Down the Wind.
They had not proceeded very far, when a cry from the girl caused them to suspend their exertions. While the others were occupied in propelling the chest, Lalee, kneeling upon the lid, had been keeping a lookout ahead. Something she saw had elicited that cry, which was uttered in a tone that betokened, if not joy, at least some sort of gratification.
“Wha is it, Lilly Lally?” interrogated the black, with an air of eagerness; “you see someting. Golly! am it de Cat’maran?”
“No,—it is not that. It’s only a barrel floating on the water.”
“Only a ba’l,—what sort o’ a ba’l you tink ’im?”
“I think it’s one of the empty water-casks we had tied to the raft. I’m sure it is: for I see ropes upon it.”
“It is,” echoed Ben, who, having poised himself aloft, had also caught sight of the cask. “Shiver my timbers! it do look like as if the Cat had come to pieces. But no! Tain’t that has set the cask adrift. I set it all now. Little Will’m be at the bottom o’ this too. He has cut away the lashin’s o’ the barrel, so as to gie us one more chance, in the case o’ our not comin’ across the chest. How thoughtful o’ the lad! Just like ’im, as I said it war!”
“We bess swim for de cask an’ take ’im in tow,” suggested the sea-cook; “no harm hab ’im ’longside too. If de wind ’pring up, de ole chess be no use much. De cask de berry ting den.”
“You’re right, Snowy! we musn’t leave the cask behind us. If the kit have served us a good turn, the other ’ud be safer in a rough sea. It be dead ahead, so we may keep straight on.”
In five minutes after, they were alongside the cask,—easily recognised by its rope lashings, as one of those they had left attached to the raft. The sailor at the first glance saw that some of the chords encircling it had been cut with a knife, or other sharp instrument,—not severed with any degree of exactitude, but “haggled,” as if the act had been hurriedly performed.