“O Lord! this smack’s mine, this little smack labouring in the North Sea is mine.  Through my poachin’ and your lovin’ kindness it’s mine; and, O Lord, see that it don’t cost me dear!” And the crew solemnly and fervently said “Amen!”

But the smack was to cost him dear.  For in the morning Duncan woke to find himself alone in the cabin.  He thrust his head up the companion, and saw Weeks with a very grey face standing by the lashed wheel.

“Halloa!” said Duncan.  “Where’s the binnacle?”

“Overboard,” said Weeks.

Duncan looked round the deck.

“Where’s Willie and the crew?”

“Overboard,” said Weeks.  “All except Rail!  He’s below deck forward and clean daft.  Listen and you’ll hear ’im.  He’s singing hymns for those in peril on the sea.”

Duncan stared in disbelief.  The skipper’s face drove the disbelief out of him.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” he asked.

“What’s the use?  You want all the sleep you can get, because you an’ me have got to sail my smack into Yarmouth.  But I was minded to call you, lad,” he said, with a sort of cry leaping from his throat.  “The wave struck us at about twelve, and it’s been mighty lonesome on deck since with Willie callin’ out of the sea.  All night he’s been callin’ out of the welter of the sea.  Funny that I haven’t heard Upton or Deakin, but on’y Willie!  All night until daybreak he called, first on one side of the smack and then on t’other, I don’t think I’ll tell his mother that.  An’ I don’t see how I’m to put you on shore in Denmark, after all.”

What had happened Duncan put together from the curt utterances of Captain Weeks and the crazy lamentations of Rail.  Weeks had roused all hands except Duncan to take the last reef in.  They were forward by the mainmast at the time the wave struck them.  Weeks himself was on the boom, threading the reefing-rope through the eye of the sail.  He shouted “Water!” and the water came on board, carrying the three men aft.  Upton was washed over the taffrail.  Weeks threw one end of the rope down, and Rail and Willie caught it and were swept overboard, dragging Weeks from the boom on to the deck and jamming him against the bulwarks.

The captain held on to the rope, setting his feet against the side.  The smack lifted and dropped and tossed, and each movement wrenched his arms.  He could not reach a cleat.  Had he moved he would have been jerked overboard.

“I can’t hold you both!” he cried, and then, setting his teeth and hardening his heart, he addressed his words to his son:  “Willie!  I can’t hold you both!” and immediately the weight upon the rope was less.  With each drop of the stern the rope slackened, and Weeks gathered the slack in.  He could now afford to move.  He made the rope fast and hauled the one survivor on deck.  He looked at him for a moment.  “Thank God, it’s not my son!” he had the courage to say.

“And my heart’s broke!” had gasped Rail.  “Fair broke.”  And he had gone forward and sung hymns.