The favorable weather did not last.
Three days later, toward sunset, a great bank of clouds appeared off the starboard bow. They rushed up to meet the ship as if on a headlong collision course, heedless of the wind which seemed going in the very opposite direction. The brilliant sunset of yellow and orange was quickly swallowed by the approaching blackness, and in less than an hour after the storm’s first sighting, the Tiger found itself engulfed in a vortex of wind and sudden driving rain. They would soon be caught in the midst of a dreaded Asian typhoon.
It took mere moments for the crew to come alive in a frenzy as if their lives depended on their every action, which in very truth they did. Some manned the lines to haul in sail, while others scrambled aloft to fasten down the canvas. Johnnie killed the galley fire and bustled from his private domain to give a hand with the foremast clew lines. The winds had already risen to such force that an Ethiopian by the name of Suderia, whom they had picked up in Calcutta to replace Turk, was knocked into the angry sea.
Robbie immediately issued an order to lower a boat. But already, even before the lines could be unhitched, the African was lost to his sight in the gathering darkness as the ship continued to race furiously ahead. Not only would there be no hope of finding him, the lifeboat would not stand a chance in that sea; additional lives would be lost and the rest of the crew and the Tiger all endangered.
He rescinded the order with a sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Yet there was no time to lose weeping over one man if they hoped to save the rest from following him.
One moment the ship seemed about to be swallowed at the bottom of a great ice-green valley with infinite walls of water on each side, the next suddenly heaved to the very top of one of those mountain-walls, to perch precariously for a moment before tumbling back down the other side into the next trough. Hoping at least to save the sail, Robbie scrambled up the mainmast of the heaving and pitching clipper.
But it was too late. The sail was already gone. Below, Digger was having trouble securing the topgallant. Robbie shimmied down the mast to assist him.
“Get on yer way, mate!” barked the bo’sun. “I don’t need none o’ yer help!”
“We all need help!” Robbie shouted over the deafening wind, “and I’m not about to lose any more good sailors because of your stubborn pride!”
Digger vouchsafed no reply. Together he and Robbie managed to bring the sail under control and secure it. Digger said nothing more, only offering a disgusted snort whenever communication was required. Carefully they descended the mast to the deck. Digger stalked away. If Robbie had been capable of despair, it would have overtaken him at that moment, for how could they possibly hope to survive if the crew were not united as a team, and instead were battling each other as well as the storm?
Robbie carefully made his way aft—no easy matter in the wind with the deck treacherously slippery—to inquire about the status of the helm. The winds and seas had already wrought so much havoc on deck that the ship was unrecognizable. Ladders had been washed away, along with two of the four lifeboats. The galley was flooded, and a huge section of the forecastle cabin roof had been smashed to pieces. Before Robbie reached his destination, he heard the awful cry through the howling wind:
“Man overboard!”
He rushed ahead to the site of the calamity, looked over the rail along the line where Jenkins was pointing. Already the ill-fated crewman had fallen half a furlong behind the ship and disappeared from sight.
“Who was it?” Robbie shouted.
“Collins.”
Robbie rubbed the rain from his eyes and sighed. With two boats lost, he could not give thought to risking another on the hopeless attempt. Two men gone was no small loss. But with their already meager crew, to lose another two or three men and a precious lifeboat besides would be suicide for those that remained. Such was the seaman’s life. The potential for tragedy always lurked nearby. But there was no time to grieve. The Tiger’s peril still lay very close.
“I told you all!” wailed Lackey. “I told you when we left—she’s a rum ship! We’re headed down!”
“Quiet, Lackey!” yelled Robbie. “Why aren’t you at the pumps?”
“It’s a lost cause.”
“Shut up! Move to your station or I’ll throw you over the rail!”
At length Robbie reached the poop just as a huge violent wave gathered itself to crash over the front of the ship, sending the aft-section breaking down into the momentarily created trough unprotected. Even in the noise of the storm he heard the distinct snap of the rudder as it was wrenched from its pintle, before the next instant the ship rose with the great heave of water. Torger was whipped to the deck as the helm suddenly lost traction.
“We lost the rudder!” he shouted, but the coxswain’s announcement was hardly necessary as the already rolling ship nearly lurched to her side.
The next moment Pike and Digger made their appearance.
“What’s happened?” asked Pike, his gravelly voice hardly distinguishable from the sounds of the windy fray.
“The rudder’s gone,” answered Robbie.
“Lor’!” exclaimed Pike, suddenly heedful of Lackey’s evil pronouncements.
“The fool Lackey must be right,” muttered Digger.
“We don’t need that from you!” said Robbie harshly.
“Yeah! An’ what do ye intend—” But his threat remained unsaid.
“We gots to make port!” interrupted Pike.
“You know we can’t make it,” Robbie replied, struggling to keep his head. He thought a moment. “The same thing happened to Cutty Sark in ’72 on a run to Melbourne.”
“I remember it,” said Pike, calming a bit. “She was in a race with Thermopylae. She lost, after what happened, but there never was a finer piece of seamanship.”
“We can do what she did!” said Robbie. “They built a jury rudder from spare parts, and fit it right at sea.”
“Ye’re crazy!” put in Digger. “This ain’t no squall; this is a full-blown typhoon. Those are hundred-mile-an-hour winds hittin’ us!”
“We can do it—it’s our only chance,” argued Robbie. “You got any better ideas to see us through this! Now, go get Jenkins on cutting the spars. And we’ll need a forge—”
He stopped suddenly and shot a glance at Pike, realizing he had rushed ahead without the skipper’s approval.
Something ominous flickered through Pike’s eyes, but almost the same moment the ship lurched violently, reminding him sharply of their imminent peril and the utter futility of his personal vendetta at that moment. He gave a jerky, half-reluctant nod of his head to Digger, who swung hotly about in pursuit of Jenkins, angrier at having to take orders from the naval clown, as he still considered Robbie, than fearful of the sea’s power to take his life. Robbie watched him go, hoping he would be able to give himself fully to the tremendous battle that lay ahead of them.
The seas washed out the forge several times, but Jenkins was a good carpenter. Despite his grumbling about the impossible conditions, eventually he managed to construct a fair substitute rudder. Then came the awesome and dangerous task of attempting to fit the huge, cumbersome instrument, measuring sixteen inches in diameter at its gunstock end, and a good four feet at its fullest width. Attaching it to wires and pulleys, manned by most of the men situated at various key positions, it was lowered over the stern of the ship.
Huge combers continued to sweep over the poop, knocking the laborers sprawling. Eventually they arrived at a system of trying to anticipate the rhythm of the waves. In the ten to twenty seconds respite while lying in a trough, the men lowered the rudder before taking what refuge they could in preparation for the next crusher. The second it was past, they sprang again to action, lowering their cables farther, attempting with each successive effort to bring it a little closer to its final destination. Battling the wind and sea and a ship out of control, it took more than two hours to lower it into place. A slight lull in the onslaught of waves allowed Robbie, secured by multiple lines around his waist, to be lowered over the side, remove the broken rudder and afix the new one into place. It took several tries, and was not without great risk, as the waves could dash a human body to pieces against the side of the ship if Robbie failed to secure himself in advance. But between them he eventually set it in place, and when he yanked on the line and was raised back up onto the deck, a great cheer went up from the exhausted men of his crew.
The storm beat on them another day, but the makeshift rudder held fast, and Pike decided to beat it past Manila, the nearest port, and chance a run to Shanghai with the present setup. In the night the makeshift rudder began to show signs of strain, and by the second morning was only barely doing the job. The Sea Tiger listed like a crippled bird, at the mercy of the unfriendly sea.
It was time to reevaluate their course. The Cutty Sark had traveled eight thousand miles in a similar condition, but she had been commanded by a first-rate master. Robbie possessed no vaunted ideas about his own abilities, nor Pike’s. They had nearly a thousand miles yet to go—a small enough distance relative to the entire voyage of some eighteen thousand, but far enough with a malfunctioning vessel. They had already shipped the new rudder aboard once for repairs and strengthening, a demanding job when added to the grueling labor of handling the rigging during the final lashing tailwinds of the abating typhoon. The short-handed crew was exhausted, and Robbie feared he might have a mutiny on his hands if they had to ship the rudder even one more time. Nothing would have pleased Digger more, he was sure of that.
He found Pike in his cabin, and with trepidation opened the door and went inside to confront the skipper. At first he had hoped he could broach the subject subtly, even making it appear it had originated with Pike.
“We’re going to lose that rudder again,” said Robbie.
“We’ll ship her aboard again,” replied Pike, as if it were no concern of his.
“They’re a lot o’ lazy babies!”
An angry return rose to Robbie’s lips. He had himself been skeptical of the crew when he first laid eyes on them, and half still resembled pirates at first glance. But they had proved themselves able sailors, and had labored remarkably for their ship. Two had given their lives. But this was no time for a confrontation with Pike. At the same time, there was now no further need to be subtle.
“Listen, skipper,” he said, “Amoy isn’t that far from our present position—I think we can keep her going until then. But for another week . . . I just don’t know if she’ll last.”
“We’re not putting in at Amoy,” replied Pike firmly.
“What about Foochow then? Or even Hong Kong, though it would mean some backtracking.”
“No.”
Robbie well knew that Pike would never agree to a stopover in a port where his contraband cargo might be discovered. In Shanghai he had no doubt already cultivated connections, and more than likely had already made arrangements with his local people for the bribing of the customs officials in advance. It would be too great a risk for him to enter an unfriendly port with such a stash of guns aboard, not to mention the cost of having to pay out more bribes to new officials.
Robbie rose to leave, seeing no further advantage to be gained from arguing the issue, when Pike got up slowly out of his chair and limped to a table where a map was lying.
“Right here,” he said, tapping the map with his forefinger.
Robbie approached the table and saw he was indicating a group of islands just north of Luzon in the Philippines. He did not know much about them, except they were notorious for their coral reefs and poor harbors. He said as much to Pike, who simply snorted his disregard for such practicalities.
“There’s a spot,” said Pike mysteriously. “I remember it so well. During the Opium wars when we couldn’t get through with our cargo and sometimes had to dispose of it till things cooled down, we found a harbor, right here—”
Again he indicated the map.
“It ain’t great. But it’ll do the job. We can at least lay over long enough to fix the rudder proper.”
Robbie sighed, relieved that he had been spared an unpleasant argument. If they didn’t crack up on the reefs, they still had a chance.
He smiled to himself as he left Pike’s cabin. He was starting to sound like old doomsday Lackey!
Later that night the winds began to abate. The worst appeared over, but heavy seas and strong winds continued to hamper them.
When the lookout shouted Land Ho!, there was not a man aboard the Sea Tiger who did not rejoice.