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Down in the crew quarters, Ryan raked a hand through his hair and concentrated on the cards before him as the ship rocked back and forth. Lady luck had abandoned him once again. The cards were not in his favor that evening but surprisingly he wasn’t concerned. His heart was no longer in the game. Perhaps it was on account he was a bit more cautious when placing wagers. Or that the stakes involved were far less meaningful. Either way, he had no qualms tossing the cards aside when a crew hand came running down the hatch steps to holler for all hands on deck.
He leaped to his feet, snatched up his oilskin from a nearby hook, and then climbed out of the crew quarters only to be greeted by a harsh gale above deck. Rain and wind pelted him as he scrambled to join his fellow sailors aloft in the sails. The ship was easily reaching speeds of nine knots if not more regardless of the developing storm. He had never been on a faster ship. It effortlessly handled the rolling waves beneath her with ease. High winds made for choppy water but the clipper maintained a steady speed, hitting each wave with a resilient force. The skies opened up and showered the wooden deck causing the plank floor to become saturated and making traction dicey.
Ryan gripped the port rail and turned his gaze toward the vast gulf before him with its dark but infinite horizon. Somewhere out there the Atlantic Ocean awaited and Ryan’s lifelong dream was about to be realized. Already he tasted the salty sea on his lips for the first time as the vessel crashed into yet another wave sending a surge of seawater onto the deck. He had waited for this moment for as long as he could remember, however he would have to postpone his triumph, as the looming storm was more pressing and required his entire focus.
Not to mention, for some inexplicit reason, his level of impending excitement was not nearly as high as he would have anticipated. He blamed it on his troubled thoughts consumed with Evelina then he cared to admit. Even to himself.
The ship lurched causing Ryan to lose his train of thought and directed his attention back to the task at hand. The sea came ashore once again as the vessel broke yet another surge. When they set sail earlier that morning the gulf had been calm but the closer they approached the sea the rougher the waters. He glanced up at the bridge and spotted the captain at the helm demonstrating his skilled seamanship as the ship remained steadfast in the unrelenting storm. It was the crew’s job to reef the sails to help reduce speed as the storm showed no signs of easing up.
Ryan climbed the rigging of the mizzenmast to the sails above. The ropes were wet and slippery but years of practice developed a sure footing. He reached over, grasped the line of the sail, and on the call, began furling inward. It was heavy with rain making the job thus more difficult and admittedly less pleasant. He breathed hard as he worked in unison with the crew line. He was drenched from top to bottom. The oilskin was useless against the storm and only felt twice as heavy and cumbersome.
The ship lurched suddenly, nearly knocking Ryan off the yard he was working on. He snatched the closest rope at the very last second preventing him from falling to his death in the churning waters below. Swiftly, he wound his arm around the line for security and found his footing on the slick riggings once again.
“You okay there, Colby?” The first mate shouted over the storm to him.
He gave a thumbs up before grasping the sodden cloth yet again. He glanced out to the angry sea behind him just as another monster wave slammed against the stern causing the ship to give another lurch. Thankfully, he had secured himself properly that time around and anticipated the hit. His gaze drifted inland to the distant horizon from where they had just departed. Though the sky was overcast, it was not as dark and ominous as the skyline that awaited them in the opposite direction. Ryan squinted his eyes against the high winds to look down at the angry sea thrashing beneath him. He had never seen a more ferocious storm.
It took some doing but the crew managed to secure the sails while leaving the jib sail upright to keep the ship from sailing off course.
Ryan scrambled back down the rigging then proceeded to secure as much loose gear as he could. He had just made his way to the starboard side when he felt the bow of the clipper lift clear out of the water. The ground under him suddenly sloped sending him sailing down the deck toward the stern. Before he reached the end, however, the clipper slammed back onto the ocean’s surface after cresting what Ryan could only assume was a rogue wave.
When the ship hit the water, it propelled his body and lunged him airborne. As nimble as a forest animal, he snagged hold of a rail at the last second and held on as the storm battered around him.
“Colby!” Someone shouted for him and he glanced back and saw two fellow crew members show up out of nowhere and help him back on deck.
“What in damnation happened?”
“We hit a rogue.” The crewmember confirmed his suspicion. “It snapped the hold below and caused a leak. We need as many deck hands below to bail incoming water.”
Ryan ran after the two fellow crewmembers to see
what needed doing. As soon as he stepped through the hatch to the decks below, he discovered a foot of water covering the bottom. And it was only rising. He cursed silently to himself. As a sailor, he knew the risks involved every time he went out on the water. Still, he couldn’t prevent alarms going off in his head. He pushed aside his fear and immediately grabbed a bucket and began bailing water. In the core of the ships hold were the heavy railroad ties, now saturated from the incoming ocean.
Ryan hadn’t been at the task long, when a loud groaning noise erupted from beneath the railroad ties. It all happened so fast, there wasn’t an instant for him to get his bearings or to realize what was happening. The next sound he heard was far more menacing and had him nearly stopping dead in his tracks. The wooden planks of the ship’s bottom began cracking.
“She’s going to snap!” someone hollered.
“Abandon ship!” the first mate shouted. “She’s going to sink!”
The crew scrambled up the ladders to the storm pelted upper deck and headed straight for the lifeboat. Voices raised in alarm were shouting all around him but he tried to remain calm knowing he had to keep his wits about him. He released the pulley that secured the lifeboat and lowered it to the sea. However high winds wrestled with the vessel and whipped it around like a toy boat. The ocean rocked the now noticeably tilted ship causing him to struggle with his footing. He glanced frantically out at the loose dingy and watched in horror as one of the lines on the pulley snapped cutting the lifeboat free. Minus any crewmembers.
Ryan' felt his heart plummet. Realizing he was about to face death, the only thought that ran through his mind was that he would never see Evelina again.
Chapter 14
Back in Detroit, Clive was smoothing out the edge of a stave with a block plane while working in the shipyard when some commotion coming from the courtyard interrupted his task. He glanced up and spotted a dockhand pinning a sheet of parchment to a column near the dry docks. A small crowd of inquisitive onlookers had gathered around him. Curious himself, Clive laid down his tool and headed over to the small group to find out what was going on. As he did, he realized the parchment the man was posting was that of a ship’s manifest list.
“What’s this?”
“We got a telegraph that the Spartan sunk in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.” He told him. “A search party returned no sign of the crew. They’re all presumed lost at sea.”
“The Spartan? Don’t think I recognize the name,” Clive said trying to recall any ship by that name.
“A clipper from Duluth. She docked here about a week ago looking for extra crew hands while on route to Boston. Apparently, they had also stopped at several other ports along Lake Huron.”
Clive frowned, as something sounded very familiar about that.
“Word has it they had taken on a heavy load of wet railroad ties up in the Soo which might have caused the clipper to sink.”
