THE RESCUE
Jimmy realized that there was no help to be had from outside. There was
no one at home but Mrs. Abel, and rowing the skiff alone against the
tide fully four hours would be consumed in reaching there and another
three hours in coming back. Then it would be well past dark. An easterly
breeze was springing up, and a chop was rising on the bay. This
easterly wind was likely to bring with it a cold storm, and Bobby,
suspended thirty feet above the water, and not warmly dressed, might
perish.
"Yes," said Jimmy, "he might perish! He might perish! And it would be my
fault!"
The thought brought a cold perspiration to Jimmy's forehead, and a cold,
unnatural feeling to his spine, and in desperation he tried the line
again. But it was useless effort. He could not pull it up. And again he
ran to the cliff, crawled out and peered over at the dangling and by no
means silent Bobby.
"Hey there, Jimmy! Pull me up! Hurry!" shouted Bobby.
"I can't! I can't budge you! Oh, Bobby, what are we going to do?"
"If you can't pull me up, let me down!" Bobby was growing impatient. "I
can't stand this much longer. The line is cutting me in two."
"Try to climb up the line," suggested Jimmy, the idea striking him as a
bright one. "Just climb up, and when you get up here where I can reach
you I'll pull you over."
Bobby tried the experiment, but the line was oily, and in spite of his
best efforts he could climb only a little way, when he would slide back
again.
"I can't do it," he shouted up to Jimmy, after several vain efforts.
"The line is too greasy. I can't get a good hold."
"I don't know what to do!" said the distressed Jimmy. "I don't know what
to do!"
"If you can't pull me up, let me down," directed Bobby.
[Illustration: "Hurry, Jimmy. I can't hang here much longer. I'm getting
all numb"]
"That won't do any good," said Jimmy. "You'll only go into the water and
drown, for there's no place for you to stand."
"Well," Bobby insisted, "let me down nearer the water. I feel all the
time as though the line was going to break, and I'm so high up from it
that it makes me dizzy swinging around this way."
"Holler when you want me to stop," shouted Jimmy, rising and running
back.
But Jimmy found that after all he could let Bobby down only a very
little way when he came to the end of the line. So he fastened it again.
"That's as far as it will go!" he called, lying down on his face again
to look over the cliff at Bobby, who was now about twenty feet above the
water.
"Then go and get the boat and fetch it down," shouted Bobby. "Hurry,
Jimmy. I can't hang here much longer. I'm getting all numb."
That was a solution of the difficulty that had not occurred to Jimmy,
and without delay he ran away along the cliff top and down to the skiff,
which was lying a half mile above, and, undoing the painter, rowed with
all his might toward Bobby, until presently he drew up directly beneath
the swinging lad.
"Can you unfasten the line and drop into the boat, Bobby?" he asked,
gazing up.
"No," decided Bobby, glancing at the skiff, which rose and fell on the
swell, and which Jimmy was holding dangerously near the breaking waves
on the cliff base. "I might hit the boat but I'd break my neck, and
maybe tip you over. Stand her off a little, and I'll show you."
He felt in his pocket for his jackknife, drew it out and opened it. Then
with his left hand he succeeded, after several attempts, in lifting
himself sufficiently to relieve the strain of his body, and with the
jackknife in his right hand cut the line where it circled his body below
the arms.
Hanging now by his left hand he deliberately and coolly closed the knife
by pushing the back of the blade against his leg, and restored it to his
pocket. This done he grasped the line with his right hand just above the
bowline knot, where he had a firm hold, slipped his other hand down to
it, and began swinging in toward the cliff and out over the waves, and
then on an outward swing, let go. Down he went, well away from the
rocks, feet first into the deep water, and, a moment later, appearing on
the surface, swam to the skiff, grasped it astern, and climbed aboard,
shivering from his icy bath.
"Oh, Bobby, you're a wonder!" exclaimed Jimmy. "I never would have
thought of that way of your getting off that line!"
"'Twasn't anything," declared Bobby, deprecatingly, as he seated himself
and picked up his oars. "Now let's pull back where we can put on a fire.
I'm freezing cold."
"I was scared when I found I couldn't pull you up," said Jimmy, as they
rowed back to the gully. "Wasn't you?"
"No, I wasn't scared," boasted Bobby. "I was just getting cold and
numb. The worst of it is I had to drop my bag with all the eggs I
picked off the cliff. I had some dandies, too! Two of them were the
prettiest eggs I _ever_ saw--real small at one end and big at the other,
and all colored and marked and spotted up. They were different from any
eggs I ever saw, too."
"Did you find 'em together, or separate?"
"Found 'em separate, on different ledges."
"I know what _they_ were! They were murre eggs. Murre eggs are different
from any other kind. They've got more colors and marks on 'em. Partner
found some last year."
"There were some murres down on the water, but I never thought they'd go
up to lay their eggs in places like that. The eggs were right on the
bare rock, and weren't in a nest at all, and if it wasn't for their
shape they'd have rolled off."
"It's a strange place for any bird to leave eggs, but that's where the
kittiwakes, auks and swimmers and some of the gulls and lots of birds
make nests and lay eggs. I suppose it's so as to make it hard to find
them when folks go egging. Partner tells me lots, and I ask lots of
questions, because he says the more I know about the way birds and
animals live and the things they do, the better I'll be able to hunt and
take care of myself."
In spite of his exertion at the oars, Bobby's teeth were chattering when
they landed at the place where they had cooked their dinner. But it was
not long before Jimmy had a roaring fire and the kettle over for some
hot tea, and then, leaving Bobby to dry his clothes, Jimmy climbed up
again over the cliff to recover Abel's harpoon line, which was much too
valuable to be left behind.
At this season of the year the days are long in Labrador, and though it
was nearly eleven o'clock at night when the boys reached home, it was
still twilight. Mrs. Abel was on the lookout for them, and had a fine
pan of fried trout and steaming pot of tea waiting on the table, for she
knew they would be hungry, as boys who live in the open always are. And
she praised them for the fine lot of eggs they brought her, and laughed
very heartily over Bobby's adventure, for in that land adventure is a
part of life, and all in a day's work.