A fearful crisis came at last, while the party were watching a dark object at no great distance, which looked like a boat. It might be many things instead of a boat; but it was more like one than any object they had seen this night. While she was looking at it, something came fluttering against Gertrude's face, which made her start. It was the flag which had waved from the gilt ball of the summerhouse. All turned, and dimly saw the whole fabric fall in sideways, and disappear amidst a cloud of dust, which was blown full in their faces. No fixture could be found near, by which the single oar could be made of any avail to keep the boat out of the eddy. That there were fixed points was soon made known, however, by the repeated shocks which the boat underwent; shocks which threatened to drive in its bottom.
"Now God have mercy upon us!" cried the mother. "If we go down, it will be now."
A cry arose from the children and the servants. From Christian there was no cry, but a groan, which, though low, reached his mother's ear and heart. She saw that his hands were grasping the ribs of the boat.
"My boy, your pain is upon you."
"Never mind me," said the boy, in a voice patient through its agony. "Let my Father take me. Save Luc. Save Roselyn."
The boat had been staved by the last shock, and was now rapidly sinking. Help was, however, at hand. The dark object was really a boat. The cry had directed it to the right spot; it arrived in time to pick up every one of the party, not before they were wet, but before they were actually afloat. Christian was very nearly going down with the wreck, so firmly were his hands clenched to its sides: but his mother exerted her fast failing strength to rescue him, and afterwards to hold him on her knees during the fearful struggle with the enemy from which he would thankfully have been released by drowning.
The villagers who manned the rescuing boat respected the misery of the mother, whom they believed to be watching over her dying child. They spoke only to say that the passage to the village would be long and perilous, and that the earliest assistance would be procured by landing on the nearest point of the sea dyke, where succours could be brought, if there should not happen to be a house at hand.
Before the moon had gone down upon the watery waste, the party were received into the house of a hospitable fisherman, who, with his wife, did all that could be done for their safety and comfort till they could be removed to the abode of an acquaintance in Winkel; or, as Gertrude proposed, to her brother's country house at Saardam. To make the exertion of this removal was, she believed, the best thing for Mrs. Snoek's spirits and for Christian's health, which might possibly be revived by the care which would be bestowed on him by those whom he most loved, in a familiar scene, far distant from the desolation which must meet his eye every time he looked abroad, if he remained at Winkel.
His mother consented with the less difficulty that there was every probability of a fever prevailing in the district which had been laid waste. She had suffered too much from the flood, to think of braving the pestilence which must ensue. When her farm servant and his wife came to condole and relate their share of the perils of the preceding night, they received her directions about saving the wreck of the property, and doing what might be practicable towards restoring the estate.
These people were full of indignation at having been left, with their mistress's family, to try their chance of escape from drowning, while those who deserved such a fate much more had taken good care of their own security. Jan and his household had chanced to sleep on board their boats for two or three nights past, after bustling about with extraordinary vigour during the day. Slyk and his daughter had also, most opportunely, been induced to pass a few days with an acquaintance whose abode was at some distance from the scene of disaster. They came to sympathize with the Snoeks; old Jakob glorifying Providence for having interfered in so marvellous a manner to preserve himself and Fransje; and Fransje full of anxiety to know whether Heins was likely to come to assist in the great work of reclaiming the section which now lay waste.