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Annesley's heart jumped; but without hesitation she pulled back the latch, and as she opened the door a rush of sand-laden wind wrenched it from her hand. She staggered away as the door swung free, and there was just time to see a tall, thin figure slip in like a shadow before the light of the hanging-lamp blew out.
And though whirls and air-eddies, sand-laden, snatched viciously at them, they won along the beach. That was lathering toil, burdened as they were, stumbling over driftwood and into holes, laboring forward, hardly able to distinguish more than the rising, falling line of white that marked the surf.
A mass of sand-laden foaming water appeared then suddenly to rise before her with a towering crest; she heard one loud cry of terror from different voices; the brig seemed lifted high in the air; the mainmast tottered; and a suffocating deluge of water came crashing down upon her, nearly carrying her with it down the cabin stairs, where she was clinging.
So there was some attempt at Christmas cheer in the holes in the sand into which the weather had driven us, for we who had once set our bivouacs to catch every breath of wind, now dug ourselves down three or four feet to avoid the sand-laden and icy blast.
But this hope was very transient; the predominant feeling was that my father was lost, and that I was about to share his fate. I was thus giving way to despair, when I was aware of a considerable decrease in the density of the sand-laden atmosphere; the last breath of the fierce whirlwind passed by; the sun shone forth bright and clear, and I stood alone amid a sea of glittering sand.
Another and another he gave till he was hoarse, but there was no reply. "Guess I was dreaming after all," remarked Wandering William retiring once more to his blanket. A sickly yellow light struggling through the sand-laden air heralded the day. But the wind had died down and the particles still held in suspension were rapidly thinning out of the air.
In the morning the chain-cable of the anchor was found tossed by the force of the sand-laden seas right over the deck, and arranged there with a certain regularity. To many of the crew it seemed clear that other than natural causes must have been at work; there were evidently "dead hands" upon the bank, and this was a warning. Nils shook his head and said nothing.
We had encountered that blasting wind known as the "sirocco" the scourge of the Mediterranean which after gathering force and heat in the African deserts comes with its fiery and sand-laden breath to sap the moisture from all who have not the natures of salamanders. Fortunately we soon passed beyond its sphere of action. Darkness rapidly sets in in these regions of eternal summer.
To the west was a thick wood, which afforded shelter from the winds blowing at times hot and sand-laden from the interior; while in front was a slight dip, at the bottom of which was the bed of a river, but through it a trickling stream alone at present found its way to the eastward.
First, the potatoes were to be washed for tomorrow's dinner. He filled the dishpan full of water, dumped the sand-laden tubers in, and attacked them with a brush in vigorous relief at the change from deadening inactivity.
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