“I have a proposition, sir,” returned the soldier, and for once his voice was unsteady with excitement. “When we were tangled alongside the gun-boat, some cases of cargo was jolted off our deck onto her deck where the woodwork and plates was all tore away. For God’s sake, put your search-light on her for a minute, quick, before she swings her smashed side away from us. She’s still turnin’.”
“And for what?” queried O’Shea, but he leaped for the lighting-switch, confident that the soldier knew what he was talking about.
“Two of them cases was nitro-glycerine, sir, and for a wonder they slid so easy that they didn’t go off. I know them when I see ’em. Just give me one sight of them.”
The search-light of the Fearless swept across the gun-boat, which was slowly shifting her position to find the middle of the channel and a safe anchorage. There was cramped room to manœuvre, and she was swinging in a small arc which exposed for a little time the shattered side that had been rammed by the tug. A gaping hole above water disclosed the main-deck forward, and the search-light of the Fearless played and flickered in and out, white and brilliant. It illuminated the wreckage and the heap of wooden cases which lay as they had slid across the fragments of bulwark that bridged the narrow gap between the interlocked vessels.
“Hold the light steady, sir,” said Jack Gorham as he dropped to one knee, shoved the barrel of the Springfield across the rail of the bridge, and laid his cheek against the stock. “It seems plumb ridiculous, but it’s worth tryin’.”
His wonderfully keen eyes had distinguished a square wooden case which sat exposed and somewhat removed from the others on the gun-boat’s littered deck. He had bragged of his marksmanship. Now was the supreme opportunity to make good. The gun-boat was moving. Her shattered side would be hidden from him before he could shoot more than twice or thrice.
As the sights of his beloved old rifle came true on the tiny target he pressed the trigger and the heavy bullet went singing on its way.
“Missed, by Godfrey!” grunted Gorham as he reloaded. “If I score a bull’s-eye, you’ll know it all right.”
Annoyed by this impertinence, the gun-boat let drive with a one-pounder which put a shell through the funnel of the Fearless and showered the deck with soot. Gorham wiped his eyes and took aim for the second shot. Good luck and good marksmanship guided it. No need to wonder where this bullet struck. The case of nitro-glycerine exploded with a prodigious detonation that seemed to shake earth and sea and sky. The forward part of the gun-boat was enveloped in a great sheet of flame. The people of the Fearless were stunned and deafened and the hull rocked violently against the reef. Burning fragments rained everywhere, and fell hissing into the bay. From the place where the gun-boat was rapidly sinking came cries for help.
“She is gone entirely. God help their poor souls,” brokenly murmured Captain O’Shea.