"Who was it fired that shot?"
"Oh, never mind about who fired it," said the doctor gruffly; but he
picked up a double rifle lying against one of the thwarts, and
mechanically opened the breech, drew out a spent cartridge, and thrust
in another.
"Have your pieces ready, my lads. Half at the word cease rowing, aim,
and fire. Are you ready, gentlemen? They're coming on very fast."
"Yes; all right," said the doctor; and Sir John rose in the boat, rifle
in hand, and gave the mate, who had spoken, a nod, and then he smiled as
Jack rose up quickly and picked up one of the loaded pieces at his side.
But no one fired at the rapidly advancing canoes, which were crowded
with men; for suddenly there was a deep roar from the yacht, a heavy
charge of grape-shot ploughed up the water in front of the first canoe,
and the paddling in both ceased.
Another shot sent the water flying over the second canoe, and as if
animated by one brain, the paddles began to work again, not to send the
vessels forward, but back toward the island; and five minutes later the
boat was alongside the yacht.
The men sent up a hearty cheer as Captain Bradleigh held out his hand to
assist Jack on board, and his words were almost drowned in the welcoming
cries; but Jack heard him, as the warm grip retained his hand, and
another pressed his shoulder.
"The best day's work, my lad, we ever did. God bless you, and thank Him
for giving you safely back."
Five minutes later the boat was swinging to the davits.
"Don't want to punish them any more, Sir John, I suppose?" cried the
captain.
"No, no, let the miserable wretches go," said Jack's father.
"Then we'll go back to the old anchorage, sir, for there's a look about
the sky I don't like."
The signal was given, and the yacht began to glide rapidly through the
water, back toward where the volcano rose up glowing with colour in the
morning light, while Jack was at Ned's side as he lay coming to on the
deck.
He stared about him for a few moments, and then fixed his eyes on those
of Jack, breaking out half hysterically--
"I couldn't help it, Mr Jack, sir; don't set me down for a cowardly
cur."
"Help what?" said the lad wonderingly.
"Turning like a woman, and fainting away that how. Oh, do give me a
dose o' something, doctor, I feel sick as a dog."
"No, no; lie still for a minute or two, and you'll be all right," said
the doctor, patting his shoulder, and Ned uttered a cry.
"Don't, don't, sir. It's agony--my bad shoulder--the arrow--and he hit
me there with his club."
"Ned, Ned," said Jack softly, as he bent over the poor fellow and held
his hand, "who could think you a coward for saving my life?"
The men began to cheer again when Ned was helped by the doctor and Jack
down to his berth, wincing at the slightest touch, for his arm had
received a nasty jar, but a smile came into his drawn face as he heard
the hearty welcome.
"Thankye, lads, thankye kindly," he kept on saying till he got below,
where the steward helped him to change his clothes, and Jack went to his
cabin for the same purpose.
"Ever so much better, sir," cried Ned half-an-hour later, when Jack went
to see him, and found him dressed and ready to go on deck. "That crack
was just like one on the funny-bone, sir, but it's all gone off now. My
eye, though! suppose it had been where he meant it! What a headache I
should have had!"
By the time Jack reached the deck, the islands from whence the blacks
came were hidden by a peculiar-looking haze, and the _Star_ was racing
through the sea to gain the shelter of the lagoon.
"A hurricane, my lad," said the captain, "and we shall get into shelter
none too soon."
"A nice hunt you gave us, Jack," said his father. "Here have we been
with half the crew hard at work every day looking for you two. Well,
thank Heaven you are both back safe and sound."
"We did our best to get back, father," said the lad, looking at Sir John
wistfully.
"Of course, I know that, my boy, and I hope you think we did our best to
find you. The doctor here pretty well lamed himself with walking."
"Of course I did," said that gentleman. "Doctors don't like to lose
their patients, do they?"
Go where he would during their run back to the harbour, Jack found the
men ready to smile and salute him with a hearty "Glad to see you back,
sir," till it set him wondering, and finding Ned forward alone, he went
to him and said something about it.
"Yes, sir, ain't it queer? I was thinking the same. I ain't done
nothing but be civil to the chaps since we come aboard, but they're as
pleased as Punch to see us back again. They're a bit disappointed
though that Sir John didn't go in for giving the black beggars an
out-and-out good thrashing."
"My father says he came for a pleasure-trip," said Jack quietly, "and he
does not wish to go back home feeling that it was obtained at the cost
of killing a number of fellow-creatures."
"No, no, of course not," said Ned quickly; "only you must draw the line
somewhere, and I want to know whether black fellows who shoot poisoned
arrows into you, and when you're swimming for your life, and ain't never
interfered with them, and they come and try to knock your brains out
with clubs, is fellow-creatures. Why, if it was me, I'd rather try to
make friends with a respectable set o' wild beasts. They wouldn't eat
you unless they was hungry. Strikes me that if I hadn't dodged that
gentleman when he hit at me, I shouldn't have been here; nor I shouldn't
neither if some one hadn't fired that shot. I say, Mr Jack, sir; it
was Sir John, wasn't it?"
"No, Ned, it was Doctor Instow."
"Then that's two I owe him. I always used to think that Sir John was
best man with a gun, but after that--well, I'm done. All I can say is,
I hope my turn 'll come to do something for the doctor, and till it does
I'll take anything he likes to give me, even if it's jollop, and won't
make a face."
Jack laughed.
"Oh yes, it's easy to smile a grin, sir," said Ned, "but if you'd tasted
some of the stuff he gave me you wouldn't."
"Ah, well, you will not want any physic now, Ned."
"Hah! it seems more natural on board now," said the mate, coming up
smiling. "You two have given us an anxious time. We must have it all
over as soon as we're safe from the hurricane."
"Hurricane?" said Ned, staring. "What hurricane? Where?"
The mate pointed astern, and Ned stared out to sea as the yacht raced
along.
"Well, I can't see anything," he said.
"Can't you see that thick, hazy look astern?"
"What, that bit o' fog?"
"Yes; it is chasing us pretty sharply; I'm afraid we shall not get into
harbour before it's down upon us. Ah, there's the skipper."
The speaker walked quickly aft, and found Captain Bradleigh, who had
just come on deck from the cabin, and after a look round there was a
brief consultation, and all hands were piped on deck. Then for the next
hour there was a busy scene. The tops were sent down, the sails doubly
secured, boats swung inboard and lashed, and every possible precaution
taken to make all that could be caught by a furious tempest thoroughly
secure.
"Well, I suppose they know what they're about, Mr Jack, sir," said Ned;
"but it looks to me like taking a lot of trouble because the sky's
getting a bit dark, and a shower's coming."
But Ned's knowledge of the typhoon of the eastern tropical seas was
naturally not very extensive, and he altered his opinion an hour later,
when, in spite of the speed with which the yacht had rushed away before
the terrible storm sweeping after them, the sea was white, and half the
heavens black as night. It was at half-speed the yacht ran in through
the gates of the reef into smooth water, and then turning round at full
speed again, went on and on, till she was well under the lee of the
great volcano, which did its part when anchors were down, and head to
the wind they lay facing the quarter from which the awful hurricane
blew.
There was no narrative of adventure given by the seekers or the sought
that night, nor any thought of sleep, for officers and men never left
the deck, but passed a terrible time of anxiety in the expectation that
one of the terrific blasts would tear the little vessel from her
moorings and cast her upon the inner side of the reef. But the steam
was kept up, and the propeller gently turning, sufficient to ease the
strain upon the cables, and the anchors held fast.
"She's a splendid craft, gentlemen," said the captain, when they had
assembled for refreshment in the cabin, during one of the brief lulls of
the furious blast; "but I'm afraid we should none of us have seen
another day if we had been caught outside. A man feels very small at a
time like this. The worst hurricane I was ever in. Didn't think the
wind could blow so fiercely, Mr Jack, eh?"
Jack shook his head.
"It feels," he said slowly, "as if the world had broke away, and was
rushing on through space faster and faster, and never to stop again."
"Yes, sir," said the captain quietly, as he gazed at the thoughtful lad.
"You're a scholar, and have read and studied these things. So have I,
sir, but not from books, and it seems to me that these things work by
their wonderful laws for reasons far beyond our little minds to grasp,
and all are working for some great end."
No one answered, and the wind began to increase in violence again, the
noise almost stifling the captain's next words:--
"But we have not broken away, sir, and the sun will rise to a minute in
the morning, just as if this hurricane had not come, and please God
everything around us will be calm; but be sure yonder you will hardly
know the island, it will be such a wreck."
The captain's words were true enough as to the calm, for just before
daylight the intense blackness which had covered the heavens passed
away, leaving the stars glittering with a most wondrous brilliancy;
there was a deep murmur dying away in the distance, and, utterly
exhausted, Jack laid himself down on one of the cabin lounges, to drop
off into the deep sleep of utter exhaustion, one from which he awoke to
find the warm glow of evening shining in at the open window, and his
father watching him with an anxious expression upon his face.
Captain Bradleigh was quite right. The hurricane had passed, and the
aspect of the island from where Jack stood with his glass on deck,
sweeping the mountain slopes, in places a terrible wreck. The hollows
and deep ravines had naturally escaped, but the higher portions, even on
that side, were swept bare, and every now and then the lad gazed through
his binocular at piled-up masses of tangled bough and branch shattered
and splintered as if they had been straws.
"Yes, my lad, it looks a terrible ruin here and there," said the
captain, as Jack handed him the glass to try; "but changes take place
quickly out here, and the sun's hard at work already repairing damages.
Those heaps will soon rot away, and fresh growth cover the bare patches.
It's bad enough, but an eruption from the mountain there would have
done more mischief than this."
Over a late meal there was a discussion about their future proceedings,
and the elders went into the pros and cons of their position.
"You could find us another island, captain, couldn't you?" said Sir
John.
"Oh yes, sir; several that I dare say would answer your purpose, but I'm
afraid that we shall have the native difficulty go where we may, for
these sanguinary blacks are a restless lot, and wherever there is a
beautiful spot they generally take possession of it."
"Of course," said the doctor gruffly. "We should do the same."
"We have done the same all the world round," said Sir John, laughing.
"Of course. `It is their nature to,'" quoted the doctor. "For my part
it seems a sin to go away when we have not secured half the grand
specimens of birds to be found."
"And my cases of insects not half filled," said Sir John.
"But after his rough experience," said the captain dryly, "I cannot
wonder at Mr Jack here feeling anxious to be homeward bound."
"I?" cried Jack, turning upon the captain excitedly. "I anxious to go
back? Why, what made you think that, Captain Bradleigh?"
"Oh, I thought you must be, sir, after what you have gone through.
Nobody could like that."
"Of course I did not," said the lad, flushing. "It was terrible and
risky while it lasted, but I don't mind it all now, and we might stay
here for months and never see the blacks again."
"That means you would like to stay a little longer?"
"Yes, father," cried the lad excitedly. "It would be dreadfully
disappointing to go away and not climb right to the crater now I have
been so near, and know the way."
An hour later Jack was on deck watching the stars, and listening to the
deep, heavy boom of the surf on the reef, thinking of how wonderful the
contrast was, and mentally going over the horrors of the past night,
when he heard a familiar air being whistled forward, one he had often
heard coming from the pantry at home, and he walked ahead, to find Ned
leaning over the side.
"Ah, Mr Jack! here you are then. I say, I'm not going to have any more
of this nonsense. Doctor's all very well, but it's a strange thing if a
man don't know best how he is."
"Why, what's the matter?"
"Doctor Instow's the matter, sir; and after all he ain't my master. If
the guv'nor says I ain't to do a thing, or you, my young guv'nor, says
it, why that's enough; but Doctor Instow don't pay me my wages."
"What has he been saying to you?"
"Put his foot down, and wouldn't let me wait dinner, sir. But I mean to
go on as usual to-morrow morning."
"Oh, very well; go on, then. But what do you think of our starting for
home to-morrow morning, Ned?"
"What, sir? Start for home--to-morrow morning?"
"Yes, aren't you glad?"
"Glad, sir? Will you excuse me asking you a question?"
"Of course. What is it?"
"Would you be good enough to tell me why we come out here, if, as soon
as we find a place like this, we want to start back?"
"The place is dangerous. These blacks--"
"Bother the blacks! Who cares for the blacks, sir? Why, haven't we
licked 'em over and over again? Oh, well, sir, I'm not master. All
I've got to say, sir, is, I'm jolly sorry we came."
"Then you are glad we are going back?"
"That I ain't, sir. I say it's a shame. Why, the fun has only just
begun."
"Ah, well, we're not going yet. I said I should like to stay and see
more, and do more collecting, and ascend the mountain by the way we came
down."
"There, I beg your pardon, Mr Jack, sir, I do indeed, for I was all
wrong. Thought you were saying that because of the niggers; and I did
hope you were too English for that."
"Well, Ned, I hope I am."