It need scarcely be said that the men did all that lay in their power to shelter the poor women, who had exhibited great fortitude and uncomplaining endurance all that weary time; but little could be done for them, for there was not even a bit of sail to put over them as a protection.
“Nellie, dear,” said Massey, when the boat was brought up under the lee of the rocks, “d’ee feel very cold?”
“Not very,” replied his wife, raising her head. “I’m strong, thank God, and can stand it; but Peggy here is shudderin’ awful bad. I believe she’ll die if somethin’ isn’t done for her.”
“I think if she could only ring the water out of her clothes,” whispered Mrs Hayward to her husband, “it might do her some good, but—”
“I know that, Eva: it would do you all good, and we must have it done somehow—”
An exclamation in the bow of the boat at that moment attracted attention. It was John Mitford, who, having taken off his own coat, and wrapped it round his shivering wife, had gone to the bow to rummage in a locker there, and had found a tarpaulin. Massey had overhauled the locker for food before him, but the tarpaulin had been so well folded, and laid so flat in the bottom, that it had escaped his notice.
Retiring aft with this god-send, the lugubrious man speedily, with the assistance of his comrades, covered over the centre of the boat so completely that a small chamber was formed, into which the women could retire. It was not high enough, indeed, to stand in, but it formed a sufficient shelter from wind and spray.
“Now, Peggy, my dear,” said her husband when it was finished, “get in there—off wi’ your things an’ wring ’em out.”
“Th–thank you, J–John,” replied Peggy, whose teeth chattered like castanets, “but ’ow am I t–to d–dry ’em? For wet c–clo’es won’t dry wi–without a fire. At least I n–never ’eard of—”
The remainder of her remarks were lost to male ears as the tarpaulin dropped around her after Eva Hayward and Nellie had led, or half-lifted, her under its sheltering folds. How they managed to manipulate the shivering Peggy it is not our province to tell, but there can be no doubt that the treatment of her two friends in misfortune was the cause of her emerging from under the tarpaulin the following morning alive and comparatively well, though still far from dry.