Un capitaine de quinze ans. English Page 12

  CHAPTER XI.

  ROUGH WEATHER.

  During the ensuing week nothing particular occurred on board. Thebreeze still freshened, and the "Pilgrim" made on the average 160 milesevery twenty-four hours. The speed was as great as could be expectedfrom a craft of her size.

  Dick grew more and more sanguine in his anticipations that it could notbe long before the schooner would cross the track of the mail-packetsplying between the eastern and western hemispheres. He had made up hismind to hail the first passing vessel, and either to transfer hispassengers, or what perhaps would be better still, to borrow a fewsailors, and, it might be, an officer to work the "Pilgrim" to shore.He could not help, however, a growing sense of astonishment, when dayafter day passed, and yet there was no ship to be signalled. He keptthe most vigourous look-out, but all to no purpose. Three voyagesbefore had he made to the whale-fisheries, and his experience made himsure that he ought now to be sighting some English or American vesselon its way between the Equator and Cape Horn.

  Very different, however, was the true position of the "Pilgrim" fromwhat Dick supposed; not only had the ship been carried far out of herdirect course by currents, the force of which there were no means ofestimating, but from the moment when the compass had been tampered withby Negoro, the steering itself had put the vessel all astray.

  Unconscious of both these elements of disturbance, Dick Sands wasconvinced that they were proceeding steadily eastwards, and wasperpetually encouraging Mrs. Weldon and himself by the assurance thatthey must very soon arrive within view of the American coast; again andagain asserting that his sole concern was for his passengers, and thatfor his own safety he had no anxiety.

  "But think, Dick," said the lady, "what a position you would have beenin, if you had not had your passengers. You would have been alone withthat terrible Negoro; you would have been rather alarmed then."

  "I should have taken good care to put it out of Negoro's power to do meany mischief, and then I should have worked the ship by myself,"answered the lad stoutly.

  His very pluck gave Mrs. Weldon renewed confidence. She was a womanwith wonderful powers of endurance, and it was only when she thought ofher little son that she had any feeling of despair; yet even this sheendeavoured to conceal, and Dick's undaunted courage helped her.

  Although the youth of the apprentice did not allow him to pretend toany advanced scientific knowledge, he had the proverbial "weather-eye"of the sailor. He was not only very keen in noticing any change in theaspect of the sky, but he had learnt from Captain Hull, who was aclever meteorologist, to draw correct conclusions from the indicationsof the barometer; the captain, indeed, having taken the trouble to makehim learn by heart the general rules which are laid down inVorepierre's _Dictionnaire Illustre_.

  There are seven of these rules:--

  1. If after a long period of fine weather the barometer falls suddenlyand continuously, although the mercury may be descending for two orthree days before there is an apparent change in the atmosphere, therewill ultimately be rain; and the longer has been the time between thefirst depression and the commencement of the rain, the longer the rainmay be expected to last.

  2. _Vice versa_, if after a long period of wet weather the barometerbegins to rise slowly and steadily, fine weather will ensue; and thelonger the time between the first rising of the mercury and thecommencement of the fine weather, the longer the fine weather may beexpected to last.

  3. If immediately after the fall or rise of the mercury a change ofweather ensues, the change will be of no long continuance.[1]

  4. A gradual rise for two or three days during rain forecasts fineweather; but if there be a fall immediately on the arrival of the fineweather, it will not be for long. This rule holds also conversely.

  5. In spring and autumn a sudden fall indicates rain; in the summer, ifvery hot, it foretells a storm. In the winter, after a period of steadyfrost, a fall prognosticates a change of wind with rain and hail;whilst a rise announces the approach of snow.

  6. Rapid oscillations of the mercury either way are not to beinterpreted as indicating either wet or dry weather of any duration;continuance of either fair or foul weather is forecast only by aprolonged and steady rise or fall beforehand.

  7. At the end of autumn, after a period of wind and rain, a rise may beexpected to be followed by north wind and frost.

  Not merely had Dick got these rules by rote, but he had tested them byhis own observations, and had become singularly trustworthy in hisforecasts of the weather. He made a point of consulting the barometerseveral times every day, and although to all appearances the skyindicated that the fine weather was settled, it did not escape hisobservation that on the 20th the mercury showed a tendency to fall.Dick knew that rain, if it came, would be accompanied by wind; anopinion in which he was very soon confirmed by the breeze freshening,till the air was displaced at the rate of nearly sixty feet a second,or more[1] than forty miles an hour; and he recognized the necessity ofat once shortening sail. He had already used the precaution to take inthe royal, the main-top-sail, and the flying jib, but he now at onceresolved likewise to take in the top-gallant, and to have a couple ofreefs in the foretop-sail.

  [Footnote 1: This and several of the other rules are conciselyconcentrated in the couplet--

  Long foretold, long last; Short notice, soon past.]

  To an inexperienced crew, the last operation was far from easy; butthere was no symptom of shrinking from it. Followed by Bat and Austin,Dick mounted the rigging of the foremast, and with little trouble gotto the top-gallant. Had the weather been less unpromising he would havebeen inclined to leave the two yards as they were, but anticipating theultimate necessity of being obliged to lower the mast, he unriggedthem, and let them down to the deck; he knew well enough that in theevent of the gale rising as he expected, the lowering of the mast aswell as the shortening of sail would contribute to diminish the strainand stress upon the vessel.

  It was the work of two hours to get this preliminary operation over.There still remained the task of taking in the reefs in the top-sail.

  The "Pilgrim" in one respect differed from most modern vessels. She didnot carry a double foretop, which would very much have diminished thedifficulty attending the reefing. It was consequently necessary toproceed as before; to mount the rigging, by main force to haul in theflapping canvas, and to make the fastening secure. But critical anddangerous as the task was, it was successfully accomplished, and thethree young men, having descended safely to the deck, had thesatisfaction of seeing the schooner run easily before the wind, whichhad further increased till it was blowing a stiff gale.

  For three days the gale continued brisk and hard, yet without anyvariation in its direction. But all along the barometer was falling;the mercury sank to 28 deg. without symptom of recovery. The sky wasbecoming overcast; clouds, thick and lowering, obscured the sun, and itwas difficult to make out where it rose or where it set. Dick did hisbest to keep up his courage, but he could not disguise from himselfthat there was cause for uneasiness. He took no more rest than wasabsolutely necessary, and what repose he allowed himself he always tookon deck; he maintained a calm exterior, but he was really tortured withanxiety.

  For half an hour Negoro stood motionless.]

  Although the violence of the wind seemed to lull awhile, Dick did notsuffer himself to be betrayed into any false security; he knew only toowell what to expect, and after a brief interval of comparative quiet,the gale returned and the waves began to run very high.

  About four o'clock one afternoon, Negoro (a most unusual thing for him)emerged from his kitchen, and skulked to the fore. Dingo was fastasleep, and did not make his ordinary growl by way of greeting to hisenemy. For half an hour Negoro stood motionless, apparently surveyingthe horizon. The heavy waves rolled past; they were higher than thecondition of the wind warranted; their magnitude witnessed to a stormpassing in the west, and there was every reason to suspect that the"Pilgrim" might be caught by its violence.

  Negor
o looked long at the water; he then raised his eyes and scannedthe sky. Above and below he might have read threatening signs. Theupper stratum of cloud was travelling far more rapidly than thatbeneath, an indication that ere long the masses of vapour woulddescend, and, coming in contact with the inferior current, would changethe gale into a tempest, which probably would increase to a hurricane.

  It might be from ignorance or it might be from indifference, but therewas no indication of alarm on the face of Negoro; on the other handthere might be seen a sort of smile curling on his lip. After thusgazing above him and around him, he clambered on to the bowsprit, andmade his way by degrees to the very gammonings; again he rested andlooked about him as if to explore the horizon; after a while heclambered back on deck, and soon stealthily retreated to his ownquarters.

  No doubt there was much to cause concern in the general aspect of theweather; but there was one point on which they never failed tocongratulate each other;--that the direction of the wind had neverchanged, and consequently must be carrying them in the desired course.Unless a storm should overtake them, they could continue their presentnavigation without peril, and with every prospect of finding a portupon the shore where they might put in. Such were their mutual andacknowledged hopes; but Dick secretly felt the misgiving lest, withouta pilot, he might in his ignorance fail to find a harbour of refuge.Nevertheless, he would not suffer himself to meet trouble half-way, andkept up his spirits under the conviction that if difficulties came heshould be strengthened to grapple with them or make his escape.

  Time passed on, and the 9th of March arrived without material change inthe condition of the atmosphere. The sky remained heavily burdened, andthe wind, which occasionally had abated for a few hours, had alwaysreturned with at least its former violence. The occasional rising ofthe mercury never encouraged Dick to anticipate a permanent improvementin the weather, and he discerned only too plainly that brighter timesat present were not to be looked for.

  A startling alarm had more than once been caused by the sudden breakingof storms in which thunderbolts had seemed to fall within a few cables'lengths of the schooner. On these occasions the torrents of rain hadbeen so heavy that the ship had appeared to be in the very midst of awhirlpool of vapour, and it was impossible to see a yard ahead.

  The "Pilgrim" pitched and rolled frightfully. Fortunately Mrs. Weldoncould bear the motion without much personal inconvenience, andconsequently was able to devote her attention to her little boy, whowas a miserable sufferer. Cousin Benedict was as undisturbed as thecockroaches he was investigating; he hardly noticed the increasingmadness of either wind or wave, but went on with his studies as calmlyas if he were in his own comfortable museum at San Francisco. Moreover,it was fortunate that the negroes did not suffer to any great degreefrom sea-sickness, and consequently were able to assist their captainin his arduous task, Dick was far too experienced a sailor himself tobe inconvenienced by any oscillations of the vessel, however violent.

  The "Pilgrim" still made good headway, and Dick, although he was awarethat ultimately it would probably be necessary again to shorten sail,was anxious to postpone making any alteration before he was absolutelyobliged. Surely, he reasoned with himself, the land could not now befar away; he had calculated his speed; he had kept a diligent reckoningon the chart; surely, the shore must be almost in sight. He would nottrust his crew to keep watch; he was aware how easily theirinexperienced eyes would be misled, and how they might mistake adistant cloud-bank for the land they coveted to see; he kept watch forhimself; his own gaze was ever fixed upon the horizon; and in theeagerness of his expectation he would repeatedly mount to thecross-trees to get a wider range of vision.

  But land was not to be seen.

  Next day as Dick was standing at the bow, alternately considering thecanvas which his ship carried and the aspect presented by the sky, Mrs.Weldon approached him without his noticing her. She caught somemuttered expressions of bewilderment that fell from his lips, and askedhim whether he could see anything.

  He lowered the telescope which he had been holding in his hand, andanswered,--

  "No, Mrs. Weldon, I cannot see anything; and it is this Hiat perplexesme so sorely. I cannot understand why we have not already come in sightof land. It is nearly a month since we lost our poor dear captain.There has been no delay in our progress; no stoppage in our rate ofspeed. I cannot make it out."

  "How far were we from land when we lost the captain?"

  "I am sure I am not far out in saying that we were scarcely more than4500 miles from the shores of America."

  "And at what rate have we been sailing?"

  "Not much less than nine score knots a day."

  "How long, then, do you reckon, Dick, we ought to be in arriving at thecoast?"

  "Under six-and-twenty days," replied Dick.

  He paused before he spoke again, then added,--

  "But what mystifies me even more than our failing to sight the land isthis: we have not come across a single vessel; and yet vessels withoutnumber are always traversing these seas."

  "But do you not think," inquired Mrs. Weldon, "that you have made someerror in your reckoning? Is your speed really what you have supposed?"

  "Impossible, madam," replied Dick, with an air of dignity, "impossiblethat I should have fallen into error. The log has been consulted,without fail, every half-hour. I am about to have it lowered now, and Iwill undertake to show you that we are at this present moment makingten miles an hour, which would give considerably over 200 miles a day."

  He then called out to Tom,--

  "Tom, lower the log!"

  The old man was quite accustomed to the duty. The log was fastened tothe line and thrown overboard. It ran out regularly for aboutfive-and-twenty fathoms, when all at once the line slackened in Tom'shand.

  "It is broken!" cried Tom; "the cord is broken!"

  "Broken?" exclaimed Dick: "good heavens! we have lost the log!"

  It was too true. The log was gone.

  Tom drew in the rope. Dick took it up and examined it. It had notbroken at its point of union with the log; it had given way in themiddle, at a place where the strands in some unaccountable way had wornstrangely thin.

  Dick's agony of mind, in spite of his effort to be calm, was intenselygreat. A suspicion of foul play involuntarily occurred to him. He knewthat the rope had been of first-rate make; he knew that it had beenquite sound when used before; but he could prove nothing; he could onlymourn over the loss which committed him to the sole remaining compassas his only guide.

  That compass, too, although he knew it not, was misleading him entirely!

  Mrs. Weldon sighed as she witnessed the grief which the loss manifestlycaused poor Dick, but in purest sympathy she said nothing, and retiredthoughtfully to her cabin.

  It was no longer possible to reckon the rate of progress, but there wasno doubt that the "Pilgrim" continued to maintain at least her previousspeed.

  Before another four-and-twenty hours had passed the barometer hadfallen still lower, and the wind was threatening to rise to a velocityof sixty miles. Resolved to be on the safe side, Dick determined notonly to strike the top-gallant and the main-top-mast, but to take inall the lower sails. Indeed, he began to be aware that no time was tobe lost. The operation would not be done in a moment, and the storm wasapproaching. Dick made Tom take the helm; he ascended the shrouds withBat, Austin, and Actaeon, making Hercules stay on deck to slacken thehalyards as required.

  By dint of arduous exertion, and at no little risk of being thrownoverboard by the rolling of the ship, they succeeded in lowering thetwo masts; the fore-top-sail was then reefed, and the fore-sailentirely struck, so that the only canvas that the schooner carried wasthe reefed fore-top and the one stay. These, however, made her run witha terrific speed.

  Early on the morning of the 12th, Dick noted with alarm that thebarometer had not ceased to fall, and now registered only 27.9 deg.. Thetempest had continued to increase, till it was unsafe for the ship tocarry any canvas at al
l. The order was given for the top-sail to betaken in, but it was too late; a violent gust carried the sailcompletely away, and Austin, who had made his way to the fore-top-yard,was struck by the flying sheet; and although he was not seriously hurt,he was obliged at once to return to deck.

  Dick Sands became more uneasy than ever; he was tortured byapprehensions of reefs outlying the shore, to which he imagined he mustnow be close; but he could discern no rocks to justify his fears, andreturned to take his place at the helm.

  The next moment Negoro appeared on deck; he pointed mysteriously to thefar-off horizon, as though he discerned some object, as a mountain,there; and looking round with a malevolent smile, immediately left thedeck, and went back to his cabin.

  Under bare poles]