Читать книгу The Lighthouse - Robert Michael Ballantyne - Страница 8

As Captain Ogilvy had predicted, Ruby was at once engaged as an assistant blacksmith on the Bell Rock. In fact, they were only too glad to get such a powerful, active young fellow into their service; and he was shipped off with all speed in the sloop Smeaton, with a few others who were going to replace some men who had become ill and were obliged to leave.

A light westerly breeze was blowing when they cast off the moorings of the sloop.

“Goodbye, Ruby,” said the captain, as he was about to step on the pier. “Remember your promise, lad, to keep quiet, and don’t try to get ashore, or to hold communication with anyone till you hear from me.”

“All right, uncle, I won’t forget, and I’ll make my mind easy, for I know that my case is left in good hands.”

Three hours elapsed ere the Smeaton drew near to the Bell Rock. During this time, Ruby kept aloof from his fellow-workmen, feeling disposed to indulge the sad thoughts which filled his mind. He sat down on the bulwarks, close to the main shrouds, and gazed back at the town as it became gradually less and less visible in the faint light of morning. Then he began to ponder his unfortunate circumstances, and tried to imagine how his uncle would set about clearing up his character and establishing his innocence; but, do what he would, Ruby could not keep his mind fixed for any length of time on any subject or line of thought, because of a vision of sweetness which it is useless to attempt to describe, and which was always accompanied by, and surrounded with, a golden halo.

At last the youth gave up the attempt to fix his thoughts, and allowed them to wander as they chose, seeing that they were resolved to do so whether he would or no. The moment these thoughts had the reins flung on their necks, and were allowed to go where they pleased, they refused, owing to some unaccountable species of perversity, to wander at all, but at once settled themselves comfortably down beside the vision with golden hair, and remained there.

This agreeable state of things was rudely broken in upon by the hoarse voice of the mate shouting—

“Stand by to let go the anchor.”

Then Ruby sprang on the deck and shook himself like a great mastiff, and resolved to devote himself, heart and soul, from that moment, to the work in which he was about to engage.

The scene that presented itself to our hero when he woke up from his dreams would have interested and excited a much less enthusiastic temperament than his.

The breeze had died away altogether, just as if, having wafted the Smeaton to her anchorage, there were no further occasion for its services. The sea was therefore quite calm, and as there had only been light westerly winds for some time past, there was little or none of the swell that usually undulates the sea. One result of this was, that, being high water when the Smeaton arrived, there was no sign whatever of the presence of the famous Bell Rock. It lay sleeping nearly two fathoms below the sea, like a grim giant in repose, and not a ripple was there to tell of the presence of the mariner’s enemy.

The sun was rising, and its slanting beams fell on the hulls of the vessels engaged in the service, which lay at anchor at a short distance from each other. These vessels, as we have said, were four in number, including the Smeaton. The others were the Sir Joseph Banks, a small schooner-rigged vessel; the Patriot, a little sloop; and the Pharos lightship, a large clumsy-looking Dutch-built ship, fitted with three masts, at the top of which were the lanterns. It was intended that this vessel should do duty as a lightship until the lighthouse should be completed.

Besides these there were two large boats, used for landing stones and building materials on the rock.

These vessels lay floating almost motionless on the calm sea, and at first there was scarcely any noise aboard of them to indicate that they were tenanted by human beings, but when the sound of the Smeaton’s cable was heard there was a bustle aboard of each, and soon faces were seen looking inquisitively over the sides of the ships.

The Smeaton’s boat was lowered after the anchor was let go, and the new hands were transferred to the Pharos, which was destined to be their home for some time to come.

Just as they reached her the bell rang for breakfast, and when Ruby stepped upon the deck he found himself involved in all the bustle that ensues when men break off from work and make preparation for the morning meal.

There were upwards of thirty artificers on board the lightship at this time. Some of these, as they hurried to and fro, gave the new arrivals a hearty greeting, and asked, “What news from the shore?” Others were apparently too much taken up with their own affairs to take notice of them.

While Ruby was observing the busy scene with absorbing interest, and utterly forgetful of the fact that he was in any way connected with it, an elderly gentleman, whose kind countenance and hearty manner gave indication of a genial spirit within, came up and accosted him:

“You are our assistant blacksmith, I believe?”

“Yes, sir, I am,” replied Ruby, doffing his cap, as if he felt instinctively that he was in the presence of someone of note.

“You have had considerable practice, I suppose, in your trade?”

“A good deal, sir, but not much latterly, for I have been at sea for some time.”

“At sea? Well, that won’t be against you here,” returned the gentleman, with a meaning smile. “It would be well if some of my men were a little more accustomed to the sea, for they suffer much from sea-sickness. You can go below, my man, and get breakfast. You’ll find your future messmate busy at his, I doubt not. Here, steward,” (turning to one of the men who chanced to pass at the moment,) “take Ruby Brand—that is your name, I think?”

“It is, sir.”

“Take Brand below, and introduce him to James Dove as his assistant.”

The steward escorted Ruby down the ladder that conducted to those dark and littered depths of the ship’s hull that were assigned to the artificers as their place of abode. But amidst a good deal of unavoidable confusion, Ruby’s practised eye discerned order and arrangement everywhere.

“This is your messmate, Jamie Dove,” said the steward, pointing to a massive dark man, whose outward appearance was in keeping with his position as the Vulcan of such an undertaking as he was then engaged in. “You’ll find him not a bad feller if you only don’t cross him.” He added, with a wink, “His only fault is that he’s given to spoilin’ good victuals, being raither floored by sea-sickness if it comes on to blow ever so little.”

“Hold your clapper, lad,” said the smith, who was at the moment busily engaged with a mess of salt pork, and potatoes to match. “Who’s your friend?”

“No friend of mine, though I hope he’ll be one soon,” answered the steward. “Mr Stevenson told me to introduce him to you as your assistant.”

The smith looked up quickly, and scanned our hero with some interest; then, extending his great hard hand across the table, he said, “Welcome, messmate; sit down, I’ve only just begun.”

Ruby grasped the hand with his own, which, if not so large, was quite as powerful, and shook the smith’s right arm in a way that called forth from that rough-looking individual a smile of approbation.

“You’ve not had breakfast, lad?”

“No, not yet,” said Ruby, sitting down opposite his comrade.

“An’ the smell here don’t upset your stummick, I hope?”

The smith said this rather anxiously.

“Not in the least,” said Ruby with a laugh, and beginning to eat in a way that proved the truth of his words; “for the matter o’ that, there’s little smell and no motion just now.”

“Well, there isn’t much,” replied the smith, “but, woe’s me! you’ll get enough of it before long. All the new landsmen like you suffer horribly from sea-sickness when they first come off.”

“But I’m not a landsman,” said Ruby.

“Not a landsman!” echoed the other. “You’re a blacksmith, aren’t you?”

“Ay, but not a landsman. I learned the trade as a boy and lad; but I’ve been at sea for some time past.”

“Then you won’t get sick when it blows?”

“Certainly not; will you?”

The smith groaned and shook his head, by which answer he evidently meant to assure his friend that he would, most emphatically.

“But come, it’s of no use groanin’ over what can’t be helped. I get as sick as a dog every time the wind rises, and the worst of it is I don’t never seem to improve. Howsever, I’m all right when I get on the rock, and that’s the main thing.”

Ruby and his friend now entered upon a long and earnest conversation as to their peculiar duties at the Bell Rock, with which we will not trouble the reader.

After breakfast they went on deck, and here Ruby had sufficient to occupy his attention and to amuse him for some hours.

As the tide that day did not fall low enough to admit of landing on the rock till noon, the men were allowed to spend the time as they pleased. Some therefore took to fishing, others to reading, while a few employed themselves in drying their clothes, which had got wet the previous day, and one or two entertained themselves and their comrades with the music of the violin and flute. All were busy with one thing or another, until the rock began to show its black crest above the smooth sea. Then a bell was rung to summon the artificers to land.

This being the signal for Ruby to commence work, he joined his friend Dove, and assisted him to lower the bellows of the forge into the boat. The men were soon in their places, with their various tools, and the boats pushed off—Mr Stevenson, the engineer of the building, steering one boat, and the master of the Pharos, who was also appointed to the post of landing-master, steering the other.

They landed with ease on this occasion on the western side of the rock, and then each man addressed himself to his special duty with energy. The time during which they could work being short, they had to make the most of it.

“Now, lad,” said the smith, “bring along the bellows and follow me. Mind yer footin’, for it’s slippery walkin’ on them tangle-covered rocks. I’ve seen some ugly falls here already.”

“Have any bones been broken yet?” enquired Ruby, as he shouldered the large pair of bellows, and followed the smith cautiously over the rocks.

“Not yet; but there’s been an awful lot o’ pipes smashed. If it goes on as it has been, we’ll have to take to metal ones. Here we are, Ruby, this is the forge, and I’ll be bound you never worked at such a queer one before. Hallo! Bremner!” he shouted to one of the men.

“That’s me,” answered Bremner.

“Bring your irons as soon as you like! I’m about ready for you.”

“Ay, ay, here they are,” said the man, advancing with an armful of picks, chisels, and other tools, which required sharpening.

He slipped and fell as he spoke, sending all the tools into the bottom of a pool of water; but, being used to such mishaps, he arose, joined in the laugh raised against him, and soon fished up the tools.

“What’s wrong!” asked Ruby, pausing in the work of fixing the bellows, on observing that the smith’s face grew pale, and his general expression became one of horror. “Not sea-sick, I hope?”

“Sea-sick,” gasped the smith, slapping all his pockets hurriedly, “it’s worse than that; I’ve forgot the matches!”

Ruby looked perplexed, but had no consolation to offer.

“That’s like you,” cried Bremner, who, being one of the principal masons, had to attend chiefly to the digging out of the foundation-pit of the building, and knew that his tools could not be sharpened unless the forge fire could be lighted.

“Suppose you hammer a nail red-hot,” suggested one of the men, who was disposed to make game of the smith.

“I’ll hammer your nose red-hot,” replied Dove, with a most undovelike scowl, “I could swear that I put them matches in my pocket before I started.”

“No, you didn’t,” said George Forsyth, one of the carpenters—a tall loose-jointed man, who was chiefly noted for his dislike to getting into and out of boats, and climbing up the sides of ships, because of his lengthy and unwieldy figure—“No, you didn’t, you turtle-dove, you forgot to take them; but I remembered to do it for you; so there, get up your fire, and confess yourself indebted to me for life.”

“I’m indebted to ’ee for fire,” said the smith, grasping the matches eagerly. “Thank’ee, lad, you’re a true Briton.”

“A tall ’un, rather,” suggested Bremner.

“Wot never, never, never will be a slave,” sang another of the men.

“Come, laddies, git up the fire. Time an’ tide waits for naebody,” said John Watt, one of the quarriers. “We’ll want thae tools before lang.”

The men were proceeding with their work actively while those remarks were passing, and ere long the smoke of the forge fire arose in the still air, and the clang of the anvil was added to the other noises with which the busy spot resounded.

The foundation of the Bell Rock Lighthouse had been carefully selected by Mr Stevenson; the exact spot being chosen not only with a view to elevation, but to the serrated ridges of rock, that might afford some protection to the building, by breaking the force of the easterly seas before they should reach it; but as the space available for the purpose of building was scarcely fifty yards in diameter, there was not much choice in the matter.

The foundation-pit was forty-two feet in diameter, and sunk five feet into the solid rock. At the time when Ruby landed, it was being hewn out by a large party of the men. Others were boring holes in the rock near to it, for the purpose of fixing the great beams of a beacon, while others were cutting away the seaweed from the rock, and making preparations for the laying down of temporary rails to facilitate the conveying of the heavy stones from the boats to their ultimate destination. All were busy as bees. Each man appeared to work as if for a wager, or to find out how much he could do within a given space of time.

To the men on the rock itself the aspect of the spot was sufficiently striking and peculiar, but to those who viewed it from a boat at a short distance off it was singularly interesting, for the whole scene of operations appeared like a small black spot, scarcely above the level of the waves, on which a crowd of living creatures were moving about with great and incessant activity, while all around and beyond lay the mighty sea, sleeping in the grand tranquillity of a calm summer day, with nothing to bound it but the blue sky, save to the northward, where the distant cliffs of Forfar rested like a faint cloud on the horizon.

The sounds, too, which on the rock itself were harsh and loud and varied, came over the water to the distant observer in a united tone, which sounded almost as sweet as soft music.

The smith’s forge stood on a ledge of rock close to the foundation-pit, a little to the north of it. Here Vulcan Dove had fixed a strong iron framework, which formed the hearth. The four legs which supported it were let into holes bored from six to twelve inches into the rock, according to the inequalities of the site. These were wedged first with wood and then with iron, for as this part of the forge and the anvil was doomed to be drowned every tide, or twice every day, besides being exposed to the fury of all the storms that might chance to blow, it behoved them to fix things down with unusual firmness.

The block of timber for supporting the anvil was fixed in the same manner, but the anvil itself was left to depend on its own weight and the small stud fitted into the bottom of it.

The bellows, however, were too delicate to be left exposed to such forces as the stormy winds and waves, they were therefore shipped and unshipped every tide, and conveyed to and from the rock in the boats with the men.

Dove and Ruby wrought together like heroes. They were both so powerful that the heavy implements they wielded seemed to possess no weight when in their strong hands, and their bodies were so lithe and active as to give the impression of men rejoicing, revelling, in the enjoyment of their work.

“That’s your sort; hit him hard, he’s got no friends,” said Dove, turning a mass of red-hot metal from side to side, while Ruby pounded it with a mighty hammer, as if it were a piece of putty.

“Fire and steel for ever,” observed Ruby, as he made the sparks fly right and left. “Hallo! the tide’s rising.”

“Ho! so it is,” cried the smith, finishing off the piece of work with a small hammer, while Ruby rested on the one he had used and wiped the perspiration from his brow. “It always serves me in this way, lad,” continued the smith, without pausing for a moment in his work. “Blow away, Ruby, the sea is my greatest enemy. Every day, a’most, it washes me away from my work. In calm weather, it creeps up my legs, and the legs o’ the forge too, till it gradually puts out the fire, and in rough weather it sends up a wave sometimes that sweeps the whole concern black out at one shot.”

“It will creep you out to-day, evidently,” said Ruby, as the water began to come about his toes.

“Never mind, lad, we’ll have time to finish them picks this tide, if we work fast.”

Thus they toiled and moiled, with their heads and shoulders in smoke and fire, and their feet in water.

Gradually the tide rose.

“Pump away, Ruby! Keep the pot bilin’, my boy,” said the smith.

“The wind blowin’, you mean. I say, Dove, do the other men like the work here?”

“Like it, ay, they like it well. At fist we were somewhat afraid o’ the landin’ in rough weather, but we’ve got used to that now. The only bad thing about it is in the rolling o’ that horrible Pharos. She’s so bad in a gale that I sometimes think she’ll roll right over like a cask. Most of us get sick then, but I don’t think any of ’em are as bad as me. They seem to be gettin’ used to that too. I wish I could. Another blow, Ruby.”

“Time’s up,” shouted one of the men.

“Hold on just for a minute or two,” pleaded the smith, who, with his assistant, was by this time standing nearly knee-deep in water.

The sea had filled the pit some time before, and driven the men out of it. These busied themselves in collecting the tools and seeing that nothing was left lying about, while the men who were engaged on those parts of the rocks that were a few inches higher, continued their labours until the water crept up to them. Then they collected their tools, and went to the boats, which lay awaiting them at the western landing-place.

“Now, Dove,” cried the landing-master, “come along; the crabs will be attacking your toes if you don’t.”

“It’s a shame to gi’e Ruby the chance o’ a sair throat the very first day,” cried John Watt.

“Just half a minute more,” said the smith, examining a pickaxe, which he was getting up to that delicate point of heat which is requisite to give it proper temper.

While he gazed earnestly into the glowing coals a gentle hissing sound was heard below the frame of the forge, then a gurgle, and the fire became suddenly dark and went out!

“I knowed it! always the way!” cried Dove, with a look of disappointment. “Come, lad, up with the bellows now, and don’t forget the tongs.”

In a few minutes more the boats pushed off and returned to the Pharos, three and a half hours of good work having been accomplished before the tide drove them away.

Soon afterwards the sea overflowed the whole of the rock, and obliterated the scene of those busy operations as completely as though it had never been!