"A steam-yacht!" cried Jim. "Not more than a half-mile off Brimstone and drifting straight on the ledges. Looks as if she was a goner!"
"Can't we help her somehow?" asked Percy.
"I'm afraid not. We couldn't drive the sloop against this gale and sea; besides, those rollers would swamp a life-boat. All we can do is to get out on the point and try to save anybody who comes ashore. Put on your oil-clothes, fellows! Light both the lanterns, Percy! Budge, you and Throppy each take one of those spare coils of rope! I'll carry another and the Coston lights. Now I can see why Uncle Tom always insisted on having a couple of 'em in the cabin. Filippo, you'd better stay here, keep up a good fire, and make plenty of coffee. There goes another rocket! The gun, too! I don't blame 'em. Men couldn't be in a worse fix!"
Leaning sidewise against the gale, the little lantern-guided procession trudged along the sea-wall and stumblingly ascended the slippery path to the beacon on Brimstone. Sheltering the oil-soaked kindlings with his body, Jim scratched a match; and in a twinkling long tongues of smoky flame were streaming wildly to leeward.
"Ah! They see us!"
Three rockets in quick succession rose from the yacht, now barely a quarter-mile away. The thunder and lightning were almost continuous. Every flash told that the imperiled craft was steadily drifting nearer the dangerous promontory.
"She'll strike the Grumblers!" muttered Jim. "And that means she's done for! If only she was a thousand feet farther east she'd float by into the cove. Hard luck!"
The Grumblers were a collection of jagged rocks, exposed at low tide. Under the incessant flashes their black heads appeared and disappeared in a welter of frothy white. It was an ominous spectacle for the men on the yacht.
Taking one of the Coston lights, Jim clambered down on the ledges. Soon the warning red glare of the torch, held high above his head, was illumining the rocks and breakers. He held the light aloft until it went out, then rejoined the others.
"They're getting a boat over!" cried Stevens.