THE CARTHUSIAN
From time to time, I would creep up into the companion, always in the
hopes of finding the lights of a ship close to, but nothing came of our
rockets, whilst I doubt if the little blast the quarter-deck pop-gun
delivered was audible half a mile away to windward. But though the
night remained a horrible black shadow--the blacker for the phantasmal
sheets of foam which defined, without illuminating it, the wind about
this time--somewhere between four and five o'clock--had greatly
moderated. Yet at dawn it was blowing hard still, with an iron-grey,
freckled sea rolling hollow and confusedly, and a near horizon thick
with mist.
There was nothing in sight. The yacht looked deplorably sodden and
wrecked as she pitched and wallowed in the cold, desolate, ashen
atmosphere of that daybreak. The men, too, wore the air of castaway
mariners, fagged, salt-whitened, pinched; and their faces, even the
boy's, looked aged with anxiety.
I called to Caudel. He approached me slowly, as a man might walk after
a swim that has nearly spent him.
"Here is another day, Caudel. What is to be done?"
"What can be done, sir?" answered the poor fellow, with the irritation
of exhaustion and of anxiety but little removed from despair. "We must
go on pumping for our lives, and pray to the Lord that we may be picked
up."
"Why not get sail upon the yacht, put her before the wind, and run for
the French coast?"
"If you like sir," he answered languidly, "but it's a long stretch to
the French coast, and if the wind should shift--" he paused, and looked
as though worry had weakened his mind a little and rendered him
incapable of deciding swiftly and for the best.
The boy Bobby was pumping, and I took notice of the glass-like
clearness of the water as it gushed out to the strokes of the little
brake. The others of my small crew were crouching under the lee of the
weather bulwark. I looked at them, and then said to Caudel:
"Shall we call a council? Something must be done. Those men have
lives to save, and I should like to have their opinion."
He at once halloaed to them, and they grouped themselves about me as I
stood in the companion way. Every man's voice was hoarse with fatigue,
and the skin of the poor fellows' faces had a puffed, pale appearance
that made one think of drowned bodies.
I asked them what they thought of my proposal of running for the French
shore under all the sail we could spread; but after some discussion
they were unanimous in opposing the scheme.
"Who's to tell," said Crew, "how fur off the French coast is? And what
port are we agoing to make? We're nearer the English coast now than we
are to France, and if there should come a shift," he added, casting his
moist, blood-shot eyes at the sky, and then fixing them upon the pump,
"we might be able to stagger into Plymouth or some port near it."
"This yacht," exclaimed Foster, "isn't agoing to keep afloat long, sir.
If then it's to come to that there boat," indicating with a jerk of his
chin the little boat that we carried, "we'd better launch her here than
furder out."
"Depend upon it, Mr. Barclay," exclaimed Caudel, "there's nothen for it
but to keep all on as we are, and wait for the weather to improve.
There are plenty of ships knocking about. Let it come clear enough for
us to be seen and we shall be picked up."
In this way ran the little debate we held, but as I am not a sailor I
am unable to repeat more of it than I have set down.
Before returning to Grace I looked at our little boat--she was just a
yacht's dinghy--and thought of the chance the tiny ark would provide us
with of saving our lives--seven souls in a boat fit to hold five, and
then only in smooth water! And yet she was the only boat we had, and
there was absolutely nothing else by which we might preserve
ourselves--scarce any materials that I could think of or see, out of
which the rudest craft could be manufactured, though the mere thought
of it coming to a raft turned me sick and faint, when I glanced at the
green slopes of the hurling hills of water, and marked the frothing of
their heads and the fathom-thick surface of yeast they shot from their
surcharged summits.
Grace was awake when I had gone on deck at daybreak, though she had
slept for two or three hours very soundly, never once moving when the
cannon was discharged, frequent as the report of it had been. On my
descending she begged me to take her on deck.
"I shall be able to stand if I hold your arm," she said, "and the air
will do me good."
But I had not the heart to let her view the sea nor the wet, broken,
shipwrecked figure the yacht made with water flying over the bow, and
water gushing from the pump, and the foam flashing amongst the rigging
that still littered the deck as the brine roared from side to side.
"No, my darling," said I; "for the present you must keep below. The
wind, thank God, is fast moderating, and the sea will be falling
presently. But you cannot imagine, until you attempt to move, how
violently the _Spitfire_ rolls and pitches. Besides, the decks are
full of water, and a single wild heave might throw us both and send us
flying overboard."
She shuddered and said no more about going on deck.
Spite of her having slept, her eyes seemed languid. Her cheeks were
colourless, and there was an expression of fear and expectation that
made my heart mad to behold in her sweet young face, that, when all was
well with her, wore a most delicate bloom, whilst it was lovely with a
sort of light that was like a smile in expressions even of perfect
repose. I had brought her to this! Before another day had closed her
love for me might have cost her her life! I could not bear to think of
it--I could not bear to look at her--and I broke down burying my face
in my hands.
She put her arm round my neck, pressed her cheek to mine, but said
nothing, until the two or three dry sobs, which shook me to my very
inmost soul, had passed.
"Anxiety and want of sleep have made you ill," she said. "I am sure
all will end well, Herbert. The storm, you say, is passing, and then
we shall be able to steer for the nearest port. You will not wait now
to reach Penzance?"
I shook my head, unable to speak.
"We have both had enough of the sea," she continued, forcing a smile
that vanished in the next breath she drew; "but you could not have
foretold this storm. And even now, would you have me anywhere else but
here?" said she, putting her cheek to mine again. "Rest your head on
my shoulder and sleep. I feel better--and will instantly awaken you if
there is any occasion to do so."
I was about to make some answer, when I heard a loud and, as it
appeared to me, a fearful cry on deck. Before I could spring to my
feet someone heavily thumped the companion-hatch, flinging the sliding
cover wide open an instant after, and Caudel's voice roared down:
"Mr. Barclay! Mr. Barclay! there's a big ship close aboard us! She's
rounding to. Come on deck, for God's sake, sir, that we may larn your
wishes."
Bidding Grace remain where she was, I sprang to the companion steps,
and the first thing I saw on emerging was a large, full-rigged ship,
with painted ports, under small canvas, and in the act of rounding with
her main topsail-yard slowly swinging aback. Midway the height of our
little mizzenmast streamed the ensign which Caudel or another of the
men had hoisted--the union down--but our wrecked mast, and the fellow
labouring at the pump must have told our story to the sight of that
ship, with an eloquence that could gather but little emphasis from the
signal of distress streaming like a square of flame half-mast high at
our stern.
It was broad daylight now, with a lightening in the darkness to
windward that opened out twice the distance of sea that was to be
measured before I went below. The ship, a noble structure, was well
within hail, rolling somewhat heavily, but with a majestical, slow
motion. There was a crowd of sailors on her forecastle staring at us,
and I remember even in that supreme moment, so tricksy is the human
intelligence, noticing how ghastly white the cloths of her
topmast-staysail or jib showed by contrast with the red and blue shirts
and other coloured apparel of the mob of seamen, and against the spread
of dusky sky beyond. There was also a little knot of people on the
poop, and a man standing near them, but alone; as I watched him he took
what I gathered to be a speaking-trumpet from the hand of the young
apprentice or ordinary seaman who had run to him with it.
"Now, Mr. Barclay," cried Caudel, in a voice vibratory with excitement,
"there's yours and the lady's hopportunity, sir. But what's your
instructions? What's your wishes, sir?"
"My wishes? How can you ask? We must leave the _Spitfire_. She is
already half-drowned. She will sink when you stop pumping."
"Right, sir," he exclaimed, and without another word posted himself at
the rail in a posture of attention with his eyes upon the ship.
She was apparently a vessel bound to some Indian or Australian port,
and seemingly full of passengers, for even as I stood watching, the
people in twos and threes arrived on the poop, or got upon the
main-deck bulwark-rail to view us. She was a long iron ship, red
beneath the water-line, and the bright streak of that colour glared out
over the foam, dissolving at her sides like a flash of crimson sunset,
as she rolled from us. Whenever she hove her stern up, gay with what
might have passed as gilt quarter badges, I could read her name in
long, white letters--"CARTHUSIAN, LONDON."
"Yacht ahoy!" now came in a hearty tempestuous shout through the
speaking trumpet, which the man I had before noticed lifted to his lips.
"Halloa!" shouted Caudel in response.
"What is wrong with you?"
"Wessel's making water fast, and ye can see," shrieked Caudel, pointing
at our wrecked and naked masts, "what our state is. The owner and a
lady's aboard, and want to leave the yacht. Will you stand by till you
can receive 'em, sir?"
The man with the speaking trumpet lifted his hand in token of having
heard, which somewhat astonished me, for though Caudel's lungs were
very powerful and piercing, we were not only to leeward of the ship,
but the wind, pouring dead on to us from her, was full of whistlings
and yells, and the clamour of colliding and breaking seas.
The man with the speaking trumpet appeared to consult with another
figure that had drawn to his side. He then took a long look round at
the weather, and afterwards put the tube again to his mouth.
"Yacht ahoy!"
"Halloa!"
"We will stand by you; but we cannot launch a boat yet. Does the water
gain rapidly upon you?"
"We can keep her afloat for some hours, sir."
The man again elevated his hand, and crossed to the weather side of his
ship to signify, I presume, that there was nothing more to be said.
"In two or three hours, sir, you and the lady'll be safe aboard," cried
Caudel; "the wind's failing fast, and by that time the sea'll be flat
enough for one of that craft's fine boats."
I re-entered the cabin, and found Grace standing, supporting herself at
the table. Her attitude was full of expectancy and fear.
"What have they been crying out on deck, Herbert?" she exclaimed.
"There is a big ship close beside us, darling," I answered; "the
weather is fast moderating, and by noon I hope to have you safe on
board of her."
"On board of her!" she cried, with her eyes large with wonder and
alarm. "Do you mean to leave the yacht?"
"Yes; I have heart enough to tell you the truth now, Grace; she has
sprung a leak and is taking in water rapidly, and we must abandon her."
She dropped upon the locker with her hands clasped.
"Do you tell me she is sinking, Herbert?"
"We must abandon her," I cried; "put on your hat and jacket, my
darling. The deck is comparatively safe now, and I wish the people on
board the ship to see you."
She was so overwhelmed, however, by the news, that she appeared
incapable of motion. I procured her jacket and hat, and presently
helped her to put them on, and then, grasping her firmly by the waist,
I supported her to the companion steps, and carefully, and with
difficulty, got her on deck, making her sit under the lee of the
weather bulwark, where she would be visible enough to the people of the
ship at every windward roll of the yacht, and I crouched beside her
with her arm linked in mine.
There was nothing to do but to wait. Some little trifle of property I
had below in the cabin, but nothing that I cared to burthen myself with
at such a time. All the money I had brought with me, bank-notes and
some gold, was in the pocket-book I carried. As for my sweetheart's
wardrobe, what she had with her, as you know, she wore, so that she
would be leaving nothing behind her. But never can I forget the
expression of her face, and the exclamations of horror and astonishment
which escaped her lips, when, on my seating her under the bulwark, she
sent a look at the yacht. The soaked, stained, mutilated appearance of
the little craft persuaded her she was sinking even as we sat together
gazing. At every plunge of the bows she would tremulously suck in her
breath and bite upon her under-lip with nervous twitchings of her
fingers, and a recoil of her whole figure against me.
"Oh, Herbert," she cried, "when shall we leave? We shall be drowned."
I answered her that there was no fear of that. "Though," said I, "but
for that ship heaving into sight and standing by us, our fate might
have been sealed before the close of the day."
"But how are we to get into the ship?" she cried, straining her eyes,
brilliant with emotion, at the vessel that hung, rolling stately, so
close by that I could distinguish the features of the crowds of people
who lined the rails staring at us.
I explained that the gale was slackening, that fair weather was at
hand, as one might tell by the gradual opening of the horizon, and the
clarification of the stuff that had been hanging in soot for hours and
hours low down over our splintered, withered-looking mast-head, and
that, in a short time, the sea would be sufficiently quiet to enable
the ship to lower one of the large white quarter-boats which were
hanging by davits inboards over the poop.
"The sea runs too high yet," said I, "not for a boat to live in, but to
take us off. She might be swamped, stove, sunk alongside of us; and
there is time, plenty of time, my darling. Whilst that ship keeps us
in view we are safe."
But though there might have been plenty of time, as I told her, the
passage of it was of a heart-subduing slowness. It was some half-hour
or so after our coming on deck, that Caudel, quitting the pump at which
he had been taking a spell, approached me and said:
"You'll onderstand, of course, Mr. Barclay, that I, as master of this
yacht, sticks to her?"
"What!" cried I, "to be drowned?"
"I _sticks_ to her, sir," he repeated, with the emphasis of
irritability in his manner that was not at all wanting in respect
either. "I dorn't mean to say if it should come on to blow another
gale afore that there craft," indicating the ship, "receives ye, that I
wouldn't go too. But the weather's amoderating; it'll be tarning fine
afore long, and I'm agoing to sail the _Spitfire_ home."
"I hope, Caudel," said I, astonished by this resolution in him, "that
you'll not stick to her on my account. Let the wretched craft go
and--" I held the rest behind my teeth.
"No, sir. There'll be nothen to hurt in the leak if so be as the
weather gets better, and it's fast getting better as you can see.
What? Let a pretty little dandy craft like the _Spitfire_ go down
merely for the want of pumping? All of us men are agreed to stick to
her and carry her home."
Grace looked at me; I understood the meaning her eyes conveyed, and
exclaimed:
"The men will do as they please. They are plucky fellows, and if they
carry the yacht home, she shall be sold, and two-thirds of what she
fetches divided amongst them. But _I_ have had enough of her, and more
than enough of yachting. I must see you, my pet, safe on board some
ship that does not leak!"
"I could not live through another night in the _Spitfire_," she
exclaimed.
"No, miss, no," rumbled Caudel, soothingly; "nor would it be right and
proper that you should be asked to live through it. They'll be sending
for ye presently; though, of course, as the vessel's outward bound--"
here he ran his eyes slowly round the sea, "ye've got to consider that
onless she falls in soon with something that'll land you, why then, of
course, you both stand to have a longer spell of seafaring than Mr.
Barclay and me calculated upon when this here elopement was planned."
"Where is she bound to, I wonder?" I said, viewing the tall, noble
vessel, with a yearning to be aboard her with Grace at my side; the
desperate seas which still stormily tossed between her and us safely
traversed.
"To Australia, I allow," answered Caudel. "Them passengers ye sees
forrads and along the bulwark rail ain't of the sort that goes to
Chaney or the Hindies."
"We can't go to Australia, Herbert," said Grace, surveying me with
startled eyes.
"My dear Grace, there are plenty of ships betwixt this Channel and
Australia--plenty hard by, rolling up Channel, and willing to land us
for a few sovereigns, would their steersmen only shift their helm and
approach within hail."
But though there might be truth in this for aught I knew, it was a
thing easier to say than to mean, as I felt when I cast my eyes upon
the dark-green, frothing waters, still shrouded to within a mile or so
past the ship by the damp and dirty grey of the now fast expiring gale
that had plunged us into this miserable situation. There was nothing
to be seen but the _Carthusian_ rolling solemnly and grandly to
windward, and the glancing of white heads of foam arching out of the
thickness and running sullenly, but with weight too, along the course
of the wind.
"Will not that ship put into an English port before she leaves for
good?" asked Grace.
"She _has_ left for good, miss," answered Caudel. "There's no English
port for her unless she ups hellum and tries back'ards again."
"Where are we, then?" cried Grace, with a wild stare over the lee rail.
"In what they call the Chops, miss," replied Caudel.
"In the mouth of the English Channel," I explained.
"I calculate, Mr. Barclay," said Caudel, "that our drift's been all
three mile an hour since, it first came on to blow. The wind's hung
about nothe, nothe-east, and I don't think it's shifted a point since
it first busted down upon us."
"You seriously believe, Caudel, that you can make the land, seeing
where we are, in this leaky, mast-wrecked craft?"
"Ay, sir, as easy as lighting a pipe."
"For heaven's sake, consider before it is too late! There's no
obligation to stick to the vessel. Give us time to get out of her and
you have my consent to let her go," and I pointed downwards.
"No, sir, that's not to be the _Spitfire's_ road. The weather's going
to come settled, and I trust that when you get ashore ye'll find the
yacht safe and snug in harbour, and me in readiness to wait upon your
honour's further commands."
I could see in his face, and by the looks he directed at his mates who
stood within ear-shot of us, that his mind was made up. Argument or
remonstrance would have been idle. He and the others were sailors, and
must be allowed to know what they were about when their resolution
dealt with their own calling. No doubt, if fine weather followed this
gloom and wind, the danger of navigating the yacht would be trifling.
The water in the hold was to be kept under, as was proved by our
salvation, when the yacht was labouring furiously and taking in whole
thunderstorms of wet over the bows; the vessel then was surely to be
easily kept afloat should the weather clear up; there were spare sails
below, a spare gaff, and other materials for rigging the broken height
of mast; and there was also plenty of fresh water and provisions. But
those were considerations to weigh with men bred to the sea life; they
would not in the least degree have influenced me even had I been alone.
In truth, I had had enough of the yacht; I should have cursed myself
for my folly had we parted company with the ship and then met with bad
weather again; it was impossible to hear the clanking of the pump, and
glance at the coil of cold bright water gushing from it without a
shudder that penetrated to my inmost being. And to keep my sweetheart
in this perilous craft, rendered leaky and ricketty by storm; to go on
subjecting her to the brain-addling convulsive pitching and tossing of
the poor, mutilated hooker; to risk with her another passage of violent
winds, merely to preserve a vessel which I was now quite willing to let
quietly go to the bottom!
"Not for a million!" said I aloud. "No, my darling," I continued, as I
fondled her hand, "my business is to see you safe first of all. There
is safety yonder," said I, pointing to the _Carthusian_, "but none
here. We must take our chance of being trans-shipped from her as
speedily as may be, of being put on board some passing steamer that
will carry us home swiftly and comfortably. But sooner than miss the
chance that vessel yonder provides us with, I would be content to make
the whole round voyage in her, with you by my side, though she should
occupy three years in completing it."
We had been waiting, and watching the weather for about an hour, when
my eye was suddenly taken by a cloud of extraordinary shape, sailing up
the sky out of the north and east, whence the wind was still blowing.
It was of the colour of sulphur, and was the exact representation of a
huge hand, the forefinger outstretched, the thumb curved backwards as
it would be in life, the remaining fingers clenched. As it came along
it seemed to project from the dirty grey surface of vapour under which
it sailed; it was as though some Titan, lying hid past the clouds, had
thrust his hand through the floor of vapour with the finger pointing
towards the mighty Atlantic.
By the time it was over the yacht its shape had changed, and it passed
away to leeward formless, a mere rag of yellowish vapour. But it had
lingered long enough as a compacted colossal hand, pointing seawards,
to astonish and even to awe me. It might have been that my brain was a
little weakened by what we had passed through, and by want of rest; it
is certain, anyway, that the spectacle of that hand of vapour touched
and stirred every superstitious instinct in me. Grace, as well as
Caudel and the others, had stared up at it with wonder, Job Crew agape,
and the boy Bobby squeezing his knuckles into his eyes again and again
as though to make sure. As it changed its form and floated away, I
exclaimed to my sweetheart:
"It was the finger of Heaven pointing out our road to us, and telling
us what to do."
"It was a wonderfully shaped cloud," said she.
"Grace, after that sign," I cried excitedly, "I would not remain in
this yacht though her leak were stopped, all sail made upon her, and
Penzance as far off as you can see," said I, pointing.
She looked, awed by the effect of the apparition of the cloud upon me,
and held my hand in silence with her eyes fixed on my face.
The ship having canvas upon her, settled slowly upon our bow at a safe
distance, but our drift was very nearly hers, and during those weary
hours of waiting for the sea to abate, the two crafts fairly held the
relative positions they had occupied at the outset. The interest we
excited in the people aboard of her was ceaseless. The line of her
bulwarks remained dark with heads, and the glimmer of the white faces
gave an odd pulsing look to the whole length of them, as the heave of
the ship alternated the stormy light. They believed us on our own
report to be sinking, and that might account for their tireless gaze
and riveted attention.
I could well imagine the deplorable figure our yacht made, as she
soared and sank, time after time plunging into some hollow that put her
out of sight to the ship, leaving nothing showing but the splintered
masthead above the clear emerald green or frothing summit of the
swollen heap of water. At such times the spectators aboard the
_Carthusian_ might well have supposed us gone for ever.