The Battery and the Boiler - Robert Michael Ballantyne (an ebook reader .txt) 📗

good ship, ably commanded, well manned, and with plenty of sea-room,-- what more could be desired? Nevertheless, deadly peril was close at hand.

That marvellous little creature--which, in the southern seas, builds its little cell, works its little day and dies, leaving to succeeding generations of its kind to build their little cells and die, each using its predecessor's mansion as a foundation for its own, until pile on pile forms a mass, and mass on mass makes a mountain--the coral insect, had reared one of its submarine edifices just where the cable-ship Triton had to pass that day. For ages man had traversed that sea without passing exactly over that mountain, and even if he had, it would not have mattered, for the mountain had been always many fathoms below the surface. But now the decree had gone forth. The conjunction of events predestined had come about. The distance between the mountain summit and the ocean surface had been reduced to feet. The Triton rose on the top of a mighty billow as she reached the fated spot. The coral peak rose near the bottom of the water-hollow beyond, and down on it the doomed ship went with an awful crash!

Her speed was checked only an instant, for the top of the rock was knocked off by the force of the blow, and the ship passed swiftly on, but there could be no mistaking the significance of that shock. An involuntary shout of alarm from some,--a gasp, halt of surprise, half of horror, from others,--then a rush of active effort when the captain gave orders to man the pumps.

There was urgent need for haste. The mass of coral rock had stuck in the hole it had made, else had they gone down in a few minutes. As it was, the water rushed in furiously, so much so that the captain detailed a party of men to construct a raft, while the rest relieved each other at the pumps. No doubt he was partly urged to this course by the consideration that a vessel weighted with telegraph-cables and other heavy material connected therewith could not float long in a leaky condition.

"Keep close to me, Robin; we must sink or swim together."

It was Sam who spoke. He was very pale, but his firmly-compressed lips showed no sign of unmanly fear. Robin, on the contrary, taken by surprise, and too inexperienced to correctly estimate sudden danger, was flushed with the feeling that now was the time to do and dare whatever should be required of him! They went to the pumps together, where Stumps and Slagg were already at work with many others.

It is surprising how fast and hard men will toil when life depends on the result. There was a cat-like activity about the carpenter and his mates as they cut, sawed, lashed, and bolted together the various spars and planks which formed the raft. In a marvellously short space of time it was ready and launched over the side, and towed astern by the strongest cable on board, for the danger of parting from it in such weather was very great. Knowing this they had lashed some casks of pork and other provisions to it before launching.

Still they laboured with unflagging resolution at the pumps, for many of those on board were picked men, whose sense of honour urged them to strive to the uttermost to save the ship, for it was no ordinary merchant-man, freighted with an ordinary cargo, which could easily be replaced as well as insured, but a vessel freighted with those magic wires which couple continents and unite humanity, whose loss might delay, though it could not ultimately arrest, the benign and rapid intercourse of man with man in all parts of the globe.

"Keep your eye on Sam and me," whispered Robin to Jim Slagg, finding himself alongside that worthy during a spell of rest. "Let us keep together, whatever happens."

Robin did not quite believe that anything serious was going to happen. Some spirits find it as difficult to believe in impending disaster as others find it to believe in continued safety. It seemed so impossible to Robin, in his inexperience, that the strong and still buoyant vessel which had borne them so long and bravely should sink! Nevertheless, like the rest, he laboured with a will.

Slagg took the opportunity to give a similar caution to his friend Stumps.

"She's sinking, sir," said the carpenter, who had been sounding the well, to the captain, about an hour later.

"I know it; stand by to have the raft hauled alongside. Knock off now, lads, there's no use in pumping any more."

The men ceased, with a deep sigh, and by that act the death-warrant of the cable-ship was signed.

During the next quarter of an hour the crew were busy slipping down the cable that held the raft. A few ran below to fetch small articles that they valued, but by that time the vessel was so low in the water, that there was little time to spare, and the captain began to urge haste.

"Now then, lads, over the side with you," he said, chancing to look at Sam Shipton as he spoke!

That spirit of heroism which induces men to resolve to be the last to quit a sinking ship, came over Sam just then, and he shrank back. He and his chief were in charge of the telegraph apparatus. It would be disgraceful to quit until all on board had left. He laid his hand on the strong cable that held the raft and said, "I'll stay to the last, sir, and cast off the rope, if you'll allow me."

"We don't cast off ropes in such circumstances," replied the captain; "we cut 'em."

Sam was silenced, but not the less resolved to hold to his point, if possible. He still held back, while the captain, being busy with the others, some of whom were rather too eager to go, paid no further attention to him. Robin, Slagg, and Stumps, recognising Sam as their leader, fell behind him and kept close.

At last all were on the raft except the captain and the four friends.

"Now, then, come along," said the former, somewhat impatiently.

"After you, sir," said Sam, with a polite bow.

"Overboard, sir!" shouted the captain, in a voice that would brook no denial, and Sam at once stepped on the bulwark, for he was not naturally rebellious.

Just as he spoke the rope broke, and the raft fell astern.

"Jump! jump! it's your only chance," cried the captain, at the same moment springing into the sea.

Sam was on the point of following, when an exclamation from Slagg checked him. Looking quickly back, he saw that Robin was not there.

Our hero, while modestly standing behind his comrades, had suddenly remembered that the small bible given him by his mother was lying on the shelf at the side of his berth. He would have lost anything rather than that. There was yet time to fetch it, so, without a word, he turned and sprang below, supposing that he had ample time.

"Robin! Robin!" shouted Sam and Slagg together, at the top of their voices.

"Coming! coming!" reached them faintly from below, but Robin did not come. The hasty summons induced him to leap over a chest in returning. He struck his head violently against a beam, and fell back stunned.

With another wild shout his friends rushed down the companion-hatch to hasten his movements by force. They found him almost insensible. Lifting him quickly, they carried, him on deck, and bore him to the stern of the vessel.

"Robin! Robin!" cried Sam, in an agony of impatience--for the raft was by that time far astern, besides which the shades of evening were beginning to descend--"_do_ try to rally. We must swim. We're almost too late. Can you do it?"

"Yes, yes, I can swim like a duck," cried Robin, rising and staggering towards the bulwarks.

"But _I_ can't swim at all!" cried Stumps in a voice of horror.

Sam stopped as if suddenly paralysed. Then, laying hold of Robin, held him back. He felt, as he looked at the dark heaving sea and the now distant raft, that it was not possible for him and Slagg to save both their injured and their helpless comrade.

"Too late!" he said in a voice of despair, as he sat down and for a moment covered his face with his hands. Slagg looked at him with a bewildered rather than a despairing expression.

"So, we'll have to sink together since we can't swim together," he said at last, with a touch of reckless vexation, as he gazed at the naturally stupid and by that time imbecile face of his friend Stumps.

"Come, only cowards give way to despair," cried Sam, starting up. "We have one chance yet, God be praised, but let's work with a will, boys, for the time is short."


CHAPTER FOURTEEN.


THE RAFT.

Sam Shipton's one chance did not seem a bright one, but, with characteristic energy, he proceeded to avail himself of it at once.

When the raft was launched over the side, as described, the carpenters had embarked upon it with the rest of the ship's crew, dropping their tools on the deck beside the mass of unused material of ropes, spars, planks, etcetera, as they left. Four of the spars were pretty equal in length. Sam selected them hastily and laid them on the deck in the form of a square, or oblong frame. Then he seized an axe.

"Unravel some of the ropes, Robin," he cried. "You two select some planks as near ten feet long as possible. Quick--ask no questions, but do what I tell you."

Sam Shipton was one of those who hold the opinion that every man born into the world, whether gentle or simple, should learn a trade. He had acted on his belief and taught himself that of a carpenter, so that he wielded the axe with skill, and gave his orders with the precision of one who knows what he is about. His comrades, although not trained to any special trade, were active handy fellows, with the exception, indeed, of John Shanks, whose fingers were usually described as "thumbs," and whose general movements were clumsy; but Stumps had a redeeming quality to set against defects--he was willing.

With a few powerful well-directed blows, Sam cut four deep notches into the two longest of the selected spars, near their ends, at equal distances from each other. Into these he laid the ends of the two shorter spars, thus forming a frame-work.

"Twelve feet by ten, not a bad raft," he muttered, as if to himself, while he snatched a rope from the bundle of those disentangled by Robin. "Take a rope of same size, you two, and lash the opposite corners as you see me doing. Stumps will go on selecting the planks."

Sam jerked out his words with as much rapidity and force as he applied to the labour of his hands. There was something quite tremendous in his energy, and little wonder--for, as he glanced now and then along the deck he saw that the ship was rapidly settling down to her final dive, and that the closing scene would be sudden.