After midnight, as the storm began to abate, Eliot performed the miracle of putting a kettle on for tea, and also managed to forage some salt cod and crackers from a storage locker. The boat climbed a sea, fell with a bang that shook her, stem to stern, her bell clanging outside like a shrill wind chime. Drew’s plate skidded across the floor and struck a bulkhead, but remained right side up.

“Look at that!” said Eliot. “Aunt Phrony’s looking out for you.”

“Sure glad we made that detour to see her, she’s doing such a fine job with this storm,” Drew said, rising to retrieve his dinner. Another sea spared him the effort of volitional movement by tumbling him across the cabin. Sitting next to his plate, he decided it would be easier to finish eating right where he was. “Yeah, Aunt Phrony, she’s doing all right by us, yes sirree.”

“Maybe we brought her the wrong brand of chaw,” Eliot suggested. “Could be she likes Redman instead of Copenhagen.”

“Could be. So maybe now she’ll drown us”—Drew, attempting to put his mouth and a handful of cod in the same place at the same time—“and then we can all have our own little gravestones right there with her kin.”

“Shut up, Drew!”

“Easy, Nat,” said Eliot, with a cautionary sidelong glance. Here, in such cramped quarters, with nothing to do but wait, and all of them exhausted and scared, it would be easy to get on one another’s nerves.

At four in the morning, the worst was over, the storm’s fury not appeased but spent. Will went above to take a look. A minute later, he thumped on the deck three times—their signal for all hands—and cried out, “Breakers to leeward!” The wind, down to fifteen knots, had veered due east, and the schooner was riding eight-foot seas toward a lee shore as yet invisible, for ragged clouds occulted the lowering moon. All ears were cocked for the sound of surf, but none was heard. Will assured them he had not been suffering from another sleepwalker’s nightmare, for the simple reason that he, like they, had not slept a wink. Nathaniel broke out the lead and tossed it as far as he could to compensate for their drift. Fifteen fathoms. Another toss. Fifteen again. And then twelve, and on the fourth heave, ten. Now, all heard the breakers, a steady rush, as of a high wind through pine trees. The thing to do was to clap on the jib, raise the main, and luff up for sea room; but they were far too worn out, and dropped the hook instead, adding the kedge to be on the safe side.

“HALLO! Y’all livin’, or y’all dead?”