CHAPTER XXII
AN EXCITING MOMENT
"You are on the crew, you and Seaman Hickey," said the boatswain's mate later in the evening. "I think I will put you in the stroke-oar position, after all."
"The other man will be displeased, will he not!" asked Dan.
"Every man in that boat must be willing to do whatever he can to perfect our organization, to help us win the race, even if he has to jump overboard to do it."
Dan nodded his approval.
"I wouldn't jump overboard for any old race," muttered Sam. "I can get wet enough by staying on board."
Every day thereafter the racing crew went out. No change in the crew had been found necessary, and her coxswain considered that he had the best crew in the fleet.
Excitement was daily growing, as the time approached for the great gig race, when boats from all the ships of the fleet would enter the contest. A valuable silver cup was to be the trophy to be raced for. It would have a place of honor on the ship of the winning crew, where it would remain for a year and perhaps longer—remain until some other ship's racing crew should win it.
Each afternoon the gig's crew was turned out for a practice spin. The men were working better and better, pulling almost as one man. Even the ship's officers felt that they had never had a better chance to win the cup, and were proportionately elated.
A short cruise was made up to the Maine coast; then the ship returned to her former anchorage to complete the torpedo practice that had been interrupted when the battleship went aground.
The first night on the anchorage proved an exciting one. Off some four miles, behind a point of land where her cage masts could be faintly made out, lay the flagship with the admiral of the fleet on board. He had come in while the "Long Island" was off up the coast on her short cruise.
When an admiral is about it behooves the commanders of other ships to be on their guard, to keep a sharp lookout for surprises. Admirals are prone to give most unexpected orders at any time. For that reason the first night on the old anchorage saw more than one officer of the deck on duty. One was placed on the bridge and one aft on the quarter-deck.
The ship settled down to silence at the usual hour; the seamen were in their hammocks and the officers had retired to their staterooms for a night's rest in the quiet waters of the bay.
Eight bells had just struck, midnight, when a messenger rushed down to the captain's quarters from the quarter-deck. Without waiting to knock, he called loudly, as he poked his head in through the curtained doorway.
"What is it?"
"Abandon ship, sir!"
Without an instant's hesitation the commanding officer reached up over his bed, pulling down a brass lever with a violent jerk.
Gongs began to crash all over the ship, from the stoke hole to the navigating bridge.
"Abandon ship!" bellowed boatswain's mates and masters-at-arms. "Abandon ship!" sang voices in the forecastle, the cry being taken up from lip to lip from one end to the other of the great battleship.
Men tumbled from their hammocks, and, without waiting to pull on their clothes, dashed for the open decks. From far below black-faced stokers ran up the companion ladders and burst out on the topside.
"Man the lifeboats! Everything overboard!" sang an officer through a megaphone.
The signal gongs were clanging automatically all through the ship. They would continue to do so for full five minutes, giving no excuse for any one to be left on board. Boats and rafts were going over at a rapid rate, the great cranes swinging out the heavier boats with speed and precision. Most of the men were working coolly while others—the newer men on board—were showing signs of excitement.
A red-haired boy came dashing up to the top of the superstructure.
"What's the matter—what's the matter?" he shouted.
"Oh, the ship's on fire," answered some one.
"On fire—where?"
"Over there. She's going down. You'll have to hurry or you'll get caught in the suction. Look over the side and you'll see the fire coming right up out of the sea."
Sam Hickey dashed to the side of the ship and leaned forward to peer over. He did not know that the rope railings had come down at the first alarm in order to facilitate putting over the rafts and other deck equipment.
When Sam leaned, there was nothing to lean upon. The result was that he toppled right on over.
"Man overboard!" came the familiar cry. "Cast the life rings."
"Look out below there. Man overboard!" roared an officer through his trumpet.
"Where away?" answered a voice from the boats down in the darkness.
"He fell over from topside," answered another.
"Who is the man?"
"Seaman Hickey."
"Find him, find him! What are you doing down there, you lazy lubbers? You stand there letting a man drown without making an effort to save him!"
"Who's drowning?" demanded a voice over the heads of the men in the small boats.
"Hickey; Seaman Hickey!"
"Pshaw! Seaman Hickey isn't drowning, and I don't believe the ship's on fire, either. What's the matter with you fellows! Whole ship's been having bad dreams, I guess."
"Who are you?"
"I'm Hickey. I guess I ought to know."
"Where are you?"
"I'm sitting on top of the steamer's awning just now, but if you wiggle around much more below there, I'll be in the foaming brine."
"Is that you, Hickey?" called an officer from the quarter-deck.
"Yes, sir."
"How did you get there?"
"Fell here, sir. I didn't jump, sir. Honest, I fell off the ship. I might have been going yet if——"
"That will do," commanded the officer in a stern voice. "Get off the steamer's hood, and be quick about it!"
Sam slid down a stanchion, causing the small steamer to careen dangerously. Two sailors grabbed him by the legs and hauled him aboard, Hickey's head and shoulders being plunged into the sea as they did so.
Sam came aboard choking, sputtering and threatening to thrash the whole steamer's crew.
"Silence in steamer number one!" roared an officer.
"Aye, aye," answered Sam.
"You shut up!" ordered the coxswain. "Do you think you are running this boat?"
"I nearly ran my head through the roof of the confounded thing," retorted Sam, wringing the water out of his red hair. "What's all this row about, anyway? I don't see any fire or anything else worth getting out of bed for at this time of night."
"Sam, is that you making all that noise?" questioned Dan Davis, from a whaleboat that had pulled alongside.
"I don't know about the noise. I'm in steamer number one, if that's what you mean."
"What happened to you?"
"I didn't change my mind this time, and I fell overboard, that's all."
"Did you fall in?"
"No, I fell on—and that's worse."
"On what?"
"I fell on top of the steamer. I was headed all right, but the steamer got in my way. I'd have made a beauty dive into the salt sea if the steamer hadn't got in the way. But what's all this ruction for?"
"It is a drill."
"A drill!" exclaimed Hickey in disgust.
"Yes."
"What kind of drill?"
"Abandoning ship."
"Pshaw, if I'd have known that I'd stayed in bed. The idea of a drill in the middle of the night, and after I've rowed half way to Europe in the racing gig. Who started this thing, anyway?"
"The admiral signaled all ships in the harbor to abandon ship. I presume all of them are taking the time, and we shall see who succeeded in getting away from their ship first."
"I'll bet I'd have broken the record if they had taken my time. That's the only way to abandon ship in a hurry."
"How's that, Hickey?" questioned a shipmate.
"Head first," answered Sam.
"Return to ship," came the command. "Be lively there, men. This counts on record, too. All boats to be hoisted aboard as they were."
The men piled over the side of the ship to the decks in fully as quick time as they had left. In a very brief time the small boats were emptied, excepting for the men who were manning them, two men in each boat to attend to making fast the falls for hoisting and riding up to the decks in the little craft.
The drill was ended without a mishap, save that which had occurred when Hickey tried to lean against the ship's rail and failed.
Lights, red, white and blue, were twinkling from the masts of the various ships at anchor in the bay, while officers on the bridge of the "Long Island" were reading them.
"Is signalman there?" called the captain from the bridge.
"Aye, aye, sir," came the response.
"Signal the flagship that the 'Long Island's' crew abandoned ship in four minutes and twenty seconds."
The signalman did so, working the keyboard of his signal apparatus—that somewhat resembled a typewriter machine—causing colored lights to flash and twinkle far up on the forward mast of his own ship.
"'Good work, sir,' the admiral says."
"Ask him for the best time."
"Flagship signals that the 'Long Island' has made a record for abandoning ship. Five minutes best time in previous record. To-night's second-best record, four minutes and fifty seconds."
"Mr. Coates, will you pass the word to the men by megaphone?" asked the captain.
"Aye, aye, sir. Battleship crew, there!"
"Aye, aye, sir," roared a hundred or more voices.
"The 'Long Island' beats all competitors in abandoning ship by thirty seconds, and has broken all previous records."
A roar went up that fairly shook the ship; then two hundred voices were raised in song:
"Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?"
The strains of the inspiring song floated out over the waters of the bay until one verse had been sung, the officers offering no objection to the jollification. But, ere the men could begin on the second verse, the bugle blared loudly, piping all hands back to hammocks. Ten minutes later the battleship was silent and the decks deserted. The "Long Island's" crew, almost to a man, was sound asleep.