The crew obeyed orders perfectly, and in a very few minutes the Ghost was running under a heavy press of India rubber blanket for the distant beach. She had fully two miles to go, but as she was sailing fast enough to keep out of the way of the sea, there was no doubt that she would cross the bay safely. It took all the strength which Harry and Tom possessed to hold the blanket, while poor Joe, with his back braced against it, had the satisfaction of knowing that if it blew out of the boys' hands, it would carry him overboard.
As they approached the shore, having passed the drifting spars on the way, the prospect was not encouraging. The sea was breaking heavily on the low edge of the meadow which lay between the bay and the sand-hills of the beach, and there was no cove into which the boat could be run. There was nothing to be done but to anchor and wait for pleasant weather. Accordingly, the blanket was taken in, and the anchor dropped about thirty yards from the shore.
"Now if the anchor holds as it ought to," said Charley, "we are all right."
"And if it doesn't hold," said Harry, "we shall be all wrong. It's going to hold, though, for there's a good sandy bottom here."
"I wish it was a mud bottom," said Charley. "The anchor would hold twice as well in mud. However, I'm not afraid that we shall drift, unless it blows a regular hurricane."
"Now's the time to mend the deck," remarked Tom. "We've got nothing else to do."
"What in the world made that mast go overboard?" asked Joe. "It didn't break, did it?"
"No," answered Charley. "Either something gave way at the step, or else it wasn't properly stepped. We ought to have made absolutely sure that we had stepped it right that day we got through Coney Island Creek. We weren't careful enough about it, and this is the way we are paid for it."
There were some small pieces of pine board stowed away in the boat, which Harry had taken along in order to split them up for kindling wood. With the aid of the few tools which the boys had brought with them, they contrived to mend the deck, so that with the help of a piece of canvas and a little white lead it would shed water. An ugly scar remained to show where the mast had torn its way out; but for all practical purposes the deck was as good as ever.
This work finished, dinner was made ready, and the boys began to think that riding out a gale at anchor was not half so tiresome as they had supposed it would be.