"I know it," replied Captain Liddle, with a significant look. "I shall keep a sharp look-out on them. I've got a man on board that's a match for a dozen black sheep, or I'm very much mistaken."
Rough-and-Ready laughed and turned on his heel, and Captain Liddle went down to say an encouraging word to his wife.
On the eighth day the captain, suspecting that they were in the vicinity of the Minerva Shoal, near which there were some dangerous rocks, ordered a sharp lookout to be kept for broken water. All the passengers were by this time in a state of great alarm, and although Captain Liddle tried to cheer them by encouraging words, his anxious face belied his speech. Perhaps the one who suffered the most from terror was Stephen Homebush. His terror was so great that he forgot his mission, and flew to others for consolation, instead of imparting it. Such men as he are most true to their calling when the weather is fine. It was a miserably dark night. The captain, completely tired out, had gone down to his cabin for a little rest. All the passengers, with the exception of Rough-and-Ready, who never seemed to sleep, and yet was the freshest man of them all, had retired to their beds with hearts filled by gloomy forebodings of what the morrow might bring; and there they lay, tossing about, listening to the raging wind that was driving them perhaps to certain death. In the captain's cabin were Mrs. Liddle and her maid. There was something in the present danger that was to Minnie almost a relief from the horrible monotony of her life. Her self-imposed silence had become unbearable, and she fretted under it until her health was in danger of giving way. So that this change, with all its terrors and uncertainties, was an absolute relief to her. She was too sad and unhappy to be frightened at the prospect of death. Had the future held out to her any hope of happiness, she would have prayed to live; but as it was--"Better to die," she thought, "and so end all." There is no doubt that this miserable state of her mind was due to the want of proper moral training in her childhood. Thrown completely upon herself; with no mother's love to teach her what is often taught by love's instinct alone, that such and such impulses and thoughts are weeds that destroy, and such and such are flowers that beautify: doomed to the almost sole companionship of a father whose misfortunes had rendered him an unfit teacher, it is scarcely to be wondered at that she should have been oblivious of the true duty of life.
"Bessie," said Captain Liddle to his wife, "I have come down for an hour's sleep. I can rest with confidence, for Marvel is keeping the watch."
Mrs. Liddle nodded, and gave him a sweet little smile that was like wine to him; and Minnie heard him say, in answer to a whisper from his wife, "We are in God's hands, Bessie, and must trust to His mercy." "We are in God's hands, and must trust to His mercy," thought Minnie as she left the cabin; "and Joshua is keeping the watch. Death may be very near. Will it be wrong to speak to him?" Mechanically she made her way to the deck, stumbling two or three times and bruising herself. But she felt no pain. "I should like to die near him," she thought; "if he would take my hand in his, I should be content and happy."
Nothing but darkness surrounded her on deck. She clung to a rope, appalled by the mournfulness of the scene. Not a star was to be seen in the heavens, and the sky and water were as black as the night. So solemn, so mournful was every thing around, that the ship seemed to be rushing into a pit of death, where no light was. She could not see her hand before her, but all at once her heart beat wildly at the sound of Joshua's voice. He was speaking to Rough-and-Ready, and they were quite near her, although she had not seen them. Even now she could but barely discern their forms in the gloom. Joshua had just made a remark that Rough-and-Ready must have been a great traveller.
"Yes," answered Rough-and-Ready, "I've been about a pretty great deal. I've led a wild life; but then, you see, I never had any one to care for but myself."
"Never?" questioned Joshua, in a tone that had a dash of pity in it.
"Never but once, and that was only for a little while. But what matters? It will be all one by and by."
"I should be sorry to think you meant that," continued Joshua; "it would be a sad belief that, at such a time as this."