Cyrus Brady - Woven with the Ship - A Novel of 1865

"He'll never do it," cried the girl, her voice shrill with apprehension. "He can't see the sunken ledge running out from the Point. He's a stranger to these waters, evidently."

"I see him, too," said the admiral. "God, what a storm! How he handles that boat! The man's a sailor, every inch of him!"

The cutter was nearer now, so near that the man could easily be seen. She was coming in with racing speed in spite of her small spread of canvas. The lake was roaring all about her and the wind threatened to rip the mast out of the little boat, but the man held her up to it with consummate skill, evidently expecting to gain an entrance to the harbor, where safety lay, on his present tack. This he could easily have done had it not been for a long, dangerous ledge of sunken rocks which extended out beyond Ship House Point. Being under water, it gave little sign of its presence to a mariner until one was right upon it. In his excitement the admiral scrambled to his feet, stepped to the rail of the porch, and stood leaning over it. Presently he hollowed his hand and shouted with a voice of astonishing power for so old a man:

"Down with your helm, boy! Hard down!"

But the stranger, of course, could not hear him, and the veteran stood looking with a grave frown upon his face as that human life, down on the waters beneath him, struggled for existence. It was not the first time he had watched life trembling in the balance – no; nor seen it go in the end. Emily's voice broke in murmurs of prayer, while Barry stared like the admiral.

Presently the man in the boat glanced up and caught sight of the party. He was very near now and coming on gallantly. He waved his hand, and was astonished to see them frantically gesture back at him. A warning! What could their movements mean?

He peered ahead into the growing darkness; the way seemed to be clear, yet something was evidently wrong. What could it be? Ah! He could not weather the Point. With a seaman's quick decision, he jammed the helm over.

"Oh, grandfather!" screamed Emily in the old man's ear; "can't something be done?"

"Nothing, child; nothing! He can't hear, he can't see, he does not know."

"It's awful to see him rush smilingly down to certain death!" exclaimed the girl, wringing her hands. "Captain Barry, can't you do something?"

"There goes his helm," said the admiral; "he realizes it at last. About he goes! Too late! too late!"

"Oh, Captain Barry, you must do something!" cried Emily.

"There's nothin' to do, Miss Emily."

"Yes, there is. We'll get the boat," she answered, springing from the steps as she spoke and running down the hill like a young fawn. The sailor instantly followed her, and in a moment they disappeared under the lee of the ship.

As the practised eye of the admiral had seen, the tiny yacht was too near the rocks to go about and escape them. She was caught in the trough of the sea before she had gathered way on the other tack, and flung upon the sunken ledge, broadside on. The mast snapped like a pipe-stem. After a few violent shocks she was hurled over on her beam ends, lodged securely on the rocks, and began to break up under the beating of the angry sea. A few moments and she would be beaten to pieces. The man was still there, however, the water breaking over him. He seemed to have been hurt, but clung tenaciously to the wreck of the boat until he recovered himself a little, and then rose slowly and stood gazing upon the tossing waters, seething and whirling about the wreck of his boat.

There was, during high winds, a dangerous whirlpool right in front of the reefs and extending between them and the smooth waters of the harbor. The water was beating over the rocks and fairly boiling before him. A man could not swim through it; could, indeed, scarcely enter it and live – even a boat would find it difficult, if not impossible. Things looked black to the shipwrecked man. He stood in hopeless hesitation, doom reaching for him on either hand. He could neither go nor stay with safety. Yet he apparently made up his mind at last to go and die, if need be, struggling.

"Don't try the whirlpool, boy," said the admiral softly to himself, as he looked down upon the scene. "You could never make it in this sea. Say a prayer, lad; 'tis all that is left you. By heaven! A noble girl, my own child! And a brave oar, too! Steady, Barry, steady! Don't come too near! Your skiff can't live in such a sea. Merciful God! can they do it?" continued the veteran, as the light skiff shot out from the lee of the Point and, with Barry at the oars and Emily at the helm, cautiously made its way toward the whirlpool.

The instant they got out from the lee of the Point the full force of the storm struck them, although they were still within the shelter of the harbor. But they struggled through it, for a stronger pair of arms never pulled oars and more skilful hands than those on that little skiff never guided a boat. Barry's strokes were as steady and powerful as if he had been a steam propeller, and not even the admiral himself could have steered the boat with greater dexterity than did the girl.

The man on the wrecked cutter saw them when the admiral did. Evidently he was a sailor, too, for he knew exactly what they intended to do. The two on the boat brought the skiff as near the rocks where the wreck of the cutter lay as they dared, – they were almost in the whirlpool, in fact, – and then Emily, gathering the yoke-lines in her left hand, with the other signalled him to jump. Nodding his head, he leaped far out over the whirling waves toward the boat. It was his only chance.

"A gallant lad, a brave boy!" exclaimed the admiral, as he saw the man spring from the wreck. "I believe they'll save him yet. No, by heavens! he's struck on one of the reefs! Is he gone? He rises! He's in the whirlpool! He strikes out feebly; the waves go over his head! No, he rises again! They have him! Well done, Emily; well pulled, Barry!"

Taking a desperate chance, the girl, seeing that the man was practically helpless, for he was swimming feebly and apparently scarcely able to keep his head up, boldly sheered the boat into the whirlpool and then turned her about. The man, retaining his self-possession, seized the stern with his uninjured hand. Emily leaned down and caught him by the coat collar, and then Barry pulled his strongest to escape from the twisting grip of the little maelstrom.

Emily steered the boat with one hand and with the other held on to the stranger. It was, of course, impossible to get him into the boat. Presently he fainted and hung a dead weight on her arm. The admiral watched them, praying fervently for their success. It was a terrible pull for the old sailor and a terrible strain on the young woman. Again and again she thought she would have to release the man dragging astern. Her arm was almost jerked from her body, yet she held on with grim determination, steering the boat as best she could with her single hand.

Barry pulled until the sweat beaded his forehead. His muscles stood out like whipcords. For a few moments he feared that he could not do it; but he looked at the resolute figure in the stern-sheets, the girl he loved, and that nerved his arms. Presently – and it seemed hours to both – he got the boat out of the whirlpool and into the comparatively smooth water under the lee of the Point. After a few weary strokes the keel grated upon the shore.

The sailor stepped out, made fast the painter, waded back to where the man lay in the water, lifted him up with the assistance of Emily, and slowly made his way up the hill, carrying him in his arms.

We have a deeper sense of proprietorship in a thing we have earned by hard labor or gained by the exercise of our abilities than in that which has been given to us, has cost us nothing.