"I descended and mounted to the poop.
"'Ye'll have to take command, sir,' said a big, red-eyed fellow, named Finnegan. 'Yer the shipped sicond mate, an' it b'langs to ye.'
"'Is the skipper dead?' I asked.
"'Dead, as he ought to be, the murderer! Ye did well, sir!'
"'And Mr. Parker?' I glanced at the quiet, bleeding form at my feet.
"'He's in small pieces, hild togither be his bones.'
"'Not a pleasant prospect for me,' I said; 'but I'm in for it, same as all of us. We'll have to stand trial; for there's no escape. But there's a rat down in his hole that we'll have to catch. Look out, or he'll pot one of you through his window!'
"I spoke at random, yet none too soon. A pistol exploded in the mate's window, and a man went down, shot through the heart—the last one to join the rush over to starboard. But the rush continued to the capstan bar rack amidships, and, armed with these handy clubs, they came back to batter in the companion. Macklin did not fire again, and I was on the point of asking him out, to surrender on terms of amnesty and deposition, when a crashing, grinding jar shook the ship from bow to stern, and all three topgallant masts went out of her, snapping at the caps and falling forward. We had struck a rock in midocean.
"There was no more thought of Macklin. As we jumped to the main deck and ran forward like sheep, the jars and jolts were resumed, working aft, while the ship reeled far over to leeward. Chips was on deck, and I got him to sound the well. 'Four feet, and coming in fast!' he called, and the men rushed for the boats on the forward house, while I went aft to the wheel. I had never heard of a rock in this part of the Atlantic, and thought for a moment that we might have hit a submerged derelict; but soon put that thought away; nothing but solid and jagged rock could so tear into a ship's bottom.
"'No steerage way, sir,' said the man at the wheel. 'She's fallen off due south.'