“There—there,” she whispered—“a man—drowning—clinging to something—a wreck—I saw him!”
“Dear me! dear me!” said the major, in a tone of relief, and with a breath of a smile.
But the special correspondent had looked into the girl's face. It was his business to understand the difference between dreaming and waking. He was by the side of the officer on watch in a moment. A few words were enough to startle the officer into acquiescence with the demands of the “special.” The unwonted sound of the engine-room telegraph was heard, its tinkle shaking the slumbers of the chief engineer as effectively as if it had been the thunder of an alarum peal.
The stopping of the engine, the blowing off of the steam, and the arrival of the captain upon the deck, were simultaneous occurrences. The officer's reply to his chief as he hurried aft did not seem to be very satisfactory, judging from the manner in which it was received.
But Harwood had left the officer to explain the stoppage of the vessel, and was now kneeling by the side of the chair, back upon which lay the unconscious form of Daireen, while the doctor was forcing some brandy—all that remained in the major's tumbler—between her lips, and a young sailor—the one who had been at the rail in the morning—chafed her pallid hand. The major was scanning the expanse of water by aid of his pilot glass, and the quartermaster who had been steering went to the line of the patent log to haul it in—his first duty at any time on the stopping of the vessel, to prevent the line—the strain being taken off it—fouling with the propeller.
When the steamer is under weigh it is the work of two sailors to take in the eighty fathoms of log-line, otherwise, however, the line is of course quite slack; it was thus rather inexplicable to the quartermaster to find much more resistance to his first haul than if the vessel were going full speed ahead.
“The darned thing's fouled already,” he murmured for his own satisfaction. He could not take in a fathom, so great was the resistance.
“Hang it all, major,” said the captain, “isn't this too bad? Bringing the ship to like this, and—ah, here they come! All the ship's company will be aft in a minute.”
“Rum, my boy, very rum,” muttered the sympathetic major.
“What's the matter, captain?” said one voice.