At each unfamiliar sound, and it appeared now as if the laboring yacht was filled with odd noises, he started in fear, fancying it betokened an accident.
He could only hold her steadily to the south, without the faintest idea of where such a course would lead them, and listen to the howling of the wind as it lashed the waves into fury.
Now and then a heavy roller would strike the Zoe on the quarter, causing her to quiver as if a hidden reef had been met, but as a rule she rode very steadily, and well she might, for a stancher little craft had never been launched.
The only fear was that she might have received some injury to her timbers by the contact with the key, and weakened them to such an extent that these downward plunges and sudden uprisings would open a seam.
During the short time he was on board the Evening Star, Ned had heard the sailors say that the danger to be apprehended in running before the wind was that of being swamped by the following waves; but, so far as he could make out, there was no occasion to fear anything of that kind yet awhile.
Had the boys been on board a craft manned by experienced sailors they would not have thought the wind so strong as to be terrifying.
As a matter of fact it did not even approach the fury of a gale, and there is no question but that the Zoe might safely have been kept on her westerly course but for the fear of striking a reef.
It was fully an hour after Roy and Vance began their work before they returned to the wheel-house, and then the former said:
“The fore and main sail are reefed down; but we didn’t dare tackle the jib.”
“I don’t think it will do any harm to let it stay as it is. The canvas isn’t large and can’t do very much toward putting her along,” Vance added. “How fast do you think we are going?”