Dutch the Diver: or, A Man's Mistake

“No,” said the captain, bitterly.

“Has the poor wretch, then, been blown up in the explosion?”

“Heaven knows,” cried Mr Parkley, “but if he is missing, that explains all. It is his work.”

“It was those blowing-up cartridges o’ yourn,” growled Oakum.

“Of course it was, stupid,” snarled Rasp, turning on the old sailor fiercely, “but the cartridges wouldn’t go off by themselves, would they?”

“You said he was better, doctor,” said the captain.

“Yes, so much so that the change was puzzling.”

“This was his work, then,” cried the captain. “He was well enough to take some terrible revenge upon us.”

“And to perish himself in accomplishing it,” said Dutch.

“Don’t know that,” said the captain. “One of the boats has gone.”

“But it may have been destroyed in the explosion.”

The captain shook his head and walked to the side where the ropes and blocks hanging from the davits showed plainly enough that a boat had been lowered down.

As he pointed to this the diabolical plot was made perfectly manifest, and its objects saw plainly enough how the villain had compassed their destruction.

“And I was so deceived,” exclaimed the doctor, stamping upon the deck in his rage. “The scoundrel was ill at first, but the latter part of the time it was subterfuge. Dutch Pugh, this is my fault. I must go back to hospital to learn my profession.”

“Suppose, gentlemen, we begin to load the boat with necessaries and construct a raft,” said the captain, bluntly. “It strikes me that we have but little time to spare. Mr Parkley, your silver is going back to its home at the bottom of the sea.”

“Yes,” said that gentleman, “and where it will lie, for there seems to be a curse with it all along.”

The boat already launched was as rapidly as possible supplied with water, cold provisions, compass, and sail; and, as soon as these were in, Dutch suggested, and his proposal was agreed to, that his wife and the captain’s daughter should be lowered down in – case of any sudden disposition shown by the ship to sink; but they objected to leave yet until one sad duty that had to be attended to was done.

A funeral at sea is a sad event, and it was more painful here at such a time, when it was a question whether before long everyone present would not have to seek a resting-place in the sea. Below lay the body of poor John Studwick, just as the doctor and Sam Oakum had arranged it, wrapped in a piece of sail-cloth, with a few heavy pieces of iron at the feet, waiting to take its last plunge.

The second boat, only a small one, had also been laden with provisions and water, so that in case of emergency there was nothing to do but to leap into one or the other and push off; and though Captain Studwick proposed making a raft, that was deferred until after the funeral.

It was a solemn scene as the body was reverently brought up from below and laid by the open gangway. The fire still burned slowly and steadily, and the smoke rose and floated away like a great black plume far over the golden water, on whose long swell the schooner rose and fell as easily as if there was no ruin in her midst. All was perfectly still and peaceful as, the arrangements having been made, Captain Studwick stood at the head of the silent, muffled figure, book in hand, and with trembling voice read the prayers for the dead, while those who clustered round forgot their sufferings and all dangers as they listened to the solemn words.

At last the captain stopped and made a sigh, when Sam Oakum gently raised the end of the hatch upon which the body lay, and with a slight rustling noise it glided off with a heavy plunge into the sea, Bessy uttering now a low wail and throwing herself on the deck.

She lay motionless there as, struggling hard to maintain his firmness, the captain finished the solemn words laid down for such an occasion, and then, closing the book, he was the stern man of business again. He gave his orders sharply, and Dutch took his wife in his arms, made fast a rope round her, and lowered her into the larger boat, Bessy submitting herself, as Mr Meldon helped, to be lowered to her side.

Mr Wilson and the doctor followed, Oakum and one of the sailors being the next, so as to take the management of the boat, with orders to push off and lie at about a hundred yards’ distance.

Hester half rose, with outstretched hands, but a word from Dutch reassured her as he set to with the captain and the rest on board to lower down such necessaries as the cabin contained to freight the second boat.

This work had been going on for about half-an-hour; the boat had been loaded as far as was safe, and coops, spars, rope, casks, and hatches were being thrown over, with axes and a saw lashed to them, so as to construct a kind of raft from the boats, whose object was to bear the heavier portion of their freight, and also to act as a kind of breakwater in case the sea should roughen, when the boats could lie to leeward and wait until some vessel hove in sight to rescue them from their perilous position.

The fire still blazed furiously, melting down the silver, old Rasp said, and this latter worthy had given a great deal of trouble, from the fact that he considered that the only thing worth saving was the diving apparatus. He had strewed the deck with various articles which he had brought up, only to be peremptorily rejected. And now all left on board found that their minutes there were numbered; but still they toiled on, till a warning cry from Oakum in the further boat drew their attention to a strange hissing noise where the fire burned most fiercely.

“She’s sinking,” cried Dutch, as the schooner gave a heavy roll.

“Yes, quick! over with you all,” cried the captain. Then, with a groan, “Poor old schooner! she deserved a better fate.”

One by one they slid down the rope left ready into the boat, till all were in save the captain and Dutch, neither of whom would go first.

“Quick, quick!” cried Mr Parkley, “or we shall be sucked down.”

“Push off!” roared the captain, who saw their peril; and as they hesitated he seized the rope and swung himself down, Dutch leaping headlong into the water at the same moment.

It was a close shave, for as Dutch rose and caught at the boat’s gunwale the oars were dipped and plied manfully, while the schooner blazed now with suddenly increased fury, as if the flames meant to secure all they could before the waters seized their prey. The vessel had begun to roll heavily, and the flames, which had now caught the mizen and fore masts, were running rapidly up the rigging, starting in tongues of fire from the tarry ropes, and curling up the masts till they were perfect pyramids of fire.

Three more heavy rolls succeeded, with the hissing of the fire increasing to a shriek, when a cloud of steam began to rise, and the schooner careened over, so that those in the last boat, as they toiled to get sufficiently far away, could see right down into the burning hold. This lasted but for a few moments though, and then the burning masts, with their fluttering sheets of flame, rose up perpendicular, and with a dive forward the vessel plunged down, there was a rushing sound, a tremendous explosion as the steam and confined air blew up the stern deck, and then the hull disappeared, followed slowly by the burning masts, while the small boat, with all the spars and raft material, was drawn towards the vortex.

“Pull,” shouted Captain Studwick, and the oars bent as every possible effort was made, but slowly and surely the boat was drawn back towards where coops and hatches, casks and planks, eddied round for a few minutes, and then disappeared.

Dutch had been dragged on board, and, like the captain, he helped at an oar, wondering the while at the power with which they were sucked towards the whirlpool, round which they at last began to sail.

No earthly power could have saved them had they not been able to delay their backward progress for a few minutes; as it was, when they neared the vortex, and over which a barrel was drawn, the bows of the boat were about to plunge down, but by a tremendous effort. Dutch dragged the little vessel round, and a succession of fierce tugs sent her once more away from the centre, and another minute’s struggle saved them, for the waters were less troubled now, and the danger past.

As they lay off, though, they saw very few of the objects selected return to the surface, and at last, heartsick, but thankful for their escape, they gave up the idea of the raft as hopeless, and now steadily rowed to join their consort.

Story 1-Chapter XL.

A Dreary Time

The occupants of the two boats, as they lay together that evening beneath the spangled canopy of heaven, little thought that the third of the schooner’s boats lay within a few miles of them, with Lauré on board, or they would not have slept in turn so peacefully and in such calm hope of being saved, for as the schooner sank with its treasure it seemed to all on board that with the silver sank the kind of curse that had been upon them all along.

It was an empty sense of superstition, but it influenced them and cheered them on through the long, sunny, scorching days as they bent to their oars and toiled on; and in the evenings, when, taking advantage of the soft breezes, the little sails were spread, and they crept on ever north and east in the hope of gaining the course of one of the vessels going south or west. But the days stole slowly by, and no sail gladdened their sight, and at last, as the water grew low in the little breakers and the provisions threatened to become exhausted, Dutch felt his heart sink, and told himself with a bitter smile that they had not yet worn out the power of the curse, if curse there were.

After long days of rowing, in which every man in the boats took part in urging them up the sides of the long rollers and then down their hill-like descent, the feeling of weary lassitude made itself more and more felt. They suffered, too, from their cramped position in the boats, but no one murmured. Even Rasp and Oakum ceased to wrangle, and the former pursed up his wrinkled mouth and followed the example of Oakum in whistling for a favouring wind.

At times the breeze would come, and, the sails filling, the boats sped onwards, but the few miles they made before the wind again dropped seemed as nothing in the immensity of the watery space around, and at last, half-delirious with the heat, after being reduced to a few drops of warm water each day, the sun went down like a great globe of fire, and Dutch Pugh felt that the time had come when they must die.

A re-arrangement of the occupants of the boat had long been made, so that both Dutch and Meldon were by those they loved, and now it seemed that the nuptial bed of the latter would be that of death. Hope seemed long before to have fled upon her bright wings, leaving only black despair to brood over them like the eternal night. Hardly a word was spoken in either boat, and once more the rope had been passed from one to the other so that their desolate state might not become more desolate by parting company during the night.

The night in question had fallen as black as that when the schooner was blown away, but no one heeded it, neither did they listen to the ravings of poor Wilson, who lay back in the stern sheets talking of his birds, and calling some particular pet by name. Then he would whisper Bessy’s name, and talk to himself constantly about his love for her, till at last the poor girl would be roused from her state of lethargy, and laying her head on Meldon’s breast sob for a few minutes – dry hysterical sobs – and then subside once more. Oakum sat twisting up a piece of yarn, crooning scraps of old songs, and ’Pollo would now and then, in a half-delirious fashion, try to sing the fragment of a hymn; but these attempts had grown now more and more spasmodic, and with the knowledge bluntly felt now that they had but a few fragments to support them on the following day, and no water, all sat or lay in a kind of stupefied despair, waiting for the end.

Upon Dutch Pugh had of late fallen the leading of the little party, for Captain Studwick had been taken ill from over-exertion with his oar beneath the burning sun, and before dusk Dutch had directed a longing gaze round the horizon in search of a sail, but in vain; and now he sat with Hesters head resting upon his lap, her large bright eyes gazing up into his, as longingly and full of love as ever, till, in the madness of his despair, as he saw her dying before him, he had strained her wasted form to his breast, and held her there when the darkness fell.

“Is there no hope, Dutch?” she whispered to him, faintly, as her lips rested close by his ear.

“Yes, always – to the last, darling,” he whispered.

“I am not afraid to die,” she whispered back; “it is for you. If I could only save your life.”

He covered her lips with his kisses, and her arms passionately embraced his neck, till a kind of heavy stupor fell on both, even as on all the others in the boat. The rest of the food was eaten next day, and then they sank back in their places to die.