ring in the air, that
he became aware of what had happened within about three yards of his
back.

He poked his head forward, groping for the ear of his commander. His
lips touched it--big, fleshy, very wet. He cried in an agitated tone,
"Our boats are going now, sir."

And again he heard that voice, forced and ringing feebly, but with a
penetrating effect of quietness in the enormous discord of noises, as if
sent out from some remote spot of peace beyond the black wastes of the
gale; again he heard a man's voice--the frail and indomitable sound that
can be made to carry an infinity of thought, resolution and purpose,
that shall be pronouncing confident words on the last day, when heavens
fall, and justice is done--again he heard it, and it was crying to him,
as if from very, very far--"All right."

He thought he had not managed to make himself understood. "Our boats--I
say boats--the boats, sir! Two gone!"

The same voice, within a foot of him and yet so remote, yelled sensibly,
"Can't be helped."

Captain MacWhirr had never turned his face, but Jukes caught some more
words on the wind.

"What can--expect--when hammering through--such--Bound to
leave--something behind--stands to reason."

Watchfully Jukes listened for more. No more came. This was all Captain
MacWhirr had to say; and Jukes could picture to himself rather than see
the broad squat back before him. An impenetrable obscurity pressed down
upon the ghostly glimmers of the sea. A dull conviction seized upon
Jukes that there was nothing to be done.

If the steering-gear did not give way, if the immense volumes of water
did not burst the deck in or smash one of the hatches, if the engines
did not give up, if way could be kept on the ship against this terrific
wind, and she did not bury herself in one of these awful seas, of whose
white crests alone, topping high above her bows, he could now and then
get a sickening glimpse--then there was a chance of her coming out of
it. Something within him seemed to turn over, bringing uppermost the
feeling that the Nan-Shan was lost.

"She's done for," he said to himself, with a surprising mental
agitation, as though he had discovered an unexpected meaning in this
thought. One of these things was bound to happen. Nothing could be
prevented now, and nothing could be remedied. The men on board did not
count, and the ship could not last. This weather was too impossible.

Jukes felt an arm thrown heavily over his sho