"OVERBOARD!"
The cry came from little William, as the Portuguese girl, lifted on the
end of the boom, was pitched far out into the sea.
The utterance was merely mechanical; and as it escaped from his lips,
the sailor-lad rushed towards the edge of the raft, and placed himself
in an attitude to plunge into the water,--with the design of swimming to
the rescue of Lalee.
Just then the boom, suddenly recoiling, came back with a rapid sweep;
and, striking him across the shins, sent him sprawling over the
shoulders of Ben Brace, and right into the sea-chest, in front of which
the sailor was still kneeling.
Ben had heard that significant cry of alarm, and almost simultaneously
the "plash" made by the little Portuguese as her body dropped down upon
the water. He had slewed himself round, and was making a hurried effort
to get to his feet, when the boy, flung with violence upon his stooping
back, once more brought him to his knees.
As William was chucked right over him into the chest the sailor soon
recovered from the shock, and rising erect, cried out in a half-confused
manner,--"Overboard! Who? Where? _Not_ you, Will'm! What is't, boy?"
"O Ben! Ben!" answered William, as he lay kicking among the contents of
the kit, "Lilly Lalee, she's knocked overboard by the boom! Save her!
save her!"
The sailor needed neither the information nor the appeal thus addressed
to him. His interrogations had been altogether mechanical, for the
plunge he had heard, and the absence of the girl from the raft,--
ascertained by a single glance,--told him which of the _Catamaran's_
crew it was who had fallen overboard.
The circling eddies in the water showed him the spot where the girl had
gone down; but, just as he got to his feet again, she had turned to the
surface; and, uttering half-stifled screams, commenced buffeting the
water with her tiny hands, in an instinctive endeavour to keep herself
afloat.
In a crisis of this character, the brave English sailor was obstructed
by no ambiguity as to how he should act. A single bound carried him
across the _Catamaran_,--another landed him upon the top of one of the
casks, and a third launched him six feet outward into the sea. Had he
been apprised of the accident only a score of seconds sooner, less than
that number of strokes would have sufficed him to reach the spot where
the child had first fallen into the water. Unfortunately in the
collision with little William, that had brought him back to his knees,
some time had been expended. During this interval--short as it was--the
craft, though under an uncontrolled sail, was still making considerable
way; and when the rescuer at length succeeded in leaping from the cask,
the struggling form had fallen into the wake of the _Catamaran_ to the
distance of nearly a cable's length.
If the girl could only keep afloat for a few minutes, there need be no
great danger. The sailor knew that he could swim, sustaining a heavier
weight than was the little Lalee. But it was evident the child could
not swim a stroke, and was every moment in danger of sinking for the
second time.
Her rescuer perceived this danger as he started to her aid; and
therefore pressed rapidly towards her, cleaving the water with all the
strength that lay in his muscular arm and limbs.
Meanwhile little William had also regained his feet; and, having
extricated himself from the chest in which he had been temporarily
encoffined, ran towards the after part of the raft. Quickly mounting
upon the water-cask at the stern, he stood astride the steering-oar,--an
anxious and trembling spectator,--his eyes alternately fixed on the
strong swimmer and the struggling child.
Snowball was still dormant, buried in a slumber profound and
unconscious,--such as only a "darkey" can enjoy. The cry "Overboard!"
uttered by little William had made no impression upon the tympanum of
his wide-spread ears,--nor the exclamations that succeeded in the
harsher voice of the sailor. Equally unheard by him had been the scream
coming across the water, though along with it he might have heard the
utterance of his own name!
As none of these sounds had been sufficient to arouse him from his
torpor, he was likely to remain for some time longer unconscious of what
was occurring. The sailor swam in silence,--the cries of the child, now
more distant, were growing feebler and feebler; while little William--
Snowball's only companion upon the raft--was too much absorbed in the
scene and its issue to allow even a breath to escape him.
In this moment of agony,--intense to all the others of the _Catamaran's_
crew,--Snowball was sleeping as soundly and sweetly as if he had been
stretched along the bench of his caboose, and rocked to rest by the
undulations of a good ship going at easy sail.
Up to this time, William had not thought of awakening him; for, to say
the truth, the boy had not yet quite recovered his presence of mind.
The shock of consternation caused by the accident was still vibrating
through his brain; and his actions, in running aft, and springing up on
the cask, were half mechanical. There, enchained by the spectacle, and
waiting with intense anxiety for its _denouement_, he had not a thought
to give either to Snowball or his slumberings.
The silence continued only for a short period of time, though it may
have seemed long enough both to actors and spectator in that thrilling
drama. It was terminated by a cry of joyous import from the lips of
little William,--in short, a loud _hurrah_, evoked by his seeing the
swimmer come _en rapport_ with the child, raise her sinking form above
the surface, and holding it in one hand, strike out with the other in
the direction of the rail.