There had been a tremendous crash, followed almost immediately by a bump, and then another bump. The Coryanda was thrown so far over that every one on board lost his balance and went sliding down almost into the water. Then the doomed ship veered around in the wind, and, carried by a mighty wave, swept forward to crash again and again in the darkness.
“I reckon she’s goin’ to pieces!” cried out Ira Small. “We’d better try for the raft if we kin make it. Be careful, everybody, or somebody’ll git drowned!”
As well as they could in the darkness, the boys, led by Jack, crept down to the rail where the raft was lashed fast. They were just going overboard when there came another mighty crash that threw every one of them off his balance.
Some struck the rail, but Randy and Fred were hurled clear into the boiling sea. Randy went down several feet, and so did his cousin. Blindly each of them struck out and soon reappeared on the top of a wave.
“Is that you, Fred?” spluttered Randy, as soon as he could speak.
“Yes. Where are the others? Did they go overboard?”
“I don’t know. Come on—let’s try to get on the raft.”
Both raft and yacht were but a short distance away, the lights of the latter showed dimly through the flying mist of the storm. Bravely the two Rover boys endeavored to reach the raft. But before they could move more than a dozen feet the storm carried both boat and raft out of their sight in the darkness.
“They’re gone!” gasped Fred. “The ship and the raft are gone!”
The thought filled the two boys with agony, and yet instinctively they kept swimming, hoping almost against hope that something would come to save them. All around were the mountainous waves, but presently they made out a line of foam which proved to them that some sort of shore must be close at hand.