Again Peter was hurled against the side of the fore-top. How long he remained there, he had not the faintest recollection. At length he raised his head. His companions were strangely quiet, except the midshipman, who was vainly attempting to stifle his groans. There were jagged rents in the floor and in the sides of the fore-top; there were also holes punched as neatly as if done by a pneumatic drill. There were pools, too, of dark sticky liquid....
Peter struggled to his feet, somewhat surprised that he was able to do so. As far as he knew, he had not been hit. He turned his attention to his companions. Ambrose was lying on his side, his face pillowed on his left arm. There was the same grim smile on his face. He looked to be sleeping peacefully, but it was the sleep that knows no wakening on this earth. The other lieutenant and the two bluejackets were simply shattered lumps of clay. Only Peter and the midshipman were left alive out of the seven, since there was no trace of the third able seaman.
The snottie looked Peter in the face with eyes that resembled those of a sheep on the slaughter-block.
"I've stopped one," he exclaimed feebly. "'Fraid it's the last fielding I'll ever do."
His left leg was completely severed just below the knee, yet Peter noticed the stump was only bleeding very slightly. The shock had evidently contracted the torn arteries, but there was every possibility of a rush of life-blood before very long.
Fumbling with unsteady fingers at his first-aid outfit, Peter contrived to rig up a rough-and-ready tourniquet. His next step was to get the wounded lad down to the dressing-station. As far as he, personally, was concerned, there was not the slightest reason why he should remain in the wreck of the fore-top. The question was, how was he to get the midshipman down?
Even had the passage down and within the centre leg of the tripod been available (which it was not), the small diameter of the shaft would not have permitted the descent of one man with another clinging to his back. To lower the snottie was also out of the question, since the signal halliard nearest the mast had been shot away and no other rope was available. The only likely way was to descend on the outside of the mast by means of the rungs provided for that purpose.
"Can you hang on, do you think?" inquired Peter anxiously.
"I'll have a good shot at it, anyway," was the reply. As a matter of precaution, the young lieutenant knotted his scarf round the midshipman's body and his own. Then, heavily burdened, he let himself down through the jagged gap in the floor of the fore-top that had once been a trap-door.
Rung by rung he made his way, never once looking down and religiously adhering to the old sea maxim: "Never let go with more than one hand or foot at a time."