"Lads!" shouted Hardy, running a little way forward, "there is a brig on the quarter. We'll see if she can give us any news, although abandoned. Starboard mainbrace, starboard foretopsail-brace smartly as possible, my lads. Starboard your helm!"
And slowly, for the helm was wearily worked and the braces were dragged by languid hands, the yards came round, and then the maintopsail was mastheaded, and the ship with the wind right abeam crushed the flint-like surge into froth, and forged ahead for the abandoned vessel.
It was time to make for her if she was to be visited at all, for the horizon was narrowing and narrowing with the thickness of rain, and soon within the distance of a mile the brig would have vanished. Hardy's glass was full of powerful lenses—its magnifying power was double that of the ship's telescope; when he now put it to his eye he instantly saw a figure just this side of the brig's main-rigging waving something white.
His heart brightened. He looked again. She was a woman, and alone! The boatswain was coming aft as Hardy looked forward.
"There's a figure aboard that brig," he shouted. "It's a woman, and she's waving a handkerchief."
"She'll be yourn," said the boatswain, and as surprise did not immediately follow perception, he added, "Well, I'm damned!"
"Stand by to back the maintopsail!" roared Hardy, who was delirious with excitement. "Let some hands lay aft and clear away the starboard quarter-boat ready for lowering. I'd board her if twice this sea was running. I knew I was right. I knew he'd head straight away. I knew I'd find her by shaping the madman's course."
"Suppose it isn't her?" said the boatswain.
"To hell with your supposings!" yelled Hardy. "In any case it's a woman, and she must be taken off."