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D'RI AND I away, her canvas torn to rags, her hull shot through, and half her men dead or wounded, she was, indeed, a sorry sight. The Niagara went by on the safe side of us, heedless of our plight. Perry stood near, cursing as he looked off at her. Two of my gunners had been hurt by bursting canister. D'ri and I picked them up, and made for the cockpit. D'ri's man kept howling and kicking. As we hurried over the bloody deck, there came a mighty crash beside us and a burst of old iron that tumbled me to my knees.

A cloud of smoke covered us. I felt the man I bore struggle and then go limp in my arms; I felt my knees getting warm and wet. The smoke rose; the tall, herculean back of D'ri was just ahead of me. His sleeve had been ripped away from shoulder to elbow, and a spray of blood from his upper arm was flying back upon me. His hat crown had been torn off, and there was a big rent in his trousers, but he kept going, I saw my man had been killed in my arms by a piece of chain, buried to its last link in his breast. I was so confused by the shock of it all that I had not the sense to lay