An Ocean Tragedy

by William Clark Russell

‘Ay, sir,’ rumbled Finn, ‘specially with that coming along,’ pointing to the north, where the weather looked heavy and smoky and thunderous with a purple rounding of shadow upon the sea-line and a hot-looking copperish light flowing off the jagged summits into the dusty blue as though it were sundown that was reflected there, whilst the troubled roll of the swell out of the shadow on the ocean put a finishing touch to the countenance of storm you found spreading astern from north-east to north-west. ‘There’ll be wind enough there, sir,’ said Finn, keeping his square-ended stumpy fore-finger levelled, ‘to give us white water to above our bow ports anon, or I’m a codfish.’

Wilfrid turned about and fell to pacing the deck; he struck out as though walking for a wager, tossing his legs and swinging his arms and measuring the planks from the wheel to very nearly abreast of the galley. Such of the sailors as were to windward slided to the other side, where you saw them exchanging looks though there was no want of respect in their manner, but on the contrary an air of active sympathy as if they were getting to master the full meaning of the existence of that sail below the horizon by observing how the report of it worked in the baronet.

‘We must try and raise her,’ muttered Finn in my ear, ‘if only to pacify his honour by the sight of her. He can’t climb, and he’ll go out of himself if he don’t see her soon.’

‘But do you gain on her!’

‘Why, yes, she is visible from the cross-trees already. But Sir Wilfrid can’t get so high.’ Well, thought I, this should surely signify slower heels than the ‘Shark’ is allowed to have.

I went to the taffrail and overhung it, watching the sky astern with an occasional mechanical glance at the wool-white spin of the wake gushing over the surface of the jumble of the swell like steam from the funnel of a locomotive. It was blowing a fresh wind, though I guessed it would slacken away soon to pipe up in a fresh slant presently. The yacht was a great fabric of cloths, every stitch abroad that would hold air, and she drove through it humming, troubled as she was by the irregular heave of the sea. In fact her movements were so awkward as to render walking inconvenient, and nothing, I believe, but the not knowing what he was about could have furnished Wilfrid with his steady shanks that morning. It was like a bit of sleep-walking, indeed, where a man who awake could not look down forty feet without desiring to cast himself out of a window, safely and exquisitely treads a narrow ledge of roof as high as the top of London Monument.

I was startled from my reverie by an exclamation, and turning, saw him hastily approaching Miss Jennings, who had just arrived on deck. He came to her with his arms extended as though he would embrace her.

‘Laura, have you heard?’

‘Is it the “Shark,” Wilfrid?’

‘Finn says yes. She exactly answers to the “Shark’s” description. Hereabouts she should be, this is her track,—yes, yes, it is the “Shark.” Would God it were Monday!’ Then, seeing me looking, he bawled, ‘Eh, Charles, what other ship should she prove? Fore and aft—fore and aft, of the “Shark’s” burthen, as you and Finn say, a schooner, a pleasure craft by the colour of her canvas—’ his face suddenly darkened, and he said something to Miss Jennings, but what I could not gather. She half turned away as if overcome by a sudden sense of sickness or faintness; the effect of some expression of fierce joy, I dare say, on his part, some savage whisper of assurance that his opportunity was not far distant now which acted upon her nervous system that trembled yet to the surprise of the news I had sent her through her maid. There was something so sad and appealing in her beauty just then that but for the feelings it possessed me with I might scarcely have suspected what a lover’s heart I already carried in my breast for her. The troubled sweetness of her glances, her pale cheeks and lips, the swift rise and fall of her bosom, betokened consternation and the conflict of many emotions and, as I could not but think, a subduing sense of loneliness. Well, I must say I loved her the better for this weakness of spirit, for this recoil from the confrontment that she had been endeavouring to persuade herself she was looking forward to with a longing for it only a little less venomous than Wilfrid’s. Nothing, I had thought again and again, but the soul of a fond, tender, chaste woman, gentle in mind and of a nature loveable, with the best weaknesses of her sex, could go clad in such graces as she walked in withal from her topmost curl of gold to the full, firm, elegant little foot on which she seemed to float to the buoyant measures of the yacht’s deck.