The subject of these remarks was seated a few feet away, his arms folded, while he was looking with a vague, dreamy expression out upon the great Pacific, stretching so many thousand miles beyond them, rolling far off in each direction, until sky and ocean blended in great gloom.
“Maybe he is looking for Asia,” laughed Elwood in an undertone.
“More likely he is hoping to get a glimpse of Ireland, for he would be as likely to look in that direction as any other. I say, Tim!”
The Irishman did not heed the call until he was addressed the second time in a louder tone than before, when he suddenly raised his head.
“Whisht! what is it?”
“What are you thinking about?”
“Nothin’, I was dreaming.”
“Dreaming! what about?”
“Begorrah but that was a qua’r dream, was that same one.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“But it’s onplaiasnt.”
“Never mind, out with it.”
“Well, thin, if I must tell yees, I was thinking that this owld staamer was all on fire, and all of us passengers was jumping around in the wather, pulling each other down, away miles into the sea, till we was gone so long there wasn’t a chance iver to git up agin.”
A strange fear thrilled both of the boys at the mention of this, and they looked at each other a moment in silence.
“What put that into your head, Tim?”
“And it’s just the question I was axing meself, for I never draamed of such a thing in my life before, and it’s mighty qua’r that I should take a notion to do it now.”
“It ain’t worth talking about,” said Elwood, showing an anxiety to change the subject.
“Be yees going to bed tonight?”
“I don’t feel a bit sleepy,” replied Elwood. “I’d just as soon sit up half the night as not.”
“And so would I; it must be after eleven o’clock, isn’t it?”
“It’s near ’levin,” replied Tim. “I’m not able to examine me watch; and if I was, I couldn’t tell very well, as it hasn’t run for a few months.”
Howard took out his watch, but the moonlight was too faint for him to distinguish the hands, and the three were content to let the precise time remain a matter of conjecture.
“Tim, how close are we to land?” asked Elwood.
“I should say about the same distance that the land is from us, and begorrah that’s the best information I can give yees.”
“I could see the mountains very plainly when the sun was setting,” said Howard, “and it cannot be many miles away.”
“What sort of a country is it off here?” pursued Elwood, pointing in the direction of the land.
“It is wild and rocky, and there are plenty of Indians and wild animals there.”
“How do you know?” asked Elwood, in some amazement.
“I have taken the trouble to learn all about California that I could before coming.”
“I believe they have gold there?” said Elwood, in rather a bantering vein.
“Tim can tell you more about that than I can, as he came to California to hunt gold.”
“How is that, Tim?”
“Begorrah, but he shpakes the truth. I wint up among the mountains to hunt gowld.”
“And what luck had you?”
“Luck, is it?” repeated the Irishman, with an expression of ludicrous disgust. “Luck, does ye call it, to have your head cracked and your shins smashed by the copper-skins, chawed up by the b’ars, froze to death in the mountains, drowned in the rivers—that run into the top of yer shanty when yer sound asleep—your feet gnawed off by wolverines, as they call—and—but whisht! don’t talk to me of luck, and all the time ye never gets a sight of a particle of gowld.”
The boys laughed, Howard said:
“But your luck is not every one’s, Tim; there have been plenty who have made fortunes at the business.”
“Yis, but they wasn’t Tim O’Rooneys. He’s not the man that was born to be rich!”
“You’re better satisfied where you are.”
“Yis, thank God, that I’ve such a good home, and an ongrateful dog would I baa if I should ask more.”
“But, Elwood, it’s getting late, and this night air begins to feel chilly. It can’t be far from midnight.”
“I am willing; where’s Terror? Ah! here he is; old fellow, come along and keep faithful watch over your friends.”
“Boys,” said Tim O’Rooney, with a strange, husky intonation, “you remember my dream about this steamer burning?”
“Yes; what of it?”
“It is coming thrue!”
He spoke the truth!
CHAPTER III
Afloat
As Tim O’Rooney spoke, he pointed to the bow of the steamer, where, in the bright moonlight, some smoke could be seen rising—where, too, the next instant, they caught sight of a gleam of fire.
“Oh, heaven! what shall we do?” exclaimed Elwood, struck with a panic.
“Wait and trust to Providence.”
“Let us jump overboard; I’d rather be drowned than burned to death. Come, Howard, let’s jump over this minute!”
He made a move toward the stern of the steamer, near which they had been seated, as if he intended to spring overboard, when his arm was sternly caught by the Irishman, who said in an indignant tone:
“Kaap cool! kaap cool! don’t make a fool of yoursilf. Can ye swim?”
“Yes,” answered Howard, “we can both swim very well. Can you?”
“Indaad, I can—swim like a stone.”
“But good heavens!” exclaimed Elwood, who had not entirely recovered from his excitement, “the land is miles off, and we can’t swim there, not taking into account the heavy sea.”
“What does that mean?”
As Howard spoke, the bow of the steamer made a sweeping bend to the right.
“They’ve headed toward shore,” said Elwood.
This snatch of conversation had occupied the shortest possible space of time. The fire had been discovered by the officials on board fully as soon as by our friends, and the men could be seen running hurriedly to and fro, all quiet and still, for they knew too well what the result would be if the alarm was communicated to the sleeping passengers. The pilot had headed the vast craft toward land, and by the furious throbbing of the engines it could be seen that the doomed vessel was straining to the utmost, like some affrighted, faithful horse striving to carry his master as nearly as possible to the port of safely ere he dropped down and died.
It was fully midnight, and, as a matter of course, very nearly all the passengers were in their berths. There were a few, however, who were lingering on the promenade deck, some smoking—here and there a couple of lovers all unconscious of everything else—one or two avaricious speculators; and but a few minutes could elapse before the startling danger should become known.
The last words, which we have given as spoken by our friends, had scarcely been said, when a man, who apparently had been stretched out sound asleep, suddenly sprung up, wild with terror. “The boat is on fire! fire! fire!”
He darted hither and thither like some wild animal compassed on every hand by death, and then suddenly made a leap overboard, and was swallowed up in the sea.
The alarm spread with fearful rapidity, and was soon ringing through every part of the steamer, and now began that fearful confusion and panic which no pen can clearly picture, and which, once seen, can never be forgotten to the dying day.
Our three friends were gathered at the stern of the steamer, earnestly and anxiously discussing the best course to pursue.
“Let’s stay here,” said Howard, “for every second is taking us nearer land.”
“That is what nearly all will do,” said Elwood, “but we can never reach the shore, and when the time comes we shall all be in the sea together, struggling and sinking, and we shall then be sure to go down.”
“Yez are right,” said Tim, addressing the las
t speaker. “Our only chance is to jump overboard this very minute, before the sea is full of the poor fellows. They’ll begin to go over the ship’s side and will kaap it up until the thing is burned up.”
“It’s time then that we hunted our life-preservers,” said Howard.
“Git out wid yer life-presarvers!” impatiently exclaimed Tim. “Didn’t me uncle wear one of ’em for six months, and then die with the faver! I’ll heave over one of these settaas, and that’ll kaap up afloat.”
“Be quick about it, Tim,” urged Elwood, who was beginning to get nervous. “See, the fire is spreading, and everybody seems to have found out what the matter is.”
There was indeed no time to be lost. The steamer was doomed beyond all possibility of salvation, and must soon become unmanageable, when everything would be turned into a pandemonium. One of the large settees was wrenched loose and lifted over the stern of the steamer.
“Now,” said Tim, “the minute it goes over yez must follow. The owld staamer is going like a straak of lightning, and if aither of yez wait, he’ll be lift behind.”
“All right, no danger, go ahead!”
They now clambered up, and sat poised on the stern. In this fearful position Tim O’Rooney held the settee balanced for a few minutes.
“Be yez riddy?”
“Yes.”
“Do yez jump a little to the right, Elwood, and yez a little to the left, Howard, so as not to hit the owld thing. All riddy; here we go!”
The next moment the three were spinning down through the air, and struck the water. They went below the surface, the boys sinking quite a distance; but almost instantly they arose and struck bravely out.
“Tim, where are you?” called out Elwood, not seeing his friend.
“Here, to the left,” responded the Irishman, as he rose on a huge swell. “Can ye swim to me?”
“I hope so, but my clothes bother me like creation.”
Strange! that not one of the three had once thought of removing their superfluous clothing before jumping into the ocean. But Elwood was a fine swimmer, and he struggled bravely, although at a great disadvantage, until his outstretched hand was seized by the Irishman, and he then caught hold of the settee and rested himself.
“Where is Howard?” he asked, panting from his exertions.
“Here he is,” responded Howard himself. “I struck the water so close that when I came up my hand hit the settee.”
“I tell you what it is,” said Elwood. “We ought to have brought something else with us beside this. We have got to keep all of our bodies underwater for this to bear us.”
“And what of it?”
“Suppose some poor fellow claims a part. Gracious! here comes a man this minute!”
“We can’t turn him off,” said Tim, “but this owld horse has all the grist he can carry.”
A dark body could be seen struggling and rapidly approaching them.
“Whoever he is, he is a good swimmer,” remarked Howard, watching the stranger.
“Of course he is, for it comes natural; don’t you see it isn’t a man, but old Terror.”
“Thank heaven for that! we never thought about him. I am glad he is with us.”
The next moment the Newfoundland placed his paw on the settee and gave a low bark to announce his joy at being among his friends. The sagacious brute seemed to understand how frail the tenure was that held them all suspended over eternity; for he did nothing more than rest the top of his paw on the precious raft.
CHAPTER IV
A Passenger
By this time our friends were a quarter of a mile in the rear of the burning steamer. The furious pulsations of the engines had stopped, and from stern to stern the great ship was one mass of soothing flame. The light threw a glare upon the clouds above, and made it so bright where our friends were floating in the water that they could have read the pages of a printed book. The illumination must have been seen for many and many a mile in every direction upon the Pacific.
“Yes, the steamer has stopped,” said Howard; “the fire has reached the engines, and now they must do as we have done.”
“But they have boats and may escape.”
“Not half enough of them; and then what they have got will be seized by the crew, as they always do at such times.”
“Look! you can see them jumping over. The poor wretches hang fast till they are so scorched that they have to let go.”
“It’s mighty lucky yees are here,” said Tim, “for every mother’s son that can swim will be hugged by a half-dozen that can’t, which would be bad for me.”
“Why so; can’t you swim?”
“Not a bit of it.”
“And nothing but this bench to keep us from sinking.”
“And be the same towken isn’t that good enough, if it only kaaps us afloat? Can’t ye be satisfied?”
“Look! how grand!”
It was indeed a fearful sight, the steamer being one pyramid of roaring, blazing fire, sweeping upward in great fan-like rifts, then blowing outward, horizontally across the deep, as if greedy for the poor beings who had sprung in agony from its embrace. Millions of sparks were floating and drifting overhead and falling all around. The shrieks of the despairing passengers, as with their clothes all aflame they sprung blindly into the ocean, could be heard by our friends, and must indeed have extended a far greater distance.
For an hour the conflagration raged with apparently unabated violence, the wreck drifting quite rapidly; but the fire soon tired of its work, large pieces of burning timber could be seen floating in the water, and finally the charred hull made a plunge downward into the sea, and our friends were left alone upon their frail support.
“Now, it’s time to decide what we are going to do,” said Howard.
“You are right, and what shall it be? Shall we drift about here until morning, when some vessel will pick us up? I have no doubt this fire has drawn a half-dozen toward it.”
“No; let’s make for shore.”
“That is the best plan,” said Tim.
“But it is a good way off,” remarked Howard; “and I have little hope of reaching it.”
“Never mind; it, will keep us busy, and that will make the time pass faster than if we do nothing but float.”
“We may need our strength; but it is the best plan.”
“But do we know the direction?”
“I can tell you that,” said Elwood; “for the moon was directly over the shore; so all we’ve got to do is to aim for the moon.”
“Begorrah! we can walk and talk, as the owld lady said when her husband stopped on the way to the gallows to bid her good-by. So paddle away!”
It being a warm summer night, the water was quite pleasant, although our friends were sure to get enough of it long before they could hope to place their feet upon the earth. Having now an object, they began working with a will, the boys swimming as lustily as possible straight for the shore, while Tim assisted materially in pushing forward the craft.
The intelligent Newfoundland appeared to comprehend what was wanted, and contributed not a little to the momentum.
“Do you think we are making any progress—”
“O, save me! save me! I’m drowning!”
The voice sounded close by them, and caused an involuntary start from all three.
“Where is he?” asked Howard, in a terrified whisper.
“There!”
At that moment they caught sight of a man fiercely buffeting the waves, as he rose on an immense swell, and then sunk down again in the trough of the sea.
“Can we do anything for him?” asked Elwood. “It’s too bad to see the poor fellow sink when we may save him.”
“I’m afeared the owld bench won’t bear another hand on it.”
But Terror had heard that cry and anticipated the wishes of his friends. Leaving them with their raft, he struck powerfully out toward the drowning man, and they both went down in the vast sea chasm together. When they came in view again
upon the crest of the swell, the Newfoundland had the hair of the man’s head in his teeth and had begun his return. A moment later the gasping man threw out his hands and caught the settee with such eagerness that it instantly sunk.
“Be careful!” admonished Howard, “or you’ll drown us all. One of us can’t swim!”
“Won’t your raft bear us?”
“Yes, if you keep only your head above water and bear very lightly upon it. Don’t attempt to rise up.”
“All right!”
The buoyant raft came to the surface, and was instantly grasped firmly but carefully by all. Poor Tim O’Rooney had come very near drowning. A man when suddenly cast into the water for the first time has been known to swim long and well; and the Irishman, by the most furious effort, had saved himself from strangling and sinking, although he had swallowed a good deal of the nauseating sea-water, and was now ejecting it.
“Worrah! I took an overdose that time, and it wouldn’t sthay on my stomach!” he said. “I’m thinking there’ll be no necessity of me swallowing any salts for some time to coom, be the towken that I’ve enough to last me me life-time.”
“We are all right now!” said the stranger. “I can swim, but I was just about used up when your dog took me in tow. May I inquire who my friends are?”
Howard gave their names and destination, and he instantly said:
“My name is Manuel Yard, and my place of business is next door to that of your fathers.”
“You know them then.”
“I have known them both very well for years, and now that you have given me your names I remember you both.”
After a few more words, our friends recognized him as a tall, pale-looking man, with whom they had exchanged greetings more than once on their passage from Panama.
“I’ve been down to the Isthmus,” he added, “and was on my way home when the steamer took fire.”
“Where were you when you heard the alarm?”
“Sound asleep in my berth; I had no time even to put on my clothes; but, thank God, if I can escape in any way.”
“Stick to us, and help shove this craft, and I’m in hopes we’ll fetch up somewhere by morning.”
CHAPTER V
Land
The Edward S. Ellis Megapack Page 79
