“I will not go—I will—not!” Heloise screamed and now her voice was completely hysterical.
Lydia looked towards the Earl.
“I think you will have to carry her.”
Still without saying anything he handed her the lantern and picked Heloise up in his arms.
For a moment she tried to struggle against him, then half-sobbing, half-screaming, she put her face against his shoulder.
He carried her out into the passage and walking behind them Lydia lighted the way.
As she passed her cabin door she realised she was wearing only the nightgown in which she had slept.
As if the Earl was aware of it at the same time he said:
“Put on a thick coat and follow as quickly as you can.”
For a moment Lydia hesitated, thinking that it might be difficult for him to reach the companion-way in the dark.
Then she saw lights at the top of it and knew that other people on the ship were carrying lanterns.
The ship gave a lurch as she entered her cabin and almost threw her to the floor, but she managed to prop the lantern up on the dressing-table before she reached for the wardrobe.
Now the ship was rolling so badly that she thought it would be a mistake to linger, and instead of finding her coat she merely took a blanket off the bed and threw it over her shoulders.
She picked up the lantern again and went back into the passage.
She could see ahead that the Earl with Heloise in his arms had just reached the top of the companionway.
She was about to follow him when she heard a voice calling:
“Help! Help!”
She paused on the bottom step wondering if she should go on, then again there was a faint cry for help.
Holding the lantern high to illuminate as much ground as possible she moved a little way down the passage and saw there was somebody lying on the ground.
“Please—help me!” a young voice cried.
Now by the light of the lantern swinging in her hand she saw it was one of the midshipmen.
“Are you hurt?” she asked.
“I think I have—broken my—leg.”
He spoke bravely but she could see there were tears of pain in his eyes.
“I was running to warn His Lordship of the fire in the Engine Room, as I had been ordered to do,” he said, “but I—slipped.”
“Perhaps it is only a bad sprain,” Lydia said, “but you will have to be carried up on deck. I will find somebody.”
She turned to go towards the companion-way, but as she did so the boy asked:
“You will not forget about me?”
He sounded like a frightened child, and she replied: “I promise I would not do that.”
For a moment the ship seemed a little more steady although she was sure the wind was whipping the waves up into a tempest.
Then as she reached the bottom step she saw the Earl coming down obviously in search of her.
“Come along!” he said. “I was worried about why you were taking so long.”
He reached her as he spoke and she replied:
“One of the midshipmen has broken his leg. He cannot walk, and if he is left here he may be forgotten.”
She looked at the Earl pleadingly as she spoke and thought he hesitated for a moment before he said: “Your father and Heloise are already in the boat and they are waiting for you.”
“Please come to carry the boy,” she said quickly. “He is in great pain and unable to move.”
The Earl did not argue, and as she was already hurrying back towards the midshipman, he followed her.
“Here is somebody to help you,” Lydia said cheerfully.
The Earl bent down and picked the boy up in his arms.
“I am going to carry you in a ‘Fireman’s lift,”’ he said, “because it is easier.”
He put him over his shoulder, his head down his back.
Then because the ship was rolling again the Earl steadied himself with his hand on the wall before he reached the railing of the companion-way.
He went up it quickly and Lydia following thought how strong he was, but she found it difficult and wished she had taken a little longer to find her coat. As it was, the blanket trailed onto the ground, and she found it impossible to lift it out of the way and at the same time hold onto the railing and the lantern. When she reached the top of the stairway she found that the Earl had already disappeared on the deck with the boy over his shoulder and there were lanterns hanging from hooks on the walls.
There was therefore no need for her to carry hers any further and as she handed it to the first sailor she saw, he said:
“Hurry up. Miss! Get into one of the boats as quickly as you can!”
Lydia walked unsteadily towards the door that led out onto the deck and the moment she stepped out she felt as if the wind swept her off her feet.
For a moment it was impossible to see anything except the waves that were illuminated by the moonlight, and seemed as they broke over the side of the ship determined to sink her.
The decks were awash, but now Lydia realised there was a light coming from the ship itself and that it was the light of the flames that had started in the Engine Room.
As she looked at it holding onto the doorway she saw the Earl coming towards her and realised the boat into which he had put the midshipman was already being lowered down the side of the ship into the sea. He reached her and said sharply:
“Why did you take so long? You should have gone in that boat!”
“I am sorry,” Lydia said humbly.
“There is another one,” he said, “and this time I do not intend you to be left behind.”
As he spoke he took her arm and led her along the deck to where the sailors were lowering another lifeboat.
The officer saw them and turned to say:
“Please hurry, M’Lord. We’re having difficulty in this sea.”
He spoke quite calmly and the Earl replied:
“We are doing our best, Officer.”
As he spoke a wave splashed over the rails and covered both him and Lydia with spray.
She felt the salt water running down her face, and as it was also in her eyes it was hard to see.
The Earl dragged her forward and a moment later she was lifted up and placed in the boat.
She wanted to put out her hands to hold onto him and beg him to come too.
Then to her relief she heard the officer say:
“Get in, M’Lord. We cannot take to the boats ourselves until all our passengers are accounted for.” The Earl climbed in sitting down beside Lydia and, as if it were the most natural thing to do, he put his arm around her and held her close to him.
Then in what seemed to her only a very few seconds the boat was full and lowered into the sea.
As they reached the water they were soaked by the spray and the boat itself was plunging up and down in what Lydia thought was a terrifying manner.
Yet because she was beside the Earl and his arm was holding her, she was not really frightened. She knew however, that by this time Heloise would be frantic and was doubtless still screaming.
The sailors pulled away from the ship, rowing strongly, but at the same time finding it extremely difficult to hold the boat in any degree of steadiness in such a violent sea.
More and more waves splashed over them, and as Lydia saw one of the seamen start bailing out the water which was rising round their feet the Earl asked:
“Can you swim?”
“Yes,” Lydia replied, “but I have never swum in a sea as rough as this.”
“Let us hope it will not be necessary,” he said in a low voice, “but if we do have to take to the water hold onto me, and I will look after you.”
It was what she wanted to hear, and it flashed through her mind that if they were drowned together she would not mind because she would not be alone.
At the same time she wanted to live, and she was sure that the Earl would survive because, as she had thought
before, he was always the victor, the conqueror, a man who always won through whatever the odds against him.
It was impossible to see at all far, for although there was a moon overhead the light from it was intermittent.
At the same time the wind was so strong that Lydia felt as if as it beat against her face it blew her hair high into the air, and distorted everything.
The Earl looked back and Lydia also turning her head could now see the ship heaving up and down, the centre of it brilliant with the light from the fire, the flames leaping up against the darkness.
“How could this have happened?” she asked in a low voice.
The wind almost swept the words from her lips, but the Earl heard them.
“She is an old ship,” he said. “It will be difficult to save her.”
The boat they were in was swamped again by a huge wave.
Then as the officer gave sharp orders one after another, a wave that seemed to loom up above them like an avenging angel crashed down into the little boat so that the men rowing could do nothing but duck their heads as it fell on them.
In that moment the boat went out of control and almost before Lydia could realise what was happening she found herself tipped into the sea and its coldness engulfed her.
She came up gasping and felt the Earl’s hand reach out towards her.
“Hold onto me!” he said sharply. “The shore is not far ahead.”
She clutched at his coat and started to swim, striking out with her legs.
Her blanket had floated away and she felt relieved that she was wearing nothing but her nightgown which made it easier for her to swim.
Then there was another wave and she felt as if she was going down into the very depths of the ocean.
She came up again and thought she must be in the surf that beat against the beaches of Hawaii.
Before she even had time to breathe, another wave struck her so hard that it carried her a long way forward and she felt something strike her forehead.
Then there was nothing but darkness ...
Lydia came back to consciousness slowly, and it took a little while before she was aware that she was lying on her back and there was sunshine.
For a moment she could not understand what had happened. Then she remembered.
Slowly she put her hand up to her forehead and found a place near her hair which hurt when she touched it.
Then as her memory told her that the ship had been on fire and the boat in which they had left it had overturned, she opened her eyes.
Above her she saw the waving green leaves of a palm-tree and knew she was lying on the sand.
She put her hand down as if to reassure herself it was not the water, then very slowly and with difficulty she sat up.
For a moment she thought she must be dreaming.
After the agony of the night, the roughness of the sea and the violence of the waves, she could hardly believe that just in front of her, now placidly lapping the shore, was the sea.
It was smooth and golden from the sun, with only a faint hint of foam as it moved gently in and out with a musical sound.
“It cannot be true!” Lydia told herself.
Then some distance out to sea she could see the grey outline of HMS Victorious.
The ship was still afloat, the fire was no longer burning, and she thought, although she could not be sure, that there was movement on the deck.
Now she looked about her and saw she was on the shore of a small sandy bay.
She had been lying in the shelter of some palm-trees, and behind her was the wild vegetation of the jungle.
It was certainly very beautiful with hibiscus flowering everywhere, as well as blossoms of yellow, pink, blue, cerise, orange and red, and dozens of other shades which she knew from her books must be the fragrant plumerias.
They were so lovely that she could only sit looking at them, finding it was hard to believe that they really existed apart from her imagination.
There were poinsettias and jacara, and a dozen other species she thought she recognised. Then suddenly as she stared in amazement, feeling because her head hurt her, bewildered and disorientated, she was aware that she was alone.
She had been so relieved in the first moments of regaining consciousness that she had only thought of how she had reached here and not who had been with her.
Now with a stab of her heart, she looked around, hoping that if she was here the Earl would be here too, and perhaps he was lying somewhere near on the sand.
But there was no one and the only sound was of the birds singing in the trees and bushes.
“Where can he be?” Lydia asked herself.
Then with a knife-pain that seemed to strike through her she was suddenly afraid.
It had not before struck her that though she was alive, he might be drowned.
Now she struggled to her feet, feeling that she must go and look for him and wondering frantically where he could be.
Then an agony of fear ran through her veins like a poison and made her think that perhaps after she had struck something which had rendered her unconscious he had saved her life and in doing so, lost his own.
“Oh, God, do not let that have happened!” she prayed. “He must be ... safe, he must ... be!”
She looked around wildly, staring out to sea as if she felt she might see his body floating in it.
Then she tried to search in the thickness of the vegetation, but knew she could not force her way through the bushes, to look for him.
Then commonsense told her that he would not be likely to be hiding from her in the jungle, and if he was not in this bay, perhaps the sea had carried him further along the coast.
“I must find him! I must!”
She pushed back her hair from her forehead and realised that it was quite dry which told her she must have been on the beach for a long time.
Anyway, it was now early in the morning, and the sun was coming up the sky.
Although she had no means of knowing whether or not she was right, she guessed it was perhaps five o’clock or a little earlier.
Her legs felt weak and she knew that her whole body ached from the effort of swimming in a rough sea and being buffeted about as if she was nothing more than a piece of driftwood.
She knew she had to search for the Earl and the only decision she had to make was in which direction she should start looking.
As she took her first steps over the sand she saw coming round the trees at the very edge of the bay the tall figure of a man.
For a moment because she found it difficult to focus her eyes she had no idea who it could be.
She only saw that he was naked to the waist and it flashed through her mind that he might be an Hawaiian, and perhaps he was hostile as the Hawaiian Warners had been to Captain Cook.
Then with a little cry of joy she saw that it was the Earl.
Without thinking, without considering, she ran towards him, speeding over the sand, forgetting everything but the wonder of knowing that he was safe.
She reached him with her arms outstretched and flung herself against him crying incoherently:
“You are ... alive! Oh, thank God ... you are ... alive!”
He caught her in his arms, then as she looked up at him her eyes and her whole face radiant because she had found him, his lips came down on hers.
It was no shock.
It was as if it was inevitable, ordained from the beginning of time, that after the horror through which she had passed he should come to her unharmed when she thought she had lost him.
She felt his lips hold her captive, and because it was everything she had longed for and thought she would never know, she surrendered herself to a rapture that enveloped her like a burning light.
She felt a streak of ecstasy seep through her so poignant, so sharp, that it was almost a pain as well as a rapture.
He kissed her until she felt as if she merged into him and was no longer herself.
He raised his head to look down
at her for a moment. Then he was kissing her again, kissing her with long, slow demanding kisses which made her thrill with sensations she had never known existed.
She only knew she had reached Paradise and that nothing else existed but the Earl’s arms, his lips and him.
Only when Lydia felt that nobody could know such glory and not die with the wonder of it did she give a little murmur and hide her face against his shoulder, “I thought you were ... dead!” she murmured. “I ... I thought I had ... lost you!”
“I am alive, my precious,” the Earl said, “and so are you!”
He put his hand under her chin and turned her face up to his.
He kissed her gently in a way that was different from the possessive demands of his lips before,
“I was so ... afraid,” Lydia whispered.
His arms tightened around her and he said: “Come and sit down, my darling. We shall be rescued later, but now I want to make sure that you are not hurt in any way.”
“I am ... all right.”
She could hardly speak.
All she knew was that her love enveloped them both with a radiance that made it impossible to think of anything else except that she was close to the man she had loved for so long, and he had kissed her.
As if he knew what she was feeling he said quietly: “How could I help it, when it is what I have wanted to do for so long?”
“You ... wanted to ... kiss me?”
“Of course I wanted to kiss you!” he said fiercely.
“But...”
“I know, I know,” he interrupted, “there are so many ‘buts,’ so many things to come between us.”
“But...” Lydia murmured again.
The Earl drew her to the foot of a plumeria tree, and they sat beneath it with its blossoms, in this case of pale pink, dropping down on them like blessings from above.
He put his arms around Lydia and as she moved closer to him she became aware that he was nearly naked.
He had nothing on except his trousers and she supposed he must have found his coat cumbersome when swimming and had shrugged it off when they were fighting against the overwhelming waves that had eventually carried them to the shore.
The Island of Love (Camfield Series No. 15) Page 9
