The Lighthouse

OLD FRIENDS IN NEW CIRCUMSTANCES

Let us now return to Ruby Brand; and in order that the reader may perfectly understand the proceedings of that bold youth, let us take a glance at the Bell Bock Lighthouse in its completed condition.

We have already said that the lower part, from the foundation to the height of thirty feet, was built of solid masonry, and that at the top of this solid part stood the entrance-door of the building—­facing towards the south.

The position of the door was fixed after the solid part had been exposed to a winter’s storms.  The effect on the building was such that the most sheltered or lee side was clearly indicated; the weather-side being thickly covered with limpets, barnacles, and short green seaweed, while the lee-side was comparatively free from such incrustations.

The walls at the entrance-door are nearly seven feet thick, and the short passage that pierces them leads to the foot of a spiral staircase, which conducts to the lowest apartment in the tower, where the walls decrease in thickness to three feet.  This room is the provision store.  Here are kept water-tanks and provisions of all kinds, including fresh vegetables which, with fresh water, are supplied once a fortnight to the rock all the year round.  The provision store is the smallest apartment, for, as the walls of the tower decrease in thickness as they rise, the several apartments necessarily increase as they ascend.

The second floor is reached by a wooden staircase or ladder, leading up through a “manhole” in the ceiling.  Here is the lightroom store, which contains large tanks of polished metal for the oil consumed by the lights.  A whole year’s stock of oil, or about 1100 gallons, is stored in these tanks.  Here also is a small carpenter’s bench and tool-box, besides an endless variety of odds and ends,—­such as paint-pots, brushes, flags, waste for cleaning the reflectors, &c. &c.

Another stair, similar to the first, leads to the third floor, which is the kitchen of the building.  It stands about sixty-six feet above the foundation.  We shall have occasion to describe it and the rooms above presently.  Meanwhile, let it suffice to say, that the fourth floor contains the men’s sleeping berths, of which there are six, although three men is the usual complement on the rock.  The fifth floor is the library, and above that is the lantern; the whole building, from base to summit, being 115 feet high.

At the time when Ruby entered the door of the Bell Rock Lighthouse, as already described, there were three keepers in the building, one of whom was on his watch in the lantern, while the other two were in the kitchen.

These men were all old friends.  The man in the lantern was George Forsyth, who had been appointed one of the light-keepers in consideration of his good services and steadiness.  He was seated reading at a small desk.  Close above him was the blazing series of lights, which revolved slowly and steadily by means of machinery, moved by a heavy weight.  A small bell was struck slowly but regularly by the same machinery, in token that all was going on well.  If that bell had ceased to sound, Forsyth would at once have leaped up to ascertain what was wrong with the lights.  So long as it continued to ring he knew that all was well, and that he might continue his studies peacefully—­not quietly, however, for, besides the rush of wind against the thick plate glass of the lantern, there was the never-ceasing roar of the ventilator, in which the heated air from within and the cold air from without met and kept up a terrific war.  Keepers get used to that sound, however, and do not mind it.

Each keeper’s duty was to watch for three successive hours in the lantern.

Not less familiar were the faces of the occupants of the kitchen.  To this apartment Ruby ascended without anyone hearing him approach, for one of the windows was open, and the roar of the storm effectually drowned his light footfall.  On reaching the floor immediately below the kitchen he heard the tones of a violin, and when his head emerged through the manhole of the kitchen floor, he paused and listened with deep interest, for the air was familiar.

Peeping round the corner of the oaken partition that separated the manhole from the apartment, he beheld a sight which filled his heart with gladness, for there, seated on a camp stool, with his back leaning against the dresser, his face lighted up by the blaze of a splendid fire, which burned in a most comfortable-looking kitchen range, and his hands drawing forth most pathetic music from a violin, sat his old friend Joe Dumsby, while opposite to him on a similar camp stool, with his arm resting on a small table, and a familiar black pipe in his mouth, sat that worthy son of Vulcan, Jamie Dove.

The little apartment glowed with ruddy light, and to Ruby, who had just escaped from a scene of such drear and dismal aspect, it appeared, what it really was, a place of the most luxurious comfort.

Dove was keeping time to the music with little puffs of smoke, and Joe was in the middle of a prolonged shake, when Ruby passed through the doorway and stood before them.

Dove’s eyes opened to their widest, and his jaw dropt, so did his pipe, and the music ceased abruptly, while the faces of both men grew pale.

“I’m not a ghost, boys,” said Ruby, with a laugh, which afforded immense relief to his old comrades.  “Come, have ye not a welcome for an old messmate who swims off to visit you on such a night as this?”

Dove was the first to recover.  He gasped, and, holding out both arms, exclaimed, “Ruby Brand!”

“And no mistake!” cried Ruby, advancing and grasping his friend warmly by the hands.

For at least half a minute the two men shook each other’s hands lustily and in silence.  Then they burst into a loud laugh, while Joe, suddenly recovering, went crashing into a Scotch reel with energy so great that time and tune were both sacrificed.  As if by mutual impulse, Ruby and Dove began to dance!  But this was merely a spurt of feeling, more than half-involuntary.  In the middle of a bar Joe flung down the fiddle, and, springing up, seized Ruby round the neck and hugged him, an act which made him aware of the fact that he was dripping wet.

“Did ye swim hoff to the rock?” he enquired, stepping back, and gazing at his friend with a look of surprise, mingled with awe.

“Indeed I did.”

“But how? why? what mystery are ye rolled up in?” exclaimed the smith.

“Sit down, sit down, and quiet yourselves,” said Ruby, drawing a stool near to the fire, and seating himself.  “I’ll explain, if you’ll only hold your tongues, and not look so scared like.”

“No, Ruby; no, lad, you must change yer clothes first,” said the smith, in a tone of authority; “why, the fire makes you steam like a washin’ biler.  Come along with me, an’ I’ll rig you out.”

“Ay, go hup with ‘im, Ruby.  Bless me, this is the most amazin’ hincident as ever ’appened to me.  Never saw nothink like it.”

As Dove and Ruby ascended to the room above, Joe went about the kitchen talking to himself, poking the fire violently, overturning the camp stools, knocking about the crockery on the dresser, and otherwise conducting himself like a lunatic.

Of course Ruby told Dove parts of his story by fits and starts as he was changing his garments; of course he had to be taken up to the lightroom and go through the same scene there with Forsyth that had occurred in the kitchen; and, of course, it was not until all the men, himself included, had quite exhausted themselves, that he was able to sit down at the kitchen fire and give a full and connected account of himself, and of his recent doings.

After he had concluded his narrative, which was interrupted by frequent question and comment, and after he had refreshed himself with a cup of tea, he rose and said—­

“Now, boys, it’s not fair to be spending all the night with you here, while my old comrade Forsyth sits up yonder all alone.  I’ll go up and see him for a little.”

“We’ll go hup with ’ee, lad,” said Dumsby.

“No ye won’t,” replied Ruby; “I want him all to myself for a while; fair play and no favour, you know, used to be our watchword on the rock in old times.  Besides, his watch will be out in a little, so ye can come up and fetch him down.”

“Well, go along with you,” said the smith.  “Hallo! that must have been a big ’un.”

This last remark had reference to a distinct tremor in the building, caused by the falling of a great wave upon it.

“Does it often get raps like that?” enquired Ruby, with a look of surprise.

“Not often,” said Dove, “once or twice durin’ a gale, mayhap, when a bigger one than usual chances to fall on us at the right angle.  But the lighthouse shakes worst just the gales begin to take off and when the swell rolls in heavy from the east’ard.”

“Ay, that’s the time,” quoth Joe.  “W’y, I’ve ’eard all the cups and saucers on the dresser rattle with the blows o’ them heavy seas, but the gale is gittin’ to be too strong to-night to shake us much.”

“Too strong!” exclaimed Ruby.

“Ay.  You see w’en it blows very hard, the breakers have not time to come down on us with a ‘eavy tellin’ blow, they goes tumblin’ and swashin’ round us and over us, hammerin’ away wildly every how, or nohow, or anyhow, just like a hexcited man fightin’ in a hurry.  The after-swell, that’s wot does it. That’s wot comes on slow, and big, and easy, but powerful, like a great prize-fighter as knows what he can do, and means to do it.”

“A most uncomfortable sort of residence,” said Ruby, as he turned to quit the room.

“Not a bit, when ye git used to it,” said the smith.  “At first we was rather skeered, but we don’t mind now.  Come, Joe, give us ’Rule, Britannia’—­’pity she don’t rule the waves straighter’, as somebody writes somewhere.”

So saying, Dove resumed his pipe, and Dumsby his fiddle, while Ruby proceeded to the staircase that led to the rooms above.

Just as he was about to ascend, a furious gust of wind swept past, accompanied by a wild roar of the sea; at the same moment a mass of spray dashed against the small window at his side.  He knew that this window was at least sixty feet above the rock, and he was suddenly filled with a strong desire to have a nearer view of the waves that had force to mount so high.  Instead, therefore, of ascending to the lantern, he descended to the doorway, which was open, for, as the storm blew from the eastward, the door was on the lee-side.

There were two doors—­one of metal, with thick plate-glass panels at the inner end of the passage; the other, at the outer end of it, was made of thick solid wood bound with metal, and hung so as to open outwards.  When the two leaves of this heavy door were shut they were flush with the tower, so that nothing was presented for the waves to act upon.  But this door was never closed except in cases of storm from the southward.

The scene which presented itself to our hero when he stood in the entrance passage was such as neither pen nor pencil can adequately depict.  The tide was full, or nearly so, and had the night been calm the water would have stood about twelve or fourteen feet on the sides of the tower, leaving a space of about the same height between its surface and the spot at the top of the copper ladder where Ruby stood; but such was the wild commotion of the sea that this space was at one moment reduced to a few feet, as the waves sprang up towards the doorway, or nearly doubled, as they sank hissing down to the very rock.

Acres of white, leaping, seething foam covered the spot where the terrible Bell Rock lay.  Never for a moment did that boiling cauldron get time to show one spot of dark-coloured water.  Billow after billow came careering on from the open sea in quick succession, breaking with indescribable force and fury just a few yards to windward of the foundations of the lighthouse, where the outer ledges of the rock, although at the time deep down in the water, were sufficiently near the surface to break their first full force, and save the tower from destruction, though not from many a tremendous blow and overwhelming deluge of water.

When the waves hit the rock they were so near that the lighthouse appeared to receive the shock.  Rushing round it on either side, the cleft billows met again to leeward, just opposite the door, where they burst upwards in a magnificent cloud of spray to a height of full thirty feet.  At one time, while Ruby held on by the man-ropes at the door and looked over the edge, he could see a dark abyss with the foam shimmering pale far below; another instant, and the solid building perceptibly trembled, as a green sea hit it fair on the weather-side.  A continuous roar and hiss followed as the billow swept round, filled up the dark abyss, and sent the white water gleaming up almost into the doorway.  At the same moment the sprays flew by on either side of the column, so high that a few drops were thrown on the lantern.  To Ruby’s eye these sprays appeared to be clouds driving across the sky, so high were they above his head.  A feeling of awe crept over him as his mind gradually began to realize the world of water which, as it were, overwhelmed him—­water and foam roaring and flying everywhere—­the heavy seas thundering on the column at his back—­the sprays from behind arching almost over the lighthouse, and meeting those that burst up in front, while an eddy of wind sent a cloud swirling in at the doorway, and drenched him to the skin!  It was an exhibition of the might of God in the storm such as he had never seen before, and a brief sudden exclamation of thanksgiving burst from the youth’s lips, as he thought of how hopeless his case would have been had the French vessel passed the lighthouse an hour later than it did.

The contrast between the scene outside and that inside the Bell Rock Lighthouse at that time was indeed striking.  Outside there was madly raging conflict; inside there were peace, comfort, security:  Ruby, with his arms folded, standing calmly in the doorway; Jamie Dove and Joe Dumsby smoking and fiddling in the snug kitchen; George Forsyth reading (the Pilgrim’s Progress mayhap, or Robinson Crusoe, for both works were in the Bell Rock library) by the bright blaze of the crimson and white lamps, high up in the crystal lantern.

If a magician had divided the tower in two from top to bottom while some ship was staggering past before the gale, he would have presented to the amazed mariners the most astonishing picture of “war without and peace within” that the world ever saw!