The night passed safely, and nearly the whole of the next day; but towards evening the wind began to get up. Wopole was on deck, and as he did not seem to wish to talk she let him alone. About seven the moon was to rise, and at about half-past five Ernalie went down to her cabin to get a book. She selected a small one that she had not noticed before. It was called ‘The Life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of Hull, Mariner, who——’ But before she had half finished the title-page—which, by the bye, is rather long—a sudden reeling of the vessel threw her right over to one corner of the room, and at the same time from above there sounded a shrieking as of ten thousand demons.
‘What on earth is that?’ she thought as well as she could, for she was lying in one corner of the room among chairs and various other articles of furniture. However, she got out of it as quickly as she could, and ran on deck, or at least she tried to run, for the vessel was rolling and pitching, and the shrieking continued to resound from above. At last she did reach the deck; but she rather wished she had stopped below, for the wind was so biting it nearly bit her hair off, and this same wind behaved so badly to the ropes of the vessel that they shrieked in their pain as the blast cut past them, causing the strange sounds that the Princess had heard below.
It was nearly as difficult to stand on deck as it had been in the cabin, and the spray that came dashing over the boat made it very difficult to see, for it got into her eyes and half blinded her.
However, she managed to steady herself by holding on to a rope, and in a few minutes she was able to see Wopole standing in the bow of the boat, and looking over the side. So she went towards him as well as she could, for the wind and spray came from over the bows. Nevertheless, she reached him somehow. He was leaning quietly against the bulwarks over the hawser-hole watching the straining cable, just as calm as if there were nothing in particular depending on whether the anchor held or not.
As soon as she could find her breath she touched him on the shoulder and shouted in his ear as loud as she could:
‘Will the rope break?’ But it was no use trying to out-roar the tempest—at least for her.
When Wopole felt something touch him on the shoulder he looked round.
‘Oh, it’s you, is it?’ she heard him cry. But the wind was still too high for her to answer. She only nodded; but she might have spared herself the trouble.
Presently, after she had waited some minutes in silence, the wind fell, almost as suddenly as it had risen.