I ran up the companion and began to struggle with the scuttle-board again, hoping that the Chinaman who was seeking shelter from the pirates’ bullets had made it possible for us to escape.  The board was looser, and I slipped it to one side nearly an inch, and then it jammed again.

“Trenholm!  Trenholm!” yelled Riggs frantically from below.

“What is it?” I called, hating to lose a second in my efforts to get the board free.

He did not answer, and I called to him again.  Before the words were out of my mouth I was sprawling on all fours on the deck below.

CHAPTER XIII

WE PLAN AN EXPEDITION

I had been thrown down the companion by an appalling crash and a sudden lurch of the steamer as she careened to port.  It seemed to me that the bottom plates were being ripped out of her and she was settling on her side with a succession of thumps which I took to be her last effort to keep afloat.  The sea was almost to the open ports on the port side; and, as I tried to gain my feet on the tilted deck of the forecastle, I fell against the outboards of the line of bunks.

“She’s aground!” screamed Captain Riggs at me.  “She’s gone smash flat into a bed of coral!  See that green streak running away from us to seaward?  That’s a reef running out from the mainland and we’ve piled up on it, and if we don’t slip off we’re safe until it comes on to blow.”

He ran to the starboard side and climbed the bunks to look through the ports there.

“It’s all around us!  Hear her settling?  She’s making a bed for herself in the coral-patch and she’s not taking any more water.  She’s safe as a church, Mr. Trenholm.  If the tide don’t lift her off enough to pull her into deep water, or the current swing her, she’ll hold until the sea comes up; but she’s pretty deep and lays steady.  She’ll break up right here.”

“That’s small comfort for us,” I said, nursing my bruises.

“They’ve gone in behind that point and made a landing,” said Riggs, still looking through the port.  “We’ll be out of here in jig-time now.  Where be my matches?  Here!  You and Rajah fish for water with these tins on a string, and wet down all these rags.  Pull all the water in here you can.”

He lit the slush-lamp again, and I wondered what he was about.  I was not quite sure whether he knew of a way to get out of the forecastle, or had lost his reason.  He was all bustle and business in a minute.

“I thought we wanted to keep the water out,” I remarked.

“Stow that talk and obey orders,” said Riggs sharply, digging grease out of the can of the lamp with his fingers and picking the wick to make it burn better.  “Look lively now with that water and I’ll show you a trick or two now that they’ve abandoned ship.  I’ll take a hand in this business myself.”

“What’s the plan?” I asked.