The agonised father ran below, rifle in hand. He might as well have been without one, for all the use he dared to make of it.
And Henry, too, followed with the ship’s musket. True, it had missed fire, and the damp priming was still in the pan. Damp or dry, it now mattered not. Saloo’s sumpitan was an equally ineffective weapon. Murtagh with his fishing-hooks might as well have thought of capturing the monster with a bait.
On it scrambled from tree to tree, and on ran the pursuers underneath, yet with no thought of being able to stay its course. They were carried forward by the mere mechanical instinct to keep it in sight, with perhaps some slight hope that in the end something might occur—some interruption might arise by which they would be enabled to effect a rescue of the child from its horrible captor.
It was at best but a faint consolation. Nor would they have cherished it, but for their trust in a higher power than their own. Of themselves they knew they could not let or hinder the abductor in its flight.
All felt their own helplessness. But it is just in that supreme moment, when man feels his utter weakness, that his vague trust in a superior Being becomes a devout and perfect faith.
Captain Redwood was not what is usually called a religious man, meaning thereby a strict adherent to the Church, and a regular observer of its ordinances. For all this he was a firm believer in the existence of a providential and protecting power.
His exclamations were many, and not very coherent; but their burden was ever a prayer to God for the preservation of his daughter.
“Helen, my child! Helen! What will become of her? O Father! O God, protect her!”