A little farther away was the large part of the foremast with the lateen yards, and some of the scorched canvas still secured. Several men were already astride the spar, while others, some pushing planks before them, were making for the frail place of safety.
"Here's our skipper, lads!" shouted Sampson, who, with a stained bandage round his forehead and another encircling his left arm above the elbow, was astride the spar and busily engaged in securing planks to form a rough-and-ready raft. "Come on, sir; there's plenty of room in the stalls."
"I'm rather late for the performance, I think," replied the sub, recognising that cheerfulness would go a long way to "winning through."
"Not a bit of it, sir," replied the gun-layer. "The blessed overture's only just finished. Show that gentleman to one of the front seats, please. Sorry the programmes ain't printed, sir; put it down to shortage of paper."
Assisted by a couple of seamen, for the sub's strength had been heavily taxed, Farrar was lifted on to a long plank lashed between the yard and the broken foremast. Of the felucca's crew there were about twenty survivors, all showing visible tokens of the merciless shell fire. Mr. Gripper, still unconscious, was lying on the highest part of the raft; even there the waves were continually breaking over him, requiring the constant attention of a couple of hands to prevent his being washed into the sea. The surgeon-probationer was missing, inquiry eliciting the information that he was attending a badly wounded man in the main hold when the felucca foundered.
The survivors were, for the most part, boisterously cheerful—almost idiotically so. The disaster gave them a chance of breaking away from the restraint of shipboard, and like a crowd of children unexpectedly let out of school, they joked, chaffed each other, and even engaged in horseplay as they worked to make good their crazy raft.
Meanwhile the U-boat was standing by at a distance of a little less than a mile. Her deck was crowded, the crew coming up from below to gloat over their glorious victory, while on the conning-tower platform a group of officers was intently watching by means of telescopes and binoculars the efforts of the felucca's survivors.
This was practically the only part of the affair that riled the British bluejackets. They had groused when the U-boat had refused to throw away the advantage of her superior ordnance; they had taken their gruelling like true specimens of the bulldog breed; they realised that it was quite playing the game for the Hun to strafe them and "get her own back" on the armed felucca for her activity in ridding the sea of a few pirate craft. But the survivors objected strongly to Fritz standing by and jeering at their sorry plight. According to British notions it wasn't playing the game. Abandon the helpless men to their fate—that is expected of the Hun—but to remain within sight and crow over them, was almost as bad as if the U-boat had kept on firing until the massacre was completed.
"The best part of the day is before us, lads!" exclaimed their youthful skipper, although the tone of his voice sounded strained and unnatural. Now that the heat of the fight was over he was feeling the effects of his wound. There had been comparatively little loss of blood, and this had the effect of increasing the pain of the contusion, while the tightly adjusted bandage seemed to cut into his forehead.
"That's so, sir," replied one of the men. "But it's a long, long way to Malta. Guess we're making half a knot, sir."