If he did, he must have meant
it for the men on the schooner to get on board the lifeboat. Percivale,
however, who had a most chivalrous (ought I not to say Christian?) notion
of obedience, fancying the captain meant them to board the schooner, sprang
at her fore-shrouds. Thereupon the wave sweeping them along the schooner's
side, Joe sprang at the main-shrouds, and they dropped on the deck
together.
But although my reader is at ease about their fate, we who were in the
affair were anything but easy at the time corresponding to this point of
the narrative. It was a terrible night we passed through.
When I returned, which was almost instantly, for I could do nothing by
staring out in the direction of the schooner, I found that the crowd was
nearly gone. One little group alone remained behind, the centre of which
was a woman. Wynnie had disappeared. The woman who remained behind was
Agnes Harper.
The moon shone out clear as I approached the group; indeed, the clouds were
breaking-up and drifting away off the heavens.
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