"Badly, if we don't do something," replied Claverhouse. "Come along, Trevear, old son; we've a job in front of-us before we go to roost."
"I'll bear a hand," volunteered Bell, and Griffiths, who was rarely separated from his particular chum, also offered his assistance.
Directly the four had gone to prepare the sea-planes for the expected blow, Merridew levelled his telescope on the Titania.
"The Old Man knows his job," he remarked to Beverley. "They're furling awnings and veering out additional cable. But I'm hanged if I like the look of things."
Just as the sun sank, leaving behind it an ill-defined blurr of indigo-coloured clouds tinged with vivid copper-coloured streaks, the rain began to fall heavily. Not a breath of wind stirred the broad-leaved branches of the palm trees, although the big drops thudded upon the foliage with a noise like the roll of a hundred drums. In less than thirty seconds the Titania was lost to sight in the terrific downpour that obliterated everything beyond a distance of fifty yards from the spot where Beverley stood.
Clad in oilskins and sou'wester, Bobby revelled in the warm rain. He waited until the short twilight had passed into intense darkness, then he rejoined the others in the hut.
"What, not turning in to-night, you fellows?" he inquired. "Perhaps it's as well. Wonder how the old Titania will stand it?"
"Wonder how the old hut'll stick it, you mean," said Fontayne. "A sand-bagged dug-out on the side of the hill would be more the mark, I fancy. By Jove, I don't envy Claverhouse and his breakdown gang."
"Any sign of a leak?" asked Bobby, casting anxious glances at the palm-leaf thatch, on the outside of which the rain was falling down with a noise like that made by a number of peas when violently shaken in a tin can.
"All right, so far," replied Fontayne, "but it looks as if the floor will be flooded. Pity we hadn't dug a trench round outside."