It was bad enough on deck, but worse to be far down below in the engine- and fire-rooms where the black water swashed to and fro and rose higher and higher. The pumps had choked with coal and ashes and it was touch and go before they were finally cleared. In this immensely difficult task, working mostly under water, Carpenter’s Mate Evans bravely helped to free the bilge suctions. Engineers, oilers, water-tenders, and the grimy watches of the furnace gang had dumbly, courageously run the chance of death by a torpedo through voyage after voyage. Now the sea had become an enemy even more ferocious than the U-boat, showing every intention of drowning them where they stood; but these were no quitters and the ship had steam enough to hold her hove to or to send her surging off before it. They were alert and steady for the signals from the bridge and they kept the heart of the ship beating strong and responsive to the need. The twin screws helped to steer her, now with a thrust to starboard, again with a kick to port, whenever the hurricane would have rolled her helpless. One of the bridge watch, yarning about it in Lisbon, recalled this incident: “I went below to roost on the steam pipes and thaw out, and you couldn’t call that outfit excited at all. What made a hit with me was a kid of an oiler who stood in the water between the two throttles, with a grip on each of ’em while he nursed the engines along. He had to help steer the ship as he got the word, opening up a little on one, shutting off on the other. Getting drowned was the least of his worries. All he had on his mind was coaxing the ship as she needed it, and the water was splashing around his legs, at that.” “It reminds me,” chipped in another of this reminiscent group. “In the morning of the big blow, a guy of my division appeared on deck all dressed up in his liberty blues. The bo’s’n’s mate asked him what he meant by turning out all dolled up like that. ‘Why, Jack,’ answered this cheerful gob, ‘I have a date with a mermaid in Davy Jones’s locker.’”