The packet steamer was slugging hot-foot for Eastville as the sun went
down behind an ominous bank of clouds. Thunder was rumbling to the
south'ard and Captain Westhaver was glancing every now and again out
of the pilot-house window. "Only a thunder storm, I reckon," he
muttered. "But I don't like that cussed glass an' that blurry sky to
th' south'ard. Looks jest like a West Injy hurricane sky. But, we'll
git in afore it strikes." The sea was smooth save for a slight swell
rolling up from the south'ard, and there was but little wind. The
chatter and laughter of the picnickers sounded unusually loud on the
quiet air. Someone was playing a fiddle, and there was a dance going
on aft.
Down on the after freight deck away from the crowd, Donald McKenzie
sat on the bitts, sucking away at a dry pipe, and communing with his
thoughts. Outwardly calm, yet boiling inwardly, he reviewed his years
of acquaintanceship with Ruth Nickerson. Ever and anon, the memory of
the night in Halifax would rise to mind, and he would vision again her
upturned face with the dim light upon it, and feel the soft warmth of
her body as he held her in his arms when she had said, "Kiss me, Don,
and go!" Pah! He brushed his hands across his lips. It was a Judas
kiss, for but a scant two months afterwards she had become engaged to
another.
There was a patter of rain on the sea, a growl of thunder, and the
sky had suddenly become overcast with sullen clouds. The pattering
rain turned into a teeming downpour, but McKenzie took no notice of
it. Nature was only in keeping with his mood, and even when the rain
slashed in upon his body he made no note of the squall which caused
it. The sea was rising after the first ten minutes of the puff, and
the rolling of the steamer caused a cessation of the music, the
dancing, and the chatter on the deck above. "Goin' t' have a storm, I
reckon," remarked someone behind him. He turned. It was a fireman up
for a breath of fresh air. "Yes," returned McKenzie. "A summer
squall."
It was darkening fast. The sun had set and the heavy clouds curtained
the after-glow. Ever and anon, a vivid flash of lightning would
shatter the darkness and render the night blacker than before, and the
wind was rising. To port, Donald could see the land against the faint
light in the west, and he knew they were drawing in to the heads of
Eastville.
He suddenly realized that he was soaking wet and he shivered with the
chill of it. His collar was limp and the rain was running down his
neck and inside his clothing. The clammy discomfort cooled his burning
body and brought him back to a realization of things around him. It
was blowing a savage squall, and the packet steamer was rolling and
smashing the waves into spray. Up on deck he could hear the frightened
cries of sea-sick women.
The sailor instinct came to the fore, and, for the time being, he
forgot the, to him, tragic event of the afternoon. Glancing ahead, he
could see the white water on the Lower Eastville Ledges, hounded by
the gusts and squalls, boiling and quarrelling with the rocks. The
Outer Ledge sparbuoy slipped by, and he felt the steamer canting as
the wheel was put hard over to make the turn into the channel. Then,
all of a sudden, something snapped above his head, and he was struck a
heavy blow, as of a whip, across the back. He turned and saw a piece
of steel wire rope hanging from fair-leads in the deck beams above.
"What the--?" he ejaculated rubbing his smarting shoulders, and then
a realization of what had happened came to him in a flash. "Jupiter!
Wheel gear has parted!"
Two men--the mate and a deck hand--came running to where he stood.
"Where's th' spare tiller? God's truth! we'll be on th' ledges--" The
words were whipped from the officer's mouth as a piling sea came
aboard and hurled him, the deck hand and McKenzie to leeward. As they
lay in the scuppers, they felt the steamer ground--once, twice, three
times--and finally with a terrific crash. "She's ashore!" yelled the
mate jumping to his feet and scrambling up the ladder. A huge comber,
with a livid, curling crest which seethed and growled, piled up ready
to fall, and McKenzie and the deck hand leaped behind the casing as it
struck the helpless steamer. Through the spray, Donald saw
white-painted planks and pieces of the vessel tossing in the wake of
the breaker, and with the water up to his chest he struggled along the
narrow alleyway to a ladder leading to the deck above.
A mob of frightened, crying and screaming women and girls were
crowding in the lee of the upper deck cabins, and when a sea hit the
steamer and caused her to grind and twist, they shrieked in fear.
Looking at the starboard life-boat, McKenzie saw that it was already
stove, so he turned to the port boat which Captain Westhaver, Judson
and other men were trying to swing out.
"You here, Don?" cried Nickerson when McKenzie elbowed his way to him.
The skipper's face was strained with anxiety, and he seemed relieved
to see him. "Git these lubbers out o' th' way, Don," he roared, "so's
we kin git this boat out. Th' gaul-derned thing ain't wu'th a hoot in
hell anyways, but we might git th' wimmin in and away from th' ship.
She'll be in flinders in a damn short time!"
Pushing back the men and youths who were pressing around the boat,
most of whom were farmers and tradesmen, McKenzie shouted, "Don't
crowd now, boys. We'll get the boat out a sight quicker if you'll give
us a chance." He spoke kindly and confidently and they stood clear
while the davits were out-swung.
"D'ye reckon ye kin git away from th' side?" cried Captain Westhaver
to Judson. "Devil of a back-wash down thar' an' she'll be stove sure
as blazes----"
Crash! A double wave piled over the steamer's superstructure and
poured tons of chilly brine into the boat, and while the women
screamed, and the men hung on to anything available, the flimsy bolts
in the davit heads parted with the weight of the water-filled
life-boat and it up ended and fell into the sea.
"God save us!" cried Nickerson, aghast at this catastrophe. "That's
yer coaster gear for ye! By the old red-headed, creeping Judas, Cap'en
Westhaver, ye sh'd be tarred an' feathered for that piece o' botch
work! Hell's bells! We're jammed in a clinch for fair, naow."
Donald stood beside him. "What's best to do now, Jud?" he asked
calmly. "Durned ef I know," answered the other. "Cal'late we'd better
see th' women with life-belts on an' git to work on a raft."
A terrible sea was piling over the ledges by now, and revealed in the
flashes of lightning, it looked awe-inspiring and frightful. The
steamer had struck broadside on to one of the reefs, and had been
lifted almost over it. If she went much further there was the dire
possibility of her sliding into the deep water on the inside of it and
foundering. A sandy beach could be seen--a hundred yards away--a
trifle astern of the vessel, while ahead of her rose a small rocky
cliff upon which some stunted spruce trees grew.
While Donald and some others were working on a raft, Captain Nickerson
was tying life-belts on to Ruth and Helena. Both girls were dreadfully
frightened, but managed to keep calm. Moodey stood, white-faced and
silent, with an arm around Ruth to keep her from sliding overboard
when the vessel pounded. Helena was hanging to her friend's arm, and
secured around the waist by a line which Judson had rove through a
ring bolt, and the other girls--about forty of them--were similarly
protected. All stood huddled under the lee of the upper deck-cabin.
Torn with anxiety and fearful of Helena's and his sister's safety,
yet Judson appeared outwardly calm, and he soothed the girls with
cheerful words. When a sea would crash over the steamer his booming
laugh would be heard. "Don't let that scare you? That's nawthin'. Hang
on for a bit and there'll be a slew of dories alongside. The boys'll
be coming aout from Eastville." In his heart he knew he lied. No
dories could live in that broil of tide, wind and ledge-torn water,
and at Eastville there was neither a life-boat or a Lyle gun
breeches-buoy apparatus.
The captain of the steamer dragged himself along to where Nickerson
stood. "Ef someone c'd only swim ashore with a line," he shouted above
the tumult, "we might git a hawser fast to a tree on th' point yander
and rig up a breeches buoy. But it's takin' a big chanst whoever
tries. Liable to git mushed up in the surf."
Judson nodded. It was a chance--their only chance. The steamer would
go to pieces inside an hour ... when the tide rose. The storm might
abate in that time, but the sea would be there long after the wind had
subsided, and hanging on to the vessel would be fatal. The only
solution was to get the crowd clear of the ship before she went to
pieces. He turned it over in his sailorly mind. _He_ couldn't swim,
but he might be able to get ashore on a couple of planks. "By gorry!"
he muttered, "it might be done!" And aloud he bawled to Westhaver.
"Git a couple of stout planks 'n lash 'em together, 'n get me
something for a paddle. I'll ride th' blame thing in to the beach same
as the Kanakas in the South Seas ride the surf on a board. Sing aout
when you're ready!"
Helena overheard the bawled conversation and clutched him by the arm.
"What are you going to do, Jud?" she cried fearfully. Then with a
glance at the surf seething and roaring on the beach to leeward and
swirling in toppling combers around them, she added hysterically. "No,
no, no! Judson, you can't do it! You can't do it!"
He looked into her frightened face and laughed. There was no fear in
his keen dare-devil eyes when he replied tenderly. "Don't worry,
Helena. I'll get there ... somehow. Jest you hang on here ... an'
pray to God!" The last words were spoken reverently.
She suddenly threw her arms around his neck and her wet hair fluttered
around his face. "Judson," she pleaded. "You can't do it. You know it
can't be done. Stay with us and we'll die together!" Then she turned
towards Ruth who was hidden from her by Walter's body. "Ruthie!" she
cried. "Judson can't swim and he's going to try and reach the shore on
a plank with a line. He can't do it! He can't do it! Don't let him
go!"
Westhaver scrambled for'ard again. "I got a couple o' fine two-inch
plank all lashed up for ye, Jud. Well-seized an' spiked they are so's
they'll hang together," he was meticulously exact in his description
of the preparations for the desperate venture, "and I've got some
stout line and a good paddle fur ye. We're ready fur ye, Jud, old man,
an' by cripes, ef you make it...."
A sea burst over the house and caused the fabric to tremble ominously.
When the tide rose, the waves would hurl themselves on the light
superstructure and it wouldn't last long. Judson knew that and he
cried, "I'll be right with ye, Eben!"
Helena screamed and clutched him tight around the neck. "No, no, no!
It's certain death!" she wailed. "You can't swim and you'd never get
through ... that!" She gave a frightened glance at the sea. Ruth, who
had been standing apathetic hanging on to Moodey's arm and the
life-line, suddenly turned to her fiancee. He was shivering and silent
and had hardly spoken a word. "You're a good swimmer, Walter," she
cried. "Why don't _you_ try it? Don't let Judson go. He can't swim a
stroke!" And she looked up into his face imploringly.
Walter seemed to be galvanized to life. He gave an apprehensive look
at the sea roaring and crashing around them and at the white water
racing and bursting over the rocks ahead. In the darkness it looked
horrible. There were pieces of jagged timbers whirling and tossing
around in this hell's caldron and he thought of swimming among them.
The roar and thunder of the water; the livid tossings in the
blackness and the awfulness of demoniac power suggested in the
staggering impacts of the waves against the steamer's hull and the
rending and grinding of timbers un-nerved him. "God ... Ruth, I--I
couldn't do it!" he burst out at last. "Nobody could swim in that.
I'd--I'd be smashed to pieces in the breakers. Look at them! Look at
them!" And he pointed with shaking fingers at the raging water.
"But to the beach below there," cried Ruth appealingly. "You might
manage that, Walter. Think of the women aboard. You might be able to
reach the shore. I'll pray for you, Walter dear. Try, Walter, my brave
boy. You're a good swimmer----"
He shook his head vehemently, angrily. "No, no, no! Ruth, darling.
Don't ask me! I couldn't do it. Nobody could swim that. You're trying
to send me to certain death. No, no, no! We'll hang on here until the
men come from Eastville in the boats. They'll be here soon now. The
storm will soon be over. Just wait, dear. Just wait!" There was a
whimpering note of protest in his voice, and in the semi-darkness,
Ruth looked at him in amazement. She heard him mumbling again. "Why
should I go? ... certain death ... just wait. Just wait." She stared
up at his face; noted the fear and horror expressed in it, and her
lips curled contemptuously. "And you so often boasted of your
swimming!" The scorn in her voice made Moodey writhe, but he hung on
the life-line and mumbled. "I know. I know, Ruth ... but I couldn't
swim in that. You want to see me drowned ... just wait!" The girl
savagely disengaged his arm from around her waist, and to her brother
she said with a trembling in her words. "Go, dear Juddy, go! And God
go with you! There are no cowards in the Nickerson family--men or
women--and ... there never will be!" And she kissed him.
Nickerson swung around to Helena. "I'm agoin', Helena," he said
calmly. "So long, little girl!" He bent down and kissed her on the
spray-drenched lips. "Go, darling, and may God aid you!" she cried,
and when he dragged himself away the two women, clinging together,
watched him vanish in the darkness with pallid faces upon which spray
and tears mingled.
On the after-deck, McKenzie, who had been busy on a raft, saw Judson
whipping off his coat. "And what are _you_ going to do, Jud?" he
asked. "Try to git in with a line," answered the other grimly. "I
might manage to make the beach yonder, and if I can, I'll come up
araound to the point ahead there and git a hawser ashore.
Breeches-buoy, y'know."
"But--but you can't swim, Jud," exclaimed McKenzie protestingly,
"You'll _never_ make it!"
"I'll make a dam' good try anyways," growled the other determinedly.
Donald laughed and proceeded to divest himself of his coat, pants and
boots. There was a resolute look on his boyish features, but he still
laughed as he stripped. "And what th' devil are you laughing at? And
what are you cal'latin' you're agoin' to do?" cried Nickerson, staring
at the young man in amazement.
"Me?" McKenzie stopped laughing, stared to leeward, and carefully
scanned the sea--the racing, broiling run of it and the violent
confusion of water which separated the wreck from the shore. "Why,
Juddy, old timer, I'm laughing at the idea of you trying to scramble
ashore on two planks. You'd be choked or drove under ere you'd made
five fathom off the ship. Remember the _West Wind_ and the _Livadia_?
I've had some practice--you haven't. I'm going to let you tend the
line, old timer, and _I'll_ swim ashore!" He spoke the last sentence
without laughing and in a voice that brooked no denial.
Nickerson demurred. "You've got a mother and you're all she's got----"
The other nodded and said in the same grim tone, "If anything _should_
happen, Jud, I rely on you to look after her. Now, get your line
coiled and see that there is enough of it and no chafes or broken
strands."
Captain Westhaver broke in, "It's a kile o' trawl ground-line, bran'
noo stuff, an' stout an' strong. I got three hundred fathom here----"
"But, hell!" growled Judson obstinately, "I'm agoin', Don--not you!"
Donald pulled off his boots and tightened the waist-band of his
under-drawers. "No, no, Jud!" he said. "What's the use of you going?
It would only be wasted effort. You can't swim. I can. It's up to me.
You're needed aboard to rig up that breeches-buoy and get the people
off. If I shouldn't make it, you can try, but not before. Gimme that
line!" "Th' lad's right," concurred the steamer captain, and he handed
the end of the thin, light, trawl-line to McKenzie, who proceeded to
knot it around his shoulders. "Now, Jud," he said finally. "I'm going
to make for the beach yonder, and if I manage it, I'll carry my line
up to the point ahead. When I give a signal, you bend a stout halliard
and a block to it and I'll pull it ashore and rig my end of the gear
to one of those trees. You know how the business is worked. Now, Jud,
old man, so long! If anything _should_ happen ... look after my
mother!" And while Nickerson stood half-dazed with the suddenness of
this usurpation of _his_ voluntary forlorn hope, McKenzie was
scrambling along to the stern of the pounding steamer. For a full
minute he stood amidst the chill sprays awaiting a chance, and his
slim body would be outlined against the livid whiteness of the foaming
water. Several times when flying water from the waves slashed across
the deck, the anxious watchers thought he had gone. They waited with
their hearts in their mouths, and Nickerson nervously fingered the
line. A smooth after a big sea; a momentary cessation of the tumult; a
muffled shout from the slim figure at the rail--then into the back of
a racing comber he dived!
Nickerson tending the line felt it weaving through his hands, and he
leaned over the broken rail and stared into the spray and rain with
chill fear clawing at his heart. He was trembling with anxiety for his
friend--the lad he had trained in the ways of the sea and the man he
loved as a brother--and he peered into the tumult of surging combers,
into which Donald had gone, with nervous concern. Watching the sea and
the line slipping through his fingers in spasmodic jerks, he was
unaware of two female figures scrambling along the drenched deck
behind him. It was Helena and Ruth who, unable to remain lashed up
for'ard, had come aft to see if Judson had gone on his desperate
mission. Mistaking him for someone else, they cried fearfully, "Has he
gone?"
Captain Westhaver heard and answered shortly, "Yes!" And added. "Take
care an' hang on, girls!" Then Judson shouted out, "He's still going!
He's still going! I believe he'll make it!"
"Oh!" The two women cried out together at the sound of the voice, and
Helena asked quickly, "Who's that? Is that Juddy?"
"Aye! That's Cap'en Nickerson at th' rail," answered Westhaver.
"Then who's gone? Who's out there?" It was Ruth's question.
"Young Cap'en McKenzie! He's aswimmin' in to th' beach!"
Ruth gave a queer little cry. "Donald?" For a moment she stood as if
dazed. She had been thinking of him all along and wondering where he
was. And he was out in _that_! And he had not come to her! Everything
seemed to swim before her, and she would have fallen had not Captain
Westhaver grabbed her as she swayed. "Oh! oh!" she whimpered. "He's
gone and I didn't know it! Oh! oh! he's gone.... Oh, God help him!"
And with Helena and Westhaver holding her up, she stared into the
blackness alternately sobbing and calling on the Almighty to guard and
keep the man who was struggling through the breakers in an effort to
save them all.
And McKenzie was having a desperate struggle--the greatest fight of
his life! With his head down, and swimming a powerful overhand stroke,
he got clear of the ship and into a broiling welter of leaping combers
which toppled over on his body, forcing him under with the weight of
the falling water and tossing him on their frothing crests like a
shingle in an eddy. The tide, racing in with the sea and wind, was
driving him towards the rocks, and he realized that, once in its grip,
he would be done for--smashed to a pulp on the ledges which were
dashing the seas to spray and effervescing foam.
It was about a hundred yards to the sand beach, but it was a hundred
yards of raging water--a mill-race of shouting, roaring, fighting,
whirling combers whipped to fury by wind, back-wash, tide and the
inequalities of the bottom, and by the time he had three minutes in
among this inferno of water he felt his strength giving out. He was
choking for want of air; his mouth and nose were full of salt brine,
and the buffeting of the waves and the drag of the tide were fast
weakening him, and he hadn't made half the distance. Gasping for
breath, he struggled on until he felt that he had reached the limit of
his endurance. His muscles were lagging and refusing to respond. His
heart was pounding as if it would burst inside his chest, and he found
it increasingly hard to breathe. He thought of his mother and Ruth and
murmured a prayer as his strokes became feebler. He was going to
die--a modern Leander of Abydos--and he decided to throw up his hands
and drown rather than be shattered on the rocks with the spark of life
in his body. He had stopped swimming, when a kindly under-tow--an
inshore eddy--caught him and bore him away from the ledges.
He thought dazedly of the women aboard the wreck and it spurred him to
life again. Treading water in the momentary respite and gulping great
chestfuls of air, he prepared himself for the final effort--the battle
with the surf on the beach. He could discern the shore clearly now as
he rose on a wave, and when he made out the sloping sand of the beach
he took a last gulp of air and drove in on the back of a mighty
comber. Husbanding his strength, he held back when it broke until he
felt the sand under his feet. Digging his toes in, he tried to stem
the back-wash, but he was too weak. His legs collapsed under him and
he was caught in the following comber and rolled over and over in a
broil of water and sand. Clawing desperately at the unresisting
grains, he caught a projecting bolt from a buried wharf-timber, and
hanging on to it with all the strength he could muster until the wave
receded, he scrambled frantically on hands and knees up the beach ere
the next breaker came pounding in.
For a full five minutes he lay prone with half the senses and breath
knocked out of him, until the brain, recovering quicker than the
muscles, began to urge, "Get up! Think of the women! Judson, Helena,
Ruth!" Even _her_ name came to him sub-consciously just as it had come
when he was for giving up in the broil of it. He rolled painfully to
his feet and staggered like a drunken man along the beach. He glanced
at the loom of the steamer lying amidst the whitewater on the ledges,
then suddenly felt for the line. It was still around his body, and he
gave three strong jerks at it to see if it had parted. By the feel of
it, he knew it was all right and mumbled thanks to God. Then,
stumbling over the sand, boulders, and pieces of timber and trees, he
ran for the point.
Aboard the wreck, Nickerson was almost frantic with fear. The line had
not taken a fathom from him for about five minutes and he imagined the
worst. Then three distinct tugs came on the cord which he held. He
wheeled around with a triumphant bellow. "By the old red-headed Judas
Priest! He's done it! By Godfrey! He's done it ... th' bully boy!" And
he laughed like a drunken man.
Helena gave Ruth a violent shake and almost screamed, "Do you hear,
Ruth? He's done it! He's ashore! Oh, God, we're saved! We're saved!
Oh, Father, to thee our thanks ... for him ... and us!" Ruth nodded
dumbly. She couldn't speak, but mentally she was praying and thanking
the Almighty for His mercy.
Judson was bawling--calmly now. "He's getting araound to the Point.
Git that block an' tayckle ready, Cap'en. You got that strop araound
th' forem'st and a tail-block on? Good! And that ring-buoy and
whip-line--have ye got it slung and ready to reeve off? Fine! We'll
send that halliard rope ashore...." He and Westhaver walked forward
with the line, shouting encouragement to the drenched, shivering, and
now apathetic mob of people hanging in life-lines under the lee of the
deck-house. The rising tide was sending solid water over the packet's
upper decks now and pieces of the superstructure were sluicing over
the lee rail. The people in the shelter of the house were often up to
their knees in swirling water. McKenzie had just reached the shore in
time! "Don't git scared naow," consoled Westhaver. "We'll hev ye
ashore in a jiffy. Th' rope's gone in ... cheer up ... soon be aout o'
this!" And Judson was chattering away to him and the packet's crew as
they rigged the breeches gear. "Knew him since he made his first
voyage to sea ... a poor little whitefaced nipper of a 'prentice-boy
in a lousy four-mast barque out o' Glasgow. Game as they make 'em....
I made a sailor out o' him ... th' little skinny nipper ... and naow
he's a better man than me!"
"Aye!" said Eben solemnly, "and you're an able man yourself, Judson
Nickerson! An able man!"
Up on the Point, Donald, shivering in his wet underwear, hauled the
stout rope ashore and was lashing a block to a tree trunk when several
men with lanterns appeared. They stared at him in astonishment, and in
answer to their questions he pointed to seaward and replied huskily,
"There she is! Steerin' gear wheel rope parted and she grounded on the
ledge yonder. I'm rigging a breeches-buoy to bring the folks
ashore.... Here! Fix this. My hands are numb! Look sharp or the old
hooker will be falling to pieces in the pounding she's getting out
there now!" The men--Eastville folks who had come out to the Point to
see what had delayed the steamer--set to work and rigged the gear
under McKenzie's direction. Within ten minutes they were hauling the
first passengers ashore.
Donald stood huddled under a boulder and watched a number of the women
land. He saw Ruth and Helena among them. He did not wish to see either
of them--the events of the afternoon were too fresh in his mind. He
was still bitter. Then he remembered his contract with Cal Heneker,
and the memory spurred him to ask a man to loan him an overcoat and
get him over to the town. Seeing that he could do no more, and that
the packet's crowd would be rescued all right, he left for home in
company with a farmer who had a horse and buggy with him.
His mother was standing in the door of Shelter Harbor when he arrived,
and she almost went into hysterics when she saw him. "Don't be
frightened, Mother," he soothed. "I'm all right and so is everybody
else. The old steamer went aground in that storm, but everybody got
off safe. I had to swim ashore and I left my clothes. So now, Mother
dear, make me a good hot cup of tea while I change, for I must get
aboard my ship and away with the tide. The storm is breaking off now
and it's going to be a fine night."
Aching in every muscle, and with his shoulders, arms and legs skinned
and bruised by the pounding he had got on the sand, Donald rubbed
himself down with liniment and bandaged a few of the worst scrapes.
Then he climbed stiffly into his sea clothes and went down-stairs.
Over a cup of scalding tea, hot biscuits and cake, he smiled at his
mother and patted her cheek. "Dear old mother," he said with a tender
note in his voice. "Always worrying and fretting about me."
"But just think, Donny, if you'd been drowned?" she said plaintively.
He laughed happily. "I'm not born to be drowned, mammy-dear. Swimming
is the only athletic accomplishment I have, and I can swim easier than
I can walk. I did it easily. 'Twas only a hundred yards."
The mother shook her head as if doubting the light manner in which he
was relating the experience of the evening, and she thought of the
day, years ago, when M'Leish, mate of the _Sarmania_, had come to her
with evil news. She shuddered involuntarily and her hand gripped that
of her son's in a tense clasp. "Oh, Donny-laddie, if I were to lose
you...?" She bit her lips and her eyes filled with tears at the bare
thought.
He set down his cup and rose to his feet. Slipping his arms around her
neck, he kissed her, saying tenderly. "Mother mine, you're not going
to lose me. I'm yours always, and you're always mine!"
She smiled gravely and looked into his eyes. "Maybe ... someday,
Donny, my son, you'll be saying that to another woman."
He winced imperceptibly, and into his tired eyes there flashed a
sudden tense look--a shadow of painful memory reflected in the windows
of the soul--then it vanished, and he smoothed her hair lovingly.
"There is no other woman but you, Mother dear!"
And an hour later, and while the crew and passengers of the ill-fated
packet steamer were being warmed and re-clothed in the farm houses
near the scene of the wreck, Captain Donald McKenzie was stiffly and
painfully pacing the quarter of the _Amy Anderson_ standing out to
sea.
The wind had dropped to a light breeze when they passed out of the
channel. A heavy swell--aftermath of the gale--was running, and the
wreck of the steamer could be distinctly discerned in the moonlight
with the waves making a complete breach over it. The whole
superstructure was gone, and nothing but the hull remained, and as he
stared at it, McKenzie thought of the mental wreck he had experienced
but a few hours previous. "Mrs. Walter Moodey," he murmured, and he
smiled bitterly.