Picked up at Sea. John C. Hutcheson
his hands gleefully as the mate came to his side and joined in the quick quarter-deck he was taking, varied by an occasional look aloft to see that everything was drawing fair. “I think we might set the topgallants now, eh?”
“You’re not a slow one at piling on the canvas, I reckon!” answered the other with a laugh. “No sooner out of one gale than you want to get into another. Look at those clouds there ahead, Cap’en,” pointing to a dark streak that crossed the horizon low down right in front of the vessel. “I guess we aren’t out of it yet!”
“Waal, if we’ve got to have another blow,” replied the skipper, “we’d better make some use of the wind we have, specially as it looks like chopping round. What is she going now?” he asked of the quartermaster or boatswain, one individual performing both functions in the Yankee craft.
“Close on nine knots, Cap’en,” answered the man, who had just hove the log over the stern, and now stood, minute-glass in hand, calculating the result.
“Nine knots with this breeze? That will never do. Away aloft there, and shake out the topgallant sails! Now, men, stir yourselves in proper man-o’-war’s fashion; and let us see it done in ship-shape style! That’s your sort, men. Johnson shall shell out some grog presently to splice the main brace.”—He continued aloud, as the hands came down the ratlins again without losing time, after lowering the sails—“Now, hoist away at the halliards. Cheerily, men! cheerily ho! The Boston girls have got hold of our tow-rope; up with the sticks with a will!”
The Susan Jane plunged through the waves with redoubled speed, leaning over until the water foamed over her gunwale and was knee-deep in her scuppers, an occasional billow topping over her foc’s’le, and pouring down into the waist in a cataract of gleaming green sea and sparkling spray, all glittering with prismatic colours, like a jumble of broken rainbows.
“What does she make now, Johnson?” asked the skipper again of the quartermaster.
“Eleven knots, I reckon, sir, good.”
“Ah, that’s more like it! The poor dear thing! she was crippled without her wings, that she was! She’ll do twelve-knots yet, eh, Seth?”
“I don’t doubt that, sir,” replied the mate, who was much more cautious than his captain; “but it ain’t quite safe with those gentlemen there gathering together ahead, like a mass meeting in Faneuil Hall.”
“Oh, never mind the clouds,” rejoined the delighted skipper, whose thoughts were filled with the fond belief that the Susan Jane would make the most rapid run across the herring-pond ever known for a sailing-ship. “Guess we’ll beat the Scotia, if we go on like this.”
“Yes, if we don’t carry away anything!” interposed the mate cautiously.
“Oh, nonsense, Seth! We’ve got a smart crew, and can take in sail when it’s wanted! How’s your patient getting on?” continued the skipper, turning to Mr. Rawlings, who had come up, the boy being in a profound sleep.
“Well, I hope,” he answered; “he is resting very tranquilly.”
“That means, I suppose, that he’s all right, and having a good caulk in my cot.”
“Exactly so, Cap’en; and when he wakes by and by, I hope he’ll be himself again.”
“That’s good news! Did he tell you who he was before he dropped to sleep?”
“No,” answered Mr. Rawlings, “he did not speak.”
“Not speak!” said the captain. “Why didn’t he?”
“He couldn’t,” replied the other. “Whether from the cut on his forehead, or what, I can’t tell; but he has had such a shock that his nerves seem paralysed. You noticed his eyes, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said the captain, “but I thought that was from fright or a sort of startled awe, which would soon go off. I’m sorry I didn’t have a look at those spars before we cast them off; we might have learned the name of the ship to which he belonged. Don’t you think, Seth, though, that he will recover his speech and be able to tell us something?”
“Certainly, Cap’en, as Mr. Rawlings says, I believe he’ll wake up all right.”
“Well, then, we’d better go below for breakfast now—here’s the steward coming to call us. Davitt can take charge of the deck,”—hailing the second mate as he spoke, and telling him to “keep his weather-eye open, and call him immediately should any change occur, but not to reduce sail on any account.”
“I wouldn’t have given him that order, if I were you, Cap’en,” said the mate, as they went down the companion together.
“Oh, Davitt isn’t a fool,” replied the skipper lightly; and the two entered the cuddy together, where they were welcomed by a hospitably spread table that spoke well for the cook’s culinary skill.
“Josh is a splendid chap for fixing up things,” said the skipper heartily, as he popped a portion of a capital stew into his capacious mouth with much gusto. “I’d back him against one of those French what-do-you-call-’ems any day!” alluding, possibly, to the chef of the hotel in Bordeaux at which he had been staying on the Susan Jane’s previous voyage.
“So would I,” echoed the mate, who was performing equally well with his knife and fork; but, what he would have further observed must remain unrecorded, for at that moment a tremendous crash was heard on deck, and a heavy sea pooped the ship, flooding the cabin, and washing the two, with the débris of the breakfast table, away to leeward, where they struggled in vain to recover their footing, until the ship righted again—the steward coming to their assistance and being likewise thrown down on the floor, to add to the confusion. Then Seth Allport darted up the companion.
The contretemps was so sudden that the skipper was quite startled; but what startled him more was the sight of the boy who had been saved, and who was supposed to be sound asleep, standing at the open door of his cabin, with his light brown hair almost erect, and his blue eyes starting out of his head with a look of unspeakable terror, and the blood streaming down his face, and dropping with a sort of hissing sound into the water that surged about the cuddy floor and over his feet, from the terrible cut across his forehead.
“Mercy upon us, Rawlings, look there!” exclaimed Captain Blowser, trying to regain his feet, and almost forgetting what might be going on on deck at the sight before him. “Is he gone mad, or what?”
Story 1—Chapter III.
Taken Aback.
“What is the matter?” exclaimed the passenger, clutching hold of the steward’s leg under the idea that it was the cuddy table, and contriving to get into a sitting position on the cabin floor, as the Susan Jane lurched to and fro, swishing the water backwards and forwards, along with the plates and dishes and broken crockery, amongst them, mixed up with bits of meat and vegetables and bread in the most inharmonious sort of medley—“What’s the matter, Cap’en?”
“Struck by a squall,” said the skipper, getting on his feet at last, and holding on tightly to a brass rail outside the door of one of the berths, that he might not get floored again. “But, look at your patient, the boy! Is he mad, or what?”
“Golly!” ejaculated the steward, also finding his legs again, Mr. Rawlings having released them as soon as he sat up. “Me tink him goin’ hab fit!”
The captain’s professional instincts roused him even more rapidly than did a loaf of soppy bread which at that moment was dashed in his face by the counter swish of the water against the side of the cabin, and he sprang up ready for action as cool and collected as possible, considering the circumstances.