The waves were running higher now, and the boat began to pitch and roll. Ahead I could faintly make out the jagged, angry outlines of the sea. The crew had scattered. Al was down by his precious engines and Charlie had gone with him. Milt and Ed were sitting on the bench behind me. In the gloom I could make out the glow of their cigarettes, reflected in the windowpanes. Bob, beside me, was peering intently through the fogged glass. Crash! Our bow shot up suddenly as if some giant hand down in the depths had punched it. For an instant we hung there, then the sea dropped away and we lunged down into a deep gray gulley and rolled dizzily on our side; a thick, twisting wall of water crashed down on our foredeck with a jarring, smashing impact and dashed up against the front of the pilot house. I braced myself on a cleat, hung to the wheel, and twisted it sharply to get back into the wind. Bob slipped and seized the handrail. Behind me I heard the thud of two soft bodies hitting the floor, and from the galley came the crash and clatter of pans and dishes, mixed with the shrill treble curses of Dad. We were out in the straits. “What’s your course now, Hal?” asked Bob, face glued straight ahead. I switched on the binnacle light and peered into our Standard Navy compass. It was a large thing, too large for our boat; for, like a rat terrier, we pitched and plunged, rocked and rolled, with short, choppy motions, while our instrument was fitted for a larger ship that rolled and swung with a slow wallow. I watched the card recover from a long, deliberate swing and estimated its arc. “About north, a quarter east,” I answered. “But she’s swinging too slow to be accurate.” “Ease her off to starboard a little more. We’re headin’ way below Morey Light now.” The wind, hurling itself through Dixon’s Entrance, fifteen miles below, came sweeping, tearing up the straits. We were right in the teeth of it. The singing in our mast changed to a low, ominous moan, mounted higher, broke into a screech, then still higher, higher, into an insistent, piercing shriek. “Bob!” “Huh?” “Did we tighten up that front stay last time we was in?” The front stay is one of the four wires supporting the mast. It runs from the top of the pole down to the bowsprit, where it is clamped. Often the clamps work loose, allowing the wire to swing slackly, rendering it easier for the pole to break under stress. There was a moment’s silence. “Nope, we didn’t.” “An’ them clamps was loose, too.” “Yep,” came the succinct answer. Bob hadn’t moved an inch from the window in the last quarter of an hour. “If it breaks loose----”