Harrigan ducked out of sight and clung to the iron rounds ready to leap up and strike if the sailor should descend the ladder, though in that case the alarm would be given and his errand spoiled; but the sailor was apparently the lookout set there by Hovey. He stayed at the head of the ladder a moment, humming to himself, and then turned and walked on his beat to the other side of the ship. Harrigan slipped onto the deck and ran noiselessly to the side of the cabin. Here he flattened himself against the wall until the sentinel had again made the turn of his beat, and as the latter moved dimly out of sight through the darkness, the Irishman stole down the deck toward the forward cabins. The first two windows showed dark and empty; if there were anyone inside, he must be asleep in the drunken torpor into which most of the crew seemed to have fallen. The door of the third room, formerly occupied by the second mate, stood ajar, and here by the dull light of an oil lantern, he saw Campbell tied hand and foot to a chair. He was placed close to a little table whereon sat a bottle of whisky, a siphon of seltzer, a tall glass, meat, bread, water--everything, in fact, with which the senses of the starving man could be tormented. And near him, sitting with elbows spread out on the edge of the table, was one of the firemen, grinning continually as if he had just heard some monstrous joke. The expression of Campbell was just as fixed, for his small eyes shifted eagerly, swiftly, from the food to the water, and back again. The fireman--the same tall, gaunt fellow who had demanded that Hovey turn over Campbell to him and his companions that day--now leaned forward and raised a dipper of water from a bucket which sat on the floor, and allowed it to trickle back, splashing with what seemed to Harrigan the sweetest music in the world. Hovey must have taught him that trick, and its effect upon Campbell was worse than the beating of the whips. The fireman let his head roll loosely back as he laughed, and while his head was still back and his eyes squinting shut in the ecstasy of his delight, Harrigan leaped from the shadow of the door and struck at the throat--at the great Adam's apple which shook with the laughter. The blow must have nearly broken the man's neck. His head jerked forward with a whistling gasp of breath, and as he reached for the knife on the table, Harrigan struck again, this time just behind the ear. The man slid from his chair to the floor and lay in a queer heap--as if all the bones in his body were broken. "Harrigan! Harrigan! Harrigan!" Campbell was whispering over and over, but still his eyes held like those of a starved wolf on the food. The moment his ropes were cut, he buried his teeth in the great chunk of roasted meat. Harrigan jerked him away and held him by main force. "Be a man!" he whispered. "We've got to take this food and this water back to the wireless house--if we can get there with it. Take hold of yourself, Campbell!"