I awoke with a start, and with wavering eyes looked at the saloon

clock. I had slept for one hour only, but it appeared to me that I was

quite refreshed. My mind was strangely clear, every sense

preternaturally alert. I began to wonder what had aroused me. Suddenly

the ship shuddered through the very heart of her, and I knew that it

was this shuddering, which must have occurred before, that had wakened

me.

"Good God! We're sinking!" a man cried. He was in the next berth to

me, and he sat up, staring wildly.

"Rubbish!" I answered.

The electric lights went out, and we were left with the miserable

illumination of one little swinging oil-lamp. Immediately the score or

so persons in the saloon were afoot and rushing about, grasping their

goods and chattels. The awful shuddering of the ship continued.

Scarcely a word was spoken.

A man flew, or rather, tumbled, down the saloon stairs, shouting:

"Where's my wife? Where's my wife?" No one took the slightest notice

of him, nor did he seem to expect any answer. Even in the

semi-darkness of the single lamp I distinctly saw that with both hands

he was tearing handfuls of hair from his head. I had heard the phrase

"tearing one's hair" some thousands of time in my life, but never till

that moment had I witnessed the action itself. Somehow it made an

impression on me. The man raced round the saloon still shouting, and

raced away again up-stairs and out of sight. Everyone followed him

pell-mell, helter-skelter, and almost in a second I found myself

alone. I put on my overcoat, and my mackintosh over that, and seizing

Rosa's jewel-box, I followed the crowd.

As I emerged on deck a Bengal light flared red and dazzling on the

bridge, and I saw some sailors trying to lower a boat from its davits.

Then I knew that the man who had cried "We're sinking!" even if he was

not speaking the exact truth, had at any rate some grounds for his

assertion.

A rather pretty girl, pale with agitation, seized me by the

buttonhole.

"Where are we going?" she questioned earnestly.

"Don't know, madam," I replied; and then a young man dragged her off

by the arm.

"Come this way, Lottie," I heard him say to her, "and keep calm."

I was left staring at the place where the girl's head had been. Then

the head of an old man filled that place. I saw his mouth and all his

features working in frantic endeavor to speak to me, but he could not

articulate. I stepped aside; I could not bear to look at him.

"Carl," I said to myself, "you are undoubtedly somewhat alarmed, but

you are not in such an absolutely azure funk as that old chap. Pull

yourself together."




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