He made a step forward as he spoke, but in a moment the man’s fingers were around the boat’s plug.
“You’ll settle me, will you?” cried he. “ – your eyes! Come a step furder, and I’ll out with this plug, and send us all to the bottom, with the boat under us!”
Jack stopped where he was, for he saw that the fellow would do as he said; had he done so, the boat would have filled and gone down in a minute.
When Jack stopped, a laugh went up from all around, for it was plain to see that the men were in sympathy with Hitch. This made the fellow feel inclined to go a step further, for he felt bold when he saw Jack pause.
“If you don’t put the boat’s head to the shore,” said he, “I’ll pull out the plug, anyhow!”
“Tom,” cried Jack, passionately, “give me the tiller; if they will drown for a pack of lubberly fools, let them drown and be – d!”
“For heaven’s sake, Jack!” cried Tom; “think what you’re about. You’ll drown us all. Let me hold the tiller!”
But Jack was blind and deaf with his passion, and would listen to nothing. Tom struggled with him as long as he was able; holding on to the tiller with might and main, fighting him off, and pleading with him all the while.
I suppose that they must have fought for two or three minutes, and the boat was nearly swamped more than once with their struggles. At last Jack wrenched Tom’s hands away and seized hold of the tiller, for a great part of Tom’s strength had gone from him, because of long and hard exposure, which seemed to have told more upon him than on Jack.
The men appeared to be pretty well frightened by this time, and Hitch had taken his oar again. In a moment Jack had put the boat’s head toward the shore.
“Pull lively now, my hearties,” said he, grimly, “for you’ll have a tough pull of it before you get to that beach over yonder.”
Just before they came to the outer line of breakers, Jack put the cutter’s head about so as to let her beach stern foremost.
Tom knew that the cutter would never get through the breakers. There was not the tenth part of the tenth part of a chance of it; therefore he flung off his coat and kicked off his shoes, so as to be in readiness when the time should come. There was not much of the raging and the lashing of the surf to be seen from the sea. Now and then a spit of foamy water would shoot high up into the air from the recoil of the waters on the hard sand, but they could not tell what the full wrath and roaring of the great breakers were until they had gotten fairly in amongst them.
Jack did all that a man could do to get that boat to the beach. He tried rather to keep it off than to urge it too rapidly toward the shore. He did his work well, for he had brought the cutter through the first line of breakers, and into the second – but he got her no further.
A monstrous wave, fully twelve feet high, a solid mountain of green water, came rushing toward them, its crest growing sharper and sharper, and seeming to mount higher and higher as it swept toward the shore.
“Pull for your lives!” roared Jack, in a voice of thunder. But it was no use, for the next instant the breaker was on them. For a moment Tom had a feeling of spinning toward the shore, with the green water towering ten feet above him; then it arched slowly over, there was a crash and a roar, and he was struggling in a whirling, watery blindness.
Over and over he rolled, grasping at the sand every now and then, but all the time feeling himself as helpless as a rat in the tumultuous swirling of the water. Presently he felt himself being sucked out again. Faster and faster he went, as the undertow gathered force in its rush. For a moment he gained his feet, and bore with all his strength against the outgoing water. The sand slid from beneath his heels, till he must have sunk three inches into it. For an instant he had a half-blinded vision of Jack Baldwin, fifteen or twenty feet nearer to the shore than himself. Then came another crashing roar, and he was whirled over and over and round and round, like a feather in the water. A great feeling of utter helplessness came over him; for a moment his lips came to the surface and he gave a gurgling cry.
Out went the undertow again, and out went Tom with it, only to meet another breaker and to be again whirled by it toward the beach. By this time he had given up struggling, and everything was sliding away from him.
All of a sudden he felt himself clutched by the shirt. Once more came the horrible dragging of the undertow, but this time some one was holding him against it. Everything was glimmering to his sight, but he felt that he was being dragged up on the beach, and at last that he was lying on the dry sand, face up, and Jack Baldwin panting alongside of him.
PART II
CHAPTER X
IN this story of Tom Granger I have undertaken to divide that which I am writing into chapters and parts, in the same manner that novel writers sometimes divide their novels and tales. I find that it keeps me more steadily to my course, so that, though I wander now and then from the matter in hand, I always get safely back to my bearings again. If you will go with me to the end, you will find that I have spun my yarn to the last word, though it may be in my own fashion.
Every one has read tales of shipwreck and of lonely islands, and there is generally something romantic and even pleasant in them; but in real shipwreck there is nothing either romantic or pleasant; neither is a desert island a cheerful place to dwell upon. I say this because I wish you to understand why it is that I do not intend to give you a long account of the life that they led at this place.
Nevertheless, I would not have you think from that which I have just written that Tom and Jack were altogether miserable during the year and a half that they lived there. Many times they were sick at heart looking for the aid that was so long in coming; but there were other times when they were full of hopes, and times when they were even happy. Neither was the place a barren, desolate, dreary sand waste, such as are many of the Bahama Islands. They saw many curious and beautiful things during the time of their living there. As an instance I may say that when Tom came away he brought with him a parcel of as handsome shells as ever I saw in all my life. They are now piled upon the mantle-shelf in my parlor. I have them before my eyes as I write these words. There is a large one upon the centre-table that has a full-rigged ship wrought upon it. It was carved with a jack-knife, and it shows the work of many idle moments, when Tom sat beside the fire in front of their hut at night, with Jack Baldwin for company.
Oftentimes a great longing has come upon Tom to visit the old place once more, and to see those things again which he learned to know so well. As I sit here now, and close my eyes, I can see many of them with my inward sight. I can even see them more clearly than when the memory of them was fresh and green, for, as the eyes of one’s body become dim and blurred, the eyes of memory become ever sharper and keener, so that not even the smallest thing escapes their sight. So now I can see the place that was Tom’s home for sixteen months so long ago, as plainly as though I had left it only yesterday. I can see the cave in the side of the sand-hill, the cutter turned bottom up for the roof, and the screen of woven grass that hung in front to keep the rain from beating in. I can even see the tame sea-gull sitting on the keel of the upturned boat.
Oftentimes, as I sit smoking my pipe after my dinner, I slide off into a doze, and sometimes I dream of all these places – of the sand-spit where they found the half-buried wreck that brought them so strange a fortune; of the long, narrow tongue of sand beyond, where, at low tide, the flamingoes always stood in a line, like so many red-coated British soldiers; of the coral reef where they fished; of the beach where the turtles came to drop their eggs, and of other things, all of them seeming pleasant as I look at them down through the distance of the past. So I should like to see the old place once more with my mortal eyes, though I may never hope to do so now, for my sands are nearly run.
But, though the place may seem pleasant to me after all these years, it was not an island such as one reads of in novels and stories; it was not a place upon which one would choose to live all one’s years, and Tom Granger was tired enough of it before he got through with it, I can tell you.
My neighbors profess to be very fond of listening to me when I get started in upon spinning yarns about Tom Granger’s life on the island, and I think that not only do they profess to be fond of it, but that they really are so.
My dear old friend, the late Doctor White, used to come regularly every Saturday night, winter or summer, clear or foul, and the first thing that he would say was:
“Come, Tom, spin us a yarn;” or, “Let us hear one of your traveler’s lies, Tom.” (This, you understand, was merely a piece of pleasantry upon his part.) Then straightway I would begin upon some yarn, while he would sit opposite to me across the fire, listening to me and smoking his pipe the while. I must say, though, that he had a nasty habit of interrupting me with experiences of his own, for he had been assistant surgeon aboard the Pimlico, in the South Atlantic, from 1836 to 1838, and he had seen a few little trivial things which he would tell me, though I had heard them a score of times before, and though they were not nearly as interesting as those things which I would be telling him.
However, that is neither here nor there, and I find that I am again wandering from the point in hand. What I began to say was, that, though my neighbors are always glad to listen to my yarns, and though they tell me that they are both interesting and instructive, I will not give a long and full account of Tom’s and Jack’s daily life upon the island on which they were cast, for this narrative concerns other matters of more import, and I thank my stars that I am able to bridle my tongue, being, as I said before, no great talker.
Tom and Jack were the only ones of all the crew of the cutter that were cast alive on the island. The first day or two of their life thereon was as bitter and miserable as could be. All this would be both painful and unpleasant to tell, as well as needless, and, therefore, I will pass it by. By the time that a month had gone, they were settled as comfortably as could be, considering what they had at hand to make themselves comfortable.
The body of the island was about five miles in length, and about two miles or two miles and a half in breadth at the widest part. From the lower and easterly end a long, sandy hook ran out into the ocean. It was the continuation of the eastern beach, and, with the south shore of the island, it enclosed a smooth, deep bay or harbor, in which even the largest ships could have ridden at anchor easily and comfortably.
On the Atlantic side of this sand-spit, and close to where it joined the body of the island, was the sunken wreck that afterward had so much to do with Tom’s fortunes, and of which I shall soon have more to tell you. The eastern side of this hook or beach was of sloping sand, washed up by the continual beating of the surf. The western, or bay side, was an abrupt coral reef. This coral reef was covered with barnacles, so that there were always plenty of fish to be caught along that shore during the slack water or the young flood.
Up and down the length of the eastern shore, and following in a line with the beach, was a ridge of white sand hills. A number of scrub trees grew along the crest of this ridge, and it was these trees or bushes that the lookout in the cutter had first sighted. In the south-western end of these sand hills Jack and Tom built their hut.
The lower end of the chain of white hills made a sudden turn to the westward, and not far from where they fell away to the level of the beach was a thicket of underbrush, with half a dozen palmetto trees growing in the midst of it. Near to the edge of this thicket a spring of clear, cool water bubbled up out of the white sand, and slid away through thick grasses and sedge until it found its way through a marshy little flat into the bay.
It was close to this spot that they chose to live, and thither they dragged the cutter from the place where she had been flung on the sand, two or three miles further up the beach. The boat had been stove in beyond all hopes of repairing, especially as they had no tools to mend it with, excepting their jack-knives and two rude chisels that Tom afterward made from rusty bolts which they picked out of the ribs of the wreck on the sand-spit. But, even if they had had a whole boat-builder’s outfit, and planks to spare, I doubt if the cutter could have been mended, for not only had the bottom been stove in, but the bow had been smashed into splinters.
The loss of the cutter was one of their bitterest sources of regret during their life on this place, for now and then they could see the looming of land not more than twenty miles away toward the southward. They could easily have reached it in a day’s time, if the boat had been sound and whole. As it was, she would never float again, so they dragged her down the beach and patched her with grass and mud, and used her for a roof to cover them at night, for they found that the dews were heavy at some seasons of the year. It took them over a fortnight to move the boat from where she had been thrown to the place where they built their home, three miles away. It was heavy work hauling it across the sand, but, as I said, by the time that a month had gone, they were pretty comfortably settled, and were feeling quite at home in their quarters.
In front of them was the long, narrow hook of white sand, over which the air danced and quivered when the hot sun beat down upon it. It curved out into the dark water for a mile, like a long, slender hook, cutting off the bay from the open water beyond. To the right of them was the bay shore of the island, the silvery sand strewn thickly with many-colored shells as far as the eye could reach. About three hundred yards away was the buried wreck. At that time nothing was to be seen of it but the ribs, that just showed above the sand like a row of dead, blackened stumps. From this wreck they obtained iron spikes, which Tom fashioned into rude tools and ruder fish-hooks.
Such was the scene that they had before their eyes for all those sixteen months, unchanged, excepting as storm or calm would change the face of things; and the same monotonous sound was always in their ears – the eternal “swash! swash!” of the ground swell on the shell-strewn beach below the hut, sounding unceasingly through the deep, heavy thundering of the Atlantic breakers to the eastward.
Day followed day in an unchanging round – now fishing and now hunting gull’s eggs. The fishing was done in the morning, when the tide was good. During the hot afternoons they would lie on the sand, in the shade of the cutter, looking out to sea, talking lazily, and now and then dozing. It was a helpless, listless life, and as time wore along, I doubt if they would have known what day or month or even what year it was, if Tom had not kept a score of the days as they passed, by marking them on the side of the cutter with his jack-knife – a short mark for week days and a long mark with a cross for Sundays. By this means they contrived to know how time was going with them.
This enforced inaction was one of the bitterest trials to them. I have known times when, while they were sitting still, Jack would burst out into a sudden volley of imprecations. Tom would never give way in this manner; – perhaps it would have been a relief to him if he had. When the darkness of despair would settle over him, he would leave Jack, and walk up and down the beach by himself; perhaps for hours at a time. During all the time that the Nancy Hazlewood was sinking under him, Tom had thought little of Patty, and had wondered at himself in a dull sort of a way; perhaps it was the press of work that was then upon him, that drove her out of his mind, or rather blunted the keenness of the thought of her. But now, in the listless idleness of his life, he thought of her, and thought of her continually. Her presence was always with him, and at times his longing for her was so deep and keen, that his heart ached with it. Often in the night time he would lie on the dark, lonely sand, looking up at the stars, saying nothing, but thinking of Patty and of his home, with a longing so strong, that sometimes he was nearly crazy with the yearning of his home-sickness. At other times the gloominess of a deep despair would settle over him in a dark cloud; then, perhaps, he would say to himself, “Supposing that I do get back to my home again, what good will it do me? I have been given a year in which to earn seven hundred and fifty dollars; it may be two years before I am taken off of this sand spit, – what chance is there of my earning that much here?” Then, maybe he would get up and walk away, pacing up and down the beach by himself, cursing the fortune that had thrown him on this land, and sometimes even selfishly wishing that he could die, and be rid of all the troubles that beset him. During such moods Jack would leave him alone, for he saw that Tom was thinking of things, and was not to be talked to or interfered with; – he had grown to have a strangely high regard and respect for him; very different from the way in which he used to look upon him. He seemed to have a dim idea that Tom’s troubles were deeper than his own, but why they were greater, he did not know, for Tom never talked of Patty to him. So Jack always let him alone, and, though he would follow him with his eyes, he never ventured a word at such times.
I would not have you think that Tom was twiddling his thumbs all this time, and idly wishing that he could get away without doing anything further than to wish.
During the fall they built a raft; it took them nearly a month and a half to make it, for they had no tools to work with, but two rude chisels and two jack-knives, one of which (Jack’s) had the point broken off of it. But after they had spent all the time in the making of the raft, it turned out to be of no use, excepting to fish off of in the bay during fair weather, so all their labor was for nothing.
They had great ideas of it at first, and one day when the wind was fair, and the day clear and bright, they undertook to sail away upon it to the island to the southward. Tom had fashioned a pair of oars out of a palmetto tree, and he and Jack had made a sail out of the coarse sea-grass that covered the island; these had cost them vast labor, but they found that with oars and sail together, they did not get their clumsy craft along at the rate of a mile an hour. I doubt if they ever could have reached the island under the best of circumstances; as it was, they met a current a couple of miles to the southward, that swept them out to sea. They were fully six hours in getting back to land; even then it was a chance that they got back at all, nor would they have done so if a wind had not luckily sprung up from the south. After that they were content to remain where they were.
They also set up a signal: it was a palmetto tree with a bush lashed to the top of it; beside this they built a pile of brush to fire at night, in case any vessel should appear in the offing at evening time. They added to this brush heap, from day to day, until it was as high as a hay stack.
Once, during the latter part of that autumn, a dead porpoise was washed up on the beach toward the lower part of the sandy hook. This was a Godsend to them as a means to let their condition be known to the outside world, for of the skin of this porpoise they made a number of bags or bladders, which they set adrift at different times, when the wind was fair for carrying them away. In these air bladders Tom put a map of the island, its bearings (as nearly as he could judge), and word of their condition. All this was drawn and written on two strips of bark, and was done with the point of a red hot piece of iron. This was the wording of the written part:
The ship Nancy Hazlewood of Philadelphia was lost at sea on the 26 of Apl.
1813. The 1st & 2d mates by name John Kent Baldwin and Thomas Granger were wrecked on ths. Islnd. If you are a Christn. come to thr. aid.
This I have copied from a slip of bark that Captain Williamson afterward gave me.
Thus they settled and lived on the island with little of interest happening in their lives, until the great hurricane of 1814 came upon them. This was great in itself, but it brought that with it which let them have no more idle days for a long time to come.