I looked from the deep, wet, gleaming side of the leaninghull, waving her wrecked spars in the reddening light of the sun--when Ilooked from her, I say, to seawards, where the flowing lines of thelifting and falling swell were running bald and foamless into thesouth-west sky.

  Helga came to the gangway and called to know if all were well with herfather.

  'All is well,' I answered. 'Come now, Helga! There is nothing to detainus. We shall be wise to cast adrift from the barque. She is very muchdown by the head, and the next dip may be her last.'

  'A few minutes cannot signify,' she cried. 'There are one or two thingsI should like to bring with me. I wish to possess them, if we arepreserved.'

  'Make haste, then!' I called. She disappeared, and I turned to theCaptain. He looked up at me out of his cot with eyes in which all thefeverish fire of the morning was quenched.

  'Is Helga remaining in the barque?' he asked listlessly.

  'God forbid!' cried I. 'She will be with us in a minute or two.'

  'It is a cruel desertion,' said he. 'Poor _Anine_! You were to have beenkept afloat!'

  It was idle to reason with him. He was clothed as I had found him when Ihad first seen him--in a waistcoat and serge coat, and a shawl roundhis neck; but he was without a hat--a thing to be overlooked at such atime as this--and the lower part of him was protected only by theblankets he lay under. There was still time to supply his requirements.I had noticed his wideawake and a long cloak hanging in his berth, and Iimmediately sprang on board, rushed aft, procured them and returned.Helga was still below. I put the hat on the Captain's head and claspedthe cloak over his shoulders, fretting over the girl's absence, forevery minute was communicating a deadlier significance to the languid,sickly, dying motions of the fast-drowning hull.

  I think about ten minutes had passed since she left the barque's side togo to her cabin, when, bringing my eyes away from the sea, into whoseeastern quarter I had been gazing with some wild hope or fancy in me ofa sail down there--though it proved no more than a feather-tip ofcloud--I saw Helga in the gangway. I say Helga, but for some moments Idid not know her. I started and stared as if she had been a ghost.Instead of the boyish figure to which my sight was already used, therestood in the aperture betwixt the bulwarks, which we call the gangway,a girl who looked at least half a head taller than th
e Helga who hadbeen my associate. I might have guessed at once that this appearance ofstature in her was due to her gown, but, as I did not suspect that shehad gone to change her dress, her suggestion of increased heightcompleted the astonishment and perplexity with which I regarded her. Shestood on the leaning and swaying side of the barque, as perfect a figureof a maiden as mortal eyes could wish to rest on. Her dress was of adark-blue serge that clung to her: she also wore a cloth jacket, thinlyedged about the neck and where it buttoned with fur, and upon her headwas a turban-shaped hat of sealskin, the dark glossy shade of whichbrightened her short hair into a complexion of the palest gold. She helda parcel in her hand, and called to me to take it from her. I did so,and cried:

  'You will not be able to jump from the gangway. Get into thefore-chains, and I will endeavour to haul the raft up to you.'

  But even as I spoke she grasped her dress, and disclosed her littlefeet, and with a bound gained the raft as it rose with the swell,yielding on her knees as she struck the platform with the grace thatnothing but the teaching of old ocean could have communicated to herlimbs.

  'Thank God you are here!' I cried, catching her by the hand. 'I wasgrowing uneasy--in another minute I should have sought you.'

  She faintly smiled, and then turned eagerly to her father.

  'I have my mother's portrait,' said she, pointing to the parcel, 'andher Bible. I would not bring away more. If we are to perish, they willgo with us.'

  He looked at her with a lack-lustre eye, and in a low voice addressed afew words to her in Danish. She answered in that tongue, glancing downat her dress, and then at me, and added, in English, 'It was time,father. The hard work is over. I may be a girl now;' and looking alongthe sea she sighed bitterly.

  Her father brought his knitted hands together to his brow, and nevercould I have imagined the like of the look of mental anguish that was onhis face as he did this. But what I am here narrating did not occupyabove a minute or two. Indeed, a longer delay than this was not to havebeen suffered if we desired the raft to hold together. I let go the linethat held the little structure to the barque, and getting the smallstuddingsail boom over--that is, the boom we had shipped to serve as asignal-mast--I thrust with it, and, Helga helping me, we got the raftclear of the side of the vessel. The leewardly swell on which we rodedid the rest for us and not a little rejoiced was I to find ourmiserable fabric gradually increasing its distance from the _Anine_; forif the barque foundered with us close alongside, we stood to be swampedin the vortex, the raft scattered, and ourselves left to drown.

  It now wanted about twenty minutes to sundown. A weak air still blew,but the few clouds that still lived in the heavens floated overheadapparently motionless; yet the swell continued large, to our sensationsat least, upon that flat structure, and the slope of the platformrapidly grew so distressing and fatiguing to our limbs, that we wereglad to sit and obtain what refreshment we could from a short rest.

  Among the things we had brought with us was the bull's-eye lamp,together with a can of oil, a parcel of meshes, and somelucifer-matches. I said to Helga:

  'We should step, or set up, our mast before it grows dark.'

  'Why?' she inquired. 'The flag we hoist will not be seen in thedark'--knowing that the mast was there for no other purpose than todisplay a flag on.

  'But we ought to light the lamp and masthead it,' said I, 'and keep itburning all night--if God suffers us to live through the night. Who cantell what may come along?--what vessel invisible to us may perceive thelight?'

  She answered quickly: 'Yes. Your judgment is clearer than mine. I willhelp you to set up the mast.'

  Her father again addressed her in Danish. She answered him, and thensaid to me, 'My father asks why we are without a sail.'

  'I thought of a sail,' I replied, speaking as I went about to erect themast, 'but without wind it could not serve us, and with wind it wouldblow away like a cobweb. It would have occupied too much time to rig andsecurely provide for a sail. Besides, our hopes could never lie in thedirection of such a thing. We must be picked up--there is no otherchance for us.'

  The Captain made no response, but sat, propped up on his pillows,motionless, his eyes fixed upon the barque.

  The sun had sunk, but a strong scarlet yet glowed in the western sky bythe time we had erected and stayed the spar. I then lighted the lamp andran it aloft by means of a line and a little block which I had takencare to throw into the raft. This finished, we seated ourselves.

  There was now nothing more to be done but watch and pray. This was themost solemn and dreadful moment that had as yet entered into the passageof our fearful and astonishing experience. In the hurry and agitation ofleaving the barque there had been scarcely room for pause. All that wecould think of was how quickly to get away, how speedily to equip andlaunch the raft, how to get Captain Nielsen over, and the like; but allthis was ended: we could now think--and I felt as if my heart had beensuddenly crushed in me as I sat on the slanting, falling, and risingplatform viewing the barque, that lay painted in clear black linesagainst the fast-dimming glow in the west.

  Helga sat close against her father's cot. So far as I was able todistinguish her face, there was profound grief in it, and a sort ofdismay, but no fear. Her gaze was steady, and the expression of hermouth firm. Her father kept his eyes rooted upon his ship. I overheardher address him once or twice in Danish, but getting no reply, shesighed heavily and held her peace. I was too exhausted in body andspirits to desire to speak. I remember that I sat, or rather squatted,Lascar fashion, upon the hatch-cover, that somewhat raised the platformof the raft, with my hands clasped upon my shins, and my chin on a levelwith my knees, and in this posture I continued for some time motionless,watching the _Anine_, and waiting for her to sink, and realizing ourshocking situation to the degree of that heart-crushing sensation in mewhich I have mentioned. I was exactly clad as I had been when I boardedthe barque out of the lifeboat. Never once, indeed, from the hour of mybeing in the vessel, down to the present moment, had I removed myoilskins, saving my sou'-wester, which I would take from my head when Ientered the cabin; and I recollect thinking that it was better for me tobe heavily than thinly clad, because being a stout swimmer, a lightdress would help me to a bitter long battle for life, whereas theclothes I had on must make the struggle brief, and speedily drag me downinto peace, which was, indeed, all that I could bring my mind to dwellupon now, for when I sent my glance from the raft to the darkling ocean,I felt hopeless.

  The rusty hectic died out. The night came along in a clear dusk with afaint sighing of wind over the raft every time the swell threw her up.There was a silver curl of moon in the south-west, but she was withoutpower to drop so much as a flake of her light into the dark shadow ofwater under her. Yet the starlight was in the gloom, and it was not sodark but that I could see Helga's face in a sort of glimmer, and thewhite outline of the cot and the configuration of the raft upon thewater in dusky strokes.

  The barque floated at about a cable's length distant from us, a darkmass, rolling in a strangling manner, as I might know by the sicklyslide of the stars in the squares of her rigging and along the pallidlines of the canvas stowed upon her yards. There was more tenacity oflife in her than I should have believed possible, and I said to Helga:

  'If this raft were a boat, I would board the barque and set her on fire.She may float through the night, for who is to know but that one of herworse leaks may have got choked, and the blaze she would make mightbring us help.'

  The Captain uttered some exclamation in Danish, in a small but vehementand shrill tone. He had not spoken for above an hour, and I had believedhim sleeping or dying and speechless.

  'What does he say?' I called across softly to Helga.

  'That the _Anine_ might have been saved had we stood by her,' sheanswered, struggling, as I could hear by the tremor in her voice, tocontrol her accents.

  'No, no!' said I, almost gruffly, I fear, with the mood that was upon meof helplessness, despair, and the kind of rage that comes withpe
rception that one is doomed to die like a rat, without a chance,without a soul of all those one loves knowing one's fate. 'No, no!' Icried, 'the _Anine_ was not to be saved by us two, nor by twenty likeus, Helga. _You_ know that--for it is like making me responsible for oursituation here to doubt it.'

  'I do not doubt it,' she answered firmly and reproachfully.

  Captain Nielsen muttered in his native tongue; but I did not inquirewhat he said, and the hush of the great ocean night, with its delicatethreading of complaining wind, fell upon us.

  My temper of despair was not to be soothed by recollection of this timeyesterday, by perception of the visible evidence of God's mercy in thistranquillity of sky and sea, at a time when, but for the change ofweather, we had certainly been doomed. I was young; I passionatelydesired to live. Had death been the penalty of the lifeboat attempt, Imight, had time been granted me, have contemplated my end with thefortitude that springs from the sense of having done well. But what washeroic in this business had disappeared out of it when the lifeboatcapsized and left me safe on board. It was now no more than a vilepassage of prosaic shipwreck, with its attendant horror of lingeringdeath, and nothing noble in what had been done, or that might yet haveto be done, to prop up my spirits. Thus I sat, full of wretchedness, andmiserably thinking, mechanically eyeing the dusky heap of barque; thenbreaking away from my afflicting reverie, I stood up, holding by themast, to carefully sweep the sea, with a prayer for the sight of thecoloured gleams of a steamer's lights, since there was nothing to beexpected in the way of sail in this calm that was upon the water.

  I was thus occupied, when I was startled by a strange cry--I cannotdescribe it. It resembled the moan of a wild creature wounded to death,but with a human note in it that made the sound something not to beimagined. For an instant I believed it came from the sea, till I saw bythe dim light of the starshine the figure of Captain Nielsen, in asitting-posture, pointing with the whole length of his arm in thedirection of his barque. I looked, and found the black mass of hullgone, and nothing showing but the dark lines of spars and rigging thatmelted out of my sight as I watched. A noise of rending, intermingledwith the shock of an explosion, came from where she had disappeared. Itsignified no more than the blowing up of the decks as she sank; but thestar-studded vastness of gloom made the sound appalling beyond languageto convey.

  'Help!' cried Helga. 'My father is dying.'

  I gained the side of the cot in a stride, and kneeled by him, but therewas no more to be seen of his face than the mere faint whiteness of it,and I could not tell whether his eyes were open or not. Imagining, butscarcely hoping, that a dram might put some life into the poor fellow, Ilowered the bull's-eye lamp from the masthead to seek for one of thejars of spirits we had stowed; but when we came to put the tin pannikinto his lips we found his teeth set.

  'He is not dead, Helga,' I cried; 'he is in a fit. If he were dead hisjaw would drop;' and this I supposed, though I knew little of death inthose days.

  I flashed the bull's-eye upon his face, and observed that though hiseyes were open the pupils were upturned and hidden. This, with thewhiteness of the skin and the emaciation of the lineaments, made aghastly picture of his countenance, and the hysteric sob that Helgauttered as she looked made me grieve that I should have thrown thelight upon her father.

  I mastheaded the lamp again, and crouched by the side of the cot talkingto Helga across the recumbent form in it. Who could remember what wassaid at such a time? I weakly essayed to cheer her, but soon gave up,for here was the very figure of Death himself lying between us, andthere was Death awaiting us in the black invisible folds in which weswung; and what had I to say that could help her heart at such a time?Occasionally I would stand erect and peer around. The weak wind thatwent moaning past us as the raft rose to the liquid heave, had the chillin it of the ocean in October; and fearing that Helga's jacket did notsufficiently protect her, I pulled off my oilskin-coat--there is nowarmer covering for ordinary apparel--and induced her to put it on. Herfather remained motionless, but by stooping my ear to his mouth I couldcatch the noise of his breathing as it hissed through his clenchedteeth. Yet it was a sort of breathing that would make one expect to hearit die out in a final sigh at any minute.

  I mixed a little spirit and water, and gave it to the girl, and obligedher to swallow the draught, and begged her to eat for the sake of thelife and heart food would give her; but she said 'No,' and her frequentsilent sobbing silenced me on that head, for how could one grieving asshe did swallow food? I filled the pannikin for myself and emptied it,and ate a biscuit and a piece of cheese, which were near my hand in aninterstice of the raft, and then lay down near the cot, supporting myhead on my elbow. Never did the stars seem so high, so infinitelyremote, as they seemed to me that night. I felt as though I had passedinto another world that mocked the senses with a few dim semblances ofthings which a little while before had been real and familiar. The veryparing of moon showed small as though looked at through an invertedtelescope, and measurelessly remote. I do not know why this should havebeen, yet once afterwards, in speaking of this experience to a man who,in a voyage to India, had fallen overboard on such another night asthis, and swam for three hours, he told me that the stars had seemed tohim as to me, and the moon, which to him was nearly full, appeared tohave shrunk to the size of the planet Venus.

  After awhile the Captain's breathing grew less harsh, and Helga asked meto bring the lamp that she might look at him. His teeth were no longerset, and his eyes as in nature, saving that there was no recognition inthem, and I observed that he stared straight into the brilliant glass ofmagnified flame without winking or averting his gaze. I propped him up,and Helga put the pannikin to his lips, but the fluid ran from thecorners of his mouth; upon which I let him rest upon his pillows, softlybegging the girl to let God have His way with him.

  'He cannot last through the night!' she exclaimed, in a low voice; andthe wonderful stillness upon the sea, unvexed by the delicate winnowingof the draught, gathered to my mood an extraordinary emphasis from mybeing able to hear her light utterances as distinctly as though shewhispered in a sickroom.

  'You are prepared, Helga?' said I.

  'No, no!' she cried, with a little sob. 'Who can be prepared to loseone that is dearly loved? We believe we are prepared--we pray forstrength; but when the blow falls it finds us weak and unready. When heis gone, I shall be alone. And, oh! to die _here_!'

  We sank into silence.

  Another hour went by, and I believed I had fallen into a light, troubleddoze, less sleepful than a waking daydream, when I heard my namepronounced, and instantly started up.

  'What is it?' I cried.

  'My father is asking for you,' answered Helga.

  I leaned over the cot and felt for his hand, which I took. It was of adeathlike coldness, and moist.

  'I am here, Captain Nielsen,' said I.

  'If God preserves you,' he exclaimed, very faintly, 'you will keep yourword?'

  'Be sure of it--be sure of it,' I said, knowing that he referred to whathad passed between us about Helga.

  'I thank you,' he whispered. 'My sight seems dark; yet is not that themoon down there?'

  'Yes, father,' answered the girl.

  'Helga,' he said, 'did you not tell me you had brought your mother'slikeness with you?'

  'It is with us, and her Bible, father.'

  'Would to God I could look upon it,' said he, 'for the last time,Helga--for the last time!'

  'Where is the parcel?' I asked.

  'I have it close beside me,' she answered.

  'Open it, Helga!' said I. 'The lamp will reveal the picture.'

  Again I lowered the bull's-eye from the masthead, and, while Helga heldthe picture before her father's face, I threw the light upon it. It wasa little oil-painting in an oval gilt frame. I could distinguish no morethan the face of a woman--a young face--with a crown of yellow hair uponher head. The sheen of the lamp lay faintly upon the profile of Helga.All else, saving the picture, was in darkness, and
the girl looked likea vision upon the blackness behind her, as she knelt with the portraitextended before her father's face.

  He addressed her in weak and broken tones in Danish, then turned hishead and slightly raised his arm, as though he wished to point tosomething up in the sky, but was without power of limb to do so. Onthis Helga withdrew the portrait, and I put down the lamp, firstsearching the dark line of ocean, now scintillant with stars, beforesitting again.

  As the moon sank, spite of her diffusing little or no light, a deeperdye seemed to come into the night. The shooting-stars were plentiful,and betokened, as I might hope, continuance of fair weather. Here andthere hovered a steam-coloured fragment of cloud. An aspect of almostsummer serenity was upon the countenance of the sky, and though therewas the weight of the ocean in the swing of the swell, there was peacetoo in the regularity of its run and in the soundless motion of it as ittook us, sloping the raft after the manner of a see-saw.

  In a boat, aboard any other contrivance than this raft put together byinexpert hands, I must have felt grateful--deeply thankful to Godindeed, for this sweet quietude of air and sea that had followed theroaring conflict of the long hours now passed. But I was without hope,and there can be no thankfulness without that emotion. These were theclosing days of October; November was at hand; within an hour thissluggish breathing of air might be storming up into such anotherhurricane as we were fresh from. And what then? Why, it was impossibleto fancy such a thing even, without one's spirits growing heavy as lead,without feeling the presence of death in the chill of the night air.

  No! for this passage of calm, God forgive me! I could not feel grateful.The coward in me rose strong. I could not bless Heaven for what affectedme as a brief pause before a dreadful end, that this very quiet of thenight was only to render more lingering, and fuller, therefore, ofsuffering.

  Captain Nielsen began to mutter. I did not need to listen to him forabove a minute to gather that he was delirious. I could see the outlineof Helga against the stars, bending over the cot. The thought of thisheroic girl's distress, of her complicated anguish, rallied me, and Ibroke in a very passion of self-reproach from the degradation of mydejection. I drew to the cot, and Helga said:

  'He is wandering in his mind.' She added, with a note of wailing in hervoice, 'Jeg er nu alene! Jeg er nu alene!' by which she signified thatshe was now alone. I caught the meaning of the sentence from herpronunciation of it, and cried:

  'Do not say you are alone, Helga! Besides, your father still lives.Hark! what does he say?'

  So far he had been babbling in Danish; now he spoke in English, in astrange voice that sounded as though proceeding from someone at adistance.

  'It is so, you see. The storks did not return last spring. There was tobe trouble!--there was to be trouble! Ha! here is Pastor Madsen. Else,my beloved Else! here is the good Pastor Madsen. And there, too, isRector Groenlund. Will he observe us? Else, he is deep in his book.Look!' he cried a little shrilly, pointing with a vehemence thatstartled me into following the indication of his shadowy glimmering handdirected into the darkness over the sea. 'It is Kolding LatinSchool--nay, it is Rector Groenlund's parsonage garden. Ah, Rector, youremember me? This is the little Else that your good wife thought theprettiest child in Denmark. And this is Pastor Madsen.'

  He paused, then muttered in Danish, and fell silent.