“ON deck for your lives!” cried Dodd, forgetting in that awful moment he
was not the captain; and drove them all up, Robarts included, and caught
hold of Mrs. Beresford and Freddy at their cabin door and half carried
them with him. Just as they got on deck the third wave, a high one,
struck the ship and lifted her bodily up, canted her round, and dashed
her down again some yards to leeward, throwing them down on the hard and
streaming deck.
At this tremendous shock the ship seemed a live thing, shrieking and
wailing, as well as quivering with the blow.
But one voice dissented loudly from the general dismay. “All right men,”
cried Dodd, firm and trumpet-like. “She is broadside on now. Captain
Robarts, look alive, sir; speak to the men! don't go to sleep!”
Robarts was in a lethargy of fear. At this appeal he started into a
fury of ephemeral courage. “Stick to the ship,” he yelled; “there is no
danger if you stick to the ship,” and with this snatched a life-buoy,
and hurled himself into the sea.
Dodd caught up the trumpet that fell from his hand and roared, “I
command this ship. Officers come round me! Men to your quarters! Come,
bear a hand here and fire a gun. That will show us where we are, and let
the Frenchmen know.”
The carronade was fired, and its momentary flash revealed that the ship
was ashore in a little bay; the land abeam was low and some eighty yards
off; but there was something black and rugged nearer the ship's stern.
Their situation was awful. To windward huge black waves rose like
tremendous ruins, and came rolling, fringed with devouring fire; and
each wave as it charged them, curled up to an incredible height and
dashed down on the doomed ship--solid to crush, liquid to drown--with a
ponderous stroke that made the poor souls stagger, and sent a sheet of
water so clean over her that part fell to leeward, and only part came
down on deck, foretaste of a watery death; and each of these fearful
blows drove the groaning, trembling vessel farther on the sand, bumping
her along as if she had been but a skiff.
Now it was men showed their inner selves.
Seeing Death so near on one hand, and a chance of escape on the other,
seven men proved unable to resist the two great passions of Fear and
Hope on a scale so gigantic and side by side. Bayliss, a midshipman, and
five sailors stole the only available boat and lowered her.
She was swamped in a moment
Many of the crew got to the rum, and stupefied themselves to their
destruction.
Others rallied round their old captain, and recovered their native
courage at the brave and hopeful bearing he wore over a heart full of
anguish. He worked like a horse, encouraging, commanding, doing; he
loaded a carronade with a pound of powder and a coil of rope, with an
iron bar attached to a cable, and shot the rope and bar ashore.
A gun was now fired from the guard-house, whose light Robarts had taken
for a ship. But no light being shown any nearer on the coast, and the
ship expected every minute to go to pieces, Dodd asked if any one would
try to swim ashore with a line made fast to a hawser on board.
A sailor offered to go if any other man would risk his life along with
him. Instantly Fullalove stripped, and Vespasian next.
“Two is enough on such a desperate errand,” said Dodd with a groan.
But now emulation was up, and neither Briton, Yankee, nor negro would
give way. A line was made fast to the sailor's waist, and he was lowered
to leeward; his venturesome rivals followed. The sea swallowed those
three heroes like crumbs, and small was the hope of life for them.
The three heroes being first-rate swimmers and divers, and going with
the tide, soon neared the shore on the ship's lee quarter; but a sight
of it was enough: to attempt to land on that rock with such a sea on
was to get their skulls smashed like eggshells in a moment. They had to
coast it, looking out for a soft place.
They found one, and tried to land; but so irresistible was the suction
of the retiring wave, that, whenever they got foot on the sand, and
tried to run, they were wrenched out to sea again, and pounded black and
blue and breathless by the curling breaker they met coming in.
After a score of vain efforts, the negro, throwing himself on his back,
went in with a high wave, and, on touching the sand, turned, dug all
his ten claws into it clenched his teeth, and scrambled like a cat at
a wall. Having more power in his toes than the Europeans, and luckily
getting one hand on a firm stone, his prodigious strength just enabled
him to stick first while the wave went back; and then, seizing the
moment, he tore himself ashore, but bleeding and bruised all over, and
with a tooth actually broken by clenching in the convulsive struggle.
He found some natives dancing about in violent agitation with a rope,
but afraid to go in and help him; and no wonder, not being seagulls. By
the light of their lanterns, he saw Fullalove washing in and out like
a log. He seized one end of the rope, and dashed in and grabbed his
friend, and they were hauled ashore together, both breathless, and
Fullalove speechless.
The negro looked round for the sailor, but could not see him. Soon,
however, there was a cry from some more natives about fifty yards off
and laterns held up; away he dashed with the rope just in time to see
Jack make a last gallant attempt to land. It ended in his being flung up
like a straw into the air on the very crest of a wave fifteen feet high,
and out to sea with his arms whirling, and a death shriek which was
echoed by every woman within hearing.
In dashed Vespasian with the rope, and gripped the drowning man's long
hair with his teeth: then jerked the rope, and they were both pulled
ashore with infinite difficulty. The good-natured Frenchmen gave them
all three lots of _vivats_ and brandy and pats on the back, and carried
the line for them to a flagstaff on the rocks nearer the stern of the
ship.
The ship began to show the first signs of breaking up: hammered to death
by the sea, she discharged the oakum from her opening seams, and her
decks began to gape and grin fore and aft. Corpses of drunken sailors
drowned between decks now floated up amidships, and washed and rolled
about among the survivors' feet These, seeing no hope, went about making
up all quarrels, and shaking hands in token of a Christian end. One or
two came to Dodd with their hands out.
“Avast ye lubbers!” said he angrily; “do you think I have time for
nonsense? Foksel ahoy! axes, and cut the weather shrouds!”
It was done; the foremast went by the board directly, and fell to
leeward: a few blows of the axe from Dodd's own hand sent the mainmast
after it.
The _Agra_ rose a streak; and the next wave carried her a little farther
on shore.
And now the man in charge of the hawser reported with joy that there was
a strain on it.
This gave those on board a hope of life. Dodd bustled and had the hawser
carefully payed out by two men, while he himself secured the other end
in the mizen top: he had left that mast standing on purpose.
There was no fog here; but great heavy black clouds flying about with
amazing swiftness extinguished the moon at intervals: at others she
glimmered through a dull mist in which she was veiled, and gave the poor
souls on the _Agra_ a dim peep of the frail and narrow bridge they must
pass to live. A thing like a black snake went down from the mizen-top,
bellying towards the yawning sea, and soon lost to sight: it was seen
rising again among some lanterns on the rock ashore: but what became
of it in the middle? The darkness seemed to cut it in two; the sea to
swallow it. Yet, to get from a ship going to pieces under them, the
sailors precipitated themselves eagerly on that black thread bellying
to the sea and flickering in the wind. They went down it, one after
another, and anxious eyes straining after them saw them no more: but
this was seen, that scarce one in three emerged into the lights ashore.
Then Dodd got an axe, and stood in the top, and threatened to brain the
first man who attempted to go on the rope.
“We must make it taut first,” said he; “bear a hand here with a tackle.”
Even while this was being done, the other rope, whose end he had fired
ashore, was seen moving to windward. The natives, it seems, had found
it, half buried in sand.
Dodd unlashed the end from the bulwarks and carried it into the top, and
made it fast: and soon there were two black snakes dipping shrorewards
and waving in the air side by side.
The sailors scrambled for a place, and some of them were lost by their
own rashness. Kenealy waited coolly, and went by himself.
Finally, Dodd was left in the ship with Mr. Sharpe and the women, and
little Murphy, and Ramgolam, whom Robarts had liberated to show his
contempt of Dodd.
He now advised Mrs. Beresford to be lashed to Sharpe and himself, and
venture the passage; but she screamed and clung to him, and said, “I
dare not! oh I dare not!”
“Then I must lash you to a spar,” said he, “for she can't last much
longer.” He ordered Sharpe ashore. Sharpe shook hands with him, and went
on the rope with tears in his eyes.
Dodd went hard to work, lashed Mrs. Beresford to a piece of broken
water-butt: filled Fred's pockets with corks and sewed them up (you
never caught Dodd without a needle; only, unlike the women's, it was
always kept threaded). Mrs. Beresford threw her arms round his neck and
kissed him wildly: a way women have in mortal peril: it is but their
homage to courage. “All right!” said Dodd, interpreting it as appeal to
his protection, and affecting cheerfulness: “we'll get ashore together
on the poop awning, or somehow; never you fear. I'd give a thousand
pounds to know where high water is.”
At this moment, with a report like a cannon, the lower decks burst fore
and aft: another still louder, and the _Agra's_ back broke. She parted
amidships with a fearful yawn, and the waves went toppling and curling
clean through her.
At this appalling sound and sight, the few creatures left on the poop
cowered screaming and clinging at Dodd's knees, and fought for a bit of
him.
Yes, as a flood brings incongruous animals together on some little
isle in brotherhood of fear--creatures who never met before without one
eating the other; and there they cuddle--so the thief Ramgolam clung
to the man he had tried to rob; the Hindoo Ayan and the English maid
hustled their mistress, the haughty Mrs. Beresford, and were hustled
by her, for a bit of this human pillar; and little Murphy and Fred
Beresford wriggled in at him where they could: and the poor goat crept
into the quivering mass trembling like an aspen, and not a butt left
either in his head or his heart. Dodd stood in the middle of these
tremblers, a rock of manhood: and when he was silent and they heard
only the voice of the waves, they despaired; and whenever he spoke,
they started at the astounding calmness of his voice and words, and life
sounded possible.
“Come,” said he, “this won't do any longer. All hands into the
mizen-top!”
He helped them all up, and stood on the ratlines himself: and, if you
will believe me, the poor goat wailed like a child below. He found in
that new terror and anguish a voice goat was never heard to speak in
before. But they had to leave him on deck: no help for it. Dodd advised
Mrs. Beresford once more to attempt the rope: she declined. “I dare not!
I dare not!” she cried, but she begged Dodd hard to go on it and save
himself.
It was a strong temptation: he clutched the treasure in his bosom, and
one sob burst from the strong man.
That sob was but the tax paid by Nature; for pride, humanity, and
manhood stood staunch in spite of it. “No, no, I can't,” said he “I
mustn't. Don't tempt me to leave you in this plight, and be a cur! Live
or die, I must be the last man on her. Here's something coming out to
us, the Lord in Heaven be praised!”
A bright light was seen moving down the black line that held them to the
shore; it descended slowly within a foot of the billows, and lighting
them up showed their fearful proximity to the rope in mid-passage: they
had washed off many a poor fellow at that part.
“Look at that! Thank Heaven you did not try it!” said Dodd to Mrs.
Beresford.
At tins moment a higher wave than usual swallowed up the light: there
was a loud cry of dismay from the shore, and a wail of despair from the
ship.
No! not lost after all! The light emerged, and mounted, and mounted
towards the ship.
It came near, and showed the black shiny body of Vespasian, with very
little on but a handkerchief and a lantern--the former round his waist,
and the latter lashed to his back: he arrived with a “Yah! yah!” and
showed his white teeth in a grin.
Mrs. Beresford clutched his shoulder, and whimpered, “Oh, Mr. Black!”
“Iss, Missy, dis child bring good news. Cap'n! Massah Fullalove send
you his congratulations, and the compliments of the season; and take the
liberty to observe the tide am turn in twenty minutes.”
The good news thus quaintly announced caused an outburst of joy from
Dodd, and, sailor-like, he insisted on all hands joining in a cheer. The
shore re-echoed it directly. And this encouraged the forlorn band
still more; to hear other hearts beating for them so near. Even
the intervening waves could not quite annul the sustaining power of
sympathy.
At this moment came the first faint streaks of welcome dawn, and
revealed their situation more fully.
The vessel lay on the edge of a sandbank. She was clean in two, the
stern lying somewhat higher than the stem. The sea rolled through her
amidships six feet broad, frightful to look at, and made a clean breach
over her forward, all except the bowsprit to the end of which the poor
sailors were now discovered to be clinging. The afterpart of the poop
was out of water, and in a corner of it the goat crouched like a
rabbit: four dead bodies washed about beneath the party trembling in
the mizen-top, and one had got jammed in the wheel, face uppermost and
glared up at them, gazing terror-stricken down.
No sign of the tide turning yet, and much reason to fear it would turn
too late for them and the poor fellows shivering on the bowsprit.
These fears were well founded.
A huge sea rolled in, and turned the forepart of the vessel half over,
buried the bowsprit, and washed the men off into the breakers.
Mrs. Beresford sank down, and prayed, holding Vespasian by the knee.
Fortunately, as in that vessel wrecked long syne on Melita, “the hind
part of the ship stuck fast and remained immovable.”
But for how long?
Each wave now struck the ship's weather quarter with a sound like a
cannon fired in a church, and sent the water clear into the mizen-top.
It hit them like strokes of a whip. They were drenched to the skin,
chilled to the bone, and frozen to the heart with fear. They made
acquaintance that hour with Death. Ay, Death itself has no bitterness
that forlorn cluster did not feel: only the insensibility that ends that
bitterness was wanting.
Now the sea, you must know, was literally strewed with things out of the
_Agra_; masts, rigging, furniture, tea-chests, bundles of canes, chairs,
tables; but of all this jetsam, Dodd's eye had been for some little time
fixed on one object: a live sailor drifting ashore on a great wooden
case. It struck him after a while that the man made very little way,
and at last seemed to go up and down in one place. By-and-bye he saw him
nearer and nearer, and recognised him. It was one of the three washed
off the bowsprit.
He cried joyfully, “The tide has turned! here's Thompson coming out to
sea.”
Then there ensued a dialogue, incredible to landsmen, between these two
sailors, the captain of the ship and the captain of the foretop, one
perched on a stationary fragment of that vessel, the other drifting on a
pianoforte, and both bawling at one another across the jaws of death.
“Thompson ahoy!”
“Hal-lo!”
“Whither bound?”
“Going out with the tide, and be d----d to me.”
“What, can't ye swim?”
“Like a brass figure-head. It's all over with poor Jack, sir.”
“All over! Don't tell me! Look out now as you drift under our stern, and
we'll lower you the four-inch hawser.”
“Lord bless you, sir, do, pray!” cried Thompson, losing his recklessness
with the chance of life.
By this time the shore was black with people, and a boat was brought
down to the beach, but to attempt to launch it was to be sucked out to
sea.
At present all eyes were fixed on Thompson drifting to destruction.
Dodd cut the four-inch hawser, and Vespasian, on deck, lowered it with
a line, so that Thompson presently drifted right athwart it. “All right,
sir!” said he, grasping it, and, amidst thundering acclamations, was
drawn to land full of salt water and all but insensible. The piano
landed at Dunkirk three weeks later.
In the bustle of this good and smart action the tide retired
perceptibly.
By-and-bye the sea struck lower and with less weight.
At 9 P. M. Dodd took his little party down on deck again, being now the
safest place; for the mast might go.
It was a sad scene: the deck was now dry, and the dead bodies lay quiet
around them with glassy eyes; and, grotesquely horrible, the long hair
of two or three was stiff and crystallised with the saltpetre in the
ship.
Mrs. Beresford clung to Vespasian: she held his bare black shoulder with
one white and jewelled hand, and his wrist with the other, tight. “Oh,
Mr. Black,” said she, “how brave you are! It is incredible. Why, you
came back! I must feel a brave man with both my hands or I shall die.
Your skin is nice and soft, too. I shall never outlive this dreadful
day.”
And now that the water was too low to wash them off the hawser, several
of the ship's company came back to the ship to help the women down.
By noon the _Agra's_ deck was thirty feet from the sand. The rescued
ones wanted to break their legs and necks, but Dodd would not permit
even that. He superintended the whole manoeuvre, and lowered, first the
dead, then the living, not omitting the poor goat, who was motionless
and limp with fright.
When they were all safe on the sand, Dodd stood alone upon the poop a
minute, cheered by all the sailors, French and English, ashore, then
slid down a rope and rejoined his companions.
To their infinite surprise, the undaunted one was found to be
snivelling.
“Oh, dear! what is the matter?” said Mrs. Beresford tenderly.
“The poor _Agra_, ma'am! She was such a beautiful sea-boat: and just
look at her now! Never sail again: never! never! She was a little crank
in beating, I can't deny it; but how she did fly with the wind abaft.
She sank a pirate in the straits, and weathered a hurricane off the
Mauritius; and after all for a lubber to go and lay her bones ashore in
a fair wind: poor dear beauty!”
He maundered thus, and kept turning back to look at the wreck, till he
happened to lay his hand on his breast He stopped in the middle of his
ridiculous lament wore a look of self-reproach, and cast his eyes upward
in heartfelt gratitude.
The companions of so many adventures dispersed.
A hospitable mayoress entertained Mrs. Beresford and suite; and she took
to her bed, for she fell seriously ill as soon as ever she could do it
with impunity.
Colonel Kenealy went off to Paris: “I'll gain that, any way, by being
wrecked,” said he.
If there be a lover of quadrupeds here, let him know that Billy's
weakness proved his strength. Being brandied by a good-natured French
sailor, he winked his eye; being brandied greatly, he staggered up and
butted his benefactor like a man.
Fullalove had dry clothes and a blazing fire ready for Dodd at a little
rude auberge. He sat over it and dried a few bank-notes he had loose
about him, and examined his greater treasure, his children's. The
pocket-book was much stained, but no harm whatever done to the contents.
In the midst of this employment the shadow of an enormous head was
projected right upon his treasure.
Turning with a start, he saw a face at the window: one of those vile
mugs which are found to perfection amongst the _canaille_ of the French
nation--bloated, blear-eyed, grizzly, and wild-beast like. The ugly
thing, on being confronted, passed slowly out of the sun, and Dodd
thought no more of it.
The owner of this sinister visage was Andre Thibout, of whom it might be
said, like face like life; for he was one of those ill-omened creatures
who feed upon the misfortunes of their kind, and stand on shore in foul
weather hoping the worst, instead of praying for the best: briefly, a
wrecker. He and his comrade, Jacques Moinard, had heard the _Agra's_ gun
fired, and came down to batten on the wreck: but ho! at the turn of
the tide, there were gensdarmes and soldiers lining the beach, and the
Bayonet interposed between Theft and Misfortune. So now the desperate
pair were prowling about like hungry, baffled wolves, curses on their
lips and rage at their hearts.
Dodd was extremely anxious to get to Barkington before the news of the
wreck; for otherwise he knew his wife and children would suffer a year's
agony in a single day. The only chance he saw was to get to Boulogne in
time to catch the _Nancy_ sailing packet; for it was her day. But then
Boulogne was eight leagues distant, and there was no public conveyance
going. Fullalove, entering heartily into his feelings, was gone to look
for horses to hire, aided by the British Consul. The black hero was
upstairs clearing out with a pin two holes that had fallen into decay
for want of use. These holes were in his ears.
And now, worn out by anxiety and hard work, Dodd began to nod in his
chair by the fire.
He had not been long asleep when the hideous face of Thibout reappeared
at the window and watched him. Presently a low whistle was uttered
outside, and soon the two ruffians entered the room, and, finding the
landlady there as well as Dodd, called for a little glass apiece of
absinthe. While drinking it, they cast furtive glances towards Dodd, and
waited till she should go about her business, and leave them alone with
him.
But the good woman surmised their looks, and knowing the character of
the men, poured out a cup of coffee from a great metal reservoir by the
fire, and waked Dodd without ceremony: “Voici votre cafe, Monsieur!”
making believe he had ordered it.
“Merci, Madame!” replied he, for his wife had taught him a little
French.
“One may sleep _mal a propos,_” muttered the woman in his ear. “My man
is at the fair, and there are people here who are not worth any great
things.”
Dodd rubbed his eyes and saw those two foul faces at the end of the
kitchen: for such it was, though called _salle a manger._ “Humph!” said
he; and instinctively buttoned his coat.
At that Thibout touched Moinard's knee under the table.
Fullalove came in soon after to say he had got two horses, and they
would be here in a quarter of an hour.
“Well, but Vespasian? how is he to go?” inquired Dodd.
“Oh, we'll send him on ahead, and then ride and tie.”
“No, no,” said Dodd, “I'll go ahead. That will shake me up. I think I
should tumble off a horse; I'm so dead sleepy.”
Accordingly he started to walk on the road to Boulogne.
He had not been gone three minutes when Moinard sauntered out.
Moinard had not been gone two minutes when Thibout strolled out.
Moinard kept Dodd in sight and Thibout kept Moinard.
The horses were brought soon after, but unfortunately the pair did not
start immediately, though, had they known it, every moment was precious.
They wasted time in argument. Vespasian had come down with a diamond
ring in one ear, and a ruby in the other. Fullalove saw this retrograde
step, and said grimly, “Have you washed but half your face, or is this a
return to savagery?”
Vespasian wore an air of offended dignity. “No, sar; these yar
decorations come off a lady ob i cibilisation: Missy Beresford donated
'em me. Says she, 'Massah Black'--yah! yah! She always nick-nominates
dis child Massa Black--'while I was praying Goramighty for self and
pickaninny, I seen you out of one corner of my eye admirationing my
rings; den just you take 'em,' says dat ar aristocracy: 'for I don't
admirationise 'em none: I've been shipwrecked.' So I took 'em wid
incredible condescension; and dat ar beautiful lady says to me, 'Oh, get
along wid your nonsense about coloured skins! I have inspectionated your
conduct, Massa Black, and likewise your performances on the slack rope,'
says she, 'in time of shipwreck: and darn me,' says she, 'but you are a
man, you are.' 'No, Missy,' says I superciliously, 'dis child am not a
man, if you please, but a coloured gemman.'” He added, he had put them
in his ears because the biggest would not go on his little finger.
Fullalove groaned. “And of course, the next thing, you'll ring
your snout like a pig or a Patagonian. There, come along, ye
darn'd--Anomaly.”
He was going to say “Cuss,” but remembering his pupil's late heroic
conduct, softened it down to Anomaly.
But Vespasian always measured the force of words by their length or
obscurity. “Anomaly” cut him to the heart: he rode off in moody silence
and dejection, asking himself sorrowfully what he had done that such a
mountain of vituperation should fall on him. “Anomaly!!”
They cantered along in silence; for Fullalove was digesting this new
trait in his pupil, and asking himself could he train it out, or must he
cross it out. Just outside the town they met Captain Robarts walking in;
he had landed three miles off down the coast. “Hallo!” said Fullalove.
“I suppose you thought I was drowned?” said Robarts spitefully; “but you
see I'm alive still.”
Fullalove replied, “Well, captain, that is only one mistake more you've
made, I reckon.”
About two English miles from the town they came to a long straight slope
up and down, where they could see a league before them; and there they
caught sight of David Dodd's tall figure mounting the opposite rise.
Behind him at some little distance were two men going the same way, but
on the grass by the roadside, whereas David was on the middle of the
road.
“He walks well for Jacky Tar,” said Fullalove.
“Iss, sar,” said Vespasian sulkily; “but dis 'Analogy' tink he not walk
so fast as those two behind him, cos they catch him up.”
Now Vespasian had hardly uttered these words when a thing occurred,
so sudden and alarming, that the speaker's eyes protruded, and he was
dumfounded a moment; the next a loud cry burst from both him and his
companion at once, and they lashed their horses to the gallop and went
tearing down the hill in a fury of rage and apprehension.
Mr. Fullalove was right, I think: a sailor is seldom a smart walker; but
Dodd was a cricketer, you know, as well. He swung along at a good
pace and in high spirits. He had lost nothing but a few clothes, and a
quadrant, and a chronometer; it was a cheap wreck to him, and a joyful
one: for peril past is present delight. He had saved his life, and what
he valued more, his children's money. Never was that dear companion of
his perils so precious to him as now. One might almost fancy that, by
some strange sympathy, he felt the immediate happiness of his daughter
depended on it. Many in my day believe that human minds can thus
communicate, overleaping material distances. Not knowing, I can't say.
However, no such solution is really needed here. All the members of
a united and loving family feel together and work together--without
specific concert--though hemispheres lie between: it is one of the
beautiful traits of true family affection. Now the Dodds, father,
mother, sister, brother, were more one in heart and love than any other
family I ever saw: woe to them if they had not.
David, then, walked towards Boulogne that afternoon a happy man. Already
he tasted by anticipation the warm caresses of his wife and children,
and saw himself seated at the hearth, with those beloved ones clustering
close round him. How would he tell them Its adventures--Its dangers from
pirates--Its loss at sea--Its recovery--Its wreck--Its coming ashore dry
as a bone; and conclude by taking It out of his bosom and dropping It in
his wife's lap with “Cheer, boys, cheer!”
Trudging on in this delightful reverie, his ear detected a pitpat at
some distance behind him: he looked round with very slight curiosity
and saw two men coming up. Even in that hasty glance he recognised the
foulface of Andre Tiribout, a face not to be forgotten in a day. I don't
know how it was, but he saw in a moment that face was after him to rob
him, and he naturally enough concluded It was their object.
And he was without a weapon, and they were doubtless armed. Indeed,
Thibout was swinging a heavy cudgel.
Poor Dodd's mind went into a whirl and his body into a cold sweat. In
such moments men live a year. To gain a little time he walked swiftly
on, pretending not to have noticed them: but oh! his eyes roved wildly
to each side of the road for a chance of escape. He saw none. To his
right was a precipitous rock; to his left a profound ravine with a
torrent below, and the sides scantily clothed with fir-trees and bushes:
he was, in fact, near the top of a long rising ground called _“La
Mauvaise Cote,_” on account of a murder committed there two hundred
years ago.
Presently he heard the men close behind him. At the same moment he saw
at the side of the ravine a flint stone about the size of two fists:
he made but three swift strides, snatched it up, and turned to meet the
robbers, drawing himself up high, and showing fight in every inch.
The men were upon him. His change of attitude was so sudden and fiery
that they recoiled a step. But it was only for a moment: they had gone
too far to retreat; they divided, and Thibout attacked him on his left
with uplifted cudgel, and Moinard on his right with a long glittering
knife. The latter, to guard his head from the stone, whipped off his hat
and held it before his head: but Dodd was what is called “left handed:”
“ambidexter” would be nearer the mark (he carved and wrote with his
right hand, heaved weights and flung cricket-balls with his left).
He stepped forward, flung the stone in Thibout's face with perfect
precision, and that bitter impetus a good thrower lends at the moment
of delivery, and almost at the same moment shot out his right hand and
caught Moinard by the throat. Sharper and fiercer collision was never
seen than of these three.
Thibout's face crashed; his blood squirted all round the stone, and
eight yards off lay that assailant on his back.
Moinard was more fortunate: he got two inches of his knife into Dodd's
left shoulder, at the very moment Dodd caught him in his right-hand
vice. And now one vengeful hand of iron grasped him felly by the throat;
another seized his knife arm and twisted it back like a child's. He
kicked and struggled furiously, but in half a minute the mighty English
arm and iron fingers held the limp body of Jacques Moinard with its
knees knocking, temples bursting, throat relaxed, eyes protruding, and
livid tongue lolling down to his chin. A few seconds more, and, with the
same stalwart arm that kept his relaxed and sinking body from falling,
Dodd gave him one fierce whirl round to the edge of the road, then put a
foot to his middle, and spurned his carcase with amazing force and fury
down the precipice. Crunch! crunch! it plunged from tree to tree, from
bush to bush, and at last rolled into a thick bramble, and there stuck
in the form of a crescent But Dodd had no sooner sent him headlong by
that mighty effort, than his own sight darkened, his head swam, and,
after staggering a little way, he sank down in a state bordering on
insensibility. Meantime Fullalove and Vespasian were galloping down the
opposite hill to his rescue.
Unfortunately, Andre Thibout was not dead, nor even mortally wounded. He
was struck on the nose and mouth; that nose was flat for the rest of his
life, and half of his front teeth were battered out of their sockets,
but he fell, not from the brain being stunned, but the body driven to
earth by the mere physical force of so momentous a blow, knocked down
like a ninepin. He now sat up bewildered, and found himself in a pool of
blood, his own. He had little sensation of pain, but he put his hand to
his face, and found scarce a trace of his features, and his hand came
away gory. He groaned.
Rising to his feet, he saw Dodd sitting at some distance; his first
impulse was to fly from so terrible an antagonist, but, as he made for
the ravine, he observed that Dodd was in a helpless condition, wounded
perhaps by Moinard. And where was Moinard?
Nothing visible of him but his knife: that lay glittering in the road.
Thibout with anxious eye turned towards Dodd, kneeled to pick it up,
and in the act a drop of his own blood fell on the dust beside it. He
snarled like a wounded tiger, spat out half-a-dozen teeth, and crept on
tiptoe to his safe revenge.
Awake from your lethargy or you are a dead man!
No! Thibout got to him unperceived, and the knife glittered over his
head.
At this moment the air seemed to fill with clattering hoofs and voices,
and a pistol-shot rang. Dodd heard and started, and so saw his peril.
He put up his left hand to parry the blow, but feebly. Luckily for him
Thibout's eyes were now turned another way, and glaring with stupid
terror out of his mutilated visage: a gigantic mounted fiend, with black
face and white gleaming, rolling eyes was coming at him like the wind,
uttering horrid howls. Thibout launched himself at the precipice with
a shriek of dismay, and went rolling after his comrade; but ere he had
gone ten yards he fell across a young larch-tree and hung balanced. Up
came the foaming horses: Fullalove dismounted hastily and fired three
deliberate shots down at Thibout from his revolver. He rolled off, and
never stopped again till he splashed into the torrent, and lay there
staining it with blood from his battered face and perforated shoulder.
Vespasian jumped off, and with glistening eyes administered some good
brandy to Dodd. He, unconscious of his wound, a slight one, relieved
their anxiety by assuring them somewhat faintly he was not hurt, but
that, ever since that “tap on the head” he got in the Straits of Gaspar,
any angry excitement told on him, made his head swim, and his temples
seem to swell from the inside.
“I should have come off second-best but for you, my dear friends. Shake
hands over it, do! O, Lord bless you! Lord bless you both. As for you,
Vespasian, I do think you are my guardian angel. Why, this is the second
time you've saved my life. No, it isn't: for it's the third.”
“Now you git along, Massa Cap'n,” said Vespasian. “You berry good man,
ridicalous good man; and dis child ar'nt no gardening angel at all;
he ar a darned Anatomy” (with such a look of offended dignity at
Fullalove).
After examining the field of battle and comparing notes, they mounted
Dodd on Vespasian's horse, and walked quietly till Dodd's head got
better; and then they cantered on three abreast, Vespasian in the middle
with one sinewy hand on each horse's mane; and such was his muscular
power, that he often relieved his feet by lifting himself clean into
the air, and the rest of the time his toe but touched the ground, and he
sailed like an ostrich and grinned and chattered like a monkey.
Sad to relate, neither Thibout nor Moinard was ended. The guillotine
stood on its rights. Meantime, what was left of them crawled back to the
town stiff and sore, and supped together--Moinard on liquids only--and
vowed revenge on all wrecked people.
The three reached Boulogne in time for the _Nancy,_ and put Dodd on
board: the pair decided to go to the Yankee Paradise--Paris.
They parted with regret and tenderly, like old tried friends; and
Vespasian told Dodd, with tears in his eyes, that though he was in point
of fact only a darned Anemo, he felt like a coloured gemman at parting
from his dear old Captain.
The master of the _Nancy_ knew Dodd well, and gave him a nice cot to
sleep in. He tumbled in with a bad headache and quite worn out, and
never woke for fifteen hours.
And when he did wake, he was safe at Barkington.
He and It landed on the quay. He made for home.
On the way he passed Hardie's bank, a firm synonymous in his mind with
the Bank of England.
A thrill of joy went through him. Now it _was_ safe. When he first sewed
It on in China, It seemed secure nowhere except on his own person.
But since then, the manifold perils by sea and land It had encountered
through being on him, had caused a strong reaction in his mind on
that point. He longed to see It safe out of his own hands and in good
custody.
He made for Hardie's door with a joyful rush, waved his cap over his
head in triumph, and entered the bank with It.
Ah!