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Devon Boys: A Tale of the North Shore, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 14. Just In Time |
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_ CHAPTER FOURTEEN. JUST IN TIME "Ahoy, lad!" he shouted. "Shove a scull over the stern, and scull her this way." This roused me, and I jumped up to seize a scull, but felt giddy and nearly fell, for Bob Chowne had hold of my wrist. "Take hold of the gunwale, Bob," I panted, as I tried again, and this time felt better, getting an oar over behind, and sending the boat along, as I had learned to years before. It was slow and awkward work, with Bob hanging on to the side with his eyes fixed, and his face white; but I got her along, and before I had been sculling many minutes, a great brown hand was thrown over on the opposite side to where Bob clung, and Jonas Uggleston said hoarsely: "Lay in your oar, mate, and lean over, and take hold of Bigley here. Get your arm well under him. That's right. Keep his head out of the water. I'm about beat for a bit." I obeyed him in a dreamy way, getting Bigley's arm over into the boat, while I knelt down and put mine round him, and held him close to the side. "Can you hold on, youngster?" said old Jonas hoarsely. This was to Bob Chowne, who stared at him wildly, and did not speak. "Nice chance for me," growled old Jonas. "There, hold fast, my lads. I'm going to get in over the starn." The boat rose and fell and rocked as he came round, passed me hand over hand, to pause by the stern, and I thought he was going to climb in; but he altered his mind, and went on round by where Bob Chowne clung, held on with one hand, while he thrust his right arm under the water, and the next moment he had hoisted Bob right up and rolled him over into the boat, where he lay for a few moments apparently quite helpless. "Now, young Duncan," said old Jonas, "you hold him fast. I'll get in this side. She won't go over." It was done in a moment; he let himself sink down, and turn, gave a spring as I turned my head round to watch him; the gunwale of the boat seemed to go down level with the water, and he was on board, while, before I could realise it, he was bending over me to get his arms under poor Big's and drag him into the boat, this time sending the gunwale so low that a quantity of water came in as well. Old Jonas set his son up in the stern with his back against the rowlock, and it was no easy job, for Big was limp, and tremendously heavy; but the bumping about seemed to do him some good, for, just as I was about to ask in a voice full of awe if he was dead, poor Bigley uttered a low groan. "Hah! He's coming to, then," said old Jonas, panting heavily, as he seated himself on the middle thwart. "Here, you young doctor, take that pannikin, and bale out some of that water you're lying in. You don't want another bath, do you?" Bob Chowne got up on to his knees in the bottom of the boat, shivering and blue, and stared wildly at us all in turn. "Cold, eh?" growled old Jonas. "Well, then, I'll bale, and you two row to the lugger." He glanced round at his son, who was showing signs of returning animation; but it evoked no sympathy before us, whatever he might have felt, for he only frowned as, in a shivering mechanical way, we two wretched boys seized an oar apiece, sat down on the wet thwarts and began to row. "Now, then," shouted old Jonas, "look where you're going. Pull, doctor! Easy, captain! That's better." Between his words he kept sending out pannikins of water rapidly to ease the boat, for it was above our ankles as we sat and pulled. "Nice fellows all of you!" grumbled old Jonas. "Why, you all look blue. Fool's trick! Who put it up?" "I--I don't know what you mean, Mr Uggleston," I said. "Who proposed to swim off to the lugger? Was it Bigley?" "N-no, Mr Uggleston," I panted, half hysterically, as I tugged at the oar, an example followed by Bob Chowne, who was very silent and very blue. "Soon as I get you aboard, I'll give you all a good rope's-ending, and chance what your fathers say," grumbled old Uggleston, as he sent the water flashing over the side. "I suppose it was my Bigley as set you at it, wasn't it?" "No, sir," I said, as I rapidly grew more composed now. "We were on the rock yonder, and had to swim for it. We wanted to get to shore." "And the current took you out, eh? Of course it would. Then you weren't swimming for the lugger, eh?" "Oh, no, sir," I cried; "we had forgotten all about the boat." "Then, where were you going to swim to--Swansea?" he cried. "I don't know, sir," I said dolefully. "No more do I," he snarled. "'Cross the sea to Ireland, eh? And no biscuit and water. Ah, you ought to be all rope's-ended. How came you on the rock?" I told him. "Lucky I saw you all standing on it white-skinned against the black rocks. I see you all dive in and took my spy-glass, and see you swimming this way, and when I told Binnacle Bill, he said just what I thought, that you was swimming out to the lugger, and wouldn't do it, and so I took the boat and come to you, and I'm sorry I did now." "Sorry, sir?" I said. "Ay, sorry. You're a set o' young swabs. What's the good of either of you but to give trouble. Here, where are your clothes? Under the cliff?" "No, sir," I said dolefully. "We undressed on the big flat rock there, and tied them up in bundles." "Bundles? Where are they then?" "Lost mine," said Bob, speaking for the first time. "Oh, you're coming round then, are you?" cried old Jonas. "You've lost yours then; and has my Bigley lost all his kit?" "Yes, sir; we've all lost our bundles, unless they get thrown up by the tide." "Which they won't," snarled old Jonas. "Rope's end it is, for if I don't thrash that big ugly cub of mine as soon as I get him aboard, I'll--Now then, what are you yawing about that way for? Easy, captain! Pull, doctor, will you? Now, both together. Regular stroke. That's better. And so's that," he said, as he scooped out the last few drops of water with the tin pannikin, and finished off by sopping the remaining moisture with a piece of coarse flannel stuff which he wrung out over the side. Bob and I did not speak, but tugged at our oars, as absurd-looking a crew as was ever seen upon the Devon coast, while we kept looking pityingly at poor Bigley. Poor fellow! He had placed his arms one on either side, resting upon the gunwale, and appeared to be hard set to keep his head up from his chest. Then he had one or two violent fits of coughing, and ended by sitting back in the bottom of the boat with a weary sigh and closing his eyes. "Look, sir, look!" I cried in agony, for I thought Bigley must be dying. "Well, I am looking at him, boy. He's coming round. I can't do anything for him here, can I? Pull hard, you young swabs, both of you, and let's get aboard. I don't know what folks want to have boys for." We rowed hard, bending well to our oars, and after a few minutes I ventured to speak again, for Bigley looked terribly ill. "Do you think he's getting better, sir?" I said. "Better, boy? Yes," he said, not unkindly, for I suppose my anxiety about his son moved him. "He'll be all right when I've warmed and laced him up with the rope's end. I'm going to make you all skip as soon as I get you aboard and there's room to move." "But he looks so ill, sir," I said, quite ignoring the rope's-ending. "Of course he does, my lad. So would you if you had gone down as far as he did, and swallowed as much water. Easy. In oars." I did not know we had rowed so far, but just then the boat bumped up against the side of the lugger, and old Jonas rose, took the painter as he stepped into the bows, and handed it to Binnacle Bill, whose grim old face relaxed into a grin as he saw our plight. "What have you got, Master Uggles'on?" he said. "White seals?" "Ay, something o' the sort," grumbled old Jonas. "Here, boys, on board with you." We needed no second order, but scrambled over the side into the lugger, while, at a word from his master, Binnacle Bill unbolted the piece of the lugger's bulwarks that answered the purpose of a gangway, and as, by main force, old Jonas lifted up Bigley, the old sailor leaned down, put his arm round the poor limp fellow, and lifted him on deck, where he lay almost without motion. The next thing was to make fast the little boat astern, after which Binnacle Bill seized the tiller, the sails filled, and the boat began to glide through the sunny sea, while Bob and I picked out the sunniest spot we could find, and watched old Jonas as he bent over Bigley and poured a few drops of spirit between his teeth from a bottle he had fetched from the little cabin. "Rowing's put you two right," said Jonas. "Ah, I thought that would do him good." Certainly it did, for in a few minutes' time Bigley was able to sit up in an oil-skin coat of his father's, while we two were accommodated with a couple of Jersey shirts, which when worn as the only garment are nice and warm, but anything but becoming. The little lugger tacked and tacked again before we could make the mouth of the Gap; and, probably because he was too busy over Bigley and the boat, old Jonas said no more about the rope's end, but ran us right in over the pebble bar into the little river, when Binnacle Bill was sent over to our cottage to fetch some clothes for me and Bob, he being about my size, and till they came we lay in old Jonas's bed. Then a tremendous tea was eaten, Bigley being well enough to join in, and afterwards in cool of the evening old Jonas rowed us round and along the coast to see if we could pick up our bundles; but they had either sunk or gone off to sea, and we returned without. Bigley was evidently very poorly, but he wouldn't give up, and started to walk part of the way back with us. I noted one thing as we were going. Bob Chowne and I held out our hands to say "Good-night," and to thank old Jonas for saving our lives. "Oh, it was nothing," he said, shaking hands very warmly with Bob Chowne, but taking no notice of mine. "It's all right. Good-bye, lads, but don't do it again." We said we would not, and started off home, where we both expected severe scoldings; but before we had gone fifty yards up the cliff path old Jonas hailed us with a stentorian, "Ahoy!" "What is it, father?" shouted Bigley. "Bring those boys back," roared old Jonas. "I forgot to give 'em the rope's end." I need not tell you we didn't go back. But when we parted from Bigley half a mile further on, I said to him: "Why wouldn't your father shake hands with me?" "Hush! Don't take any notice," said Bigley in low voice; "he's very angry still about Captain Duncan buying the Gap and finding the silver mine. That's all!" "That's all!" Bigley said. But it was not. _ |
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