"Can't somebody come aloft to give Davis a hand when he reaches the foremast?"
"Get aloft, there!" bellowed the executive officer.
"Yes, the boy Hickey has more sense than all the rest of we officers down here," exclaimed the captain.
Men ran up the ladders in a squirming white line, and quickly clambered out into the steel rigging. As Dan neared them they stretched forth their hands.
"Only a little way further, matey," they encouraged. "That's the boy! You'll make a tight-rope walker one of these days, only you want to learn to walk with your feet instead of your hands."
"Grab me!" called Dan.
"Got him!" yelled a jackie at the top of his voice.
The word carried to the bridge and to the superstructure, where a hundred or more sailors were crouching trying to peer up into the mist. They broke forth into a wild yell of applause.
In the meantime strong hands had grasped Dan, pulling him in among the steel supports of the cage mast, where they held him while he rested from his great ordeal.
Sam Hickey was dancing a jig on the top of the military mast, yelling as if he had suddenly gone mad.