day.

Every now and then too there was a loud smack against the bows, and a
shower of spray made the deck glisten for a few minutes; but it rapidly
dried up again, and as the schooner careened over and dashed along, Rodd
stood aft, looking back through the foam to see how the waves came
curling along after them, as if in full chase of the beautiful little
vessel and seeking to leap aboard.

The sun had gone down in a bronzy red bank of clouds, and after being
below to the cabin tea Rodd had eagerly hurried on deck again, to find
that the sea around was beginning to look wild and strange.

Whether he made for Josiah Cross, or Joe, as he was generally called,
came up to him, Rodd did not know, but as he stood with one arm over the
rail he soon found himself in conversation.

"Are we going to have a storm?" he said.

"Well, I dunno, sir, about storm. More wind coming."

"How do you know?"

"How do I know, sir?" cried the man. "Why, if you come to that, I don't
know. Seem to feel it like. I don't say as it will. Wind's nor'-west
now, and has been all day, but I shouldn't wonder if it chopped right
round, and then--"

"There'll be a storm," said Rodd eagerly.

"Well, I don't say that, sir; but like enough there will be more wind
than we want to use, and we might have to put back."

"What, now that we have started at last?" cried Rodd.

The man nodded.

"Oh, that would be vexatious," cried Rodd, "to find ourselves back in
Plymouth again!"

"There, you wouldn't do that, my lad," said the man. "If we did have to
put back, I should say the skipper would run for Penzance. But there,
the wind hasn't chopped round yet, and it's just as likely to fall as it
gets dark and we will get our orders to hoist more sail."

But the sailor's first ideas proved to be right, and not only did the
wind veer round, but it increased in force and became so contrary and
shifty that during the night it began to blow a perfect hurricane, and
gave Captain Chubb a good opportunity of proving that he was no
fine-weather sailor.

It proved to be a bright night, being nearly full moon, with great
flocculent silvery and black clouds scudding at a tremendous rate across
the planet, while one minute the schooner's rigging was shadowed in
black upon the white, wet deck, at another all was gloom, with the wind
shrieking through the rigging, and the _Maid of Salcombe_ proving the
truth of the sailor's words, as she was literally dancing