For a moment wild panic had him in its cold grasp. Then, heartily ashamed of the cold sweat that had broken out on him and the wild impulse he had had to cry out, he clenched his hands and regained control of himself.
The whole fabric of the ship quivered as the mighty engines flew round in the opposite direction to that in which they had been rotating. At the instant Captain Braceworth’s order had been given it had been obeyed.
For a breath there was killing suspense; and then suddenly there came the shock of an impact. It was not a violent one, but just a grating, jarring shock.
“Great Scott! We’ve struck!” exclaimed Jack, as the next instant there came a second and more violent contact.
He was thrown bodily from his feet. Forward there came a babel of cries.
The ship listed heavily to port and then slowly, like a wounded creature, she righted. Then came a sound of thunder as the masses of ice, dislodged from the berg by the collision, toppled and slid from her fore-decks.
Jack knew that what the skipper had dreaded had come to pass. In spite of ceaseless, sleepless vigilance and the exercise of every caution a man could use, the Ajax had rammed an iceberg.
Above the yells and shouts of the seamen came the captain’s calm, authoritative voice.
His orders rang out like pistol shots. Accustomed to obey, the seamen stopped their panic and fell to their work. The mates were down among them, silencing the more obstreperous in no very gentle manner.
A squad of men came running aft to the boats. For an instant Jack thought that, in their panic, they were about to lower away and make off. But he speedily saw, to his immense relief, that they were in charge of cool-headed little Mr. Brown; they had been sent aft merely to stand by the boats and tackle in case it became necessary to abandon the ship.