Beyond the first effects of the stranding no one on board seemed to mind. The lieutenant-commander came on the bridge and grinned to his subordinate.
“So you’ve smelt it, Viner?” he observed. “What are we doing?”
“Both engines half speed ahead, sir.”
“Good! Keep this going. She’s a couple of feet below her water-line for’ard. Send a dozen hands over the side and stir things up.”
The order was passed for’ard and presently a dozen seamen, who were wearing tropical uniforms including shorts, dropped overboard into about six inches of muddy water. They were equipped with shovels and crowbars, and at once set to work to loosen the hard gravel against the ship’s bows.
Then Raxworthy tumbled to it why the engines were still going ahead. The pulling astern of the propellers increased the flow of current past the ship’s sides into a miniature mill-race, and as fast as the men loosened the gravel the debris was swept away. Slowly but surely Sandgrub was sinking into a trench she was making by the aid of some of her crew and the propellers.
Then, ping!
A greyish splash against the ship’s side just abaft the bridge showed the spot where a rifle bullet had mushroomed itself.
Somewhere on the mangrove-clad bank about two hundred yards to starboard a sniper was taking pot-shots at the “foreign devils”.
“Get round to the port side and carry on, men!” ordered Wilverley. “Gunner’s mate! Fetch up a Lewis-gun and stand by! . . . I wonder where the chap is?”
The officer on the bridge levelled the binoculars, scanning the shore in an attempt to locate the rifleman.
For some minutes there was no more firing. Apparently the native was reluctant to waste more ammunition and was satisfied at having cleared out the bluejackets working in the water.
Presently there was another report and the whine of a bullet overhead.
“Smokeless powder and high velocity bullet,” declared Viner. “Shall we traverse the bank with a burst of Lewis-gun fire?”
“Yes, do,” replied the lieutenant-commander.
The weapon barked, sending out a wide-flung sheaf of bullets. After that there was no more sniping from that part of the river bank.
“Think she’ll take it going astern, Viner?” inquired the Owner.
“She’s scooped out quite a lot of gravel,” replied the lieutenant. “There’s no harm in trying.”
The engines were run first at half and then full speed astern. Sandgrub quivered but otherwise remained immovable.
“It seems as if the level of the river’s falling,” declared Poundall. “By Jupiter! It is! Look at that patch on our starboard bow. It wasn’t dry four minutes ago.”
The unpleasant fact was apparent. It meant that if the gunboat had been unable to free herself some hours ago she certainly could not now, since the river had fallen quite eighteen inches.
“We’ll be here till we’ve grown whiskers,” said the lieutenant-commander moodily as he rang down “finished with engines”. “Get the party over the side to lay out an anchor, Mr. Viner; then pipe all hands to ‘make and mend’.”
The stream anchor, weighing over three hundredweights, was lowered and a quantity of cable ranged out.
“Where do you want the killick laid out, sir?” inquired the leading seaman with the party over the side.
“Beyond that hump,” replied the captain, pointing to the shoal that had recently been uncovered. “Mr. Raxworthy, you’d better superintend operations; see that the flukes are well bedded.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” answered the midshipman.
Taking off his shoes and socks, Raxworthy lowered himself over the side into about fifteen inches of water. It was so muddy that he was not able to see his toes.
The bluejackets bent a rope to the crown of the anchor and commenced to drag it towards the spot that the Owner had indicated. When the drag of the cable became too great they ran out the slack by means of long-handled steel hooks until they were able to shift the anchor another twenty feet or so.
“Last flight, lads!” exclaimed Raxworthy, who felt compelled to take an active part in the operations, and was tailing on to the rope. “Walk away with her!”
The next instant his legs were knocked away, and he sat down in the swiftly running water. The splash nearly blinded him, while water in his ears had temporarily dulled his hearing.
Yet he was aware of the men shouting both ashore and on deck and of the sharp cracks of a rifle.
He tried to rise, but there seemed no power in his legs.
“It’s that confounded sniper!” he thought. “The blighter’s got me through both ankles!”
There were more shots. Raxworthy made another unsuccessful effort to rise. Then a pair of strong hands gripped him round the chest and partly dragged and partly lifted him to his feet.
“Thought the brute had got you, sir!” declared the bluejacket who, with others, had gone to the midshipman’s assistance.
“He has, I think,” rejoined Raxworthy. “He’s plugged me through both ankles!”
“What d’ye mean, sir?” inquired the leading hand. “Those bullets went well wide of the lot of us. They got the mugger all right.”
The midshipman, bewildered, but conscious of returning strength to his legs, knew that the term “mugger” is frequently applied to crocodiles frequenting Asiatic waters.
Then one of the men pointed to a dark object lying half awash and about fifty yards off. It was an enormous crocodile that had been lying doggo on the shoal, and had been mistaken for an exposed portion of the bank upon which the gunboat had grounded.
The brute’s back harmonized so well with the muddy water that the men laying out the anchor had got close to it before it took action. This it had done in customary fashion by making a terrific sweep with its tail and capsizing its victim. The latter happened to be Raxworthy, who was at the end of the line of men tailing on the anchor rope.
In another instant the crocodile would have seized its victim but for the prompt action of one of the seamen on board Sandgrub, who, with admirable coolness had snatched up a rifle and taken careful aim at the saurian.
The bullet struck the crocodile in his eye. In its death agonies it wriggled several yards, being assisted downstream by the current, until three more shots finished it off.
The party carried Raxworthy back to the ship, where Dr. Ridge made an examination. The curious part of the midshipman’s injuries was that although the whip of the crocodile’s tail had laid the skin open on both shins, the deepest gashes were on the soles of his feet.
“That’s easily accounted for,” declared the surgeon-lieutenant. “The force of the blow swept your feet over the gravel, and the gashes were caused by sharp stones. You’ll be on the sick-list for a day or two, my lad!”
The midshipman protested, ineffectually, that there wasn’t much to worry about, and that he was frightfully keen upon carrying out his duties; but the word of a surgeon-lieutenant carries more weight than that of a captain in such cases.
And Dr. Ridge was fully aware of the poisonous germs that infest the Yang-tse. Very thoroughly he applied sterilizing lotion to Raxworthy’s wounds, but as a concession he allowed his patient to lie on a mattress under the quarter-deck awning.
“And if you shift your moorings without my permission, young fellah, I’ll have you bastinadoed!” concluded the doctor with mock severity.