He seized this unlooked-for support with his disengaged hand.  For one fleet instant he had a confused vision of the destruction of the ship.  Both the fore and aft portions were burst asunder by the force of compressed air.  Wreckage and human forms were tossing about foolishly.  The sea pounded upon the opposing rocks with the noise of ten thousand mighty steam-hammers.

A uniformed figure—­he thought it was the captain—­stretched out an unavailing arm to clasp the queer raft which supported the sailor and the girl.  But a jealous wave rose under the platform with devilish energy and turned it completely over, hurling the man with his inanimate burthen into the depths.  He rose, fighting madly for his life.  Now surely he was doomed!  But again, as if human existence depended on naught more serious than the spinning of a coin, his knees rested on the same few staunch timbers, now the ceiling of the music-room, and he was given a brief respite.  His greatest difficulty was to get his breath, so dense was the spray through which he was driven.  Even in that terrible moment he kept his senses.  The girl, utterly unconscious, showed by the convulsive heaving of her breast that she was choking.  With a wild effort he swung her head round to shield her from the flying scud with his own form.

The tiny air-space thus provided gave her some relief, and in that instant the sailor seemed to recognize her.  He was not remotely capable of a definite idea.  Just as he vaguely realized the identity of the woman in his arms the unsteady support on which he rested toppled over.  Again he renewed the unequal contest.  A strong resolute man and a typhoon sea wrestled for supremacy.

This time his feet plunged against something gratefully solid.  He was dashed forward, still battling with the raging turmoil of water, and a second time he felt the same firm yet smooth surface.  His dormant faculties awoke.  It was sand.  With frenzied desperation, buoyed now by the inspiring hope of safety, he fought his way onwards like a maniac.

Often he fell, three times did the backwash try to drag him to the swirling death behind, but he staggered blindly on, on, until even the tearing gale ceased to be laden with the suffocating foam, and his faltering feet sank in deep soft white sand.

[Illustration:  WITH FRENZIED DESPERATION, BUOYED NOW BY THE INSPIRING HOPE OF SAFETY, HE FOUGHT HIS WAY ONWARD LIKE A MANIAC.]

Then he fell, not to rise again.  With a last weak flicker of exhausted strength he drew the girl closely to him, and the two lay, clasped tightly together, heedless now of all things.

How long the man remained prostrate he could only guess subsequently.  The Sirdar struck soon after daybreak and the sailor awoke to a hazy consciousness of his surroundings to find a shaft of sunshine flickering through the clouds banked up in the east.  The gale was already passing away.  Although the wind still whistled with shrill violence it was more blustering than threatening.  The sea, too, though running very high, had retreated many yards from the spot where he had finally dropped, and its surface was no longer scourged with venomous spray.