Robert Leckie

“ They dressed hurriedly in their sailing clothes—blue jeans, sneakers and sweat shirts—and bolted breakfast in the hotel coffee shop. Then, sea bags slung over their shoulders, they raced down the street to the Cliffport Boat Yard, rounded the corner of the main shed and, at the head of the gangway, came to a stop.
Sandy felt a sick, sinking feeling as he scanned the mooring area, searching vainly for a sight of his sloop. But where she had ridden at anchor the night before, there was only a patch of calm blue water. ”

“ Jerry laughed. “You’ve been reading too many books about pirates and whalers in the old days. You only find all those complicated sail and rigging names on the big square-rigged ships—the ones with three and four masts. If your boat is a sloop, it only has one mast, one mainsail, and a choice of maybe three other sails, flown one at a time with the mainsail. There’s nothing much to learn compared with the old full-rigged ships with up to four masts.” ”

“ Each time they came about onto a new tack, the mainsail was shifted to the other side of the boat, and the boat heeled in the same direction as the sail. The jib came about by itself, just by loosening one sheet and taking up on the other one. Soon Sandy was used to the continual shifting and resetting of the sails, and to the boom passing back and forth overhead.
Suddenly Sandy pointed and clapped Jerry on the shoulder with excitement. “Look!” he cried. “There’s a whole fleet of boats coming this way! They look just like ours! And they’re racing!” ”

“ Sandy said. “I wonder what he’s hiding on that island of his—a diamond mine?”
“You never can tell,” Jerry replied, “but it’s probably nothing at all. I guess the kind of man who would want to live all alone on an island away from people is bound to be pretty crazy about getting all the privacy he can. And as far as I’m concerned, he can have it. From now on, if we need anything, let’s head for the mainland!”
Dismissing the mysterious rifleman from their minds, they set out once more to enjoy the pleasures of a brisk wind, blue sky and a trim boat. ”

“ Jerry asked in surprise. “It’s not a real gun, you know. All it does is fire a flare. Besides, there’s only one flare in here, and I don’t know if that can do us very much good.”
“I don’t care about the flares,” Sandy answered. “It’s the gun itself that I’m interested in. It fooled me when I saw it and it just might possibly fool someone else who might not be familiar with these things. I’m hoping that if we get a chance to pull it on someone after dark, we can fool him long enough to get hold of a real gun that will help us escape!” ”

“ Jerry said. “Nothing will happen when we hoist the sail. It’s like raising a flag. The flag doesn’t fill with wind and pull at the flagpole like a sail, does it? It just points into the wind and flutters. That’s just what the mainsail will do. You see, the boat is already pointing into the wind, because the wind has swung us around on the mooring. You look around and you’ll see that all the boats out here are heading in the exact same direction, toward the wind. When we hoist the sail, it’ll act just like a flag, and flap around until we’re ready to use it. ”

“ When Sandy and Jerry mistakenly sail off in a stranger’s sloop instead of their own, they land in a sea of trouble. Their attempts to outmaneuver a desperate crew are intertwined with fascinating sailing lore. ”

“ If it were a racing hull, you might get eight and a half or maybe even nine knots out of it under ideal conditions. For practical purposes, you can figure eight or less. A knot, by the way, is a nautical mile, and it’s a little more than a regular mile. When you say eight knots, you mean eight nautical miles an hour.”
“But that’s not fast!” Sandy objected. “You said that’s what a fast racing boat would do!”
Jerry smiled. “Believe me, Sandy,” he said, “when your boat is heeling way over and your decks are awash and your sails are straining full of wind, it seems like an awful lot of speed! ”

“ Not daring to move, Sandy and Jerry waited for what seemed hours until the slight swaying of the lifeboat stopped. As cautiously as they could, so as not to start it moving again, they changed their positions in such a way as to balance the boat better. At last they were stationed one on each side of what Sandy could only hope was the engine compartment.
“How can you work in the dark?” Jerry whispered. “How will you know what’s what in there?”
“It shouldn’t be too hard,” Sandy replied. “Almost all engines have a lot in common. ”

“ I’d much rather have a boat we can sleep on and take on trips up and down the coast than a racer that doesn’t even go so fast! Besides, I’d be pretty foolish to think about any other kind of boat at all, wouldn’t I? I don’t even have the least idea of how to sail this one yet! Come on, Jerry, start showing me!”
As Jerry carefully explained the different parts of the rigging, the complicated-looking series of wires and ropes around the mast began to look a whole lot simpler to Sandy. The first thing he learned was that not much of the rigging moved or was used for actual sailing of the boat. ”

“ Jerry said, “will you answer a question for me? I don’t understand why you bother with sailboats, when a power boat could do the job so much faster.”
“That’s a fair question,” Jones said. “You are smart boys, aren’t you? Well, I pride myself on using my brains, too. I use this innocent-looking sloop for several reasons, one of which caused this whole ridiculous mix-up. For one thing, an individual member of a popular class of sailboat is very hard for the casual observer to identify. ”

“ Sandy said. “And a propeller blowing under a wing would be pretty much the same as a wind blowing at the back of a sail. Right?”
“Right!” Jerry said, looking pleased with his teaching ability. “Now you have the idea. When you have a sail, like a wing standing up, the air that passes over the sail makes a vacuum in front and pulls the boat forward into it. Actually, the vacuum pulls us forward and to one side, the same as the wind from the propeller makes the plane go forward and up. We use the rudder and the keel to keep us going more straight than sideways.” ”

“ Sandy asked. “I would have guessed that sailing downwind with the wind pushing the boat ahead of it would be the fastest.”
“It sure seems as if it ought to work that way,” Jerry said with a grin. “But you’ll find that sailboat logic isn’t always so simple or easy. When you’re running free in front of the wind, you can only go as fast as the wind is blowing. When you’re reaching, you can actually sail a lot faster than the wind.” ”

“ The only way that a boat could sail level, he pointed out, was before the wind. With the boat heeling sharply and the sails and the rigging pulled tight in the brisk breeze, Sandy really began to feel the sense of speed on the water, and understood what Jerry had told him about speed being relative.
After they had practiced on a few long reaches, Jerry showed Sandy how to beat or point, which is the art of sailing more or less straight into the wind.
“Of course you can’t ever sail straight into the wind,” Jerry said. “The best you can do is come close. ”

“ Jerry replied, “is never to let the wind blow from the same side that the sail is set on. This means that if you feel the wind shift over that way, you have to alter your course quickly to compensate for it. If you don’t want to alter your course, then you have to do a deliberate jibe and alter the direction of the sail. All it means is that you have to keep alert at the tiller, and keep an eye on the hawk, the way I told you, so that you always know which direction the wind is blowing from.”
“I guess I was getting too much confidence a lot too soon,” Sandy admitted, shamefaced. ”

“ Climbing to the deck, they inspected the newly painted cabin and cockpit, the freshly varnished coamings and mast, the almost invisible repairs on the decks.
“We’ll have her launched within the next hour,” Lieutenant Ames said. “Why don’t you go into town to buy whatever you need in the meanwhile? It shouldn’t take you too long to get stores for a short trip.”
“That’s a good idea,” Sandy said. “But we’re going to need more than the regular stores. I’m going to spend some of that reward money right away on a new spinnaker. ”

“ Jerry adjusted the mainsail to a better position relative to the wind, trimming it carefully to keep it from bagging, then he went on to explain. “A jibe can only happen when you’ve got the wind at your back. That’s called sailing downwind, or sailing before the wind, or running free. It’s the most dangerous point of sail, because of the chance of jibing. When the wind is strong, an uncontrolled jibe like the one we just took can split your sails, or ruin your rigging, or even snap your boom or your mast. ”

“ During nearly all of his boyhood he had puttered around boats and boat yards.
Although Russell Steele had spent most of his adult life in the Army (and maybe because of it) he had always had a soft spot in his heart for the sport of sailing. He had regretted that Sandy, his only nephew, lived inland in Valley View where he was unable to share in this enthusiasm. But Valley View was only a couple of hours from the seacoast and now that Sandy was old enough to drive a car, it would be possible for him to own and enjoy a sailboat. ”

“ There’s not much difference in actual speed between a really fast boat and an ordinary good boat of the same size. But there sure is a lot of difference in comfort. And I like my comfort when I go for a cruise.”
“Why should a racing boat be uncomfortable?” Sandy asked.
“It’s not uncomfortable for racing, or for day sailing,” Jerry answered, “but a racing boat of this size wouldn’t be fitted out for cruising at all. You see, to get the most speed out of a boat, designers make sure that the hull is kept as light as possible and as streamlined as possible, too. ”

“ Sandy nodded, and Jerry went on. “Streamlining the hull shape helps it to cut through the water without making a lot of waves at the bow to hold it back. Not only that, but to make the boat really as fast as possible, most designers want to streamline the decks, too. That way, even the air resistance is lowered. Well, when you streamline the hull, you make less cabin space below. Then when you streamline the decks, you have to lower the cabin roof so that it’s level with the decks. You can see that in a small boat like this, you wind up with no cabin at all.” ”

“ A reach is when you’re sailing with the wind coming more from the side than from in front or from behind the boat. Beating is when the wind is more in front than on the side, and you have to sail into it. Beating is more like work than fun, but a reach is the fastest and easiest kind of a course to sail. That’s why I want to reach as soon as we’re out in open water where we can pick our direction without having to worry about channel markers. ”

“ Sandy whispered to his friend. “Let’s just go along with them quietly. Maybe we can keep in one piece until we have a chance to figure a way out.”
At Turk’s orders, they rose to their feet. Looking up to the freighter’s deck high above them, they saw the other sailor, Bull, already on board, at the top of a long rope ladder. He too had his pistol held ready, and the expression on his face gave every indication that he would be only too glad to use it if he were given even half an excuse to do so. ”