The sun set that night in a broad bank of horizontal, mottled grey
cloud, through which his beams darted in golden splendour at brief
intervals for nearly half-an-hour after we had lost sight of the great
luminary himself; and just about the time that the spars and canvas of
the distant barque began to grow indistinct in the fast-gathering dusk
of evening, there occurred a noticeable decrease in the strength of the
wind, with every prospect of a tolerably fine night. Of course our
glasses were never off the chase for more than five minutes at a time,
but up to the moment when it became impossible to any longer distinguish
the movements of those on board, no attempt to increase her spread of
canvas had been observed. Whether by this apparent apathy her people
hoped to lull us into a condition of equal carelessness, it is of course
impossible for me to say; but, if so, they signally failed, for
immediately that the barque's outline faded into an indistinct blur in
the growing darkness, we went to work and shook out a reef all round,
never doubting but that they were at that moment doing precisely the
same thing. And our supposition was most probably correct--Ryan,
indeed, who had sent for his night-glass and brought it to bear upon
her, declared that he could detect an increase in the area of her
shadowy canvas--for even after we had made sail we could not perceive
that we were in any wise decreasing the distance between the two
vessels.
As the swift, tropical night shut down upon us every eye in the ship
became strained to its utmost power in the effort to keep sight of the
chase, for now that there could no longer be any doubt in the minds of
her people that we were after them, we felt convinced that should an
opportunity present itself for them to elude us in the darkness they
would assuredly embrace it; and, being new to the coast and to the
service, as most of us were, we had yet to learn by vexatious experience
the fertility of resource which had been developed in the
slave-trafficking fraternity by the unflagging pursuit to which they
were subjected by the slave-squadron, and of which they never missed a
chance to avail themselves. We had heard many an amusing story of the
extraordinarily clever devices that these gentry had resorted to--very
often successfully--in their endeavours to elude pursuit, and while we
had laughed heartily at the recital of them, or commented admiringly
upon their ingenuity, as the case might be, we had no fancy for further
illustrating in our own persons their superiority in the art of
mystification. And we were rendered all the more anxious by the fact
that with nightfall the sky became overspread with a thin canopy of
cloud that, while not sufficiently dense to wholly obscure the stars, so
dimmed their lustre that it became difficult to distinguish, even
through our night-glasses, the forms of the waves at a greater distance
than half-a-mile; while as for the chase, we were at length reluctantly
compelled to admit to each other that we had lost sight of her
altogether, or at least that we could not be absolutely certain whether
we could still see her or not; sometimes we were confident that we
could, at other times we utterly failed to make her out.
It was while we were in this painful condition of uncertainty that
Ryan--who like myself had remained on deck, diligently working away with
his glass, and utterly deaf to the more than once repeated statement of
the steward that the dinner was on the cabin table--turned quickly to me
and said--
"Do you see that greenish-looking star just glimmering through the
clouds right over our jib-boom end? Here, stand exactly where I am, and
when she pitches you will see it showing about ten degrees above the
horizon. There! do you see the star I mean?"
"Yes," said I, catching sight of the pale green glimmer as he placed me
in position. "Yes, I see it. What of it?"
"Just carry your eye from it down to the horizon at an angle of about
forty-five degrees in an easterly direction, and tell me if you see
anything particular."
I did so, and after two or three attempts thought I caught a faint gleam
like the light of a lamp shining through a red curtain.
"Yes," I answered, "I fancy I can just make out a dim something." And I
described what I saw.
"Precisely!" exclaimed Ryan delightedly. "There! now I have it in my
glass--no, it is gone again--this jump of a sea renders it almost
impossible to use one's telescope on the deck of such a lively little
hooker as this--not that I've a word to say against her, God bless her,
she's a beauty, every inch of her, but I wish she'd remain steady for a
second or two. There, I have it again! Yes, it's a light in the
barque's after-cabin. They've drawn the curtains, never suspecting that
the light would show through. Yes, there's no mistake about it, I can
see it quite plainly now; upon my word I believe we are overhauling her
now that the breeze has dropped a bit. Mr Pierrepoint, d'ye see that
light?"
"Where away, sir?"
It was pointed out to the lad, and after some searching and prying--for
it was so very dim that it was almost impossible to distinguish it with
the naked eye--he caught sight of it.
"Very well, then," remarked Ryan, with a return to his old, humorous
manner that showed how great a relief to him was the appearance of the
faint ruddy gleam, "keep your eye upon it, my bhoy, until I give ye a
shpell. Mr Dugdale and Oi are now goin' below to dinner, and if ye
lose soight of that loight, bedad I'll--I'll keelhaul ye, ye shpalpeen.
He's edgin' away off the wind, d'ye see, the blagguard! I wouldn't be
surprised if he was to up helm and shquare away before it in a minute or
two, hopin' to run us out of soight before the moon rises, so don't let
your oye go off that light for a single inshtant if ye value your shkin.
Keep her away a bit"--to the man at the helm--"let her go off a point!
So! steady as you go! There, Masther Freddy, the light is right
forninst your jib-boom end now. Mind that ye kape it there. We're
certainly gaining on her." And, patting the lad affectionately on the
shoulder, the warm-hearted Irishman turned and beckoned me to follow him
down into the cabin.
We had been below about half-an-hour, and were getting well forward with
our dinner, when we heard the voices of Pierrepoint and the
quarter-master in earnest conversation over the open skylight, and an
occasional word or two that reached us seemed to indicate that they were
in doubt about something. We both pricked up our ears a little; and
presently we heard Pierrepoint ejaculate in a tone of impatience and
with a stamp of his foot on the deck--
"I'll be shot if I can understand it at all, Somers; I shall call the
captain."
"I really think I would, sir, if I was you. I don't believe that's the
barque at all; it's some circumwenting trick that they've been playing
us, that's my opinion!"
At this Ryan started to his feet and, hailing through the skylight,
asked--
"What is the matter, Mr Pierrepoint; have you lost sight of the light?"
"No, sir," answered poor Freddy, in a tone of distress; "the light is
still straight ahead of us, and we seem to be nearing it fast, but I
can't make out anything like the loom of the sails or hull of the
barque, and if she is there I think we ought to see her by this time.
The red light shows quite plainly in the glass."
"I will join you on deck and have a look at it," exclaimed Ryan; and,
rising from the table, he sprang up the companion-ladder three steps at
a time, I following close at his heels.
Yes; there was the light, sure enough, right ahead of us; and a glance
aloft as well as the feel of the breeze on our faces told us in an
instant that the schooner had been further kept away, and was now
running well off the wind, although the change had been so gradual that
we had not noticed it while sitting in the cabin. Ryan took the glass
from Pierrepoint and brought it to bear on the light.
"Yes," he remarked, with the telescope still at his eye, "that is the
light, beyond a doubt; but, as you say, Mr Pierrepoint, I can see no
sign of the barque herself. Yet she _must_ be there, for that light is
obviously moving, and I observe that you have, very properly, kept away
to follow it. Surely," he continued, with an accent of impatience and
perplexity, "we have not been following some other craft that has hove
above the horizon since the darkness set in? And, even so, I can see
nothing of the craft herself. Obviously, however, we are nearing the
light--whatever it is--fast, for I can see it quite distinctly in the
glass, I even fancy that I can see it rising and falling. Take the
glass, Dugdale, and tell me what you can make of it."
I took the glass, and, after a long and patient scrutiny of the
mysterious light, pronounced my opinion.
"To me, sir," said I, "it has the appearance of an ordinary ship's
lantern wrapped in a strip of red bunting and hung from a pole, or
something of that sort. For, if you will look at it closely, you will
notice that it _sways_ with the wash of the sea, and now and then seems
to swing for an instant behind a slender object like a light spar. But
I could almost take my oath that there is no barque or any other kind of
craft there."
Once again Ryan took the telescope, and after a further prolonged
scrutiny, he exclaimed--
"By the powers, but I believe you are right, and if so we have been
done! It certainly _has_ very much the appearance that you describe.
But what in the world can it be? It is a moving object, beyond all
doubt, for see how we have been obliged to run off the wind in chase of
it! However, we are close to it now, for I can make out the swinging of
the lantern--and a lantern it _is_--with the naked eye. It is some
confounded contrivance for leading us astray, that is what it is! But
since we are so close to it, we may as well ascertain its character, if
only to be awake to the trick if it ever happens to be played upon us a
second time. Hands by the braces here, and stand by to back the
topsail. And get two or three lanterns ready to swing over the side, so
that we may see just exactly what the thing is."
We had by this time approached the mysterious object so nearly that
another three or four minutes sufficed to bring it within a couple of
hundred feet of the schooner's weather bow, when the topsail was laid to
the mast, and our way checked sufficiently to permit of a careful
examination of the thing, whatever it was. By the time that we had
forged ahead far enough to bring it on our weather beam it was close
aboard of us, and then the light of our lanterns disclosed the nature of
the contrivance by which we had been so cleverly tricked. It was in
fact nothing more than a raft composed of five nine-inch planks laid
parallel to each other with a space of about a foot between each, and
firmly secured together by a couple of stout cross-pieces nailed athwart
the whole concern. The fore-ends of the planks had been sawn away to
the shape of a sharp wedge to facilitate the movement of the raft
through the water, and on the foremost cross-piece had been rigged an
oar for a mast, upon which was set a hastily-contrived squaresail, made
out of a piece of old tarpaulin. To the head of the mast was securely
lashed an old lantern with a short length of candle, still burning, in
it; the lantern being cunningly draped in red bunting to represent the
appearance of a lamp shining through a curtain. And the whole
contrivance was rendered self-steering by the attachment of a few
fathoms of line to the after-end of the middle plank, at the other
extremity of which a drogue, consisting of a short length of plank, was
attached. This drogue had the effect of keeping the raft running dead
before the wind, and it travelled at a very respectable pace, too--quite
five knots an hour, we estimated its speed at--for the sail was quite a
big one for so small an affair; and since we had been steering for it
for just about an hour, it meant that we had been decoyed some five
miles to leeward of our proper course.
The question now was: Where was the barque? It did not take us very
long to make up our minds upon this point. It was pretty evident that
since her skipper had been at so much pains to entice us away down to
leeward, he would have held his wind all this time; and to windward
therefore must we look for him. Whether, however, he had tacked and
stood away to the westward immediately after launching his raft, or
whether he had held on upon the port tack to the northward, we could not
possibly tell, for a diligent and prolonged use of our night-glasses
failed to reveal the slightest indication of his whereabouts. Ryan,
however, was not long in arriving upon a conclusion in the matter. He
argued that if he had tacked we ought also to tack forthwith, because,
if we stood on as we were going until the moon rose, we might run out of
sight of him; whereas, if he had _not_ tacked, he would be at that
moment somewhere about broad on our weather bow. If therefore he _had_
tacked, we should be doing the right thing to tack also, since we should
then be standing directly after him; while if he had not tacked, we
should still be doing right to heave about, since even in that case we
should probably see something of him from our mast-head when the moon
rose, as she would in less than half-an-hour. We therefore at once put
the helm down and hove round on the starboard tack, keeping the schooner
as close to the wind as she would lie, while still allowing her to go
along through the water.
A faint brightening in the sky by and by announced the welcome approach
of the moon upon the scene; and shortly afterwards the beautiful planet
herself, considerably shrunken from her full-orbed splendour, rose
slowly into view above the horizon, her curtailed disc showing of a
deep, ruddy orange-colour through the dense, humid vapours of the lower
atmosphere. Two hands were at once sent up to the topgallant-yard to
take a look round; but even after they had been there an hour--by which
time the moon had risen high enough to give us plenty of light--they
failed to discover any sign of the barque or anything else; and we were
at length reluctantly compelled to admit that we had been very cleverly
tricked, and that our cunning neighbour had fairly given us the slip.
"But I'll not give him up, even now!" exclaimed Ryan, when this
conviction had fairly forced itself upon us. "Come down below, Dugdale,
and let us reason this thing out."
We accordingly descended to our snug little cabin and seated ourselves
at the table, Ryan producing a sheet of paper, a scale, and a pencil
wherewith to graphically illustrate our line of reasoning.
"Now, here," said he, drawing an arrow near one margin of the paper, "is
the wind, coming out at west as nearly as may be; and here," laying the
scale upon the paper, measuring off a distance, and making two pencil
dots, "are the positions of the barque and the schooner when the former
was last seen. Now, I estimate that the barque was going about eight
and a half knots, and we were reeling off nine by the log at that time;
and this state of affairs continued at least until the light was seen,
which was about half-an-hour after we lost sight of our friend.
Consequently, when the light was first seen, the schooner was here"--
making another dot--"and the barque there," making a fourth.
"Now, what would the blagguard be most likely to do when he had safely
launched his raft? He knew that it would go skimming away to leeward,
taking us with it; and I therefore think it most probable that he would
tack at once, going off in this direction," laying down a line upon the
paper. "Meanwhile, the raft went scudding away to leeward until we met
it there," making another dot. "Then we tacked, and, laying a point
higher than he can, stood along this line," ruling one carefully in as
he spoke. "Now, we have been travelling along this line, say an hour
and a quarter, which brings us here. But where is the barque? If she
had tacked, and _continued to stand on_ until now, she would be _there_,
eleven or twelve miles away, and we should see her. Supposing, however,
that she continued to stand on as she was going when we last saw her,
she would now be _there_, twenty-eight miles away! Phew! I was a long
way out of my reckoning when I thought that we should still have her in
sight, even if we tacked. We've lost her, Harry, my bhoy, and that's a
fact. However, we know where she's bound to, and that's the island of
Cuba, or I'm a Dutchman. Very well. Having given us the slip she will
make the best of her way there without further delay; and it is my
opinion that _if_ she is still standing to the northward she will not
continue to do so for very much longer, because, d'ye see, my bhoy,
she'll be afraid of falling in with some of our cruisers if she stands
in too close to the coast. Therefore, as we can hug the wind closer
than she can, we'll just stand on as we are going for a day or two
longer, or until the wind changes--in fact, we will shape a course for
Cuba--and if we don't fall in with her again within the next seventy-two
hours I shall give her up. Meanwhile the wind is dropping fast, so we
will get some more muslin upon the little hooker."
As Ryan had said, the wind was dropping fast, so rapidly, indeed, that
when eight bells was struck at midnight the schooner was under all the
canvas that we could set, and even then was only creeping along at a
speed of some two and a half knots per hour. Oh, how fervently we
wished then that we could see even as much as the mere mastheads of the
barque! for we felt certain that in such a light air the schooner would
make short work of overtaking her. But nothing hove in sight; and when
the next morning dawned we were still alone upon the face of the vast
ocean.
With the rising of the sun the small draught of air that still remained
to us fell dead; and we had it calm the whole day and well on into the
succeeding night. Then the weather became unsettled and thundery, with
light baffling airs interspersed with fierce squalls from all quarters
of the compass, during which we made scarcely sixty miles in the
twenty-four hours.
It was about midnight of the third day after we had lost sight of the
barque, and the seventy-two hours that Ryan had allowed himself in which
to find her again were fully spent, without affording us another glimpse
of her. All hands, from Ryan himself down to the smallest boy in the
ship, were dreadfully disgusted and crestfallen at our want of success;
and we were only waiting for a breeze to spring up from somewhere to
enable us to shape a course back to our cruising ground. The weather,
however, was still very overcast and lowering, with signs not wanting
that another heavy thunderstorm was brewing, which would probably bring
us the desired breeze. There was not much swell running, but
sufficient, nevertheless, to tumble the schooner about a good deal; and
I had accordingly taken it upon myself to clew up, haul down, and furl
every stitch of canvas, in order to save the sails from battering
themselves to rags. The thunder had been gradually working up ever
since sunset, and in fact even before that, and when eight bells struck
at midnight, and my watch below came round, the weather had such a
curious and portentous look, and the atmosphere was moreover so close
and heavy, that I determined to stretch myself out "all standing" on the
stern grating instead of going below, so that I might be all ready in
case my presence should be required.
It was shortly after two bells when Pierrepoint came and roused me out
with the remark--
"I am sorry to disturb you, Dugdale, but I think it is going to rain
very shortly, and if you remain there you stand a very good chance of
getting soaked to the skin. And what do you think of the weather? Is
it merely a thunder-squall that has been brewing all this time, or what
is it? Just look at those clouds overhead, their edges look quite red,
as though there was a fire somewhere behind them. Do you think I should
call the captain?"
It was as he had said. The sky was banked up from horizon to zenith,
all round, with enormous cloud-piles, black as ink in the body of them,
but their fringes or edges, which had a curiously tattered appearance,
were of a distinct fiery red hue. All this time there was not a breath
of wind save what was created by the schooner as she rolled heavily on
the gathering swell; not a sound save those which arose within her as
the bulkheads and timbers creaked and groaned dismally, the cabin-doors
rattled, the rudder kicked as the water swirled and gurgled about it and
under her counter with the heave of her, and the jerk of the spars
aloft, or the slatting of the braces as she swayed, pendulum-like, from
side to side.
"What does the glass say?" inquired I, in response to Pierrepoint's last
question. I walked to the open skylight and peered down through it at
the barometer, the tube of which was just sufficiently illuminated by
the turned-down cabin lamp to permit of its condition being noted. It
had fallen an inch since I last looked at it, during my watch on deck!
"Phew!" ejaculated I, "there must surely be something the matter with
the thing; it can never have fallen that much in scarcely two hours!"
I hurried below and, turning up the lamp, subjected the instrument to a
careful examination; but, as far as I could make out, there seemed to be
nothing wrong with it; the fall had all the appearance of being
perfectly genuine. But, whether or not, it was certain that the captain
ought at once to be made acquainted with the state of affairs; I
therefore went forthwith to his cabin and aroused him.
"Ay, ay," he answered sleepily, to my call. "What is it, Mr Dugdale?
Has the barque hove in sight?"
"No such luck, sir, I am sorry to say," replied I. "But I think you
ought to know that the weather has a very peculiar and threatening
appearance; and the glass has dropped a full inch within the last two
hours."
"An inch?" ejaculated Ryan, starting up in his bunk. "An inch? Surely,
Dugdale, you must be mistaken!"
"Indeed, sir, I am not," said I. "I examined the barometer very
carefully, and satisfied myself that I had made no mistake before
calling you."
"By Jove, then, it is high time that I was on deck!" exclaimed he,
leaping out of his bunk. "Just put a match to my lamp, Harry, my lad,
will ye; you will find a box there on the shelf. Is there any wind?"
"Not a breath, sir; but I shall not be surprised if we have a great deal
more than we want before long," I answered.
"Um!" said he. "Well, almost anything short of a hurricane would be
better than these exasperating calms. The swell seems to have risen a
bit since I turned in, hasn't it?"
"Quite perceptibly," said I, "and it seems to be coming more out from
the northward than at first."
"Well," said he, thrusting his bare feet into his slippers, "let us go
on deck and take a look round."
And, he leading the way, we forthwith trundled up the companion-ladder
and stepped out on deck.
It seemed to have grown blacker and more threatening than ever during
the short time that I had been below, although that may have been due to
the contrast between the light of the cabin and the darkness on deck;
the ruddy tinge on the cloud edges, however, was even more pronounced
than before, the colour having slightly changed and grown more like the
hue of red-hot copper. Ryan was evidently much astonished--and, I
thought, somewhat dismayed--by what he saw.
"By the powers!" he ejaculated, "you did right to call me, Dugdale. If
we were in the Indian Ocean, now, I would say that a cyclone was
brewing; and, now I come to think of it, there is no Act of Parliament
against one brewing here. How is the glass _now_? has it dropped
anything since you last looked at it?"