Foul Play Part 19

It was beyond words; and none were uttered, except by Cooper, who spoke so seldom; yet now three words of terrible import burst from him, and, uttered in his loud, deep voice, rang like the sunk s.h.i.+p's knell over the still bubbling water.

"SCUTTLED--BY G.o.d!"

CHAPTER XII.

"HOLD your tongue," said Welch, with an oath.

Mr. Hazel looked at Miss Rolleston, and she at him. It was a momentary glance, and her eyes sank directly, and filled with patient tears.

For the first few minutes after the _Proserpine_ went down the survivors sat benumbed, as if awaiting their turn to be ingulfed.

They seemed so little, and the _Proserpine_ so big; yet she was swallowed before their eyes, like a crumb. They lost, for a few moments, all idea of escaping.

But, true it is, that, "while there's life there's hope"; and, as soon as their hearts began to beat again, their eyes roved round the horizon and their elastic minds recoiled against despair.

This was rendered easier by the wonderful beauty of the weather. There were men there who had got down from a sinking s.h.i.+p into boats heaving and tossing against her side in a gale of wind, and yet been saved; and here all was calm and delightful. To be sure, in those other s.h.i.+pwrecks land had been near, and their greatest peril was over when once the boats got clear of the distressed s.h.i.+p without capsizing. Here was no immediate peril; but certain death menaced them, at an uncertain distance.

Their situation was briefly this. Should it come on to blow a gale, these open boats, small and loaded, could not hope to live. Therefore they had two chances for life, and no more. They must either make land--or be picked up at sea--before the weather changed.

But how? The nearest known land was the group of islands called Juan Fernandez, and they lay somewhere to leeward, but distant at least nine hundred miles; and, should they prefer the other chance, then they must beat three hundred miles and more to windward; for Hudson, underrating the leak, as is supposed, had run the _Proserpine_ fully that distance out of the track of trade.

Now the ocean is a highway--in law; but, in fact, it contains a few highways and millions of byways; and, once a c.o.c.klesh.e.l.l gets into those byways, small indeed is its chance of being seen and picked up by any sea-going vessel.

Wylie, who was leading, lowered his sail, and hesitated between the two courses we have indicated. However, on the cutter coming up with him, he ordered Cooper to keep her head northeast, and so run all night. He then made all the sail he could, in the same direction, and soon outsailed the cutter. When the sun went down, he was about a mile ahead of her.

Just before sunset Mr. Hazel made a discovery that annoyed him very much.

He found that Welch had put only one bag of biscuit, a ham, a keg of spirit and a small barrel of water on board the cutter.

He remonstrated with him sharply. Welch replied that it was all right; the cutter being small, he had put the rest of her provisions on board the long-boat.

"On board the long-boat!" said Hazel, with a look of wonder. "You have actually made our lives depend upon that scoundrel Wylie again. You deserve to be flung into the sea. You have no forethought yourself, yet you will not be guided by those that have it."

Welch hung his head a little at these reproaches. However, he replied, rather sullenly, that it was only for one night; they could signal the long-boat in the morning and get the other bags and the cask out of her.

But Mr. Hazel was not to be appeased. "The morning! Why, she sails three feet to our two. How do you know he won't run away from us? I never expect to get within ten miles of him again. We know him; and he knows we know him."

Cooper got up and patted Mr. Hazel on the shoulder soothingly. "Boat-hook aft," said he to Welch.

He then, by an ingenious use of the boat-hook and some of the spare canvas, contrived to set out a studding-sail on the other side of the mast.

Hazel thanked him warmly. "But, oh, Cooper! Cooper!" said he, "I'd give all I have in the world if that bread and water were on board the cutter instead of the long-boat."

The cutter had now two wings instead of one; the water bubbling loud under her bows marked her increased speed, and all fear of being greatly outsailed by her consort began to subside.

A slight sea-fret came on and obscured the sea in part; but they had a good lantern and compa.s.s, and steered the course exactly all night, according to Wylie's orders, changing the helmsman every four hours.

Mr. Hazel, without a word, put a rug round Miss Rolleston's shoulders, and another round her feet.

"Oh, not both, sir, please," said she.

"Am I to be disobeyed by everybody?" said he.

Then she submitted in silence, and in a certain obsequious way that was quite new and well calculated to disarm anger.

Sooner or later all slept, except the helmsman.

At daybreak Mr. Hazel was wakened by a loud hail from a man in the bows.

All the sleepers started up.

"Long-boat not in sight!"

It was too true. The ocean was blank. Not a sail, large or small, in sight.

Many voices spoke at once.

"He has carried on till he has capsized her."

"He has given us the slip."

Unwilling to believe so great a calamity, every eye peered and stared all over the sea. In vain. Not a streak that could be a boat's hull, not a speck that could be a sail.

The little cutter was alone upon the ocean. Alone, with scarcely two days' provisions, nine hundred miles from land, and four hundred miles to leeward of the nearest sea-road.

Hazel, seeing his worst forebodings realized, sat down in moody, bitter, and boding silence.

Of the other men some raged and cursed. Some wept aloud.

The lady, more patient, put her hands together and prayed to Him who made the sea and all that therein is. Yet her case was the cruelest. For she was by nature more timid than the men, yet she must share their desperate peril. And then to be alone with all these men, and one of them had told her he loved her, and hated the man she was betrothed to! Shame tortured this delicate creature, as well as fear. Happy for her that of late, and only of late, she had learned to pray in earnest. _"Qui precari novit, premi potest, non potest opprimi."_

It was now a race between starvation and drowning, and either way death stared them in the face.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE long-boat was, at this moment, a hundred miles to windward of the cutter.

The fact is that Wylie, the evening before, had been secretly perplexed as to the best course. He had decided to run for the island; but he was not easy under his own decision; and, at night, he got more and more discontented with it. Finally, at nine o'clock P.M., he suddenly gave the order to luff, and tack; and by daybreak he was very near the place where the _Proserpine_ went down, whereas the cutter, having run before the wind all night, was, at least, a hundred miles to leeward of him.

Not to deceive the reader, or let him, for a moment, think we do business in monsters, we will weigh this act of Wylie's justly.

It was just a piece of iron egotism. He preferred, for himself, the chance of being picked up by a vessel. He thought it was about a hair's breadth better than running for an island, as to whose bearing he was not very clear, after all.

But he was not sure he was taking the best or safest course. The cutter might be saved, after all, and the long-boat lost.

Meantime he was not sorry of an excuse to shake off the cutter. She contained one man at least who knew he had scuttled the _Proserpine;_ and therefore it was all-important to him to get to London before her and receive the three thousand pounds which was to be his reward for that abominable act.