Standing there at the port, with the floating drops of mist drenching his face, Zeke fell into a waking dream. He was again clambering over the scarped cliffs of Stone Mountain; beside him Plutina. His arm was about her waist, and their hands were clasped, as they crept with cautious, feeling steps amid the perils of the path. For over the lofty, barren summit, the mist had shut down in impenetrable veils. Yet, through that murk of vapor, the two, though they moved so carefully, went in pulsing gladness, their hearts singing the old, old, new, new mating song. A mist not born of the sea nor of the mountain, but of the heart, was in the lad’s eyes while he remembered and lived again those golden moments in the mountain gloom. It seemed to him for a blessed minute that Plutina was actually there beside him in the tiny, rocking space of the fore-peak; that the warmth of her hand-clasp thrilled into the beating of his pulses. Though the illusion vanished swiftly, the radiance of it remained, for he knew that then, and always, the spirit of the girl dwelt with him.
The mountaineer’s interval of peace was rudely ended. A wild volley of blasts from The Bonita’s whistle made alarum. Bells clanged frantically in the engine-room close at hand. A raucous fog-horn clamored out of the dark. To Zeke, still dazedly held to thought of the mountains, the next sound was like the crashing down of a giant tree, which 56 falls with the tearing, splitting din of branches beating through underbrush. An evil tremor shook the boat. Of a sudden, The Bonita heeled over to starboard, almost on her beams’ ends. Zeke saved himself from falling only by a quick clutch on the open port. From the deck above came a contusion of fierce voices, a strident uproar of shouts and curses. Then, The Bonita righted herself, tremulously, languidly, as one sore-stricken might sit up, very feebly. The sailors in the fore-peak, with a chorus of startled oaths, leaped from the bunks, and fled to the deck. Zeke followed.
Clinging to a stanchion, the mountaineer could distinguish vaguely, in the faint lights of the lanterns, the bows of a three-masted schooner, which had sheared through the port-side of The Bonita. The bowsprit hung far over the smaller ship, a wand of doom. The beating of the waves against the boat’s side came gently under the rasping, crunching complaint of timber against timber in combat. The schooner’s sails flapped softly in the light breeze. Zeke, watching and listening alertly, despite bewilderment, heard the roaring commands of a man invisible, somewhere above him, and guessed that this must be the captain of the schooner. He saw the crew of The Bonita clambering one after another at speed, up the anchor chain at the bow of the destroyer. He realized 57 that flight was the only road to safety. But, even as he was tensed to dart forward, he remembered his treasure of money under the bunk pillow.
On the instant, he rushed to the fore-peak, seized the wallet and the black bag, and fled again to the deck. At the moment when he reappeared, a gust of quickening breeze filled the schooner’s sails. The canvas bellied taut. The grinding, clashing clamor of the timbers swelled suddenly. The schooner wrenched herself free, and slipped, abruptly silent, away into the night and the mist. Ere Zeke reached the rail in his leap, the schooner had vanished. For a minute, he heard a medley of voices. Then, while he stood straining his eyes in despair, these sounds lessened—died. The mountaineer stood solitary and forsaken on the deck of a sinking ship.
Finally, Zeke spoke aloud in self-communion. The words rang a little tremulous, for he realized that he was at grips with death.
“Hit’s what I gits fer fergittin’,” was his regretful comment. “I reckon, if so be I’d ever got onto thet-thar schooner with this-hyar damn’ bag, she’d ’a’ sunk, too. Or, leastways, they’d have chucked me overboard like Jonah, fer causin’ the hull cussed trouble with this pesky black bag o’ mine.”
Zeke perceived that the doomed vessel was settling by the head. He surmised that time was short. 58 Nevertheless, he took leisure for one duty he deemed of prime importance. With all his strength in a vicious heave, he cast the black bag from him into the sea.
“I hain’t superstitious,” he remarked, sullenly; “thet is, not exzackly. An’ I reckon I’m gittin’ rid o’ that conjure satchel a mite late. I guess hit’s done hit’s damnedest a’ready.”
Inquiries during the leisurely voyaging through the canal had given Zeke knowledge concerning the life-belts. Now, he buckled one of them about his body hastily, for even his ignorance could not fail to interpret the steady settling of the vessel into the water. The strain of fighting forebears in the lad set him courageous in the face of death. But his blood was red and all a-tingle with the joy of life, and he was very loath to die. His heart yearned for the girl who loved him. His desire for her was a stabbing agony. The thought of his mother’s destitution, deprived of him in her old age, was grievous. But his anguish was over the girl—anguish for himself; yet more for her. The drizzle of the fog on his cheeks brought again a poignant memory of the mist that had enwrapped them on the stark rocks of the mountain. A savage revolt welled in him against the monstrous decree of fate. He cried out roughly a challenge to the elements. Then, in the next instant, he checked the futile 59 outburst, and bethought him how best to meet the catastrophe.
The instinct of flight from the rising waters led Zeke to mount the pilot-house. The lanterns shed a flickering light here, and the youth uttered a cry of joy as his eyes fell on the life-raft. The shout was lost in the hissing of steam as the sea rushed in on the boilers. All the lights were extinguished now, save the running lamps with their containers of oil. Quickly, the noise from the boiler-room died out, and again there was silence, save for the occasional bourdoning of the horns or the mocking caress of the waves that lapped the vessel’s sides—like a colossal serpent licking the prey it would devour betimes. In the stillness, Zeke wrought swiftly. He wasted no time over the fastenings. The blade of his knife slashed through the hemp lashings, and the raft lay clear. He made sure that it was free from the possibility of entanglement. Then, as the boat lurched sickeningly, like a drunken man to a fall, Zeke stretched himself face downward lengthwise of the tiny structure, and clenched his hands on the tubes. There was a period of dragging seconds, while The Bonita swayed sluggishly, in a shuddering rhythm. Came the death spasm. The stern was tossed high; the bow plunged for the depths. Down and down—to the oyster rocks 60 of Teach’s Hole, in Pamlico Sound. As the vessel sank, the raft floated clear for a moment, then the suction drew it under, buffeted it—spewed it forth. It rode easily on the swirling waters, at last. As the commotion from the ship’s sinking ceased, the raft moved smoothly on the surface, rocking gently with the pulse of the sea. Zeke, half-strangled, almost torn from his place by the grip of the water in the plunge, clung to his refuge with all the strength that was in him. And that strength prevailed. Soon, he could breathe fully once again, and the jaws of the sea gave over their gnawing. After the mortal peril through which he had won, Zeke found his case not so evil. The life was still in him, and he voiced a crude phrase of gratefulness to Him who is Lord of the deep waters, even as of the everlasting hills.