A Modern Buccaneer

We were now swimming side by side, Miranda talking to the little fellow, who had never lost consciousness, and did not seem particularly afraid of his position.

"How tremendously hard they are pulling!" I said; "they are making the boat spin again. One would think they were pulling for a wager."

"So they are," answered she, "for three lives, and perhaps another. See there! God in His mercy protect us."

I followed the direction of her turned head, and my heart stood still as my eye caught the fatal sign of the monster's presence at no great distance from us. It was the back fin of a shark!

"Do your best, my beloved," she continued; "we must keep together, and if he overtakes us before the boat reaches, splash hard and shout as loud as you can. I have seen a shark frightened before now; but please God it may not come to that."

The boat came nearer – still nearer – but, as it seemed to us, all too slowly. The men were pulling for their lives, I could notice, and the captain frantically urging them on. They had seen the dreaded signal before us, and had commenced to race from that moment. But for some delay in the tackle for lowering, they would have been up to us before now.

As it was we did our best. I would have taken the child, but Miranda would not allow me. "His weight is nothing in the water," she said, "and I could swim faster than you, even with him." This she showed me she could do by shooting ahead with the greatest ease, and then allowing me to overtake her. I had to let her have her own way. We were lessening the distance between us and the boat, but the sea demon had a mind to overtake us, and our hearts almost failed as we noticed the sharp black fin gaining rapidly upon us. Still there was one chance, that he would not pursue us to the very side of the boat. It was a terrible moment. With every muscle strained to the uttermost, with lung, and sinew, and every organ taxed to utmost tension, I most certainly beat any previous record in swimming that I had ever attained. Miranda, with apparently but little effort, kept slightly ahead. The last few yards – shorter than the actual distance – appeared to divide us from the huge form of the monster now distinctly visible beneath the water, when with one frantic yell and a dash at the oars, which took every remaining pound of strength out of the willing crew, the boat shot up within equal distance. At a signal from the captain every oar was raised and brought down again with a terrific splash into the water, and a simultaneous yell. The effort was successful. The huge creature, strangely timid in some respects, stopped, and with one powerful side motion of fins and tail glided out of the line of pursuit. At the same moment the boat swept up, and eager arms lifted Miranda and her burden into it. My hand was on the gunwale until I saw her safe, whence with a slight amount of assistance I gained the mid-thwart.

"Saved, thank God!" cried the captain, with fervent expression, "but a mighty close thing; the next time you take a bath of this kind, my dear Miranda, with sharks around, you must let me know beforehand, eh?"

"Some one would have had to go, captain," she answered; "we couldn't see the dear little fellow drowned before our eyes. It was only a trifle after all – a swim in smooth water on a fine day: I didn't reckon on a shark being so close, I must say."

"I saw the naughty shark," said the little fellow, now quite recovered and in his usual spirits. "How close he came! do you think he would have eaten us all, captain?"

"Yes, my boy – without salt; you would never have seen your papa and mamma again if it had not been for this lady here."

"But you took us in the boat, captain," argued the little fellow; "he can't catch us in here, can he?"

"But the lady caught you in her arms long before the boat came up, my dear, or else you would have been drowned over and over again; that confounded tackle caught, or else we should have been up long before. It's a good thing they were not lowering for a whale, or my first mate's language would have been something to remember till the voyage after next. However, here we are all safe, Charlie, and there's your mother looking out for you."

A painfully eager face was that which gazed from the vessel as we rowed alongside. Every trace of the languor partly born of the tropic sun and partly of aristocratic morgue was gone from the countenance of Mrs. Percival, as her boy, laughing and prattling, was carried up the rope ladder and lifted on deck. His mother clasped him now passionately in her arms, sobbing, blessing, kissing him, and crying aloud that God had restored her child from the dead. "Oh, my boy! my boy!" she repeated again and again; "your mother would have died too, if you had been drowned, she would never have lived without you."

By this time Miranda had reached the deck, where she was received with a hearty British cheer from the ship's company, while the passengers crowded around her as if she had acquired a new character in their eyes. But Mrs. Percival surpassed them all; kneeling before Miranda she bowed herself to the deck, as if in adoration, and kissed her wet feet again and again.

"You have saved my child from a terrible death at the risk of your own and your husband's lives," she said. "May God forget me if I forget your noble act this day! I have been proud and unkind in my manner to you, my dear. I humble myself at your feet, and implore your pardon. But henceforth, Miranda Telfer, you and I are sisters. If I do not do something in requital it will go hard with me and Charlie."

"Now, my dear Sybil," interposed the husband, "do you observe that Mrs. Telfer has not had time to change her dress – very wet it seems to be – and I suppose Master Charlie will be none the worse for being put to bed and well scolded, the young rascal. Come, my dear."

Colonel Percival, doubtless, felt a world of joy and relief when the light of his eyes and the joy of his heart stood safe and sound on the deck of the Florentia again, but it is not the wont of the British aristocrat to give vent to his emotions, even the holiest, in public. The veil of indifference is thrown over them, and men may but guess at the volcanic forces at work below that studiously calm exterior.

So, laying his hand gently but firmly on his wife's arm, he led her to her cabin, with her boy still clasped in her arms as if she yet feared to lose him, and they disappeared from our eyes. As for Miranda and myself, such immersions had been daily matters of course, and were regarded as altogether too trifling occurrences to require more than the necessary changes of clothing.

We both appeared in our places at the next meal, when Miranda was besieged with questions as to her sensations, mingled with praises of her courage and endurance in that hour of deadly peril.

"And her child, too," said Mrs. Craven; "what a lesson of humility it ought to teach her! Had you, my dear girl, been swayed by any of the meaner motives which actuate men and women her foolish pride might have cost her child's life."

"Oh, surely no one could have had such thoughts when that dear little boy fell overboard! I couldn't help Mrs. Percival not liking me. I really did not think much about it; but when I saw the poor little face in the sea, more startled, indeed, than frightened, I felt as if I must go in after him. It was quite a matter of course."

After this incident it may be believed that we were indeed a happy family on board the Florentia. Every one vied with every one else in exhibiting respect and admiration towards Miranda. Mrs. Percival would not hear of a refusal that we should come and stay with her, when we had done all that was proper and dutiful in the family home. Miss Vavasour and Mrs. Craven depended on me to show them all the beauties of Sydney harbour; while Captain Carryall pledged himself to place Mr. Frankston's yacht at the service of his passengers generally, and to render them competent to champion the much-vaunted glories of the unrivalled harbour to all friends, foes, and doubters on the other side of the world.

Colonel Percival privately interrogated the captain as to the nature of the commercial undertaking in which he was about to arrange a partnership for me, and begged as a favour, being a man of ample means, that he might be permitted to advance the amount of my share. The captain solemnly promised him that if there was any difficulty in the proposed arrangement on account of my deficiency of cash he should be requested to supply it. "He seemed to feel easy in his mind after I told him this, my boy," said the commander, with that mixture of simplicity and astuteness which distinguished him, "but fancy old Paul and your father admitting outside capital in one of their trade ventures!"

"This time to-morrow we shall be going through Sydney Heads," said the first mate to me as we walked the deck about an hour after sunrise one morning, "that is, if the wind holds."

"Pray Heaven it may," said I, "then we shall have a view of the harbour and city worth seeing. It makes all the difference. We might have a cloudy day, or be tacking about till nightfall, and the whole effect would be lost." I was most anxious not only that Miranda's first sight of my native land and her future home should impress her favourably, but I was naturally concerned that our friends should not suppose that the descriptions of the Queen City of the South, with which the captain and I had regaled them, were overdrawn. We sat late at supper that night talking over the wonderful events and experiences that were to occur on the morrow. Plans were discussed, probable residence and inland travel calculated, the Fish River caves and the Blue Mountains were, of course, to be visited – all kinds of expeditions and slightly incongruous journeys to be carried out.

Colonel and Mrs. Percival had been asked to stay at Government House during their visit, which was comparatively short; while Mr. and Mrs. Craven and Miss Vavasour were to go primarily to Petty's Hotel, which had been highly recommended; and the gentlemen had intimation that they would receive notices of their being admitted as honorary members of the Australian and Union Clubs. With such cheerful expectations and forecasts we parted for the night.

The winds were kind. "The breeze stuck to us," as the mate expressed it, and about an hour after the time he had mentioned we were within a mile of the towering sandstone portals of that erstwhile strange, silent harbour into which the gallant seaman Cook, old England's typical mariner, had sailed a hundred years ago.

I had been on deck since dawn. Now that we were so near the home of my childhood, the thoughts of old days, and the parents, brothers, sisters, from whom I had been so long separated, rushed into my mind, until I felt almost suffocated with contending emotions. How would they receive us? Would they be prepared to see me a married man? Would their welcome to Miranda be warm or formal? I began to foresee difficulties – even dangers of family disruption – consequences which before had never entered into the calculation.

However, for the present these serious reflections were put to flight by expressions of delight from the whole body of passengers, headed by Miranda, who then came on deck. By this time the good ship Florentia had closely approached the comparatively narrow entrance, the frowning buttresses of sandstone, against which the waves, now dashed with hoarse and angry murmur, rose almost above us, while a long line of surges, lit up by the red dawn fires, menaced us on either hand.

"Oh, what a lovely entrance!" said Miss Vavasour, after gazing long and earnestly at the scene. "It seems like the gate of an enchanted lake. What magnificent rock-masses, and what light and colour the sun brings out! It is something like a sun – warm, glowing, irradiating everything even at this early hour – and what a sky! The dream tone of a painter! I congratulate you, you dear darling Miranda, and you, Mr. Telfer, on having such a day for home-coming. It is a good omen – I am sure it must be. Nothing but good could happen on such a glorious day."

"The day is perfection, but more than one good ship coming through this entrance at night has mistaken the indentation on the other side of the South Head for the true passage, and gone to pieces on the rocks below that promontory. But, at any rate, we are now safely inside; and where is there a harbour in the world to match it?"

As we passed Middle harbour and drew slowly up the great waterway, which affords perhaps more deep anchorage than any other in the world, the ladies were loud in their expressions of admiration. "Look at those sweet white houses on the shores of the pretty little bays!" said Mrs. Craven; "and what lovely gardens and terraces stretching down to the beaches!"

"And there is a Norfolk Island pine, one – two – ever so many," cried Miranda. "I did not think they grew here, I am sure now that I shall be happy."

"Yes, of course!" said Miss Vavasour, "what is to hinder you? And you are to live in one of those pretty cream-coloured cottages – what lovely stone it must be! – with a garden just like that one on the point, and a boat-house and a jetty. One of those little steamers that I see fussing about will land Mr. Telfer, when he returns from the city, or you can get into that little boat that lies moored below, and row across the bay for him."

Miranda's eyes filled as she glanced at the pretty villas and more pretentious mansions, past which we glided, some half-covered with climbers, or buried amid tropical shrubs of wild luxuriance. Her heart was too deeply stirred for jesting at that moment. She could only press her friend's hand and smile, as if pleading for a less humorous view of so important a subject.

The harbour itself was full of interest to the strangers. Vessels of all sizes and shapes – coasters, colliers, passenger-boats, yachts, and steam launches, passed and re-passed in endless succession. Two men-of-war lay peacefully at anchor in Farm Cove, a Messagerie steamer in the stream, while a huge P. & O. mail-boat outward bound moved majestically towards the Heads through which we had so recently entered.

We had just cleared Point Piper, where I remember spending the joyous holidays of long ago with my schoolmates, the sons of the fine old English gentleman who then dwelt there, when a sailing boat sped swiftly towards us, in which stood a stout, middle-aged man waving his hat frantically.

"I believe that is Paul Frankston himself come to overhaul us," said the captain, raising his glass. "He's sailor enough to recognise the rig of the Florentia, and if we had been a little nearer his bay, he'd have wanted us to stop the ship and lunch with him in a body. As it is I feel sure he'll capture some of the party."

"What splendid hospitality!" said Mrs. Percival. "Is that sort of thing usual here? you must be something like us Indians in your ways."

"There is a good deal of likeness, I think," said the captain. "I suppose the heat accounts for it. It's too hot to refuse, most of the year. But here comes Paul!"

The sailing boat by this time had run alongside and doused her sail, while one of the crew held on to a rope thrown to him, as the owner presented himself on deck with more agility than might have been expected from a man of his age.

"Well, Charley, my boy, so you're in at last – thought you were lost, or had run away and sold the ship, ha, ha! What sort of a voyage have you had? Passengers, too – pray introduce me. Is there anything I can do for them in Sydney? Must be something. Perhaps I shall hear by and by. Who's this youngster?

"No! surely not the son of my old friend, Captain Telfer? Now I remember the boy that ran away to the islands, or would have done so, if they hadn't let him go. Quite right, I ran away myself and a fine time I had there. I must tell you what happened to me there once, eh! Charley?"

Here the old gentleman began to laugh so heartily that he was forced to suspend his narration, while the captain regarded him with an expression which conveyed a slight look of warning. "But I am forgetting. By the way, Charley, have you any curios in your cabin?" The captain nodded, and the two old friends disappeared down the companion. Only, however, to reappear in a very few minutes, which we employed in favourable criticism.

"What a fine hearty old gentleman!" said Mrs. Craven, "any one can see that he is an Englishman by his figure and the way he talks; though I suppose colonists are not so very different."

"Mr. Frankston has been a good deal about the world," I said. "But he was born in Sydney, and has spent the greater part of his life near this very spot. He was at sea in his earlier years, but has been on shore since he married. He is now a wealthy man, and one of the leading Sydney merchants."

"One would think he was a sea captain now," said Miss Vavasour. "He looks quite as much like one as a merchant; but I suppose every one can sail a boat here."

"You are quite right, Miss Vavasour. Every one who is born in Sydney learns to swim and sail a boat as soon as possible after he can walk. There is no place in the world where there are so many yachtsmen. On holidays you may see doctors, lawyers, clergymen, even judges, sailing their boats – doing a good deal of their own work in the 'able seaman' line; and, to tell truth, looking occasionally much more like pirates than sober professional men."

About this time Mr. Frankston reappeared, carrying in his hand a couple of grass-er-garments, which he appeared to look upon as very precious. "These are for my little girl," he said, "she has just come down from the bush with her husband to spend the hot months with her old father. It will give her the greatest pleasure to see these ladies and their husbands at Marahmee, next Saturday, when we can have a little picnic in the harbour and a sail in my yacht, the Sea-gull. The captain will tell you that I am to be trusted with a lively boat still."

"I never wish to go to sea with a better sailor," said the captain, "and if our friends have no other engagements, I can promise them a delightful day and a view of some of the finest scenery south of the line."

Barring unforeseen or indispensable engagements every one promised to go. Mr. Frankston averred that they had done him a great – an important service. He was getting quite hipped – he was indeed – when his daughter luckily recognised the Florentia coming up the harbour. She is a sailor's daughter, you know – has an eye for a ship – and started him off to meet his old friend Captain Carryall, and secure him for dinner. Now he felt quite another man, and would say good-bye. Before leaving he must have a word with his young friend.

"My dear boy," said he, laying his hand on my shoulder, "I have known your father ever so many years. We were younger men then, and saw something of each other in more than one bit of fun; and at least one or two very queer bits of fighting in the Bay of Islands; so that we know each other pretty well. I've heard what Carryall has to say about you and your charming wife. I think we shall be able to 'fix up,' as our American friends say, our little mercantile arrangement very neatly. But that's not what I wanted to talk to you about. You've been away a good while, so many years, we'll say."

"I have indeed," I replied.

"Well – you've grown from a boy into a man, and a devilish fine one too." Here the dear old chap patted me on the back and looked up at my face, a great deal higher up than his. "Well! naturally, you've changed. So have your people, your young brothers and sisters have turned into men and women while you've been away. And then again, another change – a great one too – you're married."

"Yes! thank God I am."

"I am sure you have good reason, my boy. But my idea is this, people – the best of people – don't like surprises, – even one's own friends. Now, what I want you to do is to bring your wife and come and stay at Marahmee for a week, while they're getting your rooms ready for you at North Shore. There's nobody there now but Antonia and her husband. It wants another pair of young people to enliven the place a bit. And Charley Carryall will go over and tell them all about you and your pretty Miranda, while you and I settle our partnership affairs."

I could see how it was; our good old friend, with a kindness and delicacy of feeling which I have rarely seen equalled, had all along made up his mind that Miranda and I should begin our Sydney experiences with a visit to his hospitable mansion. After a talk with the captain, for which purpose he had feigned an interest in South Sea "curios," they had come to the conclusion that it would be more prudent that the family should have a few days to accustom themselves to the idea of my marriage. In the mean time his daughter, Mrs. Neuchamp, would be able to give Miranda the benefit of her experience as a Sydney matron of some years' standing, and to ensure that she made her introduction under favourable circumstances.

Miranda, naturally nervous at the idea of then and there making her appearance among a group of relatives wholly unknown to her, was much relieved at the delay thus granted, and cheerfully acceded to the proposed arrangement.

"That being all settled, I'll get home and have everything ready for you when you arrive. The captain will take care of you. He knows the road out, eh, Charley? night or day; so good-bye till dinner time. Seven o'clock sharp."

Still talking, Mr. Frankston descended to his boat, and making a long board, proceeded to beat down the harbour on his homeward voyage, waving his handkerchief at intervals until he rounded a point and was lost to our gaze.

It was not very long after this interview that we found ourselves in our berth at the Circular Quay, where, unlike Melbourne and some other ports, nothing more was needed for disembarkation but to step on shore into the city. Our good comrades of so many days were carried off in cabs to their destinations, with the exception of the Percivals, who, having been invited to Government House, found an aide-de-camp and the viceregal carriage awaiting them on the wharf. At such a time there is always a certain amount of fuss and anxiety with reference to luggage, rendering farewells occasionally less sentimental than might have been expected from the character of marine friendships. But it was not so in our experience. Miss Vavasour and Mrs. Craven exchanged touching farewells with Miranda, mingled with solemn promises to meet at given dates – to write – to do all sorts of things necessary for their keeping up the flame of friendship. Then at the last moment Colonel and Mrs. Percival came up. "My dearest Miranda," said this lady, "don't forget that you are my sister, not in word only. Put me to the proof whenever you need a sister's aid, and it shall be always at your service. Kiss Auntie Miranda, Charlie darling, and tell her you will always love her."

"She picked me up out of the sea, when the naughty shark was going to eat us all. She's a good auntie, isn't she, mother?" said the little chap responding readily. "Good-bye, Auntie Miranda."

"I am not a man of many words, Mr. Telfer!" said the colonel; "but if I can be of service to you, now or at any future time I shall be offended if you do not let me know;" and then the stern soldier shook my hand in a way which gave double meaning to the pledge.

It was yet early in the day, and the captain had duties to attend to which would keep him employed until the evening. "I've ordered a carriage at six," he said, "when we'll start for Marahmee, which is about half-an-hour's drive. Until that time you can go ashore if you like; the Botanical Gardens are just round that point, or walk down George Street, or in any other way amuse yourselves. Meanwhile, consider yourselves at home also."

"I think we'll stay at home then, captain, for the present," said Miranda, "and watch the people on shore. You have no idea how they interest me. Everything is so new. Remember that I have never seen a carriage in my life before, or a cab, or a soldier; there goes one now – isn't he beautiful to behold? I shall sit here and make Hilary tell me the names of all the specimens as they come into view."

"That will do capitally," said the captain. "I might have known that you could amuse yourself without help from any one."