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With the one that followed the gale abated, and as the Florentia swept southward under easy sail, comfort was restored. The passengers settled themselves down to the enjoyment of that absolute rest and passive luxuriousness which characterise board-ship life in fine weather. Miss Vavasour and Miranda were soon deep in earnest conversation, both for the time disregarding the books with which they had furnished themselves. Mrs. Craven had devoted herself to an endless task of knitting, which apparently supplied a substitute for thought, reading, recreation, and conversation.

I was talking to the captain when a lady came up the companion, followed by the colonel, who half lifted, half led a fine little boy of four or five years of age.

"Oh," said the captain, with a sudden movement towards the new arrivals, "I see Mrs. Percival has come on deck. Come over and be introduced." We walked over, and I received a formal bow from a handsome, pale woman, who had evidently been sojourning in the East. There is a certain similarity in all "Indian women," as they are generally called, which extends even to manner and expression. Long residence in a hot climate robs them of their roses, while the habit of command, resulting from association with an inferior race, gives them a tinge of hauteur – not to say unconscious insolence of manner – which is scarcely agreeable to those who, from circumstances, they may deem to be socially inferior.

So it was that Miranda, in spite of Miss Vavasour's nods and signals, received but the faintest recognition, and retreated to her chair somewhat chilled by her reception. She, however, took no apparent notice of the slight, and was soon absorbed in conversation with Miss Vavasour, her brother, and Mrs. Craven, who had moved up her chair to join the party. The colonel deserted his former friends to devote himself to his family duties, while the captain and I walked forward and commenced a discussion which had, at any rate, a strong personal interest for me.

"Now look here, Hilary," said he, as he lighted a fresh cigar. He had been smoking on the quarter-deck under protest, as it were, and thus commenced: "Listen to me, my boy! I've been thinking seriously about you and Miranda. Your start in life when you get to Sydney is important. I think I can give you a bit of advice worth following. You understand all the dialects between here and the Line Islands, don't you?"

"More than eight," I answered; "I can talk with nearly every islander from here to the Gilberts. I have learned so much, at any rate, in my wanderings."

"And a very good thing, too, for it's not a thing that can be picked up in a year, no matter how a man may work, and he's useless or nearly so without it; you can keep accounts, write well, and all that?"

I replied that I had a number of peculiar accounts to keep as supercargo to the Leonora, as well as all Hayston's business letters to write; that my office books were always considered neat, complete, and well kept. Then he suddenly said, "You are the very man we want!"

"Who are we, and what is the man wanted for?" I asked.

"For the South Sea Island trade, and no other," said Captain Carryall, putting his hand on my shoulder. "Old Paul Frankston (you've heard of him) and I have laid it out to establish a regular mercantile house in Sydney for the development of the island trade. The old man will back us, and the name of Paul Frankston is good from New Zealand to the North Pole and back again. I will do the whaling, cruising, and cargo business – cocoa-nut oil, copra, and curios – while you will live in one of those nice white houses at North Shore, somewhere about Neutral Bay, where you can see the ships come through the Heads; Miranda can have a skiff, and you a ten-tonner, so as not to forget your boating and your sea-legs. What do you think of that, eh?"

"It is a splendid idea!" I cried, "and poor Miranda will be within sound of the sea. If she were not, she would pine away like her own araucarias which will not live outside of the wave music. But how about the cash part of it? I haven't much. Most of my savings went down in the Leonora."

"Oh, we'll manage that somehow! Old Paul will work that part of the arrangement. I daresay your father will advance what will make your share equal, or nearly so, to ours."

"It sounds well," I said. "With partners like Mr. Frankston and yourself a man ought to be able to do something. I know almost every island where trade can be got, and the price to a cowrie that should be paid. There ought to be a fortune in it in five years. What a pity Hayston couldn't have had such a chance."

"He'd have had the cash, and the other partners the experience, in less than that time," said the captain, smiling sardonically. "He was a first-rate organiser if he had not been such a d – d scoundrel. He had some fine qualities, I allow; as a seaman he had no equal. In the good old fighting days he would have been a splendid robber baron. But in these modern times, where there is a trifle of law and order in most countries, even in the South Seas he was out of place."

"He was far from a model mariner," I said, "but it hurts me to hear him condemned. He had splendid points in his character, and no one but myself will ever know how much good there was mixed up with his recklessness and despair. I left him, but I couldn't help being fond of him to the last."

"It was a good thing for you that you did – a very good thing. You will live to be thankful for it. He was a dangerous beggar, and neither man nor woman could escape his fascination. However, that's all past and gone now. You're married and settled, remember, and you're to be Hilary Telfer, Esq., J.P., and all the rest of it directly, and the only sea-going business you can have for the future is to be Commodore of the Neutral Bay Yacht Club, or some such title and distinction. And now I've done for the present. You go and see what Miranda thinks of it. I won't agree to anything unless she consents."

Miranda was charmed with the idea of a mercantile marine enterprise, so much in accordance with her previous habits and experiences. The added inducement of living on the sea-shore, with a boat, a jetty, and a bathing-house, decided her. She implicitly believed in Captain Carryall's power and ability to make our fortune; was also certain that, with Mr. Frankston's commercial aid, we should soon be as rich as the Guldensterns, the Rothschilds of the Pacific. She surrendered herself thereupon to a dream of bliss, alloyed only at intervals by a tinge of apprehension that the great undiscovered country of Sydney society might prove hostile or indifferent.

So much she communicated to Miss Vavasour as she and Mrs. Craven were reclining side by side on their deck chairs, while the Florentia was gliding along on another day all sunshine, azure, and favouring breeze.

"Don't you be afraid, my dear," said the kind-hearted Mrs. Craven, "you and your husband are quite able to hold your own in Sydney society or any other; indeed, I shall be inclined to bet that you'd be the rage rather than otherwise. I wish I had you in Northamptonshire, I'd undertake to 'knock out' (as Charlie says) the local belles in a fortnight."

Miranda laughed the childishly happy laugh of unspoiled girlhood. "Dear Mrs. Craven, how good of you to say so; but, of course, I know I'm a sort of savage, who will improve in a year or two if every one is as kind as you and Miss Vavasour here; but suppose they should be like her," and she motioned towards Mrs. Percival.

This lady had never relaxed the coldness and hauteur towards Miranda and myself. She had been unable to modify her "Indian manner," as Captain Carryall and Mr. Vavasour called it, and about which they made daily jokes.

As she passed the little group, she bowed slightly and without relaxation of feature, going forward to the waist of the ship, where she sat down and was soon absorbed in a book. The three friends smiled at each other, and continued their conversation.

"I should like to dress you for a garden-party, Miranda," said Miss Vavasour; "let me see now, a real summer day, such as we sometimes get in dear old England – not like this one perhaps, but very nice. A lovely old manor house like Gravenhurst or Hunsdon – such a lawn, such old trees, such a river, a marquee under an elm a hundred years old, and the county magnates marching in from their carriages."

"Oh, how delicious!" cried Miranda. "I have read such descriptions in books, but you – oh, how happy you must be to have lived it all!"

"It's very nice, but as to the happiness, that doesn't always follow," confessed the English girl with a half sigh. "I almost think you have the greater share of that. Anyhow, just as the company are assembled, I am seen walking down from the house. We are of the house party, you know, Miranda and I. She is dressed in a soft, white, embroidered muslin, very simply made, with a little, a very little Valenciennes lace. Its long straight folds hang gracefully around her matchless figure, and are confined at the waist by a broad, white moiré sash; white gloves, a white moiré parasol, a large Gainsborough hat with fleecy white feathers, and Miranda's costume is complete – the very embodiment of fresh, fair girlhood, unspotted from the world of fashion and folly."

CHAPTER XVI
A SWIM FOR LIFE

The words died on her lips as a shriek, wild, agonising, despairing, rang through the air, and startled not only the little group of pleased listeners, but all who happened to be on deck at the time. We started up and gazed towards the spot whence the cry had come. The colonel, who had been reading on the opposite side of the deck, calmly smoking the while, dropped his book and only saved his meerschaum by a cricketer's smart catch. The captain came bounding up from below, followed by the steward and his boy; the foc'sle hands, with the black cook, hurled themselves aft. All guessed the cause as they saw Mrs. Percival wringing her hands frantically and gazing at an object in the sea.

Her boy had fallen overboard! Yes! the little fellow, active and courageous beyond his years, had tried to crawl up to the shrouds while his mother's eyes were engaged in the perusal of the leading novel of the day. Weary of inaction, the poor little chap had done a little climbing on his own account, and an unexpected roll of the ship had sent him overboard. Light as the wind was, he was already a long way astern.

Long before all these observations were made, however, and while the astonished spectators were questioning their senses as to the meaning of the confusion, Miranda had sprung upon the rail, and in the next moment, with hands clasped above her head, was parting the smooth waters. Rising to the surface, she swam with rapid and powerful strokes towards the receding form of the still floating child. With less rapidity of motion, I cast myself into the heaving waste of water, not that I doubted Miranda's ability to overtake and bear up the child, but from simple inability to remain behind while all that was worth living for on earth was adrift upon the wave.

I followed in her wake, and though I failed to keep near her, for the Pitcairn islanders are among the fastest swimmers in the world, I yet felt that I might be of some use or aid. Long before I could overtake her she had caught up the little fellow, and lifting him high above the water, was swimming easily towards me.

"Oh! you foolish boy!" she cried, "why did you come after me? do you want to be drowned again?" Here she smiled and showed her lovely teeth as if it was rather a good joke. It may have been, but at that time and place I was not in the humour to perceive it.

"I came for the same reason that you did, I suppose – because I could not stay behind. If anything had happened to you what should I have done? Here comes the boat, though, and we can talk it over on board."

Some little time had been expended in lowering the boat. The ship had been brought to, but even then – and with so light a wind – it was astonishing what a distance we had fallen behind. It was a curious sensation, such specks as we were upon the immense water-plain which stretched around to the horizon. However, the Florentia was strongly in evidence, and nearer and nearer came the whaleboat, with the captain at the steer-oar, and the men pulling as if they were laying on a crack harpooner to an eighty barrel whale.

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."