A STRANGE WRECK.
"Well, boys, we got here just in time," observed Mr. Billings, as the boat cut through the water.
"I'm not so sure that we have arrived in time to avert a tragedy," said Jack, and he told of the shooting that he had witnessed.
"Probably a mutiny," said Mr. Billings, with the voice of experience. "The crews on those old tramps are the riff-raff of a hundred ports. Bad men to handle in an emergency."
He had hardly finished speaking when, borne toward them on the wind, which was setting from the burning, sinking ship, came a most appalling uproar. It sounded like the shrieks of hundreds of passing souls mingled with deep roars and screeches.
Even Mr. Billings turned a shade paler under his tan.
"In the name of heaven what was that?" he exclaimed.
As he spoke a huge tawny form was seen to climb upon the rail of the rusty old steamer and then launch itself into the sea with a mighty roar.
"A lion!" exclaimed Jack, "by all that's wonderful, a lion."
"That explains the mystery of those noises and the predicament of those poor fellows crowded on the stern away from the boats," said Mr. Billings, who had quite regained his self-possession.
"But—but I don't understand," said Jack.
"That ship has a cargo of wild animals on board," explained Mr. Billings. "Such shipments are regularly made from Hamburg, her hailing port, to America. Most probably she had lions, tigers, leopards, great serpents and other animals on board. When her bow was stove in a number of cages were smashed and the wild beasts escaped."
"That accounts for the shooting I saw, then," exclaimed Jack; "they must have been firing from the raised stern at the animals which menaced them on the main deck."
"Unquestionably. I am glad I brought my own shooting iron," said Mr. Billings. "I packed it along in case we had trouble with a mutinous crew."
They were now close to the blazing ship. The heat and odor of the flames were clearly felt.
"We'll have to pull around on the weather side," decided Mr. Brown. "If we come up under the wind, we'd all be scorched before we could effect any rescues.
"Pull round the stern, my lads," he ordered.
"Aye, aye, sir," came in a deep-throated chorus from the crew.
As the four boats made under the stern, white, anxious faces looked down on them.
"Thank heaven you've come!" exclaimed the captain, whose haggard countenance showed all that he had been through. "We're just about at our last ditch. The animals we were taking from Jamrachs, in Hamburg, for an American circus, broke loose after the collision with the derelict. They've killed two of my men and maimed another."
"All right, my hearties, just hold on a minute and we'll have you out of that," exclaimed Mr. Billings cheerfully.
More roars and screeches from the loosened animals checked him. Then came more shots, telling of an attack on the stern, the only cool part of the ship left, which had been repulsed. The flames shot up, seeming to reach to the sky, and the smoke blotted out the sun, enveloping everything in the burning ship's vicinity in a sort of twilight.
"Do you think we'll be able to get all of them off?" asked Jack eagerly.
"I'm in hopes that we will," said Mr. Billings, "if nothing untoward happens."
There was, Jack noticed, a shade of anxiety in the young officer's tone. There was, then, some peril, of which he knew nothing as yet, attached to the enterprise, thought Jack. But of the nature of the danger he had no guess till later.
As the first boat, Mr. Billings' craft, drew alongside the blistering side of the burning ship, a Jacob's ladder came snaking down from the stern. At almost the same moment Jack, who had been looking upward, uttered a shout of alarm.
The fierce face of a wild beast had suddenly appeared above the rail of the blazing Oriana. The next instant a great lithe, striped body streaked through the air straight for the boat. Instinctively Jack, who saw the huge form of the tiger, for that was the desperate flame-maddened creature that had made the jump, sprang for the side of the boat and dived overboard.
