“One of the stokers was overcome by the heat and would have burned to death at his post if the Chief Officer and I had not got him out of the fire room just in time to avoid being suffocated by the fumes ourselves. There were only two lifeboats aboard, and we lowered the stoker who had so nearly lost his life into the first one.

“Six men and the two assistant engineers took their places in the first lifeboat in charge of the Chief Officer, and were equipped with three pairs of oars, a compass, three cases of food, and two jugs of water. I estimated that they could live for three days, by great economy, and they all felt confident that they would be picked up long before the three days were up.

“It was a relief to me to feel that at least half of the crew were in a fair way to be rescued. The old gentleman in the cabin is my father-in-law, who is on his way out West to join a married daughter, living in Vincennes, Indiana; and the boy is his grandson, whose parents have recently died, and who is going with the old man to find a new home on American soil. I preferred,” said he, “to keep the members of my family with me, although it might possibly have been safer for them to get away in the first lifeboat; but there were still a number of things for me to do before leaving the ship.

“The northeast storm was just about at its tag-end when lifeboat Number 1 left the Monmouth. The wind was in her favor, in a general way, and the water, though still rough, was gradually calming down. After seeing them off and waving my hat as they drew away from the vessel, I went over in my mind all the things that should be got together and put into the second boat. The belongings of the crew did not fill more than three or four sea-bags and were quickly gathered. The cash, the instruments, and the ship’s papers were carefully deposited in the bottom and covered with oilskin; and now, when we were all ready to step aboard, the Second Officer reported that he could find only one pair of oars! There was a mast, but no sail; and we would have to be very careful not to break or lose either of the two oars upon which so much depended.

“But the sky was clearing, and we were all delighted to leave the heat and desolation of the burning ship. It was six o’clock in the evening as we left her; and, although we were obliged to travel slowly, our course lay toward the pleasant gleams of the setting sun—which meant a friendly shore and the beginning of a new chapter.”

While the Skipper was telling his story at the supper table, every man and boy stopped to listen with bated breath; and, as soon as supper was over and the boys had scrambled on deck, Tom, Dick, and Chippie found one another, as if by magnetic attraction, and with the same idea in their minds.

“Did you notice the Skipper was the last man to leave the ship?” said Chippie.

“You bet!” answered Dick and Tom in a single breath. “After you, Pilot!”

CHAPTER XX
Vineyard Haven

It was nine o’clock in the evening when the Bright Wing dropped anchor in Vineyard Haven; and the long boat, with a picked crew of four boys, took the Skipper and the Chairman ashore as quickly as possible. Much to their disappointment, however, they found the telegraph office closed; but, at the landing, they met the chaplain of the Sailors’ Bethel, who was an old friend, and he entered very heartily into their plans for trying to communicate with the crew of lifeboat Number 1. He had been at his present post for many years and had much experience of shipwrecked seamen.