"I don't know," answered the boy, "I'm trying to fix it, but the boat's rolling so that I can't seem to get at anything. I'm doing the best I can."
"Well, fix it as quick as you can," was Ben's reply.
"Why—are we in danger?" demanded Harry, struck by Ben's anxious tone.
"Well, I don't want to say that YET, but we've got to get out of the trough of the sea or—"
A huge wave came toppling aboard, drenching the speaker from top to toe, and almost washing him overboard. A brass handhold saved him. The cockpit was instantly flooded, but thanks to the patent self-baling scuppers, she cleared herself without much water getting into the cabin.
But it had been a narrow escape for all three of the adventurers in the open part of the boat. As the mass of water struck him, Frank had grabbed an awning stanchion, more from instinct than anything else, and thus saved himself from being swept overboard.
Bill had laid hold of the wheel, and although he was lifted from the helmsman's seat and forcibly banged down again, he was safe.
"We've got to rig a sea anchor," declared Ben, "but in the first place, Frank, get below and empty your canvas clothes bags, stuff 'em with oakum and pour all the lubricating oil you can spare in on top of the oakum and then make a lot of holes in the side with your knife."
Frank did not ask any questions, although he had no idea what the old sailor meant to do. He entered the cabin, through the slide, and was soon at work on his assigned task, although the motion of the Bolo, which seemed first to stand on her bow and then on her stern and varied this with a plunge sideways till it seemed as if she was going to the bottom, made its accomplishment difficult.
In the meantime, Ben had taken the oars and spare spar out of the dory and lashed them all together with a long rope. Carrying this bundle forward he attached it to a line and dropped it overboard. The Bolo instantly began to drift away from it as it seemed. Soon there was a distance of fifty feet or more between the struggling vessel's bow and this improvised "sea-anchor." Ben made the line fast to a Samson post and crawled aft along the cabin roof; pausing several times when an extra hard blast of wind made it dangerous to proceed.