He hooked one arm over the rope, while he extricated--not without difficulty--the jack-knife which he had in his trouser-pocket. Opening the big blade with his teeth, he then gripped the cable and commenced to saw through it till it was almost two-thirds severed. At that point he desisted suddenly, for there came an ominous crack from the rope he had been cutting, while he could feel with his fingers that the severed strands were separating widely. "It will be through in a minute," he told himself; "for, though I had no idea of it, the stream here is running fairly fast, and the weight of the vessel with the stream on it must be giving a strong pull on the rope. There it goes, cracking again, and I can feel the strands pulling themselves asunder. It's time to be off." He wasted no valuable moments in closing his knife and pocketing it again, for, owing to his drenched clothing it had been a difficult enough task to extricate it from his trousers; he dropped it, therefore, and let it sink to the bottom of the river, while he himself let go of the parting cable and struck down the stream till his fingers touched the side of the vessel and he was washed down along it. Then the fingers of both hands gripped the bilge keel, and he listened for the tramp of the sentry, only to find that he was past him and well on towards the stern of the vessel; in fact, he reached the spot where he might safely hope to clamber aboard without observation. And now, with the help of the bilge keel, which gave him a leverage, Philip raised his body from the water, and, throwing one hand above his head, just managed to reach the rail and grip it. The rest was an easy matter for a young and active fellow such as he was, and within a few seconds he was on the deck, gasping after his exertions, and dropping pools of water which ran away from his feet into the scuppers. "What's that? Someone on the deck!" he heard the Commander exclaim, though Philip did not know the meaning of the words uttered. This, however, he knew perfectly well--that his presence was suspected, and that the sauntering steps of the Turkish officer had suddenly come to a rest, while without doubt the man was staring in his direction; the dull glow of the end of his cigar was sufficient indication of that fact, while the voice supported the suggestion. Then from right for'ard there came a dull, sharp snap, while a subdued shudder ran down the deck of the vessel and communicated itself to Philip. "Cable's gone!" he told himself. "Time I was moving."