“He’ll sink like a shot in those rubber boots!” yelled Stanley.
“Thank goodness, he kicked ’em off before he went forward,” cried Ned, who was at the stroke oar.
But even without the boots, the young officer was in dire peril. As he was swept past the buoy he made a frantic grab for it, but his fingers closed on the air. The contrivance, already burdened, was swept from his reach. Ned never forgot that face as the middy was carried by. In the glare of the searchlight every man in the boat could see his distressed features as plainly as if he had been performing on a lighted stage.
Suddenly Ned gave a shout. As a matter of fact, his outcry was simultaneous with the sweeping past the boat of the struggling young officer.
“You fellows keep her head to the seas!” he shouted above the voices of the gale.
“What are you going to do?” demanded Herc, as Ned rapidly threw off his oilskins and divested himself of his heavy boots. The young man-of-war’s man stood poised in the stern for an instant of time, and then, as a white face was borne by the boat once more, he plunged overboard, his body cleaving the waves as neatly as a torpedo.
So quickly had it all happened that hardly a man in the boat but Herc realized what the boy was going to do. Situated as they were, however, there was no time to indulge in speculation. Handling the boat took every ounce of energy and brain power they possessed. By a streak of luck, however, the boat had, during all the excitement, been allowed to drift to lee of the man clinging to the buoy. A wave literally smashed him against the side of the boat, the buoy fortunately striking first and taking off the force of the blow. In the flash of time accorded him, the fellow took advantage of his opportunity and clutched the gunwale. The next minute he was hauled aboard, dripping and almost gone. A more grateful man could not have been found in the universe.
In the meantime, all sight of Ned and the middy had been lost. Not a man aboard the boat had any idea of where to look for them in the wild tumult about them. They might be struggling for their lives at almost any point beyond the oarsmen’s ken.
The suspense was maddening to Herc. Strong swimmer as he knew Ned to be, it was doubtful if, with the added burden of the middy, the boy could battle for his life long.