VI
I TIE UP MY BROKEN HEAD, AND TRY TO ATTRACT ATTENTION
My head was tingling with pain, and so buzzy that I had no sense worthspeaking of, but just kept myself afloat in an instinctive sort of wayby paddling a little with my hands. And I could not see well for whatI thought was water in my eyes--until I found that it was bloodrunning down over my forehead from a gash in my scalp that went fromthe top of my right ear pretty nearly to my crown. Had the blow thatmade it struck fair it certainly would have finished me; but from theway that the scalp was cut loose the blow must have glanced.
The chill of the water freshened me and brought my senses back alittle: for which I was not especially thankful at first, being insuch pain and misery that to drown without knowing much about itseemed quite the best thing that I could hope for just then. Indeed,when I began to think again, though not very clearly, I had half amind to drop my arms to my sides and so go under and have done withit--so despairing was I as I bobbed about on the swell among thepatches of gulf-weed which littered the dark ocean, with the brigdrawing away from me rapidly, and no chance of a rescue from her evenhad she been near at hand.
Whether I had or had not hurried the matter, under I certainly shouldhave gone shortly--for the crack on my head and the loss of blood fromit had taken most of my strength out of me, and even with my fullstrength I could not have kept afloat long--had not a break in theclouds let through a dash of moonlight that gave me another chance. Itwas only for a moment or two that the moonlight lasted, yet longenough for me to make out within a hundred feet of me a biggish pieceof wreckage--which but for that flash I should not have noticed, or inthe dimness would have taken only for a bunch of weed.
Near though it was, getting to it was almost more than I could manage;and when at last I did reach it I was so nearly used up that I barelyhad strength to throw my arms about it and one leg over it, and sohang fast for a good many minutes in a half-swoon of weaknessand pain.
But the feel of something solid under me, and the certainty that for alittle while at least I was safe from drowning, helped me to pullmyself together; and before long some of my strength came back, and alittle of my spirit with it, and I went about settling myself moresecurely on my poor sort of a raft. What I had hit upon, I found, wasa good part of a ship's mast; with the yards still holding fast by itand steadying it, and all so clean-looking that it evidently had notbeen in the water long. The main-top, I saw, would give me a back tolean against and also a little shelter; and in that nook I would bestill more secure because the futtock-shrouds made a sort of cageabout it and gave me something to catch fast to should the swell ofthe sea roll me off. So I worked along the mast from where I first hadcaught hold of it until I got myself stowed away under the main-top:where I had my body fairly out of water, and a chance to rest easilyby leaning against the upstanding woodwork, and a good grip with mylegs to keep me firm. And it is true, though it don't sound so, that Iwas almost happy at finding myself so snug and safe there--as itseemed after having nothing under me but the sea.
And then I set myself--my head hurting me cruelly, and the flow ofblood still bothering me--to see what I could do in the way of bindingup my wound; and made a pretty good job of it, having a big silkhandkerchief in my pocket that I folded into a smooth bandage andpassed over my crown and under my chin--after first dowsing my head inthe cold sea water, which set the cut to smarting like fury but helpedto keep the blood from flowing after the bandage was made fast. Atfirst, while I was paddling in the water and splashing my way alongthe mast and while the bandage was flapping about my ears, I had nochance to hear any noises save those little ones close to me which Iwas making myself. But when I had finished my rough surgery, andleaned back against the top to rest after it--and my heart wasbeginning to sink with the thought of how utterly desperate my casewas, afloat there on the open ocean with a gale coming on--I heard inthe deep silence a faint rythmic sound that I recognized instantly asthe pulsing of a steamer's engine and the steady churning of herscrew. This mere whisper in the darkness was a very little thing tohang a hope upon; but hope did return to me with the conviction thatthe sound came from the steamer of which I had seen the lights justbefore I was pitched overboard, and that I had a chance of her passingnear enough to me to hear my hail.
I peered eagerly over the waters, trying to make out her lights againand so settle how she was heading; but I could see no lights, thoughwith each passing minute the beating of the screw sounded louder to mystraining ears. From that I concluded that she must be coming upbehind me and was hid by the top from me; and so, slowly andpainfully, I managed to get on my hands and knees on the mast, andthen to raise myself until I stood erect and could see over the edgeof the top as it rose like a little wall upright--and gave a weakshout of joy as I saw what I was looking for, the three bright pointsagainst the blackness, not more than a mile away. And I was all themore hopeful because her red and green lights showed full on each sideof the white light on her foremast, and by that I knew that she washeading for me as straight as she could steer.
I gave another little shout--but fainter than the first, for mystruggle to get to my feet, and then to hold myself erect as the swellrolled the mast about, made me weak and a little giddy; and I wantedto keep on shouting--but had the sense not to, that I might save mystrength for the yells that I should have to give when the steamer gotnear enough to me for her people to hear my cries. So I stoodsilent--swaying with the roll of the mast, and with my head throbbinghorribly because of my excitement and the strain of holding onthere--while I watched her bearing down on me; and making her out soplainly as she got closer that it never occurred to me that I and mybit of mast would not be just as plain to her people as her great bulkwas to me.
I don't suppose that she was within a quarter of a mile of me when Ibegan my yelling; but I was too much worked up to wait longer, and theresult of my hurry was to make my voice very hoarse and feeble by thetime that she really was within hail. She came dashing along sostraight for me that I suddenly got into a tremor of fear that shewould run me down; and, indeed, she only cleared me by fifty feet orso--her huge black hull, dotted with the bright lights of her cabinports, sliding past me so close that she seemed to tower right up overme--and I was near to being swamped, so violently was my mast tossedabout by the rush and suck of the water from her big screw. And whileshe hung over me, and until she was gone past me and clear out of allhearing, I yelled and yelled!
At first I could not believe, so sure had I been of my rescue, thatshe had left me; and it was not until she was a good half mile awayfrom me, with only the sound of her screw ripping the water, and afaint gleam of light from her after ports showing through thedarkness, that I realized that she was gone--and then I grew so sickand dizzy that it is a wonder I did not lose my hold altogether andfall off into the sea. Somehow or another I managed to swing myselfdown and to seat myself upon the mast again, with my head fairlysplitting and with my heart altogether gone: and so rested there,shutting my eyes to hide the sight of my hope vanishing, and asdesolate as any man ever was.
Presently, in a dull way, I noticed that I no longer heard the swashof her screw, and rather wondered at her getting out of hearing soquickly; but for fear of still seeing her lights, and so having morepain from her, I still kept my eyes tight closed. And then, all of asudden, I heard quite close by me a hail--and opened my eyes in ahurry to see a light not a hundred feet away from me, and to make outbelow it the loom of a boat moving slowly over the weed-strewn sea.
The shout that I gave saved me, but before it saved me I came near tobeing done for. Such a rush of blood went up into my broken head withthe sudden burst of joy upon me that a dead faint came upon me and Ifell off into the water; and that I was floating when the boat got tome was due to the mere chance that as I dropped away from the mast oneof my arms slipped into the tangle of the futtock-shrouds. But I knewnothing about that, nor about anything else that happened, until wewere half-way back to the steamer and I came to my senses
a little;and very little for a good while longer--except that I was swung up aship's side and there was a good deal of talking going on around me;and then that my clothes were taken off and I was lifted into a softdelightful berth; and then that somebody with gentle hands was bindingup my broken crown.
When this job was finished--which hurt me a good deal, but did notrouse me much--I just fell back upon the soft pillow and went tosleep: with a blessed sense of rest and safety, as I felt the roll ofa whole ship under me again after the short jerk of my mast, and knewthat I was not back on the brig but aboard an honest steamer byhearing and by feeling the strong steady pulsing of her screw.
In the Sargasso Sea Page 6
