Leonard Lindsay ;

by Angus B. Reach

‘“He’s going—he’s going,” whispered old Captain Purvis. “The Lord hath preserved us in his great goodness.”

‘Well, Foul-Weather Don looked eagerly about as if he expected to find his treasure island, and then he mounted the rigging—all the crew holding their breath and watching him—and gazed from the maintop long and sadly. At length, he made a sort of motion of despair, and came down to the deck, where he stood wringing his hands. All at once he turned to Captain Purvis, and motioned for his boat to be hoisted into the sea. In a minute, mates, the tackles were manned, and they let the skiff go smash into the water, with a surge that would have burst another boat into staves. But only the devil, mates, could swamp a craft like that; she floated alongside as light as a well-corked bottle.

‘“Haul your wind, when the elements will allow you,” says the Don, quite solemnly.

‘“Thank you for nothing,” quoth Ned Purvis. “I should think we would, when you have brought us across the ocean against our will.”

‘But the spectre replied not a word, and seemed to glide rather than to clamber over the ship’s side into the boat. When he was fairly aboard, Ned Purvis bellowed out, “Take your sharks with you, Foul-Weather Don, they are fitter companions for you than for Christians.”

‘But there was no reply, and in a minute the phantom and his boat glanced away from the ship’s side, and the last the crew saw of her was a black speck with a figure in it, in the very crest of a breaking wave. Just as this happened, and they were beginning to breathe freely, one of the men shouted “Land!” and sure enough the next time they rose upon a sea, they saw right in the glare of the setting sun the dusky coast line of an island. In an hour after, the gale broke, lulling fast, so that before midnight they had courses and stay-sails on the ship, she lying-to with her head to the eastward. You know, mates, that in hot countries it is up wind, up sea, down wind, down sea, so that by sunrise the next day there was nothing but a great smooth swell to show that a gale had just swept across the wide Atlantic. The first thing Ned Purvis did when he came on deck to take the morning watch, was to look over the quarter, and he confessed afterwards that his heart felt sick when he saw the two blue sharks still alongside swimming close to the surface. The other seamen saw the creatures too, and they looked at Ned, and whispered among themselves.

‘Well, you may be sure that, after such a run as the ship had had across the Atlantic, she wanted refitting, and the crew wanted vegetable food, and rest; so that when the usual trade wind came to blow, and they found from one or two fishing canoes that they were amongst the most northern of the Windward islands, they cruised about, looking for a convenient beach to land at, and to refresh themselves. All this time, mates, the sharks kept their places as steadily as the very masts. Ned fished for them in vain. He even baited the hook with the choicest pieces of pork and beef aboard, but they would not as much as push the morsel with their snouts. “No, no,” said the men, when they saw this; “the creatures have their orders, and they obey them.” Then Ned tried the harpoon, but though he had often speared porpoises and dolphins, he could not make a hit at the sharks; either the ship lifted or lurched, or the ravenous animals glided aside, or the water made the spear glance; but, however it was, Ned confessed that he could not even scratch their dingy backs.

‘Upon this, there was little but black looks and murmuring words in the ship. Poor old Captain Purvis was at his wit’s end, and the crew, although they used to love poor Ned, now began to look at him as though he were a Jonas, and Ned knew it.

‘“The curse,” said the men, “is following us in a visible shape. There can be no good luck for ship, or crew, or cargo, with such a couple of attendants swimming astern.”

‘Well, Ned tried hard to laugh it off, but he could not succeed, and his arguments were of as little avail. “Why,” he would say, “they can’t jump aboard, messmates; the ocean is theirs as well as ours, and if a cat may look at a king, I don’t see why a shark may not look at a ship.”