Two days later the hurricane had blown itself out. The storm-stressed
crew were set to work putting things to rights and the yacht put on more
of her normal appearance. But she had been sadly battered for all that.
Two boats were stove in, ventilators smashed and stanchions bent and
twisted by the fury of the waves.
The flat, oily sea that succeeded the wild turmoil of the hurricane,
heaved gently without a ripple as Jack and Raynor, the latter recovered
but still wearing a bandage round his head, stood looking over the rail
into the glassy waters.
So transparent was the ocean that, under them, they could see great fish
swimming about slowly and lazily, as if life held no hurry for them. Now
and then a great shark glided by, nosing about the ship for scraps. His
sharp, triangular dorsal fin stuck from his back like a blue steel knife
cutting the surface and glistening like a thing of metal. About these
great tigers of the deep, two smaller fish usually hovered. These were
pilot fish, the strange sea-creatures that invariably accompany sharks,
and are supposed by sailors to pilot them to their prey.
Then there were queer-looking “gonies,” with their flat heads winging
their way above the water and every now and then dropping, with a scream
and a splash, in a group of a dozen to fight furiously over some
drifting morsel. After these tussles they appeared to “run” over the
water to give their heavy, awkward bodies a good start upward. Then,
having attained a certain height, down they would flop again, like
weights shooting through the air, hitting the water with a heavy splash
and sliding, with a white wake behind them, for some feet.
Schools of nautilus, too, gave them something to look at as the delicate
little creatures, with their thin, membranous sails set, drifted by
under the gentle breeze that hardly ruffled the water.
“Doesn’t look much as if this ocean could ever have kicked up the
ructions it did, eh, Billy?” remarked Jack, after a long silence.
“It does not,” replied Raynor, with a rueful grin, “but I owe it this
crack on the head.”
“And the loss of that coal,” chimed in Jack. “No wonder you look glum,
old fellow. We’ll never make port on what’s below.”
“Not a chance of it,” was the rejoinder, “about all we can do is to use
the sails if the worst comes to the worst.”
“Well, as we don’t appear to have any port in view, and nothing to do
but to keep on drifting about like another Flying Dutchman, I don’t see
that it much matters where we fetch up,” commented Jack, with some
irritation.
It was at that instant that there came an interruption. The voice of the
sea-man at the look-out forward broke the spell.
“Steamer, ho!” he shouted.
“Where away?” came a hoarse voice from the bridge, that of Mr. Jolliffe,
the first officer.
“Three p’ints on the starbo’d bow.”
“Let’s go forward and have a look,” suggested Jack. “You’re not on watch
for some time yet.”
“I’m with you,” agreed Raynor. “Anything for variety’s sake. Wonder what
ship it is?”
“Too far off to make out yet,” said Jack, as, far off, they could just
about see, by straining their eyes, a small dark speck on the distant
horizon.
“I don’t see any smoke,” said Raynor. “Perhaps it’s a sailing ship after
all.”
“We’ll know before long,” was Jack’s reply.
During an interval in which the _Sea Gypsy_ drew steadily toward the
craft that had, by this time, excited the attention of all on board, the
boys saw Mr. Jukes emerge from his cabin and take his place on the
bridge beside Captain Sparhawk. That bronzed mariner handed the
millionaire his glasses and Mr. Jukes’ rather fat, pallid face took on
an unwonted hue of excitement as he handed them back.
The boys standing on the main deck just below the bridge heard the owner
of the yacht putting sharp questions. He showed more animation than he
had at any time during the voyage. The sight of the other craft appeared
to affect him curiously.
“She’s a schooner, Sparhawk.”
“Undoubtedly, sir.”
“But although she has her canvas set she is making no way.”
“That appears to be correct. But there is little wind. Odd though that
she doesn’t signal us.”
Mr. Jukes snatched up the glasses again from the shelf where he had laid
them down.
“Blessed if I can make out a soul on board her, Sparhawk,” he exclaimed
presently. “Here, try what you can do.”
He handed the binoculars over to the master of the _Sea Gypsy_. Captain
Sparhawk took a prolonged observation. When he, in turn, laid the
glasses down his thin, mahogany-hued face bore a puzzled look.
“It’s queer, sir, but I don’t seem to be able to make out a living soul
either.”
“A derelict, perhaps?”
“Possibly,” assented the captain, and no more was said as, with all eyes
fixed on the strange schooner, the _Sea Gypsy_ drew nearer. The boys
could now make out every detail of the other craft. She was a
trig-looking schooner, painted black, with a flush deck except for her
after house and a small structure astern of the fore-mast. Her canvas
was set but it flapped idly in the light breeze as she swung to and fro
on the Pacific swells. No guiding hand could be seen at her wheel. Not a
soul was visible on her deserted decks.
There is no more melancholy sight than a sea derelict, the aimless prey
of winds and currents, drifting sometimes for years over the trackless
wastes of the ocean. The boys felt something of this as all doubt as to
human occupancy of the schooner vanished.
“Deserted, I reckon,” hazarded Jack. “Although her canvas appears
perfect, her hull sound and——”
He broke off sharply. From the abandoned ship there had suddenly come a
sound which, under the circumstances, was particularly depressing and
even startling.
It was the measured tolling of a bell, like a funeral knell.