The Pillar of Light Part 21

"All right, miss, an' Gawd bless yer," growled one who had not spoken hitherto. There was a chorus of approval. Constance gave a little gulp.

The cultured and delicate lady lying in the bunk above had not spoken so.

"Indeed," she gasped, "G.o.d has blessed some of us this night."

Then she fled, further utterance failing her.

Nearer the sky, Brand tended the lamp and discussed matters with chief officer Emmett. The sailor, with the terse directness of his cla.s.s, told how the _Chinook_ had made an excellent voyage from New York until she ran into bad weather about four hundred miles west of the Lizard.

"It seems to me," he said, "as if we dropped onto the track of that hurricane after it had curved away to the norrard, and that the d----d thing swooped down on us again when we were abreast of the Bishop Light."

Brand nodded. This surmise agreed with his own theory of the storm, as indicated by the sea.

Mr. Emmett held out a clenched fist with thumb jerked towards the reef.

"I wouldn't breathe a word if _he_ wasn't gone," he said, "but the old man was drivin' her too hard. I knew it, and the chief knew it"--he meant the chief engineer--"but he wouldn't listen to either Mac or me.

Fact is, he was fair crazy to set up a new record for the boat. She's been crossin' the Atlantic forty times a year for upwards of twenty years, and the recent alterations, although they added fifty feet to her length, only increased her engine-power in proportion."

"You surprise me," broke in Brand. "You speak as if the _Chinook_ were nearly as old as this lighthouse, yet I have never even heard her name before."

"You know her well enough all the same," said the other ruefully. "This is her maiden voyage since she was altered; an' they rechristened her, too--always a d----d unlucky thing to do, I say. Bless your heart, man, she is the old _Princess Royal_. Eh? What's that?"

He guffawed mournfully at Brand's involuntary exclamation.

"Certain! Well, surely I ought to know. I have pa.s.sed most of my service with the company in her, and when I took a crew to Cramp's to navigate her to New York after she was smartened up I little imagined I would see her laid by forever the next time we saw the lights of Old England. My goodness, even what was left of the old girl ought to know her way better'n that."

"But what did really happen?"

"Drivin' her, I tell you--drivin' her full pelt to land the mails at Southampton twelve hours ahead of schedule. With that awful sea liftin'

her, and a shaft twenty feet longer, what could you expect? Poor Perkins! A rare hard worker, too. Now he's gone down with his s.h.i.+p an'

over two hundred pa.s.sengers an' crew."

"Judging by the number saved I feared that more were lost."

"It's the off season, you know. The pa.s.senger list was light. For the Lord's sake, think of what it might have been in May or June!"

"It is bad enough as it is. All has not ended with the disappearance of the vessel."

The sailor shot a sharp glance at Brand.

"You can't be thinkin' anyone was to blame--" he commenced. But Brand waved aside the fancied imputation.

"Blame!" he said. "With a broken shaft! In that whirlwind! No, no. I sent for you to talk over the new difficulty which has to be faced.

There are food, water and fuel here for three men for two months. If you do a little sum you will find that the available stores on the basis of full rations will maintain eighty-one people for two days and a quarter."

"But we're only six miles from the mainland." Mr. Emmett had not yet grasped the true meaning of the figures.

"I have been here more than once for six weeks at a stretch, when, for all the a.s.sistance we could receive, we might as well have been within the Arctic Circle."

Again the sailor jerked his thumb towards the reef.

"Is it as bad as all that?" he queried anxiously.

"Yes."

"But six weeks. Good Lord!" Mr. Emmett had done the little sum.

"That is exceptional. A week is the average unless the unexpected happens, after a gale like this. And a week will test our endurance to the limit."

Mr. Emmett whistled softly. A grisly phantom was creeping at him. He s.h.i.+vered, and not from cold.

"By Jove!" he said. "What's to be done?"

"In the first place, you must help me to maintain iron discipline. To leave the rock today or tomorrow will be an absolute impossibility. On the next day, with luck and a steady moderation of the weather, we may devise some desperate means of landing all the active men or getting fresh supplies. That is in the hands of Providence. I want you to warn your officers, and others whom you can trust, either sailors or civilians. Better arrange three watches. My daughters will have charge of the stores. By going through the lists in the store-room I can portion out the rations for six days. I think we had better fix on that minimum."

"Of course I will back you up in every way," said Mr. Emmett, who felt chillier at this moment than at any time during the night. "I know you are acting wisely, but I admit I am scared at the thought of what may happen--if those days pa.s.s and no help is available."

Brand knew what would happen, and it was hard to lock the secret in his heart. He alone must live. That was essential, the one thing carved in stone upon the tablets of his brain, a thing to be fought out behind barred door, revolver in hand.

Whatever else took place, if men and women, perhaps his own sweet girls, were dying of thirst and starvation, the light must s.h.i.+ne at night over its allotted span of the slumbering sea. There, on the little table beside him, lay the volume of Rules and Regulations. What did it say?

"The keepers, both princ.i.p.al and a.s.sistant, are enjoined never to allow any interests, whether private or otherwise, to interfere with the discharge of their public duties, the importance of which to the safety of navigation cannot be overrated."

There was no ambiguity in the words, no halting sentence which opened a way for a man to plead: "I thought it best." Those who framed the rule meant what they said. No man could bend the steel of their intent.

To end the intolerable strain of his thoughts Stephen Brand forced his lips to a thin smile and his voice to say harshly:

"If the worst comes to the worst, there are more than three thousand gallons of colza oil in store. That should maintain life. It is a vegetable oil."

Then Constance thrust her glowing face into the lighted area.

"Dad," she cried, cheerfully, "the men wish to know if they may smoke.

Poor fellows! They are so miserable--so cold and damp and dreary down there. Please say 'Yes.'"

CHAPTER IX

MRS. VANSITTART

The purser, faithful to his trust, had secured the s.h.i.+p's books. He alone, among the survivors of the _Chinook_, had brought a parcel of any sort from that ill-fated s.h.i.+p. The others possessed the clothes they wore, their money, and in some cases their trinkets.

Mr. Emmett suggested that a list of those saved should be compiled.

Then, by ticking off the names, he could cla.s.sify the inmates of the lighthouse and evolve some degree of order in the community.

It was found that there were thirty-seven officers and men, including stewards, thirty-three saloon pa.s.sengers, of whom nineteen were women, counting the two little girls, and seven men and one woman from the steerage.