At the Black Rocks

by Edward A. Rand

When he had brought the box, standing on it he saw that the web was on the outside of the lantern, and he went without to remove the film from the glass.

"There!" he said, reaching up to the corner of the window as he stood on the box. "Come down here. Don't have cobwebs on the windows of this lantern."

He now turned about, and chanced to face the tall red pipes projecting from the roof of the signal-tower with their trumpet-shaped mouths.

"Is one of those pipes damaged?" wondered Dave. "Afraid so. I must take a sharper look at that."

At the foot of the railing of the parapet he placed the box, and from that elevation, leaning his arms on the railing, inspected as closely as he could the fog-signal. This parapet for timorous people was an ugly spot. When the wind blew hard it was not easy to maintain one's footing outside the lantern. One could cling to the railing, which was firm, but it consisted only of an iron bar resting on upright iron rods three feet apart. There was no danger of a fence-break, but the gaps between the iron rods were wide and ugly, and if one should chance to drop on the smooth stone floor and just tip a little--over--toward--the--edge--ugh! One did not like to think of that fall down--down--into the sea--perhaps upon the Black Rocks when the tide was out. Toby Tolman had told Dave that for a long time he did not care to go near the rail about the lantern and stand there a while, as it made him "nervous;' but he had ceased to be a "land-lubber," and could now face, sailor-like in confidence, any quarter of the sea and sky, just clinging to that little rail. Dave had felt pleased with his steadiness of nerve when he found he could look over that rail and then down upon the whirling sea without very much trepidation.

"Shouldn't like to have a dizzy fit when I was looking over," he said. "No danger, though."

He repeated this as he now stood on the box planted at the foot of one of the iron supports of the rail, and continuing to rest his arms on the rail, inspected closely, as already said, the fog-signal. Suddenly his arms slipped, and over the horrible edge of that narrow little railing he found himself going. Sometimes we compress years into moments apparently. We go back, we go forward, we gather it all up into the thought of a very brief now. But oh, how vivid!--like all the electric force in a great mass of cloud concentrated in one dazzling, blinding lightning-stroke. As Dave felt that his body was sliding over that rail, he seemed to realize where he had been in the past. He thought of his parents--his home--Uncle Ferguson at Shipton--how it was that he came to the lighthouse, and then he seemed to realize vividly his situation there in the lighthouse: that he was there as the responsible keeper just then; that the safety of many vessels at sea all relied on the thoroughness of his watch; and yet he was sliding over that rail, going down toward the waves, the rocks--he dared not look toward them! He could see only this one thing between him and death: beneath his hands was an iron support of the railing. There was no other object he could grasp for three feet on each side of him. It is true there was the granite rim of this lantern-deck, so called sometimes, but he could not grasp it. His hands would slide over it. Just that iron stanchion was his hope, and as he was sinking down he convulsively clutched at it, caught it, clung to it--shutting his eyes as if blinded. He dared not look anywhere until he felt that his grasp was sure, and then he somehow worked himself back, up, over the railing, and the whole of his body was on the lantern-deck again. He crawled into the lantern, shut the door, and threw himself on the floor weak as a baby.

"Horrible!" was his one word. There he lay thinking. What if he had gone down into that yawning pit of the sea! When would they have found his body? Horrible! horrible! When he was steady enough he slowly crept down the stairs. He entered the kitchen. It had seemed as if everything threatened to fall when he was in danger of going down into the sea--lantern, watch-room, lighthouse--all into the merciless sea. But here was the kitchen. No change here. It was so quiet, so restful. A lamp burned on the table. The fire murmured in the stove. The clock sang its cheerful little tune of a single note. And there was the old light-keeper's Bible. It still lay open, its pages shining in the lamp-light, and there were the promises of the psalm Dave had already noticed. What did it say? "They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone."

Dave started. Up on the high lantern-deck had any mighty angel stepped between him and death, lifting him back on the floor of stone? Who could say it was not so? Dave sat down in a chair, and then bowed his head and rested it on the table. Here was God, the kindest, dearest being in the universe, Dave's great Father, from whose arms he had been turning away, trying to avoid them; and now, up on the lofty parapet, they had been held out, restraining him, saving him.

"Oh, I can't go on this way any longer," thought Dave. "And I won't, either! If God will only have me--will only--"