“Hallo, Macdougall!” he exclaimed, “what’s the reason of this, eh?”
But the mate did not answer at once. He still seemed spellbound.
“We’ve just wore her, sir,” said Jorrocks, stepping forwards, and accompanying Captain Billings as he made his way to the binnacle.
“So I see,” drily replied the skipper, after a hasty glance at the standard compass. “But what has been the reason for thus altering the course of the ship? I gave orders for her to be steered south-west by west; and here we are now heading direct up to the northward again! What’s the reason for this, I want to know? Speak, now, can’t you?”
Macdougall, on this second inquiry being directed to him by the skipper—who for the moment seemed to ignore the boatswain’s presence beside him—mumbled out something about the rocks, but he spoke in so thick and indistinct a voice that Captain Billings believed he was intoxicated.
“Rocks, your grandmother!” he cried angrily. “The only rocks hereabouts are those built up in your brain through that confounded bottle you’re always sucking at below!”
“Indeed, sir,” put in Jorrocks at this point, taking the mate’s part, “Mr Macdougall’s right, Cap’. We’ve just had the narrowest squeak of going to the bottom I ever ’sperienced in all my time. Look there, sir, o’er the weather taffrail, an’ you’ll see summat we pretty nearly ran foul of just now—it were a risky shave!”
Captain Billings, somewhat puzzled by the boatswain thus “shoving his oar in” for a second time unasked, cast his eyes in the direction pointed out to him, where, now lighted up by the newly risen moon, could be distinctly seen the Peñedo de San Pedro, with the surf breaking over it in sheets of silver foam.
He recognised the place in a moment, having passed close by the spot on a previous voyage; and he was greatly astonished at our being in its near vicinity now.
“Good gracious!” he ejaculated, “what an escape we must have had; but how came we near the place at all?”