But when he groped his way back into the main cabin his hands came in
contact with the inside of the lazaret door. In leather loops on the
door he found saw, ax, chisel, and hammer. He was unable to keep back a
few hearty and soul-satisfying oaths.
"Why didn't you tell me where the tools were? They're here on the door."
"I had forgot about picking 'em tip. And my mind ain't on tools,
anyway."
"Your mind will be on 'em as soon as I can get forward there," growled
the incensed captain.
Mayo was not sure of what he needed or what he would be obliged to do,
therefore he took all the tools, holding them above water. When he waded
past Captain Can-dage he heard the old skipper trying to comfort the
girl, his voice low and broken by sobs. She had recovered consciousness
and Mayo was a bit sorry; in her swoon she had not realized their
plight; he feared hysterics and other feminine demonstrations, and he
knew that he needed all his nerve.
"We're going to die--we're going to die!" the girl kept moaning.
"Yes, my poor baby, and I have brought you to it," blubbered her father.
"Please keep up your courage for a little while, Miss Candage," Mayo
pleaded, wistfully.
"But there's no hope!"
"There's hope just as long as we have a little air and a little grit,"
he insisted. "Now, please!"
"I am afraid!" she whispered.
"So am I," he confessed. "But we're all going to work the best we know
how. Can't you encourage us like a brave, good girl?" He went stumbling
on. "Now tell me, mate," he commanded, briskly, "how thick is the
bulkhead between the cabin, here, and the hold?"
"I can't bother to think," returned Mr. Speed.
"It's only sheathing between the beams, sir," stated Captain Candage.
"Mate, you and the cook lend a hand to help me."
Oakum Otie broke off the prayer to which he had returned promptly.
"What's the use?" he demanded, with anger which his fright made
juvenile. "I tell you I'm trying to compose my soul, and I want this
rampage-round stopped."
"I say what's the use, too!" whined Dolph. "You can't row a biskit
across a puddle of molasses with a couple of toothpicks," he added, with
cook's metaphor for the absolutely hopeless.
Mayo shouted at them with a violence that made hideous din in that
narrow space. "You two men wade across here to me or I'll come after
you with an ax in one hand and a hammer in the other! Damn you, I mean
business!"