CHAPTER XVII
NED WONDERS
When the crash had come Ned Slade felt himself thrown back againsta deck stanchion, which he grasped desperately. In the instant ofthe collision, or so immediately following it as to make it seemsimultaneous, he had observed a big hole torn in the side of the_Sherman_.
Stunned and shaken, he clung to the stanchion while all about him wereconfused shouts and orders and the rushing to and fro of many feet.
Almost as if in a dream, Ned saw the dark shape that had smashed intothe troopship slowly back away--pull itself out of the great gash thathad been cut. Then the fog swallowed it up.
He had slid to the deck after being hurled against the stanchion, andnow he pulled himself to his feet again. As he did so he saw himselfsurrounded by a number of officers and men who had not been standingnear him when the crash came. They looked from Ned to the hole in theside of the transport, and then out into the fog.
“What was it?” some one asked.
“I--I don’t know,” confusedly murmured Ned. And then it occurred to himthat he did know--that he had seen exactly what had happened. So heanswered: “A steamer crashed into us. She’s out there!”
He pointed to the mist that was thicker than ever.
“What ship was it?”
“Did you see the name?”
“Why doesn’t she stand by and give assistance?”
“I didn’t notice what the name was,” he managed to answer. “She justcrashed into us--right here--and then she backed out.” He pointed tothe gaping hole.
“Queer she backed out again,” commented a ship’s officer. “She mightbetter have held her nose in the hole. That is, if it’s below the waterline. But it isn’t,” he added quickly, as he leaned over the rail totake an observation. “We’re safe, so far. The lowest part of the holeis above the water line. But why doesn’t she let us know who she is?Why doesn’t she signal?”
It was queer, the absolute absence of sound from the other craft.Except for that gaping hole, it was as though she had been a figment ofthe imagination.
“She doesn’t whistle,” said the officer, who had looked over the side,“and I don’t hear any shouting. Surely she’s still near enough for usto hear from her. Are you sure it was a vessel?” he asked Ned. “Whoelse was here with you at the time?”
That question gave Ned a shock. That was it! Who had been with him atthe time?
Why of course Jerry, Bob and Professor Snodgrass. And there was someone else--the sailor from whose person the little scientist had beenabout to remove a bug. It all came back to Ned now.
“Are you sure it was a vessel?” the officer asked again. “It may havebeen an iceberg. I’ve been bumped by them more than once.”
“It was a vessel,” answered Ned, and his mind was struggling with twomatters. One was to answer the questions put to him, and the other wasto try to think what had become of Bob, Jerry and the professor. He wasconfusing things.
“It was a vessel,” he went on. “I could see the camouflage paint onher. She slammed right into us and then backed off.”
“That’s queer,” murmured the officer. “If she was under steam she couldblow her whistle, and even if she was disabled, as we are, she couldring a bell. But there isn’t a sound.”
“It must have been an iceberg,” declared another officer. “That wouldaccount for everything--even the silence.”
“It wasn’t an iceberg!” declared Ned. “I saw the camouflage paint. Andlook! You can see where some of it is scraped off on the broken end ofour rail.”
He pointed to a jagged timber. It was true. Amid the splinters wereflecks of blue and white paint.
“He’s right!” assented the first officer. “Besides, if it was aniceberg there’d be chunks of it on our decks now. And there isn’t acubic inch. It was another ship!”
“But what kind?” cried several. “Why doesn’t she signal us and see ifshe can help?”
The officer had an answer ready for that question. He had not sailedthe seven seas without knowing something of the mysteries of the vastplaces.
“A derelict,” he said.
“A derelict!” came the chorus. Then they understood.
Then came a barrage of questions, chief among them being:
“How could an abandoned derelict back away?”
“She probably didn’t,” the first officer said. “The shock of thecollision probably separated us, and a stray current did the rest. Ionly hope she keeps away from us!”
The first excitement following the crash having passed, it remained tomake certain just how badly damaged the _Sherman_ was and to ascertainthe number of her crew and passengers who had been injured.
A hasty examination disclosed the fact that the hole in the side waswell above the water line. Except in the event of a storm the transportwould not leak. And, even in that case, the flooding of one morecompartment would not be fatal.
In regard to the personal damage, though, the troopship had not comeoff so well. Several had been killed when the prow of the derelicthad bit into the _Sherman’s_ side, for several decks were involved inthe damage done, and all along the rails, at the point of the crash,men had been standing. Doctors and nurses found themselves with manynew casual cases to look after, as well as those with which they hadstarted out. The dead, of course, were beyond help, and their poor,maimed bodies were tenderly laid aside. There were some of the injuredwhose recovery was in doubt, but others were only slightly hurt.
But military discipline, added to that of the naval officers, soonbrought comparative order out of chaos, and then, or even before, boatswere lowered to pick up any who might have been tossed by the collisioninto the sea.
One or two of these were picked up floating near the _Sherman_, andsome had been hurt.
Just how many were missing could not be ascertained until the listswere gone over. But Ned lost no time after a hasty survey of thosepicked up in telling that Jerry, Bob and Professor Snodgrass, all ofwhom had been talking with him a moment before the crash, were not tobe found.
“We’ll have a thorough search made,” said the ship’s captain, whenNed’s story was repeated. “If necessary I’ll keep boats cruising aboutall night.”
And he did. Sailors, marines, and soldiers formed searching parties inlifeboats, but they were handicapped by the fog. They dared not go faraway from the _Sherman_ for fear of being lost themselves, and theirshouts brought no response. Some floating wreckage was picked up, partof it from the troopship and some from the unknown derelict. “Unknown”because nothing that was found afloat after the crash disclosed heridentity.
“But what has become of Jerry, Bob and the professor?” wondered Ned.“They were with me. Their bodies are not among the dead--I’m thankfulfor that--nor are they in the list of wounded. They weren’t picked upby the boats. But where are they?”
And as Ned wondered and wondered the fearful conviction was borne tohim that his three friends must have been injured or killed by thecrash and have been flung into the sea, their bodies at once sinking.