“There is a spar, thank God! Make for it, Barret, while I see to Quin,” shouted Jackman.
As he spoke, they could hear the whistle of the steamer rushing away from them.
Barret, forcing himself breast-high out of the water, glanced quickly round and caught sight of the floating spar to which his companion had referred. Although only a few yards off, the fog rendered it almost invisible.
“Are you quiet now?” demanded Barret, in a stern voice, for the terrified boy still showed something like a hysterical determination to turn violently round, and grasp his rescuer in what would probably have turned out to be the grip of death.
“Yes, sir, oh! yes. But d–don’t let me go! M–mind, I can’t swim!”
“You are perfectly safe if you simply do nothing but what I tell you,” returned Barret, in a quiet, ordinary tone of voice, that reassured the poor lad more than the words.
By way of reply he suddenly became motionless, and as limp as a dead eel.
Getting gradually on his back, and drawing Tips slowly on to his chest, so that he rested with his mouth upwards, and his head entirely out of the water, Barret struck out for the spar, swimming thus on his back.
On reaching it, he found to his surprise that it was the experimental raft, and that the captain, Mabberly, and McGregor were already clinging to it.
“Won’t bear us all, I fear,” said Mabberly; “but thank God that we have it. Put the boy on.”