The Argosy, August 1914 — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

14 barge had been made the snapper of a tow and taken out to sea. It had broken away from the others in the rising tempest, and been left to its fate. | But such vessels usually carry a captain and a couple of hands. ‘The answer to the question this truth pro- voked was found in the absence of the customary skiff. It revealed that the crew had abandoned ship, probably taking to the tug. Having gone thus far in his reason- ing processes, Jack Garrett found him- self face to face with the probability that he approached the end of a fool's career. The sun was invisible, but the rapid diminution of light warned him that night was coming on, and with the rising of the gale it was high- ly unlikely that he would live to see another dawn. He swore a mighty oath to cling to hope until the ultimate moment. His admirers had always admitted that he possessed unlimited pluck. Now if ever was the time to show it. He clutched the. low rail to save himself from being thrown, and as, riding a billow, he scanned the horizon vainly for aid, it occurred to him sin- gular that so little water was breaking over the barge. He discovered the explanation in her dightness. She was like an empty coffin, both in shape and qualities, rising to every lift of the sea, when a load would have car- ried her under long ere this. The disadvantage of her buoyancy was her tremendous rolling. She pitched, tossed, and swung like a feather in a hurricane. At one mo- ment her sole passenger thought she was going to capsize. She righted, and an instant later was carried to the summit of a mountain-high billow, down whose flank as it passed she _ slipped with the sickening velocity of a roller-coaster. There was a humble superstructure forward, built directly over the make- shift’ forecastle into which Jack had forced his way from the great, empty _had closed his eyes. THE ARGOSY. hold. He recognized it as captain’s quarters and galley. Holding tight to the rail to keep from being thrown or washed overboard, he made his way thither. He forced the door, which was jammed, and, dripping, cold, and mis- erable, passed inside. It was a dirty, musty hovel, unfit for the accommoda- tion of a dog. .To the man’s immense gratification, however, there was a bunk. He was suffering from the reaction of his debauch, a blow on the head, and his efforts. For a minute after he had closed the door everything turned black before him. He clung to a stan- chion until the faintness had passed, after which he threw himself on the bunk, drew a pair of moldy and inde- scribably dirty blankets over him, and closed his eyes, too ill to care whether he ever rose again. Tt was light when he awakened, and the light was that of another day. Stiff and lame, yet in a measure re- freshed, he stumbled to his feet. His first thought was that the storm must have abated, for the barge rolled far less than on the night before. The sullen swash of water beneath his feet disillusioned him. Summoning every energy, he forced the door and stepped on deck. Only a glance was necessary to show that the gale was even worse than when he The wind had risen to a fifty-mile gait; it tore at the barge like a flock of harpies, promising dismemberment. Rushing upon the mighty rollers to which it had given birth, it sliced their crests and dis- tributed them in white foam. The hulk met the assault of the water sullenly, at every dip shipping the sea in tons. The manner in which she had lost her buoyancy was quickly apparent. Little by little she had set- tled as the salt wash broke through the open hatchway, until now it had be- come only a question of time when she would dip for the last time. The young man looked. swiftly GO VOOKS AMG (C@