CATASTROPHE.
The steamer looked very near now and large. It was plain it had no
longer any chance of clearing the rocks. The boatmen were bawling to one
another, but I could not understand what they said, nor hear more than a
word or two at a time.
The steamer mounted very high, and then seemed to dive headlong into the
sea, and was lost to sight. Again, in less than a minute, the black mass
was toppling at the summit of the sea, and again it seemed swallowed up.
"Her starboard paddle!" shouted a broad-shouldered sailor in a
pilot-coat, with his palm to the side of his mouth.
Thomas Jones was among these men, without a hat, and on seeing me he
fell back a little. I was only a step or two behind them.
"Thomas Jones," I screamed, and he inclined his ear to my shrill
question, "is there no life-boat in Cardyllion?"
"Not one, miss," he roared; "and it could not make head against that if
there was."
"Not an inch," bawled Williams.
"Is there any chance?" I cried.
"An anchor from the starn! A bad hold there--she's draggin' of it!"
yelled Williams, whose voice, though little more than two feet away,
sounded faint and half smothered in the storm.
Just then the steamer reared, or rather swooped, like the enchanted
horse, in the air, and high above its black shape shot a huge canopy of
foam; and then it staggered over and down, and nothing but raging sea
was there.
"O God! are they all lost?" I shrieked.
"Anchor's fast. All right now," roared the man in the pilot-coat.
In some seconds more the vessel emerged, pitching high into the
brilliant moonlight, and nearly the same thing was repeated again and
again. The seafaring men who were looking on were shouting their
opinions to one another, and from the little I was able to hear and
understand, I gathered that she might ride it out if she did not drag
her anchor, or "part" or "founder." But the sea was very heavy, and the
rocks just under her bows now.
In this state of suspense a quarter of an hour or more must have passed.
Suddenly the vessel seemed to rise nearer than before. The men crowded
forward to the edge of the bank. It was plain something decisive had
happened. Nearer it rose again, and then once more plunged forward and
disappeared. I waited breathless. I waited longer than before, and
longer. Nothing was there but rolling waves and springing foam beyond
the rocks. The ship rose no more!
The first agony of suspense was over. Where she had been the waves were
sporting in the ghastly moonlight. In my wild horror I screamed--I wrung
my hands. I could not turn for a moment from the scene. I was praying
all the time the same short prayer over and over again. Minute after
minute passed, and still my eyes were fixed on the point where the ship
had vanished; my hands were clasped over my forehead, and tears welled
down my cheeks.
What's that? Upon the summit of the bare rock, all on a sudden, the
figure of a man appeared; behind this mass of black stone, as each wave
burst in succession, the foam leaped in clouds. For a moment the figure
was seen sharp against the silvery distance; then he stooped, as if to
climb down the near side of the rock, and we lost sight of him. The
boatmen shouted, and held up each a hand (their others were holding
their hats on) in token of succour near, and three or four of them, with
Thomas Jones at their head, ran down the slope, at their utmost speed
to the jetty, under which, in shelter, lay the Malory boat. Soon it was
moving under the bank, four men pulling might and main against the gale;
though they rowed in shelter of the reef, on the pinnacle of which we
had seen the figure for a moment, still it was a rough sea, and far from
safe for an open boat, the spray driving like hail against them, and the
boat pitching heavily in the short cross sea.
No other figure crossed the edge of the rock, or for a a moment showed
upon the bleak reef, all along which clouds of foam were springing high
and wild into the air.
The men who had been watching the event from the bank, seemed to have
abandoned all further hope, and began to descend the hill to the jetty
to await the return of the boat. It did return, bearing the one rescued
man.
Laura Grey and I went homeward. We made our way into the back-yard,
often forced to run, by the storm, in spite of ourselves. We had hardly
reached the house when we saw the boatmen coming up.
We were now in the yard, about to enter the house at the back-door,
which stood in shelter of the building. I saw Mrs. Torkill in the
steward's house, with one of the maids, evidently in a fuss. I ran in.
"Oh, Miss Ethel, dear, did you see that? Lord a'mercy on us! A whole
shipful gone like that! I thought the sight was leaving my eyes."
I answered very little. I felt ill, I was trembling still, and ready to
burst again into tears.
"Here's bin Thomas Jones, miss, to ask leave for the drownded man to
rest himself for the night, and, as Mr. Carmel's away, I knew your papa
and mamma would not refuse; don't you think so, miss? So I said, ay,
bring him here. Was I right, miss? And me and Anne Wan is tidyin' a bed
for him."
"Quite right, I'm sure," said I, my interest again awakened, and almost
at the same moment into the flagged passage came Thomas Jones, followed
by several of the Cardyllion boatmen, their great shoes clattering over
the flags.
In the front rank of these walked the one mortal who had escaped alive
from the ship that was now a wreck on the fatal reef. You may imagine
the interest with which I looked at him. I saw a graceful but manly
figure, a young man in a short sailor-like coat, his dress drenched and
clinging, his hat gone, his forehead and features finely formed, very
energetic, and, I thought, stern--browned by the sun; but, allowing for
that tint, no drowned face in the sea that night was paler than his, his
long black hair, lank with sea-water, thrown back from his face like a
mane. There was blood oozing from under its folds near his temple; there
was blood also on his hand, which rested on the breast of his coat; on
his finger there was a thick gold ring. I had little more than a moment
in which to observe all this. He walked in, holding his head high, very
faint and fierce, with a slight stagger in his gait, a sullen and
defiant countenance, and eyes fixed and gazing straight before him, as I
had heard somnambulists described. I saw him in the candle-light for
only a moment as he walked by, with boatmen in thick shoes, as I said,
clattering beside him. I felt a strange longing to run and clasp him by
the hand!
I got into our own back-door, and found Laura Grey in the room in which
we usually had our tea. She was as much excited as I.
"Could you have imagined," she almost cried, "anything so frightful? I
wish I had not seen it. It will always be before my eyes."
"That is what I feel also; but we could not help it, we could not have
borne the suspense. That is the reason why the people who are least able
to bear it sometimes see the most dreadful sights."
As we were talking, and wondering where the steamer came from, and what
was her name, and how many people were probably on board, in came
Rebecca Torkill.
"I sent them boatmen home, miss, that rowed the boat out to the rock for
that poor young man, with a pint o' strong ale, every one round, and no
doubt he'll give them and Thomas Jones something in hand for taking him
off the rock when he comes to himself a bit. He ought to be thanking the
Almighty with a contrite heart."
"He did not look as if he was going to pray when I saw him," I said.
"Nor to thank God, nor no one, for anything," she chimed in. "And he sat
down sulky and black as you please, at the side o' the bed, and said
never a word, but stuck out his foot to Thomas Jones to unbutton his
boot. I had a pint o' mulled port ready, and I asked him if I should
send for the doctor, and he only shook his head and shrugged his
shoulders, as he might turn up his nose at an ugly physic. And he fell
a-thinking while Jones was takin' off the other boot, and in place of
prayin' or thanks-giving, I heard him muttering to himself and
grumbling; and, Lord forgive me if I wrong him, I think I heard him
cursing some one. There was a thing for a man just took alive out o' the
jaws o' death by the mercy o' God to do! There's them on earth, miss,
that no lesson will teach, nor goodness melt, nor judgment frighten, but
the last one, and then all's too late."
It was late by this time, and so we all got to our beds. But I lay long
awake in the dark, haunted by the ceaseless rocking of that dreadful
sea, and the apparition of that one pale, bleeding messenger from the
ship of death. How unlike my idea of the rapture of a mortal just
rescued from shipwreck! His face was that of one to whom an atrocious
secret has been revealed, who was full of resentment and horror; whose
lips were sealed.
In my eyes he was the most striking figure that had ever appeared before
me. And the situation and my own dreadful excitement had elevated him
into a hero.