"Something sure _will_, if you don't keep her headed up into the seas," declared Russ. "We'll be swamped, that's what will happen. Steady now. I'm getting some good ones," and he worked away at the camera, while the schooner sailed farther and farther away. Russ wanted to give the idea of distance on the film. CHAPTER XIX DISABLED "How much longer you going to be?" asked Mr. Pepper Sneed, as he saw Russ change slightly the position of the camera. "Oh, not much longer now," was the answer. "I have about all they'll want, I guess. This is only a sort of 'cut-in' effect, anyhow--a preliminary to the grand performance that is to come later. Poor old _Mary Ellen_, we'll soon see the last of her, I expect." "Burr-r-r!" exclaimed Mr. Sneed as he shifted his helm. "Don't talk that way. It sounds rather prophetic, you know, seeing the last of the ship, and all that, you know." "Well, I meant that they're going to sink her. You knew that, didn't you?" "Oh, yes, worse luck! I'm to be one of the last to jump over the side, I believe. I don't like it." "Well, it won't be for long," Russ said. "It will be all over in a few minutes--I mean the shipwreck proper, though there'll be a lot of rescue scenes, and then the castaways on an island, and all that sort of thing. Put me over a little more to the left, Pepper. I can get a fine view that way, with the light shining on the passengers at the rail." He clicked away at the camera crank, and then exclaimed: "No, no! I said to the left. You're putting me to the right." "Oh, so I am. I was watching that storm. I don't like the looks of things, Russ. I believe we're going to be in for it sooner than they thought." "It does look as though it were going to burst," Russ agreed, as he looked up from the "finder" of his machine long enough to take a glimpse at the weather. "Mr. Pertell said he'd signal us with a flag when he thought we had enough, but I don't see anything of a signal, do you?" "No," answered the gloomy actor, who had not been needed in the present scenes. "And I wish I _could_ see it. It's getting too rough out here for me, even if we have a good boat," and he adjusted the gasoline feed to give a little more power to the engine. "Well, it's getting almost too dark to get any more pictures, anyhow," Russ declared. "We sure are in for a blow. It's coming up fast too. We'd better get back to the ship without waiting for a signal. They may have hoisted one, that we didn't see." "That's it, I think!" cried the other. "Say, where is the schooner, anyhow?" Russ, who was taking the tripod from his camera looked up quickly. "Why, can't you see her?" asked the young operator. "No, and I don't believe you can, either, nor can your camera find her. She's disappeared!" "Disappeared? Nonsense!" Russ cried. "It's just that the sea mist has come up and hidden her. It will blow away in a moment. Say, but it is getting rough!"