Part 47 (2/2)

She looked, and noticed that far and near the water was strewn with such fragments.

She was pausing for a second to consider, when she caught sight of a black object lying on the mud beside the sh.o.r.e, and with a short cry fell to rowing with all her strength. She guided the boat as nearly up to it as the mud allowed, and then, catching up her skirts, jumped into the ooze and waded.

It was Mr. Fogo; but whether dead or alive she could not say.

Down on the mud she knelt, and, turning him gently over, looked into his face. It was streaked with slime, and powdered with a yellowish flake, as of sand. His locks were singed most pitifully.

She started up, took him by the shoulders, and tried to drag him up to the firmer s.h.i.+ngle.

Mr. Fogo opened his eyes and shut them again, feebly.

”Not dead! Oh! thank Heaven you are not dead.”

With a sob she dropped again beside him, and brushed the flaked powder from his eye-lashes.

He opened his eyes again.

”Would you mind speaking up? I--I think I am a little deaf.”

”I thought you were dead,” she cried, in a louder tone.

”No-o, I am not dead. Oh! no; decidedly I am not dead. It--it was the Tea, I fancy.”

He added this apologetically, much as some gentlemen are wont to plead ”the salmon.”

Apparently believing the explanation sufficient, he shut his eyes again, and seemed inclined to go to sleep.

”The Tea?” questioned Tamsin, chafing his hands.

”Or the Honey, perhaps--or the Putty,” he answered drowsily.

Then, opening his eyes and sitting up with a start, ”Upon my soul, I don't know which. It _called_ itself Tea, but I'm--bound--to-- admit--”

He was nodding again. Utterly perplexed, Tamsin leant back and regarded him.

”Can you walk, if you lean on my arm?”

”Walk? Oh! yes, I can walk. Why not?”

But it seemed that he was mistaken; for, in attempting to start, he groped about for a bit and then sat down suddenly. Tamsin helped him to his feet.

The reader has long ago guessed the cause of the catastrophe. It was dynamite--conspirators' dynamite, and therefore ill-prepared.

Now dynamite, when it explodes, acts, we are told, with ”local partiality”; and of this term we may remark--

That it is given as an explanation by men of science, Without being a ”scientific” explanation; But is, in fact, a ”metaphysical” explanation, And therefore no explanation at all of The astonis.h.i.+ng fact that dynamite hits one thing and does not hit another.

In the case of Mr. Fogo, his top-hat had vanished, but the brim still clung to his head, like a halo. His spectacles and one boot had gone; the other boot was unlaced. His coat was split up the back, and his collar had broken away, but his tie was barely disarranged.

He has since declared that he left the schooner with two-and-sixpence in his trowser pocket, and came ash.o.r.e with two-and-a-penny; but this was in an account delivered to a scientific audience, and is thought to have been a joke.

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