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I did not see how our smoke could reach him, for the smoking-room and his cabin were on the upper deck, targets for all the winds that blew; and besides there was no crack of communication between them, no opening of any sort in the solid intervening bulkhead. Still, to a delicate stomach even imaginary smoke can convey damage.
I knew that scarce a ship came in from any Chinese port but she carried somewhere, behind a bulkhead or in some cunning hollow of the beams, a nest of the valuable poison. Doubtless there was some such treasure on the Flying Scud. How much was it worth? We knew not; we were gambling in the dark. But Trent knew, and Bellairs; and we could only watch and judge.
The two had just gained the sugar sacks when the centre bulkhead quivered. A cross section collapsed into a V. A score of rivet holes yawned wide and red-hot bolts fell on the sacks and set them on fire. A line of plating, separating from its fellows, sagged open in a red grin and gave view of the raging hell within.
Whatever the size of the ship, it loaded slaves if it could get them to the limit of its capacity. Bosnian tersely said, "they lie as close together as it is possible to be crowded." The women's room was divided from the men's by a bulkhead, and in time of need the captain's cabin might be converted into a hospital.
"You ought to live this sort of life all the time, Sue!" Billy said idly, as they sat sunning themselves on the wide stone bulkhead that held back the water. "I? Why?" asked Susan, marking the smooth cement with a wet forefinger. "Because you're such a kid, Sue you like it all so much!"
In the same way, the bulkhead which is common to the spirit-room and after-hold may, by timely adjustment, be so placed as to gain much useful space. These things are now much better attended to than formerly in the original fitting of the ship; but I mention them to prevent, as far as may be, the dangerous practice of taking that for granted which admits of further examination.
If we're economical, there'll be enough to last for dear knows how long. We passed the night each in a state-room, sleeping on the end wall instead of the berth, and it wasn't till the afternoon of the next day that the air of the cabin got so bad we thought we'd have some fresh; so we went down on the bulkhead, and with an auger that we found in the pantry we bored three holes, about a yard apart, in the cabin floor, which was now one of the walls of the room, just as the bulkhead was the floor, and the stern end, where the two round windows were, was the ceiling or roof.
However, I'll tell you what; I will speak to the captain about it, and he steps inside the bulkhead and writes a message to the skipper. "Now our skipper was a good old soul, and thought a lot of his boson, and wanted to do everything he could to help him out, but also, like a good many other good old captains in the service, he'd forgotten a lot of this stuff about regulations.
I think it is usual to take that first which stands on the starboard side of the deck, with the after-end, or its left, as military men would say, close against the bulkhead of the captain's cabin, while the foremost men of the division extend under the forecastle.
His bed was higher from the floor than usual and, moreover, the floor was different. In the dim light he distinctly saw a ship's forecastle, untidy bunks with frouzy bedclothes, and shiny oil-skins hanging from the bulkhead. For a few moments he stared about in mystification; he was certainly ill, and no doubt the forecastle was an hallucination.
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