The Survivors of the Chancellor (6 page)

"Why not bore the deck?" I said to Curtis. "Why not
admit the water by tons into the hold? What could be the
harm? The fire would be quenched; and what would be
easier than to pump the water out again?"

"I have already told you, Mr. Kazallon," said Curtis,
"that the very moment we admit the air, the flames will rush
forth to the very top of the masts. No; we must have courage and patience; we must wait. There is nothing whatever
to be done, except to close every aperture."

The fire continued to progress even more rapidly than we
had hitherto suspected. The heat gradually drove the passengers nearly all on deck, and the two stern cabins, lighted,
as I said, by their windows in the aft-board were the only
quarters below that were inhabitable. Of these Mrs. Kear
occupied one, and Curtis reserved the other for Ruby, who,
a raving maniac, had to be kept rigidly under restraint. I
went down occasionally to see him, but invariably found him
in a state of abject terror, uttering horrible shrieks, as
though possessed with the idea that he was being scorched
by the most excruciating heat.

Once or twice, too, I looked in upon the ex-captain. He
was always calm and spoke quite rationally on any subject
except his own profession; but in connection with that he
prated away the merest nonsense. He suffered greatly, but
steadily declined all my offers of attention, and pertinaciously refused to leave his cabin.

To-day, an acrid, nauseating smoke made its way through
the panelings that partition off the quarters of the crew. At
once Curtis ordered the partition to be enveloped in wet tarpaulin, but the fumes penetrated even this, and filled the
whole neighborhood of the ship's bows with a reeking vapor
that was positively stifling. As we listened, too, we could
hear a dull rumbling sound, but we were as mystified as ever
to comprehend where the air could have entered that was
evidently fanning the flames. Only too certainly, it was
now becoming a question not of days nor even of hours
before we must be prepared for the final catastrophe. The
sea was still running high, and escape by the boats was
plainly impossible. Fortunately, as I have said, the mainmast and the mizzen are of iron; otherwise the great heat
at their base would long ago have brought them down and
our chances of safety would have been very much imperiled;
but by crowding on sail the Chancellor in the full northeast
wind continued to make her way with undiminished speed.

It is now a fortnight since the fire was first discovered,
and the proper working of the ship has gradually become a
more and more difficult matter. Even with thick shoes any
attempt to walk upon deck up to the forecastle was soon impracticable, and the poop, simply because its floor is elevated
somewhat above the level of the hold, is now the only available standing-place. Water began to lose its effect upon
the scorched and shriveling planks; the resin oozed out from
the knots in the wood, the seams burst open, and the tar,
melted by the heat, followed the rollings of the vessel, and
formed fantastic patterns about the deck.

Then to complete our perplexity, the wind shifted suddenly round to the northwest, whence it blew a perfect hurricane. To no purpose did Curtis do everything in his
power to bring the ship ahull; every effort was in vain; the
Chancellor could not bear her trysail, so there was nothing
to be done but to let her go with the wind, and drift further
and further from the land for which we are longing so
eagerly.

To-day, the 29th, the tempest seemed to reach its height;
the waves appeared to us mountains high, and dashed the
spray most violently across the deck. A boat could not live
a moment in such a sea.

Our situation is terrible. We all wait in silence, some
few on the forecastle, the great proportion of us on the
poop. As for the picrate, for the time we have quite forgotten its existence; indeed it might almost seem as though
its explosion would come as a relief, for no catastrophe, however terrible, could far exceed the torture of our suspense.

While he had still the remaining chance, Curtis rescued
from the store-room such few provisions as the heat of the
compartment allowed him to obtain; and a lot of cases of
salt meat and biscuits, a cask of brandy, some barrels of
fresh water, together with some sails and wraps, a compass
and other instruments are now lying packed in a mass all
ready for prompt removal to the boats whenever we shall be
obliged to leave the ship.

About eight o'clock in the evening, a noise is heard, distinct even above the raging of the hurricane. The panels of
the deck are upheaved, and volumes of black smoke issue upward as if from a safety-valve. A universal consternation
seizes one and all; we must leave the volcano which is about
to burst beneath our feet. The crew run to Curtis for orders. He hesitates; looks first at the huge and threatening
waves; looks then at the boats. The long-boat is there, suspended right along the center of the deck; but it is impossible to approach it now; the yawl, however, hoisted on the
starboard side, and the whale-boat suspended aft, are still
available. The sailors make frantically for the yawl.

"Stop, stop," shouts Curtis; "do you mean to cut off our
last and only chance of safety? Would you launch a boat
in such a sea as this?"

A few of them, with Owen at their head, give no heed to
what he says. Rushing to the poop, and seizing a cutlass,
Curtis shouts again:

"Touch the tackling of the davit, one of you; only touch
it, and I'll cleave your skull."

Awed by his determined manner, the men retire, some
clambering into the shrouds, while others mount to the very
top of the masts.

At eleven o'clock, several loud reports are heard, caused
by the bursting asunder of the partitions of the hold. Clouds
of smoke issue from the front, followed by a long tongue of
lambent flame that seems to encircle the mizzen-mast. The
fire now reaches to the cabin of Mrs. Kear, who, shrieking
wildly, is brought on deck by Miss Herbey. A moment
more, and Silas Huntly makes his appearance, his face all
blackened with the grimy smoke; he bows to Curtis, as he
passes, and then proceeds in the calmest manner to mount
the aft-shrouds, and installs himself at the very top of the
mizzen.

The sight of Huntly recalls to my recollection the prisoner
still below, and my first impulse is to rush to the staircase
and do what I can to set him free. But the maniac has already eluded his confinement, and with singed hair and his
clothes already alight, rushes upon deck. Like a salamander he passes across the burning deck with unscathed
feet, and glides through the stifling smoke with unchoked
breath. Not a sound escapes his lips.

Another loud report; the long-boat is shivered into fragments; the middle panel bursts the tarpaulin that covered it,
and a stream of fire, free at length from the restraint that
had held it, rises half-mast high.

"The picrate! the picrate!" shrieks the madman; "we
shall all be blown up! the picrate will blow us all up."

And in an instant, before we can get near him, he has
buried himself, through the open hatchway, down into the
fiery furnace below.

OCTOBER 20. — Night. — The scene, as night came on, was
terrible indeed. Notwithstanding the desperateness of our
situation, however, there was not one of us so paralyzed by
fear, but that we fully realized the horror of it all.

Poor Ruby, indeed, is lost and gone, but his last words
were productive of serious consequences. The sailors
caught his cry of "Picrate, picrate!" and being thus for the
first time made aware of the true nature of their peril, they
resolved at every hazard to accomplish their escape. Beside
themselves with terror, they either did not, or would not, see
that no boat could brave the tremendous waves that were
raging around, and accordingly they made a frantic rush toward the yawl. Curtis again made a vigorous endeavor to
prevent them, but this time all in vain; Owen urged them on,
and already the tackling was loosened, so that the boat was
swung over to the ship's side. For a moment it hung suspended in mid-air, and then, with a final effort from the
sailors, it was quickly lowered into the sea. But scarcely
had it touched the water, when it was caught by an enormous wave which, recoiling with resistless violence, dashed
it to atoms against the Chancellor's side.

The men stood aghast; they were dumbfounded. Longboat and yawl both gone, there was nothing now remaining
to us but a small whale-boat. Not a word was spoken;
not a sound was heard but the hoarse whistling of the wind,
and the mournful roaring of the flames. From the center
of the ship, which was hollowed out like a furnace, there
issued a column of sooty vapor that ascended to the sky.
All the passengers, and several of the crew, took refuge in
the aft-quarters of the poop. Mrs. Kear was lying senseless on one of the hen-coops, with Miss Herbey sitting passively at her side; M. Letourneur held his son tightly clasped
to his bosom. I saw Falsten calmly consult his watch, and
note down the time in his memorandum-book, but I was
far from sharing his composure, for I was overcome by a
nervous agitation that I could not suppress.

As far as we knew, Lieutenant Walter, the boatswain,
and such of the crew as were not with us, were safe in the
bow; but it was impossible to tell how they were faring, because the sheet of fire intervened like a curtain, and cut off
all communication between stem and stern.

I broke the dismal silence, saying, "All over now Curtis."

"No, sir, not yet," he replied, "now that the panel is
open we will set to work, and pour water with all our might
down into the furnace, and may be, we shall put it out, even
yet."

"But how can you work your pumps while the deck is
burning? and how can you get at your men beyond that
sheet of flame?"

He made no answer to my impetuous questions, and finding he had nothing more to say, I repeated that it was all
over now.

After a pause, he said, "As long as a plank of the ship
remains to stand on, Mr. Kazallon, I shall not give up my
hope."

But the conflagration raged with redoubled fury, the sea
around us was lighted with a crimson glow, and the clouds
above shone with a lurid glare. Long jets of fire darted
across the hatchways, and we were forced to take refuge
on the taffrail at the extreme end of the poop. Mrs. Kear
was laid in the whale-boat that hung from the stern. Miss
Herbey persisting to the last in retaining her post by her
side.

No pen could adequately portray the horrors of this fearful night. The Chancellor under bare poles, was driven,
like a gigantic fire-ship with frightful velocity across the
raging ocean; her very speed as it were, making common
cause with the hurricane to fan the fire that was consuming
her. Soon there could be no alternative between throwing
ourselves into the sea, or perishing in the flames.

But where, all this time, was the picrate? Perhaps, after
all, Ruby had deceived us and there was no volcano, such as
we dreaded, below our feet.

At half-past eleven, when the tempest seems at its very
height, there is heard a peculiar roar distinguishable even
above the crash of the elements. The sailors in an instant
recognize its import.

"Breakers to starboard!" is the cry.

Curtis leaps on to the netting, casts a rapid glance at the
snow-white billows, and turning to the helmsman shouts
with all his might, "Starboard the helm!"

But it is too late. There is a sudden shock; the ship is
caught up by an enormous wave; she rises upon her beam
ends; several times she strikes the ground; the mizzen-mast
snaps short off level with the deck, falls into the sea, and the
Chancellor is motionless.

THE night of the 29th continued. — It was not yet midnight; the darkness was most profound, and we could see
nothing. But was it probable that we had stranded on the
coast of America?

Very shortly after the ship had thus come to a stand-still
a clanking of chains was heard proceeding from her bows.

"That is well," said Curtis; "Walter and the boatswain
have cast both the anchors. Let us hope they will hold."

Then, clinging to the netting, he clambered along the
starboard side, on which the ship had heeled, as far as the
flames would allow him. He clung to the holdfasts of the
shrouds, and in spite of the heavy seas that dashed against
the vessel he maintained his position for a considerable time,
evidently listening to some sound that had caught his ear
in the midst of the tempest. In about a quarter of an hour
he returned to the poop.

"Heaven be praised! " he said, "the water is coming in,
and perhaps may get the better of the fire."

"True," said I, "but what then?"

"That," he replied, "is a question for bye-and-bye. We
can think now only of the present."

Already I fancied that the violence of the flames was
somewhat abated, and that the two opposing elements were
in fierce contention. Some plank in the ship's side was
evidently stove in, admitting free passage for the waves.
But how, when the water had mastered the fire, should we
be able to master the water? Our natural course would be
to use the pumps, but these, in the very midst of the conflagration, were quite unavailable.

For three long hours, in anxious suspense, we watched,
and waited. Where we were we could not tell. One thing
alone was certain; the tide was ebbing beneath us, and the
waves were relaxing in their violence. Once let the fire be
extinguished, and then, perhaps, there would be room to
hope that the next high tide would set us afloat.

Toward half-past four in the morning the curtain of fire
and smoke, which had shut off communication between the
two extremities of the ship, became less dense, and we could
faintly distinguish that party of the crew who had taken
refuge in the forecastle; and before long, although it was
impracticable to step upon the deck, the lieutenant and the
boatswain contrived to clamber over the gunwale, along the
rails, and joined Curtis on the poop.