There was confusion enough, but on the whole the six alarmed boys
behaved sensibly. Steve, wet to his waist, turned off the engine and
banged shut the chart-box even as he shouted his orders. "Life
preservers, fellows! Han, get the big cable from the locker. Keep your
heads now!"
Clinging like a leech to the canted roof of the forward cabin, Steve
himself worked along with the rope and, half-drowned in rain and surf,
made it fast to the cleat. The others, struggling into life-belts,
clung to the stanchions or whatever they could find. Steve crawled back
with the coil, drenched and breathless.
"We've got to get off, fellows," he said. "It's only a dozen yards to
the beach and we can make it all right. Close every hatch. Ossie, fetch
a can of biscuits. See that the lid's tight." Wave after wave struck on
the starboard beam and fell hissing across the boat. The side curtains
were ripped from the stanchions and fluttered wildly about them.
"Going to swim for it?" asked Joe above the roar of waves and tempest.
"Yes! We've got to. The boat would swamp in an instant. I'll start ahead
with the line. You fellows wait and then follow it in."
"Better let me go along," said Joe, his hands formed into a
speaking-trumpet.
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