The Argosy, Vol. 81, No. 4 — page 162: what you’re looking at

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

728 He paused, his quick imagination, as he took on this new role, leaping to a daring conception. “By Jove!” he muttered. idea.” Under the stress of it his gaze roved meditatively away across the deck; then he came back to himself with a quick start. “Say, captain,” he exclaimed, ‘‘am I fool- ing myself, or is that list of the ship less than it was a while ago?” The skipper gave a quick glance across to the farther rail; then strode away on a hurried trip of investigation. “By ginger, you’re right,” he reported gleefully on his return. ‘Whether it’s a shifting of the cargo or whether another bulkhead has broken down and let water into the after hold, I can’t tell; but certain it is that we’ve righted by more than a couple of feet. Who knows,” he cried, “but what we may yet bring the old girl into port?” But at that moment, as if in very mock- ery of his expert opinion, a mountainous wave swept down upon the Essbee. The water-logged vessel, failing to rise to it, wallowed overwhelmed in its trough, rolled heavily once or twice, and then, without further warning, took her long-expected plunge to the bottom. “That’s an CHAPTER XII. SEIZING AN OPPORTUNITY. “ (~ OING down-n-n!” The familiar phrase of the elevator boy was the one coherent thought amid all the wild jumble of impressions which Tom experienced as he was drawn into the whirling vortex of deep-green water created by the suction of the Essbee. The bottom seemed to have dropped out of everything, the world to have dissolved itself into chaos. Cascades of water poured down upon him. He was buried under tons and tons of ocean, strangling, beaten, tossed about in it, powerless as a chip in a mael- strom. And down, down, down he went as one falls in a nightmare for seeming miles with- out ever reaching bottom. His chest seemed about to burst, his skull to cave with the weight imposed upon him. And then something happened. What it was Tom never knew. Perhaps the engines of the Essbee let go. Perhaps he was THE ARGOSY. caught in some reactionary current set up by the descent of the great vessel. At any rate he felt himself suddenly flung up as by the spouting of a great geyser, and swiftly as he had gone down he was shuttlecocked toward the surface, finally to emerge upon a sea boiling with wreckage. He ducked a heavy timber which hurled itself at his head, swallowed an additional gallon or so of brine as an unexpected wave caught him with his mouth open, and then with drowning desperation clutched at a grating which went racing past, and for a space knew nothing more. When he came to himself again, he was drifting easily on a sea which had quieted down, upheld by his cork jacket and his un- relaxed grip on the grating. A short dis- tance away, was the captain anchored com- fortably like himself to one of the hatches from his late command. They swam toward each other. “Well, what are the chances now?” hailed Tom cheerfully. “Our one hope lies, I suppose, in the Idano or the Burnside, un- less some other ship happens to get a slant “Ot: 115" The skipper shook his head. “No use buoying yourself up with any dreams like that, my boy,” he retorted. ‘In a fog like this, they’d practically have to run over us before they’d know we were here. We haven’t got a chance, I tell you; not a chance.” “I suppose fogs never lift, eh?” Tom refused to be dismayed. ‘Shucks, captain! What’s the use of being a killjoy? We're not so worse off. The water’s warm, and we can float around this way almost indefi- nitely.” But the loss of his ship seemed to have submerged the skipper in gloom. “Little difference it makes to me any- how, with the old Essbee gone,” he growled. ‘What good is a master without a ship? And I’d have a hard time getting another berth, even if by a miracle I was to be saved. By George, if it wasn’t for the little money I’ve got laid by I’d have to go to the poor-house. Tom pricked up his ears. “By Jove, cap, don’t tell me that we’re going down,” he exclaimed excitedly. “Fate has thrown us out here together for a pur- pose; that’s all there is to it. You’re out of a job and with a little money to invest; I happen to know of a deal where we can pull off between $40,000 and $60,000 without COMIC OOOKS (E@)