Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/513

 506 “Where’s Mr. Dillon going?” asked a boy who had just arrived as Keefe went off.

“He’s going to the wreck by himself,” answered a girl, who was looking after Keefe with all a woman’s admiration for bravery: “they say he’ll be drowned, but I don’t know; I wish I was a man, and he shouldn’t go alone at any rate.”

“He ain’t going alone,” said the boy, stoutly, “I’m going with him.”

“No, you ain’t,” said a man, catching hold of the boy as he was running after Keefe; “if Keefe Dillon’s mad, and going to throw his life away, that’s no reason why you’re to do the same; you’ll just stay where you are.”

“Let me go, Hiram Cooke, let me go! I will go!” and the boy kicked, shouted, and struggled. But his captor, a strong man, held him firmly; and, finding all his efforts to break loose useless, the boy began to try persuasion. “Oh, for the love of heaven, Hiram Cooke, let me go! I’ll kill myself as sure as the sun’s above us if anything happens to Keefe Dillon. Oh, he’ll be gone if you don’t let me go, and what will I do then? There now, you are choking me—let me loose and I won’t stir.”

“I guess I ain’t so soft as to trust you, you young rascal. I know you well enough. Stay quiet, will you, or I’ll make you. Now, here’s your mother.”

“Oh, mother, mother!” cried the boy, distractedly, “Mr. Dillon’s going to the wreck, and there’s no one to go with him, and if I went I could help him, I know I could. I was often with him in a squall. Tell Hiram Cooke to let me go, or it will be too late. Sure I wouldn’t be here now, only Keefe saved my life when I broke through the ice, and was nearly lost himself saving me.”

“You’re right, my brave boy,” said his mother; “shame befal me and mine if we ever saw him in need, and didn’t risk life and limb to help him. Let the boy go, Mr. Cooke; go with Mr. Dillon, Con, my jewel, and the good God will watch over you and him.”

Hiram Cooke loosened his hold, and the boy shot away like an arrow. A murmur of admiration followed him, and the women gathered round his mother, but she seemed unconscious of their presence or their words, and throwing herself on her knees, in a sort of frenzy of excitement, she poured forth prayers as fast as her tongue could utter them, beating her breast in frantic invocation, and keeping her face steadfastly averted from the waves on which the boy was now being tossed. Keefe was shoving his skiff into the water when Con reached him. He was quite alone, for the other men, ashamed of their own faint-heartedness, contrasted with his heroism, had not followed him when they saw they could not prevent him from going.

“I’m just in the nick of time, Mr. Dillon,” said the boy, joyously, “let me help you.”

Keefe looked round hastily.

“Keep back, Con,” he said, “you can’t come, this is a desperate venture; it’s too great a risk for you.”

“Not if it ain’t too great for you,” said Con.

“Yes, it is. If I’m lost there’s not a soul to cry for me, but you’ve got your mother.”

“She knows I’m going; she bid me go. Don’t ask to stop me, Mr. Dillon. How would you like stopped yourself; and as little as I am, I guess I’m just as positive as you.”

“Yes, I dare say, but you don’t know the danger as well.”

“I know it right well, but if there was no danger where would be the credit of going? So now let me in, Mr. Dillon, you’ve no right to stop me; why shouldn’t I have my chance to do a brave thing?”

“Well, come along then; it’s not the first stormy voyage you and I have had together, and I hope it won’t be the last.”

“No fear of that,” said Con; “we’ll do bravely,” and he seized the paddle to steer.

“Hurra! she rides like a gull! She has need to do her best, and so have we, too. Now be steady, Con, mind hand and eye. I know you are brave, let me see if you can be cautious.”

“I will, sir; you’ll see I will!”

Con kept his word, behaving not only with coolness and courage, but with prudence and skill, obeying Keefe’s slightest sign or word with ready promptness, and almost appearing to divine his thoughts before they were spoken. His hardy, daring, buoyant nature seemed insensible to doubt or fear, and when they lost the shelter of the shore, and felt the full force of the huge surges which came tumbling towards them, and the furious wind which impelled them, his bold, brown, saucy visage, with its black elf-locks blown about by the gale, glowed with a wild exultation at the perilous excitement of the scene. No reckless lightness of nature like that of his young companion screened Keefe from a full perception of all the chances against their safe return, but strong in the consciousness of his own powers of mind and body, so often tried in danger, and never found wanting, he felt a proud, stern joy in taxing them to the uttermost. Every fibre of his frame, every pulse of his being, seemed imbued with a more vigorous and sentient life; his nerves seemed braced with tenfold hardihood and strength, his brain inspired with tenfold clearness and might, his heart filled with more indomitable energy and daring than he had ever known before, and every faculty seemed to put forth its utmost powers and capacity to conquer in the deadly struggle. He knew the merits of his little skiff well, and had braved as fierce a storm in her more than once before. She was almost as long, light, and narrow as a canoe, and now she shot over the waves like a meteor, scarcely seeming to touch the foam-wreaths that curled round her path.

Guided by her master’s strong hand and stout heart, aided by the fearless little fellow who sat at her helm, she carried them triumphantly through their hazardous course, and as Keefe rowed her under the shelter of the wreck, Con gave a wild hurrah, rising shrill above the tumult of the winds and waves. But it was scarcely heard by Keefe, for at that moment he had caught sight of the beautiful face of Helen Lennox looking down at him. Her dark, flashing eyes, dilated with feverish excitement and high-wrought feeling, her long