The Gold Brick. Ann S. Stephens
of a young hero preparing for battle.
The brig plunged and reeled more and more. Her timbers began to strain and creak; the waves leaped and howled against her sides like charges of cavalry in fierce action. The roar and boom of the storm was terrible.
The two men who sat together in the dim light, floating upon the basin near by, looked at each other. The negro's face was ashen gray; the sailor lost his ruddy color; but the boy's eyes grew bright as stars.
"It's on us—it's on us—and every stitch of canvas out!" cried Rice. "I knew he was acting like a fool, but didn't expect this. Splurge! heave! Crack—crack! Jerusalem! there goes the mainsail! Aye, aye."
The hoarse call of a trumpet rang through every corner of the brig.
"All hands on deck!"
"Aye, aye!" shouted Rice, kindling to his work; "keep a stiff upper lip, cuffy, and cheer the boy, for we are just as near Davy's Locker as any of us ever will be again!"
They saw him plunge onward through the reeling freight, and he was gone. The poor negro and the child were left alone, not quite in darkness, for the cotton wick still shimmered fitfully, and made the blackness beyond its little pale circle more dismal than ever. It seemed just enough of light to see each other perish by, and that was all.
Louder and fiercer grew the storm. The brig was tossed upon it like a handful of drift wood; every timber seemed to carry on a struggle by itself—every joint wrenched and tore against its fastenings. The strained rudder shrieked like a wild animal in the agonies of death. The hoarse cry of the trumpet sounded like a groan through the general turmoil. But all these sounds were nothing to the howl of the winds, and the great upheaving rout of the waters, as they swelled and mingled together in one tremendous uproar. The negro fell upon his knees, trembling and ashen; but the boy—the gentle, sensitive child—stood up, with a smile on his mouth and a beautiful brightness in his eyes.
"Don't be afraid!" he said, bending over the negro. "The God that took care of my mamma when she fell asleep, is here. Something tells me so."
The poor negro had no God of his own people to understand, so he hung upon the words that fell from those young lips with unreasoning trust. The dusky color came back to his cheek, and lifting his faithful eyes upward, he said meekly:
"If you say so, young master, I believe it. Jube go where you go; she'll be sure to want him, too."
A fierce plunge—a recoil—and the brig stood still, shivering in all her timbers, like a wild horse with its fore feet over a precipice. It was but an instant. Then a cataract of waters swept over her. She rolled upon her side, and could not right herself; a mighty throe, and she struggled back, working heavily. Another plunge—a crash—a despairing cry from overhead—and the boy started from his wrapt composure.
"Come, Jube, let us go up and tell them not to be afraid."
The crew had given up. One man, Rice, stood at the helm, resolute to meet death at his post when it came. Thrasher stood firmly, with the trumpet grasped in his right hand; but his face was like marble, and he gave no orders. The brig that he commanded was almost a wreck. The sails had been swept away; the mainmast was in splinters; not a vestige of her massive bulwarks was left. The men were grouped together in sullen despair. Nothing was to be done—they could only stand still and wait. With that tornado tearing through the mighty waters, and lashing them into great sheets of angry foam, there was no contending. They huddled together, that group of stout men, helpless as infants.
When despair was on every face, and the storm raged fiercest, that pale, Heaven-eyed boy, came up through the hatches, and stood among the sailors, smiling. He did not speak, but the sweet serenity of his face gave them courage.
The mainmast had fallen, dragging heavily on the ship. The last order of the mate had been to cut it away, but no one obeyed, and thus inevitable destruction lay before them.
"One more onset, my men!" cried Rice. "Clear away the mast and she will right herself."
"Jube, give me an axe, I will help!" cried Paul; and the beautiful courage that shone in his face inspired the men. They fell to work vigorously. The mast, with all its entanglement of cordage, plunged into the boiling sea, and the brig righted herself.
The storm was over, the dismantled brig still rode the waves, for the staunch timber of New England does not yield readily, and the strongest had been put to its test in that gallant craft. Jube was sent back to his imprisonment in the hold, where Paul sought him at every opportunity; but, from the night of the tempest, a strange animation had marked the boy, something which no one could understand.
"Jube," he said, having left the deck on the third night, when the sea was calm as if it had never known a tempest, and ten thousand stars broke their flickering gold on its waves. "Jube, it is time that we look for mamma. God has taken care of her, I know, but we must search and find her."
"Little master, I know where she is, we left her on White Island."
"And you did not tell me when I was so near; but we cannot be far off now, the storm drove us back. Jube, I've been watching for something to happen, for it is sure mamma wants us. Look behind that barrel, and see how much bread I've saved. Then the oranges Rice spoke of; he broke open a box, and I've got plenty."
"Well, little master."
"They've been working on the side of the ship to-day, and did not haul up the boat. That was what I've been watching for. Take the bread and the oranges, Jube, and let us go."
Jube arose, took up the little sack which the boy pointed out, and followed his young master without a question. They crossed the deck softly, dropped down the side of the vessel unseen, and with the knife which Rice had given him, Paul cut the boat loose from the ship.
The brig lay motionless, for she was still disabled, and the boat rocked lightly on the waves, breaking the starlight into golden ripples; thus the boat and the half wrecked vessel drifted apart. Three days of sunshine, and calm, lonely, bright days, in which these two childlike beings floated like people in a dream. The boy was in search of his lost parents, and looked out for them over the bright ocean with smiling and beautiful faith. The slave hoped nothing, sought for nothing. He was content by his young master's side. They had no compass, and but one pair of oars, which proved of little use, for the boat had no destination, nor its inmates the remotest knowledge of their own reckoning. Thus they drifted on three days without accident. No vessel hove in sight, and all was a clear, heavy calm. On the fourth day the bread and fruit were gone. Not a mouthful of food, not a drop of water, save the great deep, a draught of which would be delirium or death. The fifth day, and the pangs of hunger had crept steadily on, and gnawed at their vitals relentlessly. Paul no longer gazed abroad on the waters, but lay faint and ill in the bottom of the boat, looking up to the stars in the night time, as if missing his mother on earth, he sought her there. Thus they drifted on day and night, until the end drew near. Jube managed to catch a little dew at sunset, which he gave to the child. Rain fell once in small quantities, and refreshed them, but still the cry of famished nature went up for food, and there was nothing but the salt water and the rainless heavens to answer it.
Paul lay in the bottom of the boat, fading away, and moaning with the pangs of famine; Jube bent over him, breaking the hot rays of the sun from the white and sunken face with his body, for they had no other shelter. The boy moaned in his sleep, and called for his mother in feeble anguish. Jube was very weak, but he managed to lift that light weight so far as to lay the boy's head on his knee.
With a spasm of pain the child awoke.
"Little master."
Jube's voice was like that of an old man, hollow and broken. The boy looked up, tried to smile, and murmured,
"Yes, Jube."
"Would you like something to eat, little master?"
"To eat—to eat," whispered the boy, opening his eyes wildly.
"A piece of nice steak. You wouldn't mind its being cooked, would you?"
"Steak!—something