Was it nothing more than a capricious breeze, whose intermittent breath would not be strong enough to disperse the fog?
For twenty minutes more doubt reigned. Then the swell took the boat broadside on, and the boatswain had to bring her head round with one of the sculls. The foresail and the jib bellied out, drawing the sheets quite taut.
The direction they had to take was northward, until the wind should clear the horizon.
They hoped that this might happen as soon as the breeze had got so far. So all eyes were fixed in that direction. If the land showed only for one moment, John Block would ask no more, but would steer for it.
But no rift appeared in the veil, although the wind seemed to acquire force as the sun went down. The boat was moving fairly fast. Fritz and the boatswain were beginning to wonder if they had passed the land.
Doubt crept into their hearts again. Had Frank been mistaken, after all? Had he really caught sight of land to the northward?
He declared again most positively that he had.
“It was a high coast,” he declared again, “a cliff with an almost horizontal crest, and it was impossible to mistake a cloud for it.”
“Yet, since we are bearing down upon it,” Fritz replied, “we ought to have reached it by now. It could not have been more than twelve or fifteen miles off then.”
“Are you sure, Block,” Frank went on, “that you have been steering the boat on to it all the time, and that it was due north?”