III

Harty closed his wireless office and headed for the water-front. Near
the shore-end of the breakwater he came to a halt. He could but dimly
see the beginning of the outstretching wall of concrete, but plainly
enough he could hear the combers thundering over the crest of it.

A proper night for an enemy to be adrift in a powerless hulk. Sea
enough to suit any purpose out there. And wind! From where he stood in
the lee of the donkey-engine house, to the water's edge was a full
hundred feet, and yet even so, whenever he stepped out into the open, it
was only to be drenched with spray. And out there in the blackness,
twenty miles offshore, it would be blowing good; out there on the edge
of that bank, in the hollow of the short, high, ugly seas, was a
rolling, battered light-ship; as helpless as--well, there was nothing
ashore to compare to her helplessness. And when she hit in on the
beach--when she hit the sand--it would be over and over she'd roll, and
out of her he would come and be smothered. For a second he'd be smooth
and sleek as a wet rat and then--Oh, then!

Even in moderate weather, what chance would they have in that surf? And
to-night it would be to her mast-head, with combers curving like a
rattlesnake's neck, and twisting, and hissing, and they would catch him
up, and ten ways he'd go then, gurgling, smothering, drowning, and his
body, if ever it did come ashore for anybody to find,--after a December
night,--they'd find it frozen stiff.

The walls of the little engine house were icing up, the spray was
freezing on his moustache--surely a proper night for a man's enemy to be
lost. In the lee of the little shack he lit a cigar; but it would not