Gaunt then shook Ned heartily by the hand, after which the others stepped forward one by one and did the same, each saying a hopeful word or two to cheer and encourage him under the pang of parting, which it was evident enough the poor lad felt keenly. Sibylla hung back until all the others, the poor children included, had spoken their farewell, and then she too advanced and held out her hand. She was very pale, and the small shapely trembling hand which Ned grasped in his was icy cold; but however keenly she may have felt the parting under such terrible circumstances she contrived to maintain at least a semblance of outward composure, though there was a tremor in her voice which she found it quite impossible to control. She murmured a few low half-inarticulate words of farewell, gave Ned’s hand a slight involuntary pressure ere she released it, and then hastily retreated to her state-room.
As for poor Ned, on releasing Sibylla’s hand he turned and staggered out of the cabin, looking like a man who had been suddenly struck a numbing blow, and feeling as he might have felt had the saloon been a felon’s dock in which he had just received his death-sentence. This miserable parting, though he had been constantly expecting it any time within the previous fortnight, and though he honestly believed—as he had said—that he was glad of it, now seemed to have come upon him with startling suddenness, and it had called up with it an unexpected feeling of bitter anguish for which he was wholly unprepared, and for which he found it difficult to account. It was not, he thought, that he had conceived for these people an exceptionally warm friendship; he had made many friends during his sea-going career for whom he had felt quite as strong a regard, yet when the time for it came he had been able to say farewell with a cheery voice and a comparatively light heart. But now it seemed altogether a different matter; though the sun still shone brilliantly, as of old, and the warm soft wind still roughened the sapphire sea and caused it to laugh and sparkle as joyously as ever, the whole world looked dark, cheerless, and gloomy to him, and he felt as though he had suddenly become the victim of some terrible calamity. In the endeavour to get rid of the horrible feeling of depression which had thus unaccountably seized upon him, Ned went and hunted up the boatswain, and delivered Williams’ order respecting the removal of the passengers’ baggage from the hold; after which he mounted the poop, on which Williams had by this time stationed himself. But, actuated by the new and peculiar feeling which was just then so strongly asserting itself within his breast, the lad could think only of the mysterious island ahead, and of those who were so soon to be landed upon it; and his imagination, powerfully stimulated as it just then was, already pictured the little party abandoned there, and reduced to the most primitive state of self-dependence, given over to battle for their very existence as best they might: houseless, exposed to a thousand perils, and destitute of even the commonest necessaries of life until such could be provided by their own exertions. There was one—and only one—grain of comfort to brighten the gloomy prospect as it presented itself to Ned’s mental vision, which was that Mr Gaunt seemed to be a man of infinite resource; one of those extremely rare individuals who can never be taken wholly by surprise, and who no sooner find themselves confronted by a difficulty than they are ready with a remedy for it. The doctor, too, though a singularly quiet and unassuming man, struck Ned as one who, his work once fairly cut out for him, would go manfully through with it. But what could two men, however resolute, do in the position they would soon occupy, unless well provided with arms, ammunition, and tools? And, determined to let slip no opportunity to help those in whom he was so strongly interested, the lad turned to Williams and said:
“As I suppose you do not intend to turn these people adrift without arms, or the tools with which to construct for themselves some sort of a shelter, would it not be well to look up a few things for them at once, so that the ship may not be detained in a position of danger when the landing takes place?”
“Arms! tools!” growled Williams. “Who spoke of supplying them with either?”
“Nobody,” answered Ned; “but you cannot surely be thinking of putting them ashore without them?”
“Now, supposing that you had the management of this job,” snarled Williams, “what would you give them?”
“Well,” said Ned, “I should let them have one of those spare topsails out of the sail-room; a couple of rifles apiece, including the women, with plenty of ammunition, two or three axes, a hammer or two, and a few bags of nails.”
“Oh! you would, eh?” sneered Williams. “And what use do you suppose all those things would be to them?”
“The sail,” said Ned, “would serve them for a tent until they could build a house, the tools would enable them to build the house, and the arms would give them a chance to defend themselves if attacked, as well as to provide themselves with food.”
“Well, yes, that’s true,” answered Williams, rather reluctantly. “Very well,” he continued, “go and rout the things out; and let me see them when you have got them together.”