the powerful wrecking tug, which lay near us. He was a little man, but
quite fat. Red hair and whiskers gave his pale face a peculiar sickly
tint, but he was not a sickly man. He was reckoned one of the best
deep-water workers in England, and could stand a very high pressure for
a long time. Little pale eyes looked shrewdly at me as he presented
his card, coming aboard as he did from a boat rowed by six sturdy
blacks--"kroo boys," he called them. I met him at the side, and shook
hands.
"We're ready to begin whenever you say," he said. "I got the firm's
letter, and have only just arrived myself. They told me you had the
gear aboard with you."
"Yes, I have plenty of gear, all right," I answered, "and you can
commence work to-day if you want to. This place is too cold for me, and
I'd just as soon get away from here the next day, if possible."
"It's some hot, all right, but one don't notice it below so much. I
suppose those derricks you've got will hold all right--what?" And he
gazed at our hoisting gear.
The thermometer was one hundred and six under the after awning, and not
a breath of air stirring. The hot, sandy coast shone like a white band,
fringing the blue water, and I wondered what kind of weather it was on
that white, sandy shore.
We went over the gear together, and then sat sweating and panting for
air, while the steward brought us something cool to drink--that is,
as cool as could be procured. Then I went with Mr. Haswell aboard the
wrecking tug, and was introduced to the working force.
Ten white men and twenty blacks were the outfit. This with what I had
was enough to raise the ship had we so wished. Only two of the white
men were divers--Williams, a sturdy fellow weighing nearly three
hundred; and Mitchell, a short, powerful man, about two hundred and
fifty. Both were under forty, and had done plenty of deep-water work.
They looked upon the job as trifling.
"We'll blow the deck off to-morrow, and then tear out a side of the
room," said Haswell. "After that we can disconnect the safe, and you
can get your winches to do the rest. In three days we ought to cover
the job."
The hot, oily calm continued. The night was something fierce to
contemplate. The sun came out again like a molten ball of metal, and
Haswell donned his suit lazily, while the air pumps, manned by four
blacks, were started.
A ladder reaching a fathom down under the sea was fastened to the tug's
side, and Haswell lowered himself over upon it, and waited for his
helmet. This was fastened by Williams, and then the air was started.
As it whistled into the dome, the front glass was screwed on, and the
little man was shut off from us. Slowly he went down and swung clear,
dropping out of sight in a storm of bubbles which rose from his helmet.
I took out the water glass. This was a cylindrical bucket with a glass
bottom. By jamming one's head into the bucket and sinking the bottom of
the affair under the sea to a depth of three or four inches, objects
could be seen about twice as distinctly as without it--this owing to
the fact that in the open the reflection and motion of the light upon
the always moving sea surface, prevent the gaze from following objects
distinctly.
In order to use the water glass it was, of course, necessary to get
close to the sea.
I dropped into the small boat lying alongside the wrecking tug, and
leaned far over the gunwale, peering down. The long, easy swell, the
sure sign of an immense calm area of sea, came slowly from the westward
and rolled the boat gently but enough to keep me from getting a good
look until I caught my balance. Then I managed to get the glass down
firmly, and hold it about four inches under with my head in the bucket.
At first I could make out little or nothing. The sea was not very clear
at the spot, owing to the close proximity of the low, sandy shore where
the surf rolled incessantly, stirring up the bottom. Soon I could make
out the outline of the deck below where the flying bridge rose within
three fathoms of the surface.
The _Heraldine_ was drawing about twenty-two feet when she sank, and
her flying bridge was fully twenty-five to thirty above the sea. I
tried to see farther, but could make out nothing at all.
The lines of the diver led toward the fore part of the ship, and moved
slightly. Williams, who tended them, sat listlessly upon the rail of
the tug, and gave or drew in as the occasion called. I kept looking to
see things, but could make out nothing further in the way of the wreck.
A huge shadow passed under me--a long, dark shape. It was a gigantic
shark nosing about the wreck.
I called out to Williams.
"No fear," he replied lazily; "they won't hurt him in that dress--might
if he was naked."
The shark passed along forward, and sank down out of sight. Then
Haswell signaled that he was coming up.
He came slowly, and I watched the lines coming in. Soon the metal
helmet appeared, and then he climbed with seeming difficulty up the
ladder, helped by Williams. When he came above the rail, he hung over
it, and his front glass was unscrewed, the pumps stopped working, and
we came close to hear the news.
"Located her all right," he said. "You can fix up about twenty pounds
of number two gelatine--better put it in a tube, and be sure to make
the wires fast--have to pull it through some wreckage down there."
"See anything of a big shark?" I asked.
"Oh, yes, I gave him a poke in the stomach with a stick--he won't
bother me in this dress--but I did get nipped by one of those poisonous
snakes--see?" And he held out his hand, where a small trickle of blood
ran down from the second joint of his forefinger.
Williams gave an exclamation. The natives looked at him anxiously.
"I'll come aboard and rest a while before going down again," said
Haswell. And he was helped aboard, and undressed.
His finger swelled while this was being done, and, by the time he stood
in his flannels, he had a hand that was fast turning black. Williams
said little. The poisonous water snakes that infest certain tropical
seas close to the river mouths were known to him. Those in the Indian
Ocean are especially dangerous.
Haswell gazed at the blackening finger, and shook his head.
"Better give me some whisky," he said. He drank, and sat down.
Williams stood near, and Mitchell came up.
"That's a bad bite," said Mitchell.
"Well, I suppose there's no use waiting any longer--cut it off, and be
quick," said Haswell.
Mitchell, iron-nerved and steady, cut the finger off close to the hand,
and stopped the flow of blood with a strong bandage. The swelling
continued, and the arm began to pain greatly.
"Cut away the hand," said Haswell, white and shaky, but showing an
amazing coolness. He realized his danger. Mitchell performed another
amputation.
Within an hour they had his arm off at the elbow, and Haswell was
turning blue all over.
It was an uncanny thing--right there in that bright sunshine, a man
done a mortal injury by some foul sea vermin that had attacked him in
the depths. I had heard of the sea snakes that come down the African
rivers and go well offshore, but had never seen one. Those in the
Indian Ocean I had seen often, and remembered that they were about four
or five feet long and a few inches in circumference.
Haswell, with remarkable nerve, faced his end unflinchingly. It was
wonderful to see him sitting there, unafraid, with his arm three times
its natural size at the shoulder where the last bandage of Mitchell had
been fastened.
"I reckon I'll last about an hour longer," he finally said.
"It's--no--use." His strength was leaving him, and he spoke haltingly,
in hardly more than a whisper.
They gave him more whisky, and waited. Then Williams took down his last
words in reference to his family affairs, and Haswell laid himself down
on a transom. Two hours later he was stone dead.
That was a beginning that would have shaken the nerve of many men.
Mitchell had his partner sewn up in canvas, and they buried him far out
at sea, rowing off in the small boat.
The next day Williams started down. He found the location of the strong
room, and was careful to wear heavy gloves while working. Then he
placed the charge.
The crack that followed was not loud--deep down as it was. A storm of
bubbles arose to the surface, and the sea lifted a few inches just over
the place where the gelatine exploded. Then Mitchell prepared to go
down and examine the result.
The oily sea heaved and sank with the long swell, and there was
nothing to indicate that there would be any trouble. Nothing could
move the wreck. Mitchell went under at eleven that morning, and, after
he had been down half an hour, Williams signaled him. He received no
answer. With some anxiety, the big man started to haul line, when, to
the horror of all, the two lines--hose and life line--came in easily
without anything at their end.
The hose showed a clean cut well down near the helmet, and the life
line showed a ragged cut or break which stranded it out a full foot.
Mitchell was left below, cut off from us as clean as if he had been
left upon the moon.
Williams strove with all haste to get into another suit, but it was
a good ten minutes before he did so. He went down with a man of his
outfit holding line for him, and came back in ten minutes with a white
face and staring eyes.
"Whole side of the room fell on him," he said; "cut his hose and--and
left him there. Give me a line, I'll get him out."
"Dead?" I whispered.
He looked up at me from the circular hole in the helmet, and seemed to
think me mad.
"Dead? Of course, he's dead--a ton or two of iron on top of him, and no
air--sure he's dead. We'll have to put the line to the winch to haul
him out from under it."
We buried Mitchell as we had Haswell, hauling him from under the
wreckage by a line to our steam winch, and afterward carrying him well
out to sea, where he was weighted and sunk. It was bitter work, and all
the time that hot sun shone down upon us until the seams of the decks
warped and the tar ran out of the lanyards.
Williams was shaken. The next day he refused to go down, and pleaded a
rest necessary. His men were silent and awed. I could say nothing to
urge them on, as I felt that they had endured enough for a few days, at
least.
Then Williams was taken with the African fever, and there was no one
left who would go below for any amount of money offered. The horror of
the thing had shaken the nerves of the entire outfit. There might be
millions below there, but no man of that crew would touch them just
at present, and we were lying there in that oily sea, eating up the
company's money and cursing at the strange chance that had made our
expedition so fatal.
* * * * *
At the end of a week Williams was so bad that I gave him up as a factor
to help us. At times he was delirious, and raved horribly. His men
were for abandoning the work, and putting into Lagos, and from there
clearing for home.
I refused to hear of such a thing, although I was a bit worked up at
the outcome of what had at first appeared to be an easy job. To send
North for more divers was to delay the work months. To await the coming
of the next coast steamer meant delay of at least three weeks--and
even then there was no certainty of help from her. She didn't carry
divers, and, although she would naturally give me any aid in her power,
belonging to our company as she did, I felt that I would rather not ask
anything from her skipper until the last act.
A man named Rokeby of the tug's working crew offered to tend line for
me if I chose to go down. He assured me that the pressure at fifty
or even sixty feet would not injure me. I might suffer some from the
splitting headache natural to the pressure, but that was all. I could
blow open the safe or get chains fast to it, or cut it adrift somehow.
I thought over the matter while Williams raved and rolled in his
sweltering bunk, and the sun shone down upon that dead ocean full of
crawling life and hidden treasure.
"Gimme the gloves and plenty of air," I finally said, after waiting
three days, hoping that some of the wrecking crew would get their nerve
back.
They all showed willingness to work if I went down, and I was soon
incased in the suit of Williams.
If you think I was not nervous, you should have had an inside photo
of my mind as I stood there upon the rounds of the ladder waiting for
Rokeby to screw fast the front glass. I would have given it up but for
the looks of the men. They seemed to gaze upon me with a sort of awe
and amazement, but they made no comment whatever.
The kroo boys swung the pump handles with a will, and when I heard
the hiss of the air I must say my heart gave two jumps and came near
landing overboard--at least, it felt that way; but I would have died
rather than let those men see that I was afraid. Such is the ego, the
vanity of us all.
"Shall I screw her on, sir?"
The voice was Rokeby's, and it aroused me from the contemplation of the
thing to do. I tried to look bored and annoyed.
"Yes, screw it down--mind the lines tenderly, and pull me right up if I
give the signal," I said.
"Aye, aye, sir," he answered, and he screwed in the front glass.
The air whistled into the helmet back of my head, and the noise aroused
me to a sense of the danger should it suddenly cease. I put one foot
and then another upon the ladder rungs, and went down until I swung off.
It seemed as if I was about to fly off into space, and for a few
moments I almost lost my balance. Then my heavy leaden shoes sank me
straight down, and I dropped slowly until my feet touched something.
The light had gradually faded as I left the surface, and where I now
stood it seemed to be pitch dark. The pressure of the air appeared to
swell my head, and a roaring was in my ears. Then I determined to do
something, and bent forward to see if I could.
Gradually the dim outline of the ship's deck took form before the
glass--that is, the deck in my immediate vicinity. I could make out the
rail, and began pulling myself along by it. Soon I came to the pilot
house forward, and recognized it by feeling the panels of the glass
front with my hands.
I knew that I was just about right in regard to position, and started
for the rail to get over the side and down to the place where the
blow-out had been made. I carefully swung one leg over and then
another, amazed at the ease with which I lifted the immense leaden
shoes. Then guiding my air hose and line clear of the rail, I slipped
off, and dropped down to the bottom far below.
In spite of the fact that I had now been under several minutes, I could
not make out objects well enough to do anything; but determined to try
to feel for the opening to the safe. After ten minutes spent groping
about, I felt an immense hole in the ship's side, my fingers going
carefully around the edges where the torn plates told of the force of
the blast.
I entered and felt for the sides of the room within where the blast
had torn out the iron and held it hanging to drop upon the unfortunate
Mitchell. I now saw I could do nothing without more light, and
carefully made my way out to the sea floor, where I signaled to haul me
up.
I came slowly, and as I did so my brain appeared swelling until it
seemed no longer possible to hold it within my skull. The pain was
intense, and I hardly noticed the growing light until I was at the foot
of the ladder. Then I climbed up, being dragged bodily by my life line.
The front was taken off my helmet, and I spoke.
"It's all right," I panted, "get the lamp out, and stand by to send me
down the tools I'll need."
Rokeby gave me a small drink of whisky, and the rest soon had the
electric lamp ready. I went below again. This time I had no trouble in
finding my way, for the light from the spark penetrated the sea for
several feet about me.
In the watery darkness I made out the hole, and saw the damage done by
the charge. The entire wall of the compartment had been blown in, and,
in going into the room, Mitchell had gotten under it so that he had
dislodged an immense piece of plate which had fallen upon him, and cut
off his air and line.
I went forward cautiously, and poked the lamp ahead of me. It seemed
a long way to the safe, but I finally came up against it, and made out
its outline in the lamplight. Its edge stood out sharply. Beyond was
the inky blackness of a tomb.
I saw that it would be necessary for me to blow it loose from the
beams, as I was not good enough workman to cut or loosen the bolts.
Making a hasty but pretty good examination of the bottom and sides,
I determined to go back aboard and study it out. A little powder
underneath would loosen the floor bolts, and then, with a stout chain
about it, we might start the winches to haul it through the opening,
which I saw would have to be enlarged at the bottom. I came up, and was
satisfied for the day.
The next morning I had recovered my nerve to a great extent, and was
eager to get to work. The men were also better pleased at the prospect.
My head had bothered me all night, but now eased up, as I donned the
rubber.
So far I had seen neither fish nor crawling reptile. The bottom was not
very soft, however, and was so covered with weed and sea growths that
it may have harbored many things not visible to the eye at that depth.
I kept to the gloves, not daring to risk my hands after Haswell's fatal
ending.
The first shot tore the bottom off the compartment, and left the safe
hanging by the bolts against the bulkhead. The second shot broke away
these, and, when I went down again, I found the safe had dropped down
to the deck below, the powder, or rather nitrogelatine, having torn
the deck away for the space of fifteen feet or more, leaving ragged
splinters of deck planking sticking forth.
The electric lamp showed the mass below me as I stood at the edge of
the hole, and I very carefully drew my line and air so that they would
not foul when I dropped over. Then I went down and found the safe
intact, but in a very difficult position to handle.
The next blast required a large charge, in order to blow the side out
down to the lower deck, as it was impossible to drag that safe up
through the hole. I placed fifty pounds of gelatine in two charges just
abreast the safe on the outside of the hull, and blew away the plates
until a trolley car could almost have entered the hole in the ship's
side.
I was all ready now for getting slings upon the treasure, and I could
hardly wait until the next day.
The wreck was in very bad shape below from the effects of the blasts,
but I was nearly done now. Another day might find the diamonds upon the
deck of the old ship above me. I managed to pass turns of a heavy chain
around the safe, and stop them up so that they could be hocked to the
fall. Then I got the tackle down, and by means of a whip to the tug
started the mass of metal outboard.
It came along all right, and I thought it would go clear. Then
something suddenly stopped it below, and I had to go down again to
clear it. It was fast in the hole, having jammed against the edge so
that no amount of pulling would break it clear.
I lost no time getting another tackle to it, and rigged it to lift it
end up, and turn it over, then the first fall would pull it out and
clear. I was getting pretty well used to being below by this time, and
the headache was lessening. I found that I could remain under fully
half an hour now, and work most of that time.
The last time I went below I had a premonition that all was not as
it should be down there, and I went along very carefully. I made my
way into the ship's hull, and was just getting the new tackle set up
taut and ready, when the whole ship heeled suddenly to port. The safe
slewed sideways and slid down the now slanting deck, blocking the hole
entirely across, but leaving my lines and tackle clear.
I signaled to come up at once. Then my line jerked, hauled me close up
to the opening, and there I jammed, stuck so I could not get back. I
signaled frantically for help, and they pulled me with all their might.
But they might as well have tried to lift the wreck itself. I was
caught.
During the next few minutes I thought a great deal. The horror of my
situation dawned upon me. I was fast below there--not a chance for
getting out. There seemed nothing to do, but wait placidly for the end.
The next few minutes were hours to me. I could signal with the line,
but that was all. They knew I was alive, and they knew something must
have happened by the heeling of the sunken wreck.
The blasting had probably blown away the sandy bottom under her, and
she had simply cast over and slid the stuff to leeward.
There was plenty of room to take that safe out endways, but it was now
so fixed that some one would have to slew it around before that could
be done. My lamp was still burning, and the blackness lost some of its
terrors in that pitiful light.
I was in the hull of a lost ship, and I felt that I was indeed a lost
man. Memories came and went with lightning-like rapidity. I thought of
Lucy Docking, and wondered how she would take my death. Then I began to
feel the effects of the pressure, and my head grew flighty.
I dreamed of beautiful blue skies and green fields, the shore, the
mountains; and all the time Lucy was with me, going from place to
place. I was not unhappy. There was a feeling of contentment with the
woman I had chosen, and it was all real, so real that I only awoke
under the vicious pulling upon my life line by the men above.
Then the horror of my situation came back to me, and the roaring in my
ears told me of my predicament. I gazed out of the front glass into the
dark medium about me, the rays of the lamp making sharp outlines and
shadows.
I remembered the safe. It lay jammed across the hole, and, while I
was too feeble to take great interest, I recall watching it with a
sort of fascination. I felt its sides, its edges. Then the combination
attracted me, shining as it did in the dim light, like a bit of white
in the surrounding blackness. I lazily turned the knob, whirled it
about. And all the time they were pumping air to me under the pressure
of fifty feet of water.
I felt at the aperture above where the edge of the safe shut off the
opening. There was nearly a foot of clear room, but this was not enough
for my figure, incased as it was in the suit. It was ample for the life
line and hose to pass through without any interruption at all, and all
I had to do was to live long enough for them to get that safe away.
Surely some one would come down, and try to sling it again properly.
I lay with my front glass to the opening, and held the lamp so that
the rays would shine outside. There I watched and tried to control the
thoughts that kept coming with a surging feeling of dread that made my
heart thump all the harder. Drowsiness would come, and the whirling
in my brain would get me back again to the land and beautiful dreams.
Then the jerking and hauling, and trying to dislodge me would arouse me
again, and I would come back to the present.
I remember watching through the opening, and seeing forms passing.
These must have been fish, or denizens of the sea. They flitted through
the range of the lamp like sudden ghosts, the light striking their
bodies, and then disappearing into the blackness without.
The lamp suddenly went out.
I was seized with the wildest terror at the inky blackness about me.
The full horror of it all now came with greater force. That tiny
spark had kept me up wonderfully. It had seemed like a ray of hope.
I put out my hands with muscles shaking and trembling, feeling that
inexorable edge of iron that shut me off from life.
Would Rokeby try it? Would he try to save me?
That was the final thought. I tried to put myself in his place. I would
do much for a man dying by inches--dying where he might be saved if one
would take a little risk. He might get below in time yet. He might get
a whip upon that safe, and, with the powerful wrecking tug working her
winches, upset the huge square of steel, and drag it out of the way.
But if he was coming down, he should have come hours ago. As a matter
of fact, I had already been down half an hour, and I could stand it
for at least twice that long yet. But it seemed to me that I had been
abandoned, that they were too cowardly to try to save me. My whirling
brain and roaring ears told me a story of days of suffering, of
interminable torture.
Would Rokeby try it?
I remembered how it struck me when Mitchell's line came up cut off
from him. I knew what that poor fellow had gone through; what he had
suffered, at least, for a few moments down there.
No, I would hardly blame Rokeby for not trying it. It was too dangerous
for any one to try. And yet----
That latent hope, that feeling that there would be something at last,
kept me from dying. The air was still coming down, and I was in no
immediate danger.