"
"Then she can go to hell for all we care," he said, with emphatic
conclusiveness.
And just then the fore-topgallant-yard carried away--luckily as the
bow was down-pitched into a trough of sea-and when the slow,
confused, and tangled descent was accomplished the big stick lay
across the wreck of both bulwarks and of that portion of the bridge
between the foremast and the forecastle head.
Bert Rhine heard, but could not see, the damage wrought. He looked
up at me challengingly, and sneered:
"Want some more to come down?"
It could not have happened more apropos. The port-brace, and
immediately afterwards the starboard-brace, of the crojack-yard-
carried away. This was the big, lowest spar on the mizzen, and as
the huge thing of steel swung wildly back and forth the gangster and
his followers turned and crouched as they looked up to see. Next,
the gooseneck of the truss, on which it pivoted, smashed away.
Immediately the lifts and lower-topsail sheets parted, and with a
fore-and-aft pitch of the ship the spar up-ended and crashed to the
deck upon Number Three hatch, destroying that section of the bridge
in its fall.
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