Hell itself was spouting forth. On the crumbling heights the flames danced in wanton, merciless hunger. They toyed in terrible mockery with their own reflection in the swift-tided sea. They shook with their fierce spasms the bursting rocks. Before them the granite dissolved into a very paste. And over all crept slowly, gently, irresistibly, a fog of rising steam, where the boiling lava met the ice-strewn ocean, wrapping the torn wounds in the cliff-side as in a soft lint upon their bleedings. Across this veil the shudders of the rending cliff played in ruddy reflections, rippling across it like searchlight rays as the hot molten matter gouted from the crags.
For a second or two no one spoke, dwelling silently upon the grim wonder of it. Then a sob of terror broke across the tension of the stillness, and Lady Delahay sank to the deck. I raised her quickly, and placed her in a deckchair. Then I looked round me.
On my right Gerry, Denvarre, and Lessaution were clutching the rail before them in stiff, constrained attitudes. The responsive emotions worked across their faces as they watched the travail of the peak. As some gaping fissure spued up a froth of vivid flame, their lips parted in automatic unison to the sundering stone. Vi Delahay, stretching an unconscious arm, groped for something tangible to rest upon, and found Gerry’s hand. One could trace the train of thought by which she buttressed her agitated soul in thus finding support for her body. Gerry remained unconscious of the honor done him. Garlicke and Janson, silhouetted against the red gleam of sea and fire, stood with mouths agape, hands on hips, and eyes that stared unwinkingly—intentness personified. Waller and Rafferty, their grasp still upon the wheel, gazed over their shoulders into the crimson distance behind them, heedless of their charge, rigid as men paralyzed. The crew, distributed each at his post where surprise had found and stiffened him, looked like so many mummies. Just in front of me, Lady Delahay, sunk upon her chair in a disordered heap, covered her face with her palms. I was beginning to peer round me uneasily for the one face I missed.
A gentle pressure upon my shoulder showed me Gwen at my side. She was facing the glare, one hand clenched upon her bosom, the other unknowingly poised upon my arm. Her little nostrils were dilated, her face was aglow, excitement was dancing in her eyes. She never turned or stirred as I edged closer, sliding my hand dishonorably under her palm. Thus stood we all, agape, waiting, staring, wondering.
Suddenly the giant column swung sideways, rushed skyward again, and then twisted itself into knots and coronals of ravening fire. As if in agony it bowed and contorted itself seaward, and the roar of its anguish sped across the ripples toward us with the shock of an Atlantic gust. It was a bellow wrung from the tortured throat of the very earth.
A sigh burst from Gwen’s lips, and her grasp tightened upon my thankful fingers. She turned to face me, and I could read the new-born terror in her eyes. Her other hand she thrust with a repellent gesture towards the writhings of the crater, and rested her forehead ever so lightly upon the lapels of my coat to shut out the hideous sight. Being only a man and not a graven image my arm slipped into its appointed place. It clasped her waist of its own accord, though the wicked thrill that ran up it and settled very near my heart reminded me that I was exercising a right that was another’s. But there was no getting it away by then.
Denvarre I could see still stood hypnotized into stillness with the rest of our company, who all kept to their rigid, constrained attitudes. Lessaution’s lips were beginning to twitch with words for which he could find no voice, and a low moan broke from Lady Delahay. Of those who dared to look, not one could remove his concentrated gaze.
Another crash, sharp and strident as the crack of a thunderbolt, smote across the surface of the waters. It swelled with devilish crescendo into a roar that threatened to burst our ear-drums. They throbbed and palpitated to the limits of tension. A blare of yellow flame filled the horizon. The island peak seemed to leap bodily heavenwards, and the lower crags toppled and reeled swayingly. Streams of lava bubbled and boiled from a thousand rifts and rendings of the rocks. The mass writhed like a tormented monster. A yet greater cloud of steam arose, and through it the fierce conflagration played and twined itself, till all the sea and land seemed bathed in a fog of blood and fire. As the liquid stone was vomited out in splashes, it rattled in a hissing patter round us. The eternal turmoils of the lowest pit seemed loose.
One more frightful shock and ear-splitting roar. Then a mountain seemed to grow upon the bosom of the deep. Black and awesome it rose under that flaming pall; silent, dark, and threatening it swung itself up from ocean’s depths, screening from us by its awful stature the raging destruction behind. High and yet higher it mounted and swelled and rolled upon us, smooth and swart as midnight. Oily and crestless billows rippled and webbed across it in festoons. The lurid reflections gleamed upon it like the flicker of swords ashock. In a majesty of resistless might it hung over us—a doom unavertable.
As the first slope of the hill of waters slid beneath our keel I tore myself from my trance of fascination. I dashed forward and raised Lady Delahay. With a kick I burst open the door of the companion and thrust her through, turning desperately for Gwen. With the lurch of the rising deck I staggered, slipped, and fell backward. My shoulder caught the door and slammed it to. With an oath I scrambled up to clutch her fiercely.