Maid of the Mist

by John Oxenham

There was no lack of timber, however, and cordage was to be had for the cutting, and with these the skilled hands of the seaman soon constructed a raft large enough for their utmost probable requirements. Then he turned with gusto to the more satisfying joys of plunder, and developed new and startling sides to his character.

Wulf laughed, but found him surprising, as the cateran spirit of his forebears came uppermost with this tremendous opportunity.

He climbed up and down and in and out of the high-piled wreckage like a hungry tiger, bashed in boxes and cases with a huge club of mahogany which had once adorned the cabin-staircase of a ship, and raked over their contents with the avidious claws of a wrecker of the evil coasts. Now and again strange ejaculations broke from him. More than once, in the wild glee of pillage and unexpected booty, he shouted snatches of weird runes and chanties which Wulf supposed were Gaelic. At times he stood and shook his fist at the screaming birds that swooped about him, and cursed them volubly. And once, Wulfrey, on the raft below, knitted his brows and watched him with doubtful perplexity as, in the disappointment of his hopes respecting one great case which had resisted his efforts and finally yielded nothing of consequence, he attacked another with shouts of fury and a Berserk madness that scattered chips and splinters far and wide. An incautious cormorant swooped by him. With a stroke he sent it spinning, a bruised and broken bundle of feathers, and it fell with a dull flop into the sea.

The man seemed demented, drunk with a rage for plunder and the destruction of everything that stood between him and it. His great club whirled, and the blows flailed here and there without any apparent regard to direction. The lust of slaughter and demolishment burst from him in volcanic fire and fury. For the moment he had reverted to his elemental type.

To the cooler head below he looked dangerous. Wulfrey's amused amazement gave place to doubt and a touch of anxiety. He could only hope that his companion was not often subject to fits such as this.

But the Berserk madness was not wholly without method, and presently plunder of all kinds came raining down on the raft.

Heralded by a sharp "Below there!" came a roll of linen and one of woollen cloth, a bale of blankets, more rolls,—this time of silk and satin and velvet, all more or less damaged by the sea, though they were the pick and cream of his salvaging, and all no doubt dryable.

"Good heavens! What does he want with these?" thought Wulfrey, but piled them up obediently.

Then, following the unmistakable course of the marauder up above, and clawing the raft along to keep in touch with him, down came on his head a bulging little sack, which felt like beans but proved to be coffee, and presently, after a pause, necessitated by packing arrangements up above, a series of soft bundles made up in crimson silk and tied with slimy rope.

Then, after another pause punctuated by shouts and crashes, down came a rattling heap of rusty cooking utensils all slung together with more slimy rope, a rusty axe, four broken oars. Till at last the raft became so crowded that there was barely standing room left on it.