A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS.
"The storm is up, and all is on the hazard."
_Julius Caesar._
MR. LISLE had been out boating far beyond North Bay; but a sombre
sultry afternoon, and the ominous silence that precedes a tropical
storm, had warned him to steer homewards. He had heard of the awful
tornadoes that occasionally churned these seas into white mountains,
that dashed wrecks around the islands; that the storm god in torrid
regions was a terrible sight when aroused, and that a sunny, sleepy
afternoon had been known to develop into a howling hurricane in less
than an hour. Moreover, that tragic tales of boats blown out to sea, or
capsized with all hands, were but too well known at Port Blair.
The sky was now so inky black that it could scarcely look blacker, low
muttering thunder was heard from behind the clouds, and an occasional
red flash shot along the horizon. The breeze was rising steadily, and
a quick cool ripple was on the water. On the whole, Mr. Lisle said
to himself that there was every prospect of a very dirty night, and
the sooner that he was under the lee of Ross the better. Passing a
kind of cove in North Bay, he happened to notice a long white object
in the now gathering dusk: it seemed to be near the shore, and was
probably a blighted tree. Luckily, he looked again, and observed that
it moved. Could it be a human figure, at that hour?—quite impossible!
But although moments were precious, he resolved to give the thing,
whatever it was, a chance; and to take a nearer view and to accomplish
this, he was obliged to steer in closer to the land, which he did—to
his boatmen's unconcealed uneasiness. Vainly did they scowl, and point
expressively to the storm that was coming up so rapidly; he assured
them that this delay would be but momentary; a few vigorous strokes,
and they were sufficiently near to make out that the seemingly blighted
tree was the figure of a European woman, in a white dress! In two or
three seconds they had touched the beach, and Mr. Lisle sprang out of
the boat, waded through the water, and another instant brought him
to the side of a trembling, distracted girl, whom he had never seen
before, but who nevertheless accorded him a half-frenzied, though
silent welcome.
Helen, after she had seen the last of the war canoe, had once more
ventured down to the shore. The dark thick tropical jungle seemed to
stifle her, and, for all she knew, might be swarming with wild beasts!
The solitude was something appalling, and the silence!—save for queer
outlandish sounds in the forest every now and then, which caused her
to tremble violently. Her position may not seem so very terrible to
some people,—who will say, "She knew she was sure to be fetched in the
morning;" but a night alone upon that savage coast, was enough to make
even a stout-hearted man feel nervous, much less a girl like Helen, and
by this time she was completely unhinged. As she sat staring into the
gloom, she suddenly made out a boat, positively a European boat, with
three people in it,—and for the first time her hopes rose. She waved
her arms frantically, and she ran up and down the beach like a demented
creature. She was seen, and they were coming. Oh, the relief of that
moment! For the first time during these dreadful hours, tears rolled
down her cheeks.
The boat came in as close as it could, and a man jumped out of it, and
approached her rapidly. Stranger as she was, she rushed to him, seized
his arm, and tried vainly to speak, but her whole frame was shaken with
convulsive sobs.
"What is it? What does it mean?" he asked, as she clung to him, like a
drowning person.
"It's a—pleasure party," she stammered out. "I was gathering flowers,
and was left behind. Oh, take me with you! Take me home!"
"Come on, then,"—an Englishman's usual formula; "I'll take you back to
Ross. But we must look sharp," speaking rather brusquely. What if this
tearful, frightened young lady were to go into hysterics, or to faint
in his arms? that would be a nice business!
Without a single word, but with obedient alacrity, she followed him to
the edge of the sea,—and something told her that she was walking in
the wake of the notorious _Mr. Lisle_.
"I'd better carry you through the surf," he said, turning at the
water's edge; and coolly putting his arm round her, he was just about
to lift her on the spot, but, with flaming cheeks, she thrust him
aside, saying, "Thanks, no; I'll manage it myself."
"Oh, all right," he returned indifferently, "but I think you are
foolish! What's the good of two people getting wet, when _one_ will
do?" now wading out to the boat through surf, which took the young
lady up to her knees. He got in first, helped her in afterwards, and,
making a sign to the impatient boatmen to raise the sail, he said to
his dripping companion, "There is going to be a bit of a blow" (a mild
way of putting it), "but we shall have it with us, we shall be home in
no time," he added, in a tone of assumed cheerfulness.
In a few seconds they were gliding along over the water, before a nice
stiff breeze, and Helen found time to collect her senses, and to relate
her adventures—at first in rather a broken, husky voice, but latterly
with more composure.
And lest the reader should all this time be angrily blaming Colonel
Denis and Mrs. Home, I here beg to state that each believed Helen to
be in the other's boat—a thought for which they were indebted to Miss
Caggett.
The rising wind and threatening sky made prudent Mrs. Home collect
her party, and start; being under the impression that Helen would
return with her father. When the people belonging to number two boat
were mustered, and inquiries were made for Miss Denis, Miss Caggett
assured them that she had long since departed with Mrs. Home, and had
been quite animated in declaring that "there was no mistake about the
matter, as she and Miss Denis had been walking in the woods together."
She also displayed quite a feverish eagerness to be off!—for reasons
which we can easily understand. (Miss Lizzie had picked up her
letters and pocketed them, and sauntered down to the beach, and there
had joined the company, and come to the conclusion that a night's
solitary reflection among the tall Gurgeon and Pedouk trees would do
her rival a world of good! "How easy," she said to herself, "to say
afterwards, that I must have made a mistake—every one is liable to
make mistakes!") Thus reassured, the picnic party took their places in
the second boat, and no search or calling acquainted Helen of their
departure; and consequently, she was left behind, thanks to Miss Lizzie
Caggett.
The small white gig which had picked off the young lady, now flew
before the wind, and Helen's new acquaintance sat with the tiller-ropes
in his hands, and his gaze bent apprehensively on the south.
"I suppose I may as well introduce myself," he said presently. "My name
is Lisle. Perhaps you have heard of me?" he added expressively—at
least to his listener, his words seemed to have an ironical,
significant tone!
Helen muttered a faint affirmative.
"And you, I think, must be Miss Denis?"
"Yes."
"And were you really afraid of the savages?"
"I never was so much frightened in all my life, I thought I should have
_died_."
"I see a good deal of them knocking about the islands. They are not
such bad fellows, and I doubt their cannibalism."
"I should be sorry to trust them," returned Helen, shuddering.
"You are cold, I see, and wet, of course, but that was your own fault.
Here," suddenly removing it, "you must take my coat," throwing it over
her knees, where it remained all the time, in spite of her anxious
disclaiming. After this there was a long gap in the conversation.
Mr. Lisle undoubtedly possessed what the French call, "a talent for
silence." "How grave he looked!" thought Helen. How fast they were
going! How frightfully down on one side! The wind was getting louder
and louder, till it reached a kind of hoarse scream: the dusk had
suddenly given place to Egyptian gloom, and Helen felt sure (as she
sat with her hands tightly locked in her lap, and her heart beating
very quickly) that they were having more than a mere "blow" as they
tore through the water! All at once, the first splash of a cold, salt
wave dashed over the boat, and drenched her so unexpectedly that she
could not refrain from a stifled exclamation; but this was the only
time that she lost her self-control. She sat motionless as an image,
and neither moved nor spake, not even when a shrieking gust carried
her hat away, and whirled it into the outer darkness; and the storm
loosened her long hair, and flung it to the wind to play with. How
they flew up the water mountains, and were hurled down like a stone
into the corresponding valleys! If they were to be drowned, she hoped
that it might be soon; this present suspense was torture. All was so
black—an awful opaque blackness—the roar of the tempest the only
sound; it came in furious gusts, then died away, whilst wave after wave
swept over the boat; and now the low rumble of thunder burst suddenly
into one frightful peal, that seemed to shake the very sea itself: a
blinding flash lit up the gloom, for a moment it was as daylight. Helen
involuntarily turned her eyes towards her companion, and met his point
blank. In that second, their two souls seemed to recognize one another;
in his glance she read intrepidity, coolness and encouragement. She at
least was with a brave man, and might die in worse company! He, on his
side, noted the rigid figure of his passenger, her locked hands and
firmly-set lips; she was no longer the timid, shrinking creature he
had dragged on board the gig less than an hour previously; she was a
heroine, capable of looking death in the face, and Death's grim visage
was never closer to her than _now_. Another would have been shrieking
and clinging to him; but this girl was nerved to meet her fate alone,
and he honestly respected her fortitude. It was certainly just touch
and go, if they ever weathered Ross Point, but the boat was a stout
one, and the sails were new. The twinkling lights on the island now
came in view; how scornfully they seemed to mock these four people, who
were struggling for life and death in the surrounding howling darkness!
Another awful plunge into the hollows, and a hissing of boiling waves,
and a feeling as of water closing all round them. It seemed to Helen as
if _this_ was the end—they had shipped a heavy sea, the boat reeled,
staggered, and made another effort—she was not going to founder just
yet.
The stricken boatmen shouted hoarsely to one another, and baled in the
dark; Helen crept unconsciously closer to the steersman, and during a
lull in the blast, she said,—
"You can swim, Mr. Lisle, of course, and if _you_ escape, will you
take a message from me to,"—with a sob—"poor papa?"
"No, I won't," he answered roughly.
"But I shall be drowned, I know," and she caught her breath at the
chilling thought.
"If you are, I shall be drowned _too_, you may be sure of that. If I
am saved, you may rely upon it that you will be saved also. We will
sink or swim together. If she _does_ capsize, don't lose your head, and
don't cling to me, whatever you do; trust me, and I'll take care of
you; but I hope it's not going to come to that," he added; then, after
a long silence and another blinding sea, he exclaimed, "Thank God, we
are over the worst, and under the lea of Ross!"
* * * * *
It was still quite bad enough, but they were no longer exposed to the
full fury of the hurricane; in another ten minutes they were being
violently washed up and down against the soaking pier, in the presence
of a crowd of anxious faces, who were peering over, amidst the glare
of torches and general excitement. The first person to greet them was
Colonel Denis, looking like a man of seventy, and scarcely able to
articulate.
"Oh, Helen," he cried, as he seized his tottering, dripping daughter,
"this has nearly killed me! Only an hour ago we missed you, and you
were sighted from the lookout just before dark, and I never believed
that any boat could live in that," pointing his hand at the black,
hissing sea.
As Helen and her father stood thus together on the steps, she trying to
realize that she was safe, and he most thankfully doing the same—the
white boat showed signs of shoving off.
"You are not going over to Aberdeen now!" shouted Colonel Denis,
descending, and making a futile grab at the gunwale. "Are you a madman?"
"It's not so bad inside, between the islands," roared the other in
reply. "Good-night."
"Papa, stop him! Mr. Lisle," shrieked Helen, "come back—come back, Mr.
Lisle."
The idea of any one putting out again among those tumbling waves,
seemed to her nothing less than suicidal; but the white boat was
already gone,—lost almost instantaneously in the surrounding darkness.
"It's not so risky between this and Aberdeen, Miss Denis," said Dr.
Malone; "and Lisle is a capital sailor. But what a grand fright you
have given us all, and what a terrible trip you must have had!"
Miss Denis made no reply; she staggered up to the top of the steps and
stood upon the pier in the light of half-a-dozen torches—a strange
figure, in a dripping dress, with her long hair covering her as a kind
of mantle, and hanging far below her waist in thick dark masses.
"Take her home, and put her to bed at once," said Dr. Malone, "and
give her a warm drink, and don't let any one worry her with questions"
(doubtless he was thinking of Mrs. Creery); "to-morrow morning I will
call, and she will be all right, and will tell us how it happened that
she let us go off without her."
But how that came to pass was never clearly explained up to the present
day; people had their suspicions, but suspicions go for very little.
Miss Denis carried out Dr. Malone's instructions to the letter. She
went home and went to bed and fell sound asleep. One thing she did
which he had not prescribed,—
She dreamt of Mr. Lisle!