The Wings of the Morning Part 4

This time his feet plunged against something gratefully solid. He was dashed forward, still battling with the raging turmoil of water, and a second time he felt the same firm yet smooth surface. His dormant faculties awoke. It was sand. With frenzied desperation, buoyed now by the inspiring hope of safety, he fought his way onwards like a maniac.

Often he fell, three times did the backwash try to drag him to the swirling death behind, but he staggered blindly on, on, until even the tearing gale ceased to be laden with the suffocating foam, and his faltering feet sank in deep soft white sand.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WITH FRENZIED DESPERATION, BUOYED NOW BY THE INSPIRING HOPE OF SAFETY, HE FOUGHT HIS WAY ONWARD LIKE A MANIAC.]

Then he fell, not to rise again. With a last weak flicker of exhausted strength he drew the girl closely to him, and the two lay, clasped tightly together, heedless now of all things.

How long the man remained prostrate he could only guess subsequently.

The _Sirdar_ struck soon after daybreak and the sailor awoke to a hazy consciousness of his surroundings to find a shaft of suns.h.i.+ne flickering through the clouds banked up in the east. The gale was already pa.s.sing away. Although the wind still whistled with shrill violence it was more bl.u.s.tering than threatening. The sea, too, though running very high, had retreated many yards from the spot where he had finally dropped, and its surface was no longer scourged with venomous spray.

Slowly and painfully he raised himself to a sitting posture, for he was bruised and stiff. With his first movement he became violently ill. He had swallowed much salt water, and it was not until the spasm of sickness had pa.s.sed that he thought of the girl.

She had slipped from his breast as he rose, and was lying, face downwards, in the sand. The memory of much that had happened surged into his brain with horrifying suddenness.

"She cannot be dead," he hoa.r.s.ely murmured, feebly trying to lift her.

"Surely Providence would not desert her after such an escape. What a weak beggar I must be to give in at the last moment. I am sure she was living when we got ash.o.r.e. What on earth can I do to revive her?"

Forgetful of his own aching limbs in this newborn anxiety, he sank on one knee and gently pillowed Iris's head and shoulders on the other.

Her eyes were closed, her lips and teeth firmly set--a fact to which she undoubtedly owed her life, else she would have been suffocated--and the pallor of her skin seemed to be that terrible bloodless hue which indicates death. The stern lines in the man's face relaxed, and something blurred his vision. He was weak from exhaustion and want of food. For the moment his emotions were easily aroused.

"Oh, it is pitiful," he almost whimpered. "It cannot be!"

With a gesture of despair he drew the sleeve of his thick jersey across his eyes to clear them from the gathering mist. Then he tremblingly endeavored to open the neck of her dress and unclasp her corsets. He had a vague notion that ladies in a fainting condition required such treatment, and he was desperately resolved to bring Iris Deane back to conscious existence if it were possible. His task was rendered difficult by the waistband of her dress. He slipped out a clasp-knife and opened the blade.

Not until then did he discover that the nail of the forefinger on his right hand had been torn out by the quick, probably during his endeavors to grasp the unsteady support which contributed so materially to his escape. It still hung by a shred and hindered the free use of his hand. Without any hesitation he seized the offending nail in his teeth and completed the surgical operation by a rapid jerk.

Bending to resume his task he was startled to find the girl's eyes wide open and surveying him with shadowy alarm. She was quite conscious, absurdly so in a sense, and had noticed his strange action.

"Thank G.o.d!" he cried hoa.r.s.ely. "You are alive."

Her mind as yet could only work in a single groove.

"Why did you do that?" she whispered.

"Do what?"

"Bite your nail off!"

"It was in my way. I wished to cut open your dress at the waist. You were collapsed, almost dead, I thought, and I wanted to unfasten your corsets."

Her color came back with remarkable rapidity. From all the rich variety of the English tongue few words could have been selected of such restorative effect.

She tried to a.s.sume a sitting posture, and instinctively her hands traveled to her disarranged costume.

"How ridiculous!" she said, with a little note of annoyance in her voice, which sounded curiously hollow. But her brave spirit could not yet command her enfeebled frame. She was perforce compelled to sink back to the support of his knee and arm.

"Do you think you could lie quiet until I try to find some water?" he gasped anxiously.

She nodded a childlike acquiescence, and her eyelids fell. It was only that her eyes smarted dreadfully from the salt water, but the sailor was sure that this was a premonition of a lapse to unconsciousness.

"Please try not to faint again," he said. "Don't you think I had better loosen these things? You can breathe more easily."

A ghost of a smile flickered on her lips. "No--no," she murmured. "My eyes hurt me--that is all. Is there--any--water?"

He laid her tenderly on the sand and rose to his feet. His first glance was towards the sea. He saw something which made him blink with astonishment. A heavy sea was still running over the barrier reef which enclosed a small lagoon. The contrast between the fierce commotion outside and the comparatively smooth surface of the protected pool was very marked. At low tide the lagoon was almost completely isolated.

Indeed, he imagined that only a fierce gale blowing from the north-west would enable the waves to leap the reef, save where a strip of broken water, surging far into the small natural harbor, betrayed the position of the tiny entrance.

Yet at this very point a fine cocoanut palm reared its stately column high in air, and its long tremulous fronds were now swinging wildly before the gale. From where he stood it appeared to be growing in the midst of the sea, for huge breakers completely hid the coral embankment. This sentinel of the land had a weirdly impressive effect.

It was the only fixed object in the waste of foam-capped waves. Not a vestige of the _Sirdar_ remained seaward, but the sand was littered with wreckage, and--mournful spectacle!--a considerable number of inanimate human forms lay huddled up amidst the relics of the steamer.

This discovery stirred him to action. He turned to survey the land on which he was stranded with his helpless companion. To his great relief he discovered that it was lofty and tree-clad. He knew that the s.h.i.+p could not have drifted to Borneo, which still lay far to the south.

This must be one of the hundreds of islands which stud the China Sea and provide resorts for Hanan fishermen. Probably it was inhabited, though he thought it strange that none of the islanders had put in an appearance. In any event, water and food, of some sort, were a.s.sured.

But before setting out upon his quest two things demanded attention.

The girl must be removed from her present position. It would be too horrible to permit her first conscious gaze to rest upon those crumpled objects on the beach. Common humanity demanded, too, that he should hastily examine each of the bodies in case life was not wholly extinct.

So he bent over the girl, noting with sudden wonder that, weak as she was, she had managed to refasten part of her bodice.

"You must permit me to carry you a little further inland," he explained gently.

Without another word he lifted her in his arms, marveling somewhat at the strength which came of necessity, and bore her some little distance, until a st.u.r.dy rock, jutting out of the sand, offered shelter from the wind and protection from the sea and its revelations.

"I am so cold, and tired," murmured Iris. "Is there any water? My throat hurts me."

He pressed back the tangled hair from her forehead as he might soothe a child.

"Try to lie still for a very few minutes," he said.

"You have not long to suffer. I will return immediately."

His own throat and palate were on fire owing to the brine, but he first hurried back to the edge of the lagoon. There were fourteen bodies in all, three women and eleven men, four of the latter being Lascars. The women were saloon pa.s.sengers whom he did not know. One of the men was the surgeon, another the first officer, a third Sir John Tozer. The rest were pa.s.sengers and members of the crew. They were all dead; some had been peacefully drowned, others were fearfully mangled by the rocks. Two of the Lascars, bearing signs of dreadful injuries, were lying on a cl.u.s.ter of low rocks overhanging the water. The remainder rested on the sand.

The sailor exhibited no visible emotion whilst he conducted his sad scrutiny. When he was a.s.sured that this silent company was beyond mortal help he at once strode away towards the nearest belt of trees.

He could not tell how long the search for water might be protracted, and there was pressing need for it.

When he reached the first clump of brushwood he uttered a delighted exclamation. There, growing in prodigal luxuriance, was the beneficent pitcher-plant, whose large curled-up leaf, shaped like a teacup, not only holds a lasting quant.i.ty of rain-water, but mixes therewith its own palatable and natural juices.

With his knife he severed two of the leaves, swearing emphatically the while on account of his damaged finger, and hastened to Iris with the precious beverage. She heard him and managed to raise herself on an elbow.

The poor girl's eyes glistened at the prospect of relief. Without a word of question or surprise she swallowed the contents of both leaves.

Then she found utterance. "How odd it tastes! What is it?" she inquired.

But the eagerness with which she quenched her thirst renewed his own momentarily forgotten torture. His tongue seemed to swell. He was absolutely unable to reply.

The water revived Iris like a magic draught. Her quick intuition told her what had happened.

"You have had none yourself," she cried. "Go at once and get some. And please bring me some more."