Maid of the Mist Part 59

That wonderful father of theirs, however, managed to capture a pair of baby-rabbits, whose mother he had unfortunately knocked on the head for dinner before he perceived the mischief he was doing. The babies were welcomed with shrieks of delight and were like to be killed with the expression of it. The youngsters spent hours flat on their stomachs watching them in their boarded enclosure alongside the house, and more hours foraging for them the sweetest and tenderest herbs the hollows could yield. And presently the captives became friends, and were so comfortable in their narrow estate that they had no desire for a wider, but galloped about after their owners wherever they went, and sat anxiously twisting their noses on the beach when the irrepressibles found it necessary to wallow and frolic in the water.

At times, for a change, they lived aboard the 'Jane and Mary' for a week or two, but Mistress Avice always had a very reasonable fear of one or other or both of the children tumbling overboard, and so the greater part of their life was pa.s.sed ash.o.r.e, with the sand-house as headquarters and all the rest of the island as playground.

That a life so circ.u.mscribed should never have grown monotonous tells its own pleasant story. But the youngsters had known no other life with which to compare it, and their elders, who had, found it fuller and sweeter in its pastoral simplicity than any the great world had ever offered them.

Every moment of their day was occupied, if not with work, then with enjoyments. The elders had to provide for the youngsters, and these again for theirs; and when every single thing must be drawn from Nature or from an accommodating but distant wreck-pile, such provision takes time and forethought.

When the day's work was completed they all bathed and rambled far and wide, and it was on one such ramble, when they had gone as far along towards the eastern end of the Island as small legs could carry, that the end came--as suddenly as had come the beginning.

They were sitting on the sunny side of a great sand-hill, eating and resting after their journey,--resting, that is, so far as the elders were concerned. The youngsters, who had found walking tiring, or perhaps tiresome, found no fatigue in scrambling to the tops of sandhills and sliding down the smooth soft sides with shouts and shrieks of laughter.

A cessation in the sport drew their father's and mother's eyes to them.

They were both standing on the hill-top gazing eagerly out to sea and chattering to one another.

"Seals probably," said their mother. From where they sat they could not see the sh.o.r.e for an intervening ridge. And seals were always a mighty attraction to the children.

But when they began dancing excitedly on their hill-top their father called, "What is it you see, Cubbie?"

"Somefing, dad! Somefing funny."

"Somefing funny!" repeated little Avice eagerly, and the elders got up lazily and slowly climbed the hillside to see what it was.

"My G.o.d!" said Wulfrey, as his eyes cleared the top first, and he turned and kissed his wife joyously.

"Thank G.o.d!" she breathed deeply, as her eyes also lighted on that which was coming.

For there, not half a mile away, was a white boat manned by blue sailors, leaping towards the sh.o.r.e as fast as eight l.u.s.ty oars could drive her, and out beyond her, probably three miles away, was a white-sailed ship of size.

Wulfrey shouted and waved his arms. The children immediately did the same, and the regular rise and fall of the oars stopped suddenly as every eye in the boat turned on them. There were men in the stern with gilt on their hats. Then the oars fell-to again and the boat came bounding on. Wulfrey and Avice picked up each their namesakes, and plunged down the hill and ran round the ridge to the sh.o.r.e.

With a final lunge the boat came up the beach, and a tall man rose in the stern and asked, "Who, in heaven's name, are you, and what are you doing here?"--while nine pairs of eager eyes raked over the little party.

"I am Dr Wulfrey Dale, of Hazelford in Cheshire. This is my wife--and our children. We have been here five years."

"Good G.o.d! Five years!"--he was ash.o.r.e by this time, and the rest tumbled hastily out and stood about them, the burly sailors listening with one ear and trying to make up to the children, who gazed with wondering awe at the only men they had ever seen except their father.

"How on earth have you lived? ... Five years! ... Not all of you," he said with a smile.

"Not all of us. The children were born here. We were afraid we would all have to live and die here. I thank G.o.d you are come. What brought you?"

"We've been sent to prospect with a view to a lighthouse here. There has been an outcry about the number of wrecks----"

"Ay, there are hundreds over yonder," said Wulfrey, pointing westward.

"They have kept us alive, but the cost to others has been heavy."

"And where do you live?"

"Come and I'll show you--or will you take us along in the boat? It's good four miles over that way."

"Boat'll be easiest. Sand's heavy walking. How long can we count on this weather?"

"Oh, for a week at least. It's our best time of year."

"You will take us home?" asked Avice eagerly, when they had climbed into the boat and were swinging along parallel to the sh.o.r.e, the children staring in a vast silence and with rounded eyes at the bearded sailor-men and their amazing ways.

"As far as our service permits, madame, we will do anything and everything you wish. We return to Halifax in Nova Scotia, but once there you will have no difficulties."

"That is where we want to go," said Wulfrey.... "Better keep out a bit here. There are ridges below there.... Now if you will turn in."

"What's that? A ship?" asked the tall man, and all eyes shot round to the bare poles of the 'Jane and Mary' snowing over the sandhills.

"A schooner, land-locked in a lagoon. That was our first home. Now we live ash.o.r.e."

"And you've been all alone all that time?"

"We had one companion, the mate of the ship.... He died four years ago. Since then none have come but the dead.... We can get in here, I think."

The boat ran softly up the beach again, the sailors carried out Avice and the children, and they all struck up through the sandhills to the house.

THE END