The Coxswain's Bride Part 4

The lifeboat men obeyed, almost sheepishly, the one speculating as to whether highly developed precocity was not almost criminal, the other wondering how such a boy would look and act if obliged to undergo the process of being rescued--say by the hair of his head--from a wreck.

Their minds were diverted from this subject of contemplation by the entrance of a man and woman. These, like themselves, were told to sit down and wait. The man was long, thin, and lugubrious. The woman short, slight, and lackadaisical, though rather pretty.

Evidently the agent was a busy man, for he kept them waiting some time.

When he at length appeared he almost took the breath away from his visitors, by the rapid and enthusiastic way in which he described the advantages of the great island on the other side of the globe. There was gold--yes, _enormous_ quant.i.ties of gold in all directions. There was land of the finest quality to be had for next to nothing; work for all who were blessed with good bone and muscle; a constant demand for labour--skilled or unskilled--at high wages; a climate such as the Olympian G.o.ds might revel in, and--in short, if all England had heard the oration delivered by that man, and had believed it, the country would, in less than a month, have been depopulated of its younger men and women, and left to the tender mercies of the old and middle-aged.

Our two fishermen were captivated. So were the lugubrious man and his mild little wife. The end of it was that, three weeks later, these four, with many other men and women of all ranks and conditions, found themselves on board the good s.h.i.+p _Lapwing_, ploughing their way through the billows of the broad Atlantic Ocean bound for the sunny isles of the Antipodes.

Wheels within wheels--worlds within worlds--seems to be the order of nature everywhere. Someone has written, with more of truth than elegance--

"Big fleas have little fleas upon their legs to bite 'em, And little fleas have lesser fleas--and so _ad infinitum_."

One's native land is to millions of people the world in which their thoughts centre, and by which they are circ.u.mscribed. A farmer's homestead is the world to him, and one of the farmer's cheeses contains a mighty world in itself. But the most complete, compact, and exclusive world in existence, perhaps, is a s.h.i.+p at sea--especially an emigrant s.h.i.+p--for here we find an epitome of the great world itself. Here may be seen, in small compa.s.s, the operations of love and hate, of wisdom and stupidity, of selfishness and self-sacrifice, of pride, pa.s.sion, coa.r.s.eness, urbanity, and all the other virtues and vices which tend to make the world at large--a mysterious compound of heaven and h.e.l.l.

Wherever men and women--not to mention children--are crowded into small s.p.a.ce, friction ensues, and the inevitable result is moral electricity, positive and negative--chiefly positive! Influences naturally follow, pleasant and unpleasant--sometimes explosions, which call for the interference of the captain or officer in charge of the deck at the time being.

For instance, Tomlin is a fiery but provident man, and has provided himself with a deck-chair--a most important element of comfort on a long voyage. Sopkin is a big sulky and heedless man, and has provided himself with no such luxury. A few days after leaving port Sopkin finds Tomlin's chair on deck, empty, and, being ignorant of social customs at sea, seats himself thereon. Tomlin, coming on deck, observes the fact, and experiences sudden impulses in his fiery spirit. The electricity is at work. If it were allowable to venture on mental a.n.a.lysis, we might say that Tomlin's sense of justice is violated. It is not fair that he should be expected to spend money in providing comforts for any man, much less for a man who carelessly neglects to provide them for himself.

His sense of propriety is shocked, for Sopkin has taken possession without asking leave. His self-esteem is hurt, for, although Sopkin knows it is his chair, he sits there doggedly, "like a big brute as he is," and does not seem to care what Tomlin thinks or how he looks.

Besides, there is thrust upon Tomlin the disagreeable necessity of claiming his own, and that, too, in a gentlemanly tone and manner--for it will not do to a.s.sume beforehand that Sopkin is going to refuse rest.i.tution. Tomlin is not aware that he thinks all this, but he knows that he feels it, and, in spite of himself, demands his property in a tone and with a look that sets agoing the electrical current in Sopkin, who replies, in a growling tone, "it is _my_ chair just now."

Ordinary men would remonstrate in a case of this kind, or explain, but Tomlin is not ordinary. He is fiery. Seizing the back of his property, he hitches it up, and, with a deft movement worthy of a juggler, deposits the unreasonable Sopkin abruptly on the deck! Sopkin leaps up with doubled fists. Tomlin stands on guard. Rumkin, a presumptuous man, who thinks it his special mission in life to set everything wrong right, rushes between them, and is told by both to "mind his own business." The interruption, however, gives time to the captain to interfere; he remarks in a mild tone, not unmixed with sarcasm, that rough skylarking is not appropriate in the presence of ladies, and that there is a convenient fo'c's'l to which the gentlemen may retire when inclined for such amus.e.m.e.nt.

There is a something in the captain's look and manner which puts out the fire of Tomlin's spirit, and reduces the sulky Sopkin to obedience, besides overawing the presumptuous Rumkin, and from that day forth there is among the pa.s.sengers a better understanding of the authority of a sea captain, and the nature of the unwritten laws that exist, more or less, on s.h.i.+p-board.

We have referred to an incident of the quarter-deck, but the same laws and influences prevailed in the forepart of the vessel, in which our c.o.xswain and his friend had embarked.

It was the evening of the fifth day out, and Ma.s.sey, Joe Slag, the long lugubrious man, whose name was Mitford, and his pretty little lackadaisical wife, whose name was Peggy, were seated at one end of a long mess-table having supper--a meal which included tea and bread and b.u.t.ter, as well as salt junk, etcetera.

"You don't seem quite to have recovered your spirits yet, Mitford," said Ma.s.sey to the long comrade. "Have a bit o' pork? There's nothin' like that for givin' heart to a man."

"Ay, 'specially arter a bout o' sea-sickness," put in Slag, who was himself busily engaged with a ma.s.s of the proposed remedy. "It 'ud do yer wife good too. Try it, ma'am. You're not half yerself yit.

There's too much green round your eyes an' yaller about yer cheeks for a healthy young ooman."

"Thank you, I--I'd rather not," said poor Mrs Mitford, with a faint smile--and, really, though faint, and called forth in adverse circ.u.mstances, it was a very sweet little smile, despite the objectionable colours above referred to. "I was never a great 'and with victuals, an' I find that the sea don't improve appet.i.te--though, after all, I can't see why it should, and--"

Poor Mrs Mitford stopped abruptly, for reasons best known to herself.

She was by nature rather a loquacious and, so to speak, irrelevant talker. She delivered herself in a soft, unmeaning monotone, which, like "the brook," flowed "on for ever"--at least until some desperate listener interrupted her discourteously. In the present instance it was her own indescribable feelings which interrupted her.

"Try a bit o' plum-duff, Mrs Mitford," suggested Ma.s.sey, with well-intentioned sincerity, holding up a lump of the viand on his fork.

"Oh! please--don't! Some tea! Quick! I'll go--"

And she went.

"Poor Peggy, she never _could_ stand much rough an' tumble," said her husband, returning from the berth to which he had escorted his wife, and seating himself again at the table. "She's been very bad since we left, an' don't seem to be much on the mend."

He spoke as one who not only felt but required sympathy--and he got it.

"Och! niver give in," said the a.s.sistant cook, who had overheard the remark in pa.s.sing. "The ould girl'll be all right before the end o'

this wake. It niver lasts more nor tin days at the outside. An' the waker the patients is, the sooner they comes round; so don't let yer sperrits down, Mr Mitford."

"Thank 'ee, kindly, Terrence, for your encouragin' words; but I'm doubtful. My poor Peggy is so weak and helpless!"

He sighed, shook his head as he concluded, and applied himself with such energy to the plum-duff that it was evident he expected to find refuge from his woes in solid food.

"You don't seem to be much troubled wi' sickness yourself," remarked Ma.s.sey, after eyeing the lugubrious man for some time in silence.

"No, I am not, which is a blessin'. I hope that Mrs Ma.s.sey ain't ill?"

"No; my Nell is never ill," returned the c.o.xswain, in a hearty tone.

"She'd have been suppin' along with us to-night, but she's nursin' that poor sick lad, Ian Stuart, that's dyin'."

"Is the lad really dyin'?" asked Mitford, laying down his knife and fork, and looking earnestly into his companion's face.

"Well, it looks like it. The poor little fellow seemed to me past recoverin' the day he came on board, and the stuffy cabin, wi' the heavin' o' the s.h.i.+p, has bin over much for him."

While he was speaking Nellie herself came softly to her husband's side and sat down. Her face was very grave.

"The doctor says there's no hope," she said. "The poor boy may last a few days, so he tells us, but he may be taken away at any moment. Pour me out a cup o' tea, Bob. I must go back to him immediately. His poor mother is so broken down that she's not fit to attend to him, and the father's o' no use at all. He can only go about groanin'. No wonder; Ian is their only child, Bob--their first-born. I can't bear to think of it."

"But you'll break down yourself, Nell, if you go nursin' him every night, an' all night, like this. Surely there's some o' the women on board that'll be glad to lend a helpin' hand."

"I know _one_ who'll be only too happy to do that, whether she's well or ill," said Mitford, rising with unwonted alacrity, and hastening to his wife's berth.

Just then the bo's'n's stentorian voice was heard giving the order to close reef tops'ls, and the hurried tramping of many feet on the deck overhead, coupled with one or two heavy lurches of the s.h.i.+p, seemed to justify the a.s.sistant cook's remark--"Sure it's durty weather we're goin' to have, annyhow."

STORY ONE, CHAPTER 4.

The indications of bad weather which had been observed were not misleading, for it not only became what Terrence O'Connor had termed "durty," but it went on next day to develop a regular gale, insomuch that every rag of canvas, except storm-sails, had to be taken in and the hatches battened down, thus confining the pa.s.sengers to the cabins.

These pa.s.sengers looked at matters from wonderfully different points of view, and felt accordingly. Surroundings had undoubtedly far greater influence on some of them than was reasonable. Of course we refer to the landsmen only. In the after-cabin, where all was light, cosy, and comfortable, and well fastened, and where a considerable degree of propriety existed, feelings were comparatively serene. Most of the ladies sought the retirement of berths, and became invisible, though not necessarily inaudible; a few, who were happily weather-proof, jammed themselves into velvety corners, held on to something fixed, and lost themselves in books. The gentlemen, linking themselves to articles of stability, did the same, or, retiring to an appropriate room, played cards and draughts and enveloped themselves in smoke. Few, if any of them, bestowed much thought on the weather. Beyond giving them, occasionally, a little involuntary exercise, it did not seriously affect them.

Very different was the state of matters in the steerage. There the difference in comfort was not proportioned to the difference in pa.s.sage-money. There was no velvet, not much light, little s.p.a.ce to move about, and nothing soft. In short, discomfort reigned, so that the unfortunate pa.s.sengers could not easily read, and the falling of tin panikins and plates, the cras.h.i.+ng of things that had broken loose, the rough exclamations of men, and the squalling of miserable children, affected the nerves of the timid to such an extent that they naturally took the most gloomy view of the situation.

Of course the mere surroundings had no influence whatever on the views held by Bob Ma.s.sey and Joe Slag.

"My dear," said the latter, in a kindly but vain endeavour to comfort Mrs Mitford, "rump.u.s.s.es below ain't got nothin' to do wi' rows overhead--leastways they're only an effect, not a cause."

"There! there's another," interrupted Mrs Mitford, with a little scream, as a tremendous crash of crockery burst upon her ear.

"Well, my dear," said Slag, in a soothing, fatherly tone, "if all the crockery in the s.h.i.+p was to go in universal smash into the lee scuppers, it couldn't make the wind blow harder."

Poor Mrs Mitford failed to derive consolation from this remark. She was still sick enough to be totally and hopelessly wretched, but not sufficiently so to be indifferent to life or death. Every superlative howl of the blast she echoed with a sigh, and each excessive plunge of the s.h.i.+p she emphasised with a weak scream.

"I don't know what _you_ think," she said, faintly, when two little boys rolled out of their berths and went yelling to leeward with a ma.s.s of miscellaneous rubbish, "but it do seem to be as if the end of the world 'ad come. Not that the sea _could_ be the end of the world, for if it was, of course it would spill over and then we would be left dry on the bottom--or moist, if not dry. I don't mean that, you know, but these crashes are so dreadful, an' my poor 'ead is like to split--which the planks of this s.h.i.+p will do if they go on creakin' so. I _know_ they will, for 'uman-made things can't--"

"You make your mind easy, my woman," said her husband, coming forward at the moment and sitting down to comfort her. "Things are lookin' a little better overhead, so one o' the men told me, an' I heard Terrence say that we're goin' to have lobscouse for dinner to-day, though what that may be I can't tell--somethin' good, I suppose."