This self-imposed task had delayed Bates an extra hour, during which he had held the cutter, which was under steam and ready to make the run across the Straits to the American port of entry. But his commanding officer accepted the information without comment. However, when the revenue boat had steamed out of the Arm, headed for her home port, he remained on the bridge, searching with his binoculars, first the Vancouver coast astern, and then, slowly, the great reach of running sea, that stretched away to the distant and tawny pall which hung over the American side and showed the vast sweep of the forest fires. There was a strong wind, drawing in from the Pacific, and the little steamer labored in an ugly trough. When she staggered, quartering, up a mother wave, she plunged down, and half seas over, in the next crest. She made her harbor, decks streaming, port light stove in, at midnight, and, after a brief stop and slight repairs, she was under way again, moving southward into the smoke. Finally, at the end of several hours, she was brought to, and, under slow bells, began to patrol a certain course. The smoke gathered density. It was permeated with a lurid glare, and, driven by cross winds, it moved around a center, enfolding the cutter with the effect of a vast, brassy, electrical cloud. It was also a place of conflicting seas. The long, white, wicked fingers of a tide-rip reached out ceaselessly, and withdrew to the center of the whirlpool. The moon hung like a crimson lantern directly above and cast a red trail through the vortex. Then suddenly, while the little steamer skirted, listing to the maelstrom, a great gust tore the smoke asunder and Foulweather Bluff loomed through the rift. At the same moment a small yacht, under full sail bore down upon the headland. The next instant she veered and coming around in the narrow space between the cutter and the cliff, raced out, all but grazing the side of the steamer, and heeled to the whirlpool. Her great mainsail dipped lower and lower; the white fingers of the tide-rip clutched at it, caught it, held it, dragged it slowly in. The decks were awash. Then the grip of the maelstrom relaxed; the little craft righted, shivering; her canvas filled with a big gust from the Straits and she swung away into the night.