The yellow flame sputtered up and showed him the water all about him. It was knee deep and appeared to be coming in more rapidly. Over its surface was spread an oily scum from the damp floor.
Herc was glad when the match died out. He determined not to light any more, but to wait his end with as much courage as he could muster.
"I'll fight it out like a man-o'-war's-man, anyhow," he muttered, "but it's tough—tough to have to go this way."
The water rose inch by inch as remorselessly as destiny itself. Herc stood in stoical silence and felt it creeping up his body till it had reached his chest.
Only a few moments more, now, and then—the end.
Herc found himself growing strangely calm. He wondered what they would think on the ship when he failed to return. If his messmates would miss him, if Ned was safe and sound and would ever learn how his shipmate had perished.
The water was up to his chin.
A slight movement on the lad's part and a tiny wavelet spattered against his mouth. He tasted the brackish water of the tide. Herc wished that it would end right then and there. He felt that it was hardly worth while even to swim. If he was to drown, he might as well not resist his fate, but meet it passively.
But the instinct of self-preservation prevails even among the most pusillanimous. It can turn a coward into a dangerous foe. Herc struck out as the water reached his mouth.