At last, Will heard Paul shouting at him, "Come on," and they retreated to the break of the poop deck. On the deck above them, Captain Barker shouted, "Helm down." The sailor at the wheel pushed the spokes to windward and slowly the Lady Rebecca rounded up in the wind. She lay, pitching and heaving in the seas; yet, balancing between wind and wave, she hove to.
The storm kept building until it felt like a full hurricane was blowing at them. Will lost all track of time. It should have been afternoon yet was as dark as night. Then, when night finally fell, the absolute blackness seemed to swallow them whole, broken only by jagged lightning, illuminating the rolling breakers topped by crests of white foam charging at them from out of the darkness.
The mate's place on the poop deck was to windward while Will, as apprentice, stood to leeward. He took a quick round turn to secure himself to the rail to avoid being washed overboard by a breaking wave or being thrown to the deck as the ship corkscrewed in the sea. Between the waves, he kept an eye on the binnacle lantern. His task was to keep the lantern burning. The wind and driving rain kept blowing it out. He would cast off his lashings and fight to relight the lantern, wondering all the while, why it mattered. The helm was lashed down and the helmsman stood by with nothing to do but hold on and hide behind the weather cloths for whatever limited protection they might afford. Will blew into his hands for warmth, and then struggled with the matches once again in an endless battle with the wind and blowing spray.
On the second night of the gale, Fred huddled at the break of the poop with the rest of his watch. In the darkness and the spray, they didn't see John Whitney, a sailor from Glasgow, step out of the fo'c'sle cabin just as a wave broke and exploded across the deck. They heard him shout as it swept him off his feet. He grabbed in vain for the lifeline but the wall of green water carried him aft, washing him into the scuppers, then carrying him across the deck and finally slamming him against the deck pump, catching his leg on the pump handle. His screams of agony carried above even the roar of the wind.
In the wild darkness, it took four men to reach him. Torrents of water surged down the deck, as Fred, Tom, Jerry the Greek and Harry formed a human chain from the lifeline to where Whitney lay crumpled, crying out as each new wave struck. Harry managed to grab him by his shirt and pull him up from where he lay, with his leg twisted unnaturally beneath him. Whitney screamed as they hauled him slowly out from under the pump, carrying him as gently as they could on the rolling deck, through the cabin into galley where they laid him on a blanket on the table, tying him down so that he wouldn't be thrown off, as the ship twisted in the waves.
Captain Barker took a look at the injured sailor, gently straightening one leg and then the other. Touching Whitney's left leg started him howling in pain. The captain looked at Fred. "Get Chips. We'll be needing a splint.”
Fred found the carpenter's cabin and pounded on the door.
“Man's been injured. Captain says he needs a splint.”
Gronberg was pulling on his dungarees and oilskins. "You tell the captain, I'll be there right quick.”
In a few minutes, the carpenter was measuring Whitney's leg.
“It appears to be fractured in three places," the captain commented.
“Ya, looks like it." Gronberg nodded in agreement. He pocketed his tape, cinched his oilskins tight and left the galley. He hauled his way along the deck, hand over hand, holding onto the lifeline as the breaking waves sent water surging from his knees to his chest, until he finally reached the wood shop forward, where his tools and spare planks were stored.
When he returned about a half-hour later, thoroughly soaked from his trip down the deck, he pulled two pine planks from beneath his dripping oilskins. They fit Whitney's leg perfectly and had slots cut in the planks where sail gaskets could be threaded to hold them in place.
“Nicely done, Mr. Gronberg," the captain said as he began carefully tying on the splint. Whitney, who had been given morphine, slept quietly as the captain gently bound the shattered leg.
“Thank you, sir. Not my first pair of splints," Chips replied.
When the captain was finished he said, "You men, put him in the spare cabin next to the steward.”
Whitney would likely live, but he would be out of commission for the rest of the trip. As they carried the sleeping sailor gingerly to the cabin, Fred couldn't help think that the twenty-man crew was down by one and they were still well north of Cape Horn.
One thing that Captain Barker knew for certain was that even a full snorter of a gale would blow itself out sooner or later. After four days, the skies cleared and the wind filled in again from the northwest. Barker took one last look at the rising barometer before climbing the ladder to the poop deck. "Mr. Atkinson, all hands, if you please. Set everything to the royals. I don't want to waste an ounce of this breeze.”
Mr. Atkinson bellowed, "All hands." The shout was soon echoed by Mr. Rand, who a moment later appeared from his cabin. With a favoring breeze pushing them toward Cape Horn, even he looked less dour than usual.
“Come on, you motherless farmers," he shouted. "Let's see what the old lady can do.”
Will and the other apprentices laid out on the mizzen yards, casting off the t'gallant gaskets and then racing to see who could be the first back on deck.
Harry belted out a favorite shanty as the crew scrambled down the ratlines and formed up at the halyards to raise sail.
“Me boots and clothes are all in pawn,”
and all sang back, hauling in time,
“Go down, ye blood red roses, go down.”
“Cause it's mighty drafty round Cape Horn,”
“Go down, ye blood red roses, go down….”
After the misery of the gale, Will couldn't quite believe the color of the sky that peeked through the broken clouds. It was blue, as deep and clear a blue as he had ever seen. With all sails set, the canvas filled the sky and once again the grand ship rolled mightily over the waves rather than being battered and tossed by the storm. The wind was cold but bracing. Somehow yesterday's gale seemed far, far away as Will grinned like an idiot gazing up at the towering sails.
Beneath the blue skies and the steady northwesterly the Lady Rebecca picked up her skirts and danced along at close to fourteen knots. Captain Barker felt like dancing as well. He went below to to the chart table. The barometer stayed high and he smiled as he plotted a course to weather St. John's Point on the eastern tip of Staten Island, the gateway to Drake's Passage and the waters of Cape Horn. By his reckoning, they would round Staten Island on August 7, a passage of over 8,000 miles in fifty-seven days. They had lost a few days in the gale but were making up the distance nicely. Captain Barker was well pleased with his ship, his crew and himself. His only concern was his mate.
At noon, he and Mr. Rand were on deck taking sun sights beneath a clear blue sky. Captain Barker lowered his sextant and jotted his reading into his notebook, and then asked the mate for his meridian altitude as well. Mr. Rand spat it out in a growl, turned and walked to his cabin.
Captain Barker watched his back as he walked away. Had Mr. Rand been a bad mate, his choice would have been easier. There were twelve pairs of shackles in the lazarette, part of the ship's allowance, ready in case of a mutiny. He could simply clap Mr. Rand in irons for the rest of the voyage. Mutinies always need a leader and there was none better than a disloyal mate who believed he knew better than the captain, or perhaps thought that he himself should be captain. Unfortunately, Captain Barker didn't have a spare mate on the lazarette shelf next to the shackles. So far Tom Atkinson had shown himself to be a fine young man and good second mate, but this was only his second voyage as an officer and he could use more seasoning. On the other hand, Captain Barker knew that he might not have any other choice.