He saw all this in a flash—saw the gray-green maelstrom between the dunes, the launch struggling across the inlet, the yacht plunging seaward. Then in the endless palm forests the roar deepened. Flash! Bang! lightning and thunder were simultaneous.
“That’s better,” said Haltren, hanging to his oars; “there’s a fighting chance now.”
The rain came, beating the waves down, seemingly, for a moment, beating out the wind itself. In the partial silence the sharp explosions of the gasoline-engine echoed like volleys of pistol-shots; and Haltren half rose in his pitching boat, and shouted: “Launch ahoy! Run under the lee shore. There’s a hurricane coming! You haven’t a second to lose!”
He heard somebody aboard the launch say, distinctly, “There’s a Florida cracker alongside who says a hurricane is about due.” The shrill roar of the rain drowned the voice. Haltren bent to his oars again. Then a young man in dripping white flannels looked out of the wheel-house and hailed him. “We’ve grounded on the meadows twice. If you know the channel you’d better come aboard and take the wheel.”
Haltren, already north of the inlet and within the zone of safety, rested on his oars a second and looked back, listening. Very far away he heard the deep whisper of death.
On board the launch the young man at the wheel heard it, too; and he hailed Haltren in a shaky voice: “I wouldn’t ask you to come back, but there are women aboard. Can’t you help us?”
“All right,” said Haltren.
A horrible white glare broke out through the haze; the solid vertical torrent of rain swayed, then slanted eastward.
A wave threw him alongside the launch; he scrambled over the low rail and ran forward, deafened by the din. A woman in oilskins hung to the companion-rail; he saw her white face as he passed. Haggard, staggering, he entered the wheel-house, where the young man in dripping flannels seized his arm, calling him by name. Haltren pushed him aside.
“Give me that wheel, Darrow,” he said, hoarsely. “Ring full speed ahead! Now stand clear—”