Wolf Larsen rove a bowline in a piece of rope and slipped it under his shoulders.

Then he was carried aft and flung into the sea.
Forty,--fifty,--sixty feet of line ran out, when Wolf Larsen cried "Belay!" Oofty-Oofty took a turn on a bitt, the rope tautened, and the _Ghost_, lunging onward, jerked the cook to the surface.
It was a pitiful spectacle.

Though he could not drown, and was nine-lived in addition, he was suffering all the agonies of half-drowning.

The _Ghost_ was going very slowly, and when her stern lifted on a wave and she slipped forward she pulled the wretch to the surface and gave him a moment in which to breathe; but between each lift the stern fell, and while the bow lazily climbed the next wave the line slacked and he sank beneath.
I had forgotten the existence of Maud Brewster, and I remembered her with a start as she stepped lightly beside me.

It was her first time on deck since she had come aboard.