It seemed to have grown blacker and more threatening than ever during the short time that I had been below, although that may have been due to the contrast between the light of the cabin and the darkness on deck; the ruddy tinge on the cloud edges, however, was even more pronounced than before, the colour having slightly changed and grown more like the hue of red-hot copper. Ryan was evidently much astonished—and, I thought, somewhat dismayed—by what he saw.
“By the powers!” he ejaculated, “you did right to call me, Dugdale. If we were in the Indian Ocean, now, I would say that a cyclone was brewing; and, now I come to think of it, there is no Act of Parliament against one brewing here. How is the glass now? has it dropped anything since you last looked at it?”
I went to the skylight and once more peered at the mercury.
“Yes, indeed, sir, it has,” answered I, “it has gone down nearly one-tenth!”
“Then, by the piper, we’re in for something out of the common, and the sooner we set about preparing for it, the better!” exclaimed Ryan. “Ah! I see you have already furled everything; well, that leaves us so much the less to be still done. Call all hands, however, for we may have it upon us at any moment, by the look of things up there,” pointing to the frowning, ruddy sky. “Rig in the jib-boom, and send down all but the lower-yard on deck, and both topmasts as well. Set some of the men to secure the canvas with double gaskets; and close-reef the boom-foresail and set it. Let the carpenter look to the hatches and see that they are securely battened down, and he had better examine the pumps also; our lives may depend upon them before all is over. Where is the boatswain? Oh, is that you, Bartlett? Give an eye to the boats’ gripes, will you, and see that they are all right. I have known a boat to be blown clean from the davits before now. Hurrah, men! look alive with those yards, and let us have them down here on deck as quickly as possible.”
The schooner was by this time as busy as a beehive in swarming-time, the men working with a will, since they knew, from the sharp, incisive tones in which Ryan issued his orders, as well as by the menacing aspect of the sky, that the occasion was pressing. Fortunately, in so small and lightly-rigged a craft as the Felicidad, the task of preparing her for the forthcoming battle with the elements was not a heavy one, and, being well manned for our size, we were soon ready.
None too soon, however. For hardly had the finishing touches been given to our preparations, and the guns and boats made thoroughly secure, than we were momentarily dazzled and blinded by a terrific flash of blue lightning that seemed to dart from the clouds immediately overhead, and to strike the water close to us, filling the dead and heavy air with a strong odour of brimstone, while simultaneously we were deafened and stunned by a most awful, ear-splitting crack of thunder that made the schooner quiver from stem to stern as though she had been struck by a heavy shot.
Ryan, Pierrepoint, and I were all standing close together near the companion at the moment when the lightning flashed out, illumining the whole scene for an instant with a light as brilliant as that of the noonday sun, and while I was still in process of recovering from the shock produced by the terrifying crash of the thunder, I heard my fellow-mid exclaim to the captain—
“There! did you see that, sir? There is a craft of some sort away out there,” pointing in a north-easterly direction. “I saw her as distinctly as possible. She is about six miles away, and is stripped to her close-reefed topsails—”
“Did you see that ship out there on our port-quarter, sir?” hailed one of the men from the forecastle, interrupting Master Freddy in his tale.