The foresail and fore-topsail, emptied of the wind by the manoeuvre, and with no one to bring in the sheet in time, were thundering into ribbons, the heavy boom threshing and splintering from rail to rail.

The air was thick with flying wreckage, detached ropes and stays were hissing and coiling like snakes, and down through it all crashed the gaff of the foresail.
The spar could not have missed me by many inches, while it spurred me to action.

Perhaps the situation was not hopeless.

I remembered Wolf Larsen's caution.

He had expected all hell to break loose, and here it was.