The Life-Boat Wins
Bill Glass, lantern in hand, plunged into the darkness and the storm,
Jack following at his heels. Their way led them away from the winding
river and under the radiance of the lantern Jack saw that they were
treading a well-defined path through the marsh-grass. It was as much
as he could do to keep up with his guide, whose shuffling gait, while
it might look slow, covered ground with remarkable rapidity. And while
Jack was forced to stagger under the force of the gale, Bill Glass, his
head erect, never faltered. Five minutes of tramping brought them to
the railroad trestle which was here raised some eight feet above the
marsh, and even as they reached it the rails began to hum and afar to
the northward a white light came into view.
“There she be,” said Bill. “Best give me a boost, mate; I be n’t as
spry as I was.” Jack aided and Bill scrambled to the trestle. Then
the lantern was handed up and Jack followed. If it had been hard to
keep one’s footing below it was infinitely harder here and Jack was
disconcerted to find that Bill meant to walk along the track. How
he managed to step safely from one timber to another with that gale
lashing and buffeting him Jack couldn’t understand, for it was all the
boy could do to keep his feet. But fortunately a dozen yards brought
them to a place where the cross timbers had been carried several feet
out at the side of the trestle to accommodate a barrel of water for use
in case of fire. Here there was room to stand out of the way of the
train, and, better still, something to hold on to. Bill set the lantern
on the track and waited.
“She be heavy tonight,” he muttered, “or maybe the wind be rocking them
cars.”
The humming of the rails was not audible up there but the white light
grew and grew and soon Bill was out on the track waving his lantern.
And then, above the roaring of the wind, sounded the shrill, imperative
blasts of the locomotive whistle, followed more faintly by the jangle
and bumping of the freight cars as the brakes were set, and the long
train came to a stop some distance down the track. Bill Glass seized
his lantern and started off toward it and Jack, his knees quaking,
followed as best he could. But when he too reached the engine the
engineer was already making ready to go on and he had to seek another
barrel platform with Bill Glass and wait while car after car went
clattering, jarring by. When the rear light had passed Bill piloted
the way back. By this time Jack had become fairly adept at walking a
trestle in a fifty mile gale, although he was heartily glad when Bill
stopped and climbed down to the ground again. Once more on the path it
was possible to talk and be heard, and Jack asked anxiously;
“Will they tell the life savers?”
“Jim said he’d stop at the section house a mile below here and
telephone to town. Jim’s got two sons at sea himself and he won’t
forget, mate.”
There was no more said until they reached the cabin again, which was
no slight task, since the wind was more in their faces going back. But
finally the welcome gleam of the light met them and they staggered into
the shelter of the building and pushed open the door. Hal was fast
asleep in a chair and Bee, the yellow cat in his lap, was only half
awake.
“I thought you’d walked into the river or lost your way,” he said with
relief. “Old Hal’s asleep, isn’t he? Wake up, Hal!”
Bill Glass said it might be two hours before life savers would reach
the wreck and set about making some coffee. He soon had the fire
started and the kettle filled with water. The boys could not but admire
the deft way in which he accomplished things, even Hal acknowledging
grudgingly afterwards that “the old pirate was no fool.” As Bill busied
himself about the stove Jack told how they had been awakened by the
sound of the cannon and how they had gone out to locate the wreck,
afterwards speeding up the river in the launch until a sudden gust had
rammed her bow into the bank.
“We’ll have a sip o’ coffee,” said Bill, “an’ then we’ll take the dory
an’ go back there to your boat. Likely we can pull her off.”
When the coffee was ready they each drank a cupful of it and, although
their host offered them no milk for it, it warmed and invigorated them.
Afterwards they got into the dory under the little wharf and, Bill at
the oars, and two lanterns to light them, went slowly down the narrow
stream. They reached the launch in almost no time at all and Bill
again took command of the situation. Hal was directed to start the
engine and keep her at neutral. Then the stern was pushed off and the
propeller was started slowly at reverse. Bill clambered to the bank,
braced himself and pushed, while Bee and Jack shoved on the oars,
and in a moment the _Corsair_ was free again. Bill hitched his dory
astern and, since there was not room there to turn the launch about in,
directed Jack to go on up the stream for a ways. How in that blackness,
Bill Glass could tell one place from another, was a mystery, but in
a minute he ordered the engine stopped and, taking an oar, soon had
the launch headed down stream. Then they set off for the island once
more. Bill spoke only once on the journey. Then making a trumpet of his
hands, he shouted across to Hal at the engine;
“That be likely one o’ your father’s boats out there. Ain’t no others I
knows of carries signal guns.”
The wind was almost dead ahead for most of the way and the _Corsair_
tossed and careened like a sloop in a squall. Long before they found
the wharf they began to encounter waves, and they were all pretty well
sprinkled by the time the landing was made. All the way back they had
watched for rockets beyond the island but had seen none. Jack said
they had probably used them all up. Bee suggested that perhaps help
had already reached them. But when, after making fast the launch, they
battled around the beach in the teeth of the gale a dim light showed in
the locality of The Tombstones and Bill Glass, peering under his hands
through the darkness, announced that the schooner was still there.
There was nothing they could do but watch and wait, and after Bill
had signalled for some minutes with his lantern and received finally
an answering wave from the schooner they crept back to the tent for
shelter. At intervals Bill went to the flap and viewed the sea in the
direction of Toller’s Rock. There wasn’t much conversation. There
was little to say and the noise of the waves and wind made talking
difficult. The tent still threatened to go at every blast and still
held. An hour passed and the hands of Bee’s watch pointed to ten
minutes past two when there came an exclamation of satisfaction from
Bill Glass, who had gone to the tent door for perhaps the twentieth
time.
“There she be!” he called. “Roundin’ the Rock this minute. I see her
light.”
The boys clustered behind him and looked. Afar out was a tiny flicker
that came and went as the waves tossed the boat up and down. Then
suddenly a strong beam of white light shot across the water, moved
right and left and disappeared again.
“They be a-lookin’,” said Bill. “That be her search-light.”
From the front of the tent they watched the tiny speck of light draw
nearer and nearer until, at length, it was abreast of the island. Then
it disappeared suddenly and there was a gasp from Bee.
“She’s sunk!” he cried.
“Not she,” answered Bill Glass. “She be all water-tight compartments.
Upset she can, mate, but never sink. That light be in the bow an’ she’s
passed us. There be her search-light again.”
There came a chorus of cries from the boys as suddenly, out of the
blackness, the wrecked schooner appeared bathed in light. For a moment
only the search-light played upon her and then darkness shut down
again.
“Square between the ledges she be,” exclaimed Bill. “Mainmast broke
short off and fore-top-mast hangin’. Crew’s in the riggin’ and the
sea’s breakin’ over her deck hard, mates. But her hull be all right
yet, I cal’ate.” They hurried around the hill again, fighting the gale,
until they were opposite the scene.
“I saw three or four men clinging to ropes,” said Bee to Jack in an
awed voice. “Will they get them off, Jack?”
“Surely,” Jack answered. “I wonder if the life-boat can get alongside
of her.”
“Aye, that she will,” replied Bill Glass. “Come around lee side o’ her,
likely. She be one o’ Folsom’s boats, I cal’ate. A mighty long overhang
for’ard, she has, an’ she might be the _Jupiter_.”
For what seemed many minutes there was no sign of the life-boat’s
lights. Then the bow lantern glinted again near shore and was gone.
“Crawlin’ around to looard, she be,” said Bill Glass admiringly. “Eh,
I’d like mighty well, mates, to be havin’ a hand down there myself!”
The search-light flooded the scene again, but this time its radiance
disclosed only a part of the dark hull and the deck-house and a smother
of water that seemed rushing in all directions. The disk of light
again disappeared, and in its place shone, startlingly brighter and
nearer at hand, the bow light of the rescuer. After that the watchers
on land could only surmise what was taking place down there in that
cauldron of seething waves and frantic winds, for the search-light did
not show again. It was Bill Glass who pictured the scene for them,
shouting to them as they clustered close about him.
“She be alongside now, mates, under the quarter likely. All hands leave
ship! Aye, aye, twice I’ve heard that word, mates; once off Sable
Island an’ once ’most in sight o’ port. They be climbin’ down in the
life-boat now, I cal’ate, an’ the skipper’s got his log-book an’ his
gold watch an’ maybe a trinket or two. All hands to the life-boat! Eh,
they won’t need much tellin’! Thankful to go, they be, I cal’ate.”
A light moved, swaying along the deck, and then went down out of sight.
“That’ll be the last, I cal’ate,” said Bill. “Skipper, likely. Now she
be castin’ off. Can you see her light, mates?”
They couldn’t for a moment, but presently it appeared and moved, rising
and falling, and once they thought they heard the beat of the engine
as the life-boat fought her way off the shore and headed seaward.
[Illustration: THE LIFE-BOAT WINS.]
“Aye, a good job, shipmates!” shouted Bill Glass as the bow light was
lost to them. “God bless ye for brave boys!” He turned and led the way
back toward the tent. Eastward there was a lightening of the horizon
that told of the coming day. Back in the tent Bill blew out his lantern.
“If I be n’t in the way, mates,” he said, “I’ll just stop here for a
bit. It’ll soon be mornin’ an’ I be anxious to see what kind o’ a fix
that boat be in.”
“Make yourself at home,” said Jack heartily. “Take this blanket and put
it around you. Want to lie down here and have a nap?”
“No, no, I’ll just sit her an’ smoke a pipe, thank ye. But you best be
havin’ a sleep.”
“I don’t know about sleeping,” said Bee tiredly, “but I guess I’ll lie
down awhile. Will you wake me, if I should go to sleep, Jack?”
Jack promised, being certain that he would not sleep himself. But ten
minutes later each of the three boys was slumbering, and Bill Glass,
the acrid smoke from his pipe trailing out of the tent, sat open-eyed
awaiting the dawn.