Читать книгу The White Squall - John C. Hutcheson - Страница 6

The first face I saw when I came to myself was that of my father. He was bending over me and looking very anxious. I think he had been crying.

“Better, Tom?” he said softly, as if afraid of making a noise and frightening me back into unconsciousness—everything seeming to be strangely still around me!

“Oh, I’m all right,” I answered joyfully, much pleased at seeing him. “Why, how did you come here?” and I tried to get up from the sofa on which I discovered that I Was lying. But it was only an attempt, for I fell back again in a heap, feeling pain all over me. It seemed just as if I had been broken into little pieces and somebody was now separating the bits!

“Bress de Lor’, him ’peak again!” I heard Jake ejaculate, and then I noticed his black face behind dad’s, while there was another gentleman there too. The latter now took hold of my hand and felt my pulse, I suppose, although he didn’t ask me to put out my tongue, as he generally did when he came up to Mount Pleasant specially to prescribe for me!

“Hallo, Doctor Martin!” I exclaimed, recognising him. “What’s the matter with me? I can’t rise, or move my legs, or do anything.”

“You confounded young rascal!” he rejoined in his hearty voice, “a nice mess you have got yourself into, alarming us all in this way. What do you mean by galloping down Constitution Hill as if you were after a pack of foxhounds? It’s a mercy you haven’t broken every bone in your body.”

“Poor Prince isn’t hurt, is he?” I asked abruptly, without answering him directly.

“No, Mass’ Tom,” eagerly cried out Jake, glad of saying something to me in order to show his sympathy; “he berry well, no scrape um knees or nuffin’, he—”

“There, that will do,” said Doctor Martin, interrupting the flow of the good-natured darkey’s eloquence, “you mustn’t agitate Master Tom now; he’s in a very critical state, and any excitement is bad for him. You’d better go and see after the horses.”

“Me no want agg-agg-tate um, Mass’ Doctor,” pitifully expostulated Jake, almost blubbering at the accusation of his possibly wanting to do me harm, “I’se only glad to hear him ’peak again, dat all;” and he went out of the room quite crest-fallen.

“Oh, doctor!” I cried, but then, all at once, a sort of sick sensation came over me. Dad and Doctor Martin seemed to be waltzing round me, with the furniture and everything else following suit, and I fainted away again, I fancy; although I could hear their whispering voices, as of people who were far away in the distance. Then, there was a blank.

When I next opened my eyes, strange to say, I was in my own little bed at home, with my mother sitting by my side.

I felt very weak, and one of my arms was tied up in bandages, while my other limbs didn’t seem to belong to me; but, at first, I had no recollection of what had happened.

I could not imagine what was the reason for my being laid up like that; and, seeing my mother there, I fancied for the moment that I had overslept myself, as was frequently the case, and that she had come to call me for breakfast.

“Why, mother,” I said, “I’m sorry I’m so late.”

“You’ve been ill, Tom,” she replied soothingly, without referring to my laziness as I expected; “I’m glad, though, you’re recovering at last.”

“Hi!” I exclaimed, much astonished.

“Yes, my dear, very ill,” she repeated.

“Dear me! and for how long?” I asked, in wonder still.

“Well, it is more than three weeks since you were brought here, dear; but take this now, Tom,” she added, before telling me anything further, putting her arm round me and lifting me up in a sitting position, so as to be better able to swallow something in a wine-glass which she held to my lips.

“Medicine, eh?” I said, making a wry face.

“Yes, dear, but it doesn’t taste badly,” she whispered coaxingly. “Besides, Tom, if you won’t take it the doctor says you are not to be allowed to speak, and of course I shall not be able to answer your questions.”

This settled the point; so I at once tossed off the draught she handed me, which, although slightly bitter, was not nearly as nasty as I thought it would have been, having a wholesome horror of doctor’s mixtures. The draught, at all events, put fresh vigour into me. It certainly gave me strength to speak again as soon as I had gulped it down, for I was fidgeting to know what had occurred.

“Now, mother,” I said, “tell me all about it. I can’t be quiet till you do. Have I had the fever again, or what?”

I may mention in explanation of this question of mine that, the year before, I had been confined to bed with a sharp attack of a sort of tertian ague, which is the scourge of most tropical countries. This was the only illness I had ever suffered from in my young life; so, I thought now that my old enemy had paid me another visit.

“No, dear, you have not had the fever,” she answered. “Do you forget all about going to town to meet your father, and how your pony threw you over his head at the foot of Constitution Hill?”

Thereupon the whole thing flashed back upon my mind in an instant.

“But how did I get here?” I inquired, puzzled at this part of the affair. “I remember now about my tumble, and seeing dad and Doctor Martin at some place in Saint George’s, with old Jake crying behind them, but I don’t recollect anything else.”

“My boy,” said my mother seriously, her lips trembling as she spoke, “you’ve had a very narrow escape from an awful death! Do you know that had you fallen on your head in the street when Prince pitched you over, nothing could have saved your life? As it was, you got your left arm broken and face cut, besides which you have been suffering from a slight concussion of the brain, Doctor Martin says. It is the latter which has made you insensible for so long a time. At one time, indeed, we all despaired of you!”

“Really!” I exclaimed, drawing a long breath of dismay at this catalogue of my injuries.

“Yes, really, Tom,” said she; “it is a wonder to me that you are now lying here in your right senses again.”

“But how did I get home, mother?” I asked, pressing my inquiries so as to learn every incident of the accident.

“Well, dear, being unconscious, and as moving you could not affect your head much, Doctor Martin thought you would recover sooner if removed to the fresh country air of Mount Pleasant than if you were allowed to remain in the stifling atmosphere of the town. So you were brought up here, borne on the very sofa on which you were placed when they picked you up after your fall, four negroes acting as your palanquin bearers.”

“Jake was one, I bet!” I here put in, interrupting her. “I am sure he wouldn’t have let anyone else carry me if he could help it.”

“Oh, yes, Jake assisted,” she said; “and I gave him a fine scolding, too, afterwards, for allowing you to ride down that hill at such a pace. It was a mercy you were not killed outright!”

“It wasn’t his fault, mother,” I interposed at this point. Really, I was not going to let poor Jake be blamed for my obstinacy! “I made Prince gallop into the town as hard as I could, in spite of all he could say, for I was anxious to get down to the wharf before the passengers had landed from the steamer. I wished to be the first to meet dad.”

“And you’ve found out now, Tom, the truth of the old proverb, ‘more haste, worse speed,’ eh, my dear?”

“Yes, mother,” I said with a laugh, “I never got there at all. But, dad came all right, for I saw him, you know. Where is he?”

“He’ll be here presently,” she replied; “he has been very anxious about you, and has sat up every night with you.”

“I’m very sorry,” I said; but then, feeling about my face and head with the solitary hand I was now only able to move, I noticed something strange. “Why, hullo, mother!” I cried out, “what is the matter with the top of my head—where is my hair gone? All seems so smooth!”

She couldn’t help laughing—I suppose it was at my comical look of mingled astonishment and perplexity.

“It had to be shaved off when you were delirious, Tom,” she said with a smile; “you feel funny without it, no doubt, but it will soon grow again, my boy.”

“Oh dear, oh dear!” I exclaimed lugubriously; “I suppose I will be bald and have to wear a wig, like old Mr. Bunting! My arm, too, mother, hurts awfully! and I can’t move it at all.”

“Never mind, Tom, it might have been worse, you know,” she said in her quiet soothing way. “You ought to thank God for sparing your life, instead of grumbling at what your own recklessness has produced. However, my dear boy, you’ll soon pull round and be yourself again if you will only keep quiet and obey all the doctor’s directions.”

“But, mother, it’s a terrible task for me to keep quiet,” I cried in such a serious manner that I made her laugh again.

“No doubt it is,” she said, “but you must learn to do it if you wish to get well again; and, Tom, I can’t help reminding you that your being laid up now has greatly interfered with our plans. Your father wished to have sold the estate, and for us all to go home to England. Indeed, but for your accident we would have gone by the last packet.”

This was news with a vengeance! It almost made me jump out of bed, crippled as I was, and my mother had to put her hand on my shoulder to restrain me.

“What! sell Mount Pleasant?” I ejaculated.

“Yes,” she replied.

“And all of us go home together, instead of my being sent to England alone to school?” I continued.

“That was what your father thought of,” said my mother in answer to this question of mine; “but your illness has made him alter his mind somewhat, as you will learn when you are able to get up and move about. You must now, dear, remain quiet, and not excite yourself; otherwise, your recovery will be retarded and that will worry your father more.”

“All right, mother, I promise to be good,” I said resolutely, nestling down amongst the pillows which had been comfortably fixed around me, and trying to be as still as a mouse. “I will do all that you and the doctor tells me, if you’ll only make me well again.”

“That’s my brave boy,” she murmured softly, smoothing my poor hairless head with her gentle hand in such a caressing way that it made me feel drowsy, and in another minute I had dropped off into a sound sleep. I did not wake again until some hours afterwards, when I was so refreshed and hungry that I was able to demolish a large basin of jelly-like chicken broth with some thin toast, which did me much good.

From that time I gradually got better; but my recovery was very slow, on account of the thorough shaking I had received from my fall, and it was quite another fortnight before I was able to be moved downstairs and allowed to sit in the verandah, where the fresh breezes from the sea and the scent of the flowers on the terrace completed my cure.

For some days even after this, however, I had to keep perfectly quiet, in accordance with the orders of Doctor Martin, who feared that I had sustained some injury to my spine in addition to my other contusions. This suspicion of his turned out, fortunately for me, to be groundless; but the rest he enjoined was very much out of keeping with my buoyant and excitable nature, which was fidgety in the extreme.

Still, this period of convalescence was by no means irksome to me on the whole, for I had plenty wherewith to occupy my attention and my sisters for companions, little Totty, the youngest, never being so happy as when with me.

In order the better to amuse me, and make me remain in a recumbent position, dad rigged up an Indian grass hammock for me beneath the shade of one of the large silk-cotton trees by the side of the house; and here I used to swing at my ease for hour after hour, looking at the bright-coloured humming-birds flitting about and watching the busy “Jack-Spaniards,” as the wild bees or hornets of the tropics are locally styled, building their clay nests under the eaves of the verandah, just in the same way as the sand-martens make their habitations at home.

I also read a great deal, for a kind neighbour luckily lent me at this time a couple of odd volumes of Captain Marryat’s works, so that I had now the pleasure of gloating over the wonderful history of Mr. Midshipman Easy, besides enjoying the strange episodes of Peter Simple’s eventful career. Both of these books were previously unknown to my boyish ken, and I need hardly say how entrancing I found them. Even now, after the lapse of so many years, I cannot hear the titles of either mentioned, without my memory taking me back in a moment to the garden of my old island home in the West Indies—the very perfume of the frangipanni and jessamine being almost perceptible to my vivid imagination, while my fancy pictures the scene around, and my listening ear catches the faint rustle of the wind through the tops of the cabbage palms!

Once, I recollect, when lazily rocking to and fro in my hammock, I saw a large armadillo crawl out from amidst the brushwood under the trees, he having probably come down from his cave somewhere up in the mountains for change of air. This animal is something like a tortoise, only ever so much bigger; and as the negroes esteem them very good eating, saying they are better than turtle, I at once gave Jake a hail to let him know of the arrival of the strange visitor, when my darkey hastened speedily to the spot, securing the armadillo without much difficulty. Jake was all the more delighted with his prize from the fact that my accident had prevented me from going manacou hunting with him as I had promised. He argued that the armadillo would serve as a set-off to Pompey’s iguana, which had been constantly “thrown in his teeth,” as it were, ever since his rival had killed it in my presence, the one capture neutralising the other.

It may be wondered that I introduce all these little details of my illness and subsequent recovery, but, “there’s a reason in everything, even in the roasting of eggs,” says the proverb; and, when it is considered that, had it not been for my accident, dad and mother with my sisters and myself would all have gone to England in the mail steamer together, instead of my essaying the voyage alone in a sailing ship, these incidents are naturally relevant, quite apart from the strong impression they made upon me at the time, as but for what occurred I should have nothing of any importance to tell with reference to my subsequent adventures when alone on the Atlantic.

However, to make a long story short, I may briefly state that, after a pretty long interval of lying still, Doctor Martin said one day that I might get up and move about; when the change from inaction to action had such an improving effect on me that, within a very short space, I was myself again—although, perhaps, a much paler and thinner sort of Tom Eastman than “the young rascal,” as the doctor persisted in naming me, “who tried to break his neck by galloping down Constitution Hill, but couldn’t because it was so tough!”

All this while, dad had said nothing to me either about selling the estate or of my going home to school; but one morning when I was able again to mount on the back of poor Prince, who had grown quite fat during his long stay in the stable, he told me that I might accompany him, if I liked, to Grenville Bay, on the other side of the island. Dad said that there was a large merchant vessel lying off there, loading sugar from one of the plantations, and he wished to consult the captain about sending home some bags of cocoa in her. He added, that we would probably have to go off to her in a boat.

This was about a week after the doctor had released me from my hammock-prison; so, as I had not as yet had a canter on Prince since my unlucky escapade, it may be imagined with what delight I prepared for the excursion, as, independently of the pleasure of a long country ride with dad, who was one of the jolliest companions anybody could be out with, I had never been on board a real ship before. I had frequently observed vessels at a distance from the shore, when anchored in the Carenage, as the harbour of Saint George is called, or else sailing round the coast inwards or outwards bound, but had never inspected one closely.

“Golly, Mass’ Tom, dis sight am good for sore eyes!” cried Jake, laughing from ear to ear with joy at seeing me well again. “Me nebber fought you ebber lift leg ober Prince again!”

“Oh, I’m all right,” I said gleefully, jumping into the saddle in my old style, the pony going off instanter at a canter in his customary way.

“Take care, Tom, take care!” cried my mother after me anxiously; so, to ease her alarm at my venturing too much for one who had so recently been an invalid, I reined in Prince, and as soon as dad had mounted Dandy, we started away at a steady jog-trot, Jake following up close behind the heels of the horses, with which he could at any time keep pace when put to it, even when we went at a gallop.

Dear me! I shall never forget that ride.

Part of our way was past a wide stretching extent of primeval forest that clothed the mountain-side with green. Here were wonderful specimens of trees, some of which would rival the oaks of England—aye, even those in Windsor great park! There was the sandbox, whose seeds are contained in an oval pod about the size of a penny roll; which when dry bursts like a shell, scattering its missiles about in every direction; the iron-wood tree, which turns the edge of any axe, and can only be brought low by fire; the caoutchouc-tree with its broad leaves and milk-white sap, the original source from which all our waterproof garments are made. Besides these were a host of others, such as the avocado pear, soursop, sapodilla, and sapota, all of which, in addition to their size and grand appearance, bear excellent fruit. But it would have puzzled anyone to explore this almost impenetrable forest growth without the aid of a cutlass to clear the path; for, tall vines, like ship’s cordage, hung from the limbs of the trees and knitted their branches together in the most inextricable fashion, the lianas rooting themselves down into the earth and then springing up again for fresh entanglements, in the same way as the banyan-tree of India spreads itself.

This was the outlook from one side only of our route. On the other were to be seen patches of sugar-cane, planted with almost mathematical regularity and looking like so many fields of some gigantic species of wheat; green plantations of cocoa, with their ripe yellow fruit showing out between the leaves, similar to that of ours at Mount Pleasant; and several detached gardens, where the negro squatters were cultivating their yams and tanias, or else preparing their farina for cassava from the root of the manioc plant. The process consisted in first squeezing out, by means of an old sack and a heavy stone for a press, the viscid juice, which is a strong poison—the same, indeed, with which the Caribs used to tip their arrows in the old days of the aborigines—and then baking the flour on a griddle over a charcoal fire.

Passing through this varied scenery on either hand, our road led presently downwards through a series of valleys, clothed with vegetation and smiling in flowers. We crossed now and again some little stream rippling along over its pebbly bed, wherein were crawfish and tiny things like whitebait playing amongst the water-cresses that grew over the banks; until, at last, we reached a wide horse-shoe bay facing the wide blue sea, that stretched out to the distant horizon, laving its silver sand with happy little waves that seemed to chuckle with a murmur of pleasure as they washed the shore in rhythmical cadence.

There was but a single vessel here, and she was riding at anchor out in the offing some two miles from land, looking quite lonesome by herself in the distance.

She was a barque of some four or five hundred tons, with a broad, bluff-bowed hull that rose well out of the water on account of her not having completed loading her cargo. There was a long row of white ports along her side; and, as she rolled with the motion of the ground-swell, now setting inshore with the wind, she showed her bright copper sheathing almost to her keel.

“Is that the ship, dad?” I asked my father, gazing at her with longing eyes and wondering how we were to reach her.

“Yes, Tom, that’s the vessel I told you of, and we must now see about getting aboard if we can,” said he, preparing to dismount from his horse, whose bridle Jake had already taken hold of.

“And what’s her name, dad?” I then inquired, jumping down from Prince’s back as I spoke and giving the reins also in charge of our darkey groom.

“The Josephine of London,” he replied in regular ship-shape fashion; “Captain Miles, master and part owner.”