Nickerson evidently received a hard blow, and as time passed he began to jabber meaningless phrases. “I want a drink in the worst way, Don,” he cried. “Get me a drink, like a good chap!” It was very quiet on the water and the fog blanket lay very thick. Donald was shouting for help at intervals, but the mist seemed to stifle his voice. The prospects were beginning to look black, and he yelled and shouted until his voice began to crack. Real fear began to clutch at his heart. If other vessels or dories were in the vicinity, they might pass close by and never see or hear them.
They had been on the spar for almost an hour, and Donald was really anxious. Nothing could be heard save the lapping of the water around the broken mast and Nickerson’s mutterings. He was lying face down, apparently oblivious of his surroundings, and McKenzie had passed a line around his body to prevent him sliding off. He collected his energies for another spell of yelling and had bawled the first “Help! Help!” when an answer came, “Keep ashoutin’ ’til we pick you up!”
In a voice as hoarse as a crow’s, he continued crying out, until a dory loomed out of the mist and rounded alongside the spar. She was a fisherman’s dory, and there were two men at the oars.
“Get the skipper in first,” croaked Don. “He’s had a crack on the head. Who are you? Where’s your vessel?”
“We’re off the Frank and Mary—of Gloucester,” replied one of the men. “We picked up th’ rest o’ your gang in th’ dories, an’ some of us are scoutin’ around lookin’ for youse.”
“Did you get our cook and my dory-mate—a man called Thomas?” asked Donald anxiously, as he clambered into the boat.
The fisherman shook their heads. “Naw,” they answered. “We only picked up fellers in dories. We never got any fellers but youse out the water.” McKenzie’s heart flopped like a lump of lead in his breast. “Poor Joak,” he murmured almost tearfully. “Poor Joak ... my old chum. And Jack Thomas ... one of the best!” He looked over the mist-wreathed water with his fingers twining together nervously. Then he recalled the vision of a steel stem—grinding, smashing and rending—the Beast of the Banks—and he ground his teeth in an excess of rage and bitterness at the suddeness and the ruthlessness of their hurling into Eternity. He gripped the dory gunnel convulsively in fingers of steel. “They’ll pay for this! They’ll pay for this!” he cried aloud.
“You got th’ steamer’s name?” queried a fisherman, pulling away.
McKenzie started. “Aye ... we got her name!”