Under the Waves: Diving in Deep Waters

Maxwell went to the side of the vessel, where a rope-ladder had been prepared, and his two attendants assisted him to get over.

“All right?” asked Joe again, after giving the order to pump, which Ram-stam commenced with the steady coolness and regularity of a veteran.

“All right,” replied Maxwell, who immediately afterwards slowly disappeared.

After an hour’s absence he signalled that he was coming up. In a few minutes his helmet was seen far down in the depths. Then it emerged from the surface.

“I want a crowbar,” he said on the glass being removed.

“If you’d had on a helmet with a speakin’-tube,” observed Rooney, “you might have said that without comin’ up.”

“True, lad,” growled Maxwell, “but not havin’ on a helmet with a speakin’-toobe, here I am, so please look alive.”

“Any sign of treasure?” asked Edgar.

“Not as yet, sir.”

The crowbar having been brought, the diver again went down.

For some time all went on quietly, for it was expected that, deep though the water was, Maxwell’s power of enduring pressure would enable him to remain below for at least two hours, if not longer. After looking for some time inquiringly at the spot where he had disappeared, most of the Malays resumed their various duties about the vessel, though a few remained a little to regard Ram-stam with much interest, as being one who, in a measure, held the life of a fellow-being in his hands.

Suddenly a loud hissing noise was heard over the side. It sounded to those on deck as if the great sea-serpent had put his head out of the sea close alongside and sent a violent hiss into the air.

Joe Baldwin was attending to the air-tube, while Rooney held the life-line. He looked quickly down.

“The air-pipe’s burst!” he shouted, and both he and his comrade, without a moment’s delay, began to haul up the diver as fast as they possibly could.

That the reader may properly appreciate what had happened, it is necessary to remind him that at nineteen fathoms Maxwell’s body was subjected to a pressure—from water, outside his dress—of about 50 pounds to the square inch, and that to prevent such a tremendous pressure from crushing in and collapsing all the cavities of his body, an equal pressure of air had to be forced into his dress, so that the pressure of water outside the dress was met and counteracted by the pressure of air inside. This highly condensed air of course tended to crush the diver, as did the water, but with this important difference, that the air entered his lungs, wind-pipe, ears, nose, etcetera, and thus prevented these organs from collapsing, and confined the absolute pressure to their walls of flesh so to speak, and to the solid muscular parts of his frame. Maxwell, being a very muscular man and tough, was, as we have said, able to stand the pressure on these parts better than many men. When, therefore, the air-tube burst—which it happened to do at a weak point just a foot or so above water—the diver’s dress was instantaneously crushed tight round him in every part, the air was driven completely out of it, and also largely out of poor Maxwell’s body!

The moment he appeared at the surface it was seen that he was insensible, for he swung about by his life-line and tube in a helpless manner.

Seeing this, Edgar, who had anxiously watched for him, got out on the ladder and passed the loop of a rope under his arms. It was quickly done. He was laid on deck and the bull’s-eye was unscrewed by Rooney, who instantly exclaimed, “He’s dead!”

“No, he’s not; I see his lips move,” said Joe Baldwin, aiding Edgar to unscrew the helmet.

This was soon removed, and a frightful sight was revealed to the spectators. Maxwell’s face and neck were quite livid and swelled out to an almost bursting extent; blood was flowing profusely from his mouth and ears, and his eyes protruded horribly, as if they had been nearly forced out of their sockets.

It is right to observe that the helmet worn by Maxwell on this occasion was an old-fashioned one which, in the haste of departure from Hong-Kong, they had taken with them instead of one of their new ones. Most of the helmets now in use possess a valve which shuts of itself in the event of the air-tube bursting, and prevents the air from being crushed out of the dress. A dress full of air will, as we have already said, keep a man alive for at least five minutes. He has time, therefore, to reach the surface, so that danger from this source is not nearly so great as it used to be.

Such restoratives as suggested themselves to the chief onlookers were applied, and, to the surprise of every one, the diver began to show signs of returning life. In a few minutes he began to retch, and soon vomited a large quantity of clotted blood. After a time he began to whisper a few words.

“Cheer up, my lad,” said the captain in a kindly voice, as he went down on one knee beside the prostrate man; “don’t attempt to speak or exert yourself in any way. You’ll be all right in a few days. We’ll have your dress taken off and send you below, where you shall be taken good care of.”

With returning vitality came back Maxwell’s inbred obstinacy. He would not hold his tongue, but insisted on explaining his sensations to his comrades as they busied themselves taking off his dress—a rather violent operation at all times, and very difficult in the circumstances.

“W’y messmates,” he said, “I hadn’t even time to guess wot ’ad ’appened. Got no warnin’ wotsomedever. I just felt a tree-mendous shock all of a suddent that struck me motionless—as if Tom Sayers had hit me a double-handed cropper on the top o’ my beak an’ in the pit o’ my bread-basket at one an’ the same moment. Then came an ’orrible pressure as if a two-thousand-ton ship ’ad bin let down a-top o’ me, an’ arter that I remembers nothin’.”

It is probable that the poor fellow would have gone on with his comments, though he spoke with difficulty and in a feeble voice, in which none of his characteristic gruffness remained, if he had not been cut short by Joe Baldwin and Rooney Machowl lifting him up and carrying him below.

Rooney, who carried his shoulders, took occasion to say while on the way down:—

“David, boy, did ye find anny treasure?”

“No;—see’d nothin’.”

“Ow, ow, worse luck!” sighed Rooney.

Maxwell was made comfortable with a glass of weak brandy and water—hot—and his comrades returned on deck, where they found Edgar Berrington commencing to put on the diving-dress.

“Goin’ down, sir?” inquired Joe.

“Yes. We have fortunately another air-tube, and I want to complete the work we have begun.”

“Is there not a risk,” whispered Aileen to her father, “that the same accident may happen again?”

“Ah, true,” answered Mr Hazlit aloud; “the water appears to be very deep, Mr Berrington. Do you not think it probable that the air-tube may burst a second time?”

“I think not,” replied Edgar, as he sat down to have his helmet affixed to the dress. “The best made articles are liable to possess flaws. Even the most perfect railway-wheel, in which the cleverest engineer alive might fail to detect a fault, may conceal a dangerous flaw. There is no certainty in human affairs. All we can say is that, when we consider the thousands of divers who are daily employed all over the world, accidents of the kind you have just witnessed are not numerous. If I were to refrain from going down because this accident has occurred, I might as well refrain evermore from entering a railway-carriage. We must risk something sometimes in our progress through life, Mr Hazlit. It was intended that we should. Why were we gifted with the quality of courage if risk and danger were never to be encountered?”

The screwing on of the bull’s-eye put a stop to further remark, and a few seconds later our hero went over the side, while Ram-stam, smiling benignant indifference as to the event which had so recently happened, steadily performed his duty.

As Mr Hazlit and Aileen watched the bubbles that rose in multitudes to the surface, the former repeated to himself, mentally, “Yes, we must risk something sometimes in our progress through life.” He went on repeating this until at last he followed it up with the sudden reflection:—“Well, perhaps I must risk my daughter’s happiness in this youth’s hands, even though he is penniless. He seems an able fellow; will, doubtless, make his way anywhere. At all events it is quite evident that he will risk his life anywhere! Besides, now I think of it, he said something about lending me some hundred pounds or so. Perhaps he is not absolutely penniless. It is quite certain that I am. Curious sentiment that of his: ‘We must risk something sometimes.’ Very curious, and quite new—at least exhibited to me in quite a new light.”

While Mr Hazlit’s mind ran on thus, and his eyes dreamily watched the bubbles on the surface of the sea, our hero was grubbing like a big-headed goblin among the wreckage at the bottom.

He moved about from place to place in that slow leaning fashion which the resistance of water renders unavoidable, but he found nothing whatever to repay him for his trouble. There were beams and twisted iron-work, and overturned guns, and a few bales, but nothing that bore the least resemblance to boxes or bags of money.

One or two large cases he discovered, and forced them open with the crowbar, which Maxwell had dropped when he was struck insensible, but they contained nothing worth the labour of having them hoisted up. At last he was about to leave, after a careful search of more than an hour, when he espied something shining in a corner of what had once been the pirate-chief’s cabin. He took it up and found it to be a small box of unusual weight for its size. His sense of touch told him that it was ornamented with carving on its surface, but the light was not sufficient to enable him to see it distinctly. His heart beat hopefully, however, as he hastened as fast as the water would permit out of the cabin, and then, to his joy he found that it was Aileen Hazlit’s jewel-box! How it came there he could not guess; but the reader partly knows the truth, and can easily imagine that when the pirate-chief sent his other valuables to the swift prow, as before mentioned, he kept this—the most precious of them all—close to his own person to the last, desiring, no doubt, to have it always under his own eye.

Not troubling himself much, however, with such speculations, Edgar returned to the cabin, placed the box where he found it, and spent full half-an-hour more in plying his crowbar in the hope of discovering more of the pirate’s horde. While thus engaged he received two or three signals to “Come up” from Joe Baldwin, who held his life-line; but he signalled back “All right—let me alone,” and went on with his work.

At last there came the signal “Come up!” given with such a peremptory tug that he was fain, though unwilling, to comply. Taking the box under his arm he began to ascend slowly. On gaining the surface he was made at once aware of the reason of the repeated signalling, for a sudden squall had burst upon the eastern sea, which by that time, although perfectly calm below, was tumbling about in waves so large that the gun-boat was tossing like a cork at her anchor, and it was found to be almost impossible to work the air-pump. In fact it was only by having two men stationed to keep Ram-stam on his legs that the thing could be done!

With some difficulty Edgar was got on board, and the order was immediately given to weigh anchor.

Expressing great surprise at the state of things he found above water, and regret that he had not sooner attended to orders, Edgar placed the box on the deck. Then he unrobed, and drawing on his trousers and a canvas jacket he issued from behind the funnel—which had been his robing-room—and went aft, where he found Aileen seated between her friend Miss Pritty and her father.

“Miss Hazlit,” he said with a peculiar smile, “allow me to introduce you to an old friend.”

He held up before her the carved steel box.

“My mother’s jewel-case!” she exclaimed, with a look of intense surprise.

“My—my wife’s jewels!” stammered Mr Hazlit, in equal surprise; “whereon earth—why—how—where—young man, did you find them?”

“I found them at the bottom of the sea,” replied Edgar. “It is the second time, strange to say, that I have had the pleasure of fishing them up from that vast repository of riches where, I doubt not, many another jewel-case still lies, and will continue to lie, unclaimed for ever. Meanwhile, I count myself peculiarly fortunate in being the means of restoring this case to its rightful owner.”

So saying he placed it in the hands of Aileen.