The Ocean Waifs: A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea

“O, I am quite sure of it, Ben; the voices came up the wind.”

“Then we’d best go the same way and gie ’em as wide a berth as possible. Look alive, lad! Let’s down wi’ them flitches o’ the shark-meat: for it’s them that’s driftin’ us along. We’ll take a spell at the oars, and afore daylight we may get out o’ hearin’ o’ the voices, and out of sight o’ them as has been utterin’ o’ them.”

Both rose simultaneously to their feet, and commenced taking down the slices of half-dried shark-flesh, and placing them upon the sail-cloth, – with the intention, as the sailor had counselled it, to unship the oars that had been doing duty as masts, and make use of them in their proper manner.

While engaged in this operation both remained silent, – at intervals stopping in their work to listen.

They had got so far as to clear away the suspended flitches, and were about unfastening the cords where they were looped around the upright oars, when another cord, attached to one of the latter, caught their attention. It was the piece of rope which closed the mouth of their tarpauling water-bag, and held the latter in such a position as to keep the “cask” from leaking.

Fortunately they were doing things in a deliberate manner. If they had been acting otherwise, and had rashly “unstepped” the mast to which that piece of rope was attached, their stock of fresh water would have been rapidly diminished, – perhaps altogether spilled into the salt sea, before they should have become aware of the disaster. As it was, they perceived the danger in good time; and, instead of taking down the oar, at once desisted from their intention.

It now became a question as to whether they should proceed any further in the design of rowing the raft to windward. With a single oar they could make but little way; and the other was already occupied in doing a duty from which it could not possibly be spared.

It is true there were still left the fragments of the hand spike that had been ground between the teeth of the surviving shark, and afterwards picked up as they drifted past it. This might serve instead of the oar to support the mouth of the water-bag; and as soon as this idea occurred to them they set about carrying it into execution.

It took but a few minutes of time to substitute one stick for the other; and then, both oars being free, they seated themselves on opposite sides of the raft, and commenced propelling it against the wind, – in a direction contrary to that in which the mysterious voices had been heard.

Chapter Twenty Two.

Ship Ahoy!

They had not made over a dozen strokes of their oars, – which they handled cautiously and in silence, all the while listening intently, – when their ears were again saluted by sounds similar to those first heard by little William, and which he had conjectured to be the voice of a young girl. As before, the utterance was very low, – murmured, as if repeating a series of words, – in fact, as if the speaker was engaged in a quiet conversation.

“Shiver my timbers!” exclaimed the sailor, as soon as the voice again ceased to be heard. “If that bean’t the palaver o’ a little girl, my name wur never Ben Brace on a ship’s book. A smalley wee thing she seem to be; not bigger than a marlinspike. It sound like as if she wur talkin’ to some un. What the Ole Scratch can it mean, Will’m?”

“I don’t know. Could it be a mermaid?”

“Could it? In course it could.”

“But are there mermaids, Ben?”

“Maremaids! Be theer maremaids? That what you say? Who denies there ain’t? Nobody but disbelevin land-lubbers as never seed nothin’ curious, ’ceptin’ two-headed calves and four-legged chickens. In coorse there be maremaids. I’ve seed some myself; but I’ve sailed with a shipmate as has been to a part o’ the Indyan Ocean, where there be whole schools o’ ’em, wi’ long hair hangin’ about their ears an’ over their shoulders, just like reg’lar schools o’ young girls goin’ out for a walk in the outskirts o’ Portsmouth or Gravesend. Hush! theer be her voice again!”

As the sailor ceased speaking, a tiny treble, such as might proceed from the tongue of a child, – a girl of some eight or ten years old, – came trembling over the waves, in tones that betokened a conversation.

A moment or two elapsed; and then, as if in reply to the words spoken by the child, was heard another voice, – evidently that of a man!

“If the one be a maremaid,” whispered Ben to his companion, “the other must be a mareman. Shiver my timbers, if it ain’t a curious confab! Moonrakers and skyscrapers! what can it mean?”

“I don’t know,” mechanically answered the boy.

“Anyhow,” continued the sailor, apparently relieved by the reflection, “It ain’t the big raft. There’s no voice like that little ’un among its crew o’ ruffins; and that man, whosomever he be, don’t speak like Le Gros. I only thought so at first, bein’ half asleep.

“If it be a school o’ maremaids,” pursued he, “theer an’t no danger, even wi’ theer men along wi’ ’em. Leastwise, I never heerd say there wur from maremaids more’n any other weemen; an’ not so much, I dare ay. Sartin it bean’t the Frenchman, nor any o’ that scoundrel crew. Lord o’ mercy! It might be a ship as is passing near us!”

As this thought occurred to the speaker, he raised himself into an erect attitude, as if to get a better view.

“I’ll hail, Will’m,” he muttered; “I’ll hail ’em. Keep your ears open, lad; and listen for the answer. Ship ahoy!”

The hail was sent in the direction whence the mysterious sounds appeared to have proceeded. There came no response; and the sailor, after listening attentively for a second or two, repeated the “Ship ahoy!” this time in a louder key.

Quick as an echo the words came back, though it could not be an echo. There are no echoes upon the ocean; besides, the voice that repeated the well-known phrase was quite different from that of him who had first pronounced it. Though different both in tone and accent, it was evidently a human voice; and, as evidently, that of a man. A rude, rough voice it was; but it is superfluous to say that, to the ears of Ben Brace and his youthful companion, it sounded sweeter than any music to which they had ever listened. The words “Ship ahoy!” were soon succeeded by others, proceeding from the same lips.

“Gorramity!” spoke the strange voice, “who de debbil call dar? Dat some’dy in de boat? Dat you, Capten? Am it you, Massa Grow?”

“A negro,” muttered Ben to his companion. “It’s Snowball, the cook. It can’t be anybody but him. In the name o’ Neptune how has the darkey got there? What’s he aboard o’? He warn’t on the great raft wi’ the rest. I thought he’d gone off in the captain’s gig. If that wur so, then it’s the boat that is near us.”

“No,” replied William, “I’m sure I saw Snowball by the caboose after the gig had rowed away. As he wasn’t with them on the big raft, I supposed he’d been drowned, or burned up in the ship. Surely, it’s his voice? There it is again!”

“Ship ahoy-hoy-hoy!” once more came the words pealing over the water in a loud prolonged drawl. “Ship ahoy, some’dy call out dar? What ship am dat? Am it a ship at all? Or am it some o’ de wreck Pandoray?”

“Castaways,” responded Ben. “Castaways of the bark Pandora, Who calls? Snowball! Be it you?”

“Dat same chile, – who am you? Am it you, massa Capten, – in de gig?”

“No.”

“Massa Grow, den, on de big raff?”

“Neither,” responded the sailor. “It’s Ben, – Ben Brace.”

“Golly! you say so, Massa Brace! How you be dar, unless you on de big raff?”

“I’m on a raft of my own. Have you one, Snowball?”

“Ya, massa Ben, ya! I make um out o’ de wreck an de water-cask.”

“Are ye all alone?”

“Not ’zackly dat. The pickaninny be long wi’ me, – de cabing gal. You know de lilly Lalee?”

“Oh! she it be!” muttered Ben, now remembering the little cabin passenger of the Pandora. “You bean’t movin’, be you?”

“No,” responded Snowball, “lying on de water like a log o’ ’hogany wood. Han’t move a mile ebba since de bustin’ ob de powder ball.”

“Keep your place then. We’ve got oars. We’ll row down to you.”

“We – you say we? You got some’dy sides yaself on dat raff?”

“Little Will’m.”

“Lilly Willum, – ah? dat ere brave lilly lad. See ’im jess as I go down in de cabin fo’ get de pickaninny. See ’im forrard with axe, – he knock off de gratin’ ob de fore-hatch, – he set all dem ’ere niggas free. It warn’t no use, – not bit good o’ dem. Dey all got eat up by de shark, or dey go down straight to de bottom. Gorramity! how dey s’riek an’ ’cream, an’ jump overboard into de water!”

Neither the sailor nor Little William paid any heed to the negro’s half-soliloquised narrative, further than to make use of his voice to guide them through the darkness towards the spot whence it proceeded. On discovering that it was Snowball who was near, both had turned upon their own craft, and were now rowing it in the opposite direction to that in which, but the moment before, they had been so eagerly propelling it.

As they now pulled to leeward, they had the wind in their favour; and by the time the negro arrived at the end of his disjointed narrative, they were within half a cable’s length of him, and, through the darkness, were beginning to distinguish the outlines of the odd embarkation that carried Snowball and his protégé.

Just then the lightning blazed across the canopy of heaven, discovering the two rafts, – each to the other. In ten seconds more they were en rapport, and their respective crews congratulating each other, with as much joyfulness as if the unexpected encounter had completely delivered them from death and its dangers!