"A bit queer, eh?"
"No," I replied, conscious at the same time that I did feel a trifle uneasy.
"Then cut off down below," he repeated, "and keep out of the wet for a time. Tell Johnston to make you some tea; you look pinched with cold."
I obeyed, and, staggering across the slippery deck, I gained the companion and reached the shelter of the saloon. The place was in semi-darkness, for dead-lights had been placed over the scuttles and the skylight covered over with tarpaulins, and the only illumination was the dim daylight that filtered through the half-closed companion hatch. Coming from the open air, the atmosphere of the saloon seemed close and oppressive, and I would have willingly preferred to remain on deck during the storm (which Uncle Herbert insisted on terming a strong breeze) rather than be cooped up 'tween decks.
However, I lay down on one of the sofa-bunks on the lee side, battling with a dizzy sensation that made me lose all interest in life; but I could remember watching the antics of the swing table as it oscillated, in spite of its construction, with the pitching of the vessel, and wondering whether, a soda-water siphon, that was continually sliding from one side of the table to the other, would overbalance and explode.
How long I remained thus I have no idea, though it may have been hours; but suddenly there was a hurried trampling of feet on deck, a succession of orders, and the "Fortuna" went about on the other tack, sending me flying from the berth (which was now on the weather side) on to the floor, where I lay, covered with cushions, books, and half-a-dozen wooden boxes which had been disgorged from a cupboard through the lock being insecurely fastened.
In an instant my scattered senses returned, and, realizing that something unusual must have happened for the yacht to be put on the other tack when she was sailing free on her proper course, I sprang to my feet and scrambled up the companion.
On gaining the deck I found the crew clustered along the lee bulwarks, gazing intently upon a small craft barely a hundred yards away. It was a yacht, apparently, of about three or four tons, with a large rent in her mainsail, her storm-jib in ribbons, and only her foresail intact.
As she fell into the trough of the huge seas she lost the wind, but the moment she rose on the crest of a wave she was caught by the furious gusts and heeled till we could almost see her keel and as she heeled a long dark line showed on her white side close to her chain plates.
"She's done for!" shouted the bos'n. "That last squall has burst one of her seams." Crouched in her cockpit was a man whose white face was drawn with the peril of the situation. With one hand he grasped the tiller, and with the other he appeared to be trying to pump out the water that was pouring into the doomed craft, occasionally desisting to wave a frantic appeal for assistance.