Mark Seaworth Part 15

"h.e.l.lo! where's the stranger?" cried one.

"Why, if she don't beat the _Flying Dutchman_!" exclaimed another.

"I thought no good of her when I saw her up-helm and run away from us as she did," said a third, a Yankee, who was one of the oracles of the crew.

Van Graoul laughed. "We shall soon get a sight of her again," he said; "she will get becalmed among the trees, or will find the wind baffling, when we, with our fore and aft sails shall have the advantage."

The breeze still held, and my heart beat quick at the thoughts of what was going to occur. At last we approached the land, or rather the islands. They stretched away for miles before us on either side, for we appeared to be near the centre of the group. The highest were not more than five or six feet out of the water; but the greater number were only two or three feet, and some were scarcely as many inches above it, and it seemed extraordinary that the waves should not wash completely over them. That they did not do so, even in rough weather, was evident from the thick groves of cocoa-nut, palm, and other tropical trees, which grew on them, while a bright sand, on which were strewed numberless beautiful sh.e.l.ls, fringed their borders.

Van Graoul now showed some of his good qualities. Hands were stationed at the bowsprit end, each fore-yard arm, and the mast-head, to keep a bright look-out for the coral ridges, which had not yet shown themselves above water, while he stood forward where he could be seen by the helmsman, ready to direct him in the devious course we were about to pursue. I had had too recent a lesson of the dangers of coral reefs not to feel anxious as I found myself again among them. Coral islands have always struck me as one of the most interesting curiosities of nature.

A minute marine insect builds up from the bottom of the sea the solid foundation. The waves break the summit into sand. The birds of the air come and rest there, and bring seeds, which in time spring up and decay, till a soil is formed to give nourishment to more lofty trees, such as we now saw before us. We shot in between a narrow opening with the water of the deepest blue on either side. All hands were at their stations. Fairburn acted as quarter-master, ready to repeat our pilot's signals. It was a nervous time: now we seemed rus.h.i.+ng on against a bank of trees, and directly we turned to the right hand or to the left, through another opening, the termination of which was completely hidden from our sight; and had I not felt confidence in Van Graoul, I should have fancied that we were running into a blind pa.s.sage, without another outlet. On looking out astern, I found that we had completely lost sight of the sea, and thus were on every side surrounded by trees and reefs. A stranger would, indeed, have found no little difficulty in getting out of the place, had he ever by any wonderful chance managed to get into it. Still on we flew.

"Now," exclaimed Van Graoul triumphantly, "we shall see directly; and if I mistake not, we shall not be far astern of her."

Soon after he spoke we shot past a thickly-wooded point, and emerged into open, lake-like expanse. I saw his countenance fall. The stranger was nowhere to be seen.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Everybody on board experienced a feeling of blank disappointment, as in vain we looked in the hopes of seeing the royals of the brig appearing above the trees. Either Van Graoul had miscalculated her distance from us, or she had taken some other pa.s.sage; or, as d.i.c.k Harper the Yankee seaman observed, she was in truth the _Flying Dutchman_. At all events it appeared that we had run into a most dangerous position, to very little purpose. Should the brig be the pirate, and still be concealed somewhere in the neighbourhood--if we brought up, she might at night attack us with her boats; and though we might beat them off, we might not escape loss, and at the same time be as far from our object as ever.

We had no time for deliberation--our course must now be ahead, so we stood across the lake-like expanse I have spoken of, where as much caution as before was necessary; for it was full of reefs, and in another quarter of an hour we were again threading the labyrinth-like ca.n.a.ls, from which we had before emerged. Every instant I hoped to come upon the chase, but still as we sailed on she eluded us.

His attention was too much occupied to allow me to keep him in conversation and I saw he was as much vexed as I was at the escape of the stranger. Little Ungka seemed the most surprised of any one at finding himself among trees; but he showed no disposition to quit his friends on board the schooner, even for the sake of being lord of all he surveyed. For two hours we stood on; sometimes the channels between the islands widened, and here we crossed broad sounds, but did not attempt to go down any of them, as their entrances, Van Graoul said, were full of dangerous shoals. We glided on; and I began to think that we were never to be clear of this wooded labyrinth; for, curious and beautiful as it might be under other circ.u.mstances, I wanted once more to have a clear sight around me.

"Starboard!" cried Fairburn, as our pilot waved his hand on one side, and the head of the schooner deviated to the left.

"Port!"

"Port it is," repeated the helmsman, and her head turned towards a channel to the right. The wind now came on her quarter, now on her beam, according to the turnings of the channels; and I was afraid, sometimes, that it would come ahead. It, however, never baffled us; and at length, at the end of a broader pa.s.sage than usual, the unbroken line of the horizon appeared before us. The seamen welcomed it almost with a shout, for few like this sort of navigation. I proposed to Van Graoul that we should anchor before we emerged altogether from among the islands, so as to explore them more carefully in the boats, in case the brig should be still hid among them. Fairburn approved of my idea; and shortening sail immediately, we brought up in a little bay among the trees, by which the vessel was completely hid. Fairburn and the second mate, Barlow, volunteered for this service; and urged me so strongly to remain on board with Van Graoul that I consented.

Fairburn first pulled out to sea, so that he might take a look all round; but coming back, he reported that there was no appearance anywhere of a sail to the southward; so that, if the stranger had gone through the group, she must have pa.s.sed out somewhere to the northward.

While the boats were away we sent a hand to watch from the highest tree at the farthest point of land to the south, if any vessel made her appearance from among the islands. Hour after hour pa.s.sed away, and the boats did not return. The sun went down, and darkness came on; and at last I began to grow anxious about them. Van Graoul lighted his pipe, and sat on the deck, puffing away with more energy than usual.

"There is no fear," he remarked. "I did not expect them before morning; and if the brig is where I advised Fairburn to look for her, there is better chance of finding her in the dark than in the daylight without their being discovered."

Of course I could not turn in. Van Graoul and I held each other in conversation, while we kept a bright look-out on every side. It was the morning watch, when I heard a hail--it seemed like the voice of a stranger; it came nearer; there was another hail, and to my great satisfaction Fairburn and Barlow pulled alongside. They had seen nothing of the brig; and we were all very much puzzled to know what had become of her. The next morning we weighed, and stood out to sea.

Never was a brighter look-out kept for a prize than we kept for the reappearance of the stranger; but to little purpose, beyond convincing ourselves that there was no probability of her appearing. For two days we cruised in the neighbourhood of the islands, clear of the reefs, and at length once more stood on our course.

There was much discussion on board as to what the stranger was--where she had come from--where she was going--and why, if she was honest, she ran away from us. The general notion among the crew was that she was something strange and supernatural.

"If not the _Flying Dutchman_, which could scarcely be the case seeing the lat.i.tude we are in," said d.i.c.k Harper with oracular authority, "she's near akin to the chap, that you may depend on, for no other would have been for to go for to play us such a trick as he has been doing; and for that matter, messmates, look ye here--he may be the Dutchman himself; for if he can cruise about as they say he does, I don't see no reason why he shouldn't take it into his head just to come down into these parts to have a look at some of his kindred, instead of knocking eternally off and about the Cape, which no longer belongs to them, d'ye see. To my mind, it's just as well we had nothing to do with the fellow; he'd have played us some scurvy trick, depend on't."

This most philosophical explanation seemed to satisfy the s.h.i.+p's company; and as the officers had no better one to offer, except that the stranger had got into the open sea again by some pa.s.sage unknown to them, they said nothing on the subject.

It served as a matter of discussion for a long time afterwards. We made but little progress, for the wind was light, and often it fell almost calm, while the weather became very hot and sultry.

One morning, when I came on deck, I found that we were lying becalmed.

The sea was as smooth as gla.s.s, but it could not be called level; for ever and anon there came a slow rising swell, which made the little craft rock from side to side, and the sails flap with a loud irregular sound against the masts, as if they were angry at having nothing to do, and wished to remind the wind to fulfil its duty. The sun shone out of the sky, without a cloud to temper its heat, and its rays made one side of the ocean s.h.i.+ne like molten gold. Every one was suffering more or less from the la.s.situde produced by excessive heat; the pitch was bubbling up from the seams of the deck; a strong, hot, burning smell pervaded the vessel; the chickens in the hencoops hung their heads and forgot to cackle; the ducks refused to quack, and sat with their bills open, gasping for breath; the pig lay down, as if about to yield up the ghost; and even Ungka, who generally revelled in a fine hot sun, and selected the warmest place on board, now looked out for a shady spot, and sat with his paws over his head to keep it cool. The bulkheads groaned, the booms creaked against the masts, every particle of grease being speedily absorbed; while, if the hand touched a piece of metal, it felt as if heated by the fire. Two of the youngsters of the crew were actually amusing themselves by frying a slice of meat on a bit of tin exposed to the sun. As one looked along the deck, one could see the heat-mist playing over every object, on which the eye rested. If it is hot thus early in the day, what will it become by noon, we thought, unless a breeze spring up to cool us? However, no breeze did spring up, and hotter and hotter it grew, if possible, till d.i.c.k Harper declared we should all be roasted, and become a fat morsel for one of the big sea-serpents which were known to frequent those seas. We got an awning spread, and breakfasted on deck, for below it was insupportable; and though we none of us starved ourselves, we were unable to do the ample justice we generally did to the viands. Van Graoul lighted his pipe, and leaning back in his chair, watched the smoke, with calm composure, ascending in a perpendicular column above his nose. Fairburn kept his eye carefully ranging round the horizon, to look out for any signs of coming wind; for we could not but suspect that this calm was the forerunner of a hurricane, or a gale of wind of some sort. I tried to read; but I found that reading was impossible. It was even difficult to carry on a conversation with any degree of briskness. Hour after hour slowly pa.s.sed away, and there was no change in the weather, when a sound struck our ears which suddenly aroused us all from our apathy.

"A gun!" exclaimed Fairburn; "and a heavy one too--"

"There's another--and another," we repeated in chorus.

"De pirates of Sooloo or Borneo attacking some merchant vessel,"

observed Van Graoul.

"Can it be the _Emu_ engaged with a man-of-war, by any possibility?" I asked, my thoughts always naturally recurring to her.

"There are too many guns, and the firing is too brisk for that,"

remarked Fairburn. "More likely some Dutch men-of-war, or perhaps some of the Company's cruisers engaged with a fleet of prahus."

"Where do you make out the firing to come from?" I asked, rather puzzled myself to say from what direction the sounds proceeded.

"From the southward," he answered. "Some of the sounds seem so loud, that if it were night, I should say we ought to see the flashes; but that arises, I expect, from the peculiar state of the atmosphere."

"I wish we had a breeze, to be able to get up to see what it is all about," I exclaimed.

"It is one great puzzle," observed Van Graoul sagaciously, as he re-lit his pipe, and puffed away as before.

Again all was quiet for the s.p.a.ce of an hour; and we, of course, fancied that the engagement had been concluded, and that we should have no chance of helping our friends. The general opinion was, that a large force of Malay pirates had been attacked by some European s.h.i.+ps of war.

While we were discussing the matter, we were again startled by a louder report than ever, followed by several others in rapid succession.

"Did you not fancy that you felt the vessel shake under our feet?" I asked; for, soon after the loudest report, I thought the schooner was lifted up and let down suddenly, in a very unusual way.

"Yes; if I did not know that we were in deep water, I should have thought she had struck on a shoal," replied Van Graoul.

"Are you certain that we are in deep water?" asked Fairburn with emphasis. "We'll see what the lead says."

Van Graoul smiled. "I am not offended, Fairburn, though some might be; but you'll find I'm right."

"I hope so," replied Fairburn; "but a current might be drifting us faster than we expected." The lead was hove, deep water was found all round. "I cannot make it out," exclaimed Fairburn.

"Nor I," said Van Graoul, as he puffed away with his pipe. "Some s.h.i.+p blown up; or perhaps a score of prahus."

Again the sound of firing was heard rolling away in the distance.

"It must be off Sourabaya, or Lombok, or perhaps as far away as Bali,"

remarked Fairburn, listening attentively. "Sometimes I fancy it comes from the eastward, and may be away at Combobo, or Floris. Over a calm sea sounds travel a great distance."

"I cannot help thinking that there must be some engagement on sh.o.r.e between the Dutch troops and the natives of some of those islands. They now and then are fond of making a disturbance," said Barlow, the second mate.

"No, no; there was no chance of anything of the sort," answered Van Graoul. "That firing, if firing it is, comes from the sea, I tell you."

The evening was now approaching, and still the mystery was not solved.

At distant intervals, we continued to hear the sound of firing; but when darkness came on, we could nowhere see the flashes of the guns, as we expected. A light breeze at length sprung up from the eastward; but it was still hot and oppressive, and it in no way refreshed us. Anxious to discover, if possible, the cause of the firing, we trimmed sails and stood to the southward; but with the light air there was blowing we made but little way. The night appeared very long. I turned in for a couple of hours, but the heat soon again drove me on deck. When daylight appeared, we were on the look-out, almost expecting to see some of the vessels which had been engaged the previous day; but as the sun arose there was nothing in sight but the deep blue silent sea on three sides, and to the south the lofty hills of a large island, and at one end the peaks of a mountain towering over the rest. There was, instead of the bright, pure, clear atmosphere which generally exists at that hour, a very peculiar lurid glare, which, as the sun rolled upwards in his course, increased in intensity, till the sky became of almost a copper hue. Fairburn had gone aloft with his gla.s.s, to satisfy himself more fully as to there being anything in sight from the point where the firing had proceeded. He now returned on deck.

"I cannot make it out," he remarked. "After all, I am not so certain that it was firing we heard. Away to the southward, there is a dense black cloud which seems rising rapidly, as if it would cover all the sky."