I shook my head to clear it of the dustwebs left by dreams. Frightened by the nightmare memory of ragged outcrops, I lit the spotlamp and aimed it twenty yards off the bow. Black waves splashed and bit ferociously at the boat from all sides. At times I saw no water; at others, nothing but, as I was juggled on the fingertips of an irate Neptune. The ship was tossed about as light as dandelion seeds in a summer wind.

Then somewhere in the flash of water, I thought I saw a figure waving.