Some days after the wreck of the _Sunshine_, as described in a previous
chapter, Captain Roy and his son stood on the coast of Java not far from
the ruins of Anjer. A vessel was anchored in the offing, and a little
boat lay on the shore.
All sign of elemental strife had passed, though a cloud of smoke hanging
over the remains of Krakatoa told that the terrible giant below was not
dead but only sleeping--to awake, perchance, after a nap of another 200
years.
"Well, father," said our hero with a modest look, "it may be, as you
suggest, that Winnie Van der Kemp does not care for me more than for a
fathom of salt water--"
"I did not say salt water, lad, I said bilge--a fathom o' _bilge_
water," interrupted the captain, who, although secretly rejoiced at the
fact of his son having fallen over head and ears in love with the pretty
little Cocos-Keeling islander, deemed it his duty, nevertheless, as a
sternly upright parent, to make quite sure that the love was mutual as
well as deep before giving his consent to anything like courtship.
"It matters not; salt or bilge water makes little difference," returned
the son with a smile. "But all I can say is that I care for Winnie so
much that her love is to me of as much importance as sunshine to the
world--and we have had some experience lately of what the want of _that_
means."
"Nonsense, Nigel," returned the captain severely. "You're workin'
yourself into them up-in-the-clouds, reef-point-patterin' regions
again--which, by the way, should be pretty well choked wi' Krakatoa dust
by this time. Come down out o' that if ye want to hold or'nary
intercourse wi' your old father. She's far too young yet, my boy. You
must just do as many a young fellow has done before you, attend to your
dooties and forget her."
"Forget her!" returned the youth, with that amused, quiet expression
which wise men sometimes assume when listening to foolish suggestions.
"I could almost as easily forget my mother!"
"A very proper sentiment, Nigel, very--especially the `almost' part of
it."
"Besides," continued the son, "she is not so _very_ young--and that
difficulty remedies itself every hour. Moreover, I too am young. I can
wait."
"The selfishness of youth is only equalled by its presumption," said the
captain. "How d'ee know _she_ will wait?"
"I don't know, father, but I _hope_ she will--I--_think_ she will."
"Nigel," said the captain, in a tone and with a look that were meant to
imply intense solemnity, "have you ever spoken to her about love?"
"No, father."
"Has she ever spoken to _you_?"
"No--at least--not with her lips."
"Come, boy, you're humbuggin' your old father. Her tongue couldn't well
do it without the lips lendin' a hand."
"Well then--with neither," returned the son. "She spoke with her eyes--
not intentionally, of course, for the eyes, unlike the lips, refuse to
be under control."
"Hm! I see--reef-point-patterin' poetics again! An' what did she say
with her eyes!"
"Really, father, you press me too hard; it is difficult to translate
eye-language, but if you'll only let memory have free play and revert to
that time, nigh quarter of a century ago, when you first met with a
certain _real_ poetess, perhaps--"
"Ah! you dog! you have me there. But how dare you, sir, venture to
think of marryin' on nothin'?"
"I don't think of doing so. Am I not a first mate with a handsome
salary?"
"No, lad, you're not. You're nothin' better than a seaman out o' work,
with your late ship wrecked in a cocoa-nut grove!"
"That's true," returned Nigel with a laugh. "But is not the cargo of
the said ship safe in Batavia? Has not its owner a good bank account in
England? Won't another ship be wanted, and another first mate, and
would the owner dare to pass over his own son, who is such a competent
seaman--according to your own showing? Come, father, I turn the tables
on you and ask you to aid rather than resist me in this matter."
"Well, I will, my boy, I will," said the captain heartily, as he laid
his hand on his son's shoulder. "But, seriously, you must haul off this
little craft and clap a stopper on your tongue--ay, and on your eyes
too--till three points are considered an' made quite clear. First, you
must find out whether the hermit would be agreeable. Second, you must
look the matter straight in the face and make quite sure that you mean
it. For better or for worse. No undoin' _that_ knot, Nigel, once it's
fairly tied! And, third, you must make quite sure that Winnie is sure
of her own mind, an' that--that--"
"We're all sure all round, father. Quite right. I agree with you.
`All fair an' aboveboard' should be the sailing orders of every man in
such matters, especially of every seaman. But, will you explain how I
am to make sure of Winnie's state of mind without asking her about it?"
"Well, I don't exactly see my way," replied the captain slowly. "What
d'ee say to my soundin' her on the subject?"
"Couldn't think of it! You may be first-rate at deep-sea soundings,
father, but you couldn't sound the depths of a young girl's heart. I
must reserve that for myself, however long it may be delayed."
"So be it, lad. The only embargo that I lay upon you is--haul off, and
mind you don't let your figurehead go by the board. Meanwhile, here
comes the boat. Now, Nigel, none o' your courtin' till everything is
settled and the wind fair--dead aft my lad, and blowin' stiff. You and
the hermit are goin' off to Krakatoa to-day, I suppose?"
"Yes. I am just now waiting for him and Moses," returned Nigel.
"Is Winnie going?"
"Don't know. I hope so."
"Humph! Well, if we have a fair wind I shall soon be in Batavia," said
the captain, descending to business matters, "and I expect without
trouble to dispose of the cargo that we landed there, as _well_ as that
part o' the return cargo which I had bought before I left for Keeling--
at a loss, no doubt, but that don't matter much. Then I'll come back
here by the first craft that offers--arter which. Ay!--Ay! shove her in
here. Plenty o' water."
The last remark was made to the seaman who steered the boat sent from
the vessel in the offing.
A short time thereafter Captain Roy was sailing away for Batavia, while
his son, with Van der Kemp, Moses, Winnie, and Spinkie, was making for
Krakatoa in a native boat.
The hermit, in spite of his injuries, had recovered his wonted
appearance, if not his wonted vigour. Winnie seemed to have suddenly
developed into a mature woman under her recent experiences, though she
had lost none of her girlish grace and attractiveness. As for Moses--
time and tide seemed to have no effect whatever on his ebony frame, and
still less, if possible, on his indomitable spirit.
"Now you keep still," he said in solemn tones and with warning looks to
Spinkie. "If you keep fidgitin' about you'll capsize de boat. You
hear?"
Spinkie veiled his real affection for the negro under a look of supreme
indifference, while Winnie went off into a sudden giggle at the idea of
such a small creature capsizing the boat.
Mindful of his father's warning, Nigel did his best to "haul off" and to
prevent his "figurehead" from going "by the board." But he found it
uncommonly hard work, for Winnie looked so innocent, so pretty, so
unconscious, so sympathetic with everybody and everything, so very
young, yet so wondrously wise and womanly, that he felt an irresistible
desire to prostrate himself at her feet in abject slavery.
"Dear little thing," said Winnie, putting her hand on Spinkie's little
head and smoothing him down from eyes to tail.
Spinkie looked as if half inclined to withdraw his allegiance from Moses
and bestow it on Winnie, but evidently changed his mind after a moment's
reflection.
"O that I were a monkey!" thought Nigel, paraphrasing Shakespeare, "that
I might--" but it is not fair to our hero to reveal him in his weaker
moments!
There was something exasperating, too, in being obliged, owing to the
size of the boat, to sit so close to Winnie without having a right to
touch her hand! Who has not experienced this, and felt himself to be a
very hero of self-denial in the circumstances?
"Mos' awrful hot!" remarked Moses, wiping his forehead with the sleeve
of his shirt.
"_You_ hot!" said Nigel in surprise. "I thought nothing on earth could
be too hot for you."
"Dat's your ignerance," returned Moses calmly. "Us niggers, you see,
ought to suffer more fro' heat dan you whites."
"How so?"
"Why, don't your flossiphers say dat black am better dan white for
'tractin' heat, an' ain't our skins black? I wish we'd bin' born white
as chalk. I say, Massa Nadgel, seems to me dat dere's not much left ob
Krakatoa."
They had approached near enough to the island by that time to perceive
that wonderful changes had indeed taken place, and Van der Kemp, who had
been for some time silently absorbed in contemplation, at last turned to
his daughter and said--
"I had feared at first, Winnie, that my old home had been blown entirely
away, but I see now that the Peak of Rakata still stands, so perhaps I
may yet show you the cave in which I have spent so many years."
"But why did you go to live in such a strange place, dear father?" asked
the girl, laying her hand lovingly on the hermit's arm.
Van der Kemp did not reply at once. He gazed in his child's face with
an increase of that absent air and far-away look which Nigel, ever since
he met him, had observed as one of his characteristics. At this time an
anxious thought crossed him,--that perhaps the blows which his friend
had received on his head when he was thrown on the deck of the
_Sunshine_ might have injured his brain.
"It is not easy to answer your question, dear one," he said after a
time, laying his strong hand on the girl's head, and smoothing her
luxuriant hair which hung in the untrammelled freedom of nature over her
shoulders. "I have felt sometimes, during the last few days, as if I
were awaking out of a long long dream, or recovering from a severe
illness in which delirium had played a prominent part. Even now, though
I see and touch you, I sometimes tremble lest I should really awake and
find that it is all a dream. I have so often--so _very_ often--dreamed
something like it in years gone by, but never so vividly as now! I
cannot doubt--it is sin to doubt--that my prayers have been at last
answered. God is good and wise. He knows what is best and does not
fail in bringing the best to pass. Yet I have doubted Him--again and
again."
Van der Kemp paused here and drew his hand across his brow as if to
clear away sad memories of the past, while Winnie drew closer to him and
looked up tenderly in his face.
"When your mother died, dear one," he resumed, "it seemed to me as if
the sun had left the heavens, and when _you_ were snatched from me, it
was as though my soul had fled and nought but animal life remained. I
lived as if in a terrible dream. I cannot recall exactly what I did or
where I went for a long, long time. I know I wandered through the
archipelago looking for you, because I did not believe at first that you
were dead. It was at this time I took up my abode in the cave of
Rakata, and fell in with my good faithful friend Moses."
"Your sarvint, massa," interrupted the negro humbly. "I's proud to be
call your frind, but I's only your sarvint, massa."
"Truly you have been my faithful servant, Moses," said Van der Kemp,
"but not the less have you been my trusted friend. He nursed me through
a long and severe illness, Winnie. How long, I am not quite sure.
After a time I nearly lost hope. Then there came a very dark period,
when I was forced to believe that you must be dead. Yet, strange to
say, even during this dark time I did not cease to pray and to wander
about in search of you. I suppose it was the force of habit, for hope
seemed to have died. Then, at last, Nigel found you. God used him as
His instrument. And now, praise to His name, we are reunited--for
ever!"
"Darling father!" were the only words that Winnie could utter as she
laid her head on the hermit's shoulder and wept for joy.
Two ideas, which had not occurred to him before, struck Nigel with great
force at that moment. The one was that whatever or wherever his future
household should be established, if Winnie was to be its chief ornament,
her father must of necessity become a member of it. The other idea was
that he was destined to possess a negro servant with a consequent and
unavoidable monkey attendant! How strange the links of which the chain
of human destiny is formed, and how wonderful the powers of thought by
which that chain is occasionally forecast! How to convey all these
possessions to England and get them comfortably settled there was a
problem which he did not care to tackle just then.
"See, Winnie," said Van der Kemp, pointing with interest to a mark on
the side of Rakata, "yonder is the mouth of my cave. I never saw it so
clearly before because of the trees and bushes, but everything seems now
to have been burnt up."
"Das so, massa, an' what hasn't bin bu'nt up has bin blow'd up!"
remarked the negro.
"Looks very like it, Moses, unless that is a haze which enshrouds the
rest of the island," rejoined the other, shading his eyes with his
hands.
It was no haze, however; for they found, on drawing nearer, that the
greater part of Krakatoa had, as we have already said, actually
disappeared from the face of the earth.
When the boat finally rounded the point which hid the northern part of
the island from view, a sight was presented which it is not often given
to human eyes to look upon. The whole mountain named the Peak of
Rakata, (2623 feet high), had been split from top to bottom, and about
one-half of it, with all that part of the island lying to the northward,
had been blown away, leaving a wall or almost sheer precipice which
presented a grand section of the volcano.
Pushing their boat into a creek at the base of this precipice, the party
landed and tried to reach a position from which a commanding view might
be obtained. This was not an easy matter, for there was not a spot for
a foot to rest on which was not covered deeply with pumice-dust and
ashes. By dint of perseverance, however, they gained a ledge whence the
surrounding district could be observed, and then it was clearly seen how
widespread and stupendous the effects of the explosion had been.
Where the greater part of the richly wooded island had formerly
flourished, the ocean now rippled in the sunshine, and of the smaller
islands around it _Lang_ Island had been considerably increased in bulk
as well as in height. _Verleden_ Island had been enlarged to more than
three times its former size and also much increased in height. The
island named _Polish Hat_ had disappeared altogether, and two entirely
new islets--afterwards named _Steers_ and _Calmeyer_ Islands--had arisen
to the northward.
"Now, friends," said Van der Kemp, after they had noted and commented on
the vast and wonderful changes that had taken place, "we will pull round
to our cave and see what has happened there."
Descending to the boat they rowed round the southern shores of Rakata
until they reached the little harbour where the boat and canoe had
formerly been kept.