Peter nodded. He glanced up over the sprung plates of her sides.
“It surely looks that way,” he agreed. “Maybe—Holy gee! Here! Get a look up there! Look at ’em!” he cried excitedly, pointing up at the vessel’s rail. “Ther’s scores! Ther’s regiments of ’em! Get a look at those darn rats!”
All three men were staring up at a sight rarely enough to be seen. Peter’s excited estimate was by no means exaggerated. Just above the vessel’s rail was an upstanding pile of lumber, and it was literally swarming with rats of all sizes, from the full-grown, long-whiskered, grey patriarchs down to the extreme youth of the colony. They were running hither and thither without apparent aim or object till it seemed they must be participating in some sort of curious rodent gambol or driven by senseless panic.
It was sufficiently repulsive to gaze upon. There was something utterly repellent in it. For some reason it is against human nature to view these pests without deeply stirred feelings. And for all the hardiness of these men the effect upon them now was wholly one of loathing.
The scene only occupied a minute or so. Then, of a sudden, one rat, bigger, it seemed, than all the rest, suddenly made its appearance. He came to the rail of the vessel. He seemed to be contemplating it closely, or perhaps he was contemplating the men standing below him on the rocks. Then, at last, apparently satisfied with his survey, he set off along the rail on the run. In a moment the rest were following behind. They ran close together in single file, head to tail, till they looked like a long, thick, moving, grey rope. At a given point, the leader turned off back on to the deck, and the swarming creatures pursued him.
With the passing from view of the hindmost, McLagan spat and shrugged his shoulders.
“Quitting,” he said. Then he laughed. “It’s the way of things. She’s doomed. So—the rats are quitting. Guess it makes me sick in the stomach. I’ll hail you boys if I get through this way.”
He moved over to the great hole in the vessel’s side and, stooping, peered within the dark cavity. He stood there for a moment. Then Peter saw him move forward and the hole swallowed him up.
For all the extent of the rent in the vessel’s side the forepeak was dark and low and dank with the stench of bilge and rust. McLagan was forced to move cautiously over the piles of rusted cable, for he was utterly unfamiliar with his surroundings. But soon his keen eyes grew accustomed to the twilight and he was able to measure with some accuracy the place in which he found himself. A steel bulkhead shut him off from the rest of the vessel’s hold, and the walls of the place sloped inwards till their point of meeting was lost beneath the tangle of chains at his feet. Right in the centre he discovered a fixed iron companion ladder standing sheerly erect. And examination showed him that it mounted up through manholes to the top deck, where a small, gaping hatchway revealed full daylight.