“Then, wakened by the whispering and shouting and crying, other little winds came racing out of their crannies on the islands and in the mountains, and all scurried after the Reindeer and the Jane Ellen, until they couldn’t tell, to save them, which was the lee and which the weather shore! And these winds were little, only compared with the great winds that travel over the whole Earth. They were large enough for this land-locked sea; and the Jane Ellen and the Reindeer found them all they cared to meet. But the two ships were sailed so well they rode weatherly under storm-sails; and by continually trimming sails and bracing yards and luffing and doing numberless other things that sailors know all about—and you and I don’t understand a bit of—they kept on their course down the channel, looking on every side for Torquillon, the selfish Waterspout who claimed it for his own, and wouldn’t let any one pass through. As if there weren’t room for him and them too!
“They had not gone far before the whistling of the winds, like barking watch-dogs, roused Torquillon; and he raised his head to see who was coming into his waters.
“The Captain was sailing the Jane Ellen himself, so Taffy was free to watch; and far ahead, just under a black cloud that hung very low, he saw the dark water rise in a mound.
“That was only for a moment, and it dropped back again. But the winds had seen their Master; and—as if he had called them to him—they rushed from all sides, whistling and crying and whooping, and left the Jane Ellen and the Reindeer with sails drooping in the sudden calm, while they circled to the spot where Torquillon’s head had pushed above the water.
“And as they reached him he rose with one powerful leap from the waves, and caught the dark sagging cloud, pulling it down behind his head, swinging and twisting as the winds flung themselves upon him, and filled the cloud that floated like a banner and served for a sail. And then he caught sight of the two ships, and the chase began!
“Down the channel he came flying; and the Reindeer and the Jane Ellen waited, side by side, their sails hanging idly in the dead calm, and the sailors all standing by the braces to be ready when the winds struck them. And now Taffy had his wish; for no one ever had a better chance to see a monstrous Waterspout.
“As he whirled and twisted, his long trailing robes wound close about his feet, then curved out again, smooth and black in the water, like the curves of a lily-petal. They looked quite black to Taffy; but as the light struck through the edges and thin folds, he saw that they were green—like the green water under him. And following after, leaping, snarling, jumping at the edges of his robes, the white foaming waves joined in the chase, and came rushing, whirling down on the two motionless ships.
“‘Wh-iiii-sss-shoooouuuuuu-eeeeEEE—!’ shrieked the winds, and the next instant Torquillon would have had them—but just in time the sails filled; and off flew the Jane Ellen to the right, and off darted the Reindeer to the left, and left him hanging in the wind, because he
DOWN THE CHANNEL HE CAME FLYING