For miles and miles there was no other place of refuge but that bay. In such a storm it was a serious thing to have such a lee-shore, for at this part of the coast the land tends north-west, making a lee-shore for a north-east wind. Captain Drew would have felt no anxiety if no accident had happened; but in the face of a damaged rudder on a lee-shore such as this, and in such a storm, he felt very uneasy. If anything went at the rudder there would be no hope for the yacht, and little or none for any man aboard her.
The schooner was now able to show only a storm-jib and close-reefed scandalised mainsail to the storm.
At half-past one the foe, which had been so long invisible, came into sight, the Seabird being then about three miles to the south-west of the entrance to Silver Bay.
At a quarter to two the carpenter, who had been ordered to watch the rudder-head, saw the foe, which had so long been working in darkness, and reported to the captain. The carpenter said to the captain:
"In the starboard side of the rudder-cap iron----"
"Yes."
"There's a crack."
"Good God! a crack? If that goes, we are all lost!"
"I think it's going fast, sir."
While the carpenter was telling this terrible news to the captain, on shore Cheyne was standing among a knot of fishermen watching the approaching yacht.