Argosy All-Story Weekly — 'The Metal Monster' — page 79: what you’re looking at

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

BOP NET om ee THE DERELICT. . Katrina and Thorpe had to fight their way against the raging elements. This they did, gasping and choking against the force of the wind, and blinded with salt spume that cut viciously against their faces. They gained the door and plunged into Captain Buchanan’s room, just as a huge sea swept down upon the Barbuda. Thorpe flung both arms about the girl and held her close. There was a crash—a terrific shudder throughout the ship—and then, suddenly, she swung wildly around. _“ The propeller!” Katrina gasped. ‘“ The propeller or the steering-gear!” Thorpe gazed quizzically down at her. “ Which means?” he asked. | “Disaster!” Katrina replied shortly. “Tl remain here with the captain.” “You're not afraid, are your” the man marveled. . “No. Nor are you. It might be well for you to take your courage among those poor souls in the social hall again.” _ “PU go,” Thorpe replied, “ but don’t mistake this for courage. I simply don’t care what happens to me—and that’s far from courage.”’ Katrina turned from him and left the room. CHAPTER IV. MISSING. O Katrina the hours that followed be- side the captain’s bunk were a night- mare. There was little she could do. Captain Buchanan’s sufferings were intense. Besides his physical agony, the captain was in mental torture. He lay helpless—help- ~ less when his ship most needed him. Never before in his career had be been so needed —and now he lay crippled even as his ship was crippled. The night seemed interminable. That the Barbuda, stripped of her propeller, lived through it was little short of a’miracle. Had | she caught the full fury of the storm in- Stead of only the edge of it, she must have foundered. All night she lay at the mercy of the/seas which rushed down upon her and beat her into their troughs or shoul- 73 dered her out of them again. She was like a barrel, a cask—flotsam tossed upon wild seas. All night, through pipes fore and aft, oil was spread upon the waters, keeping them from breaking over the Barbuda and com- pletely engulfing her. | Her boats were stove in. Her rails and stanchions were twisted and in many cases carried away. Through some kind chance —or the good work of her black bosun— her hatch covers held. The damage to her was surface damage, except for that first terrible loss, her propeller. All night the wireless operators sent out their appeals to the Koromanti, now not only for the doctor to attend the captain, but for succor for all those on the doomed In some way, news of the captain’s ac- cident spread about the ship. This, added to the loss of the propeller, had been more than either passengers or crew could stand. With a few exceptions—the mates and en- gineers, the stewardess and the second stew- ard—the crew of the Barbuda was black or Portuguese. To quote Thorpe, there was not a “whole man”: among them. By afternoon, when the Koromanti finally hove in sight, the Barbuda was little short of a madhouse. There was only one thought in the minds of the terror-stricken people: to get aboard a ship that answered her wheel, and to make all possible speed for land. It took the chief and his engineers in a body to keep the terrified Portuguese be- low. Steam was needed for dynamo and pumps, and only the menace of revolvers kept the black gang at their posts. When the Koromanti finally hove to, a short distance away, even the dynamo and pumps were abandoned. There was a rush for the almost boatless boat-deck. Here the mates met the frenzied men, holding them back at the point of their guns, in order that old tradition might be followed and women and children saved first. The wind had gone down, but the sea was still running high. Had the people aboard the Barbuda not been driven half insane with fear overnight, they would not have dared face those waters in small boats. C (O) UL UN S (CO ElOOO