Keening in from the lake, the wind made him stagger backwards. Reaching mountainous heights, the breaking waves shattered themselves far up on the beach. Ramsay looked across them. About two hundred yards out, the _Spray_ was completely crippled. Trailing from her broken mast, the sail bled water into the angry lake. Down at the bows, the fisherman's boat seemed hung up on a rock or reef. Every second wave that washed in broke completely over her and hid her from view. But the single man remaining on board still worked calmly with the broken half of an oar, to free the _Spray_ from her prison.

Ramsay allowed himself another split second. The entire dream was coming true. There were some men who, to the last, could meet the challenge of the lake with grace and spirit. The man on the _Spray_, identified even at this distance as Hans Van Doorst, had not given up.

The boy whirled on Pieter Van Hooven. "A coil of rope!" he ejaculated.

Without waiting to see whether or not Pieter followed his instructions, he raced for the barn. Snatching a bridle from its wooden peg, he went more slowly toward the corral where the little black horse was confined.

This had happened once before and it might happen again. A man's strength was as nothing in the raging lake, but a horse was many times as strong as a man. The black horse had brought him safely in when all the others had drowned.

The little horse arched his neck and flicked his ears when his young friend approached and patted him.

"Easy," Ramsay said reassuringly. "Take it easy, Black."

The little horse rested his head over the boy's shoulder for a moment, then the latter stepped back to slip the bit into Black's mouth, put the bridle over his ears and buckle the throat latch. The horse followed willingly behind him as he pushed the corral's gate aside.

He mounted, and Black reared and pranced, just to prove that he could.

Ramsay tried not to look at the lake, but he couldn't help looking. When he did, very lonely in the gray waves, he saw the reef- or rock-bound _Spray_. The lone fisherman still could be seen, working to free his craft.

Ramsay leaned forward to pat the little horse on the neck. "We can do it," he murmured. "Let's prove it."

He took the bridle reins in his hand and trotted Black toward the foaming lake. Pieter, his eyes grave, tossed him a coil of half-inch rope. Ramsay had one glimpse of Marta's anguished face. He slipped the coil of rope over his shoulder and did not look back.

As they approached the lake, the horse hesitated, to paw the sand with a front hoof. He looked around to eye the rider on his back, and again Ramsay leaned forward. "All right," he said. "Go on."

The horse accepted his words but, more than that, his confidence. Guided by the bridle's touch, he walked willingly into the pounding lake.

Another water bomb exploded about them. They submerged, but Black came up swimming strongly. Ramsay kept soft fingers on the bridle reins, not wanting to exert any pressure or do anything else that might divert the horse from the job at hand.

Tossing his head, Black sneezed to empty his nose of water that had washed into it. He was timing himself capably and almost perfectly to meet the waves at their place of least resistance, and he rose and fell with them. From the crests Ramsay could see the _Spray_. From the troughs he could see nothing. A lump rose in his throat.

The _Spray_ was indeed sadly wounded. Only part of her stern showed above water. Hans Van Doorst still worked with a broken oar to free his boat, and as soon as he came near enough Ramsay knew that he had been right.

The Dutch fisherman had been one with the lake when Ramsay first saw him, and he was one with it now. Unafraid, he fought the lake as gracefully as a swordsman. Perched on the broken stump of mast, the sea gull fluttered his wings and clicked his mandibles.

Ramsay gauged the situation as precisely as he could. If he could throw his rope over the stranded _Spray_, the little horse might be able to pull it from its anchor and back to shore. Ramsay saw Hans Van Doorst turn to watch him. The fisherman waved a friendly hand.

Still guiding Black lightly, imposing no undue strain on the reins or bit, Ramsay steered him across the _Spray's_ sunken prow. He let the reins hang slackly on the horse's neck and took the coil of rope from his shoulder. As precisely as he could, he cast and watched the rope snake through the air.

A sick feeling arose in the pit of his stomach and he moaned audibly. He had calculated the distance correctly but he had not allowed for the strength of the wind. The rope missed Hans Van Doorst's outstretched hands by two feet and fell into the angry lake. Of his own volition, Black turned back toward shore. Ramsay saw the squawking sea gull bounce a couple of feet into the air and spread his long wings. Grasping the reins, for the first time the boy used strength as he strove to turn the horse back. He glanced over his shoulder to see what might be done next, and gasped.

Hans Van Doorst had gone to the raised stern of his wrecked boat to give himself a running start, and as Ramsay looked, he dived. Leaping as far as possible from the _Spray_ to avoid striking the rock, he hurled himself into the storm-lashed lake, straight at his would-be rescuers.

For a few seconds that seemed like hours, he disappeared into the churning depths, but when he surfaced he was squarely behind Ramsay and he used both hands to grasp the horse's tail.

Black turned back toward shore. He swam more strongly now because he was going with the wind instead of against it, and his double burden did not seem unduly heavy. Ramsay saw Pieter and Marta Van Hooven, Pieter's hand protectingly over his wife's shoulder, as they waited to see what would happen.

The last wave burst around them and they were back on shore. Instantly Ramsay slid from the little horse's back and looked around. A nausea seized him. Hans Van Doorst was no longer in sight. Ramsay had tried and failed. He glanced toward the _Spray_, as though he expected to see the crazy Dutch fisherman still there, and knew only that waves were smashing the boat into kindling wood.

Then, as though he had literally risen from the lake, Hans Van Doorst picked himself up from the wreckage of a breaking wave and walked ashore. His tame sea gull fluttered out of the sky to alight on its master's shoulder. The Dutchman reached up to stroke his pet as he looked at Pieter and Ramsay. "None but me and Captain Klaus?" he asked.

"None, Hans," Pieter said.

For a moment an infinite sadness, a melancholy born thousands of years ago in the first fisherman who had seen his mates lost, pervaded the Dutchman. But it was only for a moment. Pieter and Ramsay walked to his side and offered their assistance. He declined it.

"I'll walk," he said.

Ramsay felt a great warmth for and a vast sympathy with this man who, while daring all and losing all, could remain so very human. Marta hovered solicitously near as they all went up to the house and wore their dripping clothes into her immaculate kitchen. Hans Van Doorst sat down, tried to fold his arms across his chest, and winced.

"You're hurt!" Marta cried.

"It is nothing." The Dutch fisherman looked at the three. "It happened out on the lake. We struck something, I do not know what. Perhaps the half-submerged hull of a sunken ship. Then we were in trouble."

Marta was stooping beside him, gently unbuttoning his soaking-wet shirt.

Hans Van Doorst looked fondly down at her wet and bedraggled hair, and he offered no protest as his upper body was bared. There was a vast, ugly scar on the right side of his chest, and when Marta touched him there his ribs moved. The Dutchman sat very straight in his chair.

Though he must have felt pain, he showed none.

Ramsay and Pieter stood aside while Marta worked expertly. Ripping one of her snow-white sheets into strips, she wound a bandage tightly around Hans Van Doorst's broken ribs. Ramsay and Pieter looked significantly at each other. Such an injury _might_ have resulted when wind or a heavy wave flung the fisherman against something. Probably it had happened when Hans flung himself forward in an effort to rescue a shipmate.

Marta finished her bandaging and stepped back. "You rest now."

He grinned at her. "Fishermen have no time for rest."

"Do as she says, Hans," Pieter urged.

"Come," said Marta. She went to a bedroom, opened the door and waited expectantly.

Hans Van Doorst spread eloquent hands. "Who can argue with a woman?" he asked. "Especially a Dutch woman?"

He rose, went into the room, and closed the door behind him. Ten minutes later, Marta opened the door a crack and peeked in. She entered, and came out with Hans Van Doorst's clothing.

"He sleeps," she announced. "Like a man worn out he sleeps."

Ramsay changed his wet clothes for some dry ones Pieter had given him and went out to catch Black. From the house's ridge pole, Captain Klaus, Hans Van Doorst's tame sea gull, squawked at him. Ramsay grinned back, walked up to the little horse, rubbed him down, and put him back in the corral. He did the rest of his chores, and when he went into the house for dinner Hans Van Doorst was seated at the table.

"I told him!" Marta scolded. "I told him to stay in bed and I would bring him his food. But can I talk reason to a Dutchman?"

"Marta," Hans Van Doorst said softly, "there is fishing to be done."

Eager interest glowed in Pieter's eyes. "Are you going again, Hans?"

"I am a fisherman."

"You are crazy," Marta corrected. "One day you will kill yourself on that lake."

Again the sadness, the inborn melancholy, sat like a mask on the Dutch fisherman. But only for a moment.

"Marta," he said, "fishermen do not die in bed."