Dick quickly secured them, for though unwilling to feed the little boy with raw fish, they would, he knew, afford him an ample meal or two. Charley, however, begged to have some to play with, and was much surprised to find their beautiful wings quickly become dry, and that in a few seconds they were dead.
Dick enjoyed a better supper than he had had since the hurricane began, and he always afterwards declared that those fish had kept his body and soul, when he would otherwise have been starved—although those he reserved for a meal on the following day required a keen appetite to munch up.
Day after day Dick and his charge floated on the calm ocean. He was becoming weaker than he had ever before been in his life, and yet he would take but a few drops of water from the beaker, and would not eat a particle of the food more than was necessary to keep the life in him, so fearful was he of not having enough for Charley. Yet Dick had not been distinguished among his shipmates for any especial good qualities, except that he was looked upon as a good-natured, kind-hearted, jovial fellow, and brave as the bravest; yet so were many of the Laurel’s gallant crew, now sleeping their last sleep beneath the ocean.
The faithful fellow now often found himself dropping off to sleep when he wished to be awake—and afraid that on one of these occasions Charley might get out of his basket and tumble overboard, to make such an accident impossible, he tied him down by the legs in such a way as to allow the child to sit up when inclined, and look about him.
Poor Dick, who was getting very weak, was lying down asleep with his head on the edge of the basket, when he heard Charley’s voice sing out—
“See, see—what dat?”
Dick opened his eyes, and casting them in the direction the child pointed, caught sight of a large vessel under all sail running down before the wind, which she brought up with her.
“A ship, Charley, a ship!” cried Dick. “And we must do what we can to make her see us, or she may be passing by, and we shall be no better off than we are now.”
He instantly took off his shirt, which he fastened by its sleeves to the pole. Holding it aloft as the ship drew near, with all his strength he waved it to and fro, shouting out in his anxiety, and not aware how low and hollow his voice sounded. Charley shouted too, with his childish treble, though their united voices could not have reached by a long way as far as the ship was from them. It seemed to Dick that she would pass at some distance: his heart sank. Presently his eye brightened.
“She has altered her course; she is standing this way,” he cried out. “Charley, we shall be picked up!”