The wind, however, wouldn’t stay in any one quarter; it kept jumping about as if it were trying to box the compass and succeeding pretty well. Tom had to keep changing course. The Argo zigzagged about like a darning-needle flying over a pond. And the thunder kept crashing louder, and the lightning opening bigger and bigger cracks in the violet-black of the sky.
“Hello, there’s a canoe!” sang out Ben suddenly.
Ahead of them, an eighth of a mile from shore, a cockleshell craft was dancing over the waves. There were two people in it, one at either end, and each was paddling fast.
“Ticklish business,” said Tuckerman. “There’s white water off that point. See how it jerks about. I say, Tom, couldn’t we get up near them?”
“Righto,” answered the skipper. “Confound those blooming gusts!”
If the Argo was having her hands full in standing up to the constant squalls that kept chasing over the water, the canoe was finding the struggle an even more difficult task. She careened, righted, almost disappeared in a wave. The Argo’s crew were now all at the rail, except the skipper, watching the little craft battle her way along.
Then Ben sang out: “Why, it’s Lanky Larry and the Amoussock captain! Gee, but that water’s rough!”
A lightning flash so vivid that it seemed to daze the crews of both the boats, was followed by a roll of thunder that shook the sea and the sky. Next instant the waves leaped up as if in a frenzy of fright. A great roller caught the canoe and twisted her nose about; another slapped her amidships; a third—All that the crew of the Argo saw was a swirl of wild waters where the little craft had been.
Tuckerman muttered something. Tom, with a shout of warning, brought the Argo about. Now there were to be seen in the water two heads, two tossing paddles, and the upturned bottom of the canoe.
The point of land was not far distant, and for some reason the boys in the water were striking out in that direction, possibly because they thought the sailboat, in such a squall, could not keep her course.