Volume Ii Part 49 (2/2)
Elinor wept, and a silence of a minute ensued. ”His poor mother, and his sister!” she exclaimed at length.
”His two mothers, rather,” said Harry, with a faltering voice.
After another silence, Elinor turned to Hazlehurst with an anxious look, saying:
”And your other friends?”
”All safe; love.”
”The crew too?”
”One of the crew is lost; Black Bob, a sailor from Longbridge.”
”I remember him; he had no family I believe, Aunt,” she said.
”None, my child, that I have ever heard of.”
”The heaviest blow has fallen upon the Hubbards,” said Harry.
After a pause, in which aunt and niece had prayed for the mourners, Elinor again made some inquiries.
”Were all in the Petrel at the time?” asked Elinor.
”Smith and our poor Charlie, the negro and a boy were crossing a bay in the Petrel, when she capsized, by the bad management of the negro, who had been drinking. The rest of us were on sh.o.r.e.”
”You were not in any danger then?” said Elinor, as if relieved that he had not even been exposed to past peril.
”I owe my life to my friend Van Horne,” he replied.
Elinor shuddered, and turned deadly pale again. Harry threw his arms about her and embraced her fervently, until Elinor, who had now partially recovered the common current of her ideas, made a gentle struggle to release herself.
”But you were not in the Petrel?” she said again, as if anxious to understand all that related to him.
”We all went to our friends as soon as we saw the schooner capsize,” said Harry.
”Hubert de Vaux told me that Harry swam some distance, with the hope of saving poor Charles, who could not swim himself,” said Miss Agnes. ”It was in that way, my child, that he was exposed.”
”To save Charlie!--that was like you,” said Elinor, with a glow on her cheek.
”There was no danger--no merit whatever in doing so--I have often swum farther,” said Harry; ”the only difficulty was caused by my becoming entangled in some ropes, which drew me under water.”
”But where was the boat?”
”It was not at hand at the moment; they brought it as soon as possible.”
”Did Charlie speak?” asked Elinor, sadly.
”My poor friend was insensible when I reached him.”
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