“They aren’t sure what it is, Mitch. Somebody sick? Or overboard?”

Mitch regarded the mike. He choked and could hardly speak. “Lindy,” he croaked finally. “Overboard.”

“When?”

He could not bring himself to tell Graham that it had been almost thirty hours. “Long time,” he managed. “If you raise Papeete, tell them hurry, OK?”

A young American voice cut in, faint but perfectly readable. "Linda Lee, this is the yacht Windrift, clearing Papeete pass. The word is out on the quay. Westerly and Kialoa are following. Also Zen, no radio, Xanadu, likewise. Estimate ten hours to your area.”

“Thanks, Windrift,” Mitch muttered.

A heavily accented German voice spoke up: “Here is Kormorant, coming also, Mitch. For information, two fat French aeroplanes have just took off from Faaa. So, here is Klaus, on Kormorant, over and out.”

That call he could not even answer. Tears in his eyes, he simply climbed the companionway, mounted to the spreader, and scanned the horizon as the fat black squalls bore down.

When the eye of Arlene arrived, the wind slackened. The seas were monstrous, but they could see, for an instant, a patch of mottled blue in the tortured sky. Lindy became elated, thinking that the worst was over, and he did not tell her what was coming. He would not let her go below to try to get crackers and cheese, for he was afraid of a knockdown, and that she would be killed by flying lead from the bilge if she went.

So he kept her topside and tried to protect Linda Lee as best he could at the tiller. He waited for the westerly shift of wind when the trailing wall of the eye would hit.

He was unready for its brutality. It simply turned the air to foaming water. He could not see or breathe. He fought it as long as he could, trying to surf again in the chaos, but his back gave out. Lindy was half dead from fatigue, and was more hindrance than help, although she tried to lend her strength in his fight with the tiller.

Arlene had beaten them completely. There was no further way to battle the seas. He sent Lindy below, picked the longest trough he could find, and slewed broadside. He lashed the tiller to leeward and crawled for the hatch.

Linda Lee lay ahull, untended. A forty-foot rogue pyramided, towered, and crashed to the deck. He dove through the hatch and slammed it closed above him. She took another monstrous wave, heeling to her beam-ends. He was flung across the chart table and jammed against the bulkhead. Very slowly she came erect.