She heard him, reeled back against the stem of the nearest palm tree, and clung to it, waving her hand toward the boat. But as they looked, a young boy was standing at her side, grasping her garments with his hand, while his face was turned toward the boat. He seemed urging her to flee. Twice her arm was unwound from the palm, and a step tried, but she fell back again, as if severely hurt or frightened out of her strength. The boy still pleaded. They could see it in his gestures, in the eager hand that motioned toward the shore, which the boat almost touched.
He pointed this out; he pulled frantically at her garments; he fell upon his knees, lifting his clasped hands toward her imploringly.
Something gave her desperate strength. She left the palm, staggered, and sprang forward, more than keeping pace with the boy, who, clinging to her hand, rushed on with his great, wild eyes, uplifted to her face.
The captain sprang on shore, and met them on the verge of the surf. The woman reeled toward him blindly, with both hands outstretched, and fell into his arms headlong, as she must have fallen on the sand but for his presence.
He gathered her to his broad bosom, and wading through the surf, waist deep, laid her in the boat, upon a pile of jackets that his men hurriedly took off their persons, and cast at his feet.
She was coldly pale, and did not seem to breathe. But the captain had no time to remark this or any thing else. A group of negroes who had been pursuing their death work among the cactus hedges, saw the boy and turned upon him.
The lad saw them, and with a desperate bound, leaped into the surf—struggled, lost his foothold, and was in the very sweep of the undertow, when the captain snatched him away. The savages hurled their sharp missiles after him, which the water swallowed instantly. So, as they were without firearms, the boy was saved, while his pursuers raged and hooted on the shore.
When the boy saw his mother lying so pale and still in the boat, he struggled from the captain's arms, and kneeling by her side, pressed the beautiful face—for it was beautiful—between his little trembling hands, while in the purest and most pathetic French he besought her to look up. He told her that they were safe now—away on the sea, where nothing could hurt them. He entreated her to wake up, only for one minute, just long enough to kiss him, and then she might go to sleep again for ever so long.
The touching anguish in the boy's voice would have called any mother back to life. She opened her eyes; a look of divine tenderness came softly to her face, and died in a smile upon her lips, as the boy bent down with a gush of tearful gladness and kissed her.
"There," he said, touching her raven hair with infinite tenderness, "go to sleep now. Paul will sit by and watch."