SANDIE MCFLAIL, M.D.--"WHA WOULDNA' BE A SEA-BIRD?"--THE GIRL TELLS HER
STRANGE ADVENTURES--NIGHTFALL ON THE SEA.
There is one member of the mess whom I have not yet introduced, but a
very worthy member he is, our youthful doctor. Poor fellow! never
before had he been to sea, and so he suffered accordingly. Oh! right
bravely had he tried to keep up for all that. He was the boldest
mariner afloat while coming down the Clyde; he disappeared as the ship
began to round the stormy Mull. He appeared again for a short time at
Oban, but vanished when the anchor was weighed. At Lerwick, where they
called in to take old Magnus Bolt on board, and ship a dozen stalwart
Shetlanders, the doctor was once more seen on deck; and it was currently
reported that when the vessel lay helpless on the reef, a ghostly form
bearing a strong resemblance to the bold surgeon was seen flitting about
in the darkness, and a quavering voice was heard to put this solemn
question more than once, "Any danger, men? Men, are we in danger?"
This was the last that had been seen of the medico; but Rory found a
slate in the dispensary, into which sanctum, by the way, he had no right
to pop even his nose. He brought this slate aft, the young rascal, and
read what was written thereon to Allan and Ralph, from which it was
quite evident that Sandie McFlail, M.D., of Aberdeen, had made a most
intrepid attempt to keep a diary. The entries were short, and ran
somewhat thus:--
"February 9th.--Dropped away from the Broomielaw and steamed down the
beautiful Clyde. Charming day, though cold, and the hills on each side
the river clothed in virgin snow. Felt sad and sorrowful at leaving my
native land. I wonder will ever we return, or will the great sea
swallow us up? Would rather it didn't. I wonder if _she_ will think of
me and pray for her mariner bold when the wind blows high at night, when
the cold rain beats against the window-panes of her little cot, and the
storm spirit roars around the old chimneys. I feel a sailor already all
over, and I tread the decks with pride.
"Feb. 10th.--At sea. The ocean getting rough. Passed some seagulls.
"Feb. 11th.--Sea rougher. Passed a ship.
"Feb. 12th.--Sea still rough. Passed some seaweed.
"Feb. 13th.--Sea mountains high. Passed--"
"And here," says Rory, "the diary breaks off all of a sudden like; and
all of a sudden the entries close; so, really, there is no saying what
the doctor passed on the 13th. But just about this time, the mate tells
me, he was seen leaning languidly over the side, so--"
"Ho, ho!" cried McBain, close at his ear. The captain had entered the
saloon unperceived by boy Rory, and had been standing behind him all the
time he was reading. Ralph and Allan saw him well enough, but they, of
course, said nothing, although they could not refrain from laughing.
"Ho, ho, Rory, my boy!" says McBain; "ho, ho, boy Rory! so you're fairly
caught?"
"And indeed then," says Rory, jumping up and looking as guilty as any
schoolboy, "I didn't know you were there at all at all."
"Of that I am perfectly sure," McBain says, laughing, "else you wouldn't
have been reading the poor doctor's private diary. What shall we do
with him, Ralph? What shall he be done to, Allan?"
"Oh!" said Ralph, mischievously; "send him to the masthead for a couple
of hours. Into the foretop, mind, where he'll get plenty of air about
him."
"No," said Allan, grinning; "give him a seat for three hours on the end
of the bowsprit. Of course, Captain McBain, you'll let him have a
bottle of hot water at his feet, and a blanket or two about him. He is
only a little one, you know."
"But now that I think of it," said McBain, "you are all the same, boys;
there isn't one of you a whit better than the other."
"Sure and you're right, captain," Rory put in, "for if I was reading,
they were listening, most intently, too."
"Well then, boys, I'll tell you how you can make amends to the honest
doctor. Off you go, the three of you, and see if you can't rouse him
out. Get him to come on deck and breathe the fresh air. He'll soon get
round."
And off our three heroes went, joyfully, on their mission of mercy.
They found the worthy doctor in bed in his cabin, and forthwith set
about kindly but firmly rousing him out. They had even brought Freezing
Powders with them, to carry a pint of moselle.
"I feel vera limp," said Sandie, as soon as he got dressed, "vera limp
indeed. Well, as you say, the moselle may do me good, but I'm a
teetotaler as a rule."
"We never touch any wine," said Ralph, "nor care to; but this, my dear
doctor, is medicine."
Sandie confessed himself better immediately when he got on deck. With
Allan on one side of him and big Ralph on the other, he was marched up
and down the deck for half an hour and more.
"Man! gentlemen!" he remarked, "I thought I could walk finely, but I'm
just now for a' the world like a silly drunken body."
"We were just the same," said Allan, "when we came first to sea--
couldn't walk a bit; but we soon got our sea-legs, and we've never lost
them yet."
The doctor was struck with wonder at the might and majesty of the waves,
and also at the multitude of birds that were everywhere about and around
them. Kittiwakes, solons, gulls, guillemots, auks, and puffins, they
whirled and wheeled around the ship in hundreds, screaming and shrieking
and laughing. They floated on the water, they swam on its surface, and
dived down into its dark depths, and no fear had they of human beings,
nor of the steamer itself.
"How happy they all seem!" said Rory; "if I was one of the lower
animals, as we call them, sure there is nothing in the wide world I'd
like better to be than a sea-bird."
"True for you," said Allan; "it's a wild, free life they lead."
"And they seem to have no care," said the doctor. "Their meat is bound
to their heads; at any rate, they never have far to go to seek it. When
tired they can rest; when rested they can fly again. Then look at the
warm and beautiful coats they wear. There is no wetting them to the
skin; the water glides off o' them like the rain from a duck's back.
Then think o' the pleasure o' possessin' a pair o' wings that can cleave
the air like an arrow from a bowstring; that in a few short days,
independent o' wind or waves or weather, can carry them from the cauld
north far, far awa' to the saft and sunny south. Wha wouldna' be a
sea-bird?"
"Yes," reiterated Rory, stopping in front of the doctor; "as you say,
doctor, `Wha wouldna' be a sea-bird?' But pardon me, sir, for in you I
recognise a kindred spirit, a lover of nature, a lover of the beautiful.
You and I will be friends, doctor--fast friends. There, shake hands."
"As for Ralph and Allan," he added, with a mischievous grin, "'deed in
troth, doctor dear, there isn't a bit of poetry in their nature, and
they would any day far sooner see a couple of eider ducks roasted and
flanked with apple sauce, than the same wildly beautiful birds happy and
alive and afloat on the dark, heaving breast of the ocean. It's the
truth I'm telling ye, doctor. D'ye play at all? Have you any favourite
instrument?"
"Weel, sir," the doctor replied, "I canna say that I'm vera much o' a
musician, but I just can manage to toot a wee bit on the flute."
"And I've no doubt," said Rory, "that you `toot' well, too."
The conversation never slackened for a couple of hours, and so well did
the doctor feel, that of his own free will he volunteered joining them
at dinner in the saloon. McBain was as much surprised as delighted when
he came below to dine, and found that their new messmate, Sandie
McFlail, had at long last put in an appearance at table.
The swell on the sea was much less next morning; the wind had slightly
increased, and more sail had been spread, so that the ship was
moderately steady. The rugged coast and strange, fantastic rocks of the
outlying islands of Iceland were in sight, and, half-buried in misty
clouds, the distant mountains could be dimly descried.
"Yonder," said the mate, advancing towards Captain McBain, glass in
hand,--"yonder is a small boat, sir, with a bit of a sail on her; she
has just rounded the needle rocks, and seems standing in for the
mainland."
"Well," said the captain, "let us overhaul her, anyhow. There can be no
harm in that, and it may secure us a fresh fish or two for dinner."
In less than an hour the _Arrandoon_ had come up with this strange sail,
which at first sight had seemed a mere speck on the ocean, seen at one
moment and hidden the next behind some mountain roller. The surprise of
our heroes may be better imagined than described, to find afloat in this
cockle-shell of a boat, with an oar shipped as a mast and a tartan plaid
as a main-sail, none other than the heroine of the wreckers' reef.
Seeing that she was in the power of the big ship, she made no further
attempt to get away, but, dropping her sail, she seized the oars,
paddled quietly and coolly alongside, and next moment stood on the
quarter-deck, with bowed head and modest mien, before Captain McBain.
The captain took her kindly by the hand, smiling as he said, "Do not be
afraid, my girl; consider yourself among friends--among those, indeed,
who would do anything in their power to serve you, even if they were not
already deeply in your debt, and deeply grateful."
"Ah!" she said, mournfully, "my warning came all too late to save you.
But, praised be God! you are safe now, and not in the power of those
terrible men, who would have spared not a single life of those the waves
did not engulf."
"But tell us," continued McBain, "all about it--all about yourself.
There is some strange mystery about the matter, which we would fain have
solved. But stay--not here, and not yet. You must be very tired and
weary; you must first have rest and refreshment, after which you can
tell us your tale. Stevenson, see the little boat hauled up; and,
doctor, I place this young lady under your care; to-night I hope to land
her safely in Reikjavik; meanwhile my cabin is at her disposal."
"Come, lassie," said the good surgeon, laconically, leading the way down
the companion.
Merely dropping a queenly curtsey to McBain and our young heroes, she
followed the doctor without a word.
Peter the steward placed before her the most tempting viands in the
ship, yet she seemed to have but little appetite.
"I am tired," she said at length, "I fain would rest. Long weary weeks
of sorrow have been mine. But they are past and gone at last."
Then she retired, this strange ocean waif and stray, and so the day wore
gradually to a close, and they saw no more of her until the sun, fierce,
fiery, and red, began to disappear behind the distant snow-clad hills;
then they found her once more in their midst.
She had gathered the folds of her plaid around her, her long yellow hair
still floated over her shoulders, and her dreamy blue eyes were shyly
raised to McBain's face as she began to speak.
"I owe you some explanation," she said. "My strange conduct must appear
almost inexplicable to you. My appearance among you two nights ago was
intended to save you from the destruction that awaited you--from the
destruction that had been prepared for you by the Danish wreckers."
"Sir," she continued, after a pause, "I am myself a Dane. My father was
parish minister in the little village of Elmdene. Alas! I fear he is
now no more. Afflictions gathered and thickened around us in our once
happy little home, and the only way we could see out of them was to
leave our native land and cross the ocean. In America we have many
friends who had kindly offered us an asylum, until happier days should
come again. Our vessel was a brig, our crew all told only twenty hands,
and we, my brother, father, and myself--for mother has long since gone
up beyond--were the only passengers.
"All went well until we were off the northern Shetlands, when at the
dark, starry hour of midnight our ship was boarded and carried by
pirates. Every one in the ship was put to the sword, saving my father
and myself. My poor dear brave brother was slain before my eyes, but he
died as the Danes die--with his face to the foe. My father was promised
his life if he would perform the ceremony of marriage between myself and
the pirate captain, who is a Russian, a daring, fearless fellow, but a
strange compound of superstition and vice--a man who will go to prayers
before scuttling a ship! The object of this pirate was to seize your
vessel; he would have met and fought you at sea, but the easier plan for
him was to try to wreck you. Fortune seemed to favour this bold design
of his. The lights placed on shore, to represent a vessel of large
size, were part and parcel of his vile scheme. But the darkness of the
night enabled me to escape and come towards you. Then I feared to
return; but, alas! alas! I now tremble lest my dear father has had to
pay the penalty of my rashness with his life."
[The story of the pirate is founded on fact.]
"But the ship--this pirate?" said McBain. "We sailed around the island
next day but saw no signs of him?"
"Then," said the girl, "he must have escaped in the darkness,
immediately after discovering the entire failure of his scheme."
"And whither were you bound for when we overtook you, my poor girl?"
asked McBain.
"At Reikjavik," she replied, "I have an uncle, a minister. He it was
who taught me all I know, while he was still at home in Elmdene--taught
me among other things the beautiful language of your country, which I
speak, but speak so indifferently."
"Can this be," said McBain, "the self-same pirate that attacked the
_Snowbird_?"
"The very same thought," answered Ralph, "was passing through my own
mind."
"And yet how strange that a pirate should, cruise in these far northern
seas?"
"She has less chance of being caught, at all events," Allan said.
"Ha?" exclaimed McBain, with a kind of grim, exultant laugh, "if she
comes across the _Arrandoon_, that chance will indeed be a small one.
She'll find us a different kind of a craft from the _Snowbird_."
The vessel was now heading directly for the south-east coast of Iceland.
Somewhere in there, though at present hidden by points of land and
rocky islets, lay the capital of Iceland, which they hoped to reach ere
midnight.
A more lovely land and seascape than that which was now stretched out
before them, it would indeed be difficult to conceive. The sun had gone
down behind the western end of a long line of snow-clad mountains,
serrated, jagged, and peaked, but their tops were all rose-tipped with
his parting beams. Above them the sky was clear, with just one speck of
crimson cloud; the lower land between was bathed in a purple mist,
through which the ice-bound rocks could dimly be discerned, while the
mantle of night had already been spread over the ocean.