was on the qui vive, every eye turned, intently watching the captain as
he gave the necessary orders for bringing the ship up to the wind--as it
was far too squally and risky work for her spars and top-hamper to wear
her, before she could pay off on the other tack--and retrace her course
in her own wake to pick up the two boys, who were now out of sight.
"Stand by the lee braces, and be ready to slacken off on the
weather-side! 'Bout ship! Up with the helm! Mainsail haul!" were some
of the orders rapidly given and as rapidly attended to.
With a will, the great main-yard swung round to starboard, the _Sea
Rover_ paying off handsomely. And, in another moment, under her reefed
topsails and topgallantsails, with her courses dropped, and her yards
sharply braced up, she was going back on her track at even greater speed
than she had been previously travelling towards Australia, the wind
having shifted to the southwards and eastwards after the last squall,
and being now well on her beam, which was the clipper's best sailing
point.
There was a lookout on the fore-topmast crosstrees; but almost every one
was looking out in the direction where some trace of David and Jonathan
might be discovered. And the minutes seemed lengthened into hours as
they anxiously peered into the mass of slatey-brown water in front and
around topped with yeasty foam. But the sky was overcast with
storm-clouds and the darkening of approaching night, and their horizon
was now limited so that they could not see very far in advance of the
_Sea Rover's_ bows--not more than a mile at most.
Every voice was hushed on board the ship now, and only the humming of
the wind and the swish of the water could be heard as she dived every
now and then over her catheads into the waves, that fell in a cataract
of spray on her forecastle and washed into her waist, while she dashed
onward, gathering speed with every yard of progress that she made.
"Lookout, ahoy, there!" shouted out the captain to the man on the fore
crosstrees. "Do you see anything of them yet?"
"Not a speck in sight," was the answer; and still the _Sea Rover_ clove
through the water on what they guessed to have been their former course,
and the sky and the sea grew darker and darker and seemed to mingle
together, gradually diminishing their area of vision.
"We must have passed the spot by this time," said the captain presently
to the chief officer, when the ship had gone some two miles after coming
about. "Send another lookout into the main-top; and you, Dawkins,"
addressing one of the hands standing near, "sky up here in the
mizzen-rigging and see if you can see anything. Look well round to
leeward as well as ahead, for we may have overrun them."
"Ay, ay," said the man as he scrambled up the shrouds, and quickly made
his way, not merely into mizzen-top, but on the topgallant-yard, where
he sat astride and scanned the horizon to his right and left, to
windward and leeward of the vessel's wake.
"On deck there!" he hailed in a little time. He had the keenest sight
of any man on board.
"Ay, ay!" answered the captain. "Speak out!"
"There is something to windward, two points on the weather-bow."
"How far?"
"About half a mile or more, sir; but it may be less."
"We must get her a couple of points nearer the wind," said the captain
to the chief officer. "Clew up the courses, set the flying-jib, and let
us get the mainsail on her, and see what she can do. Come, look smart
and brace the yards round. Keep her helm up!" he added to the men at
the wheel, lending them a hand as he spoke. "Hard!"
The _Sea Rover_ leaned over, gunwales under, and made deep bows to the
sea, pitching the water over her fore-yard, as, her head being brought
round a couple of points more, she sailed almost in the wind's-eye,
taking all that two men could do to steer her, besides the captain.
"Aloft there!" shouted the captain once more to the lookout men. "How's
her head now? Does she bear towards the object, or is it still to
windward?"
"Steady!" was the answer. "She's right for it now. Luff a bit, steady,
it's right ahead."
"What is it? Can you see them?" cried the captain, eagerly peering into
the distance himself.
"Looks like floating timber, sir. I can't see anybody as yet; it seems
all awash."
A moment further of breathless suspense, and then those on deck could
see for themselves what had attracted the lookout man's notice--a black
object, bobbing up and down amidst the waves, one minute raised aloft on
a billowy crest, the next hidden from view in a watery valley that
descended, as it were, into the depths of the ocean.
It was now clear to windward on the weather-bow; and, every now and
then, distinctly visible.
"Put the helm down, slack off the sheet!" cried the captain; and, as the
_Sea Rover_ rounded-to, with the floating object under her lee, it could
be seen that it was the boat which David and Jonathan had perceived
passing them, bottom upwards, just before they were struck by the
squall. The vessel, therefore, must have gone much further back on
their track than they had imagined, for the boat must have been three or
four miles astern of the point at which the boys were washed overboard.
She would of course have drifted farther than the floating wreckage,
being higher out of water, but could not have made up more than a mile
of the intervening distance.
It was a grievous disappointment to all on board, crew and passengers
alike. They had made certain that it was the two boys clinging to the
wreckage of the bulwarks and wheelhouse that had been carried away along
with Davy; and the disappointment was all the greater because their
hopes had been so cruelly raised.
"My boy, my boy!" sobbed Mr Liston, who stood with several of the other
cabin passengers grouped around the captain on the quarter-deck watching
in breathless suspense. "My boy, my boy! He is lost, he's lost! I
shall never see him again!" and he wrung his hands in agony.
Poor, bereaved father! He had only that moment been made aware that his
son was overboard, having been below when the accident happened to Davy,
and only attracted on deck by the commotion. Johnny was his only child,
his mother having died in giving him birth, and he was the apple of his
eye. He would have jumped into the sea, too, when, he learnt what had
happened, if he had not been prevented; and his grief was frantic.
"Cheer up, my dear sir!" said Captain Markham, as he gave orders for the
ship to back across her course at right angles, and warned the lookout
men aloft to renewed watchfulness. "We may pick them up yet. You know
Davy Armstrong was holding on to something when he was carried away, and
your gallant son took a life-buoy with him when he went to his rescue,
so they can keep afloat till we overhaul them. Why, I was picked up
myself once after I had been in the water for hours and the ship
searching for me all the time, when I had been washed overboard like
Davy."
The captain's sanguine anticipations, however, even if he really
believed in them, were baseless.
The _Sea Rover_ backed, and wore, and tacked again, sailing, within a
radius of a few miles, in every possible direction the wind would let
her, without finding any traces of the lost ones, or even coming across
the pieces of wreckage, which the sombre tint of the sea and sky
prevented their seeing; and then night came on, and they had to abandon
their quest, although they burnt blue lights and cruised about the same
spot for hours afterwards, in vain!
"Alas, dear captain, it is hopeless now!" exclaimed Mr Liston
mournfully, with the resignation of despair, drawing away his gaze from
the sea, and his head dropping on his breast in despondency.
He was standing almost alone on the deck, the majority of the passengers
having gone below--for the wind was cold and boisterous, and the crew
having retired forward to the forecastle excepting those on duty aft--a
tall, thin, pale man, whom the calamity seemed to have aged ten years in
that brief space of time, and bowed with care.
"Only a miracle could have saved them!" he said, as if speaking to
himself; and then, turning to the captain, he added, "I suppose you must
give them up now, and proceed with your voyage?"
"Yes, it is useless waiting any longer," said Captain Markham, sinking
his voice in sympathy with the other. "Poor fellows, I'm afraid they've
told the number of their mess long since! But if they are drowned, poor
Davy was lost while doing his duty as a gallant sailor; and your son, my
dear sir, lies in a hero's grave beneath the wave, for he sacrificed his
life in trying to save that of his friend. It is some slight
consolation, Mr Liston, to recollect that; and I don't think the
recording angel above will have forgotten to log it down, either!"
And, as the hardy sailor pointed upwards with a reverent air to where
one tiny twinkling star was peeping out from amidst the mass of fleeting
shadowy clouds that still obscured the heavens and shrouded the horizon
from view, he wiped away a tear from his eye with the back of his hairy
hand, bidding the quartermaster a moment or two afterwards, in a
strangely gruff tone quite unlike his usual mode of speech, to set the
ship's course once more due east for Australia.
And the _Sea Rover_ went on her way.
STORY THREE, CHAPTER THREE.
A STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.
Half-drowned by the avalanche of water which had swept him overboard,
and just catching one faint glimpse of the hull of the ship through eyes
that were blinded with the spray, as it swept away from him and left him
struggling with the waves, although holding on still to the top of the
wheelhouse which he had clutched in desperation as he was carried away,
Davy thought he was dreaming when he heard the voice of his friend
shouting out, as if in the distance, miles and miles away, "Hold on,
Dave, I'm coming!"
"Nonsense," he reasoned with himself, amidst the pitiless lash of the
billows, and the keenness of the wind that seemed to take the skin off
his face and pierce through his wet clothing as he was one minute soused
down into the water and then raised aloft again on his temporary raft
exposed to the full force of the blast. "Nonsense! I'm drowning, I
suppose, and this is one of those pleasant dreams which people say come
to one at the last."
It was no dream, however.
After a little while, although it seemed ages to David, the voice
sounded nearer.
"Hold on, Dave, old boy. I'm quite close to you now, and will reach you
in a minute!"
"I can't be dreaming," thought David again, getting a bit over the
feeling of suffocation which had at first oppressed him. "Jonathan's
voice sounds too real for that, and I can see that I am adrift on the
ocean, and resting on something. Oh, how my leg hurts me! I'll give a
hail, and see whether it is Jonathan's voice or not that I hear. It
must be him!"
"Ahoy, help, ahoy!" he sang out as loudly as he could; but he was
already weak, his voice came only in a faint whisper to Jonathan, who
imagined he must be sinking and he would be too late.
"Keep up, Dave, for goodness' sake," screamed out the latter in agony,
making desperate exertions to reach him. "Don't give way! Hold on a
second longer and you'll be safe!"
Although he was such a slight, delicate-looking little fellow, hardly
doing justice in his appearance to his sixteen years, if there was one
accomplishment in which Johnny Liston was a proficient, it was swimming.
Living in the neighbourhood of Kensington Gardens, he had made a habit
of going into the Serpentine every morning during the summer months, and
sticking at it as long as the weather permitted, although he did not go
to the lengths of some intrepid bathers, and have the ice broken for him
in winter; and by constant practice, and imitating the best swimmers
amongst whom he bathed, he had learned so much that he could compete
even with professionals for speed and endurance, and made the best
amateur time on record for so young a lad.
His practice now stood him in good stead; and he had, besides, an
additional advantage, for having learned to swim in fresh water, and
indeed never having essayed his powers in the sea, the unaccustomed
buoyancy of the waves, which he now experienced for the first time, gave
him a confidence and an ease which seemed surprising to him; he felt
that he did not require the slightest exertion to keep afloat, even
without the life-buoy, as he tested by letting go of it for a short
time, and with it he was certain he could almost rival Captain Webb and
swim for hours.
Of course it was rough work for a novice, paddling in such broken water;
but after a few strokes he got used to it, and, by dint of diving under
the swelling bosom of some of the more threatening crests, and floating
over the tops of the others whose ridges were yet perfect, he made his
way pretty rapidly towards the spot where he had espied David floating
off.
The wind and the set of the sea were both against him, but the answering
hail of the middy assured him he was proceeding in the right direction,
and would be soon by his lost friend's side.
Another stroke or two, and as Johnny Liston rose on the crest of a huge
mountain of water, which took him up almost to the sky, he saw below him
the broken timbers of the bulwarks rolling about in the trough of the
sea, and he thought they formed part of the wreckage on which David had
been supporting himself, and that he had seen him on them.
His heart sank within him like lead, for no one was floating on the
broken bulwarks now. Poor Dave must have gone.
Just at that moment, however, the middy's faint hail rang again clearly
out above the noise of the wind and the sea, to assure him he was still
above the surface, and restore his drooping energies.
"Ahoy! Help! Ahoy!"
He did not require to hail again, for, the next moment overtopping
another billow, his friend Jonathan shot up alongside of him, and
grasped him by the shoulder.
"Oh, Dave," he exclaimed. "Thank God I've got you safe. I thought I
would never have found you."
David had partly clambered up on the top of the wheelhouse, and lay
stretched out with his legs in the water.
He raised his head and turned his face as Jonathan got hold of him.
His emotion was too great for many words.
"And you jumped overboard to save me?" was all he said.
But his look was enough.
Johnny Liston had been swimming with one arm only thrust through the
life-buoy, as he had been obliged to quit his hold of it each time he
dived beneath the crest of a wave.
He now took it off, holding on to the wheelhouse-top, which sank down
into the water on one side under the double weight of the two lads,
elevating the other end in the air.
"Here, put this on, Dave," he said. "I brought it for you, and a
precious job I have had to reach you with it."
"But you, Jonathan--I beg your pardon, old chap, I didn't mean to call
you so. I know you don't like it."
"Never mind, Dave. If you think of me as Jonathan you may as well call
me so. I shan't mind you doing so any longer I rather like it, old
fellow, now, for our friendship will be like that of David and Jonathan
that we read of in the Bible; you know it says that `the soul of
Jonathan was knit unto the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his
own soul.' That's just how I feel."
"What a chap you are to think of that now," said David admiringly, "with
both of us bobbing about in the middle of the ocean, and the ship out of
sight. But I won't have the life-buoy; what will you do without it?"
"Bless you, I can swim like a fish, Dave, and it was more a nuisance to
me than a help; but, we can both hold on to it, you know, if it comes to
the worst. How's your leg, Dave? I thought it was broken when you got
it twisted in the wheel that time."
"Oh, it's all right," said David, kicking it out vigorously as he spoke.
"The bone isn't quite broken, but it's very sore, and I suppose I'd
have to lay up for it if I wasn't here;" and he grinned ruefully.
"Do you think the ship will pick us up?" said the other presently,
losing some of his self-possession now that he had come up with David,
and the motive for forgetting self and personal danger was wanting.
He was naturally timid unless nerved up by necessity.
"Oh, yes," said David, whose spirits rose with the occasion, and who in
the presence of his friend forgot all the peril. "Captain Markham won't
desert us, never fear; but you can't pull up a ship like a horse, you
know, Jonathan, and it will take some time for the _Sea Rover_ to tack
about before she can fetch us. I wish, however, old chap, we had a
little better raft than this to support us; the wheelhouse-top is hardly
big enough for two, even with the buoy, which, though it can keep us
afloat, won't raise us out of the water as we want."
"Why, I passed some wreckage a few yards off before I reached you," said
his friend.
"Did you?" said David. "That must have been the gangway and part of the
bulwarks that came away with me. I wish we had the lot here."
"Do you?" said Jonathan, as we must now call him, "then I'll soon fetch
them," striking out as he spoke.
"Take care," said David; "and pray take the buoy with you."
But, the sea saved Jonathan the trouble of leaving his friend, for the
very pieces of timber of which he had spoken made their appearance at
that moment, floating down towards them from the summit of a wave, in
whose valley they were; and Jonathan swam beyond them and pushed them
before him till they were alongside the wheelhouse-top.
There was plenty of material to form a substantial raft with the
addition of what they already had; and as Jonathan drew up the heavy
mass alongside, David gave a shout of joy.
"Why," he exclaimed, "here is the cleat of the signal halliards come
away with a piece of the taffrail, and we'll have enough rope to form
all the lashings we want. Isn't that lucky?"
The young middy was handy enough in sailors' ways through his two years'
experience of the sea; and--Jonathan aiding him under his direction--in
a short time the loose timbers were lashed firmly together as a
framework, with the roof of the wheelhouse fastened on the top, forming
altogether a substantial platform, on which the two boys found
themselves elevated a clear foot or more out of the water, and free from
the cold wash of the waves, which was beginning to turn them blue.
"There," exclaimed David, "now we're comfortable, and can wait in
patience till the ship overhauls us; she can't be long now."
Watching with eager eyes they saw the _Sea Rover_ coming towards them,
after a long, long while, as it seemed to them; but ere she had reached
them, in spite of their shouts and hand-wavings, which they fancied must
have been seen and heard on board, she went round on the other tack, and
disappeared from their view, to their bitter disappointment and grief.
It was David now who was hopeful still. Jonathan seemed to have lost
all that courage which had inspired him to leap into the sea to his
friend's rescue, and was trembling with fear and hopeless despair.
The next time the _Sea Rover_ came in sight, she was further off, and
appeared to be sailing away from them, although they could see her tack
about in the distance several times, as if searching for them still.
Then it gradually got darker, and night came on, enveloping them in a
curtain of hazy mist that seemed to rest on the water, through which
they could see far off the blue lights that were burnt on board the ship
to show their whereabouts, although they were useless to them, as they
could not reach her.
Even David began to lose hope now, but he still encouraged his
companion.
"They'll not desert us, old fellow," he said, with a heartiness which he
by no means felt. "The captain will lie-to, and will pick us up in the
morning."
Jonathan was not attending to his words, however. He was shivering and
shaking as if he had the ague, and David could hear his teeth chatter
together with the cold, although the wind had gone down somewhat, and
the sea no longer broke over them.
It was so dark that the two lads could scarcely see each other as they
lay on top of the frail structure that separated them from the deep,
clasping each other's hands.
Presently, in the fitful phosphorescent light of the water, some dark
object seemed to float up alongside; and Jonathan gave vent to a scream
of horror, that rang through the silence of the night.
"Oh, what is that?" he exclaimed.
And if David had not clutched him, he would have plunged headlong from
the raft into the sea in his fright and agonised terror.
STORY THREE, CHAPTER FOUR.
ALONE ON THE OCEAN.
For hours the two boys remained in a sort of nameless terror, David
feeling almost as frightened as Jonathan, although he concealed his
fright in order to reassure his companion, with the terrible object that
had excited their fear bobbing up and down alongside them, and
occasionally coming with a crash against their frail raft, that
threatened to annihilate it and send them both into the water, when it
would be all over with them.
The night was pitch dark, for the mist that hung over the surface of the
deep appeared to increase in intensity, and they could not see even the
faint glimmer of a star to cheer them; while all they could hear was the
lapping of the waves as they washed by them, and the ripple and swish of
some billow as it overtopped its crest, and spent its strength in eddies
of circling foam, as David could imagine--for the darkness rendered
everything invisible now, even the platform on which they were
supported, and the unknown companion beside them, which might be
anything, and their very hands when held before their faces.
Some time after midnight, when David and Jonathan had gone through a
purgatory of dread, not knowing what might happen to them any moment,
the moon rose gradually from the horizon, shining faintly through a veil
of clouds that almost obscured its light, and the morbid terror of the
two boys was at once dispelled on their being able to perceive what it
really was that had occasioned them such alarm.
"Goodness gracious me, Jonathan!" exclaimed David, with a tone of glad
surprise in his voice, which at once aroused his friend, who was lying
face downwards on the raft, with his head buried in his crossed arms.
"Why, what do you think it is that has frightened us so? I'm blest if
it isn't that very identical boat that you saw in the afternoon passing
by the _Sea Rover_! Isn't it providential, old chap, that after all
these hours we should come across it again? Thank God for it,
Jonathan," he added more earnestly a moment afterwards; "it may save
both our lives in case the ship is unable to find us and pick us up!"
Yes, there it was, a long black boat, the cutter of some vessel, that
had been washed away from the bows, as it was twenty feet long and more,
floating keel uppermost, alongside the raft, although buried somewhat
deep in the water.
The night had no longer any terrors for them; and, although they waited
anxiously for the sun to rise to see whether the _Sea Rover_ was still
in sight--for the moon was frequently obscured by clouds, and its light
too intermittent and deceptive for them to scan the ocean by--they did
not dream of despairing now, even if their worst suspicions should be
realised, and the ship have left them to their fate, as the boat offered
them a tangible means of rescue, which the raft did not; albeit it had
saved their lives for the while, and served as a "pis-aller."
Morning came at last, first tinging the horizon to the eastwards with a
pale sea-green hue, that deepened into a roseate tinge, and then merged
into a vivid crimson flush, that spread and spread until the whole
heavens reflected the glory of the orb of day, that rose in all its
might from its bed in the waters, and moved with rapid strides towards
the zenith, the crimson colour of the sky gradually fading away, as the
bright yellow sunlight took its place, and illuminated the utmost verge
of the apparently limitless sea; but the _Sea Rover_ was nowhere in
sight, nor was the tiniest speck of a distant sail to be seen on the
horizon!
"Never mind, Jonathan," said David, cheering up his companion; "you
mustn't be disappointed: it is only what I expected, although I didn't
tell you so before! Now that we have the boat, you know, we are not
half so badly off as we thought ourselves at first. We've no reason to
despair!"