“Oh, Adjutant! Alf! Look!”
“My boy!” came the Adjutant’s earnest answer, as he reached upward to bury one of Captain Rufus Spooner’s hands in both of his, and then turned to murmur broken words of cheer to Lieutenant Alfred Keith, who lay in the opposite bed. Both had escaped by a hair’s breadth.
“The awful thing,” said Captain Spooner, “was to see the people trying to get up the staircase. The ship had listed so far over by the time we got up that to try to get upstairs was almost impossible. We got up a few steps, only to fall back again. All round me were frantic men and women, and then, before I could fairly realize where I was or what I could do next, I seemed to be lifted right up and carried forward off the ship into the water.
“I was rolled over and over, twisted round and round, banged against bits of wreckage and got my foot caught in something of iron and rope. I thought I was gone then, for I’m not a great swimmer; but I managed to get free. I swam round till some one got me by the neck and I felt my head going under. I thought again I was gone for certain; but I got free the second time and started out again to try for a boat. It was a narrow shave.”
“Yes, it was,” put in Lieutenant Keith, “and mine was like it.”
“The third time,” went on the captain, “I had sense enough not to spend the little strength I had left, and I got hold of a spar and rolled over on it to keep myself up. I drifted like that for a long time till I was picked up and taken to Rimouski. All I’ve got left is my bunch of keys, which stuck in my pocket.” He produced them and jingled them affectionately. “I’m going to hang on to them as a souvenir.”
PICKED UP BY BOAT FILLED WITH MEMBERS OF CREW
A member of the staff band of the Salvation Army, J. Johnson, of Toronto, got hold of a boat as it was drifting away from the steamer and hung to the side, and was saved in his night attire.
“We were all asleep in the second cabin when the crash came,” he said. “I went upstairs to see what had happened and the other three fellows in the cabin stayed behind. Two of them were drowned and one got out. When I got up on deck I found the boat listing over and I ran back and told the others to come out.
“I saw the people struggling along the corridors to get on deck, but it was awkward because the water was coming into the vessel. Commissioner Rees and some others were just going along in front of me and I assisted them up as well as I could, and eventually we got to the deck, where I lost sight of them.