The Beach of Dreams | Page 4

sang, standing out in great hoods and
folds, hard as steel; now it would yield, owing to a slackening of the
wind, and then, like a brute that had only been waiting to take them by
surprise, it would burst out again, releasing itself, whilst the yard
buckled and sprang, almost casting them from it.
Then began a battle fought without a sound or cry except the bubbling
and snoring of the great sail struggling for its wicked liberty, it shrank
and they flung themselves on it, it bellied and flung them back, clinging
to the lift they saved themselves, attacking it again with the dumb fury
of dogs or wolves on a fighting prey. Twenty times it tried to destroy
them and twenty times they all but had it under.
The fight died out of the monster for a moment and Raft had nearly an
armful of it in when it stiffened, fighting free of him, owing to Ponting
and the other fellow not having made good. They clung for a moment
without moving, resting, and Raft glancing down saw far away below
the narrow deck driving wedge-like through the foam-capped seas.
Then the struggle began again. The sail, like its would-be captors,
seemed also to have taken breath, it held firm, relaxed, banged out
again in thunder, developed new hoods and folds as a struggling

monster might develop new heads and kinks, and then, all of a sudden
when it seemed that no effort was of avail the end came.
The wind paused for a moment, as if gathering up all its strength
against the dogged persistency which is man, and in that moment the
three on the yard had the sail under their chests beating and crushing
the life out of it. Then the gaskets were passed round it and they clung
for a moment to rest and breathe.
It was nothing, or they thought nothing of it, this battle for life with a
monster, just the stowing of a top-gallant sail in dirty weather, and most
likely when they got down the Bo'sw'n would call them farmers for
being such a time over it. Meanwhile they clung idly for a moment,
partly to rest and partly to look at something worth seeing.
The squall was blowing out, there was nothing behind it and away on
the port quarter the almost setting sun had broken through the smother
and was lighting the sea.
There, set in a thousand square acres of snowcapped tourmaline, white
as a gull and beautiful as grace itself, was running a vessel under bear
poles. The two yellow funnels, the cut of the hull, told Ponting what
she was. He had seen her twice before and no sailor who had once set
eyes on her could forget her.
"See that blighter," he yelled across to Raft. "Know her?"
"Should think I did, she's the Gaston de Paree--a yacht--seen her in
T'lon."
Then they came down, crawling like weary men, and on deck no one
abused them for their slackness or the time they'd been over their job.
The Albatross was running easy and the Bo'sw'n with others was taken
up with a momentary curiosity over the great white yacht.
No one knew her but Ponting, who had for several years acted as deck
hand on some of the Mediterranean boats.

"I know her," said he ranging up beside the others. "She's the Gaston de
Paree, a yot--seen her in T'lon harbour and seen her again at Suez, she's
a thousand tonner, y'can't mistake them funnels nor the width of them,
she's a twenty knotter and the chap that owns her is a king or somethin';
last time I saw her she was off to the China seas, they say she's all
cluttered up with dredges and dipsy gear, and she mostly spends her
time takin' soundin's and scrabblin' up shell fish and such--that's his
way of amusin' himself."
"Then he must be crazy," said the Bo'sw'n, "but b'God he's got a beauty
under him--what's he doin' down here away?"
"Ax me another," said Ponting. Raft stood with the others, watching the
Gaston de Paris from whose funnels now the smoke was coming
festooned on the wind, then he went below to shed his oilskins and
smoke.
She had ceased to interest him.
CHAPTER III
THE GASTON DE PARIS
Old Ponting was right in all his particulars, except one. The owner of
the Gaston de Paris was not a king, only a prince.
Prince Selm, a gentleman like his Highness of Monaco with a passion
for the deep sea and its exploration. The Holy Roman Empire had
given his great grandfather the title of prince, and estates in Thuringia
gave him money enough to do what he pleased, an unfortunate
marriage gave him a distaste for