And again through the roaring blow of water I caught the muffled noise of the rending of wood. I shrieked out in that moment of agonising suspense, 'We are sinking!' and indeed so blinding was the eclipse of the window glass that I did truly believe we were going down and were even then below the surface. Mrs. Burke was unable to make any reply. She was almost black in the face with the anguish of supporting her weight and with horror and fear. In a few moments the strength of her arms gave out; but by relaxing her grip she doubtless saved her neck; her grasp loosened and she slided her embrace down the stanchion to the deck, and then let go and swept silent and helpless as a length of timber down to close beside me; her feet struck the cabin wall hard, and she lay a minute without motion as though the breath had been shocked out of her. She then grasped my hand and cried out: 'Oh, what can have happened? Are we amongst the ice? Did you hear a noise as if our masts had been splintered?' I shrieked back--I put it thus strongly, for you cannot imagine the uproar in that cabin, what with the grinding of the ship and the freight, the creaking of a hundred strong fastenings, the cannonading of flying tons of brine against the lifted exposed weather side of the vessel--I say I shrieked back: 'Let us try to get on deck. It is horrible to drown down here.' 'Don't talk like that. What can have happened? Is Edward safe? What has become of the ship? Oh, the suddenness of it! Are we amongst the ice?' Thus the poor woman raved. She was silenced by a roar of water like a crash of thunder close overhead; a sea of giant bulk had swept the quarter-deck, and in a breath a cataract, sparkling in the lamp light, rushed smoking down the companion, and before we could deliver a scream we were up to our waists. The water must have been of an icy coldness, but I felt it not--at least in that way; it was no colder than the summer ripples which I would paddle in when a child. Terror had rendered me insensible to pain. 'Cannot we drag ourselves out of it before more comes, or we shall be drowned?' screamed poor Mrs. Burke. Then it was that the ship began to right. She righted slowly at first, then came to a level keel with a sickening jerk and a wild leap of her whole frame that sent the water in the cabin speeding and roaring white as milk. A door opened and Mr. Owen stumbled out. 'Oh, my God!' he cried. 'What has happened? I have been unable to release myself. My berth is half-full of water.' And then he came splashing over to where Mrs. Burke and I stood with an arm writhed about the stanchion. But oh, the soul-lifting sense of relief that came into one with the feel of that level deck and the rise and fall, hard and furious as the tossing was! 'What has happened?' cried Mr. Owen.