The Adventures of Billy Topsail

"I wonder," Bobby thought, "if I'll get home before mornin'. 'Tis hard t' say. I might have t' lie out here all night. Sure, I hope it gets no thicker."

He rowed on towards Ruddy Cove, taking new bearings from time to time as the deeper shadows of the headlands loomed out of the dark of the night. Thus, he followed the coast, making with great caution for the narrow entrance to the inner harbour, which invariably was hard to find at night or in the fog.

The sea was breaking against the rocks. The noise was loud in Bobby's ears, and served to guide him at such times as the headlands were indistinguishable from the clouds. His progress was slow and cautious; for he knew the dangers of the way he must take.

There was a line of submerged rocks – The Wrecker, Old Moll and Deep Down – lying out from Iron Head, directly in his path. That neighbourhood was a neighbourhood of danger. When the lad caught sight of the strange outline of Iron Head, he swerved the bow of the boat to sea and paddled out. He wanted to make sure of rounding Deep Down, the outermost rock – of giving it a wide berth.

But the night and the noise of the breakers confused him. He could not tell whether or not he had gone far enough. At length he decided that he must be safely beyond the rock. But where was Deep Down? Often he paused to turn and look ahead. Every glance he cast was more anxious than the one before. He was getting nervous.

"'Tis hard t' tell if the sea is breakin' on Deep Down," he said to himself. "Sure, it must be, though."

It was important to know that. Sometimes only the larger swells curl and break as they roll over Deep Down. Bobby knew that just such a sea was running then. Had it been daylight, the green colour and the slight lifting of the water would have warned him of the whereabouts of that dangerous reef. But it was night; the spray, as the wave was broken and flung into the air, and the swish and the patter, as the water fell back, were the signs he was on the lookout for.

If, then, the waves broke only at long intervals, the punt might at any moment be lifted and overturned. It might even then be floating over the rock. Bobby's heart beat faster when the greater swells slipped under the boat. Would they break beneath him? Would they break near at hand? He paddled slowly. It was better to be cautious, he thought, until he had Deep Down located. So he listened and looked as he paddled on.

At last he heard the significant swish and patter. He flashed about to look ahead. But he was too late. The spray had fallen and disappeared.

"'Tis somewheres near," he thought, "and 'tis breakin'. But whether t' port or starboard, I don't know."

Again – and apparently from another quarter – he heard the noise of a breaking wave. He turned in time to catch sight of a gleam of phosphorescence off the port bow.

"If that's Deep Down," he thought, "I'm safe. But if 'tis Old Moll or The Wrecker, I'm somewheres over Deep Down. I wisht I knowed which it was."

What was it? The Wrecker, Old Moll or Deep Down? Which one of the three rocks that lay in a line off Iron Head?

"I wisht I knowed," Bobby muttered, as he bent anew to the oars.

In the meantime, old Sol Sludge, of Becky Sharpe's cove, which lies beyond Iron Head, had started for Ruddy Cove by the goat paths to tell Skipper John Matthews that he would take a berth in the schooner Rescue when she got back from the Labrador.

He had a candle-lantern to light the way. When he had crossed the Head and was bound down the valley to meet the Ruddy Cove road, he heard a cry for help. It came from the sea, with a soft southwest wind which had sprung up – a sharp "Help! Help!" ringing out of the darkness again and again. Old Sol listened stupidly, until, as from exhaustion, the cries turned hoarse and weak.

"Now, I wonder who's out there," the dull old fellow thought. "It sounded like a woman's voice. Sure, it may be the spirit o' Mary Rutt. She was drowned off Iron Head."

Nevertheless, he made haste to Ruddy Cove – all the haste his old legs and dim sight would permit – and told the folk that he had heard the cry of a spirit drift in from the sea off Iron Head. But nobody believed that.

Who was in the water off Iron Head? was the question that passed from cottage to cottage. Was it Billy Topsail? No; for Billy told the folk in person that he had come in from the grounds at twilight. Was it Josiah Seaworthy? No; for Josiah's wife said that he had gone by way of Crooked Tickle to Burnt Harbour.

Who was it? Had Eli Zitt's little partner got back from Fortune Harbour? When Eli Zitt heard of that cry for help he knew that Bobby's punt had been overturned on one of the Iron Head rocks. Like a woman's voice? That surely was Bobby's – that clear, full voice. So he called for a crew to man the skiff, and in five minutes he was ready to push off.

Old Bruce jumped aboard.

"Get out with you!" said Bill Watt, aiming a kick at him by the light of the lantern.

"Sc-ctt!" cried old Tom Topsail.

But Bruce was a practiced stowaway. He slunk forward, and found a refuge under the bow seat.

"Push off, lads!" Eli shouted. "Give way!"

In ten minutes the skiff had passed from the harbour to the sea. Eli Zitt, who worked the scull oar, turned her bow towards the Iron Head rocks. It was dark; but he had fished those waters from boyhood, and he knew the way, daylight or dark.

Dark it was, indeed! How was Bobby to be found in that great shadow? He was a water-dog, was Bobby; but there was a limit to his endurance, and half an hour at least had passed since old Sol Sludge had heard his cry for help.

A long search meant failure. He must be found soon or he would not be found at all. On went the boat, the water curling from her bows and swirling in her wake. The phosphorescence flashed and glowed as the oars were struck deep and lifted.

"He'll be swimmin' in," Bill Watt panted, when the skiff had covered half the distance to Deep Down. "They's no place for him t' land with this sea on. We ought t' meet him hereabouts."

"If he's afloat," Topsail added.

"Oh, he's afloat yet," Eli said, confidently. "He's a strong swimmer, that lad is."

"I'm thinkin' he'll be nearer shore," said Bill Watt.

"No, no! He's further out an' on."

"Bobby!" Topsail shouted. "Oh, Bobby!"

There was no reply. For a moment the rowers lifted their oars from the water. Silence was all about – from the boat to the shore rocks, where the waves were breaking. The cries for help had ceased.

"Gone down," Bill Watt muttered.

The men gave way again. Again they paused to call Bobby's name, and to listen, with anxious hearts, for some far-off, answering cry. Again they gave way. Again they called and called, but heard no answer.

"Gone down," Bill Watt repeated.

"Give way, lads!" cried Eli. "He's further out."

Old Bruce came out from hiding. He crawled to the stern seat and sniffed to windward. Then, with his nose pointed astern, he began to howl.

"Shut up, you!" Topsail exclaimed.

But Bruce could not be quieted – not even after Topsail's boot had caught him in the side and brought a sharp howl of pain. Still he sniffed to windward and barked.

"Throw him over," said Bill Watt. "We'll not be able t' hear Bobby."

"Oh, if 'twas only light!" Eli groaned, not heeding Watt.

But it was dark. The water was covered with deepest shadow. Only the breakers and the black outline of Iron Head could be seen. Bobby might be swimming near at hand but too far off to send an audible shout for help.

"Bobby – oh – Bobby!"

If a cry in answer had gone up, the barking of the dog drowned it. The dog must be quieted.

"Push the brute over!" said Watt.

Watt himself dropped his oar and stepped to the stern. He took Bruce unaware and tumbled him into the water. The old dog made no protest. He whined eagerly and swam out from the boat – a straight course astern.

"Now, what did he do that for?" mused Watt.

"That's queer," said Topsail.

Eli looked deep into the night. The dog left a luminous wake. Beyond, in the direction the dog had taken, the man caught sight of a phosphorescent glow. Watt saw it at the same moment.

"What's that?" said he. "They's fiery water, back there!"

"Man," cried Eli, "the dog knowed! Sure, it must be Bobby, swimmin' up, an' too beat out t' cry. Fetch her about, lads. We're on the wrong course. Haste! He'll not be able t' last much longer."

Eli was right. The dog had known. It was Bobby. When they picked him up he was too much exhausted to speak. It was afterwards learned that he had mistaken the spray of the Old Moll breaker for Deep Down and had been turned over by the outer rock when he thought himself safe. He had heard the call of his name, and had seen the lantern of the rescuing skiff, as it drew near; but, long before, he had worn his voice out with screaming for help, and could make no answer. He had heard the barking of Bruce, too; had known its significance, and had wondered whether or not the dog would be understood. But all that he could say, when they lifted him aboard – and that in a hoarse, weak whisper – was:

"Bruce!"

At that moment the crew heard a piteous whine near at hand. It was Bill Watt who pulled the exhausted old dog over the gunwale.

"Good dog!" said he.

And so said they all.

CHAPTER XIII

In Which Billy Topsail Sets Sail for the Labrador, the Rescue Strikes an Iceberg, and Billy is Commanded to Pump for His Life

IT was early in the spring – a time of changeable weather when, in the northern seas, the peril of drift-ice, bergs, snow, wind and the dark must sometimes be met with short warning. The schooner Rescue, seventy tons, Job Small, master, had supplied the half-starved Labrador fishermen with flour and pork, and was bound back to Ruddy Cove, in ballast, to load provisions and shop goods for the straits trade.

Billy Topsail was aboard. "I 'low, dad," he had said to his father, when the skipper of the Rescue received the Government commission to proceed North with supplies, "that I'd like t' see the Labrador."

"You'll see it many a time, lad," his father had replied, "afore you're done with it."

"An' Skipper Job," Billy had persisted, "says he'll take me."

The end of it was that Billy was shipped.

The Rescue had rounded the cape at dawn, with all sails set, even to her topmast-staysail, which the Newfoundlanders call the "Tommy Dancer"; but now, with the night coming down, she was laboriously beating into a head wind under jib and reefed mainsail.

"I'm fair ashamed t' have the canvas off her," said Skipper Job, after a long look to windward. "'Tis no more than a switch, an' we're clewed up for a snorter."

"They's no one t' see, sir," said the cook. "That's good; an' sure I hopes that nothin' heaves in sight t' shame us."

"Leave us shake the reef out o' the mains'l, sir, an' give her the fores'l," said the first hand.

"We're not in haste, b'y," the skipper replied. "She's doin' well as she is. We'll not make harbour this night, an' I've no mind t' be in the neighbourhood o' the Break-heart Rocks afore mornin'. Let her bide."

The weather thickened. With the night came a storm of snow in heavy flakes, which the wind swept over the deck in clouds. There was nothing to relieve the inky darkness. The schooner reeled forth and back on the port and starboard tacks, beating her way south as blind as a bat. There was no rest for the crew. The skipper was at the wheel, the first hand on the lookout forward, the cook and the two other hands standing by on deck for emergencies.

So far as the wind, the sea and the drift-ice were concerned, the danger was slight, for the Rescue was stoutly built; but the sea was strewn with vast fields and mountains of Arctic ice, – the glacier icebergs which drift out of the north in the spring – and in their proximity, in their great mass and changing position, lay a dreadful danger.

"Sure, I wisht you could chart icebergs," said the skipper to the cook. "But," he added, anxiously, "you can't. They moves so fast an' so peculiar that – that – well, I wisht they didn't."

"I wisht they wasn't none," said the cook.

"Ay, lad," said the skipper. "But they might be a wonderful big one sixty fathom dead ahead at this minute. We couldn't see it if they was."

"I hopes they isn't, sir," said the cook, with a shiver.

The snow ceased before morning; but at the peep of dawn a thick fog came up with the wind, and when the light came it added nothing to the range of vision from the bow. The night had been black; the dawn was gray. It was so thick that the man at the wheel could not see beyond the foremast. The lookout was lost in the fog ahead. Eyes were now of no more use than in the depths of a cloudy night.

But the schooner had weathered the night; and when the first light of day broke in the east, Skipper Job gave the wheel to the second hand, and went below with the cook to have a cup of tea.

"I've no mind t' lose her," said he, "so I'll leave her bowl along under short sail. If we strike, 'twill be so much the easier."

"'Twould be a sad pity t' lose her," said the cook, "when you've got her so near paid for."

"Ay, that's it," said the skipper.

The Rescue had been built for young Skipper Job, after Skipper Job's own model, by the Ruddy Cove trader. The trader was to share in the voyages – whether for Labrador fish or in the Shore trade – until she was paid for. Then she would belong to Skipper Job – to the young skipper, who had married the parson's daughter, and now had a boy of his own for whom to plan and dream.

That was the spring of his energy and caution – that little boy, who could no more than toddle over the kitchen floor and gurgle a greeting to the lithe young fellow who bounded up the path to catch him in his arms. The schooner was the fortune of the lad and the mother; and she was now all so nearly Job's own that another voyage or two – a mere four months – might see the last dollar of the obligation paid over.

"No," Skipper Job repeated, absently, when he had thought of the toddler and the tender, smiling mother, "I've no mind t' lose this here schooner."

Job dreamed of the lad while he sipped his tea. They must make a parson of him, if he had the call, the skipper thought; or a doctor, perhaps. Whatever, that baby must never follow the sea. No, no! He must never know the hardship and anxiety of such a night as that just past. He must be —

A scream of warning broke into the dream:

"Har-rd-a-lee!"

Skipper Job heard the fall of the feet of a man leaping back from the bow. There was meaning in the step, in the haste and length of the leaps – the imminence of a collision with the ice.

"All hands!"

The skipper had no more than leaped to his feet when there was a stunning crash overhead, followed on the instant by a shock that stopped the schooner dead and made her quiver from stem to stern. The bowsprit was rammed into the forecastle, the deck planks were ripped up, the upper works of the bows were crushed in, the cook's pots and pans were tumbled about, the lamp was broken and extinguished. Job was thrown from his feet.

When he recovered, it was to the horror of this darkness and confusion – to a second crash and shock, to screams and trampling overhead, and to a rain of blows upon the deck. He cried to the cook to follow him on deck, and felt his way in mad haste to the ladder; but there he stopped, of a sudden, with his foot on the lowest step, for the cook had made no reply.

"Cook, b'y!" he shouted.

There was no answer. It was apparent that the man had been killed or desperately injured. The skipper knew the danger of delay. They had struck ice; the berg might overturn, some massive peak might topple over, the ship might fill and sink. But, as a matter of course, and with no thought of himself as a hero, he turned and made a groping search for the cook, until he found the poor fellow lying unconscious among his own pots and pans. Thence he carried him to the deck, and stretched him out on the fore hatch, with the foreboom and sail to protect him from the fragments of ice, which fell as in a shower each time the schooner struck the berg.

Billy Topsail caught the skipper by the arm in a strong grip.

"We're lost!" he cried.

The roaring wind, the hiss of the seas, the shock and wreck, the sudden, dreadful peril, had thrown the lad into a panic. The skipper perceived his distress, and acted promptly to restore him to his manhood.

"Leave me free!" he shouted, with a scowl.

But Billy tightened his grip on the skipper's arm, and sobbed and whined. The skipper knocked him down with a blow on the breast; then jerked him to his feet and pointed to the pump.

"Pump for your life!" he commanded, knowing well that what poor Billy needed was work, of whatever kind, to give him back his courage.

CHAPTER XIV

Faithfully Narrating the Amazing Experiences of a Newfoundland Schooner and Describing Billy Topsail's Conduct in a Sinking Boat

THE deck of the Rescue was now littered with wreckage and casks. Splinters of the jib-boom, all tangled with the standing rigging, lay upon the forward deck. The maintopmast had snapped off, and hung from the mainmast in a tangle of wire and rope. They had already cut the mainsail halyards, and the big sail lay upon the boom, on the port side, in disarrayed folds.

The bows were high out of the water, as if the ship had run up a steep, submerged shelf of ice; and the seas, which the wind of the night had raised, from time to time broke over the stern. It was impossible, however, to determine the general situation of the schooner. The fog was too thick for that, and the day had not yet fully broken. All that was revealed, in a glance about, was that upon one hand lay a waste of breaking water, and upon the other a dull white mass, lifting itself into the mist.

"'Tis bad, lads," said the skipper, when the first and second hands had joined him under the mainmast shrouds.

"She's lost," said the first.

"We'll be takin' t' the boat," said the second.

"I'm not so sure that she's lost," said the skipper. "Whatever, we'll not take t' the boat till we have to."

The first and second hands exchanged a glance, and together looked at the boat. The swift glance and look were a danger-signal to the skipper.

"Does you hear me?" he shouted, his voice ringing out above the wash of the waves and the noise of the wind. "We'll not leave her. Take a spell at the pump, both o' you!"

For a moment the skipper's authority was in doubt. The men wavered. A repetition of the command, however, with clenched fists ready to enforce it, decided them. They relieved young Billy.

"Is the water gainin', b'y?" said the skipper to the lad.

Billy looked up steadily. The fright had left his eyes. He had recovered his self-possession.

"No, sir," he said, quietly. "'Tis gettin' less all the while."

At that moment the ship lurched slightly and slid off the shelf. The skipper shouted an order to raise the foresail, and ran aft to take the wheel. But the fall of the topmast had so tangled the rigging and jammed the gaff and boom that before the crew could remove the unconscious cook and lift the sail, the wind had turned the schooner and was driving her stern foremost, as it appeared, on the ice.

The skipper, from his station at the wheel, calmly observed the nearing berg, and gave the schooner up for lost. There was no time to raise the sail – no room for beating out of danger. He saw, too, that if she struck with force, the quarter-boat, which was swinging from davits astern, would be crushed to splinters.

"She's lost!" he thought. "Lost with all hands!"

Nearer approach, however, disclosed the strange fact that there was a break in the ice. When the schooner was still a few fathoms nearer, it was observed that the great berg was in reality composed of two masses of ice, with a narrow strait leading between them.

The light was now stronger, and the fog had somewhat thinned; it was possible to distinguish shadowy outlines – to see that great cliffs of ice descended on each side of the passage to the water's edge. Still deeper in the mist it was lighter, as if the strait indeed led directly through the berg to the open sea beyond. The crew was gathered aft, breathlessly awaiting the schooner's fate, helpless to fend or aid; and the cook was lying on the roof of the cabin, where they had laid him down, revived in part, and desperately struggling to recover his senses.

"Lads," said the skipper, at last, "the Lord has the schooner in His hands. They's a way through the ice. He's guidin' her into it, but whether He'll save us or not, He only knows."

The Rescue drifted fairly into the passage, which was irregular, but in no part less than twice the width of the vessel. She was swept on, swinging from side to side, striking her bow here and her stern there; and with every shock fragments of rotten ice fell in a shower from above.

How soon one might strike one of their number down, no man knew. How soon some great mass, now poised in the mist, might be dislodged and crush the schooner in its fall, no man knew. How soon the towering cliffs might swing together and grind the ship to splinters, no man could tell. Were these masses of ice connected deep down under water? Or were they floating free?

There were no answers to these questions. On went the schooner, stern foremost, slipping ever nearer to the open.5

"Skipper, sir," the first hand pleaded, "leave us launch the quarter-boat an' pull out. 'Tis – 'tis – too horrible here."

"Ay, lads, if you will," was the reply.

It was then discovered that a block of ice had fallen in the boat at the bows, and sprung the planking. She was too leaky to launch; there was nothing for it but to wait.

"We'll calk those leaks as best we can," said the skipper. "They's no tellin' what might – "

The stern struck a projection, and the bow swung round and lodged on the other side. The schooner was jammed in the passage, almost broadside to the wind. They made a shift at calking the leaks with rags and a square of oiled canvas. At all hazards the schooner must be freed.

"We must get her off quick, lads!" the skipper cried. "Come, now, who's going with me in the boat t' tow?"

"I, sir," said young Billy, stepping forward eagerly.

"I, sir," said the first hand.

"So it is," said the skipper. "Andy, Tom, when we hauls her bow off, do you stand here with a gaff an' push. Lower away that boat, now! Billy, do you fetch a bucket for bailin'."

The boat was launched with great difficulty from her place in the stern davits. She began at once to fill, for the calking had been ill done, and she was sadly damaged. It took courage to leap into her from the taffrail, leaky as she was, and tossing about; but there was a desperate sort of courage in the hearts of the men who had volunteered, and they leaped, one by one.

Billy fell to bailing, and the skipper and the first hand rowed forward to catch the line. The line once caught and made fast, they pulled out with might and main.

"She's fillin' fast, sir!" Billy gasped.

"Bail, b'y, bail!"

The tow-rope was now taut. The skipper and the first hand pulled with such strength that each stroke of an oar made a hissing little whirlpool.

"'Tis gainin' on me fast, sir," said Billy.

"Give way! Give way!" cried the skipper.

The bow of the schooner swung round inch by inch – so slowly that the sinking of the boat seemed inevitable.

"She'll sink, sir!" said Billy, in alarm, but still bailing steadily.

"Pull! Pull!"

When the schooner was once more in her old position – stern foremost, and driving slowly through the passage – the water was within an inch of the seats of the boat, which was now heavy and almost unmanageable. Twenty fathoms of water lay between the boat and the bow of the schooner.

"She's goin' down, sir!" said Billy.

"Cast lines!" the skipper shouted to those aboard.

Water curled over the gunwales. The boat stopped dead, and wavered, on the point of sinking. Two lines came whizzing towards her, uncoiling in their flight. The one was caught by the first hand, who threw himself into the water and was hauled aboard. Billy and the skipper caught the other. With its help and a few strong strokes they made the bow chains and clambered to the deck.