At this moment Montgomery Clinton appeared at the head of the stairs.
The poor fellow was pale, and disheveled, and tottered from weakness.
"What"s going on?" he asked, feebly. Harry took it upon himself to explain, using as few words as possible.
"Will you go with the captain, or stay on the Nantucket?" asked Harry.
"Really, I couldn"t stand sailing in a little boat, you know."
"That"s settled, then!" said the captain. "Into the boats with you!"
The sailors and two pa.s.sengers lowered themselves into the long boat, which was large enough to receive them all, till only Jack Pendleton and the captain remained.
"Get in, boy!" said the captain, harshly.
Jack stepped back, and said, manfully: "I will remain on board the ship, sir."
While this discussion had been going on, the boat was being stored with kegs of water and provisions, and soon after the sailors began to ply the oars.
The little band that remained looked silently and solemnly, as they saw their late companions borne farther and farther away from them on the crested waves.
"It"s a question which will last longer, the ship or the boat," said Mr. Holdfast.
"We must work--I know that," said Mr. Stubbs. "Captain Holdfast, I salute you as my commander. Give us your orders."
"Are you all agreed, gentlemen?" asked Holdfast.
"We are," answered all except Montgomery Clinton, who was clinging to the side with a greenish pallor on his face.
"Then I shall set you to work at the pumps. Jack I a.s.sign you and the professor to duty first. You will work an hour; then Mr. Stubbs and Mr. Vane will relieve you. I will look out for the vessel"s course."
"I am afraid I couldn"t pump," said Montgomery Clinton. "I feel so awfully weak, you know, I think I"m going to die!"
Harry looked out to sea and saw the little boat containing the remnant of their company growing smaller and smaller. A sudden feeling of loneliness overcame him, and he asked himself, seriously: "Is death, then, so near?"
The sea was still rough, but the violence of the storm was past. In a few hours the surface of the sea was much less agitated. The spirits of the pa.s.sengers rose, especially after learning from the mate that he had been able to stop the leak, through the experience which he acquired in his younger days as a.s.sistant to a ship carpenter.
"Then the old ship is likely to float a while longer?" said Mr. Stubbs, cheerfully.
"Not a short time, either, if the weather continues favorable."
"Captain Hill was in too much of a hurry to leave the vessel,"
remarked Harry.
"Yes," answered Holdfast. "Such was my opinion when I thought the Nantucket in much worse condition than at present. If the captain and sailors had remained on board, we could have continued our voyage to Melbourne without difficulty.
"And now?" said Mr. Stubbs, interrogatively.
"Now we have no force to man her. Little Jack and myself are the only sailors on board."
"But not the only men."
"That is true. I think, however, that you or the professor would find it rather hard to spread or take in sail."
Mr. Stubbs looked up into the rigging and shrugged his shoulders.
The next day Mr. Clinton appeared on deck. He looked faded and played out, but he was no longer the woebegone creature of a day or two previous. Even he turned out to be of use, for he knew something about cooking, and volunteered to a.s.sist in preparing the meals, the ship"s cook having left the ship with the captain. Accordingly, he rose in the estimation of the pa.s.sengers--having proved that he was not wholly a drone.
Jack and Harry grew still more intimate. The young sailor was under no restraint now that the captain was not on board, for with the mate he had always been a favorite.
All efforts were made to keep the ship on her course. They could not put up all the sails, however, and made but slow progress. They did little but drift. Nor did they encounter any other vessel for several days, so that there was no chance of obtaining the desired a.s.sistance.
"I wonder where it will all end, Jack?" said Harry, one evening.
"I don"t trouble myself much about that, Harry," said the young sailor. "I am content as I am."
"Don"t you look ahead, then?"
"I am happy with you and the few we have on board. They are kind to me; what more do I need?"
"I can"t be contented so easily, Jack. I hope there is a long life before us. Here we are, making no progress. We are doing nothing to advance ourselves."
But this did not make much impression on Jack. He did not look beyond the present, and so that this was comfortable, he left the future to look out for itself.
"What do you think has become of Captain Hill and his companions, Mr. Holdfast?" asked Mr. Stubbs, on the third evening after the separation.
"He is probably still afloat, unless he has been fortunate enough to be picked up by some vessel."
"There is no hope of reaching land in the Nantucket is there,"
continued Mr. Stubbs.
"There is considerable fear of it," said the mate.
"Why do you use the word fear?" asked Stubbs, puzzled.
"What I mean is, that we are likely to run aground upon some unknown island. If the sh.o.r.e is rocky, it may break us to pieces, and that, of course, will be attended with danger to life or limb."
Stubbs looked thoughtful.
"I should like to see land," he said, "but I wouldn"t like to land in that way. It reminds me of an old lady who, traveling by cars for the first time, was upset in a collision. As she crawled out of the window, she asked, innocently: "Do you always stop this way?""
"There are dangers on land as well as on the sea," said the mate, "as your story proves; though one is not so likely to realize them. In our present circ.u.mstances, there is one thing I earnestly hope for."
"What is that?"
"That we may not have another storm. I fear, in her dismantled condition, the Nantucket would have a poor chance of outliving it, particularly as we have no one but Jack and myself to do seamen"s work."
Mr. Stubbs walked thoughtfully away.