Page 143 - The Tigris Expedition

The Tigris Expedition
was still dead against us, first of moderate strength, then increasing
again in force. We even had to put on wind jackets to enjoy our
meals at the unsheltered table.
‘Are you sure the ancient people could have done better than us,’
HP queried. ‘Maybe they just hung on wherever they were until the
wind blew more in their direction.’
‘After all, we too could at least pick our course to span half the
horizon,’ Asbjorn added. We all agreed that we could steer success­
fully 90° to either side of a following wind.
Suddenly we observed that the violent hugging and lugging
came at much shorter intervals. Water cascaded in front of the bow.
I
We were going faster. We hurried up to the cabin roof and waved
desperately for Slavsk to slow down. This was crazy going. But
nobody on the ship ahead saw us or understood our signals. The
lifeboat midway on the tow-line was empty, it bounced on the
water worse than we did, being puHed in two directions with ropes
fore and aft. Before I could make up my mind whether to cut
ourselves free with a knife or try to contact Slavsk by radio, the
tow-line broke in a last violent jerk. Our speed slowed down as
suddenly as it had picked up. Slavsk went on alone with its empty
lifeboat.
Asbjorn climbed over the bow and reported that the one-inch
tow-line had broken close beside Tigris, but what was a real shock
to all of us was that he had found a huge hole torn in our bow.
Fragments of loose reeds were in fact floating behind us. In front of
the hole the spiral ropes hung loose across a cavity as large as a
dog-kennel. This was a frightening discovery. We forced our
fingers under the lashings on deck up front, and pulled to feel the
tautness where they passed the cavity. The spiral rope was still as
tight as if glued to the reeds. The reed bundles had fortunately
swollen so much that they squeezed the lashings fast between them.
With a large hole in the bow we thus apparently faced no immediate
catastrophe. But we had to find a way of filling the hole before it
grew too big. The reeds around it would now loosen one by one
and gradually cause the whole bundle-boat to fall apart.
Slavsk came back in a great circle and Captain Igor appeared with
a megaphone. He refused to let us remain loose. He had contacted
his shipping company in Odessa and they had approved his actions.
He had even sent a message to the Ministry of the Merchant Marine
in Moscow, and Minister Gujenko had personally authorised Slavsk
to tow the reed-boat Tigris ‘to an area of safety’.
‘There is no such area short of Bahrain,’ assured Captain Igor.
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