Unk! Bang! I heard all three men go crashing down against the wall. We were thrown high into the air, stern down. “Say,” spoke up Ed, suddenly. “If our seine table should be jarred off’n its rollers it’d go overboard in about ten seconds.” Our fifteen-hundred-foot seine rested on a revolving table on the stern, with nothing to hold it down but its own weight. Barnes shifted his gaze for the first time. “Ed, if we lose that net we’ll go to hell in a handbasket. That’s all’s helping us to ride this blow.” “Can’t pitch much worse. We’re rollin’ our tail off now.” “That table should have been lashed.” “What’re you goin’ t’ lash it to? Hain’t nothin’ there.” “We might have passed a line around it and back to the towbitts. That would have held it some.” “Well, mebbe.” “Only trouble is in getting back there,” continued Bob. “That deck ain’t out of water ten seconds at a stretch.” “Where’s that half inch rope we had?” Ed asked suddenly. “In the chest you’re setting on.” I heard him fumble about. “What’re you going to do?” asked Bob. “Tie it around me--you’n Milt hang to th’ other end and pay it out as I go. I’ll try to get back there by hangin’ to the guard rail. Pull her in when I holler.” “Won’t hear you--too much noise.” “Well, keep your eyes peeled.” “Can’t see.” “Well, dang it, use your judgment!” We lurched over on our side and he had to wait a minute or so before daring to open the door. “Any relations you want me to notify?” I asked, spinning a useless wheel. “Go to----” the rest of it was lost in a hurricane of wind, noise, and salt water that tore in as he opened the door. It literally blew him backward. He caught himself, tried again, got outside, then we lost him in the angry blackness. Bob and Milt paid out the rope slowly, both hanging to the handrail and braced against the door to hold it partly open. Again we shot up into the air, hung, and slid drunkenly back into a black abyss. The two men pulled frantically at the rope, dragging Ed back by main force, jerking him inside, and slamming the door just as a huge mountain came crowding, spilling over our side. “No use, can’t be done,” panted Ed. I could hear the water cascade from his clothes. It was absolutely dark now. We were in a vast empire of blackness, filled with millions of weird, screaming voices. Suddenly I heard, in the rhythmical throb of the engines below me, a catch, a cylinder missed fire, coughed, and caught the rhythm once again. In that moment my heart lost a beat, and I know I must have cried out some unintelligible thing to the gloom.