Free In Hazard by Richard Hughes

discarded man’s strength, cannot fall back on that strength in an emergency.
    A well-found schooner of a mere two hundred tons, supposing she had weathered that storm, would not have been dead like that. Her pumps would have still been working, because they would have been worked by men: they could be worked as long as her crew lived. Her masts, of course, would have gone overboard; but once the storm relaxed, it would have needed mere carpentry to step spars against their stumps, rig jury-sails, repair the rudder, and so limp home. The very distance a great modern steamer has advanced beyond the little schooner is the measure of what a steamer’s crew have to face, once her power has failed. Captain Edwardes, in charge of this lifeless log, in command of all these willing but unusable men, was well aware of that.
    He found Mr. MacDonald in his room, still (after half an hour) changing his clothes; and they returned to the engine room together.

Chapter V
(Thursday)
    At mid-night, Captain Edwardes went to the saloon. A gimballed oil lamp was burning. The place was a horrid mess. It was tilted steeply on one end, and the lower end was awash; with splintered chairs and smaller rubbish floating in it, and the water slapping up occasionally to the higher end. There deck-officers, boys, and a few engineers—all mixed for once—had wedged themselves behind a table, upright. No one would have thought of sleep, even if it had been possible: they were waiting for the expected lull, now so long overdue. The Chief Steward (a rotund, butler-like chap) was with them. What little food—mostly biscuits—he had in the pantry, he had locked up pending the Captain’s orders; for it would have to serve officers and crew both, English and Chinese. The storeroom was flooded, he could not get out any more till the pumps were working again. The only thing he had plenty of in the pantry was spirits. But, curiously, no one seemed to want any, not even a nip.
    There was a smell of stale sea, stale food, and stale air: but there was another smell too: bitter, ammoniac. It was quite faint, but the Captain knew it. You do not forget it, if you have ever smelt it. It was the smell of fear. Disciplined men can control their muscles, even their facial expressions. But they cannot control the chemistry of their sweat-glands.
    Captain Edwardes sniffed, and knew that the men needed some encouragement; so he gave it; his shaggy eyebrows sticking out like horns over his brilliant eyes, his tubby body planted like a light-house on a rock. For he felt himself full of power, like a prophet, with enough courage to serve out round the ship in ladles.
    When the storm began, he had been worried: for this was not the first time he had run his ship into a tropical storm. Once before, when a young man, he had been caught in a typhoon, in his first command. It had not been a storm as fierce as this one, of course, and he had come through it without damage; but there is no need to get caught in typhoons nowadays, the text-books tell you: it is your own fault: and Owners believe the text-books. Moreover, what he had done that time had been deliberate: he had deliberately run into its expected path, though if he had stayed where he was the storm would have missed him. Yes; but where he was, that was an intricate net-work of channels and islands. There might be not one chance in ten that the storm would catch him, there: but if the tenth chance did catch him, with no room to move, his ship was as good as lost. On the other hand, if he put out to the open sea, it was nine chances out of ten the storm would catch him. Yes, but with plenty of room to move, there was no real danger if it did. He had argued like that; gone out: got caught in it, and came through safely. Still, it had been difficult to prove his policy to his Owners. In the end, they had forgiven him: but not forgotten. Owners do not forget. Or, if they do, they have only to consult their