This was true. When the boat was reached and the men were on board, ready to shove off, Garnet, still holding Olly fast by the arm, said, “Keep still, will you, and hear what Master Swinton has got to say?”
“Now, you fiery polecat,” said Swinton, “you may go and cut their lashin’s, and take that as a parting gift.”
The gift was a sounding box on the ear; but Olly minded it not, for while Garnet was speaking, as he stood knee-deep in the water close to the boat, he had observed an axe lying on one of the thwarts near to him. The instant he was set free, therefore, he seized the axe, and, flourishing it close past Garnet’s nose, with a cheer of defiance he sprang towards the beach. Garnet leaped after him, but he was no match for the agile boy, who in another minute had severed Paul’s bonds and placed the weapon in his hands.
“Hallo! hi, you’ve forgot me. Cut my—ho!”
But there was no occasion for Master Trench to cry out and struggle with the cords that bound him. A furious rush of Paul with the axe caused Garnet to double with the neatness of a hunted hare. He bounded into the boat which was immediately shoved off, and the sailors rowed away, leaving Paul to return and liberate the captain at leisure.
Silently the trio stood and watched the receding boat, until it was lost in the darkness of the night. Then they looked at each other solemnly. Their case was certainly a grave one.
“Cast away on an unknown shore,” murmured the captain, in a low tone; as if he communed with his own spirit rather than with his companions, “without food, without a ship or boat—without hope!”
“Nay, Master Trench,” said Paul, “not without hope; for ‘God is our refuge and our strength, a very present help in trouble,’ so says His own Word, as my mother has often read to me.”
“It is well for you, Paul,” returned the captain, “that you can find comfort in such words—I can find none. Stern realities and facts are too strong for me. How can I take comfort in unfulfilled promises? Here we are in trouble enough, surely. In what sense is God a ‘refuge’ to us—or ‘strength,’ or a ‘present help’? Why, we are left absolutely destitute here, without so much as a bite of food to keep our bodies and souls together.”
He spoke with some bitterness, for he was still chafing under the sense of the wrong which he had suffered at the hands of men to whom he had been invariably kind and forbearing. As he turned from Paul with a gesture of impatience his foot struck against the canvas bag of pork which the man Taylor had flung to him on leaving, and which had been forgotten. He stopped suddenly and gazed at it; so did Paul.