CHAPTER XXXII
A HEAD ON THE WATER
With her engines in motion and her wheel in the hands of Captain Burke, the Summer Shelter was in no danger of being run into by the Dunkery Beacon, for she was much the more easily managed vessel.
As soon as they had recovered a moderate command of their senses, Burdette and Portman hurried below to find out what damage had been sustained by the yacht; but, although she must have been greatly strained and might be leaking through some open seams, the tough keelson of the well-built vessel, running her length like a stiff backbone, had received and distributed the shock, and although her bowsprit was shivered to pieces and her cut-water splintered, her sides were apparently uninjured. Furniture, baggage, coils of rope, and everything movable had been pitched forward and heaped in disordered piles all over the vessel. A great part of the china had been broken. Books, papers, and ornaments littered the floors, and even the coal was heaped up in the forward part of the bunkers.
Burke gave the wheel to Burdette and came down, when Mrs. Cliff immediately rushed to him. She was not hurt, but had been dreadfully shaken in body and mind. "Oh, what are we going to do?" she cried. "They are wretched murderers! Will they keep on trying to sink us? Can't we get away?"
"We can get away whenever we please," said Burke, his voice husky and cracked. "If it wasn't for Shirley, I'd sail out of their sight in half an hour."
"But we can't sail away and leave Mr. Shirley," said she. "We can't go away and leave him!"
But little effort was made to get anything into order. Bruised heads and shoulders were rubbed a little, and all on board seemed trying to get themselves ready for whatever would happen next. Burke, followed by Portman, ran to the cases containing the rifles, and taking them out, they distributed them, giving one to every man on board. Some of the clergymen objected to receiving them, and expostulated earnestly and even piteously against connecting themselves with any bloodshed. "Cannot we leave this scene of contention?" some of them said. "Not with Shirley on that steamer," said Burke, and to this there was no reply.
Burke had no definite reason for thus arming his crew, but with such an enemy as the Dunkery Beacon had proved herself to be, lying to a short distance away, two other vessels, probably pirates, in the vicinity, and the strong bond of Shirley's detention holding the yacht where she was, he felt that he should be prepared for every possible emergency. But what to do he did not know. It would be of no use to hail the Dunkery and demand Shirley. He had done that over and over again before that vessel had proved herself an open enemy. He stood with brows contracted, rifle in hand, and his eyes fixed on the big steamer ahead. The two other vessels he did not now consider, for they were still some miles away.