Bob now saw that the unknown craft held two men and that they were excitedly conferring together, while the unmoored boat tossed idly on the rippling water. Then the steersman swung the boat’s nose around again.
“Start your engine!” cried Bob to Rogers, who silently obeyed. It was plain that the stranger, at this unexpected intrusion, was going to run away without landing. Bob seized the search-light beside the wheel, flashed it over the other boat’s bows, and saw von Eckhardt, still disputing hotly with a scared-looking man whom Bob recognized as Franz’ companion, and who was turning the wheel rapidly from side to side ineffectually trying to get the boat into the stream.
“Full speed ahead!” Bob ordered. “Cut that boat off before it gets a start. I’ll do the rest.”
Rogers pushed off from the dock and ran his boat quickly up-stream to where the other still made little headway amid the steersman’s frantic shiftings of the wheel.
“Now full speed astern, and hold her here a moment,” said Bob.
Almost alongside the other boat, which now began to gain momentum enough to slip away, Bob drew his revolver and, firing two shots before her bows, called out, “Herr von Eckhardt, I am Captain Gordon. Please put inshore. I wish to speak with you.”
Von Eckhardt’s body shook with rage, and his heavy lifted hand came down on the steersman’s head in a cruel blow. “Dum Kopf! Stupid dolt that thou art!” he cried, shaking his fist in the man’s face. “If Karl had been here!”
The words came clearly over the strip of water. At Karl’s name Bob started, the reason for Elizabeth’s mysterious conduct all at once vaguely dawning on him.
“Please step on board this boat, Herr von Eckhardt,” he directed. “Your man can run inshore to wait.”
His words left no room for argument. Von Eckhardt saw the revolver gleaming in his hand, and turning his head, saw the search-lights of a French torpedo-boat steaming down the river. He attempted no defiance. As the two boats drifted alongside, Rogers holding them a foot apart, von Eckhardt sprang across and stepped down beside Bob, his face pale and mask-like in the moonlight, except for his eyes glowing with sombre fire.