“Hoot, mon, wha’ the dickens hae ye takken the sails off her—who ordered ye, I’d like ta ken?”
He was addressing Jorrocks; but the skipper, who was annoyed by his late arrival to relieve the watch, answered him sharply—
“I gave the order, Mr Macdougall, which you should have been up in time to have seen carried out; and, if you’re a seaman and will just give a glance round, you’ll soon see the reason why!”
The first mate made no reply to this save to follow out the captain’s suggestion of looking over the side; and what he saw there did not appear to give him any excuse for controverting the skipper’s words; for, the clouds had now spread over the horizon—except to the southward, where it was still clear, and from which a short sharp gust of wind came every now and then, filling out the loose folds of the courses, and then, as it died away, letting them flap against the masts with a heavy dull sound as of distant thunder, an occasional streak of pale lightning darting across the sky to the north-west, where the heavens were most obscured, as if to bear out the illusion.
“We’re in for it now, for certain,” said Captain Billings presently, noticing a faint stir in the air above amidst the whizzing clouds, the upper strata of which were going in a contrary direction to that in which the vane pointed, which was still to the south-east. “Boatswain, rouse out the watch below!”
Jorrocks thereupon immediately went forward towards the fo’c’s’le, knocking with a marlinspike three times on the deck, and shouting out the well-known hail that every sailor knows but too well.
“Tumble up there! All hands shorten sail!”
The men, who had hardly shifted their clothes and turned in, after being relieved by the port watch at eight bells, came tumbling up on deck hurriedly, and the skipper at once ordered the topsail and foresail to be reefed, spanker to be brailed up, and the main course furled; while the vessel was kept with her head to the southward, that is, as well as the cross sea and the fitful gusts of wind would allow, under her jib, fore and main-topsails and forecourse.
Presently there was an ominous hum in the surrounding atmosphere, when the waves calmed down as if by magic; and then, a large rent disclosed itself in the sombre curtain of cloud to the north-west, the heavy masses of vapour that had been previously piling themselves along the horizon there and spreading up to the zenith falling back again and scurrying away in a retrograde direction, like skirmishers on a battle-field driven-in on to their supports by a rush of cavalry trying to cut them off.
“Here it comes!” shouted out Captain Billings, ordering the hands at the same time to “stand by” the braces and topsail halliards; and, almost ere the crew could get to their respective posts, the clouds had disappeared, with what seemed a supernatural celerity from the heavens, letting the clear blue sky be seen again and the bright twinkling stars peep down to see what all the fuss was about, all being calm and easy up there!