They had unshackled the steering chain, he told me, and the rudder had swung amidships. The starboard propeller had been smashed in the collision, and, with only the port screw working and the helm almost useless, we struggled along in a very erratic manner, our bows now going round to starboard and now falling off to port.
Shells were shrieking all round us, but going wild, probably because we were swerving so much from side to side.
To avoid exposing the men, Mr. Pattison ordered all those on deck to take shelter under the fo'c'stle, leaving only himself on the bridge and the quarter-master at the wheel.
I was sent with the necessary orders, and for the first time noticed Ping Sang and A Tsi standing on deck near the for'ard torpedo-tube quite unconcerned; but I hustled them for'ard, and everybody, even the Sub, Tommy, and I, had to crowd down below, and did not see what happened during the next five minutes, though they were evidently making better shooting, for we heard several small explosions where shells must have struck.
All at once there was a muffled roar and the hissing noise of escaping steam.
We three jumped on deck and saw a great hole in the deck near the base of the foremost funnel, and clouds of steam and smoke pouring from it.
We opened the manhole cover to the for'ard boiler compartment, more steam and smoke came swishing out, and in the middle of it crawled out a stoker, with his face and arms terribly scalded. He just managed to pull himself out, and, yelling with pain, would have thrown himself overboard, had not the Sub caught him and hurled him to the deck, where he lay writhing and shrieking.
Tommy and I peered through the manhole to see if anyone else was alive, but the Sub shoved us aside, and, with a heaving-line lashed round him, and holding an old oilskin in front of his face, crawled down. His name was Harrington—I must tell you it, because this was the pluckiest thing Tommy and I ever saw.
We took charge of the heaving-line, and he half-stumbled or was half-lowered down into the steam.
When he got down the ladder and put his feet into the water we could hear swishing about, he gave a great cry of pain—it must have been nearly boiling—but he did not hesitate, and we could dimly see him groping about on the bottom plates, and could also see that the water was rapidly rising, and was quickly over his knees.