and got the
boom-foresail sheeted in, but they let the rent mainsail bang, for it
could do no more damage than it had already done.

A man sprang up on the rail with a blue light in his hand, and as the
weird radiance flared in a long streak to leeward a cry rose from the
water. In another few moments a blurred object, half hidden in flying
spray, drove down upon the schooner furiously on the top of a sea, and
then there was sudden darkness as the man flung down the torch.

Another harsh and half-heard cry rose out of the obscurity. An
indistinguishable object plunged past the schooner's stern, there was a
crash to leeward as the schooner rolled, and a man standing up in the
boat clutched her rail. The man was swung out of it as the vessel rolled
back again, but he crawled on to the rail with a rope in one hand, and
after jamming it fast around something, he sprang down with the hooks of
the lifting tackles which one of the crew had given him. While two more
men scrambled up, there was a clatter of blocks, but a shattered sea
struck the boat as they hove her clear, and, when she swung in, the
brine poured out through the rents in her. Dampier waved an arm as they
dropped her on the deck, and they heard him faintly.

"Boys," he shouted, "you have got to cut that mainsail down!"

They obeyed somehow, hanging on to the mast-hoops, and now and then
enveloped by the madly flogging canvas. After that they trimmed her
fore-staysail over, and there was by contrast a curious quietness as
Dampier jammed his helm up, and the schooner swung off before the sea.

Then somebody lighted a lantern, and Charly stooped over Wyllard, who
lay limp and still beside the wheel. In the feeble light, Wyllard's face
showed gray except where a broad red stain had spread across it. Dampier
cast a glance at him.

"Get him below, and into his bunk, two of you," he commanded.

The men carried him with difficulty, for the _Selache_ lurched viciously
each time a white-topped sea came up upon her quarter. As soon as it
seemed advisable to leave the deck Dampier went down. Wyllard lay in his
bunk, with his eyes half-open. His face was colorless except for the
broad smear of blood, which was oozing fast from a laceration in his
scalp. Dampier, who noticed his chilliness, did not trouble about the
wound. He stripped off the senseless man's long boots, and, unshipping a
hot fender iron from the stove, laid it against his feet. Afterward he
contrived