CHAPTER XXIII.
STUMPS IN DESPAIR—AND BOMBAY IN RAPTURES.
When Mr. John Shanks realised the full extent of his loss, his first impulse was to seize hold of the nearest passer-by and strangle him; his next, to dash down a narrow street close beside him in pursuit of some one; his next, to howl "stop thief!" and "murder!" and his next, to stare into a shop window in blank dismay, and meditate.
Of these various impulses, he gave way only to the last. His meditations, however, were confused and unsatisfactory. Turning from them abruptly, he hurried along the street at a furious walk, muttering, "I'll go an' tell Slagg." Then, pausing abruptly, "No, I won't, I 'll go an' inform the pleece."
Under this new impulse he hurried forward again, jostling people as he went, and receiving a good deal of rough-handling in return. Presently he came to a dead halt, and with knitted brows and set teeth, hissed, "I 'll go and drown myself."
Full of this intention he broke into a run, but not being acquainted with the place, found it necessary to ask his way to the port. This somewhat sobered him, but did not quite change his mind, so that when he eventually reached the neighbourhood of the shipping, he was still going at a quick excited walk. He was stopped by a big and obviously eccentric sea-captain, or mate, who asked him if he happened to know of any active stout young fellow who wanted to ship in a tight little craft about to sail for old England.
"No I don't," said Stumps, angrily.
"Come now, think again," said the skipper, in no degree abashed, and putting on a nautical grin, which was meant for a winning smile. "I 'm rather short-handed; give good wages; have an amiable temper, a good craft, and a splendid cook. You 're just the active spirited fellow that I want. You 'll ship now, eh?"
"No I won't," said Stumps, sulkily, endeavouring to push past.
"Well well, no offence. Keep an easy mind, and if you should chance to change it, just come and see me. Captain Bounce, of the Swordfish. There she lies, in all her beauty, quite a picture. Good day."
The eccentric skipper passed on, but Stumps did not move. He stood there with his eyes riveted on the pavement, and his lips tightly compressed. Evidently the drowning plan had been abandoned for something else—something that caused him to frown, then to smile, then to grow slightly pale, and then to laugh somewhat theatrically. While in this mood he was suddenly pushed to one side by some one who said—
The track 's made for walkin' on, not standin', young— Hallo!"
It was Slagg who had thus roughly encountered his mate.
"Why, Stumps, what 's the matter with you?"
"Nothing."
"Where 'ave you bin to?"
"Nowhere."
"Who 's bin afrightenin' of you?"
"Nobody."
"Nothin', nowhere, an' nobody," repeated his friend; "that 's what I calls a coorious combination for a man who 's as white as a sheet one moment, and as red as a turkey-cock the next."
"Well, Slagg," said Stumps, recovering himself a little, "the fact is, I've been taken in and robbed."
Hereupon he related all the circumstances of his late adventure to his astonished and disgusted comrade, who asserted roundly that he was a big booby, quite unfit to take care of himself.
"Hows'ever, we must do the best we can for you " he continued, "so come along to the police-office."
Information of the robbery was given, and inquiries instituted without delay, but without avail. Indeed the chief officer held out little hope of ultimate success; nevertheless, Slagg endeavoured to buoy up his friend with assurances that they must surely get hold of the thief in the long-run.
"And if we don't," he said to Robin and Sam, during a private conversation on the subject that same night, "we must just give him each a portion of what we have, for the poor stoopid has shared our trials, and ought to share our luck."
While Stumps was being thus fleeced in the lower part of the city, Robin and Sam had gone to make inquiries about Mrs. Langley, and at the Government House they discovered a clerk who had formerly been at Sarawak, and had heard of the fire, the abduction of the little girl, and of Mrs. Langley having afterwards gone to Bombay; but he also told them, to their great regret, that she had left for England six months before their arrival, and he did not know her address, or even the part of England to which she had gone.
"But," continued the clerk, who was a very friendly fellow, "I 'll make inquiries, and let you know the result, if you leave me your address. Meanwhile you can amuse yourself by paying a visit to that wonderful ship, the Great Eastern, which has come to lay a submarine telegraph cable "between this and Aden. Of course you have heard of her arrival—perhaps seen her."
"O yes," replied Robin, "We intend to visit her at once. She is an old acquaintance of mine, as I was in her when she laid the Atlantic cable in 1865. Does Captain Anderson still command her?"
"No," answered the clerk, who seemed much interested in what Robin said. "She is now commanded by Captain Halpin."
That evening Robin tried to console poor Letta in her disappointment at not finding her mother, and Sam sought to comfort Stumps for the loss of his treasure. Neither comforter was very successful. Letta wept in spite of Robin, and Stumps absolutely refused to be comforted!
Next day, however, the tears were dried, and Letta became cheery again in the prospect of a visit to the Great Eastern.
But Stumps was no better. Indeed he seemed worse, and flatly refused to accompany them on their trip, although all the world of Bombay was expected to go.
"Stumps, Stumps,
Down in the dumps!
Down in the dumps so low—O!"
Sang Jim Slagg as he waved his hand in farewell on quitting the hotel. "Good-bye, my boy, and get your spirits up before we return, if you can."
"I 'll try," replied Stumps with a grim smile.
The event which stirred the city of Bombay to its centre at this time was indeed a memorable one. The connecting of India with England direct by a deep-sea cable was a matter of the greatest importance, because the land telegraph which existed at the time was wretchedly worked, passing, as it did, through several countries, which involved translation and re-translation, besides subjecting messages to needless delay on the part of unbusiness-like peoples. In addition to the brighter prospects which the proposed cable was opening up, the presence of the largest ship that had ever yet been constructed was a point of overwhelming attraction, and so great were the crowds that went on board to see the marine wonder, that it was found somewhat difficult to carry on the necessary work of coaling and making preparations for the voyage.
"Robin," said Sam, as they walked along with Letta between them, "I 've just discovered that the agent of the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company is an old friend of mine. He has been busy erecting a cable landing-house on the shores of Back Bay, so we 'll go there first and get him to accompany us to the big ship."
"Good," said Robin, "if it is not too far for Letta to walk."
The landing-house, which they soon reached, stood near to the "green" where the Bombay and Baroda Railway tumbled out its stream of cotton until the region became a very sea of bales. It was a little edifice with a thatched roof and Venetian blinds, commanding a fine view of the whole of Back Bay, with Malabar Point to the right and the governor's house imbedded in trees. Long lines of surf marked the position of ugly rocks which were visible at low water, but among these there was a pathway of soft sand marked off by stakes, along which the shore-end of the cable was to lie.
For the reception of the extreme end of the cable there was provided, in the cable-house, a testing table of solid masonry, with a wooden top on which the testing instruments were to stand; the great delicacy of these instruments rendering a fixed table indispensable.
When our friends reached the cable-house, native labourers, in picturesque Oriental costume, were busy thatching its roof or painting it blue, while some were screwing its parts together; for the house, with a view to future telegraphic requirements, was built so as to come to pieces for shipment to still more distant quarters of the globe.
Sam's friend could not go with him, he said, but he would introduce him to a young acquaintance among the working engineers who was going off with a party in half an hour or so. Accordingly, in a short time they were gliding over the hay, and ere long stood on the deck of the big ship.
"Oh, Letta!" said Robin, with a glitter of enthusiasm in his eyes, as he gazed round on the well-remembered deck, "it feels like meeting an old friend after a long separation."
"How nice!" said Letta.
This "how nice" of the child was, so to speak, a point of great attraction to our hero. She always accompanied it with a smile so full of sympathy, interest, and urbanity, that it became doubly significant on her lips. Letta was precocious. She had grown so rapidly in sympathetic capacity and intelligence, since becoming acquainted with her new friends, that Robin had gradually come to speak to her about his thoughts and feelings very much as he used to speak to cousin Madge when he was a boy.
"Yes," he continued, "I had forgotten how big she was, and she seems to me actually to have grown bigger. There never was a ship like her in the world. Such huge proportions, such a vast sweep of graceful lines. The chief difference that I observe is the coat of white paint they have given her. She seems to have been whitewashed from stem to stern. It was for the heat, I fancy."
"Yes, sir, it wor," said a bluff cable-man who chanced to overhear the remark, "an' if you wor in the tanks, you 'd 'ave blessed Capt'n Halpin for wot he done. Wy, sir, that coat o' whitewash made a difference o' no less than eight degrees in the cable-tanks the moment it was putt on. Before that we was nigh stooed alive. Arter that we 've on'y bin baked."
"Indeed?" said Robin, but before he could say more the bluff cable-man had returned to his bakery.
"Just look here," he continued, turning again to Letta; "the great ships around us seem like little ones, by contrast, and the little ones like boats,—don't they?"
"Yes, and the boats like toys," said Letta, "and the people in them like dolls."
"True, little one, and yonder comes a toy steamer," said Sam, who had been contemplating the paying-out gear in silent admiration, "with some rather curious dolls on it."
"Oh!" exclaimed Letta, with great surprise, "look, Robin, look at the horses—just as if we were on shore!"
Among the many surprising things on board of the big ship, few were more striking for incongruity than the pair of grey carriage-horses, to which Letta referred, taking their morning exercise composedly up and down one side of the deck, with a groom at their heads.
The steamer referred to by Sam was one which contained a large party of Hindu and Parsee ladies and children who had come off to see the ship. These streamed into her in a bright procession, and were soon scattered about, making the decks and saloons like Eastern flower-beds with their many-coloured costumes—of red, pink, white, and yellow silks and embroideries, and bracelets, brooches, nose-rings, anklets, and other gold and silver ornaments.
The interest taken by the natives in the Great Eastern was naturally great, and was unexpectedly illustrated in the following manner. Captain Halpin, anticipating difficulties in the matter of coaling and otherwise carrying on the work of the expedition, had resolved to specify particular days for sight-seers, and to admit them by ticket, on which a small fee was charged—the sum thus raised to be distributed among the crew at the end of the voyage. In order to meet the convenience of the "upper ten" of English at Bombay, the charge at first was two rupees (about 4s.), and it was advertised that the ship would afterwards be thrown open at lower rates, but to the surprise of all, from an early hour on the two-rupee day the ship was beset by Parsees, Hindus, and Mohammedans, so that eventually, on all sides—on the decks, the bridge, the paddle-boxes, down in the saloons, outside the cable-tanks, mixed up with the machinery, clustering round the huge red buoys, and at the door of the testing-room—the snowy robes, and strange head-dresses, bright costumes, brighter eyes, brown faces, and turbans far outnumbered the stiff and sombre Europeans. These people evidently regarded the Great Eastern as one of the wonders of the world. "The largest vessel ever seen in Bombay," said an enthusiastic Parsee, "used to be the Bates Family, of Liverpool, and now there she lies alongside of us looking like a mere jolly-boat."
While Sam and his friends were thus standing absorbed by the contemplation of the curious sights and sounds around them, one of the engineer staff, who had served on board during the laying of the 1866 Atlantic cable, chanced to pass, and, recognising Robin as an old friend, grasped and shook his hand warmly. Robin was not slow to return the greeting.
"Frank Hedley," he exclaimed, "why, I thought you had gone to California!"
"Robin Wright," replied the young engineer, "I thought you were dead!"
"Not yet," returned Robin; "I 'm thankful to report myself alive and well."
"But you ought to be dead," persisted Frank, "for you 've been mourned as such for nigh a couple of years. At least the vessel in which you sailed has never been heard of, and the last time I saw your family, not four months since, they had all gone into mourning for you."
"Poor mother!" murmured Robin, his eyes filling with tears, "but, please God, we shall meet again before long."
"Come—come down with me to the engine-room and have a talk about it," said Frank, "and let your friends come too."
Just as he spoke, one of the little brown-faced Mohammedan boys fixed his glittering eyes on an opening in the bulwarks of the ship, through which the water could be seen glancing brightly. That innate spirit of curiosity peculiar to small boys all the world over, induced him to creep partly through the opening and glance down at the sparkling fluid. That imperfect notion of balance, not infrequent in small boys, caused him to tip over and cleave the water with his head. His Mohammedan relatives greeted the incident with shrieks of alarm. Robin, who had seen him tip over, being a good swimmer, and prompt to act, went through the same hole like a fish-torpedo, and caught the brown boy by the hair, as he rose to the surface with staring eyes, outspread fingers, and a bursting cry.
Rope-ends, life-buoys, and other things were flung over the side; oars were plunged; boats darted forward; fifty efforts at rescue were made in as many seconds, for there was wealth of aid at hand, and in a wonderfully brief space of time the brown boy was restored to his grateful friends, while Robin, enveloped in a suit of dry clothes much too large for him, was seated with his friend the engineer down among the great cranks, and wheels, and levers, of the regions below.
"It 's well the sharks weren't on the outlook," said Frank Hedley, as he brought forward a small bench for Letta, Sam, and Jim Slagg. "You won't mind the oily smell, my dear," he said to Letta.
"O no. I rather like it," replied the accommodating child.
"It's said to be fattening," remarked Slagg, "even when taken through the nose."
"Come now, let me hear all about my dear mother and the rest of them, Frank," said Robin.
Frank began at once, and, for a considerable time, conversed about the sayings and doings of the Wright family, and of the world at large, and about the loss of the cable-ship; but gradually and slowly, yet surely, the minds and converse of the little party came round to the all-absorbing topic, like the needle to the pole!
"So, you 're actually going to begin to coal to-morrow?" said Sam.
"Yes, and we hope to be ready in a few days to lay the shore-end of the cable," answered the young engineer.
"But have they not got land lines of telegraph which work well enough?" asked Robin.
"Land lines!" exclaimed Frank, with a look of contempt. "Yes, they have, and no doubt the lines are all right enough, but the people through whose countries they pass are all wrong. Why, the Government lines are so frequently out of order just now, that their daily condition is reported on as if they were noble invalids. Just listen to this (he caught up a very much soiled and oiled newspaper)—'Telegraph Line Reports, Kurrachee, 2d Feby., 6 p.m.—Cable communication perfect to Fao; Turkish line is interrupted beyond Semawali; Persian line interrupted beyond Shiraz.' And it is constantly like that—the telegraphic disease, though intermittent, is chronic. One can never be sure when the line may be unfit for duty. Sometimes from storms, sometimes from the assassination of the operators in wild districts through which the land wires pass, and sometimes from the destruction of lines out of pure mischief, the telegraph is often beaten by the mail."
"There seems, indeed, much need for a cable direct," said Sam, "which will make us independent of Turks, Persians, Arabs, and all the rest of them. By the way, how long is your cable?"
"The cable now in our tanks is 2375 nautical miles long, but our companion ships, the Hibernia, Chiltern, and Hawk, carry among them 1225 miles more, making a total of 3600 nautical miles, which is equal, as you know, to 4050 statute miles. This is to suffice for the communication between Bombay and Aden, and for the connecting of the Malta and Alexandria lines. They are now laying a cable between England, Gibraltar, and Malta, so that when all is completed there will be one line of direct submarine telegraph unbroken, except at Suez.
"Magnificent!" exclaimed Robin, "why, it won't be long before we shall be able to send a message to India and get a reply in the same day."
"In the same day!" cried Sam, slapping his thigh; "mark my words, as uncle Rik used to say, you 'll be able to do that, my boy, within the same hour before long."
"Come, Sam, don't indulge in prophecy. It does not become you," said Robin. "By the way, Frank, what about uncle Rik? You have scarcely mentioned him."
"Oh! he 's the same hearty old self-opinionated fellow as ever. Poor fellow, he was terribly cut up about your supposed death. I really believe that he finds it hard even to smile now, much less to laugh. As for Madge, she won't believe that you are lost—at least she won't admit it, though it is easy to see that anxiety has told upon her."
"I wonder how my poor old mother has took it," said Slagg, pathetically. "But she 's tough, an' can't be got to believe things easy. She 'll hold out till I turn up, I dessay, and when I present myself she 'll say, 'I know'd it!'"
"But to return to the cable," said Sam, with an apologetic smile. "Is there any great difference between it and the old ones?"
"Not very much. We have found, however, that a little marine wretch called the teredo attacks hemp so greedily that we've had to invent a new compound wherewith to coat it, namely, ground flint or silica, pitch, and tar, which gives the teredo the toothache, I suppose, for it turns him off effectually. We have also got an intermediate piece of cable to affix between the heavy shore-end and the light deep-sea portion. There are, of course, several improvements in the details of construction, but essentially it is the same as the cables you have already seen, with its seven copper wires covered with gutta-percha, and other insulating and protecting substances."
"It 's what I calls a tremendious undertakin'," said Slagg.
"It is indeed," assented Frank, heartily, for like all the rest of the crew, from the captain downwards, he was quite enthusiastic about the ship and her work. "Why, when you come to think of it, it 's unbelievable. I sometimes half expect to waken up and find it is all a dream. Just fancy. We left England with a freight of 21,000 tons. The day is not long past when I thought a ship of 1000 tons a big one; what a mite that is to our Leviathan, as she used to be called. We had 5512 tons of cable, 3824 tons of fuel, 6499 tons of coal and electric apparatus and appliances when we started; the whole concern, ship included, being valued at somewhere about two millions sterling. It may increase your idea of the size and needs of our little household when I tell you that the average quantity of coal burned on the voyage out has been 200 tons a day."
"It 's a positive romance in facts and figures," said Sam.
"A great reality, you should have said," remarked Robin.
And so, romancing on this reality of facts and figures in many a matter-of-fact statement and figurative rejoinder, they sat there among the great cranks, and valves, and pistons, and levers, until the declining day warned them that it was time to go ashore.