The same moment he heard a voice, two of the angels dropped
on the deck beside him, and the rest vanished. Those angels were Percivale
and Joe. And angels they were, for they came just in time, as all angels
do--never a moment too soon or a moment too late: the schooner _was_
dragging her anchor. This was soon plain even to the less experienced eyes
of the said angels.
But it did not take them many minutes now to drop their strongest anchor,
and they were soon riding in perfect safety for some time to come.
One of the two men was the son of old Coombes, the sexton, who was engaged
to marry the girl I have spoken of in the end of the fourth chapter in the
second volume.
Percivale's account of the matter, as far as he was concerned, was, that as
they drifted helplessly along, he suddenly saw from the top of a huge wave
the little vessel below him. They were, in fact, almost upon the rigging.
The wave on which they rode swept the quarter-deck of the schooner.
Percivale says the captain of the lifeboat called out "Aboard!" The captain
said he remembered nothing of the sort.
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