Part 7

ERTAIN unmistakable signs were in the wind by which anyone could have told that, Thanksgiving Day was comparatively close at hand. There was a vigorous stoning of raisins on the part of Mrs. Murray, an odour of cider in the air which pointed plainly to the concoction of mincemeat, and Nan was confident she detected the largest turkey scratching round the yard in a nervous, timorous sort of way, as though he knew his days were numbered. By the calendar the eventful occasion was still ten days off, when one cold and blustering afternoon Captain Murray came home from the Life-saving Station, and into the cosy kitchen.

“If I'm not very much mistaken,” he said (and in the matter of weather Captain Murray seldom was mistaken), “we are in for a pretty heavy storm. We shall need to be on the look out, every man of us at the Station, the whole night through. Give us a hearty supper, Mollie, that'll keep a fellow well braced till morning.”

“Do I ever put you off with a poor supper, Epher?” asked Mrs. Murray, reproachfully, pausing a moment in her mixing of some gingerbread in a large yellow bowl.

“Never with a poor supper, mother, only you know what I mean. Give us sort of an extra touch to-night.”

Mrs. Murray knew as well as could be what her good husband meant by “an extra touch,” and soon the waffle-iron was taken from its hook and Harry was on his way to the cellar to fill the maple syrup cup. It was one of those nights when a cosy, comfortable home seems doubly comfortable and cosy, and very reluctantly Captain Murray put on his great coat to go back to the Station as soon as supper was over. The rain was falling in torrents now, and as he opened the sitting-room door, a gust of wind whipped in, sending the papers on the table whirling to the floor and overturning the lamp, which fortunately went out as it fell. When order was again restored, Sister Julia began reading a bright little story aloud to the children by way of cheering them up a bit. Even Harry was quite overawed by the violence of the storm, for by this time it was violent. The wind was blowing a gale now, and it had grown so cold that the fire had to be constantly replenished to keep the room comfortably warm. At nine o'clock the children went upstairs, and were glad enough to hurry into bed, for on such a night as this it was impossible to heat the upper story of the little cottage.

“I'm glad there's a great big lighthouse at the Highlands,” Regie called out after he had gotten into bed.

“So am I,” answered both Nan and Harry, and with this comforting thought in mind they all fell asleep. But Sister Julia and Mrs. Murray scarcely closed their eyes the whole night long. Sometimes it seemed as though the little cottage could not hold its own against such a terrific blow. At daybreak Mrs. Murray came up to Sister Julia's room, to find her already dressed.

“I think there's something wrong at the Station,” she said. “Hereward and Ned have been barking and bounding about in the most excited fashion for the last half-hour. Then, when the wind dies down for a second, I think I can hear the voices of the men calling to each other.”

“Yes, and look here,” answered Sister Julia, pressing her white face close to the pane; “I imagine I can discover the masts of a schooner near the beach.”

“Yes, surely; there must have been a wreck,” and Mrs. Murray threw open the window to see more clearly. “Hark!” she added, “now don't you hear the men?”

“Of course I do,” cried Sister Julia; “and I can stand it no longer. I must bundle up and go down and see for myself.”

“Oh! my child, you ought never to go,” exclaimed Mrs. Murray, but at the same time she helped her to hurry into her heavy ulster. “Oh, dear! I've a good mind to go with you; but no, it will not do to leave the children. Send one of the men up though, as soon as possible, to let me know what has happened, and that you have reached the Station without being blown away.”

So out into the storm went Sister Julia, and Hereward and Ned were at her side in an instant. The rain had ceased falling, but the wind still blew a hurricane, and in walking from the cottage to the station all her strength was needed to bear up against it. She had gone but a little way before she discovered that a schooner _had_ run ashore, and she tried to quicken her steps, fearing and yet anxious to know the truth. Just here I would tell my young reader that this story, so far as it relates to the work done that morning by the Life-saving crew, is every word true. Somebody, whom I choose to call Captain Murray, could show you a letter, sent, in company with a gold medal, from the Government at Washington, and written in appreciation of his gallant services and those of his brave crew, and in which you could read a graphic narration of all that happened that eventful November morning.

As Sister Julia neared the Station she heard the men shouting to each other in such cheery tones that she felt sure no lives could have been lost, and her heart grew lighter. The crew were at some sort of work down on the beach, and unnoticed by anyone she entered the Station from the landward side. The large room was empty, but the door stood open into the kitchen, and there what a strange sight met her eyes! Four men were huddled round the stove trying to get a little warmth into their half-frozen bodies. On one blanket on the floor, covered by another, lay a poor woman, who looked half-dead; and seated on a stool near her was Captain Murray, endeavouring to remove the dripping clothing from a screaming baby lying across his knees.

“God bless you!” he exclaimed, looking up and discovering Sister Julia, “you've come in the nick of time. We've just brought these poor wretches in from the wreck yonder, and I've sent Burton up to the house to get some dry duds for the woman and this baby,” and he laid the soaking little specimen of humanity in Sister Julia's arms.

“Now, my hearties,” he said cheerily, turning to the men, “hurry up to the loft, strip off your wet clothing, wrap yourselves in the blankets you'll find there, and turn into the bunks. You'll have to stay there till your clothes are dry, but I reckon you're tired enough to be willing to. We'll get you up some breakfast as soon as possible. Now I'm off,” he added, turning to Sister Julia. “I am needed on the beach more than here.”

The shivering little company about the stove promptly and gladly obeyed Captain Murray's orders, and Sister Julia, having succeeded in quieting the baby, began to remove its draggled clothing. Just then someone came in from the large room.

“There were no lives lost, were there?” she asked, eagerly, without looking up, presuming it to be one of Captain Murray's crew, and in the same instant the newcomer asked the same question of her.

“No, no lives lost,” answered the woman on the floor, in a weak, exhausted voice. The new comer was Mr. Vale, who had come down to Moorlow the night before, and Sister Julia was glad enough to welcome him, for she needed someone to aid her.

“My poor woman, you ought to get that wet clothing off at once,” said Mr. Vale, bending over her.

“I know it, sir, but I'm that weak.”

“I can attend to her now, if you'll take the baby,” said Sister Julia.

“With the greatest of pleasure,” and Mr. Vale took the blanketed baby into his arms, with a knack that showed his love for children. Straightway he went up aloft, with the little stranger gazing comfortably over his shoulder, to enquire for the welfare of the men. No sooner had he gone than Burton came hurrying in with the bundle of clothing which Mrs. Murray had gotten together. Quickly and skilfully Sister Julia helped the woman to make the change, and had but just finished buttoning a warm flannel wrapper about her when, overcome by fatigue, she fell asleep in the chair in which she was sitting.

“These good people had better have something to eat as soon as possible,” said Mr. Vale, returning down the narrow stairway, “and if you can show me a place to put this baby, for it is fast asleep, we'll see about getting some food ready for them.”

“Here's a good place for it,” and Sister Julia let down a wide shelf that was fastened against the wall, and with her ulster rolled up for a pillow, made the little waif very comfortable, for it was too young a baby to be in danger of rolling off. Captain Murray put his head in at the door just then with a most anxious face.

“It is raining,” he said, “and the storm is increasing every moment. I can't spare one of the men, for we must lose no time in getting the life-saving tackle in order, though it is not probable we shall need to make use of it twice in one morning. Do you think you can manage to get a breakfast together, Sister Julia?”

“Aye, aye, sir,” answered Mr. Vale, cheerily, “we'll attend to that.”

“That must be Nan's new friend,” thought Captain Murray, but he could not take the time to find out, and hurried away, feeling that he had left his shipwrecked party in good hands. Then Mr. Vale and Sister Julia set right away to work to investigate the supply of provisions in the Station. Mr. Vale peered into boxes, and Sister Julia lifted covers of crocks and dishes, and then they looked at each other rather blankly, for they were disappointed at the result.

“I have it,” said Sister Julia, after a moment's thought. “The best thing, I think, would be for you to put on your coat and make your way as best you can to Mrs. Murray's. She will have the oatmeal on the fire by this time,” glancing at the clock on the high shelf overhead, “and it would be just like her, remembering the hard work going on down here, to have made a larger quantity than usual.”

Mr. Vale was off in a moment, and then Sister Julia made preparations for boiling the coffee, carrying the coffee-mill into the larger room, so as not to wake the baby and its mother with the clatter of the grinding. Afterward she set the little table as best she could, and slicing some stale bread she had found in the closet, placed it at one side ready for toasting. So she busied herself about one thing and another till there was nothing more to be done. It seemed to her as though Mr. Vale would never come back, but in a really marvellously short space of time there was a tramping outside the door, and in came a little party, well laden with tin pails and baskets. They were all there--Mrs. Murray and Nan, Reginald and Harry; and indeed all were needed, to carry safely through such a storm as that the generous breakfast which Mrs. Murray had prepared; and the whole family at once set about serving it. The children trudged up and down the steep stairway, carrying the steaming coffee and oatmeal to the men in the loft.

“Bless your little heart!” said one of the men, as he took a brimming cup from Nan's hand; but the others seemed too hungry to take time to say so much as “thank you.” Sister Julia woke the tired mother, who fell asleep again as soon as she had eaten a little, and then she quieted the baby, who had begun to cry lustily, with a breakfast of warmed milk served in a ginger-ale bottle. As soon as she could be spared, Mrs. Murray put on her cloak and hurried down to the beach to see how that good captain of hers was enduring all this excitement and fatigue. For the captain, as he himself said, “was not so young as he once was,” and could not stand up as well as in other days against wind and weather.

“Oh, Mollie!” he called, as soon as she came near enough for his voice to reach her, “go back to the Station; you'll catch your death o' cold in this driving wind.”

“No fears for me, Epher,” she called back, “but you must go right up to the Station yourself, you and the men, and get some breakfast, or you'll be down sick, every one of you.”

All hands were only too glad to obey this order, for the lifesaving apparatus was again intact, and they were very hungry. Filing into the big room, they laid aside their tarpaulins, and then sat down to a better breakfast than ever before graced their mess table. It did Mrs. Murray's heart good to see how thoroughly they enjoyed it, and when the captain said, “I'd like to see the wife that can compare with Mollie Murray,” the colour flushed proudly into her face.

It was eight o'clock when the hungry party finished breakfast, and they were just pushing their chairs back from the table when one of their crew, who had been left on the beach on patrol duty, threw open the door and called for aid.

“Can it be possible that we are to have another wreck this morning?” thought the captain, as he and his men hurried into their tarpaulins, and rushed out of the Station. But alas! it was possible, for a short distance up the beach another vessel was stranded. In a moment the little house was quite deserted. Calling for their clothes, the men who had been rescued from the _Starling_ got into them, wet as they were, and, accompanied by Mr. Vale, hastened to render what service they could. Notwithstanding the commotion the mother and baby still slept quietly on in the kitchen, while Sister Julia, Mrs. Murray, and the children crowded into the seaward window of the loft, to watch as best they could the terribly exciting scene taking place below them on the beach.

XIII.--THE WRECK OF THE SPANISH BRIG.

HE storm that culminated on that November morning was the worst that had been known on the Moorlow coast for years. The wind, which was north-east, blew a hurricane averaging eighty-four miles an hour. The beach was flooded by a furious surf, and, strangely enough for that time of the year, the weather was freezing cold. In less than ten minutes after the second vessel stranded Captain Murray's crew was abreast of her, but in the meantime she had worked to within a hundred yards of the beach, and Joe Burton, running down behind a receding wave, cast a line on board with a vigorous throw of the heaving-stick.

“Hurrah for Burton!” cried Harry. “He's a fine fellow, I tell you.”

As soon as the line reached the ship, the sailors on board of her tugged away at it until they had pulled up the larger line, on which Captain Murray purposed to send out the breeches-buoy. But before the buoy could be rigged up, the sailors, ignorant of his purpose, showed that they were going to endeavour to reach the land by coming hand-over-hand along the rope. Captain Murray and his men shouted from the shore, and wildly gesticulated, for it seemed impossible that any of them could reach the shore alive in that way. The surf was very violent, but the greatest danger lay in the fact that the position of the brig in the set of the strong current caused an enormous swirl of water between her and the beach, which retained eddying masses of wreckage, mainly cord-wood from the wreck of the _Starlings_ and which masses were continually swept out by the undertow, and hurled in by the breakers.

“Oh, those foolish men! those foolish men! why don't they understand and see their danger?” cried Sister Julia, attempting to draw the children away from a sight so distressing; but the boys were immovable. Mrs. Murray, Sister Julia, and Nan went down to the little kitchen to wait, since they no longer had the heart to watch.

“There, one of the fellows has started!” cried Harry, with long pauses between his sentences, “and he's all right so far. No; my goodness, there he goes! a wave has flung him over the rope, and his head is caught between the cords of the whip-line. He will choke to death. No! there goes Burton again right into the surf holding on to the line. There! he's got him, he's got the sailor; but how can he ever bring him to land? See, Rex, he's clinging to a piece of driftwood with one hand, and holding on to the sailor with the other.”

“Oh! but another man is trying it now!” exclaimed Rex. “Oh! why don't they wait? Look there--and another one of the crew has plunged in after him; but, goodness! the driftwood has knocked him completely under. Ah! there go two more of the men in to his rescue, and Burton is in the breakers again, too. Who's that with him, Harry?”

“I can't make out, but--hurrah! they've reached the sailor; they'll save him, I know.”

And Harry was right; they did save him, and five others besides, all of whom attempted the same foolhardy method of reaching the land, and all of whom were rescued by the same hand-to-hand struggle in the surf on the part of Captain Murray's gallant crew.

“I never saw such bravery, never!” called Mr. Vale, and it could plainly be seen that his enthusiasm cheered the men wonderfully in their perilous work. He longed to plunge in with them, but he knew that he would be powerless to render any aid. It was their long experience that was standing the crew in such good stead. By this time a crowd had gathered on the beach, that is, every able-bodied resident of Moorlow was there, and as the last sailor was brought safely to shore a hearty cheer went up that, for the moment, even rose above the pounding of the breakers on the shore. Stretched on the sand, in such shelter from the wind and rain as the side of the surf-boat afforded, the disabled seamen were laid. They were all Spaniards, and only two of them were able to stand upon their feet.

“Which of you is captain of the brig?” asked Captain Murray, looking kindly down upon this second group of shipwrecked mariners.

“He no here,” answered one of them who had been the least hurt, in broken English; “when he think his ship go to pieces, he go below and make hisself dead;” but the man's gestures told more plainly than his words that the captain had shot himself in the head.

Captain Murray turned to his men with a look that meant, “Our work is not over yet.”

“What shall be done with these poor fellows?” ventured Mr. Vale, when he saw that the thought of how he should reach the man still on the brig had driven all other thoughts from the captain's mind.

“Lord knows!” answered Captain Murray, sorely puzzled. “It'll be more'n a week before some of them will get out of bed, when they once get into it. There's some ugly bruises among 'em.”

“Do you think we could make them comfortable in the chapel on the beach yonder? It would serve splendidly for a hospital.”

“The very thing! I'll leave the arrangements to you, sir,” said Captain Murray, confident now that this really was Nan's new friend, the minister, about whom she had talked so much.

The first thing to be done was to get the exhausted Spaniards up to the Station, where Rex and Harry and Nan, with excited, earnest faces, waited to receive them. Over and over again the children had begged and entreated to be allowed to run down to the scene of the wreck, but Mrs. Murray had thought best to refuse them.

Captain Murray could not have left the preparation of the hospital in better hands than Mr. Vale's. Won by his handsome face and simple manner, the villagers crowded about him, eager to do his bidding. The sexton of the little church hurried home for the keys as fast as his rheumatic old limbs could carry him, and with the aid of Joe and Jim Croxson, he soon had a roaring fire blazing in the big chapel stove. Two men, harnessing up Captain Murray's Dobbin with all possible haste, drove to the Branch for doctor and surgeon, for both were needed. Two others, borrowing the largest waggon the town afforded, went off for a load of cots. There was something for every one to do, and every one was happy in doing it.

Meanwhile Captain Murray was hard at work in an effort to board the brig, with such of his crew as were still able to assist him. Three of his men had been helped or carried to their homes, too much exhausted and bruised to be of further service. When at last the little party had succeeded in reaching the brig, they had the good fortune to find the captain still alive, but unconscious from the ugly wound he had himself inflicted. They wasted no time in lowering the poor fellow into the surf-boat, and then made for the shore, for the vessel was fast going to pieces. The rescue of the Spanish captain completed the heroic labours of Epher Murray's crew for that morning, and the brave and wearied fellows went to their homes for a well-earned rest. Half-a-dozen fishermen volunteered their services to get the tackle once again in order. Indeed, none of the Moorlow people thought of setting about their regular occupations that eventful November morning, and all seemed proud to lend a hand in whatever way they could. Fortunately in a few hours the crew of the _Starling_ were so far refreshed and rested as to be sent by the afternoon train to New York, where most of them lived when on land. There was literally no place in Moorlow where they could have been accommodated, unless in the chapel, that was fast being converted into a hospital. Sister Julia was superintending the work there, and by four o'clock everything was in readiness. Mrs. Murray had devoted her time to caring for the crew of the brig in the Life-saving Station. As soon as damp clothing had been removed, those who had sustained the severest injuries were made comfortable on mattresses brought from the bunks in the loft, and laid on the floor of the large room. The surgeon and doctor found considerable to do when they arrived, and the captain's wound claimed their first attention.

Sister Julia had remained to wait upon them, until all the bruises and wounds had been dressed. Meanwhile, Mrs. Murray had improved the opportunity to slip home and prepare a second breakfast, and Harry and Rex and Nan again trudged to and fro, laden with good things, only with much less difficulty now, for the storm had greatly abated.

All through that busy day of preparation, Ned and Hereward had kept up an incessant racing in and out of the chapel. Now and then they would brush against Sister Julia's black dress, and she could never resist the temptation, no matter how busy she might be, of giving them a friendly little pat. Then the two fellows would go bounding out of doors, as though through her touch they had received some special command which they must hasten to execute.

Early in the morning, to meet the first need of the surgeon, Sister Julia had taught some of the women, who were helping in the chapel, how to prepare a bandage. She showed them how they must tear off the muslin in strips, twice the width needed, and then must fold them evenly lengthwise through the centre, and cut them apart with scissors, because tearing both edges was likely to stretch them. Then she instructed them in the art of “rolling firmly,” for there is not a more useless thing in the world than a poorly-rolled bandage. As she sat now by the side of one, and now by another, she would ask some simple question betraying her deep interest in them, and so more than one Moorlow woman, almost unconsciously, unburdened her heart to this new sweet friend, or told the story of her life. As Mr. Vale's work threw him into the company of many of the men, one after the other, he would enter into a friendly conversation with them, and some of the Moorlow men had their eyes opened to the fact that a minister might be something more than a mere preacher, standing quite apart from the common interests of their lives; that he might be an earnest, sympathetic man, a man subject to the same temptations and same trials as themselves, but able to rise above them, and even triumph in them, through the Spirit of God, which not only was in him, but which shone out in well-nigh every look and word and deed.