Geoffrey Jenkins - Southtrap

I made my decision. 'Hands aloft!' I shouted. 'Double-reefed topsails! Get the sails on her!'

The fore tops'l broke out first. It only veered her head closer towards danger.

Then the main topsail also billowed like bubble-gum blown from a giant child's lips.

'Put your helm up! Helm hard up!''

The veins started in the steersman's face as he battled with the primitive gear.

The wind bit the sails; the deck canted to their power. Rollers broke over the deadly ice, hard on our beam. It was less than a ship's length away.

Slowly, jibbing like a thrashed horse, Botany Bay clawed her way.

Then she inched clear with a spurt of foam bursting on either side of her blunt bows and drenching the foc's'le.

'Swing that launch inboard!' I shouted. 'Use the crojack yard before it knocks a hole in the hull!'

Lines went down to the boat, which was now alongside after having cast off the tow. It was secured and hoisted aboard. Wegger and Ullmann, streaming sea-water, climbed out of it on to the quarterdeck where I was.

Botany Bay was drawing steadily away from the ice-trap which had so nearly destroyed her. The Quest tumbled, unmanageable, further out to sea.

I strode across to the binnacle housing the compass.

'Steer east by north.' I ordered.

Prince Edward Island!

The main force of the storm hit Botany Bay shortly after two o'clock that afternoon.

From the time the ship had broken free of the iceberg she had been running free under triple-reefed main and fore topsails with a strong quartering sea and gale. There was also a rag of trysail in the mizzen stays to try and help the steering. The wind had steadied into the south-west in a full gale. Handling a square-rigger was as unfamiliar to me as driving a veteran car for the first time. And this was at open throttle.

A tremendous sea was building up and I blessed Botany Bay's square, heavy stern. The waves would race up astern and tower ready to burst and poop the ship. Then I would hang on, waiting for the inevitable explosion which would sweep the ship and everything on deck into oblivion. But it did not come. The heavy stern would lift and in a flash the ship would lurch into the trough. The sails would go slack as the wind was cut off by the depth of the rollers. Then she would rise to the next crest and the sails would crash like gunshots as the wind caught them anew. She would find her keel, tear away again with a shock which seemed to set every scrap of standing rigging thrumming. It was a process which repeated itself time and again. The wheel was kicking like a rodeo jumper; to help Bent I brought along a young man with shoulders like a blacksmith. Kearnay's lifelines were in full use.

At the start, Linn had been on deck with me and I had lent her my binoculars for a last look at the Quest.

'They're all coming out on deck!' she had told me.

'Heaven help them, Linn.'

'That applies to us too, John,' she replied gravely.

But we also had that space-probe-sized instrument now transmitting from under her weatherproof. And from the buoy aboard the Quest.

The thought of the transmitter and what could happen if Wegger by some mischance spotted it fuelled my tension. I had decided that the ship could spare me for a few minutes while I settled Linn below, out of view of the hijackers. I gave orders, gathered up Linn's bag, and we hurried below.

When we were out of sight of the deck Linn stopped. Her lips came hard against mine, against my cheeks, my eyes.

'Darling! Darling! Darling!'

I drew her to me. I detected the outline of the aluminium box inside her clothes.

She eyed me between tears and laughter. 'I'm pregnant with secrets, my love!'

'That transmitter frightens me, my love,' I said in a low voice. 'We've got to hide it somewhere else, quick. I die every time Wegger looks at you.'

We were in the central gangway dividing the various exhibits in their cubicles and to our right was a horrifying real 'coffin bath' exhibit which showed convicts being thrown into salt water after being flogged until they fell unconscious. Tough-faced warders were apparently trying to revive some unfortunate.

'Nothing for us there,' I said. 'We mustn't be seen searching around, Linn.'

'We can pretend we're looking for a sleeping place forme, John.'

The next exhibit depicted a man being flogged at the dreaded triangle or flogging-post; nearby a blacksmith was riveting a huge iron ball round a new convict while a long branding-iron was thrust into the palm of his hand to mark him for life with an arrow.

'I couldn't stay there, even though I know it's not real,' muttered Linn.

'No place to hide,' I said, going on to the following exhibit. A man was dismounting from his horse amid a clutter of handcuffs, leg-irons, necklets, pistols and manacles, and a notice above read: 'Captain Starlight, legendary bush-ranger.'

'John — look, the horse has a real saddle. The saddlebags! Perfect for the transmitter!'

Linn reached for the zip in her parka. 'Wait.' I gave a searching look in every direction.

'Okay. That transmitter's dynamite.'

She pulled it out. It looked ludicrously small and inadequate.

'It's working?' I asked unnecessarily. 'Sure?'

'Smit set it operating and it stays so, he said, even if it falls into the sea. It's waterproof, among other marvels.'

We unbuckled the saddle-bags of Captain Starlight's horse and hid the transmitter inside.

'I feel as if the world is off my neck, Linn.'

The creaks and groans of the ship's timbers in the seaway were like a muted chorus of wronged convicts.

'I've got to get back on deck — use one of these cubicles for a cabin. Maybe there's a bed somewhere as part of an exhibit. Try and make yourself comfortable.'

'You've no place either, John.'

Tut me next door to you — horrors don't mean a thing if you're close.'

She smiled and said gently, There's only one penguin-rug — we'll have to share, my darling.' Then she kissed me. 'Look after yourself, up there.'

'Don't come on deck unless you have to — the seas aren't funny.'

They weren't then, when I kissed her goodbye. That had been a couple of hours ago. They were even less so now.

I was hanging on to the weather rigging, a captain's station. The feel of this ship was coming through the soles of my feet, just as a racing-driver steers by the feel of the seat of his pants. Botany Bay was starting to lie over more and more as the wind worked up, and even her return roll was stiffening against the thrust of her storm canvas.

I felt her go over — and watched fascinated and afraid while she lay over until her lee gunnel was almost level with the water as if she meant never to come up again. Then the dense streaks of foam which were the crests of the rollers toppled, tumbled over, exploded, and vomited across the main deck and a welter of water poured into the waist. It seemed that the old-design hull could never have enough life in it to throw off the tons of water. Botany Bay hung like that, paused, and then began the reverse roll to right herself, taking her time, as if sea and waves didn't matter. Back and back she went, against the drag of the tops'ls and power of the gale, until her main yardarm dipped into the wild seas on the opposite side.

Each time Botany Bay did it my heart came into my mouth; yet right herself she did until I was forced to accept that this was her way of sailing. To anyone accustomed to a modern yacht's manners, Botany Bay was terrifying.

Now, however, she was close to the limit. I would have to reduce sail soon, free her of some of the leverage aloft.

I put the modern battery-operated megaphone to my mouth.

'All hands! All hands! Aloft and stow! Four reefs in the tops'ls!'