"It is a south-east gale, or rather hurricane, and probably it will not last long. I shall look for better weather by sunrise, if not before,"
I replied, as I left the cabin.
On my way back to the pilot-house I stopped in at the engine-room. I found Moses Brickland, seated on his leather-cushioned divan, watching the movements of the engine. Notwithstanding the uneasy movement of the vessel the machinery seemed to be working very regularly.
"How does she go, Moses?" I asked.
"She has done very well since you headed her up to the sea," he answered, without taking his gaze from the engine. "At one time I thought the sea would break in upon us and swamp the fires. It would have been all up with us then."
"I felt so myself, and I headed her up to the sea when I saw that it was no longer safe to keep her on her course. But I suppose you want to turn in, Moses."
"I, no; I am perfectly satisfied to keep my place here till morning,"
he replied.
"I want Ben Bowman at the wheel, with Washburn. She steers so hard in this sea that we need to change hands every hour. But I hope we shall soon be able to relieve you," I added.
"I don"t have very hard work, and I can stand it very well till morning."
I returned to the wheel-house. It was about two bells, or one in the morning. The tempest had not increased in the last hour, and I hoped we had seen the worst of it. We were working the engine just enough to keep the steamer"s head up to the sea. The Sylvania behaved so well in her present position that I dismissed the port watch at two in the morning; but I could not think of turning in myself while there was any possibility of trouble ahead. I remained in the pilot-house with Washburn, while Buck Lingley was on the lookout on the hurricane-deck.
We held our position till about four in the morning, when it was evident that the gale was breaking, though the sea was still very heavy.
"Light on the port quarter," said Buck, at one of the small windows of the pilot-house in front of his station.
I rushed over to the port side, but the windows were so covered with water that I could see nothing. It was raining hard, as it had been since midnight. I went on deck, grasping a life-line to keep me from being knocked over by the flood of water that flowed down from the forecastle. I reached the ladder and went up to the hurricane-deck.
I supposed the light the lookout had seen was on some vessel. It was at least ten miles distant; and after a time I satisfied myself that it was a revolving light. It also flashed, and I was confident it was eight or ten miles distant. I was rather bewildered, for I had not expected to find a light in that direction. I hastened down to the pilot-house to consult the Coast Pilot. I reviewed the course we had followed after leaving the wrecked bark. By our reckoning we were about twenty miles to the southward of Carysfort Light when we headed the steamer to the eastward.
We had kept the screw turning all the time, and I supposed we had been making some headway during the five hours we had been on this tack.
What was the light, then?
We were headed directly into the Bahama Islands, and I knew we had not gone far enough to place any light in those islands on our port quarter. The description in the book of Carysfort Light corresponded with what I had made out by observation.
"We are about ten miles to the south-east of Carysfort Light," I said to Washburn, when I had satisfied myself of the fact.
"Impossible! That would put us about where we were when you called all hands last night!" exclaimed the mate.
"The Light is about where it was when we began to go to the southward at ten last evening," I replied.
"But we have been going to the southward and eastward for the last five hours."
"It does not appear that we have gone at all," I continued, looking over the pages of the book. "We have been drifting all the time. The steamer is in the Gulf Stream, and that, with the fierce wind, has carried her a long distance from where I supposed she was. I find that in a strong easterly wind the Gulf Stream sets to the westward, and runs in among the Keys. I have no doubt now that this is the reason why the bark struck last night on the rocks to the southward of French Reef."
"It appears from what you say that we have not carried steam enough to prevent us from being drifted to the westward as well as to the northward," added Washburn.
"That is the fact: we have been drifting about north-northwest. In a few hours more we should have been on the reef. Ring the speed-bell."
It was plain enough by this time, when it was almost broad daylight, that the force of the gale was spent. In less than an hour the wind subsided entirely, and the wind whirled to the south, then to the west, and finally settled in the north-west. We made our course to the southward. The clouds rolled away, and the sun rose bright and beautiful after one of the hardest nights I had ever known.
The wind began to freshen from the north-west, and at six o"clock we had all sail on her. We all wondered what had become of the Islander.
Captain Blastblow was evidently well acquainted with the navigation of the Florida Reefs, or he would not have taken his vessel through the dangerous channel he had chosen. But I was too tired to talk much, and I slept an hour in Washburn"s berth until breakfast-time. When I waked, I found the captain of the bark sitting in a chair in the state-room.
CHAPTER XIV.
LOOKING FOR THE ISLANDER.
The captain of the bark was a man of about fifty. He was bald, and his hair and whiskers were sprinkled with gray. I had no doubt that the violent storm had made an end of his vessel, for the wreck was exposed to the full fury of the sea, tenfold more violent after we left it than before.
"Good morning, Captain; I hope you are quite well this morning," I began.
"I am well enough, thank you; but I cannot forget that I have lost my ship," he replied. "You had a rough night of it on deck; and I don"t think I ever knew a vessel to pitch and roll so badly as this one did."
"It was a terrible blow, and this is a very small vessel, though she is as strong as wood and iron could make her. If she had not been well built, the sea would have taken the house off this deck."
"I thought it was going to do so as it was. I think she was exceedingly well handled, or she would have gone to the bottom," continued the captain. "I have no doubt there are scores of wrecks along the Keys this morning, and many a good fellow may miss his mess after this."
I gave him a full account of the storm, and of our being carried so far out of our course by the wind and the current. I told him that we had been delayed so long by the wreck and the storm that we probably should not reach Key West till three or four in the afternoon.
"I suppose we shall be lucky to get there at all after all that has happened to us," replied the captain. "What you say about drifting so far out of your course strikes me as being a little strange."
"What was the name of your vessel, Captain?--I have not even learned your name," I continued. I intended to point out to him the way in which the bark had been lost; but I wanted to know something more about the voyage of the unfortunate vessel.
"Captain Mayfield; and the bark was the Olive, of New York, from New Orleans, with a cargo of cotton from the latter port," replied the captain. "I owned a third of her myself; but she is well insured, and so is her cargo. My wife and daughter were with me, and are now in the after cabin."
"I think you were fortunate to escape with your lives," I added.
"I know we were, Captain--I don"t know your name any better than you did mine; and it strikes me that you are a very young fellow to be in command of a steamer, though she is a very small one."
"My name is Alexander Garningham, and I am generally called Captain Alick. I have been on the water most of the time since I was ten years old, either on the sea or on the great lakes. I have had as rough a time on Lake Superior as we had last night, if not a rougher." I told my story as briefly as I could.
"Your education has not been neglected, Captain Alick," continued Captain Mayfield. "If you had not managed the Sylvania so well last night, most of us must have perished; for I have no doubt that the Olive went to pieces before midnight. She was a well-built vessel, but rather old. The gale kept forcing her up to the sharp coral rocks, and she was grinding off her timbers at a very rapid rate when we left her.
If there had been any chance for her I would not have left her. I had reduced sail at dark, when it began to freshen into a gale. We had the wind on the beam, and the bark was behaving very well."
"It began to blow the heaviest about six bells," I added.
"We did not get the worst of it. We had the foretop-mast staysail, fore and main topsails, and the spanker set. The Gulf Stream was with us, and we were making not less than ten knots an hour. I expected soon to see Carysfort Light. Our course was north, a quarter east, and I had no doubt I was making it good."
"I am afraid not."
"Of course I know now that I did not make it good; but I can"t see any reason why I did not."
"I can," I interposed. "It was for the same reason that we were drifted so far to the northward and westward. When the wind comes strong from an easterly direction the current of the Gulf Stream is partly turned to the westward."
"I have read that in the Coast Pilot; but I have been through these waters so many times without noticing anything of the kind, that I did not think of it last night. The first hint I had that anything was wrong was when the Olive struck on the rocks. I knew from the sound of the crash that she had stove a hole in her bow. She flew back, and then the wind jammed her on again. I sent hands aloft to furl the topsails, and others to haul down the jib and take in the spanker. But she drove on the rocks all the same; and I knew that would be the end of her."
I invited the captain to visit the cabin, for I thought he would wish to see his wife and daughter. Our pa.s.sengers were all at breakfast, and engaged in talking over the events of the night. Captain Mayfield was invited to join them, and I advised him to do so, while I went back to the deck to attend to the wants of the rest of the ship"s company of the Olive. The sailors were all on deck, and the mate was in the pilot-house with Washburn. Gopher had made provision for feeding the addition to our pa.s.sengers. I invited the two mates of the Olive down into the fore-cabin to breakfast, while the cook and steward were supplying the sailors on the forecastle. I found that Gopher had been liberal in his supplies, both as to quant.i.ty and quality, for the wrecked people.