and N. That's as close as I
can give it to you. In seafaring matters I leave seamen to their own
job, and don't worry about reckonings and day's runs. It's their
business to take me, mine to trust their skill. You will own, Roddy,
that if fools had only kept their noses out of _my_ job in life, I
shouldn't be having to tell you this story.
"Anyhow, Macnaughten--that was the skipper's name--took all the
ship's instruments with him on board his own boat, which was the last
to quit.
"He was a good man, and I couldn't but admire his behaviour, first
and last. The _Eurotas_ went down within half an hour of the first
explosion; which had surprised us passengers on deck as we were
chatting and watching the sunset. The sea was calm as a pond, with a
bank of cloud to northward, all edged with gold on its western
fringes.
"I think this calm, resting over sea and sky, may have helped us
through the catastrophe. The only irritation I felt was at the
slowness of it all, between the moment we knew we were lost and
the moment when the vessel went down. Yet every moment between
was used to a nicety, almost as if Captain Macnaughten had been
preparing for the test.
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