The Story of Juana Maria
“There are eight islands in the Pacific, off the coast of Santa Barbara, lying from thirty to seventy miles away and protecting the mainland from fierce winds and heavy tides. The nearest of these are now used for sheep-grazing, and San Nicolás, the farthest off, was formerly noted for its fine herds of otter and seal. On this San Nicolás lived a tribe of Indians—if they were Indians, for no one seems really to know—and at the time of our story, nearly one hundred years ago now, it was heard that the tribe had been reduced by disease to less than twenty souls. A fisherman whose boat had been blown far out to sea by adverse winds had landed on the island for fresh water and brought the news back to Santa Barbara, adding that one old man among the natives had been able to speak Spanish and had begged him to tell the Missions along the coast of their plight and to implore the good Fathers to rescue them from their island prison.
“The news spread throughout southern California and all were eager to send for the islanders, but no ship large enough for the purpose made its appearance. At last, the Next-to-Nothing, a schooner that had been on a hunting expedition in Lower California appeared in San Diego Harbor with a cargo of otter skins for sale and the skipper made a bargain with the Franciscan Fathers to sail to San Nicolás and bring the exiles back.
“The trip was made, but even before the Next-to-Nothing reached its destination a gale sprang up and a landing was effected with great difficulty. No time was wasted ashore and the islanders who, of course, had had no warning as to when, if ever, they would be sent for, were hurried into the boats in great excitement and confusion and all speed was made to reach the schooner.
“Somehow, in the hurry and hurly-burly a child was left behind whom a young mother had placed in the arms of a sailor to carry aboard. How this may have been we do not know, but no such child was to be found, and the mother, desperate with fright, with pleading gestures implored the Captain to return.
“To do this would have been almost impossible and would have imperiled the lives of the whole party, and the skipper could only shake his head at the woman’s frantic pleading.
“Finding that they were putting out to sea the poor girl, for she was little more, leaped overboard and struck out through the angry waters for the shore. No attempt was made to rescue her, perhaps none would have been possible, and in a moment she was lost to sight in the huge waves that crashed against the rocky coast.
“The Next-to-Nothing, after a stormy voyage, at last reached the harbor of San Pedro and the islanders were distributed among the neighboring Missions. The skipper planned to return at once to San Nicolás to look for the mother and child, but first going north to San Francisco for orders from the owners, the Next-to-Nothing was wrecked at the entrance to the Golden Gate and, there being no other craft at the time fit for the hazardous journey, the expedition was given up. The Franciscan Fathers never lost their interest in it, however, and for fifteen years they offered a reward of two hundred dollars to whoever would go to San Nicolás and bring them word of the unfortunate mother and her child.
“In the fifteenth year of the offer, a seal-hunter did visit the island, but could find no trace of human occupation, and people began to forget the story.
“Three years later a Santa Barbara man organized an otter-hunting expedition to San Nicolás and took with him a large company of Indian guides and trappers. He had heard the tale of the abandoned pair, but saw and heard nothing to make him think they were still living, or on the island.
“On the night before they were to leave San Nicolás, however, Captain N., walking on the beach, saw before him the print of a slender foot—”
“Oh! like Robinson Crusoe!” interrupted Lesley.
“Yes,” nodded Ronnie, “and Man Friday!”
“He saw the print of a slender foot,” continued Stumpy, “and knew it was that of a woman. He organized a search party, but found nothing that day save a basket of rushes hanging in a tree with bone needles, threads of sinew, and a partly finished robe of birds’ feathers made of small squares neatly matched and sewed together.
“Inland, they discovered several roofless enclosures of woven brush and near them poles with dried meat hanging from them, but no human beings. These were sure signs, however, that the island had inhabitants and Captain N. kept up the search with a will. After two days fresh footprints were found in the moss that covered one of the cliffs and, following them up, a woman was discovered, crouching in terror under a clump of low bushes at the top. Captain N. greeted her gently in Spanish, and in a moment she came timidly towards him, speaking rapidly in an unknown tongue. Nobody in the party understood a word she said, although there were Indians of a dozen tribes among their number. Captain N. described her as a tall and handsome woman, in middle life, with long braids of shining black hair and a curious and beautiful dress of birds’ feathers, sleeveless and with rounded neck.”
“Could she have been the child left on the island?” interrupted Lesley, hurriedly.
“Oh, no,” answered Stumpy. “She was too old for that. The child must have died, and this must have been the girl who leaped from the boat.
“She seemed gentle and quite willing to be taken back to the Santa Barbara Mission, where, although there were then many Indians there and the Fathers themselves spoke many tongues, no one of them understood her language.
“The good Fathers baptized her under the name of Juana Maria, and she made no protest, whatever they did, or pointed her out to do. She drooped, however, so the story goes, from the moment she left the island, seemed dazed and looked about with questioning eyes, and one day she fell from her chair in a faint and the next morning had passed quietly away. Father Francisco showed me her grave in the shadow of the Mission tower, poor lost creature, alone and lonely in a strange world!”
“And no one ever really knew who she was, or what had happened to her?” asked Ronald.
“No; how could they when they could not speak her language and she had no time to learn theirs? She might not even have been the woman they were looking for; she might not have been an Indian at all; who knows?”
“Poor, poor thing!” mourned Lesley. “Oh, what a sad story, Stump-ery, bump-ery!”
“So sad,” cried the old sailor, lifting himself from his rock, “that I forget my work. You wait here, you children; I come back one half-hour and we go where your father save me from wreck and where I lose my leg and that was one day, half good luck, half bad luck,” looking down ruefully at his crutch.
CHAPTER VI
HOW THE CAT CLIMBED
When Stumpy had gone, Ronald wandered off among the rocks looking for sea-birds’ eggs for his collection, and Lesley strolled along the shore picking up shining shells and telling herself a story. In this romantic tale she was a princess prisoned in a tower on a far-off island, but the suitors who landed there, having heard of her marvelous beauty, were unable to declare their passion as, unfortunately, she understood no tongue but her own and that was strange to all of them.
As it fell out, the long-lost prince, her brother, in command of a gallant ship, chanced to pass by the island and, arriving at exactly the right moment, was beginning to give language-lessons to the handsomest of the suitors, when—
“Hi, Lesley, hi! Where’s Ronnie?” called a hoarse voice that broke in upon her dreams.
“Ronnie? He’s right here—”
“Where, then? I no see,” objected Stumpy, limping down among the pebbles.
“He was here a moment ago— Oh,” in immediate fright, “where can that boy be?”
“You no watch him?” asked Stumpy, with lifted eyebrows. “I think you always watch Ronnie.”
“I do,” answered Lesley, in a grieved voice, “I always do, but I forgot one moment. Oh,” breaking into sobs, “where is he and what will mother say?”
“I know very well what she say,” observed Stumpy, dryly, “but what we do before she say?”
“He must be climbing the rocks, somewhere, he must be, for he said only this morning that he hadn’t found a murre’s egg since he lived in this country.”
Stumpy could not but smile at this Ronald-like speech, though at heart he was a little anxious. “H——m,” he murmured. “Well, if it was a murre’s egg he want, he have to climb pretty high— Halloo, halloo, Ronald!” he shouted—“Where are you? Halloo! Halloo!”
“Halloo! Halloo, Ronnie!” called Lesley in her high, clear voice.
No answer, but an unusual fluttering and screaming of sea-birds around the “Gateway Rock” showed that something was amiss there and the old sailor and the girl started off in that direction.
Now the Gateway Rock was the central one of three sisters stretching out from shore, the third being entirely surrounded by water and the second one partly on and to be reached by land. Near the top of its jagged, shining masses was a narrow opening like a door through which you saw the heaving blue waters of the Pacific like a picture in a frame of ebony. The three rocks were particularly favored by gulls, murres, and cormorants as their resting-place and Ronald had climbed there before under his father’s advice and direction. Now, however, he had mounted the heights alone, for Lesley could plainly see his small figure in the Gateway as they drew near and a bit of something white that must be a handkerchief, fluttering in his hand.
When they had painfully reached the base of the Gateway Rock, it was plain that Ronald was calling them and that he was not hurt. The roar of the breakers against the cliffs was so loud that they could not hear a word he said, but his gestures showed that he had got himself into a trap and saw no way to get out.
LESLEY COULD PLAINLY SEE HIS SMALL FIGURE IN THE GATEWAY
“I can help him down if I can only get up there,” cried Lesley, starting to climb the slippery cliff, but Stumpy held her back. “No,” he shouted, “one enough; I get him down.”
“But how can you, Stumpy,” Lesley faltered, “with your wooden leg?”
“Got wooden leg, yes,” answered Stumpy, cheerfully, “but got two arms all right. No be sailor for nothing. You wait; you see!”—and waving his hand to Ronnie he started off for the storehouse.
Lesley waited on the black rocks in an agony of fear expecting every moment that Ronald would slip down from his perch, and while she watched his small figure and turned with almost every breath to see if Stumpy hove in sight, she kept saying to herself, “No, I didn’t watch him; I didn’t. I forgot all about him. Mother will never call me her faithful little girl again!”
There was, in fact, no danger for Ronald if he kept quiet and did not try to climb down the steep cliff alone, but the anxious sister did not realize this, and it seemed to her that hours had passed when she spied Stumpy limping down among the rocks with a large bundle under his arm.
“All right, Ronnie!” he shouted, as he drew near, “I come pretty soon, now.” And he unrolled a coil of rope before Lesley’s astonished eyes and took from within it his Indian bow and a bundle of arrows.
He held up the bow and the rope to the boy, who could see, though he could not hear, and who waved his hands and clapped them to show that he understood. Not so did Lesley, however, who looked on with a white face as if she thought that Stumpy intended to tie Ronald up with the rope and then shoot him with the arrows.
“See, little daughter,” explained Stumpy, kindly; “I tie little string to arrow, tie big rope with loop on end to string, then shoot arrow up to Ronnie. He pull up rope and slip loop round big rock. Then I climb up rope, so”—illustrating hand-over-hand movement—“and I be up there pretty quick.”
“But how can you get Ronnie down? He couldn’t climb down a rope.”
“No, that all right. He know. I do that one day up by Lighthouse. You remember? I let your father down by rope to get little lamb that fall over cliff and catch on rock. You remember?”
“Oh, yes,” eagerly. “Stumpy’s coming, Stumpy’s coming!” she cried, turning to the boy.
The proper arrow was finally selected, the cord fastened to it, the great bow bent, and whiz! went the shaft to its mark, the side of the Gateway. In a moment Ronald had snatched it, pulled up the rope with all the strength of eight-year-old arms, found the loop and slipped it over a convenient peak. He tried it to see that it was taut—(“Smart boy, that!” murmured Stumpy)—and waved his hand to show that it was all right.
Stumpy limped to where the end of the rope hung dangling, threw off his cap and woolen jacket, wet his hands in a pool of the rocks and started to climb, as he had once done on shipboard. It was not far—one hundred feet, perhaps—but far enough for a one-legged man and far enough for a small boy shivering in the windy Gateway above, who knew well enough that he should not have been where he was and that he was causing untold trouble by his carelessness.
There were sharp points and projections here and there in the great rock against which Stumpy could rest his good foot and get a little breath, but he reached the top almost at the end of his strength and unable to return Ronald’s bear-like hug of welcome.
“You get down, young man, ’bout as soon as you can,” he panted. “This be ’bout the last time Stumpy get you out o’ trouble. He getting too old.”
So saying he pulled up the end of the rope, motioned the boy to come nearer, fastened it cleverly about his body with loops over the shoulders, told him to sit down in the threshold of the Gateway, with legs hanging over the cliff, and with a “Ready, now! All right!” lowered him slowly downward into Lesley’s arms. The old sailor braced himself, meantime, against the needle of rock where the rope was fastened, but even so and with Ronald’s light weight it was all he could do to manage the job, and the boy noted with distress how long it took his beloved friend and playmate to recover his breath and gather strength to climb down the rope himself.
Ronald was ready to meet him when he reached the safety of the rocks below and to hold out his hand and say, like a man, “I’m sorry, Stumpy, and I’ll never be so careless again. Thank you, and Mother and Father will thank you, too.”
“Oh, no need thank,” smiled Stumpy. “Everybody help friend in trouble. But now other trouble begin. Got to go home and tell boss what you do and Lesley tell she forgot to watch like Mother say.”
Both children hung their heads and blushed, but they knew their duty well enough and had known it without Stumpy’s reminder, so they set off for the Lighthouse, hand in hand, with a sorrowful good-bye for Stumpy.
The soft-hearted old man watched them go with a half-smile and a half-sigh. “Good children!” he said. “Good boy, that Ronnie, but too much like little cat. Climb up so far she can go; never think how she get down!”
Mr. and Mrs. McLean heard the children’s story quietly and laid the blame on Ronald, where it rightfully belonged.
“You must learn to be more careful, son,” warned his father. “It’s no good for me to punish you. You must find out how to punish yourself so that it will make you remember.”
“I’ll give up the murre’s egg!” cried Ronald, who had carried it safe home in the breast of his jacket, in spite of his adventures.
“That would be a foolish thing,” objected his mother. “You did no wrong in trying to get the egg, only in not asking Stumpy if it was safe for you to go up the Gateway Rock alone.”
“I won’t go down to Stumpy’s for a month, then,” sniffed the culprit.
“That would be punishing Lesley as well as yourself,” said his father, severely. “Think again!”
“But I deserve to be punished,” interrupted Lesley. “I didn’t watch Ronnie, like Mother always says, and I’m older than he is and ought to remember.”
The boy’s face flushed at his sister’s generous words. “Then I’ll let Lesley take Jenny Lind to water for a whole week,” he cried, “though you always said”—this with a catch in the breath—“that it was a man’s place.”
“So it is,” said his father, affectionately, “and now you talk like a man.”
“And I’ll give up my pudding for a week, and maybe I’d better go to bed now and then I shan’t hear you read the next chapter of ‘Robinson Crusoe’ to-night.” And here the small sufferer really began to sniff, and made his way blindly to the staircase, still with the murre’s egg tightly clasped in his grimy paw.
“Oh, Father, oh, Mother!” sobbed Lesley. “He won’t have to go to bed, will he, poor Ronnie?”
“‘Poor Ronnie’ will have to learn to look before he leaps,” said his father, quietly. “Going to bed never hurt anybody, yet.” And though Margaret McLean’s own eyes were moist she nodded her head in silent agreement.
CHAPTER VII
IN THE FOG
“Green-y blue, blue-y green,
Best-est fire that ever was seen!”
chanted Ronald in the Lighthouse sitting-room one foggy evening in the late summer.
It was indeed one of the “best-est,” if not the very bestest fire that ever was seen, for it was built of driftwood from some old copper-bottomed wreck and the flickering flames were pale blue-y green like a robin’s egg, deep green-y blue like a peacock’s breast, yellow as star-shine and sunset clouds, while underneath glowed a deep red, with now and then a purple bloom upon it.
“I picked up the wood on the shore this morning,” said Mr. McLean, looking at the fire with satisfaction, “and brought it up with the oil on the car with Jenny Lind. It must have come from the wreck of the old Hamburg.”
“When was she wrecked, Father?” asked Ronald.
“Oh, long ago, before our time. It was on a night just like this, probably,” looking with a shiver at the blank, white-covered windows. “The Captain of the Hamburg was steering straight for us, they say, hoping to catch sight of the Light through the mist, but his aim was too good and he sent his ship right into the hundred-foot channel between the islands and a sunken rock did the rest. The men were all saved, I believe, but the good ship lies there still, or most of it, only the water is so deep that you can’t even see the topmasts.
“God help the poor folk at sea, to-night!” sighed Mrs. McLean, “and we so cozy here!”
It was the usual evening party at the Lighthouse, Margaret McLean knitting, her husband smoking and reading his book, and Lesley and Ronald playing checkers at the table. Nothing could have been more secure or peaceful, for Jim Crow was there, perched on a chair-back in the corner, half-asleep, and it was known that Jenny Lind was safely reposing in her stable, after a delightful day spent in doing next to nothing.
The fog had been lying about in thin trails across the sky for many hours, but had waited till night to mass its forces together into a thick blanket, white as a roll of cotton and as dense. The Light, so Father said, could hardly be seen a hundred yards from the tower, so the steam fog-signal had been started and was sending out its long shrieks of melancholy warning, “Dan—ger! Dan—ger-r-r! Keep awa-a-a-y! Keep a-w-a-a-a-a-y!”
It was well that the little family had its own resources on such a night, for though the Lighthouse tender brought letters and papers only once in two months, there were a number of well-selected books on hand and these could always be read and re-read. There was a Government cable, of course, to the mainland, but it was not supposed to be used save for danger, death, disaster, doctors, and drugs, and the longing for a daily paper could not be classed under any of these heads.
“A-a-a-a-h! A-a-a-a-h!” groaned the fog-signal and Mrs. McLean looked up from her work. “Did you happen to notice, Father,” she asked, “in the last ‘San Francisco Chronicle’ we had, that story about the eight-year-old boy out in Wyoming that an eagle tried to carry off?”
“Yes, I believe I spoke of it at the time. What makes you think of it now?”
“Why, because Stumpy read it, too, and he was saying when he was up here to-day that it was a ‘foolishness,’ as he called it, and no bird could carry such a weight.”
“Oh, that’s not so,” said Mr. McLean, decidedly, while the children dropped their checkers and pricked up their ears for a story. “I don’t know about a good-sized boy, but we know that an eagle could carry a small one. My idea is that they can lift as much in proportion to their weight as a hawk or a horned owl, and I’ve known a horned owl to snatch up a large house-cat and make off with it.
“My belief is that if hawks or owls can carry more than twice their weight—and everybody knows they can—that an eagle could do as much, or more, perhaps. Once, when I was a lad, I found an eagle lying helpless on his back in the road shot through the body with a rifle-ball, poor creature. I was kind of afraid of him, he looked so fierce, and I up-ended a long road skid and dropped it on him. Before it reached him he stretched up and caught it in his claws and held it up the length of his legs above him. I walked up on the skid and stood over him, and he easily held me and the skid, which I should judge would weigh more than twenty pounds. I took pains to be weighed myself that same day and tipped the scales at one hundred and nineteen pounds. You tell Stumpy that, and tell him to put a stick in the claw of a wounded eagle and let him grasp a small tree with the other and a man must be stronger than ever I was to take the stick away from him.”
Ronald had left the table as soon as eagles, hawks, and horned owls had begun to fly through the conversation and now leaned on the arm of his father’s chair.
“I should think, Daddy,” he said in his wheedling way, “that it would be a good night to tell us that story about the baby that was carried off to Garrison Mountain when you were a little boy in Maine. I haven’t heard it, I do think, more’n once since I lived in this country.”
McLean laughed. “I’m no story-teller,” he said, “and a good thing I’m not. What with Stumpy and his tales and your mother there and her ballads, you children would never have learned to read if I’d told stories, too.”
“Never you mind about my ballads,” advised Mother, good-humoredly. “You like them just as well as the children do. Tell the boy about the white-headed eagle. I’d like to hear it again, myself.”
“It was a good while ago it happened,” said McLean, “for it was not long after my father and mother died and I was brought over from the old country to an uncle on a farm in Maine.
“We knew that two old white-headed eagles built their nest every year on a crag of Garrison Mountain in plain sight of the folks in the valley and we heard them screaming over us every spring when they came back to settle down again in the old homestead. The charcoal-burners in the camps used to hear them, too, as they swooped down to the lowlands for rushes and grass to line their nest, and when the great eggs were laid and the mother was keeping them warm, many a lamb or little pig did the old father eagle take her for her dinner. Mothers used to be extra watchful of their babies for the first few weeks of spring, but nothing ever did happen and of course they thought nothing ever would.”
“Would an eagle really like a baby better than a lamb?” asked Lesley, fearfully.
“Why, no, of course not, child. It would only see something soft and light that might be good to eat and snatch it up. Well, one warm spring morning when the apple-trees were in bloom Mrs. Shadwell had set her baby boy out to play on the grass in the care of his sister, and had left him but a few moments when a shadow flew by the window; she heard the flapping of great wings, cries and calls of distress, and she rushed to the door just in time to see old Father Whitehead rise into the air with the baby in his claws. There was nothing to do but to scream and scream and to snatch the big dinner-horn and blow blast after blast upon it to summon her husband and the charcoal-burners.
“The neighbors gathered in a few moments and plainly saw the giant bird with the white bundle in his grasp circling toward his nest. It was dreadful to see the agony of the parents and to hear the mother cry, ‘Oh, they’ll tear my Willie to pieces. Oh, save him, save him!’
“But how were they to save him? Many a time had the best marksmen of the settlement tried to shoot the robber pair, but never had succeeded, and it would be a terrible risk now to try and hit the old bird while he carried the child in his grasp. Fortunately an old hunter—‘Dave,’ they called him; I never knew his other name—had lately come to the settlement from the North woods where he had been trapping sable. Luckily, he heard the horn-blast on the hills and knew it meant danger of some kind.
“Reaching the valley, he saw the great bird overhead with his white burden, saw the crowd of neighbors, and judged what had happened.
“He loaded his long rifle, ran toward the bridge where he could get a better view of the eagles’ nest, leveled his piece on the rail and knelt on the planking. The father followed him begging him to be careful, to be careful, or he would kill the child, but old Dave waved his hand for silence, watched the eagle as he soared upward and the mother bird circling and screaming over the nest—and waited!
“I was only a boy, but I shall never forget the fright and the suspense in the eyes of the neighbors while they waited for Dave’s shot. It was a long range and the bullets fired by the best marksmen in the village had always failed to reach it, hitherto.
“Would the old hunter have better success? Could he kill the bird and not the child?
“At length the eagle slowly descended to the nest where his young ones were clamoring for their dinner and, just as he reached the rocky platform on which it was built, Dave fired.
“We held our breaths, but before the smoke from his rifle had disappeared the head of the mighty bird was seen to fall. Dave waved his hand again for silence and leveled his piece a second time, for the mother was slowly circling down to see what was amiss in the nest. The old man was a wonderful marksman, the best I shall ever see, for he fired again just at the very moment when she was stretching out her feet to alight and in a second we saw her tumble down the side of the crag.”
“Oh, that was splendid!” cried Ronald, his eyes sparkling with excitement, “and then the poor mother knew that her baby was safe.”
“Not at all,” answered McLean. “She knew nothing of the kind, and none of us did. How did she know but the young eagles were big enough to tear the child to pieces? How did she know he would not toss about and roll over the cliff?
“No, the thing was to get him out of the nest, and to do that they had to climb a crag that nobody had ever gone up, not the best man in the settlement. And they wouldn’t have done it then, if it hadn’t been for old Dave. I was one that helped the men carry the ladders and the ropes to the foot of the crag. I saw them climb as far as they could get a foothold and then set a ladder up into a gnarled oak that grew out of the rocks above. Dave climbed to the oak, pulled up the ladder and set it still farther up, lashing it to the oak-tree, while Shadwell—the baby’s father, you know—clambered after him on another ladder the men had brought. He followed Dave till they found a part of the cliff where they could climb without ladders, and then, holding on by tough shrubs that grew here and there, they dragged themselves up to the top of the crag.
“But then, you see, they were too high up and old Dave had to rope the father and lower him down to the nest which was built on a kind of rocky platform below.”
“Oh, the poor mother!” sighed Mrs. McLean, “not knowing all that time whether the child was alive or dead!”
“They very soon knew,” said her husband, “for when the father found the child alive and unhurt, he held it up for us all to see, and then, what a shout went up from the valley!”
“But how did they get the baby down?” questioned Ronald.
“Much the same way as Stumpy got you down from the rock the other day; they roped him and lowered him into the arms of the men who were waiting at the foot of the first ladder and there were plenty of arms and good, strong ones too.
“Oh, it was a wonderful sight. I never shall forget it, though I haven’t thought of it for years, and shouldn’t have now, if your mother hadn’t read that story in the ‘Chronicle.’”
“Do you think,” Lesley asked her mother wistfully, “if the little sister had been watching the baby, that maybe the eagle wouldn’t have carried it off?”
“That I can’t say,” answered her mother, briskly; “an eagle is a good-sized bird to fight, but I can say that it’s past time for you two to be in bed!”
Lesley did not fall asleep as quickly as usual that night, and when at last she drowsed she awoke with a sudden start and a beating heart. What had frightened her? She did not know, but she tiptoed to the window to see if the fog had lifted and found that all was clear and the Light shining bravely across the waters. The door between her brother’s room and her own was always left open at night, for she had had a care of him ever since he was a baby and she glanced through it as she went back to bed. She stopped in amaze, for there was no dark head on the pillow there. Where was Ronnie? She was in the room in a minute, and looking in the closet, under the bed, in the corners, then back in her own room where perhaps the boy might be hiding and trying to frighten her. No, no Ronnie there.
She ran to her mother’s door with a cry, and Mrs. McLean, hearing, lifted her head to say, “What is it, Lesley? Are you sick?”
“No, Mother, but I can’t find Ronnie,” with a little gasp of fear.
“Not find Ronnie!”—and in a moment Mrs. McLean had hurried on slippers and an old shawl and was in her boy’s room. In another moment Malcolm was there, too, gathering some clothing about him as he came, and together they looked in every likely and unlikely place upstairs. Then Malcolm hurried to the floor below, calling back that every door was shut and bolted on the inside.
“The cellar!” cried Mrs. McLean, but no, that door was also closed and bolted.
“He must be in the tower, then,” exclaimed Father, hurrying to the second floor again, and Lesley and her mother followed him as he ran up the corkscrew stairs to the Light.
All was peaceful there; the lamp blazed like a splendid sun and the speckless glass protected it from all wandering breezes. All was peaceful, but the little door in the masonry was open and the three dived through it into the gallery that ran around the tower.
“Hush!” whispered Mrs. McLean, “don’t speak to him! He’s walking in his sleep.”
That is just what the boy was doing, in fact—walking on the gallery in his little white nightgown, his eyes fast closed, as calmly as if he had been at play on the grass.
“Get behind him, quietly, Malcolm,” whispered Mrs. McLean again, “so that he won’t fall, but don’t speak to him now. Let him alone and perhaps he’ll come in, himself.”
They watched silently as Ronald came toward them, went back again and then, with arms outstretched, seemed trying to climb the tower, still with fast-closed eyes. Half-clothed and shivering in the night air, they watched him make this attempt three times and then pass them by, totally unconscious of their presence, slip in through the little door, and make his way downstairs to bed.
The boy did not waken even when his mother wrapped the blankets more closely about him, but slept on sweetly while the watchers hung above his bed.
“Has he ever walked in his sleep before, Lesley?” asked Malcolm, anxiously.
“No, Father, no; I never saw such a thing. He always talks in his sleep a lot, you know, but he doesn’t get up.”
“It’s likely he won’t remember anything about this in the morning, Lesley, and we’ll tell him when he comes downstairs,” said Mother. “I’ll fasten his door now and then we’ll get some sleep. Thank Heaven, we found him in time!”
In the morning when his astonishing feat had been related to Ronald, he only half-believed it until the evidence of three pairs of eyes was brought forward.
“What were you trying to do, Ronnie?” asked Lesley, curiously—“trying to climb up the tower?”
“Oh, I remember!” cried the boy, “I remember now. It was a dream I had and I was climbing up a rock to reach an eagle’s nest.”
“Then, in future,” said his father, good-humoredly, “as you seem determined to climb by night as well as by day, you will please tie a string to your toe when you go to bed and hitch the other end of it to Lesley’s bedpost. Then, at least, you’ll have a companion when you start on your midnight rambles.”
CHAPTER VIII
THE WHITE SLIPPER
It was not long after Ronald’s sleep-walking adventure when the faithful Stumpy was stricken with a sharp rheumatic attack that made it necessary for him to come up to the Lighthouse and be nursed by Mrs. McLean. On the whole he found his illness rather agreeable than otherwise, for Ronald and Lesley were his constant companions and the Lightkeeper laughingly said more than once that he didn’t know when he hired Stumpy whether he had engaged a nurse for his children, or an assistant for his own work.
When the old fellow was recovering and could limp about almost as well as usual, he rambled out one balmy day with his young friends and they all sat together on the rocks in the sun. Not a feather of breeze was blowing, a thing most remarkable and to be remembered, for King Æolus was supposed to have his cave in the immediate vicinity of the island and to let out from it all his romping, roaring winds every morning.
Jenny Lind, though not invited, had joined the party and was looking down upon them, benevolently, from a high rock; several sheep were scrambling about near by and a rabbit occasionally appeared, stood on his hind legs, sniffed the air, and disappeared again. Jim Crow was there, perched on the donkey’s back and croaking certain remarks in a low tone about this being a hard world, anyway, and it was a strange thing, so it was, that a poor crow couldn’t have a red ribbon around his neck, like Lesley. From time to time he eyed the steel chain that hung from Stumpy’s pocket with such a covetous air that its owner clapped his hand over it in pretended alarm and cried laughingly, “Oh, you Jim Crow! You young, handsome bird! You no want take chain from poor old man.”
“Jim-ery Crow-ery, never-y you-ery mind-ery!” cried Lesley, affectionately. “Bad-ery Stump-ery, tease-ery you-ery!”
“Oh-ery you-ery think-ery Jim-ery never-y bad-ery!” exclaimed Ronald.
“Oh, that secret language! When I learn?” sighed Stumpy. “I tell you many times you better learn Spanish.”
“Well, we’re willing,” answered Lesley, cheerfully. “We always were. Teach us some now. We know ‘Viva México!’ to begin with.”
“I think you not even know my name in Spanish,” said the old man, seriously. “My name Francisco Lopez, or Pancho Lopez, if you want use little name. In Mexico children like you call me Don Pancho.”
“Well, that’s all right,” said Ronald. “I’ll call you that, and now we know four words.”
“If we learn eight more words this afternoon and that will make twelve, will you tell ‘The White Slipper?’” asked Lesley, eagerly.
“Sure I will,” agreed Don Pancho, and the children set to work at once and learned the Spanish for donkey, crow, sheep, lamb, rabbit, man, boy and girl.
“Well, that’s done,” said Ronnie with a sigh of content, “and now ‘The White Slipper.’”
Here is the story, but it would best be told as the little Pancho heard it at his mother’s knee and not in the halting English he had learned since then.
The White Slipper[1]
“There was once a king of great riches and a great kingdom whose queen was no longer living and who would have been very lonely on his golden throne had it not been for his beautiful daughter, Diamantina.
“Only fifteen years old was Diamantina, but how beautiful and how graceful! When she rode through the streets of the city, her eyes and her jewels shone like the sun at midday and she had more lovers than there are grasses in the meadow. For all that, her father, King Balancin, had no idea of marriage for her and indeed she was too busy with her birds and her flowers to think about a husband.”
“But where is the White Slipper?” the children interrupted.
“Well, that is exactly what Balancin wanted to know,” said Stumpy, “and I will tell you all about it this very minute.
“Everybody in this world, my dears, no matter how happy he seems to be, has yet some trouble to bear, be it small or great, and Balancin’s trouble was of very good size.
“The monarch was devoted to the sport of hunting and one day, while pursuing the wild boar, he fell from his horse into a ravine where his face and hands were torn with thorns and his foot received a grievous wound.
“All the doctors in the kingdom were summoned to him, one after the other, but no one of them cured the wound which kept the poor king in constant pain. At length a learned physician from another country was heard of, was offered a magnificent fee and summoned to the palace, and after examining the injured foot he declared that he could not cure it, but that he could make a sandal or slipper for it that would quiet the pain. This offer Balancin eagerly accepted, and the physician gave orders for the slipper, which was to be made of kid-skin, beautifully soft and white and was guaranteed to last one thousand years from that date.
“When this wonderful object was delivered, the monarch naturally wished to try it at once, but the physician warned him that it must first be soaked for eight days in a liquid which he, only, could manufacture, if it were to be of any service.
“This was done, the famous White Slipper was finally put on and, oh, joy! Balancin was comfortable once more. His delight was such that he made the physician the most extravagant offers to remain at his court, but the learned man replied that he had many patients awaiting him in his own country, and he departed, at length, laden with the richest of presents.
“The king was now as happy as the sun on Easter Day and so was the charming Diamantina who had shared to the full in her father’s distress, but, alas! children of my heart, the joys of this world are fleeting!
“The date of the king’s birthday now drew near and great preparations were made for the occasion. There was to be a water festival, an afternoon of sports and games, a grand banquet at night, fireworks and an illumination of the palace. The king and his beautiful daughter appeared early upon the streets, arrayed in the greatest magnificence and were cheered and applauded wherever they went. The day was spent in gayety, but, at night, as Balancin stepped into the boat which was to take him back to the palace his foot caught on one of the thwarts and, shaking it, in a moment of impatience with the pain, off fell the White Slipper into the stream!
“The king cried out in distress, but, as it was already dusk, no one noticed his loss, and he fell swooning into the bottom of the boat before any one understood what had happened.
“The courtiers rushed to his rescue, but in their haste they overturned the boat in so doing and upset the unfortunate monarch into the water. Diamantina fainted, at once, on seeing her father’s plight, and parent and child were carried insensible to the palace where an end was immediately made to all festivities.
“Balancin remained insensible for three days and therefore could not order a search for the White Slipper; Diamantina, however, recovered on the morning after the accident, inquired for the treasure which none of the careless attendants had even thought of up to that time, and, finding that it was missing, immediately fainted away again. When she came to herself she at once organized search-parties both by land and by water in every direction, but neither then nor at any other time was so much as an inch of the White Slipper ever found.
“The king, again pursued by pain both night and day, fell into the deepest gloom, the princess wept like a fountain, and the court was plunged into mourning. Messengers were dispatched for the foreign physician, but, alas! in spite of all his learning he had departed this life.
“The unfortunate monarch now posted notices in every part of his kingdom offering the hand of Diamantina and the succession to the throne to whosoever would find the White Slipper. The princess, ready to sacrifice all for her beloved father, watched from the palace windows the swarm of youths who swam and dived in the neighboring stream in search of the missing treasure. The town looked like a seaside resort in the bathing season and, wherever you went, showers of drops were scattered over your garments as the dripping figures, with chattering teeth, darted in and out of the waters.
“At last, when Balancin was completely discouraged and ready to put an end to his life, he heard a disturbance one day in an antechamber of the palace and sending to inquire the cause found out that a fellow of the streets, a mere nobody from nowhere, as the servants expressed it, had had the impudence to call at the palace and ask to measure His Majesty’s foot for another shoe like the one he had lost.
“‘And what did you do with the fellow?’ asked Balancin.
“‘We packed him off at once,’ cried the servants, ‘and gave him a good drubbing besides for his insolence.’
“‘Very ill done,’ frowned the king. ‘The meanest of my subjects has a right to attempt, at least, to do me a service. Send for the youth. I can hear what he has to say, if I can do no more.’
“The poor fellow was sent for at once, and, appearing before the monarch and giving him a respectful salutation, begged permission to measure the injured foot and to place upon the wound a small plaster that would ease the pain until he could complete the cure.
“Balancin was astonished at the ease and assurance of the youth, but he liked his face and his manner and allowed him to make the examination, which he did with the greatest care. The plaster was scarcely laid on the wound when the king felt some relief and, more astonished still at this result, he asked his caller’s name.
“‘I am very well known in the city, Your Majesty,’ the youth answered humbly, ‘although I have no kinsfolk and never knew my parents. When I was little they called me “Goldfinch,” because I always sang in spite of my troubles and they call me “Goldfinch” still.’
“‘And you think you can cure me, Master Finch?’ asked Balancin.
“‘I am sure of it, sire.’
“‘And how long will it take?’
“‘I can hardly manage it in less than fifteen days, sire,’ answered Goldfinch.
“‘And what do you require for the cure?’ inquired the king.
“‘A good horse, strong and swift, Your Majesty.’
“Balancin was astonished again, and the courtiers could hardly restrain their laughter, but the monarch replied at once: ‘The horse shall be yours, Master Goldfinch, and in fifteen days I shall expect you here again. If you succeed in the cure, you know what the reward will be; if you fail, your daring will receive a fitting punishment.’
“Goldfinch made a profound bow and withdrew; the horse was provided at once, and the youth left the city followed by the hoots and jeers of the entire populace.
“Now I must tell you, my children, who Goldfinch was and how he became possessed of so much medical knowledge.
“His parents having died in his infancy he was taken in, out of charity, by an old apothecary who had nothing left of his business but his learning and his library.
“As the boy grew, he applied himself to study the books with which the walls were lined and was greatly assisted and encouraged by his benefactor, who, upon his death, bequeathed to his charge all the weighty volumes. The youth gained a light employment to support his scanty needs and spent his remaining time in study, whereby, one day, he found a marvelous specific for wounds which, however, required the use of a plant only to be found at a great distance and was thus completely out of his reach, as he possessed neither horse nor money.
“He had often seen the Princess Diamantina in her royal progress through the city and cherished for her a passionate affection, but had had no hope, even of speaking to her, until he saw the king’s proclamation published in the streets and so was emboldened to call at the palace and offer a substitute for the White Slipper.
“Astride his good horse, Goldfinch now galloped away for six whole days, stopping hardly to eat and only to snatch an hour’s sleep at night, and finally, in the depths of a thick wood, he found the plant so much desired. He plucked it, placed it carefully in his bosom, and Katakées, katakás, katakées, katakás, he was off again, galloping back to the city.
“Reasoning that if the king were willing to give his daughter and his kingdom to the man who should furnish him with a shoe to ease his pain, he would be even more grateful to one who should cure him altogether, the youth prepared his balsam according to directions and mixed within it the juices of the precious plant.
“This done and before the fifteen days had quite expired, Goldfinch presented himself at the palace and asked for an audience with the king. All was immediately prepared for his reception and the court assembled, the beautiful Diamantina entering by her father’s side. She saw at once that the new physician was young and of good appearance and, modestly casting down her eyes, awaited her fate.
“Goldfinch approached His Majesty and after the usual salutations inquired of him whether he would prefer another White Slipper, or a complete cure of the wounded foot. Balancin naturally replied that a complete cure was what most he longed for in the world, whereupon Goldfinch at once applied his precious balsam to the wound. A few moments slipped by, and the king, the courtiers, and most of all the princess, waited with bated breath.
“Suddenly Balancin started to his feet, he walked, he ran across the floor, and finally, in a transport of ecstasy, he danced gayly about the room, tossing his crown before him like a ball into the air.
“‘Approach, my benefactor, approach, Prince Goldfinch!’ he cried, ‘and I will gladly give thee thy reward.’
“Drawing toward him his beloved daughter, who was blushing like a white cloud in the setting sun, Balancin joined the hands of the young couple and ordered the immediate celebration of their wedding.
“Prince Goldfinch, attended by respectful courtiers, withdrew to a sumptuous apartment in the palace and shortly issued clad in white velvet embroidered in gold. Diamantina, in garments frosted with lace and glittering with gems, joined him at the altar and amid the cheers of the populace the marriage took place.
“The new-made prince filled equally well his double offices of husband and son-in-law, and on the death of Balancin reigned over the kingdom many years in peace and contentment.”
HE DANCED GAYLY ABOUT THE ROOM, TOSSING HIS CROWN BEFORE HIM LIKE A BALL
“Oh, what a good story!” cried Lesley.
“Stump-ery, true-ery
I love you-ery!”
and she pressed close to the blue-clad arm beside her.
“Much obliged to you, Don Pancho,” said Ronald in an offhand, manly way.
Nobody else said anything, for Jenny Lind had wandered away and Jim Crow had flapped his wings once or twice and departed, crying as he went, “Caw! Caw! I know a better story than that, about a pirate and a buried treasure.”
There had been a rabbit in almost constant attendance upon the party, but he had popped up and popped down so frequently that it was hard to tell at any given time whether it was himself or his brother, and probably timidity would have hindered either of them from giving applause even to a better story than that of the White Slipper.
CHAPTER IX
LESLEY TO THE RESCUE!
Many seemingly uneventful weeks slipped by after Stumpy’s recovery and return to the storehouse, but you may be sure that they were far from uneventful to the folk of the island. Life is never very dull when, like the gulls, the murres, the gannets, and the rabbits, you have to seek out your daily food and shelter and go without it, if you find nothing suitable. The domestic animals on the island were well provided for; still, there were daily and exciting climbing-parties among the goats and kids, and Jenny Lind amused herself by hiding away from the Lightkeeper whenever there seemed a chance that she might be asked to draw the little car to the shore.
The children had books and lessons, fishing and gathering sea-moss and shells for their occupations, and on days of blinding fog, or unusually fierce wind, they always sought Humpty Dumpty Land, where they played with dolls, arranged their collections, used their tools, cut out and pasted pictures, or dressed up Jim Crow with beads and ribbons, sometimes tying a long silken trail to his inky feathers and seeing him walk about the attic, mincing along like an elderly lady on a slippery ballroom floor.
“Ho! ho! ho!
Old Jim Crow,
You’re the funniest kind of a bird,
I ever did know!”
sang Ronald one morning when they had dressed their pet to particular advantage.
“Oh, Ronnie!” cried Lesley, “that’s not a good verse.”
“Why not, then? It sounds good to me.”
“No, it’s too long in the middle. It ought to be,
“Ho! ho! ho!
Old Jim Crow,
You’re just a funny bird;
And that I know!”
“Well, maybe that is better,” agreed Ronald, “and I can dance it, any way.” And he began to whirl about the playroom, stamping out the measure with a will.
“Oh, hush, Ronnie!” cried Lesley; “you’ll tear the house down.... I wonder,” she added slowly, holding the crow to her cheek while he caressed her with his beak, “if Father will let us take old Jim if we go away.”
“Why, shan’t we take everything?” questioned Ronald, with wondering eyes. “Jenny Lind and Jim Crow and the goats and—no, not the rabbits, o’ course.”
“And—not Jenny Lind, nor the goats either,” said Lesley, shaking her head. “They belong to the Gov’ment, you know, like Father says the Light does.”
“And does Stumpy belong to the Gov’ment?” in awe-stricken tones.
“I don’t know,” answered Lesley, cautiously, “but I believe he must belong to us, so prob’ly we could take him.”
This question, not of the removal of Jim Crow and Stumpy, but of the entire family, had been one that had prevented Mr. and Mrs. McLean for some time from finding life dull or unexciting. The Lighthouse tender had come in since Stumpy’s illness began and had brought a letter from the “Gov’ment,” a big one with a big seal, to Malcolm McLean.
It looked on the outside just like an ordinary letter, with a check in it for salary, perhaps, or a notice of oil that had been shipped for the Light, but in fact it held a bomb that exploded when the envelope was opened and filled the whole house with surprise and excitement.
The “Gov’ment” said, and said it very handsomely, that Malcolm McLean’s work as Lightkeeper on Friar’s Island had long been known and appreciated and that, considering his fine record and his length of service, it had been decided to appoint him to the care of the Santa Barbara Light, which was on the mainland, had a good house with plenty of ground for cultivation, was within easy reach of the town, with its churches and schools, and commanded a better salary.
It seemed and it was a wonderful appointment, but it was entirely unexpected and required a great deal of consideration. Ronald declared that he had never heard such a letter since he lived in this country, and his father asked him, with a twinkle in his eye, whether it was the praise of the Lightkeeper, or the thought of leaving the island that so astonished him.
“’Course I knew you were the best Lightkeeper, ever,” explained Ronald, carefully; “I knew that when I was a little boy, but I ’spected we’d live on this island forever’n ever!”
“And I thought so, too,” Lesley chimed in eagerly.
“No wonder they thought so, Malcolm,” smiled Mrs. McLean, turning to her husband, “when they were both born here and have hardly ever been away. I don’t know but that I thought so, myself, and it will be hard to leave the old place, if we decide to go. Still,” hesitatingly, “there’s the church and the schools for the children.”
“Well,” said McLean, “we’ve talked it over till we’ve nearly worn it out, but that letter to the Lighthouse Commissioner has got to be written to-night one way or the other”—and here he brought his hand down on the table with a bang—“for it’s got to be sent by the tender to-morrow.”
“Oh, is the Vigilant coming to-morrow? Oh, goody, goody!” cried Lesley, jumping up and down and clapping her hands.
“Let’s-ery go-ery to-ery bed-ery earl-ery!” whispered Ronnie, drawing Lesley into a corner.
“What-ery for-ery?” inquired Lesley, with a look of astonishment.
“To-ery see-ery tug-ery come-ery in-ery first-ery, you-ery goose-ery!” laughed the boy.
The mother laughed, too, seeing the whispering pair, and inquired, “Who do you think will understand your ‘secret language,’ if you go to Santa Barbara?”
“Oh, we’ll teach it to the natives, like the Missionaries did when they first came to California,” cried Lesley, gayly, jumping out from her corner.
Of course as the Lighthouse tender was sent only once in two months and as no other vessel touched the island regularly, to see her come in was a great event and one always viewed with excitement by the entire population, with the exception, perhaps, of the sea-birds, the rabbits, and the fishes, who did not care much for outside gayety.
The Lightkeeper, with Jenny Lind and the car, was early on the shore, long before the Vigilant could have been hoped for, and Stumpy, waiting in the storehouse door, saluted the Boss in nautical fashion and limped to his side to exchange opinions on wind and weather. Mrs. McLean forsook her usual stroll among the cabbages and, tying herself up in a shawl against the wind, her head as tightly bandaged as a sausage, she took her stand at the top of the flight of steps nearest the Lighthouse where everything could be seen and heard. The children stood by her side, at first, but soon clattered down the steps and along the rocky path to the shore, where novelty and gayety seemed more possible.
It was a gray day with a troubled sea and the air was filled with the screams of the sea-birds and the dash of the breakers against the black and jagged rocks. As to that, however, these noises were as familiar to the island-folk and as little noticed by them, as the rumble of street-cars and the honk of automobiles are to people of the city.
The children had hardly reached the shore, where Stumpy and the Lightkeeper were already stationed in their little rowboat, when a trail of white smoke was seen on the horizon, and jumping up and down in wild excitement Ronald cried, “There she is, there she is, Lesley! We were only just in time!”
The Vigilant at last hove in sight, steamed to within a few hundred feet of the shore and then blew a blast that startled the birds into louder screaming and greater flapping of wings.
“Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah for the Vigilant!” cried the children, and in a moment out shot their father’s flat-bottomed skiff from the rocks, dipping down behind each breaker and popping up again when it had been passed, like a very Jack-in-the-Box.
The “Gov’ment” had never felt it necessary to build a pier at Friar’s Island, so the only way to land the stores and the barrels of oil was to lower a few of them at a time from the tender into the little boat, row them back to the shore, and then haul them up by a derrick to a small platform that jutted out from the rocks. It was Pacific Ocean, you know, straight up to the island, with no friendly bay or shallow water, just wild surf and big breakers to the very base of the unfriendly cliffs.
The children watched the rocking skiff as the first load was lowered from the ship’s side, McLean receiving and placing the boxes while Stumpy balanced the boat with his oars. With eager eyes they watched the return, and Ronald waded far out to catch the package of papers and letters which his father threw into his arms. Then there was a scramble up the rocks and up the steps to Mother, who scurried off at once to the house, her skirts flapping in the wind, to look over her treasures.
The children ran back again to the shore, Ronald pitching headlong down most of the last flight of steps, but picking himself up quickly and calling back to his sister, “No matter, Les’! Nothing but the nose-bleed!”
His handkerchief held to his nose, he stood by Lesley on the rocks and watched the slow unloading of the barrels of oil, which formed, of course, the largest part of the cargo. Then the Vigilant came to life again, immediately found herself in great haste, puff-puff-puffed impatiently, as if saying, “Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!” gave a loud blast of farewell and made off for her next Lighthouse.
The rolling in to the storehouse and the packing away of the barrels of oil was not of much interest to the children, so, as their father had told them that they need not go home until he went up for dinner with Jenny Lind and the car, they sought for fresh amusement.
“I believe I left a book somewhere down here on the rocks,” said Lesley. “Let’s get it out and read till Father’s ready.”
“No, no!” shouted Ronald, “I don’t want to read now. Let’s go up higher and maybe I can fish off the platform.”
“You remind me of that boy in the ‘po’try’ Mother reads us,” grumbled Lesley, following him slowly, “the one that went through the Alpine Village holding the banner.”
“Don’t remember him!” said Ronald, stopping halfway up the steps.
“Oh, yes, he’s in the Fifth Reader.”
“Well, say him, then!”
“The shades of night were falling fast
When through an Alpine Village passed
A youth, who bore ’mid snow and ice
A banner with the strange device,
Excelsior!”
repeated Lesley, obediently.
“Oh, yes, I remember. Excelsior! Excelsior!”—and up the remaining steps the boy scampered like a squirrel.
Arrived at the platform above, Lesley settled herself with her book on a coil of rope and began to read the story of “Perlino,” that enchanting youth made of wax and sugar and rosewater and roseleaves and pearls and rubies and sapphires and yellow sewing-silk by the Princess who was so unsatisfied with the ordinary ready-made lover. Ronald found his rod and line, baited his hook from a supply that Stumpy always had on hand, and, sitting down on the edge of the platform, began to fish for the pink rock cod found in abundance around the island. He had been trusted to do this for a year, now, so long as some one was with him to see that he did not attempt any too daring feats, and Lesley felt no particular uneasiness as she glanced up from her story, only called, “Be careful, Ronnie, won’t you?”
“’Fraid Cat! ’Fraid Cat!” shouted Ronald, scornfully, turning his head toward her, but in a moment came a long shrill scream, “Lesley! Lesley! I’m falling!”—and springing to her feet the frightened girl saw her brother slip over the edge of the platform borne down by the weight of his rod. An unusually large fish must have caught suddenly at the bait, given it a tug when Ronald was not watching, and overbalanced the little fisherman.
Beneath the platform was a sheer wall of black rock, and below that, five or six feet of water into which Ronald, screaming for help, was plunged. Lesley realized, even in that moment of terrible fear, that her father and Stumpy were near at hand and, screaming for help, too, she rushed to Ronald’s assistance with a long fish-gaff that stood near by.
Leaning over the platform she caught it in his clothing and held him up for a moment, calling, above the noise of the breakers, “All right, Ronnie, Father’s coming, Father’s coming!”
It was only for a moment, however, for the weight of the struggling and gasping boy was more than she could hold, and before she knew it she, too, was dragged over the edge of the platform and down into the depths below.
The last despairing screams of both children were heard by the men at the storehouse, and McLean, followed by Stumpy, ran like a deer toward the sounds, pulling off his coat as he went. He scrambled up a rock near the platform and seeing, as he expected, the struggling forms in the depths below, leaped to their rescue. He was only just in time, for, as he caught them and pulled them to the shore, they hung from his grasp like mere bundles of clothing, limp and lifeless.
Stumpy had waded deep into the water to meet the stricken father and carried Ronnie to the land. Together the two men worked over the little bodies, chafing their hands and working their arms up and down to expel the water from their lungs, and before long quivering eyelids and struggles for breath showed the watchers that the two dear lives were saved.
Dripping with water like a merman, McLean rushed for Jenny Lind and the car with Lesley in his arms, followed by Stumpy with the boy. There was a tarpaulin on the car which was to have been used to cover the groceries as they were hauled up to the Lighthouse, and, throwing this over the children, Stumpy held them close while McLean urged the unwilling Jenny Lind over the railway.
Mrs. McLean, whose eyes were never far from the windows when her bairns were abroad, suddenly caught a glimpse of Jenny galloping, saw the two men on the car, and the covered heap beside them. What a lifetime of agony she went through until she reached the door and saw that under the canvas cover the children were breathing, she never could tell you! They were gathered in their parents’ arms, carried upstairs, undressed, dried, rubbed, wrapped in warm flannels, and laid side by side in bed before they could do more than sob and cry out, “Mother, Mother, Mother,” over and over again. Ronald did murmur in a low voice, “Not Lesley’s fault, Mummy; Ronnie’s fault,” but even those few words were only half-spoken, as he dropped off to sleep, worn-out with terror and excitement.
Quivering in every limb with the sudden shock and the fright that had followed it, Mrs. McLean watched her darlings as they slept, while the father, who had told her as much of the accident as he knew himself, sat below, waiting for the waking. It is true that the Lightkeeper had been told nothing as yet of what had happened; but he had found the fish-gaff still caught in Ronald’s clothing and guessed how it had come there.
As Margaret McLean sat quietly beside the bed, Lesley opened her eyes. “Where’s Ronnie?” she asked, with a startled look.
“Here, Lesley, mother’s faithful little Lesley!” cried Margaret, bending over her. “It was you who saved Ronnie and here he is beside you!”
“My Ronnie!” crooned Lesley, lovingly, turning her heavy head toward the round cheek on the pillow, “My Ronnie!”—and so, relieved and comforted, sank softly to sleep again.
It was twilight when Mrs. McLean crept down the stair to find her husband and Stumpy anxiously awaiting her. The old sailor had made two trips to the shore during the afternoon to see that no thievish rabbit, goat, or sea-bird had made off with the stores, but he could find no rest until he had heard the last news of the day from the “little children of his heart,” as he called them in his caressing Spanish way.
“They’ll do now, Father,” said Margaret, thankfully, leaning wearily against her husband’s arm. “They’re awake and calling for supper and they’ve told me all about it. Ronnie only did what he has always done since we let him use a rod and line, but he says he never felt such a tug as that fish gave him, ‘since he lived in this country.’”
Here she half-laughed and choked, and so did both her hearers.
Just then a little head appeared at the window above, “Mummy, Daddy, sing ‘Eternal Father,’ won’t you, and you too, Stumpy? It’s most evening now. Les’ and I will sing up here—”
“Eternal Father! strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bidst the mighty ocean deep
Its own appointed limits keep:
O hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea!
Amen.”
The words floated into the air from the open doorway and, perhaps, for the wind was quiet now, the song reached some lonely fishing-boat cruising about the island. The shadows lengthened, and soon the brave Light sent out its cheering rays across the waters, while below, saved from the perils of the sea, the children slept in peace.
THE END
FOOTNOTE:
[1] From the Spanish of Enrique Ceballos Quintana.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.