The Building of Jalna. Mazo de la Roche

very different from the world on board the ship that had brought them from India. This was a much smaller, closer world, more cut off from the old life. The last voyage had been a voyage homeward. This was one into what was new and unknown. The last had been a linking up; this was a cutting off. Adeline was conscious of an odd detachment, an exhilaration, as though she were adventuring into a spiritual as well as a material distance.

      For a week they pressed forward in fair weather. Then the head wind increased in strength and the ship struggled on against it and against the rising green waves that crashed on her bow, enveloping her in spray. It was no longer possible to stay on deck. They must spend the long hours below where there was not only the close air but the smells and noises from the steerage to be endured. The ayah became seasick and Adeline had the care of the baby on her hands. Mrs. Cameron and Mary adored little Augusta and took a large share of her care. But at night she was restless and Adeline and Philip did not get their proper sleep.

      They were going to their berths early one stormy night when there was at thumping on the door and Conway’s voice called out: —

      “Philip! There’s a leak sprung!”

      “What?” shouted Philip, staying the unbuttoning of his waistcoat.

      “She has sprung a plank! She’s leaking!”

      Then there came the heavy tramping of feet overhead and the shouts of officers.

      Adeline turned pale. She had the quietly whimpering baby in her arms.

      “Will the ship sink?” she asked.

      “Certainly not. Don’t be alarmed,” said Philip. He threw open the door.

      Conway stood there supporting himself by the brass railing which ran along the passage. He wore a bright-coloured dressing gown and, even in the excitement of the moment, Philip noticed how it heightened his resemblance to the Knave of Diamonds. With the door open, the noise of tramping feet and vehement shoutings, the roar of the steadily rising squall, the thunder and rattle of canvas and tackle, were increased. The sails were being lowered.

      “They’re lowering the sails!” shouted Conway, but his voice came as no more than a whisper. “It’s blowing a terrible gale.”

      His brother stood close behind him, clinging to the railing. He looked green with seasickness. Adeline said to him: —

      “Come in and lie down in my berth, Sholto. You must keep the baby while we go to see the Captain.”

      The boy obediently stumbled into the cabin and threw himself on to the berth.

      “Oh, I’m so ill!” he moaned.

      Adeline placed the baby beside him.

      “You are not to come, Adeline,” Philip shouted.

      Her eyes flashed rebellion. She gripped his arm in her hands. “I will come!” she shouted back.

      The vessel gave a heave that sent them all staggering into one corner of the cabin. Mrs. Cameron now appeared in the doorway. She had a shawl wrapped about her head and she was holding Mary closely to her, as though determined not to be parted from her at the moment of sinking. But she spoke calmly.

      “What is wrong?” she asked.

      “Nothing but a leak, ma’am. We are going to see the Captain.” Philip’s tone, his very presence, were reassuring.

      “We will go too.” They saw the words on her lips though they could not hear them.

      Clinging to the rail and to each other Philip and Adeline gained the companionway. They found the Captain and the first officer supervising the lowering of the sails. The great canvas thundered deckward as in terrifying capitulation. The stark masts looked suddenly fragile and the ship vulnerable. The wind blew with terrific force and green walls of water reared themselves, then came crashing against the side of the rolling ship. The heaving wash of the waters was palely illuminated by a cloud-bound moon, that only now and again really showed herself. Adeline had seen storms at sea before this and they were tropic storms, but the ship had been larger, the company more numerous. There was a loneliness about this storm. The little group of people seemed helpless, the wind was piercingly cold. However, the Captain spoke with equanimity.

      “It’s nothing but a squall,” he said in his hearty, Yorkshire accent. “I’ve been round the Cape many times myself and this is naught but a puff of wind. So you’d best go back to your berths, ladies, and not worry.”

      Above the noise of the storm came confused shoutings and tramping from the companionway. The steerage passengers were pouring up from below. They looked wild-eyed, rough and terrified.

      Captain Bradley strode over to them.

      “What does this mean?” he demanded.

      The second mate shouted back — “I couldn’t keep them down there, sir! The water’s pouring in below.”

      The Captain looked grim. He pressed his way through the crowd, ordering them to descend with him, which they did in great confusion.

      Adeline heard him shout — “All hands to the pumps!”

      Philip was patting her on the back. He was smiling at her. She smiled bravely back. He raised his voice and said — “The squall is passing. Everything will be all right.”

      “Take Mrs. Cameron’s arm,” she said. “She looks ready to drop.”

      Mary Cameron had left her mother’s side. Conway Court had his arm about her. Neither of them looked frightened but they both wore expressions of pale hilarity. Philip helped Mrs. Cameron back to her cabin. The wind was falling. Yet the sea was still heavy with great thundering waves and the wind still fierce enough to fill the storm sails, to which the ship had been stripped, to bursting point. In the welter of the waves the Alanna lay almost on her beam ends. Now a rainstorm advanced like a wall, seeming to join with the waves in the effort to drown those aboard.

      But Captain Bradley was not downcast. He went about, ruddy-faced and cheerfully shouting his orders. The swinging lanterns illumined but little the wild scene. Sailors were thrumming sails together and drawing them under the ship’s bow in what seemed a hopeless effort to stop the leak. Adeline felt that, if she went below, she would be desperate with fear. Here in the midst of the activity she felt herself equal to Philip in courage. She drew Mary Cameron and Conway to her side and the three of them linked themselves, waiting Philip’s return.

      “I gave her some brandy,” he said as he came up. “She needed it, poor lady, for she is half-dead with cold.” He turned to the girl. “Shall I take you down to your mother, Mary?”

      “Did she ask for me?” Mary’s voice was slightly sulky.

      “No. I think she’ll sleep. Perhaps you are better with us.”

      Conway Court gave a shout of laughter. “Mary, Mary, quite contrary — ” he sang. “Sailed away to the Port of Canary.”

      Philip frowned at him but Adeline laughed too and Mary gave him an adoring look. He was a wild figure in his bright-hued dressing gown with his tawny hair blowing in the wind.

      Mr. Wilmott came up to them.

      “The officers are not alarmed,” he said, “but the leak appears to be a bad one. The four pumps are working like the devil. Mr. D’Arcy and Mr. Brent are helping to man them and I’m ready to give a hand when I’m needed.”

      When morning came there were five feet of water in the hold. The pumps were working hard and the Captain said he had the situation under control. A stewardess brought breakfast to Adeline in her cabin. She had changed into dry things but had not slept. The tiny room was in a state of disorder, her wet clothing, the belongings of Philip and the baby, scatter promiscuously and depressingly. She felt herself being sucked down into a vortex of confusion, rather than of fear. But the hot tea, the bread and bacon, put life into her. She sat on the edge of the berth and combed out her hair. A pale sunlight filtered in at the porthole. She noticed the lively beauty