'"Give us a quarter of an hour," says the old man, and he puts the second mate alongside of him. "Call the 'ands, and rig up a sea-anchor."
'And that was too late, for there was a crack below, and a man screamed, and the engineer bolted for his hole. But the engines stopped right there, and the nose of 'er paid off, and she lay in the trough of the sea, and rolled once, and rolled twice. And she went over to windward till you'd 'ear everything crack, and then she rolled to loo'ard. Would she ever stop! I see the old man slide away down the bridge, squealin', and the second mate pitched off his feet, and I gave a yell and climbed up on the weather rail, and old Volcano glared red over us to the nor'ard. And she was crank, and was never meant for the sea, and she 'ad 'eavy useless spars and derricks that overweighted 'er, and her grain was in bulk, and not too much of it. And the wind got hold of her, and she never stopped. I 'eard the old man yell again, and the sea rose up against him, and the sleeping mate was screamin' in his berth with a jammed door. And then I was Jack-all-alone, scramblin' with bleedin' fingers up a rotten wet iron slope, and I stopped when I 'ad 'old of 'er very keel. And then I 'eard an awful rip and a tearing, and a boom under my feet, and I reckoned the 'ole of 'er engines dropped through her deck, and may be the boilers exploded, for she gave a 'eave on the sea that made me sick, and I 'ung on with my nails, and I found myself cryin' out "Billy" and "Jack," and I was mad that hour. Ay, I was mad, and I beat upon the black and weedy iron of the plates underneath me. I was warm to think I was saved, and I was a coward, and I shook and trembled and nigh slipped off as the old scow wallowed. 'Twas most 'orrible to be 'earin' warm and livin' men speakin' one moment, to be among 'em, and them talkin', and to see the warm light, and to 'ear the thump, thump, of the engines, and the crackin' and creakin' of the old Red Star, and then to be all alone, Jack-all-alone, sailing 'and in 'and with death, 'ove up not on an 'alf tide rock as the thing beneath me looked, but a rotten old steamer turned turtle, and like to slip away from me any moment. And as I 'owled to myself, and saw the white water run up and lip at me like open-mouthed sharks, I saw the red light of Volcano away high up, and the light was like the wink of a light'ouse blinded in a fog. And the sight of the land, or where the land was, maddened me, and I cried like a child with weakness. 'Twas most 'orrible, sir, and weakness took me so, that I slipped and nigh lost 'old of the keel. But I climbed up again desperate, and findin' a bolt worked out, I 'itched my belt to it and 'ung on.
'And then I 'eard a sound that made my 'eart stop beatin'. 'Twas as if some one was usin' an 'ammer on iron, and I knew that there was some one alive inside of the Red Star, cooped up under 'er keel and shut into a tomb. And I cried, "You can't get out, you can't get out, mates!" so that my voice made me afraid. For 'twas a scream and like no voice I'd ever 'eard. But I scrambled along the keel and came to where the 'ammerin' was, and then I knew that they was Jack or Billy, or maybe both, and I beat with my fists on the plates, and I bled, but didn't know it, and I prayed all the plates was as rotten as we believed. But they wasn't that bad, and they was iron and iron bolted, and I'd nought but a knife, and what they was workin' with inside I couldn't tell. And they was in foul 'eavy air, and in the blackest dark. I prayed and I cursed, and I beat again, and some one 'eard, for they knocked three times regular and three times again, and to answer I beat with the 'eft of my knife. And then they worked awful, and there was bitter times when they rested, and in all the cold of the Levanter and the wetness of the flyin' spray I sweated like a bull, and then I was as cold as ice. And in an 'our or more, there was some sign that what they did was tellin' on the plate they worked on. For all of a sudden I 'eard a strange sound like the 'issing of steam blowin' off. 'Twas the compressed air inside that kept the wreck afloat comin' sharp out of a bit of a crack. And I knew that every second she'd sink more and more, and I seemed to see that unless the plate came off quick, they only die the quicker for tryin' to escape. And I called to 'em, but they 'eard nothin', only knowin' that a man was above 'em. And I got my knife under the plate and the blade broke. I worked sobbin', and all the time I was talkin'. 'Twas madness, plain and to be 'eard, and then I felt a smash into the iron, and the end of a splice bar came through it, and the air screamed up under me, and I knocked again three times, and they knocked three times, and I screamed out, "Billy! Jack!" and the poor chaps 'eard me. Jack's voice came to me like a voice out o' the grave, thin and eager, and all of a scream—
'"Tom—Tom!"
'That was me! Oh, the sea at my cold feet, and the sound of the wind and the red pulsin' of Volcano, and the round 'ump of the Red Star 'ove out o' the sea like the bulk of a dead whale, and under me my brothers. There's brothers don't love each other!
'I screamed—
'"Work—work!"
'And the sea crawled up to me, or so it seemed, and the thick air spurted up at me that was their life. And they broke out a bit more, and 'twas an 'ole a man's 'and could come through. And they stopped, so that I cried again to 'em. I 'eard Jack plain.
'"I'm about done, lad!"
'"Where's Billy?"