“Cross your fingers for luck,” Dolan roared. He gestured dead ahead with a motion of his head. The glass ahead of the wheel had been smashed out. Mal squinted against the driving spray. Dead ahead, revealed only when the Bjornsan Star rose sluggishly to the top of a great wave, Mal could see the spray thundering high from the reefs, see a low gray island beyond.
It came closer with startling speed, always nearer each time it became visible. And suddenly, in the midst of the storm, there was an odd silence. Mal realized that the vibration, unheard but felt through the soles of his feet, had ceased.
The following sea began to slowly turn the Star broadside to the giant combers that leaped forward to smash against the reefs.
Dolan jumped back from the wheel roaring a great oath into the wind. “He couldn’t give me five minutes more!”
Once broadside to the waves, the Star made one gigantic roll that tumbled the unwary into a heap in one corner of the bridge. A seaman was thrown against the jagged shards of glass remaining in the frame. Badly slashed he began a ceaseless screaming.
Mal crawled and fought his way to Sara. Once he reached her he craned upward until he could see from the side windows the reef so close that the spray was flung into the air to fall on the Star. The next wave would bring them down onto the reef and all he could hope was that through some miracle they could get into the relatively quiet water beyond the harsh coral. He dropped and shielded Sara with his body. The Bjornsan Star lifted up and up, seeming to hang poised for a long moment. She came down with a rending, crashing, long-drawn-out jar, breaking her back and her heart.
She sagged over, steady for a moment at a precarious angle. And the next wave smashed her broadside. With a long scream of steel on coral she slid over the reef and down into the quiet water beyond. She floated for a moment and then the bow struck and the wind slid her slowly around. She came to gentle rest.
V
It was a breathless dawn, hot and torpid and muggy. The sun was a rising ball of brass and steam rose from the brush and the palms and the damp main road of the small thatched village.
Of fifty huts a good score had been smashed by the wind. This was Dakeet, child of catastrophe, step-daughter of the great winds, and island five miles long, three quarters of a mile wide, ringed about with coral reefs. The gray sea, not forgetting anger so quickly, still thundered at the reef and the outrigger canoes would not be launched for several days.
Mal stood on the sloping sand of the beach and looked out at the dead hulk of the Bjornsan Star. She was canted at a forty degree angle, resting on the shallow bottom, her starboard rail under water for all of its length except for a few feet near the bow. Some of the native boys had swum out to her. They sat on their heels on the canted port rail looking for all the world like three dusty brown birds. Between the thunder of each wave on the reef Mal could hear their chattering as they discussed this strange and wonderful deviation from the norm of Dakeet.
Sara came down to the beach from the shelter of the line-brush. The slacks, though badly wrinkled, were almost dry. She had rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt and she wore it open at the collar. Her hair was badly tangled and lifeless from the crusted salt, but her smile was for him alone.
“Dry, eh?” he asked.
“Enough to wear. Now tell me what you found out last night, Mal, after I collapsed on that cot in the resident’s house.”
“We were twenty-one, weren’t we? Now it’s fourteen. That man you saw slashed died of loss of blood. Torgeson was trapped below decks when she settled. He said he was going back for something just after the engines failed. MacLane and Gina are gone, of course. And two other men were swept away. One of them was the English-speaking mess boy.”
Her eyes clouded. “He was nice... and Gina... she was my friend, I guess.”
“We’re being given breakfast at the house of the resident. He’s had no time for us. Too busy taking care of his people here. There’s about two hundred of them. They had some deaths in the storm. There’s a bad food situation because of the storm. He told Dolan that he’d talk with us after breakfast.”
“Did you see him last night?”
“Just for a moment. Small, nervous type. French of course. His name is de Beauharnais. Been here for a long time, right through the last war. The people are Micronesian — probably stranded here during one of their long jaunts a few hundred years ago. We’d better head toward his place. It’s a ten minute walk, wouldn’t you say?”
Even the sturdy residency had suffered damage from the storm. The roof of one of the wings had been torn off despite the anchor cables fastened to buried logs. But the wide screened porch was intact. It was placed at the head of the village street and but fifty feet from the waterfront. The next building was a store, undamaged, its windows still boarded up. The neatly lettered sign over the closed door said, “A. Hayaka — Merchandise” in three languages.
The others were all gathered at the end of the big porch which, in L shape, encircled the village side and the sea side of the building.
Mal and Sara nodded at the others. Temble said to her, “Come here, my dear.”
She glanced up at Mal then shook her head firmly. Branch took two slow steps toward her, looking back at Temble like a dog eager for command. Temble said softly, “Not now, Tom.” Dolan chuckled dryly.
There were not enough chairs for all of them. Sara and Mal wandered away from the rest. In a little while de Beauharnais came up the steps onto the porch, his face sagging with a bone-deep weariness. He carried a small black bag which he handed to one of the house boys.
In spite of his obvious tiredness, there was an electric vitality about the small man. He faced the group in silence. “Have you injured?” he asked. “Forgive me for not asking before. I am the doctor here, too, as you see.”
“One bad wrist,” Dolan said. He turned and spoke to the man in question, who held out a swollen, discolored hand, wincing as the resident fingered the wrist.
“Sprained only. Tell him to remain with me. I will tape it.” Dolan spoke to the man who then stepped back into the group. “Are all of you here? Yes? It makes fourteen, eh? Did you radio your position?”
Dolan explained about the radio. De Beauharnais gave a Gallic shrug. “You will be with us for some time, I see.”
“How do you mean that?” Temble demanded harshly.
De Beauharnais raised one eyebrow and stared at Temble as though astonished by the tone of rudeness. He answered quietly. “It is three weeks before one of the island ships will stop here. We have no mode of communication with 'outside’. We must plan what must be done. What cargo have you? Anything salvagable?”
“A good deal of tinned food, sir,” said Dolan. “Australian butter. Tinned New Zealand beef. I took a look at the ship. At low tide it shouldn’t be much of a chore.”
“Excellent!” the Frenchmen said, smiling. “That will help solve bur most pressing problem. As soon as you have rested I shall require you to take a party of your men and begin salvage operations. The foodstuffs will be brought here for storage. Now as to living arrangements—” He found Sara in the group, bowed to her. “I would be most pleased if you would accept my hospitality, Mademoiselle.”
“She is my wife,” Temble said truculently.
“Ah, so? Then perhaps you too, sir.”
“It might inconvenience you, M’sieur,” Sara said, “as we shall require two rooms.”
De Beauharnais took a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and held it at arm's length to read it. “The note you gave me, Mr. Dolan. Let me see. I have four rooms that can be put in order. I should suggest the following people in that case. Mrs. Temble, Dr. Temble, Mr. Gopala and Mr. Atkinson. You, Mr. Dolan, along with the remaining passenger, Mr. Branch, can remain with the crew can you not?”