FROST AND NO SKATES!--RORY DISCONSOLATE--MCBAIN TO THE RESCUE--A ROARING
DAY AND A MERRY NIGHT--A MYSTERIOUS POOL.
King Frost _had_ come--and come, too, with a will, for when Rory went on
deck next morning the ice was all around the yacht, hard and smooth and
black.
"It is frozen in we are," said Rory--"frozen in entirely, and never a
vestige of a skate in the ship. Just look, Allan, that ice is bearing
already! What could have possessed us to leave Scotland without
skates?"
"It is provoking," remarked Allan, looking at the ice with a rueful
countenance.
"Well, we can't go back home for them, that is certain sure. D'ye
think, now, that old Ap could manufacture us a few pairs?"
"He is very handy," Allan said; "but I question if he could manufacture
skates."
"However," said Rory, "the ice is bearing; we can slide if we can't
skate. So I, for one, am going over the side presently."
"Not to-day, Rory boy," said a quiet voice behind him, while at the same
time a hand was laid gently on his shoulder--"not to-day, Rory, it
wouldn't be safe," said McBain. "I know you would risk it, but I love
you too well to allow it."
"And sure, isn't your word law, then?" replied Rory.
McBain smiled, and no more was said on the subject; but for all that
Rory had the ice on his mind all day, and that accounted for his having
been seen in close confab with old Ap for a whole hour, during which
pieces of wood and bits of iron were critically looked at, and many
strange tools examined and designs drawn on paper by Rory's deft
artistic fingers. But the result of all this may be summed up in the
little word _nil_. Ap had taken much snuff during this consultation,
but, "No, no; look, you see," he said, at last, "if it were a box now,
or a barrel, or a boat, I could manage it; but skates, look you, is more
science than art."
So Rory had rather a long face when he came aft again, which was
something most unusual for Rory. But his was the nature that is easily
cast down, and just as easily elevated again. His spirits were about
zero before dinner; they rose somewhat during that meal, and fell once
more when the cloth was removed.
"Do you think," asked Ralph of McBain, "that the frost will hold?"
"Oh," cried Rory, "don't talk of the frost! sure it is the provokingest
thing that ever was, that the three of us should have forgotten our
skates. I'm going to get my fiddle."
"Wait a moment," said McBain.
"Steward," he continued, "serve out warm clothing to-morrow for these
young gentlemen, and remind them to put on their pea-jackets; we are
going to have such a frost as you never even dreamt of in Scotland.
Don't forget to put them on, boys; and Peter, `dubbing' for the boots
mind, no more paste blacking."
"Ay, ay, sir!" said Peter.
"And don't forget the paper blankets."
"That I won't, sir!" from Peter.
Now while McBain was speaking Rory's face was a study; the clouds were
fast disappearing from his brow, his eye was getting brighter every
moment. At last, up he jumped, all glee and excitement.
"Hurrah!" he cried, seizing the captain by the hand. "It is true, isn't
it? Oh! you know what I'd be saying. The skates, you know! Never
expect me to believe that the man who thought beforehand about warm
clothes for his boys, and dubbing and paper blankets, was unmindful of
their pleasures as well."
"Peter, bring the box," said McBain, quietly laughing.
Peter brought the box, and a large one it was too.
Three dozen pairs of the best skates that ever glided over the glassy
surface of pond or lake.
Rory looked at them for a moment, then admiringly at McBain.
"I was going to get my fiddle," says Rory, "and it would be a pity to
spoil a good intention; but troth, boys, it isn't a lament I'll be
playing now, at all, at all."
Nor was it. Rory's fiddle spoke--it laughed, it screamed; it told of
all the joyousness of the boy's heart, and it put everybody in the same
humour that he himself and his fiddle were in.
Next morning broke bright and clear; Rory and Allan were both up even
before the stars had faded, and by the time they had enjoyed the luxury
of the morning tub--for that they meant to keep up all the year round,
being quite convinced of the good of it--and dressed themselves,
laughing and joking all the time, Peter had the breakfast laid and
ready.
The ice was hard and solid as steel, and glittered like crystal in the
rays of the morning sun, and you may be sure our heroes made the best of
it, and not they alone, but one half at least of the yacht's officers
and crew. The whole day was given up to the enchanting amusement of
skating, and to frolic and fun. Wonderful to say, old Ap proved himself
quite an adept in the art, and the figures this little figure-head of a
man cut, and the antics he performed, astonished every one.
But Seth, alas! was but a poor show; he never had had skates on his feet
before, so his attempts to keep upright were ridiculous in the extreme.
But Seth did not mind that a bit, and his pluck was of a very exalted
order, for, much as his anatomy must have been damaged by the
innumerable falls he got, he was no sooner down than he was up again.
Allan and Ralph took pity on him at last, and taking each a hand of the
old man, glided away down the ice with him crowing with delight.
"But, sure, then," cried Rory, "and it's myself will have a partner
too."
And so he linked up with old Ap, old Ap in paper cap and immensity of
apron, Rory in pilot coat and Tam o' Shanter. What a comical couple
they looked! Yes, I grant you they looked comical, but what of that?
Their skating far eclipsed anything in the field, and there really was
no such thing as tiring either Ap or Rory.
And hadn't they appetites for dinner that day! Allan's haunch of
venison smoked on the board; and Stevenson, Mitchell, and the mate of
the _Trefoil_ had been invited to partake, as there was plenty for
everybody, and some to send forward afterwards.
"Now," said McBain, after the cloth had been removed, and cups of
fragrant coffee had been duly discussed, "what say you, gentlemen, if we
leave the _Snowbird_ to herself for an hour or two, pipe all hands over
the side, and go on shore and open the new hall?"
"A grand idea!" cried Ralph and Allan in a breath. "Capital!" said
Rory.
And in less than an hour, reader, everything was prepared: a great fire
of logs and coals was cracking and blazing on the ample hearth of the
hall, a fire that warmed the place from end to end, a fire at which an
ox might have been roasted. The piano had been transported on shore; at
this instrument Ralph presided, and near him stood Rory, fiddle in hand.
McBain was duly elected chairman, and the impromptu concert had
commenced. The officers occupied the front seats, the men sat
respectfully on forms in the rear. Had you been there you would have
observed, too, that the crew had paid some little attention to their
toilet before coming on shore; they had doffed their work-a-day
clothing, and donned their best. Even Ap had laid aside his immensity
of apron, and came out in navy blue, and Seth was once again encased in
that brass-buttoned coat of his, and looked, as Rory said, "all smiles,
from top to toe."
McBain felt himself in duty bound to make a kind of formal speech before
the music began. He could be pithy and to the point if he couldn't be
eloquent.
"Officers and men," he said, "of the British yacht, _Snowbird_,--We are
met here to-night to try,--despite the fact, which nobody minds, that we
are far from our native land,--if we can't spend a pleasant evening. We
have been together now for many months, together in sunshine and storm,
together in our dangers, together in our pleasures, and I don't think
there has ever been an unpleasant word spoken fore or aft, nor has a
grumbler ever lifted up his voice. But we have a long dreary winter
before us, and perils perhaps to pass through which we little wot of.
But as we've stood together hitherto, so will we to the end, let it be
sweet or let it be bitter. And it is our duty to help keep up each
other's hearts. I purpose having many such meetings here as the
present, and let us just make up our minds to amuse and be amused.
Everybody can do something if he tries; he who cannot sing can tell a
story, and if there be any one single mother's son amongst us who is too
diffident to do anything, why just let him keep a merry face on his
figure-head, and, there, we'll forgive him! That's all."
McBain sat down amidst a chorus of cheers, and the music began. Ralph
played a battle piece. That suited his touch to a "t," Rory told him,
and led an encore as soon as it was finished. Then Rory himself had to
come to the front with his fiddle, and he played a selection of Irish
airs, arranged by himself. Then there was a duet between Allan and
Ralph; then McBain himself strode on the stage with a stirring old
Highland song, that brought his hearers back to stirring old Highland
times in the feudal days of old, when men flew fiercely to sword and
claymore, as the fiery cross was borne swiftly through the glen, and
wrong had to be righted in the brave old fashion. Stevenson followed
suit with a sea song; he had a deep bass voice, and his rendering of
"Tom Bowling" was most effective.
It was Rory's turn once more. He brought out a real Irish shillalah
from somewhere, stuck his hat, with an old clay pipe in it, on one side
of his head, and gave the company a song so comical, with a brogue so
rich, that he quite brought down the house. It was not one encore, but
two he got; in fact, he became the hero of the evening. Both Mitchell
and the mate of the _Trefoil_ found something to sing, and Ap and Magnus
something to say if they couldn't sing. Magnus's story was as weird and
wild as he looked himself while telling it; Ap's was a simple relation
of a daring deed done at sea during the herring-fishery season. After
this Seth spun one of his trapper yarns, and the music began again. A
sailor's hornpipe this time--a rattling nerve-jogging tune that set the
men all on a fidget. They beat time with their fingers, they tapped a
tattoo with their toes; and when they couldn't stand it a moment longer,
why they simply started up in a bold and manly British fashion, cleared
the floor, and gave vent to their feelings through their legs and their
feet.
The dancing became fast and furious after that, and when Ralph and Rory
were tired of playing they came to the floor, and Peter took their place
with his bagpipes. But the longest time has an end, and at last Ap's
shrill pipe summoned all hands on board.
There was little need of sleeping-draughts for any one on board the
_Snowbird_ that night.
The frost held, our heroes could tell that before they left their beds,
so intensely cold was it. Glad were they now of the addition of the
paper blankets served out by Peter; eider-down quilts could hardly have
made them feel more comfortable.
The frost held, they could tell that when they went to their tubs.
Peter had placed the water in each bath only an hour before, but the ice
was already so hard that instead of getting in at once Rory squatted
down to look at it, and he did not like the looks of it either. The
sponge was as hard as a sledge-hammer, so he took that to break the ice
with. Then he tried one foot in, and quickly drew it out again and
shook it. The water felt like molten lead.
"I wonder now," he said to himself, "if brother Ralph will venture on a
cold plunge on such a morning as this."
And, wondering thus, he rolled his shoulders up in his door-curtain,
and, poking his head into the passage, hailed Ralph.
"Hullo, there!" he cried; "Ralph! Porpy!"
"Hullo!" cried Ralph; "I'll Porpy you if I come into your den!"
"Well, but tell me this, old man," said Rory; "I want to know if you're
going to do a flounder this morning?"
"To be sure!" said Ralph. "Listen!"
Rory listened, and could hear him plashing.
McBain passed along at the moment, and, hearing the conversation, he
took part in it to this extent,--
"Boys that don't have their baths don't have their breakfasts."
"In that case," said Rory, "I'm in too!" And next moment he was
plashing away like a live dolphin. But hardly was he dressed than there
came all over him such a glorious warm glow, that he would have gone
through the same ordeal again had there been any occasion. At the same
time he felt so exhilarated in spirits that nothing would serve him but
he must burst into song.
The frost held, they could tell that when they met in the saloon and
glanced at the windows; the tracery thereon was so beautiful, that even
at the risk of letting his breakfast get cold, Rory must needs run for
his sketch-book and make two pictures at least. Meanwhile, Ralph had
settled down to serious eating. You see, there was very little poetry
about honest Ralph, he was more solid than imaginative.
After breakfast our trio took to the ice again. They soon had evidence
that some one had been there before them, for about a mile along the
shore, and a little way out to sea, they saw that several poles had been
planted, and on each pole fluttered a red flag. They looked inquiringly
at McBain.
"You wonder what the meaning of that is?" said McBain; "and I myself
cannot altogether explain it."
"But you had the flags placed there?"
"True," said McBain; "and they are placed around a pool of open water."
"Open water!" exclaimed Rory, "and the sea frozen everywhere all
around!"
"Ah, yes!" replied McBain; "that is the mystery. But we are in the land
of mysteries. This pool of open water may be situated over a warm
spring, or it may be there is some kind of a whirlpool there which
prevents the formation of the ice, only there it is, sure enough, and
howsoever hard the frost should become, or howsoever long it may last, I
think that that pool will never, never close and freeze.
"The ice," he continued, "was thin at the edge, but I have had it broken
off, and will try to keep it so, and thus you will be enabled to go
quite close to the water's edge; and if my experience is anything to go
by, you'll see many a startling apparition there before the winter is
past and gone."
"You astonish _me_," said Rory.
"And _me_," said Allan.
"But what," persisted Rory, "will the apparitions be like?"
"Nothing that can harm us, I think," said McBain. "But as the ice
extends farther seaward, sea-monsters will come to the pool to breathe
and to disport themselves in the sunshine."
"Perhaps the sea-serpent, for instance?" said Rory.
"Perhaps," said McBain.
"Och! sure then," cried Rory, losing all his seriousness at once, "we'll
have a shot at the old boy, that's all?"