Over the roar of the wind he heard something else. Was it the tumbling of breakers? He listened, then concluded that it was his imagination. But they came nearer, louder; he sat up on his plank, his nerves tense. The board lurched sidewise, spurn around, and the swell it was riding broke over him with a force that knocked him from his position. Over and over he rolled, until, almost unconscious, he felt his body dragging along the sand. The undertow was pulling at him. He fought furiously, digging his hands into the sand, and clawing desperately up the steep sloping beach. The next breaker caught him and rolled him past the water-line. He scrambled to his feet, and ran shakily ahead, neither knowing nor caring what was before him.
Behind him he heard the water sweeping in. He was out of its reach, but still he ran. A rock caught him above the knees and sent him headlong into the sand. He became unconscious, and lay still, half doubled up.
When he recovered consciousness and sat up, a fierce sun was beating down upon him. His head ached, and he was hungry. "There may be people within call," he thought. Rising unsteadily, the soreness of his muscles coming home to him, he gave a prolonged "Hello-o." A faint echo was his answer. He formed a trumpet of his hands and shouted louder. The echo came back stronger. "Only cliffs," he concluded.
The gnaw of hunger increased. "Clams are my best chance," he reasoned, and, turning, he groped his way to the water. When the incoming breakers washed his knees, he stopped. The intense dread that his experience had given him was crying retreat, but he stood his ground. Stooping over, he began digging in the sand. His cut and bleeding hands burned with the salt water, but he dug steadily, moving rapidly along the beach. At last his fingers turned up a round, ridged object. Feeling the edge of it he knew that he had found what he sought. He wanted to eat the clam at once, but reluctantly dropped it into his pocket, and went on digging.
When he had filled his pocket he straightened up and started toward the shore. As he waded through the last shallow wash of the wave, his foot caught in something soft, and he fell. He rose, and then on second thought stooped to feel what had tripped him. His hand touched a mass of wet, tangled hair. He jerked it back hurriedly and screamed. The strain he had been under was telling. Nerving himself, he reached again, and touched a face.