IX.

_Corbet at the Helm.--Visions by Night.--The Vis-ion of sudden Wealth.--

Over the Waters.--The Ocean Isles.--A startling and unwelcome

Sight.--Landing of Corbet.--Corbet among the Moun-seers.--Unpleasant

Intelligence.--An unwelcome Visitor.--A sharp Inquisition.--Corbet in

a Corner.--Answers of Guile and Simplicity.--Perplexity of Cross

examiner._

THUS the Antelope passed away from the eyes of the boys, and vanished

into the shades of night. The breeze was light, and Corbet stood at the

helm, shaping his course for the Magdalen Islands. The first feeling

of uneasiness which he had experienced on leaving ‘the boys in so very

peculiar, perhaps dangerous, a situation, had passed away with the

boys themselves, and his thoughts now turned on other things. He was

virtually alone. Wade indeed, was on board, but the captain had sent

him below to sleep, so that he might be able to relieve him and take his

turn at midnight.

Thus alone at the helm, Captain Corbet looked out over the silent sea,

and up into the starry sky, and lost himself in peaceful meditations.

But his thoughts were not concerned with sea or sky. Other and dearer

subjects gave them occupation. It was his “babby” that occupied his

mind; that babby for whose sake he had deserted the boys, and left them

alone in mid ocean. He was going to make a fortune for his son. He was

going to take measures for securing the wrecked ship, so as to bring her

into some port, sell her, and divide the proceeds.

Night, and solitude, and silence are ever the best promoters of

meditation, and Captain Corbet’s fancy was stimulated and quickened by

his present surroundings. In thought he went all over the Petrel.

He examined her hull; he considered her cargo; he made light of her

injuries--He concluded that a very small sum might make her once more

seaworthy, and he thought that fifteen thousand pounds might be easily

obtained for her. Then as to her cargo; that he knew must be perfectly

free from injury. He tried to estimate the number of tons; then he

multiplied these by the price per ton, so as to get at the value of the

entire cargo. Then he added this to the value of the ship, and allowed

his mind to play freely around the aggregate. It was a sum of dazzling

proportions--a sum far greater than he had been able to make after the

hard toil and persevering efforts of many laborious years! And all this

he was now about to achieve by one stroke. It was to be the work of a

few days. It was to be for the good of the “babby.”

Here another theme attracted the thoughts of the good captain,--the

fondest of all themes,--his infant son. That son would now have

something that would approximate to wealth. All his future would take

tone and flavor from this adventure. The father’s best feelings were

roused, and in fancy he traced the future of his beloved infant. He saw

him pass from long clothes into short clothes, from frocks into jackets,

and from jackets into coats. He followed him in thought from his

mother’s arms to his own legs; from his home to the school; from the

school to the college. He watched him consume the midnight oil for

years, until he at length reached the brilliant end of his educational

goal. Then he portrayed before his mind the form of his son in the

future,--now at the bar pleading, or on the bench judging; now at the

bedside of the sick; now in the pulpit preaching. He listened to the

sermon of the imaginary preacher, and found himself moved to tears.

“Dear, dear!” he murmured to himself; “I’d no idee the little feller’d

be so eliquint. It doos beat all, railly.”

Captain Corbet was really like one who had taken intoxicating liquor, or

opium; and, in fact, he was intoxicated, but the stimulus was no

drink or drug; it was merely his fancy, which had become heated by the

extravagant dream of sudden wealth. Gold produces its own fevers and

deliriums; and the good captain had been seized by one of these. Yet,

after all, let it be remembered that his avarice was not for himself,

but for his child. And as the lone navigator stood at his post under the

midnight sky, in solitude and darkness, heaping up those bright fancies,

out of which he was rearing so stupendous a castle in the air, he was

building, all the while, not for himself, but for another.

Had he left the boys under any other circumstances,--that is, supposing

that he had been capable of so leaving them,--there is no doubt that he

would have been a prey to the most harassing anxiety on their account,

and would have passed a wakeful night, full of mental distress. But now

these new thoughts so occupied him that there was no place for anxiety,

and he went on towards the accomplishment of his purpose as resolutely

as though he had left them all in the safest and pleasantest place in

the world.

Yet the situation in which they were left was one which might have

created anxiety in the breast of even a more unfeeling man than Captain

Corbet--on board a wrecked ship, that lay there in mid sea, with no

means of saving themselves in the event of disaster. It was calm now,

but how long would the calm continue? This breeze, that was wafting

him along so gently and pleasantly, might stiffen, and strengthen, and

intensify itself into a gale; and how would the gale act upon a ship

that was virtually under water? Where could the boys betake themselves

for refuge? How could they avoid the sweep of the surges that a rising

storm would pour over her decks? Where could they find security from the

downfall of the masts, which, in the writhing and twisting ship, must

inevitably fall. A storm might change their foothold into a waste of

boiling foam, and make the masts above as dangerous as the sea below.

Even a moderate wind and a very ordinary rising of the sea might make

their situation one of peril. Of this the boys, in their inexperience,

had taken no thought; but this was the very thing that Captain Corbet

ought to have thought of, and this was the thing that he was destined

to think of afterwards with anguish of soul. But, for the present, not

a thought of this sort came to him. His mind was altogether given up to

the sway of those exciting and alluring fancies which beckoned him away

to imaginary wealth.

Captain Corbet had arranged to call Wade at midnight; but so excited was

he by his dreams and speculations that he took no note of time, and was

at length startled by the coming of the dawn. Then he hurried away, sent

Wade to the helm, and flung himself into his berth.

After a long and profound sleep, which was the natural consequence of

the excitement of the previous night, he awaked. To his surprise he

found that it was about eleven o’clock.

He cast a hasty look around.

His first feeling was one of satisfaction. There, immediately in front

of him, were the Magdalen Islands. His course had been sufficiently

accurate to bring him to his destination. He was near enough now to cast

anchor, and Wade was already moving forward with that intent.

But in that first look that he had given he noticed another thing,

for which he was not prepared, and which detracted somewhat from the

satisfaction that had been caused by the sight of the islands.

He saw a schooner at anchor.

The beautiful outline, the slender, tapering masts, the white spars, and

the immaculate neatness that characterized this schooner, all told him

plainly what she was, and he needed no closer inspection to feel sure

that it was the Fawn.

Now, the sight of the Fawn disturbed the mind of the venerable captain.

He dreaded a meeting with her skipper, Captain Tobias Ferguson.

The Petrel was a prize for those who might be her salvors. To that

fortunate situation he did not wish to admit any others. He wished

merely to procure sails, and then navigate her somehow with the

help that he already had. He knew well, and he dreaded, the keen

inquisitiveness and the active, restless energy of Captain Tobias

Ferguson.

He did not want to meet with him at all. In fact, the very last

person in all the world that he would have chosen to meet with at this

particular time was this very man.

So great was his dread of a meeting, which might ruin all his plans,

that his first impulse was to fly. He cast a hasty look all around. Upon

the beach he saw the boat of the Fawn. Evidently the skipper was ashore.

Upon this discovery he at once acted, and determined to move farther

away. Hastily checking Wade, who was in the act of dropping the anchor,

Captain Corbet wore round, and continued on his former course for a mile

or so. Then, rounding the extremity of the island, he kept on his way

along the shore, anxiously considering what was best to be done.

There were other islands in the group, but this was the one which he

wished to visit, for here only could he hope to find anything like

sails. He had come here for this purpose, and to go away without

accomplishing it was not to be thought of. It now seemed to him that

the best thing for him to do, under the circumstances, would be to land

here, and pursue his investigations in a quiet way about the island,

managing so as to avoid all contact with Captain Ferguson. He therefore

dropped anchor here, and, taking Wade with him, he went ashore.

Once on shore, he went about his search with the utmost diligence, going

from house to house, and making inquiries about sails. But from the

first his task was a roost discouraging one. Every one assured him that

there were no spare sails on the island; all the schooners were away,

and whatever stock any one had he generally kept in his schooner, and

took it with him. This was the information that he got from every one to

whom he applied.

For hour after hour Captain Corbet kept up his fruitless search, dodging

about cautiously, so as to avoid being seen by Captain Ferguson, in case

he might be ashore, and keeping a wary lookout. At length he had visited

every house on the island of any consequence. The only thing that they

could suggest was for him to go to Miramichi, where he would be likely

to obtain what he wanted.

Captain Corbet, in deep dejection, now retraced his steps to the boat.

He thought for a time of applying to Ferguson. But a moment’s reflection

made him give up that idea. He knew that Ferguson would be full of

curiosity; that he would ask him all about the boys; and he feared that

if he got the slightest hint of the facts of the case, he might start

off instantly for the wreck, and thereby forestall him. It does not

follow that Ferguson would really have done this; but this was Captain

Corbet’s belief, and it influenced him, of course, precisely as if the

belief had been well founded.

Having thus dismissed the idea of appealing to Ferguson, it remained for

him to decide what next to do. He did not think of going back. Better to

take Ferguson into his confidence at once. He still clung to his first

hope and his first plan, and, since Miramichi was the nearest place

where he could rely upon finding sails, he began to think about going

there. True, this would take up two or three days more, and the boys

would be left to themselves all that time; but, as he had already

accustomed himself to think of them in their present position as quite

safe, he was able to entertain the thought of leaving them this way

still, longer. He had committed himself too deeply to his plan, he had

gone too far towards its execution, and he had built too largely upon

its successful accomplishment, to be willing to give it up just yet.

And so by the time he reached the boat he had about made up his mind to

start off for Miramichi at once. With this resolve he went back to the

schooner.

The moment that he stepped on deck he was astonished at detecting in

the atmosphere the smell of cigar smoke; and while he was yet standing,

with open mouth and expanded nostrils, inhaling the unwelcome odor, he

was still more unpleasantly surprised at seeing a figure emerge from

the cabin, in whom at one glance he recognized the well-known and

particularly dreaded lineaments of Captain Tobias Ferguson.

His unwelcome visitor held out his hand, and wrung that of Captain

Corbet with affectionate cordiality.

“Didn’t expect to see you back again in these parts so soon. You must

have made a fine run of it, too. How far did you go? Not to the Bay of

Islands--hey? Why, there’s been a reg’lar old-fashioned calm about here,

and this here wind ain’t much to speak of. And how are my young friends,

the ragamuffins?”

“Wal--pooty tol’able,” said Captain Corbet, in a faint voice.

“Hm--glad to hear it. And where was it, did you say, that you went to?”

“O--a--kine o’--genral sort o’ kerrews, like.”

“Hm--and so you left them in the Bay of Islands?”

“Wal--n--n--no--, ’twan’t exactly thereabouts.”

“O--not Anticosti?”

“Wal--n--no,” said Captain Corbet, with an increasing sense of

discomfort.

“Ah, St. Pierre?”

“N--n--n--not exactly.”

“St. Paul’s, then?”

“Wal--‘twan’t St. Paul’s, nuther.”

“O, a kind o’ general cruise, I see; young adventurers, and all that.

But I’m glad you took my advice, and didn’t go to Anticosti. A bad

place. And how do they like Newfoundland?”

“Wal--they--didn’t--quite git to Newfoundland, nuther,” said Captain

Corbet, in a low, faint, hesitating, confused way.

“No, of course not,” said Ferguson, briskly. “Too far away; I said so.

You concluded to go to Gaspe, of course.”

“Wal--n--n--n--no, we didn’t quite get--off--in that thar--de--rection,”

replied Captain Corbet, who was utterly at a loss how to fight off this

eager and inquisitive questioner. Had the good captain been capable of

telling a lie, his task would have been easier; but he was a truthful

man, and in this case he hardly knew what to do.

“Well, come now,” said Ferguson, “where did you go?”

Captain Corbet started at this point blank question, and was perfectly

dumb.