Birds of Prey - Smith Wilbur (версия книг TXT) 📗
For two days the wind never ceased its assault upon them, and the seas grew taller and wilder with every hour until they seemed to tower higher than the mainmast as they rushed down upon them. Halfswamped, the Golden Bough was slow to lift to meet them, and as they struck her they burst into foam and tumbled green across her decks. Two helmsmen, lashed to the whipstall, battled to keep her pointing with the gale, but each wave that came aboard burst over their heads. By the second day all aboard were exhausted and nearing the limits of their endurance. There was no chance of sleep and only hard biscuit to eat.
Llewellyn had lashed himself to the mainmast and from there he directed the efforts of his officers and men to keep the ship alive. No man could stand unsupported upon the open deck, so Llewellyn could not order them to man the main pumps, but on the gundeck teams of seamen worked in a frenzy at the auxiliary pumps to try to clear the six feet of water in her bilges. As fast as they pumped it out the sea poured back through the shattered gun ports and the cracked hatch covers.
Always the land loomed closer in their lee as the storm drove them onwards under bare masts, and though the helmsmen strained muscle and heart to hold her off, the Golden Bough edged in towards the land. That night they heard the surf break and boom like a barrage of cannon out there in the darkness, growing every hour more tumultuous as they were driven towards the rocks.
When dawn broke on the third day they could see, through the fog and spume, the dark, threatening shape of the land, the cliffs and jagged headlands only a league away across the marching mountains of grey and furious waters.
Schreuder dragged himself across the deck, clinging to mast and shroud and backstay as each wave came aboard. Seawater streamed from his hair down his face, filling his mouth and nostrils, as he gasped at Llewellyn, "I know this coast. I recognize that headland coming up ahead of US."
"We'll need God's blessing to weather it on this course," Llewellyn shouted. "The wind has us in its teeth."
"Then pray to the Almighty with all your heart, Captain, for our salvation lies not five leagues beyond," Schreuder bellowed, blinking the salt water from his eyes.
"How can you be certain of that?"
"I have been ashore here and marched through the country. I know every wrinkle of the land. There is a bay beyond that cape, which we named Buffalo Bay. Once she is into it, the ship should be sheltered from the full force of the wind, and on the far side there stand a pair of rocky heads that guard the entrance to a wide and calm lagoon. In there we would be safe from even such a storm as this."
"There is no lagoon marked on my charts." Llewellyn's expression was riven with hope and doubt.
"Sweet Jesus, Captain, you must believe me!" Schreuder shouted. On the sea he was out of his natural element and for once even he was afraid.
"First we must weather those rocks, and after that we can prove the quality of your memory."
Schreuder was silenced and clung desperately to the mast beside Llewellyn. He stared ahead in horror as he watched the sea open her snarling lips of white foam and bare fangs of black rock. The Golden Bough drove on helplessly into her jaws.
One of the helmsmen screamed, "Oh, holy Mother of God, save our mortal souls! We're going to strike!"
"Hold your helm hard over!" Llewellyn roared at him. Close alongside, the sea opened viciously and the reef burst out like a blowing whale. Claws of stone seemed to reach out towards the frail planks of the little ship, and they were so near that Schreuder could see the masses of shellfish and weed that cloaked the rocks. Another wave, larger than the rest, lifted and flung them at the reef, but the rocks disappeared below the boiling surface and the Golden Bough rose up like a hunter at a fence and shot high over it.
Her keel touched the rock and she checked with such force that Schreuder's grip on the mast was broken and he was hurled to the deck, but the ship shook herself free, surged onwards, carried on the crest of that mighty wave, and slid off the reef into the deeper water beyond. She charged forward, the point of the headland dropping away behind her and the bay opening ahead. Schreuder dragged himself upright and felt at once that the dreadful might of the gale had been broken by the sprit of land. Though the ship still hurtled on wildly, she was coming back under control and Schreuder could feel her respond to the urging of her rudder.
"There!" he screamed in Llewellyn's ear. "There! Dead ahead!"
"Sweet heaven! You were right." Through the spume and seaftet Llewellyn picked out the shape of the twin heads over the ship's bows. He rounded on his helmsmen. "Let her fall off a point!" Though their terrified expressions showed how they hated to obey, they let her come down across the wind and point towards the next pier of black rock and surf.
"Hold her at that!" Llewellyn checked them, and the Golden Bough tore headlong across the bay.
"Mister Winterton!" he roared at Vincent, who crouched below the hatch-coaming close at hand with a halfdozen sailors sheltering on the companion behind him. "We must shake out a reef on the main topgallant sail to give her steerage. Can you do it?"
He made the order a request, for it was the next thing to murder to send a man to the top of the mainmast in this gale. An officer must lead the way, and Vincent was the strongest and boldest among them.
"Come on, lads!" Vincent shouted at his men without hesitation. "There's a golden guinea for any man who can beat me to the main topgallant yard." He leapt to his feet and darted across the deck to the mainmast shrouds and went flying up them hand over hand with his men in pursuit.
The Golden Bough "tore across Buffalo Bay like a runaway horse. Suddenly Schreuder shouted again, "Look there!" and pointed to where the entrance to the lagoon began to open to their view between the heads that towered on either hand.
