THE SEA WAIFS
As the liner's life-boat drew nearer the foundering hulk, the men
at the oars could see how fearful was the plight of the handful of
survivors. The arms of a gray-haired man were clasped around a slip of
a girl, whose long, fair hair whipped in the wind like seaweed. They
were bound fast to a jagged bit of the mizzen-mast and appeared to be
lifeless. Far forward amid a tangle of rigging and broken spars, three
seamen sprawled upon the forecastle head. If any of them were alive,
they were too far gone to help save themselves.
Just beyond the innermost ring of oil-streaked sea there was a patch of
quiet water, and as the boat hovered on the greasy swells, the third
officer called to his men:
"One of us must swim aboard with a line."
The excited cadet, straining at his sweep, yelled back that he was
ready to try it, but the officer gruffly replied:
"This is a man's job. Bos'n, you sung out next. Over you go."
The bos'n was already knotting the end of a heaving line around his
waist, and without a word he tossed the end to the officer in the
stern. David Downes bent to his oar again with bitter disappointment in
his dripping face. He was a strong swimmer and not afraid of the task,
for this was the kind of sea life he had fondly pictured for himself.
But he had to watch the bos'n battle hand-over-hand toward the wreck,
the line trailing in his wake. Then a sea picked up the swimmer and
flung him on the broken deck that was awash with the sea. Those in
the boat feared that he had been killed or crippled by the shock, and
waited tensely until his hoarse shout came back to them. They could see
him creeping on hands and knees across the poop, now and then halting
to grasp a block or rope's end until he could shake himself clear of
the seas that buried him.
At length he gained the cabin roof, and his shadowy figure toiled
desperately while he wrenched the little girl from the arms of her
protector and tied the line about her. The life-boat was warily steered
under the stern as the bos'n staggered to the bulwark with his burden.
With a warning cry he swung her clear. A white-backed wave caught her
up and bore her swiftly toward the boat as if she were cradled. Two
seamen grasped her as she was swept past them and lifted her over the
gunwale.
Again the bos'n shouted, and the master of the vessel was heaved
overboard and rescued with the same deft quickness. Mr. Briggs rejoiced
to find that both had life in them, and forced stimulants between their
locked and pallid lips, while his men rowed toward the bow of the
wreck. The three survivors still left on board could no longer be seen
in the gray darkness.
David Downes, fairly beside himself with pity and with anger at the sea
which must surely swallow the wreck before daylight could come again,
had tied the end of a second line around his middle while the boat was
waiting under the stern. Now, as the mate hesitated whether to attempt
another rescue, the cadet called out:
"It's my turn next, sir. I know I can make it. Oh, won't you let me
try?"
"Shut your mouth and sit still," hotly returned Mr. Briggs.
He had no more than spoken when David jumped overboard and began to
swim with confident stroke toward the vague outlines of the vessel's
bow. The whistle of the liner was bellowing a recall, and her signal
lamps twinkled their urgent message from aloft. It was plain to read
that Captain Thrasher was troubled about the safety of his boat's crew,
but they doggedly hung to their station.
As for David, his strength was almost spent before he was able to fetch
alongside his goal. He had never fought for his life in water like this
which clubbed and choked him. By great good luck he was tossed close to
a broken gap in the vessel's waist, and gained a foothold after barking
his hands and knees. Half stunned, he groped his way forward until a
feeble cry for help from the gloom nerved him to a supreme effort. He
found the man whose voice had guided him, and was trying to pull him
toward the side when the wreck seemed to drop from under their feet.
Then David felt the bow rise, rearing higher and higher, until it hung
for a moment and descended in a long, sickening swoop as if it were
heading straight for the bottom. There was barely time to make fast a
bight of the line under the sailor's shoulders before, clinging to each
other, the two were washed out to sea.
The men in the boat discerned the wild plunge of the sinking craft, and
guessing that she was in the last throes, they hauled on the line with
might and main. Their double burden was dragged clear, just as the bark
rose once more as if doing her best to make a brave finish of it, and
a few moments later there was nothing but seething water where she had
been.
When David came to himself he was slumped on the bottom boards beside
the groaning seaman he had saved. They were close to the _Roanoke_
and her passengers were cheering from the promenade deck. It was a
dangerous task to hoist the boat up the liner's side, but cool-headed
seamanship accomplished it without mishap. Several stewards and the
ship's doctor were waiting to care for the rescued, and as David limped
forward he caught a glimpse of the slender girl being borne toward the
staterooms of the second cabin.
Men and women passengers hurried after the cadet, for the bos'n had
lost no time in telling the story, winding up with the verdict:
"A cadet vas good for somethings if you give him a chance."
Wobbly and water-logged, David dodged the ovation and steered for his
bunk as fast as he was able. The other cadets of his watch shook his
hand and slapped him on the back until he feebly cried for mercy, and
brought him enough hot coffee and food to stock a schooner's galley.
"There will be speeches in the first cabin saloon, and the hat passed
for the heroes, and maybe a medal for your manly little chest," said
one of the boys. "You are a lucky pup. How did you get a chance to kick
up such a fuss?"
David was proud that he had been able to play a part in a deed of
real seafaring, such as he had thought was no longer to be found
in steamers. He had changed his mind. He was going to stick by the
_Roanoke_ and Captain Thrasher, by Jove, and with swelling heart he
answered:
"I just did it, that's all, without waiting for orders. I tell you,
fellows, that's the kind of thing that makes going to sea worth while,
even in a tea-kettle."
"You did it without orders?" echoed the oldest cadet with a whistle of
surprise. "Um-m-m! wait till the old man gets after you. You may wish
you hadn't."
"What! When I saved a man's life in the dark from a vessel that went
down under us? I did my duty, that is all there is to it."
"It wasn't discipline. It was plain foolishness," was the unwelcome
reply. "I am mighty well pleased with you myself, but--well, there's no
use spoiling your fun."
Next day the _Roanoke_ was steaming full speed ahead toward the
Newfoundland banks, the storm left far behind her. David Downes, every
muscle stiff and sore, went on duty, still hoping that his deed would
be applauded by the ship's officers. While he scoured, cleaned,
and trotted this way and that at the beck and call of the bos'n, a
bebuttoned small boy in a bob-tailed jacket hailed him with this brief
message:
"_He_ wants to see you in his room, right away."
The cadet followed the captain's cabin boy in some fear and trembling.
He found the sea lord of the _Roanoke_ stretched in an arm-chair, while
a steward was cutting his shoes from his feet with a sailor's knife.
The captain tried to hide the pitiable condition of his swollen feet
as if ashamed of being caught in such a plight, and grumbled to the
steward:
"Thirty-six hours on the bridge ought not to do that. But those shoes
never did fit me."
To David he exclaimed more severely:
"So you are the cadet that jumped overboard without orders. Don't do it
again. If you are going to sail with us next voyage, the watch officer
will see that you have no shore leave in New York. You will be on duty
at the gangway while the ship is in port. What kind of a vessel would
this be if all hands did as they pleased?"
Standing very stiffly in the middle of the cabin, David chewed his lip
to hold back his grief and anger. Overnight he had come to love the sea
and to feel that he was ready to work and wait for the slow process
of promotion. But this punishment fairly crushed him. He could only
stammer:
"I did the best I could to be of service, sir."
The captain's stern face softened a trifle and there was a kindly gleam
in his gray eye as he said:
"I put Mr. Briggs in charge of the boat, not you. That is all now. Hold
on a minute. I hope you are going to sail with us next voyage."
The cadet tried to speak but the words would not come, and he hurried
on deck. After the first shock he found himself repeating the captain's
final words:
"I hope you are going to sail with us next voyage."
Said David to himself a little more cheerfully:
"That means he wants me to stay with him. It is a whole lot for him to
say, and more than he ever told the other fellows. Maybe I did wrong,
but I'm glad of it."
He would have been in a happier frame of mind could he have overheard
Captain Thrasher say to Mr. Briggs after the boy had gone forward:
"I don't want the silly passengers to spoil the boy with a lot of
heroics. He has the right stuff in him. He is worth hammering into
shape. I guess I knocked some of the hero nonsense out of his noddle,
and now I want you to work him hard and watch how he takes his
medicine."
As soon as he was again off watch, David was very anxious to go in
search of the castaways, but he was forbidden to be on the passenger
deck except when sent there. The captain's steward had told him that
the captain of the lost bark, the _Pilgrim_, was able to lie in a
steamer chair on deck, but that the little girl could not leave her
berth. The bos'n was quick to read the lad's anxiety to know more about
these two survivors, and craftily suggested in passing:
"Mebbe I could use one more hand mit the awnings on the promenade deck,
eh?"
David was more than willing, and as he busied himself with stays and
lashings he cast his eye aft until he could see the gray-haired skipper
of the _Pilgrim_ huddled limply in a chair, a forlorn picture of misery
and weakness. David managed to work his way nearer until he was able to
greet the haggard, brooding ship-master who was dwelling more with his
great loss than with his wonderful escape, as he tremulously muttered
in response:
"Ten good men and a fine vessel gone. My mate and four hands went when
the masts fell. The others were caught forrud. And all I owned went
with her, all but my little Margaret. If it wasn't for her I'd wish I
was with the _Pilgrim_."
"Is she coming around all right?" asked David, eagerly. "We were afraid
we were too late."
"She's too weak to talk much, but she smiled at me," and the
ship-master's seamed face suddenly became radiant. "So you were in the
boat. It was a fine bit of work, and your skipper ought to be proud of
you, and proud of himself. That three-ringed oil circus he invented was
new to me. I thank you all from the bottom of my heart."
The cadet grinned at thought of Captain Thrasher's "pride" in him,
but said nothing about his own part in the rescue and inquired in an
anxious tone:
"Does the doctor think she will be able to walk ashore? Had you been
dismasted and awash very long?"
"Two days," was the slow reply. "But I don't want to think of it now.
My mind kind of breaks away from its moorings when I try to talk about
it, and my head feels awful queer. John Bracewell is my name. I live
in Brooklyn when ashore. You must come over and see us when I feel
livelier."
"But about the little girl," persisted David. "Is she your
granddaughter?"
"Yes, my only one, and all I have to tie to. My boy was lost at sea and
his wife with him. And she is all there is left. She's sailed with me
since she was ten years old. She's most thirteen now, and I never lost
a man or a spar before."
The broken ship-master fell to brooding again, and there was so much
grief in his tired eyes and uncertain voice that David forbore to
ask him any more questions. When he went forward again, David sought
the forecastle to learn what he could about the lone seaman of the
_Pilgrim's_ crew. A group of _Roanoke_ hands were listening to the
story of the loss of the bark as told by the battered man with bandaged
head and one arm in a sling who sat propped in a spare bunk. The cadets
were forbidden to loaf in the forecastle, and after a word or two David
lingered in the doorway, where he could hear the sailor's voice rise
and fall in such fragments of his tale as these:
"Broke his heart in two to lose her ... American-built bark of the good
old times, the _Pilgrim_ was ... me the only Yankee seaman aboard, too
... I'll ship out of New York in one of these tin pots, I guess.... No,
the old man ain't likely to find another ship.... He's down and out....
I'm sorry for him and the little girl. She's all right, she is."
The _Roanoke_ was nearing port at a twenty-knot gait, and the cadets
were hard at work helping to make the great ship spick and span for
her stately entry at New York. Now and then David Downes found an
errand to the second cabin deck, hoping to find Captain Bracewell's
granddaughter strong enough to leave her room. But he had to content
himself with talking to the master of the _Pilgrim_, who was like a
man benumbed in mind and body. He was all adrift and the future was
black with doubts and fears. He had lived and toiled and dared in his
lost bark for twenty years. David could understand something of his
emotions. His father had been one of this race of old-fashioned seamen,
and the boy could recall his sorrow at seeing the American sailing
ships vanish one by one from the seas they had ruled. Captain Bracewell
was fit for many active years afloat, but he was too old to begin at
the foot of the ladder in steam vessels, and there was the slenderest
hope of his finding a command in the kind of a ship he had lost.
These thoughts haunted David and troubled his sleep. But he did not
realize how much he was taking the tragedy to heart until the afternoon
of the last day out. He was overjoyed to see the "little girl" snuggled
in a chair beside her grandfather. She was so slight and delicate by
contrast with the ship-master's rugged bulk that she looked like a
drooping white flower nestled against a rock. But her eyes were brave
and her smile was bright, as her grandfather called out:
"David Downes, ahoy! Here's my Margaret that wants to know the fine big
boy I've been telling her so much about."
Boy and girl gazed at each other with frank interest and curiosity.
Even before David had a chance to know her, he felt as if he were her
big brother standing ready to help her in any time of need. Margaret
was the first to speak:
"I wish I could have seen you swimming off to the poor old _Pilgrim_.
Oh, but that was splendid."
David blushed and made haste to say:
"I haven't had a chance to do anything for you aboard ship. I wish I
could hear how you are after you get ashore."
"You are coming over to see us before you sail, aren't you?" spoke up
Captain Bracewell, with a trace of his old hearty manner.
"I'd be awful glad to," David began, and then he remembered that if he
intended sticking to the _Roanoke_ he must stay aboard as punishment
for trying to do his duty. So he finished very lamely. "I--I can't see
you in port this time."
Margaret looked so disappointed that he stumbled through an excuse
which did not mean much of anything. He had made up his mind to stay
in the ship as a cadet, even though he was forbidden to be a hero. He
realized, for one thing, how ashamed he would be to let these two know
that he had almost decided to quit the sea. He had played a man's part
and the call of the deep water had a new meaning. But it would never do
to let Margaret know that his part in the _Pilgrim_ rescue had got him
into trouble with his captain.
David was called away from his friends, and did not see them again
until evening. A concert was held in the first-class dining saloon, and
the president of a great corporation, a famous author, and a clergyman
of renown made speeches in praise of the heroism of the _Roanoke's_
boat crew. Then the prima donna of a grand-opera company volunteered
to collect a fund which should be divided among the heroes and the
castaways. She returned from her quest through the crowded saloon with
a heaping basket of bank-notes and coin. There was more applause when
Captain Bracewell was led forward, much against his will. But instead
of the expected thanks for the generous gift, he squared his slouching
shoulders and standing as if he were on his own quarter-deck, his deep
voice rang out with its old-time resonance:
"You mean well, ladies and gentlemen, but my little girl and I don't
want your charity. I expect to get back my health and strength, and I'm
not ready for Sailor's Snug Harbor yet. We thank you just the same,
though, but there's those that need it worse."
David Downes was outside, peering through an open port, for he knew
that the concert was no place for a _Roanoke_ "hero." He could not hear
all that the captain of the _Pilgrim_ had to say, but the ship-master's
manner told the story. The cadet had a glimpse of Margaret sitting
in a far corner of the great room. She clapped her hands when
her grandfather was done speaking, and there was the same proud
independence in the poise of her head. David sighed, and as he turned
away bumped into the lone seaman of the _Pilgrim_ who had been gazing
over his shoulder.
"He's a good skipper," said the sailor. "But he's an old fool. He's
goin' to need that cash, and need it bad. All he ever saved at sea his
friends took away from him ashore. My daddy and him was raised in the
same town, and I know all about him."
"Do you mean they'll have to depend on his getting to sea again?" asked
David.
"That's about the size of it. He's worked for wages all his life, and
knowin' no more about shore-goin' folks and ways than a baby, he never
risked a dollar that he didn't lose. Here's hopin' he lands a better
berth than he lost."
"Aye, aye," said David.
Next morning the _Roanoke_ steamed through the Narrows with her band
playing, colors flying from every mast, and her passengers gay in their
best shore-going clothes. David had no chance to look for Captain
Bracewell and Margaret. It was sad to think of them amid this jubilant
company which had scattered its wealth over Europe with lavish hand.
The contrast touched David even more as he watched Captain Thrasher
give orders for swinging the huge steamer into her landing. With voice
no louder than if he were talking across a dinner table, the master of
the liner waved away the tugs that swarmed out to help him, and with
flawless judgment turned the six hundred feet of vibrant steel hull
almost in its own length and laid her alongside her pier as delicately
as a fisherman handles a dory. The strength of fifteen thousand horses
and the minds of four hundred men, alert and instantly obedient, did
the will of this calm man on the bridge. David thrilled at the sight,
and thought of Captain Bracewell, as fine a seaman in his way, but
belonging to another era of the ocean.
The cadet was on duty at the gangway when the happy passengers streamed
ashore to meet the flocks of waiting friends. The decks were almost
deserted when the skipper of the _Pilgrim_ and Margaret came along very
slowly. David ran to help them. They were grateful and glad to see
him, but the "little girl," could not hide her disappointment that her
boy hero was not coming to see them before he sailed. She could not
understand his refusal, and when she tried to thank him for what he
had done for them, there were tears in her eyes. Her grandfather had
fallen back into the hopeless depression of his first day aboard. Weak
and unnerved as he was, it seemed to frighten him to face the great and
roaring city, in which he was only a stranded ship-master without a
ship.
David tried to be cheery at parting, but his voice was unsteady as he
said:
"I'll see you both again, as soon as ever I can get ashore. And you
must write to me, won't you?"
Margaret's last words were:
"You will always find us together, David Downes. And we'll think of you
every day and pray for you at sea."
They went slowly down the gangway and were lost in the crowd on the
pier. The cadet stood looking after them and said to himself:
"I can never be really happy till he has another ship. But what in the
world can I do about it?"