is second in
command. "I have never been so anxious before in my life. Thank God the
night is drawing to a close. Perhaps, when day breaks----"

His last words contained a prayer and a hope. Even as he spoke the ship
seemed to lift herself bodily with an unusual effort for a vessel
moving before the wind.

The next instant there was a horrible grinding crash forward. Each
person who did not chance to be holding fast to an upright was thrown
violently down. The deck was tilted to a dangerous angle and remained
there, whilst the heavy buffeting of the sea, now raging afresh at this
unlooked-for resistance, drowned the despairing yells raised by the
Lascars on duty.

The _Sirdar_ had completed her last voyage. She was now a battered
wreck on a barrier reef. She hung thus for one heart-breaking second.
Then another wave, riding triumphantly through its fellows, caught the
great steamer in its tremendous grasp, carried her onward for half her
length and smashed her down on the rocks. Her back was broken. She
parted in two halves. Both sections turned completely over in the utter
wantonness of destruction, and everything--masts, funnels, boats, hull,
with every living soul on board--was at once engulfed in a maelstrom of
rushing water and far-flung spray.

CHAPTER II

THE SURVIVORS

When the _Sirdar_ parted amidships, the floor of the saloon heaved
up in the center with a mighty crash of rending woodwork and iron. Men
and women, too stupefied to sob out a prayer, were pitched headlong
into chaos. Iris, torn from the terrified grasp of her maid, fell
through a corridor, and would have gone down with the ship had not a
sailor, clinging to a companion ladder, caught her as she whirled along
the steep slope of the deck.

He did not know what had happened. With the instinct of
self-preservation he seized the nearest support when the vessel struck.
It was the mere impulse of ready helpfulness that caused him to stretch
out his left arm and clasp the girl's waist as she fluttered past. By
idle chance they were on the port side, and the ship, after pausing for
one awful second, fell over to starboard.

The man was not prepared for this second gyration. Even as the stairway
canted he lost his balance; they were both thrown violently through the
open hatchway, and swept off into the boiling surf. Under such
conditions thought itself was impossible. A series of impressions, a
number of fantastic pictures, were receive