Part 2 (1/2)
I picked up a five-pound note, two sovereigns, and soe
”Seven pounds, nine and a halfpenny,” I said ”Yes, that's about what it was”
”That's all right I took care of it for you Here's your watch and chain I ventured to open the pocket-book to find out your identity
Now, if you'll take et up and join us at breakfast”
I took it, and soon the captain and I and the broad red man, as the chief mate, and rejoiced in the narilled chops and mashed potato--for the fresh meat supply had not yet run out--ever tasted better The while we discussed the situation
”The nearest point I could land you at would be the Canaries,” the captain was saying, ”and I daren't do that My owners are deadly particular, and it ot a family to support”
”Well, I haven't,” I answered, ”so I wouldn't allow you to take any risk of the kind onto But-- what about passing steamers?”
The two sailors looked at each other
”The fact is,” went on the captain, ”it's blowing not only fresh, but strong The glass is dropping in a way that points to the next few days finding us with our hands all full After that we shan't sight anything much this side of the Cape, and it'll hardly be worth your while to transhi+p then I'm afraid you'll have to e with us”
I recognised the force of this, and that it was a case of resigning h s of events But forand hu of that invite I should never have found is, or even have heard of such a place; and now here I was, after a perilous experience, launched upon the high seas, bound for a distant colony, and that without any will of ot there, I could always arrange a return passage I had so, unless I chose to live upon ould aes of an artisan
Therefore there was nothing to cause me serious anxiety, unless it were that my berth would probably be filled up But, as I have hinted, the tenure of it was somewhat precarious, so some consolation lay that way, and I could doubtless find another So I reasoned, forgetting that after all we are blind and helpless instruments in the hands of Fate, a lesson which ht well have re experiences, perilous and otherwise, lay between now and when I should once ood sailor, at any rate, Mr Holt,” said the captain, breaking in uponseasick,” I answered ”It didn't occur to ht then If we've done, I would suggest a turn on deck If we get a bad blow, you et there for a while, so better make the most of it now”
CHAPTER THREE
SOUTHWARD
A stirring and lively scene reat waste of roaring tu off into foa under the keel and roar on afresh in a limpses of sickly sunshi+ne strove here and there to pierce White gulls hovered and darted, squealing; and, thrown out in a cloud of proud ainst the inky sky to the ard, a homeward-bound shi+p, under a full spread of canvas, was thundering over the boil of billows, dashi+ng the white spray before her in cataracts
From the poop-deck I could see for the first time what manner of craft I was in The _Kittiwake_ was an iron steaed; and the water was pouring fro of the green seas So up the foresail to the accompaniment of a shrill nautical chant, and the broad red one up to relieve the second e To a landsman's eye, the aspect of the weather quarter looked black and threatening to the last degree, and it hardly needed the captain's warning that a dusty time, which would keep all hands busy, was in front of us
”You were saying you had no incubus in the matter of family dependent on you, Mr Holt,” the captain remarked as we paced the short poop-deck, which was literally, as he put it, fisherman's walk--three steps and overboard ”But I hope you've left no one behind who'll be anxious about you”
”Not a soul,” I answered ”I have no friends, only relations, and their only anxiety--at least, on the part of one of two of the nearest--will be as to how soon they can file claihed drily at this, and there was a twinkle of sympathetic fun in his eyes
”After them, the most anxious person will be the man who let me the boat,” I said ”But I can coht of Bindley, and how ht possibly spoil his holiday; but then, I didn't suppose it would He was one of those o about by themselves; in fact, I wondered why he hadthat his idea of coo to sleep h dinner No, he wouldn't ive him matter to oraculise upon
The next three days were so to rehts either hove to or going dead slow I had been through rough weather before, but never such an experience as that, and, to tell the truth, never do I want to again Black darkness, only qualified by a di below--thunderous roaring, crashi+ng and poundings as though the shi+p were being ground in pieces between two s And then the inert uncertainty of it! Every upheave seeh the shi+p were already on her way to the bottom The steward and I stole furtive looks at each other from white faces as we moved about, nearly knee-deep in water, and I think the sae was going to be the last Seriously, that momentary expectation of death, condemned the while to utter inaction and surrounded by every circu tu as can find place in anybefore the recollection of it passed froet the scene that greeted my first appearance on deck, after the subsidence of the stor the spick-and-span so boat, wonderfully clean and shi+p-shape, now had all the appearance of a wreck Everything movable on her decks had been swept away Three out of her four boats were gone, and the green seas careat breach in her bulwarks Crates of poultry and a live sheep alike had disappeared, and she wore the aspect of a woe-begone hulk However, we had weathered the gale, and the engines had stood out nobly
The captain and chief mate, too, looked hardly the sah still broad, could no longer be described as red The long spell of sleeplessness and terrible anxiety had told upon them, and the eyes of both were dull and opaque
I did not address the the first time that lu of the gale