“Arthur!” Frank yelled down the companionway, “come up; Ken’s overboard!”
CHAPTER XIV
A RACE WITH A GALE
“Ken, where are you?” Frank’s voice was almost drowned by the roaring of the breakers.
It was totally dark, and though both boys strained their eyes to the utmost, not a sign could they see of the skipper, who had vanished in the twinkling of an eye—knocked out of existence, seemingly, by the swinging blow of the boom.
Again they shouted, in unison this time. Surely Kenneth must hear them, they thought, if he was still alive and above water.
“Hulloa!” The voice was startlingly near.
The two looked about quickly in the direction from which the sound came, and beheld the skipper hanging on to the end of the boom, far to leeward; his white nightgown wet and clinging to his long legs, which were waving frantically in the effort to help their owner to crawl along the boom towards the yacht. From time to time, as the yawl rolled, the clinging figure was dipped in the sea, and then as suddenly dragged out and swung about like a wet rag on the end of a stick.
For a minute Frank and Arthur stood stupefied, then the humor of the situation dawning on them they began to laugh.
This was too much for Kenneth’s patience, and he shouted wrathfully: