A week passed by without any event of note happening, during which period the little community did not suffer from any want of food or other necessaries, for they found a store of provisions in one of the huts that had evidently been placed there in case of need similar to their own; so, things jogged on evenly enough. Still, all were in a state of high-strung suspense, looking out eagerly from morning till night for the promised vessel that every one expected was coming to deliver them.
“I guess they’d better look alive, mister, if they’re coming,” said Mr Lathrope, “or else the summer’ll be gone afore we git away, and then we shall have to go back to Penguin Castle for another winter. I’d sooner a durned sight be thar than haar if it comed on to blow!”
“Patience, my friend!” replied Mr Meldrum. “Don’t you recollect that old French proverb, ‘Everything comes to him who waits!’”
“Don’t reckon I dew, mister,” answered the other. “I guess, though, it warn’t a waiter at one of them hotels that said that, hey?”
“Perhaps not,” said Mr Meldrum, smiling at the American’s hit; “but I’ve no doubt we shall be rescued this year, even if we have to wait.”
He was not disappointed.
On the Monday morning of the following week the look out man—for they had set up another signal station here at the head of the harbour the same as at Penguin Castle—sang out the welcome call—“Sail ho!”
And, soon after, a large fore-and-aft rigged schooner was seen entering the bay.
She proved to be the Matilda Ann of New London. She was engaged in the whale and seal fishery between Kerguelen Land and the neighbouring Heard Islands; and as she was empty, having transferred her oil to a homeward-bound whaler belonging to the same owners, her captain readily accepted the offer made him by Mr Meldrum on behalf of Captain Dinks, to charter the schooner to convey the survivors of the passengers and crew of the Nancy Bell to the Cape of Good Hope, whence they would easily be able to get a passage back to England or to their original destination in New Zealand.
“I guess that air prime,” said Mr Lathrope; “but I’ve hed enuff v’yging fur a spell, and I kinder kalkerlate I’ll make tracks to hum. I don’t mind either, darkey, if I take you along o’ me! I’ve got a fust-rate brown-stone front in Philadelphy, and I’ll chuck you in as cook, if you like, hey?”