Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1889-03-22
CHAPTER XIII.
THE ICE BREAKS AWAY.

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It was not yet o'clock. was restless in
my mind, under q great surprise, and was
not sleepy. filed a pipe, made me little
pannikin of punch, and sat down before the
fire to think. If ever l had suspected the
accuracy Of my conjecture that the French
mans sudden astonishing indsposition was
the effect of his extreme age coming upon
him and breaking down the artificial vitality
with which he had bristled into life under
my hands, | must have found fifty signs to
set my misgivings at rest in his drowsiness,
noddng, bowed form, weakness, his lettering
and trembling, and other features Of his
latest behavior II was right, then had
reason to be thankful to Almighty God for
this unparalleled and most happy dispense
ton: for now should have nothing to fear
from the old rogue's vindictiveness and hor-
rid greed.
Thus 1 sat for an hour smoking and wet
ting my lips with the punch, while the fire
burned low, so exulting in The thought Of my
escape from the treacherous villain had re-
covered from the grave, and in the feeling
that | might now be able TO 60 TO rest, TO
move here and there to act as | pleased
without being haunted and terrified by the
shadow Of his foul intent that | hardly gave
my mind for a moment TO the situation Of
the schooner nor to the barren consequences
Of my fine scheme Of mines.
Tho wind blew strong. l could hear the
humminC Of it in every fiber Of the vessel.
The bed on which sho rested trcmbed to the
blows of the seas upon the rocks. From
time TO tinc. in the midst Of my musmg, l
started to the sharp claps OF parted ice Stll
feeling seepless threw few Goals on the
fire, ord, catching .cht of the pirate flag,
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would permit, and sat Gown 10 contemplate
the hidoous insignia embroidered on it. Ny
mind filled with hundred faucies as nv
gaze went from the skull on the black field
to the deaths head pipe that had fallen from
the grasp Of Tassard and lay on the deck;
and was sitting lost IN a deep dream like
contemplation when / was startled and
shocked into instantaneous activity by
blast Of noise, louder than any thunder clap
that ever | heard, ringing aAd booming
through the schooner. This w, ,ollowcd by
L second and then third. al intervals dur
ing which you might have coV4ted ten, and
] became sensible OF a strange siClIening
motion, which lasted about twenty or thirty
moments, such as might be eXIcricnced iy
one swiftly descending, in a balloon, or IL
falling from Il height while pen1 up in
coach.
o.
so violently that the bcr,lc, and all things
movable in the cook room Slid as Tar as they
could 90, and 1 heard q great clItter and
commot.on among the freight il the hold.
She then camc upright again, and Si-lu!tane-
ouSly with TINS a vast mass Of water tuua-
bed ON 10 tho deck and washed over my
head, and then ieil another and then an
other, all in such Il way rs to make me know
that the ice had broken and slipped the
schooner close to tAe ocean, whore she lay eX-
posed % los s,!r-eS-hut not FREQ OF TIE ice,
for she did NOS toss or roll.
l seized the lantern and spraur to the
cabin, whore / hung it up, and mounted the
companion steps But rs put my hand 10
the door to thrust it open a san broke over
the Siic and filled the decks, bubblins and
laundering past the companion hatch in such
u wa as 10 advise me that need but open
the door to drown the cabin, | waited, my
heart beating very hard, mad to see what
had happened, but not daring to trust myself
on deck lest l should be Immediately swept
into the sea-
Half al hour must have passed, during
which time the decks were necessarily swept
by the seas, iusomuch that | never once
burst open the door, even 10 look out. But
nothing having happened to increase nay
CONSERVATION in this half hour, though the
movement in the schooner was that If very
ponderous and ma jestical rolling and heav-
ing, showing her bed To be about, began TO
find my spirits, and to listen and wait with
some buildings of hope and confidence. At
the expiration OF this time the seas began to
fall less heavily and regularly on TO the deck,
and presently could only hear them break
ing forward, but without quarter Of their
former weight, and nothing worse came att
than large, brisk showers of spray.
| armed myself with additional clothing
for the encounter of the wet, cold and wind,
and then pushed open the door and stepped
forth. The sky was dark with rolling clouds,
but the ice put its own light into the air, and
l could see as plain as If the irst Of the dawn
had broken. II was as l had supposed the
mass of the valley in which the schooner had
been sepulchred for eight and forty years
had come away from tho Elaln, and lay iioat-
ing within n cables length Of the coast. \
stranger, moro wonderful picture human eye
never beheld. The island shore ran RAM
part of faintncss along the darkness TO where
1t died out in liquid dust To right and left.
The schooner sat upon bed of ice that
showed a surface Of about half an acre; her
stern was close To the sea, and about SIX feet
above it. On her larboard quarter the slope
or shoulder of the ACTIVITY had been broken
by the rupture, and you looked over the side
into the clear sea beyond the limit OF tho ice
there; but abreast Of the foreshrouds the ice
rose in kind of wall, a great splinter it
looked Of what was before a small broad
browed hill, and the wind or the sea having
caused the body on which the schooner lay to
veer, this wall stood as a shield betwi1t the
vessel and the surges, and was now receiving
those blows which had heretofore struck
her starboad side amidships and filed her
decks.
The wind blow from the southwest, but the
trend Of the island coast was northeast; and
as the mass OF ice was upon. in parting