CHAPTER XXXI.

A STARTLING APPARITION.

THERE was a second man in the boat, a negro also. He lay dead in the bottom, a dreadful sight, naked to the waist, and clothed with a pair of sailor's old drill trousers, the right leg discoloured by many blood-stains. He was twisted, as though his spine were broken, with his breast partly turned towards the stern of the boat, while his knees, which were drawn up, pointed forwards, and his face stared straight up, the eyes open like dull glass, and the skin of that indescribable sort of greenish ashen hue which a black face takes in death. The other fellow was on his back, as he had fallen, with his head in the bottom of the boat and his legs over the thwart. He still breathed, but I noticed the foam gathering upon his lips even as I looked for a moment or two at this terrible picture. He was dressed in a soldier's or marine's coat, a cloth round about his loins, and his lean shanks naked; an old ragged Scotch cap clung to his woolly head.

It would be impossible for me to tell you how this little ocean-tragedy was heightened by the element of the grotesque in it. There was no sail in the boat, no breaker that might have held water, no hint of the miserable creatures having sailed or been blown away with so much as a bite of biscuit. The oars were scarcely more Nc. 359.-vOL. LX.

than paddles, and evidently had not belonged to the little fabric. She was black outside and white within; clearly, as I had thought at the beginning, a ship's quarter-boat. The words Prince William were painted in small black letters on her stern, inside of her. Miss Grant overhung the craft in a posture of pity and horror.

"This poor fellow in the bows is still alive," she cried.

"I see that he is," said I; "we will help him in an instant; but the value of this boat signifies the worth of our lives, and we must make her a bit securer yet. Please pull at this rope as I pull."

I handed a bight of the line in the bows to her, and then put my hand on the gunwale at the head, and together we ran her another few feet out of the water, the wet keel slipping readily enough up the ivory-like grit of the sand. All this was done as swiftly as I can write it. I then jumped into the boat, and with some trouble, for he was an exceedingly heavy man, I raised the negro on to the thwart, and set his back against the mast. head lolled upon his shoulder like that of a person hanging. He looked at me with a gleam of intelligence in his bloodshot eyes, and his lips moved, but the merest rattle of noise trembled through the foam that filled his mouth. He raised his hand and pointed to his throat.

Y

His

"Why, of course!" cried I; "1 must have been mad not to perceive it. The poor fellow is dying of thirst. Will you get some water, whilst I keep him propped up here?"

She was off in a bound like a stag, and in the briefest imaginable time returned with a meat-tin full of water, which I put to the negro's lips; but the moment he tasted the cold of it against his mouth a frenzy seized him. He grasped the tin, throwing me from him with a jerk of his elbow that was like to have broken my back for me against the gunwale, and uttering a strange throaty cry that made one think of the yell of a hunted negro to the first leap of a bloodhound upon him, he drank the whole of the water at one draught—a full quart, as I should reckon, for the tin was a big one-let drop the vessel, flinging both his hands against his breast in the manner of a man furiously striking himself, stood bolt upright with a most mad and murderous look in his eyes as they met mine, ere they rolled right up till you saw nothing but their crimsoned whites, and then without a groan fell backwards across the other body and lay motionless.

I looked round at Miss Grant. "The draught has killed him, I fear," said I.

She turned away her head with her hands over her eyes. I kneeled down and grasped the poor wretch's wrist that showed like a bit of ebony forking out of the ragged sleeve of the red coat, but could feel no pulse. I next soaked a handkerchief in salt water, plucked the Scotch cap off his head, and bathed his brows, but nothing followed. Once a movement as of muscular contraction went in a twitch through him, but the drop of the jaw told me all I needed to learn.

It was proper however that I should let him lie for a while to make sure that he was dead, and so I stepped ashore, and to still further secure this precious gift that had come to us, I carried the end of the painter, which was a good long length of coir rope,

with the strands at the extremity showing that it had parted, to a tree which stood near the head of the creek, and secured it, then withdrew with Miss Grant to the shelter of some tufted heads of the cocoa to sit down and rest and think a little, and wait to observe if the man had actually expired.

My companion was greatly overcome. Dreadful indeed the sight was, but the pitifulness of it, I am almost ashamed to say, was largely qualified to my mind by the transport of joy with which I viewed the boat, and understood that the time of our deliverance -a chance not to have been dreamt of two or three hours before-had come to us. It needed but a very brief spell of thinking to arrive at how this thing had happened. As one who had used the ocean, I could not fail to see it all clearly and quickly. In fact the parted strands of the coir line told me the tale.

It was no painter, but such a rope as a boat would ride astern of a ship by. It had broken, maybe, in the gale that had stormed over us two nights before, and the boat had gone adrift with these negroes in her, without a sail, with a rudder that was without a tiller, without water, and without food.

I waited for some time, and went to the boat to have another look at the man, and then his appearance persuaded me that he was dead. I was heartily grieved that this should have been so, for now that he lay at rest he showed, methought, a very bland and honest countenance, besides being of a most muscular and robust make; and I felt that had he lived he might have proved of the utmost use to us, not as a pilot only, and as one perhaps who would know the situation of this island and its name, but as an assistant to help me to rig the fabric and navigate her. However, the truth lay before me; and I suppose these hard islandexperiences of ours having rendered me extremely prosaic and matter-offact in directions which at another time would have stirred all the senti

ment in me to its depths, I determined to deal with the bodies without ado. So looking around me, I picked up two good big stones, one of which I secured to the body of the man who had just died by the cloth round about his middle, whilst I attached the other to the second body in a manner I need not describe; then without saying a word to Miss Grant, who sat watching me, clearly understanding my intentions, I unhitched the line from the tree, shoved the boat afloat, and sculled her clear of the creek where the water was deep, and tumbled the bodies overboard. It was as odious a bit of necessary work as ever mortal man could put his hand to. Hot as the sun was, the job made me feel as cold as if the chill of an English November night were upon me; but I breathed more freely when I came to scull myself back to the shore, and when I stepped out with the end of the line in my hand, the earlier emotion of joy that the possession of the little craft had raised was again so active in my heart that I could scarce hold myself from singing like a boy at the top of my voice.

The morning was already advanced, and we had not yet broken our fast. I disliked the idea of turning my back upon the boat, lest on my return I should find her gone. However, her forefoot being hard and fast ashore, and the line in the bows secured to the trees, it was impossible that the flow of the tide in the creek could play me any ugly tricks with her; so we walked to our underground chambers to get some breakfast. I remember that our repast corsisted of cold turtlesteak, plantains, sweet oranges, and a draught of cold water from the brook. The stock of provisions that had been set ashore with us was now exhausted; we had a small quantity of spirits left, but the biscuit, tongues, preserved meat, and the like, were gone. Such a breakfast as ours was hardly fare to grow fat on, but it was wholesome and cool, and perhaps the sort of food that Nature intended for the use of such

human beings as should live in this island. It seems to me that the properest food for the people who inhabit a country is that which grows good for eating in it. Think of Broadwater's bill of fare, for instance, under such a dog-star as raged over the spot of earth we had been marooned upon !-roast pork, massive sausages, turbid pea-soup, and the atmosphere all the while so hot that you heard the spikes and leaves and tendons of the breathless vegetation quivering with tingling noises like the faint crackling in burnt paper, or in a sheet of tin curling to the roasting glare of a furnace! I was mighty sick of turtle, and so was Miss Grant, but then it was a sort of meat in its way, and combined to make out a meal with the fruit, which was too delicious to weary us. One helped the other, and rendered the whole diet nutritious; and maybe it was the simplicity of the fare that kept us well. We had been a long three weeks upon the island, yet Miss Grant had never once uttered a complaint of indisposition, whilst for my part I was almost unreasonably hearty in face of the heavy anxieties that weighed down my spirits.

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"Thank God," said I, with a look round the room, as I seated myself with my companion to our lenten meal, we shall soon be taking a long farewell of this most melancholy haunt. It would have been strange indeed if that ill wind the other night had blown us no good. A boat is the next best thing to a ship."

"How strange it is," she exclaimed, "to watch the working of the hand of fate! Ashore, it is an influence, a hidden government; but at sea it is as apparent as a billow, or the rising of a cloud. One saw that in the boat as she approached. Fate was at her helm; and if I were an artist, and desired to materialize the conception of fate and make it a visible thing, I should figure two people standing as we did, hopeless and imprisoned on this island, watching the boat coming out of the tiny blot it made in the

far blue distance, gliding towards us without a swerve, with a final complete surrendering of itself to us, as it were, through the death of the two poor creatures in it." Her fine eyes shone to the high religious mood that was in her. "Little wonder," she continued, "that we should always be saying God's hand is most plain on the deep. The Ancient Mariner was not mad when he spied the little barque with Death on board gambling with a woman for human souls. The sea is to me so much more wonderful than the land, that I believe I could credit any amazing thing that should be related of it. Where else does one come closer to one's Maker? Oh, Mr. Musgrave, it seemed to me like seeing the Divine finger itself when I watched that boat growing upon the calm sea, urged, as we know now, by dying hands."

She shuddered, and pressed her fingers to her temples. She had been overtaxed, nor was the horror wrought in her by the incident of the morning to be soothed by the deep excitement that the opportunity for escaping from this island brought with it. Hysteria, I thought, was bound to dog the heels of such moralizing as she had started on; so there was nothing for it but to be blunt and prosaic, though, but for the fear I had that the humouring of the mood she was in would be bad for her, I could have listened all day. It was not so much what she said as the thoughts which lay behind her words, which spoke in her face, making her beauty eloquent with the rich fancies flushing to her delicate cheeks, and flashing a brighter light yet into her

eyes.

"We shall have to go to work briskly," said I;" if all were prepared I would start at once."

She came back to herself with an effort, and brought her hands from her white brows with a faint smile, as if she understood what was in my mind concerning her.

"What is to be done, Mr. Musgrave, that I may know my share?" she asked.

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Well, first of all we must victual the boat," said I; "we have bottles enough for the storing of fresh water, and you can do a useful hour's work by hunting for the corks which we have drawn and thrown away, and fitting them to the bottles afresh. For food we must be content with the handsomest stock of craw-fish, fruit, and turtle that we can contrive. The boat wants a tiller; that is easily managed. She also wants a sail, which we shall have to manufacture out of your shawls. I must likewise make a yard for the sail, which may be got from a bough off one of the fallen trees. This done, our business will be to embark and head away west."

"It is a little boat for so great a sea," she said, in a low voice.

"Ay," said I, "but then the film of land that was visible from the crosstrees of the Iron Crown is not too far distant for her to fetch, and it will be mighty odd indeed if that streak of blue haze which the men talked about be not an inhabited island, with houses to lodge in, and the means of proceeding to Jamaica, which can't be far distant; whence our next departure will be for Rio and for Alexander."

She looked down suddenly, with the pearl of her teeth showing over the under-lip she slightly bit, then her eyes sought mine again with a soft gaze so full of inquiry that my heart seemed to stop for a breath, as though to catch the words that must follow her look; but she did not speak. I jumped up.

"I must go to work now," cried I; "in fact, it frightens me to think of the boat, lying half dry as she is, being unwatched."

She rose too, with the air of one starting from deep thought. "My business, then," said she, smiling, "is to look for corks, and fit them to the bottles?"

"If you please," said I.

For the rest of the day I worked very hard, stripped to my trousers and shirt, with my wide straw hat to shelter me, scarce intermitting my labour

but to eat and drink, and obtaining quite fortitude enough out of the prospect of getting away from this island with Miss Grant, to enable me to defy the intense heat. I found amongst the fallen trees the very bough to serve my turn, and without much difficulty I severed it with my little saw, trimmed it of its leaves, and proportioned it to the size of the required yard. I also cut a tiller for the boat. This work I was able to accomplish under the shelter of the trees. Miss Grant possessed several shawls of different textures and colours, and when she had collected the bottles, and gathered what corks there were to find, I set her tacking some of these shawls together into the shape of a sail, which she managed by perforating them with a bodkin, and then connecting them with tape, of which she had a little parcel. She made no trouble over mutilating her shawls, though I cannot but think that the first thrust of her bodkin into them must have caused her a pang. I cut off a short length of the coir-rope, and got yarns enough out of it to convert into as many robands as were necessary to connect the head of our queer sail to the yard. There was still plenty of line left for a tack and sheet and halliards, which I rove through a sheave in the head of the mast. My impatience gave me very great energy indeed. We had a good supply of fresh turtle, which needed boiling, and this, with other matters which it would only weary you to specify, gave my fair companion plenty to do. I was resolved not to quit the island without being well stocked with food; for should it come on to blow from the westwards, I foresaw that our sail would not help us, and that we should not be able to lie up to the wind more than six or seven points, so that we should stand to be blown away into the Atlantic eastwards, where we might spend days without a view of a ship.

When the cool of the evening came, I plucked some hundreds of plantains

and oranges, which I carefully stowed away in the little lockers aft that served as seats in the boat's stern; and I then fired a torch and waded into the sea for crawfish in the manner I have before described, meeting with a more plentiful harvest than had at any other time happened to me, insomuch that I had to give up stooping and throwing them to Miss Grant through sheer aching of my back, though the sandy bottom was still black with the dusky, lizard-like shapes of the creatures crawling into the light, when I extinguished my torch to step ashore. I also provided the boat with a stock of cocoa-nuts; but I never could discover a single turtle's egg, spite of my earnest exploring of the sand for several nights running during those three weeks.

We were wearied rather than sleepy when the darkness was deepening into midnight. There was a young moon in the sky, with a wire-like waving of silver under her in the gloaming sea that spread very darkly to the stars. I had still several bundles of cheroots left, and lighting one of them, I brought our camp-stools close down to the wash of the ocean, for the cool of the atmosphere upon the water, and to get away from the trees, in whose shadows the suffocating air of the day seemed to linger as though imprisoned. This was to be our last night on the island, and neither of us could think yet a while of shutting ourselves up underground. The outline of our boat stood clear like a sketch in ink against the sand on the other side of the creek.

"We shall have much to tell," said I, "when we are released from this place; more than many will think credible, I dare say. 'Tis almost like some old Arab yarn, this marooning of a young man and a lady, the old piratical lair underground yonder, the incident of the monkey, and strangest of all, at least to my mind, the arrival of that boat there this morning with its tragic burden of dead and dying blacks. What will Alexander think?'