“Der sneagin’ Sohn off a peach ain’t sorry die Clara is by dose tam Chermans gesunken!”
“What!” Sutton howled. “The Clara sunk? Whatya mean––sunk?”
Bohlmann told him. Sutton wavered. He had driven thousands of rivets into the frame of the ship, and a little explosive had opened all the seams and ended her days! When at last he understood the Clara’s fate and Nuddle’s comments he turned to Jake with baleful calm:
“And you thought it was good business, did you? And these fellers was thinkin’ about lynchin’ you, was they? Well, they’re all wrong––they’re all wrong: we’d ought to save lynchin’ for real guys. What you need is somethin’ like––this!”
His terrific fist lashed out and caught Jake in the right eye. Jake in a daze of indignation and amazement went over backward; his head struck the steel deck, and his soul went out. When it came back he lay still for a while, pretending to be unconscious until the gang had dispersed, satisfied, and Sutton was making ready to begin riveting again. Then he picked himself up and edged round Sutton, growling:
“I’ll fix you for this, you––”
Sutton did not wait to learn what Jake was going to call him. His big foot described an upward arc, and Jake a parabola, ending in a drop that almost took him through an open hatch into the depth of the hold. He saved himself, peering over the edge, too weak for words––hunched back, crawled around the steel abyss, and betook himself to a safe hiding-place under the tank-top till the siren should blow and disperse his enemies.