CHAPTER XXIII
Peter takes Charge of Things
Exerting every ounce of strength, Olive tried and tried in vain to haulMostyn into the boat. In normal conditions he was no light weight, andnow, in his waterlogged clothing and wearing a cumbersome lifebelt, hewas so heavy that the girl could do no more than lift his head andshoulders clear of the water.
She called to the lascars for assistance, but the only reply shereceived from the two men for'ard was: "No good; him dead man."
Mahmed, however, although he had no doubt that he was handling acorpse, came to her aid, although he worked with an averted face. Evenwith his assistance Olive had a hard task, but at length Peter wasunceremoniously bundled over the gunwale, and placed in thestern-sheets close to the unconscious Preston.
Anxiously the girl gazed at his pallid face, hoping to detect some signof life. Then she began the operations as laid down in theinstructions for restoring the apparently drowned.
In her schooldays Olive had been taught this useful knowledge, but shehad never before had an opportunity of putting the knowledge to thetest. She felt none too sure of it. Once or twice she found herselfwondering whether she was doing the wrong thing.
For a full half-hour she kept up the respiratory exercises, until, inthe uncertain light of the lantern, she fancied that the colour wasstealing back to Peter's face.
"He is alive; your master isn't dead!" she exclaimed to the hithertoapathetic Mahmed.
The announcement had an electrical effect upon the Indian boy. Peterdead was nothing to him; Peter living was his master for whom he hadundoubted affection and devotion.
He began chafing Mostyn's hands, while Olive, now deadly tired,doggedly continued her efforts.
Mostyn's heart was now beating. His nostrils were quivering. He wasbreathing faintly, but with steadily increasing strength. Thoughpartially choked by the water he had involuntarily swallowed whencarried down by the ship, he had been saved from suffocation by hislifebelt, which kept his head clear of the water after he had regainedthe surface.
Restoring the circulation was the next step. Fortunately both thewater and air were warm, and the dangerous consequences of a prolongedimmersion were mitigated. Had the disaster occurred in other thantropical waters, the comparatively low temperature would have beenfatal.
At length Peter opened his eyes. He was quite at a loss to grasp thesituation. The lamplight puzzled him. At first he was under theimpression that he was in his bunk, and that either Watcher Partridgeor Watcher Plover had roused him to take in a signal. Somehow thatdidn't seem correct. Awkwardly he fumbled for the edge of the bunkboard. Instead, his fingers encountered the stern-grating. Then hisattention was wonderingly attracted by one of the knees of the afterthwart. It had been split, and the sight of it irritated him, althoughhe didn't know why, exactly.
He was beginning to realize that he was in a boat. How he got there,and why he should be in it, was a perplexity. It might be the OldMan's motor-launch--but no! Something was wrong somewhere.
A dozen fantastic theories flashed across his mind, only to bedismissed so unsatisfactorily that the failure made him angry. Onething he was certain of. Miss Baird was with him, but what she wasdoing there was a baffling problem. He wanted to speak to her, buthesitated lest that certainty should turn out to be an unreality.
He was still cudgelling his brain when he fell into a fitful and uneasysleep.
The short tropical dawn was breaking when Peter awoke. He was nowfully conscious of the events leading up to the foundering of the _WestBarbican_, but was still at a loss to account for his presence in theboat. Stranger still it was to find that he had not been labouringunder a hallucination with regard to Olive Baird.
The girl was sleeping on the bottom-boards, her head pillowed on alifebelt. On the next thwart sat Mrs. Shallop, looking extremelydishevelled, with her black hair streaming in the wind. For once shewas silent. On recovering consciousness she had grumbled considerably.Now there was no one to listen to her complaints. Peter had beenasleep; Olive was still slumbering. Preston, although awake, wasdecidedly light-headed. As for Mahmed and the two lascars, they werehuddled together in the bows awaiting the appearance of the sun withits beneficent warmth.
Peter sat up wonderingly. His head swam a little, and he felt as weakas the proverbial kitten. Some one had covered him with an oilskin.He wondered who?
It came as a nasty shock to see poor old Preston stretched alongside,with one half of his face looking as if it had been battered in. TheActing Chief looked at Peter, but there was no recognition in the look.
"Hello, old man!" exclaimed Mostyn. "How goes it?"
The greeting was ignored. Preston made an effort to place his hand onhis head. The attempt failed. With a groan the Acting Chief rolledover on his side.
"Water!" he gasped feebly.
Peter dragged the beaker from under the stern bench and moistened theinjured man's lips. His own throat felt dry and parched, but alreadyhe realized the absolute necessity for husbanding the precious fluid.
Preston sighed and closed his eyes. For the time being Peter could donothing more for the badly injured Acting Chief.
The Wireless Officer was feeling far too "groggy on his pins" to stand.Supporting himself by the gunwale, he knelt up and scanned the horizon.The wind was fresh and the sea fairly high, though regular. The boat,not under control, was driving broadside on to the wind, her highfreeboard and comparatively light load allowing her to scud at quite asteady rate. Also, owing to the same circumstances, she rode the seaswell, only an occasional flick of spray finding its way inboard.
The rain had ceased during the night, but the bottom-boards were awash.The masts and sails were still rolled up and stowed in a painted canvascover. Beside them was a bundle of oars, and on top of them a rudder.
The fact that the boat was not under control stirred Peter to action.Having made sure that none of the rest of the _West Barbican's_ boatswas in sight, he aroused the inert lascars.
"Hai! hai!" he shouted. "Aft, you hands, and set sail."
The men showed no great haste to execute the command.
"Where go? India?" asked one.
"Lay aft, both of you," exclaimed Peter sternly, although in his weakstate he found himself asking how he could enforce obedience. He knewenough of the native temperament to realize that if he gave a commandand failed to see it carried out, his authority over the lascars was asgood as gone for ever.
"Me tired," objected the other. "No _pani_, no _padi_."
Without another word Mostyn produced and ostentatiously displayed hisautomatic. There were great odds against its efficacy, after beingsubmerged for several hours. The cartridges were supposed to bewatertight, and were well greased. He had little fear on that score.The difficulty lay in the fact that the delicate mechanism of thepistol might have been deranged through the action of the salt water.
He felt confident that he could rely upon Mahmed. The boy was adevoted servant, and true to his salt. And Peter had no doubt aboutMiss Baird's ability to aid him if the lascars proved openly mutinous.For the present Preston was out of the running, while Mrs. Shallop wasliterally and figuratively a "passenger".
Greatly to Mostyn's relief the sight of the automatic acted like anelectric shock upon the two lascars. With great agility and speed theybegan casting off the sail-cover and setting up the heavy mast.
While they were hoisting the lug-sail Mahmed shipped the rudder, andsoon the boat was slipping along before the breeze.
Peter had been puzzling over the course for some considerable time.Against the westerly breeze he knew that days might elapse before theboat made the Mozambique coast. Being light and not provided with acentre-board, she was unable to sail at all close to the wind. Infact, it was doubtful whether she would make to windward at all. Onthe other hand, she would run well, and, with the knowledge that theisland of Madagascar was somewhere under his lee--it might be anythingbetween two
hundred and four hundred miles--Mostyn decided that thebest chance lay in making for it. There was, of course, a greatpossibility of several vessels being in the vicinity. If the boat weresighted, so much the better. If not--well, they would have to "stickit out" on very short rations.
A thorough search in the after locker disclosed the fact that there wasan airtight tin containing fourteen pounds of biscuits, another lanternand a pound of tallow candles, a lead-line, some rusty fishing hooksand lines (relics of a long-forgotten fishing expedition), a hatchet,grass rope, and half a dozen signal rockets. Elsewhere in the boatwere a small compass, a water-beaker about three-quarters full, spareoars, baler, boat-hook, grapnel, and a jib and mizzen sails, besidesthe lug that had already been set.
The baler had been nearly filled with rain-water during the night, butthe lascars had drunk every drop. Peter, of course, was ignorant ofthis, and when he served out a small quantity all round the lascarsmust have congratulated themselves on their astuteness.
The tin of biscuits was then broached, and one biscuit handed to eachperson in the boat. Preston munched his ravenously, although everymovement of his jaw caused him intense agony. He was stilllightheaded, muttering incoherently about taking over the middle watch.
Olive was hungry and ate the "hard tack" with zest, but Mrs. Shalloppettishly declined her share as being unfit for a lady to eat. Sheeven began her now well-known speech of self-advertisement, when Petercut her short.
"I can offer you nothing better," he said curtly. "I would advise youto keep it, because you'll want it badly before long. And pleaseunderstand there must be no grumbling. It has a bad effect upon thelascars."
"Surely I can talk if I want to?" protested the woman.
"Within limits, yes," replied Mostyn. "But I would point out that itwould be far better if you did something useful. There's Preston, forinstance, he requires pretty constant attention."
"Oh, Miss Baird can see to him," declared Mrs. Shallop. "She's youngerthan I am."
"Considering Miss Baird had three cases on her hands during thenight--you, Preston, and myself--I think she's done more than her fairshare," said Peter, and, filled with disgust, he turned to the helm,which Mahmed had temporarily taken.
He could see Olive's face flush under the selfish rudeness of theparvenue, but the girl, repressing her impulse to reply heatedly,remained silent.
A stiff glass of brandy, and the sound sleep resulting from it, hadkept Mrs. Shallop in ignorance of her narrow escape from death in thedisaster to the _West Barbican_. She was in the habit of consuming thecontents of a bottle of strong waters per week. "By Dr. Selwyn'sorders," she would explain. "He says I must have it, and it must bethe very best." And Selwyn was never more astonished than when heheard of the prescription that was attributed to him. When the shipshook under the explosion a steward had rushed to Mrs. Shallop's cabin,and, unceremoniously dragging that lady from her bunk, had carried heralong the alleyway to the companion ladder. Here the lady promptlycollapsed. Meanwhile Mr. Shallop, who had been in the smoking-room,had gone on deck. In the darkness he saw nothing of his wife, andconcluded that she was amongst the first to get away in the boats. Atwhich he congratulated himself. He was spared the ordeal of beingcooped up with Mrs. Shallop, who would to a certainty vent her angerupon him for having taken the sea voyage, although it was entirely onher suggestion that the ill-assorted couple booked passages on the S.S._West Barbican_.
"This isn't going to be a picnic, I can see," soliloquized Peter, as heglanced to wind'ard. "It's up to me to do something now. I wonder ifthe Old Man would have logged me for this? Decent old chap, Bullock.I suppose he's gone."
Mostyn was steering due east by compass. He had no idea of themagnetic variation in this part of the Indian Ocean, neither had he anyknowledge of the deviation of that particular compass. By steering dueeast he was hoping to effect a landing between the north and south ofMadagascar--a fairly generous target of 1000 miles in length.
It was responsibility with a vengeance. Not only had the WirelessOfficer to take over executive duties; he had to navigate the boat,regulate the supply of food and water, and maintain discipline untilsuch times as Preston recovered and was able to take command. Judgingby the injured man's appearance that day was still very remote.
Meanwhile Peter Mostyn, hiked by fate into the joys and difficulties ofcommand, accepted the situation with typical British grit.
"I'll just carry on and make the best of it," he decided. "It won't befor want of trying if I don't get the boat safely to shore."