“But you are too hard on him,” said Syd. “There, let’s go and sit with poor Mr Dallas. We must keep him in good spirits.”
“I haven’t the heart to go,” said Roylance, sadly. “He is suffering horribly from the want of a drop of cold water, and we have none to give him.”
The long day dragged by, and was succeeded by a hot and pulseless night. The last drop of water had been voted by common consent to the sick man, and the sailors were face to face with the difficulty of passing the next day. It would be maddening, they knew, without water on that heated rock. They had tried to quench their thirst by drawing buckets of water down on the natural pier and drenching each other, for they dare not bathe on account of the sharks; but that was a poor solace, and the poor fellows gazed at each other with parched lips and wild eyes, asking help and advice in vain, and without orders climbed up high and perched themselves on points of vantage to watch for a sail, the only hope of salvation from a maddening death that they could see.
The look-out man by the flagstaff was ready with the bunting for signals; and when he hauled it, all knew now that it would be no flaunting forth of defiance, but an appeal for aid. But no ship came in sight all that next long day.
“It’s all over, Belt,” said Roylance, as the sun rose high once more, and his voice sounded harsh and strange. “I shall die to-day raving mad. We must go, but let’s write something to your father to find when he does come.”
“I have done it,” said Sydney. “I wrote it last night before I turned so queer and half mad-like with this horrible thirst.”
“Did you turn half mad?”
“Yes, when I was alone after I had done it.—I told my father that we had all tried to do our duty, and had fought to the last; and said good-bye.”
“Where did you put it?” said Roylance, as they walked slowly to the upper gun, while Terry lay beneath a rock seeming to watch them.
“Put what?” said Sydney, vacantly.