Accidents generally happen instantaneously; people are in safety one moment, the next there is a sudden awakening to the fact that something dreadful has happened. It was so here in the coming darkness of night. Almost before the two lads had realised more than the fact that something black was approaching there was a loud rushing noise, a crash, and shock, as the boat was struck a tremendous blow on the side, whirled round, sucked under water, and then all was blackness, choking, strangling sensations, and a horrible sense of dread.
Dick, fresh from London, did not understand what was the matter. For one moment he had an idea that the boat had been attacked by a monstrous whale; the next moment that and every other idea was washed out of him by the dark waters, which ran up his nose and thundered in his ears, as they made him gasp for breath.
How long this lasted he could not tell, before he found himself on the surface, confused and helpless, amidst a sheet of foaming, swirling waters.
“Can you swim?” some one shouted in his ear.
“Ye–es—a—lit-tle,” panted Dick.
“Steady then, steady, lad. Slow—slow—take in a reef. You’ll drown yourself like a pup if you beat the water that how.”
Influenced by the stronger will and the stern order, Dick, who had been striking out with all his might, calmed down and began to swim steadily, but with a great dread seeming to paralyse his limbs, while Josh, who was by him, shouted, “Ahoy!”
“Ahoy!” came faintly from a distance, in the direction where the black cloud had resolved itself into the form of a great screw steamer with star-like lights visible here and there.
“Here away, lad,” shouted back Josh. “They haven’t seen us,” he added to Dick.
“What—what was it?” panted Dick, who was swimming more steadily now.