The Rescue: A Romance of the Shallows, Volume 17

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Doubleday, Page, 1920 - Lingard, Tom (Fictitious character) - 402 pages
We meet adventurer Tom Lingard aboard his brig Lightning. His ship is stuck with no wind on their way to ... somewhere. There may be pirates in the waters around them, but it is not a pirate who arrives beside them in a small boat. A yacht has grounded on a sandbank and the men in the boat have been sent out with urgent messages for help. But Lingard is dismayed to learn the exact location of the stranded yacht, for it turns out to be the very spot he is heading for himself, and he knows the unexpected presence of the yacht will complicate his plans.

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Page 5 - On the unruffled surface of the straits the brig floated tranquil and upright as if bolted solidly, keel to keel, with its own image reflected in the unframed and immense mirror of the sea. To the south and east the double islands watched silently the double ship that seemed fixed amongst them forever, a hopeless captive of the calm, a helpless prisoner of the shallow sea.
Page 412 - They decorate our life for us. They are the gracious figures on the drab wall which lies on this side of our common grave. They lead a sort of ritual dance, that most of us have agreed to take seriously. It is a very binding agreement with which sincerity and good faith and honour have nothing to do. Very binding. Woe to him or her who breaks it. Directly they leave the pageant they get lost.
Page 5 - ... continuous surface to wanderings facile and endless. There was no wind, and a small brig that had lain all the afternoon a few miles to the northward and westward of Carimata had hardly altered its position half a mile during all these hours. The calm was absolute, a dead, flat calm, the stillness of a dead sea and of a dead atmosphere. As far as the eye could reach there was nothing but an impressive immobility. Nothing moved on earth, on the waters, and above them in the unbroken lustre of...
Page 87 - There was something to be done, and he felt he would have to do it. It was expected of him. The seas expected it; the land expected it. Men also. The story of war and of suffering; Jaffir's display of fidelity, the sight of Hassim and his sister, the night, the tempest, the coast under streams of fire—all this made one inspiring manifestation of a life calling to him distinctly for interference.
Page 329 - Conflict of some sort was the very essence of his life. But this was something he had never known before. This was a conflict within himself. He had to face unsuspected powers, foes that he could not go out to meet at the gate. They were within, as though he had been betrayed by somebody, by some secret enemy. He was ready to look round for that subtle traitor. A sort of blankness fell on his mind and he suddenly thought: "Why! It's myself.
Page 468 - Directly both ships were in clear water he went below saving to Carter: "You know what to do." "Yes, sir," said Carter. Shortly after his Captain had disappeared from the deck Carter laid the main topsail to the mast. The Lightning lost her way while the schooner with all her light kites abroad passed close under her stern holding on her course. Mrs. Travers stood aft very rigid, gripping the rail with both hands. The brim of her white hat was blown upward on one side and her yachting skirt stirred...
Page 121 - Their coming at this moment, when he had wandered beyond that circle which race, memories, early associations, all the essential conditions of one's origin, trace round every man's life, deprived him in a manner of the power of speech.
Page 229 - On deck there! Any wind?" All was still for a moment. Somebody above answered in a leisurely tone: "A steady little draught from the northward." Then after a pause added in a mutter: "Pitch dark." "Aye, dark enough," murmured Lingard. He must do something. Now. At once. The world was waiting. The world full of hopes and fear. What should he do? Instead of answering that question he traced the ungleaming coils of her twisted hair and became fascinated by a stray lock at her neck. What should he do?...
Page 469 - South as near as possible," answered Carter. "Will you give me a course to steer for the night, sir?" Lingard 's lips trembled before he spoke but his voice was calm. "Steer north,
Page 11 - It softened the outlines of his rugged nature; and these moments kept close the bond between him and his brig. He was aware that his little vessel could give him something not to be had from anybody or anything in the world; something specially his own. The dependence of that solid man of bone and muscle on that obedient thing of wood and iron, acquired from that feeling the mysterious dignity of love.

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