“We can do it.”
Wanted a bit of doing. Like trying to walk a plank you couldn’t see which was only there sometimes. It was a wonder it ever came back. My God, she was like a balloon, trying to sail out of it. But the water was up there too. Here was the ladder down to the deck. He had got on to its rungs when the warm mouth came near his ear again:
“Wait. Hold tight.”
The thing under their feet heaved, but checked, as if this was too much for it. The night exploded over them and fell in broken thunder. Couldn’t go through that.
“Go on,” ordered invisible Hale. They reached the deck, and ran. Ran in short lengths. You can’t keep running on a slope which changes direction abruptly in the dark. Together they got to the foot of the ladder to the bridge-deck, and Hale pushed Colet at it, the signal to mount quickly; but when he gripped the iron thing it came at him as though loose. He was pulling the ladder out of the ship. Nothing to stand on. Then the ship fell head first into nothing; the purser’s face was dragged after the retreating ladder and struck it. Colet could hear the sea in behind him and clambered up; yet hesitated.
“Captain?”
The old man was in that below. No good shouting. The purser got down to the deck again, and groped, with the flood at his knees. He found Hale on his hands and knees, rising, and clutched him.
“Go on, go on,” Hale shouted.
The captain came into Colet’s cabin with him, and stayed there for a moment. He was smiling.
“You would never have believed that, would you, Colet?”
Colet, a little breathless, held to the edge of his bunk. He hinted that the violence seemed a bit unreasonable.
“No. There’s sufficient cause. I’ve seen it before. We must wait for daylight.”
When the master had gone, Colet considered his bunk. No. The settee tonight. No use turning in when things were happening all the time. But it needed very deliberate control to sit there, waiting for light to come, when the world was falling to pieces. Especially, when, the longer you waited, the louder grew the mania of the wind, and the more surprisingly delirious mounted the buoyancy of the ship. Could she stand it? She seemed terrified. Colet remembered a rabbit he had once seen leaping and convulsive in a wire noose. She was desperate, but she was done.
Colet surrendered limply to the anarchy. Once he rose and vomited. Well … not long to wait now … the day was about due. The wind did all the moaning that was necessary. That moan outside would do for all creation. No need to add to it. It was the antiphon of doom. And it didn’t seem to matter now. Nothing more to do. A sea battered on his door, but Colet did not look up. He would rest while waiting.
XVII
The port-light was a grey round, and the lamp had paled. When Colet noticed that, he wondered how it had come about. He peered out from the port. He could see nothing but wan panic, and a long loose end of rope resting straight on the wind as rigid as an iron bar. This was called day. The deck looked as though no man had been on it for years; but Sinclair came into view, leaning and pulling up against the drive of morning. Coming to him? Colet got at the door to be ready for him. It felt as if it weighed tons. It fought.
“Fuh, Colet,” he breathed. “You’re not overside, eh?”
He tore his sou’wester off. His hot hair was extinguished and flattened.
“What a night.”
Sinclair’s appearance was almost that of a stranger. His face was bleached and seamed, his eyes were raw. They blinked sorely as he grinned. He plumped on to the couch and leaned back.
“She has had a time. Two boats look as if elephants had sat in them. The old man was right after all.”
The grin remained on his face. He had forgotten to take it off. He was grinning at the window.
“Look at that rope. Hell. Look at it.”
“Is Hale all right?”
“Eh? Yes, he’s still up there.”
Sinclair was regarding now in childish wonder a wound on his hand. “How did that come?” He dismissed his hand.
“The old man? Yes. Well, this ship’s got a master. Colet, the old man’s all right, if anyone wants to know.”
“How is it now?”
“Don’t ask. She’s taking it easier, though. Sitting in it like a duck. Shouldn’t have thought it possible, but the old man was sure she would. Been rolling her bridge-ends under, too. Glad to see daylight.”
Sinclair shut his eyes.
“I say, I think I’ll take my ten minutes here. Handy, here.”
He sought Colet again, with a grin.
“Nice job for this child presently, when it moderates. Coming with us? The rudder’s broken at the couplings. You know that? Must get her under control. There’s a boat to be got out. Wires from the steering chains to the rudder. That sort of thing. Fix it up. You’d better make for the bridge-house now, the old man says. Tell him where I am, won’t you?”
The chief officer’s head fell sideways; this time he was certainly asleep.
The purser adventured for the bridge-house. If you checked yourself from point to point, hand over hand, you were not hurled along. The wind was solid. The purser did not look at the seas, but some heights caught his eye as they fled past. They were aged. It was better not to look at them. Hale turned his head as Colet entered. He grimaced at him humorously. Was the old man enjoying it? A seaman was still at the useless wheel, as if apart, and in a trance, looking to futurity through the glass, and waiting. His jaws moved slightly, now and then, but that was all. Nobody else was there.
“Did you sleep, Colet? No sleep till morn, eh? Well, I think
