“On the nearest tree,” suggested Rory with a mischievous smile.
The viking laughed grimly at the joke.
“Well,” he said, “we will hang them anyhow, trees or no trees.”
But McBain could not be induced to deviate from his set purpose, and bidding these simple folk a friendly farewell, they steamed once more out of the bay, passed many a strange, fantastic island, passed rocks pierced with caves, and bird-haunted, and so, with the vessel’s prow pointing to the northward and west, they left the Faroes far behind them.
Tremendous seas rolled in from the broad Atlantic all that night and all next day, little wind though, and no broken water. In the evening, in the dog-watch, the waves seemed to increase in size; they were miles long, mountains high; when down in the trough of the sea you had to look up to their crests as you would to the summer’s sun at noontide. Indeed, those waves made the brave ship Arrandoon look wondrous small.
McBain, somewhat to Stevenson’s astonishment, made the man at the wheel steer directly north.
“We’re out of our course, sir,” said the mate.
“Pardon me for a minute or two,” replied the captain, half apologetically, “we are now broadside on to these seas, I just want to test her stability.”
“Well, everything is pretty fast, sir,” said the mate, quietly; “but if the ship goes on her beam-ends don’t blame me.”
“Perhaps, Mr Stevenson, there wouldn’t be much time to blame any one; but I can trust my ship, I think. Wo! my beauty.”