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For Treasure Bound

<h3>Chapter Nineteen.</h3> <h4>My Father.</h4> As the sun went down the wind fell light, and we did not average more than four knots an hour all through the three night-watches. I was at first afraid that we were about to have another hurricane, as it is not usual for the breeze to fall so light as we had it just then in the trades. But the glass was high and steady, and the weather looked settled, so I did not shorten sail; and when the sun rose next morning he brought the breeze up again somewhat fresher with him. It was my eight hours out that night; consequently I was on deck when day broke. As morning dawned, and the obscurity of night yielded imperceptibly before the approaches of the great day-god, I became conscious that there was a break in the level of the horizon, about four points on my starboard-bow; and, watching this as it continued to grow lighter, I found that it was land, a small and low island apparently, about nine miles distant I was rather surprised at this, as according to our chart, which was constructed from the most recent surveys, the nearest land was fully a day’s sail distant to the westward. I decided to take a nearer look at the place, and as this would involve a deviation from the course which the cutter was then steering, and would necessitate a jibe, I left the helm for a moment with a couple of turns of the tiller-rope round the head of the tiller, and went forward to take in the spinnaker. Formerly we had considered it necessary that both Bob and I should be on deck when handling this large sail; but practice had by this time taught us both how to work the cutter alone, so that it was now only on occasions of emergency that either called the other to assist in making or shortening sail. As the Water Lily drew in closer with the land, I made out that it was a small coral island, with the usual encircling reef and lagoon. It seemed to be about two miles long, but, from the direction in which the cutter was approaching it, I was unable to judge of its width. I was soon near enough to distinguish the line of surf which betrayed the presence of the surrounding coral reef, and I then called Bob to come on deck and take the helm, whilst I went aloft, as usual, to look out for a channel. When he came on deck— “Why, Harry, how’s this?” he exclaimed. “I thought you said there wasn’t no land within a hundred and fifty mile of us last night, and here’s as pretty a little spot, close aboard of us, as a man need wish to set his eyes upon.” “I went by the chart,” I answered, “and that showed a clear sea all about here. But you can never rely upon a chart here, in the Pacific; what is clear sea at the time that a survey is being made, may very possibly be dotted with a score of such small islands as the one ahead in a very few years. I have read that coral islands form very rapidly. This one, however, cannot be of such very recent growth, for there are full-grown cocoa-nuts upon it, as well as other trees; I am surprised that it is not shown on the chart.” I said this as I was standing at the foot of the mast, and on the point of going aloft. In a few seconds more I was standing on the cross-trees and examining the line of surf ahead for the narrow strip of unbroken water which would indicate the existence of a passage through the reef. As I stood thus, my gaze was arrested by the appearance of a small object in rapid motion across the bosom of the lagoon inside the reef, and a scrutiny of a few seconds was sufficient to satisfy me that it was a canoe. Seating myself upon the cross-trees, that I might more conveniently use the glass which I had taken aloft with me, I quickly focussed the instrument and brought it to bear. With its assistance, I was now enabled to discern that the canoe was a craft of about the same size as the one which we had towing astern, and it held three persons. The two who wielded the paddles were black, but, unless my eyes strangely deceived me, the third was a white man. I cannot attempt to describe the extraordinary feeling which came upon me at this discovery. “Can it be possible,” thought I, “that this is the island upon which the Amazon was cast away, and am I about to have the inexpressible joy of seeing my beloved father once more, and so unexpectedly as this?” I again had recourse to the glass, and being now somewhat nearer, I no longer had any room for doubt; the individual who sat in the stern of the canoe, and who, I now saw, was steering the craft with a paddle, was undoubtedly white. I now observed, too, that the canoe was passing through an opening in the south-western edge of the reef. The passage would have escaped my notice in the then position of the cutter, had it not been for seeing the canoe passing through it, for it was broadside-on to us, as it were, and the unbroken water was therefore not easily detected. I turned my telescope upon the island, and now saw a thin film of light blue smoke, as from a wood fire, rising from among the trees; but there was no sign of a wreck of any description within view, and if anything of the kind existed, it must be on the other side of the island. The canoe was by this time in open water, and I saw that she was paddling along the edge of the reef towards us. Bob now made her out from the deck, and hailed me, asking if I saw her. I answered that I did, and, in an uncontrollable tumult of excitement, descended to the deck. I directed Bob to keep the cutter away for the canoe, for, strangely enough, the thought never entered my head that her occupants might be enemies. I ran down below and got up our club ensign, which I hoisted at the peak, and as it blew out in the fresh morning breeze, we saw the figure in the stern of the canoe rise to his feet and wave his hat. I took up my glass once more, and was now able to make out that this figure was tall, deeply bronzed by the sun, and had grey hair and a thick bushy grey beard. “That is a white man, Bob, in that canoe,” said I excitedly. “A white man!” exclaimed Bob; “then it’s the skipper, Harry, for a thousand pounds.” “No such luck, Bob, I am afraid,” replied I; “this man is grey-haired, and my poor father’s hair was dark brown, if you recollect.” “True,” answered Bob; “but if not the skipper hisself, it may be somebody belonging to him.” “That cannot be, either,” I returned; “for according to the account we received from the seaman, there was no one left with him but the chief-mate, who, I presume, was Winter—who, you will recollect, was put into your berth when you met with your accident; and Winter was quite a young man—scarcely thirty, I believe.” “Well, whoever it may be, we shall soon find out all about him now, for we shall be alongside the little hooker in another five minutes,” remarked Bob philosophically, but with evident disappointment in the tone of his voice. This was true, for we were nearing the canoe fast. I again had recourse to my telescope, and, with its assistance, was now able to see with perfect distinctness the occupants of the canoe. I scanned with the greatest intentness the features of him who was steering, and who was facing directly towards us; and as I did so, in a tumult of the most painful agitation and suspense, feature after feature once more became familiar, and notwithstanding the grey hair and beard, I at length recognised, with unspeakable joy, my father. “Hurrah!” I shouted; “hurrah! it is he—it is my father, Bob; and we have found him after all, and that when we little expected to do so. Thank God; oh! thank God!” “Amen,” answered Bob, taking off his tarpaulin reverently for a moment, while the tears rolled down his weather-beaten cheeks. We took room, and rounded the cutter to, and as she came up into the wind, with all her canvas shaking, the natives vigorously plied their paddles, and with a few lusty strokes shot their light craft alongside. I went to the gangway, and held out my hand to assist my father in over our low bulwarks, whilst Bob hove the end of a coil of line into the canoe, shouting to the blacks, “Now then, darkies, look out, and catch a turn with this here rope’s-end, will ye? for if you goes astarn, you’ll have all your work afore ye to overhaul us and get alongside again.” “Good Heaven! that voice—surely I should know it,” murmured my father. “Thank you, sir. Yours is the first sail I have seen for—Why, how is this?” I had been unable to control myself any longer; and, to my father’s infinite surprise, he suddenly found himself in my embrace, and, as suddenly, recognised the tones of the voice which called him “father.” I thought the dear old man would have fainted, but he rallied himself with a powerful effort, though it was some little time before he could speak. At length— “My son! my noble boy Harry,” exclaimed he. “Great God! Merciful Father! I thank Thee for this great and unexpected mercy. Little did I think, my dear boy, when I saw your white sails standing in for the island, what unexpected happiness awaited me. And, if I mistake not,” added he, “this is my old friend and staunch shipmate, Robert Trunnion. This is indeed a happy day for me,” grasping Bob’s hand heartily, “a day I have despaired of ever seeing again. But, tell me, what has happened, and how come you to be here in this small cockle-shell of a craft? You surely cannot have been cast away, and have built her yourselves. If you have, you are wonderfully good shipwrights. And how came you to find out that I was here? or is this happy meeting the result of accident? Everything is so surprising that I feel perfectly bewildered.” “You shall know all, dear sir, in good time,” I answered. “The story is too long to be told in a breath. Let us get inside, and come to an anchor; and as soon as we are sufficiently recovered from our present excitement to tell an intelligible tale, you shall know everything.” “Well, well, so be it,” answered my father; “and I suppose I had better play pilot in navigating this ‘seventy-four’ of yours through the channel. What water do you draw?” “Seven feet aft,” I answered, “and she works to perfection; so you will have no difficulty with her.” “So much the better,” answered my father, “as it will be rather ticklish work. Keep her well to windward, Robert; do not go closer than forty fathoms to the southern extremity of the surf. And now, my dear boy, one word more. How is your sister?” “Well; quite well, I am happy to say. At least, she was so when we left England, little more than four months ago,” I answered; “and so was everybody else in whom we are interested.” “I am delighted beyond measure to hear it,” returned my father; “this is good news, better than I could have dared to hope. Now keep her away, Robert. Starboard your helm—hard a-starboard; so, steady now as you go. Do you see the opening of the channel? Steer as straight as you like for it. This will be a surprise for Winter, indeed.” “He is still with you, then, dear sir?” said I. “I trust he is in good health.” “Yes, I am happy to say he is quite well,” returned my father. “Indeed, we have neither of us had a day’s illness since we have been on the island. I was quite an invalid at the time that the ship was lost, certainly; but I soon recovered, thanks to Winter’s care and good nursing. But how did you know of his being with me?” “We learned your whole story, from the time of your sailing for home up to the day of your being so shamefully abandoned,” I replied, “and that by the merest accident. We happened to fall in with one of the men whom you shipped at Canton, on board a vessel which we boarded on the line, on our passage out. But here is some one with whom I must make you acquainted, dear sir,” I continued, as Ella’s fair head appeared at the companion. I then introduced her to my father, briefly narrating the circumstances under which she became a member of our little crew, and frankly explaining the relation in which we now stood towards each other. When I had finished my explanation, my father took the dear little girl by the hand, kissed her on the forehead, and said a few kind words to relieve the embarrassment and agitation under which it was evident she was suffering; and I had the very great satisfaction of seeing that these two beings, in whom I was so warmly interested, were mutually impressed very favourably towards each other. We soon worked through the short passage in the reef, and then stood away to the westward, rounding the southern extremity of the island very shortly afterwards. The moment that we cleared this point, and opened the western side of the island, Bob shouted, “Ah! there lies the dear old barkie, sure enough. Look at her, Harry, lad. She’s sorely mauled about, poor old beauty, but I should still ha’ knowed her anywheres, as far as these old eyes could see her.” There, indeed, lay the wreck of the Amazon, close to the beach, about two miles off, and sorely mauled about she was; so much so, that I greatly doubted whether Bob would ever have identified her as our old ship, had not my father’s presence, and the story we had already heard of her loss, assisted him. Her three lower-masts were still standing, but the whole of her upper works were gone, and I at first supposed that they had been used for fire-wood, until we opened up a tiny bay somewhat nearer us to the southward, and saw a small vessel in process of being built on the beach. “You have established a ship-yard here, I see, sir,” I remarked, as this object came in view. “Yes,” answered my father; “but we have made but poor progress, so far. You will be of the greatest assistance to us, my dear boy—you and Robert here. Since you have managed to turn out such a sweet little craft as this cutter, I shall be strongly inclined to pull our work to pieces and begin all over again.” “How do you mean, sir?” I inquired. “You surely do not imagine that Bob and I built this cutter?” “Did you not?” returned my father. “Then where did you pick her up?” “She was built on the Thames,” I replied; “and Bob and I have managed to bring her out here between us.” My father was greatly surprised at hearing this, but as we were now approaching the anchorage, it was decided to defer all explanations until we could have an opportunity of proceeding with them in a straightforward fashion. Sail was shortened, and in about ten minutes afterwards we dropped our anchor in a pretty little well-sheltered bay, within a couple of cables’ length of the beach, and in full view of a neat little cottage constructed of bamboo, which stood on a lawn of about an acre in extent, environed with beautiful tropical trees and plants. Winter was down on the beach full of curiosity respecting the new-comers, and I will leave to the reader’s imagination the surprise and delight with which he recognised in them two of his old shipmates. The two canoes conveyed all hands of us ashore, and my father, after welcoming us heartily to “his dominions” as we stepped from the canoes to the beach, gave his arm to Ella, and with me on his other side, and Bob and Winter following arm-in-arm astern, and the two natives bringing up the rear, we at once wended our way to the cottage, where we found that Winter had prepared a sumptuous breakfast in anticipation of our arrival. Whilst discussing this meal, I related, at my father’s earnest solicitation, our whole story, commencing with an account of the wreck on Portland beach, and of the tale of the treasure-island told by the dying Spaniard, and then going on to relate how we had been induced, by a belief in this story, to build and fit out the Water Lily and sail in her in search of the treasure, mentioning, in due course, our meeting with the seaman who had given us a clue to the Amazon’s fate, and of our resolve, therefore, to search the whole Archipelago, if need be, for the abandoned ones; and winding up with an account of our late achievement of the destruction of the Albatross and of the consequent imprisonment of her crew, upon the island we had so recently sailed from. Great was the surprise of my father and his companion as I proceeded, and frequent their comments and interruptions; but at last I got through with it, and then, of course, I became anxious, in my turn, to hear how matters had gone with my father and Winter during their long stay where they now were. “I have very little to tell,” replied my father, in answer to my questions; “and that little I should not now be alive to relate, but for the unceasing care and attention of my friend and comrade, Winter, here, who refused to save himself from a possible lifetime of captivity on this island by deserting his commander. He watched me all through a long and tedious illness, and, under God, was the means of saving my life for this happy moment. We have never quite despaired of being restored to home and friends, but latterly we have felt that our deliverance might be the work of years. At first, we were kept buoyed up by the hope of being rescued by some passing vessel; but, though we have maintained a ceaseless watch, we have never sighted a single sail from the moment of our first arrival here until you hove in sight this morning. All my charts and instruments of every description were carried off when the mutineers left in the boats, so that I have but a very remote idea of our actual whereabouts, but we must be in a very out-of-the-way corner of the globe, as indeed I now gather clearly from what you have told me. Our first work, after my recovery, was the building of this hut: and then followed the preparation of a garden, a short distance inland from here, so that we might secure the means of existence. As soon as this was completed to our satisfaction, we went to work upon the building of a small vessel but our appliances were so inadequate to the task, that our progress has been excessively slow, as you may judge when I tell you that we have been at work now fully two years, and the craft is yet barely half-finished. Latterly, indeed, we have got on somewhat better, for the two blacks—who, as far as I can learn from their signs and the few words of English they have picked up since being with us, were blown off their own island in a gale of wind, and came ashore here in the last stage of exhaustion—have been of the greatest assistance to us in the mere handling of heavy weights; and now that you have joined us, I think we may make short work of the remainder of the job.” I was at first disposed to suggest the abandonment of the half-finished schooner (for such she was), but, on more mature consideration, I came to the conclusion that it would be better to finish her, on many accounts—the chief of which was that as we now mustered seven hands, all told, including the blacks, whom we could not leave behind, we should be uncomfortably crowded on board the cutter; and I doubted much whether we could find room to stow away, in so small a craft, a sufficiency of water, to say nothing of provisions for so large a party. The day was, of course, declared a high holiday on the island; and, after our mutual explanations had been fully given, we all—the whites, of course, that is—proceeded to the beach to inspect the craft on the stocks. She was a much larger craft than the Lily, measuring fully thirty tons. My father and Winter had given a great deal of care and attention to her design, and the result was a very pretty model, though her lines were by no means so fine as the cutter’s. She was immensely strong, owing to the fact that it was less laborious to build in the timbers just as they were taken from the Amazon, or only with such alterations as were imperatively necessary to bring them to the required shape, than it would have been to reduce them with the imperfect tools in the possession of the builders. The whole of her framing was set up and secured, and the garboard and two adjacent streaks on each side bolted to: and that was all. I could easily understand, as I looked on her massive timbers, how great must have been the labour for two pair of hands to bring her even thus far forward; and, in addition to this, there was the pulling of it all to pieces, in the first instance, on board the parent ship, and the rafting of the materials down to the bay afterwards. After taking a good look at the craft, we shoved off in the canoes for the wreck, calling on board the cutter on our way, that my father and Winter might satisfy the curiosity they felt concerning the little craft which had so successfully traversed so many thousand miles of ocean. They were, naturally, delighted at everything they saw, and admired her model greatly: but were, nevertheless, loud in their expressions of wonder at what they termed our temerity in venturing on so long a voyage in such a mere boat. A quiet paddle of about half-an-hour took us alongside the wreck, which lay grounded in about ten feet of water, pretty much as she had been left by the mutineers. We had no difficulty in boarding, a substantial accommodation-ladder having been constructed to facilitate so frequent an operation. There was not much to see when we stood upon her deck—the whole of the poop having been removed to furnish materials for the schooner; but Bob and I naturally felt a deep interest in the ship which had formerly been our floating home, and as to whose fate we had for so long been in a state of such painful uncertainty. We remained on board about an hour, during which Ella insisted on having pointed out to her the exact spot which my old berth had formerly occupied; and then we returned to the shore and visited the garden, which had been formed in a small natural clearing within about a quarter of a mile of the house. Here we found a goodly patch of wheat, almost ready for the sickle: a large plot of potatoes, which, my father said, grew but indifferently well in that climate; a few other English vegetables, some yams, and several fruit-trees of various kinds, including the very useful bread-fruit, which had been carefully selected and as carefully transplanted to their present position, where they had flourished amazingly under the not very efficient gardening skill which had been bestowed upon them by the two recluses. Of animal food there was no lack, the small island being almost overrun by the many descendants of three pigs and half-a-dozen fowls, which the mutineers had, in an unaccountable paroxysm of generosity, left behind. The remainder of the day was spent in a tour quite over my father’s limited dominions, Bob and Winter having, however, devoted the afternoon to the rigging up of a couple of tents close alongside the hut, for the accommodation of us of the cutter’s crew. During our ramble, which Ella shared—though she at first wished to remain aloof, thinking my father and I might have private matters to discuss after so long a separation—the subject of the treasure-island again came uppermost; and my father seemed to be strongly of opinion that, in spite of our failure to find it, it really existed, and that our disappointment had arisen in some error as to its exact position. For my own part, I hardly knew what to think. I could not for a moment believe that the Spaniard, knowing himself to be a dying man, would tell a wanton and objectless falsehood; and I had never supposed him to be otherwise than in the full possession of his senses whilst relating his story. But he had given the position of the island definitely, and, on our arrival at the latitude and longitude named, we had found no land at all. True, there had been a certain amount of reservation in his statement. He had given the position “as near as he could ascertain it,” or in words to that effect; but, allowing the possibility of an error, that error was not likely to exceed a few miles, and I thought that, had the island really existed, we ought to have been able, at all events, to see it from our mast-head when in the position ascribed to it. We talked the matter over at some length—for no one is quite indifferent to the advantages accruing from the possession of wealth—but we could make nothing very satisfactory of it; so at last the subject was changed, and we discussed and arranged our plan of immediate operations, my father’s longing for home being a thousand times increased now that he knew we had sent information home of the possibility of his still being in existence. We all fully shared in his impatience, as I knew that Ada would soon begin to feel uneasy, if she were not already so, at the long period which had now elapsed since she could last have heard from or of us. As for Winter, he was a Portland man, and the stories Bob told him of his kith and kin fully aroused his semi-dormant longings to see them all once more. The next morning, we all turned to with a will upon the schooner. It happened that more materials were required from the wreck; and the obtaining of these, and the rafting of them down to the ship-yard, had hitherto been a work involving the expenditure of much time and great labour, as, until the arrival of the two blacks in their canoe about six months before, my father had nothing in the shape of a boat, excepting a rude catamaran sort of an affair; and after the acquisition of the canoe, though she was, of course, most useful for many purposes, the rafting down of the timbers and planking was almost as tedious and laborious an operation as ever, the canoe being too small and too light for towing purposes, and their usual mode of procedure had been to kedge down everything. But our arrival put an entirely new phase upon this part of the business. We got out our tube-boat, and put her together and rigged her; and then we six men—four whites and the two natives, who were strong, active lads—manned her and the cutter, and proceeded to the wreck, where we combined our forces in taking apart such portions of the wreck as we thought most suitable for our purpose. By the middle of the afternoon two good-sized rafts were in the water, and the Lily taking one of these in tow, and the tube-boat (which Bob insisted on christening as the Ella) the other, we got the whole down to the bay and moored to the beach in little more than an hour—a task which, my father declared, had usually occupied him and Winter the best part of a day, and even then the amount of material transported had scarcely been a quarter as great as that now brought down. So great, indeed, had been the additional assistance afforded by the two pairs of strong arms belonging to the cutter’s crew, that we considered we now had a sufficiency of material to plank the schooner right up to her gunwale. I do not know whether I have mentioned it before or not, but, in fitting out the Water Lily, I had provided a very complete chest of carpenter’s tools, so that we might have the means of effecting any necessary repairs to the cutter, as far as our skill would allow; and these now came into play with excellent effect. We all worked in high spirits, for it was now no longer a doubtful question as to whether the schooner could be finished or not, the additional strength contributed by Bob and myself being found just sufficient to render manageable, and comparatively easy, work which had before proved too heavy for my father and Winter alone, or even when aided by the two natives. These, I may as well now mention, were two lads of about eighteen years of age, and, having been treated very kindly from their first arrival by my father, proved very tractable and willing, and altogether very valuable aids in many respects. We were none of us very skilful in the handling of tools, and our work was, consequently, of no very highly finished character; but everything was as strong as wood and iron could make it, and within a fortnight we had contrived, by dint of sheer hard work, to get the schooner planked right up. At first we had a great deal of difficulty with our fastenings, from want of a smith or a smith’s forge; and this had been the greatest bar to my father’s progress. Ella was the means of helping us out of this difficulty, by suggesting an idea which I think would never have occurred to any of us men. This was neither more nor less than the construction of a rude but efficient smith’s hearth out of some old sheet and pig iron obtained from the wreck, and the manufacture of a bellows from some boards and stout tarpaulin, the nozzle being made of bamboo, and inserted into an orifice in the hearth which was packed air-tight with clay. It was a clumsy contrivance certainly, but it answered our purpose well enough to save us a great deal of time and labour. The laying of the deck was our next task; and it took us another fortnight to do this, as we resolved that everything should be as well done as possible. This was exclusive of the time occupied in fixing the combings of the hatch and fore-scuttle, cabin-companion, skylight, and other openings. As we “got our hands in,” however, we made more rapid progress; and, in little more than two months from the date of the Water Lily’s arrival, the hull of the schooner was completed and in readiness for the reception of her spars. These we got out of the spars of the wreck, all of which had been sent down long before by my father and Winter, and carefully stored up for this very purpose. Another month saw these spars all shaped and fitted, and ready to be put into their places. This had been the work of my father and myself, aided in the lifting, turning over, and shifting generally by the natives, Bob and Winter busying themselves meanwhile in the manufacture of a suit of sails from those belonging to the Amazon. Our rigging was not very trustworthy, being manufactured, for the most part, out of the old rigging of the wreck; but there had been a good supply of new rope also on board, as a stand-by, and this we had used in, as far as it would go, in the most important parts. We decided to rig the craft complete upon the stocks, and then launch her, and tow her down alongside the wreck, to take in ballast, and her water-tanks, stores, etcetera. This we accordingly did, finishing off everything, even to the bending of the sails; and four months to a day after the Water Lily’s arrival saw her caulked, her seams paid, her hull painted, and, in short, everything ready, even to wedging up, for launching. <hr> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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