A storm at sea is bad enough in the daytime, but at night it is
terrible; for then, the peril unseen is so magnified by the terror-
stricken mind as to become far more appalling than a much greater danger
seen face to face and realised:-- the latter can be grappled with, but
the former, by its very intangibility and "unreachableness," daunts the
bravest heart and paralyses the strongest arm!
Llewellyn, the steward, managed to procure a light, which he did only
after much delay--the racket and uproar having apparently sent his
little wits wool-gathering--the cuddy looked the very picture of
desolation, almost leading to the belief that the sea had made a clean
breach through the sides of the ship in one of its rude onslaughts
dashing everything to pieces.
Fortunately, however, this was not the case, although the saloon
skylight had been carried away, gratings and all, and a considerable
amount of water had come down through the opening, which loomed now
above the semi-lighted space like a large hole broken in the deck; but,
by reason of the carrying away of the table and seats from their
lashings and ring-bolt fastenings and now being washed in a jumbled heap
to one side of the cuddy, the cabins to leeward were so completely
barricaded that their occupants were prevented from issuing forth. It
was from this quarter that the cries for help proceeded--the voice of
Mrs Major Negus, it need hardly be mentioned, predominating, although
the American passenger, who had a berth alongside that distinguished
lady, also sang out pretty loudly.
"Hullo, steward!" called out Mr Meldrum on seeing the light, having
already opened the door of his state-room, which had a sliding panel and
was undamaged as far as he could notice. "Why, what's the matter!"
"Only shipped a sea, sir," answered Llewellyn rather gruffly, for he was
annoyed at being roused from his sleep, "though from the row they're a-
making one would think we were all going to the bottom!"
"Much mischief done, eh?" asked Mr Meldrum, taking in at a glance the
havoc in the cuddy--"I mean on deck," he added.
"Can't say, sir," replied the other; "ain't had time to look about here
yet, much less to go up and see! It's a bad berth that o' steward to a
lot of bawling females on a passenger ship; I'd liefer--"
But, his grumblings were stopped for the moment by the renewed loud
screams of Mrs Major Negus--who was his pet aversion on board on
account of her giving him more trouble than all the rest combined, while
Master Maurice really was the plague of his life.
"Steward--stew-ard!" she cried, "Come here at once and get me out! I'm
all smothered and drowned, and nobody will help me! Stew-ard! I'm
dying--I'll tell the captain with my last breath. Stew-ard!"
"Sure I'm coming, mum, as fast as I can," sang out Llewellyn aloud,
adding _sotto voce_ for his own satisfaction, "Hang that Major Madam!
I'd never have shipped in the _Nancy Bell_ if I had a-knowed she was
coming aboard! Bless you, mum, I'm coming--everything is all right and
there isn't no cause for alarm!"
"Isn't there?" indignantly demanded the lady in a queer sort of half
suffocated voice from behind the barred door of her cabin. "If you were
jumbled in a pool of water, with all your luggage on top of you, I don't
think you'd think everything right. Help, man! release me at once, or
I'll be drowned and flattened into a pancake!"
"Say, you Mister Steward, you jest hurry up and git the lady out of her
muss, and come and fix me up," chimed in the voice of Mr Zachariah
Lathrope. "I guess I've had my innards a'most squoze out agin the
durned bunk, an' feel like a dough-nut in a frying-pan. If you leave me
much longer I kalkerlate this old boss'll be cold meat, you bet, and
you'll have the funeral to pay!"
Mr Meldrum coming to Llewellyn's aid, the steward managed at length to
clear away the wreckage from before the door of Mrs Major Negus' cabin,
and then from that of the American, when both the occupants were found
more seriously hurt than either of their rescuers had imagined, they
thinking that their outcries had proceeded more from alarm than any real
injury.
The wife of the deputy-assistant comptroller-general of Waikatoo was
lying, all purple in the face, with a heavy portmanteau on the top of
her, on the deck of her cabin in nearly a foot of water; and by the time
they got her up from her perilous position she fainted dead away in the
steward's arms.
"Here, Mary!" called out Llewellyn to his wife, the stewardess, who
quickly appeared on the scene half-dressed. "Attend to this lady, while
we go and see after Mister Lathrope."
The American was in a much worse plight; for, whereas Mrs Major Negus
had only swallowed a lot of sea-water and had been only nearly
frightened to death, Mr Lathrope's sallow face was so unearthly pale
that Mr Meldrum was certain he had received some severe injury; as he
was tightly jammed between his bunk and the washing-stand, while a heavy
packing-case had tumbled out of the top berth on to one of his
shoulders, preventing him from moving.
"I guess, mister, you jest come in time," said the poor fellow with a
sickly smile, as they pulled away the case and wash-stand, and helped
him into a sitting position on the bunk, "another minnit and it would
have been all up with Z Lathrope, Esquire!" And he gasped for breath,
putting his hand to his left side, as if feeling pain there.
"Oh, papa, are you there?" said Kate, coming out, in a charming state of
dishabille, from the state-room she shared with her sister on the
opposite side of the saloon, alongside to that of Mr Meldrum. "Is
anybody hurt?"
"Yes, my dear," answered her father, "you'd better bring some sal
volatile or something. Mrs Negus has fainted; and I'm afraid poor Mr
Lathrope is in a bad way."
The plucky girl did not delay, or exhibit any of that feminine weakness
or nervousness which might have been expected under the circumstances.
Retiring for a moment, to throw a shawl round herself and get what was
required in the emergency, she quickly reappeared again at the door of
the state-room,--which she closed behind her to prevent Miss Florry,
inquisitive as usual, from coming forth; and then proceeded to cross the
floor of the cuddy as well as she was able--a somewhat difficult task
considering the rolling and pitching of the vessel, and the fact that
the table and seats, which generally formed points of vantage for
holding on, had been swept away, so that there was nothing for her to
cling to.
Half running, half sliding, she, however, reached the opposite side and
was quickly engaged in the Samaritan task of bathing Mr Lathrope's
temples with Eau de Cologne.
"Don't you bother, miss," said the American faintly, "I guess I ain't so
much hurt arter all!" but he couldn't help groaning as he spoke,
whereupon Mr Meldrum laid him down gently and sent the steward for some
brandy, which revived him somewhat.
"I got a pretty considerable gouge in the ribs from that air wash-
stand," said he, pointing out the objectionable piece of furniture as he
uttered the words; "but I guess I'll be all right presently. How's
Madam Negus!"
"Oh, she was more frightened than hurt," said Mr Meldrum laughing; "she
was in a nice pickle on the floor of her cabin. You should just have
seen her. I really don't think she could ever be dignified to me any
more!"
"For shame, papa, to laugh at misfortune!" said Kate; "and now, as Mr
Lathrope seems better, I'll go and look after his fellow-sufferer." So
saying, the girl clambered along by the side of the saloon to where Mrs
Major Negus was ensconced in state, in the adjoining cabin--now revived
from her fainting fit and with Mary Llewellyn ministering to her wants,
although "the Major" could not help scolding the latter at intervals, as
if she were the cause of the disaster.
In the midst of all this, down came Mr McCarthy, the first mate, from
the poop.
"Be jabers and it's a foine time you are having of it, any way!" said he
by way of greeting, looking round with a quizzical cock of his eye at
the dismantled cuddy. "I only thought you'd have had a drop of wather
or two whin the skoilight got adrift, and we've rigged up tarpaulins
over it and battened it down comfortably, so that ye'll not be throubled
any more by the say washing down. But, how did the table git carried
away! It was fixed down so strong it's a puzzle to me entirely!"
"Goodness only knows," said Mr Meldrum; "there came a tremendous crash
amidships soon after midnight, and away it went!"
"Ah that was whin that gossoon Adams had howlt of the helm. The
omahdawn, he was looking up at the spars and tellin' the cap'en about
taking the topsails off her, as she was carrying too much sail, instead
of mindin' his own business and lookin' to the steering; and, faix, he
let the ship broach to, bad cess to him!"
"And how are you getting on now, on deck?" asked Mr Meldrum.
"Will, sorr," said the mate, speaking more earnestly than was his usual
wont, and dropping his voice so that no one else could hear him. "To
spake the truth and shame the divil--faix it's no lie I'm telling--we're
right in the centre of a cyclone, and the Lord only knows if we'll iver
git out of it!"
"I thought so," murmured Mr Meldrum; "my poor children!"
"Sure and be a man now!" whispered the mate as Kate came out of Mrs
Major Negus' cabin. "I wouldn't have tould you if I had thought
contrariwise!"
"I was not thinking of myself," said Mr Meldrum sternly; "what sail are
you carrying?"
"Sail!" exclaimed Mr McCarthy; "faix and its joking ye are! Ivery
stitch of canvas, sure, was blown to smithereens when the ship broached
to, and the foretop-mast was thin took out of her, too, by the same
token! The divil a hap'orth are we carrying, save a piece of tarpaulin
lashed in the weather rigging to kape her hid to the say, and that's all
we can do till daylight comes, if we iver say it, please God, for it's
as dark now as a blue dog in a black entry, and you couldn't say your
hand before your face to set any sail, if ever a man could git up the
rigging--but whist now about that! Steward," he added in a louder key,
"come, look alive here and git the cuddy to rights in shipshape fashion!
By the powers, but the skipper'd be in a foine rage if he saw it all
mops and brooms like this! Bear a hand, man, and be smart, and I'll
send the carpenter to help you as soon as the watch is relayed." With
these words he bustled on deck again, after changing his oilskin, which
was all knocked to pieces, for a rough pea-jacket, and saying to Mr
Meldrum that he thought the latter would be more handy, for it was
blowing enough to take one's hair off!
"Papa," said Kate as soon as the mate had ascended the companion, "what
was that Mr McCarthy was saying when he spoke so low to you?"
"Eh, my dear?" answered her father a little confusedly, with some
hesitation in his voice. "Oh, only that the storm was raging violently
and did not seem to lull at all yet."
"Did he say that there was any danger?"
"Danger, eh? no, I--I can't say. I think I'll just step up and see for
myself;" and, anxious to escape this cross-examination, as well as
really to judge whether the position of the ship was as precarious as
the chief mate had indicated, Mr Meldrum likewise went up on to the
poop, finding some trouble when he reached the top of the companion
stairs, in opening the hatch.
For a moment, after emerging on to the deck, all was terribly dark--as
black as ink, as Mr McCarthy had said; but, the next instant, the whole
awful scene was lit up by the most intense and vivid flash of lightning
Mr Meldrum had ever beheld--the electric fluid being quite
unaccompanied by any peal of thunder, although that might have been
drowned by the continuous roar and shriek of the howling wind which
appeared to have gone mad with the unbridled fury of a demon.
During the brief space of time in which the zigazag stream of fire from
the vault of heaven momentarily lit up the surroundings of the ship,
which it did with a brightness that eclipsed the light of day, Mr
Meldrum could see the vessel tumbling about amid a chaotic mass of
waves, which it was no exaggeration to term mountains high, as if she
were in the vortex of a whirlpool; while dense opaque black clouds
hovered over her, vomiting forth wind, apparently from every quarter of
the horizon, the gusts tearing at the ship with harpy-like clutches, as
if they would rend her to pieces--she, like a poor human thing racked
with pain, labouring and groaning, and bending this way and that to
escape the relentless wind, so well aided by the clutching billows from
below that leaped up to engulf the vessel when they themselves were not
absolutely flattened to the surface of the water, as they were
sometimes, by the force of the hurricane.
The scene was literally awful!
The next moment all was darkness again; with the night black as Erebus,
and Mr Meldrum unable, as the mate had said, to see his hand before his
face.
Captain Dinks, however, had noted his arrival on deck; and approached
him without being seen.
"I advise you to go below, Mr Meldrum," said he, "you can do no good
here, nor any of us, indeed, until morning, when I hope we'll have
better weather. It's a terrible night, the worst I have ever seen at
sea in all my time!"
"Aye, terrible," replied the other, shouting in the ear of the captain,
but, as he was facing the wind, his voice seemed to the latter only like
a whisper. "I'll take your advice, as I see I could be of no use;
still, if I can be of any service, mind you call me!"
"Aye, aye," said Captain Dinks, "you go down and go to sleep. We are
all in God's hands now, though I'll do all that man can--good night!"
"Good night," said Mr Meldrum; and he then went below again to give
what report he could to Kate, who was waiting anxiously for his expected
reappearance, as he had said he should not be gone long when he left
her.
She had been certain the ship was in great danger; and she now read the
confirmation of her worst fears in her father's face.
"Oh, papa!" she exclaimed, throwing her arms round his neck as soon as
he came down the companion, without waiting to hear a word from him. "I
thought so, I thought so!"
"Hush, my child!" said he soothingly, leading her towards her state-room
and opening the door, "go in to your cabin and pray!"
And thus the weary night passed away.