Now by insensible degrees the near shore receded and the far shore drew near. Still slack chain rattled out of the hawse pipe. Hat strode forward. "For the Lord's sake, ain't you going to snub this ship!" she cried in a voice hoarse with fury. Jed Tyler thrust a ghastly dewy face out of the windlass room. "I can't do it, Hat!" he gasped. "You can't! Don't tell me you can't! Everything's been done that's been tried. You drop that hook or I'll know the reason why!" "The friction band's broke square in two." "Oh, damn it all, if I must say so--there!" said Hat bitterly, for she was not captain in name only. "If there's any such thing as break it's break at a time like this. Let go that port anchor." "Both wildcats will turn idle the way things are here." "You do as I say! The weight of the chain may check her in some." Tyler dropped his other hook. "How much chain have we got on that starboard anchor? Do you know?" "About one hundred and seventy-five fathoms." Hat went aft again and gave a calculating glance. When the chain had been paid out to the bitter end the ship would bring up perforce if the anchor had caught on, for the bitter end had a round turn taken about the foot of the foremast, and was shackled to the keelson with a monster shackle. But--what was the width of the harbor at this point? "Give her port helm, you ninny," said Hat, wrapping herself in her arms. She shivered, partly because the night was chill and partly from nervous excitement. There was no time to be lost. "Can't. The rudder's bolted in the amidships position," said Jed in shaking accents. This had been done to make sure that that giant tail-piece should meet the water squarely, as otherwise the thrust of the ship might snap the rudder post like a pipe-stem. "Well, I guess the horse is out of the stable, then, that's what I guess," Hat said hoarsely. "She's launched herself now with a vengeance." They fell silent. With the indifference to danger of a sleepwalker the _Minnie Williams_ marched across the starlit harbor. Presently Hat brought down a heavy hand on her spouse's lean shoulder. "You see what she's going to do, don't you?" she cried. "She's going to mix it with the Higgins place, that's what she's going to do! Give them a blue light. They're awake. I see a light burning in that south window." Tyler fetched a blue light; but his matches were wet with the sweat of his efforts in the windlass room. He could not strike fire. "What are you doing? What are you doing, man?" shrieked Hat. "Come, if you can't strike a light give them a shot out of that shotgun. The whole place is coming down round their ears in a minute." "I give away the last cartridges I had yisterday to a boy that come asking for them." "I suppose you'd give 'em the shirt off your back if they come asking for it," cried Hat. "I never saw such a man. Get up the patent fog horn."