They were about half a mile out from the nearest line of reefs, floating idly on the long swells, with the sails flapping and the boom swinging inboard in annoying fashion. Henry Burns groaned. “Oh my!” he exclaimed. “What a beastly stroke of luck. I’m tired enough to turn in now. Don’t you suppose we’ll get a little evening breeze?” “We may,” replied Harvey, “but there’s something queer in the way the wind dropped all of a sudden. I’m afraid we’ve seen the last of the breeze for to-day.” But Jack Harvey’s prophecy was refuted with startling suddenness. “Jack,” said Bob, almost the next moment, “there’s something queer about the water just along the line of the reefs and the shore back of them.” He pointed, as he spoke, to a strange, white light that lay in a long, thin line just off the land, a half-mile ahead. It was almost ghostly, with a brilliant, unnatural whiteness. And, even as they gazed, its area rapidly extended and broadened. Harvey shot a quick glance ahead. Then he sprang from the wheel and seized the throat-halyard. “Get the peak—quick!” he cried to Bob. “Head her square as you can for the light, Henry. Tom, cast off the jib-halyards and grab the downhaul. It’s a white squall, I think.” Henry Burns seized the wheel, while the two boys at the halyards let the mainsail go on the run. There was no steerageway on the _Viking_, as they had been drifting; but Henry Burns managed, by throwing the wheel over quickly and reversing it moderately, to swing the boat’s head a little. They were not a moment too soon. Out of a clear, cloudless sky, there came suddenly rushing upon them a wind with such fury that, sweeping across the bow, it laid the yacht over; while there flew aboard, from the smother about the bow, a cloud of fine spray that nearly blinded them. The _Viking_, its head thrown off by the squall, that struck the outer jib, which they had not been able to lower, careened alarmingly. Then Henry Burns brought her fairly before it, just as a sea began to roll aboard. The cockpit was ankle-deep with water; but they were scudding now safely out to sea, drenched to the skin, as the squall, whipping off the tops of the long rollers, filled all the air with a flying storm of spray. The blast had fallen upon them so unexpectedly, and with such incredible quickness, that they scarce knew what had happened before they were running before it toward the open sea. They got the hatches closed now, after Tom had dashed below and brought up the oilskins. True, they were soaked through and through, but the wind had a sharp, cold sting to it, and the oilskins would protect them from that. They got the outer jib down, too. Then, when they saw there was no immediate danger, as the _Viking_ was acting well, they collected their wits and discussed, hurriedly, what they should do. “My! but that was a close call,” said Bob. “How did you know what was coming, Jack?”