As they emerged from the strait, they sighted a ship, hull-down. It disappeared from view without revealing its identity. While it was probably Spanish, given that it was heading west, David saw no reason to risk a fight when his ships were already chock-full of treasure, and the stranger couldn’t possibly reach port in time to give a timely alarm. Anyway, David figured it was a straggler from the New Spain flota, bound for Veracruz. If so, it was carrying immigrants and manufactured goods, not treasure.
As they bore eastward into the Straits of Florida, David kept his ships as far from Havana as practicable. The Spanish intermittently posted a garda costa there, and he wasn’t looking for trouble. He cleared the Straits without sighting anything more ominous than a pod of dolphins, who rode in the Walvis’ wake for a while.
David was feeling quite pleased with himself.
* * *
The three ships threaded their way between Florida and the Bahamas. They had to claw their way northward, close-hauled, fighting against the northeast trades. But at least they had the Gulf Stream to help them along. As they struggled to wring what progress they could against the unfavorable wind, the captains and crews could take comfort in the knowledge that they would eventually escape the zone in which the trade winds, which barred a direct course to Europe, prevailed. Once they reached the forties, they could pick up the westerlies and head for home.
The wind became very light and variable, further reducing their headway. That was common when one passed between the two wind zones, but at this time of year, the area of transition usually lay farther north.
Fortunately, the skies were mostly clear, and the barometer had risen slightly since the last watch. The barometer had once hung on the roof post of a Grantville porch, and David had been very pleased to have it loaned to him.
Soon after they passed the latitude of the northern fringe of the Bahamas, the northeast wind resumed. David didn’t like the look of the sea, however. The swells seemed a bit heavier and longer than usual. He took out a one minute sand clock and counted the swells. Four a minute. Eight was norm.
“Go check the barometer again!” David ordered.
“It’s level,” Philip reported. “But it seems . . . jittery.”
* * *
The next day, at sunrise, there were white wisps of cirrus clouds, low in the sky. The “mares’ tails” seemed to point southeast, and the swells were stronger. The barometer had slowly fallen during the night watches. It usually dipped a bit twice a day, but this seemed to be something more than the usual variation.
“Well, Philip, I am afraid that I think we have a hurricane approaching. The winds are from the north-northeast, and since they spiral counterclockwise about the center, the center should be nine to twelve points off the wind direction. Probably southeast.”
“So what do we do? Run to the west?”
“How sure are you of the accuracy of the cross-fix you took earlier today?”
“Pretty sure. Two star fixes and a sun fix, perhaps an hour apart. Why?”
“If I trust the last position fix you took—and I do—we don’t have enough sea room between us and the American coast. Only about a hundred miles. Believe me, you don’t want to be near a lee shore in a hurricane. So running west, toward land, really doesn’t appeal to me.”
“Then should we stay put? Throw out an anchor or something?”
“It’s not so simple. According to the Bowditch, the paths of Atlantic hurricanes are quite idiosyncratic, but they usually move northwest in the Greater Antilles. Sometimes they’ll make landfall and disintegrate, but they can also curve north. And they can then recurve and head northeast.
“If I knew that the hurricane was marching northwest, I would head south, and go back the way we came, into the Gulf. And if I thought it was curving north, or recurving northwest, I would head north. Or just heave to.
“What about heading east, or northeast, to get more searoom?”
David shook his head. “That’s likely to bring us into what Bowditch calls the ‘dangerous semicircle,’ the area to the right of the hurricane track. Assuming that we’re not in it already, of course.”
“Why is it dangerous?”
“The wind strength is the sum of the revolving wind, and the forward movement of the storm. And in the forward quadrant, the winds try to push you right into the path of the hurricane.”
“Ouch. So there’s a ‘safe semicircle’?”
“Bowditch prefers the term, ‘less dangerous semicircle.’ Nothing about a hurricane at sea is ‘safe.’ Anyway, I am going to keep heading north for a little while. Or as close to north as the wind will let us. We’re square-rigged, so we can’t point close to the wind. No closer than six points of the compass.”