CHAPTER XXV. THE FLIGHT.
Gabbett, guided by the Crow, had determined to beach the captured boaton the southern point of Cape Surville. It will be seen by those whohave followed the description of the topography of Colonel Arthur'sPenitentiary, that nothing but the desperate nature of the attempt couldhave justified so desperate a measure. The perpendicular cliffs seemedto render such an attempt certain destruction; but Vetch, who had beenemployed in building the pier at the Neck, knew that on the southernpoint of the promontory was a strip of beach, upon which the companymight, by good fortune, land in safety. With something of the decisionof his leader, Rex, the Crow determined at once that in their desperateplight this was the only measure, and setting his teeth as he seizedthe oar that served as a rudder, he put the boat's head straight for thehuge rock that formed the northern horn of Pirates' Bay.
Save for the faint phosphorescent radiance of the foaming waves, thedarkness was intense, and Burgess for some minutes pulled almost atrandom in pursuit. The same tremendous flash of lightning which hadsaved the life of McNab, by causing Rex to miss his aim, showed to theCommandant the whale-boat balanced on the summit of an enormouswave, and apparently about to be flung against the wall of rockwhich--magnified in the flash--seemed frightfully near to them. Thenext instant Burgess himself--his boat lifted by the swiftly advancingbillow--saw a wild waste of raging seas scooped into abysmal troughs,in which the bulk of a leviathan might wallow. At the bottom of oneof these valleys of water lay the mutineers' boat, looking, with itsoutspread oars, like some six-legged insect floating in a pool of ink.The great cliff, whose every scar and crag was as distinct as thoughits huge bulk was but a yard distant, seemed to shoot out from its basetowards the struggling insect, a broad, flat straw, that was a strip ofdry land. The next instant the rushing water, carrying the six-leggedatom with it, creamed up over this strip of beach; the giant crag, amidthe thunder-crash which followed upon the lightning, appeared to stoopdown over the ocean, and as it stooped, the billow rolled onwards,the boat glided down into the depths, and the whole phantasmagoria wasswallowed up in the tumultuous darkness of the tempest.
Burgess--his hair bristling with terror--shouted to put the boat about,but he might with as much reason have shouted at an avalanche. The windblew his voice away, and emptied it violently into the air. A snarlingbillow jerked the oar from his hand. Despite the desperate efforts ofthe soldiers, the boat was whirled up the mountain of water like aleaf on a water-spout, and a second flash of lightning showed themwhat seemed a group of dolls struggling in the surf, and a walnut-shellbottom upwards was driven by the recoil of the waves towards them. Foran instant all thought that they must share the fate which had overtakenthe unlucky convicts; but Burgess succeeded in trimming the boat, and,awed by the peril he had so narrowly escaped, gave the order to return.As the men set the boat's head to the welcome line of lights that markedthe Neck, a black spot balanced upon a black line was swept under theirstern and carried out to sea. As it passed them, this black spot emitteda cry, and they knew that it was one of the shattered boat's crewclinging to an oar.
"He was the only one of 'em alive," said Burgess, bandaging his sprainedwrist two hours afterwards at the Neck, "and he's food for the fishes bythis time!"
For the Term of His Natural Life Page 58