Dring grinned. ‘Well, it doesn’t frighten me. I don’t mind taking your share.’
Keeton finally agreed to let Dring have a quarter of the gold. He felt he was being generous.
The sharks appeared on the second day. There were two of them and they came gliding through the blue-green water with a sinuous, purposeful motion. The smaller fishes fled before them, but they did not attack the men.
Back on the deck of the yawl Dring said: ‘Sharks only go for you if there’s blood. They smell it. A wounded man doesn’t stand a chance. It’s lucky those cuts on your chest have healed.’
‘I hate the brutes‚’ Keeton said.
But he saw no more of the sharks, and one after another the cases of gold were manhandled out of the strong-room and hauled to the surface. The yawl sank lower in the water as the gold weighed it down.
By evening a wind had begun to blow and it freshened rapidly. Soon the yawl was tugging at the cable and beginning to drag the anchor.
‘We shall have to shift‚’ Keeton said. ‘I’ve seen what happens when the sea piles up on that reef. If we don’t get clear before nightfall we’re likely to be in trouble.’
Dring agreed. Valerie listened to the men discussing the situation, but she said nothing. They could hear waves slapping against the bows, and drifts of spray were coming over the yawl. Astern the long curving line of the reef showed white as a ridge of snow.
‘Right then‚’ Keeton said. ‘Let’s be getting out of it.’
He started the engine while Dring went for’ard to haul up the anchor. The yawl moved away from the reef, heading for the safety of deep water.
‘Now how long is this going to last?’ Dring said. ‘We can’t operate in this weather.’
Keeton made no answer. He was reflecting bitterly that every delay gave Rains just that much more time to arrive on the scene. And Rains was one man he did not wish to see. For this reason he was reluctant to go far away from the Valparaiso, and as soon as he felt it safe to do so he stopped the engine. Hove to, with a riding sail and sea anchor, the yawl was snug and dry with its head to the wind.
Keeton shared the watches with Dring. The girl offered to take a turn also, but Keeton refused.
‘Four and four is no hardship. You get your sleep. Ben and I can manage.’
But he could not persuade her to go to the other cabin. She insisted on staying where she could see what was going on.
Keeton took the first watch himself and called Dring at midnight. The girl was still awake and had made cocoa and corned beef sandwiches. Dring sat up and drank cocoa, his eyes bleary with sleep.
‘Everything OK, Skipper?’
‘Fine and dandy.’
Dring put his head on one side, listening. ‘That wind seems stronger.’
‘A little‚’ Keeton admitted. ‘It’s veered too, and it’s pretty gusty. You’d better take a look at the sea anchor warp now and then; it may chafe.’
‘Right‚’ Dring said. He put down the empty mug, slipped an oilskin coat over his clothes and went out of the cabin.
Keeton lit a cigarette and stretched himself out on the settee. The oil lamp, swinging in its gimbals, shed a soft, yellow light and threw a shadow on the girl’s face as she peered at him across the table.
‘Don’t you want to sleep?’ he asked.
‘No. I’m not tired.’
‘You’re lucky. I could sleep on a steel wire.’
Yet, when he had finished the cigarette and closed his eyes, he did not fall asleep at once. He listened to the rising and falling note of the wind, and he could feel the yawl moving erratically. He thought what a small, fragile craft this was to contain so much wealth, and he thought of the girl with the shadow on her face, this girl who did not wish for any share of the gold. And thinking of her, he fell asleep and dreamed he was back on board the Valparaiso with the Japanese submarine shelling.
He awoke to find a hand tugging at his shoulder. Dring’s voice was shouting in his ear, and Dring sounded alarmed.
‘Wake up, Skipper. We’re in trouble. You’d better come quickly.’
Keeton did not wait to ask what trouble. He saw that Valerie was still awake. How long had he slept while she sat there? An hour? Two hours? It made no difference. He went out into the cockpit wearing only his shirt and trousers, and the rain met him and drenched him to the skin in a moment. But it was not the rain that threatened the safety of the yawl. The danger glimmered through the darkness; it seemed to be all around them; wherever he looked there was nothing but the white, churnedup water, the foam blowing over the coral.
‘The warp parted‚’ Dring yelled. ‘We’re driving on to the reef.’
The yawl was out of control. The wind struck her on the beam and she heeled over, shipping water; the riding sail rattled like a drum.
‘I’ll start the engine‚’ Keeton shouted.
It was the only chance they had of getting out of danger; but even this aid might come too late; at any moment the keel might grind on the coral and the bottom might be ripped out of the yawl. Crushed against the reef, she would be battered to pieces by the sea.
The engine coughed, spluttered and relapsed into silence. Keeton tried again and it came to sudden life. Dring had already unlashed the tiller; Keeton pushed him aside and took charge of it himself. The propeller was churning, but now the white patches of foam were nearer, all around. It seemed as though the yawl had drifted into a maze out of which it was impossible to find a way.
He heard Dring’s voice above the shrieking of the wind.
‘That way, Skipper.’ Dring was pointing, and where he pointed there seemed to be a patch of open water with no white foam warning of coral just below the surface. Keeton tried to bring the yawl into that open water, but almost immediately he felt the keel grinding. The yawl stopped moving forward and the propeller raced ineffectively. A burst of spray came over the cabin top and Keeton saw the girl appear at the head of the companionway.
He yelled at her savagely: ‘Get back. You can’t help here.’ But she stayed where she was.
He reversed the engine and tried to drag the yawl off with the propeller. The only effect was vibration, like a shudder of fear, passing through the timbers.
‘She’s aground sure enough‚’ Dring shouted.
Keeton snarled back at him: ‘I know. Tell me something useful.’
Dring was silent. The girl stood motionless, drenched by spray, staring at Keeton, waiting for him to get them out of this danger, relying on his strength, his experience.
Again Keeton raced the engine and again the yawl shuddered but did not move. And then a wave did what he had been unable to do; it lifted the yawl off the coral, the propeller began to drag and they slid back into deeper water.
Keeton let the yawl go astern for a short distance and then went ahead at slow speed, keeping clear of the place where they had grounded.
He heard Dring’s voice in his ear: ‘Foam on the starboard bow, Skipper.’
He shifted the helm and brought the yawl’s head a shade more to port, waiting for the shock of grounding.
A little later Dring shouted: ‘On the port now. There!’
Keeton put the helm over slightly and the yawl’s bows swung in answer. On the port side a churned-up cauldron of foam appeared like a ghostly face in the night; a wave hit the yawl; a spout of water gushed up and fell with a crash on the cabin top. The yawl seemed to hesitate for a second, like a horse refusing to jump, and Keeton felt the rasp of coral under the keel.
And then they were through. The yawl rose on the back of a wave and slid down the other side, and there was nothing but deep water ahead. The reef was behind them.
Keeton set Dring to work on the pump, and Valerie came and stood beside him at the helm.