Geoffrey Hampstead: A Novel

by Stinson Jarvis

But Lemons did not come up again. In two or three seconds it occurred to some one to ask whether Lemons could swim. They had taken it for granted that he could. The thought came over them that perhaps by this time he was gone forever. Without waiting further, Geoffrey dived off the wall-sided yacht to grope along the bottom, which was only twelve feet from the surface. He entered the water like a knife, and from the bubbles that rose to the surface it could be seen that a thorough search was being made. Each one took slightly different directions, and went over the side, one after another, like mud-turtles off a log. Between them all, the chance of his remaining drowned upon the bottom was small. Several came up for air, and dived again in another place and met each other below. There was no gamboling now. They were horrified, and looked upon it as a matter of life or death. They dived again and again, until one man came up bleeding at the nose and sick with exhaustion. Geoffrey swam to help him to reach the yacht, when an explosion of laughter was heard on the deck, and there was Lemons, with the laugh entirely on his side. As soon as he had got underneath the surface he had dived deep, and by swimming under water had come up under the counter, where he waited till all were in the water, and then he came on deck.

Revenge was never more complete. Lemons was the hero of the hour. The girls thought him splendid, and afterward the sight of eight pairs of trousers and eight shirts drying on the main-boom seemed to do him good.

Charlie said they ought not to make a laundry clothes-horse of the yacht on Sunday, and proposed to leave Cobourg. Mrs. Dusenall made a slight demur to leaving on Sunday. Jack explained that if it blew hard from the south they could not get out at all without a steam-tug from Port Hope. This seemed a bore—to be locked up, willy-nilly, in harbor—so the yacht was warped to the head of the east pier, where, catching the breeze, she cleared the west pier and headed out into the lake. Outside they found the wind pretty well ahead and increasing, but, with sails flattened in, the Ideal lay down to it, and clawed up to windward in a way that did their hearts good.

Some topsails were soon descried far away to windward, showing where two other vessels were also beating down the lake. This gave them something to try for, and when the topmast was housed and all made snug not a great while elapsed before the hulls of the schooners became occasionally visible. The sea was much higher and the motion greater than on the previous day, but the breeze, being ahead, was more refreshing, and nobody felt in danger of being ill after the first hour out. They "came to" under the wooded rocks of Nicholas Island, put in a couple of reefs, for comfort's sake, and "hove to" in calm water to take lunch quietly.

After lunch, as the yacht paid off on a tack to the southward to weather the Scotch Bonnet Lighthouse, they found, on leaving the shelter of the island, a sea rolling outside large enough to satisfy any of them. One hardly realizes from looking at a small atlas what a nice little jump of a sea Ontario can produce in these parts. The hour lost in mollycoddling for lunch under the island made a difference in the work the yacht had to do. The two schooners, having received another long start, were making good weather of it well to windward of the light, and, when on the tops of waves, their hulls could be seen launching ahead in fine style through the white crests. The yacht's rigging, as she soared to the top of the wave, supplied a musical instrument for the wind to play barbaric tunes upon, which to Jack and some others were inspiring. As she swept down the breezy side of a conquered wave, her rigging sounded a savage challenge to the next bottle-green-and-white mountain to come on and be cut down.

Mrs. Dusenall went below and fell asleep in her berth, and some of the others were lying about the after-cabin dozing over books. Nina and the Dusenall girls lay on the sloping deck, propped against the companion-hatch, where they could command the attention of several other people who were sprawled about in the neighborhood of the wheel. Margaret and Rankin persisted in climbing about the slanting decks, changing their positions as new notions about the sailing of the vessel came to them. They seemed so pleased with each other and with everything—exchanging their private little jokes and relishing the odd scraps culled from favorite authors that each brought out in the talk, as old friends can. Maurice made love to her in the openest way—every glance straight into her deep-sea eyes. Not possessing a muscle or a figure, he wooed her with his wits and a certain virtuous boldness that asserted his unmixed admiration and his quaint ideas with some force. And she to him was partly motherly, chiefly sisterly, and partly coquettish, like one who accepts the admiration of half a score before her girlish fancies are gathered into the great egotism of the one who shall reign thrice-crowned. Just look at Geoffrey now, as he nears this schooner, steering the yacht as she comes up behind and to leeward of the big vessel that majestically spurns the waves into half an acre of foam. They tell him he can't weather her, that he'll have to bear away. Now look at his muscular full neck and thick crisp curls. See his jaw grow rigid and his eye flash as he calculates the weight of the wind and the shape of the sea, the set of the sails, and the distances. Obviously, a man to have his way. Objections do not affect him. See how Margaret's eyes sweep quickly from the schooner back to Geoffrey, to watch what he is doing. Why is it when they say he can't do it that it never occurs to her that he won't? She looks at him open-eyed and thoughtful, and thinks it is fine to carry the courage of one's opinions to success, and she smiles as the yacht skillfully evades the main-boom of the schooner and saws up on her windward side.

The sunrise that Maurice saw early in the morning was too sweet to be wholesome. As the day wore on, the barometer grew unsteady. A leaden scud came flying overhead, and the fellows began to wonder whether they would have to thrash around Long Point all night. A good many opinions were passed on the weather, which certainly did not look promising. Margaret suggested that it would be more comfortable to go into port, but was just as well pleased to hear that they had either to go about forty miles further for a shelter or else run back to Cobourg. Presque Isle was not spoken of, since it was too shallow and intricate to enter safely at night. Lemons suggested that they should go back and anchor under Nicholas Island, where they had lunched.

"Might as well look for needle in a hay-stack," said Charley. "It's going to be as black as a pocket when daylight is gone. And if you did get there it is no place to anchor on a night like this."

Jack did not say anything. He knew that Charley would go on to South Bay, and he looked forward to another night of it round Long Point. The only person who cared much what was done was Mr. Lemons. Towards evening he began to think about the next meal.

"My dear skipper, how can you ever get a dinner cooked in such a sea as this? The cook will never be able to prepare anything in such a commotion," said he regretfully.