"You can see for yourself that there are several women to go yet," responded Herc calmly, although he felt anything but easy in his mind as the muscular giant glared at him with terror and vindictiveness mingling in his gaze. "Women first, that's the rule." "What in blazes do I care about the women?" roared the fireman, behind whom were now ranged several of his companions. "Let me by, or----" He flourished the spanner with a suggestive motion anything but agreeable to Herc. The red-headed boy gazed over in the direction in which he had last seen Ned. There was no hope for help from that quarter, as a glance showed him. Ned was holding back an excited man with long whiskers and of prosperous appearance, who was shouting as if he were a phonograph: "A thousand dollars for a seat in the boats! A thousand--two thousand dollars for a seat in the boats!" Suddenly, so suddenly that Herc had not time to guard against it, the stokers made a concerted rush for him. "Ned! Ned!" shouted the boy, as he felt himself borne down by overwhelming numbers and trampled underfoot. Ned heard the cry, and in two leaps was in the midst of the scuffle, dealing and receiving blows right and left. "Do you call yourselves men?" he shouted indignantly, as the stokers fought their way forward in a grim phalanx which there was no resisting. "It's deuce take the hindmost, and every man for himself now!" shouted a voice in the crowd, and the cowardly mob elbowed forward through the few women that still remained on the stairway and its approaches. Ned and Herc, who had by this time struggled to his feet, fought desperately to stem the tide. So effective were their blows that for a time they actually succeeded in checking the advance. "Oh, for a gun!" breathed Ned. "A cannon!" amended Herc. Above them they heard a cheer, signifying that the first boat had struck the water. "Stick it out, Herc!" panted Ned, as he struggled with a grimy giant, who, thanks to his ignorance of wrestling and tackles, was easily hurled backward by his lighter opponent. But the fight was too uneven to be of long duration. Step by step, fighting every inch of the way, the two boys were borne backward by the opposing mob. Ned's foot caught in the lower step of the stairway and he was toppled over backward. A mighty onrush of the fugitives immediately followed, and Herc shared Ned's fate. The thought that they had failed flashed bitterly through each Dreadnought Boy's mind as they were trampled and crushed by hurrying feet of the terrified firemen, whose van was followed by the badly scared male passengers. The screams of the women who were being ruthlessly thrust aside tingled maddeningly in the boys' ears as they strove to regain their feet. Suddenly, above all the noise of the fugitives and the crackling of the flames as they ate through the bulkheads about the engine-room hatchway, the boys heard a sharp command.