From Jest to Earnest

by Edward Payson Roe

At last the tide turned, and the dreary, monotonous waiting in their hopeless position was exchanged for an upward movement that would soon bring them above the mountains again, where, from the thickly peopled shores, there would be a better chance of being seen and rescued.

There was no certainty that they would be missed, and therefore sought for, as the coachman, not finding them on his return, might conclude that they had been prevailed upon to remain all night with the friend they were visiting.

But any exchange from the black, rayless shadows that surrounded them would be a relief; and it was with a faint feeling of hopefulness—that they recognized their movement northward, which slowly increased in speed as the tide gained mastery of the slight natural current of the river.

The strengthening northern gale had thrown up quite a "sea," and the experienced oarsman soon saw that the ice-field by which they were surrounded was breaking up under the influence of the waves. This might at last bring relief, or increase their danger. If the ice should all break up around them and leave their boat tight and sound, they could tow ashore. If the boat had been or should become so injured as to leak badly, it might fill with water before they could reach land. Thus, in any case, the trying nature of their peculiar position was aggravated by a terrible uncertainty and suspense.

As they emerged from the Highlands into the broad waters of Newburgh Bay, their worst fears seemed about to be realized. Here, for many miles, the north wind had an unrestrained sweep, and the waves grew larger and more violent. Under their increasing force the ice-floe crumbled around them rapidly, until at last little was left save the mass of double thickness caused by the union of the two large cakes between which the boat had been caught. This, at last, began to give under the weight of the boat, and let it more deeply into the water. Then, to their dismay, they saw that the seams of the boat had been so wrenched apart that the water came in rapidly.

They tried to keep it down by baling. The frosty gale tossed Mr. Martell's white hair, while with his hat he worked, in pathetic earnestness, for the sake of his daughter; but in spite of all that he and the oarsman could do, the water gained on them, wetting their feet and creeping up their legs with the icy chili of death.

Every moment or two the man would pause in his work and send forth a cry of such terrible power and earnestness that it would seem some one must hear.

Again Alice Martell saw the distant lights of her own home, but she turned from them to those that gleamed from the nearer residence of Mrs. Marchmont. Was he there, safe and happy, looking love into the eyes of Addie Marchmont, while every moment she sank lower into the cold river? The thought sent a deeper chill to her heart than the icy tide from which she could no longer keep her feet.

"God and man is agin us," said the oarsman, savagely. "What is the use of trying any longer! The sooner it's over the better"; and he was about to give up in despair. Alice, with equal hopelessness of any earthly aid, was about to turn her eyes from the faint rays which, barbed with the thoughts suggested above, pierced her heart like arrows, when the throwing open of the hall-door by Hemstead let out such a broad streaming radiance as attracted her notice. By calling the attention of the others to it, she inspired in them a faint hope.

But when, soon after, the door was closed, and the lights had their usual appearance, the flicker of hope sank down into a deeper darkness.