CHAPTER XXVIII.
A SINGLE CHANCE.
The sea grew rougher as the wind freshened, just as Jack had feared it would. The little boat fairly flew along now, at times almost burying her lee gunwale. It was at such moments that Jack showed his skill as a sailor. One fraction of a mistake in his handling of the small craft and she would have keeled over a particle of an inch too far and filled up.
But with a closer view of the island a disconcerting fact was discovered. There appeared to be no place to land. The surf could be seen in great white clouds rising from the white beach, on which the big rollers crashed with a noise like thunder.
“How in the world are we going to land there?” Tom asked in dismay, gazing at the surf as it was tossed ten feet into the air. The thunder and roar of it could be plainly heard.
“We’d be smashed up in a second in those rollers,” declared Jack. “We must find some other landing place, that’s all.”
At the risk of swamping the boat, he headed her on a course that would carry them around the lighthouse end of the island. Flying along, half buried in foam, the little craft made good weather of it. But they now had a beam sea, and she was more difficult to manage.
Suddenly, from a small tin-roofed house that nestled under the tall lighthouse, a man came running at top speed. He had seen the boat and now shouted something, pointing to the other side of the island. Jack rightly guessed that he meant that there was a harbor on that side.
Hurling spray high over her, the little boat dashed around the end of the islet. On the other side the sea was just as high, but a sort of reef ran out at one point, behind which natural breakwater lay the harbor of which the lighthouse keeper had tried to tell them.
The waves broke on the reef with terrific violence, and at first Jack looked in vain for an opening. At last, however, he saw one. But it looked terribly narrow. To get through it he would have to run his boat almost in the shadow of the big breakers, any one of which would have smashed boys and boat like eggshells. Yet he knew that he must make that opening to reach the smooth water beyond.
Luffing up, he went about on another tack. In his eagerness he stood half upright in the stern, crouching forward above his steering oar, guiding the plunging boat as a skilled horseman controls a restive animal. Tom, who was huddled in the bottom of the boat so as to give her more stability, saw the opening. He glanced back at Jack with a look that said:
“Dare we chance it?”
Jack’s lips were set in a grim line. His muscles stood out like whipcords on his arms. The wind blew back his curls above his high forehead. He was a picture of strong, confident, American youth. But in reality there was in his heart anything but confidence that he could make that opening. It could not have been more than twelve feet or so across, and on either side the cruel fangs of the reef showed when the rollers broke over them.
On flew the boat like a runaway horse with the bit in its teeth. But Jack had her under perfect control. Twice he tacked; once, in executing the maneuver, he almost swamped his small craft. But she recovered and once more headed up for that pitifully small opening between the teeth of the reef.
This time Jack did not tack. Gripping his steering oar with one hand, and the sheet rope of the sail with the other, he made straight for the opening. Grimly he told himself that he must force the boat through. It was that or the alternative of being pounded to death on the reef.
And now the opening was quite close. With fascinated eyes and beating heart Tom gazed at it and then stole a backward look at Jack. The figure he saw gave him confidence that, come what might, Jack would not lose his nerve in a situation where the slightest hesitancy might mean death for both of them.
Almost at the same instant the reef was on them. Tom almost uttered a cry as he saw the boat headed for what appeared to mean annihilation. But with a quick, skillful twist of his oar, Jack headed her off, and like an arrow she shot for the opening.
As she flew through it, Tom could have reached out and touched the reef with his left hand, by so close a margin of safety did they gain entrance. But the daring trip was made in surety, and the next instant the reefs were thundering behind them and they were skimming over calm water inside the natural breakwater, formed by the outer rim of rocks.
“I never thought you could do it, Jack,” exclaimed Tom, fixing admiring eyes on his chum. “It was the cleverest bit of boat handling I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, it wasn’t so very hard,” rejoined Jack modestly; “it was getting on a tack that would bring me flying through, that was the hard part.”
“I was scared stiff, I can tell you. I thought sure we’d be battered to a pulp on those rocks.”
“All the more credit to you for not making a holler. Luckily I had too much to do to think of getting scared. But it’s all over now, and I’m not a bit sorry, I can tell you. All the skin is off my hands. But—— Hullo! there comes the lightkeeper down to meet us.”
The same man whom they had seen run out on the beach was now coming down to a sort of rough wharf which stretched out into the lagoon. He was a tall chap, thin and lanky, with an unhealthy-looking complexion. As they drew closer they saw that his face was streaked with shadows and drawn in tense lines. His eyes were sunken and blurred. Apparently he was not far off from a breakdown.
“Oh, but I’m glad you’ve come!” he exclaimed in a voice that was half hysterical. “My partner has been gone for more than two days! I guess that fog delayed him getting back, and the light’s gone bad—she’s gone bad. Last night she wouldn’t shine, and there are big reefs that stretch out for miles that her light warns of.”
The boys tied the boat and climbed up a flight of rough steps to reach the surface of the wharf. The man greeted them with open hands.
“I should have gone crazy if you had not come!” he exclaimed. “I should have gone crazy!”
“What’s the matter with the light?” asked Jack.
“I don’t know. The boss is the mechanic. He could have fixed it, but he went away on the supply ship. He should have been back last night, but he didn’t come. Oh, I have had a terrible night!”
“Surely something can be done,” said Tom, really distressed by the man’s excitement.
“I don’t know. I can’t tell what is the matter,” was the rejoinder.
“Well, I have some little mechanical skill,” replied Jack. “Suppose we go up to your house and have some breakfast, of which you seem to be in need and we certainly are, and then I and my cousin, Tom Jesson here, will go to work on your light.”