Nan Sherwood's Summer Holidays

by Annie Roe Carr

This was becoming a real adventure and Nan was enjoying every minute of it. If her conscience troubled her at all, she paid no heed. Others on the boat had told her of going out of bounds, and she could see no real harm in it.

She walked around deckchairs piled high against the side of the boat, caught a glimpse of some phosphorescent fish in the ocean, and walked over to the rail. How pretty they looked in the deep black of the water! She stood for a while watching the colors at play and then went on. It was almost as though she was motivated by some force outside herself.

She heard no sounds from people in the boat now, for she had passed the lounges and the recreation rooms. She felt almost alone on the boat, and laughed a little to herself as she thought how timid Grace would be in such a situation. However, Nan liked it.

It brought back to her mind nights at Pine Camp. How far away all that seemed now! How far away it was! Northern Michigan was in another world. The people there, Aunt Kate, Injun Pete, Toby Vanderwiller, and Gedney Raffer, all of them, were like people she had dreamed about. She shook herself impatiently, driving away some eerie thoughts, and then went on until she came to the very back of the vessel, the stern.

Here she stopped, and looked back over the ocean which the boat was putting behind it. The wake, the white foamy path of the boat stretched out as far as she could see. The waters, which made it, rolled aside in big white waves leaving the center black and deep.

How much colder it was getting! And how much rougher! Nan clung to the rail, and held her head high as the wind whipped her hair back so that it stung the sides of her cheeks. She watched the waves coming, each one higher than the last and angrier. She counted them, “One, two, three,” someone had told her once that the seventh was always the highest, “four, five.” She could feel the spray on her face and the air was full of mist. “Six, seven—why the seventh wasn’t any bigger than any of the rest! And—eight.” It was the eighth that was the biggest of all! It climbed up the boat, over the rail, and across the deck, taking Nan off her feet!

She lost her balance completely, wrenched her arm as she fell, and was afraid for a second that she would go over with the wash of the wave. But she held on, and as the boat righted itself after the inundation, Nan rose to her feet, half dazed.

She rubbed her hair out of her eyes, winced with the pain in her arm, and being very careful now, started toward the door. She stopped short.

Was that a cry she had heard? She raised her head, listening attentively for some sound other than the roaring of the waves. There wasn’t any. She must have imagined it. She went on across the deck, now shiny after its bath with sea water. There was something white at her feet. She stooped to pick it up—a handkerchief. Again, she thought she heard a low moan and stopped dead still.

Yes, there it was again. Nan hesitated, deciding whether to investigate herself or call for help. The crash of the waves drowned out everything and decided Nan. She could hear them coming, one, two—what direction had the sound come from?—three, four, five. There it was again, over at her right. She started toward it and lost her balance, grabbed hold of a flagpole, and then crept forward. Six—seven—it was the seventh that was the biggest this time, but before it had struck with its full force Nan’s hand reached out and grabbed the coat of someone lying on the deck. With her other, as the wave struck, she held fast to the pole.