There was nothing to see, nothing to hear, and in spite of the wonder and awe that had pervaded him, Rodd Harding now behaved like a very ordinary human being, for he yawned, felt sleepy and that he was not so hot as he was before, and thinking that it was no use to stop there any longer, and that he might as well dress, he crept softly back to his cot and stood thinking again.
“Can’t be anything like morning,” he said to himself, “and I shall be able to see that brig then. Why, I remember now; I was dreaming about the storm at Havre, and that vessel—what was it? The Jeanne d’Arc—escaping, and the forts firing at her; and I saw the flashes from the guns. Of course; how absurd! That was the thunder and lightning, and—”
Rodd slipped slowly on to his pillow, yawned again, muttered something about how sleepy he felt, and the next moment he was off as soundly as his uncle; but only, it seemed to him, to begin dreaming directly after about the escaping of the brig, and the storm, mingled with the noise and the shouting of people ashore, and a heavy bump from somewhere close at hand; and then the boy was wide awake again, springing up so suddenly in his cot that it was not his hand but his head that struck with a rap against the woodwork, as a voice that he hardly recognised in the confusion shouted—
“Rodd, boy! Quick—on deck! The schooner’s going down!”
Chapter Twenty Seven.
Strange Proceedings.
“Is it a wreck, uncle?” panted Rodd.
“I thought so, boy,” cried Uncle Paul; “but don’t talk. Slip on two or three things.”