“What cheer, Groggy Fox? Have ’ee hoisted the blue ribbon yet?”
“No, Stephen Lockley, I haven’t, nor don’t mean to, but one o’ the fleet seems to have hoisted the blue flag.”
Groggy Fox pointed to one of the surrounding vessels as he swept past in the Cormorant.
Lockley looked round in haste, and, to his surprise, saw floating among the smaller flags, at a short distance, the great twenty-feet flag of a mission vessel, with the letters MDSF (Mission to Deep-Sea Fishermen) on it, in white on a blue ground.
“She must have lost her reckoning,” muttered Lockley, as he tried to catch sight of the vessel to which the flag belonged—which was not easy, owing to the crowd of smacks passing to and fro between it and him.
Just at that moment a hearty cheer was heard to issue from the Admiral’s smack, the Cherub. At the same time the boat of the Lively Poll was launched into the sea, Duffy and Freeman and another hand tumbled into her, and the skipper had to give his undivided attention to the all-important matter of transhipping the fish.
Dozens of boats were by that time bobbing like corks on the heaving sea, all making for the attendant steamer. Other dozens, which had already reached her, were clinging on—the men heaving the fish-boxes aboard,—while yet others were pushing off from the smacks last arrived to join the busy swarm.
Among these was the boat of the Fairy, with Dick Martin and two men aboard. It was heavily laden—too heavily for such a sea—for their haul on the previous night had been very successful.
North Sea fishermen are so used to danger that they are apt to despise it. Both Bryce and Martin knew they had too many trunks in the boat, but they thought it a pity to leave five or six behind, and be obliged to make two trips for so small a number, where one might do. Besides, they could be careful. And so they were—very careful; yet despite all their care they shipped a good deal of water, and the skipper stood on the deck of the Fairy watching them with some anxiety. Well he might, for so high were the waves that not only his own boat but all the others kept disappearing and re-appearing continually as they rose on the crests or sank into the hollows.
But Skipper Bryce had eyes for only one boat. He saw it rise to view and disappear steadily, regularly, until it was about half-way to the steamer; then suddenly it failed to rise, and next moment three heads were seen amid the tumultuous waters where the boat should have been.