“Help!” was what Dick made out above the uproar about him.
He rushed to the door which Hemming had left open behind him. The lights in the main cabin were still on and showed him that the lower part of the place was awash with water. He had hardly time to realize this discovery when the lights went out and the place was plunged in total darkness.
[CHAPTER X.]
THE CASTAWAYS.
Dick had a mind that worked quickly. It did not take him long to arrive at an approximately correct idea of what had happened. The yacht was ashore; and the water lapping about the lower part of the cabin showed that she had stove a hole in her bottom or else strained her plates so badly that the water was rushing in.
Suddenly the frantic pounding on the wall of the cabin which held Mr. Chadwick and his fellow prisoners recommenced. The shouting, too, was now plainly audible, for above the door opening into the main cabin was a small grating for purposes of ventilation.
“Help! help! The cabin is half full of water,” cried the imprisoned men.
“Gracious! They’ll drown if I don’t do something and do it quickly!” flashed through Dick’s mind.
All at once he felt his feet grow wet; the water already had reached half way up the steeply inclined cabin floor. There was not a minute to lose. He started for the cabin door, hoping to find a key in the outside of it, when footsteps sounded on the companionway stairs.
“Who’s there?” he yelled.