Chapter XVIII: Señor Sarpinto

Nearer and nearer sailed the _San Salvador_, closer and closer into the bay; and soon the dark spot resolved itself into something with a definable shape. Presently all doubt was dispelled; it was a ship lying on the ice on her beam ends, and a few minutes after several men were seen clustering near her.

The captain took the glass from his eye,

"There is no doubt about it," he said aloud. "Yonder lies the wreck of the _Resolute_."

Then the crew manned the bulwarks, the capstan, and winch, and cheer after cheer rose on the icy air of the morning, such cheers as only can be heard from true British sailors.

Was it an echo from the cold and snowy mountain cliffs, or was it really a cheer in response to theirs, that now came feebly back over the dark waters? None could tell. But in a very short time the _San Salvador_ was near enough to see figures running excitedly about on the ice.

They are soon near enough for safety, the anchor chains rattle out, and the sails are clued; and soon a boat is speeding shorewards, both Captain Cawdor and his young friend Fred being seated in the stern sheets.

And now I have a strange fact to record; and mind you, reader, facts are stranger far than fiction, and I must leave the elucidation thereof to the psychologist.

As the boat entered the bay then, and the mountains and cliffs grew taller and taller, and cast great shadows across the water, Fred was noticed by his captain to become strangely excited, and to look more and more surprised every moment. He kept gazing around him.

"Captain Cawdor," he said at last, clutching his friend's arm, "am I really and truly awake? Oh, sir, everything around me is familiar--every rock and cliff and gloomy hill! Oh, captain, I've been here before!"

He looked so wild as he spoke that Captain Cawdor really began to think he was taking leave of his senses. But he had more reason to think so immediately afterwards.

Fred started to his feet, his cap falling off as he did so, his eyes staring shorewards, in which direction also his right arm was stretched.

"I knew it! I knew it!" he cried. "It is my dream coming true--my thrice-dreamt dream! Look, sir, look! Yonder stands Frank himself!"

He waved both arms madly above his head,

"Frank! Frank! Frank!" he shouted, "it is I, Fred Arundel, your friend, your brother!"

He sank down almost exhausted.

Captain Cawdor noticed a young man in the garb of a sailor come staggering along the snow to the very edge of the black water, where he swayed about, so that those in the boat were in momentary expectation of seeing him fall into the sea.

No sooner had the boat touched the snow edge than Fred sprang up and leapt on shore, and next moment the two long-lost friends stood hand in hand gazing into each other's faces, though neither could speak a single word.

Frank was the first to regain his voice.

"God bless you, Fred; I knew you'd come."

"You _knew_, Frank?"

"I did."

"But how?"

"I dreamt you would. That is all. And night after night I dreamt that dream again. It is all God's merciful providence, Fred. Heigho! I feel so happy now."

"But how weak you are! Come into the boat and seat yourself. Captain Cawdor, we'll stick to the boat a bit; the men can go with you."

"Take a pull of this flask, my lad," said the captain in kind tones to Frank.

"Oh, thank you; no, sir!" he answered. "I have sworn never to touch _that_."

"As you please, boy; but go and sit down."

"I'll tell you in a word why I refused the captain's flask," said Frank, when the two were seated in the stern sheets. "My dearest friend on earth--he's not on earth now--whom I loved as much as you, because I hadn't you to care for, fell a victim to accursed rum, and one night he threw himself into the sea, Fred, and before my eyes I saw him torn in pieces by the sharks."

What a long story that was that each had to tell the other of their travels and adventures, since last saying farewell on the Broomielaw at Glasgow!

But it was not all told on the ice here.

Fred and Señor Sarpinto, with the skipper of the _Resolute_, and some of the ailing ones among the crew, were taken at once aboard the _San Salvador_.

The others remained in camp beside their ship.

The skipper, a little dark-skinned Yankee, told Cawdor at once that he believed it possible to repair and float the _Resolute_, and so that very day a picked crew was sent on shore to work at her. All the damage that could be found out about the brig had been done to her starboard quarter. Here was a big hole, but as the vessel lay on the port side, two days hard work sufficed to make good repairs.

Then came the tug of war. How was she to be got up?

The skipper's plan at once proved the boldness of Yankee device.

He would, he said, blast the ice from under her.*

* A plan I have seen resorted to in Greenland more than once.

"Would this not damage the ship?" said Cawdor.

"Oh, no, sirree," was the reply. "We'll sink the keg of powder well under, and it will be the easiest work in the world."

"Well, we'll try," said Cawdor.

So preparations were immediately commenced. Luckily the weather continued fine.

A stout hawser was fastened to the _Resolute's_ main mast head, and carried towards that of the _San Salvador_, which had been brought near the ice floe and anchored there. This was done with the view of causing the _Resolute_ to take the water keel down, else she might actually turn turtle as it is called.

All being ready the keg of powder was lowered, and lighted by means of a long fuse.

Then ensued a long time of anxious waiting. Minutes on minutes seemed to elapse before the explosion actually took place.

When it did so, instead of being anything very startling, it resolved itself simply into the raising of a vast balloon-shaped fountain of salt water and spray which blinded everyone it fell upon. Pieces of ice also fell with rattling thuds upon the deck of the barque, but no one was hurt. The _San Salvador_ shook and shivered and swayed about for a few moments; huge lumps of the _débris_ of the blasted iceberg thundered against her sides; then it could be seen that the _Resolute_ was slowly righting herself on an even keel, and sinking down to her water-line.

All speed was now made to cut the hawser, but there was no further danger. The rescued brig lay there like a duck upon the water; sail was soon after made, and both vessels moved slowly out to the open waters of the bay.

Much to everyone's surprise the _Resolute_ made scarcely any water; so the Yankee skipper's daring had been well rewarded.

Next day a strong breeze sprang up from the south-west; and, taking advantage of it, away went the consorts under all sail _en route_ for New Zealand.

* * * * * *

Nothing, I think, affords such convincing proof of the limitedness of the human mind as the futility of the attempts we sometimes make to grasp or understand the infinitely great or the infinitely small. We are willing enough, for instance, to take it for granted that the milky way on which we gaze on some still starry night is in reality a mist of myriads on myriads of worlds and suns, millions of which are as large in comparison to our mite of an earth as a crownpiece is to a pin's head; but if we attempt to form any just conception of so great a marvel we feel our own littleness at once. Again, we may be told that every drop of stagnant water under the microscope resolves itself at once into a world in which creatures live, and move, and have their being, and act out their own little life-stories on their particular stage just as we do in ours. We can grasp this truth; but take it in the aggregate, and where are we? How many drops of stagnant water are in yonder pond? And how many microscopic worlds are there? We are best to leave all such calculations alone. They do but stagger and stun us. Besides there is the golden hope given us in the Bible, that though here below we see darkly in a glass, our hereafter will be more bright and intellectual.

I am led to make these remarks from a glance I have just taken at a map or chart of the world, and that portion of it in particular we call the Pacific Ocean. On this map of mine the islands that dot its vast surface are fairly well marked to the extent of our present knowledge. But probably not a thousandth part of them are down here, nor have ever been visited even. And when we consider that most of them are teeming with life--with animal, human life even--and are the homes of creatures and peoples utterly foreign to us, as are also their fauna and flora, the thought is indeed somewhat startling. Then to think of the ages and ages that have elapsed during the formation of this mist of islands, whether by the breaking into pieces of vast continents, or the raising from the ocean's bed of isle upon isle by volcanic or coral agency! Is it not weirdly strange?

It is in the very centre of this wondrous mist of islands that the next scene of our story opens.

The vessels _San Salvador_ and _Resolute_ had reached New Zealand, and both had loaded up and were on their way home to San Francisco. Frank was strong and well again now, and had been transferred from his own brig to the _Salvador_, and proving to be really a fairly good sailor, Captain Cawdor had kept his promise to Fred, and duly installed him in the position of third mate. So all had gone well, and the two young men now felt as happy as the day was long, and just as bright as the days were.

Señor Sarpinto had also preferred to leave the brig and sail with Captain Cawdor. Frank was very fond of this Spanish grandee, as he called him. To all appearance there was not much of the grandee about him. He was a man of about forty years of age, small in stature, but as strong and lithe as a puma; his dark eyes at times used to glare and glitter when he talked, as if fires really raged within him that could not be concealed. His love of adventure and sight-seeing was remarkable. This it was that had determined him to go with the skipper of the brig _Resolute_ to the southern seas, where whales and seals were said to swarm. This same love of adventure had made a rover of him all his life. He was wealthy, extremely so. He did not tell anyone this boastingly; he simply admitted it, and added that he could not help being rich. He believed, he said, if he were stripped naked, and put down in the midst of an unknown island, he would become a wealthy man in less than ten years. He was born to sprout and flourish like a green bay-tree, and every new speculation he turned his thoughts to was successful.

Yet he would have been deeply offended at anyone who ever hinted that he cared for money. No wonder Deakin and Co. would have been sorry to lose so fortunate a partner as this Señor Sarpinto.

Not a part of the world, even the most remote, he had not visited, or if such regions did exist, they existed but to be visited some day or other by this same adventurous Spaniard.

Being therefore a citizen of the world it will surprise no one to be told that the English he spoke was faultless.

During the long voyage to New Zealand from the southern ice he had made quite a favourable and friendly impression on Fred, and never did he seem more happy than when sitting between the two lads on the quarter-deck of an evening, smoking and drinking sherbet. He would not sit in the dark, however.

"I must see the faces of those I talk to," he said.

So wherever at night the señor sat on deck a lantern was swung.

The lads were never tired listening to stories of his strange life and adventures; they were thrilling in the extreme. At the same time they were natural and naturally told.

Yet with all his nonchalance and his gaiety our heroes often noticed that at times there came into his face a look of weariness, nay, at times, even of utter woe, that used to sadden while it surprised them.

They were old enough and wise enough to know from this that Señor Sarpinto had a life-story he never told; that deep down at the bottom of his heart was a well-spring of sentiment, no drop from which ever in their presence found its way to the surface.

There was no need to hurry, this voyage, the señor told Captain Cawdor over and over again. Life among the beautiful islands of the southern Pacific was far too delightful, far too idyllic to be hurried over. But a ten-knot breeze had the same effect upon both Cawdor and his mate that a red rag had on a bull. It excited them, and clap on sail they would.

So the only way Señor Sarpinto could think of for delaying the voyage, was to ask for a boat to visit every island they came any way near. The voyage was all that could be desired for a fortnight and over. Then contrary winds blew. This state of affairs was succeeded by a hurricane or tornado that blew both vessels very much out of their course.

It was a night of fearful darkness and storm; but next morning, though the waves were still houses' high, the wind had fallen to a dead calm. But where was the _Resolute_?

Her lights had been seen at eight bells in the middle watch; but when the sun shot up at half-past six, and apparently changed the round, rolling waves into blood and fire, the brig was nowhere visible.

Here was Señor Sarpinto's chance come at last then, to delay the voyage for a short time.

He could never think of leaving his good brig and his faithful skipper, so he told Cawdor; but the captain really could not help perceiving that it mattered very little to the señor where the _Resolute_ was. So he told him.

"Ah! then," was the reply, "for courtesy and politeness' sake we will lie to for some days till she comes up. Or we will creep around and look for her."

But the _Resolute_ never appeared.

The waiting for her, however, led to events that were indeed but little looked for, as we shall presently see.