TO THE RESCUE.

Had the seas been breaking, the boat could not have lived a minute. The moment that she struck the water would have been her last.

But, thanks to Captain Braceworth’s up-to-date seamanship, the oil-skimmed swells, although high, were smooth, without dangerous spray and breakers.

The five seamen and the young wireless man who had volunteered at the last instant, tugged frantically at the big sweeps. Jack had been guilty of no exaggeration when he had said he could row. It had been his favorite amusement about the bay, and he was as strong as a young colt, anyhow.

In the stern at the steering oar stood Mr. Brown. His eyes were riveted on the wreck ahead.

As a monstrous green swell rushed under the boat he gave a shout:

“Lay into it, bullies! Pull for the girls, boys! That’s the stuff! Break your backs! All together now! We’ll pay Paddy Doyle for his boots!”

Mr. Brown, in his youth, had been before the mast on a whaler, and in moments of excitement he went back to the language of whalemen when out in the boats.

“H-e-a-v-e a-l-l!” he bellowed, with a strength of lung that appeared wonderful in such a diminutive man.

As the tanker’s boat was pulled by its stalwarts across the heaving seas, the men at the oars, by turning their heads, could see in what desperate straits were the handful of survivors.

“There’s a woman on board!” yelled Mr. Brown suddenly. “Pull for all you’re worth, my lads! It’s a little girl, by the Polar Star!”

As if this information had given them new strength, the men gave way with renewed energy. Jack, by twisting his head, could see, as the boat topped a wave, the sight that had excited Mr. Brown. Astern, lashed to the stump of the mizzen-mast, was the figure of a tall, spare, gray-haired man. His arms were clasped tightly around a young girl, whose hair was whipped out wildly by the wind.

Near by, another form was lashed to the wheel, while forward were two figures, apparently those of sailors. They also were tied, in this case to the windlass. This fact alone betrayed the desperate conditions through which the unfortunate craft had fought her way.

“She’s a down-easter, from Nova Scotia or Maine. Lumber, I guess,” opined Mr. Brown. “Good thing for them they had a lumber cargo, or she’d have been keeping company with Davy Jones by this time. Give way, men!”

But all Mr. Brown’s urgings to “hit it up” were unneeded. The crew of the boat were all Americans, and anyone who knows the merchant navy of to-day, knows that it is by a rare chance that such a thing happens. American ships are largely manned by foreigners; but aboard the Ajax,—Captain Braceworth was particular in this respect,—the majority of the crew were American. Consequently, they needed no driving to do their duty when lives were at stake.

Jack, tugging at his oar, felt the strength of ten men. His whole being thrilled to the glory of the adventure. This was real seaman’s work. This was no job for a monkey-wrench sailor, but a man’s task, requiring strength, grit and nerve.

But as they drew alongside the wreck, it was apparent that any attempt to get close enough to take off the crew must infallibly end in disaster.

Mr. Brown turned to his crew.

“Men, which of you can swim? I’m like a lame duck in the water or I’d do it myself.” (And nobody doubted that he would.) “We’ve got to get a line to that craft.”

Jack’s face flushed with excitement. He would prove worthy of his line of sea-going forbears.

“I can swim like a fish, sir! Let me try it!”

At the same time that he spoke, four other voices expressed their willingness to try. Mr. Brown looked at Jack.

“This is no job for a wireless kid to tackle,” he said grimly. “Dobson, you spoke next. I’ll send you. Get ready and make fast a line around your waist.”

But Dobson was already knotting a line about his middle. He stripped to his underwear, and, while Jack looked on with bitter disappointment in his face, the man tossed one end of the line to Mr. Brown and then, without a word, plunged overboard.

Jack watched him with a thrill of admiration, as with strong, confident strokes he cleft the sea. Then he looked in another direction. Off to the leeward was the Ajax, tossing on the seas for an instant and then vanishing till only the tops of her masts and a smudge of smoke were visible.

It was growing dusk. A wan, gray light filled the air. The next time the steamer rose on a swell, Jack saw that at her mast-head the riding lights had been switched on. They glowed like jewels in the monotonous sea-scape of lead and dull green.

Dobson reached the wreck. With clever generalship he had waited for a big sea, and then, as it rose high, he had ridden on it straight for the vessel. When the sea swept by, they saw him clinging to the main chains and after an instant begin clambering on board with the line trailing from his waist.

Those in the boat broke into a wild cheer. Jack’s voice rang out above the rest.

“There’s a real seaman,” he thought; “one of the kind my father and Uncle Toby were.”

As the hoarse shouts of the men in the boat rang over the waters, they saw the form of Dobson creeping aft along the wreckage. They watched through the thickening light as the shadowy figure toiled along. He gained the side of the old man and the little girl.

Taking the line from his waist, he made it fast to the latter’s body.

“Give way, men,” ordered Mr. Brown, and the boat was warily maneuvered under the stern of the wreck. It was dangerous, risky work, but while the small craft tossed almost under the derelict’s counter, the forms of the old man and the child were lowered into her. Although both were badly exhausted, there were stimulants in the boat, and Mr. Brown pronounced both to be safe and sound and not in any danger.

But the seaman who had made the rescues was, himself, in no condition after his long, hard swim to do any more. When the girl and the old man were safe in the boat, he, too, made a wild leap and boarded it. Immediately it was sheered off.

Jack’s heart gave a wild leap. There were still two men in the bow. What about them?

There was a second line in the boat and the young wireless man had already made it fast around his middle.

“It’s my turn now, Mr. Brown,” he urged. “Let me go now, won’t you, and get those two poor fellows in the bow?”

“Shut your mouth and sit still,” came hotly from Mr. Brown; and then a sudden exclamation, “Great guns! He’s as brave a young idiot as I ever saw!”

For Jack had taken the law into his own hands, leaped overboard into the boiling sea and was now swimming with bold, confident strokes toward the dim outlines of the derelict’s bow.