CHAPTER XI

MRS. VANSITTART'S FEAR.

The tribulations which clustered, in bee-like swarm, in and around the Gulf Rock Lighthouse during those weary hours were many and various. Damp clothing, insufficiency of food, interior temperatures ranging from the chill draught of the entrance passage and stair-ways to the partial suffocation of rooms with windows closed owing to the incursions of the rising tide--this unpleasing aggregate of physical misery was seriously augmented by an ever-increasing list of sick people, an almost total absence of any medical comforts, and a growing knowledge, on the part of those not too despondent to think, that their ultimate relief might be deferred for days rather than hours.

No mere man can understand, and a woman of ordinary experience can but dimly imagine, the difficulty and arduousness of the task undertaken by Constance and Enid.

To cook and supply food for eighty-one persons with utensils intended for the use of three, to give each separate individual an utterly inadequate portion, so skilfully distributed that none should have cause to grumble at his or her neighbor's better fortune--here were culinary problems at once complex and exhaustive.

By adopting fantastic devices, bringing into service empty jam-pots and sardine-tins, they found it was possible to feed twenty at a time. This meant the preparation of four distinct meals, each requiring an hour's work. Long before the last batch, which included themselves, was lamenting the absurd discrepancy between appetite and antidote in the shape of anything to eat, the first was ravenous again.

The women complained the least. In the occupants of the two bedrooms the girls encountered a passive fortitude which was admirable. It was an extraordinary scene which met their eyes when they entered either of these stuffy apartments. Many of the rescued ladies had not given a thought to changing the demi-toilette of evening wear on board ship for more serviceable clothing when the hurricane overtook the vessel. They all, it is true, possessed cloaks or wraps of some sort, but these garments were still sodden with salt water and therefore unwearable, even if the oppressive warmth in each room rendered such a thing possible. Their elegant costumes of muslin, cotton, silk or satin, were utterly ruined. Lucky were the few whose blouses or bodices had not been rent into tatters.

Some of the worst sufferers in this respect were now the best provided. Blankets and sheets had been ruthlessly torn up and roughly stitched into articles of clothing. Mrs. Vansittart, for instance, who first suggested this _via media_, wore an exquisite Paris gown and a loose dressing-jacket arrangement of yellow blanket, the component parts of which she persuaded two other women to sew together on the model provided by her own elegant figure.

A few quick-witted ones who followed her example exhausted the available stock, and pillow-cases and rugs would have undergone metamorphosis in the same way had not Constance come to the rescue by impounding them, declaring that they must be reserved for the use of those sufferers who needed warmth and rest.

The men passed their time in smoking, singing, yarning and speculating on the chance of the weather clearing. Ultimately, when the banging of the waves again made the column feel unsafe, a small section began to plan petty attempts to pilfer the provisions. It is the queer mixture of philosopher and beast in the average human being that makes it possible for the same man, in one mood, to risk his life quite voluntarily to save others, and in another, to organize selfish theft.

After an ingenious seaman had been detected in the attempt to pick the store-room lock, and when a tray of cold ham was deliberately upset whilst a football scrimmage took place for the pieces, Mr. Emmett stopped these ebullitions by arming the watch with assorted weapons from the work-shop and issuing stern orders as to their use in case of need.

Here, again, the warring elements which form the human clay were admirably displayed. On duty, under the bonds of discipline, the coarse-grained foremast hand who had gobbled up a surreptitious lump of fat pig during the first successful scuffle would brain the daring rascal who tried to better his condition by a similar trick a second time. Discipline, sometimes, converts a skulker into a hero.

When the state of the tide permitted, storm-shutters were opened and a free draught of air allowed to enter through the door. Then all hands eyed the sea with anxiety. The wind was strong and piercing, and the reef maintained its ceaseless roaring. Wherever a window opened towards the land there was a small crowd waiting to peep through it. At last, the sense of orderliness gradually permeating the inmates of the lighthouse actually resulted in the formation of queues, with stated intervals for moving on. There was a momentary relief in looking at the land. The cliffs, the solitary white houses, the little hamlets half hidden in cozy nooks, seemed to be so absurdly near. It was ridiculous to imagine that help could be long deferred. The seaward passing of a steamer, carrying flowers from the Scilly Isles to Penzance for Covent Garden, caused a flutter, but the sight of a Penzance fishing-smack scudding under jib and close-reefed foresail between the rock and Guthenbras Point created intense excitement. Noah, gazing across the flood for the return of the dove with the olive branch, could not be more pleased than these castaways in their granite ark when the brown-sailed boat came within their view.

The window in the coal-cellar opened fair towards the Land's End, and the grimy occupants of this compartment could look their fill at the messenger of life. A rich New Yorker in vain offered a hundred dollars to any man who gave up his place in the line after he himself, by the operation of the time-limit, was remorselessly sent away from the narrow loop-hole. Dollars and pounds sterling have a curiously depreciated value under such circumstances.

The men of the watch were always questioned for news by the unemployed majority. They related the comings and goings of the _Falcon_, carried sympathetic inquiries from story to story--promiscuous passing to and fro being forbidden owing to the narrowness of the stairs--and seized every trifling pretext on their own part to reach the topmost height and feast their eyes on the extensive panorama visible from the storm-girt gallery. Had they watched the coast-line less and the reef more their observations would have had value.

Quite early in the day, the purser handed to the occupants of each room a full list of passengers and crew, with the survivors grouped separately. In only three instances were husband and wife both saved. The awful scene in the saloon accounted for this seeming discrepancy. Dazed men and senseless women were wrenched from each other's clasp either by the overwhelming seas or during the final wild fight for life at the head of the companion stairway. A wreck, a fire in a theatre, pays little heed to the marriage tie.

The third, and last meal of the day was eaten in silence and gloom. All the spare lamps were diverted to the kitchen, because Brand, during a further detailed survey of the stores, made in company with Mr. Emmett and the purser, discovered that there was an alarming deficit of fresh water in the cistern.

In the hurry of the earlier hours a serious miscalculation had been made in transmuting cubic feet into gallons. It became an instant necessity to use every heating appliance at command and start the distillation of a drinkable fluid.

The Gulf Rock Light did not possess a proper apparatus. The only method that could be adopted was to improvise a coil from canvas sewn into a tube. The exterior was varnished, and wrapped in wet cloths to assist the condensation of the steam. Hence, every kettle and pot being requisitioned for this paramount need, cocoa could be supplied to the women alone, whilst the taste of the water, even thus disguised, was nauseating. No more potatoes could be boiled. Raw, they were almost uneatable. And potatoes happened to be the food most plentiful.

The genuine fresh water, reduced to a minimum in the cistern, was only a little better in condition unless it was filtered, and Brand decided that it ought to be retained for the exclusive use of those seriously