"Em frente Sahib. Diretamente em frente."
Then he gestured toward the waist of the ship and seemed to be asking the depth reading.
As though in answer, the bosun's voice came again, trembling.
"Five fathom, Cap'n, and still dropping."
"Cinco." Elkington translated, but his concerned tone was
a question. What does it mean?
The pilot shouted an alarm in Gujarati and threw his fragile weight against the whipstaff. The Resolve pitched and shuddered, groaning like some mourning animal at tether, but it no longer seemed to respond to the rudder.
Kerridge glared at the pilot in dismay.
"Tell the blathering heathen steady as she goes. She'll take—“
The deck tipped crazily sideways, and a low grind seemed to pass up through its timbers. Then the whipstaff kicked to port, strained against its rope, and with a snap from somewhere below, drifted free. The Resolve careened dangerously into the wind, while a wave caught the waist of the ship and swept the bosun and his sounding line into the dark.