“Ay, ay, sir.”
“What time did you say it was?”
“About three bells and a quarter. The sun will be up in a short time.”
“Good! I’ll be on deck in a brace of shakes.”
Sandie and Willie had been aroused by the shouting and trampling of feet, and dreading something unusual had happened, they had quickly dressed and gone on deck.
On learning what had happened, both heartily volunteered to lend a hand at the pumps, and so the work went merrily on.
Soon the sky assumed the most glorious colours, with flushes of gold and cloud stripes of purest amber and crimson.
Next, there hung low down on the horizon a short bright blood-red line, which got bigger and more definite in shape every moment, till at last up leapt the sun, and a triangular bar of bright ensanguined water stretched right away to the very hull of the sinking ship herself.
Higher and higher mounts the sun, paler and clearer become its beams. And now, to the joy of all, there is visible, not many miles away, a green island.
It is like a veritable fairyland, for it does not appear to be in the sea at all, but afloat in the ambient sky.