When Jack moved about now, feeling, dully, as though a cane on which to lean would be a great boon, the others got to their feet with evident effort and joined in one more despairing search.
This hunt ended as the others had done, only more quickly. The only places into which they had been able to look for the missing wrench were the same places that had been vainly examined twice before.
This time it seemed to cause pain even to sit down. How much longer could the torment last, ere death came mercifully to their relief?
"It seems as though I ought to reach out my hand and lay it on the wrench," muttered Captain Jack Benson, to Henderson, next to whom he found himself sitting.
The former boatswain's mate smiled a ghastly smile, his eyes glowing bright like coals. Jack turned, with a shiver, away from the strange glint in the big fellow's eyes.
"Friends," said Mr. Farnum, presently, "we may as well realize the whole situation, and agree to face it like men. We can't find the wrench. Wherever it is, we are not going to find it. The little breathable air that is left us here is not going to last more than a few minutes. We will not waste any more of that air in getting up to make useless searches. Let us be as calm as possible. Perhaps each man had better look down at the floor, and so continue to look. At the end—the end!—let no one, I beg of you, raise his eyes to witness the final sufferings of any comrade."
There was an awed pause.
"Is that agreed to?" asked Farnum, huskily.
"Yes," came in hoarse whispers. There was another long silence—long as time must now be measured, for a breath, now, was as long as an hour on the surface.
It was big Bill Henderson who spoke next.