She perceived now that he was exhausted, and in trouble about something, and, putting her hand in the pocket of her dress, she searched for something that she knew was there. She produced a Tangerine orange, and leaning forward she touched the Spent One"s head with it.
Mr b.u.t.ton raised his head, stared vacantly for a second, saw the proffered orange, and at the sight of it the thought of "the childer"
and their innocence, himself and the blasting powder, cleared his dazzled wits, and he took to the sculls again.
"Daddy," said d.i.c.k, who had been looking astern, "there"s clouds near the ship."
In an incredibly short s.p.a.ce of time the solid cliffs of fog had broken. The faint wind that had banked it had pierced it, and was now making pictures and devices of it, most wonderful and weird to see.
Hors.e.m.e.n of the mist rode on the water, and were dissolved; billows rolled on the sea, yet were not of the sea; blankets and spirals of vapour ascended to high heaven. And all with a terrible languor of movement. Vast and lazy and sinister, yet steadfast of purpose as Fate or Death, the fog advanced, taking the world for its own.
Against this grey and indescribably sombre background stood the smouldering ship with the breeze already shivering in her sails, and the smoke from her main-hatch blowing and beckoning as if to the retreating boats.
"Why"s the ship smoking like that?" asked d.i.c.k. "And look at those boats coming--when are we going back, daddy?"
"Uncle," said Emmeline, putting her hand in his, as she gazed towards the ship and beyond it, "I"m "fraid."
"What frightens you, Emmy?" he asked, drawing her to him.
"Shapes," replied Emmeline, nestling up to his side.
"Oh, Glory be to G.o.d!" gasped the old sailor, suddenly resting on his oars. "Will yiz look at the fog that"s comin"--"
"I think we had better wait here for the boats," said Mr Lestrange; "we are far enough now to be safe if anything happens."
"Ay, ay," replied the oarsman, whose wits had returned. "Blow up or blow down, she won"t hit us from here."
"Daddy," said d.i.c.k, "when are we going back? I want my tea."
"We aren"t going back, my child," replied his father. "The ship"s on fire; we are waiting for another ship."
"Where"s the other ship?" asked the child, looking round at the horizon that was clear.
"We can"t see it yet," replied the unhappy man, "but it will come."
The long-boat and the quarter-boat were slowly approaching. They looked like beetles crawling over the water, and after them across the glittering surface came a dullness that took the sparkle from the sea--a dullness that swept and spread like an eclipse shadow.
Now the wind struck the dinghy. It was like a wind from fairyland, almost imperceptible, chill, and dimming the sun. A wind from Lilliput.
As it struck the dinghy, the fog took the distant ship.
It was a most extraordinary sight, for in less than thirty seconds the ship of wood became a ship of gauze, a tracery flickered, and was gone forever from the sight of man.
CHAPTER V
VOICES HEARD IN THE MIST
The sun became fainter still, and vanished. Though the air round the dinghy seemed quite clear, the on-coming boats were hazy and dim, and that part of the horizon that had been fairly clear was now blotted out.
The long-boat was leading by a good way. When she was within hailing distance the captain"s voice came.
"Dinghy ahoy!"
"Ahoy!"
"Fetch alongside here!"
The long-boat ceased rowing to wait for the quarter-boat that was slowly creeping up. She was a heavy boat to pull at all times, and now she was overloaded.
The wrath of Captain Le Farge with Paddy b.u.t.ton for the way he had stampeded the crew was profound, but he had not time to give vent to it.
"Here, get aboard us, Mr Lestrange!" said he, when the dinghy was alongside; "we have room for one. Mrs Stannard is in the quarter-boat, and it"s overcrowded; she"s better aboard the dinghy, for she can look after the kids. Come, hurry up, the smother is coming down on us fast.
Ahoy!"--to the quarter-boat, "hurry up, hurry up."
The quarter-boat had suddenly vanished.
Mr Lestrange climbed into the long-boat. Paddy pushed the dinghy a few yards away with the tip of a scull, and then lay on his oars waiting.
"Ahoy! ahoy!" cried Le Farge.
"Ahoy!" came from the fog bank.
Next moment the long-boat and the dinghy vanished from each other"s sight: the great fog bank had taken them.
Now a couple of strokes of the port scull would have brought Mr b.u.t.ton alongside the long-boat, so close was he; but the quarter-boat was in his mind, or rather imagination, so what must he do but take three powerful strokes in the direction in which he fancied the quarter-boat to be.
The rest was voices.
"Dinghy ahoy!"
"Ahoy!"
"Ahoy!"
"Don"t be shoutin" together, or I"ll not know which way to pull.
Quarter-boat ahoy! where are yez?"
"Port your helm!"
"Ay, ay!" putting his helm, so to speak, to starboard--"I"ll be wid yiz in wan minute, two or three minutes" hard pulling."
"Ahoy!"--much more faint.
"What d"ye mane rowin" away from me?"--a dozen strokes.
"Ahoy!" fainter still.
Mr b.u.t.ton rested on his oars.