His brother sprang to the halyards at the warning, but it was a moment too late. At that instant a wave, rolling higher than any they had yet encountered, raised the Spray on its crest and hurled it forward, at the same time causing the little craft to yaw so that the boom was buried for a moment deep in the seas. That moment was enough. There was a sharp snap as the boom, splintered in two in the middle, emerged from the waves, a useless thing. The yacht nearly broached to, while the next oncoming wave broke fairly aboard, filling the cockpit half-full of water.
They thought it was all over with them then, but they kept their heads and saved themselves. Henry Burns and Arthur Warren, at the risk of going overboard, managed to get the broken boom aboard, after they had let the halyards run, and lashed it astern, so that the yacht was utterly without sail. At the same time Tom and Bob, who knew little about handling a yacht, but were ready for any emergency, bailed furiously with pails to clear the boat of water.
Fortunately, the hatch had been shut, and the deluge of water had not gone into the cabin, or the boat must have foundered. As it was, she rolled heavily till they had bailed the cockpit dry again.
“That does settle it, with a vengeance,” said George Warren, when they had recovered a little from the shock. “We have got to run for it now, clear across this bay. I think we can do it all right, but you fellows will have to bail lively. That won’t be the only sea we take aboard.”
“Where do we run to?” asked Henry Burns.
“That’s the worst of it,” replied George Warren. “I’m not sure, by any means, whether we get blown out to the shoals, or whether we can head over to the eastward any, ever so slightly, and strike the Gull Island Thoroughfare. If we can land under the lee of Gull Island, we may be able to do something. The first thing, though, is to get there.”
It was no easy thing to hold the yacht on its course, even with no sail to drive it up to windward. Every wave threatened to throw it broadside on, and it required now and again the united efforts of George and Arthur Warren to steady it. Then a wave would come aboard astern, rolling in and nearly filling the cockpit. Several times it did this, and at each and every time it seemed as though the little yacht was going down. They bailed desperately then, every one of them falling to except George Warren.
To their credit, though, not one of them lost his courage. Their faces were drawn and set, but they had confidence that the little Spray would somehow bring them through.
Toward the middle of the afternoon they had got the Thoroughfare well in sight, big Gull Island lying nearly dead ahead and the smaller Gull Islands lying away to the eastward.
“If we can manage to get a scrap of sail on her just as we pass the end of Gull Island,” said George Warren, “I think we can swing her in and not capsize. We’ve got to keep headway on, though, or one of these big rollers will get under us and tip us over. We shall have a few rods to run broadside on, for, as we are running now, and the best we can head, we cannot come nearer than that to the island.”