In the discovery of the “fault” and the cutting out of the injured part of the cable, twenty-six hours were lost. During all the time Captain Anderson was obliged to remain on deck, while the minds and bodies of the engineers and electricians were subjected to a severe strain for the same period. They had scarcely begun to breathe freely again, and to congratulate each other on being able to continue the voyage, when they received another shock of alarm by the cable suddenly flying off the drum, while it was being transferred from the picking-up machinery in the bow to the paying-out arrangements in the stern. Before the machinery could be stopped, some fathoms of cable had become entangled among the wheels and destroyed. This part having been cut out, however, and new splices made, the paying-out process was resumed.
“I’ll turn in now and have a snooze, Robin,” said Ebenezer Smith, “and you had better do the same; you look tired.”
This was indeed true, for not a man or boy in the ship took a more anxious interest in the cable than did our little hero; he had begun to regard it as a living creature, and to watch over it, and dream about it, as if it were a dear friend in extreme danger. The enthusiastic boy was actually becoming careworn and thin, for he not only performed all the duties required of him with zealous application, but spent his leisure, and much of the time that should have been devoted to rest, in the careful study of his idol—intensely watching it, and all that was in the remotest way connected with it.
“You’re a goose,” said Stumps, in passing, when he heard Robin decline to retire as Smith had advised him.
“It may be so, and if so, Stumps, I shall continue to cackle a little longer on deck while they are examining the fault.”
That examination, when finished, produced a considerable sensation. The process was conducted in private. The condemned portion was cut in junks and tested, until the faulty junk was discovered. This was untwisted until the core was laid bare, and when about a foot of it had been so treated, the cause of evil was discovered, drawing from the onlookers an exclamation of horror rather than surprise, as they stood aghast, for treachery seemed to have been at work!
“An enemy in the ship!” murmured one.
“What ship without an enemy?” thought another.
That mischief had been intended was obvious, for a piece of iron wire, bright as if cut with nippers at one end and broken off short at the other, had been driven right through the centre of the cable, so as to touch the inner wires—thus forming a leak, or conductor, into the sea. There could be no doubt that it had not got there by accident; neither had it been driven there during the making or shipping of the cable, for in that case the testings for continuity would have betrayed its presence before the starting of the expedition. The piece of wire, too, was the same size as that which formed the protecting cover, and it was of the exact diameter of the cable. There was also the mark of a cut on the Manilla hemp, where the wire had entered. It could have been done only by one of the men who were at work in the tank at the time the portion went over, and, strange to say, this was the same gang which had been at work there when the previous “fault” occurred.
“Call all the men aft,” was the order that quickly followed this discovery.