Misfortunes, they say, never come singly, and these words had hardly
been uttered when voices were heard, and directly after a familiar voice
said loudly, the words coming in through the low passage and quite
plainly to the boys' ears,--
"Made the oar myself, Skipper Jarks, and I ought to know it again. What
I say is as they must ha' managed somehow to ha' got in here."
The boat darkened the entrance for a few moments, and then glided by;
while the cavern kept closing like some monstrous eye whose lid was
pressed up from below, opening again fairly widely, enough almost to
suggest the possibility of their passing under; but closing again as the
tide rose and sank in slow, regular pulsations.
But as they watched they could make out that the soft wave rose higher
and higher and sank perceptibly less, while the prisoners' eyesight
became so preternaturally sharp that they could detect the gradual
opening of the sea anemones, as they spread out their starry crowns of
tentacles after the first kiss of the water had moistened them. The
many limpets, too, which had been tight up against the smooth rock, like
bosses or excrescences, were visibly raising their shells and standing
up, partly detached.
Then a new horror attracted the boys, and made them almost frantic for
the moment; for, as they crouched there in the bottom of the boat,
watching the slowly diminishing amount of light which came in through
the archway, the water softly and quickly, welled up, nearly shut the
entry, and a wave ran up the passage and passed under the boat, which
was heaved up so high that the gunwale grated against the roof, and they
had to bend themselves down to avoid being pressed against the rock.
Then, as they lay there, they heard the wave run on and on, whispering
and waking up the echoes far inside, till the whole of the interior
seemed to be alive with lapping, hissing sounds, which slowly died away
as the boat sank to nearly its old level, and the light flashed in once
more.
"That's a hint to do something," said Vince, as he rose up, finding that
his head nearly touched the shell-encrusted roof.
"Yes; to force our way out," said Mike excitedly. "We must before it's
too late."
"It is too late, as I told you before," said Vince sharply. "Look for
yourself. Can't you see that the arch is too small for the sides of the
boat to get through? and at any moment another of those waves may come
in. It's all right, Ladle, if you'll only be firm."
"I'll be as firm as you are," said the boy angrily.
"Then help me push her along."
Mike pressed his hands against the roof, Vince did the same; and they
both thrust hard, but in spite of all the boat did not stir.
"Why, you're pushing to send it in," said Mike.
"And you to drive it out! What nonsense! This place is sure to get
bigger inside, where the water has washed it out. We must get right in,
beyond where the water rises."
Mike shuddered; for the silence and darkness of the place would, he
felt, be horrible, and all the time he knew that the water would be
gradually chasing them, like some terribly fierce creature, bent on
suffocating them in its awful embrace.
Vince's was the stronger will; and his companion yielded, changing his
tactics, and forcing the boat along for some distance before there was
any change in the roof, which crushed down upon them as low as ever, and
Mike began once more to protest.
"It's of no use," he said: "we may as well be smothered where we can see
as here, where it is so dark. Let's go back as far as we can."
"No; I'm sure this place will open out more if we go farther in."
At that moment there was a loud, plashing noise far inward, and this
raised such loud reverberations that Mike was fain to confess that the
roof must be far higher.
Vince took advantage of this to urge his companion on; and a minute
later they could not touch the rock above them with their hands, while a
little farther on it could not be reached with an oar.
"Yes, it's bigger," granted Mike; "but we shall be suffocated all the
same. There can't be enough air to last us till the tide goes down."
"We shall see," said Vince; and then, quite cheerily: "I say, this is
better than wading, the same as we did in the seal hole."
"Yes, but there are seals here. I heard them."
"Yes, so did I, but what of that? We mustn't interfere with them, and
they won't with us. Besides, we're in a boat now, recollect."
Mike recollected it well enough, but it did not comfort him much;
however, he kept his thoughts to himself, and proposed that they should
keep as near the light as they could.
"Better keep where the roof's highest," suggested Vince. "We shall be
able to breathe more freely then."
After that they were both very silent, for they suffered horribly from
the dread that as soon as the entrance was entirely closed up by the
tide, they would be rapidly exhausting all the pure breathable air
shut-in; and so deeply did this impress them, that before long a
peculiar sensation of compression at the chest assailed them both, with
the result that they began to breathe more hurriedly, and to feel as if
they had been running uphill, till, as it is called, they were out of
breath.
Neither spoke, but suffered in silence, their brains busy with
calculations of how long it would be before it was high water, and then
how long it would take before the tide sank low enough for the mouth of
the cave to be open once more.
Vince probably suffered the more keenly after the light was shut out
entirely; but his sufferings were the briefer, for just when his breath
was shortest, and he was feeling that he must breathe more rapidly if he
wished to keep alive, he heard a loud plashing and wallowing some
distance farther in.
That it was a party of seals playing about he was certain, and in
imagination he saw them crawling up on to some piece of rock by means of
their flappers and plunging down again. Once he heard a pair of them
swimming in chase one of the other, blowing and uttering loud, sighing
noises as they came near, and then appeared to turn and swim back, to
climb up on the rock again, with the effect of dislodging others, which
sprang heavily into the water, sending little waves along big enough to
make the boat rock perceptibly.
This was just when Vince felt at his worst, and Mike was lying back in
the boat breathing hard and in the most hurried way.
It was singular that just then the recollection of a story he had once
read in a work belonging to his father came to Vince's mind. True or
false, it had been recorded that some French surgeons had been
discussing the effect of the imagination upon the human mind, and to
test for themselves whether its effects could be so strong as some
writers and experimentalists had declared, they obtained permission to
apply a test to a condemned convict.
Their test was as follows: It had been announced to the man that he was
to die, and that his execution was to be the merciful one of being bled
to death. So at the appointed time the culprit was bound and
blindfolded in the presence of the surgeons, who then proceeded to lance
his arm and allowed a tiny jet of warm water to trickle over the place
and down to the wrist.
It is said that, though the man had not lost a drop of blood, he began,
as soon as he had felt the lancet prick and the trickling of the warm
water, to grow faint, and after a time sank and sank, till he actually
died from imagination.
"And that's what we're doing," thought Vince, as he drew slowly a long,
deep breath, and then another and another.
The first was very catchy and strange, the second caused him acute
suffering, and the third was deep, strong, and life-inspiring.
"That's it," said Vince to himself--"it is imagination; for if the
seals, which are things that have to come up to the surface to breathe,
can live in here, why can't I?"
Vince again took a deep breath, and another, and another, and so great a
feeling of vigour ran through him that he laughed aloud, and Mike
started up.
"What is it?" he said.
"Listen," cried Vince; and he loudly drew breath, and expressed it as
loudly, then, "Do that," he cried.
"I--I can hardly get mine. This place is stifling."
"Try," said Vince. "That's right. Again! Better. Now take a long
pull. How are you now?"
"Oh, better--better," said Mike eagerly.
"Breathe again."
"Yes, yes; I am breathing better and better. Then the air is coming
now?"
"Yes," said Vince drily; "the air is coming fast, and the light can't be
very long. There--it's all right, Ladle; we shan't hurt now. But I
don't know how we're going to manage when the tide falls, for we shan't
dare to go out."
"No," said Mike, whose spirits sank again at these words, "we shan't
dare to go out. Do you know, I wish, as you did, that we had stopped on
board."
"And not taken all this trouble for nothing. How long should you say it
would be before the light comes again?"
"Hours," said Mike; "but I don't mind it so much now that we can breathe
better."
"No; it is better," said Vince drily. "I say, I wonder what they are
doing at home?"
Vince wished the next moment that he had not said those words, for they
had the effect of sinking his companion into a terrible state of
depression, while, in spite of his efforts, he was himself nearly as
bad.
But then it was before breakfast, and they had hardly touched a mouthful
since the morning before.
At last, after what seemed to be a full day in length of time, there was
afar off a faint soft gleam of light on the surface of the water--a ray
which sent a flood into the hearts of the watchers--and from that moment
the light began to grow broader and higher, while they suddenly woke to
the fact that the boat was moving gently towards the entrance of the
cavern, drawn by the falling tide.
After a while there was a tiny archway; then this began to increase as
the water sank and rose, but always rose less and less, leaving the sea
anemones and the various shell-fish dotted with drops which gathered
together, glittering and trembling in the light, and then fell with a
musical drip upon the smooth surface.
The little arch increased rapidly after a time, and still the boat drew
nearer to the entrance, neither of the boys having the heart to check
its progress after their long imprisonment, for the outer world never
looked so bright and glorious before.
But they had to pay for their pleasure. As the level sank till there
was ample room to thrust the boat out, and they were thinking that to be
safe they ought to withdraw a little and wait until they could feel sure
that the lugger and her crew were gone--a departure they felt must be
some time that evening, when the tide was at a certain stage well known
to old Joe--the entrance was suddenly darkened once more by a boat,
whose bows came with the stream from the right, and were cleverly
directed in, while her occupants began to thrust her along by pressing
against the sides, and a couple of lanthorns were held up.
"Aha!" cried the voice the boys had grown to hate, "so ve have found a
pair of ze seal sitting in a boat vich zey steal avay. You are right,
Joseph, _mon bon ami_. Your boat sall not have gone out of ze pool, and
you sall have him back. Aha! Stop you bose, or I fire, and zis time I
vill not miss."
"In, in farther, Vince," whispered Mike wildly.
"No: they've seen us, and they could follow us in their boat. It's of
no use, Mike; we must give up this time."
"You hear me?" roared the captain fiercely. "I see quite plain vere you
sall be. _Venez_. Come out."
"Come and fetch us," said Vince shortly. "You have your men."
The captain gave his orders, the boat was thrust on, and as its bow
approached the boys saw the black silhouette of their old companion in
many a fishing trip seated on the forward thwart.
This was too much for Vince, who began upon him at once, with bitter
irony in his words and tone.
"You there, Joe!" he cried. "Good morning. Don't you feel very proud
of this?"
"Dunno 'bout proud, young gen'leman; but I'm precious glad to get my
boat back."
"Your boat back!" cried Vince, as one of the smuggler crew made fast a
rope to the ring-bolt in their stern.
"Aye. Didn't know as young gen'lemen took to stealing boats
altogether."
"You dare to say we stole the boat, and I'll--"
"Well, you took it right away, anyhow. That comes o' beginning with
borrying and not asking leave."
"Better than taking to kidnapping people."
Old Joe growled out something, and shuffled himself about in his seat
while the boat was drawn out into the sunshine once more, and drifted
behind the other rapidly along till she reached the smugglers' cavern.
"Give zem some biscuit and some vater," said the captain. "You, Joseph,
take your boat and go on. _Allez_!"
The old fisherman looked at him rather uneasily, then at the boys, and
back at the captain.
"You hear vat I sall say?" cried the latter fiercely.
He made a menacing gesture; and the boys took each a deep draught of
water, and began to nibble the hard sea biscuit that was their fare.