Chapter Twenty One.
A terrible adventure.
With the disappearance of the corposant there was nothing whatever to betray the presence of a strange sail in our vicinity; for now, strain my eyes as I would, I could not be at all certain that I saw anything, although there were times when the same vague, shapeless blot of deeper darkness that had previously attracted my attention seemed to loom up momentarily out of the Stygian murkiness ahead. There were times also when, the water being highly phosphorescent, it appeared to me that, among the ghostly gleamings of the breaking surges, I could faintly discern a more symmetrical space of luminosity, corresponding to the foaming track of a ship moving at a high rate of speed through the water. But, to make sure of the matter, I ordered the reef to be shaken out of the foresail, and also set the mainsail, close-reefed, with the boom topped well up. This increased the speed of the schooner quite as much as I thought desirable, more, indeed, than was at all prudent; for, let me tell you, it is risky work to be flying along before a gale of wind at a speed of fully nine knots an hour on a pitch-black night, with a suspicion, amounting almost to absolute certainty, that there is another vessel directly ahead, and close aboard of you for aught that you can tell to the contrary. And, indeed, we soon had evidence of this; for, feeling uneasy upon the matter, I had started to go forward with the intention of warning the look-out men that I had reason to believe there was a ship close ahead of us, and that they must therefore keep an extra bright look-out, when, as I arrived abreast the fore-rigging, my eyes still straining into the darkness ahead, the schooner was hove up on the breast of a heavy, following sea, and as she topped it with the ghostly sea-fire of its fiercely-hissing crest brimming almost to the rail, a black shape seemed to suddenly solidify out of the gloom ahead, apparently within biscuit-toss of our jib-boom end, with an unmistakable wake of boiling foam on each side of it, and the two look-out men yelled, as with one voice, and in the high-pitched accents of sudden alarm.
“Hard-a-port! hard a-port! There’s a ship right under our bows, sir!”
The helm was promptly put over, the schooner sheered out of the wake of the black mass ahead—apparently a craft of considerable size,—and we ranged up on her starboard quarter. It will convey some idea of the closeness of the shave we made of it when I say that, even above the howling of the gale, the fierce hiss of the rapidly rising sea, and the roar of our bow-wave, we caught the sound of an unintelligible hail from the stranger, which almost immediately displayed a lantern over her taffrail for a few seconds, as a warning to us, her people being doubtless under the impression that our encounter had been accidental, and that we had only that moment seen her for the first time.
Having now established beyond all question the fact of the stranger’s proximity to us, I ordered our mainsail to be hauled down, balance-reefed, and reset, by which means we presently found that the stranger was gradually drawing ahead of us again; and the danger of collision being thus averted, I began to ask myself whether it was advisable to continue the chase any longer. The fact is, I had followed this craft instinctively, for I knew that there were so few vessels flying British colours in that precise part of the world that the presumption was strongly in favour of this one being either a Spaniard or a Dutchman, and in either case an enemy. But assuming her to be one or the other, she was just as likely to be a man-o’-war as a merchantman—she had appeared to be quite large enough to be the former, in that brief, indistinct glance that we had caught of her,—and if she happened to be a man-o’-war we should probably find ourselves in the wrong box when daylight broke. On the other hand she had not appeared to be so large as to preclude the possibility of her being a merchantman—a Spanish or Dutch West Indiaman; and should she prove to be either of these, she would be well worth fighting for. I considered the question carefully, and at length came to the conclusion that the risk of following her was quite worth taking, and we accordingly held all on as we were.
Meanwhile the gale was steadily growing fiercer, and the sea rising higher and becoming more dangerous with every mile that we traversed in our blind, headlong flight before it; and it appeared to me that the option whether I should continue the pursuit of the stranger would soon be taken from me by the imperative necessity to heave-to if I would avoid the almost momentarily increasing danger of the schooner being pooped, when a piercing cry of “Breakers ahead?” burst from the two men on the look-out forward, instantly followed by the still more startling cry of “Breakers on the port bow!”
“Breakers on the starboard bow!”
I sprang to the rail and looked ahead. Merciful Heaven! it was true, right athwart our path, as far as the eye could penetrate the gloom on either bow, there stretched a barrier of wildly-leaping breakers and spouting foam, gleaming spectrally against the midnight blackness of the murky heavens; and even as I gazed, spell-bound, at the dreadful spectacle I saw the black bulk of the strange ship outlined against the ghostly whiteness, and in another instant she had swung broadside-on; and as a perfect mountain of white foam leaped upon her, enfolding her in its snowy embrace, her masts fell, and methought that, mingled with the sudden, deafening roar of the trampling breakers, I caught the sound of a despairing wail borne toward us against the wind.
Oh! the horror of that moment! I shall never forget it. There was nothing to be done, no means of escape; for the walls of white water had seemed to leap at us out of the darkness so suddenly that they were no sooner seen than we were upon them; and the only choice left us was whether we would plunge into them stem-on, or be hove in among them broadside-on, as had been the case of the strange ship. With the lightning-like celerity of decision that seems to be instinct in moments of sudden, awful peril, I determined to drive the schooner ashore stem-on; hoping that, aided by our light draught of water, we might be hove up high enough on the beach, or whatever it was, to permit of the escape of at least a few of us with our lives; and I shouted to the helmsman to steady his helm, the breakers right ahead of us seeming to be less high and furious than those on either bow. There was no time for more; no time to order all hands on deck; no time even to utter a warning cry to those already on deck to grasp the nearest thing to hand and cling for their lives, for my cry to the helmsman was still on my lips when the schooner seemed to leap down upon the barrier of madly-plunging breakers, and in an instant we were hemmed about with a crashing fury of white water that boiled and leaped about us, smiting the schooner in all parts of her hull at once, foaming in over the rail here, there, and everywhere like a pack of hungry wolves, spouting high in air and flying over us in blinding deluges of spray until the poor little craft seemed to be buried; while I, without knowing how I got there, found myself on the wheel-grating, assisting the helmsman, with the yeasty water swirling about our knees as it boiled in over the taffrail. I caught a momentary glimpse of the strange ship as we swept athwart her stern at a distance of less than a hundred fathoms. Her black bulk was sharply outlined against the luminous loam as a whelming breaker passed inshore of her, and left her, for a second, up-hove on the breast of the next one; and I could see that she was on her beam-ends—a large ship of probably twelve hundred tons. I could see no sign of people on board her, but that was not surprising; they had probably been all swept overboard by the first mountain—wall of water that swept over her after she had broached-to.
And such was to be our fate also. My only wonder was that it had not come already; but come it must, and I braced myself for the shock, already feeling in imagination the terrific grinding concussion, the sickening jar, the awful upheaval of the schooner’s quivering frame, and the wrenching of her timbers asunder. But second after second sped, and the shock did not come; and half-buried in the boiling swirl of maddened waters, the schooner swept ahead, now up-hove on the breast of a fiery breaker that swept her from stem to stern as it flung her forward like a cork, now struggling and staggering in a hollow of seething, yeasty foam. At length, as the schooner settled down into one of these swirling hollows, she actually did strike, but the blow was a light one, only just sufficient to swear by and not enough to check her headlong rush for the smallest fraction of a second; and shortly afterwards I became aware that the breakers were perceptibly less weighty, so much so that in about another minute they ceased to break inboard.
It now dawned upon me that we must be passing over a submerged reef of considerable extent, and my hopes began to revive; for since we had traversed it thus far in safety, there was just the ghost of a chance that we might manage to blunder across the remainder of it without serious damage. As my thoughts took this direction my eyes fell upon a figure clinging to the main rigging, and I made it out to be Saunders, my chief mate. I shouted to him, and by good luck my voice reached him, and he came staggering aft to me. Without relaxing my grip on the wheel, I hurriedly explained to him my impression with regard to our situation, and directed him to go forward and see both anchors clear for letting go; for I had determined that, should my supposition prove correct, and should we be so extremely fortunate as to traverse the remaining portion of the reef in safety, I would anchor immediately that we should emerge into clear water. Fortunately for us all in our present strait, our cables were always kept bent, so that there was not very much to be done; and in a few minutes Saunders returned aft with the intelligence that all was ready for anchoring at any moment.
And now I really began to hope in earnest that we might perchance escape, for the sea was not breaking nearly so heavily around us; indeed I could distinguish, at no great distance ahead, small patches of unbroken water, with wider patches beyond; and, best of all, we had only touched the reef once, and that but lightly. Presently the schooner shot into a patch of unbroken water that appeared to communicate at one point with a larger patch, and I at once steered for the point of junction, at the same time singing out to the mate to get in the mainsail, and for the hands to stand by the fore and staysail halliards. A line of breakers still extended for some distance ahead of us, but they were now detached, with clear water between them, and if we could only contrive to keep the schooner in the unbroken water all might yet be well. We were still rushing along at a great pace, for the gale was blowing, if possible, more fiercely than ever; but the water was smooth, and I was consequently hopeful that, by letting go both anchors and giving the schooner the full scope of her cables, we might manage to ride it out without dragging. At length we brought the last of the visible breakers fair on our quarter, and I was in the act of putting the helm over, singing out at the same time to haul down the staysail and foresail, when the mate, who was on the forecastle ready to attend to the letting go of the anchors, shouted that he thought he could make out something like a large rock or small islet a short distance ahead. Hurriedly instructing the helmsman to keep the schooner as she was going, I ran forward, and immediately made out the object, which looked amply large enough to give us a lee to anchor under. We were pretty close to it; so without further ado the schooner was stripped of her remaining canvas and conned into a berth close under the lee of the huge mass, when both anchors were let go, the port anchor first and the starboard anchor half a minute later; and in less than five minutes we had the supreme satisfaction of finding the Sword Fish riding snugly, and in smooth water, with some three fathoms between her keel and the sandy bottom.
I was by this time pretty well fagged out, for the hour was drawing well on toward daybreak. Nevertheless my curiosity was so powerfully excited with regard to the spot which we had stumbled upon that, after thoroughly satisfying myself that the schooner was safe, and before turning in, I got out my chart and spread it open upon the cabin table. Our position at noon on the previous day was of course laid down upon it, and it needed but a few moments’ consideration of the courses and distances that we had subsequently steered to demonstrate that we had blundered right into the heart of Los Roques, or the Roccas, the most dangerous group of islets, without exception, in the whole of the Caribbean Sea. They are situated some seventy-five miles due north of La Guayra, and extend over an area of ocean measuring about twenty-five miles from east to west, and about half that distance from north to south. The group consists of two islands proper, Cayo Grande and Cayo de Sal, the first being triangular in shape, and measuring some six and a half miles each way along the perpendicular and base of the triangle, while Cayo de Sal is about seven and a half miles long by perhaps half a mile broad.
There are about thirty other islets in the group, all of them very much smaller than the two above named, and some of them so small as to deserve rather the name of rocks than islets. But the peculiarity about the group which renders it so exceedingly dangerous to strangers is that it forms part of an extensive reef, roughly of quadrangular form, the belt of reef being about three miles wide, with a fine open space inside divided into two fairly good anchorages by a reef stretching across it in a north-westerly direction, from the westerly extremity of Cayo Grande to the main reef. There are several passages leading through the main reef into these anchorages, notably one on the northern side of the reef, but the difficulties of the navigation are so great to strangers that, if report is to be believed, it was, up to a comparatively recent date, a favourite resort of pirates, who, once through the reef, were practically safe from pursuit. Such was the spot into which the Sword Fish had rushed, blindfold as it were. And I can only account for our escape from destruction by supposing that we had providentially hit off one of the channels through the reef, or else that the gale had heaped the water upon the reef to such an extent that, with our light draught, we were able to pass over it. However, I had only to look at the group, as portrayed upon the chart, to feel thoroughly assured as to the safety of the schooner and ourselves; so I turned into my bunk with an easy mind and a grateful heart at our truly miraculous escape, and fell asleep the moment that my head touched the pillow.
When the steward came to call me at seven bells the gale was still raging furiously; but about four bells in the forenoon watch a break in the sky appeared to windward, and shortly afterwards there was a noticeable decrease in the strength of the wind. Meanwhile the break in the clouds widened, patches of blue sky appeared here and there, extending rapidly, and when noon arrived I was able to get a meridian altitude of the sun, which conclusively demonstrated the truth of my surmise that we were anchored in the Rocca group. The rock that sheltered us was some forty feet high, and about twenty acres in extent, situate nearly in the middle of the northern anchorage; and astern of us, at a distance of four miles, lay Cayo Grande, with Cayo de Sal about the same distance on our larboard beam. Now that it was daylight it was a perfectly simple and easy matter to identify our surroundings with the aid of the chart.
By the time that dinner was over the gale had so far moderated that, in our sheltered position, it had become perfectly safe to lower a boat. I therefore ordered away the gig, and, taking the ship’s telescope with me, landed upon the rock which had afforded us so welcome and timely a shelter, and climbed to its summit to see whether any portion of the wreck of the unfortunate stranger that had been in company with us during the preceding night still hung together. To my surprise I found that quite a considerable portion of her was visible; indeed at times it appeared to me that I could see almost if not quite the whole of her hull; but as she was some eight miles distant I could not be at all certain of this. The sea appeared to be still breaking heavily over her at times, but she seemed to have beaten almost entirely across the reef, there being but little broken water between us and her; and to this circumstance I attributed the fact that she was still in existence. I spent quite half an hour upon the summit of the rock, gazing upon the strange, wild scene by which I was surrounded; and when at length I rejoined the boat the wind had moderated to such an extent that, although it was still rather too strong for an eight-mile pull to windward, there was no reason why we should not sail as far out as the wreck, to see whether any of her crew still survived. I therefore returned to the schooner, and, procuring the boat’s mast and sails, started upon our expedition. But we were rather late in getting away; so that it took us until within half an hour of sunset to work up to the wreck, and even then we could not approach her nearer than within a cable’s length because of the broken water; but we got near enough to enable us to make out that she was an armed ship—she had all the look of a small frigate—and I took her to be Spanish. But although her hull was not nearly so much battered about as I had expected it would be, there was no sign of life aboard her, at which I was not surprised when I looked at the broad belt of still angry surf through which she had beaten. But I saw enough to determine me to pay the wreck a visit before leaving the group, and accordingly, when I got back to the schooner, which Saunders had made all ataunto once more during my absence, I made arrangements to weigh and beat up to the wreck immediately after breakfast next morning.
By daylight the wind had dwindled away to a gentle breeze, while the sea had gone down to such an extent
that I anticipated no difficulty whatever in boarding the wreck. Nor was I disappointed, for when we reached the craft, shortly after six bells in the forenoon, the sea was no longer breaking over her, or even round her, the breakers now being confined to the outer fringe of the reef. But imagine, if you can, my astonishment at seeing a man—a wretched, ragged, scarecrow of a fellow he looked to be—on the poop, who, as we drew near, began to wave and signal to us with frantic energy. He appeared to be desperately afraid that we had not seen him, or that, having seen him, we should still not trouble to take him off, for he was waving a large, dark cloth when we first made him out, and he continued to do so until the boat was almost alongside. We bumped against the wreck in the wake of her mizzen chains—her main and fore chains were under water—and, the instant that the bowman hooked on, this man, who seemed to be the only survivor of the wreck, came slipping and sliding down the steeply inclined deck until he stood just above us, when he stood for a few seconds staring down upon us in silence. Then he cried, in a piercing voice: “Say, for the love of God, are you English?”
“Ay, ay, my hearty; you have guessed right the first time,” I answered. “But, pray, who in the name of fortune are you? And what ship is this?”
For answer the fellow plumped down upon his knees, clasped his hands before him, lifted up his eyes to heaven, and by the movement of his lips I supposed him to be engaged either in prayer or thanksgiving. One or two of the men in the boat with me laughed, and a third must needs display his wit by calling out a profane jest; but I silenced them sharply, for there was an intense abandonment in this strange man’s manner and behaviour that showed him to be under the influence of extraordinary emotion. Presently he rose to his feet, and, scrambling down into the boat with the most astonishing activity, grasped my hand and pressed it to his lips fervently. Then he looked me in the face and said:
“Oh, sir, I thank God most humbly and heartily for this His great mercy to me, a poor, miserable sinner. But you’ll take me away with you, sir; you’ll not leave me aboard here to fall into the hands of my enemies again? Sir, sir, you are an Englishman, you say, and your tongue is English. You have a kind, good face. Sir, take me with you, and make me your slave if you will, but let me not fall into the hands of those incarnate fiends the Spaniards again.”
“Have no fear, my good fellow,” answered I. “Of course we will take you with us, not as a slave, but as a shipmate if you will. But you have not yet answered the question I asked you. Who are you? And what ship is this?”
“Who am I?” he repeated, staring wildly at me. “Why, I used to be called Isaac Hoard to home in Exmouth, and among my shipmates, but for the last five years, ever since I’ve been in the hands of the accursed Spaniards, I’ve known no other name than ‘heretico’.”
“And the ship,” I reiterated; “is she Spanish?”
“Yes, sir; she is Spanish,” answered the poor fellow, who looked half-mad as well as haggard, and thin almost like a skeleton. “She was a fine frigate forty-eight hours ago, named the Magdalena; now the vengeance of God has fallen upon her and her crew, and she lies a wreck, while every one of them has perished and gone to his own place.”
“And how happens it that you survive while all the rest of the crew have perished?” I demanded.
“By the mercy of God and the inhumanity of the Spaniards,” he answered. “They made me a slave of the crew, at whose every beck and call I was from the beginning of the morning watch until four bells in the first watch; and when my day’s work was over they used to lock me into a cell under the forecastle. So that when the ship struck I was unable to rush on deck with the rest of them, and so my life was saved.”
“Well,” said I, “it appears that you have a story to tell that may be well worth listening to at some future time. Now, tell me, do you know where this frigate was last from, and whither she was bound?”
“Yes,” answered Hoard, “I can tell you that, sir. She sailed from Cartagena five days ago, and was bound to Cadiz with despatches; at least such was the talk among the crew.”
“With despatches!” I ejaculated. “Good! Now, do you happen to know where those despatches are to be found?”
“No, sir; that I don’t,” answered Hoard. “I’ve never been abaft the mainmast until to-day, if you’ll believe me; and I don’t even know the cap’n’s name. But I expect his despatches will be in his cabin, along with any other papers of value that he may have had in his possession.”
“Quite so; most likely they are,” I remarked. “I’ll go on board and give the craft an overhaul. Jump on deck, a couple of you, to lend me a hand in case I should need you; and catch a turn with the painter somewhere.”
So saying, I climbed up on the ship’s poop, and with considerable difficulty—owing to the exceedingly steep slope of the deck—made my way to the companion, which I descended. At the foot of the ladder, I found myself confronted by a bulkhead which, as I soon found, partitioned off the captain’s quarters from the other part of the ship. Opening a door that faced me, I entered a fine, handsome cabin, magnificently fitted up, and very little damaged, except that the two guns which had evidently been in it seemed to have broken adrift and gone through the vessel’s side, the gun on the weather side having smashed a handsome mahogany table to smithereens in its passage athwart the cabin. There were stains of wet on the sofas on the lee side and on the carpeted deck, showing that the water had entered through the breach in the ship’s side: but that, with the smashed table and the hole in the side, constituted all the visible damage in the cabin. There was another bulkhead in front of me, with an open door in it, through which I caught a glimpse of stern windows, together with certain indications that the cabin into which I was looking was in all probability the captain’s state-room. Here, if anywhere, I thought I should be most likely to find the despatches which constituted the chief object of my search; and I accordingly made my way into the after-cabin. A handsome and roomy cot, slung on the starboard side, confirmed my impression that this must be the captain’s private sanctum; and I at once looked round for a likely receptacle for papers of importance and other articles of value. I had not far to look. Close to the door, against the bulkhead, stood a massive and handsome cabinet writing-table, so placed that the light from the stern windows would fall over a sitter’s shoulders on to the table. Right up against the starboard side of the ship stood a large chest of drawers, with the top arranged as a dressing-table: and against the port side was a book-case with glazed doors, three or four of the panes of glass being smashed so completely that several of the volumes had tumbled out on to the floor. I took up one or two of the books and opened them, but could make nothing of their contents, they being in Spanish, which was all but a sealed language to me. The book-case was full of books from top to bottom, so it was clear that it was useless to look there for the documents I desired to find; I therefore turned to the next nearest object, which was the writing-table. This was fitted with a sloping top that evidently lifted, and a nest of capacious drawers occupied the back of the affair, above the writing-desk, while a large cupboard on each side formed the base, with room for a man’s legs between the two. I tried the top, the cupboards, and the drawers, but all were locked; and the article was so solidly constructed that I at once saw it would be useless to think of breaking it open without proper tools. I therefore sang out to the two men on deck to take the boat and return to the schooner for the carpenter, bidding him bring with him everything necessary to pick a number of locks, or otherwise open some drawers and cupboards. And while the boat was gone I turned my attention to the dressing-table.