The G.A. Henty

by G. A. Henty

  “Wood and iron can’t stand that much longer,” Jack Harvey said; “another hour and I should say there won’t be two planks left together.”

  “It is awful, Jack; I would give all I have in the world if I had not persuaded them to go on board. Keep her off a little more, Watkins.”

  The Seabird passed within a cable’s length of the breakers at the northern end of the reef.

  “Now, lads, take your places at the sheets, ready to haul or let go as I give the word.” So saying, Tom Virtue took his place in the bow, holding on by the forestay.

  The wind was full on the Seabird’s beam as she entered the broken water. Here and there the dark heads of the rocks showed above the water. These were easy enough to avoid, the danger lay in those hidden beneath its surface, and whose position was indicated only by the occasional break of a sea as it passed over them. Every time the Seabird sank on a wave those on board involuntarily held their breath, but the water here was comparatively smooth, the sea having spent its first force upon the outer reef. With a wave of his hand Tom directed the helmsman as to his course, and the little yacht was admirably handled through the dangers.

  “I begin to think we shall do it,” Tom said to Jack Harvey, who was standing close to him. “Another five minutes and we shall be within reach of her.”

  It could be seen now that there was a group of people clustered in the bow of the wreck. Two or three light lines were coiled in readiness for throwing.

  “Now, Watkins,” Tom said, going aft, “make straight for the wreck. I see no broken water between us and them, and possibly there may be deep water under their bow.”

  It was an anxious moment, as, with the sails flattened in, the yawl forged up nearly in the eye of the wind towards the wreck. Her progress was slow, for she was now stemming the current.

  Tom stood with a coil of line in his hand in the bow.

  “You get ready to throw, Jack, if I miss.”

  Nearer and nearer the yacht approached the wreck, until the bowsprit of the latter seemed to stand almost over her. Then Tom threw the line. It fell over the bowsprit, and a cheer broke from those on board the wreck and from the sailors of the Seabird. A stronger line was at once fastened to that thrown, and to this a strong hawser was attached.

  “Down with the helm, Watkins. Now, lads, lower away the trysail as fast as you can. Now, one of you, clear that hawser as they haul on it. Now out with the anchors.”

  These had been got into readiness; it was not thought that they would get any hold on the rocky bottom, still they might catch on a projecting ledge, and at any rate their weight and that of the chain cable would relieve the strain upon the hawser.

  Two sailors had run out on the bowsprit of the wreck as soon as the line was thrown, and the end of the hawser was now on board the steamer.

  “Thank God, there’s Grantham!” Jack Harvey exclaimed; “do you see him waving his hand?”

  “I see him,” Tom said, “but I don’t see the ladies.”

  “They are there, no doubt,” Jack said confidently; “crouching down, I expect. He would not be there if they weren’t, you may be sure. Yes, there they are; those two muffled up figures. There, one of them has thrown back her cloak and is waving her arm.”

  The two young men waved their caps.

  “Are the anchors holding, Watkins? There’s a tremendous strain on that hawser.”

  “I think so, sir; they are both tight.”

  “Put them round the windlass, and give a turn or two, we must relieve the strain on that hawser.”

  Since they had first seen the wreck the waves had made great progress in the work of destruction, and the steamer had broken in two just aft of the engines.

  “Get over the spare spars, Watkins, and fasten them to float in front of her bows like a triangle. Matthews, catch hold of that boat hook and try to fend off any piece of timber that comes along. You get hold of the sweeps, lads, and do the same. They would stave her in like a nutshell if they struck her.”

  “Thank God, here comes the first of them!”

  Those on board the steamer had not been idle. As soon as the yawl was seen approaching slings were prepared, and no sooner was the hawser securely fixed, than the slings were attached to it and a woman placed in them. The hawser was tight and the descent sharp, and without a check the figure ran down to the deck of the Seabird. She was lifted out of the slings by Tom and Jack Harvey, who found she was an old woman and had entirely lost consciousness.

  “Two of you carry her down below; tell Johnson to pour a little brandy down her throat. Give her some hot soup as soon as she comes to.”

  Another woman was lowered and helped below. The next to descend was Mrs. Grantham.

  “Thank God, you are rescued!” Tom said, as he helped her out of the sling.

  “Thank God, indeed,” Mrs. Grantham said, “and thank you all! Oh, Tom, we have had a terrible time of it, and had lost all hope till we saw your sail, and even then the captain said that he was afraid nothing could be done. Minnie was the first to make out it was you, and then we began to hope. She has been so brave, dear girl. Ah! here she comes.”

  But Minnie’s firmness came to an end now that she felt the need for it was over. She was unable to stand when she was lifted from the slings, and Tom carried her below.

  “Are there any more women, Mrs. Grantham?”

  “No; there was only one other lady passenger and the stewardess.”

  “Then you had better take possession of your own cabin. I ordered Johnson to spread a couple more mattresses and some bedding on the floor, so you will all four be able to turn in. There’s plenty of hot coffee and soup. I should advise soup with two or three spoonfuls of brandy in it. Now, excuse me; I must go upon deck.”

  Twelve men descended by the hawser, one of them with both legs broken by the fall of the mizzen. The last to come was the captain.

  “Is that all?” Tom asked.

  “That is all,” the captain said. “Six men were swept overboard when she first struck, and two were killed by the fall of the funnel. Fortunately we had only three gentlemen passengers and three ladies on board. The weather looked so wild when we started that no one else cared about making the passage. God bless you, sir, for what you have done! Another half hour and it would have been all over with us. But it seems like a miracle your getting safe through the rocks to us.”

  “It was fortunate indeed that we came along,” Tom said; “three of the passengers are dear friends of mine; and as it was by my persuasion that they came across in the steamer instead of in the yacht, I should never have forgiven myself if they had been lost. Take all your men below, captain; you will find plenty of hot soup there. Now, Watkins, let us be off; that steamer won’t hold together many minutes longer, so there’s no time to lose. We will go back as we came. Give me a hatchet. Now, lads, two of you stand at the chain cables; knock out the shackles the moment I cut the hawser. Watkins, you take the helm and let her head pay off till the jib fills. Jack, you lend a hand to the other two, and get up the trysail again as soon as we are free.”

  In a moment all were at their stations. The helm was put on the yacht, and she payed off on the opposite tack to that on which she had before been sailing. As soon as the jib filled, Tom gave two vigorous blows with his hatchet on the hawser, and, as he lifted his hand for a third, it parted. Then came the sharp rattle of the chains as they ran round the hawser holes. The trysail was hoisted and sheeted home, and the Seabird was under way again. Tom, as before, conned the ship from the bow. Several times she was in close proximity to the rocks, but each time she avoided them. A shout of gladness rose from all on deck as she passed the last patch of white water. Then she tacked and bore away for Jersey.

  Tom had now time to go down below and look after his passengers. They consisted of the captain and two sailors—the sole survivors of those who had been on deck when the vessel struck—three male passengers, and six engineers and stokers.

  “I have not had time to
shake you by the hand before, Tom,” Grantham said, as Tom Virtue entered; “and I thought you would not want me on deck at present. God bless you, old fellow! We all owe you our lives.”

  “How did it happen, captain?” Tom asked, as the captain also came up to him.

  “It was the currents, I suppose,” the captain said; “it was so thick we could not see a quarter of a mile any way. The weather was so wild I would not put into Guernsey, and passed the island without seeing it. I steered my usual course, but the gale must have altered the currents, for I thought I was three miles away from the reef, when we saw it on our beam, not a hundred yards away. It was too late to avoid it then, and in another minute we ran upon it, and the waves were sweeping over us. Everyone behaved well. I got all, except those who had been swept overboard or crushed by the funnel, up into the bow of the ship, and there we waited. There was nothing to be done. No boat would live for a moment in the sea on that reef, and all I could advise was that when she went to pieces everyone should try to get hold of a floating fragment; but I doubt whether a man would have been alive a quarter of an hour after she went to pieces.”

  “Perhaps, captain, you will come on deck with me and give me the benefit of your advice. My skipper and I know the islands pretty well, but no doubt you know them a good deal better, and I don’t want another mishap.”

  But the Seabird avoided all further dangers, and as it became dark the lights of St. Helier’s were in sight, and an hour later the yacht brought up in the port and landed her involuntary passengers.

  A fortnight afterwards the Seabird returned to England, and two months later Mrs. Grantham had the satisfaction of being present at the ceremony which was the successful consummation of her little scheme in inviting Minnie Graham to be her companion on board the Seabird.

  “Well, my dear,” her husband said, when she indulged in a little natural triumph, “I do not say that it has not turned out well, and I am heartily glad for both Tom and Minnie’s sake it has so; but you must allow that it very nearly had a disastrous ending, and I think if I were you I should leave matters to take their natural course in future. I have accepted Tom’s invitation for the same party to take a cruise in the Seabird next summer, but I have bargained that next time a storm is brewing up we shall stop quietly in port.”

  “That’s all very well, James,” Mrs. Grantham said saucily; “but you must remember that Tom Virtue will only be first mate of the Seabird in future.”

  “That I shall be able to tell you better, my dear, after our next cruise. All husbands are not as docile and easily led as I am.”

  A PIPE OF MYSTERY

  A jovial party were gathered round a blazing fire in an old grange near Warwick. The hour was getting late; the very little ones had, after dancing round the Christmas tree, enjoying the snapdragon, and playing a variety of games, gone off to bed; and the elder boys and girls now gathered round their uncle, Colonel Harley, and asked him for a story—above all, a ghost story.

  “But I have never seen any ghosts,” the colonel said, laughing; “and, moreover, I don’t believe in them one bit. I have traveled pretty well all over the world, I have slept in houses said to be haunted, but nothing have I seen—no noises that could not be accounted for by rats or the wind have I ever heard. I have never “—and here he paused—“never but once met with any circumstances or occurrence that could not be accounted for by the light of reason, and I know you prefer hearing stories of my own adventures to mere invention.”

  “Yes, uncle. But what was the ‘once’ when circumstances happened that you could not explain?”

  “It’s rather a long story,” the colonel said, “and it’s getting late.”

  “Oh! no, no, uncle; it does not matter a bit how late we sit up on Christmas Eve, and the longer the story is, the better; and if you don’t believe in ghosts how can it be a story of something you could not account for by the light of nature?”

  “You will see when I have done,” the colonel said. “It is rather a story of what the Scotch call second sight, than one of ghosts. As to accounting for it, you shall form your own opinion when you have heard me to the end.

  “I landed in India in ’50, and after going through the regular drill work marched with a detachment up country to join my regiment, which was stationed at Jubbalpore, in the very heart of India. It has become an important place since; the railroad across India passes through it and no end of changes have taken place; but at that time it was one of the most out of the way stations in India, and, I may say, one of the most pleasant. It lay high, there was capital boating on the Nerbudda, and, above all, it was a grand place for sport, for it lay at the foot of the hill country, an immense district, then but little known, covered with forests and jungle, and abounding with big game of all kinds.

  “My great friend there was a man named Simmonds. He was just of my own standing; we had come out in the same ship, had marched up the country together, and were almost like brothers. He was an old Etonian, I an old Westminster, and we were both fond of boating, and, indeed, of sport of all kinds. But I am not going to tell you of that now. The people in these hills are called Gonds, a true hill tribe—that is to say, aborigines. The chiefs are of mixed blood, but the people are almost black. They are supposed to accept the religion of the Hindus, but are in reality deplorably ignorant and superstitious. Their priests are a sort of compound of a Brahmin priest and a African fetish man, and among their principal duties is that of charming away tigers from the villages by means of incantations. There, as in other parts of India, were a few wandering fakirs, who enjoyed an immense reputation for holiness and wisdom. The people would go to them from great distances for charms or predictions, and believed in their power with implicit faith.

  “At the time when we were at Jubbalpore there was one of these fellows whose reputation altogether eclipsed that of his rivals, and nothing could be done until his permission had been asked and his blessing obtained. All sorts of marvelous stories were constantly coming to our ears of the unerring foresight with which he predicted the termination of diseases, both in men and animals; and so generally was he believed in that the colonel ordered that no one connected with the regiment should consult him, for these predictions very frequently brought about their own fulfillment; for those who were told that an illness would terminate fatally, lost all hope, and literally lay down to die.

  “However, many of the stories that we heard could not be explained on these grounds, and the fakir and his doings were often talked over at mess, some of the officers scoffing at the whole business, others maintaining that some of these fakirs had, in some way or another, the power of foretelling the future, citing many well authenticated anecdotes upon the subject.

  “The older officers were the believers, we young fellows were the scoffers. But for the well known fact that it is very seldom indeed that these fakirs will utter any of their predictions to Europeans, some of us would have gone to him to test his powers. As it was, none of us had ever seen him.

  “He lived in an old ruined temple, in the middle of a large patch of jungle at the foot of the hills, some ten or twelve miles away.

  “I had been at Jubbalpore about a year, when I was woke up one night by a native, who came in to say that at about eight o’clock a tiger had killed a man in his village, and had dragged off the body.

  “Simmonds and I were constantly out after tigers, and the people in all the villages within twenty miles knew that we were always ready to pay for early information. This tiger had been doing great damage, and had carried off about thirty men, women, and children. So great was the fear of him, indeed, that the people in the neighborhood he frequented scarcely dared stir out of doors, except in parties of five or six. We had had several hunts after him, but, like all man eaters, he was old and awfully crafty; and although we got several snap shots at him, he had always managed to save his skin.

  “In a quarter of an hour after the receipt of the message Charley Simmonds and I were on the back
of an elephant which was our joint property; our shikaree, a capital fellow, was on foot beside us, and with the native trotting on ahead as guide we went off at the best pace of old Begaum, for that was the elephant’s name. The village was fifteen miles away, but we got there soon after daybreak, and were received with delight by the population. In half an hour the hunt was organized; all the male population turned out as beaters, with sticks, guns, tom-toms, and other instruments for making a noise.

  “The trail was not difficult to find. A broad path, with occasional smears of blood, showed where he had dragged his victim through the long grass to a cluster of trees a couple of hundred yards from the village.

  “We scarcely expected to find him there, but the villagers held back, while we went forward with cocked rifles. We found, however, nothing but a few bones and a quantity of blood. The tiger had made off at the approach of daylight into the jungle, which was about two miles distant. We traced him easily enough, and found that he had entered a large ravine, from which several smaller ones branched off.

  “It was an awkward place, as it was next to impossible to surround it with the number of people at our command. We posted them at last all along the upper ground, and told them to make up in noise what they wanted in numbers. At last all was ready, and we gave the signal. However, I am not telling you a hunting story, and need only say that we could neither find nor disturb him. In vain we pushed Begaum through the thickest of the jungle which clothed the sides and bottom of the ravine, while the men shouted, beat their tom-toms, and showered imprecations against the tiger himself and his ancestors up to the remotest generations.

  “The day was tremendously hot, and, after three hours’ march, we gave it up for a time, and lay down in the shade, while the shikarees made a long examination of the ground all round the hillside, to be sure that he had not left the ravine. They came back with the news that no traces could be discovered, and that, beyond a doubt, he was still there. A tiger will crouch up in an exceedingly small clump of grass or bush, and will sometimes almost allow himself to be trodden on before moving. However, we determined to have one more search, and if that should prove unsuccessful, to send off to Jubbalpore for some more of the men to come out with elephants, while we kept up a circle of fires, and of noises of all descriptions, so as to keep him a prisoner until the arrival of the reinforcements. Our next search was no more successful than our first had been; and having, as we imagined, examined every clump and crevice in which he could have been concealed, we had just reached the upper end of the ravine, when we heard a tremendous roar, followed by a perfect babel of yells and screams from the natives.