"THE _BLACK ADDER_"
Jack, sitting hunched up with his face between his hands in a posture
of utter despair, looked up dully as he heard the sound of approaching
feet; then, as the gloomy procession came out on to the sands, he
started to his feet with a cry.
First came Loyola, walking slowly with bent head and one hand on Jim's
shoulder; but it was the sight of what was behind her drew the cry from
his lips, for on the shoulders of Broncho and the man-of-war's man lay
the body of a man.
The rover rushed forward.
"Hawksley's cashed in!" came in a solemn voice from Broncho, as he
reached his side; but there was little need of the words. The fact was
evident enough.
"You hanged him after all?" burst out Jack, with a queer strangle of
reproach in his voice.
"No, pard; it ain't our funeral. The angels finished our job,"
explained the cowboy quietly.
The body was covered with the boat-sail and laid under the big palm;
then the castaways flung themselves down to sleep, worn out by the
tragic events of the night.
Nobody awoke until long after sun-up, and as Broncho was serving out
their scanty rations, Tari appeared out of the scrub and slunk into a
corner with downcast eyes.
Jack awoke to find himself blind again, but as he felt the woman's hand
in his, he knew that she was at last free, and, notwithstanding his
blindness, a great comfort flooded his soul.
At breakfast Jim explained his share in the tragic lynching to
the astonished bosun's mate and Broncho, and the mystery of the
supernatural voice was cleared up.
At midday the body of Hawksley was buried at the foot of the big palm
in silence.
After the exciting events of the first twenty-four hours, life on the
atoll progressed smoothly enough.
At first the shock of the tragedy seemed to stun Loyola's overstrained
senses, but gradually, as the lazy, uneventful days passed, the memory
of all the late horrors wore off, and a great hope of future happiness
in Jack's arms filled her heart.
She began to pick up spirits and show more of that sunny disposition,
with its infectious gaiety, which had been such a feature of her
character before her unfortunate marriage.
At times a snatch of song would burst from her lips, which caused a
smile of satisfaction to flit over the faces of the castaways, and she
owned a devoted slave in each one of them.
"My, boys! but she's good gear!" commented Bill enthusiastically, one
lazy afternoon, indicating Loyola with his pipe as he reclined under
the cocoa-palms.
She and Jack, deep in talk, were pacing up and down the beach, hand in
hand, for such was their custom on account of the latter's blindness.
She was telling him all the Island news, of new schooners, new
stations, and new captains: of how old So-and-so had taken a new native
wife, and Jack Bounce had been called down and thrashed by a new chum;
of the stranding of the _Wee Willie_ whilst Cap'n Ben was locked in
his cabin killing imaginary snakes, and how the new trader on Pleasant
Island had got a forty-four Colt bullet through the back from Nigger
Bill, as a gentle hint to clear out; that Billy Cæsar, a noted chief in
the Hebrides, had been wearing out his teeth on tough missionary again;
how the blackbirder _May Allen_ had lost a boat and her new recruiter
in the Louisiade Archipelago, and numerous other small bits of South
Sea gossip.
"She's shore a peach!" assented Broncho to the bluejacket's remark.
"Don't she smile be-e-autiful?" chimed in Jim, with an awestruck voice
of admiration. "Lor, but she's a fine lady!"
"You can see that stickin' out a foot," agreed Bill Benson. "She'll
'ave a gunny-sack o' dibs too, bein' 'Awksley's widder. 'Eavens! but
she is 'traps,'" and he turned up his eyes expressively.
"I don't surmise Jack'll let her handle any o' that Hawksley varmint's
crooked-gained wad," declared Broncho. "He's powerful proud, is Jack."
"An' what about them maroonin' jokers on the _Black Adder_?" queried
the bosun's mate reflectively.
"Does you-alls allow they're liable to come heavin' up on the scenery?"
inquired the cowpuncher.
"Very pre-obbable," said the bluejacket. "They may 'ave the curiosity
to see 'ow we're makin' out. If that Dago Charlie--him that were
'Awksley's mate an' did the maroonin' act--if 'e, I sez, comes
protrudin' that snaky schooner our way, there'll be trouble, sure;
but I won't panic much if 'e do come mine-droppin' under our bows.
I just itches to draw a bead on 'im with one o' these Winchesters.
Howsomedever, I fancies he's too busy lootin' copra stations an'
fishin' other jossers' pearls."
"Let's bathe," proposed the boy suddenly; and rising languidly to their
feet, they strolled off to the lagoon.
Here they were wont to disport themselves in the water four or five
times a day, and to Jack especially this was a great pleasure, for he
found that his blindness was no great inconvenience in the water.
As the lagoon of this atoll was completely surrounded by the growth,
resulting from the toil of the coral insect, it was safe to bathe in
it, without fear of the dreaded sharks which swarmed round the outer
reef.
It made an ideal bathing-place. The white beach shelved gradually, and
such was the transparency of the water that the bottom, with its clumps
of coral, its glittering pearl-oyster beds, and its brilliantly hued
fish, could be seen with ease.
Jim, the first few days on the island, fished with his usual ardour,
and caught a number of queer-shaped marine monsters.
He was all keenness to cook and eat his catch, but Jack and Tari put
their veto upon it.
As the rolling-stone explained, only the inhabitants of an atoll can
tell what particular fish are poisonous and what are not, and on each
atoll they vary according to the phases of the coral.
Tari stated that this strange poisoning of the fish changed according
to the position of the planet Venus. This is the general belief among
all South Sea Islanders, but of the two theories Jack's was more
probably the correct one.
Jim, foiled in his fishing for fear of poisonous fish or fish with
poisonous spines, turned his attention to shell-collecting, and he soon
had quite a quantity heaped up, each one having the usual red spots
which cover both shells, coral, and shellfish on an atoll.
It was a very pleasurable experience for the adventurous boy, this
picnicing life on a coral island, and, though he said nothing, he felt
keenly disappointed when departure was decided upon.
He dreaded a renewal of the open-boat trials and sufferings, and if the
choice had rested with him there would have been no relaunching of the
whaleboat.
After nearly three weeks on the island, of rest and recovering from the
late trying times, they one day launched the boat out through the surf,
and, with a good load of cocoanuts, headed away before the south-east
trades for Papeete.
Hour after hour went by as the buoyant little craft ran gaily before
the steady trade wind, with a new pioneer at the steering-oar in the
shape of Mr. Bill Benson, late bosun's mate of Her Majesty's gunboat
_Dido_.
"She weren't a bad little bug-trap as things go, an' no Callao ship
neither," pronounced the navy-man, speaking of his late ship as they
took their midday tiffin. "She was too top-'eavy, though, to my likin'
for rough weather; the owner, too, was a bit wet on muslin. It was
enuff to give one fits to see the way 'e carried on in that little
'ooker. Stunsails, mind you, on the fore, reg'lar old style. She could
sail, too, an' weren't such a bad model, on'y 'er bally old nose
sp'iled the 'ole effec'. I've passed many a Chinee junk in 'er under
sail, an' some o' them ain't no slouches neither with wind to suit
them.
"Her engines, though--oh, Lord! just a lot o' scrap-iron. You'd 'ear
the tink-tink o' the bloomin' tiffy's 'ammerin' an' repairin' all day
long. And b'ilers--oh, my! them wretched artificers spent mos' of their
time crawlin' about on their bellies, tinkerin' of 'em.
"There weren't never no time wasted. D'rectly they wos cool enuff to
boil a lump er ice, in them pore sweat-rags 'ad to go, creepin' an'
crawlin' on dunnage wood so as their feet shouldn't catch fire; then
presently out they'd come, legs first, cooked to a turn an' 'most
senseless. An' the way she wasted steam through 'er numerous cracks an'
chinks would 'ave made the bloomin' Chancellor o' the Excheq'r go muzzy.
"That were 'er on'y defec', though; otherwise she wos a' appy ship.
Full er talent, too. Gunnery very fair, footer team first chop, the
dramy a bloomin' constellation o' stars o' the first magnitude, finest
squee-jee band in the Pacific, whilst our Jimmy Bungs[14] was er artist
on the cinder-track. Wot more d'you want? But I guess my jaw-tackle's
workin' too free. Give that cocoa-juice a fair wind, will ye, sonny,"
and he pointed to the pile of cocoanuts amidships.
"Do you-alls reckon that this war-canoe o' yours is browsin' around
anyways handy hereabouts?" inquired Broncho.
"She was diggin' out for a bit er cannibalisin' through the Line
Islands when I took my fancy dive."
"Then I surmise that we can diskyard the war-canoe from our hand as
bein' wo'thless."
"I don't think we are likely to get picked up," said Jack, from the
bottom of the boat. "The Paumotus are far from being popular with
Island traders, and we are much too far to the west for any of the Cape
Horners."
"That's so," admitted the bosun's mate. "We came through the Paumotus
in the old _Dido_, an' did some fancy navigatin' at that, scrapin' our
weeds off on coral reefs, an' jammin' through tide-rip channels with
the wind jumpin' all round the compass. I went all cold up my back
more'n once, muckin' through them bloomin' reefs."
"Ain't we goin' to stop at any of the islands on the way?" asked Jim
anxiously.
"Not if we can help it," replied the rover. "I had a bit of trouble
in the Low Archipelago once, and haven't forgotten it. You remember,
Lolie, in the old _Moonbeam_?"
"Yes," muttered the woman, and shivered.
"Cawpse an' cartridge occasion, Jack?" inquired the cowpuncher in his
off-hand way.
"Pretty near. Shooting in the South Seas is more noise than business
though, sometimes."
"Every tuppeny bust-up is a 'orrible war. One copper-coloured coon
with a slit skin will give t'other side a big vict'ry. Some er these
Low Islands, howsomedever, is 'most perishin' for long-pig stakes, an'
enjoys massacretin' whites now and agen if they gets the chaunce," said
Bill Benson.
The afternoon passed in tobacco-smoke and siestas, and with the stars
came back Jack's eyesight, which event always seemed to give him
renewed life.
"Out of it, Bill," he cried, springing to his feet. "It's my wheel now,
and your watch below."
"Them sidelights o' yours is the most mysterious be'aved optics I's
ever shipmates with. I think you oughter adopt more drastic measures
than them blighted bandages. Them eyes o' yours have run outer oil or
somethin', or mebbe wants trimmin'," exclaimed the bosun's mate as he
shifted places.
"The nerve's gone wrong somehow."
"It's that 'ere luminary that puts the hobbles on 'em. It was him
cold-decked you, Jack," asserted Broncho.
"The moon's responsible for a lot of trouble in this world," said Jack.
"You never know the way it will strike you, either. Some people who get
moon-struck can only see in the daytime; others get their faces screwed
up, and some go half-witted; but I'm hoping that perhaps when the moon
changes my eyes will improve."
"Do you really think that, Jack? Oh, I do hope so, with all my heart,"
exclaimed Loyola earnestly.
"Wall, you've only three sun-ups to wait, Jack, if you allow that's
your high kyard," announced Broncho.
"Mebbe they've got eroded an' won't render, but if it's the blessed
moon you've manœuvred up against, I've heard tell that folks that is
hoodooed that way, such as lunattics an' paralytic jokers, gets worse
at the full moon. Don't you butter your dough too much on that idee,"
observed Bill wisely.
"The trades are going to leave us," put in the rover abruptly, after a
keen look at the sky.
"Goin' to have more calm?" asked Jim anxiously.
"Well, doldrum weather, I expect."
"Ca'm weather kinder palls on one," drawled Broncho disgustedly, "'an
it's shore onheathful, an' liable to make a gent feel moody an' bad;
but if it's a forced play, we makes it ontil somethin' goes pop."
"Don't you jokers go manufacturin' trouble. Your joints'll tingle
just the same when it does come alongside, an' if it do keep below the
horizon, you're frettin' your brain-cases 'bout nothin'," said Bill
reprovingly.
"'Last Post's' gone; it's about 'Lights Out,'" announced Jack. "Shy us
over that almanac before you bed down, Jim. I'll take a star presently."
"I'm going to stand watch with you, Jack," declared Loyola decisively,
getting up and seating herself by his side in the sternsheets.
So it was decided that these two should take the first watch, Bill
Benson and Tari the middle, and Jack again the morning, as he could not
trust either Broncho or Jim sufficiently with the dead reckoning.
The night passed quietly with but little wind. Loyola insisted on
again bearing Jack company in his lonely vigil from four to eight, and
after breakfast these two lay down in the bottom of the boat and slept
soundly till near midday, awaking to find a big change in the weather.
The whaleboat was going close-hauled into a dead head wind. She was
right off her course, heading a point to the east of north.
The Pacific sparkled under the strength of the tropical sun, and there
was a heavy swell running from the nor-west.
On different quarters of the horizon rain-squall clouds hovered black
and wind-torn.
The breeze blew fitfully, and occasionally came in stronger puffs,
which heeled the whaleboat over till her garboard streak showed to
windward.
It had evidently been blowing hard somewhere below the north-west
horizon, to account for the long hills of water rolling in from that
direction.
The atmosphere seemed very clear, and the surf, breaking on a line of
reef about a mile to the north, showed up plainly, as if it was only a
cable-length off.
In the west the rain was falling heavily and the sea was torn up by it,
a well-defined line of white water denoting the edge of the squall.
Loyola, with the first instinct of a sailor, took a keen look to
windward as she rose from her recumbent position.
"We're going to have a blow," she announced quietly, turning to the
rolling-stone, who was slowly filling his pipe with a clumsiness caused
by his blindness.
"Are we?" he muttered indifferently.
"You're right, ma'm," broke in Bill. "The wind broke off soon arter you
turned in, an' 'as been very unsteady ever since."
"Coming out of the nor-west," went on the woman calmly; "a nasty
quarter in these seas."
"Can you locate us at all, Jack?" inquired Broncho.
"What's your dead reckoning for the last four hours?" asked the rover.
"We've been headin' a point off north most o' the time," returned Bill
Benson, "and ain't averaged more'n two knots an hour."
"St. Jean Baptiste can't be far below the horizon in the nor-west,"
said Jack, after making a rapid mental calculation.
"Pass me over the sextant and I'll get a noon sight," observed Loyola
quietly.
Bill stared in astonishment, and ejaculated half under his breath,
"Blawst me, but she's a sailor's daughter an' no mistake."
"She was four years old when Big Harry brought her out to the South
Seas in the old _Moonbeam_. When he lost his money he turned the yacht
into a trader, and kept his daughter with him, as she had no mother,
and she's been at sea most of the time ever since," explained Jack in a
low voice, as this sea-maiden ogled the sun.
Silently they watched her. This taking of the sun to the uninitiated
always seems a most mysterious and wonderful operation, and Broncho,
Jim, and the bluejacket stared with eyes full of awe and admiration.
The sun was now close to the meridian, and presently the woman called
out,
"Make eight bells!"
Jack laughingly beat the notes of the bell with a spoon on the barrel
of his six-shooter.
"Throw me over the almanac and tables, Jim," cried Loyola coolly, and a
minute later she announced their latitude.
"Think we're in for some dirt, Lolie?" inquired the rolling-stone
casually.
"Sure of it! What you say, Tari?"
"Missee qui' right, big blow by-an'-by."
"I hope not," said the boy anxiously. "In an open boat there ain't no
joke in it."
"I'm with you, Jim," declared the cowboy. "I'd rayther be lost in a
blizzard a whole lot with a good hoss under me, than be upheaved an'
junked about on this here onrestful sea."
Presently the wind died away completely, and the boat lay rolling
helplessly on the swell, her sails flapping.
The afternoon passed slowly. Bill, in the bottom of the boat, lay
face downwards, apparently dozing. Jim, next him, was listening with
open eyes to one of Broncho's cattle-yarns. Tari, in the bows, slept
placidly; and in the stern sat Jack and Loyola, conversing in low tones.
None of the boat's crew noticed the rapidly approaching change of
weather. Loyola had her back turned to the heavy squall rising so
rapidly, and neither Broncho nor Jim perceived it until the blind man
cried suddenly,
"I smell wind!"
One glance was enough. Up sprang Loyola, and, seizing the steering-oar,
with one long stroke she swept the boat's head round.
Then with a screech the wind fell upon them. The boat gave a violent
lurch and lay down to it, the water pouring in over the gunwale.
Broncho and Jim, taken completely by surprise, were tumbled to leeward
on top of the bosun's mate, who was half drowned before they could
extricate themselves, whilst Jack was awkwardly groping about in a vain
effort to get in the awning.
The woman steered superbly, and her clear voice rang like a bell above
the squall as she called to Bill to get hold of the sheet before the
sail flogged itself to rags.
The rain fell in solid sheets, and the sea hissed as it beat upon
it. The boat, rushing madly before the wind, rocked wildly, and
dipped her rail under at each roll; whilst Jack, in a foot of water,
baled furiously to keep pace with the rain; the other four struggled
desperately with the maddened sail. Loyola, hanging on to the long oar
with her strong young arms, stood swaying gracefully to the motion of
the boat, as, calm and watchful, she held it steady.
The sunshine fled below the horizon to the south-east, chased by a mass
of heavy, threadbare clouds, which came pelting across the sky.
The sail was quickly muzzled and close-reefed, and Loyola cautiously
brought the wind on to the quarter, feeling its strength with practised
hand.
But it was more than the brave boat could stand, and a sea washed over
the rail which nearly filled her.
"Down that sail!" yelled Jack, whilst he and Jim baled with furious
energy. "Down that sail!"
After the first tremendous downpour the rain fell steadily, but with
less weight. Meanwhile both wind and sea commenced to rise, and though
the whaleboat rode the big rollers splendidly, many of the smaller
waves slopped aboard and kept the balers hard at work.
With the sail off her, Loyola swung the boat's head up into the wind,
and held her with the steering-oar from falling off.
"Lemme relieve you, ma'm," called the man-of-war's man, clambering aft.
"I'm all right," answered the plucky woman. "Give the balers a spell."
"What's the glass say?" jerked out the blind man, panting with his
exertions.
"Phew! but it's low, an' dropping too," replied Bill, squinting into
the face of a small aneroid which they had saved from the _Ocmulgee_.
"Can you see under the squall?"
"No, it's black now, clear round the horizon."
"Wind seems to me to be increasing," commented Jack, feeling its
strength with his face.
"It's just like the start of that blow we had in the _Moonbeam_ off
Rarotonga," called Loyola.
"That's bad!" commented the former. "I think, Bill, you'd better rig up
a sea-anchor for us to ride to. What do you say, Lolie?"
The woman flushed with pleasure at Jack asking her opinion, and her
eyes, shining with suppressed excitement, aroused in her by this
struggle with the elements, beamed fearlessly into the heart of the
storm.
"It's going to blow very hard, I'm sure of it," she answered; "but you
know best, Jack."
Thereupon they wasted no time in acting on the rover's idea. Three
oars were lashed together triangle-wise with a tarpaulin spread between
them. This was weighted by the small boat-kedge. Then, with their
strongest line attached, this contrivance was lifted over the bows and
the line paid out as the boat drifted down to leeward. This had the
effect of holding the boat's head up to windward, and caused her to
ride easier.
There was nothing more to be done but sit still and hope that the
gallant craft would succeed in weathering out the storm.
Leaving the post that she had held so well, Loyola seated herself
beside Jack in the bottom of the boat, where they were protected in
some degree from the howling wind.
Jack made her don a long oilskin coat to keep out the wind and rain,
as, slightly clad as they all were, the wetting caused a feeling of
cold.
Now that the strain and excitement of the first strenuous fight were
over the woman felt somewhat limp and disheartened; but the presence of
her lover by her side, blind and helpless though he was, proved a great
comfort to her.
Shyly she sneaked her hand into his. He closed his fingers upon it
reassuringly and whispered in her ear,
"I'm very proud of you, Lolie, steering through that squall."
Such was the noise of the wind that, though the castaways sat shoulder
to shoulder with their backs to the gale, Jack, farthest aft, could
only hear Loyola speaking next to him by putting his ear close to her
mouth.
On the other side of Loyola sat Jim, the baler in his hand; whilst next
to him Broncho and Bill Benson exchanged remarks, Tari being in his
favourite place up in the bows.
"She rides well," muttered the bosun's mate, "an' if this kick-up
don't stir up the mud too much, we'll see another dawnin' in this old
low-degree turnip after all."
"You allows as how these perverse elements ain't goin' to get our
scalps then," drawled the cowpuncher. "The deal comes a bit florid to
me. The amount of _agua_ we-alls contrives to gather at one time I
regyards as liable to have baleful effects."
"An' my idees were about the same gauge. It's the gal who pulls us
through the shindy. She's a bit o' dossy goods, wi' enuff nerve an'
savvy to make an' ordinary josser pipe low an' subdued."
"You're shore right a whole corralful. I feels plumb useless an' no
account when that 'ere squall rounds up on us, an' I near cuts loose
a howl; but when I sees how she's playin' the game so ca'm an' easy,
I cinches up my paltry feelin's an' whirls into the play with renewed
sperit."
"Poor ole Jack, too," observed Bill. "That blindness o' his cuts him to
the quick for sure. I watches 'im balin' with the blood runnin' from
his lips where he's bitin' of 'em. 'E's an old bird, is Jack Derringer;
keeps a stiff upper lip an' don' show much, but that blood lets out how
fretted 'e is an' gouged up in 'is innards."
Broncho nodded in silence, for Jack's misfortune hit his old bunkie too
hard for him to feel inclined to talk about it.
Suddenly a vessel was descried to windward, flying down upon them under
a close-reefed topsail, flinging the surges to right and left of her
and dipping to her cat-heads at each dive.
As she lifted her stern her deck could be plainly seen, crowded with
men, who crouched under her bulwarks in glistening groups. Her low
black hull battled in a field of raging foam, and her long topmasts
swung madly across the heavens as she rolled.
She was evidently an Island schooner.
"Jack, it's the _Black Adder_," cried Loyola nervously, after one
glance at the nearing vessel.
"Is she close?" inquired the rolling-stone.
"We'd be standin' by water-tight doors in the _Dido_," declared Bill.
"Near enough to throw the shorthorn steerin' with a thirty-foot rope,"
put in Broncho.
As the schooner surged by, her crew manned the rail, staring wild-eyed
at the whaleboat.
Aft by the helmsman stood a long, thin man with a scraggy beard, and
so near was the flying schooner that the movement of his jaws could be
seen as he chewed steadily.
Suddenly he bent forward, and shading his eyes with one hand, gazed
fixedly at the castaways.
"It's Dago Charlie!" gasped Loyola, with a horror in her eyes.
"By God, he's seen us!" yelled the bosun's mate wildly.
Sure enough the man began brandishing his arms in furious
gesticulations, and a deep roar reached the whaleboat from the combined
lungs of the stranger's crew.
"Bah! You swabs! We don't care that for you!" roared Bill Benson
savagely, standing up and snapping his fingers.
"Thar's squaws among 'em," exclaimed Broncho with surprise.
"Island girls," muttered Jack.
The schooner had hardly got a quarter of a mile to leeward when she put
her helm down and hove-to with a tarpaulin in the rigging.
"Goin' to lie by us till it moderates," said Bill. "Now he's spotted us
he won't let us go if 'e can 'elp it. 'E knows it's the gallows for 'im
if we gets clear, and 'e'll stand by to pounce on us. 'E'll get what
he ain't lookin' for if 'e comes protrudin' here."
"What for of a play would it be if we-alls sends some lead after him,
as a sorter hint to move on?" inquired Broncho.
"Wouldn't do!" pronounced Jack. "We'd get it all back with interest. If
it moderates at all to-night we'll put the horizon between us."
"I'm jest pining to shoot him up some," declared Broncho bloodthirstily.
"Let 'im begin the action," said Bill grimly. "We'll finish it!"
Loyola said nothing, but cowered closer to Jack with big, anxious eyes.
"We'll give him the slip, Lolie, don't you fear," cried the rover
heartily.
Slowly the hours passed. The gale continued to blow with unabated
vigour, but the whaleboat rode it like a duck.
The castaways sat silent for the most part, and watched the schooner
down to leeward with various emotions.
Jack, handicapped by his blindness, lay back with closed eyes, deep in
thought.
Loyola, next to him, sat silent and troubled; whilst Broncho and the
bosun's mate tried to converse, but gave it up after a few efforts.
Jim, with the baler in his hand, busied himself with keeping the boat
free of water, for though she took no green water aboard, sprays and
spindrift flew over in a continuous shower-bath.
As evening came on they ate their slight, unpalatable meal and
struggled with damp matches to light their pipes in the screaming
wind. Then, as the darkness deepened, they all sat silently expectant,
waiting for the return of Jack's bewitched eyesight.
The rover sat up and sniffed round, turning his head slowly through
the points of the compass with straining eyes.
They watched him, fascinated by this queer freak of fortune, Loyola in
an agony of anxiety, the others curiously, but quietly confident.
Then, as the stars began to peep forth through the rushing clouds, they
saw his eyes suddenly brighten.
"I can see again!" he murmured, almost below his breath; though they
did not catch the words, all recognised that change in his face.
"Thank God!" burst forth Loyola half brokenly, for it was her great
terror that some day perhaps his eyesight might fail to return with the
nightfall.
A wave of intense relief rushed over the castaways, and as if some
great weight had been lifted from their spirits, they commenced to
talk, or rather shout, cheerfully.
The mere fact that their leader, if only for a few hours, was once more
restored to his usual self, gave renewed confidence to all.
With a swift, winning smile, Loyola tenderly grasped the rover's hand
and hugged it.
"So glad! so glad!" she cried joyfully.
"It's full moon to-night, Jack!" said Broncho casually, as if it were
of no importance, though he knew full well how anxiously he, nay, all
hands were looking forward to its advent as a slight chance of release
for Jack from his horrible affliction.
"I know," replied the rolling-stone very quietly; then more brightly,
"Now, let's have a look round. Ah! There's the schooner--rather too
close, I'm thinking. How far do you make it, Bill?"
"'Bout 'alf a mile."
"About that, I think," agreed Jack; then he turned and looked keenly to
windward.
"This dust-up will be over before dawn," he declared. "Let's see. The
moon rises about eleven; the sky is getting clearer every minute.
But that marooning hound needn't hug himself about that; he'll have
to catch us first and fight us afterwards, and if he gives me half
a chance to draw a bead on him before daylight, I'll put him out of
action for ever, and think no more of it than stamping on a cockroach."
"That's bizness, Jack, that's the tactics! Kill the bloomin' swine
an' all's serene. One of us ought to be able to 'it the bull's eye,"
asserted Bill keenly.
"Why, chucks!" exclaimed Broncho, "it's a cert if he comes mouchin'
'round he's due to get creased a whole lot. That yappin' wolf'll find
it a heap fatiguin', chasin' round ropin' after this outfit. I allow
he's some fretted now he pastured you-alls on the island so headlong
an' thoughtless. That play o' his is goin' to make him sweat blood."
FOOTNOTES:
[14] Nickname for the cooper.