“One of our luggers couldn’t do it, Master Dick, with a wind like this, let alone a big ship.”
“What will happen then?” cried Dick excitedly.
“Rocks—go on the Six Pins, I should say. That’s where the current’ll take her—eh, master?”
Uncle Abram was holding his long telescope against the corner of the pilchard-house, and gazing attentively through it at the distant ship.
“No, Josh, my lad,” he said; “there’s too much water on the Six Pins even for her. She’ll come clear o’ them and right on to Black Point.”
“And then?” said Mr Temple anxiously.
“We shall do what we can with the rocket-line if the masts hold good for a bit, sir.”
“But a boat—a life-boat!”
Uncle Abram shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.
“Soon as that first gun was heard, sir, there was a man got on a horse and went over the hills to Corntown, where the life-boat lies, and they’ll come over as fast as horses can draw the carriage; but it will take them a long time to get over along the rough road, and when they do get her here, where she’s to be launched I can’t tell.”