Marjorie

by Justin H. McCarthy

  CHAPTER XXIII

  WE GET TO THE ISLAND

  Even if we had lost a better man than Jensen it would have been our dutynone the less to work hard the next day to get our rafts ready and fitfor sea. Very few men are indispensable to their fellows, and certainly,as far as making the rafts was concerned, it would have been far moreserious if Abraham Janes, the carpenter, had taken it into his head tothrow himself overboard than that Cornelys Jensen had taken it into hishead to do so. Yet, in a manner, too, we missed Cornelys Jensen. He wasan able man, full of all kinds of knowledge, and he had a domineeringway with the seamen which they seemed to recognise and to obeyunflinchingly. These fellows, for the most part, took the tidings of hisdeath very indifferently. Some of them seemed to miss him as a traineddog might miss his master. Some, again, seemed scarcely to miss him atall. One or two, and especially the fellow who saw the death and themanner of it, seemed to take the matter very greatly to heart, and to goabout with a sad brow and a sullen eye in consequence.

  As for Lancelot and myself, I must say that we soon grew to accept hisloss with composure. There was so much to do that there would have beenlittle time for a greater grief than either of us could honestly wear.The weather was mending hourly, and the rafts were making rapidprogress. By the end of that day they were finished and ready for thesea.

  By this time, so strange are the chops and changes of the weather inthat part of the world, the sea and sky were as gentle as on a summer'sday. I have heard the phrase 'as smooth as a mill-pond' applied to saltwater many a thousand times, but never, indeed, with so much truth as ifit had been applied to the ocean that day. It lay all around us, onetranquillity of blue, and above it the heavens were domed with an azurefretted here and there with fleeces of clouds, even as the water wasfretted here and there with laces of foam. In the clear air we could seethe islands ahead of us sharply dark against the sky, and as we watchedthem our longing to be at them, to tread dry land again, was so great asto be almost unbearable. Those who have lived on shore all their livescan form little or no idea of the way in which the thoughts of a man whois tasting the terrors of shipwreck for the first time turn to a visibleland, and how they burn within him for longing to walk upon turf orhighway once again in his jeopardised life.

  Now, the rafts that we had constructed were by no means ill-fashioned.That ship's carpenter, Abraham Janes, was a man of great parts in histrade. I never in my life saw a handier man at his tools or a defter atdevices of all kinds. The poor old Royal Christopher had timber enoughand to spare for the planks that were to make our rafts, and we had agreat plenty of idle rope aboard in the rigging wherewith our fallenmast was entangled. So there was no lack of material, and when our mensaw that there was really and truly a prospect of escape there was nolack of willing hands to work. So by the end of the time I have alreadyspecified we had two large and serviceable rafts ready to try theirfortunes upon the ocean that was now so tempting in its calm.

  It was a matter of some little surprise to us who were on board the shipthat with the calm weather Captain Amber made no further attempt to comeout to us. But there was no sign of a sail upon the water, although wewatched it eagerly through the spy-glass; and we were sorely puzzled toimagine what could have happened to our leader, for that he could beforgetful of or indifferent to our danger it was impossible to believe.

  The rafts being now ready and the weather so propitious, nothing wasleft for us but to commit them, with ourselves and all our belongings,to the water, in the hope of making the shore with them. They were eachof them capable of holding our whole number and a quantity of suchstores as were left on board. These latter, therefore, divided into twoequal parts, we proceeded to put upon the rafts as quickly as we could,together with as many barrels of water as we had. Each of the raftscarried a stout mast and sail, and in the absence of any wind could bepropelled slowly over such a smooth water as that which now lay aroundus by means of oars. The stores and water barrels we adjusted in such away as to preserve as nicely as might be the balance of the rafts.

  We effected the transfer of our stores and provisions with very littledifficulty, and embarked all our party, also without any difficultywhatever. In obedience to Lancelot's resolution, which he had privatelycommunicated to me beforehand, we divided our forces into two parties.That is to say, half of the sailors were set on each raft, and with eachraft half of our armed men; for though we had little or no apprehensionnow that there would be any trouble with the sailors, we still deemed itbest to let them see very plainly that we were and meant to be themasters. I went on the one raft, Lancelot--and of course Marjorie withhim--upon the other, and when all was ready we pushed away from theRoyal Christopher and trusted ourselves and our fortunes to our newequipages.

  There was happily little danger, even little difficulty, about theenterprise. The rafts were well made; they rode on the waters likecorks. What little wind there was blew towards the islands, and the seawas as placid as a lake, so that the men could use their big oars easilyenough. It was indeed slow work to paddle these great rafts along, butit was quite unadventurous, so that I have little or nothing to recordof note concerning our journey. Little by little the Royal Christophergrew smaller and smaller behind us, with her great mast sticking out sosadly over her side; little by little the island loomed larger andlarger on our view. At last, after a couple of hours that were the mostpleasurable we had passed for many days, we came close to the island,and could see that the colonists were all crowded together upon thebeach, waiting to receive us.

  The island was very large, rocky, and thickly wooded, and the coast wasrocky too, and the water very shoaly, which made me understand howdifficult landing must have been in the stormy weather. But now, withthe sea so fair and the weather so fine, we had little or no difficultyin getting ashore, and with the eager assistance of the colonists weresoon able to effect the landing of all our stores and belongings.

  Our first great surprise on our arrival was to see no sight of CaptainAmber amongst those who were gathered upon the beach to receive us. Buthis absence was soon explained in reply to our anxious inquiries. Itseemed that a great spirit of discontent prevailed among the colonistsupon that island, and that they upbraided Captain Amber very bitterlyfor being the cause of their misfortunes: as is the way withweak-spirited creatures, who have not the heart to bear a commonmisfortune courageously. To make a long story short, they insisted thathe must needs endeavour to find some means of rescue for them by gettinginto the sea track and persuading some ship to come to their aid andtake them from the island; which certainly was a disconsolate placeenough, especially for people who were always ready to make a poor mouthover everything that did not please them. As the sailors who were withCaptain Amber sided with the colonists in this matter, he had no choicebut to consent; and as his vessel was fairly sea-worthy, he and hispeople had departed, in the hope of meeting some ship to bring allsuccour. Captain Marmaduke was, it seems, most loath to depart while wewere in such a plight on board of the Royal Christopher; but there wasno help for it, for his men were almost in open mutiny, and would havecarried him on board would he or no. So he had sailed away and thecolonists were all hopeful, in their silly, simple way, that he wouldsoon return in a great ship and carry them to a land as lovely as adream, where all their wishes would be fulfilled for the asking, andwhere each man would have his bellyful of good things without theworking for it. For that was, it seems, the notion most of these fellowshad in their heads of poor Captain Amber's Utopia.

  I had begun to perceive by this time that a very large number of thosethat had come out with Captain Amber aboard of the Royal Christopherwere but weak-spirited creatures, and such as might be calledfair-weather friends. So long as all was going well and there was aprospect before them of a prosperous future and everything they wanted,they were supple enough and loud to laud the good gentleman who wasconveying them to comfort. But with the break in our luck their praisesand their patience went in a whiff, and they showed themselves to besuch a par
cel of wrong-headed, grumbling, disheartened and dispiritingknaves as ever helped to shake a good man's courage. They were as readyto imprecate Captain Amber now as they had been to load him with praisesbefore, and in this they were supported by all the worser sort--andthese were the greater part--among the sailors that had stayed with thecolonists. But with Lancelot's arrival upon the island he soon put astop to all loudly expressed grumbling--or at least to all grumblingthat was loudly expressed in his hearing. There were some good fellowsamongst the colonists, and the old soldiers were staunch and sturdyfellows, who adored Captain Amber, and Lancelot after him. So, as we hadthese with us, we made the grumblers keep civil tongues in their heads,aye and work too to the bettering of our conditions. The first partyhad made themselves some huts and now we made more for ourselves whowere new-comers, with tents of a kind out of sail-cloth that we hadbrought from the ship, and for Lancelot a large double hut covered withsome of this same cloth for him and Marjorie to dwell in. And, Lord!what a joy it was to see how Marjorie bestirred herself making herselfas good a lieutenant to Lancelot as Captain's heart could desire. But wewere all so busy that in those hours on that island I seldom had speechwith her, for my care was chiefly with those discontented and weaklingswho were so eager to complain and make mischief.

  It seemed to me then that the best man of all that pack was the womanBarbara Hatchett. For while the colonists were making poor mouths overtheir plight and piping as querulously as sparrows after rain, and whilethe sailors were for the most part sour and sullen, Barbara took her lotwith cheerfulness, and had smiles and smooth words for everybody andeverything. She had even smiles and smooth words with me, who hadexchanged no speech with her beyond forced greeting for this many a day.For she came up to me laughing once, at a time when I stood alone andwas, indeed, thinking of Marjorie who was busy in her hut at some taskthat Lancelot had set her. Barbara began to banter with me in a way thatseemed strange with her, saying that I was fickle like all my sex, thatI was sighing for fair hair now, who had doted on black locks a fewyears ago, and much more idle talk to the same want of purpose. At lastshe asked me bluntly if I had loved her once, and when I answered yes,she asked me if I loved her still, now that she was a married woman; andwithout giving me time to answer she said that she had a kindness forme, and would do me a good turn yet for the sake of old days when shecame to be queen.

  I was vexed with her for the vanity and importunity of her mirth, and tostop her words I asked her bluntly if she had ever seen a black flag.But my question had no effect to disconcert her gaiety.

  'You mean the black flag of poor Jensen?' she said; and when I noddedshe began to pity Jensen for his belief in his trophy, which, after all,had brought him no more luck than a sea grave; and then she went on withshrillish laughter to tell me that she had begged it of him to give herto make into a petticoat, 'For it would have made a bonny petticoat,would it not?' she said suddenly, coming to a sharp end and looking meearnestly in the face.

  I was at a loss what to say, being so flustered by her carriage and herwords, which seemed to make it plain to me that I had sorely misjudgedthe dead man. But I said nothing, and moved a little way from her; andshe, seeing my disinclination, laughed again, and then 'God blessed' mewith a vehemence and earnestness that, as I thought, meant me more harmthan good. But after that she turned and went back to the rest of thewomen, and I could see her going from one to the other, soothing andcomforting them, and showing them how to make the best of their bittercommons on the island. And as I watched her I wondered; but I had littletime for watching or for wondering.