“He deserves to die,” I cried out; “and God forgive me, I am not man enough to be his executioner.”
But Maud was by my side, passing her hand soothingly through my hair as though I were a child, and saying, “There, there; it will all come right. We are in the right, and it must come right.”
I remembered Michelet and leaned my head against her; and truly I became strong again. The blessed woman was an unfailing fount of power to me. What did it matter? Only a set-back, a delay. The tide could not have carried the masts far to seaward, and there had been no wind. It meant merely more work to find them and tow them back. And besides, it was a lesson. I knew what to expect. He might have waited and destroyed our work more effectually when we had more accomplished.
“Here he comes now,” she whispered.
I glanced up. He was strolling leisurely along the poop on the port side.
“Take no notice of him,” I whispered. “He’s coming to see how we take it. Don’t let him know that we know. We can deny him that satisfaction. Take off your shoes—that’s right—and carry them in your hand.”
And then we played hide-and-seek with the blind man. As he came up the port side we slipped past on the starboard; and from the poop we watched him turn and start aft on our track.
He must have known, somehow, that we were on board, for he said “Good-morning” very confidently, and waited, for the greeting to be returned. Then he strolled aft, and we slipped forward.
“Oh, I know you’re aboard,” he called out, and I could see him listen intently after he had spoken.
It reminded me of the great hoot-owl, listening, after its booming cry, for the stir of its frightened prey. But we did not fir, and we moved only when he moved. And so we dodged about the deck, hand in hand, like a couple of children chased by a wicked ogre, till Wolf Larsen, evidently in disgust, left the deck for the cabin. There was glee in our eyes, and suppressed titters in our mouths, as we put on our shoes and clambered over the side into the boat. And as I looked into Maud’s clear brown eyes I forgot the evil he had done, and I knew only that I loved her, and that because of her the strength was mine to win our way back to the world.
Chapter XXXVI
For two days Maud and I ranged the sea and explored the beaches in search of the missing masts. But it was not till the third day that we found them, all of them, the shears included, and, of all perilous places, in the pounding surf of the grim south-western promontory. And how we worked! At the dark end of the first day we returned, exhausted, to our little cove, towing the mainmast behind us. And we had been compelled to row, in a dead calm, practically every inch of the way.
Another day of heart-breaking and dangerous toil saw us in camp with the two topmasts to the good. The day following I was desperate, and I rafted together the foremast, the fore and main booms, and the fore and main gaffs. The wind was favourable, and I had thought to tow them back under sail, but the wind baffled, then died away, and our progress with the oars was a snail’s pace. And it was such dispiriting effort. To throw one’s whole strength and weight on the oars and to feel the boat checked in its forward lunge by the heavy drag behind, was not exactly exhilarating.
Night began to fall, and to make matters worse, the wind sprang up ahead. Not only did all forward motion cease, but we began to drift back and out to sea. I struggled at the oars till I was played out. Poor Maud, whom I could never prevent from working to the limit of her strength, lay weakly back in the stern-sheets. I could row no more. My bruised and swollen hands could no longer close on the oar handles. My wrists and arms ached intolerably, and though I had eaten heartily of a twelve-o’clock lunch, I had worked so hard that I was faint from hunger.
I pulled in the oars and bent forward to the line which held the tow. But Maud’s hand leaped out restrainingly to mine.
“What are you going to do?” she asked in a strained, tense voice.
“Cast it off,” I answered, slipping a turn of the rope.
But her fingers closed on mine.
“Please don’t,” she begged.
“It is useless,” I answered. “Here is night and the wind blowing us off the land.”
“But think, Humphrey. If we cannot sail away on the Ghost, we may remain for years on the island—for life even. If it has never been discovered all these years, it may never be discovered.”
“You forget the boat we found on the beach,” I reminded her.
“It was a seal-hunting boat,” she replied, “and you know perfectly well that if the men had escaped they would have been back to make their fortunes from the rookery. You know they never escaped.”
I remained silent, undecided.
“Besides,” she added haltingly, “it’s your idea, and I want to see you succeed.”
Now I could harden my heart. As soon as she put it on a flattering personal basis, generosity compelled me to deny her.
“Better years on the island than to die to-night, or to-morrow, or the next day, in the open boat. We are not prepared to brave the sea. We have no food, no water, no blankets, nothing. Why, you’d not survive the night without blankets: I know how strong you are. You are shivering now.”
“It is only nervousness,” she answered. “I am afraid you will cast off the masts in spite of me.”
“Oh, please, please, Humphrey, don’t!” she burst out, a moment later.
And so it ended, with the phrase she knew had all power over me. We shivered miserably throughout the night. Now and again I fitfully slept, but the pain of the cold always aroused me. How Maud could stand it was beyond me. I was too tired to thrash my arms about and warm myself, but I found strength time and again to chafe her hands and feet to restore the circulation. And still she pleaded with me not to cast off the masts. About three in the morning she was caught by a cold cramp, and after I had rubbed her out of that she became quite numb. I was frightened. I got out the oars and made her row, though she was so weak I thought she would faint at every stroke.
Morning broke, and we looked long in the growing light for our island. At last it showed, small and black, on the horizon, fully fifteen miles away. I scanned the sea with my glasses. Far away in the south-west I could see a dark line on the water, which grew even as I looked at it.
“Fair wind!” I cried in a husky voice I did not recognize as my own.
Maud tried to reply, but could not speak. Her lips were blue with cold, and she was hollow-eyed—but oh, how bravely her brown eyes looked at me! How piteously brave!
Again I fell to chafing her hands and to moving her arms up and down and about until she could thrash them herself. Then I compelled her to stand up, and though she would have fallen had I not supported her, I forced her to walk back and forth the several steps between the thwart and the stern-sheets, and finally to spring up and down.
“Oh, you brave, brave woman,” I said, when I saw the life coming back into her face. “Did you know that you were brave?”
“I never used to be,” she answered. “I was never brave till I knew you. It is you who have made me brave.”
“Nor I, until I knew you,” I answered.
She gave me a quick look, and again I caught that dancing, tremulous light and something more in her eyes. But it was only for the moment. Then she smiled.
“It must have been the conditions,” she said; but I knew she was wrong, and I wondered if she likewise knew. Then the