Streams of water were hissing against
the steel barrier and flying back at the faces of the nozzle men in hot
spray.
"There's a bulge in the centre," reported the second officer.
"Yes," said Dan, who seized a lantern and held it above his head,
pointing out new objective marks for the water. The smoke had grown
thicker. One man gagged at a nozzle; but drinking from the pipe the
air which the water brought, he lowered his head and fought on.
They fought as men should fight, in the pungent half-gloom, colliding
or falling prone as the vessel pitched, eyes fixed straight ahead,
following the powerful silver lines of water which ribbed the dark and
splashed against the steaming steel; white-yellow smoke spirals writhed
about their heads like some grotesque saraband; coatless, shirtless,
their streaked, sweating bodies gleamed dull and ghastly.
One of them straightened from the nozzle and glared at his side
partner; and Dan, whose eyes were everywhere, saw him and moved close
to him, where his fist could do best work if necessary. Any sign of
mutiny now called for decided measures.
"Say, Mike," said the man in a rich brogue, "give us a hunk o' yer
'bacca--this makes the mout' dry"; and Dan chuckled his admiration for
the fighting spirit of the Irish.
Once a tiny lance of flame leaped out through some hidden
crevice--leaped far out at the men as a rifle spits its deadly fire,
and then, curling about a sugar sack like a serpent's tongue, withdrew
so suddenly, so silently, that it seemed to those who saw it as
something which had flashed through their imaginations.
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