"You will find none sharper, sir," Jack answered confidently. "We best get on with it. There's not a moment to be lost!"

.....

Some time later with his knees aching Jack, wishing as always that he had listened to Stephen and run up the rigging a few more times each day to combat his sixteen stone and delicate appreciation of good English food, stopped and peered ahead.

"There's an end to this length up ahead," Jack communicated. "I will need to get closer to see if it is a dead end or if there is an up or down from there."