"Hold Fast!" Shouted a Voice Below.
"Hold fast—they're coming!" howled Sam Hickey from his perch high in the air. His voice was lost on the roar of the gale, but he did not know it.
"Where's that confounded waterspout?" he muttered. "Oh, I see it. The thing is going to come pretty close to the ship, I'm afraid. But I don't care. I'm too high up to get hit by it."
His mind turning from the waterspout to Dan Davis, Sam wheeled, steadying himself by holding tightly to the railing that extended around the top. Every lurch of the ship was like "cracking-the-whip" at school. It seemed to make every bone in one's body snap.
Sam groaned as he saw Dan swaying back and forth.
"Oh, why doesn't he grab the mast? Why doesn't he?"
Sam did not know that Dan was making desperate efforts to do this very thing, but thus far had been unable to.
All at once the lad's feet slipped out of position.
"He's going! He's going overboard!" yelled Hickey in a voice that was heard on the bridge and to the stern of the superstructure.