"That's right!" declared his chum. "If anyone can hold the cable with the weight of the big gun straining on it, the giant can. I'll get him!"
"On deck, Koku, quick!" gasped Ned. "Master's cannon may fall into the sea."
"But the powder!" asked the big man, simply. "Master told me to guard the powder. I stay here."
"No, I'll stay!" insisted Ned. "You are needed on deck, I'll take your place here."
Koku stared uncomprehendingly for a moment, while the loosened gun continued to thump and pound on the deck as though it would burst through. Then it filtered through the dull brain of honest Koku what was wanted.
"I go," he said, and he hurried up the companionway, while Ned, eager to be with Tom, took up the less exciting work of guarding the powder.
Once more, with the giant strength of Koku to aid in the work, the task of lashing the gun again to the deck was undertaken. A bight of steel cable was gotten around the breech, and then passed to a big bitt, or stanchion, bolted to the deck. Koku, working on the heaving deck, amid the hurricane, took a turn around the brace.
There came a roll of the ship that threatened to send the gun sliding against the stanchion, but Koku braced himself. His arms, great bunches of muscles, strained and fairly cracked with the strain. The wire rope seemed to give. Then, as the ship rolled the other way, the strain eased. Koku, aided by the cable, and by the leverage given by the several turns about the bitts, had held the big gun.
"Quick!" cried Tom. "Now another rope so it can't roll the opposite way, and we'll have her."
For a moment the ship was on a level keel, and taking advantage of this, when the weight of the gun would be neutral, another cable was passed around it. Then it was a comparatively easy matter to put on more lashings until the giant cannon was once more fast.