Читать книгу The Harbor Master - Theodore Goodridge Roberts - Страница 6

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The big ship was hopelessly astray in the fog and in the grip of a black, unseen current that dragged at her keel and bulging beam, pulling her inexorably landward towards the hidden rocks. Her commander felt danger lurking in the fog, but was at a loss to know on which side to look for it, at what point to guard against it. He was a brave man and a master of seamanship in all the minute knacks and tricks of seamanship of that day; but this was only his third voyage between London and the St. Lawrence, and the previous trips had been made in clear weather. The gale had blown him many miles out of his course, and lost him his main-top-ga'ntsail yards and half of his mizzen-mast; the cold snap had weighted ship and rigging with ice, and now the fog and the uncharted deep-sea river had confused his reckoning utterly. But even so, he might have been able to work his vessel out of the danger-zone had any signal been made from the coast in reply to his guns and flares. Even if after the arrival of the men from Chance Along on the beach at Nolan's Cove, the heaps of driftwood had been fired, he might have had time to pull his ship around to the north, drag out of the current that was speeding towards the hidden rocks, and so win away to safety. There was wind enough for handling the ship, he knew all the tricks of cheating a lee-shore of its anticipated spoils, and the seas were not running dangerously high. But his guns and flares went unanswered. All around hung the black, blind curtains of the fog, cruelly silent, cruelly unbroken by any blink of flame.

Black Dennis Nolan and his men stood by the frozen land-wash, along which the currents snarled, and rolling seas, freighted with splinters of black sea-ice, clattered and sloshed, waiting patiently for their harvest from the vast and treacherous fields beyond. A grim harvest! Grim fields to garner from, wherein he who sows peradventure shall not reap, and wherein Death is the farmer! Aye, and grim gleaners those who stand under the broken cliff of Nolan's Cove, waiting and listening in the dark!

A dull, crashing, grinding sound set the black fog vibrating. Then a brief clamor of panic-stricken voices rang in to the shore. Silence followed that—a silence that was suddenly broken by the thumping report of a cannon. The light flared dimly in the fog.

"Quiet, lads!" commanded the skipper. "Let the wood be till I gives ye the word. She bes fast on the rocks, but she bain't busted yet."

"An' she'll not bust inside a week, i' this sea," said one of the men. "Sure, skipper, the crew'll be comin' ashore i' their boats afore long. An' they have their muskets an' cutlasses wid them, ye kin lay to that. None but fools would come ashore on this coast, from a wreck, widout their weepons."

"Aye, an' they'll be carryin' their gold an' sich, too," said the skipper. "Lads, we'll do our best—an' that bain't fightin' an' killin', i' this case, but the usin' o' our wits. Bill Brennen, tell off ten men an' take 'em along the path to the south'ard wid ye. Lay down i' the spruce-tuck alongside the path, about t'ree miles along, an' wait till these folks from the ship comes up to ye, wid four or five o' our own lads a-leadin' the way wid lanterns. They'll be totin' a power o' val'able gear along wid them, ye kin lay to that! Lep out onto 'em, widout a word, snatch the gear an' run fair south along the track, yellin' like hell. Then stow the noise all of a suddent, get clear o' the track an' work back to this Chance Along wid the gear. Don't bat any o' the ship's crew over the head if ye bain't forced to it. The gear bes the t'ing we wants, lads."

"Aye, skipper, aye—but will the sailormen be a-totin' their gear that a-way?" returned Bill.

"Sure, b'y, for I'll tell 'em as we bes from Nap Harbor, an' I'll send four lads to show 'em the way. After ye take their gear—as much as ye kin get quick and easy—they'll follow ye along the path to try to catch ye," replied Black Dennis Nolan.

Bill Brennen went up the twisty path to the barren, and along the edge of the cliff to the southward, followed by ten sturdy fellows armed with long clubs of birch-wood. Of the nine men remaining with the skipper, six were sent, along with the gear, to hide behind the boulders and clumps of bush on the steep slope. The skipper cautioned them to lie low and keep quiet.

"Ahoy, there!" bellowed the skipper.

"Ahoy! Can't you show a light?" came the reply, from the fog.

"Aye, aye, sir. Bes ye on the rocks?"

"Lord, yes! Show a light, man, for Heaven's sake, so we can get the boat away. Her back's broken and her bows stove in. She's breaking up quick."

The skipper and his three companions speedily made a small heap from the big pile of driftwood on the shingle, and lit it from the candle of a lantern. They poured a tin of seal-oil over the dry wreckage, and the red and yellow flames shot up. It was evident to the men on the land-wash that the unfortunate ship had escaped the outer menaces and won within a hundred yards of the shore before striking. She was burning oil now, in vast quantities, to judge by the red glare that cut and stained the fog to seaward.

"What sort of channel?" came the question.

"Full o' rocks, sir; but it bes safe enough wid caution," cried the skipper.

"Can't you show more light?"

"Aye, sir, there bes more wood."

A second fire was built still closer to the edge of the tide than the first.

"Stand by to receive a line," warned the masterful voice from the ship.

A rocket banged and a light line fell writhing across the beach.

"Haul her in and make fast the hawser."

Black Dennis Nolan and his three companions were most obliging. They pulled in the line until the wet hawser on the end of it appeared, and this they made fast to a rock on the beach as big as a house.

A small light appeared between the ship and the shore, blinking and vanishing low down on the pitching sea. The glare from the fires on the land-wash presently discovered this to be an oil-lantern in the bows of a boat. The boat, which contained about a dozen men, was being hand-hauled along the line that ran from the wreck to the shore. Black Dennis Nolan and his companions exchanged glances at sight of drawn cutlasses and several rifles and pistols in the hands of the men from the wreck. As the leading boat came within ten yards of the shore an officer stood up in her bows. By this time the light of a second boat was blinking and vanishing in her wake.

"Bear a hand to ease us off," commanded the person in the bows of the boat.

"Aye, sir, we bes ready to help ye," replied the skipper, humbly.

"How is the landing?"

"It bes clear, sir—shelvin' rock."

"How many are you, there?"

"We bes four poor fishermen, sir."

The boat rowed in and was kept from staving in her keel on the land-wash by Nolan and his men. The officer sprang from the bows to the icy shingle, slipped and recovered himself with an oath. He was a huge fellow. In one hand he carried an iron dispatch box, and in the other a heavy pistol.

"This the lot of you?" he asked, glancing sharply at Black Dennis Nolan.

"Aye, sir, we bes only four poor fishermen," replied Nolan.

"I am glad to hear it. This coast has the name of being a bad place for shipwrecked people to come ashore on."

"You bes talkin' of the coast 'round to the south o' Cape Race, sir. We bes all poor, honest folk hereabouts, sir."

"Oh, aye," returned the other, drily.

By this time all the men were ashore and the boat was high up on the shingle, out of reach of the surf. The men stood close around it. They were well-armed, and kept a sharp look-out on all sides.

"What do you call this place?" asked the officer.

"Why, sir, Frenchman's Cove bes its name," replied the skipper.

Frenchman's Cove lies three miles to the south of Nolan's Cove; but the skipper was cautious.

"Do you live here?"

"No, sir. There bain't no houses here. We bes four poor men from 'way to the nor'ard, sir, a-huntin' deer on the barrens. We was makin' camp 'way back inland, sir, when we heared yer guns a-firin'."

"How far away is the nearest village?"

"Why, sir, this country bes strange to me, but I's t'inkin' Nap Harbor wouldn't be more'n ten mile to the south, fair along the coast. Bes I right, Pete?"

"Aye, skipper, I be t'inkin' the same. Nap Harbor lays to the south, maybe ten mile along, maybe less," replied Peter Nolan, a cousin of the skipper's.

A second boat reached the shore and discharged its freight of humans and small packages and bundles. This boat contained four sailors and ten passengers. There were three women among the passengers. All were clutching bundles of clothing or small bags containing their personal possessions of value. One of the women was weeping hysterically.

"Could we get a passage 'round to St. John's from Nap Harbor?" asked the officer.

"Aye, sir, I bes sayin' ye could. Sure there bes a fore-and-after i' Nap Harbor," said Nolan.

"Will you guide us to Nap Harbor?"

"Aye, sir, that we will, an' glad to be o' sarvice to ye."

"We will pay you well, my good man," said one of the passengers, a tall gentleman with a very white and frightened face, draped in a very wet cloak. "In the meantime," he continued, "let us dry ourselves at these fires and have something hot to drink. Where are those stewards, the lazy dogs!"

Two more boats came from the ship to the shore without accident. In the last to arrive were the captain and the doctor. The company gathered round the fires, keeping their boxes and bags close to them. The stewards and sailors brewed hot punches for all. The lady with the hysterics was soothed to quiet by the doctor and a tiny mug of brandy and boiling water. The officers held a consultation and decided to get the passengers safely to Nap Harbor, and aboard a schooner for St. John's and then to return to Frenchman's Cove themselves and salve what they could of the cargo of the ship, which was evidently of unusual value. (Black Dennis Nolan had expected this.) They would get help in Nap Harbor for the work of salvage, and would leave the four boats on the beach, under a guard of five seamen and the third officer. They had brought food from the ship, and so they ate a substantial meal while they warmed themselves and discussed their plans. But Captain McTavish neither ate nor drank, so bitterly did he feel the loss of his ship. He feared that even the moderate sea now running would break her up within forty-eight hours.

Black Dennis Nolan vanished in the darkness many times in the furtherance of his task of gathering wood for the fires. At last, after he had covertly inspected all the bags, bundles and dispatch boxes, he disappeared in the surrounding gloom and did not reappear at all. Dick Lynch, a man of about his own size, shape and coloring—one of the six who had taken cover on the hillside—the firelight in his stead, carrying a fragment of broken spar. The change was not noticed by the men from the wreck.

Dry, warmly clothed, and inwardly fortified with food and drink, the ship's company set off for Nap Harbor, carrying as much as they could of their portable possessions, and led by four of the honest fishermen of Chance Along. They left behind them the third mate, a sturdy youth armed with two pistols and a fowling-piece, and five sailors armed with cutlasses and pistols—and enough dry and liquid provisions to last the guard for several days. They climbed the steep and twisty path that connected the beach with the edge of the barren, and soon their lanterns were lost in the fog. The third mate and his men brewed another generous supply of rum punch, heaped more wood on the fire and lit their pipes. By the time each had emptied his tin mug for the third time all felt inexpressibly sleepy. Mr. Darling, the commander of the guard, counted his men with a waving forefinger, and an expression of owlish gravity on his round face. Then, "Daniel Berry, you'll stand the first trick," said he. "Keep a sharp look-out and report anything unusual. Silas Nixon will relieve you at eight bells of the middle watch."

So Daniel Berry got unsteadily to his feet and stumbled away from the fire; but five minutes after his companions began to snore he returned to his blankets by the fire and fell fast asleep. He would never have been guilty of such a crime at sea; but ashore it was quite a different matter. What was the use of a look-out ashore? The island of Newfoundland was not likely to strike a reef or an iceberg. So he sank deep into the slumber of the just and the intoxicated.

A dawn wind, blowing gently out of the west, began to thin and lift the dripping fog. Out from the dark that hedged in the fire crawled six vague shapes which, as they came into the illuminated zone, proved to be Black Dennis Nolan and five of his men of Chance Along with ropes in their hands. They stooped over the blanket-swathed sleepers, working quickly and cunningly with the ropes. They also bandaged the eyes and mouths of the unconscious mariners with strips of blanket. By this time the light on the stranded ship was burning low. The skipper and his companions examined the four boats, dragged one of them down to the edge of the tide and launched it. The fog was thinning swiftly, and a gray pallor was spreading in the east and south. They manned the boat and pulled out for the wreck, following the dripping hawser.

The wreck lay across a sunken rock, listed heavily to port. Her spars were all over the side, a tangled mass washing and beating about in the seas. A snag of rock had been driven clean through the timbers of the port-bow. Black Dennis Nolan and his companions managed to get aboard at last. A fire of rags and oil still burned in an iron tub on the main deck. They went forward to the galley for a lamp, and with this entered the cabins aft. Dennis Nolan led the way. The captain's room was empty. They found and examined the quarters of the passengers. Clothing and bedding were tossed about in disorder, and it seemed that everything of value had been collected and carried away. They gathered up a couple of silk gowns and a fur-lined cloak, however. The skipper was shaking out the sheets from a berth when he felt something strike the toe of his boot. He stooped quickly, recovered a small box bound in red leather, and slipped it in his pocket. The others had observed nothing of this. In another cabin, they found the passengers' heavy baggage packed in about a dozen big leather boxes. They carried these to the main deck without waiting to open them. By this time the dawn was an actual, dreary-gray fact, and the fog was no more than a thin mist.

"Now for the cargo, lads," said the skipper.

They removed the tarpaulins from the main hatch, and broke it open. With the lamp in his left hand, the skipper descended into the hold by way of the stationary iron ladder.

"Pianeys," he shouted.

"Hell!" exclaimed the men on deck, in voices of disgust.

The skipper returned to the deck, after about ten minutes in the hold.

"The cargo bain't o' no use to us, lads," he said. "Pianeys, engines, an' fancy-goods."

They broke open the lazarette and found several cases of wines and brandy, and a quantity of provisions of superior quality. They lowered the passengers' baggage into the boat and pulled ashore through the spouting, slobbering rocks and reefs. In a second trip they salvaged the spirits and provisions. They carried boxes, cases and crates up to the barren, and hid them in a thicket of dense spruce-tuck, and concealed their gear of lines and boat-hooks in the same place.

"She'll last a good few days yet, if it don't blow up a gale," said the skipper, waving his hand towards the wreck, "and maybe we'll come back an' get some pickin's. But we bain't wantin' to raise any suspicions."

He loosened the bindings at Mr. Darling's wrists, so that they could be worked off in time, and then set out briskly for Chance Along with his three companions at his heels.

Of the future of the ship's company little need be said. On their way to Nap Harbor they were set upon and robbed by a large force of big men. Their valuables vanished into the fog and darkness, as if they had never been—and their guides vanished also. They went on, following the edge of the cliff, and reached Nap Harbor about two hours after dawn. From Nap Harbor they sailed northward to St. John's, and there reported the robbery to the police. The police calmed them with promises, and in time sent officers to Nap Harbor armed with search-warrants. Needless to say, the jewels and money were not found. Captain McTavish did not return to Nolan's Cove to salve the cargo of his ship, for the agent in St. John's explained to him that the task would be a profitless one. A few days later he was joined by Mr. Darling and the five men of the guard, and eventually they all sailed away. But the tall gentleman with the white face and the long cloak left a sting behind him. He was Sir Arthur Harwood, Baronet, and the lady who had wept hysterically, and been quieted by the ship's surgeon, was Lady Harwood. By the wreck these two had lost much of value in clothing, jewelry and money; but their greatest loss was that of a necklace of twelve flawless diamonds and fourteen rubies. Sir Arthur offered a reward of five hundred pounds for the recovery of this necklace. In this reward lay the sting.

In the little retiring harbor of Chance Along, Black Dennis Nolan was a great man. His plans had worked without a hitch—and still the carcass of the ship lay in Nolan's Cove, only waiting to be picked. A rich harvest had been gathered without the loss of a life, and without attracting a shadow of suspicion upon Chance Along. The skipper called together the twenty men who had shared with him the exertions and risks of that night. This was in his store, with the windows obscured by blankets, the door bolted and the lamp lit.

"Lads," said he, "here bes twelve hundred golden sovereigns. I makes 'em into twenty-four shares o' fifty each. Now, lads, step up an' each take a share."

The men obeyed, their eyes glowing and their hands trembling.

"Now there bes four shares still on the table," said the skipper.

"Aye, skipper, aye," stammered Bill Brennen, huskily. The others breathed heavily, shuffled their feet, gripped the money in their pockets and glared at the yellow pieces still glowing in the lamplight.