Part 17 (1/2)
And then, just then, the faintest possible whisper of air passed by It was fro canvas was not stirred, and yet my face had felt the air and been cooled
”Cooky,” Wolf Larsen called in a low voice Thoo that forebooo the sheet and co with the tackle And if you make a mess of it, it will be the last you ever make Understand?”
”Mr Van Weyden, stand by to pass the head-sails over Then jump for the topsails and spread them quick as God'll let you-the quicker you do it the easier you'll find it As for Cooky, if he isn't lively bat him between the eyes”
I are of the compliment and pleased, in that no threat had acco head to north-west, and it was his intention to jibe over all with the first puff
”We'll have the breeze on our quarter,” he explained to htly to the south'ard”
He turned and walked aft to the wheel I went forward and took my station at the jibs Another whisper of wind, and another, passed by The canvas flapped lazily
”Thank Gawd she's not comin' all of a bunch, Mr Van Weyden,” was the cockney's fervent ejaculation
And I was indeed thankful, for I had by this tih to knoith all our canvas spread, what disaster in such event awaited us The whispers of wind became puffs, the sails filled, the Ghost moved Wolf Larsen put the wheel hard up, to port, and we began to pay off The as now dead astern, er, andlustily I did not see ent on elsewhere, though I felt the sudden surge and heel of the schooner as the wind-pressures changed to the jibing of the fore- and -jib, jib, and staysail; and by the ti into the south-west, the wind on her quarter and all her sheets to starboard Without pausing for breath, thoughlike a trip-ha to the topsails, and before the wind had beco down Then I went aft for orders
Wolf Larsen nodded approval and relinquished the wheel toFor an hour I steered, eachait ere going on a quartering course
”Now take a run up with the glasses and raise sooing twelve or thirteen now The old girl knoalk”
I contested myself with the fore crosstrees, some seventy feet above the deck As I searched the vacant stretch of water before hly the need for haste if ere to recover any of our h which ere running, I doubted that there was a boat afloat It did not seem possible that such frail craft could survive such stress of wind and water
I could not feel the full force of the wind, for ere running with it; but froh outside the Ghost and apart froainst the foa instinct with life Soreat wave, burying her starboard-rail fro ocean At suchthrough the air with dizzying swiftness, as though I clung to the end of a huge, inverted pendulureater rolls, must have been seventy feet or iddy sweep overpoweredon, hand and foot, weak and tre boats or to behold aught of the sea but that which roared beneath and strove to overwhelht of the men in the otbut the naked, desolate sea And then, where a vagrant shaft of sunlight struck the ocean and turned its surface to wrathful silver, I caught a small black speck thrust skyward for an instant and sed up I waited patiently Again the tiny point of black projected itself through the wrathful blaze a couple of points off our port-bow I did not attempt to shout, but co nalled affirer, and so swiftly that for the first tiht Wolf Larsen motioned for aveto
”Expect all hell to break loose,” he cautioned me, ”but don't mind it Yours is to do your oork and to have Cooky stand by the fore-sheet”
I ed to make my way forward, but there was little choice of sides, for the weather-rail seeridge as to what he was to do, I cla a few feet The boat was now very close, and I couldhead to wind and sea and dragging on its mast and sail, which had been thrown overboard andEach rolling mountain whel anxiety, fearing that they would never appear again Then, and with black suddenness, the boat would shoot clear through the foath of her botto, wet and dark, till she seeli water in frantic haste, when she would topple over and fall into the yawning valley, bon and showing her full inside length to the stern upreared almost directly above the bow Each time that she reappeared was aaway, and it ca up the rescue as i to heave to, and dropped to the deck to be in readiness We were now dead before the wind, the boat far away and abreast of us I felt an abrupt easing of the schooner, a loss for the moment of all strain and pressure, coupled with a swift acceleration of speed She was rushi+ng around on her heel into the wind
As she arrived at right angles to the sea, the full force of the wind (froht us I was unfortunately and ignorantly facing it It stood up against s with air which I could not expel And as I choked and strangled, and as the Ghost ed for an instant, broadside on and rolling straight over and far into the wind, I beheld a huge sea rise far above ain The wave over-topped the Ghost, and I gazed sheer up and into it A shaft of sunlight slireen, backed by a milky smother of foam
Then it descended, pande happened at once I was struck a crushi+ng, stunning blohere in particular and yet everywhere My hold had been broken loose, I was under water, and the thought passed throughof which I had heard, the being swept in the trough of the sea My body struck and pounded as it was dashed helplessly along and turned over and over, and when I could holdsalt water into et the jib backed over to ard I had no fear of death I had no doubt but that I should co Wolf Larsen's order persisted inat the wheel in the ainst the will of the storainst what I took to be the rail, breathed, and breathed the sweet air again I tried to rise, but struck my head and was knocked back on hands and knees By some freak of the waters I had been swept clear under the forecastle-head and into the eyes As I scraridge, who lay in a groaning heap There was no tiet the jib backed over
When I e had co of wood and steel and canvas The Ghost was being wrenched and torn to fragments The foresail and fore-topsail, e in the sheet in ti and splintering froe, detached ropes and stays were hissing and coiling like snakes, and down through it all crashed the gaff of the foresail
The spar could not have missed me by many inches, while it spurred me to action Perhaps the situation was not hopeless I remembered Wolf Larsen's caution He had expected all hell to break loose, and here it was And where was he? I caught sight of hi it in and flat with his treh in the air and his body outlined against a white surge of sea sweeping past All this, and more,-a whole world of chaos and wreck,-in possibly fifteen seconds I had seen and heard and grasped
I did not stop to see what had beco to the jib-sheet The jib itself was beginning to slap, partially filling and e with sharp reports; but with a turn of the sheet and the application of th each time it slapped, I slowly backed it This I know: I did ers; and while I pulled, the flying-jib and staysail split their cloths apart and thundered into nothingness
Still I pulled, holding what I gained each tiave reater ease, and Wolf Larsen was besideup the slack
”Make fast!” he shouted ”And come on!”
As I followed hih order obtained The Ghost was hove to She was still in working order, and she was still working Though the rest of her sails were gone, the jib, backed to ard, and the , and holding her bow to the furious sea as well