That is, he and the schooner were safe. As to the welfare of his three
companions he could not say. Nor did he dare leave the wheel in order to
find out, for it took every second of his undivided attention to keep
the vessel to her course. The least fraction of carelessness and the
heave of the sea under the quarter was liable to thrust her into the
trough. So, a boy of one hundred and forty pounds, he clung to his
herculean task of guiding the two hundred straining tons of fabric amid
the chaos of the great storm forces.

Half an hour later, groaning and sobbing, the captain crawled to Chris's
feet. All was lost, he whimpered. He was smitten unto death. The galley
had gone by the board, the mainsail and running-gear, the cook,
everything!

"Where's the sailing-master?" Chris demanded when he had caught his
breath after steadying a wild lurch of the schooner. It was no child's
play to steer a vessel under single-reefed jib before a typhoon.

"Clean up for'ard," the old man replied. "Jammed under the
fo'c'sle-head, but still breathing. Both his arms are broken, he says,
and he doesn't know how many ribs. He's hurt bad."

"Well, he'll drown there the way she's shipping water through the
hawse-pipes. Go for'ard!" Chris commanded, taking charge of things as a
matter of course. "Tell him not to worry; that I'm at the wheel. Help
him as much as you can, and make him help"--he stopped and ran the
spokes to starboard as a tremendous billow rose under the stern and
yawed the schooner to port--"and make him help himself for the rest.
Unship the fo'castle hatch and get him down into a bunk. Then ship the
hatch again."