A Sea Queen's Sailing

by Charles W. Whistler

So we put the ship about, shipping a sea or two as we did so, and then, with our unhandy canvas full and boomed out as best we could with two oars lashed together, we fled into the unknown seas to south and west, well-nigh hopeless, save that of food and water was plenty.

I have no mind to tell of the next three days. They were alike in gray discomfort, in the ceaseless wash of the waves that followed us, and in the fall of the rain. We made terribly heavy weather of it, though the gale was not enough to have been in any way perilous for a well-found ship. We had to bale every four hours or so, and at that time we learned that Gerda knew how to steer. Very brave and bright was she through it all, and maybe that is the one pleasant thing to look back on in all that voyage. We rigged the sail of the boat across the sharp, high gunwales of the stern as some sort of shelter for her, and she was content.

It was on the morning of the fourth day when we had at last a sight of land. Right ahead of us, across the tumbling seas, showed the dim, green tops of mountains, half lost in the drifting rain. We thought they might be the hills of the western islands of Scotland, but could not tell, so utterly had we lost all reckoning.

Whatever the land might be we had to find out presently, for in no way could we escape from a lee shore. Nor was it long before we found that here was no island before us, such an we expected, but a long range of coast, which stretched from east to west, as far as we could see, in a chain of hills. All I could say for certain was that these hills were none which I knew, and so could not be those of the northern Scottish coasts, which I had sailed past many a time.

There was more sun this morning, for the clouds were breaking. Once or twice the light fell on the far hilltops, bringing them close to us, as it were, and then passing. Out to seaward astern of us it gleamed on the white wavetops, hurried after us, and cheered us for a time, and so swept on to the land that waited our coming, with what welcome we could not say. Presently a gleam lit on a small steady patch of white far astern of us, which did not toss with the nearer waves, and did not shift along the skyline. It was the first sail we had seen since we had lost sight of Heidrek, and it, too, cheered us in a way, for the restless, gray and white sea was no longer so lonely. Yet we could look for no help from her, even if she sighted us and was on the same course. We could not heave to and wait her, and by the time she overhauled us, we were likely to be somewhat too near the shore for safety.

For the mountains hove up from the sea very fast now. Some current had us in its grip, setting us shoreward swiftly. Soon we could see the lower hills along the coast, with sheer, black cliffs, and a fringe of climbing foam at their feet, which was disquieting enough as we headed straight for them. We forgot the other ship in that sight, as we looked in vain for some gap in the long wall which stretched across our course. Only in one place, right ahead, the breakers seemed nearer, and as if there might be shelving shore on which they ran, rather than shattering cliffs on which they beat. And presently we knew that between us and the shore lay an island, low and long, rising to a green hill toward the mainland, but seeming to end to the seaward in a beach which might have less dangers for us than the foot of the cliffs beyond. So far as we could make out from the deck, the strait between this island and the mainland might be two miles wide, or a little less.

"If only we could get under the lee of that island we were safe," said Bertric to me. "It would be calm enough to anchor."

"We can but try it," I answered.

And with that we luffed a little, getting the island on our port bow, but it was of no use. The unhandy canvas set us to leeward, and, moreover, the water gained quickly as the strained upper planking was hove down with the new list of the ship. I went to the open space amidships whence we baled, and watched for a few minutes, and saw that we could do nothing but run, unless the other tack would serve us.

That we tried, but now we were too far from the eastern end of the island, and it was hopeless to try to escape from the breakers.