Page:The Seven Seas (Kipling, 1896).djvu/87

Rh But three were down on the Baltic's deck and two of the Stralsund's crew.

An arm's length out and overside the banked fog held them bound,

But, as they heard or groan or word, they fired at the sound.

For one cried out on the Name of God, and one to have him cease,

And the questing volley found them both and bade them hold their peace;

And one called out on a heathen joss and one on the Virgin's Name,

And the schooling bullet leaped across and showed them whence they came.

And in the waiting silences the rudder whined beneath,

And each man drew his watchful breath slow taken 'tween the teeth—

Trigger and ear and eye acock, knit brow and hard-drawn lips—

Bracing his feet by chock and cleat for the rolling of the ships.

Till they heard the cough of a wounded man that fought in the fog for breath,