Part 8 (2/2)
”Was no one saved?”
”None but ourselves.”
”And the s.h.i.+p?”
”Is a hopeless wreck on the sands,” he answered.
As they rose to gaze upon their surroundings, John Stevens thought with regret that if the crew and pa.s.sengers had remained below hatches, they would have been saved; but he and Blanche were all who remained, and he turned his gaze to the wild sh.o.r.es hoping to discover some sign of civilization. There was not a hamlet, house or wigwam to indicate that Christian or savage inhabited the land.
Blanche marked the troubled look on his face and asked:
”Do you know where we are?”
”No.”
The sh.o.r.e was wild and rocky, and on their right it was covered with a dense growth of tropical trees. Farther inland rose two towering mountains. The beach directly before them was low and receding. A long, level plain, covered with a dense growth of coa.r.s.e sea-gra.s.s, was between them and the hills, which were covered with palms, maguey and other tropical trees.
John feared that they had been wrecked on the coast of some of the Spanish possessions and would be made captives and perhaps slaves by the half-civilized colonists.
They could not live long on the wreck, and he began to look about the deck for some means of going ash.o.r.e. The pinnace which had been stowed away between decks was an almost complete wreck. It would have been useless had it remained whole, for John and his companion could not have launched it. There was a small boat hanging by the davits, which had sustained no other injury than two holes in its side. He was a fair carpenter, and getting some tools from the carpenter's chest, he mended the boat. After no little trouble, he lowered the boat and, a.s.sisting Blanche into it, pulled to the sh.o.r.e half a mile away.
It was a sh.o.r.e on which no human foot had ever trod. The great black stones which lay piled in heaps along the coast to the northeast until they were almost mountain-high forbade the safe approach of a vessel.
The entire coast was armed with bristling reefs to guard it against the approach of wandering s.h.i.+ps. It was almost miraculous that they had been driven in between the reefs at the only visible opening. A hundred paces in either direction their vessel would have been forced upon the rocks.
”Is this country inhabited?” asked Blanche, when they had landed, and made fast their boat to a great stone.
”I fear not,” he answered; ”or, if inhabited, it is probably by savages.”
”Should that be true, ours will be a sad fate.”
”I will not desert you,” he answered.
They sat down on the dry white sand to rest and gazed at the wreck, with its head high in the air and its stern low in the water.
”We made a mistake in not bringing some arms to defend ourselves against savages or wild beasts,” said John.
”Can we not go back for them?”
”Would you be afraid to remain on the beach while I went?” he asked.
She said she would not, though he noticed her cast nervous glances toward the thickets and forests inland. As he pushed out once more into the shallow waters lying between the beach and wreck, she came down so close to the water's edge that the waves almost touched her toes.
”You won't be long gone?” she called in a low, sweet voice, trembling with dread.
”No.”
He reached the wreck and went on board by means of broken shrouds lashed to the gunwale. The sun shone as brightly and the sky was as peaceful as if no storm had ever swept over it. The deck was almost dry, and, the hatches having been fastened, John was agreeably surprised to find but little damage done by the water. He went down to the companion-way and found less water in the hold than he expected. He brought out two muskets, a pair of pistols, a keg of powder, and bullets enough for his arms. The guns and the pistols were all flint-locks, for at this time matchlock and wheel-lock had about gone out of use.
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