"Get in the shrouds!" Biddlecomb shouted again, gesturing with one arm. He could not let go of the wheel, and even if he did, he was lashed in place by the line around his waist. In a second the water would be on them.
And then Peabody saw the boy. He leapt from the shrouds and grabbed Fox by the collar, yanked him around, and shoved him into the shrouds. Then the boy understood. He scrambled into the rigging, weaving his limbs between the lines.
And then the wave was on them.
The Adams's bowsprit drove into the side of the sea asthe breaking wave, seventy feet high, dropped its tons of water on the ship's frail decks. The water crashed down on the bow, submerging the entire ship to the foremast, and rushed aft sweeping away men and gear.
"Captain!" shouted Biddlecomb. Peabody did not have time to regain the safety of the shrouds. Biddlecomb abandoned his grip on the wheel and lunged at the captain, grabbing him in a bear hug and dragging him to the deck. He wondered if the waist lashing would hold them both.
The water struck with such force that Biddlecomb's breath was knocked away. It smashed the two men into the taffrail, rolling them over like paper blown in the wind. Biddlecomb strained to hold Peabody as the two men were lifted off the deck. The waist lashing came tight around Biddlecomb's body, as if straining to cut him in two.
They hung there, supported by the rushing water and pounding against the taffrail. Biddlecomb's hands came down on the wood with the force of Peabody's two hundred pounds. He felt his grip slipping.
"Hold on to me!" he screamed, and received a mouthful of water. He choked and gagged and tried to breath but only swallowed more water. It occured to him that Peabody might be dead, killed in that first concussion of water.
A second rush of water came aft and Biddlecomb's feet were lifted over his head and he felt his waist come down on the taffrail, his breath knocked out again, his feet dangling in aie over the stern. He grabbed the rail and dragged himself inboard. Then the seas fell away and the deck heaved and gleamed where Biddlecomb lay, and Captain Peabody was gone.
Chapter 12.
Trough of the Seas
BIDDLECOMB PULLED HIMSELF TO HIS FEET, clutching at the spokes of the will. He allowed himself a second, less than a second, to reflect on Captain Peabody's fate, then pushed the thoughts aside as more immediate concerns overwhelmed him.
The Adams was lying down on her larboard side, or nearly so, and the deck sloped at a crazy angle. Biddlecomb held the wheel as much to keep himself from sliding away to leeward as to keep the ship under control. Slowly, painfully, the Adams shook off the tons of waterfrom her deck and came upright, her sails slatting in the diminished wind between the two waves.
The ship had slewed around as the wave passed over, and now she was lying in the trough, broadside to the sea. Rather than meeting the huge waves bow-on, the Adams was now presenting her high, flat side to the sea, and the next wave would roll her completely over. Biddlecomb saw a figure moving down the starboard side of the quarterdeck, moving fast despite the ship's severe angle. It was Rumstick, laying aft for orders. Thank God he's all right, thought Biddlecomb. I need him now.
Rumstick came aft to the helm, squinting through the driving rain as he searched for the captain. Haliburton was just behind him.
"Ezra!" Biddlecomb shouted. "Peabody's gone, over the side!" Rumstick nodded, and in that instance Biddlecomb made a decision.
"I'm going to wear ship, keep her coming around to larboard!" he shouted, and Rumstick nodded again. Behind him Haliburton was nodding as well.
Biddlecomb felt the ship rise and knew that that the next terrific wave was upon them. If they remained sideways to the sea, as they now were, for even a minute longer, they would be rolled completely over. He heaved up on the wheel, putting the helm over to larboard, and Larson followed his lead. The Adams turned as she rose on the wave, turning her stern into the seas.
Haliburton clung to the cabin top for balance as Rumstick stumbled across the deck and grabbed the wheel from Biddlecomb. "I'll take the helm! You see to putting us about!" he shouted, and Biddlecomb nodded, surrendering the wheel. He glanced over at Larson. The Swede was planted like a tree to the deck.
Biddlecomb jerked his knife out of the leather sheath strapped to the small of his back and cut the waist lashings away. The Adams was falling off now, turning her stern to the wind. That was good, for a few moments at least.
"Keep her coming around!" he ordered, staring aft at the oncoming sea. "Meet her! Keep her stern to this next wave!"
A black shape materialized at his side. Biddlecomb tore his eyes from the water and looked. It was Mr Fry.
"I'm wearing ship, Fry! Jump forward and see to the braces!" Biddlecomb shouted, but Fry did not move.
"You will do nothing of the sort! You are not in command here! I am!" Fry screamed, and Biddlecomb realized, to his surprise, that indeed he was not in command. Nonetheless, he knew that his actions were the only ones that would keep the Adams from foundering.
"We shall maintain this heading! Run before it!" Fry was screaming.
Perfect. Instead of being set down on Nova Scotia, they would sail straight into it. "God damn it! Peabody said we had to wear ship! We are halfway around already! If we don't wear ship, we'll pile up on Nova Scotia!"
"I am in command! I shall not say that again!"
This was absurd, and worse, it was putting the ship in great danger. Biddlecomb felt the deck swoop up beneath him as the stern rose to the following sea.
"Fry, you stupid, no-sailor son of a bitch!" Haliburton was shouting across the deck. "You want to kill us all?"
The Adams was running with the wind and the sea directly astern, and despite her much reduced canvas she was moving extremely fast. Biddlecomb braced himself as the sea lifted the ship. She surfed down the front of the giant wave, like a huge cart out of control and careening downhill, and Biddlecomb could not tell if the wave would pass beneath them or if they would bury their bow in the sea. If they buried the bow, then they would pitchpole. The bow would stop, like the front wheels of the cart suddenly locking up, and the wave would lift the stern and tumble the ship end over end and she would be turn apart.
Biddlecomb squeezed the taffrail until his hand ached. He felt the ship moved under him, saw the trough of the wave as they hurtled toward it. And then, suddenly, the deck sank beneath him and the bow rose high in the air, obscuring the sea. The wave had passed beneath them.
"We'll pitchpole for certain next time!" shouted Rumstick.
"Start coming around now!" shouted Biddlecomb. "We'll wear ship now!" They were safest in the valley between the waves.
"No!" shouted Fry. "You shall do nothing without my orders!"
Biddlecomb swung around to confront the mate and was nearly knocked to the deck as Rumstick's arm shot out and grabbed Fry by the collar. He jerked the mate like a rag doll across the deck until their faces were inches apart. His left hand never lost its grip on the wheel.
"Isaac is wearing ship! You tend to the braces!" That was all he said. He released Fry, pushing him away, and with a dexterity surprising for a big man he brought a leather seaboot up to Fry's back and propelled him forward. Fry fell to the deck, scrambling on his hands and knees until he regained his footing and disappeared forward.
Rumstick and Larson spun the wheel and the Adams responded, turning to larboard. Biddlecomb looked up at the deep-reefed topsails. They would have to be braced quickly or the sails would come aback and tear the rig apart.