He took Joe out of the office to the rail of the vessel and then drew his attention to the steel plates for'ard. If they had been of a dull red heat before, they were now of a bright redness, while flames were actually issuing from some of the lower portholes. As for the deck, it was a smouldering mass of blackness, to which a thin cloud of smoke clung tenaciously.
"You'd want thick boots on to walk across it," said Mr. Henry, "and then you'd never know when it might fall in and take you into a furnace. I tell you, a fire aboard ship is almost as bad as one in the forests of Canada. Ever heard tell of them?"
"Then they're bad, real bad, and you've to move quick if you want to live through one. Now aboard a ship you can batten things down, just as we've done; or you can rouse up some of the cargo, get a hold of the stuff that's alight, and heave it into the water. That's what we tried and failed to do. Now there's nothing more but to wait till we join company with the _Kansas City_. Reckon there's a crowd of people will be glad to say goodbye to this vessel."
A saunter between decks proved that rapidly to our hero. Not that there was any great alarm or any marked sign of uneasiness. People congregated in little bunches; men stood lounging and smoking together, talking in eager, low voices. Here and there a woman was weeping; but there were few who showed less courage than the men, and, indeed, not a few displayed noble devotion.
"How's things going?" asked Sam, accosting our hero and whispering his question. "They tell me you've been up with the captain and have been working the Marconi office. You'll come in for something, me lad. Guess the skipper of this ship did a lucky thing when he booked you as a passenger. But what's happening?"
Joe told him in a few words. "We've got into contact with another ship," he said.
"Which means that you have," answered Sam, catching him up abruptly. "Give things their right names, lad. But there, I've seen it with you afore. It's jest like Joe Bradley to leave himself out of the question. So you've got talking with another vessel?"
"The _Kansas City_," Joe explained. "She's steering a course south of us and almost parallel. She's coming north a little of her course, and should reach us early in the morning. If need be, and we cut off steam, she could come due north and get alongside before midnight even."
