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And it was silent, in spite of that queer composite sound of voices, and shuffling feet, and the occasional squeak of chair legs from above a silence that seemed to belong to this miserable hole alone, that seemed immune from all extraneous noises. And after a time, in a curious way, the silence seemed to palpitate, to beat upon the ear-drums, to grow almost uncanny.
While all this, along with many other noises, squealings of boat-boys and shouts of Borckman, was impacting on Jerry's ear-drums, he was still sliding down the steep deck of his new and unstable world. But he did not bring up against the rail where his fragile ribs might well have been broken.
A bullet took a lump of hair off his temple, and shrapnel exploding near by almost split his ear-drums; but still he went on shooting. His heart was really in the job now, he was going to stop these Bosh or bust.
Down and down I went till I thought I'd never come up again. My ear-drums felt like they'd bust and my head seemed to have been hit with an axe. But come up I did eventually as you know, and found poor George Melville there, too. Of the dirigible there was not so much of as a match-stick left. The rest you know." Ben's voice shook a little as he reached the latter part of his narrative.
And as if they were not excruciating enough, during "Holy Week" they conspire against the ear-drums of their victims by revolving a sort of infernal machine made of wood in the form of a hollow cross, with four swinging hammers on each arm which strike against iron plates as the thing goes round. The keeper's remark that the noise was awful was superfluous.
This may be a cavalier way of treating Liberty, but perhaps Liberty enjoys it better than being kept on her feet all day, listening to speeches and having her ear-drums split by cannon. Who knows? At all events, Newry's programme certainly suits the firemen of the county, from Smyrna in the north to Carthage in the south.
All at once the earth seemed rent by a roar that shook the very dam. Followed instantly a second volume of sound more terrific, more blasting in its quality, more dreadful in its power, deafening, stunning, as if the world had erupted. "Their dynamite!" Weir breathed to himself. His ear-drums appeared to be broken. His hat was gone. His body ached from the tremendous dispersion of air.
He had filibustered down to Chili; had acted as ice pilot on an Arctic relief expedition; had captained a crew of Chinamen shark-fishing in Magdalena Bay, and had been nearly murdered by his men; had been a deep-sea diver, and had burst his ear-drums at the business, so that now he could blow tobacco smoke out of his ears; he had been shipwrecked in the Gilberts, fought with the Seris on the lower California Islands, sold champagne made from rock candy, effervescent salts, and Reisling wine to the Coreans, had dreamed of "holding up" a Cunard liner, and had ridden on the Strand in a hansom with William Ewart Gladstone.
The pale square of the single window, over which a bleached-out cotton flour-sack had been tacked, let in only enough light to intensify the gloom. Within the cabin was a blackness thick, tangible, oppressive; the brothers stared into it with bulging eyes and listened with ear-drums strained to the point of rupture. Oddly enough, this utter silence augmented their agitation.
If they please the eye, they ain't like to hit the ear-drums so bad. Wimmin is cur'us that aways." "Mebbe," agreed Rust, bowing to the butcher's superior knowledge. "But I guess it must 'a' cost a heap o' dollars. Say, Will must 'a' got it rich. I'd like to savvee wher'," he added, with a sigh, as they thoughtfully returned to the bar. But nobody paid any attention to the blacksmith's regrets.
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