Crash! A double wave piled over the steamer’s superstructure and poured tons of chilly brine into the boat, and while the women screamed, and the men hung on to anything available, the flimsy bolts in the davit heads parted with the weight of the water-filled life-boat and it up ended and fell into the sea.
“God save us!” cried Nickerson, aghast at this catastrophe. “That’s yer coaster gear for ye! By the old red-headed, creeping Judas, Cap’en Westhaver, ye sh’d be tarred an’ feathered for that piece o’ botch work! Hell’s bells! We’re jammed in a clinch for fair, naow.”
Donald stood beside him. “What’s best to do now, Jud?” he asked calmly. “Durned ef I know,” answered the other. “Cal’late we’d better see th’ women with life-belts on an’ git to work on a raft.”
A terrible sea was piling over the ledges by now, and revealed in the flashes of lightning, it looked awe-inspiring and frightful. The steamer had struck broadside on to one of the reefs, and had been lifted almost over it. If she went much further there was the dire possibility of her sliding into the deep water on the inside of it and foundering. A sandy beach could be seen—a hundred yards away—a trifle astern of the vessel, while ahead of her rose a small rocky cliff upon which some stunted spruce trees grew.
While Donald and some others were working on a raft, Captain Nickerson was tying life-belts on to Ruth and Helena. Both girls were dreadfully frightened, but managed to keep calm. Moodey stood, white-faced and silent, with an arm around Ruth to keep her from sliding overboard when the vessel pounded. Helena was hanging to her friend’s arm, and secured around the waist by a line which Judson had rove through a ring bolt, and the other girls—about forty of them—were similarly protected. All stood huddled under the lee of the upper deck-cabin.
Torn with anxiety and fearful of Helena’s and his sister’s safety, yet Judson appeared outwardly calm, and he soothed the girls with cheerful words. When a sea would crash over the steamer his booming laugh would be heard. “Don’t let that scare you? That’s nawthin’. Hang on for a bit and there’ll be a slew of dories alongside. The boys’ll be coming aout from Eastville.” In his heart he knew he lied. No dories could live in that broil of tide, wind and ledge-torn water, and at Eastville there was neither a life-boat or a Lyle gun breeches-buoy apparatus.
The captain of the steamer dragged himself along to where Nickerson stood. “Ef someone c’d only swim ashore with a line,” he shouted above the tumult, “we might git a hawser fast to a tree on th’ point yander and rig up a breeches buoy. But it’s takin’ a big chanst whoever tries. Liable to git mushed up in the surf.”
Judson nodded. It was a chance—their only chance. The steamer would go to pieces inside an hour ... when the tide rose. The storm might abate in that time, but the sea would be there long after the wind had subsided, and hanging on to the vessel would be fatal. The only solution was to get the crowd clear of the ship before she went to pieces. He turned it over in his sailorly mind. He couldn’t swim, but he might be able to get ashore on a couple of planks. “By gorry!” he muttered, “it might be done!” And aloud he bawled to Westhaver. “Git a couple of stout planks ’n lash ’em together, ’n get me something for a paddle. I’ll ride th’ blame thing in to the beach same as the Kanakas in the South Seas ride the surf on a board. Sing aout when you’re ready!”
Helena overheard the bawled conversation and clutched him by the arm. “What are you going to do, Jud?” she cried fearfully. Then with a glance at the surf seething and roaring on the beach to leeward and swirling in toppling combers around them, she added hysterically. “No, no, no! Judson, you can’t do it! You can’t do it!”
He looked into her frightened face and laughed. There was no fear in his keen dare-devil eyes when he replied tenderly. “Don’t worry, Helena. I’ll get there ... somehow. Jest you hang on here ... an’ pray to God!” The last words were spoken reverently.