CHAPTER XVII
ADRIFT IN SMALL BOATS
The scene was now one of wild excitement. The sailors were workinglike Trojans to launch the boats, as it could not be told when the_Eagle_ would founder. Already she was settling in the water.
For once Mr. Tarbill seemed too stunned to know what to do. Bobmade up his mind to save a few of his own possessions if he could,and he hurried to his berth.
"Put on a life-preserver, Bob," called the captain to him. The boythought of the time when this order had been given before, but notneeded. Now there was real cause for it.
"Oh, Bob! Help me!" pleaded Mr. Tarbill, who was trembling withterror.
"I will. If there's anything valuable in your cabin, you'd betterget it out."
"Everything I have is valuable."
"Well, you can't take it all. The boat won't hold it."
"Have we got to go in small boats out on this dreadful ocean?"
"It's the only way to save our lives."
Mr. Tarbill selected some of his possessions, as did Bob, and thenthe only two passengers on the ship, having donned the corkjackets, went on deck again.
The sailors were busy putting provisions and water into the smallboats, of which, fortunately, there were enough to hold all, evenwith the loss of the one the mast had smashed.
"Is there no way of saving the ship?" asked Bob of the captain ashe stood, calm, yet stern, on the quarter-deck.
"No. Her bows are stove in and the foremast has pounded a big holein her quarter. The _Eagle_ is doomed. There must be an unchartedreef about here, or else we were blown off our course."
"Boats are all ready, sir," reported a sailor, running up.
"Very well, tell the men to get in. Mr. Carr will be in command ofone boat, Mr. Bender the other, and I will go in my gig. Bob, youand Mr. Tarbill will go with me. Pull well away from the wreck,men, and lay to until we are all together. Then we'll try to getour bearings."
It was getting lighter now, but the storm showed no signs ofabating. The _Eagle_ was fairly impaled on a sharp point of thesunken reef and was immovable, but the waves were dashing high overthe bows.
Suddenly the ship gave a shudder and seemed as if about to tearherself loose, ready to sink beneath the billows.
"Lively, men!" exclaimed the captain. "She'll not last muchlonger!"
The orders were given to lower the boats. Bob went forward towatch the work, holding on by stray cables that dangled from thewrecked masts.
As the boat of which Mr. Bender was to take charge was beinglowered, one of the ropes in the davit pulley, that at the bow,fouled, and, as the sailors at the other davit were letting theirline run free, the boat tilted. There was imminent risk of theoars, sail, and mast, besides the supplies, being spilled out. Bobsaw the danger and sprang forward with a shout, intending to lend ahand.
As he did so a big piece of one of the yards of the broken mizzenmast which had been hanging by splinters was whipped loose by agust of wind and fell almost at his feet, missing him by a smallmargin. Had it struck him squarely it would have killed him.
Bob only hesitated an instant, though the narrow escape gave him afaint feeling in his stomach. Then, before he could make thesailors understand what the trouble was, he grabbed the rope thatwas running free and, taking a turn about a cleat, prevented thefurther lowering of the boat.
"Good!" shouted Second-Mate Bender, who had seen what had takenplace. "You saved the boat, Bob. In another second all the stuffwould have been afloat. Lively now, men. Straighten out that lineand lower away. She's settling fast."
In the meanwhile Mr. Carr had succeeded in lowering his boat, andhe and his men were in it. The crew of the captain's gig were busywith that craft, and it was all ready to lower.
"Get in, Bob," said the commander of the _Eagle_. "And you too,Mr. Tarbill."
"Aren't you coming?" asked Bob.
"I'm the last one in," was the sad answer, and then the boyunderstood that the captain is always the last to leave a sinkingship.
"Shall we get in before you lower it?" asked Bob of the sailors whostood at the davit ropes.
"Yes. We can lower it with you two in. The captain and we canslide down the ropes. We're used to it, but it's ticklish businessfor land-lubbers." And the man grinned even in that time of terror.
Captain Spark had gone to his cabin for his log book, the ship'spapers, and his nautical instruments. As he came out the red sunshowed for an instant above the horizon.
"If we had seen that a few hours sooner we wouldn't be here now,"remarked the commander sadly. "But it's too late now."
The other boats had pulled away from the wreck. Bob and Mr.Tarbill got into the gig and were lowered to the surface of theheaving ocean.
"Take an oar and fend her away from the ship's side a bit," thecaptain advised Bob. "Else a wave may smash the gig."
Bob did so. Mr. Tarbill was shivering too much with fear to be ofany help. A few seconds later the two sailors who had lowered theboat at the captain's orders leaped into the gig as a wave liftedit close to the _Eagle's_ rail. Then the commander, carrying a fewof his possessions and with a last look around his beloved ship,made the same jump and was in his gig.
"Pull away," he commanded sorrowfully, and the sailors rowed outfrom the foundered ship.
When they were a little way off they rested on their oars. Allaround them was a waste of heaving waters. The two other boatscame up, and the occupants looked at the _Eagle_ settling lower andlower as the water filled her. The wrecked ship, now sunk almostto her deck level, seemed, save for the three boats, to be the onlyobject in sight on the bosom of the tumultuous ocean.
"Well, men, give way!" at length called the captain, with a sigh."We may be sighted by some vessel, or we may land on an island.There are several islands hereabouts, if we are not too far awayfrom them."
Then, bending to the oars, the sailors sent the boats away from thewreck. Bob and his friends were afloat on the big ocean in smallboats that, at any moment, might be swamped by a mighty wave, forthe wind was still blowing hard, though the sun shone brightly inthe eastern sky.