I was a good swimmer, and made some headway until I butted hard into a floating object I failed to see in the darkness and nearly stove in my skull. I reached wildly upward, and my hands clutched the combings of a hatchway.
Then I recovered myself and drew my tired body clear of the sea. I had a float that would keep me from sinking as long as I had strength to stay upon it.
The Yarmouth bore down on me, and I cried out. She altered her course a point or two, but did not stop, and in a moment she was gliding away into the darkness, leaving me alone on the hatchway.
I could hear the rush of the water under her bluff bows, and the cries of the men on deck calling out orders. Then she faded away into the night.
In a little while I heard a cry from the dark water near me, and soon I made out a man’s head close to the hatch. I called to him, and reached out and pulled him up on the float, for he was too weak to help himself.
He raised his face as it came close to mine, and I recognized my brother-in-law, Mr. Robinson.
He was very feeble, and I soon saw that he was badly hurt, but he said not a word and lay there on his back, quietly gazing up at the stars.
I could see his features with that look of profound thought expressed upon them as in the days we worked in the ship-yard together.
My only feeling towards him was one of awe. No idea of killing him entered my head, though I could easily have disposed of him in his present weak state, so there I sat gazing at him, and he took no more notice of me than if I was part of the floating hatchway.
In a little while I made out another dark object in the water near us, and presently a voice hailed me. I answered, and soon afterwards a piece of spar supporting three men came alongside the hatch.