At the expiration, as I supposed, of twenty minutes, the hatch cover was opened, this time without any following screech and blast of wind, and Caudel descended. Had he been a beam of sunshine he could not have been more welcome to my eyes. He was clad from head to foot in oilskins, from which the wet ran as from an umbrella in a thunder-shower, and the skin and hue of his face resembled soaked leather.
"Well, Mr. Barclay, sir," he exclaimed, "and how have you been getting on? It's been a bad job; but there's nothen to alarm ye, I'm sure." Then catching sight of Grace's face, he cried, "The young lady ain't been and hurt herself, I hope, sir?"
"Her fear and this movement," I answered, "have proved too much for her. I wish you would pull off your oilskins and help me to convey her to the lee side there. The edge of this table seems to be cutting me in halves," the fact being that I was to windward with the whole weight of my sweetheart, who rested lifelessly against me to increase the pressure, so that at every leeward stoop of the craft my breast was caught by the edge of the table with a sensation as of a knife cutting through my shirt.
He instantly whipped off his streaming waterproofs, standing without the least inconvenience whilst the decks slanted under him like a see-saw, and in a very few moments he had safely placed Grace on the lee locker with her head on a pillow. I made shift to get round to her without hurting myself, then cried to Caudel to sit and tell me what had happened.
"Well, it's just this, sir," he answered, "the mast has carried away some feet below the head of it. It went on a sudden in the squall in which the wind burst down upon us. Perhaps it was as well it happened, for she lay down to that there houtfly in a way so hobstinate that I did believe she'd never lift herself out of the water agin. But the sail came down when the mast broke, and I managed to get her afore it, though I don't mind owning to you now, sir, that what with the gear fouling the helm, and what with other matters which there ain't no call for me to talk about, 'twas as close a shave with us, sir, as ever happened at sea."
Grace moaned, opened her eyes and then shut them again, and moved her hand that I should take it. The companion cover lay a little way open, but though tons of water might be flying over the bow for aught I knew, not a drop glittered in the hatch. I could now, however, very clearly hear the roaring hum of the gale, and catch the note of boiling waters; but these sounds were not so distracting but that Caudel and I clearly heard each other's voice.
"Is the yacht tight, do you think, Caudel?" cried I.
"I hope she is, sir."
"Hope! My God, but you must know, Caudel."
"Well, sir, she's adraining a little water into her—I'm bound to say it—but nothen that the pump won't keep under; and I believe that most of it finds its way into the well from up above."