“Back the fore topsail!” I yelled, springing down the poop ladder to the main deck and feverishly casting off the fore braces; “it is the only thing that we can do; we may lose our topmasts, but we must risk that. With our fore topsail aback we may perhaps be able to edge down upon and pick them up, otherwise we shall never set eyes upon them again.”
Working like demons, each of us seeming to be possessed, for the moment, of the strength of a dozen men, we got the head yards braced round and the braces made fast before the squall reached us; and then I sprang aft to the wheel, while Gurney and Saunders, snatching up as many loose coils of rope as they could grasp, stood by to drop them into the boat. As I reached the wheel and wrenched it hard a-starboard, the squall, with an indescribable fury of sound, struck us—fortunately well over the starboard quarter. With a report like a cannon-shot and a creaking and groaning of overstrained spars and timbers the Mercury buried her bows in the boiling sea and gathered way, paying off square before the wind as she did so. I let her go well off, until the longboat was broad on our starboard bow; then, putting the helm hard down, I brought the ship close to the wind, thus throwing her fore topsail aback, and, by the mercy of Providence, judging my distance with such nicety that the next moment the longboat, by this time full to her thwarts and utterly helpless, was scraping along under the shelter of our lee side, while the ship, suddenly arrested by her backed topsail, careened until her lee rail was level with the foam. Gurney and Saunders hove their rope’s-ends fair into the boat; but there was no need for them, the ship was bowed so steeply that the occupants were able to seize her rail and scramble inboard unaided. In as many seconds fourteen strange men had transferred themselves from the sinking longboat to our decks, while the boat, rasping astern along the ship’s side, capsized and turned bottom-up as she drove clear. Gurney flourished his hand to me as a sign that all was well, and then, as I once more put the helm up and allowed the ship to go off before the wind, he seized some three or four of the dazed strangers and invoked their aid to square the foreyard.
It was with a mighty sigh of relief that I presently resigned the wheel to Saunders and went forward to greet and welcome the rescued men; for, by the skin of our teeth we had saved them all in the very nick of time, and that, too, without parting so much as a ropeyarn. Furthermore, by an extraordinary stroke of fortune—good for us, although bad for them—we had, in the most unexpected manner, secured the services of enough hands to enable us to work the ship without being constantly worried as to the quantity of sail that we might safely venture to set. Therefore we were now in a position to avail ourselves to the utmost extent of every kind of weather, and could hope to bring our remarkable voyage to a speedy conclusion.
As I joined the group of strangers clustered about Gurney, down on the main deck, it was easy to determine, even before I came within sound of their tongues, that they were British—Australians, that is to say, for they one and all bore the well-marked characteristics of that sturdy, independent, self-reliant race. Gurney at once took it upon himself to perform the ceremony of introduction.
“This, mates,” said he, indicating me, “is our skipper, Mr Troubridge. He is but a youngster, as you may see for yourselves; but you may take my word for it that, so long as he commands, everything will go right with us. Our story is a long one, and a queer one—too long and too queer to be spun just now, so it must wait; but you will all be glad to know that we are bound for the port that you hail from; so, please God, it will not be long before you see your sweethearts and wives once more. This, Mr Troubridge, is Mr Thomson, chief mate of the schooner Seamew, blazing out yonder; and the rest are the remainder of her crew, whose names I have not yet had time to learn.”
“Welcome aboard the Mercury, Mr Thomson, and men of the Seamew!” said I. “I am heartily glad that, since it was your lot to meet with misfortune, we happened to be near enough at hand to pick you up. But what of your captain; where is he?”
“I am sorry to say, Mr Troubridge,” answered Thomson, “that Captain Peters and Mr Girdlestone, our second mate, were both struck dead by the flash of lightning that set the schooner afire; and we were obliged to leave ’em aboard to burn with her, since we had no time to do anything else. The Seamew was Cap’n Peters’ own property; and we were out after sandalwood, of which the schooner was more’n half-full when this misfortune happened to her. We fought the flames as long as we could, in the hope of savin’ her; but we never had a chance from the very first, for she was old, and as dry as the inside of a tinder-box, and she burned like a pine splinter. We hung on to her so long that we had to leave all our belongings aboard her, comin’ away with just what we stood up in, and we cut it so fine that if we’d delayed another minute we’d all be in Davy’s locker now.”
“Ay,” said I, “there is very little doubt of that, I think. However, a miss is as good as a mile, they say, and you are all here, except your unfortunate captain and second mate, so you must make yourselves as comfortable as you can until we arrive in Sydney. I am afraid I shall have to ask you to work your passages, for we are very short-handed, as you will have seen; but no doubt when we arrive—”
“Oh, that’s all right, sir!” cut in Thomson; “of course we’ll work our passages, and glad of the chance to do so. It’s a lucky thing for us that you were near enough to pick us up.”
So the matter was arranged, Gurney and Thomson each heading a watch of six men, while the cook and the steward of the Seamew respectively took charge of the Mercury’s galley and pantry, and Saunders promptly escaped from the cabin to the more congenial atmosphere of the forecastle, where he entertained the men, during the remainder of the voyage, with stories of our adventures, first on the island, and afterwards on the reef. But a timely hint from Gurney, terse and strong, kept his lips closed upon the subject of the pearls, of the existence of which on board not a man of the schooner’s crew ever became aware.