Chapter 28 - A Story of Adventure on Land and Sea by Mayne Reid
“Overboard!”
The cry came from little William, as the Portuguese girl, lifted on the end of the boom, was pitched far out into the sea.
The utterance was merely mechanical; and as it escaped from his lips, the sailor-lad rushed towards the edge of the raft, and placed himself in an attitude to plunge into the water,—with the design of swimming to the rescue of Lalee.
Just then the boom, suddenly recoiling, came back with a rapid sweep; and, striking him across the shins, sent him sprawling over the shoulders of Ben Brace, and right into the sea-chest, in front of which the sailor was still kneeling.
Ben had heard that significant cry of alarm, and almost simultaneously the “plash” made by the little Portuguese as her body dropped down upon the water. He had slewed himself round, and was making a hurried effort to get to his feet, when the boy, flung with violence upon his stooping back, once more brought him to his knees.
As William was chucked right over him into the chest the sailor soon recovered from the shock, and rising erect, cried out in a half-confused manner,—“Overboard! Who? Where? Not you, Will’m! What is’t, boy?”
“O Ben! Ben!” answered William, as he lay kicking among the contents of the kit, “Lilly Lalee, she’s knocked overboard by the boom! Save her! save her!”
The sailor needed neither the information nor the appeal thus addressed to him. His interrogations had been altogether mechanical, for the plunge he had heard, and the absence of the girl from the raft,—ascertained by a single glance,—told him which of the Catamaran’s crew it was who had fallen overboard.
The circling eddies in the water showed him the spot where the girl had gone down; but, just as he got to his feet again, she had turned to the surface; and, uttering half-stifled screams, commenced buffeting the water with her tiny hands, in an instinctive endeavour to keep herself afloat.
In a crisis of this character, the brave English sailor was obstructed by no ambiguity as to how he should act. A single bound carried him across the Catamaran,—another landed him upon the top of one of the casks, and a third launched him six feet outward into the sea. Had he been apprised of the accident only a score of seconds sooner, less than that number of strokes would have sufficed him to reach the spot where the child had first fallen into the water. Unfortunately in the collision with little William, that had brought him back to his knees, some time had been expended. During this interval—short as it was—the craft, though under an uncontrolled sail, was still making considerable way; and when the rescuer at length succeeded in leaping from the cask, the struggling form had fallen into the wake of the Catamaran to the distance of nearly a cable’s length.
If the girl could only keep afloat for a few minutes, there need be no great danger. The sailor knew that he could swim, sustaining a heavier weight than was the little Lalee. But it was evident the child could not swim a stroke, and was every moment in danger of sinking for the second time.
Her rescuer perceived this danger as he started to her aid; and therefore pressed rapidly towards her, cleaving the water with all the strength that lay in his muscular arm and limbs.
Meanwhile little William had also regained his feet; and, having extricated himself from the chest in which he had been temporarily encoffined, ran towards the after part of the raft. Quickly mounting upon the water-cask at the stern, he stood astride the steering-oar,—an anxious and trembling spectator,—his eyes alternately fixed on the strong swimmer and the struggling child.
Snowball was still dormant, buried in a slumber profound and unconscious,—such as only a “darkey” can enjoy. The cry “Overboard!” uttered by little William had made no impression upon the tympanum of his wide-spread ears,—nor the exclamations that succeeded in the harsher voice of the sailor. Equally unheard by him had been the scream coming across the water, though along with it he might have heard the utterance of his own name!
As none of these sounds had been sufficient to arouse him from his torpor, he was likely to remain for some time longer unconscious of what was occurring. The sailor swam in silence,—the cries of the child, now more distant, were growing feebler and feebler; while little William—Snowball’s only companion upon the raft—was too much absorbed in the scene and its issue to allow even a breath to escape him.
In this moment of agony,—intense to all the others of the Catamaran’s crew,—Snowball was sleeping as soundly and sweetly as if he had been stretched along the bench of his caboose, and rocked to rest by the undulations of a good ship going at easy sail.
Up to this time, William had not thought of awakening him; for, to say the truth, the boy had not yet quite recovered his presence of mind. The shock of consternation caused by the accident was still vibrating through his brain; and his actions, in running aft, and springing up on the cask, were half mechanical. There, enchained by the spectacle, and waiting with intense anxiety for its dénouement, he had not a thought to give either to Snowball or his slumberings.
The silence continued only for a short period of time, though it may have seemed long enough both to actors and spectator in that thrilling drama. It was terminated by a cry of joyous import from the lips of little William,—in short, a loud hurrah, evoked by his seeing the swimmer come en rapport with the child, raise her sinking form above the surface, and holding it in one hand, strike out with the other in the direction of the rail.