The sea grew indefinite in the dark,—­as indefinite as the undulations of a black shroud.  It was as though the tug were tossing through some mysterious agency.  There were times when the tall mast-head lights astern showed not a foot above the rim of that more intense darkness which marked where the water ended and the horizon began.

Again there were times when the glowing specks seemed to scale the heights of a sable vacuum.  Once a section of the rail went ripping away in the gloom and once a shredded small boat was torn and hurled into the waters.

One hour, two hours, three hours, four hours—­and still the wild night went on, and still the Fledgling held to her work.  Crampton, the chief engineer, struggled up from the engine-room at nine o’clock, his swart face lined and creased.

“She’s like an old man dyin’,” he said, and his voice quivered.  “The old injines are drivin’ as hard and brave as a man with a club; but a lot of the kick has gone out of them.  Nothin’ the matter of ’em that I can see—­but just feel.  My old injines are feelin’ about fur an excuse to cave in.”

“Well, hang on,” replied Dan, “and don’t tell me what you feel may happen; I can think up enough things myself.”

“Well,” and Crampton hesitated.  “I didn’t come up here fur anythin’ I’ve said—­Cap’n,” he added in a low voice; “we’re takin’ in water.”

An imprecation trembled on Dan’s lips, and one of his hands left the wheel in an involuntary gesture of resignation.  Then he shut his teeth tight and talked slowly through them.

“Where the yacht hit us?” he asked.

“Yes, forward; it’s opened up a little under the floor plates—­about twenty strokes a minute I should say; the force-pump’s kept it level so far.”

“Good,” said Dan; “there’s nothing else to do but keep it going.”

“Nothing,” said the chief, and he reeled out of the pitching pilot-house.

Two, three, four hours more—­the water had gained nine inches, so the chief reported through the speaking-tube.  But still the Fledgling held her tow, and Dan and Mulhatton stood silent at the wheel, the rush of the wind, which had long torn out the double windows, swirling their hair into their eyes and numbing their torn and bleeding hands.  The elements, as though divining the weakening of the tug,—­a tug which often had laughed them to scorn,—­were making mad work of it; there were strange sounds, unforeseen blows—­but still the tug hung on.

There came an hour in which she did not rise to the waves as she had been doing,—­an hour when the leak gained terribly, and when the Fledgling, struggling bravely, if wearily, upward to meet a wave, would stop half-way with a jerk and a sigh, the wave gouging along the deck—­breaking over the stern-board.

They could feel her going in the pilot-house.  But she hung on to her lines with the grip of death.  Dan stood at his mate’s side, his eyes fixed straight ahead into the darkness.  He had cast his die; he had chosen his lot—­now the toll was to be paid.  He thought, too, of the men who, without question, had taken their stand with him.  He reached out his left hand and placed it gently on his mate’s shoulder.