All about the barque were the lowering banks of scud4, darkening the ocean now almost to night, and flying with the rapidity of the wind. Above was the deep gray of the heavy pall5 of vapour.
I glanced into the binnacle and noticed that the wind had already shifted, although it had been blowing less than an hour. It had become more and more squally, and the blasts roared down upon the barque with incredible force. The sea was ugly, but instead of the great, rolling sea of the Cape6, it was a short, quick mass of water that flung itself with appalling7 force. High as she was, The Gentle Hand took them now and again over the topgallant-rail, 163and flooded her main-deck waist-deep. Soon her lee bulwarks8 tore away, letting the flood have full sway across and overboard. This eased her a trifle, and we strove to nurse her closer to the wind, although, without canvas, the wheel would have been as well lashed9 hard down.
For three hours more she headed up beautifully, although sometimes the blasts would take her to leeward10 and whirl her head up into the sea. Then another would strike her full, and off she would swing almost into the trough, while Hawkson and the rest would struggle to get a cloth against the weather mizzen ratlines.
Suddenly, after one wild, snoring rush of warm wind, it fell dead calm. The sea was leaping wildly, bursting over our bow one moment, and then the next piling in amidships with a crash that tested the strength of the old hull11. She would seem to settle under the load, and once there was nothing visible forward of the break of the poop save the end of her t’gallant forecastle. The men had to lay aft and keep alive.
While the calm moments lasted, the air was oppressively warm, and I noticed Hicks come from behind the shelter of the spanker-boom and coolly light his pipe, although the barque was rolling and plunging12 so heavily it was hard to see how he kept his feet without holding on. He made his way aft 164just as Mr. Curtis emerged from the companion, followed by Miss Allen.
The barque was plunging wildly, and I had all I could do to hold the wheel-spokes. Suddenly I heard a cry from forward. Captain Howard stood clear of the mizzen for a moment and pointed13 aft. Over the starboard quarter a huge sea rose like a wall, then topped into a snoring comber, and flung with the rush of an avalanche14 over the poop. The dull, thunderous crash drowned all sound, and the same instant I felt myself being torn from the wheel by the flood. Then I went under, still holding on with all my strength to the spokes, but feeling them dragged from my hands by the prodigious15 power washing me away.
When I came to my senses, I was lying against the rise of the poop, where I had brought up doubled over, my body on top and my legs hanging in the swirl16 that rolled over to leeward. There was no one at the wheel. The Norwegian had gone overboard, and, as he had probably struck heavily against the spokes, he was doubtless killed outright17.
I crawled back, gasping18 and driving the brine from my face. Then I remembered Miss Allen and her lover, Mr. Curtis, and looked for them.
In the boiling foam19 of the side-wash a few fathoms20 from the side, the girl’s head, with her hair 165floating in tangles21, showed above the white. She was apparently22 swimming, though feebly, for she must have been hurled23 far below in the cataract24 that poured to leeward. Near her was Mr. Curtis, his eyes staring at the ship and his face expressing surprise and anxiety. He struck out for the barque, and did not help the girl near him, or, in fact, give her any attention until he had grasped the lee mizzen channels as the vessel25 rolled down. Here he drew himself up, and started to coil a line trailing overboard to throw to her. I started to the side, letting go the wheel, but before I reached the rail, I saw a form plunge26 from the mizzen sheer-pole, and in an instant Hicks rose to the surface almost alongside the young lady. It was boldly done, and I caught the expression in his eyes as he seized her by the shoulder and turned toward the ship.
Hawkson was bawling27 out something, and I turned in time to feel the first puff28 of a squall that came snoring down upon us with a rush that made every line sing to the strain. In an instant the barque was laying over to it, and as it struck her abaft29 the beam she started ahead.
Hicks was now alongside, and Curtis, aided by Yankee Dan, was helping30 the young girl on deck. It was a remarkable31 occurrence, happening as it did in the centre of that hurricane, when the barque was becalmed and without any headway. Otherwise 166it would have been a certain death for any one going over the side. In less than five minutes the gale32 was blowing as hard as ever from an almost opposite point of the compass, the squalls coming with appalling force, sending us a good fifteen knots an hour, with nothing but the bare yards aloft to receive the pressure.
Two men came aft to relieve the wheel, which I had rolled up with Mr. Gull33’s help, and I had a few minutes’ breathing space as we tore along, the men forward trimming in the braces34 and squaring the yards for a run before it.
Hicks stood upon the poop near the mizzen, where he had climbed up, and he gazed after Curtis, who, with Yankee Dan, half-dragged and half-carried Miss Allen below. There was a strange look in his eyes, and I saw him cursing in a sinister35 manner, though what he said was lost in the uproar36. Then he joined the captain at the break of the poop, where the old man had remained, having escaped the flood by springing with the rest upon the spanker-boom.
Sir John Hicks was a thorough rascal37, according to report, but somehow he showed up very well with Mr. Curtis, who had been a well-known churchman and piously38 inclined even to the time he had bought his interest in The Gentle Hand.
As for the grim old villain39 in command, he made 167no comment, but stood watching his ship without a trace of anxiety upon his mask-like countenance40. Even as I watched him, he was calculating the time to swing her up on the port tack41 to keep afloat in that cross-sea, before which no vessel could run very long.
I could hardly help thinking then that so much nervous strength and control must have a limit sometime. The old fellow had been through a good deal, and certainly must have used up much of his giant energy in earlier trials. I wondered vaguely42 for a few moments when the time would come when his stoical indifference43 and cruelty would be used up and he become a debtor44 to nature. How would the old man die? Would he be inscrutable and implacable to the last? It would be a matter of physical force with him, and he appeared pretty tough yet, ready for many a rough fracas45, and afraid of nothing.
Yet I doubted whether his courage was any finer than some others who were less reckless and held responsibility as something of value. He finally gave the order to Hawkson, and the deep voice of the mate sounded above the booming, sonorous46 roar overhead. A heavy tarpaulin47 was lashed in the mizzen-rigging on the outside, so that the shrouds48 might make a solid background to hold it against 168the blast. It was an old hatch-cover, but of heavier cloth than our topsail.
The wheel was rolled hard down just as a heavy squall showed signs of slacking, and a comparative smooth space showed to windward. The old barque came quickly into the trough, and, as she did so, the full force of the hurricane could be felt. Over and over she went until her lee rail disappeared beneath the foam, while above her towered a sea that bade fair to drive her under as it fell aboard. She lay perfectly49 on end for an instant, the deck being absolutely perpendicular50, and her yard-arm beneath the swirl to leeward, and the weight of that rolling hill broke clear across, the larger part of it landing in the sea to starboard.
The shock was terrific. Both fore1 and main topmasts went out of her and trailed alongside in the smother51. There was no sound save the thundering crash of the water, but as soon as the men who had saved themselves could move from their places, we tried to save the ship. Hawkson, Gull, Henry, Richards, Jones, Martin, and the rest made their way forward by holding to the pin-rail, and we cut to clear away the foretopmast alongside. All the time the barque was on end, her hatches under water, and the wild, booming snore of the hurricane roaring over her, sending cataracts52 of water over her t’gallant-rail. By desperate work we led the wreckage53 169forward, and towed it by a heavy line from the port cat-head. This finally had the effect, together with the tarpaulin aft, of pulling her head into the sea, and after a quarter of an hour, every minute of which I expected to see her go under, she began to right herself.
Too exhausted54 to speak and half-drowned by the seas, we hung on under the shelter of the forecastle until she once more rode safely into it. I looked into the streaming faces of the men, and wondered how many had gone to leeward that day, and then it seemed to me that slaving for wealth might not be any better than I had originally held it to be. Aloft in that gray pall the scud were whirling past, and I found myself thinking of Tim and the cry of the South Sea. A sailor is apt to get superstitious55 even without reason, and it struck me that there would be little luck aboard the old pirate on this cruise.
When we had a chance to leave, we found that one dago and the little Dane had disappeared from among us, and, as the gale wore down toward evening, there was a sorry picture of a black barque riding the quick sea of the western ocean, her rigging hanging and trailing to leeward from the stumps56 of her topmasts, and a half-drowned crew holding on to anything they could.
Before morning the hurricane had passed, and 170we were again heading off across the ocean, with a badly wrecked57 ship and an ugly, demoralized set of men, cursing their luck, the ship, and especially her officers in a manner that spoke3 of trouble ahead.
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1
fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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spokes
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| n.（车轮的）辐条( spoke的名词复数 )；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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scud
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| n.疾行；v.疾行 | |
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pall
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| v.覆盖，使平淡无味；n.柩衣，棺罩；棺材；帷幕 | |
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cape
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| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
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appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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bulwarks
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| n.堡垒( bulwark的名词复数 )；保障；支柱；舷墙 | |
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lashed
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| adj.具睫毛的v.鞭打( lash的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
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10
leeward
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| adj.背风的；下风的 | |
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hull
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| n.船身；(果、实等的)外壳；vt.去(谷物等)壳 | |
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12
plunging
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| adj.跳进的，突进的v.颠簸( plunge的现在分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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avalanche
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| n.雪崩，大量涌来 | |
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prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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swirl
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| v.(使)打漩，(使)涡卷；n.漩涡，螺旋形 | |
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outright
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| adv.坦率地；彻底地；立即；adj.无疑的；彻底的 | |
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gasping
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| adj. 气喘的, 痉挛的 动词gasp的现在分词 | |
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foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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20
fathoms
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| 英寻( fathom的名词复数 ) | |
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tangles
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| （使）缠结， （使）乱作一团( tangle的第三人称单数 ) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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hurled
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| v.猛投，用力掷( hurl的过去式和过去分词 )；大声叫骂 | |
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24
cataract
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| n.大瀑布，奔流，洪水，白内障 | |
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25
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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plunge
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| v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲 | |
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27
bawling
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| v.大叫，大喊( bawl的现在分词 )；放声大哭；大声叫出；叫卖（货物） | |
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28
puff
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| n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气 | |
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abaft
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| prep.在…之后；adv.在船尾，向船尾 | |
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helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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gale
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| n.大风，强风，一阵闹声（尤指笑声等） | |
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gull
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| n.鸥；受骗的人；v.欺诈 | |
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34
braces
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| n.吊带，背带；托架( brace的名词复数 )；箍子；括弧；（儿童）牙箍v.支住( brace的第三人称单数 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来 | |
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35
sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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uproar
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| n.骚动，喧嚣，鼎沸 | |
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rascal
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| n.流氓；不诚实的人 | |
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38
piously
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| adv.虔诚地 | |
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39
villain
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| n.反派演员，反面人物；恶棍；问题的起因 | |
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40
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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41
tack
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| n.大头钉；假缝，粗缝 | |
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42
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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43
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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44
debtor
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| n.借方，债务人 | |
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45
fracas
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| n.打架；吵闹 | |
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46
sonorous
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| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
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47
tarpaulin
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| n.涂油防水布，防水衣，防水帽 | |
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48
shrouds
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| n.裹尸布( shroud的名词复数 )；寿衣；遮蔽物；覆盖物v.隐瞒( shroud的第三人称单数 )；保密 | |
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49
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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50
perpendicular
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| adj.垂直的，直立的；n.垂直线，垂直的位置 | |
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51
smother
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| vt./vi.使窒息；抑制；闷死；n.浓烟；窒息 | |
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52
cataracts
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| n.大瀑布( cataract的名词复数 )；白内障 | |
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53
wreckage
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| n.（失事飞机等的）残骸，破坏，毁坏 | |
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54
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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55
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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56
stumps
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| （被砍下的树的）树桩( stump的名词复数 )； 残肢； （板球三柱门的）柱； 残余部分 | |
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57
wrecked
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| adj.失事的，遇难的 | |
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