Page:The Wireless Operator with the U.S. Coast Guard.djvu/245

 something unusual was happening. Again he sensed the fact that the ship was turning, but this time he knew that it was different. Now the motion of the cutter was terrifying. At times she was almost on her beams’ ends. Henry peered out through the windows. He noticed that life-lines had been run along the deck, to grip when passing. He had not realized how truly awful the sea had become. When he glanced over the side of the ship, his heart fairly stood still. They were almost in the breakers. Evidently the captain had been wrong in his reckoning. The cutter had almost piled up on the shoals. She was coming about, very, very slowly. Now Henry understood why she rolled so terribly. He clung to his desk and watched the sea and the boiling breakers in silence, fascinated, almost paralyzed with horror. Was the Iroquois going to be where the Capitol City had so recently been?

At last the ship was headed about, bow to the sea, but the waves had drifted her so close to the surf that every second Henry expected to feel. the ship jar and pound on the sands. In the pilot house the captain stood with nerve of iron, though his cheeks had gone white, directing every movement of the Iroquois. The instant she was nose to the sea, he signaled for full speed ahead. The cutter drove forward, and a huge wave,