Two sailors cling to life as all hope for rescue fades.

‘Look, Dad!’ I pointed to a pair of elegant white swans swimming in the harbour. In more than twenty-five years of sailing on lakes, we’d seen ducks, geese and thousands of albatross - but never swans. We couldn’t take our eyes off them. Their grace and beauty were mesmerizing, and they shimmered luminously in the low afternoon sun of an autumn day. Dad and I were preparing our seventeen-foot sloop Orysia for a short cruise around one of the biggest, and most favourite, of all our lakes.

We watched the swans a few minutes longer and then got under way, leaving the harbour about one o’clock with everything shipshape. The wind was moderate, and Orysica cut cleanly through the waves as I handled the tiller. ‘We could make it all the way across the lake on a day like this,’ Dad said, smiling. Lake Michigan is more than a hundred miles wide.

We rounded the top of Rock Island from the west, sailing right on course. Heading south, dad called, ‘The winds are shifting. We’ll have to tack.’ the temperature fell rapidly. Orysia’s sails snapped like whips. Around three o’clock, when we finally cleared the easy side, reaching the passage between Rock and Washington islands, the wind had become fierce. It angled off the cliffs, blowing the water into powerful whirlpools.

‘Get her into the wind!’ Dad shouted. ‘I’ll get the job and mainsail down!’

‘I’ll start the motor, I yelled.

But the wind and current were too strong. Our little boat shuddered, listing to port. With a lurch and a splash of foam, the top of the mast hit the water. We hurled against the gunwales.

‘Hold on!’ I cried. Too late! Dad and I were catapulted into the lake, and Orysia, with a final heave, capsized, her proud sails plunging into the water.

I grasped the boat’s hull, trying to keep myself afloat. The water was so cold it hurt to the bone. ‘Dad?’ I called, looking around frantically. I felt a tug at my sleeve, and dad surfaced beside me, gasping for air. I pulled myself up on the hull and reached for him. We flopped onto the boat, clutching the keel and shivering violently, our sodden clothing clinging to us. Then a wave surged against the boat and threw me off. ‘Dad!’

Holding fast to the keel with one hand, my father thrust out his other towards me. Churning waves buffeted Orysia, and dad lost his grip. He slid back into the freezing water, pulling me down with him. We clawed our way back up until we were able to grab the boat’s keel again.

The winds drove us out into the huge 20,000-square-mile lake. The boat was sinking. Less than a foot of it remained above the surface. Waves crashed over us as we drifted farther from land. Then, below us, we felt the mast smash against a rocky shoal. The impact tossed us back into the water. We could only watch in horror as Orysia’s keel disappeared into its housing beneath the waves.

A small part of the hull was still above water, but how would we hold on? Swimming to shore through the turbulent waves was an impossibility. I was almost ready to give up, almost ready to sink into the lake along with the keel. But then I felt Dad’s arm around me. He pushed me toward Orysia. We both grabbed on and scrambled up, gripping with numb fingers the slot in the hull where the keel had been. Our bodies curved against the bulbous surface, more in the freezing water than out. We hadn’t seen any other boats since we had entered the passage, and none would venture forth now in howling winds. There is no hope for us, I thought looking at Dad.

As night fell we turned to prayer. Together and separately, aloud and silently, Dad and I asked that our lives be spared, that God would send help. When the moon rose I was able to see my watch: eight o’clock. We’d been in the lake for five hours. We talked, trying to keep alert, but our speech became slurred. I knew that meant one thing: Deadly hypothermia was setting in. I’d been cold for so long I began to have feelings of warmth. ‘Keep moving,’ Dad urged. We tried shifting our arms, shaking our legs, anything to keep our circulation going.

The full moon cast an eerie glow on the pitching waters. I checked my watch again. Nearly midnight. Nine hours. Our prayers for rescue changed to prayers for mercy. Death seemed imminent.

Suddenly we heard whirring above us. A searchlight cut through the blackness, reflecting of the waves. A helicopter! ‘Here!’ I shouted, with the little strength I had left. ‘Here!’ Dad echoed, even more weakly than I. We both shouted again, but the roar of the helicopter smothered our cries. The searchlight moved to our right then to our left, but never shone on us. Abruptly the chopper flew off. The lake is so big. How will they ever see us? We’re two specks down here.

The helicopter made another pass. We yelled with everything we had left. It flew on, returning several times until I couldn’t yell anymore. Dad and I were exhausted. The boat had sunk lower, and we had to lift out of the water just to breathe.

Then I became aware of something to the north of us. I strained to see. I saw white wings. A mirage? No, it was swans! Two swans, just as we’d seen the day before in the harbour - floating on the waves in the moonlight, their long necks swaying in a mysterious dance. What were they doing way out here?

‘Dad!’ my father raised his head. The swans were so beautiful we almost forgot our predicament, and as we watched I saw another searchlight sweeping towards us. A boat! But our hopes plummeted when the light shone away from us. Dad lowered his head, sighing deeply. ‘No!’ I screamed. Almost as if I had been heard, the light swung in out direction again. ‘Look,’ I said, helping my father lift his head. ‘They’re coming back! The powerful beam shot out from the boat’s bridge, surrounding us in its glow. We’d been found. Quickly we were hauled on board.

‘We were going to head the other way,’ the fishing tug’s skipper told us. ‘Then we thought we saw two swans in the light.’ when they looked again, the swans were gone, and they spotted Dad and me instead. The two of us knew the swans had been there on the storm-tossed lake, guided by a merciful force greater than nature itself.

By Dan Kulchystsky