A Terrible Coward | Page 2

would hold his breath in dread as he saw Mark Penelly, who was the finest swimmer at the port of Carn Du, climb up the side of the great black rock upon some fine summer evening, then go round along the narrow shelf of shaley stone, till he stood alone there forty feet above the sea, his white figure as he rested against the black rock, every muscle standing out from his well-knit frame, and his arms crossed, looking like some antique statue in its niche.
There were plenty of young men who could perform the feat, but Mark Penelly was acknowledged to be the master.
Dotted about the swelling surface there would be the heads of plenty of swimmers--men and lads--some going smoothly along, mounting the rollers as they came in, and descending softly into the hollows; others again swimming to meet each wave, then rising a little, and with a plunge like a duck or one of the great bronze-black shags, or cormorants, that sat upon the rock-shelves, diving right through the mass of water, to come out fairly on the other side.
Some would swim out to the little buoys, rest by them for a time, and swim back. Others would make for one of the cinnamon-sailed luggers lying at anchor, to go round and back, or would get into one of the boats; while some, more venturesome, or really more confident in their powers over the water, would go boldly out, perhaps a mile, to meet some lugger coming in from the fishing-ground, sure of being taken aboard and riding back abreast of the boulders where they had left their clothes.
To be a good swimmer was everything at Carn Du. They looked upon it as a business--as part of their education--for no boy or man was counted fit to go out in a boat who could not leap overboard and swim alongside, or, during a capsize, keep himself afloat, and help to turn the boat and bale her out.
But from the meanest to the best swimmer there, every one paused to watch Mark Penelly standing statue-like up against the black rock, waiting till a great ninth wave came majestically rolling in, sweeping over the outer rocks--the Shangles--and then with a boom leaping at Carn Du, running up it, as it were, in a mighty column of water, some twenty feet even on a calm day.
Now was the time, calculated by practised eyes to the moment.
As the wave struck, Mark could be seen to grow suddenly less statuesque. His arms would drop to his side, and then as it rushed up towards where he stood, like some mighty sea-monster seeking to make him its prey, Mark's hands joined above his head, he bent forward slightly, and then with one tremendous leap seemed to leave the rocky ledge, and plunge down head foremost into the wave.
The effect was electric, but its daring seemed to savour of madness. There one moment stood the statuesque figure, white as a cameo cut in the black rock, the next moment there was a gleam of something flashing through the air, and passing into the deep blue wave, which, as if by the contact of the figure, broke into silvery foam, rushing back like a vast cascade towards the Shangles.
Where all before was smooth heaving water all was now rushing foam, as the broken wave raced back, as if to pass between two narrow jagged pieces of rock rising up like a gateway some fifty yards away before the next wave came in.
The breath of the person who saw it for the first time was held as he looked in vain for the brave diver, or wondered whether the act he had seen was not some mad effort to destroy life. There was the foaming water, there the black rocks, that were swept over by the roaring wave, but now showing plainly amidst a sheet of white surf, with beyond them a comparatively smooth surface, through which a current seems to run.
But there was no diver to be seen, nothing but the racing, hissing foam.
Yes: there he was--that was his head, rising out of the foam thirty or forty yards away, and being carried to inevitable destruction against those terrible jagged rocks.
No man could swim against the furious, racing torrent which was now passing between them. No one could get out of such a current when once in. It was horrible to look at, for the helpless swimmer seemed as if he would be dashed against the crags and then float, stunned, wounded, and helpless, out to sea.
That seemed to be Mark Penelly's fate; but no--as he neared the gate in the Shangles he could be seen to turn over upon his back, keeping his head well out of the water, paddling with his hands, and