The Coxswain's Bride; also, Jack Frost and Sons; and, A Double Rescue by Ballantyne (reading fiction .TXT) 📕

The state of things on the island was now considerably improved. Peggy, under the influence of gratitude for restored felicity, became more helpful than she had formerly been, and more loquacious than ever. Her female companions, being amiable and easily pleased, were rather amused than otherwise at the continuous flow of discursive, sometimes incomprehensible, and always good-natured small talk—particularly small talk—with which she beguiled the hours that might have otherwise hung heavily on their minds while their hands were busily engaged with the bone-needles and sinew threads which the coxswain had manufactured for them. For the clothes with which they had landed on the island—especially those of the men—had begun to wear out after eight or ten months, and new garments had to be made, while repairs never ceased.

Meanwhile, the men were fully occupied each day in hunting seals or fishing, cutting firewood with the axe they had found in the hut, and in making their home more comfortable. A door was fitted to the hut; a wooden partition was put up to cut off more effectually the women’s apartment from that of the men; the open crevices in the walls were stopped up with moss, and many other improvements were made. A few nails extracted from the walls of the hut were converted into fish-hooks, by means of the file which had been found, and Nellie spun some excellent fishing-lines from flax found growing wild in abundance. The file also enabled them to strike fire with broken flints picked up on the shore. The ash of burnt cotton, as the doctor knew, makes good tinder; so in the public interest, John Mitford agreed to part with the ragged remains of the cotton shirt he had long worn—quite unnecessarily—over his woollen jersey. Thus they could afford to let the fire go out, and were relieved from constant watching, as well as anxiety in regard to it.

They did not, however, cease their nocturnal vigils, for the hope of deliverance never died out, though it at last sank very low. Besides keeping their seal-skin flag flying, they kindled a beacon-fire every night, to guard and replenish which became the nightly duty of one or other of the men—watch and watch about—all the time they stayed on the island.

During the earlier part of each night, however, the beacon-fire was not watched. It was merely lighted and left for some hours to look after itself. During this period, after supper, the whole party were wont to draw round the blazing fire in the hut, and each contributed his or her share to the entertainment of the social circle. Then it was that lugubrious John Mitford developed amazing powers of inventive story-telling, and Joe Slag came out strong with thrilling lifeboat tales, every word of which Bob Massey corroborated, while Terrence O’Connor displayed powers of sarcastic criticism of the highest order, and Tomlin, Black Ned, and the women proved an intensely appreciative audience. But the latter were not merely listeners. True, Peggy did nothing for the general good. Having quite exhausted her lungs with incessant talk during each day, she was fortunately almost incapable of speech in the evening, but Nellie, who possessed a voice as sweet as herself, and clear and true as that of a nightingale, was induced to “favour the company”—chiefly with pathetic or patriotic ditties and hymns—while Eva thrilled her audience with terrible tales of slavery, in many of which she had acted a part. Of course Dr Hayward lent his aid, both with song and story; but, like a true leader, he devoted himself chiefly to drawing out the powers of his companions, directing or diverting the flow of conversation, and keeping order. He also instituted what may be truly styled family worship at night, by repeating from memory portions of the word of God and engaging in prayer just before retiring to rest. Bob Massey and Tomlin were induced to help him in this, and never was a prayer put up from that hut in which there was not an earnest petition that a ship might be sent for their deliverance.

“But a ship is long, long o’ comin’,” said Slag to Jarring as he accompanied the latter part of the way to the beacon-fire one night when it was Black Ned’s turn to watch.

“A ship’ll come, Joe, when God sees fit to send it,” said Ned.

Slag glanced at his comrade in surprise, the reply was so very unlike Ned’s usual style of speech that he felt uncertain whether it was uttered in earnest.

“The only thing I feel an awful longin’ for now, at times, is a bit o’ ’baccy,” continued Ned.

“So does I, Ned, an’ I sometimes think Dr Hayward has got the advantage of us there, for he never smoked, so he says, an’ in coorse it stands to reason that he can’t have no longin’ for a thing he don’t want—an’ he seems as jolly an’ happy as the best of us without it!”

“Ay, jollier and happier!” replied Ned, shortly.

“But, I say, Ned, don’t ye ever feel a longin’ for grog? Ye used to be raither fond of it.”

“No—not now, Joe. It’s the best thing as ever happened to me, bein’ cast on this here island—wi’ Dr Hayward to give a feller a word of advice.”

Slag, who felt a sort of self-righteous superiority over his comrade, inasmuch as he had never given way to drink, said, “You should be thankful for that, Ned.”

“I am thankful,” returned the other in a tone that induced Slag to say no more.

It was a very dark night, and cold, so that Black Ned involuntarily shuddered as he approached the beacon-fire alone—Joe having left him—and commenced to heap on fuel. Then rain began to fall heavily. There was no shelter, and the watchman was soon drenched to the skin. Heaping on more logs till the fire roared again, he tried to warm himself, and stood so close to the blaze that his garments smoked—they would have burnt had they not been wet—but no heat seemed to penetrate the shivering frame of Black Ned.

Next morning the poor man was smitten with a raging fever. From the first the doctor had little hope of his recovery. With a constitution fatally injured by dissipation and drink, his chance was very small; but of course every effort was made to save him. He was laid on a soft bed of moss in the warmest corner of the hut, and the women took their turn in nursing him, night and day—the coxswain’s wife, however, being the chief nurse; for, besides being sympathetic and tender by nature, she had been trained in a rough school where self-reliance and capacity were constantly called into action in circumstances of difficulty, so that she was better fitted for the post than either of her companions. But their efforts were of no avail. After a week, Black Ned died, with a smile of gratitude on his dark face as he gazed in Hayward’s eyes, and held his hand until the spirit returned to God who gave it.

The gloom cast over the little community by this sudden appearance of the King of Terrors lasted for many days, and had the good effect of turning the thoughts of all of them to those subjects which are obviously and naturally distasteful to fallen man—the soul and the world to come. But gradually the gloom passed away, though it left in the party a greater longing than ever to escape from their island prison.

One day, while some of them were at breakfast, Terrence O’Connor rushed into the hut with the news that a ship was in sight! Instantly the boat was manned, and they rowed with all their might towards the vessel, which was seen like a white speck on the horizon. They rowed to within four miles of her, with an oar set up as a mast, and a jacket attached thereto as a flag, but a breeze sprang up, and the strange sail actually passed on without taking the slightest notice of them—though the people on board could not have failed to see the boat!

Profound was the disappointment, and violent the indignation, that filled the thoughts of the castaways as they rowed slowly back to land.

“Sure it’s devils that must live in the bodies o’ some men,” growled O’Connor, in the bitterness of his soul.

“You’re too hard on the devils, Terrence,” said Bob Massey. “Some men in this world do the worst that they can, an’ surely devils can do no more than that.”

This incident, however, aroused the hopes and expectations of the party to a high pitch, so that the beacon-fire was kept burning more steadily and brightly than before, and the look-out hill was more frequently visited; still, weeks and months passed by, and no deliverance came to them.

During this period, the seal-hunting, fishing, clothes-mending, etcetera, were carried on with unflagging energy, and the nightly entertainments became more and more entertaining, by reason of use and effort developing new capacities and talents that might in less favourable circumstances have lain altogether dormant. All this was due very much to their leader; for, besides being a God-fearing man, Hayward was pre-eminently cheery, and full of fun as well as vigour. The coxswain, too, was like-minded, and of great capacity in every way; while his wife’s voice was so charming that the party became almost dependent on it. They could scarcely have gone to rest at last without Nellie’s hymn or song as a lullaby! We must state, however, that Tomlin did not share in this pleasure. That poor man had been born musically deaf, as some people are born physically blind. There was no musical inlet to his soul! There was, indeed, a door for sound to enter, and music, of course, sought an entrance by that door; but it was effectually destroyed, somehow, in passing through the doorway, so that poor Tomlin showed no symptom of pleasure. What he heard, and how he heard it, is known only to himself!

Once or twice during this time they