CHAPTER XII.

DR. HERIOT'S PATIENTS.

Filled with the interest roused by this new episode, the crew, for a time, forgot everything in their desire to know what ship this had been, where she hailed from, to relieve the sufferers, and to learn all they had undergone; for, even in his worst moods, Jack is always ready for anything, and the more of novelty it contains, the better for him.

The four drooping figures could be distinctly discerned now, with their heads bare, their faces blanched and pale. Ethel and Rose were full of commiseration; already their gentle eyes were swimming in sympathetic tears. The former kept by the side of her father, and the latter, in her excitement, leant more heavily than usual, perhaps, on the arm of Dr. Heriot; and even old Nance Folgate had come out of her berth, and muttering "Lor' a mussy me!" from time to time, clung with cat-like tenacity to the nettings on the lee-quarter, to see the castaways, whom, she had no doubt, had been devouring each other from time to time, till only four were left now.

"Back with the mainyard," shouted the captain; "to the braces, men; let go and haul!"

The lee-braces were cast off the belaying-pins; the weather hauled in, and the yard was slued round till the sail was laid flat to the mast; and now the great ship, which had been edged down towards the piece of wreck, as she lay to, rose and fell with slow, but regular and impatient heaves, on the swelling ridges of the sea, while, with a quick revolution of the double-sheaved blocks, the fall-tackle fell and the quarter-boat vanished from its davits with a splash into the sea alongside.

She was speedily manned: Mr. Foster, the second mate, took the tiller; Bill Badger, the Yankee; Joe, the steward; Quaco, the black Virginian, and Dr. Heriot (with Rose's entreaties to take care of himself, ringing in his ears), shipped their oars in the rowlocks, and she was shoved off.

"Happy go lucky! here's summut new, at all events," said Bill Badger, as he made the tough blade of the stroke-oar bend like a willow wand; for after a long, dull voyage like that of the _Hermione_, varied only by adverse winds and the loss of a mast at the Canaries--a voyage in which a few restless and roving spirits are shut up for many weeks in the small compass of a ship--anything that may serve to relieve or vary the tedium and monotony of the life they lead is welcome; hence, a drifting wreck, with its contingent stories, mysteries, and the surmises it may occasion, is, perhaps, the most welcome, though least lively adventure they could meet with.

The proceedings of the boat's crew were watched with deep interest by those who lined the ship's side, about 500 yards off.

Mr. Foster pulled round the stern of the wreck, and was seen to stoop with his face close to the water, as if he was endeavouring to read (which was the case) the vessel's name, then sunk some feet below the surface, as the wreck was half submerged.

Then he sheered the boat alongside, and by the painter it was made fast to a timber-head; but almost immediately after, for fear of accidents, this was cast off, and she was simply held on by the boat-hook.

Mr. Foster, Dr. Heriot, and another stepped along the piece of quarter-deck, and were seen to be examining the four men, whom they relieved from their wet lashings by simply cutting these through with a slash of Quaco's jack-knife.

"Evidently, the poor fellows are not dead," said Captain Phillips, joyfully, as he clapped his fat hands together.

"How do you know, dear sir?" asked Ethel; "ah, the poor men, I do not see them move!"

"They are putting them into the boat to bring them aboard, Miss Basset. If they had been dead, there would have been little use in doing that."

"What would you have done in that case, captain?" asked Mr. Basset.

"Sunk each of 'em simply, with a round shot at his heels, as we did the poor fellow whom we found floating with the life-buoy. Mr. Quail, get some brandy and wine out of the cabin locker--some water, please, too."

"Oh, let me assist you, sir," exclaimed Ethel.

"And me--me too," added Rose, with enthusiasm.

"Stop, ladies, you'll only lose your footing and get a tumble, perhaps, the ship is pitching so; better stay where you are, and hold on by the side netting."

"Hush!" said Captain Phillips, suddenly; "silence on deck--silence fore and aft, for Dr. Heriot is hailing the ship, and waving his cap."

"What is it that he is saying?" asked several, as the doctor's clear voice came distinctly over the water.

"Captain Phillips," they heard him cry, "please to request the ladies to leave the deck."

"That is plain enough, miss," said Mr. Quail, touching his cap to Ethel.

"Why--for what must we go?" said Rose, pouting.

"You must permit me to lead you below, ladies," said the captain; "depend upon it, the doctor knows best. There is something there he does not wish you to see."

So Ethel, Rose, and the old nurse, to the intense mortification of the latter, left the deck, and retired to the cabin to wait the event.

The truth was that the worthy young doctor had found the four sufferers on the wreck, though not dead, as he fully ascertained on feeling their pulses, in such a frightful state of prostration and delirium, that he deemed it better Ethel and Rose should be spared the shock of their first appearance, and should not witness the conveyance of them up the ship's side.

"They are all in the boat now, and now she is shoved off. Give way, my boys--give way!" shouted the captain, whose kind, ruddy English face flushed with eagerness. "Lay out on your oars and pull with a will, for a glass of grog awaits you all."

To do them justice, the men in the boat needed no incentive; to the whole length of their arms they bent to their oars, and the boat came sheering alongside in a twinkling.

"In larboard oars, out fenders," said Mr. Foster, as he relinquished the tiller.

"Into the main-chains there, some of you, and bear a hand to get the poor fellows on board," said Captain Phillips, jumping down the short ladder at the break of the quarter-deck, just as four thin and wasted figures--their tattered clothes sodden and saturated by salt water, their matted hair encrusted with salt--were handed like children up the side, passed over the bulwark, and laid on the deck near the long-boat.

"Poor fellows, poor fellows! God help them," said Phillips, commiseratingly, as they seemed quite insensible. Their teeth were clenched, but their lips were far apart, cracked, parched, and, in some instances, bleeding. They breathed irregularly, and twitched their fingers convulsively.

"They must be your peculiar care for a time, doctor," said Mr. Basset, as Heriot flung his coat on the deck, and while rolling up his shirt-sleeves, rushed below to his medicine-chest.

"Boy, Joe--steward, bring wine and brandy here! Carpenter, get four comfortable hammocks slung in the 'tween decks; and you, Quaco, my darkey, get us plenty of hot water from the galley," cried Phillips.

"Yaas, sar," replied the sable Virginian, as he hastened forward with a bucket.

Every one bustled about, and even Sharkey, the sulkiest villain of that ill-assorted crew, made himself useful in some way, or fancied that he did so.

"These men are evidently British seamen," said the captain, as the doctor stooped over each, and raising his head, poured weak brandy-and-water, with some medicament therein, down his throat. "How thirstily they drink! One opens his eyes. All right, my friend, you'll soon come to," added the kind skipper, as he patted Morrison on the shoulder. "Now then," said he, "Mr. Quail, get the quarter-boat hoisted in, and fill the mainyard. Trim the ship to her course."

"Very good, sir."

It was soon done, and the _Hermione_, as she began again to walk through the water, soon left the piece of wreck astern.

"Did you make out the name of that unfortunate craft, Mr. Foster?"

"Yes, sir; but with difficulty."

"And what was it?"

Our readers, of course, anticipate the reply.

"The _Princess_, of London--ship rig evidently, from the side chains, the double row of dead eyes, and the gearing of the mizzenmast."

"All right. Now bring up the ship's log."

The four patients were taken below. A little food, such as might be made for children, arrowroot with, sherry, and so forth, was given to them, and greedily they devoured it. They were then stripped, sponged with warm fresh water, and lifted each into a comfortable hammock, the active young doctor, Mr. Foster, the captain and steward, working for them like servants and nurses with hearty good-will.

Gentle cordials were then administered, and soon after Heriot appeared in the cabin with a bright and smiling face, wearing the happy expression of one who, in doing a good action, has done his best, to report that they had fallen into a sound sleep, were all doing well, and would, he hoped, soon be free from danger.

"It was too bad of you to send us below like children," said Rose.

"And you think they will recover, doctor?" asked Ethel, interrupting some playful apology of Heriot's.

"Recover? Oh yes, and perhaps be with us soon at table, too; so poor Manfredi's seat may thus be filled. Like Banquo's, it has long been empty."

"Oh, Leslie, how can you jest thus?" whispered Rose.

"I don't jest, dearest," replied the doctor, deprecatingly. "I liked poor Adrian Manfredi too well to associate his idea now with a jest," he added, gravely, as he thought of that night in the forecastle bunks, of the revelations he had heard, and the peril that was yet unaverted.

"Have the poor men said anything?" asked Ethel.

"Not much, Miss Basset, beyond a few indistinct and delirious mutterings."

"Could you gather who they were?"

"No; but they all seem to be seamen, save one."

"One?"

"Yes."

(How little could she dream who _this one was_!)

"And you are able to distinguish," she resumed.

"At once--by their hands and general appearance."

"And this one, who is not a seaman?"

"Is a pale, and thin--but then he has been starved--and gentleman-like young man. Though half dead with privation, he made a whispered apology for the trouble he gave us."

"Poor fellow!" said Ethel, whose eyes glistened.

"Where was their vessel from?--how was she lost?--and where was she lost?" asked Rose.

"They are past telling all this now," said the doctor, smiling, and patting Rose's hand; "by to-morrow evening, perhaps, we shall learn all."

"I do long so to hear their story--how terrible it must be--quite a nautical romance; and then, the other poor men of their ship, who have been drowned!"

"Yes, Rose," said Ethel, glancing at the captain and mate, who were each making an entry in his log or journal, "this incident will fill up an entire page of your diary."

"How--why?" asked Rose, reddening very perceptibly.

"For Lucy Page's perusal," said Ethel, with a smile that had a little mischief, or waggery, in it.

Rose grew redder, for her diary or journal of the voyage, which she had begun to keep (from the day she left Laurel Lodge), for the special perusal of her friend and gossip, Lucy Page, had proved rather a bore, and had been completely relinquished, as she could not consistently omit, and yet shrank from recording, memoranda of a certain little interview with the doctor, being naturally restrained therefrom by a certain awkwardness, if the eye of Jack Page, now almost a myth to her, as he has been, perhaps, to the reader, should peruse them also.

So Rose had ceased altogether to continue that interesting volume, which, we may presume, terminated abruptly on that night recorded in a previous chapter, when she and the doctor took a turn on deck to view the stars.

At this moment Cramply Hawkshaw entered the cabin with an expression of face so scared, so altered, and so unmistakably wretched, that Ethel surveyed him with surprise; and then, with some commiseration, she kindly inquired if he was ill?

He complained of giddiness, and abruptly hastened on deck.

In fact, our ex-Texan officer had just come from between decks, where he had been visiting the doctor's patients.